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Monday, February 27, 2006
  I know it's Fox News...

but still, can't you at least do some fuckin' research? From a review of V For Vendetta:

Then there’s the whole thing with Alan Moore, who wrote the graphic novel but had his name taken off of the movie. Illustrator David Lloyd left his name on the credits, which seems right. Why Moore didn’t want a “based on” credit beats me. After all, a lot of his dialogue survived. I think he’ll regret that move.

Dude. All this has been covered. Moore giving up his credit "beats" you? Well, there's a thing called Google. It'll take you to where you need to go. After being named in a plagiarism lawsuit over the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen shit-bomb,
Moore felt that enough was enough and decided that if something was worth reacting to, "it was worth overreacting to." He stated "I'd have nothing to do with films anymore. If I owned the sole copyright, like with 'Voice Of The Fire,' there would not be a film. Anything else, where others owned copyrights, I'd insist on taking my name off future films. All of the money due to me would go to the artists involved. I'd divorce myself from the film process, the film industry and any adaptations. And I felt a sense of moral satisfaction."

So, yeah, is that so hard to understand? And when it comes to regret, well, uh, no. No, he won't. No matter how good the movie is, or how much money it makes, I really doubt Alan Moore will regret passing up credit. He's already read some of the script, and found it atrocious. He's already established the fact that he has absolutely no interest in Hollywood. It's probably more likely that he'd return to DC to write a Captain Carrot book than ever express any sort of regret over not sticking to his principles.
 
  Jim's Meme

Haven't had a good meme in a while.

1. Worst DVD I own:

When I'd get bored or depressed in Athens I'd go buy random shit at Borders. One day I bought Nurse Betty, Timecode, and They Saved Hitler's Brain for absolutely no good reason whatsoever. None of them are awful, or anything (well, okay, that last one is, but it's more entertaining than the other two), but there's no point in me owning any of them. And since I pretty much only buy a DVD if I know I absolutely want it, these are probably the worst, or least necessary, in my collection. Oh shit, also that Almost Famous DVD, the one that came out before the Untitled edit. A shitty, unnecessary DVD for a pretty shitty movie.


2. Worst concert I've seen in person:

I didn't quite see it, but I was there, in person, on stage. The ingredients for an anti-classic: an uncomfortably packed house show on a cold night. An hour delay after the first two bands have played. Kegs that never seem to run dry (normally a good thing, yes). A violent drag-queen. Easily breakable light fixtures. Bad acid. Starting our set well after two am. Lack of practice. Untunable guitars. Pragmatic drummer. Blood, shattered glass, general mayhem. We made it through two and a half songs before Griggs walked out. More stuff got broken. What a horrible, horrible, absolutely miserable experience, far worse than any of the many shitty concerts I've seen by other folks.

3. Worst experience ever in a restaurant:

Not a great story. We were at some shitty chain bbq joint in Chattanooga, like the Applebee's of barebecue, maybe Famous Fingers or Sticky Dave's. The waiter was some frat-house pretty-boy who spent all his time flirting with the waitresses. He brought us our menus after ten minutes or so and basically disappeared. We'd see him walk out of the back, go talk to a waitress for a few minutes, then disappear again. After another ten or fifteen minutes he took our drink orders. Twenty minutes later we had to flag down the manager, who brought us our drinks and took our order. After our food came, the waiter came by, sat next to us, and tried to sweet-talk us into forgiving him, talking about how they were short a cook in the back and he was filling in. Of course we saw him take a smoke-break at one point, and he was regularly flirting with the waitresses. He was even half-assed with the smooth-talk. He very obviously did not give a fuck whatsoever. The manager gave us free dessert, which was nice, and comp'ed the folks next to us, who apparently waited over a half-hour to get their bill.

