Bloody marvelous. Today while I was at work I dropped my brand new mobile phone into a bucket of hot soapy water, and, needless to say, it died on me. That was a waste of £130...

PhrygDom - I know I'm a bit late, but If Joe's music was a place it would be the English Channel: It can be beautiful, it can be violent, it can be hot, it can be cold, you can float away on it, and at times it's really fucking dirty...

Yay!!!!!!!!! My phone works again!!!!!!

My "Secret Jewel Box" has literally just arrived, about five minutes ago. The picks are pink, man! (?) And why is there a mirror on the inside? I guess the little compartment at the top could beused as a make-up box...

ebadros - There aren't really any exercises I can think of for learning Pitch Axis, as it's more of a concept than a technique, but phrasing's a whole different story. Come up with an easy lick that you know you can play perfectly every time. Now slightly change the articulation of it, ie. the way the notes are played. For example, if the last note is bent, make it a slide instead. Now it's phrased differently. Change the duration of some of the notes, change where abouts in the bar the lick starts, and all this sort of thing. It's all really simple stuff, but once you master it you can come up with some really great ideas. Steve Vai's riff from "The Attitude Song" takes phrasing to the extreme, because of Chris Frazier's 4/4 drum beat over the 7/8 main theme. The riff cycles around starting on different beats of the (4/4) bar, until eventually it returns to the beginning of the bar. Excellent idea. "Hill Groove" is another good one for phrasing, but it's more subtle here - when the main melody is moved up the octave, Joe bends to the last note, whereas befor it was just a normal fretted note. Hope this helps.

Clarky - Can your super cool computer program on which you write all your stuff do odd time-signatures, namely 5/4? If so, I have an unjustifiably large favour to ask...

Clarky - I'll send it in an e-mail because, apart from other things, I have to go to work now so don't have time to right it all now. Maybe in your mail box tonight, but the gist of it is the chorus is in 5/4 with a bar of 6/4 at the end, and the verse is in 4/4 with a two-chord repeating pattern that comes in at various places in the bar, "Time"-style, but far more extreme. Thanks.

Clarky - I'm just about to compose/send the e-mail now, so by the time you read this you should have received it...

Clarky - Er, it could be as I don't have a minidisc player...

Just entered that competition. I already have a guitar signed by Joe, but you can never have too many guitars! Especially when they're signed by Joe... Trouble is, that guitar will have those horrible stock Ibanez p/ups...

What's the greatest feeling in the world? I'll tell you - when you go into work and your boss just gives you a day off because your'e going on holiday tomorrow. I love my job sometimes. The days when I don't have to do it... But the holiday's going to kick ass. I'm going to Newquay with a whole bunch of mates from college, as a sort of farewell before we all tottle off to our various Universities in September. American Pie 2 style... Trouble is, we're leaving at five o'clock in the morning!!!!!!! So, this is my last post for just over a week.

Anybody noticed that Steve Vai mght be slipping a little bit? I know this is a bit of a long shot, but in "The Secret Jewel Box" on the hidden CD he mentions about the final guitar solo in Bill & Ted, and how it was supposed to save the world, and says "I'm not even sure if it could save my career...", so I'm like what's wrong with your career? Then I realized that we haven't had a proper studio album of original material from him since "The Ultra Zone", back in 1999. What's going on? Hmmmmm...

Clarky - Whatever's easiest for you, man. I mean, you're doing me a huge favour here, so I can hardly ask for anything else. Besides, I think I have a friend somewhere who can copy audio from MInidisc to CD. I know he can do it the other way. And what are you gonna call this seven-string custom shop monster of yours, anyway?

Man, IUMA's really starting to piss me off now...

Neil Morgan

Over six hundred pages pf post in just over a week?! Christ, you guys talk a lot!!!!!!!!!

Wow, what a great holiday! Weather was a touch miserable at times, but that meant the surf was better. One of my mates broke a surfboard clean in half, and another got stung by a jellyfish. We all got really drunk in the evenings and blahdy blah; I can't remember most of them. Except for the curry night, when eight of us managed to work up a bar tab of £532!!!!!!! Rock and roll!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh well, back to work...

