Top 5 tips for working from home

Home is where the work is

Home working (thankfully) is becoming more and more common and we all know that it makes SO much more sense. That is not to say that going into the office (or in my case rehearsal/gig) on occasions is not crucial to maintain relationships and have human and work interaction.

But, in this day and age, working from home really is possible and can serve to cure many of today’s pressing issues, such as combating congestion, helping to reduce co2 and climate change; helping employee’s with health issues such as  stress and over working; helping employee’s to achieve a much better work life balance.

I am fortunate as a guitarist and composer that I get to work in my home studio....in my home!

But that doesn’t mean that it is all swings and roundabouts, there are some problems, just as there are going to work in an office.

But even with a few cons, the pro certainly outweigh them!!!

As they say, “we have the technology”, and so much more at our fingers tips,

So, WHY in this day and age are we forcing millions of people into (usually) very small city centre areas, all at the same times of day, to sit in over priced offices and (if we are honest) just think about and wish it to be home time so they can escape again (with the other millions).

There are SO many alternatives to the antiquated Victorian industrial era habit, and enabling employees to work either from home or hub offices and in their own time would do go part of the way to achieving this, and I am sure making the world a much better place!!

If you would like to hear more then please check out there There is another way podcast.

The Lucky Ones??

Yes, so of us are fortunately to already be able to do this, either because we decided to work for ourselves (I am sure this is the future!) or have actual liberated, open minded and most importantly trusting employers, who have embraced home working. BUT, what find is that when we cross this divide and finally get to work from home (or those of us who run our own businesses, there are a new set of issues to contend with.

Hopefully, this article serves to help overcome some of the common problems of isolation, new stresses, inactivity, procrastination and more.Sit back and enjoy the tips.

Top 5 tips for working from home

1) Make your bed.

According to a podcast from the ultimate home worker Tim Ferriss, when he interviewed a military general, his top piece of advice to avoid procrastination and giving your sense of habit forming and achievement is to make your bed and make your bed every day.

As you do this, it starts to form a habit, and when habits form they are hard to break. With the bed made and the formulation of this habit stuck in your head, you can then set to create the next habit task which starts directly after you have started your first task of the day, such as checking emails, corresponding to clients, or going to the gym.

To beat procrastination your need a routine and you need to form habits. Making the bed also gives you a sense of achievement that you have already completed a task at the start at the day. Therefore your are already on your road to success! Try it, your will be surprised.

2) Put your shoes on.

The act of putting your shoes on to me help signal to my brain that I am in work mode. I am ready for action, should I need to go out, go to a meeting, I am ready. Working in Pj's and slippers might sound like a great enticement to home working, but it can easily lead to you confusing work with being at home, and whilst this is fine, it can also (if you are that way inclined) cause you to start stressing as there is no delineation between your work and home life.

Bonus tip - Take your shoes offThis is a biggy to help relief and home working stress anxiety , the very act of removing your shoes signals that you are no longer at work, but at home and it is your time. It really does help you to relax and triggers your brain to start switching off from work life and moving from home life. Try it! It is just another trigger!

3) Put the radio on

I personally recommend some form of news talk show type program, as this chatter in the background at a low level is very similar to being in a work place environment, where you no longer feel isolated, and can switch in and switch out of the conversation. Just like in an office, when you are in the zone, you focus out the conversation, but thanks to the cocktail party effect, if something of interest is mentioned, you can zone back in again.

This tip really helps if you are feeling isolated working from home and alone. The constant hubbub really can help focus the mind on your task as you aren't thinking about being isolated. You should use the radio and not the TV as the visual elements of the TV will serve to distract you and the way that TV is edited is to draw you in and not allow you to switch off, because you just have to know what is coming next.....

4) GO out

This is very very important. You have escaped the office, and the sedentary life that goes along with sitting at a desk all day....to sit at a desk all day. Yes we are all guilty of it. But unfortunately this is actually worse for your fitness because you aren't even walking to the bus or the car or up the office stairs.

You need to keep yourself active, so make sure you go out for a walk, to the gym, whatever takes your fancy. This will also help clear your mind and for me helps my creative mind come up with new ideas and projects.

5) Find the place you work well

This could be a spare room, the sofa, for me it is a coffee shop. I became my own boss so I could work where I like and when. I have discovered after years of doing this, that I work SO much better in short very concentrated bursts in coffee shops.

I manage to kill two birds with one stone. I pick a coffee shop that is a mile or two away, and count that as part of my exercise (See above).

