Bronco Bama Victorious Playlist

Photo from: http://gimetzco.tumblr.com

Bartle Four: We All Die One Day

Photo: www.terrakatephoto1.com

Episodes 47/48/49

The march to 50 continues.  Still not caught up?

Episode 47 : Obamanation
"It's the most wonderful tttiiimmmeeee, of every 4 yearssss." With less than a month to go before the election Terry, Chris, Brad, Phil(osopher) discuss the 2012 presidential election, Big Bird, Snoop Lion's (surprise)endorsement, and Michael Jordan as the defender from the alien apocalypse.

Episode 48: Snacking
Fresh off the 2nd presidential debate of the century 0-12, Terry, Chris, Brad, and Phil(osopher), discuss the lively debates between the rulers of the free wor, um, I mean president of the United States. And more importantly, the true definition of "snaking".

 

 Episode 49: Karma-Fied

In our 1st segment, Phil(osopher) interviews the internet obsession Karma Rocket, and the normal crew openly talk about what's happened so far on The Walking Dead. 

Letterpress Banner

Zombie Files is coming to a close, we are gearing up for episode 50, the last metroid is in captivity, and the galaxy is at peace.  As always, we have new projects in the wings.

Banner talk after the jump.

Zombie Files: The Cadence of the Dead - End Game

42 months ago:

As I came to from being knocked unconscious, I felt like part of my head was missing I’d been hit so hard. The blood wasn’t new though, blood was everywhere. The smell, the sight, even the taste…but there was something new though. In my mind, in my memories, there was something different. Something I wish had never come back.

The Cadence of the Dead - Part Three

42 months ago:

Just before the bullet left the gun, I heard, “Wait!” BLAM! My fingers then went numb and my mouth fell to ground, opened wide in amazement. I slowly muttered, “A human...” I heard a scream, “No! What the hell did you do?!” Before thinking any further, I was knocked unconscious.

Episode 46: The Brodo Code

Boom! Another legendary episode, so pull the wax out of your ears and listen. Don't forget your box wine! You can also find our podcast on our site and iTunes. Peace!

Episode 45: Phinally Phil

Another great episode has arrived to satisfy your Dash Files needs! Featuring one of our great friends, Phillip, we do the smart thing and enjoy ourselves! You should listen for a piece of enjoyment! Find us on our site or on iTunes!

Episode 44: Old School Style

Check out Episode 44 of the Dash Files podcast on our site or on iTunes! With Brad/Edward on a short hiatus, Chris and Terry kick it old school as a Dash Files duo. The topics, however, are fresh: iPhone 5, Wii U, and more!

Zombie Files: Exiled at Sea - The Finale

Down With the Ship

 

 

    The unlocked door to Moore's room swung open as Gerard walked though it with his pistol drawn. The guards had absconded once the fire had consumed The Hyperion's lower levels, so there was no one to impede him. Gerard saw Moore sitting behind a large, mahogany desk drinking a glass of single malt scotch contently.

    “I was wondering when someone would walk through my door looking to put a bullet in my head,” Moore said as he took a long sip from his glass. “Come in, have a drink before you kill me.”

    Gerard closed the door behind him and took a seat. Admiral Moore tipped the bottle of scotch over into an empty glass as liquor splashed carelessly over the sides.

    “Do you know who I am?” Gerard asked the man.

    “Well, I know you're not the Butcher. You have his mask, but I'd be dead already if you were really him. If I had to wager, I'd say the explosion that's currently sinking my ship was the result of the real Butcher. So, to answer your question, I don't really give a fuck who you are.”

The Bartle Four: Part 4 - The Shadow of Angels

Zombie Files: Exiled at Sea - Part Five

He Who Fights Monsters

  

    Before Gerard could utter another word to his father, Forrest and the rest of the islanders surrounded the both of them. They were armed with the spoils of their victory that day. Forrest spoke with a new found sense of leadership as well, “What are you doing with the Butcher, Gerard?”

