Rebuilding My PC - Back To Basics

I ran Ubuntu Linux on my desktop for quite a while and I noticed that for Multimedia purposes it still really cannot beat the more recent Windows-versions. It's not criticism, it's just a fact. Microsoft's been at it for at least 20+ years so one may expect them to get it right eventually...

So I decided to revert the desktop back to Windows. For the record; I still have a dual boot laptop that runs Windows 7 and Ubuntu 10.4 so I can still investigate and use Linux.

I scratch-installed Windows XP Professional on my desktop and gave the hardware a proper check-up. This took the better part of the Friday night. Late that evening I also installed the drivers, the WindowsXP updates as well as AntiVir, Firefox, Thunderbird and Chrome.

Installing Thunderbird turned out to be a bit of a mistake, as there is a know bug in the latest version that prevents you from sending email under certain circumstances. There is a workaround but as an ICT-man myself I don't like workarounds at all.

'Fortunately' (and I use the word loosely here) the next morning I rebooted the PC and immediately got a disk error message. After a lot of work I decided to switch the master and the slave disk(they are both identical and could both be formatted) and then try again. The disk I used for this second install however, was older and much much slower, so the new installation seemed to take forever. After the installation had completed the system was still much much slower than before. To solve this problem I downloaded a freeware software package called Easeus Todo Backup and cloned my C:-disk to the faster D:-disk(including a format to get rid of the disk-errors I mentioned before). Obviously I let this run at night as it is as much fun to watch a clone-operation as it is to watch paint dry...

The next morning I swapped the two disks back again, so the new and faster(cloned) hard disk became the C:-disk again and Lo and Behold! Speed!! I then disconnected the D:-drive because it may interfere with the operation of my PC and make it slow down, and I will only use that drive if my C:-drive fails to recover the system. As I have external USB-disks I am not short for disk space anyway. My C:-disk NEVER holds user-data.

As a part of the rebuild of the PC I also removed everything that was/is not completely necessary for the PC to work properly. I now have my sound back. The SoundBlaster Live! turned out to be defective so I'm now running the audio over the on-board sound chip(a standard Realtek AC97). To my big surprise I have absolutely no complaints about the audio-quality. I installed the Realtek driver-suite though, instead of just the driver, and that makes all the difference. For such a simple on-board chip it has very extensive settings, including an effects section and most importantly; a 16-band equalizer.

I can also play video properly again, something that I could not do for about one and a half years when it ran Ubuntu 10.4. And yes, to all you Linux-lovers out there; I did install ALL the codecs I could find.

On top of that I found that one of the disks was getting really old and therefore terribly slow. This may have cause sluggishness in the old configuration because I suspect that Linux checks all disks frequently and writes a control record to each disk. As the write operations on the slow/old disk really took a long time to complete, I experienced 'hick-ups' when using the system. Especially Firefox would just 'hang' for 5 to 10 seconds and then continue as if nothing had happened.

My PC is now really really fast. As a properly tuned 2.4Ghz PC should be...


Configuration :

Hardware :

• Processor        : 2.4Ghz Intel
• Memory          : 1024MB
• Motherboard   : Intel PB4GL(82845G chipset)
• Internal disks   : 1x 40GB(I do not keep data on my internal disks)
• External disks  : 1 x 160GB USB and 1 x 460GB USB
• Audio/Video     : Onboard chips, no additional cards.
• Sound system  : Soundblaster 5x Sensurround Set with subwoofer

Software :

• OS                  : WindowsXP Professional
• Virus checker  : AntiVir
• Browsers        : Firefox 3.x, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer 8.x
• Email               : Outlook 2007
• Office software: Microsoft Office 2007
• Audio Software : Virtual DJ 6.0
• Utilities             : ToDo Backup-/cloning-software, WinRAR, uTorrent
  

Music of the sun

The sun has been the inspiration for hundreds of songs, but now scientists have discovered that the star at the centre of our solar system produces its own music.

Source.

I'm going slightly mad...

Laptop has been in for repairs for about five weeks now. And I am slowly but surely going around the bend.

What I Am Reading Now - The Hotel New Hampshire

The Hotel New Hampshire is probably Irving's best novel to date, although "The World According To Garp" was a masterpiece too and "A Prayer For Owen Meanie" still reverberates in my mind. The Hotel New Hampshire though, is absolutely the most emotionally gripping novel by Irving that I have read.

The story is way too complicated to explain here so let me just make a few observations. You can read the whole(very accurate) wiki-entry by clicking on the link above.

The book contains all the basic elements of a true John Irving story; bears, wrestling, death, incest, you name it, it's in there. It tells the story of the Berry-family(mother, father and five children) from the moment the parents meet each other until the father's death and everything in between.

The parents run a hotel, first in the U.S.A. but later on in Vienna(Austria). They have to deal with bears(and 'State O' Maine' is not the only one), with prostitutes, with left-wing terrorist bombers, and so on. And that is really just a small part of what the book is about, the mis-en-scene. Irving never loses sight of what I think the book is about; the impact of these circumstances on the Berry family.

As far as I can see the story Irving wrote tells the path from being pretty much a dysfunctional family - or at least a super weird one - to coming to terms with each other and accepting each other for what they are. One brother is in love with his sister, another one is gay, one of the sisters doesn't grow and is basically a dwarf, etcetera.

The book was made into a movie that starred - among others - Jodie Foster and Rob Lowe. I saw it by chance, way back in the late 80ies or early 90ies, in the loft of a local cafe, because a movie had been cancelled and they had replaced it with this one. I still distinctly remember expecting nothing and consequently being extremely impressed with Rob Lowe. I knew that Jodie Foster was a brilliant actress but at the time Lowe was considered to be an actor for 'bubblegum-movies' like 'St. Elmo's Fire'. Yet here he was, convincingly playing a gay teenager coming to terms with himself as well as the people around him. Of course I was wrong about Lowe; he starred in many a good movie and I just loved his acting in The West Wing. Oh well, it's great to be wrong that way.


For me personally, after all the books I have read through the years, the words "Sorry, just not big enough" can still move me to tears as they have done many times in the past.

Read the book and judge for yourself. And Keep Passing The Open Windows.

