Animal Sounds In Different Languages

Derek Abbott's Animal Noise Page is the world's biggest multilingual list of the words people use to mimic the sounds of animals.

Quack-Project takes it a step further. The software is full of sounds of children making animal noises in different languages. You drag icons of the animals to an area that has an axis for time and another for pitch so you can create mini-songs with the kids' animal sounds. You can download a limited demo [only ducks] or buy the full version as a CD-ROM. There's also a free archive online of all the mp3 files.

JazzMutant Lemur V2 Firmware

JazzMutant has announced the upcoming release of a new Version 2 firmware for their Lemur multitouch-screen controller.

New features:

• Breakpoint object : offers total control of synthesiser or sampler envelopes with a multi-segment envelope editor to allow you to really get inside a sound. Rather than assigning knobs to these sound shapers, jump right in and directly tweak an on-screen representation of the envelope.

• Gesture object : this emulates a trackpad control with advanced gesture recognition and has three novel ways to interact with your sound. You can send different control messages to your computer simply by pinching, rotating or tracing your fingers.

• Alias : now you can easily produce a copy or alias of a controller object that sends exactly the same information to your computer. This takes up less memory and is much less time consuming than setting up a new object with identical characteristics. Manipulating the original or its doppelganger can now control the same computer parameters but from different interface screens. Moving one will automatically update its "mirror image".

• Tabbed Container : containers are virtual panels that contain a selection of controls. Tabbed containers allow you to change the contents of this panel at the tap of a finger. This feature allows you to greatly improve interface layouts.
Mouse and keyboard control : now Lemur's objects can be used to remotely control the mouse cursor or computer keyboard.

• Workflow improvements : setting up your custom performance interface is a breeze with the improved and new-look Jazzeditor. Workflow improvements include the ability to simply drag objects from the new palette into the work area – any custom-made modules from your library will also appear here. It's now no longer necessary to select a MIDI or OSC target for each parameter within an object – just choose a "parent" target and you're done. There's also a new 'colour chooser' to make your interfaces visually distinctive.

• Extended scripting abilities : a new multi-line script pane opens up a whole new world of possibilities. You can now modify the physical behaviour, appearance or size of an object in real time. Add a ball to a Multiball object by touching a pad, or zoom in on a fader for ultimate precision. These scripts can act locally or be received from the computer. For Ableton users that means it is now possible to receive clip names and colours and display them on the Lemur. Any changes in your Live set are automatically reflected on the Lemur.

The public beta of the v2 firmware update will launched at AES (October 3rd to 5th) with the full version released Q4 2008. The full update will be free.

I got to check out the Lemur at the Ableton Live User Group meeting at SAE in LA last week. It's pretty awesome. I want one!

via macmusic.org

Jean Shin Sound Wave

Jean Shin's "Sound Wave" is a wave-shaped sculpture made of melted vinyl records. Catch the wave now on display in the new home of New York's Museum of Arts and Design.

Photo: Hiroko Masuike [NYT] via boing boing

Moment Factory NIN Stage Show

Moment Factory is the Montreal-based team of filmmakers, art directors, producers, designers, animators, programmers and technicians who worked with Trent Reznor, art director Rob Sheridan and stage/lighting designer Roy Bennett on the interactive stage show for the current Nine Inch Nails Light in the Sky tour.



More info: wired

littleBits

littleBits intro from ayah bdeir:

littleBits is an opensource library of discrete electronic components pre-assembled in tiny circuit boards. Just as Legos allow you to create complex structures with very little engineering knowledge, littleBits are simple, intuitive, space-sensitive blocks that make prototyping with sophisticated electronics a matter of snapping small magnets together. With a growing number of available modules, littleBits aims to move electronics from late stages of the design process to its earliest ones, and from the hands of experts, to those of artists, makers and designers.
ayahbdeir.com/littleBits

a project by Ayah Bdeir (www.ayahbdeir.com) and Smart Design
(www.smartdesignworldwide.com)

with the support of: Eyebeam Open Lab (www.eyebeam.org)

design and implementation: Ayah Bdeir and Jeff Hoefs

many thanks: Jeff Sturges

Future littleBits modules include audio record and playback, mp3 player, microphone, speaker, radio, amplifier and all kinds of crazy controllers. Look out for littleBits instruments coming soon.