4. Worst movie I've ever seen in the theater:

Too many to decide. Maybe Million Dollar Mystery, the first time I ever saw a movie in a completely empty theater. Or perhaps Caddyshack II, the first movie I ever walked out on. Color of Night would get some consideration, if it wasn't absolutely hilarious. But no, only two films can legitimately compete for this award: Devil's Advocate and Pumpkin.

5. Worst book I've actually finished:

I don't even finish books I like half the time. I'd have to go back to something forced upon us in high school, probably, to answer this one. Or how about Nevermind the Pollacks? Again, not really awful, but two or three halfway decent, but not particularly clever, jokes stretched out to 200 pages. Definitely inferior to his first one, which still wasn't even that consistently great.

6. Worst looking/least appealing celebrity I'd have intimate relations with "just to tell the story":

I don't know, Barbara Walters? She was the first woman network news anchor, and everything.
 
Friday, February 24, 2006
  more radio in half an hour

Mesmerization Eclipse, WZBC, 3 to 5 pm.

Hopefully the streams are working.

And c'mon! Gay City! That's classic! And that's not even Photoshop - that's a legitimate panel from an actual 1940 Superman comic.

And Robin face-first in some dude's butt! What's wrong with you people? Fuckin' gold, solid gold.
 
 

 
 

 
Thursday, February 23, 2006
  A Feast For The Ears

My pal Yoshi put this up on his blog. I don't know where he found it, but I'm sure a lot of you will thoroughly enjoy this. I love Tuvan throat singing. I was in a Joy Division cover band with Dark and OJ.

As my new boss would say (forty times a day), ENJOY.
 
  and a thousand horrible bands discover a new name

Quick, is www.jurassicbeaver.com taken yet?
 
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
  legal downloads

I'm a law-abiding citizen. I quit soulseeking when I met my wife, think that Kazaa is a fictional Russian country in a 1980's G.I.Joe comic, and have never paid attention to BitTorrent 'cuz it sounds like some awful techno band. When I download shit it's on the up-and-up, at least lately. The last couple months I've grabbed stuff from iTunes, Napster, and eMusic; all three have their benefits and drawbacks. Here are some thoughts on the last of them services, the latest I've explored.

Good things about eMusic:

1. They've got back-catalogue from pretty much every major indie label. Drag City and Sub Pop are notable exceptions. You want all those Portastatic or Xiu Xiu records that all sound exactly the same as one another, but don't want to pay full price for 'em? You can get it at eMusic.

2. You get 50 free downloads before your membership kicks in. With that fifty I grabbed a ton of live Hawkwind stuff and some great records by Jack Rose, the Diplomats, and Makoto Kawabata and Richard Youngs.

3. 90 downloads a month costs only $20. Or seventy bucks less than iTunes.

4. They've got the Chrome Box. Early Chrome records are impossibly hard to come by now. Go look on eBay; I'm sure you'll find a copy of Blood on the Moon going for some ridiculous amount. You can buy a cd with great early album 3rd From the Sun and some later inessential shit for only $199 through Amazon. I got both those records plus like four more through eMusic, and still had enough downloads left over for five more albums.

Bad Things about eMusic:

1. No major label participation whatsoever. TVT and Koch are as big as it gets. This of course leads directly to...

2. A horrible selection of rap/hip-hop. Other than Lil Jon, the Ying Yang Twins, the Diplomats, and the last two Goodie Mob records, pretty much all rap you can get on eMusic comes from unknowns. If you want to download those two good Dem Franchize Boyz songs, you'll have to look elsewhere.

3. Although there are dozens of records I am interested in hearing, there are very few that I'm actually excited to download. They do have some excellent stuff - the new Excepter ep, the entire catalogues of Robert Wyatt and the Minutemen, etc. - but I had a hard time finding stuff I'd be willing to pay full-price for in stores. eMusic's useful for sampling stuff, but you're not very likely to find that one specific album you most want to own at the moment.

4. They didn't credit me for my 50 free songs when my wife signed up. I sent my wife an invitation, she joined, and I still haven't received the 50 free downloads they promised. Assholes.