Notes From The Organization

Most of the DJ-gig of Sunday afternoon 6th of June 2010 :

Roger Waters - The Tide Is Turning

Roger Waters - The Pros and Cons Of Hitchhiking

Laurie Anderson - O Superman

Syd Barrett - Terrapin

Peter Gabriel - I Think It's Going To Rain Today

Steve Hackett - Spectral Mornings

Muse - Knights Of Cydonia

Glass Hammer - Empty Space / Revealer

Mystery Jets - Two Doors Down

Genesis - It's Gonna Get Better

I'd Rather Go Bowling - Notes From The Organization - Part IV

The latest news, though I really don't know if it's entirely correct(Ooh yeah I Heard It Through The Grapevine!);  The threesome that handled the volunteers coordination etcetera, has now been reduced to a solo act as two of them have apparently resigned. How why and when I do not know yet. Whatever! It can't possibly get any worse than it was.

Anyway, on with the story...


But It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time!

Someone introduced a rule about two to three years ago(when I was 'on a rather long leave of absence') to 'pay' the volunteers for their work not in one way but in two ways. Payment would be in tokens(a token has a value of roughly a beer or a coke) and there would be an administration in the office so everyone would know how much tokens they were owed. In effect it meant that the pay out doubled overnight; both a token per hour as well as one drink per hour. This was quite a change, a break away from the past, because when The Organization was just the Volunteer-driven Amateur Pre-professional Organizational Riot(a.k.a. VAPOR) that everyone seems to scorn nowadays, we just used to drink something while doing our work and that was it. Yes it cost money but there really was not that much abuse compared to the total turn-over of The Organization.


Frank Zappa's Cheapness.

The newly introduced administration system also allowed for volunteers to be able to 'save' their tokens, in a bank as it were. So a volunteer could take out some tokens when he or she needed them or one could buy other things with them like specialized education... Can anyone imagine that a volunteer who makes 10 tokens(while working from 19:30 until 06:00) then saves these token to buy training that he or she can use IN The Organization?!? Like First Aid and that sort of thing? In my opinion "Cheapness" (as Frank Zappa so aptly described it on 200 Motels) was redefined by The Organization; Instead of training your volunteers at the expense of the organization, so the quality of their work would improve, the volunteers had to pay for that training themselves. Needless to say that the tokens that people were owed where typically used to BUY BEER on the volunteer's night off, not on specialized training.


Balancing the books.

Of course there was another and much bigger operational problem with this system : The Proper And Timely Administration Of The Tokens Earned. Keep in mind that The Organization is open almost every day of the week so volunteers earned tokens every day of the week, which then had to be accounted for and administrated. After a while the delay in the administration meant that a volunteer had to wait an average of two to three weeks before his or her work was administrated and the token were added to their account.

A typical problem; a volunteer visits The Organization on a Tuesday and want some of his hard earned tokens. Sorry, no go, because there is no one present who is authorized to hand out tokens. This was 'solved' by supplying the bar personnel with a list of all volunteers and their 'credit'. This way the barman could make a note when ever a drink was ordered and these lists would then be entered into the database a.s.a.p.(otherwise known as 'In Two Weeks') by the official administrator in the main office.


Having Your Tokens And Having Them Too.

It gets worse : a rule was instated that said that a volunteer was entitled to drinks on his credit as long as the list had not been updated! Stunning!! Can anyone see the operational problems that this stupid rule causes? How about a volunteer who has 5 tokens/drinks on his credit and drinks them on Tuesday night. The same volunteer comes again on Thursday night and still has the five drinks credit so he drinks them again(although the list at the bar was updated on Tuesday so there is no credit left except in the computer database). The volunteer is now five drinks in the red and has to work five hours to get back to zero.
  
Now multiply the number of drinks because some volunteers had 35 credits on monday and had used up 135 monday a week later(until the list was officially updated).
    
  
So the problems that The Organization caused all by itself without anyone else to blame for them :

1. Extra administration that was not done in a timely fashion and therefore caused problems when paying out a volunteer.

2. People 'going in the red' on their credit, sometimes up to 150 drinks(!). First inadvertently, as time went by on purpose.

3. Double the cost as compared to the old system in which a volunteer 'just' got a couple of drinks.

4. Preferential treatment. As in serving the volunteers you like extra drinks for free.

5. Angry volunteers who have just worked their collective asses off during the weekend, and then could not get some of their tokens because there was no one in the office.


Introducing The Hard Line.
    
As I have described in a previous 'I'd rather go bowling'-item, The Organization ultimately discovered that their system did not work and worse; That It Was Costing Them A Fortune. So a meeting was organized for all volunteers(see previous entries) and a list of draconian and short-sighted measures were announced. To give one example; each cafe-crew ideally consists of three people; one barman and one DJ, and one backup for the two. Especially now that smoking has been banned in the whole building you need a third person to take over if one of the other two wants to go outside to have a smoke. Also; if one of the three is ill or otherwise unavailable you immediately have your backup available.
  
This crew-configuration btw, is what I was responsible for when I did the cafe coordination and it was an official agreement between 'The Office' and 'The Cafe'. Four people in a crew as the absolute maximum but three as the general number of crew-members per evening. However; as part of the new rules it was ordained that only two people would be allowed to work on any cafe evening, and that they would be allowed to have one drink per hour during opening hours(!). This may sound reasonable but it isn't. Opening hours were probably assumed to be from 20:00 until 00:00 but a cafe-crew would typically come in around 19:15 to check everything and to prepare the bar. The bar then would be open until at least 01:30 after which it had to be cleaned. In reality a bar-evening did not last for four hours, it lasted for at least six to seven hours.
    
Ultimately the result of these new rules was that quite some people refused to work for The Organization as they were of the opinion that they did not earn anything for themselves but for The Organization instead, and that this squeezing dry of the volunteers went too far.

A little while after having quit my cafe-coordinator work over all the amateur crap that 'the management' managed to pull, I suggested that maybe they should not pay the volunteers extra tokens but just let them have a drink while they're working. That would cut the cost of the volunteers in half immediately and they would all just be going back to the old situation that no one had ever had a problem with. Of course I did not get an immediate response and I'm absolutely not saying that my words had any influence, but a couple of weeks ago The Organization finally came to their collective management senses and did just that; the new internal policy regarding the volunteers has been revoked so it's all as good as back to the old status quo again.
      
Which begs the question : Why On Earth did no one consult the people who actually know how The Organization works internally? Who have so many years of experience that they have seen these new rules come and go many many many times? Because really; this has been one big blunder from start to finish and it has alienated yet more people. As if The Organization can afford to lose more motivated volunteers still...


Rocket Science.
        
If people want to organize things perhaps they should realize that organizing matters properly is a True Profession that you can study for at the University. And a little bit of emphasis on People's Management would not be a bad thing either.  Because it really isn't rocket science.

