72 Hoyt Street

More from the Mashpit!

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Wed, 28 May 2008 06:50:00 +0000

When I was "In The Mood", I studied quite a bit about dcop (more precisely, in the context of python-amarok), I wrote a mini remote controller for amarok with wx and python for shits and giggles. Some months later, when I became a decent mobile snake wrangler, I decided to juice my Nokia N73 a bit more. So now I have this very small bluetooth-based amarok remote controller called "Ytsejam" (because that name is original and nobody else could have possibly thought about it \oo/ ). Ytsejam is based on PyS60s socket/appuifw API and has a server app (once the mini controller, stripped off its UI), which processes commands over bluetooth sent by a client (N73) and pushes them to amarok via dcop.

Here is the amarok server code.
And here is the client (on phone) provided you have the snake on there.
Need I mention that you have to have your python dcop bindings, and PyBluez in place? Also, you'll need to change your bt addr for the adapter on your computer in the client.

-Riffenstein

Whose Line is it Anyways?

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 10 May 2008 17:43:00 +0000

As I write this I'm thinking (and listening to the music) of a band named after a phrase coined by Frederico Fellini. This band has a vocalist with a distinct high pitch voice who has a penchant for doing acrobatics on stage, a lead guitarist and band leader who with his curly hair and spectacles reminds me of the character Benny from the movie Cidade de Deus (City of Gods). Members of this band have titles such as "sound manipulator" and their music switches constantly between early Pink Floydish ambient themes, jazz, Latin music, Classical, metal and a lot of other music that I'm not sure I can classify. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I'm talking about the group that calls itself The Mars Volta.

You see, a friend introduced me to The Mars Volta with the words "If you give their music some time and understand what they are trying to do, you'll love their work." And it did take me time - close to a year - to start listening to them seriously. And strangely I started listening to them soon after a very intense ultra-long-distance telephonic discussion with Riff about so called "progressive" bands and the limits they go to. More specifically we were trying to come up with some kind of resolution to the question "where does one draw the line?" when it comes to pushing the envelop on unconventional music. How far can a band be allowed to go to let their music still be considered music and not simply noise. And Mars Volta comes really close... In fact I was the one that brought their name up. I was telling Riff about Mike Portnoy's statement in a recent interview that he thought that Dream Theater's music is more accessible to people than music of bands such as Tool and Mars Volta. I'd heard tracks by Mars Volta before, and while I liked some parts, a lot of it I couldn't comprehend. It felt like their music had unusual musical patterns (or no pattern at all) for the sake of coming up with something different. In fact Omar Rodriguez-Lopez - Mars Volta's guitarist and leader freely admits that he might not like to create music for Mars Volta forever and he might get bored and try other things.

But soon after I put the phone down, I started listening to their music - mostly to still convince myself that I was right in categorizing their music in that gray area between music and noise. This time though, I was paying attention to the music unlike earlier times when I was listening to music while doing other things. And between the familiar parts in the tracks, I was slowly beginning to recognize those other sections that I had earlier felt were chaotic. While I could still not make any sense of their structure, etc., I started liking these for their improvisation and wierdness. Between some really nice melodic sections, these felt like a burst of inspiration - not very much unlike the improvisation a blues guitarist might come up with when he's in the moment. If you've seen any of the several Mars Volta videos available on You Tube, you can even get a glimpse of the band enjoying themselves.

What had changed now? Had I heard the music for too long? If you listen to any music long enough, however bad, you will start enjoying it. Was this happening to me with Mars Volta? The thing is I don't know. And more importantly now, I don't care! After that discussion with my friend, I started realizing something - I'd been trying too hard to analyze the music, and that was stopping me from just enjoying the music. And Mars Volta is just one band that I've trying to over-analyze. Emerson, Lake and Palmer (ELP) is another band. Whenever I heard their music, all I tried to do was try to figure out why their music is called progressive, and forgetting to pay attention to the music and the beautiful melodies they composed - From the Beginning from ELP's Trilogy album, or The Sheriff for instance. If I'd heard this music not knowing they were from a so called "progressive" band, I would have been tapping my foot to the music and trying to find out who the artist was.

