Edward's December 2017 Mix

 
It’s been quite the eventful month for me. My oldest daughter came home for Christmas, and I got almost two weeks away from work (always a great thing!) I made my 2017 Reading Challenge on goodreads.com, and I finally beat XCom, a game I’ve been playing for two years now. I watched a lot of movies this month and pretty much stayed inside driven to do so by the arctic temperatures we’ve been having. I caught up on some old music, adding a few CDs to the collection. For a media fan like me, it’s been true nirvana. I had my first checkup since the upgrade with the third wire, and it seems my heart beat is still firing a tad too early. I’m beginning to wonder if they’ll ever get it entirely sorted out. They turned my pace up from 63 beats a minute to 70 bpm, thinking that might straighten it out. I suppose time will tell.

1.      Company of Heroes: Tales of Valor on PC: I was long overdue for a return to my favorite RTS game of all time. Tales is the second (and last) expansion to the original game. It introduced new vehicles and armies to the long revered multiplayer game, but the single play story line was lackluster at best. I wouldn’t say the game was rushed out the door, but for a last grand hurrah for a great series it seems the story could have been written better. The story was a desultory of different units (on different sides) of the war. I finished it in 9 hours in what was basically one sitting. I can now comfortably move on to Company of Heroes 2 with pride in knowing I completed the original series. I have numerous friends who have Company of Heroes, yet not a single one of them have beat the original story line campaign. Tsk! Tsk! Tsk! It’s a shame because this is an RTS everybody should experience. 

2.     A Flock of Seagulls: The Best of on CD: I will always love this band until my last breath. November 1982. It was at a nightclub called Pinocchio's situated at 418 Murray Street in downtown Perth, WA. We had been to sea for a while (US Navy days) and I went into this wonderful dance club where the women seemed to outnumber the men 2 to 1, and the song, “I Ran” by A Flock of Seagulls began blasting out of their giant speakers as the MTV video played on their giant screens that adorned the walls. I fell in love. As soon as I could I bought The Seagulls’ debut album. Oddly, “I Ran” became a number one song in Australia. I’d never heard anything like it. I felt as if those months of disconnection at sea, and then pulling into port and hearing this album as if I’d come back twenty years into the future. I was a fan of their next two albums over the years, and I was quite surprised to stumble upon this collection of hits on a CD dated 1991 with no remastering. (You all know how I feel about “Loudness Wars” and remastering. Big no-no!) The CD album is crisp, pure, and sounds perfect. 

3.      Revenge of the Sith on Blu Ray: This, the third movie in the series, is probably the one that made the most impact on me. And not in a good way. This movie is dark. We see Anakin Skywalker butcher a nursery full of Jedi “youngling” children. Well, okay, we don’t SEE that, but you see the look in his eye and hear the lightsaber crack to life and you know through that very suggestion what is about to go down. And then we see Skywalker venture to another planet and brutally slay a group of pacifists on Emperor Palpatine’s order. I hate Darth Vader! There is nothing redeemable about him whatsoever. I used to feel sorry for him when he removed his mask and died in Return of the Jedi. But seeing his seduction and descent from the Jedis into the dark side of the Force, his cruelty and his anger just made me abhor him. Hayden Christensen, who portrays him does a less than stellar job of it, but I think he was hamstrung by the manner in which George Lucas directed him. The movie itself, on Blu Ray is beautiful on a 4K television. As I mentioned earlier, the movie is dark, and it ends on a note of hopelessness, but it’s an important movie in the series chronicling the transformation of Anakin Skywalker into the arch-villain, Darth Vader.


4.  XCom on PC: I finally whipped it. The only way I could get through it was to take a few steps, get a lucky shot in and when the aliens took their shots at me and missed I’d quicksave! I can’t believe the game took me two years to beat (it’s unbelievable how time flies). I played it off and on sometimes taking long breaks from it just to get away from it. 118 hours for a game I should have beat in 40 hours. I just couldn’t find the “trigger” that began the end game. All I had to do was outfit one of my operatives with a psi ability helmet. But now the thing is done and I thought I’d be geared up for XCom 2. But nope. There is a decent expansion out for XCom entitled, “XCom Enemy Within.” I guess I’ll have to play that one next.

