It’s Ryan here wishing everyone a happy 2005. I’m going to spend the new year’s eve on the mellow tip with Anji and listen to my new copy of the recently remastered Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd. I checked out a minute or so of it yesterday and thought it sounded wonderful. I can’t wait to hear the entire cd tonight. I also have The Endless Summer DVD, from 1966, which I’ve always wanted to see. So it looks like I’ll be going back to the 60’s and early 70’s this new year’s eve.

It’s great that the site has been redesigned so that the email list automatically updates itself when people join. Just about every day since the change, someone has joined. Even still, there are hundreds of folks on the old email list that I’m making sure don’t get left behind.

I think I’ve recreated our email list probably a half dozen times since I joined the band in 1999. I’ve done it so many times before that I feel like I’ve memorized some of these people’s contact info, even though I don’t know them personally.

Last night I was fricken dreaming that I was updating the email list… If only I had woken up to find that little elves had done all the work for me!

today, i finally bought a new battery to replace the old one i had for a couple of years in my ibook. before today, i was down to around 2 minutes of battery life before my computer would go to sleep. not really all that useful or portable, since i always needed to be connected to an electrical outlet. not the best use of a wireless internet connection, always forced to sit in the same spot.

anji got a new computer keyboard to replace her previous one that a cat vomited on, causing the bottom row of keys to no longer work. so $190 later, we’re back to where we were before our respective items became unusable.

anyone want a battery with 2 minute of useful life? how about a keyboard with one missing row of keys?

Man, the site is looking awfully sharp if I do say so, myself! After a heavy 2 days of geeking out, everything has come together just as we envisioned. We really needed a good first page, but when we first changed the site over, we still weren’t sure what we wanted. Now we’ve got a pretty nice balance of image and content, with an emphasis on all the basic things any first time or returning visitor would want to find. We even have a link to the previous incarnation of the band, to make it easier on old folks looking up the band for the first time in a decade. 😉

Looks like we updated the site yet again! Seems like there’s always something new we want to try out. Sometimes we bring back something old that we miss, but with a new twist — like this blog! Now ya’ll can comment on things, if you feel so inclined. We’re still in need of some new band photos, as Ryan and I look quite a bit different than we did back in the Windblown Kiss period, but it looks like we’ll be hooking up with our favorite photographer, Susan Jennings, early next year. It’s not as far away as it sounds…

Ryan and I have already made a New Year’s resolution to stay in better communication with our fans, and part of that will be accomplished by sending out newsletters more often. We get people signing up to the newslist every week, but it’s been months since I’ve sent one and I do feel a little bit bad.

We’ve also set up an RSS feed of our news page, and I think we’ll have one of the journal soon, too. Looks like we haven’t added that link to the site yet, though. I’ll have to pester our code monkey. Heh heh…

This may well be the final journal entry. We’re preparing to overhaul the site and I think we’ll probably axe the journal. We just don’t write in it very much. I already update the news and man the messageboard, so that doesn’t leave a lot of inspiration for the journal. Plus, those in the know already read my personal journal elsewhere…

European music site, BeSonic, is currently featuring the Chill-Out Lounge Vol. 2 Jazz-Step version of “Hand in Hand” on their Music Recommendations page, along with a review by Jeza. Also available on BeSonic is the
Deep House remix of “Walk Away” by remix producers Sunburn in Cyprus.

Italian indie music zine, Losing Today, is hosting a free download of Lovespirals’ wintry John Denver cover song in their Mp3 Today section . Download “Aspenglow” for your holiday listening pleasure.

Wow, Peace Love Productions says we’ve already gotten 500 downloads of our remix files since Friday! I wonder how many actual remixes we’ll get? I wonder how many other people will try to illegally use our samples? I hope they won’t but I’m sure someone will.

Some people have already asked about posting the remixes on their sites. I think that would be cool. I guess I should get together a credits file to be posted with the mixes. I should ask DJ Puzzle about adding something to the remix site for folks to use.

Sounds like PLP might end up doing some kind of remix CD, if the entries are cool enough.