Danny Stewart

An experience I feel I should share.

While in the Apple Store buying my iPhone 4, I was treated like royalty by Apple. It was like I was their only customer. They asked for my name and constantly referred to me by it. They asked if I had questions or concerns and walked me through the whole process. The guy even made casual conversation about bumpers and some other design-related things about iPhone 4 while we were waiting for my iPhone to activate. But since I was using my brother’s upgrade eligibility, we needed to switch the numbers on the phones, which required AT&T.

AT&T had a small table of their own inside the Apple Store. It was, to say the least, a stark contrast to my experience with Apple. The Apple employee introduced me by name to the AT&T workers, who ignored him. They were sitting at the table with ugly Dell laptops running Windows XP, Internet Explorer, and some incredibly ugly proprietary software that still had the Cingular logo on it. The AT&T employee I dealt with was coughing and sneezing into his hands, then handling my phone. Another AT&T employee jokingly chided him for not using gloves to handle a customer’s phone, which they both then laughed about right in front of me.

It took AT&T several failed attempts, repeatedly entering the same information, to get the numbers switched on my phones. It seemed to me to be a combination of carelessness and not being entirely sure what they were doing. Dealing with AT&T took roughly three times as long as dealing with Apple.

While I found some of the experience amusing, I found a lot of it disturbing. How is coughing on a customer’s newly purchased and just unboxed property and then joking about it with your fellow employees in any way professional or acceptable behavior?

I was frankly astounded at how great of a job Apple did with their service. I would have probably broken down after a couple of hours of iPhone launch sales. But they were the image of politeness and professionalism. AT&T was embarrassing.

Just thought I should share that.

(Regarding iPhone 4 itself, my experience echoes that of most other people. The device’s design, display, and speed are a joy to experience while making the iPad feel outdated just months after its release. There is little else I feel the need to add. It’s an amazing update and well worth it for anyone considering it.)

As promised, here are some isolated elements from my Mindwarp Mix (Whomix).

Here’s what I’m making available (six elements total):

• Bassline (first and second layers, separated)
• Melody (sine and backing)
• Synth Pad
• Orchestral Strings

The elements can be downloaded in zip format either as individual AAC files or as a preassembled GarageBand project for the cool Mac users out there. If I get multiple requests for MP3 or AIFF versions, I will consider providing them.

While these are mainly provided for educational value, you are welcome to use them in your own work provided that you give me full credit.
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While I was at TimeGate, Dom was gracious enough to provide me with his updated 2008 Doctor Who theme multitrack. Since I returned home, I’ve been hard at work on a new theme based on it. This is a new mix of Dominic Glynn’s theme based on his 2008 remix for the Trial of a Time Lord DVDs, using elements from his original and 2008 multitracks, plus several new elements of my own. It’s a pretty good indication of my conception of a “perfect” mix of Dominic Glynn’s theme. Enjoy!

Can’t see the embedded player above? Click here.

I had a wonderful experience two weekends ago attending TimeGate 2010 in Atlanta, GA. Truth be told, the main reason I attended the convention was because it was the first North American convention appearance of my friend and mentor Dominic Glynn. But the convention was a great success and I had a lot of fun there.

Upon arriving there Friday evening, I called Dom and we went out for drinks. We had a lovely time catching up. As we were discussing the convention schedule, I mentioned the Doctor Who music panel on Sunday. The program billed it as “Dominic Glynn and a panel of enthusiasts,” and I joked to Dom about it. “Enthusiasts? Why am I not on it?” Dom, ever gracious, thought that was a perfectly legitimate suggestion, and said that he would pull some strings with the hosts at the convention to get me on it.
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While not the score I’ve been working on over the past week, I have posted some of my work from early this year which was used on a friend’s film for school, entitled Forever Winter.

The score mostly consists of ambient, atmospheric pieces with a dark electronic soundset. I’ve also included some earlier, more melodic demos to give those interested a sense of the progression the score took as it developed.

Please feel free to visit my music page to check it out, and keep an eye out for my latest score in the coming weeks. (The album cover image comes from here.)