Spurs Playoff Games

I was a lucky boy this week

On Tuesday my friend Holly took me to see game one of the Spurs' 2nd-round playoff series against the LA Clippers.


Paper tickets? Not for these playoff seats!
We had a great time, of course.
Thanks Holly!



As always I tried to get a good shot of the tip-off.
Meh.
With this particular camera it's mostly luck getting anything good indoors, but I'm not complaining--I was there for the game.



Tony Parker (who turned 30 today) didn't score much, but still put his stamp all over this game.
Thought it was funny that the "MVP!!" chants went up during his free-throws despite it being awarded to Lebron James already.
Just shows that TP is SA's MVP in our hearts, because we love team basketball.



I was sorry to see George Hill go in the trade that brought us Kawhi Leonard, but now all is forgiven.
Not too many 20 yr old rookie starters in regular season, let alone the playoffs.
He is such a hard worker, and a great kid.
Big future for Kawhi.


Despite the lock-out shortened season, it's been a great ride so far.
And if you've never been to a playoff game, I recommend it.
Nothing compares to the energy, excitement, and sheer volume of the ATT Center in the post-season.

Televators***Evil Olive***Friday May 18

Be There!

The SPURS Are #1 In The West

The night before our mini-vacation we got to use my Christmas present and see the Spurs play Philly.
Best seats I've ever had, and a parking pass to boot--thanks again, Holly!

We had the best time ever!

Here's San Antonio's favorite referee Joey Crawford admitting to Coach Pop that his penis is smaller than a six week old snapping turtle's:
Tim Duncan looks on, having no idea he would earn a technical foul in this game despite not even playing. At the game the announcer pinned the tech on Pop, so we were surprised to learn the truth when we fired up our DVR. Even though it wasn't Crawford's doing, he might have been in trouble had the crowd of 18,000+ found out, seeing as how we haven't forgotten the time he ejected Timmy from that Dallas game a few years back for laughing on the bench.
Gary Neal and Tiago Splitter also wore suits that night, although they escaped the "DND--Old" that Timmy got entered into the stats on his own behalf.


Bruce Bowen had his number retired a few days before this game, and it brought back many fond memories seeing his jersey in the rafters with the other legends. 21, 20, and 9 are probably next, and they better find a way to enshrine our cranky old coach, too.
Since the year 2000, the SA Spurs are THE #1 franchise in ALL team sports in the USA, period. We have the best win/loss percentage in the last decade and the current one. Better than every other baseball, football, hockey or curling team--not just hoops.



I always try to catch the tip-off because it's the only part of the game when they use spotlights:



Manu Ginobili, the single most amazing and unpredictable player in the NBA:
Did you SEE that pass he made to Patrick Mills last night???


As a bonus, it was Military Appreciation Night. There were many moments before the game and during commercial breaks that brought a tear to your eye.



Danny Green making sure I'm paying attention to the Coyote:
It was super-cool being so damned close to the action you could hear stuff besides whistles and shoes squeaking. A little spoiled now. I want a job as a courtside photog in the worst way, but don't much like the idea of being one of those sweat-sprayed sitting ducks under the basket. I'd like to shoot their faces in coach's huddles during timeout and action shots from above the rim using remote-triggered cameras.


Pop coaches Manu:
Like he needs it. Probably better info flowing from player to coach in this instance. Manu can run a team once his playing days are over. Hell, there are like a half-dozen current NBA coaches who are former Spurs players, and the front-office spread of our alumni is staggering. The whole league is buying what San Antonio is selling.


The Spurs are on a 10-game winning streak right now, and just secured a spot in the playoffs even if they lose every game left in the season.
We have the best record in the tougher Western Conference, which makes us the top dogs in the league as far as I'm concerned. The East can bite me--they stink. Lebron James is never going to get a ring because he sold his balls years ago for shoe cash. He's a franchise and money-making machine but "King James" should read "King Choke". When SA whipped his Cleveland Cavs in the 2007 Finals, Lebron could have learned enough to make it to the next level, but he wasn't paying attention in class.

Our recent acquisitions of Stephen Jackson, Boris Diaw, And Patrick Mills are genius moves for cheap $$, and already paying off.
The bench is crazy skilled and tough as nails. They WANT to win like I want to be able to tan--a LOT.
Our youngest player, 20 year old Kawhi Leonard, is already playing like a seasoned veteran, which is why he's a starter and a closer and a game-changer. We all miss George Hill, but Kawhi is the shit and RJ is already a distant memory.

