[ "Of the Month" Archives List ]
Link of the Month:
Woot!
Woot.com is an online store and community that focuses on selling cool stuff
cheap. They sell one item per day until it is sold out or until 11:59pm central
time when it is replaced. A new product is released every morning at 12am central
time, seven days a week. You can find some insanely cool things for insanely
cheap prices.
DVD of the Month:
Pushing Daisies - The Complete First Season
The premise: The protagonist can bring anybody or anything dead back
to life with a touch. If he touches it again EVER, then it dies again forever.
If he doesn't touch it again within 60 seconds, though, something of equivalent
life value nearby will spontaneously drop dead. A private detective learns this
and uses the protagonist to solve murders by having him touch the victims and
asking what happened, then touching them again before the 60 seconds elapse.
Beyond the premise, though, Pushing Daisies is an absolutely delightful, whimsical,
colorful fantasy mixed with romantic comedy and good old-fashioned detective
capers. It is an absolute delight and like nothing I've ever before seen on
TV. A cheery, quirky, Tim Burton-esque romp with quick, snappy dialogue and
not a single boring/standard character or situation.
Album of the Month:
Three Ninjas: Live at Studio 7
Aaaah. Good times. Good times. 6 songs performed with special guest Geoff Gibbs
(of the Crazy Boy Floyds) on bass live in front of an actual, real-life audience.
Includes an improvised "Rap Fight," the never-before-heard "Going Gay For House"
and an astonishing "Beluga Calf" medley! Best of all, this album is a FREE DOWNLOAD
over at Three Ninja's blog, jeffthefish.com
Link of the Month:
Monstrous.com
An aggregate site for all things horror, weird science, paranormal, and cryptozoological
in the real world and in popular culture. The Monstropedia sub-section has detailed
articles of over
1,500 different monstrous things.
DVD of the Month:
Bill's Big Pumpkins
A fun, inspiring look at an offbeat corner of American gardening and
the dedicated, hard-working, and slightly nutty people who inhabit it. Follow
giant-pumpkin grower Bill Foss (he grows giant pumpkins; he's not a giant himself)
as he attempts to grow the biggest pumpkin in Minnesota history.
Album of the Month:
Black Eyes & Neckties: Apprarition!
A local (Bellingham-based) horror-punk-rock band who owe much to the Misfits
and Murder City Devils. They rose from th same dirty rock scene that also spawned
USS Horsewhip and the Wastelanders. Apparition! is a fierce blend of
loud, buzzing guitars, spooky organ lines, pummeling rhythms, gravelly, shouted
vocals, and horror-inspired lyrics. It has suitably horror-themed songs such
as "Ghosts in Our Clothes," "Tide of Bones," "Bloodbath,"
and "Dirty From the Grave." Repeatedly voted the best rock band by
readers of What's-Up Magazine.
Link of the Month:
Garfield Minus Garfield
A fascinating project: Garfield Minus Garfield is a site dedicated to removing
Garfield from the Garfield comic strips in order to reveal the existential angst
of a certain young Mr. Jon Arbuckle. It is a journey deep into the mind of an
isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness and
depression in a quiet American suburb.
Book of the Month:
Runaways: Dead End Kids by Joss Whedon
After Brian K. Vaughan left his own creation, the wonderful comic book series
Runaways, who could possibly be found to fill his shoes? Well, they
did a pretty good job by getting Joss Whedon to do it. His run on Runaways
finds the kids desperate to escape from Iron Man and his registration forces.
After a couple of bad decisions, they end up running farther than they've ever
run before. It's a good story arc, and it gets plenty crazy with dozens of new
characters and basically an entirely new setting for the Marvel Universe.
Game of the Month:
Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People
Hey. You. You want to be cool? You want to attract… the ladies?
Well, then, young mister, look no further than Strong Bad's Cool Game for
Attractive People! Thrill at the hours of pre-recorded dialogue! Kick the
Cheat into a clothes dryer over and over again! This point-and-click adventure
for PC and Wii will thrill you with its state-of-the-art 3D graphics (they're
CGI!!!!). Made by some of the same people who made recent Sam & Max
games, SBCGfAP relies on a lot of the same "logic" in solving various
puzzles throughout the course of the game. And fear not: a new episode of this
game is going to be released every month for several more months!
Link of the Month:
Pink Tentacle
A nice little blog site that updates with interesting news and strange tidbits
of information about those exotic lands across the Pacific Ocean. No, farther
north. I mean Asia, idiot.
Book of the Month:
When You Are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris
David Sedaris (Amy's brother) is a really great essayist, and this is his latest
collection. Funny, funny, funny collection.
Album of the Month:
Ballzack: Yeah Indeed
Ballzack, an hilarious bounce rapper from N'Orleans. This album is one of his
bounciest to date with lots of great call-and-response, commands (especially
in "Wine Candy," which is basically just a series of commands to do
a bunch of different, made-up, food-related dance styles), and full as usual
with Ballzack's special brand of humor. Where most rappers write songs about
(A) how good they are with the ladies and (B) how much prowess they have at
rapping, Ballzack generally writes songs about (A) how horrible he is with the
ladies (there's a great bit in one song where he tries to do a call and response
with an audience and they play along until he tries to get them to say good
things about him), and (B) how he can't really rap worth a damn. The songs are
also full of references to specific New Orleans institutions, so they're a big
hit with my Katrina evacuee friends. Yeah, indeed.
