Behold The Internet!

3.24.11

3:48 pm

Yesterday, I was thinking about David Bowie.

Specifically about how, aside from Extras and guesting on Arcade Fire's and Scarlett Johansen's albums, he hasn't put out any of his own music since before his heart surgery in 2004.

So, I popped his name into The Internet and came back with a news story about how his unreleased 2001 album, "Toy", was leaked, in full, a few days ago.

"Toy" was to be a follow-up to 1999's genre-shifting "hours..." and consisted of a few new tracks and mostly older songs from Bowie's waaay early career re-recorded and re-vamped.

Honestly, most of the songs on "Toy" are shit compared to their original versions, lacking the raw energy and sweetness they were made with, and sounding like Adult Contemporary trying to impress the twentysomethings and failing miserably and the songs you'd want to hear remade ("Love You 'Til Tuesday" and "The Laughing Gnome") are nowhere to be found.

I'm not going to say it should have remained unreleased (Hole In The Ground" and "Shadow Man" are pretty good), but I'll be happy to say that you get exactly what you pay for.

But the point I'm trying to make is that, within twelve minutes, I had brand new David Bowie music.

Thanks to The Internet.

So thank you, The Internet, you make instant gratification more instant.

Also, there's porn.

Lots of porn.

Weird porn.

Dapper Dan's Underoos OR a review of Lykke Li's 'Wounded Rhymes'

3.17.11

3:27 pm

 

I honestly did not realize it was St. Patrick's Day until, around 2:45, a bunch of guys wearing huge, fuzzy, green top hats came onto my train and starting talking about bars.

And even then it still took me a minute.

My Irish half must have been sleeping in.

Lucky Mick.

I, on the other hand, am very sleepy and awake and have been running around full bore since 10 this morning.

And again, all you Daylight fucks can blow me.

My waking up at 10 is the equivalent of your waking up at 4.

Do the math, ass bags.

 

Anyway.

So I am tired.

 

In other news, I have spent a few days with the new Lykke Li album, Wounded Rhymes, and it's awesome.

I think this chick is Swedish or Swiss or something along those lines.

But let's not hold that against her.

Her album sounds, at times, like a pagan beach party, shiny keyboards matched with crazy huge drums and chanting, and, at other times, like some sort of ancient tribal rite in which people scrump instead of pray.

There is a sacred feeling to it, due to the droning quality of Li's vocals.

And not droning in a bad way. Her voice pours over everything like ritualistic syrup, oozing into the spaces the usually sparse instrumentation leaves open.

Almost every track has a starkness to it, but it's a weighty starkness.

While listening to Wounded Rhymes, I was reminded of eels ("Youth Knows No Pain", the high energy opener), Joy Division ("Love Out of Lust", a beautiful, sincere song) and Depeche Mode ("I Follow Rivers", a synth line and drum loop that feel oddly 80's amidst the temples to which Li's voice brings the listener), but, at no point did I forget whose album it was.

Lykke Li stands out among the overabundance of "tough" female pop singers because she has a sincerity that others seem to lack.

Yeah, these other singers are tough...until see they see a hot guy with great abs and then it's back to high school.

One gets the impression from her music and lyrics that Lykke Li could totally kick Lady Gaga's ass.

And might enjoy doing so.

The album is full of stand out tracks, so much so that there end up being one or two that simply don't shine as brightly as the others, namely "Unrequited Love", a sort of doo wop track that doesn't really go anywhere, and "Sadness Is A Blessing" which can become repetitive and features the cringe-worthy lyric "Sadness is my boyfriend". Ouch.

But again, these aren't bad songs, just not as great as the rest of them.

"Rich Kids Blues" is infectious; from it you will catch an ass-shaking disease, curable only by, yes, shaking one's ass, "I Know Places" has a steamy, affected innocence that soaks this simple song in sexuality and "Silent My Song" is a dark, powerful closer, making the listener wish there was more to be had.

In fact, aside from those two not-as-great tracks and a penchant for overusing reverb, both on her vocals and on every drum you hear, this might be the best album I've heard this year.

Although, unrequited love? Seriously? This woman is made of smoke and fire and honey, how could ANYONE not requite her love?

This woman is a goddess, more than a goddess; she's the High Priestess of a cult that worships sex and sensuality and flesh and dancing and drums. Watch her aggressively, confrontationally sexy video for "Get Some" if you don't believe me. This video makes men feel like boys and boys enter puberty.

Listen to this album, shake your booty and worship at the Church of the Holy Vagina.

Get Down, Make Books

3.15.11

3:56 pm

Couldn't decide what to listen to today, so I hit the "Shuffle Songs" button on my iPod.

Eventually, "Mutilation Is The Most Sincere Form Of Flattery" from Marilyn Manson's "Eat Me, Drink Me" album came on.

I recalled only listening to the album once and thinking it was a piece of shit, that the music was all right, if a little "more guitar solos!!! YYYYYEEEEEAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!" for my taste, but the lyrics had this jumbled, disconnected feel, like Manson was just reading scribbled free verse phrases of a crumpled handful of cocktail napkins he'd found in his pocket. Things didn't make any sense, let alone rhyme.

And he didn't so much sing the lyrics as croak them tunelessly.

Which he does, but, somehow this seemed more tuneless.

But, anyway, I felt that maybe I had given this album the raw deal and hadn't paid enough attention to it.

So I listened to the first four or five tracks.

And, no, I was right, as was the music-listening-public in general: the album sucks dog cock and should be avoided, by Manson fans and certainly by non-Manson fans, as it may change one's indifference towards him into rage.

His new ("much more than a") album is going to drop later this year.

My breath is neither baited nor held.

