cortex has a new job and was hard to track down and we had a few months of missing each other. We found some time on August 14th and tried to play catch-up. Runs about 97 minutes.

Helpful Links

Podcast Feed
Subscribe with iTunes
Direct mp3 download

not_on_display did the mixing on this one and I think it hopefully sounds better than last time?

Preroll
Heat pumps!
BestofMeFi on Facebook

Jobs
Flickr Commons and Jessamyn's new part-timey job
Federal Gov't Administrative Support Specialist by kinsey

Projects
We built a giant eagle pupper for Iceland's national day by Nothing
Have You Played? by adrianhon
adrianhon on peglin
Our Backyard by joannemerriam
Banned Book Book Club by bwerdmuller (MeFi Post by Paul Slade)
Jessamyn's tips for dealing with haters
FLW inspired Bird Feeder by Marky
Infinite LP records from the Boston Public Library via archive.org by metatuesday
Today in Tabs

Meta MeFi
Site Update by jessamyn
Happy birthday, Metafilter! by Melismata
MeFi24 in 2023 by jessamyn

MeFi
Jeopardy! contestants weigh 2nd shot at glory vs. crossing picket line by Etrigan
The Greatest Animated Series in the Surreal Sci-Fi Toilet Horror Genre by AlSweigart
Police Log: "Misdemeanors: blahblahblhablahb" by not_on_display
"For me, being an artist means being in community with others." by jessamyn
To be more specific, he's a surgeon. by Fizz
when you get your ass handed to you, just hand it right back by cortex
"A counterexample to established techno-utopian histories" by box
Design notes on the 2023 Wikipedia redesign by Etrigan
Writing to possible or impossible audiences by brainwane
WAH WAH WAH! [wah wah wah wah waaaaaaah] by cortex
a comment by unearthed
a comment by dephlogisticated
Redditors, in defense of Reddit, destroy Reddit by Rhaomi
a comment by sdrawkcab
What Should We Learn from Reddit? by Bottlecap
Room Temperature Superconductivity? by ZakDaddy
The Unreality of Pro Wrestling by Pachylad
"Don't rub it too high or someone will cry, and steal your homerun away" by The Pluto Gangsta
Iocaine Powder by clawsoon

AskMe
Memory Filter: what is the name of this design thinking author/blogger? by mecran01
Rhinos named Clara by johngoren
What does " T—S.T.D.—B" mean in a book? by whitewall
Best "I quit Twitter and my life is richer for it" story? by Jon44
Recommend me brilliant biographies about brilliant women by underclocked
I bought a dremel. Tell me everything! by cortex

MeTa
2023 MeFi Fundraising Month by loup

FanFare
The Afterparty
Peacemaker
Mrs. Davis
Silo
TV Shows Not Set in the US or England
Forged in Fore

More MeTa
A Memorial Day
shoesfullofdust passed away

In 2016, at only 28-years-old, pianist John Burke has already accomplished the dream of a lifetime for many musicians -- to be nominated for a Grammy Award. It's for his newest album " Orogen ," a breathtaking journey through what he describes as the creation of mountains.

The day Margo Price walked into the studio to start recording her new album, That's How Rumors Get Started , she had butterflies in her stomach, a mixture of excitement, trepidation — and morning sickness. "I definitely was not expecting to be pregnant," she says. "I had planned to go into the studio regardless of what was happening in my personal life." Her daughter Ramona was born last June — and her new album is now out in the world, too. Price says that the two processes, making an album and having a baby, were eerily similar. "I think when you're making art and you're creating something, you have this feeling of protection," she says. "You keep it to yourself at first, and it's evolving and growing and changing. And the same [can be said] when you're carrying a baby. It's such a process that it's really hard to describe either one. I think they're both kind of mysterious in their own way. It's something that's just so personal." NPR's Ailsa Chang spoke to Margo Price about staying

Pastor Doug Batchelor takes you on a fascinating, faith-building exploration of the greatest and deepest of mysteries—the triune nature of our Creator God.

