there is one thing this review exists for: to communicate to you that machinarium is awesome. buy it, play it, love it. potentially impregnate it with your children and then spend the next nine months trying to figure out what sort(s) of sustenance a human/software hybrid child needs. it's that fucking grand.
two things that might exempt you from liking machinarium:
1. Do you hate love?
2. Do you hate the nightmare before christmas?
if your answer to either of those is "yes", then you might dislike machinarium. but you might also not be human, in which case HOW ARE YOU READING THIS?
i digress.
here's what machinarium looks like and sounds like.
i can't get over the way this game looks, the way it moves, and, perhaps most surprisingly, how good the music is. i could pulsate subliminally to the soundtrack all day long.
anyway, the game itself is a semi-standard point-and-click adventure game. you have an inventory, but it never ends up holding more than 3-4 things at once. you can stretch your little robot-guy taller or shrink him shorter if necessary. beyond that, you just move from screen to screen and click on things.
now, i should come clean: i hate "adventure" games. nothing seems less like an adventure to me than clicking through a bunch of 2-D landscape paintings strung together by a cliche narrative. i tried to like myst, i tried to like lots of the myst clones that have come out since. none of them worked for me. machinarium works. despite having more in common than not with games like myst, somehow it's significant enough artistically and - yes - emotionally to warrant a full playthrough (i actually played through the entire game in two sittings, and though it's a short game, it still probably took me about 10 hours to figure everything out, so that's a lot of sitting).
somehow, machinarium sidesteps the dullness of the simple point-and-click and experience that so many adventure games seem to boil down to...part of this is due to the simple (but ingenious) touch of making it so you can only interact with objects (or realize that you can interact with them) if your robot is in arm's reach of them. so, every time you enter a new room, you don't just immediately canvas the whole room with your cursor, waiting for it to turn into a clicky-hand. granted, what you do instead is click around to make the robot walk the circumference of the room, and then check to see if you can click on anything...but somehow this little tweak is significant.
the story, told entirely through little thought bubbles that pop up at opportune times, is also oddly significant. the robot is looking for his robo-girl, and there's an especially poignant moment about halfway through the game when you find said robo-girl, but are unable to rescue her as yet. the two of you trade items through the bars of her cell-like room, and it's simultaneously adorable and sad in a way that i've seen few games manage (indie games or fancy full-on 3-D megacorp games).
the puzzles themselves are hard. not impossible, but hard. they require a lot of clicking, obviously. machinarium also includes two levels of sanctioned "cheating"; at any point, you can click a little thought bubble in the inventory bar, and you get a short pictorial representation of how to solve the puzzle closest to where you're currently standing. if you want more help, you can click on the book icon, but the game forces you to play a little side-scrolling shooter game a la gradius before giving you a hand-sketched book page of how to proceed for the next several steps. interestingly, neither of these tricks will blatantly spell out an answer for you, but they do reduce the stymie-ing effect of some of the games puzzles to more simple visual riddles. other reviewers have complained about this, but i think it's absolutely perfect to be made to run through the mini-game before getting any game hints. if you really want to cheat, just look on the internet. if not, the game's going to force you to work for it. that seems fair. also, the hand-drawn nature of the hints you do get, and their presentation (through the metal-ish book creaking open) are just perfect within the steampunk aesthetic of the game.
i have to say, in response to some of the criticisms i've seen of the game's puzzles, that i didn't find anything in the game too hard. machinarium is actually quite a blessing in the sense that the solutions to the puzzles make sense, unlike in a lot of adventure games. even the few times that i accidentally happened upon a solution, it was clearly a solution that i could have thought of myself logically; i just hadn't. only once in the entire game did i hit upon a solution to a puzzle that didn't make any sense (involving scaring a robot with something that i never would have guessed would scare it in a situation where it was completely unclear that you were even supposed to scare it), but even that one i just got through via random clicking. i never used the walkthrough and only used the hint bubbles once...and i'm bad at these types of games.
so yeah. i love machinarium. you do too, even if you don't know it yet.
Feb 23, 2010
Feb 21, 2010
i DO love the indie bundle!
so, as i posted about ad nauseum on facebook and twitter last week, i made an impulse-buy at theindiebundle.com and came away really impressed. the deal was six of the most well-reviewed indie games of the last few years for 20 bucks (the deal's now over, as of yesterday), and while i've really enjoyed the few indie games i've played (mostly world of goo and braid), i bought the bundle more out of a self-imposed professional sense of obligation (i.e. i write about video games for my job, so i should probably check out what's going on in the indie genre) than a desire to really play the games. but i'm glad i did.
first point: "indie games" is a sort of troubling moniker for me. mostly because of the connotations that "indie" has taken on in the last few years. "indie" music and "indie" films, of course, started out at a categorization for music and films made under the radar, for a miniature budget, and outside the constraints of the expectations of big labels or big studios. now, "indie" seems interchangeable with a form of "cool" that implies the kind of anti-establishment chic you can buy at hot topic. "indie" media, by and large, is about as counter-establishment as wearing resin-frame glasses is original at this point (i say this last, of course, with the appropriate amount of tongue in my cheek). but i'm not writing a cultural critique here (and you should be glad for that because i'd probably ramble for the rest of the night and my finally hitting "publish" would break the internet's stupid-ranting filter). all i want to say is that in a lot of ways, "indie" games are still indie. i can say i played an "indie" game without feeling like i'm being disingenuous. and (though this is an unoriginal complaint) most big-budget games nowadays are so starting to look like the regurgitated actionflash garbage that hollywood keeps vomiting out that i'm glad indie games, at least, are still indie. the games i'm going to look at all have their shortcomings, but i'd rather pay 60 bucks for this bundle, warts and all, than pay 60 bucks for another gears of war clone. so yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeah!!! SUCK IT, GAME PUBLISHERS!!!
no, seriously. as long as companies can get away with shit like this (and don't tell me that people aren't going to buy assassin's creed 2 anyway; they will), i will continue to seek retribution through pointless, ALL-CAPS tirades. now: on to the games.
