Welcome From FreshUbuntu Podcast

Just wanted to post a shout out to anyone visiting from the FreshUbuntu podcast!

As Harlem mentioned, I have been working on putting together some theme music. The first track I sent over was actually a draft of the title track that will be on my upcoming demo album, called "6 Inches From the Curb". Most of the music on that album will be original jazz and funk, and will feature "solo bass" work (to be clear, solo in the sense that the tracks are predominantly drums and bass guitar, with little or no other instruments). My goal for this demo is to practice my new skills with multitrack production, and to demonstrate my musical concepts to musicians I will collaborate with on future projects (stay tuned!)

The tune was a little rough - I have decided to put together something more reflective of my skills, and more specific to podcast use. Tune into the next FreshUbuntu to hear it!

Rant on G-mail's Supposed "Send Mail As" Feature

Gmail: In development for over
4.109578 years (and counting)

Despite my having sworn off third-party e-mail providers, I broke down and moved my e-mail account to Gmail recently. I was under the impression I could make the transition without anyone noticing that I was even using Gmail. I set up my personal address to forward to my Gmail account, and then set up the Gmail "Send Mail As" feature to send mail from my personal address.

As many users have found out, this is not as seamless as Google makes it out to be. This has been bothering me as well. Gmail doesn't change the sender address, only the reply-to address. Apparently this is because mail coming from a Gmail server (and thus being different from the sender domain) has a tendency to trip spam filters.

I did find this note at the bottom of the Gmail instructions:

" Note: when you're sending with a different 'From:' address, your Gmail address will still be included in your email header's sender field, to help prevent your mail from being marked as spam. Most email clients don't display the sender field, though some versions of Microsoft Outlook may display "From yourusername@gmail.com on behalf of customaddress@mydomain.com."

In practice, contrary to the above note's claim, all of the e-mail clients I have experience with just show the message to be from yourusername@gmail.com . A reply is sent to your custom From: address, but this doesn't really help you much. In fact it's really just more confusing to the end user, as they deal with 2 different e-mail addresses when replying to you. Not to mention it's your Gmail address that gets auto-added to their address

What should Gmail do? They should do as the feature name suggests, change the From: address and let me worry about the spam ramifications of that. I am the true owner of the domain I am trying to send from, and I can create an SPF record which will show Gmail as a valid mail host for messages coming from my address.


Hm... what should I expect from a "Beta" service? Gee, when(ever) Gmail is done it's going to be a good product.

My Godaddy Hosting Cancellation Survey

When I cancelled my Godaddy Virtual Server, they asked me to fill out a cancellation survey. Here's what I wrote:

1. I had my virtual server with godaddy for several years. The whole time, the machine suffered from lag. This was evident as a delay when serving web pages, using Plesk to administer the machine, and severe (at times up to 20 seconds) latency when typing over SSH. I opened a ticket about this and was told it must be my connection. Apparently it wasn't, as the new service I am using doesn't have this problem.

2. SMTP - The godaddy mail relays are constantly DNS blacklisted because many of the servers are being used to send spam. I opened a ticket about this and no one got back to me. Can't really blame them.

3. While Plesk made administration easy, it was extremely slow and prevented me from being able to install other programs or keep the machine up to date with package tools, such as yum.

4. There is no OS upgrade path without having to reprovision the server.

5. I found a better deal - not the least of which is cheaper, faster, better administration tools, and an SLA that doesn't cater to spammers.

The 10 Elements of Music

Bass guitar virtuoso Victor Wooten performed a clinic (view it on www.bassplayer.tv) in which he taught that there are 10 elements of music that you should know how to use. (in no particular order):

1. Notes
2. Rhythm
3. Feel
4. Dynamics
5. Technique
6. Tone
7. Phrasing
8. Listening
9. Articulation
10. Space

Quiet Your Rehearsal Space on the Cheap

Build your own acoustic tiles for under $100





(This post is aimed at improving a band rehearsal space, but could also apply to a home studio or home theater)

Have you ever jammed in a room that just seemed disagree with every instrument? The vocals are difficult to make out, the drums seem too loud, and you're constantly battling the sound board to keep feedback at bay. If this sounds familiar, you've probably experienced jamming in an underdamped room.

Bare walls can cause excess reverb, and lead to a host of problems- feedback, bad equalization, and other poor conditions that make it difficult to get any work done. The easy way out is to hang a crappy old rug on the walls... And while you're at it, why not break out the cheap beer and a Playstation for the full dorm room effect. However, if you want to do it with a little more style, you'll want to use 2'x4' or 2'x2' panels. While the pros will charge you upwards of $500 for such acoustic panels, you can make them yourself for about $90.

Assuming you have a carpeted (if you don't have carpet on the floor, at least put down a large rug), unfurnished 200 sq ft. room being used for general rehearsal needs, you'll need 80-100 sq. feet of coverage for general rehearsal use. This is about (10-12) 2'x4' panels.

Materials

$65 100-120 sq ft. of commercial carpet (10x12) - cheaper if you can get used or damaged carpet
$20 (16-18) 2x3" studs
$5 (100 or so) Finishing nails or brads
$5 (500 or so) staples
--------
$95

Tools:
Mitre Saw
Tape measure/pencil
Nail gun
Cushion back cutter
Carpet knife
Duck-billed napping shears (regular scissors will work)
Safety Glasses
Safety gloves

First you'll need to obtain the carpet. You can use second hand or damaged carpet if you don't care how it looks. The only stipulation is that you'll need the smallest pieces to be slightly larger than 2' x 4'. I suppose you could use other types of carpet as well. I purchased brand new commercial carpeting from Home Depot for about $65.

