Simon_Ishtar - 8

[simon_ishtar]

yay for Friday!

 thats all I wanted to say today 

 

[simon_ishtar]

Anyone wanting to buy some second hand pedals go check out trade me, have got a few bits and pieces up...  mainly stuff like compressors and noise suppressors, things I've got a few of...

 blog stuff... Am a few days away from payday + am in overdraft again though still have about $100 cash + $58.50 in change in my cash box, technically means am likely to be around $0 this wednesday  has taken a little while to get there but things are slowly coming right- I don't think I realized how much the last move would hit my bank balance..
 Now the danger is I'm looking at new toys.... wondering how much I'd get for my Washburn Woodstock + how much more it'd cost for a newer 12 string without the woodstock's really high intonation.
 Am also thinking its about time I got a nice big liquor cabinet.
 Downloaded a few songs from a Grahgam Bonnet solo album- normally I'm a big fan of Graham's - the guy has a huge voice, 5 octave range + has sung with some of my favourite bands (MSG, Rainbow, Alcatrazz) but basically this is muzak disguised as an R&B covers record... atrocious hardly covers it- not so much the vocals but the bland musicianship.
 Also downloaded some Pantera - Am not sure why it's taken me so long to get into them- definitely far more awesome 

[simon_ishtar]

Am at work in the new building... feels good not to be in a concrete bunker anymore but still got an urge to be outside today. Got an urge to be out on the water, on my way ot Mercury bay or something.
 Cardenio, the name of a play written, or at least co-written by William Shakespeare- only a fragment of it exists- it was based on Cervantes' Don Quixote, something I find kinda mind blowing- that the greatest writer in the English language had actually read the world's first novel- I wonder if it ever took his fancy to try his hand at a novel (he would've beaten Samuel Richardson's 'Clarissa' the first English novel to the punch by well over half a century if he had)..
 The Cardenio sessions will be something that hopefully makes sense soon 
 
 

[initial]

Whats your Trademe name?

[simon_ishtar]

hey Initial, is simon_ishtar as it is on most forums and stuff... currently 10 pedal listings up there.

[simon_ishtar]

blog stuff for today...

 yay for Friday!

 yay for my extra $16 dollars, am planning to spend it on IPL treatment, that is if petrol doesn't swallow it all up. 

 boo for the Kahui jury- I don't think (in spite of one family member saying so last night) Kahui was found innocent- the prosecution failed to provide enough  to find him guilty- big difference.
 IMO NZ needed a whipping boy on this - not least of all when you look at Sue Bradford's anti smacking law- would Govt really have voted it in were it not for another case of someone going all Jake the Muss on two kids?
 I guess one way of stopping family violence is just to beat the kids till they die- that'll stop one branch of future generations of Kahui from beating kids up right?
 Meanwhile big brother Govt is prosecuting good parents for smacking their kids in public... Well done justice system for again proving ineptly named 

[simon_ishtar]

oh man what a week  been flat out at work, which at first I was not overjoyed with- have been moved back to doing preposession notices on vehicles and sending out field calls for the forseeable future - gotta admit the day seems to go a bit quicker... unfortunately don't have time to post on RF so much at the moment.. 

 Am at home now watching a video of Rainbow doing a cover of Will you still love me tomorrow... Graham Bonnet is singing - I've been a huge fan of Graham Bonnet since getting a copy of MSG's Assault Attack on LP as a teenager + loved Richie Blackmore since seeing a video of Deep Purple at the California Jam... Add to that an old rock and roll song from Phil Spector's revolving girl band stables - was a Shirelles song originally?- awesome in any case...

 Not a lot else to blog about at the moment, just dropping in really... 

[simon_ishtar]

things today to blog about? ... Currently have an amp in the shop for a service- put it in 2 weeks ago and haven't got it back yet- Am increasingly disappointed with the North Shore rock shop, though not surprised... I ordered a GT8 through them and gave up on it- Called Henderson Rock Shop and they had one for me same day- finally 3 weeks after the fact the NS Rockshop called me to say it'd arrived.. Asked for them to get in a gig bag for the GT 8 and they got in something about as big as a pencil case, now 2 weeks to get my amp back- the key niggle here is they are charging me $45 freight when it was sitting in their shop for a week waiting for the repair person to pick it up- Why exactly am I paying freight when its not freighted anywhere + is a week acceptable when the job was tagged 'urgent"?

Think I'll be headed out to Henderson in future when I need strings and stuff

The flat seems peaceful at the moment.Am thinking that isa bad thing and maybe it is time I had a housewarming- at the very least it'd be a good excuse to meet the neighbours- 3 months there and I can't say I know them... I wonder what 'History or Myddle' author Richard Gough would make of that, coming from a time (17 Century) when you knew everyone in town... I wonder what he would make of a 21 Century housewarming?

 My selling spree on Trademe has almost reached an end and I am feeling wealthier for it... thinking I'll put a few more bits and pieces up there next week then once those are all gone give it a rest...

 Yay, Judas Priest Album is released 16/06!

 Yay, for 20/06 getting closer + the impending Oblivion gig with Miscreant and Cliff Hedley...

 Apart from NS R/shop no real negatives yet this week- I am very disappointed to hear people getting on the case of the ambulance staff in the shooting in Manurewa - Personally knowing Mel is in training to do that work I hope there is never an expectation to send Ambulance staff into an unsecured room...

 Am a little pissed off this week that I can't post any comments/messages on facebook so that can be my negative for the day.

[simon_ishtar]

Got the Judas Priest album + am still digesting it- it is definitely one to listen to a few times to take it all in. My opinion so far there are definitely ups and downs.

Ups:
There is a great energy from the band- This is a band who still have a lot of passion for making music, something not all bands of their era put across IMO <Cough> Ozzy-Black Rain<Cough> Uriah Heep-Wake The Sleeper<cough>
There is a massive amount of chops in this band- they have come a long way since 'Rocka Rolla'
Individually some fantastic songs + while I think the dramatic range of this album could've been wider there is nonetheless a lot on offer in terms of diversity...
The album's production values are great, although IMO Halford's vocals should be a little more reverbed/delayed at times...

neither up nor down:
On a number of occasions you get the feeling Halford is not singing about Nostradamus at all. There is a bit of a sense this album is more about Halford than Nostradamus really.
- On that topic am yet to really get the reason for the love songs...

down:
 It is long, my current opinion too long.
 Way too much first person- some of it can be eye of god or even second person but it isn't...
 It lacks those nice spoken word bits that tie together Bruce Dickinson's Chemical Wedding or Dream Theater's Metropolis pt2- IMO a simple device that would give the album more structure + accessibility- It is possible having downloaded from Itunes and not having the booklet am missing out on that bit to tie it all together but am afraid it seems a little disjointed as is really.

 Overall if I was giving stars I'd give it loads of them but not all + recommend Judas Priest's Nostradamus, it has some kick arse music on it.

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