2009 in Ben’s Limited Scope of Listening
Here’s my top 5 albums of 2009. All in my very humble opinion, of course.
Honorable Mention: Cosmic Egg – Wolfmother
Honestly, I thought this album was boring. I tend to listen to the first half and then turn it off because it’s just not very gripping. It even extends into the technical side. The drums aren’t mixed right, or loud enough or something, and his vocals aren’t as powerful as they were in the band’s debut.
Basically, it seems kind of like a Black Sabbath wannabe album, borne from the departure of two of the original three of the Wolfmother line-up. It’s very heavy metal and… well, like I said, boring. New Moon Rising is probably the best track.
I only mention it honorably because it’s Wolfmother, and I still count them as one of my favorite bands.
Honorable Mention: Raditude – Weezer
Okay, so I only just got around to listening to this, somehow, even though it came out last month and even though I love Weezer. I don’t know what I was thinking.
And, um, well, it’s okay, you know.
It’s definitely not their best though, but hey, it’s Weezer. Weezer will always be pretty great.
Am I the only one who got a very self-destructive vibe from this? Like Rivers is just needing some help or something before he destroys himself. I dunno, maybe I was just in a bad mood when I listened to it.
5. Baby Darling Doll Face Honey – Band of Skulls
True story: when I first heard the song “I Know What I Am” on the radio in the car, coming home from the library, I turned to my sister and said, “Hey, this is the Dead Weather!” (number 4 on this list.)
And then, of course, I realized that it wasn’t. When I got home, the first thing I did was look to see who it was, and, apparently, it was Band of Skulls.
This album is very good.
4. Horehound – The Dead Weather
Jack White from everything and the White Stripes and Alison Mosshart from the Kills (and Dean Fertita from Queens of the Stone Age and Jack Lawrence from The Raconteurs) in a supergroup of epicity. And it’s interesting, because you can totally tell when Jack White’s on the drums. It just has this bluesy swing to it that fits his style so well.
3. Them Crooked Vultures
What happens when you put Dave Grohl (Nirvana, Foo Fighters), John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin), and Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age) all in a band together? No, don’t answer that was hypothetical. And you already know the answer. Stupid.
Them Crooked Vultures is like a combination of Led Zeppelin and Franz Ferdinand that ends up sounding a bit like The Raconteurs. Needless to say, it’s pretty great.
2. Shaka Rock – JET
Shaka Rock is pretty dang good, all classic JET, Beatles-y, great music. I don’t have a lot to say other than, yeah, really good.
1. Humbug – Arctic Monkeys
This is a fantastic album by a fantastic band. The Arctic Monkeys are Midas when it comes to music. I’m pretty sure they’re incapable of producing anything that sounds like crap. They could have an entire track of fart sounds and nails on a chalk board (so a Jonas Brothers cover) and it would come out being better than anything else on the radio.
Humbug is the Arctic Monkeys’ Doors album. The influence is pretty obvious. I mean, first off, all the tracks are about six times slower than average Arctic Monkeys tunes, and very psychidelic sounding. And Alex Turner’s voice takes a turn for the Jim Morrisonish.
Humbug is the Arctic Monkeys’ In Utero.
And that’s all there really is to say on the matter.
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I was going to include Cage the Elephant, but apparently their album came out last year, so whatever.
Filed under Miscellaneous, Musical Expenditures, Reviews | Comment (1)Level 26: Dark Origins
Level 26: Dark Origins is the ‘first ever Digi-Novel’ by CSI creator Anthony E. Zuiker.
What, praytell is a digi-novel, I hear you ask? This is a very good question. The basic idea is that you have this book, right? And you have this website, right? And as you read this book, when you get certain parts it gives you this code, and you go to the website and enter the code to unlock a little video thing that continues the story from where you left off. Then when that’s over you go back to the book and read some more, ’til the next cyber-bridge, when you log on to the site and enter the code and watch some more of the story.
Exciting.
No really, this is a really awesome concept. Really, really, awesome. Really, really, really, really, really, awesome.
For real.
I quite enjoyed the story. It’s pretty well-written, and it’s disturbing, and creepy, and sad, and everything you could hope for in a book about a serial killer who’s been at it for decades and who is pretty much impossible to catch.
