Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Two Handsful of Sound

My good friend Mari, gave me a copy of Manu Delago's album called "Handmade" just a while ago and it literally blew me away. I've been following Manu Delago for a while now (one of my very first posts in this blog was about him and the wonderful instrument called the Hang), and this was the first time I've ever gotten my hands on one of his albums. The only other performance of his that I was able to download is at Shpongle live back in 2008. And he only had a short stint performance in the entire concert at that.

So after listening to the first few tracks of Manu's "Handmade" album, I looked at his website to see what's new with his work. I came across a video in this YouTube channel that yet again blew me away. Here is the video below. You should definitely check it out.



What's amazing is that it's actually a 10 layer song (yes, I even counted the number of separate "picture in picture" screens in this video). Each track is a separate Hang track that he recorded one at a time and it came together really well. What I like about the song the most is that you'll notice that each track starts ending one after the other with the same melody lick until it reaches to just 2 tracks and ends there.

Manu is the man. I found his Facebook fan page and I definitely clicked on "Like". I even left a post on his wall praising him and how I wished to be blessed with a Hang of my own.

I faxed a letter to the Hang makers a month ago, and I haven't received a response. From what I've read on the net, the Hang makers don't really respond right away. Perhaps I'll send a follow-up letter through snail mail this time. I don't know how much better I can phrase my letter for them to know how serious I am of wanting one and exploring the instrument myself. Oh how I wish.


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Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Starcraft 2 Sounds

All gamers practically have all the common voice overs of Starcraft 1 units imprinted in their brains after years of incessantly spam clicking each unit for amusement. Those phrases normally come up in normal conversation, followed by a chuckle and a giggle displaying how geeky we really are. Starcraft 2 rolled in with closed beta, sporting new voice overs that are totally different yet still very funny and entertaining. A guy in YouTube going by the call sign 9livesBE painstakingly recorded a lot of the new unit voice overs. Check two of the basic Starcraft 2 units and their voice overs below. I'd add a Zerg unit on this post. But Zerg units still don't say anything discernable in Starcraft 2. Just different variations of somebody throwing up. LOL!

Terran Marine



Protoss Zealot



Cracks me up. LOL!


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Monday, April 12, 2010

Photoblog Migration

Found a way to import all the posts in my Blogger photoblog over to Tumblr (Not like the pictures in my photoblog are much to look at or anything). You can check out further posts in my new photoblog in the link below.

http://sundowndos.tumblr.com/


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Sunday, April 4, 2010

Feeling Music Beyond Just Hearing It

Every musician should watch this video. Evelyn Glennie is a true inspiration to all musicians. What drew me to this video is the fact that this orchestral master percussionist is deaf. Yet, she feels and understands music better than most people who have the use of their ear drums.



Very inspiring indeed...


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Thursday, April 1, 2010

Highs and Lows: On the Lows and Returning to Status Quo

After having so much fun at the beach, the days after that were filled with physical difficulty and self-induced loneliness. This is the second part of wheel of karmic of fortune I speak of.


The Lows

The very next day when I arrived back from Puerto Galera. I obviously had a sore throat. I was surprised to find that I had difficulty eating, drinking, and swallowing. My throat would even hurt when I would yawn. I had this metallic taste in my mouth that I couldn't get rid of no matter what I would do. And I felt a fever coming on.

A fever did arrive after a few hours, and I spent the next two to three days not being able to eat anything at all. I attempted to self-medicate, which of course isn't always the wise thing to do. I was too weak to step outside to even buy medicine, let alone drag myself to the doctor.

My office obviously needed me, given the truck load of issues that even co-executives in my company conveniently left for me to handle when I get back to work. I was following everything that was going on in the office during my vacation by reading all the emails coming in on my Blackberry. But I had to keep letting go of work especially since I was sick.

Perhaps I could've dragged myself to the doctor back then. But when I remember the days when my ex-girlfriend left me, and my entire family was in the States during one of my 1-2 month long cluster headache bouts, I hesitate to ask for help or even heave myself over to Makati Med for a check-up. I remember being alone to tend to my pain back then. I remember being bounced around between my HMO's office and Makati Med several times in a day when I sought medical help. All of that made me turtle shell this time around, and attempt to nurse myself back to help on my own.