End of Year Review 2020

Good day to you ladies and gentlemen and welcome to my annual End of Year Review where I look back on the year and highlight certain things that were interesting to me. So 2020, I think we can all agree that this year has been a bloody disaster, but in the midst of the chaos and despair, there has been some bright spots for sure. So as per usual, I will talk about the year as a whole from my perspective, break it down into sections and then conclude with a summary. So without further ado let’s begin.

Video Games

2020 has been an interesting year for us gamers, even though the pandemic really messed with a lot of development and left certain games released incomplete or pushed back to next year, there have been a number of good releases across all consoles, and we even got the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, well sort of as there was a lot of scalpers.

As for me, I ended up playing quite a few games, some old ones and a few new ones as well. Since getting stuck back in the UK in March I was able to play my PS4 and finally play Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and Horizon: Zero Dawn, the former I enjoyed besides some crazy game-breaking glitches and the latter which was fun but not as captivating as I had hoped. I even back to some of my older Nintendo Switch games like Child of Light, Terriria and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (especially after sephiroth came out).

But what about new games? Well like everyone else I jumped in on Animal Crossing: New Horizons and had stupid amounts of fun messing around on my island and reconnecting with friends online. Streets of Rage 4 had a wonderful presentation and was pretty good even if I didn’t play it as much as I would’ve liked. Also Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition was a delight and though it got a little hard at times, I frigging love the gameplay and the beautiful upgrades to the visuals and audio. A Short Hike came out of nowhere to be one of my favourite relaxing gaming experiences since I played Animal Crossing: Wild World in 2008. And then, of course, there was Spider-Man: Miles Morales, which even on PS4 was a visual delight with a badass soundtrack, cool quality-of-life upgrades to the established gameplay and story which was captivating. Now sure the game got a little glitchy and it probably could’ve been priced a little lower, but I had a great time regardless. And finally Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is a game I’m still working my way through, but I’m having a lot of fun with because of the varied combat options for the characters, the awesome music and nice character moments in the story. It is a little repetitive towards the 20-hour mark, but I will hopefully I’ll get back to it the next week or so. The only game missing from this list is Final Fantasy VII Remake, I did buy it in the summer, but wanted to dedicate time to Animal Crossing and play through the original FFVII up to the point where Remake ends, so I’ll probably play it January.

Top 6 Games

1. Animal Crossing: New Horizons
2. Spider-Man: Miles Morales
3. Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition
4. Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity
5. Streets of Rage 4
6. A Short Hike

Films

Watching films in 2020 has been weird. I can still remember being in Canada near the start of the year watching Bad Boys, Birds of Prey, Sonic and The Invisible Man, then the pandemic hit and everything got shut down (well it did in the UK). Some films were pushed back to the end of the year, some moved to streaming services and some have no release date at all. The pandemic really hit the industry hard with a lot of cinemas getting closed down from indie theatres to big chains like my very own Cineworld. And since watching films at the cinema is one of my favourite things to do it has left me feeling pretty sour. Though it wasn’t all doom and gloom as there were a number of films that showed up on streaming, from Netflix to Amazon to Disney Plus and so on, and while I was late to the party with a lot of these entries, I was glad that I was so inquisitive as I ended up finding a lot of surprising films online this year.

Top 10 Films of 2020

1. Over the Moon
2. The Trial of the Chicago 7
3. Soul
4. Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
5. Da 5 Bloods
6. Elona Holmes
7. The Way Back
8. The Devil All the Time
9. Gretel & Hansel
10. Leftover Women

So this list was incredibly hard to put together and I imagine if I had more time I’d be shuffling these around and adding more films from this year’s slate especially if I were still able to go to the available cinemas in Vancouver. But hey it is what it is. I am only sad I had to take The Invisible Man off of my list as I had SO much fun with that film, however, the films I ended up with resonated with me on a higher frequency. I’m sure I’ll be doing a lot of catching up next year so I look forward to that.

Honourable Mentions

• The Invisible Man
• Robin’s Wish
• Bad Boys For Life
• Sonic the Hedgehog
• Extraction
• The Social Dilemma
• Borat 2
• Fatman
• Bill and Ted Face the Music
• Tenet

Television

When it comes to TV it’s funny, I haven’t watched that much, to be honest. You’d think with a pandemic that kept me indoors for the majority of the year I would have watched a lot more. But to be honest not too many things really tickled my fancy besides returning shows. I mainly went back in time and rewatched all of Parks and Rec, and I’m still working my way through Grimm and Fringe with my family. I also found myself finally getting around to Hunter x Hunter which has been really fun so far, I also finally saw the second season of Mob Pyscho 100 which was amazing and I’m also going through Outlaw Star the whole way through too.

The only new show I saw was Close Enough, another beautifully wacky show from the creator of Regular Show. Beyond that, I really loved The Boys season 2 which was suitably insane, violent, layered and entertaining throughout. Closely followed behind would be The Mandalorian‘s second season which was more cohesive and had some great character development for Mando, gorgeous music and incredible world-building with the introduction of Clone Wars and Rebels elements. The new season of Umbrella Academy was pretty good, Lucifer returned and was decent, but not as engaging as before, and Big Mouth continued to be vulgar and uncomfortable, but also incredibly accurate and relatable to the troubles of adolescence and race.

Top 6 TV

1. The Mandalorian Season 2
2. The Boys Season 2
3. Close Enough
4. Umbrella Academy Season 2
5. Big Mouth Season 4
6. Lucifer Season 5

Music

Unlike last year, music has been my everything and I also believe this is the year I have put the most amount of work into finding new music and luckily I’ve found some great stuff old and new. I have found myself consumed with Anita Baker, Level 42, Issues and Foo Fighters, alongside the new and classic sounds of Calvin Harris, John Paesano, Drama, Victoria Monét and SG Lewis. I’ve found new and delightful music in all sorts of unexpected places, from Lecrae’s Restoration album to Another Sky’s album, I Slept On The Floor. It was actually tough to put a list together because I had too many choices, but below I believe those are my favourites from the year.

Top 5 Albums

1. Lecrae – Restoration
2. Another Sky – I Slept On The Floor
3. Drama – Dance Without Me
4. Victoria Monét – Janguar
5. John Paesano – Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Top 10 Favourite Songs

1. SG Lewis – Feed the Fire
2. Victoria Monét – Experience
3. Kid Cudi – Leader of the Delinquents
4. John Paesano – New York’s Only Spider-Mn
5. deadmau5 – Pomegranate
6. Calvin Harris – Over Now
7. Yebba – Distance
8. Janelle Monae – Turntables
9. Pharrell – Entrepreneur
10. Wiz Khalifah – Speed Me Up

My Experience

Man, I think it goes without saying that this year has been a big fat mess. I was in Canada, flew back to the UK for a quick excursion in March and got stuck here, I have gone through multiple funks, had creative block while working on projects and a general lack of enthusiasm especially towards the summer. That being said, through all the negativity of this pandemic stuff, especially here in the UK, there has been a lot of positives that have come to pass as well. I wanted to highlight the main points below:

• I turned 30 this year and was lucky enough to have a birthday gathering before the first lockdown happened
• I reconnected with so many friends online
• I really got into my artwork and even got paid for it

Its funny, not a lot has happened and yet so much has changed for me especially with my creativity and mindset being way more focused and positive than ever before. That being said I have missed al my peeps in Canada, I miss my job, the food, locations and vibe of Vancouver and I have no clue when I’ll be able to return. But overall I’m still rocking and very positive about the future

Conclusion

In conclusion, 2020 has been a bit of a shit show but some good has emerged and has had a positive effect on me. So I’m sure next year will be filled with so much creative content for me. But like everyone else I’m ready to kick this year to the curb and never speak of it again, so I’m gonna go back to my drinks and I’ll see ya in 2021!