I finished "Full Dark, No Stars" last night and here is what I have to say about each of the four stories...

"1922"

King managed to nail the bleakness and desperation he was setting out to convey, but, at its heart, it's just a ghost story; a ghost story proceeded by a pretty brutal murder scene, but a ghost story nonetheless.

A typical, dark King story which ends in the ridiculous Lovecraftian tradition of "I must finish now for the creature I fear and loathe is sitting behind me waiting for an appropriate point at which to inter--"

"Big Driver"

King's version of a revenge tale mixed with aspects of a Dexter-esque, crime-scene-cover-up mentality.

Does that make sense?

Some added character elements made it more interesting than a typical revenge tail, but the mention of the recent Jodie Foster revenge movie, "The Brave One" and the 70's Wes Craven revenge movie, "The Last House On The Left", took something away.

Maybe King felt that not mentioning them would lead people to point out that borrowed elements from them.

Not sure.

A good one though, well executed.

"Fair Extension"

My favorite in this collection.

It takes place in Derry and references both Pennywise and the Dark Tower series (both tiny, but delightful), and has that wonderful black humor that King can do so well when he allows himself, along with a gripping, what-happens-next feel to it.

Only problem is that it ends prematurely.

This isn't a matter of I wanted to know what happens next, it was s matter of how does the thing end.

Kind of a bummer.

"A Good Marriage"

Although a bit long-winded at times, this was a good one. King did a great job of putting his main character in a place where there was no right answer and every choice was immeasurably difficult. A very solid ending to a better-than-good collection.

All in all, a good read, if not as amazing as the hype lead me to believe.

But, that is why it's called hype.

Next time, I'm going to try to avoid any press and see how that goes, although his next novel "11/22/63" is about a guy who time travels back to stop the Kennedy assassination.

Which was the plot of an episode of Quantum Leap.

And a stupid idea for a Stephen King novel.

But who knows, he made a kid talking to his finger creepy, so yeah.

Next up is the latest Phil Tucker book, "Blood From The Mountain", which, I've been told, involves orcs.

Then "Side Jobs" by Jim Butcher, then "Ghost Story" by Jim Butcher and then, unless his head explodes while writing it, the newest Phil Tucker book, the one with more story elements that...well, fucking anything I've ever read.

Should be fun.

A: Eddie Murphy, Choking To Death On A Wet Sock

3.8.11

4:33 pm

Q: What does the man in here sound like when he laughs?

What do I win?

nothing

Enough of that.

Over the weekend, I set out to learn the keyboard line of this song that's been trapped in my head and screaming to get out like sixteen thousand hamsters on crystal meth with smaller hamsters declawed, detoothed and covered in Vaseline up their asses (not the whole song, just this goddamn two-and-a-half-second-long keyboard loop). This isn't your usual, "I keep singing the chorus to Bad Romance and it's driving me nutty LOL!!!" this is, "Every time I'm not actively thinking of or focusing on something, these notes start streaming through my mind, causing me to click my teeth together and tap my feet in time with the rhythm."

This sequence of notes has replaced silence in my mind.

First thing when I wake up and last thing before I fall asleep.

Looping.

Endless.

Murderous.

I failed in that task to replicate and, possible, hopefully, expunge it from my soul, and then said fuck it and made a dark, ambient thing that sounds a bit like Coil to me.

It's called "Just This Thing" and can be found here...

I made this piece using a keyboard and a Stylophone and Pro Tools.

I plan to do more dark, ambient stuff as the mood suits me and, although my one and only band is George Washington Diarrhea, I might start a new one for this, less vocal, more instrumental, more...I don't know..not fecal/phalli/dolphin-touching-centric sound.

Not that more than 70 people in the world have ever heard any of the music I've made, most likely far less.

The thing I'm concerned with regarding making music that involves very little musical input and/or talent and a whole lot of knob twiddling is that there's no real substance to it.

Stripped of all the effects I've layered onto it, "Just This Thing" isn't all that impressive.

Not that the final product is going to win me any Grammies, but I think it sounds cool and it definitely has a distinct, foreboding feel to it, which is what I was aiming for.

I mean, with enough work in post, knobs, buttons, switches and etc., you could probably strum a detuned electric guitar once and take the right person on a musical journey through their own spleen and back, but that doesn't say much for the composer's musical ability, of which, in my opinion, I have very little.

But that really doesn't matter as less than 70 people have ever heard anything I've done.

Which is sort of par for the course, I suppose, as four people read this.

Hi everyone.

How's things?

Good on ya.

All right, self deprecating hatespiral finished.

After recording my shitty bullshit fucking asshole piece of shit "song" on Saturday, I met with Lauren and we had some good Italian food capped off by some pretty bad Italian coffee (overtones of burned popcorn were present) and the best Italian chocolate cake I've had in months.

It was like eating Jesus' personal fudge stash, but made into a cake.

Augh, I'm actually salivating.

Pavlov was onto something...

After an excellent meal and a healthy amount of catching up, I returned home and did some grinding* in Dead Space 2, only to realize I might just be done with that game.

Fool of a Took.

The next day...I don't really remember, probably watched some West Wing, and then Chris came home from Katie's birthday thing in Philly and we watched The King's Speech, which was great, but maybe didn't deserve all those Oscars.

What happened was that Colin Firth didn't go full retard...because you never go full retard...unless you are, in fact, a full retard.

Hey, does the phrase 'full metal retard' make anyone else think of that Master Blaster guy from Thunderdome?

hahahahahahahahahahahahaha

I am now full retard.

And you never go full retard.

After finishing Perdido Street Station, I reread the first Grind Show book in preparation for spitballing ideas for the next few Grind Show books** with Phil, the second of which should, barring his fingers falling off, be finished April 1st, maybe give or take because of some extenuating circumstances in his real life.

