Music

About my music

I've been doing music for a long long time. I'm either a bass or a baritone with a range that stretches up fairly high, and can play pretty much anything with frets, keyboards, or a sequencer. I was recording on the computer in the mid 90s before it was the cool, industry altering thing to do because I saw it coming ahead of time.

I have just enough musical theory knowledge to not be able to claim that I can't read music.

In 2002, I switched gears in a major way and went from being somebody known for his music to somebody known for his art. Between 2002 and 2010, I have done pretty much nothing with music. However, I've always vaguely wanted to get back into doing something, so I finally did.

A longer version of the history and People I've worked with

The music

TopKill 2010-06-11 12:21PM

I thought that Top Kill (BP's failed plan to stop the oil leak) sounded like a good industrial song. So I wrote one..

I've got LogaRythm 2008-01-22 01:11AM

So, this is another one of those "Gee, I haven't tried to stretch myself, compositionally, pretty much ever. So I should screw with things a little" pieces.

Welcome to the New Millennium (Live) 2007-12-22 07:17PM

This is a live version of "Welcome to the new Millennium".

The Chase 2007-11-04 11:54PM

This is my more recent work, where I try to shake 5 years of cobwebs out of my brain.

Freedom (Live) 2007-11-04 11:35PM

This song features a chiptunes sample that was actually some random file on my hard drive that I thought sounded kinda neat when played as a sample.

Experiment 7 (Live) 2007-11-04 11:35PM

This is from the second Electronic Cafe of 2000. It's a high-speed collision between Robert Miles and metal.

The Launch 2002-02-02 11:02PM

A musical spaceship launch.

Mirrorshades 2002-02-02 11:02PM

This is the song. Everybody has at least one good song in them. This is clearly mine...

Experiment #17 2002-02-02 11:02PM

Me, messing around with my new old Digitech f/x processor.

Techno Improv (Y2K Courtyard show #1) 2002-02-02 11:02PM

I was on the guitar, Ash Wise on the guitar, Peter Kuo on the keyboards, Mike O'Sullivan on the bass, and Manny on the drum machine. We aimed for the sort of weird techno that could be done live. It came out really REALLY odd.

Blues Improv 1999 2002-02-02 11:02PM

This would be me on the guitar, Charles Li on the keys, Mike O'Sullivan on the trumpet, and Anne Thissen-Roe on the vocals.

Funk Improv (Y2K Courtyard show #2) 2002-02-02 11:02PM

This one's just me, Ash Wise on the guitar, and Peter Kuo on the drums.

Blues Improv (Y2K Courtyard show #1) 2002-02-02 11:02PM

Me on the guitar, Charles Li on the keys, Mike O'Sullivan on the trumpet, Laura Johannsen on the Cello, and Peter Kuo on the bass. Tied with the 1999 for one of my favorite improvs.

Funk Improv (Y2K Courtyard show #1) 2002-02-02 11:02PM

This was me getting down on the bass, Ash Wise on the guitar, Anne Thissen-Roe on the vocals, and Manny on the drum machine. I really love doing funky bass parts, in case you haven't noticed.

The infamous pants sketch 2002-02-02 11:02PM

Brent, Ash Wise, and I doing goofy things on stage.

Music Blog

Drum samples: It's a trap! 2012-04-02 11:16AM

When you start to have a group of musicians, you really need some way to keep all of them together in synch. In classical music, you tended to use a conductor to keep everybody on time, such that the drums are used as an accent. But jazz, rock, and blues all come from a different root and all of these bands really need a proper drummer to keep time...

Results from practicing, March 2012 2012-03-25 11:45PM

So... a little over a month ago, I was at a friend's place, and was vaguely asked to play a song for people. And I vaguely responded with a line about being at a weird transitory period of my playing and being without a song to play for people...

I want to replace my MDR-NC5 headphones, but I'm stingy 2012-03-04 10:54PM

So, if you've been reading along, you probably know about the MDR-V6 headphones that I have. And I like them even more since I replaced the stock headphones with the velour replacement pads intended for the Beyerdynamic DT250 headphones once the pleather ones started to fall apart.

The inharmonicity of standard tuning 2012-02-23 10:57AM

I took some classes on experimental electronic music and such when I was in college and did some reading on my own since then... and so I've been exposed to some ideas in music that are way way way distant from the popular music norm. And I'm still not entirely sure what I really think about them so I'll write some thoughts up instead...

Sharps, flats, and patterns 2012-02-12 12:33AM

The thing that I've come to appreciate about different instruments is the things that become easy or hard depending...

Music Reviews

Don't Be Afraid by the Information Society 2008-01-24 12:25PM

I have a lot of old links pointing to this article that hasn't been present for a long long time, so I figure I should wrote something here. I found my old review in the Internet Archive and decided that I should really write it all over again. I'm a better writer now, and I can give more thoughts.