Since the coronavirus pandemic battered China's economy, tens of millions of urban and factory jobs have evaporated. Some workers and business owners have banded together to pressure companies or local governments for subsidies and payouts. But many of the newly unemployed have instead returned to their rural villages. China's vast countryside now serves as an unemployment sponge, soaking up floating migrant workers in temporary agricultural work on small family plots. "Say a factory used to hire 1,000 temporary workers; now, without new orders, these business owners can't afford to hire this many people," Yan Xiyun, a labor intermediary, told NPR. "The factory I usually go to in previous years could easily hire 2,000 people. Now there is scarcely anyone [on the factory floor]." Ten years ago, Yan left her own village near the small city of Zhumadian in Henan province for the first time and joined the migrant workforce. Now, she's a headhunter working on commission, placing thousands

It may seem obvious, with double-digit unemployment and plunging economic output. But if there was any remaining doubt that the U.S. is in a recession, it's now been removed by the official scorekeepers at the National Bureau of Economic Research. The bureau's Business Cycle Dating Committee — the fat lady of economic opera — said the expansion peaked in February after a record 128 months, and we've been sliding into a pandemic-driven recession since. In making the announcement , the committee pointed to the "unprecedented magnitude of the decline in employment and production, and its broad reach across the entire economy." At the same time, the committee noted the recession could be short-lived. The U.S. added 2.5 million jobs last month after losing more than 22 million in March and April. Many forecasters said they expect economic output to begin growing again in the third quarter. The standard definition of a recession is "a decline in economic activity that lasts more than a few

Updated at 4:12 p.m. ET The Federal Reserve left interest rates near zero Wednesday and once again promised to deliver whatever monetary medicine it can to an economy that's badly ailing from the coronavirus pandemic. "The Federal Reserve is committed to using its full range of tools to support the U.S. economy in this challenging time," the central bank said in a statement . While noting that "financial conditions have improved, in part reflecting policy measures to support the economy," the Fed's rate-setting committee reiterated its intent to leave interest rates at rock-bottom levels, "until it is confident that the economy has weathered recent events and is on track to achieve its maximum employment and price stability goals." Notes released along with the committee's statement suggest no rate increases are expected at least through 2022. "We're not thinking about raising rates," Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said at a news conference. "We're not even thinking about thinking about

Editor's note: This is an excerpt of Planet Money 's newsletter. You can sign up here . Geoff Caddick / AFP via Getty Images Brooklyn Heights sits across the East River from Lower Manhattan. It's filled with multimillion-dollar brownstones and — usually — Range Rovers, Teslas and BMWs. These days it's easy to find parking. The brownstones are mostly dark at night. The place is a ghost town. And the neighborhood's sushi restaurants, Pilates studios, bistros and wine bars are either closed or mostly empty. It's a microcosm for what has been the driver of the pandemic recession: Rich people have stopped going out, destroying millions of jobs. That's one of the key insights of a blockbuster study that was dropped late last week by a gang of economists led by Harvard University's Raj Chetty. If you don't know who Chetty is, he's sort of like the Michael Jordan of policy wonks. He's a star economist. He and his colleagues assemble and crunch massive data sets and deliver insights that

It's a GPT that rates your existential dread

[Link

In which I write about Islam, spirituality, my Hajj pilgrimage in the summer of 2024, living as a USian in southern Spain, and change both voluntary and unwilled.

Example of what I write about: I just added a post about how fear of Satan, which was encouraged by the Catholic church and pop culture, scared me off from belief in ANYTHING Unseen (including God) for decades.

[Link

Stark Raving Mab, the third book in my urban fantasy trilogy Gravity's Daughter is out as of yesterday. If you're intrigued by any of the following: action-heavy urban fantasy, less-traditional faeries, gravity-defying antics on public transit, Canadian settings or in-over-their-heads characters who will not give up sarcasm 'til you pry it from their cold, dead hands, then give the books a look or request them from your local library.

I did a projects post back in 2022 on the first book but I think I forgot to crow about the second last fall, because I have trouble regularly remembering to talk about myself. (Or even, uh, irregularly--like when I publish a literal book.)

[Link

"Honeymoon in Oak Ridge" is a documentary that tells the story of my parents, two young newlyweds who unknowingly contributed to building the world's first atomic weapon.

In 1998, I returned with them to Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where they shared on camera their wartime memories with pride and sorrow. Decades later, I sat down with their grandkids to hear what they think about their grandparents' role in this piece of history and how it affected our family and their view of history. The 20-minute documentary won the Jury Award for Best Short Documentary at the 2024 Uranium Film Festival. It's now available to stream on Docsville.com (free trial available).

[Link

Minneapolis-based singer/composer Nona Invie unveils gentle offering “Forget My Name,” from forthcoming LP Self-soothing. Giving us a glimpse of the health and cathartic project, the new single is built on…

Pastor Doug Batchelor takes you on a fascinating, faith-building exploration of the greatest and deepest of mysteries—the triune nature of our Creator God.

