Batman Was Silly Part 8: The Curious Case of Batman Button

This weeks might be the most silliest to date. Not only is Batman a baby, but he is a well built 5 year old looking baby. I can't imagine what caused him to decline in age, I can only assume it was due to Robin being tired of his younger "boy" image. However it's still Bat-Baby........and Robin. Sorry Robin. You will always be behind Batman when people yell "Look it's...." Even if Batman is 10 years younger and 3 feet smaller.

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"Look out! Bat-baby has on the new pair of L.A. Gears!"

March Music Wrap-Up

This month was a little slow for new music, but there are some great ones in there. I was hoping by now that I could download those bonus tracks from the new Cursive cd on iTunes or Amazon or something but no such luck. I guess I should have just bought the actual cd instead of the digital download. Oh well. Once again, be aware that these songs are for sampling purposes only and will be removed next month to save space where they are hosted. If you enjoy any of these artists, please support them in any way possible. To all record execs or angry musicians, I'm just trying to spread the word of your talent. Don't be mad. I'll remove anything that you want me to if you are. Disclaimer aside, lets get into the music.




The Decemberists

The Wanting Comes in Waves-Repaid



The Hazards of Love 4 (The Drowned)






Josh Freese - I Don't Think That's OK



No, I didn't pay $75,000.




Mastodon - Crack the Skye



I always thought Mastodon was much heavier, which I'm not always into. My friend told me to check out this cd though and it's pretty good. It still doesn't beat their most amazing song ever, the parody of the concession stand song at the beginning of old movies that they made for The Aquateen Hunger Force Movie. If you make out here I will cut your lips and tongue from your head with a linooooooleum kniiiiiiiiiiiiiiife!!




mc chris - IG-88's '57 Chevy



A few cds back mc chris did a skit about his agent wanting him to make more songs about bounty hunters from star wars on vehicles since Fett's Vette was so popular. Now he's jokingly doing those songs, on what is probably his biggest effort to date, a 5 part cd released over the next 2 years, entitled, ironically, Part Six. Also, the skits involve him in Hell now. What messes will MC get into next?




MSTRKRFT - It Ain't Love Feat. Lil' Mo



This is my favorite song off of the new MSTRKRFT cd, despite the dance club flavor of the week singing from Lil Mo.




Clear Days Always

Chalk



Linoleum



Clear Days Always is one of my favorite local Michigan bands. The thing I love most is that I can never know what to expect next. I have 3 cds now, one of which is a combination of 2 so technically I have 4 cds, and each one is different from one another. This new release is much heavier then previous releases, but equally as amazing. The best part is you can download it for free HERE, which means theres absolutely no reason you shouldn't check it out.




Man at Arms - Title Track (A Waste of Time and Space)



Sure, this cd actually came out in November, but I just remembered about it existing now so I just bought it. Plus I don't want to miss an opportunity to rave about this amazing band. A lot of duo's tend to make more simplistic music. After all, it's pretty hard to layer in a bunch of stuff with only two musicians. Like Death from Above 1979, these guys have no problem doing so however.

How do you make people pay for music?: EXTREME EDITION

So, remember many posts ago, when I talked about bands experimenting with different ways to get people to buy their music and not just steal it? Well Josh Freese, drummer for The Vandals, DEVO, Nine Inch Nails, and A Perfect Circle has taken that idea from NIN and ran completely out of control with it to get people to buy his new solo cd "Since 1972". Here are the different price structures and various perks that come with them.

# $7
-Digital Download of "Since 1972" (including 3 videos)

# $15
-CD/DVD Double Disc Set-Digital Download

# $50
-CD/DVD Double Disc Set
-T-shirt
-"Thank You" phone call from Josh for buying Since 1972. You can tell him what you like about the record that you purchased, or what you thought sucked. Ask whatever you want, like "Is Maynard really THAT weird?" or "Which one of Sting's mansions has the comfiest beds?" or "Are Devo really Suburban Robots that monitor reality or just a bunch of Dads from Ohio?" or "Why don't the Vandals play more stuff off the first record?" It's your 5 minutes to yack it up. Talk about whatever you want.

# $250 (limited edition of 25)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download.
-T-shirt
-Signed Drum Head and Drumsticks.
-Go on a lunch date with Josh to PF Changs or The Cheesecake Factory (whatever you're into.)

