Something from the past. The PPG Wave Synthesizer. One of the most interesting and musical of all those godlike keyboards ever created. A big favorite of prominent musicians like Kate Bush and the electronic prog crowd - when they could afford one! It was very much ahead of it's time. It was also the first wavetable synth. A radical new technology (for the time) that really broke the mold and set electronic music on a whole new path for several years following it's introduction. It had a very organic feel. And the sounds it created were to die for. You just couldn't sound bad on this thing.

Awesome rig.

Check out the sounds! No wonder so many game music composers were totally hooked on it's vibe.


Here's a run through of the various wave tables contained within it:

nice!

Quote from: 40hz on October 11, 2015, 04:40 PM

Two young ladies playing a matched set of those godawful all-in-one built-in amplifier and rhythm box guitars Vox built way back when.

They probably didn't get them from older models:

Quote

Vox again revived these body styles in 2013 with their Apache Series Travel Basses.

I'm aware. I just didn't feel like getting too pedantic about these things like I usually do in this thread.

FWIW you can still find a limited number of them in various places including Amazon. But they are starting to get hard to find again, so if you have $350-$400 (average) burning a hole in your pocket, you'd better act fairly quickly if your GAS is acting up for one. 

Prince in a recent interview. What do you smoke to keep looking this young? Prince: "I smoke other Guitar players"


He reportedly asked Dhani Harrison before hand how he wanted him to play it- and Dhani said, something different than the way his dad played it - just to go all out and burn it.  Afterwards, George Harrison's wife said that she was wondering what Dhani was up to when he asked Prince to play it, and she had her doubts - but that he'd killed it.

For all that he was doing in there, I noted that he was paying constant attention to Tom Petty, and when he called it, was instantly there.

Very underrated guitarist.

Dollars to donuts, this will intrigue a few people here:

Dollars to donuts, this will intrigue a few people here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6btFObRRD9k

Interesting if a little long-winded at times.

But I think Lori Anderson did that sort of thing much better back as early as 1986 with 1/10th the technology we have to work with today. 

Here is an article I found interesting. Be sure to read the sole comment, made by the blogger mentioned in the first paragraph.
http://www.cruiseshipdrummer.com/2015/11/laughable-myth-or-laughable-math.html

Interesting if somewhat poorly written article. However I have to disagree with the commenter you pointed to. Because whenever you start speaking in "new" business terms like "monetizing fans" you're already heading in the wrong direction IMHO. Because fans actively resent being treated like a resource to be mined as if they were some mineral. And all the other "begging" schemes (i.e. crowdsourcing) and/or plans to sell music by the slice (i.e streaming, etc.) are not going to work long term.

In the end, I think we're seeing a seismic shift in the landscape for music. The days of producing a series of hits, and afterwards retiring to your secluded mansion for a purely studio career (a la The Beatles et al.) are over for all intents and purposes. The way bands will (and do) make money is by doing live shows. They can supplement their income by selling swag or hard copy recordings of their music - but the show is the thing that brings in the real money.

People are so virtualized and digitized that anything recorded and reachable via the Internet is perceived as valueless. Or, if it is grudgingly acknowledged to have some value, then the feeling remains that the price tag should be: FREE! regardless of that. And that mentality isn't going to change anytime soon - if ever.

So my feeling is, if you want a career as a professional musician, be prepared to go out on the road full-time and work for a living. Just like every band used to do up until the modern recording distribution cartel kicked into high gear between 1950 and 1970 and transformed music into a full blown industry. An industry with them in charge and calling all the shots when it came to broadcasting and record sales. Streaming media is just a logical extension of their monopolistic "closed shop" practices. And it works the same way as far as the average band is concerned.

Music is a performance art. With the advent of LPs (and now digital media and distribution) there were (and still are) many musicians that hoped technology would liberate them from the constant need to perform. But it didn't. And now, it's even more obvious it won't. So if you're a professional musician - or want to become one - the  time has come to face the music and go back to doing what musicians have always done - perform music in front of a live audience.

I don't see it working any other way. Either in the short or long-term.

(Note: I'm sure many wishful thinkers will tell me otherwise. To which I can only say: show me the trend - not the occasional Cinderella (e.g. Amanda Palmer) case that seems to show otherwise.)

Quote from: 40hz on November 17, 2015, 01:58 AM

Amanda Palmer

I wouldn't consider her a Cinderella in this piece.  She performs a lot.

By that I meant somebody who broke the limit and actually took in $1M+ on a crowdsource campaign that was targeting something like 1/10th of that.

Please don't get me wrong. I have a lot of respect for her as an artist and a businessperson. (I actually kicked in on her project and I own everything she ever released.) But she is so far removed from a typical musician that I think her story is more inspirational than it is instructional for most people.

I also think she was the right person, with the right project, in the right place, at the right time - and the crowdsourcing scene was in a unique moment where it wanted to put some real momentum behind something. So I think it was more a phenomenon rather than a sign that pointed the way for others.

I also think she was the right person, with the right project, in the right place, at the right time - and the crowdsourcing scene was in a unique moment where it wanted to put some real momentum behind something. So I think it was more a phenomenon rather than a sign that pointed the way for others.

