I decided to write this little eBook during my 2011 Holiday Vacation. It was a “fun” little project that took me a few days to get together, send around to my friends, get their input.

As of right now, it’s only available on Amazon Kindle Publisher Select for only 99 Cents. It’s 2500 words long. It only takes 15 minutes to read.

Description:

Guitarists of all levels: this eBook is not for your fingers. It is for your mind.

It contains simple, yet counter-intuitive musical concepts that many professional guitarists fail to understand after playing for 15 years. But you can discover them here in only 15 minutes.

I offer you no sweep-picking exercises. No scales, no chords, and no “tricks.” I am leaving out all of the specific data and techniques that you would typically practice and commit to memory while taking guitar lessons. But I promise you that the most creative and accomplished guitarists in the world have mastered these high-level principles of musicianship.

At the time of writing this eBook, I have (intentionally or otherwise) studied the guitar as a tool of artistic expression for 24 years. My experience as an eccentric musician called Sir Millard Mulch took me as far as an invite-only audition with Steve Vai. But I never trained to be a musical soldier in someone else’s army, so I continued to make my own albums with guest musicians such as Virgil Donati, Marco Minnemann, Devin Townsend, and many other unique creative geniuses.

I have personally directed approximately 3,000 guitar instructional videos for GuitarTricks.com—regularly working with some of the most talented graduates and private instructors from Musicians Institute and Berklee College of Music.

However, if you’re like me—ready to break free of the limitations of a traditional guitar education—this short guide is for you. And to my knowledge, you cannot find this information compiled anywhere else.

I challenge you to question all of these ideas, and apply them to your guitar-playing at your own risk. Each idea will be accompanied by a musical example, which I encourage you to seek out and listen to (and I mean really listen to) on your own.

Buy It Now: http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Guitar-Only-Minutes-ebook/dp/B006RB2BY4

Ever heard of a song called, “The Boy With The Perfectly Square Butthole” by Sir Millard Mulch?

Probably not. It’s not available anywhere.

Ever PLAYED on “The Boy With The Perfectly Square Butthole?”

Here’s your chance!

The song was originally recorded 30 YEARS AGO TODAY on September 12, 1997.It was printed on a 100-run of cassettes and later, an out-of-print CD called “50 Intellectually Stimulating Themes From A Cheap Amusement Park For Robots & Aliens, Vol. 1.”

It’s a song about alienation, naivety, and the pride that can only come from two parallel lines and another pair of parallel lines placed perpendicular to those, between two buttocks. (It’s kind of Masonic.)

Here’s what to do:

1.) Download the guide track: http://soundcloud.com/mutantmall-com/perfectlysquare_guide
2.) Play along with it. On any instrument. Or vocals. Or any kind of noise you can make.
3.) Email your tracks or a link to your tracks (with the guide removed) to: contests@carlkingdom.com.

Rules:

• You must follow the original form, tempo, and lyrics of the song.
• That means someone is going to have to sing it. Scary, huh? Male, female, we don’t care.
• You can add fills, weird beats, displacements, metric modulations, harmonies, etc. Do whatever you want. You can program it, play it, just make it good. Finally.
• Any recording quality is accepted.
• You know that part where the drums and bass get all weird with pointillism? Do a solo there. Or play something steady so someone else can solo. Go crazy, or don’t.
• If you can figure out how to be creative while still meshing with unknown tracks, you will probably win. You can submit as many tracks and instruments as you’d like.
• It’s not a bad song, but it can be better. So make it better. Surprise us.

This contest is open to anyone, unless Carl King doesn’t like you.

In TWO WEEKS from today (9/26/11), the best tracks will be cleaned up and mixed together by Carl King and released as a commemorative download. The song was written in one evening, so don’t whine. Winners will have their name / band promoted and receive a very special T-shirt.

It will be official. You can say you worked with Sir Millard Mulch. You can put it in parenthesis after your name, like this:

Your Name (Sir Millard Mulch, Some Other Boring Band, Some Stupid Girl With Rich Parents)

EXCITING BONUS QUESTION: What if not enough people participate?
ANSWER: Carl King will hire a well-known musician to play the remaining parts. Who could it be?

Good luck!