Oil

Oil, Oil, You can get it now for free.
Just come down to the shoreline where the water used to be.

Steve Forbert - "Oil Song" from the 1970's

Bad marketing...

Jeez...

Hackers

The replacement text is juvenile and on the verge of racist. Still, nice trick if you can do it!
Link

May 25th...

A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitchhiker) discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, washcloth, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet-weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitchhiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitchhiker might accidentally have “lost”. What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

Just chillaxin', he twat...

The people over at Lake Superior State University have compiled their 'banished words' list again.

"The list this year is a 'teachable moment' conducted free of 'tweets,'" said a Word Banishment spokesman who was "chillaxin'" for the holidays. "'In these economic times', purging our language of 'toxic assets' is a 'stimulus' effort that's 'too big to fail.'"

Project Gutenberg - The Web Is Useful But Not Vital

Once upon a time back in 1970, a man named Michael S. Hart did some work for the University of Illinois. He was rewarded with almost unlimited access to the mainframe they operated. As Hart wanted to do something useful, he set up a system whereby all books would ultimately be digitized an stored on the mainframe. The format would have to be plain and simple ASCII so all future computers would still be able to read the data.

Project Gutenberg has now been in existence for almost 40 years and is still going strong. This despite the effort of Google to do the same work over again.

All of the materials on Project Gutenberg are either so old that they are copyright free or the copyright has been waved by the original author.

Link

Notes From The Organization

Ok, so May 16th 2010, Sunday afternoon : A cafe full(I mean FULL!) of people, a progrock-band playing unplugged for two hours, a pretty massive consumption of beer and lemonades, and an atmosphere you will not find anywhere else or on any other 'night' in The Organization. The audience were so quiet that you could frequently hear a pin drop. If there would have been falling pins... And on the other hand half the audience sang along to Genesis' Ripples(SAIL AWAY AWAYYYYYY!!!).

The gig started off with 'The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway" including the piano intro et al. Not a bad start at all. *grin*
  
The band played songs from ELP's first album, songs by the great Harry Sacksioni(obviously a favourite of the guitarist!). Hell, they even played stuff from 'And Then There Were Three', one of the most underrated records Genesis ever recorded. And no; it wasn't 'Follow You Follow Me' they played, it was 'Burning Rope'.

"You climb upon a burning rope
to escape the mob below
But you had put the flaming out
so the others could not follow"


But ProgRock is dead of course. That is what I hear from many many ignorant peasants so it must be true.

Stupid Idiots In The U.S.A.

Autistic Boy Charged With Making Terrorist Threats Over Stick-Figure Sketch

The stupidity and paranoia of these folks never ceases to amaze me...

I'd Rather Go Bowling - Notes From The Organization - Part III

Ok, so the latest I heard is that there are now already several DJ's and bar-people who refuse to work for The Organization because of what they believe to be unfair and unworkable conditions. I sympathize and I agree with them completely. Of course you should not become a volunteer for the money or the beer, but what is happening now is the reverse: the failings of upper management are being paid for by the volunteers.

The new rules are mostly and quite squarely aimed at the cafe-activities, not so much at the band- or party-nights. What's much worse is that some people in The Organization believe this cafe cost reduction to be the magic bullet. Now I don't see how people can miss this but they do; even if/when the cafe-activities would run like clockwork and be extremely efficient and cost effective it still would not be enough to solve the insolvency of The Organization by far. In the 'good old days'(I'm talking 5 years ago here) the cafe only contributed a little bit to the total revenue of The Organization. What it did do was give people a chance to learn how to organize activities, which every now and then were moved to the main hall and turned into a big partynight. The cafe as the incubation room of The Organization. Every time such a new party was born it made a hell of a lot of money. Through the years this was how The Organization managed to put up decent parties without spending a truck load of money on outsiders. Nowadays the general and incorrect concensus is that the cafe has to be cost effective in itself.

I had several talks about this yesterday. Of course it is now easy for me to give advice, after all; I am now only a bar-man / DJ. Hearing several people, what struck me as odd is that the reality of the situation(change upper management's way of doing business before anything can be improved) is still not clear to everyone.

For example : who said that the price of a drink cannot go up? Ever? The price of a drink has not gone up in over 4 years while cost has been soaring. Increase the price by 5 percent(which basically comes down to a dime per beer) and you immediately make an estimated  8.000 to 10.000  euros a year more. It's a start. Then use that money to build a smoking room in The Organization which will then make much more money than it does now. I estimate that the total cost of the smoking room would be earned back within three to four months.

Of course this would mean an active role for the board... Oh well, one can dream...

What I am reading now.

Anthem was the sole inspiration of Neil Peart when he wrote the lyrics to Rush' 2112. It's quite an interesting read, somewhere in between George Lucas' THX-1138 and Orwell's Nineteen-Eighty-Four. Anthem was written well before Nineteen-Eighty-Four so no one can accuse Rand of copying the master.

Anthem is a novella, a short novel. As such it is remarkably well written. It does not have the 'John Galt'-bias that most of her later stories have.

You can download the novella for free from gutenberg (I'll write an entry about that website soon).

Some music on this day , some music that will last a lifetime.

Van Der Graaf Generator


- White Hammer
- Darkness

UK - Carrying No Cross

Jethro Tull - Aqualung(album)

People -- what have you done

locked Him in His golden cage.

Made Him bend to your religion

Him resurrected from the grave.

He is the god of nothing -

if that's all that you can see.

You are the god of everything

He's inside you and me.

So lean upon Him gently

and don't call on Him to save you

from your social graces

and the sins you used to waive.

The bloody Church of England

in chains of history

requests your earthly presence at

the vicarage for tea.

And the graven image you-know-who

with His plastic crucifix

he's got him fixed

confuses me as to who and where and why

as to how he gets his kicks.

Confessing to the endless sin

the endless whining sounds.

You'll be praying till next Thursday to

all the gods that you can count.

