Lifting and Music

Hey, Folks:

This is turning into a workout journal, huh?

Well, not completely, but I suppose that's been taking up a good number of my blogs of late.

So, then, here it comes...yep, the workout element.

My system's bearing up well to increasing levels of cardio tribulation. All the levels I'm hitting on my cardio workouts are going up. I burned, for instance, 363 calories in 15 minutes on the elliptical machine yesterday, over 100 in 15 minutes on the recumbent bike, and, well, an unknown amount during my arms and shoulders routine. It was an "aces" workout. My arms and shoulders were pumped to a level they haven't been in some time.

My basic lifting idea is to keep it quick, simple, and challenging. Here's my routine, as it stands:

Day One: Chest and Back (All exercises 3 x 10, unless otherwise noted)

Chest Press (incline)
Cable Pull Down (Wide Neutral Grip)
Chest Flyes
Cable Pull Down (Wide, Behind Neck)
Dumbell Pullovers
Dumbell Bent-over Rows
(Plus abs and cardio)

Day Two: Legs/Trunk

Leg Press (6-8 sets, ascending weight)
(with)
Calf Presses (sets as above, x20 reps)
***
Leg Curls
Leg Extensions
Weighted Back Extensions (6 x 10)
(Plus abs and cardio)

Day Three: Shoulders and Arms

Shoulder Press
Upright Rows
Front Raises (one set)
Lateral Raises (one set)
Rear Shoulder Raises (one set)
Dumbell French Press (or barbell skullcrushers)
Supinating Biceps Curls
Dips (or reverse grip cable push-downs)
Reverse Curls
(Plus cardio)

So, I devote three exercises to most muscle groups, with four going to legs and arms. I take the absolute minimum of time between sets and exercises, to keep my pulse high and my muscles on the ropes. In general, I like to have the weights and cardio done within 1.5 hours, at the very longest.

Currently, I sometimes throw in another cardio workout if I can, and there's a bending/crushing routine, generally on Thursday or Friday. I hope to add in a sandbag lifting workout at some point, but I'm trying to figure out where it could be done without negatively impacting the rest of my workout days. Sunday would be the natural day for it, but I'm concerned that it would overload that part of the week. Hmm. Pesky time.

On to other things: Music!

I've been going back to the early days of the "Gothenberg Sound", in regards to Melodic Death Metal. I've been a big fan of Dark Tranquility for years, but the oldest CD of theirs that I'd heard was "The Mind's I". I'd heard a lot about "The Gallery" being their definitive work, and I'd been interested in "Skydancer" and " Of Chaos and Eternal Night", as well.

I went ahead and picked those up, and have been listening to them this week. My early impressions are as such:

Skydancer is much different from later DT stuff. Totally different vocal sound (different singer) to begin with. I prefer Stanne's voice, to be honest, but it's interesting stuff. The musical formula had not been solidified at that point, and so they were trying a variety of motifs. Sometimes they work, other times, they're a little odd. There is some female singing, and some clean singing by Stanne on this release, but it's not as well integrated as in later stuff. Production, while pretty good, is not as elaborate and powerful as later releases.

Of Chaos and Eternal Night is a short EP that shows DT beginning to find their sound. It's a bridge between what they were and what they would become. I think that Century Media has a release that encompasses both Skydancer and Of Chaos... For the melo-death fan, it's a worthy purchase.

The Gallery really does show Dark Tranquility finding its groove. Much of the hallmark sound is there, though The Gallery, to my ear, sounds as if it uses more of the stop/start technique that can be heard in other sorts of death metal and metal in general than any of the other releases. Probably more dual guitar leads here, too. Really good album. I don't think it towers above the others, as some would assert, but because it's the seminal release that helped create a genre, it's worthy. A must-buy for fans of the style, and probably for metal-heads in general.

I also picked up the other melo-death lynch-pins that are often sited as having created the genre: "Slaughter of the Soul" by At the Gates and "The Jester Race" by In Flames.

These releases are very much "of a piece" with the DT stuff of that era. "Slaughter of the Soul" is much more straight-forward. Like a punch in the face from Kerry King of Slayer. This is intensified, death-vox thrash. Good stuff. If you like Slayer and want something similar, albeit with grim vocals, this is your record. The re-release has a neat cover of "Captor of Sin", too.

