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A slightly geeky entry [10 Mar 2010|09:15am] [ mood | accomplished ] [ music | (Onj's TV) ] Hello. Lately I've been feeling motivated to do more with my Juno-G. Why? I don't know. Probably because I went online and found some patch banks made by other people and decided for the third time, to try the juno librarian. What that basically does is allow me to fill the user area of my keyboard up with some happy goodness. So two days ago, I sat down and said i will get this bastard thing working, because it's bugging me that I can't. I'm only blind, not stupid. Well that's questionable, but still. So I did. I managed to get it working to the point where I now have some very fun patches in my Juno, and one of the banks i found was all the sounds from the XV that I used to own. Thing about that is, the XV had some great sounds. the juno also has some great sounds. But some of the XV had sounds the Juno doesn't. So I've been spending the last two days finding sounds that I've really, really missed ever since I sold the XV, and am being more amazed by the power of this keyboard all the time. I bought it when I needed a replacement for my Korg Trinity which I sold to some guy named Alex, who can actually make better use of it than I can. Really, it was just meant to sit on topp of my Rhodes and look cool. I later found out that it had some great sounds, as I didn't really plan to use them for much quite honestly, and only use it as a controler. And then as I say, two days ago my virtual eyes were opened to the possibilities. Now I want not only to use sounds, but to make them as well. So as soon as a working editor comes along, that's what I'll be doing. I've managed to retreave sounds from such tracks as the theory, Bec and fix this. Many more as well that I liked but never used in any pieces, so it's all quite new and exciting. Possibly the most interesting thing, if not the best-sounding thing I found is a piano from the Fantom X. That module is the Juno's daddy box, in that the Juno has most of the wave forms from the Fantom X, but is missing 64 mb of the wave rom, including this piano. Someone managed to rip the piano and put it into 92 little wave files, and port it to the Juno. It's better than the stock piano but not as good as the one on the expanssion board that I have. It's certainly alright though, and multi-layered. With that in mind, I definitely want to start sampling things and make my own sounds. It just takes the Juno ages to boot now, because the sounds come from a Compaq flash card, into the ram, so boot time is now equivalent to a fairly fast computer, taking about 1.5 minutes. It's mighty odd when a keyboard actually has a noticeable boot time. In any case I'm still in bed, and the shower has my name on it, so I will go and use it. However, I feel like writing new music so expect to hear more from me shortly, especially with the fun sounds I'm finding. Derek Lane, Dan R, and a guy from Finland who's name I can't spell, let alone pronounce are all welcome to my Juno bank should they want it. And GF also sounded interested, but his Juno's at church, so it can't benefit quite yet. Maybe the Jawsites among us will have better luck with the editor though, and be able to create and share some sounds should they feel like it. Would be nice. PS. IF you get a spair moment, throw your media player at this or if that doesn't work, this which, by the information in the title bar when you load it, will be obvious what it is, so doesn't require explanation. It's a link to a stream, not a virus. I'm not quite that dumb and stupid. Oh, that's another sound I was able to retreave from the XV, I forgot. 1 odness| come on, be odd!

Time for my first track this year [04 Mar 2010|12:50pm] [ mood | relaxed ] [ music | A day in the rain ] Greetings peoples. I haven't written here for quite a while so what's to catch up on? A few different things if I remember any of them. Jake continues to , grow, what a bloody surprise, that! Getting teath now, sharp ones. I have been composing many many things but not really releasing any of them, apart from very short clips in mp3 for some friends of mine who cannot play ogg at their school, all located here and today decided to just si down on a whim and write something utterly brand new and for me, never tried before. Picked up a Korg M1, a piece of Hypersonic and the old Korg Wavestation and produced A day in the rain which is more of a tracklette than a track, being only 1 minute 47 seconds, and it is unlike anything I personally have ever done before. for the MP3 version you'll be wanting this one if ogg isn't your thing. I doubt I'll make a habbit of producing both versions as quite frankly it's tedious but aah well, for now it shall suffice. Also got a ninjam I threw together with a group of peeps a while back as well. Simply called live for today it can be downloaded up there a bit. This incorporates Bandstand and a bit of playing and what not. Other people come in later, but not for a good few minutes. I'm alone on the server to start with, so I did what I do best, which is solo my face awwf! Hope you enjoy both of those, let me know what you all think either in LJ where this is published first, facebook as a note, or on my website at AndreLouis.COM where this gets sindicated. How nice of it! 3 odnesses| come on, be odd!

