Colourmusic are the rarest of musical rarities- a band from the isolated hinter portions of America's Heartland (Also known as "The Sticks") that not only doesn't suck, but actually turns out to be pretty great. And not in that sort of special olympics, everyone's a winner, "well, they're good for [insert your tiny state here]" kind of way, but actually, honestly, for realsies good. Kind of like how The Flaming Lips are so good......

With so many epic video game titles making their debut last year, 2008 has some pretty big shoes to fill. Several titles released in 2007 undoubtedly rank the highest among several industry top 10 lists; Bioshock, Call of Duty 4, and Mass Effect to name a few. These games have proven and will continue to prove that they will be quite difficult to surpass in quality. Such competition is exactly what makes the gaming......

As you might have guessed, we're pretty big into gaming over at my house -- our console set-up includes the both generations of the Xbox, not one but TWO PS2's (one for the living room, one for the bedroom), a Dell XPS with a wide-screen monitor (for PC gaming), a Nintendo Gamecube, a Nintendo 64, an SNES, and a Gameboy -- oh, and possibly a Sony PSP floating around somewhere. Our 50" big-screen is optimized......

So you've been bowled over by our Best of the Year lists, but do you demand more? Scratch that, do you crave more? Because if you do, you're in luck. Here's a round up of some of 2007's more creative year-end round ups. Time's Top Ten Underreported Stories of the Year. You gotta love how Time gets into the list spirit this, well, time of year. Twenty-five top tens, with everything from kids books......

Artist: DJ Bitman Album: Latin Bitman Label: Nacional Records Release Date: November 6, 2007 Listen to the track "My Computer Is Funk": DJ Bitman is Chilean Jose Antonio "Toto" Bravo who has also gone under the name of Bitman & Roban. Latin Bitman is his second release in the US following last year's Musica Para Despues de Almuerzo and while I didn't hear that debut I really like this "sophomore" effort. You may have heard......

Holidays have you indulging a little more than usual? Just in time for those New Year resolutions and post-holiday diets, the Wii Fit is expected to be released in North America in January. Released earlier this month in Japan, Wii Fit sold over a quarter million units in the first week. The game was designed for families to exercise with activities like stretching, yoga, step aerobics, push ups, jogging and much more. The additional......

People with too much time on their hands: Amy Ephron and other striking writers have whipped up a food blog. Our current food blog obsession: Luxeat, a Parisian model who eats at the finest restaurants in France and takes luscious pictures. Of the food. Over at the LA Times, food editor Leslie Brenner is really sticking it to the new Michelin Guide. Among her criticisms? "The book that purports to be the bible of......

Read our exclusive LAist interview with G4TV's Olivia Munn to find out how she feels about playing Gay Chicken with Kevin Pereira, living in Los Angeles, and making out with her spray-tan lady...

The buzz on Enchanted--and especially Amy Adams--has been high for the last few weeks. Weren't they saying the same thing about Adams, though, after Junebug? Either way, I'll see Enchanted this weekend. In a strange way, it reminds me of Galaxy Quest. Stay with me here. I thought Galaxy Quest looked horrible when I saw the previews, but I ended up loving it. Will the same hold true for Enchanted? I'm actually a fairly......

For many of you, this week is all about Turkey Day. For others, it's still all about The Strike. For me? This week will go down in history not because of the strike or Thanksgiving, but because the most awesome video game of all time, Rock Band, was released yesterday. I got my kit set up and ready to go within minutes, and began rocking out almost immediately. First impressions? The drumming element is......

Last night I was happy to make it to Lou on Medium on "Guitar Hero III", the latest video game to earn more than $100 million in sales in its first week. But I just got the thing last week, so I was just satisfied not to get booed off the stage... again. After feeling cocky about making a respectable run through Metallica's epic "One" and long time favorite Maiden's "The Number of the......

Flashy graphics and superfuturistic weapons aren't the only things grasping the attention gamers near and far these days. Riding along with the success of this past weekend's E for All video game expo, LA was home to this year's premier of Video Games Live, an orchestrated performance of some the gaming world's top musical scores. With renditions of everything from Tetris to Halo, this concert was definitely not as geeky as it sounds.......

Dan "Shoe" Hsu knows video games. As the Editor-in-Chief of Electronic Gaming Monthly, one of the most popular magazines in the world of gaming, it's part of his job. Shoe, 35, first dove into video game coverage in 1996. After graduating from the University of Michigan with a degree in Statistics, he sent query letters to 30 different organizations in the rapidly-growing industry. "I was looking for a job, any job in the game......

If you happen to find yourself driving around at 11pm tonight, you'll likely see long lines of (mostly) men standing outside of Best Buys, EB Games and Gamestops all over greater Los Angeles. Do not be alarmed. It's just the hardcore gaming faithful lining up to claim their midnight copies of Halo 3, the biggest video game of the year. For the completely uninitiated, Halo is the sci-fi shooter franchise that is basically the......

Seattlest watches as a S.L.U.T. is born and Seattle Flickr users go nuts over a local art installation. A restaurant critic demands a Diner's Bill of Rights over a gnat next to her drink, and, in lieu of a Portlandist, Seattlest debates with itself over the identity of the Northwest's crown jewel. Seattlest also joins the guys from Fantagraphics for an ill-fated gun party in the woods. LAist saw national headlines soar this week with......

