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2010

Best of Bootie 2010

Thanks to Glee, mainstream America was introduced to the term mashup in 2010.  But to some of us, we’ve been listening to mashups for years.  Bootie, started in 2003 by DJs Adrian and Mysterious D, hosts monthly dance parties featuring mashups.  Starting in 2005, they started publishing the year’s best mashups on their website.  I’m not into pop music and Bootie is what introduces me to what’s been popular in the past year.

The 2010 Best of Bootie was just released, and you can download the MP3s, which play as one continuous mix, or, for the first time, the unmixed files, allowing you to mix and match songs without having the beginnings and ends cut off.   (If you you choose the MP3s and do want to burn it, remember to choose gapless burn in your software!)

And now, not so much a mini review of the Best of Bootie 2010, but some observations and thoughts:

  • Track 2 – The Face Melters – Ice Ice Tik Tok (Ke$ha vs. Vanilla Ice) – Who knew Vanilla Ice would still be relevant 20 years later?  Great mix to kick it off with a bang.
  • Track 3 – DJ Tripp – Dynamite Pressure (Taio Cruz  vs. Queen & David Bowie) – Always good to hear Queen, a popular band for mashups. I like how Vanilla Ice’s hook for Under Pressure transitions from the previous track into this song. (The Kleptone’s A Night at the Hip-Hopera was one of the first mashup albums I ever got into. Still one of my favorites, featuring all Queen songs overlaid by other’s vocals)
  • Track 5 – DJ Lobsterdust – Knock Out Eileen (LL Cool J vs. Dexy’s Midnight Runners) – When I first saw this track title, I thought no way could that work. It’s a knockout (pun intended).
  • Track 6 – Rad Bad – Moving Da Royalty (Will Smith vs. Daft Punk) – Same as 5. Can’t think of the last time I heard Will Smith rapping about Bel Air – it’s been years!. Great mashup with the bass line from Daft Punk.
  • Track 7 – Mashup-Germany vs. Faroff – Everybody & Ray Speaks No Americano (Yolanda Be Cool & DCUP vs. Backstreet Boys vs. Ray Charles vs. Benny Benassi) – Amusing. Wins longest title of the year. They should have given a credit to C&C Music Factory too.
  • Track 11 -DJs From Mars – Enter Telephone (Lady Gaga vs. Metallica) – As the song opens, you get a combination of the famous guitar lick form Enter Sandman with Lady Gaga’s unique vocals. As the song progresses, the Metallica is not overwhelming, but when you overlay the keyboards it’s really well done, especially the chorus, at the guitar from Enter Sandman ratchets up.
  • Track 12 – DJs From Mars – Teenage Gay (Katy Perry vs. O.M.D.) – To an uneducated ear, you would think this is just a Katy Perry remix. Hearing the Enola Gay synth from OMD is a treat. It’s obvious at the start of the song, but much more subtle as the song progresses.
  • Track 14 – DJs From Mars – California Jump (Katy Perry vs. Van Halen) – Katy Perry’s vocals overlaid with the keyboard parts from Van Halen’s Jump. The first of 3(!) songs featuring Van Halen’s Jump in this years Best of Bootie.
  • Track 15 – The Kleptones – Jump You Fucker (Cee Lo Green vs. Van Halen) – Cee Lo’s smash hit Fuck You with Van Halen’s Jump. I’m surprised more Cee-Lo mashups didn’t make Best of Bootie this year – but it’s clear why this one did.
  • Track 16 – DJ Le Clown vs. Ludachrist – Pon De Billie Foley (Major Lazer vs. Michael Jackson vs. Harold Faltermeyer) – Axel Foley approves.
  • Track 19 – DJ Topcat – Folsom Prison Gangstaz (Eazy-E vs. Johnny Cash) – Easy-E and Johnny Cash. What else do they have in common besides this great mashup? They usually wore black. Another mashup on paper that you wouldn’t think goes together, but works really well. Speaking of Easy-E, takes me back to the first time I heard the Best of Bootie 2005 with Smells Like Compton – N.W.A vs Nirvana. Who thought that would work and it was one of the best mashups of 2005, if not all time.
  • Track 22 – LeeDM101 – (Find Myself) A Heap Of Love (Florence & the Machine vs. Depeche Mode vs. Imogen Heap) – Slowing it down as the album starts to come to a close, Florence + the Machine was one of my favorite albums this year. Add some Depeche Mode some Imogen Heap, mix well, and kick back in listen.
  • Track 23 – Mighty Mike – Imagine A Jump (Van Halen vs. John Lennon) – The album winds down with John Lennon’s Imagine mixed with Van Halen’s Jump. David Lee Roth’s vocals actually work pretty well.

Thanks again Bootie! (Follow them on Twitter too!)

