James Cochran’s Blog

The wife and I (along with unborn baby Cochran) went to go see Third Day live in Bloomington recently and it was great.  We had pretty good seats which I’ve talked about before here.  Also the opening acts were great.  So great in fact that I picked up Revive’s and NEEDTOBREATHE’s albums and even met the guys from Revive and had them sign their cd for me.

Third Day came out and rocked our socks off as usual.  They played an awesome set.  Speaking of which how about I run down the set list for you here real quick.  I know this has changed in the shows since and they are doing a couple of acoustic songs now but it’s basically the same and what you can expect if you are going to any of the future shows in this tour.

1. This Is Who I Am
2. I Got A Feelin’
3. Tunnel
4. Call My Name
5. Slow Down
6. I’ve Always Loved You
7. Thief
8. King of Glory
9. Run To You
10. Come Together
11. Always Be True
12. Cry Out To Jesus
13. Revelation
14. Creed
15. Love Song
16. Otherside
17. God of Wonders
18. Agnus Dei

As you can see I think we got our money’s worth!  Afterwards we got to go back stage and meet the band along with about a hundred other people.  We did get a couple of minutes with each guy though to say hey and tell them how much we enjoyed the show.  Of course after everyone was done shaking hands we got a picture.  The first one here is while we were talking to the drummer David and the second is us with the band.  Notice how Angi got the guys to sign her “baby bump” instead of anything like a cd or a poster of the band.

Finally, here is a little video post card that the band posted on YoutTube from the Bloomington show we went to.  If you ever have the chance to go see them live you should do it.  It’s always a blast and they know how to rock!

Gizmodo has a little story about how the iPod has been around for seven years.  The coolest thing is they made a little mock up of all the iPods over the years, what they cost, and what features you got.  Check out that photo here.  They are missing the iPhone is an iPod, after all it is three different things in one including an iPod.  Also they’ve left off the iPod Shuffle.  

My first ipod was the third generation I got back in December of 03 as a Christmas present from my wife.  Thus beginning the transformation to an Apple fan boy.   Two years later when the fifth gen came out I had to pre-order.  I had two of those.  Lost the first one and bought a new one.  Found the old one and had the new one stolen.  Such is life.  Somewhere in there I ordered the original shuffle which was awesome.  It was a 1GB memory stick and an iPod to boot.  When I used to have to run I always took that thing with me.  You could hold it in your hand and it was so light you didn’t even know it was there.  It’s still around here somewhere.  I should dig it out.  I held on to that fifth gen for 3 years until the new iPhone came out and now I use both.  It’s been good times and have gotten a lot of good use out of my iPod’s.  Money well spent I say.

As usual, I followed Engadget’s live coverage of Apple’s event today. The rumors I posted about a week ago came true and there were a few nifty surprises too. In case you missed it here is a quick run down of what was introduced:

• iTunes 8.0
• 1 version of iPod Classic now 120 GB
• iPod Nano v.4
• $79 ear buds
• iPod Touch updates and price cut

iTunes 8.0 was expected and most of the cool new features have been leaked before today. The one feature that was pushed more than any is Genius. The ability for iTunes to pick songs for you and suggest songs you don’t have from the iTunes store. If you like music by Franz Ferdinand you can click on Genius and it will create a playlist of songs based on that selection. Very cool if say you want to hear a particular style of music that day you can create a playlist quickly and easily with Genius. Something Last.fm has been doing for years by the way with their similar artist radio. This, however, is of your own music and of course these playlists can then me manipulated and used in other smart playlists.

I’m sure someone guessed the iPod classic was dropping the fat body style and keeping only the slim one at 120GB. I didn’t know it but it’s nice because I always thought the big body larger styles were ugly ever since I saw the first version of the 5th gerneration iPods. $250 for this is a great deal.

Everyone knew there was going to be a new Nano coming out mainly because a case for it was released early and then some pictures came out and what not. There were still some surprises there though. It has the accelerometer built in so it knows when you turn it on its side and it will then switch to cover flow mode. With that you can also now shake it and it will shuffle the play. A neat feature but nothing that’s going to make headlines. It’s thin, thin, thin which makes it look amazing. It’s screen does look a little awkward but then again when the Nano fatty came out it looked strange too but has since grown on me. The Genius function works on the iPod itself which is cool. I hope they bring that over to other iPods. Especially the iPhone which is doable in a firmware update. The 24 hour battery life isn’t anything to scoff at either. Also don’t forget about the rainbow of colors that it is available in. Setting all the colors next to each other will make them look like a gay pride bumper sticker. No joke!

$79 ear buds. Wow. I know there are expensive headphones out there but Apple seems to be trying to get into the game. Of course these ear buds look like they do some pretty cool stuff. Each bud has two drivers. A woofer and a tweeter. Like my iPhone headphones there is a microphone in them with a button right on it. Clicking it once is play/pause, twice is next song, and three times goes back to the previous song. I Can’t wait to see a review on the quality.

The new iPod touch has several updates including an enhanced UI. One feature I thought is pretty cool is the integration of Nike+. The receiver anyway, the transmitter is still required and a pair of Nike shoes. This should be great for all you non fat people types who like to run/jog/walk around aimlessly. It’s thinner and hands on reports are saying it’s very sexy. Apple is also going after the portable gaming market with this saying “It’s the best portable device for playing games…”. Watch out Nintendo!

They also mentioned the iPhone 2.1 firmware update at the end which I am looking forward to. It should have a lot of bug fixes including less dropped calls and an improved battery life. This is due out Friday.

So what are you still doing here? iTunes 8.0 should be available for download now so go and get it and be a Genius!