Chris M Evans

Resume and Personal Blog

Personal thoughts and background information on Chris M Evans, an IT Professional and Blogger.
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Useful Pages

Dark Woods Coffee

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I found Dark Woods Coffee through (of all places) Liberty of London.  Liberty has a small groceries section in their store near Carnaby Street and Dark Woods is sold under the Liberty name.  As a result I decided to buy directly, picking the Crow Tree I had before and a new choice – Under Milk Wood.  As a blend this is a great coffee and does what it promises if you like milk in your drink.

It’s interesting that the UK-based coffee roasters aren’t that obvious to find, even though they invariably do have websites and online shops.  The coffee I’ve purchased in the UK is easily as good as anywhere else, so there is plenty of skill around in achieving effective roasting.

I’m always on the lookout for new retailers, so if you know of any good ones, then share the love!

CD#472 – Speak & Spell – Depeche Mode

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Speak and Spell wasn’t an album I had when it first came out.  In fact I only purchased a CD copy a few years ago.  As with most of my music history, I listened to the radio and followed singles.  As a result, tracks like New Life, Just Can’t Get Enough and Dreaming of Me are my bread and butter.  Depeche Mode or “depeche-ay” as they seem to have been called in their early days (according to TOTP) has always been one of my favourite bands.  I grew up with the synth sound in my early teens and the music still seems as fresh today as it did then.

The tracks on Speak & Spell are certainly an eclectic mix.  The intro to New Life was a call to the dance floor (not that I did that much dancing).  But that almost siren-sounding intro was an instant trigger to get up and move – and still is.  New life has lots of intricate changes, but remains a consistent theme all the way through.

Contrast that to Just Can’t Get Enough, a classic Vince Clark riff, which has everyone tapping the tune out every time they hear it.  The hook is enduring enough that 35+ years later, it still sounds great, despite the tinny and totally synthetic sound of the synthesiser on which is was written.  Although the track sounds simple, the overlays of each melody are incredibly well interwoven that they sound effortless, but clearly aren’t.

So much of this album seems like an experiment.  What can we try?  What works, what doesn’t? What musical variations can we create? I Sometimes Wish I was Dead, with that very odd twinkling sound.  This wouldn’t have been a successful single, but is a great album track (and only 2 minutes long).  Puppets reminds me a little of Computer Love by Kraftwerk, pioneers of the synthesiser sound.

I like this album more and more as I play it.  It shows that great tunes will last the test of time.

Favourite Track: Just Can’t Get Enough

  1. New Life – 3:47
  2. I Sometimes Wish I was Dead – 2:18
  3. Puppets – 3:57
  4. Boys Say Go! – 3:08
  5. Nodisco – 4:16
  6. What’s Your Name? – 2:46
  7. Photographic – 4;43
  8. Tora! Tora! Tora! – 4:39
  9. Big Muff – 4:25
  10. Any Second Now (Voices) – 2:35
  11. Just Can’t Get Enough – 3:45
  12. Dreaming of Me – 4:02

CD#370 – The Hurting – Tears for Fears

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Which band can bring back memories of being a teenager better than Tears for Fears? Listening to songs for this album transports me instantly back to places and people.  As a teenager I was definitely a singles fan, so put Mad World, Pale Shelter or Change on and I’m there – word perfect. However, I’m less familiar with the remainder of the album, most of which I consider to be typical album tracks, with the exception perhaps of The Way You Are (which is on my extended version).

TFF are one of the bands that had a definite division to their early and late music.  Comparing The Hurting to The Seeds of Love, released only six years later and there’s even more focus on production quality and detail, that is initially evident on the first album.  Perhaps that’s why I liked them; I’m not a real fan of live music but prefer the consistency of hearing the tiny details in the master version of any music.

Change is definitely at the top for me as a favourite track, with what I guess is the glockenspiel chorus and the constant change of tempo and style throughout the song.  As the Wikipedia entry for the album helps to clarify, there are additional tracks from the release/remaster in 1999 (the copy I have).

