I have a new love-- Bloc Party.
They're independent rock band from Britain. They're a bit like Arctic Monkeys, thrown in with a bit of... er... I dunno. They're just so versatile. They're guitar riffs are pretty cool. The vocals are a bit... meh. Really nice stuff. As far as rock-ish bands from the West go, let me rank them...
1. Franz Ferdinand
2. Bloc Party
3. Arctic Monkeys
4. Coldplay
5. Mute Math
Little Thoughts: A sorta sweet song. I like it, it's sorta mellowing.
Hunting for Witches: A more rock song. I don't like the very distorted start, but the guitar riff is very cool!
Flux: My favorite BP song. Techno for the win.
Helicopter: A decent song by them. A lot heavier than their other stuff that I've posted here.
Banquet: Second favorite Bloc Party song.
I really love their stuff... it's really an interesting band. I got all their CD's, and they came to St. Louis (!) but then Kele (main singer) got laryngitis, so they canceled the show. Which was oh so lame.
My first reaction was "WHAAA? A BRITISH BLACK GUY IN ROCK MUSIC?" But whatever. I like it.
I think that this band's a lot more versatile than the Arctic Monkeys, and are sort of like Franz Ferdinand in their usage of synthesizer in their newer stuff. They're also pretty good live. I'm going through my sort of "indie rock" phase. One good example is the band "The Editors".
Editors-- An End Has a Start
They are just... different. I dunno how to explain it. Catchier riffs, sort of like the Strokes (love that band too).
The Strokes-- 12:51: This is my favorite song by this band. Electronic sorta, but the vocals are just perfect. Main guitar distortion is amazing.
I'll post pics from prom later... I deleted my Facebook, and wow, I've got so much free time.
Dear Girl,
There's been something that's been eating away at me for almost a month.... I've never felt this way before. I think it's love. No, I'm sure this is love. I think it would be best for me to be frank with you, seeing as how you are heavily involved in this love of mine.
See, love is irrational. It's blind. It has a will of it's own. For that reason, I was unsure at first if what I was feeling really was love. But now I'm sure it is.
Now, in advance, although this may sound a bit creepy, even if you don't feel the same way, let's at least stay friends.
Girl, I'm in love. With your laptop.
You may have pretty eyes, a lovely smile, a charming personality, a nice laugh, but your laptop has DUAL CORE PROCESSORS. Your laptop also has A BUILT-IN CAMERA!! Mon dieu! An ergonomic keyboard surely makes your laptop a lot better!! Your laptop has a nice LCD display, a nice mousepad, is slim and easy-to-carry, has over 100GB of hard disk space, God knows how much RAM it has, and it RUNS VISTA ALMOST PERFECTLY!! I haven't fallen in love-- I was gagged and thrown headfirst into it!
Tell your laptop that I love her,
Love,
Me
I'm going to either gonna give it to her or read it out loud at the next National Honor Society meeting on the mic as 100 some members look on in awe. Suggestions? Read it at the meeting, read it in a class, read it in front of her alone, her and her friends, just give it to her? I'm going for the "OMG" value and reading it in the meeting, just to make her blush like hell is red.
I think I had an orgasmic experience with a girl.... or rather, her laptop.
She was running Vista (said it was XP... fail), it had a nice pink theme to it, it was Sony Vaio, had Pentium dual core processors, a nice built in camera (aesthetically nice, dunno about functionality), very sweet keyboard and mouse layout, and was actually running pretty smoothly.
I totally plugged my USB flash drive into that thing.
It was this experience that made me realize something. I like computers and spend more time with computers than I do with girls. Besides the obvious reasons, here are some more insightful reasons why I favor computers over girls.
Listing a few of them off...
1. You can plug your USB drive into a PC right after you buy it and install the drivers. *innuendo*
2. You can unzip files on a PC within like.... ten seconds. A girl? Not so much. *innuendo*
3. Hitting your PC can usually fix problems. Hitting girls gets you in trouble.
4. You can dual boot a PC. So in case you don't like how your PC is running, you can install another OS. Girls can't change their personalities like that. Unless they're bipolar, in which case, you've got some problems.
5. The bigger the number on a PC (RAM, hard disk space, etc.), the better. The bigger the number for a girl (weight, age, etc.), the worse.
Yes, I need a life.
So I decided to look up the stuff I used to like three-five years ago.
