If you’re looking for music… (and Baldur’s Gate II)

I’ve posted a lot of music on this blog, but the site I was using to do so (which also happened to be the website for Pimp Lando) has been deleted, so now a lot of my music links won’t work. I’ll fix them when I get a server on which to host them, but for now you may have to do without. Sorry, all you out there who really really wanted to listen to that SONAR piece I wrote about in the last post. Next time you’ll grab it when you can! It apparently was a limited-time offer!

On an entirely different topic, a long time ago Casey and I made a character for Baldur’s Gate II named “Stalingrad T. Stalker” who was a human stalker (a type of ranger), and for some reason was Russian. About a year ago I decided to flesh him out and make him a full-blown joinable NPC, with dialogue, interjections, and even a quest. While I never finished the quest (all I’ve done so far is add Alexander Romanov to the inn, where he tells Stalingrad to go hunt a jewel called the Red October), I did add a lot of random interjections to already-existing dialogue. Most of it I had forgotten when I went back and played the game earlier this month, so it was like discovering it again for myself. Here is my favorite bit I’ve run across so far, after a short parody of Cyrano de Bergerac, with a guy named Garrick being the Christian character (click to enlarge):

Stalingrad’s line is at the bottom. If you don’t find it funny, chances are you probably never will, but I about hit the floor laughing when I read it. And as a side note, yes, my main character appears to be Mr. T, and yes, it’s absolutely hilarious, and yes, I’m one of those people who can’t take fantasy role-playing seriously and always introduces anachronisms because I think they’re funny.

SONAR Home Studio…What?

Next in our fine list of programs I can use after I graduate: SONAR Home Studio 7 XL! I actually bought this as an upgrade to my old Cakewalk Home Studio and got a discount. Let’s compare two versions of an old SaXon Geat song that was actually mostly written by Ben (the filename is “What” but the song itself is unnamed, although Casey may recognize it as the MIDI file I used when we played Lode Runner):

Old version – created many years ago using the old Cakewalk.

New version – created tonight using SONAR.

Which is better? Are either professional quality? Feedback, please!

Reverse parodies

There are some things that are assumed to exist in the collective cultural consciousness. Elements from a source so familiar, that if somebody makes a reference to it that person assumes that the audience will recognize the source material and any connotations associated with it. However, if a person is not familiar with the source material, but grows to love some derivative of it, and then goes back and encounters the original, there is a much larger shock, especially if the person does not realize that the offshoot was a derivative at all. This has been my experience, at least lately.

Let me explain. Most people know the story of Romeo and Juliet, so when West Side Story was written the writers assumed that most audience members would recognize the connections. But let’s say a person grew to know West Side Story very well without knowing about Romeo and Juliet at all. If such a person later sat down and read or saw Romeo and Juliet without any prior preparation, such a person may suddenly start making connections. “Wait a minute! Romeo’s just like Tony! These Montagues are like the Jets if they wore tights and couldn’t dance as well!” It would be moment after moment of amazing coincidences!

Not being intimately familiar with Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story, or any other offshoots, let me continue this explanation with my own experience, which hasn’t been precisely the same as this unnamed protagonist in our Shakespearean/Sondheimian example. I’m a giant sci-fi fan, and I always have been. However, there have been some movies that I hadn’t got around to seeing yet. Such a movie was 2001: A Space Odyssey, one of the most famous and influential films of the 20th century, especially in the sci-fi genre, which I finally got around to seeing about a month or so ago. Previously, I was familiar enough with various pop-culture references and parodies of it to know basically the big moments (apes learning how to beat other apes with bones thanks to a black rectangular slab, the psycho computer Hal, the “I’m sorry Dave, but I can’t do that” line, the 20-minute acid trip that closes out the movie, etc.) and recognize them if they came up in an episode of The Simpsons or whatever.  But imagine when I saw this segment, with an astronaut jogging in a circle:

Why, that’s almost exactly the same as the opening credits of the Mystery Science Theater 3000 movie, where Mike Nelson jogs in a hamster wheel! (I tried and tried to find a video of this, but to no avail; the best I found was about fifteen seconds — from 0:10 to 0:25 — from a collection of clips that it won’t even let me embed in WordPress for some reason, so follow the link!) That wasn’t just another “Oh yeah, I heard about this part where they play the entirety of the Blue Danube Waltz twice!” but it was something entirely unexpected and therefore much more satisfying.

