The Electronic Playground bills itself as “the #1 source to electronic games related material featured in movies and television series,” a claim that not many video games web sites that exhaustively and exclusively cover video game cameos in popular media would dare to make. The Electronic Playground is not only the authority in video game hardware as set dressing, it’s a fabulous way to kill a weekend and shirk work obligations.

Want to know how many Death Wish movies included video game hardware cameos? The answer is three (Death Wish, Death Wish II and Death Wish IV: The Crackdown). Thanks, Electronic Playground!

This is the kind of game trivia minutiae I get off on, as an arcade dwelling troll of the 80s who mourns the current ready-for-hospice arcade situation. Say, remember that episode of Weird Science, the television series, where that one kid played a Sega Game Gear? No? The Electronic Playground does. It even knows what arcade cabinets guest appeared in the completely unnecessary Psycho II. And yes, there was a Frogger machine in Magnolia.

Even if you just need photos of Michael Knight manhandling an Atari 2600 joystick, The Electronic Playground has something you’re interested in.

In all seriousness, this site is satisfyingly completist for arcade junkies or TV and movie buffs who love wowing others with their knowledge of exactly which episode of Fresh Prince of Bel Air an Arkanoid cabinet appeared in.

Built from survey data of the least desired elements of music, three masochistic geniuses have created what they believe is the least desirable composition that garageband can produce.

Elements included are bagpipes, childrens chorus, George Stephanopoulus, jingoism, marching tubas, and operatic rap.

As far as I heard the missing elements include an Auto-Tuned hook, theremin lead melody, and a guest verse by Chingy.

But what else is missing?

Download Komar & Melamid and David Soldier – “The Most Unwanted Music”

A Disquiet Follows My Soul: “Galen Tyrol, you are not the father.” Does anyone else think that this isn’t such a big deal? The only significant thing it means is that little Nicholas isn’t half-Cylon and that Hot Dog managed to get laid. I do feel bad for Chief though, even if he is a toaster.

Shit is going down with Gaeta (who has quickly become one of my favorite characters during the past two seasons). He tells Starbuck that “some kind of a reckoning” is soon coming and we learn at the end of the episode how Gaeta plans to set it in motion. He expresses offensively showy bitterness towards the new alliance with the Cylons, especially in the scene where he confronts Starbuck in the rec room. At the end of that scene, after Starbuck exits, Gaeta looks around at the soldiers who just witnessed their argument and says, “Close that hatch. We need to talk.” I got chills. It’s interesting to see how Gaeta is slowly losing his humane qualities and is gradually becoming more like the Cylons he loathes. Anyone who watched the 10-part webisode series “The Face of the Enemy,” saw what Gaeta is capable of.

A lot went on concerning the Roslin and Adama relationship, including some implied boot-knocking at the end of the episode. Roslin has taken herself off her meds and refuses to return to her role in government, despite Adama’s pleas. She states that both her and Adama deserve to live like ordinary people and they should try to enjoy themselves while they still can. Adama’s failing health was front and center in a lot of scenes; popping pills, struggling just to get out of bed, and the old man can’t even brush his teeth without breaking into a sweat. Since Roslin now refuses to act as president, could it actually be Adama who is the dying leader referred to in the Pythian prophecy?

The decision by Adama to upgrade all ships with Cylon FTL technology causes a split in the Fleet. Vice President Zerek meets with the Quorom and a movement is passed which allows ships to refuse any Cylon technology and any Cylon who wishes to board. As Saul is informing Adama of this, the Fleet’s tylium refinery ship, “Hitea Kan,” is veering off course and communicating with Zerek, who urges them to not cooperate with Adama. When Adama sends some raptors to intercept, Kan jumps. Adama has Zerek arrested and bluffs him into revealing the location of Kan. Then we get a real treat with the meeting between Gaeta and Zerek who are planning a coup against Adama and the Cyon alliance. Gaeta assures Zerek that he has “enough” men in the Fleet who will follow them. Zerek is a character who I’ve always been on the fence about, but I really dig him after this episode and I look forward to seeing him and Gaeta disrupting the Fleet.

Is anyone else tired of Baltar?

My Favorite (no pun intended) have always been one of my favorite bands. Hailing from Long Island, NY they were the new wave/post-punk revival before the Rapture ever got into a van and moved to Brooklyn from San Diego. Equal parts synth-pop and dream-pop, They crafted the sort of songs that felt more at home in a long gone era rather than modern updates on long defunct scenes. Their swooning keyboards & jangly guitars were the perfectly accented by the lyrics of  Michael Grace Jr., who was the sort of singer/lyricist who wore his love for Morrissey on his sleeve. Writing the kind of over-the-top heartfelt lines that left you guessing as to their sincerity or if they were simply tongue-in-cheek. Coupled with the soft and sweet voice of co-vocalist/keyboardist Andrea Vaughn who not only provided the perfect female counterpart, but filled the band’s songs with the sort of sexual tension that is only possible when two band mates are in a real relationship that runs hot & cold. That emotive interplay burned across their cold and distant soundscape providing the sort of excitement and emotion devoid of most revivalist bands.