Link of the Month:
Star Pirates
This is just a really fun text-based MMORPG. It's easy to log on, play for a
couple of minutes, then log off. Or if you want, you can log on and play for
hours. Plus its absolutely free! It has a great sense of community with fleet
building and fleet wars. But it's also a game in which everyone is a pirate,
so there is a lot of player-killing and theft, so you gotta think strategically
and watch your back. If you want you can use real-world money to purchase advantages
in the game (such as regenerating fuel and energy at a must faster rate), but
I've been playing for a couple of weeks now without spending a dime, so I know
first-hand that it's a great game even if you're dirt-poor. Like me!
DVD of the Month:
My Boys: The Complete 1st Season
I would never have thought that I'd like this show. It's about sports writers
in Chicago. It's 100% baseball metaphors. But I just think it's hilarious. I
knew that it was one of my favorite shows on television when they actually had
a "douchebag intervention" when one of their friend started acting
too "douchy." These characters are really funny, and actually seem
like they've known each other for years. Hugs, not drugs.
Album of the Month:
Natalie
Portman's Shaved Head: Glistening Pleasure
This album from a great Seattle-based indy group hasn't even come out yet, and
I'm making it my Album of the Month. I feel justifiably confident that it's
going to kick ass because I've heard it. Several songs are available on their
MySpace page, and beyond that I've seen them live and the show was an absolute
hoot. Hoot, I tell you! They're like a brilliant parody of 1980s, high-energy,
synth-rock. With songs like "Beard Lust" and "Me Plus Yr Daughter,"
Natalie Portman's Shaved Head is just awexome. And the band named after it is
pretty awexome, too. Be like me and pre-order
this album! Support your local awexome!
Link of the Month:
Hulu
A website where you can watch TV online. It has a lot of really great, hard-to-find
shows like Andy
Barker, P.I., Exosquad,
The Time Tunnel,
Land of the Giants,
She-Spies, etc.
It also has recent fare like the new Battlestar
Galactica, Ghost Hunters,
and even recent episodes of Late
Night with Conan O'Brien in case you fall asleep before it comes on.
Good quality video with full-screen capability.
Game of the Month:
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
The best of the console Prime series (I haven't played Hunters yet). Corruption
is an enormous game that defies the usual Metroid formula by taking place on
several different planets and having your spaceship be a useful game mechanic
(besides using it as a save point and to fly between locations, you can use
it to pick up objects and also do strafing runs in rooms that are open to the
sky). The controls with the Wii remote are fantastic (as long as you have it
on Advanced with High Sensitivity) and really feel like a mouse-plus-keyboard
control scheme. Missions are surprisingly varied, and it took me upwards of
20 hours to play all the way through it (only getting 81% of items, though I
later went back and collected all the ones I missed).
Album of the Month:
Takako
Minekawa: Fun 9
Takako Minekawa is part of Shibuya-kei,
the same musical genre that produced the Pizzicato
Five and Cornelious (whom she would
later marry). This 1999 offering from Takako (partially produced by Cornelious)
is delightfully eclectic, with vocals layered over jazz/lounge samples and complex,
broken electronica beats. It's really good IDM
with really good vocals.
Link of the Month:
TV in Japan
The website that tells you: "This is what TV is like. In Japan." Often
weird, often hilarious, and often starring American film actors hocking strange
Japanese products.
Game of the Month:
Mario Kart Wii
Aaah. It's about durned time. The best video game franchise in the history of
history has finally come to the Wii, and thanks to the included Wii Wheel, you
have the option of playing it a whole new way. Other than that it's very similar
to the DS version, with 16 new tracks and 16 classic tracks from previous Mario
Kart games. Glorious goodness. And they've greatly improved the online play—it's
a whole lot of fun, you can play up to 12 opponents from around the world, and
you can play until you decide to quit without penalizing yourself or screwing
up the people you're playing with.
DVD of the Month:
Juno
Very close to being the best movie of the year 2007 (only beat out by Grindhouse
and Hot Fuzz). A wonderful celebration of wit, intelligence, and honesty.
Go read my full review to see why you should
own this movie. Plus (in case you don't trust my tastes) it was Ebert's favorite
movie of 2007.
Link of the Month:
My Wish List
It's that time of year again: Time for you to buy things for me for my birthday!
BUY THINGS FOR ME! Don't forget to sort the wish list by PRIORITY. And DO NOT
buy me Mario Kart Wii (Carrie is getting that for me). Thanks in advance!
DVD of the Month:
Battlestar
Galactica Season 3
Here is the of-told story of my relationship with BSG: I watched most of the
1st season and enjoyed it very much. I watched the beginning of the 2nd season,
but then I just kinda fell out of habit of watching it, and I kinda forgot about
it. When the 3rd season premiered I thought, "I'll give it another shot."
