Among the list of bands I’d like to see get completely back together, Dennis DeYoung with Styx is near the top. He might be 61 but there is no reason — other than personality conflicts — I can tell anyway that he couldn’t and shouldn’t still be singing with Styx. I saw DeYoung perform for the first time at the Rockin’ The Rivers concert in Montana earlier this month and they rocked the place. His voice is in great shape.

Rockin’ The Rivers is billed as the biggest rock concert event in Montana of the year and this was the 10th time they’ve had the concert. It’s three days of bands that play from noon until 2am. People camp overnight, drink (lots) of beer and have a great time. At $120 for three days or $50 for one day this is among the best value concerts out there. Here’s what the official concert guide looks like:

The Van Halen cover band Hot For Teacher was impressive as well as Fran Cosmo singing Boston Songs. Wasn’t as impressed with Manny Charlton with Nazareth. We didn’t attend day 1 or day 3. That’s the only bummer I can think of regarding this concert: it’s like 650 miles from here. We’re planning on going again next year and maybe doing the camp out thing. Lots of fun.

Dennis DeYoung Rockin’ The Rivers 8/9/2008 Setlist
The Grand Illusion
Lady
Loralei
Don’t Let It End
Castle Walls
Light Up
Mr Roboto
Desert Moon
100 Years From Now
Rocking The Paradise
Sweet Madam Blue
Babe
Best Of Times
(encore) Come Sail Away

When I saw Matt Wardlaw post the House of Blues 8/24/2008 setlist from the band Styx including members Tommy Shaw, James “J.Y.” Young and Chuck Panozzo I was reminded to get this post out of the draft bin. Check out the same songs played by both bands, marked with asterisk, as well as the order:

House of Blues 8/24/2008 Setlist
Blue Collar Man
* The Grand Illusion
* Loralei
One With Everything
* Lady
Too Much Time On My Hands
Snowblind
I Am The Walrus
Boat On The River
Man In The Wilderness (Shaw acoustic)
Crystal Ball (beginning acoustic w/ Shaw only)
* Suite Madame Blue
Fooling Yourself (The Angry Young Man) (Chuck Panozzo on bass)
Miss America
* Come Sail Away (Panozzo on bass)

Interesting to note that both bands closed with Come Sail Away and The Grand Illusion was Dennis DeYoung’s opener and the second song Styx played. Must admit I missed Tommy Shaw singing "Snowblind" and "Crystal Ball" and would have liked hearing Blue Collar Man in the Dennis DeYoung line-up. I thoroughly enjoyed hearing the extended guitar solo version of Desert Moon and wouldn’t have wanted that axed in favor of Styx doing a Beatles cover.

I realize Styx sans DeYoung had a bit of success with their covers album but I don’t go to a concert with a band the calibur of Styx and want to hear songs they covered by The Beatles when that is in place of other, better songs like "Castle Walls" which DeYoung said Styx never played when he was with them.

What a haunting, beautiful song from the same album as "Come Sail Away."

The YouTube video of Desert Moon shown above (taken from the Arlington Heights show on July 6, 2008) and the one of Castle Walls (Chicago Ridge, Illinois on July 25, 2008) don’t do the live performances justice but are included here to give you a sampling of what it was like.

DeYoung played the title song from his new album 100 Years From Now that’s out in Canada and available via his website. He said it will be coming out in the states in January 2008. My wife didn’t care for the song, but I liked it. I’ll be buying this one when it comes out in the states, if not sooner.

A sweet moment in the DeYoung concert was when he dedicated "Babe" to his wife of 38 years Suzanne and she came out on stage and danced with him. Come on Dennis and Styx, mend those ties and get back together already!

As mentioned back in November 2007 and despite being within hours of the ocean, we usually only get out to the beach about once per year. We’re beach bound again today, this time not to Lincoln City, but to Ocean Shores. I collected pictures from the last Lincoln City trip that haven’t been posted and shared yet online and uploaded to my Google Picasa web space.

Slideshow embed (you will likely have to click thru from RSS reader to see this):

We are traveling to Ocean Shores with my sister and law and her two girls, one of which has never seen the beach before. Should be a great time if weather cooperates. According to Weather.com, it’s going to be a bit on the chilly side (high of 61F) tomorrow. The sun is supposed to be out both today and tomorrow, but it’s going to rain on Wednesday.

See you on the other side.

Note to Mac OS X readers: none of the IFRAME embeds in this post work at this time with the Mac. Sorry about that, Photosynth is a Windows-only thing at the moment although they say they are hard at work on a Mac version.