I think it's clear the positives outweight the negatives here. I heartily recommend eMusic.
 
Friday, February 17, 2006
  radio

Okay, MezEclipse the Show is on WZBC right now. No idea if they've fixed the streams, or if SA has changed his schedule.
 
  more on tv

NOTE: I've never really been into dramas or hour-long shows, at least not until the last few years, so for the most part the words television and sitcom are interchangeable below.

I'm generally not one to ever put limitations upon what items can legitimately be compared to each other. It'd be odd to compare and contrast a certain type of shoehorn to an ancient Sumerian sun-god, but if you can pull it off convincingly then, by all means, try. Of course comparing an ancient sun-god to a comparable god from a similar ancient culture would be far easier to justify and maintain than comparing one to a modern footware implement, but still, I believe the whole apples and oranges argument is invoked far too often. Still, in spite of this, I have a seriously hard time comparing television of the last fifteen to twenty years with that which came before.

Talking about the relative greatness of today's television naturally made me think of the great (and just supposedly great) shows throughout history. Unfortunately many of these shows, while definitely important and no doubt excellent and ground-breaking taken within their historical context, hold little for the modern viewer. How can one seriously compare Seinfeld or The Simpsons to something like The Andy Griffith Show? Now, don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Andy Griffith, and truly believe it to be the greatest sitcom (and perhaps program) of tv's first forty (or so) years. But the entire nature of television in general, and the sitcom in particular, has changed so thoroughly over the last twenty years that Griffith, despite its wonderful writing and acting, would probably be barely recognizable as entertainment to anybody under the age of 18.

I grew up in the '80's, watching endless reruns of shows good and bad from the '50's, '60's, and '70's. My love of television was forged by shows like Andy Griffith, Sanford and Son, Bewitched, WKRP in Cincinati, The Jeffersons, Three's Company, Diff'rent Strokes, Leave it to Beaver, Ozzie and Harriet, Benson, et al. When I see these shows today they don't seem odd or quaint to me, although they do make me nostalgiac for my youth. I have extensive experience with these and many other old programs, and so when I see them I'm able to accept them for what they are. When I encounter a show from those eras that I've never really seen before, though, it can be really jarring. The wife and I started watching Soap this week. I had seen a few stray episodes when I was a kid, but other than the concept, some of the actors involved, and the Benson character, I've never really know anything about this show. With no personal history, I was shocked at how slow and labored everything was. There was hardly any subtlety, and the only irony was reflective of soap opera cliches and not those of sitcoms. In the present post-traditional-sitcom era, a sitcom that's stereotypical in structure and format is almost impossible for me to accept, even if it's a show from the past that I've merely never seen before. I realize Soap was considered controversial and groundbreaking at the time, and is still spoken of as one of the more notable sitcoms in history; all I see, though, is a mediocre program hobbled by the stodgy constraints of its genre, and that generally bungles its good concept. If they had cut back on the awful punchlines and dropped the laugh-track, Soap would have worked far better both as comedy and as a parody of soap operas. Of course, if they did that, it'd be an even more blatant rip-off of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.

And so, I find it surpassingly difficult to effectively compare the telvision of the last 15-20 years to that which came before it. The programs I knew well as a child are what, in comparison, made The Simpsons and Seinfeld and Get a Life so amazing and special, whereas those very same shows from the '90's, and the ways in which they broke down and destroyed the traditional tropes of the sit-com, have made it almost impossible to get into older shows that I have no history with. Thus I am completely incapable of comparing the new and the old. Fuckin' A.

