Are the entrees at this eatery really so expensive that these two have to share? You write the caption!
Competitive gaming has been fighting for legitimacy for a few years now. The fine folks over at the Cyberathlete Professional League have led the way. In the nine years since its inception, the CPL’s tournaments and leagues have catered to 160,000 gamers while shelling out $3,000,000 in prize money. If you think you are good enough, just sign up and put your mouse where your mouth is.
But the debate rages on. Can video games be considered a sport?
For all the inroads the CPL has made into legitimacy, here comes Snoop Dogg to put competitive gaming back a few years.
Last week he announced the formation of the Hip-Hop Gaming League. It doesn’t matter whether you consider yourself “hip-hop’’ or not, you’re not getting into this VIP lounge. You see, it’s a private league with hip-hop artists such as Twista and Paul Wall, NFL mouth Chad Johnson and NBA star Carmelo Anthony. The HPGL has a full roster of players on the Web site, but the real question is why?
What does Snoop Dogg get out of priming the PR machine? It could only be one of two things. To make competitive gaming ‘‘hot’’ then start a public league to rake in the cash playing off an image or this could simply be another avenue to stroke the egos of celebrities.
Either way, legit organizations like the CPL get caught in the wake. Interactive entertainment as spectator events will happen, hardcore gamers just have to hope the whims of celebrities don’t turn it into novelty.
Which is true if you are a fan of literature, or theater. Or witty word play and action. 1599 is the year that William Shakespeare, already established as a great poet and playwright, elevated his game and became a writer for the ages. The Bard wrote Henry the Fifth, Julius Caeser, As You Like It and Hamlet - all in this one year. Author James Shapiro covers that one year in A Year In The Life of William Shakespeare, in which he pieces together where Shakespeare was hanging out, what he was reading, etc., when he went on this creative binge.
The above is one of a few books I found, going through the Books I Never Got Around to Writing About in 2005 But Should Have. Also:
“Music Through The Floor,” by Eric Puchner. This collection of short stories is earning big praise from critics, and I like the stories I have read.
“Harvard’s Secret Court: The Savage 1920 Purge of Campus Homosexuals,” by William Wright. The title says it all, and no less a personage than Joyce Carol Oates calls it “disturbing and illuminating.”
“Moses Levy of Florida: Jewish Utopian and Antebellum Reformer,” by C.S. Monaco, which provides an indepth look at the contradictory life of Levy: slave owner and abolitionist, religious reformer and biblical conserverative.
“Get Back In the Box,” by Douglas Rushkoff, which, inevitably, is the next step in the ever-changing industry that tells us how to operate a business. Yes, not that long ago you were told to think outside the box, now Rushkoff - lauded by many as a leading thinker in this area, sort of the “It” guy in offering advice to business leaders - is saying get back in there. I don’t know. It’s interesting, though, I suppose, if this is your sort of thing.
It’s kind of like hibernation for the video game industry. The run up to Christmas is the busiest time of the year. Then … silence. From then until about now the industry goes into its shell.
I’m back. There are things to talk about.
Let’s start with PlayStation 3. If analysts are to be believed, the new console is going to cost more than a new boat and won’t be released until 2019. If you saw some of the PS3 technology demos at last year’s E3, then you’d know that Sony is trying to accomplish something that is listed under “A’’ for ambitious.
With that comes a price: a monetary price and the cost of development time. When they targeted a Spring ’06 release last year, myself and many of my fellow industry folk just snickered a little. It’s looking more and more like the peanut gallery was right on.
Don’t get me wrong, PlayStation 3 is going to be great when it hits shelves - but at what cost? Sony is banking on the new Cell chip (which reportedly is hard to develop for) and Blu-Ray disc technology. Blu-Ray drives, a new high-capacity optical format that could replace DVDs, are running around $900 right now. PS3 won’t necessarily cost that much, but it ain’t going to be cheap. Microsoft took a loss on every Xbox they ever sold, and still do with the 360. If the games are good, Sony will make a killing on the software side to compensate.
If Microsoft was smart, they’d be pumping out more content to take advantage of Sony’s potential delay. There have been only two 360 games released so far this year, and those have been in the past week. That doesn’t include a handful of titles released over the Xbox Live Arcade download service, but the boys in Richmond better get cracking if they hope to take over the market. Sony doesn’t sleep, it waits.
In case you hadn’t yet figured it out, I do plenty of bar hopping. I don’t always write about everything I do, usually because I’m too hung over to concentrate on writing (just kidding). You might think that being the nightlife columnist means free cover, free drinks and VIP service all night, but as a journalist first and foremost, I can’t accept anything for free unless, for example, the club is running a special promotion where everyone in the place gets free booze until midnight.
Going out to bars and clubs three or more times each week can get pretty expensive, and my job with the Trib doesn’t cover all of my expenses. Some nights, I’ll only have $20 in my pocket, and that has to last me all night. That’s why I’ve scoured Tampa Bay to compile a list of places where you can get a good buzz for less than you’d spend on a T-shirt at the mall.
