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This is a 38-second preview of a music video I shot 1.5 months ago, and it should be completed in December, after we do some necessary re-shoots. The Bay Area artist is Andy Kong, the song is called “Accidental Love Song”, and it’s part of his newly released album “This Beautiful World“.

It was shot with a naked Canon HV20 (just an ND filter was used). The specific “band” scenes you see here were shot in PF24 (at 1/48), but the rest of the video actually has cut-scenes of a little background story we put together. The cut-scenes were shot in 60i, interpolated to 60p, and then slowed-down to 24p (2.5 times).

Edited with Sony Vegas Pro 9, Cineform removed pulldown to 24p, and the following plugins were used: AAV ColorLab, Color Corrector, and a custom Magic Bullet template.

Finished watching The Prisoner’s 2009 remake last night. A total of six episodes, starring Ian McKellen (as 2) and Jim Caviezel (as 6). Spoilers below.

The cinematography and pacing was good throughout the six episodes. It starts with 6 finding himself in the desert and getting back to this seemingly idealistic “Village”. The people there have accepted that there’s nothing beyond the village, that there’s no other world beyond it. During the six episodes, No 2 is trying to break No 6, to make him believe that there’s nothing beyond the Village. However, unlike most of the others who only have dreams relating to other places, No 6 has clear as day memories of his New York life that happens in parallel to his Village life. Naturally, he tries to break free of it, but he can’t. No 2 is the authority in the Village, and he’s got a son and a comatose wife. The Village is not a nice place in reality: everyone’s spying on everyone else, people are getting abducted or getting killed if they are reported. The idealistic nature of the Village is only skin deep.

At the end, is revealed that the Village is not a real place, but a subconscious (or other state of consciousness) level, ran by the brain of No2’s real-life wife in New York, who’s a scientist and creator of psychotropic drugs. The other inhabitants of the village are random NY people, most of them employees of Summakor, the corporation that real-life No2 leads (and that No6 recently resigned from). Summakor runs this project supposedly to help these people, who are all chosen to occupy the village since they lead a troubled real life. So basically, the Village acts as a restrain of the subconscious mind in order to control unwanted behavior of the real life person.

Some people were not happy with this resolution, that the Village is not a real place, but I like it just fine. I think it’s sci-fi enough, and pretty interesting too. Others were unhappy because the series was not like the original ’60s series. Personally, I don’t care about this at all, I review this series on its own merits, as an individual work of art. My problem with the series is elsewhere.

My problem is with the ending. No2 is blowing himself into pieces in order to free himself from the Village’s plane of existence, just as 313 (6’s romantic interest in the series) takes a special pill that makes her real life NY counterpart the new “brain server”, rather than No2’s wife. Now, No2’s wife is not comatose anymore (she was comatose in both lives, because her brain was needed at 100% operation in order to run the Village), and 313/Sarah is. At the very end, 6 is trying to make the Village a better place (in the Village life), and he’s accepted back a higher ranking job at Summakor (in his NY life). The last thing we see in the series is 313 crying, and we don’t know if it’s because of happiness because 6 will indeed try to make the Village a better place, or because 6 has turned, without realizing it, into the new 2: a tyrant.

See, this is a very unsatisfactory ending. We spent 5.5 episodes seeing 6 fighting the status quo and rebel against the tyranny. Even just 20 minutes before the ending the NY counterpart of 6 was questioning the ethics of running such a project. Are we to believe that just like that 6 accepted the Village for what it is and decided to stay in it? Why? Just because of a woman? And was No2’s plan all along to get 6 to accept the Village and be part of it, even if 6 had full knowledge of the other world? In other words, was the whole thing a trap, to find a new boss for the Village? A new boss who while he knew of the truth he would choose to stay?