Binary Beat + 3^n Beat

Niklas Roy, one of the inventors of the International Dance Party, created these videos as experiments in the music of numeral systems.

In the Binary Beat video above, a sequencer counts from 0 to 255 in binary [00000000 to 11111111]. Each bit has a sound sample attached to it, so when a digit is changed from 0 to 1, a sound is played: hihat, snare, kick, handcuff, organ or beep.



The next video, 3^n Beat, counts up from 0 to 728 in the ternary [base-3] numeral system. A sound plays when each trit [trinary digit] changes from a 1 to a 2.

Light-Paint Piano Player

Light-Paint Piano Player from Ryan Cashman:

"Animated light paintings of a little piano player performing. Filmed at night with the lovely I-5 and San Diego skyline in the background. I would like to thank everyone for the fantastic feedback I have received lately. To answer a few questions, I wrote the music and recorded it first. The frames were photographed with a Canon Rebel using 20-30 second exposure time. I used a small green LED keychain light to draw each frame. Once all the positions were photographed they were strung together and synchronized to the music in After Effects."

LinnDrum II Third Design

Roger Linn and Dave Smith released another teaser of the upcoming LinnDrum II. This third design is NOT what the LinnDrum II will actually look like.

If the actual release is even better than this... Wow!

I've been holding off on buying a drum machine for a while. I've narrowed down my choices to the Elektron Machinedrum, the Jomox XBASE 999 or the LinnDrum II.

The LinnDrum II release date has been pushed back to 2009.

NAMM?

via create digital music

Robot Feelings - Thingamagoop

"Robot Feelings" is a series of short videos by Karen Abad which explores three basic human emotions: Longing, Loneliness and Love.


Longing: Explores the desire for romantic relationships as a means to remedy loneliness. In part, this “Longing” is conceived when self - validation is thought to be needed through pursuits of a romantic nature.


Loneliness: Dwells on the stagnate state of failing to achieve the first part of “Longing.” In this state, one tries to reconcile the state of being alone, whether it be physical or emotional.


Love: The third and final installment is the proposed resolution to overcoming the previous state of “Loneliness.” Weight is placed on love that surpasses that which is romantic and examines other forms of love.

An emotional journey of robots, Omnichords and Thingamagoops.

Click the links above for stories behind the videos. For the piece on Loneliness, Karen Abad posted her cell phone number on her blog and asked people to leave anonymous voicemails to answer the question, "What is loneliness?" Read more on the Robot Feelings project here.

Mozart Music Found In Nantes Library

A single fragment of sheet music by Mozart was recently found in a library in Nantes, France. The piece had been in Médiathèque's collection for over 150 years but left undocumented since it does not bear the signature of its famous composer.

Ulrich Leisinger, head of research at the International Mozarteum Foundation in Salzburg, Austria, said Thursday, "His handwriting is absolutely clearly identifiable... There's no doubt that this is an original piece handwritten by Mozart."

The last time unknown Mozart music was discovered was in 1996. Only about 100 Mozart-scribed pieces of music are known to exist today.

Circumstantial evidence, including the type of paper used, has led experts to believe the piece was written for a church service in the last years of Mozart's life. Plans are forming for a January 2009 public performance of Mozart's newly discovered 18th century Mass.

via AP + Photo: David Vincent
AP video [plays after ad]

Raju: Veena Maker

Raju, veena maker, in the Basavanagudi area of Bangalore, India.

Sound Analogous: Scala Media

Scala Media creates sound based on the movement of water. Four wooden vessels have shallow pools of water on top and speakers mounted in the base. As the water is touched, sounds emanate and grow in richness and complexity as multiple nodes are activated concurrently.

