From a series of shows I have been to recently:
Silver Columns – Ruby Lounge, Manchester
Gold Panda – Ruby Lounge, Manchester
Kele – The Ritz, Manchester
Delorean – Ruby Lounge, Manchester
I’m going to try and grab a still from all future gigs and post them up here, regardless of the quality … or lack of it rather.
Dan
I thought I should drop a post as I haven’t said anything for some time now due to university having me on lock down. I think I’ll try and stay on top of things this month, not that my blog gets major traffic, but it’s good for posterities sake.
Here are some things I have been messing around with, I am going through a bit of a sampling phase at the moment so my apologies to all those artists who’s beats, hooks and grooves I have destroyed for experimentation:
Voek – Blame.mp3
Breakwater – Say You Love Me Girl (Voek Edit).mp3
Northend – Happy Days (Voek Edit).mp3
Odyssey – Native New Yorker (Voek Edit).mp3
Joanna Newsome – Cosmia (Voek Edit).mp3
Voek – Idea 24/10/10,mp3
As you can hear, I’m a bit all over the place at the moment but having fun with it non the less. It seems uni gives me the time to mess about with sound again. Also, the new art is courtesy of the one and only Andrew Tunney. Cheers!
I’ve recently started experimenting with vinyl too, so i’ll be chucking up a mix on here sometime in the not too distant future. Stay salty.
- Dan
Well, nearly another month without an update, but this time it’s because I have been busy with starting university. I have to say, if it this year carries on like it has started then university is more than likely going to be one of the most positive decisions I have made in my life.
Any who, I have consumed two large bottles of Tyskie in rapid succession and I am finding it a bit hard to throw decent sets of words together. So, in lieu of words, please accept this little song I have been working on:
Voek – On Disc
I take it you recognise the sample. Viva la disco.
- Dan
What a dreary Saturday. Anyway further to yesterdays post, I got my hands on a copy of the guitar tabs for Aphex Twin – Avril 14th and swore to myself that I would have to have a go at recording a little cover. I thought it would take me a little while to act on this idea but with it being such a gloomy day today, I ended up doing the recording.
Aphex Twin – Avril 14th (Voek Cover)
As you can hear, it in no way does the original any justice and some parts are out of time, the end is a little sketchy and, you get the picture … I just wanted to have a stab at it. It’s times like these I wish I had some decent recording equipment and wasn’t forced to record guitar through my laptops mic. Dreadful.
Perhaps i’ll record another song on the morrow if the weather turns out to be as dull as today.
- Dan
It’s a curious thing having your own place, in my case it has resulted in getting far less achieved than usual. I did however get the old axe out today and spent a while throwing some patterns together, it resulted in the following:
Voek – Friday
One decent thing to come out of today though was the fact that I was able to get a tab file for Aphex Twin – Avril 14th, so i’ll definitely be learning that tomorrow, and will post up a little recording of it too. If you haven’t heard Avril 14th, go here and gawk, it is a beautiful piece.
Here’s to vegetating.
- Dan
I am currently in a quandary over an accidental discovery I made today whilst scouring eBay for a laptop. What’s happened is that I have stumbled upon a device called the iRobot aPad, which I had previously heard nothing about.
As you have probably deduced from the name, yes, it is an iPad clone, but with a spicy twist … it runs Google’s Android OS. Now, save the ooo and ahh’s because they should be savoured for when I drop the price tag of the device, which is under £100. Yes indeed, these things are generally kicking it on eBay for an average price of £80. What about the spec you ask, well it’s not fantastic but it isn’t awful and it’s definitely enough to get you by and to perform day to day operations.
Let us have point our optical orbs downwards to catch a glimpse of this little bleeder:
As you can see, it looks pretty cool but I am just wondering where it would fit into my life between my laptop and my BlackBerry? I am sure having one would be great for taking out and about and for raping WiFi hotspots, but then again, I can’t think of an occasion when i’ve ever needed to use a WiFi hotspot before … I think maybe I just want to spend some cash.
Maybe that £80 is better off in my ISA after all. If you want to check out the full details of the aPad, you can visit the iRobot website at http://irobotgroup.com/.
