Ultimate Band List

Once upon a time, in a galaxy far far away, the Internet was still new and a 5.6mb song takes almost an hour to download on my 56kbs modem, there was a website called The Ultimate Band List.(or as it is known in the inner circles… ubl.com)

It was the Holy Grail for a teenager trying to show off to his equally impressionable friends by quoting “non commercial” indie bands such as the Flaming Lips, Weezer and Green Jelly (and here I speak from experience, check to make sure it REALLY is the “new Green Day album”  before splurging the last of your pocket money on it).I was hooked on the website for quite a while, but eventually it became a phase in life that I outgrew.

I blame evolution.

Evidently, having intimate knowledge of the names and discography of obscure bands does not rank highly in the “Factors that make girls want to make babies with you” list.

Recently, I’ve started developing the classic symptom for quarter-life crisis: I wanted to get myself an electric guitar. I know that I have the musical ear and rhythmic sense of an American Idol contestant (the ones that kicked out in the audition rounds, not those in the finals… meaning my musical talents are comfortably placed somewhere between clinically proven deaf and… N Sync ), but there is this odd feeling that if I could just get my hands on an electric guitar, I’ll be able to make really loud noises.

Anyway, to relive the younger days, I tried going back to ubl.com and realized that this URL has became the domain of some lame commercial artistdirect website. Had to Google “ultimate band list” to come up with the new web domain for ultimate band list which is…

http://67.15.171.16/i

I’m serious, they have not only ran out of good domain names, it seems like there is a webwide famine of domain names… It’s a disgrace that the UBL is reduced to an URL of numbers when the website is still doing good work. It continues featuring artists that have not been signed yet. And like the good old days, if you are willing to spend some time going for an aural exploration safari, it is very likely to come up with some really good gems.

In the midst of re-finding my Ultimate Band List, I came across this pic from Virgin Digital that supposedly has the graphical representation of 74 “obscure” bands in them.  I considered it my geekish quest to name them all.

10 minutes later, I was only able to name 23…

Can you do better?

And for fellow cheats… Answers below…

It’s all about WAR(s)!

Right now, there are at least 3 wars raging in the big 2 universe. And I am just talking about the “regular” universe and not the various multiverses that they have.

War is one of the ultimate story telling techniques for companies with big and recognizable rosters.  It is a wonderful excuse to bring together their biggest names in a big showdown and milk the feel good (and cash) factor of the various brands for all they are worth. Kind of like WWE’s annual Royal Rumble.

Over the past few years we’ve seen lots of wars being raged. Civil War, Skrull Invasion, War of Kings, Annihilation War, Secret War, Secret War 2, Kree Skrull War, Sinestro Corp War, The Invisible War, Doom War, World War Hulk, Siege just to name a few. Even events like House of M, Blackest Night and Final Crisis though technically not wars, have the same factors as all the above mentioned storylines.

Comic War veterans (like myself) have come to realize that not all wars are created equal. For every Blackest Night, there is a World War Hulks. And we have probably come to a realization of what makes a “war” work and what doesn’t.

2 factors which make or break a “war” storyline for me are:

– the “time between installments” factor

– the “does anything that happen here matters” factor

Regular readers here will know that I think “Blackest Night” is the most awesome storyline since Huckleberry Finn, but it reaaaaaaally irks me that we can go weeks, even up to a month without any progress in the main story. I understand that is probably the publisher’s attempt to cash more out of this mega event, but having to wait so long for a fast and furious war just seemed wrong. This is what I think is the primary reason for the failure of “Siege” as well.

“War of the Supermen” certainly fixed the timeliness factor well. It is essentially a 100 minutes (yup you read it right, MINUTES) war and the whole story is over in 4 issues that comes out weekly. Pretty awesome, except for the fact that it does not pass the “does it matter” test. Sure the whole New Krypton concept has gone down the toilet and the fatalities were high, but New Krypton was a concept that is like the proverbial fish and overstaying guest. It stank because it has hung around beyond its welcome period. And at the end of the day, no matter how many Kryptonians die, we know that the primary ones (Superman, Supergirl, Superboy, Krypto the Super Dog) and even the sub primary ones (Zod and gang) will live on. PLUS: the action sequences were quite crappy. They should have taken a peek at what the Green Lanterns were doing in Blackest Night.

Which brings us to the mess that is World War Hulks… or Fall of the Hulks… or whateveryouwanttocallit.

