Amazon: 

Stay Positive

C'mon guys... Yer not checking the amazon.com mp3 store on a daily basis? I gotta be the one to tell ya?

Look, for $1.99, you get The Hold Steady's new album, Stay Positive. Critically-acclaimed, indie-darlings, booze-hounds... $1.99!!!!!

(clicky-clicky the link above)

I haven't even heard it yet and cheap-skate-ol-me is downloading it as we type.

Today only (August 15, 2008)

I love you.

-pat

Amazon: 

65 Twin Reverb Guitar Combo Amp

Grabbed my trusty Fender Twin Reverb out of the garage today to bring it up to the office. Hadn't played in in awhile. Turned it on, tubes warmed up, plugged it in... Ahhhh!! Hello, old friend.

This is how an amp should sound like. Warm, deep, alive, real.

This is a reissue (blackface), but sounds so amazing.

Contrast this with the experience I had recently with a "blemished" Blackheart Little Giant Combo I got off of Zzounds. Came to me DOA. Loud Technologies were even kind enough to send me new tubes, but no go. Light turns on, no sounds come out. Uh... Back it goes.

Amazon: 

Every Picture Tells A Story

Oh boy oh boy, Rod Stewart's Every Picture Tells A Story, is an unbelievably fantastic record.

Don't have it yet? Get it. For $1.99, you can can't go wrong. A great example of fine 70's rock and roll. All of The Faces are on this record, including Ron Wood.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Every_Picture_Tells_a_Story

My pal, Rob, from SF, posts and excellent review/story about Camper Van Beethoven's 25th Anniversary show at the Fillmore in SF. Long, but well worth the read.
http://whatduvetsaid.blogspot.com/2008/06/take-off-that-jumpsuit-you-loo...

Btw, CVB is doing it's annual Campout in Sept. Anyone else want to go on Friday night? Camper Van Beethoven, Built To Spill, Quasi.

Fantastic!

We just got back from a few days in Las Vegas. Fun, and I can't believe I'm actually thinking about going back, but had my issues, namely with "usability". Will post more later.

In the meantime, Technorati Profile

Amazon: 

Either/Or

C'mon! Don't have this yet? It's a classic Elliott Smith release. And for only $2.99?!?

Today only (7/28/2008)

Get it while it's hot!

Put some tracks of my old band from the mid/late-90's, Go Pound Salt, up on Last.fm.

http://www.last.fm/music/Go+Pound+Salt/Self-titled

They have a new artist program, so what the heck, let's try it and see.

Posted a quick demo I did last night on myspace: http://www.myspace.com/lectric

Done in Garageband with one of the built-in drum samples. Drum sound is a bit cheesy, and the arrangement needs fleshed out, but wanted to get something down "on tape" and the essence is there.

Amazon: 

Re-Volts

Ventured past the Orange Curtain last night to the Surf City Saloon in Huntington Beach to see my pals from the Swingin' Utters play in a couple of side project bands.

Johnny is in Druglords of the Avenues, who are more modern sounding punk outfit, with his unmistakably great punk vocals leading the charge.

lasers are the future on 12seconds.tv

Amazon: 

Cry-Baby

From Norway. Beach recommends them. Post-punk/Indie/Neo-Prog. Really good stuff.

One of the very, very few bands on this "social networking" web site called "MySpace".
http://www.myspace.com/ungdomskulen

Beach, Sol, and gang are in the spotlight today with a bunch of articles about http://www.12seconds.tv.

From the site:

What is 12seconds

Amazon: 

Drums And Guns

Many of Sup Pop's albums are selling for $7.99 on Amazon.com. Congrats to Sub Pop on their 20th anniversary.

Moving into our new house got me thinking about ways to save on energy costs (going from small apartment to full house), and with the abundant amount of sunshine we get in Long Beach (and Southern California in general), I'm especially curious about solar energy.

So last month, I finally got myself a VPS through Slicehost and decided it was time to start doing my own personal Drupal stuff. The experience has been mostly positive; building the virtual box from scratch, prepping a multisite environment, doing some light theming, etc.