# $500 (limited edition of 15)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download
-T-shirt
-Signed Cymbal and sticks
-Meet Josh in Venice, CA and go floating together in a Sensory deprivation tank (filmed and posted on youtube)
-Dinner at Sizzler (get your $8.99 Steak and "all you can eat" Shrimp on)

# $1,000 (limited edition of 10)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download.
-T-shirt
-Signed Cymbal, Drum head and Drumsticks.
-Josh washes your car OR does your laundry....or you can wash his car.
-Have dinner with Josh aboard the "Queen Mary" in Long Beach, CA-Get drunk and cut each other's hair in the parking lot of the Long Beach courthouse (filmed and posted on youtube of course)

# $2,500 (limited edition of 5)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download.
-Get a private drum lesson with Josh or for all you non-drummers have him give you a back and foot massage (couples welcome)
-Pick any 1 member of the Vandals or DEVO (subject to availability) to accompany you and Josh to either the Hollywood Wax Museum or the lunch buffet at the "Spearmint Rhino"
-Signed DW snare drum.
-Take 3 items of your choice out of his closet (first come, first serve)
-Change diapers and make bottles with him for an afternoon (after hitting the strip club)

# $5,000 (limited edition of 3)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download.
-T-shirt
-Josh writes about a song about you and makes it available on iTunes.
-Co-direct a video with him for the song about you and throw it up on the youtubes.
-Josh gives you and a friend a private tour of Disneyland
-Get drunk together. If you don't drink we can go to my Dads place and hang out under the "Tuba tree"
-Stone from Pearl Jam will send you a letter telling you about his favorite song on "Since 1972"

# $10,000 (limited edition of 1)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download
-T-shirt
-Signed DW snare drum from A Perfect Circle's 2003 tour.
-Josh gives you a private drum lesson OR his and hers foot/back massage (couples welcome, discreet parking)
-Twiggy from Manson's band and Josh take you and a guest to Roscoe's Chicken n' Waffle in Long Beach for dinner.
-Josh takes you and guest to "Club 33" (the super-duper exclusive and private restaurant at Disneyland located above the Pirates Of The Caribbean) and then hit a couple rides afterwards (preferably the Tiki Room, Haunted Mansion and The Tower Of Terror)
-At the end of the day at Disneyland drive away in Josh's Volvo station wagon. It's all yours....take it. Just drop him off on your way home though please.

# $20,000 (limited edition of 1)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download.
-T-shirt
-A signed drum from the 2008 Nine Inch Nails tour.
-Maynard James Keenan, Mark from Devo and Josh take you miniature golfing and then drop you off on the side of the freeway (all filmed and posted on youtube)
-Josh gives you a tour of Long Beach. See his first apartment, the coffee shop on 2nd St where his buddy paid Dave Grohl $40 to rip up tile just weeks before joining "Nirvana." See the old Vandals rehearsal spot, the liquor store he got busted using a Fake I.D. at when he was 17 (it was Dave from the Vandals old ID). Go check out Snoop Dogg's high- school. For an extra 50 bucks see where Tom and Adrian from No Doubt live. For another $25 he'll show ya where Eric from NOFX and Brooks from Bad Religion get their hair cut.
-Spend the night aboard the Queen Mary and take the "Ghosts And Legends" tour. (separate rooms...no spooning.)
-Josh writes 2 songs about you and it's made available on iTunes and appears on his next record (you can sing back up on em, clap, play the drums, triangle, whatever....)
-Drum lesson OR foot and back massage (once again...couples welcome and discreet parking available)
-Pick any 3 items out of Josh's closet.

# $75,000 (limited edition of 1)
-Signed CD/DVD and digital download
-T-shirt
-Go on tour with Josh for a few days.
-Have Josh write, record and release a 5 song EP about you and your life story.
-Take home any of his drumsets (only one but you can choose which one.)
-Take shrooms and cruise Hollywood in Danny from TOOL's Lamborgini OR play quarters and then hop on the Ouija board for a while.
-Josh will join your band for a month...play shows, record, party with groupies, etc....
-If you don't have a band he'll be your personal assistant for a month (4 day work weeks, 10 am to 4 pm)
-Take a limo down to Tijuana and he'll show you how it's done (what that means exactly we can't legally get into here)
-If you don't live in Southern California (but are a US resident) he'll come to you and be your personal assistant/cabana boy for 2 weeks.
-Take a flying trapeze lesson with Josh and Robin from NIN, go back to Robins place afterwards and his wife will make you raw lasagna.


Anybody got a spare 75k lying around that I could borrow??

Series Retrospective: Suikoden

Behind the obvious Final Fantasy series, my favorite role playing game series is most likely Suikoden. It's a series that few have discovered, but those that have are very devoted to. Just look at ebay auctions for the limited released Suikoden 2 for evidence of fan devotion. There are so many reasons to love these games though.

Suikoden did many things different from other Japanese RPG's when it came out. Instead of a party of characters 1-10 or so in size, it brought 108 to the table. It was based on a classical Chinese novel involving 108 stars of destiny that gather together at a moment in time. You are usually the first star, the Tenkai Star, and the one with whom all the other stars gather. As it works in all the games, you're the leader of an army essentially, and you're gathering troops.

This leads to another of the features that stand out in the series, combat. While primarily combat is the normal RPG type, there are many skirmishes between your army and other armies. In the first game these worked out as rock-paper-scissors type battles where you would attack with a charge, a bow attack or magic. In later installments however, military encounters played out like a grid based strategy game. You'd move your units around a map and have them attack enemy units. Thrown on top of all of this, is one on one duels.

