MUSIC: Black Gives Way to Blue (Alice in Chains)

A few days ago I picked up AIC new album. It’s the first one in since 1995 and the death of the original singer Layne Staley. Now they’re back with new singer, William DuVall, and a similar yet fresh sound. At first most were skeptical of DuVall’s ability (even I had my doubts) but after hearing this album it’s safe to say that AIC’s future is looking very bright.

Although I’ve never really gotten into AIC before and only really listened to more mainstream stuff like “Man in a Box”, “No Excuses”, and “Heaven Beside You”. However I always loved their sound. Like many other bands I enjoy I know when I’m listening to a Chains song. Staley and Starr’s harmonized sound always was a staple in the industry and in musical history. So the first thing the new AIC wanted to focus on was keeping a sound that fans recognized but could still say was different and was great. With DuVall they have greatly accomplished this. The harmonized sections still sound like old Chains however when DuVall is solo you can tell it’s someone else but still a powerful singer who fills the shoes given to him.

Musically, in my opinion AIC hasn’t changed much, which is perfect. Their style of playing with a mix of heavy riffs and acoustic backup always gave them a unique sound. This album is no different. Songs such as “Your Decision” and “Black Gives Way to Blue” just sound amazing. Although in the total of the album I admit that my favorite song still is “Check My Brain”. With it’s heavy riffs and classic harmonizing, the song just comes out and says “we’re new, but we’re still the same guys you fell in love with back then”. I agree.

Lyrically the album is also very accomplished. All songs were thoroughly thought through and written and executed beautifully.


Although AIC has been out of the game for a while, they never lost it. In fact now it seems like they’re riding even higher then before. This album is a definite buy for any rock lover whether it be grunge, metal, or what be you.

+Same sound, but still fresh
+Great Lyrics
+Great Muscianship

We're Back!

Heeeey everyone! Much apologies!
I'm pretty sure you all gave up on me right? We'll no more! I'm back with a fire! I still don't really care who reads this or if anyone reads this. For a while now I've been meaning to do an anime special. So here it is. Here is the planned schedule for the next few posts:

-Cowboy Bebop
-Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
-Baccano
-Black Lagoon
-Elfen Lied
-Fullmetal Alchemist (both the original and a special preview review of Brotherhood!)
-FLCL
-Eden of the East
-K-On!
-Kenko Zenrakei Suieibu Umisho
-Lucky Star
-Negima!
-Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu
-Onegai Teacher
-Ouran Highschool Host Club
-Rosario + Vampire
-Soul Eater
-The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
-Trigun

Now these won't be in this specific order but Bebop should be soon.
Also I plan on making a special on Music soon. I still need to pick up some new albums. Here's the posting plan:

-Dethklok: Dethalbum 2
-Pearl Jam: Backspacer
-Alice in Chains: Black Gives Way to Blue
-Spinal Tap: Back from the Dead
-Matisyahu: Light

As for movies...Havn't had much chance to catch anything new. Although "Where the Wild Things Are" might be up if I can get some time this weekend.

As for games, I could do a Halo 3: ODST but its already been out for a while so probably not. Although I do plan on picking up Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 so look for that!

Well that's all for now. It's been a while but I'm back now and I'll do my best to make you guys know the truth.

LOVE AND PEACE!
-WK2029

By the way if anyone's interested in knowing about anime you can start around myanimelist.com or animenewsnetwork.com. I'm on M.A.L. so look me up!

MOVIE: Valkyrie

Again sorry for the delay. School just started so I had to get things back together before writing this but here goes.

 

Valkyrie is a film starring Tom Cruise as a German Millitary Officer in the WWII era who is fed up with Hitler’s way of fighting the war and plots along with other officers to assassinate Hitler and take over the country. The most interesting point of the movie is the truth behind the story. I myself had already heard of this story and was curious to see how Hollywood would retell it. In my opinon, they did great. Not wonderful as it could be but still pretty good in terms of detail and acting.

 

This movie is interesting. It’s the kind of movie that even though we know the outcome, we still cheer on the characters in a futile fight. That is what I believe determines the quality of the movie. The movie over all had only one major problem in my view (even though it’s not that big of a deal) which is that many of the characters did not have convincing accents or German qualities. The worst of it all, Tom Cruise. Cruise is a great actor but he was not right for the role. His very soul screams AMERICAN rather then German. This is about a furious soldier and NATIVE not a spy from the other side planting seeds of rebellion.

