More rants fellow fashion loves. Jeggings!
Obviously someone in the fashion world read my last column about the death of leggings, they seem to have very quickly done a spooner-ism and combined jeans with leggings. No longer will teenage girls looks like 5 year olds anymore, they have an alternative to the skinny jean which fits anytime no matter how many bloating carbs you’ve eaten!
All right the kind of look like jeans from a distance but this doesn’t hide the fact that they CLING and will SHOW EVERYTHING!
If you have a massive vag I don't want to see that ugly meat cauliflower poking out, smiling and dribbling rank fluids in my general direction.
There's few things worse I can think of, perhaps an even bigger Gunt where the vag meets the gut in a hideous deformed unborn foetus type growth that sits there pulsating inside the jeggings or maybe if an extremely well hung male were to wear the jeggings, I mean yes we'd all be impressed or shocked for a couple of minutes before we'd get bored, yawn and think of boring old bratwurst. I love bratwurst, but there’s a time and a place and jeggings are not it!
If you really can't get into those skinny jean there might, maybe might just be a reason.
SO for heavens sake, please please don't go out on the town and disgust me with your unsightly god given features, unless its Swindon or Chard and then I don’t care.
Next Time, the swan song of the thong.
Love, Gok Wan's current boy. x
Thursday 21 January 2010
Ring Modulation - an overview and guide.
A strange concept invented to convert radio signals so you could hear your analogue radios signal, however thank the lord someone in
Music came across one and made our musical lives a slight bit more interesting!
Signal processing effect were we either mix a pair of frequencies (mainly by addition, subtraction but other methods are available).
We can also modulate two signals by their relative amplitudes, in this case an original signal is translated into a version that goes along with the carrier signal. This method is called amplitude modulation (AM).
As you can see both techniques do the same thing, we have two signals put together ending as one signal. Typically in music we have a user signal, e.g. a guitar and the carrier signal would be an oscillator set to a particular setting, although it is for instance possible to have a carrier signal of something totally different for instance a piano, a drum machine or even another guitar.
User signal can also be as varied as you like, for instance the Dr Who Dalek voice was made with a ring mod.
Ring modulation where the carrier is an oscillator typically gives a metallic synthetic bell type sound, due to the fact it has been combined with a synthesizer you wouldn't be surprised! If a drum machine for instance was used as the carrier this would in theroy give a pulsating rhythm to your guitar work.
If you hear the start of Black Sabbaths 'Paranoid' you can hear a ring mod effect on a guitar.
I am currently using the ring mod in the line 6 MM4 (same as the one in the line 6 FM4) which is digital and allows amplitude
Modulation (which you can set between AM and FM, basically results in lofi or hifi sounding). There seems to be some kind of digital noise gate since it is a very silent effect. Although it is not a very loud effect so a booster is needed afterwards, I tend to use a distortion which can add some tasty fuzz meat or an overdrive for a cleaner sound.
I can achieve the same high pitch squeal noise as heard on the exmodels album 'zoo psychology', mainly because they use the same device but any ring mod will achieve the same effect.
There’s plenty of choice out there for ring modulator pedals, from basic ones on multi effects (e.g. Alesis Multi Effects) to boutique analogue ones (Burford Robot) to higher quality digital (Line 6 MM4 / FM4) to 'the daddy' analogue ring mods (Mooger Fooger Ring Modulator or Pigtronix Spaceship).
I would advise in my experience of analogue pedals to use a noise gate after wards, to get rid of the carrier signal when you're not playing (similar advise goes when using cheaper digital or high gain effects that tend to hiss).
Although occasionally you want to hear the carrier signal, you can do fun things with some modulation, delay and the carrier signal since its like having a mini synth pedal.
Most synths tend to have a ring mod bit, for example the Microkorg allows a carrier signal to be input as the ring mod. Yummy, regimented drum machine ring mod alert ahoy!Hopefully this little article has persuaded you to let some ring modulation into your life too :)
Selection of ring mods mentioned above :
Music came across one and made our musical lives a slight bit more interesting!
Signal processing effect were we either mix a pair of frequencies (mainly by addition, subtraction but other methods are available).
