dgb

I think Ted's liver can handle anything you throw at it at this point, so contaminated water is a mere trifle..

Damn dude, you must be living right! I don't find crap at yard sales. If I find a box of stinky, mildewey records I am thankful. So how big is the difference between the Forte and the KHorn? Massive? How about the bass?

Guiness is my top choice. Tasty, smooth and never a hang over. Good old Yeungling Lager, which used to be dirt cheap before it became so popular. Hop Devil, Becks, Bittburger (good, cheap German beer), Straub. Really liked Molson Export Ale but I can't find it in Pennsylvania any longer. McEwans Scotch Ale is also very pleasing, but very, very heavy. The one beer to have if you're only having one.

Really surprised to see Phil Collins mentioned on so few lists. Listen to the 1973 Genesis Live LP or the Genesis Archives 1 with the entire Lamb Lies Down on Broadway live. Phil is just smoking the skins. In his youth his speed was amazing and his odd time signatures really took Genesis songs in interesting directions. After he took over vox and some songwriting duties his drumming was always the core of the band IMO. Many of their songs were written starting only with a drum loop as a starting point. He and Chester Thompson playing together is truly a treat and even in their 90s tours, the 70s style Drum Duet was the highlight of the show, as were the instrumental sections of the longer songs where Phil would run behind the kit. And of course their is the signature Phil Collins sound most widely heard on In the Air Tonight. I'm sure he didn't invent it (I know he didn't) but he certainly put it to the best use. Pert, love him or hate him, is an amazing techinical drummer although I don't feel as much "intangibles" coming from him as others. But it works for Rush and their oddly technocratic style. Bonham is a great drummer, but really I don't think he's the greatest ever. I am huge Zep fan, but I enjoy a lot of other drummer more than him. I find his live Moby Dick solos a bit tedious. Moon, well, as someone mentioned, Quadrophenia is his shining moment. He simply kicks *** on "the Rock" which is one of my all time "Crank it Up in the Dark" songs. Dave Grohl drove Nirvana into stardom IMO. Of course Cobain's lyrics were the essence of the band, but musically the addition of Grohl on Nevermind gelled the musical portion of the band. Much of the stuff off of Bleach and other early releases is really lacking focus. Is it any coincidence that the CD Grohl played drums on for Queens of the Stone Age was far and away their best? The Foo Fighters current drummer, Taylor Hawkins is also tremendous. Foo Fighters are, I think, the last hope for Rock and Roll. Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers is often overlooked because he is so overshadowed by Flea. Good to see Don Brewer mentioned. Talk about a huge band that time has forgot! GFRR LIve albums are the bomb. Chicago is another band that mostly due to their progression into writing songs for 12 year old girls, has got the short shrift in Classic Rock annals. Chicago Transit Authority and Chicago at Carnige Hall are must owns for any true rock enthusiast. Is Terry Kath the most unappreiciated guitarist in rock annals? Bill Bruford. Any coincidence the best Yes and King Crimson releases feature him on drums? Thought not. Surviving recording of his 1976 tour with Genesis are treasures. He and Phil both brought their A-Games on that tour. John Stainer (ex-)of Helmet. Rolling Stone quote. "Helmet makes Metalica sound like The Archies". The guys are fast, tight and heavy as hell. Plus they were cool enough to play at a free Residence Hall concert at PSU while they were on the charts! How cool is that? The 80s seem to have lost the drums. Any 80s bands with great drummers? Duran Duran had a pretty decent rythym section, but I mostly remember John Taylor's bass, not Roger Taylor's drums.

Currently drive a 2003 Subaru WRX. Fun in all kinds of weather, and cheap insurance for a high performance car. If price were no object... Probably an a/c Cobra 427. Really the ultimate no-frills, bad *** sports car. Huge power, light weight, convertable, and just looks plain cool. For the newer cars probably a Viper for the same reasons. Although the Mercedes SLKs are pretty sweet too and the new 911 Turbo. If I had massive fundage I'd be one of those crazy bastards with like 40 cars. Not all expensive either. Like the classic Cherokees, Eagle Talon Tsi, VW Schirocco and Thing.