That’s pretty much a real general idea of the story. Sqweegel is this serial killer guy who transcends all other serial killers. He has been killing people for years, and has never come close to being caught. Until Steve Dark comes on the case. Dark comes closer than anyone else before him to putting a bullet in Sqweegel, but unfortunately things go terribly, terribly wrong and he ends up giving up on catching the monster. Now, a few years later, Sqweegel has been promoted to a level 26 killer, the only one of his kind, and the Special Circumstances department of the US Government’s only hope of catching him is to convince Steve Dark to come back to his job and finish what he started.
Some stuff happens and some people die.
Like I said, I really enjoyed it, but the cyber-bridges left something to be desired. They felt kind of disconnected from the story that was going on in the book. Like, they were cool and all, but only a couple of them felt like actual extensions of the book, and only another couple were really that fantastic. Snails was my favorite, all creepy and disturbing and stuff.
I think that Level 26 a great idea, and this book is pretty well done, but if they wanted to expand this idea to its full potential, the cyber-bridges should have been a bit more important to the plot. As it is now, there’s really no reason to watch them as you read the book, other than for curiosity’s sake. They don’t really stand alone all that well, although some of them are kind of entertaining, and having to stop reading the book to get to the computer kinda took me out of it a bit. And pretty much everything that happens in the videos is just described in the next chapter of the book, anyway, so you’re pretty much experiencing the same thing twice…
And as for the being-pulled-out-of-it-to-go-to-the-computer-thing, I know that lots of people on the site were saying that it’s completely fine to just read through the bridges and watch them later, which I normally probably would have done. But I wanted to do it as it was meant to be done. Kinda like watching all the Star Wars films in order from I-VI to see if that somehow makes the prequels better than they actually are.
I really liked the contortionist playing Sqweegel too. I thought that was a nice touch, because contortionism is kinda creepy as is, but a contortionist serial killer? Downright frightening. The problem is that sometimes the contortionality just kinda comes off as comical, rather than creepifying and scary.
People were talking about glaring continuity gaps between the book and the videos, but to be completely honest, I mostly didn’t notice, and when I did it just wasn’t that big of a deal. It’s pretty easy to deal with.
So, anyway, my final declaration is that Level 26: Dark Origins is a really good book, and while the video cyber-bridges leave a bit to be desired, the overall experience was entertaining and I would definitely recommend it.
I hope that the cyber-bridge videos are a bit better for the next book, and that they are more connected to the book and more important to following the story. As in, not having what you just watched described right away when you go back to reading. That seems kinda like saying that the videos are negligible, and if they are, then there’s just no point in having them.
Lastly, the title of the next book, Level 26: Doppelganger of Darkness… please change this. I do not want to go out into public and have to admit I’m reading a book called Doppelganger of Darkness. People will be all like, “Oh, I think my six year old’s reading that.”
I mean, it’s a fricken alliteration. Come on. No. Please no.
So yeah. Level 26: Dark Origins. Check it out, maybe.
-Ben
And some proof that this is actually me:
xkcd: volume 0 (Review)
The following are the personal opinions of one Fizzzard. Sir Benjamin personally has no idea what to make of these things because he doesn’t own the book, and quite frankly probably won’t anytime soon.
As you know or will know by the end of this sentence xkcd released its first book on Tuesday, entitled xkcd: volume 0. Personally I ordered my copy as fast as I could. I did not however pay $17 extra, almost the same amount as the book itself, to get it signed. They said to allow 1-2 weeks for shipping so I was quite happy when it arrived only 4 days after I ordered it.
However, once I opened the box I noticed an immediate problem. Though it had been shipped with some packing paper as protection against harm the paper was all crammed to one end of the box, not protecting the book. Dented books are not cool, at least not when they’re dented before I get them. The book also appears to be somewhat warped, I don’t know why, it just is.
The choice in strips to include is a bit weird. The first to entries of the journal series are included but none of the ones after Megan takes his hat are. On the other hand some of the not so good comics are included, including the ferret in a plane, Donner party of four, and the Penny Arcade parody.
In the blag post announcing the book’s release it was said that there was going to be extra comments in the margins of the book. Well there are, but only on about a third of the pages, and some of the ones that are there are in some sort of code or other that makes no sense to me.
