To complement this I recently picked up a Focusrite Saffire Liquid 56 Firewire Recording Interface – something I’ve had my eye on for a while. I sold a bunch of gear to finance the purchase and said goodbye to my old M-Audio FW1814 unit which served me well for nearly 5 years and an album or two.

As I looked around the web I couldn’t help but notice that nobody has done a mic pre shootout of the new Liquid Preamp technology to show off the emulation capability of the Saffire. The dual-channel microphone preamp models are one of the main selling points of this item, and the web needs a de-facto mic pre shootout of this piece of kit. Unfortunately I’m not the guy who can pull off a full-blown scientific test of this kind – and you’d want to hear it on many sources with many mic types to really get an idea of how it stands up.

Instead I thought I’d put together a really quick ribbon-mic on acoustic test… a challenge that not just any preamp can rise to; something that shows off the tonal characteristics of each preamp. You’ll notice the quick transient response on the preamps you’d expect it, and slower response – even a lower output – on something like the Solo 610 from Universal Audio.

This isn’t comprehensive, and it’s not meant to be. It’s meant to show you the ability of these preamps. They’re excellent bang for the buck – but while they’re stellar models I wouldn’t go throwing out my Portico just yet. Instead this will add to my arsenal and allow me to get the flavor of different pres without the investment. I look forward to being able to use the 3124 model on drum overheads or the Avalon 737 model for some rap vocals.

All of these tests were done with the gain on the Liquid Saffire 56 at approximately 52db. The waveforms have been normalized to 80%. The microphone is a Cascade Fathead  at about the 13th fret aiming away from the guitar body. I’m using Mogami cabling. The mp3′s are 320kbps @ 44.1kHz. Check out the shootout below.

Millenia HV-3D

Milennia-NORM_01

Manley SLAM!

Manley-NORM_06-01

Avalon VT-737SP

Avalon-NORM_03

API 3124+ (hi gain setting)

3124-NORM_02

Neve 1073 (hi impedance setting)

1073-NORM_04

Universal Audio 610 (low impedance setting)

610-NORM_05

I was outside just yesterday as Jaci and I were spending the early evening hours working in our yard. It’s so funny that when we first moved into the house just 5 months ago we were out there every day – pruning, replanting, putting down fresh mulch and putting in nice flowers! But it seems the last few weeks have given way to distractions.

My dad has been pretty ill. I have had a very busy work schedule lately and we’ve had the joy of multiple visits from friends and family coming over and… well, you get the point. Somehow over the weeks we just stopped going outside to water and tend the garden as much as we used to. And now our ficus hedge is ill and dying, our flowers have all but suffered sun stroke and our grass is getting overrun by weeds again.

What’s amazing is that, even in the middle of summer, we had 3 weeks of almost no rain here in Florida. If you know what it’s like here it rains almost every day! As a homeowner you tend to take it for granted; you don’t need to move the sprinkler around and get doused by the rusty water in the hose. It is glorious. (I never thought that I would enjoy rain!)

So there we were: uprooting weeds, plucking out dead flowers, planting fresh ones, when it struck me that this is an incredible spiritual parallel. Sometimes I can get so jazzed and hyped up for Jesus and my walk with Him is so close that I am out in that garden every single day – I uproot weeds and water my thirsty spirit. But then life happens. Gets in the way. And wouldn’t you know that at the same time a terrible drought comes in and kills all of my flowers. And the bugs move in and kill my ficus. (My spiritual ficus, that is.) To be sure, this is more than just convenient timing! Weeds and bugs and the hot sun are always there waiting to move in, but I wasn’t prepared for the drought and the bugs in the first place because I hadn’t really committed to a lifestyle of spiritual gardening.

Then I thought to myself – If you’re a gardener you probably watch the TV shows and read the magazines and visit nurseries on a regular basis. You probably have plans and designs for what you want your garden to eventually look like. But the fact is, as Christians, there are those of us who rarely even consider God outside of our Sunday ritual.  And there are even fewer of us who have actual designs and plans of where we want to be and what we want to look like in the future as a child of the Almighty.