I walk to the coffee shop (most have WIFI these days....in fact I am writing this now in a coffeeshop) sit there and enjoy the atmosphere, which for me is very conducive for concentrated work (I know that this might not be for everyone) and sit and work very intensely for a few hours and then walk home with a sense of achievement.

I jokingly call the coffee shop my office, and I am so lucky as I have a huge range of “offices" to go to depending on my mood. For you it might be different, it might be a bean bag in your kitchen, or a shed.

Where ever that space where you find you can do your best work is, go there, and DON'T worry about what or where it is at the end of the day your client or boss want to see results....Do they REALLY care that you did it at 2am in a late night service station? Nope!

NOTE : This article was written before the enforced home working of the Covid-19 Pandemic for many people around the world. For additional advice about homeworking and homeschooling do check out this article on Mindgenius.

I’d would love to hear your home working tips and tricks, please leave them in the comments below!

Enjoy

Peace

Neil

Hans Zimmer Masterclass Review (and a short rant about education!)

A little while ago, I wrote a blog post entitled "The expectations of education and online learning.”, about my experiences of both taking the Hans Zimmer masterclass and then the online commenting in forums and Facebook from other students. I really felt that there was a big gap between some students expectation of what they would be getting and I think this is reflected by the nature of the modern student and instant gratification.So, I put together video on my thoughts on the Masterclass and Hans’ content, you can simply click the video below and enjoy (there is also a little rant in there as well!) Personally, as you can see in the video. I though this was an excellent course and would certainly sign up to others. I feel it offers excellent value for money and has certainly inspired me (which surely is the main aim of any education?)EnjoyPeaceNeil

The SECRETS of how to play guitar in a band

This is a question I often get asked.....what advice would you give for someone wanting to play guitar in a band? Well, I thought it would be a good idea to put all of my tips and advice into a single video. It is never easy starting a band, and it is even harder joining a band when you don’t have too much experience. There are a number of things you can do straight away to ensure that you are successful, both with your band mates and making your band a success.I would also love to hear your advice and guidance as well. Please let your thoughts in the comment box!Top tips and advice on how to be successful when you start playing guitar in a band.EnjoyPeaceNeil

The expectations of education and online learning.

Recently, I have been overseeing and taking part in a few online courses (both paid for and free), as well of course as my own online youtube videos and lesson content. I am surprised by a number of students reaction to the teaching and more importantly, their expectation of what they are supposed to get from a class, tutorial, workshop or lecture. The notes below are a reflection on the criticism towards the Hans Zimmer Masterclass series.As a university lecturer this notion of 'not getting much' from tuition is becoming a regular occurrence in the education sphere. I put it down to a younger generation learning with newer pedagogical methodologies where learning is instant and targeted to what you need to know NOW and very much a how to do what you need right now, rather than a more holistic approach to learning and understanding your area of specialism.I also find a slight misunderstanding by students in the terminology used traditionally, such as tutorial, workshop, lecture and masterclass. I think that many students (or people who signed up for the HZ Masterclass) were expecting a workshop or tutorial on ‘How to score a oscar winning soundtrack' with accompanying step-by-step guide on the 10 steps you need to take from switching on your DAW.Further Learning (i.e not school) is about asking questions, the learning is about being given ideas or concept which you can then study further and investigate yourself with the assistance of your tutor. I guess (and I could go on about this for ever), in the corpora-education results focused world we now live, education is about making sure stats look good to ensure the steady flow of cash.In a masterclass class (!), the student should (I feel) expect to listen and be inspired by the PROCESS that the Masterclass expert has This should not be a tutorial in techqniue but an overview, with room for case studies, tips and tricks as well as experiences (which I feel HZ did). I think many were expecting him to fire up Cubase and show them how to write a melody, orchestrate it and receive an Oscar.I do feel that perhaps it might have been nice to have seen him approach an unseen cue and talk about that but I feel for the money that there have been enough suggestions and comment from Hans to help develop my work, inspire me to work more and some useful tips on how to be more effective.What are your thoughts on this? What do you expect from a class, lecture, or masterclass?PeaceNeil

Choosing gear - How would you choose your gear if you didn’t have the internet?

How would you choose your gear if you didn’t have the internet?