Carl Kingdom / The Marketing Department
news@carlkingdom.com
http://www.carlkingdom.com
http://www.facebook.com/carlking
http://www.twitter.com/carlking
http://carlkingdom.tumblr.com

If you walk into any Barnes & Noble or Borders, you should be able to locate a magazine in the Computers section called 2600 (The Hacker Quarterly). 

Earlier this year, Dr. Zoltan wrote an article called “Hacking Music” and it has been published in the Autumn issue:

http://store.2600.com/autumn2008.html

Dr. Zoltan could scan and upload the article, but he would not want to ruin the magical experience of reading the printed magazine in your local bookstore. 

It is an honor to be in print for the first time in nearly 3 years.

Dr. Zoltan Øbelisk
Hollywood’s Most Innovative Entertainer Since Carrot Top
drzoltan@drzoltan.com>
http://www.drzoltan.com
http://www.myspace.com/drzoltan
http://www.youtube.com/drzoltan
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=10795446153
http://www.lastfm.com/user/drzoltan

What better way to celebrate seven years of confusion than with a campfire sing-a-long? Dr. Zoltan & Will have released a song called Freefall (Catchy Folk Tune To Celebrate The End of the Republic). You can download the song for FREE if you fill out this contact form: http://www.drzoltan.com/contact.php

CREDITS
Will Maier - Vocals
Dr. Zoltan - Acoustic & Electric Guitar, Keyboard, Bass, Drumkit From Hell

Cover art by CarlKingCreative

DR. ZOLTAN’S THOUGHTS ON 9/11
Dr. Zoltan’s take on this is very simple. He is not a conspiracy theorist, he just does not believe the official story of what happened on 9/11. He does not know what sort of dark force is responsible for making the buildings fall down, but here are his thoughts on some peripheral (yet central) issues.

The White House and CNN gave oversimplified explanations for the disaster and used them to justify an endless war. The American public cynically disregards their own powers of research and observation, handing over too much power and responsibility to their government and the media. There are many unanswered questions about 9/11 and the official stories are as confusing as the nutty ideas put forth by paranoid amateur filmmakers. More time and energy is spent on horrible tabloid stories like Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears than investigating a real crime. 

Instead of helping us make sense of it all, corporations and the government are feeding the stupidity of the masses, perpetuating consumerism and instilling a deep fear of objectivity. Team-oriented politics and conformist cult branding, fueled by religious dogma, racism, and fear, are substituted for the importance of… IDEAS. 

The War On Terror is a press release right out of George Orwell’s 1984. Terrorism is asymmetrical by nature. It cannot be fought with a “War.” Its sole purpose is to cause a government to implode on itself by bloating its military and restricting the freedoms of its citizens — warrant-less tapping of communications, detaining of random suspects, expanded executive powers, et cetera. Through this, a handful of chaotic individuals can cripple a country of hundreds of millions. In a police state everything grinds to a halt in the name of protecting the homeland from the boogeyman. Benjamin Franklin said it best: “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

The truth is that “fun” products like cigarettes, alcoholic beverages, and junk / fast food kill more humans than terrorist attacks ever could. But in a world of billions of crazy humans with their hands on deadly technology, occasionally bad things will happen — on purpose. REALLY bad things. Humans can do their best to stop these things, but what they need is the strength and freedom to sustain damage and go on living. 

LYRICS
You’re better off hiding with some weapons in a hole
When a corporate fascist state has taken control
But instead you’re dancing, drinking, and you’re having lots of fun
While the end of the United States has already begun

Chorus
Brother, Look no further, there’s no other proof you need
Buildings can’t collapse at freefall speed

You can expect to see another pseudo-terrorist attack
When the best you’ve got are posing fakes like Tom and Zach
Hiding from the truth behind their blurry poetry
While the crime scene is buried at the bottom of the sea

It’s gonna come to civil war sooner or later
Protesting won’t stop an evil dictator
Don’t try to vote him out, there’s nothing you can say
The tyrant that’s in office isn’t going away

Last year, Steve was given the opportunity to jam with Dr. Zoltan at an audition held in a secluded North Hollywood rehearsal studio. At the end of this video, you can see Steve playing the very song he played in the audition. While it is a great song, it is unfortunate that Dr. Zoltan was unable to accommodate Steve’s own yearning for creative solo music pursuits. The two shook hands and parted ways, never to have lunch again. Dr. Zoltan wishes Steve Vai the best in his solo career!

