Top 10 Favorite Album Covers

Number 10:  The All-American Rejects - The All-American Rejects

The All-American Rejects

I've only driven go-karts a couple of times but this album cover has always kind of held a special place with me.  Why?  Well, something about the lush green grass and the general atmosphere of the cover remind me of summer.  Essentially, this cover brings back good memories which is why I had to put it on the list.





Number 9:  The Clash - London Calling 

London Calling

Paul Siminon, one of my favorite bass players, smashing up his bass in classic rock and roll style.  How could I not like this?  I have a poster of this on my wall so I can see it every morning when I wake up.







Number 8:  My Chemical Romance - Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge

Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge

I think what a lot of people don't know about this album cover is that it is drawn by the lead singer of the group, Gerard Way.  I always liked the colors used in this cover.  Everything about this represents the album well:  love, pain, and bloodshed all mixed together.








Number 7:  Pink Floyd - Wish You were Here 

Wish You were Here

I heard somewhere once that the guy in this picture is actually on fire.  I can't say for sure if that's true or not.  In fact, it probably isn't.  But, I like to think he's actually on fire anyways.









Number 6:  Green Day - Dookie

Dookie

Have you ever looked at this album in detail?  The album is filled with all sorts or little jokes.  Like the fly that is asking the dog if he is going to just throw that shit away.  Or, the farmer with a pumpkin for a head chasing Elvis with a pitchfork.  Basically, I love this cover.  I always will.  It's silly and disgusting and makes me laugh even now.







Number 5:  She Wants Revenge - She Wants Revenge/This is Forever 

She Wants Revenge

I was trying to decide which She Wants Revenge album that I wanted to include in this list but I decided to include both since the album covers are so similar.  These album covers go well with the content and the band name.  Note that in each of the covers she has her right hand behind her back.  That is because she has a knife and a black rose on the back side of the corresponding album covers.  Particularly, there is a glowing light behind her on the This is Forever cover.  What I find interesting about this is that her hair appears to be white as if she is a witch or something of the sort.  This is especially evident on the backside of                                                             the This is Forever album.  

This is Forever

Though the album art is simplistic, I think the art really captures the meaning and emotions of the band.








Number 4:  The Unemployed Misfortune - Fuck Work

Fuck Work

I saw this album in the store last Sunday at a Disc Replay.  They're an underground band from Chicago.  I had never heard of them.  However, when I saw this album cover, I was basically sold.  The only reason that I didn't buy it was because it was twelve bucks.  But, I can honestly say that I had never been persuaded so much by an album cover in my whole life.  You try looking at that employee's psychotic face without chuckling.  Try it.





Number 3:  Pencey Prep - Hearbreak in Stereo 

Heartbreak in Stereo

I suppose I am very biased about this one just because I like this album so much.  However, I feel this album cover really captures how I felt about myself in high school.  You have a small and goofy looking kid.  He appears to be shy.  He has no arms which makes him look evermore timid.  Most notably, his heart is splitting down the middle.  However, it is not completely split in half.  






Number 2:  Paramore - Riot 

Riot!

Another simple album cover.  I love the chaos though.  Amongst the craziness, you can spot Paramore in the bottom right hand corner.  Also, each word is written in a different style.  Some are scratched in for thickness and others are block lettering.








Number 1:  Jimmy Eat World - Futures

Futures

This has been my favorite album cover since 2005.  I've been using it as my login picture for every computer that my family or I have owned since my dad got a new computer around 2006.  Why would I have such an obsession over an album cover?  Well, it's simple.  It's because it does everything right that I feel an album cover should do.  One thing that drives me crazy about album covers is how often it is irrelevant to any of the music contained on that album.  Sure it could be a cool picture but if it's irrelevant to the context it's portrayed in, then it's pointless.  Like, imagine if someone painted the Mona Lisa at the fifty yard line in Soldier Field.  Sure, the Mona Lisa is a classic and is a great painting.  But, what the fuck is it doing on a football field!?

