mowlie - I think that the yellow handheld thing may be a DVM [digital volt meter]... these can also measure resistance so the guy was most likely probing for a short circuit or a voltage hanging around on the earth.... they dont have to be yellow... lol

Most noise that is not caused by single coil pickups is caused by earthing problems. Sometimes a piece of kit somewhere else in the building has a bad earth [some power or signal leaking into it] which causes current to flow over the earth connections between the various pieces of kit in your rig... you normally hear this as 'mains hum' which is essentially crap in the mains power. You can get 'isolated' mains adapters to prevent this. It is an 'LCR' circuit that is tuned to mains hum and prevents it getting into your kit. The inductor also blocks DC transients from the mains - the popping sound you hear on your recording caused by anything with an electric motor powering up elsewhere in the house [hair dryer, fridge, oven etc]. Changing over to battery power on the pedals may help a lot but not totally cure it... because your amp etc is also connected to the mains.
Another thing with background noise is to do with where you live.... are you close to a railway, electrical pylon, power station, factory, workshops etc... some of these guys produce high quantities of electro-static radiation... so it gets into your signal via the pickups and mics... keyboards are reaonably immune to this..... the cure is a 'Farady cage'.

On the minger thing... I think that this is the finest export from the north for decades.... "London white stilletto massive"... lmfao... and the Essex girl.. bleach blonde, 'basdard blue' eyeshadow and fuckme-anywhere shoes...... lol "all-rahwit geezer.. tits first 'cos I 'm a proper lady"... lmao

nick - I was just trying to do my bit for the greater good of mankind.....
sticking your knob into slags of all kinds is bad m'kay...

You spoke about sound engineering... I did this for a few years when I was in my early 20's.... great fun and I learned a lot...

ovation - great news about your mum-in-laws progress.... fingers crossed.....

My past experiences with the term 'temporory' have been pretty permanent... it appeared to be a 'let you down gently' term.. maybe for you this may actually be temporary but you can never tell.... If I were you I'd not sit and wait by the phone... crack on with your life and enjoy it.. your too young to piss your life away over a girl and serious relationships....

take note of what r6r is saying... pretty sound advice..

The great thing about girlies is that there are lots of them... enjoy them all..... shag yourself stupid... OD on flange.. maybe even find out what some of their names are.. [but that's the slippery slope to getting serious again]

It's at times like this that mingers and slags are good medicine.. lol.. heal yourself.. lol lol lol

On another note... I'm just getting new kitchen and hall flooring done.. when that's sorted we can jam....

my last post was number 355.... maybe I should have said something nice I about Gibsons.........

JSC1 - I had a 335 for a while... a right hand one... the good part was that it was easy to string the other way because the cut-aways are the same top and bottom.... the feal and tone though where not for me....

I've only ever sold 3 guitars... the 335 was one... the others were an SG and an Explorer..... all Gibsons....

ovation - PRMAN came to visit me Sunday and I played him The Baptist... which is so far a complete backing track plus the first 3 minutes of lead guitar..... he really liked it and thinks that should be the closing track on the album..I'm inclinded to agree with him.. it's just 'that sort of track'... so there's a tick in the box for me..lol..

Loudness - now there's blast from the past... great band...

have I helped or made things worse... lol

ovation - when the Baptist is done, I'll send you a copy of the sketch.. same as before....... I'd be interested to see what you think....

nick / thebob - what was the question........

must be done...

Grand Master Klarkagi - Shredo Ryu - Moshi Pitu Dojo

trutina - if you have Eddies number, let me have it and I'll call him the next time I'm drunk and lost.... which is no more than a few days away...

let me know if you need help and I'll talk you through it so that you can have a set-up that you can live with until the luthier does the proper set-up

thebob - what Yoda says is correct... a few points to add regarding key are:
a key always has a scale associated with it... almost to the point where the terms are interchangable "being in the key of Em"... "using the scale of Em"....
key therefore determines the 'tonic' note [the 1st note] and also determines how far appart the notes within the scale are from each other [the intervals].
This being the case, the key is the 'birthing' place for the scale and the chords. The scale and chords that belong to the key are termed 'diatonic' because they are made only from this collection of notes.
Notes that are not members of this collection are therefore 'undiatonic'.
Sometimes, you will need to alter a note value from being diatonic to being undiatonic. These 'shifted' notes are 'enharmonic'... this means that on the score you will see a 'sharp', 'natural' or 'flat' marking next to the note in question.

as you go through the theory posse post, you'll find that you only need to learn seven different fingerings for a scale and a little very simple math... you'll then be able to play major and minor scales in any key everywhere on the neck...

lastly - don't get scales and modes confused... they are related but not the same thing.

r6r - maybe I could be the bad guy in the anti-anti-smoking ad.. that would make me worse than an 'evil robot us'....

