20 Hurtz

Mother of All Funk Chords

2009-03-13T16:06:00.000-07:00

Young People Prefer "Sizzle Sounds" of MP3 Format

2009-03-11T10:15:00.000-07:00

Jonathan Berger, a professor of music at Stanford, tests his incoming students each year by having them listen to a variety of recordings which use different formats from MP3 to ones of much higher quality, and he reports that each year the preference for music in MP3 format rises. Berger says that young people seemed to prefer 'sizzle sounds' that MP3s bring to music because it is a sound they are familiar with. "The music examples included both orchestral, jazz and rock music. When I first did this I was expecting to hear preferences for uncompressed audio and expecting to see MP3 (at 128, 160 and 192 bit rates) well below other methods (including a proprietary wavelet-based approach and AAC)," writes Berger. "To my surprise, in the rock examples the MP3 at 128 was preferred. I repeated the experiment over 6 years and found the preference for MP3 — particularly in music with high energy (cymbal crashes, brass hits, etc) rising over time."

Dale Dougherty writes that the context of the music changes our perception of the sound, particularly when it's so obviously and immediately shared by others. "All that sizzle is a cultural artifact and a tie that binds us. It's mostly invisible to us but it is something future generations looking back might find curious because these preferences won't be obvious to them."

Trent Reznor case study

2009-02-05T11:12:00.000-08:00

Animal Collective

2009-01-22T18:50:00.000-08:00

You will hear much more about Animal Collective in 2009, and for good reason - their latest album, Merriweather Post Pavilion is absolutely brilliant. Animal Collective has always dabbled in post-experimental rock, but this album hits the nail on the head: their music transcends where pop music ends and pure sonic experience beings.

Check it out for yourself, as you'll discover deep bass pulses amid psychedelic synth and guitar riffs with overlapping vocal harmonies. What a great way to begin the year as this album will surely be one of the best releases of 2009.

Roland TR-808

2008-12-17T14:49:00.000-08:00

"But I know ya'll wanted that 808 can you feel the B-A-S-S bass" sings Andre 3000 from Outkast. What, ask you, is an 808?

Well it's not an area code, but one of the first programmable drum machines. Introduced by Roland in 1980, this device was meant for musicians to create drum beats in the studio without forcing a drummer to pick up his sticks. The sound of this device became very distinct, in part due to its kick drum sound, which could produce very deep sub-bass.

The group 808 State named itself after this classic little wonder. Additionally, Kaney West's fourth studio album is entitled 808s & Heartbreak. Kanye insisted that every track use TR-808 generated drum beats for a more 'tribal drum' sound.

Top 5 Albums of 2008

2008-12-10T14:06:00.000-08:00

Artist: TV On The Radio
Album: Dear Science

Genre: Indie Rock

Sounds like: America in 2008

These Brooklynites greeted our historical year with awe and responded with some art-rock party music. Call it the audacity of hope. Producer-guitarist Dave Sitek streamlined and deepened the band's fusion of doo-wop, punk and soul; there are swooning ballads, wind-whipped funk and even a Tom Petty bite. Be sure to listen closely though, there's a lot going on here that only reveals itself with time.

Artist: Lil Wayne
Album: Tha Carter III
Genre: Southern Rap
Sounds like: The best rap album of 2008. Period.
"Next time you mention Pac, Biggie or Jay-Z/Don't forget Weezy Baby," croaks Lil Wayne. This is just one of Lil Wayne's punchlines that hit the mark, however his greatness lies not just in what he says, but in how he says it. I don't know how this weed smoking troll-of-a-man does it, but he's a virtuoso of variations in mood and meter, tone and timbre that mark him, as much as any singer, as one of 21st-century pop's great vocal stylists. Oh and most importantly; don't forget to pack your subwoofer.

Artist: Metallica

Album: Death Magnetic

Genre: Thrash Metal

Sounds like: Agression and escalataion

Critics have called this Kirk Hammet's revenge and I can't agree more. The guitars are back in full force - monsterous riffs, chuga-chuga palm mutting and wah-wah infused solos. They may be old timers, but they've proven they can still rock in vitally violent way. Metallica finally sounds like Metallica again.

Artist: Portishead

Album: Third

Genre: Alternative Rock/Trip-Hop

Sounds like: A mysterious psychedelic rock album

11 years in the making, this is the most effective and all the while challenging music you will listen to this year. AllMusic went on to say: "It demands attention, requiring effort on the part of the listener, as this defies any conventions on what constitutes art pop apart from one key tenet, one that is often attempted yet rarely achieved: it offers music that is genuinely, startlingly original."

