MERC HAVEN

GOA TRANCE is the best club music on Earth!!! Proud to claim its roots in INDIA!!! Psychedelic trance is the 2nd best. Also invented in India.

Example 1 - Listen (must listen all 1:30 min)
Example 2 - Listen (also must listen full 1:30 min)
Click here to download an awesome hypnotic psychedelic track (ogg file).
Click here for an album full of Goa trance.
Click here to listen to goa/psych any hour of the day (winamp/real player/any aac+ player needed)

3rd best - breakbeat
4th best - Russian trance

Posted by Prashant at 8/31/2006 06:28:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Dear Prashant,
I appreciate your application.
However ,the position has been already taken.
Good luck,
xyz

Sometimes it really pisses me off when a job position goes to someone else before all the applicants have applied. If my credentials are not good enough, that's another matter. But losing a job opportunity without even being considered is really messed up.

I wonder why the fuck this position is still being advertised on CampusWeb ?? Is the policy something like - Accept whoever applies first? In that case I guess a notice saying so would be appropriate. And if I may suggest, also consider taking off the month-long advertisement, before someone else believes that the spot is still available. Not everyone can access the CampusWeb from off-campus.

Posted by Prashant at 8/28/2006 06:16:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Ahhhh.... don't ask me to write anything more than the fact that I made it back to my bed at IUB. For the third time in a row, the airline misplaced the guitar. This time they lost it totally with no tag and no trace. They've GOT to fuckin bring it back. Serious. As of now they are still "tracing" it.

And this seems to happen only at European airports. US/Indian airports don't really care and just put it in the hold like any other `cargo' ... but you know how delecate we Europe dwellers are (added we to avoid political correctness debates). We have to take care of things so much that it gets hard to even find stuff back. Bahh.

If I have time after the day long workshop tomorrow, I will write about my ... "interesting" loopy-loop route which turned an 8 hour journey into a 27 hour ordeal. Wouldn't blame the airline(s).

Now I have to die for a while.
Bbye.

By the way, the Boeing 747-400ER is a freakin big plane. Like, whoa.

Posted by Prashant at 8/24/2006 02:44:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

Travelogue Part 1

It's funny. The real part of the journey back to IUB hasn't even begun and I'm already tired. It's 2:15 am. My legs hurt like hell. I'm hungry and sleepy. And so far all I have managed is getting from Patna to Delhi.

Travelling from Patna to Delhi was fun - first time that I went to my hometown's airport. Met Mr Vinod Singh (Oxygen movement), who happens to be the head of an airline's operations in Patna/Bihar (the one I was travelling with). Naturally, I got preferential treatment (ugh... sounds so bad). Had a VIP-like check-in. Attendents carrying my luggage, checking it in for me before everyone else's, getting me a priority boarding serial #, letting me carry 2 pieces of cabin baggage despite regulations (because I had two valuable items on me, in separate bags), X-ray guy coming with me to instruct the security personnel to let me carry those 2 ... even right up to a guy taking me to the best front window seat in the aircraft (they have free seating policy). The hostesses were, for a low-cost-airline, quite nice. You know.

And all this on a low cost carrier's ticket purchased for INR 800, which is less than 20 bucks. AND with no extra baggage cost, and this airline is fam0us for charging exhorbitant rates for even 1 kg of extra baggage.

So I was advised by Vinod uncle to buy books worth the money he saved me on the excess baggage charges. Will do.

Delhi airport is the worst airport I have ever been to. Once again, NOTHING was labeled, and security people or other official looking guys were no help. For a second time, I went out the exit, searching for the international terminal transfer bus. Went as far as the main road and found auto drivers. How much do they want? Rs 150. Another guy said Rs 200. I spat some mild swearwords and headed back. After much running around, finally managed to board the free transfer bus and arrived here at the international terminal's waiting lounge (after paying Rs 30 to get in - I'm too early).

Talked home. Talked to Rajeev. Had some water (tasted chockfull of chlorine). Put my luggage somewhere I could monitor it from my seat here in this iWay cafe, and logged on (didn't feel like checking for wireless here).

6 more hours to go before I fly off to London (yay). Hope to not get into problems. Check in at Patna, contrary to what I thought, was pretty tight in terms of security. Pretty tight. Yes I did see them haggling with a woman adamant on carrying her moisturizer lotion on board.

Laterz.

Posted by Prashant at 8/23/2006 01:51:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

This has got to be the quickest one I have ever done. Although halfway through it we got bored (and also were a bit short on time).

What is it? Well, a recreation (attempt, at least) of JaL's song "Woh Lamhey."