The true test will come, I suppose, whenever I make an attempt to watch The Mary Tyler Moore Show, or The Dick Van Dyke Show. Both are regularly mentioned as being among the greatest shows of all time. I've seen, maybe, two episodes of either. Could I ever believe them to be genuinely great, or will they merely be great in relation to the sit-coms of their day? Anybody a fan of either?
 
  television thoughts

For the last day or two SA and I have been having a really ridiculous conversation about television. It sort of started in earnest when Sean asked me if I agreed that we might currently be in the middle of a "television renaissance". I don't know if I'd call it a golden age, or anything, as like 90% of what's on tv is still awful beyond belief, but there does seem to be more good to great programs on than at any other point of the past thirty or so years. Of course, with cable's non-stop proliferation and expansion, it only makes sense that there's more worth watching; more channels should equal a greater probability of quality, right? Anyway, here are some excerpts from our conversations. I'm in bold, SA's in italics, 'cuz he's half-Italian hisself.

SA: do you think we're in the midst of a television renaissance? think about all the awesome shows that are on right now or have been in the last five years. compare that to any other five year period in the history of TV.

Dark: I don't know if I'd call it a golden age. there are only like three or four shows I make a point of watching. granted that number would maybe double if I could afford HBO. it makes sense, though, that as we have more and more channels we'll have more and more good tv shows.

...

Go back to '92-'93, though, and even though there are less good shows, overall, the greatness of two of them maybe eclipse everything happening today. Both Simpsons and Seinfeld came into their own in 1991, and for the next three years they were maybe the two greatest shows of all time. Seinfeld is questionable, but The Simpsons is easily the greatest show in the history of television, primarily for Seasons 3, 4, and 5, and parts of seasons 2, 6, 7, 8, etc. It's still capable of greatness today. I would say that, based solely on these two shows being at their peak, and the additional goodness of Picket Fences, X-Files, Brisco County, Bob (loves me some Newhart), last year of Cheers, Lowell and Antonio on Wings, the beginning of Beavis and Butt-head, etc., 1992-1993 might be better than today. I WOULD say that, if it weren't for the only show that comes close to the Simpsons at its best: Arrested Development.

...

Those early Simpsons are incomparably brilliant. I was about to say that I'd take today over back then, if only because AD is almost as great as those Simpsons, and we still have an occasionally hilarious Simpsons on the air. But damn, I don't think I can bring myself to vote against those years of the show.

Can we just agree that the last 15 or so years of tv is better than the 40 or so years that preceded it?


i think HBO really changes everything if you compare the present to 1995 (when did the sopranos start?).

I forgot about News Radio. Also the Kids in the Hall was really good, but that was pre-95, right?

This will probably piss you off, but I can't really think of the Simpsons in the context of Great Shows, similar to how it's difficult to think of Star Wars in cinematic terms. Simpsons, like Star Wars, is so embedded in my personal... culture, I guess, that I can't really compare it. I've seen the episodes so many times, plus in my opinion it really has gone dowhill over the last five or seven years. I haven't watched it regularly in many years now.

However, I can think of Seinfeld as a Great Show for some reason.

Let's put it this way: my favorite shows of all-time, in no order:

1. Seinfeld
2. the Wire
3. Freaks and Geeks
4. Arrested Development
5. Mr. Show
6. the Office (if you lump both versions together)

That's three shows from now. Plus, Veronica Mars is supposed to be awesome.


you really got me thinking.

I broke up the last fifteen years into three five-year blocks. They run like a tv season would, fall to fall, except for the first block, which starts with January 1, 1991. So it goes 1/1/91 through 8/96; 9/96 through 8/01; 9/01 through this fall, etc. I've included only dramas or sitcoms, no sketch or stand-up or talk shows or news parodies. Also excluded shows that weren't primarily one story told over at least a half-hour, so out goes Beavis and Butthead and everything on Adult Swim.
Okay, here's how I'm looking at it:

1991-1996

The Simpsons
Seinfeld
Twin Peaks
Newsradio
Get a Life
Picket Fences
The Larry Sanders Show
Cheers
Frasier
X-Files (only watched season one, but it was good)
Adventures of Brisco County Jr