Well, thanks for reading. So how was 2020 for you? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below and finally, have a safe and happy new year and I’ll see ya in 2021. Laters! 😀

 

The Good Sounds of SG Lewis

Howdy ladies and gents, its been a while since I’ve posted on this blog that wasn’t film-related. But since I’ve been on lockdown for just over a month and won’t be flying back home any time soon, I’ve had a lot of time to think and I’ve wanted to start writing about music again. So I wanted to start by talking about one of my favourite artists I’ve found in the last few years; SG Lewis.

My Discovery & Journey

So I discovered SG Lewis while I worked at the airport in my home town 4 years ago. His song “All Night” was on the radio and it caught me ear, so I put some of the lyrics on my phone and then found the song online. I became obsessed with the song for months. Then later that year I bought his EP Yours and found new songs to jam to and in 2017 I found Shivers which was also a nice listening experience. In 2018 I heard Dusk and that was my favourite EP so far with its gorgeous sounds and I was in love especially with the song “Aura“. And in 2019 I heard both Dark and Dawn and they were awesome as they had that familiar gorgeous sound but had progressed in new and exciting ways. And on top of that, I got to see him live TWICE! Once at ONBlackheath music festival in London and then around 4 months later at Fortune Sound Club in Vancouver. Both experiences were such awesome sessions, but the Vancouver show as extra special as I got to meet him in person which was just amazing!

Why His Music Is So Good

So I’ve given you a condensed version of how I found Lewis’ music and my listening experience so far. But now its time to tell you I believe his music is so good. Now, as I’ve stated on previous music-related blog posts I am no music aficionado, though I try to do my best to communicate my points through sound and feeling. So SG Lewis’ music in the broadest of terms is essentially electronic, but because of the variety in his music, you can get vibes of R&B, disco, house and the 80’s feeling with the use of synth. Lewis’ music has an immediate effect on your ears because it’s so infectious. Once you hear that beat or specific melody it has a way of getting into your head and then you just want to hit the repeat button. Also, the songs never outstay their welcome, they’re always just long enough to leave you wanting more. And one of the key things that make his music so accessible for me is how he has a song for any situation. Whether you’re chilling and vibing to the sounds of “No Less“, “Golden” or “Rest” or you want to dance to the sounds of “Aura“, “Hurting” or “Coming Up“, there is always a song to suit your mood. And then there’s hearing his songs live which adds a new dimension to the songs because of the live vocals, improvisation, extra bass from the speakers and joy you feel from being able to dance with likeminded individuals. There’s nothing quite like it.

Recommendations

So it comes to recommendations and this is where it gets tricky as I would say just listen to everything in chronological order as you’ll enjoy the ride and see Lewis’ progression as an artist. But if I had to narrow it down I would say it would be down to the following EPs: Yours, Shivers and Dusk. Each of those has my favourite listening experience from start to finish with Dusk being the best in my opinion. It’s just something special, you just vibe with it on another level, its instantly replayable, and again it has to be stated how good “Aura” is, it is a perfect jam for dancing.

Now from the EPs to specific tracks and while it’s hard to narrow it down, the following 10 songs are my favourites that I believe are essential and you should listen to right now. Check them out below:

1. Aura
2. Dreaming
3. Lighter
4. All Night
5. Holding Back
6. Yours
7. Hurting
8. Meant to Be
9. No Less
10. Coming Up

And that’s it, I hope my words and examples have spurred you on to check out some of SG Lewis’ music as he really is one of the best artists out there that deserve more love. If you’re a new or an established fan of Lewis, let me know what which song are your favourites in the comment section below. Thank you for reading and I’ll see you in the next post, laters! 😀

 

End of Year Review 2019

Good day to you ladies and gentlemen and welcome to my annual End of Year Review where I look back on the year and highlight certain things that were interesting to me. In my eyes, 2019 has been a year that’s been both fun and dull at the same time. There’s been some stuff that’s worth celebrating and some worth forgetting. So as per usual, I will talk about the year as a whole from my perspective, break it down into sections and then conclude with a summary. So without further ado let’s begin.

Video Games

2019 has been a good year for gaming, amidst all the controversy and BS from certain developers and publishers, we’ve had a solid set of games from AAA to indies. And while there haven’t been as many standout games as previous years, it has been more consistent than last year for sure for all console platforms.

Alas, I haven’t played nearly as many new games as I would have liked. Since I had to leave my PS4 with my sister back home I’ve primarily been playing on my Nintendo Switch which has served me well for the most part. But due to timing, lack of funds and no PS4, I missed out on a ton of games this year which makes me sad. So no Resident Evil 2 Remake, no Devil May Cry 5, no Jedi Fallen Order, no Fire Emblem, no Astral Chain, no Super Mario Maker 2 and so on. I briefly got to play Kingdom Hearts 3 when I went home in the summer but not enough to have a proper opinion on it. So I ended up playing some older games like the wonderful Celeste, the fun yet tricky Valkyria Chronicles and of course Smash Ultimate with all those awesome DLC characters which were fun especially with Piranha Plant, Joker and Terry.

So what new games did I purchase this year? Well, I did get to play Blaster Master Zero 2. Now I know the first game was largely ignored during the early days of Switch since everyone was playing Breath of the Wild, but I really enjoyed the original with the additional DLC characters as well. But the sequel just did so much more by refining the controls, giving you new ways to attack enemies, adding more exploration and new planets and the presentation was really good too. I also had a lot of fun with Tetris 99, that game came out of nowhere and became one of the most addictive games I’ve played in a while. Sure it’s essentially a battle royale against 98 other players, but man when you’re in the thick of it competing and making crazy comebacks when other players are trying to take you out. There’s no better feeling. There’s a rush, sense of danger and satisfaction that comes from this style of gameplay. And then there’s Untitled Goose Game, the game that blew up 2019. This game is worth playing just for the funny, foolish, bizarre and chaotic things you can unleash on people as a goose. And while the initial charm did wear off for me after the first few hours, it’s still a fun game to mess with just to see what you can get up to. And finally, there’s Dragon Quest Builders 2, while I didn’t play the full game, I played both demos collectively close to 10 hours and man that game is just as addictive as ever and I really need to get the full game to get lost in it. 😀

Top 10 Games

1. Blaster Master Zero 2
2. Tetris 99
3. Untitled Goose Game

Films

 

 

When it comes to films I would say that even though there were plenty of solid films, this year felt a little lacking compared to previous years (feel like I’ve been saying that every year since 2010 or 2011 haha). That being said there was plenty to enjoy, but there was also a lot of trash, most of which I avoided haha. I saw as many as I could though it was really tough to get out between October to December.

Top 10 Films of 2019

1. Parasite
2. Avengers: Endgame
3. One Piece Stampede
4. Ip Man 4
5. How to Train Your Dragon 3
6. Ford v Ferrari
7. Doctor Sleep
8. El Camino
9. John Wick Chapter 3
10. Knives Out

I’m sure I’m gonna get shit for my list missing a number of the critically acclaimed films of this year but I’ve only gotten to see a certain amount of films in the last couple months, plus films like Joker and The Irishman, I enjoyed for sure, but they didn’t do it for me like ones listed above.

