I should write in here more often, so that all these little things don't pile up so much.
I beat some videogames!
I never beat one-player videogames. I usually play a given game for two or four days, and then go off to do something else, but I recently beat Castlevania DS (although I started from a save-game leftover from summer) and Titan Quest. The latter was so much fun that I immediately started a second character and got about 1/3 through the game again. I like playing that character more than the first one, but it was time to move on. So for my next project:
I've ripped a Bunch of CDs.
My plan is to move my stereo equipment into the office, but leave the speakers in the living room, so that I can have all my musics in one handy place. As of presstime, I've ripped a little over a hundred CDs. That's roughly a third of my collection. I've been ripping them all into .wma format. The little option says that it's lossless, but I'm not so sure. Can anyone verify this for me?
It's all been pretty time consuming. There's just enough time between swapping CDs to get bored, but not enough that I can really do anything productive that doesn't also involve the computer. So in those ten-to-twenty minute chunks,
I've started designing a videogame.
Basically, it's a choose-your-own-adventure book with musical page-turning. You get to play DJ for some poor sap's life. I haven't worked out the story too much yet, because I want to work in environments that my (as-yet unknown) artist is comfortable with. Equally important for this game will be the music, and I've got a guy to do that for me. Ideally, this will be a three-person game development, let's see if I can make it happen.
Since I have a basic concept of the game mechanics, I've started work on the tech design. I'll develop the game tech in tandem with the story. I've never done 3D animations before, so the graphics tech could be very tricky. I'm willing to work in 2D, but that might make the artist's job impossibly hard. If I'm lucky, this will be a fun forray into fuzzy logic and neural networks. If I'm not, it'll be months and months of frustrating animation development. I'll keep you posted.
29.12.06
19.12.06
Nerdcore
Usually, when I decide to like a genre of music, I take a couple of weeks or months researching artists and listening to tracks, until I find a sub-genre, or at least a handful of bands, that I can really get into. See trip-hop, drum & bass, punk, ska, etc. But I've been trying to get into hip-hop for years, and can never find a rapper who I seriously enjoy. Sure, I've got a few exceptions laying around (Saul Williams, Massive Attack/Tricky, Dj Krush.) In most cases, I'll find a few tracks I really like (The Roots, Mos Def, KRS-One,) but half their records will be on some soul tangent that I really can't get into.
So I was at a party over the weekend, and someone put on an MC Chris record. You probably know who I'm talking about - he voiced MC Pee Pants on Aqua Teen Hunger Force. His raps are about things like Boba Fett and Robitussin. Some of those tracks really rocked out, so I figured it was time to hit the 'net again and look some shit up.
It turns out there's a whole cabal of assholes making rap about geek culture, coining it "Nerdcore Hip-hop." Fine. I figured it would all be an amusing gimic, like Wierd Al's new parody "White and Nerdy," but that doesn't seem to be the case. A lot of it is awfuly gimmicky, but there's enough legitimate music and feeling there that these tracks have replayablility beyond the 'gimmick' of rappers who are hardcore about being suburban nerds.
There's this compilation project, RhymeTorrents that's trying to make a space for lots of different Nerdcore artists to be heard. There's six disks worth on the site, with enough variance to tell that the genre isn't a one-trick pony, but enough similarity to know that these folks really can benefit from a localized space in which to be heard.
I've only listened to the first three disks enough to give any kind of review, so I'm going to do that. When I talk about the music in my reviews, I'm only referring to those three (even if I say "all" the disks, etc.) If you're only going to read part of this post, here is definitely the place to start. (I shoulda mentioned that at the beginning, huh?)
