Jumat, 29 Juni 2012
Minggu, 19 Februari 2012
Stratoblogster Labs: Book Review — “Guitar Zero”
Guitar Zero: The New Musician and the Science of Learning is a recent book release by Gary Marcus, an author and MIT-educated cognitive psychology research professor who teaches at New York University.
In spite of being a really smart guy and music lover, Marcus’ own attempts at learning to play musical instruments from grade school age to adulthood were futile, as he struggled with music-aptitude issues made worse by useless clock-watching music teachers.
Then in his late 30’s, Marcus became hooked on playing Guitar Hero, got pretty good at it and decided to take another crack at playing a REAL guitar.
And that’s the premise of Guitar Zero. Such a book was destined to appear eventually as this topic has seen a fair amount of discussion within guitar culture over the past few years.
I’m glad Marcus took this on, because his book isn’t simply a fluff about a video game’s valid or invalid role in influencing actual guitar heroes. Guitar Zero is an in-depth exploration into various perspectives of music as a talent, a perception and a process. As one might expect based on the author’s background, the early chapters take us into the tedious territories of genes, brain mapping, brain chemistry, neurology, linguistics and human evolutionary references. We even touch on the differences between gray matter brain tissue and the white stuff. Yum!
Fortunately, though, the text blooms into more aesthetic realms as Marcus relates hanging out with the likes of Pat Metheny, Tom Morello and shredder/teacher Tobias Hurwitz. He meets Hurwitz at Day-Jams band camp, where the author joins a kids’ band for a week and has a major epiphany about the nature of music which merges science with Zen.
He also debunks some older theories about talent and music extending back to Darwin. For example, Jimi Hendrix is used to illustrate different points, ultimately leading to why humans don’t simply create music to attract a mate, and why Malcom Gladwell’s 10K hour rule doesn’t always apply.
Other facets I found interesting include discussions about whether language or music evolved first, as well as various historical research references, and a review of a few current music instruction curriculums that get results by nurturing creativity—instructors take note.
Overall, Guitar Zero is a very contemporary-style text on musicology and music anthropology. And although Marcus’ approach comes from a scientific and psychological perspective, he’s not bound academia for its own sake.
For awhile, it seemed odd that he never refers to spirituality, in spite of the fact that musicians often place emphasis in this area. However, one feels the author may have skirted around such terms out of respect. Through his own process and experiences, he seems to arrive at Death Cab’s point where “Soul Meets Body” in a jam session; resulting in the extraordinarily profound statement that, “Music isn’t a special inborn modular mental mechanism; it’s a technology, refined and developed over the last fifty thousand years, in no small part to maximize flow.”
Read that again!
In spite of being a really smart guy and music lover, Marcus’ own attempts at learning to play musical instruments from grade school age to adulthood were futile, as he struggled with music-aptitude issues made worse by useless clock-watching music teachers.
Then in his late 30’s, Marcus became hooked on playing Guitar Hero, got pretty good at it and decided to take another crack at playing a REAL guitar.
And that’s the premise of Guitar Zero. Such a book was destined to appear eventually as this topic has seen a fair amount of discussion within guitar culture over the past few years.
I’m glad Marcus took this on, because his book isn’t simply a fluff about a video game’s valid or invalid role in influencing actual guitar heroes. Guitar Zero is an in-depth exploration into various perspectives of music as a talent, a perception and a process. As one might expect based on the author’s background, the early chapters take us into the tedious territories of genes, brain mapping, brain chemistry, neurology, linguistics and human evolutionary references. We even touch on the differences between gray matter brain tissue and the white stuff. Yum!
Fortunately, though, the text blooms into more aesthetic realms as Marcus relates hanging out with the likes of Pat Metheny, Tom Morello and shredder/teacher Tobias Hurwitz. He meets Hurwitz at Day-Jams band camp, where the author joins a kids’ band for a week and has a major epiphany about the nature of music which merges science with Zen.