What am I doing here again? [31 Jan 2010|11:39pm] [ mood | silly ] [ music | LeadBelly RockIslandLine (Shirley and Spinoza -BROKEN BOUNCING MIXED UP RADIO WAVES FROM YOUR PLANET ] Left hand folows right and and considers what to enable human at end of arms to type on keyboard. Typing thusly, proves that nothing really useful was thought about, and thus stream of conciousness or something meant to resemble that appeared on your screen. In actual fact, this lead to nothing of consequence being typed, and nobody is quite sure what the point of this was in the first place. Perhaps embibing Jigermeister in not quite small, but not quite large quantities on a Sunday evening is the reason for what most of you will most likely term, bulldoodoo, or equivalent expletive. Please move along now. Some day I shall come back here, investigate the writings on the wall and ask myself or whoever happens to be in my vicinity at the given time, why exactly I would dare to compose something so utterly pointless, that it makes golf look interesting. something is seriously wrong if that sport has entertainment value outside of the wii version. I think at this point a bye bye is in order, so that is exactly what shall happen at this juncture. 1 odness| come on, be odd!

Alive it would seem [27 Jan 2010|08:34am] [ mood | a bit angry, but not too much ] [ music | Steve Kilbey & Martin Kennedy present - Maybe Soon - Unseen Music Unheard Words (SmoothLounge.com - ] Yes quite right. I'm here just on the off chance somebody sees this and wanted to know that. If not, well, feel free to return to your umbrella and stay out of the rain. so what's going on? Good question. Jake grows up, we are looking for a new place to live, and the world turns. All bog-standard things right? I thought so. However, it hasn't been an entirely uneventful few weeks sinse my last update, no no. what have I done? In no particular order: Upgraded mine and Kirsten's netbooks to Wireless N from Wireless G, improving the range of connectivity and speed for one thing. It was interesting to say the least. having never opened up a netbook before, and not wishing to do so while it was still under warrantee, I waited till it wasn't, and then struck! Well not quite as dramatic as that or anything, but I thought it sounded better than to simply say, I just took an electric screwdriver and screwed the hell or unscrewed the hell out of it. In any case, it happened, it was good, or rather is good, so it feels like I gave my netbook a new lease of life without having to resaut to one of those horrid Harpu's (bless me!) sorry about the sneesing thing, but Harpu (bless me!) just does sound like that. Asus and their stupid naming schemes. Next, my website that has had the exact same look since 2006 was updated with the help of Quinn and Wordpress in various dosages. Feel free to take a look at what I like to call, the new and improved AndreLouis.COM and comment here, or on the site as you can do that now, about your thoughts. Do you find it screen-reader friendly? Is it sluggish to load on your connection? Does the colour scheme do really trippy things to your face and upset your equilibrium? None of the above? All of the above? Let me know. Speaking of screen-readers, them things over at blind bargains are holding a voting something or other I don't really know what for, but one of the categories is best screen-reader of 2009. Now, I don't want to vote for Apple, Flaws, Windoweyes or system access. In fact I thought to myself, I'll vote for NVDA just because it's doing really quite well, and surprise all you people that know I'm a diehard Dolphin fan, but the fact that they weren't even represented upset me so much on principal, that I simply chose not to vote, and will not do so therefore. You can all feel free to do so though, if you go over here and look at what other categories are listed. they appear to be interested in best accessible game for 2009, best hardware product for the blind, best software product including Klango and Quitter and a few others. I would like to note that one of the choices, namely 'Apple Accesible iPhone and iPod Touch' is miss-spelled, and as I stated, Dolphin is not represented. Now whatever you might think of them regarding screen-readers, their product is a magnifier, and how can you not magnify properly? you just do. One of their voting categories says, and i quote: '3. Best Screen Access Program. This award goes to the best screen reading or magnification product of 2009, regardless of the operating system. This includes both computers and mobile devices.' Note the word *magnification* in that category. Please also note: Talks & zooms, and MobileSpeak are not represented, despite the fact that it says, and once again I quote: 'This includes both computers and mobile devices.' It's a tad hard to represent the mobile community if only Apple is here, is it not? Or am I just being too damn picky? either way, there's stuff missing. If you're going to produce a website, do the damn research and put *all* the requisites up there, not bloody editor's choice for frig sake! Otherwise Jaws wouldn't have even gotten a looking. It would've simply been System Access and Nvda. Possibly Window-eyes but only because they have one good programmer working with them, namely audiorabbit03 who knows his stuff inside, outside,backside, and all other kinds of side that haven't yet been invented. Right well I'm done here. Like I said, an update. Nothing overly long or even interesting but I pay for the privilege of ranting in LJ since I have a payed account, and I wanted to get that off my chest. Why pay for something I don't use? Yeah