Archive for September, 2009

Why should we wait for Copenhagen?

Wednesday, September 30th, 2009

Okay folks, you’re gonna have to bear with me here, this is going to be a bit of an opinionated post, and if as a result you’re gonna flame me, be sure to do it with biomass ;)

It’s now less than 68 days before the International Climate Conference in Copenhagen (COP15) starts and all over blogs and news there is a rising amount of expectations. Can we reach a deal? Can we get Obama to attend? Can we get China to cut their emissions? Isn’t it too late anyway? If you’re reading this, chances are there’s little you can do about any of those questions above.

Or is there?

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[Climate Week] Where are our leaders?

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

After a very promising first day, the second day was marked mostly with discussions from world leaders to (allegedly) kick start an agreement prior to the Copenhagen Summit in December. I’ll get back to that in a minute, but before a piece of news that caught my eye:

Airlines are set to cut their carbon emissions by 50% by 2050. That’s a long way to go 2050 isn’t it? Who’s to say what the industry will be like in 41 years? Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good initiative but it’s almost as if there is no room for research an development in the industry to come up with a revolutionary system that would allow planes (or whichever equivalent may be invented) to fly of purely green fuel. I’m a bit biased towards aviation I must say, the carbon footprint that a single return translatlantic flight slaps in your face compared to everything else is staggering. Sure planes are convenient and bizzarely way cheaper than they used to be (flying was always a luxury for businessmen until the advent of low cost airlines…) but I’ve always hoped for a better way to travel to one day come up. Zeppelins would be fun if they weren’t so slow ;)

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[Climate Week] The Ball is Rolling

Monday, September 21st, 2009

Well today was the first day of Climate Week. The event really centralises in New York City but with so much going on at the same time, this is turning out to be a global set of events. I’ll try to report as much of it as I can see, so far much of it is extremely encouraging and I hope the trend will continue.

The first thing to mention is of course the Global Climate wake up call, which is probably finished by now as 1pm has now come and gone on the far side of the USA. My wife and I took part in it on St Andrew’s Square in Edinburgh and I was pleased to see that it was not going to be 3 people and a baby but a good 30-odd people gathered holding their phones up in the air. Hundreds of people have sent pictures to Avaaz to show just how global the event was, from Australia to India, Mongolia, France and of course the UK. You can catch a glimpse of us on this photo, this photo and this photo. Unfortunately, it started to rain just as we were wrapping this up so I was unable to take photos myself.

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Asiaone talks Paul Gilbert & Mr Big

Friday, September 18th, 2009

It’s not an interview strictly speaking and is probably mostly interesting if you live in Singapore but it’s still an interesting article on one of the ways Mr Big changed Paul Gilbert’s career. Here’s an excerpt below:

Before joining Mr Big, Gilbert was the founder of heavy metal band Racer X, renowned for its chugging guitar riffs and fast solos.

Though Mr Big’s style of music is vastly different from Racer X’s, the versatile Gilbert did not have any difficulty adapting to sing-a-long pop rock anthems such as Just Take My Heart and To Be With You.

‘I enjoy many musical styles. In fact, I hardly notice the division between genres,’ he said.

‘Personally, I just like to play good songs with solid musicians and I feel very fortunate to have played with both bands (Racer X and Mr Big).

‘After playing a loud and fast track, playing a melodic, acoustic song sounds especially lovely in contrast.’

Mr Big is due to play in Singapore on 18 October at 8pm.

Joe Satriani tells how Hendrix changed his life

Friday, September 18th, 2009

Here’s a really interesting interview of Joe Satriani from Music Radar that reveals just how much Jimi Hendrix influenced his decision to become a guitar player.

It’s hard to imagine just how much of an influence the passing of such a great player could have on someone. I mean when I read Joe say at age 14:

Jimi Hendrix died today and I’m going to devote my life to playing the electric guitar

It says it all really. In my generation there’s only 3 tragedies among the great guitar players I can think of: Randy Rhoads, but I was 6 when he was killed and didn’t know of him until about 10 years later; Jason Becker, who is still alive but bound to a wheelchair unable to play the guitar yet with so much music in his mind still and Dimebag Darrell, but I never really was a big fan of his.

And I know Satch wasn’t the only one who was heavily influenced by Hendrix’s death, Paul Gilbert and Steve Vai also mention it as a special event in their musical life, but perhaps not to the same extent as Satch.

Yet, when I see the great music he offers now, you can’t help but think that a lot of good still came out of Hendrix’s passing and as sad as an event like this is in itself, it’s also something to be hopeful about that he could have so much influence in living as in dying.

So cheers Jimi, and cheers Joe, keep playing!

Global Climate Wake Up Call – Find your event

Tuesday, September 15th, 2009

On Monday 21 September it will be the Global Climate Wake Up Call, a woldwide event organised by the organisation Avaaz. The idea behind this is to once and for all have us, the common people, show our governments that we want action on tackling Climate Change and we want it NOW! It seems to me that for months now many governments have been coming up with targets, promised, plans but so far there has been very little action. This gives the impression that many politicians see Climate Change as a “NIMTOO” situation.

But Avaaz isn’t the only organisation behind this massive rally. (more…)

Not one but two Paul Gilbert Interviews

Monday, September 14th, 2009

Happy Monday and thanks to Jenn once again, there are no less than 2 brand new interviews with Paul Gilbert.

The first one is with Guitar Gear Heads and there’s a cool excerpt:

John: You have had a long career with Racer X, Mr. Big, as a solo artist and in other collaborations, such as G3. How would you say that your style varies between projects in terms of technique, approach and gear?

Paul: I’m pretty much the same guy no matter what kind of music I’m playing, but I do try to adapt to the song. So if it’s metal, I play something metally, if it’s got some blues elements, I’ll add some of that. I still learn a lot of cover songs just to keep expanding my vocabulary and get new ideas for chords and solo techniques.

(Be sure to check Jenn’s blog as well for lots of cool pictures ;) )

The second interview is with Metal Sucks again with a few interesting passages:

That’s awesome. Do you feel like you’ve gotten a second chance with Mr. Big, an opportunity to maybe improve things with which you’d been dissatisfied in the past?

One thing I was excited about was my own playing. I love what we did in the old days, but one of the ingredients of Mr. Big is the blues-rock sound. When I joined I was just coming out of Racer X, so I was very, very metal. I was able to adapt pretty quickly, but [since then] my vocabulary in the blues-rock idiom has expanded enormously. I’m excited to apply that to Mr. Big. I’ve got a lot more stuff that works in the style of the band.

What I don’t think I appreciated before, but really appreciate now, is the vocals. Eric’s always been great. But as for the background vocals, we just fell into them. Pat’s a great singer. Billy and I sing a lot. The three- and four-part harmonies that we do live are a blast! I feel singing is a healthy thing to do as a human being. Your body is the instrument and you’re actually resonating from the inside out. If I can rehearse with a band or just ride around singing in my car, I’m a much better balanced, happy individual than if I don’t sing. It keeps me sane as a human being, and there’s a lot of [singing] in Mr. Big. I’m really glad to have another opportunity to do that.

The following is interesting:

More recently, with all the clinics I’ve been doing, I made a conscious decision to never play with backing tracks again. [It comes] from seeing so many people sitting down and playing with backing tracks, [thereby] taking guitar playing in a direction I’d rather not see it go: the nerdy bedroom guitar player.

Why? Because that’s ME, the nerdy bedroom guitar player with no friends to play with :mrgreen:

Cheers Jenn :D