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Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Well the way to play Itunes Roulette is to put your iTunes on Shuffle and then you announce the first 10 songs that come out on your blog. No cheating, no matter how cringeworthy some of your songs may be.

My iTunes currently has 1,678 songs, so I have no idea what may come up.

1. 3 Doors Down - Not Enough: Good band, good song. Wouldn't be one of my favourite songs, but I like it all the same. Definitely recommend it to a friend.

2. The Posies - I Guess You're Right: This is a song that I only know of because it came as a free sample with my laptop. Had never even heard of the Posies before that, but it's a great song and one of my most played.

3. Linkin Park - Place For My Head: I don't care what anyone thinks of Linkin Park and I know a lot of people don't like them, but ultimately they're the band that introduced me to rock music. If it hadn't of been for Linkin Park, I'd probably still be listening to manufactured pop and wouldn't be the same person I am today. Really like this particular song - it's one of their lesser known songs, but equally as awesome as any of their stuff.

4. Alabama 3 - Woke Up This Morning: Absolutely amazing song, that most people will recognise as the theme song to The Sopranos, an equally amazing television experience. This is one of those songs I could listen to a hundred times in a row and never get sick of it. Great bluesy beat mixed with a rock texture.

5. Mundy - Cailín na Gaillimhe: The irish language version of the classic Irish tune, 'Galway Girl'. This song brings back some great memories and makes me hopeful that there'll be plenty of memories left to be made.

6. Colin Hay - Overkill: First heard this song in that episode of Scrubs where Hay followed JD around singing the song. Great song. Slightly happy feeling, despite the sad lyrics.

7. Radiohead - Pyramid Song: I'm a big Radiohead fan - they're one of my favourite bands. This song just reminds me of chilling with my friends and having a few drinks, which is a great feeling.

8. Coldplay - Fix You: Another of my favourite bands, pretty much love everything by Coldplay. This song creeps me out, but in a good way. It starts off making you feel sad and depressed, but by the end you just feel fulfilled and ready to live life to the full. It proves how great musicians Coldplay are, that they can instill those feelings.

9. System of A Down - Cigaro: Not a huge System fan. I like them for what they are, but there music is a bit too much for me these days. Having said that, it's not a bad song. Lyrics are slightly vulgar, but when I'm in the mood to rock out, System are a great choice.

10. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Snow (Hey Oh): One of my favourite Chilis songs - it's very relaxing and a great song to listen to no matter what mood your in, because it can be interchangeable to suit your mood.

Well, I was lucky this time. Nothing embarassing showed up anyway. My favourite song of the 10 is Coldplay - Fix You.

iTunes Roulette is good fun to play, so give it a go yourself. I'll be back for a second game soon, to discuss some more songs.

Posted by Anaithnid, 7:15pm
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Saturday, Feb 23, 2008

In this volume I will review Irish television show Seacht, interview children's author Darren Shan and reveal my top 10 Prison Break characters.

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INTERVIEW #1 - DARREN SHAN

"I was six when I decided I wanted to be a writer. I wrote a story in school and got to go to another year and read it out. My Mum taught in the school, but I decided to go to a different room where a girl I fancied was. I can remember her beaming up at me while I read it out - and that was that," claims Irish author Darren Shan, best known for writing children's books about Demons and Vampires. Born Darren O'Shaughnessy, the author decided to write under the pen-name Darren Shan when he began writing for children. "The first book I ever published was for adults and I released it under my real name. When I came to write a book for younger readers, I decided to change my name, so as not to cause any confusion. Given the number of books I've signed since then, I'm delighted I did. My hand would have dropped off years ago if I'd had to sign O'Shaughnessy every time."

Shan who started out writing for adults, found his literary feet with his children's series', The Saga of Darren Shan which began in 2000, and more recently The Demonata, although he never realised his children's novels would be as successful as they became, "I wrote the first book for fun, as a side-project. I hoped it would get published and do well, but I never thought I'd make a career out of it. Children's books don't normally sell in huge quantities in the short run, despite anything you might read to the contrary; you need to be very, very lucky to succeed in this branch of the writing business." Shan's genre of writing can be truly terrifying at times, especially if you're a twelve-year-old child, but Shan confirms that he doesn't make it his goal to scare his younger readers, "I often temper scenes in my books; as hard as that might be to believe when you read about a boy seeing his father hanging upside down with his head cut off , or another boy visiting a world made entirely out of guts; but I'm not interested in grossing readers out. I want to take readers to the edge and give them an experience they've never had before, but it would be too easy just to throw a load of gore their way. When I'm editing a particularly juicy scene, I always think, 'Would I be comfortable reading this out in a live environment, in front of a group of kids and their teachers or parents?' If the answer is 'No', I look at ways to fine-tune it."