This album captures all of the emotion and meanings of Futures perfectly.  Futures is a concept album (in a loose sense).  The theme of the album is the idea of moving on.  No matter how bad or good times in the past are, the past is the past and you must always have at least one eye looking ahead.

This album cover I always found interesting in that everything around this phone booth is pitch black.  The guy looking at the phone booth is clearly down on his luck and has nowhere to go but this phone booth.  Also, if you look closely, the words "out of order" are written in the grime or dust or whatever it is on the windows of the phone booth.

I think there are a couple of ways you can interpret this cover.  This man is down on his luck and has nowhere to turn but this phone booth (technology from the past).  He's just standing there because he doesn't know who to call or where to go.  It's certainly a turning point in his life.  A turning point between his past and a brand new future.

I also have interpreted this album as maybe perhaps the man wants to go back to the past which is why he is at a piece of technology from the past.  To him, the past is much more comfortable (hence the light) but the future seems frightening and uncertain (hence the darkness).  The darkness on this cover also overwhelms the light of the phone booth because his fear of the future is overwhelming.

But, also note the faint city lights in the background.  With that, the cover is saying that the immediate future may be tough but if you make it through the darkness, eventually you will make it to the light again and that there are many other good times to be had.

Sorry about my long analysis.  But this cover has a lot of meaning put into it and truly reflects the meanings and themes of the album.  Therefore, there is no doubt that this album is my number 1 favorite album cover of all time.

















The All-American Rejects Image:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a6/AAR-AAR.JPG/220px-AAR-AAR.JPG

London Calling Image:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/00/TheClashLondonCallingalbumcover.jpg/220px-TheClashLondonCallingalbumcover.jpg

Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge Image:
http://i690.photobucket.com/albums/vv262/Matt_Tuck_69/my-chemical-romance-01.jpg

Wish You were Here Image:
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51FKs%2BhIylL._SY300_.jpg

Dookie Image:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4b/Green_Day_-_Dookie_cover.jpg/220px-Green_Day_-_Dookie_cover.jpg

She Wants Revenge Image:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/5/59/SheWantsRevenge.st.jpg/220px-SheWantsRevenge.st.jpg

This is Forever Image:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/62/SheWantsRevenge-ThisIsForever.jpg/220px-SheWantsRevenge-ThisIsForever.jpg

Fuck Work Image:
http://f0.bcbits.com/z/50/37/503738945-1.gif

Heartbreak in Stereo Image:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/93/Pencey_Prep_-_Heartbreak_in_Stereo.jpg
Riot! Image:
http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lo3wlpI4Op1qgfw69.jpg


Futures Image:
http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/13388/homepage_large.ab16d013.jpg

Paramore Self-Titled Album

After Josh Farro (Lead Guitar) and Zac Farro (Drums) left Paramore, I was concerned about the direction of the band.

Last Tuesday, Paramore released a self-titled album:  the first Paramore album to not have Josh or Zac Farro in the band.  I was very skeptical about how this album would turn out.  Especially since Josh and Zac are very talented musicians and had a lot to do with why I like the group as much as I do.

The singles "Now" and "Still into You" were very underwhelming.  I feel pretty indifferent about both songs.  Though, the singles were a clear indication that Paramore fans were in store for a much more pop album than prior albums.

Which is exactly what we got.

My first impression was similar to the first time I listened to Danger Days, the last My Chemical Romance album.  It was really different.  At first I didn't like Danger Days, but it slowly grew on me and now I like it quite a lot.

The new Paramore album was similar, except, it grew on me quickly.  Over the past few days, I have really started digging this album.  Which is interesting because it's exactly what I feared... well, almost.

This album is very pop.  If you despise pop, you will despise this album.  Well, I guess I despise pop too so therefore I should despise this album, right?  Well, I guess if you want to get technical, I don't really have anything against the genre of pop.  I just generally hate the artists that fall into the genre of pop.  In my opinion, most of them are talentless hacks that either don't write their own music or write really unemotional, unimaginative, and annoying shit.

