Return to Acoustic Club

Last night after my guitar lesson I decided I'd go to the Acoustic club that Village Guitar holds. Village Guitar is the guitar lesson place I looked at back in September 09' but didn't work out to well.

The cost of starting up was too high for me. The banks wouldn't give me any money for it and despite the fact that I like the guy who runs the company (franchise), I didn't get a good vibe from the shop I was interested in. I also didn't get a good vibe from the more established shops either.

I guess it's just one of those things.

However, I'm still in contact with Village Guitar even though they are now competition. Hahaha. They say it improves the breed. Truthfully though, I'm not doing any lessons anywhere near the guy. So I doubt there's any competition at all.

But anyway, Acoustic Club is something that Village Guitar runs on the last Wednesday of every month. It's where a bunch of blokes get together, bring their acoustic instruments along and just have a jam, or chat, or do absolutely nothing. We seem to have a tradition where we are all disorganised. The chemistry seems to work, but we don't end up doing much. Disorganised as usual.

It's a fun evening though. Lots of musician jokes and cliché notes and progressions thrown in while we're jamming away.

I left my guitar lesson on a high yesterday and went from passing on my knowledge to a young starter, ending the night having a jam with a bunch of great guys, sitting in a circle and drinking beer. I think the only way to improve this would be a camp fire. Which I did joke about and said we have plenty of wood around. Hahahahaha.

One of the best ways I've found I learn about music is to just jump in there and do it, which is why I've always gone to open mic nights, music clubs like the Acoustic Club and so on. It's where you really learn. A bit like learning a new language. You can learn it properly with tapes and classes. Or you can go to the country and immerse yourself amongst it. I prefer the latter.

My First Lesson

Today marks a new beginning.

Today marks the day I became a guitar teacher. It's been a long time waiting. It's been one of those things you realise one day and keep in the back of your head. It's one of those things you say you'll get around to. Something you'll do later.

Screw that. I did it now. And I had one of the most fulfilling experiences today when I spent 30 minutes with a young kid who wanted to learn how to play guitar.

I won't go into details of how the lesson was conducted. But it was great to be able to relate to a child (being childish myself), and him understanding me. His biggest issue with guitar lessons was how boring they were. So I told him we won't be doing boring stuff. But we will have to cover some key elements on how to play guitar. How to hold it properly. How to strum and pick.

He asked me some great questions, like why does the note go higher when you play closer to the sound hole? And, what are the dots on the fretboard?

The most fascinating part about the lesson was the ending. Instead of me saying "Thanks for today, see you next week" Which is what I usually tell my clients in IT.... who are generally not pleased to see me because me being there means they're spending too much money. I have to say it to them only to hear it back. Otherwise I'll just get a "bye"

Today, this kid said to me "Thanks for the lesson, I learnt a lot. See you next Wednesday at 6PM"

I give him and his mother a "You're welcome, it was my pleasure, see you next week" and I walked to my car..... with the biggest, cheesiest grin. I thought to myself, "Why am I smiling like a dork?" Why shouldn't I? I just enjoyed the best work I've done since, well.... since I can't even remember.

I can't wait for the next lesson.

I've scored my first guitar student

And I'm bloddy nervous.

I start Wednesday Afternoon and it's only 30 minutes. It will be for every Wednesday for the next 5 weeks, as this is what the client has requested.

Perfect for me because every other day at the moment is booked out with work and music. Soon the lessons will replace the work and I'll eventually open up my guitar school.

The ball is now rolling. :)

AC/DC - McDonald's of Music

If anyone actually reads this and they're an AC/DC fan, they will either hate me or find what I'm about to say funny.

My wife and I have a travel rule. It's a golden rule we've come up with through our travels around Australia and overseas. The golden rule is, "When coming off a plane, starving, you need to eat some food. Don't gamble on the local restaurant or Fish n' Chip shop. Go to McDonald's."

Why? Why would I tell people that I want to eat craptastic burgers and fries when I can get a nice, real burger with chips from a good, local, corner take away shop?

The answer is, through travelling so much, my wife and I would arrive in a country and usually felt quite hungry. We'd try the local shops for food only to always ben disappointed. Once we stopped at a place that touted itself as the best rated Fish n' Chips place in Tasmania. The food was greasy, and their oil had not been changed in quite a while. I didn't even finish my meal.... which never happens. We wasted the food by throwing the rest that we didn't eat in the bin. I felt bad because I don't like wasting food.

Once my wife broke the rule. We were at the airport getting on our plane when she mentioned food and it reminded me that my stomach was growling. So I lined up at the Maccas (McDonald's) at the airport terminal. She decided she wanted something else. I warned her. She said "It'll be fine". Her famous last words. Her meal was ordinary. However, my meal was fine. I went to Maccas. She tried the place next door and got herself a Turkish Gozleme.



Why was my Maccas breakfast better than her Golzeme, which I like more than Maccas?

