Music and "Relevance"

Okay, so I've been trying to hammer this post out for a while now, so here goes.

I have noticed something when it comes to talking about music. Especially people who write articles about music for various publications. It is the word relevance.

Relevance: having significant and demonstrable bearing on facts or issues. Synonyms: applicable, germane, apposite, appropriate, suitable, fitting (from dictionary.com, as my physical dictionary is currently AWOL).

I keep seeing this word pop up in musical articles and I have always wondered about this particular choice of wording. For some reason the phrasing of such statements always put me off, and not just because it usually implied that the newest flash in the pan was more "relevant" than older, well-established acts, or not in a comparison but still implying that said older, well-established acts were not "relevant". Up until now I've just sort of taken this position on the whole thing.

Then I read this article talking about the Superbowl Halftime show from this year, where the Black Eyed Peas were the headlining act. This was the line that started this whole thing:

"Sure, the band's music is aimed at "mindless partying," and Fergie's glittery top was "absurd and somewhat laughable," but the Peas had more relevance than previous baby boomer acts..."

My reaction to this was as follows:

What? The show put on by the Black Eyed Peas was panned almost across the board as underwhelming, stale, inane, and just more of the same with nothing new and interesting added to the act (TRON costumes notwithstanding) to their regular show repertoire.

Why? Why are the Black Eyed Peas more "relevant" than past performers? Let's look at the halftime shows for the five years previous to this one.

2010: The Who

2009: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band

2008: Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
2007: Prince, Florida A&M Marching Band
2006: The Rolling Stones
2005: Paul McCartney

2004 was of course the famous "Nipplegate" show with Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake. Now then, all of these previous five shows were performed by famous and well-established acts, and that's putting it mildly (I mean really, The Who, The Stones, and a Beatle?). These are big names, that have not only had hugely successful careers of their own, but have influenced countless acts that have followed. And it isn't as if the songs by these artists aren't well known. Anyone who watches CSI knows at least as many songs by the Who as incarnations of the show that they watch, for example. Either way, these are some of rock's biggest acts. Ever. That is not an exaggeration.

And, how do you qualify this? What really bothers me about these statements about how "relevant" a band/artist is is that there is never any kind of qualifier for this. These statements are made without ANY context at all. What is the criteria for determining the "relevance" of a musical act? The number of hit songs? If so, according to what charts; Top 40? I-Tunes? Billboard? Something else? Does relevance have to do with how popular an act is at that specific moment in time? And again, how is that measured? Is it how fast a concert sells out? Because in the past two years or so both Metallica and AC/DC stopped in our area and the tickets sold out in 10 and 30 minutes respectively. Did I mention that the 30 minutes to sell out AC/DC was because the played the football stadium instead of the arena, and so had almost three times as many seats?

Anyways, what it really comes down to is this; what is the basis for the statement of one artist/band being more "relevant" than another? Can you back this up somehow? As someone who's chosen field of study deals a lot with context and where citing and having sources for one's information is very important, I cannot stand having someone throw out something like this with nothing behind it. So please, tell me why The Black Eyed Peas, or Ke$ha, or Justin Bieber are more relevant than bands like The Beatles, Judas Priest, or Black Sabbath. Tell me why you refer to an act with a career longer than the lives of these "relevant" acts, in this way? Explain your reasoning behind the idea that a band or artist who has been an inspiration to countless others is not relevant. Is Judas Priest less relevant because they were one of Pantera's influences? Or Metallica because of bands like Trivium? On the pop side, Lady Gaga lifts tons of stuff from Queen, Madonna, and David Bowie. I argue that they will ALWAYS be relevant for the two reasons I have stated; for the accomplishments of their own careers, and for the inspiration they provide to younger acts. They are well within the definition of relevance; as having significant and demonstrable bearing on facts or issues. The acts of today would not be what they are without those that came before them. Therefore you cannot classify an a band or an artist as nonrelevant*, except in the context of specific genres or in talking about a specific artist (Beyonce was probably not influenced by Ozzy Osbourne, for instance). But that is the key, there MUST be context.

