Random Tips and Such

If you can't go to sleep, don't lay there in bed. Get out, move around, and come back again later. It's incredibly helpful for getting a good night's sleep.

It's a good idea to keep your brain active by doing random activities. Many puzzle flash games do the trick, and there's even a site that has a training program. Check out Lumosity.

If you work out, make sure you have food you'll be able to eat sometime afterwards, just so you don't end up passing out, or feeling really terrible for the rest of the day.

The recent ban of toys has done little but make the kids have less fun. I suppose this will end up programming their brains so that later in life they'll immediately associate fast food with no fun, which could be partly useful, hopefully.

A recent "ban" on M rated games in California is likely making many an internet business quite happy. They may be rated M for Mature, but honestly.. if you're Mature, why on earth would you be playing a game like Unreal Tournament or Call of Duty?

Oddly enough, California is probably making their marketplace worse with there various "good ideas to save children". Just another step in the wrong direction, eh?

Music Theory and Jamming

There is a very good reason to learn at least the basics in Music Theory, and that's for being able to have a successful jam session. Sure, if you have some songs planned out, it can work fine, but there's not much creativity going on in that.

Guitar players need to know the name of the chord they're playing. There are several sites on the web that can help you out with that.

Bass players need to be able to hear the name of that chord and know exactly what notes to make a successful bass line. Check out the Bass Player Magazine's website for some tips.

Drummers need to at least understand the basics of time signatures, time changes, and what that means for their beats. Google it.

Going a step farther, they need to be able to know what "I IV V" or "II V I" means. Here's something a lot easier to explain in text, so I'll give you some help on that. My explanation will assume you've taken some theory.

I is the "root" chord. Let's stick with a C Major. All of your chords will usually stick with the same notes, so you won't find anything outside of C Major in your other chords. The rest go as follows -

II - Dorian (Written as D-7 when using C as the root)
III - Phrygian
IV - Lydian (Written has FMaj7 when using C as the root)
V - Myxolydian (Written as G7 when using C as the root)
VI - Aeolian (Written as A- when using C as the root)
VII - Lochrian

So a I IV V in C would be C Fmaj7 G7

Or a II V I would be D-7 G7 C

Hopefully that makes sense. If you have any questions on this, I'll be glad to answer them.

Some Nonsense

I can't say I'm too excited about anything today. In fact, I'm quite down and out of it. For lack of anything I could fill an entire post with, I think I'll just rant about a few things.

There's a bit of a mess in Arizona. See, if anyone has a doubt about the legality of your citizenship here in the U.S. you will be questioned, and likely put in jail. Not only will it cause racial profiling, but it will make the problem of racism even worse in Arizona then it is in the rest of the United States.

We don't seem to understand that racism never disappeared. All it did was (mostly) shift to another skin color. Looking "mexican" has become a reason to kick people out of your store, or an excuse to give them poor service. It's become absolutely ridiculous the way we treat people. Is that truly what America is about? I'll let you think about that one.

Here's a few suggestions if you're looking for some artists on your new iPad(You know, that oversized iPod Touch, yeah?). Matthew Jordan is an amazing Pianist/Singer/Songwriter guy who has recently released an album called "Horizon". Check him out over at his website, eh? There's also a man who goes by the name Zander Zon. He recently released an album called "Sonorous", a CD full of his solo Bass Guitar work. You can at least check out his YouTube, even if you don't plan on buying from him.

I think that's about it for today. Off I go.

The Mind: It Wins Every Time

Many people don't realize this, but the mind has for more control over your abilities then your actual body. Sure, there are the occasions where you have physical boundaries, but there are many a time when it's all right there, in your mind. The one I hear most often is "I can't do math." As soon as you say "can't" you've already made your chances terribly low on being able to do something. Sure, it's not as easy as saying "I can", but that's the first step.

If you tell yourself "I can do it!" You're more then halfway to reaching the goal, being able to do whatever it happens to be. As soon as you've got the expectation that you can do it, you'll have more then enough of a chance, now you just have to do the work.