Scala Media is the creation of Sound Analogous [Jeff Hoefs + Peter Chester].

aeo: DrawSound + Balls

DrawSound is a performance instrument that uses multi-touch input technology to create sound and music from the act of drawing. DrawSound has been used live by The SINE WAVE QUARTET and aeo. It was on display at the Second International Conference on Tangible and Embedded Interaction [Bonn 2008].



aeo also play a pair of glowing orbs that have acceleration and ultra sonic distance sensors that react audibly to movement.

aeo is the sound art performance project of EYE Yamatsuka (performance), Taeji Sawai (sound/programming) and Jo Kazuhiro (instrument design).

more on neural.it

Street Musicians

Street Music from Rip Zip. This video was shot near the London Bridge tube station in November 2006.

Sometimes I really enjoy street musicians. I've heard some really good musicians on the street, in subway stations, on the sidewalk outside concert venues, in parks... all over the world. I really like bucket drummers. Every once in a while I'll throw some money in. I have plenty of recordings of street performers I've run across in my travels. I often carry a portable recorder with a stereo mic to capture the sounds of a city. Street musicians add color to the scene.

I've heard some amazing players making music on the street. I've bought a few random CDs from street musicians over the years. There are some incredible one-man-band guys out there. On the other hand, street performers can be just plain loud, awful and annoying. Have you ever had a rap guy hustle you to buy his CD even though you've never heard him?

I've never performed on the street before although there have been times in my life where I could see myself doing it. Have you ever done it? Do you have a favorite street performer?

Squarepusher Just A Souvenir

Squarepusher's new album, Just A Souvenir, is up for download now at bleep.

Squarepusher says:

“This album started as a daydream about watching a crazy, beautiful rock band play an ultra-gig.

At first, a giant fluorescent image of a coat hanger appeared at the back of the stage. A couple of seconds later a full size replica of the Camden Falcon backroom materialised around the glowing coat hanger. Upon the stage was a group composed of five musicians. They seemed to be of differing ages, some young, some old. I noticed that the drummer was an Eskimo. They played instruments either of their own design or conventional ones that were modified such that they could be used to generate a range of sounds not typically associated with a rock band. For instance, one of the musicians appeared to be using a device attached to the body of his classical guitar that allowed him to accelerate or decelerate time in his immediate vicinity. At a certain point he seemed to quickly reverse back to a couple of months ago. My suspicions were corroborated by his hair and beard temporarily looking rather shorter. Sonically, this had the effect of extruding certain melodic phrases into shimmering monoliths and slow emotion wave fronts. Other sounds being generated near to him on stage also got partially sucked into the time sponge and were returned at high speed as imploded sonic pin cushions.

The coat hanger started glowing emerald green. At the same time, a river emerged on the stage and appeared to be running under the drum kit. I was concerned for the safety of the musicians being as it was that they were powering their other-worldly equipment with electricity. Just as I began to venture a comment, the members of the band that weren’t kayaking were enveloped in a localised electrical storm. As the electricity arced around various nodal points such as the drummer’s left hand, the guitarist’s teeth and a Venus fly trap that was sitting just behind the bass amp, I noticed to my relief that they weren’t being incinerated by this high voltage extravaganza. No, but it did seem to have the effect of generating a bass -distortion that sounded as if the bass guitar was actually a RSJ being played with a chainsaw, enclosed in a ventilated cabinet of fine mahogany. In fact, the high voltage was smash-mapping the bass line to a lightning wave and then amplifying it millions of times over. The bassist was now using the entire building as a speaker.

My vision at this stage was hence somewhat blurred, but I am sure I saw all of the drums in the drummer’s kit rapidly exchanging places with one another. The snare drum would occasionally rocket to the ceiling and hover there for minutes at a time, oscillating at rates factorially related to the tempo. Thus it started to act as a receiver for electromagnetic radiation emitted by nearby neutron stars. The strange lonely songs of astral bodies echoed about the room as their electromagnetic radiation was demodulated by the UHF calf skin. Then it exploded, showering the band in pieces of plywood.

