Little Lady with Big Needles -part 1/2

It came slowly, but when it appeared again, one day 4 weeks ago I really noticed. The pain had spread its way into the entire back of my leg... It had gotten so bad, that in the middle of a sleepless night, I was up screaming to myself begging for morphine and a sterilized saw-blade. In search of some relief, I ended up going to the after hours clinic, hobbling in to see the doctor. While there was not quite enough exclamation marks or energy left in me to express the pain verbally, I settled for a solemnl telling of how it was hell. To think I had broken bones before, played lacrosse and even watched the entire last season of Lost, (complete with with questionable ending). I knew pain, and this was the worst by far. “There's no swelling” she said . “Its probably just muscle spasms”. “Sure” I thought 2 days of non-stop muscle spasms and she was probably just a sadist. I wondered if she was just trolling me, or did she expect me to ask for a note to get out of an exam. In the end I just hobbled away taking my prescription for hard pain medications with me.

Just as I took a sigh of relief thinking to myself "that's done with" ; Nope, it wasn't, and so it got worse. The pain continued, occupying almost the entirety of my thoughts, my condition progressed, with my muscles tightening worse then Scrooge at a charitable fundraiser. It just can't get worse I thought, there is no way, but even then it did. A few days later I went in to see my family doctor who able to provide the same muscle spasms theory as the previous doctor . “Muscle spasms", hmmm I thought, non-stop for close to a week now. Without much by way of explanation, and only hard and ineffectual painkillers I ventured that I may need another opinion, so I talked to some of the dozens of nurses I know, including my Aunt, Mother and close family friends. They weren’t sure what it was but offered a possible solution that, that my average of 2 hours a night of sleep/ brain would be inclined to agree to; The solution, have some nice Chinese lady, message me and stick needles into me. Acupuncture they call it.

Hmmm, worth a shot, (no pun intended) I would gladly take a needle or two, or half a dozen in order to ease the pain. This lead to the the only time I would ever pay money for physical contact, which would also help me isolate what was wrong and eventual find ways of treating/ curing preventing it. To skip forward in time for a moment I'm at a much greater place now to be able to even sit down briefly and write about these experiences. Having gone through them, and having the worst behind me I can only think of how incredibly useful it would have been for me to have stumbled upon a website that would lay out this painful acquired knowledge. So we now have the purpose of this blog post ! A quick run down of the start and the intention of laying out the conditions, symptoms causes, treatments, and preventions by the end of part 2 of this blog post. Firstly though, more on the little lady with the big needles....

Part 2 - Chinese philosophy - Needles -What is it ?- Sweet relief

Dishes and Video Game Music.

While washing a large stack of dishes, that was doing what could be the best tower of Pisa impersonation outside of Italy; I had time to think. While taking on this behemoth task I would slip into constant flashbacks, like a poorly scripted Anime. In one of them I seemed to recall a good friend of mine talking about his impression of music. He didn't say much, but he did say very bluntly he didn’t like instrumental music. That's ironic in that I made music for games we made together (these were simple flash games mind you), and he is largely impart a level designer and gamer himself. Since so much of game music is instrumental only, he was essentially saying he didn’t like my music or game music in general. I had to think about that for awhile. Through reflecting on it, I came to realize game music is in reality a niche market. I can easily envision that the honest sentiments of my friend is actually held by many other people out there. I pictured thousands of gamers hammering to find the mute button the moment their favorite game loaded up.

There was an article in kotaku I read a few days ago ( http://kotaku.com/5821655/why-video-games-with-silent-heroes-had-the-best-soundtracks) which attempted to argue that any sort of vocalization is a hindrance to musical affect. It even went so far as to announce that characters and scenes are much less memorable, with vocalization on top of instrumental accompaniment. The argument focuses on some examples of personal nostalgia and a strong preference for the music of Final Fantasy or Chrono Trigger. (which I am not so impartial to myself). The author goes on to emphasize that action scene's in particular have less affect with any sorts of vocalization and references movies such as Star Wars, stating that the theme's never play while the characters are on screen, and even presents a working example to help demonstrate the main point;

Here's a scene from final fantasy scored without voicing (the original) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bx7nlSDFZVM&feature=player_embedded. Contrasted with one later rerecorded by the auther, voice acting included , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2-6NnQVaBU&feature=player_embedded

As much as I would to believe this argument and take it all in like a starving child who suddenly finds himself in the midst of a large western all you can eat buffet for the first time, But wait after taking it all in the fortune cookie that I read out loud (“the food was not real”) and left a bad taste in my mouth. This argument is shaky on so many grounds for brevity sake I'll address only a few.

The main example for films given, (Star Wars) is probably one of the best examples only to disprove the theory. Star wars lives and dies by its music, and the interaction on the set are not brought to life by the wonderful dialogue, or incredible acting on set, but more so the way the music brings out the emotions in scenes where Lucus may have otherwise failed (awaits hate-mail) . To see this in action you just have to count how many times you hear Obi-Wan's voice ringing out, use the force Luke, followed by that theme for the force that instantly sets up our state of mind for this mystical religious concept that draws us in every-time we hear it. Or when Luke first spy's princess Leia on a holographic recording from R2, the audience hears her plight meanwhile Leia's musical theme brings us into the experience that Luke is having at the time. Or who could forget the final action scene of the movie were Luke is about to make the shot to save the empire, and we here Obi's voice and the theme for the force right before he switches off his guiding system and makes the shot that saves all.

