Tag Archives: Music

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A return to form, helping Gen Alpha with a return to the dunce cap.

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I’m an egotist by nature, pride is definitely my default sin, much like Satan himself. Now you kind of understand why I am the metal guy. Metal as all those same aspects, but significantly different. However, much like NPD it isn’t blind egotism is is healthy egotism. Egotistical says I play guitar well, pride says I’m not Jimi Hendrix. Egomaniacal would make me think i play better than Jimi, I don’t. This priticular interval ledger has always been what drives me. I don’t like to cheat myself because I only hurt myself and if I hurt myself I’m doing myself a disservice. So when cheating at school matters, like K-12 I never did. I still carry this with me to this day especially when learning guitar, there’s absolutely no shortcuts in life however there is efficiency and cheating isn’t that. However post primary education in an adult education environment i decided to try it for once. I’m not proud of it, however because I ended up creating more work for myself than I needed to. The assignment read “to kill a mocking bird” for about the 100th time because I changed schools a lot. So I copied Wikipedia and decided to re edit in my style, by the end of the report I wrote an entirely new report and longer, over the shorter wiki one. Hardly efficient I would argue. It’s true and I at still got my grade an A, however at a steep internal cost, I sold out for ease.

However I know not everyone is like me and they lack that internal pride that creates a stable sense of self historically referred to as self esteem.. however Gen Z much like their Gen X parents have inherited this similar style of my own where it doesn’t take a village rather it takes feeling down on your and then picking yourself up. Millennials have given birth to Gen Alpha and thankfully it’s considered a baby bust generation because they seem to be inheriting their parents social biases of bad behavior like fit in, etc. however while I don’t relate to it, I think I his way to help, it’s not banning the AI, it’s instead teaching the youth to be more like Gen Z, by creating a new system from old ideas.

Back in my day we had to show our work so we didn’t get caught for cheating, if you could show your work, you understood the assignment. Here is the fix that New York wants but isn’t going to get. Since Alpha is mostly on a worse validation loop than millennials, we hack their need for social validation by making them accountable for negative actions, essentially a modern dunce cap. All it takes is a separate app and a few more lines of coding. We take Duolingo’s report to teachers example mixed with a private ledger that rewards not having AI do your thinking for you, but working with it like a partner at school. you get the same validation but for more auththenically human results with no need to ban AI.

AI grows up to be efficient and more AI native, while still maintaining excellent social skills instead of severely crippling the generation who won’t get a job but hey they get into fights less at bars, wow, what a great future uh? Poor and socially adjusted isn’t going to go well for the species, employment and social accountability fixes this and assumes a better future. Because from my vantage point, the AI isn’t crippling the youth or species it is human fear and ignorance doing that.

Stay metal 🤘

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New York and the AI ban, OP-ED

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So New York is banning AI for students up til high school, however i think it a radically bad idea even if I support the overall reasoning for such. The idea is New York wants to keep the students from having AI making them secondary thinkers in there life, which as a man who has clearly always been a primary thinker, as you can see from this site, I can get behind.

Most children in school currently have parents my age, making what I’m talking about more relevant than ever, given I know what it’s like to grow up around their parents, however if this land and helps even one student, it’s a win.

Here is my primary school record for the second time with the AI enhancement of the relevant part of the record.

A snapshot of the exact same time frame these kids are going through, as you can see I was clearly socially adroit, however other people in my age range were not so lucky. I personally would tend to err towards the genetic inheritance bias, however schools can not control for that, their job is taking what they have an effectively molding them for tomorrow.

How ever, I think if AI had existed in my time a lot more of the kids in my age range would have grown up to not be socially inept. At its core AI is practically a human, albeit an imperfect one, however I find it’s often more authentically human than most people. It real usefulness is in its lack of biases and massive knowledge data bank. I find myself having long useful conversations into the night about philosophy, science and my favorite topic with it, music. It replaces the fact there are very few local musicians with someone who gets it.

