I've picked up a *ton* of CDs lately: Four from Rush (including the triple-disc Rio performance, so seven discs), two from Megadeth, two from Tool, two from Steve Vai (three discs in all), and one each from Black Label Society, Bush, Alice in Chains, Alter Bridge, Smashing Pumpkins and Foo Fighters.

Statistical breakdown:
Releases: 16
Discs: 19
Songs: 202
Playing time: roughly 17 hours
What I paid for all of this: about $120. Not a bad deal. :)

Yeah, it's gonna take me a while to get caught up with all of this!

I got home from work and found a box from Eurotubes sitting on the table. Hooray! I wasn't expecting to see my tubes until at least Saturday. I loaded them into the Recto and I'm quite happy...it really does sound like a blanket was lifted off of the amp. It's fun to play through my rig again.

Note in that photo my brand new Daniel Briere jersey, which will be worn with pride when I head down to the arena to watch the Sabres beat Ottawa in Game 4 of the second round next Thursday. :)

Also in the mail was my tax money back from Uncle $am. Looks like someone's going bike shopping soon. :) Now if only my Tone Zone 7 would get here... I'm hoping it gets here tomorrow or Saturday so I have time to drop it in my guitar before the jam on Sunday.

What a game and what a series! The Sabres just dismantled the Flyers, 7-1, to win the first-round series in six games. Carolina won their series tonight, which means that we'll play Ottawa in the second round. I'm cautiously optimistic about this: it all depends on the Sabres' mindset. In the games that we lost to the Sens, we showed them too much respect and played right into their hands. In the last few games vs. Ottawa, the Sabres faced Ottawa as they would any other team and they were very competitive. Add the important experience gained in the Philly series and I think we can pull this off. As I see it, this is a series with two closely matched teams and, whichever team wins, there are no upsets.

On an unrelated note, 60-80% of Lurid will be getting together for a jam this weekend. Will, Nick and I will be getting together on Sunday afternoon, maybe with Andy as well. I'm hoping that my new tubes and the 7-string pickup that I ordered will get here by the weekend so I can have them in place for the jam. In addition, I'll be meeting up with a couple Cyberjammers at the musicians' flea market in the morning...looks like that's gonna be a good day. :)

I've been a Lacuna Coil fan for two years now, and I had been waiting all that time for the follow-up to 2002's Comalies. Finally, after over three years, they delivered Karmacode.

Not much is new in the band's musical direction. The biggest difference is the heavy use of seven-string guitars for a lower sound. The other elements remain largely unchanged. The lead vocal duo of Cristina Scabbia and Andrea Terro are in fine form. However, I find that the music doesn't quite live up to the band's older work. There are some excellent songs; notably, "Within Me," "Closer" and "In Visible Light," but there aren't many memorable songs beyond those. The surprise of the album is the closing track, a superb cover of Depeche Mode's "Enjoy the Silence."

This is an enjoyable album with a number of very good songs, yet I can't place this above Comalies. I've been listening to this for about two weeks and, while has grown on me over that time, I can't see it growing much more. I give it a 3.5/5.

So this weekend has been pretty eventful...
• I made contact with an old friend after months of waffling
• I went to Game 5 of the Sabres' series vs. Philly; Miller pitched a shutout as we won 3-0.
• I bought a Daniel Briere jersey at the game :-D
• I ordered a Tone Zone for my 7-string and a full tube complement for my Recto
• I'm working on some more new tunage

So yeah, I'd say things are going well. :)