For 30 years I just had a 6 string Squire, that 16 years ago I shielded and put a Humbucker in the bridge of. Hated the tremolo as it was just a detune lever and unusable. But with the humbucker, I could use high distortion without the hum and I did a lot of recordings with it.
In retirement I have spent much time recording and using 6, 7 and 8 string guitars. I had thought a Ibanez RG with locking nut and trem would be the end game of the ultimate guitar for me, but not at all. Down tuning and heavier guitar music lead me to the 7 and 8 string guitars.
I have my guitars in DROP tuning now, even my bass, but found that doesn't work with an 8 string. The lowest string is too floppy that way, doesn't sound great at the really low end, and I am not interested in heavier string gauges. I already have a Jazz Bass. So the 8 just stays 1/2 tone down tuned, and it ends up the 7 gives me as many usable low notes. The ones that sound good. Being fixed bridge is also so much easier for tuning and setup. Tuning is something I fuss about a lot, and more strings and trem make it even more tedious. I find the bridge pickup on the 7 sounds better than the bridge on the RG too. The RG sounds really thin.
Will be keeping them all though, but will probably give the Squire to the grandson when he is older. 12 months ago I was really into Melodic Techno with no guitars, so have no idea where I will go musically in the future.
MUSIC+COMICS scheduled Saturday morning 8:15AM release. Music a little different, maybe, in this one.
More MS-20 synth noises.
Should the D-50 have been 808 styled? Not at the time, and the more modern look was right for it. The font they developed that was used on the D-50 and other products was called BIOFORM. I used to have a copy of it. Real SciFi looking and I loved it.
Other Things
Had the last of my main medical procedures done yesterday. Nice weather today after snow and rain this week, but I will be taking it easy. Will go back 3 times for some related things that will be more painful for a bit, starting in a week and a half.
Valentines Day to day, but I bought a cake at the Keihan Department store during the week when they first went one sale and we had it then. It was good.
Found out from an X post yesterday that mangaka MIYAGAWA AKIRA had continued MASAMUNE SHIROW'SAPPLE SEED world in 3 books that were published from 2012. This was news to me, so tracked them down second hand and will have them shortly.
Enshittification was the word of the year added to an Australian Dictionary a year or so ago now. Such is the state of the world, and this talk and interview with the author goes into more details.
Anecdote how Uber will pay one driver more to make him a cheerleader, while everyone else gets very little is one tiny part of the bigtech algorithm in his talk here. I have seen the same thing with random encouragement in all kinds of things I have done from Google, like in these YouTube SHORT view counts of mine.
Still haven't found what I'm looking for, but maybe this is closer to THE music + comics style where the speech balloons aren't animated, but other parts of the frame are. Removes the frustration of having to wait too long or the speech balloons pass by too quickly to read.
Guitar started very STATUS QUO, but it mostly went elsewhere. Been using the same, or very similar ZebraHZ bass, lead and other sounds last few musical things as I just love them. The melodic guitar has the Valhalla DSP Space Modulator Super Resonant Flanger on it that gives this just on the edge sound to me. Love sequenced synths, metal power chords and melody, so this seems to be maybe SynthRockPop as far to melodic to be metal, and there is no shredding.
Just joking, but not really 😅, did this comic too:
Other Things
THE RAT IN A CAGE guy, Billy Corgan seems to have taken over from Rick Beato as the guy with the really interesting interviews worth watching to me. And it was Rick Beato's interview with Billy that brought him to my attention.
I had heard of Smashing Pumpkins, but hadn't heard any of their music till Rick talked with Billy about tracks like Jelly Belly a couple of years ago. I then got a few of their albums, and even bought the Smashing Pumpkins BIG MUFF PEDAL.
Billy's latest interview with Patrick Mata and his Kommunity FK and the founding of GOTH music was all new to me. Hadn't heard of the US bands they mentioned during this, but did know of most of the UK bands mentioned. Being in Australia, then Uni and working at Fairlight Instruments meant the music media I had time for was limited and I had more important things to do. I had never read any of the music magazines or newspapers either, so gossip and trends local and overseas were not even on my radar.
