I recently discovered this acoustic version of All within my hands on Youtube. Even though St. Anger has some highlights I must admit that it isn’t my favorite Metallica album (that is of course Master of Puppets). However, I really liked the acoustic All within my hands and I wanted to get it eh … all within my own hands.

It turned out that it was played at the yearly Bridge School Benefit for children with severe physical impairments and complex communication needs. I am no big fan of people running after me in the streets or calling me on the phone to ask me to donate money to whatever reason. Even though the causes are good I just don’t like being nagged into doing something. I prefer doing it of my own will. I must admit though that I am not much of a charity giver (shame on me) but when I could get good music and support a good cause I felt it was right.

The solution was of course the live Metallica catalog which I think is a good source for music and a great store. The store sells all (?)  live Metallica shows since 2004 and gives you about 20 older shows for free. The music comes without DRM in either MP3 and FLAC. You’ll get the MP3 version of a show for $9.95 and the FLAC version is going at $12.95.

Metallica played at the Bridge School charity both the 27th and the 28th of October 2007.  Metallica played only 8 songs each night (some covers and some Metllica songs) so the shows are a bit expensive. However, you have to remember that all net proceeds goes to the Bridge School. The set lists have some variations between the two days. Of the cover songs I really liked I’m only happy when it rains.

This is by far not the first thing I have bought after seeing it on youtube or somewhere else. I just don’t see why people are against it and so afraid of people posting copyright protected material there. I think the exposure it gives an artist and the sales this generates is well worth the potential loss of income. I could have chosed to continue listening to the youtube version but I wanted to have the song and I decided to pay for content of higher quality in the sense that it is Flac and therefore also transportable to other devices but my computer.

Justice Is Lost
Justice Is Raped
Justice Is Gone
Pulling Your Strings
Justice Is Done
Seeking No Truth
Winning Is All
Find it So Grim
So True
So Real

I must admit that I probably look for the opportunities where I can use Metallica lyrics to express something but this time I think it is quite appropriate. While I am against piracy I must say that I value democracy, freedom of speech, and just legal system over the commercial interests of a reactionary industry. Recently, it seems the commercial values of the movie and music industry is more valuable than a just legal system. Legal companies here in Norway are pushing to get sensitive information (IP, names, addresses etc) from the Internet Service Providers about “suspected” pirates. The attorneys are in other words trying to do the police’s work. Do we really want to privatize the police? I don’t think so.

However, it seems the Norwegian courts are bending over for the movie and music industry. A recent verdict about whether or not a Norwegian ISP has to hand over the identity of a suspected pirate to the attorneys, was today kept secret from the public. I agree with Atle, WTF? How is it possible to keep a verdict which concerns the whole legal system, secret? If private companies are allowed to act as police I would like to know about it.

If the movie and music industry feel the police are not doing enough to solve their cases maybe they have to realize that there are other cirmes (murder, rape, child molestation, trafficing and so on) which are way worse than illegal distribution of music and movies. Second, maybe they should try to deal with this politically like the rest of us. If they are not happy with the way the police is spending their resources maybe should start their own political party and change the way the country is run. Third, why don’t the industry start providing the services we want? How hard can it be? There are plenty of alternatives of people who have understood how to use technology propperly to distribute digital content: NRKbeta, Steam,  Metallica (of course), and a whole lot of others.

Grand Theft Auto IV The Lost and Damned - Screenshot rockstargames.com

While January is a totally quiet month, February has a couple of titles worth watching out for. First out is the next addition to the horror shooter F.E.A.R. from 2005. F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin hits the shelves on February 10th.  The first game was a very good shooter with great explosions and scary moments.  I still think my laptop is named Alma after one of the characters in the game and I am looking forward to facing here again. I have seen a couple of in-game videos and I am not that impressed. However, based on the fun I had with the previous game I will most likely check out this game closer when it is released. Next up is the downloadable content to Grand Theft Auto IV. Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned will be available February 17th through Xbox Live  to 360 owners only. GTA IV  was criticized because of the lack of checkpoints, too high realism (in other words no fun), poor cars, annoying friends and so on. Despite all this, it was claimed game of the year, received great critics and I loved it. It is therefore natural to look forward to the next extension of the game. Hopefully, they have fixed a few of the mentioned problems.