It was at this stage that my attention was switched to the electric guitar player. Splinters of detonated snare drum were striking the strings of his guitar such that his right hand was free to operate a cupboard full of granite spheres illuminated in a dull orange. As he did, his person rapidly fragmented into various historical stages of mankind. For example, there was a Cro-Magnon man and a Homo Erectus playing Monopoly. The Cro-Magnon appeared to be winning. Suddenly the Cro-Magnon was in a headlock. Suddenly everyone in the room was incredibly happy. Riffs of medieval joy bloomed about the small man as he struggled to fight back tears of elation. They were happy because they were real. They were smoking because they were real. The coat hanger winked out, they thanked me and left forthwith leaving no trace save a small dent where a pantechnicon lorry had smashed through the back wall of the stage to deliver a replacement snare drum.

What to do after an experience of that order? As the room around me regained its familiar shape, I was left with an urgent sense of responsibility that I do honour to this vision of a remarkable ensemble. My memory of it was the only souvenir, and I feared its vulnerability with only a skull to protect it. I ventured forth to the studio shortly after the New Year. I emerged on July 15th. This is the result. I hope you enjoy it.”

The CD/LP will be out on October 27 on warp. Preorder now.

Internal Combustion Guitar

The Internal Combustion Guitar is an interesting take on the electric guitar.


Internal Combustion Guitar from Jesse Brown.

If I understand the idea (and I'm not sure that I do), the Woody B Internal Combustion Guitar attempts to recreate the feedback, sustain and resonating effect of playing in front of a stack of amps but without the extreme volume. The signal from one of the pickups is sent out to a small, low-wattage amp and then back into the guitar where it is amplified under the strings.

Instead of forcing the resonate energy to the outside of your guitar, the Internal Combustion Guitar's proprietary driver system gently pumps it back inside. Then our coupling mechanism redistributes the controlled energy to your strings.

Your touch sends signal to a small amp (6 watts or less) or processor combo

The small amp sends the conditioned signal back to the Internal Combustion Guitar

The Internal Combustion Guitar power driver reenergizes the now harmonically enriched and colored string tone

It's not a Moog Guitar, but it's about half the price. There's a MIDI option too.



Anybody actually play one of Woody Bruce's Internal Combustion Guitars yet?

Strange Attractor - Mettle

Strange Attractor will release their second album, Mettle, on October 6.

Niels van Hoorn [Legendary Pink Dots - Tear Garden + Mark Spybey] and Richard van Kruysdijk [Sonar Lodge - Phallus Dei + Music for Speakers Amplified] are joined by:

• David J [Bauhaus]
• Peter Christopherson [Coil - Throbbing Gristle - Psychic TV + SoiSong]
• Winston Tong [Tuxedomoon]
• Graham Lewis [Wire]
• Richard Sinclair [Hatfield & the North]
• Marie-Claudine [Sonar Lodge + Music for Speakers Amplified]

Strange Attractor Mettle tracklist:

01. Anything (ft. Marie-Claudine)
02. The Best Things Are Left Unspoken (ft. Graham Lewis)
03. Evaporate (ft. Marie-Claudine)
04. Loneliness Is A Crowded Room (ft. Richard Sinclair)
05. Sleaze (ft. David J)
06. Plain Gold Ring (ft. Marie-Claudine)
07. Sound Generation
08. Quietude (ft. Winston Tong)
09. Snail (ft. Peter Christopherson)
10. Heaven (ft. Marie-Claudine)

Legendary Pink Dots - Plutonium Blonde + Rainbows Too?

The Legendary Pink Dots will release their new album, Plutonium Blonde, on October 7 on ROIR.

Plutonium Blonde tracklist:

1. Torchsong
2. Rainbows Too?
3. A World With No Mirrors
4. My First Zonee
5. Faded Photograph
6. An Arm And A Leg
7. Mailman
8. Oceans Blue
9. Savannah Red
10. Cubic Caesar

Edward Ka-Spel - voices, keys, devices
The Silverman - synths, keys, devices
Martijn De Kleer - acoustic and electric guitars, fuzz bass, banjo and exotic percussion
Niels van Hoorn - saxophones, flute, bass flute and bass clarinet
Raymond Steeg - mixing and engineering

Here is the music video for "Rainbows Too?"