Not obscure enough for you? Well, consider this next example. In preparation for the new Star Trek movie coming out on May 8th I’ve been familiarizing myself with old TOS Star Trek episodes. Now don’t get me wrong: I’m a Trekkie through and through. I’ve never been to a convention nor dressed like a Klingon, but I do own a few uniform shirts, the entire DVD sets of Next Gen and DS9, and even wrote an a capella song of Data’s “Ode to Spot.” But I was weaned on the later generations (pardon the pun) and series of Star Trek, and therefore never really got around to watching the original series that started it all. Maybe it was never on reruns at the right time, I dunno. In any case, with the advent of hulu.com I’ve been able to watch those old classic episodes for the first time ever! And while I could make a list as long as my arm and then some about the cool references in later series that I finally understand, perhaps the most surprising to me came in the episode “Mirror, Mirror.” It wasn’t a scene, or a famous piece of dialogue, or even some sort of conceptual idea in the storyline that stood out to me, but something in the soundtrack that made me get excited!

“Mirror, Mirror” on CBS.com

Follow that link and fast forward to about 44:10. There’s a musical sting that plays there and in other various spots in the episode that is a good, ominous, foreboding clip, sure. But now compare it to “The Landing Bay”, a piece of background music from the Sierra game Space Quest IV (about 25 seconds into the clip).

It’s the exact same theme!

It makes sense! The Space Quest series is all about parody. At this point the protagonist Roger Wilco has made it back to his home planet of Xenon, only to find it in a post-apocalyptic ruin, where killer cyborgs roam the once-friendly streets. What better way to evoke a feeling of familiar-yet-unfamiliar, where what once was good has now turned dark, than to crib a riff out of the classic Trek episode “Mirror, Mirror”, a story where Kirk and his landing party find themselves in a parallel universe, where the ship is the same yet dark and brutal. In a game series known for some pretty broad humor, this is one homage that has probably gone unnoticed by a gigantic amount of players, and even those who may have recognized the theme from SQIV as a piece of incidental music from Star Trek probably wouldn’t have thought much of it other than, “Oh, Space Quest is parodying Star Trek. That makes sense.” But for someone who grew up playing Space Quest (a relatively obscure series nowadays) to hear the same thing later in life in an episode of Star Trek felt to me like watching, say, American Idol, when suddenly the ultimate winner in the last show breaks into a song that your next-door-neighbor wrote.

I may be the only person in the world who finds this interesting. But by gum, I thought it was awesome! Who knows what other gems I may uncover as I watch the rest of the series and geek out?

Then what chain of stores would be located within an English Hogi Yogi?

True story:

(An English girl in my Songwriting class comes in early, eating something Oriental)

ME: Hey, that smells pretty good, what is it?

ENGLISH GIRL: It’s something I got for lunch. I’ve never tried it before. It’s rice and chicken, but with some sort of sauce on it.

OTHER GIRL: Is it soy sauce?

ENGLISH GIRL: Not really. The best way to describe it is it’s kind of like soy sauce crossed with treacle.

(Stony silence. Everybody in the room is racking their brains trying to remember/figure out what treacle is or what it tastes like.)

ENGLISH GIRL: They gave it a weird name too: Terr-ee-yack-ee, I think.

EVERYONE ELSE: Ohhh!!!! Teriyaki!

ENGLISH GIRL: What, you’ve tried it too?

Seriously, though, I saw tons of oriental restaurants when I lived in Spain. Are most English unfamiliar with the concept of teriyaki sauce? Really makes you think.

Also, who puts treacle (which, it turns out, is molasses) on rice?

Choose the Right remix?

