i should be something like -0.5, not -1.9.
-1.9 is more on par with somebody in their 80s.
so, what do i do about this?
Wednesday, June 2, 2021
the good news is that the fit test was negative.
the bad news was that the bmd was terrible. -1.9. that's technically osteopenia, but practically osteoporosis.
i'm 40 years old.
over the last several years, i have gone through incredible lengths to try to get my testicles removed, to try to increase my testosterone suppression and to ensure that i'm getting usable, absorbable estrogen. the system has blocked me every step of the way...
and, now i have osteoporosis.
it is probably not a coincidence that my teeth started eating away at the same time that i went back down to 100 mg/day of cyproterone. and, while i don't have the ability to prove it, i'm entirely convinced that the declining estrogen is also at the root of the iron absorption problems.
i need to sleep on this.
all you can do for right now is
(1) send a letter to the company explaining your concerns. in theory, if they get dozens of more letters from people that support dogs than from people that want to get rid of them, they should reverse the ban. and, send the letters to all of the companies, not just the ones in canada.
(2) while you're waiting, boycott companies that ban dogs.
but, you have to realize that this struggle exists before you can react to it. you don't realize it, and that's at the crux of the problem.
out of all the things we could be concerning ourselves with in this techno-dystopia, right?
and, it's just going to get worse as one basic western cultural norm after another ends up challenged by cultures with more buying power than ours.
we're going to have to refight battle after battle that we fought and won hundreds of years ago.
and, it's going to slow us down, as we spin in place, for who knows how long.
secularism will win in the end, it always does. but, we could be in for decades or centuries of stupid bickering, in the mean time.
and that's really my perspective on this: these are dumb concerns that i don't want to bother with, and that i resent being forced to deal with.
didn't they recently pass a "bill of rights" for airline patients?
my hunch is this: there are certain cultures that don't like dogs, and they whined and complained until they got banned. these cultures have more market power than northern european culture, so they won and got to enforce their values on everybody else. these are the kinds of changes in culture that we're going to have to get used to, if we continue to allow competing cultures to invade and dominate us - which we seem to be happy to do.
while some legal action is probably justified in the long run, what i'd suggest for now is voting with your wallet and picking transit options that allow for pets, whether they're classified as "support animals" or not.
i'd rather ban hijabs than dogs, myself. but, i don't have the money to make those choices.
today's post is my 6th record, inri063.
these are all songs that were written with the intent of sean singing over them, and then reclaimed, completed and remastered over 2014/2015. the elephant in the womb indicates the gestation period - this is a behemoth that was a long time coming, and is only surpassed by my upcoming and still gestating records.
the posts over the last several days have slowly built up to this, and i think i've said all i can say about each of these tracks. but, i'm pretty proud of this as a piece of abstract electronic music and am excited to finally finish the follow-up.
=====
the idea of a second jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj record was not something that remotely crossed my mind until i started seriously analysing my work from 2002. that was a separate idea; rabit is wolf separated it from the trivial group. however, remixed instrumental tracks over the rabit is wolf period slowly collected to the point that there was enough to justify a whole record. that wasn't a conscious choice at the outset, but it seems to be the conceptual framework collected on the record. i toyed with the idea of releasing it as a rabit remix record, but my influence over it is far too lopsided.
the thematic linkage with the first jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj record is a tendency to lean towards more "serious" ideas. there are strong influences from a few different types of classical music, including jazz, as well as some more modern electronic and noise influences. however, these songs lean more towards more palatable rock or techno based song structures and are less dependent on existing scores.
the stories for these songs are diverse and explained in more detail on the track pages.
these tracks are all based on existing demos from 2001-2002 that were initially intended to be completed with vocal parts and were remixed from july, 2014 to may, 2015 as purely instrumental recordings. released may 2, 2015. disc finalized as lp014 on nov 21, 2017. this is my sixth official record; as always, please use headphones.
this release also includes a printable jewel case insert and will also eventually include a comprehensive package of journal entries from all phases of production (2001, 2002, 2014, 2015, 2017).
released december 1, 2002
j - electric & acoustic guitars, electric bass guitar, effects, synths, electric air reed organ, digital piano, flute, voice, electronic drum kit, drum programming, drum manipulations, drum sampling, orchestral sequencing, sampling, loops, equalization, digital wave editing, sound design, production, composition.
sean - harmonica (2), melody (6)
greg - drum performance sample source (4)
the various rendered electronic orchestras include tuba, french horn, trombone, trumpet, english horn, saxophone, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, flute, orchestra hit, melodic toms, timpani, orchestral drum set, piano, agogo, tubular bells, glockenspiel, koto, violin, viola, cello, contrabass and various full string sections. it also includes choir.
Tuesday, June 1, 2021
today's post is the 5th volume of flac dvds.
============
purchasing this release does not come with a download.
inri054: recorded in late 2001 and early 2002. track 6 was constructed in may, 2004 out of files recorded 1999-2001. tracks 1-4 were reconstructed over october, 2014. final mixes were finished on october 18, 2014. released on oct 21, 2014. disc closed on oct 30, 2017.
inri055: written in early 2002 and recorded and mixed in early 2002 and late 2014. released on nov 15, 2014. expanded, re-released & finalized on nov 1, 2017.
inri056: written & recorded in late 2001 and early 2002 and mixed in early 2002 and late 2014. released on nov 19, 2014. expanded, re-released and finalized on nov 2, 2017.
inri057: written and recorded in late 2001 and early 2002. initially sequenced in may, 2002. re-sequenced and first released in june, 2002. re-released in slightly different forms from 2002-2014. resequenced to mimic the original sequencing and re-released on november 8, 2014. except to sequence the record, these files have not been altered since 2002. disc finalized as lp013 on nov 3, 2017.
inri058: written over 2001 and 2002 and rethought repeatedly between 2002-2014, with no clear resolution in a final mix. reconstructed from source in late 2014 and then rendered at multiple stages to create a series of snapshots. final mixes were completed over the last week of november and the first week of december. released as a two-volume set on dec 7, 2014. the concept was rethought on nov 3, 2017, which led to the inclusion of five more mixes and an expansion to four cds. re-released in four volumes & finalized as symph007 on nov 12, 2017. the raw guitar mix was corrected on jan 6, 2018.
inri059: written and recorded over 2001 and 2002. mildly remixed in november, 2014 to make the tracks more presentable; nothing substantial was altered, and no new sound was recorded. released on november 19, 2014. re-released on physical media and finalized on nov 14, 2017.
inri060: written in august, 2002. track one was remixed in december, 2014 to turn the rest of the track up relative to the vocals. released on dec 12, 2014. disc finalized on nov 14, 2017.
inri061: written over the summer of 2002 and initially recorded in the early fall of 2002. additional writing, arranging, recording, production and mixing occurred from dec, 2014 to apr, 2015. released as a two volume set on april 27, 2015. this release was expanded to include a third disc on nov 17, 2017 and filled in with eight new remixes over the next few days. re-released as a slightly rearranged three volume set and finalized on nov 19, 2017.
inri062: this track was written in late 2002 and completed over april and may, 2015. released may 11, 2015. disc finalized on nov 20, 2017.
originally created over the course of 2002, with some files dating to late 2001. this compilation is dated to nov 30, 2002. slowly remastered, reconstituted, compiled, reconstructed, released and finalized from 2014-2017. compilation finalized on nov 21, 2017. as always, please use headphones.
released november 30, 2002
j - guitars (electric, acoustic, nylon), electric bass, electric mandolin, sequencers, synthesizers, drum & melodic & orchestral programming, electric air reed organ, digital piano, flute, regular drum kit, electronic drum kit, sampling, digital and analog effects processing, sound design, soundscaping, loops, granular synthesis, noise generators, voice, vocoders, drum & vocal manipulations, digital wave editing, equalizers, production, composition.
sean - vocals/lyrics (inri054-inri059, inri061), harmonica (inri054, inri057), ring modulator (inri057-inri058), vocal concept (inri062)
greg - drum performance sample source (inri056-inri058)
jon - guitar performance (inri057)
bob - hammering (inri058)
the various rendered electronic orchestras include acoustic bass, synth bass, electric bass, brass, french horn, trombone, trumpet, tuba, english horn, saxophone, flute, oboe, piccolo, clarinet, bassoon, orchestra hit, drum machine, electronic drum kit, nylon guitar, electric guitar (distorted & clean), acoustic guitar, synthesizers, synthesizer effects, glockenspiel, vibraphone, hammered percussion, music box, tubular bells, bells, agogo, wood blocks, marimba, melodic toms, timpani, taiko drum, backwards cymbals, synth drums, orchestral drum set, harp, koto, piano, bells, mellotron, violin, viola, cello, contrabass and various full string sections. there is also choir.
