Halite 0.29

Woo! No protocol encryption yet, being dependent on libtorrent’s implementation, which I hope is underway. Can’t find a changelog, but 0.29 has got to be 0.01 better than 0.28, right?

Get it from the official Halite site, as usual.

Rush – Far Cry

One day I feel I’m on top of the world
And the next its falling in on me
I can get back on
I can get back home
One day I feel I’m ahead of the wheel
And the next its rolling over me
I can get back on
I can get back home

The lead off single from the upcoming album Snakes & Arrows. Some very tasty riffs in there. Can’t wait for the release of the album proper on the 1st of May.

Hopefully it is better mastered than the last studio album Vapor Trails which was horribly over-compressed. There are rumours of a remastered version but for now it remains just that, rumours, not hard news. Come on record label guys, do the right thing.

Rush - Far Cry (Official Video)
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Categorized as Music

Goodbye Sygate, Hello Comodo

 It was finally time for my beloved Sygate Personal Firewall to go.

As the pipes I have access to got fatter, Sygate’s CPU utilisation was getting unacceptable, up to 15% sometimes.

It was also getting long in the tooth (Symantec stopped development after taking over. Damn you Symantec!). Now that’s not necessarily a bad thing, but being a closed source application, the possibility of unpatched vulnerabilities is a concern.

And so, off on my quest. My criteria were simple.

  1. Cheap, free is even better
  2. Simple, as in “stop trying to do everything”
  3. Perhaps most importantly, effective

Unfortunately effectiveness can only be judged by reviews and tests as I have neither the means nor the desire to see for myself.

The popular candidate would be Kerio, but I do not like that it does web filtering, or that it nags you to register when the full version trial is over.

Happily, I decided to give Comodo Personal Firewall another go.

I have tried it before, maybe a year ago. Back then it had the obnoxious “Comodo LaunchPad”, and was bloody “chatty” with the warnings. Glad to see the LaunchPad is gone, and the sensitivity maybe tuned down somewhat.

Very nice, Comodo. Thanks.

Jimi Hendrix – Little Wing

This is the song that made me want to master the guitar. The video quality is atrocious, so just close your eyes, listen to the music and fly away.

Surely Jimi must have been channeling the music from somewhere not of this earth. That bit about me mastering the guitar? Still working on it.

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Categorized as Music

Brad Delp 1951 – 2007

There is really only one thing I can quote:

I looked out this morning and the sun was gone
Turned on some music to start my day
I lost myself in a familiar song
I closed my eyes and I slipped away

R.I.P. Brad, and thanks.

Update: It was a suicide. Damned shame.

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Categorized as Music

Kuniaki Haishima – Grain

“Grain” is dark, atmospheric, chilling, surreal. It reaches for the sacred while wallowing in the profane. It is like nothing else I have heard. It is perfection.

Monster OST 1 - GRAIN (opening theme)

It is also the opening theme for Monster, one of the best fictional work I have ever experienced, in any medium. Highly recommend, even for, to use a cliché, people who hate cartoons.

Kyon – Hare Hare Yukai

On one sunny day
She, who is endlessly wishing for
The fun beyond magic, is a problem

Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu (涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱) or The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi was one of the better anime of 2006. Not the best, mind you, but definitely one of my top 5. The ending theme Hare Hare Yukai (Sunny Sunny Fun) is generic J-pop fluff (i.e. not my idea of art or a good time), but the ending animation is strangely addictive, a guilty pleasure.

Just found out recently that the voice actors each recorded a version of Hare Hare Yukai in character. Thanks to YouTube, I managed to listen to a few. Mostly rather mediocre (as I expected) but there is one gem, the Kyon version.

ハレ晴レユカイ~Ver.キョン~

It has a bluesy, “unplugged” feel, and Kyon (Tomokazu Sugita) has a fine singing voice. Plus, the lyrics are hilarious for anybody who’s seen the show, or read the manga or novels.

Jim Carrey – I Am The Walrus

There! I did it! I defiled a timeless work of art!

Sir George Martin’s “In My Life”, meant to be his farewell album, gathered some unlikely personalities covering Beatles songs, with Sir George producing, of course. Having Jim Carrey do a cover may seem like a joke, much less something iconic like I Am The Walrus, but… well listen for yourself.

I guess Jim proves on this track his performance of the Might Mouse theme in the Man On The Moon was no fluke. A great set of pipes, and the progression from just plain crazy to totally deranged is perfect for the song.

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Categorized as Music

Like Suicide

She lived like a murder
How she’d fly so sweetly
She lived like a murder
But she dies
Just like suicide

This is a song I have loved since the first time I heard it in 1994. I got to listen to the acoustic version on a friend’s copy of Songs From The Superunknown but was not overly impressed by it at the time (ah, youth!). I have since changed my mind and now consider it superior to the released electric version; it could very well be one of Chris Cornell’s finest moments. Beautifully poignant like a Japanese death poem, the increased emphasis on the voice lends the elegant lyrics greater weight.

Soundgarden - Like Suicide [Acoustic]

From Wikipedia: Frontman Chris Cornell was inspired to write the song when a bird flew into the window at his house. He heard the sound, and expecting a burglar, instead found the small creature suffering. He subsequently put the bird out of its misery. Cornell has been quoted saying the bird inspired him to “write a song about the harshness of love.”