I thought so too. PS. If you ever watch the TV, namely BBC, you might like to share with your friends this pointless clip because I mentioned it in my facebook status and I think, quite scared a few people. Have a nice day. London, United Kingdom [0C, Mostly Cloudy] 8:20 AM GMT on January 27, 2010 18 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Hello? can you all hear me at the back there? [01 Jan 2010|08:33am] [ mood | relaxed ] [ music | Randy Muller Boom Chang Bang - Luvanova - Groovin' U (SmoothLounge.com - Music To Move You (by Smoot ] Greetings. I was going to say greetings to one and all but what exactly does that really mean? One an all? If I'm saying greetings to one, then wouldn't I just come up to you and say 'hi, wassuuuuuuuup!' Or something. If I'm saying hello to loads of you, then I dono, I'd uh, say something different, right? So why one and all? Oh I dono it's all stupid and pointless anyways. For the record it's 2010 like it is in most parts of the world by now, apart from possibly Hawaii, Alaska, Midway Island and international dateline west. Given that I don't know anybody from those places apart from Keao who might not even live in Hawaii anymore anyway, I won't waste time writing the three words, 'happy new year' but oh damn, I just did, so consider that my duty done. At this time, I am the only person who is cognicent in my house. My lovely wife Kirsten and son Jake are asleep, but I decided that I couldn't sleep anymore at about 5:58, read for a couple of hours, got up, had a shower, and now I'm here doing this. Once this is done and I've worked out what it is I actually wanted to say, I will return to my book and see what the first of the first 2010 has to say for itself, if anything. Most likely it will say much the same as most other days, but one can never tell can one? Yesterday was fun though. James Bowden the QWS guy showed up, and spent a few hours here, then we received a visit from Ednun, who I went to college with, who we call Donkey Ed, but only in a nice way. He has a probably quite dangerous fixation with that particular animal so it is fitting. All in all, a nice day. In the evening when our house was just ours and visitor-free, we watched eastenders, put Jake to bed, had some particularly decent alcahol, and finger-food which passed the evening away quite nicely thank you very much. I admit to not having been bothered to see in midnight, so I cannot say that I was awake last year, but oh well. There's always next year. And the next. and the next too, most likely. So then, in a very quick year review, what has happened? Marriage, April 18. Proceeding week, receive visitations from Pam, David, Patrick and Brandon. Also Domica and Iyana's Christening. Week after wedding, lack of honeymoon due to lack of money. No lottery wins here. Christening party for above sisters, fun. May 30, turn another age on the calendar for whatever reason. This appears to happen every year without fail, and I haven't yet worked out what causes it. August 29, Kirsten joins me in the turning a new age thing. Is this some kind of trend? Also, release my debute album A State of Mind. In following weeks, be notified it hits Amazon UK, Amazon France, Amazon US, and Amazon Germany. Possibly others. Also napster, iTunes, and just recently, CdUniverse.com. I think. September 21, Jake is born. What a bloody day! Literally and figuratively. Tiring yes, but more for the wife than for myself. I'm just the guy after all. What do I know about letting some kid suck on my tits night after night? Sleep through it that's what. September 22, my nan, my mother's mother turns 60. Living the life in Barbados, what more could you ask for? sun, sea, sand, sounds all good to me. If having a kid is considered to be quiet, then the next few weeks are relatively that, as nothing too exciting happens. October 8, London eye gig for Blind in Business. Fun, not particularly profiteable for myself, but that's alright I suppose. Someone benefited somewhere so that makes it all good. Vaguely. November 5, Bonfire night. Nothing of import here whatsoever. Nothing. Nothing to record, nothing to show for it. What a dull day that was. November 6, Charlotte's birthday. That's my crazy sister inlaw who turned 16, and took a trip to New York. Nothing to do with me, but a note on the calendar. If anything else happened between then and Christmas I don't know. Probably, but nothing of great excitement so ignore it. December 25, no idea. What's that all about anyway? Is it some sort of significant day I'm supposed to be aware of? December 27, now ya talkin! food! fooooooooooood at my grandad's. Oh, and on december 25 I just remembered, I had also much much much good food at my inlaws. so that's what it must have been for. Man, how I forgot about the food I don't know. December 27 till present, pretty quiet, and thus concludes this. How sad. No truthfully it was a very eventful year I must admit, and i'm certain there are things I forgot but not out of spite, so don't bother suing me. If you think I have anything worth taking away you're mistaken. other than my wife and child which you can't have anyway, and if I forgot something I took part in that had anything to do with you, well I appologise for that also. Not for the taking part you understand, but for the forgetting there of. Well, I must go now, I've been at this writing lark for what seems like ages, but is only in fact 33 minutes and counting, so that's that. I've only written this much in half an hour? that's quite sad isn't it? Aah well, can't have everything I spose. Oh, happy new year. Forgot about that. 3 odnesses| come on, be odd!

