From: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org (ecto-digest) To: ecto-digest@smoe.org Subject: ecto-digest V6 #364 Reply-To: ecto@smoe.org Sender: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-ecto-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk ecto-digest Monday, December 4 2000 Volume 06 : Number 364 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Mandalay ["Adam K." ] Re: Mandalay [Neile Graham ] odds and ends [Neal Copperman ] Re: odds and ends [Joseph Zitt ] Re: odds and ends [Markku Kolkka ] Re: odds and ends [Neal Copperman ] Mariel news [Neile Graham ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2000 11:29:43 -0000 From: "Adam K." Subject: Mandalay Is Nicola Hitchcock still singing with Mandalay? She had an album out in '93 called "A Bowl of Chalk" which got great reviews -- I never got it, but I got a cd single of hers with some great backing b-sides stuff, including a cover of "Is That Love?" with Chris Difford on backing vocals. I'm always keeping my eye out for the album, 'cos the four songs I do have on the single are all winners, and have all, at one point or another, found their way onto mixes that I've made. There is no higher compliment! np: Kid A - Radiohead (jury still very much out) nr: The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingslover ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2000 17:31:23 -0800 From: Neile Graham Subject: Re: Mandalay At 11:29 AM +0000 12/3/00, Adam K. wrote: >Is Nicola Hitchcock still singing with Mandalay? She had an album out in '93 >called "A Bowl of Chalk" which got great reviews -- I never got it, but I got >a cd single of hers with some great backing b-sides stuff, including a cover >of "Is That Love?" with Chris Difford on backing vocals. I'm always keeping >my eye out for the album, 'cos the four songs I do have on the single are all >winners, and have all, at one point or another, found their way onto mixes >that I've made. There is no higher compliment! Yes, she is. What's missing on this one compared to the first is, I think, Stigsworth's production. He produced _empathy_ (with Mandalay) and gave it a bit more of an edge. This album (_instinct_) is Mandalay and Michael Ade (whom I've never heard of). - --Neile n.p. Jorane, _16mm_, which continues to grow on me. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Neile Graham ...... http://www.sff.net/people/neile ....... neile@sff.net Les Semaines: A Weekly Journal . http://www.sff.net/people/neile/semaines The Ectophiles' Guide to Good Music ....... http://www.smoe.org/ectoguide ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2000 22:59:58 -0700 From: Neal Copperman Subject: odds and ends First some CD-R oddities... I've finally started burning CD's, and I expected to have to throw away one or two while I was getting the hang of it. What I wasn't expecting was to throw them away because the CD's are too big. Has anyone had this happen before? I bought a Memorex spindle, and the CD's are actually different sizes. I probably would not have noticed this, except that I was testing them all in my Sony carousel, and one wouldn't play. The one that wouldn't play doesn't spin up right. When I look at it in the tray, it is snug against the walls of the cd drawer, while normal CD's (and most of the other CD-R's) will turn easily. There are a few of them like that too. (Looks like Memorex is a brand I'll avoid in the future. I had thought they were a realiable name brand.) I've been in the neverending process of redoing my CD database. I figure I probably have only about 3 hours of sticking discs in my computer before I'm done. (I think I've spent 9 hours so far, and that's just the loading the discs part.) What really threw me for a loop was when I put in a batch this morning and ran them past CDDB, and I got a correct hit on a CD-R! Can anyone explain that to me? The serial numbers aren't burnt into CD-R's, are they? (This was actually a bootleg too, which seemed all the weirder to me. Perhaps the person actually enters their boots into CDDB?) And lastly, I went to an avant-garde percussion and dance show on Saturday, featuring J.A. Deane, Colleen Mulvhill and Le Quan Ninh, the latter in particular was quite amazing. As an odd choice of intermission music, they played Susan McKeown's Bones. neal np: These Times - J. A. Deane ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 4 Dec 2000 00:39:35 -0500 From: Joseph Zitt Subject: Re: odds and ends On Sun, Dec 03, 2000 at 10:59:58PM -0700, Neal Copperman wrote: > I've finally started burning CD's, and I expected to have to throw > away one or two while I was getting the hang of it. What I wasn't > expecting was to throw them away because the CD's are too big. Has > anyone had this happen before? I bought a Memorex spindle, and the > CD's are actually different sizes. I probably would not have noticed > this, except that I was testing them all in my Sony carousel, and one > wouldn't