I posted a while ago that Big Finish were planning to bring out some more Survivors stories. Well they have, in fact, two have come out this week.
The first is ‘Ghosts and Demons’, which is a narrated story. Not that I particularly dislike a narrated story, at times they can be very good actually. This one is narrated by Carolyn Seymour, who is of course one of the main actors in the Survivors series anyway. I have listened to her narration before, and it is always great.
The second audiobook is a full cast drama with three individual stories.
I don’t know why I am such a big fan of the Survivors stories. I think it has something to do with the world being reset. Not always in a good way of course. Not always with positive outcomes. I find that I am drawn to these kinds of apocalyptic stories more and more. I don’t think that has anything to do with the pandemic in particular, although it does bring it home somewhat. But I always have enjoyed these kinds of stories.
I hope that Big Finish manage to keep Survivors going for some time to come. I had thought that it was done after season 9, but I’m always up for more, and I’m looking forward to hearing these.
I bought an Apple Watch around half way through 2020, over a year ago now. It was a device that I had always been tempted by, but never got around to buying. Initially I didn’t like the Apple Watch because it was actually thicker than the Pebble Time smartwatch I had for a long time, but with the more recent series Apple seem to have made them slimmer, and to me, more acceptable as a watch.
There are lots of reasons why I got it. One major one was around data. Data about me, and being able to use that data to create music. But enough of that for now. It is a subject for another day at some point in the future.
When I bought an Apple Watch it was before OS 14, so some of the functionality that I now enjoy wasn’t there, but it was a series 5 watch so hopefully it will last a few years at least. I don’t expect it to have the same replacement cycle as an iPhone. Sadly, for me, they brought out the series 6 watch just under two months after I got mine, which was annoying, but never mind, these things happen. At least I will be able to time my next purchase a bit better.
The device itself is a nice piece of technology, and the connection between it and the iPhone is very solid. The health data is interesting and useful, and as a device for receiving, and in some cases acting on notifications it is actually extremely useful. Certainly more useful than my old Pebble devices.
However, what I really want, is for it to useful as a device in its own right and not just as an adjunct to other devices. That has been my aim with most of the wearables I’ve had over the years, and my expectation was that the Apple Watch should be the device that meets those expectations.
LiveView BinaryClock
A variety of smart watches I have had over the years
So far there are only a few things it does completely on its own. For the most part it is a companion to my phone, and, whilst that’s ok, it isn’t quite what I want.
The apps I am finding useful at the moment are:
Just Record – A very simple audio recorder, but a very useful app to have on your watch
Shazam – Finding tracks using my watch is very handy (yes, pun intended)
Wotja – Generative music controlled from my watch
Holonist – Music data created from my own motion and bio data
There are a few others too, but the above are things are use regularly.
I was skeptical about having an Apple Watch. It was an experiment, and, thankfully, one that paid off. Since buying it have used it every day and now I’m not sure that I would be very comfortable without it.
I expect I will write again about how I’m getting on with it. Probably in a few months. Well, maybe.
Which is great news indeed. I had been wondering if Big Finish were going to produce any more in this series, and they are. It comes out in February next year.
The previous episodes in the Big Finish remake have been good. Not astonishing, but good. Which is enough for me. Especially as the graphic novels appear to have vanished for now.
Big Finished announced this today. There are more Survivors stories coming!
After the ninth season of Survivors Big Finish said that there would be no more of the current iteration of Survivors but mentioned that there might be a spin off. Now it is real. Two new box sets coming in November this year and February next year. With Abby and Lucy. This is excellent news. At least it is for me anyway.
I have been to knoops before, back in 2018. The hot chocolate was amazing. Both excellent and very different. As I was back in Rye just last weekend I thought I would pop in and try it again. I looked up the knoops website and was interested to find out that there are now four stores. The one in Rye is still there, but there are a couple in London and another opening soon. When I had visited a few years ago I had no idea it would franchise out into a chain. Somehow that just didn’t seem very likely.
But I was wrong. Now knoops is a chain and the Rye shop is just one of the outlets. But, most importantly, was the hot chocolate any good? The short answer, yes, it was. It was very good, but there was one thing missing. Something not as it was back in 2018. When I had originally visited the Rye shop was run by the owner and he was brilliant at explaining everything about the different percentages of cocoa and what that meant.
