Diversity is the Spice of BBNB – Bruised But Not Broken

How and when did you start on your musical journey?
As a brother and sister team, we started about 3 years ago. However we both have been in the music industry for most of our lives; I, Gab, as a singer (classically trained) and performing mainly Jazz standards in clubs around town for most of my early career and also teaching. My brother Peter, with a lifetime of musical credits to his name, has always performed in bands across the State and has majored in classical guitar – but has a strong love for bass guitar. He is a multi-instrumentalist and is well honored and renowned for his diverse and extraordinary talent.

What kind of music do you like to make? How would you describe your music?
Our motto is ‘Diversity is the Spice of BBNB’ Mainly ‘retro’ in overall style, we produce many varying genres, from pop, to funk to soft rock, power-ballads, psychedelic and even a little softgoth… whatever suits our mood… and as human beings, our moods can change like anyones!!! So we like to cater for each moment and each mood for all who listen to our songs.

Who is your musical inspiration?
Our father was a maestro and very well renowned violinist – he paved the way for both of us and our very earliest memories of music are of Glen Miller, Cole Porter, and Burt Bacharach. Modern influences are wide and vast. From the Beatles (of course) through to LZ, Jacques Brel, Muse, JET… well the list goes on.. I guess I must mention Billy Joel, as he has played a major role in my personal musical journey, as has Barry Manilow and my forever personal inspiration, Ted Neeley.

How do you distinguish yourselves from others?
We enjoy producing retro-style music without the typically expected sound that is marketed today. We like to stay true to our own energy and we have been praised many times for ‘bringing real music back’. Our fans/friends enjoy dancing, singing and even crying along with our songs! Our lyrics have been requested by many fans to be posted on their various website or journals, as they feel they can relate very well with our lyrics and songs.

Tell us more about your album on Guitarati. What is the inspiration behind the album?
All of these particular songs are a reflection of my life and the occurrences in my life at the time of writing, so I guess you can say they are a journal of that period of my life.

Do you write your own songs?
We compose, perform, arrange and produce all our own songs

Which is your favorite song? What is the story behind it?
If I had to choose just one, it would be ‘Loser Wins’, as it has a fabulous arrangement and moves really well – but also has a positive message to inspire and bring hope to listeners. ‘Surprise’ is also a favorite, as it is melancholy and has a monumental or everlasting feel, message and sentiment. I personally favor all our songs so it’s a very hard question. ‘Prisoner’ is also a fabulous mood song – softgoth in style and again the sentiment is widely understood. Its our most popular favorited song amongst our fans.

Are you working on a new album?
This year we are working with a new producer and hope to produce our debut album by the end of the year. We are also focusing heavily on YOUTUBE and have just started our own CHANNEL at www.youtube.com/divagabwhich is doing really well so far.

What is a day like in the life of a musician?
A solitary life at times, as one can get caught in the studio, either writing new material or arranging/producing/mastering songs. Also there is much networking and marketing to be done and many people to liase with during the course of the day to keep it all moving.. the key is movement and never stagnating – not for a moment.

Any parting shot?
We have a driving passion to succeed and have come very far the past year or so. We would love to meet new friends who enjoy our music. We would also like to connect with producers and A & R people who may like to consider our songs for use in movies, TV, or for other artists to perform via negotiation. We are open to all invitations and all inquiries regarding our songs and we’re very excited about our current and future ventures.

 

Music is a never ending journey of discovery – Wo Fat

How and when did you start on your musical journey?
As a band, we started jamming together about 5 years ago. Individually, we’ve all played music for a long time. Michael, our drummer, and myself, Kent, have known each other and played together in various musical incarnations covering a number of different styles (including funk, jazz and heavy rock) for roughly 20 years. Tim , our bass player came from playing in an experimental improvisational noise band. Wo Fat was born from a desire to just Rock.

What kind of music do you like to make? How would you describe your music?
Wo Fat’s music falls into the genre usually referred to as Stoner Rock, which is rock and roll that harkens back to heavy metal’s roots: 70′s rock, psychedelia, and the blues. It’s a music that is heavily riff-based and stems directly from the blues. We think of our music as Roots Metal.

Who is your musical inspiration?
There are many musical inspirations for Wo Fat. Black Sabbath, Jimi Hendrix, Cactus, Zeppelin, Tommy Bolin, Leafhound, Buffalo, Leslie West and Mountain, Budgie, Fu Manchu, Sleep, Nebula, Kyuss, Trouble, ZZ Top, Church of Misery, Miles Davis(especially the 70′s stuff), Atomic Bitchwax, Herbie Hancock’s Mwandishi and Headhunters bands, John Lee Hooker, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Junior Kimbrough, RL Burnside, Howlin Wolf, Pink Floyd, and many many more. Music is a never ending journey of discovery and we are inspired by listening to as much great music from the past and present as we can get our hands on.

