SamuelBLupowitz
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Posts posted by SamuelBLupowitz
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As I'm low-key shopping for the interface that's going to serve as the recording hub and rehearsal PA/headphone mixer for our new home studio space (whenever we're able to move, that is), the Zoom L20 is now grabbing my attention... I'm an in-the-box guy sort of out of necessity; something that functions as both an interface that can multitrack a whole band AND a standalone mixer, for under a grand, is not to be sneezed at.
Edit: of course, it weirdly can only record 96k to an SD card; when running as an interface, it caps at 48k. Now, I record at 48k a lot anyway, but it did make me raise an eyebrow.
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Correct. I work for a large university, so I've been doing support for Zoom for the last three years (and pretty heavily for the past three weeks, as you can imagine). We've been upping the standards for security as necessary. I think we can have up to 300 in a meeting.If someone has a professional (paid) Zoom account, that would be a great solution. -
I would really love to participate if we can work something out. I'm sure more than a few of us have access to pro/corporate versions of some of the videoconferencing tech for hosting purposes. I can volunteer my Zoom account, provided this can happen at a time that won't conflict with my work needs.
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That was a lot of fun! Some heavy-hitters pretty early on there. Love the "tag, you're it" style of the video, with each player setting up the next player's key.
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We should all remember that staying minimum six feet apart not only inhibits the disease's spread, but improves the stereo spread.
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I don"t know. Is this political or just hysterical?
I vote for hysterical.
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If you're on a Mac, you could start for free with Garageband, and move on up to Logic pretty easily when you want to invest the few hundred bucks -- at this point Garageband is basically the simplified, trial version of Logic. The nice thing about Logic is that it comes with a lot of house plugins and software instruments that are perfectly usable.
Audacity is also a very popular open-source, free DAW -- it doesn't have the built-in plugins and softsynths like Garageband, but it's not as limited as far as recording quality.
Those are the ones I have the most experience with. Ableton seems more geared toward looping and live performance, and I've had frustrating experiences with it, but I know folks who love it to death. A lot of the available DAWs, both cheap and expensive, have their own strengths, weaknesses, and areas of focuses, but these days, more and more, it seems like it really comes down to personal preference, as there's enough overlap in features that you can't really go wrong.
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I'm really going to enjoy listening to all of these. Scott, "Maddy Gray" wouldn't be out of place on a Tom Petty record; I detect a little bit of George Harrison in there too. Maybe once the submissions are capped for this installment, we can all discuss our tracks a bit?
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I've become a big user of expanders since I record a lot of podcasts at my day job, and you have to make very dynamic human speech cut through road noise if you're listening in a car, but not crank up hiss and room noise... it's also great for reducing the hum on a Wurlitzer or Clavinet without the distracting stop-and-start a gate can introduce. This is a very cool application, though; I'm interested to try applying it for musicality (like compression) rather than utility (like, well, less fun compression).
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I've been reading the webcomic xkcd regularly for over a decade, but this is the first one that's really made me emotional:
Mouseover text: "We're not trapped in here with the coronavirus. The coronavirus is trapped in here with us."
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User-definable knobs are a cool idea; I've taken advantage of it a bit on my XT with a USB midi controller and the MIDI-learn feature. I'm wondering if this Mojo will have all of the additional instruments of the 61; it feels like it would be a missed opportunity not to... but we'll see re: multitimbrality and flexibility. I know the 61-plus-lower-manual can't play organ and another sound simultaneously; the older dual-manuals, of course, can do that, but it's famously inflexible as far as which piano and which organ goes on which manual. I've found the built-in Rhodes useful for rehearsal, but if I'm playing a gig where the Mojo is my main keyboard, it's a Mainstage controller for everything other than organ.One of the few things I wish the Mojo had was a couple user-definable nobs for things like EPiano tremolo speed or delay time. I would rather have those on the hood than Perc Vol.
It's funny how tricky it is to market features towards such a specific, idiosyncratic market (gigging Hammond players who crave authenticity, at least for certain features). I actually mess with the click volume a fair amount -- not as much as drive or reverb, but I tend to like a LOT of click, and every now and then I find myself playing a ballad and it's too much.TBH, I don't really mess with the Click volume much either.
