A few days ago a friend of mine was telling me about a series of videos on YouTube. These videos are The Joker Blogs...
Essentially, these are elaborate examples of fan fiction... in this case with the premise of, or at least starts with the premise of, video tapped therapy sessions of the Joker in Arkham Asylum. What follows is a 19 episode series (plus some other "mini-sodes" if you will) that, in my opinion, is very entertaining and definitely worth a look.
Should you choose to dive in- I will say to watch the first 3 or 4 episodes before deciding one way or the other. The reason I say this is because obviously the series is based around the Joker- and of course we all want the Heath Ledger Joker. You can tell that is where this actor is drawing his influences from- and I will admit that in the first episode he doesn't quite hit the mark. But by episode 3 he's got his character pretty well fleshed out. Granted- it's not Heath Ledger. As far as I'm concerned- nobody will ever be able to duplicate that performance. However, by episode 3, I think that Scott McClure (the actor in question) does a good job of nailing many of the mannerisms so that, despite differing for the most part in the voice category, the result is a worthy homage to Ledger's creation.
The acting is alright (varies from character to character), the production is pretty decent considering I'm sure they were working mostly on an out-of-pocket budget, and the storyline is engaging enough that it keep me clicking through to the next episode.
So without further ado- if you are intrigued/curious/bored, I send you along to
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
rant
**begin rant**
Eminem's new music is shit... blah blah blah. His lyrics were so much better on (insert one of the first couple CDs here)... blah blah blah. Bring back Slim Shady!
The man is turning 38 soon and you want him to sound/rap/write the way he did 11 years ago when the Slim Shady LP came out!?!? For the love of god- artists grow and change over time, but you want them to stay in the same timeless box!? But heaven forbid they actually do that! Cuz then you'll bitch and complain about them putting out the same sounding album time after time. Ugh!! This new CD is probably my favorite by him. I think it's the truest album he's put out! I never got into the shock-value songs of the past... give me the Eminem that's working through his bus full of demons! If you want to hear Slim Shady- go listen to the old stuff!! But don't expect a man who has put 11 years and countless troubles over those times under his belt to sound the way he did when he was 27!! Arg!!!
**end rant**
Saturday, October 2, 2010
the early days
hanging out with some old friends tonight and at one point (ok- at many points) the conversation turned to music... new and old. This got me thinking about some of the music that I was getting into around the time I was getting to know these guys. In fact- it was because I was getting to know these guys that these songs crossed my path in the first place
(disclaimer... if you don't like metal/screaming vocals, you may as well quit now)
I can still remember the first time Where Blood and Fire Bring Rest by Zao was played in my presence. I had never heard anything quite like it before... and I loved what I was hearing!! This was the first track on the CD... so chances are very good this is what got it all started!!
That really got the ball rolling... been pummeling my ears with all sorts of heavy/extreme music ever since! The following are some other pioneering songs I can recall from my youth around that same time (in no particular order)
Living Sacrifice - Reject
(disclaimer... if you don't like metal/screaming vocals, you may as well quit now)
I can still remember the first time Where Blood and Fire Bring Rest by Zao was played in my presence. I had never heard anything quite like it before... and I loved what I was hearing!! This was the first track on the CD... so chances are very good this is what got it all started!!
That really got the ball rolling... been pummeling my ears with all sorts of heavy/extreme music ever since! The following are some other pioneering songs I can recall from my youth around that same time (in no particular order)
Living Sacrifice - Reject
It was also around this time I came across a band called Circle of Dust. It was a one man project and he had just recently put out what would end up being his last CD (under that name). That release- Disengage- has always been my favorite C.o.D. release, and produced a song I still love today- Chasm. As time passed however- the man behind this band (Scott Albert... now Klayton) continued to make music- but now released it under the name Celldweller. You may have heard me mention this name before, as this project of his has become one of my music favorites.
Some of these bands are still around and putting out music I enjoy (Underoath, Project 86, Living Sacrifice [they're recently reformed after breaking up for a few years]), and others have transformed (Luti-Kriss is now Norma Jean). Some are not around anymore (Extol, Embodyment, Lengsel, Stretch Arm Strong), and others are but just don't hold my interest as much these days (Zao, P.O.D., Blindside). But in that window of the last few years of the 90s- these bands helped shape my musical tastes- at least on the heavy end... and at the very least it's been fun recalling "the good ol days"
Thursday, August 12, 2010
busy busy busy
So excited!! Busy next couple of days coming up and it should be tons of fun!! The low point is coming in a few hours when it's off to work... but even that should be alright. I work from 1:30-9:00, and then till you squeeze in two 15 min breaks and an hour lunch- the day flies by (hopefully!). And then from work heading straight to Nate's and hopefully (oh please oh please oh please!!) catching a midnight showing of the Expendables!!!