osmos
i'm loving osmos. i'm finding it occasionally incredibly infuriating - contrary to the game's claims of zen-like calm inducing-ness - but otherwise i'm really liking it. it has the two quintessential indie game charms: 1) a distinct ambiance/production and 2) a really simple but engaging game mechanic. you're a amoeba-mote sort of thing, and you just click the mouse to fly around. you can slow down and speed up time, but this doesn't necessarily effect the gameplay any further than letting you take longer to make decisions when things are moving too fast, or letting you speed to a conclusion when things are moving too slow. the beauty of the game (non-visually speaking) is the simple physics model. the game, fittingly, starts with the "equal-and-opposite" quote from newton, and that's about all you have to understand to play. when you propel yourself, you shoot off a little bit of your body in order to gain momentum. that little bit bounces around, and maybe gloms on to another mote, or eventually finds its way back to you. the point of the game, though there are a few variations in later levels, is basically to just become the biggest mote by absorbing smaller motes and avoiding larger motes. everything else follows from physics: don't propel yourself too much because you'll eject all your mass and won't be big enough to absorb anything. if you're trying to slow down, don't eject a bunch of your mass into the mote in front of you that you want to absorb, because you'll make it bigger. here's a pretty comprehensive gameplay video:
one thing i don't like about this game is that some of the later levels amp up the challenge in sort of unintuitive ways. when there are so many games (indie and otherwise) out there that really cleverly and gradually introduce new challenges (world of goo specifically comes to mind), it seems like a lot of challenges in the later levels of this game are just "challenges" in the sense that you are put in a potentially impossible situation and maybe 1 out of 10 times you're able to worm your way out of it. for example, a few levels require very detailed awareness of how your mass-ejecting effects the rest of the motes in the level; unfortunately, there are so many motes crammed into some of these levels that you can spend 15 minutes meticulously bouncing around in slo-mo, trying to keep from pushing other motes around to the point where they have the opportunity to get larger than you, only to zoom out and realize that you've accidentally created a huge mote on the other side of the screen that you'll never get bigger than. some of these levels, i think, are supposed to be puzzles, but they quickly degenerate into exercises in frequent restarts, and your final success ends up feeling more like luck than skill or planning. overall, though, this game is unique and worth playing; at least until you get about 2/3rds of the way through...after that, only continue if you're prepared to be seriously challenged.
next ip: machinarium
first point: "indie games" is a sort of troubling moniker for me. mostly because of the connotations that "indie" has taken on in the last few years. "indie" music and "indie" films, of course, started out at a categorization for music and films made under the radar, for a miniature budget, and outside the constraints of the expectations of big labels or big studios. now, "indie" seems interchangeable with a form of "cool" that implies the kind of anti-establishment chic you can buy at hot topic. "indie" media, by and large, is about as counter-establishment as wearing resin-frame glasses is original at this point (i say this last, of course, with the appropriate amount of tongue in my cheek). but i'm not writing a cultural critique here (and you should be glad for that because i'd probably ramble for the rest of the night and my finally hitting "publish" would break the internet's stupid-ranting filter). all i want to say is that in a lot of ways, "indie" games are still indie. i can say i played an "indie" game without feeling like i'm being disingenuous. and (though this is an unoriginal complaint) most big-budget games nowadays are so starting to look like the regurgitated actionflash garbage that hollywood keeps vomiting out that i'm glad indie games, at least, are still indie. the games i'm going to look at all have their shortcomings, but i'd rather pay 60 bucks for this bundle, warts and all, than pay 60 bucks for another gears of war clone. so yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeah!!! SUCK IT, GAME PUBLISHERS!!!
no, seriously. as long as companies can get away with shit like this (and don't tell me that people aren't going to buy assassin's creed 2 anyway; they will), i will continue to seek retribution through pointless, ALL-CAPS tirades. now: on to the games.
osmos
i'm loving osmos. i'm finding it occasionally incredibly infuriating - contrary to the game's claims of zen-like calm inducing-ness - but otherwise i'm really liking it. it has the two quintessential indie game charms: 1) a distinct ambiance/production and 2) a really simple but engaging game mechanic. you're a amoeba-mote sort of thing, and you just click the mouse to fly around. you can slow down and speed up time, but this doesn't necessarily effect the gameplay any further than letting you take longer to make decisions when things are moving too fast, or letting you speed to a conclusion when things are moving too slow. the beauty of the game (non-visually speaking) is the simple physics model. the game, fittingly, starts with the "equal-and-opposite" quote from newton, and that's about all you have to understand to play. when you propel yourself, you shoot off a little bit of your body in order to gain momentum. that little bit bounces around, and maybe gloms on to another mote, or eventually finds its way back to you. the point of the game, though there are a few variations in later levels, is basically to just become the biggest mote by absorbing smaller motes and avoiding larger motes. everything else follows from physics: don't propel yourself too much because you'll eject all your mass and won't be big enough to absorb anything. if you're trying to slow down, don't eject a bunch of your mass into the mote in front of you that you want to absorb, because you'll make it bigger. here's a pretty comprehensive gameplay video:
one thing i don't like about this game is that some of the later levels amp up the challenge in sort of unintuitive ways. when there are so many games (indie and otherwise) out there that really cleverly and gradually introduce new challenges (world of goo specifically comes to mind), it seems like a lot of challenges in the later levels of this game are just "challenges" in the sense that you are put in a potentially impossible situation and maybe 1 out of 10 times you're able to worm your way out of it. for example, a few levels require very detailed awareness of how your mass-ejecting effects the rest of the motes in the level; unfortunately, there are so many motes crammed into some of these levels that you can spend 15 minutes meticulously bouncing around in slo-mo, trying to keep from pushing other motes around to the point where they have the opportunity to get larger than you, only to zoom out and realize that you've accidentally created a huge mote on the other side of the screen that you'll never get bigger than. some of these levels, i think, are supposed to be puzzles, but they quickly degenerate into exercises in frequent restarts, and your final success ends up feeling more like luck than skill or planning. overall, though, this game is unique and worth playing; at least until you get about 2/3rds of the way through...after that, only continue if you're prepared to be seriously challenged.
next ip: machinarium
Feb 20, 2010
new music posters, thanks to LD
i just got these as a gift, to use in future music endeavors, and i thought i'd post them because they are FREAKING AWESOME.
