An early morning black coffee helped get back from the high altitudes ‘Rocket Fuel’ had taken me the previous night. Plan of the day was to relax and save all the energy for the big evening.  So I was chilling at the hotel doing what I normally do, talking to my computer lol

That’s it 4:30 PM time to rock or I should say time to be “in a state of trance” the only place that makes sense

We rushed out of the hotel to reach sunburn, the unexpected traffic made me realize that I was not the only one in Goa who was waiting for this day (obviously). Our car was moving at a snail’s pace, it was bumper to bumper horror. So we decided to find an appropriate place to dump our car, which turned out to be some 3.5 km away from sunburn festival venue. We didn’t walk the distance … We ran!!!

It’s funny that when you want to reach somewhere so badly even 3 km would seem like 300 lol. By the time we reached the venue DJ Pearl was already jamming at the sky dome and Sander Van Doorn at the Tree Dome. DJ Pearl was playing awesome house music and this time I was very near to the  stage (the right place to be)

No doubt DJ Pearl is one of India’s Finest House Music DJs. Her beats weaved magic…Check the Video

Pearl Jamming

7:30 PM 29th December 2009, So far Best day of my life… There comes the GOD on the sky dome, ready to take everyone into a state of trance. His entry sent the whole crowd into a tizzy, I caught myself chanting his name Armin! Armin! Armin! along with the crowd. The hysteria was similar to a cricket stadium when people are screaming  Sachin! Sachin! ….LOL …Ok don’t get mad, not trying to hurt anybody’s sentiments here… both are GOD’s in their respective worlds: P

If anyone present at sunburn had any doubt why is he called the No1 DJ in the world, Armin put it to rest with the first set he played. Armin’s intro track was a remix of his own track BT’s Every Other Way (awesome song), a great intro track i must say…he did a Air Guitar act which was funny…lol One of the reason I think he’s so great because the way he connects with people, If he finds you standing still and lost, he would immediately raise his hands and mesmerise you back in to the state of trance!!!

The next track was Paul van Dyk feat. Johnny McDaid – Home (Cosmic Gate Remix) another one of my favourite tracks, below this post I have the entire track list of Armin Van Burren at Sunburn Festival. Well I could go on and on about how the show was, but I don’t wish to bore you with just text so instead am posting the video… I am sharing my Armin Van Buuren Sunburn experience that we managed to capture for all of you who missed that special night and also for those who wish to go back in time and refresh their sunburn experience.

01. BT feat. JES – Every Other Way (Armin van Buuren Intro Remix)
02. Paul van Dyk feat. Johnny McDaid – Home (Cosmic Gate Remix)
03. ID
04. Velvetine – Safe (Wherever You Are) (Rank 1 Remix)
05. Evol Wavez – Name Is The Answer
06. Mat Zo – 24 Hours (Oliver Smith Remix)
07. Cerf, Mitiska & Jaren – Beggin’ You (Armin van Buuren Remix)
08. OceanLab vs. Gareth Emery – On A Metropolis Day (Myon & Shane 54 Mashup)
09. Jochen Miller – Brace Yourself
10. Ali Wilson vs. Armin van Buuren feat. Jacqueline Goavert – Never Say Shakedown (Armin van Buuren Mashup)

11. Gaia – Tuvan
12. Super8 & Tab – Irufushi

12. Super8 & Tab – Irufushi
13. Sophie Sugar vs. Sunlounger feat. Zara – Lost Together (Armin van Buuren Mashup)
14. Ernesto vs. Bastian – Killer Tone

15. Statica – Deadly Nightshade (Phynn Remix)

16. Filo & Peri feat. Aruna – Ashley (Alex M.O.R.P.H. Remix)

17. Chapter XJ – Resurrection (Jorn van Deynhoven Remix)
18. Roger Shah & Signum – Healesville Sanctuary (Roger Shah Mix – AvB Edit)
19. RAM vs. Dash Berlin with Cerf, Mitiska & Jaren – Man On The Ramsterdam (Mashup)
20. Cirez D vs. Armin van Buuren feat. Sharon den Adel – On Off Of Love (Armin van Buuren Mashup)

21. Dustin Zahn – Stranger To Stability (Len Faki Podium Mix)
22. W&W – Mainstage
23. Armin van Buuren vs. Rank 1 feat. Kush – This World Is Watching Me (Cosmic Gate Remix)
24. Paul Webster feat. Angelic Amanda – Time (Sean Tyas Dub)
25. Armin van Buuren feat. VanVelzen – Broken Tonight (Alex M.O.R.P.H. Remix)
26. John O’Callaghan feat. Sarah Howells – Find Yourself (Cosmic Gate Remix)
27. Armin van Buuren feat. Justine Suissa – Burned With Desire (Rising Star Mix)

<< My Psychedelic Journey – Sunburn Goa – Day Two

Dec 28th Sunburn GOA 2009

Day two started with a new travel plan, a place called the ‘zu bar’ situated on Ashwem Beach (North Goa).  The place was highly recommended by Unmisha’s friend Amaan. Yesterday was electronic circus and today operation ‘zu’.. not bad!  But we were warned… to reach ‘zu’ one had to manoeuvre a treacherous 90 degree steep road.

