Grant Morrison's Wonder Woman comments

Nerd Post:

I have a tremendous amount of respect for Grant Morrison.  I don't always love everything he does, but there's no denying his genius.  He has a way of presenting classic characters in new and interesting perspectives.  Some of these characters are over 70 years old, so evolution is a necessity. However, his recent comments about Zack Snyder version of Wonder Woman really annoyed me.

According to Mr. Morrison, the warrior princess iteration of the Wonder Woman character is not what the original creator, William Moulton Marston envisioned for his character. This may be true, but who cares?!?  This character is 73 years old.  Of course it's going to go through several interpretations.  If Wonder Woman stayed exactly the same this whole time, people would lose interest.

Based on a nearly 4 minute trailer in which Gal Gadot appears as Wonder Woman for a total of 1 and a half seconds, Grant Morrison has decided that this version of the character is going to be too much of a stretch from the original creator's vision.  If you don't believe me, go back and watch the trailer again:

https://youtu.be/0WWzgGyAH6Y

She appears in the costume for less than 2 seconds!

Now, I don't know if Mr. Morrison has access to more info than the general public, but if this is the basis for his hypothesis, then it's pretty silly.

But even if he is correct in assuming that this version of the character will be all about busting skulls and kicking ass, is that so bad?  Wonder Woman was sucking wind for a very long time until New 52 creators, Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang made a few tweaks and saved her from obscurity.  Their interpretation is probably the best thing to happen to the character since the animated Justice League series.  If you like Wonder Woman, and haven't read their run, I highly recommend it.

SPOILER ALERT*****

In this New 52 Version, they play up the Greek Mythology end of things with Wonder Woman being a demigod.  It's revealed that the whole "you were formed from clay" story is a lie.  Her mother, Hippolyta, was impregnated by Zeus, and desperately wanted to keep it a secret, so she concocted this clay story.  When Diana (Wonder Woman) finds out about this, she is forced to deal with her half brothers and sisters on mount Olympus as she is drawn into their petty power plays. This is a particularly bloody and violent interpretation of the character, and I think that played no small part in the series' success.  At one point she even becomes the God of War, and it's awesome!

So, Grant Morrison, who's made a career of looking at characters from different angles, thinks this version is too far from the original creation.  Again, I love Grant Morrison.  I've bought a lot of his work, but I 'm calling shenanigans on this.

Grant Morrison is coming out with his own Wonder Woman book.  I'm very excited to read it and I'm sure it will be awesome.  His version of the character is supposed to be in line with the original version.  I think that his comments about the Zack Snyder version of the character (of which we've only seen 1.5 seconds) are nothing more than a promotional tactic.  Every comics blog posted about him, and here I am writing about them, so obviously the guy knows what he's doing.  So even though Grant Morrison may be the greatest comics genius of our time, he's not above using cheap promotional tactics to sell books.  In fact, this was my big problem with his recent Multiversity series.  It felt like a sales pitch to me.

Things that don't evolve eventually become extinct.  Look at how many different interpretations of Batman there are.  This constant re-interpretation is what makes the character relevant year after year. Because we live in a time where everything is preserved, you can stick with your favorite version!  If you hate Christian Bale, you can pull up the Michael Keaton version on Netflix!  Think Keaton is too dark?  Well, the Adam West episodes have all been digitally restored!  Is Adam West too corny?  Well, then pickup the animated series and experience Kevin Conroy's performance.  We have options!

Zach Snyder is carrying the torch on this characters.  He is re-imagining them for new generation.  As anazing as the Lynda Carter Wonder Woman was, you can't have that kind of character in a serious comic book movie in 2015.  The character has to evolve.  Look what happened when Bryan Singer tried to re-do the Christopher Reeves Superman in 2006.  It was a horrible bomb.  The character has to evolve.

If you prefer Lynda Carter to Gal Gadot, or Christopher Reeves to Henry Cavil or Michael Keaton to Ben Affleck, then guess what?  All of those videos are easily accessible.  Knock yourself out. They're all great.  There's also a possibility that we will see more traditional interpretations of these characters on the big screen in the future.  But for now, Zack Snyder's version is what these characters need to keep them alive in 2016 and beyond.

What A Great Time To Be A Fanboy

Last week was a great geek-week.  We got a new Star Wars trailer, a Batman V Superman Teaser, and a Battlefront 3 Trailer.  I'm super excited about all of the comic book, sci fi and fantasy games and movies on the horizon.  I'm even excited to go see Fantastic Four, which doesn't look promising based on the trailers, but it's a comic book movie and I'll happily pay my $15 to go enjoy it.