Oh and to top it off there are several misprints through out the book. There’s a red dot in the middle of one of the comics. There a some small red lines across some white space the probably shouldn’t be there. Oh and one of the scroll-over comments has the lower half of its text to the left of the upper half of the text.
I’ll probably buy volume 1 if it’s released but mostly only because it exists. Unless you have money to spare don’t bother buying the book, just read the comics online.
Filed under Guest Contributors, Miscellaneous, Reviews | Comment (0)This, this, and this: My Views on Brisingr
Back in July I wrote a blog post some found humorous about my predictions for the next book in the Eragon Series. The Inheritance Cycle, as it’s called (by people talking about it to other people who know that’s what it’s called.. ahem).
Anyway, I got the book, read it, and… well, you’ll find out, now, won’t you? I even took pictures. Whoa.
And, of course, to prove that’s really me, here’s the book reflected in Arthur. See all you “the toaster is dead” conspiracy theorists? Arthur is still very much alive. Just a little… resigned as of late.
Anyway.
I haven’t written one of these in awhile, because everyone hated them. Huh.
So I go to the library, pick up the book off the hold shelf, go to the counter, am reminded of my exorbitant fines, get the book checked out, take the book, and leave, frankly utterly unexcited for this book. When I get home I do some stuff and then eventually turn to the first page of the book. Whoa.
Brief disclaimer: if you’ve not yet read this book, this is very, very likely to spoil something or other. Unless, y’know, you’re like me and….
Anyway.
The book starts off, as I predicted, with them going to rescue Katrina from the Ra’zac. Christopher Paolini, the [adjective] author, had the good grace to leave out the thirty chapters of traveling I predicted would be there. Thank the lord for that.
But yeah, the book begins with their rescuing of someone that was kidnapped in the last book. While Katrina is in no way as awesome as Han Solo, nor was she frozen in carbonite, the resemblance remains.
Then there’s this subplot involving Katrina’s father and sending him off to his death or something. That was dumb. Or maybe just happy.
Then he… TRAVELS!
Finally, after Arya manages to intercept Eragon perfectly and after some deal with spirits or something, they get to the Varden, marriageness happens, attackness happens, Elva happens, then he goes to Dwarvland, meets a god, etc. etc., proceeding on to Elvland to meet up with Yoda again.
They discuss things, namely Eragon’s father, Darth Vader — um, I mean, Morzan, and eventually one thing leads to another and Christopher Paolini has swapped out “Leia is your sister” with “Actually Brom’s your father, not Morzan.”
I can’t say this was expected, but it’s not something that came suddenly or surprisingly. It just came.
That’s what she said?
Nah.
So now that that’s settled, Eragon crafts his new sword, pissing off the Menoa tree in the process. Incidentally, when he had the option of choosing a previously-crafted sword, it would have been green, as I predicted, so…
Then they go to battle, and they fight, then Galbatorix speaks, then Yoda dies, then a Shade is created and, eight seconds later, destroyed. By Arya.
And that is the book.
Note how nothing interesting happens?
Yeah.
I really disliked this book. This feeling was most likely strengthened by the fact that when I was about half way through Brisingr, the second Mistborn book, the Well of Ascenscion came in at the library and I put off starting it until I finished Brisingr so I could give it the attention it deserved. And nobody makes me put off my Sanderson.
No one.
Or at least, no one should.
The following is taken from a different site I may have this posted on.
While Brisingr’s not an exact replica of ROTJ, it does in fact share a lot in common with a bunch of the first part of ROTJ. I mean, you have them rescuing someone from being eaten by some nonhuman creature (han/sarlacc pit), a second family revelation (leia is luke’s sister), you have the yoda-character’s death.. what else happens in the first half of that movie? All they have to do now is make their assault on the second Death Star.
But first they’re going to travel there. A lot.
……I really didn’t like this book.
-Timmy
Filed under Reviews | Comments (3)
Oh and…
THE DINOSAURS WERE WIPED OUT BY MICROWAVE OVENS! DON’T BELIEVE ANYTHING ELSE YOU HEAR ABOUT THAT CATASTROPHE!!!
That is all.
-Timmy
Filed under Films, General Site Stuff, Miscellaneous, Musical Expenditures, POTOR News, Reviews, The Brotherhood Saga, Words and Phrases | Comment (1)