Top Chef notwithstanding, it is rarely advisable to see how a sausage is made. This is not a new aphorism—aphorisms are rarely new—but technology has given it new resonance. It has never been easier to distribute bonus content, to be ‘closer’ to artists, and to see heretofore-mysterious processes. A
Unlike movies, videogames rarely have memorable trailers. Most of the commercials created to show them off are either brief sizzle reels or prolonged, hacky punchlines. The TV spot for the original Gears of War was an exception, however. Undercutting the promise of apocalyptic alien carnage with the
With his latest EP, Paths We Take, internet weird-house and software artist Brian returns us to his distinctive realm of ordinary life turned bizarre. It’s an EP of four songs, each one describing a chapter in a story that follows two people and their life together as it unfolds. “They meet, fall in
How many videogames could just as easily be Bon Iver or Sigur Rós music videos? Ten percent? Fifteen? In the spirit of that question, here is the trailer for Soft Body, which, in addition to being the fashion thinkpiece term of art for yours truly, is apparently “an action-puzzle game set in a medit
If you ever wanted to see Gorillaz and Blur frontman Damon Albarn dressed up as a giant ice cream cone, now’s your chance. Britpop group Blur have re-envisioned Super Mario World in their music video for “Ong Ong,” replacing Mario and Peach with Mr. and Ms. Okay, two smiling yellow circles. The vide
Feeling starved for layered electronic beats and primary-colored shapes? Well, you’re in luck. In Colour, the debut album by Jamie xx, is here to fill that rectangle-shaped void in your heart. Like the music of his other project, The xx, Jamie’s solo work is low-key and beautifully simple, but In Co
I remember being eight-years-old and having a playground debate as to how Jamiroquai’s music video to the song “Virtual Insanity” was made. We were kids, so obviously one of the suggestions was that it was magic. Another said it was computer graphics. But the most plausible was that the floors were
I sometimes fear that Basehead’s Play With Toys is lost to time. Originally released in 1992, the record got a lot of acclaim and little else: an immaculately low-key live-instrument take on hip-hop, with songs that seemed to have ambled into existence. On the microphone, Michael Ivey split the diff
Say the words “Radiohead” and “new music” almost anywhere and you are bound to attract attention. Maybe even a lot of attention. So when I heard that Radiohead’s interactive wandering app, PolyFauna, from developer Universal Everything, was not only being updated but also that it had 8 new tracks th
The imagery for George and Jonathan’s interactive music videos for their album III is simple yet savvy: bright polychromatic lines streak across a grid towards infinity. It’s pretty much like the light-cycle scene in Tron, which is suiting enough for electronic music, but with one catch: all the com
Mac DeMarco writes jangly, bluesy indie rock songs. As far as I know he has no songs about burning insects with cigarettes, though I could be mistaken. He does however have a game about it. His label has just released Squish’Em, which you can play here. Armed with a half-smoked cigarette from your c
Granted, there’s a lot to love about the pig masks. But Scarface-types in animal masks aside, the smooth, distinct vibe is realized in the music video/not-quite-a-game Honey by musical artist James Dean and video artist Vince Mckelvie. There are the rows of palm trees receding in the horizon; the th
The song is called “Radiation Therapy” by a noisecore artist going by the name of Wolfshirt. (Googling produced no additional information other than this superlative entry on Urban Dictionary: Wolf shirts generally possess an almost magnetic effect on women; who as if under a spell, cannot quench th
As part of Moogfest, we’re arranging an afternoon of talks featuring people who worked on Nidhogg, Dance Central, Gone Home, and more. It’s gonna be awesome.
Physical touch is something that’s been sorely missing as music has become more digital. You’re not going to see a producer going all Pete Townshend on his $10,000 dollar studio equipment. But a weird and wonderful acoustic research project by Felix Flair turns any hard surface into a tactical music
Today, Radiohead surprised everyone with a free mobile “app” called PolyFauna in which you walk around a desolate atmosphere while messing around with your phone’s features and, of course, listening to Radiohead. I’m just gonna call a spade a spade and say it’s a game. Here are some of the game-lik
The RZA is the grandmaster of hip-hop, and we do not mean that in like a “Grandmaster Flash” context. The dude is mega-good at chess. Next week in Anaheim he will be defending his crown at the Hip Hop Chess Federation’s celebrity tournament, which is the most RZA-sounding federation ever. He’ll prob
