faq - frequently asked questions
1. About Norbu
1.1. What is Norbu?
1.2. Meaning of Creative Commons license
1.3. Meaning of the word Norbu
1.4. Demo policy
1.5. I want to support you, but don't know how
1.6. About our design
1.7. Why shoutbox?
2. Confusing stuff
2.1. Why/what is octal?
2.2. What's up with Droog's multilinguality?
2.3. What's up with Kalope's multilinguality?
2.4. What is Petanque?
2.5. What is Grgamrgatron?
2.6. The story behind norbu00
2.7. Why the long pause(between 07 and 10)?
1.1. What is Norbu?
Norbu is a pioneering RSS-powered Belgrade-based netlabel specializing in minimal, deep house and ambient sounds. We distribute our releases free of charge under Creative Commons license (see below for more info). Our previously almost-monthly releases are available in 256kbs MP3 format and lossless. Norbu was founded by Danilo Tomic and Jan Nemecek. The idea behind it was to have an outlet for any kind of sounds that make them move, from glitch minimal to ambient deep house. Sometimes, during the octal year, we can have one or more special guest appearances.
1.2. Meaning of Creative Commons license
The Creative Commons is a non-profit organisation that tries to make creative work available for others to use and share. The type of license we are using allows you to freely share our music (copy, distribute and transmit the work), but only if you fully credit us and it is for noncommerical purposes. Sampling and altering of the music is not allowed by this license, but be free chop/effect it during your performance :)
1.3. Meaning of the word Norbu
Norbu is actually a popular Tibetan name. It means a precious gem (germ).
1.4. Demo policy
We do not accept demos anymore. We especially do not accept speedcore, grindcore, noise and ambient noise demos. If you really wanna send us tracks, make sure they fit in well with the releases on the site (preferably later ones) so we can consider you for our annual octal year special guest appearance. This is your chance to appear next to netlabel luminaries such as droog and kalope.
1.5. I want to support you, but don't know how
If you really, really want to support us, you can buy our releases on Beatport and/or vinyl stores.
If you're unsure what we're called, please consult Discogs and MySpace.
1.6. About our design
If you're confused about our design inconsistencies, you should be. The good stuff all designed by Vlada Stevanovic, our talented designing friend. The not so good stuff is designed by design hotshot duo Kalope and Droog (the latter being in charge of typefaces).
1.7. Why shoutbox?
"Because it's interesting and nothing is interesting in this world any more..."
2.1. Why/what is octal?
The octal numeral system is the base-8 number system which uses digits from 0 to 7 (hence the norbu10 release after norbu07). If you're asking why, it is because the counting using the spaces between their fingers is always more fun than the fingers themselves. If you are still confused, please see the Wikipedia entry.
2.2. What's up with Droog's multilinguality?
Droog is a Nadsat term for friend from A Clockwork Orange. Other phrases used by Droog may also come from this work and/or his born affection for Spanish and German (Muy Schon, Alles Ist Hermoso, etc...).
2.3. What's up with Kalope's multilinguality?
TBA
2.4. What is Petanque?
Pétanque is a form of boules where the goal is, while standing with the feet together in a small circle, to throw metal balls as close as possible to a small wooden ball called a cochonnet.
2.5. What is Grgamrgatron?
Grgamrgatron is a large battle robot (as lovingly depicted on norbu05 cover).
2.6. The story behind norbu00
Concerning the norbu00 release (which is required by our octal numeral system and present in our release catalogue), all we are at liberty to say is that it will emerge sometime in distant future. It has nothing to do with current global economic situation and it does in fact have a lot of cowbells as expected for such an early release.
2.7. Why the long pause (between 07 and 10)?
Like a flap of a butterfly's wings that may cause an unexpected larger changes in the future, such was the influence of the norbu00. Eventually, we found out in late 2007. that it was impossible to upload the finished norbu08 release. We then spent several months pondering the future of Norbu and with little help of one of our math wizz fans, it was revealed that we were in octal numeral system all along. The proof was undeniable, we never had success with releases uncompatible with the base-8 system.