Note to Windows users: If you have trouble viewing any of the IFRAME embeds, just visit my Photosynth page to see all the synths. Update 6:59pm PST: I just removed all the IFRAME embeds, they weren’t working right and just screwing up display of text in the browser.

Day #1

As probably heard already, getting into Microsoft’s new Photosynth picture service on launch day was difficult. Saw too much of this:

I wasn’t going to let scaling woes deter me, I kept checking back throughout the day trying to get through the process.

Day #2 - First synth: 72% synthy

I finally got in and tried putting together my very first Photosynth of the Rockin’ The Rivers concert we attended recently in Montana feature Dennis De Young and the music of Styx as well as Manny Charlton playing with Nazareth. This is the largest annual rock concert in Montana:

Process seemed to go ok until about 85% of the way through where it just froze up and stared back at me like this:

At Get Satisfaction, a service for tracking customer service issues, I found numerous people complaining about the stopped during publishing phase issue.

Came back a couple hours later and my Photosynth was showing as ‘72% synthy.’ I’m embedding below using IFRAME which if you’re reading via RSS you might have to click over to this page too see and — a big, big sorry to all Mac OS X reader — readers on Macs can’t see the finished synths If the IFRAME is hosed you can see the synth directly here

Day #3 - more synths created and synth experimentation

Tried creating my second synth of the Pierce County Foothills trail which is near our office. I had 25 pictures for this collection. This was my first time where the process worked all the way through. My second synth only scored 10% synthy. Not very good. I almost deleted this synth since it only seemed to have used 2 of the 25 pictures.

Tip: use the SPACEBAR to get through all the photos. Here is the IFRAME embed of my 2nd synth (If the IFRAME is hosed you can see the synth directly here):

The difference between the two synths is the similarity between the pictures. Through trial and error I learned that pictures that were more similar were more synthy. So if I had started with one picture and then just moved and took more pictures.

I did the following planning for my third synth, starting at the edge of a road and walking toward a wooded trail:

• total of 105 pictures, my biggest synth attempt yet (nearly 250 MB worth of photos)
• every 10 steps I snapped a picture from about the same perspective and view
• every 100-200 steps I would alter the vertical level of the photo
• at scenic intersection I panned the camera left and right at about the same vertical position
• at the end of the road, where it turned into a trail, I took several shots so photosynth would (hopefully) detect I was still on the same path, only there was no more road straight ahead, I was not going into a wooded area
• at the end of the trail, I took a panaromic set of pictures from my position that led back to the road I’d just walked as well as to the river that blocked my path in front of me
• I took no close-up shots

Now how did this turn out? Same as my very first attempt: it froze up about 85% done at the "publishing synth" phase. I decided to pare back the number of photos with synth #4 attempt and only do the attempted panaromic pictures I took at the end of the wooded trail, which numbered about 25 in all.

This one finished at 55% synthy and wasn’t quite what I expected. It feels a little bit like you are walking through the trail. The panorama portion is broken. IFRAME embed:

At this point, I decided seek out how to make something closer to 100% synthy. While doing that I went to work on synth #5 attempt by taking a bunch of pictures around my desk. In this picture I:

• took more pictures of the same things with very small variations
• pictures were taken at different zoom levels
• I panned more up and down with pictures

This resulted in being 89% synthy, my best effort, IFRAME embed below:

This turned out to be the best created synth out of the 5 so far (only 4 of which have shown up). Use the + and - to zoom in and out and see different things around the desk. You can even see this very blog post in draft mode on my monitor in portrait mode inside Windows Live Writer. This might be a good way to start out with your first synth creation. Just take pictures around your desk or some other common area in your office.

While writing the last paragraph I got another idea for a new synth. I decided to make a synth using my Gibson Les Paul Studio red wine guitar and allowing viewers to stroll up the neck of the guitar. Sort of a synth journey of navigating the fretboard while playing a smoking guitar solo.

Turned out to be 0% synthy. Guess I’ll have to refine this idea and/or take better pictures. The results of this guitar experience swayed me from a 6th and final synth attempt for this blog post. I was going to take the screenshots I made — most of which weren’t used — in this post and combine them into a synth. Since my guitar one was a bust, I figured the screenshot one would be too, so forgive me bailing on the title idea.

Decided to leave the title alone because it describes the thought process one goes through when creating synths. Whenever I pick up the camera now, I’m thinking about synths. That to me spells a great way to start a new service. Features I’d like to see added — and forgive me for calling out the social card — the ability to add friends synths, create folders of favorite synths and more. Sure, there are a zillion bookmark tools out there, but it would be very cool to have these functions built in. How about a Stumble-upon like synth exploration feature?

