Got some more freebies from the Pepsi/iTunes giveaway, so I downloaded:
One old song… REO Speedwagon’s “I Don’t Want To Lose You”…
And two new tunes… Steve Vai’s “Building the Church” and “Glorious” off his recent Real Illusions: Reflections album. I have always been a fan of Steve’s guitarwork, and I just couldn’t pass these songs up. Listening to the first track, I’m reminded again of why I love his music! If any of you get the chance, and you haven’t listened to this man play, borrow an album from a friend (or just buy one). You may not be disappointed!

Here’s a pic of the two eggs our female ‘tiel Emily has just produced:

(see the post on 3/5/05 for newer pics)

Christine wanted to share the news with the world, though we don’t know if they’re even fertilized yet. It’s very sad if the male cockatiel, Alex, doesn’t know what to do! We’ll keep everyone posted…

Hello again! I have been downloading Sonata Arctica’s “Reckoning Night” album track-by-track from Apple’s iTunes store. So far, it’s an awesome album! I have listened to half of it already, and I just dowloaded the last 3 tracks this morning. This group has some of the most sonically and melodically intense music I’ve heard in awhile. I wrote a partial review of the album for Amazon.com, which I’ll be updating very soon, and they still get 5 stars IMHO!

I also downloaded Dream Theater’s “Train of Thought” from iTMS. I’m also impressed with this one, but not as much as for “Reckoning Night”, mainly because it contains the same level of musicianship I’ve come to expect from these guys. James LaBrie does dramatically different things with his voice, which is a good thing… he needed to expand his vocals. However, in the song “Honor Thy Father”, his vocal work gets slightly irritating. John Petrucci does his familiar brilliant guitarwork, and Mike Portnoy proves once again that he can mop the floor with half of the other drummers in the world. Haven’t listened to all of the album yet, but I can tell already that it’s better than “Falling Into Infinity”! (what they were thinking when they cooked that album up, I really don’t wanna know!)

Well, gotta do the weekend chores… will write later!

Hello, hello, hello! My name is Christopher Walls, and welcome to my weblog. I will be using this service to post my thoughts, pics/graphics, musical musings, and other esoteric nonsense. A little about me: I’m 32 years old (birthday in July), Happily married to my wonderful Christine, work as an inventory auditor, and have lots of interests. I love most kinds of music, exceptions being (c)rap/r&b and rap-rock (that stuff makes me wanna kill whomever’s playing it!), but mainly listen to hard rock/metal. We currently have six birds in our household, with the possibility of baby cockatiels coming our way soon (our female ‘tiel, Emily, just laid an egg a coupla days ago). I’ll make an update on this development soon!