HairyScaryMark

Please note: Wednesday is no longer our practice time. All the band members are going through changes lifestyle to do with jobs, university etc. We currently don't have a regular time but this is being worked on.

I think one guitar played well + keyboard + ocasional guitar overdub on recording works fine. Sometimes 2 guitars helps but usually are unecessary in the sort of power metal I am partiuclarly interested in. Iron Maiden have 3 guitars as they seem to have built up a collection of guitarists over the years and don't have much in the way of keyboards. Most of their riffs are harmonised between guitar so 3 guitar players makes sense. Sonata Arctica and Statovarius are rather good at harmonising riffs between guitar and keyboard. I do enjoy harmonised guitars but I think it is slightly more interesting at the moment to harmonise between keyboard and guitar in the main riffs in songs. 3 guitar players + keyboard is plainly greedy though.

Sounds quite amazing but I am not bought yet. I still prefer the idea of the roadking http://www.mesaboogie.com/Product_Info/Rectifier_Series/roadking/roadking.htm for an amp that is supposed to be able to do everything.

I like power metal and I can play keyboards to a not completley hopeless standard but also am extremely busy. If you prove yourselves to be mighty warriors of steel, I may be interested. I really should write my keyboard playing demo sometime. p.s Ascension mp3s sound amazing and also don't contain the obvious mistakes I previously noticed. Have I become less observant or have they been corrected/changed? the Vocals at 4:40-ish could do with being re-done. Also, Is there a way of hearing everwicked?

Interesting but disagree on a number of fundamental points. "America's underground leads this immense musical experiment." I very much disagree with this. Most genuine American metal fans (that listen to current bands) will tell you that the European metal scene is currently much healthier and more varied than the US one. It missed out much mention major touring acts which combine folk, jazz and classical qualities in a rock band. There are already quite a number inside of specialist scenes or particularly popular in other countries. And what about 70s progressive rock and the influence of Robert Fripp on guitarists? Most rock musicians of the 80s who were doing 'experimental' rock music of the time were fans of bands such as Yes, Genesis and Focus. Isn't this also a large factor as progressive rock seemed to a formidable attempt to combine jazz, classical, folk and rock into one uber-style in the 70s. Metal fans are often quite open minded but not always. Metal has also largely been a european dominated style for the last 10 years. Europe being a more open minded and tollerant society may also be a factor here. There is also a greater tradition of learning folk instruments in some other countries, making it more practical to create such bands. The 90s was a conservative decade, culturally as well as politically. Aren't we just beginning to see a move away from this for at least part of society?

That only proves my point further. You can make up statistics about anything. The assumption that every song downloaded would have otherwise been bought as a CD is foolish. A few years a go a survey even showed that people who download music buy more CD's and buy differnet sorts of CD's. This only goes to show that music downloading has helped supports the musicians and supports artists who are outside of current mainstream trends and long term radio play (bands who never stopped getting played on radio). There is room many more bands and a lot more styles of music. Of course it would be good if there was an all-inclusive system where bands could make many tracks available to be downloaded for free and other's can be bought. All the existing systems are critised for either not offering enough range of artists, only clips of tracks to download for free, not enough range of diffenrent tracks, too expensive or tying you in with other hardware i.e I Tunes. We must question how the system with copyright and loyalties works at the moment. Is it fair that we should have to pay for music on CD format again if we already own it on vinyl? Should it be illegal to download songs by artsists who would recieve no royalties if you bought it (i.e expired copyright)? The current laws are unclear over what is acceptable.

I used lexicon reverb which comes with Sonar, it sounds really good (as you would expect from lexicon). Don't think I am desperately in need of an upgrade at this point. Obviously, if i was running a pro studio or recording an album which I could make serious money from, splashing out on a top of the range unit would be a good idea. As I am sure you are aware. 'Natural' room acoustic reverb is a differnet sort of thing, not likely to be that important for a rock band as the sound tends to be 'processed' a lot. I am sure sound engineers who record in great sounding rooms will tell me otherwise. Apparently an un-carpeted floor helps acoustic guitars sound good when being recorded wtih a large diaphram mic (according to the latest 'sound on sound' magazine. I will give this convolution thing a try. I am going to record my friend's band this Saturday. I aim to get to mixing done within a couple of weeks (I have a busy schedule and I would like to gate the drums and generally get it sounding good.)

I wasn't keen on the other My Minds Weapons songs. This is my favourite, by far. The guitars sound overly like percussion instruments at times but that is part of the style. Where was this recroded? The quality sounds very good and deffinately album worthy. I don't like the style of singing but he gets away with it becuase it is done relatively well and recorded quite favourbly. I like the through-composed/prog structure. The lead guitar/solo part about 2/3 of the way through is also well done and is about as much as you can probably get away with in this song.

I worked at texas again last night/this morning. Was much better than the previous night. Not really sure why. Hopefully none of the managers read Aberdeen Music. The most exciting moment today, which shows the lack of excitement involved in this job was... I was given a set of bath biscuits to put in the bathroom products section. I went and handed them to the biscuits people and they didn't seem to happy at this reunion.

