Edwin Soto’s Blog

I just wanted to say that I said it now not after Hollywood or in the top 32 or 10. Lisa Tucker, a 16 year old from Anahiem, was my initial favorite to win - yes win - all of American Idol. She is the only audition that made me say “wow”. Her rendition of “One Moment in Time” was unbelievable. All the other contestants that made it to Hollywood were just “eh”. Don’t get me wrong, they were good singers mostly, but they lacked real musicality.

21 Year Old, Katherine McPhee, from Sherman Oaks, CA is easily the best singer so far. If there is not anyone that knocks her off my pedastal, she is the clear cut choice for this year’s winner. Her rendition of “God Bless the Child” was one of the best performances I’ve seen on the show, ever. It ties for best audition with Mario Vasquez (another of my AI favorites).
You may be wondering what my criteria is for a good singer. There are 4 things that I look for in an audition:

1. Pitch - no matter how nervous you are, a good singer never falters far away from pitch. Finish the audition in the same key you started in. If you do go off, it must be in a way that is never noticable to the public ear since I know not everyone can’t be perfect 100% of the time.

2. Dynamics - bar none the most important thing besides singing on key. If you yell everything, I don’t even give you a second chance. There must be a distinct level of emotion between words. This is usually portrayed by volume levels throughout the song. People think you’re cool when you belt out Whitney Houston or Mariah Carey, but any vocalist and musician will tell you that’s the wrong way to approach music. Most people that go to Hollywood on AI don’t know how to use this.

3. Sing the Words Correctly - there is nothing I hate more than when a singer uses “ghetto slang” in the song. I understand if that is your accent, but singing needs to be expressed by saying the words correctly. Don’t sing chal, guurl, frens, or bahiby - the words are child, girl, friends, and baby.

4. Personal Style - riffs and fancy singing can only get you so far. You must use this to your advantage and very, very sparingly. If you do anything right, let it be pitch and dynamics before fancy vocal work. Vocal instructors teach you how to sing properly, not how to sound like Beyoncee.Normally, I think that America gets it wrong anyway, since most of America votes for lesser talented. Some of the people passed up: Justin Guarini (should’ve won) and Diana DiGarmo (far far better than Macy Gray/Mary J. wannabe Fantasia - which is not a compliment since Gray and Blige are only passable singers).

If you look like “those guys” you may be committing douchebaggery. Watch the PSA to find out if you’re a douchebag. Make sure you let us know in the comments section.

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Finally Jeese and I have collaborated again to bring you the latest in dumb podcasting!  We not only encourage you to listen, but we demand it!

Read More  | Neveryone.com

This poor fella and a few others mentioned in his article have experienced loads of problems and the eventual termination of their Blogger/Blogspot accounts. The reason for his blog being deleted, after some runaround, was said to be link spam related. Here’s an exerpt from an email he received:

Blogger reserves the right to remove those blogs which are setup either automatically or manually for the purpose of directing traffic through hyperlinks to specific external site(s). This practice, known as link spamming, is in violation of our Terms of Service. In accordance to the termination provision of the TOS, we have therefore terminated your account.

This is the reason why I decided to host my own blog - for freedom of putting up whatever content I want. That reminds me, in two weeks this will be a gay pr0n site.

Read More | The English Guy

I have been really hitting the web development field by doing something I have never done before: Cascading Style Sheets. What the hell is that (for the non-geeks)? Its kinda of a “translator” that helps webpages look the way it should. Heck, you are looking at one right now! It’s been really liberating to be able to automate some functions in web pages as well as hide source code from the users. Ok, I’m done being a geek for now…

Why the sudden interest? Well I am in the midst of creating a theme for EJ’s Site. One that I have been constructing from the ground up. Also, I’ll be doing a project for Big Break Productions using CSS as well.