The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Friday, November 7, 2014 - 5 0 The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom Friday, November 7,2014- 5 Just another day at Ricks 'Evil Within' lands with twisted grace Blonde Redhead proves its durabil By AMELIA ZAK sounds and electronic feedback. Throughout their hour-and- Daily Arts Writer Indubitably unique, this was a a-half set, Amedeo's dark voice sound lurking beneath much of and punk rock guitar brilliantly This past Sunday, in one of their Sunday night set. juxtaposed the Bjork-like, whiny- Detroit's popular music hubs, It's clear that this band has but-beautiful voice of Kazu. She, the Magic Stick, Blonde Redhead been working at its craft for a long in turn, rhythmically danced graced a slightly small but highly time. The music hits you like a with growing enthusiasm as the enthusiastic crowd with its wall of sound fused together by an vibes of the room grew from presence. The crowd was a sea of incendiary electric guitar, ethereal silent appreciation to vehement, older, all-too-cool leather-jacket- voice, constant, complicated visible excitement. A five-minute brazen couples and fans. Covered drumming and a soundboard. instrumentation toward the end in eccentric tattoos, the crowd's The use of the soundboard added of the band's set left the crowd excitement was almost palpable. excitement to the performance catcalling for minutes. Everyone Honest shouts of admiration and and sound, bending Kazu's in the room lost the cool that their appreciation began the minute voice as if it had just entered a leather jackets had so long been these fedora-wearing, noticeably kaleidoscope. The image of the sustaining. Drummer Simone laid mature musicians quietly stepped graying Amedeo as he mixed down an eccentric, heavy beat on stage. Twin brothers Simone Kazu's voice into a compilation as Kazu added her effervescent and Amedeo Pace manned the of bells, claps and rattles was an dance moves and voice. With the drums, vocals and lead guitar, especially interesting clash of the audience groping at eachand every respectively. Kazu Makino, laced new and old. sound, Amedeo completed this up in Stevie Nicks-esque garb, This is a band that involved the building jam session in burning was dripping in ethereality for heavy use of a soundboard before swipes of an electric guitar that, the entirety of the performance. it became musically ubiquitous. metaphorically and literally, Her vocals were the band's best Because of this, Blonde Redhead's brought people to their knees. instrument-as they were stretched unique and perfected use of Blonde Redhead is an aged band and expanded on Amedeo's on-stage electronic additions and that, with all of the its experience soundboard. synthesized elements beckons the and experimentation, knows This band is and always has question: How many bands have how to control its sound. The been incredibly ahead of its time, they inspired? Contemporary band members understand their the irony being that all three of greats like Arcade Fire or Alt-J audience, abilities, and the music its members are in their mid- immediately come to mind. Their they have the skills and technology 40s. Blonde Redhead stepped musical footprints are undeniable, to create. Synthesized chimes, onto the New York City music but they do manage to maintain a whistles, bells, ethereal fairy-like scene in 1993. With heavy Sonic brassy, at times even bluesy rock lead singer juxtaposed her fellow Youth influences, the group was sound. The band's heavy inclusion twin punk-rock band mates, initially regarded as a band of ofanelectricguitarwasareminder this band is an amalgamation the uncommon noise rock genre, of what contemporary music may of gathered interests, talents which makes use of traditional be lacking: that incendiary sound and experiences that keep a rock music instrumentations but only a confident six-string can demographically similar and loyal incorporates atonality, dissonant produce. fan base coming back for more. Vid tray "Re best v '* This i my op "RE4" of th critica acclain video ever, an a review of Metac it was and te game t person over-th system game denyin had o. Effect, of Wa moder today establi of thei Nin are g succes Shinji the "R and w is now develo Games newfou create horror Wh after t acclaim surviv becom action and " a re. respon philoso these Evil" stalwa horror limitin ludicro and c comes Often, better The Sebast leo Game brings capable, but simultaneously fragile. He is no badass zombie- asient nightmare slayer, he must use his wits and dexterity in order to make it out realm to life of each of the game's terrifying, memorable combat situations By JACOB RICH alive. Daily Arts Writer And boy, does Mikami love putting his protagonist sident Evil 4" is one of the through hell. "Within" 's best ideo games ever made. moments are tense and often sn't just deeply disturbing horror inion - scenarios. "Within" takes is one TheE il place in a sort of transient ie most h nightmare realm, a series of illy Within memories and locations strung med together psychologically, but games Tango not physically. Progressing holding Gameworks through these loosely ggregate PS4,Xbox0ne, connected worlds is like score PC, PS3, Xbox360 strolling through a highlight 96 on reel of the most violent, ritic. Released in 2005, disturbing moments from the a beautiful, innovative last 30 years of J-horror and rrifying survival horror American slasher films. Seb hat revolutionized third- must fight giant stitched- action with its fixed together abominations and he-shoulder camera escape darkly ingenious . Whether you like the mechanical deathtraps. Each personally, there's no of these situations is heart- ig the influence it has poundingly tense and tonally n gaming. Be it "Mass unique. ,""Uncharted," or "Gears "Within" isn't technically r," pretty much every impressive on PS4, with its n third-person franchise framerate chugging under has "RE4" to thank for 30FPS at times, but its art shing the ground rules direction is extraordinary. r combat. Mikami's obviously talented e years later, we art designers and programmers raced by its spiritual must have harmonized their sor, "The Evil Within." work immaculately to create Mikami, the creator of worlds as fascinating as tesident Evil" franchise these. "Within" has more riter/director of "RE4," environmental variety in each the CEO of his own one of its 15 chapters than pment studio, Tango many whole games. works. He's used his Unfortunately, while und creative freedom to "Within" 's survival horror "Within," his survival combat works well for the opus. most part, some aspects en Mikami