For Annelise’s upcoming murder mystery show I’ve created this remix (still a work-in-progress) of a popular LDS hymn. Tell me the truth, people: does this track contain a higher level of awesomeness, or blasphemy?

Conference in a nutshell – version 5

Once again, here are my notes and impressions of the LDS General Conference, this time from Apr. 2009:

• New apostle — Neil Lyndon Andersen
• The prophet may sing “El Rancho Grande” if you put him in a sombrero and sarape.
• The four most caring words: “We can’t afford it.”
• Be reverent!
• Virtue is not just for young women, but men too.
• Be acquainted with the voice of the Spirit, so you can recognize and understand it in the heat of the moment.
• Trials are invitations to grow, and those who accept trials as such can find peace in the turmoil.
• Learn from others, smart guy! Prophets and apostles are in touch, despite being old.
• Learn from the past too, lest you be doomed to repeat it.
• A loving God only makes sense if there is continuing revelation, and hell is not endless.
• Faith is like spiritual photosynthesis.
• Go to the temple and participate in all ordinances!
• Forgive to be forgiven.
• Add audible “amen” as a listener to a prayer.
• Learn how to pray from Christ’s prayers.
• Prayer doesn’t need to be long-winded. Six words can be as effective, or more so, than one thousand.
• Young people speak of the future because they have no past. Old people speak of the past because they have no future.
• Take care of your body.
• Do not immerse yourself so much in the technical that you fail to learn the practical.
• Help others through this time of economic hardship, especially with unemployment issues.
• Involve the whole family in home evening. The four-year-old can still share a Primary lesson.
• Don’t do Church work on your employer’s time.
• Elder Uchtdorf pokes fun at his own propensity to tell aviation stories.
• A malfunctioning light bulb led to the crash of a plane.
• The tendency to focus on the insignificant instead of the profound ends in tragedy.
• Don’t text while driving!
• Our weakness is failing to align our actions with our conscience.
• We’re at spiritual war! Let us be not just spiritual soldiers, but spiritual medics as well.
• Prophetic counsel: take notes!
• Be always ready to give a reason for the hope within you.
• Three not-new suggestions for safety:

1. Study diligently
2. Pray fervently
3. Live righteously

• Prayer is the passport to peace.
• Don’t eat egg salad sandwiches after leaving them out in the sun.
• Answer the call to serve, even if it’s just giving a blessing to a drummer with food poisoning.
• Live worthy every minute.
• Get on with life! Adapt to change!
• Next time you want to groan, laugh instead! Ha ha ha!
• The Spirit had to withdraw from Christ on the cross so He could understand the hopeless despair of those who have committed grievous sins.
• Don’t be an unresponsive onlooker on the road to Golgotha.
• Perseverance with faith in hard times will lead to peace.
• If you ever find a mother with four children journeying in bare feet and tattered clothes across a war-torn country, for pete’s sake help her out, lest she be forced to bury all four of her children with a spoon, and later her bare hands in the snow!
• The future is as bright as your faith.
• Church members’ willingness to sacrifice comes from faith, church leader instruction, and commitment to covenants.
• Selfishness and entitlement (the feeling of getting something for nothing because one “deserves” it) are behind the global economic meltdown.
• Going to church is better if you’re active, not passive, while there.
• Regular temple-going is the way to truly take Christ’s name upon us.
• You’re never lost when you can see the temple.
• Make your home as holy as the temple.
• Our Father will respect our freedom to shoes, er, choose.
• GPS systems are awesome, except when they lose the satellite signal in underground parking garages.
• Our personal GPS (conscience) will lose its connection with the divine if buried under the concrete parking garage of sin.
• When you lose sight of the camp, let the old experienced horse lead the way.
• Analogy: full-time missionaries = search and rescue team. Members = shepherds. Who has a better chance of bringing in the sheep?
• Share your musical talents with others! That means go to choir, kid!
• Word of caution: careful on the Internet! There’s a whole lotta crap on there! Avoid it at all costs, especially the porn!
• Remember President Monson and all general authorities in your prayers!

