Artist: Akira Tana
Album: Moon over the world
Label/Catalog#: SONS OF SOUND/70018
This is one of those truly amazing musical moment: I was casually listening to the Jazz channel on Music Choice (the service bundled with Directv) and the familiar melody of a theme song from a Hong Kong kung fu TV series appeared which totally caught me off guard. I immediately paid closer attention and reconfirmed that I haven't mistaken. I was even more surprised when I saw the artist is a Japanese! Googled the name and found out he actually collaborated with Hong Kong jazz pianist Ted Lo so suddenly it all makes sense.
Ted is playing with words here: Condor Man in Chinese sounds the same as hero, which was part of the title of the kung fu series.
BTW, legendary Hong Kong singer/songwriter Sam Hui has made a parody cover version of this song. I'm actually more familiar with his version than the original. He sang about the heroics of winning the game of mahjong!
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Album: The Gathering
Artist: Geri Allen
Personally I think Geri Allen's work as a leader deserves more praises and attentions than it does now. "The Life Of A Song" released last year was a great example. In fact it was my top jazz CD of 2004.
Her only album on Rhapsody is "The Gathering" from 1998, which was equally interesting. These 2 tracks (Rhapsody Link) are especially recommended as they feature Vernon Reid (ex-guitarist of hard rock band Living Colour)
Personally I think Geri Allen's work as a leader deserves more praises and attentions than it does now. "The Life Of A Song" released last year was a great example. In fact it was my top jazz CD of 2004.
Her only album on Rhapsody is "The Gathering" from 1998, which was equally interesting. These 2 tracks (Rhapsody Link) are especially recommended as they feature Vernon Reid (ex-guitarist of hard rock band Living Colour)
Friday, August 26, 2005
Track: The Crunge
Artist: Joshua Redman Elastic Band
Album: Momentum
You might not find anything special about this track but there are 2 reasons I write about it: 1) it is a Led Zeppelin cover, 2) Flea from Red Hot Chilli Pepper plays bass on it. A lot of bass players, including myself, idolize Flea.
BTW, Joshua Redman's first Elastic band was an organ trio. This one is different: besides the trio, it also features additional musicians like guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel, Peter Bernstein, vibist Stefon Harris, trumpeter Nicholas Payton, appearing on different tracks. (Flea also played on "Blowing Changes" and "Double Jeopardy") I think this all-star lineup is appealing enough to give it a listen!
Rhapsody Link
Album: Momentum
You might not find anything special about this track but there are 2 reasons I write about it: 1) it is a Led Zeppelin cover, 2) Flea from Red Hot Chilli Pepper plays bass on it. A lot of bass players, including myself, idolize Flea.
BTW, Joshua Redman's first Elastic band was an organ trio. This one is different: besides the trio, it also features additional musicians like guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel, Peter Bernstein, vibist Stefon Harris, trumpeter Nicholas Payton, appearing on different tracks. (Flea also played on "Blowing Changes" and "Double Jeopardy") I think this all-star lineup is appealing enough to give it a listen!
Rhapsody Link
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Track: Shoots and Ladders
Artist: Korn
This song's lyric comes from many well-known nursery rhymes, e.g. Mary has a little lamb, London Bridge, Ring around the rosie...
The last one is not well-known to me though 'coz I just learned it from my daughter's swimming class.
You might have read that "Ring around the rosie" is from the Europe Middle Age plague
era, i.e., many died of the "black death disease" transmitted by rats. Scary huh?
"Shoots and Ladders" is about the dark origin of nursery rhymes. I think they want to ridicule that we teach such creepy songs to kids.
However, the Urban Legend page disputed the association of "Ring around the rosy" with the plague though.
Rhapsody Link
This song's lyric comes from many well-known nursery rhymes, e.g. Mary has a little lamb, London Bridge, Ring around the rosie...
The last one is not well-known to me though 'coz I just learned it from my daughter's swimming class.
You might have read that "Ring around the rosie" is from the Europe Middle Age plague
era, i.e., many died of the "black death disease" transmitted by rats. Scary huh?
