Is it hot in here….

If you’ve got an account on my forums, can I ask you a small favour? Would you try logging in? I’m not asking for board activity, it’s just that I was trying to log in and it won’t let me. Says I need an activation key, and when they sent me the key, it doesn’t work. So yeah, give it a shot. Pretty please? With sugar on top?

UPDATE (7:40PM) – I managed to log in, and wiped the whole place. Now, the Forums of Death are the Torrential Coozy Forums. I decided that we need a message board for Coozy for Hire, and thus I’ve relaunched it under a guise of being the official forums for both sites. And also, I mentioned a new pseudo-article to be up near the end of September a while back. While it’s pretty late, that’ll be ready to go tomorrow.

HIM – Dark Light

When I heard about the new HIM album back in July or whenever it was announced, I was marginally excited. Being the fan of HIM that I am, I probably should have been more excited, but all it got from me was a lackluster “Wooh” and a light air-punch. You know what I mean. If not, diagram. What can I say? I like drawing diagrams.

Fortunately, as time passed and live versions of a couple new songs from the album became available to download, my excitement rose exponentially. The two songs, “Vampire Heart” and “Killing Loneliness” were awesome. Though “Killing Loneliness” was cut short due to bass troubles, I listened to the songs many, many times. My Last.fm page might have you believe differently, but trust me, those songs were played almost too many times between when I got them and when the CD came out. And that’s pretty much where we are now. Dark Light was released on September 27, and now that I’ve had a week (and about 40 plays) to let it sink in, I think I’m ready to give it a great big review. Of course the review won’t really be that big, it is a mini-review after all.

We last heard from HIM when they released their greatest hits CD, entitled And Love Said No. Featuring two original songs and 15 other great songs, it’s been my favourite up until now (though most fans would disagree and say Love Metal is the best), but Dark Light has come and made me question that preference. There’s something wrong with that sentence, but I just can’t point it out.

All you really need to know is that Dark Light rocks. I’ll go as far as to say it’s got a bit more pop influence than what HIM’s exhibited up until now, but that’s not at all saying that they’ve changed. There’s no selling out here, we’re still talking full metal assault on your eardrums, it’s just that most of the songs seem more upbeat and whatnot than usual. And it’s not necessarily a bad thing either.

The album kicks off with “Vampire Heart”, and while it’s a great song all around, the album version is slightly less kickass than the live version. A little shake-up, but it was expected. Then we get what they’re touting as their new single, “Rip Out the Wings of a Butterfly”, or just “Wings of a Butterfly” for short. This is where that pop thing I mentioned factors in. It’s a great song, but I do have a complaint. See, the song is almost entirely chorus. There are only two verses, and they’re very short. Normally no big, but it makes the song seem kind of short and half-assed. That aside, it’s awesome. Awesome in its most aural form. After that comes along my new favourite song “Under the Rose”. While a couple other bands have songs with remarkably similar titles (read: exact same), this is not another cover. It’s got the catchiest chorus I’ve heard is some time, a really sweet guitar solo, and the rest of the song isn’t bad either. Plus it gives me an excuse to use a flower as my MSN Messenger avatar. Don’t make any assumptions. The last of the fearsome foursome that headline this album is “Killing Loneliness”. This one I actually prefer to the live version. Can’t think of anything else to say about it.

Now, it’s kind of weird, but as far as I care to say, the title track is the weakest on the disc. It’s not that “Dark Light” is a bad song, it just doesn’t stack up so well to the four kickass songs that preceded it. “Behind the Crimson Door” is average enough, and is more or less forgettable. Mind you, that even though I say that – and I’ll probably say it again before the review is done – none of the songs on the CD are bad. They’re all pretty good, some just don’t stand out as much as others. “The Face of God” is another one I really like. It’s got a really subdued maraca (I think?) part during the first half of the chorus that always catches my ear, even though you’d normally have to listen for it specifically to even notice it. “Drunk on Shadows”, unfortunately, failed to make me care much for it.

At first, I was apathetic towards the second-to-last track, “Play Dead”, but one day it just kind of popped into my head and after really listening to it, I’ve come to truly appreciate it. I’ve always liked slower songs, and “Play Dead” is great in every respect. Also, there’s some really beautiful piano work towards the end, which is always a good thing. The last song is another slower one (well, maybe not that slow), a popular way to end a CD. But aside from the correct placement, “The Nightside of Eden” is another weak song. Forget what I said about “Dark Light” being the weakest, this one just doesn’t strike me as good enough. I just don’t really like it that much.

I’m having a really tough time deciding just where I should rank Dark Light against the rest of HIM’s work. On one hand, most of the CD just plain kicks your ass, but there are a few songs that are barely worth mentioning. Very similar to the debut album Greatest Lovesongs Vol. 666. Though I didn’t like the good songs on that one nearly as much as I do the ones on the newest offering. I suppose that with the aid of “Under the Rose” and “Play Dead”, I’ll have to put this one at the top of the chart.