Prem said Chal dekte hai kya hai yeh (let’s see) and i heard Unmisha screaming “yay! ADVENTURE, Toooooooo Cooooooool”.

All right don’t get so excited, so we were there facing the “dangerous 90 degree steep road” and when Prem saw the road he kinda shivered almost dwelling on the thought of going back … heheh just kidding, the so called 90 degree steep road was just an over hyped urban legend, the kinds which you will hear from any advertising professional, The 90 degree steep road was so easy even my Bro ( a second gear Schumacher) could have taken it blindfolded…

Zu cafe was awesome, well i must thank Amaan for recommending us such a cool place… After a crazy Sunburn night, chilling at a peaceful place was not a bad idea, the heavenly beach is so cool that i would definitely would want to go there again n again.

TIP- If you ever go there DONT ever try the kalakhata drink  (black current Zu special) the drink just and i say it again JUST looks nice, i don’t wanna waste my time commenting on the taste of that drink because i would need another post for that.

Okay… Now we were fully charged for another crazy Sunburn Day.

We reached right on time to experience yet another killer night and what a deadly night it was! Roger Sanchez was brutal he was unleashing his killer house tunes which literally swept everyone off their feet.

This time I was at the VIP area… to be really honest i found it a little stupid since the vip area was so far away from the stage we could hardly see Roger Sanchez, but the beats were so insane that it could find its way to you, no matter where you are…

The music and the environment created a potent mix helping the adrenalin rush.

After those brutal beats, it was time to check a place called Sweet Chilli. We were told that not too far from sweet chilli there is a haunted place near Fort Aguada…so we decided to check that first… Again there was a warning!!! ”be careful its dark and HAUNTED, last time when I had been there I narrowly escaped the ghosts touching me ”

hahahhahahahahhaha……

Ok be serious… that sounds like a scary and pervert ghost… Sorry to disappoint you again, we wasted 10 minutes just looking for that ghost with our head lights down, creating a perfect opportunity for the ghost to scare us, but only two people who felt the TOUCH was Unmisha and Chetan who were sitting at the back seat… I don’t think I need to say anything further

All right any guesses who recommended us that place ?… you’re right, it was HIM again lol

Anyways we all were exhausted when we got there, but I was quite happy with sweet chilli restaurant because of great ambiance and live retro music… we ordered some food and I called for a drink which goes with the name of “Rocket Fuel”. Now that cocktail can really make you FLY, why?… Simple, it’s a heady mix of Whiskey, Rum, Vodka and Tequila!!!

All I wanna say is Rocket Fuel did what it was suppose to do

My Psychedelic Journey – Sunburn Goa – Day Three >>

What is Sunburn festival?
Sunburn is Asia’s biggest three-day electronic musical event held at Candolim beach in Goa. Sunburn offers live performances by top DJ’s from all over the world, check the DJ lineup below (get more info here)

I attended Sunburn with my 2 “Big” bros and my Bhabhi.. lol  (Sudish aka Prem, Chetan and Unmisha aka Bhabhi )

My magical journey began with a road trip,.. we started on 26th Dec at 6:00 am and touched the sands of GOA at 6:30 pm…I heard Prem saying “Sun rises in Mumbai and Sets in Goa” though some of the songs on my bro’s iPod somewhat killed the fun of a road trip, (he listens to Phir Teri Kahani Yaad Aayi, Pankaj Udhas, Aashiqui). Don’t believe me? Just check the screens below that I took from his iPod touch)

Anyways, I said “Fuc* it, anything for Armin!” Oh! I should mention this. The egg curry at (Sai Plaza Kolhapur, Maharashtra ) totally rocks! Do give it a try

Dec 27th - Sunburn Festival Day One

Let me tell you, if you are taking your car to GOA in December then it’s a bad idea! No parking space, insane traffic = total CHAOS!!!.

We noticed the problem and found a great solution straightaway, a “two seat bicycle”

Something which no one else had in GOA and it was a great experience riding one on the streets of GOA.

The Peddlers in GOA

I know what you’re thinking after watching the video…such a lucky dude, well let me tell you something… I was feeling like one till the end of the day, but riding one of these on Indian roads is a big challenge and with any challenge comes some amount of pain…Piercing pain in unmentionable body parts  AAAAAHHHH!!!

