Jim Morrison alive?!

So what if Jim Morrison, lead singer of the amazing 60's band The Doors, was still alive? Who knows, maybe he is. Jim was a true rockstar persona, even if he wanted to be one or not. Of what I've read and understood he was not very fond of it at all, and it's said that the rockstar lifestyle ain't no pretty thing, so I have no hard times believing that. Personally, Jim is one of few people whose words I've paid any attention to at all. Most bands always were music first, words last, with lots of things in between. Vocals have always more or less just been an essential extra melodic instrument in music to me. I pretty much never cared for the topics of lyrics, except for the power ballad love ones. I mean c'mon, everybody pretty much goes through heartache, I've done it too, lots of times. I don't need to hear a hundred bands on the radio, at the same time, singing about the same fucking thing - how their girlfriends is done screwing them and wants to screw someone else. That topic is just so tiresome, especially in the 80's with all the bands I love.

Jim's lyrics are different, however. I remember as a kid when my dad had a poster of Jim and there were commercials on TV of different The Doors compilations. My dad laughed at me because I tried to sing "Light My Fire" in a fictional English (I was like 8-9, couldn't speak a word of English). I started listening to The Doors by myself (of course my dad also played them at home, so I grew up with them) in 2009. It was like a bomb dropped, it was so good. At first I pretty much fell for the obvious hits, classics or whatever, but I soon found out how great all of their albums are. Today I guess I mostly prefer medium-known or "filler" songs by them, but I listen to them very often and it doesn't really matter what comes on.

One thing that is very tragic, but also very interesting, is the death of Jim Morrison. It's said that he died in Paris after he went there. Well I guess that it's true that he moved there, as the surviving Doors are saying that themselves. But no one really knows how he died, there are just theories. I've read quite a lot and the most likely one would be some kind of drug-related thing, I'm sure. While I certainly hope that Jim died a graceful death, I find that very unlikely. One theory is that he was found in a bathtub by his girlfriend Pamela Courson. That doesn't feel like any justice at all, to me. But then I've also read all sorts of comments about him being alive, which is just people fucking around, of course, but what if he was still alive, what could he possibly be up to today?

As it was pretty obvious, Jim was not a fan of his stardom and would most likely have gone into obscurity. Maybe he staged his own death to get away from everything, but I don't like that theory as I think it's disrespectful to Jim and his family and friends. But if he's alive, or at least was alive for more years to come after his official death, I really hope he had a good time after The Doors. His words have given me a lot of thoughts and many hours of recognition when times were hard on me.

I just want to thank Jim Morrison and The Doors for making amazing, poetic lyrics and music.

Pantera Reunion?!

First off, the photo to the right was scanned by me in 2008 from a Sweden Rock Magazine (I don't recall what issue), and if you don't believe me, then go to http://www.lastfm.se/music/Pantera/+images/7559869 and look at the uploader, which is Idiots-Rule = my account. I love this photo of Pantera btw, it's a great, early shot from 1989 or 1990. I really love how Dimebag (R.I.P.) really is looking thrash here, while Phil look hardcore as usual.

But anyway, the topic I wanted to discuss about Pantera today is a potential reunion with them. I've read lots of opinions from fans all over the net for one or two years now, and the most common sollution for a "reunion" looks like Pantera feat. Zakk Wylde. Now I love Zakk, he's a great guitarist, a cool dude, he played with Ozzy whom is my favorite of all time, and he's got Black Label Society which is another band that I love. But as much as I love Zakk and his music through the years, I also do love Pantera and their legacy - a legacy I belive should be left alone and to age with pride. While I certainly still would find it cool to hear and maybe even see a reunion (or as close to one as it can be, without Dimebag that is), I still believe that it would ultimately be a rotten, dirty, and bad thing to do. Now from what I understand, the surviving guys seem to agree that a reunion is out of the question, which is a relief to me. I mean Phil's got Down, which I totally love, and he should stick with that, focus on that as well as his side-projects. Rex is doing fine with Kill Devil Hill which is one of my favorite bands of this year, and Vinnie Paul also seems to have a solid place in Hellyeah (though I don't listen to them, never have been, I dunno why, haven't got the slightest idea).

With this said, I'm sure that there would be lots of great names, big as small, to pay tribute to Dimebag if a reunion ever would take place, but really everyone. Show Dime some respect, don't destroy the great legacy of Pantera, no matter how much money the capitalist, bastard suits can caugh up to see it.

Over and out.

The Best AND Most Disappointing Albums Of The Year 2012

I remember back during the first half of my teen years, maybe like 2003-2007, there were very few new(er) bands that I liked. I was a very closed-minded, old school-only listener and listened to almost 80's music exclusively, apart from the 70's Gods like Sabbath, Zeppelin, AC/DC, Purple, and so on, you get the picture. In 2007, however, all that changed and I started to expand my musical mind with a big step into the 90's music (still dissin' the modern metal of that time, which still is pretty much the same metal today, unfortunately). The music was Death Metal, particularly the Swedish, classic old school-era and the East coast (Stockholm) sound. Entombed was the first band to break me into it with their legendary debut "Left Hand Path", but was soon followed by Dismember, which from that point to this day remain my favorite death metal band ever.

Anyway, in late 2007 I needed to cool off from all the ultra-pissed off extreme metal with something more mellow, but I wasn't really in the mood to return to my old NWoBHM / heavy and thrash metal, as well as AOR. To add is that I totally abandoned AOR in mid-06 when my band got a re-charge and we started to crank thrash metal 24/7 for some innovative influence and cleansing (the others were into Sum 41-punk, which is faggot punk, as well as nu metal, very much to my distaste as I've never liked those music styles). After that, whenever I hear AOR, I can't listen to it. It's just too much "midlife crisis music" to me, and I'm still young, hungry, and in need of going crazy to music, not in need of some cozy fucking and tender words during it after some wine and a luxious dish.

But as I was trying to explain, in late 2007 I took a pause from death metal and got addicted to early 90's alternative music and metal. With the great Jane's Addiction cracking me into this wave, it all soon followed with bands like Alice in Chains, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Mr. Bungle, and particularly Faith No More, which today is my favorite band. Danzig was another band I really cranked a lot every day, but I actually started to get into them in 2005 already (they had one 80's album ... they passed my then-rule #1: only 80's) and in 2006 they pretty much were the only non-thrash band that I listened to. I even had a T-shirt with their classic Devil's skull and logo (it became to small later on and I gave it to a skinny friend in 2009 or early 2010). So Danzig was pretty much the first 90's band I ever listened to and they are to this day a top-5 favorite band o'mine. Then I also got into old school hip-hop, electronic music and so on. My musical has expanded all the time and still does.

BUT NOW I'M DONE WITH THE HISTORY LESSON. I'm sorry, I just have so many fond memories and too much love for the music to not wander off like that. The point with all that is that today, I listen to all kinds of music, or at least I give it a shot, and it doesn't matter what time it was made in either.

So 2008 was a pretty bad year musically, I wanna recall? However, it WAS a year when things started to get better, and it has gotten better with each year since then. I thought 2011 was a pretty great as well as surprisingly good year musically, but I think I dare to say that 2012 has topped it!

Here's my list of this year's best albums:

1. Overkill : The Electric Age
- Intense, high-energy, "electrified" thrash (see what I did there! *ba-dum-tsch*). After the phenomenal Ironbound in 2010, Overkill went for a less proggy approach this time, but still kept the total-ass-kicking intact. The album of the year for me, congrats guys!

2. Steelwing : Zone Of Alienation
- As a fan of the New Wave of Traditional Heavy Metal retro style, particularly the Swedish bands, this was a real solid ball of metal. I love everything about this album. I'm actually even going back and forth whether this is even better than Enforcer's Diamonds (2010) or not.