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
the ben-bear and his mail-order bride.
yes. i bought a 26" tall care bear on ebay for one dollar. because there's something wrong with me.
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| From Spring '10 |
Feb 13, 2010
here's something you don't already know: i'm a fan of wilco!
so partially as a consequence of good timing and needing to go to seattle anyway, i got to see wilco shows #3 and #4 this weekend. they were both fantastic in comparison to wilco shows #1 and #2, which were also fantastic in their own way. so. a little background:
wilco show #1 was in 2008 in spokane, at the opera house. i was in the midst of becoming a wilco fan, but wasn't familiar enough with many of their songs (except the ones on sky blue sky) to really fully appreciate the experience. similar to my first RA concert, appropriately enough, which i hated. well...i didn't hate my first wilco concert, but i certainly liked the fleet foxes (their opening band) much more. wilco #2 was in vienna, va, this summer. it was a solid show, but i was completely exhausted and it was in an amphitheatre, which meant that all of the sonic subtleties that make wilco interesting were obliterated by loud-ass speakers and the fact that i was a football field away from the stage. this week's shows were both in small old-school theatres, both with amazing sound, and one in which i had a seat 20 rows away from the stage, in the center of the room, and the other in which i was literally standing about 12 feet away from tweedy's mic stand. so yeah. that in and of itself made these shows better. but so did lots of other things! joy!
first of all, this band was more energetic throughout the entire show (both nights) than pretty much any band i've ever seen, except maybe picadilly circus in 2004. keep in mind, 5 members of this band are (i think) over 40, and one is almost 55. and they played with an energy that would quite literally but a bunch of coked-out 20 year olds in a black flag cover band to shame. it was amazing.
second, the lighting was amazing. after seeing phish this summer, i was finally made to understand the difference a decent, well thought-out light show can make at a live concert. the lighting for wilco was certainly not chris kuroda-grade lighting (but then again, what is?). but, they had rigged up a really badass textured sort-of-sheet (which you can see in the pictures in my other post) which really interestingly reflected the various types and colors of light back out into the audience all night long. also, there were the weird frankenstein electrodes that were behind and to the sides of the band, that performed all sorts of visual acrobatics for different songs all night. combine this with side-stage lights that threw weird, huge shadows of the band members on the walls of the theatre and an intense fog machine, and it was the best light show i've seen, ever, for a theatre show.
oh, there was also the music, which was good. some highlights:
first night opener = "sunken treasure" > "remember the mountain bed" > "hell is chrome". "sunken treasure" is basically the perfect opener, slow and plodding, but intense, and (in this version) driven by a lonely harmonica during the instrumental breaks. "mountain bed" is (as you might know from previous posts) pretty much my favorite love song ever, so it was great to hear it live, and this version was especially well done. tweedy's voice, especially on night one, was better and clearer than i've ever heard it, and never as much as it was on these first three songs. "hell is chrome" is just chilling, especially with the stage and the front rows of the crowd bathed in undulating red lights throughout.
"bull black nova" was INSANE. the lights were crazy, especially with the electrodes doing an eerie pantomime of an electric chair over the climax of the song while tweedy shrieked "PICK UP!!!" over and over again. the band converted me to a lot of songs from wilco (the album) during these shows, and "one wing" was the first. i've never liked this song much, save for the debut version they played a few years ago, which was a lot more dead-ish, jammy version than what ended up on the album. however, the version they played in portland was absolute, full-on rock and roll. they followed that up immediately with the fastest-tempo version of "shot in the arm" i've ever heard, which ended in an absolute wall of noise and a great visual moment featuring each member of the band cranking out the noise in the best way they could: nels flinging feedback at his amp, pat standing and going at the keyboards ben-folds-style, glenn and tweedy hammering away, and mikael slamming at all his weird sound pads with two huge pillows (yeah, i don't know why either, but it sounded awesome). it was great to hear "side with the seeds" > "at least that's what you said", and later on "far, far away". then they rocked out "sonny feeling", which is a song i unapologetically HATED until a few days ago. now i can at least stand it. both nights they played a run of "sonny feeling" > "hate it here" > "walken" > "i'm the man who loves you" to close their main set, and that was the one part of the show for me that was a little underwhelming. i'm not a huge fan of either of the middle songs, and though "i'm the man who loves you" was excellent both nights, it was sort of an odd run to end the set, especially getting the exact same songs in the exact same order both nights.
as another complaint in that vein, i was really concerned that we'd get essentially the same show both nights, and we almost did. the second night opened with "wilco (the song)", yet another song i didn't like until right that moment, but then we got five songs in the row in basically the same order as we'd gotten them the previous night. they were all great songs (especially, again, "bull black nova"), but it was a little disappointing, considering how many songs the band has in their repertoire. but then we got "radio cure" (!!!) and "pot kettle black" (!!!!!), which made up a bit for it. later, there was also "handshake drugs" and "i'll fight" before the aforementioned four-song run to end the set.
encores both nights were typically intense wilco-rock-encores. scott mcaughey came out both nights (once with peter buck, once with bill frisell) for "california stars". both nights the band opened the encore with buffalo springfield's "broken arrow", and the first night we also got "kingpin" (livin' in...portland...uhhh...oregon..."), and "i'm a wheel" (complete with pat pulling The Who-style guitar windmills). the second night was simultaneously a bit more exciting and disappointing: they played "you never know", then "box full of letters" (upon which i promptly lost my mind), and due to the response of the crowd to "letters", tweedy then said "how'd you guys like it if we played some more old songs?" only to come back a moment later and say "apparently we're out of time". they closed with an amazing "hoodoo voodoo", featuring probably the best moment of the two shows in a guitar duel between pat and nels. so, yeah. fantastic end, but i also would have loved to hear them play a few more A.M.-era songs.