No matter how it stacks up to it’s brethren, Dark Light is easily a keeper. If you like HIM or just rock, metal, whatever, there’s a good chance that you’ll enjoy it. It’s more than worth your $16. The front sleeve (Inside the case. It comes in an actual sleeve.) art is pretty snazzy too, so that’s a plus. A plus that makes no difference in musical worth, but it’s still a plus. Go out and buy it. All those underlines and quotation marks don’t look so good on such a large font. Website.

The Good Stuff:
  • “Under the Rose”
  • Sweet cover art
  • Maracas. Barely noticeable maracas, but maracas nonetheless.
  • Beautiful piano on “Play Dead”
    		•
    The Bad Stuff:
  • Not as good as past releases
  • A little short
  • “The Nightside of Eden” is totally forgettable
    		•

    Band of the Month – October 2005

    First I’d like to note that the offers on both the Super Mario Bros. Super Show and Bots Master theme songs have expired. If you really want to download those songs, youse-a gonna hafta find ’em youseselves. It’s sad, I know, but the dumping of excess weight saved me over 1.5MBs. Hooray!

    On to the task at hand, this month’s “band” is the Canadian rocker Matthew Good. Anyone out of the loop might be inclined to ask “But isn’t it Matthew Good Band?” Then I would point out that “No.” True, there was a band, but that was ages ago. Sometime in between 2001 and 2003 (I can’t remember for sure, and I’m not going to look it up), the band broke up and Matt went out on his own. Word on the street is the breakup was caused by Matt’s assholic personality, and who’s to say differently. If you want to try to figure it out, the picture on the sidebar leads to his blog, and you can read into that if you really care. If not, you can keep reading this. It’s not like there’s anything better out there. Trust me, there isn’t.

    It all started back in 1995, when the MGB released their first album, entitled Last of the Ghetto Astronauts. This was before I listened to them, so I’ve never heard this one, even though I’ve bought mostly every other MGB/Matt Good CD. The other one I don’t own was a half-assed attempt released two years later, featuring only five songs, two of them coming from the previous disc. Raygun may only have five songs, but they generally charge the normal CD fee of $15 for it, and I’m not shelling out $15 for five songs. Some places even bump it up to around $20. “Generation X-Wing” is a pretty damn good song, though. Almost makes it worth it.

    My personal experience starts with Underdogs, which was released the same year as Raygun. I think the first MGB song I ever liked was the incredibly slow “Apparitions”. I still really like the song, but there are better ones out there. Other greats on the CD inclued “Everything is Automatic” and “Indestructible.” The next CD, Beautiful Midnight, was easily the peak of MGB’s success, being home to at least four hit singles. “Hello Time Bomb”, “Strange Days”, “Load Me Up” and “The Future is X-Rated” are all great, but don’t think that that’s all the album has to offer. “Giant” is a first-rate and somewhat touching song, and “Jenni’s Song” mixes a great chorus with a tune that I know is from another song. Or at least very similar. This is a great CD to start with if you’re just getting into MGB. My personal favourite of the MGB releases is their last, The Audio of Being. This one sounds different from the previous ones, or it does to me anyway. The sound gets a lot more serious and while I don’t stretch as far as to call it emo, some might apply that tag here. There are plently of good rock songs here, but the overall mood seems to be of a slower pace and has a more mature tone to it. Eventually, “Anti-Pop” hit the big time with some radio/TV play, but I think that’s all the mainstream world really saw of this album.

    And that was when they split. Would this cause a big change in the music? No. Not really. As far as the music tells you, Matt was pulling all the strings, at least towards the end. There’s very little differenece between the Matthew Good Band and the Matthew Good solo act, so fans could breathe a sigh of relief. His first solo release, Avalanche, is fantastic and provides a great split between the moodier sound of The Audio of Being and the more rock-oriented previous CDs. Something for everyone here, and it even brought Matt back into the mainstream with the singles “Weapon” and “In A World Called Catastrophe”, the latter which had something of a thematic video (at least I think it was that song), presenting you with footage of the war on Iraq. While I generally look down upon political music (another story altogether), the song itself doesn’t explicitly touch on the subject, so I can deal with it.

    The most recent album, White Light Rock & Roll Review is just as good, if not better than its predecessor. In fact, I often confuse some of the tracks between the two. More radio hits here, I’ve heard both “Alert Status Red” and “It’s Been a While Since I Was Your Man” get plenty of play on the local rock station. I personally like the uber-simplified “Put Out Your Lights” and hard-rocking “North American For Lofe”, but hey, if I chose what they played on the radio, I’d be the king of mainstream. And yes, I meant for that sentence to go nowhere. The cool note is that this is the only MGB/Matt Good CD (that I’ve listened to/can remember) that totes a hidden track. “Hopeless” is an excellent song that’s almost country, but I love it, and am very disappointed that it doesn’t show up on the upcoming greatest hits CD.