Its these things that drew me into the game, and its the characters and their stories that kept me coming back. Unfortunately, after the third game, the main story writer left. He had supposedly been building to something for the fourth game, but that was never fully realized. Instead, others have continued the games in his absence, and in my eyes, the series has fallen significantly in greatness. While all the normal features were technically there in Suikoden 4, the story was set more then 100 years before the first game, probably to help hide the fact that they had no idea where to take the characters we had already been introduced to, and it lacks a lot of polish. The fifth game did a lot to make up for the fourth, but it just doesn't seem to be on par with the first three games.

If you are out of the loop on these amazing games, a new way to catch up seems to be here. Recently, the first game was released on the Playstation Network, so those with a PS3 or PSP can purchase it for the measly amount of $5.99. With the amount of sequels to games previously released on PSN, there's a good chance that the second will come out there too. Meaning you will no longer have to shell out more then $100 to get it on ebay. I couldn't reccommend these games highly enough to those looking for a new series to familairize themselves with. Whether you want to move on from those and find copies of 3, 4, and 5 on PS2 is up to you, but picking up the first and hopefully the second on PSN is a no brainer.

OnLive: The Future of Gaming?

The biggest news item coming out of the Game Developers Conference, an event that's not meant for news at all, was the unveiling of OnLive. Worked on in secret for years now, and barging through the door with partners such as UbiSoft, Take Two, Epic, and EA, this may be the future of gaming if all goes as planned. Granted though, it's from the guys behind WebTV which some may have seen as the future of surfing the internet and we all know how that panned out. My sources on most of the information about this, as I wasn't at GDC, are 3 podcasts, Giant Bombcast, Listen Up, and the Joystiq podcast, but here's what I know so far.

It seems to be OnDemand for video games basically. You can log in, via a set top box, a computer, or possibly a game console at some point. When you play a game through this, you aren't in direct control though. Essentially, the game video is streamed to your tv or computer monitor, you press a button on your controller and that button press is sent back to the server which makes your character respond. If all works as they say, this means you could play extremely high end games with the best graphics around and in HD, on your crappy old laptop. Thus, eliminating the need for pimping out your computers with the newest graphics cards so that you can keep up with the latest in gaming.

Will this be the future of gaming? The creators say that they will launch it this year, with five server locations, and according to them anyone within one thousand miles of one of them will have virtually no lag. If it truly works that well then I can see this succeeding, but I can imagine sending all the content across hundreds of miles would result in an extremely slow gameplay experience. If it takes 10 seconds for your character to respond to your button press, then the whole thing is broken. There's also the problem of service providers having bandwidth limits. Comcast has a limit of 250gb per month, which seems like a lot for streaming these games, but when factoring in other activities and other users within the household, it can add up real fast.

We'll have to wait and see. Will it work the way it is promised to, and if it doesn't, will they be able to provide the additional support for it to? If no one adapts it initially because living a thousand miles from a server farm means your experience is broken, then will they have the cash to set up more server areas, or will they call it a failed experiment and give up? I'm certainly curious to find out, but I'm definitely not getting my hopes up.

First Where the Wild Things Are Teaser Trailer!

Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages. It is finally here. The first moving images we have of Spike Jonze's adaptation of Maurice Sendak's beloved childrens book Where the Wild Things Are. It is just a teaser trailer, but a great one! Thanks to firstshowing.net for the update.

I have to say that this movie looks beautiful. Amazing locations and scenery, the Wild Things look amazing, and just the general feel of the movie seems perfect. This is shaping up to be a classic kids film that also appeals to adults as well. I am extremely excited for this film and I hope this trailer makes you excited as well. Where the Wild Things Are will be in theaters October 6th of this year. Thoughts?






You can check out a much better quality video that would not fit, here.

Batman Was Silly Part 7: Breaking the Fourth Wall

This weeks cover is not really as stupid as the rest. I actually found it kind of cool. And plus the gray and blue batsuit was my favorite.

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"Hey kids! Do drugs and Robin and I will come to life and draw stuff for you!"

First official photos from Spike Jonez's Where The Wild Things Are

I've been following this movie for quite some time. From reshoots due to the child playing Max not being likable enough to the first look of what the monsters will look like. Now thanks to USA Today and Firstshowing.net we have the first official photos from the film.

I am very happy with the way the monsters look. Cuddly yet scary at the same time. Also the CGI looks very realistic. I am pretty sure that just the faces and some other parts are CGI but the bodies are costumes.

As for the feel of the film Jonze says, "I never thought of it as a children's movie. My intention was to be true to how it felt to be 9 years old. Maurice's whole thing is to be honest. You can say anything to kids as long as you are respectful and not pandering." I am very pleased with the fact that he is sticking to the perspective that is Where the Wild Things Are. A kid in a place with big monsters who want him to be king and stay there forever. So it seems that this movie will be loved by both kids and adults alike. The movie will be out on October 16th. I couldn't be more happier with the way it looks. Check out these photos and tell me what you think.

