:: arjanwrites music blog ::: Hot New Talent Alert: William Besson

Well I’d argree with the Arjan Writes blog – bigging up (sorry couldn’t resist that) William Besson (Link to :: arjanwrites music blog ::: Hot New Talent Alert: William Besson).   If the music on his myspace account is anything to go by then there is some serious talent here (http://www.myspace.com/williambesson). Some bits resemble Depeche Mode during their Ultra period, with fragments of Massive Attack – a blend of chill and trip hop.

 

Besson has is own web site as well – http://www.williambesson.com/. It is possible buy his first album – Isn’t It About Faith? via his website which links to several sites around the world such as CD Unsigned

 

I shall be investing further.

 

 

Ryan Adams Reveals New Album Details

Horrah – new Ryan Adams official album has been announced, details here (Link to Ryan Adams Reveals New Album Details).

 

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Mainstream artists starting to grasp the net for promotion?

Are more mainstream artists are starting to leverage their net presence? To promote new albums and get people’s attention.  In the last two days of news NME have reported:

  • free tracks from Ash (here) – article (here)
  • free tracks from Manic Street Preachers (here) – article (here)

 

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More Album News

Polly Paulusma whose debut album Scissors in My Pocket garnered rave reviews has announced a new album called Fingers & Thumbs to be released in May.

 

If you like your slightly folksy female singer song writers in the vein of Joni Mitchell and Kathryn Williams. Her record company have an glowing (obviously) bio of her here which will give you more of a sense of her musical styling.

 

Polly according to her website will doing a live acoustic performance as part of Channel 4 radio’s music show The Tube.

 

Note – Polly’s website is annoyingly not RSS enabled – so if you want to keep abreast of her activities you’ll have to sign up to the news letter!

 

No Rock And Roll Fun: CD Wow heading back to court

Surprisingly the news that the BPI are taking another pop at CD-Wow hasn’t really reached the mainstream news – article here – Link to No Rock And Roll Fun: CD Wow heading back to court on the case.

You would think that the BPI would be better of trying to level the pricing playing field. Although that would probably hurt their members profits as UK is on of largest music buying nations based on purchases per person.

 

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Software Test Automation

Having looked at the book Software Test Automation to see if I can get some ideas on how to improve our continuous test cycles at work, I created a mind map of notes as I went which can be found here.

Software Test Automation
For an experienced Architect / Development Manager  a lot of the books content was simply an expression of what I already knew – through experience and reading over the years.  For me at least the interesting part of the book is the approaches to calculating ROI on test automation which put some underpinnings to what I had felt intuitively.  The bit I’d not really connected up in my own mind was the use of measurements (metrics) on the test automation to continue determining where to best expend effort.  The last area of more interest was the case studies of several significantly sized organisations.

My only criticism of the book, although it is never stated, there seems to be an underlying bias towards heavier project processes rather than the rising agile styles, which if anything need more of the automated (read continuous) testing techniques.

Overall, I’d say the book is pretty readable – an achievement for a subject that isn’t particularly exciting even for a techie.  For the less experienced person I’d recommend it as a read.

Rush of new album announcements

I’ve had a number of emails announcing new albums over the last twenty four hours.

The first about Rush announcing a new studio album, to be called “Snakes and Arrows” to be released on May 1st.

Then Billy Joel, with his the first set of new recordings in 13 years called “All My Life”. Then Tori Amos announcing a new album on 1st May called “American Doll Posse” with a world tour to follow.

 

 

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thru traffic lights

 

thru traffic lights

Having leafed through a photography magazine the other week I saw some interesting night photography. Now that I’ve gone digital, I thought it was about time I experiemented a bit more in this area – I used to be hesitant about such things given you can easily write off an entire roll of quality film and processing and get nothing.  

Anyway I’ve added a couple of photos showing my first attempts’ results.  

Finally, get someone else to drive when doing this sort of thing, so you can concentrate on taking the pictures.

 

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SXSW Showcasing Torrent – 1st one available

 SXSW put together a great set of torrents in the build up to SXSW with tracks showcasing artists that appear every year.  You can find the torrent here : Link to south by southwest festivals + conferences.  A word of warning the torrent is BIG.

 

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Canadian Content Holders Spin Softer Anti-Piracy Plan — Digital Music News

 It looks like the Canadian record industry have recognised that the current RIAA strategy isn’t doing them any favours according to this article :

Link to Canadian Content Holders Spin Softer Anti-Piracy Plan — Digital Music News

 

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