    “That's impossible, this man is my father. His name is Richard, and there's no way he could be that merciless maniac,” Gerard insisted as he moved closer to his father, blocking their line of fire. They would have none of that.

Zombie Files: The Cadence of the Dead Part Two

48 months ago:

Every time I closed my eyes I saw flashes that started when Jacob and I left the city. The flashes began as nightmares, and then they slowly approached the surface as lucid dreams, becoming instant memories of constant surreal images. Some of those images were fragmented and blurry, but some were clear as day. Nothing made sense anymore, between slipping into REM and waking to real life. Everything began to blend together and I frequently forgot what was real. When I slept, I saw a little girl with a blurry face surrounded by plants as she crouched down, holding her knees. I could hear her laughing and whispering, “You found me!” I saw her again in the backseat of a car, with a pacifier clutched in her hand. I saw a crib with a yellow blanket in it and a voice in the background singing her to sleep. I saw many things that didn’t make sense, but they slowly started to seem oddly familiar and peaceful. When I woke up, the electricity was out, the food was gone, the smell of rotting flesh never ceased to be incredibly rancid. Gunfire was rapid and constant with screaming in between, hospital buildings were evacuating and burning, and the local animal shelters freed their animals out into an even crueler world than they were brought into. People were running and Ferals were chasing them, but eventually there were no more people to chase. Every movement turned into shuffling and every sound turned into low grumbling. There was no more order to the surrounding chaos. After fleeing the city and staying in a nearby town didn’t suffice, eventually there wasn’t even ONE place the Ferals couldn’t get to. The only temporary getaway was the mountains, so Jacob and I packed our bags once again.

Zombies Files: The Bartle Four - Part 3

Bartle Four Part 3: Through the Smoke a Monster Was Seen

Zombie Files: Maya's Calendar - Conclusion

DARE TO KNOW

Memories were swimming through Maya’s subconscious as wild beasts newly released from captivity. Thoughts that were buried deeper than bodies began to rise to the surface of her mind. Dark and dead, these memories should have remained beyond the veil of synaptic fire. Nonetheless, few forces are able to inhibit the mind whenever it becomes unchained. Memories begin to reveal secrets when the mind dares to know itself.

Photo:motherhoodthetruth.com

           

Zombie Files: Exiled at Sea - Part Four

 

Beneath the Mask

    Gerard stared out at the ocean in anticipation as Archer recovered the pistols and other gear from the raiders' bodies. They let Sage make his way to a nearby camp to rest, but they told him not to speak of the coming raiders yet. The goon who had fired the flare was still hobbling along the beach, so Gerard slowly made his way to him. Sand crunched underneath his feet as he reached the injured man. 

    “Please, don't kill me,” he pleaded. 

    “Keep quiet,” Gerard instructed as he stomped down on his wounded leg. The man cried out in pain.       

    “I need you to deliver a message to Moore for me. Tell him he can send as many men as he can muster, but it won't matter. The time for subjugation has passed. We will be the ones standing on this beach tomorrow, when the sun rises. Now, one last thing. Where are the Jet Skis you used to get here?”

    “Down that way, another half mile,” he pointed. “We pulled them into the treeline to keep them hidden from your people.”

Zombie Files: Maya's Calendar - Part Four

Photo: all-hd-wallpapers.com

Spring 2: The Dream Long Forgotten

Mom didn't like mosquitoes. No, she hated them! When my brother and I were young, my mother used to scream at us about malaria or AIDS or something. My brother had it the worst. For some reason, mosquitoes loved his blood...anyways, I need to stay focused. The mosquitoes here are huge and unrelenting. The Florida swamps breed monsters, and all of them are not Mannys. It makes me think about what would happen if a mosquito sucks the blood out of a Manny and then bites me. What would happen? I can't think about that right now. I must get to New York...
~Maya