I. This seems like the most logical place to start listening. This disk most represents what I wanted to hear when I thought of "Nerdcore." I think it's the most gimmicky of the three, but it's also the most raw and "hardcore" sounding. It's a wealth of videogame samples and low-fi production. While a logical place to start, I'm not sure it's the best. Many of the tracks suffer from poor delivery of otherwise tight rhymes. As a starting point, this negatively reinforced the nerd stereotype for me by painting the artists as amateurs or as being rhythmically impaired, which they're certainly not. Despite that handicap, I think it's a pretty solid compilation, with only two auto-skips on the whole compilation: Monzy's "Kill Dash Nine," which has good rhyme and flow, but I can't stand the cracked-voice screaming, and Rai's "Big Lie," which you might like if you're into j-pop, but I am not.
If you're just gonna download a couple of tracks, here's my top three:
Nursehella - "Nursehellametery" Your basic "Hi, I'm a rapper chick. I'm awesome and everyone wants to get with me" track. No rhymes to write home about, but a great tune with hot production. Some people might get turned off by the distorted squeaking/moaning, but I dig it. This is possibly my favorite track of all the records.
Shael Riley (Featuring Beefy) - "Miss Information" Nerdcore namedropping. I'll use this moment to point out that there's a lot of shit-talking about MC Chris on this record. I read that MC Chris didn't want to participate in the RhymeTorrents project, and that might be a large chunk of the hate on this record. Maybe he's just a hot-button issue in the community. Anyway, there are some cute rhymes on the track, and a catchy chorus.
1337 Geek Beat - "Emulation Station" I didn't want to put two female MCs in my best-of list since they're very much a minority, but they really do have the best tracks. 1GB is undoubtedly the most hardcore of the whole nerdcore scene (and MC Router is more than a little elitist about it, which is weird.) This track has a good 8-bit melody and a really amusing sample in place of "scratch" noises. Somehow, they manage to pull off sounding hardcore while a girl is rapping about emulating NES through her TV. That should definitely count as quality Nerdcore.
Honorable Mention: Oddioblender - "Zombie Panic" I neeeeed more songs about zombie apocalypse. This one should have been a home-run, but the delivery is flat and awkward.
II. This is my least favorite disk. It's the most experimental, and while I'm all for experimentations, a lot of these don't work for me. But it's still worth sifting through. There are a number of tracks that are well worth taking home. Here's just the top three:
MechP - "Lo-Fi All-Stars" I wish I knew enough about rap to name the song that this reminds me of (even though I now think they're using a sample from Mario 2, I thought at first that they were sampling a song I'd heard.) He's rapping about old skool gaming. The repetition through the end might annoy some people, but I can't help but think about how cool a sing-a-long it would become at a show.
Optimus Rhyme - "Obey the Moderator" Reminds me more of hardcore punk than hip-hop, but maybe it's just because they use real instruments. I know Optimus Rhyme is a big name in the scene, and I was hoping that I'd really like their other stuff, but I haven't liked any of the other songs I've heard. Still, this one is a lot of fun.
Incredibad - "I Think I Might have Killed the President (High-C's Minimalist Remix)" Incredibad a.k.a. TheLonelyIsland, recent additions to the Saturday Night Live crew, have a knack for making really amusing raps. They're balanced precariously on the line between parody and legitimacy, which fits on a Nerdcore compilation pretty nicely.
Honorable Mention - YTcracker. He's narrowly missed list I and II. He's got that white gangsta sound down pat, and he can drop computer science with the best of 'em.
III. This is by far my favorite of the three. Most of the tracks on this record are as good as my top tracks from the other two. I've also listened to this disk the least, so it'll be some work to pare it down to just three.
Futuristic Sex Robots - "Fuck the MPAA" The only track on all three disks in the running with Nursehella. In fact, this track is my favorite. Not all the verses are 10s, but this is a straight-up nerdcore barn-burner. This track could easily be Nerdcore's Straight Outta' Compton. (Well, they open the track with a Public Enemy reference, so maybe more in that direction.)
Shael Riley - "Bit Pop" This is where Nerdcore and pop merge, certainly. It ends up sounding dated, like a mid-nineties "alternative" band merging alt-rock with rap. But that doesn't mean it still isn't cool.