1996-2001

Freaks and Geeks
Newsradio
The Simpsons
Oz
Buffy
Gilmore Girls
Seinfeld
The Larry Sanders Show

2001-2006

Arrested Development
The Office UK
Gilmore Girls
Lost
The Office US
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Andy Richter Controls the Universe
The Simpsons
Buffy
Undeclared
King of the Hill
Firefly

Really, all three periods are not too far off from each other. 96-2000 didn't have many great shows, but it did have much excellence. Freaks and Geeks is my favorite drama / hour-long show ever, probably my third favorite program of all time. You also have the glory years of Newsradio, Buffy, and Oz, the first season of Gilmore Girls, a still-strong but notably deteriorating Simpsons, and a Seinfeld that I unfairly wrote off at the time. If you ease up my restrictions, amazing stuff like Mr. Show, Conan at its peak, the Kilborn-hosted Daily Show, and Space Ghost would maybe make the list. There's also the first season of the Sopranos, which I've never seen, but which some critics have called the greatest season of any tv show ever. Still, though, I'd say this is obviously the weakest of these three periods.

So it comes down to 91-96 and 01-06. And here's where the dilemma mentioned in my previous email pops up: there're more great shows overall these last few years, but their collective greatness might be less than that of the best shows from '91 to '96. As I've already established, absolutely nothing beats the Simpsons at its peak. From '91 to '94 Seinfeld was almost as great as The Simpsons, thus almost as great as the greatest tv that ever done greated. The first half of Twin Peaks is unassailable, the last quarter is almost as good (the stuff in-between sucks). Picket Fences was awesome for its two first seasons, at least. Easily the best show David Kelley ever made. You've got the first season of Newsradio, the last few years of Cheers, the beginning of Frasier (maybe the last of the great traditional sitcoms), the start of Larry Sanders, the only season of X-Files I ever watched (which was really great), etc.

The argument can be framed as such: would you rather have a rotation with two true aces, two Buehrle-type dudes who'd be number ones on teams without a true ace, a steady proven inning-eating veteran on the downside of his career and then a stacked bullpen; or one with the greatest pitcher of all time, two additional aces, a solid number two starter, a promising rookie who will develop into an all-time classic (before untimely tragedy ends his career early), and then a solid bullpen? The former being today, the latter being '91 to '96. It comes down to greatness vs. depth, and I can't really pick.


see, i never watched a lot of these shows, nor gave a shit about tv until now, even though the only shows i watch are/were AD, office, and lost. that would all change considerably if i had HBO, though. and showtime(?). and SKINEMAX.

here's how my blocks would look, while trying to include the Simpsons:

1991-1996
Seinfeld
Simpsons
Newsradio
X-Files
Twin Peaks (never really got into this for some reason)
ER (was really into it at the time, would never want to watch dvds of it)
Frasier (I watched this but didn't really like it that much)

1996-2001
Freaks and Geeks
Seinfeld
Newsradio
Sopranos
King Of The Hill
Buffy
Simpsons

2001-present
The Wire
Arrested Development
Office UK
Office US
Deadwood
Undeclared
Sopranos
Lost
Curb Your Enthusiasm (I only saw the first few episodes a while back and keep meaning to rent the dvds- so it could rank higher later on)
King Of The Hill
Buffy
Simpsons
Six Feet Under
Angel

And Rome, Gilmore, Battlestar Galactica, 24, the Shield, Firefly, and especially Veronica Mars are all supposed to be really great too.

Oh, EXTRAS!


Is Firefly good?

I had trouble deciding to rank the wire of arrested development on top. they are the opposite of each other, but both completely incredible.


Okay, yes, amazingbly boring reading. I'll follow up in another post.
 
Friday, February 10, 2006
  more radio hi-jinks

Okay, once again, Mesmerization Eclipse on WZBC, 3 to 5 pm. Today we'll be talking with a suepr secret special guest*, so listen in.






*: this is not true.
 
  Oh, come on!