I could go on and on. Yes, this is a FUN service, even though it’s getting pounded and off to a rough technical start and doesn’t work on a Mac yet. Photogs are going to love this. Most fun I’ve had checking out a new online service in awhile.

Every once in a great while I see people talking seriously about Bigfoot’s existence and shake my head.

And big surprise (not) that we shouldn’t believe in the most recent phony Bigfoot sighting either, cooked up by a car salesman and now-fired police officer:

On August 12, [Steve Kulls] said, Dyer and Whitton "requested an undisclosed sum of money as an advance, expected from the marketing and promotion." Two days later, after signing a receipt and counting the money, Dyer and Whitton showed the Searching for Bigfoot team the freezer containing what they claimed was the carcass: "Something appearing large, hairy and frozen in ice," Kulls wrote on the Web site.

Credit Mr. Kulls sleuthing who runs the site SQUATCHDETECTIVE.COM (pictured above) for giving me the best laugh of the week. Just look at the Squatchdetctive homepage and try not to at least smile. I especially enjoyed the tagline: "Investigation of The Bigfoot Enigma"

Umm, what enigma? I’m not some super outdoors guy but I’ve got grandparents who have been all over the Pacific Northwest and when I was younger I tagged along. The Pacific Northwest is supposed to be Bigfoot territory, right. In my grandparents 80-odd years in these parts and my nearly 40 years, we’ve never encountered Bigfoot.

I’m willing to believe (but not in a freak-like way) in the existence of extraterrestrial beings but it’s a big hairy no, no, no on Bigfoot. I’ll take my chances with Loch Ness being more real than Bigfoot.

But back to the laugh of the week, SquatchDetective (SD). The flaming logo which doesn’t have a transparent GIF background looks like it was cooked up using some online generator. The SD badge with ‘Bigfoot XING" looks like just the type of road sign we’d encounter while out hunting wild mushrooms or elk.

Add to that the Squatchdetective MySpace page and SD radio show every Monday night at 9pm EST. I’m curious what type of callers a show like the Squatchdetective gets? I decided to record my Squatchdetective eyewitness report, please listen to my terrified Bigfoot Utterz and see if it makes the cut.

I need your help solving the enigma!

Wondering what prison life was like in the 70s? Fortunately I don’t know what prison life is like in any era, including the present, but got a firsthand look at what it’s like, or rather used to be like as a tourist. Check out the castle-like look of the Old Montana Prison.

The Old Montana prison, originally constructed in 1893 in Deer Lodge, Montana hasn’t been used since 1979 and has become a tourist attraction. The wall shown above is twenty-four feet high and extends four feet underground. It was built entirely with convict labor and no inmate ever successfully tunneled under the wall.

At the time the prison was retired in favor of the new prison about 4 miles away it had around 300 inmates. The new prison has 3,000+. Old Montana Prison is located just off Interstate 90 heading east to Butte or west to Missoula.

View Larger Map

For $9 per person (good for both Saturday and Sunday, if it’s a weekend visit) you can tour most of the prison and get a feel for what it was like being a Montana prisoner as late as the 70s. It’s an unguided tour, but you can schedule a guided one if you want for more bones.

As part of the admission a tour brochure points out plenty of highlights, like the "out of bounds" written in the concrete in blood red paint with white writing. Inmates who passed this line without permission and/or guard escort could be shot by the guards above. It took three different keys to get through the gate to the outside, lowered by rope from the guard walkway above.

Too bad tourists are not allowed to walk along the guard walk-way. It would be great to see the prison though the guard’s eyes, but some of the prison is roped off for safety and liability reasons. As it is, the walkway on the ground are starting to crack and show their age.

I was kind of surprised by the size of each prison cell. Sure, not much space for two people, but I had imagined the cells would be even tighter conditions.

I so don’t look good wearing bars. Walking down the hall outside the prisons raised the hairs on the nape of my neck. Something downright spooky about the cold concrete floor outside the prison cells which counted 50 in number, four floors high. Ghosts of past inhabitants existence spiritually imprinted on the concrete?

Four floors above where this picture was taken in 1959 there was a riot that ended in a bazooka blast and a murder suicide of two inmates, Jerry Myles and Lee Smart who orchestrated the riot. The damage from the bazooka was never repaired and can be seen from outside in the second long window from the left in the picture below:

How did prisoners spend time in their cells? Some used their cells as hiding place as plotting ground for escape and contraband. The prisoner seized contraband exhibit showed off some elaborate shanks, rope made out of toilet paper, a bible with the center cut out for smokes and much more.