I don't hate all pop artists, believe it or not.  If you don't believe me, then maybe you should check this out.

So, what makes this album different from other pop music?  Basically, it does everything right that pop music generally does wrong.  The songs are creative.  The songs are emotional.  The songs have strong lyrical meaning.  The songs are catchy but they also give the listener something that they can truly relate to instead of another generic party song or something annoying as shit like LMFAO.

The singles for the new Paramore album are not a very good representation of what the rest of the album entails.  The song "Part II" was really the first song that I noticed lyrically since it is a reference to another song from Riot called "Let the Flames Begin."  Both songs start with similar lines about how "It's a shame that we all became such fragile broken things," and the same transition between verse and chorus of "Oh glory."  I thought that it was cool that they wrote a song about how they still feel the same as they did then.  Well, they supposedly still feel the same, anyways.

There is also this part of "Last Hope" that really struck with me.

"But the salt in my wounds,
Isn't burning anymore than it used to.
It's not that I don't feel the pain,
It's just I'm not afraid of hurting anymore."

This line is pretty heavy.  It almost sounds like something that you would find in a Jimmy Eat World song. Which is interesting because Paramore cites Jimmy Eat World as one of their biggest influences.  But, don't ask me to cite that fact because I don't remember where I heard it.

But, if that's not enough for you.  Paramore has done a cover of Jimmy Eat World's "Sweetness" at least twice live.  So...there!

The album also includes a couple of interludes which remind me a lot of Ingrid Michaelson.  If you haven't heard of Ingrid Michaelson, I suggest you check her out.  She's a very clean sounding folk artist with elements of pop

The slower songs also remind me of Christina Perri (not to be confused with the boring Katy Perry).  They're very emotional and the vocals sound astounding.  Then again, we don't really expect any less from Hayley Williams by now, do we?


The album is also very long.  It's much longer than any other album that Paramore has done.  It clocks in at around 63 minutes give or take a minute.  The thing is, the album really doesn't feel like it has any filler.  Every song on the album, whether I like that particular song or not, seems to have real meaning to the band which is more than The Clash can say about Sandinista!

Basically, I really like this album.  I think it takes all of the aspects that pop music has to offer and puts a Paramore kind of twist on it.  Sure, this album doesn't really come close to being as good Riot but this is still a very good Paramore album, especially for an album I thought was going to be garbage.  I really suggest you check it out.  Even if you generally hate music like I do.  You might change your mind after listening to this.

Tony Hawk's Project 8 and Tony Hawk's Proving Ground

So, I was at Disc Replay and noticed that they were selling both of these games for two bucks a piece.  Being a big fan of the Tony Hawk games growing up, I had to check these out.

I've played through Project 8 but have not completed Proving Ground yet (both for the PS2).

Basically, Project 8 sucks.  I just don't really know what the hell happened when they were making this game.  When they made American Wasteland, they stuck to the formula that they had been using since Pro Skater 4 which worked.  American Wasteland may not have been as good as some of the other games but it was still a good game.  I had a lot of fun playing it.

Project 8 takes everything that worked in the older games, puts it in a shit grinder, and flings the pieces all over your living room and television.

To start, the plot is random as fuck.  At least in the older Tony Hawk games, they didn't try to have a story so they had complete creative freedom.  The Underground games had a basic story, I guess, if you could call it that.  American Wasteland is basically the first Tony Hawk game to have a story.  And, admittedly, it was basic and there were plot holes but, it was enjoyable and decent.

Project 8 makes no sense.  Project 8 has a story that is simpler than American Wasteland but also has random stuff happen that is never explained.  Most notably, in order to proceed to the school level, (because Tony Hawk games have never had a school level) you need to help a retired colonel collect government documents from the general capitol building in the general city you're in.  He says that he needs to get these documents in order to get into the school.  Why?  I have no fucking idea.  All that I know is that if kids had to jump through that many hoops to go to public school, no one would go.

