Tracklist

COPY is Aira Mitsuki’s debut album, and was released on the 3rd of September, 2008.

The album opens with one of the best new tracks on this album, GALAXY BOY, which was the main promotional track for the album. It opens with Aira singing, with some shining synth behind her, before the main arrangement comes in. This song has what I consider the most bland verses on the album, but the bridge actually gives the song some sense of having an arrangement, when the now double-length chorus comes in and makes the song about ten times more interesting. It’s also the part of the song that’ll keep you coming back, as it’s definitely catchy. A side note, both covers for this album are based on the GALAXY BOY video, sans 2D Aira. (Watch it, you’ll see.)

We now come to the second single for the album, China Discotica. The synth arrangement for this song sounds pretty random at times, but that actually helps the song. The most annoying part of this song is definitely the repeating “Ey” sound that opens the song, but the rest of it is definitely addicting. It doesn’t really make you think of China, and I have no idea what the hell a Discotica is, but that doesn’t matter. It’s sorta sad that the Chinese had to burn her by not playing this at the Olympics though, despite being a respect song for them.

Colorful Tokyo Sounds NO.9 was definitely a great debut for Aira, as it shows how catchy, yet simple, her songs can be. It finds a happy medium between GALAXY BOY and China Discotica, as the whole arrangement is interesting, without any of the verse breaks GALAXY BOY had, while keeping it simpler than China Discotica. The synth never really changes much, save for a few additions in the chorus that help the song come out a bit better. This song definitely has the largest Perfume influence compared to any other song, as if you’re an avid Perfume fan, you’ll be able to pick up on a few similarities between this song and a few select others from them.

Darling Wondering Staring was probably the weakest of the A-sides this era. While I love the heavenly synth arrangement at times, the verses sound a bit too choppy, and Aira’s voice is distorted in a way that doesn’t seem to help. The whispering before the chorus is a bad move as well, as the song doesn’t flow as well after that, and the chorus itself tends to have too many words crammed into it, so it comes out as too fast. It’s not horrible, but it has some obvious flaws.

Now comes the second new song on this album, HEART LINE ALIVE.  It opens with an upbeat, jumping synth line, that rises into the actual song. The song isn’t as happy as the opening makes you think it is, though, as there’s a sort of darker tone to the way the tone of the song comes off when it reaches the chorus. It’s another great synth arrangement, and Aira’s distortions fit well here, but while the song’s good, something about the random Aira sounds they put throughout it annoy me to no end. The slow down at about 4 minutes with the pan pipe sounds was a nice touch though.

 Next up, in an extremely odd move by the arranger of the tracklisting, we have China Discotica’s Substance Remix. It’s not a bonus track, it’s just there, and most likely because it appeared on the Beautiful Techno compilation album. The song has a much more stable synth line, and while it loses the random charm of the original, it’s a good song on its own. The high volume, continuous synth line in the bridge and opening can be a bit grating, as it tends to be a bit louder than everything else found in the song. Also, it cuts the chorus from the song completely, with only the “Plastic Fantastic” line remaining. I’ll take the original over this, personally.

Fantasy Candy is the next new offering on COPY. It’s another instant start song, blasting straight into Aira’s singing and a synth line that sounds strikingly familiar to China Discotica, until it finishes the chorus. This is one of the fastest songs on the album this far, with a steady thumping beat and random chiming electronic synth lines in the background that help give the song a bit more life. The song takes an instant notch down when the vocals stop for the second time, which is fairly early in the song, which is more of a reasonable idea for how the verses are going to sound in comparison to the chorus. The song has a great bridge too, and I’m always a fan of when vocals start high and end low. It may be due to my odd attraction for fast techno pop, but this song is definitely the best up to this point in the album.

This is where the tracklist starts to get confusing. You folks with the regular edition of COPY are treated to the original version of High Bash. Aira’s vocals are low at the beginning, and distorted to pretty much the same degree as every other song. The song has a thumping synth line once more, that takes an extremely choppy sound before the first verse. It’s probably what Fantasy Candy would sound like if it was a bit slower. As such, in its current position, it comes off as a bit boring. The chorus is probably the blandest I’ve heard from Aira, and the rest of the song isn’t much better, to be honest.