Boston - Piece Of Mind

Styx

- Mademoiselle
- Light Up
- Fooling Yourself

You see the world through your cynical eyes
You're a troubled young man I can tell
You've got it all in the palm of your hand
But your hand's wet with sweat and your head needs a rest

And you're fooling yourself if you don't believe it
You're kidding yourself if you don't believe it

Why must you be such an angry young man
When your future looks quite bright to me
How can there be such a sinister plan
That could hide such a lamb, such a caring young man

You're fooling yourself if you don't believe it
You're kidding yourself if you don't believe it

Get up, get back on your feet
You're the one they can't beat and you know it
Come on, let's see what you've got
Just take your best shot and don't blow it

You're fooling yourself if you don't believe it
You're killing yourself if you don't believe it

Get up, get back on your feet
You're the one they can't beat and you know it
Come on, let's see what you've got
Just take your best shot and don't blow it


Salmon - Shazz

Books I Am Currently Reading

1. 
   Larry Niven : Rainbow Mars

I'd Rather Go Bowling - Notes From The Organization - Part II

Well well well... just as I thought. The Organization(as I will call it from now on) is going to economize by squeezing the last drop of motivation from the volunteers. All rules, no rights, current regulations suspended or plain cancelled, compensation for hours worked cut in half, etcetera etcetera.

We did this before and ultimately decided that the volunteers should not be the ones to suffer from a bad economy or bad management. But I guess they are re-inventing the wheel again.
     
It will all be in vain. Nothing can stop The Organization from hemmoraging money except for a good solution for the smoking ban, better internal management and especially; some really well attended concerts and parties.

Don't save money, MAKE money!

And in the meantime I keep wondering how much the board members get from the local government for the fantastic job they are doing...

I'd Rather Go Bowling - Notes From The Organization

Communication Is The Only Way
              
I work in the cafe of a concerthall every now and then. This is strictly volunteer work but it's fun; DJ-ing and taking care of the bar and all that. Until last week I was also the cafe-coordinator; someone the people could call if they really didn't know where else to go for advice. By and by over the last years this coordinatorship had turned into an almost full managerial job.
                 
The problem with the organization that I worked in/with however, is the almost complete lack of knowledge when it comes to efficient internal communications on the one hand, and the total lack of discipline when maintaining any rule of good communications that they are handed on a silver platter. For the record : I gladly exclude the one or two people in the organization who have actually read a book about the subject in their life, but in general these people do not even know how to write proper minutes.
                                   
Of course you may now think 'Is that all? You can run a organization without minutes and all those things'. Yes, but the lack of communicational and organizational skills is much worse than it looks. Because this organisation is run by volunteers who do not see each other too often, who have day jobs, etcetera, communication must keep flowing like water, using all means available such as email, internal forums or down-to-earth meetings and minutes.

Trust But Verify
                                         
What compounds the problem is that there is supposed to be a - completely new - management, or rather a 'board of directors' monitoring it all. Unfortunately the members of said board can be defined as 'people you never see in the building'. Some time after the government take over of the organization - say about a year ago - this board appointed a managing director to take care of the internal organization. Suffice it to say that - although I am not fainting in admiration at the man's skills - I can see that his job is impossible to do with the current people running around and taking care of things. This is a failure by the board to lead, to organize and then to step back. Ronald Reagan's famous words come to mind : "Trust But Verify".


Have A Smoke And A Smile
                                              
Unfortunately the situation is getting worse and worse now that the government is cracking down on smoking in public places. The organization has had almost two years to come up with a solution but didn't do crap all. So now that the local government(the owners of the building) have demanded a ban on smoking in the whole building, the organization does not have a single alternative. There have been proposals coming from the work floor but they have all been deemed 'too expensive'. We'll have to wait and see if that is still the case when the turnover will drop and drop and drop over the next couple of months. I have seen no official figures so I can make an estimate without violating any trust given to me; I think total revenues have gone down more then 50 %. Frankly; I think the whole place is definitely doomed if they don't come up with a solution in the next month or so. After all; coming up with a plan is one thing, executing it in a timely fashion is something else altogether.
                               
The 'smoking-problem' is a perfect example of the structural problem in the organization: You can see the problem coming, you ignore it for as long as possible, and ultimately you have not even made a financial reservation to be able to come up with a solution. Don't even look at what the competition(e.g. the professional bars and cafe's) do. Don't even take into consideration that most of them still condone smoking until the fines get too high, because they fear that otherwise they will go bankrupt. And don't even look at what it is going to cost you to be more catholic than the Pope.

One Vision
                                       
There is one other major problem and that is the complete lack of vision by the board members and the complete lack of information that flows from the board to the volunteers. Basically, the volunteers can go and play in their little sandbox like Linus Van Pelt, but they should not come out under any circumstances. I could indeed quote StarTrek : 'Resistance Is Futile'.
                                     
When compared to the situation as it was until a few years ago, the first thing that went out the windows under the new local government management was the input and the responsibility of the volunteers for what goes on at a higher level in the organization. This is of course lethal for the initiatives and the ambitions of exactly those volunteers who can really make a difference if they would be allowed to.
                                
If the current board would have formulated a proper policy for the next three to five years this situation would be something that(almost) everyone could live with. In the current 'I Amp Volunteer So Ai Know Nothink' culture that pervades the organization, no volunteer knows anything about anything except where to report to work in the cleanup crew or what time to show up for their 9 hour bar-shift.

                          
Breakdown

So it took another year but last week it was there; that moment when you are so fed up with a situation that you just can't seem to improve, that you basically just stop trying and give up.
                          
In the course of trying to get things working better, a communications breakdown occurred again last week when all the volunteers were invited for a meeting. First of all the communication was severely misdirected. People who no longer work for the organisation received email-invitations while others who still work their asses off did not receive one at all. The email-notice for said meeting was two days. The meeting had been planned while the cafe in the building was supposed to be open, etcetera. Oh! And it was also planned on Mothers' Day at four in the afternoon...

After complaining about this(I admit; loudly) via an email I was told by the person who wrote the actual email that he wrote it on the orders of someone else and he did not feel like discussing the contents of the email. Actually, he used other words as in 'not needing any conversation about this shit' but I'll try to stay polite on my blog.
                   
It was the straw that broke the camel's back so I quit as the cafe-coordinator. I do not stand for these kind of responses, especially when it is so crystal clear that something is being handled wrong. And this sort of thing has happened with alarming frequency for quite some time now.
                  
                    
If people don't want to listen then I'm going to let them do it their way. Because I'd rather go bowling.

Taxman

TaxMan

Let me tell you

How it will be.

There's one for you,

Nineteen for me,

'Cause I'm the taxman.

Yeah, I'm the taxman.

Should five percent

Appear too small,

Be thankful I don't

Take it all.

'Cause I'm the taxman.

Yeah, I'm the taxman.

If you drive a car,

I'll tax the street.

If you drive to the city,

I'll tax your seat.

If you get too cold,

I'll tax the heat.

If you take a walk,

I'll tax your feet.

Taxman!

'Cause I'm the taxman

Yeah, I'm the taxman.

Don't ask me what I want it for,

If you don't want to pay some more.