Clarky - You brave, brave, man... lol

Good to see IUMA back in business. Sort of...

Clarky - Thanks for your comments, man. They really encouraged me. The 'bare' sound in the verses is partly down to the program I made the backing track in. It's shocking. But the instrument is very sparse, I suppose. Also, there is a modulation in this piece - didn't you notice it? The solo section shifts up to C# minor from B minor. The next song on the site will probably be a re-make of "A Face In The Clouds", so I'll let you know when that's up. Did you check out the improv piece "Let's Hear It For A Minor!!!" at all? First take to one of Guthrie's backing tracks fropm GT magazine.

The rest of you can all feel free to check out the new song called "Crimson" at my site.

Local Dude - Welcome back, man. Good holiday? Where d'ya go? My A2 results really surprised. me. They were good, but pretty much the exact opposite of what I was expecting. I got ABB for Performing Arts and a D for music. D for music? Hmmmm...

Clarky - Jam? With you? I should think so... Keep me posted about that backing track, dude. And the guitar...

JSC1 - Rick Parfitt (Status Quo) had an RSI a couple of years ago from playing the same rhtyms and chord shapes/progressions. That's a fact. AS for how to heal it, I have no idea...

Death Cube K - Dude, I hardly flunked it! I only got a D...

Clarky - Wow, thanks man...

Er, what the hell is a "3-peat"?

I NEED THE LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Honestly, who steals a guitar? I don't know what I'd do if I had either of my axes stolen, especially my RG, signed by Joe. But I imagine that doesn't come close to the sentiment surrounding Pearly...

JSC1 - Of all the things I thought a 3-peat could be, that was not one of them!!!!

IUMA users - I need your help. I don't know if you've ever been to my site, but the main image file didn't upload properly and I was left with a mass of grey and a picture of the top of my head. So, today I uploaded a new image file to replace it (or attempted to), which I assume was done correctly as it took the best part of half an hour (I have quite a slow connection). So, when I left Artist Uplink I typed in the address for my site, just to check it all worked and I got the grey/top of head phenomenon again. I pressed the refresh button at the top of my screen and the same thing happened. The thing is, I also put in a new date in the "shows" section but that was included in the site. Can anyone help me? Thanks. Here's a link.

Over and out.

Neil

The new chat is much better, by the way. Good stuff.

Yoda's essential life tips #1: Never re-heat a meal comprising Yorkshire puddings in the microwave. Go hard, crispy, and generally rock-like they will. I nearly bent my damn knife!!!!

Iambic - Sorry, I'm not sure what you mean...

Yoda's essential life tips #2: Don't go in the sea after a shave. Bloody hell...

PhrygDom - What could possibly possess somebody to put a campfire out with their face? lol :) The IUMA image thing sorted itself out somehow. I went there today to see if anybody had left a comment. Absolutely nobody has been to my site, but the proper image is there. Me and "Ol' Faithful", my RG-570 Ltd. with Evo's and a stupidly low action, signed by Joe.

Clarky - I went up to Guildford today and signed the lease for my shared house with other ACM students. I'm moving up there on the 23rd of September, so we could meet up together for a fret-melting session any time after that. If you like...

Iambic - Cool. I thought it was a bit of advice or something. Makes sense now... lol :)

My car failed the MOT today. I need new wiper blades, the exhaust is blowing and the hand-brake cables ned tighntening. Notrhing major, but hassle all the same.

Yoda's essential life tips #4: Don't drink and drive. You might spill it...

L8rz, Neil.

Last night I went to Harper's (my local guitar players pub) with Danny, my jam buddy, and we jammed with the guy under whose instruction we both played our first chord. Oh, that fateful day... He was quite shocked to see how far we've come along in about three years. Cool guy, even if he was really drunk...

Neil - If you haven't heard "Crimson" yet, do so NOW!!!!!!!!!