Wow, I had such bad taste. I'm going to note what I liked then, what I like now, and some trends.
Music:
Then:
+44? Blink-182? Green Day (post-American Idiot Green Day)? Sum 41?
Now:
Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand, Techno, Eurodance, Motion City Soundtrack, Nightwish, the pillows.
Trend:
Less crap, more electronic, indie, and foreign music.
Television:
Then:
Animes like Bleach and Naruto? I rest my case.
Now:
Full Metal Alchemist, Death Note, Fawlty Towers, House, Mind Your Language
Trend:
More mature stuff, British comedy added
Movies:
Actually, this has stayed pretty much constant. The movies I liked then I still like.
Hobbies:
Old:
Game Maker, moderating GMC, playing video games.
Now:
Game making has died. I don't use GM, nor do I moderate the GMC with an iron fist. I hate video games if I play them for more than an hour now... with a few exceptions (melee, Tales of Symphonia). I'm trying to learn CSS and actually design decent webpages. I do most of my programming in C++/C.
Trend:
Maturity +6.
Outlook on Life:
I've mellowed out a hell of a lot in the last year... as anyone can tell. I've screwed the whole anti-social thing, but I'm still quiet. I think. I'm a bit more optimistic.
Political Views:
More liberal socially, more financially conservative. That still places me in the "liberal" category.
Wow, this is a nice way to look back on five years of my life and see how much progress I made.
@sk8, don't stalk my friends/spam my wall.
It's midnight, and I'm wide awake. I can't sleep. Too much caffeine. Hah, it's pretty weird, feeling wired on caffeine.
I guess I'll follow the typical Takagi blog format....
Music:
No new music for me. Cascada's "Everytime we Touch" is my new favorite song. I'm also liking Linkin Park. That one band that I liked in 5th grade, then hated right after that.
Their older stuff is cool, and I like the start "Bleed it Out". I like Mike Shinoda's stuff... Fort Minor is too "hip hop" though. I like a middle road between the two. It's hard to explain. "Faint" is good, "Numb" I like, and "Papercut" is weird.
School etc:
School's okay. I'm almost sure I will have straight A's this semester. Not sure about AP exams though. Comp. Sci, US Government and Comparative Government, all seemed a bit hard. I didn't study enough I guess... Physics and Lang are soon, so I need to work on those this weekend. I'm also guaranteed number 1 at the end of the year if I get all A's.
Speaking of which...
Life:
Why are all the hot girls really.... ditsy? Take for instance our lovely redhead Haley (our being friends is a great example of us both being awesome/forgiving). Three examples to prove that the cutest/best-looking girls are a bit dull.
Example 1:
Her: "Yeah, my dad's in China... or somewhere near there. What's that country that starts with 'Q'?"
Me: "Qatar?"
Her: "Yeah!"
Me: "Qatar is in the Middle East. It's balling. It's nowhere near China."
Example 2:
Me: "Yeah, I used to live in Columbus."
Her: "Wait.... we have a city called 'Columbus'?"
Me: "Yeah, in Ohio."
Her: "Wait.... they have a city called Columbus?"
Example 3:
Me: "You like your cousin? You too?"
Her: *laugh* "Wait... did you say 'you too?'"
One word to describe what goes in most girls' mind: Lag. It's like playing an online game where the host has dialup. And you're running Windows ME.
Oh yeah, I had the weirdest incident when I assumed she knew programming.
Scene: Casual before-school meeting
Me: "Real men program on paper" (in reference to AP Comp. Sci)
Her: "Like 'int' and stuff?"
Me: "Whoa, you know CPP?"
Her: "Huh?"
Me: "You can code in C plus plus? Java? C?"
Her: "No.... my calculator has this 'int' function on it... isn't that programming?"
Actors and things I hate:
I hate high school actors.
First of all, they're arrogant snobs. "Look at me, I'm awesome! I can do a British accent! Now sleep with me."
Secondly, people listen to them. And love them. "Oh Joe, you were so awesome!!!" I could do the same exact thing, but no... I don't get "Takagi, you were so awesome!". I get a "Takagi, stop being such an idiot. And die."
Thirdly: they have fan clubs. At least in our school, we have two fan clubs for actors (not sponsored by a teacher, but a bunch of girls join together to basically stoke actors' egos).
Fourthly, people vote for them in Student Council elections etc. Even though they're retarded.