Zombie Files: Bartle Four Part 2

Bartle Four Part 2: Born to Die

Photo provided by: http://hs-olympics.tumblr.com

The coordinates encoded on the brunette’s holotape pointed towards a town sixty miles south of Reverie. Spades was sketching out possible routes when Heartless returned with the other two men. Looking up from his work he noticed the look of concern on their faces. “I know how much you all hate going out there. Hell, I wish I didn’t have to ask for your help but my hands are tied.” Spades slide the holotape into the projector hoping that the brunette’s message could show the men the urgency of the situation. The brunette materialized in front of the men revealing the reason they were called to meet Spades. Clubs rubbed the bridge of his nose as if contemplating some abstract thought. He looked weary, his eyes sunken behind black bags. He spent most of his night tinkering in his private lab. Most of the things in Reverie still worked properly thanks to him. Before he called Reverie home Clubs spent most of his days helping with repairs on a ship called Hyperion making him a very skilled mechanic. Spades flip the holotape off and examined the men standing in his living room for their reaction to he news. Clubs broke out of his trance. “Well, I guess if she has an answer to the contaminated water problem then your right, Spades. We really don’t have a choice. It will only be a few months until the water supply here is almost depleted. I guess back into the waste we go, my friends.” Clubs tried to finish his statement with a smirk in his voice. The other man, Diamonds, stood silently with a grave look of concern on his face. 

Zombie Files: Exiled at Sea - Part Three

 

A Fire in the Sky

    The wild boar finally entered his field of vision, so Gerard readied his aim against the hulking creature.  A shrill squeal pierced the air as it fell to the ground. “You're getting pretty good at using that bow,” Archer called out to him from behind a bush. “If we salt the meat, this pig will keep us all fed for at least a week or two.”

    “It's just like you explained it earlier: Visualize yourself making the shot in your mind's eye, then follow through with it,” Gerard recited the man's valuable advice back to him.

    “Correct,” he exclaimed as he gave Gerard a light slap on the shoulder. Even without sight, Archer was never one to lack his bearings. They placed a tarp beside the area and pulled the wild pig's remains onto it.  As they began making their way back, with the boar in tow, Gerard heard a rustling in the trees around them.  He dismissed it as the wind and his mind playing tricks on him. However, Archer did not feel this way as he immediately dropped the tarp and sprang around with his bow, ready to loose an arrow.

Zombie Files: Maya's Calendar - Part Three

Photo: urbanghostmedia.com

 Winter 1: A Sheep Among Wolves

All of the news regarding the Apocalypse is becoming nonexistent. This is the scariest part of the whole thing. I have been keeping up with events via my Smartphone. Every YouTube video and social networking site shows you more and more of the horror in the world. In some countries, the winter storms have silenced entire governments. The dead is overrunning India and China faster than any medieval conqueror. Battling the Mannys AND the weather is a losing scenario. Luckily, I'm in South Florida. Hopefully, it's not too bad where I'm headed. I must get to New York...

~Maya

Podcast Notes (episodes 37-42)

I've become a bit lax (read: lazy) about updating the blog with information and links on the latest episodes of Dash Files, so it's high time I fix that:


Episode 37: Millennials.
In this episode we focus on one topic, Millenials. We focus on the the circumstances that shape our generation.  The declining value of college, rising student loans, jobs, new forms of communications, social media, voter suppression, and our generations place in history are all discussed. 

Episode 38: Still Working
Frank is back from England, Bradward moves in, and Travis is still silent.  We get used to living with a dog, the birth of a think tank, Frank adventures backpacking in Europe, college exams, travel tales, Bonnaroo plans are the evening's topics. 

The rest of the missing episode descriptions after the jump:

The Banner: Zombie Files

As you probably have noticed we're in the middle of rolling out the Zombie Files a series of original post-apocalyptic stories written by the Dash Files collective. If you haven't already, bookmark this site and check back often as we have more Zombie Files, and Dash Files podcasts on the horizon.  Beyond that we're thinking up exciting new directions to take Dash Files, so do us a favor and spread the word.