He also debunks some older theories about talent and music extending back to Darwin. For example, Jimi Hendrix is used to illustrate different points, ultimately leading to why humans don’t simply create music to attract a mate, and why Malcom Gladwell’s 10K hour rule doesn’t always apply.
Other facets I found interesting include discussions about whether language or music evolved first, as well as various historical research references, and a review of a few current music instruction curriculums that get results by nurturing creativity—instructors take note.
Overall, Guitar Zero is a very contemporary-style text on musicology and music anthropology. And although Marcus’ approach comes from a scientific and psychological perspective, he’s not bound academia for its own sake.
For awhile, it seemed odd that he never refers to spirituality, in spite of the fact that musicians often place emphasis in this area. However, one feels the author may have skirted around such terms out of respect. Through his own process and experiences, he seems to arrive at Death Cab’s point where “Soul Meets Body” in a jam session; resulting in the extraordinarily profound statement that, “Music isn’t a special inborn modular mental mechanism; it’s a technology, refined and developed over the last fifty thousand years, in no small part to maximize flow.”
Read that again!
Like New Alvarez K Yairi CY120
Year: 1974
Make: Alvarez Yariri
Model: CY 120
Price: 600.00
Description:
Like New Vintage 1974 Alvarez K Yairi model CY-120 classical guitar. This classical guitar should not be confused with the S Yairi classical guitars. K Yairi classical guitars are well-known for both higher quality craftsmanship and wood used in construction. This classical guitar was recently reappraised using a more recent edition of the Blue Book of Acoustic Guitars at 700 to 750 in excellent condition which is the condition of the guitar based on an independent expert inspection. It has 3 very, very tiny dings and a barely visible short hairline scratch, which you have to look for to detect. Bought new by my aunt in early 1975; however, one year after purchasing and playing, she died in a car crash and I inherited it. The neck was too wide for me to play due to my very small hands, so it has been stored in a display case with the rest of my guitar collection in my parents den since 1975. It will come with a new hard case valued around $40 to $50. If you would prefer a specific case, higher priced case we can negotiate.
Contact: Denise Truskosky
Address: 1415 Woodridge Dr
City: Danville
State: Illinois
Phone: 217-231-5754
Make: Alvarez Yariri
Model: CY 120
Price: 600.00
Description:
Like New Vintage 1974 Alvarez K Yairi model CY-120 classical guitar. This classical guitar should not be confused with the S Yairi classical guitars. K Yairi classical guitars are well-known for both higher quality craftsmanship and wood used in construction. This classical guitar was recently reappraised using a more recent edition of the Blue Book of Acoustic Guitars at 700 to 750 in excellent condition which is the condition of the guitar based on an independent expert inspection. It has 3 very, very tiny dings and a barely visible short hairline scratch, which you have to look for to detect. Bought new by my aunt in early 1975; however, one year after purchasing and playing, she died in a car crash and I inherited it. The neck was too wide for me to play due to my very small hands, so it has been stored in a display case with the rest of my guitar collection in my parents den since 1975. It will come with a new hard case valued around $40 to $50. If you would prefer a specific case, higher priced case we can negotiate.
Contact: Denise Truskosky
Address: 1415 Woodridge Dr
City: Danville
State: Illinois
Phone: 217-231-5754
Jumat, 04 November 2011
Jimmy Fallon as Justin Bieber
Jimmy Fallon pulled off a surprisingly accurate impression of Justin Bieber on last night's episode of Late Night. In a parody of the teen pop star's hit "Baby," the host goofed on the news that the 17-year-old singer has been hit with a paternity suit by a 20-year-old woman in California. In addition to Fallon's turn as Bieber, Roots emcee Black Thought dropped in for his own spin on Ludacris' guest rap during the middle eight.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/videos/new-and-hot/jimmy-fallon-as-justin-bieber-not-my-baby-20111103#ixzz1cjIhHezr
Paul Simon
If you couldn't make it to Paul Simon's special show at Webster Hall in Manhattan back in June, you can take solace in the fact that it was filmed for Paul Simon: Live At Webster Hall New York, a concert movie that will be broadcast on PBS starting on December 3rd. As you can see in this performance of "Rewrite," a cut from his new album So Beautiful or So What, the film has a loose, intimate quality that captures the thrill of getting up close to a living legend in a small club.
