Apparently ssa.gov website is only running during set hours. This is what shows up when I try to log in (to see my social security...

Apparently ssa.gov website is only running during set hours. This is what shows up when I try to log in (to see my social security contribution statement). I decided to check it out after reading about this poor gentleman, whose benefits are suspended for no good reason.

Shutting down the government would have just accelerated Trump’s plans and power grab. It’s a tough pill to swallow, I get it. The...

Shutting down the government would have just accelerated Trump’s plans and power grab. It’s a tough pill to swallow, I get it.

The perceived leverage Dems seemed to think they had around the shutdown appears misguided and reactionary as far as I can tell. They don’t have a plan yet, plain and simple

The news ping pong cycle is the definition of insanity, whether the subject is eggs or Trump’s next bit of stupidness.

The news ping pong cycle is the definition of insanity, whether the subject is eggs or Trump’s next bit of stupidness.

Playing drums to a Peter Erskine drumless track

Peter Erskine, famous jazz drummer from the likes of Weather Report and other, put out some drumless tracks that are available for purchase on iTunes. I purchased a handful of them and have been enjoying coming up with parts.

The political equivalents of this tragic headline are both of these a). GOP states wondering why the guy they voted in is creating...

The political equivalents of this tragic headline are both of these a). GOP states wondering why the guy they voted in is creating instability in their neck of the woods and b). Dems wondering why people aren’t donating money to their txt campaigns.

Nothing new, the GOP are cruel, full stop. Department of Education Told Employees to End Support for Transgender Students.:...

Nothing new, the GOP are cruel, full stop.

Department of Education Told Employees to End Support for Transgender Students.: propublica.org

Currently listening: .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; }...

Currently listening:

Deleted: Realized I am falling into the trap of propagating unnecessary negativity.

Deleted: Realized I am falling into the trap of propagating unnecessary negativity.

This, so much, this. Hello non-technical people. Just a heads up. Musk isn’t a programmer, a systems architect, or anyone with experience...

This, so much, this.

Hello non-technical people. Just a heads up. Musk isn’t a programmer, a systems architect, or anyone with experience building or running large systems of any kind. However, he’s taken credit for others building large systems which makes him think he’s That Guy. He is not.

Some geese, on a frozen pond.

Some geese, on a frozen pond.

More of this please New “WikiTok” web app allows infinite TikTok-style scroll of Wikipedia. arstechnica.comDave Winer...

More of this please

New “WikiTok” web app allows infinite TikTok-style scroll of Wikipedia. arstechnica.com

As a music listener, I want to press play on a purchased track in Apple music that says “downloaded”, so that I...

As a music listener, I want to press play on a purchased track in Apple music that says “downloaded”, so that I can…successfully listen to the song I had purchased and downloaded.

Apple music management just keeps getting more and more terrible. I just want to play the tracks I own.

Think I will take the train next time. Trump Vows ‘Great Computerized System’ for Air Traffic politicalwire.comPolitical Wire...

Think I will take the train next time.

Trump Vows ‘Great Computerized System’ for Air Traffic politicalwire.com

The amount of attempts being made to sign in to my Microsoft account is pretty wild.

The amount of attempts being made to sign in to my Microsoft account is pretty wild.

Dan Sinker explains why we have to write it down. Part of the design of of all this is to overwhelm you and the other part is to deny that...

Dan Sinker explains why we have to write it down.

Part of the design of of all this is to overwhelm you and the other part is to deny that you are seeing what you’re seeing.

Never heard of this service but seems like a clean and easy way to blog, directly from the notes app in iOS or macOS, blog.montaigne.io

Never heard of this service but seems like a clean and easy way to blog, directly from the notes app in iOS or macOS, blog.montaigne.io

I decided months ago to really shore up our emergency fund. I’ve been recommending the same to friends, family, and strangers. Saving...

I decided months ago to really shore up our emergency fund. I’ve been recommending the same to friends, family, and strangers. Saving is hard, it can feel impossible, but even $10 a month is better than zero. Cheeto Prez is lighting his matches.

RIP Marianne Faithful .embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; }...

RIP Marianne Faithful

Learning basic baião patterns on the kit. Content or trigger warning: photosensitive folks should not watch. My lights started flickering...

Learning basic baião patterns on the kit.

Content or trigger warning: photosensitive folks should not watch. My lights started flickering during recording and flashes throughout the video. Apologies for that.

Marketplace has been my go to news show since 2006 and here’s host, Kai Ryssdal, answering why they didn’t pause their regular...

Marketplace has been my go to news show since 2006 and here’s host, Kai Ryssdal, answering why they didn’t pause their regular programming to respond to everything Trump has done, and I love his answer.

Had mine since April, 2010. It doesn’t turn on anymore, on my list of to-dos to try and revive it.

Had mine since April, 2010. It doesn’t turn on anymore, on my list of to-dos to try and revive it.

Yeah, a resolution condemning things Trump does, that’s going to make him pause and reflect. Keep on winning, Dems. Democrats Move to...

Yeah, a resolution condemning things Trump does, that’s going to make him pause and reflect. Keep on winning, Dems.

Democrats Move to Condemn Trump for January 6 Pardons politicalwire.com

A small hike yesterday to close off a highly bizarre week.

A small hike yesterday to close off a highly bizarre week.

Netflix sent me notice about my rate increasing. While I could absorb the cost (and normally didn’t pay attention to the increases in the...

