Invented (Jimmy Eat World Album Review)

This is going to be a short review because everything I have to say after this sentence will fit into one paragraph!

This is the most mind numbing droning party emo music ever. Its not terrible its just DRONING, if your looking for something to listen to at a party that won't distract people THIS IS TOTALLY THE ALBUM FOR YOU. If you were looking for a great indie/emo album to listen to, sorry your not getting it here. The music and lyrics are POORLY written! Every track sounds so plain and vanilla you will probably not even know its by Jimmy Eat World. This album consists of 10 blah emo tracks and 3 blah indie tracks, it'd just be better to skip this album all together and pick up Bad Religion's FANTASTIC The Dissent of Man, which for a limited time is only 8 bucks at target and is a much better album. Invented gets a 2 out of 5

I will leave you LIKE I ALWAYS do with the first single off of Invented, My best Theory

Ok finally....

Ok, so I got it. Halo:Reach has been in my possession since launch day... And I know I'm late to reviewing it, but there are reasons, I swear. One, my WoW guild leader and me have been hammering out gearing me, her alt, and another guy so we can start raiding and teaching him tanking in a 10/25 man environment... Yeah I'm that guy. And two... well we will get to two.... But lets start with a story.

I get home with Halo:Reach. I'm a huge fan of the story, so naturally I wanna play campaign FIRST, as not only a refresher course of Halo but because well... It is REACH....

For those of you that don't know the name Reach for us Halo fans is huge. Reach was the pin being pulled from the grenade that was Master Chief. The fall of Reach was that part in the story that always gets mentioned but was never seen. Think the "Jedi Wars" from Star Wars and you'll get it. If you don't know that reference well... I pity you.

Getting into the thick of it, your are Noble Six. You are shoved into Noble Team as they are deployed to Reach. Some of them at first are apprehensive. You are filling the shoes of a fallen soldier in a tightly knit platoon. Not to mention much of your past is kept secret. But ONI and the UNSC has plans for reach and you have to help. What follows is a roller coaster ride.

Lets start with any good story really, dialogue and voice acting. Top notch in both regards. It is hard to overstate Bungie's use of words. They weave a great story in every game and this is no exception. The voice actors do an amazing job. And if you have ever seen Castle, Firefly, Serenity, or Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog then there is the treat of hearing Nathan Fillion calling for your backup.

Now, the score was perfect. It was filled with sorrow, pain. It was soft and driving, but filled with the sort of impending doom I love in these stories. Now, again, for those that don't know why it is done this way.... Reach as a planet is taken over. The whole planet falls to the Covenant. And in fact, Halo fans know that what they are doing is futile (kinda) because in the end all the Spartan-IIs (Master Chief is a Spartan-III) that where on Reach die... Noble team is all Spartan...

And as a side note, thank you Bungie for giving me the one sequence in a video game I've always wanted. No spoilers here BUT wait till after the credits. It is possibly the single most effective story telling devices I have felt for the end of a video game series. As I sit here thinking about the heroics, and how the ending is conveyed I am almost in tears. It was simply beautiful. I wanted to see it... but I never wanted to see it... It is a thing that if you are into story telling it is amazing.

Now not everyone that gets Halo games are in it for the story telling.... Now rememeber When I said I'd get to two? Well.... Multiplayer is reason two that this is late. Bungie really raised the bar on arcade shooters. Every weapon feels well balanced and you never feel overpowered. Before the sword or the hammer or the fuel rod canon would make you feel like a God. Well in here, atleast to my eyes, they are very balanced. obviously some weapons are better then others, your not gonna wanna use pistols all the time, but they all have a distinct place. Couple that with some amazing gametypes (my favorite is Headhunter. Think of the rings in Sonic after you kill a guy, you gather them up and then deposit them back at base... the catch? If you don't make it back to base and you die all the heads you carry drop for the other person to pick up) and its addicting. As I type this I'm waiting to turn around and jump into it again.