Sudden Death - "Reign of Error" A story of computer crashes with amusing use of computer voices. There was only room in the three for one story track, but MechP's "City Crusher" is also very good.
Honorable Mention - Monzy - "So Much Drama in the PhD" has awesome computer science rhymes. Also: crude humor.
Disqualified: Dr. Octagon - "Ants" I have Dr. Octagon's album already, so I'm somewhat biased. Also, I think they have significantly more money and professional experience in production than the rest of these acts, so the track doesn't sound like it fits in as well. (I like the low-fi, DIY sound on the rest of these tracks to one extent or another.)
There you go. They're legally free, so go download some tracks! I'll be listening to the next 3 RhymeTorrent compilations over the next few days. Maybe I'll write more about it.
So I was at a party over the weekend, and someone put on an MC Chris record. You probably know who I'm talking about - he voiced MC Pee Pants on Aqua Teen Hunger Force. His raps are about things like Boba Fett and Robitussin. Some of those tracks really rocked out, so I figured it was time to hit the 'net again and look some shit up.
It turns out there's a whole cabal of assholes making rap about geek culture, coining it "Nerdcore Hip-hop." Fine. I figured it would all be an amusing gimic, like Wierd Al's new parody "White and Nerdy," but that doesn't seem to be the case. A lot of it is awfuly gimmicky, but there's enough legitimate music and feeling there that these tracks have replayablility beyond the 'gimmick' of rappers who are hardcore about being suburban nerds.
There's this compilation project, RhymeTorrents that's trying to make a space for lots of different Nerdcore artists to be heard. There's six disks worth on the site, with enough variance to tell that the genre isn't a one-trick pony, but enough similarity to know that these folks really can benefit from a localized space in which to be heard.
I've only listened to the first three disks enough to give any kind of review, so I'm going to do that. When I talk about the music in my reviews, I'm only referring to those three (even if I say "all" the disks, etc.) If you're only going to read part of this post, here is definitely the place to start. (I shoulda mentioned that at the beginning, huh?)
I. This seems like the most logical place to start listening. This disk most represents what I wanted to hear when I thought of "Nerdcore." I think it's the most gimmicky of the three, but it's also the most raw and "hardcore" sounding. It's a wealth of videogame samples and low-fi production. While a logical place to start, I'm not sure it's the best. Many of the tracks suffer from poor delivery of otherwise tight rhymes. As a starting point, this negatively reinforced the nerd stereotype for me by painting the artists as amateurs or as being rhythmically impaired, which they're certainly not. Despite that handicap, I think it's a pretty solid compilation, with only two auto-skips on the whole compilation: Monzy's "Kill Dash Nine," which has good rhyme and flow, but I can't stand the cracked-voice screaming, and Rai's "Big Lie," which you might like if you're into j-pop, but I am not.
If you're just gonna download a couple of tracks, here's my top three:
Nursehella - "Nursehellametery" Your basic "Hi, I'm a rapper chick. I'm awesome and everyone wants to get with me" track. No rhymes to write home about, but a great tune with hot production. Some people might get turned off by the distorted squeaking/moaning, but I dig it. This is possibly my favorite track of all the records.
Shael Riley (Featuring Beefy) - "Miss Information" Nerdcore namedropping. I'll use this moment to point out that there's a lot of shit-talking about MC Chris on this record. I read that MC Chris didn't want to participate in the RhymeTorrents project, and that might be a large chunk of the hate on this record. Maybe he's just a hot-button issue in the community. Anyway, there are some cute rhymes on the track, and a catchy chorus.
1337 Geek Beat - "Emulation Station" I didn't want to put two female MCs in my best-of list since they're very much a minority, but they really do have the best tracks. 1GB is undoubtedly the most hardcore of the whole nerdcore scene (and MC Router is more than a little elitist about it, which is weird.) This track has a good 8-bit melody and a really amusing sample in place of "scratch" noises. Somehow, they manage to pull off sounding hardcore while a girl is rapping about emulating NES through her TV. That should definitely count as quality Nerdcore.