Favourite Track: Change

  1. The Hurting
  2. Mad World
  3. Pale Shelter
  4. Ideas as Opiates
  5. Memories Fade
  6. Suffer the Children
  7. Watch me Bleed
  8. Change
  9. The Prisoner
  10. Start of the Breakdown
  11. Pale Shelter (Long Version)
  12. The Way You Are (Extended)
  13. Mad World (World Remix)
  14. Change (Extended Version)

CD#066 – Full Moon Fever – Tom Petty

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It seems quite appropriate to start reviewing and listening to my CD collection in more detail with Tom Petty.  Sadly Tom’s death was announced last week at the age of 66.

Wikipedia tells me that the album went gold in the UK with over 100,000 sales.  I’m not sure what directed me to Tom Petty (and the Heartbreakers) in the first place, but it may have been his involvement with the Travelling Wilburys.  Whatever the reason, this is an album I’ve played so many times.  I think of it as a classic style, mulitple songs that are singles in their own right, with hidden album gems like Zombie Zoo.  The sound is so familiar, but of course that is bound to be due to the involvement of other Wilbury members like George Harrison and Jeff Lynne.  Songs like “A Face in The Crowd” have a real Harrison feel.  From memory this was a classic time for Harrison and Co (with Cloud Nine released two years earlier).  Tom Petty offered a new angle to the Wilbury sound with more of a rock style.

There’s more than one influence here though.  “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” has a real resonance the 1960’s and  “Needles and Pins” by The Searchers.

This album continues to be one of my favourites, with certain tracks hitting the top ten of the ones I play on iTunes.

Favourite Track: Zombie Zoo, a classic 3-minute pop song.

  1. Free Fallin’ – 4:17
  2. I Won’t Back Down – 2:58
  3. Love Is A Long Road – 4:08
  4. A Face In The Crowd – 3:59
  5. Runnin’ Down a Dream – 4:50
  6. I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better – 2:50
  7. Yer So Bad – 3:05
  8. Depending On You – 2:49
  9. The Apartment Song – 2:33
  10. Alright For Now – 2:01
  11. A Mind with a Heart Of its Own – 3:31
  12. Zombie Zoo – 2:57

Wikipedia Page: Full Moon Fever

The Technology Diet

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It’s been a great summer and after two weeks in the Turks and Caicos Islands, with everything inclusive, it’s time to lose a little weight.  I’ve been thinking about how to approach things, as in the past I’ve been less than successful at anything other than the 5:2 diet.  It strikes me that as a technologist, technology could provide the answer at getting good results.  That to me means, measuring and monitoring and understanding the physics of how the weight loss process works.  So, here’s the first stage; monitoring.

Weight

For weight monitoring I use Withings scales, now sold as Nokia Body+ since the acquisition.  These scales provide high accuracy, multiple user tracking and uploading of data automatically to their web application, Health Mate, which has also been Nokia branded.  Data is also available online, through the Nokia website.  The upgraded (version 3) release of Health Mate also claims to be able to track pulse, but it’s done through the rear iPhone camera, which really doesn’t work and certainly isn’t practical for during workouts.  Compared to the Withings version, the Nokia rewrite of Heath Mate is pretty awful.  I don’t understand why they couldn’t have simply taken the previous version and refactored the UI, but there you go.

Blood Pressure

I monitor blood pressure weekly using an Omron device.  I’ve thought about upgrading to a Withings for the automated recording, but I couldn’t see the point of paying just for the automation when I have a perfectly serviceable device.  Recordings are intermittent, but around 1-2 weekly.  Data is kept in a spreadsheet and graphed up in Excel.

Apple Watch

I previously recorded pulse and sleep through a Jawbone UP3, however the rubber wristbands kept breaking so I eventually abandoned them and moved to an Apple Watch 2.  The watch is great for keeping track of pulse, both at rest and during exercise.  It also records specific exercise details, including exercise time and calories burned.  All of the data gets uploaded to the iPhone App.

Bringing it Together

With Apple introducing the health app, most data is starting to get centralised.  As yet I’ve not seen this working fully, because weight data is not being moved over from Withings/Nokia.  Obviously BP details have to be entered manually, but that’s not too much of an issue.

With all the data to hand, the next stage is monitoring and looking at progression.  A subject for another post.