I grew up listening to classic rock because my parents are old, and Pink Floyd was about the latest music that they had in their playlists. This didn’t matter to me however, because as many of you are undoubtably aware; Pink Floyd is pretty awesome. Especially my favourite album, “Dark Side of the Moon”.
Know what else is awesome? The NES, in all of it’s 8-bit glory. Well, somebody decided that the two of these bits of nostalgia go AWESOME together.

Well you know what? I concur.

Here’s Pink Floyd’s unforgettable “Money”, done in 8-bit. The rest of the album is available on the user’s channel. I dare you NOT to enjoy.

–Jeff “DanyLektro”

If at any point you’ve been bored enough to read my FIRST post about The Secret Of Monkey Island (Link here: http://www.nerdnexus.com/monkey-island-awesome-edition/), you would know that this game has been making me cream myself for a good many years. From learning the theme song on my synthesizer to making articles about islands of Monkey, I love this series. What I didn’t tell you… is my inexperience with the rest of the series.

I had played through MAYBE half of Monkey Island 2. An old girlfriend introduced me to Monkey 3 and it wasn’t to my taste after mostly skipping the second one. The fourth title in the series was in bad 3D, and I only barely found what I did play of it to be funny. Needless to say, I loved the first game. The rest of the series, however, I never gave too much of a chance. That changed when I heard that The Secret of Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge, was going to get the same HD treatment as the first game. I decided that it had earned a fresh perspective from me and pre-ordered right away.

If the first enhanced remake had any shortfalls, it’s that is was not accessible to new players. The inventory system was confusing to anyone who didn’t realize that you had an inventory and you had to cycle through controls. To put it simply: unless you played the original game, 20 years ago, you had no idea what to do. This makes it great fun for old players, but the lack of support for new players was panned across the board, with the only viable method to get around it, being to switch to the “classic” view.

This has been thrown out the window, as a new command system and inventory take to the center stage. The animation has been even more beautifully rendered and the voice-acting is absolutely engaging. This doesn’t feel like an old adventure game that’s been given some HD treatment… this feels like a NEW game, a game that’s open and clear to all, while still being absolutely hard as HELL.

With a bit of help from a friend, I cracked my way through it in a few days, and while I was frustrated and confused numerous times, it was never because of the game design. No, I just wasn’t thinking hard enough. Spoiler, a rope and a crowbar can help you swing across a gorge. A CROWBAR! Hahaha, man do I feel stupid.

Enclosed below are some hilarious screenshots that I took while beating the last half of the game.

Monkey Island 2: http://store.steampowered.com/app/32460/

Also, I have an extra copy of the original HD Monkey Island. Contest coming soon.

–Jeff “DanyLektro”

I'll be BACK!

Not if your pun is as bad as your buns.

That's what she said.

Did you, Obi-Wan?

Jeez, what a tagline.

That's a lot of locks.

Yes, all of the options are 'spit'.

Stupid stump joke..

OMG! Nostalgia for Nostalgia!

...so I can see you with my OWN eyes.

Chuckie is pretty metal.

Michael Jackson eat your heart...oh yeah...too soon? Or not soon enough?

(poorly) Written By: Helder Smith

After a long hiatus (and the crumbling of cheesecore.com) I have triumphantly returned to nerdnexus, ready to cram my unwanted opinions down the gullet of the masses (or to the 2-3 folks who may read my “work”).

A “mockumentary” is exactly what you think it is.  A work of fiction shot in the style of a traditional documentary, complete with one-on-one camera confessionals and seemingly revealing “real-life” moments.  Directors like Christopher Guest have carved entire careers out of the concept (Guest has several amazing examples, I have chosen to include only one, otherwise he might dominate the list).  So here they are folks, my five favourite mockumentaries, in no particular order.

*Please keep in mind that this is a list of my favourite mockumentaries, and this is just the opinion of a lowly multi-millionaire who bench presses dangerous animals and lives by his own rules (I’m the James Dean of my generation).*

Trailer Park Boys

Corey. Trevor. Smokes, Let's go!

