Ross Robertson's Blog

Blog moved!

2007-11-19T21:52:00.000Z

Hiya, I've moved my blog to my bebo page:

Ross http://rossrobertson1701.bebo.com/

Windfarms again

2005-12-14T06:01:00.000Z

Backing up my little rant on NIMBYs - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4521994.stm

NIMBYs

2005-11-25T00:40:00.000Z

I read in the local rag today that residents of Auchermuchty have voted against plans to have a windfarm sited near the town. I read similar stories about the proposed windfarm on Clatto Hill.

It pisses me off no end that most of the residents probably wouldn't mind the turbines being there. but the usual bunch of NIMBYs (Not In My Back Yard) shout and moan because they are worried about their property prices being slightly lower or some other trivial matter.
Its usually the same type of people... Conservative voter... Middle to Upper class... 200k+ property owner... drives umpteen 4x4s... kids at private school... you know the type.
Its just that they are the ones creating so much opposition to the plans that they eventually get dropped, when most who don't mind don't voice their opinion as loudly.

I mean there are pylons and telecommunications masts everywhere thesedays. A few more man made structures are hardly goung to hurt. Especially when the benifits far outweigh the negatives. We are crying out for cheap electricity from renewable sources and these windfarms fit the bill so well. They aren't that much of a blot on the landscape, less so that mobile phone masts or pylons. But yet everywhere they are proposed, the NIMBYs come out in force.

Why should a small group of well off snobs spoill it for everyone else? Urgh.

Return Of The Champions DVD

2005-11-25T00:36:00.000Z

Ooops, forgot to update the blog on this one, but as you can read on my website, the mix was used on the menus and closing credits on the DVD.
The sound was pretty ropey. I guess they couldn't get a CD quality copy of the vocal tracks from Sergey as I provided QP with a CD quality source of the music. Oh well.
Its a pity as if I was given access to a clean copy of Freddie's vocals, I could have made a better mix than the original, but I guess that remains tantalisingly out of reach for now.

Another Update

2005-10-13T16:02:00.000+01:00

Nothing much to say really apart from me now not working at that repair place. They tried playing games with their diciplinary procedures, for something that I wasn't guilty of so I told them to stuff it.
Apparently this is quite common for the company in question and their worker turnover is very high.
I would name and shame them here but I have other interests to protect. But if you are local to the area then you probably are aware of them anyway.

Oh and my mix wasn't on the CD. I'm hoping it'll be on the DVD as I was told but it seems I'm about last to know anything! lol!

Update

2005-08-10T07:02:00.000+01:00

Hi all.
Nothing really much to add, apart from me now working as an Electronic Technician, testing cable TV set-top boxes a local repair company. Yawn.

The 2005 Queen+PR DVD and CD

2005-06-05T20:49:00.000+01:00

Hi again,
Well I'll try to post here more often!

I've been in contact with GB and offical sources say that my track is going to be used on the new live tour DVD and CD, which will be released sometime later this year.

So that means I'm going to get my name on an offical Queen release!!!!

So in a funny round about way, I have achived what I set out to do back in 1997. Funny how things work out! lol!

Anyways, thank you to all those who emailed me and even if I haven't replied yet, your messages are appreciated.
Who knows, they might even get me back into doing some new mixes of some sort or other!

Blogs

2005-05-27T06:26:00.000+01:00

Funny thing blogs.
When you start one, you intend to update and post new things all the time but in actuality a few posts in and I can't really be arsed any more!

More on my track 13 mix

2005-05-18T06:17:00.000+01:00

Just thinking about that mix and how it took three goes to "get it out".

The first was when I included it on several floppy disks with other songs I did at the time to a PD house in exchange for other disks. For those who don't know, in the days before the internet was cheap and widely available, and faster than a 9600bps connection, it made sense to get freeware and shareware and other large downloadables on a disk from PD houses or Public Domain libraries.
The deal with this was you could either buy the programs you wanted, usually at something like 20p each or say £5 for one of those newfangled CD-ROMS full of stuff. Or if you contributed several items of software, you got several 'credits' you could use in exchange for stuff on a disk.
For some reason I never got my 'credits' for the disks I sent in so I can only assume the guy running the PD house thought they weren't worthy enough!
Needless to say, I didn't use that particular PD place again!

The second go was when I put it and a few other things that I had done onto a limited run CD which I gave away to friends on my college course. Being the big-headed so and so that I was back then and mostly for a laugh, I signed them so that when I became famous eventually, my friends could flog the CDs for lots of money.
Hmmm... I might go and check on eBay.... lol!!

And now, third time lucky, thanks to the wonders of the internet, its out there being listened to and hopefully enjoyed by probably hundreds of thousands of people!