  • in music
  • 1 min read

Live concerts on The Current

89.3 The Current, a Minnesota Public Radio station, is ending the year with a bang and broadcasting four outstanding concerts that took place in Minnesota this year.

  • Monday, December 27th: Rock The Garden.  An annual show hosted by The Current at the Walker Art Center, this year’s Rock the Garden featured Retribution Gospel Choir, Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings and MGMT.
  • Tuesday, December 28th: The Hold Steady’s 4th of July show at First Avenue.
  • Wednesday, December 29th: October’s Mumford and Sons concert at First Avenue.  One of the hottest tickets of the year in Minneapolis if you were lucky enough to have one.
  • Thursday, December 30th: Broken Bell’s December show at First Avenue.

Boxee Box

My wife (who knows me all too well) got me a gift I’ve been coveting since it was announed at CES last year:  the Boxee Box.

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I’ve been using Boxee on a Mac Mini hooked up to my home theater for almost two years now – and love it.  Unfortunately, the Boxee Box by D-link has been a disappointment so far.

Setting up the box was a breeze – plug in the power and the HDMI and on first boot it checks for new firmware, which it downloaded, installed and rebooted.  I’ve been a release or two behind on th Boxee software on my Mac Mini due to a bug it has with processing a full HD stream from my MythTV box, but using the new UI was simple.  It was easy to find where to adjust the screen size and add network shares to start scanning my local content.

And that’s where the problems started.

While scanning my content, I tried to watch The Daily Show from the Comedy Central website.  Video played fine but there was no audio.   Tried a Youtube video and the same thing.  I then tried to play a file locally from my NAS and guess what – no sound.

It appears I’m not the only one.  Sure enough, plugging the Boxee Box directly into my TV and not my receiver, sound and video work fine.  Connecting the HDMI into the receiver, I get video and no audio.

This has to be a problem in software – I’m familiar with the HDMI spec, and transmitting a video signal and not audio is not a physical problem.  I own a Denon AVR-4306 – it’s not like it’s a cheap receiver either.

The second major issue is that the MythTV support I’ve been using in Boxee doesn’t seem to work on the Boxee Box.   Rumor is that the mythtv:// protocol was removed, but I haven’t been able to confirm it yet.  What’s worse, trying to play back video via the MythTV UPnP doesn’t work for me either, which seems to be hit or miss for most people.

I want to love the Boxee Box.  I really do.  The fact that sound is not working for a small subset of people is concerning.  I love the software, but the hardware implementation just isn’t there yet.

Some other random observations:

  • I love the form factor.  I know some people don’t, but I love how unique it is.  I like how the Boxee logo lights up when it’s powered on.
  • The remote is awesome.  Perfectly sized and light.  The keyboard built into the remote is good too – not too big or too small.
  • I was happy to open the packaging, take out the Boxee Box and have a paper copy of the GPL.  That always makes me smile.
  • An HDMI cable is included.  A very nice touch.
  • I like the browser improvements they’ve made in the new WebKit browser.  It’s much easier to move the mouse cursor using the remote.
  • I’m happy with the new firmware updates – the changes they made to playing back local media and listening to their users feedback was impressive.
  • I won’t even comment on the lack of Hulu and Netflix support – they promise it’s coming, but it’s not out yet.

I want to love the Boxee Box.  Especially since my wife bought it for me.  But it doesn’t work for me and I don’t know if I’m going to keep it yet.  I may buy a new TV for a different room in the house sometime in the next year, but it seems silly to hang on to something I can’t use.  Please try again Boxee.

  • in GNOME
  • 2 min read

2009 GNOME Annual Report is out!

From the better late than never department, the 2009 GNOME Foundation Annual Report has been released.

When Lucas first asked me to help with the annual report a year and a half ago at GUADEC in Gran Canaria, one of the goals was to try and help it come out sooner. Apparently, I had the opposite effect. I have lots of excuses, but none of them good. (Though someone did point out to me that Mozilla just released their 2009 report a few weeks ago, so I felt a bit better. But not a whole lot, I hate being tardy, believe it or not).

The Annual Report wouldn’t have happened without Daniel Galleguillos C. who did all of the design and layout work and put up with my constant change requests. (Thanks to those who have already found a couple small typos – please email me with any more you find and I’ll work to get an updated copy out this weekend).

Thanks to all of our writers, including Jason Clinton, Pockey Lam, Stormy Peters and Diego Escalante Urrelo – and everyone who contributed to a quarterly report. I’d also like to thank everyone who helped with photos or re-licensed their photos so we were able to use them including Cody Russell, Chris Lord, Michael Dominic K., and Lucas Rocha. Lastly, thanks to everyone who helped edit and everyone I’m forgetting (because I know I am – especially on the photos!)