Just imaging for a moment that there were no interviews, no magazines, no hundreds and thousands of user reviews, no online reviews (you know the kind that I do a lot of!). Are you imagining that?? I hope so, please go with me on this one!Firstly,  please understand that I'm NOT shooting down the reviewers or the reviews, they serve a purpose and they are doing a great job. It is just that I'm trying to throw out an idea of what would you do if none of this information existed? How would you choose something?

Well, I think it would go a little something like this....

You walk into a guitar shop, you have no idea what any of the pedals are, brands, types, components, you have no idea! So, how would you go about choosing something?Well, perhaps you go and look something that you are visually attracted to, nothing wrong with that. what would you then do?Well, you probably plug it in, turn the knobs, see (hear!) what happened, and I’m pretty sure you would be drawn to something if you liked how it sounds. I am going out on a limb here, but you probably wouldn't care about anything else.We get so side-tracked by other people's opinions, XYZ does this, it sounds better than this, etc, but if you didn't know any of this information, if you haven't heard the voices of the internet or magazines telling you all this, you would probably pick a product primarily on how it sounds, and how it looks, and that is something we forget about quite a lot.I am a big advocate now of just plugging into something and seeing how it sounds. Asking.....does that sound appeal to me? Can I change all the knobs? what does it do? Really getting under the surface of the piece of equipment and finding out what the hell it can do, and how it sounds, and if I like that sound. does that sound work for me? does that sound make me want to play guitar?The little nugget of advice I'm giving here is, that sometimes when you're looking for something, go into a guitar shop, forget the internet for the time being, as awesome as it is, but go in to that guitar shop, go in blind. Get the shop assistant to plug in a whole bunch of pedals that you can't see, and see which one sounds good for you. does it do what you want it to do? Does it make the sound in your head come to life? Does it achieve the sound that you are looking for?We are brainwashed at the moment into thinking XYZ says this, XYZ says that, some guy I've never met before (including me) says this is a great pedal, and it sounds better than this pedal because whatever, and it costs more therefore it must be better, does it really?Of course there are a whole bunch of other factors to factor in, there are some useful things about reviews, if you have a great pedal but it's in a case made of flimsy plastic and you step on it and it breaks, that's not a good thing, and it's probably worth noting that, but in terms of sound and what sound is and how personal it is to someone, if you like the sound of a metal zone pedal then buy one and make it work for you.If you hate the sound of a metal zone pedal, don't buy one, buy a soul food or Andy Timmons Angry Charlie, or something like that, but whatever it is you buy, make sure it works for you and not for some other guy on the internet who says it's a great thing and it works for them.PeaceNeil

NAMM 2017 Rumours

So it is that time of year again!! Doesn't come around so quickly there days?? The NAMM show in January 2017. is a time to start thinking and dreaming of what might be coming out in this year. It seems like quite a few companies like Korg, Supro and various pedal companies (to name the two that I have seen) have done pre-release press releases, so we already know what is coming. A bit of a shame, as I love the excitement.....but I a very excited about the Korg Gadget getting a desktop version!! Amazing!So what am I hoping for this year? Well, I think I am going to be disappointed (as always it would seem), but one can dream. TC Electronic (now part of Music group i.e Behringer) seem to only be concentrating on single stomp boxes now, which is a real shame. My other wish is for Spectrsonics to update Stylus RMX, but given keyscape only just came out I doubt that they will. NAMM used to be big for them, but they seem to have gone very quite of late.Like most years, (if you have read any of my blog previously), really I am only looking for a couple of companies to do a couple of things (which are actually pretty much the same from year to year!!!), so I am guessing there must be a gap in the market, and one thing in particular, the TC Electronic Nova System is right up there. Given by just how popular my review and videos on the unit are, it would seem I am not alone. So for the fifth year running, this is what I am  hoping for.But, otherwise here are my NAMM 2017 wishes1) (This is the big one!) A new Nova System from TC Electronic. Well to be honest, I love the Nova System, I have been gigging mine for over five years now, but there are a few omissions and small things that would make it totally perfect. These are, a filter section (Autowah, envelope filter perhaps, I would have these over the pitch if I had to), and improved tuner (insert a polytune please!!!) and perhaps another way to access patch v presets. I would also love for it to be Toneprintable, how incredible would it be to be able to download Toneprints to the Nova System. Oh okay maybe one more, to make it the most perfect object of all time, perhaps adding in a few basic amp models (Fender, Marshall, Vox perhaps?), so that it could be used direct into a PA or as a basic modeller. That would make it perfection!! Particular on the last point that the TC Halicon Voice Channel can do this, and Tech 21 have introduced this concept with the FlyRig, it would be perfect. But sadly I don't think it is coming.2)Love to see an update to the Ibanez RG Prestige range, perhaps a natural finish guitar??3)Spectrasonics?? Where are you???????….maybe some new libraries for Stylus RMX?  and how about the next generation of awesome software that we know you are capable of!!4)Logic 11? 2013 was the year of Logic X, I am very cautious with Apple at the moment and their (what feels to me) move away from supporting the creatives that carried them through the bad times. They are a phone company now and not a computer company, evidenced by their latest update to the Mac Mini, a total backward step IMHO.5) I also use Digital Performer 9 a fair amount and whilst it is great for audio and film stuff, I still prefer Logic for straight composition and song writing, probably because of the ability to work with looped regions. Maybe this will come to DP one day?6) A decent Marshall amp (we can dream!)7) Atomic Amplifire - actually you guys totally rock! I am loving my amplifier so maybe I don't need a replacement for the Nova System now. I am sure if you have something new it will blow us away!I would be very interested to hear what you are waiting for/hoping for.Maybe I'll get my book there next year ;)