The High Bash YAKENOHARA version has the same vocal line as the last song, with a much more active synth arrangement to accompany it. The synth has a much louder sound to it, and has a bit more bass compared to the original version. Otherwise, it’s pretty similar to the original, in that it doesn’t change much and has dull vocals. It’s an improvement, but I’m still not overly interested.

This next track is confusing, too. The version we have here is called Swallowtail D.A.N.C.E (Cherryboy Function ver.), but where’s our original? Anyway, it opens with a synth line resembling a tambourine (after some splat synths with Aira sighing over them), which lasts quite a while. This section of the song is certainly lively, but at a minute in and no vocals to speak of, I was getting nervous. They come in after that minute, and the song takes its usual one notch down method. The synth line is definitely interesting, and is the main reason you’ll be listening to the song, so hopefully you like it as much as I do. It’s a song that likes sticking to its forumla.

Beep Count Fantastic is definitely the most aggressive song on the limited edition of COPY. The beginning is a repeating synth sound that’ll pretty much deafen you, followed by a thumping bass line and rising synth sounds. It’ll then swap to the opening synth at a much more drawn out level, which is later joined by some synth that sounds closest to how a musical synth arrangement would act as a phone key dialing tone. There’re no lyrics until OVER a minute in this time, and they last for under half a minute, and by this point, I usually either get too bored to care about to continuing, or my sore ears won’t allow me to. It might be danceable for some people though, and would most likely sound great in a dance club.

Yellow Supercar is bound to get your blood pumping after the last song, and it lives up to the Supercar portion of its name: this song wins the award for fastest song on the album (as far as I can tell), and it sounds twice as fast as any other song. It might not be literally, but anyway, the song starts off slow and thumping, like many Aira songs do, followed by the song speeding up slightly (Fantasy Candy speed), then doubling itself afterwards. It’s full of quick rolling synth and beeps. Aira does a great job at keeping up with this ADD song, with the only real let down being that the chorus mainly consists of the words Yellow Supercar. I can live with that though, because this song is just great fun to listen to, with its upbeat atmosphere and high-speed sound. (Like I said, fast techno is in.)

Happiness Land is the final non-bonus song you’ll hear on this album. It slows it down considerably after Yellow Supercar, and adds a traditional flair to the song, albeit only a small one, with the Chinese-influenced beeps that play during the opening. There’s something that screams B-side about this song, which may be the somewhat bland chorus, yet it’s still an alright song to listen to once in a while.

While Happiness Island marks the end of the normal tracks, STAR FRUITS SURF RIDER, the second A-side from the Darling Wondering Staring/STAR FRUITS SURF RIDER single, opens the Regular edition bonus track section. I’m still not a real fan of this song, despite the acoustic guitars thrown in with the array of the usual synth. The song comes off as boring in comparison to some of what we get in the album, so it’s not surprising that it was placed here instead of somewhere above.

OH LORD, AIRA, I LOVE YOU! This is probably the least likely cover of a song you’d expect Aira to do: The Lenny Kravitz song Rock’n Roll Is Dead. This is what you call putting an electronic spin on old Western rock, as it opens with some metallic synth thuds followed by an electric guitar solo from the original song, followed by some ethereal synth, which is blown away by the electric guitar from the opening, with electronic distortions placed over it. Aira makes a noise or two in this part, but the vocals come in shortly after. I’m LOVING the arrangement in this song, and despite it having minimal vocals, they fit perfectly in this song, and it easily tops anything I’ve heard on this album. It’s an interesting mix of two seemingly unrelated genres, and yet it works perfectly. It does tend to repeat itself with the guitar, but not in a bad way. Sadly, this is the only new song found in the bonus track section on the Regular edition album. This is also the song that rivals Beep Count Fantastic in aggressiveness. (Thus the “On the limited edition” line in the BCF song review.)

ROMANTIC ROPE, the B-side from the China Discotica single, follows up Rock’n Roll Is Dead, and I groan at how boring it sounds in its position. It’s a calmer song, with a much softer sound, but it’s also the worse of the B-Sides that have appeared on Aira singles. (Candy Light Mode and this song.) There’s never much of a tone change, which is never a good thing, and while it’s one of the few songs from Aira to feature a lot of natural instrument sounds, it doesn’t pull it off as well as Candy Light Mode did, which makes you wonder why it was left off of the album.