And perhaps most importantly:

• If you’re staying at your parents’ house from Saturday night to Sunday morning, make sure you’ve set your clock for Daylight Savings Time back in your childhood bedroom, lest you believe it’s 9:30 when you go upstairs, only to find out that conference has been going for a full half hour. I heard Pres. Uchtdorf’s talk had to do with Palm Sunday, but that’s about all I got.

This was the first April conference since I moved down to Provo where I haven’t been in the choir at one session. While that means I got to hear the whole thing instead of being stuck on a bus for most of a session, it was still kind of sad. I guess I can’t be there all the time, though, not unless I join the Tab choir. Maybe I’ll do that someday. I’ll be right up there with Mark Pearce and Brad Omer! On a related choir note, the Saturday Afternoon choir was a combined Institute choir from Salt Lake County, and it was conducted by a guy in my home stake, who was in charge of the tenors when we put on From Cumorah’s Hill when I was in seventh grade (and was a tenor). Kind of random.

In any case, enjoy the conference proceedings, and remember to consider the lilies in the field. How they grow? How they grow.

Making a todo about what to do

I’ve got a lot of projects in the air right now, but I can never seem to remember them all when I get some free time. So I’ve decided to list a bunch of things I’ve been meaning to get to; trivial or life-changing, old or new, easy or difficult — here they are:

• Finish college (this current semester, plus the music history core, form & analysis, an English class, and an internship, is all I have left)
• Finish my Super Metroid Limit commentary
• Finish up all the disks on my Atarieviewer site, plus video reviews
• Somehow save up enough money to be able to buy a new Mac, so I can:

1. Buy Logic and a couple of good sound libraries to be able to compete professionally in the music business, particulary in the arena of film/tv scoring and/or minus track writing, and
2. Finish editing all those home videos Mom wanted me to work on like four years ago. (If that goes well I may end up scoring them. If those end up going well, I may use that as a source of income! “Hire me to score your home movies!” Rich bishops who live in Mapleton would love it!)

• Write a choir piece for Tuesday’s choir arranging class.
• Write a ten page research paper on something in the field of Media Music for my songwriting class before next Friday.
• Write two entirely original songs, plus two hymn parodies, for the Called to Murder murder mystery show that Annelise is organizing, preferably sometime in the next week or two.
• Help Annelise with that script, along with the casting and other responsibilities I will no doubt assume upon the whole opening of the murder mystery show here in Orem.
• Watch the entire series of: 24, The Office, Doctor Who, Stargate SG-1 and Atlantis, and whatever other shows society and my friends and family deem I need in my consciousness.
• Finish my Rescue Ranger Adventure game.
• Work with Crystie Cook on her pioneer script (for which I’ve done less than nothing, sorry!)
• Get the Easter program to run smoothly for Easter Sunday (luckily I’ve delegated well on that count).
• Talk to Ron Simpson and get an internship going, preferably local so I can still help Annelise out.
• Finish my Facebook Diplomacy games (there’s only one left now!)
• Film and put together my birthday present for Josh Reese: an action movie trailer where Billy and Dan Omer take over the future with a clone army.

That’s all I can think of right now; I’m sure there are more. I’ve also omitted items from a few categories, from the ones that are so far off and vague that I can’t make real specific plans at this time (getting married), to the ones that are both personal and inconsequential (playing through Final Fantasy VII like my roommate Shaun wants me to do, watching last night’s Colbert Report), to the ones that are obvious (go to work every day, eat, read scriptures).

The murder mystery show, oddly enough, is the same one I was doing waaay back when I started this blog years ago. It’s needed a major rewrite, since we’re not affiliated with the Hunts any more and the format has changed. Also, the songs are all going to be originals. It’ll be performed in May and June at the Wise Guys comedy club in Orem, near UVU. I’m a bit pressed for time right now (we’re hanging up posters around town advertising auditions), but maybe later I can relate the whole story of how this opportunity came to be. Needless to say, ’tis very exciting!

