White boys, fathers of classical music, and some crappy shoes.

I hope you’re ready to get your music on, because that’s why I’m here. I’ve got some good stuff that I guarantee you have never heard of, I also have some pretty crappy stuff that you don’t ever need to hear, but that’s just one of the hazards of this site. Feel free to leave whenever you want.

To start us off is the hilariously named, Berlin based band, “The Whitest Boy Alive”. The group started off as an electronica experimental group but has morphed into some strange musical mixture that I find to be ultimately quite groovy. The first few songs on their “Rules” album feel like a mixture of jazz, 1970’s pop, dance music and a random assortment of strong painkillers. The syncopated guitar cords placed over the steady bass line and percussion parts gives the tracks a groovy sound that is both new, but still strangely familiar. The lyrics are terribly hard to understand, and from what I can tell make no sense anyway. The vocal part is easy on the ears however and fits into the overall feel of the music well. I’m not sure what else to compare this group to since I have never really listened to anything like them before, I can tell you that the song “timebomb” on the album made me feel like I was listening to a song by The Gorillaz, except for the fact that the only word in the entire song is…well….timebomb. If you want to fully experience how the group sounds then you will have to give some of their songs a listen yourself. I personally enjoy the album immensely, not only do The whitest boy alive have a great band name, they also have some good song names, like Promise less or do more. The result is a band with a name you can throw out to astound your friends at how cultured, and hilarious, your musical tastes are, and a sound that can really only be qualified as “groovy”. My favorite song off the album right now is probably Gravity, check it out.

Next we are going to take a little trip over to France to chill with Phoenix and their new album “Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix”. To be honest I can count the things that have come out of France that I enjoy on two fingers, and this album is one of them. Once again we are given a little taste of groovy, only this time it happens to be thrown into a blender with some rock and mixed up really well. Once again the vocals fit really well, but are completely unintelligible, it seems to be a recurring theme today. It is true that “Phoenix” as a band name is…well….ok at best, but the album name is pretty sweet, and I’m totally digging the bomb graphics that are all over the CD case. Once again for all of you people out there who want to seem cultured and intelligent, and perhaps also happen to be big fans of classical piano, the song Lisztomania may be a favorite. The instrumental duo “Love like a sunset parts I and II” make me feel like I’m watching the most dramatic and heroic part of a movie, the protagonist has just risen from the ashes of defeat with new light in his eyes, ready to save the day! But my personal favorite song right now is probably girlfriend, and I’m pretty sure that almost the whole album comes up in the “related videos” box so you should probably listen to a few more tunes before you leave the page. I recently went on a 12 hour drive, and I must admit that I listened to this album at least five times in a row in the car. Its only a little over a half an hour long, but the songs flow into one another with an almost unnatural fluidity that you rarely find. The album itself is a piece of music, yes the songs are distinct, but each one seems to lead you into the next track, it is very easy to get sucked into the overall path the music takes. This album is a winner; I even think I got it for fewer than ten bucks at best buy, go for it.

 

The clunker of the day? Street Sweeper Social Club. I know. An album with cover art like that should be awesome by default, sadly that is not the case. The group consists of Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine, and Boots Riley of who knows what. (And really? Who cares? He is the major downfall of the album anyway) The album fails to produce giant gun barrels in your stereo by a long shot. Overall it’s the vocals that really miss. There is also a song called 100 little curses, the fact that there seem to be more then 100 large and in your face senseless uses of the F word also severely takes its toll on the album (not to mention the absurd ninja sounds Boots makes at the end of that song). Tom Morello is a great guitarist in his own right, and the album really fails to make use of his talents, the music is a hard rock/funk mix that could be made much better first by some more creative instrumental parts (canned drum beats and repetitive guitar/bass parts really get old), and getting rid of Boots Riley (he just generally sucks). If you really must listen for yourself ( I don’t advise it)…you can also check out a picture of the horrible sideburns on Boots Riley. Even if you find this for under $10…save it.

Equality and Vonnegut

First, I’d like you to go read this short story by Kurt Vonnegut: “Harrison Bergeron”

Okay, hopefully you did read it, as it isn’t all that long, and I don’t really have much to say.  The story, however, reminds me of several conversations I’ve had about greatness.  It seems to me that the basic tendency of our “democracy” is to destroy greatness.  Perhaps not in such extreme ways as depicted in the story, but greatness is not really something that fits into our culture.  It seems to me that much of it has to do with what it means to say that all men are created equal.  Does it mean all men are equal legally or naturally?  Obviously, it seems absurd to claim that everyone is naturally equal, so the answer seems to be that everyone is legally equal.  Natural inequality, however, can make all other types of equality difficult to achieve.  There is also the question as to whether equality is really a truly worthwhile goal.  More than a few authors have advocated the idea that some men are above the rules that exist or the cultural norms.  At this point, I’m not going to go too deeply into that conversation, but it seems to me that there probably is a time when somebody could be above those things.  I am intensely interested in what others have to say, and I know that my co-author has strong feelings about this subject.

Caesar

Portal

This is the second review I’ve written for Portal, mainly because the first one was really bad. I tried to make it informative and not give too much away, but I realized that it was boring, really boring. I decided that I should just write a review that isn’t completely boring, and that everything else would sort itself out. 