How do you distinguish yourselves from others?
We don’t really think about that. We just make the music that we dig.

Tell us more about your album on Guitarati. What is the inspiration behind the album?
Our only album, which is the one for sale on Guitarati, is “The Gathering Dark.” It is a collection of songs that mostly use imagery from horror movies, H.P. Lovecraft, etc. to convey a fairly political message. Take what you want from it. You don’t have to agree or even know what the message is. It just so happens that the songs were all written during some dark political times in America and that’s what was on our minds. The title track, “The Gathering Dark”, was written right after the 2004 elections. All of the songs with the exception of one are original, that being “Dreams of Milk and Honey,” which is by the great Leslie West.

Which is your favorite song from your album ‘The Gathering Dark’? What is the story behind it?
One of my favorites on the Album is “From Beyond,” which actually is one of the first songs that we wrote. It just turned out killer I think. Another favorite of mine is the instrumental song that finishes the album, “Runnin’ the Voodoo Down.” If you didn’t get it from the title, it is inspired by some of the mindblowing stuff Miles Davis was doing in the early 70′s.

Are you working on a new album?
Yes. We are currently working on a new album, to be entitled “Psychedelonaut.” It will be again packed with riffage, and I think will have a bit more of the psychedelia goin’ on in it. We are tracking it on 2″ analog tape using killer analog gear, so it will be good and thick. We are hoping to have it completed sometime this summer.

What is a day like in the life of a musician?
For me, I spend my days in the recording studio as an engineer recording bands. I am lucky enough to be able to make my living in the music industry. I work with a huge variety of musicians of all styles every day, which provides me with many ideas and much inspiration.

Any parting shot?
Lastly, I would like to mention what a great thing websites like Guitarati are doing for musicians. More than ever before it is possible to get your music heard and to connect with like-minded people without being under the boot of a major label. Down with mindless corporate music and right on for independent artists!

 

I distinguish myself by the tone of my guitar, and the feeling in my playing – Stratcat

How and when did you start on your musical journey?
Started playing guitar when I was 12, that was 32 years ago (ouch!). Both my brothers are musicians, you could say it runs in the family.

What kind of music do you like to make? How would you describe your music?
I like to make music with a lot of feeling, thats why I’m drawn towards blues/jazz.

Who is your musical inspiration?
I’m inspired by guitarists such as Ronnie Earl, Duke Robillard, Steve Ray Vaughn, Robin Trower, Frank Marino, to name a few.

How do you distinguish yourselves from others?
I distinguish myself by the tone of my guitar, and the feeling in my playing.

Tell us more about your album(s) on Guitarati. What is the inspiration behind the album(s)?
This album is a collection of material I recorded in my home studio, I spent many late nights laying down these tracks, trying to find my tone and style.

Do you write your own songs?
I write all my own music.

Which is your favorite song from your albums? What is the story behind it?
My favorite song at the moment is Chicago Style, I think it best exemplifies my tone and style, and the direction I’m headed with my guitar playing.

Are you working on a new album?
I’m constantly working on new material.

What is a day like in the life of a musician?
I’m not a professional musician, I have a day job. I work in the graphic arts field, photoshop guru.

Any parting shot?
I just hope someone likes my guitar playing, if someone listens to my music and it makes them feel good than thats all anyone can ask.

 

Guitarati.com Public Beta Launching!

We’re launching our public beta on April 8th, 2008. This means that everyone can discover, search, listen to, download and color tag music at Guitarati. Buckle up!

 

Guitarati.com Private Beta launches!

So after 5 months of burning the midnight oil, with dreams and sleep in our eyes, we’ve launched perfectly as scheduled! It seemed like more than a coincidence that our launch date was Feb, the 14th – Valentine’s Day as well as World Sound Healing Day. Music is about love and music heals too. What better day than that to unfold a new way to discover and relate to music!

During this Private Beta phase, we’re inviting all musicians and record labels to host their music with us as we continue to work on refining the website and the unconventional music discovery method.

Whether you’re a musician or not, check out the shiny new Pandora’s box : http://www.guitarati.com.

 

Getting simple_captcha image to show up on Ubuntu Linux

If you are using a plugin such as simple_captcha that requires RMagick, then you may encounter the following error during the rendering of jpeg catpcha image on Linux: (seen in the logs)

ArgumentError (unknown format: JPG):
/vendor/plugins/simple_captcha/lib/simple_captcha_image.rb:95:in `format=’

This mean that we need to install the delegate library for JPEG.
1. do apt-get install libjpeg62 (not sure if this is required or just dev is enough)
2. do apt-get install libjpeg62-dev
3. cd to where you downloaded Imagemagick and do ./configure, make, make install.
The result of ./configure will summarize the status of deletgate libraries in the end.