For me, Parasite was just the best and such a lovely surprise. I’d heard rumblings about how good it was through certain areas of the internet and on numerous occasions its over-hyped BS. But Parasite was a unique, hilarious and unexpected film with twists and turns in many forms. Beyond that I just had a blast with Avengers: Endgame, as it was just an event-based film that wrapped up everything pretty well despite some minor, nitpicks here and there. Talking of event-based films, One Piece Stampede was a session and a half featuring some of the best references, character interaction, action, art and animation and humour the series has seen so far.

While I didn’t love Knives Out as much as everyone else did, it was a really well-made film with a terrific cast and a plot full of humour and neat twists and turns. Ford v Ferrari was better than I expected with great performances from the two leads and Doctor Sleep, a film not on my radar ended up being way more captivating than I expected with great performances, a good story and good references to The Shining.

Also, John Wick 3 was hella fun, just cool hand to hand combat and the expanding nature of that world continues to entertain me. How To Train Your Dragon 3 was a beautiful end to the trilogy, while El Camino was an intense and dramatic continuation for Jesse Pinkman following the events of Breaking Bad and finally Dolemite is My Name was really funny, engaging and it was great to see Eddie Murphy back on top form again.

Honourable Mentions

• Joker
• Dolemite is My Name
• The Irishman
• Spider-Man: Far From Home
• Promare

Television

With TV there’s been SO many to keep track of this year that keeping up with them all is impossible. There are many I’ve yet to watch or finish like Watchmen, Jack Ryan, Succession, Good Omens, Bojack Horseman, Swamp Thing, all the CW shows and so on. But luckily I’ve got to see some really fun, familiar, new, exciting and crazy stuff this year that’s kept things interesting. I also want to say thank god for the streaming services, now I know there’s too many of them emerging left, right and center, but I love them because their episode counts are much smaller and easier to manage and/or binge. So I’ve found myself really enjoying the new and returning stuff on Netflix, Amazon and Disney Plus.

Top 10 TV

1. The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
2. The Mandalorian Season 1
3. Stranger Things Season 3
4. The Boys Season 1
5. Love, Death & Robots
6. Lucifer Season 4
7. The Witcher Season 1
8. Umbrella Academy Season 1
9. Big Mouth Season 3
10. South Park Season 23

I’ve really enjoyed returning TV shows like Lucifer season 4 which was so fun and emotional, the third season of Stranger Things had some really interesting, dark and crazy stuff going down and Big Mouth‘s third season continued to be crude, weird, funny and true to life. And South Park‘s 23rd season was alright, but it certainly had its fun moments. With new TV stuff I had so much fun with Umbrella Academy‘s first season, The Boys on Amazon was one of the craziest rollercoasters I’ve ever been on with so much immoral, dark, hilarious and engaging stuff and Love, Death & Robots was one of the most strange, intriguing, beautiful, violent and visually unique things I’ve ever seen. And even though I’m a couple episodes away from finishing The Witcher, I’ve enjoyed that show ever much for its world, mythology, gritty and dirty look, catchy music and the beautiful Henry Cavill. 😀

And as much as I LOVE The Mandalorian for its story, characters, references and amazing music, The Dark Crystal show was incredible and has to take the top spot. I thought it would be good, but it was far better than I or anyone else could have expected. The way it expanded upon the original film with new characters, mythology and references were very impressive. The presentation was brilliant with awesome practical effects and a wonderful voice cast and I only gush about this show because barely anyone watched it and I want people to check it out damn it!

 

Music

With music, I have barely listened to any new music from this year. I have mainly been going back in time to check out music in the ’80s or going through the discographies of artists I know or have discovered over the course of the year. That being said there has been some 2019 music I wanted to highlight. Friendly Fires finally came out of hiding and released their new album, Inflorescent and I really liked it, was a very feel-good and dancy kind of sound (which I will review on here at some point). Also, SG Lewis, who is one of my favourite artists of the last 3 years I got to see twice in London and Vancouver and even got to meet him which was the best thing ever! I also got to see Jamiroquai live for the third time and they were amazing and I even made some new mates in the process!

But my favourite music from this year comes from the brilliant Ludwig Göransson, his work on The Mandalorian had been nothing short of amazing. From the first episode, he created new, enchanting, hopeful, dramatic and new sounds for us to experience in the Star Wars universe. And it all starts with that theme song… It’s SO GOOD! For me its the best and most recognisable piece of music that Star Wars has had since the Prequel Trilogy, yeah I said it and I’m not afraid. 😀

Favourite Songs

1. Ludwig Göransson – The Mandalorian
2. Coldplay – Orphans
3. Friendly Fires – Silhouettes
4. SG Lewis – Blue

My Experience

2019 has been one hell of a ride for me, full of all sorts of adventures, life-changing experiences and lessons. It’s honestly been one of the best years of my life and yet there’s also been a fair bit of struggle. I know I left this blog pretty vacant over the course of this year as I focused on my podcast and went off and tried new things, but hopefully, I’ll have a better focus on it next year as I still have numerous things I would like to share on here. 🙂

So this year I did numerous things but I’ll highlight the main stuff below:

• I moved to Canada
• Slowly got back into exercising
• Went to Bulgaria and met some homies in real life for the first time
• Experienced my first conventions outside of the UK in Vancouver and Seattle
• I started networking and collaborating with some people on personal projects
• I volunteered at a film festival and made some new mates
• Really got into the groove with my artwork

I’ve just been in an extremely good mood trying new food, going to new places, going to events I’ve never tried and forging new connections with wonderful people. At the same time, I’ve dealt with some depression, a little loneliness, had to deal with some questionable individuals and confront some of my many faults that’s caused me problems this year. But I’ve also learnt a lot and I believe I’ll be much better and focused in the future.

Conclusion

In conclusion, 2019 has honestly been one of the best years of my life and while it wasn’t a perfect year and there were some downs, I’ve just learnt so much and been grinning almost all the time so the pros definitely have outweighed the cons for sure. So 2019, its been fun but you can go away now and let’s say hello to 2020!

Well, thanks for reading. So how was your 2019? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below and finally, have a happy new year and I hope I’ll see ya in again in 2020. Laters! 😀

 

End of Year Review 2018

Good day to you ladies and gents, so 2018 has come to an end and it is once again time for my annual END OF YEAR REVIEW! Now I think the year has been pretty good all things considered, I’ve had an interesting rollercoaster of highs and lows, but the pros have definitely outweighed the cons. As with previous entries, I will talk about the year as a whole from my perspective, break it down into sections and then conclude with a summary. You ready? Cool, let’s go!