3. Unleashed : Odalheim
- And this one goes for the Death Metal album of the year. While they actually are a band whose latter material I prefer before their old, classic stuff, this album only made it more obvious: it fucking kicks ass! Their best album yet!

4. Rage Against The Machine : S/T remastered "XX 20th Anniversary"
- I know, not nearly a "new" album by any means, but a nice remaster, if not too different from the original, and it's got their first demo as well as some live tracks as bonus material, and that is what makes this release so great for any RATM fan.

5. Kill Devil Hill : S/T
- Maybe there are a few releases that would deserve this spot more, but I chose this because, 1. I for one really like this album, 2. I really looked forward to it for quite many months. I can confess that I wasn't reaaally satisfied with my expectations upon hearing it, but still it's a great album. I really like the voice.

6. Down : Part IV: The Purple EP
- I love Down, especially their third and latest full-length album. This was not a let-down apart from the one little fact: this is an EP. If it only would've been a full-length release and pretty much as good or better than Over The Under, it would've landed on fourth place.

..................................................................................................

Here's my list the most disappointing albums of 2012:

1. Testament : Dark Roots Of Earth
- Well. I love them, they're one of my absolute favorite bands, but no, something went wrong here. I was sooo anticipated about this one, and it finally showed to have been way too much. I was totally disappointed. It's not a bad album and Alex Skolnick is amazing, one of my favorite leads ever. The music's just too mediocre and Native Blood was a bad choice for a single. Also disappointing that my favorite drummer Gene Hoglan didn't get to do what he does best - beating the shit outta the drums, making tsunamis all over the world from the blastwaves.

2. Fear Factory - The Industrialist
- I had a moment of a few months in 2009 where I was addicted to their classic album Demanufacture, but just like then, the rest of their stuff still just sound recycled in a shittier form. Boooring.

3. The Devin Townsend Project - Epicloud
- I love Dev, I love his music, I have followed his music since 2007 I think, when I discovered Strapping Young Lad. Never has any of his albums really disappointed me. Some were not master-masterpieces, but they were great. This one was not a funny listening experience. After hearing preview samples from it, I didn't feel like anything really stuck out to me, and upon hearing the album I got it confirmed. It was kinda boring. But I don't judge Devin. The man is constantly trying out new approaches with his music, even if his trademark wall-of-sound is present everywhere, and one cannot simply make awesome albums without failing at least once. To me, this was Dev's first failure, and not a big one at that.

Sons of Anarchy: Season 5 is over!

The season 4 cast: Tara, Jax, Piney, Clay, Gemma, Juice, Chibs, Tig, Opie, and Bobby.

*Contains spoilers*

So now season five of Sons of Anarchy is over. What can I say? It's what it is - a show that a love, but that made me somewhat tired of the constant shit that happens in it (I'm usually not really a big fan of drama, but I love bikes and the biker culture). I loved the first two seasons of the show and in the third one I thought things were becoming kinda annoying, the whole thing with Abel being kidnapped and all. Season four didn't really get me going again as I sorta felt too much shit was still happening to the gang. After I watched the season 5-premiere though, I felt the "fire" in me that is the love for this show. It really showed something I didn't feel I had seen for a while, and it stayed at that pretty much the whole season through. There were some moments in the middle of the season, especially with the nomads and the home-invasion attacks, that dragged out a little much, but otherwise I think it was the best season since season two.

While season five did not end as bad as I thought it would - I thought Tig and Juice both were gonna die, and Clay would go to Belfast. Lucky me it didn't end that way, but the shit with Tara going to jail and Bobby leaving his VP-seat are still bad. Now I can only wait for season six to see what happens next. After Opie's tragic but strong death scene, I don't wanna see more of the main cast go, apart from Clay that is. I'd also like to see new faces as I feel the club is getting so small without Opie, Piney, Kozik, Miles and the others who've died.

Grand Theft Auto V !!!

My Top-10 Xbox 360 Games!

Last month I did a top-5 list of the worst and / or most disliked games in my collection of Xbox 360 games (that's what I play on), so now I thought I'd do a top-10 best games instead. I have about 70 games or more now and most of the games I do like, of course, so finding 10 extraordinary awesome games shouldn't be hard for me. So let's go ...


10. Left 4 Dead

Today this game was a game I pretty much even didn't wanna put on the list, but I did it anyways for the good old times I've had with it. One of my first games for the Xbox 360, I pretty much played this on a daily basis with my stepfather back in 2009 and first half of 2010 (when I was living at my mom's, that is). We had lots of fun together with this game, but since then I have, pretty understandable I hope, grown kinda tired of playing it. I have recently played it on Xbox Live with a friend of mine, but I am just too tired of the same old four campaigns over and over again. I know every inch of them inside and out, and it's the same old zombies and you get the whole picture. I have Left 4 Dead 2 as well, but I never liked that one as much, thought it was "too much / over the top" compared to the first one. But yeah, while I play this today and rather irritate myself over the many bugs, especially in the second one, rather than enjoying it and having fun, it was a great game back in the day, and still would be if I would've started playing it today, and it also still is the best zombie game I've played. I had 1,5 years of total fun with this game and that is something I'll never forget.


9. Saints Row 2

The best installment in its series, I bought this game in early 2009, being one of my first games. I bought it for a probably very common reason - it being a GTA-clone, and me being a GTA-addict. Clone or not, it's still a very good and fun game, or at least it was for its time. Unfortunately it's grown to be one of my most "broken" games which I rarely feel to play anymore, and when I do it it's like fifteen minutes tops. But this doesn't make me deny its former glory in my collection. It is one of the games I overall have played the most, as well as loved. It was also the first game I played of this series and I liked it a hundred times better than the first one, and when The Third came out a little over a year ago I ultimately thought this was still the best one. This is a real street-gang drama like it should be, with a lot more options (like the character creation, great variety of clothes, etc.). The Third did bare puff on this one. I can only hope that Saints Row 4, which I guess will come to life, will be as good as the second, or of course even better.


8. The Darkness 1 / 2

I could not decide which one is my favorite out of the great Darkness games. The first one was one of my first games for the Xbox 360 and while the gameplay isn't the most awesome I've played, the story is the thing about it that gets the big prize. The second one is better in gameplay and much of the physics, like the cell-shading graphics and that it actually looks and feels more like the original comics. Though I think I found the first game to actually be darker story-wise, but it's really just a matter of opinion and I'm sure that it differs from people to people who've played the games around the world. Personally, I'm leaving it at this, calling it even between two great games, and maybe time well give me more of a single choice which is the better one.


7. Gears of War 3

This amazing series is simply nothing but amazing. I have played all three of them and looking forward to the prequel Judgment now. One thing about the GoW games I really love is the story. It's a very great, well-written and interesting sci-fi story which really is what these games are all about. The gameplay controls always were a bit clunky but got better with each game, but that's not all. I really think they outdid themselves with each game overall. The first one was great, the second even better, and the third one the best. Now that's how it should be with games when they do series of them. Of course not all game series are like this, but GoW certainly is. If you're the type of gamer that really enjoys a good story, then GoW is easily one the finest choices you could go with.


6. Vanquish

This is a game that really came out pretty much unnoticed if I'm right. Not many people seem to know this game or wanna play it if they do. The reason because of this is most likely that it's an obvious Gears of War-clone set in a different sci-fi environment (much more white instead of the grey decay which GoW is set in), as well as the real boring cover art. I mean, if I wouldn't have seen gameplay for this and then tried out the demo, but simply seen it for the first time in some store, I would've thought it looked like some boring child's game. Clone or not, I have all the GoW games, Quantum Theory (another clone, though rather bad) and Vanquish. Now there is also Inversion which I have yet to play, but to be honest, I really think that Vanquish was slightly better than all of the GoW games. I simply enjoyed the gameplay more, especially with the abillities you have with your suite (glide). It's also a very high-paced game with 100 % action all the time. The only thing really about Vanquish that doesn't beat what GoW have is the story, which is kinda mediocre. But as I said, the gameplay is awesome and that made this one of the funniest games I ever played.