Portal is a puzzle game. Honestly, most of the puzzles don’t require one to be a genius, but enough of them are challenging to keep it fun. Calling Portal a puzzle game is similar, however, to calling Aristotle “a philosopher.” Meaning, yes, it is technically true, but it severely misses the point. Quite simply, Portal is the most condensed fun I have had with a video game for a long time – perhaps ever. Now, I’m not generally into puzzle games, I usually play long, slow strategy games or RPG’s. You are perhaps now curious – “how can a puzzle game be that much fun?” The answer, quite simply, is I have no idea. I have no idea how that made a puzzle game that brought me so much entertainment. Perhaps it was a deal with some sort of deity – good or evil, perhaps they sacrificed virgins to the gods of fun, I really don’t know. What I do know, however, is that I hope they do it again, even if it means somebody has to live forever in some sort of Greek punishment. 

Ravings aside, I can tell you what I enjoyed so much. As I said before, the puzzles were interesting and challenging. Using portals to solve puzzles certainly changed the way I looked at things, and I find myself wandering out home and school now, thinking how much better my life would be if I had a portal gun. The learning curve was extremely easy, and they kept introducing new sorts of problems that show up later, but with slight changes. Portal’s physics are pretty incredible, but it also leads to some oddly dizzying moments. When you go into a portal, you come out the other one at the same speed as you went in, this leads to times when you ‘fall’ up, which gets confusing. The puzzles, though, while excellent, thought provoking, and enjoyable, were not the most enjoyable part of the experience. 

Without question, the reason I feel compelled to come up with new words to describe how much fun I had, is the atmosphere they created in the game. A dark humor pervades the entire experience, and since dark humor is my favorite type of humor, it was roughly akin to diving into chocolate cake. This atmosphere begins, and ends, with GlaDOS. GlaDOS speaks to you throughout the game in a women’s computerized voice, and is the only speaking character in the entire game. Early on, she gives direction through the tutorial levels, but then you start to wonder if you can trust her. At one point, she admits she lied to you before, but that she is no longer allowed to “embellish the truth.” However, as you play through the game, there are sections outside of the sanitary-looking testing ground where people have scrawled on the walls “She’s watching you” and, the now famous “the cake is a lie.” This is because GlaDOS has promised cake to you at the conclusion of your testing. Before I get too carried away talking about GlaDOS, it’s worth noting that even the androids who simply shoot at you add to the atmosphere. When you kill them, they sometimes utter a faint “I don’t hate you” as they shut down forever. GlaDOS, however, is the real star. She is one of the best characters I have come across in the games I have played, and she is essentially nothing more than a voice – and the game only takes a few hours to complete. Like I said, I don’t know what sort of deal they made, but I’m glad they made it. I really don’t want to spoil the story/experience for those people who haven’t played it yet, so I’ll refrain from more specifics about GlaDOS, but hopefully you understand how fantastic of a character she is. Also, the song in the credits is probably one of the best credit songs – in any medium, that I have ever heard.

In short, if you haven’t played Portal, your life would most likely be improved if you do. It’s available on the PC and Xbox 360, possibly for the original Xbox, I don’t know. It came in the “Orange Box” which includes Half-life 2, and Episodes 1 + 2 for Half-life 2, along with Team Fortress 2. I’m not sure if it is available separately on the 360, as I got the Orange Box – but I got the Orange Box for something like $18 used. On the PC, you can buy it from Steam, and if it’s less than $10, it’s like your robbing them for the amount of fun you should have with it. Once again, the people who made this game are probably deserving of some red boots, unless of course they already sold their soul.

What we wish, we readily believe, and what we ourselves think, we imagine others think also.

Welcome to Search and Caesar. You have found what is perhaps the most absurdly outstanding blog that has ever been created since the dawn of time. As this is the first and only post so far that last statement may be grossly inaccurate. Regardless, expect great things, and expect them often. This blog is, first and foremost, a page of reviews. Over the course of the next months there will be two authors who will be doing all your heavy lifting for you. Have you ever wanted to read a book, but want to make sure it’s actually worth reading before you waste time reading the first 200 terrible pages, just hoping that at some point, it will get good? Ever pondered buying music only to find that upon purchase you cant even make it past the first two songs? Ever wondered what the heck War and Peace was actually about but don’t have time to read an 857 page Russian novel? Well prepare to send us cash in the mail because we here at Search and Caesar are the answer to your prayers. Expect to find reviews of certain works of fiction as well as heavy non-ficton tomes that ponder the meaning of the universe. Expect reviews of music, new and old, good and “causing long lasting ear damage” bad. Expect reviews of films, video games, items of clothing, hair cair products and airports. Expect any and all of these reviews to not only be helpful and informative but also hilarious, sad, touching and honest, all in the opening sentance. Our goal is to be there for you, every step of the way…Ok in reality our goal is to search out every aspect of life we enjoy and sneak these items into your life through this blog. This way we will be influencing every single decision you make, subconsiously controlling your life! The control of Caesar! HAHAHA! Now if we could just find our red boots….