I turned on the radio as I was showering the dirt off of my legs from pushing the lawn mower around my dusty front lawn and to my surprise there was a teacher that was echoing the same thoughts I was having. I’ll paraphrase but in effect he said:

There are two ways you can make a tree bare fruit. You can go to the supermarket where it’s already been picked and washed, take it home, and tape it to a tree. Or you can nurture a healthy plant so that it produces the fruit naturally. The problem is that from a distance they both look like the same thing.

If you had seen my front yard from an overhead shot on Google Earth you probably wouldn’t have noticed a thing. But if I had invited you over to my house just a few days ago you might have immediately recognized that my grass was too long, weeds were creeping in, and my impatients were about to meet their Maker.

I pray that, in my life, I would be constantly challenged to be a prudent, diligent gardener of my spiritual walk. I don’t want to spend this existence on earth in a cycle of peaks and valleys; times where my lawn looks good and times where you might as well just bring in new sod…. I want to live a life for God that is so pleasing and so fruitful that no matter how close or how far you are to me that the fruit I produce is natural and healthy just the same.

I don’t want a fabricated faith or a façade that I keep up for the sake of appearances. I want a real, true, revelation of Christ that makes me a better Christian – and a more diligent gardener.

Dave Matthews Band returns to form after what I consider 2 lackluster studio releases; their best in 8 years easily....

I’m just now listening to the new Dave Matthews Band release, Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King … wow it’s really quite a return to form even after the passing of LeRoi Moore (saxophonist)… Track 1 opens with a kind of an ‘homage’ to him … feels like it should actually have closed the album instead of opening it. That said, that’s not to say that there’s any lack of horn work on this project – there’s quite a substantial amount… some performed before Moore’s passing and some by Jeff Coffin of Bela Fleck’s Flecktone band.

The guitar work on Big Whiskey is fantastic. Lots of electric guitar – played mostly by Tim Reynolds… it’s incrediblely expressive and more than makes up for the missing dynamic of LeRoi’s dulcet sax tones… in a way it’s like they decided not to try to replace him with someone – but to let the music dictate what needed to fill that hole.

My only criticism so far is that, at times, Carter Beauford (drummer) shows himself to be a one-trick pony. Albeit, those tricks are INCREDIBLE, but he seems to be completely incapable of playing a straight-8 on the hi-hat. Now, I know that’s his shtick, and I’m in awe of his phenomenal ability: but, at times, he just doesn’t come across with diversity.

As someone who LOVED Before These Crowded Streets, I grew very fond of Everyday mostly because of Glen Ballard’s amazing production of this album. Admittedly, I only listened to Busted Stuff vicariously through the radio play and JR’s incessant love of it, and completely skipped Stand Up… But let me just proclaim right now that I AM IN LOVE AT FIRST LISTEN.

I mean, to me, that’s just as bad as using filler words in prayer – as if God has forgotten who you are talking to. “Father”,”Lord”,”Lord-God”… I’ve heard all of these uttered as filler between the important stuff.

I bring this up because I think it’s so sad that as Christians we forget what we’re saying and the incredibly profound meaning behind our words. Let’s take “worship the Lord in the beauty of His holiness” as an example. It comes from Psalm 29:

¹Give unto the LORD, O ye mighty, give unto the LORD glory and strength.

 ²Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name; worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness.

In this passage the author is speaking to us, the readers, and admonishing that we should give the Lord all glory and all strength; give him glory because it is due to Him. What amazing words!  Every month when I pay the bills, most of the ones I have to pay is to pay for a month of service that I have already received. The bill is due because the services have already been rendered – what an amazing thought; give God glory because it is due to Him.  And not just because of the things He has done… oh no. But also for all the things He will do in the future, too! And He just doesn’t deserve glory and strength because of His mighty works… we owe it to Him merely because of who He is. He is GOD.

In the very same passage that Jesus gives us the Lord’s Prayer, He instructed His disciples to pray in Matthew 16, saying: 

⁷And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. ⁸Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

We must be aware to make every word count. Make every thought and every word intentional and full of meaning. Make sure you understand what it is you’re asking for and what it is you’re petitioning God about. It is our duty as worshippers of the Living God that we become informed and doctrinally learned in order to profess the Word boldly.