On top of all of that, in order to collect the documents, you need to avoid touching red laser beams that, not only appear inside the capitol, but also all over the city center.  Now, what kind of sense does that make!?

Not only that, but the detection is fucking broken on these laser beams.  You'll ollie over a laser beam but the game will still say that you touched it.  What a bunch of bullshit.

In each level, there's a person that offers up the classic goals like high score, collecting the s-k-a-t-e letters, etc. and they attempt to have a story around those things.  Sometimes it kind of works.  For instance, there's a politician that needs someone to create a ruckus in the city in order for their opponent in the next election to look bad.  That makes general sense.

But then in the car factory level, the forman wants you to clean up the place by collecting skate letters and whatnot.  How is riding around in the place the best way to clean it up?  You're bound to create a mess while collecting the skate letters.  Especially since the factory is running while you are collecting them!

I could probably go on and on about the plot.  But the general plot is that you are one of the top 200 local skaters and you want to impress Tony Hawk's crew into letting you into his team of eight amatuer skaters.  So, you go around doing stupid shit like you do in every other Tony Hawk game until you improve your rank from 200 to 8 (or above).  As you gain ranks, more and more skateboard and shoe brands sponser you (though in reality, all that matters is the rank since gaining a sponser seems to have no impact on your progress in the game).  When you beat the last level, which is incredibly easy, you join Tony Hawk's team and you unlock the last level (which is boring as shit).

You Tony Hawk Pro Skater players remember the Downhill Jam level in the first game?  Well, this unlockable level is a really boring version of that.  It's just a hill.  It's a street that slopes down and there's some rails to grind.  That's about it.  Then, when you get to the bottom, it respawns you back at the top.  Why even bother making the bonus level if it's going to suck ass!?

Speaking of the levels, most of them suck.  Most of them are tiny and don't have much to offer as far as fun shit to skate on.  For instance, the downtown level is fucking boring except for the goal when you have to manual up and down the bowling alley lanes and knock the pins over.  Now that was pretty cool!

Ironically, the school level actually is pretty cool.  Though, knowing that this is like the 500th school level they've made, it better be pretty damn good since they've had so much practice at it.

They also made an amusement park level which is, once again, not new.  Though the rope bridge is pretty cool in this amusement park level, I will take the carnival level in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 any day,.

The controls are by far the worst part of this game.  Seriously, all they had to do was keep them the same as before.  But, they really just had to change them all around, didn't they?  They are fucking sluggish as hell!  There is a considerable delay between when you press the button combination on the controller and when they actually start doing the trick.  This is incredibly frustrating!  Also, there is a delay between when you start doing a trick and when they register that you start doing it.  For instance, I had trouble passing the tutorial level because the damn game wouldn't register that I had actually done a wallride.  My character in the game was doing a wallride but the scoring system refused to acknowledge that I was doing it.  Fucking stupid.

Related to that, this causes a problem with any kind of distance goal that you need to complete (grinding and manualing).  Anyone who has played Tony Hawk with me before knows that I am very good at manualing.  Well, I had a ton of problems with the manual distance goals.  Why?  Well, because whenever I started manualing before a marker, it kept registering as past the marker.  So, in order to get the game to actually register that I had started manualing before the marker, I basically had start manualing about five yards or so before the start line.  That's fucking ridiculous!

Also, the focus control is so laggy that half the time it doesn't even go into focus!  Instead of pressing L3, you basically have to hold it down for a little less than a second for it to work.  This is a long time if you're trying to go into focus while manualing or grinding!

The camera controls are junk!  The camera is so disorienting and impossible to control that it gives me motion sickness.  Everytime you turn around, the camera jolts into a position that you weren't expecting and when you try to correct it with the right stick, the camera just bounces all over the place.  I don't know how they messed this up since the camera controls in prior Tony Hawk games were pretty solid.

