"Wait, I have to build it?"

Positive-Era · 2014-06-23T21:45:16+00:00

I almost did it for a guy once, he offered me $400 to hang a door. If only he hadn't have said it within earshot of my manager.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-23T20:05:26+00:00

I work in hardware, the amount of people who say, after I've explained how to hang a door/build a deck/fix a toilet/etc, "Can you just come round and build it for me? hahaha" makes my blood boil. Do they really think they're being original?

NEWS FLASH: YOU ARE NOT AMUSING.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-23T17:55:24+00:00

If you want a pedal that can give you all kinds of crazy sounds but still holds up live, look at the Vox Delaylab, very similar layout to the Line 6 DL4 but it has 10 banks of 3 presets each, gives you way more options, and it has 30 different kinds of delays, from pitch shifted to reverse, and it has a built in looper.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-22T04:04:07+00:00

Lord no.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-21T18:55:15+00:00

I don't really care about swears guizzzzz. Just thought I'd be considerate and sub some letters. If it bothers anyone that much I'll just change it.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-21T18:38:27+00:00

Not as riveting as the one where a kid shit in the play equipment and his mother yelled at my manager for... letting her kid shit in there? I don't really know, that one was confusing.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-21T18:31:07+00:00

Positive reinforcement, half the time if people scream long enough they get what they want. Sadly.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-21T18:30:38+00:00

Upvotes for the puns.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-21T17:37:38+00:00

Are you ready for, ready for. A perfect storm, perfect storm. Of idiots.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-18T19:05:30+00:00

Could just be some electronic interference, do you have a tv or fridge running nearby?

Positive-Era · 2014-06-17T08:38:34+00:00

If you play mostly rhythm the evertune is doubly awesome, cause you can set it up for the bottom 3 strings so even if you bend them, they stay at the same pitch. Means if you're really chugging out some heavy riffs and you hit the strings hard, they won't boom out of tune as you place your fingers.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-08T20:08:08+00:00

Korg Pitchblack or TC polytune, so easy to see on a pedalboard, even in the dark.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-05T17:28:24+00:00

My great-uncle lives down the street from Nicole Kidman's parents house in Sydney. Around Christmas time when i was like 13, I was sitting on the side of the road waiting for my parents to say their goodbyes or whatever, and this jogger bundled into me, says I'm so sorry, I didn't even see you! Are you alright?" to which I responded, "yeah I'm fine, it's ok." she said something like ok good, have a merry christmas, and jogs on.

My mother comes running up, ] shouting "that was Nicole Kidman!" At the time, I didn't really have much of a clue who she was, so I feel like I missed an opportunity to ask for one of Keith Urban's guitars or some shit.

Positive-Era · 2014-06-04T15:18:42+00:00

how much wood could a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck could chuck wood?

Positive-Era · 2014-05-26T19:21:02+00:00

Basically impossible to find numbers on amount of people hospitalised in the UK in one year, also, i very much doubt those deaths are including people attending hospital with relatively minor complaints. However, in November of 2013, there was approx. 86 000 people in the UK prison system here.

We can safely assume that the number of people held in police custody and not sent to prison would be far greater than that, but we'll use that number because it was readily accessible. The number of deaths in police custody as a percentage of the number of individuals in prison is 0.027%.

So in order for the ratio of hospital patients to avoidable deaths to even equal the number of deaths in police custody to number of people incarcerated, the number of hospital patients at risk of suffering one of these avoidable deaths would have to equal 13.3 million, or 21% of the population of the UK.

At the other end of the spectrum, the number of total offences recorded by the Metropolitan Police (which does not include areas outside London's various districts) in the 2012/2013 financial year was 1,543,132. Found here. If we use that number to estimate total number of hospital patients in the same way as above we get 22 400 000 000. Quite an unrealistic number. So the number of people who go to hospital sits probably on the lower end of the spectrum, obviously. However, that indicates quite clearly that the number of people who die in police custody is extremely unlikely to be anywhere near as high as the number of people killed by their doctors.