I apologize that this has become a big wall o' text post, but I have found myself greatly irritated by this, and not just because they are usually referring to bands I like compared to ones I don't. No, I don't like the Black Eyed Peas, or Ke$ha, or Taylor Swift, or Justin Bieber. But other people do, and that's awesome that they found artists that they like. Just like not everyone is going to like Def Leppard, Disturbed, Judas Priest, and Rammstein because I like them. That is totally cool, it's individual taste. What does irritate me is when artists are labeled as nonrelevant by journalists simply because they aren't on the Top 40, or the latest tween/teen craze. Just because an artist doesn't factor into your little bubble of oh-so-knowledgable pop-scene journalistic sense, doesn't mean they aren't relevant to someone else, or to a whole other genre you haven't considered. I say pop-scene because this is where I most frequently see this type of thing. Then again, these are the people that at one time, Vanilla Ice was relevant, and Rick Astley (twice!).

I must now bring this rant to a close, or I'll lose my cool it will be a big, never-ending mess. If you've made it all the way through, then congratulations and thank you for slogging through with me. I hope that I've made myself clear in my argument, but feel free to leave a comment here if I haven't, or if you have thoughts on the subject. I will leave you all with a song about the awesomeness of music (despite how crappy the rest of the world might be) from an awesome artist. Yes, it's a pop song (shock! I know!), from the one pop artist I love. Enjoy all and we'll see you next time!







*I know I should use "irrelevant", but it doesn't fit as well. Sue me.
Regarding the date on this post, the date reflects when I started writing this. It was actually posted March 6th at 1:47 am.

Demo Reviews: Dragon Age II

After an extra week of waiting I finally got to dig into this demo on Tuesday. Since then, I have played it twice and the Cynic has played it once. Now that it's had time to sink in, let's have a look. As usual, spoilers ahead.
Dragon Age II takes place during and after the events of the first game. You play as Hawke, either male or female, on your quest to become the Champion of Kirkwall, and whatever that entails. As with the first game, you have a slew of companions, some of them romance options, that accompany you on your travels. The difference here is that one of these companions, depending on your class, will be a sibling. You will either have a Carver, a warrior, or Bethany, a mage.


Family!



You are introduced to three other possible companions at this time. First you will meet Varric, a dwarf who also serves as the narrator. He's a rogue that carries a crossbow.

And chesthair.

Next is Aveline, a sword-and-shield tank warrior, who already has a reserve spot in my party, especially after the demo.

Lady Tank FTW!

And finally, some of you might remember Isabela from the first game. Yes, the one with whom you can have a three-or-foursome with that will teach you the Duelist spec. Well, she's back with a spankin' new revamped look for Dragon Age II.

Holy massive boobage, Batman!

I won't get into too many spoilers here, but there are two other returning characters that I'm really excited about. The first is Flemeth, once again magnificently voiced by Kate Mulgrew. She also has a vastly new look from the eccentric old-Wilds woman bit she pulled on our Wardens.

New Flemeth look, but still the same awesome character.

The other is everyone's favorite mage from Awakening (and I'm certainly not talking about Velanna): Anders! I won't get spoilery, but suffice to say, Anders has changed. And I'm so psyched for his story.

Oh, and ladies, this time he's romancable!

Anyways, onto the game itself. I played through twice, as a warrior and a mage (both female). The Cynic played through as a male rogue.

Although why you would when default Lady Hawke is this pretty is beyond me.

The rogue class doesn't really appeal to me, but the Cynic was having fun with it. It's a very acrobatic class, but at least on the demo, the DPS is quite low overall. This is for a very low-level dual wield build, however, and later talents may boost that. My first choice was warrior class, as that is my preference. It's about the same as Origins, only minus the dual-wield talent. The faster and more reactive combat definitely gives this class more flair, and I had a lot of fun with it. Mage is very fun. The same talents are available, now divided into talent trees, but the mage seems more melee now than before. You can actually hit enemies with your staff when they get too close. It's nice to actually have that recourse. The casting of the regular staff bolts is much faster as well, as is casting and cool-down times of other spells. The mage is definitely formidable, and I can't wait to see some of the high-level talents like Blizzard and Chain Lightning out to try. I did get a chance to use Crushing Prison during the demo, and it was gleeful.