Amazon: 

MAudio BX8a Deluxe Bi-amplified Studio Reference Monitors

Wow. I dropped a chunk o' change for these monitors today. I've only played around with them a bit, but so far they sound great. Finally, I feel like I have some real gear in my arsenal to record with.

The one thing about these speakers. They are HUGE! 8-inch woofers with tower above my iMac.

In any case, I'm pretty excited about them and want to start experimenting with recording acoustic guitar. Me thinks a solo, acoustic album might not be too far off.

Amazon: 

American Beauty

Get 'em while their hot! Greatful Dead's American Beauty is downloadable in mp3 form for only $1.99!! Today only.

UPDATE: Day after the price is back to 7.99. Ya snooze, ya lose. No worries, though. Keep watching Amazon.com's mp3 store. They always have a great album on sale per day.

Saw a really cool movie, Such Hawks, Such Hounds, last night at the Silent Movie Theatre on Fairfax. Such Hawks was co-produced/co-directed by an old Rhino co-worker of mine, John Srebalus, and is a documentary on stoner/doom/proto-metal/pych/hard rock from the 70's till now.

Various thoughts on transportation issues here in the South Land:

Amazon: 

Blackheart BH5-112 Little Giant Guitar Amp Combo, 5W All Tube with Attitude

Since the move, I've been redoing my music recording/practicing set up. One thing I've been thinking about for awhile is getting a low-watt boutique(-ish) combo amp for my room. I know these style of amps are very trendy right now, but for a good reason. Good sounding amp that won't piss of the neighbors, good for recording and even good for small gigs.

Amazon: 

Retribution Gospel Choir

Alan Sparhawk's side project, Retribution Gospel Choir, produced by and released on Mark Kozelek's (Sun Kil Moon, Red House Painters) label, Caldo Verde. Nice stuff. Think Low songs with Sun Kil Moon production. We have a winner, folks.

I love Alan's songwriting, the melancholy atmosphere his songs create. Hey, they don't call it Sadcore for nuthin'!

Amazon: 

2- song

Egg Hunt was a project with Ian Mackaye and Jeff Nelson from Minor Threat. This two song EP is the only document of this short-lived project, but the songs are fantastic examples of post-hardcore melodic rock. The songs bridge the gap between Minor Threat and Fugazi.

A nice find on Amazon. I use to have the 7-inch and haven't heard these songs for a long time.

The Drupal goddesses and gods over at Lullabot are set to release a learning DVD, "Understanding Drupal", later this month. The topic list looks interesting and could be a good tool for folks getting started with Drupal, or helping to train non-technical (or not-so-technical) folks on your team.

More info:
http://drupal.org/node/276923

Holy cow! Now THIS is a useful app. How long has this been around and why am I only discovering it now? This app is going to save me oodles of time.

“Tester is a free WebBrowser that allows you to have the rendering and javascript engines of IE8 beta 1, IE7 IE 6 and IE5.5 on Vista and XP, as well as the installed IE in the same process.”

http://www.my-debugbar.com/wiki/IETester/HomePage

Amazon: 

iRobot 560 Roomba Vacuuming Robot, Black and Silver

Actually, he is "Bob 2". My mom has the original Bob. She started the madness by being the first in our family to the iRobot Roomba vacuum. Our kids freaked out over it. Turns out, not only does it clean the dust from your floors, but keeps the kids entertained for a good hour. Amazing.

Anyhoo, my wife fell in love with it and now we have one. Hooray for technology and automation. Welcome to family, Bob.

Amazon: 

Ampeg ADA6 Dan Armstrong Guitar with Rock Treble & Sustain Treble Pickups

Ampeg announced in January at NAMM a WOOD version of the classic, if not cultish Dan Armstrong guitar.

From the pictures, they looked pretty sweet and affordable at under $500 (I liked the red one, especially.) So now it's July. Where are they? A few suspect shops via google list them, and Ampeg's site still lists them as "Coming soon" (define "soon", please...)