Inmates who repeatedly couldn’t follow the prison rules were subjected to a Hollywood-style hyped hole. Yes, the hole exists. After 10 days in the hole with only bread and water served twice daily, a physician would examine the prisoner and if he was ok, he’d go back into the hole for 10 more days. After the hole punishment was ruled "excessive" the hole was never used again. The memory remains.

Now look at the inside of the hole below and see if you can imagine being locked in this cell with no light, no human interaction for 10 days and only two rations of water and bread a day? I’d be thinking of roaches crawling around with me in the dark …

No thank you. Would rather stay on the right side of the law. Leave the ball and chain to others. If they aren’t doing this already, they should bus neighboring town school kids and take them through a guided tour of the prison. Deterrent, yes.

I’ll admit being curious how prison live in 2008 compares to prison life 30 years ago. Have you ever toured the inside of a prison either past or present? Or want to admit [gasp] to seeing the inside firsthand?

The order of restaurants to eat lunch at if concerned about calorie count below is ranked by most (worst) to least calories (best) using my preferred lunch order at each restaurant. These are well known chain restaurants that you might find in your area as well. The following restaurants were ranked (links to the nutritional pages/guies for other chain restaurants are included after the rankings):

1. Jack In The Box (most calories)
2. Little Caesars Pizza
3. Taco Bell
4. McDonald’s
5. Taco Time
6. Subway (least calories)

You might consider making your own meal calculations using these restaurants and see how the list looks for your dietary and nutritional concerns. All links lead to the nutritional information linked from the official websites of each restaurant.

Jack In The Box
After building my favorite Jack In The Box lunch with calorie count in mind only one word comes to mind: ouch!

My lunch includes the 974 calorie Ultimate Cheeseburger and 642 calorie natural cut fry. Throw in a 32 ounce soda and this badboy goes over 2,100 calories! Let’s forget the soda and maybe drop those three delicious mozzarella sticks and it’s still my whole calorie intake for the day. And I didn’t even factor in the marinara sauce for the mozzy sticks. With small soda: 1,998, without: 1,858.

Little Caesars Pizza

In our area Little Caesars has been making a major comeback by offering $5 cheese and pepperoni pizzas. You just walk in, tell them how man you want, pay and they hand them over. No waiting for the pies, as long as they are stocked. It’s working so well that nearby competitor pizza shops have begun to match their offer. Their nutritional guide:

I can just about devour an entire pizza myself. Let’s say 8 out of 10 servings which clocks in at a whopping 1,840 calories without soda or crazy bread, which I’m in for 1 crazy bread piece (100 calories) and about half the crazy sauce (22 calories). Add this up and it’s a calorie killer for the whole lunch. If I cut back and go with only 5 servings (half a pepperoni pizza), a small soda and no crazy bread, it’s still more than most of the other lunch options. I don’t know if I can cut this one out of my weekly lunch stops, calories be damned. With soda: 1,290, without: 1150.

Taco Bell

When it comes to Taco Bell it’s all about their sauce which according to their nutrition calculator has 0 calories? No way.

Put me in for 3 bean burritoes and a ton (10 at least) of their mild sauce and loads of tabasco sauce. I prefer a small soda to wash this down, but might be able to go with water only. With soda: 1190, without: 1050 (pictured).

McDonald’s
Who doesn’t have the golden arches nearby? According to McDonald’s Nutrition Calculator (link is on page toward bottom) my favorite meal at McDonald’s: quarter pounder with cheese, large fry and large drink is over 1,200 calories.

If I scale it back to a medium fry and small drink, it clocks in at 1020. By skipping the soda and going with water it’s down to 880, almost half my daily calorie intake at my height and weight. Not terrible, but it could be better. With soda: 1020, without: 880.

Taco Time

I love the crisp bean burritoes at Taco Time and my usual order consists of: 1 crisp bean burrito (394 calories), 1 soft bean burrito (377), 1 chips (150) and medium salsa (8), 1 sour cream (85) and small soda (140). I rarely eat the entire soft bean burrito, more like half or not at all, depends on how hungry I am. The calorie figures in parenthesis above use Taco Time’s nutritional info (PDF only).