As a card carrying (and maple syrup chugging) Canadian, this television show is essentially my religion.  It follows the exploits of career criminals Ricky, Julian, Bubbles and all of the other miscreants that inhabit Sunnyvale trailer park.  Despite the inclusion of heavy drug use, coarse language and drunk male prostitutes, the show has some serious heart and is a must watch for anyone who even has a passing interest in laughing (or even has the ability to chortle).

Waiting for Guffman

Broadway bound?

Christopher Guest has perfected the mockumentary and this story of a small town theatre production is his magnum opus.  Equal parts awkward and hilarious, the flick sports a superb ensemble cast, with a great script propped up by improvisational genius.

The Office (UK)

Free love, on the Free-love Free-way

Ricky Gervais was launched into the comedy stratosphere (god that’s a lame phrase) with his portrayal of David Brent, the clueless manager of a middling paper company in Slough, England.  No show in the history of television has been as cringe-worthy or soul crushingly awkward and uncomfortable as this comedic gem.  The true genius lies in the show’s ability to humanize the otherwise deluded and self –important, David Brent.  Any other show would have allowed him to spiral into a cartoonish characterization.

The Office (US)

You should put your mouth on that

The Americanized version of The Office started as a lame recreation of the original, but quickly evolved its own comedic identity (less awkward and soul crushing than its UK father) .  Although the show is losing steam, the first few seasons featured sharp writing and an amazing cast including the breakout performance of Steve Carell as manager Michael Scott, who is truly the heart of the show (He recently revealed that he is leaving after the 7th season, this will probably prove to be the show’s death knell).

Fubar

Turn up the good, turn down the suck!

Another Canadian favourite, Fubar is the story of two mulleted hosers who live for drinking and rock music.  Mostly improvised, and featuring a relatively unknown cast, Fubar is a great blend of Hilarity and drama (although with the accents, characterizations and speech patterns, even the drama is hilarious).  This is the most obscure of my choices, so I won’t reveal plot-points, just go watch it.

As always, if you disagree, or want to pimp your own opinions…just drop me an email or leave a comment.

**BONUS**

So Parker, what do you think of Helder's return? Coolness.

Happy Independence Day, from Toronto, Canada, to all of our United-States-ians. In celebration of YOUR day of independence, we’re holding our gay pride parade straight through the downtown core.

That is all.

WARNING: RATED “R” FOR TOTALLY “R”ADICAL…and coarse language.

Previously, on Nerd Nexus: http://www.nerdnexus.com/so-i-went-to-this-theme-park-pt-2/

Where was I? Oh right, IN A DARK, POWERLESS, BORING C&C! Well naturally I caught some shut-eye. Not much really happened during the night. Lots of ‘roar’ sounds playing from outside. I wish they’d have shut up, I mean, sleeping on a floor is uncomfortable enough, right? The funny-lookin’ fatass from earlier had hauled out and I guess he was gone. They kept talking about him anyway. “Wayne” this and “Wayne” that. Even ol’ Samuel L., “We can’t get Jurassic Park back online without Wayne Knight.” Oh man, no internets? Now what am I gonna do when you fix the power, play solitaire? Well okay, I’m not gonna lie; Freecell FTW.

...raptor Jesus???

So I’m checkin’ out this sweet-ass lookin’ breakfast that’s probably from yesterday, just layed out waiting for god knows what. Obviously, I tear right into that shit but NOOO, we have to go to some shitty storage bunker and do fuck all for the rest of the day. Great, that sounds like a plan, let’s go, can’t wait. I love dark bunkers with even less to do than here. Can I at least take a crepe?

Samuel L. apparently needed to go off to go fix the power but I don’t see why this needed ALL of us. I mean, if I had it my way, I’d have LEFT already, if I saw like an exit, or a doorway that said “GTFO here”, I’d take it. So far what I’ve seen is graphics that aren’t on-par with Crysis, empty pens with names on them, and a goat. Well okay, two goats, and one of them was very big, not furry, and looked kind of like an iguanagoat. Let’s call ‘im ‘Iggy’. I was one not-happy-camper. (Overnight-stay makes it camping, SHUT UP, I DON’T CARE IF IT WAS A FLOOR!)

Found you! HAHA okay now you go hide.