As everyone knows, the graphics have been updated for this installment as well. Personally, I like the look. It still looks like Dragon Age, but nicer, if not... pointier. Things are spikier, especially armor. Although some familiar things will be there, although updated; such as the Templar Armor, which seems a little more toned-down this time around. The regular mage robes look nicer, and default Hawke (who you can see in the top pic) is actually wearing mage armor. How is that not exciting? The demo ran smoothly for us, both cinematics and in-game without a problem, and the facial renders during conversations looked very nice.

Onto the gameplay. A lot of things were locked in the demo, like the inventory, the character creator, and such, but it was nice to see that those things were still there. The radial menu was more or less the same, but the map has been separated from the rest of the menu. Not a huge deal, but something to be aware of. The dialogue wheel, which I was against at first after having some surprising responses in Mass Effect, is very well executed. The icons that accompany the responses make things much easier (although it seems to follow the Mass Effect pattern of: Top answer-nice/Paragon, center-sarcastic/ME-neutral, bottom-dickbag/Renegade). But there were no other options such as flirt, so we will have to see when all of that is available as well.

The combat. This was a big thing, the change to the combat. And you know what? I like it. No more shuffling around enemies and allies to get to your target. No more waiting for the character to get in position to use a talent. It's faster, it's fluid, it feels better. You can still play tactics and give orders if you want, or you can hack-n-slash. You can also still switch between party members the same way. There will also be the option for auto-attack in the full game, for anyone who wants it. I greatly enjoyed it, and I'm happy that this was implemented.

The voice acting. Now, this is BioWare, so of course it's going to be good. Your character is now voiced, and I like both the male and female Hawke voices. However, if you wanted a Commander Shepard-type voice for your Lady Hawke, I'm afraid you might be disappointed. Lady Hawke's voice is much more feminine, and it's a nice change, as you wouldn't want your characters to sound too similar to one another (despite the fact I adore FemShep's voice <3). From what I can see, you shouldn't be disappointed by the voice acting.

Did I have any complaints. Maybe just one. The text. I know that console games (yessir, I'm one of those evil, mouth-breathing cretins known as a console player lol) are taking into account the widescreen and high-definition and all that stuff that comes with today's TVs. It just sucks that it results in text been very small on my giant, old tube TV (how archaic!). Although it's not too bad for the most part, and not as bad as Two Worlds II, where part of my screen was actually cut off (thankfully it could be adjusted) because of the aspect ratio setting.

Final thoughts? Well, I only have to make it to next Tuesday before I get my grubby little meathooks on the full game. Until then, PLAY THIS DEMO. I definitely recommend it, and not just because I'm a fangirl. It really is a lot of fun. The world created in these games is an amazing one, and you would not do wrong to give it a try. I give it 4 1/2 hurlocks out of 5.

A Potential PanterA Reunion Tour & The Obstacles To Overcome

If you are reading this, I assume you are familiar with PanterA and what they meant to heavy metal and the community within. I'm also going to assume that you are well aware of the drama and infighting that eventually dissolved PanterA and the tragic events of Dec. 8, 2004 that seemed to destroy any possible hope of a PanterA reunion. Yet that hasn't deterred the Facebook community any and there is a cause you can join and donate to to get the surviving members of PanterA with a stand-in guitarist to do a reunion tour to keep the PanterA community happy. When the local radio station first announced this, my gears immediately started whirring and contemplating the concept of my favorite band, albeit with a different guitarist, hitting the road for the first time in 10 years. I'm not entirely sure the person who started this cause, nor the people who have joined it, knows exactly how lenghty of a fight is ahead of them. There are many blocks in the road that make up a colossal beast of improbability that one needs to take into consideration, such as:

Who Stands In For "Dimebag" Darrell Abbott?

Sure, one can learn songs written and performed by a guitarist, but can you truly replicate one's style? This is quite possibly the biggest complaint that people have with the idea of a PanterA reunion, co-founding member and drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott included. PanterA is remembered most notably for the guitar work from Dime even before his death, and much like Hulk Hogan to wrestling, there'll never be another guitarist like Dime, so this presents any guitarist with the task of taking his place (even temporarily) with almost impossibly large shoes to fill, even with the two likely candidates Zakk Wylde of Black Label Society or Slayer's Kerry King. Both are great guitarists in their own right and were good friends with Dime, but they also have styles that don't replicate Dime's sound enough to do it justice. If you're going to have a PanterA reunion tour, shouldn't it sound like PanterA and not three of the original members ft. a guest guitarist trying to sound like PanterA?