Modes: Modes are funny things.... If you wrote an entire song / section of music in a specific mode, then yes you could treat it in the same way as being in a key - you have a scale and a collection of chords ... a great example of this is funk.. the tonality that really makes funk tick is a major 6th and a minor 7th... so major funk tends to be mixolydian and minor funk tends to be dorian... much of the music by Satch and Vai also treats a mode more like a key by having large sections of a song use the 'scale' and available chords from a specific mode... this is a way of exploiting some of the more colourful combinations of intervals - making their music interesting and sometimes kind unusual sounding.. The Jazzers have a very different approach.. Very often they will apply different modal ideas over each successive chord that they encounter. So if a progression changes chord at a rate of 1 chord per beat of a 4 / 4 bar - then you could well hear 4 different scales / modes per bar. This means that the overall tonality of the music becomes very loose - i.e. major-ish / minor-ish because there is no single fixed key center. This is why Be-Bop, Swing, Fussion etc can sound quite unstable and 'out-there'... So in this case, modes are used as a 'passing moment' - purely as an applied scale but not a key center....
So it's all really in the application......

r6r - contrary to what some folks believe.. I'm not a pro musician.... I've tour and done albums with David Cross [getting paid of course].. and I've studied music at university... but I actually have a day job.... I am a systems design engineer in voice communications networks.. so it's all code, hardware, software, binary, hex, electronics [analogue and digital] and optical technology... quite a wide range of disciplines.. so my knowledge of physics and maths is reasonable too... music and my job has taken me all over the world.. travel is a whole world of learning in its own right... as a hobby I read a great deal about world / military history, astrophysics, geology and of course music...
I'd like to think that I'm reasonably well read and I've travelled more than most... I'm also not that young either. In addition to this, I was born and raised in the shitiest slum that London has to offer [which is thankfully very far away from where I live now] - which explains the more crass attributes to my make-up...
so one day could be spent at a lecture in grand unification theory at the science museum, that night I could be out with the Millwall boys and in a whole lot of trouble... lol
variety is the spice of life... lol

I guess I could say that I've had a pretty full life and I'm not done yet either.....lol

Shit... this post is like the examination I underwent in the mental institution.....

I am a massive fan of education... the only thing that prevents education is death...

olly - If I've written Am, D, C then that is a mistake... I, IV, V in A Dorian is Am, D, Em...

I think that this is one one those cases where my brain is working too far ahead of my fingers.... I do try to 'proof read' this stuff before I post... but obviously from time to time the odd typing error will get through...

thanx for pointing this out..

and happy birthday to you.... old man.... lol

dragonchild - dude... you need to find a better library... In my local one they have some nice young part timers during the evenings and weekends..... college / university girlies making a little extra cash to fund their weekend exploits.... shwing!!!!

On this CD I hear
large amounts of Dream Theatre,
Malmsteen [Trilogy era - especially in the vocals, composition and some of the guitar work],
Tony McAlpine style keyboard playing [when he played keys for Vinnie Moore],
a hint of ELP orchestral style in places,
the orchestral parts sound very very synthetic [because they are] in places... I'd have thought that better sample playback modules would have been used by a band of this ilk... also the parts should be writen not to expose this.. you can only write 'true' orchestral parts when you have a real orchestra to do it with... those of us that have to emulate that sound have to make the trade off between "what you want the ochestra to do" against "does it still sound realistic"...
the compositions contain a few modulations that sounded a bit dodgey here and there... as if it was modulation to sound clever and not because the melody / riff was crying out for it....

The overall mix contains a little too much 'high-mid' eq [especially the vocals and guitars] for my taste...

The other side of the coin is:
these guys are serious serious players...
the riffs are "as tight as a baby's ass"
some of the solos are dead clever and imaculately executed... big respect to the axeman....
the riffs are big and heavey - just like the doctor ordered...
the songs have heaps of dynamic variation - great if you're a progger - which I am....

Nick - Summer Song is Mixolydian.. I haven't played along with it for years so I can't remember the actual key. If I recall correctly, the guitar is detuned by a half step too... so it may actually be in Ab Mix in concert pitch [A Mix on the detuned guitar]... If I'm wrong then I'm mistaking it with War [I know that one or both of those are tuned down]. Also, the modulation is minor... so if the track is scored in A [with the 7th notes shown as natural accidentals - which is more logical than showing the center key of D for A Mix] then the modulation is in Am [key sig is C]... The Bb part... well I don't know where that comes from... to be honest, I'd need to dig out the CD and have a good listen so all of this information above has been dragged out of my decaying mental archive...

A funny thing... I recall many years ago sitting in the drafty halls of the University of London... analysing and debating over 200 orchestral works from 1600 to 1950.. the great masters:- Bach, Handel, Hydn, Mozart, Schubert, Schumann, Beethoven, Wagner, Tchiakovski, Borodin and the list goes on... sight singing Bach chorals with the other students, studying the impacts of instrument developments upon orchestration, making notes all over the score of Schuberts unfinished Symphony in Bm [awesome tune] detailing where the various components that comprise Sonata form occur... etc...
that being the case... what is the most played CD in my car?????????????????

Iowa - Slipknot

I think that says something........

local - like I said... it's been a long time since I've played along to it so I am probably wrong.... I think that maybe I should blow the dust off that one and give it a listen...
On the Williams Symph #5, no I've not heard it... I'd guess that the way to work out the mode would be to look at the bass / chord progression... I know that modes don't really resolve over cadences as such but there would be an underlying key centre. If the chords appear to move around the C chord so it has that chord I vibe then it'll be C lydian, if the same is true for the D chord then it'll be D mix... to be honest I'd need to hear it......

Regarding my craziness.... I'd have to quote the great Nigel Tufnell from Spinal Tap
"it's a fine line between stupid and clever"