To end the Regular edition album, we’re given the Darling Wondering Staring PLASTIC FANTASTIC remix. This is a remix that annoys the hell out of me, with the repeating Aira sounds, and the destruction of anything ethereal that could be heard in the original version, which was what made it as good as it was. It’s oddly catchy at the same time though, so I don’t really hate it. It’s just a general dislike thing, as they’ve basically removed the lyrics and made it an original song of its own.

Almost there now! All of you people who purchased this from HMV will get the bonus track L0ne1yBoy L0ne1yGirl as well, and to be honest, this sounds like STAR FRUITS SURF RIDER's twin. It's another ethereal song, with airy, echoing vocals and a light synth arrangement. When it reaches the verse, it sounds a bit more like a dance song instead, due to the increased beat and quickly added new beats. The chorus follows the latter arrangement, before going back to square one and slowing down again. The break down near the end is pretty well done, with some interesting, high-pitched synth thrown in. It's a very good track, but overall, it doesn't add a large amount to the album itself.

And now, to end the most confusing album in our current times (for you Limited Edition album holders, anyway) is the YAKENOHARA MEGAMIX. This song is a medley of a few tracks from this album, including: China Discotica (Substance remix), China Discotica, Colorful Tokyo Sounds NO.9, Swallowtail D.A.N.C.E (Cherryboy Function ver.), Beep Count Fantastic, and ROMANTIC ROPE, in that order. I’m not too happy that they left some of the better songs out of this, but no matter how you look at it, it’s basically a repetition of some sections of the above songs with the “Ey” sound that opened China Discotica opening it, and a looping of the ending sound from ROMANTIC ROPE closing it. There are some sped up and skipping parts though, with the most annoying definitely being the end of Beep Count Fantastic, where it keeps rising and getting louder until it deafens you and swaps to ROMANTIC ROPE. I’m not a fan of mega mixes, and this is no exception.

Album Score
B

Favorite Tracks
GALAXY BOY, Colorful Tokyo Sounds NO.9, HEART LINE ALIVE, Yellow Supercar, Rock’n Roll Is Dead

While this album certainly has many ups and downs, overall it’s a solid debut album for a budding star in a genre that’s only now gaining true attention in the music industry. Many of the new tracks don’t come off as well as they could, but there are a few true gems found within that make this one of the most recommendable Techno-Pop albums of 2008.

No longer did I have to worry about short intros and outros and mismatching beats, because I could re-edit my own versions of songs I wanted. And once I started saving loops and samples of my favourite parts of records, I could start remixing them from the bottom up in a live situation - using a drum loop from one place, bassline from anoter, an acapella from a third track, and so on. I added a midi controller to operate the volume and EQ levels for up to sixteen tracks simultaneously, and that was all I needed - I didn't even need headphones because I had a  graphic representation of the song in front of me and could see the breakdowns etc and even mark where elements of a song began and ended.

Finally, I realised that I could also mix anything in 4/4 time very easily. With Ableton you set a beat marker at the start of a bar and one at the end, and then just tell it how long to take to get from one marker to the next. So if I had a record at 120bpm, I could simply set the master tempo for 125bpm (for example) and Ableton took care of the time-stretching and key - no more speeded up records sounding like Mickey Mouse!

The Shenanigans series of mixes was born out of a desire to see how much I could push myself using Ableton - whether I could mix rock, dance, hip-hop, r&b and pop as seamlessly as I could mix dance records together. This mix, Shenanigans 01, is my very first attempt at doing that. I deliberately picked as varied a selection as I could, so in this mix you have Ocean Colour Scene and The Sugarhil gang mixed together as an opening pair, and artists that feature later include Korn and Girls Aloud, Linkin Park and Elvis Costello, Deep Dish and Elvis Presley, and so on.

I've split the mix into different parts to make it easier to download and find your favourite bits later. You should download all eight parts, then play them in order with no gaps between the tracks in order to get the full effect. If you put them on your iPod or press then to a CD, make sure you don't have gaps between the tracks!