Because McDonald's is familiar. I can travel anywhere in the world and I know when I see the golden arches, I know what I'm getting. Sure the menus change slightly from nation to nation, but generally it's all the same. It's comforting to know that I can go anywhere and get the meal I expect for, really, when you think about it, a pretty cheap price.

After all that, I can tell you why AC/DC is the McDonald's of music. It's because you know what you're getting. They've been playing the same songs over and over again. And I'm not talking about the exact same songs. I'm saying that their latest album sounds pretty much like their first album, or their second one, or their third for that matter. And people lap it up. They love it. They can't wait to hear more AC/DC. When's their next album coming out? I duno, but if you put on their last album, you'll know what the new one is going to sound like. Hahaha.

It's funny but it's true.

And the reason is simple. People buy it because they are buying that Big Mac. You know what it tastes like. You know that if it's any different to what you normally know, taste, hear or smell then it's not the same.

You've changed!

AC/DC use a brilliant formula to sell as many albums as possible. Give the people what they love. Don't change it unless it's broken. They rocked out with simple beats, rhythms, solos and basic notes. There is absolutely nothing special about what they do at all, musically.

But what they do, they do really well. They're solid, they rock and you know the next album will rock too. Because you've placed your order for that McChicken burger, you know that's what you're getting. If you end up with a whopper from Hungry Jacks (Burger King), then you know somethings gone wrong.

They can't change their sound. Especially in such a fickle industry where cutting your hair can break you. And it will. If AC/DC turned up one day and played like Metallica, I think the fans would like it, but I also think their album sales would drop, if any are purchased at all, and it's all because you're no longer lining up at Maccas anymore. You're at KFC now, buying the next Beyonce album. WTF? How did I get here? I wanted Jack Black, and you've given me Lady Gaga.

Tune in next week as I might compare Bono to Oprah, or Mozart to Kurt Cobain.

YAY! Steam engines are back!

I hope so anyway. When you look at the design of a steam engine, it has to be one of the best man-made things to exist. Unfortunately, due to progress and lack of environmental consciousness, combustion engines took over and steam died.

Now they might be back, and I'm really excited if this takes off.

Take a look here at what this guy talks about with the engine. It's a bit of information overload but if you're mechanically minded, you'll get it.

I went to the website to have a look for more information. Much of it is repeated from the video but there are pretty pictures and a bit more background.

Steam engines are good because they have 100% torque from the start. This design reduces reliance on fossil fuels while still utilising a small amount for heat production. The system's Ace of spades is that much like your refrigerator, it's a closed loop system that requires little to no maintenance. The water that's heated for propulsion is recycled from vapour back into water and used to not only propel the vehicle its powering, but to lubricate the moving parts in the engine.

I think it's back to basics, it's simple. It's efficient, well, more efficient than a petrol otto cycle engine. The heat it produces isn't wasted, it's actually used for forward motion. The high levels of torque eliminate a gear box with multiple forward gears so only forward and neutral is needed. For reverse, the engine can turn the other direction.

It's brilliant. I love it. I want to see it in action.

New toys

I just received delivery of some new audio goodies today.

The theatre thing with Val is coming along really well. But the other day when Val was talking to one of the venues we are going to perform at, they asked us what our requirements were. Val went through the list until he got to my guitar, which is a had made Spanish classical guitar. No pickup, no nothing. Just wood, glue and strings. Val said "We'll need a condenser mic for the classical guitar."

The guy apparently went silent. He didn't know what a condenser mic was. Then Val said "We'll need phantom power for it to operate". Again, the guy fell silent. Val thought his mobile phone had poor reception. But it was fine. The sound guy at the venue had no clue what he was on about.

Sad part is, you'd expect a sound engineer to know. I told Val I'm possibly buying my own condenser mic and a nice mic pre amp anyway. So, that's exactly what I've done.

Bought one of these.


It's a valve mic pre amp, but you can use it for musical instruments. ART makes some good stuff but this is cheap and I got in on Ebay with next day delivery.

The other toy I got to match is the ART M-ONE Condenser mic.


Now, I was advised that what I needed was a small diaphragm condenser mic and a mic preamp with a built-in compressor. I didn't want to complicate things with compressors and what not. The sound guys can take care of that. I also went against the advice of the small diaphragm and got a large diaphragm mic instead. I did this because there seemed to be more people recording with the larger ones than the smaller ones. Plus, there were more larger ones available in stock.

The main difference between the small diaphragm mics and the large ones is the response time of each one. The smaller ones respond better to changes in sound. If that's the case, so be it. But most recordings are done with large condenser mics and I'll just follow what works in practice, ignore the theory and do things the way I've always done it, by the seat of my pants.

The part that sucks about my new purchases is that I can't plug it in because I didn't think to buy a cable. DUH! And I also didn't buy a mic stand.

The great part about all this is that the mic is worth about 3 times what I paid for it. And the preamp was had for about $50 off the normal price. In the end saving myself about $300 if I walked into a local music shop.