Stickshift Rocketship
This band gives ALL their music away for free download on their website. It isn't really tech-related but the music is good enough in my opinion to justify the digging. Its a little David Bowie-esque but more characteristically wimpy. Either way, its a free download and probably worth a listen based on that.
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My new site is up. You have no reason to continue on this server as every last one of my old posts has been archived into my new website. Seriously, I have Ayavaron.com and my blog is there. You have absolutely no reason to come here. Go to ayavaron.com or click the above link.
Bow down to my awesome-ness for I am nifty!
Times are a-Changing
This site is going to move soon. It'll no longer be hosted by Google (though I consider the possibility of exploiting Google for image-hosting....) and it'll no longer use the Blogger templates. Instead, I intend to use a system called WordPress. This will have a domain name too.
ayavaron.com (Though there is not a thing there at the moment.)
The WordPress blog offers a couple neat features like Categories, User-Profiles, dynamic page recompilation (Which is something that none of you will notice) and I'll be able to host any type of file. If I want to put up a PDF or a DOC then there shall be nothing to stop me. The site will look different too but hopefully that'll be for the better. I'm sick of my shitty banner anyway.
I also am going to be getting myself some Private Wikis. These will be for my own projects which I'll eventually make public, but while they're unfinished, they'll be hidden. What am I working on? Something that if doen correctly will be hilarious, but if done poorly will be boring.
See my reader(s) on the new server!
Bow down to my awesome-ness for I am nifty!
Good Things and Good Things to Come
Ah, Geekiness is blessed currently.
Futurama is officially being uncancelled and 26 new episodes have been ordered by Fox.
Windows Vista will
NOT be crippling Open GL support as previous rumors would indicate. Thankfully, these were just nasty nasty rumors that Microsoft didn't care enough to commnet on until now. Knowing this, I am quite excited to get Windows Vista on my PC in 2007. (Becuase the people who do it in 2006 are gonna get screwed with a bunch of bugs, you just know it. Early Adopters live that edge.)
On Friday, I saw
V For Vendetta, and I urge all those who have read negative reviews of the movie to completely disregard the movie. This film is
AWESOME. Its powerful, emotionally in tune, witty, and at times even hilarious. I do not mean to say that the film is light-hearted. There was just a great really funny scene in there that worked quite well with the film's plot. I honestly give it my highest recomendation I have ever given on this blog.
Here is to hoping an Oscar.
The Pit of Despair guys (Ben LeBeau and his brother) loved my review of Relics and they'd like me to do their other three shitty albums with the same treatment. They even have me mentioned on the
front page of their site. So I'll probably be reviewing at least one of their albums soon. You have that to look forward to.
I'm not going to review V For Vendetta because I don't think its necessary. There are plenty of positive reviews out there and they're right. I don't need to add to them. I will admit though the film had a couple of plotholes and that Natalie Portman did kinda forget her fake accent occasionally. Despite these flaws though, this is still one of the best films I've seen in a long time, and doubtlessly the best I've seen this year.
Go see it. You'll be happy you did.
Bow down to my awesome-ness for I am nifty!
My friend has a website and a little band:
Pit of Despair's and Goggle Boy's Official WebsiteHis little band released a new album called Relics which I have chosen to review. I did this quite harshly, but I got his approval to be mean about it before I started writing it. No hard feelings are represented but I had fun doing this. I think he also had fun making this.
I have chosen to rate tracks in terms of what they'd be worth on iTunes. The lowest it can go is a penny and the highest is almost nearly a dollar. Of course, on iTunes, you pay the same whether or not it sucks or rocks, but I have chosen to ignore this because I don't want to let facts get in the way of a rating system.
Behold my review below:
1. The Pit of Despair
The track opens strongly with some quality guitar-work. It even has some quite catchy lyrics I shall reprint:
RERRRRR!!!!
RARRRRR!!!!
DESPAIR!!!!
Its actually a good song which might have some real value.
Value: $0.99
2. I Feel Lost
This track is a quiet and somber one. It feautres some decent, albeit simplistic playing that sounds alittle acoustic. The track manages to trail on the end of mediocrity and only occasionally tends toward the crappy end of the spectrum. It is again, a massive improvement over previous works.
Value: $0.32
3. Get Up
This song is repetitive, simplistic, and boring. The vocals in the song are weak at times and expose the limitted range of the singers. Fortunately, it is short so not all is lost.
Value: $0.02
4. Unfathomable Mayhem
This song stays pretty much instrumental, and most of it features quality guitar-work, however, about a minute before an end, it tends toward a very different sound that seems to be jagged. Going from short riffs to a DUNT! DUNT! DUNT! style fo play. Its actually a surprisingly interesting song, but not very great. I still think its worth hearing because the first half has interesting compositions.
Value: $0.51
5. El Zorro
The track starts out with some good guitaring. (I think they're using loops in some music-making program as it is very repetitive.) Unfortunately, this elegance is lost when the lyrics start. It sound like the voice is clipping the microphone, but upon further scrutiny, I realized it was actually just weak singing. There is one point where one of the singers says "Hola!" and that sounds pretty good. The song is too loud though and too samey. It is weaksauce.