Video Games

2018 was a great year for gaming and looking back on everything that was released this year and comparing it to last year, it really is hard to say which year had the better selection of games to play. The games industry has had a lot of dodgy and questionable stuff going on with the ongoing issues related to gambling and microtransactions to the poor PlayStation Classic to Nintendo’s bad online service to Metal Gear Survive to Bethesda and the never-ending dramas of Fallout 76. But I will say that my overall gaming experiences were better last year because I played a lot more, however, the 2018 games that I did will stay with me for a good while. This year I finally gave into the hype and tried out Fortnight and I dabbled for a little while and gave up because I just wasn’t into it haha. I also restarted Zelda: Breath of the Wild and got lost in that world again and good god that game is SO much fun, the exploration and traversal just put me in a good mood especially when you end up playing for a good few hours. Another game  I also bought Rocket League and discovered the joys and frustrations that come with that game, I also played a fair amount of Fallout Shelter and discovered the addictive nature that comes with micromanagement and expansion, and Pokemon Quest was another one of those games that ended up getting way more of my attention than I expected, like 10 plus! 😛 But here’s my top 4 games:

1. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
2. Spider-Man PS4
3. Sonic Mania Plus
4. Pokemon Let’s Go Pikachu
5. Dragon Ball FighterZ

Oh look Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is my game of the year, who would have guessed? Haha! 😛 But in all seriousness Smash is my everything, it is my favourite gaming franchise and after the E3 reveal I was all in and the game is pretty much everything I wanted. The game mechanics are as fun as ever, the music selection is AMAZING, the amount of characters to mess with is fabulous and World of Light and Classic Mode are very unique and lengthy, though the former gets a little tedious after a while and the CPU difficulty is a hell of a lot harder than before. When it comes to Spider-Man I think it would have been my game of the year if Smash hadn’t come out, I REALLY had a great time playing that game and I’m still annoyed I never reviewed it back in September. The game is best Spidey game so far with its incredible web-slinging and overall movement, the versatile combat, wonderful selection of suits and a story that takes so many wonderful aspects of Spidey’s source material and adaptations and crafts its own unique and beautiful story that’s up there will the best of the Spidey material. Thanks to the Plus DLC, I ended up revisiting Sonic Mania and fell in love again. And while I still haven’t played Encore mode yet to my shame, I did love messing around with Ray and Mighty’s new game mechanics. As for Pokemon Let’s Go I was surprised by how captivated I was for the first few days. After seeing some of the videos and positive word of mouth around the game when it released I caved in and bought the game. I loved the nostalgic feelings the game gave me from seeing the enhanced visuals to the wonderful soundtrack, and on top of that, the seeing Pokemon in the overworld was cool and the new catching mechanics being easy to do for the most part. Alas, the changes to some of the core mechanics of battling and level grinding and a lack of features from later generations meant that my engagement waned. And finally Dragon Ball FighterZ I only played for a little while but it left a really good impression on me, while I wasn’t very good at it due to its technical aspects similar to the Marvel Vs. Capcom games, but I loved the visuals, the attempt at a story mode and attention to detail when it comes to the voice acting and specific finishing attacks.

Films

For me, 2018 was a good time for films and while I didn’t watch as many films as last year, I feel like I saw most of the films that I wanted/needed to. I had a lot of fun, interesting and surprising experiences in the cinema this year but definitely tried to watch more films at home. Also for those who aren’t aware, I’m only counting films released in 2018, films originally released in 2017 that got a UK release this year DOESN’T COUNT! And with that out of the way, these are my favourite films of 2018:

Top 11 Films of 2018

1. Searching
2. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
3. Avengers: Infinity War
4. A Star Is Born
5. Annihilation
6. Crazy Rich Asians
7. Mission: Impossible – Fallout
8. Bumblebee
9. Whitney
10. Widows
11. A Silent Place

Honourable Mentions

• Bird Box 
• Incredibles 2
• Bad Times at the El Royale
• Overlord
• Creed 2
• Sorry To Bother You
• Blackkklasman
• First Man
• Black Panther
• Bohemian Rhapsody
• Ready Player One

Top 4 Worst/Disappointing Films of 2018

1. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
2. The Predator
3. Tomb Raider
4. Den of Thieves

Top 5 Surprising Films of 2018

• Crazy Rich Asians
• A Star Is Born
• Bumblebee
• Solo: A Star Wars Story
• Deadpool 2

Television

Man, my TV viewing experience for 2018 was a far cry from last year and it’s not because I’m getting bored or not interested in what’s available and more to do with the fact that I just haven’t had the bloody time to watch everything like I used to haha. 😛 That being said I was able to check out a good few shows here and there and I will say that most of them were worth watching. From finishing the super fun Tournament of Power arc in Dragon Ball Super to enjoying the second season of The Tick to really liking the direction of the first half of season 3 of Into the Badlands (which I hope comes back at some point). When it comes to new shows I liked Disenchantment with its weird sense of humour, world and ongoing storyline, I also liked Altered Carbon for its visual design, an interesting cast, and on Amazon, you had Jack Ryan which was quite captivating with its plot, cast and the concise number of episodes. Daredevil season 3 and Bojack Horseman season 5 have been my favourite TV from this year giving just wanted while also providing me with content I didn’t know that I’d love as well. And finally Lucifer‘s season 3 got really good towards the end, and for a little while my show was cancelled, but then Netflix gave us a miracle and picked it up for season 4, sweet!

Top 10 TV Shows

1. Daredevil (season 3)
2. Bojack Horseman (season 5)
3. Altered Carbon (season 1)
4. Lucifer (season 3)
5. Jack Ryan (season 1)
6. Into the Badlands (season 3)
7. The Tick (season 2)
8. Disenchantment (season 1)

Music

In 2018 I wasn’t as overly fussed about music as much as last year, there wasn’t much new music that caught my ears, however, there have a been a few new songs that have caught my ears from new and established artists which have made my year quite enjoyable. Interestingly enough a lot my favourite music hasn’t been from mainstream radio but more so from films in the cinema and other places. There have been a good few films with nice film scores from Avengers: Infinity War to Solo to Annihilation to Incredibles 2 and son. But it’s Ludwig Göransson’s score for Black Panther that I’ve remembered with “Wakanda” being my absolute favourite! Firstly there’s the return of Justin Timberlake with his Man of the Woods which was a nice album with a good variety of tracks and a catchy first single with “Filthy“. I’ve also been continuing to listen to SG Lewis and his EP, Dusk has been one of my favourite listening experiences this year with “Aura” being one of my favourite songs of the year. AFI came back with The Missing Man and I really liked that EP especially with the songs “Get Dark” and “Trash Bat“. Also, there’s the Eurovision Song Contest, I haven’t followed this event since 2010 or 2011, but this year had a good number of really good songs, but my favourite was “Dance You Off” by Benjamin Ingrosso, that song was SO catchy! And finally there’s Tee Lopes, crafter of the brilliant Sonic Mania soundtrack who released his debut album Youinverse which is wonderful, but my favourite song is awesome “Gray City Day“.

Favourite Songs

1. Ludwig Göransson – Wakanda
2. SG Lewis – Aura
3. Justin Timberlake – Filthy
4. AFI – Get Dark
5. Benjamin Ingrosso – Dance You Off
6. Tee Lopes – Gray City Day

My Experience

All things considered, 2018 was a pretty decent year and in a lot of ways has been my best year in quite some time just because, looking back on the year as a whole, I dealt with a fair amount of bullshit, but it wasn’t nearly as troublesome or time-consuming as previous years. As for the stuff I got up to, there weren’t as many crazy adventures but I did have some fun here and there and experienced some things for the first time. Firstly there was my trip to the MCM London Expo with my best friend for our 10 year anniversary since we went in 2008, I also gave blood for the first time after talking about doing it for around 5 years haha, I also attended my first hen do and first baby shower which were surreal and delightful experiences. And I also did my annual volunteering for the 5th year and it was just as fun as ever. But on top of that, I feel like I’ve started to find my creative side again with all the drawing and animation stuff I’ve been doing which has been way more than previous years. Plus my mental state of mind I think has gotten to a place where I’m stable and can live with myself and have a good outlook on life which has been great especially in the last few months.

