Gorgonzola Cheese!

I love music gizmos and don’t blog enough about them.  This is what I’d like for Christmas please:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hELTtsBRie4

Buy it here

If you’ve ever wondered what it’d be like if one of the world’s best video game developers worked together with one of the best animation studios to create a video game, take a look below.  This is the trailer for Level 5 (Dragon Quest 8 and 9, Professor Layton series) and Studio Ghibli’s (My Neighbor Totoro, Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, Ponyo) collaborative Nintendo DS game, Ninokuni or “The Another World.”

alternate link

I’ve been painstakingly trying to learn how to play piano for the past year anticipating the moment where I’m sitting at some old timey eating establishment minding my own business when an old crooner from the live band suddenly announces that the keyboardist has been injured and they will have to cancel the show unless there’s anyone in the audience who can fill in.  Like physicians on airplanes, the 2 keyboardists next to me will suddenly get very quiet and avoid any eye contact and then I will rise up to the occasion, a la Marty McFly, and meticulously plink out the keys to the theme of Dr. Wiley’s Castle stage from Mega Man 2 while the band jams along with me and we ROCK OUT.  Until that happens, here’s a guy with actual talent named Ronald Jenkees. There’s no telling if this guy is some Rain Man-esque savant or a classically trained musician fooling the world. Either way, I love how he can play so fluidly and freely and genuinely looks like he’s having the greatest time doing it.

A dog and a bust of Napoleon discuss Street Fighter II in this Portuguese TV show.

via GameTrailers.com

It’s the end of the week so I thought I’d do a MEGA POST starting with a trailer for a live action Mega Man fan movie made by Eddie Lebron.

Check out the Proto Man cameo at 2:29. The guy playing Dr. Wiley is spot on.  I’m sure the actress playing Roll could be cute without the wig, but it unfortunately makes her look like a dude. This movie looks like a very ambitious project and I can’t wait to see it when it’s finished. Check http://www.megamanfilm.com/ for more details.

To continue this post, here is a really creative fan ad for Mega Man’s most recent appearance in the video game world, Mega Man 9.  Mega Man 9 took the series back to its roots and reintroduced the NES-style graphics and gameplay similar to Mega Man 2.  It is available for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Nintendo Wii as a downloadable game.  The music for this ad is Concrete Man’s theme.


Mega Man (in his Mega Man Legends helmetless form) will also be appearing in the upcoming Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Cross Generation Heroes, which is a spiritual successor to the the Marvel vs. Capcom series. It will be released on December 11th for Nintendo Wii but be ready to import it because it looks like the game will not be leaving Japanese shores due to the licensing nightmare that would ensue due to Tatsunoko’s distribution rights being owned by various companies in the US.


I’d like to end it all with an oldie but a goodie.  Okkusenman is a song about our childhood memories, which may include Mega Man or Ultraman and it is done to the theme music to Dr. Wiley’s Castle from Mega Man 2. The song became hugely popular a year or two ago and has spawned many covers and even flash animated music videos.

I was reminded of this song the other day and thought I’d share it since it’s a big part of my childhood and probably why I enjoy trippy cartoons, pinball, and have problems counting above 12.  The Pinball Number Count made its debut on Sesame Street in 1977 and was recorded by Oakland’s The Pointer Sisters.

There is an excellent remix by DJ Food on Ninjatune’s Solid Steel Presents Sesame Street.

This cover of Europe’s The Final Countdown using a kazoo, ukelele, and keyboard hybrid made my day. I’d start my magic tricks illusions with this performance any day.

via Reddit

Here’s an excellent cover of Daft Punk’s “Something About Us.” It’s done by Randy George via Reddit.

He’s using a Nintendo DS with Jam Sessions (known as Hiite Utaeru DS Guitar M-06 originally in Japan), a Moog theremin (I had no idea that Moog even made theremins!), and vocoder and keyboard powered by Ableton Live.

Randy George Cover:

Original “Something About Us” Music Video:

“Hey, Doctor Jones, no time for love. We’ve got company!”

-Short Round

What better way to celebrate Singles Awareness Day than to geek out with the new trailer for the fourth Indiana Jones movie: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull?

Is Harrison Ford too old to eat solid foods? Will Shia Leboeuf pull off a convincing 50s greaser? Will this movie be more patriotic than Spider-Man 3? We’ll find out May 22nd.

As you wish, my unusually sized rodent friend!

We rang in the Chinese New Year by making some noodles, which oddly enough is how we celebrate Thanksgiving too. Noodles are supposed to symbolize a long life on Chinese New Year and on Thanksgiving it means that your parents don’t know how to celebrate American holidays. It is also the year of the Rat in the Chinese Zodiac, which comes around every 12 years, and signifies luck for everyone born on this year.

Also on Chinese New Year, CCTV has a huge variety show event that includes singing, dancing, comedy skits, and a lil thing called Wushu, which is more popularly known around the world as Kung Fu. Here’s the best clip I could find of yesterday’s performance:

UPDATED WITH BETTER QUALITY VIDEO 2/9/2008

The performers in the middle are some of China’s top competitors from the 2007 All China Games.