An actual show from me? Bloody'ell! [27 Dec 2009|02:20am] [ mood | content ] [ music | Andre Louis, Arthur Pirika & others - The Larfy drop Bin - December 26 2009 ] Yeah I know. I never thought I'd do that again either but apparently I did. Last show from me and arfy8820 this side of 2010 and you can download it here if you want. It's very chilled out, new music, much talk, and kind of a step back to the 2004-2006 days when it was Skype not teamtalk, and the quality tried to be good but failed. Must go to bed at this point, tiredness is making itself known. Thank you for reading. Thank you even more if you can spair the time to listen. We do this for you after all. 3 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Still alive [25 Dec 2009|08:37am] [ mood | yep ] [ music | Inverse Cinematics - The First Noel - The Reindeer Room - A Christmas Chillout (SmoothLounge.com - M ] To whom it may concern, Wishing you and yours a merry/happy Christmas, if you celebrate and if not, good for you. Right. so today I will be at my inlaws for the usual Christmas dinner and what not, which will be fun. I hope the rest of you have a day worth remembering, I'm sure I will. The last few weeks have been nothing out of the ordinary, hense the reason I've been this quiet, but I figure if I don't post now, I probably won't for the rest of 2009, so get it over and done with. Thus, I did. May you have a better year than this one, and may you perhaps win the lottery and make millians, but if you do, just remember it was my good wishes that made you get as far as you did, so I expect a 60/40 cut, in my favour. Haa bloody haa. Piece out. Can't be arsed to say much more. Nothing much more to say. 3 odnesses| come on, be odd!

I suppose I should kind of update? [02 Nov 2009|06:26pm] [ mood | contravercial did I spell that right? ] [ music | Aziza - La Costa (remix) - Jazzsoetry Vol. 1 (SmoothLounge.com - Music To Move You (by SmoothJazz.co ] Boy oh boy. As my wife just said, the weeks just feel like they're flying buy. Jake is 6 weeks old this very day, and it has been a busy 6 weeks at that. I've been told to update by two people so I thought I should put in an appearence, though admittedly I don't know what to say. As non-parents might imagine, or perhaps they can't, it's a trip. Sometimes it's great, sometimes it isn't. Take last night for example. He slepped for 4 hours straight, which doesn't happen often. Usually it's a case of, after 9 o'clock, get as much sleep as you can even if you're not tired because by 8 the next morning, you won't be tired, you'll be friggin dead! he is getting better though, and Kirsten makes the point that she feels like she feeds and changes him in his sleep most times now. Naturally lots of family have been down to see him from both sides of the divide and apparently he looks like me quite a bit, which for him can't be good. Poor kid. For those who don't follow me on facebook, you won't have been notified of the pictures I put up a few days after he was born, so you can get them here assuming you can see them, or someone you know can. I will have to collect more of them as time goes buy, as they were taken a relatively long time ago now, and he has changed. What you also won't know is that my album A State of Mind is not only available to buy from CdBaby, but also from iTunes, Amazon US and Amazon UK. I found this out purely by accident when googling for it, because I was told by CdBaby they send to as many digital musical outlets as possible, so I wanted to see if it was true. I actually do feel quite famous now that I'm on both iTunes and amazon, as a lot of people know such big brand names, so it's a feelgood factor. Though I don't update much, stay tuned to this space, you never know, I might have a recording or two of whatever firework celebrations occur in this part of town in a few days time, it just depends. There isn't much out of the Jake quarter yet because he doesn't do much other than eat, sleep, poo, cry and sleep some more, which doesn't really make for an exciting listening experience, but when he starts to be a bit ambulatory shall we say, then I will gladly pull out the Jeklin disk, put it on the floor, sit back, and hit the record button. If he comes upto the mics and starts yelling at them, all the better.Our living room has more than enough floorspace to let that happen so it will be interesting to see what he does. In any case, I go now, having done my civic duty to my live journal which I haven't abandonded, honest. Yes I said abandonded, deal with it. It felt right to type it, so type it I did. If, or when anything of significant interest happens, you'll get to know about it. Right now though, unless you live in the UK and want to give a pretty cool christmas present of a pogo colour mobile printer, I'm afraid I have nothing much more of interest to say. I bought one of them because Ebay sent me an email of daily deals and that was one of the things, and we like it. Look it up in your favourite search engine and buy one for your sighted brothers, sisters, cousins, they'll definitely like it. I bought one for Charlotte, my fake sister personage, and Karine, my 15 year old cousin who saw the one we had here, printed a picture on it, and said I definitely gotta get me one of those, so she got one too and loves it. Definitely a girly thing. Right well that really is it. I don't know what I'm still doing here honestly, so with that said, I will won't be here any longer. Yup, you heard it here first, I will won't. So bye, and all that. 5 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Babies are strange but I have one anyway. [22 Sep 2009|09:40am] [ mood | tired ] [ music | Rupert Leighton - My Sahara - Take the Sidewalk (SmoothLounge.com - Music To Move You (by SmoothJazz ] I know, unusual subject line but well, it says that because it's true. Jacob Peter Louis was born at 06:58 yesterday, September 21 and came home at about 11 PM the same night. He clocked in at a wapping 10 pounds 6 ounces and therefore, is chunky and heavy. Kirsten and myself were up all night from Sunday through to last night, and then she was up practically all of last night as well of course, but I did manage to catch a few hours of sleep, somehow. I want to share with you however, a small file that is 13 minutes in length and starts at about 07:05, just 7 minutes after Jake was born. It's basically just a bit of what was going on in the room at the time, and is titled, naturally, Baby archive 2009 which follows on from my 2005 offering, when my sister Domica was born. I know it's not much, but after that, the recording got very boring and quiet and extremely uninteresting. He slept, Kirsten tried to doze, I was on the NEtbook chatting to the fine people on irc as they got the exact time Jake was born. I was in IRC for about 10 minutes before he started crying to signify that yes actually, I am here, feed me now or else, hear the loudness of my face! After that I took out mister Iriver, microphones which are dying on the right hand side and I don't like it much, and you get the recording found above. Well, time to start a new day in the life of the louis family and see what's in store. Visitors no doubt, and other such things. Enjoy. 8 odnesses| come on, be odd!

