macJasp

Sonic T-Amp and Airtunes

After hunting around for a while I've finally managed to get hold of a Sonic T-Amp for an upcoming DIY project of mine to extend my Airtunes music streaming in the home.

These amplifiers are no longer sold or manufactured but I've sourced one on eBay for around £35 and the plan is to get this up in the loft attached to some ceiling speakers, plug a spare Airport Express I have into the T-Amp's 3.5mm jack and start piping music via iTunes into the bathroom. I can't wait to get started.

Attending Crowded House – May 2010

It's with great excitement that we've managed to get hold of tickets for the upcoming Crowded House tour at Newcastle City Hall in May of this year. I've seen Neil Finn play live in many forms over the years,  as both a solo artist and with his brother Tim as the Finn Brothers so to say I'm an admirer of his work would be an understatement.

I'm particularly pleased that this tour isn't playing the cold arena venues with their distinct lack of atmosphere, I much prefer the slightly more intimate feel of the City Hall, so with this tour and their new album preceding it,  the early part of 2010 (musically) is something to look forward to .

Putting trust in Last.fm

I normally find new music via the usual places, through the radio or from discussions with friends but after constant prodding from the last.fm recommendation service recently about Turin Brakes I decided to take a chance and purchase their Optimist album from 2001. It thinks that because i like Doves, Badly Drawn Boy and Elbow (which I certainly do) that Turin Brakes is right up my street. I don't have a single Turin Brakes record in my collection, I know of one of their songs from the early part of the last decade (2003's Pain Killer), so I'm putting faith in the service to find me this type of new music that I'll hopefully grow to love and begin wondering why I hadn't heard of them sooner, after all that is the whole point of last.fm, right? If anything it's to be an interesting experiment as to whether the site really can work out my musical tastes based on what I play regularly and I'm very much hopeful that this particular choice will enable me to trust the service more in future.