Will Phil Anselmo's Old Habits Stay Buried?

The parties thrown by PanterA were the stuff of legend, but unfortunately, so were the personal habits of frontman Phil Anselmo. The drinking, the drug trips, OD'ing on heroin which left him dead for four to five minutes, Phil was truly living the life of a rock star with the amount of contraband around him, but he wasn't just doing this because he was on top of the world but because of his back pain and couldn't afford to take time off touring for the surgery. He admitted in the VH1 Behind The Music episode on PanterA that this was about as effective as "putting a band-aid on cancer" and from reading interviews from him as well as record executives who have spoken to him in recent years, Phil Anselmo has cleaned up his act from the hellion he was back in the PanterA days. However, one cannot help but wonder if a reunion tour were to happen if the old temptation of reliving the glory days offstage would arise in Phil and the hard drugs would begin flowing through his veins again. The effects of the drugs and alcohol Phil abused were seen onstage in PanterA's later years as well as in Phil's side projects before he cleaned up, and it would be heartbreaking to see him fall apart like that again.

Can Everyone Maintain A Professional Relationship Throughout The Tour?

Ever since PanterA crumbled, most of the press interviews and news stories were, as bassist Rex Brown so eloquently put it, "A bunch of 'he said she said' nonsense." Dime and Vinnie would give their side of the story as to why things with PanterA weren't working out and then Phil would come around and say something that didn't match Dime & Vinnie's story. Sadly, this continues to this day as Phil Anselmo offers Vinnie Paul a chance to come back into his life but Vinnie is not interested, sticking to his guns that if they had been able to work out their differences back in the day, PanterA would still be around and Darrell Abbott would still be alive (in my stubborn nature, I'd probably be doing the same thing if I were in a similar situation). Let's say for argument's sake that Vinnie and Phil call a truce so that the fans can see some incarnation of PanterA one last time, could they truly maintain that peace for the duration of a world tour? Furthermore, what if the stand-in guitarist has some sort of beef with either Phil or Vinnie because of this media war of words? This reunion tour would require more counseling than when Metallica recorded St. Anger.

What About Naysayer Fans?

Regardless of what you do and where, there's always going to be the group of people that will stand up and proclaim, "This is a REALLY bad idea!" From the research I conducted for this blog, it seems that for every person who is all for a PanterA reunion tour, there is at least one person who thinks that for one reason or another it's a horrible idea. I've read reasons that range from "Phil's a tool," "Zakk Wylde is overrated," to "Vinnie's a sellout and would only do this for money," or "PanterA died when Dime did." If someone is starting a cause for a PanterA reunion on Facebook, perhaps someone in charge of putting a tour like this together should put it to a vote on various social networking sites and let the fans decide whether or not PanterA should attempt to reunite, this way anyone who is against the idea has a chance to plea their case against it and it would be a fair decision in the end because each side has had their input and it would just be up to the numbers to decide.

Now, like I mentioned earlier in this blog, I LOVE PanterA and I am not writing this blog to try and persuade anyone's thoughts on it. I included the link at the beginning of the article if you wish to support this cause and if you do, great. For the sake of anyone who does support the cause, I hope something comes out of this because it would just go to show you (again) how powerful a tool Facebook can be. Me? I want to support this cause, but I think there's too many variables involved that makes the idea of a PanterA reunion more trouble than its worth. It's not like their legacy has weakened where it matters. As long as fans wear the shirts, sport the tatts and crank the tunes, PanterA's spirit lives and will continue to do so for years to come. Why spoil that with a reunion that could turn really ugly really quick?

However, if this tour does happen and is well received, I will record and post a video apology to all parties involved on my YouTube account.