"Shoots and Ladders" is about the dark origin of nursery rhymes. I think they want to ridicule that we teach such creepy songs to kids.
However, the Urban Legend page disputed the association of "Ring around the rosy" with the plague though.
Rhapsody Link
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Album: Frozen in Time
Track: Stand Alone
Artist: Obituary
"Frozen in Time" is indeed a well-suited title. Listening to this album will certainly reminds you of the glorious day of death metal, which was more than 10 years ago! In fact, this is the 1st studio album by Obituary since their last released 8 years ago. The track "Stand Alone" impressed me the most on this album in terms of guitar work. Of course I still miss the great guitar solo on "Cause of Death," Obituary's 2nd album, featuring James "the god of death metal guitar" Murphy.
Rhapsody Link
Artist: Obituary
"Frozen in Time" is indeed a well-suited title. Listening to this album will certainly reminds you of the glorious day of death metal, which was more than 10 years ago! In fact, this is the 1st studio album by Obituary since their last released 8 years ago. The track "Stand Alone" impressed me the most on this album in terms of guitar work. Of course I still miss the great guitar solo on "Cause of Death," Obituary's 2nd album, featuring James "the god of death metal guitar" Murphy.
Rhapsody Link
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Book: Sonic Boom
Author: John Alderman
I've just finished reading Sonic Boom: Napster, MP3 and the new Pioneers of music It is about the history of digital music from its infancy in the early 90s to the explosion of popularity of MP3 in 2000. This book does a good job covering almost everything in that decade from the most well-known companies like MP3.com, Real Network, and of course Napster, to the lesser-known ones, like Liquid Audio, Listen.com, Internet Underground Music Archive, Riffage.com, Nullsoft (the maker of Winamp, which is certainly more famous than the company itself) It ends with the ruling on the Napster case, which effectively shutdown the 1st generation Peer-to-peer music file sharing service.
I consider myself a close follower of the development of digital music and thus have a pretty good idea about what these major players did. However, this book went into much deeper levels of details about the stories and people behind the companies. A very interesting read I must say.
After reading this book, which was published in 2001 (that's why I picked it up dirt cheap at a discount bookstore,) the first thing came to my mind was that it would have a very interesting sequel, with developments after 2001, covering Apple's iPod and iTunes Music Store, Rhapsody (a music streaming service offered by Listen.com and later sold to Real Networks along with the company), the 2nd incarnation of Napster (the name was bought by Roxio, which sold off its software business, best known for its CD-burning software, and renamed itself to Napster!) and the Grokster ruling (the highest-profile case against P2P company after Napster)
Readers of this book would all agree that there is no way record companies could turn back the clock and go against the digital music revolution. Looks like some record companies are slowly but finally getting it. Here is a sign: Warner Music developing e-label
I've just finished reading Sonic Boom: Napster, MP3 and the new Pioneers of music It is about the history of digital music from its infancy in the early 90s to the explosion of popularity of MP3 in 2000. This book does a good job covering almost everything in that decade from the most well-known companies like MP3.com, Real Network, and of course Napster, to the lesser-known ones, like Liquid Audio, Listen.com, Internet Underground Music Archive, Riffage.com, Nullsoft (the maker of Winamp, which is certainly more famous than the company itself) It ends with the ruling on the Napster case, which effectively shutdown the 1st generation Peer-to-peer music file sharing service.
I consider myself a close follower of the development of digital music and thus have a pretty good idea about what these major players did. However, this book went into much deeper levels of details about the stories and people behind the companies. A very interesting read I must say.