    And speaking of that, In A Coma (October 11th, if you’re interested) will be released in not one, but two versions. The first is your regular greatest hits package with a couple new songs tacked on for fun. The second, though, is just mind-blowing. Not only is it two discs long, but the second disc is full of acoustic classics and rare songs. To top that all off, it also includes a DVD packed with videos, commentary, a documentary and all sort of other superfluous junk. As you may have guessed, I totally coozied when I heard about this one. It’s probably gonna cost a pretty penny though, and I’m not really looking forward to that part of the transaction. Other things I should mention include two EPs, Loser Anthems and Lo-Fi B-Sides, the latter of which was given a limited release, with only 500 copies produced. Too bad none of those copies made it into my grubby hands. The former also has some limited availability jargon associated with it, but I don’t feel like retyping my finds.

    And so another Band of the Month segment comes to an end. Seriously, if you like Matthew Good and are thinking of picking up a CD, go with either Beautiful Midnight or one of his solo CDs. Of course, the impending release of the In A Coma anthology looms on the horizon, so you could always wait for that. There’s not much else to say, except for that tomorrow I’ll be putting up a new mini-review, somewhat related to today’s post, and I’m not gonna be making a post specifically to draw attention to it tomorrow. I’ll be too busy, because Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow and MegaMan Zero 4 released yesterday, and Future Shop or EB should have them by tomorrow.

    The mind of a killer

    Last night, I watched one of the coolest movies I’ve seen in a while: The Cell. The basic plot is that this psychotherapist (played by Jennifer Lopez) goes into the mind of a serial killer and tries to figure out where he’s got his latest victim hidden. Anyhow, I started watching because I flipped by the channel and I saw Vince Vaughn, and figured that I haven’t seen a bad movie with him in it yet so why not. A while in, it occured to me just how similar this movie is to one of my favourite PS2 games, Silent Hill 4: The Room. Honestly, if you’ve played the game and understood the whole story, you would just be blown away by when you watch The Cell and see just how many things they have in common. Or vicey versa, whatever. They’re not entirely the same, but you’d be hard pressed to not see similarities between the two. The point is, if the guys who wrote SH4 said they weren’t at all influenced by this movie, I wouldn’t believe them for a second. My advice is to play SH4 and watch The Cell. Awesome game, awesome movie. It’s just like how the original Silent Hill had a lot in common with Jacob’s Ladder (which are also awesome, by the way). That is all.

    That time of the month

    For the longest while now, I’ve been doing maybe one article a month, coupled with a few mini-reviews mixed in between. And I’ve been thinking, maybe I should get back to what the site was all about. I’m not going to try the per-week system I had back in March/April of oh-four, but I’m going to go for two a month. The thing is, they aren’t going to be so long anymore. I’ve been looking at Mike’s site, I-Mockery, Gorilla Mask, and several other sites I visit regularly (no links, they’re all on the sidebar), and I’ve noticed that their articles usually aren’t so long. I really think that my obsession with writing tons and not just getting to the point is one of the biggest factors that keep article production near the bottom of the to-do list. The only issue is that this would effectively nullify the mini-review section. The only true difference between the two would be the pictres in the regular articles. So we’ll see how this goes. The trial period will be October and November. But really, I just wanted to make a news post. So here’s some goods for you to salivate over. Tv reviews! Hooray! I just did it on a whim, so it’s crappy, but it is full of good info, so read up, young ones.

    Some new TV shows, reviewed

    Every year, around mid-September, a phenomenon happens. That phenomenon is the new TV season. This is a season where many new shows will have the chance to test their mettle against each other, as well as current favourites, and see if they can make it more than two episodes. If they make it that far, chances are good that they’ll see at least one whole season. And the best from that group will go on to see many more years and the stars will be able to bask in the limelight of being on a popular to semi-popular TV show. Today, I take a look at a handful of the new shows on TV this season.

    The War at Home
    TV.com page

    Easily my favourite new show of 2005, this is more or less a basic family sitcom. It does, however, take a few interesting turns. For one, the characters will now and then talk to the camera to clarify things, or add a punchline. It’s been seen before (Titus) but it’s certainly not seen often. Secondly, and the part I like most, is that it really pushes the limits of what you can see on sitcoms. The only show that’s ever been more racist, sexist, and just plain off-colour that I can think of is All in the Family. As I said, there’s tons of shock material, including heavy doses of drugs, racism, homophobia, cybersex and even cross-dressing. The characters are great, being your less-than average sitcom family including the slow-witted, short-tempered father (Michael Rapaport), the glue-that-holds-it-together mom (Anita Barone), the teenage daughter (Kaylee Defer), one very odd/effeminate son (Kyle Sullivan) and another sneaky, blackmailing son (Dean Collins). There’ve been three episodes so far, and I’ve really enjoyed watching it. If you’ve not seen it yet, it’s on between the Simpsons and Family Guy on Sunday evenings.

