JOURNAL: FirestormXIII (Robert X. Hill-Williams)

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  • omg rAwr :O x100000000000000000000000000... 2002-12-16 19:46:29 Hot damn, it looks like the Donut is actually gonna happen. I can remeber when talk first started about this and it was one of those things that everyone said, 'Well, it would be nice, but we may not see it in my lifetime' (well, maybe not that long, but you get the idea) and look where we are now. This suddenly makes me feel like I've been on the org for a long time. Of course, seeing how being 18 was the longest year of my life, that feeling isn't really far off. O.o

    Honestly I don't *need* the Donut, since I'm already paying for hosting, but I'm going to donate anyway. (In fact I plan on donating early so we can see this thing off the ground) I believe what I'm going to do is host my older videos from my hosting, and place my newer videos here. I'm really not sure yet, it may be easier (and cheaper) for me to place all my videos here and drop my hosting. As I do not run a website (because I have no l33t html skill) it wouldn't hurt me to stop my hosting plan. I still haven't decided though, because I do at some point want to run my own site. And if I can store all my videos here, that would mean I'd have that much less to worry about with my hosting deciding it's going to drop me or anything like that. Of course, none of that accounts for my 'teh suck' factor at html. Oh well, that can be fixed with time, and reading XD

    Well, that's about all for me, I think I'll go post my concert report from my previous entry in the General Music forum. I also need to make my bumper for Mission Improbable. Weeee :O

    Later. 
  • Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah, Kwanzaa, or whatever it is you celebrate... 2002-12-16 11:15:17 Well, last night I went to my first concert. It was the Y-100 Feastival, held at the First Union Center in Philadelphia.
    I must say that it was lots of fun, and the whole night was filled with good music. Most of the concert was what I expected it to be like, but there were a few things that I didn't expect.

    For one thing, people seemed to be into one or two of the bands more than any of the others on the lineup. Now, I suppose you could account this to the diverse lineup of bands that were playing, which were (in order from first playing to last up) Seether, Queens of the Stone Age, New Found Glory, Zwan, Good Charlotte, and Coldplay. But while the diversity might be a part of it, I think it had more to do with the crowd of 12 year old girls-wishing-they-were-sluts-trying-to-be-punk, who's daddies bought them tickets and brought them to the concert. The *only* bands that group was interested in were Good Charlotte and New Found Glory. Not that there's anything wrong with either of those bands, in fact, they both had great sets. But the problem is with the whole rush of people who want to (suddenly, I might add) be punk (nevermind the fact that punk has no real definition or image to follow, although *coincidentally* 90% of the punk-sluts looked like Avril Lavigne knock-offs. Who'da thunk it? =/ ) because it's an 'in' thing to do. But whatever, they were all gone by 10:30 anyway, probably past their bed times.

    I unfortunately missed Seether, because we got to the concert a bit late. It was unfortunate, because I wanted to see Seether live and hear some of their other songs, but it was no huge loss, I'll just have to pick up their debut CD when I get the chance.

    The second band to play was marked as the worst one by my friend/god brother and his older sister, who got the tickets. And they actually ended up being better than average after they finished, which boded well for the rest of the night. The band was Queens of the Stone Age, and if you're a fan of stoner rock then you would have been in heaven. This was the absolute worst band to have to get my ears used to the venue with first, because they were just knock down, drag out power rock and tear-your-ears-off-and-stomp-them-into-the-floor loud. But they were still good, especially after my ears got used to the volume. They were a little bit on the slow starting side, but they really got going after their first song, and their last song was a great, hard-rocking tune that I thoroughly enjoyed. And on top of that they sounded better live than they do on the radio.

    The next band was where the crowd really started getting into things, and that band was New Found Glory. These guys had *energy x10* and were the first ones to get the crowd on their feet and jumping around. They were really good, they were all about having fun while they were up there. I feel sorry for the camera guys that werre on stage though, because NFG's lead singer loved to mess with them. At one point after one of their songs he said "Yo these cameras are really cool to play with. Hey, camera guy, get over here." When the camera guy finally came over the singer gave the camera the bird and said "Fuuuck you, camera guy." But after that he said he was just kidding and gave the camera guy a hug. Musically the band was really together, and they really connected to the audience. Just lots of fun with this band, and good music from opening to finish.

    Now the fourth band to play gets the 'Musical Surprise of the Night Award' for coming out of absolutely nowhere and playing extremely well. To be honest I had never heard of Zwan before last night, and even when I heard about them I didn't have an inkling about who they were.. Turns out the front man for Zwan is none other than Billy Corgan from the Smashing Pumpkins. After I found that out I was a bit more interested about how the band would sound, but at best I figured they'd play a couple of their songs, and would then turn into the Smashing Pumpkins revisited for the rest of the set. Oh how wrong I was. Zwan, who is comprised of Billy Corgan (gtr & vocals, Pumpkins), Jimmy Chamberlain (drums, Pumpkins), Matt Sweney (gtr, Chavez), David Pajo (gtr, Slint), and Paz Lenchantin (bass, A perfect Circle) is a band just bristling with talent that stands on its own two feet without leaning on the Smashing Pumpkins at all, aside from two members of the band being in this band. Not a Pumpkins song was heard through their whole set, solidifying my notion that this band is its own entity. The high point of their set in my opinion was the last song they played. It was a musical tour-de-force that was topped off by a crazy guitar solo by Corgan that lasted like 10-15 mintues and went through several tempo and style changes ranging from straight rock to alternative some really free progressive rock and then some, and then back again. A lot of people in the crowd were of the four minute max attention span generation though, so a lot of them didn't really understand anything except 'this band has played a song that's lasted more than five minutes, I'm bored now'. They had no idea what they were missing. I thought it was fuckin' dynamite. Of course I'm kind of a throw back as far as attention span goes because jazz songs tend into the 6-10 minute range and longer depending on solos, and if you don't have the attention span then you miss a lot. If their performance was any indication I see good things in the works for Zwan. I'm defintely picking up their first album when it comes out in January.