Shenanigans 01 - Part 1:

Format: mp3

Size: 7.8Mb

Time:8:21

Tracklisting:

Sugarhill Gang - Rapper's Delight
Ocean Colour Scene - The Day We Caught The Train
Amerie - Man Up
Fun Lovin' Criminals - Love Unlimited
M.I.A. - Galang
Survivor - Eye Of The Tiger
Usher - Yeah
AC/DC - Back In Black
Korn - Freak On A Leash
LL Cool J - Phenomenon
Embrace - Save Me
Linkin Park - In The End

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 1" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 2:

Format: mp3

Size: 6.2Mb

Time:6:41

Tracklisting:

Freestylers - B-Boy Stance
Blondie - Rapture
Daft Punk - Da Funk
Syntax - Bliss

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 2" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 3:

Format: mp3

Size: 9.5Mb

Time:10:18

Tracklisting:

Prince - Kiss
Fatboy Slim - Praise You
The Jackson 5 - I Want You Back
Elvis Presley - A Little Less Conversation
Barenaked Ladies - One Week
Michael Grey - Weekend
NERD - She Wants To Move
James - Laid
The Bucketheads - The Bomb!
Lionrock - Fire Up The Shoesaw
Britney Spears - Slave 4U
Thunderbugs - It's About Time That You Were Mine

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 3" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 4:

Format: mp3

Size: 6.8Mb

Time:7:22

Tracklisting:

Holly Valance - Curious
Gorillaz - Dare
Felix Da Housecat - Silver Screen Shower Scene
Lenny Kravitz - Are You Gonna Go My Way?
Audio Bullys - We Don't Care

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 4" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 5:

Format: mp3

Size: 6.6Mb

Time:7:12

Tracklisting:

Todd Terry - House Sermon
Fanny Pack - Nu Nu Yeah Yeah
Mighty Dub Katz - Magic Carpet Ride
Paul Oakenfold - Faster Kill Pussycat
Deep Dish - Sacramento
Mint Royale - Sexiest Man In Jamaica

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 5" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 6:

Format: mp3

Size: 6.7Mb

Time:7:16

Tracklisting:

The Clash - Rock The Kasbah
David Bowie - Rebel Rebel
Yer Man - Weird Therapy
Miss Kittin - Professional Distortion
Primal Scream - Rocks

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 6" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 7:

Format: mp3

Size: 10.6Mb

Time:7:37

Tracklisting:
Candi Staton - You Got The Love
Men Women & Children - Dance In My Blood
Kush - Bittersweet

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 7" here

Shenanigans 01 - Part 8:

Format: mp3

Size: 8.9Mb

Time:9:38

Tracklisting:

Elvis Costello - Pump It Up
ESG - Dance
Nikka Costa - Funkier Than A Mosquito's Tweeter
The Knack - My Sharona
Girls Aloud - No Good Advice

Download "Shenanigans 01 - Part 8" here

50% Cotton, 50% Polyester

How it fits: runs small

song lyrics here

Eleutheria (ἐλευθερία, pronounced [elefθe'ria]) is an ancient and modern Greek term for, and personification of, liberty. Eleuthera is also an island in the Bahamas.

I felt like puking, and it had far less to do with the fact that I'd run 4.5 miles in just 30 minutes. Instead, it had everything to do with a Kohl's commercial starring Lenny Kravitz and his wannabe rock anthem: Love Revolution. The Love Revlution was a feature of MySpace's music tour [that's right, I said MySpace's music tour] called Get On The Bus, which was also the name of a [redundancy alert!] very bad Spike Lee movie.

This is where it gets really edgy [No, not Kravitz's long list of pilfered/mutilated songs]: The Get On The Bus moniker tied into Kravitz's Love Revolution bus, which toured the nation while plugging his --and I am NOT making this up-- Levi jeans and t-shirt collection sold exclusively at Kohls.

The campaign featured other notable rockers [please note the distinct smell of sarcasm]: Avril Lavigne, Plain White T's, and Vanessa Carlton. Others suckered into pawning Kravitz's horrid music and clothes inclue: professional skateboarder Tony Hawk and Hayden Panettiere, who is best known for her role as the cheerleader on Heroes.

