Archive for April, 2009

30
Apr

Black Math Horseman

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Categories: Music Review

Black Math Horseman – Wyllt

Black Math Horseman are trying to do something with this album. To me it sounds like they’re trying to blend Sigur Ros and Mastodon. Minus the Hopelandic vocals, and the songs about whales, of course.

To say I dislike Wyllt would be unfair. To say it isn’t what I expected would be completely fair. The last Tee Pee Records release I heard before this was “The Weight – Are Men” which is an old-style country record. So, obviously, I’m never really sure what I’m getting into here.

If you listen to this record smoking a J, and you’ll be lost for days in it’s meandering drums and bass, and constrictive guitars. But if you listen to it sober while you’re making your kids a grilled cheese sandwich, it’s not quite the same effect.

If you like Sigur Ros, and Mastodon, this is worth checking out.

myspace
label

www.myspace.com/blackmathhorseman

http://www.teepeerecords.com/

27
Apr

Broken Ohms

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Categories: Music Review

Broken Ohms – Nocturnal Emissions

This record is a barrel roll of early Soundgarden vocals, and Josh Homme riffs. These are guys who are huge Kyuss and Black Sabbath fans, so you definitely know where they’re coming from. The first time I heard them, it was their tune “For the Air” and I remember thinking to myself “This song would SLAY live.”. Well, a few months later they played Moncton so I went to check it out. Lo and Behold, they fucking slayed live. If you like thunderous guitars, elephant heavy drums, deep and groovy bass-tones, and voice control beyond fucking belief, stop waiting for Soundgarden to reunite and start listening to Broken Ohms.

Broken Ohms

21
Apr

DSi.

Matthew Stewart
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Categories: Game Review

So today I got the completely random notion to go out and buy myself a DS. I’d been wanting one for a long time, ever since my room mate in Halifax got one four years ago, and there was a Mega mushroom that made Mario take up the whole screen.

When I got to the video game store there was a line up of high school students on their lunch hour, so I decided to look around for a bit before asking the man behind the counter if he had any used DS lites available. As I was looking around, I noticed the new DSi boxes, and decided to take a look at those. After some consideration (do i really need to be able to take pictures? I have an mp3 player, does my game system have to play music too?) I decided I’d ask how much they were. It was about fourty dollars cheaper than I thought it was going to be, so I said to myself, Why the hell not? I have the money, and I wanted a DS anyway.

I crammed the DSi box, and a game I bought with it (Harvest Moon DS) into my bag and walked home through the rain. I thought about stopping for some lunch, but Wendys was pretty full, and I wanted to start my new game experience as soon as possible. So I skipped it and booked it to the apartment.

Once home I carefully opened the box, and was immediatley surprized by the size of it. It’s been quite a while since I’d seen a DS, so it just looked tiny. The instruction manual was bigger than the machine. My first dissapointment was that the colour blue they chose for it could have been a bit darker, and not so… pastel. I immediatly thought I should have gotten the black version.

I booted it up, and customized the system. The next thing I noticed was that I have no idea how to connect to the internet with it. Apperently it’s possible, it’s one of the selling points, but I couldn’t get it to work. I plan on working on that later on.

The OS is really nice. Very empty when you first start up, but I’m assuming you can get new applications to add to it once the internet gets up and running. It’s pretty simple to figure out. You click on what you want, and start it. It starts. Simple.

I played around with the duel camera for a while. The inside camera made me realize my hair needed to be washed, so I switched to the outside camera and took a few pictures of the living room. To move them to your computer you need an SDcard, which is not included. I hear they’re fairly cheap though, so I plan on picking one up eventually.

The music programs can only play .AAC or something foolish like that, off the SD card of course. Too bad all my music is in mp3 format, otherwise this would be a nice little addition.

The next thing I noticed is that there is no slot for GBA games. This is the one thing I’m dissapointed in the most. I have several GBA games, but no way to play them! I can get past this though because if I really wanted to play them, I’d download the roms, or go and buy a second hand GBA for 40 bucks from some kid trying to save up and buy one of the DSis.

All in all I am glad I bought it, even though I am going through a bit of the whole ‘did I really spend that much money just now?’ I wanted a DS like I said for quite some time now, and I picked up the game I wanted most for it. So all is good.

If you’re looking at the DSi, I can see it being a lot of fun if you want to play around with pictures of your friends, or listen to music on the bus when video games have gotten boring. If you’re looking for something just to play the games though, spend less and pick up a second hand DS lite.

I am satisfied with the purchase, I just have to get back into playing video games again, which shouldn’t take too long once I get Harvest Moon going, and I pick up the new Pokemon game.

If only it were a different colour…

21
Apr

GRID

Ryan Cole
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Categories: Game Review and Reviews

While geeking it up with a few fellow gamers at a LAN last weekend, I had the opportunity to play Codemasters’ latest racer, GRID. It falls somewhere between arcade and simulation, providing simple and accessible racing. There’s no complicated car setup options, the damage model is forgiving, and the physics won’t snap your car around if you get into a turn a little too hot, but it’s still difficult enough to require some driving ability to do well. If you’re looking for a true sim, you should look elsewhere, but if you want something you can still talk your friends into playing that’s a little more realistic than the Need For Speed games, GRID is it.

As a long-time sim racer, it’s definitely too arcade-y to spend a lot of time playing by myself, but the accessibility of it makes the multiplayer portion a blast. Of the 14 of us playing at the LAN, even the ones using their keyboard to drive were competitive, though I wouldn’t recommend playing without at least a gamepad.

