yeah. i cut my nightly back up partition from 50 gb to 10 - i'll just have to be more focused about it - and shifted the 40 to the discography partition. that let me shift the aleph isos over to the discography partition, which gave me 20 gb back on my iso backup partition. now, i've got enough for about 10 more isos there, and plenty of extra space in the discography for alephs and wave files. by the time i get that done, my pile of work to get through should fall down to about 50 gb, which will let me swap my work partition [a full 250 gb drive] for the iso partition [a 135 gb partition]. if there's only 50 left, the 135 will be plenty of space to work with - and it will put the other drive aside for eventual storage as iso backups. that won't be until probably the end of the summer, but i need to be thinking about it. and i think this configuration will probably last me until christmas, if i'm still alive by then. maybe ssds will go down by then or hit a sale point...

if you're wondering how i'm using 750 gb, of course i'm not. it's just a question of partitioning things and being sure i don't hit a brick wall. the way things are set up gives me two drives to work with; the plan was three, and that's what i'm musing about fixing.

first drive:
system: 50 gb. just program files.
part 2: 50 gb. installation files. there's a script; i could shrink it, but there's not a lot of space, and it wouldn't be useful, due to where it is, physically.
part 3: 50 gb. virtual machines. i'm actually a heavy vm user, because my image is so minimal. and, there's backups and shit hidden in there. linux. i'm a half credit short of a computer science degree, you know, so it's useful for programming. cracks. suspected spyware. having it in it's own partition (and scripted) makes it easier to not lose in a reinstall.
part 4: 100 gb. temp. it's about half full, of install files and other shit. having sufficient temp space is incredibly useful.

drive one has been pretty much static for ten years and is unlikely to change. pretty much ever.

second drive:
music partition: 250 gb. currently, there's about 100 gb of unfinished files and 30 gb of samples for vst instruments. previously, there was almost 200 gb of unfinished files. so, the need for this much space decreases as i get through the work. this particular drive will get shelved in time, but i like the idea of a dedicated drive for music work. i certainly don't want it on my system drive...

third drive:
part1: 10gb. backup. just whatever i'm working on.
part2: 95 gb. discography. mp3s, flacs, waves & isos for compilations of them. it's for easy access, but it's necessary. this will probably eventually need it's own drive, but i can't see it ever getting over 250 so that drive is probably this one.
part3: 145 gb. iso backups. this is the completed work - all source material, mixes, programs, etc.

so, there's lots of space there, it's just not really usable. like i say: i built this for four drives. and i guess it means i'm eventually buying two, not one. just not right now...

well, i got the cymbals/bowl notated, anyways. needed a break there to clear my head of the syncopation, and come back fresh. next up needs to be the pens/toms. i'm thinking about adding snares. and there's a few guitar parts to get in there, too. i'm going to need to eat first, though.

i'm running out of hard drive space. on the one hand, that was never supposed to happen. i built this thing ten years ago with 4x250 gb drives, giving me a tb of storage. on the other hand, i lost a drive last year [it was a traumatic experience; i lost months and ended up having to get a bus pirate to parallel in to flash the bios...], which has me down 250 gb, to 750 gb.

nowadays, i'll never find a 250 gb drive that isn't refurbished. which seems nuts. but t approaches infinity whether we like it or not. and, while i might be able to get a deal on something, buying used hard drives is like buying used underwear - even if it seems alright, you never really know what's in there. rootkits. who knows. so, it seems like i'm looking at adding another at least 500 gb. but i didn't budget for this (although i should have - and i almost bought a drive instead of the blu-ray burner). i'm tempted, but it's going to hurt my finances.

i should be able to move things around for the night. in the long run, i'm going to actually take one of these out completely, for data redundancy. they're all almost ten years old. i take good care of my shit, but with hard drives it's not if, but when. i figure 250 gb should be sufficient to hold all the source files of everything from 1996-2015. so, i'll just take it out and put it in the box. i'll then swap it out for a newer drive...

i've got my pile of work down low enough that i should be able to get it into one of the smaller partitions, now. i can then drop all those isos on to the disc i wanted to put away. that should hold me, but not for very long.

i've been holding out for an ssd, but they're still kind of pricey, and a lot smaller. even a 250 gb drive is pushing $200. tb hdds are around $60. and, in 20 years, i've only ever had one die. it's just that i know i'm eventually going to land an ssd, probably several, so it doesn't seem like the wisest purchase.

on top of that, it's really just a convenience issue. i could wipe the isos. i've got them backed up several places.

but, i'm thinking about it. i'll do some shopping at some point over the weekend. and carefully look at the budget.

it shouldn't slow me down, though - not really, at least.

i've been holding off on this because i was hoping to fit period 2 on to one dvd, but this isn't going to be possible. i'd have had to have truncated to do it in the best scenario; instead, i'm going to be inclusive over three discs. what i had previously posted as the rabit is wolf disc will be filled out and converted to disc two, and the third will be ftaa, comps and the first trivial group eps (up to may, 2004, which is the ftaa completion date and the completion of the last period 2 material).

it's a combination of the box sets for deny everything & jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj, minus the wave which fits better on 2.2.

when period 2 is done [within a few weeks...], i'll have this up as a 3xdvd and 1xbd.