Like Taco Bell I prefer a small soda to wash this down, but might be able to substitute water. As it turns out looking at the other restaurants, I don’t need to. I probably could not eat the soft bean burrito but the calculation that follows includes half the calorie count of a soft bean burrito. Without the soft burrito this would be among my best lunch choices. With soda: 816, without: 676.

Subway
Subway (nutrition PDF), you know that place where the guy lost weight with his only eat at Subway diet? At least from a calorie counting perspective, it looks like a promising place to eat lunch.

My sandwich of choice: 6" Roast Beef with cucumbers, onions, yellow peppers, mayo, mustard, oil, vinegar, salt and pepper is going to set me back about 350 calories.  I usually go through a small bag of BBQ chips which for every 20 chips is 150 calories. Factor in a small soda (140 calories) and a Subway lunch will clock in at 640 with soda and 500 without soda. I’m going to have to start eating at Subway more often. With soda: 640, without: 500.

Additional restaurant nutritional pages (not ranked)
Links to a few other restaurant websites nutritional calculators and/or guides I looked up and compiled alphabetically sorted:

Arby’s
Burger King - site is in Flash and doesn’t allow direct linking (?), go to this link and then choose "nutrition"
Domino’s (PDF)
KFC (PDF)
Panda Express
Papa Johns (PDF)
Pizza Hut
Quiznos - this guide is incomplete
Wendy’s (PDF)

Brown bagging it beats them all?
Subway looks like my best bet but I’m curious what is your best place to eat lunch at as far as calorie count is concerned? Brown bagging lunch like mom used to do is probably easier on the calories than any of the choices above. Mother knows best.

I’ve been thinking about my experience getting back into a band lately and what makes up a good bandmate. Subjective, I realize, but there are definite traits which make someone harder to get along with in a group setting. Rather than focus on the negatives, let’s review and hopefully discuss in the comments below some positive tips.

When I was originally invited to jam with three other guys I wasn’t expecting to be invited back but it was a good feeling when that happened. The initial jam session was one of those less than formal things, awkward for the first five minutes perhaps, but as I’ve returned to jam over the last couple months I’ve collected a list of things our band needed that we didn’t have and slowly filled in those gaps.

Hey wait, what if I can’t find a band to play with?
Finding other musicians that enjoy the same types of music isn’t easy. While I wasn’t really looking to being in a band before being invited to play with this band, I have been looking for others to play with since and that process needs its own how-to. There are sites like Bandmix.com which might help out, but the following tips assume that you have already found a band to be in and that you enjoying playing the same basic types of music. A death metal guitarist is probably not going to be a good fit for a jazz band.

The band organizer role
I wouldn’t call myself the leader of our band, and truth be told I’m not sure a band leader is absolutely required, but I’ve definitely taken an organizational role. I think it’s critical that at least one person — it can be by committee if multiple people want to fill this role — be an organizer. There are a bare minimum number of things a band needs to, well, be a band.

Before getting into tips showing how to be a better bandmate, let’s look at what is required to call the group of musicians you’re playing with a band.

Band requirements
1. Musicians with equipment. You aren’t a guitarist without a guitar, no more than a drummer is without drums. First phase: buy or rent the equipment. Phase two: learn how to play. It is possible to learn how to play in a band setting, but most bands aren’t going to tolerate a new member who doesn’t have the basics down before looking to play with others.

Guitars: you should learn a few songs all the way through, including guitar solos and be able to tune and keep in tune your guitar. Learning tab is handy too. Learn common chords like E, A, D, G, C, B, F and be able to fret them cleanly as both open chords and barred. I’d check the internet for one of a zillion different websites that covers scales and learn a few scales too. I’m not hardcore like some are about scales, but if you plan to play lead guitar and solo, scales will help your playing immensely. Rhythm guitar? Not so much. Also make sure to change your strings after 15-30 hours of playing or when the sound starts to sound dull.

Drummers: Be able to play, keep a beat and perform periodic and creative fills. Keep the drum heads tuned. Have plenty of extra sticks handy. If the drummer can’t keep time, everybody can get messed up. Timing is everything.

Bassists: the one and perhaps only part of a band that can be average or fairly new and still get by. This is a good place for people brand new to play. Playing badly is still playing badly, but you really only need to know how to play in key and keep the rhythm. Not trying to diminish importance of a skilled professional bassist, but I think even seasoned bass players would admit of all the parts of a band, a bass is a logical, safe starting place for someone brand new to a band.

A great bass player will help a band immensely while an average bass player can sink into the background and not be annoying. An average drummer, guitar player and/or vocalist are a lot more noticeable than an average bass player — and not in a good way.