Now I’m really not one to bitch but… well okay, yes I am. When we get to the bunker, three guesses who gets to leave. That’s right, everyone who’s cool. First Samuel L., then the English mofo and MILF take off (together I might add. Hmm, wonder what’s going on there, eh?). So now I get to chill with Jeff, who’s whining about his straw-allergy, and baldy, whining about his kids: his really annoying bratty kids. Yeah man, I’m sure they miss you too, you and your big fat chequebook.

So it turns out that while MILF and English dude are out, they stumbled across a black guy’s arm. No doubt one of the guys who built the place. I guess these two aren’t privy to Snakes on a Plane though ‘cuz they automatically assumed it was Jackson. Last I checked, he was as tired of these mothafucking dinosaurs on his mothafucking plains, as he was tired of those mothafucking snakes on that mothafucking plane. So yeah, recap. Sam and the annoying kids are out of the way. Wayne Knight went home. Lawyer was dinner. Some poor sap got stuck behind a box and his arm is mistaken for the black-guy equivalent of Chuck Norris.

WAZZUUUUP?

MILF came back, but apparently the English guy left too. Guess he was so bored that he couldn’t take this shit anymore. I don’t blame him, not that sitting around in a bunker isn’t my idea of a great vacation… just maybe with a bit more XBL and internets it might be a TAD better, right? Well anyway, guess who picked the greatest time to show up too? That’s right, Sam with pappy’s grandkids. Yep, that’s just what I wanted to put up with. The next 10 minutes consisted of me sitting in the corner, annoyed while THEY ATE MY F-ING FOOD! WHAT THE EFF! Like come on, I’ve been hungry all morning. You’ve been out in the jungle, why didn’t you eat a pineapple or something? This trip so far – SUCKS, last thing I ate was some awesome super-high class shit in a badass lookin’ dinner hall. That was the day before. This high-class food, it’s like chinese; when you’re done, you’re hungry again in half an hour. Like don’t gemme wrong, it’s AWESOME while you’re eating it, but far LESS awesome when that’s all you’ve had for two days. You’d think with planning like that, they’d put a McDonalds on the island or something.

"A Unix System"? Looks like some Apple crap, iPark, amirite?

At this point I’m gonna stretch out for a moment. At the beginning of this whole ordeal, Sam was talking about some book that he wrote, apparently. Well, the kid was talking to him about it but that don’t matter. ANYWAY, long story short… All the animals on the island are birds. So get this… these two big-ass birds followed the kids into the banquet hall and… wait for it… ARE CHASING THEM AROUND THE KITCHEN! Hahaha, you stupid kids, that’s what you get for touchin’ mah food. You gonna be bird food now, bitches.

The kids got out of that (aw nuts) and we go to the C&C room. Kane was there waiting for us and told us that the time had come for him to end the reign of GDI. The greatest legions of the brotherhood of Nod were standing outside, surrounding our location and… haha no, I’m just fuckin’ with ya. Apparently the locks were broken and now the birds were coming after US. Yeah great, thanks kids, I’d love to be pecked to death today, you’re awesome. So the bratty girl thinks she can fix shit because she’s a script kiddy, “It’s a Unix system, I know this”. Bitch if my computer moved that slow, I’d be using Windows 95. So long story short, it’s a Mac. An old mac, and you’re a n00b. Anyway, she manages to “navigate her way through the commands”, because it lists them all in big blocks that take up way too much space. Come on, I seen DOS computers that were more aff… affishint? than that. Right?

I found out a moment later that this really didn’t mean shit ‘cuz they got in some other way, anyway! Couple of capgun shots later and it was time to climb up into the vents, ‘cuz we just blocked our only way out… yet somehow the birds were getting in anyway. Yeah… that makes sense. Sam kicked the ladder down that we used to climb up and you should’a SEEN the look on the bird’s face. It was all “Yeah so… I don’t fuckin’ care”. pwned, Sam, pwned.

GOATASAUR!