Amongst the plethora of controls that they fucked up, they did improve them in a couple of ways.  You can now go into a manual using the square button or the down up command from before.  There are times when it's more convenient to use the square button.  But not very often.  Also, there's the new Nail the Trick mode which allows you to control your feet with the right and left sticks while doing flip tricks.  This was pretty cool, even if frustrating to get a hang of.

The music in this game is disappointing.  Most other Tony Hawk games had killer soundtracks.  This one has a pretty lame one mostly filled with generic punk.  There are only two songs done by major punk artists, one of those being the Ramones and the other The Transplants.  It's not horrible, just not nearly as good as the other games.

In this game, you can't change your appearance for shit.  I know it's something that really isn't relevant to the game play but when you only have the option of picking from tool 1, tool 2, tool 3, tool 4, tool 5, tool 6, and have pretty limited options when changing their appearance, it gets tiring staring at that same dumbass that you couldn't edit earlier.

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So far, Proving Ground has been a slight improvement from Project 8.  But, not much.

The music is way better in this game than in Project 8.  In fact, I would say that it is one of the best Tony Hawk soundtracks.  It includes The Pretender by the Foo Fighters, Breed by Nirvana, Clash City Rockers by The Clash.  It also has The Sex Pistols, Nine Inch Nails, and others that I'm probably not thinking of at the moment.

One thing that I hate is that they completely changed the balance meter.  Instead of a display that takes up part of the screen, it's a white, foggy arch that takes up the whole damn screen!  I can't stand it.  But, I guess it could be worse.

One thing that's cool about this game is that there are goals where you use the game's level editor to set up ramps or whatever you need in order to accomplish the goal.  That was pretty cool, innovative, and a cool addition to a good series.

They also added Nail the Grab, which is similar to Nail the Trick in Project 8.

They also added the Aggro Kick? (I think that's what it's called.  I can't quite remember!)  But basically, if you press the R1 button in rhythm while skating, you can get huge ass speed quickly.  This is cool because in past Tony Hawk games, there were only a few and, generally, inconvenient ways to gain massive speed.

Since I haven't finished it yet, I can't really say much about the story.  Thus far, the story seems okay.  Kind of feels a bit to serious and realistic for a Tony Hawk game though.  When I play Tony Hawk games, I generally expect sillyness.  But, maybe it's a change for the better.

Green Day at the Allstate Arena

Cancellations due to Billie Joe's rehab resulted in March 28th at the Allstate Arena being the first stop on their 99 Revolutions Tour (which I thought was called the Uno Dos Tre tour because that's what they were calling it on q87.7, but I can't imagine that the t-shirt I bought from vendors at the show that says 99 Revolutions Tour on it is wrong, and well, I can't imagine Green Day getting the name of their own tour wrong).

Anyways, I should probably give a brief opinion on what I thought about Uno Dos and Tre.

meh

Now that I got that out of the way, to the concert.  Before I start talking about the actual show, I want to mention the audience that came to see Green Day.  I'm not too accustom to seeing shows in stadiums but one thing I found unusual about the Muse concert at the United Center last month was that there were people dressing up for it.  I thought it was odd.  It's not New York Philharmonic people!  On top of that, I was the only one standing in my section for about half the show.  Pretty lame guys.

The Green Day concert was a completely different story.  People wore their band t-shirts and EVERYONE was standing the whole show.  Well, except for the young kids in front of me that got tired and decided to sit down towards the end.  I'll give them a break on that.

I don't mean to talk down about Muse but I can't help but to compare since I saw the two shows not too far apart.  Basically, I thought that Green Day blows the doors off of Muse live.  Green Day appreciates the fans every concert as opposed to Muse who goes out there and plays their music and basks in how great they are.  Green Day even took requests for one song.  That was awesome!  But yeah, sorry Muse.  I have a right to my opinion and, even though Muse is one of my top 20 favorite bands easily, they got nothing on Green Day live.