anyway, i continue to be blown away by this band and will definitely be keeping an eye out for any other chance to see them, as somehow they just keep getting better with time.
wilco show #1 was in 2008 in spokane, at the opera house. i was in the midst of becoming a wilco fan, but wasn't familiar enough with many of their songs (except the ones on sky blue sky) to really fully appreciate the experience. similar to my first RA concert, appropriately enough, which i hated. well...i didn't hate my first wilco concert, but i certainly liked the fleet foxes (their opening band) much more. wilco #2 was in vienna, va, this summer. it was a solid show, but i was completely exhausted and it was in an amphitheatre, which meant that all of the sonic subtleties that make wilco interesting were obliterated by loud-ass speakers and the fact that i was a football field away from the stage. this week's shows were both in small old-school theatres, both with amazing sound, and one in which i had a seat 20 rows away from the stage, in the center of the room, and the other in which i was literally standing about 12 feet away from tweedy's mic stand. so yeah. that in and of itself made these shows better. but so did lots of other things! joy!
first of all, this band was more energetic throughout the entire show (both nights) than pretty much any band i've ever seen, except maybe picadilly circus in 2004. keep in mind, 5 members of this band are (i think) over 40, and one is almost 55. and they played with an energy that would quite literally but a bunch of coked-out 20 year olds in a black flag cover band to shame. it was amazing.
second, the lighting was amazing. after seeing phish this summer, i was finally made to understand the difference a decent, well thought-out light show can make at a live concert. the lighting for wilco was certainly not chris kuroda-grade lighting (but then again, what is?). but, they had rigged up a really badass textured sort-of-sheet (which you can see in the pictures in my other post) which really interestingly reflected the various types and colors of light back out into the audience all night long. also, there were the weird frankenstein electrodes that were behind and to the sides of the band, that performed all sorts of visual acrobatics for different songs all night. combine this with side-stage lights that threw weird, huge shadows of the band members on the walls of the theatre and an intense fog machine, and it was the best light show i've seen, ever, for a theatre show.
oh, there was also the music, which was good. some highlights:
first night opener = "sunken treasure" > "remember the mountain bed" > "hell is chrome". "sunken treasure" is basically the perfect opener, slow and plodding, but intense, and (in this version) driven by a lonely harmonica during the instrumental breaks. "mountain bed" is (as you might know from previous posts) pretty much my favorite love song ever, so it was great to hear it live, and this version was especially well done. tweedy's voice, especially on night one, was better and clearer than i've ever heard it, and never as much as it was on these first three songs. "hell is chrome" is just chilling, especially with the stage and the front rows of the crowd bathed in undulating red lights throughout.
"bull black nova" was INSANE. the lights were crazy, especially with the electrodes doing an eerie pantomime of an electric chair over the climax of the song while tweedy shrieked "PICK UP!!!" over and over again. the band converted me to a lot of songs from wilco (the album) during these shows, and "one wing" was the first. i've never liked this song much, save for the debut version they played a few years ago, which was a lot more dead-ish, jammy version than what ended up on the album. however, the version they played in portland was absolute, full-on rock and roll. they followed that up immediately with the fastest-tempo version of "shot in the arm" i've ever heard, which ended in an absolute wall of noise and a great visual moment featuring each member of the band cranking out the noise in the best way they could: nels flinging feedback at his amp, pat standing and going at the keyboards ben-folds-style, glenn and tweedy hammering away, and mikael slamming at all his weird sound pads with two huge pillows (yeah, i don't know why either, but it sounded awesome). it was great to hear "side with the seeds" > "at least that's what you said", and later on "far, far away". then they rocked out "sonny feeling", which is a song i unapologetically HATED until a few days ago. now i can at least stand it. both nights they played a run of "sonny feeling" > "hate it here" > "walken" > "i'm the man who loves you" to close their main set, and that was the one part of the show for me that was a little underwhelming. i'm not a huge fan of either of the middle songs, and though "i'm the man who loves you" was excellent both nights, it was sort of an odd run to end the set, especially getting the exact same songs in the exact same order both nights.
as another complaint in that vein, i was really concerned that we'd get essentially the same show both nights, and we almost did. the second night opened with "wilco (the song)", yet another song i didn't like until right that moment, but then we got five songs in the row in basically the same order as we'd gotten them the previous night. they were all great songs (especially, again, "bull black nova"), but it was a little disappointing, considering how many songs the band has in their repertoire. but then we got "radio cure" (!!!) and "pot kettle black" (!!!!!), which made up a bit for it. later, there was also "handshake drugs" and "i'll fight" before the aforementioned four-song run to end the set.
encores both nights were typically intense wilco-rock-encores. scott mcaughey came out both nights (once with peter buck, once with bill frisell) for "california stars". both nights the band opened the encore with buffalo springfield's "broken arrow", and the first night we also got "kingpin" (livin' in...portland...uhhh...oregon..."), and "i'm a wheel" (complete with pat pulling The Who-style guitar windmills). the second night was simultaneously a bit more exciting and disappointing: they played "you never know", then "box full of letters" (upon which i promptly lost my mind), and due to the response of the crowd to "letters", tweedy then said "how'd you guys like it if we played some more old songs?" only to come back a moment later and say "apparently we're out of time". they closed with an amazing "hoodoo voodoo", featuring probably the best moment of the two shows in a guitar duel between pat and nels. so, yeah. fantastic end, but i also would have loved to hear them play a few more A.M.-era songs.
anyway, i continue to be blown away by this band and will definitely be keeping an eye out for any other chance to see them, as somehow they just keep getting better with time.
new road trip/wilco photos
have a few pictures from wilco/my trip to seattle this week. just because.