Vocalist: take care of your pipes and memorize the lyrics. Obvious: make sure you don’t come to practice with no voice and sans lyrics. You can read off a lyrics sheet for awhile, but if you plan to gig out lyric sheets are not very cool to carry around. Get the lyrics down.

Keyboards: know how to program and play your keys. Helps being able to read sheet music because the band can give you the sheet music for songs and you can get up to speed. Same as guitar, know a few songs all the way through and being able to play without making (many) mistakes.

2. Place to practice. This could be a basement or garage or pretty much any place that is ok sound-wise. Should be relatively dry as electrical equipment and moisture don’t get along. Also need to have the temperature be tolerable. It can get pretty hot. You also need to be able to practice where the noise level doesn’t adversely impact neighbors. The later at night your practice the bigger an issue the noise becomes. If you’re playing in the middle of the day you can probably get away with being a little noisier, but if you crank up the Marshall stack after 9pm, don’t be surprised if the police come knocking.

3. Regular practice schedule. A band that never practices isn’t a band, it’s a bunch of guys that play music together once in awhile. Whatever schedule and time works for the band as a whole, stick to it so it becomes habit. I know we practice on Sunday nights at 6pm unless it’s a holiday weekend. Easy to remember and not something that has to be written down. Pick a schedule, stick to it, show up and play.

That’s it.

Notice I didn’t get into picking a band name or logo or website or slick myspace page. The band I’m in currently doesn’t have any of these things. We have played one original song only one time and haven’t recorded a lick of video or audio yet. I suspect we’ll be playing more originals as time goes on, but first we are figuring out what kinds of music we sound best playing and tightening various cover songs. That process can take some time when you’re only playing once a week. Once we have the music down because hey, it’s all about the music, it’s easy to worry about promotional activities and gigging out.

I think coming up with a name for your band happens after you have actually written and performed original music and make plans to record and/or play that music at a gig. Who gives a crap if your band has a cool name if you don’t have #1-3 above locked down first? So, no, we don’t have a band name or some catchy myspace page, but we’re still a legitimate band. You will be part of a band too if you are doing #1-3 above.

At home we have a drum set, PA, bass, guitars, amps and mixer. We have a place to play, but we don’t have a regular practice schedule. Therefore I’d say we’re not a band, just a family that practices playing music together once in awhile. If we setup a regular schedule, we could become a band.

Enough descriptions, now that you know how a band is defined let’s get to the good stuff.

Tips how to be a better bandmate
1. Be willing to learn, practice and play music you don’t like. A major frustration I’ve read about is not having compatible music tastes. If you don’t like playing song X or band Y, suck it up and compromise. This doesn’t mean playing in a band with an entire genre of music you can’t stand like playing country or rap if you only like rock, but it does mean being flexible with different types of country artists if you are in a country band or being willing to cover pop songs when you are in a rock band. That kind of thing.

I remember a situation when I shared a Whitesnake song with the group and the artist was universally panned. Oh well, no Whitesnake then. Move on. Personally, I think Whitesnake has some killer songs, but there are thousands of bands to choose music from that you don’t need to be hung up on covering one artist that the rest of the band doesn’t like. A good band mate shouldn’t get hung up on having to play any one artist.

2. Leave the drugs and alcohol out. I enjoy playing with other band members who are not stoned or drunk and treat my band mates with the courtesy of not showing up — ever — messed up. If you want to get high, do it on your own time, not during practice or performances. The band I played with in high school this was a huge problem. So much that after a few songs, we sounded much worse. It always bothered me because I felt like we weren’t respecting the music and our progress was being hampered. Playing music and having fun doesn’t require drugs or alcohol.

We’ve all heard the stories about rockers who seem to be “better” when they are high or drunk, but I’ve yet to meet even one real musician in a real world practice and/or performance scenario that was a better player high than straight/sober. I’m sure there people who are awesome musicians straight and are better than average players when they are high, but it’s a shame not to see musicians at their absolute best. Not trying to be preachy but drugs and alcohol impair, not improve.

3. Bring at least one new complete (or almost complete) song to each practice session. Let’s face it, if you play the same music over and over again without trying/learning/playing any new songs, yes you will get better at those songs, but eventually things will get boring. I make it a goal to come to each new practice session with at least one new song the group hasn’t played together before. I think a good band mate tries to grow in their craft and bring in new songs that the group might be able to play together. Some songs work out of the gate and others will require multiple plays to stick.