Two new songs: Menace to Society and Come On Back to Me

I wrote lyrics to that song and finally recorded it, along with a somewhat companion song. Let me know what you think!

1. Menace to Society (I’m Running Outta Time)

2. (Come On Back to Me) I’m Your Dell

Protected: Number Two, and lessons learned from both

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You’ve got to pray just to make it today!

I don’t remember where I found this, but I know it’s awesome.

That is all.

Lyrical Help Needed!

All right, faithful blogketeers, I need some inspiration. I’ve got a song due next week in my songwriting class. I wrote a song, but have no idea what the subject of the lyrics should be. To get some ideas I’m opening it up to you, loyal readers. What should this song (here’s the MP3) be about? What does it remind you of? (Yes, I know that it just ends abruptly; don’t point it out, it will be fixed.) Any ideas? First thing you think of? Anything?

Leave your comments! It’s due next Friday!

Catharsis?

I started a new private blog, mostly due to the fallout from this post, and it’s been great; a place to really accomplish the purpose that this one used to have. I’m not letting anybody know where it is, no exceptions, but from time to time I may post something interesting here that comes out of it. For instance, here’s part of a story that suddenly came out one day when I was looking for rule variants for Mafia:

The moon was shining high in the night as I trudged into town. The train conductor had kicked me off the train for losin’ my ticket, so here I was, new and clueless. The town of Reginald looked sinister; something was amiss. I don’t know what it was: something in the air. I didn’t feel like walking down the middle of the biggest street was wise, so I ducked into a local bar, run by a swarthy-looking Indian guy. The place was deserted except for a lonely looking bartender. His eyes kept darting to the back door of the place; whether out of guilt or fear I don’t know. I walked up to the bar and ordered a drink.

“You new in town?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. “Just got kicked off a train for Newark.”

“Since you’re new, I’ll let you in on a little tip, bud.” He leaned over the bar, the smell of cheap scotch on his breath. “This town, it’s run by the mafia.”

“The mafia?!?”

“Yep. There’s only 16 of us left. Youse better skat before you get taken down, too.”

Suddenly, the sounds of gunfire burst out of the back room. The barkeep dove behind the bar, and as I did the same, a man with dark sunglasses burst into the room, firing his gun at an unseen assailant.

That’s as far as I got. Here’s a part of a post having to do with my new music classes this semester:

But hey, I like my Music 304 class so far, because it’s applicable! By crinum, I’m learning a lot about how music has evolved from the common-practice period to the post-modern global mismash it’s become, and it’s very intriguing to see how that all fits together, as opposed to taking it for granted that somehow music now is radically different from Beethoven. I could talk about this all day. Strauss influenced John Williams? Perhaps. Modernism, a rebellion against staid academia, is now oddly enough the academia against which people are rebelling (for example, nobody writes Schoenberg-esque pieces but old stuffy college professors). Avant-garde music is now a staple of the scholarly world, not the underground. So what is the new rebellion music? Techno? Rave? Some sort of easily dismissible music that 100 years from now will suddenly become art music? Who knows? In Civ III the modern era was weird ’80’s saxophone music, but in Civ IV it’s all John Adams works. Which is more telling of the culture of our time? The art or the pop? By a different token, which will be remembered and studied 100 or 200 years from now and which will be forgotten as easily as the folk music of the 1700’s (however it was)? Even Jazz is now becoming a more scholarly type of music than popular. In 50 years from now will the only people that enjoy listening to and writing like the Beatles be old stuffy college professors? In 100 years will it be Steve Reich or Kurt Cobain that makes it into the “History of Western Music?”

I may post more from there, from time to time. I think this arrangement will work out better: I can still get all my feelings out somewhere without a filter, then organize them better to put them here if I feel something’s safe and/or worthy enough. In the meantime, I’ll probably just keep posting links and boring other generic blog stuff here. Yay.

You’re not the boss of me, Nancy Pelosi!

#53 in the Better Know a District series; Stephen Colbert interviews Jason Chaffetz from Utah’s “Fightin’ Third” district. I voted for this guy! He does pretty well; I shudder to think how Chris Cannon would have dealt with Colbert.