my basic position is this: if you or marx or anybody else don't like what i choose to alienate myself from then fuck you.
and, this idea that i can't see through it - that i'm just brainwashed in some system of control - is insulting, and fuck you for suggesting that, too.
i'll alienate myself from what i bloody well choose to alienate myself from.
and, i think i'm getting my point across. for all of the terminology and pretentious references, this is really just marx getting moral on your ass, about things he has no right to criticize you for. and, he should fuck off.
i'll continue to point to his substantive critique of classical economics, though.
an individual cannot be alienated from themselves, by definition - the supposed alienated individual is the only individual that actually exists. you can imagine some other individual, but it's not real; you can moralize as to what the individual ought to be, but that's just religious bullshit.
the individual merely exists as they are, and that is all.
and, i don't have a lot of time for people that want to argue about nonsense.
i actually think that marx' diatribes about "alienation" are the worthless, masturbatory (and, frankly, bourgeois) parts of marxism that are best done away with, and one of the reasons i'd rather call myself an anarchist. it's also a kind of relic of marx' love-hate relationship with religion, and his inability to completely sever himself from it, the way that kropotkin or bakunin did.
i don't want to be a part of a community, and i don't want to join a political movement that insists i must be, or insists i must define myself that way - i want to be an individual that exists outside of any collectivist entity, and i actually see capitalism as a system that minimizes and distorts the individual (i know that's what marx actually said) rather than one that exalts it. we need collectivism in production to make sense of it, but the point should be to manifest human individuality - and i don't want to join your movement if you want to negate or minimize that.
humans do not have a definable nature or essence in any non-trivial sense, and there is no shared human condition. it's just a bunch of empty philosophizing - bourgeois, pointless nonsense.
as an anarchist, i cite marx for his economic and political ideas; i don't care much for his philosophical positions.
so, how do we overcome this?
meh. i'd rather embrace it...
so, i got the following done:
- salicylate (thinner)
- ascorbic acid (general dietary)
- asca (crohn's)
- mercury (blocker)
...but results are not available, yet.
this lab does not do glutathione, iodine or pyruvate kinase - but the other corporate lab does, so i'll have to take it there, instead. the amino acid fractionation requires a fast (oops). and neither of the labs do serum oxalate, so i'll have to ask the doctor to put urine down instead.
i will have to shop around to see what the best prices are for the cancer screening.
(this post is dated to june 1, 2021 because it describes events over that day. however, it was written on june 11, 2021)
so, once the mediation with the hospital was done, i got on my bicycle and went out to do a blood test at the life labs, which is about a third of the way to belle river, which i needed to get to to get my sealant – and to get some exercise, as my general exercise routine has been corrupted by the border closure during the pandemic.
the reason i went to this further blood lab is that the closer lab sends large amounts of the tests they do to this lab as a starting point; the local lab mostly does routine tests, whereas anything complicated gets sent to the corporate lab. so, it’s essentially a front for the corporate lab. even that is sort of irrelevant to me, except to point out that i can’t access the results myself once they’ve been sent off, i need to wait to talk to my doctor, which i find frustrating. the reasoning behind going to the corporate lab is to get access to the results before i can talk to the doctor. i wanted less than five vials taken on this day before i headed to the outskirts of town, so the fact that they could only do four of the options worked out well for me. i just had to get to the lifelabs by 2:45, then make it to belle river before 6:00 – which i was able to accomplish rather effortlessly.
as it was with the previous ride to belle river at the start of may, i barely stopped at all on the way there, which meant i actually made excellent time. and, i wanted to make sure i could stop at the dollar store to get a tarp on the way home, so i rushed back without really stopping, either. i didn’t check the time, but i’m guessing i got into town at about 18:00 or so – lots of time to stop into the dollar store for 30 second to get a tarp, right?
there are dollaramas spaced across tecumseh like tim horton’s – they’re every couple of intersections, and i knew that, even if i wasn’t sure exactly where each one was. it should be pointed out that there are closed big box stores at almost every mall up this strip, many of which have left behind these still thriving dollaramas, and it says a little about the demographics of this city, as well as a little about the prices in these larger stores. where ronas and home depots and ikeas fail, dollaramas flourish. well, i’m seeking their $4 tarps for a reason – i don’t want to pay $30 for the same thing at walmart. who would, actually?
the first sign i saw was at the tecumseh mall, which has been on life support since i moved here. this dollarama was outright closed for the remainder of the pandemic, and we’ll have to see if it recovers or not (i’d bet it will).
the next one was across the street, sandwiched between a value village and a maternity store. this one was closed at 18:00.
closed at 18:00? what the fuck?
the next one was a few blocks up, beside a freshco, and it was closed at 17:00. so, i’m starting to panic.
i tried the one near the metro – closed at 18:00.
the last one on the way home was beside the next freshco, and i barely made it in before they closed at 19:00 – but they didn’t have a tarp in stock. for fuck’s sake....
...and, 19:00 was the late option, apparently.
so, that’s five attempts to buy a tarp, with no luck. i had no choice but to go home, empty-handed.
i don’t know what the logic of forcing businesses to close early in the pandemic is, but i wasn’t the only person upset about it. the store had a line-up of people outside, baffled by the early closing time. i mean, the grocery store next door was open until 22:00, so what’s the point of forcing the dollar store to close early? and, if there are people trying to get in after 19:00, forcing them to come in early is just increasing the number of people in the store. there’s no logic in this, unless the logic is that somebody doesn’t want people working at "supper time", because they think they ought to be eating a family dinner, instead. which is just, like....fuck off.....
it was otherwise a good day, though – five hours on the bike, and with a bottle of sealant to show for it.
so, then what i need to ask for for tomorrow is:
- celiac
- cea (general cancer, often used for colon cancer)
- gastrin (stomach and pancreatic cancer)
- p-anca (colitis)
- copper serum
- another fit test
+
- psa (prostate cancer)
- ca 19-9 (general cancer)
& i'll keep at my once-per-month approach to the other minerals and vitamins, too.
that should tell me if i'm in scaryville or just having some absorption issues, at least.
so, i got enough to fund the surgery, and then some, meaning it should be enough to make for a weekend in toronto, and then some. the exact amount isn't important, but i can't publish it here as per the terms of agreement.
i can't do anything after the surgery, so if i'm going to party it up, i'll have to do so the night before.
hey - call me a crazy ass drama queen motherfucker, but i got what i wanted, which was funding to get my balls cut out.
now, i need to call the urologist back and make sure they can schedule me.
so, i got my most recent blood rec in the mail. i'm just writing it down here because the lab i went to has apparently dropped a few results.
i'm still waiting for vitamin a. i'll talk to him tomorrow about that. i should get the bone mineral density results, as well.
for this blood rec, the following were done on saturday:
- uric acid: 331 (normal)
- inr: 0.9 (normal, to slightly low - but that suggests increased clotting activity, not decreased clotting activity)
- ptt: 30 seconds (normal)
- ptt control: 29 seconds
- lipase: 29 iu/l (normal)
- amylase: 59 iu/l (normal)
they told me they were doing fibrinogen, but it didn't come up. maybe they sent it off. i also asked for aptt and it's not in the rec.
as mentioned, that suggests my k absorption is fine, my ability to clot is fine (and i might be getting too much, but i'm also on estrogen, remember), my pancreas is fine, and the markers i was looking for for molybdenum and manganese do not flag absorption problems with either.
so, what's left is:
- oxalate (iron blocker)
- salicylate (blood thinner)
- fibrinogen? (part of vitamin k test)
- mercury (blocker, and bad news in general)
- aptt? (part of vitamin k test)
- glutathione (selenium, and general curiosity)
- amino acid fractionation (absorption, and diet check)
- iodine (absorption, and thyroid)
- pyruvate (manganese)
- ascorbic acid (absorption)
- asca (crohn's)
when i talk to him next, i'm going to add:
- cea
- gastrin
- copper serum
and, we'll need to wait until next time before i can do research into b vitamins and potential indirects for them.
the next ten years in the united states are going to have hurricanes like nobody's ever seen. these mostly won't affect canada, which will broadly benefit from climate change.
but, something that will happen here and that we're going to have to adapt to is a northwards moving of the tornado line from the american midwest to the canadian prairies. koto, i don't think we're in saskatchewan, anymore.