Artist: B.B. King

Album: One Kind Favor

Genre: Electric Blues

Sounds like: B.B. King outside his comfort zone

One Kind Favor is a celebration of life with all of its ups and downs, filled with heartbreak but also great joy, which is precisely what B.B. King's best music has always been. His style and tone has changed though, the most radical since the success of The Thrill Is Gone back in 1970. At 83 years old, this singer-guitarist proves once more why he remains one of America's living legends.

Honorable Mentions:

Dido Safe Trip Home

Girl Talk Feed The Animals

Kings of Leon Only By The Night

Nine Inch Nails The Slip

Santogold Santogold

Taylor Swift Fearless

Vampire Weekend Vampire Weekend

Dido - Safe Trip Home

2008-12-04T07:23:00.001-08:00

Providing the hook for Eminem's murder ballad "Stan" is an odd way for this English singer to launch her career. But this former Faithless frontwoman and writer for Britney Spears has always harbored a dark side. This third album expands her relaxed wine-bar sound with even deeper shadows.

There are melancholic edges to these tracks, but it's not haunting - it's comforting, reassuring music that's quietly groovy; music that Dido hinted at before but never quite made. The last two tracks, "Burnin Love" and "Northern Skies" seep into each other just perfectly and are an appropriate, powerful way to bring closure.

My Top 5 Nickelback Songs

2008-11-24T13:45:00.001-08:00

In order of how long I can stand listening before changing the radio station:

5. Never made it as a wise ma...

4. Prison gates wo...

3. From undernea...

2. Look at...

1. I...

DJ Rupture

2008-10-24T10:08:00.001-07:00

Stop Motion Cambalacha from Rukula on Vimeo.

A Jack Johnson Christmas

2008-09-15T08:29:00.000-07:00

Brushfire Records — home of Jack Johnson, Mason Jennings, Matt Costa, G. Love, Rogue Wave and others — will soon release This Warm December: A Brushfire Holiday Vol. 1, a mix of Christmas songs performed by their family of artists.

Can Indie Rock do Christmas justice? I hope so. Jack Johnson will sing "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" and "Someday at Christmas". Their is also a Mason Jennings' rendition of "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" that should be...interesting.

From Brushfire: "This is something we've been talking about for a while. It was a little difficult to get everyone in the Christmas spirit to record these songs during the summer, but we pulled it off." Elsewhere on the disc, Matt Costa does "All I Want for Christmas" and G. Love debuts "Christmas Baby."

The collection will also feature the first ever official track by Malaysian singer Zee Avi, who is the first woman to be added to the Brushfire roster. Patrick Keeler (drummer from the Raconterus) really likes her and claims she's a cross between Norah Jones and Billie Holliday. Check out a clip of Avi here.

Metallica - Death Magnetic

2008-09-11T07:36:00.001-07:00

Death Magnetic can now be listened to in it's entirety. All for free. With this release comes a well written review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine:

Call Death Magnetic Kirk Hammett’s revenge. Famously browbeaten into accepting Lars Ulrich and producer Bob Rock’s dictum that guitar solos were “dated” and thereby verboten for 2003’s St. Anger — a fraught recording chronicled on the 2004 documentary Some Kind of Monster — Metallica’s lead guitarist dominates this 2008 sequel, playing with a euphoric fury not heard in years, if not decades. This aesthetic shift isn’t because Hammett suddenly rules the band: powerless to add solos to St. Anger, he couldn’t reinstate them without the blessing of Ulrich and James Hetfield, the politburo of Metallica. The duo suffered some combination of shame and humility in the wake of the muddled St. Anger and Monster, convincing these two unmovable forces to change direction. They ditched longtime producer Rock — who helmed every album since 1991’s breakthrough blockbuster Metallica — in favor of Rick Rubin, patron saint of all veteran rockers looking to reconnect with their early spark. Rubin may be the go-to producer for wayward superstars, but as the producer of Slayer, he’s also rooted in thrash, so he understands the core of Metallica’s greatness and gently steers them back to basics on Death Magnetic.