There is a limit to how many new songs make sense. People that get together to play don’t want to waste too much of that time learning new songs, so just mix in at least one new song every practice session. I actually shoot for 3-5 new songs, but no less than one new song. This way if the first song doesn’t go well, there are a couple other new ones to try.

4. Keep track of what songs gel right away. The best songs you perform are worth playing again and again and added to a regular playlist. They should be practiced and refined so that every band member feels good enough to be able to go in and out of them in any order.

In order to know what songs we’ve played (and played well), I keep track of every song alphabetically sorted by artist in a text file. I use an asterisk for songs we have not played in front of the song and the + for a partial song performed. I keep two three ring binders. The bigger binder contains lyrics for all the songs we’ve ever played. The smaller binder contains the lyrics and list of the songs we’ve played that sound the best.

To make it from the big to small book a song has to sound pretty good. This way, we have a list of songs that the group could choose from to play at live gigs someday and/or practice regularly if there are no plans to gig out.

5. When it comes to covers, listen to the originals as group and individual. I keep several special playlists on my Zune with the original and/or live recordings of each song we are playing. If I don’t have the song — a new song perhaps another band mate has shared with the group — then I’ll go buy it from AmazonMP3 or one of the other online stores over the next week.

At band practice I plug the Zune into the mixing board and the group can listen to the original to get certain parts of the song down. This would be good for sharing original song ideas too.

A bit of music philosophy here: I don’t think covers should be exact copies of songs unless we’re talking about games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero. I know some bands try to cover things exactly. I think it’s more important to give a respectful treatment to the song. This means that a) you get all the vocal parts down and b) you include the main musical parts of the song. By listening to the original you will learn what is important in a song and can improvise and enhance from there. Frankly, I find exact covers — or close to exact — boring and uninspired.

If the others in your band disagree and want to create exact copies of songs, then you have an important choice: practice to get the songs down as close to the original as possible or search for a different band that has a more liberal approach to covers.

Our band enjoys guitar solos so we take songs like Tom Petty & The Heartbreaker’s “Breakdown” which the original song is less than three minutes and make it a 5-7 minute song with some creative changes and nice solo breaks. We also don’t play it with keyboards which I think adds a slightly different dimension. Not going to say anything bold or crazy like our version is better than Petty’s, but I think if you heard it at an event or in a bar, you’d not only recognize the song but think the treatment was good.

6. Be flexible, willing to switch instruments and/or from lead to rhythm. Three of the four people in our band, including me are flexible and willing to change from lead guitar to rhythm as well as play bass. Our drummer is the only set player in the group. When it comes to singing, two of the four in our band take turns with the lead vocals, although I could see us getting a dedicated vocalist for all the songs and the current vocalists becoming backup singers.

I put this tip last because it won’t apply to bands who have set members, but it is handy for bands who are trying to work through what combination of players works best with each song. It is also good when one of the group can’t make practice. We have two very capable drummers, so if our regular drummer doesn’t show, the other member can step in competently.

Respect, patience and having fun
I could have made the bolded title above the only tip because a lot of being in a band is about respecting other members. It’s also about having patience to work through new songs and troubled spots in existing songs. Above all others, it should be fun playing music. If you don’t enjoy playing music, or get super stressed in expectation of a playing with others, a band is the last place to be.

I’m looking forward to when we start creating some original music and recording. And perhaps beyond that if all continues to go well someday if/when an opportunity arises to play a gig and realize that we have to pare down a list of songs to the ones we enjoy playing best. It would be awesome if that list of songs was well over 100. Then again, if we never gig out, it’s just fun as heck playing and learning new songs. Money? Fame? Not part of any of our band’s agenda at the present time. No idea what the future holds but in the meantime we all seem to be having fun.

Should you ever decide to be in a band or are already in one, I hope this helps you become a better bandmate. You’re welcome to and encouraged to add additional tips below or trackback from your blog. I stopped at six tips, but I’m sure there are plenty more.

Check this out, a Google Maps mashup called Map Tunneling that answers an eternal childhood question: if you dug a hole in your backyard that was so deep it went through to the other side, where would end up?

In our case: in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Bummer. Considering 78% of the earth is water most people would end up with a gigantic pool. And here I thought all holes in my backyard led to China! My childhood dreams are crushed.

Note to purists readers: I realize it’s extremely unlikely one would ever be able to dig through to the other side of the earth. Or at least we don’t have any tools on earth capable of such a feat, see this explanation:

Well, first .. we can’t! Forget the fact that we have a mostly molten core … we have barely gone a few miles down into the crust! Plus, the physics we are going to talk about here won’t work with a rotating Earth (or at least not the way we plan to analyze it).