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/merch/period-21-deny-everything-jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj

note to self: writing syncopated cymbal parts in 48/32 is challenging. it's almost like i'm going to need a math degree or something to do this.

the backbeat is in patterns of sixteen but is a dotted sixteenth note, which means i need to be thinking of ways to weave the offbeats in at a 64th note quantize level due to the factorization, but also that everything is staggered with ties and dots. if one sixteenth of the bar is measured in terms of a dotted sixteenth (that is three 32nds), then a 32nd of the bar is half that, which is three 64ths. i may find myself looking for 128ths (this program stops at 64ths).

this is probably the reason i played the percussion in the original recording - using bowls, pens, tables and other objects i had around. it's not that i need the quick succession, it's getting the space between the notes right. and i'm currently not sure i'm going to be able to divide the various subsets (or bars) into small enough pieces to get the syncopation my brain is giving me.

in some sense, what 48/32 really indicates is a tempo change (represented by the dot), and i suppose i could sit down and work that out, then rewrite it in a more "normal" time. that would convert my dotted sixteenth notes into quarter notes and give me my "128th" and also "256th" back. but, it would mean shifting the math to the already written sections. i'm only going to do that if i really can't get small enough notes...

also, i don't know how or why i have 300 subscribers, but it seems as though i do. the only benefit of this that i can comprehend is that it might rank my comments higher, thereby increasing traffic.

otherwise? sorry, google. subscribers are useless...

i mean, i uploaded a video the other day, and i've got 8 hits on it. hooray for 300 subscribers....

don't get me wrong: i like the idea of having 300 interested people. it's just that, strangely, subscribing to a music channel doesn't seem to indicate any interest in the music uploaded to it.

i think most of them liked something i had to say, or thought i was cyute or something.

in fact, i'm not even posting it to the main profile! i scoff at the general direction of your subscrrrribers! i'll wait until i get to 25K...

[i'm actually well over 25K. but i deleted around 5000 hits since i posted 20K. unnecessary uploads...]

46 and 47 aren't done yet, but i've got them up public.

i'm currently filling in the midi sections for 46 to better represent the completed track. that will render into the end slot of 47 disc 1. i'll then remix that for modern vsti, which will slot into the end of 47 disc 2. i'm going to do at least an ambient mix of 46 as well, which should appear on 48 with the other ambient mixes. i'll have to decide if it's done at that point or not.

this is 46:


this is 47:

why the computer isn't behaving like it should, i don’t know...

maybe i should just play it?

it's gotta be a quantization thing, it's just that i don't think the version of cubase i'm using can count this precisely. oddly, this windows 95 program i'm still using - noteworthy composer - doesn't have any problem with it.

i'll figure something out. but if it doesn't come down to finding the right setting to tweak, it may have to be pretty odd.

maybe i should register after almost twenty years?

nah....

it was shareware, dammit! i doubt a crack even exists....

honestly: it's way better than finale or sibelius or the rest. just a very simple, clean ui. it can't do anything fancy. but it's keyboard oriented, rather than mouse oriented, so it's much faster for geeks. when they sat down to write those other programs, they seemed to assume they were writing them for balding music teachers that used aol and needed simple point and click uis...

ah, aol. i miss it, sometimes.

ironically, i may have to get one of the newer scorewriters on here for this, if i can't get cubase to read it. i *think* some of the newer ones take vstis.

reflections (original soundblaster mix)

this is the 2003 version, which is special due to the greater focus in the mix on the skittery choir parts.

written and recorded in early 2003. transcribed, slightly rearranged, remixed repeatedly and re-rendered repeatedly over may, 2015. this render from may 7, 2015.

reflections (punk sonatina mix)

this is the original program, for piano, synth and strings. it has a more minimal feel.

written and recorded in early 2003. this render is from 2003.

reflections (windows mix)

the windows xp software synth rendered this rather differently than the old soundblaster, which just gives it a different flavour. of specific note is the guitar section at the end, which comes out sounding bowed.

written and recorded in early 2003. transcribed, slightly rearranged, remixed repeatedly and re-rendered repeatedly over may, 2015. this render from may 7, 2015.

