vegetable instruments of course

we're still alive, and making vegetable instruments.

A video from Pop Montreal 2007!

This is old news, but I just noticed that it was uploaded on Youtube... so here it is:

HOT HOT GOLD

Marilis took some pictures of my paintings and mobiles:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/marilis/

Jake E. Lee shreds

"With Ozzy in the background spicing things up.."

Gamelan!

Bali. Has. Amazing. Music.

a free halloween treat mp3 EP!

I've spent the last few weeks producing this hallowe'en EP with some friends.

You can download the songs here (right click, save as...):

Random Creature Generator "Its hallowe'en"
Mussaver "Momma Frankenstein"
Elliot Maude "R.R.Hood"

The credits are as follows:

Random Creature Generator (Me, Tyler) - It's Hallowe'en (Featuring Ruby, Mussaver and Dishwasher)

Mussaver (Telefauna's own Katherine Peacock) - Momma Frankenstein (featuring Ruby and Random Creature Generator)

and

Elliot Maude - R.R.Hood (featuring Random Creature Generator, Ruby, and a barely audible Dishwasher)

Go check out Mussaver's myspace too!

Please share these mp3s.

Happy Hallowe'en!

The world's most comprehensive private music library shut down

Users of popular, membership-only music Torrent-tracker website OiNK.CD were met with a heart-breaking, if not threatening front-page today:



Luckily I had just finished downloading some rare Raymond Scott and Edgar Varese that I probably won't ever be able to find elsewhere.

We had actually pre-released some of our own material on OiNK, simply because it was a good way to get people to hear our songs (Our Under the Underground Water/Bamboo Shoot single is still available for free here.

This is a huge blow to independent artists, who rely on services like this to popularize their music, and it is up to debate as to whether or not it will harm or hinder the Major Label's sales (I know that the threat of being sued certainly doesn't turn me on).

But this was also probably one of the largest, and most comprehensive, collections of the world's recorded music to have ever existed. Shouldn't a website like OiNK be applauded for collecting so thorough a catalog of recorded material?

For further reading:

Torrentfreak.com has a good, informative article on the subject:
http://torrentfreak.com/oink-investigation-seeks-identities-and-activities-of-users-071023/

DJ Rupture has an interesting and honest take on the fall of OiNK. He is aware of the economic problem for artists, but even more aware of the benefits to fans and lovers of music:
http://www.negrophonic.com/2007/defending-the-pig-oink-croaks

A much less balanced point of view comes from the official IFPI (The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) website. They attempt to paint OiNK users as theives and criminals by misleading, and sometimes outright lying:
http://www.ifpi.org/content/section_news/20071023.html