I felt like that when I hit a Melissa Ferrick show. I was one of three males in the audience of maybe a hundred, and definitely the only hetero male. That's not an /unusual/ situation for me to be in - long story - but it is kind of disappointing that such interesting experiences can be so sharply gender-specific.

Sky Captain looks really quite neat. I'm digging these throwbacks to Saturday-morning serials. Did you catch the NYTimes article about Kerry Conran that appeared a little while back? And speaking of films, have you seen Hellboy or Eternal Sunshine yet? Any thoughts?

I hadn't noticed the article, thanks for the link. I like knowing it was a labor of love, at least in the beginning.

I haven't seen Hellboy or Eternal Sunshine yet -- I'm so busy these days...

I saw hellboy and eternal sunshine both last weekend. Hellboy was a middling-to-good comic book movie. I thought Eternal Sunshine Of A Spotless Mind was phenomenal. I liked Adaptation a bunch, and this more.

Gnomon, meet Jesse. I went to high school with Jesse and he was my best friend at the time. Back then he enjoyed juggling, dance music, and the demo scene. I assume at least some of those interests persist.

Jesse, meet Gnomon. I've met Gnomon once, at the LL3 conference. He works for the Canadian government, with a bunch of lawyers, I think.

Jesse, pleased to make your acquaintance! Please, call me Ben. Or Gnomon. Whichever one you prefer is fine by me.

You too were a fan of the demo scene? I grew up marveling at the first-generation megademos and the entire tracker scene (I see you hung out #trax a lot; did you ever run into FutureAssassin? He tracked, among other things, Demon's Pride Remix), sustained mostly by midnight leech runs on local underground BBSs; still a fan of those who have moved on from the Future Crew into various game-related activities.

Incidentally, have [either of] you heard about the Mindcandy demo compilation on DVD? They've got it in stock over at ThinkGeek.

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And Kim, I do indeed work with several lawyers. I don't often talk online about my place of work because I've seen too many friends get burned by revealing too much information. I'm trying not to be /too/ paranoid, though ;)

In passing, I saw Eternal Sunshine last night. It was... well, I don't want to ruin your potential enjoyment by setting your expectations too high, but you really should see it if you get the chance.

I have the mindcandy demo dvd. It's a mixed bag. The oldest few demos are, well... stupid. Cheesy would be too charitable, but offensive would be too harsh.

There are a few in the middle that I remember with much fondness, e.g. the ones from Future Crew.

Most of the later ones are a little uninspiring from the technical standpoint, because it starts to become clear that the raw computational demands aren't much of a bottleneck anymore. But from an artistic point of view, a couple of the later ones are a tremendous improvement over the earlier ones -- like a fine wine, compared to a grape flavored juice box.

Money well spent.

Hi, Ben. Yes, I still do hang out on #trax. There was actually a big 10 year #trax reunion a few weeks ago, right near here. One of the guys who made the Mindcandy DVD (phoenix) actually was staying at my house.

I agree about the old demos, basically they're technology demos, and generally the real old ones are VERY boring to watch. Once technology is not a huge limitation the design takes over - there's still trickery involved to make stuff look like that, but it's much much higher level.

Gnomon, how did you know I used to hang out on #trax?

Kim, Jesse - excellent, excellent! I'm glad to hear that the Mindcandy DVD is so interesting; now I'm /really/ looking forward to getting my copy and settling for a good chunk of nostalgia. Thanks for the mini-reviews!

Jesse, ah! Trev had briefly mentioned the reunion, but I hadn't heard that he'd attended. I'll have to get in touch and ply him with pho for the details!

I inferred from the number of people who have called you weird that you hung out there rather often. (I hope you don't mind - I've read the rest of your site as well)

Now I'm all enthusiastic about learning what's happened in the demo scene in the last five or ten years. Och, this is going to take up so much of my leisure time... I can't wait ;)