Author: Toby White

I'm a doer!
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Why I hate (most) horror films

The Ring

I understand that this could be quite subjective but I find that I can’t watch through the first 15 minutes of most modern horror films, as they’re either so bad or so predictable that you can guess the outcome of the film before you’ve finished it.

I’m a tradtionalist when it comes to this genre; I still like Blair Witch Project even though nothing much happens, but to tell the truth it’s films like that that so many others learnt from and built on. The original Alien film was made on that premise… in that you don’t really see the namesake.
There are some films that have followed this particular trait. The Hills Have Eyes 2006 remake was redone following the success of others (Texas Chainsaw, Amityville Horror) and is great as you don’t see any of the action until later on.

The original Texas Chainsaw (1974) is great for the same reason. The cinematography in that film is off the chart.

I’m not a fan of jump scares, and films that constantly build up from one scene to the next just to create that reaction. They tend to not have any plot either and for that reason they tend to be quite boring.

I’m open to suggestions though and happy to receive any recommendations!

Here’s a list of the 50 best horrors on Netflix at the moment: https://www.vulture.com/article/best-horror-movies-on-netflix.html

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Raspberry Pi Streaming Music Player – Built!

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For a long time I have been meaning to get a Raspberry Pi and create a dedicated streaming music player that I can connect to my surround sound system. With lockdown 3.0 I finally bit the bullet and ordered the kit from HiFiBerry.com and got it done.

Step 1 – Building the kit.

This was really straight forward. It took around 30 minutes. It didn’t come with any instructions so took some figuring out but I got it worked out in the end.

Step 2 –  Loading the PiCorePlayer software

I was going to use this to connect to the Logitech Media Server. It’s a low key piece of software running on the Pi Core OS and implementing the Squeezelite software all bundled together and running as one.

I used the Raspberry Pi Imager software which made the job of loading the OS onto the SD card super simple. You can download that from the Raspberry Pi site: https://www.raspberrypi.org/software/

You can read more about the player software at https://www.picoreplayer.org/

3 –  Enabling WiFi on the Pi

WiFi isn’t enabled by default so I had to load a file onto the SD card with SSID details for our network. The Pi loads this on boot and voila. I used this guide to configure: https://docs.picoreplayer.org/how-to/setup_wifi_on_pcp_without_ethernet/

4 – Playing some music

I am using the device as a headless unit, ie without being connected to a screen… so was looking for a nice and free way of doing this. You can use iPeng but that’s costly so I did some hunting!

I found the following plugin for Logitech Media Server: https://github.com/CDrummond/lms-material

This plugin, called Material, uses HTML5 to give you a nice layout for playing music from a webbrowser.

You can watch me putting it together in the video below:

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Has Streaming Killed Blu-Ray?

Blue-ray

When DVD first came along it was a revelation… streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime et al weren’t really such a big thing. I mean when Netflix first started, you used to get a DVD in the post.  It was great, you could get a higher than normal definition film (720p) on a disk that would take up less space than a VHS and be at a higher quality. All the old films could be remastered and made available for the new series of flat screen TVs.  I remember when DVD first came about, it was a BIG thing. All the tech firms were making players, and the combo VHS/DVD player recorders, that allowed you to rip your old tapes onto DVD.

Then the year 2000 came and went and Internet around 2003 really starting picking up. YouTube started in 2005 and the world of online video really started to kick off. Since then, no one has really looked back… I guess though, that DVD was also a greater format due to the increased amount of storage, but also as a natural evolution from the CD and a form of general data storage.

BluRay came at a tricky time as PCs were coming down in price and availability was increasing but at the same time USB storage was also coming down in price and if you wanted data backup you’d use an external disk and not a DVD or the upcoming Blu-Ray.

By this stage streaming services and fast broadband were becoming more widely available and more people were buying into it.  It was cheaper to pay for a streaming service where you can watch a full HD (1080p) film, and older films, in full HD.  If you compare the quality of an older DVD film and a full HD film, it’s like chalk and cheese 🙂

I’m a big fan of catalouging software MyMovies (esentially the film equivalent of Discogs), but they do need to introduce a streaming film / digital collection option as buying and renting full HD films online is now cheaper than buying the disk equivalent, even for 4K and higher films.

Blu-Ray come at a difficult time, when fast Internet and ease of access to streaming services go hand in hand!

What are your thoughts? Do you collect Blu-Rays or like to have the disks in your collection and the physical media or is the only thing you worry about, the fact you can watch full 1080p or higher films wherever you are?

Blu-Ray costs a lot to print and put out, whereas making the same available for streaming services is a lot less.

For those that don’t know, the  original film stock media that cinema films are filmed on, can be remastered massively. At the time, the good old VHS was the only technology; then they could make it higher quality on DVD and then the Blu-Ray made it possible to load up the highest quality possible from a film that came out over half a century ago! And of course, now many films are filmed in 4K or higher in digital directly….. and of course the audo tracks could also be remastered (which takes up more space), and surround channels with 5.1 or higher channels.

More reading: A ZDnet articlet from 2014

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Building A Streaming Media Player with Rasberry PI

HiFiBerry Case

How have you been coping during the Covid Lockdown? Lots of people have been been undertaking various projects and this is something that has been on my list for a long time.

I have been using the Logitech Media Server software for a long time. I currently have my music library running on a Lubuntu micro PC that I bought for £20 used. The music library is stored on a NAS device.

Up until now, I have been using a phone app or Apple TV app called SlimLibrary but I have always wanted a physical device to connect to one of my Hi-Fi and/or surround amplifier so this has prompted me to kill two birds with one stone and work on a Rasberry Pi computer that I’ve always wanted to play with, and also with some software called piCorePlayer to receive the streamed music from the server software.