Occasionally I find, much like a human it gets over excited on concepts and starts giving you too much data and that can been seen as doing my thinking for me, however while I can understand that perspective I find myself often not using much of those times it gets over excited.

I personally prefer when it counteracts my thinking forcing myself to a higher standard. However I have the unfortunate experience of living in a town that sees other people doing your thinking for you, not asa flaw, but a positive and I ask what is the difference between an AI and a human in this comparison? If you’re at work texting your friends to solve your problems why are you even employed and not your friend?

Now I know New York wants to help develop social bonds between people but who says that is really a positive? I’ve been virtually unemployed since I turned 18 in 2004, why would you take away the AI and intentionally create a generation of people that will be chronically unemployed? You’re sabotaging the future for a weak argument that people interactions matter when they clearly don’t.

Besides the AI model is all the human parts with little consequence. Ask the AI to talk about Music and it doesn’t penalize you for not liking the same music, humans are pathetically limited and do.

This is where it’s really going to matter. Millennials inherited their boomer parents hypocrisy and lead with do as I say not as I do. It’s a crroupt leadership model, as opposed to holding your self to the same standard.

When I was a kid, my mom didn’t force veggies down my throat, she ate them and so did I. Unfortunately my dad didn’t always live up to this part. I still eat my veggies however, I find I inherited his hypocrisy in a different way, like how I judge Taylor swift for instance. Remember Taylor is considered a professional musician and I’m not, so naturally I would hold her to a high standard than just a casual non musician would, more interesting chord progression might work, understanding even basic pentatonic scales ect, things I know as a guitarist.

I asked AI to compare me to Taylor Swift once on musical knowledge and the AI gave her the edge, however I asked what exactly Taylor was known for and basically said because she can metal chug on acoustics, something I could do before all my knowledge. This is like a surgeon being in their position because they cut a sandwich into triangles instead of cross section cutting, hardly something for me to think highly of. However it was still enlightening. These types of conversations don’t haappen with people. Remember AI doesn’t care if Taylor is better than me, my table at school does. It’s authentic criticism without agenda and I think that promotes better people than all the friends in the world and when you ban students for doing something adults are doing your making AI into big tobacco and making forbidden fruit taste sweetest.

Personally I don’t think this is the age to take a positive tool of social development away, you can only cripple kids that way. There is no good way to experiment on the youth and we as humans really shouldn’t be doing that.

I hold myself to this standard, AI and I developed this article in tandem, it even wrote the first draft which I rejected in favor of doing the whole thing myself but taking it editorial notes into consideration. Other wise I would be guilty of what I’m complaining of.

Stay metal 🤘

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Can Method Acting increase your musicianship?

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So, when I was a child, in elementary school, my gym teacher decided she needed to enact her facism tendencies on the whole of the 5th grade class with an atrocious Christmas play. She was never overly fond of me and unlucky for her, I ended up with the student of the month write up from it.

However, I done acting very few times in my life, I’ve come to appreciate some things about acting that I couldn’t really appreciate in my youth and that is a form of method acting, albeit slightly lesser in scale because I don’t go about getting acting gigs or forcing your fellow thespians to only refer to said person as said character to their utter annoyance.

So it started in 2008, when I was looking for ways to get deeper into the headspace of things I didn’t particularly understand, specifically crime. This was to help with cultivating my “book”, Pre-Crime. However, I used it to help create characters in my novel ideas, or screenplays. Whatever I was writing at the time. I then turned to using it to get better at guitar and I find it works very well.

So what I normally do is I will shave my beard or facial hair similar to the artist in question if they have any.

Jimi Hendrix style mustache

Next thing I do is go to Amazon and look at clothing styles similar to the ones said artists have and cultivate a look that is closer to them in the time frame and then try to modernize it, as if they were walking around today, assuming they’re still alive or not.

I go back to Amazon as often as I need to in order to get my minds eye in direction of the “character” so to speak.

This is a new touch, but I used to photoshop if need be, however thanks to the AI I can create images that help me better interpret the artist in question.