By the way, our black person is pretty nice; I saw him on BYU campus one day last year.

Disney Curmudgeon

I’ve made several attempts to write a post on this blog about why I’ve never enjoyed the phenomenon of High School Musical, at least not nearly as much as my siblings seem to, other than that I’m much more cynical, but then the Agony Booth crystallized it much better than I could. It’s not that it’s a bad show, or franchise, it’s just, as they put it, “stunningly mediocre.” Filled with black-and-white issues and cliches. That’s great for 10-15-year-olds, but I like to see a bit more humanization in things I watch.

That’s all.

A little musical experiment for all y’all

There have been two main pieces I’ve been working on in my synth class this past semester. One I’ve posted a version of already: the Absoludicrous theme song. The other was a master edition of the Escape piece from Travels. I did quick versions of both of these before I had the instructor come in and look at it. He helped me tweak and fix a whole bunch of little issues with both pieces: EQ, compressors, limiters, and other audio buzzwords. The Escape piece we worked on for two whole months (of classtime, not realtime) trying to get it to sound better. Now, here’s the ticket. I want to know, to the average Internet listener, 1) which version you think came first (before the tweaking) and which came second, and 2) which one sounds better. They’re labeled “version 1″ and “version 2,” but that doesn’t mean that version 1 necessarily came first.

Absoludicrous theme: version 1 | version 2

The Escape: version 1 | version 2

Leave your comments! Nate, I’m looking in your direction! Bonus points to whoever can tell me the biggest thing that still needs fixing in both versions of “The Escape” in terms of audio.

newspaper open – 3D Movie Maker Sound FX (and Colbert)

I know I recently did a little rant about people just making blog posts to fill in cute little surveys, then tag their friends, and I especially apologize for having done a similar one before. However, in that previous one I kind of cheated, skipping until I found an actual song. This time I didn’t cheat; I let the playlist bring up what it would. If this really describes my life, I suppose it’s apt, considering my life doesn’t make any sense, either.

JUST FOR FUN….
Feel free to do this yourself.

Directions:
1. Put your iPod, iTunes, Windows Media Player, etc. on shuffle.
2. For each question, press the “next” button to get your answer.
3. YOU MUST WRITE THAT SONG NAME DOWN NO MATTER HOW SILLY OR NON-SENSICAL IT SOUNDS

1. IF SOMEONE SAYS “IS THIS OKAY” YOU SAY?
Prelude, op. 28, no. 9 – Frederic Chopin

2. HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOURSELF?
“Arabian Dance” – Tchaikovsky

3. WHAT DO YOU LOOK FOR IN A GUY/GIRL?
Maridia 2 – Super Metroid

4. HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
Silence – F-Zero

5. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE PURPOSE?
Eterna Canción – OBK

6. WHAT IS YOUR MOTTO?
Bad Reception Erase – Mario Paint

7. WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
Aria from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach – Anna Magdalena Bach

8. WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU?
Fingerprints, Thunder, & Theme – Ken Allen, The Colonel’s Bequest

9. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
“But the museum would like to make its own assessment.” – 3D Movie Maker Default Voices

10. WHAT IS 2 + 2?
Battle 1 – Super Metroid

11. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND?
Mushroom Kindom II – Tadashi Ikegami, Shogo Sakai, Takuto Kitsuta, Super Smash Bros. Melee

12. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
A MIDI file called “LOVESTAY” that I don’t recognize

13. WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
“The Geddup Noise” – dj teh Cheat

14. WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO WHEN YOU GROW UP?
SoundStone – Earthbound

15. WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
“Courtroom Scene (dialogue)” – The Who, from Tommy

16. WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING?
Briefing – Starfox

17. WHAT IS YOUR HOBBY/INTEREST?
Bubble Bobble Title – Amiga

18. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST FEAR?
step grass left – 3D Movie Maker Sound FX