Boys and girls, here's how we learn that karma is a bitch: My Name is Earl During the tour, Kravitz was admitted to Miami Hospital suffering from a series of severe respiratory tract infections that developed into bronchitis. If the universe thinks you suck, it'll give you a warning.

COOK OUT

Michele Humes over at the foodie blog, A Fine Furious Life, just posted an excellent story [replete with fantastic pictures] entitled, So You Want To Go To Culinary School. A highly recommended read.

Nobody's Fault

First of all, a little about my Guitar Hero ability, to get some perspective on how easy the game is. I'm stuck on the last tier of Guitar Hero III (Raining Blood, Number of the Beast, One, Cliffs of Dover) on Hard, and just started Expert and so far can play through the first few tiers without much difficulty. Picking up Guitar Hero: Aerosmith, I decided to start out on Hard and hope that I wouldn't get stuck. I think I got through without failing a song once, though a few restarts were necessary. I've started playing on Expert and haven't gotten too far, but it's more a result of a lack of free time than genuine difficulty. The vast majority of the songs aren't too challenging (I got 100% on Dream On on Hard on my first try, and that's the second last encore), and so far moving up from Hard to Expert hasn't proved too difficult (the video above is on Expert, and I can only find one or two parts that differ at all from Hard, though I haven't actually played that far yet).

As for the song list, it's half Aerosmith, half other bands. Obviously, you're only even going to consider buying this game if you like Aerosmith. I only have their O, Yeah! Ultimate Aerosmith Hits greatest hits album and I've heard Rocks, and that was enough for me to enjoy the track list, arguably more than Guitar Hero III's track list. But that's mostly a personal call. For me, I found that I liked most of the Aerosmith songs, and the game only got dull during the other songs like "Dream Police" or "All The Young Dudes", which aren't similar to Aerosmith by any stretch of the imagination and scream "POWER BALLAD!!!!" a little too loudly for me. Only four songs are covers and another four Aerosmith songs are re-recordings (by Aerosmith, don't worry), including "Dream On" and "Mama Kin", the latter of which has the "smoking tea" line edited down to "smokin'", which kinda throws off the song musically, because it's obvious there's another word there.

Like Guitar Hero III, the animated story parts are incredibly lame, but are fortunately only at the beginning and end. Instead, there are brief interviews with the band in between tiers where they talk about the part of the band's history the game loosely covers (it ignores the druggy stuff and break-up, but that's understandable), though these are only worth seeing once.

Unfortunately, the band from Guitar Hero III makes a return as well, and are just as hideous as they were last time. There's also a second guitarist added to make the band match five people like Aerosmith, and she's just as ugly and jerky as the other characters, even if she does garner some diversity points. Another complaint is that buying guitars in the game seems kind of spotty, since I've bought a few that it won't let me use.

It's worth noting that, unlike GH III, there is no co-op career mode, which is lame. And some of the motion-cap is a little creepy, since it varies from Joe Perry's mouth barely moving like he overdosed on botox to Steven Tyler's mouth moving so loosely it looks like his lower jaw is in danger of falling off.

Also, the game has both the original and Run-DMC versions of "Walk This Way":

Walk This Way

As far as the Wii version goes, I'm sure Wii owners will be happy to hear that they didn't get shafted this time. The game is in stereo, there are a ton of special guitars I suspect weren't in Wii's GH III, and a few other additions, like extra animations for star power that I think were left out for the Wii version of GH III.

I'm not sure it's the same for all versions, but the Wii version, graphically, looks rushed and pretty bad. There have been times where the crowd or band would be heavily pixilated, making the background look worse than N64 quality.

By far the biggest complaint against the game would have to be the price, especially for the Wii version. Paying $50 for the game is kind a stretch by itself, but a $100 game/guitar controller set is not only more expense than Guitar Hero III, even when it was new, but still too expensive, especially when you consider that the controller in the Wii version isn't even wireless and doesn't really have any excuse to cost as much as the PS3 and 360 versions.

Overall, it's a pretty fun game, as long as you like Aerosmith, but it's also worth waiting for the price to come down.