A lifetime of guitar knowledge for only £6.95Take the next step with your playing...

Or Kindle version....

So what is on your list?

PeaceNeil

Apple MacBook Pro 2016 Review

Apple MacBook Pro 2016 Review

So yesterday, at the Apple event, they announced the new Apple MacBook Pro 2016 Model....with Touch bar. As a result music and video forums around the world seems to give a resounding 'really' is that it? Is that the announcement? No new iMacs and crucially no new Mac Pros? What are you doing Apple, you remember those guys who saved you in the 90's, the designers, the studios, the video guys....remember, the one's you thought it was 'cool and trendy' to be associated with. Well, I personally think you are starting to dump on them BIG style! For the biggest company in the world, is it too much to put some resource aside and keep us guys content? Is it really?

SO Thoughts.....

I have given this some thought since the announcement, and the one thing that really jumps out is how, given the immense computing power available to the world now, why Apple in particular, aren't making absolute beasts of machines for those working in especially media related fields (Audio, Video, Photography) etc. It seems there is a specification undercutting happening, perhaps the warning flag should have gone up when the iPod classic left the shelves. You know when real music lovers, who LOVED the fact they could have their entire library on a tiny portable device ,were told that this was not cool and you should either stream or die like a dinosaur, I mean I guess some people do only listen to 3 albums these days whilst permanently tethered to GOOD WIFI!!!There seems to be a complete disjunct between the needs of professional creators and the machines we have. Why are these MacBook Pros being shipped with a max of 16Gig of Ram? That is kind of pointless for many of us out there, not just in audio production and music, ESPECIALLY when you can't upgrade it. 256 Gig HD, yes cool it is SSD but that is like 1 and a 1/2 quality sample libraries and it is full, before you take in to consideration any applications, and let alone think about an ACTUALLY PROJECT FILES! But no Grandad, why aren't you uploading your project to the cloud? SO uncool Dude. Because I have GIGs of project files and yes Apple, you market saying...work any where, be a free spirit, travel, record indigenous tribes in their native home lands, but less an less giving us the tools to do that....wow cool I have a SUPER THIN SHINNY box, but that pretty much goes out the window when the rest of my bags is filled up with hard drives, power supplies, and now 4 more different adapters to connect to all the other adapters to make the gear I have invested thousands and thousands in actually work!! That is not cool Apple, it takes me 20 minutes to plug everything in.

Top of the pile??

Why oh why is it not possible to have a SOLID performing laptop (Which might be a bit thicker than some others used for web browsing and typing documents), with a powerful CPU, upgradable RAM, maybe....just maybe....two hard drives in it?? SHOCK, and yes why not have 3-4 USB ports, and SD card reader, and HDMI port and Two Thunderbolts all running down the side. I would be so proud to tell all my friends about a product like that, you know one where I could actually just take that to a gig, a forest, a tribe and DO EVERYTHING. THAT WOULD BE COOL APPLE.But NO, style over substance, form over function now from the INNOVATION CREATIVE FRUIT BASED COMPANY. Phones, watches, $$$$$$$$$s and watch the old guard take the lead and innovate. Who in a million years thought they would ever actually look up from their fruit based computing device and watch a Microsoft promo (firstly actually watch it!) and go....ooooh what's going on over there..........Peace, love and good happiness stuff!Neil