It's Carnival time! [30 Aug 2009|12:36pm] [ mood | alive ] [ music | Nottinghill carnival 2009 - live from a bedroom window! ] Yes that's right. Nottinghill Carnival 2009 is upon us, and doing what I do every year, I'm streaming it live to you. Yesterday was my wife's 23rd birthday and we enjoyed it together, and I've bought her a present she doesn't know about which will arrive some day soon. What fun! Still, carnival is fun, and I figure if you can't come to it, it can come to you, or at least that part of it that is hanging out of a third floor window on one particular street. Want to listen? Feel free. Click here to listen live and enjoy it because it will be fun, that's for sure. Two days of music and all in gloreous stereo too! Brought to you by my ISP, an Iriver H140 or should that be H160 now? In either case, a set of Wizzzolium microphones, a laptop, and a nice, inexpensive USB soundcard. Hope you enjoy. PS. Here's a none-descript song and here's a file recording with my Jeklin disk created by Kelly and dgl1984. Signing off, click, enjoy, and tell your friends. 1 odness| come on, be odd!

The Louis Bin for August 08 2009 [09 Aug 2009|01:15am] [ mood | tired ] [ music | TBRN presents Blart Radio! ] Well then. Another show time is it? Sure is. This week, join me, all by my self as I play tracks from my now available album, take phone calls and near the end, the return of good old Just William. Forgot about him didn't you? Well so did I. In any case, click here to download the show while I go off to sleep land, and be next to the wife. For those that tuned in, thank you very much. To those that didn't, thank you for existing, you will do it next time. Archive listeners, you're great too. 2 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Well, I did it. A State of Mind is now available to buy. [07 Aug 2009|10:21am] [ mood | satisfied ] [ music | SeinSahThin ReallyStrangeAndWeirdThings (Shirley and Spinoza radio ] Quite so. I don't know quite how it came to this but it did. I doubt people that know me will feel like buying it, and I completely understand why, but if people do, I will of course be greatful. As kevin Reeves pointed out to me, the fact that music is available online shouldn't put people off. It's the fact that it's on a physical media, with actual cover-art and lossyless that should attract users. Not something you burned at home. In any case, I don't really clame I did it to make money for me. I did it to give my son something to spend when he's older. Yes go on laugh. This kind of venture doesn't make a huge amount of money, I well know that. Plus, a first album is probably going to be not that great. I know that too, but I did it, I achieved it, and I can be happy for that. You can flame me, shoot me down, but I will only bounce back again. I hear a lot of people laughing because I'm selling freely available music, but that's really OK. I know that, in my own mind, I put a lot of effort and time into creating each and every one of these tracks, and I've had free stuff online for years. Why then, now that I've tested it out on a lot of you guys, should I not make something, even if it's hardly anything, back from that? Anyway. Should you be so inclined, you can buy it here with paypal or here with a credit or debit card. Now I shall go and hang my head, and attempt to enjoy the rest of the day. Your thoughts welcome. 7 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Time for 11 things to download [26 Jul 2009|01:40pm] Greetings. So you may have heard the show last night? If you didn't, well here it is in condensed form. I asked the inhabitants of a small Island called Pushchair upon pant-leg to provide titles for these 11 tracks, since I was unable to think of any, so whatever you see is nothing to do with me. In any case, without further anything whatsoever, I present you these in no particular order: 10 minutes of your time, C minor can be cool too, D minor takes the stage, let E flat relax you, the funk e groov part I, the funk e groov part II, time for some funky 80's, let E flat jazz you up, QA with thyself, the Violin wants to talk to you and finally, the Violin wants to talk to you, again. Few! It's all over! I can go and do something interesting now! I've been editing for just about 3 hours. Bye bye! oh yeah. Comment and tell me what you think of all this madness, and thank the people of Pushchair upon pant-leg as I said above. 2 odnesses| come on, be odd!