Why does nobody talk to me anymore? Are my posts invisible? :( And how come hardly anybody goes to my IUMA? Everybody else gets loads of people going to theirs and telling them how great they are, but I just have this one guy called Sam who goes to the same school as I did and thinks the sun shines out of my ass. He's a cool guy, but I want some people to hear my music that don't live in the same town as me. And I'm ill. Anyway, that's enough of feeling sorry for myself. I'm probably depressing everybody, and no-one probably cares. Boo hoo hoo. :(

Neil.

Crushingday62 - A RATM fan? Nice. That's their best album, don't you think? In terms of guitar playing anyway. I'm looking forward to the new album with Chris Cornell on vocals...

PhrygDom - Yeah, my sympathy vote worked!!!! lol Thanks for your comments. As far as recording goes, I'm moving to Guildford in about two weeks, so I'll be closer to SW London than I am now. But I just bought an SM57 and an SM58 for recording direct to the PC (I already have Logic Audio PLatinum 5). But I suppose if I ever want to record anything totally insane, where I'll need mixers and blah blah to enable me to do blah and blah blah, then I'll drop you line. Here's my e-mail (although I'm sure you already have it...): dontspillmybeer@hotmail.com

The Local Person - "A local bus for local people" LMAO at that. The next Recoil gig, which you're more than weclome to come down for, is on Saturday 19th October at The Crypt, which is the premier live music venue in Hastings at the moment. The thing is it costs about £5 to get in, but if you get down here early enough I should probably be able to sneak you in "with the band"... All my gigs get posted at my IUMA, which is another great reason to become a regular visitor :D

Andy of UK - Wow; that's a great compliment. The fact that you're gonna burn it to CD implies to me that you actually want to listen to it due to it being good, rather than out of courtesy towards another Satch freak. That means a lot to me. Thank you.

JSC1 - There's four tracks on there now, as far as I can remember. Two more coming soon. The link's at the bottom of my post. It's probably not a good idea to dive into recording yet, like you said, but another classical piece sounds great. Incidentally, since you're far better at that stuff than I am, I have a request: I'm writing a full-blown Sonata for solo guitar. The trouble is, I can't play it very well at all (not at the right tempo anyway...). If you can read music let me know, and I'll mail you the score for it and maybe you could record it for me? That would be excellent. It probably won't be finished for quite a while yet, as I've only just started the second movement.

Austin/JBlaze - Here's the link: The 4,000,634th greatest guitar player alive (at a guess...) Actually, even that's probably a touch ambitious... lol

JBlaze/Mr. Nick - Try again, it should be working now. I've just been there. I don't know what the fuck has happened to it though. There's loads more buttons and the image has disappeared. I did not tell it to do that. Very annoyed. Looks shite. Anyway, the songs are still there...

Mr. Nick specifically - Two weeks on monday till I go to ACM!!!!!!!!!! I got a job in the Wetherspoons. There's so many people looking for staff, it's so easy to find work. Mostly bar work, though.

Clarky - Yeah, I know, but whenever I post about a new track, still no-one goes... Jam? :D

The Local Person - What did you think of Crimson?

Pete Mulas - Thanks for your comments on my site. Self-analysis has shown me that I do a lot of "out of nowhere" sweep arpeggios, but I really dig them. I'm very pleased with the way that song turned out...

Austin - Thanks, man. Crimson is my favourite track on there, both in terms of quality and to play. Just in case you were wondering though, I wrote that riff before I'd heard Crystal Planet (people say it sounds similar. In fact, my girlfriend thinks it's identical). It just took a while to turn it into a half-decent song.

JSC1 - Yeah, I'll do that, but it probably won't be for quite a few months. It's nowhere near finished. Although I have completed the first movement, so I could mail you that if you like.(?) Maybe learn it bit by bit, or whatever. It's up to you.

Oh, I almost forgot. I was made redundant yesterday. Fucking shitty bollocks. There was good money in that job. Now I have to find a way of getting a regular, large income before I go to ACM on the 23rd. But who the fuck's going to employ someone for two weeks? Bollocks. And again I say, bollocks. Bollocks bollocks bollocks.

I like being able to swear on this T2J. It's quite therapeutic sometimes.

Bollocks bollocks bollocks bollocks.