The Eye of the Hurricane

Steamboat - Here We Come

We are a little over a week away from heading out to Steamboat Springs for the MusicFest! All the planning is done.. all that’s left is to pack up and head out!

During the festival I’m going to see if I can really show everyone how awesome this festival is. If for some reason you don’t get to go, or even if you are there I think you’ll think this will be cool.

Over in the sidebar to the right there is a stream of messages that I’ll be sending in as they happen. Usually they will come in as I’m texting them from my phone.. so at anytime you’ll know things like, “I’m heading over to RRB.” And then if you look at towards the top of the page you’ll see a photo stream which will be fed from my camera phone or camera. These also pop in real time. so when I shoot in the message “I’m heading over to RRB.” I can snap a picture of us walking over or of the RRB onstage and you can see exactly what we see. In addition to these live feeds I’ll be writing a “Day In Review” each morning for things that happened.. complete with pictures and maybe some videos. I hope these kind of things really help connect everyone to the environment Dickson creates up there.

My whole goal in starting Galleywinter was to help each person feel like they are part of the movement… help them build relationships with other people so they don’t feel alone when going to shows and talking about music. The larger the community… the more real it feels. I hope that by letting you guys into my life at Steamboat, you’ll feel a little closer and maybe want to join us next year.. either by coming.. or by hanging out with us!

Klipsch Customer Service

A few years ago I picked up a Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 sound system for use primarily with the new record player I bought, but quickly found that it makes a nice addition to our home PC. I read tons of reviews and listened and listened to Bose setups, JBL setups and found that for the price, I really couldn’t beat it. It’s got GREAT bass response and note for note is comparible to the Bose Companion 3. The Bose has a smaller footprint, but for $100 more I didn’t think it was worth it. Then along came the iPod craze and I found that the sound from the analog out is superb and even when I brought over the Bose docking station and tried them song for song, the clarity was head and shoulders above that unit. All that to say I’ve been very happy with the purchase.

On to my point. Two nights ago I was pulling wires around and broke the plug that connects the volume control to the bass unit. I thought.. oh great.. this will cost me the price of the unit itself to fix. I got online with Klipsch Customer Service and within 5 minutes was directed where I could buy the part I need online, have it delivered in 3 days, and all for just for $30. Have you ever priced Bose replacement parts? Yeah.. you may as well add your kid into the bargain in order to even talk to someone, much less get an answer that doesn’t require shipping your speakers to them. Klipsch has great online forums where their employees monitor questions, they have great online and phone customer support and they have replacement parts that don’t cost more than just buying a new speaker. Great products backed by a great company and I’d recommend them to anyone. If you need a set of speakers that sound great you should try these out. They also have a very cool wireless setup for ipod docking stations. Hmmmm…..

Cactus Music Reopens

Cactus Music was solely responsible for introducing me to literally hundreds of new artist throughout the years and when they closed their door’s, a small part of me died inside. I have been forced to thumb through the Houston Press or sit through horrible bands in order to find new music… and don’t even get me started on having to buy a CD online or from the sterile environment of Best Buy. So, when I heard they had reopened, I had to go down and see if the rumors were true.

Christy, Heather and I met over at Freebirds for lunch and then took a short walk over to the new location of the just reopened Cactus Music. The new place is pretty cool… they even have a dedicated record area with what looks like a wide variety of vinyl. There seems to be plenty of room throughout the entire store and even a small stage where they are supposed to have live music Thurs - Sun. All the employees were busy stocking the shelves with new inventory and what looked like, inventory that had been stored in some warehouse.

Browsing around the CD/Independent Music part of the store was a trip down memory lane. I had no intention of buying any music but just enjoyed picking up various albums…. looking them over.. and moving on to the next one. One of the biggest things I saw missing was the listening stations that they used to have where they always had some good music on from someone you had never heard of.. but would probably buy their CD. I would imagine they will bring them back as they looked to be keeping busy just trying to get the store restocked.

The bottom line is that it definitely still has that “record store vibe” that I’ve been missing. We were walking around and over the PA comes a little Drive By Truckers… that’s something you don’t get at any Best Buy. Heather walked out with 5-6 CD’s and a shirt, and as hard as it was, I saved all my impulse buying for at least another month. As for the location… it is superb… better than the original for sure. It’s within walking distance of about a dozen restaurants and pubs so I could literally spend an afternoon down in that area of town now. Overall, I’m extremely happy about Cactus making a return to Houston and I plan on MANY trips down there. This is, by far, the best Christmas present Houston could have ever given me.