After rereading TGS, I finally got to the Patton Oswalt book, Zombie Spaceship Wasteland.

A lot less funny and a lot more thoughtful that I'd expected, but still hilarious in places, namely the fake movie script punch-up and the essay about North American hobo songs.

If you have any interest in Oswalt's incredible stand up, you should check this out.

And, if you don't, then you haven't heard his stand up and I am better than you.

Or at least more versed in cultural literacy.

This evening, I will embark upon Stephen King's latest, a collection of novellas called Full Dark, No Stars, an excellent title which goes along with, so I've heard, an excellent book.

By the time I'm done with that, I'm going to read the most recent Dresden book, Side Jobs, which should lead me right up to the release of the newest Dresden book, Ghost Story, coming out in April.

Then, I will have read all the books there are and there will be no more.

Running beneath all this (aside from that fucking keyboard loop) is me, chiseling my way through West Wing.

I'm two episodes away from the end of season four and, I believe, the end of Sorkin's involvement with the show.

Hopefully, the dip in quality will not be too noticeable.

When I get home tonight, I think I'm going to spend a moment looking for tablature for this goddamn song so I don't blow my fucking head off.

Wish me luck.

* Grinding in the sense of doing the same, simple action again and again and again in order to make one's character more powerful, usually unfairly so, not in the sense of slamming my crotch against someone or something.

** The second of which, I have on good authority, will be called The Beauty Of The Beholder Is In The Eye Of The Cloacae.

Walter Must Die.

2.28.11

3:13 pm

First, you don't know Walter and you never will so don't fucking judge me.

He must die.

He ought to die and, if I were given a sharp hammer and three minutes in a windowless room with him, I'd be happy to take care of things.

But I can't.

Thanks Obama.

Next, as everyone suspected, Reznor and Ross won their Oscar last night, and as a result, people have been interviewing him.

The only nugget my obsessed little mind centered on was what he said regarding the How To Destroy Angels LP: "Have to mix it, early fall, most likely."

Originally (and obviously I should have known that anything relating to release dates coming from Trent Reznor should be taken with a huge amount of salt), Reznor had slated the new album for January 2011. His fans, by this point, understand that when he says "soon" he means "within the next year", "very soon" "within three months" and "really really soon" "within the next day". But when he gives a month? That's different. I'll try to not Cake out as I've done over the past three years or so, but just letting you, the Internet, know that I am bummed about the potential six month wait that myself and fans are in for.

And, right along those lines, it was reported that TMBG's fifteenth studio album (and first adult album in more than a year) was due out in April, the fifth to be specific. Recently, the band spoke up and said that "an album preview EP" would be out in April and that the album itself was now scheduled for July.

July.

As in, four months from now.

Last week the new Radiohead album came out. It's called The King of Limbs, it's eight tracks and 38 minutes.

Personally, I'm a two/three/four-tracks-an-album guy when it comes to Radiohead, usually discarding the rest for whatever reason (although Thom Yorke's The Eraser was awesome), and this new one is in the same place as their previous ones.

I mention this because of the recent disturbing trend in popular music where time between albums is getting longer and the albums themselves are getting shorter.

Is this the artists' way of antagonizing pirates?

"You want to steal our music? Fine, here's 40 minutes for the next few years, steal THAT you little shits."

That's healthy.

Surprised and disappointed that Haley whatshername from True Grit didn't win for Best Supporting.

Have to see Melissa Leo in The Fighter to know whether or not I should continue feeling this way.

Also, apparently I need to see The King's Speech.

That thing fucking swept.

Anyway, along with Oscar Fever, I caught Dead Space 2-orrhea.

I bought the game when it came out (on January 25th) and have held off playing it, despite hearing people rave about it, for fear I would disappear into it.

I'm about 85% done with the game after two play sessions, about five hours each.

I'm not even done with it and I'm already looking forward to playing it again.

They have improved upon everything from the first game and executed perhaps the most brilliant revisiting of a previous area I've ever encountered.

And it looks and sounds fantastic, just like its predecessor.

In particular, there's a segment where you are manually realigning a bunch of solar panels while floating over Titan and you can just stop for a moment and look down at Jupiter...absolutely stunning.

Plus there's a new enemy which is, basically, an exploding baby.

So that's rewarding.

I should be done tonight unless I have something tomorrow morning that restricts me from finishing up.

Oh, and Will, it might not be the exact same as Diana's, but Chris followed her directions to the letter last night and made some amazing arroz con pollo.

It really does have to do with not touching the rice it seems.

How odd...

And speaking of Will, massive congrats to him on shucking off the boring humdrum chains of the Google Lunar X-Prize and stepping into the high class world of luxury, recreational space travel.

One more time.

LUXURY, RECREATIONAL SPACE TRAVEL.

Unless space disappears in the next few years, Will will actually be in space before he's 33.

So, he's pretty much taken care of.

He's going to space.

What else is there?

I suppose he could finish the Tall Like Paul screenplay...maybe even while he's in space...he could use that pen that writes in space that the US government developed.

Or a pencil.

Whichever.

In other BFFLOLROXORZ!!!1! news, I'm super-stoked, once again, to read Phil's latest novel, Blood From The Mountain.

Or Mount.

Whatever.

I admit that I am even more stoked for his March novel, the second chapter in his Grind Show series.

I dug the hell out of the first.

In fact, it might be my favorite thing he's written, certainly my favorite novel of his.

Christina has yet to read it and, although we celebrated our 11th anniversary on Friday and over the weekend, we won't make it to twelve unless she reads the first Grind Show in the next few weeks.

See Phil? THAT is how dedicated a fan I am.

