Ben Jao Ming » Listening

From Monument To Masses

benjamin — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 21:25:11 +0000

I don’t have a rating system… but if I did “The impossible leap in one hundred small steps” would score X/X where X is the highest possible rating. This is seriously my most favorite album in I dunno… a year!? Beautiful and relevant post-rock with a dash of electronica, indie, math, jazz… but just a slight dash.. not so much that it becomes over-creative in an annoying way.. like so many other talented bands out there, that I never really feel.

Just listen…

To Z (repeat)
Comrades & Friends

ATP vs. The Fans 2007 Pictures

benjamin — Fri, 25 May 2007 10:17:09 +0000

The pictures cannot be enlarged… my camera sucks, so this is as good as it gets.

BATTLES

BUILT TO SPILL

CLINIC

CORNELIUS

ISIS

NOTWIST

SHELLAC

THE CROWDS

THE GLASS ON THE FLOOR

FRIENDS+ME

ON A PLANE

Now recommending…

benjamin — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 22:56:19 +0000

From Monument To Masses: My favorite band currently. It’s feels both like experimental art rock, but the song structures are both creative and catchy like a mix between Explosions In The Sky and Redneck Manifesto. More mp3s are at their website and epitonic.
Mirah: Reminds me a bit about The Blow. Songwriting is very good and catchy. I really like the new album.
Antelope: A very typical Dischord band, but also a bit more nerdy than aggressive. Also there isn’t enough of their kind just yet. It’s alot like Q And Not U.
Final Fantasy: The guy who plays strings in Arcade Fire has a folk band, which you really have to hear to judge. You’ll like it.

Making Rio Karma work on Ubuntu Dapper

benjamin — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 22:12:51 +0000

First off, I just got a replacement hard drive for the second time. A Hitachi Travelstar 1.8″ (C4K20) compatible with the Karma is very hard to get, but Hitachi just started a new production, so if you need one, you should try to call Hitachi and ask, who’s stocking them currently.

Now, just to let you know, what you’re in for:

The features are pretty simple, but effective:

USB Transfer (much faster than LAN-interfacing with RMMLite)
Automatic plug’n'play detection with HAL
Automatic transcoding of file-types that the Karma doesn’t play (see the screen shot)
Synchonisation with media library
All the new cool features of Banshee 0.12 (or whatever later version of Banshee that might currently be out)
The version I got from SVN was stable! No crashes after hours of running.

This is what you need to do:

All of this takes less than an hour. We’re gonna install some stuff from 3rd party repositories, get Banshee from SVN, patch it and install it, and then last – but not least – install a kernel module that enables Ubuntu to detect the Karma and mount it.

Run all this stuff in superuser mode by doing a sudo bash
Get the newest Mono-framework libs by adding a source to apt, updating and then upgrading:

# echo “deb http://directhex.mfgames.com/ ./update” >> /etc/apt/sources.list
# apt-get update
# apt-get dist-upgrade
Remove Banshee and add the requirements for compiling it from SVN

# apt-get remove banshee
# apt-get build-dep banshee
# sudo apt-get install libmono-sqlite2.0-cil \
libmono-cairo2.0-cil libglib2.0-dev libtool \
subversion autoconf automake1.9 gnome-common \
libavahi1.0-cil
Ensure that automake is set up properly and the new libraries are loaded in runtime cache:

# update-alternatives –set automake /usr/bin/automake-1.9
#ldconfig
Get the newest packages of libkarma, libkarma-dev and libkarma-cil from this source. Install them (from command line simply do dpkg -i package.deb).
Checkout Banshee – SVN will create a new directory for it. But before executing make, ensure that the the last lines of autogen said “Karma: Yes” – otherwise you’re missing the Karma Libs.