Upcoming LPD tour dates:
18-Sep-2008 Munchen/Feierwerk DE
29-Sep-2008 Berlin, DE Club JOSEF, Flachland Festival
9-Oct-2008 Tromso, N Insomnia Music Festival **
** Norway performance will be an Edward Ka-Spel solo show
16-Oct-2008 Vancouver, BC Richards on Richards
17-Oct-2008 Portland, OR Berbati's Pan
18-Oct-2008 Seattle, WA El Corazon
20-Oct-2008 Salt Lake City Urban Lounge
21-Oct-2008 Denver, CO Bluebird Theater
23-Oct-2008 Minneapolis, MN Varsity Theater
24-Oct-2008 Chicago, IL Empty Bottle
25-Oct-2008 Detroit, MI Magic Stick
26-Oct-2008 Toronto, ON The Mod Club
27-Oct-2008 Montreal, QC Les Saints
28-Oct-2008 New York City Knitting Factory
29-Oct-2008 Boston, MA The Middle East Downstairs
30-Oct-2008 Washington, DC Rock & Roll Hotel
31-Oct-2008 Chapel Hill, NC Local 506
1-Nov-2008 Atlanta, GA The Earl
2-Nov-2008 Orlando, FL The Social
3-Nov-2008 Tampa, FL Orpheum
5-Nov-2008 Houston, TX Warehouse Live
8-Nov-2008 Austin, TX Stubbs
9-Nov-2008 Dallas, TX Granada Theater
11-Nov-2008 Albuquerque, NM Launchpad
12-Nov-2008 Tempe, AZ Big Fish Pub
13-Nov-2008 Los Angeles, CA Knitting Factory
14-Nov-2008 San Francisco Cafe Du Nord
15-Nov-2008 San Francisco Cafe Du Nord
28-Nov-2008 Santiago, Chile Waiting for confirmation **
29-Nov-2008 Valparaiso Waiting for confirmation **
** Chile performances will be Edward Ka-Spel solo shows
19-Apr-2009 Frankfurt, DE Das Bett (to be confirmed)
21-Apr-2009 Leipzig, DE Moritzbastei
22-Apr-2009 Vienna, DE TBD (together with Attrition)
23-Apr-2009 Munich, DE Feierwerk (Sunny Red)
24-Apr-2009 Zofingen, CH Ox Club (to be confirmed)

via the witness exchange - brainwashed + lpd

Spring-O-Caster Racquet Guitar

BTM - Orgy Of Noise - Racquet Guitar & Bent Toys - OrgyOfNoise.com from BTMTV.

Bill T Miller = Orgy Of Noise on Spring-O-Caster Racquet Guitar and Circuit Bent Toy Guitar.

I Met The Walrus

I Met The Walrus

In 1969, a 14-year-old Beatle fanatic named Jerry Levitan, armed with a reel-to-reel tape deck, snuck into John Lennon's hotel room in Toronto and convinced John to do an interview about peace. 38 years later, Jerry has produced a film about it. Using the original interview recording as the soundtrack, director Josh Raskin has woven a visual narrative which tenderly romances Lennon's every word in a cascading flood of multipronged animation. Raskin marries the terrifyingly genius pen work of James Braithwaite with masterful digital illustration by Alex Kurina, resulting in a spell-binding vessel for Lennon's boundless wit, and timeless message.

Check out the interview on movieweb with producer Jerry Levitan + director Josh Raskin about meeting John Lennon and turning the experience into an Oscar-nominated animated short film.

Screechophone

Larry Cotton's Screechophone from Mark Frauenfelder.

Larry Cotton:

I built this bizarre musical instrument--based loosely on the playing-card-in-the-bicycle-spokes principle--a while back, shot a quick video, then cannibalized it for parts. As you'll see, the bicycle spokes were scaled down to a small white plastic gear. The card remained.
I called it a screechophone for reasons which will become obvious as you watch (and listen) to the video.