TD21 looks like a kid again, and is dunking more than he ever has before.
Tony is the best damned point guard in the league right now.
Splitter has SO much junk in his inside game it's almost funny. A few years ago I watched a lot of EuroLeague games just because I knew he would come here eventually, and he was THE best big over there, fighting through double and triple teams with ease. A Duncan fan since he was a boy, this guy is going to be a major part of our future.

Manu is Manu again. We won plenty when he was injured, but Ginobili is our not-so-secret weapon. He can make the impossible happen every night.

Neal and Green and Blair are stepping up and playing like real men.

If we can keep it together and not lose anyone to injuries, there isn't a team that can keep us from our fifth Championship.
How the coaches will trim our roster for the playoffs is beyond me. There's only one guy that isn't performing above and beyond the level required.




I used my "ATT Center" Sony H1 for these pics because of the rule against detachable-lens cameras.
There always seemed to be an exception for the rodeo, which is why I got better quality pics of the action and concert.
This year they enforced the rule for the first time, so after one aborted attempt to enter I straight up LIED to two different screeners to get my Alpha300 into the building.
I think I haven't posted the rodeo/concert pics yet because I feel guilty.


Special Thanks to all my friends that came out to see Televators at Evil Olive last weekend!
Thanks for the beers and kind words.

The stress is mounting--heading up to WireRecording Studio in Austin this coming Wednesday for our big break.
Seriously, why couldn't this have happened 25 years ago when the dream of being famous was important to me?
How did taking a phone call while shopping at ROSS for picture frames and a can opener turn into this big crazy thing?

I'm glad that the band sided with me on including the song that my bass lines sparked into being back in January. The producer wanted to record a different one but we all believe that the 7-minute opus "Milk Run/Cosmic Stream" represents the future sound of Televators, so at least I'll have one of my compositions recorded professionally to serve as my musical legacy after 32 years in this crappy stinking business.

Got A SPURS Fix Today

For the second time in recent memory, server error caused me to get a LOT more bacon with my breakfast than I ordered. Oh darn.

Fortified by my extra pig meat, I braved the crowds on too-little sleep to see the SPURS practice at the ATT Center.
Free parking, free admission, this little gift to the fans is a yearly ritual for us.
$1 hotdogs and sodas.
With training camp only just begun it's a very early look at all the new faces, many of whom will likely be gone before the season starts.

And it's nice to see the vets out having fun.



I was bummed when Tiago Splitter hurt an obsolete tendon and had to sit out. The best player in the Spanish league last season, we've been waiting for him for years.

I didn't know what the Coyote was doing until reviewing pix in the car. Just...wow!

Did I mention that the place was infested with little kids?
Most were of an age where they won't rate a paid ticket during the regular season, so it was nice that families can give 'em a taste of the excitement.








More than once I just closed my eyes and reveled in the sounds and smells of a game.
Almost brought a tear to my eye--I love my team and city so much.

If anyone cares, the Blacks beat the Silvers with George Hill and DeJuan Blair putting up the most points out of all the SPURS.
James Gist, Alonzo Gee, and Garrett Temple showed a lot of hustle.
McDyess and Jefferson looked more comfortable than last year.
Coach Popovich was funny as usual, and it was great to see the return of Jacque Vaughn on the coaching staff. He's a school for our young guards, and will be a big help (for less money than Avery Johnson).


Afterwards, we went to DQ for mini-Blizzards and onion rings.

Not Guilty!

I mean, I don't feel guilty about not updating this blog in over two weeks.
Life happens...and sometimes you don't get a picture or a story out of it.

Introducing the newest member of the family, Kristin Brown.
My new "niece" was born on Thursday July 15th.
Mom, Dad, and Baby are all doing fine.

As her "crazy uncle" I'll be introducing her to Nutella, guitars, cameras, Southern Comfort, and explosives.
I'm already trying to figure out a way we can all get rich off those long toes she's sporting.



In other news...
I have been saving my pennies to buy this bass, the 4-string version of my beloved 8-string monster.
I like the idea of using the same electronics and materials and shape and almost everything, so that when I get the sound dialed-in there isn't a drastic change when I switch instruments. As I soundman I battle this all the time, so I'm trying to make things easier for me and anyone who has to mix me.

But then...
We went looking for all of the little obscure guitar shops around town this past weekend, and this was the first bass I got my hands on.
Red strings notwithstanding, I thought it was kinda sexy.
But when I played it...how can I word this?...there was movement in my pants.

Now, I have mixed hundreds of electric basses over the years, and tried most of them for a few minutes.
Played a few hundred more in stores.
Owned my share, both new and vintage.
My first bass was a 1962 Fender Precision that I sold for a 500% profit 3 years later.
(Had I kept it until now it would have been a 5000% profit, but times were tough).
What I'm getting at is that I know when I'm holding an instrument that has magic.
My guitar had magic when I played it in the store, and I still feel blessed that it was under the Christmas tree that year.