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Bumpin' 'n' Grindin'

I just now realized upon viewing that cover enlarged what the fist is made out of.

I'll just start this out with, why MSTRKRFT?!?! Why!?!?

Their new cd, Fist of God, has been overtaken by songs featuring other artists. The thing is, I can't seem to shake the feeling that it sounds much more like that particular artist is featuring MSTRKRFT on the song. I suppose that has something to do with the fact that a band that is nothing more then samples and electronic music is something that would usually just be written as the background for some other artist, and I guess you can't really climb the music industry ladder with that.

Still, I get the feeling that the artists featured on this release (Lil' Mo, N.O.R.E., John Legend, Ghostface Killah and more) are not the singers that fans of MSTRKRFT would know or care about. Whether they followed along after the demise of Death from Above 1979, or find out about them as a tribute to Kraftwerk, I doubt Ghostface Killah is also on their mp3 players. So why invite a bunch of hip hop, r&b, and rap artists to do vocals for your electronica cd? You want to get play in clubs.

I'm alright with it I suppose. I just miss Death from Above 1979, and you can't turn back time. Still, I could do with a little less callouts in my music. I'm well aware of the fact that I'm listening to MSTRKRFT, but thanks for reminding me. I made a compilation of all the calling out of names on the cd for your listening displeasure.

Warpaint

Ok. So I just came across this band called Warpaint through the John Frusciante fan site invisible-movement.net and I am completely blown away. Their sound is a bit haunting and beautiful at the same time. I have fallen in love with all of the females in the band and I think this band has the makings to become something a lot bigger.

Right now they only have an EP out, and sadly it is only on Itunes, which I have made a blood oath of sorts to never ever give money to. I may have to break that oath in this occasion though. That is how great this band is. Here is a link to their myspace page. The band consists of Emily Kokal (vocals, guitar), Theresa Wayman (guitar, vocals), Jenny Lindberg (bass, vocals) and David Orlando (drums). The BEAUTIFUL actress Shannyn Sossamon was the old drummer, who you might recognize from films like A Knights Tale and One Missed Call (horrible movie but I forgive her). Below is a youtube "video" of their song Stars. Many thanks to invisible-movement.net for the post about this band. The reasons why they are featured on a John Frusciante fan website is because they have recorded a couple songs in John Frusciante's home studio and credit him in the production on their Ep.

Resident Evil 5 Review

This review contains no spoilers

Now let me start this with saying that I have never played a full Resident Evil game before. I played RE2 a couple times on Playstation and I have tried my hand at RE4 on the Wii. I have no history with Resident Evil so I was going into it as pretty much a noob to the whole history behind it. I first played the demo for RE5 and found myself extremely frustrated as only a big fan of shooters could be. A friend of mine who shares an interest in games played it and loved it. I told him that I would most likely not be getting the game. But who was I kidding? A possible game of the year that looked as beautiful as RE5 did, how could I not get it. So I played the demo a couple of times and got the hang of how the game plays and was ready to play the full game.

At first the controls were extremely frustrating. I had a hard time wrapping my head around why you couldn't move and shoot or move and reload. But it became perfectly clear early in the game that without this type of restraint on the action in the game it would be a totally different game with little to no strategy. Being able to only shoot while stationary made picking which weapon to use and who to shoot at more important than it would be if you were running and gunning all the infected. After getting the hang of the controls it all feels like second nature. And getting headshots was even more satisfying.

I think it is obvious for everyone that the look of the game is better than anything out there right now. I have yet to see such detailed environments and terrifyingly real atmospheres in a game that I have seen in RE5. The run down towns of Africa seems hot and humid and the caves seem dank and claustrophobic. The enemies in the game look frighteningly real and their motions are also very realistic. Sure the infected will run towards you only to slow down giving you an opportunity to try for a headshot, but without this the game may be impossible to beat. However later in the game the enemies get harder (no surprise) and run for longer.



There are a fair amount of weapons in the game with tons of upgrades for each. Upgrading your weaponry will use up most of the money you acquire in the game. Either by gold or by treasures, some easily found and others hiding on ceilings and on walls and in other inconspicuous spots. It is a good idea to check around you a lot for treasures and boxes to break. You can not buy ammo at the shop, which you can only access out of the game rather than walking to the merchant like in RE4. Every time you die or beat a part of a chapter you will be able to organize your inventory and buy and sell and upgrade. Not being able to buy ammo got me mad a couple of times, but again it just makes the game more challenging and forces you to stratagize more. However if you upgrade the weapons carrying capacity your gun will automatically fill up with the amount of ammo that you can carry. My favorite gun to use in the game was the Dragunov sniper rifle. Once upgraded it would normally take two shots to the body or one skillfully placed shot to the head and the enemy went down. While aiming with the gun the scope bobbles a bit because holding a gun steady in real life is hard while standing, this makes hitting far away targets difficult but feels very rewarding once an infected's head blows apart. Overall I found the gun selection to be very vast. However I found that the first pistol, the first shotgun, and the Dragunov sniper rifle to be my weapons of choice.

