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Joe Muscara

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Everything posted by Joe Muscara

  1. Theoretically, I could afford the current version, but imma gonna wait to see what this turns out to be. I don't need Yet Another Keyboard, but depending on where it falls in price, I might just have to. If so, the question then becomes, which color will complement my Sparkle Blue Tolex Vibanet?
  2. I use custom molded earplugs with the Etymotic filters, and they're pretty amazing. When I first put them in, I wondered if they were doing anything because everything sounded so good. I pulled them out and went, "yep, they're definitely doing something! Ouch!" and put them back in. I was with a band before the pandemic that rehearsed so loud that the drummer needed to mic his kit so we could hear him, and only full foam Home Depot type earplugs properly inserted satisfactorily cut the level down. That was ridiculous. We were rehearsing in the bassist's living room. I'm glad to not be a part of that anymore.
  3. Where did you find a list? That's my old store too. I'm glad to know you weren't working there in the late 80s/early 90s when I was talking about their… service. *cough*
  4. I bought shares at $32 (1998), $14.75 (2001), $14.95 (2003), and $109 (2016). I'm not allowed to say how many of each nor how many I currently have, but damn, I wish I had bought more! I just purchased most of these as a token of support, not really an investment. I've done that a number of times with a few companies that I believed in. Most of the time I ended up with nothing or close to it (including Steinway), but this one time I got very lucky.
  5. I did leave out of my previous post that I've wondered about the ICE side as far as it not being used very much. When you leave a conventional ICE car to sit for long periods, all sorts of things can decay. If you never get around to using gasoline and it's sitting in the tank, the lighter hydrocarbons tend to evaporate leaving you with gunk that clogs up fuel systems. It's definitely something to consider, though the concept as a bridge to going all battery has its merits.
  6. Are you talking about products like goggles and glasses? Because from what I've read, "wearables" generally includes things like the Apple Watch and AirPods, which I don't see resistance to.
  7. I get a chuckle every time I see a headline about this. I mean, it's basically saying, "Rumor has it that rumored product has been killed." IOW, "That thing I said might be happening? It's not happening. I think. If it ever was." My long standing theory has been that the "Apple Car" was really CarPlay in evolution, much of it (or possibly all right now) has already been announced by Apple as "next generation of CarPlay" as seen about halfway down this page. They would need to do a lot of research in order to have such a full integration with the various systems in modern cars. Perhaps that's what a lot of the work that was rumored really was. If it was real, at all. As far as gas vs. electric, etc., I've seen a few articles lately saying that the best current option for many might actually be the plug-in hybrids, which give you about 40 miles on a battery charge. Statistics say that many people only drive that much or less in a day, and if you need to go further, you switch to the ICE. So, you can charge the car up every night and you're covered for most of your around-town driving. Lots of people have "range anxiety" about how far they can go in a fully electric vehicle, but that's because they're stuck in the old paradigm we have of getting several hundred miles without needing more fuel. OTOH, I don't drive much, and I'm excited about the idea of not having to stop at a gas station when I'm low on fuel, adding to the time and effort for that trip. Because I don't drive regularly, it's kind of a big deal to remember that I need gas when I do. But, my car is paid off, in great shape, a lot of fun to drive, and I can't justify replacing it right now. I'm just keeping my eye on things so I'm ready when I need to get something new.
  8. Dude, what is wrong with you? I live to buy stuff online and watch it arrive via tracking apps. I'm not sure anything fires up my dopamine like that. In fact, I have to work to not constantly buy stuff online just for the hit. 😂 I have a long standing bad taste from Sam Ash. Growing up on LI, Sam Ash was the big music store, practically the only music store except for those tiny guitar stores that didn't have keys anyway. I used to go to the Sam Ash in Huntington and… get ignored. I'd see the sales guys running around and they'd blow by me without saying a word. When I did finally get one, they weren't useful, really. I'm not saying my later experiences in Guitar Center nor other stores were better, but the Sam Ash experiences were formative. We have one Sam Ash store in Houston, it took over a Hermes Music that took over a local store called Parker Music, so strangely the building, out by itself along the interstate, has long been a music store. I wonder if it will survive. The rent is probably not bad but I have no idea how it's doing. I think there's a Sam Ash near San Antonio too.
  9. That's what blows my mind. But damn, I bet it's keeping Steinway in business. Good move. I'd rather see that than they go under.
  10. It always amazes me when people make these kinds of generalizations. I'd bet money that all schools have the issues with students that he talks about, throughout all time. (I must admit, when I was in college, no professor or TA took attendance nor noted lateness. The attitude was that if you missed or were late for class, that was your problem. That being said, I didn't take any classes that related to music nor performance so I don't know if those would have been different. I did have labs though so I guess if had missed those I would have not gotten credit for those experiments or whatever we did had I missed them.)