"Look at me... I'm in remedial math, I've no leadership roles in the past, but I can sing, dance, and tell sucky jokes. Vote for me as StuCo President!"
I also hate those weird sessions in which girls basically squeal over the new cute guy they found. Two parts envy, yes, but four parts annoyance. As a friend of mine said, it's girls' version of the stock market. They invest in the guy and date him when he's "legal".
I also hate womanizers. Same issue. I guess that's one reason I hate actors, because they're such womanizers.
Game Maker etc.:
Game Maker: the best 18 dollar programming teacher I ever bought. I figured I'm never going to use it again. I figured out that the only reason that I used the GMC was because my own real life was so dull and boring. However, that's not true anymore, and as a result, I've dropped GM and the GMC. Not too sad though, GM is the only reason I have an A in Comp. Scence.
And sk8tm8trix, do you play football? And stop stalking me.
I finally got around to finally making another blog today.... hurray? Let me discuss stuff as it comes to mind...
School and Education:
It's going good... I guess. So far, grades have been doing well. I've got to take the ACT this weekend (February 9th). I'm not feeling too good about it. Thus far, I have been able to maintain the rank of #1 (cumulative GPA of 4.59), but I expect it to fall by next year. Not too ticked about it really, my close friend is going to move up to #1. This bloke got a 36 on his ACT. Why bother competing with him? We got our PSAT results back, I ended up with a 219. 80 on math, 70 on Writing, 69 on Reading. Nothing else in school besides that in terms of grades/tests/boring stuff.
I've learned that by reading www.bash.org everyday, I've become more witty, but my GPA ends up falling more and more. Damn you time wasting sites!
Music:
I've been listening to "Arctic Monkeys" recently. Most of their stuff is pretty interesting. "When the Sun Goes Down", "A View from the Afternoon", "Fake Tales of San Francisco", and "Teddy Picker" are my current favorites by this indie-rock (?) band. They remind me of Franz Ferdinand.
I've also begun to listen to "Nightwish". Nice band, I don't mind the new singer too much. "Amaranth" is my current favorite song by them (Annette Olzen sings in it), with "Nemo" coming second (sung by Tarja). Power metal band, sort of weird, but I enjoy that stuff.
Another band which I've been listening to lately... Bad Religion. They're really old, but dude, I love a lot of their stuff. "Supersonic" is what got me hooked first... but then I heard their better songs. "American Jesus", "Sorrow" and "Twenty First Century/Digital Boy" are my top three. Bad Religion... sort of punk-ish... I guess. I can't tell.
Gorillaz is also really good. "Clint Eastwood" and "Feel Good Inc." are incredible. Alternative rock with rap interspersed.... I recommend their music.
Game Maker:
I've not been too active lately. I'm sort of tired of it now. Moderating the GMC, hard to get in, great benefits (well, not really) and harder to get promotions. But you have great job security. I'm sort of irritated with this new GM registration system... if it got straightened out, the GMC would probably a lot better. And if maybe YoYoGames actually told us (moderators) about stuff before they announce it to the public. I've played Frozzd. Great game... best GM game I've played in a while. I was sort of away from the internet when the whole 64Digits attack and decompiler thingy came around.
Social Life (or whatever remains of it):
Sk8m8trix, stop trying to stalk me. I've already got a stalker/weird girl following me. It's a girl 1 year junior to me (a sophomore) who I sit next to in Chemistry. Of the last twenty Facebook wall posts I have, eight are by her. She made some weird note for me and gave it to me in Chemistry... and then took a picture of me as I looked at it. I didn't know she took the picture until I logged in to Facebook and saw my Notifications. Holy hell, how do I say "f-off!" but not hurt a girl's feeling? Why can't the girls that I actually have some interest in like me? Wait... it's because they're guys/weirdos/dead/drugged up/below 13.... Just joshing of course.
I've been able to mend all social mistakes I had made in the last two years in about a span of a month. How? I baked chocolate chip cookies for them all. Girls melt in the presence of chocolate chip cookies. Except that one redhead... she refuses to eat them. And they weren't spiked with anything that time!! Well, she and I are cool now, after I helped her with like... thirty Calculus lessons.... . Our "Girls ask Guys Out To A Dance" dance (Turnabout) is like in three weeks.... I'm afraid that the weird sophomore is going to ask me out. So I'm going to have to beg another girl to ask me out so I can turn down that sophomore with a reasonable excuse. I can't throw the "I'm raiding with my WoW clan" excuse out... I don't play World of Warcraft.