I just find it stupid knowing the truth and not killing yourself to get out of it. Regardless if there’s a woman involved or not. Made no sense to me. Or is this an allegory for “yeah, you’re young, you’re rebellious, and then you get married, and your life is over“. Because honestly, that’s the only “deeper message” I got out of the series. Or are we, the viewers, to believe that such an experiment with people’s minds “is a good thing” and that’s why 6 accepted it? I personally don’t see anything good with it, it’s evil. Especially since none of these people volunteered for it!

What should have been done instead was the NY 6 destroying all computers and maybe even No2’s wife in order to end the Village. That’s what any sane person would have done. Instead, (a pretty confused throughout the series) No 6 becomes a conformist himself, in both lives. Or was 6 brought into the Village in order to tame/conform him, a subconscious development that subsequently controlled his NY counterpart to accept the job as the new high ranking exec of Summacor? Is this how that corporation hires people, by manipulating their employees’ morality in their subconscious level first? Most people do conform later in their lives, so I guess the ending does mirror real life.

Regardless, the ending just felt unsatisfactory as it left a negative, hopeless mental let-down to the viewer. And the writing was particularly confusing at the end. This is a series that could have been done a bit better if the story and subplots were spelled out a bit clearer with less over-done “artsy” cuts like the ones at the end of each episode. Less surrealism please in the last 5 minutes. Thank you.

Reza Productions just posted on Vimeo the full short movie they shot last March with a bare-naked Canon HV30. In my opinion, it’s on the best top-5 of all the HV short films shot so far: it’s color graded well, light and photography is great, it’s cut pretty well, and the director was smart to setup his shots in a way that by zooming-in he would introduce some slight shallow depth of field. Shallow enough to make this short movie to look very “filmic”, as in “movie-like“. I am very impressed by the look he got out of his naked HV30. Download the 1080p HD version here.

This short movie proves that HV’s 1/2.7″ sensor & semi-fast lens are enough in most cases, if you know how to light & shoot properly. From all the gadgets I’ve bought over the last 2.5 years to feed my filmmaking hobby, the 35mm adapter was the most useless one. Except the initial test with it, after it arrived on my doorstep, I never used it to shoot anything. I wasn’t happy with the vignetting, the loss of resolution and stabilization, the bulkiness, the difficulty of actually shooting with it. Instead, I learned how to maximize my camera’s ability to achieve a shallow-enough-for-my-purposes DoF. Even a tiny bit of shallow DoF is enough to get rid of the “video look”. You don’t need massive amounts of it! The latest music video I shot has some pretty shallow DoF at times, and it’s shot with a bare HV20 too. Here are two snapshots from it:

I believe that most of the videographers who bought a 35mm adapter are misguided. Except maybe a handful of HV videos shot with a 35mm adapter on Vimeo (out of about 500 such videos watched so far), the majority are just shaky “tests”. Sure, there are situations that very shallow DoF looks better, but I am personally just not sold on it. There are more important things on a video than blurriness. And I am not willing to lose so much just to get blurriness. In fact, now that I have a 5D MarkII, I will do my best to keep shallow DoF under control.

Last night, the new sci-fi show “V”, had a major dip in the ratings (from 13+ mil in the pilot, to 10.6 mil for the second episode). The only way from here is the bottom, just like any other genre show lately on TV: Dollhouse got canceled today too. FlashForward’s and Heroes’ ratings are a disaster too. Except Lost and BSG, no other genre shows have seen an actual return in their investment in the last few years, and a date for a natural, non-abrupt ending.

So what’s wrong with sci-fi shows? Why are bullshit like NCIS get over 16 million viewers, and genre shows hit rock bottom within few weeks of airing? Here are the reasons why, in my opinion:

1. The writers are buffoons

Except the two main LOST writers, I have been personally disappointed with all other writing teams on TV. None of these people have the vision, drive, and money to create an epic franchise of a show, rather than going to work 9-5, sitting behind a desk, and simply rehash whatever we’ve already seen on TV the last 60 years.

Add to that their scientifically weak plots, which drives the younger generations (who actually gone to college and they know that there’s no sound in space) away. Sci-Fi has to be “hard sci-fi” in this day and age. Having Flash Gordon-type bullshit doesn’t work anymore.