    How I Met Your Mother
    TV.com page

    This is another good one, though in a different vein than the previous. It takes place (kinda) in like 2031 or something, and is about this guy telling his kids how he met their mom. Obviously. It all starts when the main character, Ted (Josh Radnor), feels like he has to get married when his best friends (Jason Segel and Alyson Hannigan) get engaged. It’s basically your average sitcom, and there’s not a lot to make it stand out in the sea of sitcoms, but I like it good. The best part, I feel, is the hilarious antics of Ted’s other friend, Barney (Neil Patrick Harris). I probably wouldn’t enjoy the show half as much if this character were not present. Barney is to this show as Joey is to Friends. In the first episode, every time he gets off the phone while arranging a meeting with whomever, he always says “suit up!” and nobody ever does. I hope they keep the gag running. It’s always funny when he gets mad at them for not suiting up. I never watched Doogie Howser, MD, so it doesn’t spoil the character for me as it does for other people (TV Guide and my parents). Oh, and Alyson Hannigan is hot. That’s always a plus. Monday nights. I don’t know when.

    Out of Practice
    TV.com page

    Not so great. I only watched the first episode, and I wasn’t all too impressed. It’s basically about a family of doctors and their various misadventures. I can’t be bothered to tell you any more, because when the second episode came on, I opted to go play video games instead of watching. I mean, it wasn’t a bad show. Not at all. It was funny and all, but I just couldn’t get into any of the characters, and it just doesn’t stand out as something that I really want to watch every week. Check it out if you feel like it, don’t let my apathy discourage you. You might like it. Mondays after How I Met Your Mother and Two and A Half Men.

    American Dad
    TV.com page

    Yes, it technically started last season, but it was only on a limited trial run of seven of the 20 episodes they’d produced for the first season. So it’s this season that it really gets into full swing. While it may be overshadowed by its universally loved big brother, Family Guy, American Dad is an excellent cartoon. I’ll admit it, I wasn’t immediately taken with it, but after a few episodes it finally grew on me and now it’s another reason I can’t wait for Sunday night to come ’round. The show is centered on CIA agent and father Stan Smith, who is constantly trying to better his family skills and keep his country safe from communists and terrorists. Other characters include his wife Francine, son Steve, daughter Hayley, goldfish Klaus and alien Roger. All the characters offer up a lot of great material, whether they’re funny themselves, or set up other characters for funny. And of course, you can draw a lot of parallels between this and Family Guy. My only complaint is that Klaus is a great character, but is severely limited by the whole “being a goldfish” thing. Oh well, it’s still way more entertaining than the Simpsons has been for the last couple years. If you need me to tell you, it’s on Sundays right after Family Guy.

    And that’s about it. Expecting more? To tell the truth, I really don’t watch much TV, and those are the only shows of the billions of new ones out there that I’ve watched. It’s not like there were gonna be tons of these tiny little TV show reviews. It’s a mini-review after all. Besides, everything else I watch has been on for more than a season now. If you really need to see what other good things have started this month, check somewhere else on the internet.

    The Good Stuff:
  • Alyson Hannigan is hot
  • Now I have something to watch on Mondays
  • The War at Home is way better than Malcom in the Middle
  • Another cartoon on Sunday!
    		•
    The Bad Stuff:
  • Out of Practice is really hit-or-miss
  • American Dad is underrated because people expect another Family Guy
  • The War at Home gets old kinda quick
    		•

    The new lab tech

    1. I fixed some links on the sidebar there. By that, I mean, struck out a dead one, and accomodated to a changed domain name. Changes were only applied to the main page.

    2. After waiting three long weeks, Jump Superstars finally arrived yesterday. I love the game, and have a hard time saying where it would rank in my current library. It’s entirely in Japanese, but I’m coping pretty well. I’ve alrady reviewed the demo, so I don’t know about an article…

    3. Coozy for Hire’s second comic is up. It’s now official that new comics come out on Thursdays, and that my (comic Ryan’s) storyline will be hoggin’ the spotlight for the next three comics or so. Thus is what happens when you put me in charge of actually managing the comics.

    4. Disturbed’s new CD Ten Thousand Fists is out now, and I’m picking it up today. HIM’s Dark Light is due on the 27th, as well as Corner Gas season 2. Whoopee!