The whole thing was synced to accompanying music from a mini-CD through an ancient Commodore 64 computer, programmed in BASIC. A transparent disc printed only with black arcs spun with the CD and was read by a photocell.

iPhone Cycorder + Audio

Cycorder now includes audio capture. Cycorder is the free iPhone video recorder that is better than DreamCatcher's $19.95 iPhone Video Recorder software. The video above was recorded with an iPhone 3G using Cycorder.

Nine Inch Nails: Points On The Earth Part 9 + Oakland Oracle + LA Forum

After hiding an envelope under a red rock in Denver on Tuesday, Nine Inch Nails continued the Google Earth treasure hunt in Salt Lake City.

The clue: "Looks like they're out of newspapers."

A fan drove 40 miles to the federal courthouse in Salt Lake City at 2am to find it. Inside one of the boxes of free newspapers was an envelope with a ? written on it. Like the other seven envelopes previously found in the Points on the Earth hunts, this one contained a souvenir card [numbered 008] autographed by Trent Reznor and a letter promising a gift at the end of the NIN tour.

The next stop on the Lights in the Sky tour was Oracle Arena in Oakland, California, on Friday. Great show.

Robin Finck had a ton of energy. The guitarist jumped down in front of the crowd for March of the Pigs. Trent seemed pretty pissed during The Big Come Down and hit the light screen cage in front of him so hard that the panels came apart. The crew scrambled to fix the damage after Head Like a Hole.

We heard there was a 4.0 earthquake during the concert. Didn't notice it.

Setlist 9/5/08:

999,999
1,000,000
letting you
discipline
march of the pigs
head down
the frail
closer
gave up
the warning
vessel
5 ghosts I
17 ghosts II
19 ghosts III
piggy [ghost]
the greater good
pinion
wish
terrible lie
survivalism
the big come down
31 ghosts IV
only
the hand that feeds
head like a hole

echoplex
god given
hurt
in this twilight

Yesterday my friend Craig and I drove from San Francisco back to LA. We were on the 101 when we found that Nine Inch Nails had dropped ? #009 on the Google Earth map. It was over an hour away, but it was on the way we were headed. We turned east on the 152. Traffic sucked. We kept getting caught behind slow cars on the two-lane road, and there were too many cars coming the other way for us to pass. Once we reached the 5, it was smooth sailing. We were flying.

A friend guided us over the car's speakerphone. He checked the satellite pics and the NIN forums. He said the closest person he read about online was farther than we were. High hopes!

The clue was "Cop car." That's a weird one! Was it under a cop car? Would it still be there when we got there? We were close. Really close. Just a right turn on the Panoche exit and a quick left and we're there.

Craig yells, "Cop car!" I'm driving right at it! I hit the brakes and stop right in front of it.

There's somebody there! Some guy is getting out of the cop car, and he's got something in his hand. NO!

We jump out, but it's too late. We were so damn close. Again. And again. Unbelievable. This is the third time I've been right there at the treasure hunt location to see someone else get the prize!

Bryan, the guy who found it, told us the story. He beat us there by five minutes. He first checked the license plate area on the back of the car, but there was nothing there. Then he looked around and under the car. It took him a minute to think that the envelope might actually be hidden inside the car. It was! It was sitting on the front seat. The drivers side window was barely cracked open. The NIN guys must have slipped it in through the window.

Bryan tried opening all four doors of the old cop car, but they were all locked. He ran to his truck to find something to use to smash the window. He was about to grab a wrench when he found a coat hanger. He bent the hanger and slid it inside to pull the lock up. Bingo! He opened the door and grabbed the envelope just as my friend and I pulled up. Lucky guy!

Craig and I got back on the road and made it to LA in time for the NIN concert at The Forum. What a show! It was the last concert of the first leg of the tour. I got to see the second half of the show front and center on the barricade. It was intense. The Forum setlist was identical to the Oakland show except I think they switched a Ghosts song and added Reptile to the encore. That was great. The whole show was incredible.