There has been much speculation made as to why Shan chose to name the main character of his first children's series, The Saga of Darren Shan, after himself, but according to Shan, that character is based no more on himself than any of his other characters, "All of my main characters are based on myself to a certain extent, but I've never tried to represent myself entirely with a single character, not even Darren in The Saga." With a film adaptation of The Saga in the making, Shan reveals that he has nothing to do with the film and is more than happy to stay out of it, "When you sign a deal with a Hollywood giant like Universal, you give them the right to do whatever they want with your stories. As a writer, you can't exercise control over what happens next with the film, and most writers who try end up bitter and disillusioned, having wasted a lot of time and energy trying to fight the system and control that which is uncontrollable. My philosophy is a simple one; take the money, thank them nicely, and use it to fi nance your writing career, to ensure you can go on writing the sort of stories that matter to you most."

Although Shan is currently focusing on writing novels for an adult audience, he is adamant that he will continue to write books for children, "I'll definitely be writing more children's books. Whether I ever do another long series again, I don't know. I've never planned a multi-book series - The Saga of Darren Shan and The Demonata both grew organically. I hope that happens again, as I love working on such an ambitious scale. But it's not something I'll ever try to force. We'll just have to wait and see what comes out. "Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, Jonathan Carroll and James Ellroy have all had a huge infl uence on me, but so have many other writers, along with filmmakers and artists. No matter what genre you work in, you should seek inspiration from a variety of sources and fields. Good writers should try to subvert and change the rules of the genres they work in, not just work to an established formula."

As an Irish writer, one may presume that Shan would only be a recognised name in Ireland, but Shan's books have been successful worldwide and many readers are not even aware that Shan is Irish, as his stories are never set in any specific location, "I like the vagueness of location. It means readers in any location can imagine the story happening wherever they live. I think that's part of the reason the books have worked so well for different audiences, all around the world. The only advice I can offer to aspiring authors is to write. There are no shortcuts; the more you write, the more you learn, the better you get. When you've put a lot of hours and graft in, and think you might be getting to the stage where you could get your work published, read The Writers And Artists Yearbook - that gives you all the practical advice about publishing you'll ever need."

Shan is currently working on his first trilogy aimed at adult readers, in his home in Limerick. The first book of the trilogy, Procession of the Dead, will be released in March this year under the name D.B. Shan, with the second part, Hell's Horizon, being released in March 2009, and the conclusion, City of the Snakes, in March 2010. "So I've a busy few years ahead," he concludes.

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TV REVIEW #2 - SEACHT

*****

Seacht is a sexy, gritty drama aimed at viewers between the ages of 18 and 29. The first series, consisting of 8 episodes, began in January 2008 began on Ireland's finest television station TG4 and the show is entirely in the Irish language.

Seacht follows the lives of seven students and the trials and tribulations of student life in Belfast. Eithne (Linda Breathnach as pictured above), Pete (Eoghan McDermott), Caroline (Alana Henderson), Brian (Diarmaid Murtagh), Decko (Andrew Kavanagh), Joanne (Neasa Ní Chuanaigh) and Linda (Aoife Nic Ardghail) all attend a university for performing arts. Eithne and Pete clearly have feelings for one another, but something always seems to get in the way of them forming a relationship. Decko has fallen in love with Caroline, but she's besotted with Brian, whos primary aim is to have sex with as many women as possible. Linda is often the voice of reason, but has her own problems with an overbearing father and Belfast not having much of a lesbian love scene. Joanne tends to cause trouble for everyone else when not furthering her steamy affair with lecturer Bill (Tom Ó Súilleabháin). Add plenty of drugs and a fantastic soundtrack to this show and you've got yourself a true Irish experience.

Whether there'll be a second series or not, is up in the air, but with the first series being such a success, it would be foolish of TG4 not to commission the second series.

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TOP 10 PRISON BREAK CHARACTERS

10. John Abruzzi - Until almost killed by T-Bag early on in season 1, Abruzzi was one of the best characters, but once he returned to the prison he was not the same. In a way that made me glad they killed him off early in season 2.

9. Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell - If it wasn't for his season 3 storylines, T-Bag would be much higher up on my list, he was one of the nastiest characters throughout the first two seasons, but Sona has tamed him and he's no longer that interesting.

8. Benjamin "C-Note" Miles Franklin - I think C-Note is a slightly underrated character. Fans never seemed to warm to him, but I always liked him. Deep down he was a good guy, but made a few mistakes. It's a shame they wrote out his character in season 2.

7. Michael Scofield - Who doesn't like Michael - he's the brains of the operation. His relationship with Sara bored me, otherwise he'd be higher up on the list.

6. David "Tweener" Apolskis - I think Tweener had much more of a story in him and we didn't get to see it, because of his untimely death, but he was definitely one of the best characters at the end of season 1 and beginning of season 2.

5. Brad Bellick - I didn't care too much for Bellick throughout the first season, as he could've foiled the escape plan, but I grew to like his character in season 2 and apart from Mahone I think he's the best season 3 character.

4. Fernando Sucre - You gotta love Sucre. He's loyal and is purposely made out to be the most likeable character in the show. His first two seasons were great, but like most characters, his season 3 storylines were lame.

3. Charles "Haywire" Patoshik - Haywire was the most interesting character to follow after the break-out because no one knew what expect and his death was the saddest one of the entire three seasons.

2. Alexander Mahone - Mahone's season 2 charachter was a bit too evil for my liking, but he's my favourite season 3 character overall. His storyline was well developed and it probably helped that an amazing actor like Fichtner plays the role.

1. Paul Kellerman - I didn't like Kellerman in season 1, but his season 2 role completely made up for that, especially at the point he turned and came over to the good side. I'm one of those people who hopes Kellerman is still alive and if a fourth season is commissioned I hope he comes back.

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Volume 3 coming soon. Watch this space.

Posted by Anaithnid, 1:41pm
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Friday, Jan 11, 2008

Welcome to volume #1 of 'Going Through The Motions', my new blogger series that can feature anything and everything from TV to Film, from Books to Comics, from Music to Games, from Life to Death, from Batman to Robin. Basically what I'm saying is it can cover every aspect of the Universe.

In this volumeread my reviews on The Shawshank Redemption, Land Of The Giants, and the Foo Fighters and find out who my top 10 Lost Characters are.

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MOVIE REVIEW #1 - THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION

Emotionally Uplifting

*****

Based on the novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption from Stephen King's bestseller Different Seasons, Frank Darabont's adaptation did not fare well when originally realeased in 1994, despite high hopes from producers. At a time when the public only wanted blockbusters with special effects, this prison drama with a strange name did not fit that category.

However, when word spread that The Shawshank Redemption had received seven Oscar nominations, video stores worldwide were kept busy with eager punters waiting to rent this film and Darabont's film became the most rented film of 1995 in the United States. A copy of The Shawshank Redemption on DVD or VHS can now be found in most household film collections, appealing to family members from the age of thirteen or above.

With a gripping story and spectacular performances from Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, James Whitmore, William Sadler, Bob Gunton and Clancy Brown it is no wonder that The Shawshank Redemption is one of the best loved films of all time and currently ranks at the number two film or all time in IMDB's Top 250, with only The Godfather outranking it. Since reaching the top five of this list over eight years ago, The Shawshank Redemption has never dropped below the fifth position.

Although set in a prison, The Shawshank Redemption can be compared to everyday life. The overall theme in the film is one of hope. As Andy Dufresne (Robbins) says in a letter to Ellis Redding (Freeman), "Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies." The idea behind the film is that things may seem difficult and life may be hard, but if you only have hope, you can work through all that. Darabont often claims when speaking about the film that he once received a letter from a young man who had been suicidal and was ready to end it all, until his roommate convinced him to watch The Shawshank Redemption and he realised that there was reason to live afterall.

Whenever you are feeling down or depressed, watching The Shawshank Redemption will always cheer you up, no matter how many times you've already seen it. It is the type of film that you feel you must convince anyone who hasn't seen it, to go and watch it immediately. Hopefully, as time goes on The Shawshank Redemption will maintain its legendary status and affect more people's lives for the better.