So the four episodes of Arrested Development airing on Fox tonight are probably the last new ones we'll ever see. Fox hasn't officially cancelled it, but their top guy has made it clear that it will not be returning. The gossip maven from E!'s website writes today that ABC and Showtime are both prepared to offer deals, but that Hurwitz and the cast are leaning towards throwing it in. She quotes an "Anyong-in-the-walls deep" source within the show as saying there's only a 20% chance of the show returning. So tonight is most likely the end, for real. This reminds me of that night in July of 2000 when NBC burned off three of the four unaired episodes of Freaks and Geeks in one night. This isn't quite as depressing, but still, man, drag. For the last couple years AD and Lost have been the only shows that I'm totally obsessive about, where I won't answer the phone or make any plans whatsoever for the nights they're on. Of course AD has been on so infrequently this year that I've already adapted to not planning an evening around it. The last few Mondays have been intensive Gilmore Girls nights, usually tearing through three or so episodes. The missus and I would probably be obsessive about watching GG on Tuesdays, if we had been able to catch up through the first five seasons before the current one started. We actually just finished season five last night, which is the last one thus released on dvd. Unfortunately I don't see it possible for us to catch up on season six before seven starts, so we'll probably never become regular weekly Gilmore viewers. Anyway, I suppose The Office could replace AD as appointment television for me, but even though I really like it hasn't grabbed me as tightly or resolutely as AD or Lost or Buffy or Freaks and Geeks or The Simpsons or Facts of Life all have in the past. I've missed the last few episodes of The Office without feeling any remorse. I downloaded one from iTunes, actually one that I missed back in December, the "Booze Cruise" episode, but that was mostly just to see what it's like watching tv on the train to work. It's probably the closest to being a potential obsession for me, but it's still not at that level. I guess for the time being at least Wednesday will be the only night where I allow the tv to boss me around.
 
Tuesday, February 07, 2006
  computer help

Hey, does anybody know a good, free program that'll convert .avi files to mpeg-4?
 
Monday, February 06, 2006
  Where I Will Be Tomorrow Night


Shintaro Miyake: The Beaver Project is an all-encompassing, whimsical dissertation into the real and imagined world of the American Beaver (Castor candensis)

Rob the Field Recordist is helping to put this together. He has personally guaranteed its amazingness.

Donning a fuzzy homemade costume of a "cartoon" beaver, Miyake starred as "Beaver" in a video that blurs fiction and reality as he gathered wood to build his 45-foot multi-colored dam and shopped for chest waders and lumber for his lodge. Throughout the process Beaver was aided by friendly "neighbors" who gave construction advice, helped gather and paint wood and placed the structures in the water ...

This epic exhibition will include a re-created pond with a beaver village, including the dam and lodge from the film, many landscape drawings, "faux" nature documentary film and an on-site performance wall drawing which will commence at the exhibition's opening. Miyake, as Beaver, will then draw continuously for three days to complete this 30-foot narrative. There will also be a Beaver Souvenir Stand and a Natural History Museum of Beavers (in collaboration with Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology).

Unfortuately I fear photographs will not be allowed.
 
  I Am Not a Child

Okay. I play video games sometimes. Lately those times are more often than not. If I'm home, and I'm not watching something with the wife, I'm probably playing a video game. If it's not considered entirely normal and natural for a man of my age to play video games, it's because the general population has yet to come around and realize that video games are an entirely valid form of cultural consumption for members of any and all age groups. They're not always inherently just for kids, and I think it should be readily apparent by now that the first generation of video gamers, a generation of which most of us are probably a part, will mostly persist in playing and enjoying video games as long as members of it remain on this Earth. When all those Restoration kids were going nuts for that Oroonoko shit, did that brand English-language novels as kid's stuff forever after? Should video games thus be denigrated in such a fashion? Heavens, no!

