This doesn’t sound like something I’d usually listen to, and I bet it doesn’t sound like anything you’d listen to either. It was in the Hotel Costes CD that I got recently, and I didn’t think much of the song at first. But after listening to it for a while, it started to sound pretty interesting. Nice rhythm, interesting chords, and a catchy tune. And there’s even some whistling included as well. I like the whistling, mostly ‘cos I can’t really do it myself…

Raid the Radio, by General Elektriks. It grows on you, kinda like unwanted body hair.

It all started with Peugeot, when they decided sometime in 2005 that all their cars should bear an evil, plastic smile:

Then in 2009, Mazda debuted the Mazda 3, with her very own cheerful, slightly retarded-looking grin:

And now, Lotus has unveiled the new Elise, and she’s happy because she’s found herself some LED daytime running lights and cruise control:

Yes. Cruise control. On an Elise.

The next thing you know, it’s actually gonna be comfortable to drive.

But then again, maybe that’s what the Lotus Evora was all about…

I love happy, cheerful cars. I did a double take the first time I saw the new Mazda 3, but now that I’ve gotten used to it, I actually think it’s quite adorable. You see one and it smiles back at you, like a weird little kid at a street corner smiling to herself in a cute, mildly disturbing sort of way.

“Hehehehehe”

But after you’ve seen that weird little kid around for a while, you start missing her and looking out for her everytime you walk past that street corner. Then you start becoming ashamed of yourself for appreciating something that’s so queer. It’s the strangest thing, but the creepy-smile thing actually works.

For me at least…

Pomplamoose. Comprised of Jack Conte and Nataly Dawn, the band lives by 2 rules: everything you see in the video was recorded together with the audio (in other words, no lip-syncing), and everything you hear in the song will be shown in the video at some point.

It’s a simple idea, implemented in a not-so-simple studio that looks extremely well equipped, with magnificent results. When Desmond first showed me one of their videos (a cover of Single Ladies), I wasn’t too psyched about it. But then I was forced to listen to the original version of the song by Beyonce, and I became quite impressed by Pomplamoose. They were able to turn it into something that sounded so much smoother and fuller, which wasn’t going to be very difficult in the first place, since it’s a Beyonce song. But still, it’s a commendable and very creative cover.

It made me curious, so I watched the rest of their “Videosongs” on their YouTube channel, and they’re actually pretty good. But when I started watching more of it, something freaky happened: Dawn started reminding me of Yvonne, and Conte reminded me of Desmond, at which point my enjoyment of the videos started to decrease…

But they’re still well worth the watch, and Desmond and Yvonne are still good people. =)

The amplifier made the lows a lot stronger too. Actually, it made the whole sound a lot better, but I could particularly tell the difference with the low notes. Whether it’s because a change in the low end is more discernable or because the low end was boosted a bit more than the rest of the spectrum, I have no idea. But it does make quite a difference.

Apparently, a headphone amplifier works by increasing the amount of power supplied to the headphone transducer – the part of the headphone that converts the electrical signal into sound – and this supposedly increases the volume and clarity of the sound produced, which it does quite well. It’s quite amazing what a small little box and a bit of power can do.

But I still miss my Sennheisers…

Jaben. It’s a small shop on the 4th floor of the Adelphi, beside Funan the IT Mall. They sell earbuds, headphones, in-ear monitors and the best service I’ve seen in a long time. Don’t bother with research before you head down to the shop, ‘cos these guys actually allow you to try out and compare different earbuds and headphones to see which works best for you. And they know their stuff too. They know the balance and the sound offered by each of their headphones and earbuds, and they’ll recommend different sets of phones for you to try, based on the feedback you give them after you go through each pair of phones. What kind of shop actually does this kind of thing? It was amazing.

$50 doesn’t get you very far in terms of earbuds. Most of the earbuds I tried had either a tinny sound with too little bass, or excessive, and sometimes mushy bass. My search ended with the “Hippo Pearl” - a pair of nondescript-looking earbuds married to some oddly coloured silicone tips, and named after a tubby-looking animal and my drumset. Not the most promising start then.

But listening to it reminded me of my Sennheisers. A nice balanced sound, with distinct, clear highs, and lows that were strong and slightly punchy but not mushy like some of the other buds that I tried. The sound isn’t mind-blowing, and I still miss my Sennheisers, but not by much. It doesn’t get any better than this for $50. In fact, $50 seemed like quite a bargain for the kind of sound made by the Hippo.