Netflix sent me notice about my rate increasing. While I could absorb the cost (and normally didn’t pay attention to the increases in the past) I decided on a whim to just cancel my account. They are clearly baller because there was no attempt to retain me (member since 2009), just good luck and thanks for the great years. 😂

Pluralistic: Enshittification isn’t caused by venture capital (20 Jan 2025) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow When tech...

Pluralistic: Enshittification isn’t caused by venture capital (20 Jan 2025) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

When tech critics fail to ask why good services turn bad, that failure is just as severe as the failure to ask why people stay when the services rot.

Playing drums to a loop for giggles, its been a while since I did anything electronica-ish. The recording quality through GarageBand (on my...

Playing drums to a loop for giggles, its been a while since I did anything electronica-ish. The recording quality through GarageBand (on my phone) is remarkably improved over Yamahas Rec ‘N Share app. Going to play around with using my old iPhone SE as an overhead mic combined with the EAD10 to see how that works out quality wise.

Ive been keeping up with my drum playing regimen and challenging myself to learn a single song per week by listening to it for 5 minutes,...

Ive been keeping up with my drum playing regimen and challenging myself to learn a single song per week by listening to it for 5 minutes, jotting some notes on structure, feel, and potentially key parts. I record the performance in one take (mistakes and all) and spend some time listening back to highlight what areas I need improvement on or (heaven forbid!) what I did well!

I do this to practice my active listening skills, and really get in touch with what my body is doing during the performance vs. the final outcome. Ive always struggled with mindfulness techniques (staying quiet some place, focusing on breathing etc) in standard settings. While playing the drums these days it has been a boon to mood, and has contributed not only to improvements to my playing but also my presence with my family and general life/mental health.

Here are some of the latest Ive recorded:

Shout by Tears for Fears

I really enjoyed how this one turned out (and it is a great song). There is a blip at around the 2:28 mark that Im positive is an issue with the bouncing of the track but I accept it as a performance gap on my part.

You Dont Know How It Feels (To Be Me) by Tom Petty

What can I say about this song (and Tom Petty for that matter)? Its a slow steady beat, a little behind the tempo (not driving) that is maintained throughout the entire song. I love the drum sound of this entire record and Steve Ferrone (of Average White Band fame among others) is an outstanding groove master. The Yamaha Rec ‘N Share app that I use to split instrument tracks does mess with original recording a bit (sometimes strips out too many frequencies that make the song thin or under water sounding) but certainly capable enough for me to insert my own drum track over.

In the Air Tonight by Phil Collins

This is just a snippet of the classic fill into the groove of the song. It had to be done 😂

I applied some effects and compression to try and mimic the original sound (Phil Collins uses concert toms and lots of compression in this song).

Bending Time

Ive been messing around with my drums and mic setup and I think Ive dialed in the sound how I want it. One of the things Ive been practicing is taking a song with lots of space and introducing little snippets of tension in the time without losing the pulse. Super fun exercise, and when done right, downright musical (not saying I have achieved this). Heres a snippet of the song “Eat the Elephant” by A Perfect Circle that I played my own drum interpretation over:

Is That a Drum Studio in Your Pocket?

It is bitterly cold today in central Nebraska. Wind chills of -38 degrees Fahrenheit to be precise. Absolutely gross. I could have chosen to binge watch a show or two in bed all day, instead I chose to play drums for 5-ish hours.

During my teens, playing along for hours with headphones, to Pearl Jam or Nirvana was fun, but created a lot of fatigue due to shitty headphones, blasting the music way up to counter the loudness of the drums. As I resolved to pick up the drums again, I knew that not only protecting my hearing would be important, but also recording my playing to listen back on what I can improve on would be vital.

I came across various YouTube drummers recording their videos and noticed their drums didnt appear to be closely micd, in fact I couldnt detect microphones at all. Reading some of their equipment descriptions led me to this crazy little product from Yamaha: the Yamaha EAD-10. Its a little stereo microphone that attaches to your bass drum and connects to a brain/processing unit (the mic also can act as a trigger for your bass drum, and you can purchase separate triggers to attach to your snare, toms etc for added sound capabilities).

This little device has been absolutely amazing. I can connect my smartphone or laptop to the brain and record audio from my drums in near studio quality.

Here's what it looks like on my bass drum:

Yamaha Companion App: Rec ‘N Share

Yamaha has a companion smartphone app called Rec ‘n Share available in the App Store or Google Play Store. This app is what makes this equipment shine. The app is functional and fairly basic (certainly could use some better design touches) but it really makes it easy to either record your drums/practice session and organize them or load a track from your music library to play along to (it even has some ML features that can split the instruments of a track so you can mute them and record your parts into the track). Its main premise is to also record video from your phone as well as the drums track so you can share on YouTube (I have no intention of publishing on YouTube).

My Practice Sessions

I made a commitment to play at least one hour every day. Thankfully I have stuck to this since August when I got my drum studio set up. When I purchased this mic back in November of 2023, my sessions immediately increased to averaging several hours every day.

Heres a sample of a drum track. I literally started a new recording on my phone, the app gives me a countdown from when I press record, and I played for a few seconds then stopped the recording and shared the track via Airplay to my Mac (the app bounces the track to a .M4A file but I can also extract a .WAV).

Heres a sample of just the drums:

And heres an example where I stripped the drums with the app from a song I recorded with one of my old Seattle bands and recorded a new drum track to the original instruments:

There literally is no step 3 to this! I plug in and press record and voila! I have been extremely happy with the results, and it allows me to analyze what areas to focus on if Im in a practicing mindset, or just jam at all hours to my song library.

15-year-old me would be truly amazed at what technology has enabled me to do musically, and this technology has brought back a joy that I havent felt since I was 15.