Re5 is strictly a cooperative game. You are constantly playing with a partner, whether that partner be controlled by the computer or a friend. There are a lot of instances where both players have to open a door, pull a lever, or go into an elevator. There are also instances where one will boost another to a spot unreachable by ones self. The co-op game play really shines if you are playing with a friend and not the computer. Although the computer is fairly smart it's still not as smart as playing with another human. I beat the game with a friend and although our schedules didn't always coincide, when we both could sit down and play it was a blast. Talking about what we needed and what we had in our inventory and thinking of strategies and what to do differently if we died. It was the most fun I've had playing a game with someone else cooperatively. I suggest everyone who gets the game to play it with a friend.

All in all it was a great game with plenty of replay value. After beating it on veteran we unlocked a mercenaries mode which is a timed game where you try to kill as many infected as possible. Also there is so much stuff to find in the game that you will want to play it over again to try and find everything. Also after beating it on veteran you unlock professional mode which is a harder difficulty.

I would suggest anyone who enjoys games, or zombies, or cool boss battles, or amazing graphics, or any of the combination to buy this game. I traded in 2 games at Gamestop towards RE5 and only paid 21 cents! Pick up this game now!

5/5

Batman Was Silly Part 6: Big Buisness Punch

This weeks cover is a strange one. There's no writing on it to give the reader a clue as to what is going on. It almost looks like a political cartoon without any labels telling people what things represent. I'm guessing it's some type of big business owner. Is Bruce Wayne a hypocrite?

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"Terrific work Robin! A punch in that location will send his nose bone straight into his brain killing him instantly! Luckily the circus was in town and let us borrow their high flyin' seesaw."

The Age of the Digital Download

It's coming. Before we know it we will be purchasing all of our video games from our couches. Attempts to make this the norm have already been made. The downloadable game area is a huge part of all 3 of the consoles, and now with the release of the DSi both of the handhelds as well. Not only can we virtually purchase tons of mini-games but whole retail games have been making appearances for download also. Sure most of them have had box copies in stores because of pressure from the big guns in retail, but soon that may end.

So what does that mean for our rights to the content we buy online? We really are just the guinea pigs in this experiment. Apple hasn't even figured everything out with music and we're diving head first into the deep end with our video games. So what happens when we move onto the next console generation? Do all of our downloadable games come along with us, or will we have to plug in old consoles to play them even if the newer consoles can play the physical copies of games from past generations? And when our old systems crap out on us, will the online servers still be up for us to redownload our purchased games?

With so many questions, it seems unwise to make hasty purchases now before we know fully what will happen in the future. Still, I'm as eager as ever to dive into the deep end of digital downloads. The games I've bought on my PSP are great for quickly playing without having to carry around a whole case full of discs. Now I can take it with me in my car and when I have time to kill I have a selection of either the longer adventure in the disc slot or many shorter ones on the memory stick. I just wonder if I'll be able to take the memory stick along with me to the PSP2.

I don't know what I should advocate the publishers to do to answer all these questions, but I do know I want some answers. If they are going to leave me to drown when they move onto the next hotness, then I'd at least like to know that now so I can make educated purchases. I can fully understand that it's not their responsibility to carry this stuff onto the newer technology, certainly nobody helped you transfer your vhs tapes to dvd, but it'd be nice to know. Staying silent just leads me to believe I'm going to be dumped, because if they had plans to help transfer your downloaded content I'd think they would be saying something about it.

I'm sure when changes come people will cry out in disgust at mentions of nontransferable content, and we will have a generation of poorly implemented systems to try to fix the outrage, but unless there is some sort of set guidelines in place for virtual content then no one will work to let you keep it. Not when its taking money out of their pockets to keep servers running and to design new technology that plays old purchases.

Saturday Morning Watchmen

This is so great. What if someone made a kids friendly Saturday morning cartoon show based on Watchmen? Well thankfully we have this video to see how horribly inaccurate it would have be.

February Music Wrap-up

I've noticed on a lot of different blogs that they do monthly mixtapes and put up mp3's for you to download. While I like the idea so that I might be able to expose people to music they haven't heard, I thought about the fact that I myself would probably be too lazy to download each mp3 and try them out unless I had already heard of the band. So I took it a step further and I'm going to post embedded players so that you all can easily click, listen, and decide if you like it or not. So here you go, we'll call this the Musical Sampling for the month of February even though there are some recent releases in there as well. Just make note of the fact that these are for sampling purposes only. They'll be removed from the file site I have them on when I do this again in a month. If you like what you hear then purchase some merchandise from the band, go see them in concert, write them a crazy obsessive fan letter. If you're a pissed off band or record company then I will definitely obey your cease and desist notices, I'm just trying to help though so don't sue me please.

