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On the National Symphony's program of videogame music* at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, here are the
RAVE REVIEWS!* "Live orchestral music with cutting-edge video screen visuals from Halo, Mario, Zelda, Warcraft, Metal Gear Solid, Kingdom Hearts, Sonic, Everquest II, God of War, Medal of Honor, Myst, Tron, and a classic arcade medley from Pong to Donkey Kong" [hat tip shm]
Los Angeles Times: "A GROUNDBREAKING SHOW! Video game music has come a long way from monotone bleeps to full-blown orchestral, choral, and opera arrangements. This fully choreographed tribute highlights the best games and their best features, whether it's the full choir accompanying Halo or the light show complementing Tron."
USA Today: "This spectacle is just the latest sign that songs written for the interactive gaming world are blasting out of consoles and into the mainstream!"
The Washington Times: "Video games are attracting serious composing talent!"
MTV.com: "If your idea of a hot Saturday night is a few hours of Xbox and a trip to the local Pink Floyd laser-light show, then Video Games Live is your dream date!"
Keywords: adolescent impulse dig dug
"Vox Computational" [mp3 removed]
Update: The chimy percussion in the chorus was bugging me so I redid this. The track has subtler percussion (an octave lower, plus a new "high" chime), a vibrato synth wail before the break, and it's been remixed.
Update 2: A couple of notes sounded out of tune to me, so I fixed them.
remix of work by Oliver Laric. A full size version (too big for the present page) is here.
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Belatedly discovered Bleep.com, an electronic music site specializing in, um, bleepy dance music of recent vintage (and some classics). The mp3s cost money, but I'd pay a little for decent quality DRM-free mp3s of such things I've been looking for (or just came across on their site) as: A Guy Called Gerald's Black Secret Technology, miscellaneous early Black Dog, previously unreleased Swayzak tracks, Elektroids Elektroworld, CiM CDs I don't have, and Lab Rat XL (a Drexciya alias). The site is all about labels, which I don't really get at this point--with no CD printing or promotional costs, why is another middleman between musician and the public necessary?
GIF by unknown artist X 9
From Curbed:
Intellectually, we always understood that the far-more-attractive-than-it-needed-to-be temporary PATH Transit Hub at the World Trade Center site wouldn't be with us forever, but seeing photos of the rubble on the just-demolished site is, nonetheless, jarring. Writes our phototipster BrianVan, "I'd think they'd at least be a little less brazen than this. The nicest temporary transit station New York's ever had, gone forever. (But soon to be replaced by that Calatrava wings thing.)"If you know a structure is going to be up for only two years, build something that can be taken apart and assembled elsewhere. Don't smash it and then melt it for scrap. This photo is sickening. Way to go, Port Authority.