ACK Studio photos !!

ACK Studio - Designed by Trác Ngọc Lĩnh

Photos by Anh Nguyễn

Lại 1 lần vất vả

Hôm thứ Hai tuần trước (24/05/2010) khi bắt chuyến tàu cánh ngầm cuối cùng trong ngày đua về SG để hôm sau bay show Tiger ở ĐN thì tớ bị 1 cú đầy hoang mang.

Sáng đi sớm xuống VTàu, chiều may mắn dàn xếp trót lọt công việc + công tác để đi đủ mấy show tuần rồi, tớ leo lên được tàu cánh ngầm là lả người luôn, mơ màng dù thấy sóng gió bắt đầu mạnh lên...

Vừa đi được 15min, nghĩa là half way giữa Vũng Tàu và cửa biển Cần Giờ, sóng khá mạnh, làm tàu chồm lên chồm xuống như bửa củi...

Rồi rầm 1 phát, nước biển ùa vào như lũ. Mọi người hốt hoảng bật dậy, tớ vớ ngay áo phao, vừa tròng vào vừa quan sát những người ở khoang trên chạy xuống, đồng thời dòm luôn mấy cái cửa nẻo, phòng trường hợp không thể chen chúc ở 2 cái cửa chính.

Tàu vẫn chòng chành rất mạnh.

Trong số đám người ướt sũng chạy xuống có 2 cô khoai Tây, bộ dạng khá bình tĩnh. Còn mấy nhân khoai Lang thì hốt hoảng ra mặt. Tình hình như thế có nghĩa là không nghiêm trọng lắm. Thật ra thì với kinh nghiệm đã từng học lớp thoát hiểm trên biển (Survival at sea) thì tớ không ngại tắm biển, nhưng chỉ tiếc nhất là cái harddisk chứa dữ liệu của công ty, và dĩ nhiên là cả gia tài FX, plugins, soft làm phòng thu mà tớ tích cóp được bấy lâu... Còn máy móc thì thôi, con kiến sao kiện nổi củ khoai :|

Tàu lắc mạnh quá, tớ bắt đầu mệt vì say sóng và tập trung theo dõi tình hình. Cô gái ngồi cạnh run lẩy bậy, mếu máo bấm điện thoại sao đó không được, quay qua xin mượn điện thoại tớ để khóc lóc với ai đó... Mãi sau mới biết là run quá không bấm được, nên sau khi êm êm rồi thì cô í lại móc điện thoại ra sms bình thường.

Tình hình loạn cả lên. Nhiều người la lối đòi quay đầu lại bến. Có vài người say sóng quá chịu không nổi phun tại chỗ. Có bà nọ thì điện thoại cho ai đó, bảo nó đến làm dữ ban quản lý tàu, chửi rủa nhặng xị. Thật ra thì phàm là tàu bè trên biển đều phải nổ máy mà tiến, cắt ngang sóng mà đi, chứ tắt máy dừng thì sóng oánh một hồi là nát bét. Thủy thủ và phục vụ tàu biết nên vẫn bình tĩnh cho t

àu đi, mặc sự sợ hãi của hành khách. Tớ là tớ thấy tình hình ỏm tỏi như thế nên đành thôi, có nói cũng chỉ rối thêm.

Đang hoang mang như thế, thì có tiếng la hốt hoảng: Chập điện!! Cháy!! cháy!! phía cuối tàu. Tớ phắn 2 chân ngay lên ghế nhìn ra sau. Thì ra có cái ổ cắm vớ vẩn cắm cái quạt tường đặt dưới sàn, tàu dốc ra sau nên nước tràn vào bốc khói khét lẹt. Sau đó chính cái ổ cắm đó lại được dùng để kết nối hệ thống bơm nước trong tàu ra ngoài cực kỳ hiện đại (Bilge pump). Tay thủy thủ nhanh trí giật phắt cái ổ ra trước khi nó cháy to.