 

However in total this did not take away from much of the action. All though I will give kudos to the man who played Hitler, it was accurate to the point of being creepy.

 

All in all I would recommend seeing this movie in theatres. It is a great way to remind ourselves of the past and deems itself worthy of a stamp of approval from the history channel. Cruise still does a great job of showing German pride as well as showing another side of Nazi Germany that were people who were fed up with their government and decided it was time for CHANGE.

 

Valkyrie

+Great historical accuracy

+ Good acting

+A lot of time and review spent on production

-Cruise not best for role

 

GRADE (Out of 10): 9.2

 

“Hey you, Whitehouse, ha ha charade you are. You house proud town mouse, Ha ha charade you are, you're trying to keep our feelings off the street. You're nearly a real treat, all tight lips and cold feet and do you feel abused?”

 

-WK2029

MUSIC: Death Magnetic by Metallica

Ok this review is a little overdue but I still decided to do it because of its importance.

 

Death Magnetic is Metallica’s newest album released this past September. I am not the biggest Metallica fan but I still have a great amount of respect for them and will go see them in concert in a heartbeat if they just came to an area around here (they’re not visiting NC or SC!!).

 

First let me cover the tracks. My favorite of all the tracks by far is “The Day that Never Comes”. The track reminds me a lot of “One” which is one of my top 3 Metallica songs of all time and sounds incredibly well made. The song goes into a laid back verse with James singing about (what I believe to be) an abusive relationship (“born to push you around, better just stay down, you pull away, he hits the flesh, you hit the ground”). The song does an amazing job of encompassing all of which made the band famous. From “Nothing else matters” to “Master of puppets” its all in here in its own way. The song has an amazing opening as well as solos. Its clearly evident that both Kirk and James have not lost their talent at all.

 

As for the rest of the album there is no single song that I had problems with. At most the song which I did not enjoy the most would probably be “Suicide and Redemption”. This track is all instrumental and although impressive in technical sense, it grows to be bit repetitive after listening through all of it. Still I believe that at best it was a great track that could have been shortened at most.

 

Other tracks like “The Unforgiven III” also show how seriously musical Metallica has become with the addition of an orchestra for part of the song. It makes me happy to see great bands like these guys incorporate other musical senses into their work (and make it work).

 

Beyond that, the album is an incredible feat. From recording to listening, no problem was overlooked. The album also sounds incredibly amazing. Also kudos to the new bassist, he sounds amazing and fits great with the rest of the band.

 

Ever since St. Anger I was worried that Metallica might have lost it. But thanks to their dedication to fans and the help of producer Rick Rubin, this album turned out to be in competition with Master of Puppets and Justice for All in my book. I recommend that everyone who moderately likes Metallica and above go out and buy this album (but don’t start with it, always start your collection with Master of Puppets to know where they came from). This is one of the best albums I’ve heard in a long time and I know it will constantly be in my playlists and most played songs list

 

Death Magnetic by Metallica

+Amazing sound

+Sounds like true Metallica

+Great tracks

GRADE (Out of 10): 9.8

"Mother do think she's good enough for me. Mother do think she's dangerous to me. Mother will she tear your little boy apart"

-WK2029

Break

Hey everyone. I will be on a break for a while because of Thanksgiving and Finals but I'll try to get back ASAP. Plan to have Fallout 3 (Game) review next along with Transporter 3 (Movie), Death Magnetic (Music), Black Ice (Music),  Chinese Democracy (Music), and Fabe 2 (Game).

Thanks for listening!!!

-WK2029

Facebook group is up!

Hey everyone! I just finally managed to make a facebook group so come join it if you can! It will usually have updates for whenever I make a new post.:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=96252965692

MOVIE: Quantum of Solace

Film Viewed:  Twice on same day (11/14/08)

 

Well it’s here. The newest 007 flick is out and I have to say…I’m disappointed.

