Riadsala’s Blog

Recently I have been…

Read the rest of this entry »

After the excitement with my computer last weekend (it blew up) I’ve decided that now that I have it working again that I should reformat everything so I can try and have a sensible set up with hard disks, so I can use the automatic backup facility. Just now my c: drive is far too small, so everything is dotted around on various partitions here and there. Which makes finding stuff very confusing. Especially as Windows keeps getting confused and creating new music, photo, document folders for me.

A some what dull job, but it should make finding things easier. And I can relax, drink coffee and listen to music as I go. And hopefully everything will be working smoothly for next month, when work starts again on the AlK&AlC album/demo

Well back at uni after a busy weekend. Friday night PC blew up. Which was pretty exciting. Turns out the power supply shorted out. So no computer for me until I sort out getting a replacement through the guarantee. It meant my plans on finishing off a tune in Cubase have been put on hold though. Read the rest of this entry »

A collaberation with Bard Edlundart. I’m resposible for the warr guitar (playing rhythm guitar and bass), drums, synth and generealy production. Bard did the vocals, lyrics and lead guitar.

Read the rest of this entry »

I went to see Ne Le Dis A Personne (Tell No One) last night. If I could write film reviews, I’d write one. But I can’t. So I’ll just say that I thought it was really good. So go see it.

Read the rest of this entry »

After a long silence, there’s some new music on the AlKandAlC site, a new song from Al K (who’s currently still in California). Head over to the AlKandAlC site if you want to have a listen. Or wait until September when we’ll hopefully be gigging again :p

I also have a gig coming up at the end of this month: Roger and I are returning to Henry’s on the 30th.  Sadly Nick Trepka won’t be joining us (as he’s now living down South, having just returned from an awe inspiring trip round India). Ahmed Remally will be stepping into Nick’s shoes on lead guitar, so hopefully it will be a good gig

On a more work related note, if any of my friends in Edinburgh read this (somebody must be reading this as there are now 200+ hits), would you like to do a little experiment I’m carrying out as part of my PhD? It would involve  going to Heriot-Watt. I’ll buy you a coffee in return!

And finally, Richard Thompson’s new album, Sweet Warrior, is excellent. So go buy it if you like that kind of thing.

Now that Benny’s band has come to an end (at least for the time being, I imagine there might be future gigs as the first one was pretty good), it’s time to find some new projects. Two of them are African based bandsa, Kernel and Sagrenti.

I’ve had a few rehearsals with Sylvain and friends (who make up Kernel) but due to upcoming gigs (namely, the launch of a new afro-beat club night at the Bongo Club) there isn’t really time to get me up to speed properly, so I won’t be playing the gig. All very sensible really…

..especially when  I’m trying to find time to jam with Sam (who you can see playing the djembe on the youtube clip below) and his band, Sagrenti. He’s been trying to organise something for a few months now, and finally, we should be having a jam this Thursday. I’m looking forward to it. Apparently there might be a few Edinburgh festival in the pipeworks…

And finally, I had a fun jam with Roger again.  We tried reworking a couple of e/t/c tracks so they worked without Nick and Roger showed me a few old songs of his. Hopefully we’ll play a little set together at Blue Wednesday this week

on this little youtube clip from last Saturday’s gig.

You can tell I’m a bassist as I’m lurking at the back.

Spiderman 3: Good to watch if your flatmate has booked the living room for the evening and your local cinema has incredibly comfy sofas to sit on. Otherwise, don’t bother. 3/5 with comfy seat, 2/5 otherwise.

Cimematic Orchestra – Ma Fleur: The first track is very Coldplay-ish. Which is a big negative if you’re me. But the album gets considerably better after that, although not as moodly as “Every Day,” which is an awesome album. 3/5. It would probably have been 4/5 if they dropped the Chris Martin soundalike and stuck with what makes the band great.

Benny Tetteh-Lartey and the Afro-Scot Beat: Yeah, I know, reviewing a gig I played in. But hey, the main thing I wanted to say was how great the support acts were. And to Benny’s credit, our part of the show was the most polished I’ve been involved in recently, which made a nice change