Cố gắng chịu đựng sóng biển thêm 15min thì tàu vào cửa biển, êm hơn. Mọi người bình tĩnh dần, tớ mon men lên khoang trên chụp hình và tám với mấy ông cũng bà Tám xí xọn làm vài pô ảnh kỷ niệm. Sau đó thì tớ chập chờn thiếp đi một chút cho đến khi về đến bến Bạch Đằng.

Bên mũi phải:

Bên mũi trái:

Khoang giữa:

Đây là hệ thống bơm nước khẩn cấp cực kỳ hiện đại:

Trong tình huống này, nhiều người khó giữ được bình tĩnh, la ó thủy thủ đoàn mà quên đi sự an toàn cho bản thân mình. Có gì đi nữa thì nên bình tĩnh trang bị cho mình đã. Áo phao, cách ly khỏi nước nếu có chập điện, quan sát lối thoát hiểm v.v...

Trong thời buổi nhà nhà (nhà tàu, nhà xe, nhà ga...) tận dụng kiếm tiền triệt để dư lày thì sống chết đành phó mặc cho cái số. Tuy nhiên nếu có kiến thức cơ bản thì vẫn hơn. Tàu cánh ngầm có 03 hãng, chia nhau thế chân vạc (chứ không phải thế cạnh tranh) chặt chém hành khách. Mấy tàu này vốn là tàu chạy trên sông Volga, nhập lại từ các bác Nga ngố, không bảo trì, dơ bẩn, hay chết máy, chạy ẩu (đã từng cán đứt đôi người đi ghe qua sông). Vui nhất là có 2 bác lớn tuổi, ngồi im thin thít từ đầu đến cuối, sau té ra là lần đầu dưới quê ra Vũng Tàu thăm cháu về, chẳng may gặp hạn ngay đúng chuyến đầu mặt xanh như bẹ chuối, bấu chặt tay ghế mà chịu trận.

Thôi thì thêm 1 lần hú vía, sau này có việc cần (chạy sô chẳng hạn) cũng vẫn phải "qua sông lụy đò".

Chúc mấy bẹn may mắn không gặp chuyện trắc trở như tớ.

Nice day.

Wanna have fun with playing music? Get ready to cope with this.

Got a band and painfully keeping it alive among daily shits?

Or

Wanna form a band and have fun?

Read this and think twice :)

I collected from The Compressor blog - not mine. This situation happens all the time. Sad truth.

_____________________________

The Compressor is on a Mission From God

Jake: We’ll put the band back together, do a few gigs, we get some bread. Bang! Five thousand bucks.

Elwood: Yeah, well, getting the band back together might not be that easy.
Jake: What’re you talking about?
Elwood: They split, they all took straight jobs.
Jake: Yeah so you know where they are. You said you were gonna keep in touch with them
Elwood: I got a coupla leads, a few phone numbers, but I mean, how many of them visited or even wrote you huh?
Jake: They’re not the kinda guys who write letters. You were outside, I was inside, you were s’posed to keep in touch with the band. I kept asking you if we were gonna play again.
Elwood: Well, what was I gonna do? Take away you’re only hope? Take away the very thing that kept you going in there? I took the liberty of bullshitting you, okay?
Jake: You lied to me.
Elwood: It wasn’t lies, it was just bullshit.

Occasionally, the Compressor will strap on a guitar and take a trip down memory lane. The band had originally existed in the 80’s but split up due to musical differences….the audience wanted to hear different music than ours! We had a few moments of glory, but generally we were crap…it was the gear you see…..

Recently, over a pint in a pub…and before I took up residence at Compressor Towers, we decided to reform the band. It wasn’t so much a mission from God…more of a mid life crisis combined with un-finished business. We had over the 20 years or so, done OK, which made it possible to acquire some relatively decent gear. However, as I started to spend the cash, it became apparent to me how much you needed to spend! And we were only a 3 piece!

A Mackie PA, a little 1604 desk, some in ear monitors, some SM58’s, some stands, a couple of guitars, some amps, a drum kit…more mics for the drum kit, some pedals, miles of cables and of course the obligatory sign! Oh and the lights and smoke machine and portable stage!