Of course, Metallica’s basics are pretty complex: intertwined guitar riffs, frenetic solos and thunderous double-bass drums, stitched together as intricate seven-minute suites. Metallica slowly weaned themselves away from labyrinthine metal during the ’90s, tempering their intensity, straightening out riffs, and spending nearly as much time exploring detours as driving the main road, all the while losing sight of their identity. This culminated in the confused St. Anger, a transparent and botched attempt at returning to their roots, crippled by the chaos surrounding the departure of bassist Jason Newsted. With all their problems sorted out in public — including replacing Newsted with Robert Trujillo, who acquiesces to the Metallica custom of being buried far, far in the mix — the group embraces every gnarled, ugly thing they eschewed in the years since Metallica. Death Magnetic bounces the band back to the days before Bob Rock, roughly sounding as if it could come after And Justice for All. Such a deliberate revival of the glory days can be tricky, as it could make a group seem stuck in the past — or, just as badly, they can get essential elements wrong — but Death Magnetic is a resounding success because the band hunker down and embrace their core strengths, recognizing that their greatest asset is that nobody else makes noise the same way as they do.

That’s the pleasure of Death Magnetic: hearing Metallica sound like Metallica again. Individual songs and, especially, Hetfield’s lyrics — less the confessional ballast of St. Anger, more a traditional blend of angst and terror — are secondary to how the band sounds, how they spit, snarl and surge, how they seem alive. Metallica isn’t replicating moves they made in the ’80s, they’re reinvigorated by the spirit of their early years, adding shading they learned in the ’90s, whether it’s the symphonic tension of “The Unforgiven III” or threading curdled blues licks through the thrash. Listening to the band play, it’s hard not to thrill at Metallica’s mastery of aggression and escalation. There is no denying that the band is older and settled, no longer fueled by the hunger and testosterone that made their ’80s albums so gripping, but on Death Magnetic older doesn’t mean less potent. Metallica still is vitally violent and on this terrific album — a de facto comeback, even if they never have really gone away — they’re finally acting like they enjoy being a great rock band.

Music Taste Defines Personality

2008-09-06T11:11:00.000-07:00

Fans of classical music and jazz are creative, pop lovers are hardworking and, despite the stereotypes, heavy metal listeners are gentle, creative types who are at ease with themselves.

So says Professor Adrian North of Scotland's Heriot-Watt University who has been studying the links between people's personalities and their choice of music.

"People often define their sense of identity through their musical taste, wearing particular clothes, going to certain pubs, and using certain types of slang," North said.

"It's not surprising that personality should also be related to musical preference."

North claims this is the largest study ever conducted into individuals' musical preference and character; taking survey of over 36,000 people from around the world to rate how much they liked 104 different musical styles before taking a personality test.

"Researchers have been showing for decades that fans of rock and rap are rebellious, and that fans of opera are wealthy and well-educated. But this is the first time that research has shown that personality links to liking for a wide range of musical styles."

His study concludes that jazz and classical music fans are creative with good self-esteem, although the former are much more outgoing whereas the latter are shy.

Country music fans were found to be hardworking and shy; rap fans are outgoing and indie lovers lack self-esteem and are not very gentle.

Those who like soul music can be at ease as his research concluded they are creative, outgoing, gentle, at ease with themselves and have a high self-esteem.

North is still looking for volunteers to take part in his research.

Reactable

2008-08-28T16:42:00.001-07:00

How do you categorize music?

2008-08-27T17:45:00.000-07:00

It's often asked how one categorizes music. "Guess what, that electronic sounding track you're listening to, well it's actually fall under the 'micro-house' category. Nope not electronic music, not techno but 'micro-house'." Most people brush off statements like this, however it's important to note that this way of classification happens not just in electronic music, but all forms of music.

People appear to agree as what are prototypical songs for musical categories, such as "jazz music", "country music" and "rap music". However, within these categories we all know certain songs or groups that are lesser examples than the prototype: the Beastie Boys aren't really rap, Frank Sinatra is not really jazz, or at least not as much as John Coltrane is.

How do we know this? Why are we able to define music?

One hundred years ago, Philosopher Ludwing Wittgenstein supplied an answer: categorical membership is determined not by a definition, but by family resemblance. Let's use an example then of defining music by definitions. We could say that heavy metal is a musical genre that has (a) distorted electric guitars; (b) power chords; (c) loud drums; (d) sexy lead singers, usually shirtless, dripping sweat as they twirl the microphone stand around the stage and (e) frightening band names like Black Sabbath, Spinal Tap, or The Sword.