19. WHAT IS YOUR BIGGEST SECRET?
A MIDI file of “O Come All Ye Faithful”

20. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR FRIENDS?
“Goodnight Saigon” – Billy Joel

21. SONG THEY WILL PLAY AT YOUR FUNERAL?
Sonic 3 Breaking the Ice – DigiE (ocremix.org)

22. WHAT WILL YOU POST THIS AS?
newspaper open – 3D Movie Maker Sound FX

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: democracy just doesn’t work. On a side note: DON’T WRITE IN CAPS UNLESS YOU ARE SHOUTING, ANONYMOUS TAG-WRITER! I’m too lazy to go back and retype the whole thing so it’s not in caps, but really people, the Web is reaching its upper teens; surely people have learned nettiquete by now, roflol.

In other news: I’ve always enjoyed the Colbert Report, mostly for its satirical edge, but after watching this interview (all five parts are available under the “More From:” link) I’ve learned to appreciate it a whole lot more, especially seeing Stephen, out of character, describe exactly how the whole thing works, and a bit about his true quest: to change the world for the better by pointedly embodying much of what is wrong with it on a comedy show. One day I’ll write about that whole thing, but it’s finals week; give me a break!

Water Harmony

The practice of improv comedy has many levels. Many performers believe that if you can make an audience laugh, you have accomplished your mission. But there comes a time when a performance transcends the simply comedic; when the different players and pieces of a game coalesce to form a true work of art: a game at which people don’t simply laugh, but they are compelled to stand up and applaud.

Last night, during an Absoludicrous improv practice, such a work was created. Out of a simple ABC story game came a tale worthy of Dostoyevsky, regarding a snowman that just couldn’t melt. As the seasons turned he mocked his creators, then creation itself for sustaining and prolonging his existence. Contemplating the babbling brooks that flowed him by, he yearned for a return to that blissful harmony of running water that was denied him. He tried to move to Arizona, but the xenophobic citizens there sent him away, back to his native Russian homeland. He pleaded with passers-by to end his life. He lamented each autumn he was forced to behold, noting that snowmen should never see autumn: they should be built in the winter and melt in the spring. Finally, in a last-ditch attempt to end his wretched sojourn upon this bleak earth, he jammed a firecracker into his torso and lit it.

His fate remains unknown.

Mario Jones, Where Are You?

Another in the feature “Jeff’s search for a cheap music-writing program for use after college;” we see here that Jeff is reduced to writing a song using both the most useless and most awesome songwriting program ever devised: Mario Paint!

If you recognize the song, it’s because it’s my (in)famous “Mr. Jones, Where Are You?” song I wrote a while back. If you haven’t heard it, you can find it on my Soundclick page, found in my links on the right side of this blog. Sadly,with the limitations of three sounds at a time, plus the ability to only do 24 measures (about three lines of the first verse), I couldn’t recreate the whole thing, but oh well.

What do you think? Should I scrap my plans to buy a program for hundreds of dollars, and turn songs in to my clients featuring cats, dogs, burpy-baby sounds, and Yoshi noises?

The changing face of life, and blogitude

I used to blog about important, personal things that were going on in my life. Lately, however, I haven’t done any of those, for fear that the wrong people may read it. I’ve got a lot of personal posts, still, but I haven’t made one in a very long time. Even posts about mission stories and Diplomacy just aren’t the same as some of the more thought-provoking (for me, anyway) posts of early days. I’d say that it’s been at least since last March that I posted something relevant to why this blog was made in the first place, and the best example before that is nearly a year old. Since now nearly everyone I know has his or her own blog and they’re all linked, it’s more likely that people will stumble across the stuff I post; people who aren’t either complete strangers and therefore don’t care or people that are good enough friends with me that they can handle anything I post.