People have complained that its "Not COD" and to that I say GOOD. This is an ARCADE SHOOTER. This has HEALTHPACKS and guns that DON'T make sense, and physics that are weird, they throw curve balls. If you wanna be competitive and try to outplay and be super 1337 and uber pwnerer and be pro or w.e., play CoD by all means. I'm not stopping you. What I wanna do when I game? I wanna have fun, with friends, I wanna laugh a lot. I wanna relax and just have a good time. Halo:Reach right now to me, for my dollar, is the best console shooter for that purpose.

The Dissent of Man (Bad Religion Album Review)

I am probably one of the biggest Bad Religion fans you'll meet. I was raised on No Control, How Could Hell Be Any Worse, and Against the Grain. When I heard they were streaming their new full length album The Dissent of Man, on Myspace, you could understand why I would be so excited. This is a pre-release review, so the quality of the music I am listening to isn't as good as it would be on CD, so I won't comment to much on production quality to much.

This is Bad Religion so commenting on the writing, is hard to do because they have some of the best written punk songs of all time. I think the writing on this album is up to par with Stranger Than Fiction, smart writing with allusions to literary and scientific knowledge and that special kind of tongue and cheek word play. Their debut single "The Devil In Stitches" is probably one of the best examples of that, its such a smart song that might go over some peoples heads, but most will get the word play and allusions. The only thing I can really comment on is this album has a little bit more pop sensibility than their previous 2 albums.

As far as the recorded music sounds, it really reminds me of Social Distortion, which isn't a bad thing at all. It still sounds like a Bad Religion album, its just it has a lot of great guitar riffs in the background and a poppy vibe going against the melodic hardcore sound that Bad Religion in a lot of ways defined. They do have songs on the album that are Melodic Hardcore, like the great song "Meeting of the Minds", its just its mixed in there with Pop Punkish songs like "Won't Somebody" and "The Resist". Its a nice change of pace as most BR albums start to blur together if you listen to them to long. My 5 Favorite tracks on this album are The Devil In Stitches, Won't Somebody, Meeting of the Minds, The Resist Stance, and my favorite song on the album "Cyanide".

To conclude, The Dissent of Man, is a great album, and a very fun listen. At 40 minutes long it is totally worth full price, but Target will for a short time be selling it for $9 for a short time after its release. So if you wanna buy the CD you can get it September 28th at Target! I definitely recommend this album to everyone except, people who hate punk, and those who think atheists eat babies. I give the Dissent of Man a 5 out of 5

I will leave you guys with the single "The Devil in Stitches"

Hurley (Weezer Album Review)

Weezer is a band I really love, in fact one of my favorite albums of all time is Pinkerton, and I love everyone of their albums except Make Believe....well until I heard Raditude. Raditude was just awful I hated it, it wasn't the worst album ever it was just so disappointing coming after the instant classic of the Red Album. So when I heard Hurley was going to be release LESS THAN A YEAR after Raditude, you could understand how I would be skeptical about this release. Honestly I thought it was just some contractually obligated thing they had to do for Epitaph like some contract revision that said they had to release their first Epitaph album as fast as possible. After listening to it, I find something special about it, something that makes it better then Raditude and even the Red Album in some regards.

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The song writing reminds me of the old indie rock Weezer, before they went overtly pop rock. I have nothing against the Pop Rock stuff Weezer has done, I mean I love Maladroit and the Red Album, its just hearing this reminds me of the Green Album, Pinkerton, and the Blue Album. Rivers is back from whatever funk he was in with Raditude, and you can tell this is grade A Weezer song writing at its best. The only problem with any of the writing is on the song "Memories" there is a lyric "back when Audioslave was still Rage" its kind of easy to see that this song was not written in the last 4 years, and that it was meant for either Make Believe or Maladroit.

The songs as a whole are honestly just beautiful, taking the style of music from Pinkerton and mixing it with the synth from Maladroit with improved talent, just make pure eargasm. There is not a single song on the album...well except for the cover of "Viva La Vida", but thats because I despise Coldplay. If I had to pick my favorite 5 songs from the album it would probably have to be "Ruling Me", "Unspoken", "Run Away", "Smart Girls", and "Memories".