-Bradward

Zombie Files: The Cadence of the Dead

 “You hear about the end of the world all the time on TV, in books, and in classrooms. You never think that it can happen to YOUR world. Well, it did happen…and not a single human being was prepared for it.” –The President of the United States

Zombie Files: Maya's Calendar - Part Two

Photo: creativeuncut.com

Autumn 1: The Heart Grows Fonder 
They remind me of mannequins. Sometimes when it's really quiet and dark, they look like black mannequins littering the streets. They can no longer be considered human because they are dead. Dead humans don't walk or feed tirelessly on the living. These lifeless monsters are not the same as me. I'm sure that the world will fall to these Mannys and they will be the only "life" left on Earth. I just don't think anyone has the willpower to survive and reproduce all that has been lost. I pray I don't become a Manny. I pray I don't end up like my mom and brother. I must get to New York...
~Maya

Zombie Files: Exiled at Sea - Part Two

Adrift. . .

    After the Sun had beaten Gerard into submission, he struggled to stay afloat the freezing waters.  He began slipping in and out of consciousness after night had fell, and his arms had grown weary from being shackled together.  The ocean water stung at his red wrists and swollen hands.  Inescapable blackness threatened to swallow him whole if he were tempted to give into its underwater allure.

 

    Memories of his childhood danced across his mind like synaptic home-movies.  Playing catch with dad, his mother teaching him to read, running to their bedroom during a thunderstorm and other recollections swam along side him in the water.  His father had been a successful, mechanical engineer, and his mother worked as a nurse in the ICU at the local hospital.  The whole family had decided on a cruise vacation that summer because of his parent's 15 year anniversary.  It was supposed to be a two-week trip around the Bahamas, but it turned permanent once the feeder plague had decimated the world's population.  Gerard's father had even helped The Hyperion's crew repair their engine after a critical failure had immobilized the large vessel days after the initial outbreak.  The surrounding islands had turned into a tumultuous war-zone, so they were forced to stay at sea for a long while.  Whole cities burned, and the putrid smoke filled the air for weeks on end.

Zombie Files: Bartle Four

I try shifting my weight across the door to get a better look at the man lying across the room. Watching the man carefully I decide the twitching is just dying neurons sending their final signals because it is too soon for him to be changing. Black spots are dancing around my vision’s outskirts for every tiny movement results in excruciating pain. This bullet in my gut feels like a termite trying to burrow its way deeper into my internal organs but I have to be ready for when he changes. The thing that unsettles me the most about them, the Vacant, is the emptiness in their eyes. The Vacant appear as nothing more than a shell of someone from long ago that refuses to die. Endlessly shuffling from one place to the next consuming life and leaving a wake of death. They almost remind me of myself. I check my Jericho 941 F and see I only have three 9mm bullets left. Sliding back the chamber I flip the safety off and wait for my friend to come back from the dead with the one desire of eating me.

Zombie Files: Maya's Calendar

 Photo: andywarthol.com

Summer 1: Skulls and Fire
I miss my mom and my little brother more than I can handle. Practically every day I cry harder and harder because I know that they are never coming back. The world isn't coming back. All of my hopes and dreams, including finishing high school, will never happen. I will never see my mom again or laugh at my brother's corny jokes. I will never go on more dates or ever get married. Sometimes I wish that I had the guts to kill myself. Any place is better than now. I have survived two years alone. In the times that I had companionship, it was usually against my will. The dead walking seems normal to me now. There are ten times as many Mannys than live humans. The people left behind have to endure the hell that remains. I have only one mission. I must get to New York...
~Maya

Zombie Files: Exiled at Sea

The Hand or the Drink?

     

 

    Saltwater invaded Gerard's nostrils as he awoke to the laughter of his captors.  It seemed the guards had chosen to wake him less than gently that morning; the day of his trial.  His sentence would be decided upon by a tribunal consisting of three different ships' captains.  Unfortunately, the only vote that actually mattered was decided by Admiral Moore, the self-appointed captain of the massive cruise liner named The Hyperion and the Savior of The Fleet.  Once the U.S. was overwhelmed with feeders, Moore's group had no choice but to look to the sea in hopes of finding an uninhabited island to hold out on.  His savior moniker was earned by leading an exodus of ragtag ships off the coast of Florida nearly five years ago in search of such a place.  Some say he had killed as many humans as he had feeders.  These were stories that Gerard had heard growing up as a child that seemed heroic if not so apocryphal.    