It is… in every sense of the word, a HUGE mess. Beside the awful story telling and horrible characterizations, it does not even have the decency to end its run early. The whole fiasco with Red Hulk and the Intelligencia started even before Siege and it is still ongoing. The gaps between each inconsequential installment of the series is painstaking and furthermore, the creators seemed to be under the pompous delusion that whatever happened here matter. I mean… Hulked out marines and… Hulked out heroes????? The Hulk brand can do A LOT better.

Anyone still intending to do a “War” story should really look at how Marvel is kicking ass in “Second Coming” for the X Men.

The action is fast and superbly furious. There is AT LEAST one installment of “Second Coming” every week and each installment progresses the story with new plot twists and casualties from the war. And the best part? They did all this without sacrificing the quality of the storytelling and the art.

The casualty rate in Second Coming is high and we have already seen the death of an instantaneously recognizable X Men, with numerous others suffering potentially career ending  injuries.

And the best part? Marvel does not seem like it is going to let up on the body count any time soon.

Say what you want about the overexposure and brand exploitation of the X-Men, but Marvel certainly knows how to protect the brand integrity of the X-Men. By telling stories of the highest standards when it comes to mega events like “Second Coming”. (Childish sidenote: I still can’t help sniggering at the title)

THIS is the way War should be done.

A special mention this week should go to The Amazing Spider Man. Almost 2 years ago, I was doing some serious bitching about the concept of Brand New Day. I am still not happy with the deus ex machina they used to annul the marriage of Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson, but I have to admit that much good came out of it. The whole “Gauntlet” mega storyline and its various mini components have worked superbly so far, and they would not have happened if Peter Parker was still happily, or unhappily married. I love the fact that they never let the “Spider Man” concept grow old and so far, managed to reinvent some of his older rogue gallery to make them more than the goofy concepts they were 30 years back.

My favorite panel of the week, however has to be this….

If only for the preview tagline.

I mean, seriously…

“Lobo PUNCHES PEOPLE WITH RINGS… hard”

Comics does not get better than this. *Excite*

Of an Ending and 2 Goodbyes

And so it ends.

For a 4 issue event, Siege lasted 3 issues too long.

I mean it is essentially ONE big BRAWL and Marvel managed to drag it out over the main “Siege” books, “Siege Embedded”, “Siege: Random Marvel character”, “the XXX Avengers” among the OTHER countless tie ins. It is paced less like a brawl than a leisurely game of Bridge played at the local old folk’s home.

Siege IS the BIGGEST damn Mess I’ve ever seen.

I speak as someone who is not above sitting through an entire M Night Shayamalam movie just for the payoff at the end. If anything. the ending of Siege was ALMOST as bad as the whole set up and premise. There was no emotional connection to the *surprise* death at the end of it all. The only thing going for the ending was how conveniently (and sneakily) Marvel (or Brian Michael Bendis) managed to tie up some loose ends in their current continuity. In one fell swoop, Marvel found a way to kill off a character that was too awkward to exist in their little multiverse and at the same time found a purpose and place for a newly resurrected one (who conveniently is gonna be starring in a movie real soon). *cough* Steve *cough* Rogers *cough*

Which brings me to the “death”.

We now have the obligatory heroes send off at the end of the mega crossover. The “send off” issue, besides milking fan boys of our remaining pocket money for the month, serves as a recap of the fine things the “hero” has done and a reminder of why people love him.

In that respect, Siege’s hero send off was staler than the sweat of the boy who had just ingested a gallon of Cheezit (trust me, I know about this subject, sadly) because there just isn’t so much to “remember” *insider nudge nudge wink wink* about this particular character!

It’s exceptionally bad when compared to the “sending off” in Marvel’s other event for the moment – The X-Men’s Second Coming (Insert your own lewd joke here)

It is MY Marvel event for now. To be honest, there is not much of a fight here. It is currently pitted against Siege and… *horrors* World War Hulks. I am a HUGE fan of the Hulk. I even semi enjoyed Ang Lee’s vision of a poetic Hulk. But a Hulked out Marvel universe is too much for me to bear. This shall be a gripe for another day…

The pacing for SC has been superb. The death was really shocking.  The emotional investment I have in it is immense. Added on the whole new team dynamics of the X-Men since the Utopia storyline. I get the feeling I always get from reading my favourite pulps – That there might not be that bright cheery ending at the end of it all. That we are watching the characters go to hell in a fast car, but it is too damn fine a ride for us to look away.

Simply awesome.

Of course, I must point out this week’s fine reference to sunny lil Singapore.

Fear the prowess of Maxwell Lord!!