Value: $0.31
[NOTE - I have been informed that this is not a looping program, but rather, it was just kept on-time very well. I am simultaneously impressed and disapointed. LeBeau said also that the only utilization of post-production was in Track 1. So disregard my comments on looping wherever they are.]
6. The Devil
The first two minutes of this track are good. They are instrumental. The next part makes it one of the only tracks on the album to have decent vocals. Unfortunately, that only means the first three minutes are good. Then in the lat 30 seconds, the singer does something totally stupid. Its barely describable but it sounds like very bad rap music where the MC rhymes "dope" with "dope" and that is the only word in the line. Its a shame, because this song could have been their surprise hit.
Value: $0.74
7. Don't Smell So Close to Me
This is quite possibly the worst song ever. I mean that. Its Ben LeBeau going, "BLEEP BLAP! BLABLA! over and over with a guitar loop in the back. I have half of a mind to expect to be paid to listen to that kind of thing.
Value: -$0.16
[NOTE - Some people may be worried that I was too harsh. LeBeau had this to say in response to my review: "hahahahahaha" and "o man thats great"]
8. Itty Bitty Boy
There is very little instrumental music in this track, and LeBeau sings. He manages to stay on tune most of the time and it isn't too bad. But occasionally, he loses control of his pitch and something bad happens. The track goes temporarily from mediocre to shit.
Value: $0.21
9. I Am a Romantic
The guitar is out of tune, but it seems to work most of the time. The singing is also surprisingly not execrable. It is quiet, subdued, and almost pretty even. Honestly, I was surprised until I hit the 1 minute mark. LeBeau throws his voice out of its range and ruins a lot of the beauty in the song. However, that out-of-tune guitar is pretty enough to resuce the song from shittiness.
Value: $0.71
10. Waiting
Thsi track is instrumental and features a nice albeit minimalistic composition. Its a surprisingly enjoyable listen.
Value: $0.89
11. Relics Intro
Repetitive haunting guitar notes and a depressed-sounding voice introduce us to our next song. It doesn't exactly sound bad. There just isn't much there.
Value: N/A I don't think its really fair to rate this one alone as its just a part of the next song.
12. Relics
Decent vocals and the same kind of haunting guitar as in the previous track lead us into the song. It sounds organioc and pretty. But its a tad longer than necessary and a ways more repetitive than it deserves to be. It never reaches any kind of climax and fails to realize any kind of potential.
Value: $0.63
Final Value:
$5.17
Average Track Value:
$0.47
Bow down to my awesome-ness for I am nifty!
Good Night and Good Luck
About an hour ago, I watched a movie called
Good Night and Good Luck. Up to that point, I didn't know George Clooney had any talent. (To be fair, I'd only seen him in one other movie,
Batman and Robin and that movie sucked ass. Anyway, Clooney wrote and directed this movie, and up until the weaksauce ending, it totally rocked.
The movie focussed on a reporter's efforts to stop a crazy politician Senator Joe McCarthy. (I am aware he was a real guy and was really quite scary during his heyday.) It did a great job of making this reporter seem to be a one-against-the-world kind of guy and really gave you something to cheer for. There were actually a couple of moments when I clapped for this guy's accomplishments. He was an excellent reporter, or at least the film portrayed him as such. Its really fun to be able to applaud for a character.
It was a lot of fun to watch, and most definitely, it was a highly enjoyable film.
But unfortunately, they don't make "perfect movies" and the film's ending disapointed me. It lacked the punch it needed. THey ended by cutting back to the beginning where a guy was giving a speech about 15 years after the film's events and I was actually thinking, "Wow. If this were the ending, that'd be a really crappy ending." THE END. I think it should have had a little more punch, rather than just having the reporter talking and saying he beat McCarthy, they should have had McCarthy there being beaten.
Filmmakers, be true to the mantra, "Show. Don't tell." Otherwise, you're just copping out.
However I still recomend it. Its no surprise it got the Oscar nomination it did, but I'm also quite unsurprised that it did not win the Oscar.
Seeing something like this though reminds me of John Carpenter's
Escape From LA. That movie had the opposite pattern. It really was a very weaksauce movie, but the ending was totally kickass.
Sigh, if only
Good Night and Good Luck's ending had punch or if
Escape From LA was worth its weight in shit before the ending. Then we'd have two more really great movies.
Bow down to my awesome-ness for I am nifty!
Garfield - Garfield = HilarityApparently, this is something popular, but I only just found out about it. The theory and execution is quite simple.
Take one Garfield comic where Garfield talks to Jon or vice-versa, and then remove Garfield's thought bubble. The result is often hilarious. (Unfortunately, it is not always.)
It just shows Jon as a sad and pathetic loser. However, despite the bleakness inherent to it, it becomes qutie funny as long as you achieve the right mindset.
Anyway, I find this hilarious. I hope my reader(s) like it too.
Bow down to my awesome-ness for I am nifty!
The work of others brings free goodies for those willing to exploit another person's work. Some guy figured out how to exploit several companies for some free stuff. Then he put his results up on the web so likely, anyone should be able to get free stuff based on his findings.
I just thought I'd share this wealth further.
The $39 Experiment: Asking Random Companies for Free Stuff
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