-The Cynic

Just a Quick Note

As you may or may not know, the Dragon Age II Demo was out Tuesday. Unfortunately, given our current non-Gold status, I can't play it until next week. So sadly, the Demo Review has been pushed back until then. However, I will have it done as soon as I can once I have played through at least once. If you desperately need a look RIGHT NOW then head over to Blistered Thumbs where Angry Joe has a Let's Play up for the demo. I haven't watched it myself yet as I want to play the demo first, but I find his reviews to be very fair and would recommend you check it out.
I will likely do a review for the game itself, since I have been so stoked and hyped this game up a lot. Expect that in March sometime.
Cheers all.

Demo Reviews: Bulletstorm

First off, sorry this has taken so long. Things got really busy after putting up my last video. So, let's jump right into Bulletstorm.



Now we actually downloaded this demo a couple of weeks ago now, so it's had plenty of time to sink in and for me to play through a few times (and for the Cynic to as well, of course). So what did I think of it? Two words: RIDICULOUS FUN.

Now Bulletstorm would just be an average, run-of-the-mill, and likely forgettable sci-fi FPS, if not for the implementation of skillshots. This basically rewards you with tons of extra points for being creative with your kills (not to mention personal satisfaction and amusement!) , with tongue-in cheek-names such as voodoo doll, shocker, flyswatter, one hit wonder, and many more. These skillshots utilize not only your weapons, which all but the energy leash have various secondary fire modes, but also the environment of the planet Stygia. The demo itself takes place
in a toppled skyscraper hotel that is crawling with mutants and marauders alike. It's not an overly long demo, in fact, it's quite short (especially if you want the time bonuses), but it emphasizes replay to discover more creative kills and thus more points.

What else did I like about this? The cast, from what we saw of it at least. The moment the player character, voiced by Steve Blum, starts narrating the first part of the demo, I realized this was going to be a hell of a lot of fun. He voices your character (a pirate named Grayson Hunt) almost as a cross between Wolverine and Oghren from Dragon Age. And you can just tell he is having a lot of fun with it, which is really cool.

Sounds like a good combo to me :D


Joining Grayson is a cyborg named Ishi Sato, who gets about one line, so I can't tell you much about him. Last, but certainly not least is Trishka Novak, voiced by Jennifer Hale, who, from what we hear, sounds something like this:

FemShep + Ophelia = Win in my books (interestingly enough, my first Shep looked almost exactly like this one :D).

Of course, as with many games, certain types of people are getting their panties in a twist about the violent nature of the game, especially the names of some of the skillshots. I'm not going to get into that here or this will turn into a massive rant against certain types of people, for which this review is not the place. I'll just direct you to this video, courtesy of Blistered Thumbs and The Game Heroes, as they sum it up quite nicely. *Goes off to grumble about people bitching about my M-rated games*

So what are my final thoughts? Download this bad boy and try it! Now! It is a ridiculous amount of fun, if not a little short. You will want to replay it just to see what new combos and kills you can come up with. It is well worth your time. The game itself comes out next Tuesday (Feb. 22), and I will most likely at least give this one a rent. Maybe I can squeeze it in between the Dragon Age 2 Demo and release. Anyhow, definitely give this one a look if you are looking for a great way to have some fun and discover some really sweet and creative methods of dispatching your enemies.

Final score: 4.5 headshots out of 5

**Oh, and if you're interested, check out my other blog: Dungeons& Diapers. It will be the new home of PMS Cooks!, as well as other non-CWTC stuff, although everything posted here will be cross-posted there. **

Jurassic Park: The Devils In The Desert #2 Review

Yup, it's time again to look at IDW's latest arc in the Jurassic Park franchise, The Devils In The Desert. Now, assuming you read my review of the first issue, you know that this series has taken an interesting and ballsy move in their choice of "villain." In regards to the JP series, I try not to use that term very often (if it all) because usually the island's inhabitants are labeled with said term, but the fact is that the dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures created by InGen are just animals doing what they do in order to survive and not making things difficult for the humans in order to take over the world. However, Devils In The Desert #2 brings up an interesting point that had been mentioned but somewhat brushed aside in Jurassic Park III: the creatures are not actually dinosaurs or Pteranodons but rather genetic replicas of them with imperfections throughout...which of course is a nice way of saying, "Genetically engineered theme park monsters." With that said, SPOILER ALERT.