Then we began practising…so we needed a room….which cost even more money. Then the location we had a designated for our comeback gig demanded a cd demo in case we were crap….so I bought a small Pro Tools rig, an AD converter and started tracking the band. We lived quite a long way from each other…and we had jobs. Which meant it was weekends only….which meant wives and kids in tow…at mine as I had now converted my garage into a small studio with practise room and small control room. Wives and kids need looking after, which fell to her-in as I was busy in the studio.

Now how can I put this….the wives of the other two band members hadn’t quite grasped the magnitude of this event….it was rapidly becoming the biggest comeback since Lazarus…or Elvis. In their eyes, in terms of good ideas…it was right up there with ‘I know a short cut’ said by the Captain of the Titanic.

Which meant that after about 20 minutes of practising the wives and kids would come and see what was going on. Which meant that we would stop practising….and then it was lunch time. Over a few months we weren’t getting any better, so we started to extend the visits into sleep-overs to allow us more time in the studio….

Does anyone reading this have children? What is that all about? It took my mates an hour to unload the car just to stay a night….travel cots…bags…sterilizers….he even had a plastic duck that was a night-lite AND a tape recorder: ‘she won’t get to sleep unless she has ‘hush little baby’ playing’….this had become a nightmare.

We now had 8 extra every other Saturday night staying over…and being fed…and torching my house. Now I’m not tight, but you would think that an occasional bunch of flowers…a bottle of wine…a box of chocolates could be shoved under my wife’s nose as a thank you? Er….no….zero, blank, nought, nothing….which starts to grate. In fact it soon dawned on me that this had become MY band…MY idea…and they were doing me a favour by coming to practise!!!! Therefore, I should entertain them…and pay for everything… and the missus was getting highly pissed off…there is only so much…’Little Tommy…show Mrs Compressor what else you can do…’ a woman can take.

Meanwhile, back in the studio, I of course needed more plug-ins and outboard to make our brief recordings sound better…and a full HD system, and better monitors. A genius needs his equipment. They would track for a couple of hours, leaving me to comp and mix over the next two weeks, whilst working of course. The idea over a pint had become a second job. Anyway, the cd got made, the pub said yes and we booked the date.

Gig day….and we went to set up…having hired a van and an engineer…which fell to me of course as the other two band members couldn’t wire a mic! Sound check and we were away. The gig of course was amazing…it would have to be….and 250 people came to a pub that normally holds 15. The Landlord not only made a years revenue in one night (and that’s true!) he was so grateful he named his daughter after me….I know Compressor Jones doesn’t work does it.

The next day, after all of the clearing up, loading the van and getting everything back home, we sat and had a post-mortem.

‘Do you think we could go on tour?’ said the bass player. I actually choked. ‘You can’t even stay at my house without 3 sherpas and a caravan as long as this road. Your wife can’t give you more than 5 minutes without showing you what little f$@king Tommy has done in his potty! How the f**k are you going to go on tour you toss pot? And you..(I said to the drummer) you can’t even play. You haven’t bought me a drink in 6 months…instead you come to my house, eat my food, drink my wine, soil my sheets…stink out my bog with your smelly poohs…and don’t even say thank you. F*@k off the pair of you and take your spacco wives with you.’

So that was the end of the band…I had lost the plot…and had in the process lost the band.

Compressor’s thought for the week: anyone thinking of starting a band, think carefully.

Make sure you live near each other

Make sure everyone understands the commitment

Make sure you have the support of your partners

Make it an equal affair

Otherwise, one of you will have so much gear left…they’ll have to start a studio…which I did!

TTFN

The Compressor

An End and A New Beginning

I was so tired for a while. Didn't think about it recently. But when I look back, I wonder why how I survived after all.