...and, it may actually make the american midwest a particularly attractive place to relocate, as a relatively warm enclave that is both too far inland to get nailed by the hurricanes and, increasingly, too far south to deal with devastating tornadic activity - even if it's increasingly too warm to grow food.
i think this gets the right idea for the summer. my weather forecasting may seem hokey, but it's just because it's based on a broader interpretation of the various oscillations that define the weather (and are broadly determined by solar output, first and foremost) and is adjusted to be specifically dialectical. so, i can't tell you what it's going to be like tomorrow, but i can provide a broader concept of what is happening.
the models want to focus on the pacific, and i understand why, but i think it's a mistake in the eastern part of north america. here, the same basic struggle between the warming atlantic and the now receding vortex (technically, the vortex is strengthening, but it means the cold air is receding) is what is going to primarily define the weather here, not pacific air from the west. as the vortex is receding with the sun, and the warming of the atlantic is accelerating, we should have a broadly warmer summer than we have had recently. if we get periodic shots of hot air from the pacific, it could lead to higher humidity as a kind of extra level of warmth, but it won't affect the general forecast.
the fact that the cold air is going to be receding for the next several years should amplify the effects of global warming in the atlantic, but we're still near the bottom of the cycle, remember. it's going to take some time for the energy at the northern latitudes, along that nasty tilt we have on our planet, to rebuild as it always does. so, if we see something like a lull in hot air from the atlantic due to too many hurricanes, or some particularly nasty cyclones in the east pacific, it could allow the lingering cold air to overtake the limes and sack the south.
but, i'm going to suggest we should broadly lean towards a warmer than usual summer due to the dominance of the warming atlantic on the patterns in the region.
and, i'm also going to expect a heavy hurricane season, as well - which our neighbours to the south should prepare for.
there's a certain framing that comes out of this kind of thing that goes something like this:
"we used to be a racist society built on colonialism and genocide, but we got better. now, we have identity politics and neo-liberalism, instead - and all of that stuff is done with. so, come work for our logging company."
i'm a robot. i get it. but, my main concern is not what happened 200 years ago, it's what's happening right now. and, even if you're obliged to feel a little bit more than i am, don't lose that basic point - the present is more important than the past.
they found a mass burial of some kids in a "residential school", which was a kind of internment camp for indigenous people run by the catholic church, in kamloops. the suggestion is that they were probably killed by the administrators of the school. there was no previous record of this - in fact no previous record that the kids were even missing.
indigenous women continue to "disappear" in that part of the country on a regular basis, and everybody knows the government is killing them. they keep squashing inquiries. this is something that is happening and we can do something about to try to stop.
but, i don't know what to do about this mass grave in kamloops besides send the vatican a sternly worded letter. i mean, it's not even clear who the families were.
it's very sad and everything, but i need to remind people that the present is unfolding around us, and there is no deficit of injustices to fight against right now, every day. don't let them sidetrack you into getting angry about ancient history, instead.
that 30 hour day yesterday took so much out of me that i forgot how to add.
(12 + 6 = 18. but, the baseline was 24 hours, not 12 hours, and 24 + 6= 30.)
it's nice and warm in here, and i'm not complaining, but the heaters make me so tired. if i was outside in 30 degree humidity, i wouldn't be falling asleep, but my thermostat says 30 degrees on it, and it's all from the dry heater, and it's just cutting me down.
or, maybe i'm dying of brain cancer.
but, they'll just tell me to get a colonoscopy...
"doctor, i'm....."
"colonoscopy. immediately."
"but, i didn't even...."
"irrelevant. colonoscopy. now. bend over."
"but, i'm gaining weight...."
"irrelevant."
"...and my blood tests say that...."
"the ministry instructs that you must enjoy your colonoscopy right now!"
they're all gay men, too - they all have lisps.
i'm pretty sure i have a handle on this mediation thing, which is earlier than i thought - it's at 9:30. i thought it was at 12:00. so, i'm going to get to narrating the last few days.
the short of it is that i need to wait ten days for the fit test results (but they might not be useful), that i'm not dealing with clotting issues (except maybe too much clotting) and that my pancreas is fine. together, these things suggest my trace minerals are probably ok.
should i just remaster everything so it can with withstand the onslaught?
no.
it's the algorithm...
see, what the mp3 algorithm does is decide that there are certain spectra of sound that people don'r care about, anyways. what i'm doing is filling in those spectra, in utter defiance.
so, i'm not going to compromise, i'm going to tell low bitrate mp3s to fuck off.
also...
lalalala - and versions, including the one on the sixth record - is one of the tracks that compresses very badly. the detail of the track is all in the reverb, which is heavier here than almost anywhere else in my discography. i've got reverb coming from a dozen different places, including the environmental audio effects. this reverb is creating all kinds of interesting artefacts and sound effects in places that an mp3 compressor (which is almost as bad as a corporate rock producer) is just going to squash out of existence.
the version on the album has this ping-pong reverb from about 4:04 to about 5:32 that you can't hear at all on bandcamp. like, i don't mean that it's been crushed or distorted - it's just gone. instead, you get about a minute and a half of silence. there should be a delay there, but it's just utterly inaudible due to the compression algorithm deciding that it exists in unimportant frequency ranges.
so, this is kind of a ubiquitous problem for a sound artist, faced with the normality of low quality sound devices. this is an extreme example - you can't even hear the song. at all. - but it demonstrates the nature of the problem.
and, all i can tell you is that it sounds great in lossless audio through a decent amp and good headphones.
for now, the best way to get around it is to feed it into an external amp at low volume and crank the amp. but, ultimately, the compression is irreversible, and the detail is not recoverable from the format.
so, my nose is bleeding.
it's a little dry in here, but...
*sigh*. the doctor has to treat me for colon cancer because it's what the probabilities say, and what the direction from the ministry says. i've realized this recently - doctors in canada are actually overwhelmingly regulated. you might imagine that you're going to an educated specialist that is going to react creatively, using their base of knowledge, but it's really not like that; it's more like you're going to see a drone worker that is following a decision tree that their boss (the state.) gave them, and could face severe penalties if they try to actually use their brain.
i told him immediately that i was more concerned about my brain bleeding than my stomach bleeding. i told the er doctor the same thing. they both ignored me and followed the decision tree, instead.
it's dystopic, really.
so, i've been trying to get these gastro-intestinal tests over with to get them out of the decision tree, but it's been impossible, because you're just stuck with even more obstructions when you try to speed it up, or get around the lobbyists.
you will have a colonoscopy, and you will like it!
it might just be dry in here. but, if they had listened to me, they might have been able to catch this before it's too late.
now, what do i do?
i dunno. i don't want to go to the hospital for a nosebleed. and, i know they're just going to schedule me a colonoscopy.
Monday, May 31, 2021
temporary full may, 2021 backup archive (not source material - to be permanently deleted when pdf uploads)
saturday, january 1, 2022
monday, january 3, 2022
tuesday, january 4, 2022
wednesday, january 5, 2022
thursday, january 6, 2022
friday, january 7, 2022
saturday, january 8, 2022
sunday, january 9, 2022
monday, january 10, 2022
tuesday, january 11, 2022
wednesday, january 12, 2022
thursday, january 13, 2022
friday, january 14, 2022
saturday, january 15, 2022
sunday, january 16, 2022
monday, january 17, 2022
tuesday, january 18, 2022
wednesday, january 19, 2022
thursday, january 20, 2022
friday, january 21, 2022
saturday, january 22, 2022
sunday, january 23, 2022
monday, january 24, 2022
tuesday, january 25, 2022
wednesday, january 26, 2022
thursday, january 27, 2022
friday, january 28, 2022
saturday, january 29, 2022
sunday, january 30 2022
monday, january 31, 2022
today's post is the single for the last rabit is wolf track, la la la la la, which i had to complete without sean. so, i'm singing here, not sean - but sean actually gets a primary writing credit here. i do not expect that it would sound substantively different had sean actually sung it, which is the irony of somebody with a somewhat idiosyncratic voice insisting on a basic, generic idea.
the track would be reworked as the first trivial group track by flipping it over backwards and starts my 8th symphony, which is where i left off in 2018. it also now ends my 6th record, finished in 2015, in initial form. so, the effect is that the 6th record ends with the track playing forwards, and the 8th symphony starts with the track playing backwards.
the single itself is consequently a sort of historical footnote. i had this track leftover from the rabit period that was never finished as a rabit song, but was finished as a trivial group track. so, i just went back and finished it as a rabit track myself, and released it as a single. the rabit version should consequently be interpreted as a remix, or even as an outtake.