Honorable Mention: Oddioblender - "Zombie Panic" I neeeeed more songs about zombie apocalypse. This one should have been a home-run, but the delivery is flat and awkward.
II. This is my least favorite disk. It's the most experimental, and while I'm all for experimentations, a lot of these don't work for me. But it's still worth sifting through. There are a number of tracks that are well worth taking home. Here's just the top three:
MechP - "Lo-Fi All-Stars" I wish I knew enough about rap to name the song that this reminds me of (even though I now think they're using a sample from Mario 2, I thought at first that they were sampling a song I'd heard.) He's rapping about old skool gaming. The repetition through the end might annoy some people, but I can't help but think about how cool a sing-a-long it would become at a show.
Optimus Rhyme - "Obey the Moderator" Reminds me more of hardcore punk than hip-hop, but maybe it's just because they use real instruments. I know Optimus Rhyme is a big name in the scene, and I was hoping that I'd really like their other stuff, but I haven't liked any of the other songs I've heard. Still, this one is a lot of fun.
Incredibad - "I Think I Might have Killed the President (High-C's Minimalist Remix)" Incredibad a.k.a. TheLonelyIsland, recent additions to the Saturday Night Live crew, have a knack for making really amusing raps. They're balanced precariously on the line between parody and legitimacy, which fits on a Nerdcore compilation pretty nicely.
Honorable Mention - YTcracker. He's narrowly missed list I and II. He's got that white gangsta sound down pat, and he can drop computer science with the best of 'em.
III. This is by far my favorite of the three. Most of the tracks on this record are as good as my top tracks from the other two. I've also listened to this disk the least, so it'll be some work to pare it down to just three.
Futuristic Sex Robots - "Fuck the MPAA" The only track on all three disks in the running with Nursehella. In fact, this track is my favorite. Not all the verses are 10s, but this is a straight-up nerdcore barn-burner. This track could easily be Nerdcore's Straight Outta' Compton. (Well, they open the track with a Public Enemy reference, so maybe more in that direction.)
Shael Riley - "Bit Pop" This is where Nerdcore and pop merge, certainly. It ends up sounding dated, like a mid-nineties "alternative" band merging alt-rock with rap. But that doesn't mean it still isn't cool.
Sudden Death - "Reign of Error" A story of computer crashes with amusing use of computer voices. There was only room in the three for one story track, but MechP's "City Crusher" is also very good.
Honorable Mention - Monzy - "So Much Drama in the PhD" has awesome computer science rhymes. Also: crude humor.
Disqualified: Dr. Octagon - "Ants" I have Dr. Octagon's album already, so I'm somewhat biased. Also, I think they have significantly more money and professional experience in production than the rest of these acts, so the track doesn't sound like it fits in as well. (I like the low-fi, DIY sound on the rest of these tracks to one extent or another.)
There you go. They're legally free, so go download some tracks! I'll be listening to the next 3 RhymeTorrent compilations over the next few days. Maybe I'll write more about it.
13.12.06
B/W Confidant changes
Here's a decklist:
Creatures:
4 Dark Confidant
4 Descendant of Kiyomaro
4 Jotun Grunt
Spells:
4 Funeral Charm
4 Skeletal Scrying
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Duress
4 Gerrard's Verdict
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Vindicate
Lands:
4 Plains
4 Swamp
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scrubland
Sideboard:
2 Tormod's Crypt
4 Engineered Plague
2 Rule of Law
4 Diabolic Edict
3 Massacre
There's this big, sanctioned Legacy tournament coming up in May, and a friend of mine's let me know that he's got a full set of Scrublands that I can use if I want to go to it with him. (Plus access to any of his large backlog of cards that I might need and he isn't using.) So I've been researching popular decks, and I've come up with this one as my current favorite. I love a lot of the synergies here. I especially like the Descendant and the choice of Gerrard's Verdict over Castigate.