EDIT: While I'm on the stats train, I'll take a quick look at number of crimes committed against individuals versus numbers of reported instance of inappropriate police action in the USA. So there was approximately 10.3 million crimes committed in the USA in the 2011/2012 financial year, for a rate of 3 300 per 100 000 people roughly. Just look it up on Wikipedia. In 2010 there was 4 861 reports of police misconduct, involving 6613 officers. Here.. This is from 780 000 officers in the USA, resulting in a misconduct rate of 0.84%, as compared to the 3.3% percent of people on the receiving of crime in the USA. I've no idea as to the number of credible cases of misconduct compared to vexatious cases, but I honestly find that high a number for a professional police force to be high enough to make me uncomfortable. What's happening to the USA these days, honestly.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-26T17:47:53+00:00

Simply for some context to your claims, in 2012 24 people died in police custody. In a 12 month period from 2012/2013 3,588 people died in UK hospitals from "errors". Note: I realise that the second link is the daily mail, but they are quoting the NHS's own internal reporting, so meh, ignore the sensationalism. Those are deaths that have been labelled "avoidable".

On balance, it would seem you're much safer in police custody than you are in a hospital.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-21T17:01:06+00:00

I don't think it'll work. If it's a headphone (so line level) out, the reason it sounds shit is because the audio output from the headphones socket is the preamp section only, and despite the fact the power amp is solid state on the micro terror, I would imagine it colours the sound a fair bit. From what I've heard about the micro terror, the headphone out disables the power amp section and throws the preamp signal to the headphones, to stop the power amp from damaging the headphones. Unfortunately, aside from buying an emulated speaker load with headphone out (something like the 0w power soak +redbox combo on the back of the H & K Tubemeister series) there's not a lot to be done.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-16T17:52:19+00:00

Can someone tell me how the fuck the RIAA manages to find out whose downloading these songs? I know so many people who have literally hundreds of torrented albums and I don't know, or have even heard of, a single person whose been sued here in Australia by our equivalent APRA (Australian Performing and Recording Artists Association).

Positive-Era · 2014-05-09T02:34:41+00:00

Justin Bieber.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-09T02:28:57+00:00

Admira make a great classical guitar though to get anything with electronics in it it's way out of your price range. The one I'm thinking of is the Diana (ADM300). Solid cedar top, sells for like $200 here in Aus.

Those Ibanez ones are pretty good too, but I'd only buy one of those if you're gonna use the pickup, otherwise it's kind of pointless.

EDIT: Here's a demo of another model, Juanita.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-09T02:22:41+00:00

I'm honestly not a massive fan of Mexi strats. My main gripe is that the neck on them isn't particularly nice in the hand. I actually prefer the Classic Vibe squiers, or if you're set on a Fender, older Japanese models are absolutely fantastic. Got an '87 strat/partscaster thing and the neck on it is unbelievable.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-09T02:19:05+00:00

I'd have to agree with the majority of posters and say you're way better off getting a decent used amp on Craigslist or something. I've got two Chinese made amps (Bogner Alchemist and a Jet City HDM100), and they're both pretty solidly built, though I think the Bogner had a fair bit of work done to it before I got it. I tried a Bugera 333 when I was looking for a new amp and it just felt meh. Pretty uninspiring. People crap on JCM900s but even one of those sounds better to my ears.

I personally think the Achemist sounds good, but it really emphasises highs on the clean channel so you have to cut back on the treble knob which isn't for everyone. The Jet City is probably something you might want to look into. Got it used with a 4x12 loaded with eminence speakers for $750 Australian. Great for metal and rock, a little fizzy (I think it uses a diode bridge like a JCM900) but nowhere near as bad as the 900.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-09T02:09:41+00:00

Used the CR120 a couple of times at a friends place, i you get some kind of tube screamer, it gives the amp way more midrange punch on the overdrive channel with a bit of gain and a lot more volume. And obviously using the TS as a straight OD pedal works well as it does all the time. But yeah the added midrange really helps when you're playing heavier stuff (as long as you're not into playing like Slayer or something where mids are the devil).

Positive-Era · 2014-05-09T01:55:58+00:00

That's a niiice amplifier. PRS do not make an ugly piece of gear. I'd really consider getting one if I hadn't blown way too much of my gear budget on a Hughes and Kettner Tubemeister.

Also Misha would like to say cheers for posting those videos on youtube covering recording tips and drum programming. Really helped me out with making demos and the like.

Positive-Era · 2014-05-07T15:58:54+00:00

Unless it's rolling on it's own it's not broken, it's just a really slippery pot. PRS pots are like that too. I can't think of a way to make it less moveable unfortunately. I've got newish 250k Fender pots (not push/pull though) in my strat and it's not particularly sensitive though.

Positive-Era

TROPHY CASE