After reading this book, which was published in 2001 (that's why I picked it up dirt cheap at a discount bookstore,) the first thing came to my mind was that it would have a very interesting sequel, with developments after 2001, covering Apple's iPod and iTunes Music Store, Rhapsody (a music streaming service offered by Listen.com and later sold to Real Networks along with the company), the 2nd incarnation of Napster (the name was bought by Roxio, which sold off its software business, best known for its CD-burning software, and renamed itself to Napster!) and the Grokster ruling (the highest-profile case against P2P company after Napster)
Readers of this book would all agree that there is no way record companies could turn back the clock and go against the digital music revolution. Looks like some record companies are slowly but finally getting it. Here is a sign: Warner Music developing e-label
Friday, July 15, 2005
Howto: Listen to Rhapsody offline
The heavily promoted method is: subscribe to Rhapsody-To-Go and buy a Microsoft PlaysForSure compatible portable player (most newer non-iPod are or will be after firmware upgrade)
The (almost) unpromoted method is: subscribe to Rhapsody Unlimited and buy a notebook that runs XP. I dunno how many people went this route but I did. (Hey, that's 50% of the reason I bought a new notebook!)
Here are the steps:
0) (if you haven't done this before) Choose Tools->Authorize Computer from your Rhapsody 3.0 client
1) Add your songs to your library
2) Go to "My Library" and choose songs to be downloaded, right click your mouse and choose "Download track"
3) Now you could listen to these downloaded tracks offline (and even online as you might prefer 160KBps WMA versus streaming compressed at 128KBps)
However, like most Windows/Real software, this process might not be as trouble free as you'd hope. For me my computer tripped at Step 0! Without that step, when I tried to play a downloaded song, it showed a yellow triangle next to it, moused over the yellow triangle it said "Helix error c00d0bbe." And choosing Tools->Authorize Computer simply did nothing and the computer remained unauthorized.
I figure it probably has something to do with Microsoft's DRM (digital right management) so I opened Windows Media Player 10. It's the first time I run it (See! setting up and running Rhapsody are so high priority for me!) so I went thru some setup and it seems to have downloaded some components over the internet. Looks like that's the missing piece that prevented me from authorizing the computer as I was able to complete Step 0 afterwards (The choice became "Deauthorize computer" afterwards)
BTW, I submitted this issue to Rhapsody's support 4 hours ago, before I figured this out myself. No response yet. Well, the Windows/Real combination is certainly not for the computer skill challenge crowd. My money advice to Microsoft and companies: if you want to beat your competition (you know who, the name of that company starts with an "A" >:) you gotta make things that work smoothly, for everyone, not something that requires 2 Computer Science degrees!
The (almost) unpromoted method is: subscribe to Rhapsody Unlimited and buy a notebook that runs XP. I dunno how many people went this route but I did. (Hey, that's 50% of the reason I bought a new notebook!)
Here are the steps:
0) (if you haven't done this before) Choose Tools->Authorize Computer from your Rhapsody 3.0 client
1) Add your songs to your library
2) Go to "My Library" and choose songs to be downloaded, right click your mouse and choose "Download track"
3) Now you could listen to these downloaded tracks offline (and even online as you might prefer 160KBps WMA versus streaming compressed at 128KBps)
However, like most Windows/Real software, this process might not be as trouble free as you'd hope. For me my computer tripped at Step 0! Without that step, when I tried to play a downloaded song, it showed a yellow triangle next to it, moused over the yellow triangle it said "Helix error c00d0bbe." And choosing Tools->Authorize Computer simply did nothing and the computer remained unauthorized.
I figure it probably has something to do with Microsoft's DRM (digital right management) so I opened Windows Media Player 10. It's the first time I run it (See! setting up and running Rhapsody are so high priority for me!) so I went thru some setup and it seems to have downloaded some components over the internet. Looks like that's the missing piece that prevented me from authorizing the computer as I was able to complete Step 0 afterwards (The choice became "Deauthorize computer" afterwards)
BTW, I submitted this issue to Rhapsody's support 4 hours ago, before I figured this out myself. No response yet. Well, the Windows/Real combination is certainly not for the computer skill challenge crowd. My money advice to Microsoft and companies: if you want to beat your competition (you know who, the name of that company starts with an "A" >:) you gotta make things that work smoothly, for everyone, not something that requires 2 Computer Science degrees!
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Service: AOL Radio
AOL has release a beta version of its portal today, which I've been waiting for since it's announcement a couple of months ago.