That’s it! I was there staring at the DREAMLAND all set to get Sunburnt, but the 30 minutes delay by Sunburn team due to preparations was killing us, so we decided to take a quick tour of Candolim beach to relieve some pain. But as you can see in the pic, the disappointment on our face is clearly visible

Finally we entered the electronic circus and it was far more awesome than what I had imagined. The SUN, SAND, BEER, and MIND-BLOWING music. DJ Inferno & Ritesh at the shack with Nikhil Chinappa and an amazing crowd.

Electronic music was not the only thing. Sunburn was also offering rock climbing wall, hookah stalls, exceptional shoes, neon glasses etc. There was something for everyone

After a while, we moved out to grab some lunch and later to the hotel…I already had the DJ lineup with me so I knew which gigs I can’t afford to miss, after all I was dependent as I was attending Sunburn with 3 people who don’t like electronic music at all. They didn’t even know Armin Van Buuren, DJ Sultan until a month back! But thanks to internet “Google” they did a quick research on Sunburn and the DJs so they can rant on Facebook, Twitter LOL!

Alright, going back to Sunburn day one, I knew that was no matter what happens, I shouldn’t miss DJ Sultan. I became a huge FAN of DJ Sultan when I first heard Sultan and Tone depth mix “which takes you someplace else ” and BT Rose Of Jericho (Sultan & Ned Shepard mix) which I remember playing repeatedly on my iPod for days, well just check the DJ sultan video from Sunburn that I captured,  you can see the camera shaking…the music was so COOL I just couldn’t stand still.

It was just perfect, truly magical first day of Sunburn and the view from my neon glasses was so great, I can’t even explain you where those neon lights and such cool music can take you!

My Psychedelic Journey – Sunburn Goa – Day Two >>

It’s been a while since I updated my blog. Last year had been a super roller coaster ride for me. I’ve been busy with Work, Life and Trance…

Been doing things that I don’t like…well everyone hates to do things that they don’t like but there are times when we don’t have a choice and all this while, my only companion was Electronic Music and no one else. Yes Trance! Being in a state away from the real world. People think Trance sucks, I say it Rocks! It makes everything all right! When you have to focus or even lose your self completely there is nothing better than electronic music.

Last year on May 23rd 2009 my friend Ashwin aka addu had made arrangements for me to experience my first ever electronic music gig by Midival Punditz @ BlueFROG (Thanks Ashwin) I was so excited, as I love this music genre so much and to be able to experience it live is totally awesome! But it didn’t turn out the way I thought it would People say lack of rest leads to tragedy and I learnt it the hard way (still learning ).

Before the big Friday ah! Its Friday I’m not in love hehe… out of 50+ hrs, I only managed to get sleep for 4-5 hrs and that cost me big time, but no regrets. The gig started and the music totally rocked! Was just 2 songs away and I was literally in a state of trance (I just love this phrase…Ya! I love this), My brain put me into sudden sleep…I passed out due to lack of sleep. In fact, it was so bad it took me 15 days to recover completely.

Life goes on… I was back to my routine, but my love with this music continues. Well, hitting the fast forward button I’ll jump to November 2009. When I found out that Armin Van Buuren (No 1 DJ in the world) is coming to

Goa, India @Sunburn WOW!!! Not a single day of mine goes without listening to his tunes so how can I miss his gig… No F**king way!

I started working towards my trance dream and what an awesome way to end the year, a roller coaster year that will always remain in my heart! I greatly missed my friends at Sunburn. They like this music genre as much as I do but couldn’t make it. So my next post on Sunburn is dedicated to all my friends who missed this magical experience.

Anyhow I’m back with a promise to update my site more frequently…

So stay tuned for more dope!

Sam

On Saturday 31st Jan Big G scared the bejesus out of me. I Googled something and my sites showed up in search results with a shocking tag “This site may harm your computer” right under my webpage title.

Before going completely nuts, I Googled new term and this time it was “Google” and this is what I found… lol

It turned out to be nothing but a small coding error by Google but an hour of mental trauma for Google users

Google’s official blog post about this incident This site may harm your computer

What happened? Very simply, human error. Google flags search results with the message “This site may harm your computer” if the site is known to install malicious software in the background or otherwise surreptitiously. We do this to protect our users against visiting sites that could harm their computers. We maintain a list of such sites through both manual and automated methods. We work with a non-profit called StopBadware.org to come up with criteria for maintaining this list, and to provide simple processes for webmasters to remove their site from the list.

We periodically update that list and released one such update to the site this morning.

Google team quickly found this error and fixed it. Thanks Big G

In SEO a very important aspect of any On-page optimization is Clean Code. Search engine robots or spiders see your website code and we humans see content and design directly.