the first few, featuring the weirdly calm reflectivity of the columbia river, were taken by LDz:
next few are of the wilco show in portland...i mostly gave up on trying to get good pictures of the band because of the giant-headed dude in front of me; however, i wanted to get a few pics just to show off the band's awesome frankenstein/tesla lighting setup:
the first few, featuring the weirdly calm reflectivity of the columbia river, were taken by LDz:
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
next few are of the wilco show in portland...i mostly gave up on trying to get good pictures of the band because of the giant-headed dude in front of me; however, i wanted to get a few pics just to show off the band's awesome frankenstein/tesla lighting setup:
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
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| From Spring '10 |
phish re-review, pt. 2
night two was the awesome. not that there weren't issues, but the overall effect was a lot more positive than night one. which is odd, because i originally remembered thinking the two nights were of pretty equal quality. but through the "magic" of reliving the shows via recording, i've now decided night two was far better. for whatever that's worth.
anyway, i came into night two having felt that the previous night was one of the best concert-going nights of my life, but also wondering if i could physically (and mentally) take 3 more hours of phish again this soon. the band started off with "mango song", which was pretty much the weirdest opener in the universe and it was so confusing that it took me until the next song, "chalkdust torture", to adjust. fortunately, they almost always blow this song out of the water, and they did here as well. kind of feel like they should have switched the order of these two in the setlist...
next was "middle of the road", which is apparently a mike gordon tune. this was a neat little song, and i hate to sound bitchy, but at this point, i was getting a little sick of first-set songs i didn't know or had never heard. i guess after waiting to hear the band live for 8 years and knowing and loving pretty much all of the 250+ songs they play, it was a little frustrating to hear at least 4-5 songs i didn't even know where there were so many songs i wanted to hear.
next was "tweezer", and as much as i usually love this song, after the first few minutes (with the notable exception of the island tour version) it usually devolves into a serviceable but unremarkable jam. no different this time. it was solidly played, but not nearly as exploratory or interesting as a lot of the late-set jams from night one.
next was "driver"...now, i love "driver", but again, i felt the same way i felt about "sleep" the first night. why play this if you're not in a room with 5 people and an acoustic guitar? i felt like i was at a DMB encore, where a solo acoustic performance is considered some sort of reverential occurrence, for some reason. i guess i just don't get it.
next was "twenty years later". another song i'd never heard, and another sort of workmanlike rendition (much like "joy" from the first night). at this point i'm loving the show, of course (it's still my virgin phish experience), but getting a little leery that if things continue as-is song-selection-wise for much longer, i might go home a little disappointed. fortunately, the next two songs are "ya mar" and "it's ice". "ya mar" is a pretty run-of-the-mill song, technically, but it such a fun, bouncy tune (and the crowd was obviously more familiar with it than a lot of the songs thus far that night) that it was just the right song to get everyone bouncing around and screaming and whatnot again. "it's ice" was a perfect counterpoint: a short, but technically complicated and interesting song that led beautifully into...
..."wolfman's brother". where the first night made me a believer in "down with disease", night two was all about the "wolfman". i've never liked this song much either, however, this night changed my mind. a great near-20-minute funk version, complete with the best glowstick war in the universe, and i still can't help but grin when i listen to the tape of this. great, great moment.
first set ended strong with "character zero" > "run like an antelope". the crowd responded to "antelope" like we'd been waiting since the beginning of the night to jump up and down screaming like maniacs when trey demanded that we "run like an antelope, out of control!"
where i liked second night, first set better than first night, first set, the second night second set was part great, part not-so-great (though it ended on a high note). first we got a 20 minute cover of velvet underground's "rock n roll", which was really fun and unexpected. next was "makisupa policeman", which included a jam where trey and mike switched instruments for a few minutes. then came "alaska", a song which i've desperately tried to like time and time again and just cannot. i'm sorry. then there was "the wedge", which is always a nice pop-ish gem, followed (finally) by "YEM". honestly, i was hoping all weekend for "divided sky", so the opening notes of "YEM" were a little disappointing for me. nonetheless; it was a great version of the song, with an excellent five minute vocal jam at the end.
the closing combination of "backwards down the number line > piper > grind" was fun, but at that point i think all the standing, dancing, heat, and contact high was wearing on me and i sort of felt like we were just waiting for the encore. "backwards" is not a high-energy song by any means, and the transition to "piper" was a little wonky. "grind" was cute, but singing a cappella is about as far from rock as you can get :)
fortunately, the encore was a great (nay, perfect!) way to end a two-night stand: "good times bad times" and "tweezer (reprise)". the encore thus made sure that we were all screaming like mad(wo)men by the end.
ultimately, it was a more enjoyable weekend than i had even hoped, and more than lived up to my live phish expectations. was it the best phish show i've ever heard? no, but the fact that i was finally actually there in the flesh more than made up for some of the lacking technical proficiencies. on the recording, things don't stand up quite as well. the high points and the intensity come across a lot less, and the glitchy playing stands out more. i feel like the recordings do a good job (for better or worse) illustrating the semi-episodic nature of both nights: the good and bad seemed to come in chunks...so i suppose in a way having a recording is nice because i can skip the parts i don't necessarily feel like i need to hear again.
i hope they tour again next summer because i'll totally be there...
anyway, i came into night two having felt that the previous night was one of the best concert-going nights of my life, but also wondering if i could physically (and mentally) take 3 more hours of phish again this soon. the band started off with "mango song", which was pretty much the weirdest opener in the universe and it was so confusing that it took me until the next song, "chalkdust torture", to adjust. fortunately, they almost always blow this song out of the water, and they did here as well. kind of feel like they should have switched the order of these two in the setlist...
next was "middle of the road", which is apparently a mike gordon tune. this was a neat little song, and i hate to sound bitchy, but at this point, i was getting a little sick of first-set songs i didn't know or had never heard. i guess after waiting to hear the band live for 8 years and knowing and loving pretty much all of the 250+ songs they play, it was a little frustrating to hear at least 4-5 songs i didn't even know where there were so many songs i wanted to hear.