I want your word babies.

I also want you to write my biography.

Maybe in April?

call me

**************************************Finished Perdido Street Station tonight.
Man oh man does that guy China know how to fuck over some heroes.

I've got (a) styl(ophone).

2.24.11

4:42 pm

Motherfucker YES!

And not only that, but since it has a headphone jack (why someone would want to listen to a Stylophone on headphones is beyond me, maybe the right combination of drugs makes you only want to hear Stylophone...?) I was able to plug it into my ProTools earlier today!!!

Stylophone + massive reverb = PSYCHEDELIC FREAK OUT!!!

I am way too excited about this...

Also on their way are a professional tambourine (none of that fake-ass tambourine shit for me, I'm a taxpayer), an egg shaker (like a maraca for people who aren't assholes) , a piano horn (it's a piano, it's a horn, what) and a toy accordion (because a real accordion is like three hundred dollars and probably really hard to play well).

I don't actually have a composition in mind for all this stuff, but it's always better to have a Stylophone/professional tambourine/piano horn/egg shaker/toy accordion and not need one than to need an etc etc etc and not have one.

A carpenter does need a reason to buy a new hammer.

Everything but the Stylophone was ordered off Amazon, BUT the Stylophone was ordered from thinkgeek.com.

Thinkgeek.com is fucking awesome.

They have a plethora of products laced with caffeine (cocoa, jerky, soap) and bacon (salt, mayonnaise, lip balm), a bunch of Star Wars/Trek/comic merch, a category simply called "Science!" and much, much, much more.

There's a t-shirt that says "Schrödinger's cat is dead" on the front and "Schrödinger's cat is not dead" on the back.

It's a t-shirt...riffing...on quantum physics...that you can buy...and wear.

Go then, there are other gems than these...

http://www.thinkgeek.com/

With all this influx of musical stuff, I do feel a song comin' on...I'm just not sure what it is or how it will sound.

It's coming though...count on it.

I honestly believe that the lack of Stylophone was the only thing holding George Washington Diarrhea back.

Now that I've got one...sky's the limit.

Sky's the limit.

These Streets Are Full Of Garbage, A Review Of The Streets' Final Album, "Computers And Blues".

2.23.11

3:20 pm

 

Today I've been listening to the new (and final), Streets album, 'Computers and Blues'.

This is a horrible album to go out on.

 

A few years ago, The Streets put out their fourth album, 'Everything Is Borrowed', on which all the songs were written about and based on axioms and parables, so much to the point that some of the songs were just non-rhyming retellings of these old chestnuts. That fact plus the less than inspired background beats made for quite a bland entry.

When 'Everything Is Borrowed' came out, Skinner told the world that this was to be the second to last Streets album. I think therein lies the problem with 'Computers and Blues'.

 

This new album doesn't feel like the final piece in some puzzle or some huge, triumphant ending, it feels like he's doing this so he can be done, as if 'Computers' had been on his To Do list too long and he just got fed up with the clutter.

As on 'Borrowed', the backgrounds are unexciting and wallpapery, well assembled, but not as nuanced and compelling as their earlier work, and the astounding lack of energy in Skinner's vocals causes me to ask myself why I should care about these songs when the person performing them doesn't.

The track "Blip On A Screen" is about Skinner's unborn child, about a life he helped to create, but the level of enthusiasm he brings to it makes it sound like he's reciting the contents of a laundry hamper.

I'd point out other low points, but they've all sort of blended together to make a sad pudding of unimpressive, forgettable sound.

There are a few exceptions, such as "Trust Me", which has a pretty decent beat and just a ghost of Skinner's liveliness that is so noticeably lacking throughout the whole album, and "Lock The Locks", the final Streets track ever (unless Mike Skinner changes his mind), which has an excellent sense of closure to it.  Along with those two the two other stand out tracks I've encountered are "Going Through Hell", one of the only tracks on the album that exhibits any of the Streets' signature cockiness and vigor as well as a rousing, enjoyable beat, and "ABC", a too short, straight up rap using the alphabet as its lyrical template, but, I'm sad to say that these tracks stand out only because everything else on this record is so substandard. These tracks would almost surely be ignored on any of the Streets' first three albums.

 

The Streets' first album, 'Original Pirate Material', was rough, fresh and exciting, their follow up, a brilliantly mundane rap/opera about Skinner misplacing a thousand dollars entitled 'A Grand Don't Come For Free', showed their growth as a group and the honing of their skills as well as granted them a massive amount of fame and success, and their third album, 'The Hardest Way To Make An Easy Living', documented the dangers of believing their own hype and the price they paid for the renown they'd earned. The story told by these three albums is brilliant and truly worth all the praise they've received, and to see the final two albums in their career turn out the way they have makes me wonder if Skinner should have stopped earlier.

Do yourself a favor and stick to the first three.

Bane is CRAZY.

2.22.11

3:58 pm

Maybe a month ago, I heard that Tom Hardy was cast to play a villain in the next and final (according to Nolan) Batman movie.

I vaguely recalled a dapper British guy from Inception who airily tossed bon mots and fought some guys in a tilty, fucked up hallway and was sure I was mistaken.

I was not.

I did some research as to why this dandy fop would be cast as the massive South American master strategist/psycho steroid addict with a hard on for snapping Batman in half.

Turns out, Mr. Hardy starred in a movie about "Britain's most famous prisoner", Charlie Bronson.

The movie was called Bronson and I watched it last night on streaming Netflix.

I no longer have any doubt about Hardy as Bane (except for his size), but I must say, that movie was awful.

The trailer compared it to A Clockwork Orange and Snatch.