13/116 = 11%.

that's how many front page views have officially counted over the last two days. the other 89% did not meet some kind of youtube condition. i'm able to get more reliable stats on this video, because the count is under 300 - so it increments immediately, and then the scripts "confirm" the hits after.

i'm not here to argue about conditions. it's quite obvious that these hits "should count". i'm here to point out how grossly inaccurate the view counts really are.

i've been through this in this space before: i don't care about hit counts. youtube is not a marketplace, it's an advertising area. i seek to maximize sales, not to correctly enumerate advertising reach.

it's just that it would help if i could correctly enumerate advertising reach.

89% is not a minor error to be written off or otherwise ignored. the stats are completely useless.

and, i still don't know why ~60,000 views on this page disappear and reappear - although i do expect them to come back any day, now. before i get to 300,000, anyways, so i can get the snapshot. thanks.

i'm not the one going on about the sanctity of the metrics. i'm just pointing out that they're basically worthless.

with 42 finally done, 43 on hold and 44 decided upon, i had to take a moment to pause for 45 before i moved to 46 as i wasn't going to look back a second time. i uploaded it the other day, as it was left in 2002. but was it really done?

i run this page as a journal, not a marketing site. facebook is useless for marketing. this needs a journal entry to explain what i'm thinking. for historical reasons.....

i claimed that i couldn't figure out where to go with this, but it's a slight fib. it's more that i came to dislike it as i was recording it. it struck me as cheesy and goofy; i just abandoned it, and then avoided it. all these years later, and with a little hindsight, those concerns are less relevant to me. i mean, i agree with my twelve year-ago self: this is cheesy. and goofy. but that's cool with me, at this point.

so, what was i going to do with this? well, i had vocals in mind, and i think i wrote them down, but they seem to have evaporated into nowhere. i don't remember them now and i'm not going to make up new ones. besides that, i was mostly just going to fill up the "chorus" with extra electric guitar parts.

listening to it today, i feel that adding electric guitar riffs into the track would in some ways be obvious but would ultimately not be beneficial for the following reasons:

1) the spectrum is already saturated. adding guitars would necessarily blunt the attack of the bass, drums or both - and i sort of like them how they are. one way to work with this is to saturate the guitars (perhaps by vocoding them into a synth), but thought experiments on the point presented the existing minimalist structure as preferable.

2) for the second chorus, it would create a fake crescendo that would be flat out trite. with the rising breakbeats, i'd have no way out of it. and, it would be reducing the track to some kind of parody.

the result remains frustrating. it's not done, but i've concluded that finishing it is impossible without ruining it. it really has no future but stasis.

so, i've acknowledged as much, left it is a download only outtake release and am moving on.

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/ostrich

that ended up taking two days rather than one but i am now ready to wrap up in that blanket and work through from 45-55 over roughly the next week. expect relatively frequent uploads.

at the end of it, i expect my throat to be in better shape, and i should be able to take a shot at finishing 43.

it's basically going to have to wait until my throat is good enough for it.

ugh. it's going to get ugly down here when the humidity picks up. i'm going to drive the temperature down here up to 35, and hope he keels over.

it's may 5th - a good seven weeks before summer. the high today is 12 degrees, with a cool wind from the north. it's gloomy and overcast. it's a cold, yucky day. and, yet the air conditioner is on upstairs, seemingly set to around 10.

the result is that i have the heat set to 25, i'm wearing two sweaters and yet i'm still cold.

i've been trying to understand how the thermostat can say 25 degrees, and yet i'm shivering. it has to just be what a/c units do to the air. they suck all the good parts out, leaving the no good parts. the thermostat might say something, but it doesn't reflect the actual air quality. i mean, there's a difference between 25 with a cool wind, 25 with humidity and 25 with a dry, bright sun, right? the thermostat says the same thing in all cases, but it can run the spectrum from 'need a sweater' to 'sweating profusely'.

air conditioners are a special kind of evil in what they do to the air, though. they'd steal the oxygen right out of it if they could - vampires. you get one of these units running, and there's just nothing good left in what you're living in.

the frustrating thing is that it's actually too cold outside to open the window. i have no option but to crank the heat.

obligatory "influential on lead track post"...

i'm trying to remember what i was driven by at the time, and the truth is that i was just mostly playing with the gear. all i'm really coming up with is some early 90s industrial music. it's about the time i was starting to get big into coil and skinny puppy. but, in the sense that it was an influence it was more in the horizons-expanding sense. listening to records like this one legitimized the idea of splicing samples together in weird ways.