For example, during the past semester I’ve had a girlfriend and almost had another one. I’ve learned a lot about and through the experiences. Have I posted about it? Nope. Because I know that both the girls in question know about this blog. And even if they didn’t know, I know they could find it easily, what with Facebook and Google and all. I know that at least one post from the past made both of those relationships a little more uncomfortable than they needed to be. So, within this past year, most of my posts have been about either current projects or just things online that I found that I wanted to share, like the map at the top of this post showing, county by county, where people say “pop,” “soda,” or “coke.” And if a post ends up being personal, it’s either much too short to be of use other than general ennui or frustration, or is about something rather inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. In other words, this blog is becoming much more generic than it used to be.

I’m not sure if I like that. While some privacy and uncomfortable situations may be avoided, writing in here is not nearly as cathartic as it used to be. I used to use this blog as a way to organize my thoughts, or voice frustrations or other problems I was having, to be better able to face life. In fact, most of the earlier posts on here (not counting the “old journal” posts) were quite angsty, but for good reason. Now that it’s all fluff, I feel like there’s a lot I’ve needed to express, but haven’t had an outlet to do so. Just typing a private online journal isn’t quite what I want either, though, since there are some things I love to share with the world that I think can add to the grand tapestry of life, even if they might be a bit embarrassing for people who might know me personally. In addition, some of these older posts I want to share with people so they can understand me better. I know that some of my siblings, while they are dear friends and I’m very close to them, don’t get me at all. That’s partly my fault, as I’ve never been one to forcefully express myself in my family; too many dominating personalities in one room at a time kind of leave the youngest out of things. But that’s they way it’s always been, even if they’ll never understand that. In any case, I had hoped that through this blog they, and others who cared, could get to understand what really made me tick.

Some of this frustration is why I ended up moving all of my Atari reviews, although for some reason search engines aren’t directing any traffic to that site, choosing instead to send people to defunct posts here that no longer exist. I moved them so this blog could get back to its roots: a sort of online journal, where I could express freely my thoughts and feelings openly. Can I still do that? Is this blog culture that has sprung up even since I started this three and a half years ago grown so inconsequential that posting personal things on a blog is not only taboo, but just a bad idea? Will anyone really care if this blog suddenly gets personal again? Does anybody but myself even care about this dilemma? I sure hope not; because that means I’m writing this post for myself, at least, and that’s helping me get back to my roots. Even just writing this post feels good; just to get something off my mind and be myself in one of the only places I feel I can, without people interrupting me to either tell me that I’m wrong and/or I’m too hard on myself. You know, where I can express opinions and feel they’re valid, even if they’re not.

¿Le Gusta Leer? Porque me gusta leer. Y eso es lo que importa. Screw you, internet denizens! This post has become increasingly nonsensical. My favorite! Man, this feels good! Cheese puffs can kill your dogs!

In any case, now my blog has been recently updated. So you Blogger people whose blog lists change based on how long ago they posted, maybe now you can take a break from “Check out my new photos” and “Proposition 8: My View” and “Here’s twenty questions about me! Now YOU answer them!” and read something different! At least until this post gets old, at which point the blog of your friend halfway across the country who is posting thirty pictures of her toddler every week with inane captions will top your list of recently updated blogs and you can go look at those, under which no less than fifty people will comment “Aww! So cute!”

Travels Commentary

This was originally supposed to be part of a DVD of Travels that I was working on about three years ago, but the software I was using to make this was giving me all sorts of problems, so the DVD never materialized. What it is is Nate, Casey, and I doing commentary on the first act of the show. I wish I had a video file of the whole thing, but until I upgrade both my hardware and software that’s not going to happen, so enjoy it anyway and imagine the show in your head. In addition, the audio is about a minute ahead of the commentary for the first half hour or so.

You may get some interesting insight into the process of writing this musical from both the composer and the orchestrator. You may also get various Star Trek II references from Casey, whose real purpose for being on this commentary track remains unclear, since he had nothing to so with the show, but everything to do with hilarity! In any case, I hope you have fun with this 75MB MP3 commentary for Act I of Travels! (Note: the commentary was taken down because of space restrictions, but see below for video version)

EDIT: All right, I’m trying to get this thing uploaded as a video. Parts 1-3 are still off sync, but should be fixed soon. Until then you can start with part 4 on Youtube.

Watch it!