Urgh...... did I say I was looking forward to something from AOL? I'm not kidding. It's because AOL has partnered with XM to create their radio service and offering a few dozens channels free! Even though I didn't took the plunge to XM after a free trial (read my not-so-positive review here, I won't mind having it as a backup/alternative to Rhapsody (To Real: Rhapsody went down again last night! If it doesn't improve, I'm going to take my money elsewhere. You've got competitions!)
My first impression of AOL Radio is pretty good. All of my favorite genres (metal, jazz, blues, classical) are covered. In fact, AOL Radio has a good variety of channels dedicated to the sub-genres under each main genre. IMO, they are a grade above Yahoo's free LAUNCHCast Radio, which has less variety. (If you want more, you need to pay to listen to LAUNCHCast Plus, which still covers less than AOL's) You can't skip tracks on AOL Radio like you could with Yahoo though.
AOL: even though you're not getting a lot of love from the geek land. You do get some from Bigland. It's free! Enuff said.
Urgh...... did I say I was looking forward to something from AOL? I'm not kidding. It's because AOL has partnered with XM to create their radio service and offering a few dozens channels free! Even though I didn't took the plunge to XM after a free trial (read my not-so-positive review here, I won't mind having it as a backup/alternative to Rhapsody (To Real: Rhapsody went down again last night! If it doesn't improve, I'm going to take my money elsewhere. You've got competitions!)
My first impression of AOL Radio is pretty good. All of my favorite genres (metal, jazz, blues, classical) are covered. In fact, AOL Radio has a good variety of channels dedicated to the sub-genres under each main genre. IMO, they are a grade above Yahoo's free LAUNCHCast Radio, which has less variety. (If you want more, you need to pay to listen to LAUNCHCast Plus, which still covers less than AOL's) You can't skip tracks on AOL Radio like you could with Yahoo though.
AOL: even though you're not getting a lot of love from the geek land. You do get some from Bigland. It's free! Enuff said.
Monday, June 20, 2005
Artist: 6
Album: 6
Track: Angel
Looks like using numbers as names has become a popular practice for metal musicians: the members in Slipknots are named by numbers. And Marilyn Manson's guitarist is John 5. Now we have a band named 6! It probably has something to do with reflecting the going-digital/people-losing-identity/faceless nature of the modern society.
Anyway, 6 is equally interesting music-wise: another good example of blending electronic and rock (think NIN.)
Rhapsody Link
Track: Angel
Looks like using numbers as names has become a popular practice for metal musicians: the members in Slipknots are named by numbers. And Marilyn Manson's guitarist is John 5. Now we have a band named 6! It probably has something to do with reflecting the going-digital/people-losing-identity/faceless nature of the modern society.
Anyway, 6 is equally interesting music-wise: another good example of blending electronic and rock (think NIN.)
Rhapsody Link
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Artist: Ones and Zeros
Rhapsody link: "1. Fascination Street (by the Cure) - Ones And Zeros"
This band got my attention because of this cover of my favourite song by The Cure. Their electronic hard rock rendition of Fascination Street is certainly interesting. I guess this review best describes their sound: it's like Alice in Chains meet Filters. So, you know whether it's your cup of tea, or not...
This band got my attention because of this cover of my favourite song by The Cure. Their electronic hard rock rendition of Fascination Street is certainly interesting. I guess this review best describes their sound: it's like Alice in Chains meet Filters. So, you know whether it's your cup of tea, or not...
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Artist: System of a Down
As my bandmate said, System of a Down is the type of band that you either like it or hate it, a lot!
It's because they have a very unique sound, as evident in their songs like "Chop Suey" and "B.Y.O.B.", which you might have heard on the radio.
If you like alt metal but hate them because of the above songs, you should check out "Suite-Pee" and "P.L.U.C.K" (Rhapsody Link)from their self-titled album. These sound more "conventional" alt metal (is this term an oxymoron?)
It's because they have a very unique sound, as evident in their songs like "Chop Suey" and "B.Y.O.B.", which you might have heard on the radio.