left Capcom of resource management he success of "RE4," the have regressed in quality in ned series ditched its comparison to "RE4." When al horror roots in favor of playing on normal difficulty ing more of a cooperative or higher, ammo actually franchise with "RE5" appears too infrequently. RE6," which received This ended up ruining a few soundingly lukewarm boss fights. Seb, strapped of se. "Within's" gameplay ammunition, was trapped in ophy spits in the face of a claustrophobic area, forced post-"RE4" "Resident to run in circles around the games. "Within" is as hulking boss monster until rtly traditional survival- ammo conveniently respawned as it gets these days: and he could fight again until g camera angles, his clip ran out, repeating )usly scarce ammunition the process once more. These ombat in which death broken fights were frustrating quickly and brutally. because of how simply their running away is a design problems could have strategy than fighting. been mitigated. Worse yet, protagonist, Detective there are a few fights towards ian Castellanos, is the end of the game that lack this method of replenishing ammo - meaning if the player runs out, he/she must commit suicide and restart the fight, no matter how well they were doing. This is inexcusably bad game design. Also unfortunately lackluster in "Within" are the characterizations of the protagonist and his allies. With a name as cool as Sebastian Castellanos, was it crazy to expect something more interesting than a largely emotionless white guy with brown hair and stubble? Sporting bad voice acting, terribly translated dialogue with an over-reliance on the word "fuck," and a pair of sidekicks that somehow exceed his level of bland. Seb's design is in direct opposition to the creativity that the rest of the game exudes. "Within" 'sgreatest strength is its unpredictability. You will never expect what is coming next, and you will always be nervously excited about what psychological twist or horrific innovation is through the next door. It's the small stuff that counts here. To give an example of such an innovation, "Within" employs a small but ingenious scare tactic that most major game review publications have failed to commend - it messes with you in the save rooms. In "RE4," the "typewriter" rooms in which you saved the game were the one place that nothing could harm you or scare you. In fact, this is a trope in most video games that utilize save files - nothing can hurt you in the save room. Devilishly, "Within" predates upon this established convention. Without giving any spoilers, know that Mikami's team has devised some intelligent ways to never let you feel truly safe in this game. While "Within" is clunky and inconsistent in some areas, the sick and twisted creativity permeating every harrowing situation is enough to make those terrible boss fights worth it. "Within" isn't nearly as innovative as "RE4," nor as mechanically sound, but it's often just as fun and exciting. It's a must-play for fans of the survival horror genre, and a beacon of difference in an era where creativity in mainstream video gaming is increasingly hard to come by. Let's bring b ack the girl groups, please By CARLY SNIDER Along with this shift in perform- instead of acompetition. Thiskind For The Daily ers came a change in subject of positive image is greatly lack - WE KNOW THERE ARE A LOT OF FASHIONABLE PEOPLE ON CAMPUS WE SEE YOU ALL THE TIME SO WHY NOT WRITE FOR THE DAILY'S NEW STYLE BEAT? FOR AN APPLICATION, E-MAIL ERIKACAT@UMICH.EDU With every trek to the library, mywalk is devoted to decidingthe soundtrack to that day's study ses- sion. Music is crucial in setting the tone: Am I going to be productive or spend most of my time bobbing along to summer hits of the '90s? Sitting down to browse through my Pandora stations and, with some luck, actually beginning to work, I land on Beyonce radio. Bey is usually reserved for estro- gen-fueled gatherings, perfect for empowerment, but not so great for studying. Feeling indulgent, I select the station and let the first few songs play. The mix is largely made up of '90s and early '00s hits from groupssuch as Destiny's Child and TLC. I find myself becoming nos- talgic for a time in which strong all-girl groups ruled the radio. The longing is not entirely legitimate since I never got to really experi- ence this era in the first place. For example, I was only four years old when "No Scrubs" came out, and songs of this genre are almost universally seen as classic throw- backs, even if it technically means throwing back to infancy for some. There is something innately infec- tious about this female-fueled genre that is missing from today's popular music scene. While there is no denying the positive impact of powerful women in music today, the domi- nance of girl groups has shifted to that of powerfulasolo artists. Names like Rihanna and-ironi- cally, Beyonce have replaced these older groups in favor of solo acts. matter. The focus became less on producing bouncy tracks that cel- ebrated independence and more on sexuality and, arguably, a high- er dependence on men. Not to say that these subject matters were absent in popular hip hop of the time (we all remember "Goodies") but thatthey have become more of a driving force behind sales and popularity. With that in mind, I propose a return to the bumping female hip- hop group. There is something far more impactful and entertaining about a group of women perform- ing together rather than a solo diva as the center of attention. Imagine if Beyonce, Nicki Minaj and Alicia Keys decided to band together to create a super group - I think we would all buy tickets to that show. The perception of women would shift back to one of a united front ing in music today, and its absence gives younger female audiences theimpressionthattheonlywayto be a strong women is to do it alone. Aside from any social implica- tions of girl groups is the fact that their music is just plain fun. There is a reason that songs like "Say My Name" and "Jumpin', Jumpin'" still get a reaction out of people. Groups of the '90s and early 'OOs took the best aspects of music at the time and improved upon them. The combination of R&B sound, hip-hop beat, killer vocals and feisty lyrics could result in noth- ing less than timeless widespread popularity. There is no denying that it is hard to stop listening once you start. Bringing back this lost art form would once again fill the airwaves with fabulous female harmonies and soulful sounds of another era. Choose your country and program: peacecorps.gov/openingsI It only takes an hour to apply! Campus Office: 734.647.2182 or peace.corps@umich.edu