I think that the networks need to employ young writers. Just like Damon Lindelof was inspired by Twin Peaks and brought LOST a step further at 31 years old, the networks should find new writers, who have been inspired from *recent* shows, like LOST, and then try to innovate and bring their own shows one step further.

In other words, sci-fi writing must have innovation in the story telling method and plot, backed with hard sci-fi. And it has to be epic. Complex stories with many characters involved. Small stories about a small group of characters that no one cares about when there are bigger fish to fry (just like in V), just won’t work anymore.

2. Young people don’t watch much TV anymore

Oh, don’t get me wrong. Americans watch more TV than EVER before. Almost 5 hours a day (God help us, although I recently read that Greece is SECOND in that list!!!). But it’s the youngsters, the important 18-49 year old demographic that advertisers are after, that actually watch less. With the booming of the Internet, people spend a lot of their free time browsing (and not necessarily YouTube), rather than watching TV. And it’s that demographic that usually watches sci-fi shows.

3. Money

There’s a reason why LOST was so successful originally. Its 2-episode pilot cost in the excess of $14 mil, more than any other TV show before, or after. But the reality is, to create an epic show, with lots of characters and elaborate sets, you need money. Normal TV shows usually get between $1 and $3 million per episode to shoot, and unless you move to the cheaper Vancouver studios to shoot, or you only get uknown actors, your budget won’t be enough to create a truly great pilot to hook your viewers up. LOST hooked people mostly with its first 4 episodes for example.

4. No space ships

The last “space”-based sci-fi show on network TV was Firefly (BSG was on cable). That was 2003. Since then, we are fed with daytime-like soaps that happen to have sci-fi elements in them (e.g. the terribly dull Dollhouse). That’s just not enough to inspire the sci-fi crowd.

See, science fiction is mostly liked by people who try to look at the big picture, the future. They are idealists, visionaries. Therefore, offering them a soap with some sci-fi elements in it, just won’t work anymore.

5. People aren’t into sci-fi anymore

The truth is that NASA hasn’t exactly inspired people in the last 20 years. Their new spaceships look like ass, and are crammy as hell. All this make people not want to have lots to do with the whole space thing. Laugh it all you want, but it’s a factor. Why do you think Apple is selling like crazy?

Here are some indie bands that I believe deserve more popularity. They make beautiful music, and at least 2-3 of them break new ground. Except for one of the following bands, I found out about them through their promotional free mp3s (Malbec, I found them through the Canon HV20 community). So I decided to return the favor and spread the love. If you like their music as I do, please buy their albums to support their work too.

Disclaimer: No songs are stored on this server, and no copyright infringement is intended. The sole purpose of this article is informational. I did my best possible to make sure that the songs linked are legal, stored on official artist/label/PR sites or on music/promotional sites that have the required distribution rights. If you represent one of the labels or artists found below and would like me to stop linking to your songs for some reason, please contact me.

* Cloud Cult
Description: One of the best bands of all time, in my opinion. On their latest record they play some very accessible… experimental music. It’s a fusion of classic, rock, folk, all in one. No one else makes music like this.
Mp3s:
- The Tornado Lessons
- Everybody here is a Cloud
- When Water Comes to Life
- Journey of the Featherless
- Lucky Today
- Take your medicine
- Chemicals Collide

* Longwave
Description: A great shoegazing band. They had a contract with a major, they lost it for not selling well, and then they release independently their best album ever. Each and every song on their latest album could be a huge hit if it had the right backing.
Mp3s:
- Secrets are Sinister
- No Direction
- Theres a Fire
- Everywhere You Turn

* Portugal. The Man
Description: An Alaskan band that moved to Portland to hunt their musical dreams. Through the years they went through various experimentation stages and they often introduced brand new takes on existing genres. This is a band that can hop between genres without effort. I highly recommend you buy “The Devil”, and “How the Leopard Got Its Spots” tracks btw.
Mp3s:
- Shade
- People Say
- AKA M80 the Wolf
- And I
- Out and In and In and Out
- The Sun
- The Woods
- Ruby Magic
- Sapphire Magic