There’s also a lot of stuff that happened in the world, too much to mention, from the ongoing fears and dramas surrounding Brexit to Theresa May and her weir “dancing skills” to the absurd amount of memes we went through from Ugandan Knuckles to Bowsette to the recent Bird Box film. And then there was the death of certain celebrities this year as well, but the main two that hurt me the most was the passing of Jon Schnepp and Stan Lee. Schnepp has been one of my favourite people to watch on AMC and then Collider because he was such a passionate nerd and taught me so much, also her Superman documentary was great and even met him 2015. So his passing just sucked. But then there was Stan Lee’s passing, that felt so surreal and unnatural. I always thought the guy would live forever and it still feels weird to talk about him in the past tense, but I sort of knew he would pass on at some point but I was not prepared at all. I am forever grateful for not only being able to meet him but for all of his creations that made me the person I am today.

Conclusion

In conclusion, this year was a good time, had some good and bad experiences, learnt some life lessons and yeah I don’t have nearly as much to complain about which can only be a good thing right? Well 2018, its been fun but its time to say goodbye, and hello to 2019 because it will be a year of big changes for me which I can’t wait to share in due time. 🙂

Well, thanks for reading. So how was your 2018? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below and finally, have a happy new year and I hope I’ll see ya in again in 2019. Laters! 😀

 

RIP Stan Lee

Good day to you ladies and gents, today I am writing a blog post that I hoped I wouldn’t have to write any time soon, but alas, Stan Lee, a legend in the world of comics and entertainment and beloved nerd and creator for many fans across the world unfortunately died yesterday and even now it feels so surreal. So today I just wanted to share my thoughts on what he meant to me and share my respects.

So every once in a while in life, there emerges an individual who goes on to become someone special and Stan’s one of those individuals. To have such an interesting life journey and career from being in the army to writing comic books and then having what you created reach so many people, and have those properties be taken on by new writers and artists for decades to come, and then, of course, have those creations get adapted into various animated and live-action TV shows and films… All that from one guy and his collaborators. It is truly incredible.

Stan Lee is a man who has fascinated me since childhood, and as I’ve gotten older and learnt more about him through research, written and video interviews and so on, I’ve only appreciated him more and more. I’ve always loved hearing the stories about how he created some of his most notable characters like the Fantastic Four or Spider-Man or the X-Men, how he had the knowledge and guts to tell stories about flawed/troubled individuals that made them relatable to the readers. It just shows that this guy was on the ball and perceptive.

But beyond the wonderful characters, stories and worlds he’s given us over the years, he had such a wonderful personality. Stan Lee always looked like he was having the time of his life in a lot of his old photos working at Marvel, he’s always smiling, and through articles and interviews he’s always come across as a sweet, cool and kind man who had time to pass on his knowledge and had great stories to tell. The guy was fantastic and every time I saw him in an interview he’d always make me smile and laugh because he was also quite funny.

But I think where a lot of people have gotten to know Stan from in recent times is through his cameo work in the Marvel Studios films. Now Stan is no stranger to being part of the properties he’s created. He’s narrated for TV shows and video games, made numerous appearances in live-action films going back to the first X-Men film from 2001, he’s made appearances in the cartoons and has been a playable character in games like Amazing Spider-Man 2 or Lego Marvel Superheroes. He’s been all over the place and I’ve always seen him pop up as it always brought joy to my soul.

And now I would like to share some of my favourites that aren’t from the MCU and probably aren’t as well known.

Spider-Man: The Animated Series

This Stan Lee appearance will always hold a special place in my heart. It was probably the first time I sort of got an idea of who Stan was as a kid. I remember being maybe 8, 9 or 10 years old when I first saw this episode and I thought it was hella cool that Stan Lee, the creator of Spider-Man, made an appearance in the 90’s cartoon show. And every time I saw it since it made me so happy. It is a short yet wonderful moment filled with fun, reflection and humour, and seeing Stan get left on the roof without any way to get down and hoping the Fantastic Four would give him a lift, priceless.

Spectacular Spider-Man

This is a small and probably insignificant cameo for most, but I remember watching Spectacular Spider-Man’s second season and just loving this cameo. Here Stan’s just a guy who states the stuff he hates and I think we can relate to that. But it is the line “Are we being punked? I hate that.” Haha. I’ve always loved it.

Spider-Man 3

This one has always stuck out for a number of people and I’d be inclined to agree, it is such a simple yet beautiful bit of dialogue that perfectly sums up Stan’s positivity and then work that Peter had done up to that point. And it is probably the highlight of that entire film really.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

I almost forgot about this cameo until I saw it on my YouTube search. I remember watching Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. during season 1 and thought this was the greatest cameo just because it came out of nowhere and made me laugh so hard. It wasn’t enough that Simmons was giving Coulson a hard time with this fictional story that everyone on the train cart was paying attention to, but for Stan to step in, sympathise with her and then scold Coulson so hard was an incredible moment in time that I’ll never forget. 😛

But of course there are the Stan Lee cameos from the MCU and there are many to pick from, and while a lot of them were just minor appearances, some of them were quite funny and significant. So here are some my favourites:

• Thor: When he tried to pull Mjolnir out of the ground with his truck and failed.
• Avengers: “Superheroes in New York? Gimme a break.” Love that line.
• Guardians of the Galaxy 2: Seeing him hanging out with the Watchers was one of the best nerdiest things I’ve ever seen. 😀
• Spider-Man: Homecoming: When Spider-Man gets scolded by a bunch of people and Stan shouts at him from a window, great moment! 😀
• Avengers: Infinity War: “What’s the matter with you kids? You never seen a spaceship before?” I frigging loved that line, such a casual thing for an old bus drive to say. 😀 😛

Here’s an epic compilation to check out below:

Anyway, to conclude, Stan Lee, all I can say is thank you for everything that you’ve given me and many fans young and old throughout the many decades that you were with us. And like many I’d like to thank you and Ditko for Spider-Man, he’s one of my favourite characters in fiction and I’ve learnt so much from him and have loved all the heroes, villains and stories that you’ve given Spidey over the years and my life wouldn’t be the same without that character. And also it was an honour to be in your presence in for a moment in time, but meeting you in 2014 was one of my life goals that I never thought I’d get to do and it was one of the best experiences of my life that I will cherish forever.

RIP Stan Lee and thanks for everything. Excelsior!

 

So it’s Birthday Time Again, Yay!

Howdy people of the internet, how are you? So as you can see from the title of this blog post today is my birthday, I am one year older and as is tradition I feel the need to blog about it haha. 😀

You know what? I’ve been writing these posts for a good few years and I never have a clue how to write these things out, there’s no proper format, I just wing it and hope for the best haha. And so far today has been nice and relaxed. I have received 3 birthday cards all of which have been great especially the one from my bestie from Sheffield 😛 And I have spent most of my day in the cinema so far firstly rewatching Black Panther for the 4th time and finally checking out Isle of Dogs; with the former I still really like the film a lot, for my full thoughts I recommend reading my review, but in short I love the characters, themes, the film score, some of the cool combat scenes and traditions and visual style. As for Isle of Dogs, I have a fair amount to say about the film which I will dish out in an upcoming review, but what I will say it was very unique and different from I expected, but the visual material was incredible and the voice cast was really good. So with my films so far I’ve enjoyed myself.