The Hand That Feeds had a bonus: a photo of George W. Bush. I was not happy when NIN canceled their performance at the MTV Movie Awards in 2005, especially because I got tickets specifically to see NIN play the otherwise worthless awards show. They said they backed out because MTV wouldn't allow them to play behind a backdrop of a picture of GWB.

Now three years later, they did it... with a twist: over the course of the song, the image of Bush morphed into one of John McCain. Good one.

I really enjoyed the recent NIN concerts and all the crazy treasure hunt adventures. Can't wait for more!

Back to the beginning... Part 1...

Nine Inch Nails: Points On The Earth Part 8 + Red Rocks

Nine Inch Nails played a killer concert in Denver at Red Rocks on Tuesday, September 3, 2008.

But first, let's catch up on the NIN Points on the Earth treasure hunt. After my brother and I came up empty handed in New York's Central Park, the NIN Lights in the Sky tour moved on to Philadelphia and Lexington, Kentucky. On the way to Lexington, the band dropped another ? [006] in Morehead, KY. [Morehead? Sounds like a fun town to me.]

The clue: "Under the sun." The prize was found at the base of a Days Inn sign off the highway.

The next day Trent Reznor posted a snapshot on the nin.com photo blog of Pho Duy, the Denver restaurant where the band was eating dinner. Fans wondered if there was another prize waiting there.

All that was waiting there was the band. They were growing tired of waiting for the taxi they called to take them back to the hotel. Alessandro Cortini called on NIN fans to save the day. He posted another pic of the restaurant, its address and "We need a ride downtown.care to help? No cabs coming.please help. 6 people need a ride."

Within just a few minutes, their call for help was answered. "Aunt Linda and Ashley" rolled up, and the NIN crew piled into the Lexus. NIN fans to the rescue!

The next day [9/3/08] was the concert at Red Rocks. After a lunchtime adventure at Casa Bonita, PFU Ben and I drove to Red Rocks in Morrison. We hiked up to the amphitheater and took a breather to watch the construction of the stage.

Red Rocks is one of the best places in the world to experience a concert. The only other time I had been to Red Rocks a couple years ago I didn't have enough time to explore the area during the day. The red rocks, the mountains, the view... all absolutely spectacular.

Ben and I hiked around the rocks and found a geocache [not a NIN one] near the venue. A couple hours before the show, we enjoyed catching NIN sound check a couple Ghosts songs.

Then I got word that another ? [007] had just popped up on the Google Earth map. It was somewhere nearby. The clue: "Under the (red) rock."

Go! Go! Go!

We ran out the North exit and back to the car. Ben wrote down the coordinates and read them back to me so I could type them in my iPhone. It looked like the treasure was on the other side of the venue, but it was hard to figure out exactly where. I asked several people for directions along the way, but nobody seemed to know exactly where it was. Ben put the coordinates in my Garmin GPS unit. We parked the car on the street as close as we could to the GPS coordinates. Unfortunately, the GPS was pointing us the wrong way because the coordinates were in the wrong format. I still haven't figured out how to convert the decimal style GPS coordinates into the traditional degrees/minutes/seconds format for my old GPS.

I downloaded a satellite picture of the area to my phone and realized that the ? was way up by a parking lot near the entrance ramp to the venue. Shit! Another long uphill hike.

We ran through the South parking lot up to the trading post. I realized I could put the Google Maps app on my phone on satellite view for a better view of the area. Why didn't I think of that before?! We ran as fast as we could, but between the thin mountain air and two days of rigorous hiking, we were beat. Huffing and puffing. I couldn't breathe deeply enough.

We finally made it to the big red rock we saw on the map. I looked left. Ben went right. For a second I thought I found the envelope, but it turned out to be a white paper bag covered in spider webs. I went back over to the smaller red rocks and looked everywhere. There was already someone else there looking, and after a couple minutes, a whole bunch of other people showed up. Ben and I were looking under every rock we saw, and there were a lot of them. Several of us ran up the hill and heard security guards over at the venue yelling at us to get down. Why is it illegal to climb the rocks?

