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Sonic Boomers – David's Signature Strings
Available Soon
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David Gilmour plays
GHS 'Boomers' guitar strings, an association
that started in 1979 when working on The
Wall, but he uses non-standard gauges that
until now were not available in sets.
Well, the wait is over for Gilmour guitarphiles,
because GHS are to issue two sets in boxes designed
by Steve Knee, using photos taken by Polly Samson. |
Both sets use the strings actually used by David on
his Gibson Les Paul and Fender Stratocaster.
Check this out, fact fans: Fender Stratocaster
– 0.10, 0.12, 0.16, 0.28, 0.38, 0.48; and Gibson
Les Paul – 0.105, 0.13, 0.17, 0.30, 0.40,
0.50.
Boomers seem to withstand the extreme bending that
David subjects them to, so they are obviously worth
checking out. Click to see the Fender
and Gibson
pack designs, which are expected to hit
the market, at least in the US, some time after
Monday 19th November.
Make 20th November Your Blu-ray Day
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Blu-ray is the Sony-supported
high resolution disc format, on which many films
and video games are being released to take advantage
of its larger capacity and better resolution.
David's Remember That Night concert is
being released by Sony BMG in the United States
on Tuesday 20th November to coincide
with the Thanksgiving weekend, production willing.
It is a relatively new technology and utilises
a blue laser, hence the name. |
Blu-ray has a longer production process than standard
DVD, which is why the release has been later than
the standard DVD. However the disc holds roughly four
times the data of the standard DVD, and in our opinion
it really pays off on Remember That Night.
The content is exactly the same, with higher-resolution
pictures and audio (see below), except that lyric
subtitles have been supplied for all songs, apart
from Arnold Layne, for arcane copyright reasons.
It will be EMI Records' first Blu-ray disc ever, and
they have scheduled it in the following week, for
Monday 26th November across Europe.
Some technical issues: the audio on the disc is PCM
Stereo and Dolby Digital surround 5.1 (mandatory on
all Blu-ray players), but if you want to enjoy the
higher resolution of the Dolby True HD higher-resolution
5.1 surround sound audio stream, you will need to
use a player that supports the format, as follows:
USA
Plays Dolby True HD: Pioneer BDP-HD1; Samsung
BD-P1400; Sharp BD-HP2OU (though not confirmed in
the manual).
Does NOT play Dolby True HD: Philips BDP9000;
Pioneer BDP-94HD.
Worldwide
Plays Dolby True HD: LG BH100; Sony BDP-S1;
Sony BDP-S300; Sony PlayStation 3 (must use HDMI cable).
Does NOT play Dolby True HD: Panasonic DMP-BD1000;
Samsung BD-P1000.
European Union
Does NOT play Dolby True HD: Pioneer BDP-LX70.
Blu-ray is competing in the marketplace with HD-DVD,
and both can be hard to find, although the bigger
music stores in the US and UK should stock them, as
well as mail-order companies such as Amazon. There
are no current plans to release Remember That Night
on HD-DVD.
Turn On, Tune In, and Wig Out – RTN on TV
After the very successful BBC TV showing of the 60-minute
version of Remember That Night, details are
coming in of broadcasters taking the programme around
the world. TV companies can be slow to schedule music
concerts, and often don't feed back local transmission
details, so do please check your local schedules.
We will try and keep you updated, but here's what
we have so far:
November
USA – the RAVE channel will be
showing a 90-minute version in high-definition on
Thanksgiving weekend; in theory, this is on the evening
of Thursday 22nd November.
Similarly, and supposedly on the same night, the 60-minute
version is due to run on PBS in standard definition.
We await complete confirmation, but hope to get this
closer to transmission date.
Latin America – HBO in Latin America
has confirmed the 60-minute version for Friday
30th November.
Europe – Belgian French-speaking channel
RTBF is scheduling a 30-minute version in November,
date to be confirmed. It would feature in their D6Bels
programme, one Thursday at around 10.45PM.
December
Germany – 3Sat/ZDF on Monday
31st December.
Other countries have showings under consideration,
including France, Norway, and Japan, so please feel
free to lobby your local stations.
An Awful Lot Of Coughing From Brazil
Coughing in the embarrassed sense, that is, since
Sony Brazil have only now revealed their new release
date for the Remember That Night DVD –
Friday 26th October.
Our previous information re: the release was unfortunately
incorrect, for which many apologies to all eager fans
(and there are plenty in Brazil). Apparently there
was a delay with the local production of the sleeve
packaging, but Sony Brazil didn't inform Sony Central,
who didn't inform us. Sony Brazil do say 'we're doing
our best to have it very soon in stores', and in fact
are planning a campaign with the Saraiva chain, so
look out for it there.
Other release news: as well as the newest chart triumphs
in Estonia and South Africa (No. 1 in both), the DVD
is now available in Chile and Hong Kong, and is still
scheduled for Wednesday 7th November in Japan. In
Israel, it is "DVD/Album of the month" in Zlil, the
second largest retail chain.
A Pocketful Of Gemstones
Some bling in the air, as David's No. 1 DVD Remember
That Night has been racking up the Sales Awards
to go with its chart positions. Today it has just
passed Platinum in the UK, and is 2 x Platinum in
Canada, adding to its current Gold status in Poland,
Australia and New Zealand.
Book Re: Black Goes Back.
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Phil Taylor, David
Gilmour's long-standing guitar tech (and Tour
Director of the On An Island tour), is
much-respected in the world of guitars, effects
and audio.
