Sunday, October 25, 2009

Nerd News in Brief

Before we get into the nerdy news, just allow me a minute to dispense some heartfelt congratulations to our brother DataVortex. At this year's Fall Fest in Sister Bay, WI, Data proposed to his girlfriend – via the annual ping-pong ball drop, no less.

So please join me in wishing the happy couple much nerdy love and the best of fortune in their upcoming nuptials!
  • She's Still a Geek: Nerd-friendly songstress Marian Call has announced that she'll begin recording her new full-length album, Something Fierce, over the coming weeks. Proposed song topics include Anchorage, the International Space Station and sushi. Further details and tour dates can be found at Marian's site.
  • Fish and Chips: Chip artist Bit Shifter will be performing at Chicago's Ai Lounge this Halloween. Tickets are $20 at the door, with a nice $15 presale. And, so as to make things flow nicely from that Marian Call piece, Ai also serves sushi. There you go.
  • I'll be Your Toad: Scared of Dinosaurs dropped a new single this week, a cover of "Mario Kart Love Song." You can peep the track on The 61, and, of course, there's an accompanying video.
  • Once Upon a Time: In what is surely the wildest release news of the week, YTCracker has just unleashed Chrono Nurga Vol. 1 upon an unsuspecting world. The 7-track EP, the sum of which was created in less than 24 hours, is freely available from the DG himself.
  • Out of the Blue: In other release news, Random has at long last made the instrumentals from his Capcom-licensed Mega Ran 9 album available. Download, cover, remix and share.
  • Hip to be Square (Enix): And to complete the hat-trick of musical awesome that is this week's new nerdy albums, OverClocked ReMix has just dropped their Xenogears remix project Humans + Gears. This double-disc album is available for free from the fine folks at OCR.
  • Like a Gypsy: As an added bonus, I'll also point out the excellent new Fleetwood Mac mash-up album Fleetwood Mix at no additional charge. Because, y' know, I am all about value. And also Instamatic is my homey!
  • Playing with Power: My pal Masu was one of scores gamers thrilled earlier this week when the Surfacescapes team at the Entertainment Technology Center of Carnegie Mellon University released this video. It's a proof-of-concept for a tabletop dungeon-crawl experience using the Microsoft Surface technology. This is how our kids will game.
  • Describe to Me Immediately: There's only one man who could've possibly found a Klingon translation of the Sesame Street theme. That man, of course, is Church H. Tucker!
  • Apparently, We Rule (Again): As we all well know, an edition of NNIB isn't complete without our obligatory geek chic link, and this week Church came through with two. Both from CBS.
  • A Cool Case of Old Milwaukee: Zen Albatross was nice enough to turn me on to This Spartan Life, the world's first machinima talk show web series. It's been going strong since 2005, but is presently taking advantage of the Kickstarter program to take the show to that all-important next level. Give it a look. And maybe some scratch.
  • Stick it to You: And speaking of sharing money/support, my friend and long-time hosting solution Antisoc has some sweet new stickers. You can get 'em free just by giving his music a little publicity, which seems like a pretty fair shake.
  • Worst. Costume. Ever.: When Dave the Knave first tweeted this, I was sure it was a joke. But then I realized that, since this is the internet, it's sort of a crap shoot.
  • Accio Equality: The Harry Potter Alliance's Wrock 4 Equality project garnered some amazing press last week. More specifically, Andrew Slack wrote a great piece for HuffPo, and the event even got some attention from the Wall Street Journal!
  • I Came to Get Down: I am not familiar with Brett Domino, but after Matt Ryd mentioned this video via Twitter, it became apparent that I need to buy a Stylophone Beatbox. And also a polka dot backdrop.
  • Wu-Tang Forever: For years I've been talking about the importance of nerds in hip-hop – not just nerdcore – and nobody listened. But that was before RZA came out of the geek closet. Yes, my friends, we're closing out this edition with a video you've all most certainly seen by this point. Why? Because it's that fuckin' important! And because if I don't, Matt will clobber me.


8 comments:

Dave White said...

God, I love the things the folks at my alma mater come up with. "Oh, this? We weren't goofing around with the big ass table. No sir. This is, uh, computer science research."

Church said...

Sonnovabitch! I've had Ep. 6 of TSL in my feed for months and didn't notice!

Z. said...

You'd be surprised the shit you can get away with, Dave, by just bookending it with "FOR SCIENCE!" ;)

Understandable, Church. You spend most of your energy staying on top of those geek chic posts on my behalf. :D

J.Goodwin said...

The RZA was interviewed on NPR last week. TWICE.

How crazy is that?

Matt Ryd said...

I'm pretty sure that when my Stylophone Beatbox comes, I'm going to have to do a Stylophone/Beatbox/Vocals YouTube video. I haven't been this excited for a kitschy instrument since I won my Omnichord on eBay.

Jimi said...

Random is the bomb.

I like how they asked him what super power he would have. My mother is a lecturer in educational studies, and she went to a seminar recently to see some pretty significant guy (who I forget the name of) in educational studies who she has looked up to for years, and who she quoted in her PhD thesis etc. She ended up in the pub with him afterwards asking him what his superpower would be :P

Z. said...

Did you catch him on Colbert, J? It was epic!

I haven't bought an odd instrument since I got my steal drum, Matt, so I figure I'm due. :D

I think "What's your superpower" is one of those so-shallow-it's-deep questions, Jimi.

J.Goodwin said...

No, I didn't see the Colbert piece, I should check that out.

On Point:
http://www.onpointradio.org/2009/10/the-wu-tang-way

Marketplace:
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/10/16/pm-tao-of-wu

When I search on NPR.org I get a lot of other hits as well, so I apparently missed some (Fresh Air).

Very much surreal. I often wonder how he personally viewed his audience in the early days. Who was he writing for, and did he have any idea that his music was going to fill the headphones of white suburban high school kids not just around the US, but around the world, inspiring a whole new boom in hip-hop in Europe, nerdcore worldwide, etc.

Just thinking about it gives me goosebumps.