We can also modulate two signals by their relative amplitudes, in this case an original signal is translated into a version that goes along with the carrier signal. This method is called amplitude modulation (AM).
As you can see both techniques do the same thing, we have two signals put together ending as one signal. Typically in music we have a user signal, e.g. a guitar and the carrier signal would be an oscillator set to a particular setting, although it is for instance possible to have a carrier signal of something totally different for instance a piano, a drum machine or even another guitar.
User signal can also be as varied as you like, for instance the Dr Who Dalek voice was made with a ring mod.
Ring modulation where the carrier is an oscillator typically gives a metallic synthetic bell type sound, due to the fact it has been combined with a synthesizer you wouldn't be surprised! If a drum machine for instance was used as the carrier this would in theroy give a pulsating rhythm to your guitar work.
If you hear the start of Black Sabbaths 'Paranoid' you can hear a ring mod effect on a guitar.
I am currently using the ring mod in the line 6 MM4 (same as the one in the line 6 FM4) which is digital and allows amplitude
Modulation (which you can set between AM and FM, basically results in lofi or hifi sounding). There seems to be some kind of digital noise gate since it is a very silent effect. Although it is not a very loud effect so a booster is needed afterwards, I tend to use a distortion which can add some tasty fuzz meat or an overdrive for a cleaner sound.
I can achieve the same high pitch squeal noise as heard on the exmodels album 'zoo psychology', mainly because they use the same device but any ring mod will achieve the same effect.
There’s plenty of choice out there for ring modulator pedals, from basic ones on multi effects (e.g. Alesis Multi Effects) to boutique analogue ones (Burford Robot) to higher quality digital (Line 6 MM4 / FM4) to 'the daddy' analogue ring mods (Mooger Fooger Ring Modulator or Pigtronix Spaceship).
I would advise in my experience of analogue pedals to use a noise gate after wards, to get rid of the carrier signal when you're not playing (similar advise goes when using cheaper digital or high gain effects that tend to hiss).
Although occasionally you want to hear the carrier signal, you can do fun things with some modulation, delay and the carrier signal since its like having a mini synth pedal.
Most synths tend to have a ring mod bit, for example the Microkorg allows a carrier signal to be input as the ring mod. Yummy, regimented drum machine ring mod alert ahoy!Hopefully this little article has persuaded you to let some ring modulation into your life too :)
Selection of ring mods mentioned above :
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Wednesday 13 January 2010
Frederic Effects : Harmonic Perculator HP-1.
Frederic Effects are a one man show from a guy called Tim. He’s doing the whole boutique clone thing with good looking, well built pedals, all of which thus far are in MXR style enclosures (nice for pedal board spaceage).
The HP1! This germanium overdrive beast was created in the 1970s for guitarists to do battle with. There's only two controls, level which controls volume on the right (going over 50% turns this things into a minature amplifer with lots of gain, although not nearly as much as Fuzzy Pedal by Squirrel Audio) and harmonics on the left which controls the amount of work the pedal does (going over 80% creates an amazing synthetic robots attacking Corgan’s Marshall stacks).
I tested the pedal with a Hofner Shorty (in drop D for lovely Melvin’s esq sounds) with Humbucker pickups and a Strat Clone on a 15 watt amp.
There’s a switch to turn it onto a sole overdrive mode which is louder and less distorted, this is a new addition to the original design and add something extra (eg less money on extra pedals, always good).
With regards to the gain control you get the following options, at a subtle level the device overdrives slightly, thus adding a much needed coat of colour to a rubbish janglyness a lot of electric guitars have.
A mid-level setting it steps up the crunk factor giving more colouration and a nice kkrrrraazzzz we associate with electric guitars.
A higher range levels it adds more colour and a nice sound of electronics doing work for you it you let a note ring. The gain is pretty big so in a decent setup i expect you could get some cool feedback to play around with. It also starts getting fuzz, not an untuned tv set like most distortion/overdrives more like a hoard of screaming wasps, only the wasps are actually guitars with wings and terrifying teeth filled faces.
The harmonics and gain are interlinked, e.g. no harmonic control big gain = no sound. I’ve found the best setting for myself is harmonics at 12am and gain around 2pm.