Update: tonight's screening at the Arclight is a special presentation with a Q&A with the director Seth Gordon afterwards. The film will then show tomorrow at the Nuart thru the 23rd. If you walk through the arcades these days you will see three different games. Driving games where you speed through various versions of Hell. Shooting games where you shoot and kill as many people places and things that you can. And walking down......

According to an article in today's New York Sun, Boll is being sued by the New York Post Co. for trademark infringement. Whither the scuff up? ...

Here are a few choice picks for your gaming pleasure, courtesy of the good people at Gamespot: Nintendo Wii Mario Strikers Charged (Sports) Nintendo DS Picross DS (Puzzle) Sony Playstation Portable Brave Story: New Traveler (Role-Playing) World Championship Cards (Strategy) PC Combat Mission: Shock Force (Strategy) Ride! Carnival Tycoon (Strategy) MAC Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Adventure) Command & Conquer 3 Tiberium Wars (Strategy) Photo by DsWii via flickr......

I have never in my life thought that the following words would ever escape my lips: "Wow! That Flock of Seagulls song is AWESOME!!!" But that day has come: and so too has Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the Eighties, the latest installment in the worldwide gaming phenomenon/franchise. You now have thirty more classic songs to RAWK OUT on, including such favorites as Skid Row's "Eighteen and Life," White Lion's "Radar Love," and of course,......

Angels 7, Twins 2 - After 134 innings without going yard, an Angel finally sent a ball into the heavens. Garret Anderson hit an upper-deck blast to snap the streak. Every Halo run was scored by a different player, each in a different inning. They also spread around the hits, as every starter connected during the game. On the mound, Joe Saunders pitched seven strong innings to earn his third win of the year. Mets......

The Darkness Starbreeze Studios X-Box 360, PS3 As you play The Darkness, you will probably notice a special ability that your character has. It is activated when you walk up to the corpse of a recently killed mobster, and the option of eating this enemy heart with the press of the button is given. That basically sums up the entire game. You get to eat HEARTS. The Darkness is a first person shooter, in......

Thousands of video game addicts, cosplayers and booth babe fans shed tears last year when the Entertainment Software Association announced that it would be scaling back the size and focus of future E3 Expos. The game industry and fan bacchanalia had previously attracted a record attendance of over 60,000 visitors and 400 companies in 2006. Instead of being held at LA's own Convention Center, the "more intimate" show will take place this year in......

Transformers: The Game Travellers Tales X-Box 360, PS2, PS3, PC, Wii Possibly the biggest of all the summer movies is the Michael Bay giant robot extravaganza, Transformers. And, as with all Hollywood popcorn movies, there is a new video game to go with the flick. The creatively titled “Transformers: The Game” is, unfortunately, a typical movie game. Short, with crappy controls, and just a little bit of fun, that saves it from totally sucking.......

Suburbia: 140-mile commute to LA and back, life in subsidized housing in Antelope Valley is of a different brand. Douchebag: So this is where David E. Kelley gets his material for Boston Legal on ABC -- right here in LA where our own City Attorney stonewalls the simplest of yes or no questions. What an asshole, don't vote for this guy if he runs for anything. Another good example: he wasted money suing the Grand......

If ever there were a date to debut an expensive almost-sure-to-be-crap comic book sequel film, it would be June 15th. It's the summer, so kids are out of school and looking for a movie to waste their allowances on. It's PG enough that parents can take their youngest. And it's just hot enough in middle America and the South that anyone without an air conditioner will be looking for a dark theater to kill......

Attention all gamers: Guess what, there’s a new video game expo in town. No, I’m not talking about the enormously underwhelming downsized version of E3, but an aptly titled “E for All” convention. Amidst the drug-infused connotations of the show's title, E for All will be a more consumer-based spectacle geared directly towards nerdy and sexy gamers alike. From the E for All website: “Entertainment for All™ Expo (E for All) is the event......

Grand Theft Auto, Doom, and Counterstrike are the reasons why young people kill, homicide "expert" Jack Thompson continues to preach. Crying when he recalls the prayer that he claims to say whenever he drops his teenage son off at school. Forgetting, somehow, that the first recorded murder ever was between two brothers. A murder that any so-called expert, and anyone who regularly prays, should know about: Cain murdering Abel. The first two kids ever......

Well now we know what quarterback to get on our fantasy team next season - anyone but Vince Young. The Tennessee Titan was dealt the worst luck yesterday when EA Sports announced that he would grace their cursed cover for Madden '08. Something we wouldn't wish on our worst enemies. Here's a glance of what happened to those who took the money from EA to be on the classic video game: Garrison Hearst, Madden......

Besides exposure for new and upcoming music, SXSW also serves as a launching pad for products, companies and shows like MTV's upcoming Human Giant. Starring funny men Aziz Ansari, Rob Huebel and Paul Scheer, the show kicked off a sneak preview party last night at Friends on 6th St. We ran into Sam Grossman, development exec at MTV. He talked about the new sketch comedy show with us over beers. “There’s a Bugs Bunny......

Yesterday we showed you an interview from upstairs of the Austin Convention Center at SXSW where companies are answering questions about their Internet- and film-related products. Today, thanks to the Houston Chronicle, who took this footage above, we can show you a small glimpse of what's happening on the bottom floor of the Convention Center, in the video game area -- where things are getting mighty interactive. There you will see the new Nintendo......