next was "tweezer", and as much as i usually love this song, after the first few minutes (with the notable exception of the island tour version) it usually devolves into a serviceable but unremarkable jam. no different this time. it was solidly played, but not nearly as exploratory or interesting as a lot of the late-set jams from night one.
next was "driver"...now, i love "driver", but again, i felt the same way i felt about "sleep" the first night. why play this if you're not in a room with 5 people and an acoustic guitar? i felt like i was at a DMB encore, where a solo acoustic performance is considered some sort of reverential occurrence, for some reason. i guess i just don't get it.
next was "twenty years later". another song i'd never heard, and another sort of workmanlike rendition (much like "joy" from the first night). at this point i'm loving the show, of course (it's still my virgin phish experience), but getting a little leery that if things continue as-is song-selection-wise for much longer, i might go home a little disappointed. fortunately, the next two songs are "ya mar" and "it's ice". "ya mar" is a pretty run-of-the-mill song, technically, but it such a fun, bouncy tune (and the crowd was obviously more familiar with it than a lot of the songs thus far that night) that it was just the right song to get everyone bouncing around and screaming and whatnot again. "it's ice" was a perfect counterpoint: a short, but technically complicated and interesting song that led beautifully into...
..."wolfman's brother". where the first night made me a believer in "down with disease", night two was all about the "wolfman". i've never liked this song much either, however, this night changed my mind. a great near-20-minute funk version, complete with the best glowstick war in the universe, and i still can't help but grin when i listen to the tape of this. great, great moment.
first set ended strong with "character zero" > "run like an antelope". the crowd responded to "antelope" like we'd been waiting since the beginning of the night to jump up and down screaming like maniacs when trey demanded that we "run like an antelope, out of control!"
where i liked second night, first set better than first night, first set, the second night second set was part great, part not-so-great (though it ended on a high note). first we got a 20 minute cover of velvet underground's "rock n roll", which was really fun and unexpected. next was "makisupa policeman", which included a jam where trey and mike switched instruments for a few minutes. then came "alaska", a song which i've desperately tried to like time and time again and just cannot. i'm sorry. then there was "the wedge", which is always a nice pop-ish gem, followed (finally) by "YEM". honestly, i was hoping all weekend for "divided sky", so the opening notes of "YEM" were a little disappointing for me. nonetheless; it was a great version of the song, with an excellent five minute vocal jam at the end.
the closing combination of "backwards down the number line > piper > grind" was fun, but at that point i think all the standing, dancing, heat, and contact high was wearing on me and i sort of felt like we were just waiting for the encore. "backwards" is not a high-energy song by any means, and the transition to "piper" was a little wonky. "grind" was cute, but singing a cappella is about as far from rock as you can get :)
fortunately, the encore was a great (nay, perfect!) way to end a two-night stand: "good times bad times" and "tweezer (reprise)". the encore thus made sure that we were all screaming like mad(wo)men by the end.
ultimately, it was a more enjoyable weekend than i had even hoped, and more than lived up to my live phish expectations. was it the best phish show i've ever heard? no, but the fact that i was finally actually there in the flesh more than made up for some of the lacking technical proficiencies. on the recording, things don't stand up quite as well. the high points and the intensity come across a lot less, and the glitchy playing stands out more. i feel like the recordings do a good job (for better or worse) illustrating the semi-episodic nature of both nights: the good and bad seemed to come in chunks...so i suppose in a way having a recording is nice because i can skip the parts i don't necessarily feel like i need to hear again.
i hope they tour again next summer because i'll totally be there...
phish @ the gorge re-review (finally)
last weekend, i finally listened to the tapes of the phish gorge shows that i saw this summer, and since i never got around to doing an "official" review at the time, i thought i'd merge a review of the live experience and the recording re-listen. you know. for the hell of it. because i'm not buried under tons of writing for work. oh, wait. yes i am.
anyway, here goes.
night one started off with "down with disease", which was, a bit ironically, one of my least favorite phish songs. imagine my wry amusement when, after seeing phish walk out on stage live for the first time after waiting for 8 years and through a long hiatus, they start playing one of the few songs in their repertoire that i actively dislike. two minutes later, though, i was converted. it was that immediately that i knew that their "reunion" tour was less a gimmick and more a serious attempt to extend the band's legacy. the whole band was pitch-perfect throughout the song, and my first experience with the phish crowd jumping around and dancing joyously will now always be punctuated by trey's guitar riff during the song's first interlude. i remember being dimly aware that i bounced up and down that i was grinning like a giddy idiot already and that i had approximately 6 more hours of phish to go. clearly, i'm a bit biased towards this particular performance of this particular song, but on the recording, it also sounded great.
next up was "ocelot" and "pebbles and marbles". i'm pretty neutral when it comes to "ocelot". it was a solid performance, but whatever. "pebbles and marbles", on the other hand, is one of my favorite phish tunes, and it was the first of a few moments during the show that i was concerned that the boys might have bitten off more than they could chew by choosing such an ambitious setlist. it was great to hear the tune live, but it was a little rough, and on recording, without the crowd's ambiance and excitement, it's downright painful. the band had a lot of trouble with this one.
