Archive for 2009
« Older Entries | Newer Entries »There’s More To Frankie Goes To Hollywood Than Frankie & Hollywood
[ 2 Comments ]Posted on November 17, 2009 by admin in Music
Tuesday, November 17th, 2009Frankie Say: Okay, you can quit relaxing now, it’s time to come up with a new style kids.
  Frankie’s Greatest Hits. There weren’t many, but they left a mark, so to speak. |
Something happened in the 80′s. I’m not sure what, but it hasn’t happened much since then. As easy as it is to make fun of the hair, fashion, and music of the era, the simple fact is that pop music hasn’t changed much since then. I present as evidence Exhibit A, the 2009 25th anniversary remix of Frankie Goes To Hollywood’s Relax. 25 years later, the song is still marketable, and still gets heavy exposure in movies, ads, and clubs. The remix? They raised the tempo about 20 BPM, and electronified the bassline a bit. The casual listener might not notice the difference, except that it feels even less soulful than the original. Even the visuals look 80′s. If you were doing a 60′s tribute in the 80′s it would’ve been obvious from the fashion, but the fact is that frankly, clubbers look the same in 2009 as they did back then. One thing that I think made a big difference is that a lot of genres that popped up in the 80′s (and have been remixed and recombined repeatedly since then) were actually the calculated results of just a few British production teams, specifically Trevor Horn’s label ZTT Records, Factory Records, and 4AD. Almost every pop music trend since then can be traced directly to a band produced by these labels. Frankie Goes To Hollywood, for instance, was a rather hollow-sounding Liverpool club band that Trevor Horn elevated to epic and orchestral levels with an elaborate production method and provocative, politically-driven marketing. Their couple of hits launched an entire movement of gay pride, and a musical style to go with it. Watch this interview (also below) to see FGTH performing Relax prior to Trevor Horn. You’ll also get some background on the controversy about the song’s sexual content, which got them banned from the BBC. Which in turn allowed them to chart in the top 20 on the recording’s release date. They also briefly discuss the Reagan vs Chernenko wrestling match in the song Two Tribes. For those of you who don’t recall, it was a commonly held belief at the time that the nuclear apocalypse would be caused by one of these two doddering old eccentric leaders simply losing it one day. Little did we suspect we’d be watching an aging, Liberace-like Holly Johnson reliving it all 25 years later. Sometimes I wish my 80′s nihilism had been a little more effective 
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Buying A Touchscreen Tablet PC: Mac, Android Vega, Or CrunchPad?
[ Comments Off ]Posted on November 16, 2009 by admin in Technology
Monday, November 16th, 2009I’d love to own a Mac Tablet, but I’ll probably settle for any lightweight tablet PC that actually exists.
 One thing I’ve noticed about these tablet PC’s is that they all look better with Dissociated Press on the screen |
I don’t know why I’m so impatient. I mean, it was just a few thousand years ago that we were still picking bugs off of each other’s heads and grunting, but for some reason I expect the personal computer to be the size of a small legal pad, talk, accept voice commands, and have a holographic keyboard in the first thirty years of its evolution. But in my heart of hearts, I know that’s unreasonable, so I’ll settle for a decent tablet PC with a touch screen. And whine about it ’til I get one. Preferably a Mac, as I’ve said before, but recently I’ve considered lowering my standards. Especially after the last couple of weeks of hoopla about the mystery tablet that NVIDIA’s CEO used to taunt the tech press. In spite of a short-lived flurry of rumors that it had something to do with a Mac Tablet, it’s now pretty clear that it was an IDC Vega 15 inch tablet. And if it was, I’ll add this to the list of devices I’d consider buying, along with the the CrunchPad. I just want to get rid of my cellphone and laptop, and do it for less than a couple grand. Take your time, Apple. As much as I love you, personally I’ll probably settle for a tablet that actually exists in physical reality. Read the rest of this entry »
Making The Unreal Real
[ 2 Comments ]Posted on November 15, 2009 by admin in Popular Media
Sunday, November 15th, 2009What If Things Inside Your Computer Were Real?
I ran across a rather amusing real-world rendition of the Mac and Windows calculators yesterday (images below), which sent me on a little quest for similar items that explore the realm of “what if it were real”. Probably the most disturbing things I found were these realistic renderings of cartoon characters like Charlie Brown and Homer Simpson. Another artist has done the entire Simpsons family , and apparently there’s an actual Simpsons house in Las Vegas. But back to the idea of making things in your computer real, French artist Guillaume Reymond has created a series of vintage video games rendered with pixels as people for his GameOver project, including classics like Space Invaders (YouTube clip). This concept was put to more exploitive use on Italian TV (we’ve warned you about Italian TV before) with Human Tetris With Bikini Chicks. On a slightly more clever note, you may have already seen Internet Party and Internet Party II: An Intervention for MySpace, in which real actors play popular web sites at a cocktail party. Maybe we should start a Facbook group demanding an updated Facebook/Twitter version. And more recently, CollegeHumor.com created the Sims Horror Movie Trailer, presenting a frightening world in which real life people all turn out to be Sims characters, living entirely at the mercy of their game-playing masters. Know of any other realistic renditions of unreal things? Read the rest of this entry »
How To Talk Like A Hillbilly
[ 11 Comments ]Posted on November 14, 2009 by admin in Lifestyle & Culture
Saturday, November 14th, 2009Well baste my boobs and call me a turkey! I had more fun than a tornado in a trailer park startin’ this list. Help me out.
It may be because of the fact that – hereditarily – I’m probably within spittin’ distance of Appalachia, but I have a fondness that borders on obsession for odd expressions that old geezer friends of mine use. They usually have a sort of southern flavor, sometimes a little hillbilly, sometimes a little redneck, sometimes a little white trash. We’ve talked about regionalisms like Leafpeeping Massholes and general misuse of English before, but I’m trying to assemble and categorize as many of these redneck and hillbilly sayings as I can. As you might imagine, the people most familiar with their usage are the least likely to have a computer and broadband. I worry that we’re rapidly losing some of the most colorful expressions in American English. Here are some highlights from what I’ve collected. I’d love to hear any that you may have heard from your uncle Cletus. Read the rest of this entry »
Stunning Building-Sized 3D Projections
[ Comments Off ]Posted on November 13, 2009 by admin in Popular Media
Friday, November 13th, 2009Dutch company Nuformer Digital Media generates some buzz with their mind-blowing building-sized 3D projections.
For a longer version of this demo, see the clip below |
As something of a stimulation junky myself, I find it amusing that our actual reality, with its 3D visuals, surround sound, and full-function tactile and olfactory responses is simply not enough. We’re always trying to recreate that special 3D experience, and – usually – falling a bit short somehow. In spite of the fact that the film industry is making us slap the 3D glasses back on so they can charge us more money, and that free standing holograms made our Top 10 Disappointing Technologies list, some interesting headway is being made elsewhere. You may have seen the Puma Lift ad that uses 3D projection mapping to make it appear as if a dancing couple is being constantly transported to different landscapes and changing outfits magically. Well, Dutch company Nuformer Digital Media has taken this idea to an impressive new level with their ProjectionOnBuildings work (clip featured at left, more below). They don’t say anything on their site about how it works; they’re mostly trying to sell it to high-budget advertisers. But if you’re interested, here’s the math, as they say. The results are stunning. The last seemingly innovative projection technology to get some decent press kind of “mist the point”; as impressive as I02 Technology’s “Mid-Air Touchscreen Display” seemed to be (see a clip here), it required a fine mist in the air. Something that’s not really gonna fly in most boardrooms, no matter how impressive the results. Read the rest of this entry »