If, like me you are too old to know exactly what sub-zero minimal techno is, help is at hand. Attack Magazine has a webpage showing how to put together various dance rhythms.

Every town has its High Street, with stories to tell. Since the earthquake Christchurch has been left with more historic spaces than places. The stories of what used to be there are being collected on the High Street Stories website. 

The old Post Office building stood firm through all the shaking (even the parapet). It was built in 1932, just after the Napier earthquake. Around 100 reinforced concrete piles were sunk 35' into the ground and a 15" concrete pad was poured for the foundation. The style is stripped classical, and it stands out (in every way) as a triumph of over-engineering. 

The music educators of Berks County have put together a page of links to articles on research that associates music to better cognitive performance in other areas (eg maths). Possibly nothing new here, but it is handy to have all these listed in one place.

Compact discs account for 80% of all music sales in Japan. In 2012 CD sales rose, and downloaded music sales fell. The trend is attributed to an ageing buying public, and a Japanese liking for a physical product.

"Ohm Studio is the first and only pro grade, cloud-based collaborative Digital Audio Workstation. Whether you're a band who need to record a demo, a polished LP, a professional musician, teacher, student, a hobbyist - this changes everything. Time and space are so passé!"

https://www.ohmstudio.com/

Waves have just released a plugin that emulates the famous EMI J37 1" 4 track.

I went to hear this last night - the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie with the score presented with a live orchestra. The Christchurch Symphony Orchestra was accompanied by a small choir, and Hamish Oliver on synthesiser (for bells and low frequency rumble). The music was miked up through the PA so a proper balance of all aspects of the sound could be done - and good it sounded too.

Today I was reworking an Excel spreadsheet that I wrote back in 1991 to calculate room modes. I needed to update a macro that handles a sort function and was about to delete the old macro and write a new one, but thought why not try to modify it first. So I edited it and guess what - off it went working perfectly. I can't even remember which version of Excel I wrote that on way back then. I have to hand it to MS - when it comes to backward compatibility this is amazing.
I love it when software soldiers on through lots of OS updates etc. Logic is brilliant at this too. Pro Trolls...well that's another story.

NZ singer Lorde has topped the US Billboard chart with the song "Royals". Not bad going for a 16 year old kid from lil' ol' New Zealand. Joel Little co-wrote and produced the song.

Update: Royals has now been at the top of the Billboard 100 for seven straight weeks, and is the cover story on this weeks Billboard magazine.