* Living Things
Description: Now, this is real rock! Hard, provocative, entertaining. You will love all three of the tracks! Their singer is my kind of guy: he says it like it is.
Mp3s:
- Oxygen
- Mercedes Marxist
- Let It Rain

* Malbec
Description: An LA band with a beautiful and very accessible electro-pop/rock sound. Their music videos (that they shoot by themselves) are wicked too!
Mp3s: (16 songs)
- The Answering Machine, EP1
- The Answering Machine, EP2
- The Answering Machine, EP3
- The Answering Machine, EP4
- The Answering Machine, EP5

* Loquat
Description: Beautiful indie pop/rock from the Bay Area. “Swingset chain” is one of my all-time favorite songs. The version linked below is not the one that ended up on their album though (the album version is a bit nicer).
Mp3s:
- Swingset Chain
- Harder Hit

* The Rosebuds
Description: Another indie pop/rock band (a husband and wife). Very atmospheric, amazing melodies.
Mp3s:
- Leaves Do Fall
- Life Like
- Get Up Get Out
- Blue Bird
- Kicks In The Schoolyard

* Wiretree
Description: Indie pop/rock with a very distinctive guitar sound. Their “Big Coat” song linked below is one of my favorite songs ever.
Mp3s:
- Big Coat
- Back in Town
- Satellite Song

* Glint
Description: A relatively young NY band with easy-listening pop/rock. Good ratio of good songs on each of their albums/EPs.
Mp3s:
- Freak

* The Rural Alberta Advantage
Description: A very nice indie folk/rock Canadian band.
Mp3s:
- Frank Ab
- Don’t Haunt This Place

* Sin Fang Bous
Description: A very interesting experimental folk singer from Iceland. I suggest you buy the “Melt Down the Knives” track from his first album, excellent track.
Mp3s:
- Catch The Light

* Black Gold
Description: A new indie pop/rock band from Brooklyn. Their latest album, “Rush”, is well worth listening to.
Mp3s:
- Detroit

We watched the remake of “V” tonight on ABC. I’ve only watched bits and pieces from the original TV series, but this is besides the point, since this is supposed to be a full reboot of the show.

So basically, “V” is mediocre at best.

The problem is that the episode felt rushed and disconnected. It felt like a 2 hour pilot, cut into 1 hour. Things just go too fast and we don’t have the time to really see the reactions of the world on this new major situation.

Adding to that is the unbelievable behavior of people towards the aliens. When the original message off of the spaceship is done, everyone claps their hands and welcomes the new world order. If that was a real life scenario, people would just panic and loot everything in front of them. No one in their right mind would believe that message of peace. Or when that anti-V terrorist finds out that his old friend is actually alien he seems to accept it and go on by his business instead of showing even a small shred of disapproval.

And, oh, did I say “aliens”? Sorry about that. It’s “Vs” (pronounced vees), or “Visitors”. No one is calling them what they really are, aliens that is. Apparently ABC had a problem making it an alien show, of fear of alienating housewives (get it?).

Finally, there was very little mystery left in the series after the first 45 minutes. Two guys already getting revealed as aliens instead of one of them, or none. The show feels like it’s a cold-told tale of things happening to a few people we care nothing about rather than adding mystery, and making it a high-impact plot to the whole of the planet (we need to SEE it rather than just brush it off like nothing happened and accept the new world order out of thin air). Where is the UN and US government and military of the world in all this? UN got referenced but we see nothing that went on in that building.

Overall, just like “Flash Forward”, and “Heroes” before that, “V” is a good idea with a bad implementation. I don’t understand how some people can screw up a production so much. I wonder if the only talented TV writers left in the world are Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof. At least these two guys can only screw up romantic plots, but when it comes to action/mystery/thrill, they know their shit.