Work is already beginning on the 2010 report. It will be out sooner (I promise) and I’m also going to change it so it coincides with GNOME’s fiscal year rather than calendar year, so it may be a slightly smaller as there will be some overlap. If you want to help out, let me know!

Heard it on the Radio

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Hall & Oates play a sold out show tonight in Minneapolis at the State Theater.   I fondly remember growing up listening to my father’s lite rock station as their hits were played.  With six #1 songs, it’s good to see Hall & Oates music celebrated for the pop genius that it is.  No one is going to pretend that their songs will change the world, but they are catchy and stay with you long after you hear them – which is exactly what a good pop song should do.  Hall & Oates have never pretended to be anything other than what they are.

One of my favorite album’s this year was The Bird and the Bee’s Interpreting the Masters Volume 1: A Tribute to Daryl Hall and John Oates.  Covering 9 of their hits and clocking in at over just 30 minutes, they do a note for note rendition of Hall and Oates’ greatest hits. Inara George’s ethereal voice does a wonderful job adding nuance and depth to these timeless pop hits.

I originally bought the album earlier this year on a whim when it was featured for less than $5 as an Amazon deal of the day.  I own The Bird and the Bee’s earlier albums and you may know their hit Diamond Dave about David Lee Roth, which has received airplay on The Current and other indie rock stations.  For $5 and a return to my youth, I couldn’t go wrong.  It quickly became one of my favorite albums of the year – when I need something poppy or to get me going it made great background music.

Two weeks ago on Black Friday and Record Store Day, I came across a vinyl copy (pictured above) on sale at the Exclusive Company.  For $12, how could I say no?  And now I’ve bought two copies of a cover album and continue to enjoy it.

With the show tonight, Hall and Oates are receiving some good press in the Twin Cities.  The Star Tribune’s entertainment section, Vita.MN, takes a look at what continues to make Hall and Oates relevant.  The City Pages looks at eight awesome moments we have Hall and Oates to thank for.

  • in music
  • 1 min read

Best Album Lists of 2010

It’s that time of the year when various writers and magazines start publishing their “Best of” lists as the year draws to a close.

Whether it’s a top 10 list or a top 50 list doesn’t matter – what matters is we celebrate the the great music that came out in 2010.  I’m pleasantly surprised in perusing the lists how many of these albums I’ve purchased and enjoyed.  While I may disagree with some of the rankings, I generally agree with almost all of the lists I’ve seen so far.

Before we get to the lists though, I highly recommend this article which explains how all of these lists are compiled.  If you read one top 10 list, you should read this first.

Some of my favorite looks at the best albums of 2010:

I’m still working on my list – it will be out in the next week or two.  And I’ll make sure not to try and fall into the traps in the article above!

  • in Digital
  • 2 min read

Superchunk

Superchunk @ South Street Seaport

(Photo by Barry Yanowitz under a CC-NC-BY 2.0 license)

Somehow I went through the 90s oblivious to Superchunk.  I’m sure they were played on Rev105 back in the day, but for some reason I just don’t remember them.  I’m now making up for lost time.

Amazon MP3 has had a number of specials on Superchunk since their September release of their latest album, Majesty Strategy, their first release in 9 years.  This month you can get the remastered version of On the Mouth for only $5.

It’s been well documented that one of the major reasons for the delay between releases is that two of the founders of Superchunk, Mac McCaughan and Laura Ballance, are the founders of the record label, Merge, which they still run.  You may not have heard of Merge, but I can guarantee you’ve heard of two little bands on the label, Arcade Fire and Spoon.  As you can imagine, that keeps them busy.

Superchunk is playing at First Avenue tonight and the Twin Cities is all a-buzz with their return.  The Star Tribune currently features tonight’s Superchunk show on their front page and the City Pages has great coverage.  They published an interview today and later in the day published the complete transcript including quotes that didn’t make the print edition.

They talk about Superchunk’s songs, running Merge and some of the great shows they’ve had playing at 7th Street Entry and First Avenue.  What I wouldn’t give to have seen Superchunk with Rilo Kiley at the Entry…

And if you see their guitar on an American flight, let them know.

Update December 2nd:  A cover of Velvet Underground’s John Cale’s Child’s Christmas was released today.  Read more about it and stream it at Cover Me. (Via Largeheartedboy)

It’s Gameday!

As a huge (American) football fan, it amuses me to no end how my children get into the excitement of game day. They know how much I love my football teams and want to know who the Packers (or Badgers) are playing each week, which other teams I want to win in the other games, and share my enthusiasm for the game. Jack’s knowledge of the players and the opposing teams is almost scary considering he is only 4 years old.

As a Wisconsin native living in Minnesota, they really get excited when the Green Bay Packers take on the Minnesota Vikings. (Though all real Packer fans know the real rivalry is with the Bears – a fact that Minnesotans just don’t understand. The Packer / Viking rivalry is nothing compared to that one – ask me about the time I went to a Packer / Bears game at Lambeau sometime).