The comic opens with a trucker almost running over one of the hikers from the end of the first issue and then taking her to a hospital. While Sheriff Tobias and his party come to the conclusion that the Pteranodons did in fact come from Site B, Tyler Franklin runs off to find his father (who was found dead in the first issue) and he & his horse are attacked by the Pteranodons. As the Pteras rip Buttercup apart, Tyler falls into a crevice and twists his ankle. Agent Harding gets a call from one of his colleagues saying that the survivor of the hiking crew said she was attacked at Morton Ridge so the group heads over and while on his way, Tobias gets somewhat lectured by Liz the secretary about how he let Sara, Tyler's mother, get away all those years ago but Tobias tells her to mind her own business. When they get there, Harding hands out some guns stowed in the back of his humvee but they do agree with Monica, one of the scientists from the university, that they should try and take some of the Pteranodons alive. However, when the Pteras attack and cause their truck to flip over down the side of the hill, that idea gets abandoned and Agent Harding begins blowing holes into them. They rescue Tyler from the crevice (I swear, Tyler is eying Monica's ass in this panel) and the last wound Ptera lunges at Harding's leg, injuring him before he blasts its head apart. Monica investigates the top of the ridge and finds that their problems are just starting...

Honestly, there isn't a whole lot to say about issue #2 of this series that wouldn't sound like a rehash of my feelings on issue #1. The artwork looks just as good this time around as it did with the first issue and the writing is well done...mostly. My only gripe this time around seems to be with how Liz and even Sara's parents are nudging Will's shoulder going, "Hey, hey, she's single, hey, hey, you should get on that, hey, hey." There are fucking Pteranodons killing livestock and people alike, not to mention the woman just lost her fucking husband and the father of her son, even if he was something of a douche. This is not the time nor the place. I'm glad Will is focusing on the task at hand instead of humming and hawing over hooking up with his now back-on-the-market-due-to-unforeseen-and-tragic-circumstances-former-high-school-sweetheart. Looking forward to issue #3, which should hopefully ship at the same time as this.

Also, expect a new video sometime within the next week or so.

-The Cynic

New Feature! P.M.S Cooks!

Hey guys, just plotting some new content for all of you instead of working on my latest review (which will actually be a new video! yay!).

Now something I've noticed with my Facebook posts is how often I talk about cooking. I love to cook and bake. So, a new feature I am thinking of implementing is recipe reviews, as well as posts of my own various culinary exploits, using the Cynic and myself as guinea pigs lol. This posts will probably not be as frequent as other features here, but might be something different and interesting every now and again.

So for our first feature let's have a look at some homemade pizza. Well, more or less homemade, I started with a Kraft Pizza Kit and went from there. We used to get them sometimes when I was a kid and I've always liked them. So once the dough was on the pan, sauce was added and then the spice packet. After this I added sprinkled on two cloves' worth of garlic, which had been put through a press, and some spinach (which I didn't measure, just cut up enough for our tastes). Parmesan cheese was then sprinkled on, and it looked like this at this point.



Pepperoni came next. Now I had acquired a 1 kg pepperoni and that was WAY more than enough for the two pizzas. In fact, I got about 2 1/2 layers on each, as I wanted to use it all. I think the picture will explain better than I can just how much pepperoni was on these pizzas.



Finally the whole works was cheesed over with mozzarella. I used a whole block for both, but it was one of the smaller, thinner blocks and that was enough.



With my messy table and Def Leppard on the DVD player lol.

I'd say these were about ten minutes or just over in the oven at 400F. Then again, my oven tends to run hot, especially when cooking pizza. Here they are all done and ready to eat. And it was delicious. :D





So, what do you guys think? As I said, these will be sporadic compared to something like the Demo Reviews, but would be something different (as there really haven't been a lot of new demos lately, most of them are games that are already out). Let me know if you like or dislike.

Oh, and one last thing. I just want to share with you the super-aweome, holy shit, jump-up-and-down-squeeing birthday present that I got from the Cynic. Behold!



This is probably my favorite show EVAR, and to have BOTH seasons on DVD is pants-shittingly awesome. And I have already dug into it, and it is so much fun. :D

Well kids, that's all for me this time, I will see about a new demo review soon. Unless something new comes out very soon, though, it will be a game that has already been released. But, we shall see!