Update: New York Times’ review got it right too.

Back in April I wrote a blog post about what solution would be ideal to feed our 65 GB of music library to our main speaker-set and amplifier. There was nothing that was doing exactly what we needed to do, so we were thinking of buying a second 400 CD-changer appliance, to fill it with our existing CDs and burned iTunes purchases.

The Sonos system was also discussed as a possible solution, but we were not happy with the fact it could not hold our library in the device itself, and needed constant streaming. We were not looking for a streaming system, but on a device that could hold all of our music in its internal drive, and get easily updated when we need it to.

Eventually, we added an intermediate step. We held back from the 400 CD-changer purchase, and bought a 120 GB iPod Classic with an Apple dock that featured a line-out. The problem with that solution is that we could not see what the heck was playing in the iPod’s 2.5″ screen while we were sitting on the couch, 2.5 meters away. Not to mention that for some reason the “back” key on the remote for the dock did not work with the Classic. Add to that the fact that the iPod line-out audio quality was below par (low volume compared to other input sources in our amplifier), and so sooner than later we were again in the market for a solution. Our Zune 120 GB and its dock had the similar usability/volume problems btw.

What made us root for the AppleTV was its “Remote” application for the iPhone/iPodTouch. There we are now, sitting on our couch, using the exact same UI as in the iPod Touch’s amazing music UI to control our AppleTV. We don’t even have to turn ON the HDTV to control it, it’s headless (that was one of our requirements)! We simply turning it ON once using its remote, then the iPod Touch’s “Remote” application takes over for the music control, and when we need to turn it OFF we just use the AppleTV remote again (long press on the play button puts the AppleTV on standby). Audio quality is punchy, CD-quality, much better than the iPod/Zune dock’s line-outs.

So far, so good! Only thing missing from the “Remote” app is the ability to rate songs (the UI is there but the rating mechanism is not implemented — maybe it comes in a future version)!

I don’t use the AppleTV for video playback, since the Sony PS3 is a much better solution for that (better support for formats and 1080/30p). But it’s perfect for our music, and maybe even for some streaming internet radio (new feature in the AppleTV 3.0 firmware).

Some have suggested that we could use a small laptop/PC with MPD in it, but there is a certain installation/configuration/annoyance associated with that. Turning ON the laptop/PC from standby would require to physically go close to the device, and then we would have to use MPD remote applications that simply don’t have the elegance of an Apple-designed app. Instead, the AppleTV just works, and we are able to _easily_ sync it with our iTunes installation too. That’s a major bonus since we use iTunes. Even more interestingly, the AppleTV is *cheaper* than a dedicated small laptop/PC running MPD.

So basically, for us at least, the “Remote” application is what made the whole difference for us, not necessarily the AppleTV itself. It’s one of these times that a side-project like that app is, brings value to other products!

Here’s a list of science fiction-themed or simply scifi-titled songs found on my iTunes library. The songs listed were released in the last 3 year period, and for the ones that have a link there’s a free, legal, download too. Enjoy them just as the uber-geek yours truly is.

* Cage the Elephant – Tiny Little Robots
* Radiohead – Bodysnatchers
* Asobi Seksu – Walk on the moon
* Deastro – Greens, Grays, and Nordics
* The Moog – You Raised A Vampire
* My Robot Friend – Robot High School
* The Faint – The Geeks Were Right
* Fighterpilot – Astronaut
* Golden Bloom – Doomsday Devices
* Blitzen Trapper – Sci-Fi Kid (my favorite song on this list, don’t miss it)
* Girls are Robots – Girl, you are a Robot
* Maritime – For Science Fiction
* The Killers – Spaceman
* MGMT – Of Moons, Birds & Monsters
* Muse – Supermassive Black Hole
* Muse – Knights Of Cydonia
* Kanye West – RoboCop
* Thriving Ivory – Alien
* Shiny Toy Guns – Major Tom (2009 version)
…and an oldie…
* Orchestral Manoeuvres In the Dark – Walking On the Milky Way

I decided to enter the Ubuntu Free Culture Showcase competition last June, and apparently I won! A small QVGA OGG version of the following video will be part of Ubuntu’s Creative Commons showcase in the new distro version, under the “examples” folder (there is a 2.5 MB limit, that was the real challenge). The bulk of my videos are licensed under the liberal Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, and I hope more videographers do so too.

