A quiet weekend...

...is what I tried to have. I visited my dad in the hospital and he's doing better, visited with friends (and ate at the Pizza Palace), and did laundry. Nothing exciting, nothing strenuous. I have added some more pics from my trip to Cali', the beginning of the hydraulic leak at NAMM, and some from Disney.

Back on the grid.

I've missed a couple of days recently due to a couple of unforseen things and I'll try to tell those stories in the correct order.

On Sunday night after the NAMM show we were waiting for our packing boxes to be returned from storage when we heard an evacuation alarm. We thought at first it was a false alarm like the Hilton had the night before, but it turned out to be a broken hydraulic in the ceiling just outside the door for Hall E in the convention center. I hope to have a couple of shots of this later from a video we shot. Needless to say this slowed down things a good bit and we didn't get our boxes back until about 1 AM. After we got the boxes back we realized that another member of the crew (actually the company president) had the combination to one and he was already asleep. We pack what we could and hit the hay so we could get back early in the morning. Monday we finished our packing and headed out.

The next two days were hectic with moving to L.A. digs and studio visits (like the Mutato I mentioned in a previous post). I flew out Wednesday leaving Mitch to visit the likes of the WB studios to watch motion pictures being made and Trent "NIN" Reznor for an album sneak peek. When I got to Knoxville my bags were AWOL. I got them the next day along with the news that my father had just experienced a cardiac arrhythmia and possibly a heart attack. He has since gone under the knife for the implanting of an in heart device to regulate the heart beat in case of another arrhythmia and if need be shock it back into the correct rhythm.

Well this has been a log and dark post so we go with a lighthearted picture to finish up. We saw this place in Inglewood, who knows maybe Jules and Vincent had a tasty burger here once.

Some of us didn't make it back...

It's the wee hours of Thursday morning and I'm home, but my luggage didn't fare so well. If I'm lucky it'll show up tomorrow, maybe it's gone to the Roosevelt for a nights vacation.

Nothing says Mutato like a pug.

Day 4 at NAMM has come and gone as well as a day spent at Disney and in LA. There's a long story behind that and I'll go into it tomorrow or the next day when I'm back in Knoxville.

Just a quick note, I went to visit John Enroth and Albert Fox at Mutato Muzik (the studio owned by the members of DEVO) today. If you visit their website you'll see the pug, I have my own photo from the visit.

Ahhh NAMM day 3

Day 3 here in Anaheim is in the books. Saturday is usually the busiest and today was no exception. Good day and a good evening. We went out to eat (Anita's again) and went sight seeing. The laughs were good and plentiful. You need to check out the Flickr page for the days goodies and I did enjoy getting some of them, thanks Cassia!

Day two NAMM. part two

Well now the day is done, and even though I didn't see that much of the show, I did see a lot. If you follow the flickr badge on the right side of the page you can see a few more photos and I'll try to get some better ones tomorrow, it'll probably be the busiest day of the show.

After the show tonight we had a really good meal in of all places Downtown Disney. We went to Catal, and had wonderful tuna tar-tar, cheese assortments, prime rib, braised rabbits, scallops, compressed salads, deserts and sangria. We shopped the Lego store, bought kettle corn and more. You get the idea I think. Well off to dreamland so we can start again in the morning.

Day two NAMM

Well this is the beginning of the day for a change. Yesterday was long, but I saw a lot of old friends on the show floor. Never realized before how long I've been on the user side of things in this business, and more than that how different what I do as a post for television engineer is from that of a music engineer. Audibility is one of my major concerns, less that of fidelity many times. Not that I don't care but with the material given sometimes it can't happen. My job is often more salvage as opposed to creation. I have what has come in from the field and that needs to work with any music, effects, and narration that are added during the editorial process. Car noise, city sounds, and everything else in life that we don't think about makes noise and when you "flatten" that out by recording it voice often gets lost and voice is king in the reality TV world. There aren't any over dubs or voice replacement in reality TV either. That being said I still like going to the shows and talking the talk. All the new speakers, like those Focal speakers (pronounced "faux" Cal from what I understandd) we are using in the booth and all the new soft synths, compressor and eq flavors coming from every directions it's like being a kid in a candy store. And those are just the beginning there are also instruments and celebrities.

Last night we went to an eatery called Anita's, WOW! It's a southwestern place and I forget year to year that it's as good as it is, Santa Fe enchiladas with a fried egg on top and pork adovada inside, mmmm.

NAMM day one...

We moved to a swank new hotel this morning right across from Disney. Well nothing tremendous on the first day of the show, but I spent most of it in the booth. The AudioCube and Loop Master guys are right next door and that can be amusing at times.

We're back...

After almost two days without internet I've finally gotten back on the inter-web! The booth is set up and the show starts tomorrow. I haven't seen anything too aweful cool yet but the trip is still young. Here is my favorite so far.

We leave at first light

Actually before first light, gotta be at the airport by 5am tomorrow. If all goes well old man winter will let me pass and I'll be in L.A. by 12:50 EST. Last of the packing is done and I'm hittin' the hay, more later, from the left coast.

What a Saturday

I didn't do anything I was supposed to do today. Instead I spent the day with EMS crews and Explorers from Morristown and Hamblin County. I was recording their extrication classes and I hope to be able to pull some sound effects out it all.

I guess it's laundry and editing tomorrow.

West of the Fields

A night of chinese food and margaritas, the pleasures of Elysium are such. Good friends, good conversation, good times. Where were the rest of you?

It had to start somewhere...

Everybody else is doing it, so I thought I'd jump off the bridge as well. I will do my best to keep this filled with interesting subject material and as few misspellings as possible. I guess I should put something in this that says a little bit about who I am in life outside the internet. In my day job I do sound design and mixing for television, and in my spare time I'm all over the place. I've done live sound for bands, worked in the theater, helped in the making of indepenant and student films, done lots of field recording for a sound effects library I'm trying to build, and wasted a lot of time.

This coming week I'll be in L.A. for a tradeshow for the music and audio business called NAMM (National Association of Music Merchants). That being said, there will be dealers from around the world, as well as celebs at the show. I'm going to be assissting a company called Sound Toys (http://www.soundtoys.com) who make plugins for Pro Tools. Pro Tools is an audio application used to record and mix audio. Most likely your favorite album, tv show and movie of this last year all went thru Pro Tools at some point. Plugins are the effects for audio, and that song, TV show or movie might have even had Sound Toys used on it.

The packing has begun and I fly on Tuesday for L.A. so more to come once I hit Hollywood.