This time round it was just like going to any other chain. Perhaps a bit nicer, but it didn’t have that local feel, that independent feel. I guess that is the price you pay for things expanding. The loss of the personal touch. The loss of that feel of something truly unique.
Knoops is still good though. The hot chocolate is still good, and I would still recommend it to anyone who likes hot chocolate.
The idea of the quantified self is not a new one at all. Capturing data on steps, heart rate, weight etc is something that a lot of people do on a regular basis. I’ve been slowly taking this on board for over a year. It started with just step counting but now extends to all manner of data. However, in the last few months I’ve began to extend this into a new concept which I call ‘the sonified self’, that might be something that already exists, but if it does I’m not aware of it. This involved the capture of data, again like steps, motion, heart rate etc and turning that data into sound, or in fact music when that’s possible
I’ve been experimenting with this idea for a few months now, and more recently I think some of my experiments have got to the point where I might even share them. Not in this post, but perhaps in the coming weeks.
Before I do share some of the experimental output I plan to go into more detail about how the process works for me, or at least the component parts of the process and the technologies involved in it. As you might imagine the process involves a number of different devices and apps. However, in the centre of all of this is an app called Holonist. Holonist is in many ways the operating system for my ‘sonified self’ concept. Without it the whole process would not hang together at all.
Holonist really deserves a post all on its own. It’s a complex piece of software and I have barely scratched the surface of it. There’s a lot more to learn and experiment with, and I’m very aware that I am at the start of what could be a long journey.
The next post on this topic will probably focus entirely on the Holonist app itself, after that I’ll cover the process, and, hopefully by then I’ll be able to share some output.
This has been something I’ve been meaning to experiment with for some time now. Last year I bought an ‘Ether’ device to experiment with electromagnetic waves. I was really taken with the sounds that were in the videos of the ‘Ether’ device, and it was impressive.
So far I haven’t used the Ether as much as I’d hoped. But one of the things that I wanted to try out was the electromagnetic waves that might be given off by stone circles. A bit strange you might think. Or maybe not.
My first, and probably most nonsensical thought was to try at Stone Henge. I’ve been there before and you can’t get anywhere near the stones. So I emailed English Heritage. No response. Not a massive surprise though. I had thought that they’d at least do me the courtesy of replying, but no. Nothing at all.
The next possibility was to try a stone circle where you can get right up to the stones. Hence Avebury. The Avebury circle is in fact older than Stone Henge. So I thought I’d give this a go. I took my gear and got up close.
The device I use for this is an ‘ether‘. I’ve had this for over a year now. It’s an interesting device, and, when I have used it, I’ve found the output very interesting. However, I haven’t found a real place for it in my creative workflow. Hopefully I will at some point, but I think that I probably need to do some more research.
Avebury
Anyway, back to the stones at Avebury. I hadn’t researched the composition of the stones at Avebury. If I had, I would have expected the outcome I got. Which was basically nothing. The best I could get was that the stones effectively acted as big radio receiver. I suppose that in itself was interesting, but not really what I’d wanted.
So that’s that really. I need to think about another use for the device. When I do I expect I’ll write about it.
This was one of the reasons I decided to get Apple TV+. The concept intrigued me and it looked like someone had spent money on making it. I have to say that the first season wasn’t bad. Not amazing, but certainly not bad, and some of the fight sequences were really amazing. The story was fairly predictable, although that isn’t a bad thing really. There were one or two twists in the season that I didn’t see coming and that’s always nice.
As I understand it there is another season coming, but, like so many productions right now, it will be delayed. I can wait. I’m in now hurry right now. In fact I’ve put my subscription on hold until this, and some other shows come back for another season.
An interesting book about how both listening and playing music can help you
I read this recently. It’s quite an interesting little read on the whole. Quite short and to the point, which is handy. But it makes some interesting points about how music changes our brains. Not just listening to music, but also making music, playing music.
For me it isn’t a big surprise, but it’s nice to have it validated. I’ve enjoyed reading it.
This year I’ve been really enjoying reading poetry again this year. Both revisiting poetry that I’ve always enjoyed, and also finding new poets and collections. One such is Deluge by Charlotte Ansell. It’s a great collection.
I’ve never read her work before, but I may well go back and read some of her other work based on this. From the first poem onward it has been brilliant. Insightful and penetrating, funny at times, gentle and revealing.
I think that this is a collection of poems that I’ll read again, and again.
I am Ashley Elsdon 