Elohim, our Ruler and Lord... Jehovah, our covenant-God of the promise. "Our hearts shall rejoice in Him, because we have trusted in His holy name." The Lord is faithful forever and He yearns for a personal relationship with YOU. Join us now and learn more ! 1.- Malachi 4 verse 5 says that God will send Elijah before the great and dreadful day of the Lord. Is this the same Elijah from the Old Testament ? 2.- The book of Revelation talks about people washing their robes. What is this referencing ? 3.- How many courtyards were there in the sanctuary during Jesus’ time on earth ? 4.- Is 1 Corinthians 15 verse 29 saying we should baptize the dead ? 5.- Was Joseph of Arimathea a Christian before the death and resurrection of Christ or did he become one after ? 6.- What is God’s name in Hebrew ? 7.- Why were Jesus’ last words on the cross the same in Matthew 27 verse 46, and Mark 15 verse 34, but different in John 19 verse 30 ? 9.- Please explain the “white stone” and “new name” in Revelation 2 verse 17 ? 10.- Many people believe once you are saved that you are always saved. Is this biblical ? 11.- When in Earth’s history does Isaiah 6 verses 9-13 occur ? 12.- Where were the sea creatures during the flood ? 13.- Did Jesus raise Himself from the grave, or did God the Father call Him ? 14.- What does the Bible say about spiritualism in the last days and UFOs ? 15.- Is Revelation 22 verse 2 describing more than one tree of life in Heaven ? 16.- Deuteronomy 22 verse 11 says we are not to wear garments made of more than one type of fiber. Is this advice still applicable ? 17.- What does 2 Corinthians 5 verse 8 mean when it says, “It is better to be absent from the body” ? 18.- Are the two witnesses in Revelation 11 verses 1-14 Moses and Elijah, and will they come down to Earth before Jesus comes ? 21.- Why does the new Jerusalem need walls and gates ? Is there anything bad outside ? 22.- If everyone is going by the Bible, why does one pastor answer differently from another ?

The Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, and his counterparts in Britain and the European Union spoke at a conference in Portugal.

Roughly half of those surveyed say they are worse off financially than a year ago, and most disapprove of President Biden’s handling of inflation.

http://www.musicxray.com/xrays/2672493 KadoMane - my present

http://www.musicxray.com/xrays/2672495 KadoMane - Salute My Guy

Ive been making music for couple of years now but still cant figure out why my mix doesnt sound professional. Im I doing something wrong? This is the link to my tracks http://www.ourmedia.org/node/300488 Someone please help me out.

The 100% guaranteed way to get your bedroom mixes to sound more professional (and by far the most expensive) is to spend time in a recording studio. Take the raw tracks to something you want to mix, import it into their ProTools setup (or whatever they use) and have a pro engineer (must be a talkative, friendly one, not a grumpy, cynical one) to mix it. ASK A BILLION questions, be a dork and write stuff down if you have to. The worst case scenario is that after 2/3 hours at least you'll know what questions to ask of Google or at the local tech book store. The best case is that your music impresses the engineer and he/she becomes a pseudo mentor for you. Engineering is by far my weakest area (along with playing in tune and in time) so everything that follows is said that caveat: I have found that going cheap on mastering tools (compression, limiters, eq) hurts bedroom mixes a lot. Money I've spent on the top utilities there (I use Waves) dwarfs all my other plugins put together by an order of magnitude. (Reason's mastering suite is pretty good so you may be covered there; although I've applied Waves L2 to mixes done after the 'final' Reason mixdown and there's no question there was a marked improvement in pro-sheen.) I have found tweakheadz site very useful, especially their mixing 101 page. Finally I have been told (and have experienced it myself) that posting often to ccM and asking for real, brutal reviews and feedback has helped a lot of people. I, for one, am very, very embarrassed by several of my uploads from 2 years ago here, while only very embarrassed by more recent ones; all strictly due to people hearing stuff I didn't.

that sounds good. ill look for a studio near my place. at the end you said that the comments from ccmixer is very useful but what shall i do if i want a brutal review of my own original mix? because on ccmixer i can only upload remixes or samples or separate tracks.

being a remix site and short on resources we can't handle original material. so, er, get remixing... ;)

my buddy des has a great blog he runs that can surely help almost anyone here with improving their production. http://www.hometracked.com/ also, his music is worth checking out, just so you can see that he knows what he's talking about. des is a great guy and a really excellent artist. http://www.deshead.com/

