Seven 9s and 10s

High-res “The Slash story is exactly the way I remember it. Dug this photo out of the archives, circa 1992.” My brother posted this to my Facebook wall yesterday, after I posted my April 15th story That photo conjures up some great memories. He was probably teaching me to play The Lemon Song or Radar Love or something else equally awesome. That was his bedroom at the time. He’d later move out and it would become my bedroom. Those guitars both eventually became mine as well. I owe him a lot. A lot.

“The Slash story is exactly the way I remember it. Dug this photo out of the archives, circa 1992.”

My brother posted this to my Facebook wall yesterday, after I posted my April 15th story

That photo conjures up some great memories. He was probably teaching me to play The Lemon Song or Radar Love or something else equally awesome. That was his bedroom at the time. He’d later move out and it would become my bedroom. Those guitars both eventually became mine as well. I owe him a lot. A lot.

High-res Beneath The Stars (by Steelopus) The Perseids were a bit disappointing last night. I awoke and went out at 3:30am to drive to my favorite star-gazing spot south of the city. It was quite chilly with a stiff breeze so I only stayed for about an hour. I only saw ~25 meteors, and none were very dramatic. The crescent moon with Venus and Jupiter was pretty, but far too bright. Oh well. Now I’ll look forward to the Geminids on the night of December 13th. It will be a new moon during that show so that will certainly help with the darkness. 

Beneath The Stars (by Steelopus)

The Perseids were a bit disappointing last night. I awoke and went out at 3:30am to drive to my favorite star-gazing spot south of the city. It was quite chilly with a stiff breeze so I only stayed for about an hour. I only saw ~25 meteors, and none were very dramatic. The crescent moon with Venus and Jupiter was pretty, but far too bright.

Oh well. Now I’ll look forward to the Geminids on the night of December 13th. It will be a new moon during that show so that will certainly help with the darkness. 

High-res A light rain began to fall at 1:45. We finished playing at 2. Then the real show began as all hell broke loose and the sky opened up dumping a reported 3” of rain in under an hour. During that hour we moved all of our equipment through the storm - about 100’ from the tent under which we played to the van parked in the lot next door. Anyway. Hello. I’m super wet. (Taken with Instagram)

A light rain began to fall at 1:45. We finished playing at 2. Then the real show began as all hell broke loose and the sky opened up dumping a reported 3” of rain in under an hour. During that hour we moved all of our equipment through the storm - about 100’ from the tent under which we played to the van parked in the lot next door. Anyway. Hello. I’m super wet. (Taken with Instagram)

High-res steelopus: Happy birthday, Bob Moog! August 18, 2003 : House of Guitars : Rochester, NY I fell in love with electronic synthesis back in 1998 during my undergrad studies.  Naturally, guys like Bob Moog and Don Buchla became heroes of mine as I began to learn the history of early synthesizers.  I was blessed to have access to an EMS VCS3 modular synth in the studio at school - to this day it’s still the most impressive piece of human engineering I’ve ever laid my hands on. Bob came to town on a promotional tour for the new Minimoog Voyager synth and there was no way I was going to miss it.  I grabbed the only piece of Moog equipment that I owned - the face of a Minimoog D that I found at a musicians flea market in Buffalo (where many Moogs were manufactured for a while in the 70’s) - and headed down to the (legendary) House of Guitars.  Bob gave a brief demo of the unit, which wasn’t all that impressive because, as he was quick to point out, he was an engineer, not a musician.  Then he took questions from the standing-room only crowd that had gathered amongst the dusty and cluttered isles of the store.  It was a hot day, as you can tell from the picture, but Bob stayed up there until every question had been answered, and then he stayed until each person that wanted to chat with him one-on-one was able to do so.  I shly approached him and asked him to sign the remnants of a once-great instrument and he happily obliged, commenting on the condition of the hardware and how surprised he was to see it preserved so well despite its missing guts.  I thanked him for everything he’s done and for his inspiration and went on my way.  He was truly kind, gentle, and engaging. Two years and one week later, Bob passed away after a short fight with a brain tumor.  I feel tremendously priveledged and lucky to have met one of the greatest inventors in history.  Despite how goofy I look, this will always be one of my favorite pictures. Happy Birthday, Bob. It warms my heart to see such a great tribute from Google today. The technology that powers it is as forward-thinking as that which he pioneered over 50 years ago.

steelopus:

Happy birthday, Bob Moog!

August 18, 2003 : House of Guitars : Rochester, NY

I fell in love with electronic synthesis back in 1998 during my undergrad studies.  Naturally, guys like Bob Moog and Don Buchla became heroes of mine as I began to learn the history of early synthesizers.  I was blessed to have access to an EMS VCS3 modular synth in the studio at school - to this day it’s still the most impressive piece of human engineering I’ve ever laid my hands on.

Bob came to town on a promotional tour for the new Minimoog Voyager synth and there was no way I was going to miss it.  I grabbed the only piece of Moog equipment that I owned - the face of a Minimoog D that I found at a musicians flea market in Buffalo (where many Moogs were manufactured for a while in the 70’s) - and headed down to the (legendary) House of Guitars.  Bob gave a brief demo of the unit, which wasn’t all that impressive because, as he was quick to point out, he was an engineer, not a musician.  Then he took questions from the standing-room only crowd that had gathered amongst the dusty and cluttered isles of the store.  It was a hot day, as you can tell from the picture, but Bob stayed up there until every question had been answered, and then he stayed until each person that wanted to chat with him one-on-one was able to do so.  I shly approached him and asked him to sign the remnants of a once-great instrument and he happily obliged, commenting on the condition of the hardware and how surprised he was to see it preserved so well despite its missing guts.  I thanked him for everything he’s done and for his inspiration and went on my way.  He was truly kind, gentle, and engaging.

Two years and one week later, Bob passed away after a short fight with a brain tumor.  I feel tremendously priveledged and lucky to have met one of the greatest inventors in history.  Despite how goofy I look, this will always be one of my favorite pictures.

Happy Birthday, Bob.

It warms my heart to see such a great tribute from Google today. The technology that powers it is as forward-thinking as that which he pioneered over 50 years ago.

High-res nicky36: Ain’t no party like an internet party because an internet party doesn’t involve talking to other people. It was great seeing old friends and meeting new ones this weekend. Thanks for being good people and for providing much-needed distraction and frequent laughter. I love you all.

nicky36:

Ain’t no party like an internet party because an internet party doesn’t involve talking to other people.

It was great seeing old friends and meeting new ones this weekend. Thanks for being good people and for providing much-needed distraction and frequent laughter. I love you all.

I decided the best tribute I could offer Jim Marshall would be to go down to the basement in my rock and roll sweater and my poorly fitting rock and roll pants and my SUPER ROCK AND ROLL SLIPPERS and plug my Les Paul straight into my Marshall half-stack and play some rock and fucking roll.

So here’s me playing Go! from FMGreen’s 3-2-1 Go! EP.

Volume at 5… turned up to 11 at the end just to make sure the residents of the neighboring county could hear me clearly.

(Side note… the mic on the iPhone is impressively resilient. The SPL meter in front of me was registering 120+dB the entire time.)