5. Bulletstorm

Gears of War gone FPS style. This is what this game is in one sentence. Created by Epic Games just like the GoW-series, this was a sure go for me. After playing the demo before its release in 2010 I was really excited about this one. It was great and fun gameplay, really cool sci-fi environments and cheesy Duke Nukem-style humour. I think the missions are very fun and the boss battles are fun and memorable, to me at least they were. I recently finished this for the third time and I'm certain that I will do it again and again. Non-stop action, funny and interesting characters (a sexy chick, of course!) and lots of skill points (my favorite being "rear entry"). The games soundtrack theme is also very great and occassionally there are moments where the music goes great with the gameplay.


4. Max Payne 3

Another masterpiece in Rockstar Games' catalogue. I loved the first two Max Payne games so this was a must for me, even if the sunny Brazilian setting sure differs from the trademark snowing or raining New York City like in the previous two games. I wasn't really sure what to expect when I was about to play it, thinking too much about the previous games. But I gotta say, this game did not disappoint! Rather the opposite, it really did left as a very worthy installment in the series, though I don't know if it's better than the previous ones. I leave that up to everyone to decide for themselves. It also has got a very good and interesting original soundtrack done by the L.A. noise band HEALTH. I liked every single second of the soundtrack during the gameplay and is easily music I could recommend as a stand-alone as well. A great combo of a great game with a great soundtrack, is the final verdict for Max Payne 3.


3. Deus Ex: Human Revolution

I never played any of the earlier Deus Ex games, but I always heard good things about them. As I am a big sci-fi fan, or rather the dystopian style which is on earth, tall buildings, flying cars and so on. I'm not a very big fan of aliens and overnatural stuff, really. Anyway, this game is a futuristic sci-fi story and that's why I decided that I must have this game. When I got it and did not expect it to be such a big surprise as it turned out to be - it was awesome! I played the story through immediately almost twice before changing to another game. It was just such a refreshing experience in gaming for me from my otherwise sandbox-style filled game collection. I've played some Splinter Cell games back in the day but never was much for the sneak-style games, but this was just what I needed at the time. The story is also cool and always kept me wanting to get further into it, and the freedom while doing everything is just great. The soundtrack is also one of the best O.S.T's ever made and alone worth getting this game.


2. Red Dead Redemption

GTA goes the wild west, not a bad idea I tell ya. The result is amazing, too! In 2008 or even early '09 before I ever heard of this game (I didn't know about Red Dead Revolver at the time either) I would've never figured that Rockstar Games would do this kind of game, but I'm really happy they did, because it's an awesome game just like everyone else of their games. The graphics are also pretty nice for the game's size, details and loads of content. I've played this one quite a lot online lately as well (I haven't had Xbox Live before, shame on me ...) and it's so fun! I'm really looking forward to another game in this series.

The only disappointment with this game was the (big) DLC - RDR: Undead Nightmare - a zombie-themed version of the game with a small, new side-story in which there is a zombie apocalypse. While I had fun playing it, I also felt disappointed in some ways. I'm not really sure in what ways, but I just feel like I'm missing some things that other Rockstar-games have, but then again, not all games can be perfect. Nonetheless, the Game Of The Year-edition of the game which I have now is a must-buy and includes every DLC.


1. Grand Theft Auto IV

The big winner in my collection and probably my favorite installment in the GTA series as well. The first GTA game I ever played (from what I recall) was GTA II, which was another thing, kinda. In 2001 I played GTA III which instantly made a huge impact on me - I loved it so much! The complete freedom to do whatever you can, and as I was just 10-11 years old at the time, it was extra cool. The year after I went on with GTA Vice City which literally changed my life at 12. The game was not only awesome, it's radio stations had great (80's) music that made my interest break into that as well. I officially became a metalhead while realizing that V-Rock had some awesome metal music, but also the synthpop and new wave channels became well played. A few years later GTA San Andreas came and expanded all boundaries and really showed that GTA was about to stay as my favorite games. After playing both VC and SA for pretty much every day straight between 2002-2007 (I wasted my youth on this, really), the latest GTA IV came out in 2008 and really did not change my habbit. I was in deep love, again.

Liberty City, which is the city in which GTA IV takes place, is based on New York City, which is a city I love in the movies and dream about going to, so it's just a perfect atmosphere for me to drive around the city as well as doing the missions. It's a great story, the best yet in fact. I liked the other GTA stories as well, but especially San Andreas' street gang-theme wasn't really my dream come true. I also really liked the DLC episodes they introduced in IV, especially the biker gang-themed the Lost and Damned  (now this is the type of gang I like!).

I've just had so much fun with the GTA games for over 10 years now, and with the fifth installment, called GTA V of course, I will have at least two more years of solid GTA-fun (though I will continue to play no matter how tired I get of it).

--------------------------------------------------------

Some of my other cirka 70 games that didn't make the list, good as bad ones, with * for close ones:

Batman: Arkham City*
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow*
Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning*
Devil May Cry 4*
Mirror's Edge*
Rage*
Bioshock*
Bioshock 2
Gears of War
Gears of War 2*
Dead Rising
Dead Rising 2
Skyrim
Fable II
Fable III
Prey
Turok
Timeshift
Sleeping Dogs
L.A. Noire
Saints Row
Saints Row The Third
Assassins Creed II
Racedriver: Grid
Battlefield 3
Crackdown
Alpha Protocol
Call of Juarez: Bound In Blood
Duke Nukem Forever
The Godfather II
Borderlands
Left 4 Dead 2
Dead Island
Perfect Dark Zero
The Simpsons Game
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men
Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days
Gun
The Club
F.E.A.R.

and more!

Old school punk!

Kick-ass track!

The Top-5 Worst XBOX 360 Games In My Collection.

I have about 70-80 games for Xbox 360 and I have had more before. This is a list of the five worst games I ever had, that I've been the most disappointed or frustrated with, or simply have a pure hatred against now. So let's go ...


5. Borderlands (2009)

I love wasteland-themed movies and games, post-apocalyptic sci-fi style with the classic, cliché desert savages, small town camps, and super vehicles and so on. One really good game with these features is Rage, but unfortunately I can't say the same thing for this game. I bought this because it was supposed to be such a good game that very many people's got, but I guess opinions still relies in oneself and not the public. While not necessarily a very bad game in its classic sense, I found it pretty mediocre-boring while playing it by myself.

As I only played it once by myself, I've had it laying around for times when I have friends over so we could play it in co-op mode, which is a hell lotta more fun. But not anymore ... I'm generally a solid FPS games, half of my games are FPS I imagine and I've been playing FPS games almost exclusively lately. The last time we played though, we pretty much died once a minute. I mean it was really frustrating. I had the best weapons I had been able to find / buy and just shot, shot and shot the enemies, at times in the face for a long time - almost whole mags - without them dying! I mean, that sucks so badly. It's not even fun anymore when it gets like that. I rage-quitted the game and don't wanna play it now. It's very repetitive anyways, too. So ultimately - I did not like Borderlands.


4. Crackdown (2006)
 
This was one of my like 5-7 first games I ever got for the Xbox 360. At the time I had an old white Premium 20 GB, which is kind of nostalgic now. The reason I wanted this game was because not too many games really interested me, besides Grand Theft Auto IV that is. I'm a huge GTA nerd and it was pretty much the only series I played for some years in the mid to late 2000's. So looking up other, "similar" sand-box / free-roam kind of games, I found out about Crackdown. I got it from my stepdad who worked in a kind of media-disc warehouse where they had movies and games, so he brought a copy home. Since I didn't have too many games at the time, I believe I played this one quite a lot, almost finishing it actually. Though I played it so much, I couldn't help but to feel that it was very repetitive all the way through.

