It was below freezing on the last morning of our trip to Lassen Volcanic National Park, so I immediately started building a fire after emerging from the tent. The embers from the previous night were still hot underneath the ash, so I was able to get things going with only a few balls of newspaper and some fresh logs. The dry logs, donated to us by our next-door neighbors, immediately began snapping and popping. In the background you can hear the woodland birds and the nearby campers getting up.
Ok, this is not exactly white noise, nor is it really “noise” at all. Yesterday afternoon I had the opportunity to catch one of my favorite bands, Two Gallants, do a sound check over at the Independent in San Francisco. I was there to assist my friend (and now co-worker) Leona Laurie interview them for Crowdfire, an interactive media event Federated Media (our employer) is putting on at the Outside Lands Festival this weekend.
Now I wish I’d recorded more of their ambient sound check goodness, but I was concerned with conserving battery life for the interview to follow. I eventually turned on the microphone to catch them playing one song. What I got was a nice combination of 3 minutes of sound check, followed by 3 minutes of Adam and Tyson playing an apparently unreleased song.
Today was my first day working in a “real” office in the “big” city. Which means the internet was slow and the air conditioning was always on. I spent half the day sitting in this white noise cone of silence before it grew into the infernal screeching you’re about to experience. After which I moved to a new desk and the HVAC guys came around and got the situation under control. But I couldn’t help myself from recording the aural experience of my first day in the new office.
Somewhere around Avalanche Lake in Desolation Wilderness, MC Soleil and I stopped to record a stream running over some rocks. Unlike the pure white noise of Glacial melt, this sound has a pleasant depth to it. Like a constantly flushing toilet or an impossibly full bladder. Do not press play if you don’t have easy access to a restroom.
Everyone has their own technique to dry their hair. Whether it’s towel dry, natural dry or hair dryer dry, to each our own. I like to par-dry my hair with the dryer and then let it finish naturally. I flip my head down and kind of wiggle the dryer to separate the hair strands, which creates an uneven sound that wakes me up. Then I progressively tilt my head upright, letting the hair fall back bit by bit guiding the whole process with my other hand’s shaping fingers. The final touch are the bangs, making sure they are blown in both directions.