Night shift at tescos is really boring. I just did my first shift and I want to quit already. You sit around, nobody speaks. Sort out boxes, stack shelves, have a pointless break where barely anyone speaks also. stack more shelves, go into awkward positions in an attempt to stack shelves without everything falling everyhwere. The next stage after the other pointless breka is to allign the stuff on the shelves so it catches the eye of the 'consumer' who will buy stuf they previously didn't know they wanted. There are no customers. It messes up your body cloock. It is terible. It is more slow paced than I could have ever imagined. When I got home I felt like I had wasted a day and a night. It only pays about 1.20 more than regular tescos pay. British supermarkets pay their regular staff a discracefully low amount. LIDL and ALDI (German supermarkets) pay something like 7-8 an hour standard and Walmart, I am led to believe are meant to be quite good to their staff. If a manager from the Tescos I work at reads this, I am stuffed (being fired would be a real shame, woudln't it?)

I view the sueing of the makers of peer to peer 'networks' to largely be about control rather than directly about fiancial losses (although both of these things are related). Big record companies are scared at the prospect they could loose control over where people buy music from and what music they listen to. The idea of someone downloading a few tracks of some band then buying their CD's, directly from their websites, bypassing a record company terrifies some record company fat cats. It is time to question the merits of this system of copyright in music. The power essentially lies with major corporations. Bands get a tiny percentage of money from album sales. A system which dosen't rely on PR companies and marketing so heavily is an improvement. It is time to remove the need for so many middle men to get a musical artist beyond their first stages. The huge bands like metallica who moan about copyright theft are multi millionaires and wont suffer in the slightest if they never sold another CD again. Metallica also had fiancially one of the most sucessfull tours, just a few years a go with their Summer Sanitarium tour. CD sales have never been higher despite being more expensive in the UK than the US. The witchhunt has extended to guitar tab and song lyrics websites. These websites have helped create a market for guitar tab books. Remember, guitar tabs books were not that popular up until recently. Artists usually get money for these books (i think). I am actively persueing a career in music and believe I should be able to make a decent living from doing this. I don't expect to be able to gain my entire income from performance or CD sales. The internet has given rise to specialist music scenes globally which couldn't exist large-scale before, this will help me when I realease recordings. With the internet, the aritist has the means to promote music, by themselves. The facts and figures in Catherine's post resemble the sort of propoganda you might find from a record company press release. Statistics like that prove nothing.

You may pick up the sound of the room, it will also sound less defined and more 'fuzzy'. When you mix this with the sound with a mic close up, some people say this can be an effective way to get a balanced sound. I however had limited sucess with it. It did however serve limited purpose when I recorded my guitar. The room i recorded it in was fairly 'dead' acousticly and would have needed to be more than 2m away to really gain from any acoustics. I tried SM57 close up (4 cm) angled towards centre of cone and C1000 about 2m away facing the cabinet. The sound mixed together was quite good but it wasn't as good as i hoped for. I will try C1000 close up and differnet combinations of mics at different parts of the speaker cone. i.e one at centre of the cone at an angle and one at the edge. The best explanation i can provide is that diffenret parts of a speaker produce differnet frequencies of sound, so placing mics will effect the balance of the sound picked up by the mic. My aim was to recreate the sound I heard in the room. Some sound engineers will go for a particular sound and place mics baring that in mind. I don't think your recording software will effect you overall recording quality. It will be more an issue of features.

Thanks. I will probably give one of these nights a visit within the next couple of weeks. I am not sure how to promote such an event. I think knowing lots of people is probably your main virtue when starting it off. Also on the mainstream issue. I think you will find that a lot of people find the alternative crowd a lot more friendly than the crowd in dance clubs. I know people who go to the likes of Moshulu and The Moorings who are not into rock music, but find the crowd more pleasant and friendly. This however is not always the case. Is my suggestion that you try promoting your club nights to people who aren't into the music? no but i think you will find some people will come along anyway out of curiosity when they hear of this. Some will return.

ITV seems to have got to a stage where it rarely has any new programmes which aren't reality TV. Channel 4 should know better. BBC news seems to have declined recently. House is on channel 5 and is brilliant. ITV3 has some amusing stuff but it is all stuff you previous had a chance to watch (assuming you were alive when it was last shown). BBC3 is mostly piss but has some good stuff BBC4 has a habbit of not working properly in my house and is often good when it works. BBC parliament only works when it is the most boring things are being shown (even by BBC parliament standards). I watch 4 TV programmes regularly Lost House (already seen most of them) Neighbours (i know it's wrong but it usually makes me smile) Hollyoaks (i know it's even more wrong than neighbours)

Is there something every Saturday along the heavy rock or alternative electronic vein? i.e if i turn up on a Saturday not mentioned above will I end up in a dance night or will be it closed? This is quite confusing. I don't usually decide where exactly I am going until I am town and it often changes later in the night. If someone produced a comprehensive list of club nights at the metro, it might help people like me choose where/when to go. I reckon these sorts of club nights could get a lot more people with some publicity. I probably would have been to a Sanctuary rock night if I had heard of it, before it hapepned. This could possibly be something to promote at freshers week if they are going to be started again (which I have seen no mention of). A lot of people I have spoken to feel there is nowhere to go in terms of clubs for this sort of thing.