Although most heavy metal songs do have distorted electric guitars, so does "Beat It" by Michael Jackson - in fact, Eddie Van Halen(a heavy metal god) plays the guitar solo in that song. Even the Carpenters have a couple songs with distorted guitars, yet no one would call them "heavy metal". Led Zeppelin - the quintessential heavy metal band and the band that spawned the genre - has several songs with no distorted guitars at all("Down by the Seaside", "Going to California", "The Battle for Evermore"). "Stairway to Heaven" has no power chords, yet remains a heavy metal anthem. There are no heavy, loud drums either (or distorted guitars for that matter). Metallica is a heavy metal band, yet I don't think anyone would think the lead singer, James Hetfield, sexy. And band names such as Underworld, Burial, Monolake, and Plastikman sure sound dark and scary, right? Actually, these are all artists who produce music on their computers, with no distorted guitars or singers, just lots and lots of bass for people to dance to.

The point here is that definitions of musical genres are not very useful. We say that something is heavy metal if it resembles heavy metal - a family resemblance. In other words, keep listening.

One Day As A Lion

2008-07-28T10:08:00.001-07:00

"It's better to live one day as a lion, than a thousand years as a lamb." Zach de la Rocha(vocalist of Rage Against the Machine) took this quote to heart. His solo project is a stripped down attempt to realize this sentiment in sound. It's not what you might think though. These five songs, clocking in at just over 20 minutes, are an intense racket of sociopolitical noise. There isn't any filler here; it's an aural ignition of a gasoline bomb going off in your ears. If you've been waiting for new Rage Against the Machine, download this EP.

Lost Highway: the opera

2008-06-20T11:56:00.000-07:00

Opera composers have turned to just about any source available for their work: ancient mythology, the Bible and other sacred texts, epic poetry, folktales, drama, novels, short stories, history and many have created their own original plots. It’s somewhat surprising, then, that cinema has taken so long to catch on as a source for new operas.

This summary taken from AllMusic:

Lost Highway might seem like an odd choice for adaptation to the operatic stage. By almost any measure, the film would be categorized as a “cult classic,” one of the darkest, most disturbing, and most narratively obscure films by any major director. The subject of endless debate, the film raises questions about reality versus fantasy and offers few certainties about its meaning. It leaves the viewer wondering not only “What was that supposed to mean?,” but “What just happened?” The film involves an affluent, unhappily married California couple, Fred and Renée Madison, who receive a series of increasingly intrusive and creepy videotapes, which someone has taken inside their house while they slept. At a party, Fred meets a Mystery Man, who has the unnerving ability to be two places at once — at the party and inside the Madison’s house — simultaneously. The next day Fred receives a videotape of himself, bloodied, beside Renée’s mutilated body, but he has absolutely no recollection of it. He’s sentenced to death for her murder. One day, the prison guards discover that the man in his cell is not Fred, but a young mechanic named Pete Dayton. Pete has no idea of how he came to be in prison; he’s released, and returns to his job in a garage, but detectives follow his every move. He disastrously falls in love with Alice (a thinly disguised version of Renée), the mistress of his sinister and violent mobster client, Mr. Eddy. To escape Mr. Eddy’s wrath, Alice leads Pete on a murderous crime spree and then abandons him in the desert, where Pete is somehow transformed back into Fred Madison. Fred discovers Alice in a motel room with Mr. Eddy, kidnaps him and takes him into the desert. They fight, and Fred cuts Mr. Eddy’s throat as the Mystery Man looks on, videotaping everything. The movie ends with Fred, pursued by the police, fleeing down the desert highway.

Lynch’s movie is a marvel of visual and thematic leitmotifs that often obscure, rather than clarify meaning or relationships. It’s so packed with barely glimpsed images, mysterious connections, and enigmatic details (that may or may not be significant) that it demands to be seen repeatedly. Lynch has vigorously asserted that the movie can’t (and shouldn’t) be comprehended on a rational level. If it has a logic, it’s an intuitive logic that would lose its essence and mystery if it could be explained. Since music can do its most powerful work on a subconscious level, Lost Highway makes an entirely logical choice for an opera. And based on the resulting piece, it’s clear that Neuwirth was just the composer to make it work. She succeeds because she takes the same approach to the material as Lynch does; her music doesn’t “clarify” the story, or tie plot elements together, but it operates on the same subliminal, non-rational level as the film, enriching it with yet another layer of mystery. Like the film, the music may not make sense to you, but you know that you’ve been punched in the gut.

The film’s soundtrack was written largely by Angelo Badalamenti, one of Lynch’s favorite collaborators, and also includes songs performed by David Bowie, the German industrial metal band, Rammstein, Trent Reznor, Lou Reed, and Barry Adamson. Badalamenti’s ominous soundscapes are the perfect accompaniment to Lynch’s dark imagery, but they are so low key that they rarely draw attention to themselves. The amorphous, subliminal creepiness of his score make it clear that he has absorbed some of the same modernist techniques as Neuwirth. Neuwirth doesn’t mimic the sound of the film, but some moments, like the Badalamenti-esque treatment of Alice’s entrance mentioned above, sound like an homage to the searing cool jazz that’s the hallmark sound of much of Badalamenti’s work for Lynch.