Every night, Whiskey North and Whiskey SoHo have a Goddess Happy Hour from 5 p.m. until 8 p.m., with $10 limited open bar. On Fridays, the owners extend that invitation to the men.
All four Green Iguana locations have dollar drink nights on Wednesdays. For a dollar, you can order select beers, and for two dollars, you can order slightly fancier, better tasting beers.
On Saturday nights, Orpheum in Ybor City holds its Retro Red Square Recall, with $9 sink or swim. You can order select draft beer or well drinks while listening to music by ’80s pop bands and indie rock groups.
Full Moon Saloon hosts three-for-one drinks on Thirsty Fridays. Wells, bottle beers and even top shelf drinks are included.
Yee haw! The Round-Up offers $1 domestics after 9 p.m. on Tuesdays. Fridays feature free Coors Light bottles all night, and Saturdays are $10 sink or swim.
Stonewood Grill and Tavern in New Tampa has $4 martinis on Wednesdays, and they’re some of the tastiest in Tampa.
If you know about any other cheap drink nights, leave me a comment below so I can add them to the list.
Sorry for the Michael Jackson reference. There’s just no excuse. At any rate, that’s the cumbersome intro to today’s entry: a number of thrillers are hitting newstands now or soon. Among them are Kill Me by Stephen White, which already has been praised as a “thinking person’s thriller,” apparently centered on the notion that people can sign a contract that sets in stone the day they will die. Cheery!
Zero To The Bone is Robert Eversz latest in his crime series about ex-con turned tabloid photographer Nina Zero. This time Zero is actually opening an art show of her photographs of “Hollywood pulp scenes,” but things get derailed when Zero gets a package that contains a bondage video that may have ended in death. More cheeriness!!
The Bobbed Haired Bandit by Stephen Duncombe and Andrew Mattson is set in the Roaring 20s - the age of jazz, flappers and illegal booze - and involves a married couple who decide to start robbing corner stores in Brooklyn. This is based on a true story.
Danielle Steel also has a new one - The House - which involves a mysterious old San Francisco mansion being renovated by a no-nonsense attorney who, you guessed it, “cannot explain the force that draws her to the mansion and its history” (according to the book flap). Renovation and mystery!
Finally, yet another medical thriller will hit bookshelves in a few weeks. This one - Isolation Ward by Joshua Spanogle - h involves three homeless women in a Baltimore hospital who might be (here comes the thriller part) the victims of a lethal act of bioterrorism with possible global implications. Now there’s a REALLY cheery premise.
Of course, we don’t read thrillers to be cheered up, do we? That’s where those chicken soup books come in.
Happy reading.
Our esteemed leader seems confused about something. What could it be? You write the caption.
Demos of this song have been unofficially floating around on the Internet for months, but now it’s finally legit. Know what that means? You must go download it immediately!
Of course, that’s assuming you haven’t already. Now that Brit-rock darlings Arctic Monkeys’ (awful band name, but don’t let that dissuade you) raucous debut, “Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not,” has been released Stateside, we can finally start drooling over their gloriously sloppy guitar-rock (think the Libertines with maybe just a dash of the Strokes) and hardscrabble tales of growing up in Sheffield.
It’s only February, but this one gets my vote for single of the year. Seriously. Did you download it yet? Why not?
A tune from the new Arctic Monkeys CD:
Arctic Monkeys: “I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor” from “Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not” [mp3]
When was the last time your family went to the movies? I’ll tell you, it is a special treat in my household and not a regular weekend occurence.
It is just too dang expensive for a family of four when you factor in those kid-packs and my jumbo soda.
Not so at the Ruskin Drive-In Theatre. There the admission price is $4.50 for adults and children 8 and under are free. They have a concession stand, but there is nothing preventing you from bringing your own goodies from home. Including maybe something a little healthy for a change! In addition to saving money, perhaps this is a good idea for all you dieters out there. It is hard to be tempted by movie theater popcorn if you can’t smell it.
Plus you have all the comforts of “home.” You can go in your jammies if you want. Have a pillow to hug, or a loved one…
There are a few other drive-ins still in the area: The Silve Moon in Lakeland, Fun Lan in Tampa and the Joy-Lan Drive-In in Dade City. All offer similar extreme discounts on first run movies.
Shar Jackson, Marla Maples and Angie Everheart will be hosting “The Ex-Wives Club,” a new reality-lifestyle show, where the three will be joined by a few life experts to help the recently divorced get their groove back. Sounds like a case of the blind leading the blind to me. Everheart hasn’t had a splashy movie part in 10 years, Jackson’s career has been held hostage by UPN, and Maples is barely a blip on the radar. Getting life advice from this crew on bouncing back after a divorce is sort of like getting career advice from the guy who works the gravity ride at the state fair. “Yes, Nay-Bob, it does seem like a great job, but I think I want my benefits package to include more than unlimited corn dogs.” Living well is supposed to be the best revenge, not living “alright in a sort of a limited way for an off night.”
