Famed Japanese jazz pianist Yosuke Yamashita has expressed his burning passion for music by setting his piano on fire.
On a Japanese beach in front of 500 spectators and wearing a firesuit, Yamashita played an improvised jazz piece for 10 minutes before all the strings were burnt out or snapped and the piano went quiet.
This is the second time in 35 years that he has played a burning piano. Link
[via]
A track made from 2 iPhones and a Nintendo DS. Not bad.
This giant music collection consists of 3 million records and 300,000 CDs totalling over 6 million song titles. It's currently for sale on eBay with a starting bid of $3,000,000. If you can't quite afford $3m, you qualify for a $10 discount from eBay.
Have some fun with this web version of the classic Roland TR-909. From Boing Boing...
This drumcomputer hits the market 1984 and was a long time the state of art in house and techno productions. Shift-Click the Step-buttons for accent triggers. Shift-Click-Move knobs for smoother resolution. Press Save to store a snapshot of the current settings to a flash cookie. Restore snapshot by pressing Load. Clear to delete all patterns and reset all knobs. Drag and drop a pattern button (invisible) to copy a pattern to a new location.
Bullets not included. More pics here.
Saudi Arabia has released a music video that has been produced entirely in with the country - the first of its kind.
The video is unusual because it was made in a country where the religious establishment considers music un-Islamic and bans it in public places. And the main cast includes a Saudi woman, something rare in a work produced inside the kingdom.
But in a sign of Saudi impatience with the restrictions, "Malak Ghair Allah" or "You Only Have God to Count On" was a hit when it was launched at a popular mall in the western seaport of Jiddah last week. Hundreds of people showed up to watch it on a giant screen in the mall's main hall.
The video is expected to air on most of the Middle East's more than 30 music satellite TV channels this week. Despite fears among the Saudi clergy over the corrupting influence of music videos, the clip had implicit government approval. The credits thank "those who helped make this work a success," including the Information Ministry.
You can view the video here.
An awesome looping machine controlled with a Wii controller. [via]
Can anyone identify the music that this girl is dancing to in a Nokia NSeries shower?
The Sea Organ in Zadar, Croatia, is the world’s first pipe organ that is played by the sea. Carved in the stone quayside, the movement of the sea pushes air through, and – depending on the size and velocity of the wave – musical chords are played. The waves create random harmonic sounds. Along with more pictures, this site has a sound file of the organ in action and it sounds surprisingly good.
A group called Naturally Seven perform an impromptu concert on a subway train. I wonder how many people missed their stops listening to the song? [via]
3 guys play a guitar at the same time producing some good sounds. [via]
Watch this guy play awesome renditions of Owner of a Lonely Heart by Yes and Smooth Criminal by Michael Jackson...on a violin! [via]
These Chechen's have got some rhythm. [via]
Some of these album covers are truly awful. [via]
From Spluch (translated from this Chinese article)...
In the town of Tel Aviv in Israel, a total of 144 beds -- complete with pillows and blankets – are set up for the customers to lie on while enjoying a classical music concert. This event is set up by a mattress company for promoting its mattresses.
A collection of rooms belonging to famous DJ's. Above is Sven Vath's. [via]
He sounds just like a drum kit. [via]
I've just finished watching Dragon's Den* and the successful businessman this week was a guy who has created an MP3 store that allows you to create and download your own mixes.
The site is called MixAlbum.com and uses patented software to mix any two tracks together. The software will not only match the timing and beats, it will also ensure that the tracks finish at the right moment to prevent any clashes.
The aim of the site is to allow aspiring DJ's to mix their favourite tracks together into their own personal mix and to download it. It looks like you can add as many tracks as you like to a mix and each track within that mix costs 89p. According to the site a mix will take approximately 10 minutes to prepare and is downloadable as a single MP3 file. It's not clear how long the file will be made available on the MixAlbum site.
At present only UK customers can purchase mixes from MixAlbum due to restrictions with their payment site. They have worldwide licenses for the music so should be able to sell worldwide soon.
I can see great potential with this site although I do have my reservations. Some tracks just won't mix. I tried mixing Martin Solveig - Everybody (Original Mix) with Narcotic Thrust - I Like It - Original Mix and they didn't go well. This means that it does take a little knowledge of the tracks you are trying to mix. The site does try to alleviate this problem by allowing you to pick any two tracks and let the system mix them before adding them to your mix.
The site is due to launch in about 30 minutes but if you can get in through the back door by clicking here.
If they get a much larger catalogue and a wider variety of styles of dance music then I could see this being a success. The Dragon's thought so too and invested £150,000 in the business.
* Dragon's Den is a BBC programme in which people with new business ideas try to get a group of successful business people to invest in their idea.
Update: The site has gone live but there are some issues with it. Some links are not working on certain pages and it looks like the demo mixer feature is not working. It also looks like at the moment you can't purchase any mixes.
The version of the site that I was able to access earlier appears to be the test site that looks very different to the live site but it still allows you to use the demo mixer. Go here to view the test site and play around with the mixer.
A Welsh record shop which is probably the world's oldest is up for sale. Spillers Records in Cardiff has been selling music since 1894 and has a place in the Guinness Book of World Records.
Originally setup by Henry Spiller to cater for aspiring merchant classes in the city, the shop specialised in the sale of phonographs, wax phonograph cylinders and shellac phonograph discs.
Despite competition from major chains and now internet downloads, Spillers has continued to flourish but if a buyer is not found there is a risk that the shop will have to close.
Awesome scratching from DJ Q-Bert. [via]
French DJ's C2C performing at the DMC World DJ Championships 2005. These guys are really good. [via]
A human beatbox with a difference. This guy makes all the sounds using his hands and his chest! [via]
They don't make music videos like they used to.
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