AUTO-TUNE THE NEWS

Someone just hipped me to "Auto-The the News," a feature on YouTube that edits together news clips and makes them sing, literally.

It's a testament to the amazing things that can be done with certain off the shelf technologies and the insanity of the people who use it. And I mean that in a good way.

FAROE FRIDAY: UP ALL NIGHT

A few weeks ago, I wrote in this space about the long summer days in the Faroes this time of year. From The end of may to about mid July, there is at least twilight (the light, not the movie) in the sly at all times.

Perhaps that's why these people want to stay up so late. While doing an interview for the podcast, an American woman told me about how late into the night the Faroese like to party. She was at an anniversary party and finally left when things appeared to be breaking up around 3 AM. At the time, she thought she had been pretty daring with how late she had stayed out.

But about a week later, the woman who threw the party asked her, "why did you leave to early?" The hostess went on to explain that the band hadn't started yet at 3 AM. Indeed, the party went on until 8 or 10 the next morning.

I have a reputation for being something of a night owl and am no stranger to the rave scene (or at least I wasn't when I was in my 20s), but this is insane. When to these people sleep?

It appears I will be able to find out later this month. As I've already mentioned, I will be traveling to the Faroe Islands in about three weeks. The first thing I'll do is attend the G! Festival, a three day concert on the beach in a town called Gøta (see picture above). I've been researching some of the bands that will play the festival and am quite excited about the lineup.

I spent some time trying to find a schedule of what bands will be playing when, but I couldn't find one. So I looked at some schedules from previous festivals and was a little shocked by what I saw. The headliners each night weren't scheduled to take the stage until about 1:45 AM. And I'm told it's not uncommon for the final band to start playing well after 3.

I guess I'm just used to Coachella, where stiff fines greet any band caught playing after midnight. As a matter of fact, I thought the music might have to stop even earlier at the G! because the venue is so close to all the homes in Gøta. Nope. It looks like the music plays all night.

This could be an adjustment for my 40-year-old body. I'm going to start taking naps right now.

THERE, BUT FOR THE GRACE OF GOD...

There are times when I miss the news industry, and other times when I don't. Consider the case of the following story from Cleveland then join me below...



This link was forwarded to me with the hopes I could use my news expertise to determine if this was a real story or some sort of parody. After careful inspection, I'm sad to report that this story is almost certainly the genuine article.

In this reporter's defense, he was given an almost impossible task. He's working in a visual medium and he has to do a story about a bear. But there aren't any pictures of a bear. This creates all sorts of problems if you're a television news reporter.

But the solution to this problem may well be worse than the problem itself. Prancing across the woods holding a cardboard cutout of a bear? Really? And that rabbit head is wrong no matter what story you're covering... even if it's a story about rabbit costumes.

Working under deadline pressure, a reporter can say and do a lot of things that may be regretted later. Heaven knows I turned in a couple of stories that will hopefully never find their way onto YouTube. That's one of the hazards of the job, everyone gets to see you fail.

Whoever posted this story to YouTube included a note that said some disparaging things about the story, and not without reason. But the post of this video online looks like an inside job. The version posted above isn't exactly what you'd see on TV. You'll notice there was a long silence at the beginning and 15 seconds of what's called "pad" at the end. There also weren't any graphics in the story. The CGs are added during the live broadcast to keep the video in the story pristine if you have to use it another day. (Click here to see what the story looked like when it actually aired.)

The version posted here is what the story looks like when it's turned in by the reporter. That means the video was likely posted to YouTube by someone who worked at the station where this story aired. That's cold.

I'm glad the people I used to work with would never do a thing like that. Right?

PRE-TAPED CALL IN SHOW

One of my favorite sketches from one of my favorite troupes. Mr. Show, we hardly knew ye.

FAROE FRIDAY: EIVOR, COMING TO (NORTH) AMERICA

(Yes, I know. I know it's not Friday)

Since I started writing about the Faroe Islands here, I've written a lot about music, but very little about Eivor (the "o" has a slash through it, but I can't figure out how to do that on this keyboard). This is a huge oversight that needs to be remedied with a much more extensive post one day.

