Have you noticed that bands are now seemingly required to do musical encores after there main set?

Why do them if they are not really an encore… because it is expected? It used to be an uncontrollable display of desire by the audience to just get one more taste of a performance!!!, now just a regiment, lackadaisical clapping will do.

Arcade Fire

Okay, so this one wasn’t just today… for the last four days I have been consumed by Arcade Fire. If you haven’t checked out Grooveshark (they are an awesome streaming music venue that allows you to create your own playlist)… get on there and type in Arcade Fire and listen and love!

Also, the Unstaged webcast of Arcade Fire’s Madison Gardens concert (directed by Terry Gilliam) is pretty darn good.

I heard about them years ago (I think from SXSW buzz, or ACL? not sure), and like many bands, I shrugged them off as not quite my taste and I’ll get there when and if I ever want to. I tend to be the type that gets way into the music of a particular band; it is like peeling off the layers to get to the core. I want to really know something or not at all… and then forget it next month just to remember that once upon a time, I knew and felt! That said, I spent the last two years being completely consumed by Beirut (check them out too).

That is all… continue as normal.

I am pretty impressed by Ricci Adams’ Music Theory website.  It has lessons exercises, and resources to learn all the basics of music theory. I need a refresher course on key signatures/scales, but got plenty of music theory in high school band.

In India, Elephants are adorned with brass bells during parades.

The bells are cast and engraved  in brass working cities in the north of India like Jalesar and are cloisonnes-ed with a color such as crimson or blue.

The chime they make is gorgeous and is often confused with meditation bells.

Here is a very good explanation of Elephant Bells.