I'm probably going to regret asking 64Digits and GM users for asking for girl advice.
I'm still alive!
What Have I Been Doing for the Last Few Months?
-Not really moderating the GMC
-Learning Java, CSS and C++
-School
-Music
-Video Games
GMC:
I've not been doing uber moderating there. It's all good in the hood though, or so it seems. I'm a bit confused about this YYG Winter Contest. I think that I'm going to judge it.
Other Computer Stuff:
I finally got a basic understanding of CSS now. It took me long enough. I'm also taking AP Java this year. A bad move? I think so. Java crawls to its knees when it sees C++. Speaking of which, I've finally developed some useful C++ programs for our school's chapter of the National Honor Society. Two other friends and I have been asked to work on a program to match tutors and people who need to be tutored. I'll upload it if you guys want to see it. It's console based, but it works.
I'm also working on a revised point-keeping system for National Honor Society for next year. Currently we use Excel, and it sucks.
School:
I've made it my mission to be more popular this year and less of a jerk. So far, so good. I've figured that it's not that hard to get a girl. My grades are good, I'm not doing a lot of studying, and I'm set for a rough round of finals next month.
Music:
I like Franz Ferdinand. "Take Me Out", "The Fallen", "Lynsey Welles", and "Walk Away" are my favorite. I've also started listening to Asian Kung-Fu Generation some more. "Jihei Tansaku", "Kaiga Kyoushitsu", and "Rashinban" are my favorites. And I've also been listening to 'the pillows' alot. "Carnival", "Ladybird Girl", "Scarecrow", and "Ride On Shooting Star" are my favorite songs from them. Finally, I've also begun listening to "Maximum the Hormone", another Japanese band. "Zetsubou Billy", "What's Up People" and "Koi no Mega Lover" are my favorites. In terms of English-speaking bands, I'm subsisting on a staple of Franz Ferdinand, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Green Day, and Oasis.
Video Games:
I've been playing no games at all. Fire Emblem and Golden Sun 2 are about the only things I "play".
Let me just post a blog before 64Digits goes down again. It's bound to do so sooner or later.
Life:
Life's going fine. School's about to start. As in, about to start in 25 hours and fifty three minutes as of me typing this sentence. I got around to reading the Great Gatsby and Catch-22 this summer (for summer homework). The Gatsby was boring. And lame. Catch-22 however, was a great book. I liked it a lot, it's funny, but it's dark. And later on in the book, the author poses some moral questions that I don't care for. Oh, and I read Harry Potter 7 a while ago. It was good, but the epilogue sucked.
Manga/Anime/Movies/Music:
In other news, I downloaded all of the Death Note episodes. I read the manga completely, and it's a good series. I'm just burning the series onto a CD as a backup measure. I'm going to watch the whole series sometime. Yeah, sometime. And apparently Death Note is now in English. I saw the trailer for it. Blech. So yes, go out and read or watch Death Note. It's a great series, no filler (woo hoo!), intelligent, dark, and, just like Catch-22, poses some moral questions. It's an anime series that doesn't revolve around fights. It's like Sherlock Holmes, sort of. I also watched both Death Note movies. They're okay, the first movie sucked, the second one was pretty good, but not "OMG!" good. I watched Borat. It was dumb. The funniest bit was the part about the cockroaches and the Jews....
Now for music. For the last few days, I've been listening to "We Didn't Start the Fire" by Billy Joel. I like the beat, and listen to think of the historical references. I've also listened to some Red Hot Chili Peppers and Green Day (both of whom my Physics teacher likes). "Snow", "Californication" "Dani California" by RHCP are good, and "Minority", "Basket Case", and some other songs by Green Day are good.
Now my new obsession has been these two Japanese bands that some kid in my C++ class told me about. "The Pillows" and "Asian Kung-Fu Generation".
I like both bands a lot, here's a list of my favorites:
The Pillows:
Carnival
Ladybird Girl
Ride on Shooting Star
Little Busters
Asian Kung-Fu Generation (aka Ajikan/AKG/AKFG)
Rewrite
Haruka Kanata
12
Sunday
N.G.S.