====
this was meant to be the last rabit is wolf track, but instead morphed into the first trivial group song. this single explores the track from various angles.
sean wanted a song that just went "lalalala". i think his intent was to try and simplify my thought process, because what i'd been doing sounded more like FTIeikdTY7isdD7E5dk!. he was just kind of like "how about.....lalalala.".
it got a bit of an eye roll from me, as you could imagine, but i played with it. he wasn't really that excited about what i did, and it just didn't move forward. there were no further sessions, as he became interested in working with a more conventional early 00s "emotional hardcore" (think at the drive in) style guitarist and i got very involved in a relationship.
despite his initial suggestion, i'd consider the result to clearly be of my own doing. so, i took the core of what i did and warped it into the first track on the reflections symphony. this track has lain dormant since, comfortably completed.
it's now 2015, and i'm completing my discography. that puts this track in a blurry space: it was completed, but not as initially intended. while there may have been a vocal part recorded, i don't have it any more. yet, the intention is clear enough - and the manipulation would have been thick enough - that i do not consider it to be invasive to complete it on my own.
i'm releasing it as rabit because it's collaborative in the abstract, despite sean not actually existing in the track.
this track was written in late 2002 and completed over april and may, 2015. released may 11, 2015. disc finalized on nov 20, 2017. as always, please use headphones.
the album version of the track (track 3) also appears on my sixth record, jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj^2 (inri063):
jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj-2
this release also includes a printable jewel case insert and will also eventually include a comprehensive package of journal entries from all phases of production (2002, 2015, 2017).
released november 15, 2002
j - guitar, effects, bass, drum programming, soundscaping, sound design, sampling, vocals, vocoders, digital wave editing
sean - lyrical concept
so, we're going to get today's post in at the end of the day.
after a long day of biking on saturday, i was up early on sunday morning (the google myactivity suggests the first search was 5:29) and didn't stop cleaning until around 12:00 on monday. so, you're looking at roughly 30 hours...
in the process, i managed to get all of the plastic down in my bedroom, as well as do most of the sealing in the studio area. i ran out of sealant and had to buy some more, which i can pick up next time i'm out. at $10/can, it's going to cost me $20 to seal the whole space.
i found an ant hill connected to the wall under the window near the studio, so the sealing is justified on that basis, along with the temperature and mold issues.
i also finally got the shower curtain scrubbed down and even got through a good chunk of stuff in the back room, so i'm the bulk of the way there.
but, after 30 hours, i had to crash this afternoon and was out for about 11 hours, straight. i'm feeling awake, now. let's hope today is as long or longer. i like these long days....i hate sleeping...
this morning, i need to prepare for the mediation, which is this afternoon.
that's such an underrated record. there's one for his sidekick too - and this is really just about a perfect pop song. no, really. if i were to objectively evaluate the construction of this for some bourgeois competition, it would get a perfect score - and there's only a few out there that can compete with it. as i'm closing the rabit run through, i can only wish that we could have got somewhere close to this, even if sean was nowhere in this headspace at the time.
when you say "i'm so sorry", there's of course two interpretations.
the first is that you apologize, and mean it.
and, the second is a self-deprecating statement.
now, how do you put these things together when you repeat the line "i'm so sorry" over and over again?
i've been over this before - what exactly does it mean to apologize for something that somebody else did? is it a statement of condolence? you can't express regret when you're not responsible. and, the state cannot be personified in that manner - it is cold, impersonal bureaucracy.
so, i don't know what those words mean.
and, it's truly a sorry display, isn't it?
so sorry, indeed.
Sunday, May 30, 2021
jessica murray
jessica murray
1 second ago
that said, let's talk about israel and the evangelicals. let's understand this...
jessica murray
jessica murray
1 second ago
what it says in the christian bible - the revelation, which was written in greek, rather than aramaic - is that israel will be destroyed from the east. i always laugh at these christians that think russia means the east; in fact, russia is to the west of israel. rather, everybody living in israel at the time would have known that the east meant the persians, the ancestors of today's iranians.
jessica murray
jessica murray
1 second ago
so, what do the evangelicals actually want? do they want to support israel as a colonial state and have it take over the region and bomb the iranians? i mean, you could naively assign that to the generals (although larry aptly described why that's wrong), but what about the evangelicals, who you couldn't even get to vote at all until reagan?
jessica murray
jessica murray
1 second ago
what the evangelicals actually want is the second coming, the return of jesus, who will separate the worthy from the damned on judgement day. and, in order for that to happen, the temple must be destroyed, by the beast from the east. which is iran.
jessica murray
jessica murray
1 second ago
so, this idea of evangelical support for israel is sort of a double-edged sword, like jesus' wacky tongue, in the psychedelic visions that describe the prophecies - they want to ensure israel exists....so it can be destroyed. and, by who? by iran.
jessica murray
jessica murray
1 second ago
larry set this up fairly well when he talked about the first gulf war. nothing's really changed - if the americans were going to go into iran, they'd bring everybody except israel. pakistan, turkey, the saudis - but not israel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLFX_3TKGJk
if you want to talk about human rights, i'm going to align with you, at least abstractly - although we might disagree about what that means. for example, i tend to reject the premise that religious belief is a human right, and instead lean strongly towards the idea that humans have a right to be free from the religious values of others, and point heavily towards freedom of association.
but, if you start talking about human rights and, midway through it, start waving a hamas flag, then you've lost me.
...because there are few political organizations on the planet that care less about human rights than hamas.
and, here's the thing: the contemporary fake left is so ignorant that a lot of them don't even know what they're supporting. they no doubt imagine that hamas is a group of nice, clean cut arabs with broadly secular viewpoints - like the arabs they know in their lives. it's orientalism in reverse. but, they're that clueless - they have no idea.
i'm not going to attack people for being ignorant.
it's the ones that know better that piss me off.
but, this isn't empty rhetoric, because supporting hamas is just speeding up the process of genocide. the more that the fake left supports hamas, the faster the palestinians die. they have to get past this, or they're done - and if you actually care about their plight, if you're not just looking for a right-wing militia to support to work out your own issues with society, then you'll realize this very quickly. and, sometimes it makes you wonder when you see who is aligning with them, too.
this is an old problem in the midst of empire - barbarians are consistently dumb and they consistently behave in ways that lead to their own demise.
but, if your support for hamas is rooted in upholding human rights, and there's no irony in your position, i can't be bothered with you - because it's a delusional position to take. you need to be supporting the left on the ground, not fueling right-wing nationalism and pretending it's some kind of leftist struggle. 'cause it ain't....
i don't often stand up for cenk uygur, but what started this recent stupidity in the gaza strip?
was it an incursion of israeli settlers into an illegal settlement? a conflict at a checkpoint? even some kind of pyrrhic attack on israeli soldiers by idiots with rocks?
no.
it was a quasi-fascist islamic extremist organization called hamas reacting to israeli crowd management at the al aqsa mosque to end ramadan.
trying to deny that this was about religion is delusional, but it demonstrates the point i've been making for quite a while, now - there are a lot of fake leftists on the surface out there that are, in truth, conservatives or nationalists or both in disguise. and, some of them are sephardic or mizrahi jews. while they may claim it's about human rights, the reality is that they're looking for a right-wing militia to identify with in their struggle against modernity, which they despise. so, they readily and eagerly align with the most backwards elements they can find, in their zeal to tear down the world around them.
there's a lot of things i don't like about the world, too, and i've been clear enough that i think that what israel is doing and has repeatedly done is unjustified and needs to stop. but, i'm not about to align with a palestinian nationalist movement that wants to turn back the clocks, either - and i would challenge those that tell people it's pragmatism to be a little more honest about where their politics really are. i can see through them, even if most people can't.
there is a left on the ground. it is not very powerful, but that will not change if everybody that could prop it up aligns with the nationalist right, instead.
so, i will state again: i stand with the apostates, and call for an end to religion in the region as a precondition for an integrated, multicultural society. and, if that sounds absurd to you, you're not able to see past the status quo.
i haven't been able to sit down since i left to get the fit test yesterday morning. i'll have a lengthy write-up coming soon.
so, the post for today is inri061, which is the 3xep single for the track that started as a rabit is wolf track called "penny shoeman" and ended up as an epic guitar concerto, and the climax of my serious music phase. this is the piece that sean liked enough that he wanted to turn it into an emo rock/pop song with a second guitarist, but i pulled the plug almost instantly and pivoted to industrialized techno, instead. these drums were transcribed into a score writer before they were played back, so that skinny puppy style breakdown in the chorus existed directly in the score, from the start.
when remixing this, i resisted the cheesiness of sampling something like heavyocity, partly because the drum, & bass tracks were already in place from 2002, and those weren't the parts i was looking to uplift. rather, i spent a huge amount of time with guitar overdubs and orchestral sequencing to really make this thing as ridiculous as is possible.
the guitar concerto is not a form that was been well developed. i think clapton tried to do one, but it predictably sucked. some of what mike oldfield has done could be labeled that way, although i suspect he'd reject it. even zappa never really touched this, although one wonders if he might have later on.
the only actual guitar concerto that i'm aware of that comes close to this is mike keneally's 2004 masterpiece, the universe will provide, which was composed as a jam with an experimental dutch orchestra. as i added the guitars after, i'm not going to claim this is older than the keneally piece (even if the core of it is). but, that's the reference point...
guitar concertos are the kind of thing i imagined myself writing more of as i aged, so if there's any music still to come from me, this is not a bad approximation of what it might sound like.