O Biro Biro não tem muito o costume de abrir espaço para um post pessoal, mas acho que o momento é propício à isso. Estava olhando meu profile no Orkut esses dias e conclui que é muito fácil falar de si. Porque, pensando bem, não é preciso ir muito fundo em nossas personalidades para, de alguma forma, falar um pouco de nós. Há coisas simples que dizem muito de nós, apesar de não nos definir. Eu, por exemplo:

Adoro fazer notas nos meus livros e abrir livros que já tiveram outros donos e encontrar suas notas;
Odeio quando alguém passa muito perfume e se senta ao meu lado no ônibus;
Odeio quando pego o louro do feijão;
Odeio passas no cachorro quente;
Adoro biscoito goiabinha da piraquê;
Adoro terminar de ler um livro;
Odeio mais que tudo esperar elevador;
Adoro fotografar cenas mentalmente para guardar lembranças;
E adoro comer umas colheradas da carne moída, assim que fica pronta.

É um ótimo exercício e ajuda a conhecer ainda mais as suas manias !

Enfim, é isso que tenho por hoje...

Post ao som de: Lenny Kravitz - Can't Get You off My Mind[audio http://gatinhadomeier.googlepages.com/06CantGetYouoffMyMind.mp3]

1. About a Girl - Nirvana
2. Aggro - The Enemy
3. American Woman - The Guess Who
4. Are You Gonna Go My Way - Lenny Kravitz
5. Beat It - Michael Jackson
6. Bullet with Butterfly Wings - Smashing Pumpkins
7. B.Y.O.B. - System of a Down
8. Crazy Train - Ozzy Osbourne
9. Dammit - Blink-182
10. Everlong - Foo Fighters
11. Eye of the Tiger - Survivor
12. Feel the Pain - Dinosaur Jr.
13. Float On - Modest Mouse
14. Hollywood Nights - Bob Seger
15. Hot for Teacher - Van Halen
16. Hotel California - The Eagles
17. In the End - Linkin Park
18. The Joker - Steve Miller Band
19. Lazy Eye - Silversun Pickups
20. Light My Fire - The Doors
21. Livin’ on a Prayer - Bon Jovi
22. Love Me Two Times - The Doors
23. Low (Travis Barker Remix) - Flo Rida featuring T-Pain
24. Misery Business - Paramore
25. Mr. Crowley - Ozzy Osbourne
26. Never Too Late - The Answer
27. No Sleep Till Brooklyn - Beastie Boys
28. Nuvole e Lenzuola - Negramaro
29. Obstacle 1 - Interpol
30. One Armed Scissor - At the Drive-In
31. Overkill - Motorhead
32. Purple Haze (Live) - Jimi Hendrix
33. Rebel Yell - Billy Idol
34. Rooftops - Lostprophets
35. Santeria - Sublime
36. Some Might Say - Oasis
37. Stillborn - Black Label Society
38. Too Much, Too Young, Too Fast - Airbourne
39. Trapped Under Ice - Metallica
40. Up Around the Bend - Creedence Clearwater Revival
41. Weapon of Choice - Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
42. What I’ve Done - Linkin Park
43. The Wind Cries Mary - Jimi Hendrix

**My HOT husband set up the message by singing the Lenny Kravitz song "Love Revolution".  (Just had to throw that in... I know I'm a little biased, but it's my blog, right? :) )

Pete reminded us that our vision as a church can be summarized by these three statements:

• Intimacy with God
• Community with Insiders
• Influence with Outsiders

He then went on to explain how our vision or strategy is modeled after the patterns of Jesus' life.

Luke 6:12-13

"One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God.  When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles."

Luke 6:17-19

"He went down with them and stood on a level place.  A large crowd of his disciples was there and a great number of people from all over Judea, from Jerusalem, and from the coastal region around Tyre and Sidon, who had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases.  Those troubled by evil spirits were cured and the people all tried to touch him, because power was coming from him and healing them all."

Matthew 22:37-39

"Jesus replied: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'  This is the first and greatest commandment.  'And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'"

John 13:34-35

"A new command I give you: Love one another.  As I have loved you, so you must love one another.  By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

Pete challenged us today about how we as Christians are living in Community.  Are we living in love toward one another?  Are we looking at each other and calling out the best from each other? Unfortunately we as Christians have failed miserably at this.  Oftentimes we are the most judgmental and critical of others.