Thursday - Beyond the Visible Spectrum

Propagandhi - Supporting Caste

Lily Allen - Not Fair

Fake Problems - You're a Serpent, You're a She-Snake

Cursive - Caveman

Cursive - From the Hips

Dan Deacon - Get Older

...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead - Isis Unveiled

These things can be a little janky, at least on my end. Sometimes they play right away, other times not. Try refreshing the page if you have any issues. I'll try to find something better before next month if there are a bunch of problems.

Batman Was Silly. Part 5: The Jungle Batman?

In this week's cover we sadly see that Robin is mauled to death by a Black Panther in the jungle. I'm just wondering what kind of crime they could be fighting in the jungle. Tarzan raping unsuspecting apes?

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Batman and Robin are starting to realize the hard way that the concrete jungle is the only place they belong.

The Slow Demise of the Album

Gone are the days when people would purchase an album with the intent to listen to the whole thing through. Nowadays people just buy their favorite singles on iTunes. Sadly though that may be the thing that is slowly killing my favorite type of album, the concept album.

Recently my wife told me about how the people on her social network for moms type website were attacking the new single by The Decemberists, which has lyrics describing a father systematically killing his children one by one. The thing is, that song is right in the middle of the cd, and it is introducing us to the villain character of an overarching storyline. The character is describing his previous deeds to the woman he has just abducted. Suffice it to say that he meets an unpleasant end in a later song, but of course those denouncing the lyrics as a glorification of violence never read that part. Now, I'm not entirely sure who's at blame here. Maybe it was band themselves idea to have that song be the single, or maybe it was the record companies. Either way it was an unwise choice, but if we didn't live in a time when the single is the only important part of a record release then we would have never encountered this issue.

It's releases like this new Decemberists cd that excite me the most. I love to pick apart the story of an album and piece it all together. Musical movements are introduced in earlier songs, and then reappear in later ones to establish thematic tones and elements. Characters have whole songs sometimes just to flesh out a back story for them, whereas if it were just one song then we would never get a back story. We would just be told the characters names and that they were in love and something happened. The End.

Our culture has devolved into a society of people with a 3 minute or so attention span. When The Mars Volta put out a cd that had a half an hour long song on it, the studio decided to try to chop it up into lots of different songs and even considered releasing one of those as a single. It didn't matter that the song as a whole was the most powerful and intense song the band had ever done, and probably ever will do.

Record companies have no idea what to do with bands that tell stories nowadays, and that's sad. I will always be a million times more interested in a cd that keeps pulling me back to discover new parts of a fascinating storyline then a poppy single that keeps my interest for exactly 3 minutes. Do society a favor and support bands that put thought into plotting out the structure of a full album by purchasing and listening to that album from start to finish.

Thursday's Common Existence

Just after the release of A City by the Light Divided I was in the most local record store I have and the guy had a description on the cd that read something like "What did you expect them to do? Remake Full Collapse over and over again?". At the time I nodded my head in a Hell Yeah! fashion, because I didn't want that. I wanted Thursday to grow and evolve. I loved Full Collapse, and then I loved War All the Time even more, so I was hoping they would continue the growth. Somehow though something just didn't connect for me with City. I enjoyed it but the changes they had undergone didn't fit for me. The last thing I normally want a band to do is go back to old styles, and that is what Common Existence is essentially doing, but it works for me this time.

It really just clicked for me all of a sudden. I had given it two or three listen throughs, but then I got lost in the barrage of new releases. Initially I wasn't amazed, upon listening to it again after a week or so however I am really enjoying it. I could see this fitting more in between War All the Time and A City by the Light Divided. It's more of an incremental step up from War, but still showing some of the growth on City. The most noticeable difference is that the rock is ratcheted up several notches. There are maybe two or so slower songs, but even the hardest songs will have an interlude,outro or something that brings it down a bit.

So I guess I'm alright with them rehashing their older days. They tried a different style and for some reason it didn't really work for me. I can almost see this release surpassing War as my favorite though, because it's that incremental step above. As long as they keep making some progress, you can't really fault them for making Full Collapse over and over again.

Propagandhi's Supporting Caste

There are few punk bands that I still follow religiously. I wait with bated breath the 4+ years a new Propagandhi release usually takes. As they don't tend to tour extensively I drove over 6 hours and through 2 states to see them. Unlike a lot of the bands I listened to in high school, Propagandhi have somehow managed to mature along with my musical tastes, while at the same time being the same loud, fast, snotty punks they always were. They appeal to my newer musical tastes with very thoughtful and clever lyrics, and they appeal to the kid in me with face melting rock and middle fingers raised high. It's a rare band that can make old woman look at you with disapproval as you blare them from your car, but also educate you with very insightful lyrics.