But getting back to the main topic of this post, The Mars Volta. The band admits that they like to experiment - Cedric Bixler Zavala frequently mixes Spanish and English lyrics in his songs; he even claims that one of the ways he comes up with the lyrics is to first mumble and sing gibberish to arrive at a certain kind of sound/melody and then adds lyrics later that sound similar! Omar Rodriguez Lopez is known to ask his band members to compose their parts separately from one another so that each part sounds complete by itself. These are then arranged later. Don't ask me how! The bands influences are eclectic as much as they are unconventional (I haven't even heard about some of the bands they cite as their influence). But some of the ones I've heard before include Bjork, John Maclaughlin and the Mahavishnu Orchestra, and interestingly movie directors such as Werner Herzog, David Lynch and David Cronenberg. Omar who has produced most of the albums for The Mars Volta and composes most of their tracks has said in interviews that he is not musically trained and a lot of the music he composes is what he hears in his mind. There is no music composition by the numbers here. He uses visual means at times to communicate his ideas to Cedric and the other band members.

If you are about to get into The Mars Volta, I will repeat the advise I got from my friend - give their music some time. Their music is filled with segments that sound totally random - filled with discordant notes. For a first time listener this can seem very intimidating. But in between these parts, you will get a tour of genres - foot-tapping latin music, jazzy themes, catchy riffs on both the guitar and the keyboards and awesome crescendoes. And often times you'll hear Pink Floyd-ish ambient sounds. The music always keeps you on the edge of your seat. Check out the intro to Son et Lumiere from the De-Loused in the Comatorium album. Or the serene intro to Cignus...Vismund Cygnus from Francis the Mute, before it makes a drastic transition to a fast paced riff. A lot of their music can be heard online for free on You Tube or last.fm. Check them out...I'm going to stop now... I don't want to analyze this too much...

Frequency: Drown

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 16:44:00 +0000

Check out Frequency's Drown on their MySpace page. Lalit Mehta's vocals on the track are among the better guttaral voices I've heard.

Cellular Snakes!

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 05:56:00 +0000

So I went out and got me a N Series Nokia recently (N73). I had not really planned this, but what else does a guy do when he accidentally drop his phone into the shit-pot?? No really ... I aint talking shit!! Luckily enough, I had flushed the bowl clean before it all happened. So my good old Nokia gave up and I couldnt transmit voice anymore. So I thought I should buy me a "cool" phone this time round. The N73 is a pretty neat instrument. Apart from being a music player (I know ... iPod still rulz!!), a camera, an office assistant, a web browser/email/blogger client, it also makes phone calls and sends SMS. So when I was considering a purchase, I had to go through about 2 millions different types of phone. And then I gave up and just bought something "popular". Of course, there were some other things that drew me to it. Guido's comments on the Python For Series 60 effort at MobiLenin.

First foray into Python on Symbian. And boy, is that a treat! Install the S60 Platform on the PC, write and test your Python scripts using an emulator, move them to the phone via Bluetooth/Data Cable, and the thing is a snake-pit!! Haven't done much in this yet. Just looking for some goodies that Ill need to start working with this. Here's some resources and screen-shots...

Resources:
1. Nokia Forums (Tools and SDKs)
2. A nice comparison between Python and other tools for Series 60.
3. Jurgen Scheible's tutorial for PyS60.
4. PED - A full-featured Python IDE for Nokia S60 platform.
Screen-shots taken from AllAboutSymbian.com and other resources ...

Python interpreter on Series 60 device ...

Snake (coincidence!) python script at werk!

PED - Neat python script editor built for editing python scripts on device directly ...

So finally, I did end up buying a *cool* phone. Now where do I buy the ideas from??

My god!! There's snakes everywhere!!!

Blog updated

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 17:48:00 +0000

I updated a few things on the blog today. A summary of the changes:

Replaced the black background from the 'Minimal Black' template by Douglas Bowman with a shade of gray. Also changed color of a few other text elements.
Removed two links to external blogs - Indian Band Stand and Heavy Rock Spectacular, either because they have been taken down (former) or have been turned into an invite-only blog (latter).

This of course is not the last of the changes. Riff has been working on changing the theme for the home site itself, and some of this may reflect in the blog as well or the other way round. Comments/feedback of course welcome!

