Guess That Song

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Music-loving dudes should get MSN 7.5. Yeah. It kicks ass. Not only can you set it to show what’s playing on Winamp (and Windows Media Player), you can also stream whatever’s playing through Voice Clips.

To start, you need to route your Recording Device to whatever’s playing; double-click your Volume Control, and click the Options menu then click Properties. The Properties window should pop up; choose to Adjust volume for Recording. Look for Stereo Mix, Wave Out Mix or What-U-Hear, tick that and press OK. Then, click on the Select checkbox under the Stereo Mix, Wave Out Mix or What-U-Hear. Your microphone will now “hear” every sound that plays on your computer!

Now for the fun part – guess that song! Play a song, then find a music fan, hold down the F2 key (or click Voice Clip) and it will record up to 15 seconds of low-quality audio, and then sends it to your chat buddy. It’s quite impractical for guitar unless your foot presses the mouse button or F2 key. 🙁

The best part of it is, you can replay it (hmmm what is that song?) and save it! Sure, we could just use it for voice, but who is unabashed enough to use MSN as a walkie talkie when people are around? It might be better than Audio Chat because you don’t need to wait for a connection to be established.

See I’m all fun and games on MSN. Guess which song my nickname came from! Beat me at MSN Games’ Solitaire Showdown or Minesweeper Flags! Guess that song snippet!

Or, if you’re not on MSN, guess where these lyrics came from:
Nothing really mattered to me
Nothing really matters to me
Nothing else matters
Nothing matters no one else
Nothing matters now

Bohemian Rip

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Darn you Tracy Wong!

Ever since your MSN nick was “so you think you can stone me and spit in my eye“, I Googled it and found out which song that was. Queen – Bohemian Rhapsody has been playing in my head ever since, in my Winamp, on my guitar, and I’m losing sleep trying to convert the piano bits of the song to guitar. Am7dim5 baby! Uh… yeah. I reckon I can do an in-tune but not in-octave version with bass guitar only. Modern day multi-track sound recording software will give me the 84-voice choir needed.

Heck, I haven’t fallen in love with lyrics in such a long time. Such pompous drama.

The Bruce Dickinson cover version of the song is carried off full blast, and does justice because while Freddie Mercury was trying to be camp, Bruce is naturally camp around Beezelbub, being the vocalist for Iron Maiden.

I think I have an obsession with songs over 5 minutes, to such an extent that I’d actually put paper in the printer and bother printing and then analysing the chord progressions and structure. Ask me now though, and I would not be able to play it in order. 😛

Over 5 minutes:
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Californication, The Beatles – Hey Jude, Blur – Coffee And TV

Over 6 minutes:
Metallica – Fade To Black, Black Sabbath – Fairies Wear Boots, Pink Floyd – Comfortably Numb, The Eagles – Hotel California, Stevie Ray Vaughn – Little Wing

Over 7 minutes:
Metallica – One, The White Stripes – Ball And Biscuit, New Order – Blue Monday, Pantera – Cemetary Gates

Over 8 minutes:
Led Zeppelin – Stairway To Heaven, Guns ‘N’ Roses – November Rain, Opeth – The Drapery Falls (their other stuff escapes me.), Jamiroquai – Funktion (one of their few bass tabs I bothered with.)

Come to think of it, what tabs do I really print out that is under 5 minutes? Jimi Hendrix? Even then I didn’t list his 11:37 jam of Red House, live at the Isle of Wight.

It says something about me. I am long winded and draggy. Apparently, so are rockers or people with good taste. 😀

Act Ticket

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Some of you might have wondered where I get money to buy two computers and a cupboard-load of Transformers recently. Well, I have a job, but I also do little side projects, namely websites.

Now the usual deal is, there is always a middleman who communicates between me and the actual client; he usually appears out of nowhere and is not closely related to me (a friend of a friend, you call these…) The one thing these middlemen have in common is that in their emails or conversations, they start off horribly fake.