‘pparently the ONLY legit way out at this point is to climb out of the vents… down some big-ass skeleton statues. This is NOT cool. NOT! I forgot t’mention that climbing down statues isn’t really my “4-tay”, so really, this is a pretty embarrassing part of the story. I started out wi-SHIT IT’S SPELT ‘EFFICIENT’! Man, I suck ass at English today. So where was I? Right – there we are at the front door and a couple of the big-ass birds are waiting for us. I guess birds are smart or they know the layout or something, I dunno. Honestly, I think there were more of them waiting for us. Still some big-ass birds in the kitchen, still some big-ass birds at the C&C room, now here’s some more big-ass birds. That is a LOT of big-ass birds! One of them’s creeping up on us in a “Baaaaaam!” pose and then… well, “Bam!”, IGGY COMES OUT OF NOWHERE AND EATS THA’ MOTHAFUCKING BIRD! Iggy man, you so pro, to the maaaaax.

Baldy was waiting for us outside ‘nd he drove us to the choppa. I must say, I haven’t really had a theme park day like this before. I been ‘ta wonderland ‘nd disneyland and flintstone land and they were all pretty different, and all fun in their own way – but in NONE of these places was I ever devoid of a bed to have “fun”. Fuck you, Baldy, go play Kris Kringle in a bad remake, it’ll suit you better.

AND I’M STILL HUNGRY, DAMNIT!

-fin

-Jeff “DanyLektro”

Personal note: Most of the characters in this film I called by the actor’s names. Sam Niel played the wonderful lead, Dr. Alan Grant, for instance. If I didn’t know the actor’s name because I failed to care about the actor, I didn’t mention it. Normally my English is a bit more distinguished than it’s been written here, but of course, I was in character of an idiot, much like yourself. I was very tempted to tag the last photo, “GOATse”.

Article Concept, Construction and Crafting by Havelock

A stranger enters the bar. He is of average hight and build, his hair and colouring are both dark but his bearing holds no menace. As he passes, you detect the memories of smells in the air; exotic spices, sun bleached deserts and the cold salt of all seven seas. He sits and stares at you, around his eyes cracks, wrinkles and lines tell tales of laughter and loss. The deep forest colour of his irises are full of life, hidden within them a keen mind searches your face in a friendly fashion and in that moment your soul is examined carefully. He leans forward in a conspiratorial manner and you turn your head to hear his quiet whisper, “Are you a seeker?”. Confused and intrigued you  can’t stop your head from signalling affirmatively. “Ah” he replies. “I’ve found it” and he tells you…

He sort of looked like this

Finally after months of travel and misadventure I have returned. It has been an arduous quest across the vast surface of our world. I have travelled by every method known to man, and some only previously to women. I have sought answers at the far edges of every field of endeavour in the modern world and have reached back in time to pick through the wisdom of our ancestors. I come back down the mountain bearing  new meanings for the terms Nerd and a Geek.

*Coughs to clear his throat*

“Henceforth, through out the multi-verse and parallel dimensions (they are so hard to park) and for the rest of Time:”

See those 2 electrons on the bottom left? About the distance between them

Nerd shall refer only to those who have developed desirable skills and knowledge in any given area of expertise. It will be a broad spectrum term and hold no negative connotations in any circles. Think about it. People who know sports statics, car model numbers, celebrity relationships status and annual fashions,  all equally seen as important to the people in their relative environments and interest groups. While at the same time not excluding the term’s use in reference to computer literacy, bookish knowledge seekers and the other archetypes nerd is commonly associated with, we will make it inclusive. With this one act we stand closer to uniting the human race in harmony and peace, well only a really tiny bit, like the subatomic scale level of distances, but every little helps.

While Geeks, shall remain a term exclusive for individuals involved in scientific and other erudite pursuits. It is a noble and ancient term, it speaks of the dawn of civilisation and the birth of the idea of Republics and structured debates. A word to remind us of our origins and culture, in the time before the great changes of the early 21st century. That way we still have a badge of identification, keeping the old pacts made in the secret councils of the Elders back in the 1950s between our vast and varied bloodlines. We shall sublet its undesirable aspects upon the laboured and unloved terms, Dork and Dweeb. In this way we shall defuse it, making it the new Black or Gay.

