My story

 Here we are in spring break at the end of my first winter quarter. It went well to put it shortly. I accomplished all my academic goals, we made ICPC NAC which was totally an imagination before this quarter, and I kind of just found my spot, my flow, and my rhythm in college culture and life. References: freshmen winter quarter halfway freshmen fall quarter Academics I took 4 classes this quarter:   - AM 10 (Applied Math Linear Algebra)  - CSE 16 (Applied Discrete Mathematics)  - CSE 12 (Computer Systems and Assembly)  - MUSC 80P (US Popular Music) Looking back at my winter quarter halfway post, I said that this quarter was definitely harder than fall. I'm not sure if that's still true, as finals week was def less grueling than fall quarter. However, I did certainly have more work overall, so it was still prob harder than fall quarter. AM 10 (Applied Math Linear Algebra) This class is a lot of work but at the end of the day the quizzes and exams are all su...

Melodic Dubstep Is Losing Creativity Melodic dubstep was my prime and it was my soul during 2019, 2020, 2021 namely. Highlighted by Virtual Riot, Teminite, Au5, Seven Lions, Trivecta, and also Crystal Skies, Derpcat among others, this genre was truly incredible. It's made up of powerful, uplifting, and heavenly chords with beautiful melodies. The drops are so dynamic within itself and it paints a soundscape that no other genre or subgenre achieves. And then you fill the gaps with the dubstep components which bring so much flow, strength, contrast, and fire. Melodic dubstep was my core where I branched into similar genres like future bass, electro house, and riddim. It was my obsession then, so look where we are now. Melodic dubstep is now being represented by the likes of Illenium, Dabin, ARMNHMR, Said the Sky, Kaskade, William Black, and these songs that I listen to don't get me wrong are fine tracks, but they are so incredibly bland and formulaic. Evertime I listen to the new...

As seen as in  cavs4twdiary.blogspot.com , thought this was worth sharing on the main blog: Today was a very busy day, quite hectic to be honest. Tuesdays and Thursdays are the only two days I don't have class. The only responsibility I have is discussion section in the morning, after that I am free to do whatever I want. Here's what I did today 8:40 AM = woke up, arrived at my discussion section at like 9 AM, it started at 8:30 AM but I can be late because I need to get my sleep in. I think I did bad on my quiz but its whatever 9:30 AM = Came back to my dorm, got my bag ready and took an ebike to the gym. 11:30 AM = Finished my workout, I did push, I think my form is bad because my forearm started feeling weird after some sets but whatever I'll figure it out later. At this point I went to play basketball but apparently there was some class going on that ended at 12 PM. So I was either gonna go back to my dorm or wait out the 30 min, so I decided to go to Stephenson coffee ...

   Welcome to the February installment of new EDM. I actually listened to like every song released this month and wrote out reviews for all of them which took up a lot of time. I won't be doing this for next month as it would also make these posts more concise and breathable I presume.  But anyway, there's always new music coming out it's actually pretty crazy, it's lowkey hard to keep up with sometimes. This month we got some Beyonce, Dua Lipa, Selena Gomez, SZA in the pop scene, along with new Grant, NOTD, Fox Stephenson, Madeon, Owl City, and Eliminate's album. Also worth noting is as I wrap up this blog post here on March 1st, we've just found out that Porter  has finished his 3rd album  which is so soon for his standards as he released Nurture in 2021. This pink theme reminds me of a lighthearted hyperpop type vibe, I'm VERY EXCITED for this new album, Porter hasn't released new music in a while. Albums and EPs 1/25 =  new grey EP  - Lots to talk ...

How do I even start. So I'm in the competitive programming club here at UC Santa Cruz where the premise is basically just centered around ICPC. It's a big competition that's truly global. Like tons of European and Asian colleges along with middleeastern and even African colleges participate in it. It's basically groups of 3 people solving a set of ~13 problems from colleges. And not to mention the contest is literally 5 hours long. stream link general/broad contest page So before I get to the contest man I woke up at 7:30 and got to the quarry plaza at 8 AM where one of the coaches/UCSC student picked me up and the rest of my team to carpool to De Anza college. Here we are at the California venue. Notably Berkeley, Stanford, UC Davis, SCU, De Anza themselves, SFU, SJSU, Chico state, and some other CSUs and other colleges. So you know what that means TIMOTHY PULLED UP which was so fun because first of all when we got there I saw this guy: THAT right there is xiaowuc1. Wh...

 Hi, I've been pretty busy and I am still very busy with a ton of stuff to do, but here's your little quarter midpoint checkup update post or whatever. Let's get straight into it: Overview This quarter is definitely harder than my previous quarter. First of all, I'm taking 4 classes:  - AM 10 (Applied Math Linear Algebra)  - CSE 16 (Applied Discrete Mathematics)  - CSE 12 (Computer Systems and Assembly)  - MUSC 80P (US Popular Music) Last quarter I only took 3. I wasn't expecting to get off the waitlist for MUSC 80P but I did 1 week into the quarter and had a lotta catchup to do but I'm good now. AM 10 (Applied Math Linear Algebra) This class is arguably my hardest. The thing we have to address right off the bat is how horrible my professor is, he's like a very young phd student or something and he projects a written notes sheet and just writes stuff in pen and it's just so horrible. Many times he'll go on a rush of just spamming out conceptual stuff...

Starting 2024, I'm gonna start a monthly series for new music that comes out, primarily EDM of course. Introduction  As for the first month of this series, let's set some expectations. I think that this year won't be an "iconic" or "elite" year for EDM. I think it could be worse than 2023. But I also think that there are some interesting artists to look out for, like Skybreak, Haywre, THIRST, Tsu Nami, JeongHyeon. But it's def not comforting knowing that we're fresh out of a year with album releases from Skrillex, Owl City, Au5, Chainsmokers, Midnight Kids, Man Club, Chime, Jvna, Emei ... and these artists likely will be on tour or taking this year to work on new music or a break or whatever. Madeon even established this year to be the "gap era" where he will release one song in February and take the rest of the year to dip out and work on new music and find inspiration and stuff. So yeah, nonetheless, EDM will always be thriving, as th...