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/videos/new-and-hot/paul-simon-rewrite-live-at-webster-hall-20111101#ixzz1cjIceJj4
Florence and the Machine
Florence is a machine. When Florence Welch burst to prominence two years ago, fronting a five-piece rock band as vigorous as any that's emerged from the U.K. in recent memory, it was clear that she was something special: a vocalist with extra horsepower who hurtled through love songs like a truck tearing down an empty highway on a moonless night.
Florence and the Machine's second album is as dark, robust and romantic as ever, but a revving 18-wheeler is no longer the apt metaphor for Welch's voice. Listen to her hooting and growling on "Only If for a Night," a ballad somewhere between classic soul and midnight-on-the-moors English art rock. Listen to "Shake It Out," a treatise on heartbreak and spiritual rebirth. "I am done with my graceless heart/So tonight I'm gonna cut it out and then restart," she cries, over guitars and keyboards that heave and chime. This is the sound of a human turbine – a wind machine.
On their 2009 debut, Florence and the Machine were a wiry rock band with a taste for melodrama. Here the scale is vastly inf lated: turbulent ballads, powered by booming drums and vocal chorales rising like distant thunder, full of Welch's banshee wails. The music touches on Celtic melodies, bluesy rock stomps, nods to goth and gospel. But the wind never stops howling.
Welch is a hopeless romantic obsessed with bad romance. Song after song casts relationships as struggle, with a hair's breadth separating rapture from disaster. For Welch, love is a force as vast and violent as nature itself. In "What the Water Gave Me," a spurned lover goes to a watery grave: "Oh, my love, don't forget me/I let the water take me/Lay me down/Let the only sound/Be the overflow."
This is a very British record, drawing on a tradition of iconoclastic U.K. pop that stretches from Kate Bush and Siouxsie and the Banshees to PJ Harvey. There's also a hint of another large-lunged Englishwoman here. Listen to "Lover to Lover," where Welch blasts out a gospel-soul-style lead vocal over an arrangement that winks at the thudding backbeat of classic Motown. Adele, anyone?
The rock band most forcefully evoked on Ceremonials is one of the biggest of all time: U2. Like them, Florence and the Machine are a true band, who channel garage-rock camaraderie into a huge, lashing sound more fit for an Olympian mountain peak than a garage. And like U2, Florence and the Machine are fronted by a singer with the pipes, and the shamelessness, to pull off the melodrama – to turn the ridiculous into the sublime. 2011 has been a banner year for left-of-center women rockers, from St. Vincent to Feist to Laura Marling. Those women are boutique stars, as, for the moment, is Florence Welch. But Ceremonials suggests she could be a rock star, and a big one. The album concludes with the rock-gospel uplift of "Leave My Body," as Welch roars out a vision of transcendence: "I'm gonna leave my body/Moving up to higher ground/Lose my mind." It's a big song, with a big, brash, Bono-worthy sentiment. And a voice to match.
Kamis, 04 Agustus 2011
Alice Cooper to Open Attraction at Universal Studios
Alice Cooper has teamed up with Universal Studios Hollywood to create a new attraction that will debut at the theme park just in time to celebrate Halloween. Alice Cooper: Welcome to My Nightmare is a maze that Cooper says will be a "living horror movie within screaming distance of the sound stages where horror movies first began." The maze will include simulated guillotine decapitations, electric chairs, a giant snake and an insane asylum.
Cooper's maze attraction will be part of the larger Halloween Horror Nights 2011 event, which will kick off on September 23rd and continue on selected nights through Halloween evening on October 31st. The event will also include two mazes designed by horror director Eli Roth based on his Hostel series and the forthcoming movie The Thing: Assimilation.
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