News, Reviews and more from Australia's Macintosh Authority
News, Reviews and more from Australia's Macintosh Authority
This is the second in a series of retrospectives on prominent Mac-using musicians. David Bridie is arguably one of the most substantive musicians in Australia. He's just released a new album calledSuccumb so it's timely to take a look back at his approach to songwriting and Macs. This Pro File originally appeared in the September 2006 issue of AMW.
David Bridie has been writing songs for well over twenty years, and what a discography he has. Best known for his work with Not Drowning Waving, Bridie has for the past 17 years been a pivotal part of My Friend The Chocolate Cake as well as releasing solo albums and composing for film and TV. His most recent project has been RAN (Remote Area Nurse) for SBS TV that featured a range of Torres Strait Islander performers and music. AMW caught up with Bridie at his home in suburban Melbourne.
David Holloway | Sep 3, 2008
It’s a shame, but most people tend to know Cyndi Lauper and her work via a few very successful songs from the mid-1980s: "Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "She Bop", "Money Changes Everything" and "Time After Time". They’re all classic songs now, but are by no means all of Lauper’s best work. Since the multi-million selling She’s So Unusual, there have been eight albums. Throughout that regular output are a not insignificant number of gems, all illustrating Lauper’s musical progression and growing songwriting maturity.
David Holloway | Jul 22, 2008
I received a fascinating URL the other day for The Food Lifeboat . It’s a site that lists the basic food requirements you’ll need to live at home if a pandemic like bird flu hit Australia. Aside from my sometimes obsessive interest in contingency planning (yes, I filled my bath full of water just in case for Y2K), it got me thinking about music technology and surviving on the bare basics. Like most musicians who use their computer as a central part of the creative process, I’m damn effective at accumulating gear.
David Holloway | Apr 7, 2008
Podcasting is really the 21st century version of mix tapes. Remember those? I spent many hours producing compilations of music on a 90-minute cassette and I even dabbled in recording some spoken word creations (don't ask). What was exciting about mix tapes is also what's exciting about podcasts: direct control over your listening experience. Of course, podcasting gives you so many more creative options but the principle is unchanged. GarageBand covers the bases pretty well for the beginner podcaster although any of the AMW team will vouch for the initial challenges one can face in producing podcasts -- particularly when it's a group effort.
David Holloway | Mar 11, 2008
Having being involved with software-based music recording since 1993, I've been around the block a few times with pretty much every application out there. I started out on the fully MIDI-based Cubase Score, progressed to Cubase Audio ("I can record audio directly on the computer and EDIT it -- unbelievable!") then onto Pro Tools LE with side-stops in Soundtrack, Ableton Live, Logic (circa 1999), Sibelius, GarageBand and Sequel. Since 2001, Pro Tools LE has been my workhorse and from the first few hours of using it, its work flow appealed to me immensely. I was smitten.
David Holloway | Feb 12, 2008
January each year sees Apple observers focusing on Macworld San Francisco but just down the road in Anaheim, one of the biggest music product trade shows in the world kicks off at nearly the same time as Macworld. NAMM is the show that any gear-obsessed musician would love to attend at least once in their lifetime – I know it’s on my to-do list. Well over eighty thousand attendees are expected this year and there’s plenty ofnew music gear being announced.
David Holloway | Jan 15, 2008
A very nifty way to display your photos or videos in front of some great template backgrounds or your own design.
David Holloway | Dec 11, 2007
As I type these words, I am waiting for Apple's Developer Connection web site to ease up sufficiently for me to download the long-awaited Software Developer Kit for the iPhone (and iPod touch, just by the by). In a way, I hate developer-oriented announcements — "here's a really cool thing we're working on, and it's available now, and hoi polloi can have it in about six months". Actually, it's the six months I hate.