This is the first time I ever won anything, and it’s a pretty good feeling, since I felt a bit beaten down the last few days, after my music video shoot last weekend (apparently we need to re-shoot some scenes with the artist and possibly re-cast our female model).

Anyways, many thanks to the Ubuntu team! Can’t wait for the new release (my husband switched to Ubuntu recently too, in both his work PC, and at home currently).

I am spending way too much time hunting down legally free independent alternative rock music, but it’s paying off: I now have about 2,000 such songs in my library. About 50% of them have 3 stars in my iTunes library, 30% have 4 stars, and about 20% have 5 stars. Here’s how I find them: every morning, I visit the following sites to preview their legal, free download collection:

- StereoGum
- Better Propaganda
- AOL Spinner
- RC.RDBL
- FingerTips
- InSound
- KEXP Radio
- PitchFork
- PureVolume
- Daytrotter Sessions
- HearYa Sessions

And then of course, if you would like to go cherry pick the best songs yourself manually, there’s the various artist’s official web sites, and indie labels that usually host loads of mp3s, like SubPop, Vagrant, Matador, Merge, etc etc. And finally, there are the PR companies, like IODA, Beggars, Tool-Shed and many more! Yup, all legal, and most of it, exceptional!

After missing both their shows in the Bay Area back in April, JBQ and I caught up with Blitzen Trapper in San Francisco, Sunday night, at The Independent venue. Aside from having our hair smelling like pot (or something) at the end, we had a great time during our stay (at least I did). The sound at The Independent was definitely better than it was at the Cafe du Nord venue a few months ago.

I had my first big personal surprise right after walking in. We decided to sit toward one of the sides, next to another random couple. I kindly said “hi”. And the guy replied “Hi, Eugenia”.

WTF ???

My first thought was that I had a tag with my name, I so quickly gazed through my breasts. Nope. No tag. At that point my face probably looked like a surprised LOLcat.

“Chris McKillop“, the guy said. Suddenly it all made sense. Chris and I have been geeking out online for many years about OS stuff when I used to write for OSNews.com (Chris has worked for QNX, Apple’s iPhone, and he’s now at Palm working on WebOS) but I had never met him in person. I had even interviewed Chris back in 2003, when he was still working for QNX. 10 seconds in, I remembered reading once that he’s also a fan of the Trappas. I asked him how he recognized me, and he said that… I look the same as in my Facebook picture (I am sure it’s my crazy witch-hair ).

To make the long story short, the world is a very small place.

Later, I bought a Blitzen Trapper t-shirt, since ther was no new tour CD available. Drew Laughery (keyboards) was a very sweet person to talk to. Later, I quickly talked to Erik Menteer (guitar/keys) telling him that their Black River Killer video was amazing. He said that no more videos are planned for the Furr album, as the band will now focus on their next one. Both Drew and Erik were very kind and cool to talk to.

20 minutes later, the supporting band, the Wye Oak, took the stage. They sang about 5-6 songs, which were pretty good, but not exactly exceptional. Except “Take it In”, their main hit (free, legal download), and their last song, the rest kind of felt flat to me — not enough melodic variation. JBQ liked them more than I did. One thing is for sure, Andy Stack should be given a medal for being able to play the drums with one hand and one foot, the keyboards with the other hand, and either supporting vocals or using woodwind instruments with his mouth! A true instrumentalist super-hero.

Then, when the Trappas took the stage, I moved directly below the stage, and they rocked my world. The band started very strongly with two very hard rock songs, and then they became a bit more folky and mellow. The band obviously had fun, and joked around a lot.