After this, a blank image should start to show up in place of the simple_catpcha image and the logs may show something like this:

sh: gs: command not found
sh: gs: command not found
RMagick: unable to read font `(null)’.
RMagick: Postscript delegate failed `/tmp/magick-XXfm5AzA’: No such file or directory.
sh: gs: command not found
sh: gs: command not found
RMagick: unable to read font `(null)’.
RMagick: Postscript delegate failed `/tmp/magick-XXg7z0RL’: No such file or directory.

4. Do apt-get install ghostscript if simple_captcha image shows up as a white blank image, without any letters. Don’t forget to do ./configure, make, make install from your Imagemagick source dir after this. Restarting of the server will be required for production environment.

Example result of ./configure status.

Delegate Configuration:
….
JPEG v1 –with-jpeg=yes yes
FreeType –with-freetype=yes yes
…

These 4 delegate libraries got simple_captcha working.
1. libfreetype6-dev (This also seems to be for fonts, but didn’t cut it for simple_captcha, but I had installed it already, so I let it be.)
2. libjpeg62-dev
3. libpng12-dev ( installed it just in case…)
4. ghostscript
Running ./configure, make, make install from imagemagick source dir is necessary after installing the above libraries.

If captcha image is not getting recognized, you may need to run the following (for rails > 2.0, there is a separate command for older Rails which can be seen from the simple_captcha website.)
rake simple_captcha:setup

then run
rake db:migrate

 

Solving ruby script/console "no such file to load — readline" error

(These instructions are for Ubuntu for the error given below)
script/console
Loading development environment.
/usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/completion.rb:10:in `require’: no such file to load — readline (LoadError)
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/completion.rb:10
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:252:in `require’
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:252:in `load_modules’
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:250:in `each’
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:250:in `load_modules’
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:21:in `setup’
from /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/irb.rb:54:in `start’
from /usr/local/bin/irb:13

1. apt-get install libreadline-ruby
2. apt-get install libreadline-dev
3. cd to where your downloaded source for ruby is located. (say ~/installed-software/ruby-1.8.6.tar.gz)
4. cd to ruby-1.8.6
5. run ./configure
6. run make
7. run make install
While running make, while the lines are streaming by, you will be able to notice ‘compiling readline’.
8. try ruby script/console from your app dir. It should load it this time.

 

MySQL 5.1 Partitioning Example for Ruby on Rails Migration

1. Creating table on mysql prompt : (separating partitions by 6 months each)

   

2. In the migration file 001_create_stats.rb:

   

3. After running rake db:migrate. On MySQL prompt, single partition being used in this example

   

4. On MySQL prompt, two partitions being used in this example:

   

5. On MySQL prompt, the default storage engine type is shown as InnoDB:

   

 

Upgrading MySQL 5.0.xx to MySQL 5.1.xx for InstantRails

MySQL 5.1 at this time is in release candidate state, but I thought I’d just check it out for its partitioning feature.

Preparation

1. Take a mysqldump of the existing databases. You don’t want to wipe out anything.
   backup_dir> mysqldump –all-databases > backup.sql -u root -p
   Enter password: ********
2. Stop the InstantRails MySQL through the InstantRails Confirguration Interface (where Apache and MySQL server status shows?).
3. Check using task manager, just in case the MySQL application is still running. No MySQL should be running. If you use any MySQL GUI tools such as MySQL Query Browser, close them too.

Installation of MySQL 5.1

1. Downloaded mysql 5.1 setup exe (Windows ZIP/Setup.EXE (x86)) for Windows. I downloaded the 5.1.22 distribution.
2. Cd to mysql-5.1.22-rc-win32 directory and click on setup.exe.
3. This starts the MySQL setup wizard. Select ‘typical’ setup type and click Next, Next. This will start the installation in C:\Program Files\.
4. The installation will additionally show another popup urging you to register, and that’s upto you. In our main installation window, the installation has completed. The ‘Configure the MySQL Server now’ box is checked, and the next step is to click ‘finish’. Click it.
5. In the configuration popup, select Standard Configuration if you’re a chicken like me or select Detailed Configuration otherwise. Here we are going with Standard Configuration.
6. The next step shows two options, ‘install as windows service’ and ‘include bin directory in windows path. I chose mySQL to be installed as a service. And checked the ‘include bin dir..’ box too. (I had encountered certain problems in starting up MySQL server on my Windows Vista when I did not choose to install it as a service.)
7. The next step asks you to create a new root password, which you should do. I did not create an anonymous account, but just set the root password and moved on. I did not check the ‘allow remote access’.
8. Click ‘execute’ in the next screen and voila! Your firewall software may pop up a window asking you to allow the security settings execution to go through.
9. Open Task Manager -> Services. MySQL is already up and running as a service. You can configure it so that it does not start automatically. (manual start).
10. Open a brand new command window (not the one using InstantRails ‘open a new console window’ but using the start menu. There’s a reason for it.) Key in mysql –version and it should show 5.1.xx. Key in the same in a Ruby console window got from InstantRails configuration and it should still show the previous verson of MySQL that your InstantRails is using.