The Car Test

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 03:32:00 +0000

In the movie Once, the music producer at the studio where Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova's characters record their album takes the band for car ride once the recording is over to listen to the demo CD on the car's speakers. He calls that the "car test". I don't know much about the process of recording and producing an album, but I figure the "car test" or something similar is an important element in ensuring that the production is of good quality. And recently I got to experience the impact that even a decent pair of a car speakers can have on the overall sound quality of a track. I was listening to a song called My House by the Mumbai based Alternative band Split. The vocalist on the track (I think) is Garreth D’Mello, who's been called the "Indian Chris Cornell" [1]. Garreth does have an amazing voice and his skills are on full display in the song My House. I'd been listening to the track (in a loop :-) on a pair of computer speakers and then on the iPod with head phones, and both places the track sounded great. But then I played the song on my car speakers, with the song playing on an iPod connected via an FM transmitter. And now I couldn't hear the vocalist at all, his voice was drowned by the sound of the instrumental tracks. I thought it must have been bass settings on the car music system, which I usually keep at a high level, but then the next song on the playlist - Pig Society, also by Split - sounded just fine, vocals included. If I reduced the bass levels to a minimum and increased the treble to the maximum, the vocals could be heard better, but only barely - no where close to the levels it could be heard at on a pair of headphones. I'm not sure if this is a problem with the mixing of the song, or my car speakers or both. If you get a chance to try this experiment out, please let me know. The track can be download from the bands media page.

References:

1. http://split-magazine.com/2006/05/24/split-of-imaginary-donuts-and-real-tantriks/

Naagin the Lady Cobra

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 11:17:00 +0000

Here's a really cool metallic version of Tan dole mera mann dole - the famous song from the 1954 classic Bollywood movie Nagin by the Delhi based Progressive Metal band Decibel:

You can read more about this cover on the band's blog Decibel Diary.

Split Magazine launches Split Radio

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 16:18:00 +0000

Split Magazine, one of the more polished websites covering the Independent music scene in India has spun of its splitradio section into a new site called Split Radio, complete with its own logo and design. The new site like it's parent site will cover music "exclusive to bands from the Indian subcontinent" [1].

Whenever I've thought of Split magazine, I've always thought of a site that provided well produced content. Although not a frequently updated site, articles in split-magazine have always had a personal feel to it, devoid of any cliched journalistic values and written by people who were first and foremost ardent music fans. And the site covered bands (national as well as International) and topics that you wouldn't know about unless you frequented Gigpad or RSJ forums. In addition the webzine has always maintained its site well and the articles it carries are always accompanied by polished graphics and artwork. While I haven't heard the splitradio section while it was part of the main Split magazine site, I have downloaded several tracks from their Download section, which was a godsend for people like me who don't really get to attend concerts of Indian bands, but want to hear more of their music anyways. Recently the magazine also started a video section that currently has a small collection of music videos.

Split Radio is not the first streaming service covering the Indian Indie music scene, RadioVerve has been doing the same since June 2006. Having just started listening to Split Radio, I don't have much information to compare the two sites, but RadioVerve has a big and diverse collection that is is going to be hard to match. But I doubt Split Radio is trying to compete with RadioVerve. That said, the first song that played when I launched the player was Maya by Motherjane from their Insane Biography album (which by the way is available for free download from the band's site). So that was a great start. Split Radio has a Shows section that may end up being the site's USP. It has what appears from the listings to be a nice collection of band interviews and shows providing an overview of topics related to the music scene in India. Some of them don't seem to work. Hopefully those links will be fixed soon.

Update: The link that was broken have now been fixed. It's great to see such a quick response by the people who run the site!

References

[1] http://split-magazine.com/2008/04/06/splitradioin-split-radio-new-and-improved/

Megadeth's Wanderlust and Fleetwood Mac's The Chain

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 01:54:00 +0000

I was listening to Wanderlust from Megadeth's Risk album and a guitar riff with a heavy bass pedal in the background from that song sounded very familiar, but couldn't really make out where I'd heard it before. But a little latter in the same track, there was another section that I felt I had heard before. And this second section has a drum crescendo (if I may use 'crescendo' to describe a section where the drum tempo picks up gradually). Now I know one band that I like a lot for its percussion - Fleetwood Mac. And it's drummer makes use of bass pedals too. And turns out that both the sections I recognized are from the same song - The Chain, which is one of my favorite Fleetwood Mac track. Doing a search on google indicates that this link has been noticed by others too.