If you like alt metal but hate them because of the above songs, you should check out "Suite-Pee" and "P.L.U.C.K" (Rhapsody Link)from their self-titled album. These sound more "conventional" alt metal (is this term an oxymoron?)
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Track: Aisha
Artist: John Coltrane
Album: Ole Coltrane
Even though I'm a huge Coltrane fan, I gotta admit I still haven't listened to everything from his catalog as he had such a prolific career. That explains why I've not listened to this wonderful ballad before. It is certainly much less well-known than the other ballad named after a lady, Naima. (I was curious about who Aisha is. The only thing I was able to find out is this was a McCoy Tyner composition. If anyone knows more about Aisha, please update this post)
Another reason this album is so overlooked is that it was the last recording Coltrane did for Atlantic records (after Giant Step and My Favourite Thing) as he was moving to Impulse. It actually features an all-star lineup and deserved much better exposures. Here is a detailed review of the album.
Rhapsody Link
Album: Ole Coltrane
Even though I'm a huge Coltrane fan, I gotta admit I still haven't listened to everything from his catalog as he had such a prolific career. That explains why I've not listened to this wonderful ballad before. It is certainly much less well-known than the other ballad named after a lady, Naima. (I was curious about who Aisha is. The only thing I was able to find out is this was a McCoy Tyner composition. If anyone knows more about Aisha, please update this post)
Another reason this album is so overlooked is that it was the last recording Coltrane did for Atlantic records (after Giant Step and My Favourite Thing) as he was moving to Impulse. It actually features an all-star lineup and deserved much better exposures. Here is a detailed review of the album.
Rhapsody Link
Artist: Stereomud
Track: Pain
Album: Perfect Self
I have not heard of this band before but this is one fine Alt Metal band! For some reason they're less well-known than the likes of Mudvayne and Staind. Yet another example to show that you need a lot of luck to succeed in this business.
I think bands like this must have benefited from recommendation engines of online music services like Rhapsody.
Rhapsody Link
Album: Perfect Self
I have not heard of this band before but this is one fine Alt Metal band! For some reason they're less well-known than the likes of Mudvayne and Staind. Yet another example to show that you need a lot of luck to succeed in this business.
I think bands like this must have benefited from recommendation engines of online music services like Rhapsody.
Rhapsody Link
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Store: Yourmusic.com ($5.99 CD!)
Yourmusic.com sells you CD for $5.99 (free shipping too!) That's cheaper than most 2nd-hand CDs! What's the catch? Well, it sorts of work like a music club (e.g. BMG/Columbia House) yet better: You have to buy 1 every month but you get to choose the CD from their catalog for that monthly CD (unlike BMG/CH who choose for you, and charge you expensive shipping) Again, what's the catch? Well, I have to say the "catch" is that the selection is kinda limited. I "tested" it with the CDs I wrote about here and I was only able to find Bill Frissell With Dave Holland And Elvin Jones but no Matthew Shipp, no David S. Ware, no Shadows Fall, no Arch Enemy...... These are kinda not-so-mainstream anyway. I could easily find another dozen of CDs I would like to own.
Sounds tempting? (Hey, if I switch from Rhapsody to Yahoo Music, the extra few bucks I saved could be spent on this......)
Sounds tempting? (Hey, if I switch from Rhapsody to Yahoo Music, the extra few bucks I saved could be spent on this......)
Wednesday, June 01, 2005
Track: Part of the Queue
Artist: Oasis
Album: Don't Believe the Truth
Even though Oasis belongs to that group of bands I constantly criticize of ripping off old bands, for some reason I just like them. Their latest album doesn't seem to get as good reviews as they used to, and I tend to agree, but this is one of the better songs on the album. Ironically, I'm working on a queue processor right now! What a coincidence!
Rhapsody Link
Album: Don't Believe the Truth
Even though Oasis belongs to that group of bands I constantly criticize of ripping off old bands, for some reason I just like them. Their latest album doesn't seem to get as good reviews as they used to, and I tend to agree, but this is one of the better songs on the album. Ironically, I'm working on a queue processor right now! What a coincidence!