Understand
Kimi to iu hana
Blue Train
Loop and Loop
Denpatou (sp?)
Re:Re
Sakurasou
Aru Machi no Gunjou
Rashinban
They're both rock bands. I strongly recommend them. YouTube them, you can find a lot of their stuff online.
Game Maker Related:YoYoGames:
Wow. I just remembered, that there's a YoYoGames site. I never moderate that site. Never. There's too much junk for me to actually take the site seriously. I can see though, that the purpose of YoYoGames is to allow everybody to upload games, but honestly, the level of abuse is sickening. I don't mind a shoddily made Pacman clone, but having FREAKING JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE OR 50 CENT AS A PREVIEW PICTURE!? That's like YouTube, adding stupid tags so that whenever I type in "Colbert" I get some retard's speed run of Donkey Kong. And the thing is. Yes, I'm not too happy with the people who are members of YYG. The crap does sink, but the fact that I have to moderate it irks me. Or maybe it's just the difficulty I have to go through to moderate it that irks me. It's a slow-loading site. Yeah, it's definitely the annoying moderating tools (that are supposed to be fixed in the next release?)
Game Maker Community:
Well, on a plus side, I notice that the spam catcher forum is working very well! I'm sure I can disclose this information. 49 spam topics caught thus far. I like it. Has anyone noticed any difference in the Game Design forum in the three-ish years I've been here in terms of dumb topics and messiness? Just a review if you will. I was also recently turning over the idea of resigning as a moderator. Being a normal sure does have it's own appeal.
Games etc.:
Yes, I need to make a game, from start to end. So I'm going to do that (yeah right).
That's it.
Entertainment:
L'Arc~en~Ciel is a J-Pop band. They're.... weird. Some of their stuff is really "pop-ish" so I take a liking to it. "Ready Steady Go!" and "Lost Heaven" are good. Another good song is "Asterisk" by Orange Range. Asian Kung Fu Generation's songs "Rewrite" and "Haruka Kanata" are also nice. Yes, these are all Japanese songs. So meh. I'll do English songs some other time.
GMC: Contrary To What You Think...
...the GMC doesn't care about you.
...the GMC doesn't know you, so don't post that you're leaving or coming back.
...DLL's cannot do everything.
...an MMORPG doesn't get made by just three people.
...saying you worked on a game for three months doesn't make it commercial-quality.
...a cruddy game made in a year is still a cruddy game.
...a cruddy game made when you are twelve is still a cruddy game.
...you're not a genius.
...you're not important enough for others to constantly track you down and flame you.
...you're not important enough for a GMC conspiracy to be targeted against you.
...when people tell you that making an RPG in GM right after you get the program, they speak from experience.
...Takagi probably doesn't know you.
...the moderators don't care enough for you to recall every topic you made and every moderator action he took against you, your posts, your games, and "your brother".
...the "brother" excuse has been tried and tried on GMC moderators and we've begun to make it a joke.
...there is no "GMC Moderator" application.
...there is no "Mark's Helpers" application.
...Mark Overmars probably doesn't care about the development of your game.
...Jesus probably wants you to read the GMC rules.
...God probably wants you to read the GMC rules.
...moderators aren't meant to cater to your GM help needs.
...GMC members aren't psychic, so they can't read your mind and spew out pages of code to make your game "wrok".
...there is no "codes to make my gaem online!".
...GM games cannot work on a console by merely renaming the .exe file to .gcn/.ps2/.xbox.
...GM games aren't converted to Flash/Java by renaming the file to *.swf/*.java.
...Takagi says all of these things honestly.
Okay, something weird. At the GMC, I got a PM just saying "Hi". I said "Hello. Do you need something?". He said "Just saying hi". And for the next hour, every topic I went to, he went to. o_O
Yes, I was looking at the "Users reading this topic:" bar... Weird. Stalker.
Despite what may be your belief:
...GMC moderators aren't directly hired by Mark Overmars.
...GMC moderators don't necessarily have to be good at GM.
...GMC moderators don't cry in a corner when you call them stupid or curse at them.
...GMC moderators don't feel intimidated when you curse them.
...GMC moderators don't automatically do something because you swore at them and insulted them.
...DLL's do everything you need in GM.
...You can't make a game just with motivation.
...the GMC isn't meant to cater for your needs alone.
...GM cannot go onto a platform other than a PC without major changes to the other system.