"possum", as usual, was energetic and a good, solid, simple jamming song to get things back on track, but then it was followed by "sleep". now, i have nothing against "sleep", it's a great, neat little song. but why play it for thousands of people at an amphitheatre? we had made it pretty clear we were there to rock, and yet we get a lead out of the blistering solo at the end of "possum" into "sleep"?
next was "destiny unbound", which i didn't really know (apparently this makes me not a real phish fan). not much to say about this one. "stash" was great, and included a pretty extended, unique jam. unfortunately, its main riff is so distinct that when the notes get flubbed a bit, it really sort of hurts the song for me (it's sort of like trey biffing the arpeggios at the beginning of "YEM"; it's just sort of naturally wince-evoking). yeah, so that happened. and on tape the band's sort-of struggling with parts of the song is even more obvious. fortunately, next up was "sneakin' sally > cavern", which was one of the highlights of the weekend for me. great vocal jam at the end of "sally", straight into the almost-pop of "cavern". live, at the end of the first set i was still absolutely pumped and ready to hear 10-15 more songs i'd never heard in person. on tape, i'm not remembering the show quite as fondly as i maybe once did. a few great moments, but also a few slip-ups at important points in important songs = pretty mediocre first phish set.
set two started with "moma dance > light > taste", a really great start that alleviated most of my discomfort over certain parts of the first set. "moma dance" was a great way to ease into the second set, getting the crowd grooving and letting the band stretch its jamming legs without taking on anything too orchestrated or convoluted. i love "light", especially when it gets the extended intro treatment like it got on this night, and "taste" is pretty much always great.
we had a few seconds to recover from this run of songs before "fluffhead", which is the one song i really wanted to hear and never expected to get to. the band ripped through this one wonderfully, and it's one of the major highlights for me to have on tape and to be able to listen to over and over again. "joy" was next. this was my first time hearing the song, and it's a cute, schmaltzy phish-pop song. not bad, not wonderful. just a good, solid song.
the closing run of the second set was a long "bathtub gin" and "harry hood", followed by a "slave to the traffic light" encore. by itself, this might not have been anything special, but following on the heels of a set that already featured "fluffhead" and extended takes on "moma" and "light", this basically meant a set two/encore run that added up to a handful of songs and about 2 hours of music. phish brought the jam during this part of the show, and hit all the right notes during the composed bits of "fluffhead", "harry", and "slave". neither of those last two have ever really been my favorite phish songs either, but i was converted, especially to "harry", on this particular night. the second set ending with the band climaxing their "harry" jam by belting out the "you can feel good! good! good about hood!" was a pretty epic, great-concert-memory moment.
the band's intensity and their artistry shows through a lot more on the second set recording than on the first, and at the very least i'll be playing the crap out of the back half of this show for a long time.
i'll do a review of the second night as a separate entry, so as not to prolong the typing madness.
anyway, here goes.
night one started off with "down with disease", which was, a bit ironically, one of my least favorite phish songs. imagine my wry amusement when, after seeing phish walk out on stage live for the first time after waiting for 8 years and through a long hiatus, they start playing one of the few songs in their repertoire that i actively dislike. two minutes later, though, i was converted. it was that immediately that i knew that their "reunion" tour was less a gimmick and more a serious attempt to extend the band's legacy. the whole band was pitch-perfect throughout the song, and my first experience with the phish crowd jumping around and dancing joyously will now always be punctuated by trey's guitar riff during the song's first interlude. i remember being dimly aware that i bounced up and down that i was grinning like a giddy idiot already and that i had approximately 6 more hours of phish to go. clearly, i'm a bit biased towards this particular performance of this particular song, but on the recording, it also sounded great.
next up was "ocelot" and "pebbles and marbles". i'm pretty neutral when it comes to "ocelot". it was a solid performance, but whatever. "pebbles and marbles", on the other hand, is one of my favorite phish tunes, and it was the first of a few moments during the show that i was concerned that the boys might have bitten off more than they could chew by choosing such an ambitious setlist. it was great to hear the tune live, but it was a little rough, and on recording, without the crowd's ambiance and excitement, it's downright painful. the band had a lot of trouble with this one.
"possum", as usual, was energetic and a good, solid, simple jamming song to get things back on track, but then it was followed by "sleep". now, i have nothing against "sleep", it's a great, neat little song. but why play it for thousands of people at an amphitheatre? we had made it pretty clear we were there to rock, and yet we get a lead out of the blistering solo at the end of "possum" into "sleep"?
next was "destiny unbound", which i didn't really know (apparently this makes me not a real phish fan). not much to say about this one. "stash" was great, and included a pretty extended, unique jam. unfortunately, its main riff is so distinct that when the notes get flubbed a bit, it really sort of hurts the song for me (it's sort of like trey biffing the arpeggios at the beginning of "YEM"; it's just sort of naturally wince-evoking). yeah, so that happened. and on tape the band's sort-of struggling with parts of the song is even more obvious. fortunately, next up was "sneakin' sally > cavern", which was one of the highlights of the weekend for me. great vocal jam at the end of "sally", straight into the almost-pop of "cavern". live, at the end of the first set i was still absolutely pumped and ready to hear 10-15 more songs i'd never heard in person. on tape, i'm not remembering the show quite as fondly as i maybe once did. a few great moments, but also a few slip-ups at important points in important songs = pretty mediocre first phish set.
set two started with "moma dance > light > taste", a really great start that alleviated most of my discomfort over certain parts of the first set. "moma dance" was a great way to ease into the second set, getting the crowd grooving and letting the band stretch its jamming legs without taking on anything too orchestrated or convoluted. i love "light", especially when it gets the extended intro treatment like it got on this night, and "taste" is pretty much always great.
we had a few seconds to recover from this run of songs before "fluffhead", which is the one song i really wanted to hear and never expected to get to. the band ripped through this one wonderfully, and it's one of the major highlights for me to have on tape and to be able to listen to over and over again. "joy" was next. this was my first time hearing the song, and it's a cute, schmaltzy phish-pop song. not bad, not wonderful. just a good, solid song.
the closing run of the second set was a long "bathtub gin" and "harry hood", followed by a "slave to the traffic light" encore. by itself, this might not have been anything special, but following on the heels of a set that already featured "fluffhead" and extended takes on "moma" and "light", this basically meant a set two/encore run that added up to a handful of songs and about 2 hours of music. phish brought the jam during this part of the show, and hit all the right notes during the composed bits of "fluffhead", "harry", and "slave". neither of those last two have ever really been my favorite phish songs either, but i was converted, especially to "harry", on this particular night. the second set ending with the band climaxing their "harry" jam by belting out the "you can feel good! good! good about hood!" was a pretty epic, great-concert-memory moment.
the band's intensity and their artistry shows through a lot more on the second set recording than on the first, and at the very least i'll be playing the crap out of the back half of this show for a long time.
i'll do a review of the second night as a separate entry, so as not to prolong the typing madness.