'Cause I'm the taxman.

Yeah, I'm the taxman.

And my advice to

Those who die.

(Taxman!)

Declare the pennies

On your eyes.

(Taxman!)

'Cause I'm the taxman.

Yeah, I'm the taxman,

And you're working for no one but me.

Taxman!)

Apple Inc - Maximizing Profit: Anything For A Buck?

I do not use Apple products although they look very slick and nice. Never caught a blow from the ol' Apple Windmill. And I seriously doubt if I'll purchase anything by the company anytime soon.

Everybody who has been following the ICT developments over the years knows - or should know - that Steve Jobs may be a design visionary, he also rules Apple like a potentate. Stories of how he checked 150 shades of black to get 'just the right kind of black' for his computer-casing may be charmingly quirky, but they tend to cover up the less friendly and eccentric sides of Jobs(and Apple).

The other day Gizmodo got their hands on a new IPhone. Apparently it was left/lost by an Apple-employee and then sold to Gizmodo by the lucky finder.

So far so 'good'. Mister Jobs has been known to throw employees out of the building when they blundered like that but ok; it IS pretty stupid to leave a new prototype IPhone in a restaurant.


But now the home/office of the writer of the Gizmodo-article has been raided by the police, although that has been deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

So what we have here is a company that wants to decide what you can see on your IPod, on your IPhone, and on your Personal(!) Computer(ITunes anyone?).

And all this while back in 1984 this same company produced one of the most famous commercials in history, in which they accused IBM of being Big Brother...  History has come around again. And it's biting Apple up it's royal fat ass.

Recently Apple announced that there would be no 'Porn-apps' for the IPhone or the IPad(although apparently the Playboy App was not a problem...). Erm.... Excuse me? Even Bill Gates never wanted to decide which content was/is suitable for you. As long as people watched it on their Windows PC.

Jobs is trying to control the content of the Internet. He will fail, but what an incredibly stupid move.

On this beautiful Saturday afternoon...

There must be music!

Donald Fagen - I.G.Y.
Donald Fagen - The Goodbye Look
Donald Fagen - The New Frontier
Donald Fagen - Walk Between The Raindrops


Don Henley - Not Enough Love In The World
Don Henley - Building The Perfect Beast


Michael McDonald - I Keep Forgettin'


Duran Duran - Save A Prayer
Duran Duran - Wild Boys


The Beatles - Got To Get You Into My Life




Al Stewart - Merlin's Time


The Beatles - Eleanor Rigby
The Beatles - For No One




Al Stewart - Almost Lucky


Gerry Rafferty - Get It Right Next Time


Fleetwood Mac - The Chain
Fleetwood Mac - Dreams

TBC...

The Ludicrous Glenn Beck

Here's an informative story about the person who is trying to become a real life Howard Beale.

The problem is that God is giving The Plan, I think, to me [...] I think the plan that the Lord would have us follow is hard for people to understand. But I'm telling you, here's what I feel with everything in me.



And here is Jon Stewarts unsurpassed and absolutely brilliant parody of the guy.

"Glenn Beck didn't want to have to tell you that people who believe in safety belts are killing America."

A Poem For The Ages

And death shall have no dominion

Dead men naked they shall be one

With the man in the wind and the west moon;

When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,

They shall have stars at elbow and foot;

Though they go mad they shall be sane,

Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again

Though lovers be lost love shall not;

And death shall have no dominion.

"And death shall have no dominion" by Dylan Thomas

Serious Music Cafe 18/04/2010 Riverside Live In Paradiso

DJ Lenne and his mates 'did' a serious music cafe again yesterday. These sunday afternoons are dedicated to ProgRock, ProgMetal and related genres.

Yesterday saw a cafe very much focussed on Progressive Metal. The CD of the month was by Knight Area and the music played was mainly Progressive Metal. The video played was of a concert in Paradiso by Riverside, a band from Poland, which I must say is very much Progressive Metal. Fun to see how the long haired fierce looking gentlemen of the band took a deep bow after the show, almost modestly accepting the audience's cheers and praise. I have seen a lot of bands with a hell of a lot worse attitude.

The latest Knight Area CD was the prize in a ticket raffle so somebody went home with an extra bit of music in his pocket!

Two weeks from now there will be a much more classic progrock sunday afternoon, and on May 16th there will be a band performing.

We may be quite a while away from Tilburg or even Zoetermeer, but it goes to show again : one can play Progressive Music everywhere.




(Overheard this afternoon: Riverside, Katatonia, Knight Area, etc.)

Heroes

I guess we all know the details already. Still a great article about heroes

The Most Useless Publication Of Lyrics On The Interwebs!

Mahna mahna

(ba dee bedebe)

mahna mahna

(ba debe dee)

mahna mahna

(ba dee bedebe badebe badebe dee dee de-de de-de-de)

(repeats)

mah mama na mahna mah namwomp mwomp

ma mo mo mana mo

mahna mahna

(ba dee bedebe)

mahna mahna

(ba debe dee)

Mahna Mahna!

(ba dee bedebe bedebe badebe debe de-de de-de-de)

(long pause)

...mahna mahna?

Seriously...

ProgRock > 1985 - The Second Wave

Last night was a fun night, even though I had to work on my tax forms. As long as there's ProgRock I will not complain.

Transatlantic - My New World


IQ - The Darkest Hour
IQ - Failsafe


Glass Hammer - Revelation / Chronometry


Dream Theater - Pull Me Under
Dream Theater - A Nightmare To Remember


GTR - Hackett To Bits


Klaatu - Set The World On Fire

Music tonight...

A bit of what used to be...

Tears for Fears - Advice for the young at heart
The Hollies - He ain't heavy, he's my brother
A-Ha - Hunting High and Low


Bonnie Tyler & Todd Rundgren - Lovin' you's a dirty job(but somebody's got to do it)
Linda Ronstadt - Tracks of my Tears
Jim Croce - You don't mess around with Jim


Carpenters - Rainy days and mondays
Gilber O' Sullivan - We Will
Cher -Walking in Memphis
Cat Power - Ramblin' Woman
Robert Cray - Right Next Door
John Lee Hooker - The Healer

I almost made a dreadful mistake : Apres Ski Must Die!!

Ok, so I see this as a dreadful mistake where others will not understand what I get so upset for. But still...

I almost made a dreadful mistake and it has taught me to do better research before accepting a DJ-gig.