 

Solace takes off where Casino Royale left off (literally only like 20 min. later!) with Bond driving away from some villains. Be warned Bond-lovers, this movie does not have the traditional follow circle to shot and blood spill. It just simply begins with the action. That was one of the first major problems. No Bond film (as far as I am concerned) didn’t start that way. Casino Royale almost didn’t but it made up for it with a great opening. Anyway moving on. After the car chase we are witness to Mr. White’s interrogation by M and Bond only for both to discover that Mr. Whites “organization” has “people everywhere” at which point an agent goes rouge and attempts to kill Bond and M. Bond then launches into a high speed foot chase with the agent through an Italian city. It is clearly obvious here that the writers heard from Casino Royale’s lack of action scenes and tried to make up for it. After this chase is when we get the song opening which brings in the new problem. “Another Way to Die” by Alicia Keys and Jack White is by far one of the worst Bond songs I have ever heard. It does not sound like Bond nor does it have any sort of style. Its chorus also sounds strangely miss-tuned (I play enough instruments to know). All in all it’s by far much worse than Chris Cornell’s “Arm Yourself” song for Casino Royale which I immediately loved. Don’t get me wrong I love Alicia Keys and Jack White, I don’t think it’s their fault, I believe it’s the problem with the mixer and orchestrator. We are witness to Mr. White’s interrogation by M and Bond only for both to discover

 

Moving on to the plot…if only there was some. I am not joking to you when I tell you that you will never discover what the heck the Quantum of the Solace is but instead hear it being spoken of for only about 10 minutes max in the film. The entire movie is about a man named Greene who has the evil plot to steal countries water sources and sell it back to them. Wow…really? I know there is this huge eco-friendly movement going on right now but that doesn’t have to translate into movies, especially not Bond. In my book evil plans fall under 3 categories:  Money, Domination, Destruction. This is a money scheme and I admit original but seriously? This evil plan was already used in the movie The Tuxedo (you know the one with Jackie Chan that sucked, wait there a lot of those) where the villain was going to poison the world’s water supply so that his was the only one left for use. However even Greene’s plan gets little air time in the film. The plan is only discovered slightly in the last 30 minutes of the movie. For most of the film all we know is that Greene is rich, evil, and wants desert land in exchange for giving power to dictators. Beyond Greene there is the main Bond-Girl that we are introduced to, Camille. She is introduced after Bond follows a lead (who he kills) and Camille, mistaking him for the lead that Bond was after, attempts to negotiate a deal and realizing her mistake runs off (of course Bond gives chase). Camille is probably one of the worst Bond-girls of all time. The worst part is that in my opinion that Camille’s story gets more screen time then the main story. Not only does this happen but also that Bond never has an intimate relationship with her and mostly just acts like a friend or brother to her most of the time goes against all previous Bond-girl standards. Camille is a strong female who does not mind fighting for herself and does not fall for men so easily which makes her the complete opposite then what she should be. I am not a sexist and by all means do I agree with equality and fairness, but ever since Casino Royale, Bond-girls have become more and more feministic. At least Vespa interloped with Bond, Camille just simply gives him a kiss. Ian Fleming had always intended for Bond to be a bit sexist yet admiring of the opposite sex. Women were generally put in as feeble and easy to charm in Bond movies. At most Jinx from Die Another Day was as strong as they get for being with the CIA and fighting along with Bond, however she still fell in love with him. Another thing about Bond girls is clothing. All Bond-girls have been known for their revealing dresses and outfits yet since Vespa’s shoulder pads in Casino Royale, it has been getting worse. At the most Camille wears a night dress for a party but beyond that just generally wears a tank top and jeans (not really that sexy). Camille’s story revolves around with her revenge to kill a general who murdered her family years ago and thus puts her in a similar boat with Bond who seeks revenge on those who killed Vespa. That is also the 3^rd major part of the story, Bond’s revenge. This part also makes the movie worse in that Bond was never very emotional and the most we had ever done so was during On her Majesty’s Secret Service where Bond got married.

 

The film in total goes completely against Bond standards perhaps in an attempt to see new grounds for the series however fails horribly. In Solace it should be noted that Bond will never use a single gadget nor will he make any witty, yet corny remarks (ie: a man gets shot with a harpoon and Bond says “I think he got the point” -Thunderball). These two things are major trend setters by Bond and have never been left out of the films until now. It is safe to say that the next Bond will continue this story and hopefully truly reveal the idea behind the Quantum of Solace. All in all this Bond movie just doesn’t feel like one, It feels just like a random action flick with a big budget and a useful name.

 

Quantum of Solace

+It still is Bond so that’s one

+Great action

-No major plot

-Bond-girl has most screen time in terms of plot

-Horrible Opening song (not the performers, the creators)

-Terrible Bond-girl character (not the actress but the character)

-Does not feel like a Bond film

-Most Pointless title of the Year award

GRADE (Out of 10): 5.5

"Beyond the horizon of the place we lived when we were young. In a world of magnets and miracles. Our thoughts strayed constantly and without boundary. The ringing of the division bell had begun"

-WK2029