Well, after three notes on the bass above and I just knew that the stars were aligned when 3 seeds sprouted on 3 different continents, and that the angels above guided the saw blades at the lumber yards.
Every monkey and bird that sat in those branches could suddenly talk, and they only said the nicest things.
I know for damn sure that it wasn't assembled on a Monday or Friday.
This bass sings.
Every note rings forever, with clear tones.
It's a dream to play, like my hands were measured before they designed it.

On the other hand, it's rather a lot more than I had planned on spending despite the fact that the shop only wants around 55% of MSRP.
So it's a steal, but if I'm going to go for it I need to put down a deposit ASAP before someone else with half a brain beats me to it.
Decisions...decisions...


Did I mention that my birthday is coming up soon?
More importantly, 2 days after that is my 30th Anniversary in the music business.
(Legally in the biz--my older friends would sneak me into clubs to play guitar long before I turned 18).

Even more importantly, although we don't remember the exact day to celebrate our first date, Sylvia and I have been together for 10 years.

A Triple Milestone Party?
Sounds Awesome!
Hope I get invited...

More Spurs Game

Sometimes Timmy gets away with fouls like this. You can bet if Joey Crawford was ref-ing, this would have been a T.

View from the smoking deck.

The Coyote launches T-shirts into the stands. Not an easy catch, for fans or photographers.

I never leave a game early.
It's disrespectful to the team and the fans in your section who are trying to watch the game's end.

Winners head to the locker room.

Final score.

I wish I had gotten a shot of Manu's monster block on Kevin Durant.
That play is still being talked about weeks later.
It was a great game.

More From The ATT Center

First Spurs home game after the "Rodeo Road Trip" saw the OKC Thunder come to town.
We didn't smell any lingering evidence of the previous tenants, btw.

Bill Land and Sean Elliot do the televised pregame show, with bonus dipshit waltzing into the frame.

First time-out huddle.

Rookie sensation DeJuan Blair sinks a freebie.

Winner of the commercial break pedalcar race.

Richard Jefferson blocks George Hill's attempt to show the love.

More to come...

Spurs/Mavs Part 2

Tim Duncan controls the tip-off just as the Spurs controlled the entire game.
Somehow we were behind 1 to 0 at the start, but never trailed again.

A couple of Tony Parker's 38 points.
He was a super stud all night.

Newest Spur Drew Gooden completes an and-1.
A bad fall soon afterwards had him spitting up blood, but he came back to play in the 4th quarter.
Personally, I think he just bit his tongue and was trying to make it seem worse than it was, but what do I know? He's kicking ass and scoring inside so I like him now. When he was on the Cavaliers? Not so much.
And he has brought his alarming grooming choices under control--it was just a matter of time before peer pressure in our locker room worked it's magic.
2 months ago--NBA Thug.
Today--Cultured Gentleman.
In tonight's loss he ditched the sweatband and I think even the sleeve.

The final score plus our hero.

From this shot you can tell how high up we were.
You can still see everything perfectly--better than on TV in fact.
But the crowd was so loud we never heard any referee whistles or shoe squeak, which was strange.

The people around us were a lot of fun.
The nachos were good enough.
Lot 9 is worth the extra money.
They have live bands and drinks (plus a huge screen showing the game) outside the ATT Center, and the bands play before and long after the game to help you get your party on.
The same setup is in place for away games so for the price of parking or bus fare you can still have a lot of fun with other fans in a game-like atmosphere.

Tonight's blowout loss sucked, and now we're behind a game with one more to play in Dallas.
Without Manu Ginobili we're probably toast, so I'm trying to savor every remaining game.
It's always the damned ankles with this bunch.

NBA Playoff Time--Oh Hell Yeah!

As usual, the most successful sports franchise in the USA over the last ten years has made it into the post-season.
Monday Night's Spurs/Mavericks Bloodbath was only the 2nd game I've managed to attend this season, but I couldn't have wished for a better one.
Game 2 of the bitter "I35" rivalry was one that will be remembered for a long time.

Since "pro" cameras (detachable lenses) are banned from the ATT Center, I took the Sony H1 which happens to have more zoom than my Alpha plus a wider aperture and IS.
It did a better job from our nose-bleed seats than the big and heavy bag full of black camera gear.

I hope this shot conveys my excitement as we took the escalator up to our level. By steadying the H1 on the handrail I took a chance that the result would match my wide-eyed anticipation of the game to come.
My Favorite Photo so it's all downhill from here.