New Weezer

2008-05-26T14:15:00.000-07:00

A YouTube video about YouTube videos:

Maiden, Mother & Crone

2008-04-11T11:58:00.000-07:00

New Portishead!

2008-04-10T21:17:00.000-07:00

It's been 10 years, but Portishead is finally releasing their third album(aptly titled "Third") later this month. Here's a preview of their first single, Machine Gun.

Gods of the Earth

2008-04-01T12:52:00.001-07:00

If anything, The Sword has turned up the knob marked “nerd” on its sophomore album Gods of the Earth released today - April fools day.

This isn't a criticism - metal and geek culture continue to cross paths over and over again throughout rock music’s history. It's easy to forget how geeky a lot of the Led Zeppelin songs were - quests of hobbits, dragons, evil forces, etc.

Make no mistake though, Gods of the Earth rocks. Gone is the sludge/stoner/doom/whatever sound of their first album and instead we are treated to a full on thrash assault(think Metallica's Kill 'Em All instead of Black Sabbath's Master of Reality). The riffs are huge, the rhythms are sneaky and brutal, and the pacing is quick. In fact, everything has been turned up, except the vocals, which often get drowned out by the dual guitars.

Song titles include "Fire Lances of the Ancient Hyperzephyrians" and “The Frost-Giant’s Daughter”, which is by no coincidence the title of a Conan story.

As good as their first album? No, but not much is.

Epic? Of Course.

For those about to rock...

2008-03-26T16:39:00.000-07:00

we salute you. I have no idea what Monotonix is all about, but they sure do rock. All their live shows are done at ground level - within the crowd. I can't wait to see this fiery trio from Tel Aviv.

Binaural Recording

2008-03-04T14:04:00.000-08:00

The latest Nine Inch Nails album, "Ghosts I-IV" is a sonic achievement for headphone listening. These 36 tracks are instrumental and most were recorded in a special way: binaurally.

This type of recording uses a simulated head with microphones in the ears. The artist plays the instrument and the recording sounds exactly as what a person would hear in the recording studio. This is a key distinction as studios may be acoustically perfect, however the device(guitar, piano, turntable, etc) is being outputted to a single mic or mixer board. What you get with binaural recording is an amazing 360° degrees of sound, retaining and delivering the space the music was recorded in.

Once recorded, this effect can be reproduced only using headphones. It won't work using loudspeakers, as the acoustics of this arrangement distort the channel separation. Where you stand in the room, the direction of your ears and how close the speakers are all change the sound.

However if you listen through a good set of headphones the result is an awesome listening experience that spatially transcends normally recorded stereo. It accurately reproduces the effect of hearing the exact recorded sound, given the 360° nature of how human ears pick up nuances in sound waves. Binaural recordings can very convincingly reproduce location of sound behind, ahead, above, or wherever else the sound actually came from during recording.

Indie Rock

2008-02-28T14:15:00.000-08:00

I discovered a group this week called Beach House. What a lonely, strange pop album this is. Check it out.

MP3: "Gila"

Video: You Came to Me

Why People Listen To Music

2007-12-27T18:42:00.000-08:00

"The excitement in music comes from variation in rhythm, timbre, pitch and loudness."
-Robert Levine

Snoop Dogg - Sensual Seduction Music Video

2007-12-20T12:10:00.000-08:00

Top Five Albums of 2007

2007-12-17T15:53:00.000-08:00

Artist: The Sword
Album: Age of Winters
Genre: Doom Metal
Sounds like: A bunch of bison being pushed over a cliff
For most, heavy metal is not music. I can agree on some fronts, especially with song titles like: "Lament for the Aurochs" and lyrics that sound like a hilariously drunken attempt to recount a night playing Dungeons and Dragons: "Bane of the demon lord/Slayer of the spider-priests/Spiller of the silver blood!"
Yet apart from all the Norse-viking mythology, this is the most engaging hard rock album in ages - guaranteed to get your head bobbing and heart pumping. Part Black Sabbath, part Lynard Skynyrd, and part Led Zeppelin - the riffs are heavy(two guitars tuned down to drop C) and will restore your faith in rock music.