"Rock In India" openers ...

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 04:49:00 +0000

Man oh man ... what a weekend!! This has gotta go down as one of the biggest events in Bangalore RnR history. Nine bands playing at the palace. Here are the excerpts...

TAAQ:

Yet another Thermal show ... only this time Jason (Parousia, Black Earth) on keyboards!!
Amazing performances from one and all ... New album is gonna rawk!! Check out the noo and improved site too ... KUDOS!!! Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge response from the audience!! Bruce was impeccable ... damn ... that tone!! And another thing which I had never seen, was a Gibson, new addition to King Bruce's collection ...
They did "Chameleon", "Paper Puli", "Humpty Dumpty" and covered one section of "Rodeo"... which incidently has also been covered by our own ELP as "Hoedown" on "Trilogy". What a performance!!! This song is a real challenge ... and to do it this brilliantly ... dyaam ... good work Thermal ... enough said!!!

Millennium:

So after a decade, I (along with a dozen other crazy Metal Armymen) finally got to see Millennium. The cool thing was that Bennie, my bandmate from the old BGM days was with me at the show!! So both of us were really charged up. Sadly enough, right when "Rainmaker" started, we saw clearly that they fell a couple practice sessions short. Sharmon showed some major timing issues there. But guys, Vehrnon is STILL right up there with his vocals. Almost the same as the last time I saw Millennium live. Praful was energetic and played nicely.
Roberto flubbed big with sticks flying out and everything. I guess his haitus from metal caught up and caught up BIG. Alwyn scorched as usual!! Desperately trying to get something happenning from the other side of the stage, he still did a great job with all solos. "Twist Of Fate" was done well, except for they never played that fine interlude (WTF??!!) ... that was a bummer. Vehrnon got the crowd in with the "METTAL AAARMIEE!" chant. If this was ten years ago, you would have heard those chants hours before the show started. They went on an covered "The Clash", which was received well by the heads. The performance was enough for sore throats for me and Bennie and was a great prelude to what was coming!!

Pentagram:

We stepped out for smokes ... Pentagram is as important as certain singing competitions on TV ...

The Machinehead/Megadeth review will follow soon ...

Take care yall ...
- Riffenstein

Bootlegs from Rock in India concert

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 16:16:00 +0000

Isn't YouTube a godsend for concert lovers!? Actually, YouTube and tagging! Check out these videos from the recent Rock in India concert which took place in Bangalore!

Megadeth

Millennium

Motherjane

Pentagram

NoTunes Redux

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Sat, 08 Mar 2008 13:46:00 +0000

So I did some more stuff on NoTunes and finally sealed it off with RSS, MusicBrainz integration and WikiPedia integration. Apart from some problems with threading, this version rocks!!
Im looking to put it up on sourceforge in a week after docs 'n things ...

- Riffenstein

And heres a screenshot ...

'Only Be One' video: Millennium

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 18:59:00 +0000

About Covers

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 17:54:00 +0000

You can tell Indian music scene has started to evolve when a school band starts covering Indian bands (this one a cover of Zero's PSP12):

Indus Creed

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 01:57:00 +0000

Note: This post ends abruptly... You've been warned.

I don't think I'll ever get bored of listening to Indus Creed's self-titled album. From the amazing string picking intro on Fly to the amazing chord change in the chorus in Trapped, to the wacky lyrics on Best Friend, the list can go on. I'm amazed that this album was released in 1995. The album would do well, even if it was released today!

The things I like about Indus Creed's music is the guitar work by Jayesh Gandhi and mahesh Tinaikar, especially the string picking on Fly, Pretty Child, Cry, the vocals by Uday Benegal and the lyrics. Consider the following lines from Trapped:

trapped in a dream and you can't even scream
'cos there's no one ever here

and

chased in a dream by a freshly rested team
of black horses drawing a hearse

Or the following from Cry:

under the ground beneath the bones
beneath the sadness, tilling stones
machines humming, insouciant drone

They were one amazing band!

NoTunes

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 10:49:00 +0000

Ever since I got my iPod Shuffle, like a zillion other people, the one problem I found with it ... the iTunes/Amarok/RhythmBox dependency. There was no way you could simply copy mp3s onto your iPod and make them "playable" ....