Right now I’m pretty much chilling listening to some nostalgic sounds of Earth, Wind & Fire and plotting my movements for tonight when I head out for some night time shenanigans with my friends haha. I also have some fun stuff planned for tomorrow and potentially on Sunday too so hopefully this feeling of happiness and good times carry on through til the end of the weekend. 😀

Other than that I’m thinking I really gotta sort my life out, I’m pretty close to 30 and I only have a handful of achievements to my name, and I know there’s no set way to live life, but I do feel like I need to be doing better and I have gotten a few things worked out with my podcast and illustration material in full swing at the moment. So hopefully 2018 will be a year for change and progression, but I guess we’ll see and take things as they come. Anyways I’m gonna go finish some illustration stuff and look forward to my review for Isle of Dogs which will be coming soon, laters! 😀

 

Late End of Year Review 2017

Howdy ladies and gents, so 2017 is over but there’s no way I can go on without doing my annual END OF YEAR REVIEW! I didn’t have much time to prepare because of awkward work hours and the small window of time I had to record two episodes for my podcast, so forgive me if there is a lack of polish to my material. 😛 Man 2017 had been a pretty crazy adventure filled with highs and lows and once again it is weird that everything has come and gone so quickly haha. As with previous entries, I will talk about the year as a whole from my perspective, break it down into sections and then conclude with a summary. You ready? Cool, let’s go!

Video Games

2017 really was the year I became a gamer again. While in previous years I’ve had my moments here and there, it was mainly thanks to Nintendo and their new games console that I got back into playing games in a big way. As a long-term Nintendo fan, to see the Switch come out and pretty much deliver on its promise of being a portable/home console hybrid was a lot of fun, playing games on there has been addictive as hell and while I miss certain OS features I have on the 3DS and PS4, it is still a good piece of hardware. And the games, bloody hell! At the launch of the Switch we had a handful of games to play, but now we have far too much to play and it is awesome! And just in general, 2017 has been an insane year for gaming just in terms of the releases of quality games and not having the time to play them all. Sure we had some dodgy games here and there and the rise of microtransactions was awful, but overall things worked out for the best in a lot of cases. I wish I had played more PS4 games but what I played on Switch was definitely fun. ARMS was a fun little time, I also got some good nostalgic fun with Ultra Street Fighter 2, that Project Octopath Traveler demo was the best thing ever and I also really liked Blaster Master Zero. But here’s my top 5 games:

1. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
2. Sonic Mania
3. Super Mario Odyssey
4. Steamworld Dig 2
5. Xenoblade Chronicles 2

I think it is no surprise to people who know that Zelda came out on top, that game made me fall in love with gaming all over again. The sense of joy, discovery, mystery, surprise, the vastness of the world, fun combat, breaking of the usual formula, boss battles and shrines, music, visuals and atmosphere, it just worked for me. Also Sonic Mania, damn, what a fun session. I haven’t played a platforming game that much for a while, it was everything I wanted and more, and while having more new stages would have been great. Going through the game and discovering each of the nostalgic stages along with the new ones with the incredible music, visuals and references to older games was hella fun despite some of the tricky parts. Mario Odyssey was SO MUCH FUN. Much like Zelda, there was a sense of discovery and fun that changed things up from previous games, finding moons, checking out the varied kingdoms and experiencing the crazy gameplay thanks to the hat capturing mechanic was great. Steamworld Dig 2 is a great follow-up to one of my favourite 3DS games, it built on the original game’s mechanics, has a better soundtrack and more noteworthy story too. And Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a lot of fun, taking in the wonderful art direction and music, going through the vast world and getting good at combat and levelling up is delightful even if the game can feel a tad overwhelming with some of the game mechanics.

Films

For me 2017 was a good year for films, it was a lot more consistent than last year especially in regards to the summer film season, and while there were certainly some stinkers here and there, I did appreciate how many quality films there were in different genres at different points throughout the year. There were some nice experiences to be found in the cinema, and even some extra films to watch on Netflix, and while I missed a good few films I missed, I tried my best to catch up on a few in December. On top of that, I got around to watching a good few films at home for the first time like Ip Man 2 & 3, Gladiator, Mission: Impossible 1-3, Spaceballs, Airplane and Batman: Mask of the Phantasm to name a few. Like last year I was strategic in avoiding most bad films, though I did, unfortunately, catch a few dodgy ones here and there. Anyway, I technically did a top 10 film post already, but for those who haven’t seen it I will list it below and as usual, I’m only counting films released in 2017, films originally released in 2016 that got UK release last year DOESN’T COUNT! And with that out of the way, these are my favourite films of 2017:

Top 10 Films of 2017

1. Blade Runner 2049
2. Baby Driver
3. War For the Planet of the Apes
4. Star Wars: The Last Jedi
5. The Big Sick
6. Spider-Man: Homecoming
7. Logan
8. The Villainess
9. Okja
10. Detroit

Special Mentions

• Trainspotting 2
• Split
• Get Out
• John Wick Chapter 2
• Wonder Woman
• Molly’s Game
• Gifted
• Life

Top 5 Worst/Disappointing Films of 2017

1. Kingsman: The Golden Circle
2. Alien: Covenant
3. Power Rangers
4. Ghost in the Shell
5. The Dark Tower
6. The Circle

Television

TV last year has been a lot of fun as I’ve continued to watch a lot of my favourite on-going shows while also discovering new ones along the way. That being said, with the number of films and video games coming out at certain points in the year, it was difficult to keep up with everything. So what I’ll do is briefly mention a few shows here and there that I have enjoyed. Let’s start with those superhero shows. The latter half Agents of SHIELD‘s 4th season with the LMD, virtual world and Ghost Rider storylines came to a close last year in really fun and interesting ways, and by the end of it, I was very curious to see where the show would end. With the 5th season, I’ve only seen the first two episodes but it is certainly an intriguing plot so far. Amazon’s first six episodes of The Tick was surprisingly fun, quirky, weird and awesome and I’m hyped to see more of it next year. With Arrow, it was on an upwards trajectory since season 5 and so far season 6 has been my favourite of the DC CW material because of the references to the past, the higher stakes and an overall sense of drama and un I haven’t felt since season 2. The Flash has been good, not consistently good, but solid during season 4 and the Crisis on Earth-X crossover was the best Arrowverse episode so far. There was also the Netflix side of the Marvel shows where we got one and a half good shows out of three. Iron Fist was one of the most disappointing and boring shows I’ve ever watched, with a story and characters that were annoying and inconsistent. Also, The Defenders had good chemistry between the characters and some cool ideas, but a weak villain and story that got worse after episode 5. But The Punisher, that was my shit. I knew the show would be good, but what we got was something dark, aggressive, super violent and thought-provoking, they did the character justice and I loved the show… Oh and Inhumans, simply put, it was a waste of time, they done messed up with that one.

After waiting for AGES Master of None season 2 came out and it certainly didn’t disappoint, it offered more exciting, insightful and emotional stories with Dev and his adventures in Italy and America. Game of Thrones came back with the first of its last two seasons and season 7 for me was a hell of a lot of fun, it was swift in pace, had a lot of great moments from glorious action sequences to nice reunions to cool reveals and character exchanges. Lucifer for a little while became my favourite show because of humorous and intriguing plots, great character development and chemistry between the cast, and the ongoing fantastical storylines both in seasons 2 & 3. I also binged season 1 & 2 of Into the Badlands and it was really fun seeing how the show’s come with the world, plot, locations and the delicious/well-choreographed action scenes. Samurai Jack season 5 was dark and unsettling, yet fun and full of nostalgia, and to that show return, last year after so many years meant so much to me.  I also enjoyed Big Mouth, the first season of Lost and having fun watching Star Wars Rebels, Rick and Morty and Dragon Ball Super. And finally Bojack Horseman, a show I dismissed for ages because of the weird art and hype, I gave it a watch it changed my world. That show has so many layers and themes that only got darker, more engaging and uncomfortable as I watched each season, and by the end of season 4, I was an emotional mess.