Hello Albert

Rubber Soul

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I was playing The Beatles – Hey Jude on Winamp (which then shows on MSN 7.0 or later) when this conversation ensued:

Hey Jude!!
I like Sun Yan Zhi’s version
I heard hers as well, but I prefer the Beatles version… hers is a bit too angelic and pure voiced
Nice maaa
She doesn’t have the part where they go Yeah yeah yaaah yeaahaa WHHOOOOOO! And those intricate harmonies!
ergh
I dunno how to explain.. but I prefer Yan Zhi’s version
Haha okay
I like that particular bit (3:00 onwards) where they go all spazzy and rock and roll-ish
It’s very expressive
ergh
You don’t like that part?
Nope
Painful to the ears
Makes me cringe
*picks you up and puts you on the side of the line of people who don’t like that part*
Aiyo!
I LOVE IT
The fact that the Beatles have a lot of these cuckoo moments is what makes me love them
And the jude-a-jude-a-waaah-aaa-AOOOWWW!
Why do you think Michael Jackson bought the rights to them Beatles songs maaan
coz he got the AOWWW from them, he might be scared that they would sue him
I mean, I like the beginning and the chords and all, but the second half really defines the song for me
At the same time, I think Nelly feat. Kelly Rowland – Dilemma is a &@!#*&@!# annoying song
Especially the high-pitched AUUUW part at the end of each sentence
Kalau takde benda itu, sure orait punya

You can figure that those in italics are what I said.

But seriously man, the fact that they go cuckoo and just lose it makes the Beatles’ version better. Better. Better better better better OH!!!

Which is why I don’t like Mariah Carey. She’s a tonally perfect pitched multi-octaved super singer singing robot. She’s got no SOUL!

To sit here in a two seater

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You know the general social rule that if there is a passenger in the car, one of them has to sit in the front passenger seat? If the front passenger got off, another passenger was to get in front. I never quite knew that until I started working, since my family never enforced such a ridiculous rule. In fact, the front passenger seat was almost always empty!

But first, why is it necessary? To provide accompaniment for the driver. To avoid making the driver feel like he/she is driving a limosine. To not have to ask the passenger behind to move his head so he can reverse.

One day my mom dropped me off at the bus stop where my colleagues were waiting. As my mom used the front passenger seat to store her stuff, my siblings and I would always sit behind in the van. When I got off, my bitchy colleague was incensed because of my apparently rude seating position.

My parents were practical people, and so we never practiced the ritual of having a front passenger get off, and a rear passenger get out and get on the front passenger seat.

I’d still comply to the social ritual when not with family. However, I thought this such ritual (or at least, the re-occupation of the front seat) on a two-door, four-seater car was stupid.

Supposing there were two passengers each getting off at different locations, and the one to get off first was behind. How do you get both out of the car?

  1. Driver stops at first location; front passenger opens the door and gets out
  2. Front passenger folds seat to the front so that rear passenger may exit
  3. Rear passenger exits
  4. Front passenger folds seat back
  5. Front passenger sits down and closes door
  6. Driver stops at second location; front passenger opens the door and gets out
  7. Front passenger closes door

Supposing you got smart and swapped passenger positions:

  1. Driver stops at first location; front passenger opens the door and gets out
  2. Front passenger folds seat to the front so that rear passenger may exit
  3. Rear passenger exits
  4. Rear passenger folds seat back
  5. Rear passenger gets in front seat and closes door
  6. Driver stops at second location; (formerly) rear passenger opens the door and gets out
  7. (Formerly a) passenger closes door

Both take the same number of steps, but the second case can be optimized:

  1. Driver stops at first location; front passenger opens the door and gets out
  2. (Formerly) front passenger closes door
  3. On the drive to the second location, the rear passenger folds the seat to the front so that he/she may exit, so this isn’t really a time-consuming step
  4. Driver stops at second location; rear passenger opens the door and gets out
  5. (Formerly a passenger) folds seat back and closes door

This can be useful when the driver is in a rush, or when you’re on the wrong lane to drop off passengers. Are you going to endanger their lives by making them do a switcheroo while avoiding traffic? Think about it.

Picture This August

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Here’s to August 2005. Yeah. Tales with pictures. Obscene amounts of them.

4th August 2005

I headed to Hartamas Square for the first ever We Are One gig, held every Thursday. The grand openers were Soft Touch, who wasn’t soft or acoustic enough for what was presumed to be an acoustic set.


This picture was taken moments before all electricity in Hartamas Square was gone.

Soft Touch, I realized, was the missing half of a fully produced rock band – they were the falsetto, the organ, the light rhythm guitar in the background. Take three raw rockers to collaborate, and you have a full-sounding album.


