Doug Van Pelt

I SUCK

I am bad at keeping up with my blog lately, it seems. It's probably all Levi's fault. Or maybe I can blame it on a woman nick-named "Tornado." She's a cat killer, you know.

Anyway,
I'm reviewing these cool new headphones right now. I popped 'em in (after spending literally five to ten minutes trying to determine which one was "left" and which was "right") and connected them to my iPod playlist of "hits." I guess the New Amsterdams ("From California") and Nirvana are good bands to test out a pair of headphones. The first thing I notice about these headphones is how LOUD they are. The fine devices are made by the folks at ultimate ears. They're called SUPER.FI "universal fit earphones." They rock. With a long body with a bend for a "natural" fit (natural, that is, once you figure out which ear to put the custom earphone into). It allows for some really good and deep low end to make its way into your ears. I'm not sure how they do it (it's probably the gold plated input connector or the frequency response of 20-16,000 Hz), but you need not get anywhere near your iPod's high volume settings to blast your ears into submission. The highs are super clean.

I can sense the beefy and full low end, but I need to test drive another song to really find out. Something ambient, something low. hmmmm.... I guess the bass intro to "Come As You Are" is sufficient. Wow! The snap and crispness of the snare in this song are so bright and loud it's almost painful. Wow -- even Muse ("Starlight") and Mute Math ("Typical," "Chaos" and "Noticed") are almost too bright, too "treble-y." What's going on? Let me try Type O Negative... There we go ("Summer Breeze"). Oh yeah...!

I retro-fitted the earphones with one of five sets of Ear Tips. The "Disposable Foam Ear Tips" offer a really rich and deep bass tone. The foam quality allows it to be molded to your ear canal, forming a perfect seal. At high volumes, the bass is, like, thundering. I'm impressed.

I am a rock star

In the realm of my Griffin ear buds headphones, I was just on stage with the Scorpions, rocking out with massive, wall-shaking reverberations that shook the massive arena we were "in."

Actually, what I was doing was test-driving the new iGTR from Waves. It's a hand-held guitar effects unit that clips on to your belt, etc. Called the "personal guitar processor," it's like a small practice device that sends a nice and loud signal into two sets of headphones (so you can share your guitar hero skills with another). The major effects processed ever so mightily by this iPod-sized unit are "ambience," "effects" and "amplification." Under ambience, you can adjust delay, chorus and reverb. The effects variations are "wah," "tremolo" and "phaser." Under amplification, you can adjust for "warmth," "normal" or "brightness." All of these options can be adjust from zero (bypass entirely) to full on. You're "tweaking" the ambience; adjusting "speed" for the effects, and "driving" the amplifier.

I'm a totaly guitar novice. I know about three chords, but can only really play two of them. But when I first hooked this unit up (which involved installing four "AAA" batteries and plugging in the guitar chord and headphones), I was very happy to discover that the effects were so rich and drenched in delay that strumming the open E string sounded full-on massive. The sustain held on forever, so just plucking around the six strings and covering various frets on the neck made it sound like I was a master at the distorted guitar. I was reminded of an old Scorpions song as I hit various notes of the dark and ominous side. The song is a mesmerizing piece called "Animal Magnetism," which would go great for some epic movie about the slaves in Egypt being dominated by powerful tyrants that ruled by intimidation. Imagine a "GWAH ... thud, thud, thud, BOOM!" It's just awesome. Very little singing and lots of sustained notes of destruction.

So, the next thing I did after tweaking various effects and seeing how easy it was to sound purposeful, was to hook up my trusty old iPod to the auxilery jack, which allowed me to mix and "play along with" the Scorpions as that song rocked. My memory served me fairly right about the ominous and delay-drenched tones. Wow! That was fun! If I could really play, this would allow me to see how close I could mimic my guitar heroes and master actual songs.

