• 13Oct 07

  Makes me scream with happiness: Kenna-Make Sure they See my Face.

  Recently, I decided to leave the bank to pursue my future of a Graphic Designer, however this leaves me unemployed, but it does not stop me from wanting to buy Kenna's new effort: Make Sure They See my Face. For the past week or so, I've been listening to the advanced copy of the CD along with the recently leaked version. I even listen to it in a very obnoxiously loud manner in my car. Yeah, I'm openly admitting it, only because I am very excited to purchase the actual copy on Tuesday, October 16th. In fact, I'm praying that some of the songs on the Advanced Copy make it into the final release. Songs like Never Let Me Down bring in some major high energy Kenna action!

  It's nice to see how an artist matures from their last album as well. New Sacred Cow is by far one of my favorite albums and was ahead of its time. (Even if it had a lot of the Neptune's produced tracks that have similar sounds all the time.) This time around, Kenna reunites with the Neptunes, preferrably Chad Hugo to create another amazing CD. In fact, IGN music gave the album 8.8/10. However, my trusted site for lesser known artists, Okayplayer, gave it a 3/5 ?uestlove heads, but gave it a very harsh review. I on the other hand, after waiting for a few years for a new Kenna Album must say that the album is well worth the wait and continues to make me smile even if it is a leaked version.

  If you ever went to Myspace, you can sample a few of his songs, which include Out of Control, a song featured on a PSP commercial, Face the Gun, a teaser for his upcoming album, and Say Goodbye to Love, which is his current single. Each of these songs make me happy to have waited this long for his album. However, the length that it took was due to a plague that continued to harm Kenna's career. That plague? The jump from label to label, in which labels tend to let him go and make Kenna fight to find a rightful home for his CD. In fact, delays were constantly occuring like his first album. However, unlike NSC, this album is released in conjunction with his current single and not delayed years after the single.

  Originally scheduled in August, then pushed to September 11th, then now October 16th. Personally, I think this is a much better chance to sell, since September 11th, Kenna had to battle against Kanye and 50 cent. As an avid Kenna fan, I must admit that he could not touch a piece of the pie created by those two artists. However, his CD deserves much praise since he experiments, but is successful. In fact, Kenna's vocals are not strong at all, but you can feel him express so much heart and thought in his music that you can almost feel what he is thinking. The only problem with the CD? The agony of realizing that the 12 tracks on this CD will make you realize that Kenna's third album may be released years after MSTSMF. Bright side? I am definitely going to listen to this CD years after I buy it from my local music store. (AKA Best Buy.)

  If anyone is reading this, definitely look into this CD and BUY it. Sure you can download, but Kenna deserves the recognition. Definitely, being the opener for the Live Earth concert as a growing artist is big and hopefully the sophmore release will do the same.

  I'll make sure that Kenna's album will see my face on October 16th.

  • Posted Oct 13, 2007 1:31 pm GMT
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• 8Jul 07

  To Open Up the Minds of Gamers

  In the brink of watching people constantly debate on which system is better, it made me a bit annoyed. Sure, I could've easily avoided all contact by not reading user comments, but I just could not help it at all. It's like a child who knows that something is dangerous, but goes on to play around with the dangerous thing anyways. So why must people hate on their opposition? A bunch of "lowlives" arguing over the gaming supremacy of all systems. "Go PS3! Down with Microsoft!" That for example deserves a slap to the face by the parents. There's better things to be arguing about in life. For example, one can argue about the current state of the world, but most Game Spot readers choose not to. Instead, they post thousands of posts within a whole week just to get their point across and help their marketed system.

  What happened to the days where people actually tried out each system? During the classic Sega and Nintendo battles, gamers weren't really arguing much about the better system like they did today. Instead, gamers would flock to Best Buys and treat it like a Mini gaming convention. Gamers from across the city would come to these places just to try out the latest games from all current systems at the time. No, they were not there to debate, but they were there to debate in their minds about which games were fun or not. At the time, Mario garnered fans throughout the world, both young and old because of the gameplay found in the games. Nowadays, people tend to strand away from Mario because he looks too darn cute for his own good. How does this relate to Nintendo's current state in the flame war? The obvioius "Nintendo is for children" statement occurs. What ever happened to the word fun? The PS3 is just a big blu-ray player! Most of us owned a PS2 at one point, or at least a PSX? XB360 is just full of first person CRAP! Did one forget that Microsoft is realizing their issues and entering new markets? Viva Pinata, in my opinion, helped expand the age group quite a lot. Not to mention, it was a good game for all ages with a bit of cannibalism too.

  Do not forget the portables either. They witness similar battles through the idiotic "DS VS PSP" threads. I own both and I enjoy both equally. There's games in there for everyone. However, it does not hurt to expand your horizons by trying out a game YOU think will not be fun. The casual gamer tends to stay away from games that look too darn cute for their own good, but give them GTA and it will be the greatest thing ever to them. My friends were casual gamers and normally only played sports and action games, but it was interesting to hear one of them talk about Harvest Moon being a great game for the SNES.

  In an age where people tend to think cute games are for kids, that brought a smile to my face. If they can realize and open up to other kinds of games, then so can everyone else. Since almost 100% of the "I think these games are for kids" gamers are males, I must say most males are idiots. Yes, I'm a guy too, but it's true. In terms of gaming, a girl is much more brave to try out different kinds of games compared to a guy. Those same girls are also not afraid to play Gears of War or Halo. A lot of X-Box Live subscribers will notice the increase of female gamers recently.

  It amazes me. My girlfriend LOVES everything Disney, enjoys RPGs and because of this is a big Kingdom Hearts fan. However, when Gears of War came out, she wanted to get Gears of War BAD. To save her the groans of buying a system, I had to convince her not to get a 360, why? Only because she did not have enough money to pay off the 360 ASAP. She also loves to spend money on clothes. Besides, she does not like me spending too much money on games either so it just shows that we look out for one another rather than be too controlling.

  Of course, this blog was not going to dive deep into the level of open mindness of a gamer, but hopefully spark SOME form of interest to gamers so that they will actually try games and systems more than what they see on boxes, ads, commercials, or at a local retailer. There's more to a game than just the look, there's also something we've all forgotten about, and that little thing is called fun.

  • Posted Jul 8, 2007 11:20 am GMT
  • Category: Games
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