Author: smallglowingpig

The House that Duck Built

After weeks of very slow mixing progress, Season 4 is complete.  It is, without a doubt, the fourthiest of seasons for Duck House.  Thanks again go to collaborators Kate Bojanek and Jim Hernovich for their work on the album.  Enjoy!

You can download mp3s here, check out the catalog page, or get some sweet lossless goodness over at Bandcamp.

We’ve got a few ideas for what might be next.  Possibly an acoustic EP where we write songs for each other to perform.  Maybe a soul record with a focus on historical presidents.  Even a video for one of the Duck Houses could be on the docket.  We’ll have to wait and see!

-Mike

Music Club: Summer 2017

Based on the irregularity of the output, I’m thinking the Music Semi-Monthly (aka Music Not-Monthly) feature needed a new name.  By going with Music Club, we won’t feel the intense pressure of listening to and critiquing an album a month.  We’ve all seen how we respond to pressure…

This time, Jefim put Chris Cornell’s Higher Truth up for discussion.  Steve, Jefim, and I were all taken aback last year with Cornell’s passing, and this was a good chance to revisit his musical legacy.  We all love Superunknown and Down on the Upside, but Cornell’s 2015 release was something a bit different.  Our impressions are below.

Continue reading Music Club: Summer 2017

Fun with Game Maker

While Blonski and I continued to work towards the release of Duck House‘s Season 4, I stumbled upon a Humble Bundle for Game Maker Studio and thought, as I often do with these bundles, “It’s a buck, why not?”

Since then, I’ve been going through some tutorials and Googling things like “== vs = game maker” and “game maker collision detection”.  One particularly neat series involved someone coding a version of the NES’s Legend of Zelda from scratch.

I started by trying to create a Smash Bros. or Samurai Gun – like, since I figured I wouldn’t have to worry about enemy AI or screen scrolling.  As I go, I’ll chronicle my progress here and on our YouTube channel.  Check out the latest playtest below.

-Mike

Rock Music Advertisements of Days Past

As Blonski and I continue to “wrap up” the fourth season of Duck House, I spent a minute or two looking at the cover art for the upcoming album.  For some reason, this jogged my memory of a few of the Black Velvet show posters I made years ago and figured sifting through them a bit to revisit old times might be a fun exercise.  It’s probably not the worst idea to get them up on the SGP blog for posterity’s sake too.  So, without further ado, behold!  The Black Velvet show posters in reverse chronological order.  As a bonus, I’ve included the letter from our apartment complex that cancelled Willi-Oaks fest II.  Typical The Man.

 

My favorites are the Ketchup vs. Mustards and the Marilyn Monroe picture signed to Don, the manager at the Hungry Tiger in Manchester.  I don’t think he ever framed it and hung it up, unfortunately.  Thanks to Carmen Zambrano for contributing a sweet sketch to the Jim Beam Me Up Tour.  Finally, that All-Stars poster is a total ripoff of Witch Season and Dead Diamond River.

New music soon!
-Mike