=====
this is the second of two lengthy singles to come out of tracks that were begun in 2002 and not completed to my liking. the mixes in this single chart this song's rather elaborate development over fifteen years, with the first disc consisting of historical versions and the next two discs consisting of finished mixes.
it became clear through the course of july, 2002 that rabit is wolf wasn't really going anywhere and i was better off cutting my losses. we jammed a few times, but it wasn't really serious.
this track was initially written as a folk punk song, but i jumped to the scorewriter with it almost immediately. the expanded guitar demo was written in a scorewriter and then performed, rather than vice versa. it was initially less about explicitly creating a techno song and more about ordering the parts in a way that could be deconstructed more effectively. i wanted a more flexible approach to production that would allow me to take tracks in and out based on sean's input.
i may have gone over this in this space before, but my mixing process up to that point was considerably unconventional. i would record tracks in one by one using a wave editor and then paste them on top of each other. i worked this way because i just didn't have more advanced tools. while there are benefits to this approach (it's additive synthesis, which blurs the mix for soundscaping), it meant that each additional track was destructive. i could not remove tracks once they were added. this meant sean was unable to provide much input into demos i sent to him.
i also picked up a copy of cakewalk to help with this, but i quickly learned that my system couldn't really handle it. at around eight tracks, it just became unresponsive. with less than eight tracks, it didn't matter if the mix was destructive because it was easily reconstructed. so, i went back to the wave editor approach until 2007, when i upgraded to a modern pc.
the taiko drum part was initially just to keep time; it wasn't supposed to be a part of the song. but, as i built it up i began to realize how interesting it sounded as a techno tune and sort of ran with it. once i'd notated it, i had to convert the drums into a soundscape because the midi render just wasn't good enough. this was done using a mix of software drum machines, midi snippets and isolated jimmy chamberlain samples. i then performed the score i had notated, with the exception of a few synths which were sequenced back. unfortunately, the midi file for the synth build up at the beginning of the track has been lost.
the mix never came out well, partly due to ram issues with cakewalk and partly because i got a little pretentious with some of the parts. i was also extremely distracted over this period. despite this all being done to make sean's input more easily integrated into the material, he had no interest in the direction i took it and basically put his nose up at it again. i attempted a few different things over late 2002 and early 2003 to try and salvage it for my own purposes, but in the end i shelved it as unworkable.
when i first set up the bandcamp site around 2010, i realized i had a collection of tracks that fit a sort of techno-guitar description and compiled them together under the name "tetris". i uploaded an incomplete mix for that project, but it was never really done and i never really felt good about it.
it wasn't until late 2014 that i came back to the track, to authoritatively finish my discography. first, a mix was reconstructed from source to include all of the existing sound files. next, three separate sequencer mixes were sculpted out of the score - a jazz fusion mix, an overture mix and an ambient mix. pieces of these sequencer mixes were then isolated and mixed into the reconstructed original mix. finally, a series of extra lead guitar parts were recorded and mixed separately into a final mix and the orchestral mix, creating the end result and an accompanying guitar concerto. the recording process for this was very lengthy, which was ironically partly due to consistent distractions.
this release was revisited in november, 2017 as a part of the process of finalizing period 2 and was expanded from two to three discs through the addition of multiple supplementary mixes.
i've included the midi file of the original composition, if you'd like to mess with it on your own.
written over the summer of 2002 and initially recorded in the early fall of 2002. additional writing, arranging, recording, production and mixing occurred from dec, 2014 to apr, 2015. released as a two volume set on april 27, 2015. this release was expanded to include a third disc on nov 17, 2017 and filled in with eight new remixes over the next few days. re-released as a slightly rearranged three volume set and finalized on nov 19, 2017. as always, please use headphones.
the album version of the track (track 7) also appears on my sixth record, jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj^2 (inri063): jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj-2
this release also includes a printable jewel case insert and will also eventually include a comprehensive package of journal entries from all phases of production (2002, 2014, 2015, 2017).
released september 15, 2002
j - guitars, effects, bass, synthesizers, drum sampling, drum programming, sequencing, sound design, soundscaping, digital wave editing
sean - vocals (1)
the various rendered electronic orchestras include electric bass, synth bass, distorted electric guitar, clean electric guitar, acoustic guitar, violin, viola, cello, contrabass, harp, koto, french horn, trombone, trumpet, tuba, english horn, flute, oboe, piccolo, clarinet, bassoon, synthesizers, piano, glockenspiel, vibraphone, hammered percussion, music box, tubular bells, bells, agogo, wood blocks, marimba, melodic toms, timpani, taiko drum, backwards cymbals, synth drums, orchestral drum set and choir.
Saturday, May 29, 2021
(this post is dated to may 29, 2021 because it describes events over that day. however, it was written on june 10, 2021)
as i got paid that morning, i had to spend the evening doing kind of normal grocery things, but it was a weird month for that kind of thing, so i found myself going on a pretty hefty bike ride, with the hopes of getting everything done.
first, i got some calcium carbonate (for my teeth, as a mouthwash. it’s designed to increase the ph of my mouth directly after eating. i am not swallowing this or using it as a calcium supplement. and, i’m using the hydroxyapatite as a calcium topical, instead – the limestone is just about basic acid/base chemistry, which seems to be the easy way to protect your teeth from acid erosion caused by bacteria.) at the store right beside the lab i dropped the fit test off at.
then, i biked to the far superstore on walker looking for some plant-based omega-3s, as the closer one did not have any, according to the website. while i was there, i got some things at the bulk barn next door. unfortunately, though, they didn’t have any nutritional yeast, so i had to go to the other bulk barn to get it (and it seems that the bulk barn is now carrying the omega-3s, for future reference). and, i stopped at the food basics (as well as the shopper’s, to get my rx) on the way back, as well.
then, i went to the metro to get some soy milk, stopped at the freshco to get a few basic items, headed to the walmart to get the other soy milk and stopped at the superstore for some ice cream.
so, that was a good 40 km (the map is a mild underestimate), in the end – and my nap, when i got back, became a lengthy rest, which was ok. these are days i wish i had more of, and hope to have more of when i can get back to biking in detroit again.
(this post is dated to may 29, 2021 because it describes events over that day. however, it was written on june 10, 2021)
so, after waiting patiently for several weeks, and running through every blood test i could imagine, i finally got some money in my account on the 29th of may and was able to get out to get a fit test to make sure i didn't have cancer – or prove that i did. however, it didn’t quite work out according to plan...
i wanted to take a nap on the friday afternoon, get up in the evening, make a big meal a little after midnight, get the fit test first thing in the morning, take a shit when i got home and then get it back by the end of the day. unfortunately, i ended up knocked out cold instead of having a nap, and it was something like 4:00 am when my body woke me up to pass a giant bowel movement. that’s a shitty turn of events, right?
i made something to eat before i left, and tried to make the best of it. when life gives you shit, you make shitonade - and enjoy it, with a shit-eating grin.
well, i got there and realized i didn’t have to pay for it until i brought it back. so, i could have picked up the test the night before, used my giant 4:00 am bowel movement and brought it in fresh, at 7:00 am. alas....
it was a cold morning, so i had my ski mask on, and i’ll remind people once again that, yes, i bike with a ski mask in the cold weather and, no, it doesn’t have anything to do with covid-19 or with religious observation. these masks are manufactured for use with things like snowmobiles, as it gets incredibly cold up here in canada and people need them to work or play outside when it does; i use them for biking even when it’s up to 10 degrees out, if the wind is pushing in from the north and creating a windchill effect. this was an unusually cold day for late may, but cold it was, and i was actually glad to have the protection as i struggled through the blizzard-like wind chill to get the things i needed done.