Every sporting event has it's weirdos.


Who's that getting ready to sing the national anthem?
Looks awful familiar.

Oh yeah, from American Idol--the local girl with the tiny shorts so the world could see her legs.
She looks a little more top-heavy here than I remembered from TV, but this only confirms some intel received from a patient at the same doctor's office so I wasn't surprised.

If you think it was disrespectful of me to take a picture during the Star Spangled Banner, what about the 3 video guys who are ruining my shot?
My hand was on my heart for most of the song, which BTW got sung within an inch of it's life--she did a fantastic job.

Next Up--The Game

New Band Practice #2

A few peeks into the huge new thing going on in my life.
It feels great to finally play music again after who knows how many years, instead of just running the sound and saying to myself "I could have played that song better".









Shot some cool videos, but the editing/upload thing is a bitch.
Wait for the finished product.

What I've Been Up To Lately

This uber-tiny keyboard and a mouse = recording studio.
Plus beer, of course.
ProTools™ is some mighty serious professional software.

Plush
Uploaded by KeithAlanK

In case you can't tell, I'm a bass player now.
Finally!

Only played one paying gig on bass (1979?) but have always loved it.
Was always more valuable as a lead guitarist or a sound engineer, I guess.
Sold my last less-than-6 stringer in 2002 so I had to learn the songs on a regular guitar, which had me worried.
Plugged in, clamped a Sony H1 to the headstock for BassCam™ goodness, counted down four beats and rocked.
The basscam was inspired by 1980s metal videos on MTV, BTW.

Possum Kingdom
Uploaded by KeithAlanK

Edited this one to the part where you can hear me play without guitar and vocals covering it up.
I also like watching Mike and David drink beers while Steve and I lock into the groove.
Running sound for him during almost all of the last 20 years, I can pretty much read his mind.
Once I regain my chops (and calluses) we'll be a seriously tight rhythm section.


Next rehearsal will see some more complicated bass songs, like Judith by A Perfect Circle and In The Meantime by Spacehog.

God Bless YouTube and the tablature and lyric websites!
Back in the day we had to lift the tonearm up and place it carefully down again to re-play the section we were trying to figure out.
The rich guys had a "cueing arm" that was hands-free.
Our LPs got demolished from this abuse.
There was almost no sheet music for heavy rock releases, and what you could find was horribly wrong.

Today, when a guy nails a song he'll write it out in a chart with graphic string/fret format and upload to sharing websites.
The most accurate ones rise in the rankings so they are easy to find.
Didn't have time to decipher the lyrics and write them down?
Clickclickdownloadprint, bitches.
Saves untold hours of tedious work, especially on complicated stuff that makes no logical sense to those of us with classical music training.

My name is Keith
I play the bass

Whistling Monkey

Whistling Monkey
by KeithAlanK

Recent Projects

Anyone who also visits the MySpace page that I reluctantly maintain might have noticed that over the last few weeks I have been "Building Things" and my mood has been "Productive".

Here are the things I've been building:

First--a black straw grid for my second flash:

I'm not really showing-off the device in these photos because it's just a simple and boring box that fits over the flash and holds a grid pattern of black straws in front of the light-emitting part.
This restricts the light, so instead of going all over the place it's forced into a narrow beam.

Beam of light seen here:

I built one for my main flash a year ago, but needed to solve some design problems because this particular optical slave flash has an unusual shape.
It was a success.

Another flash accessory I'll be needing soon (to shoot a couple of weddings) is a flash bracket.
Simple versions can be had for under $20.
Good ones for $50.
Pro ones for $350 and up.

I made mine for $5, plus some parts I had laying around.

The main thing is that it puts the flash above and to one side of your lens, while also being convenient to carry everything around.
It eliminates everything that makes a typical snapshot of people look bad, from the flat light with bad shadows to the dreaded red-eye effect.


A wooden dowel, a 1/4"-20 anchor with extra threaded section to grab more epoxy, a flash mounting shoe donated by a junk camera, some paint, a piece of steel with proper holes that I already had...
Works great, plus it comes apart and the two pieces slip into the front pocket of my camera bag, whereas "real" flash brackets are big and bulky to carry around.

A full article on this build was requested of me, and is being published on a photography website next week.



This is a test of both projects at once.
The main light is coming from the strobe on top of my flash bracket.
No monkey red-eye!

(Yes, I'm kidding. I tested for red-eye on humans and never found any).
The other flash with grid is coming in from behind and to the left of Nanners, used as a hairlight or rimlight which is it's intended purpose.
This technique helps keep a person's hair from blending into the background and adds some spice.