{ This post was written and proofreaded by Dr. Zoltan! If your tie-dyed t-shirt is still tucked in after reading it, visit http://www.drzoltan.com/blog. Or wear a wig and fake beard and take yourself really seriously.}

Something is seriously wrong with Metallica. With all of the available resources (studios, microphones, pre-amps, guitars, engineers — and even the most powerful rock music producer in the world, Rick Rubin), they can’t figure out how to make an album sound professional. Their new single, “The Day That Never Comes” sounds like it was recorded on a cassette tape on a boom box.

Dr. Zoltan estimates that it has been roughly 13,140,000 seconds since a snare drum played by Lars Ulrich sounded correct. Dr. Zoltan also estimates that 13,140,000 amateur musicians in home studios all around the world have had no problem with that basic task. You might expect this sort of thing on a low budget — perhaps with a single Radio Shack microphone stuck in a closet, recorded onto a K-mart tape from 1992, but not considering the unlimited financial resources that Metallica has.

Rather than firing Bob Rock, they should have fired Lars Ulrich. Listen to that hi-hat disaster at 1:13. It is one of those moments where the drummer is not so sure he was supposed to go into that section, and he is ducking under the cymbals and looking around at his bandmates for validation. 

As if that is not wrong enough, the weakest performance of the worst drummer in the world had to be masked by digitally cranking a fancy volume knob akin the the Maximum Volumizer. Mastering? Bah.

The Day That Never Comes is the day that Metallica can remember anything they learned about sounding like non-amateurs.

{ This post was written and scrutinized, perhaps by gnomes licensed in perpetuity throughout the universe by Dr. Zoltan! If you find any scratches or bumps, visit http://www.drzoltan.com/blog. Also… }

If you are the type of human who enjoys purchasing mp3 files, “How To Sell The Whole F#@!ing Universe To Everybody… Once And For All!” – Collection 1 (Success) is now available on CDBaby.com. Coming soon to iTunes, too.

Other options:

Download 192k mp3 files of this album for FREE.
Listen to this album on iMeem.
Download Lossless FLAC files from The Secret Club.

For now, MutantMall.com will not be carrying CDs by other artists.

$5 Inventory Liquidation on the following items:
Virgil Donati / Planet X – Live From Oz (CD)
Electrocution 250 – Cartoon Music From Hell (CD)
Devin Townsend Band – Synchestra (CD)

Limited quantities. Available on eBay.

As many of you know, Dr. Zoltan offered his entire discography (192k mp3 files) for FREE DOWNLOAD last month. What Dr. Zoltan didn’t realize is that these were actually CASSETTE TAPES. Over 700 of them flew into the air and exploded. The entire warehouse burned to the ground, destroying several hand-painted Voice of Nothing T-shirts and a Wags napkin. 

View photos of the disaster here: http://www.drzoltan.com/contact.php

{ This post was written and approved by Dr. Zoltan! If you put a hole in a dog’s butt, visit http://www.drzoltan.com/blog. Or just run over green snake. What about that block? Do you like Elvis on MTV at 3am? }

Now you can download “How To Sell The Whole F#@!ing Universe To Everybody… Once And For All!” for FREE. This “Commercial Magnum Opus” originally released in 2005 by Sir Millard Mulch is being released as two remastered Digital Collections, Success and Failure. Each Collection will contain 2 hours of audio material, for a total of OVER 4 HOURS. (Probably closer to 5.)

The first of the two:

Collection 1: Success (53 Tracks Total)
Disc 1 – 24 Tracks, 69:18
Disc 2 – 29 Tracks, 66:53
Total Length: 2 Hours, 15 Minutes, 53 Seconds
Format: 192k mp3

Download it at http://www.drzoltan.com/contact.php or just wait to purchase it on iTunes.

Collection 2: Failure will be released next month. 

All tracks will also be made available in a Lossless Format inside The Secret Club.

{ This post was written and approved by Dr. Zoltan! If you think Compact Discs should become extinct sooner than later, visit http://www.drzoltan.com/blog. What about that block? }