U need to have a good pair of monitors, headphones will not do at all! I agree with Fourstones, Waves is a very good suite. I use it within SoundForge and it really does help in cleaning up the frequencies. My mixes really improved when I had monitor speakers included in the set up. Experiment and let me know, I'll give u some quality feedback, no holds, sometimes the truth hurts! LOL! EZ m8 Morr

The best thing I can say is: learn about sound. Learn about frequencies, which ones sound like what and do what to the overall mix. Whether or not to use a low or high pass filter on something. Fiddle with EQs for hours. And more importantly, get criticism. It's the easiest way to learn what sound to look out for, and such. And most importantly of all: Practice. Mix till your ears bleed. (from the time spent listening to the same song, not due to the terrible mix :P) Mixing is one of my strong suits, but most of it is just being able to hear the song, and make the adjustments that I want, to be able to make the necessary changes and just know what needs to be done.

bravo!

That's a very good point- I started with a Mac LC, EZVision and an M1, with the only audio manipulation being Hypercard. I got good at customizing patches and finding seamless loop points manually just to get what I could out of what I had, with mastering being 1/4"-to-RCA from the headphone jack on the M1 to AUX IN on the cassette player, or the same thing with 1/8" adapter for the 'puter sound files. Then I'd record and bounce these cassette tracks to my 4-track, with final routing from 4-track's headphone-out back to the cassette. Ugly stuff, but that's what I had to work with...

This is a very good point. I think that it's easy to keep adding new gear, and thus miss the richness of existing gear and software. I like to work with more limited software sometimes, so that I can feel as if I am exploiting it to its fullness.

Ive been making music for couple of years now but still cant figure out why my mix doesnt sound professional. Im I doing something wrong? This is the link to my tracks http://www.ourmedia.org/node/300488 Someone please help me out. The first thing I noticed was the lack of higher frequencies in your mix... My mixes always end up being bass heavy (because I suck horribly) so I can see we both have the same problem... There's is (however) an over-abundance of frequency-fighting in your track... A lot of distorted things competing for my attention (at least in my ears). Dunno if any of this has been helpful, but we could all learn things...so hopefully you'll have advice for me in the future ;-) Good luck, and we me luck too! -Joel

This is a useful thread. Im just in the middle of mixing a new ccmixter-based song and its just not coming together for me. The tweakheadz and hometracked sites are great. A couple other useful sites: tips and techniques at gearslutz - http://www.gearslutz.com/board/tips-techniques/168409-tips-techniques.html ; Live tips - http://www.ableton.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27120 ; general EQ reference - http://www.idmforums.com/showthread.php?t=11466 Im definitely going to get the mix Im working on up here, I need some blunt advice.

OK, I uploaded Hollywood Picture Book (feat Calendar Girl and Kaer Trouz) and entered a pluggy plug for comments over this weekend.

Escuche el programa de este lunes 5 de febrero. La Luciérnaga, un espacio de humor y opinión de Caracol Radio que acompaña por más de 31 años a sus oyentes en el regreso a casa.  

La artista es reconocida por haber interpretado a Celia Cruz en una telenovela,

I have just moved and wish to update my address with Equifax. The other credit agencies allowed me to do this online, but Equifax say I have to mail them a photocopy of my driver's license and SS card. I have never updated my address with them in the past, but they already have all my previous addresses, so do I need to mail them my details too - or will they just get updated automagically?

A quick Google says you can change your address in the myEquifax Dispute Center, but if I do that and choose to dispute my current address (my previous one), I'm given the following options for "Why are you disputing your current address" - "I have never lived at this address", "This address belongs to another person with a similar name", "I believe I am a victim of fraud or identity theft and this address is not mine" - none of which fit my pretty common "I have moved".
It seems that I'm missing something here - that the only way to update my address with a major credit agency is by mail? - and if I do so, I'm also not quite sure if I'll receive confirmation when/ if it is done. Am/ will I?

From working as a cloakroom attendant at Ronnie Scott's in jny: London to performing on the club stage to a sellout audience with one's own quartet is quite a journey. It might sound like a corny plot from a TV series, but since playing their first show in 2021, Finn Carter and his quartet have gone from strength to strength with a string of sold-out shows, including playing the main show at the venerated Ronnie Scott's and headlining the Brick Lane Festival... [ read more ]