"The Jester Race" is much more varied musically. As death metal goes, it doesn't get much more catchy. The songs have musical ebb and flow, acoustic interludes, and inventive riffing. I'm not a huge fan of the vocalist, honestly. Some of his screams have that agonized quality that I'm not into, but it's far from a deal-breaker. This is an "important" album, and any metalhead who can deal with death vocals should pick it up.

Okay. That's a long blog. I'm stopping now. I'll have other news for you soon.

Peace.

Writing Update; Shiva In Exile

Hey, Folks:

Here I am, with a little update on what I've been doing.

1) I have two short stories and one poem submitted at this moment. I hope at least one of them "pops".

2) I'm working on a few other stories, as well as putting the final touches on "Dust". I know, I know, I'm dragging my feet with "Dust", but it's been such a long term project, it feels like I have to give it time to breathe before I do my final run-through. Or, I'm just lazy. One or the other.

3) I got a new laptop. A "netbook" in reality. It's a Dell Inspiron Mini 10. Very clear screen, great wireless stability, touch-type capable keyboard (even for huge fingers like mine!). Downsides? Yes. It's not upgradable, for one thing (should have done my homework instead of saying, "Ooh! Look at the pretty!") Also, it uses a weird video chip (Intel GMA 500) which is not supported by the newer linux distros. I found out about this a few days AFTER I installed Ubuntu UNR 9.04 as a dual-boot. The distro works, technically speaking, but it can't support the video card, and this causes the screen refreshes to take FOREVER. Plus, it squanders some of the small screen real estate with a bad horizontal pixel count. Oh, well. Back to the XP partition (which is working peachy keen, by the way, thanks for asking.) I could install a hacked/worked version of Ubuntu 8.04, which is supported by Dell, but I'm waiting, hoping that they may created a workaround for a more recent distro. That, or I'll blow away the partition and just settle for Wynders. Probably should have spent the extra 40 bucks and gotten an Asus EEPC 1000 HE. It's the better machine, with monster battery, upgradable RAM, and so on. Grrrr!

Okay, now onto a purchase I don't have any qualms about: Here's a disk I got from Magnatune. If you like Dead Can Dance, Vas, or vocal Mid-Eastern stuff, you might dig Shiva in Exile.





Nour by Shiva in Exile

Happy St. Patrick's Day; Music

Hey, Folks,

Just wanted to give you all a "happy" on my namesake's big day. No need to banish any snakes on my account, though. I'm okay with the reptile folk, myself. Not a huge amount to report on this time. I've been hither, thither, and yon this last week, and the writing hasn't really gone very far in my absence. I hope to get some good work done later this week, though.

It's getting nice outside at last here. I rode my mo-hickle around on Sunday, and may well ride it to work tomorrow. It's dirty, but it's running great.

I'm pissed about some of the jackassery going on in the news. We need to feed a few of the bankers and money men to the hogs, just to get them back around to a realistic world view. I'm surprised that some of the folks that have lost everything haven't gone Death Wish on these dweebs. I know, I don't usually rant here, and I'll stop, but I'm just sayin'...

Now, on to more cool music from Magnatune. This is a short little album, but I dig it. Reminds me of Michael Penn a bit. Check it out:





Little Palaces by Greg Annussek

Settled Dust getting closer; The Union Trade

Folks,

I've had some good critiques for the bulk of "Settled Dust" from my friend Julie Frost, and I'm feeling confident that I can actually pull the project off as a singular whole. I just collected the last part and did yet another editing pass. It'll go out for concrit later this week.

I've got a few "fill in" scenes yet to write, and I've been told to make one segment nastier still. Aye, aye! I will do this. Once I get the corrections and concrit changes put in, I'll be ready to put the whole thing into "pretty" format and send it around to a few more of my readers. If they don't squawk and holler about awful things I've screwed up on, it'll be near the time that I will need to reach out to possible publishers for my little project.

In other news, I found another sweet album at Magnatune. This one's more of a rocker, from a band called The Union Trade. I dig it. Check it out. If you like it, Magnatune will sell it to you for a reasonable price. Hope everyone's well.




Everyday Including by The Union Trade