the j. botter voxlog

What were your top 5 TV shows of 2006?

1. Heroes
2. The Office
3. The OC
4. Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip
5. Lost

What are some of your favorite holiday traditions?
Submitted by sami711.

I guess it's different for everyone, but for me, the simple process of getting our entire family to spend a few days together is the thing I love the most. I always go home and spend the night at the parents, along with my sisters (who are both in college), and we get up on Christmas morning and cook breakfast and just spend time together.

In a time where it's hard to get all five of us in the same place at the same time, that's something that I treasure.

I also love the old Christmas shows, like Rudolph and Frosty and the rest.

What is your pet peeve, the one thing which really drives you mad? 
Submitted by Beki.  

Complainers. I'm surrounded by a bevy of them these days, and it drives me crazy. I understand that certain situations are sometimes unavoidable, but I can't stand people who complain just for the sake of complaining.  I get hounded by people all the time who complain about the Army, people who don't seem to understand that nobody forced them to enlist or join in the first place. I always point out this little fact along with the concept that they're actually drawing a paycheck for the stuff we do, but it seems to go over the heads of most.

They're in for a reality check when they get in the real world.

I know this is probably easy for a lot of you, but I'm looking for a way to run Windows programs on my MacBook without having to run BootCamp or install Windows. I think I've heard that Parallels can run Windows programs on OSX without having to actually install Windows, and I'd much rather go that route than be forced to install Windows and use that crappy operating system again.

Yes, I know...why would I need to run Windows programs, right?  There's one app that I really need that doesn't have an OSX alternative; otherwise, I'd never even be entertaining the idea of installing Windows again.

Update: Never mind. I've read from various sources that the best way to run Windows on a Macbook is by installing BootCamp and dual-booting, so that's the route I'm going to go with this.

It's official: my time in the Army will be over January 2nd. I'll be moving home to Katy on the 3rd, with four years of Army life behind me and whole new set of experiences that I'll carry with me for the rest of my life.

It's hard to believe, but I've got less than three weeks left.

Daughtry

Daughtry

The new Chris Daughtry album sounds like Nickelback.  That's not entirely a bad thing, because Chad Kroeger can sing and they do write some great hooks. The problem with Nickelback, historically, has been that they find something that ensures them a hit single and then they continue to beat that hook into the ground on later albums.  For Daughtry to have any success, he's going to need to vary from that formula.  His record sounds aimed directly at radio, which is a smart choice for him given his audience, but I'd like to see a little more expression than what's included here. Four years ago, this album would have been #1 for 30 weeks, but the tastes of American audiences have largely expanded since then.

Don't get me wrong -- there are some GREAT choruses here, and it's not a bad first attempt (especially for an American Idol winner), but I want to see more out of this guy on the next album. He's writing his own material, which is, at the very least, more than you can say about any other American Idol winner.

Today marks the first time in over three weeks that I've had staff duty.  For those who don't speak military, staff duty is a one-day position where you sit at a desk in Headquarters, answer the phones and kiss up to your chain of command.  When I say one day, I mean one ENTIRE day: the duty lasts 24 hours and you have to stay awake the entire time.

Needless to say, there's a very good chance that I'll be posting drivel tomorrow morning when I get off work, so be forewarned.

Some of you have heard that Jon Stanka and I have started a production company called Soundgruve.  I'll expand a bit more on the company in the next few weeks, but here's a quick overview: we're going to be a full-fledged music production company, with services ranging from actual in-studio recording and production all the way to photography and web development. The concept for the company is to provide artists and bands with a one-stop solution to recording, releasing and marketing an album. Instead of building our own studio, we made an arrangement with my Dad (and Faith West Church) to take over the current studio there. We are keeping virtually none of the gear they've got and are replacing it with some incredible, incredible gear, and that process has currently started.

So, here's an update on how things are going with the company.

Jon and Tiffany are painting the studio this week.  We've been using this studio for several years now, but since we were just guests, we always used it as it was. Now that we're running it and are going to be spending a large part of our daily lives in there, we took a long, hard look at everything that needed to be improved upon, fixed, abandoned or built. Painting the rooms was the most obvious choice outside of gear; the walls were painted with a bright white, which, while cheap, certainly doesn't make it easier on the musicians who have to spend hours upon hours laying down tracks in there.  We opted for a really awesome combo of a muted, earthy green, a vibrant dark red and a neutral tan color. The green and red are used for accent walls while the tan color takes up most of the space.

I've seen a few pictures Jon took from his cameraphone, and the place looks incredible. Jon's supposed to be sending me a few better-quality pictures tonight when they get done working, so I'll post them on here whenever they come in.

We're also re-doing most of the lighting, opting to use lamps with soft bulbs instead of the current brilliant white overhead lights. We'll keep the overhead fixtures in place for load-in and setup times, but I have a feeling that most musicians (if they're anything like me, at least) will want to use the ambient lighting we'll provide.

So, the studio is coming along nicely. We purchased our webserver from Media Temple yesterday as well, so we'll begin the process of moving the official Soundgruve site (along with our personal sites) to that server tomorrow.  I think Jon is planning on picking up our console desk on Friday, and our first client sessions begin on Saturday.  Things are moving right along; we haven't even started advertising Soundgruve yet (outside of friends and family) and we're already getting bookings, so things look to be moving about like we thought they would.  Given that I'll be making the jump from the Army to a job where I'm helping run the company and can mostly set my own hours, everything looks exciting.

I've told some of you about another job I'll be holding down come January as well.  I can't reveal details just yet, but I can tell you that a major blog network has hired me to become the Managing Editor of a new music blog focused on up and coming bands. I'll be on salary and bonus incentives, but I'll be writing about music for a living and that's a pretty amazing feeling.  Not only will I be writing about it, but I'll be producing it as well, and it feels like I'm living a dream come through.

If all goes well, I'll be out of the Army one month from now.  That, friends, is a reason to celebrate like none other.  I've already moved 99% of my personal belongings back to Houston, cleaned all my gear, and am basically living out of a backpack with just enough clothes to get me by until the next time I wash, which is becoming more and more frequent.