# svn co http://svn.gnome.org/svn/banshee/trunk/banshee
# cd banshee
# wget “http://bobcopeland.com/karma/banshee/fix-transcode.patch”
# patch -p1 < fix-transcode.patch
# ./autogen.sh --prefix=/usr --disable-docs
# make
# make install
Now you have Banshee installed and ready, but you still need to make Ubuntu and HAL capable of detecting and mounting the Karma. To do this, you need to compile a module that enables OMFS, which is the filesystem the Karma uses. First get the Kernel sources and link them correctly:

# apt-get install linux-source
# cd /usr/src
# tar xvfj linux-source-*.tar.bz2
# ln -s linux-source*/ /lib/modules/`uname -r`/build
Now go here and get the latest version of the OMFS kernel module. Untar it somewhere and do this:

# make modules modules_install
# depmod -a
# modprobe usb-storage

# mkdir /media/karma
To have the Karma automatically detected please refer to the “HAL” and “fstab” chapters on this page.
Now plugin your Karma. Something should happen (maybe Rythmbox starts… of so, kill it). Now start Banshee and notice that nice Karma icon.

Troubleshooting

Double-check that you have followed all these steps. To ensure that you have the kernel module installed properly, do this:

# blockdev –report
# mount -t omfs (name of partition… /dev/sda2 or something) /media/karma

If this command says “unknow filesystem type”, the module isn’t installed correctly. You should check that it is located in /lib/modules/your-current-kernel/extra/omfs.ko. If it is, then try to do a “depmod -a” again and then “modprobe usb-storage” and then re-connect the Karma. The command “dmesg” will tell you if the kernel detected your drive at all.

Other resources

ATP here I come!!

benjamin — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 22:34:39 +0000

So in about 2 months from now I’ll be listening to (amongst others):

Youthmovie System Soundtrack
Built To Spill
Do Make Say Think
Shellac
Brightblack Morninglight
The Books
Band of Horses
Grizzly Bear
ISIS
Explosions In The Sky
Modest Mouse
Mogwai
Yo La Tengo
Les Savy Fav
AND Wilco

I can’t believe how great the program is already… it’s gonna be the festival of a lifetime. And only 6,000 tickets available for 3 stages. I hope they don’t put too many bands on simultaneously.

Expect pictures!

ATP vs. The Fans is the greatest concept for a festival ever… they put on a few great names and let the fans vote for the rest. Explosions In The Sky, Modest Mouse, Les Savy Fav and Wilco are all coming because of votes. I of course voted for some others hoping they, too, would show up… there are still 20 names left to publish afterall… so I voted for The Evens, Envy, These Arms Are Snakes, Of Montreal, Jens Lekman, American Analog Set and Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin… yep, why hold back!? Obviously the booker is some kind of god…

Music of December

benjamin — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 18:48:35 +0000

I’m starting my blog again. I didn’t blog for a long time, and I didn’t have anything useful to publish, anyway. I used to blog about personal stuff on Xanga, but it became a pointless ramble and only taught me how important good conversation is.. in contrast to the introvert late-night Xanga-rambles. Blogging is supposed to be worth reading for others. My past principle used to be that blogging was to be worth reading for myself, but just like keeping old letters for the sake of future understanding of the past… well, we just don’t want to know about the past. It’s well-enough archived in our minds. And someday Xanga, Blogspot or my own harddrive is gonna seize to exist and that’ll probably happen a lot earlier than any elderly eager to understand the past.

Now, music. This is what I love right now.. with links to reviews and mp3s.

Built to Spill – Keep It Like A Secret: Wonderful! Reminds me somewhat of Modest Mouse – but a little less silly and more beautilful.
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin – Broom: Perfect songs, the mood is light and happy. Broken relationships are easy to remember without regrets when listening to this. [Mp3]
The Thermals – The Body The Blood: Very straightforward. I like the biblical texts. [Mp3]
American Analog Set – Promise of Love: So beautiful and mellow. I have no words. I love “Set Free” from 2005, but this previous release is even more beautiful. Even though it’s so quiet it really stirs something inside me and the songs keep playing eventhough the stereo is off. [Mp3]