Heh

No deadlines for next week, still some kitchen work but maybe time off to chill and write. Did some today, sanitised up to 1st 35 chapters by now. Making each chapter count, or trim and condense brutally. 37 now, which is later.
Tried to engage a dear old friend in conversation again but failed. Probably tried wrong track but tired of trying, dead horse flogging not my thing. Enjoyed pil on jooz. Back to novel, Pat gone to bed tired. Extra hour in bed, stupid idea...

Yep, Sunday evening now and it's way too dark already. It's like we got kicked into winter before time.

So a weekend off, with beer, chocolate, writing and probably some Game of Thrones later. Bliss. Sorry, nothing exciting to report but here's some pix, each spoilt by something.

Tempus Fugit

It sure does. A month since I remembered I have a blog, must mean something. Naturally I've been busy, have also had a stinking cold that's lasted about 3 weeks, still lingering slightly.

So what's new? Well, I put out a couple of old albums on bandcamp. As usual I was wrong about which one people would like, that award going to Ephemeris rather than Transhuman Express. I thought the first was too gloomy but it turns out the second is too experimental, or disorganised, which is very possibly true. I reorganised the bandcamp page into some kind of order. Keep getting requests for the very early stuff - and by that I mean 1980 onwards. The stuff before then I don't even admit to as the stuff that is known is bad enough. Better to keep the mystery and not put it out, I think, even if I did have a working cassette deck. Yet another person has offered me money for the original tapes, which is like 4 or 5 people now.

https://paulnagle.bandcamp.com/

I've written a lot lately - well not last week. Plumbers are destroying the house. Today two plasterers really showed the others were playing at it, the place is a total mess now. Novel progressing well, have sanitised first 30 chapters. Each comb through improves it, sharpens, snappifies. More to do as I'm getting down to the details. Could carry on forever, I enjoy this part most of all. Reviews going well, despite some slowness in response here and there.

Bought another new module. Did I tell you my Clouds arrived? Well, I added a Spectral Multiband Resonator and it's awesomely good. And I'm reviewing another I love, so it's getting a bit mad in the eurocrack box.

So anyway, stuff to do, just saying that I'm still alive really.

New Headshock album

Of course to us it's quite old. We sat on it for a while to see how comfy it felt. By a while I mean months. In the end, it made no sense to keep doing so, so here it is
https://headshock.bandcamp.com/album/electronic-meditation

In other news, my Clouds module arrived - it's all part of the eurorack rabbit hole I swore I wouldn't get dragged down. It sounds fantastic, haven't looked at installing any alternate OS yet, still plenty to go at with this one.

It's been a sunny week. My promises to get some work done in the garden have been only partly fulfilled. Picked a few shrooms but there weren't many. Then Pat threw half of them away by accident. Such is life.

Novel still in that 'finished but could be improved upon' state. I'll pick away at it over the coming months until I reach some kind of contentment. Some parts of it are very good indeed. Some are still poorly-realised. I made the mistake of starting a Douglas Adams and suddenly the parts I thought very good had to be downgraded. Any writer who thinks he can write should read even a few paragraphs of DNA to restore humility.

Whatever else I have to say will have to wait. For it's Friday, the sun is shining and my reviews are almost complete. Day off methinks!

Tinkling the white plastics

Well, ivories would be soooo wrong. And anyway, we need it all for chinese fertility medicine, right? No, I have no idea either. I spent a lovely afternoon just playing, been ages since I did that. Very, very enjoyable even though I'm rusty as hell. I may, possibly, have concentrated on the machines too much, or even to the exclusion of all else. Or noodling on monosynths, which is usually as much about knobbing than keying. Will never be a concert pianist but I sure do like the piano. Will never be Peter Bardens, but I'm partial to a bit of organ too. :)

This evening I ordered a couple of albums, more Popol Vuh and a Moebius on vinyl. Well, why not? I feel in my love for the music of Cluster and Roedelius I've neglected poor Moebius and feel guilty I'm appreciating him now he's dead. Still better late than never eh?

I listened to an album today that I'd been indifferent to when I first got it. I'd tell you what it was but I can't remember, sorta dark ambient plodding technoish stuff. Not selling it am I? Hold on, I'll go look and write it down. See what a service I perform... it's....Porter Ricks : Biokinetics.

Hey, it's Friday and I/m slightly drunk it has to be said. Tim and I got an hour's of music today, gonna put on the CD when we go to bed later. We being Pat and I, not Tim and I heheh. Not explaining myself well. Some really cool music happened,

Possible Mutable Instruments Clouds sighting for next week :)
Yes, in fact I ordered one despite promising myself to hold off on the euro for a while. Now I'm skint again. Idiot!