Some time ago somebody asked me to join in for an evening as a DJ on what they incorrectly call 'Apres Ski'. It is named aptly incorrect because I live in The Netherlands and there really are no Dutch Mountains, let alone Dutch Mountains with Lots of Snow... (Full Disclosure : I've never ever even been on a ski-ing holiday). ;)

Now I know that there are hardly any standards when it comes to that 'style' and after all; how can you name a serious style after a boozerama-Fest?

So although I did have some ideas about what to play on the night(go real bad and play Wham, Abba, yes; I would even put aside most of my musical principles and play Boney M!),  I investigated 'Apres Ski' a bit more. I Also checked the torrent-sites to see what kind of Apres Ski CD's were being released.


My Word And I Don't Fucking Believe It! I am definitely most certainly so NOT going to DJ on saturday!

Holy Fuck what an incredibly bad taste in music must you have to DJ on such a night!!!

I just found a whole load of Apres Ski CD's ready for download and they made a chill run down my spine. I was transported back to the days when my parents used to like that stuff and the rest would curse it whole heartedly.

Believe it or not : Boney M is not even at the same level as this drivel; Boney M are an artistic landmark compared to this Apres Ski shit.

No way Jose: I have my principles. I don't even want to be there as a guest so I absolutely Do Not Want To Hear Any Of This Bleh!

Now I know why some people call me a musical elitist, or even a musical snob. If these people believe that Apres Ski is music than I AM ONE BIG FUCKING ELITIST SNOB!!! And very, very! proud of it.

I know that there are people who absolutely adore this shit. Some are even friends. They go so far as to travel to the big city to hear it! I am allergic to it. Possible also because I have seen studio-guys put this kind of crap together in the studio in my days.

And now for another cup of coffee to get rid of the bad taste in my mouth. To think that I actually almost was an Apres Ski DJ. Brrrrrrrr... This was a very close shave.


P.S. As an afterthought I just realized that if I wanted to I could blow the doors of the bloody cafe with my Apres Ski DJ-set. The only thing I would have to do is recall my parents dutch language record collection. Jan Boezeroen, Rob de Nijs, Gert en Hermien, Zangeres zonder Naam(Mexico-hoooo!), De Kermisklanten, etcetera, supplemented by a bit of German: Freddy Quinn, Marianne Rosenberg, Freddy Breck, Heino(!!!).

I am SO glad that those days are over!

Another day, another forum.

First : Heads up for the Dutch Progressive Rock Page !
 
The 'Now Playing' thread is very informative. Only if you like that kind of stuff of course, which I do. So much so that I don't want to discuss my tastes anymore on some other laymen's forum where people still think Progressive Rock means Yes or Marillion. How On Earth people think they can judge ProgRock without even knowing Gentle Giant or Soft Machine is a mystery to me anyway.

As an extra, here are some of the more relevant wiki-entries to ProgRock, ProgMetal, etcetera :

Progressive_Rock
Progressive_metal
List of progressive metal artists
Symphonic Rock

and a couple of useful links to some ProgRock-sites :

Dutch Progressive Rock Page
Prog Archives
Prog Rock Startpagina(dutch)

The Annotated Lamb

It must have been a very rainy day... But still, quite a nice read if you're into ProgRock and especially into Genesis.

"Hackett's guitar weavings became an integral part of the moody atmosphere, as Banks wisely kept his keyboard playing melodic and lyrical instead of succumbing to the obvious desire to create a Third World War like so many of his peers and contemporaries."

The Annotated Lamb

Vot are U plaiying nov...?

ELP - Still You Turn Me On
ELP - Lucky Man
Tony Banks - Still It Takes Me By Surprise
Steve Hackett - Every Day
Styx - Fooling Yourself
Kansas - The Wall . Miracles Out Of Nowhere
Queen - Procession / Father To Son

For now...

Fresh crop for sunday

Managed to get hold of the complete Emerson Lake and Palmer. 'Still you turn me on' and all that.

Also got my hands on some Pendragon, Pineapple Thief and some more bands like that. Quite interesting, and always good to have when you DJ a ProgRock set.

The Downfall Of A Would-Be Empire

America is definitely decaying fast. Yes; although both big parties have been fucking about since Reagan, thinking politics first and country(perhaps) second, the Republicans are to be blamed by far the most, with their idiotic hate-speeches, their tea-parties, their death-panel hoaxes and so on. Not to mention putting a complete political nobody, an empty head like Sarah Palin right smack into the middle of national politics. Also; one would think that after eight years of 'Compassionate Conservative' G.W. Bush in the White House, the Republicans would have learned some humility. Not so!

The Republicans have turned renaming and rebranding stuff they don't like into a high art form. 'Anti-abortion' became 'Pro-Life', trying to restrict the ownership of weapons of course became 'Constitutional Infringement', 'Creationism' became 'Intelligent Design', 'Government Healthcare Plan' became 'Socialism', 'Fascism' 'Communism' and 'Nazism' at the same time(quite an accomplishment!), etcetera etcetera.

Oh! And Barack Obama is a Kenyan-born muslim socialist as well as the Anti-Christ who has illegally usurped the presidency... Such idiocy makes european politics pale by comparison.

What I feared for some time now is coming true fast, which is that at some point-of-no-return, part of the american public will actually start to believe these republican fables and fantasies. And that is the moment that you will lose control Mr. and Mrs. Republican. That is the moment that you will become Pontius Pilate, washing your hands in innocence while your raging idiot-followers burn down the house and threaten children.


Coffin placed on Carnahan's lawn

A coffin was placed on a Missouri Democrat’s lawn, another in a string of incidents against lawmakers after their vote Sunday on a health care overhaul.
Rep. Russ Carnahan (D-Mo.) had a coffin placed “near his home,” a spokesman said Wednesday evening. This came after Rep. Tom Perriello’s (D-Va.) brother’s gas lines were cut, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) received death threats and Rules Committee Chairwoman Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.) received a message saying snipers were being deployed to kill children of those who voted for health care overhaul.

Several other Democrats have had threats leveled against them, prompting a closed-door briefing of Democratic members by the FBI, Capitol Police and the House Sergeant at Arms.

"Carnahan appreciates thoughtful feedback received both in favor and opposition of health insurance reform,” Carnahan spokesman Jim Hubbard told POLITICO Wednesday evening “We can disagree on important issues facing our country without resorting to this kind of thing. Russ Carnahan isn’t going to shy away from the importance of reform when 45,000 fellow Americans died last year due to a lack of health insurance.”

When a population goes after its own children it is only a matter of time before the house comes crashing down. This may only be a threat, but just wait; once an idea has been floating around there will ultimately be some ungodly asshole to turn it into a reality.