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TV REVIEW #1 - LAND OF THE GIANTS

1960's Sci-Fi ****c

*****

Land Of The Giants made its television debut in 1968 and although the show only lasted for two seasons it still remains a cult ****c amongst viewers of all ages today. The show's creator, Irwin Allen, was already well known for his previous Sci-Fi series, Lost In Space, and he made a great job at creating another ****c with Land Of The Giants.

The show revolves around seven Earthlings who'saircraft has crashed in a forrest on a planet much like their own, except that the inhabitants of this planet and everything else is twelve times the size of our heroes, who must live on this planet until they can repair their aircraft.On the ship there were three crew members, Captain Steve Burton (Gary Conway), his co-pilot Dan Erikson (Don Marshall) and stewardess Betty Hamilton (Heather Young). The shipwas also carrying five passengers who were en-route to London when the ship was taken off course. There was engineer Mark Wilson (Don Matheson), wealthy vixen Valerie Scott (Deanna Lund), mysterious GermanAlexander Fitzhugh (Kurt Kaznar), orphan Barry Lockridge (Stefan Arngrim) and Barry's dog, Chipper.

Each week, one or more of our heroes would be captured by Giants and the others would have to come up with ideas to rescue them. As it was a family show, each episode ended with everyone safely back at camp and there were never any nail-biting cliffhangers, however the show was still incredibly enjoyable even though you know they'll be rescued in the end. On occasion, some Giants would attempt to aid the Earthlings and would end up paying the price of imprisonment or death, if found guilty of this crime. Throughout the shows two season run other Earthlings were introduced in certain episodes, but would dissappear again by the episodes conclusion and never be mentioned again.

Overall Land Of The Giants is a must see for Sci-Fi fans and TV addicts. The characters are loveable and their adventures exciting. This show was years before it's time and if it were to be re-made today it would give Lost and Heroes a run for their money.

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ARTIST REVIEW #1 - FOO FIGHTERS

Foo-tastic

*****

Foo Fighters are an Americanrock band formed by former Nirvana drummer and rock legendDave Grohl in 1995. Foo Fighters have released six studio albums and one live album to date and remain one of the most influencial rock groups on the music scene. The current band line-up is Dave Grohl on lead vocals and guitar, Taylor Hawkins on drums, Nate Mendel on bass guitar and Chris Shiflett on guitar and backing vocals.

For the recording of the self-titled debut album Grohl played all instruments and sang all vocals with the exception of Greg Dulli of the Afghan Whigs on guitar for X-Static.Before the release of the album Grohl drafted bass player,Nate Mendel, and drummer, William Goldsmith, from the recently disbanded Sunny Day Real Estate. Pat Smear, who had worked with Grohl in Nirvana, became the second guitarist and completed the band.

The band's first single This Is A Call was released in June 1995 reaching number two in the US Hot Modern Rock Tracks charts. The debut album was a month later and reached number 3 in the UK album charts. I'll Stick Around, For All the Cows and Big Me were also released as singles from the debut album.

Goldsmith left the band before the release of the second album The Colour and the Shape in May, 1997 and was replaced by Taylor Hawkins who had previously been Alanis Morissette's touring drummer. The Colour and the Shape has been considered to be the Foo Fighters best album by the majority of the fans, spawning the singles Monkey Wrench, My Hero and Everlong. Shortly afterwards in September of '97 Smear announced he was leaving the band and was replaced by Grohl's former Scream bandmate Franz Stahl.

Prior to the recording of the third album, There Is Nothing Left To Lose,Stahl left the band over created differences and Grohl, Mendel and Taylor recorded the album as a trio. There Is Nothing Left To Losewas released in November of 1999 and the singles Learn To Fly, Stacked Actors, Breakout and Next Year were released from the third album, with Learn To Fly giving the Foo's their first number one single. After recording of the album was finished the band auditioned many guitarists before settling on Chris Shiflett before their upcoming tour.

Shiflett was originally contracted as a touring guitarist but achieved full-time status before work began on the fourth album One By One which was released in October of 2002 and featured the singles All My Life, Times Like These, Low and Have It All. There have been no more changes to the band's line-up since Shiflett became an official member.

The fifth studio album, was a double-disc album, and was released in June, 2005. In Your Honour had one disc of rock songs and the second disc had acoustic songs. The singles released from the double disc album were Best Of You, DOA, Resolve, No Way Back and Miracle. To further support the release of In Your Honour the band organised an acoustic tour in the summer of 2006 and in November of the same year released their live and acoustic album Skin and Bones which was recordered over three nights in Los Angeles.