An hour later, power was restored, and Broken Scar played his last gig before going on a month-long hiatus.


Flatline had some interesting effects added to their melodic rock mix – the guitar synth (far left) was one of them.


Quizzicals, an up and coming vocal harmony band, sounded good. They had good originals and very good stage presence, but for some reason, I lost a bit of respect when they decided to cover their mentor’s song to the dot (V.E. – Pop Ye Ye).

6th August 2005


I headed to UiTM to be a guest judge at the “At 19 Records & Xfresh presents Battle It Out“. I even wrote a review with my rants on emo bands. But hey, check out the 27 fret Samick electric guitar I was drooling over at Do Re Mi Music. Sure, you can’t really have any precision up there, and there’s only space for two pickups, but there’s a coil tap switch so you have more options.

I wandered around town aimlessly after that, landing in KLCC Convention Centre for the PIKOM PC Fair 2005. I bumped into Loco, who was emceeing at the Samsung booth.

“The Samsung booth? Damn, that’s the one with the most chicks!”
“Eh yeah! When I came in the morning, I was thinking they were like normal only, but I walked around, and thus concluded that yes, my Samsung booth had the most chicks.”


We then went to Avenue K (next to KLCC), and checked out the haze. He sat down outside Avenue K and lit a cigarette when a security guard came up to him. “No sitting here.” Uh, right… we were outside his turf, yo.

7th August 2005


Everybody recognizes and blogs about Friendster Cafe. What about the Zouk reflexology center nearby?

I went for the Spirit Of Independence gig. (Alright, you’ve seen enough pictures of these bands plus there will be nicer shots later in this entry.) Anyway, who played?

Y2K, Tempered Mental, Dragon Red, Az Samad (in Paul’s New Place for the very first time!), Cosmic Funk Express…

Okay so my excuse is that I forgot to bring extra extra batteries. My extras were already flat!

So anyway, there was Jasemaine Gan, Nao (the Chinese version of seminal rojak-core band LYME. DAMN CHUN!) Then came Soft Touch, Furniture and X-cited Screamers.


So yes, I did take some pictures; Nao is in top-left; X-cited Screamers top-right, and Soft Touch with a kickass bassist with ALL the energy and the lower rock vocals (the raw half I was talking about!), with Jack of 360DHR on guitar!

12th August 2005


See? I told you that there would be good pictures. Zack rips out a classical piece.

Alda elbows his bass.

That night at the Sunrise Mont Kiara Jazz Fest, it was Cosmic Funk Express and an outrageous(ly) bad Outrageous (better pub bands should be playing!)

18th August 2005

I went to the Lost Generation Space for the Not That Balai art exhibition.


Creepy indeed was the refurbished house atop Robson Heights, near Seputeh.


Creepy indeed was the art, too. Yes the computer on the right actually works.


From left, Photoshopped badly: Wolf of Spungy Funggy, Lissa, James of Fallen Leaves, and Izuan Shah of Auburn.


From left to right, top to bottom:

  • Toilet signs
  • Escape into the woods
  • I was about to wash my hands with black toothbrushes
  • An experiment in staring, a screening that got the audience riled
  • The slope actually has tire stoppers!
  • Not only were the inclines crazy, the turns were sharp and narrow

And to think, I was merely there to share the joy of the premiere of the Fallen Leaves – Drown With Me video that had Joy in it.

23rd August 2005


My siblings half-adopted my cousin’s birthday presents – two hamsters; one of which produced a chip out of thin air her stomach.

IMG_3780.JPG – hamster spits out thing and chews it. Also only still picture of it

Happy times. It was very hard to get a picture of them standing (without using camera flash)! Those were the good days before these females starting trying to kill each other. Apparently a male and female hamster will get along, and two males will get along too. Male (hamsters) for peace!

25th August 2005

I headed to the Kuala Lumpur Performing Arts Centre (KLPac) in Jalan Ipoh to catch Romi And Joolee Dan Lain-lain, a hilarious Malaysianized take on Shakespeare.


Sentul East – HOME.


I took a scenic 15-minute walk. A bush maze! Have you seen that in Malaysia?


A tractor that looks like something out of Smallville! Have you seen that in Malaysia?


A rusting old factory in the middle of nowhere! Have you seen that in Malaysia?