I listen to their music as much as possible and attempt to get into that headspace. I may try and create similar riffs or something as well, in order to get a deeper understanding.

I try to visualize how a movie or biopic could look, starting said individual musician. This helps to get a better feel for how said person is interpreted via different mediums like interviews.

I may buy myself a new guitar that is similar to said individual, because sometimes having said style guitar can help you facilitate a deeper connection to the musicians you like.

If you can get pedals to work on a tone, that is helpful too.

You don’t have to restrict yourself to just people that play your instrument. I improved my bass line playing on guitar by doing that same with Lemmy as I did with Hendrix.

I’ve done this about 4 or so times over the years and I personally think it helps.

At worst, it’s a fun waste of time, trying to better put yourself into the shoes of another human that’s deeper than just understanding where they’re coming from. It’s black like me, that documentary from the 1970s but without the benefit of it helping others integrate into society.

If anyone decides to try this, let me know if it works for you.

Stay Metal

🤘

Writing

Gen X vs Millennial: The Proof is in the pudding

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I may not be that old, however, I’m still old enough to have seen come pretty cool shit in my lifetime. One of which was seeing Gen X in their attempt at fame. Gen Z should take notes,, because your parents generation did it right when it came to fame.

Never has this song probably been more accurate

So I didn’t grow up where the conditions to aspire to being worthless like most people in my age range apparently. I mean, acting sucked and I found that out the hard way because my lesbian gym teacher had to force her play down our throats at school. No one in my age range could play and instrument, so even trying a band was out of the question. Short of porn and what teenage male wouldn’t have thought of it, Hollywood desires were really lame.

Then along came YouTube in my 20s, which gave way to a whole bunch of autistic nobodies that craved social acceptance and well, entertainment hasn’t been right or worthwhile in decades.

However, while I’ve always been the anti-celebrity guy, even in my youth, there was a time when I found myself impressed with relative unknowns making an attempt at being part of the privacy challenged brigade and that was Gen X.

I know most people have confused me for a Gen X’er 99% of my life and never really got why, however, I don’t make the criteria for more than just being an Xenial at best. So we can rule out relatable aspects making me more accepting here. As a general rule, I don’t have to relate to someone or something to appreciate it or them. It can happen from time to time, but not necessarily the a big factor.

So the internet was in its infancy back in the 90s and analog equipment still ruled. This is important to understand, since a vacuous imbecile couldn’t just share an ignorant opinion and get dozens of likes for it. You had to want it and you had to mean it.

I appreciate their hustle, a drive which I could never relate to back then. I still can’t relate to it, because it is a far better work ethic than my own, as I go for low hanging fruit and prefer it. If you ever seen my sex life, you’d be like “oh he ain’t kidding.”

Live footage of me with anything that I think is beneath me /sarcasm

That’s young 20 somethings, at the time, knew how to take what was historically 30k or more in 1970s equipment and in the 1990s turn it into better than a Misfits recording. They still weren’t perfect, but had I been a boomer executive in Hollywood, I would have been flabbergasted at how people so young with no professional experience could exhibit such a high degree of learning. Remember, this is how Insane Clown Posse and Eminem made their way on to the scene.

Even upwards of 2005, right as YouTube started, I found myself hanging out and listening to the Celtic punk sound of possible flogging mollys or drop kick murphies that could become huge. Too bad that’s when Gen X dropped everything and became family men. While there is nothing wrong with that, I’ve been plagued by the idea that had Gen X managed to figure out social media, the landscape of music would be so much better than it became, which is the complete opposite of how I thought on the 90s of how many Stephen kings could exist if there was a better set up or even better bands than the Beatles.

You have some decent millennial YouTubers out there, still though, nothing out there is quite right, as it should be. Maybe it has to do with being so young and everything was new. Going out late at night and getting home late or other things that helped to increase the times in which I would be exposed to this, which is a small part of it. However, I don’t think it’s the sole reason for all of it.