It happens a lot in sports and music. As soon as a coach, or a director, expresses an expectation of any sort, the group will end up expecting that of themselves. You know what that means? A sudden interest in working to become the expectation.

This works both ways. Low expecations causes complacency and very little improvement in the group. The best coaches and directors expect a lot, but even more, the best people expects even more then that.

Too few say "The goal is perfection, the minimum is excellence." It's something that isn't focused on enough either. I think tomorrow I'm going to do a bit of work on the whiteboard, and see what the Jazz Band does.

A Visit to the Music Store

On my way back from State Solo/Ensemble today, I decided to stop off at Bert Murdock. Now, Bert Murdock has a very large selection of just about everything. Today, I was checking out Bass Guitars, as I've been needing an upgrade for quite a while. The guy at Bert Murdock was very helpful, telling me what he preferred, what a lot of other people preferred, and the good ones of their selection, and let me try out a few.

I'm going to tell you a bit about two of the ones I tried out that I ended up liking.

First there was the Schecter Stiletto Custom 4 String. It's feel is amazing, and it's sound is very reminiscent of most Funk. This is my top pick for someone who likes to keep up a Funk sound. I'm not sure about any other sounds, but you could probably mess with the EQ to get a few sounds, but let me emphasize that this is best for Funk.

Secondly there was my favorite, the Ibanez SR500. This is a beautiful bass with a wonderful sound. The Bartolini pick-ups produce an amazing sound, and messing with the EQ can get you quite a few different sounds. It has a really nice feel to it, and is very comfortable to play on. This is something you'll want to get after you're finished with that beginner bass.

They are definitely ones you'll want to check out sometime or another if your a Bass player.

Music: A Language

Now, you may think that the best thing to do to learn music is to pick up a book labeled "For Beginners" and follow it's steps as best you can, or take a class where a teacher says "This is how you do it."

Now, that's grand and all, but it's not quite there. I don't remember sitting in a classroom and being told "This is how you speak English. First, you take a deep breath, as shown on page 2 of your books." In fact, all I heard was voices, and eventually I figured out how to do it on my own.

So how does this apply to music? How do you take an instrument you've never played before and learn it without someone telling you what to do? Well, that's not exactly what I'm saying. There is a certain point in music where you know most of the basics on how to play and how to make different tones and sounds with whatever you happen to play. However you get there, the best way to help all of that is to listen to a player who sounds like you want to sound. If you don't know what you want to sound like, listen to people in the genre or genres your interested in.

It's more then just listening though. After you listen to it, try to do it. Try to get the rhythmic popping of Marcus Miller, the harmonies of Victor Wooten, or the piercing octaves of Maynard Ferguson. Find the people who speak your language, who speak your instrument, and repeat what they're saying.

Now you see where I'm going with this?

The most important thing to note in all of it, that even if you can't do it with their speed, in their octave, or in their clarity, it's whether or not you think you'll ever be able to that is key to getting there. Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right, and no one can stop you.

Earth Day

Yes, thinking about the Earth only happens once a day! Well, it's a good start I suppose. The teachers I know really didn't bother to do anything about it though. There was only one teacher who said "Ya know, it's Earth Day, let's rehearse in the dark." So that's we did. The lights were off, and we played our music, and it was good.

The only problem, is it's just one day, and even on that one day most people just don't care enough to do anything. Look at me, I'm sitting here posting a blog. The problem is, is we're the problem. We don't do a thing about it, and nobody encourages doing a thing about it.

So, are we going to do anything about it? You might not think so, but I know I'm going to do something. I'm going to turn off this computer, which is weird for me, for the rest of the night. I hope you do something as well.

They Finally Decide Good School Food is a Good Idea... .. Again..

The U.S. Army gets plenty of new recruits every year with the amount of fitness that is required to sign up. They're now realizing that in the future, that may not be so. We feed school children with very unhealthy food, and we notice that obesity rates are going up, so we tell them to eat right. Oh, and we keep feeding them unhealthy food. There's an article about all of this and what retired military officials want to do right here.

On the other end of things, there's someone who actually cares about the health of the kids, rather then the health of the army. Jamie Oliver has been taking the time to go school to school individually, making his own dishes, teaching them how to cook it, and providing some fresh food to kids before they get diabetes. He works with kids one on one and teaches them how to cook as well. You can sign his petition here.