To close you guys out, Hurley is what Weezer was trying to do with Raditude. It seems to me this is the record Weezer has been trying to make since Maladroit, its just the Label wouldn't let them. I was terrified when I heard Weezer was releasing a new album less than a year after Raditude, fast forward to now, I am excited to hear that Weezer is planning on releasing a new record less than a year after Hurley.

Anyway I will leave you guys with the Video for "Memories" Featuring the boys from Jack Ass 3D

Albums That Changed My Life: Boxcar Racer (self titled)

This is a series of blogs that I am trying out. Once a week every Saturday morning I will write one blog about albums that changed my life. If people don't like it or if I get an overwhelmingly negative response I won't do any more. Anyway on to the blog.

Boxcar Racer's self titled was the first album I listened to all the way through. When I was like 8 I knew there was a band called blink 182, and I knew my two older brothers listened to them and I heard a couple songs, but one day my brother brings over his Boxcar Racer CD when he was visiting. He forgot to take it back with him and I stole it essentially for 2 months, I listened to it over and over again. It was the first album I had ever listened beginning to end.

This was the album that made me a music geek. The tracks that have stayed with me for almost 9 years now would have to be "I Feel So", "Tiny Voices", "Letters to God", and "My First Punk Song", just all such memorable tracks. In re-listening to the album I would have to say the entire album is amazing, it's just such a great mix of song writing and musicianship. Its not very often you can say that an album you listened to as a kid over and over again holds up like Boxcar Racer's self titled has.

One thing that always bugged me when I was a kid, but now I understand is why didn't they make a second album? Then it just clicked, the reason there is only one boxcar racer album is because the first one says everything. below is the music video for "There Is" the 10th track from one of the best albums of all time.

The Pretty Reckless' "Light Me Up" album review

This review has been a few days coming, its just I haven't had time since I got this album off of Itunes UK to write a review! Now that I do I can finally give my thoughts on this album...buy it!

Okay maybe that wasn't a good enough review that this album deserves, so as standard to my format lets talk about the song writing. "Light Me Up" doesn't fall for the same traps that most modern rock albums by popular bands fall into (ahem Nickleback and Kings of Leon). Every song's lyrics are very unique, you don't have 10 songs that sound the same (like Nickleback and Kings of Leon), it also features a very creative use of metaphors that don't fall flat (yeah I don't like Nickleback and Kings of Leon so what), and this just pop rock songwriting at its best! Last time I had seen writing this good I'd have to go back to 2008, with Cage The Elephant's debut and I LOVED THAT ALBUM TO DEATH!


How about the music supporting the lyrics? I'd say its better then the lyrics, I am reminded a lot of "Mellon Collie and The Infinite" with the mix of punkish hard rock song rock songs and power ballads that use classical instruments. If there are two song that is the WOW track to this album I'd say they are "Goin' Down" or "Just Tonight" because both show the best this album has to offer! The only song I am not a big fan of is "You", and its only because it sounds like a thrown on acoustic song. AND if I wanted to be knitpicky I could say that "Miss Nothing" and "Goin' Down" is to much power to be put back to back...but that'd be anal!

Normally my last paragraph is giving my final summations, and telling you guys whether this album is good or not...its 5 out of 5 stars...but I feel I need to address some things OTHER reviewers have been saying. I have been hearing a lot of people (mainly kids and 40 year old women) arguing either that front woman Taylor Momsen is the next Courtney Love or Cherie Currie or the opposing side that says she is like neither. I have to agree with the opposing side, SHE IS NOTHING LIKE COURTNEY OR CHERRIE. I mean if I had to compare Momsen to anyone it would be Billy Corgan, Dave Grohl, or to name one female Poe...actually yeah she reminds me a lot of Poe! Another thing I should address before leaving you with a music video, is how some people dislike Nothing left to Lose because it doesn't sound like something that 16 (now 17) year old Momsen could have written...its because I don't think she did, while no official word, this song sounds like it was written by a guy most likely songwriting partner and Pretty Reckless' guitarist Ben Phillips...just wanted to put that out there.

Anyway I'll leave you guys with the video for Miss Nothing (only watchable if you are from the United States) Light Me Up Available in the US September 7th, and Available now in the UK