I'm also eagerly awaiting Avengers 2 which comes out soon.  I really like all those Marvel Studios movies.  The movie I'm most excited about, though, is Batman V Superman.  I'm a big fan of Zack Snyder's style and I definitely lean toward DC in my fanboy tendencies.  I think seeing the 3 biggest superheroes of all time share the screen will be an epic event.  If Snyder puts the same love into BvS as he did in making a panel by panel recreation of Watchmen, this will be truly incredible.

I know some people didn't care for Man of Steel, but I loved it.  I also though Bryan Singer painted Superman films into a corner with his sub-par take on the character.  Zack Snyder played the only hand he could, which was to distance himself from Christopher Reeves and Bryan Singer as much as possible.  The result was a dark, violent and sort of tragic movie with heaping portions of Superman whoop-ass.  I absolutely loved the Russel Crowe sequences on Krypton.  I thought Michael Shannon's off-beat Zod was great, and the epic battle at the end was incredible.  To the people who complain about the collateral damage in that movie, I say this....It's a movie!!!  I want to see stuff get blown up!   And I have a feeling that there will be repercussions for Superman's recklessness in the movies to follow, so don't get your panties in a bunch just yet. 

I'm also hearing a lot of people say that BvS is going to suck...after only seeing a teaser.  This is really silly.  Why would you want a movie to suck when you know you're going to pay to see it? From what I've seen so far, I'm very satisfied.  It looks like Snyder is really bringing Frank Miller's Dark Knight into the real world.  Affleck looks totally jacked in that batsuit.  And his anti-Superman suit looks like it walked right off the pages of Miller's Dark Knight Returns.  I even went to that special IMAX trailer screening just to see 4 seconds of extra footage....and it was awesome.

On the TV end of things, Arrow and Flash continue to crush.  I'm really enjoying their shared universe.  Gotham is still finding its footing.  I'm not 100% in yet, but I'm finding more things to like about it.  I'm even enjoying some Marvel shows.  Agent Carter was an excellent mini-series which I highly recommend.  I'm also a few episodes into Daredevil which is also really good.

Basically, were at the point where you can watch new superhero content every night of the week.  How cool is that?

I haven't had much time for gaming lately with my work/podcast schedule, but I continue to sneak in Artemis sessions with my friends.  That game is really amazing and if you're a Star Trek fan, you owe it to yourself to get 5 friends together and try it.  It's cheap, fun and excellent.   It can be a little glitchy at times since it's  designed to work on many different devices, but the occasional restarts are a small price to pay for the amount of joy this game creates.

My wife is back into Diablo III.  She's playing with my friends and I maintain that that's the best multiplayer console game ever.  It's so easy to jump in and out of games with your friends which is so important.  I think every game should be like that.

I'm looking forward to Arkham Knight and Battlefront 3 as I mentioned earlier. I'm really hoping Battlefront 3 offers that persistent ground to space transition that was rumored in the early development stages.  We'll see.

Meanwhile there are a couple of crowd-funded games that have caught my attention.  Elite Dangerous and Star Citizen both look like tons of fun.  I haven't had the chance to play them yet, but I have been watching other people play on twitch.  Twitch is a great streaming service for spectating video games.  It sounds like a silly concept, but I really like it.  It's a great way to really see what a game is like before spending any money on it.

So now that the geek stuff is out of the way, I have a busy musical schedule coming.  After a month off, Blue Oyster Cult is back on the road with plenty of shows coming up.  I'm also doing a solo show opening for Eddie Money on May 31st at the St. George Theater in Staten Island. NY.  I'm very excited about that.

We also have some great stuff coming up on my Band Geek podcast.  If you haven't seen our ridiculous Michael McDonald video, please check that out here: https://youtu.be/Fu5XXkn6exo

To subscribe to Band Geek, go to www.riotcast,com/bandgeek

-Richie

Copyright Thoughts

Here are my thoughts on the Robin Thicke thing.

The way I was taught copyright law, you're only violating copyright if you use the same words or melody.  That's really all you can own in a song.  In the case of Sam Smith and Tom Petty, it's clear cut copyright infringement.  This example is not, because the melodies of the Robin Thicke song and the Marvin Gaye song are totally different.

However, I think this case goes beyond a simple copyright dispute.  From my understanding, you are also allowed to own the contents of a recording.  This is why it is illegal to use samples of other people's records in your music without their permission.

But again, this is not the case here. Blurred Lines doesn't use any samples from Got To Give It Up.

So what is the deal here?  If according to copyright law, you can only own words and melody, then that leaves all the other musical contributions in a song up for grabs.  This is because the copyright law is an outdated law written at the birth of published music. Since sheet music only contained words and melody, the right to copy that sheet music only protected words and melody.

