Archives for July, 2005
Heart - Then and Now
Last night, Pam and I went to see Heart at the Pacific Amphitheater as part of the Orange County Fair. The thing that made this evening potentially notable for me was the fact that Heart was the very first super-group I saw in concert. When I say “in concert,” I mean full on sports arena type venue with thousands of screaming fans. I was 13 or 14, and it was at the Jack Murphy Sports Arena in San Diego.
From what I can remember of that show (hey - it was 27 years ago), it was phenomenal. Though I was a major KISS fan back then, I was blown away by how well the voices of the Wilson sisters mixed. I think that show was a major catalyst in opening my mind up to other genres of music besides hard rock and heavy metal.
Fast forward to today. The venue is not quite as big, holding maybe four to five thousand. I look around and realize most of the people around us are in their forties & fifties. Then it hits me. Though I like to think that I’m still young, the truth is that I’m getting up there in years. I think the fact that our daughter turned 20 last week helped me realize it.
Anyway. For the most part, this show was good. The Wilson sisters still harmonize as well as they ever did. But I’ve gotta say, who ever their sound man is, he (or she) needs to have their hearing checked. At the start of the show, the bottom end (bass) overall was so hot that it eventually blew out the P.A. Once that happened, levels never really got back to where they should have been. To me, the sound was very tinny and thin on the high end, and muffled in mid to low range with the kick drum the only driving sound at the bottom end. Bad mix.
Then, I just have to say this, because it’s one of my biggest musical pet peeves. Being a bassist once myself, having played most of the clubs on the Sunset Strip in “the day,” I’ve just got to point out how gross I think it is for performers to spit (hock loogies) while on stage. I’m speaking specifically of the bassist, who — to me — didn’t seem to fit in with the other, more mature, band members. He looked like some Hollywood castoff type from the late 80’s who’d simply gotten lucky enough to land the gig. The dude must’ve hocked at least 20 phlegm balls up into the air over the course of the show. Sorry dude, this ain’t no Guns & Roses show — so act like it. Yech! Otherwise, as far as I could tell (due to sound issues), musicianship all around was fairly good.
All in all, it was a nice evening out with Pam, even if the show didn’t blow me away as much as the first one did. But then, being out with Pam is what’s most important to me anyway.
Yasu Updated to v1.3.2
A new version of Yasu has just been released and is available for immediate download.
This update fixes a minor issue that would prevent Safari browser cookies from being deleted, as well as adding some new System Cache cleaning routines which are specific to Tiger.
Head on over to the Yasu page to get your copy!
Yasu Update on the Way
Thanks go out to James Huff over at MacMerc who posted a bug report on the forums yesterday. Because of his diligence, I’m working on getting a minor update for Yasu ready for download in the next day or so.
The bug James found was preventing Safari browser cookies from being removed if that option was selected. Since it’s a rare occasion that a user wants to wipe out all of their cookies, it took a while for someone to find it.
I also took the chance to add some new cache cleaning routines that are specific to changes in Tiger while I was under the hood. This should (hopefully) be the last minor rev before I do a new “from the ground up” rebuild in the next couple of months.