The example of final fantasy 7 scene with and without voice acting is also suspect. The voice acting and music could be great on its own, but you cannot just combine them willy-nilly and expect it to work out. Just as a composer cannot just drop in a "cool" song into what is seen as a good game, and expect the sum of the two to work indefinitely. A more pragmatic view would look to the voice as you would any other instrument. As such you cannot just drop in a voice track over a good song and consider that it will be better for it. Instead scoring it as one would an instrument, being mindful of its range, and frequency bands allotted as well as how best to fit the music, would go a long way.

My dishes are still not done, and as much as I love and cherish instrumental music I'm reflecting that I should like to escape the traps set up by this article and avoid getting stuck with a mindset that does not allow me to experience new forms of music. My first clue that this article was way off, came from the experience of listening to whole genres of music, dedicated to the sampling of vocal lines, from movies and T.V . These include certain forms of hip hop, industrial music, and pys-trance to name a few. Unless game designers and composer want to find themselves washing more dishes regularly, (and not just the occasional tower) Games need to expand and adapt to changing tastes of people and the market. Not every soundtrack has to imitate Final Fantasy or Chrono trigger, and vocal music should inevitably play a larger roll in the games to come.

In our time, our century the instrument most revered is not the the piano the drums, or even the guitar, but the human voice. The use and application of this knowledge even in a minimal fashion could be useful in bringing a larger audience into gaming as well as introducing gaming as an art form, and a credible way to tell a story as well as entertain. While the situation may not be as as dire, as my mini leaning tower, it does warrant some new thought and better foresight, then I had before the tower first sprouted up in my sink.

Things I learned from Anime...

So I'm going to Atomic Lollipop in a couple weeks, its an Anime convention. For those of you don't know what that is, its sort of a homage to Geek culture where people dress up as their favorite icons (which happen to be mostly Japanese, but not all). Its fun in the sense that you get to see some of the characters you've know in games and shows come to life. The virtual world comes to the real world in that time. I enjoy it, it can be tones of fun, however any way I try to explain to my friends, I get the usual... sullen stares and cruel Japes. So for those clever people that are to cool, or sensibly invested in the real world to go; I thought I would chime in and introduce the top 6 things I've learned from these conventions and Japanese culture in general. Some of these I have had to learn through trial and error so I hope to both enlighten and save you some trouble of making the same mistakes.



(1) If you are a female, never ever trust, a tentacle monster ! A good rule of thumb, if a guy or girl has something sticking out, stay away!

(2) If you are a hard working Asian and struggle hard enough, you can overcome yourself and become Caucasian (Dragon ball Z) . They call its called going Super Saiyan.

(3) Wardrobe malfunction is a way of dress (Gurren Lagann)

(4) When in doubt about the lead character of a show, look for the most sexual ambiguous one. I have made this mistake to many times where I would say he or she is a really cool character only to find out that she is a he lol.

(5) Never argue away the the "awesomeness" of Cloud strife (from final fantasy), People will fallow you home and likely poison your pets.

(6) Finally the lady with a Burka on, is not a Ninja. You shouldn't complement her on her costume, or ask to borrow it/

Is this where I write the subject line ?

(note this was originally written for another blog on live journal so references to the layout are not so much hallucinations on my part, but belongs to the layout on that site)

For my blog layout, assuming the where is Waldo look is not fashionable anymore, I would like to apologize to anyone with mild to moderate aesthetic sensibilities. For those that really do like that look, (I think I've hit a very awkward target audience ;) I hate to admit it but, this is not my first blog, so I should know better; though right now as I look up at the candy-cane swirls of red and white with a backdrop of elongated, pixelated mountains I'm far to confused to do anything about it :P That will stay that way, at least for the time being. Maybe if I attain my lofty goal of 5 followers I'll change it, and possibly serve less kool-aid at my cult meetings. People really get antsy about that for some reason.

Well anyways I started this blog for two main reasons. (1) I don't write anymore, at-least not words. Now I have a medium where I can post non-credible outrageous and often insinuating comments (without having to become a talk show host, yeah! ). (2) I'm starting to feel that writing for the days events or thoughts, would help bring to light anything new that I may have learned (intentional or unintentional). In a way I'm sort of hoping to create a reverse dream Journal, where I recount a fragmented view of reality (my day) in ways that would maybe add a new layer of understanding and not go to strange new age forums and ask strangers, why I'm always having bizarre sex dreams...

As for some exciting news. I have agreed to go on a Podcast hosted by a couple friends of mine. You know when they ask Musicians, and composer to get on there they are getting desperate. On the show I plan on discussing prevailing ideas and theories on talent, and how its developed. I will go over a few major and contemporary theories such as the "10.000 hour rule", as well as the relationship between Schizophrenia, autism and talent. After that I will bring up some of the points from a book I read titled the philosophy of music. As well as my very own theories on how talent comes about. After that I will announce a musical project that should be near release in about that time. The show will be really interesting for some people- lacking in random nudity for others . I could address the later, though honestly I doubt a where is waldo themed strip tease would do much for my credibility, though on the other hand, if its as popular as my blog layout, album interest should peek :P