5.  Beneath the Planet of the Apes on Blu Ray: Made a few short years after the original movie, this film takes us on a rescue of our original protagonist, Taylor, and his crew propelled through time and lost, unknowingly having landed back on Earth and unaware until the final riveting scene in the original movie. Taylor, played so well by Charleton Heston doesn’t make an appearance until the last quarter of the film. The lead man in this vehicle is James Franciscus who plays Brent and does a remarkable job. Surprisingly Nova (always pleasant to look at) makes a return. This Blu Ray transfer does a nice job, surpassing the old late night telecasts I watched of the movie years ago.
  
6.  Rush: A Farewell to Kings on CD: I managed to snag a “pre-Loudness Wars” edition CD on eBay. I think this album marked a departure for Rush. It was their migration from the really heavy “Caress of Steel” stuff to more musically articulate numbers. If you love Alex Lifeson’s guitar solo in “Closer to the Heart” you know what I’m talking about. I simply can’t stop listening to this CD on auto repeat. Although the album “Hemispheres” was released after this one and “Permanent Waves” after, this album perfectly segues into “Permanent Waves,” which is every bit as musically articulate (and sways far more into the territory of philosophy.) 

7. The End of the Affair by Graham Greene: (shamelessly plagiarized from my own review on goodreads.com) “For me one of the most true and moving novels of my time, in anybody's language." -- William Faulkner. I have to agree with the venerable Mr. Faulkner. Greene's characterizations in this novel, his ability to create a character who commits adultery with a woman married to his friend, and which causes our main character to grow to both pity and hate the woman's husband is done quite well. Greene creates a character we grow to be come repulsed by, yet can't help but feel sorry for. And the wife, Sarah, is simply seeking a love her husband cannot give her. She is perhaps the most pitiful character in the book.
     This book was made into a movie, but so much of it is simply feeling and thoughts I don't see how it could be effectively made into a film. Greene's capturing of wartime England, the dismal weather and the pubs, the loneliness after being spurned by the woman he has the affair with simply because her guilt is all consuming (which causes our main character to hate the woman's husband even more) and the final tone of the book, that of redemption and forgiveness and the abandoning of faith, is penned so elegantly and sad in this novel. I'm honestly surprised I haven't read any of Graham Greene's works before, but that will change after reading this book.
 
8. Bullit on Blu Ray: Made quite famous by the chase scene involving Steve McQueen in a 1968 Ford Mustang Fastback and the bad guys in a black 1970 Dodge Challenger, it was the impetus causing me to pick this one up. The story line was a tad confusing and somewhat disjointed, but the movie was a nice little trip in a time machine that crash landed in the year 1970. McQueen was his usual suave, king of cool guy of few words, more reactionary than proactive. The transfer to Blu Ray was accurate with smooth colors and pristine visuals, but be warned this wasn’t a 1950’s Technicolor rendition, nor was it meant to be. 

9. Brian Eno: Apollo: Atmospheres & Soundtracks on CD: This album crafted by Brian Eno and Danielle Lanois is one of the great atmospheric albums of all time. The thing is, you’ve probably heard cuts from it and never realized. Just look up “An Ending (Ascent)” on YouTube. Remember that beautiful song from the soundtrack of the zombie movie, “28 Days Later?” I’ve had friends tell me they want this one played at their funeral. It’s such a majestic piece that firmly belongs to this collection of other soulful ambient tunes. 

10. Planet Coaster on PC: The annual Steam Winter sale presented itself, and I couldn’t resist. If you enjoyed any of the Chris Sawyer Rollercoaster sim games you’ll love this one. As a matter of fact, it’s a perfect homage to those games of yore, albeit with revamped sound and graphics. You have control over everything, from individual ride ticket prices to how much salt and ketchup you want to put on your customers’ sandwiches (the more condiments, the more people get thirsty which drives them to buy soft drinks.) The tools included to build roller coasters are a real joy to play with. It’s a game that disguises itself as a time robber, one of my so called, “dawn games.” It doesn’t matter what time you start. It will be dawn when you finally close out for the night.

Edward's November 2017 Mix

I’ve come through the fire again this month. And hopefully, this, the last time. My ICD (heart device) was not working as hoped for. Doctors had discussed this option months ago and they finally decided to go with it. They upgraded my device with an additional wire (this makes three now. I’ve become even more bionic.) And my ICD is slightly bigger compared to the previous one.  Maybe now I really can get back to normal. It’s a short one this month simply because one game dominated (just like F1 2016 did last month.) This game is the most fun I’ve had in multiplayer this year, and quite possibly the most fun I’ve had in a multiplayer game ever.

