DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

This loop was composed in Virtual Drummer. It feels linear to me because every instrument is struck individually, so the time is felt as the sound moves around the kit. Only on one beat are two sound sources struck simultaneously.

I composed this as 4 sets of 4 beats, and my goal was to come up with 4 different combinations of kick/snare rhythms under a slightly off-kilter ride groove (1 + 2 3 + 4). Keeping distinct dynamic levels between the ghosted snare notes and the accented snare notes (represented in V.D. by two different snares altogether, just to make it easier to program) is critically important to the feel.

Played slowly, this groove takes on a hypnotic feel. I would like to kill the guy who made the “ride cymbal 1'' sample for QuickTime, though… ecch.

Patronize these links, man:

• Virtual Drummer loop
• MIDI
• MP3

It’s harvest time in northern California. We picked 15 lbs of tomatoes and made about 15 lbs of soup. The entire house smells like tomatoes, onions, garlic… not a bad thing actually, but I had to quickly bake some sourdough before olfactory vertigo sent me reeling.

I saw Nurse Betty today. Renee Zellweger is unreal, or perhaps more accurately, hyper-real. It’s as if she has a knob for sincerity.

On the recommendation of the proprietors of the Inn at Schoolhouse Creek, I hiked through Jug Handle State Reserve today. To be frank, I’m not a hugely successful hiker; I typically end up recalling little but the view of my feet trodding on a dirt path, and an occasional vista, especially when the dirt path is at Julia Pfeiffer Burns state park.

But the story of Jug Handle is intriguing and has stayed with me. The land in the Reserve has been sculpted by an unusual interplay between glacial action and weathering; the result is an “Ecological Staircase” that climbs through five distinct microclimates. At least, they’re distinct to geologists, who write the fabulous prose on this website:
http://www.mcn.org/1/mendoparks/jug.htm

That site describes the park much better than I ever could.

Topolos at Russian River Vineyards is just south of Forestville on highway 116. The thing you have to like about Topolos is the sheer number of Zinfandels they pour… about six at this visit.

Sadly, they were not pouring the ‘96 RRV California Zinfandel, which we’d enjoyed previously. Most of what we tasted this time were too sour for our liking (not that that prevented us from buying anything, natch).