But I have one problem with the deck: Skeletal Scrying. It empties a yard you could feed to a Grunt and takes the life you need to feed Bob. Blech. My best guess is that it's supposed to give you some sort of lategame edge, and maybe get the fetchlands out of your 'yard so the Grunts don't keep recycling them (although being able to shuffle more seems like a good idea to me.)
Don't worry, though. I think I have a solution. Gravestorm. I'm not sure it's as great late-game draw as Scrying (unless you've gone through several Grunts,) but it actually combos really well with Jotun Grunt and wrecks all kinds of various graveyard decks. If you can get a couple of these guys online, you should be golden.
It's not all milk & honey, though. Gravestorm is a more expensive card, so it shouldn't be taken lightly. I'll only put in three Gravestorms, but get rid of all four Skeletal Scryings. That last spot? I think Umezawa's Jitte should turn the trick. If the devil fork is good enough for Bob in Standard, it should be good in Legacy too, right?
My changes are also largely influenced by what I think of the metagame. I can't get into a Legacy game around here (even if I could find one, I'm borrowing all the cards from a friend 600 miles away.) So I've been reading a lot about it online. As near as I can tell, the biggest threats right now are Vial Goblins and Threshold.
The initial decklist doesn't really have much against aggro. Sure, it can knock a bunch of cards out of hand early in the game, but with a turn-one Goblin Lackey or AEther Vial, they're probably playing guys just as fast as you can play discard. Then, once they're in topdeck mode, half your spells are blank. The Jitte might give you a tiny edge in the first game since you can use it for removal, and in non-aggro matchups you can always use it to gain back some of the life that Bob took, or just end the game quicker with pump-ups. I know one-ofs without tutors are a bad play, but with a ton of card draw you just might see that Jitte anyway. Besides, you can always 'Board in a second one if you need it.
With the inclusion of Gravestorm, I think it opens a couple spots in that Sideboard. I don't know how Gravestorm would fair against reanimator decks, but they don't seem that popular. It should work wonders against Threshold, though. So I don't see too much point in boarding more graveyard hate. In place of the Crypts, I'd like to see another Jitte and that fourth Gravestorm (just to be sure that I'm right about how awesome Gravestorm can be.)
There are a few other tweaks I'd like to make to the deck, but I'm much less confidant about them. (Ba-dum-tchsh.)
I'd like to see a couple Paladin en-Vecs or possibly Tivadar of Thorns in the sideboard, to further shore up against aggro and especially Goblins, but I'm unsure what to take out. My first thought is one Massacre and one Engineered Plague, but I think the former can be good against a lot of different matchups (not just the Threshold matchup I pegged it on) and if I'm so worried about goblins, why would I take out an excelent anti-goblin card to put in a lesser one? For all the discard, I feel strong about Combo matchups, but I still wouldn't want to ditch those Rules of Law, just in case. And the Edicts are mostly staying in due to a base-line fear I have for Paladin en-Vec and Akroma.
I'd like to fool with the mana base a bit, too. If I could get 'em, I'd try out Tainted Fields and Godless Shrines (I have two of the latter, anyway.) After adding a couple of shrines, I'd like to see what would happen with a couple less lands over-all and putting in a couple Dark Rituals. (First-turn Gravestorm, or Duress->Hymn?)
Anyway, I'm quite sure these ideas have all been tried already, and I'm terribly, terribly wrong. I don't even win any games at FNM , and here I am talking up a Legacy tourny. Oh well. A nerd can dream, can't he?
Creatures:
4 Dark Confidant
4 Descendant of Kiyomaro
4 Jotun Grunt
Spells:
4 Funeral Charm
4 Skeletal Scrying
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Duress
4 Gerrard's Verdict
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Vindicate
Lands:
4 Plains
4 Swamp
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scrubland
Sideboard:
2 Tormod's Crypt
4 Engineered Plague
2 Rule of Law
4 Diabolic Edict
3 Massacre
There's this big, sanctioned Legacy tournament coming up in May, and a friend of mine's let me know that he's got a full set of Scrublands that I can use if I want to go to it with him. (Plus access to any of his large backlog of cards that I might need and he isn't using.) So I've been researching popular decks, and I've come up with this one as my current favorite. I love a lot of the synergies here. I especially like the Descendant and the choice of Gerrard's Verdict over Castigate.
