My First Album Review: Slipknot's All Hope is Gone.

Anyone who is familiar with my blog here (and my old one over on MSN Spaces) knows that I generally always post a review of the latest movie I have seen in the theatres, and that's usually about one a week. Today I thought I would try to do the same thing but with a new music album. Before I get into what I think of the album, I should give a caveat that I am a rather tone deaf person. In fact, I have practically no musical skills whatsoever outside of Rock Band and Guitar Hero (is that nerdy or what?).

Anyways, the album I want to briefly comment on is one that I can't stop listening to and that is Slipknot's latest offering All Hope is Gone. In this day and age it is extremely rare for me to like every song on an album. All Hope is Gone is not one of those albums. It is pure dynamite from start to finish, although I could do without the first track which is lead singer Corey Taylor talking of some distortion noises. I have never been a fan of this type of "intro" tracks.

The rest of the album is pure Slipknot although track 11, "Snuff", is a bit of a departure I think for them as it is a slower, more acoustic song that you would expect to hear from Stone Sour (Taylor and guitarist Jim Root's other band).

My favourite song is definitely "Pyschosocial", the current single being played on the radio. It is one of those songs that is full of heavy guitar riffs and powerful vocals that just gets your adrenaline rushing.

I definitely think that most Slipknot fans will love this album as well but some hardcore metal heads will be turned off by the aforementioned track Snuff. I definitely give it a solid 4/5, and just in case you needed any convincing that you need to get this album, I present to you the video for "Psychosocial":

Sean's Movie Reviews: Death Race

Caught the latest offering from Paul W.S. Anderson this morning. While his movies will already ever be considered among the best ever made, they are usually rather entertaining. Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil are definitely two of the better video game adaptation movies out there.

Death Race is his latest offering. This is based on the original Death Race 2000 from the 70s (which I have not seen yet) but instead of being a cross-country race, this one is confined to a prison. The best way to describe the new Death Race is Running Man meets The Condemned meets Twisted Metal.

Jason Statham stars in this movie, as yet again another driver...which is just fine by me. I think he's the best pure action star out there right now. Statham plays a man who is framed for killing his wife so that he can wind up in the prison holding Death Race and, of course, participate in same. The rest of the cast includes Joan Allen as the prison warden (evil of course), Ian McShane as Statham's prison driving coach, Tyrese Gibson as his main rival and Natalie Martinez as Statham's super hot navigator.

The best way to sum up this movie is mediocre acting and writing but incredible balls to the wall action and that is all I was hoping for really. I'd give this a good 3/5 just for the action alone.

In other news, I'm still waiting for my replacement 360. It's been two weeks since mine died and about a week since I took it back to the courier, so I'm hoping to have it early this week. I'm itching to play some more Devil May Cry 4 and Geometry Wars 2, plus I'm missing out on the demos for Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and Tiger Woods 09. Although, I guess it's better that it died now and not in the Fall when all the big games, especially Gears of War 2, come out.

Now that it's almost at an end, I hope everyone has had a safe and happy summer...even though it's been a rather wet one.

Microsoft Can Kiss My ......

So about a week ago I got a hankering to play some more Geometry Wars 2. I have become rather hooked on that game and I love trying to top my friend's scores, even though I know some will be way out of reach for me. lol Also, I'm just getting into Devil May Cry 4.

So back to last week, I turn on my 360 and it decides to light up like a Christmas Tree with the red ring of death. Needless to say I was a little upset to see this, especially since it is my 3rd Xbox 360. So I called Micro-shit right away to put in the repair order so that I can get my 4th system from them. Of course they were so generous as to offer me a free month of Xbox Live. Wow, a whole 5 or 6 bucks considering the amount of gas and inconvenience I have to go to, now a third time.

At first I thought, maybe it was an early adopter problem since I've had a 360 from day one but now I've come to realize, and I'm sure I'm not the only one, that this system was poorly designed and manufactured from day one.

This is getting a little ridiculous and will definitely make me think twice about picking up their next system right away.

