Human error is a sad reality. We spill coffee on our resume before an interview. We break bones in uneventful ways. We put our lives on computers, and then incessantly press the power button or impulsively toss them out the window.
Such is the case with Pax of experimental trip-hop trio Astrea Corporation, who recently dropped a hard drive on his concrete patio outside his Lake Worth home, ultimately breaking it. A more modest example of computer violence than the examples above, sure, but still pretty devastating. The drive included two years of material including music files, visuals, pictures, videos, and masters to projects by locals such as Protoman, Lavola, and Ricardo "Gaps" Tejeda.
Fortunately, not all is lost, according to Pax. They can retrieve the data if they send the drive to a data recovery specialist, who takes it into a clean room -- a sealed environment with polymer floors and walls and controlled temperatures and humidity levels -- and then does some computer voodoo called "hardware repair" and "specialized disk-imaging."
Data recovery, however, is pricey, averaging $1000, with difficult cases running double that.
Meanwhile, half a project by local hip-hop artist Ricardo "Gaps" Tejeda sits in limbo. Tejeda is set to release the first part of the project -- the part which was not on the drive and which consists of the four-song EP Live to Love Another Day -- Tuesday. But the scheduled mid-May release for the second part, currently on the drive, still hangs in the balance.
Moreover, he intended to make Live to Love free to the public, but is now asking for donations to help pay for the data recovery.
"The reason this hit us so hard is that there are so many projects on that drive," Tejeda says. "There are two years of Astrea Corp. music, a project for our buddy Iron Ora, a project from Pax and Protoman ... We all worked hard on it, and for me, [the songs on the drive] are the best I've written to date.
"From my perspective, this project was more than music," he continues, referring to good times and solidified friendships. "It's one of those funny things where you finish something, feel happy about your accomplishment, and sort of expect something bad to follow. And then it does, and it's way worse than you imagined."
To make a donation, or download the album early, visit here.
-- By Erica K. Landau
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