Artist: Radiohead
Album: In Rainbows
Genre: Experimental Rock
Sounds like: OK Computer, yet much more lush and sparse
This is Radiohead's most accessible album. It is also their most quiet and yet it's still classic Radiohead: easy-going but tense, comfortable and anxious, fatalistic and hopeful. Tom York remains one of the most gifted song writers of his generation: "I'm an animal trapped in your hot car," from "All I Need," has to be one of the saddest, most open-hearted metaphors used to express unrequited love.

Artist: Burial
Album: Untrue
Genre: Dubstep
Sounds like: A long walk by yourself, in the middle of the night
Created by an anonymous producer from London, no other album this year conveys such loneliness(ok, so In Rainbows comes close) through the raw atmosphere it creates. This album is full of beats, bass and voices that reinforce the music's sense of persistence and alienation. Nowhere does it cross over into mainstream electronica nor are there any stylistic variations, just solid dubstep taking center stage.

Artist: Iron and Wine
Album: The Sheperd's Dog
Genre: Indie Rock
Sounds like: Warm, Lush, Autumnal, Reflective, Melancholy, Intimate, Bittersweet
No more does Sam Beam sound like a musician who records his albums in a small closet. His distinctive whisper falsetto is all but gone and instead we are treated to banjos, bongos, pianos, guitars, and tambourines - making Iron and Wine sound almost like a full band. This is masterful songcraft and a note-perfect production.

Artist: Saul Williams
Album: The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust
Genre: Poetry/Political Rap
Sounds like: Public Enemy collaborating with Nine Inch Nails
Saul William's isn't an MC, he's a straight-up poet. Teaming up with Trent Reznor, these songs are a one-way street littered with industrial, punch-in-your-face story telling. Layer after layer of meaning, Niggy Tardust goes further than most hip-hop albums. It hits you harder as well. Oh, and the entire album can be downloaded for $5.

Honorable Mentions:
Arcade Fire Neon Bible
Echospace The Coldest Season
Feist The Reminder
M.I.A. Kala
Nine Inch Nails Year Zero
Panda Bear Person Pitch
Rilo Kiley Under the Blacklight
Spoon Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
The White Stripes Icky Thump

Hip-Hop Statistics

2007-11-20T12:32:00.001-08:00

In an ever changing world of social vernacular, one is often perplexed with understanding hip-hop lyrics. I've come across an amazing set of graphs and pie charts that are quite educational. For example, the above bubble chart helps one comprehend the fact that bitches ain't shit but hoes and tricks.

World's Largest Subwoofer?

2007-11-15T15:15:00.000-08:00

A few years ago, Royal Device, a self-proclaimed esoteric audio/video company built: "The Biggest SUBWOOFER of the WORLD, for the most esoteric Audio and AUDIO-VIDEO Room of the World. The Highest efficiency ever obtained with NO distortion using NO feedback tube low power amplifiers and NO crossover on the speakers"

The subwoofer has dual 9.5 meter horns driven by eight 18" drivers each. Yes, that's right, eight 18" drivers in each horn for a total of 16 woofers. It has a claimed frequency response of 10Hz at full power - below the level of human hearing. With an efficiency of more than 110 dB at 1W/1meter the system operates at 6400 Wrms total.

The subwoofer horns are built underneath a solid concrete floor, one meter deep.

The acoustic level at listening position(about 6 meters from frontal speakers) are 100 dB with 1 Watt.

Damn.

Fall Music

2007-11-09T10:54:00.000-08:00

Looking for some good fall/wintry music to get you through the shorter days? Forget all the new Pop music coming out - fall is a darker time; the cold slowly approaches and the once familiar landscape begins to take on a skeletal appearance. Yeah! Nothing is more perfect than Morton Feldman's meditation, Rothka Chapel. Best described as minimal choral music, its worth checking out and best listened to alone with headphones on. I advise downloading track one, titled Rothka Chapel 1 from either iTunes or Amazon.

Not quite in the pensive mood for Feldman? Then check out Yagya, a minimal techno producer from Iceland. Don't let the album cover throw you off - this album is anything but the sharp, cold feelings the art suggests. This album is soft, sweet and full of great rhythmic beats. Rhythm of Snow is perfect for long cold nights. This album remains one of my all time favorite ambient albums as it conjures all the good feelings associate with snow(laying in a thick down comforter while watching snow fall peacefully outside) rather than the bad ones(frostbitten toes). Check out track eight, appropriately titled "Snowflake 8".

