Digital Fugue - Random Thots

Aicha

Aicha

Outlandish - Three guys, of Moroccan, Hunduran and Pakistani descent. Based in Denmark. Now, how multicultural can you get? :o)
Anyway, their new single is a remake of Cheb Khaled's almost trance like brilliant song, Aicha. I used to listen to this song on and on and on when it hit the charts a couple of years back. Checkout Outlandish's MTV of Aicha (Real Player required).

Anyway, here's the lyrics to the original Aicha, in french;

Comme si je n'existais pas
Elle est passee a cote de moi,
Sans un regard, reine de Saba
J'ai dit: Aicha, prends tout est pour toi

Voici, les perles , les bijoux
Aussi l'or autour de ton cou
Les fruits bien murs au gout de miel
Ma vie, Aicha, si tu m'aimes

J'irai ou ton souffle nous mene,
dans les pays d'ivoire et d'ebene
J'effacerai tes larmes, tes peines,
rien n'est trop beau pour une si belle

Aicha, aicha, ecoute moi
Aicha, aicha, t'en vas pas
Aicha, aicha, regarde moi
Aicha, aicha, reponds moi

Je dirai les mots, les poemes
je jouerai les musiques du ciel
Je prendrai les rayons du soleil
pour eclairer tes yeux de reve

Aicha, aicha, ecoute moi
Aicha, aicha, t'en vas pas

Elle a dit garde tous tes tresors
Moi, je vaus mieux que tout ca
Des barreaux sont des barreaux memes en or,
Je veux les memes droits que toi
Du respect pour chaque jour
Moi, je ne veux que de l'amour

Comme si je n'existais pas
Elle est passee a cote de moi,
Sans un regard, reine de Saba
J'ai dit: Aicha, prends tout est pour toi

Aicha, aicha, ecoute moi
Aicha, aicha, ecoute moi
Aicha, aicha, t'en vas pas
Aicha, aicha, regarde moi
Aicha, aicha, reponds moi

Updates

Updates

Amir Yussof have released his digitally remastered first album, "Some of this is real". The album includes three bonus tracks from the ImagineX Jam Sessions.

Bush lies have moved, still being hosted under blogspot but the new URL is now http://bush-lies.blogspot.com/

Finally, you just gotta check this out. This is ultra hillarious. Go to www.pornolize.com. Dont worry you wont be greeted by obscene pop ups or visually stimulating images. Next type in a URL in the field provided. Could be anything. Say, www.cnn.com or www.thestar.com.my or www.whitehouse.gov or your favourite blog or even your company's website. Click the Submit button.

Happy Reading! :D

An Evening with Mozart

An Evening with Mozart

Last saturday evening I had the chance to catch a performance by the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra at the Dewan Philharmonic Petronas.
The program was all works by Wolgang Amadeus Mozart:

Concertone in C, K. 190 (186e)
Masonic Funeral Music, K. 477 (479a)
Serenade No. 7 in D, K. 250 (248b) "Haffner"

I missed the Concertante in C, having arrived just seconds after the they closed the hall. Intead of being frustrated, I was rather amused that the stint some how reminds me of Mozart being late for his performance to the Archbishop of Salzburg as seen in Amadeus. Of course in that scene, Mozart was happily rolling on the floor "serenading" Constanze Webber. I, on the other hand was stuck in Saturday's evening KL jam.

Anyway the performance was super. The Masonic Funeral was dark and at the same time elevated. It made the dimmed hall seemed darker.
After the intermission, music director and conductor Kees Bakels took the baton with a miraculous performance of the Haffner Serenade. Almost 60 minutes of pure non stop soothing sound!
Kjell-Arne Jorgensen was supposed to be the concertmaster, however that night the concertmaster was Marcus Gundermann. Nevertheless, Marcus played exceptionally well, the cadenzas flow beautifully and flawlessly from his violin. That was one of the best moments i had in the concert hall, since the late Yehudi Menuhin took the stage in 1999.
Bravo!

Earlier in the afternoon, I was window shopping at Low Yat Plaza. Yes, there are so many things to buy but so little money to spend. There are a few DVD stores operating secretly. I just got myself printer ink, a lousy game and two DVDs. As I was strolling down the shops, i noticed this old caucasian man. His wrinkles tells that he is in his mid to late 60s, but he is still fit and healthy. I looked at him as he walked pass through the shops checking out 3com's wireless APs and adapters. I could have sworn he was Intel's Andy Grove!