So in my 360-less time, I've been watching some DVDs, playing Crisis Core in the PSP, and of course watching some movies in the theatre, which brings me to my next couple of reviews:

Star Wars: Clone Wars

This was pretty much complete shit in my eyes. Do not see this unless it's because you're taking your kids because, much like Phantom Menace, that's who it is for. The animation was ok and the action scenes were done well but nothing that hasn't been done before. Some characters, i.e. Mace Windu and Palpatine, looked weird. The voice acting was decent with a few of the movie actors playing their parts.

The story itself is pretty goddamn weak and the movie just draaaaggggeedddd. It also pretty much has none of the original Star Wars music, which I guess shouldn't be a big thing but without it, the movie doesn't really feel like Star Wars. The dialogue is bad too. Anakin and his Padawan spout like a teenager show on the CW. I have some more criticisms, but I don't want to spoil it for anyone who is planning on seeing it.

I think that George Lucas is becoming like the owners of the Toronto Maple Leafs. No matter what shit they put out there, people will keep paying money for it because he obviously doesn't give a shit about quality anymore.

Tropic Thunder

This was pretty funny. Downey Jr. had most of the best parts of the movie. Jack Black had a few very funny scenes too. Ben Stiller was ok. Tom Cruise's cameo is way over hyped. I think the best comedy this summer in my opinion is Step Brothers followed very closely by Pineapple Express.

Pineapple Express Review

This is about a week late but last week I caught Pineapple Express, one of my most anticipated movies this summer. I've loved the rest of Seth Rogen's movies - 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and of course Superbad.

Pineapple Express was a pretty funny movie but I don't think it was over the top hilarious like Superbad. I definitely laughed out loud more at Step Brothers than I did at this movie. I think part of the problem with Pineapple for me is that I'm not a pothead, nor have I ever been a pothead, so I think I have a little trouble relating to the whole being stoned thing but still, I can find it pretty funny.

James Franco was very good as the eternally spaced out dealer. The rest of the supporting cast was great as well. Where they found Rosie Perez though, I'll never know. I'll always have fond memories of her though from White Men Can't Jump when I was 12 years old. :P Seth Rogen was good again but I fear that he is becoming a one trick pony almost and will wind up like Vince Vaughn, another one trick pony. I hope his next movie doesn't revolve around pot because I think there is more to him than that, i.e. Superbad.

The action scenes in the movie were actually pretty well done and there is quite a bit of violence in it, much the Lethal Weapon movies, one of the main inspirations of the movie's buddy theme.

I'd give this a 3.5/5. Definitely worth seeing for the laughs and also to give support to Seth Rogen, a fellow Canadian.

This weekend I plan on checking out Tropic Thunder and I'm really looking forward to it.

Sean's Movie Reviews: The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

This is by far the worst movie I have seen all year. The writing was complete shit and the action scenes were ridiculous. The worst was the use of a firework that acts as a bazooka and somehow makes an electricity run street trolley explode like it was full of gasoline. The action just continued on a downward spiral from there.

Considering how the director is Rob Cohen, I guess I expected a little better. He also did Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story and the first Fast and the Furious, and I loved those movies.

On top of the crappy writing and action scenes, the acting was crap too. I wasn't expecting anything Oscar worthy but with Maria Bello in the cast, I was expecting something better. All her performance made me do was wish for Rachel Weisz. Bello's fake British accent was awful.

The other thing that really stood out was the fact that the son in the movie was supposed to be 21 and I don't buy that when you look at Fraser and Bello. Also, somehow the kid lost his British accent from the second movie to this one.

All in all, I'd give it a 1/5. Just complete crap. We sat there and made fun of it the entire movie. I'm really thinking I should have just gone to see The Dark Knight for a 4th time.

Speaking of which, I finally got to see it on the Imax this past week and that is most definitely the best way to see it. The picture and sound are much improved and the 30 mins of the movie that was filmed using Imax cameras are just gorgeous. I think I will see it on the Imax again.