After watching it, I can inform you that that is because is features four minutes of bare knuckle boxing and some guy in and out of prisons and mental institutions...remember? Like that guy from A Clockwork Orange?

It had a few hints of Natural Born Killers, but just a few.

It looked great, the sets and make up were very effective and vibrant, even the darkest, dingiest holes, but there was really no plot.

The whole deal with this guy is that he wanted to be famous.

So, the movie kind of went like this: He beat people up, got beat up by people, hung with Super Hans from Peep Show, said he wanted to be famous, called a lot of people "cunts", got totally naked once or twice, decided he was famous.

The whole movie was like a collection of deleted scenes.

Whatever the case, Hardy did a great job with a big ol' bag of nothing.

And anyway, I'll never doubt Nolan's casting again.

Also cast in the new Batman was Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle/Catwoman.

When I heard that, I realized I only knew of her from her interactions with Chris.

I don't think I've ever seen her in anything but Brokeback Mountain and, well, let's just say she took backseat to the Joker fucking Donnie Darko, plus I watched it on a plane back from Zurich to New York and, as I hadn't slept more than three hours in three days, well, it's a bit fuzzy.

But, like I just said, I trust Nolan.

Aside from Katie Holms, a problem he solved with the help of sad turtle Maggie Darko, the man is above reproach.


I WILL BREAK YOUR CUNT!!! (Bane from the comics on the left and Hardy from Bronson on the right)

Along with doing the Bane research, I spent a bunch of time with Chris, including a trip to St. Mark's and thereabouts for an evening of eating like a 7-year old.

First, we hit the St. Alps Tea House for some bubble tea, then Pomme Frites (my first time!!!), for some expensive but fucking amazing fries and then to Luna's, the only gluten-free, dairy-free ice cream parlor in New York City (that I'm aware of), where Chris got some mint chocolate chip ice cream and I get a vanilla milkshake made from cashews. Before you gag on your own vomit, it tasted like cake batter and was delicious, so bite me.

Between the Pomme Frites and Luna's we passed a small shop called Obscura and we went in.

Among other things, they had a full human skeleton in a coffin ($6000), a preserved human head (brains included) from the 20's or 30's ($6500) and a huge array of other fucked up shit.

Apparently this place is considered a medical museum and is quite famous.

Chris got a bad vibe off the skeleton so we didn't but it.

We did have an involved conversation with the guy working there who turned out to be from New Mexico.

We then returned home where our bodies reminded us that eating like you're seven and actually being seven are not the same thing.

We finally watched The Proposition which had been mouldering* on our Netflix pile for over a month.

Seemed dark and brutal for the sake of being dark and brutal, but it was beautifully shot.

It gets more impressive when you find out that Nick Cave did it.

Yesterday, I recorded the VO for this commercial I wrote for Ray for Alina Tugend's book "Better By Mistake".

Whoa.

That's a mouthful.

Ray was hired to make a commercial for Alina Tugend's book.

Ray asked some people for ideas.

I gave him an idea.

On Sunday, Ray shot the idea I had.

I'm also doing VO for it.

Okay.

That's better.

Yeesh.

Finally, I have gotten Chris addicted to Plants Vs. Zombies.

Or rather, she has gotten herself addicted to it.

But I'm cool either way.

Did not start Dead Space 2 or restart Fallout 3.

Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

Still carving my way through the West Wing.

It's still Sorkin, so I'm still having a good time.

I wonder if I'll be able to tell when he leaves?

Hm...

Okay.

Done.

* I added the 'u' because, although I am not British, the British spelling of 'moulder' reminds me of Alan Moulder, the producer who is currently mixing Nine Inch Nails' "The Fragile" into 5.1 surround sound.

Paul (The Movie, Not The Me)

2.17.11

3:13 pm

Recently, I had the glorious good fortune to get an invite to a screening of the new Simon Pegg/Nick Frost joint, Paul.

Just a note before I begin...in the near future, if you see me randomly posting things in first person (e.g. Paul is very funny, Paul is just the right length, Paul is packed with cultural references, Jason Bateman is great in Paul), I'm not referring to myself, I'm referring to this movie...even though all the things just mentioned apply to both.

Anyway.

I was literally brimming with excitement over this movie as I'm a huge Simon Pegg fan, specifically of the stuff that he and Frost have written together like Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. Paul was also written by them and it goes right up there with the other two; it's snappy, childish, caustic and layered with humor, ranging from awful puns to alien dick jokes to subtle (and not so subtle) Star Wars nods to all the other stuff you'd expect from a movie made by these guys.

The three biggest differences between Paul and their first two films are that Edgar Wright didn't direct (the lack of his hyper-editing style is noticeable, but not overly detrimental), it's a lot less British (but still quite British) and, rather than focusing on Pegg and Frost, there's a whole slew of co-stars; Jason Bateman, Kristen Wiig, Bill Hader and Joe Lo Truglio (who are all brilliant), and a whole bunch of cameos as well from Jeffery Tabor, Jane Lynch, David Koechner, Sigourney Weaver (whose appearance is a surprise only if you've never heard her voice before in your life) and, oddly, Blythe Danner.

It was especially good to see Joe Lo Truglio, originally of The State, doing more than his usual two or three scenes as Nameless Funny Guy, and I hope this means more stuff for him.

As fans would expect, Paul features that wonderful Pegg-Frost brand of homoeroticism which divided the audience between people who think "they gay" and people who understand that the images in front of them are not real and that the people in these images are pretending, but I digress.

The basic gist of the film is that Pegg and Frost are lifelong friends who are visiting America for the first time to attend the San Diego Comi-Con and then take a UFO tour of the Southwest. They meet people and things happen...funny things.

Much like the plots of their earlier works, Paul is full of tropes, but also like their earlier works, the joy isn't in the plot, it's in watching these guys experience the plot.