The band toiled for about a decade or so releasing one full-length and  a handful of EPs (later collected into a double album along with remixes) before calling it quits. I saw them play what would be their last show at the now defunct Hook in Red Hook, Brooklyn on Valentines Day to a mostly empty club. Sadly it was quite an apropos end in many ways. They were the kind of band that despite everything they did just couldn’t seem to get a break or the sort of attention their music deserved. And after a while I’m sure the creative tension mixed with the personal relationship between singers probably proved too much to handle without much commercial success to show from it.

The Kids Are All Wrong is (again no pun intended) my favorite of their EPs, with The Radiation being one of (sigh… again no pun intended) my favorite songs of all time.

My Favorite – The Kids Are All Wrong EP

Toilet Cobra has this uncanny knack of writing about shows and really making you feel like you were there even if you weren’t. I love how he almost never bothers to really review the music or bands, but more so the atmosphere and people in the crowd which in truth is what we all go to shows to experience. He did however bail out before Fucked Up could go on, but thankfully the New York Times comes to the rescue for any of you who were curious on how the last hour or so of the night played out!

New York Times: Chords of Fame? These Bands Never Heard of Them

I wonder how long the Market Hotel is going to be open after this kind of press? Oh and thanks to Rob for directing me to the article.

This should keep everyone entertained over the weekend while we give our weary little blogging fingers a break.

Sayonara folks, we’re off to never never land.

The Mishka bro-ciety (society of bros) got me on the list for the Fucked Up show at Market Hotel so I went there. Market Hotel is a giant fucking performance space in Bushwick shaped like a wedge of cheese. Actually it’s shaped like a wedge of anything. Any kind of wedge. You stare at the stage and it feels like the room’s shrinking. Does that make sense?

The entrance to the club involves a long, steep, slippery, crowded and unlit staircase which would definitely kill you if it got the chance.

The walls all seemed to be foam-core or some garbage like that. It felt like it would be really easy for someone to punch through the wall and find a rap group on the other side and yell “WALK THIS A-WAYYYYYY!”

80s Hardcore went on stage.  That’s a band with Gavin McInness, founder of Vice and Streetcarnage, Josh from the Stalkers and two other guys.  One works at Eat Records.  This was supposedly their last show but we’ll see.

They did all the songs that you would want to hear and there was some girl holding up the lyrics to all of the songs to the right of the stage.  She even did little drawings on them to accompany the lyrics.  I wasn’t sure if she was someone’s girlfriend or sister or just an enthusiastic fan.

I wandered around in the darkened room bumping into people I knew. Gasface gave me a nice zine. Some others gave me smirks & dirty looks. Market Hotel is an eerie fucking place. It feels good though. It’s like the old hardcore spirit is alive. Spontaneous performance spaces and things done without licenses or thoughts for safety. I love the photos of the old LA punk clubs, the Masque and the Starwood. This space reminded me of them. I almost expected Laurence Fishburne to be working the door.

Mike Jones and I had a meeting of the minds afterward in his girlfriend’s car and discovered that we had the same plan in case of fire. If fire broke out we both planned to kick back for a little bit while everybody else trampled each other to death. After they were all dead or the smoke and flames were getting too intense we would luge down the slidey slope of dead and unconscious bodies that would coat the staircase.

The Vivian GIrls are pretty girls who make poppy garage rock.  They are all really cute.  The music is rockin’ and occasionally cute.

Editors note: the Vivian Girls are Twee douchebag!

By the time Pissed Jeans went on I was all tired and fagged out.  (fagged out is an English phrase that means tired I think.  I am trying to make it a thing that people say.)  They punched a hole in the wall and punched out the one light in the place.  After they were done I was too tired to deal with Fucked Up so I clambered into a cramped car and got dumped out outside my house.  I’m going to bet that Fucked Up were pretty good.

My business partner is an interesting fellow. Sure, I’m into some pretty stupid shit: hundred dollar plastic toys, some sort of unspeakable mouse-like deviant, and of course, Nine Inch Nails.

But, well, it’s a certain breed of person—a breed to watch out for, really—who could ever truly find themselves prepared to say, ‘No no…this is my dress flashlight‘, or ‘when you think for a second, it makes perfect sense that production-grade velocimeters cost more than bare-bones component compasses; the latter is a MUCH more precise instrument.’ When you start to hear that kind of stuff coming from the desk next to you, you eventually don’t even have to pause to figure out if they’re serious…because why would somebody joke about shit like that?

But that’s not to say that no humor is involved. The internet—a no-brainer pedestal from which tinker-types from around the globe can up the ante on dorky AND dangerous—recently yielded this gem:

This is the ADDCO portable sign. Today, you see what is on the inside, and how they are programmed to display important information.

*** WARNING YOU SHOULD NEVER TAMPER WITH THESE SIGNS ***

The above image more or less cuts directly to the bone for me: if I saw that sign, there is a more-than-10-percent part of me that would go batshit, sad to say. Congratulations, you industrious nerds, you.

Anybody think they can outdo that message in three, 7-character lines?

U2 – Mysterious Ways

Silversun Pickups – Well Thought Out Twinkles

The National – Mistaken For Strangers

Tom Waits – Goin’ Out West

Smashing Pumpkins – Cherub Rock