There are a lot of successful music and art campaigns on Kickstarter and Patreon.  And I think it's awesome.  It hails back to the 18th century when patronage was a thing.  Pentatonix is a group that has benefited from it.  And Lindsey Sterling.  But that is a supplement that allows them to do their thing in all three cases, rather than a support.  And I think that's an important distinction.  Without the other side - engaging with your fans in a real way, producing, and performing, you'll never rise to the level of real sustenance.  More... subsistence, I think is the word I'm looking for.

So I don't see a return to patronage as necessarily  desireable or without danger to artistic integrity.

I do agree there are dangers- but there's danger in everything.  The trick is to be aware of them, and work to avoid them.  You really think that the current system we have is any better?  And that those same pressures don't exist?  The current system is closer to classical patronage- the few hold the money, and they support who they will on a whim.  When I say patronage, I don't think towards that system- but more towards those that want support directly.  That is what I like about patronage.  I give $1 and it's not much.  10000 give $1 and it's a clear sign that you're doing something that people like.  100,000 give $1... and you're well on your way.  So I mean everyone being a patron of what they like.  Rather than the artist getting only a fraction of what I pay, and being in control of a lesser fraction.  And where you have to basically sign away your work in order to get published.

I had a friend... a moderately successful writer.  He wrote a pretty niche set of novels, and still writes them.  It was originally his story... and one that the publisher just publishes, right?  He tried to go into different media.  Things that the publisher wasn't even into.  Used Kickstarter for it, and was very successful.  Too successful one might say- there was nothing from the publisher's side, until the Kickstarter did so well.  You can imagine the rest.  It ended *reasonably* well, but still, it shows that people above will grasp onto anything they can keep ahold of, and squeeze until there's nothing left.

Quote from: 40hz on November 18, 2015, 01:26 AM

So I don't see a return to patronage as necessarily  desireable or without danger to artistic integrity.

I do agree there are dangers- but there's danger in everything.  The trick is to be aware of them, and work to avoid them.  You really think that the current system we have is any better?  And that those same pressures don't exist?  The current system is closer to classical patronage- the few hold the money, and they support who they will on a whim.  When I say patronage, I don't think towards that system- but more towards those that want support directly.  That is what I like about patronage.  I give $1 and it's not much.  10000 give $1 and it's a clear sign that you're doing something that people like.  100,000 give $1... and you're well on your way.  So I mean everyone being a patron of what they like.  Rather than the artist getting only a fraction of what I pay, and being in control of a lesser fraction.  And where you have to basically sign away your work in order to get published.

I had a friend... a moderately successful writer.  He wrote a pretty niche set of novels, and still writes them.  It was originally his story... and one that the publisher just publishes, right?  He tried to go into different media.  Things that the publisher wasn't even into.  Used Kickstarter for it, and was very successful.  Too successful one might say- there was nothing from the publisher's side, until the Kickstarter did so well.  You can imagine the rest.  It ended *reasonably* well, but still, it shows that people above will grasp onto anything they can keep ahold of, and squeeze until there's nothing left.

Point taken. But it's also dangerous to equate the music industry with the publishing industry. Because except for some similarities when it comes to distribution models, the two worlds and businesses are very different once you get beyond the superficial resemblances. Having been in both worlds, I can speak from firsthand experience on that subject.

I also don't agree that it's necessarily worth revisiting an already known "bad option" with the (IMO) mistaken notion that just because its dangers are known, that somehow makes it potentially more "acceptable" or worth considering a second time. Because according to The Book of 40Hz: "When something sucks - knowing that it sucks (and how it sucks) - doesn't make it any less sucky."

Or to put it more professionally: A "bad option" remains a bad option, regardless of the degree of risk involved in pursuing it. 


---------------

To go back to Amanda Palmer's successful Kickstarter campaign, I think it's also worth noting that she didn't solicit funding to write the music (which took 4 years), put the band together, or record the master tracks. She had already done that and was at pains to make sure people understood this wasn't the usual: "Hey wassup! We want to do our own album peeps! Mommy and daddy already said no. So can you maybe help pay to do it?". Which made her campaign very different from most music Kickstarters in that there already was "product."

In her case she was soliciting contributions for final mastering, manufacturing, and distribution. Basically those things a record company traditionally handles for a recording artist. So you could probably say she wasn't doing a music project campaign so much as a campaign to create a single project recording and distribution company. Because the creative part was already finished. All that remained was the manufacturing and distribution. And the road show...

Which was, I think, was an extremely significant factor in getting her the backing she got - along with her roughly 14 years of "street cred" and active involvement with her fan base leading up to it.

Might this be the beginning of the end of the "tonewood" debate? A completely cardboard Stratocaster commissioned by Cardboard Chaos rolls out of the Fender Custom Shop...

Cardboard Chaos is here and it’s time to riff on a new idea! Rock out with your cardboard stock out! This episode we work with a master builder at the Fender Custom Shop to see if paper has the ability to handle the look, feel and sound of one of the world’s most recognizable guitars, the Fender Stratocaster. A master builder can make just about anything look good, but will it sound good? Will it have tone and will it be able to handle the heat and get approval from one who rocks for a living in one of the most ass kicking bands of the last two decades, Linkin Park?! It’s a tall order and with roughly 250lbs of torque put on the neck of a guitar from the strings – We have ourselves a challenge and some Cardboard Chaos!