Harmonica players usually have a tough time getting both the right volume and tone without carting around a heavy custom amp rig. The Harp Commander III specialist Harmonica preamp from jfet magician Ron Holmes (http://www.holmeseng.com/) is a great solution, allowing harp players to DI into a PA (or amp) and have full control over their feedback free sound level and tone.
I was coming back from a jam session in a few weeks ago and my backpack split at a pedestrian crossing, dropping my Harp Commander III onto the hard bitumen. Initially I thought it was ok, but it the next morning I had an online gig and it was dead. On further closer inspection it appeared one of the xlr output volume controls had taken a hit, and it was off axis. I sent Ron Holmes a quick note, explaining what happened and that I was willing to take a shot at repairing it myself - something I would never have done pre-hackerspace soldering skills days.
Ron sent me back some detailed tear down/repair instructions, and part replacements specs which I ordered from mouser online. It was my first big desolder/repair/resolder and went pretty smoothly thanks to the detailed instructions from Ron, and over the shoulder checking from fellow TokyoHackerSpace members.
All back together…and ready to Boogie the Bitstream. Thanks Ron!
(fyi detailed info on Ron’s design approach -> http://www.holmeseng.com/index_files/Page937.htm )
Tokyohackerspace made a trip last weekend to Kamogawa, across Tokyo bay in Chiba, to check out Kamogawa Valley for some possible rural hacking projects - wireless sensor networking for farming, arts etc. Here’s some video and pics. Click through on them to access the geotagged google map to see the locations.
After a rough start due to some new client issues, we finally got rolling at the Alphaville Herald launch party in metaplace. Metaplace needs a few more things to assist live musicians, but it’s still in beta so it will evolve. The metaplace crew were rolling out updates to fix client bugs a couple of times during the gig, and it eventually settled down. Mucho Fun had by all!
Thanks to Hathead and Noma for the Interwebz jam , Pixleen and the alphacrew, and the Metaplace team.
After the metaplace gig I hopped over to videoranch , Mike Nesmith’s live music virtual world, for the launch of the memorial day musicrise festival. It used Activeworlds as the platform, and their live video streaming is very nicely integrated into the environment.
Sounded great to me. I love the scaling of the RL video to avatar size, another subtle cue that adds some more immersion to mixed reality gigs like this.
Catch the hottest live blues trio in the Metaverse for a real time musical collaboration across the internet from three countries in full 2.5D isometric glory!
Komuso Tokugawa on vocals, harmonica and guitar live from Tokyo
Hathead Rickenbacker on piano live from Toronto
Noma Falta live from Atlanta on Bass/Vocals
I’d never been to a barcamp, so it was interesting to see the self organising presentation system at work.
After lunch I decided to do a little presentation on “The Future of Music”. Check the video out for my take on where I see some of this going, as a result of my prototyping of the Future of Music in Virtual Worlds such as SecondLife and Metaplace.
Temple University Japan have been doing a study on the SL music scene, where a number of people inlcuding myself have been prototyping the future of music in virtual spaces.
The students have looked at various aspects of the music scene and have done some nice posters up illustrating their findings.
I streamed a short SL concert into the Real Life gallery space in Design Festa, Harajuku, Tokyo last night with Noma Falta joining me on Bass.vox from Atlanta via Ninjam. It was a borderline event in technical terms;-) but I think everyone had fun and it illustrated some ideas of what we are doing on the bleeding edge of performing inside virtual spaces to the real world.
I’ll add a link to the Temple University website of the exhibition when it is up.
I’ve been working on other projects the last year so this blog was put on the backburner, but I’m about to start blogging a couple of times a week on the new paradigm music business and the future of the music industry.
Masterpiece - a “beta” multi-world 3d printing service from an Akihabara firm involved in gamedev. When the cost comes down and quality goes up these real models of avatars etc will become excellent merchandising items for online musicians to add to their marketing toolset.
Eitarosoft’s mobile 3d virtual worlds. They have an interesting solution to scaling the system to allow up to 400 people to access a virtual town at one time. I’d tell you how but then I’d have to kill you…
Vizimo’s lightweight funky world that supports up to 8 people at a time. Current version allows users to design physics enabled games/activitities from pre-built components [next version to allow import of user created content], with integrated sns.
Daletto World has an interesting look, with flat 3d characters.
SL ® was well represented, and opensim/realXtend also had some demos from 3rd party providers.
After attending the virtual worlds party in the early evening I visited the Tokyo 2.0 SNS party next door, the Japan SNS and Linux worlds events being held concurrently in the same hall as the virtual worlds event. Fortunately the beer and food at the web 2.0 party proved to be a little more real than the virtual worlds one!
A gaggle of VW people then met back at Bar Tube in Shibuya, where Philip Rosedale signed the Toilet Door, a tradition at Kanda-san’s bar when visited by internutz celebrities.
Another loose bar tube jam session eventuated with a number of people swapping off on different instruments - Hayashi-san from Impress on drums/bass, Kanda-san [owner of BarTube and well know IT/Video journalist] on bass, japanese j-rock guitar legend Hatake-san on bass/guitar, Komuso on harp/bass [badly I might add!], various jpop singers, Jets Fride on guitar/Bass and even Philip Rosedale attacking the flying V - though we had some trouble tuning that beast and it took Hatake-san to finally tame it into submission! Rock and Roll!
Following on from my recent ninjams with Hathead Rickenbacker and Moshang Zhao I recently collaborated with Von Johin on a ticketed event, also using ninjam, to celebrate the opening of his new sim - the French Quarter.
We sold out in just over a day after going on sale. To keep the sim performance reasonable for the audience (and ourselves!) we limited it to ~55 tickets. It was still laggy, but considering the tech issues we had with rehearsals the final event went very smooth, with only one disconnection and some other minor glitches. The internet gods were with us that evening, and the paying audience were more than satisfied with the three hour show we put on. Setlist was Von Johin solo, Komuso solo (with 1924 martin acoustic, 1934 National Steel, and electric), then Komuso on Harp with Von Johin followed by Von on Bass with Komuso’s electric set.
I recorded it all as well, maybe we’ll release a cut or two soon!