So I bought it. They gave me a headphone amplifier for free too. It’s supposed to improve the quality of the sound piped out of your iPod, but now I have no idea what to do with it. I tried feeding it to my Hippo but they seemed to make the same kind of sound as if the amplifier wasn’t there. It seems I’m not audiophilic enough to tell the difference.

I like my Hippo, and if you’re hunting for a new pair of headphones or earbuds, you’re probably gonna find something you’ll like at Jaben too. It’s located in the Adelphi, #04-11. Not the most impressive-looking shop by any means, but pretty much everything else about it is. Just like my Hippo.

“Apocalypse: The Second World War”. It’s a 6-part documentary series about World War II, and it’s the best documentary I’ve watched all year. In fact, I’m so impressed by it, I’m gonna say it’s the best documentary I’ve ever watched. Period.

“Apocalypse” seems like any other World War II documentary. It illustrates the war using restored film footage, or in this case, “previously unseen, colourized footage”, and it chronicles all the major events in World War II, from Hitler’s rise to power, to the dropping of the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Much of the footage is indeed “previously unseen”, with some of them being a bit graphic. There is an abundance of footage featuring the corpses of dead soldiers, or the lifeless bodies of some unfortunate civilians, which isn’t uncommon for a World War II documentary.

There is a marked focus on the European theater. But with sufficient footage to last a total running time of 4 and a half hours (or 6 hours if you count the commercials), “Apocalypse” is able to describe these events with so much more detail than anything I’ve seen. And it does so at a good pace too - you could get a really good picture of what was going on, instead of losing the plot after watching 10 minutes of some other documentary.

And then it goes one step further. What really sets “Apocalypse” apart from the other WWII documentaries for me, was that it didn’t merely lay down the facts with the help of colourized footage. I watched it, and perhaps the last round of exams have dislodged a couple of screws, but at times, you could actually get a good feel for some of the events and characters. For instance, the mysticism surrounding Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich, the tactical billiance of Field Marshall Erwin Rommel, and the determination and grit of the British people during the Battle of Britain.

The narrator’s lines are superbly written, with none of the gaudy “this footage of 2 dead hamsters has never been broadcasted, UNTIL NOW…”  Also, Martin Sheen does a commendable job of executing the narration. He doesn’t sound like he’s struggling to stay awake – quite rare for a footage-based World War II documentary. The background music helps to convey the appropriate moods too, and the variety of footage is staggering. It makes you wonder how much more footage has been left on the cutting room floor. And despite of the variety of footage featured, the production is rock-solid. The whole package feels really well put-together, and there’s always continuity throughout the entire 4 and half hours.

So there you you have it. “Apocalypse: The Second World War”. It’s an old story that you think you already know. But they tell it so well, you’ll feel like you’ve never heard it before.

Then follow me on Twitter, @glowingbrakes. My random, incoherent thoughts will provide you with all the intellectual simulation that you don’t need, and inspire you to make better use of your time by doing something more worthwhile.

Sorry Cuddles, I can’t bring you back to life. But I’m sure you’ll be able to find your way out of that hole in the ground somehow…

Look at it, look at it. It’s so preeetty…

And now that I’ve finally gotten my mitts around a copy of the game, I’m going to gush even more about it like some excited little girl. But importantly, I can now try it out for myself and neglect my work. 800 real-world cars (!!!), including the Nissan GT-R, the Ferrari F2007, and the Le Man Prototype Audi R8 race car, and around 40-something tracks. Yes, I know, most of the tracks don’t really exist in the real world, and you don’t see what all the fuss is about because you’re boring, but still, 800 cars… That’s pretty awesome. And with so many cars and tracks, it seems like a game I’ll be playing for a really, really long time to come. My CAP score screams in horror as I spend hours playing the game everyday, but I love Gran Turismo. Until I get my results…

And that’s not the only drawback with this game. It may have a “Challenge” mode, where you learn more about driving on a track through series of challenges, but there’s no career mode… which is fine actually. Also, I can race with a maximum of 3 other cars at the same time. Yes, not 1, not 2, but 3 opponents. That’s even more than the number of girls I’ve dated.