i went immediately from the first blood lab (“dynacare”) to my normal blood lab (“medical labs of windsor”), because the doctor had faxed them the requisition. this was a large requisition, and i expected to need to go to the other labs anyways, so i just asked them to take a few vials of things they could test for directly, which turned out to be vitamin k related items, and some issues related to my pancreas, which i wanted to check indirectly for absorption – inr, ptt, fibrinogen, uric acid, lipase & amylase. i then hit the grocery store for a first run of items and went home to try to take a shit and get it back before 14:00...
i’m actually relatively successful at urinating on command, but that could be a function of high coffee consumption. i’m not sure i’ve ever tried to force myself to defecate, and it’s not that i didn’t give it a good try, but after four hours of giving it my best, all i could get out were these hard little blobs. while a chemical analysis would be required to verify my suspicion, it would seem to me that i probably passed the iron i had swallowed right before i went to sleep the night (day) previously. and, you know what iron + carbon is, right? that’s right, it’s steel. so, these little steel nuggets were all i could conjure up, at 13:30 in the afternoon, and i had to act quickly to dip the applicator in and get it back at the very last minute.....
given these nuggets in front of me, should i have waited? well, i didn’t have a lot of experience with guessing the consistency of stool by observing it on wax paper; i had dogs growing up, and picked up after them occasionally, but that was a long time ago and i consequently had a strict deficit of recent experience in physically handling any sort of material passed from the anus of any living creature. so, it didn’t really cross my mind to pass on this one – i was just excited that i finally got something out and moved to quickly capture it, before it was too late.
i quickly broke the seal on the fit applicator – which was the point of no return – and pulled it out to notice that it....i realized the problem right away. i think i was expecting something with a pick at the top, or something vaguely serated, but it turns out that it was this plastic screw that wasn’t going to pick anything up unless it was dipped directly into stool that falls decidedly on the mushy side of the scale.
so, i tried to dip the applicator into my drying steely excretion and got nothing. it was like trying to cut into an acorn with a spoon – it was going nowhere. if i diced it up a little, i could get a piece of it off like i was picking something up with a toothpick, but it didn’t fit into the tiny hole for the applicator (which is a definite design flaw). shit.....
in the end, i tried to ram a little piece in and made like nike on my bicycle to the lab, where i dropped it off at the very last minute, hoping for the best but expecting the worst....
today's post is for the second dvd of high quality mp3s, although i'm considering removing the mp3 downloads. note that an mp3 disc will have more on it than a flac disc. so, this is a huge amount of music.
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purchasing this release does not come with a download.
inri033: written and demoed in multiple stages from 1996-1999. initially constructed in this form in dec, 1999. slightly resequenced in jan, 2014. re-released jan 3, 2014. finalized as lp007 on sept 19, 2017. this is my third official record.
inri034: written & recorded in the fall of 1999. originally released on inridiculous in december, 1999. split into it's own ep on january 3, 2014. remastered, finalized & re-released on sept 28, 2017
inri035: initially written and recorded between 1996-1999 and remixed between 2013-2015. initially released as part zero of a three volume set on may 21, 2015. split into it's own release on june 14, 2015. finalized as lp008 on sept 29, 2017.
inri036: written and recorded in late 1999 and early 2000. these versions of these tracks were sequenced without further modification in jan, 2014. released on jan 9, 2014. re-released on physical media and finalized on oct 3, 2017, with the remainder of hummer added as a bonus track.
inri037: recorded in spring, 2000. released, unmodified, on jan 10, 2014. release finalized on oct 3, 2017.
inri038: written and recorded, 1999-2001. track 3 was reconstructed out of existing sound in june, 2004. initially sequenced on jan 12, 2014. expanded with remixes from 2014-2017, re-released with a newly remastered lead version and subsequently finalized on oct 5, 2017.
inri039: this was constructed over a little more than a month: from 7/7-8/20, 2000. it seems to have been recombined into one track around 2006 but has otherwise not been modified since it was completed. first released as an ep on jan 14, 2014. release finalized as symph004 on oct 8, 2017
inri040: recorded in april, 2000. samples added in oct, 2000. album version reverted to original mix in sept, 2006. released as a single on jan 14, 2014. expanded & finalized on oct 9, 2016.
inri041: recorded over the space of the year 2000. remixed substantially in 2004, 2006 and 2014. existing version released on jan 14, 2014. finalized as lp009 on oct 9, 2017. this is my fourth official record.
inri042: this record was recorded over the years 1999 and 2000, but did not take this form until mid september, 2017. the first track list dates to sept 14, 2017. these tracks are technically outtakes, but did not become outtakes until the remastering process removed them from their respective recordings. released & finalized as lp010 on oct 9, 2017.
inri043: written late 2000 & early 2001. the renders present here are all from after 2013. minor instrumentation changes to facilitate a small wind section were implemented in late april, 2014. live guitars were layered into the final version over may, 2014. released in a single volume on june 7, 2014. four new orchestral mixes were added in late may, 2015. re-released in a single volume on may 26, 2017. this release was split into jazz and orchestral volumes in early oct, 2017. two renders were then added to the jazz volume, while three new mixes were created for the orchestral volume. re-released in two volumes and finalized on oct 12, 2017. a
inri044: written early 2001. drastically rearranged in june, 2014. rendered, arranged and performed over june and july, 2014. released on july 21, 2014. six new mixes were added in late may, 2015. re-released on may 28, 2015. four new mixes were added in mid october, 2017. re-released & put on indefinite hold as to status on oct 15, 2017.
inri045: recorded in the first part of 2001. initially released as a bandcamp upload in august, 2010. re-released on january 18, 2014. finalized on oct 14, 2017.
inri046: written in the spring of 2001. lent out for a different project in jan, 2004. reconstructed in the first quarter of 2006, especially over march. released as a one track single on april 1, 2006. expanded with alternate mixes and re-released on july 23, 2014. the vst mix was added on jan 10, 2015 and the two guitar mixes were added on may 29, 2015. re-released on may 29, 2015. finalized as symph005 on oct 15, 2017.
inri047: written one day in june, 1998. re-created on another day in june, 1999. reimagined on yet another day in june, 2001. a failed remaster occurred at the end of 2013. slightly rearranged and re-rendered at the end of july, 2014. released in a single volume on july 25, 2014. re-released in a single volume with a new string orchestra mix on may 30, 2015. this release was split into two cds on oct 15, 2017, with the first disc being composed solely of the process piece. four new tracks were added to the second disc. re-released in two volumes and finalized on oct 16, 2017.
inri048: written in the summer of 2001. remembered over july, 2014. completed august-september, 2014. released sept 24, 2014. expanded, finalized and re-released on oct 16, 2017
inri049: written and recorded in the fall of 2001. released on sept 6, 2014. expanded, re-released and finalized on oct 21, 2017.
inri050: written in the fall of 2001. rendered, remastered and remixed in late september and early october, 2014. released oct 3, 2014. the string mix was corrected for clicks on june 1, 2015, but unfortunately left accidentally inverted. this was corrected on oct 21, 2017. the lead track was re-rendered with the clickless string mix on oct 21, 2017. disc finalized on oct 21, 2017.
inri051: created in the fall of 2001. sequenced and released on sept 7, 2014. disc finalized on oct 22, 2017.
inri052: tracks 1, 3 and 8 were written in 2001 and reinterpreted and completed in 2014. tracks 2 and 5 were interpreted and completed in 2001. track 4 was written in 2000 and reinterpreted and recorded in 2001. track 6 was written in 2001 and completed in 2006. track 7 was written in 1998, reinterpreted in 2001 and rendered in 2014. tracks 1-7 were sequenced on sept 9, 2014. final completion date is oct 3, 2014. refinalized as lp011 on oct 22, 2017. this is my fifth official record.
inri053: written late 2001 and early 2002. this file is ripped from a cd-r that was burnt around 2002, as that was the option that would produce the most accurate reproduction of the original composition. published without modification on oct 6, 2014. expanded, re-released and finalized as symph006 and lp012 on oct 23, 2017.
inri054: recorded in late 2001 and early 2002. track 6 was constructed in may, 2004 out of files recorded 1999-2001. tracks 1-4 were reconstructed over october, 2014. final mixes were finished on october 18, 2014. released on oct 21, 2014. disc closed on oct 30, 2017.
inri055: written in early 2002 and recorded and mixed in early 2002 and late 2014. released on nov 15, 2014. expanded, re-released & finalized on nov 1, 2017.
