Date: Sun, 25 Sep 94 04:00:06 CDT From: numan@cs.uwp.edu Reply-To: numan@cs.uwp.edu (Gary Numan) Subject: Gary Numan Digest V1 #98 Gary Numan Digest Sun, 25 Sep 94 Volume 1 : Issue 98 Today's Topics: ANNIVERSARY (2 YEARS) FINALLY got "Ghost" and "White Noise" Gary Numan Digest V1 #97 (2 msgs) How to subscribe to Numan digest? Introduction RFI: Trainspotter Help Needed ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 23 Sep 1994 13:06:02 -0700 From: dlangs@sunstroke.sdsu.edu (Derek Langsford) Subject: ANNIVERSARY (2 YEARS) To: numan@cs.uwp.edu This week's issue corresponds to the second anniversary of the Gary Numan Digest. Out of 104 potential issues we are on number 98 meaning only 6 weeks have passed without any contributions - not a bad record. (Most of those are from Christmastime when people are away from home/too busy to post). It is very satisfying to see the Digest getting busier with time. I'm not sure how many people are subscribed but I would guess it's more than the 71(?) we last counted many moons ago (Dave?). I'd like to extend a welcome to all of those who have joined this past year. Don't forget to email me about the Digest's future. I've had maybe 12 or 13 responses. For details see last week's Digest. Basically, I want your opinions on the operation of the Digest. Should it: 1. stay as it is - weekly? 2. become a daily digest? 3. become a reflector list? 4. be available as either a daily digest or reflector? 5. become an alt music group? 6. become biweekly (suggested by a respondent)? Send your thoughts to me (dlangs@sunstroke.sdsu.edu) with the subject as "digest future". Many thanks to all for your valuable input to this question and in the Digest this past year. Here's to another informative, enjoyable year. Derek ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Derek H. Langsford Dept. of Biology dlangs@sunstroke.sdsu.edu San Diego State University ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 17 Sep 94 20:24:14 From: Joe.Lindstrom@telekon2.cpubbs.cuug.ab.ca (Joe Lindstrom) Subject: FINALLY got "Ghost" and "White Noise" To: numan@cs.uwp.edu Howdy Numanoids! First a quick aside to Manish Soni and Ziggy Blum - yes, I've received your cheques. Manish, yours is wending its way through my bank's computers now. Ziggy, yours is being deposited Monday. I've been an absolutely TERRIBLE correspondent lately - school has given me a new appreciation for the word "busy". My profuse apologies. Anyways: Well, my local record store (called "The Record Store" oddly enough) finally came through - my copies of "White Noise" and "Ghost" are here, and they only (!!!) cost me $49.99 CDN each. Ouch! But well worth it. Overall, I gotta say I'm impressed with 'em both. "White Noise" has cleaner sound quality, but the mixing was done somewhat badly - the backing vox and often Gary's own singing are buried. "Ghost" has much better overall mixing but not QUITE the same crispness. Maybe it's time for a "Top Ten Live Tracks" list to go along with the earlier Top Twenty list. I've personally got MOST (but not all) of his live material, and unfortunately most folks have NOT managed to acquire them all yet. Kinda a shame, although I'm glad to hear that Beggar's Banquet plans to release the old Living Ornaments stuff. I was sorta confused about an earlier statement that said that they had the 1979 concert but not the 1980 concert - why not just grab a copy of Asylum 3? Heck, I'll lend 'em mine if they need it. They should HAVE it though - while Alfa records released Asylum 3, it's got the BB logo plastered all over it and I would assume SOMEBODY has a copy of the original tapes kicking around somewhere. I'm rambling again. So I'll just make some of my own comments about these two live albums. White Noise "Berserker" remains my favorite live Numan track... proving that a live performance of a song can *FAR* outshine the studio version. There's a funny thing about the "Berserker" studio album - while most of the material is far and away some of the most innovative and interesting stuff he's done, it seems like the album was released only 80% finished. There's just not enough "polish" to most of the tracks, including "Berserker" and "My Dying Machine". In fact, I far prefer the live version of "Berserker" and I *MUCH* prefer the IRS remix of "My Dying Machine" as it appears on New Anger. To illustrate what I mean, take his "Strange Charm" album. The material here (with "My Breathing" being a big exception) isn't nearly as innovative but the overall SOUND is much, much cleaner. "My Breathing" is an example of what the finished product SHOULD sound like - and something Gary's quite capable of. While I'll still give my eye teeth for a CD copy of Berserker (heck, even