Somehow this has turned into some sort of a review

I bought a new thing for recording my guitar, a Line 6 POD Studio UX1. Here's my first recording:

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It plugs into a USB port and comes with some recording software called Riffworks T4 which is really good and it even has a feature that makes drum loops.

The problem I used to have with other recording programs was that it would take ages for me to record something and I'd have to make some sort of drum loop and it would take forever to mess around with the thing, trying to get what I had recorded to fit together and so on, but with this program I actually recorded a whole song in a few hours and it doesn't sound bad considering I had only just started using it. I suppose it's just better because it's tailored to guitar recording and not over complicated, there is enough there to record good tunes but not too much going on that you get lost and take forever and then wonder why it's 11:35 pm and what you have been doing with the weekend and why you have only recorded about two chords which sound like rubbish. Instead you still spend all night on it, but it's a lot more fun and you end up managing to actually finish a bit of music for a change and probably be quite pleased with the result.

The only thing is as far as I can work out, it looks like you can only use the set drum loops (which are still good because you can adjust them, make them faster and change how varied you want them to be and although you can also buy different loops on the company's website) but it would be better if there was some sort of option where you could put together your own loop with different individual drum samples (eg individual hi hats, snare drums and all those other sorts of drums... just goes to show how little I know about drums) if you wanted to make your own loop. (Maybe you can do this? I haven't been able to so far, I'm assuming you can't).

Otherwise though it is pretty good. Miles better than what I used to do years ago which involved plugging in a crap microphone into a crap sound card and recording a crappy noise which didn't even sound like a guitar. So yes, I'm quite impressed I suppose. Review over.

Anyway, you can expect me to start posting loads of tunes I have made now. I think I will also have to find a way to record my banjo onto the computer so I can add some banjo sounds to my tunes.

There is a microphone hole in this Line 6 UX1 thing which is probably meant for singing (yeah that's not going to happen) so I think maybe I could get a good mic and try recording the banjo with that. The only thing is, as I mentioned above, I've had problems with trying to record with a microphone before and I don't know if I can record well without getting the sound of the computer in the background (and my computer is really noisy, it sounds like either some sort of generator, or something that is about to take off, probably because it has loads of cooling fans inside).

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the tune. It's sort of a rock song but with a strange bit in the middle with some diminished chords and minor 7 and 7b5 chords.
I've also been learning a bit more music theory and was trying out a few different chords and modes and things, so being able to record ideas easily is going to make it a lot more fun.

Return

Well it's been a while, but I feel in the mood for a posting, well it has only been almost 10 months now...
Some things which have happened:
I did a lot of gardening this year. This came from being quite fed up in around January and suddenly becoming addicted to buying seeds in Homebase on my way home from work. It was in an attempt to not hate the coming year and maybe look forward to something. It was all quite rubbish at the beginning of the year but I have to say things are a lot better now (I don't like to speak too soon, but various much better things have happened, and some unsavoury people have moved along out of my life and far away which has been a huge relief.)

I grew a lot of things, potatoes, beans, tomatoes (I grew a variety called Hundreds and Thousands and there really were loads of them, they were nice, very small and sweet). The tomatoes got blight in the end but even so I still had loads, in fact there were too many.

I gave one plant to my grandparents, just the one plant, and they said they had hundreds of tomatoes from it too. I had about 6 or so plants, so you can imagine the number of tomatoes I ended up with, I was practically swimming in them, they were coming out of my ears. Well alright, not out of my ears, just off the plants.

I also still have a lot of peppers growing. Mum grew a weird spiky cucumber, which freaked me out. I also grew a plant called Weretors of Elgebar (which is the purple flower in that *fantastic* montagé (ooh big word, I even managed to find the e with the accent on top for that one) I have made above, which took me all of 1.3 seconds) and also a plant called Neural Miner, from which I have a gourd (that big green thing at the bottom of the montage. Ooops look at that, I forgot the accent there) which is inedible but really weird, which is always good.

I also bought a great pair of socks last week. They are made from one of those soft fabrics, you know, like chenille or something, actually, yes, exactly chenille. They are very soft. I wore them today and spent most of the morning walking around in them because it felt like I was walking on a new carpet, except I wasn't, it was just the socks.

I also have a master plan for avoiding colds and flu. I am really busy at work at the moment and can't afford to be off sick, and let's face it, I'm not one of those people that really enjoys being ill. But it's that time of year again. So I bought a bag of onions and have put one in my coat pocket in the hope it will stop me getting a cold. I heard once that years ago people used to do this and have always wanted to try it. The only thing is I am using a shallot and I don't know if that will work as well as a normal sized onion.

Ah I just found a fantastic website: www.shallot.com
Can't see anything about putting them in coat pockets though. In fact I can't find anything anywhere about putting onions of any sort in pockets on the entire internet.

New year

I hope everyone has had a good Christmas and New Year.
I don't know if anyone else feels the same way but it all seems a bit peculiar at the moment, life in general I mean. There is a weird atmosphere or something and everything seems to hae slowed down, it's like being in hibernation.

It's a a shame about Woolworths, I took a picture of it just before it closed down:

It's cleared out and empty now, I keep meaning to take another photo of it.

Here's another photo of nothing in particular, just because I thought it was funny:


Also it seems to be one of those periods where everthing you own starts breaking. It's not enough for one thing to break, there seems to be a rule of three.

First the kettle broke, then the washing machine, and now the vacuum cleaner. Not only that, but the new kettle broke too. Luckily dad fixed the washing machine but the future of the vacuum cleaner is under discussion at this very moment.

I have to say the third kettle is a lot better than the second one, it looks a lot nicer.

Duck egg

Earlier in the week a neighbour came to the door with some duck eggs! It was unexpected, I didn't even know she had any ducks. I know she has some chickens because I can hear them clucking sometimes.

The eggs were quite interesting, they were slightly larger than chicken eggs and the same sort of shape, but translucent. I had one fried in a pan and it was really nice, the white was sort of translucent too and it had a slightly different flavour to a chickens egg and it wasn't as heavy.

Christmas Tree/Man

Everyday on my way to work I pass a fancy dress shop which has two dummies in the window displaying whatever costumes are appropriate for the time of year. There have been some amusing ones (once the male mannequin was wearing a pink tutu) but the costume in the window this week has to be the best so far:

I managed to take a photo as I went past on my phone (I mean, I took the photo with my phone, I didn't ride past on the phone). A Christmas tree costume, how funny.

Finished!

Well I think I'm finished with the template now. It's similar to the old one but different enough that it makes a change.

Looking through my old links to other blogs, I discovered that a lot of them don't exist anymore! Where has everyone gone? Anyway, I've taken those off. I have to look around for some new interesting blogs to add to the list.

I was trying to add my own blog to those blogring/bloglistings sites but a lot of the old ones seem to have disappeared (although a lot of them were fairly useless). I'm on Technorati.com where I just discovered I have 1 fan. I got very excited and clicked on the link to find out who it was... it was me. Haha! I don't remember doing that.

Template.... yes I know, I'm nearly finished though

It's getting there...
Time I went to bed.