inri056: written & recorded in late 2001 and early 2002 and mixed in early 2002 and late 2014. released on nov 19, 2014. expanded, re-released and finalized on nov 2, 2017.
inri057: written and recorded in late 2001 and early 2002. initially sequenced in may, 2002. re-sequenced and first released in june, 2002. re-released in slightly different forms from 2002-2014. resequenced to mimic the original sequencing and re-released on november 8, 2014. except to sequence the record, these files have not been altered since 2002. disc finalized as lp013 on nov 3, 2017.
inri058: written over 2001 and 2002 and rethought repeatedly between 2002-2014, with no clear resolution in a final mix. reconstructed from source in late 2014 and then rendered at multiple stages to create a series of snapshots. final mixes were completed over the last week of november and the first week of december. released as a two-volume set on dec 7, 2014. the concept was rethought on nov 3, 2017, which led to the inclusion of five more mixes and an expansion to four cds. re-released in four volumes & finalized as symph007 on nov 12, 2017. the raw guitar mix was corrected on jan 6, 2018.
inri059: written and recorded over 2001 and 2002. mildly remixed in november, 2014 to make the tracks more presentable; nothing substantial was altered, and no new sound was recorded. released on november 19, 2014. re-released on physical media and finalized on nov 14, 2017.
inri060: written in august, 2002. track one was remixed in december, 2014 to turn the rest of the track up relative to the vocals. released on dec 12, 2014. disc finalized on nov 14, 2017.
originally created from 1999-2002. this compilation is dated to sept 1, 2002. slowly remastered, reconstituted, compiled, reconstructed, released and finalized from 2013-2017. compilation finalized on nov 14, 2017. as always, please use headphones.
released september 1, 2002
j - electric piano, drum & other programming, orchestral & other sequencing, vocal & drum manipulations, classical & acoustic & electric guitars, ebow, digital & analog effects & treatments, electric bass, mandolin, organ, synthesizers, sound design, noise generators, granular synthesis, generative synthesis, generative percussion, light-sound synthesis, cool edit synthesis, sampling, vocals, vocoders, windows 95 sound recorder, flute, drum kit, hammerhead (909 emulator), pick scrapes, found sounds, metronome, digital wave editing, loops, films, tapes, coughs, a broken equalizer, equalization, production, composition.
sean - vocals, lyrics (inri048, inri049, inri053-059), harmonica (inri054, inri057), ring modulator (inri057, inri058)
greg - drum performance sample source (inri056-inri058)
jon - guitar performance (inri048, inri049, inri057)
bob - hammering (inri058)
the various rendered electronic orchestras include acoustic bass, electric bass, synth bass, upright bass, distorted electric guitar, clean electric guitar, steel string acoustic guitar, nylon guitar, guitar effects, banjo, harp, sitar, french horn, tuba, trumpet, trombone, brass ensemble, saxophone, soprano saxophone, orchestra hit, violin, viola, cello, contrabass, pizzicato strings, full string section, piano, synthesizers, synth pad, synthesizer effects, mellotron, organ, bamboo flute, clarinet, flute, piccolo, oboe, english horn, bassoon, voice, music box, tubular bells, bells, clavinet, kalimba, xylophone, glockenspiel, ukelele, theremin, gongs, woodblock, vibraphone, marimba, taiko drums, detuned piano, pc card, drum kit, jazz drum kit, hand drums, melodic toms, orchestral drum kit, drum machines, hammered percussion, synthetic percussion and electronic drum kit. they also include choir.
so, i made it through all of these videos and will be going back to the harvard videos next...
ken tends to make a lot of kind of basic, amateur errors that you'd expect to hear from "audiophiles" and are generally discarded by real engineering professionals and math or physics nerds, which is a little bit disappointing. one example is his insistence on using balanced cabling in a home studio, which is sort of laughable given that he won't ground his circuits correctly (by connecting half to the grid and half off of it). if you ground your signals, you won't need to balance your cables, ken. and, how much noise is your furnace creating, anyways?
balanced cables are great if you're playing in a hockey arena, but if you're experiencing noise in your home studio then you probably want to address it at the source, rather than waste hundreds or thousands of dollars on cables in order to improve a number that your ears can't actually perceive. i guess there's a theoretical point where you have so many cables that some noise is inevitable, and that is the situation where you either need to buy balanced cables or fucking clean up that goddamned mess, but this is obscure and not really relevant in real life.
on top of that, balanced cables only go so far in cancelling the noise. i mean, they're not a magical bullet. if you live directly underneath a noisy gas furnace that was installed in the fucking kitchen (which was the situation i found myself in a few years ago...), your puny balanced cables will do nothing.
so, it's a minor solution to a problem you probably don't have - and if you actually do have a serious interference problem, it almost certainly won't be good enough to actually fix it. in both cases, you really want to focus on reducing noise, rather than blocking it. and, if your environment is as bad as mine was, you need to build a faraday cage - or move.
these are the kinds of debates my dad's friends used to have, and he sounds every bit as clueless as they did. so, there's some humanizing of ken marshall going on here - a name i had only previously seen in liner notes, as a contributor to the back-of-the-house sound engineering on a lot of my favourite records (specifically, those by download and skinny puppy).
but, i'm going to keep up with this out of curiosity. while he hasn't said much that has blown my mind yet, this is a sort of an invaluable resource that i wish i knew was there from the start.
Friday, May 28, 2021
i'm working on a giant post...
i called the gastro-enterologist, and he entirely discounted the premise of deductive thought, in context. "but, i checked for everything else and..."
"IRRELEVANT!"
listen - i appreciate the flair, as highly illogical as it may be. i'm italian; i don't mind getting yelled at. in fact, sometimes it's actually more effective.
while he may have been exaggerating slightly (that is, i don't think it's irrelevant), i get the point - these tests i'm asking for are useful as hints to help figure out what to do next, but they don't prove or disprove anything, in the end.
he let me know that the ministry direction is that i should get a full scope immediately, and that opinion is fully noted. however, i think the ministry direction is wrong, and that healthy 40 year-olds shouldn't be getting scoped due to one piece of data, when there's 100 others that suggest otherwise; the ministry direction should be to get me a fit test as quickly as possible, not to try to coerce me into an unnecessary and potentially damaging scope by refusing to pay for it.
that's fine; i don't have anything else to do this month, i can pay out of pocket.
however, i did not get paid today, and will need to wait until monday.
i feel fine...
again: i'm on the side of the americans with this. i don't eat beef, but i know that safety regulations around things like hormones are much stricter in canada and that, as a canadian, i would like to know that my meat is not being imported from the united states, if i were eating it.
and, it's something that american consumers should think about, as well. if i lived in the united states and i did eat meat, i would want to purchase that meat from countries with stronger levels of industry regulations than exist in the united states.
but, as i don't eat beef, i should be clear that i'd also be in support of anything that would reduce the total amount of beef being raised and exported from canada, due to broad climate concerns and general ethical reasons. the cattle industry will find no solidarity from me - shut them down. great...
so, today's post is inri060, which is the first fully post-rabit release (although a few loose ends will trickle through...) and also features my first recorded vocal track in almost two years.
after starting hormones in may, i was going through somewhat of an identity crisis and that's really what the track documents, although i'm being obscure about it for good reason - this is a period of my life i'd rather not fully document. let there be somewhat of a black hole here in the historical record. what i'll say is that i was experimenting with a few things, both chemically and sexually, and in the end took away from it what i needed to take away from it, which is that i made the correct choice to transition into a female identity.
it's one thing to transition as a child, and it's another to transition as a full adult that's lived a life in the gender assigned to their birth sex, and it's another altogether to try to transition as an actual, literal virgin (i'd never even held anybody's hand, or even experienced the rejection of being turned down, because i'd never asked. i was a 100%, complete, total, utter virgin in every conceivable way imaginable.) in your early 20s - that's the period that people spend experimenting with their sexual orientation, and with their identities more broadly, to try to figure it out.
i don't "believe" that people are assigned gender identities or sexual orientations at birth, in some kind of conceptionist/creationist/religionist process that fixes who we are for the rest of our lives. in fact, the science rejects that hypothesis, despite what you may have heard otherwise (mostly from lawyers). i "believe" that sexual orientation and gender identity are fluid processes that change dramatically over the lifespan of an individual, and are brought on by a culmination of experience and individual choice - which is what the science actually says on the topic. as i am an evangelical atheist, i simply don't care what religious authorities think about this, or have the remotest interest in their enforced concepts of morality around the issue (to the point that i will actively try to convince them that their religion is wrong about this, and they should apostatize and repent over it), which is the actual basis of the existing fake left legal regime around the issue - what i do "believe" is that people ought to be free to make their own choices regarding their orientation and identity, and if the religious authorities or general society doesn't like those choices then they can fuck off, and circle jerk at home. as a queer person, i just don't fucking care. at all.
i don't want to fit in or be normal, anyways.
so, i think people should experiment with who they are and draw conclusions from the experiments they do, rather than base who they are on some theory written in some book, and that is what this is really all about.
this kind of scientific imagery is omnipresent in my work during this period, but this is the only vocal part recorded during the period that really explores the themes i was imagining, and that's something i've largely chosen not to develop fully as i've completed my recordings over this period.
you can hear a phone call in the end of the third track (developed fully as inri061) that snaps me out of it, at least for a little while. but, these themes of exploring experimentation around sexual orientation and gender identity would continue on for a few years, if perhaps never quite so explicitly.