...G-Java is essentially vaporware.
......the GMC moderator didn't misunderstand your topic, you just misunderstood the rules.
...I don't care enough about your WIP to receive a weekly PM from you when you post a new demo.
...Mark Overmars isn't God.
...you aren't a genius if you learn GM at the age of 10.
...the word "n00b" isn't a curse word. It's just an insult.
...the internet hates you. Deal with it.
...Microsoft isn't all that bad.
...saying "Linux" now and then doesn't make you seem smart.
...websites shouldn't have automatically playing music *cough*JakeX*cough*
...nobody will work with you when all you're doing is "ideas"
...nobody will work with you when all you're doing is "management"
...computer programmers don't get paid a lot.
...computer programming for video games isn't as fun as hobby programming.
...because you use C++ doesn't mean you're automatically a genius.
...You will not be a moderator by asking.
...You won't be a member of Eo by just asking.
...Paint banners can only be so good.
...typing in l33t doesn't make you seem cool.
...speaking in l33t doesn't make you seem cool (as in yelling out "lol" and "wtf" randomly. Pwned and owned I can understand).
...Yourself isn't wrong, you are.
...a game made in 2 minutes that is a piece of garbage is still a piece of garbage.
...GMC members can't read minds, so give some more infomation about what doesn't work.
...by posting a game in the Creations or WIP forum, you're allowing your game to be criticized.
...moderators don't lose any sleep after locking topics.
...GMC members don't lose sleep after insulting you.
...putting a picture up of you is an invitation for flaming.
...God also tells you to follow the rules, so get your 700 by 200 "I Luv Gdo" banner out of your signature!
...speaking in "gangsta" words is only cool for a while.
...just because you know a girl doesn't mean she will like you.
...Takagi enjoys a nice PM now and then.
...I don't get a pleasure out of warning random people. Okay, maybe I do.
...your brother didn't do it. You did. You don't even have a brother.
...If it was your brother, bad spelling and/or stupidity must be an inherent trait.
...It isn't cool to be mainstream.
...Moderators are meant to make sure you and everyone else follows the GMC rules. Not to reopen your topic once it's been locked.
...There is not "make_game()" function.
...There isn't a tutorial for every single possible game.
...Just giving credit doesn't always cut it.
...you can sell any game. It's just that you probably won't get anything sold.
Meh, just some things I thought up. I'm thinking about making a list of these and maybe putting them in some program. I was also thinking about making a program that would allow for easier searching of the GMC rules and perhaps some tips for using the GMC. Ah well...
They're independent rock band from Britain. They're a bit like Arctic Monkeys, thrown in with a bit of... er... I dunno. They're just so versatile. They're guitar riffs are pretty cool. The vocals are a bit... meh. Really nice stuff. As far as rock-ish bands from the West go, let me rank them...
1. Franz Ferdinand
2. Bloc Party
3. Arctic Monkeys
4. Coldplay
5. Mute Math
I also hate womanizers. Same issue. I guess that's one reason I hate actors, because they're such womanizers.
Game Maker etc.:
Game Maker: the best 18 dollar programming teacher I ever bought. I figured I'm never going to use it again. I figured out that the only reason that I used the GMC was because my own real life was so dull and boring. However, that's not true anymore, and as a result, I've dropped GM and the GMC. Not too sad though, GM is the only reason I have an A in Comp. Scence.
And sk8tm8trix, do you play football? And stop stalking me.
. Our "Girls ask Guys Out To A Dance" dance (Turnabout) is like in three weeks.... I'm afraid that the weird sophomore is going to ask me out. So I'm going to have to beg another girl to ask me out so I can turn down that sophomore with a reasonable excuse. I can't throw the "I'm raiding with my WoW clan" excuse out... I don't play World of Warcraft.
I'm probably going to regret asking 64Digits and GM users for asking for girl advice.
Now for music. For the last few days, I've been listening to "We Didn't Start the Fire" by Billy Joel. I like the beat, and listen to think of the historical references. I've also listened to some Red Hot Chili Peppers and Green Day (both of whom my Physics teacher likes). "Snow", "Californication" "Dani California" by RHCP are good, and "Minority", "Basket Case", and some other songs by Green Day are good.
Now my new obsession has been these two Japanese bands that some kid in my C++ class told me about. "The Pillows" and "Asian Kung-Fu Generation". 