So I was happy to see, that without any prompting from me, my two youngest pick out their own clothes this morning:

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Now that brings a smile to my face. We’re just minutes from game time – go Pack go!

  • in GNOME
  • 2 min read

GNOME Boston Summit 2010 kicks off

The GNOME Boston Summit 2010 kicked off a couple hours ago. Dozens of GNOME hackers are at the Tang Center at MIT.

John (J5) Palmieri and Jon McCann helped kick off the Summit.

J5 gave an overview of what the Boston Summit is. It’s different from GUADEC which is many presentations and more formal talks. The Boston Summit is much more informal and run Barcamp style. It gives hackers a chance to hack together and get stuff done. Face to face time is very important and the Boston Summit helps facilitate that.

Jon McCann continued the kickoff and thanked Stormy for her time at the GNOME Foundation as Executive Director to a rousing round of applause.

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He then gave an update on things he’s been working on. The Control Center is actively being developed in GNOME git, new themes for GNOME Shell are coming online, and GNOME 3.0 will feature a new font! The new font is designed by David Crossland (spelling?) who is a big believer in open design and is also hosted on GNOME’s git servers.

Jon talked about Shell briefly (and Owen will talk about it more later today). New guidelines are being written for GNOME 3 applications and wiki pages discussing that as well as compatibility and messaging are in progress. He asked the crowd how many people were running GNOME Shell now and about 25% of the hands in the room went up.

Work on the new modulesets for GNOME is in progress and there is a renewed focus on GNOME’s core and a focus on what the desktop is. One conversation that he looked forward to having this weekend is what is the Core OS versus the applications that layer on top of it. A goal is to make it easier to build the core desktop. One example of this is jhbuild – jhbuild has seen its core modules reduced from 255 to 92 modules! Jon is hoping the group will continue to brainstorm on how to make that even easier.

There are 3-5 months left for development (depending on how you look at freezes) and now is a great time for the community to come together. GNOME 3.0 is a very important release for GNOME and it will take all of us.

Lastly, Jon encouraged the community to watch the video of the talk that Michael Meeks gave at Linux Plumbers this week. The talk was about how GNOME is doing open source right. GNOME has a strong message to share and other projects look to us for things such as doing design in the open, community engagement and more.

From there, people proposed talks and sessions to give Barcamp style and we voted to help prioritize the sessions and J5 started assigning rooms and times for the talks.

  • in GNOME
  • 3 min read

Thank you Stormy

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Most people by now have heard that news that Stormy is leaving as the Executive Director of the GNOME Foundation to take a position at Mozilla.

I’ve had a few people reach out to me to follow up on her announcement to make sure it has nothing to do with the drama going on in the community (it doesn’t) or concerned about the timing with GNOME 3.0 coming (GNOME 3.0 is still coming!)

Now, no one on the Board asked me to do this and I’m speaking for myself, but I believe we’ll be ok. We have a great release coming in April and the Release Team is doing a great job of overseeing that. GNOME Developers are porting apps fast and furious to GTK3, GNOME Shell is coming along nicely, release parties are being planned, docs are being written and I could keep going on. None of these activities are going to stop because we don’t have an ED.

Most of us have left a job at some point – it’s not personal. And Stormy gets to work on something she’s passionate about. I saw this first hand this past April at the Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit where she organized a track to talk about how the desktop should interact with web services. Cornelius from KDE spoke, I spoke, Rejon from identi.ca and more. She also received some great press from a talk she gave this past August about software freedom on the web. And now she has a chance to work to further that cause – which is a worthy one. While I’m sad to see her go, I’m happy to know she continues to work on software freedom and something she is just as passionate about, if not more so.

Stormy has always been visible to the GNOME community and transparent about the work she does with her regular updates of what she’s working on via her blog and emails to the Foundation list. But one of the most important things she did within the community was never in those recaps – and that’s the encouragement she provided to everyone who pinged her. As the face of the Foundation, volunteers would ping her to get her opinion on a new idea or a new feature. They valued her opinion, but more importantly, they wanted affirmation they were doing something right.

Stormy did that for me – in my last job I would commute to Boulder, Colorado about once a quarter, which isn’t too far from where Stormy lived. I was active in the community, but with Stormy’s gentle nudges, I was inspired to take that to the next level. Stormy made time for me and we would meet for coffee or lunch every couple of months and brainstorm and get stuff done. Stormy encouraged me to come to GUADEC in 2009 and was always there to listen to a new idea or answer a question.

I am grateful we had someone as qualified as Stormy to work for the Foundation the last 2+ years. Sure, I’m sad to see her go – not that she’s going far – but more importantly, I’m thankful for everything she has done for everyone in the GNOME community. Thanks again Stormy!