Pete shared three things that he believes Jesus was all about in regard to community and he challenged us as a church to get serious about living out these three things:

1. Everybody's welcome
2. Nobody's perfect
3. Anything's possible

How did this message affect you today?  Which of these three things do you have the most trouble with?

(direkt von Virginrecords)

Lenny Kravitz is reportedly set to become the new frontman for US rockers Velvet Revolver.

Lenny, 44, has been spotted in the studio with the band – which features former Guns ’n’ Roses guitarist Slash – who have been looking for a high profile replacement to appear on their new record since parting company with original singer Scott Weiland in April.

A source close to the band told Britain’s The Sun newspaper: 'Velvet Revolver’s new album will draw heavily on their messy split with Scott. The band wanted a big name who could easily hold his own and reckon Lenny is just the man for the job.'

Other singers linked to the frontman position include former Van Halen singer Sammy Hagar and Liv Tyler’s husband, former Spacehog star Royston Langdon.

Speaking at the time of the band’s split from Scott, Slash said: 'This band is all about its fans and its music and Scott Weiland isn't 100 per cent committed to either. Among other things, his increasingly erratic onstage behaviour and personal problems have forced us to move on.'

Fuente: music-news.com

Simplemente, increible. Nunca pude imaginarme que Lenny Kravitz y Slash fueran a acabar en el mismo grupo, a pesar de que son amiguetes. Hay cierta controversia sobre si realmente Lenny podrá adaptar su estilo musical al rock, mucho más duro, de la banda de Slash. Sinceramente, espero lo mejor de Lenny, uno de los mejores vocalistas que hay en el panorama del rock.

Esperemos que esto sea mucho más que un mero rumor.

Owkay, owkay hetgene wat ik bedacht had voor vorige week is niet goed genoeg bevonden voor deze blog (door mijzelf) en aangezien jullie alleen maar het beste van het beste verdienen is het er niet op verschenen. Bovendien had ik geen zin om iets nieuws te verzinnen dus heb ik het maar zo gelaten. Sorry!

Pukkelpop is zojuist begonnen en dat klinkt als een verleidelijk onderwerp maar volgens mij gaat niemand nog iets aan raadgevingen van welke groepen zeker te gaan zien hebben (die zijn al naar daar vertrokken) dus ga ik maar nieuwsjes en bedenkingen brengen.  Wie nu een onsamenhangend geheel verwacht komt bedrogen uit want er zit wel degelijk een, misschien lichtjes vergezochte, rode draad in.

We beginnen met het nieuws dat de heer Kravitz Lenny in de studio gesignaleerd zou zijn bij de heren van Velvet Revolver. Die waren op zoek naar een nieuwe zanger en ze hadden beloofd dat het een grote naam ging zijn. Lenny beantwoordt inderdaad aan het profiel van grote naam. Velvet Revolver met Lenny Kravitz, dat klinkt niet zo héél slecht want Slash heeft ten slotte ook een gitaarsolo uit zijn mouw geschud op "Always on the Run".  Ik wacht vol spanning op een singletje!

Waar ik minder op te wachten zit is Chinese Democracy, zijnde de nieuwe cd van Guns n' Roses (Ha! Twee rode draden! Velvet Revolver is basically Guns n' Roses zonder Axl Rose) Naar verluidt zou hij al klaar zijn sinds vorig jaar (14 jaar om een cd op te nemen... het is ook een kunst) maar ik heb nog altijd geen nieuwe Gun n' Roses in de winkel gezien. De frisdrankenproducent Dr. Pepper heeft in maart zelfs een weddenschap afgesloten waarin ze beloofden dat iedereen in de VS (uitgezonderd Slash en Buckethead) een blikje Dr. Pepper kreeg als de plaat nog dit jaar uitkwam.  Waarom kijk ik niet zo erg uit naar Chinese Democracy? Ik vrees dat Guns n' Roses zonder Slash hetzelfde is als seks zonder wrijving. Der is geen bal aan met andere woorden.