I dig this toy and would rate it high for the pleasure effect. I look almost as happy as that guy snarling on the packaging. The only thing I'd like to see them add on would be a tuner. At $79 it's not too out of range for even the curious.

Purple Door.1

I have set up the HM Magazine booth at the Purple Door Festival and am just waiting for things to start. I have met up with the folks from Stand True, Rock for Life, Girder Music, Spoken, Red, and the guys from The Showdown. It was fun showing them the new issue of HM, which has a big feature on the band, as well as the lead-off album review in this new issue. I think they liked it.

Apparently the photo we used of them standing in some water was not cropped the way they had hoped (it shows their jeans rolled up by their knees, instead of cropped mid-thigh.

The line-up at this 1.5 day festival looks great. Check this out:
Seabird
Reilly
Bob Lenz (speaker)
Red
Skillet
Calling Out Closer
Wavorly
John Reuben
Bryan Kemper (speaker)
Bradley Hathaway
We Shot The Moon
Kurt Weaver (speaker)
The Glorious Unseen
Sherwood
Disciple
Emery
Neocracy
Oh, Sleeper
Gwen Stacy
Inhale Exhale
The Showdown
Haste The Day
August Burns Red
Gulls
Kronicles
Spoken (acoustic, I'm guessing)
Hiram Ring
Farewell Flight
Timbre
The Mint
Foxhole
Denison Witmer
Derek Webb

How hot is that? All in one Friday evening and one all-day Saturday. I'm looking forward to it all starting.

S-ka-tology

I have a sneaking suspicion that a few of my friends that have bought into the Amillennial eschatology view (I probably got that label wrong) have really only rejected the pre-millennial pre-tribulation rapture theory that they believed earlier. Maybe they just heard a good argument against the pre-trib rapture theory (like its origins being less than 100 years old, as opposed to the other theories). I think they discredit the pre-trib rapture theory by not taking a second look at it, though. It's a pretty thorough biblical exegesis of the Old and New Testaments. I don't exactly prescribe to it, but I can see its validity as an argument.

The criticism I hear slams that theory and describes John the Revelator's writings as cryptic anti-Rome statements meant to encourage the persecuted church. I can see valid points in that theory, but reading the words of Jesus in Matthew seems to ruin that for me. I'm all over the map with my eschatology and; frankly, I don't care which theory is correct. I mean, I have some concern and passion for the different theories (I probably lean towards a post-trib rapture), but in the big picture, it's trivial to me. If my family gets tortured for Christ in front of me from some fascists police, it won't seem trivial then; but now it's about as important an argument as whether speaking in tongues is valid, necessary, or gone. When I read Daniel, I kinda think in terms of mid-trib... 1 Thessalonians, pre-trib; and Matthew, post.

There. That's what came to mind when installing some Ikea shelves. Go figure.

Free Poker

Okay, that's not a good title, but it's the most recent comment on my blog. Speaking of comments, did you know that 74% of all bloggers go into deep depression when no one comments on their posts? 33% of these 74% actually drink alcohol or indulge in other addictive behaviors. 17% of the 33% of the 74% have been caught on tape ransacking video stores, ranting about how "nobody cares" and other such nonsense. The other 26% realize that people are reading, but understand that posting a comment can sometimes seem like a daunting task.

Speaking of blogs, one of my fellow Compassion Bloggers, Anne Jackson, posted a cool update on some of the cool things that have happened as a result of our trip to Uganda last February -- over 500 children have been sponsored as a result of that trip!

That's so cool. I sat down with an old friend last night, which was really cool, because it involved reconciliation over a damaged relationship six years ago. One of my former managing editors left on less than good terms way back then, and it was cool to re-affirm our forgiveness towards one another. That kinda stuff is always rad. Anyway, during this discussion I shared a little bit our trip to Uganda and about my wholesale support and belief in the effectiveness of the work Compassion International does. It's so awesome to know that people are making a difference in other's lives - in practical and meaningful ways.