After that, I strolled down to Sg Wang Plaza to the friendly neigborhood CD store and got myself Cafe IbiZa and a two CD-lounge album. Excellent!

In the morning, i had breakfast with a few prominent Malaysian bloggers from the kotaraya group. It was fun meeting the bunch. Will certainly meet up with them again... errr did i hear clubbing next weekend...? Or was it paintball? Anyway, checkout the pictures from the Blog meet here and here. Summarized accounts of the meet can be found here.

Soothing sounds

Soothing sounds

I managed to buy two brilliant CDs. Hard to find but they're well worth it! If you think Buddha Bar is cool, wait till you check this one out!
One is Comfort Zone Volume 2, Compiled by Living Resources, Produced by r02, featuring tracks and mixes by Tosca, Zero7 and Chris Coco & Lenny from Ibiza. The other was a double CD Ambient Lounge Volume 5, by the guys who cameout with Cafe-Ibiza.

Plug:
Aisehman
Ramblings of an Insane Ox

F�te de la Musique

F�te de la Musique

Today is F�te de la Musique!
Here's the schedule

Fête de la Musique Thanks

Fête de la Musique

Thanks to the French, the Fête de la Musique or Festival of Music will be held all over the world this coming June 21st and it will be the anticipated summer event of the year. In Malaysia, the Fête de la Musique will be held at Bintang Walk in KL and Gurney Plaza Shopping Complex in Penang from 2pm to midnight.
Ample time have been given, don't say I didn't warn you. See you there! :)

MIDI with a vengence

MIDI with a vengence

In the late 80s and early 90s, computers comes with limited beeps. At different frequencies, these beeps evolved into "music", similar to mobile phone ringtones. Then Adlib and Creative came out with 8 bit sound cards that can play digitized sounds. .WAV files were created, then .AU and MP3s.
Among the amatures, wav samples were converted to smaller samples and arranged together thus came MOD files followed by other standards, .IT, .XM etc, depending on the sample editors. These are pure digital music not digitized music.

MAZ-Sound offers a plethora of trackers, encoders and samples for you to play with. Armed with your winamp, you can also checkout some cool tunes crreated by MOD freaks. The Mod Archive is packed withover 10Gig worth of Mod files. Another good source of mod can be found at Modplug.

On a different plane, MIDI seemed to be playing its own game, serenading its own elite, MIDI evangelist. Music professional flirted with it... and still do. I used to have a field time fooling around with cakewalk. Somehow rather the popularity of MIDI seemed to be going down during the mid 90s. Some argues that MIDI sounds too synthesized. MIDI enthusiast came out with wave table devices to support a more natural sound to instrument samples. But that didnt really please the public.

The real push for MIDI came with the introduction of polyphonic ringtones. Now MIDI files are a gem on its own. Obviously people are offering it left right and centre. A couple of years back, MIDI files were available in abundance for free. Now, a professionally created MIDI song is going out at about USD 5.00 per download.

Late Lounge

Late Lounge

Its a long weekend, with the May Day holiday, I took friday off. send the car for service, and hang out at Whitewall Media splashing out cool tunes from the synthetizer/vocalizer.
Big J passed me some ultra cool CDs. I got Saint-Germain des Pres Cafe III, Miguel Miggs, Hotel Costes Suite, Hotel Costes III and the best, Zero 7.

Now, Im going to dim the lights down, light some candles, roll a joint or have a nice cigar and chill out while listening to endless lounge/acid jazz. This is going to be a blissful weekend!

Web Launch Party

Web Launch Party

Amir Yussof will be having a web launch party this coming 9th May. Check it out.

Immortal Beloved

Here's a brilliant song by Evanescence. I'd like to dedicate this song to the one who took a piece of my heart and went away. wherever you are.

My Immortal - Evanescence
i'm so tired of being here
suppressed by all of my childish fears
and if you have to leave
i wish that you would just leave
because your presence still lingers here
and it won't leave me alone

these wounds won't seem to heal
this pain is just too real
there's just too much that time cannot erase

when you cried i'd wipe away all of your tears
when you'd scream i'd fight away all of your fears
and i've held your hand through all of these years
but you still have all of me

you used to captivate me
by your resonating light
but now i'm bound by the life you left behind
your face it haunts my once pleasant dreams
your voice it chased away all the sanity in me

i've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone
but though you're still with me
i've been alone all along