It's really the same thing you do over and over and over again from the beginning to the end, and I hate that with games. I really think game developers should actually develope a game, not develope a mission, repeat it lots of times and call it a game. You're a super-cop or agent or whatever, and you can jump and climb on buildings, collect green orps and then you assassinate some drug dealers, mafia bosses or whatever. It's really the same route over and over in this game with everything, not a very fun one at that. Needless to say, I got tired of it before I finished it and stopped playing it.


3. Duke Nukem Forever (2011)

I'm gonna stay short on this one. 14 years in development, the hopes of the gamers pretty much dead, no high expectations anymore, this was bound to fail.
I played Duke Nukem 3D as a kid, maybe I played the others too, I don't remember anymore. I got this without really expecting anything from it rather than the obvious - that is was gonna be bad. Therefore, I wasn't too surprised either. This game lacks pretty much everything it shouldn't. The graphics are horrible as they differ from stage-to-stage in the game, pretty mediocre / lame gameplay overall and the humour wasn't really that funny no more neither. Bulletstorm, also released in 2011, is what Duke Nukem Forever should've been. But ey, at least I had that 3D poster on my wall for a while.


 2. Fable III (2010)

First off, I never played the original Fable game, I started with Fable II for Xbox 360 maybe a year ago? I liked that game, pretty much playing it non-stop until I finished it. As Fable III had already been out for a while at that point, I had heard things about it and no good things, I can tell you. Actually, what I heard about it was so much bashing that I kind of thought it was ridicolous, really. So then one day I was at the local media store and found it for 99 Swedish kronor (about 13-14 bucks), so I thought I'd get it, it wasn't so much money to lose anyway.

So I came home and started playing it. At first I didn't really think too much of it, I was just kinda trying to see if it either sucked or was better than people say. As time went by I started to recognize the issues pretty much "everybody" had been talking about. I also found myself missing Fable II a lot during the playthrough of this. It's certainly a huge step down in every good way that was Fable II, and then I've heard that the second one was kind of that to the first one as well. But I liked the second, after a short while I did not think fondly of the third. I did finish it, however, but it wasn't too long either so I guess that explains it. I was ultimately very disappointed with this game. A huge let-down after the great Fable II.


1. Dead Island (2011)

And here's the crowned winner of my top-5 worst Xbox 360 games in my collection! This game is pretty much everything bad about a game and I don't think I've never been more frustrated by a game than with this stupid piece of shit! I generally love zombie games and have a bunch of them - Left 4 Dead 1 and 2, Dead Rising 1 and 2, Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare,  and I had the first four Resident Evil games and I even played the zombie bonus on Call of Duty: Black Ops, but this motherfucker takes the fucking cake for being a real bad, piece-of-shit-game which should never have been released! It's a fucking blasphemy amongst zombie games.

I bought this a while back after it dropped in price (THANK GOD I did that ...), at a cost of 199 Swedish kronor (about 25-27 bucks I think?), a price which is just too much for this crap. I do realize that I'm using lots of silly words and shit right now, but it's just my angry fucking frustration of this game that is getting out through my fingertips. I somebody mentions this game to me I also get in a very bad mood because it reminds me that I payed that much money for this shit!

Where Left 4 Dead are the zombie games I currently like the most, especially the first one (I thought the second was a little flawed and mediocre and that game frustrated me some as well, but that's another story), this is pretty much an obvious rip-off of Left 4 Dead. Now the style of this typical zombie-apocalypse themed game is pretty much bound to be "like the rest", especially Left 4 Dead when it's an FPS game, but the ripping-off doesn't end there. This is very much a total rip-off of Left 4 Dead - its "special infected zombies" looks similar too and ARE similar to Left 4 Dead's special infected. The boomers are here called Floater, the tanks are called Ram, hunters are Butcher, and so on. It feels so obvious that I get really mad at this game. How little imagination can there be to come up with some original ideas for special zombies? Very little I see!

The gameplay is probably even worse. I think it's kind of flawed in many ways. It's like often very frustrating when fighting zombies and you clearly see / feel / know you're hitting them, yet they get no damage and damage YOU instead. I also don't really like their melee-weapon system, that weapons break and you have to repare them (for large sums of hard-found cash!). I mean, it could be there to make the game more challenging, but I think the weapons break way too fast in the game = frustrating. It's also unbelieveably repetitive. Every mission is the same over and over. You go to some motherfucker and get a task to do for them, then you go do it. Now this is mostly retrieving things around the world for them as they're not bad-ass enough to fight the zombies themselves. The things are mostly unimportant shit too, the prime example being some girl in a bungalow who wants her fucking TEDDYBEAR back, which is located half-way across the fucking map! Was the teddybear meant to be funny or something? It certainly was NOT, just fucking irritating, nothing else. The people are often cocky or ungrateful towards you as well, making me think of how I hate most people in real life = making me angry. As said, it's very much the same thing over and over and it gets boring and uninspired real fast. Many times during these missions you also encounter other motherfuckers mid-mission, maybe denying you entry or passing if you don't GO BACK A WHOLE FUCK-LONG WAY to get them a fucking apple or whatever! During these encounters I just felt like I wanted to kill them and go on, but guess what - YOU FUCKING CAN'T! WHY did they leave out the option to chose whether to be good or bad? It would've been better if you were able to chose to be bad and kill survivors as well, but no. So when the missions were already irritating and boring, they make it even worse with all these stupid characters!

Now this is also a level-game. You get points, level up, yada yada yada, you get the point. The thing is though, no matter how fucking much you level-up, upgrade your feats ans so on, the zombies also levels up as much as you do, and the shit you upgrade pretty much doesn't make any difference, not a big anyways, meaning that this game's level-system is fucking worthless as you never get superior to the zombies anyway! On top of that new special-infected are regularly added to the world, making the level-sytem even more and more and more worthless all the time. I mean, WHAT THE FUCK were they thinking?! It also hasn't got a manual save option and the auto saving system sucks just as much as everything else in this game. There's an icon which flashes (if I remember right) when it's saving, but it does that at odd times so you can pretty much never quit when you want without being sure if it's saving or not, making it even. more. frustrating! The characters are nothing funny either. They're boring, uninspiredly created and just typically done like "we gotta have each of one race". As for the facial expressions, well they doesn't exist in this game. Surprised? They always look the same neutral, bored, fuck-faced fucking way and the dialogue is worthless as well. *Sigh*

This game is so fucking bad, I HATE it. It's not fun, it's not good, the mechanics, graphics and so on are either very bad or average. I've never been more angry, frustrated or even disappointed I think I dare to say, than with this fucking game. It's the worst thing I've ever played on Xbox 360 and I almost finished it, too! Go on and get Left 4 Dead instead. It's the same game but a thousand times better, only it hasn't got an open-world format. If you must have that, go and get Dead Island instead. It's a TPS game, but a hell lotta better than this. Dead Island is bad. Bad, bad, BAD! Fuck this game, don't buy it.

80's Raw Power Hard Rock 'n' Roll

So I'm too early for the first time in like several years (woke up a little after 5 am) and am currently listening to some old school raw power-hard rock band that I love. Most of the bands mostly came out in the late 80's and tried to survive during the early 90's grunge outbreak. Though I love some grunge bands like Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, and Mother Love Bone (I'm more into death metal and alternative bands like Faith No More, Jane's Addiction, Rage Against The Machine, etc. rather than grunge, not a big fan of Nirvana or Pearl Jam for instance), I still prefer the old, ballsy hard rock stuff that was like if AC/DC had have a threesome with Motörhead and The Stooges. So here are some classics that I really like rocking out to....