Making the 2'x4' frame

Using the mitre saw, cut (2) 2x3's and assemble them according to the diagram.

The crows foot pattern on the studs will give you the correct angle, as well as allowing you to make 2 cuts at a time, without having to reposition the wood. Be sure to mark these on the wood, and don't rush, so you don't reverse any angles by accident. You should be left with one extra 4' piece, which you will use for the next frame.

When you're finish, nail them together at the corners. I used an air powered finishing nailer. If you don't have one of these, you should get one. Otherwise, use glue, or buy some small L brackets ($2 a piece) and use screws. I don't recommend trying to hammer this together. The joints should look a bit like this when you are done:




Making a 2'x2' frame

You can make a 2'x2' panel the same basic way, just do all 2' sections, instead of two 2' and two 4'.

Putting the carpet on the frames

Ok, now it's time to carpet the frames. Here's the tools you'll need:

You can obtain these tools at most hardware stores. The carpet tools can sometimes be rented. If you are patient and have a helper, you could probably get away with a utility knife.

Lay the frame out on the carpet to be cut, leave about 1-1.5" of extra space around the frame near the edges of the carpet.


Cut the carpet around the frame, again 1-1.5" wider than the frame.


Next, lay the frame down, and place a couple of scrap wood pieces in the center, to keep the carpet from sagging in the center while you staple it.



Lay the carpet on top, and do your best to align it so that the extra overlaps evenly on all sides.


Put a staple on of each of the four corners. Try to pull the carpet tight as you do, to minimize sagging in the center. If you want, you can remove these staples later, for cosmetic reasons.


Now you can stand the unit up, which makes it easier to work on. Snip 45 degree angle cuts so you can fold the corners down...


And staple away. I found 2 or 3 inch spacing sufficient to keep the sides relatively flat. You will use a lot of staples.


When you get to the corners, fold them over and staple as shown.

Here is the finished product:



To hang them, I used sheetrock anchors with the screws screwed halfway in. You can then hang the tiles on the screws like a picture. This allows for adjustment and easy removal, should the need arise (cleaning, etc.)

Enjoy! Your ears, PA, and singers will thank you.

Hydrogen is a widely misunderstood fuel.

Often I'm asked why I'm a proponent of vegetable oil as a fuel, rather than a fuel that doesn't emit CO2, such as Hydrogen.

Carbon neutrality is more important than to zero CO2 emissions at the tail pipe. Hydrogen is no more a fuel than are the batteries of an electric car- you put energy (electricity) in to make it, and it's then just a carrier of that energy for a vehicle. If the Hydrogen was produced using electricity from a nuclear power plant or coal plant, you still contributed new CO2 to the atmosphere.

Using plant mass as a fuel, however, is carbon neutral. When plants grow they convert CO2 to oxygen- the same amount that will be turned back into CO2 when it is used by cars. Thus, you could accurately say that a veggie car is, in some cases, less of a CO2 contributor than a Hydrogen car.

The promise Hydrogen offers is that of a better fueling infrastructure: one that will centralize energy conversion (and thus any CO2 production) to one location and source. Right now every single car is a separate problem, even if there really was some other choice (for the masses) to use instead of gasoline. When we convert fuel sources to clean energy carriers at one centralized location, the problems with those fuel sources become much more simple to deal with. For example, a hydrogen plant could, at any given time, be fueled by contributions from any or all of the following sources, based on supply, demand, and other various factors:

(carbon neutral)
Solar, Wind, hydro
Biomass
Biofuels

(not carbon neutral)
Nuclear
Coal, Oil
etc.

So, while Hydrogen offers a lot of hope for improvement in the future, the CO2 impact of using hydrogen itself is not really comparable to using vegetable oil to power your car. Furthermore, the benefits of Hydrogen are still a *long* way off.

Mike Watt - Hardest Working Bass Man in America

I never intended for anyone to become my hero. As a bass player who is trying to further his self, one of the most important companions to creating music is studying other music - all of it. The good, the bad, the popular, and the unprecedented. Mike Watt and the Minutemen helped shape the early American punk movement in the late 70's. Traveling all over in a beat up Ford Econoline van, setting up their own tours, and conveying their own message, they "jammed econo".

What do you do when your best friend and musical soulmate is killed in an accident? For Mike Watt, music was his life when D. Boon died in 1985. Hanging up his bass guitar and calling it quits would have been equivalent to suicide- and I'm sure the thought crossed his mind during that dark time. Instead, he did the only logical thing to him, and has everyday since then- he gives himself to the musical world, in the name of his fallen mate.

Mike Watt gives his energy to us in several ways. Besides the gigs that he plays almost every night with one of several bands (The Stooges, The Missingmen, Banyan, Dos, and other projects), you can listen to his regular podcast, The Watt From Pedro Show. It's a three hour presentation featuring Watt's philosophy, interesting special guests from different areas of his life, influential music, and new music from around the world. He's been doing the show for almost 6 years, with well over 100 shows archived. That's 300+ hours of mind expanding material for your listening pleasure. It's kept this side of overwhelming thanks to Watt's careful attention and faithfulness to a consistent show format.

Watt is also very good (considering the challenges involved) about "writing from the road" He posts his experiences, thoughts, and memoirs in his blogs on The Hootpage, his personal website. Thanks to these gifts, it's not hard to learn what kind of person Mike Watt really is... a hard working, caring, and real person- who has become a hero of mine.