Top 10 TV Shows

1. Bojack Horseman (season 4)
2. Punisher (season 1)
3. Samurai Jack (season 5)
4. Master of None (season 2)
5. Game of Thrones (season 7)
   
6. Into the Badlands (season 2)
7. Lucifer (season 2/3)
8. Arrow (season 6)
9. The Tick (season 1)
10. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (season 4)

Music

Music last year has been a little better than 2016. I mean don’t get me wrong, I have heard some absolutely crap stuff via the radio at work or when I went on nights out with my mates. But there has been a surprising amount of catchy music that’s caught my ears. I did get the return of three of my favourite artists; Jamiroquai, AFI and more recently N*E*R*D*, each of them brought a yet familiar sound with their new albums. My favourite had to be Jamiroquai, that Automaton album had my heart and soul for ages, while AFI’s In the Blood album felt like a continuation of Burials, but with echoes of their sound from the mid-2000’s and N*E*R*D*s’ NO ONE EVER REALLY DIES was interesting as it felt like something new, familiar and very Pharrell (in terms of his recent music), I liked it. The other major surprise was Calvin Harris’ Funk Wav Bounces Vol.1, an album that was different yet felt very much like Harris, I liked the funky and varied jams his crafted with a collection of people he worked with on the album, the best stuff he’s done for years. And finally, somehow Zedd and Alessia Cara came out of nowhere with “Stay” one of the most played songs I heard on the radio last year and eventually became one of my unexpected favourite new songs of last year. So bloody catchy! 😛

Favourite Songs

1. Jamiroquai – Automaton
2. Calvin Harris – Feels
3. Zedd, Alessia Cara – Stay

My Experience

2017 was pretty decent overall and while there was certainly hardships to overcome, I also feel like it was one of my better years. I don’t if that’s just due to me adjusting to the crapper aspects of my life or if I’ve made some changes in life that have made the experience easier. Whatever the case is I feel at ease. And I have a lot to look back on and smile, whether it was my volunteering at the Children’s Media Conference for the fourth year in a row, or hooking up with old friends and discussing potential animation projects or returning to both the London Film & Comic-Con and London MCM Expo for some cool convention shenanigans, or the fact that I got to attend the Boardmasters Festival in Cornwall and check several great musicians including my all-time favourites Jamiroquai! But one of the key things that went down that raised last year to another level was going back to Vancouver, Canada with my sister and cousin for 2 weeks. As someone who has been trying to get back there since 2007, I thought it would be a lot longer before I went back, but luckily I went back and got to catch up with some old faces and meeting some new people, refamiliarising myself with Vancouver’s sights and sounds, eating so much food and trying out all that alcohol haha. It was a wonderful adventure that was over far too soon. Other than that I’ve just been at work, facing the highs and lows of that stuff, enjoying the hang time with my workmates on nights out especially that all-day session in Camden, I had a nice 10 year reunion session with my best friends from college and I also doubled down on my commitment to my podcast, illustration work and ideas behind certain animations I want to make. I’ve also made a number of mistakes, some more painful than others, but I think last year is the first time I’m really looking at my issues and trying to rectify them.

There’s also a lot of stuff that happened in the world in regards to the news and media, from royal wedding plans to dangerous hurricanes to sexual harassment cases all over Hollywood and so much more. Talking about any of these things or more would take too long, but what I did want to mention was the loss of certain celebrities last year that affected me personally. Right near the start of the year wast he passing of Bill Paxton, that took a while to settle in. He was one of my favourite actors from childhood, from Twister to Aliens to more recent appearances in End of Tomorrow and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., the guy was everywhere. So funny and charismatic and the fact that I met him at a convention a few years ago really hit home. also, Bruce Forsyth, he’s one of those guys you thought would live forever considering how long he’s been on TV and the number of shows he’s hosted, and yet when I heard of his passing it saddened me. Charlie Murphy’s death got me good, I had only really started to get into his work in recent years after watching Chappell Show and Black Jesus, The passing of Roger Moore and Adam West, two actors great associated with massive franchises James Bond and Batman, was again really sad and was just a shock. But the most painful for me was the passing of Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington. Cornell I’ve loved since I found Audioslave in 2008 and his music has been part of me for years, the same can be said for Chester’s incredible work with Linkin Park, without his passionate vocals, my music world wouldn’t be same. Their contributions to music and my life are hard to put into words and even thinking about it now, it hurts. So let’s just show some love for those we lost in 2017.

Conclusion

In conclusion, 2017 was a good year, not perfect, but still a solid experience. I learned a lot, gained some new connections, had some fun experiences that may make for good stories in the future, and I feel like a lot of my experiences this year have prepared me for whatever happens next year. So goodbye 2017 and hello 2018!

Well, thanks for reading. So how was your 2017? Please be sure to comment below and finally, have a happy new year and I hope I’ll see ya in again 2018. Laters! 😀

 

Year 6 On WordPress! Its Anniversary Time Again!

Howdy ladies and gentlemen, what’s going on? As you can see from the title I’m just making a quick little post about the fact that this blog is celebrating an anniversary. It feels crazy that another year on this blog has passed since I last talked about my fifth year on WordPress but hey, I’m still here in year six so let’s talk about it! 🙂

You know I had to get a good meme for this anniversary post haha. 😀

So like I said before, it feels mad that a whole year has passed since the last anniversary. Time moves far too quickly, blink a several months go by especially between the summer and autumn/fall, and I almost forgot my anniversary was today until I stopped and thought about it and then looked on WordPress just to be sure, and indeed today was the day.

Now as I’ve mentioned before this blog has changed a lot since it’s inception, between 2012 to 2014 was my most active periods in terms of content and interaction from followers/visitors, and since then I don’t post nearly as much. And that’s just because of life as an adult working a lot and not having the same amount of time I did when I was at university, plus I’m just mentally drained these days in ways I never thought I could be and so I just don’t post that much these days. That being said I haven’t given up on this blog, regardless of how little viewership and interaction that I get on here, I will stick around because blogging is something I still enjoy a lot.

So what’s next for this blog? Well just like last the TV season is coming back and I am hoping to do reviews for several returning shows including Arrow, The Flash, Lucifer, Blindspot and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and many more. Also the film reviews will be around for certain films of note in the cinema and finally I’ll be showing off more of my podcast, Film Focus on here in the following months so look out for that when it comes.

In conclusion, to all of you who still swing by this blog and check out my material after all this time, thank you and I hope you will continue to support my content in the future. Until next time, laters! 😀

 

LATE REVIEW: Boardmasters Festival 2017

Howdy ladies and gents, today I am going to talk to you about the Boardmasters Festival that went down in Newquay over the past weekend. I was actually meant to write about this on Monday, but because the weekend was so long and I had to work soon after I just put it off. But I had to at least do some kind of review for it on the blog so here I am. 🙂

So yeah after the longest 9-10 hour journey ever via coach to get down to Newquay I got into the festival on Saturday morning with my friend and it was a lovely area. Even before the various stages were housed by the different artists, there was a lot to see, do and buy. With several stands for buying food, merchandise, and loads of other stuff, and then there were the different sound stages just blaring out music, benched areas for sitting and of course numerous toilet areas too. I just appreciated how well everything was placed in just the right area and there was a nice variety in the food you could eat, the places to chill, the places to go to the loo and a good distance between stages with the various musicians so the sound did overlap/overshadow each other.