Harmonics seem to add more and more colour to the sound, unless the overdrive switch is on and they don’t do that much at all.
The only person linked to this pedal is Albini who uses this pedal solely but it doesn’t sound particularly Albini when you plug it in. So I think the nice thing about this device is it doesn't sound dated or linked to a particular type of music, like the way you’d link a wah wah or fuzz face to Jimi H, or a boss distortion or small stone to Kurt C.
Having kept an eye on Frederic Effects over the last few month some exciting things look to come, currently Tim is also offering the Sovek Big Muff (in a tiny case and accepts a normal adaptor!), MXR Distortion / Green Ringer Hybrid and a Shin-Ei fuzz clone.
I’m intrigued to see what this guy comes up with next.
Web site : www.fredric.co.uk/effects/
Ebay Account : http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/timhulio/
The HP1! This germanium overdrive beast was created in the 1970s for guitarists to do battle with. There's only two controls, level which controls volume on the right (going over 50% turns this things into a minature amplifer with lots of gain, although not nearly as much as Fuzzy Pedal by Squirrel Audio) and harmonics on the left which controls the amount of work the pedal does (going over 80% creates an amazing synthetic robots attacking Corgan’s Marshall stacks).
I tested the pedal with a Hofner Shorty (in drop D for lovely Melvin’s esq sounds) with Humbucker pickups and a Strat Clone on a 15 watt amp.
There’s a switch to turn it onto a sole overdrive mode which is louder and less distorted, this is a new addition to the original design and add something extra (eg less money on extra pedals, always good).
With regards to the gain control you get the following options, at a subtle level the device overdrives slightly, thus adding a much needed coat of colour to a rubbish janglyness a lot of electric guitars have.
A mid-level setting it steps up the crunk factor giving more colouration and a nice kkrrrraazzzz we associate with electric guitars.
A higher range levels it adds more colour and a nice sound of electronics doing work for you it you let a note ring. The gain is pretty big so in a decent setup i expect you could get some cool feedback to play around with. It also starts getting fuzz, not an untuned tv set like most distortion/overdrives more like a hoard of screaming wasps, only the wasps are actually guitars with wings and terrifying teeth filled faces.
The harmonics and gain are interlinked, e.g. no harmonic control big gain = no sound. I’ve found the best setting for myself is harmonics at 12am and gain around 2pm.
Harmonics seem to add more and more colour to the sound, unless the overdrive switch is on and they don’t do that much at all.
The only person linked to this pedal is Albini who uses this pedal solely but it doesn’t sound particularly Albini when you plug it in. So I think the nice thing about this device is it doesn't sound dated or linked to a particular type of music, like the way you’d link a wah wah or fuzz face to Jimi H, or a boss distortion or small stone to Kurt C.
Having kept an eye on Frederic Effects over the last few month some exciting things look to come, currently Tim is also offering the Sovek Big Muff (in a tiny case and accepts a normal adaptor!), MXR Distortion / Green Ringer Hybrid and a Shin-Ei fuzz clone.
I’m intrigued to see what this guy comes up with next.
Web site : www.fredric.co.uk/effects/
Ebay Account : http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/timhulio/
Fuzzy Pedal by Squirrel Audio
I recently stumbled across a very cool looking fuzz pedal from a company called Squirrel Audio. Turns out this company is one man called Doug from Durham, England.
Squirrel Audio are doing Squirrel based designed artwork on the pedals, there’s a Squirrel with one eye called Cyclops that is a signal booster, an evil evil evil looking Squirrel whose sole purpose is to make a horrible silicon based fuzz racket (thus we have here) and a number of others that include a Silicon/Germanium Fuzz (a switch enables switching between the two transistors) and a Tube Overdrive (evil bakelite squirrels).
Anyway, back to the Fuzzy Squirrel. It’s a silicon transistor pedal so 1960s fuzz face vintage fans can fuck right off. This baby has two controls, volume (left) tone (right).
I tested the pedal with a small 15 watt amp and Hofner Shortey with Humbucker pickups.
The (super)gain/volume puts to shame the Spinal Tap theory of volume 11, I turned the damn pedal on 10am setting (6am is the lowest) and my amp louder than any high gain pedal I’ve got in my array. I was also pleasantly surprised to find harmonics jumped straight out of the amp.