In between of one of these songs I professed my love for the band’s leader & singer, Eric Earley, by yelling his name, sending him a kiss and winking at him. He saw me that one time, and he cracked a smile, hehe. I’ve been infatuated with his genius since earlier this year when I read that he was homeless (I guess my motherly instinct took over).

My impression of the Trappas in the South Park universe! Click for a larger version.

Going back to the gig, the Trappas have amazing energy on the stage. Towards the end, where they played mostly rock songs, the audience went wild. However, both JBQ and I agreed that the middle part of the gig, where Eric did a few mellow folk solos, were the weak part of the experience. Eric Earley is an amazing writer and performer (his vocal range is amazing), but the mellow stuff took too long. In my opinion, only Black River Killer and Furr of that bunch should have been performed, and the rest of the songs should have been a selection of their more hard rock feel. If the crowd’s reactions are any indication, I think most would agree with me.

At some point Marty (guitar) started singing a capella, and that was much fun. Then, Marty asked the crowd which song they would like to listen, so I yelled: “Sci-fi Kid”. Yup, that request was mine!!! Eric started playing the song, and then the unthinkable happened: he forgot the lyrics and he stopped the song! Oh my! See, the band doesn’t play that song live anymore, and that’s a big shame. Sci-fi Kid is my favorite song of the Trappas (with Gold for Bread coming second), and I believe that if they were to write more such songs they would become super-stars, since these two songs are more modern-sounding than their usual ’70s-styled music.

I was able to take video snippets from about 1/3 of the gig, but then the Independent’s staff asked me to turn off my camera. Oh, well, their loss. “Independent” my ass.

There was also one brand new song that the Eric performed (”The Man Who Would Speak True“), which I thought it was pretty good. However, I believe that the song could be produced in a way that sounds more modern, and by using harsh electric guitars in the chorus instead of the harmonica. If the final album version uses the harmonica like with Furr, I believe that this can be one big loss for the Blitzen Trapper in terms of winning out the alternative rock stations/fans.

Towards the end, the tempo picked up again with hard rock, and the crowd went crazy. Overall, this was the best live experience I had in my life so far. I love the energy the Trappers bring on the stage, and I hope their next album makes them even more successful. Catch them up if they are coming to your town, they worth the attention!

“LOST” is in the end of its life (last season starts this February), so ABC is hard at work trying to find the show that will replace it. Apparently, while “LOST” doesn’t have as many viewers as some other shows, it is very consistent with the 18-49 demographic, which is what brings money in to TV networks. Plus, its DVDs sell very well, despite being one of the most torrented shows in the world, and all its episodes being available for free HD viewing on abc.com and Hulu.

So the show that is set to supposedly replace LOST in the the hearts of us geeks, is “Flashforward“. The first episode aired tonight, puts forward the story for a strong mythology, mysteries, conspiracy and other theories, and of course, personal drama. The first season storyline is building up on the fact that the whole Earth population blacks out for 2:17 mins, and during that time they have a lucid vision of themselves 6 months in the future. The main hero, an FBI agent, tries to put the pieces together.

At this point though, the similarities to LOST are too great to ignore:
- The show starts with a major catastrophe, with the first scene being the main character waking up in this chaotic situation (just like Lost’s Jack woke up in the jungle and ran towards the fallen plane).
- Just like the polar bear on Lost, Flashforward features a kangaroo! A kangaroo out of nowhere running amok in downtown LA.
- Towards the end of the episode, a guy in black, shown to be unaffected by the universal blackout. This guy is the equivalent of the “smoke monster” on Lost, also shown at the end of the Lost pilot episode.
- Two Lost actors have been recruited on Flashforward (Lost’s Penelope and Charlie).
- The show asks philosophical questions about destiny; Lost has dealt with the concept greatly too.
- Heck, there was even a big sign of the Oceanic Airlines in the beginning of the episode, ABC’s way of paying homage to LOST!