Fabric 36 - Ricardo Villalobos

2007-11-08T15:44:00.000-08:00

The 36th volume for the popular Fabric mix series is by Ricardo Villalobos. It's a bit unique in that every track is produced by him and then mixed into an album. Similar to Richie Hawtin's minimal DE9 and Transitions, this album is sparse, multi-layered and takes quite a bit of patience. The Chilean/German DJ had a few interesting comments to say about his influences and love for percussion:

“I started to play conga and bongos; I was listening to percussive and South American music at the time. In a way, the electronic music we listen to when we dance is very similar to African and South American percussion music. On one hand, you have the percussion, like Samba, where people are dancing for hours and days – it’s the same rules and ideas behind techno: to make people go crazy, lose their realities, let go. This is happening with percussive music. It was a clear path, or it was a normal consequence, to go from acoustic percussive music to electronic percussive music. All my knowledge I have about percussion, I put into electronic music of course. When I was a kid, I was very often in situations with percussion sessions, for hours, the whole night. My parents had friends that owned concert agencies so we heard so many Southern American musicians and sessions. I was just a little kid, always looking on and recognising something that was making people dance. This has always really fascinated me. As a musician, you are searching for that your whole life. I’m constantly on a search for the truth about the dance floor - why do people dance, what’s the secret behind it.” – Ricardo Villalobos

There Will Be...Strings?

2007-11-08T08:39:00.000-08:00

Jonny Greenwood composed the score for Paul Thomas Anderson's latest film There Will Be Blood. Based on Upton's Sinclair novel Oil!, this is a story about family, greed, religion and of course, oil.

Jonny is most commonly known as the guitarist for Radiohead and it seems odd he'd compose an entire film score, especially for a major Hollywood movie. However, he's no neophyte to orchestration as he's done the score for a documentary called Bodysong as well as being commissioned by the BBC to compose a piece call "Popcorn Superheart Receiver".

There Will Be Blood is a brutal, inspiring movie as well as the year's best so far. Jonny's score keeps the film's tone as an abrasive and in-your-face melody, the kind that demands to be heard. Sound is 50% of a movie and you'll no doubt pay attention to the music - whether you like it or not. There will be strings, lots and lots of very loud strings that create a foreboding, haunting presence from beginning to end.

When interviewed together for EW about the score, they replied:

JONNY GREENWOOD: Sometimes Paul would describe the thing as kind of close to the horror-film genre. And we talked about how The Shining had lots of Penderecki and stuff in it. So yeah. I think it was about not necessarily just making period music, which very traditionally you would do. But because they were traditional orchestral sounds, I suppose that's what we hoped was a little unsettling, even though you know all the sounds you're hearing are coming from very old technology. You can just do things with the classical orchestra that do unsettle you, that are sort of slightly wrong, that have some kind of undercurrent that's slightly sinister. Which is what's happening with this film sometimes. Part of what I picked up on and got excited about is that it's the end of the 19th Century. A lot of [things are] just implied, so it's not a horror film in that sense, because people are sort of being polite, but there's a sense of darkness going on at the same time. I love that kind of stuff, when things are unspoken.

PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON: I guess when you have a title like that, the music better be a little bit scary.

Gimme some FLAC!

2007-11-01T15:02:00.001-07:00

FLAC is a file format for audio compression. Since it is a lossless audio format, it doesn't remove information from the audio data stream and diminish the sound like all MP3s do. FLAC is the closest you can come to CD quality and is the format of choice for those wishing to preserve their audio collections. It can handle PCM bit resolution from 4 to 32 bits per sample and go as far down as 1Hz(oh yeah) to 1,048,570Hz with up to eight unique channels. Stereo or 7.1 surround sound if you'd like.

So why don't more people use FLAC files instead of MP3s? Well don't expect FLAC to play easily in mainstream players like iTunes or Windows Media Player. The format itself is DRM free, unencumbered by patents, has an open-source reference implementation and even includes an API. Sounds a lot like Linux, eh?

With the rise of digital music downloads, the increase in personal storage space and the demand for better audio...expect to see more FLAC in the near future.

Trent Reznor and Saul Williams Collaboration

2007-10-31T15:59:00.000-07:00

Trent Reznor produced the latest Saul Williams album which is due for release later tonight. Saul Williams, a spoken-word and hip-hop artist will no doubt gain attention as the sound of this record spans many genres: think NIN meets Gnarls Barkley meets Deep Dish. Interestingly enough, you can download his entire album for free, or chip in $5 to support Saul.