The tone/fuzz control is like the tone control on a guitar (very bass to very treble). With the guitar is sounded great between 9 and 11 oclock on the dial. Below 9 it started to get sludgy, great for Melvins dirge sound, and above 2pm it started to get into Jesus and the Mary Chain territory. Finally between 5 and 6 it was burning white noise, you can get that sound My Bloody Valentine use on the piercing horrible track they do at the end of their sets. Lovely noise!
Now dear reader you’re thinking, what?
Any pedal that can get from reasonable volume to very bloody loud, and do sludge dirge to melodic to white noise to feedback is a versatile little box. m
Now what are the problems with the pedal you think?
Unfortunately there are a few downfalls as with every thing, although they are small.
You can turn the pedal on/off without any cables being plugged in; however since it is true bypass no battery drain would be expected in normal circumstances, the enclosed is MXR type (screwdriver needed for the battery compartment) but the control are slightly closer to the switch than normal (people with massive feet?
Having said this I’m a size 10 in shoes and could operate it fine during band practice) and finally the tone and volume are not labeled, however as I’ve said its obvious what each control does by the sound.
Myself and Doug briefly spoke over the power of email, yes kids people still use email to speak and not twitfacespazz or whatever the latest craze is, and he’s a very nice and helpful chap. Even offers money back guarantee if you don’t think it sounds like you thought it would.
He also mentioned he’s currently attempting to build good digital pedals (rather than rubbish mass produced Chinese rubbish (sorry guys I know you’ll have your day very soon), which does the job but hohum, combined with quality analog controls.
Very exciting stuff considering the majority of boutique pedals out there are analog fueled by Z Vex or clones of older devices that can’t be accurately be reproduced due to the fact people don’t make the parts anymore.
Website : http://www.squirrelaudio.co.uk/
Ebay account : http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/britishstuff/
Squirrel Audio are doing Squirrel based designed artwork on the pedals, there’s a Squirrel with one eye called Cyclops that is a signal booster, an evil evil evil looking Squirrel whose sole purpose is to make a horrible silicon based fuzz racket (thus we have here) and a number of others that include a Silicon/Germanium Fuzz (a switch enables switching between the two transistors) and a Tube Overdrive (evil bakelite squirrels).
Anyway, back to the Fuzzy Squirrel. It’s a silicon transistor pedal so 1960s fuzz face vintage fans can fuck right off. This baby has two controls, volume (left) tone (right).
I tested the pedal with a small 15 watt amp and Hofner Shortey with Humbucker pickups.
The (super)gain/volume puts to shame the Spinal Tap theory of volume 11, I turned the damn pedal on 10am setting (6am is the lowest) and my amp louder than any high gain pedal I’ve got in my array. I was also pleasantly surprised to find harmonics jumped straight out of the amp.
The tone/fuzz control is like the tone control on a guitar (very bass to very treble). With the guitar is sounded great between 9 and 11 oclock on the dial. Below 9 it started to get sludgy, great for Melvins dirge sound, and above 2pm it started to get into Jesus and the Mary Chain territory. Finally between 5 and 6 it was burning white noise, you can get that sound My Bloody Valentine use on the piercing horrible track they do at the end of their sets. Lovely noise!
Now dear reader you’re thinking, what?
Any pedal that can get from reasonable volume to very bloody loud, and do sludge dirge to melodic to white noise to feedback is a versatile little box. m
Now what are the problems with the pedal you think?
Unfortunately there are a few downfalls as with every thing, although they are small.
You can turn the pedal on/off without any cables being plugged in; however since it is true bypass no battery drain would be expected in normal circumstances, the enclosed is MXR type (screwdriver needed for the battery compartment) but the control are slightly closer to the switch than normal (people with massive feet?
Having said this I’m a size 10 in shoes and could operate it fine during band practice) and finally the tone and volume are not labeled, however as I’ve said its obvious what each control does by the sound.
Myself and Doug briefly spoke over the power of email, yes kids people still use email to speak and not twitfacespazz or whatever the latest craze is, and he’s a very nice and helpful chap. Even offers money back guarantee if you don’t think it sounds like you thought it would.