Very rough mix actually.. done in just 2 hours. It is kinda annoying when Anando wants to "gift" his girlfriend a song in his voice and I am the one who is supposed to stay up all night recording the guitar, drum, bass, everything for him to sing over. So this time I just left it for when he would come to record the vocals... he was pissed, but so was I. Heh. Whatever.

DOWNLOAD HERE

Posted by Prashant at 8/19/2006 03:58:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

So here's the final version of the song. There are actually 2 versions - a short and a full version. The one linked in the previous post was the short version in its preliminary form (now removed from the download server). The new one linked here is the full version which is almost 7 minutes (!) long... has a one minute long solo in the end. This is also the first song which I fade-out... I don't like it but hey it sounded cool with the solo playing.

Anyway, here it is (comments are welcome)

"Akele"
Prashant Vaibhav & Anando Mukherjee

DOWNLOAD HERE (3.7 MB, OggVorbis)

Note: You need a media player that can play this .ogg file (e.g. Winamp, VLC, most Linux players etc.) If you use Windows Media Player, please download and install "Ogg DirectShow Filter" (look for it on Google).

Posted by Prashant at 8/17/2006 12:27:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

That's right!

Nice co-incidence that Anando happened to be in town for a few days, so we decided to use the opportunity to finally complete recording a song we were writing 2 years or so ago. It's called "Akele".

This is just an initial mix, by the way. The intro and the ending are not completed, neither are the vocals final (just a guide). Quite a lot of changes will be made to make it sound more polished before we can call it "complete" (we're doing that tomorrow).

But I can hardly wait :-)

Download Here (3.7 MB, OggVorbis)

The nice thing about this song is that we recorded it using completely consumer-grade equipment. Basically, just my laptop. But most of the sounds are from the excellent Syngeri GS soundfont which I purchased (but it costs less than 20 USD). The microphone was a cheapo computer headset, and the soundcard was the one built into Dell laptops.

BUT - I used the Fender Strat to record the guitar parts (listen for it!).

I like this song. Just make sure you don't fall asleep during the first minute or so (it's not final).

Posted by Prashant at 8/16/2006 01:12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

This one is really hilarious, although it might actually be correct in everything it says.

Posted by Prashant at 8/16/2006 12:25:00 PM | Permalink | Comments

By god they don't.

Just read this webpage and you'll know why. This guy (or girl.. I don't know and I don't care) is supposedly lobbying for a "hacker-free America". I wanted to include quotes from that site here, but it seemed I would end up copying the whole thing. Anyway, here's my favourite few -

There should be an “Internet drivers license“

Linux computers are often provided without any anti-virus software, and often become riddled with viruses.

We should make an example of these evil people - Americans demand life imprisonment or possibly a death penalty. [...for the offense of 'hacking']

Check it out, it's a nice blog.

EDIT: I thought it was a satire website, but Wikipedia says nope, it's real.

Posted by Prashant at 8/16/2006 10:06:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

LOL.

As if we don't have enough lunatics to laugh at, things just keep popping up.

Right now on STAR PLUS, a show is going on which is about some people (a lady, to be specific), who predict a person's future. And how do they do it? By looking at patterns in left-over coffee in a cup the person has drunken from. Because they spell out words in Arabic, and sometimes show pictures.

Awesome. These so-called astrologers seem hell bent on predicting future out of anything. But ... coffee patterns?!!!

Yeahhh.

Posted by Prashant at 8/12/2006 11:39:00 AM | Permalink | Comments

Sorry to anyone who might get annoyed at my continuous ranting about broadband in India.

One friend recently told me his 600 kbps broadband connection has a data transfer limit of 350 MB per month.

Simple calculations -

600 kbps = 75 kB/s download. Let's say it works at 50 kB/s.
At 50 kB/s, 350 MB will take around (350 x 1024) / 50 seconds to download.
Which comes to around 7200 seconds.
Or, 2 hours.

So yeah. Broadband connection. With a 2 hour / month usage limit.
What this particular company can't get in their heads is that broadband is not to "get email fast". I don't give a fuck if my email loads in 2 seconds instead of 10. What I do care about is whether I can use VoIP or Video chat or not. Whether I can download the latest Linux distro CD or not. Whether my Windows update takes 10 minutes or 4 hours.

The guy is switching to "150 kbps unlimited" plan instead. 150 kbps is by no means broadband, by the way. At least it's better than "32 kbps broadband" that Satyam was selling up to only a year back.

The company in question is Reliance, in case you're wondering.
As for BSNL, their rates seem to be more in line with what they should be. 256 kbps unlimited plans start from Rs 900 per month. If only they would make it actually available to those who are not their existing customers. In the 2 or 3 years that it has been in operation, I have filed the application 5 times. No luck yet.

Posted by Prashant at 8/12/2006 09:27:00 AM | Permalink | Comments