In the wake of the proposed David Gilmour signature
model 'Black Strat', Phil undertook to write
a book about the development of the guitar from
a standard 1970s Fender Stratocaster (bought
off the shelf in Manny's, 48th St., New York),
to the iconic instrument it is today. |
Entitled simply The Black Strat, it contains
more than 100 pages of photos, detail, and descriptions
of the many modifications made to the guitar.
Current publication date is Thursday 15th November
(it has moved back two weeks from the planned date),
and it will be available ONLY via its own dedicated
Web site. No pre-orders are currently available, but
we will supply updated details when it is definitely
available to purchase. The cover, designed by Storm
Thorgerson and Dan Abbott, is shown above, and you
can check out two of the page spreads here.
The actual instore date of the DG signature black
Fender Stratocaster model has not been 100% confirmed
by Fender US yet, because they are still making last-minute
adjustments.
Careful With That Syntax, W³.
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Jubilation from lovers
of good English (The
Blog) and bad puns (Latest News), as
DavidGilmour.com celebrates an award for Best
Copy/Writing.
Hard on the heels of The Blog's recent No. 1
position as Best Music Blog (see below),
this one is a Silver gong in the W³
Awards. |
W³ is a US-based meritocratic organisation, who
claim to provide a level playing field for Web site
competitors, as accessible by the biggest design agencies,
the smallest firms, and everyone in between; indeed,
there's a wide range of winners across many categories.
Judging is by the International Academy of the Visual
Arts, an invitation-only body consisting of professionals
from media, interactive, advertising, and marketing
firms, including persons from organisations such as
Brandweek, Coach, The Ellen Degeneres Show, Estée
Lauder, HBO, MTV, Polo Ralph Lauren, Sotheby's Institute
of Art, Victoria's Secret, Yahoo!, and others.
To check out all the winners, click here
for the W³ Awards Web site. To enjoy regular David
Gilmour-related news where puns never set (to the
Plain English Society's dismay), stay tuned...
Something About The Live From Abbey Road DVD
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Sadly, this is for
UK readers only – at the moment. The producers
of the Live From Abbey Road TV programme
will be releasing a 2-disc DVD of performances
next week (Monday 15th October) in the UK only.
Fremantle Media are currently at the International
MIPCOM trade fair tying up other deals, so some
releases across Continental Europe are expected,
but it's only scheduled in the UK at present. |
As well as David's performance of On An Island
with his 2006 tour band, the set includes an interview
with him (extended by about a minute from the broadcast
version), plus we're told that Phil Manzanera also
makes some illuminating comments about his experiences
on last year's tour.
Extras include behind-the-scenes content, a
section on LFAR Sponsor B&W speakers, picture
galleries, and session information.
Twenty-seven artists are featured, including: Corinne
Bailey Rae, Put Your Records On; Dr. John,
I Ain't No Johnny Mercer; Damien Rice, 9
Crimes; Nerina Pallot, Idaho; Gipsy Kings,
Bambaleo; Norah Jones, Thinkin' About You;
The Good, The Bad & The Queen, Nature Springs;
Gnarls Barkley, Smiley Faces; Iron Maiden,
Hallowed Be Thy Name; and Dave Matthews, American
Baby.
It Was The Blog What Won It!
No surprises for followers of the best Blog in town
that David Gilmour's
The
Blog won the BT Digital Music Award
for Best Music Blog, 2007.
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Guy Pratt stepped
in to accept the trophy, accompanied to the
event by Richard Wright. Paying tribute to the
Features Ed's tireless efforts, Guy praised
the David Gilmour Blog as an example of a great
conduit between the David Gilmour band and its
audience, in particular giving feedback during
the dates on last year's On An Island
tour. |
We don't know if Guy's speech will make the cut, but
tune in to Channel
4 (UK) this Saturday 6th October in
the wee small hours (12.40AM–1.45AM) of the morning
to find out. The Awards are also running a live blog.
A hearty three cheers for David's mighty Bloggers!
Charts and News – Our Autumn Almanac
As Ray Davies said, "...to compensate for lack
of sun..." we enter Autumn, or indeed Fall, with
some uplifting news – round the globe chart positions
for the Remember That Night DVD.
Here are the latest Music DVD chart positions:
Austria #1; Belgium #1 (2); Canada #1; Denmark #1
(1); France #1; Germany #1 (1); Holland #3; Ireland
#2 (3); Italy #1 (1); New Zealand #1; Portugal #1;
Spain #6; Sweden #1; UK #1; USA #1.
The DVD sales are also included in the CD album charts
in: Austria (#69); and Germany (#9). Stay tuned for
more this week.
Meanwhile, in other news, The
Blog has been nominated for Best Music
Blog in the BT Digital Music Awards. Fingers
crossed for tomorrow's result (October 2nd), which
should be announced live here.
We will, of course, try and beat them by a split second
if the news is good.
We have a confirmed release date for the North American
high-definition Blu-ray edition of Remember That
Night, which is Tuesday 20th November via
SonyBMG. We hope to achieve a date in Europe of Monday
19th November, but this is not 100% confirmed
by EMI yet. The Blu-ray holds approximately four times
the data of the standard DVD, and really makes for
high-quality viewing.
Along with the David Gilmour Signature model
Fender Stratocaster, which Fender are hoping to make
available at the end of November (tbc), GHS Strings
will be announcing their David Gilmour sets of Boomers
guitar strings. These are the custom sets that David
actually uses on his Fender Stratocaster, with a different
set on his Gibson Les Paul, and will be available
in special card boxes designed by our own Steve Knee.
More details shortly. |
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