Wicked Cool Video Game Driving Simulator

I WANT ONE.

This is just an F1 simulator, but the possibilities are endless!

Monday Eargasm #14: Michael Giacchino - The Score to "Lost"

Turn that radio off! We know you grow tired of the cookie cutter top 40 hits that's bombarded at you 23 time a day. Let us soothe your ears to something new and maybe introduce you to something entirely different, no tip required. All in a day's work for The Monday Eargasm:)




And so it is over. After 6 beautiful years of amazing storytelling, LOST came to an emotional end last night for its series finale. Not many words can describe how I feel about the ending, other than it was beautiful, satisfying, and thought-provoking. Also, I can have a life now!!

One of the best parts of the show was the amazing score, composed by Academy Award winner Michael Giacchino. The music was a character of the show it self. Simply beautiful. There's no way I couldn't feature part of his score as a Monday Eargasm, so enjoy the live recording/rehearsal of Giacchino's music before the LOST Live event that took place last week.

Thank you Michael, for providing bombastic glissandos and heart string tugging ballads to the most amazing television show of all time.

LOST Cast Retrospective Video

Yeah, yeah. I didn't post this week's Monday Eargasm. It'll resume next week! I'm in the process of moving back to Atlanta to start my new internship, but more on that later.

Here's a retrospective video from the cast members of LOST. The series finale is Sunday, May 23rd, so I hope everyone is getting ready for their LOST viewing parties! Enjoy the video and have a box of tissues near by.

Bigger and Better Things to Come!

Hey guys, sorry about my recent absence in the blog. I've been working on several things for the blog and other outlets of creativity (that I might even share with you when I'm done). Which brings me to my point in this post: things to come!

Bryan and I have been talking about the blog and we want to try a few new things to help make our blog more accessible and more appealing to a broader audience. Among the little things, the biggest announcement is that The Cross Pad will now have a video series! That's right, yours truly will be giving you a video each week covering whatever game-related material I can cram into a video small enough to fit on Youtube. Oh yeah, that's another part of it, we will be starting the official The Cross Pad Youtube Channel!!! So when we do, be sure to subscribe so you can keep up to date on our oh-so-informative posts about anything digital media! As far as my first video post, you can expect it Thursday (yes, past due for yet another Indie Game Wednesday but I make up for it, promise).

All in all, I'm really excited to be doing this and I hope you all like it as much as we do! Thanks, as always, for reading and game on!

Monday Eargasm #13: Rebecca Roubion - "Free"

Turn that radio off! We know you grow tired of the cookie cutter top 40 hits that's bombarded at you 23 time a day. Let us soothe your ears to something new and maybe introduce you to something entirely different, no tip required. All in a day's work for The Monday Eargasm:)

I made a very cool new friend at the office a couple months ago and then when I found out she was a singer/songwriter, I was instantly a fan of hers. Rebecca Roubion has such a soothing tone and her piano playing skills equally exhibit the amount of talent she has. Check out her song "Free" and more from her album A Fine Place To Start at www.rebeccaroubion.com. Can't wait to see her live soon!

P.S. - Everyone in Nashville is a musician. Seriously.

My First Year In The Real World

Exactly one year ago today, I stood up, turned my tassel over and stepped into the real world. It's cliche, but damn - what a year it has been. Back on May 9th, 2009, after the initial highs of being done with my college education was over, I was terrified. I had no clue where my life would go. I had a degree in music education, but wanted to pursue my dreams of having a career in the music business. The problem was I didn't know those dreams were. I was just hoping I could put my foot in the door somewhere and work my way up the ladder, something everyone told me I would have to do.

After sending 42 resumes all across the country during the summer, my mentor Bruce Burch forwarded me a job opening in the music industry in Nashville. I sent another resume, had a phone interview and was hired all within a day. It was a big sigh of relief and excitement engulfed me. Moving to a new city and a new job was pretty amazing. It looked like my life was on that road of working up ladders, but life sometimes likes to throw some curve balls.

Pump the brakes!! Three months later, I got laid off. This completely shook my world and panic took over. I tried to look for other jobs, but kept hearing the same thing: "We're looking for someone with more experience."

UGH.

Periods of solitude and hopelessness suck, but they really do make you grow as a person and force you to make decisions. I had to skip this whole "climbing up the ladder" plan because that plan no longer exists today. I repeat: the plan of working up the ladder does not exist anymore. I went straight to what my passion was.

I've been creative all my life. Either making stop-motion movies with Lego pieces or sketching Star Wars characters on paper. Being creative will be the only thing that will make my life worth while. Coming to this conclusion, I decided that I will be a audio engineer and composer for film and interactive media. After I decided this, I put my plan in motion. I reached out to my mentors, got put in touch with people that could help me and been having a blast since.

Interning with Tommy Cooper has been completely inspiring as I've learned so much about audio engineering and life in general. I've also been supplying scores to a short film, an upcoming indie video game, and some hip hop vocals from co-workers. I've got so much in stored for the next year as well!

Anyway, I was just musing on the state of my life a year after graduation and it's tough but definitely a lot better and more focused. 5 years of college prepared me for the real world, but the real world is definitely where I've learned about what I want to do with my life.

Cheers to all new grads (oh, and moms!). In the mean time, I'll still be blogging about nerdy things.

The Nashville Flood - May 2nd, 2010

No new Monday Eargasm this week. Instead, I'd like to feature an astounding new video on YouTube made of many images from the flood that hit Middle Tennessee this past weekend. Between May 1st and May 2nd, Middle Tennessee was hit by a devastating storm that accumulated the greatest amount of rainfall ever recorded in Tennessee history.

Thankfully, the immediate area I live in was not hit, but you can find flood damage just a mile away. Rock walls were torn down. Cars were stranded on the side of the road. An ambulance was in a ditch flipped over. Some roads were just completely gone. This is the first time I've ever experienced a flood and it was pretty scary. My thoughts are going out to the victims of the storm and I hope things will get better in the coming days.