Some personal thoughts on: Skyrim

I recently was lucky and got a copy of Skyrim exactly a week ago. As most people most likely know, Skyrim's a hit game that very many players have been discussing. Though I never was too anticipated about it when it was announced, maybe because I had only heard about Morrowind and Oblivion but not actually played 'em, I recently felt it was about time that I got this game myself.

So now a week has passed, I've had some time to play it and feel what it's all about. I'm going to do a review of it right now, I believe there's still way too much to do in it before a review, but I'm gonna share some thoughts I have about it so far. I'm close to 40 hours of gameplay now, I'm at level 20 as of this moment, and my obsession of playing it has decreased more and more during the last few days. I guess that is a first step in seeing what I think about the game - it's ultimately not as fun for a long time as it's in the beginning, not for me anyways. It's not like the GTA-series. I played Vice City from when it came to when San Andras came, probably almost every day, then it was pretty much the same with San Andreas. I kinda "lived" in those game-worlds back then. I believe GTA IV has the record now, though. Having been out since early 2008, I myself got an Xbox 360 in January '09 and GTA IV was my first game. I still play it today, it's the game I play the most and keep going back to over and over again. Now the point by all this GTA-talk is that I don't believe Skyrim will by like those in the long run.

Though I'm at almost 40 hours now, I guess I already around 15-20 hours felt the game was getting somewhat annoyingly repetitive. In my opinion it's just way too much of the same "speak to him and get a quest, go to that cave and get that item, return it to the quest giver". I would've liked more different tasks and environment than just caves for most of the quests. While this tends to be somewhat bad with the game, it still has tons of other great things to weigh it all up. Just pointing out a few other bad things quickly, which would be the stiff facial expressions during conversation, some bugs, and many annoying loading screens.

Now I'm going to focus on the things I really like about this game and what makes it unique. First off - character creation. Rather than having different human races, this games has different races all-in-all. Now I do not remember the race names, but you can be a human-like cat and lizzard, orc, elves, and of course some human-looking races. Being half Swedish, half Finnish myself, I play as a Nord because I'm fascinated by the old, nordic vikings and that stuff. You also join different factions which I really like. I instantly joined the Stormcloaks and fought against the Imperial. That's what I would've done in real life too, I guess - being revolutionary. After that I joined the Companions, whom I really as well. The third and so far last faction I've joined are the Thieves Guild. Them I do not like. I do not like their attitude at all and only does it all for the quest. Other than these three factions, I don't think there is any other I'm really too interested in, but I will probably do them anyway.

This game also has a great system of weapons and magic. I really like the possibility of having magic and (one-handed) weapons at the same time. There are also plenty of spells and weapons to use, as well as expand the weapons with magic and such, though I'm not good at this yet. I also like to go and wander around the world. It has its charm and places. I really like the college of Winterhold, I think it's a beautiful place when it snows a lot, and I can find myself just standing there and looking around. It's also very beautiful when it's raining. The "cities" are also great in this game, majestic and beautiful. My favorites are Whiterun and Riften I think, but Solitude is great too, especially when seen from the outside.

-------------------

All in all it's a great game so far, but in the long run I think I will let go of it, unfortunately. I do not see why there is so much fuzz about this game. While it certainly is a solid play, there are many games that I would easily prefer over this. But then again, I don't play games like Call of Duty any more. I do not see what's so special about some of those biggest names, with CoD as a primary example now. I really thought Black Ops (the last CoD I played) was nothing special at all. There are too many overrated games out there, Skyrim unfortunately being one of them. While I love many, many things with it, there are too many things to not make it "crush the competition". While I can probably say it's better than its closest rivals, like the Fable-series, I would rather pick up and play games like GTA, Gears of War, Deus Ex: Huma Revolution, Sleeping Dogs, Saints Row 2, and so on. But then again it's all just opinions.

My current rating for Skyrim: 8.2 / 10

My favorite drummers (hard rock / metal)

I thought I should share my personal favorite drummers as well as biggest influences. I'm a drummer myself so this is based on personal influence. I'm not a fan of today's drummers. I don't know if it's all the pro-tools and so on, or if they really just are that secure. I hate machine-drummers! What's the point of having a drummer, instead of a simple drum machine that doesn't cost any members' fees, if he just sounds like a machine? That is beyond me! Way too many drummers today seem to focus on skill, perfection and speed, while competing with every other drummer in the world about who is the best. This to me has made drumming today really soulless, uninspired and plain boring. "Yeah, cool dude you can play like a machine" but it sounds fucking stiff, boring and soulless. One thing I can say is to all the Lars Ulrich haters and trolls: at least he's real.

I'm kinda into a lot of death metal at the moment, and it's the old school stuff. Mainly the Swedish scene at the moment and the Stockholm sound (never were a big fan of the ultra-melodic Gothenburg sound nor its bands). I don't think there's a guitar sound that I like more than the buzzsaw sound Dismember, Entombed / Nihilist, Carnage and Grave had. One thing I also like is the drumming! It's kick-ass, raw, and very alive! Not like a fucking machine! It's sounds like a human who is solid-as-rock yet has got very much heart in it. If I listen to for instance Vader today (a buddy of mine really likes them and is trying to hook me into them as well), I just can't stand 'em for more than a few tunes - the drumming sounds so fucking dead. It's just pure drum-wankery. I generally hate blast-beats because of modern drummers, but I do like blast-beats in Carcass, for instance. Why? It simply sounds good, dynamic.

So after preaching my bullshit here, and I don't say any drummers of today are bad. Obviously they have a lot of skill, but they forgot to put any heart into it. So here are some of my favorite drummers of all time:

Gene Hoglan - Before you start: I know he's the "atomic clock" and all, but back in the day when he bashed skins in Dark Angel, he sounded like a fucking tank in-battle on the drums, making Dave Lombardo on "Reign In Blood" sound like just another soldier rather than a general.

Fred Estby - A death metal legend, drummer and song-writer from the Swedish legends Dismember, my favorite death metal band. I'm glad this guy never played guitar in that band, because his drumming is so kick-ass it makes me headbang and air-drum like a maniac!

Nicke Andersson - Another Swedish legend, both in death metal and hard rock / rock 'n' roll music. To me he's the old Entombed drummer, to others he's the main man in the Hellacopters. He didn't kick ass on drums in that band, however, in Entombed he certainly did. Like Fred Estby, a very alive drummer. Entombed's first two albums show great extreme metal drumming.

Ken Owen - The drummer from U.K. legends Carcass. This guy was drumming grindcore and death metal in their beginnings and is in that way a pioneer. Too bad drummers after him didn't follow his feel when doing blast-beats. It's really sad that the guy can't play no more. Let's hope he gets better and some day will drum again.

Chuck Biscuits - Probably my very favorite drummer at the moment. The guy is mostly known for his time with Danzig, but also punk acts like D.O.A. He has one of the smallest drum kits in heavy metal music, particularly for that time. Yet he sounded bigger than any one else. Like an animal behind the kit, he is what drumming is about, at least to me.

Sons of Anarchy is back!

I'm a pretty big fan of Sons of Anarchy. I love motorcycles, the chopper style and not the sports bike kind. I love Rockstar Games' "The Lost and Damned" installment in the Grand Theft Auto-series. Nothing to say really other than it's a very suitable show for me. I totally loved season one and two, but with season three I unfortunately kinda felt the quality of the show decreased. This continued with season four, though I don't know which of s.3 and 4 I liked the least. I'm also not completely sure why I didn't like these seasons as much, but a friend and myself both agreed about these seasons not being as good. With season three I ultimately got pretty tired of the whole Abel thing, that they lost him over and over again, as well as only shit after shit happening to Samcro. In season four it definitely was that way too much shit just kept coming to them, over and over again.