I was immediately hooked. And to my shock every single episode of Season 3 just
kept getting better and better and better and... I don't know of any other single
season of any other television show that had as many "Holy Sh*t" moments
as BSG Season 3.
Album of the Month:
Leeni : 8 Bit Heart
Leeni is a local (Seattle-based) woman, who made the wise decision of composing
the music for her latest album almost entirely using an old-school, 8-bit Nintendo
Gameboy®. She also has a very pretty voice, very soothing and highly reminiscent
of someone (exactly whom... I just can't put my finger on it). The songs tend
to be a bit on the long side for my taste (the shortest one is more than 3:30;
I like my songs in the 2:00 to 3:00 range), leaving only room for 9 on the entire
album, but the Gameboy music is just plain fun and innovatively used, and the
songs never grow tiresome. This album is right up my alley and I highly recommend
it.
Link of the Month:
Oobject
From the "About Oobject" page: "Oobject is somewhere between
a blog and a directory. We pick topics for lists of gadgets . People then suggest
items to go into them by tagging things as Oobject in wists. Visitors then vote
on items to create something like ‘Billboard charts for gadgets’,
voted by everyone. Some of the topics we pick will be standard categories such
as ‘top digital SLRs’. These will be constantly updated over time,
with new items. Other topics will be quirky and fun, one offs, where we find
a particularly interesting topic such as ‘retro soviet gadgets.’
Each day, instead of single blog posts, we will feature a single topic which
is new or has been newly updated."
DVD of the Month:
The
Simpsons Movie
It's really hard to dislike a movie when you're laughing out loud every couple
of seconds. Not only is The Simpsons Movie flat-out one of the funniest
movies of the past several years, but it actually does a really good job of
feeling like an honest-to-goodness movie and not just a long episode of the
TV show.
Album of the Month:
Zero 7: Simple Things
Simple Things is my very favorite downbeat album, and by "downbeat"
I don't mean depressing. I mean that the songs and instrumentals are all mellow
and laid back, but they also have an absurdly smoothe groove to them that I
find irresistible. Supremely relaxed/groovy/funky bass lines and beats weave
under densely layered, hypnotic guitar and synth lines. The vocals are all sung
by voices that excellently match the smoothness of it all. It's sexy stuff.
It's "smooVe" with a capital "V"
Link of the Month:
We The Robots
My new favorite webcomic is about (surprise) robots! Robots who hold dead-end
cubicle jobs and despair over their lives, just like real people!
Game of the Month:
Super
Mario Galaxy
Man-o-man, I just cannot say enough good things about this game. But the one
thing I love even more than the fantastic gameplay, the unbelievable gravity
rules, and the sense of epic granduer, is the game's aesthetics. The game is
just gorgeous. And the design of the game's universe is so incredibly
inventive and original. There has never been any game quite like this.
Album of the Month:
Blue Scholars: Bayani
This is the 2nd album by local Seattle Hip-Hop duo Blue Scholars, which consists
of Geologic on the mic and Sabzi as MC. Sabzi's work on this album is truly
phenomenal, weaving dense, interesting piano/synth lines with groovy horn sections
and straight-up beats. Geologic grooves right along with his own hypnotic, almost
monotone style. The lyrics are clever and intelligent and about things more
important to life than just bitches and money. I'd really love to see them at
a show.
Link of the Month:
The Crime Lounge
A site dedicated to the cool world of crime, thriller, and spy music. 60s spy
music is one of my all-time favorite music genres, and this site has hours and
hours of it available, all free for downloading. Check out the newly-posted
"Definitive Bond Soundtrack Collection." You have been authorized
by Her Majesty's Secret Service to access these music files...
Game of the Month:
The
Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass
All of the fun and none of the frustration of The Wind Waker! This Zelda game
for the DS foregoes any traditional notions of play control: this game can be
controlled ENTIRELY using the DS stylus! Touch the screen where you want Link
to walk. Tap an enemy to attack it. Make slashing motions across the screen
to have link swing his sword, or draw quick circles around him to have him do
his spin attack! Draw a path on the screen for your boomerang to follow! The
thing is, it isn't just gimmicky; the stylus-based play control is easy, intuitive,
and quickly becomes second nature, allowing you to concentrate on the fun of
the story and puzzles of probably the best-ever handheld Zelda game of all time!
Album of the Month:
Cocco: Sangrose
Cocco is a female Japanse singer. Sungu Rose, released early in the new
millenium, is a powerhouse of lush, rich, dramatic (some might say melodramatic),
huge rock ballads. No, not ballads so much as full-on torch songs. With only
a couple notable exceptions (the light and airy "Still" and the 80s
Grrrl-sounding "Dream's a Dream.") these songs seem to scream straight
from a tearing heart laid completely bare. It's a wonderful wall of pure, undiluted,
Texas-sized emotion that pours over you in gigantic, crashing waves. But in
the end the noise comes almost to envelop you in a strangely comforting warmth.
Sorry if that description was a little out there, but there's no realy way for
me to write intellectually about such a raw (though extremely well-produced)
album.