After trying velcro. I wouldn't recommend it. The velcro itself isn't really the problem, it is the tape stuff you attach it with that had a habbit of falling off. I would say, attach things using things made of metal that wont fall off.

A SM57 making a mesa boogie sound fuzzy? I think you need to turn up your mid control and/or re-concider mic placement. There is no point on spending money on any microphone unless you know where to place it. To reduce 'fuzzyness' you probably want to position the mic at a slight angel towards the middle of a speaker cone. This should boost the upper mid frequencies and make it sound smoother. The main charachteristic of SM57 that i can put in an aesthetic word is 'punchyness'. I never accociated fuzzyness with it. To get a good sound with just one mic. You may want to concider something like a large diaphram condensor, as often used for vocals. I've tried various combinations. Shure SM57, SM58, AKG C1000, Behringer B1. The B1 gave the most 'balanced' sound with just one mic. the C1000's could give a good sound both close up and far away and will probably be what i use when i next record my guitar. The C1000's are probably the best mics I have although the sound at the distance (2m) was extremely fuzzy. You need to experiment with placement. I know people who can get a better drum sound with only one mic than some people can get with 8. It is all about how it is done, as much as what is used. The high sound levels may be a problem for some mics but there is usually information on the manufacturers website about that. If you believe you are taking a risk buying a mic. Check the re-sale values on ebay and sell it if you are unhappy with it.

Does the metro have a website with useful information about club nights and such? My google search didn't find anything.

There may or may not be something currently available for your pedal setup. It depends what pedals you use. If it is just a GT-8 you use, there will be a number of things on websites such as www.thomann.de Personally, i would get a thin bit of wood, attach your pedals down to it with something which wont allow them to realistly become un-attached, put it inside some other flight case and attach it strongly. If it is only a tempory setup (i.e there just to save setting up time at practices and gigs), electrical tape will do the trick, if it is pernament, use metal clips of some kind and some cable ties. If you plan to carry it around to practices, the weight of a case may be a factor but it is also more likely to get bashed. Personally, I don't trust soft cases any more. Solid case with foam on the inside is my preferance for just about all musical equipment.

I partially agree with the article with relevance to the US rock scene, specificially the LA rock scene although in my opinion the 90s lacked genuinely new creativity with reguards to music. A lot of the bands mentioned in that article, are still touring and playing to huge crowds. There is however unlikely to be many more new hair metal bands which get immensely popular. I would tend to argue in the opposite direction from what is being said in that article, each decade of the 20th century, had genuinely new musical styles formed, the 90s however did not really. Grunge (intially interesting as it may be), dominanted popular US rock in the early 90s, a few years later nu metal gained huge popularity. I still view the LA rock scene in the late 80s and early 90s are far more positive than for most of the 90s. In my view the 90s is still the weakest decade for popular popular music since it was first created. Grunge and nu metal were both self pitying and self centred styles of music. This has not existed to nearly that extent since african american blues guitar. There were plenty of good bands in the 90s but on the whole there was lack of genuinely new styles and creative thinking. What is often presented as new styles i.e nu metal and various types of hip hops usually weren't immensely diffenret from some artists in the 80s. In the UK, the 90's was generally a very conservative decade. This was reflected in music, brit pop is a conservative style of music, it is looking back to only one time with little new thinking encorporated. The dance, trance and euro disco stuff is often a lifestyle orientated type of music, it is made for parties, clubs and Ibiza. It has recently became deeply accociated with Chav culture. I also believe the lack of imaginative thinking in the 90s, could be partially due 100's of channels of low quality TV and some computer games (not all computer games are bad for imagination, but some are). The general imagination of an artist is hugely important when creating music. There is also a differnet attitude to learning in the 90s, as if it should be done for you. In the 60s, rock stars learnt their instruments by themselves and would develop good musical ears as a result. In the 90s, many learn from guitar tabs and use little of their own initiative with creating and writing music. Please note, I wish to study music to degree level and beyond and I am strongly in favour of people learning how to play music, the point i was tryinig to put across was to do with attitudes of the time.

Hello Bill. Might concider the DTR-2 if it is still available. Talk to you about it next time I see you (probably Thursday).

correction: Black Atom cancelled and I didn't go to the gig.

It looks like we will quite possibly record our first demo (largely to get gigs with) with our current bass player. The problem is he is going to leave to Edinburgh or Glasgow soon. It is still very important for us to find a long term replacement. I had the phone number of a 2 possible replacements in my mobile phone (which I recently lost).