But I have one problem with the deck: Skeletal Scrying. It empties a yard you could feed to a Grunt and takes the life you need to feed Bob. Blech. My best guess is that it's supposed to give you some sort of lategame edge, and maybe get the fetchlands out of your 'yard so the Grunts don't keep recycling them (although being able to shuffle more seems like a good idea to me.)
Don't worry, though. I think I have a solution. Gravestorm. I'm not sure it's as great late-game draw as Scrying (unless you've gone through several Grunts,) but it actually combos really well with Jotun Grunt and wrecks all kinds of various graveyard decks. If you can get a couple of these guys online, you should be golden.
It's not all milk & honey, though. Gravestorm is a more expensive card, so it shouldn't be taken lightly. I'll only put in three Gravestorms, but get rid of all four Skeletal Scryings. That last spot? I think Umezawa's Jitte should turn the trick. If the devil fork is good enough for Bob in Standard, it should be good in Legacy too, right?
My changes are also largely influenced by what I think of the metagame. I can't get into a Legacy game around here (even if I could find one, I'm borrowing all the cards from a friend 600 miles away.) So I've been reading a lot about it online. As near as I can tell, the biggest threats right now are Vial Goblins and Threshold.
The initial decklist doesn't really have much against aggro. Sure, it can knock a bunch of cards out of hand early in the game, but with a turn-one Goblin Lackey or AEther Vial, they're probably playing guys just as fast as you can play discard. Then, once they're in topdeck mode, half your spells are blank. The Jitte might give you a tiny edge in the first game since you can use it for removal, and in non-aggro matchups you can always use it to gain back some of the life that Bob took, or just end the game quicker with pump-ups. I know one-ofs without tutors are a bad play, but with a ton of card draw you just might see that Jitte anyway. Besides, you can always 'Board in a second one if you need it.
With the inclusion of Gravestorm, I think it opens a couple spots in that Sideboard. I don't know how Gravestorm would fair against reanimator decks, but they don't seem that popular. It should work wonders against Threshold, though. So I don't see too much point in boarding more graveyard hate. In place of the Crypts, I'd like to see another Jitte and that fourth Gravestorm (just to be sure that I'm right about how awesome Gravestorm can be.)
There are a few other tweaks I'd like to make to the deck, but I'm much less confidant about them. (Ba-dum-tchsh.)
I'd like to see a couple Paladin en-Vecs or possibly Tivadar of Thorns in the sideboard, to further shore up against aggro and especially Goblins, but I'm unsure what to take out. My first thought is one Massacre and one Engineered Plague, but I think the former can be good against a lot of different matchups (not just the Threshold matchup I pegged it on) and if I'm so worried about goblins, why would I take out an excelent anti-goblin card to put in a lesser one? For all the discard, I feel strong about Combo matchups, but I still wouldn't want to ditch those Rules of Law, just in case. And the Edicts are mostly staying in due to a base-line fear I have for Paladin en-Vec and Akroma.
I'd like to fool with the mana base a bit, too. If I could get 'em, I'd try out Tainted Fields and Godless Shrines (I have two of the latter, anyway.) After adding a couple of shrines, I'd like to see what would happen with a couple less lands over-all and putting in a couple Dark Rituals. (First-turn Gravestorm, or Duress->Hymn?)
Anyway, I'm quite sure these ideas have all been tried already, and I'm terribly, terribly wrong. I don't even win any games at FNM , and here I am talking up a Legacy tourny. Oh well. A nerd can dream, can't he?
boom. Aaaargh!
My current high score is 157. This is how you know it's time to stop playing minesweeper for the day.
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