A recent interview by New York Magazine have Saul and Trent discussing this release, their feelings towards major record labels and their praise for OiNK:

How did this collaboration come about?
Trent: I'd come across Saul through his "List of Demands" video, and it really impressed me as strong piece of work, as an aggressive rock-type track that jumped out of the television. So I checked to see if he was interested in touring with me. And it impressed me that he could go in front of an audience that probably didn't know who he was. He won the crowd over, and I watched it happen every night. I said, "Hey, if you ever want to experiment on some tracks, let's see what happens."

How would you characterize the music?
Saul: Gosh, I don't know, ghetto gothic? I guess I'd characterize it as hard-core dance. I don't know if I'd include spoken word in it, actually. It's so danceable. I have a lot to say, but I wanted to find a way to say it that didn't get in the way of me dancing my ass off.

Did you ever butt heads?
Trent: There were times when we disagreed on things, certainly, but sooner or later he'd realize that I was right. [They both laugh.]

What inspired you to go the In Rainbows route with this album?
Saul: From the start, I remember Trent saying, "Let's give it away for free." At first, I was like, "This dude is out of his mind!" But then it really started making sense, and, of course, with Radiohead doing it, we were like, "What the fuck? The idea that we had was great, and we should really follow it through."

Trent: I think it's just an awkward time right now to be a musician. The reality is that people think it's okay to steal music. There's a whole generation of people, that's all they've known. I used to buy vinyl. Today, if you do put out a record on a label, traditionally, most people are going to hear it via a leak that happens two weeks — if not two months — before it comes out. There's no real way around that. I'm truly saddened because I think music has been devalued, so that it's just a file on your computer, and it's usually free. But we can't change that. What we can do is try to offer people the best experience that we can provide them. Will it work? I don't know. But I think it's a great way to get music out to people who are interested. At the end of the day, all I care about is the integrity of the music, and that the feeling of those who experience it is as untainted as possible. I'd rather it not be on an iPod commercial. I'd rather it not be a ringtone that you have to get with a free cell phone or any of that bullshit.

Are you using this project, Trent, to test the waters for a self-released NIN record?
Trent: There isn't a Nine Inch Nails record done. I'm starting one right now. If I had one that was done, I would [release] it today in exactly the same way. I won't have one done for several months. One of the things that started this in motion with Saul was me sitting around thinking about finally getting off a major label, which I think is the right move for Nine Inch Nails. I wasn't looking to jump right back into another binding contract with a big company, and I just wanted to make sure that I wasn't advising Saul to do that in today's climate. We decided to go the route we did, and we'll see what happens.

How long do you think before the labels are out of business?
Trent: I mean, who knows? I remember a time when it felt like, being on a major label, our interests were aligned. At times, it's a pretty well-oiled machine and the luxury is that I feel like I've got a team of people who are taking care of the shit I don't want to think about. I don't care about the radio guy, I just want to make music. But those days are gone. Because, mainly, that infrastructure is broken at the moment. How long before [record companies] are irrelevant? Who knows? They seem to be doing everything they can to make sure that happens as quickly as possible.

Saul: I had already had experiences with my first album, with Rick Rubin and Sony and everything, where the company basically sat on it for two years and told me it wasn't hip-hop. So, I was also very familiar with the infrastructure, and this just made the most sense.

What do you think about OiNK being shut down?
Trent: I'll admit I had an account there and frequented it quite often. At the end of the day, what made OiNK a great place was that it was like the world's greatest record store. Pretty much anything you could ever imagine, it was there, and it was there in the format you wanted. If OiNK cost anything, I would certainly have paid, but there isn't the equivalent of that in the retail space right now. iTunes kind of feels like Sam Goody to me. I don't feel cool when I go there. I'm tired of seeing John Mayer's face pop up. I feel like I'm being hustled when I visit there, and I don't think their product is that great. DRM, low bit rate, etc. Amazon has potential, but none of them get around the issue of pre-release leaks. And that's what's such a difficult puzzle at the moment. If your favorite band in the world has a leaked record out, do you listen to it or do you not listen to it? People on those boards, they're grateful for the person that uploaded it — they're the hero. They're not stealing it because they're going to make money off of it; they're stealing it because they love the band. I'm not saying that I think OiNK is morally correct, but I do know that it existed because it filled a void of what people want.

How much did you guys pay for the new Radiohead album?
Saul: I paid $7, which is like, what, fourteen pounds? No, wait, that's like three pounds!

Trent: I bought the physical one, so I spent a whopping $80. [Pauses.] But, then I re-bought it and paid $5,000, because I really felt that I need to support the arts, so people could follow in my footsteps. [Saul laughs.]