The Louis Bin for July 25 2009 [26 Jul 2009|01:08am] Well if you heard it, good. If you didn't, you missed a 198 minute and 45 second long musical experience known as Ninjam. as I say in the show, 99.9 percent of the jam was good, the rest is taken up by silences and people who really can play guitar, but choose to be all loud and obnoxious which is unfortunate, because it kind of ruins it. We managed to get through over 160 minutes of the jam, and unless I edit all this stuff tomorrow, the next time I show up in your ears, you'll hear the rest of it, unless you tell me it was so bad and you just don't care. Oh well. Click here to download it if you'd like to do that. I hope you do. Bed time for me, Wife is much more interesting than this computer chair in any case. 2 odnesses| come on, be odd!

The Larfy bin for July 11 2009 [12 Jul 2009|02:29am] You wouldn't believe it if you didn't see it here first. There was a show though, the first I've personally broadcast since January of this year. I know it's been a *long* time in coming but it has happened. Hopefully it will happen again sooner than next January, as that would be another 6 months of no broadcasting, but hey, it happens. I suppose a show link would be appropriate at this time so here is exactly that. I'm tired, bed is calling, the wife is already there and I'm not. The sooner I go, the sooner I'm not in trouble. Heehee. Enjoy the four hour and 15 minute show. Since we had so much content to get too, it took quite that long. Better download this one as I have no clue when the next one will be. Oh and I'm working on my album which will most likely be called 'A State Of Mind', containing 19 tracks. I just need my brother to help with the coverart then it's just a case of sending the CD via snail mail or internet uploadage some place, and going from there. I figure it's about time I try to make some money in this bastard business, and this is the one way I can do it. I hope you will all support me by buying just one copy when I've done all the making stuff. Yes, you can download the stuff online for free and it will be free and I make no show of hiding that fact. It's free because it's in ogg, and thus lossy. for an actual CD buying is the way to go, and it helps support a nobody musician and his family of unborn child and wife. I just hope it will work. Anyways, I'm still here and not in bed and that is not a good idea. 4 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Somebody please turn the weather down a little? [28 Jun 2009|02:00pm] Hello. still alive? good, great. fantastic. Been a strange few weeks here that it has. Been recording some videos for youtube with my brother who's pretty damn good with a camera, so here I am to pass along links and whatnot, as I usually do, apart from my last entry, where I didn't. So what have I got in the links bag today? Well to start with, there is a game known by various different names. Rhythm heaven in America, rhythm paradise in Europe and Tengoku Gold in Japan. the game is for the Nintendo DS gaming system and teaches (or tries), you to become proficient at rhythm and timing. It's quite new and has been advertised at least here in the UK, quite a lot recently. My brother decided to give it a go, so he got the game, and subsequently completed it in exactly one week. Yep that's right, one week to the day! so then, since he did so very well at it, and before he completed it, we put up two videos on youtube. the first is one of the levels called Moai Doo Wop 2 Perfect meaning that he performed perfectly on the level. This is why there is a strange harpy sound at the end of the video. If he did not achieve a perfect, that sound would not have happened. Next, we have Rhythm Paradise Remix 10 -Perfect, yes you guessed it, another perfect score and not only that, but the very final level in the game. this is why at the very end, quite quietly on the left channel to save your ears, is his rather exultant yell that could be heard from several countries away when it was first shouted. This video meant that he completed the game, and he did so, right there on youtube for all to see and hear. Note to blind folks: These videos are more based around sound than actual visuals, so give them a listen, if for nothing else, than to see what a DS is capable of. We can actually play this game, I have done so and done pretty well, once the level was explained to me. next comes some odd stuff. A site called street pianos is doing something which I think is quite interesting. The below text is taken directly from their website. Street pianos are appearing in cities across the world. Located in skate parks, industrial estates, laundrettes, precincts, bus shelters and train stations, outside pubs and football grounds, the pianos are for any member of the public to enjoy and claim ownership of. Who plays them and how long they remain is up to each community. The pianos act as sculptural, musical, blank canvases that become a reflection of the communities they are embedded into. Many pianos are personalised and decorated. Questioning the ownership and rules of public space 'Play Me I'm yours' is a provocation, inviting the public to engage with, activate and take ownership of their urban environment. The first pianos appeared in March 2008 when 15 pianos were placed into the streets of Birmingham UK. This website - www.streetpianos.com - was made for the public to post their comments about the pianos and describe their use. The site has helped document each piano's journey whilst connecting the street pianos and their communities across the city. 'Play Me, I'm Yours' is an arts project by Luke Jerram: www.lukejerram.com -- End-text So as you can see, there are pianos in lots of places. Recently a streetpiano came to Portobello market which is right outside my flat, so of course I just had to go down and play it didn't I? An unedited voicepost of the piano-playing is here, while a cut-down, video-version available on youtube is here. I even took the time to submit the same video to the streetpianos website for Portobello Road as I thought it would be seen by more people. Not till too late did I realise that the audio that goes along with the video clips somewhat, though the original voicepost does not. We decided not to reupload the 1.18 GB video file to youtube for a slight alteration so sorry about that. I was able to find a news story about the streetpiano idea at the globe website as well, for some more background information. Maybe if you look hard enough, you'll find a streetpiano near you. If you do, you of course should record it and submit it somewhere. Now I'm hungry and thursty so naturally I will go away and deal with those things. After all, what's left to say? Oh well, other than the fact that we're not allowed to move house because the waiting list for a two-bedroom apartment is supposedly 20 years. How they expect two parents and a child to fit in a place this size I don't know. what, the child lives in the bath or something? I won't get started on what I think of Kengsington and Chelsea housingtrust, it would fill a very thick book. Bunch of incompetent retards for the most part, and then some. Still. It's a Sunday, and I have no energy for this crap. Oh yes, of course. One more thing. I received my Jeklin disk and contact mic from dgl1984 and recorded a very stupid thing that has been played on TBRN extensively with it. the contact mic that is. Using audacity, the mic, the leg of my Fender Rhodes and my face, I bring you a dumb production simply called what can you do with a contact mic and leave it at that. I won't even bother to explain what it does, or why I did what I did, it doesn't speak for itself, and nore can I speak for it. Even better stopping point methinks, as it's 2 o'clock. I was originally going to end this at 1:55 but this is even better. 3 odnesses| come on, be odd!