1.      Sanford and Son: The Second Season on DVD: I took a hiatus from this series a long while back and just now decided to get back to it. As I said before this was probably the first adult situation comedy that appealed to me as a kid. This edition isn’t pretty. It’s as if they simply transferred the existing VHS media right onto DVD. There is no clean up or remastering that I can see. But what makes this show the gem it was is its racy (er . . racist) dialogue and the supreme performances by Redd Foxx and Demond Wilson. No punches held back, a show like this simply wouldn’t be made today. Still, this was a great slice of life back in the early to mid 1970’s. 

2.     Fight Fat by Stephen George, Jeff Bredendberg and Men’s Health Magazine. “If you want to lose fat then exercise; if you want to lose muscle then diet.” And so begins the premise of this excellent book that includes everything from laypeople’s guides to different sports/exercise types to recipes to scientific explanations of what fat really is, how it can be combated and kept off forever. Written in 1995, this guide has aged very well. There are a few anachronisms by today’s standards . . . a mention of VHS instead of DVD/Blu Ray, but the book gets its point across.The book’s mainstay mantra, however, is not completely cut the things you love to eat out of your diet, but moderation. According to the book, one must burn 3,500 calories to burn off one pound of fat. You’d have to walk thirty miles to do that. You could do it all at once, or you could simply walk a mile a day for 30 days and lose the same pound of fat (providing you’re not porking out on spareribs or pecan pie. The book preaches consistency and moderation. This truly is the best book I’ve ever read on the subject of men and weight loss. 

3.      Mustang: Forty Years by Randy Leffingwell. An ultimate book on the history legacy and the forward movement of America’s well loved muscle car, the Ford Mustang. This is a fascinating look into the history of the pony car complete with beautiful pictures and some little known history detailing Lee Iacocca's involvement in this premiere car. Of course what sparked all of this interest in me was the purchase of my own 2014 Mustang GT. The car is an ultra modern beast, yet the whole look has a certain retro to it that hails back to the 60’s and 70’s. They say everyone has a Mustang story. Mine is a simple one. In the late 90’s my Austin buddy, Ed Humes gave me a ride in his GT Cobra. I knew that day I wanted a Mustang. Thank you for that, Ed. I’ve owned numerous makes of cars over the years, and this one is my favorite. Did you know Ford attempted to buy out Italy’s Ferrari Corporation in the late 1960s? And what’s odd is, the deal fell through only at the very last minute. I’ve looked for an update to this book, but I have yet to find one. We definitely need a Mustang: Fifty Years.  

4.   XCom on PC: I’ve been struggling to finish this epic game which is a remake of an old Microprose game, X-COM: UFO Defense, for a year now. It’s not that it’s a bad game or anything, it’s quite addicting truth be told. It’s just such a long game! And the beauty of it is you can create your own characters and take them through the game. There is nothing more frustrating than losing a loved character in a firefight because the random number generator gods rolled against your favor. Still, from what I’ve been told I’m winding down the game. I think I’ll have it beat by the end of December, that is if I continue to play. I got bored with it, stopped playing, and now playing it again I almost can’t wait to defeat it so I can start a new game and begin again. If you like turn based strategy games this is definitely one to pick up.  

5.  Rainbow Six: Siege on PC: My friend Tommy Stephens had been on me for a while to pick this game up so we could play together. I procrastinated, probably because of my last month’s infatuation with F1 2016. Well, during the Steam Autumn Sale I picked it up finally. Boy howdy. It’s a simple concept. 5 vs 5. Terrorists against the good guys. Each team has one minute to set up before the attack phase. The defenders fortify walls, plant mines and build traps. And the attackers send out radio controlled drones to get a fix on enemy locations. Talk about a quick minute. And then the attack phase begins. The attackers attempt to rescue a hostage, or defuse a bomb . . or neutralize all of the baddies. This is no Call of Duty or CS:Go where the 17 year old with the fastest twitch reflexes wins the game. This involves much more of a thought process. This is a game even I can be good at, because Heaven knows my fast twitch reflexes are long faded. This is the best multiplayer game I’ve played this year, and possibly one of the best multiplayer games I’ve played ever. Yes, it even beats my wonderful days of Battlefield 2 and Battlefield 2: Bad Company. I beseech all of my gamer buddies to pick this one up so we can have the time of our lives. You can thank me later. 