By using CSS (cascading style sheets) you can enhance your website SEO in a major way

Let’s see how we can do SEO with CSS

• Rapid Loading Web Sites
  One of the foremost reason you should use CSS is because, it makes the webpage lighter. If coded properly it will significantly cut down the weight of your webpage and will remove any unwanted html code. This in turn would make it easier for the search engine spiders, to crawl the website, and lead to better and faster indexing of your website. It will also positively facilitate ‘content to code ratio’ which is very important in SEO
• Content on Top of webpage
  Now, let me tell you something about how search engine spiders crawl websites, they read websites top to bottom. Having your most important content with keywords embedded on top of the webpage, helps your website to rank higher for your major keywords. You can achieve this by using “absolute” tag

Download this ready to use SEO CSS layouts which you can use while developing your website

You can also download SEO layouts from http://layouts.ironmyers.com/ they have a variety of tableless layouts available for download

• Headlines – H1 /H2 tags instead of ugly <font> tag
  H1-H6 tags or heading tags if used correctly it can boost your rankings. But I know they don’t look as cool as your <font> styling. With CSS you can tweak how H1 tags render your headings. You can change font size, color, give borders, backgrounds etc

Here is a little example of how cool heading can look and at the same time it helps in boosting SERP

<h1 class=”h1″>Custom HEADING using CSS</h1>

.h1 {
color: #000;
font-size: 110%;
border-bottom-width: 3px;
border-bottom-style: dashed;
border-bottom-color: #FC0;
font-family: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif;
font-weight: bold;
padding-bottom: 4px;
background-image: url(icon.gif);
background-repeat: no-repeat;
background-position: left 2px;
padding-top: 12px;
padding-left: 30px;
background-color: #FFFFD9;
}

• SEO Friendly navigation
  Your website’s internal link structure plays a very crucial role in SEO, as it helps pages   to get indexed quickly and having your keywords hyperlinked increases the relevancy between pages. Also it’s really important for your visitors to navigate your site in just few clicks. A good SEO navigation can help you achieve high rankings in search engines. I recommend using pure CSS menus instead of using crappy JavaScript / Table menus

You can download some really cool SEO friendly CSS menus that I have developed. Just play around with CSS and you can change the style of these menus as per your website design

• Ease of maintenance a real time saver
  Yes by using CSS you can maintain your site efficiently and swiftly. Time is money, and CSS not only helps your site rank higher in search engines but it also saves your much valuable time.In a scenario where you decide that you want to change the text color and background color of your header, if your site is coded the old fashioned way without CSS, then you will have to edit each and every page of your website and make the needed changes. However if you are using CSS, with a slight change in the tag and all your pages gets updated in the desired manner, instantly.

Wrong CSS techniques that will result in getting your site banned in search engines

Using CSS to hide keywords/text

Many webmasters use Black Hat SEO techniques. Hiding keywords from users through CSS will definitely get you into trouble. Search engines read that text, but it also detects that the text is hidden from users, which could get your site banned.

I have stated some of the important benefits of using Cascading Style Sheets. If you have some of them to share, please use the comment form below.

Wishing everyone a very Merry Christmas and a rocking 2009!!!

Bad reviews by users in blogs, forums & other online reviews/media websites about your company, leads to bad reputation in search engine and only way to tackle them is by using the power of  world wide web

The best way to start improving your online reputation is with your own website

Some of the steps you should take are:

•    Re-design your website
•    Update good quality content
•    Add a FAQ section
•    Set up company blog
•    Company News updates

Now that you have revamped your website its time you get really aggressive.

You can begin, by doing some online research using search engine such as Google, simply search your company name and find out specific blogs and forums of your industry, where your company’s image has been affected by bad reviews

After you have the list of those blogs and forums, you need to start blog commenting and forum posting. Consider posting some positive information about your company. Register to those forums and participate in discussions, be sincere and honest while keeping your point. If you discover your company has made many mistakes then admit it and apologize.  Just a sorry won’t work, try and fix their problems

You can also do some article submissions and set up social networking pages for your business, which you can further optimize and get them ranked in search engine through SEO. They will push the bad reviews down in search results and will also bring new traffic to your website

If you don’t have time or your company reputation has really taken a beating then, you need to contact online reputation management expert. A good SMO expert can really turn the table around and make your brand stand-out with good positive results. Through social media optimization you can really win back your company’s image and also get hell lot of traffic and high quality back links to your website

Another funny way to tackle the situation is to create another mistake but a small one lol.

So the current pages go down in SERP, but this is very tricky and not advisable. If the strategy doesn’t execute as planned then your brand will be completely screwed