The worst part about all this, is we teach them how to eat healthy. We just .. don't .. feed them healthy food. Why is that? Well, there are several reasons, such as low budgets, laziness, and misinformation. When you've set a standard, why change it? When you don't have a budget, how can you? It's a problem that needs fixing, and this is the project I was talking about in my post "Website Blocking in Schools". Next year I'll be making a petition, with as much information as I can possibly fit on how to solve the problem, rather then just asking them to fix it themselves.

"Family Friendly"

Many of us out there call a few certain words "swear words" or "cussing". Now, the thing about this words, is certain people have decided they are socially unacceptable. In deciding that such words are "bad", all we're doing is saying telling people that the best way to get some attention is to cuss.

With all this, it's caused words to be taken completely out of context.

Now, in the latest "family friendly" movies, you find that no matter who you are, you seem to completely avoid saying anything society considers vulgar. It also decides that "bad" people are very good at avoiding harsh words, and hides any of the problems there are in society.

It creates an illusion that the world is all happy and sunshine, and that "right" always wins.

So, what we're trying to tell our future children is that so long as you do the right thing, you're going to get far in the world. We define right as being happy-go-lucky and thinking either not at all, or thinking far beyond the average person.

Why do you think kids find themselves so easily scared by someone wearing a different style of clothing then Mr. Happy-Go-Lucky?

At any rate, I define "family friendly" as a misrepresentation of most anything, and more of an escape from the world then anything else, and we spend far too much time doing that, and not enough time getting stuff done.

Socialism: What are we worried about?

Now, I hear many an argument about why we shouldn't be paying part of our taxes to poor people. Apparently they're lazy, and are just trying to suck off the system, and not a one are genuinely poor for a reason. They made a mistake early on in life, and that sucks for them, cause we sure as heck don't want to help them out.

Let me tell you about a few of the poor people I know. I know a kid who works his butt off every minute of the day, and doesn't even have a penny to his name. One of his parents got screwed over by doctors by doing the surgery wrong, causing a physical disability. The other one is mentally disabled. Why doesn't he have a penny to his name? Well, somewhere along it was decided that if you became poor, you'd have to be stuck being poor for the rest of your life unless you were incredibly lucky enough to run into the right friends, have the right idea, and start some sort of business that everybody liked.

The amount of poor families isn't quite the amount of new ideas a society can throw money at, at the same time. They can't pay for food, and they definitely can't pay for a new anything if any of their stuff breaks. They are stuck. Why don't we help them? Well, sometimes you'd rather fix someone else's problem. Sometimes you find the pictures of starving African children more appealing to your wallet then someone starving next door.

Sometimes we decide that it's far more important to mock our President by calling him a Nazi, then to get over ourselves and say "Hey, those guys need help, and they live right down the street from me."

We call it socialism, but what's so bad about helping out your neighbor by giving up a small percentage of your paycheck so they can buy enough food to eat, and manage in society, and maybe even manage to be able to give a bit of their own money to help out someone in need.

Who's truly the lazy one?

The Future

Many people have speculations for the future that involve high speed interactions, showing up where you want in a matter of seconds. Well, there are a few who think that's not how things will turn out. People like Alain de Botton believe that not only will we not have a faster way to travel the world, we'll decide to take a slower approach to moving about.

In her article, "A world without planes", she states

In a future world without aeroplanes, children would gather at the feet of old men, and hear extraordinary tales of a mythic time when vast and complicated machines the size of several houses used to take to the skies and fly high over the Himalayas and the Tasman Sea. BBC News, "A world without planes" by Alain de Botton

But is it a likelihood? When people only have a short break to visit somewhere, or have gigs in several different parts of the world, I don't see people completely forgetting about the idea of planes. Now, for those with time on their hands, or maybe someone who takes a few months off of work to do some traveling, I can see a reason for them to decide to take some time to get to where they're going. After all, it's not about the destination, but how you got there.