So where am I going with all this? Well, I watched the season five premiere. A while back I saw some behind-the-scenes footage for season five, and they really made it sounding promising. I got some hope back that season five might be more like the first two seasons, which I'd definitely like to see now. So now, after watching the s.5 premiere, I was really surprised! I think it's gotta be the best episode since sometime in season two, for sure! It was such a great episode, that my hope really got pumped up for the rest of season five. Now the only thing that can tell how it all will end up, is time, and I definitely feel like I can spend more time finding out. I've read rumors, or fact, I don't know actually, that SoA is planned for a total of seven seasons. After s. 3 and 4 I kind of wanted it to just end with season five, but if this season shows to be like the first two, or hopefully even better, I'd really like to see the show continue for more seasons.

The Satanic Bible

The Satanic Bible, written by Anton Szandor LaVey a.k.a. "The Black Pope", founder of the Church of Satan. This is some good readin'.

The Gathering

Here's The Gathering and some of my favorite tunes by them! Enjoy!

This was the first song I heard and I instantly fell in love with her voice.

This is probably my favorite song by them. It's just so dark and haunting.

This is one of their most famous songs and more of a live-party-song, to me at least.

This is another fave of mine. I really like her melody she uses around the music in this one.

This is an amazing one that focuses more on the band for most part, but when Anneke starts singing around half-way through, it's like an angel started singing. Amazing.

What's crackin' at the moment.

As of this moment, week, or whatever, the bands that I really listen to right now are:  
The Doors 
Danzig
U2 
Type O Negative 
Septic Flesh 
Life of Agony 
Rotting Christ 
Aphex Twin

and a lot of other electronic artists.

I don't really now how to describe this mix, but when I'm in a calm(er) mood I'm really listening to The Doors and U2. Two bands with beautiful music, in my opinion. When I'm in a dark / more deppressed mode it's definitely Type O and Life of Agony. Septic and Rotting are kind of new to me, so it's interesting and I really like their Greek metal style. Electronic stuff is for variation and I really like some kinds of electronic music, especially with analogue synthesizers. Danzig is probably the most listened right now. I've always been a huge fan since I discovered them. Glenn Danzig is one great songwriter and he has a special sound. I like every album he's done solo, as well as some of the Misfits and Samhain stuff (and the Black Aria albums), but like most other people I prefer the first four Danzig albums. I do, however, really like the 6:66 Satan's Child album, which to me is equally as good as Danzig 4.

Review: Overkill - The Electric Age

 Overkill have always been one of those thrash bands that to me, never released any bad albums. Sure there were a few that obviously wasn't as good as the others, but never an album I felt "what the fuck is this shit?" about. Though it seems like the band had their peek during the eighties and early nineties, like most thrash bands, Overkill seem to have gotten a new peek in recent years. Ironbound was a bomb that got dropped in 2010, a thrash album every true fan of the genre had wanted for a long time. The Electric Age is no exception two years later as the band is in the middle of a nuclear war, it seems!

Since its release I've had the time to go through it a bunch of times and it sure is one solid piece of metal music! While unfortunately most other big thrash bands today put out mediocre albums, Overkill really do the opposite. I think it shows in albums sales / popularity as well. When the album kicks in with "Come And Get It" my first thought was "is this Megadeth?". It sounds like something Megadeth should've done, but did not. It's a very great opening track that shows what this album is like. After the Megadeth-like opening the song kicks into traditional Overkill style, but the song has one more big surprise ahead! The middle section turns into a sort of marching thing reminiscent of many great eighties heavy metal bands. Throughout the whole album there actually is an Iron Maiden-feel in particular songs, so think classic Overkill meets Megadeth cirka 2007-2009 meets Iron Maiden. Next song to go is the lead single "Electric Rattlesnake" - a catchy, fun, and to-be live staple kind of tune. As the album continues we hear "Black Daze", a mid-paced song that also is very catchy and reminds me a little of Megadeth's "In My Darkest Hour". "Drop The Hammer Down" is a given to-be fan favorite and the ending track "Good Night" stands for this album's most "ballad" like tune, which is a very common and great thing Overkill have on most of their albums. It's very catchy and I sure only hope the song doesn't point at that this could be the last Overkill album. In between all these stick-outs there are some very solid and good Overkill album, though maybe not of lead single-caliber?

The album sound continues in a similar vein to Ironbound but the songs are overall shorter and not as progressive. Think that this is a stripped-down, more straight to the point Ironbound version and I think you've got the idea. I think this was a great move by the band as another "that" progressive album maybe wouldn't have matched its predecessor. Instead Overkill take the energy and quality of Ironbound and put it into a more "classic Overkill album" style.

In conclusion this album was both very surprising and not. It was surprising that the band managed to do an equally good album after the awesome Ironbound, but at the same time it's not surprising as I imagine that the band got really fired up by the great response Ironbound got. In the end this album shows that Overkill are in a new peek in their career and I feel a need to mosh and drink beer while listening to it. I raise my fist in honor of Overkill for succeeding once again, with hope that there will be more albums of this caliber in the near future!

I feel pretty secure when I say that Overkill will most likely be the winners in 2012!

Final rating: 9.5/10

Listen to album for free with Spotify! Listening with Spotify gives the band money while it's free for you!

I love Jackass

This says it all. Funny as fucking hell. I mean, seriously? Who comes up with ideas like this? Pure art.

Poetic and beautiful lyrics, part 1

I've got something to say
I killed a baby today
and it doesn't matter that much to me
as long as it's dead

We'll I've got something to say
I raped your mother today
and it doesn't matter much to me
as long as she spread

The Misfits - Last Caress

R.I.P. Raintime

The Italian metal band Raintime has disbanded as of May 27th (2012). I got this news yesterday and I was both sad and disappointed that this had happened. Raintime, one of my personal favorite (and one of few) modern metal bands I actually really enjoy listening to, is now no more. I was introduced to the band with their now last album "Psychromatic" (released in 2010) and instantly fell in love with it. I know that most Raintime fans seem to favor the "Flies & Lies" (2007) album, but I just can't deny the fact that "Psychromatic" was the one that hooked me, and I had never even heard of these guys. However, I do enjoy the "Flies & Lies" album as well as their debut "Tales From Sadness" (2005), though their last album was musically the most evolved and interesting one, and very finest work of theirs to me. I really listened a lot to the album for the first half year it was out, then I kinda moved on to other albums and revisited it once in a while.

This really wasn't great news at all, since I was looking forward to a new album. I heard though that three of the members would form a new project that is yet to be announced. Let's wait and see and time will tell what it'll be, I guess. But for now, I'm listening to this now defunct, fantastic band and I wanna share it with you all. I personally recommend "Psychromatic" for fans of more power, progressive, melodic and somewhat experimental metal, while the other two albums would fit well with fans of a more straight melodeath sound. All their albums are great anyways.

Some of my favorite tracks I recommend: Fire Ants, Shift, Fake Idols, Beaten Roads, One Day, Walk-On Actor, Flies & Lies, The Black Well, Beat It (Michael Jackson cover, great one too!!), Matrioska, Faithland, The Experiment, Chains Of Sadness, Using The Light Forever

R.I.P. Raintime. I will forever hold-on to my copy of the amazing "Psychromatic" album.

Kill Devil Hill - Kill Devil Hill (2012)

This album has been one of the albums I've been looking the most forward to for quite some time now and finally it arrived. This supergroup consist of Jason Bragg - vocals (ex-Pissing Razors), Mark Zavon - guitars (ex-W.A.S.P.), Rex Brown - bass (ex-Pantera, Down), and Vinny Appice - drums (ex-Dio, Heaven And Hell, Black Sabbath). The band is now going on tour with another supergroup - Adrenaline Mob - featuring Mike Portnoy (ex-Dream Theater) on drums, among others I don't know too well. Though, if I'm gonna be honest, Adrenaline Mob is an okey band, but not really my bottle of Coke. I couldn't personally really recommend them, but Mr. Portnoy is a great drummer nonetheless. Anyway ...