As an electrical engineer, I faced too many troubles since the beginning of 2009. 02 generators suddenly broken down, burned out both stators and rotors, 01 other gen. failed after 03 non-working-years unexpectedly. And many motors of all kinds needed to be overhauled due to their mainternance time. All the technical details, drawings, standards to follow and take care of. The result was that I had to travel back and forth among Saigon, Hanoi, Vung Tau a lot. I went to Hanoi on business nearly once a month from Feb through Sep. At first it seemed interesting, but after sometimes, I was disappointed in my Hanoi musician friends' spirit. Without their leader, they almost lost their faith and seemed to give up music. Besides that, my business in Hanoi was not always smooth, dealing with and supervising the contractor were like playing games. It's hard to guide them to follow our company's Western standards. And a lot of paper works and payment receipts... Yep, works'll never end.

With Microwave, I achieved a big step with the 2nd album - "Time". The production phase was interesting and fun, but sometime it's a pressure to finish it on time. Lots of experiments, re-tracking and re-mixes to fit the sonic to every members' tastes. Yes, it's fun but it took more than 1 year already dudes. And I'm glad that it got some success recently :D In 2009, I was so crazy about musical gears, spent a lot to get 02 Mesa Boogie amps, a Paul Reed Smith Signature guitar, and a lot on my Protools studio gears. Have you ever heard of G.A.S.? Yep, the Gear-Aquisition-Syndrome hahaha :)) Now I need a lot of acoustic treatments to shape the studio room sound. But right now, I could start composing and producing again :D

And this year ends with 02 big events. One is my wedding, and the other is the sudden death of our oil rig's captain due to a block vein in his head. He was active and fun in the morning meeting, but passed out so fast in the early evening out there, in the middle of the sea. Both of these happened so fast. The wedding assigned a new role to me, and the captain death reminds me that life is unpredictable. We just got one chance to live, one chance to do what we want. So dudes, let's live up to the fullest!

I had no idea of what would happen in 2009. But now I could see some things to do in the next 2010 and I'll keep them to myself.

So see you guys in a Happy New Year! Best wishes to you and your family!

A.

- The K Project - Please spread out these infos to your friends dudes :)

- The K Project -

Recruiting members to form a new rock band in HCMC. Facebook Page

Specification:

- Main language: English.

- Style: Compose band own songs, and can cover some others.

- Genre: Alternative/ Rock/ Pop-rock/ Punk. (References: Paramore, Avril Lavigne, Kelly Clarkson, Taylor Swift, Daughtry, David Cook, Third Eye Blind, 3 Doors Down to name a few)

- Outlook: Contemporary, Clean and Professional.

General Requirements to all members:

- Located in Saigon.

- Love to create something new.

- Love to express yourself, your own feelings.

- Can arrange your own time to jam with the band, mostly on weekend.

- Has ability to play at least 01 instrument, no need to play very well, just can play for another to sing.

- Has experience in playing in a band, if you're new, it's still OK.

In details:

* Vocalist:

- Male or Female.

- Can cover some English songs that you can do your best. (This is required in audition)

- Wiliing to develope singing skill. (You'll receive DVDs and books on vocal training and be tested every weekend)

- MOST IMPORTANT: Can express your own ideas or opinions or feelings as texts.

* Drummer:

- Male only.

- Can cover some English songs that you can do your best no matter what genre they are. (This is required in audition)

- Willing to focus exercising on techniques and consistency.

- Has your own drums or drum pads to practice at home.

* Bassist:

- Male or Female.

- Can cover some English songs that you can do your best no matter what genre they are. (This is required in audition)

- Willing to focus exercising on techniques and consistency.

- Has your own bass guitar with/without FXs.

* Guitarist:

- Male only.

- Can cover WELL some English songs that you can do your best especially alternative and rock. (This is required in audition)

- Has basic knowledge on guitar sounds and FXs according to each genre.

- Has your own playing / sound taste. This will affect strongly to the band's voice and genre.

- Has your own guitar and FX.

- MOST IMPORTANT: Can express your own ideas or opinions or feelings as texts.

* Keyboard or 2nd guitarist:

- Male or Female.

- Can cover some English songs that you can do your best. (This is required in audition)

- Has your own instrument.

Send your demos or link to mp3 demos or spread out these infos to your friends to start a new chance.

Thank you.

Recovering

I always know that each time I had trouble with my DAW, when I had to re-install everything, I'd get a powerful system again, with the best of the best toys to suit my work flow.