The first song on Supporting Caste threw me off. It's the return of an old trick of the band, time changes that you don't see coming. It's one of the reasons I fell in love with them in the first place because it made their song structures so much different then any other band. The next thing that becomes immediately apparent is the second guitarist. These two things make this new record infinitely re listenable. You'll never pick up everything going on in the songs the first time you listen to them because there will always be some sort of wailing guitar line or amazing riff in the background that your ears didn't focus on at first, and just about when you get a hold of where the song is going and your foot starts tapping, it immediately takes a different direction. A lot of bands would think of a great guitar riff and say job well done on a whole song, but Propagandhi instead embed several into a layered song that leaves you always coming back because you can never get enough of each one before its gone and never returned to.

The guitars aren't the only attraction here though, the lyrics also offer a reason to keep returning. There aren't verses or choruses because Chris Hannah doesn't seem to think about writing songs, he just writes and then fits it into the song. You may think this would sound awkward, and while I wouldn't say there weren't some songs in their catalog that this style of writing didn't work out great for, on this cd he has managed to weave the lyrics around the music in amazingly complex ways. I'll give you this example from the song Dear Coach's Corner:

"I guess it comes down to what kind of world you want to live in. And if diversity is disagreement, disagreement is treason. Well, you'll be surprised if we find ourselves reaping a strange and bitter fruit that that sad old man beside you keeps feeding to young minds as virtue. It takes a village to raise a child, but just a flag to raze the children till they're nothing more than ballasts for fulfilling a madman's dream of a paradise. Complexity reduced to black and white."

Combining lyrics like that with music that melts your face is what this band has become known for. Of course there are a couple of what I like to call Kowalski interludes, meaning those short but explosive nuggets of songs in which bassist Todd Kowalski crushes you with his much harder style of singing. Still though, the interludes on this cd are much more fleshed out then Superbowl Patriot XXXVI was on their last cd Potemkin City Limits. Many times throughout this album I was reminded of the Propagandhi of old. On songs like Human(e) Meat (The Flensing of Sandor Katz) or Potemkin City Limits, you get a definite twinge of their first two records, but with plenty of reminders of how they've matured since then. Whatever you may consider punk, they have most certainly not kept to the notion of it being simplistic. Propagandhi frequently show their impressive musicianship, while still keeping to their own style enough to not piss off purists. It's the reason why I still love them even though I don't always listen to such loud and fast music nowadays, and it's the reason that I'll always be willing to drive ridiculous amounts to see them play live. They single handily display the evolution that all aging punk bands should be following and chances are I will still be a fan when I need a cane to get around.

Re: How do you make people pay for music?

I thought Alex's article (a few posts down) touched on a great topic and while responding to it in the comments I realized I was writing a lot so I decided to turn my thoughts on the topic into its own post.



I mostly buy CD's for artists that I really like. I like to check out the album booklet and see what the musician(s) were feeling about the album. Also it's nice to have lyrics to look through.

For me and my friends, Tower Records was a huge source of music for us growing up. Although overpriced, it had a huge selection and was very close to most people, walking distance for me. I enjoyed walking in and spending time in the store looking at albums, books, magazines and such. There was always a weird phenomenon that would occur when I walked into tower records. If I did not have a specific artist or album in mind I would forget most of the artists I listened to. All the mainstays were there, artists that I had multiple albums of, but I would forget newly found and less listened to bands. So it would take me awhile to walk around a spot an artist that I knew. I feel like the lack of and closing of music stores that have a wide selection is a big part of why people don't buy albums and pay for music. The accessibility of the stores plays a big role because I know when I want an album that is out I would rather have it now then wait a week or so for it to be delivered by mail through amazon or towerrecords.com. So why not just download the album in a few minutes through torrent websites for free? At least in your mind you were willing to pay for it and that counts for something right?

I'm sure you have been thinking well what about Itunes? Personally I would never give Itunes a cent. Not a damn cent. They, to me, are destroying music. From artists only selling their album on Itunes, to artists giving people who buy the album on Itunes first picks on concert tickets (The Mars Volta for example). If anything this is killing CD sales. Why wouldn't someone want a pre-sale spot on their favorite artists' new tour. Why look for the cd in a store when you could just go to itunes and download it? It is hard to argue against that. However, like I said earlier I like looking at the album booklet and I just like to have the actual CD and CD case. If my portable hard drive decides to die one day a chunk of my life will have died with it. The cds I have left will be the only source of music I would have until I downloaded over 33 gigs of music back.

Another argument for downloading for free is why not just download it for free instead of downloading it off Itunes and paying? I would rather get an album that I am not too sure I will like for free rather than paying for it and giving another web service my credit card information.

I'm well aware, as most who download music for free, that it is hurting the musician(s) for our benefit. This is true and looking back at it it can make one feel a little guilty. But usually I'm paying more attention to my funds than the musician's funds. This may be self centered but that is just the way it is.

So, for me, in order to encourage people to start buying CDs and paying for music we should re open stores like Sam Goody and Tower Records, lower CD prices, and also get rid of stores like Itunes. All of these would make me extremely happy also. I'm not saying these are the only solution but it would be a great start.

Any other suggestions?

Batman Was Silly. Part 4: The Strange Creature

This week there's a new light in the sky. And it's not the spotlight for the opening of a new McDonalds either.