I suppose as time goes on people will be able to get a job closer to home, or have an easier time moving close enough to their work to be able to take the time and walk the way. Though, this could only be easily achieved if businesses weren't all next to each other, trying to compete for your attention before the other guy.

I guess it's less of a lifestyle change, but more of a market change, to see a change like that. Perhaps someday one business will buy out the rest and there won't be so many advertisements. Let's hope it's not Wal-Mart or McDonald's, they're so meager in good customer service and healthy choices these days.

Website Blocking in Schools

Is it truly necessary for schools to block even half the sites they block?

Social media is a very important part of many people's lives, and yet sites such as Facebook and most blog and email services are blocked. If the prime focus of school is education, why do they try to hide the world from them? Children don't know how to stay safe and responsible on the internet if their prime educators completely ignore the existence of the most visited websites.

Social media is also a prime source for research. If you're doing a research project on some of the big names in anything these days, they will likely have a fan page on Facebook, and likely run it themselves. What's better then reading directly from the person you're researching, rather then some biography written by someone who interviewed them maybe once or twice? If you're lucky enough, you could even get a direct answer for a few of your own questions.

Speaking of research, I notice one of the categories of blocked websites is "Music Appreciation". Websites for magazines like Rolling Stone are blocked for this. Rolling Stone has been a great way to find the back story on groups that made it to one of the many Hall of Fames in Music. Why a site like that should be blocked is beyond me.

In most cases, blocking these websites is really just a distraction in schools. Students just spend more time finding ways around it, and most of what the teacher is saying falls on distracted ears. You might argue that giving students their websites back would be a bigger distraction then blocking them, but just knowing you can get to the website without a problem makes it far less likely that they'll actually visit the websites.

I suppose my next project at my High School is to get these sites unblocked. I'll explain what my first project will be another day. I will give you a hint though. Ever wonder what it would be like to see a Health class check the the nutritional value of school lunch?

Donating to Charity... A Fail?

There are many many charities, and many of them claim to do quite a bit of good, but many of them are doing it the wrong way. Most of them look at a country and say "What do we think they need?" and then they ask for money. Once they have enough money, they buy whatever they decided on, and they send it on over. You'd think this would work, but having done absolutely no research on the area.. they failed. One example of such a failure is in Camp Shahraqi Mawijirin in Afghanistan.

A hundred or so paces away from the last hut of crumbling mud brick, a colorful, shiny playground rises out of the barren earth, like a twisted joke played on the 145 families dumped in this forlorn wasteland.

Because who needs a playground, asks Fateh Mohammad, his mouth contorted into a warped smile, when there is no food? Who needs a playground when the houses are falling apart?

Who needs these two red and blue metal slides, four swings, two soccer goals, and a seesaw, Fateh Mohammad demands as the smile fades from this man's sun-browned face completely, when the children are dying?

Anna Badkhen's "A Journey Through Northern Afghanistan, Day 5" at Foreign Policy

Now, this isn't to say that donating to charity is a bad idea. It can be helpful in many cases. One place where the money went in the right direction is the Uncultured Project. Shawn went to Barguna, Bangledesh through the charity Save the Children. He spent his time there building them a sand water filter, bringing them drinkable water. You can watch the video here.

Next time you plan on donating to a charity, do your research. Make sure you're not giving money to give starving children a playground instead of food, a clinic but not water, or job without a house. It could mean the difference between a wasted $5 and $5 that bought a month's supply of food for a family.

A Music Lounge

Our social lives have gotten pretty laid back, but mostly focused technology. I have nothing against any of that, but I think we need to make some time for actually hanging out with friends. Sitting around texting, emailing, and IMing is great and all, but how about sitting around listening to some music, talking to friends, meeting some new people with your taste of Music, and maybe getting a little snack while you're at it? The online music business is lowering the enjoyment of the ol' CD Store, so why not go for something in between? Something below the level of Concert, and not quite a Dance Hall, a... Music Lounge?

I'd like to start a music lounge I suppose. Have a few separate lounge areas for separate music tastes. I wouldn't have them labeled "Rock", "Country", "Rap", etc, but have something like the Pandora engine going on, where a group can go over to the music player and choose an artist or two, have a couple groups intermingle, and such.