Then Fri late afternoon/evening and Saturday its off to Purple Door to rock out!! \m/ lol! Here's the artists I'm super stoked to see play!! (and even in order of how I'll be seeing them! haha)
War of Ages
August Burns Red
Thousand Foot Krutch
Leigh Nash
Demon Hunter
Paper Route
Project 86
Family Force 5
Also looking forwards to checking out all the other bands in between those that I don't really know that well!!
Then Fri late afternoon/evening and Saturday its off to Purple Door to rock out!! \m/ lol! Here's the artists I'm super stoked to see play!! (and even in order of how I'll be seeing them! haha)
War of Ages
August Burns Red
Thousand Foot Krutch
Leigh Nash
Demon Hunter
Paper Route
Project 86
Family Force 5
Also looking forwards to checking out all the other bands in between those that I don't really know that well!!
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
personality test
| Enneagram Test Results
Your variant is social |
Main Type | Overall Self |
 |  |
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Geocaching
So recently the term geocaching has been flying forth from my mouth with increasing frequency. I had been introduced to the idea many years ago, but since I was a poor college student with no money to spend on a handheld GPS unit- I never gave it a go. Fast forward to a month or two ago, when one of my coworkers (Michelle) was surprised to find out I knew what this whole geocaching thing was all about. She took me out for my first time a little while back and I was hooked- hence the increase of the term in my vocabulary. All that being said- I still haven't said a word about what it is. Well- to sum it up very nicely... here's a t-shirt that I find amusing
Hehe... ok, now to expand on that a bit. From geocaching.com- "Geocaching (pronounced geo-cashing) is a worldwide game of hiding and seeking treasure. A geocacher can place a geocache in the world, pinpoint its location using GPS technology and then share the geocache's existence and location online. Anyone with a GPS device can then try to locate the geocache"
So it's all pretty simple. Get your hands on a GPS unit, hit up the aforementioned website to find some caches near you, plug the coordinates of said caches into said GPS, and off you go. Caches range in size from micro (film canisters, hide-a-key magnets, M&M minis containters, etc) to large (ammo boxes, tupperware containers). Generally the micro caches are hidden in more populated areas, while you'll probably have to hit your local woods to find the larger caches. At the very minimum- all a cache needs to contain is a log for those who find it to sign, but the larger ones will also contain various little treasures ("swag" in caching terms). It's a good idea to bring some swag of your own along with you, because caching etiquette says that if you take something from the cache, you leave something of equal value behind. Some caches also contain "trackables", which are coins or items with a Travel Bug dogtag attached to them. The coin or dogtag will contain a unique ID that you can lookup online to find out the original location of that item and it's path to you. Some items even have a destination they are trying to reach, or even a mission to complete.
(This is T-Bone. He's from Virgina and has traveled south to the Carolinas before a long trip up north to the northwestern part of Pennsylvania, and then eventually making his way to a cache near the Middle Creek Reservoir where I found him.)
Caches are also rated on a 5-star scale on both difficulty to find as well as the terrain to get to the cache. This information really comes in handy on the woodsy caches so you have an idea what kind of hike you have in front of you. From what I understand- a full 5 star difficulty will require special equipment to find the cache (scuba or rock climbing equipment for example).
So yea- that's a pretty good introduction to geocaching I think. For more info- hit up geocaching.com or contact me... I'm pretty new to it as well, but I'm always happy to talk about it! Hehe. And if you wanna try it sometime, let me know! I'm waiting for payment to clear on a newer GPS I bought on ebay, so I should have that within a week and I'll be looking to try it out. The first one I bought was an older model that didn't have the newer high sensitivity GPS chips in them, so it's accuracy under tree cover was pretty crappy. I'll end this post with a couple pics from my geocaching adventures thus far...
This is my first piece of swag! I name him C.C. (short for Cache Cow)
Ordinary looking stump? Nope!!
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
random stuff
So I've come across a bunch of stuff today and I figured I'd put it all together in a blog post...
Double Rainbow
If you haven't seen the video that started it all off- here's some guy that I really hope is trippin big time on something... cuz he is completely blown away with this double rainbow
So then a few days later- behold the power of imagination and auto-tune!
And now, as of today, there's a rock/hardcore cover of that song!
mc chris - I Love Drugs
While this would probably be a fun tune regardless... it really helps if you're familiar with the song Your Love Is My Drug by Kesha (if you listen to pop radio at all- it's almost a given you've heard it recently)
Count Censored
Last but not least... this one isn't new- but it never ceases to make me laugh!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)