Visually, the game is stunning… On a rig that can handle it, it’s quite possibly the best looking racing game I’ve ever played, and the crash physics are gloriously entertaining. There’s a decent replay feature too, so you can review the carnage, and the flashback feature allows you to rewind the race after you’ve wrecked so you can have a second chance. The video at the bottom goes into a little more detail on that.

I haven’t played much of the story mode, so I can’t comment on that side of it, but the multiplayer has ensured that I’ll at least give a shot to a game I rejected when I first tried the Xbox demo.

21
Apr

The Thermals – Now We Can See.

Matthew Stewart
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Categories: Music Review

I always spend the spring months looking for that new album that I’ll listen to all summer. A year ago it was Wilco’s Sky Blue Sky, the year before that it was The Thermals’ The Body, The Blood, The Machine. I could go on, but I’d be passing my point. The Thermals have taken this spot again with their 2009 album, Now We Can See.

If you know any of The Thermals old stuff, (if not and you’re into choppy fun punk light, check them out) then you’ll likely appreciate how track one jumps straight into their sound, and they don’t quit.

The Thermals play a good, unclean, simple rock. The type of music that you can easily throw your head around to at a party, or sit around alone and just take in. The lyrics are smart. The one thing I’ve noticed most about The Thermals, especially on The Body, The Blood, The Machine, is the lyrics. Any (pop)punk band can throw a finger to the man, or harmonize about some teenage girl, or being young and irresponsible (which they do, and they do a good damn job at it) The Thermals were a complete revolation to me. Now We Can See jumps back into that lyrical style.

The Earth was too hot,
the air was too thin
I took off my clothes
I took off my skin
I crawled to the sea
that was crawling from me
so I could swim…

The Thermals take tracks like When I Died, Liquid in Liquid out, and the title track, Now We Can See and almost force you to sing along to the chorus. All through the album The Thermals deliver a nice, rocky sound only taking breaks half way through for At the Bottem of the Sea, and again just before the final song with How We Fade, making Now We Can See my first ‘new favorite album’ of 2009, and definitely one of my albums of the summer.

To repeat myself, if you like a good, choppy rock song, I suggest Now We Can See, along with the rest of their albums. If not, please disregard this post.
Either way, later.

http://www.thethermals.com/

13
Apr

Grampall Jookabox

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Categories: Random Music

Grampall Jookabox – The Girl Ain’t Preggers

10
Apr

MIMEfest

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Categories: Music Review

Well, it’s been a while. I do have news, though. I went to a festival last weekend. MIMEfest is a weekend long music festival here in Moncton. Because of my parental duties, I was only able to make it for two of the shows (one of which I played) Here are my opinions on the bands I saw on the big Friday night.

Jason Haywood – I only saw a couple of minutes, but I’m a fan of Jaywood’s music.

The Trick – I didn’t see them.

Danger Bees – I didn’t see them, but the Iron Acadian told me they were fantastic.

Thee Requiems – They had a few technical difficulties, but when they got the ball rolling, they were good. The song I heard on the Superbob sampler was rad, too!

Paranerd – I’m pretty sure I’m in love with Paul

The Sidewalks – These guys were great. Totally reminded me of Less Than Jake. I kept waiting for them to play “All My Best Friends are Metal Heads”.

Blood Royal – Great. As always.

The Tireless Sedans – Their singer, Dave, sounds like the guy from Jimmy Swift Band, but The Tireless Sedans are good.

Ricochet – I wasn’t sure what they were going for. One minute they were punk, the next they were metal, and then a minute later, they were ska. I was OK with them til one of them took off his shirt. That’s a no-go in my book.

The Kamalas – I caught a tune by them, and it was pretty good. Solid punk rock for fans of the Ramones, but, y’know, with girls.

Phil Flowers – He’s considering calling his album “Smug and Unaccomplished”. I love it. Except, he SOUNDS accomplished. My favourite singer/songwriter in town right now.

Secret Agent – There was a guy standing on the side of the stage with a saxophone and a top hat for about half of their set. Then he walked over and played. I was ok with them.

The Peter Parkers – I like two songs by them, and I didn’t hear either of them when I was there, so I didn’t catch much.

Heethcliff – VERY technical. REALLY talented. If they had somebody dedicated to JUST singing, they would SLAY!

Michou – These guys play pretty music. I liked it.

RUSTED DAWN! – I interviewed Jeremy a little while back and was blown away by how humble he seemed to be. His band fucking slays. They were the highlight of the weekend for me BY FAR!

The Slate Pacific/Share/Force Fields – I missed pretty much all of their sets because of Rusted Dawn and Les Paiens. I hope they understand. BTW, Dear Force Fields, sorry for calling your old band name “Pussy Fart” for so long. It was mean of me.

Orchid’s Curse – Only caught a couple of tunes because of Les Paiens, but I liked what I heard. HOOGS has a mean voice, man.

Kestrels – I missed you guys. You can thank Rusted Dawn.

Les Paiens – I love those guys. Some of my best musical memories were from jamming with these guys. RIDICULOUS!

MANLORD! – So heavy they gave me a headache and I had to go home. AWESOME!

So, there it is in a nutshell. It was a great weekend and bunch of great bands. Our scene is thriving. This will grow. I’m in love with MIMEfest.