I picked up Satantic Majesties Request last week, and it was a revelation. It was worth the money just to hear "She's a Rainbow". The attack and decay and instrument plotting is 10x better than the LP. I fully intend on picking up a BUNCH of these remasters. ---------------- On 8/11/2005 9:01:52 PM dragonfyr wrote: The remasters of the Stones were quite a shock for many, as they ignored the fact that Jimmy Miller intentionally muddied their mix as part of the production. So when the parts are presented in a clear pristine fashion alot of folks were horrified that an original production element was eliminated. Not to mention the difference in sound! In other words, it was like Ted Turner colorizing all the movies whose directors COULD have made them in color had they chosen, but they intentionally shot them in black and white. That is a real potential problem if not using the same engineer to remaster... There is cleaning them up and pulling parts out of the mud, and there is changing the original intent of the artist. I like the first approach! ----------------

This was my Charger, lovely puke green color and all! http://www.martinpacker.com/classic-cars/dodge-charger/1973-dodge-charger-2.htm I stand corrected. Evidently the Charger SRT-8 WILL have the same HP as the original Hemi. 425hp. Impressive. $39,000 is a steal for this level of performance.

The Charger looks better than the new GTO, which looks like a big Accord to me. But as noted, it doesn't look like a Charger at all. It should be law that you cannot use a classic nameplate to hawk a new car design. Chargers DID handle sloppy, but they were definately fast, especially the Hemi's which would crush the new "hemi" mercilessly. Do they offer the Hemi Orange or the Puke Green color options? Hopefully my 70 Trans Am will be done before summer ends. I think I can get the Ram Air III to put out 400hp and 500 ft/lb within my budget. Show these poseurs what a real muscle car is. (lots of power, am mono radio, 2/55 air conditioning and an interior noise level of 110db). Then onto restoring the body and interior, which is my DIY project. These new cars like the GTO and Charger are very, very nice and a refreshing change, but come up with a new name. They share very little with their namesakes. At least the new 300 is similar to the original. A big family/luxury car with some punch.

I found a Mitsubishi DD-8020 on Ebay for $49. It was originally $400 and is DVD-A and HDCD compatible. I have a pre-DVD-A flagship player from Mitsu and it was a terrific sounding machine. Although since it was progressive scan and HDCD in 1999/2000 it was $750! Ouch.

That is very cool of you RPlace, you will be getting mail shortly!

The digital output is a moot point, my reciever only has 2-channels, all analouge baby. Ultimately I'm wondering if the DVD-VIDEO 48/24 layers on these DVD-As is worth the price? I suppose I could just cough up the $14 and find out.

Has anyone used a DVD-A title on a regular DVD player? How is the sound of the lower rez layer? There are a few titles I wouldn't mind picking up to replace some of the brutal CDs from the 80s. Anyone have any experience with DVD-A in general? Is it worth picking up a cheap player (don't want to put too much into it, as I see "Betamax" or "DCC" written all over the fomat)?

This Marantz number looks pretty sweet for the price. 85w or 25w class A integrated amp with phono and tape loop (far from a given these days). http://www.amusicdirect.com/products/detail.asp?sku=AMARAPM7200

Johnny Socko's Giant Flying Robot. Terrific, if cheesey, Japanese live action show from the 70s, along the lines of Ultraman. Made Godzilla's "special effects" look Spielbergian.

There's a pair of "Dreadnaughts" on Audiogon right now. Only $66,000.

Kenyan coffee is killer, as is the aforemention Kona from Hawaii. As much as I hate to admit it, Starbucks regular coffee is pretty good. I just love to go into Starbucks and order a "large coffee". Poor employees look like deer in the headlights. You couldn't pay me to say "Venti". For everyday use I get Maxwell House French Roast, otherwise I'd be in the poor house. I'm pretty sure I've mutated my DNA with caffine by now. I urge you all to try using a percolater rather than a drip machine. Much more flavorful in my opinion. Pain in the arse to clean though.