As careful as we are not to use lofty words of men’s wisdom, we must take care not to oversimplify and mitigate our speech. Mitigated speech is most often seen when subordinates speek  to their superiors (e.g. in the workplace) in order to suggest an alternate course of action or to heighten awareness. Culturally, mitigated speech is accepted as a sign of respect. However, in the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus doesn’t mitigate speech at all. He speeks directly to the Father.  In the Garden of Gethsemene we see Jesus ask:

Luke 22:42
“Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.”

How can Jesus so boldly ask GOD to change His mind about a situation? Surely if Jesus prayed in this way we should take notes. Jesus didn’t say “Oh Lord God, our God, dear God. If you would mind, dear God; if it is your will, oh God; if you should so desire, Father… please let this cup pass, oh Father-Lord.”  How can we be so bold as to pray this way? Paul gives us a hint in Ephesians 2:

⁶And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus

Finally, “worship the Lord in the beauty of His holiness.”  To the psalmist, God’s sinless nature is, itself, beautiful. He has no sin and no iniquity; He has no shame. He faces no death and no consequence for wrongdoing. He IS righteousness. He embodies holiness. And that makes Him beautiful.

The next time you hear someone utter these words off-handedly; remind yourself that God, completely absent of sin, became man; to show that sin and death have no power.

     To show us that the grave is defeated.

     To demonstrate His holiness

     … and to show us His beauty. 

The severity of his condition was downgraded on Sunday and he was moved to a regular room at Brandon Regional Hospital from the ICU. They still don’t know the ultimate course of action – but he is at least eating a small amount of solid food.

He’s struggling to rest and I know he’d rather be at home! He’s being strong though and I know he has a will to fight through this latest trial. We’re glad to have friends like you who are lifting us up — please accept our sincere thanks and gratitude.

Please continue to pray and I will give everyone another update when his condition improves!

The doctors surmise that he had become dehydrated and his colon has become perforated as a result. In a healthy individual pumping them full of fluids tends to fix the problem as the colon is very resilient. However, my dad has been the victim of multiple heart attacks and has lost more than half of his heart tissue to scarring from the events. This causes fluid to gather around the heart cavity and to flood the lungs. Needless to say we’re in a Catch-22.

The other option is to remove his colon entirely, only to live life on a colostomy bag; however this is a 12-14 hour surgery and even healthy individuals have an incredibly difficult time surviving and recovering from this surgery.

The last option is to manage the pain and call hospice and wait for the inevitable. At this point we are praying for God’s intervention – but we have known that this choice may come in some form for quite a while. After 3 strokes, 2 heart attacks, and countless hospital visits in the last 5 years we pray only for his comfort and whatever he wishes. He is a believer and we are confident of his final destination regardless of the outcome; however please pray for my sister Kristen, and for Jaci and I during this time.

More jammage – this time with the Gretsch; this thing just sounds sooooooooooooo big and rich. I’m in love with this guitar. The best thing about the Grestch is that it’s perfect for this kind of clean, reverby, vibey type of music.

Take a listen and comment back if you like it!

Christopher Harry's drum tracking room - not mine

Chris Harry and I have been going back and forth with some new music ideas; he sent me some drums he tracked off the cuff — and I threw a little bass, rhodes & guitar down.

Not really anything to brag about here, but it was a lot of fun!

Don't worry - there are 10 tracks; I just don't even have them all yet on my iPod!

With the launch of our first CD later this week – Jaci and I are thrilled at the response we’ve already been receiving. People have called us and written emails to us about how excited they are – some are even forming “street teams” and are starting their own guerilla marketing campaigns on our behalf!!!!

We’re probably most excited to announce that our CD shipment is ahead of schedule – even though we’ve been consistently behind schedule for most of the project!! I got notification today that they will arrive Wednesday morning, November 19th; presales should ship the same day. If you are lucky enough to see us at a choir practice etc. that Wednesday you JUST MIGHT get your hands on an ADVANCE copy

Remember that presales have free shipping on ALL sales until release day - Thursday, November 20th!