He also mentioned he’s currently attempting to build good digital pedals (rather than rubbish mass produced Chinese rubbish (sorry guys I know you’ll have your day very soon), which does the job but hohum, combined with quality analog controls.
Very exciting stuff considering the majority of boutique pedals out there are analog fueled by Z Vex or clones of older devices that can’t be accurately be reproduced due to the fact people don’t make the parts anymore.
Website : http://www.squirrelaudio.co.uk/
Ebay account : http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/britishstuff/
Thursday 7 January 2010
Prince: a musical (and a little personal) critique
Now before all you hardcore Prince fans start shrieking with indignation (and when I say shrieking, I suspect literally), I admit that Prince has written some good songs – unfortunately he has also produced a lot of very bad songs. This is often the problem with prolific songwriters, and Prince is so prolific that it actually seems to have stunted his growth. For every “Gett Off” and “Alphabet Street”, there’s a track like “God” or “Head” to counteract it. Have you actually heard “God”? Christ, I mistakenly watched “All Dogs Go To Heaven 2” a while ago, and I honestly couldn’t decide which was worse – and bear in mind that “Dogs 2” is a) about 30 times longer, and b) utterly, utterly shit. Now before all you hardcore Don Bluth fans start protesti – oh, there aren’t any.
But how does this, so much musical bumwad, correspond to Prince’s success rate with women, is what I can’t understand. The lyrics alone are hardly likely to win over even the more tolerant of dames; on “Just Another Lonely Christmas”, Prince sensitively informs his ladyfriend that he fancies her more than her sister - though as it sounds like she is dead (his girlfriend not the sister), perhaps this is not such an issue. Another particularly touching moment is in “I Love U In Me”, where Prince promises not to blow his beans too soon, only to explode as soon as she so much as breathes on it. As if this wasn’t bad enough, he delivers every single line in a whimpering falsetto, which combined with his ridiculous stage attire and labradoodle mullet, gives one the impression of being serenaded by a particularly horny Dogtanian.
It’s not exclusively the B-sides though; “Sign O’ The Times”, while being a good album on the whole, is let down by a few rubbish tracks. “Adore” and “It’s Gonna Be A Beautiful Night” are simply too long for a couple of not very interesting songs; but it is “If I Was Ur Girlfriend” that marks the real low-point. Again the music is unremarkable, but it is Prince’s pathetic pleading that is most embarrassing, as he employs perhaps the most flawed argument imaginable to try and get his end away:
“If I was your girlfriend would you let me undress you?”
Well no, because that would be weird, wouldn’t it? Seeing as I’m not a lesbian, and this isn’t “American Pie” 1, 2 or 3.
“If I was your girlfriend would you come to me when someone hurt you, even if that someone was me?”
Again no, because a) if you had hurt me you would be the last person I’d speak to, mainly as you’d probably just try and hump my leg or spike my drink again, and b) if you were my girlfriend we wouldn’t be dating, and so you wouldn’t have hurt me in the first place. We’re getting into the whole Terminator paradox thing here… Oh, that’s given you an idea for a song? When you’ve finished can I please not hear it? Thanks… Yeah, I think probably a B-side too.
The song eventually finishes with Prince screaming and whining like an over-indulged child because, quite inconsiderately, she won’t let him watch her taking her clothes off.
“Why not? If I was your girlfriend you would.”
Christ, I thought we’d covered this…
“I’d do it for you.”
I’ve no doubt you would, Prince.
“Now that I’m naked, what should I do?”
Why don’t you put your clothes back on, and your coat while you’re about it… Don’t worry, I’ll give you the money for a taxi.
“ For you naked I would dance a ballet, would that get you off?”
No. No it wouldn’t.
I mean, if Prince can afford to chuck away an entire album on account of so-called evil spirits, surely there’s room for a couple more duffers on the cutting room floor. I hear that Prince is due a hip replacement operation soon, having reduced it to biscuit crumbs after years of dancing in high heels; perhaps when the doctors rip it out they can give him a swift lobotomy while they’re about it, or as anyone else would call it, a vasectomy. What the… Get off, stop it Prince! That’s it, I’m getting the cat basket down from the loft – don’t hide behind the sofa!...
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