So even though Blurred Lines doesn't copy melody or lyrics, when many people hear it, they immediately think "this sounds like Got To Give It Up."  This poses an interesting problem. Should production, arrangement and accompaniment ideas be something you can own?  As someone who does both these things for a living, I'd say yes.  But this is a tough thing to judge.

For example, Stacy's Mom copies a production genre.  So should that be illegal?  I don't think so.  In that case, Stacey's Mom sounds like a Cars song, but not a specific cars song.  It's not overtly using the same groove, or chord progressions, but it's definitely trying to sound like a song the Cars would record.

Blurred Lines, copies a specific song so I think they're asking for trouble.

I don't think Robin Thicke did anything wrong under the Copyright laws as I understand them.  But I do think it's time to revisit these laws and create more specific language regarding what artists, writers and producers can own.

Pop and R&B have become the wild west of rip off artists, and I think it's time to start dropping the hammer on some of the more blatant offenses.

Band Geek

What is Band Geek?

It's me!

I'm a Geek and I play in a Band.  So...Band Geek.  But, seriously, Band Geek is the name of my Podcast.  I've been listening to Podcasts of all kinds for a few years now, and I decided to give it a try.

This Podcast is basically what happens when I hang out with my friends.  We talk about games, movies and comics, and then play music.  I also teach some of the songs we play.

To my knowledge, this is the first Podcast with a house band.  We take requests from Facebook and Twitter and play them live on the show.  This is sort of like what I used to do at the Red Lion when I was playing gigs there.

The Band Geek podcast is available at www.riotcast.com

It's also up on the iOS podcast app.

Give it a listen, hit us up on facebook and twitter.

Thanks!
-Richie

Artemis on the road!

I was reading a bunch of blogs today and then I thought...wait...I have a blog too!

So here I am.  Not sure if anyone reads this considering I do most of my posting on Facebook, but I have a blog, it's here, it works, so I should fill it with words.

Right now I'm in a hotel in Wendover, NV.  We got in last night.  Our show is tonight with Foghat.  Last night, was amazing.  I organized a game of Artemis in my hotel room.  It was incredibly fun.

I'm a little obsessed with Artemis at the moment.  It's probably the best multiplayer sci fi game ever made.  It's simple and kinda lo-fi by some of today's standards, but the game is so incredibly good that you barely notice that you spent most of the time looking at graphs and blips.

I was going to refrain from describing the game on my blog, but I love talking about this game, so why not.

It's a starship bridge simulator.  You can connect up to 36 computers or mobile devices to a single router or you can play online.  I haven't tried online play yet. To be honest I think this game is best played by people in the same room.

You can have 6 stations on each ship.  Captain, gunner, pilot, communications, engineer, science.  There's a main viewer which gives you the space graphics that we all know and love from Star Trek.  The captain gives orders and the rest of the crew has to carry out those orders on their respective control panels.  It's easy to play, but has enough nuance that you can get really strategic with it.

So last night we played a game with Eric, Jules, Andy, and Jimbo from Foghat.  It was really fun. A great time was had by all.

Go here for more info

http://www.artemis.eochu.com

Just Checking In

Hello blog subscribers.  I don't have anything to promote today, so I'll just say hey!

I'm having a really busy month.  I've been playing a bunch of West Coast gigs with BOC and doing a lot of work in my home studio.  I get a lot of calls and e-mails from people wanting me to contribute to their recordings.  I love doing this kind of work.  I can work from home, it's very creative and fun.  Since I'm working from home, the turnaround time is usually very quick.

I have a lot of ideas in my head for future projects, but I've put them all on hold.  I'm getting married next month and there's a lot of things to be done for the wedding, so that takes priority right now.

I can tell you a few of the cool things I'm in the middle of at the moment.  We're nearly done filming Tiger's Fang 10.  This has been the most challenging one yet because it was our first time using a green screen and we made about every noob mistake possible.  Steve and I have been painstakingly going through every frame of these shots.  Not fun.  The movie is looking really good and it's really really funny.

I'm working on an awesome project with some of my students.  I can't say much yet, except that I'm totally blown away by their talent.  This one is going to be jaw dropping!

I've been working on a lot of new music for myself and my friends.  I have a collection of songs that I'm planning to release as digital singles.  They're all done, I just have to polish them up a bit.  I've also been contributing parts to original music for some of my more well known buddies.  Can't say anything about those projects yet.

On the subject of MorningStarlett, we've been kind of stagnant.  Not by choice though.  There just aren't many places for a band like us to play.  The nice thing though, is that the CD did pretty well for an unknown band release.  I've been reading reviews from all over the world and people really love this album.  I'm very proud of the MorningStarlett CD and it makes me feel great that there are people who really appreciate it.

Now onto the important stuff.  This has been an amazing video game month for me.  I got the new Tomb Raider.  I just finished it.  What an incredible game!  Beautiful, exciting, fun...it was right up my alley.  I loved it!