1. Beyond Good and Evil.

I played the GameCube version, but I believe it also exists on Playstation 2, X-Box, and PC. I had never heard of this until I looked at Metacritic's list of the highest rated GameCube games a year or so ago. Apparently it was a massive failure, reinforcing the unfortunate fact that games geared towards older or smarter players tend to fail when released for the Cube. Whenever I'd find myself near an EB or GameStop I'd always check the used racks for a copy, but could never find one. Over the months I noticed used copies on Amazon increasing in price, so when I noticed a copy on EBay for $17 last November I splurged and won the damn thing. I didn't start playing it 'til a couple weeks ago, though.

Anyway, this is a really great game that would have been an all-time classic if it had been slightly longer and/or more difficult. It's very much in the style of the last Legend of Zelda game, but with a more interesting and involving storyline. Unlike The Wind Waker's stock fantasy storylines and annoyingly elementary dialogue, BG&E's conspiracy theories and fully developed secondary characters aren't entirely insulting to an adult's intelligence. Don't get me wrong, I loved the last Zelda game, in fact it's a better game, overall, than this one, but its story-telling was distressingly deficient.

The story-telling is the most succesful element to Beyond Good and Evil, and is far more notable than the gameplay. The planet Hillys is beset by random attacks from terrorist aliens. The people of Hillys agree to turn their protection over to the galaxy's elite anti-terrorist fighting force, the Alpha Section. The Alpha Section gradually takes away more and more of the Hillyans' freedom, though, while failing to prevent future attacks. Eventually the main character discovers that the government is actually working with the terrorists, using them as an excuse to restrict the civil liberties of the residents of Hillys. You join an underground resistance force and try to expose the conspiracy to the public. In the process you traverse Hillys by hovercraft, traveling from island to island and solving various puzzles and defeating bosses in a number of labyrinthine structures.

The gameplay is remarkably like Zelda, right down to the heart-meters and the lock-on aiming system. There are also a number of incidental side-quests that are entirely optional, like Zelda. This isn't a problem, of course, as Zelda games are reliably awesome. Unfortunately, though, there's very little actual game to Beyond Good and Evil; I beat it in like thirteen hours, and that was with a lot of pointless dicking around. There are only about five "dungeons" to explore, maybe six boss battles, only one town to walk around, etc. They've crafted a storyline that would appeal mostly to those over the age of 13, but have made the game so easy that those players might get bored. There are a few Metal Gear-style subterfuge levels that are a bit dicey, but for the most part none of the gameplay is even remotely difficult. I was able to defeat the main boss without dying once, which isn't a good sign, as I'm a fairly horrible button-puncher. Still, though, I highly recommend this game, as it has probably the best story-line I've ever encountered in a video game, and a death scene even more moving than the notorious one in Final Fantasy VII.

2. We Love Katamari.

For the Playstation 2. I never played the original Katamari Damacy. I had read about it, and found it interesting, but seeing as how I didn't own a PS2 until this past December, I never had the capability to enjoy it. It's hard to find now, but this sequel is ever-present, and supposedly far better. I do know that it's quite the brilliant piece of inscrutable Japanese cuteness, and thoroughly enjoyable, at that.

Quite simply, this game makes no sense whatsoever. The King of All Cosmos has accidentally destroyed all the stars in the sky, and sends you, his son, to Earth to help create new ones. You do this by rolling objects up into something called a katamari. The King takes these katamari and turns them into stars, planets, asteroids, etc. The things you roll up aren't anything special; in fact, they're normal, everyday, household objects, up to and including animals, humans, and the house itself. You start off small, rolling up paperclips, bottle-caps, or dominos, and as you accumulate more and more junk you can roll up larger and larger items. Eventually you'll be tumbling over the hilltops rolling up buildings and automobiles and maybe even an oiltanker or two. You're given certain goals, like roll a katamari this big as quickly as possible, or in this amount of time, and the better you do, the bigger the celestial body created by your katamari. Eventually you get to roll up all the stars and planets created by your katamari and then attempt to roll up the sun. I haven't gotten to that point yet, but I fuckin' totally can't wait.

