Bash ‘em for no reason

I really like the magazine Tape Op. It is a magazine that provides interviews with some of the most overlooked and creative (mostly working-class) music and recording people — folks who do it for the love and not bling. I have several gripes with the magazine (editor Larry Crane writes like the bullish and trouble making kind of guy you’d hate to have on your web forum, the editorials seep with pretentious and self-serving references to studio culture, drugs, and vinyl records), but the variety of interviews is awesome, and it is definitely one of the most informative resources I know of when it comes to music and audio, especially considering that you can subscribe for free.

Anyway, I was seriously irked by the latest issue’s interview with Lewis Durham. He’s from a group called Kitty Daisy & Lewis, a family band from London that only makes sense in the same sort of way that Cherry Poppin’ Daddies or Royal Crown Revue made sense fifteen years ago. In the same post that I’ll praise Tape Op for interviewing people who really make a difference in recorded music, I’ll criticize them for including Durham’s poorly-written (not to mention typewritten and scanned-in?!) history of recording. A following interview explains the confusion regarding the quality of the article — Durham turns out to be not more than a kid who’s likely obsessed with zoot suits, lucky strikes, vargas pinups, and fifty-year-old 4-track recorders for all of the wrong reasons (namely that by liking them he can recreate the sound of rockabilly and mid-century swing pop — this is clearly mirrored by the fact that using a typewriter to write your Tape Op article doesn’t make it a good article).

Why would I criticize this kid who’s just doing what he wants and trying to make the music that he likes? Well, I don’t know. Maybe I’m jealous — I too had an obsessive streak when I was eighteen, and if I had the success of his group, I would have probably taken it farther than him. I think that what he and is group are doing is fine, but that Tape Op buying-in the way that they did is annoying.

One of the things I like about Tape Op is the “it’s not the tools that matter, it’s the person using them” frame of mind. The inclusion of this article and interview go against that mentality in a very rigid and glaring way.

In the end, I won’t complain — the magazine’s free and it’s all cool — I didn’t have to read the articles. But since I decided I can complain about the absurdity of Sarah Palin ever having held an office higher than notary (and ultimately the possibility of becoming vice-president), I can criticize other people as much as I want.

Alternate reality gunk

I’m all for alternate reality games. My own large-scale projects are definitely influenced by aspects of ARGs. As far as I know, the roots of the trend are in marketing: adverARGs. The early ones had a novel aspect that got people excited and effectively promoted their products, but it’s clear at this point that to run a successful ARG, especially one that’s main purpose is to sell something, you need a really clever set of developers. A big budget wouldn’t hurt either.

The ARG to build buzz for the new season of LOST was very well done — and I was a big fan of the cross-media backstory for the game Portal.

So being in an ARGey frame of mind, I was quite interested when I saw what looked like an opening for an ARG in a TV spot a few weeks ago. In the commercial, a bunch of hipsters were running around with handheld cameras, scared of something and talking about finding the truth and seeing a symbol or something. Really the only reason I was interested is because the commercial looked to take place in the Chicago area, showing buildings around the city and a blip of a city map. So I thought it to be a local undertaking, maybe something worth getting involved in — it would be cool if there were teams of people doing that kind of thing somewhere outside of New York.

So I went to the site displayed at the end of the spot, seeitnext.com, where there was a message that said something would be revealed in the first week of February (something earth-shattering, I’m sure). I was directed to enter my e-mail address for updates, so I did. I also made a half-hearted attempt to scan the page for links or secret images, you know — ARG stuff. Nothing. So I assumed they’d send an e-mail once the game got underway.

So I had the site in the back of my mind for the next couple of weeks when I’d be watching TV and see other spots for the mysterious website, but I didn’t look into it much farther because, well, I was busy with stuff. Anyway, for me, the official King of not Doing Fun Stuff, to be tracking an ARG, even half-heartedly — that’s evidence enough that there were probably a whole bunch of other people in the area really looking into it, making a serious attempt to get to the next step in the game.