Feb 7, 2010
Feb 2, 2010
teaching and learning
so i'm teaching a sort-of lit class for the first time this semester. and it's been great so far. i got to choose the books, and as per the class requirements, they all had to be books published recently. so i picked a lot of books that i simultaneously thought were interesting to talk about based on their own literary merits and were interesting in a cultural context. now not only do i have a class where we can talk about characterization, plot, setting, ethos, believability, immersion, etc., but also race/class/gender/place AND technology, apocalypse, wilderness, conservation, zombies, home, and all that jazz. so. it's a pretty thematically dense discussion class. and it's so fucking fun my eyes want to pop out. of course, they also want to pop out because it's at 9am and i have to get here three days a week before 7am to get prepped for class (they have to submit questions online every morning and i have to be able to read them all and draw up a class plan around them before class starts that day).
anyway, i'm having a lot of fun, and the students in class who enjoy talking and discussing seem to be enjoying themselves. now that i'm over the initial shock of the joy of teaching something i'm actually directly invested in (teaching comp is fun, but it has nothing to do with what i care about directly, and requires that i have an entire "comp" section in my brain that i switch over to each monday, wednesday, and friday), i'm starting to get that nagging doubt in the back of my head that i get every time i remember that nothing in life is perfect. maybe this is just my latent comp pedagogy reflex taking over my brain, but my fear is that i'm not actually teaching these students anything.
granted, the only real goal of this class as it was explained to me was to talk about reading and talk about how it is relevant and important in today's society (BOOOOOOOM!). and i feel like i'm definitely doing that. i guess i'm so used to the lecture model, the skill-teaching model of a class that i feel like a failure just going in, talking about reading, and enjoying myself. it feels too easy. at times, when i'm being easier on myself, i feel like maybe the learning that's taking place in a class like this is really just less tangible that it might be in a comp class (and that's less than it might be in a science class, and so on). i mean, i'm running this class pretty similarly to some of the seminars i've taken in grad school, and i learned more from the discussions in those classes than i have at pretty much any other time in my life (at least in a school environment).
i certainly lecture from time to time briefly about certain character archetypes, or certain literary techniques, and those kinds of things. but these students are all experienced readers. they infer these things if you hint at them. they don't need to learn what the hero's quest is. they can see it, and talk about it, and understand its value and also the value in deviating if you're a writer. i also have lots of small checks built into the class to make sure they're keeping up on the reading and paying attention in class (and two big checks in the form of a midterm and a final). but it's just strange. i've never taught a class like this, and it's odd to have a class that puts most of its value in discussion rather than lecture and regurgitation/revision. it's odd to think that students will come out of this class having read 8 new books, and that's (largely) it. when teaching comp 101 (and even 201), we sort of have this idea impressed upon us that we're the gateway to our students' ability to write at a college level, which in turn is the gateway to the rest of their entire future success. of course, that's aggrandizing and a little ridiculous in some ways, but i guess what i'm getting at is that with the impression we're giving as budding comp teachers, it's easy to convince yourself that you're doing god's work if you have an off day. there's not a lot of room for crisis of purpose. that's not the case anymore.
that said, we're finishing up talking about Snow Crash tomorrow and we'll be moving on to neil gaiman's American Gods on friday. can't wait.
anyway, i'm having a lot of fun, and the students in class who enjoy talking and discussing seem to be enjoying themselves. now that i'm over the initial shock of the joy of teaching something i'm actually directly invested in (teaching comp is fun, but it has nothing to do with what i care about directly, and requires that i have an entire "comp" section in my brain that i switch over to each monday, wednesday, and friday), i'm starting to get that nagging doubt in the back of my head that i get every time i remember that nothing in life is perfect. maybe this is just my latent comp pedagogy reflex taking over my brain, but my fear is that i'm not actually teaching these students anything.
granted, the only real goal of this class as it was explained to me was to talk about reading and talk about how it is relevant and important in today's society (BOOOOOOOM!). and i feel like i'm definitely doing that. i guess i'm so used to the lecture model, the skill-teaching model of a class that i feel like a failure just going in, talking about reading, and enjoying myself. it feels too easy. at times, when i'm being easier on myself, i feel like maybe the learning that's taking place in a class like this is really just less tangible that it might be in a comp class (and that's less than it might be in a science class, and so on). i mean, i'm running this class pretty similarly to some of the seminars i've taken in grad school, and i learned more from the discussions in those classes than i have at pretty much any other time in my life (at least in a school environment).
i certainly lecture from time to time briefly about certain character archetypes, or certain literary techniques, and those kinds of things. but these students are all experienced readers. they infer these things if you hint at them. they don't need to learn what the hero's quest is. they can see it, and talk about it, and understand its value and also the value in deviating if you're a writer. i also have lots of small checks built into the class to make sure they're keeping up on the reading and paying attention in class (and two big checks in the form of a midterm and a final). but it's just strange. i've never taught a class like this, and it's odd to have a class that puts most of its value in discussion rather than lecture and regurgitation/revision. it's odd to think that students will come out of this class having read 8 new books, and that's (largely) it. when teaching comp 101 (and even 201), we sort of have this idea impressed upon us that we're the gateway to our students' ability to write at a college level, which in turn is the gateway to the rest of their entire future success. of course, that's aggrandizing and a little ridiculous in some ways, but i guess what i'm getting at is that with the impression we're giving as budding comp teachers, it's easy to convince yourself that you're doing god's work if you have an off day. there's not a lot of room for crisis of purpose. that's not the case anymore.
that said, we're finishing up talking about Snow Crash tomorrow and we'll be moving on to neil gaiman's American Gods on friday. can't wait.
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