When it comes to the musical acts I’m not gonna I only knew about 3 or 4 acts, everyone else was new to me. And do a degree I feel bad because about 90% of them were really good to bloody incredible. But at the same time, I liked coming into this thing completely blank as I had no expectations so to be blown away and discover all this music I didn’t know I would love was a magical feeling.

Firstly there was Kioko which my friend and I found while randomly walking around and their sound caught our immediately with their song “Deadly Roots”, and from there the rest of their set was just a delightfully cool and addictive. Next major act of interest was Will Heard, I have never heard of this guy, but he had such a lovely voice and a nice sense of humour, he also had a wonderful band and backing vocalists, and together they delivered an incredible session which was great for chilling and jamming. Heard and his people really brought the main stage alive. There was a nice variety of Heard’s music and it got a lot of people dancing, me included and it was so much fun. The next musician to catch me by surprise was Laura Mvula, she had such a beautiful voice and an incredibly engaging presence through her music and charisma, her music really touched the soul and like my friend said, it sounds like her music belongs on film soundtrack like maybe the upcoming live action Lion King film that Disney is doing, she’s that good. 🙂

Next highlight of the day for me was Lethal Bizzle, now I knew Bizzle would do well, but I had no clue it would be nearly as fun as it turned out. Besides one other act, Bizzle had drawn in the most people to the main stage area and I was in the middle of that when it all kicked off. Bizzle stepped on stage and asked the crowd to start up some mosh pits and what followed was a chaotic mess of energy, excitement and a loss of items from the crowd. I had the best time ever, but trying to avoid, the moshing, getting hit in the face and being shoved around left, right and centre was crazy. Bizzle had a great selection of all of his most popular material and some new material too and everyone had a great time, whether it was “Dude”, “Rari WorkOut”, “The Drop” or “Pow 2011” it was damn good, but of course “Fester Skank” was the highlight, that was just incredible, oh and can I just say I’ve never seen people so willing to throw shoes, shirts and hoodies out up in the air until that concert haha. And after that was The Vaccines, a band I’ve heard but never really listened to and their material was pretty good and a lot of the crowd going for sure.

And finally to close off the day on the main stage Jamiroquai came and bloody killed it. I saw them once before in Guilford at the Magic Summer Live Festival 3 years ago, so I knew how good they’d be live, but considering the awesome material that the band have crafted with Automaton I knew they’d have some awesome new live material and they did not disappoint. They started out with the opening track from their latest album, Shake It On which was a lovely way to get everybody jamming, but when they went straight into “Little L” I lost my mind. 😛 We also had the gorgeous sounds of “Automaton”, “Dr Buzz”, “Cloud 9” and some of the classic jams like “Cosmic Girl”, “Canned Heat”, “Love Foolosophy” and sexy new arrangement of “Emergency on Planet Earth”, to some unexpected jams like “The Kids” and “Supersonic”, the latter of which is one of my absolute favourite songs to chill to, and the fact they used it to finish out the concert was the icing on the cake for me.

So to conclude the Saturday session I had at the Boardmasters Festival was hella fun and it was totally worth the trip with a great selection of artists, a great venue and a good sense of organisation too. I would totally recommend it if you’ve never been. 🙂

 

RIP Chester Bennington & Top 8 Linkin Park Songs

Good day to you ladies, alas I am back in the blogging world to discuss some sad news from yesterday, the passing of Chester Bennington former lead singer of Linkin Park. I was hoping I would have to make another post like this for a while, but alas it seems like depression has gotten the best of another talented individual and man does it suck. Now I’m not gonna act like I was the biggest fan of Linkin Park, however, to say they didn’t have a huge impact on my music taste and life, in general, would be a big lie. Along with songs like “Nothing” by A and “Blurry” by Puddle of Mudd, “In the End” was part of my journey into the world of rock and metal, and their music helped me through a lot of the internal drama going on in my mind especially during my teenage years, but on top of that their music was incredible and a big part of that was Chester’s vocals which were so distinctive, intense and gorgeous and to know that he will sing no more hurts me the more I think about it.

So I thought I’d just share my favourite Linkin Park songs based not only on personal preference but also where I Chester’s vocals stood out the most, so in no particular order:

Easier to Run

For a good few years, this was my favourite LP song, it had a sense of drama and emotion that I latched on to pretty easily and the lyrics felt like they related directly to my life during some of those dark days, so this song was always comforting. It is the chorus that gets me every time, Chester’s vocals are gorgeous and you feel the passion especially towards the end with the instrumental side of things building up. Still awesome.

One Step Closer

What can I say? I love the classics, I’ve always loved shouting “Shut up, shut up, shut up, Shut up when I’m talking to you!” especially when you hear it at a night club where rock/metal music is the focus. Everything about this song just screams of pure energy and power and Chester’s vocals play a big part of that for me.

Crawling

I’ve always been attracted to this song because of the lyrical content and again how it felt like it spoke to me in my younger years, and the way Chester sang that chorus is what hooks me every time.

Bleed it Out

Ah man, this is one of the songs I played endlessly during my college years and since then it has been the one LP song I can put on repeat and never get tired of. It is on the shorter side and yet has the right about of style and drama in the music and vocals to stand out as one of my favourites from Minutes to Midnight. My favourite lines: “I’ve opened up these scars, I’ll make you face this, I’ve pulled myself so far, I’ll make you face this now!”

Pts.Of.Athrty

The original “Points of Authority” is still a great song, but the remix is the sound I fell in love with especially during the early 2000’s when it was used during a TV advert/music video for either Toonami on Cartoon Network or the channel CNX in the UK. The way the song has the rock elements but also these extra beats and variations on the original composition is wonderful. And once again Chester’s vocals along with Mike’s raps carry you through the song in a swift, badass and beastly way.

Forgotten

The sad thing is I never experience Hybrid Theory properly until I went to university which was 6 years ago so there are so many great songs I never heard until that point, and this song falls into that category. Well, actually I’ve never been sure if I have heard this song before 2011, but regardless this is easily one of the best songs on the album. Musically it is perfectly crafted with most of subtly and intensity, and Mike and Chester kill it with the rapping and singing, Chester’s vocal is so smooth, delicious and badass, frigging love it!

With You

At this point in time, this is my favourite LP song. There’s an intensity that you appreciate about this song from the first 20-30 seconds and the lyrics paint an emotional picture and good gravy the way Mike and Chester work together on this song is something special, its pure emotion and I adore everything about this song. The whole composition is aggressive and in your face and Chester’s vocals are fantastic.

The Little Things Give You Away

I remember the first time I heard this and good gravy I almost cried. The way the song starts up, with the soft guitar and vocals and then builds to that incredible ending with full on drama with all the instruments and Chester’s vocals washing over the track all the way until the end. Pretty much perfection. This was one of the first songs that I noticed as one of those key songs that finish off an album in a spectacular manner, and now that Chester’s no longer with us it makes the song more powerful than ever.

So yeah there’s my list, I could have done so much more with songs like “Numb“, “The Catalyst“, “Somewhere I Belong” and “Nobody’s Listening” to name a few, but I didn’t want to make this any longer than it needed to be. In the end, I just want to say that Chester, I appreciate everything that you and your band gave me and I’m going to miss you. RIP.