vinyl will do), it remains SOMETHING of a disappointment. Moving on... y'know, I always hated the songs "Me! I Disconnect From You" and especially "My Shadow In Vain". Both songs come ALIVE on this album and are both extremely enjoyable, especially MIDFY - I can't stop listening to this song now, whereas I used to always press the "next track" button on my CD player whenever it came up before. Excellent job here. Neatest bit about "My Shadow" was his changing of one line, to reflect his current choice of makeup: "I only think in blue and white" "Cars" was a disappointment. Seemed like a PARODY of the original. "We Take Mystery" still sucks. "Music For Chameleons" is a neat song - but does NOT come off well live. I hope we don't see this one on another live album ever again. :-) On the other hand, some nice surprises were "The Iceman Comes" and "This Prison Moon" - I thought they'd blow, but they were EXCEPTIONALLY well done. By far the most INTERESTING track is the encore performance of "Are 'Friends' Electric?" in which Gary twice blows it and begins laughing in mid-lyric. The crowd gets off on it and you find yourself laughing as well, even though you don't know what the joke is. Preceding this is an introduction of all the members of the band - the fans seem to really be in love with Rrussell Bell. Ghost "I Can't Stop" - yes, Gary, you *CAN* stop, and we'd appreciate it if you would *STOP* performing this song. "Me! I Disconnect From You" is not quite as good as the White Noise version but still very enjoyable. Eek! Did I just say that? "Tricks" was tricky to pull off.... and he ALMOST does it. There's a couple of glitches but otherwise very well done. The most PLEASANT surprise was "My Breathing", a very studio-oriented song that I felt for *SURE* would be a complete wreck when I saw it printed on the back label. Surprise! Turns out it's the best thing on here, and this is a GOOD disc. "I Can't Stop" listening to it. "Cars" was, again, a disappointment. Sounded almost identical to the Skin Mechanic rendition - very "barren". He makes up for it with some banter prior to playing it.... Gary - "Do you know... what is number... 26?" Crowd screams in approval Gary - "Do you think they're gonna play it?" Crowd screams in disapproval Gary - "Nah, me neither, so we're gonna..... somebody's got to, haven't they?" "Berserker" - not quite as good as the White Noise version, but it has a few new twists to it to make it worth listening to over other versions. If you haven't got either disc, pick 'em both up. If you have to choose between 'em, give the slight nod to White Noise. Ratings: I think most folks would rank "Living Ornaments" (aka Asylum 3) as Gary's "best" live album. So using a scale of 1 to 10, placing "Living Ornaments" at 10, here are Joe's Rankings. White Noise - 9 out of 10 Ghost - 8.5 out of 10 Skin Mechanic - 7.5 out of 10 (dat's all I got, one more is "on the way") Well, guess that's a wrap. It's a good thing CD's don't wear out the way vinyl LP's do, or else I'd already have to start thinking about ordering another set of these albums... been playing 'em a *TON*. :-) Take care, and remind me to smile. [~] The Liquid Engineer [~] ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 18 Sep 1994 19:45:17 -0400 (EDT) From: "Todd W. Carter" Subject: Gary Numan Digest V1 #97 To: numan@cs.uwp.edu Where can I get the "Best of Gary Numan" CD? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Today's revelation: "There are no paper cuts in cyberspace." | | "Ahhh! > > > Todd W. Carter a/k/a tcarter@access.digex.net < < < | Bach!" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 18 Sep 94 16:17:04 EDT From: thx1138@angus.mystery.com (Scott Abfalter) Subject: Gary Numan Digest V1 #97 To: numan@cs.uwp.edu (Gary Numan) RE: alt.music.numan I would LOVE to see this started. Does anyone out there know the mechanism for getting a new USENET group started? Judging from some of the ones out there it CAN'T be that hard... THX RE: Numan in general I've just become fascinated by the 'First Albumn' again. Last month it was Dance I played over and over. Now it's the first albumn. I also just listened to Outland a bit ago and I have to say that I think the people here give it a bad rap --it's the most technically proficient albumn he's put out and seem much more professional that many others. I like it a lot. I have evolved to the level of an '80 deizen and have purchased a CD player (finally --it ws getting hard to hold out any longer). Went to the music store to get a CD to put in and and - dooh!!! --no Numan of any sort in stock. Oh well.... -- Scott Abfalter (thx1138@angus.mystery.com) Mystery Spot BBS, Royal Oak, MI --------------------------------------------?-- ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 18 Sep 1994 18:30:23 -0500 (CDT) From: Martin Wagner Subject: How to subscribe to Numan digest? To: numan@cs.uwp.edu Hi. I was given this address to contact regarding the Gary Numan digest, but the person who gave it to me did not remember exactly how I should get my name on the list. Please e-mail me with any information/instructions. Martin ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 19 Sep 1994 11:41:37 -0700 (PDT) From: David May Subject: Introduction To: numan@cs.uwp.edu > I have been a big Gary Numan fan since I was in junior high. He, > Soft Cell, Human League, Kim wilde, Adam and the Ants, really influenced > me and gave me the urge to start playing keyboards. > > So I started buying equipment and messing around, I did a few > numan cover's and wrote originall material. At the age of 23 I became serious > about music , recieved a degree in Recording Technology, and started my > own record label CYBORTRONIK. CYBORTRONIK presses a few 12" records a year > for DJ"S and we put out tons of tapes. We deal with techno, dance, hip-hop, > industrial, electronik types of music. > > I am and have been a key member in Liquid 25, KBD, Demolition League, > Joy Circuit, Cybortronik World Media, Kryonik, and Noise Matrix. I > play keyboards , bass, guitar, sing, ect... I am now 26 and live in the > Dallas Fort Worth Area. > > Some of my favorite Numan Albums are Berserker, Strange Charm, The > fury, and Telekon, althoug I love all his music and have all the cd's and > lp's Ive been able to find. I think a newsgroup would be cool also for Gary > Numan, lot's of others have them and he sure deserves one! > > Currently I am producing a Television show (soon to be on Satelite) > called Alien Death Squad. It features music video's, Japanese Anime, Live > Action, Bondage Gear and Clubs from around the world, and other weird stuff. > We have been trying to contact Numa Records for some time to find out what > video'sa are available from Gary Numan, so we can include them in our > program. But we havnt had much luck tracking them down, if any one has a > phone number or fax number please send it to me!!! I know the video's > are out there just not where to get em so any help would be great. That's > about it, this is great Numan on the net, I love it!!!!! > > > dmaycrg@netcom.com > > ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 22 Sep 94 20:35:38 -0600 From: ozymandias G desiderata Subject: RFI: Trainspotter Help Needed To: vajra@selway.umt.edu Right up front, we want to apologize for this massive cross-posting. It is important to us that we reach as many of you as we can, since you are the people that we are creating this program for. However, we are sorry if some of you have to look at this more than once (special apologies to Lazlo Nibble and Dave Datta, who will each be seeing this around five or six times). With that out of the way, this is a: REQUEST FOR INFORMATION ----------------------- My friend David Tolliver and I, Forrest Norvell, are designing a music database system (which we've nicknamed "Trainspotter" ;). Our chief goals for the system are that it be very flexible and fast. If this doesn't sound very specific, it's because it isn't -- we're trying to get your input without giving you any preconceptions about what it is we're trying to do. What do we want from you? Simple -- information! What sort of features would you like to see in a program like this? What sort of information are you interested in tracking (about labels, groups and their members, releases and their tracks, and similar things)? Are there other music cataloging programs that you've used, and if you have, what have you liked and disliked about them? Are there special-purpose features that you've never seen implemented but would like to? In short, if you could create a dream program to keep track of your music collection, what would you want? Tell us! Send your suggestions to me at ogd@selway.umt.edu with the word "Trainspotter" in the subject line. PLEASE BE CAREFUL TO REPLY ONLY TO ME! We're imposing on the good graces of the net enough as it is, and we don't want to be responsible for a huge torrent of flames and counterflames. As you can tell from the huge number of addresses in the To: field, we are anticipating a large number of replies, so don't be upset if we don't get right back to you. However, if you do take the time to make a thoughtful reply, we will try our best to make sure that we get an equally thoughtful response back to you in a timely fashion. Thank you VERY much for your time in advance, Forrest Norvell ogd@selway.umt.edu ------------------------------ End of Gary Numan Digest ******************************