Billy, unlike Rick, has the annoying habit of interrupting his guests, but he was also a very successful alt musician, guitarist, singer, song writer and was in the world they talk about and really lived it. He is very well spoken and philosophical. Rick is more a failed jazz musician that became a producer, even though that did mean he played a lot on his artists records.
Last year I went to the SHIROW MASAMUNE Exhibition in Tokyo on his manga that includes APPLESEED and GHOST IN THE SHELL. A week after I went to Tokyo and attended the exhibition, it was announced it would open next in Osaka. An Exhibition on the making of the Animated Film GHOST IN THE SHELL has just opened in Tokyo. It has much of the artwork found in these books I have had for many years:
I expect this one will also make it to Osaka sometime, but will not be disappointed if it doesn't. I have already seen many of the original film's background paintings. It is all very cool, but it is the manga artwork that interests me most, and I have now seen that. So if it comes to these parts I will attend, but it isn't worth the effort to go to Tokyo for it to me.
Came back to halfway through episode 7 of the HALO TV series on PRIME after a few days, and instead of RESUME, was met with START YOUR FREE 7 DAY PARRAMOUNT+ TRIAL. A hard no to that. I wouldn't have started watching it if that was originally the case. Netflix Japan recently lost all STAR TREK and assume something related for PRIME too.
Diane Warren | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan interview is really interesting, and a drive to make the above MUSIC+COMIC. In D Flat/C# Dorian @ 135BPM. Powered up the MS-20mini for the first time in awhile too.
Brian Cadd has a story that he was in the studio with THE POINTER SISTERS to record one of his songs, and he was playing the piano in the session. They decided they wanted to change the key to suit their voices better, and as he couldn't do that himself, they had to get another guy in to play the piano. He just laughs it off. Being a great song writer and being a great versatile musician aren't related.
It seems Diane Warren is a bit that way herself, great at the words, emotion and melody, and that is the bit that counts. Maybe a bit like Irving Berlin, but they didn't go into it.
Makes me feel a bit better about the music I am making.
So the FAIRLIGHT INSTRUMENTS 50YEARS pin arrived in the mail today, for attendance at the Event held 2025/12/19 in Sydney. I was one of the ex-staff on Zoom that attended.
The type of thing worn on a suit. I rarely do that. Put it on my hat maybe?😀 Not that anyone I expect to meet will ever have any idea what it is about.
I had my first medical procedure on Monday, 2 days ago and it was painless and took all of 5 minutes. Will go back in a bit over a week for #2 to be taken care of.
Urasawa Naoki's ASADORA vol 9 English was released yesterday and I ordered my copy.
After watching THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY for the first time, Star Trek leaving Netflix last week and BONES repeats starting on Netflix this Sunday, HALO TV series on PRIME seemed the best option. 5 episodes in and it is holding my attention. Never played any of the games but know about MASTER CHIEF. For something that started as a FPS, the TV series has a very human core to the story.
Watched part of a JAMES CAMERON interview in the last weeks and there was one part where he says after finishing Titanic, he spent many years doing other things like the deep sea dive and working with NASA making cameras. The guys at NASA were super smart and driven and paid little attention to films and what the latest buzz in that, what was his world, was up to, and he hadn't met people like that before. I had spent years in a similar NASA frame of mind where the trivia of movies was a waste of time and there were far more important things to do. Part of the reason I can catch up on things in retirement.
I expect the local to me Art Museums and Galleries I have regularly visited over the last 3+ years will have some interesting things on this year, but am not aware of anything yet. I thought that for months at the beginning of last year, then the mangaka MASAMUNE SHIROW exhibition opened and that was a surprise and a delight.
But the overnight trip to Setagaya/Shinjuku Tokyo showed me how tiring things get for me as I age. The previous year I went to Nagoya and visited 2 exhibits in the one day, even if I did have to rest in the Anno exhibition. It is further to Tokyo and I could just manage the one exhibition and getting to lunch and dinner. I have to pace myself even more.
A week after I visited the MASAMUNE SHIROW exhibition, they announced it would move to Osaka. The same happened after I visited Nagoya 2 years ago for the Mamoru Nagano exhibition, and it to came to Osaka a few months later. So this year I will wait to see if a popular exhibit gets announced as going Osaka.