(Click on image for full size)

Aww, the guy called it his pal.

New Terminator Salvation trailer!

Wow. I was excited for this movie given everything that has already come out. The first trailer, pictures, interviews, and Christian Bale's freak out lol. But after seeing this new trailer, which will also be in front of Watchmen on March 6th, I am 1,000 times more excited and optimistic about Terminator Salvation.

This trailer has a really terrifying feel to it. The motorcycle machines, half of an exoskeleton crawling towards someone, the hydrobot, the big ass robot that collects humans, and so much more. It really feels like it is humanities last stand. I am so excited for this. More than Transformers now mainly because this is much more realistic that Transformers. However both are going to be kick ass summer movies. What do you think?

How do you make people pay for music?

It's a much debated topic. Nowadays a vast majority of music lovers just download new music from torrents. It's fast, easy and most often is an option well before buying the actual cd even is. So what do bands do to stop or make some revenue off of this?

Two major bands to take strides in solving this dilemma were Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails. The former providing their last album for download on their site for whatever you wished to pay, including zero, and the latter setting up many different price structures including a free download, a $5 digital download, $10 double cd set, $75 deluxe edition set and even a $300 ultra deluxe limited edition package. Both had great success in these experiments, but measures like that may be best left to the bigger bands.

Saul Williams however had a good amount of success when he did almost the same, he released his cd for download at a price of either free or $5. He's sold a moderate amount more of them then his last cd, but the free version was chosen by more then four times the people. Still, much more of the funds from this venture would have gone directly to him then would have if he had printed cds and shipped them to stores.

In these times however, these attempts may have failed. People have even less money now and pirating is still just as easy. So what are the smaller bands doing to combat the inevitable illegal downloading of their music? Well, in 2007 the band Stars offered up their newly completed In Our Bedroom After The War on iTunes before there was ever a chance for it to leak. Given the option, many fans immediately paid for a copy they could listen to months before the actual cd release. As well, Cursive is planning to release their newest album on March 10th, but as of today you can pay for the right to download a copy for only $1. Every day before the day of release the price will increase a dollar, but I have a hard time believing that fans having been given the option to pay such a minimal amount now wouldn't just fork it over. And for those who don't, the band is putting the cd out with several bonus tracks, videos, and extras not available on the digital download.

Granted, every one of these will be available online for free to those who wait, but music fans have grown to have an insatiable appetite. When they hear of a new album they are interested in they quite often cannot bear to wait until the actual release date, and end up downloading a leak instead. Once their appetite has been satisfied, buying the music legally will fall by the wayside despite their constant claims that they'll eventually purchase it. So when given the choice to give the band money before they have become tired of the music, they might just accept. It sure seems like me to be an acceptable alternative to suing people who share the music online, but is it the only way? Are there better ways to get people to pay for their music? Time will tell.

Question: Does Lily Allen suck?

I'm confused. I'm not even sure where Lily Allen came from. All I had seen or heard of her was from ads on myspace, not exactly the mecca of good music recommendations, so I assumed she was another Duffy or Katy Perry. Then they played her on All Songs Considered and my confusion began.

I really liked what I heard, but does this mean it is socially acceptable to like her and still remain "hip"? Is she my guilty pleasure? A result of my wife's musical tastes slowly seeping in? The thing is, I don't think my wife would even like her. That's probably a result of her lyrics often leaning toward profanity or sex, she's not big on that. And while normally I think I would groan at any band who used the words "F*ck you, f*ck you very very much" in a song, somehow I'm alright with it here. Is this some sort of clever plot to rope in people who normally abhor pop music? Has it worked? Was I roped in?

Maybe I wouldn't have noticed, but I've also been listening to Propagandhi lately and when I switch between the two something feels wrong. It's like when I go to McDonalds and order a southern chicken sandwich with extra pickles and a double cheeseburger with no pickles. I only like pickles in specific scenarios, and on a burger is not one of those. I feel as though pop music is like pickles for me, but its like she's playing games with me. Songs like "Not Fair" or "Back to the Start" are great and I feel no shame in liking them, but then there comes a song like "Never Gonna Happen" and I'm forced to question whether or not it's good. I mean I still love that song, but it is so glaringly a pickle. It makes me question whether or not I really want to be eating it.

In the end, I think I'm OK with admitting I really like her cd, which is apparently her second. Wasn't it acceptable for indie types to like Amy Winehouse when she came about? I never jumped on that train, but we all know about the derailment, and I feel like maybe the same will happen with Lily. As I read her wikipedia page I'm finding signs such as "Her appearance at the 2008 Glamour Awards of the Year also generated criticism, as she showed up intoxicated with a dress depicting decapitated Bambi figures, and had an on-stage, expletive-laced exchange with Elton John" or "Allen has shown her third nipple on television." So maybe one day we'll all be rolling our eyes when someone asks about how we liked Lily Allen. That is if anyone else is with me here, if not then just disregard this whole article.