====
this is two conceptually linked outtakes from mid 2002 that document an event that i'm going to be vague and obscure about.
written in august, 2002. track one was remixed in december, 2014 to turn the rest of the track up relative to the vocals. released on dec 12, 2014. disc finalized on nov 14, 2017. as always, please use headphones.
the lead track appears without vocals on my seventh record, ftaa (inri079): jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/ftaa
this release also includes a printable jewel case insert and will also eventually include a comprehensive package of journal entries from all phases of production (2002, 2014, 2017).
released august 31, 2002
j - guitar, effects, bass, drum sampling, drum and other programming, digital wave editing, vocals
Thursday, May 27, 2021
in fact, that strat is so heavy that it weighs more than my sg:
like, a lot more.
go back to the previous video, though, and check out gorgeous maple neck. like i say: nobody can figure out where the body came from, although it has a typewritten number on the inside of it, suggesting it's fairly old. like, just the font suggests 60s or 70s. but, it seems like somebody put the coronet neck on it.
one hypothesis is that somebody smashed it and put the coronet neck on to replace it, but that doesn't help us understand where this heavy hh strat came from to begin with.
open concept basement bedroom, 1997-1999
- my parents moved across the city in mid-1997, and i lost the soundproof room in the process :(. i lost the drum kit & the tascam in the process, as well. however, i gained a computer with internet access and windows 95 (my previous computer had no internet access, and had windows 3.1. in fact, my first bedroom pc was shipped with ms dos 6.2 and wordperfect, the latter of which was actually reasonable, given that i grew up in ottawa (corel disappeared, but the big adobe building remained a presence in downtown ottawa for years.). i've actually kept up on the old software reasonably well, mostly because i never stopped using most of it: cool edit 96 (https://www.audacityteam.org/), noteworthy composer (https://noteworthycomposer.com/), the windows 95 sound editor, a hacked version of logic that never ran smoothly and a guitar tablature to midi program called "bucket of tab" (https://antisleep.com/bucket) were where i got started on this. but, this pc did not have the resources for even the most basic sound recording.
- i got an ry30 mid summer, to replace the drum kit. my dad was sad; my stepmother wasn't. that ry30 stuck with me until 2003, when i sold it to go to bc. of all the gear that got sold, that's the piece i think i most miss, and i'd love to see a serious attempt to emulate it. i can load samples into battery, but it's missing the point - this was a powerful little drum synth, and i made massive use of it for years, all the way to the end of the rabit is wolf period. that said, the reason i sold it is that i felt i grew out of it, and there kind of wasn't a lot left to do with it. i couldn't justify spending $400 on it given that i can do everything with free plugins nowadays, but i will eventually replace this thing...
if you know where to get an actual vst emulation of the ry30 - not samples of it, but a vsti of the actual machine - let me know.
- a bass reappeared. i don't remember the model. it was green, and played very smoothly, which was necessary because i have freakishly small hands (to this day, i play a mini ibanez bass).
- i actually synced the noteworthy composer sequences with the ry30 parts manually because nobody told me i could sync them automatically. so, it's all very meticulous, but using very simple hardware. i would have had a basic consumer grade soundblaster in this thing, and the initial sequencing is all using general midi. it's for that reason that i went looking for general midi a few years ago and came away with bandstand, by native instruments (a very big company in music creation circles):
bandstand was central to the recordings i did over 2014-2016, because i needed a way to emulate general midi using updated sound fonts. this has been discontinued, and i think it's the last attempt by the industry to save general midi for recording, as it seems that the standard nowadays is to use specific sample libraries rather than a general sound font library (and native instruments suggest the use of kontakt, instead). i think this is unfortunate, myself, as i liked the standardization of being able to take a midi score and plug it into a daw, but the industry doesn't seem to be interested in scored music in much of any abstraction at all anymore and rather more interested in just creating textures out of existing sound. so, the standard nowadays is to sell you this pile of violin scratches, rather than a collection of violins to sequence - and tell you to hire a violinist instead i suppose. but, of course, i still have soundblasters i can track if i need to. i will eventually install kontakt on the 64 bit machine, as the experiments i had with the 32-bit machine were just simply that i needed more ram. but, i actually found that kontakt was unnecessarily inefficient (it loads everything on start-up, even if you're only using a fraction of it) and that the freeware sound libraries actually even sounded better....
i would like to find an update for bandstand, but nobody seems to really want there to be one. this seems to be something people have moved past, and something you're going to need to curate old software for if you want to hang on to.
- the jx-8p & tascam 4-track both show up about this time, with the jx being my only and primary keyboard for years after. this is of course the last version of the roland juno series, and combines analog style juno sounds with more modern digital sounds. the jx has been keyless for years and driven by a dx100, and i've had a midi frontend installed on it for years and never used it, but this is a vsti of it in case i want to sequence it (i could of course sequence it manually, too):
i should also look into something called "zenology" when i get my windows 7 machine back up and can start looking for evaluation copies.
but, i suspect i'll keep programming it with the little window, as that's what i'm used to doing.
- later programs included hammerhead (a 909 emulator) (http://www.threechords.com/hammerhead/introduction.shtml), sound raider (a noise generator) (https://web.archive.org/web/20060721182502/http://www.andyw.com/zip/raider.zip), goldwave (for extra effects processing) (http://www.goldwave.ca/), granulab (https://www.abc.se/~re/GranuLab/Granny.html), coagula (light-sound synthesis) (https://www.abc.se/~re/Coagula/Coagula.html).
- my aunt sent me back a flute from a trip she took to india that shows up on several tracks
- somewhere along the way, the cassette deck stops working properly, and a song is constructed out of it.
- it was some time in late 1998 that my dad asked me to go to songbird with him to help him pick out a guitar for my sister, who was going through a difficult phase. as mentioned, she had been doing a lot of piano playing since she was very little, and now wanted to play guitar and was threatening to run away from home if she wasn't gifted with an expensive brand name guitar (in fact, i think she was trying to get my dad to buy her boyfriend a guitar, and i don't think that ever clicked). so, my dad got baited into buying her a guitar.....which she didn't accept, because it didn't have a brand name on it. and, it definitely pissed him off, yeah. meanwhile, i continued to play my entry level ibanez, right? it's worth pointing out that my sister was a delusional, spoiled brat at this point, but i really never said anything about it. the guitar i picked out has yet to be properly understood by anybody i've presented it to; it seems to have a coronet "batwing" neck, the dual humbucking pickups seem to have been installed manually and the body, while shaped like a strat and built like a paul, is of unclear origin. so, this is a guitar that somebody seems to have built from parts. the reality is that i picked the guitar out from the store because it played better than any other in the store due to the beautiful neck on it; after my sister rejected it as not sufficient because of the lack of brand name on the headstock, i ran it off to my friend greg's before it could get sent back, where i let it sit until everybody forgot about it. it eventually found it's way back to my studio, and has been my main guitar ever since.
- while i never said anything about it, i get the impression that my dad eventually felt a little bit stupid about asking me to pick out an expensive guitar for my sister (who did not play guitar), while i continued to play a starter ibanez roughly ten years on. i didn't care about the brand name, but that frankenguitar i snagged from songbird had a beautiful neck on it, and i sure appreciated it. nonetheless, he seemed to realize, in hindsight, that it was kind of a shitty deal for me, and went and bought me a red sg, along with an electro-acoustic. the black guitar itself is somewhere in the sg/guild range in terms of weight, in the sense that it's lighter than a paul and heavier than a strat, but i've always treated it like a sort of a fat strat due it's shape and construction. so, in the end, i got three guitars out of my sister's hissy fit and she got zero. all three of the guitars start showing up in recordings over the end of 98 and start of 99.
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