True brilliance.

I use an old reciever to do the trick. Those pre-amps you get with conversion software or from Rat Shack are garbage.

You can get used Threshold, Forte and Nakamichi amps around or under the $1000 mark. Made to kick serious *** but also to deliver very low distortion even at very low levels. STASIS was the trademark of the amp design which is class A/A-B combination. I have a Nak STASIS reciever (100 W) and I've not heard a reasonably priced amp that can touch it. When I went to audition replacements for my deceased TA-2 STATIS I was not impressed with what I was willing to spend (Yamaha, Sony, Onkyo Integra, H-K, Denon) so just bought a used TA-4. The Nak STATIS recievers can be used as amps only too, so if you want to try one on the cheap, you can get a 40w version for around $100-$200, and it's a steal. The seperates seem to go for $500-$4000+ for the Threshold monoblocks.

The one thing that turned me off about Godsmack is that they not only named their band after an Alice In Chains song, but they pretty much seem to be trying to sound like Alice In Chains. Any of you listen to Helmet?

A couple bands in the last decade have caught lightning in a bottle as far as the total package of writing, playing, arrainging and ***-kicking. Good hard rock/heavy metal has been slim since the end of the grunge "thing". You have a lot of the industrial metal types stuff (Korn, System of A Down) which somehow doesn't really fit into the scheme of Hard Rock or Heavy Metal IMO. Not that I don't enjoy some of it, but it doesn't really seem to be based on the same template. Soundgarden (RIP), Audioslave, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age seem like the last bastions of album based "classic" rock. I'm sure their are others, but they are the ones that jump to mind.

I saw War of the Worlds in a theater in Bethel, ME. Not only did this theater not have surrounds, or subs, it didn't even have stereo! I think a Bose Wave Radio would have done a better job. I could barely hear the dialogue. The theater was, and I'm not kidding, 7 seats across (aisle in the middle!) and probably 30 rows deep. I felt like I was watching an AV Club movie in Elementary school.

Congrats Woodog, that's a great story. Seeing a good nutritionist is a good way to start, especially if you actually take his/her advice. The one I saw about two years ago said the best, and easiest thing I could do was to cut out eating cereal everyday and replace it with protien, specifically eggs, and to get more carbs with whole grain. No one's body chemistry is the same either, so some diets will work better than others for a specific person. Mild depression, sleep apnea, fatigue can almost always be rectified by getting healthier. Unfortunately I've not quite been able to get rid of the arthritic joints since the sports I enjoy most (softball, squash, raquetball) are all high impact on the joints and frequently require joints go in directions they are not intended. But I dropped from about 260 to 215 (I'm 6'4") and much lower body fat, and I did notice my foot pain (flat feet and poorly healed fractures) and back pain diminished greatly.

Top to bottom the Big 10 is the best conference in the country. At least our athletes have to beable to read, unlike the SEC. It's good to have Michigan back on the schedule again, although we'll probably get our asses kicked this year. After 1994 I thought we'd be ruling the Big 10, shows what I knew. All PSU needs to do is score more than 21 points a game, and they'll be fine. The defense is spectacular. PSU going to the Big 10 was mainly about academics since the Big 10 Schools have the reputation and facilities that are comparable to PSU. It was also about finding a home for our outstanding non-revenue teams like Gymnastics, Swimming, Fencing, Wrestling and girls Basketball. Paterno tried to get a Big East conference for years but could never get everyone on board, particularly Syracuse. He tried to get Syracuse, Rutgers, Temple, BC, Pitt, Notre Dame, WVU, Miami to form a Big East ten years before it happened. The Big 10 was too good an opportunity to pass up. If we could get ND to agree to a Big10 football agreement, that would be awsome since so many Big 10 teams already have a rivalry with them. Academically Notre Dame definately does not fit into the Big 10.

My motivation has usually been to excel in a sport, so actual fitness has been more important that anything. But not having to buy new clothes is also a bit of a motivation.