Configure InstantRails to use MySQL 5.1

1. Rename the mysql directory under InstantRails to say, mysql_old. (if you don’t want to delete it)
2. I use a program called junction to create a symlink, a la Windows style.
3. Key in:
   C:\Softwares\Junction>junction “C:\InstantRails\mysql” “C:\Program Files\MySQL\MySQL Server 5.1″
   Junction v1.05 – Windows junction creator and reparse point viewerCopyright (C) 2000-2007 Mark RussinovichSystems Internals – http://www.sysinternals.com
   Created: C:\InstantRails\mysqlTargetted at: C:\Program Files\MySQL\MySQL Server 5.1
   C:\Softwares\Junction>
4. Now InstantRails’s mysql path points to your MySQL 5.1 installation. Keying in mysql –version in this window now should show the new version of mysql.
5. Modify database.yml for the new root password if you chose differently from your previous root password.
6. In the Ruby console window, just for convenience, cd to directory where your backup.sql. Now start a mysql shell here. We want to recreate the databases from our old copy.
   mysql -u root -p
   password: ********
   mysql> source backup.sql
   … this will show tons of row creation info etc… hang on…
   mysql> show databases;
   … this should show all your old databases…
   mysql> quit
7. Start InstantRails. For me, the InstantRails configuration window shows MySQL as stopped, but we know it is running as a service.
8. Running rake db:migrate is not necessary since we have already created the databases with all the data brought in from the old tables.

 

Setting up Mongrel with Apache Proxy on Windows Desktop using Instant Rails

1. cd C:/InstantRails/www. This is assuming your Instant Rails is installed in C:

2. rails -d mysql myapp. This will create a new Ruby on Rails application in C:/InstantRails/www with MySQL as the default database server.
3. On command prompt, key in: ruby script/server –port=3003. Check that you are able to access myapp at http://localhost:3003/ in your browser.
4. Check that Apache is running by typing http://localhost/. This will display the index file fron C:/InstantRails/www directory.

5. cd C:/InstantRails/apache/conf.
6. Open http.conf file. In this file search for ‘VirtualHost’. This will lead you to the bunch of virtualhost declations for typo and cookbook applications.
7. httpd.conf with InstantRails has proxy_module already uncommented for use. LoadModule proxy_module modules/mod_proxy.s.
8. Add myapp block to httpd.conf:

   

9. In the InstantRails configuration tool, select Configure -> Windows Hosts File. Click it open and add an entry to the end: 127.0.0.1 myapp. Save the file and exit notepad.
10. Restarting Apache server was not needed since I was running this set up for the development environment.
11. Key in http://myapp/ in the browser to check that your app is indeed showing up the index.html page from myapp/public folder.
12. As a further adventure, add up on myapp:
    C:\InstantRails\www\myapp>ruby script/generate scaffold Blog blog_id:integer title:string body:text
13. Run rake db:migrate
14. Now key in http://myapp/blogs and it should show up the ‘index’ action for blogs correctly. Browse around by clicking on ‘new blog’ and see that the page is served as http://myapp/blogs/new.
15. Also look at Apache access logs from InstantRails application and also the mongrel server logs from the command line.
16. If keying in http://myapp/ takes you to http://www.myapp.com/, then you need to checks Windows Hosts file using InstantRails.
17. If keying in http://myapp/ takes you to the Index of / directory listing that just shows the files in myapp folder, then you need to make sure you have given the DocumentRoot in the virtualhost declaration in httpd.conf as C:/InstantRails/www/myapp/public/ and NOT C:/InstantRails/www/myapp/ alone.
18. Alternatives: in httpd.conf file if you
    (a) provide ServerName as http://www.myapp.com/,
    (b) provide ProxyPass / http://localhost:3003/ instead of ProxyPass /myapp/ http://localhost:3003/, and
    (c) include the entry 127.0.0.1 http://www.myapp.com/ in Windows hosts file,
    you can access you application at http://www.myapp.com/ from your desktop. If the browser continues to show the real http://www.myapp.com/ then just restart the browser or perhaps just clear the browser cache.
19. It is not necessary to create your application under InstantRails/www. Having an application as InstantRails/rails_apps/myapp and providing the document root in httpd.conf as C:/InstantRails/rails_apps/myapp/public works just fine.