So exciting…

But then again, the silliness of a 4-car race is justified by, and probably caused by, the frame rate of 60 frames/sec(which is almost unheard of for a driving game on the PSP), and the mostly immaculate modelling of the cars. No grainy, vague looking shapes here. The shape of each car model faithfully conforms to the appearance of its real world counterpart. You can really tell which car you’re looking at just by looking at the shape of it, because here, unlike in NASCAR, a Ford Mustang really looks like a Ford Mustang, which is brilliant. And it’s not just the shapes of the cars that are accurate. You can really discern the different handling characteristics of each car as it pitches and rolls through the corners as well. And if you’re driving a Ferrari Enzo or a McLaren SLR or something that’s supposed to have spoilers that extend at higher speeds, the spoilers actually do that in the game! The first time I drove up behind the SLR in the game and watched the spoiler come up on the SLR, I was so impressed, I drove into its rear end.

It’s this attention to detail that makes Gran Turismo stand out from the rest of the games out there, especially on the PSP, because it’s first and foremost a simulator. If you’re a fan of arcade-style racers, you probably won’t be very fond of this, because this is something that actually requires you to brake 200m ahead of a hairpin turn. It requires you to drive sensibly, and driving sensibly is good. All drivers should learn how to drive sensibly. That way, we’d have fewer women driving on the roads…

One thing that did bother me though, was that you can only purchase cars from 4 manufacturers at any one time. The manufacturers randomly rotate after every other race or event that you enter, so theoretically, you should eventually see all the cars from all the manufacturers after a few lifetimes, when they’ve all become obsolete. I wouldn’t mind this too much, but my PSP seems to be incredibly fond of Nissan, Toyota and Mazda, which is annoying, because I don’t want to buy Nissans, Toyotas or Mazdas anymore. But that’s pretty much the only thing I don’t like about this game. Otherwise, it’s a simulator, and simulators rock. Especially good ones.

After all, who needs 3 girlfriends when you can race 3 other cars around the Nordshleife?

Shine Jesus Shine FAIL

FOC2009′s gone, and so is rally, and bidding, which means the summer break is about to follow suit as well. And so far, the whole summer has been strangely unsatisfying. There’s no reason for this, but I’ve spent the entire summer with dread, this sense of impending doom. What kind of doom, I have absolutely no clue.

I thought the “doom” would go away after FOC, but it didn’t, because we jumped straight into the Rally project. So I thought it would go away after the Rally, which was MM’s last major project, and it didn’t. There was no “Thank God it’s finally over,” not immediately after the rally, not 3 days after, not a week… not ever. It just felt like any other day.

It’s like as if the fact that I can finally put my feet up and chill never really sank in. I’ve still got this overwhelming sense of dread, like as if Facebook is going to be revamped with a Hello Kitty theme, but I don’t use Facebook, so that wouldn’t be so bad… Or like as if BMW’s going to pull out of Formula 1, which is actually going to happen. They’re leaving Formula 1 at year’s end and leave the Sauber Team to die an even more horrible death than they already are this season. It would make my BMW Sauber cap a really cool cap to have though, because the team wouldn’t exist anymore, or at least exist under a different name…

And then there was the CSS AGM, which didn’t help to reassert any sense of normalcy either. Not that it was an extremely important personal thing for me or anything, but I’m just glad we didn’t have more freshmen present, or who knows what they might start thinking of us. I shan’t delve into anymore details. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t entirely bad. It was just… extremely weird, as I’m sure most people would agree.

But I’m not dreading any of that nonsense. I’ve spent the entire summer like this. I can’t even take a proper break and take my mind off everything, ’cos I don’t even know what my mind is on. Is it the impending semester and all its work? Irrational paranoia that I may lose some good people this semester? Money problems? IPPT? That I’ve lost my mind because I don’t know what it’s on??

I’m dreading something, but I don’t know what.

Well, at least it’s going to be here. First announced with the original PSP, and with its latest announcement on the same day as the new PSP Go, it’s been christened Gran Turismo Mobile, and is set for release on the 1st of October this year, which means I’ve gotta wait 5 more months to get my hands on it. Unless it gets delayed again, in which case, I’ll probably have to wait for a PSP Come before I get any wind of it again… But my faith in Kazunouri Yamauchi and Polyphony Digital shall prevail, and I trust they will deliver on October the 1st.

And the new Gran Turismo 5 makes me wanna get a PS3, because it just looks absolutely stunning:

I feel so infatuated now…