Tim has a lovely Analog Keys. I predict great things from it and him. And us.

Another session with Tim today. Then curry. Pat really is incredibly tolerant, she even volunteered to drive him back later so we can drink all day. In other news, some twat nicked the milk off our doorstep this morning, a first.

Sorry, thought I'd taken some interesting photos but perhaps not. Tim took some yesterday so perhaps they'll turn up later.

Still Boiling

Sadly I'm not referring to the weather but to the fact we're in the 3rd week of boiling water here. United Utilities not exactly crowning themselves in glory in the efficiency or information stakes.

Liminal Entity is very nearly finished, or at least it's nearly a complete thing you can read all the way through. I have a number of points I can go over and get properly right before turning over to readers. This time I'll make sure it does get read before I publish! It's around 68,000 words which isn't a bad length, I think.

Real proud of Tim who got a prize in a Glasgow art competition and the judge bought the painting. Looks like a cracker too, must make him happier after that shitty BBC farce. Must get him to complete the album cover and put out Electronic Meditation. Trouble is I found a track yesterday I think might fit well on it, maybe a replacement for one of the 'aimless' ones.

Today I'll be writing but as it's my day off it's my own stuff, not reviews. Only one of those currently on the cards and plenty of time to complete it, actually almost done. Giving them chance to squash a few bugs.

Spent the evening bailing out water after blocked drains and instant downpour combine to flood many homes where I live. We escaped - just - but the drains will get blocked again unless people take action. That means preventing gravel from floating from your drive and into the road, that means thinking about the water table when concreting your drive, that means a bit of - dare I say it - social responsibility. Yes, humping wheelie bins full of water can bring out the grumpy old man.

Today I believe our Dawn is giving birth. I have to stay sober in case I need to go hold the baby or take vital supplies. Hey ho. Update: birth happened, I'm officially a 'gramps'. Today I can drink beer again :)

Work and precious little sunshine

August is summer's last chance but I'm not holding out too many hopes for anything different. After last year's glorious summer we're back to intermittent rain, cloud, muggy warmth alternating with chills. I suppose it is helping me get work done but isn't doing much for my spirit.

Was pleasantly surprised to be asked to contribute another Bollywood track and did so, knocking one out in an afternoon that the lib liked. I do enjoy those though, Bollywood has lots of scope for dramatic, melodramatic, melancholy and mayhem, all with extra cheese. Right up my alley basically. It also let me do lots of manual playing amongst the loops. Having done that I'm back to reviewing mode, one cool thing one I'm not quite so impressed with. Battling bugs in both, but that seems to be the way these days. Two OS updates for the cool thing, one for the not-so-cool thing. Sorry for being vague but best I keep these rambling notes as no-spoilers.

I'm heading off to Leeds next Saturday (15th) for Modular Meets The Elektrons. Should be a hoot, picking up Paul on the way. Let's hope there aren't lots of tempting modules on sale...

Recorded more Headshock material, now featuring Tim sequencing stuff with his P3. Sequencing a Minimoog and JP6 means some pretty cool new tunes although when we'll get the album out I have no idea. Tempted not to spend much (modules are calling) and do another CDR but that feels a bit limp. Still, WTF.

Annoyingly, the backlight has died on Cirklon #002. So it's a torch on the job until I see Colin next or go visit Tony to get my ESX-1 with its super-duper new main encoder. Arse.

Synth DIY & random thoughts of no consequence

I almost wrote 'thoughtage' there but I'm glad I didn't. :)

Synth DIY was so similar to previous ones I had to keep asking myself what year it was. OK, in previous years I wasn't rudely awakened with a fire alarm. Got to play with Paul's synths, looked at a Beatstep Pro or three, enjoyed playing with Synthis real and cloned and really admired the ARP 2600 clone. Other than that, spent a lot more money than I wanted to, smoked more of my weed than I wanted to, missed several days I could've worked on my novel... I know, I know, I must force myself to go out into the world now and again. Didn't bother asking for Cirklon updates, no point.

Today, with no review work in and no desire to write any music, I spent quite a while cramming samples into . Discovered another bug too, related to sliced sample playback. Made lots of loops at 11k and a fair few samples at 22k, all working well. Down to 60 seconds free though. 

Tomorrow I hope to get some stuff done in the garden and perhaps a day without rain... yes, I'm becoming an old man. Maybe I should agree to do more gigs!