6.  Duran Duran: Greatest Hits on CD: You know those life defining moments one has, the ones in which you are walking down the street and bear witness to something that forever marks you and makes you think, “Yes, I remember that. I was 22 when that happened.” Well, one of those defining moments for me was in 1982, while walking down a ginza (shopping district) in Yokosuka, Japan. I was holding hands with a Japanese girl and suddenly a song emanated loudly from a record store. I stopped in my tracks and asked my girlfriend to find out who the band was and the song name. We went into the record shop and I found out the name of the song was “Rio.” I walked out with the album on cassette, and I played it until I wore it out. That album became the soundtrack for that year in the Navy. Duran Duran has since come in and out of my life in the years since, but each time I hear “Rio,” I’m reminded of that beautiful day in Yokosuka. And to this day John Taylor with his Japanese made Aria Pro II SB1000 is one of the most talented bassists out there.

Edward's October 2017 Mix

 I’ve discovered a new love this fall. Formula One racing! This, all because I picked up Codemasters’ great racer, F1 2016. Not only has it instilled a fresh faith in this long running series, but it’s turned me into a RL fan.  Now if Codemasters would just acquire the license to the IndyCar Racing League! It’s a shame I didn’t do more this month, but I was just too hooked on F1 2016. 

1.      Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb on Blu Ray: Made in 1964, this Hammer film left something to be desired. It was slow moving. Most of the exciting mummy-destroying-those-who-desecrated-his-tomb antics occurs in the last 15 minutes. The movie featured a host of Hammer actors I’d never seen before. The sets were posh in the usual Hammer style and the costumes magnificent, but I’d pass on this one. Even the Blu Ray transfer was poorly done – the film being too grainy. 

2.      Planet of the Apes on Blu Ray: I first watched this at Twin Cities Drive-in in Urbana, Illinois with my parents. I was seven years old and I found it amazing at the time. Here it is five decades later and watching it on Blu Ray instills that same feeling of astonishment. The transfer is brilliant, the colors vibrant, you can almost taste the dust in your mouth. Made long before CGI, the film stands the test of time. I’ve seen the movie a few times over the years, but this time was the first time I really took notice of something wholly appropriate in the movie: its soundtrack. Jerry Goldsmith created the unorthodox and minimalist film score using an array of odd instruments and devices. He used ram horns which only have two notes. He used bass slide whistles. And he produced some very strange music by removing the mouthpiece from certain brass horns and reinserting it reverse and blowing through them in the usual manner. This movie is testament that Jerry Goldsmith may have been one of Tinseltown’s greatest underrated film composers.  

3.      Lurk by Adam Vine on Kindle: Imagine a stoner college kid living in an old house where everybody takes up drunken or stoned residence either on the couch or the floor. One day he stumbles on a box of photographs in the basement left behind by tenants thirty years ago, and everytime he looks at the pictures they change. And not in a good way. I’m a quarter of the way into this read, and I like Vine’s writing style. He does a good job of capturing Generation Y dialogue imbued with gamer references and good  sci fi references. This kid has brought something up from the basement with the pictures and released it out into the world, and Vine ingratiates the character so well you can’t help but to feel sorry for him. And the thing is, nothing’s really happened yet!

4.     S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat on PC: Back in 2008 I rage quit the original S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl twice before falling in love and racing to its finish. Much like CD Projekt’s venerable The Witcher series, this game was inspired by a novel, Roadside Picnic written in 1971. And playing the original game inspired me to read the novel. The game was better, you can trust me on this. Seeing the Pripyat Ferris Wheel in the distance and finally working my way to the point where I was standing beneath its rusted inglorious hulk, well, that scene wasn’t even in the book (it would have been an anachronism if so) and anyway, it’s a classic case where a picture transcends the thousand words maxim. I have to say this was one of the hallmark moments of my almost 30 year computer gaming stint. I’m told Call of Pripyat is a better game. All I can discern at this point is that it’s difficult and will remain so until I can “earn” (e.g. kill, loot, or pillage) enough credits to buy stronger armor and better weapons. So far the game is tough, but fun.  

