Watch The Beatles Rock Band Opening Cinematic

A few weeks ago I launched a personal blog, powered by Tumblr. I intend to use it to post photos and music stuff that really doesn’t fit on this blog. Initially I thought about using a standard Tumblr theme instead of fussing over a custom one when I was busy enough as it was. However, I couldn’t bring myself to use someone else’s template and ended up creating my own, minimal theme over the course of (mostly) two nights.

For some reason I decided I should release the theme. I think it was seeing so many bad Tumblr themes that did it. I’ve called it I Could Live In Hope, after the first album by one of the favourite bands, Low. If I create any themes for any platform in the future I intend to name them after subsequent Low albums, in corresponding chronological order.

So if you have a Tumblr account, head over to the I Could Live In Hope page to preview the theme, and install it via the Theme Garden. Unfortunately the Theme garden doesn’t have permalinks for each theme, but it’s near the top of the Recent page, and currently just above half way up the Popular page. To date over 400 people have the theme installed, and that’s rising every day.

Please let me know if you have any feedback on theme, or find any bugs.

Dead By Dawn, a print client of mine, invited me to the festival a couple of weeks ago. I saw some excellent films, but something that really caught my attention was The Pearce Sisters. A short film by Aardman, it is funny, gory and baetifully drawn. You can watch the whole short film right now at Atom, and find out more at the official site.

Press Check is the third iPhone game by FORMation Alliance in their Games For Creatives series. From their website:

PRESS CHECK is a designer ode to the old-school art of print plate alignment re-imagined as a challenge of speed and accuracy on your iPhone/iPod Touch. Show off your non-digital skills with levels ranging from the beginner 2-color set-ups to the expert 5-color jobs. Compete against virtual press operators worldwide with the international leaderboards for which to aim and judge your scores against. You’ll long for the sweet smell of ink and the hum of the press as you test your eye for perfect registration.

These games (Press Check, Kern and Eye vs. Eye) probably won’t appeal to many outside the design community, but with so many designers owning iPhones, I’m sure that’s not problem. The games are good fun in a hugely nerdy way. Press Check is currently £1.19 in the UK App Store [iTunes Store link]

Watch the video

The video was created by Tribal DDB and Stink Digital, to promote a fancy new Philips TV, on a specially created microsite. The microsite annoyed me so much with its series of questions about location and broadband speeds, that I’ve linked to the video on the Stink Digital site instead.

At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what the video was created for, or where it ended up. It’s just jaw-dropping. Enjoy.

(Via Colin Gilchrist)

Surely SXSW is a great place for music industry people to come and try to learn from their Interactive counterparts? Yet there was a distinct lack of good music web companies represented. In the music trade show I saw at least 3 companies trying to make money selling music-specific rip-offs of popular web services. At one booth I had a conversation with a company rep who explained their service. “Oh, so you’re a similar to service to Campaign Monitor?” was my response. “I’ve never heard of them. Our USP is that we are solely catering to the music industry”, was her reply. Are music companies so blinkered that a) they don’t know who their competition is and b) they think that being music centric will actually make them money, if they could be expanding to other markets?

When are music companies going to start looking to the web community for help, instead of calling them all thieves pirates? Where are the big hires from the web community to big music companies? God knows music could use the help. I’d like to see smart people from Google/Yahoo/wherever, who love music, being paid to apply that thinking to a ‘sinking’ industry. Remember, ‘social media expert’ is a modern name for ‘marketer’. Adding them to your arsenal is potentially a smart move but it won’t solve your problems.

Are there companies I’m missing here? Web companies which could really change the music industry? Please tell me I’m wrong. I’d like nothing more.

* I should probably mention that I am aware of a (very) few good music web services. Last.fm is one. Spotify is another. There are also lots of people doing great things with what they have, especially at small indie labels.

All being well, I’m currently in a hotel in Austin, Texas before the first day of SXSWi. Today’s Video Friday is explained thus:

Art Spiegelman, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Maus, creator of Wacky Packs and the Garbage Pail Kids, and father of the modern graphic novel (though hes still demanding a blood test), presents this warts-and-all reproduction of his private sketchbooks — and the results are as candid, sharp, and funny as the relentlessly innovative man behind them. BE A NOSE! is a rare glimpse into the secret scribblings of an American original.

I haven’t embedded the video this time, as you really need to watch it in glorious HD. This is 2 minutes of intense and clever animation that you need to see.

As I’ll be at SXSW for the next 11 days, expect very erratic updates here, if any.

The music video for the Broken Family Band song “It’s All Over”. I really love The Broken Family Band, and this video is just lovely.

Do yourself a favour, watch it in HD.

We are pleased to announce the launch of SXSWisEASY.com.

Designed with simplicity in mind, SXSWisEASY provides straight up information for everything related to SXSW. It covers everything from essential elements of Austin TX to the Best Interactive Parties all they way to a list of the Social Do’s and Don’t of the Film Festival.

Essentially, everything you could possible need to know to prepare you for SXSW in one easy to read spot.

As a group we have also provided a break down of the best parties and best interactive sessions at the festival. Including our own take on why it’ll be worth sitting in on the session. A guideline to help you make the most of your time down there.

So please spread the word of SXSWisEASY, send it to anyone you know heading to Austin. Even start following the SXSWisEASY Twitter account for the latest updates and information.

A big thank you goes to our friends Kurt, Joe, and Connor for being great to work with. Thanks again guys.