    The second to last band, Good Charlotte, was much like NFG as far as being able to get the crowd on their feet and just having a good time. But if NFG was *energy x10* then Good Charlotte was *energy x10^2*. And everyone was into it. Crowd surfing was at an all time high during their performance, and more than one mosh pit developed down on the floor. The first, and only, technical problem of the night reared its head when the band first came on and the lead singer's mic wasn't working. It didn't matter at all though, because everyone in the crowd already knew the words, and was singing to make up for any technical problems that were going down. By the time the chorus rolled around in the first song all was well with the mic again, and everything was in full swing. Good Charlotte talked more than any other band while they were onstage and really worked the crowd. They fit quite a few songs into their hour set, and I never realized how many songs I've heard/know that were played by them. It's going to be absolutely nuts when GC and NFG come back to Philly in the Spring along with (I believe) H2O.

    Now at this point after Good Charlotte ended a good amount of people (see paragraph about 12 year old slut-punk hybrids for more details =P) started leaving, since they could have cared less about the last band, which while popular, wasn't punk. But no complaints, as their leaving left the crowd (true punks and non-punks alike) that cared about *all* the good music that was being played, for the last band and headliners for the Feastival, Coldplay.

    Now as far as bands go in the lineup, Coldplay was probably the most different from the other bands. They can rock, but it's a different kind of rock than the other bands, and not quite as hard. But that didn't matter at all, because they were good. And keeping everyone's attention with their style of music after following up Good Charlotte is no easy task, but they managed to do it. Coldplay's frontman was really charismatic, and knew how to talk to a crowd, and musically the band was really tight. The lead singer/frontman also mixed in some choruses from Christmas songs in some of their songs, which got the crowd all excited. And he won 'The Absolute Funniest Moment of the Night Award' when he broke into a chorus of 'Hot in Here' (aka 'It's gettin' hot in here, so take off all your clothes...') at the end of one of their songs. Everyone was cheering and cracking up all at the same time. I fell out of my seat laughing, because it was the most unexpected thing that happened all night. Nobody even really noticed the switch until he said 'So take off all your clothes, I'm gonna take my clothes off too' because he made the transition so seamlessly. Truly hilarious stuff, those guys are just damn good musicians. They wrapped their set up with 'Yellow', only they rocked it harder than what you'd hear on the radio, which was a nice ending to the whole concert. They did do an encore song, which by its end transitioned into another Christmas song, complete with red and green lights shining down on the band. Nice ending to a great concert.

    Well, that's my first concert/Feastival report. Oh wait, there was one other thing.

    The rawktacity last night at the concert: I was one of all of three black guys at the concert. m/>_<m/ Rock forever, baby!

    XD 
  • Omg, the Impudence, it burns my eyes! 2002-12-11 22:27:04 Heh, there's been a funny thread or two to pop up in SWP involving impudence and Photoshop. Fun times indeed XD

    But anywho, I haven't written anything here in a while so I figured I'd do that.

    I'd planned on being finished with my part of Mission Improbable today, but after getting a solid 75% I've hit a small snag. That doesn't really mean much, except that I won't finish it tonight, and therefore may not get it on klinky's ftp until the day of the deadline, rather than the day before.

    I'm glad I gave myself a day leeway, rather than cutting it to the wire, otherwise I would've been late with it. But anywho, I just have to figure out the main sequence I'm going to have going on during the last 10 seconds or so of my section. I've got everything set up for the drum rolls and back beats that are taking place, I'm just missing that unifying factor to bring it all in.
    Well, tomorrow's another day, and I'm sure I'll have some fresh ideas when I wake up in the morning.

    I think I'll go have some ice cream and call it a night.

    Later all. 
  • :O x2,363,109.4^10 2002-12-06 15:03:11 AHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA!!!!!


    I got accepted to Rutgers New Brunswick for the Spring!!!




    Makes me glad I got online before work. ^_^ 
  • And Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! 2002-11-23 21:20:23 Well, today was kind of uneventful. Sat around the better part of the day playing Suikoden III. I'm at the final battle now, and keep getting my ass handed to me by the boss. I'm sure there's some pattern I'm missing, but at the time I didn't care. I wanna finishing finding the rest of the 108 Stars of Destiny (a.k.a. secret characters) and doing some other stuff in the game anyway. Not being able to beat the boss just solidifies that =P

    Once again I'm being lazy when it comes to AMV editing. I don't think I'm really gonna start editing a lot again until I go away to college. I find I have more time, and am more focused when I edit when I'm away. I've got the trailer video and audio ripped and ready, and my source is ready as well. I still have to IVTC though, and prepare my audio of 24fps editing as well. Video games distracting...

    Recently I've gotten 007 Nightfire and a multitap, Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, and Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance. I haven't even gotten around to playing them yet, them and GTA:Vice City and SOCOM. So many games too little time. I expect that to open up now that I've reached a slowing down point in Suikoden though.

    I had work today, and I have it again tomorrow. That makes three days in a row of nigh-unto-Christmas-shopping doom. And it's not even Black Friday yet. I shudder to think about that day/weekend.

    I also discovered today that taking a break from DDR is a no-no, as when you come back you'll be either too slow, not conditioned enough, or just not in practice enough to pick up where you left off. Oh well, that's neither here nor there, and I don't really need my DDR skillz <--*slang!* until AWA next year so I can show up ErMaC.




    Yea right =P like that'll ever happen.

    Anywho...
    Later. 
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