Repost from Facebook….
Hey all… Nuno here. I wanted to share some news with you… A
friend and Music Director, Tony Bruno, reached out to me and asked if I
would be interested in playing guitar with Rihanna. Rihanna is a
regular in the Bettencourt-house playlist… And as much as I dig her
as an artist… my first thought was that there isn’t a whole lot of
guitar in her music and therefore probably not the greatest fit for
what I do. But before I had a chance to verbalize that thought… Tony
said, “before you say anything let me play you the direction she wants
to go live.” And when I heard it… I said wow, this rocks… it’s heavy
and funky… and it hit me that this is MY sh*t… this is my style…
how I love to play… I got very excited at the possibility of playing
some of her great songs with a heavier treatment. When I asked Tony
Bruno why?… he told me that Rihanna loves bands like Paramore and
Linkin Park and loves to push it up a notch or two live in the rock
department. Hmmm… let me think? Touring and sharing the stage with a
cool and talented artist like Rihanna… and being able to bring what I
do passionately to the table as a musician and performer…? IM IN!
And having finished the first round of rehearsals… it did not
disappoint. Even better than what I expected because she also has the
most incredible band, and I get the privilege to add to their wall of
sound. It’s gonna be fun. Come see and hear it for yourself!
Nuno
And BTW… No… this is NOT the end of Extreme. We have a live DVD and
CD coming out in early 2010 and we will be writing new material
throughout the year. We had a great run across the globe on Saudades do
Rock….and we’ll be back.
Streaming Live from London, November 16, Rihanna and Nuno will be
performing tracks from her album, Rated R, to a free online audience.
Join in on the largest free music event of the year at http://nowplaying.nokia.com/join-us/
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And there you have it….
Here’s the deal on this EQ. First of all it’s mono. So for those of you out there who aren’t familiar with the term you could also refer to mono as being a single channel. So to have EQ in stereo with a piece like this, you need two. The back has a single 1/4″ or XLR in and out. The difference between a parametric, and graphic EQ is this. A parametric basically has two knobs per frequency, (sometimes more) that effect the sound. One knob determines the frequency, or frequency range, the other boosts (increases) or cuts (decreases) the amount of that frequency in the signal. A graphic EQ lays everything out in a line so you can make a smiley face out of it. Really the only difference between a graphic and parametric EQ is the fact that the graphic EQ predetermines the frequency that will be cut or boosted. The parametric allows you to select it. Here’s a quick interesting fact for you. I bet most of you who have used an EQ have seen the old smiley face setting. Here’s the thing. Generally a graphic EQ has the lower frequencies on the left, mid-range frequencies in the middle and high frequencies on the right. The reason why most people do a smiley face on the EQ is because they like the sound of a boosted high and low frequency with a cut mid frequency. This is because human ears are most sensitive to mid-range frequencies. This is the range of frequency that most of the populations voice hovers around. People do the smiley face EQ because their ears pick up the mid-range frequency more than the lows and highs and so they do that so it sounds more pleasing to them. This unfortunately can be a bad thing. Especially when you are EQ’ing a signal with a lot of prominent low frequencies, like a bass guitar for example. So for all you bassists out there, if you have a graphic EQ on your bass amp, try experimenting with the mid-range frequencies. I think you’ll be surprised at the impact it will make on your sound for the better.