This time I still get some little good news upon the rest, that I've just lost the OS and some games, some "movies" :"> . All the projects' data are still safe in the other external HD, including the new Microwave Time album.

The previous time was not as lucky. Everything related to Microwave debut album "Escape" was totally destroyed. I still keep that harddisk, hope that someday somebody would rescue it, and I definitely do some remix and remaster things.

2 big shows coming this weekend. Haaa, so busy!

A Walk On The Clouds

Another video of mine. On a flight back to life by a chopper. Enjoy :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dg8G_-IYQDI

(seems the player couldn't fit to this blog page. Please view it on Youtube by that link above. Thanks :D )

Another Microwave Lockscreen for your iPhone!!!!

Microwave 2009 Poster lockscreen theme for iPhone !!! Made by ACK hehe

Instructions: (Your iPhone must have Winterboard app. installed from Cydia first)

1. Download the new theme files to your computer. Here the links:
http://rapidshare.com/files/276736191/MW_Slider.theme.zip
http://rapidshare.com/files/281220994/MW_Poster_Lockscreen.theme.zip


2. Use DiskAid or PhoneView application to access your iPhone disk.
3. Copy these 2 theme files into this folder:

/private/var/stash/Themes.XXXXX/

(note: XXXXX is your phone folder characters, this maybe different from mine so I made it XXXXX)

4. Open Winterboard, uncheck any lockscreen and slider themes, then check MW Poster Lockscreen and MW Slider themes.
5. Exit to Home and wait for the phone to respring then enjoy !

Voila !!!!

Why mp3s sound bad, and how to hear it

I hate mp3, and this post will tell you why.

DO NOT read this post if you have a large collection of mp3s, enjoy listening to them and can’t hear any problems with them, because it’ll ruin them for you !

There’s been plenty written on how mp3 works, and why lossy compression sounds worse than uncompressed audio in general. My aim here is to demonstrate how mp3 sounds bad, for all the people who keep telling me there’s no difference.

I’m going to give you clear guidelines and examples on what to listen for and the negative effects of mp3, but there’s no going back - once you can hear the problems, you’ll never stop hearing them.

This isn’t limited to audiophiles, or “golden ears”, by the way - in my opinion anyone can hear this stuff, with a few pointers.

So seriously, unless you’re prepared to start using FLAC or AAC (which means buying an iPod) - stop reading now !

Still here ? Good.

First, I need to make this clear - I have nothing against lossy audio or data compression in itself - I do most of my casual listening on an iPod, using 128kbps AAC files - they sound fine. Not as good as the original CDs, obviously, but OK. And yes, I’m well aware that AAC is just a more advanced version of mp3. But the fact is that mp3 has fundamental limitations - even at higher bitrates.

Next - I’m also a pragmatist. mp3 is a temporary phenomenon, just like AM radio, cassettes and CDs. In the long run, none of those have killed music, and neither will mp3, or lossy compression in general. So, why the rant ?

Because people keep saying mp3 sounds great, or “indistinguishable from CD” and it’s just not true.

mp3 isn’t good enough

It doesn’t matter what encoder you use, it doesn’t matter what settings you use or what pre-processing you apply - mp3 just doesn’t cut it. AAC and later, more sophisticated encoders use more advanced encoding methods, and sound better to varying degrees, but mp3 just FAILs.

How does it fail ? That depends a little on the encoder being used, but some of my own pet hates include:

mp3 sizzle - the artificial, unnatural swirling metallic noises that sound like someone’s added chime bars to everything, or there’s a mosquito buzzing in your ear. Some people actually say we prefer these noises in mp3s - I say bullshizzle !
Added distortion - Yet another side effect of the so-called Loudness Wars. mp3 encoders rarely include any headroom for the encoding process itself, so the added processing pushes the music even further over the limits, generating inter-sample peaks and adding even more distortion in the process
Flat, two-dimensional sound mp3 works by throwing away musical information that we supposedly can’t hear - up to 90% of the original information, at 128kbps. That means all the subtle, delicate stuff, like ambience, space and realism. So a lush, three-dimension original is reduced to a flat, cardboard replica of itself
Mushiness All but the very best mp3 encodes just sound fuzzy, muddled and - well, mushy !