I had the honor of being the only person who got (or, at least, the only one who got and laughed at) a Star Wars reference (odd as I'm not a huge fan). At one point, our heroes end up in a shitkicker bar where a cuntry band is playing the song from the cantina scene in Star Wars.

I felt pride and shame, like a fly that has found a huge pile of shit all to himself.

I'm planning on seeing Paul again when it comes out as it is worth however much these Hollywood twats are charging for movies these days.

Oh, also it's rated R so you don't have those stupid moments where "fuck" is the right thing to say, but you can only say "screw".

Fuck that.

Hard.

With a dick.

So, on March 18th, go see Paul.

The movie, not me.

Although if you want to me, that's cool too.

Just call me so I can get you a ticket to Paul.

And me.

And last night, as I was home, Chris and watched the first two thirds of Reality Bites.

Why the first two thirds, one might boggle?

Well, heck, I'll tell you why!

Because Netflix needs to pay more attention to the condition of their DVDs.

But, the fact that I didn't ask them to send a new copy probably tells you what we thought of the movie.

Or at least the first two thirds.

Did we really talk like that?

Jesus.

I apologize to everyone who isn't in their 20's who has to listen to people in their 20's talk.

And that music?

And have you EVER seen Jeanine Garaflo be that sincere?!

It was weird.

In a bad way.

Oh and both Chris and I agree that Christian Slater and Ethan Hawke should battle to the death.

Before the screening yesterday, I managed to finish (part of) Plants Vs. Zombies, an excellent little game originally for the PC then the Xbox then the iPod Touch then the iPad and, finally, the PS3.

If you have any of these platforms, you should check it out.

It was totally worth the wait.

It's made by a company called Pop Cap, which was known for cell phone games and smaller, time-wasting things you'd play while waiting for a train or something, but PvZ has a depth and humor that allows it to stand out from the mire of games like itself.

And it has zombies being attacked by plants.

And AMAZING puns.

Like a Wall-Nut...which acts like a wall.

Or a plant that shoots a lot of peas in rapid succession...a Repeater.

Or a plant that spits out coins...a Marigold.

And the list goes on and on and on.

Today is a good day.

Can't say why.

Just saying it.

I feel a song comin' on...

So Much Party As To Make The Sky Bleed

2.7.11

3:48 pm

Oh goodness do those Chinese know how to party.

On Saturday, despite the assy weather, Chris and I wandered over to Jen and Jim's Chinese New Year party.

We stuffed our faces with some amazing homemade Chinese food, dumplings and lo mien and rice and pea shoots and pork and everything you get from a store but REAL and HOMEMADE!!!

Then, after a few moments of that, they were just starting a game of Apples to Apples and Chris and I were the only two who'd played it before, so we ended up introducing it to a group of TOTAL strangers and came in a close second, one point away from winning.

It was interesting, trying to learn things about the other players by their choices and judging styles.

From what I remember, our winners were:

Principled - Batman (utterly. The man WILL NOT kill, not even the Joker and he will not use guns, unless you're Darkseid)

Eternal - Eleanor Roosevelt (she NEVER loses, a true Trump Card)

Sweet - Sailors (as in "Thweet...Thaliorth!!!")

Innocent - Fuzz (because...yeah...)

Some losers (which should tell you just how much we weren't playing with the people we usually play with):

Touchy Feely - James Bond (get it? because he fucks a lot)

Chewy - A Morgue ('nuff said)

I forget the rest.

Anyway, after Apples to Apples, people sort of split up and talked among themselves.

I ended up talking to a girl named Joann for about 45 minutes about books and movies and music and all the stuff I normally geek out about.

She mentioned an author named John Bellairs who sounded interesting.

Phil, any info of this guy?

After I'd flitted away from her, social butterfly that I am, I spoke to a girl named Megan and a guy named Treb (opposite of Bass) about how even though Cake hates their fans, they are worth listening to (I happened to be wearing my Cake shirt). I also told them about my adventures with TMBG and it turned out they were kindred spirits, at least with TMBG.

THEN I sat down and talked to ANOTHER girl (Seri, who was just as adorable as her name) about music, mainly Cake again but also about Weezer and how their irony might not be sincere and how it's actually quite a chore to enjoy their music.

Then some weirdness happened when this girl Anna, who I was talking to about Clue and alternate dimensions, turned out to be into the production end of voice over stuff and she's going to (hopefully) get me involved in some of her work which involves sending me scripts and recording them at home...perhaps on some awesome-ass home recording equipment?

After that, a lot of people left...and I was sort of assaulted by a drunk chick.

She made Kaitlyn look like a baby kitten.

Soon after, Drunky McAngrychick left and Chris, Jim, Jen and I talked for an additional three hours until five in the fucking morning.

It...was...EPIC.

Chris and I left with three days worth of amazing food and Jim lent me the hardest, most hey-you-like-video-games-well-FUCK-YOU-YOU-GAMER-SCUM-SUCK-SHIT-AND-DIE-BITCH-GET-A-JOB-AND-CUT-YOUR-HAIR game I've ever had the misfortune to play.

I gave it an hour of my life then calmly removed it from my PS3.

I understand when I'm not wanted somewhere.

Then Chris and I watched Piranha 2D.

It went too far at points (and that was hilarious) and not far enough at other points (which made me wonder why they started down that path in the first place).

Movie like that have to be at 1000% the whole time or it doesn't work.

I'm looking forward to Machete because I've heard that THAT is 1000% the whole way through.

Afterwards, Chris and I played a lot of Little Big Planet 2, which makes one feel better about the world.

Did not even have a chance to put in Dead Space 2 this weekend.