Back to the old lyrics freak angle...

The warming sun, the cooling rain,
The snowflake drifting on the breath of the breeze,
The lightning bolt that frees the sky for you
Yet only eagles seem to pass on through.
The words of love, the cries of hate,
And the man in the moon who seduced you
Then finally loosed you.

You climbed upon a burning rope to escape the mob below,,
But you had put the flaming out so that others could now follow,
To be out of the bounds and the barks of those who do not wish you well.

You must blaze a trail of your own, unknown, alone,
But keep in mind
Don't live today for tomorrow like you were immortal.
The only survivors on this world of ours are
The warming sun, the cooling rain,

You're old and disillusioned now as you realise at last,
That all all you have accomplished here will have soon all turned to
dust.
You dream of a future after life, well that's as maybe, I don't know.
But you can't take what you left behind, you're all alone.
So keep in mind
Don't live today for tomorrow like you were immortal.
The only survivors on this world of ours are
The warming sun, the cooling rain,
The snowflake drifting on the breath of the breeze,
The lightning bolt that frees the sky for you
Yet only eagles seem to pass on through.
The words of love, the cries of hate,
And the man in the moon...

But you had put the flaming out so that others could now follow,
To be out of the bounds and the barks of those who do not wish you well.

You must blaze a trail of your own, unknown, alone,
But keep in mind
Don't live today for tomorrow like you were immortal.
The only survivors on this world of ours are
The warming sun, the cooling rain,
The snowflake drifting on the breath of the breeze,
The lightning bolt that frees the sky for you
Yet only eagles seem to pass on through.
The words of love, the cries of hate,
And the man in the moon who seduced you
Then finally loosed you.

You're old and disillusioned now as you realise at last,
That all all you have accomplished here will have soon all turned to
dust.
You dream of a future after life, well that's as maybe, I don't know.
But you can't take what you left behind, you're all alone.
So keep in mind
Don't live today for tomorrow like you were immortal.
The only survivors on this world of ours are
The warming sun, the cooling rain,
The snowflake drifting on the breath of the breeze,
The lightning bolt that frees the sky for you
Yet only eagles seem to pass on through.
The words of love, the cries of hate,
And the man in the moon...

(One of my five favourite lyrics)

Can't dance, can't sing, can make a little money...

Boys will be boys...

Axl Buffett!

Fuckheads, retards and bureaucrats

Around 09:20 this morning I was reminded by my phone that I had to be at the dentist... Fat lot of good that'll do, something wrong in the configuration, it should have warned me yesterday. As should my email here at work have done btw.
 
So I immediately called the dentist to check and lo and behold! I did have an appointment. So I said 'Sorry about that, and can we check the other appointments to make sure that they are ok?'. 'Of course sir, yes... they are all correct. We'll see you on the 26th'. Also, they said they had called me and emailed me. Ri-i-ght... both my email address and my phone number were registered incorrectly. That's one hell of an achievement considering I wrote the info down for them myself, and that they had already contacted me several times by phone...
      
Oh well... So ten minutes later I get a call from the same dentist office to inform me that they will have to charge me for the missed appointment. Ok, I can understand that, you have to pay a fine... Until they told me that the cost would be the complete cost of a normal treatment! That means including the shots, the gear, the whole fucking lot. So just because they can go and have a coffee instead of overcharging their patients I also have to pay for their unused materials!!!
  
I told the lady politely that I had been extremely flexible every time they called me up to ask if I could come the next morning because someone else cancelled an appointment, and that I find these cost completely over the top. I also stated that there was nothing to be done about it anyway so I did not see the use of getting into a discussion about it. The lady then said that I had missed appointments previously and that this was/is one of the reasons that they would charge me for the treatment. I informed the woman that that then would have been over 5 years ago(!!!) AND that I had cancelled those appointments perfectly ahead of time AND with perfectly valid reasons.
  
She had to look it up and what I said was completely true. She said she would discuss it all internally. I told her that would be nice, but that for the rest I am not counting on flexibility from anyone in this world any more. I was very polite but also very annoyed to be honest. On the one hand I can service them(while being the patient!) when they have holes in their schedule, but on the other hand they show no flexibility whatsoever.
  
Of course this means one thing for sure : the next time they call me and ask if I can be flexible and go to the dentist at a different date than the appointments that already have been set, they can forget it. Flexibility works both ways, I am not going to go to my boss to rearrange my schedule to please the dentist anymore. Let them charge someone else for their valuable time...


It seems to me that this kind of unreasonable shit is occurring more and more in life. A friend of mine just put an article up on his own blog pondering over what it means to get to be fifty years old. Well Alfred, from what I have seen(and I am not yet 50, I'll grant you that); one of the things it means is that you start to get more and more impatient with people trying to shit you.

Am I right? :)

Just a great poem that inspired great songs

Richard Cory

Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.

And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.

And he was rich—yes, richer than a king,
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.

So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.

Late Night Song - Another One...

Get out of the way fat man. You got something to do
Go fill up your hands till they're shining up at you.
You gotta get out while there's gold in the air
It's falling like water, coming down from the hills.

Go West young man
Earn a dollar a day just like your family said.
You're rolling your days right on into the night
The head of the line's going way out of sight.
Go West young man like your family said

All along the wagons
All along the dusty trail.
Seventeen years not over a day
Like children in the wild.
Your mother's milk still wet on your face
And no one to pray for your safe journey home.

Out beyond the desert
Across the mountains by the fall.
Servants who leave their masters house
Are walking all the way.
The golden fields that beckoned you
Are darkened by the years.

Go West Young Man
If you knew then what you know today
You'd be back where you started a happier man
And leave all the glory to those who have remained.

So Go West Young Man
Go West Young Man, like your family said.

Late night song...

A Song With A Real Song Meaning...

Fifty thousand men were sent to do the will of one.
His claim was phrased quite simply, though he never voiced it loud,
I am he, the chosen one.

In his name they could slaughter, for his name they could die.

Then one whose faith had died
Though many there were believed in him, still more were sure he lied,
But they'll fight the battle on.


Then one whose faith had died

Fled back up the mountainside,
But before the top was made,
A misplaced footfall made him stray
From the path prepared for him.
Off of the mountain,
On to a wilderness of ice.

This unexpected vision made him stand and shake with fear,
But nothing was his fright compared with those who saw him appear.
Terror filled their minds with awe.

Simple were the folk who lived
Upon this frozen wave.
So not surprising was their thought,
This is he, God's chosen one,
Who's come to save us from
All our oppressors.
We shall be kings on this world.

