The Lair of The Dark Knight

I've recorded one of my DJ practice sessions. It's pretty basic, no advance techniques or effects used. Comments and critique are welcome.

Click to download.

Song List:
Billy Daniel Bunter & Peacemaker ft. Niki Mak - Love Will Not Die (Sc@r Remix)
Junior & The New Generation - Tears Fall (Slipmatt & Mike Modulate Remix)
Billy Daniel Bunter & CLSM ft. Leah Symons - My Desire (Original Hardcore Mix)
UK Hardcore - Step Up 2 The Next Level (Squad-E Remix)
Gammer - Body Flow (Original Mix)
Seduction & Joey Riot - Work It - Re-Work
Hixxy, Sy & Unknown - The Clit Commander

I am aware that the mixing at 19:18 isn't too great. Got distracted. c.c

Apparently this film isn't out over here until Wednesday, but I guess that someone didn't inform Vue Cinemas as I was able to book a ticket and watch a screening this morning.

I've been a fan of Hergé's series of comic books The Adventures of Tintin, having read many of the comics in their 90s printings and having watched The Adventures of Tintin, produced by Ellipse and Nelvana, every week when I was growing up.
As soon as I saw the trailer for this film on YouTube I got seriously excited. Not only was it being remade by Spielberg and Jackson but Stephen Moffat, Edgar Wright, and Joe Cornish were writing it.

Deciding to go to the cinema to see it was a pretty last minute decision. I saw a picture on Twitter from the premiere of the film of Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Daniel Craig and Jamie Bell, which reminded me that the film was due out. I immediately looked up times and bought a ticket to see it today. I wouldn't usually do this as I've fallen out of favour with the movie going experience due to the rudeness of other patrons, plus not being able to smoke, but I knew I had to see this.

I don't regret it either. This film is a fantastic and faithful adaptation of the first three Tintin books. The mocap CG was beautifully done, leading me to double-take a few times because of the incredible amount of detail used. Hergé's art style was kept in the character designs, which I loved, and the effects were never over the top. The actors were fantastic in their respective roles and the writing brought all three books togtether quite well in it's 107 minute run time.
There were also numerous nods and homages to the comics and previous works on Tintin, which made me smile.

I would really reccomend this if you've a liking of Tintin at all. Spielberg and Jackson seem to have an amazing chemistry that reminds me of when Spielberg was working with Lucas on the first three Indiana Jones films, and it really shows in how beautiful this film is.

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In other news I decided to pick up a copy of Metal Hammer, a monthly Heavy Metal music magazine, on Saturday whilst on my way to work. I hadn't really looked at the cover until I got on the train and then saw what was inside it... a 10" record of Machine Head's song Locust (YouTube).



This massively surprised me. I was not expecting to have a record as a cover freebie with a magazine. Unfortunately I didn't have a record player to play it on, but a quick trip to Cash Generator sorted that problem. I picked up one that has a USB connection for audio transfer to a computer for £15!



I've yet to hook it up to a proper amp (will probably use my Fisher CA-224), but it sounds pretty awesome through the headphone socket on the front of the player. I look forward to hearing how it sounds through some nice speakers!

Spamming another video again, but this is another Look Around You remix that's just too awesome to pass up! :D

Meh-Di-Bot?

I've been getting my grubby paws on quite a bit of 90s dance music recently, and crap does this stuff take me back. There's no wonder really that I fell in love with Happy Hardcore after growing up with 90s dance music. <3

I was totally shrieking (in a manly way) with joy at every song I listened to.

I don't care what people say, the 90s rocked for music. :3

Oh, and if you haven't heard of any of the following then you totally should take the time to listen to them. :D

All Seeing I - Beat Goes On
Clock - Axel F
Dr. Spin - Tetris
Mr. Oizo - Flat Beat
Rozalla - Everybody's Free (To Feel Good)
Prodigy - Out of Space
Shamen - Ebeneezer Goode
SL2 - On A Ragga Tip
Smart E's - Sesame's Treet
U96 - Das Boot
Utah Saints - Something Good
Underworld - Born Slippy
Urban Hype - Time For Trumpton

I may be behind on the times with this prodigy, but holy shit; 9 years old and he can crack out Ozzy Osbourne's "Crazy Train" perfectly (except for the singing).



The best guitarist in the world? Quite possibly when he gets older. I'm really expecting good stuff from this little dude. :3

I'm actually quite loving the song "Zelenoglazoe Taksi (Club Remix)" by Oleg Kvasha, part of the Grand Theft Auto IV: Vladivostok FM Soundtrack.

...bored of it yet? Tough. ;)

So this morning I decided to do a little more mixing, which mainly sucked balls. Might upload it later for S&Gs.

Yesterday, whilst on the bog and playing idly with my DS, I got to thinking about touchscreen kit that I had seen (mostly via YouTube) DJs use before during live events. Then I thought "Hang on, I'm missing a trick here; the DS has a touch screen, so why not make music creation software for it?"

I got back to my desk and furvently scowered the Internets (mostly via Google) for DS based music software. One impressive piece of homebrew tech is ProteinDS, an audio manipulation package which allows one to take advantage of the touchscreen to play around with loops and samples. Very nice.

I've played around with it quite a bit, and despite only being "proof of concept" right now I think that it's got a lot of potential.

But what really impressed me was KORG DS-10, another non-game music creation app that emulates a KORG MS-10.

If that's not amazing enough, you can wirelessly link up to eight units together to perform an ensemble. Colour me speechless.

Here's a video of a dude playing with four of them linked through a mixer.

In closing, the Nintendo DS never ceases to amaze me. Sure it's 3D graphics aren't all that, but it's power comes from it's versatility and innovative nature.

As I was stupid and didn't make a recording of my set from the RBW DeadDog party I've decided to recreate it with a little "poetic license". I've included most of the songs that I played that night but I've also added a few songs that I wanted to play but didn't. Obviously I've chopped some out, hence the 45 minute run time instead of an hour.

I'll upload it when I get home from work and make a link available tomorrow morning.

So I'm chatting with V here at work and I mentioned that I like a couple of songs by Cher (namely "Jesse James" and "Walking in Memphis") to which he repiled:

"That'll be your GayNA kicking in then."

XD

Also I'm gonna start learning to play the guitar soon. V's gonna give me a guitar to play around with and I'm going to spend some of my free time practicing.