A rather odd winter has befallen. No snow and no Antarctica temperatures. I’m certainly not complaining. I finally beat Dungeon Siege II after 95 hours. But that’s the way I roll, beating 40 hour RPGs in 90 hours. Dungeon Siege II certainly isn’t a first. After saving my pennies I was finally able to score a Gibson Les Paul. I’ll keep practicing and hopefully develop enough mad skillz to do it justice. I became an official empty nester parent this month. I’m trying to get used to how quiet the house is. Coming home is like walking into a newly discovered ten thousand year old tomb. But you know what? I can crank the distortion on my amp and attempt to bellow out some tunes. I could get used to this. Okay, this is a first. As I was typing this, my monitor died. My beautiful 144hz 1440P 27” monitor gave up the ghost. I picked up an el cheapo at Best Buy. Now I’m the proud owner of a 1920x1080 25” It will have to do until an upgrade. I had to pick up something to be able to provide you with this most awesome reading material. Oh, how we suffer for our art!
1. Magic: The Gathering - Arena on PC: I read about this one a couple of issues ago in PC Gamer. The editors stated it was the best rendition of the game on PC yet. They were right. The game has an excellent tutorial and the art style and interface will make you feel right at home if you’re a veteran player. The AI is challenging enough, but playing online is where it’s at, of course. There are even ranked games, and best of all, the game is free. There’s no need to go to McDonald’s anymore to play or call your buddies who always have something else going on. Be forewarned: the game is chocolate crack.
2. Frampton Comes Alive! on CD: This album which sold 8 million records its first year and was the first album that sold one million cassette tapes spawned a few big radio hits that always takes me back to high school days. I can still listen to the elongated (13:46) “Do You Feel Like We Do” all the way through and hit the repeat button to hear it all over again. It was my first exposure to a guitar Talkbox. Peter Frampton seemed to harbor as much of a talent for it as he did playing his magnificent black Gibson Les Paul. This album is somewhat of a fabricated live album, but not in a bad way. It’s not a continuous recording of a single concert. The songs are all live, but they were recorded at concerts in San Francisco and New York City and meshed together in production.
3. Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation on Blu Ray: The Mission Impossible movies are always nothing short of a roller coaster ride. This one involves a group of former secret agents who have formed their own cabal and of course Tom Cruise and crew are being blamed for their shenanigans. Set pieces include Tom Cruise riding the wing of a transport plane from takeoff (in which he really did the stunt, truly death defying) and an underwater scene in which Cruise had to hold his breath for several minutes. Admittedly, the high point of the movie was what went on behind the scenes. Cruise co-produced it, stepping from behind the camera to take over and augment every scene how he saw fit to do so. Directed and written by Christopher McQuarrie, McQuarrie said the only thing Cruise cared about was making each scene breathless for the movie-going audience. I abhor Cruise’s politics and personal beliefs, but as an actor who puts so much effort in his movies as to perform his own stunts (and he’s older than I am!) I have to admit: I admire the guy.
4. The Witcher on Netflix: As an avid fan of the game series (I picked up the original game in 2007 on day of release) I dismissed this series because of the casting. Placing Henry Cavill was a no-no in my book. The man was simply too young and too handsome. Geralt of Rivia, in the games was much older and more meaner looking than handsome. But hearing guys at work talk about how good it was, I had to check it out. Boy, was I wrong. Henry Cavill played the role with aplomb. And of course, now I want to replay the games. I’ll probably see Henry Cavill in my mind’s eye as Geralt from here on out which is not such a bad thing. The series touches upon many things in the books and the games. It’s a bit mature, but well worth watching if you enjoy fantasy set in medieval times.
5. Home Alone on Blu Ray: A John Hughes classic film (are any of his films not classics?), this is one I had never seen before. It was one of those movies I was quite familiar with, having been exposed to numerous scenes over the years and hearing how good it was from my parents. I could see this movie become a favorite Christmas movie for the multitudes. My own personal title is Elf. Like other Hughes films, this was made in Chicago, Illinois which made it special for me since I spent some of the best years of my boyhood in the prairie state. Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern are excellently cast in this slapstick comedy, basically a “family movie without the family” as the movie’s tagline described. The Blu Ray transfer is on point. If you’ve never seen this, you’re missing a gem, but that’s impossible because I’m the only person I know who had never seen this film.
6. 2018 Gibson Les Paul “Classic”: Saving and yearning for quite a while I was finally able to pick one up from Reverb.com. It wasn’t brand new, but the former owner who bought it new only had 3 hours play time on it. As I’ve said before, when you are a lefty the search is always treacherous and unfruitful. I got lucky with this one. Equipped with P90 pickups, it emanates total Angus Young AC/DC tone. I did find a minor quality control issue with it. Kudos to my friend Josh Query for remedying it for me. Weighing in at over ten lbs. it’s not light, but I’m loving the 1960s style smaller neck and the way it makes me feel I have to step up my game to do it justice when I play it.
7. Dead Space 2 on PC: I finished the original game way back in 2011. I figured it was about time to knock out the next game in the series. The last game I played this scary was 2014’s venerable Alien Isolation which filled me with such a sense of dread I was just happy to finally get through it. This game runs a close second with each door sliding open and not knowing what’s in the room. There is nothing more terrorizing than being swarmed by necromorphs and having to stop to reload my weapons. This game offers such situations in spades. Taking place on a space station orbiting the planet Jupiter’s biggest moon, Titan, the game environment is so immersive it feels like a real place to me. When a game accomplishes this so well, there’s just no other place I’d rather be than at my computer.
8. Guitar Gods by Rusty Cutchin: Basically a mini encyclopedia of some of the greatest guitarists in history. Loaned to me by my guitar mentor, Michael Stevens, this is a compelling book for a few reasons. It hosts a biography and photo of every guitarist I've ever known of, and it also lists the albums that made them famous. I've been jotting the albums down and listening to them on Spotify. I will never need a rock and roll appreciation class after this! Talk about an education. I may adopt this venue and call it my own, "Edward Burton Rock Appreciation 101."