Rhapsody Link
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Album: Dreamland
Rhapsody Link: "1. Hey Joe - Robert Plant
2. One More Cup Of Coffee - Robert Plant"
I am not sure how many classic rock fan has followed Robert Plant's career from the Led Zeppelin era to his solo days. I'm certainly not one of them. In fact, I just "discovered" this all-cover album after I read a review of his latest one, "Mighty Rearranger."
Although Plant's "One More Cup of Coffee" retained a lot of the arrangement from Bob Dylan's version, it sounded as if it could have been Plant's own song. That's surprising. On the other hand, this version of "Hey Joe" is definitely very different from Hendrix's. What is interesting is that Jimi's most well-known cover is probably Bob Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower" These three songs form a full circle, cover-to-covered!
2. One More Cup Of Coffee - Robert Plant"
I am not sure how many classic rock fan has followed Robert Plant's career from the Led Zeppelin era to his solo days. I'm certainly not one of them. In fact, I just "discovered" this all-cover album after I read a review of his latest one, "Mighty Rearranger."
Although Plant's "One More Cup of Coffee" retained a lot of the arrangement from Bob Dylan's version, it sounded as if it could have been Plant's own song. That's surprising. On the other hand, this version of "Hey Joe" is definitely very different from Hendrix's. What is interesting is that Jimi's most well-known cover is probably Bob Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower" These three songs form a full circle, cover-to-covered!
Saturday, May 07, 2005
Album: Coverkill
Rhapsody Link: "1. No Feelings - Overkill"
Metal "historian" would tell you thrash metal is heavily influenced by punk. You might not hear it immediately but you could definitely tell when Megadeth and Overkill were covering Sex Pistol's songs.
BTW, clever name of the album!
Metal "historian" would tell you thrash metal is heavily influenced by punk. You might not hear it immediately but you could definitely tell when Megadeth and Overkill were covering Sex Pistol's songs.
BTW, clever name of the album!
Friday, May 06, 2005
Album: Bill Frisell with Dave Holland and Elvin Jones
Rhapsody Link: "1. Outlaws - Bill Frisell"
Drummer Elvin Jones is best known for his polyrhythmic drum work as a member of John Coltrane Quartet. Bassist Dave Holland, well, is known for his versatility, well fit in small combo or big band or any setting you could think of. Guitarist Bill Frisell has a unique country/blues rooted sound. The three of them playing together? A lot of interesting chemistry is guaranteed.
Drummer Elvin Jones is best known for his polyrhythmic drum work as a member of John Coltrane Quartet. Bassist Dave Holland, well, is known for his versatility, well fit in small combo or big band or any setting you could think of. Guitarist Bill Frisell has a unique country/blues rooted sound. The three of them playing together? A lot of interesting chemistry is guaranteed.
Thursday, May 05, 2005
Album: Quintessence Volume 2
Rhapsody Link: "1. We'll Be Together Again - The Stan Gets Quartet With Chet Baker"
If there is a "sound" that could make people "fall in love too easily" (pun intended,) it gotta be from Stan Getz's saxophone. Ballad like this is his forte.
If there is a "sound" that could make people "fall in love too easily" (pun intended,) it gotta be from Stan Getz's saxophone. Ballad like this is his forte.
Album: Crazy People Music
Rhapsody Link: "1. Spartacus - Branford Marsalis"
Maybe it's just me. I always feel that Branford is a bit undervalued as a Post-bop saxophonist. Probably he got "tainted" by his pop music side projects. :P I first listened to his album "Requiem" from 1999 and was very impressed but he has been playing awesome Post-bop way before that, for example, "Crazy People Music" was from 1990.
Maybe it's just me. I always feel that Branford is a bit undervalued as a Post-bop saxophonist. Probably he got "tainted" by his pop music side projects. :P I first listened to his album "Requiem" from 1999 and was very impressed but he has been playing awesome Post-bop way before that, for example, "Crazy People Music" was from 1990.
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