Well, enough talk about Muse.  Green Day kicked ass this show.  This show might have been even better than when I saw them at the United Center in 2009, which is pretty amazing considering how old they're getting.

Leading up to this show, I was worried that a sobered up Billie Joe would not be as enjoyable to watch and the concert would be a flop.  But, Billie Joe proved all of my doubts dead wrong!!!  It was high energy from start to finish.  They didn't let up once!

My favorite of the Uno Dos and Tre songs is "99 Revolutions" and I was hoping that they would play it (this was before I knew the tour was called '99 Revolutions').  But, of course, they came out and started with "99 Revolutions" which started great and kicked ass!

They then played "Stay the Night" which was okay.

After that, it gets kinda foggy since they played a lot of songs.  In fact, Green Day's show last Thursday was approximately 45 minutes longer than Muse's.  But, I said I would stop talking about Muse now...

They played "Know Your Enemy" which is a simple song but a crowd pumper.

They played some more from the new albums which, quite frankly, I didn't know the songs.  So I don't have song titles.  In fact, at this point, I was kinda worried that they were going to play mostly stuff from Uno Dos and Tre.

But then, they played "Letterbomb" and "Burnout."  Those are both amazing songs to see live.  I've always loved both of those songs and it was great shouting the words of "Letterbomb" and watching Tre tear up the drum solo in "Burnout."

Then, it gets even better, Billie Joe shouts, "I'm taking requests!  Someone shout what you want to hear!"  I shouted the first track of 39/Smooth "At the Library" but, alas, I can't be heard from the back.  However, he heard someone from the front who, I guess, had shouted "Disappearing Boy," the second track from 39/Smooth so, I was content with that.

They then decided to play some more from 39/Smooth with "Going to Pasalacqua."  At this point, I'm just loving it!

After that, they played "2000 Light Years Away" from Kerplunk! which is my favorite song from that album.

I really don't know the order from this point on so I'll just start listing songs that they played.

They played "Longview," "Basket Case," "She," and "When I Come Around" from Dookie.

Also, they played "Brain Stew," from Insomniac.

They played "Oh Love" from Uno which is my least favorite Green Day song.  However, I was expecting it. It couldn't be avoided.  What I was also expecting was "Kill the DJ."  But, they didn't play it.

Of course, they played "King for a Day" from Nimrod.  The 10 minute-ish version which they wore funny hats and do a medley of other songs as an interlude.  I could try to explain it all to you but, you're probably better off watching the footage from the Bullet in a Bible DVD.


The last song before the encore was "Minority" from Warning.  Another crowd anthem where you have everyone chanting the chorus at the stage holding up middle fingers.

They also played "Holiday" and "St. Jimmy" at some point in the show which are from American Idiot.  Those songs are great live.  Especially "Holiday," when the whole crowd is shouting the bridge of the song accompanied with Mike Dirnt's bass.

The encore was almost exactly the same set as when I saw them in 2009.  They came out and played "American Idiot" and "Jesus of Suburbia" which, quite frankly, brought memories back of circa 2005.  Especially "Jesus of Suburbia."  But, I don't think you've really heard "Jesus of Suburbia" until you've seen it live.  It really hits home with you when you're singing it along with a crowd of thousands of other people who enjoy the music as much as you do.

They then played "Brutal Love" which I am not too familiar with but, it was a cool song at the end of the show.

Green Day then left the stage again and... never came back.

Where the fuck are you Billie Joe!?  You didn't play "Good Riddance!"

I was fucking shocked.  The show was essentially flawless until they decided to not play "Good Riddance."  I mean, c'mon!  "Good Riddance" is a fan favorite and you are expected to do it at the end of every show!  I couldn't believe it!

Though it was a great show and I will keep going to Green Day concerts without hesitation, it did end with a small sense of disappointment.

Overall, it was one of the best shows I've been to despite the lackluster ending.  I hope enough fans give them feedback about how bad of a decision it was to cut "Good Riddance."