Rudy Rucker
Rudy Rucker is a writer, a mathematician and a computer scientist. Born in Kentucky in 1946, Rucker moved to Silicon Valley when he turned 40. Rucker has published twenty-five books, primarily science-fiction and popular science. He was an early cyberpunk and an editor at Mondo 2000. He often writes SF in a style is characterized as transreal. His most recent novels were Frek and the Elixir, a far-future epic about a boy's galactic quest to restore Earth's ecology and As Above So Below, a historical novel based on the life of the sixteenth century painter Peter Bruegel. Rucker is a professor emeritus of computer science at San Jose State University, where he created a number of freeware programs relating to chaos, artificial life, cellular automata, higher dimensions, and computer games. He is presently working on The Lifebox, the Seashell and the Soul, a nonfiction book about computers and the nature of reality. Rucker's website can be found at www.cs.sjsu.edu/faculty/rucker or at www.rudyrucker.com.
ReMixed Game Music: Awesomely Longevous
OverClocked ReMix is my favorite site for remixed game music. "a website dedicated to reviving the video and computer game music of yesterday, and reinterpreting that of today, with new technology & capabilities. This site's mission is to prove that this music is not disposable or merely just background, but is as intricate, innovative, and longevous as any other form." Yes, it's a word. And yes, there's some good stuff in here. I won't recommend anything specific, musical tastes being what they are. Start with a game you know. posted by Marc Laidlaw at 11:51:35 PM | permalink
Game Concerts
Several months ago I attended an elementary school concert. A 6th grade girl played a beautiful piano piece that left everyone gasping and teary eyed. I thought the piece sounded susiciously like something Joe Hisaishi might have cooked up for a Miyazaki or Beat Takeshi soundtrack, but when I looked up the title, it turned out to have been something from the score for Final Fantasy X. Game music may not get respect (who needs it?), but it does have legions of fans. Sold-out concerts consisting of orchestras performing game music are a tradition in Japan. Here comes one in Germany. What a great excuse to hear an orchestra...and expose kids to it...and keep musicians employed... posted by Marc Laidlaw at 2:20:07 PM | permalink
Oldest and Weirdest Anything Deserves A Bloggin'
I guess no one else is going to blog this. Lucky me! posted by Marc Laidlaw at 9:23:09 PM | permalink
The Cover-Up is Complete...
Chilean scientists have managed to
suppress the truth about the washed-up shoggoth, claiming it is merely a rotted sperm whale (although they have managed to concoct a very convincing and disgusting-sound process by which the alleged sperm whale rots and creates the shoggoth-simulacrum). Shame on you, Chilean scientists! Shame on you! (Nice verisimilitude, though!) posted by Marc Laidlaw at 9:13:00 PM | permalink
William Hope Hodgson Mania!
Night Shade Books has embarked on a project of reissuing the complete fiction of William Hope Hodgson. For nightmarish weird horror, Hodgson has never been topped. The first volume, The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" and Other Nautical Adventures, is now shipping. I've only read a few of the stories in this collection. Maybe the others have been forgotten because they're truly forgettable; maybe not. It's going to be great to have a chance to decide for myself. Also, you can't have too many nice editions of The Night Land and The House on the Borderland.
Discuss where the pig-things can't hear you posted by Marc Laidlaw at 11:30:31 AM | permalink
VJ Day is On the Way
I resisted Viewtiful Joe for a long time. Then I saw it in action. I guess I can wait till October. posted by Marc Laidlaw at 5:44:23 PM | permalink
WiFi Free Zone
Over here! Hey! Yeah, you! No references to W*F* in this column. Guaranteed. posted by Marc Laidlaw at 5:38:22 PM | permalink
Ringu Changes
Today I got my hands on a copy of the first English language edition of Koji Suzuki's Ring. I've enjoyed every version of the Ring/Ringu cycle I've encountered (so far I've only seen Hideo Nakata's Ringu and Ringu 2, as well as Gore Verbinski's The Ring). In both the Japanese and American films, the main characters are a female reporter and her odd but sympathetic ex-husband, and I always figured the films must have lifted this couple straight from the novel. However, the book's jacket copy informs me that this time out (the first time out, actually), the reporter (Asakawa) is male, and his partner in the investigation (Ryuji) is "a cynical philosophy professor and a self-proclaimed rapist." Ooh-kay. It's sounding more like an actual horror novel all the time.
