Pylon

Pylon guitarist Randy Bewley RIP

Randy Bewely died yesterday after suffering a heart attack. Pylon was an american new wave / post punk band based in Athens, Georgia. They started in 1978 and they have released 5 albums and some eps and singles. They were one of a few important (and great) american post punk groups. You can read about them in Simon Reynolds book Rip it Up and Start Again: Post Punk 1978-1984

Read more about Pylon on Wikipedia
Pylon on Myspace
Review of the 2007 album reissue of Gyrate Plus (Gyrate orginally released 1980) on Pitchfork

Khoda animated short film

This short animated film is actually a student project by Reza Dolatabadi. He’s made it together with Mark Szalos Farkas (story), Adam Thomson (animation). Music by Hamed Mafakheri. The film has won several prizes:

• Winner of the Best Animation Canary Wharf Film Festival (London) Aug, 2008
• Winner of the Best Student Animation Flip Festival (Birmingham) 2008
• Winner of the Best Student Animation, Royal Television Society Award, Scotland (rts) 2009
• Official selection for the “Best Short Film Program” at Waterford Film Festival (Ireland) November 2008

Reza Dolatabadi’s site: http://www.rezaart.com/
The film’s place on Vimeo

Nude baby playing synth

This cool baby has already started to play synth, and he’s so into it he didn’t have time to put on his pants!

Doves new album

One of my favourite Manchester bands, Doves, has a new album to be released april 6. That’s my birthday! The album is called Kingdom of Rust, and the first single goes by the same name. Here’s the video of the song:

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Another song is already released, its called Jetstream:

You can download it from Doves official site.

Doves on Myspace

My favourite youtube cat

I’m allergic to cats, so I’m not a big fan of them, but this one is so cute!

The history of multitouch

Bill Buxton of Microsoft research has made an overview of what has happened in multi-touch research. For those of you who thought multi-touch first came with Jeff Han or the Iphone, have a look at this page. The picture on top here is from the Multi-Touch Tablet developed at Toronto University in 1985.

By the way, what is Jeff Han up to now? This video shows him demonstrating a new type of bidirectional LEDs capable of sensing your fingers. Check it out:

Vodpod videos no longer available.

More about this project here.

Scott Walker DVD

Have you seen the music documentary 30 Century Man about Scott Walker? It’s a must see, a really good documentary about the legendary artist that started out in The Walker Brother but has gone experimental on his later records. The movie has interviews with among others David Bowie, Radiohead, Brian Eno, Allison Goldfrapp, Rob Ellis and Johnny Marr. Check out this trailer:

More about the documentary here

Gibson Dark Fire Update

MusicRadar.com now has a review of the Gibson Dark Fire. There I found this video from Guitarist magazine. Some of Dark Fires tuning possibilities and sound options are demonstrated briefly.

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Physical Heart, Virtual Body

New guitar deisgned at MIT Media Lab
Vodpod videos no longer available.

This guitar represents something very new in guitar design. By using a small woodplate with five piezo microphones coupled with a dsp audio chip that simulates a guitars body the researchers at MIT Media Lab has made an instrument that is capable of a wide range of inspiring sounds. It is possible to change the sound of the guitar by simply using a woodplate with another wood and profile. The piezo microphones pick up the sounds of the wood, and by using the dsp technology the guitar can be small but recreate the sound of larger acoustic guitars. The dsp opens a lot of possibilities regarding how sounds can be tweaked or even modulated while you play, all inside a regular size electric style guitar. they are currently working on a system that makes changing the woodplate easier.

Now this would be a great product, so I hope it sometime it will find it’s way out of the MIT Media Lab.

The project is discussed here.

The Letter U and the Numeral 2

“Yeah, you’re the fat one, and I wanna be with you”

Does anybody remember the Negativland / U2 controversy?

Negativland, the british experimental/plunderphonic band released the The letter U and the Numeral 2 in 1992. This was a 25 minute CD and booklet pressed in 4000 copies as a response to them being sued by U2’s label Island for using U2 as a name for an EP they released in 1991. In 1992 the american cyberpunk magazine Mondo 2000 was contacted by U2’s publicist wanting them to do an interview with U2 guitarist The Edge about U2’s multimedia Zoo TV tour. The magazines editor R. U. Serius, a friend of Negativland, set it up so that Negativland’s Mark Hosler and Don Joyce (without The Edge’s knowledge) could participate in the interview, letting them ask The Edge questions about copyright. There’s a transcript of the interview here.

The Letter U and The Numeral 2
Acapella version

Special Radio Edit version

Read more: article in The Wire from january 1995