This album is quite varied, yet follows a line that doesn't completely separate the songs too much style-wise. The band themselves have reported it sounding like a mix of Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Alice in Chains, which I definitely agree with and couldn't describe any better. Some people have even said they hear some Pantera in this (because of Rex Brown), but I don't really hear anything that did lead my mind to Pantera, except for maybe the calm "Gates Of Hell", which sounds somewhat southern styled and "The Great Southern Trend-Kill" alike. The album starts with a track called "War Machine" which is an instant rocker and face-punch introduction to what this album is about. Vinny Appice doesn't play double bass drums so there are no really fast-paced tunes to be heard here, but this song would be one of the faster ones on the album. We get two songs that start off with Rex's mean bass acompanied with drums in "Hangman" and "Rise From The Shadows". Personally, I'm a fan of bass guitars and I belive it is the most underrated and overlooked instrument in metal music. "We're All Gonna Die" gets my thoughts a lot to Alice in Chains, especially during the chorus, and "Old Man" is probably the most straight-forward and simplest rocker on the album, reminding me of Led Zeppelin. Much of the other material is kind of Ozzy- and Dio-era Sabbath sounding, heavy and doomy.

The tunes come in a nicely done production. It sounds okey for an album by today's standards when everything is supposed to be in the red, why I don't know really, but it's like that and that's the way it is (hi Run-D.M.C.!!). Very instrument is also audible which I strongly like, especially the meatty bass. The guys put out great performances overall, but with both Vinny and Rex that comes as no big surprise, really. Mark Zavon also proves to be a great guitarist and I can only wonder where he's been before this project, aparat from a touring member of one of my all time fave bands W.A.S.P. But the biggest surprise about this band is the singer Jason Bragg. What a guy! This guy sings really fucking good, I love him! I guess he could be described as a mix between Lane Staley (ex-Alice in Chains, R.I.P.) and Tony Martin (ex-Black Sabbath), at least he sounds like that to me. He also used to be in a now defunct band called Pissing Razors that played a groovy sound somewhat similar to Pantera, Exhorder and Machine Head, in which he used more screaming which I didn't think was his great talent. I even think I can go as far as saying he's my favorite singer of the year, so far at least. Just great, what a voice, damn.

So to put a close to this review now. This was probably the one album I was looking forward to the most for quite a long time now, especially after hearing these three great tracks they put out for streaming: Time And Time Again, Voodoo Doll, and Revenge. I love all these three tracks and I really think they were good preview choices, they describe the album very well, I think. They also made a video for the song "Strange". A good one, but probably not the one I'd do a vid for. Anyway, after hearing the whole album, it left me a little disappointed in some way. I don't quite know what way(s), but I felt like I miss something. Maybe it's just that some tunes aren't as strong as the others, though there are no fillers really. To check out Kill Devil Hill and see what they're all about, I'd recommend the three tunes they released for streaming as album previews, as well as the video of course, and one of my own personal fave tracks on the album: Up In Flames.

Final rating: 8,5 / 11 ("this go to eleven" ;-) )

Keep your eyes open for the album in Spotify and you can check out some stuff by them at YouTube already, and of course buy the album and support them! :-)

West Of Hell - Spiral Empire (2012)

2012 has musically been pretty damn good so far, and we're not even quite half through it, yet. I've been pretty active with checking out new bands / releases lately and I stumbled on this little piece of metal music. It features the singer from Zimmers Hole and Mechanism (both featuring my favorite drummer Gene Hoglan, unfortunately he ain't playing on this album, but it's a great drummer on this album nonetheless), whose voice I like quite a lot. Musically the band themselves said this is a variety record and I can do nothing but agree. While its main roots are in the thrash folder, it still crosses the lines of other genres as heavy and I even guess progressive, groove and power metal to some extent.

The musicians, apart from singer "The Heathen", are no guys I've heard of before, but they don't lack any skill in playing and keeping their shit together. The guitars are really cool, with some great riffing but especially solos, I have to say. At least that was the biggest surprise to me, guitar-wise. The rhythm section is heavy and in full-throttle with a thick bass and massive drums, and together the whole mix is nicely done and every instrument is heard.

The somewhat (small) let-downs of this album is the album production. First off, "Death Magnetic" anyone?? The thing is clearly in the red. I HATE that. Secondly it sounds like a toy at times, you know like a toy machine or something, plastic-ly basically. But it ain't thaaat bad anyway, just a liiitle at times, that's all.

Material-wise I can't really put my finger on any "hit(s)" on this album as it's very consistent all through, but on the other hand it's not always good either. Sometimes it's actually very great to have that "special tune" everybody either loves or hates, but maybe most importantly - catches the attention of the listener. Therefore, I can't really give any tip on what song(s) to try out, so try the whole album instead. It's worth it.

Final rating: 8,7 / 11 ("this go to eleven" ;-) )

Listen to the whole album for FREE at Spotify, and some money will go to the band / rightholders.

Old memories

A friend of mine just sent me a message on the phone, telling me of a time maybe 1,5 years ago when we were at school and tried to print a picture of something. He couldn't get it to work, so he said that I had said "let me try.." and when I succeeded, I said "I want purr." (purr = the sound cats make, but I said purr as a word, I didn't try to make the sound myself). I WANT PURR?? That cracked me up. I used to say "purr" in lots of different and weird sentences, at completely random timings. This made me in a good mood.

My Name Is Earl

Just wanted to share a quick recommendation. There was this TV-series a few years back called My Name Is Earl. I think it was aired on Fox, but I'm not sure since I don't live in the US and we don't have Fox in Sweden so. Anyway, it's a comedy lasting four seasons about a guy called Earl, of course. Earl is an around-30 guy who's a low-time criminal, mainly stealing stuff. His life sucks and bad things happens to him, so one day he gets hit by a car and discovers karma. This makes him turn his life over completely. He makes a list of everything bad he's ever done and starts to make-up for all his mistakes.

It's often very hilarious when he meets the different people who he's harmed in some way, often kinda silly too. He's got a brother called Randy which is really stupid, but funny as hell. That guy just cracks you up totally. If you don't laugh at him, you sure are a sad motherfucker born without any humour. I've watched it since it aired back in '05, I think? I've had a lot of fun moments watching it and this series lies close to my heart. It's so warming in some way and I think Earl is a really cool dude. He's a rocker, I guess. At least he listens to AC/DC, Lynyrd and that stuff, and he looks like a stoner. That's good enough for me. It's a look I could go with.

Try it out if you already haven't! My Name Is Earl is awesome!

GTA IV: The Lost and Damned

                  Johnny K. taking The Lost brotherhood into action.

A game with a great story!

A dark mood. A raining Liberty City. Roaring motorcycles in the night. Blazing gunfire in the middle of the streets. An insane gang. This is the Lost motorcycle club.

*Warning! Spoilers!!*

Grand Theft Auto (IV): The Lost and Damned - that is the first episode Rockstar Games put out after the original IV story / game. Its story is based around The Lost motorcycle club in which Johnny Klebitz, the mysterious biker dude from the original story who Playboy X was afraid of, is the vice president as well as the protagonist. Johnny has been in charge while the club's ordinary president, Billy Grey, has been in rehab. When Billy gets out of rehab at the beginning of this story, there's immediate tension within The Lost, especially between Johnny and Billy. Johnny who believes in certain order argues a lot with Billy, who runs the club in anarchy much for his own good and will.

