zelda + a box of thin mints + procrastination = this
I spent a good part of the weekend playing (and just now finishing) Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, which I got free from pre-ordering the new Gamecube Zelda game. It's quite possibly the best video game that I've ever played, even though it came out about five years ago. Mike and Tammer were by my side as I fought through the half-hour ending battle sequence, shouting out ideas on how to defeat the last boss. I think I need to take a long, long break now...for the past two nights I've had the strangest dreams. They start out normal, you know, me getting chased by a dinosaur or something, and then out of nowhere these yellow lock-on triangles circle around a friend and next thing you know I'm shooting fire arrows at them. Yeah, it's definitely time for a break - at least until The Wind Waker comes out on March 25.
I was thinking about how video games are only growing in popularity and will probably be right up there with movies one day. I remember reading last year that the video game industry makes a heckuva lot more than the movie industry now. With a movie, you're immersed in an escapist world for two or three hours, talk about it with your friends as you leave the theater, and life goes on (well, except for The Ring...television static still scares me. It's out on DVD now; you should check it out). But once you add interaction, movies essentially become video games: a story that you control. I've thought for a while that music should go through this interactivity too. You've heard your favorite song the same way 100 times...who says that it can't change? I'd almost guarantee that future music will take advantage of user control. Sure, okay, there would be one main commercial version of a song. But then the possibilities are endless. Leave out or add certain instruments. Change the arrangement of the verses and choruses, or somehow unlock hidden lyrics or sounds. Listen to what happens when a hardcore goth-rock anthem switches into a bluegrass jamboree. I'm envisioning some digital format beyond a CD that could contain hundreds or even thousands of variations of a single song. And it wouldn't have to be nerdy-technical, although I'm sure that it would appeal to the computer programmer types. You're driving in your car listening to Okay Samurai's "Mosquito", an extended 15 minute version. Your phone rings and your friend tells you to check out preset #354964, so you type in the numbers on your car's audio device. This numerical code selects a certain arrangement with certain instruments in a certain order. Now you're listening to the musical themes of Mosquito developed through orchestral music while a commentary plays about the importance of the fire extinguisher. Artists might spend as much time on one song as an entire album. I mean, even my favorite songs have lost something after a hundred listens, after learning them on guitar and throwing in some variations on my own. You lose that sense of newness and surprise. I think that's why jazz appeals to so many people: the complexity of the arrangements and harmonies (aka not distorted power chords) leads to a unique listening experience. Unless you memorize where every Coltrane note is going to be played, you'll hear something new or familiar each time.
Woah, I really went off on a tangent there. I think I started with video games and somehow ended up with interactive jazz. That's it, no more Zelda.
"Oh No The Radio" (Owsley), "Hurt" (Johnny Cash), "Sing For The Moment" (Eminem), "Conjugate the Verbs" (Enon), "On Our Own" (Bobby Brown), "Invisible Touch" (Phil Collins)
Sunday, March 9 at 2:51 PM
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