Usually I’d offer people a chance to debate and reflect upon my works. But this is the word of Your Lord and Master. *wink*

-Havelock “the “i”Pad”

This Topic has been on my mind many times but what inspired my to finally write about it was reading a hilarious site called http://clientsfromhell.net/ It’s full of anecdotes from graphic designers and web designers about funny and crazy requests from clients. At least 50% of the posts involve clients trying to scam their way out of paying the designer. The film industry has similar situations. The film industry tries to get as much as they can for free. A lot of the problem is young designers or young people aspiring to go into film don’t realize that they are supposed to be paid for their work. People are spoiled by young people’s ignorance and expect the same from established professionals.  I myself am just entering the film industry and it is true that early in your career there are a lot of things you have to do for free in order to get your name out there, for example I was a PA for a Billy Talent video about a month ago. The problem comes when you get into real skilled work, anyone can be a PA but not everyone has the training and skill to be, for example,  a camera assistant.

This especially applies to anything that involves computers. So many people think that the software does it for you, many don’t realize that it still takes skill training and artistry do design something in photoshop or to edit something in Final Cut and yes editing is art. My brother is a musician and he writes a lot of his music in a program called Cubase. He was talking about it one day to someone and they actually asked him this “So you just push a button and it randomly generates a beat you?” He was extremely angry because it takes many hours of work to write music and pick the right instruments and it is not done automatically.  Same with photoshop, it’s an amazing program and a lot can be done with it but it takes hours of work. Many people don’t understand that pictures are not three dimensional objects you cannot remove a person to see what’s behind them. It sounds kind of ridicules but I’ve met people like that.

I don’t know what ever gave people the idea that designers or film crew should work for free or less than what they’re worth. The reason it costs $400 for a logo design and not $50 is because it takes a designer years and lots of money to:

a) Develop their creativity to come with great ideas for your logo

b) Training in many different programs including photoshop, illustrator, indesign, etc. etc.

c) Develop their artistic talent to actually be able to draw your logo, which isn’t limited to the computer but doing sketches, painting, life drawing and so on.

d) Develop their business skills and to get their name known so people will hire them.

All of this doesn’t even include the time and effort it take to just develop a good logo for you. You are paying for their time, experience, knowledge and creativity and if you think all of that is worth $50 there is something wrong. These things also apply to roll in the film industry. People have accepted that they need to pay for everything except when it comes to art or creative jobs. I wish there was a way to get people to respect the efforts of artists and pay them what they are worth.

Just remember this; Executives don’t work for free and neither do you.

- Geeks Only

WARNING: RATED “R” FOR TOTALLY “R”ADICAL…and coarse language.

Previously, on Nerd Nexus: http://www.nerdnexus.com/jurassic-park-part-1/

Bug in my candy? Get that away from me!

Here we are in these green SUV’s, I don’t know, I guess green’s the new bling or something – and the bratty chick I mentioned? Oh man, she has a couple orgasms over the inter… ackta… viddy… ah, the touchscreen. I’m just sitting here thinkin’ “man, if I want touchscreen, I’ll just get a DS. OLD!”.

So everyone who ISN’T a total fag just gets into the other lime on wheels and we finally get moving. After passing through some giant doors and a rewind-the-VHS-to-watch-it-over-again joke about King Kong, we finally get to the POINT of this whole trip; the wildlife that supposedly isn’t just some 3D-image. Apparently, we’re entering the “Dielofosore-us” pen and wow, what do you know, no pee on the car. No monkeys. No 3D… no nothin’. Srsly, it was trees with bad narration. Like, if you’re gonna pour all this money into a theme park, at least get Morgan Freeman to narrate, right? So yeah, guess you could say “total bull, yo”. In the middle of the road at the next term, half the people get out of the SUVs, probably on account ‘a how bored we were.

RAWR! IMMA GOAT!

We keep going and come across another pen, this one, a bit more open (and with a straw-bathroom. No shitting you, STRAW! They supposed to got big bad wolves in this park and you build a washroom out of straw? Why not just put us in SUVs too! Oh wait..), but guess what? That’s right Sherlock, fuck all shows up. I’ve seen better shows from drunk chicks downtown on a party night. I’ve had more fun playing Daikatana. I’d rather be watching Starship Troopers 2. You get the idea, right?

