Minding the Planet

Check out this Music!

Hey everyone, check out this music: http://www.myspace.com/marinvibes

These are the first public recordings by my brother, Marin, a soon-to-be-famous jazz prodigy.

Not only is Marin writing great new tunes with a distinctive style, but he also plays every instrument on the recordings. As you will hear on the recording above, that is an impressive feat in itself.

The music is a new fusion of jazz, reggae, folk, groove and funk. In particular you've gotta hear the first cut "Bohemian Extraordinaire" about his experiences as a street musican in Paris. Make sure you listen to the whole track -- there's a great solo.

The other 2 cuts are great too. Enjoy!

This is just the beginning of a work in progress. He'll be adding more over time.

I'm hoping to help him get signed so if you know anyone who should hear this, please let us know -- and pass these tunes on to your friends who dig this style of music.

Hassleware -- A New Strategy To Make Users Not Close Your Software

This post is not to be taken too seriously. I'm not actually advocating for the strategy outlined below. Just pointing out that it is taking place already, at least in iTunes.

One thing I've noticed about iTunes on Windows XP is that it is a massive resource hog -- especially when starting the application, but even worse, when exiting it. It typically takes several minutes for iTunes to quit, and during this process there are several moments where my machine freezes up because all resources are being used by iTunes. I like iTunes as a product -- don't get me wrong -- but it is the most impolite app in my system. No other app freezes my computer just to shut down.

My computer has a 2.1 gigaherz processor and more than 2 gigs of RAM, and lots of availale disk space, so it's not due to scarce resources. It's simply iTunes. The hassle factor of starting and shutting iTunes is in fact such an annoyance that I have resorted to just leaving it running in the background most of the time. In thinking about this it occurred to me that -- perhaps unwittingly -- Apple has come up with a clever way to make me keep their software open all the time. It's just too painful to close iTunes, so I leave it running.

Playing Proteins as Songs Helps Researchers Hear Patterns

All living things are made up of proteins. Each protein is a string of amino acids. There are 20 different amino acids, and each protein can consist of dozens to thousands of them.

Scientists write down these amino acid sequences as series of text letters. Clark and her colleagues assign musical notes to the different values of the amino acids in each sequence. The result is music in the form of "protein songs."

By listening to the songs, scientists and students alike can hear the structure of a protein. And when the songs of the same protein from different species are played together, their similarities and differences are apparent to the ear.

"It's an illustration transferred into a medium people will find more accessible than just [text] sequences," Clark said. "If you look at protein sequences, if you just read those as they are written down, recorded in a database, it's hard to get a sense for the pattern."

When people look at a page full of text corresponding to protein sequences, Clark explained, they tend spot clusters of letters but fail to see the larger pattern.

"If you play [the protein song for that sequence] you get that sense of the pattern much more strongly," she said. "That's my feeling at least. You hear stuff you can't see."

From National Geographic

Glass CDs Promise Crystal Sound Quality

An invetor in Japan has created the world's first glass CD. Because of glass's exceptional clarity and durability it not only provides better sound quality than plastic, it lasts "forever." The catch: it costs a hefty amount yen to buy one since they are presently made by hand.

Two Other Artists I Really Like -- Aimee Mann and Sia

I've been listening to a lot of music today. Two other albums that I have that I highly recommend are the Magnolia soundtrack by Aimee Mann, and Colour the Small One by Sia. While we're on the subject, if you like these, you'll probably also like Dummy by Portishead, even though it's quite different from them.

Pandora is Great But...

The online music recommendation service Pandora is really cool in all ways but one. Due to what they report as a requirement of their music license the user is only allowed to skip a small number of songs per hour. This can be a problem since the whole point of Pandora is that you give it feedback as it plays songs for you and it learns what you like. If you're like me and you rate a bunch of songs and quickly skip ahead to keep rating more of them (while avoiding the songs you don't like), then Pandora's present rule is a bit frustrating. (Note: a workaround was suggested by a reader below -- but it's still kind of a pain.) (Note 2: See the extensive and informative comments added by CTO of Pandora, below, as well).

After you hit your skip-limit you have no choice but to sit through the songs you don't like because you can't skip them. Eventually the count is reset and you can start skipping again. This is an odd limitation and I can't quite understand why it makes sense for Pandora or the music companies -- it would seem that the more music a user listens to and rates the greater the chance they will buy something, which is how both Pandora and the record companies make money. So they should be encouraging all forms of use -- including skipping songs to find other songs you like. At least when users skip songs they still stay in the site -- if they are forced to sit through songs they don't like they are more likely to leave.