Ik vrees eveneens voor Death Magnetic, de nieuwe cd van Metallica. Niet dat ik zo'n grote fan ben (ik ken alleen maar de klassiekers) maar er gaan verschillende alarmbelletjes in mij af als er artiesten zijn die beweren dat hun nieuwe plaat beter klinkt dan hun beste. Zéker als het bovendien nog eens 17 jaar geleden is sinds er een deftige plaat van die groep uitgekomen is. Het enige wat we doen is hopen...

Nu dat het toch over cd's gaat (al een tijdje eigenlijk maar hou het stil): Consolers of the Lonely a.k.a. de nieuwe van The Raconteurs is meer dan deftig te noemen. Begeef u a. s. a. p. naar de dichtstbijzijnde winkel en kopen zeg ik u!

Afkortingen brengen mij dan weer naadloos over naar hetgene waar ik deze post mee ga afsluiten (op de song van de week na dan) met name een filmpje. Bereidt uzelf voor op een wel heel erg nerdy filmpje.

De Large Hadron Collider is een van de minst hippe onderwerp ooit, zeker om over te rappen maar informatief was het wel. Respect daarvoor!

De song van de week komt uit de laatstgenoemde cd vandaag (die dekselse rode draden toch), heet Rich Kid Blues (van The Raconteurs dus inderdaad) en heeft iets Beatlesiaans zelfs vind ik.

I knew it was just too wild of a rumor. Lenny Kravitz is not joining Velvet Revolver. He is not the "big guy" VR was referring to.

Kravitz continues his own tour and puts to rest the Velvet Revolver gossip:

“I know and love the Velvet Revolver guys but there is no truth to the story about me joining their band”

Click to for Exclusive: Lenny Kravitz Tells RS “No Truth to the Story” About Joining Velvet Revolver

And now I leave you with Velvet Revolver - Fall to Pieces

Lenny, 44, has been spotted in the studio with the band - which features former Guns ’n’ Roses guitarist Slash - who have been looking for a high profile replacement to appear on their new record since parting company with original singer Scott Weiland in April.

A source close to the band told Britain’s The Sun newspaper: "Velvet Revolver’s new album will draw heavily on their messy split with Scott. The band wanted a big name who could easily hold his own and reckon Lenny is just the man for the job."

Other singers linked to the frontman position include former Van Halen singer Sammy Hagar and Liv Tyler’s husband, former Spacehog star Royston Langdon.

Speaking at the time of the band’s split from Scott, Slash said: "This band is all about its fans and its music and Scott Weiland isn't 100 percent committed to either. Among other things, his increasingly erratic onstage behaviour and personal problems have forced us to move on."

Velvet Revolver have released two albums, Contraband and Libertad.

Stone Temple Pilots are currently on tour throughout America.

HRH Comment: Lenny Kravitz could bring an interesting dynamic to Velvet Revolver. He is no slouch on the guitar, and is a good singer. He could bolster Velvet Revolver's sound, assuming he gets to play the six string.

Check out Lenny on the tune, "Are You Gonna Go My Way" below.

Slash said: 'This band is all about its fans and its music and Scott Weiland isn't 100 per cent committed to either. Among other things, his increasingly erratic onstage behaviour and personal problems have forced us to move on. (Ouch Scott! that hurts! does it? does it? hahahaha)

I leave you with Lenny Kravitz and Heather Graham in "American Woman" .... Cheers!

_ Velvet Revolvers new album is about their separation with Scott (Weiland. The band wanted a big name and Lenny is the right man for the work, says a Insider to the Brittish newspaper The Sun.

I think their new album's gonna be awesome!

SDT Waste and Debris owner Sidney Torres IV loves using rock stars in his garbage company’s commercials.

Kid Rock is the latest rocker to appear alongside Torres in a TV ad. Rock is a Detroit native whose albums include “Grits Sandwiches for Breakfast,” “Early Mornin' Stoned Pimp” and “Rock N Roll Jesus,” among others.

The commercial, which SDT said begins airing in New Orleans this week, shows Rock, sometimes without a shirt on, in New Orleans as he hangs out with people eating crawfish and cruises around the city with Torres.

Torres, who is friends with Lenny Kravitz, used Kravitz in an earlier commercial.•