Bad news for Blockbuster

So far this Friday had nothing to squawk about. It proceeded as planned: an hour of job hunting, some breakfast, a little exercise, more job related endeavors, and finally culminating in a relaxing session of Halo. So far this Friday had been pretty great but what happened next was what put it over the top.

1. Cut out the middle man.

The world is overrun with these pesky half-trys of business models. They exist to make life easier, or so they say. But in reality the world would be a simpler place without them. Which leads me to what I stumbled across while playing Halo tonight. 

The new NXE interface is pretty sweet. It's a complete overhaul of how the xbox feels and brings with it a new list of features available to the xbox owner. Netflix now streams to your xbox (in HD). One can now purchase & download  movies (in a variety of qualities) straight to the xbox.  Community games, created by regular people, can be purchased or demoed directly from your xbox. It just takes up some space but 120GB is a fat enough wallet. 

What caught my eye was something much smarter than anything I've found on my wii: demos of the latest games. Yes, I am as of 11:56p.m. on Friday, January 2, 2009 downloading demos for Too Human, Tomb Raider, Mirror's Edge, Banjo Kazooie, Lego Batman, Dead Space, and some Lord of the Rings title. All for free. And if I'm debating whether it looks worthy of download space there're game trailers and screenshots to view. All for free. If the game's rad, I can buy/download it right then and there. 

So if Blockbuster CEOs are up late playing their xboxes they might want to realize that despite it's awesomeness this doesn't bode well for their company's position in the video game market. 

Is Blockbuster really hoping to live on as merely a rental service? Seriously guys? I noticed you've added gummy bears in the snack aisle leading up to the checkout counter but besides that what have you really innovated in the last decade? 

2. Competition

Why not just be able to trade your game backups (when you download your game to your hdd)? Just associate some special key with it and then let the end-user (who know legally owns that specific copy of the game) control the transaction completely. It's their money anyway - they spent it originally. And seeing as it's not a copy there shouldn't be as much to guffah about.

3. The Nostalgic Bus.

The reason, I think, that I held off on the whole console wars escapade (and didn't just leap out at the 360) was based off of some preconceived notion that Microsoft products are POS hand-me-downs of the tech world. BSOD is justly infamous. All it took was for a spark happiness derived from video games to flare out. 

There's something wonderfully centering about reconnecting with past experiences. For me it was playing super nintendo with my brother, blasting through levels on Super Metroid, or at each other in mech games. On the flipside of the nostalgic bus...something plainly predictable awaits. 

The list of positives for the Xbox360 continue to climb. All I can suggest is that you get one and enjoy the hell out of it.

Thieves - a missing link?

*Am I far off on this one?

It feels like it could lead into something very well. Don't know what quite yet. Some ideas floating around. Tinkering around like some blimp mechanic.

A lot of the tracks need polishing, that's a given since this is all just being mashed together with my looping pedal. I have a very high chance of becoming overwhelmed when the choice of possibility is presented. Maybe I'll have my new mac by then and it'll be my first project. Though I suspect I may become an electronica junkie right off the bat with all the beats I see you can make.

Now I'm reconsidering moving parts around, the actual composition comes next. Things are getting exciting.

A sudden ambush of stuff lunged up at me continually for the past few weeks.

I've been mulling over another piece for a while, trying to decide whether or not it belonged in this song. Since then I have come to the conclusion that it deserves its own legs. With that decided my brain decided to finally move past the tumble dry stage and come up with this bit. I hope you like it as much as I do.

• Part 1 - rCut2.
• Part 1 - rCut3.
  
  
  
  Lyrics:
  Don't be afraid of me.
  Lock your windows now they're coming.
  Don't be afraid of me.
  I will stop pretending if you do.
  *CherubBoyy
  
  Edit 11/24/2008:
  Added Part 2 - rCut3
  rCut3 adds a hint of xylophone and a new bass line over the "Lock your windows" line.

Thieves - another part of the puzzle

A lot of interesting things have been happening with this song. It originally started as this sort of meeting place where the members of The Jesus and Mary Chain and The Smiths sat down around a large wooden table and reminessed about their teenage years. But then space shot out my ears and the reverb dial couldn't hold still. After I had posted the part that I posted earlier, I went back and rethought a lot about how these bits would sound and how they would work together. 

I'm not sure if I've achieved either but I suppose these are the medium stages of a longer process.

I present my audience with another part from Thieves - my work in progress.

• It says "Part 3 - cut2" but don't trust it.
  
• Part 3 - cut3

Lyrics:
Who are you? Leave us alone. Thieves!


Fun facts about this chunk:
- didn't sound anything like this until after a wonderful bike ride at night where I met a fellow musician, Demez, who was also enjoying a bike ride.

- it's my first recorded guitar solo

- it's unfinished

- You'd think that a second piece of a song would clue its author in on what it's about.

Enjoy,

Brennan

P.S. I just noticed that mediafire (download host) has added a little ad beside the download button. Make sure to uncheck it unless you really like spam. Click on my ads instead.

[Edit: September 16, 2008 @10:27 p.m.]

Added new cut. 

Will be posting all subsequent cuts of this part when they become available. 

Thieves - part4 - cuts

Hello,

This is a section of a song I've been working on. It's called "Thieves". I thought it might be fun to show the/my fractal stages of songwriting.

Lyrics:
We need to feed. We are never full. We are thieves.

Links that are [hopefully] working:

• Part4 - Cut2

• Part4 - Cut3

If I can be as productive on the other parts I will upload those as well.

[Stay tuned. Use headphones.]

Cheers,
Brennan

[Edit: September 16, 2008 @10:17 p.m.]

Added old cut. For comparison's sake.

Will be posting all subsequent cuts of this part when they become available.