Archive for June, 2008

Expanding The Preons Instrument Rig

June 30, 2008 by john No Comments »

I spent some time this weekend working on my guitar synth setup, which I’m planning to bring into play with The Preons. It will allow me to drive some additional tones from the guitar platform, and since I’ll be using my Strat with the synth pickup, I will also have a great electric guitar to add to our existing mayhem. We are working on a few songs that I really want to take solos on, and this will let me pull up some bass sounds underneath the guitar patches. Plus I’ll have the ability to play some skronky synth parts.

Of course, this nearly doubles the amount of stuff I need to haul to gigs… fretted bass, fretless bass, guitar synth controller, guitar synth module, effect processor pedal, amp + cabinet…. sheesh… between Brad and I we’re a mobile pawn shop.

 

Rocking The Kitchen

June 27, 2008 by john No Comments »

We’re almost done with the new granite counter installation in our kitchen, and it’s really turning out to be a beautiful look. The stone we selected is dark (almost black) with 1/4″ flecks of mica and other inclusions. Our kitchen installation was just big enough that we couldn’t do the whole thing with a single slab of granite, so we purchased two and will use the remaining material in another project.

What most amazes me about granite is that it can be worked like wood, using many of the same tools. Naturally, it’s a heck of a lot heavier and requires care to avoid cracking it. But watching our installer saw / drill / rout it, I’m surprised at how cleanly the material can be machined. I guess I would have expected more rough edges and fragmentation.

This is the biggest transformational step in the kitchen remodel, and I’m really glad we went for this look. The next things are to get the window installed and to tile the walls, then I can put the new vent hood above the stove. We may eventuall have this kitchen remodel complete…

 

Common Cold Cure… Where Oh Where… ooh, and jetpacks too!

June 26, 2008 by john No Comments »

MR YUKI have a horrible head cold. Apparently my sinuses were optimized for maximum head-cold misery, which means I get to spend a few days feeling like my skull is a basketball. Feh. I thought somebody was going to cure the common cold and spare humanity from all this inconvenience. And weren’t we supposed to have jetpacks by now? And robots to cheerfully do all the crappy stuff like housework? Man, the future isn’t what it used to be.

For the record, yes I do realize the common cold is an ever-changing myriad of mutating strains and can’t be cured by a single targeted pharmaceutical knockout punch. So while the lab coats toil to assemble some kind of cold-killer medicine, can we at least have jetpacks and robots?

 

Thoughts On The Preons Gig 6/21

June 23, 2008 by john No Comments »

Last Saturday the preons played at Easy Street Records in West Seattle. We were on the bill with some other great local bands including Hart and the Hurricane, one of my local favorites for double bills. The setup in the record store is somewhat typical for a small venue gig: small stage, small PA (vocals only) and plenty of cool people milling around while you play. My dad made it to the gig, which is always fun. He said afterwards that my band wasn’t “nearly as annoying as the noisy rock band that played the early set”. A ringing endorsement if ever one existed. 🙂

As usual, Brad held down kitchen sink duty, providing keys / trumpet / melodica / harmonica / backing vocals. I did my best to appear very important by playing lots of note (kidding here… just did my usual stuff). Overall it was a great time and I felt very comfortable with our set. Josh was unusually chatty onstage, delivering funny quips and filling in between songs with stories. Janie did great too.

I’m absolutely convinced I need to get in-ear monitors and will be pushing ahead with something next paycheck. Gotta have some isolation from the stage volume, and need to hear my vocals/bass. I’m also increasingly interested in buying an Akai MPC1000 so I can trigger loops and other cool parts. If anybody has a lot on-stage experience with these units (or has one just lying around you want to sell…) I’d love to hear from you. Next Preons gig is 7/12 at the West Seattle Street Fair, which I’m sure will be a great time.

 

ICE ON MARS!

June 20, 2008 by john 1 Comment »

It’s official: ICE ON MARS. http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/06/mars-phoenix-tw.html

Step 2: ???
Step 3 : PROFIT!

 

Tear Down The Wall

June 19, 2008 by john No Comments »

One of our ongoing themes at home is projects. We’re in the final stages of a kitchen remodel (hopefully!) and we just couldn’t stand the idea of not having some sawdust flying. So we decided to knock out the wall between the living room and the hallway. Actually, we knocked out just the upper half, but still…

Like always, the demolition stage is therapeutic and goes pretty quick. In this particular case we decided to shore up the header above the new opening for the sake of visual balance and physical support. All that remains now is to do the trim work and some painting. The biggest immediate difference is the amount of light that floods in from the back yard. It provides a fantastic illumination source for living room and brightens up the hallway. There is a wonderful view from both sides, and the space seems larger.

This seems like it must be getting close to being the final wall we could possible take out. The other ones are holding things up, or are necessary for practical reasons. Then again, we haven’t allowed mere practicality to stand in the way of our projects so far… �

 

5 Days In Montana (and some buggy moonshine)

June 17, 2008 by john 4 Comments »

Cobra + Scorpion = Danger!Montana is incredibly beautiful. Any local who says otherwise is probably trying to hide their favorite fishing spot. I just returned from spending five amazing days with family and friends, attending a wedding and generally having fun. Over the course of those five days I took over six hundred pictures (!) and had some great adventures. At the wedding reception in Big Fork (right on Flathead Lake), we were doing the usual toasting / visiting / dancing / drinking. Behind the bar was a bottle of dangerous-looking liquid containing a coiled cobra biting the tail of a fairly large scorpion. It turns out this unusual liquor hails from Laos and is supposed give a person “increased vitality and health”. The bartender told us they’d had this bottle for a few years and nobody had ever wanted to drink any of the magic high-proof elixir inside… but that was before we arrived! Note that this picture shows a bottle that is only half full… sure enough, by midnight a bunch of us had taken shots of this terrible stuff.

I had two shots of it and am pretty sure I will soon be mutating and/or developing super powers.

 

Tube Sox – Bye Week

June 11, 2008 by john No Comments »

It’s our bye week, so we are spending tonight thinking victorious thoughts and pretending we might have won a game. The team is actually pretty good this year and everyone seems to be having a great time. I’m glad that we added some new folks this season; keeps the blood fresh and we’re picking up all kinds of strange new on-field patter. It’s not the same as having patter provided by the inimitable Jon Hyde, but still mighty fine.

 

Thoughts On The Preons Gig 6/6

June 7, 2008 by john No Comments »

We had a great gig at the Skylark last night. Brad was his usual multi-talented self, and Josh and Janie both did a good job as well. I did a bit more two-handed work on the bass parts, introducing a counterpoint line in a few sections (Teri refers to this technique as my “Stick-y” playing”). Truth is, I really do need to get a Warr guitar or maybe a better Chapman Stick. Anybody out there who feels like sending me one of those, feel free!

After the show I received an interesting comment from a musician from one of the other bands. He said “you play bass like a frustrated guitarist”. I replied that I wasn’t particularly frustrated, and he laughed. He clarified by saying that I played bass like someone who had an unusual amount of facility with chords and two-handed tapping parts. So I briefly explained my strange history and my unorthodox approach to the instrument. I’m sure this is going to continue to happen. My playing is evolving toward the weird end of the scale…

 

Tube Sox

June 5, 2008 by john No Comments »

Last night during our softball game I had the two best hits of my season so far. I managed to get a fairly serious connection with the ball and reached base on two strong singles. I’m getting my timing down, which is definitely a big part of the challenge… short bat + big softball = tough to get a decent hit.

It’s a great team this year and everyone is having a lot of fun. I’m darned glad to be a part of the crew.