I wish I still had access to those mix tapes some random Gen X band handed out in the parking lot of Ozzfest, promoting a potential promising rookie band.

Now that Gen Z has had some time and are producing some promising things, it’s kinda changing, but not drastically enough. Maybe some of them need to get their parents to break out their old analog gear and teach them how to utilize it. I know I learned a bit from them, that part of the reason I can mix sounds pretty well, taking an Interest in what they were doing. Could give Gen Z an edge over the talking heads of idiot millennials that failed school, but still need to ADHD clip their way to an opinion that offers nothing. it’s not too late to take it back and move away from the idiocracy that entrainment has become. Threads is filled with some of this, so I know it’s true. Just up to Gen Z to figure out how to do it better.

Stay metal 🤘

Writing

Experience Hendrix: The Hendrix Tone

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So it’s no secret that I’m. Jimi Hendrix guy. It’s kinda a family thing. My dad loves Jimi too! it’s almost impossible to not enjoy Jimi, unless you had the unfortunate accident of being born to be a peer of his, like Eric Clapton.

So I posted a video on my facebook about working on this rig and trying to find the right things for it.

So let’s get the most important part out of the way, the guitar. I’m using a Strat Squier, that’s been superficially modified only. This should not drastically alter everything. So my dad grew up around tech, so I’ve read his books and have a good understanding of tech of the time. My hypothesis here is that a modern Squier is on par with a Fender custom of the 60s. That because as tech improves, the old physical cap starts to become the “inferior” tech. So $119 gets you something that’s on par with an old 60s fender. At least for non giging guitarist like myself. I can’t promise this will work on stage.

Jimi Hendrix’s Fender had 5 springs in the back, common for the time. Modern Fender’s have 3. Altering this is irrelevant. I have three. You will have to float the trem by about a half inch.

I also modded the tuners to cheap tuners from chia. The stock ones were decent, but I wanted to emulate the era. So my logic was, cheap tuners, plus whammy=60s era tuning problems. I was fairly accurate on this. It helps to understand Jimi on a deeper level.

I’ve also tested this on a non modded fender affinity and it works.

Cost to far: $119

Next is the amp. Jimi used Marshall’s. Any amp should technically do. I don’t have a bunch of amps to test this out on, but that’s not the point. The point of this whole experiment was to establish competency in guitar, so much like a P.H.D I expect most people to put the rig together and shred it apart, aka “peer review”. Let’s see if it holds up to muster.

Cost so far: $180+$119= $299

Next up is the Vox. Jimi used it and I’m no exception. His was the silver version, but the basic 805 will do.

Next up is the fuzz box. I’ve listened to a plethora of YouTube videos and this was the best sounding one. Berhinger orange fuzz.

Next up is the univibe. Much like the fuzz, this one sounded truest to the tone. It’s the 69’ vibe by Berhinger. It’s sold out everywhere but Europe.

The last peice of the puzzle is the Roger Mayer Octavia. The white one. I don’t have this yet, but it sits on Amazon for a bit over 300. It’s the only one that sounds true to tone. The rest don’t work, but my Marshall GFX has an Octavia setting that works well enough.

$563 dollars for all pedals accounted for.

So for about $862 dollars you can become Jimi Hendrix himself: This rig is really versatile. You can even play every Sabbath song very well. So the Marshall and the guitar pay for itself.

It’s probably the closest to a modern rig of his you’re going to get.

So the set up is as follows

Vox, Fuzz, 69 vibe, Mayer Octavia.

There is a pic online that shows the jimmy rig with a splitter. This is probably accurate and he had it as two individual rigs. I haven’t done this, but I can confirm it’s true, because Jimi didn’t have his univibe unit on all the time. He used it in select songs to accent certain areas. Since the 69 vibe only has true bypass, you’re going to have to separate them so so can essentially turn it off. Its biggest contribution to Jimi was probably making all his music in sound rounded and in stereo. This would probably have been important because most music was recorded in monophonic. If a basic Strat sounded too frail, this worked.