(relevant tracks: skinny puppy have been a dominant influence on material i recorded after 1997.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_VmkLKkRgw

obligatory "influential on lead track post"...

when i started playing with samples in late 97, i was told by some older music fans that negativland is worth checking out. i spent quite a bit of time sorting through mp3s downloaded via ftp and didn't really find anything i could seriously relate to. it was very influential on me in an aesthetic sense though - it legitimized the idea i had of splicing samples together in weird ways.

(relevant tracks: inrisampled, eat my fuck, most of the connecting sections in the 1997/1998 material)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6gPSSYxex0

obligatory "influential on lead track post"...

i'm trying to remember what i was driven by at the time, and the truth is that i was just mostly playing with the gear. all i'm really coming up with is some early 90s industrial music. it's about the time i was starting to get big into coil and skinny puppy. but, in the sense that it was an influence it was more in the horizons-expanding sense. listening to records like this one legitimized the idea of splicing samples together in weird ways.

(relevant tracks: inrisampled, eat my fuck, most of the connecting sections in the 1997/1998 material)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzqsVbFs5fc

odsp drug coverage / transgender medication not covered

hi...

i'm contacting you about the issue of hormones being covered under the odsp drug benefits. whether i agree with the reasons or not (cosmetic, not medical), i understand why that this has not traditionally been covered. and i understand that it's something that is probably still a little touchy in certain circles. however, i think the current liberal majority is the type of government that is likely to throw off certain stigmas attached to the issue, that it will probably even generate broad public support, and it's something progressive forces should consequently be taking the opportunity to move a little on. you are my mp, so i'm approaching you as a first point of contact.

i've been taking hormones for years, and have been able to cover the cost for one of three drugs while the province covers the cost of the other two. i've interpreted this as "it could be worse", but the price just went up a lot and it's provided me with an incentive to try and get it covered. i understand that there's a procedure to go through to ask for an exception, but i think it really just ought to be changed altogether.

the three drugs are a progesterone, an estrogen and a testosterone blocker. the province covers the testosterone blocker because it's used to treat men that have difficulties with sexual impulses - rapists and child molesters. it covers the progesterone because it can be used as a menopause treatment. further, it will cover some types of estrogen that are used in birth control, but the doses are far too low to be useful to me.

should i really have to rely on a legal loophole for sex offenders when i have a diagnosed medical condition, and the prescription i need is approved for other uses? this condition is deeply intertwined with mental health issues. it's generally consistent in the canadian legal framework to ensure access to this kind of thing, when it intersects with issues of well being. i know i'm on the right side with this.

again: i understand why this would have been difficult twenty years ago. but, i think the society has matured enough around this issue that this medication should be interpreted by odsp as medically necessary, and consequently covered under the circumstances of my diagnosis - rather than the loophole i'm currently forced to accept. and, i think the current government provides an opportunity to move on this.

jessica

record #6

hello...

as i mentioned before, if you've given me your address, which i never asked for, you must be pleading with me to send you updates. i must respectfully oblige.

my sixth lp released the other day. this is a major release of 2002 material, and the portal out of my second period.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj-2

i also completed a double ep single last week which is of special interest in terms of it's complexity. you don't hear the phrase "guitar concerto remix" very often.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/untitled

two large compilation records will also release in the next 10-14 days.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/thru
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/ambient-works

the next major release will be the seventh record, which is already completed and should be sequenced and released by june.

j

record #6

i was hoping to have this done by the beginning of the year, but i got very caught up in one of the tracks, which took me nearly five months to work through.

this is the 6th record:
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj-2

this disc takes me up to the end of 2002. it requires headphones, preferably not cheap ones. these are thick mixes. it's number 44. it's built on a succession of singles: 29, 35, 36, 37, 42 and 43.

the 42 single is the one that took me five months, and takes that particular track in every direction possible, including the form of a guitar concerto.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/untitled

also in this space exists the grand total of rabit is wolf material, which left two lps (34, 38), an acoustic demo (40) and five singles (30, 35, 36, 37, 43). the sixth lp is largely a reclamation of rabit material as instrumental music.

the other thing that exists in this space is the first few noise lps, which will form the basis of my seventh record, which should be done by the beginning of the summer at the absolute latest. two of these are short eps of harsh noise (32, 41) while the other is a systemic workthrough of what i call my fourth symphony (39).

45, 46 and 49 lean forward into the next period. 47 & 48 are electronic music focused compilations of the first 45 records, based on the ideas of midi music and ambient music, respectively. they will appear within the next week.

as before, the bandcamp site is the preferable site for all purposes. however, here is a back door to the mp3 archive. again: please do not share this link.

(link removed)

j