  11. Technically, I think he goes by Geoffrey Keezer professionally. He was one of the first to join Open Studio with his Keez to Jazz Piano course, which is amazing, both for his excellent ideas on how to practice to improve, as well as his playing. That’s where I first heard of him and I immediately knew he was a player I wanted to know more about. He’s since recorded several other courses for Open Studio (KTJP was originally recorded for his own web site and they converted it to an Open Studio course). His last couple of albums are great, and his most recent won a Grammy. I haven’t dug further back in his catalog, but I plan to as I’m a big fan.
  12. I get the excitement to a degree, but there’s an annoying aspect to it as well, as a fan of an opposing Big Ten team (Go Terps!j. I’ve watched MD v. Iowa games and it was almost like she was the only player in the game. Even when she was on the bench, they kept cutting to her. Throughout the game, they couldn’t stop talking about her. Then, watching other Maryland WBB games, there were often times they would start talking about her because of what she did recently or an upcoming Iowa game (which they probably were promoting a bit to keep you tuned in) and I was like, can we talk about the game we are watching??? Good for her, good for NCAA WBB, and probably good for the WNBA when she goes there. Can I just watch my Terps WBB now? 😇😉🙃🙂
  13. Of course. For us Gen Xers, no one having heard of us is a feature, not a bug! 🤣 [point of clarity: I’m not saying that I am one of those great pianists, I’m saying Gen X is routinely skipped or ignored, and we usually prefer it that way. 🤫 ]
  14. Or a freakin' Hammond organ! I guess if you were so determined to change the tuning of one you could create a circuit that changes the AC frequency from 60 Hz to whatever it would need to get you that tuning.
  15. Where does being brighter matter? In the Loudness Wars, the idea was to be louder and seem better sounding on the radio. But if I go see Citystate Orchestra play Beethoven's Ninth tonight, and then see Nationstate Symphony play Tchaikovsky's Fifth in a month, am I really going to say one sounds better because it was at a higher pitch, even though the performances were a month apart and two completely different programs?
  16. FYI, from NAMM.org, The 2025 NAMM Show: January 23–26, 2025 The 2026 NAMM Show: January 22–25, 2026 I had not seen these dates published before this week. My calendar is already marked.
  17. I started a whole thread about Clavinet Songs a few years ago. Edit: Shortly after I started that thread, the editors at Wikipedia removed the "Notable Songs" section because they don't like lists for some reason. However, you can find that section by going into the page's history.
  18. The problem is that they still don't know the cause and don't have a cure. It's hard to fix something when you don't understand how it's broken. I'm glad people are working on it, though I wish there were better science* behind these treatments. Hopefully that will come.
  19. The Ravens D had it all over Stroud and the Texans offense. Still, the future seems bright for the Texans and they finally seem like an organization that can truly succeed. It's taken them long enough.
  20. When he first started comping with the EP sound, that wasn't bad. I kind of liked a bit of it. Once he started the electric guitar sound, that was WAY too much. I've been revisiting my fandom of Van Halen lately and one thing I've been thinking about is how well EVH worked on/in a tune. He didn't just shred for the entire song, his parts fit in as part of the tune, not over the vocals but between them, leading into the next part. That being said, you might forgive Jordan because maybe he was experimenting. Sometimes, when we're just jamming and learning a tune, we play a lot of stuff to see what might fit. A lot of what Jordan played could fit. If he gave me all of that to use for a track, I might take a phrase here and one there to use on the track, just not all of it. At the end of the initial listening section after he played the guitar stuff and went to the rhythmic pattern, that could be okay as a bed on the tune or parts of the tune, something underneath that provides more of a feel and not something you really hear. Pop music does this all the time. I feel similarly about the orchestral part he played near the end. Some of that could be okay as a bed. But no, if he's going to just wank over the entire tune, that's not what the tune is about. And no, Alicia doesn't need to add more tracks.
  21. Thanks for the info. Mine has gotten pretty bad lately, I don’t have a reason why (I can pinpoint certain events when mine leveled up to where it went from occasional to chronic, and I also believe I know what started it when I was younger, but not the latest increase). My ENT isn’t on the list for Lenire, but I might contact him and ask about latest treatments. When I saw him about it a few years ago, what he had didn’t work for me and the last thing he suggested was something I didn’t think would work so I didn’t bother. Maybe he’s aware of some of these new treatments.
  22. It was a pretty wild weekend where teams that seeded well or were generally expected to do well pretty much got blown out. And, several of those games started out with one team crushing the other in the first half, the other team looking like they found their rhythm and were going to come back, but then collapsing. It was weird seeing several different games having the same feel. Congrats to the winners and those of you who are their fans!
  23. Cleveland’s defense was obviously quite good. They made a lot of good stops. I was worried there for a while.
  24. What book? I have never found a book by Barry, but several by various students.
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