Anyway, they decide “hey let’s get some of this shit out here”, and we hear Mr. SAMUEL L. MOTHERFUCKING JACKSON tells us this. F’kyeah. When S.L. Jackson’s on the case, ain’t nothin’ gonna piss him off. NOTHIN’! Well, didn’t turn out to be as epic as that. They hit some buttons and a lil’ cage comes up outta the ground. Suddenly we got….. A GOAT! Wait, what? This is your theme park? A goat from a cage in the ground? Gimme Wild Water Kingdom any day. Now they’s got some REAL monsters; 8 year old spoiled kids. HUNDREDS of them! So no shit, we’re sitting here staring at this goat for hours. It starts raining, it gets dark. It’s nighttime, and we’ve been staring at a goat for an hours. Then some real shit starts going down – namely, the power goes down.

"Objects in mirror are closer than they appear."

Now at this point we start contemplating, really, why the shit we all came out here. We’ve seen two empty pens, a giant puppet that we got out of the car for and a goat. I’m really missin’ my COD4 right about now, the adults are borin’ the hell out of me talkin’ about kids. The kids are playing with things under their seat, I guess and making fun of each other. Then I see the lawyer-dude run out to that little straw washroom. I guess all the rainwater finally got to him.

A moment or two passes and we notice that thing just ain’t right now, you know? The cables on the side of the pen start snapping off. One of the polls COMPLETELY unnaturally bends towards one of the SUVs, and then a giant goat crashes through what’s left of the fence and starts “bah”ing. ‘Cept instead of “bah” it’s “RAWR” and instead of “goat”, ‘s more like a big T-Rex, you know like in Turok? Looks pretty real I gotta say, ‘n everyone starts freaking out. They’re scared I guess, I don’t know, no worse than a roller coaster at six-flags. Well, at least until it starts tearing up the other car. I guess that wasn’t really in the description, so I just sat down and watched it all go to hell. It’s a shakedown of the park, I gotta give ‘em feedback, right?

Not sure if want...

So Sam & Jeff actually got OUT of the car and start trying to fuck with the big goat. By the end of it, Sam ended up stuck on the other side of the pen with his goofy hat and Jeff hurt his leg or something ‘cuz he’s allergic to straw. All in all, the BEST part about it was the lawyer.  Caught him sitting on the toilet WITH HIS PANTS UP! I’ll bet he pissed himself or something and was crying. The goat showed him who was boss with that though, haha. I hear some more screaming but then I start to get really peeved because, get this, on top of the HOURS of waiting for the ubergoat to show up, I gotta wait like 10 minutes for them to pick me up in a jeep. What’s wrong, you don’t got a back up generator? CAN’T HANDLE A STORM IN THE TROPICS? Weak, you guys ought be prepared for a storm on a tropical island, seriously, you’ll get one every day or two. “Oh sorry guys, hurricane that we didn’t expect, we gotta close down for the rest of the night. Hope it wasn’t too hard to chopper all the way over here, come back again soon!” Yeah right. Don’t make me sue you.

The English dude in the jeep and that MILF drove me back to the Visitor’s Command Centre again. I tell you, without power, that place sucks a lot more. I’d have killed for a DS, or just a touch-screen ‘interactive’ monitor. (I found out the word, it’s interactive!)

To be continued…

Part III: http://www.nerdnexus.com/so-i-went-to-this-theme-park-pt-3/

–Jeff “DanyLektro”

Sam tries a double-up variation on the classic "pull my finger".

WARNING: RATED “R” FOR TOTALLY “R”ADICAL…and coarse language.

So I went to this theme park on the weekend and lemme tell you, they don’t make them like they used to! I remember when I was just a young man, my babysitter decided to make my weekend fun for myself and her boyfriend’s daughter. Together they took us out in their old Pontiac to African Lion Safari. There, we learned exactly how long a monkey will tease you before it decides to pee on your car. What I wish I’d been old enough to comprehend is just how often these monkeys have to pee, to hit every car during the day!

That was nothing compared to this, though. This older guy, can’t recall his name; Ham-something, invited us out to tour his island while he worked out some of the quirks in their state-of-the-art-fully-automated-system. He said that it had something to do with these big reptiles that died off millions of years ago. Simply put: Yeah right, old man,  and King Kong just got gunned down on top the Empire State.