It will be there...it will wait...

A huge weekend, thoroughly enjoyable.

Jim and Jen are fast becoming good friends and Chris and I both look forward to spending more time with them.

Those muthafuckas KNOW how to party.

After all that I watched more West Wing.

Did you know that the President's daughter, Zoe, is Peggy Olsen (with better teeth) from Mad Men?

Weird...like time travel weird...

Anyway.

Yes.

I love the fishes...because they're so delishes

2.4.11

3:51 pm

Finally got all the components of my Birthday Bonanza up and running last night.

Wow.

The audio is incredible and the program is baffling.

I'll figure this out eventually...

Now I am on a quest to get some cool instruments, maybe some pedals, switches and other things I don't understand.

I found a way to connect and hear my keyboard through the Mbox, but not record it...

That is a problem which, I'm sure, can be solved by flipping a switch I can't find.

It turns out that you don't record your voice by clicking "Record", no.

You click "Record", then "Play" THEN you're recording.

Now that just seems...I don't know...extraneous, yeah?

Whatever.

If it's good enough for Reznor, it's good enough for me.

The Fragile, here I come.

While I've been watching The West Wing, I decided to check out an episode of Studio 60, the most recent Sorkin TV venture.

I can clearly see the Sorkin writing, but Amanda Peet?

Who made that choice?

I mean, she's delivering these clever Sorkin zingers and batting around the solid Sorkin dialogue, but...it's like she's speaking a foreign language, like none of this wit is at home in her mouth.

I only watched the first episode and I might go further, but I really don't see the need, especially since everyone spoke so poorly of it.

I finished One By One a few days ago and spoke about it with Phil.

He is planning on going back and revising/editing some parts, which is good as I think it has potential.

I went from his book to Perdido Street Station.

Man is this a fully realized world.

This China guy (aside from looking like a power top bouncer at a gay bar) can write!

I'm only a bit into the book, but it's just spellbinding.

Very much looking forward to diving deeper.

This is going to be a full weekend, Saturday I'm recording with Ray for a book trailer and then partying with Jen and Jim for the Chinese New Year; and Sunday, well, Sunday is going to be me and Christina playing Little Big Planet 2 until we die.

And maybe eating some more arroz con pollo, which, sadly, didn't turn out as perfect as in New Mexico, most likely because we used white rice instead of yellow rice.

Live and learn.

It is still good though.

All right.

Off with you.

The Filthy Lucre

1.27.11

3:53 pm

And now I am 30.

Still feel the same as when I was 17.

But with more sex.

A little more...

Received a plethora of amazing gifts from my best friends and family on Tuesday.

Basically, an industry standard home studio: Pro Tools, an M Box, sound dampening panels, an awesome mic (a Node, I believe) and mic stand.

I feel like a toddler that has been given a Stradivarius.

And I am terrified.

In a good way, but terrified nonetheless.

Just looking at the Pro Tools interface is...dear lord it's baffling...

I must now write and record songs for all those who presented me with this excellent stuff.

Whether they like it or not.

Had a mostly restful two days off; I purchased Dead Space 2 and finished Dead Space: Extraction, which is sort of a Dead Space 1.5, on-rails shooter that came out only for the Wii. It was added onto the PS3 version of Dead Space 2 because Sony rules and Microsoft blows children.

Or because there's more space on a Blu Ray, I'm not sure.

It's a nice little supplement to the original game.

I also started watching The West Wing again.

Oh my goodness that is prime Sorkin writing...

Speaking of which, the Oscar nominees were announced and The Social Network is everywhere.

As is True Grit, Black Swan and Inception.

I've never really been an Oscar person, but I've also never seen half of the year's best films without knowing they were, in fact, the year's best films, and one of my favorite bands doesn't usually get nominated for an Oscar.

Oh, and Reznor and Ross are totally going to win.

They're up against some classical pap from The King's Speech, some typical orchestral Zimmer stuff and...shit, I can't even remember the others.

As fitting or unfitting to that movie as that score is, it's definitely the most interesting one out there.

Very excited about their work on the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo remake.

I should watch the original soon...

Chris and I finished The Walking Dead as well.

Boy oh golly did they deviate from the comics...

Not really a cliffhanger ending, just sort of a "god damn I wish there were more episodes to watch right fucking now" ending.

I also put some more work in on Pesadilla and I am now one segment and a few credits from finishing.

Then, I start the authoring, which will hopefully not be an issue, and then...I am finished.

About two months after the trip, give or take...not too bad.

Party this weekend.

Who knows how that's going to go.

It might snow, you know...and we all know how seeing that fluffy, white stuff gently float from the sky makes us all insane with fear and grief.

POWDERED FUCKING WATER! IT'S POWDERED FUCKING WATER!!!!!

Anyway.

I'm 30.

Reflections Upon Turning 30

I have none.

Thank you.

I'm Sorry...What?

1.24.11

3:50 pm

Rumbating.

Lardamarcy.

Yakeyanmissit.

Tingsendat.

God damn are you Jamaicans unintelligible.

You're Ja-makin'-me want to throw grammar books and dictionaries at you.

Or machetes.

Anyway.

Made massive progress on Pesadilla over the weekend.

Like,  85% done.

Tried dropping some of the actual feature into the authoring program...no go, I'm going to need to pick up some DVD+R DLs for this one.

Certainly hope all y'all DVD players can handle these...

The menus are looking a bit tight, might have to compromise something there...

But, I found out I can do a shit ton of cool authoring stuff.

If it fits...

I only have the credits, some Santa Fe stuff and the Party section...then organizing everything and then...?

Yeah, that might be it.

I'm taking tomorrow and Wednesday off as it is my Birthday, so I should hopefully have things done by then.