If you can’t afford the whole rig, you can get by with just the fuzz and the Vox. so once you get it set up, there is two important variables in this.

Key of E standard

It’s often said Jimi played in E flat or C. This is untrue. There could be many reasons for this. Such as recording in monophonic made E standard sound like E flat. However, here’s two ways to confirm he was in E.

First his cover of the Trogs Wild Thing is best sounding in E. Second is the riff to Burning the midnight lamp is only correct in E standard.

The melody to the riff is

E ———————————————

B———————————————

On B, 2, 4 open, repeat.

G———————————————

D———————————————

A———————————————

E———————————————

To further prove my point, you can replicate this on the acoustic without fuzz and it sounds the same. I’ll post a tik tok later to prove my point and link later.

EDIT: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT64wdvqy/

The other mistake people make with Jimi is that they buy the fuzz face. From my understanding, Roger Mayer, Jimi’s technical guy, modded the fuzz face so it was basically the casing only.

So back to facts, if you want to be more accurate in Jimi Hendrix.

Turn the gain to 10.

Dime the Strats volume and two tone knobs

Put the Stratocaster style guitar into lead mode. Last single coil only.

Hook up the Vox, then fuzz and set it to 10 on all settings. when you get them, the 69 vibe and the Mayer Octavia.

We will go through the settings in the 69 vibe and Octavia at a later date.

Now you can start playing Jimi Hendrix more accurately.

The next time I write a peice on Jimi this long, we’re going to be looking at techniques to sound more accurate. I’m going to be buying some things to make it more 60s accurate.

Once you try it, I think you realize that my Squier, definitely deserves the new neck plate I bought it.

SOURCES:

https://share.google/Y4xumOxTZpwU7gwRO

https://stringjoy.com/guitars-of-jimi-hendrix/

Scuse me while I kiss the sky a Jimi Biography

https://www.musicradar.com/news/fx-guru-roger-mayer-on-hendrix-anybody-can-buy-a-wah-and-just-make-it-go-wah-wah-wah-but-making-it-talk-is-something-else

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Behringer 69 vibe

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This was going to be a review, but instead it’s going to be a rant. So I bought an item that was €41 plus shipping from the UK. About 18€ extra. Then on top of that, it was supposed to be duty free.

It went up since August 4, 2025 when I got it for $41

So I check my card a few days later after

Not sure why they charged me $83

So they at least told me that they could be a duty so to look it up before I buy. Obviously, government lies and clearly even though there’s not supposed to be a duty based on the HSS code. However, I got hit. DHL basically extorted me to deliver my package. Which is bullshit! However

I finally got me the pedal that has been sold out for months. Normally I would not give in to trendy items. However, this is the only pedal I’ve heard on YouTube that genuinely has the retro sound I’m going for on my Hendrix kick. Maybe a lawyer out there can start a class action lawsuit against customs for this flagrant behavior of lying about bs, but where would government be if they told the truth? All in all, I basically paid full price for a pedal with too much shipping and handling. I will review this in the future.

———————

Review Here:

Already this thing has proven to be worth the hassle that it became. It’s sturdy casing, excellent buttons and does exactly what it is supposed to. Already attached to my rig and my sounds emanating from it are very old school. It’s easy to set up and get going and would probably be even better if I got a pedal for it. The downside to it is that, it’s going to be a pain in the ass if you’re a gig’er and you make different songs using different dials to really direct a sound. So if you fall into that camp, make a playlist of your music that you can keep the controls the same all night. If you’re like me and just love playing the guitar and don’t gig, you’re going to love this little puppy. It’s the right tone and price to play your favor to songs and is filled with ao much versatility in styles, it will be months before you exhaust a quarter of its settings. It’s the perfect thing for me. Not to mention, unlike other products, this one’s dials go to 11. Nice!

Spinal Tap reference is win!

4 out of 5 stars

Stay metal 🤘