I'm finding I like goofy light-up nonsense more than most. I mean, I bought a LUMI, what does THAT tell you?Light-up logo on the front... LAME. Very lame. I hope it can be disabled. -
Is it just me, or do iOS apps seem to be ahead of the curve a bit as far as MPE support? Maybe my sample set is just skewed, but could it be because developers on that platform are more used to pushing the envelope as a necessity?They've just added MPE support, which is being debugged and fine-tuned right now. -
Well, I won't be replacing my new XT anytime soon (lord knows it's been helping to get me through quarantine), but the Classic sure is sexy. The additional knobs, percussion "tabs" instead of Prophet-style buttons, and the flat top definitely would have made this my choice if it were on the market last summer. Best of luck to Crumar with the new line!
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This is the thing that bites me in the butt most frequently; it's not even the different rigs I use for different projects that get me, it's the different sizes of gigs, where I'll need to lean harder on the laptop for one because it's a smaller venue where I can't bring as many boards. I've never gotten into too much trouble but I'm always trying to work out a way that I can stay modular without misplacing important cables and devices.The idea of routinizing and following a set procedure every time is hugely important. Harder, obviously, if you take different equipment to different gigs.That said, I'm way ahead of most of my bandmates. I think my record was providing a backup amp, two instrument cables, and a keyboard (!) for three of the other four musicians ... and I was playing bass on that gig.
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Is that all it is? I remember shedding it for weeks a few years ago, and I could *almost* play it at half-speed (which, to be fair, is the tempo at which George Martin played it).When you want a good challenge, try learning the solo of In My Life. All eight gddmn bars of it -
That was one of the first tunes I learned when I really got into playing the piano (Let It Be was the very first) and it became -- and remains, really -- my solo piano party piece. Won a middle school talent show performing it, and I credit that with my shift in identity from "geek" to "rock and roll guy (who is also kind of a geek)" during my early teen years...I like working on a piano-only cover of Lady Madonna. It takes some effort to get it all going right (especially since I don't usually have a lot of left-hand work going on playing in a band). It's a lot of fun, and it's a great song for piano - when I play it right!The Beatles are my favorite band, and my most overwhelming influence, and that's the case for many of my musician friends. So it never ceases to collectively amaze us, every time we try to learn one of their songs that we've been listening to for our entire lives, how deceptively complex -- or deceptively simple? -- so much of their catalogue is. Every tune has at least one little twist that I would never intuit, either "oh, I can't believe it's that simple to make it sound right, I never would have thought of that" or "how the hell did they come up with that?!"
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Not to keep pulling the thread off-topic -- I know the matter at hand should be Alicia's keys, not Weird Al -- but this seems as good a place as any to share this photo I dug up accidentally this week. Backstage around 2010 after winning a sweepstakes in the local newspaper while home on break from college. I probably wouldn't have paid money to see him before winning those tickets, but I'll line up to see him anytime since that show.
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Agreed, it's a portrait of a sensitive soul who knew what he wanted and what he was willing to put up with. A gentle giant of the music world, and an astonishing songwriter, capable of crafting timeless classics out of chords, melodies, and lyrics that are so simple they make you think "Hey, I could do that." But you didn't. Bill Withers did.If you haven't watched the documentary Still Bill, you should, it's a great insight into the man and his soul. -
Weird Al's from-home Tonight Show performance has won this game thus far, in my opinion... no sweet keyboard setup, but no lyric revisions necessary, either.
[video:youtube]
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Thank you for all you do here, dB!
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Jeez, I always forget that Kath-era Chicago was just one of the coolest bands around. This is awesome! Cetera was such a wicked bass player... I really mourn his transition into 80s top-40 balladry, though I'm sure his bank account doesn't.my favorite Chicago song (suite) is at the 48 minute mark. -
Here's one I enjoyed a whole lot a few months ago and have been meaning to share here. Booker's got a killer band here (including his son on guitar and vocals), and I think the drummer is particularly impressive... dig his drum/rap break in Hip Hug Her!
[video:youtube]
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Going on the list. I always pictured Clive Davis as the wryly-named record industry mogul "Marv Ellis" in the Mixerman Diaries.
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In a time of so much humor being too real for comfort... this is too real for comfort!
Is Progressive Rock Keyboard Playing a Priority ?
in The Keyboard Corner
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But it doesn't mean the material doesn't lend itself to keys at all! :wink:
[video:youtube]
(Just an FYI, that's an unlisted video -- that performance is a little rough around the edges, in no small part due to the drunk dude who kept trying to grab the mic from our lead singer... but it's fun enough that I'm happy to share it here.)