Foo Fighters released their sixth studio album, Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace in late September of 2007, bringing back the producer, Gil Norton, of The Colour and the Shape in an attempt to maintain the bands signature sound while branching out in different directions. So far both singles released from the album, The Pretender and Long Road To Ruin have done well in the charts, both reaching the number one spot.

Foo Fighters are bigger and better than ever before and continue to tour and write songs. Hopefully the band will stay together for a long time and produce many more albums.

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TOP 10 LOST CHARACTERS

To be honest, my favourite characters in LOST flip around on a daily basis. One day I'll like one character more than everyone else and despise them the next, but overall it's these 10 that I like the best and usually in this order.

10. Ben Linus - Honestly Ben gives me the creeps, but every show needs a creepy bad guy who could turn out to be a good guy and Ben plays that role really well. Ben became one of my favourites towards the end of season 3 when he brought Locke to see Jacob and we got some flashbacks for Ben. Definitely want more Ben flashbacks.

9. Michael Dawson - In season 1 and early on in season 2 Michael was a great character. Unfortunately when his only line became "they took my son/boy" over and over, I was glad he left, but on news of his return and promises that he'll be a different character I've bumped Michael back into my Top 10. Hopefully he'll kick ass when he comes back.

8. Claire Littleton - I don't know why Claire became one of my favourites, most likely because she's a hottie and attach an Aussie accent - we have a winner. I think it's unfortunate that Claire doesn't play a bigger role on the show. Maybe in future seasons she'll become more of a key player in the adventures.

7. John Locke - Locke was the fan favourite of season 1 after his first Locke centric episode when we found out he used to be in a wheelchair. Unfortunately due to spending the majority of season 2 watching him press a button every 108 minutes I grew sick of his character and didn't begin to like him again until he blew up the submarine. Hopefully they won't give him another button to press in season 4.

6. Charlie Pace - Charlie is ultimately the reason I decided to watch the premiere of Lost back when it first aired in Ireland in 2005. I saw the ad on TV and recognised him as the Hobbit from Lord Of The Rings and throughout the first couple of episodes he was my favourite character. For most of the first season he remained in my top 5 characters, but I grew sick of him during season 2 when he pissed everyone off, however once I found out he was going to die, I realised I really didn't want him to and he became one of my favourites again, completely redeeming himself in the last few episodes of season 3.

5. Hugo "Hurley" Reyes - Hurley is a kick ass character. He has some great comic moments and some of my favourite episodes are Hurley centric. I loved in the season 3 finale when everyone kept telling him, they didn't need his help. At first I felt really sorry for him, but then he mows down Pryce in the hippie van and all I could say was "Dude..."

4. Jin Kwon - In the first season Jin was an unliked character because of his treatment of Sun, but I liked him because I knew Daniel Dae Kim from his role on Angel and when you start watching a new TV show, you're drawn to the recogniseable actors. In season 2 and 3 we saw a much kinder side to Jin and even though there is a language barrier between him and the majority of the other characters, he's still great to watch as a character, which goes to show that having lines is not the most important thing.

3. Desmond Hume - When Desmond was introduced in the Season 2 premiere I was too busy trying to figure out who the hell he was and why he was in the hatch to realise how cool he was. When he returned in the season 2 finale he was still too much of a mystery to be considered a favourite, in my eyes, but in season 3 he was the character everyone rooted for. Maybe it's because of his accent or because he can see the future, but Desmond quickly became one of my favourites.

2. Mr. Eko - When first introduced in Season 2, Eko was merely the scary guy who was keeping Sawyer, Jin and Michael as prisoners, but once we saw who he really was, Eko took over Locke's season 1 position as the kick-ass mysterious character who everyone considered to be a legend. His death, early on is season 3 came as a shock to all fans and people still hope the island will bring him back.

1. James "Sawyer" Ford - Who doesn't love Sawyer? He's always in the middle of all the action and his witty one-liners will put a smile on anyone's face and although he seems like a bit of a hard ass we all know that deep down Sawyer cares about the people around him and whether he likes to admit or not he considers his fellow losties, his friends.

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Well that's all for now. Please leave some comments and in the mean time I'll be working on Volume #2...

Posted by Anaithnid, 6:13pm
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Some people just don't have opinions. Like Anaithnid.
Anaithnid must really love MovieTome and agree with every review we've ever written! What other reason could Anaithnid possibly have for not rating a single film?
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