This Shit is F&*%$*# Crazy, Man.

What is F&*%$*# Crazy, you axe?

Dorkfest 2005. Yes, I was there. Last Wednesday I attended Video Games Live, a concert wherein the LA Philharmonic played the music from several popular video games at the Hollywood Bowl. (National tour dates are on the website). If you think that's cool, you're a dork. You're also right - it was awesome.

They showed footage from the games on a huge screen while the orchestra played, and the inside of the Bowl had a changing light show that would have been really cool had I been on hallucinogenic drugs, like some good mushrooms for example. I mean, I don't do drugs, but man, if I'd had some really high potency mushrooms, that one part where the red was swirling around and all the smoke, and they were showing "God of War" clips?! That would've been totally....um....awful, and probably made me sick or something, cuz..uh...drugs are bad.

Anyhoo, in between the songs they had some people talk - some on stage and some on video screens. The creators of Sonic the Hedgehog and Super Mario Bros. drew huge cheers from the crowd. That is to say, some people knew who they were. Now that's dorky. But they also had the video game pianist play live, and he was pretty damn good. Check out the footage for yourself, especially the ten minute clip where he plays all the music from Super Mario Bros. It's worth the wait until the end when he plays the music fast, like the game did in the last minute or so of a level. It's been said that the footage was sped up digitally, but he's disproved this by using a metronome in the background. Pretty cool.

I was also amazed when, while the 70's and 80's video game medley played, the 6 yr. old girl and her slightly older brother behind us named off all but two of the games (they had no idea what Tempest and Joust were - losers). They had also never heard of Tron, and were amazed to hear that it was a movie BEFORE it was a video game. Yeah, that was how we did it back then. They were cool little shits though. The girl used the word "perplexed" in a friggin sentence. I swear she was no more than 6.

Then they had a 9 year old kid compete on stage in a game of Frogger against a 30-something mom who had never played a video game in her life (I know, what kind of "life" is that, right?) It was supposed to be randomly selected people from the audience, but they totally set that shit up. She scored 170 pts., never getting a frog past the highway. He only scored 1900 pts. in his 1 minute of play, and you could tell he'd never played before, but he did alright. I would've smoked him though. That playstation would have been MINE. I would have done to him what I've promised to do if I ever catch a foul ball at a baseball game with a kid near me: hold it out to them and then snatch it away and laugh. That or bounce it off their head and catch it again. Can you imagine the audience's reaction after seeing that on the Jumbotron? Priceless.

Oh yeah, and I love the Hollywood Bowl. It's hidden way up in this ravine and you get there by going past all these little nature park areas where you can picnic before the show (and alcohol is allowed both there and inside the arena). But you don't have to hike - they have these cool escalator things that are basically moving sidewalks raised to impossible angles. It's all outside, and not that big actually. There's also a bus that brings you there from the parking lot and then back to your car afterward. It's my new favorite place.

F&*%$*# Crazy shit no. 2: Today I was made aware of a stunt by pro skater Danny Way wherein he jumps the Great Wall of China on his "Megaramp" (tm). You can just check that out for yourself and I'll let the video do the talkin.

As the MCP cone says (that's the Master Control Program from the movie Tron for all you 6 year olds):

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