Then the Godsend ... the shuffle db (re)builder ... a python program that you must copy to your iPod Shuffle and run after you've copied all your mp3s onto the iPod ... and there it is ... the builder rebuilds your iPod database with all of the folders (or tracks) and makes them playable ...

The rebuilder also has a "smart shuffle" feature which makes the shuffling "more" random.

Here's a snapshot of a UI (which Ill call "NoTunes") that I built for the builder ... I moved some "In the Mood" functionality (as seen in bottom pane) inside NoTunes for sh#%s and giggles too ...

Some more loose ends and then no more iTunes for me ...

A word of caution ... do not try this program on regular iPods ... it has been built for shuffles only ... if you want to be free of iTunes with regular iPods, you should try reTune ...

BTW ... couldn't make it to the Millennium show in DL on account of ill-health ... cant miss BLR ...

Stay frosty ...

Riffmeister

UPDATE: Implemented volume read/write in NoTunes. Also, implemented un-governed clustering of collection based on song mood. Check out the new avatar. You can export clusters to cross-app playlists as well as move them to your iPod.

Dream Theater at Rock in India !!!?

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 15:16:00 +0000

Several sources (Gigpad, Music Ballroom) have reported that Dream Theater may play at the Rock in India festival. Dream Theater recently finished the Asian leg of their world tour and most recently played in Australia (Feb 1st) to promote their latest album called Systematic Chaos. So they might very well be in the area. While the band site doesn't mention anything about this concert, Jordan Rudess in an interview had said that India "would be an interesting place to give a show". So it might very well happen! If so, Wow!

Update: I guess it was too good to be true! As Crayogenic_Death points out, DT have a show in Caracas, Venezuela on March 14th. So the chances of DT playing in Bangalore the same day is close to zero! I should have done a bit more research myself before posting! Apologies for spreading the rumour!

Millennium!

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 00:55:00 +0000

Yes! That is me wearing a Millennium tee! Riff recreated the design on the cover of I Concept 2 Live album! This was my way of celebrating the reunion of Millennium after more than seven years for a concert in Delhi today (Feb 1st, 2008). Unfortunately, I couldn't be at the concert, but I'm waiting to read reviews of the concert. They will be performing again at the Rock in India festival in Bangalore on March 14th, where they will be opening for Megadeth.

Btw, if you haven't heard the 1 Concept 2 live album yet, you can find a link to download it on this forum thread on Gigpad.

Update: Updated the date of the Rock in India concert. For some reason I kept thinking the concert was on February 14th! I must have been stuck in some kind of a time warp.

Maiden In Bombay!

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 10:59:00 +0000

Hello folks:

This just came in ...

Iron Maiden plays Bombay, February 1st, 2008. Its the "Somewhere In Time World Tour" and its the opening show! So if any losers missed out the first time in Bangalore, here's a chance to redeem yourselves!!!

Suraj Mani now has a blog

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 12:48:00 +0000

Ladies and Gentleman, Suraj Mani - the vocalist and also the song-writer of Motherjane now has a blog - The Singing Sensei. His latest series of posts have been the lyrics of Insane Biography. And he asks for your opinion! How cool is that!

Thanks to Rahul Gandhi for the tip (via Orkut).

Millenium is Reuniting

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 18:05:00 +0000

Yup! You read right! You can also try pinching yourself on your arm and read this again if you like! MILLENIUM is REUNITING! Gigpad reports that Millenium will be reuniting for a short set at the M.O.S (The Pyramid), Delhi on Feb 1st, 2008. According to the reports, the lineup for the reunion consists of:

VEHRNON - Vocals
ALWYN - Lead Guitar
SHARMON - Rhythm Guitar
PRAFUL - Bass Guitar
ROBERTO - Drums

But that is not all! The month after that they will be playing at the Rock in India festival (that continues to impress rock fans with it's ever increasing list of bands signing up to play at the festival). There is also a facebook page for the reunion event (registration required).

For those readers who haven't heard about Millenium, read about them on the following RSJ forum thread. The thread contains an amazing amount of information about the history (including photos) of the band. The first post on that thread also contains a link to download four unreleased studio tracks of the band. Check them out!