Unfortunately, Flashfoward’s pilot doesn’t come close to Lost’s pilot in terms of sets, directing, intensity. It’s a good pilot, but not a masterpiece. The main problem is that apart the main character, the rest of the characters are not as interesting or strongly defined as Lost’s — they feel flat. There’s no Sawyer, there’s no Hurley, there’s no mysterious Locke sitting at the beach not talking to anyone and only smirking away! There are just a bunch of people acting as they would in any other drama. LOST on the other hand, clearly defines its characters from the get go — they feel unique.

Additionally, the main cast seem to be comprised by 14 people, the same amount of actors as in Lost’s first season, however, Lost has a gazillion of supporting actors via flash-backs/forwards/other, enriching the show greatly. Flashforward instead, seems to rely mostly on these 14 characters and very rarely is going to add any more important characters to it. This can make the show feel “smaller” and its plot less significant than the global ramifications it should actually communicate to the viewer. The story should be more epic.

Another thing that bothered me was that the show was not as smart as Lost. For example, when the main character lied to his wife that “he saw nothing else in his vision”, the director/editor shows (again, for a 3rd time in 30 minutes) the part of his vision where he relapses and becomes an alcoholic again. If that was Lost, the viewer would have to figure out what was what in that scene and what was insinuated, rather than having the editor spelling it out for us like we are 5 year old. There were 2-3 more such scenes that Lost would have dealt differently in terms of writing/directing/editing.

Overall though, the first episode definitely made me want to watch more. It is the best new show I’ve watched this fall season so far, and I expect it to stay that way until LOST starts again in February. However, many viewers already complain about how to sustain this plot and keep it interesting: apparently, its writers have said that they have already plotted away 5 seasons for the show. They know where they are going, and most importantly, they have an end date: which is super-important in serialized shows like this (as Lost proved).

I only pray that the show doesn’t become too much of a drama — as was hinted by one of its actors recently — and retains the mythology, action and mystery.

Two months ago I wrote an opinion piece about this decade not having a defining artist with enough music influence to compare to monsters of rock of the previous decade. I know some of you disagreed with the opinion, and the rest completely missed the point. But I am now revisiting the topic, since there are some interesting articles discussing this same issue. Their writers also feel that there is indeed an “issue” with today’s oversaturated music industry.

Refe wrote an article here, published a response from an industry veteran here, and that same veteran wrote an article of his own here. The consensus seems to be that there is indeed a “problem” in this decade pinpointing new genres or influential artists that take the world by storm (rather than being niches). As the internet age is trying to define itself musically, the culture itself takes a hit. Maybe it is a social sign o’ the times. Please read these articles before commenting below.

And please let me rant a bit more, this time about Muse’s brand new album, “Resistance“. It sounds exactly like Queen did in the ’70s and ’80s. The album sounds like a bad cover of Queen (many others have noticed too, and one music reviewer even made fun of the fact). Now think about it: if a “progressive rock” band (that was the definition of Muse’ sub-genre so far) is copying a 30 years old band, how progressive is that? Obviously, not much. I can see the rotten state of music perfectly through the new music of Muse. It is to me a perfect example or irony.

I wonder if and when the internet age re-shuffles itself and the dust is settled down, maybe the new major genre we might look at would be electro-rock. Think of bands like the Passion Pit, Metric, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, MGMT. This genre encompasses electronic, dancy pop-disco melodies, and rock. It is accessible enough to pop audience, still has rock elements to appease the rockers, and it uses electronic samples which are in line with the internet and computer revolution (each generation uses whatever tools it can to make music, and electronic is today’s main tool). This is the only genre that I see as emerging right now as one that has enough strength to become ultra-popular. If this genre fails too to create major artists (e.g. the way grunge had Nirvana as its poster boys), I don’t see light at the end of the tunnel for music.

Then again, as Refe wrote, maybe the true legacy of this decade is to have true variety, through many niches of genres and artists. And maybe that’s a good thing — just different from what we were used to before.