:o)

The new BBC Weather graphics

2005-05-17T16:55:00.000+01:00

Have you seen the new BBC Weather graphics?
They have now been slanted with a clear bias on the south of England. Fine for those who live in the south but for us choochters it is now really hard to see if it is going to rain, snow, or whatever.
Even their 3D sweep of the country only goes up as far as Newcastle (wayaye man) before rising westwards to glipse Northern Ireland then sinking southwards back over Cumbria.
You need binoculars to see what the weather on Stornoway is doing.

I dont know if it is pissing down outside now but I do that the BBC has pissed away millions of pounds of the TV Licence payers' money developing this new system. Daft.

My track 13 mix as used by Queen

2005-05-16T03:10:00.000+01:00

As you have probably read on the flossmixes site, one of my mixes has been used on the into tape to Queen's currents gigs.
Wow! is a serious understatement and I'm just gobsmacked!

But i didn't even know the actual mix used existed up until last week:
Bart Lammey, my fellow fanmixer and you could say the original fanmixer, emailed me along the lines "so you're famous now" with a link to queenconcerts.com and the snippet with "Its a beautiful day 2005 techno mix - DJ Koma - Ross Robertson [mix tape]".
I assumed someone had ripped my mix of Bo Rhap which used Beautiful Day so i basically emailed back along the lines of "Hmph". Some lowlife probably taking credit for one of my mixes on some mix tape. It's happened before with some Japanese guy palming my Christmas mixes of WWRY as his own mix.

I was going to leave it at that but I thought I might as well follow the link and take a goosey.
BOOOOM!
I had to take several retakes at the page - It was a tracklisting of one of Queen's current concerts and and the first track to be played was this Ross Robertson / DJ Koma mix as an intro before the first live track.
In total shock I spent the next few hours doing some serious digging on the internet to find out what was going on.
The first link took me to queenzone.com, not one of my favourite sites as i find there is way too much bitching and knowledge snobbery, and someone whining about how crap they thought this mix was.
I managed to find a link to an audience recorded snippet of this mix from one of the concerts and on listening to it I discovered that it wasn't the mix that I thought it was.

This DJ Koma had ripped my Track 13 mix. Ironically the only one of my original compositions that I have made publicly available and the only "flossmix" that really has no connection to Queen!! :)

It was one i did while faffing around with my keyboard and a programe called Impulse Tracker or something. Its been years since I did this and I dont really remember the details.
Anyway, I think it was for one of the QFM contests that I decided to use this as the insparation for the track was from one of the echoey riffs from track 13 of Made In Heaven.

To say Im a bit cheesed off here is an understatement. Don't get me wrong though, I'm honoured and thrilled that Queen have decided to use this as an opening to their concerts (they could have let me know about it though!) and I'm not cheesed with Queen, I'm cheesed with this DJ Koma guy.
He has ripped one of my own songs without even asking me or letting me know about it, grafting the beginning to Beautiful Day on the start and dubbing some Freddie samples over it. Its been done okay I suppose, but it essentially remains my song. I guess I should be grateful that he has at least kept my name in the title and given me some credit for it!

If he had taken one of my Queen mixes as a base then added to it, then yep. Again an email would be nice but at the end of the day it would have still been a "Queen" remix. By using my Track 13 inspired mix, one of my original songs, without permission, notification or anything and altering it (and not very much at that) it really gripes me. Probably because I feel the song is "my baby" and I feel like its been stolen from me!

Lol! Listen to me. I know some people would say its poetic justice for what I have been doing to the Queen tracks but at least QP knew about it. Greg Brooks knows about my mixes. So does Jim Beech. So does Brian May (apparently).
I didn't know about this mix to my song!

Listen to me, I sound like some old housewife whos had her sheets nicked!

At the end of the day I'm just really happy, thrilled, honoured et al. that Queen have used my mix in their live shows and they are more than welcome to continue using it.

If they feel the need, then by all means send me some signed CDs, DVDs, unreleased demos, etc or even divert some funds from Brian May's wig fund to me.
Did I tell you that I am in great need of a new Honda Accord type R, and my fiance' is constantly bugging me to buy her a Seat Leon. Lol! Only joking.... I know Brian May doesnt have any wigs! :)

24 hour takeaways?

2005-05-15T23:57:00.000+01:00

It's going to be after midnight before I can get round to having something to eat. I really fancy either a Burger King Whopper or something from the "Wing Wah", my local chinky or chinese takeaway to be PC.
But as sods law dictates, both these places will be closed by then.

We have 24 hour supermarkets now so why cant we have a 24 hour chinky?

Mmmmm... saturated fat.... :)

The Obligitary Test Post

2005-05-15T22:43:00.000+01:00

just to see that this works!