                Billy breaking up the truce between the Lost and the Angels of Death.
                     Left to right: Jason, Johnny, Jim, Billy and two Angels of Death-members.

We get to follow the Lost as they once again fall back into biker-gang warfare after Billy breaks a truce, which was set by Johnny, between the Lost and their rivals Angels of Death. As things progress the tension between Johnny and Billy increases and the gang wars get worse. Johnny starts to find himself kinda lost within his own club but apparently ain't alone. After a while when things are starting to collapse, Billy can't stand Johnny any more and makes a set-up with the triads, to kill Johnny and his friend Jim Fitgerald during a heroin deal. They however manage to escape and fight through lots of triad goons, only to find Billy, who has crashed with his motorcycle, getting caught by the cops. Billy goes into jail and Johnny becomes president once more, but the Lost is split into two factions due to Brian Jeremy, a close friend and supporter of Billy's beliefs, claiming that it was Johnny who set up Billy in order to become chapter president again.

                        Johnny witnesses the arresting of Billy Grey.

Now the Lost are having internal war as well as the gang wars still raging on. Johnny and co. eventually finds Brian and his faction after a tip from the Italian mobster Ray Boccino (from the original IV) and take them down. The Lost, now in bad condition and a lot of members short, start to face the big problem - Billy. Billy is taken into protected custody and is gonna rat on Johnny and Angus, another close friend and fellow member to Johnny. A politician, Thomas Stubbs, who Johnny worked for gives out this information to warn Johnny. Johnny and the remaining members of the Lost then proceed to break into the Alderny State Correctional Facility, where Johnny finds and kills Billy.

                       Johnny proves to be a real dangerous man, blowing the prison gates, going in and 
                       killing Billy Grey inside the prison.

Johnny and the others then go back to the Lost clubhouse, which has been trashed by Ray Boccino's goons for being ripped off by Johnny. He and another hitman of Ray's, Niko Bellic from the original IV, had met up with the Jewish mob to exchange some diamonds for two million dollars. The deal was however ambushed by Luis Lopez (later the protagonist of The Ballad of Gay Tony) who shot and killed two members of the Jewish mob. Niko fled and Johnny managed to take the briefcase full of money before he fled. He never gave them to Ray however, instead keeping them for the Lost and giving them to Jim Fitzgerald, who was later killed by Niko Bellic on orders from Ray Boccino (which originally was to kill Johnny, but he wasn't there when Niko showed).

                        Johnny was put through some bad actions by Billy and didn't get any respect for it.

The Lost brotherhood now mostly destroyed with only a few members left, the loss of several important members such as Billy, Brian, Jason Michaels (killed by Niko Bellic on orders from Mikhail Faustin for Jason dating his daughter) and their friend Jim, and the destroyed clubhouse. Johnny orders the others to burn down the place to "put it out of its misery". The story ends with Johnny and fellow members Terry, Clay and Angus, watching their clubhouse burn down.

                        In the end I think Johnny felt sad and lost. The Lost and Damned = not a happy ending.

In conclusion all I can say about this game / episode is: I LOVE IT! I'm quite a fan of motorcycles and motorcycle gangs. I watch and love the TV-series Sons of Anarchy, which in many ways is similar to The Lost and Damned, or vice versa. I would love to see a movie made based on this story since it's very solid, deep, dark and filled with action. I love the character of Johnny Klebitz who I can relate to in some ways. That's one of the things with the GTA games. Until GTA IV, I couldn't really relate myself to any of the protagonists, which is somewhat boring, but Niko and Johnny are both great characters who I see some of myself in.

Rockstar Games also did something special for this one. They put this noise filter over the picture in this one, making it looking dirty / gritty. Now, I've seen many fans complaining about this, but in my opinion it just adds more feeling to the mood and it's perfect for this game! You can of course turn it off, but some morons don't seem to understand that, or they are too goddamn fucking lazy to get their asses into the options-display menu.

Some of the music is also new in this game. For instance, what kind of music fits the biker culture? Heavy Metal, Hard Rock, yeah? The L.C.H.C. (Liberty City Hard-Core) channel is much better than in IV (I never was a big fan of hardcore(-punk) apart from the N.Y.C. band Cro-Mags), now featuring mostly death metal, but also some black metal. LCR (Liberty City Rock) is also completely new and made me discover old classic acts like Nazareth and Styx, while introducing me to some songs I've missed by bands I've loved for ages, like "Touch Too Much" by AC/DC. It's my new favorite AC/DC song! Also cool that they put some good, old Saxon in it. Kinda wish there was something with Motörhead though, but you can't have everything and I'm glad for that. What joy in life would that give?

It's not exactly a new game anymore, but it's a classic to me, a game I love and have played over and over, and will continue to do. I totally recommend it! The Lost and Damned ROCKS!!

Saints Row - "2" is better than "The Third"

I love sandbox-games. I LOVE the Grand Theft Auto-series. I remember back in the day when I played GTA II, then III when it came out and had that amazing TPS-view instead. Vice City was the first game I ever truly loved, San Andreas the second and IV no less than the others. Then we also have the Saints Row-series. A GTA-ripoff to some, a different kind of a "GTA clone" to some, and so on. Personally, I'm just happy that there are more games "like" GTA, since that's my favorite kind of games.



I bought Saints Row 2 back in 2009 when I found it in a store. I think I read the back and thought it seemed to be like GTA and therefore bought it. I do not regret it! I've had SO much fun with that game, it's unbelievable. It was like a weird, crazy, comedy cousin to GTA: San Andreas with some better graphics and mechanics. I totally loved the free options of choosing your clothes and even making your very own character. Then I played the first Saints Row, which was good but quite bad in some way(s) compared to the second game.

In time I started waiting for the third installment in the series, with great anticipation. When it finally came out in late 2011 I bought it. Well, what can I say about it? While it's a great, funny and pretty good looking game, it misses kinda a lotta things. I've played it over and over and always find things here and there that makes me compare it to the second. Here are some of the things I like and dislike, comparing the second game with the third:

Saints Row 2

Good:

• Lots of different clothes and haircuts
• Quite many, different from each other, safe-houses
• Quite many enterable buildings
• Activities like fight club, demolition derby and fuzz
• Many different-looking areas in the map
• The urban street gangs fight each other

Bad:

• Quite stellar and bad driving mechanics
• The same with the shooting mechanics

Saints Row The Third

Good:

• Nicer-looking city in many ways
• Sexier girls (both pedestrians and player character)
• Upgradeable weapons
• Better driving and shooting mechanics
• Funnier vehicles
• Buildable Saints headquarters (though only three)
• More Saints-characters (like Oleg, Angel, Viola, Kenzie and Zimos)
• Funnier missions

Bad:

• The whole middle-section of the story is made up of side-missions (boring!)
• They took away my fave activities fight club, fuzz and demolition derby
• But they KEPT the boring and annoying snatch, escort and trafficking
• Less enterable buildings 
• All the buildable safe-houses look the same inside (boring...)
• Shaundi is fucking annoying
• Many parts of the city look the same
• Less secrets (secret rooms etc. that were in 2)

I'm sure there are other things as well, both possitiva and negative, for both games that I just didn't come up with now. Overall, I think Saints Row 2 had more, was more solid and fun in the long run than The Third. While Saints Row The Third has many improvements, it certainly feels kinda thin and rushed in many ways. WHY not KEEP all the good and fun from 2 and ADD the new stuff? In Saints Row 4 I'd like to see 2 combined with 3, with new stuff. Don't rush it, make it awesome! 

In the end, I am not satisfied with SR3 since I bought it full-price when it came out. I bought SR2 for 200 Swedish kronor (about 25-30 bucks maybe, SR3 was like 65-75 dollars) and I've had more fun with it.

                Concept art for SR the third. It did / does NOT look like this .....