Update: Millenium now has a page on MySpace. The page has three Millenium tracks that you can listen to. Make sure you listen to the Metal Army track on that page. You are going to hear plenty of chants of 'Metal Army' during the forthcoming Millenium concerts!

Happy New Year!! To the Hoyt street family...some new stuff for Y'all to check out..

noreply@blogger.com (lighthouse keeper) — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 04:30:00 +0000

A very Happy '08 my friends...
Cutting to the chase....we all know and have heard the great Russell Allen from Sym X...but I don't know how many of you out there have heard of this awesome vocalist Jorn Lande...a very Allenesque voice..soaring vocals ..great voice...check him out...I've gone out and bought albums of bands that he has sung for ..and I think he's pretty darn good...one tip ..be sure to check out the band before you go out and buy their albums with Jorn on it..some might not like the overall sound/music of the band..A few suggestions for bands are:
- Beyond Twilight
- Mundanus Imperium
- MasterPLan
- ARK
Besides these some new Prog Metal/Rock I've been listening to (not necessarily great..but something different...eh..we've been doing DT for a while so why not..)
- Redemption (saw them live,they opened 4 DT..pretty good)
- EverGrey
- ARK
- Riverside
- Amaran's Plight
- The Flower Kings
- U.K ( Finally got hold of this super band on itunes of all the places..one of Mike Romeo's favs...)

Cheers and happy listening!!

Megadeth in India and Motherjane Band Update

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 03:11:00 +0000

Megadeth will be performing in Bangalore, India on march 14th at the Rock in India festival. Tickets can be purchased through ticketpro.in. Machine Head will also be performing at the same show. Junkyard Groove and Pentagram are the two Indian bands that'll be performing at the festival.

I saw Megadeth (and Machine Head) perform with Black Sabbath in New Jersey earlier this year. It was an amazing concert (made even more special by the fact that I got to meet three members of Symphony X at the concert)! United Abominations is a great album. If you're in India, make sure you go to this concert!

The other big news is that according to the grapevine on the Motherjane's orkut forum the band has finished recording all the tracks on the much awaited album Maktub. Hopefully the CD will be out soon. The band has also put up their entire Insane Biography album for free download on it's site, since the CDs have all been sold out. The download page on the site can be accessed here.

Update: According to posts on the Motherjane Orkut forum, Motherjane will be performing at the Rock in India festival as well! I don't think it could get any better than this! If you're in Bangalore on March 14th, make sure you are the the Palace Grounds!

America to Perform in India

noreply@blogger.com (satchit) — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 16:52:00 +0000

America, the classic rock band known for several hits such as Horse with no name, Sister Golden Hair and You can do magic will be performing at two concerts in India - December 9th at the Palace Grounds, Bangalore and December 11th at Shanmukhananda Hall, Sion, Mumbai. Nice! Incidentally Horse with no name was one of the first songs I learnt to strum on my acoustic. Via Gigpad.

Parousia@Joseph's

noreply@blogger.com (Riffmeister) — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 14:40:00 +0000

Possibly the last show for a long time for me in the hometown (thanks to Parousia ... Renjith in particular!!) ... Parousia progged the shite outta Joseph's ... maybe not to all of the fans' expectations ... but twas enough ... some highlights ...

Opened with the SFAM overture ... (watch it ... here comes Parousia!!!!) ... though I still liked Freedom Jam a notch better ... Rambo and me were outside ourselves that night ...

They're going onto classic prog people ... Porcupine Tree (Blackest Eyes) and Kansas (COWS) ... in great detail (although Renjith was too eager to get to that whole scale high "...No more" in COWS) ... solo ... Naveen and Bry ... enough said ...

Purple's "Sometimes I feel ..." was ok ... but Ive seen much much better outta these boys ... and in closing ... Symphony X ... not as tight as I or the guys would've liked ... but they had the balls to whip out "Sea Of Lies" da!!! And that tap sequence in SOL and the entire solo in "Candlelight... " ... almost verbatim ... thanks Naveen ... you deserve all those hails from them Josephites ... you got mine too bruhh!!!

Later for picks/rant/banter with Parousia (btw ... there's more folks back there asking for picks ... finally Ive got competition!!!!!) ... out for dinner and talk ... home ... better person today!!!

Chill out you guys ...
-A