- Dan
Well, it has been some time! Quite a bit of time in fact … since my last post, I have been to Japan, left my job for university and moved into a new house, but today, oh today, we we’re finally reunited with the Internet at our new place! Rapture.
I thought I would slam up a quick post to say that the blog is alive and kicking, just that I haven’t actually had real access to the Internet for quite some time. Hopefully I will get some shots of Japan up in coming days, but for now, I am off to enjoy the splendour of the World Wide Interjive.
- Dan
So I have been working on this track called “Call Me Up” recently and thought I would post up what I have so far. The track is actually a rework of and old funky/soul tune, “Kashif – Lover Turn Me On”, released in 1983. Here is a rough idea of where I am going with it:
Voek – Call Me Up
And if you want to check the original for a bit of a comparison, you can check it out below:
– Dan
Today i learned that sometimes, no matter how thoroughly you think you have checked a report, there is still something wrong with it. This is clearly no good when you are sending out botched figures to senior management. Alas, too make mistakes is human and as long as we learn from them, all is not lost. You know it’s weird, I think we have to make mistakes sometimes to truly reaffirm things in our heads. For example, I know my new role at work requires that I pay extra attention to figures and how reports are compiled, so why did I make such a blatant mistaken yesterday? I wouldn’t put it down to carelessness as such, but maybe I wasn’t truly giving it my all when I checked the figures before sending out. However, by making this mistake I now know I have to double my efforts and rigorously check things, and I believe this will make me more effective in the long run.
So, whilst initially a little embarrassing, I believe it’s been a good learning curve and I also believe that mistakes are actually somewhat vital to progression. Unless your perfect? Like Juliette from Lost, she’s allowed to make mistakes …
Well, she’s not perfect, she’s just lovely. Lovely Juliette. Any way, I will leave you with a little tune I made last night. I ended up having a blast on the axe and found myself staying up till the small hours fiddling with this beat. It’s inspired by my lacklustre day at work yesterday and is aptly titled, “A Bad Day”.
Voek – A Bad Day
Just a little indie sounding number, I’d like to make more stuff with this kind of sound really. Now, to see what happens in Stargate: Universe and then sleep.
- Dan
Playing When Posted: Death in Vegas – Girls
I have been trying to find time to write this post for the past couple of days but I have either wound up being busy or falling asleep due to the mad hot weather we are experiencing in the UK. It is probably quite obvious what I want to talk about, and that is of course the series finale of Lost. All I have done is whinge about it the past couple of weeks, but I am actually sad now that it is gone … gone for good.
The actual finale itself was a pretty p*ss poor episode but, it was also quite heart warming. Whilst I don’t think it was the best ending we could of asked for, I do feel as if I have gotten closure and that it has been boxed off at least in a “decent” manner. I am a bit of a sucker for romance sometimes and the finale was certainly full of it, I think more specifically I am just a sucker for Juliette and we got to see her again which was good.
So I don’t know, I have mixed emotions on the matter, it wasn’t fantastic but it wasn’t terrible. There is also the fact that there are things that were left totally forgotten about or just wholly unexplained, which is a tad annoying. I am going to have a think over the next few days and then maybe bang up a post with some of the said unexplained items. It’s too much to go into now or I will be late for work.
Other than the Lost series finale, I had a really good weekend just gone. The weather in the UK has been popping off recently (it’s actually taken a nose dive today ..) and it was particularly nice last weekend, so good so that me and my band of merry gangsters ended up at the beach,
There was plenty of nerf’ing, BBQ’ing, drinking, sand dune posing and all round good times. The sea however was a little off, it actually had little leach like insects in it that stuck to your body and made you itch … good old English sea side. However, once you get over how absolutely diabolic it was, it wasn’t too bad and the water was actually quite warm too.
Other than the beach, there was a lazy afternoon spent at the park, which was also mega sunny too. I am finding it a little hard to believe that I have actually managed to walk away from the weekend without getting burnt by the sun as I am usually a magnet for it. It’s not like I am complaining though, sun burn is sent from Satan’s fiery holiday cottage itself.
Anyway that is enough of that as non of it was particularly that interesting. Time for work, horrible. Absolutely horrible.
- Dan