    Moore was not a forgiving man however, and Gerard had accidentally killed a captain's son in the galley two days prior.  Working late, Gerard was in the kitchen when a drunken stranger had approached and insulted him for working such a lowly job.  Gerard had quipped back, “Not everyone can be born a captain's son.”  The man's face had gone blood red with that jibe and he waited til Gerard finished his shift to resume the hostilities.  However, it wouldn't have ended the way it did had the man not pulled a knife on him.  Gerard would have been hanged and thrown over the bow of the ship immediately for his crime had he not been only 15 years old.

Bloggaroo 2012.

Bonnaroo is now over, and it was easily the most successful, satisfying festival experience I've had so far.  After the jump a ton of photos and videos from Bonnaroo 2012. 

Dash Files Presents: Mojito Mix

After staying up wwwaaayyy too late listening to Boiler Room podcasts I got the urge to make a mixtape.  I've been off from work the past few days so I thought it was appropriate to make a chilled-out summer mix.  I hope you enjoy.

A Post Apocalyptic Post Rock Playlist

The Lonely Road

School has finally become a distant thought and summer has been warmly embraced. The tug of war over my so called free timed has ceased and activities once shrugged off now seem feasible. Once the debt to my biological sleep debt is repaid I will indulge in my guilty pleasure of wondering the waste. Nothing beats the soft click of a Geiger counter as you rummage through a desk inside of an abandoned school left baron after a nuclear winter. Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas will always be some of my favorite games to come out this generation of gaming and I consider both games timeless. Yes, both games have been criticized for being laced with glitches but the good far outweighs the bad. When you are presented a nuclear apocalyptic wasteland full of monsters, bloodthirsty bandits, and people living in villages built on grains of humanity you can forgive Bethesda Softworks for a few glitches. However that is not the reasoning behind this blog. Seeing the blog hasn’t gotten a new music playlist in awhile I decided to throw up a post rock playlist I throw on when I roam the waste.

Summer Sketches, Vol.1

Pedobear v. Zombie - Edward Castle

 Episode 38: Still Working, is on the horizon and should be available to you soon.  Now that I'm about settled in the new place I've started working in my sketchbook, thinking out ideas and just playing with line and color.  These are straight from the sketchbook, most of these will be developed further, but this is a peek at the sketches as they are right now.  Mostly pen and watercolor.

What If...You Accidentally Time Traveled?

Photo: Suren Manvelyan

What if you accidentally time traveled ? What year would it be? Do you remember how you looked or how you behaved? How would it work? What if you got caught? What if there were others like you, but they were hiding?

May Banner

Summer is here.  Ok, summer isn't official until next month, but the weather is warm and school is out so it's close enough for me.  Summer time means more to spend doing whatever we please, which for the time being means spending the wee hours of the morning roaming the wastelands of Fallout 3 and New Vegas, or in my case, spending hours digging holes and building practically useless things in Minecraft, including a ever burning banner for the site.

Dash Files via Minecraft.  Netherrack, flint and steel, dirt, and rock.

One day I'll write an epic post about Minecraft, but not today.  No, today I'll spend hours upon hours digging holes in search of precious minerals or randomly generated castles.  Isn't that what summer is all about?

Social Network Circa. 1912.

Social Network Circa. 1912, Edward Castle
Pen, ink, and watercolor on paper.

