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Album review: Tomorrow’s Harvest by Boards of Canada

Boards of Canada have always been one of ‘those’ bands for me. The kind of band you heard once at a club, and the track caught your attention enough to ask the DJ about, but never quite get around to really checking out. On the occasions I’ve heard them, I’ve liked them but never got around to sinking myself into their discography. Back in the spring, I stumbled across their website and noticed they had a new album, called “Tomorrow’s Harvest”, due out soon. Even then, it wasn’t until a…

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Arts Computing Music 

World War Z trailer launches, unfortunately

After moving back the release of World War Z from December to the summer of 2013, it’s not surprising that the trailer is getting a lot of buzz.  Too bad that before the end of the first minute of the trailer, I already didn’t give a crap. The trailer opens with Brad Pitt and his family stuck in NYC gridlock.  Every lane is packed with cars, and Brad Pitt gets out to see what’s going on.  There’s an explosion far up ahead… so far so good.  Something ominous, and unexplained fireworks in…

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Arts Computing Featured Film Mobile Music TV 

Zune Music coming to Canada

Microsoft’s Zune Music services have always been a very US centric brand, with rumours that it would come to Canada swirling for a couple of years. The last we heard, it was originally going to show up here back in the spring of this year. While the Zune video marketplace has been available in Canada for some time, allowing users to rent and buy TV and film content via their PCs or Xbox 360s, the iTunes competitor has been bereft of, well… tunes, until now.

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Arts Featured Gaming Music Show video 

Dancing Assassins – a random moment from Fan Expo

Some of the best things to happen at conventions are totally random, and you don’t expect to have your camera running at the time. At Fan Expo this year, we all happened to be in the right place at the right time. The above video is the result of a bunch of random cosplay Ezios and Altairs milling around the Ubisoft booth when they’re starting a Just Dance 3 contest.

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Zune HD coming to Canada

Microsoft’s Zune HD portable media player, formerly only available in the US and UK, will be coming to Canada in the near future. Although first released in 2009, the hardware has never been available here. It’s curious that Microsoft would choose 2011 to bring their media player here, since they’ve been focusing on Windows Phone for their mobility solution as of late, including integrating many of the Zune features into their new phone platform. While the Zune software on PCs and the Xbox allows for both movie and TV rentals and purchases, it’s been noticably absent of music options here.

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Clint Mansell to score Mass Effect 3

In an interview with The Quietus, Clint Mansell let it slip that he’ll be scoring the third installment of Bioware’s Mass Effect franchise.  Mansell is one of the best film composers working in Hollywood today.  His work includes being the ‘go to’ composer for Darren Aronofsky, director of Pi, Requiem For A Dream and Black Swan.  As the soundtrack for Requim so deftly illustrates, Mansell isn’t afraid to draw from a wide array of genres and styles to arrive at something unique. This blending of genres is nothing new for…

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Toronto Comic Con annouces line-up

Fan Expo may be the biggest comic convention in Canada, but it’s not the only one. The line up for Wizard’s 2011 Toronto Comic Con was announced earlier this week, and it’s chalk full of fandom favourites including Star Wars alumni Billy Dee Williams and David Prowse. Of course, beyond the pop culture draws, there will be plenty of comic creators on hand.

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Dance Central – One Step At a Time

While the gyms are full and too many people are jiggling around in too little clothing, I’ve become a basement gamer. A dancing basement gamer.

Dance Central has only recently become a tool for fitness in my household. It started out as the coolest novelty, a well-intentioned weight loss method, then loads of fun as a party game. So ironically, hubby and I would just be watching everyone else sweat, while we sat and haphazardly reminded ourselves to play later.

We didn’t.

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Gamercamp Lv2 starts tomorrow

Like the title says, there’s only one day left until Gamercamp Lv2 kicks off tomorrow morning at 11 am.  The 2 day festival of gaming, in it’s second year, will feature gaming presentations, the Saturday night 1UP bash and a whole lot more.  You can get your tickets right here.  Instead of trying to sum it all up myself, here’s the official poster of events, followed by a write up from event organizers Mark Rabo and Jamie Woo. Saturday doors open at 10:30am and presentations get started at 11am. We’ll…

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Halo Ballet: Dance Dance Evolved?

Miguel of Spooky Squid fame just passed on this link to the premiere of the Halo Ballet.  Yes, as in the Bungie developed video game.  This Sunday at The Music Gallery in Toronto, modern dancers will perform live choreographed machinima via networked Xbox 360s. X AVANT Festival — “Dance Dance Revolution™” featuring Halo Ballet™ + The Aperghis Suite + The Plunder Suite Modern dancers take on John Oswald, Georges Aperghis and the Halo™ video game environment Halo™ Ballet: Inspired by machinima — the repurposing of 3D graphics engines from video games…

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