Key Of Grey

July 3rd, 2009 - Air (sometimes written AIR) is a French electronica duo consisting of Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel. Their music can be characterized as down tempo, synthesizer heavy music. The aural landscape is lush, and evokes strong visual imagery. Because of this, Air's music is often used in amateur video shorts (a fantastic example is embedded below). In fact, as I posted about before, it is often through independent shorts that I am exposed to new music and new artists. ... Read More

Photo courtesy of sryffel July 2nd, 2009 - Dave Grohl of Nirvana and Foo Fighters fame is creating a super band with John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin and Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age. Grohl will be taking the drummer's seat, with John Paul Jones on bass and Josh Homme on guitar and presumably vocals as well. They are supposedly in LA right now recording their album, and it's supposed to be a secret, albeit a poorly kept one. I ... Read More

Photo courtesy of ydhsu July 1st, 2009 - I should qualify this post by saying that I am not a DJ. I may use DJ tools and skills to produce some of my music, but I have never made a living by rocking parties and clubs. Have you ever noticed that a lot of great hip hop and electronic music producers have at one point been DJ's? What is it about the turntables that makes DJ's as equally suited to working in the ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Andrea Vandrucci June 30th, 2009 - Want to hear some melodic drumming? Andrea Vadrucci covers such diverse artists as Dream Theater to the Nokia stock cell phone ringtones. Utilizing a drum set up that looks pretty close to Mike Portnoy's and with similar technical flare, Andrea rocks the set like few can. Enjoy gratuitous double kicks? Then you'll like his style. Like subdued "on the ones" drumming? Then maybe not. Since I'm in an 8-bit nostalgic mood today, I've embedded his ... Read More

Photo courtesy of NeuroSky June 29th, 2009 - I'm not sure if it's because I'm in a weird mood today, but when I read about the NeuroSky MindSet, I immediately began to consider its possible usefulness for music. The NeuroSky MindSet is a device designed for gaming that reads your mind. It reads brain signals through a sensor aimed over the gamer's forehead. Supposedly it actually works, and although NeuroSky has its own line of games for the MindSet, it is opening up ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Audiologica June 28th, 2009 - Following my trend of posting DIY projects on Sunday, today will be no exception. I was checking out the Audiologica website, when I came across instructions for putting together the CMoy Pocket Amplifier. Designed by Chu Moy, the CMoy Pocket Amplifier is a good starter project for the beginner DIY audio tweaker. The basic amplifier costs about $20 in components while a nicely speced version will cost about $50. Compared to the prices of headphone ... Read More

Photo courtesy of LatestBuy June 27th, 2009 - Fans of the novelty t-shirt rejoice! Now you can add LatestBuy's Electronic Bongo Drum T-Shirt to your collection that already includes the DIY Wearable piano, and both of ThinkGeek's Personal Soundtrack and Electronic Drum Kit shirts. Why is it that these shirts deal with simple instruments? Where are the flute and violin t-shirts? Just be sure to supercharge the shirt with a car battery and jump into the hot tub for some electric beats. Darwin ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Bill Shouldis June 26th, 2009 - City and Colour is Dallas Green's (of Alexisonfire fame) solo project. In stark contrast to the post-hardcore assault that is Alexisonfire, City and Colour features singer-songwriter acoustic balladeering. I'm not particularly a fan of screaming in music, so I have to be in a certain type of mood to listen to Alexisonfire, but when I do, I enjoy the melodic counterpoint Dallas Green brings to George Pettit's screaming. City and Colour brings Dallas' soaring melodies ... Read More

Photo courtesy of vissago June 25th, 2009 - This post is a continuation of one that I wrote almost a year ago. It's easy to obsess over having the highest possible quality; we all want the best. In the audio world, what does that mean? We see 24-bit here and 192 kHz there and I wouldn't doubt that we'll see 32-bit 768 kHz or something else ridiculous in the near future. Let me quickly break down what bit depth and sample rate mean quickly. ... Read More

June 24th, 2009 - I've wanted to get an Apogee Duet for quite some time to replace my M-Audio Firewire410. It's not that I don't like the FW410, but I'm looking for something a little simpler, and a little more compact for mobile recording. If I'm out on the road, I usually need two inputs max, so the Duet is the perfect solution. The only problem is that it's a little on the pricey side for only two inputs. Because they're so ... Read More