While skimming through the book, this phrase leapt out at me for some reason:
"Calmly, Ryuji had replied: 'While viewing the extinction of the human race from the top of a hill, I would dig a hole in the earth and ejaculate into it over and over.'" posted by Marc Laidlaw at 11:46:09 PM | permalink
Clear Sky Clock
My whining about unpredictable Seattle skies (well, they're mostly all-too-predictable) prompted receipt of a very cool link to the Clear Sky Clock. Also, a link to the Aurora Alarm for the Northwest and Midwest, so that you can be alerted immediately about all the auroral activity you can't see thanks to the cloud cover. I've been a subscriber to the latter service for a couple years now, and it's always nice to know what I'm missing. (Thanks fellow cloud-commiserator, robotojones!) posted by Marc Laidlaw at 10:56:09 PM | permalink
Apocalypse Averted and No One Notices
Hey, we didn't flip over! posted by Marc Laidlaw at 5:02:39 PM | permalink
Backyard John Carters Take Note!
Handy article on the looming Martian spectacular. I'm more and more convinced that I'm going to totally blow this and forget to even go outside at night all August. It's bound to be overcast in Seattle. Plus I hear there's a big-ass dust storm on Mars right now and those things don't tend to clear up in a hurry. Hey, I wonder if astrologers are getting all worked up about the approach of Mars, since it's literally the manifestation of the god of war and all that. Except maybe in non-Western astrology. But that's becoming less and less relevant all the time, right? All I know is, the last time Halley's comet came around I had like the worst time ever, so I totally believe that stuff about comets being harbingers of doom. posted by Marc Laidlaw at 4:58:34 PM | permalink
Ping
Pong. (Thanks, Robin.) posted by Marc Laidlaw at 4:31:46 PM | permalink
MorTrinity
Buddy Hackett, Buddy Ebsen, Barry White. Why do I have the sense there's an elaborate pun hidden in there somewhere? It's like Death is doing one of those crossword puzzles where you try to get from "mailbox" to "yardbird" in five steps. posted by Marc Laidlaw at 10:46:02 PM | permalink
Brutal Confession
There's no he-manly way of putting this. I love all things Zelda. (Thanks Adrian and Art.) posted by Marc Laidlaw at 11:24:17 AM | permalink
As Long As He's Not Ranting At Me...
I love when John Shirley rants.
Btw, there's a looong Shirley-Laidlaw novelette called "Pearlywhite" in this anthology. It's all musicians in there, except for me. I sneaked in on Shirley's coattails. I once interviewed Camper Van Beethoven for the now quaintly archaic and exceedingly offline Mondo 2000; that's it for my rock credentials. I imagine Robyn Hitchcock skimming down the table of contents going, "Who's this wanker then?" posted by Marc Laidlaw at 1:17:06 AM | permalink
That is Not Dead
I'm always on the lookout for good Cthulhuvian tales that don't just rip off H.P. Lovecraft's inimitable style but instead grasp the firm structural underpinnings that made them lodge in the collective imagination in the first place. People always miss this. The feverish language seems terrible unless you're, oh, 14. But the best stories are structural masterpieces, and even as they weather superficially, the bones and foundations look better and better. Here are two very good updates from writers who trust their own instincts rather than palely apeing old HPL:
From the cruelly Overlooked & Underrated Richard A. Lupoff, whose Into the Aether and Space War Blues warped my adolescence beyond repair, "Discovery of the Ghooric Zone," itself 25 years old now, but aging well.
And from the hopefully not to be O&U'd Charles Stross, "A Colder War." (Mr. Stross informs me that this story was a dry run for a novel of his, The Atrocity Archives, which is forthcoming from Golden Gryphon Press. A "humorous
Lovecraftian technothriller": Can't wait!)
Both stories and much, much more to be found at this stellar compendium of fiction and reviews. posted by Marc Laidlaw at 12:56:53 AM | permalink