play. The one that wouldn't play doesn't spin up right. > When I look at it in the tray, it is snug against the walls of the cd > drawer, while normal CD's (and most of the other CD-R's) will turn > easily. There are a few of them like that too. (Looks like Memorex > is a brand I'll avoid in the future. I had thought they were a > realiable name brand.) I've worked with a lot of different brands, including Memorex (which have worked well for me) and have never ever seen CDs of different sizes (other than the 3" ones and intentionally shaped ones). This may be a rare manufacturing fluke. > The serial numbers aren't burnt into CD-R's, are they? (This was > actually a bootleg too, which seemed all the weirder to me. Perhaps > the person actually enters their boots into CDDB?) As I understand it, CDDB does not work from any sort of serial number. Rather, it performs some calculation based on the array of lengths of tracks, which turn out to differ enough to almost distinctly identify discs. This is why you'll find a lot more ambiguities for discs with very few tracks than discs with many: there's a much better chance of two CDs with a single track on each having the tracks be of identical lengths than for two discs with 20 tracks each matching all the track lengths. What baffles me is why so many labels haven't caught the clue and aren't entering their disc info into CDDB as a part of their release process. (Paging Suzanne Cerquone: do your company's labels do this?) While I've been gradually building my database, about a third of my discs are not in CDDB and therefore awaiting mt pounding in the info myself, or something. - -- |> ~The only thing that is not art is inattention~ --- Marcel Duchamp <| | jzitt@metatronpress.com http://www.metatronpress.com/jzitt | | Latest CD: Jerusaklyn http://www.mp3.com/josephzitt | | Comma: Voices of New Music Silence: the John Cage Discussion List | ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 04 Dec 2000 08:29:34 +0200 From: Markku Kolkka Subject: Re: odds and ends At 07:59 4.12.2000, you wrote: >What really threw me for a loop was when I put in a batch this morning and >ran them past CDDB, and I got a correct hit on a CD-R! Can anyone explain >that to me? The serial numbers aren't burnt into CD-R's, are they? AFAIK, CDDB doesn't use the EAN/UPC numbers to identify the discs, but the directory information (number and length of tracks). - -- Markku Kolkka markku.kolkka@businesstori.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2000 23:38:53 -0700 From: Neal Copperman Subject: Re: odds and ends At 12:39 AM -0500 12/4/00, Joseph Zitt wrote (again before I asked!): >As I understand it, CDDB does not work from any sort of serial number. >Rather, it performs some calculation based on the array of lengths of >tracks, which turn out to differ enough to almost distinctly >identify discs. This is why you'll find a lot more ambiguities for >discs with very few tracks than discs with many: there's a much >better chance of two CDs with a single track on each having the tracks >be of identical lengths than for two discs with 20 tracks each matching >all the track lengths. That is interesting. I have had about a dozen or so false hits. They have all been short, but I'm not sure that was the real issue. I think they were all promos or special singles (then again, what do your short discs tend to be?). I just did a bunch of 2 track Tori discs, and they all were fine. The odd matches are usually pretty intriguing though. They are almost always really bad... something I would never get. It would be interesting if I actually matched something else that I owned. neal np: These Times - J. A. Deane ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2000 22:49:49 -0800 From: Neile Graham Subject: Mariel news Hi, this is from an artist who recently submitted her disc for review on The Ectophiles' Guide. I didn't know she had an mp3.com page. She's not really to my peculiar tastes, but I know other people here who like pretty pop music might want to check her out. Info at http://www.mp3.com/mariel and of course on her Ectophiles' Guide page at http://www.smoe.org/ectoguide/guide.cgi?artists/mariel and her website at http://www.mariel.net - --Neile >From: AerialSnd@aol.com >Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2000 16:36:20 EST >Subject: Happy Thanksgiving >To: AerialSnd@aol.com >MIME-Version: 1.0 > >Hello! > >I just want to wish you a happy and safe Thanksgiving. There are several new >songs and pictures at MP3.com if you >want to check it out. Thanks for everything! Be well. > >Love, >Mariel > - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Neile Graham ...... http://www.sff.net/people/neile ....... neile@sff.net Les Semaines: A Weekly Journal . http://www.sff.net/people/neile/semaines The Ectophiles' Guide to Good Music ....... http://www.smoe.org/ectoguide ------------------------------ End of ecto-digest V6 #364 **************************