I got a call from an East Coast NIN treasure hunter trying to help me find it. I looked at the satellite pic on my phone again and figured out it must have been hidden much closer to the base of the rock. I finally felt I knew exactly where to look. Completely out of breath, I struggled to get back down from the rocks...

"Found it!"

A girl's voice yelled the dreaded words. She found the prize right where I was headed, just a few feet in front of me. Missed it by that much. Again!

The girl from Oklahoma was really excited. She found it under the first rock she checked. Lucky girl!

I don't know how we missed it. Ben and I did get a consolation prize though: one of the best concerts ever!

The NIN show at Red Rocks was truly outstanding. Our 4th row view was awesome. The NIN stage show on this tour is without a doubt the best visual experience I've ever witnessed at a concert. The sound was also phenomenal. You could tell the band was putting forth the energy to make this show something special.

The one thing that weirds me out at a venue like Red Rocks that doesn't have a pit is during the crazy songs, I want to go nuts. March of the Pigs without a pit is just plain unnatural. Same for Wish, The Great Destroyer and a bunch of other songs. I'm not talking about moshing and crowd surfing, but I missed the feeling of being on the floor surrounded by a crowd of people jumping up and down, especially when the band is on fire like they were here.

The flip side was that it was really cool to see the nuances of the live show. All the seats in the house are higher up than the level of the stage so you can see the performers from above instead of below.

Alessandro Cortini is a badass on the multitouch Lemur LCD screen. Trent Reznor rocked on the Lemur too. Vessel was really great. This was the first show that NIN played three Year Zero songs before the Ghosts material versus the usual two.

The Ghosts section was particularly amazing. Trent on marimba, Josh Freese on a trash kit with a water jug + other household items + a tall set of water chimes [?], Justin Meldal-Johnsen on upright + electric bass and Robin Finck on mandolin - electric guitar + wooden flute. Alessandro had all kinds of weird instruments too. He played a harmonium [reed organ?] during Piggy by playing the keyboard with one hand and the bellows with other. Super cool. He had all kinds of other DIY-looking noise boxes and effects that I'd love to get a better look at. Keyboard Magazine or somebody needs to do a full writeup on the Ghosts instrumentation pronto. Enquiring minds want to know.

Down In It brought back great memories. Can you believe that song is 20 years old? Reptile started the encore which sacrificed Echoplex, even though it was on the setlist, due to time constraints. Trent spoke of how cold it was and how intimidated they were because normally he just sees a blur of black shirts in the crowd, but this time he saw a million faces instead.

I turned around to see the lighters in the air and everyone singing along to Hurt. Beautiful. The show ended with each band member having his time in the spotlight before exiting one by one from the stage during In This Twilight, until Trent was left alone playing softly on the keyboard. He waved goodbye and walked off stage to the cheers of the audience.

Setlist 9/3/08:

999,999
1,000,000
letting you
discipline
march of the pigs
head down
the frail
closer
gave up
me, i'm not
vessel
the great destroyer
5 ghosts I
6 ghosts I
19 ghosts III
piggy [ghost]
the greater good
pinion
wish
terrible lie
survivalism
31 ghosts IV
only
down in it
head like a hole

reptile
god given
hurt
in this twilight

Overall, the NIN concert at Red Rocks in Denver was one of the best concerts ever. I can't tell you how many times we heard the words "best" and "ever" while walking back to the car. If NIN ever plays Red Rocks again, I will be there.

In the meantime, you can check out the new nin.com or read more about the previous NIN Points on the Earth treasure hunts.

Here's Part 9...

Or go back to the beginning... Part 1...

ohGr Devils In My Details

ohGr is releasing their third album, Devils In My Details, on October 17 via Synthetic Symphony/SPV.

ohGr is the project of Skinny Puppy's Nivek Ogre + Mark Walk.

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