Hear for yourself

Don’t take my word for it - here are some examples. First, a truly nasty 128kbps mp3 example, from a Deep Purple live album I mixed a while back:

(Before anyone jumps on me, I’ve heard even a 256 kbps mp3s sounding like this - I’ve just used a low quality version to make the point.)

If that doesn’t sound too bad to you at first, try this - I’ve filtered the file to highlight the high frequencies. You can hear the problems most clearly when the vocals start:

Some people describe this effect as “sizzle”, or “swirlies”. It’s not just that I’ve removed all the bass, what I’m pointing out is the unatural bubbling, twinkling “chime-bar” type sound, or as my friend and fellow mastering engineer Nick Watson once called it, the “flocks of tweeting ultrasonic birdies”. It also reminds me of someone crinkling up tin foil !

Once you’ve picked it out, listen the first version again. Doesn’t sound so nice now, does it ? Can you ignore the swirlies, now you know they are there ?

Now download and listen to the original file:

‘Talk About Love - Excerpt’ - 5 MB WAV file

Listen to the clarity, punch, and bite of the WAV, compared to the swirly, soggy mess of an mp3. Which one do you prefer ?

The loss of depth, richness and three-dimensionality is more subtle side-effect, but just as unfortunate. Here’s a snippet of a recording I did for the brilliant Hans Koller, featuring Christine Tobin on vocals:

(This is a much better mp3 encode, with far fewer heinous swirlies. But still…)

Here’s the WAV version:

‘The Great Bear And The Small - Excerpt’ - 11 MB WAV File

Don’t expect the difference here to leap out at you straight away, it’s more a case of feeling it - listen to the swirls of the harp from 30 seconds in, listen to the piano and Christine’s voice - on the wav file, there’s a warmth, and a depth, and a sparkle that in the mp3 has just gone.

Listen to the wav several times over, then switch to the mp3. Do you honestly feel it sounds as good ? The mp3 is OK, but it’s just… meh. I’m not drawn in, my attention wanders, it doesn’t move me.

Something essential has been lost, and you can’t get it back. And once you’ve heard that loss, even cranking the data-rate up doesn’t help. The only solution is a more advanced format, or lossless files.

Try listening to the mp3s in your music collection. Go back and compare them to the CDs you ripped them from.

…Sorry.

My comment: This is what I recognized long time ago. Since the day I started to listen to MP3 files in the 90s, I felt something wrong with them, but couldn't tell what is it. Till now, even there're some foreign producers can't listten to and don't accept the fact that there're differences between WAV and MP3, or 44.1kHz and 96kHz. That's why nowadays there's less and less high sonically quality music, as long as people keep listening to crappy music TV channels, or desktop speakers.

These days, it seems that quantity and pace are more demanded than quality in every aspects of life. People cannot make choice of what they want to listen or watch. The MEDIA industry is doing that for them. Feeding all the garbage day by day surrounding our senses.

Yup, we couldn't change anything, just try to survive and keep our own tastes. Try to keep it high, dudes ;)

How to add Microwave theme into your iPhone :D

Microwave "Time" album 2009 lockscreen theme for iPhone !!! Made by ACK hehe

Instructions: (Your iPhone must have Winterboard app. installed from Cydia first)

1. Download 2 theme files to your computer. Here the links:
http://rapidshare.com/files/276736191/MW_Slider.theme.zip
http://rapidshare.com/files/276735971/MW_Lockscreen.theme.zip

2. Use DiskAid or PhoneView application to access your iPhone disk.
3. Copy these 2 theme files into this folder:

/private/var/stash/Themes.XXXXX/

(note: XXXXX is your phone folder characters, this maybe different from mine so I made it XXXXX)

4. Open Winterboard, uncheck any lockscreen and slider themes, then check MW Lockscreen and MW Slider themes.
5. Exit to Home and wait for the phone to respring then enjoy !

Voila !!!!