THE KLPac. It looks like a factory from a European country. Have you seen that in Malaysia?


A lake and some poles without flags on them! Have you seen that in Malaysia?


Okay this is just cool. I bet you’ve seen it before.


The lobby was easily four storeys tall!


Outside, I waited for the show to start.


How much is that doggy in the window?

I was disappointed when a source revealed that Malaysia didn’t actually have such a budget to build a magnificent building out of thin air. It was a recycled showhouse. Still, it was very cool architecture.

Oh right. What about the play? Gavin Yap played many roles excellently; the guys did an excellent rendition of The Beatles – Yesterday (with Rashid Salleh’s solo lines sung in a hilarious Malay voice.) I didn’t have to care about knowing Shakespeare references to laugh at their jokes; a very good thing indeed.

26th August 2005

A day of misfortune, indeed.

I met up Davina, to head to Hartamas, where a minor guilt drama ensued when her friend offered to pick us up from KL Sentral, but his vehicle broke down just as he left Hartamas!


We took a cab to Hartamas JamAsia for the Fretboard Menace gig, supposed to be featuring Deja Voodoo, Az Samad and Cosmic Funk Express. However, Deja Voodoo pulled out and was replaced by Alcentric, a metal band (left in picture). Elliot of Cosmic Funk Express couldn’t make it either and was replaced by Stephanie, an equally energetic and cute drummer. Manshaan of Dragon Red and Izwin also guest-starred-rocked with them.


The promised highlight was the G3-style guitar trio show. They improvised on Miles Davis – So What, and upon calls for encore, wowed the crowd with blues in the key of G.

I then wandered around, bumping into Iris with the saddest expression ever. She had just lost her 3G-capable Nokia 6680 phone!

30th August 2005

After meeting a friend I ended up in Hartamas Square for the Merdeka Eve celebration, with Frequency Cannon, Vespertine, some rappers, Dragon Red, Edge Of Fire, Estranged (with the vocalist on guitar) and then some, but the smell of spraycans was getting to my head and so I left.

2nd September 2005


Guess where these rapids are.


Malaysia’s longest Lego millipede at Ikano.


It had a tail that extended outside. Technically, since there was no record before this, anyone could have made a 10-meter long Lego millipede and called the Malaysian Book Of Records. So that’s the trick!


A tired Lego builder looks upon a long roti tisu.


We left it at this. You’d need maybe 4 hungry people (and lots of drinks) to finish this condensed-milk-laden treat. I stopped because my kidneys started hurting. Serious!

Maybe I should call the Malaysian Book Of Records, to be the first to declare that my site will take over 1MB to download, from all these pictures. Yeah.

The Domino Effect

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Eating at Domino’s seems to be literally a Domino effect. You hit a domino, and another domino falls. So on and so forth until every domino falls, making pretty colored patterns and raking in money for the (not so) fast pizza chain.

Sometime ago, I was bumming around Subang Parade, and I saw Nando’s and was reminded of the last time I had dinner there with Leech. Feeling lucky (I bumped into quite a few people on the same day they contacted me) I called her and whatdyaknow? She was there too.

We went to Domino’s because she had these discount coupons, and we tried the double decker crust pizza. We were also conned by the fine print (details on her blog). I explained the problem to the manager-like person. When the bill came, they gave me those same three discount coupons! We left, and the waitress smiled and thanked me. Leech grumbled, “no need to smile at me ah…”

This wasn’t the first time people in the service industry smile or say goodbye to me, totally ignoring and (thus) incensing whoever I’m leaving the joint with.

I kept the coupons till one fateful day I was in Subang Parade again, and I had a personal pizza this time, using the coupon.

Anyway. I wonder if people only eat at Domino’s because they have coupons. I wonder if people go:

“Hey! So where do you wanna eat?”
“I don’t know… where do you wanna go?”
“Hmmm. Domino’s looks good. Not as thick crusted as Pizza Hut.”
“Hmmm yeah. But do you have a discount coupon?”
“Argh. Nope. Ah well, let’s just go when we do have one.”

Domino’s has never successfully delivered pizza to my office on time. They screw up office extensions! Everytime we collect the pizza, we get a coupon/card so that we get the Domino effect. Sucky service yes, but a brilliant marketing strategy. They know what us cheapskate Malaysians want.

This is my personality now, snarky.