But in short, Eivor is a 25 year old Faroese singer who is perhaps the most critically acclaimed artist from the islands. She has sung in rock bands, and with symphony orchestras. Many critics claim her singing embodies the Faroese spirit. Others have compared her to Bjork.

While she's a fixture in the Icelandic music scene and has toured extensively in Europe, she's not been seen much on the Pacific coast... until now. Eivor will be playing two music festivals in British Columbia in about a month. She'll play during the Mission Folk Festival on July 25th and 26th, and then at the Canmore Folk Festival on August 1st and 2nd.

While I'm excited she'll be performing in my neck of the woods, there is some irony regarding the timing of these two shows (ironic for me, not for her). While she's performing at the Mission Folk Festival, I'll be at the G! Festival... in the Faroe Islands. She performs at Canmore on August 1-2. On August, 3rd, I'll return to the Pacific Northwest.

Oh well. We may be ships that pass in the night this time, perhaps our paths will cross some other time.
This week's Faroe Photo is of the beach at Gota. I know Eivor lives near the beach, and the G! Fesatival takes place somewhere near here as well.

(29 days until I leave for the Faroes! Not that I'm counting.)

SAY CHEESE... REALLY HARD

A year or two ago, a co-worker of Julie's got me some Wegman's cookies as a favor. You see, Wegman's is the greatest grocery store in the world, and they were an institution back in my hometown of Rochester. But I'm about 3,000 miles from the closest store, so any treat from their bakery makes my day.

The deal with that cookie shipment was that I would post some cute photos of Nate and Will as payment. So I did.

This week, another box of cookies arrived at my door, shipped FedEx overnight by the same co-worker of Julie's. This time I earned them by helping Julie out on a project, but I still feel like I owe some pictures. So here we go...
For the past several months, it has been extremely hard to get photos of Nate and Will in the same frame. In fact, Still photos of any kind have been difficult. They do like to run about. But now, it seems we have the opposite problem.

The photo above (Nate is on the left, Will on the right) was the first attempt to take any pictures of them for quite some time. With the exception of Will appearing to flip me the bird, the photo is pretty natural. But as soon as they realized the camera was out, they started with the cheesy smiles. Nate started first...
And pretty soon Will was infected, too...

Pretty soon, I was almost impossible to get Nate to stop. He just kept shouting, "cheese!"
Will, on the other hand, was able to pull off a slightly more natural smile...
But Nate was seriously in danger of breaking his face...
The smile-fest continued throughout breakfast.

But when mealtime was over, Nate was still on a mission to smile until it hurt.



By the end of the day we had to simply ice the guy's face down. Those smile injuries, they can be costly.

FAROE FRIDAY: MEET THE PRESS

Yes, I know it's not Friday anymore, but this is a very busy time for me.

This week, with my trip to the Faroes about five weeks away, we're concentrating on the press. First up, I was the subject of a news story in a Faroese newspaper.

Click the link if you please, but unless you can read Faroese, you may not get much out of it. From what I've been told, the article says I'm coming over there and that I like the Faroe Islands quite a bit. Both are true.

I'm somewhat amused by the photo they used for the story. I used it as as a profile image on Facebook a while back, and it makes me look like an extra on "Miami Vice." Boy, are they going to be disappointed when I arrive.

The second media story comes from the UK. The British newspaper, the Guardian, sent a reporter to investigate the Faroese music scene and do a preview of the upcoming G! Festival. The excellent article uses the music scene to explore larger issues in Faroese society. It is is probably the best thing I've read about the Faroes since the New York Times article two years ago.

The report has two elements, the first is the article:
You can read the article here (highly recommended)

The article is accompanied by an "audio slideshow" which has music and photos from the islands. It runs about 2:30 and is also pretty fun to watch:
The audio slideshow is here.
This week's Faroe photo comes from Arne List's collection on Flickr. It's of Hov on Sudroy. The article in the Guardian reports on a local legend that says the population on the islands is a mix between Vikings and Portuguese pirates who invaded the island hundreds of years ago. This is said to account for the dark hair of many Sudroy residents.

Usually, I'd follow up a paragraph like the one above by saying something like, "and I hope one day I can see that island and speak with the people myself." But that seems unnecessary now. I'll be there. In a few weeks. Am I excited? Yes. Yes, I am.