 

 

 

This is the first in what I hope are many pieces of my art I will post to the site.
-Edward

The American Dream Bailout

We all grow up chasing a dream of becoming something. Some of us dream of money, some of us dream of power, and some of us dream of making a change. No matter what your dreams are, our dreams all shares the same underlying principle of trying to make yourself a better person as we grow through life. We are told all through out our lives that the means to achieves these goals are simple: go to school, go to college, and then once you graduate you will have a career waiting for you and the only thing left to do is find a family that you can raise in your house with the white picket fence. Maybe it was the hardships I went through for this goal of the American dream or maybe I have hit the age in which I can see the flaws that most overlook (including me) due to the fact that we are so tunneled vision by the end reward. Whatever the delusion may be, many young Americans have had the wool pulled from their eyes, as life after college isn’t exactly playing out how most of us thought it would. There is a few reason why but the main flaws of college are first, there wasn’t a bunch of jobs waiting for us after the four years of college. Secondly college isn’t cheap so many kids have to take out students loans or try to work full time to keep up with the expensive lifestyle. Third, it is really hard to know what you want to do in life so many students will find themselves switching majors, tacking on another semester or two until they graduate in to a saturated job market. There are two reasons I wanted to write this blog post. I wanted to bring light to the flaws of a college life style and I also want to discuss the next American finical crisis: Student Loans.

Episode 36: Dash Files International

Check out episode 36 - Dash Files International on our site or iTunes.  Listen as we discuss lost glasses, Mass Effect 3, the Walking Dead season finale, Prometheus, and being unworthy of Ray Allen.  Spread the word.

The Mind of Swerve 2: Swerving Harder Vol. 2- Feb. '06

You know you love it.

Well, we meet again. In an effort to make my Swerve personality more transparent, I will continue to pretend that this blog is my therapist. My first post about Swerve was just an appetizer; a snack for those who were hungry, but a warning for those scared to dive deeper. This post features more explanations as to why I wrote what I did, and what the metaphors mean. Again, this Swerve piece was written in stream-of-consciousness fashion. To be honest, it was never actually "finished." Luckily for you guys and gals, I can actually remember what most of it means.  As I dig through the rubble of my mind to uncover the gems, I hope that your voyeuristic urges are satisfied.

The Inherent Art of Game Mechanics

thatgamecompany's Journey

It seems every year there are one or two games come out that the gaming community surrounds and proclaims, “See, games can be art.” thatgamecompany's Journey looks to be 2012's “See, games are art” game. So every year along with the adoration comes a backlash of people who argue games are not art or that games are inherently unable to be art. Roger Ebert infamously proclaimed “Video games can never be art" and still to this day probably gets more e-mails about that article then junk mail about home loans and penis enhancers- combined. Countless people have refuted Ebert's arguments so I won't rehash that here.

After the jump: A beardstrokingly long article containing my opinion on the art game debate (in short, yes they can be) the artistic merit of dead sharks, Mario's best mechanic and some Metal Gear Solid 4 spoilers, (which if you haven't played it yet, either shame on you)

Nintendo 3DS

My relationship with Nintendo’s handhelds has always been a rocky one for me. From broken parts to greedy hands I have had three Nintendo handhelds (Gameboy, Gameboy advance, and a DS) break beyond functioning properly and had two Nintendo DS stolen from me. Now, I find myself yet again with a portable Nintendo product and can’t help but wonder what fun times and heartbreaks await my new Nintendo 3DS future. My experience so far has been a pleasant one so I decided to give a little write up on some of the good and bad that Nintendo’s latest addition to the handheld world holds. Following the jump will be an analyze of the 3DS itself as well as four games that I recommend for those looking to expand thier 3DS library. 

The Mind of Swerve: Personality Switch '05

I don't miss the dreads.

Several people have been asking, "When is Swerve gonna drop something new?" "When is the next live show?" "Please Swerve, can I have your babies?" Well, all of these questions have been stirring in my brain for a few months now. While I cannot say when my next live show will be, I can announce here that Swerve has begun production on his new album. In the meantime, I want to become more transparent with the work that I do. So, over the course of this year, I want to bring you into my mind. Yes, it is true that everyone will not make it out alive.

The Banner

Edit: So it seems that a portrait banner throws off the layout of the website so we're going back to last months til I can iron things out.
Sorry I'm a bit late with the banner.  I've been busy studying Radiohead live setlist like Dead Sea Scrolls trying to divine the future.