The gameplay is really repetitive, but for some reason rolling shit up has yet to get old. In fact I had a few Katamari-based dreams a while ago, similar to the Tetris-themed ones I'd have occasionally back in 1989. But so, everything's really cute and colorful, and the occasional cut-scenes showing you how the King met his wife, which are unlocked gradually as you open new levels, like in Ms. Pac-Man, are both humorous and kind of sweet. If you're only into stuff like GTA or those first-person shooters, this may not be your kind of game, but if you dig stuff like Animal Crossing or Parappa the Rapper, you might like Katamari, too.

3. Karaoke Revolution Party.

For the Playstation 2. Good God, is this hard as shit. You've got to hook every word of every song if you want to score well. I suck even on Easy, failing to go even Gold on every song except "Sweet Caroline" (which I fuckin' rock, by the way). The wife is really good, but I just totally suck. I don't even really enjoy it, it's so bad. Compared to real karaoke, which is fun in part because you can personalize and reconfigure how a song is supposed to sound, this game is a major let-down. If you don't hit the notes they tell you to hit, they'll boo your ass and send you home, which is a truly miserable feeling. I only recommend this to those who can truly sing, or those who don't mind being told they suck by an entirely digital audience.

4. Dance Dance Revolution Extreme 2.

For the PS 2. Anything past beginner is absolutely ridiculous. The music's pretty awesome, though.

More to come...
 
  shit, I missed it...

Who won the Puppy Bowl?

We had a little party with two tv's running last night, one on ABC and one on Animal Planet. A bunch of young dogs randomly running around and biting each other is far more interesting than that other shit. Frankly, though, it wasn't really all that interesting itself, at least not after fifteen minutes or so. We kept it on, but I wasn't paying attention by the end. So who won?

The halftime show, put on by kittens, was amazing, though. That fluffly little grey dude was a total dick. I wanted to touch him. I wanted to touch all of them.
 
Friday, February 03, 2006
  big beer jam on the radio

Mesmerization Eclipse on WZBC returns this afternoon. Same time, same station, new day. Listen in from 3 to 5 pm. Lots of good stuff lined up - Witch, Endless Boogie, Plastic Crimewave Sound, Raccoo-oo-oon - and the WZBC debut of the Game's "300 Bars". It'll be time well spent. I just might havta get lit 'tween now and then.
 
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
  an increasingly rare post over at the mp3 page

New music + early leaving boss = inspiration.
 

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MESMERIZATION ECLIPSE RADIO:
Elliott is on AM 1690 the Voice of the Arts on Monday nights from 7-9PM for Radio Undefined
Crews is on WXDU on Tuesday mornings from ten to noon

Photobucket

email

Dark doesn't want to own her, but he can't let her have it both ways.

Cocaine Bref is proud of his island heritage & will riff with you.

Elliott is sufficiently breakfast.
PS3 ID: ATLbloodfeast

Crog works in the bullshit industry in Hollywood. He was born on May 7th, 1978.

Jerkwater Johnson (friend to CT Jake Motherfucker) lives in San Francisco. He likes snacking, and the Mets, and is the proprietor of a bar called Duck Camp.

NOTABLES
some twitter things:
je suis france
still flyin'
reports (a band with dark in it)
elliott
crog
dark
crews
LD
MB
cgervin
scarnsworth

some weblogs:
unrealized scripts
oceanchum
hillary brown
shazhmmm...
garrett martin
old man crews
microzaps kindercore
talking radio towers
corp. hq of the san antonio gunslingers
crabber
overundulating fever
ryanetics
blunderford
dehumidifier
big gray
unwelcome return
day jobs
maybe it's just me
captain scurvy
movies stella has not seen

je suis france
still flyin'


wzbc
wuog
wfmu
wmbr
wxdu




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