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I received a forwarded Powerpoint file about a Tibetan Personality Test. It was quite annoying (oh look I know how to do Powerpoint transitions! The more people this is forwarded to, the more time is wasted collectively!)

And so, I Googled the contents and paste it here so hopefully if you get the daily digest, you won’t get annoyed by the animations.

(1) Put the following 5 animals in the order of your preference:
Cow, Tiger, Sheep, Horse, Pig

(2) Write one word that describes each one of the following:
Dog, Cat, Rat, Coffee, Sea

(3) Think of someone, who also knows you and is important to you, which you can relate them to the following colors. Do not repeat your answer twice. Name just one person for each color:
Yellow, Orange, Red, White, Green.

(4) Finally, write down your favorite number, and your favorite day of the week.

(Okay so then there are more “suspense-building” screens here. OH BOY!)

Your priorities in life are
career (cow)
pride (tiger)
love (sheep)
family (horse)
money (pig)

2) Your description of dog implies your own personality
Your description of cat implies the personality of your partner
Your description of rat implies the personality of your enemies
Your description of coffee is how you interpret sex
Your description of the sea implies your own life

3) Yellow: Someone you will never forget
Orange: Someone you consider your true friend
Red: Someone that you really love
White: Your twin soul
Green: Someone that you will remember for the rest of your life

4) You have to send this message to as many persons as your favorite number and your wish will come true on the day that you recorded

This is true, even if you are not superstitious.
Please do this. It is fascinating. SEND THIS E-MAIL MANTRA TO AT LEAST FIVE PERSONS AND YOUR LIFE WILL IMPROVE.
0-4 persons: Your life will improve slightly
5-9 persons: Your life will improve to your liking
9-14 persons: You will have at least 5 surprises in the next three weeks
15 or more persons: Your life will improve drastically and all that you wish will come true

Now this is funny because in quizzes like these, I always pick a horse, not because it represents family, but because it is practical, can be rode, does not stink, does not run off, can intimidate smaller animals, and in the worst case scenario, could even be eaten. Okay a cow comes second in terms of practicality, plus you can milk it, though it won’t be fast.

Believe it or not, I actually have Power Ranger friends. Namely, friends who I associate with those colors because they’re always wearing those colors!

P.S. This is not a jab at anyone who forwards such files; I just thought that the one particular bugger who had time to convert all the text into a Powerpoint file should be shot. If he/she really wanted to show his/her technical prowess he/she could make an online quiz where it would calculate the results for you. He/she could then get side income from ads.

I have definitely more than 15 blog readers. I wish for world peace!

Weirdo Baggins

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Four years ago, I was a thirsty camel. I used to lug around a 1.5 liter water bottle wherever I went, and so, I tore a few bags in the process. There was free water everywhere; a drinking water fountain at college, and a pantry at the office.

And so, when I was at a supermarket in Mines Wonderland with family, I saw a wonderful innovation. A bag where the bottom seams were such that the bottom piece was a U shape instead of a cardboard piece lining the bottom. Genius! Plus it came with many zipped pockets (instead of one). It screamed “PRACTICAL!”

Before that, having one pocket meant I’d dig out my wallet, keys, tag, and MP3 player from that one pocket, put those in my trousers, and put the pens, batteries (and other quick-access items) back in that same pocket.

Now, with two or more pockets, I could take out the items I’d want for my trousers without having to put things back. You dig?

I bet girls don’t go into detail how they transfer their necessities from one bag to another to complement their outfit. Organizational science.

So there I was, content with my new bag, and its immense organizational power, gallivanting around college with my 1.5 liter water bottle. YEAH! No more bottles escaping my bag, making an embarrassing watery thump sound!

After a week of classmates and colleagues asking if I had gone back to school, I finally realized the truth.

I was wearing a primary school schoolbag.

Now if that warrants anybody judging me to be a weirdo, screw you well at least you know my justification. I see the practicality in something first, impractical fashion… later.

Right after I lost my first mobile phone, I became excessively paranoid of putting it in my trousers pocket. So I got a belt clip for my next phone. People said it was uncle-like, but did I care, when everyone else was losing their Nokia 3310 phones?

In case you’re wondering, I gave my schoolbag to my younger brother after a week, and I used a lanyard (sometimes tied to a belt strap) for the next phone.