Bring in some real, fresh food. Have a kitchen in the back, and a few people working the stoves bringing in some nice non-preservative snacks. It's not necessarily going to be all healthy, but it'll be a heck of a lot healthier then picking up a snack at a fast food joint any day.

Feature some of the local upcoming bands, maybe even have a recording studio attached to it. Local artists could come in and check out what's been popular amongst the customers, and even take some survey's of what they're looking for in music.

Teach some lessons in the basement of the building, renting it out to some of the local musicians. It would be a grand hang out for those who don't feel like the expense of a concert, or the intensity of a dance hall, and would rather lounge around and buy a snack or two here and there.

The Story Behind the Rocks

This story has changed throughout the years, constantly finding itself beaten to death, revived, and rekindled. Where the flying rocks are now can only be speculated, but here is the story of how they came about.

Long ago, when cavemen only knew how to throw rocks, put things in their mouth, and relieve themselves, a rainstorm came about. As the cavemen were doing their usual thing, throwing rocks at each other, a strange happenstance came about. As two rocks collided, lightning striked right between them.

A new creature opened its eyes for the first time, as the poor natives ran away from the "big boom light" that so scared them. The first living rock had just been born, and not one man had seen it. The minerals inside this living, breathing rock were formed into fractals when the lightning struck, which caused this being to have an immense level of intelligence, and it soon learned all it needed to to survive on the primitive planet.

No matter the intelligence, it didn't have a clue how it had been born. This caused quite an emotional complex with him, especially as night came(if ya know what I mean). He had kept his eyes closed any time a felt vibrations in the ground, as he had decided it was better to be an undiscovered creature. He had already realized all the other rocks around him were quite unintelligent, and that the cavemen were quite attracted to hurling them across the vast bits of air above him.

It wasn't for several years until he finally discovered the way one of his kind were born. This made him try several experiments. Arranging rocks on the ground in a good distance for the cavemen to manage hitting them together, he spent ages waiting for thunderstorms of any sort. He ended up with quite a few friends, and got quite far.

Course, this had also started happening in other parts of the world, with very different kinds of rocks, but I'll get to that later.

One day, something a bit different happened. A pigeon ended up between lightning and rock, and something different appeared. A living rock with.. black wings. This made the original rock quite excited. Their only mode of transportation before was intense vibrations to cause a pseudo-hovering motion, but wings... life would be so much easier.

This caused a sudden interest in trying to combine already living rocks with others, in fact, it caused him to try combining three rocks at once. After several tries, he decided it would be far too dangerous to let something that could be potentially more powerful then him be made without being in it. He decided to try something far less likely, and that involved six rocks and a pigeon all at the same time. Several years, hit after hit after hit, each time missing the all important moment he was waiting for.

Eventually.. it worked. He was Lord of the Living Rocks and ruled over them all. Having wings, he decided to move on from the area he'd spent all his time experimenting. As he flew across lands, he caused many flying rocks to be born. Not once did he decide to live among the other flying rocks though, always staying secluded.

By now, there became a distinct variation in what they decided would become separate tribes of flying rocks. There were the Shinies, always so jealous of the Ones of Red, and always the Angries attacking the Peacefuls. They would become the four tribes, and the Lord of the Living Rocks would become The Great Flying Rock, a tribe of his own.

Now, you may ask how I know all of this, but it's quite simple really. One day, I got a cut in my arm that was utterly life threatening. This was caused by a rock that fell down right on top of my shoulder. He felt quite bad, and he decided to save my life. In his unsureness of how to do so, he decided to trade blood with me. The flying rocks have the grand ability of being able to heal quite easily, so he hoped that giving me his blood would work it's magic on me.

It did. The magic of the Flying Rocks is actually quite great compared to anything us humans have been able to accomplish, though we've forgotten how to use anything our ancestors discovered in our arsenal. It's been quite the journey, but I discovered it all by speaking to The Great Flying Rock, as word of the blood trade spread amongst them all. It has been their greatest monumental moment in their history, though I'm still not sure why. Maybe I'll find out later on in life.