Infected Mushroom - First post

So I've recently been getting into Infected Mushroom. My first introduction was their most excellent album from 2001, B.P. Empire. It's rather ornate Psychedelic Trance. In the words of Ben (who introduced me to it), "I keep waiting for it to get boring, but it doesn't."

For those of you who don't know, Psychedelic Trance is a type of dance music that can be extremely repetitive. It typically sounds like the first track on B.P. Empire (which you can find at the link above) at 5:08. Thud Woomp Thud Woomp Thud Woomp Thud Woomp. But this album has so much variety and depth to it that it's never dull.

I'm moving past that disc now (though not forgetting it!), and have bought The Gathering (1999), IM the Supervisor (2004) and Vicious Delicious (2007). I haven't digested all of these, but so far, I'm leaning toward the earlier stuff. I can see that after BP they have begun to veer into rock territory with songs and lyrics. They're very good at filling in around these structures with Psy Trance garnish, but ultimately it doesn't interest me as much. It seems to be making a big difference in their popularity, so I'm just hoping that eventually they'll do a return-to-roots album in a similar vein to BP.

I'm reminded of the worst Doors song I'm aware of, Touch Me. The Doors are generally an improvisational-sounding band, with basic structures set up that they embellish. Since there are only four of them, they're able to riff off each other and their music can have a very interesting jam-session style to it.

In Touch Me, it seemed some producer thought it would be commercially smart if they were to do a song with orchestral backing. The structure set up for the orchestra is so tight, it leaves The Doors no room for their trademark improv. You can hear them trying: the drummer trying to add as many possible notes to the rhythm and the keyboard's unusual trouble coming up with interesting notes to add to the orchestra. But it falls flat. The song ultimately has no energy despite sounding like it should.

I see IM's rock tracks like this. The rock structures are unforgiving and narrow, and it leaves them with little room for their Psy Trance. It comes off sounding stiff. Maybe I'll grow to like it; it's possible I was just expecting something different after BP. We'll see, and I'll post more about it as I get further through their catalog.

Tap Tap Revenge3 iPhone: Avoid this.

So I got this. Seems ok, plays well enough. There are some ads, but it's a free app, so I don't mind. There is a free track each week, and I can buy more songs if I want. Everything is ok.

One day, I turn on my iPod, and I get an alert from Tap Tap telling me there is some offer. I hadn't even started the application! Imagine if you 20 apps on you iPod that do that. You could be bombarded with alerts when you turn on your iPod.

Honestly, I can't believe Apple allows this on their device. If you value your right to use your iPod and not have apps doing things when they're not even running, don't use this app.

The New Alice in Wonderland

I went to see this, expecting nothing groundbreaking or as dark as I would like because it was by Disney. They haven't done anything with teeth for quite some time (I'm not counting Bolt since that was effectively a Pixar film). Last I can remember is the fiery lust scene in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. That was old school kind of stuff where if you see it as a 5-year-old, you think nothing of it. Then when you see it when you're an adult, you say, "Wow! I hadn't noticed that..."

I at least hoped the visuals would be incredible. Some were; the Red Queen's Castle was pretty cool. But I found myself really bored with the film, and halfway through I figured out why.

It hit me when Alice was rewarded for returning a favor to someone that had hurt her in the past. Wonderland made sense. Gone were the insanity and chaos of the animated Disney film of 1951 (which I quite like). What I really had hoped for, dimly in the back of my mind, was to be transported to a world of beautifully-rendered utter nonsense.

Another thing that was missing was the trademark wit of the book. Some of this was present in the 1951 film, but it was entirely missing here.

That is not to say the film is without some merits. Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter's performances were excellent as usual, as was much of the costume design.

All of this is a real shame, because I think Alice In Wonderland is a story that could really benefit from modern visual technologies.