It's simple. Detweet or die! [08 Jun 2009|07:44am] When you skip passed no less than 6 entries one after another on your friends page that contain nothing but one-sided twitter updates, one starts to get very mildly pissed off. That is not a good sign for a Monday morning. You people who know who you are, will either stick your one-sided, pointless twitter updates behind a cut, or at least from my personal life, you will be cut like a maloderous infection. I am getting ever so slightly sick of seeing quite that much unrelated junk on my friends page. There are but a handful of *clever* people who do\ cut, and good for them. If you are unable to cut these pointless, utterly useless one-sided entries, ask somebody who does. It's Monday morning, and I dislike it intensely. For one thing, the USB keyboard I use on my Netbook is broken, so I am using the Samsung internal keyboard instead. I don't mind the keyboard, but what I do mind is having to pick up the entire thing, while it's attached to a hard drive and having to move it to type, when the point of an external keyboard is so one doesn't have to do that. that does contribute to my overall serlyness this morning, but the appearence of twitter annoying my day significantly exacerbates this, and it is going to change, now. With more and more of you joining this completely stupendous craze, it is more and more of you I must see everyday performing these *attempts* at updating that put children to shame. If your life must consist of 140 character Haiku's, then at least make them somewhat interesting to read. It's almost rude having to read a one-sided dialog, because not only does it take up space that could have otherwise been filled by *real* entries instead, but it's equivalent to standing very close to somebody who is on a phone to all their friends at once, with their interjections. IT is completely unnecessary. Twitter has made a mockery of blogging I believe, and the fact you can integrate it with a *proper* blogging site such as this, makes it even more outrageous, as now, people simply, dare I say it without sounding retarded? Tweet, about their day and expect that to suffice. It, does, not! I do not have to mention names, but you all have one week. If you are not cutting, then I am going on a most definite friends clean, as I'm sure my page could do with a tidy in any case, and this would be the ultimate reason to do so. Without 10 twitter entries to read every morning, I might actually get through the *important* reads in 10 minutes as I used too in 2007. Not so much now. Having to stop, then skip, then see who's next to make sure it isn't somebody's pointless specialness, skip that, to find one out of maybe four actual entries per page makes my daily read somewhat tiresome. I shall enjoy reading my friends page from start to finish without interuptions in exactly one week from today. I hardly need to sign up for twitter do I? When the same people I would be following, see fit to give us a shareware version of what happens there anyway? For even more useless conversation, sign up to twitter today! For the shareware version, just read my LJ! I wouldn't only have to see it once, but twice! How completely, utterly, absolutely pointless! 23 odnesses| come on, be odd!

News, info, updates, bleh [05 Jun 2009|09:52am] first and formost since I forgot, happy belated birthday to the crazy nick6489. I hear it sucked, but I hope that, because you have good friends, it wasn't so so bad. I first met you on VT. Remember that? The first thing you did, was play with Mackie reverb, and I remember thinking, er, exactly why? But I didn't say much, as it was possibly my first time on a VT server running 44 KHZ, and it's waste of bandwidth 9 KBPS. Wouldn't do it again for anything. Still, we had a conversation about how to use effects somewhat better and got talking from that point onward. Now you like to call me from just outside class on my ATA, and yell at me on the buss. Great guy. Mad, stupid, in a good way that is, but great guy. Would've said hi yesterday but had crazy shit going down. One word. Thursday! In any case, two other bits of news I have. Firstly, remember that wedding thing I attended in April? WEll I guess I was kind of one of the main people involved in it? Well we have a not very nice quality video to go along with it, so the sighted among you can view it, or show your friends who can see. Can't help the poor camera quality so don't sue me, you'll get approximately nuffink! I'm about poorer than a homeless toss pot right now, so save yourself. Anyway, a portion of the wedding is here on Youtube and Dwayne is working on a sequal and a sequal to the sequal, coming soon. Finally, for those Harry Potter fanfic lovers like myself, I started a mailing list for the purpose of updating people who care about such things, when I add new books or update old ones, on the site. Otherwise everybody gets way behind and that just isn't very fun now, is it? If you're new to HP fandom and haven't checked it out yet, well you should kind of go here and look at the not particularly small collection of books that have been collected over the years, since oh I'd say about 2004? Perhaps slightly earlier. If you do go there, the first actual link, after the name, size, type, modified, is a way to subscribe to the mailing list, so if you like that sort of thing, feel free and join us. Now given what time it is, I think breakfast is a calling and I'm going to take advantage of it, so there. I can't be bothered to try and write useless nothings for another 8 minutes just to pad out this already boring entry so I'm not gonna. 1 odness| come on, be odd!