I am looking to HiFiBerry to buy one of their bundles, including a bolt on DAC (no soldering required). This coupled with some RCA cables to the amp should provide the solution.

I look to be posting more here on that, and also some videos on YouTube so watch this space.

Read about the build here

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“Low Rider” and car culture in music and film

Who doesn’t love cars and 70s culture? I’m a big car fan and it was probably through the film “Gone in 60 Seconds” (remake) that I first heard this song.

Reading into it a bit more and looking at the background behind the song and what it was all about got me looking at the low-rider scene. This is where paint, wire wheels and hydraulic suspension are all used to jack the car up at individual corners, often controlled remotely as well so the driver could use the car as a show piece whilst not driving – all very cool.

Ford Galaxy – lowrider. You can download this here: http://getwallpapers.com/collection/lowrider-backgrounds

The band itself was made up of a multi-ethnic lineup and at the time did wonders to improve the acceptibilty of different races in pop music.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this, and now invite you to listen to the original video for the song. https://youtu.be/hg_KZQ7k3kI (unable to embed, sorry).

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Easy Rider – a cult classic and the true meaning of “road movie”

The Easy Rider film poster

I probably need to thank Film4 for showing this film all those years ago, at least that’s where I think I first came to see it.
It’s got a lot of everything in it: the music, the fashion, the dream of going on a trip and not looking back, the adventure, the women and more.

It’s a nitty gritty film with lots of action right from the off and something which keeps you watching right from the start.

Needless to say it also shows a lot about the South and how many people were still ridiculed for the way they dressed or how they looked. This is the era where race discrimination was still rife and even the police turned a blind eye a lot of the time.

The original cut of the film was going to be over 220 minutes but was later shortened to an acceptable length.

One fun fact is the motorbikes were all stolen before the final campfire scene which is why the bikes are no longer in the background.

If you haven’t watched it then you really must. It’s one of those films you need to see before you die!

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Rebel country music and the rise of “The Highwaymen”

L-R – Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson

I’ve loved country music for quite some time, and among all the country greats, you have the likes of Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, and Johnny Cash. They all had very successful careers spanning decades.

Why is it called rebel country music you may ask? If you didn’t already know they all had run-ins with the law and were in jail or prison at various points throughout their lives. Looking back, this is what gave them more of a following and infamously boosted their careers.

In 1985 they came together to record their first record together but at that time didn’t yet have a name. The album “Highwayman” was credited to the band members individually.

In 1990 they came together again for a second attempt and produced another album of songs, dubbed “Highwayman 2” and toured extensively.

In 1995 they released their final release “The Road Goes on Forever” before Waylon and Johnny’s deteriorating health.

Since Waylon and Johnny both passed, the supergroup has become increasingly more popular. There have been several remasters or original recordings and releases of concert footage on Blueray.

You can read more about the group at AllMusic

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How to make your retro Hi-Fi Bluetooth enabled

Bluetooth Logo

Everyone is so used to being able to stream music from your phone or tablet directly to your car or stereo but only recently have you been able to to buy off the shelf separates or stereo units with built in Bluetooth for this purpose. Additionally they do tend to be quite expensive and if you have something that works perfectly, why pay the extra?

For very little expense, you can now also enable your home stereo to receive stereo audio from your mobile devices.

There are a few products on the market that will do the same job, but there really is little need to spend a fortune. I’ve checked some reviews and the following will get you kitted out for less than £30.

Both have phono outputs and will enable you to connect to your stereo with no issue, as long as you have those aux inputs.

If you have an Apple TV or similar set top box, you can do this already using AirPlay but as the device doesn’t have dedicated sound out, you have to use the same channel as your TV, so if you want a dedicated EQ or music setting on your amplifier the Bluetooth receiver may be the better way to go.

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Dolby Digital or Dedicated To Sound (DTS)?

This was a gag on The Big Bang Theory a while ago, but all the same I realised that I didn’t really know myself which was better so decided to do some digging.

Referenced from BigBangTrans:

Leonard: Alicia, what do you want as your default setting for DVDs, 5.1 Dolby or DTS?
Alicia: Whatever you think is best, cutie.
Leonard: Well, DTS has more low end, so… okay

By default our Marantz surround sound receiver has both, but we tend to play using Dolby Digital in Movie mode. And to tell the truth it does sound fine to my ears.. but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the best.

Now, rather than rewrite the wheel I’m going to reference HowToGeek:
https://www.howtogeek.com/304200/whats-the-difference-between-dolby-digital-and-dts-and-should-i-care/ – they have done a good job in explaining what’s what in as simple way as possible.

One thing to note is that “Higher bitrate does not necessarily mean higher quality” and whether one sounds better than another is also questionable.

At the end of the day, you’re better off testing yourself or letting your AV receiver choose for you 🙂

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The Music of Bon Scott

I love AC/DC. I love rock music in general. I love loud music and it is without a doubt, and a pretty good fact, that AC/DC wouldn’t have been so successful had it not been for Bon coining a very large number of their best known hits.

I’m not going to bother compiling a list of my favourite tracks, as Ultimate Classic Rock have done that for me – see here: http://ultimateclassicrock.com/best-bon-scott-acdc-songs/ – but what I did want to do is list some of the music he was involved with before AC/DC came about.

Bon was the eldest member of AC/DC when he joined, but probably had the most experience out of them all.

He had sung in three bands prior to AC/DC.

  1. The Spektors (co drummer and singer)
  2. The Valentines (vocals)
  3. Fraternity (lead vocals, recorder)
I’ve created a playlist featuring some of the songs – feel free to add some of your favourites too!

I don’t think Bon Scott gets enough credit for his songwriting or the impact he had on AC/DC after he died.

Hope you enjoyed reading this.