Follow me!
I'll play the game you want me,
Until I find a way back home.

Follow me!
I give you strength inside you,
Courage to win your battles -

No, no, no, this can't go on,
This will be all that I fled from.
Let me rest for a while.

He walked into a valley,
All alone.
There he talked with water, and then with the vine.

They leave me no choice.
I must lead them to glory or most likely to death.

They traveled cross the plateau of ice, up to its edge.
Then they crossed a mountain range and saw the final plain.
Still he urged the people on.

Then, on a distant slope,
He observed one without hope
Flee back up the mountainside.
He thought he recognised him by his walk,
And by the way he fell,
And by the way he
Stood up, and vanished into air.

For Sander

Some people think
Think they have none
They might as well stay down
Running in circles
Like bulls in a ring
'Til the sword finds it's way down

While the creep beats the rap on appeal
And the cop who can't stop
Shows the kids how to steal

And we all need some light now
We all need some light now
Yes, we all need some light now

Some people think
Think they have none
They might as well stay down
Running in circles
Like bulls in a ring
'Til the sword finds it's way down

While the creep beats the rap on appeal
And the cop who can't stop
Shows the kids how to steal

And we all need some light now
We all need some light now
Yes, we all need some light now
Turn on your light
And wash the darkness away

Hey you on the brink
Waiting to fall
To become human surplus
The movie's still shooting
You might still get the roll
And man it's all just a circus

But the clown left town long ago
Maybe he'll come back and give us a show

And we all need some light now
We all need some light now
Yes, we all need some light now
Turn on your light and wash the darkness away

Turn on your light
And wash the darkness away

Hey you on the brink
Waiting to fall
To become human surplus
The movie's still shooting
You might still get the roll
And man it's all just a circus

But the clown left town long ago
Maybe he'll come back and give us a show

And we all need some light now
We all need some light now
Yes, we all need some light now
Turn on your light and wash the darkness away

A New Life For Quality Music - And It Feels Like Coming Home

What started it all.

Quite recently I came across an article on the web that made me look at Prog Rock with an altogether different view. When I was a teenager back in the deep down dark and somewhat damp 70ies I grew up being an avid and fanatical fan of Sympho and Prog Rock. Bands like Gentle Giant, Yes, ELP, Camel, and of course Genesis, I listened to them for hours and hours, for days and days.

Of course, just like most people, I thought that this musical branch had just about died out in the early eighties.  There was Marillion, but like many musicians who had enjoyed the bands I mentioned, I always thought that this band was basically Genesis in C minor. So... I set my sights to new musical styles and if/when I played some Prog Rock it would be the 70ies bands that I loved so well.


Getting my own back.


Some years ago though, I came across Spock's Beard. A friend of mine, who happens to be the one of the biggest ProgRock fan I have ever known(Hi there Dick!) gave me a cd of these guys, and although it was well written and performed it harkened back to the old days just a bit too much to really get me enthousiastic.

So imagine my surprise when about one week ago I decided to check out what had been happening in this particular musical scene in the last 15 to 20 years. It turns out that since around the year 2.000 there has been a surge in Prog Rock that I had not been aware of. Bands like IQ(a bit older than that really), Transatlantic, Mystery Jets, The Mars Volta, etcetera, have given the scene an enormous boost. For the first time I can listen to new material that indeed is influenced by the first generation of Sympho and Prog Rock, but at the same time does not wallow in the old chord progressions and technicalities. These bands can all really play, but they have taken the style beyond what it was in its heydays. There are even a lot of power chords in that music(Alfred!)

First 'fun fact' : Although I think Radiohead are quite ok(computer...), I never understood what all the big fuss was about. Turns out that a lot of these newer bands pay homage to Radiohead because it was the first new succesful band to forget about the standard 'intro/verse/chorus/verse/chorus/solo/fade out' format. So in effect they rediscovered wat had been lost in the 80ies and the 90ies.

At the moment I am especially listening to  band like Glass Hammer, Transatlantic and Mystery Jets. After which I shall have to check out The Mars Volta in more detail.


On Retournez Toujours A Ses Premier Amour

It feels like coming home. NOT because it is the same ol' same ol' but on the contrary; these folks really went on to create the next generation of Prog Rock/Sympho. Fun fact : I have actually seen and heard quite a lot of the lesser Sympho Gods in Het Kasteel in the time that we had Dick as our programmer. Jadis, Act, Salmon, John Wetton, Colin Bass, Grey Lady Down, For Absent Friends, etcetera. In retrospect that was a bloody good job by our programmer/Prog-head.

And to top it off, Het Kasteel will very likely have its own ProgRock Cafe in the very near future. Another fun fact; I did some slightly demographic research for a cafe-evening on sunday and not very much to my surprise all the people under 24 replied that they would not be there on a sunday 'because they would still be wasted from the night before'. So... basically we have a night every week on which we can do whatever we want, and we do not have to cater to what 'the hip scene' wants to hear.  A perfect opportunity to see if we can get the more 'mature'(read 'older') cafe-visitor to drop by.


Good times are here again! And people who tell me that this music is So Last Century can go and kiss my lovely royal arse. When a band like The Mars Volta sells over 600.000 records and plays for a sold out Paradiso, what do they know?
We'll make a deal: they will get 9 out of 10 nights and the 10th is for 'us'.

And who knows : perhaps even Dick will drop by again...

Music on a relaxed saturday

Another fine saturday, let the music play!

Alan Parsons Project

- Inside Looking Out
- Paseo De Gracia

Genesis

- Ripples
- Dancing With The Moonlit Knight
- The Musical Box

UK

- Carrying No Cross
- Rendez Vous 6:02

Camel - Never Let Go

Caravan - The Show Of Our Lives

David Bowie - Warszawa

Emerson Lake & Palmer - The Only Way

For Absent Friends - Each And Every Day

Gentle Giant - In A Glass House

Greenslade
- Waltz For A Fallen Idol
- The Ass's Ears

Jethro Tull - Aqualung

Jon and Vangelis - Each And Every Day


TBC...

Han Solo?

As Dave said "A HEADLINE-WRITER WAITS AN ENTIRE CAREER"...

For this...

Book(s) I am currently reading.

 

The discovery of football in Ankh-Morpork

(that is football as in SOCCER, you uncivilized americans!)

The Lighter Side...?

The floor of a Weight Watchers clinic in Sweden collapsed beneath a group of 20 members of the weight loss programme who were gathered for a meeting.

Irony if I ever saw it...