In the pantheon of Dungeons and Dragons monsters, the illithid, or mind flayer, don't get the reverence among non-20-sided-dice-slingers they deserve.  In the game Mind flayers spit acid in your face and cast some of the nastiest spells around including the infamous Mind Blast,  an attack whose side effects may include; dry mouth, vomiting, uncontrollable rage, confusion, coma, permanent insanity, shitting the bed, and/or the least worth of all -- death.  To make matters even worse, illithid feasts exclusively on the brains of sentient beings.They exist only to fuck players up.  But outside the worlds of Dungeons and Dragons, people rarely know what an illithid is, so those of you working on a young adult novel about a monster falling in love with a adolescent girl who sees past the monsterish features and falls in love -- consider the mind flayer. 

--Edward

A Tale of a Traveling Friend

One of our good friends has taken a break from the corporate world and decided to travel through Europe while he is still young. While swimming through new experiences and culture he has taken the time to show us a little love by putting our stickers up all over Europe. He has already snapped us a photo with Big Ben and the Eiffel Tower. For his latest activities he placed a few stickers up for us in Amsterdam and as an added bonus he sent a snippet out of his travel journal of his experience in Amsterdam. Before I hand this over to our first guest blog post we want to give a big shout out to Frank Ramey for showing some Dashfiles love from across the pond.  

And the Lord God Planted a Garden Eastward...

A Grimp getting closer to a Spectra.

I have never believed in miracles. As a child with a skeptical mind, I questioned the validity of stories filled with the workings of "once in a lifetime" saviors and their journeys. I grew up mocking and ridiculing the people who believed in such fairy tales, dismissing their ignorance and painting a red 'X' on any opinion tied to their brainwaves. That was me before witnessing a miracle firsthand. That was me before PixelJunk Eden.

A Random Thought

Most days I find myself lost in reflection as I subconsciously gaze over the sea of faces we encounter in everyday life. Lost in puzzling questions such as “What truly goes on behind the mask we wear in public?” Do we all debate over present day dilemma that could hinder our future or do we find ourselves stuck in the trench of everyday toils and the stress which accompanies it? I always catch myself wondering how a certain person arrived at the present state they are in and how does their view of the world differ from mine. With the idea of solipsism I can only truly understand myself and apply my views and experiences to understand the minds of others, which always leaves me with a sense of isolation in a social world. This isolation has seemed to manifest itself with technology as we walk blind and deaf through our surroundings as the hum of music usually fills our ears and our eyes are fixated on a little screen connected to our digital self by means of text messages and social media updates. These distractions cause the people surrounding us to be nothing more then leaves tumbling in the wind as we walk like ghost invisible to others behind our technological shields. So my random question for the day is “ Why concern yourself with how others perceive you when most people are to busy analyzing themselves to differentiate you from the tumbling leaf in the wind?”   

Just something I was thinking about while walking on campus and listening to some post rock. So while you yourself dwell deeper on the topic at hand push play on the link below to listen to one of my favorite post rock songs at the moment: Fragile by God Is an Astronaut. It will get your creative juices flowing. 

#Highfashion

~Chris

The Progressively Interactive Videos of Arcade Fire.

At first the internet and music videos have had a tenuous relationship with one another. The ability to watch anything whenever you want made TV channels like MTV and VH1, where viewers were given music videos on the provider's schedule, irrelevant. In response music videos began popping up around the internet, but even though the medium changed the videos did not. Just recently bands like Arcade Fire began incorporating technology available in computers and used it to create videos that can only be experienced on the internet. 

 

Every video Arcade Fire creates pushes the idea of how people view music videos on the internet further than anyone else. Arcade Fire videos meld simple interactive elements from video games with aesthetics of music videos into experiences that are neither video-game-music-videos, or music-video-video-games. The latest audio visual experiences from the band arguably fall into the nebulous “internet art” category.

More on specific videos after the jump. Speakers/Headphones, and HTML 5/Flash compatibility required. 

The Silver Lining of Mainstream

Episode 34: The Silver Lining Of Mainstream is available here and on iTunes.  In this episode we make like Nostradamus and predict future festival lineups and the next generation of video game consoles and we proudly earn our explicit tag.