Empire: Total War - Concept Art totalwar.com

I am really looking forward to March as it will give us a few great games. First up is the highly anticipated strategy title Empire Total War which will be out March 3rd. 10 days later, the 13th, it is time to kill zombies again. I really enjoyed killing zombies in Left 4 Dead and I want more. Resident Evil 5 looks very promising and I am in particular looking forward to the two player mode. Hopefully it will be as fun as it looks.  The last game on my March list is Guitar Hero Metallica which will be available in the U.S. on March 29th. However, it is not available here in Europe until May (why do we get everything later?). As fan of Metallica for almost the last 20 years I really am looking forward to the game after trying Guitar Hero World Tour a while back.

April promises us another strategy gem. A new expansion to the Company of Heroes series, Tales of Valor, will be available on April 13th. I really enjoyed the last installment of this real time strategy title and I am looking forward to the next one. Company of Heroes was actually the first strategy game I have played which was quite hard to beat. When that is said, I have not played that many strategy games the last years but it was a thrill struggling (though sometimes quite frustrating) with a decent computer controlled adversary.

Other titles you might want to look out for: Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II on February 18th, The Sims 3 on February 20th, The Godfather 2 on February 24th, Killzone 2 on February 27th, Halo Wars on March 3rd, Tom Clancy’s EndWar sometime in March/April, Dragon Age: Origins on March 23, Stormrise on March 24th, and The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena sometime in March. While I do have super high expectations for all of these, you might fancy them.

Courtesy of Gamespot. Copyrights belong to the respective owners of the images.

I also maintain a list at Gamespot of the games I am tracking (some of which you should see above). If you are interested in other PC games you might want to see this extensive list created by Adrian Werner (great job Adrian). International readers might want to check out the GT countdown and if you ware a Norwegian you might want to see what Norwegian news reporters are waiting for as well: Aftenposten, Gamer, Itavisen, and Vg.

The day before yesterday, Metallica released their new album Death Magnetic and I had to get my hands on it. I could have bought just a digital copy but as a long time fan of Metallica I opted for the CD. The CD was delivered actually the day before the release date but I was rather disappointed when this was what I found in a thin envelope in our mailbox. The cover was broken, beat and well perhaps not scarred.

When that is said, I think Metallica has succeed here on two fronts with their new album. They have made very good record but they have also created a successful distribution model. Through Mission Metallica I have been able to see a couple of hours of video from the recording of the record, and download about 10 live concerts and four singles. All this before the record was released. I think this is the way to go to stop or at least to reduce piracy. Provide something extra to the ones who pay. When providing something extra, they also make more money. The record was a bit more expensive than a normal CD (30 Euros as compared to a normal price of 18-25 for a new record) and by releasing material over the Internet, Metallica has managed to create a buzz around the album. However the extra 10 Euros were well worth it. In particular the live material is priceless.

For the future I think I will go for digitally distributed movies, games and music. If the provider offers backup I do not have to fear broken CDs and covers, and I do not have to reserve several meters of dusty shelf space to the covers.

My all time favorite dansband “The Metallicats” are about to release a new album in September. They are furthermore having a concert in Bergen, Norway tomorrow night. Expectations for both the concert and the new album are relatively high after listening to some of the new material they have released at http://missionmetallica.com. I would recommend any fan to have a look at the site for their new record. It is most likely set up to help them make even more money but it is fun to see some behind the scene stuff and listen to the old concert recordings they give you for free.

Even though I like the way the Metallicats inlay from Garage Inc make fun of all the other ugly album covers, I hope the album cover is somewhat different. I am looking forward to new heavy riffs and plenty of new solos on Death Magnetic which can be pre-ordered now (from Platekompaniet here in Norway). Metallica has also announced that you can play the entire album through the console game Guitar Hero III on release day.