Samual L. Jackson's running this tour? Man, this is gonna be so Pringles.

We copter’d our way over there and what do you know, some guys named Sam and Jeff were there too, along with a MILF and a lawyer, but he was a wimp so we all kind of just ignored him. I mean, this guy tripped on a toilet stall, let’s just leave it at that. Anyway, the chopper lands and we take these REALLY unexciting jeeps. What do you know? We stop, right smack in the middle of nowhere, and some giant pastel-looking 3D imagery starts stamping around. Now naturally, everyone else was jizzing their pants over this. I guess none of them saw the StarCraft II TV spot: WAY higher-def. I didn’t mind though because John Williams had scored it, no more of that WoW-soundtrack bull that I’m tired of.

Moving on, we got back in the ghetto-jeeps and made our way to the “visitor’s centre”. Now I don’t know where they come off calling it that because this place was the whole command centre and research laboratory. Unless the lab is a walk-in for any scientist who feels like chillin’ then this ain’t no visitor’s centre, this is C&C. Not like the games with that bald guy and Tim Curry, Command and Control. Though according to Star Trek VI it’s also “Commander ‘n Chief” so I think they gotta just pick one, you know? They got the “Command” part pretty much down in all of them but then it’s up to interpretation I guess.

Is that shit? Pretty much sums it up.

So get this, who’s up in the C&C runnin’ this bitch? SAMUAL L. JACKSON, and when you see that guy’s face, man you know nothing ain’t can go wrong, you know? He was tired of these motherfucking glitches in that motherfucking system. There was also some English dude and a fat guy, but who can notice that when you see Mr. Bad Mother Fucker himself, eh? As I was saying, Mr. baldy was taking us on this really terribad ride and it turns out Sam and Jeff would have none of it, so they forced their way out into what’s laughingly called “the lab”. There was some dude with a powerglove in there, moving bad-looking incomplete DNA on an old CRT monitor. It’d be hardcore, like 20 years ago. We chilled in there for a bit while this butt-ugly bird hatched and Jeff started making fun of what the eggheads were apparently doing. Now hey, I’m not one to judge but if you ask me, the best way to make fun of these guys was just point at the powerglove and laugh. Nobody really seemed to listen to him though ‘cuz they were all hung-up on this bird hatchin’ from its egg, I guess ‘cuz for a bird, it was ugly-as-sin! Seriously, I’ve turned down fat chicks prettier than this.

"I go big game hunting for wildlife in captivity, I'm so badass."

Baldy takes us outside for a walk where we run into the English guy again. Must say, he was pretty chill. They dumped a cow into this kinda cage-like thing and I guess the harness was caught or something, because when they pulled it back out (sans cow) it was a wreck. We’re talking Lindsey Lohan after a night of clubbing kind of wreck. I guess it’s all good though ‘cuz they all just laughed it off – except for the chick. She looked like she was going to throw up or something, guess she doesn’t like seeing good equipment go to waste or something. Lunch was some rich-folk food that I just kinda swallowed up while people took pot-shots at each other. Like jeez, guys, grow up. This bald guy’s giving you a free vacation. F-R-E-E, at least thank the old geezer for the food.

On the way back to where we came in, we all found out baldy not only had kids… but his kids had kids. One of them was this REALLY bratty girl (she’s a veggie-tarian, a shut-in, and self-proclaimed hacker. Can you say ‘script kiddie?) and the other was this annoying little.. uh.. “playleontology” dork. I guess that’s like, the study of legos or something. Turns out that none of what we’ve seen so far is the tour, no no, the tour’s all in SUVs on a track, African Lion Safari much? Oh well, least it ain’t my car gettin’ pissed on, am I right?

To be continued…

Part II: http://www.nerdnexus.com/so-i-went-to-this-theme-park-pt-2/

–Jeff “DanyLektro”

I’m diverting slightly from being a total nerd about nerdy things here and I’m instead going to dive into my nerd-level interest in music. Specifically, my nerd-level interest in heavy music. More specifically, my nerd-level interest in heavy metal music. If you don’t care then please, feel free to read on and learn something about one of the most notoriously misunderstood genres of music.

Yum. Crows.

