Innovation Road is Yamaha’s interactive museum, packed with instruments that the legendary company has made over the past 130+ years. And yes, you’re allowed to play them, because the museum is meant to be a hands-on experience.
I hoping to at least see, if not play, the Yamaha DX1 (pictured above), a synth of which only 140 were ever made, and one that I’ve never seen in real life. For any synth players out there, it’s basically two DX7s in a single keyboard, and with much better displays. In 1983, it retailed for $13,000 (alomst $44,000 in today’s money):
Here are a few tunes you’ve probably heard that feature the DX1…
…and here’s a quick thing I put together on the DJX 2:
In addition to their famous synths, it’s also home to a lot of pianos…
…guitars…
…and all sorts of instruments because in the music world, Yamaha seems to make everything:
Here’s a tour from 6 years ago:
…and here’s a short video from a month ago:
And oddly enough, admission to Innovation Road is free! You just have to reserve one of the 150 spots they make available every day from Tuesday to Saturday.
It’s Sunday, and it’s time for another “picdump,” but this is no ordinary picdump. This one is made of a record-breaking 750 videos, memes, pictures, and cartoons floating around the internet that I found interesting or relevant this week, which includes a lot of Jack Smith / Eric Shmitt stuff. Read, and share these far and wide!
How many kids did DOGE kill? Elon says “zero”, but he has this “tell” that gives him away when he lies: words come out of his mouth.
Adam Conover gets people who are good at math to do the math, and the number isn’t zero, or in the tens, hundreds, thousands, or even hundreds of thousands. It’s higher.
Want to know more? The Banker, a part of the Financial Times network has this story.
I also subscribe to the Barry’s Economics YouTube channel, and this piece of his on your own influence ripples out farther than you might think:
If you’re looking for something to watch in a theatre, go and catch Forgotten Island, which was woefully under-promoted by DreamWorks, and is actually quite good!
Here’s an explainer of the Filipino culture and mythology in the film:
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This one’s given me a lot to ponder, seeing as I’m both a software developer heavily immersed in the AI world and a musician:
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Hogwarts meets hog warts.
Canada still wants America as a friend, unreliable as it is. But tell me: have you had a friend like that? I have, and I now keep them at arm’s length and take a more pragmatic, almost Macchiavellian approach with such fair-weather friends:
Here he is in 2023 with Geddy Lee (I would love to hang out and jam with Geddy — and hey, Krist too!):
Another pic of Krist:
By the way, it pleases me to no end that a member of Nirvana has embraced the accordion. I’m glad to be in good company.
I haven’t seen a photo of him in several years, so until today, if you mentioned his name, this picture would come to my mind:
But we all get older. In 1992, the year the photo above of young Krist was taken, this photo of young me (and the band I was in, The Dangerous Kitchen) was also taken, and I certainly don’t look like that anymore:
Here’s to getting older. It beats the alternative!
The Sourdough Co. in St. Pete has some pretty nice digs now in St. Pete’s EDGE District, but their upgrade is going to be impressive. They’re moving to the Union Trust Bank building at 895 Central, which will give them an impressive storefront:
This is a big step up: the building has three levels with a mezzanine and basement (basements are rare here) for nearly 11,000 square feet of floor space.
And yes, it has one of those classic bank vaults!
The building’s been empty for three decades, having been saved a number of times from demolition by its place as a historic building and community efforts.
It’ll take a while to get the place set up, and in the meantime, they’ll remain in their current location (1113 Central). I look forward to having one of their Flamin’ Hot chicken sandwiches in the vault room.