Dom DeLuise
1933-2009
Legendary larger than life comedian Dom DeLuise passed away yesterday in his sleep at the age of 75. Suffering from kidney failure and respiratory problems, DeLuise passed away at a Los Angeles hospital. Known early on for his appearances on the Dean Martin Show, Dom would forever be known for his distinctive comedic voice and performances in various Mel Brooks’ films. A staple of some of Brooks’ best work, Dom appeared in such comedies as The Twelve Chairs, Blazing Saddles, Silent Movie, History of the World Part 1, Spaceballs and Robin Hood Men in Tights. Dom was as well a frequent co-star of Burt Reynolds appearing in six films with the mustached macho man and a favorite of animator Don Bluth lending his voice to such films as The Secret of NIMH, An American Tale and All Dogs Go to Heaven. Personally I always enjoyed Dom as the imaginary “Koos A La Goop A La Goop” on Dexter’s Laboratory a very humorous performance if I must say.

I mean no disrespect, but I’m surprised that an old fat guy like Dom lived as long as he did. I guess this was one of those things that was bound to happen soon but you just don’t want it to. We send our deepest sympathies here at Cat Fancy.

Did you guys hear that Coldplay is coming out with a live album? Me neither. But I just read about it and I’ve got some good news: It’s free.

Yep, on May 15 Coldplay is dropping what I assume will be a Zip file full of MP3s that anyone can download. It’s stuff from the tour that is still going on right now. I guess they think of it as a favor to loyal fans who are living through these tough economic times.

Oh, and it’s title? LeftRightLeftRightLeft.

Yeah.

Well, it’s free, they don’t have to try very hard.

With all this swine flu shit going on, there was a more local news story that recently caught my attention.  I was sitting in the lounge area of one of my school’s buildings waiting for class to start when I saw a San Francisco newspaper with a headline that read “Zodiac Killer To Be Named”.  I was kind of intrigued because I’m a big fan of the 2007 movie Zodiac, which shows the entire history of the Zodiac case.

For those who don’t know, in the late ’60s and early ’70s there were a number of murders committed in the Bay Area by a man who called himself the Zodiac.  As the film Zodiac shows, the identity of the Zodiac killer has never been confirmed although Arthur Lee Allen has always been thought of as the most likely suspect of being the Zodiac.

So apparently yesterday a woman named Deborah Perez claimed that her late father, Guy Ward Henrickson, was the Zodiac and she helped him write many of the  infamous confession notes that were sent to San Francisco police, newspapers and sleuths with elaborate ciphers and riddles, claiming responsibility for 37 deaths.  She also claimed that she had a pair of glasses belonging to the Zodiac’s final victim.  

Of course a lot of people are still pretty skeptical about this claim, especially considering what a long and arduous case the search for the Zodiac killer has been.  I really doubt there will ever be any real closure to this case, but hey it made for a great movie, and who knows maybe with some further evidence this claim will indeed close the door on one of the most brutal series of killings in the history of the  Bay Area.

I guess I didn’t post about this here, so there’s a chance you guys haven’t heard the news yet. Well, you know Rock Band? That game that we all really like? They are making a new one. You know that. But I’m not talking about the Beatles game or the PSP one, either. No, tonight I’m talking about the game they announced last week.

Lego Rock Band.

Let that sink in for a little while. The hugely popular Lego franchise of games are merging with Rock Band to create a new title. This game is poised to become the family-friendly band game, with kinder, gentler songs than we get in the big boy versions of the game. It even has a new mode that is supposed to be easier than easy. What are those songs? They’ve announced:

“The Final Countdown” by Europe
“Girls and Boys” by Good Charlotte
“Kung Fu Fighting” by Carl Douglas
“So What” by Pink
“Song 2” by Blur

I know: what? They’re gonna make by a fucking Lego game so I can finally play “Kung Fu Fighting” and “Song 2”? God damnit! Who knows, maybe this game will work with all the other DLC, and they will make RB2 exportable… making this the new disc through which all Rock Banding is done.