At this point, after having seen every picture and video clip taken on this trips numerous times, I must say, next time we have to get more pictures of the people.

There are three (3) pictures of Grace, three (3) of Phil and Grace and one (1) of just Phil.

Meanwhile, there are, literally, dozens of me.

Why did God curse me with such...photogenetism?

Also, there is exactly ONE picture of the six of us.

What the fuck, people?

Are we, as individuals and as a group, less important and beautiful than New Mexico?!

I say thee NAY, mothafuckas!!!

I say thee eff that ess!!!!

EFF IT!!!

Hard.

Also, next time, we need all of us.

This decision has nothing to do with sentimentality or anything like that, I'm just getting sick of explaining every single joke that Phil and Grace weren't there for.

It gets old.

Fast.

All right.

Enough of that.

Chris was away this weekend and, when she got back, we watched The Assassination of Jesse James By The Longest Movie Title I Have Seen In Quite A While.

We were excited to get on a small "Western" kick after seeing True Grit last weekend.

Folks, The Assassination of Etc. is NOT the same type f movie as True Grit.

It's a lot less...Coen-y.

A bit too much Oscar gloss and arty shots that just went on for fucking ever.

Sam Rockwell did great and Casey Affleck did really supergreat.

Brad Pitt was using his "slightly Southern" voice and did just fine as well.

It wasn't what either of us expected, not they either of us know anything about Jesse James.

I know a little about Jesse Jane, the porn star.

I also know that her movie, The Assassination of Jesse Jane's Ass By Ten Guys, is also, not quite like True Grit.

In a few days we'll have The Proposition.

I only know that Nick Cave either wrote and/or directed that.

So we'll see.

After Chris went off to bed, I watched Greenberg, the recent Ben Stiller movie.

In a way, Stiller kind of reminds me of Crispin (Hellion) Glover as he has these two discernable sides to his acting career: the mainstream Fockers, Tropic Thunder, Something About Mary side, and the more subtle, less retarded Permanent Midnight, Flirting With Disaster side.

Greenberg is totally the latter.

It's almost shocking to see Stiller acting so well.

In the movie...nothing really happens, but the writer/director does a good job of making it an interesting nothing, yeah?

You really get to know the character Stiller plays.

At the heart of the role, he's really just a hugely socially awkward guy, but Stiller does it so well, you don't mind.

It's not the greatest film you'll ever see, but it's a new look at Ben Stiller, specifically one or two moments of really excellent acting towards the end.

Returned our cable box (I haven't turned on the TV to watch TV in about six months) and bought Patton Oswalt's book, "Zombie Spaceship Wasteland".

Still have yet to finish Garp, start the new King, Butcher or "Perdido Street Station" or obtain the Ender books.

I should be set for a while.

Tomorrow I'm picking up Dead Space 2 and happy to do so.

Like I'd mentioned, I'd sort of lost interest in the game, but after playing the demo?

Yeah, back on it.

These guys nail atmosphere like no one else.

One might say it's just Silent Hill/Resident Evil in space, but a.) that's fucking awesome, b.) when there's a good RE or SH game out again, I'll give that complaint some clout and c.) DS2 is 1080p and you can see them working the shit out of every one of those pixels.

The game looks unbelievable.

And the sound design is so damn effective...you'll hear a small noise, like someone tapping their fingernails on an empty soda can, which seems to come from the ceiling and, once you assure yourself nothing is going to explode from the air vents and cut your face off, you'll forget about it. The higher you go, the more pronounced the sound gets until, an hour later, you're facing the three-story nightmare that's been punching it's way through a huge, steel wall the whole time.

So, I'm going to be pooping a bit when I get that up and running.

What you see above are the plans for my 30th Birthday: finish Pesadilla, play some scary games and spend some time with my One and Only.

This weekend, there is party and pizza and cuppy cake and fondue and pool.

And that is good.

10:37 pm

Just (finally) finished The World According To Garp by John Irving.

And I figured out what it is I liked about A Prayer for Owen Meany (a later book of his) that made me want to go back and read Garp.

It's the fact that there is a complete story in his books, the main characters never just pop up or disappear.

He writes them from birth to death (and a bit before and after in Garp) and everything in between. Sometimes that's actually a bit of a drawback because, as I had said, the book dragged at times, but that was only because Irving was focusing on the life of the main character (in this case, T.S. Garp), making him more real.

When something is referred to, it doesn't merely feel like foreshadowing what it's first mentioned, like a device as subtle as the author calling you up and saying "Wink, wink", it just feels like something in the character's life coming up again; more cyclical than heavy-handed.

He does an excellent job of showing the humor and sadness in life too, but without really hitting you over the head with it.

Plus he isn't overly precious with his characters either, ever one is subject to something awful at times, and it feels genuinely surprising in most cases.

Overall, a good one.

I'll probably read more of his, but not for a while.

Actually, reading over the above list of potential and upcoming reading material, I forgot one: in about 7 days, I'll have a brand new P. W. Tucker to read as well.

I'll stumble through the rest of the week reading comics and then, starting February 1st, I'll jump into Phil's fourth (finished) novel, One By One, which, if Will is telling the truth is a biography of the band Foo Fighters.

Very excited about that one as, despite what Phil thinks I thought of Dark Fae or Mother, Maiden, No Crone, I do enjoy his writing immensely.

2011 is looking to be an excellent literary year for me.

As a bystander, at least.

Oh, and Phil, right around the time you get to your ninth or tenth novel this year, can I suggest you write one about me?

Not only do I think it would be an excellent opportunity for you to write about me, but I would love to, finally, be immortalized in a book.

Written by you.

So...think about it.

In return I could write you a song...