So last night I was again watching TV (seeing a pattern?), and a commercial comes on. It’s new. And it looks as though the next step is about to be revealed. So I put down my tortilla chips and actually pay attention.

There’s a brief moment of cryptic video, and then it launches into…

A full-blown commercial for a General Motors dealership.

Seriously, me and my tortilla chips were like WTF!

There wasn’t even any attempt to make the commercial fit in with the style established by the earlier spots. It was your same old local car commercial announcer yelling about leases and financing and APRs and stuff! And what’s worse, when I went back to the website, all the cryptic ARG stuff was gone, replaced by a form that, if filled out, would no doubt get you bombarded by phone calls from enthusiastic car salespeople. The same form you’d see on any other car dealer’s website.

So now it appears that the ARG-that-never-was is over, revealing it’s true face as a run of the mill car dealership promotion.

I really hope that the marketing team behind this steaming piece of skunk dung is listening:

It’s incredibly BAD FORM to start what looks to be a game, and then switch it out with a crappy car sweepstakes. That’s called bait-and-switch. Fool me once…

Shouldn’t there be a code of ethics involved here? Like I said, if someone as apathetic as me was interested, you can bet your bottom car commercial that there were other people in the Chicago area taking off work and canceling father/son picnics to obsessively track down THE MEANING OF THE SYMBOLOMGWTFBBQ!!!11

So, marketing department: you can’t hire a bunch of attractive young hipsters to run around Chicago with handheld cameras, starting up mysteries with clandestine symbols and single-frame flashes of words and webcam videos. Well actually you can, but you have to have a payoff. That’s why people get involved with ARGs, so they can find out what happens at the end. Not to win a shoddily-built SUV from 1997 in a one-in-ten-million car dealership sweepstakes.

So out with the payoff, blow-holes. Come on, you started this thing. What’s the big mystery? And don’t tell me that to find out I Have to Hurry on Down to my Local Chevy Dealer and sign a thirty six month lease.

Red ring of inevitable customer support

So last night I was booting up Rez HD for Xbox 360, looking forward to playing it and writing a rockin’ review. Five minutes into the game the thing froze up, so I shut down the system and watched an episode of Monk to quench my desire for video-based entertainment. This morning I went to it play, and the game froze again. I decided to restart the console, but it wouldn’t boot back up. Instead it flashed the dreaded Red Ring of Death (the name of which is a play on the conceitedly named ‘Red Ring of Light’ on the front of the console), indicating a ‘General Hardware Failure’ (thanks, Microsoft support). My circle of friends being made up of nearly exclusively of gamers, I knew that the Red Ring of Death spelled doom for my Xbox 360*, and that the console would have to be sent in for repairs. I called customer support and they’re sending me a prepaid box so that I can send in my console to be repaired or replaced.

Though my livelihood is based in part on video games, I’ve never considered myself addicted to games. I play a lot less than many of my friends, and I generally take a casual approach to technical issues or a disappointing title (as opposed to flying off the handle and say, running over my Xbox with my car). But just the fact that I now cannot play when I want to has me feeling strangely stir-crazy, though it’s not like I’m ever starving from a lack of things to do with my time.

With the reported failure rate of Xbox 360s, and the increasingly poor performance of my system over the last few months, I knew this moment would come, and I’m happy to live a month of my life relegated to playing the Wii. I may just revisit Bully on the Playstation 2.

Despite my contentedness in looking toward a month of Xbox-less life, I briefly considered buying a new 360 and then selling the old one when it came back from repair. Luckily I quashed that urge by spending a little time reading to calm myself down, and calling friends on the phone for support.

Meanwhile I have a date with my Wii.

Meaning my Nintendo Wii Game Console, you sickos.

*In lieu of flowers, the owner of this Xbox 360 requests that donations be made in the Xbox’s name to your favorite charity.