5.      The Shadow of a Doubt: on DVD: Alfred Hitchcock’s favorite film. This is the movie in which Hitchcock brings evil into small town Americana. The movie concerns a serial killer always one step ahead of the law who hides himself by coming to stay with his sister and her clan, a slice of  life typical family, the oldest daughter of the house being “Young Charlie,” the serial killer Uncle Charlie’s namesake. Hitchcock used camera angles and zoom-ins to convey a great sense of vicarious discovery by the young niece, Charlie. We bear witness to Hitchcock’s film making ingenuity when the steam train pulls into town, thick black smoke billowing from its stack, and a great shadow coloring the platform dark as it pulls into the station portending the arrival of something sinister. We are with young Charlie through her loss of innocence as she discovers her charming uncle isn’t what her family perceives him to be. Though the movie was filmed in northern California, Hitchcock chose a town that resembles any mid American small town, making it as central of a character as any of the actors in the film. He collaborated with Thornton Wilder, the great playwright in making this film. If you’re a fan of Alfred Hitchcock’s suspense then this one is a must not miss.

6.      The Ginger Man by J.P. Donleavy: I’m a third of my way into this seemingly important novel penned in the late 1950’s. The protagonist, Sebastian Dangerfield, on the surface seems a rather likeable bloke, a transplanted American cashing in his G.I. Bill after a stint in the WWII Navy, at a uni in Dublin, Ireland. He’s newly wedded to an Englishwoman and recently become a father. He’s studying to be a lawyer. In reality, he’s a complete failure in all facets of life from flunking his academia to disparaging and abusing his wife, to ignoring and hating his newborn daughter. He squanders his monthly G.I. Bill money to get drunk and try to screw anything with two legs. He swindles credit in all of the local pubs on his faux charm. J.P. Donleavy has created a character we love to hate, yet I can’t put the book down. I’m surprised I hadn’t heard of Donleavy before, to be honest. Like I mentioned last month, his sparse, brunt no-word-wasted style of writing makes me think of Ernest Hemingway. And he paints word pictures as well as Charles Dickens. He’s as lugubrious as the king of gloom, himself, Thomas Wolfe. I’ll be anxious to find out what happens to our lecherous fiend of a protagonist, Sebastian Dangerfield.

7.   F1 2016 on PC: I played F1 2012 and hated the AI in the game. Get bumped by a car trying to pass you in a curb, and YOU get the penalty. Though I did applaud the game’s graphics and sound design. Another year passed, and Codemasters released F1 2013. I guess P.T. Barnum was right about suckers being born every minute, because through the advertising hooplah, I bought into the idea that the next edition would be better, and I bought the game. After 70 hours I wrote a Steam review decrying its non-improved AI and its hard as heck game play. I held out for a long time, a few years actually until the announcement of F1 2017. F1 2016 went on a crazy sale and I picked it up for peanuts. Boy, I’m glad I did. I actually, for the first time feel like I’m in a career that’s going to make a difference. My car is easy to handle and that tactile feeling of being able to improve lap times as tires get warmed up has made and the real feel that the AI is much improved has made all the difference in the world. It’s made such a big difference I actually have been watching F1 races on television. I’ve become a fan. This is truly a racing sim with just enough arcadism to make the game a real blast. 

8.  BladeRunner 2049 on Imax: This film flopped, but you know what? I’m kind of glad. The original was a cult film anyway. There’s no reason why the new one doesn’t become one either. I was lucky enough to see this one on its intended medium, a larger than to be believed Imax screen. The sound was incredible, and like my old shipmate, Clint Richardson said, “It must be seen on a big screen, the cinematography is outstanding, as is the sound design. It accomplishes what good science fiction films should do, which is to show us things we've never seen before and provoke thought.” This movie was the perfect homage to Ridley Scott’s 1982 film, and of course it’s one of the few movies I’ve seen that blows away the original novel it was made from.

9.  Chicane Giants on FLAC: Thank you to my friend and workmate, Cary Gillaspy for introducing me to a DJ I’ve become quite a fan of. Nicholas Bracegirdle, whose stage name is Chicane, was inspired by Vangelis and Maurice Jarre, two of my most favorite film composers. At 12 years old, Bracegirdle was creating demo discs. This is one of those musicians that I’m surprised I’ve not heard of. “Flotsam & Jetsam,” and “Middle Distance Runner” are standouts. Cruising down the road with “Middle Distance Runner” thumping my sub-woofer is a joy in itself. I will definitely be checking out more from this talented trance/house musician.