If that is the case, take heart knowing that the game might have some silly charm to it. Instead of earning money, you earn Lego blocks when you complete songs. You use those blocks to customize your character, your staff, your “rock den” and to build vehicles. That’s right, instead of unlocking, say, the van, you just build it. Then, when you have enough blocks, you build an airplane. OK, that’s kind of neat. Also, there will be Lego-style challenges, like blowing up buildings with the power of rock.

Fine, you win Harmonix and Traveller’s Tales. I’ll keep an open mind about this strange new game. But I still wish you would just release all these songs as DLC.

This has been a big week for Dreamcast gamers, as two of my favorite DC games are making the leap over to XBLA and PSN.

First we have Virtual On: Oratorio Tangram, the classic mech fighting game. I know I spent a lot of time playing the console version of this, but remember the controls weren’t as fulfilling without the twin sticks from the arcade version. Maybe this new version will remedy that. Regardless it adds online multiplayer and some graphical enhancements. It will be $15 and its just on XBLA.

Then there was the announcement everyone’s been waiting for, Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is coming this summer. This is absolutely huge, since this game is often heralded as one of the all time great fighting games. With its huge roster and insane gameplay, it was probably my favorite Dreamcast game.

Today, it’s a real bitch to find a copy of the game. I’ve seen the PS2 version a couple times, but it is always marked up to like $80, and you know I’d never drop $80 on a single game.

Which is why this is so exciting. We don’t have a release date yet, but based on the history of XBLA and PSN, we can assume it will only cost $15, $20 max. That’s more than acceptable. Plus, Capcom has already confirmed it is adding online multiplayer. Based on the videos that I’ve seen, it doesn’t look like this game has been given the HD remix, but it still looks pretty good.

Very exciting.

I don’t mean to intrude on Classic Album Tuesday but I thought I’d do a quick update and bulk up our post count. First order of business is what’s on the table this week. I’ll probably be doing an album review very soon and I’ll also be going to see The Killers tomorrow, so you can expect a post regarding my thoughts on that. I’m excited that The Soloist is finally coming out this Friday and assume someone will review that depending on who all goes to see it. There’s Bob Dylan’s new album out next week but after that there’s a definite dry spell (at least for me) regarding album release until June.

In other news, mock rockers Spinal Tap have released new information on their upcoming album to commemorate the 25th anniversary of This is Spinal Tap. It’s been announced that the album now titled Back From the Dead will be due out this summer and will be a double album. One disc being a reworked version of Tap’s first album and the second being entirely new material. They have a free download available on their site, but it’s just some one minute long joke, brass song called “Saucy Jack” it’s purposefully stupid and I don’t recommend downloading it.

In preparation of the new Star Trek movie I’ve been submerging myself deep into the original series. I’d always liked the show but never really felt motivated to watch more episodes. So now that I have a reason I’ve checked out some of the most acclaimed episodes and I really love it. I’ve started with Entertainment Weekly’s picks for the best episodes (They list them on Trek’s wikipedia page) so I hope to see enough to do some kind of favorite episodes list on either the week of the new Trek’s release, or the week after. Though I’m not positive I’ll go through with that, I think Sean is playing with the idea of doing a Trek movie list, so we’ll all see how that week plays out soon.

One list I do plan on doing in probably a week or two is “My Top 10 Baseball Movies”. I’ve been renting a few and finally watched Pride of the Yankees though it was pretty weak in my opinion. You practically never see any actual baseball and they basically gloss over his entire major league career. It was really more of an overly sappy love-fest, probably initially acclaimed due to the fact that it came out just a year after Gehrig’s death. I mean if I hadn’t already known before hand, I couldn’t even tell you what position Lou Gehrig played. Oh well, I still got some interesting flicks to check out.

In more personal news, the new family ferret “Steve” or as I occasionally call him; “Young Steven”, “Steve II.” or “Steve Reloaded” is fitting into the family quite well. I probably already like him better then any of the other current ferrets, so he’s definitely an adequate successor to the name of “Steve”. AJ and I should be finishing our music video this weekend and I’ve already got other stuff in the works. Well that’s all for today I got to go study, Otteni out.