Ozzy Osbourne is probably one of the most recognized frontmen for a band in the last 40 years. Despite his rises and falls from popularity, the familiarity of Ozzy transcends the genre he’s stuck to. 12-year-old ‘gangsta’ kids have heard of Ozzy, California valley-girls have heard of Ozzy, quite hopefully, you’ve heard of him too. Why is he so recognized? Hell if I know, maybe he’s just got charisma. Love him or hate him, just about everyone in the English-speaking world knows his name.

This is unfortunately a problem for him, because you see, nothing Ozzy can do is low-profile by any means. So of course, as soon as he said “I’m releasing another album” and then so rudely fired his guitarist without telling him, sparks flew. I’ve had the opportunity to listen to this new album via the steam on the Ozzy Osbourne MySpace (which you can check out here: http://www.myspace.com/ozzyosbourne) and… well, let’s backtrack for a moment and look at how this came about.

Despite his status as a cultural icon, unless you’re paying attention to Ozzy news specifically, his album releases don’t carry the same weight in the news as his suing Tony Iommi for Black Sabbath royalties. This is mostly due to the fact that none of them have really been all that amazing. When Ozzy fronted Black Sabbath for the first 10 real years of his career, they became something of a legend for a new breed of music, with his face an icon of that legend. His drug abuse and various social issues got him out of Sabbath though and in the 1980s, into his own “solo” band. Calling it “Solo” is a stretch, though. It’s as much a solo band as White Zombie was, everyone contributes. In most cases, everyone contributes more than him. He’s a vocalist and not much else.

In looking at this new release, you have to look to where his main writing influence was before this: Zakk Wylde, Ozzy’s former guitarist whom was fired in full-hollywood-drama fashion, fit best for an episode of Degrassi. Zakk Wylde, better respected as the brains behind the extremely skilled heavy metal act, “Black Label Society”, also hasn’t done much of note in a long time. Essentially, he and Ozzy joined forces and we discovered that artists can only make art when they have the right influences. These two just didn’t have “it” with one another.

So naturally, the part of the world that cared about Ozzy’s releases wondered what the latest Ozzy album could offer, when he announced that Gus G. of Arch Enemy fame had been named his new guitarist. Curiosity is what will sell this album, if nothing else. Originally it was set to be called “Soul Sucka”, which I must say did not turn anybody’s interest on. (Hopefully) because of that, it’s since been renamed “Scream”, after the first single, “Let Me Hear You Scream”.

Egomaniac!

As I’ve been writing this, I’ve been re-listening to it. I guess you could call that a good thing but I don’t know if I’d be content to leave it at that. His voice certainly hasn’t wavered. Ozzy still delivers his vocals with strength and power, while remaining quite melodic. Despite a couple of effects which kind of come with the music industry nowadays, such as multi-tracking and *cringe* even auto-tuning on one of the tracks, it’s still a strong presentation.

The guitarwork? Well… I’m impressed, it’s more metal than I expected (Ozzy albums have a tenancy to come off as rather pop-y), every solo or riff opportunity comes out with writing that can be as heavy as an Arch Enemy album, something that I think Ozzy’s voice is famous for being well-suited to. Taking these two major points in mind, there’s one unfortunate problem…

…it doesn’t work. If Ozzy is doing any of the writing, then he’s writing his own parts, as well as the harmony to go with it. His powerful voice will drift from note to note beautifully, with almost a soft approach in many songs, very melodic. Then you switch over to a heavy guitar riff which is also good, but it’s different. I wouldn’t call it innovative like “Oh, they’re mixing two genres, well-done!”, moreso “Oh.. but that part of the song is this genre… and this part of the song is a different one”.

Don’t get me wrong, I like it, however this album seems like it’ll be the kind of release that metalheads will listen to for the metal parts… then just ignore the rest. This unfortunately is going to slap the album into the same label that most of Ozzy’s releases fall under; forgettable. I might still be listening to it by the end of the month, but when the “Let Me Hear You Scream” single debuted, that only held my attention for about two days.  Ten more tracks? Well, on the bright side, I only disliked one of them. That’s impressive at the very least when the album keeps you listening, right?
Right?

–Jeff “DanyLektro”