If it weren't for this one frustrating limitation I would really use Pandora all the time to discover and buy new music. There is one more feature of Pandora that I would like -- a way to pop the client into a small floating window, or even a desktop client so I don't have to keep my browser sitting there all the time.

I've already used Pandora to discover and buy music -- and I would use it even more if the above issues were solved in later versions. However, even with these limitations it is still one of the best and most enjoyable ways to discover new music that matches your interests. I think the potential of this app (and the Music Genome Project, that it's based on) is huge, and I can't wait for future versions.

Great Singer -- Martin Sexton

If you haven’t heard of Martin Sexton yet, or you haven’t heard the album Black Sheep yet – go and get it as soon as you can. Click here to see it.

Martin Sexton is possibly a genius singer and songrwiter -- you have to hear him to know what I mean. It's amazing that he isn't massively famous yet. One review says he is a singer of remarkable conviction, which is a pretty accurate description. He puts his guts into it, especially the solos. I haven't heard anything like this from a contemporary artist (but if you know of anything comparable let me know).

Here is a good selection of full clips you can listen to. Check out "Glory Bound."

Click here to visit his site and hear some more free clips of some great tracks off of his different albums.

Definitely listen to "Where Did I Go Wrong?" -- this is a really cool one if you have the patience to wait for the solos where he improvs. A great example of Sexton's skills on all fronts.

The Album, Black Sheep, in particular has some great tracks and it's a good place to start. In particular, check out the tracks “Glory Bound" (one of my favorites), "Can't Stop Thinking 'Bout You," or “Candy” as well as the title track "Black Shee." You have to listen to each one for a few minutes to get the parts where he really lets loose and then you'll hear what I'm raving about. This guy just nails it on his solos like nobody you've ever heard.

The track "Angeline" gets off to a pretty bad start in my opinion, but changes into a fun gospel-inspired romp. Still, it's not the best example and doesn't really show off Sexton's improvisational skills -- so I suggest skipping it until you've heard more tracks so it doesn't influence your opinion.

The track "The Beast in Me" has some pretty impressive vocal improvisation as well but I think his band wasn't up to the challenge and couldn't match him -- their solos and improvisations were not nearly as virtuosic as Sexton's and seemed to wander and get lost. Martin on the other hand is mind-blowingly creative and stays on track as he improvises on the main theme, experimenting with surprising but extremely subtle twists and turns.

Another great track is "Love Keep Us Together" on the album, The American. This track evolves and impresses more and more as it goes, reaching some wonderfully lyrical grooves.

It's almost jazz, except it's not jazz -- it's existing mainstream genres like country, folk, R&B and soul liberated by the improvisational and structural freedom of jazz and fortified with the poetic complexity of Bob Dylan. And that's why it's quite a new sound in my opinion, or rather a new take on an old sound. Either way, it's a refreshing blast of real music.

Driving Interface for Music

An experimental driving interface enables a user to control the performance of a composition by driving through a landscape using a game-controller. This system is similar in some respects to my idea for driving through soundscapes of last year.

You've Got To Hear This Album...

My friend, Bari Koral, just released her new album, "Confessions of an Indie Girl." Bari is an incredible talent -- and this is her best album yet. She tours most of the year and has a large following, but she is still undiscovered by the mainstream. This review says it all:

"Confessions of an Indiegirl is A CLASSIC.  A sure bet to be one of the biggest releases of 2005.

Feels like it should be a blockbuster hit. Comparisons to such artists as Chrissie Hynde, Lucinda Williams, Norah Jones, Shelby Lynne and Fleetwood Mac, while inevitable, are in no way limiting."

--Al Muzer, The Aquarian

You can read the whole review, listen to clips of every song, and BUY A SIGNED COPY of the record now at: www.cdbaby.com/bari3

I really hope a lot of people hear this album -- it really is a "classic" -- I hope it gets the attention it deserves.

Her website is www.barikoral.com -- a new version of the site will be going up very soon.

The Next Mozart?

This just in: Read this article about an amazing child prodigy who may be one of the greatest musical geniuses in 200 years. Not only can he compose like a master, but he can compose multiple pieces of music at once! How does he do it? It's a bit spooky -- maybe he's the reincarnation of Mozart? Or maybe his brain is just different in a special way?