But hey, it’s kind of cool to know what’s under our feet. In our case and 78% of the rest of the world the answer is a whole lot of water. Guess a Google mashup wasn’t needed to tell me that. I’d be curious to hear from readers who actually have land on the other side of them.

To use the map, just adjust the left map to where you are at and the right map will show the other side.

It looks like Chrysler is going after techies — in a good way.

I’m going to contact the sales department at our local Chrysler dealer and ask them about UConnect Web and when the 2009 model cars are coming in.

The system is not rigged to keep the driver from doing such things while the car is moving, though Chrysler will discourage it. UConnect Web will be offered in most 2009 Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep vehicles starting in August. The in-vehicle router will cost $449, plus installation of up to $50. Mobile Web access for it will require a $29-a-month subscription, after $35 for activation, through provider Autonet Mobile.

As some readers might recall, our last new vehicle purchase was a 2007 PT Cruiser. Subpar gas mileage aside — I mean you’d think a little car like this would get great gas mileage, but it doesn’t — we’ve been happy with the purchase otherwise. There have been a few other minor dealer-related annoyances, but nothing worth writing about. We really like the fact that all our preventive maintenance was paid for in advance. I’d buy that plan again and would recommend to friends.

I’m mildly interested in the Sebring, but like the look of the Chrysler 300. The next business vehicle we buy will be automatic and likely not an SUV. We’re interested in something small that does at least 30 MPG on highway (the Sebring does) and needs to have something like UConnect. Like the idea of a built-in GPS as well and it wouldn’t break our hearts to see built-in Sirius satellite radio either. This will be my wife’s car and she wants to get her driver’s license for the first time (hence the reason it needs to be smaller).

If someone reading knows of smaller cars that fit the above specs, please let me know in the comments or trackback in.

Our weekend was active, how was yours?

On Saturday I went to the first Podcamp Seattle and learned about the service Twemes. A number of Podcamp Seattle attendees were using Twitter messages and the tag #podcampseattle (pictured) through Twitter to create an IRC-like experience.

You can tag any message in twitter with the # in front of the keyword and then follow along on Twemes. There wasn’t an official IRC room for podcamp, at least that I saw, which would have been nice. I attended the introduction to podcasting and Twitter 101 talks in the morning. Brought my HD camera and captured 3 of the 4 sessions I attended from beginning to end. I put the camera on a tripod this time around so no shaky hand syndrome.

Not enough podcasters at Podcamp
Had lunch with Stuart Maxell, Leif Hansen and Rob Greenlee at a local teriyaki restaurant. Stuart said he reads MakeYouGoHmm (thanks!).

I was a little disappointed that there weren’t more actual podcasters at an event called Podcamp.

After the event on the way to our cars I mentioned to Leif and Rob that the event seemed more geared to social networking and marketing. Not that this is bad, but not quite what I expected as far as who would be attending. I realize that the attendees are what make an unconference so I’m partly to blame for not getting more involved.

After lunch I did pipe up during Rob’s session on Advanced Podcasting and say a few words about how I felt my Zune podcast work was more about being a podcast promoter rather than being an ‘editor’ of podcast submissions. Also gave out my Zune email address if any of the podcasters in attendance needed help with their Zune podcast submissions. As of this writing, I’ve had one email thanking me for the offer.

There is a local Seattle podcaster meetup that I need to try and get to in the next few months and introduce myself to podcasters there and let folks now I’d like to help them if I can with their Zune Marketplace podcast submissions.

21 is the magic number
On Sunday my wife and I went to Hoquiam for some prospective business. Afterwards on Sunday we drove 15 minutes to the Quinalt casino and check out the speed limit sign on the driveway to the casino which is right on the beach.

First time I’ve ever seen a 21 MPH sign. Clever casino marketing, eh?

We had a nice lunch with the ocean in the distance and a live pianist in the background. We then proceeded to lose $40 rather quickly in their casino and then came home. The casino was pretty dead for a Sunday at lunch time. Rising gas prices have to be hurting their business.

Due to conflicting events our band wasn’t able to jam on Sunday night, but we’ll be back at it this coming Sunday. I’m planning on taking my HD camera to our next session and trying to catch some footage to bring back to the blog if the group is up to it, anyway.

George Carlin moves along
Sad to see comedian George Carlin has passed away at 71. Feel like I should post those seven dirty words that he was famous for outlining, but will save your eyes and ears in this post.