You have to check out Shar Jackson’s video interview on the subject of Britney and Kevin; it was the picture of class, dignity, and rise-above-it. She proclaimed Kevin one of her very best friends, had kind words for stepmonst..er, stepmother Britney Spears, and generally told the world that she doesn’t hold a grudge. I can’t help but wonder who is her drama coach, because that act was better than all the work she did in her years as a Brandy sidekick on ‘Moesha.’ Come on, we all know, despite all that glad handing, that she would love to smack that man-stealing witch just once.
The excellent music blog Stereogum recently had an “indie-rock hottie” readers’ poll and Jenny Lewis (the impossibly cute Rilo Kiley singer) won in a landslide. My vote went to Neko Case, who finished fourth. Fourth?! Please. Clearly these people never saw that issue of CMJ with the photos of Neko in the tub. Their loss.
Still, looks aside, the woman’s sultry, smoky pipes are her main attraction. For my money there’s no more seductive voice in the alt-country universe. Check out this fine example, a track from her upcoming album “Fox Confessor Brings the Flood,” due out March 7.
A tune from the new Neko Case disc, courtesy of Anti Records:
Neko Case: “Star Witness” from “Fox Confessor Brings the Flood” [mp3]
System: Microsoft Xbox 360
Publisher: Sega
Reviewer’s rating: B
ESRB rating: Mature
Game type: Action/adventure
Kind of like: “Resident Evil”
Best feature: Truly frightening moments will have your heart pounding.
Worst feature: The gameplay gets pretty repetitive.
The bottom line: Many of the Xbox 360’s launch titles were games we’d seen before on other consoles, repurposed for the industry’s Next Big Thing. That’s weak.
Among the small handful of original fare, “Condemned” lurked in the shadows of bigger titles with louder buzz.
It’s not weak.
This first-person adventure puts the player in the role of a crime scene investigator on the trail of a serial killer. There’s a weird, supernatural element thrown in, too, just to keep you guessing.
The game’s finest moments borrow their fear factor from the survival-horror genre (think “Resident Evil”). As you wander through dark, abandoned buildings plucking evidence from the squalor, you never know when a depraved sociopath will come skulking around the corner, bearing a lead pipe with your name on it.
There are guns (and very limited ammo), but most of the action involves melee weapons—bats, axes, sledgehammers and the ever-popular 2-by-4 with a nail in it.
Groundbreaking? Hardly. But the hair-raising hostilities and eerie atmospherics make for a fun ride. Beats paying good money for “Quake” all over again, anyway.
This shot was taken at the 2006 Winter Olympics. What is going on? You write the caption.
Last week, my boyfriend and I learned that Grand Prix, a video game arcade with batting cages, mini-golf, go-kart tracks and a giant sling shot seat, offers $10 for all day video game play on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Furthermore, we learned that they’ve also built a bar there, so people can drink cheap brew while they play. It’s similar to GameWorks, but I like that it is closer to where Mick and I live than Ybor City is.
We’re going there tonight, so if you’re looking for something to do that is fun and cheap, you should join us. One of these days, we’re going to try that sling shot chair, too, but I have a fear of high places. Of course, I once jumped out of an airplane, so I suppose being afraid of heights isn’t a very good excuse.
One of the great post-R.E.M. albums to see heavy rotation on late-‘80s college radio was the eponymous debut by a San Francisco band called the Donner Party. Gloriously raw guitar-driven sound and sweet boy-girl harmonies aside, the band wouldn’t have been a blip on the radar without the stellar songwriting of leader Sam Coomes. His tunes managed to be chock full of hooks without resorting to predictability, and his dour but clever lyrics (“Oh, let me recline in my chair in the corner / No one in heaven or earth is forlorner”) prefigured the cynical ‘90s without giving in to its whiny, insufferable petulance.
Then the Donner Party dropped off the face of the planet. Poof.
Years later, I discovered a Portland, Ore., roxichord-and-drums duo called Quasi after reading about their album “R&B Transmogrification” in an indie music mag. I bought the disc and dropped it in the player without looking at the liner notes, and before the first track was over I knew I’d found the missing Mr. Coomes. Sure, the tunes are now mostly drenched in hyperactive blasts of organ instead of messy guitar, but the quirky pop smarts and bittersweet lyrical bent are unmistakable.
Both the grittier, “R&B” and the epic follow-up, 1998’s “Featuring Birds,” were pure pop genius from start to finish. Three discs since have been somewhat more hit-or-miss, but they’ve all featured moments of brilliance from both Coomes and his drummer/ex-wife Janet Weiss (of Sleater-Kinney fame).
A new album, “When the Going Gets Dark,” is due out in late March on Touch & Go. If “The Rhino” is any indication, this record is going to be much looser and less angular. If that signals a return to the sinuous shizophrenia of “R&B,” I’ll be a happy man.
A tune from the new Quasi disc, courtesy of Touch & Go:
Quasi: “The Rhino” from “When the Going Gets Dark” [mp3]
Advertisement