I'm doing the Riddler stuff in Arkham City.  That game is simply incredible.  It's perfect.  Sometimes when I need to unwind, I just put that game on and patrol Gotham.  It's so amazing that I can play it without even touching any of the missions and still enjoy it.

I just picked up Diablo 3.  While the gameplay and the graphics are pretty basic, the multiplayer features make that game great.  Being able to jump in and out of games with your friends whether they're in your living room, or at their own houses makes this a real winner.  It's like a fantasy party game.  Very cool.

I'm also back into comics.  Yes, my nasty habit is back.  I'm currently reading the DC new 52 stuff.  I was resistant at first, but a few story lines piqued my interest.  I'm not current on everything but I've been reading Batman, Detective Comics, Wonder Woman, Huntress/Powergirl, and Justice League.  It's great stuff to read on the plane when they make you turn your phone off!

-Richie

New Fly-Out Rig!

I just built a new super compact and totally awesome sounding guitar rig for fly out dates where I can only bring a limited amount of gear.  If I had my way, I'd bring my Engl Stack and my big rack o' TC gear to every gig, but on fly out dates, that's simply not possible. 

I got tired of being at the mercy of backline companies' amps.  Usually they're ok, but you do get some poorly maintenanced stinkers every once in a while.  I didn't want to chance it anymore, so that inspired this new rig. 

Here are all the gory and geeky details:

1) My signal obviously starts with the guitar.  I use various Ernie Ball Music Man guitars, all equipped with DiMarzio pickups. 

2) This goes into an Audio Technica AEW-4110 wireless system.  This is a really great sounding and reliable wireless.  It's probably the oldest piece in my entire rig.  It's almost 10 years old and still works great.  How many pieces of electronic gear can you say that about?

3) The output of the wireless goes into a TC Electronic Poly Tune.  This is the coolest tuner ever.  You can check the tuning of all 6 strings at once.  This makes it really easy to tune during very short song breaks.

4) From the tuner, we go into the input of a Line 6 Pod HD-500.  That's right, a POD!  I used to be a tube amp purist. So why did I start using a Pod?  As I said before, the unpredictable nature of backline tube amps, made it nearly impossible to get a consistent sound.  Also, since we started using in-ear monitors, we've been able to keep the stage volume way down.  This made it easier to make this transition.  It took me a long period of tweaking, but I finally got the Pod sounding just right.  The HD models in there are very nice.  The effects are also cool, but they too require a whole lot of tweaking.  I basically use 4 sounds:

            A) Clean Fender Twin Reverb with Chorus, Delay and Reverb

           

            B) Slightly overdriven Dr. Z amp with Tube Screamer, Tremolo and Delay

            C) Crunchy Marshal JCM-800 with Chorus and Flanger

            D) Engl Fireball with 2 Delays set to different rhythms and mix levels.

Within each of these presets I have the ability to turn the individual effects on and off as if the were stomp boxes.  I also have the expression pedal set up to control the Delay mix level.  At first I was using the Pod going direct, but I wasn't thrilled with these results.  So, I ended up disabling the cabinet simulation.

5) The Pod's mono output goes into a BBE Sonic Stomp pedal.  One unexpected side effect of turning the cabinet simulation off and only using the Pod as a preamp was the loss of the low end.  Don't get me wrong, the tone was great, but that super low end depth that you get from a real amp, was just not there.  This pedal was the perfect solution to these missing freqencies.

6) From there the signal goes into a Matrix Guitar Amplification G-1000 Stereo Power Amp.  This is a solid state 1000 watt power amp that only weighs 6 pounds!!!  It's stereo, so I run it in mono mode.  I could run my rig in stereo if I wanted, but I find that my being mono is more effective in this particular band.  Buck has a really nice stereo spread on his sound, and I don't want to get in the way of that.  Since I wasn't really loving the sound of the Pod going to direct into my ears, this was a perfect solution.  I got the air moving and I got to have a little bit of stage volume. This power amp isn't as loud as you'd think, but it does give you a pretty respectable stage volume and it's totally fine if you're using in-ears.  I kind of wish the amp had a depth and presence control like other power amps, but the BBE pedal fills that void nicely.

7) The power amp goes into a Marshall 1960 Cabinet. This is the only piece of rental gear I use.  These are usually consistent enough where my sound won't change much from gig to gig.  This gets miked up and then sent to the PA.  I'd say the most important step in getting a good guitar sound through a PA is microphone placement.  Poor placement can totally wreck your sound, no matter how great your gear is.  I place the microphone myself using my in ears to monitor the sound.

So that's my new rig.  It's really small and I'm really enjoying it.

-Richie