Something to resemble an update [19 May 2009|09:54am] Interestingly enough I realise I haven't posted for exactly 1 month. Not a huge amount has happened in that time but what has happened could be considered significant, maybe. For one, I found out that the baby is a boy. For another, my brother who doesn't remember what an LJ is and hasn't updated in forever is staying with us, and for another, since I'm just such an N82 lover, I bought him one. He loves it, and even though he's fully sighted, states most emphatically that he'd rather have this, than any shitty Iphone. Mostly his words, not mine, though naturally I agree with the centiment. As I get ever older and my birthday draws ever nearer, I contemplate that in the year 2013 I will be 30 years old, and my child will be 4. That is of course, assuming that London where I live, survives not only the 2012 games, but the end of the world also said to happen in same year. Assuming that nothing too untoward happens, then I will live to see my thirtyith birthday and will then consequently feel very old. I have also had the chance to think about people that have life-changing, or semi-life-changing experiences. For example, when someone leaves a job, moves house or even bigger, moves country, they can sometimes forget who their friends are, and act in a way not befitting a person with any friends at all. I have seen this sadly, from people that I still tentatively call friends, but am starting to question whether I am one to them or not. I think that it is possible for people to forget the value of others sometimes, and it is in their best interests to realise this before it's too late. The above statement does not just pertain to my situation, but think about whether you fit into that category or not, and attempt to act with the decorum you know you should. I can possibly relate myself, which is why I started to question where I stood on the matter personally. It was pointed out to me, whether in gest or otherwise that, since I am now a married man, I would let TBRN die, and abandon my friends which I personally have no wish to do either. One does not set something up, keep it going for 5 years and then simply let it go just because one has made other commitments. For starters, commitments work to enable you to have many things you wish to keep, be that the station you started, the job you enjoy, or the partner you're with at the moment or long-term. Therefore it is inconceivable that I would allow something like marrage to break up what I have put together. Speaking for myself at any rate, I would not be happy with myself if I let this come to pass. With regards friends, I still maintain the ones I have had, and occasionally find someone else worthy of the melting pot, and adjust as necessary. Talking to one's partner only goes so far, and if you have to lose friends just because you put a ring on your finger, then you weren't worthy of having them in any case, so give them to someone who wants them. Friends, like puppies, aren't just for Christmas. Right. Well done with the soap-box now, so in light of me and the wife having a baby boy, I decided on the day to write a small and not very exciting little something called piano doodles as I was sitting at the keyboard, and feeling somewhat introspective, thus I did. Please enjoy, and comment on it's boringness as you see fit. Also since I forgot, have a link to the wedding pictures where you can look either individually or download a large 1.7 GB zip file of all 416. It's your choice. Probably you will hear from me in another month. In the meantime stay safe and don't take life for granted. 11 odnesses| come on, be odd!

Wedding archive and things of that nature [19 Apr 2009|11:11am] Well then, Kirsten X Sharp is now MRS Kirsten Louis, and I am a husband. It feels strange, but good, as apposed to strange and weird. As I write this I am sitting in the hotel room using my Netbook, and this place actually has an ethernet connection as well as wireless. Or at least I think it has wireless, but I don't seem to be able to connect to it. Oh well in any case, for those people that heard the live wedding stream, you can now click here to download it and hear it without buffering and other such badness. Equally for those that didn't hear it at all, you too can get it from clicking up there a bit. I'm going to go back to eating croissants and jam, relax for a bit, leave this place and go home. Dwayne my brother, and his girlfriend Becky looked after my flat last night so I'm sure it wil be in good condition when we get back to it. Finally, I'd just like to take this time to say thank you to everybody that came to the wedding and following reception, listened live or tried too, and wished me via email, im's, facebook and text messages, congratulations (with a t not a d!) and am glad to have such awesome friends. Oh, and the word 'Wife' is so much shorter and easier to spell than the word 'Fiance'. I have a wife, and I love her very much indeed. 11 odnesses| come on, be odd!

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