Get Lamp is a documentary about text adventure games from Jason Scott, the director of BBS: The Documentary. Both of these films cover some rather geeky areas of computing, but, having read Twisty Little Passages, I was much better acquainted with the world of interactive fiction.The film is based almost entirely on interviews with various I.F. luminaries. These interviews focus more on the individuals’ personal connections with interactive fiction rather than a more direct history of the genre. Of all the types of video games, text adventures are about as close as a game can get to being an art form, and the film explores this notion in quite some depth. Personally, I think preferred the bonus footage (which fills an entire second DVD) to the main feature because these went a little more off into more niche areas of the topic with which I was less familiar. For the main film, I guess I would have liked to see more historical material and less talking heads. Throughout the interviews Scott has a habit of dropping to a black screen while the audio continues. Why not throw up some old photos, game art , or anything to make the film more visually interesting. Well, I suppose talking is the cinematic equivalent of text output. So, I guess this isn’t a huge complaint.
What you see pictured here is some of the DVD packaging for the independently produced documentary film about text adventure games, Get Lamp. In the digital age, packaging matters and the creators of Get Lamp went above and beyond in creating a DVD package that satisfies collectable object fetishists like myself. The inner gatefold sleeve is covered with a nostalgic fantasy illustration that looks like it came straight off of an Atari 2600 cartridge. The DVD also came with a fancy numbered and editioned coin (mine’s number 1540), which would seem kind of cheesy (alá the tin coin that came Ultima V) but is actually very well crafted and, dare-I-say cool. All this comes together in a well made cardboard DVD case that alone almost justifies the $40+ dollar price tag. Thankfully, the film is very good and, as one might expect, the discs contain the usual DVD extras, featurettes and bonus footage. As an added reward, you also get a nice selection of actual, playable games on the DVD -ROM partition of the disc. If you have any interest in text adventures, video games and computing history, you should check this out! More on the film itself later.
Add to my slowly growing list of technical capabilities (in addition to Puzzle Quest Maester and lawn mowist) Motion Graphics Artist.The last couple of days of work have been spent making a video presentation for a major northeastern Illinois power company. I’ll let you guess to which company I am referring. Video is pretty fun to work with but it is somehow physically exhausting. Perhaps it is just the strain of having to listen to stock audio over and over again. In any event, I now want to get a newer version of After Effects. Good times.
I went in to this film ready to hate it but it wasn’t that bad. It follows the same themes as Up with a cranky old man warming up to the joy of children. But, unlike Up, there is a dash of dark humor in the lead character which leads to the audience rooting on the side of crankiness and evil. I kind of wish there was more of an Addams’ Family vibe through to the end of the film but, of course, they had to make it all heartwarming just like every other animated film that Hollywood cranks out.
Lester Peabody is an excellent finger-picking guitarist from Finland. His technical ability is absolutely amazing. At times he sounds like Jimmy Bryant, other times Chet Atkins. My ear for this type of music isn’t trained enough to distinguish if Lester brings anything unique to the style, but all-in-all is a rather enjoyable listen.
A nice little collection of Les Paul & Mary Ford. As one might expect, Lots of fast harpsichord sounding guitars and multi-tracked everything. Paul’s music can sound a bit like a tech demo at times. But there are also quite a few slow numbers which my my daughter refers to as “night time music.”
Ministry with Ian MacKaye on vocals. Pretty much sounds like all of the Ministry side projects of that era. Better than later era Fugazi in my opinion.
This is one of the first CDs I ever bought. I really have no idea what I was thinking at the time because it’s kind of lame. I guess I have to remember that in 1987 there weren’t that many cool bands releasing their records on CD (at least not at Musicland in the Northwoods mall where I would make my ill-informed music consumer decisions). The shelves were stocked mostly with The Beatles and your typical major label pop groups—in the absence of “Ringo” on drums, I’m pretty sure The Other Ones fall into the latter category. Perhaps I am being somewhat harsh because they aren’t really that bad. The single “Holiday” is probably what drove me to buy this CD and it is about as upbeat as a song can get. This single, like the rest of the CD, is awash with late 80’s digital synths and chorus-y guitar effects. With my love of cheesy horror soundtracks, I actually am turning back on to this sound these days, but the problem is that they tend to fill the rest of the disc with ballads. “We Are What We Are” is good, and I could see myself slow dancing the night away to this song but I would have preferred more tracks like “Holiday.” It’s hard to believe that one of the members of this group went on to create the legendary, thumping techno-soundtrack to Run Lola Run. Also, as an aside, this is the most valuable CD in my entire collection. I see it selling for nearly $100 for a used copy on Amazon.com!
This CD compiles all the Oblivians’ Sympathy for the Record Industry records on one CD. There are quite a few “hits” here including “I’m Not a Sicko There’s a Plate in my Head” and “Memphis Creep.” The Oblivians play noisy, minimal, rootsy (but not retro) sounding punk rock. They are one of the few 90s era garage bands that still holds up. Listening to this again I am surprised by how similar Greg O’s vocals sound to David Yow’s legendary crooning.
