How To: Get Into The Venture Brothers

Need a new animated show to tide you over while you wait for each week’s new Family Guy? The Venture Brothers on Cartoon Network may be your answer.

Cartoon Network may have a sleeper hit on its hands with The Venture Brothers. The show features the same referential gags found in shows such as The Simpsons and Family Guy, but the style and tone are unique among today’s animated series. It’s as if Hanna Barbera created a show aimed squarely at adults.

At first glance, The Venture Brothers appears to be an adventure show that falls into the action category of the Adult Swim lineup. A closer look reveals the show is an action spoof set in a world full of hopelessly incompetent supervillains and the heroes they have chosen to terrorize. The characters in The Venture Brothers act as if they know they are just playing out roles that were prescribed to them. The Monarch is evil because, well, he is a supervillain and that’s just what he does. The Venture family and their bodyguard play their roles as the heroes and fight back, but it rarely takes much effort on their part to save the day. The hilariously over the top villains are the real stars of the show. The Venture Brothers simply give them something to do.

Here’s what you need to know:

• Hank and Dean Venture are the brothers Venture. They are hopelessly sheltered teenagers who have little or no connection to the world around them.
• Dr. Venture, father to Hank and Dean, lives in the shadow of his brilliant and respected father.
• Brock Samson, voiced by Patrick Warburton, is the Venture family bodyguard. He is an unstoppable “Swedish murder machine” who will do anything to protect the Venture family.
• The Monarch is by far the most incompetent supervillain in the history of supervillains. He is an orphan of wealthy parents who were killed when he was young, leaving him to be raised by butterflies. He has dedicated his life to destroying Dr. Venture. The Monarch is to The Venture Brothers what Stewie is to Family Guy… A scene-stealing fan favorite who constantly serves up the best lines in any given episode.

Standout Episodes:

• Ghosts of the Sargasso
• Return to Spider-Skull Island

Apple Notebook with integrated iPod mini

From Macsimum News:

"Apple's roadmap, in accordance with Patent Application 20040224638, reveals one of Apple'��s coolest ideas that I personally think could be a market winner...."

I don't know how this would work or why you would need it, but I have to admit I am intrigued.

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Review: Tone Heaven Vol. 1

Tone Heaven Vol. 1 – MacSongTools ($19.99)
3.5 stars out of 5

Imagine having instant access to hundreds of the most recognizable guitar tones in the world at your fingertips. This is the promise of Tone Heaven Vol. 1, a series of 450 guitar presets for GarageBand and Logic from MacSongTools. Whether you want to rock like AC/DC or pretend for just a moment that you have captured the fabled tone of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Tone Heaven provides more variety than you might expect for under $20.

Tone Heaven Vol. 1 is aimed squarely at those of us who love GarageBand, but are left wanting after toying around with the miserly selection of its built-in guitar sounds. There are several Jam Packs available for GarageBand, but none of them are particularly guitar-centric. Should you shell out $70-$100 just to add the “Vintage Blues” preset that John Mayer demoed when GarageBand was introduced? Not at all. If a simple assortment of ready-made guitar tones is what you are looking for Tone Heaven Vol. 1 fits the bill nicely.

Tone Heaven Vol. 1 is a series of presets that allow you to quickly achieve some surprisingly warm and accurate tones. Once the presets are installed on your Mac you can access them directly from the Real Instruments column in GarageBand. There are settings for specific amp models, artist tones, and even specific songs. This package is perfect for the casual player who doesn’t want to spend time dialing in these settings through trial and error.

Tone Heaven offers a wide variety of sounds covering most genres of popular music. The quality of the sounds is surprisingly good. A few presets suffer from excessive noise, but you are free to adjust each one until you achieve the desired result.

There is room for improvement in Tone Heaven Vol. 1. The biggest issue is that all 450 presets are assigned to “Tone Heaven Vol#1” in your Real Instrument list. Perhaps in future volumes MacSongTools might consider breaking the presets down by genre. This problem isn’t helped at all by the cryptic names given to some presets. What is “YYZ” anyway? Is there really a need for a “Xanadu Rhythm” preset? Surely there aren’t many musicians covering a song from Olivia Newton John’s worst film ever. “Smooth Gutfiddle”? Seriously, if anyone knows what “Smooth Gutfiddle” means please let me know. Barring some unfortunate examples, many of the presets in Tone Heaven are easily recognizable to anyone who might be interested in such a software package.

Overall, you get quite a bit for your $20 with Tone Heaven Vol. 1. It’s a more diverse and economical alternative to the existing Apple Jam packs, and you are free to adjust the settings in any way you choose. Improved sorting and a less cryptic naming convention would greatly improve this already enjoyable package.

For $19.99 Tone Heaven Vol. 1 stands alone as the only guitar package for GarageBand that won’t bust your budget.

3.5 stars out of 5

Reality Bites

Something is terribly wrong with me. I am apparently one of the few people in the country who cannot stomach 98% of reality television. Why only 98%? Why not 100%? Surely all reality shows are created equal, right? Not by a longshot.

Over the years, there have been exactly two reality shows that managed to hold my attention. The two shows that got past my self-imposed reality ban were VH1’s Bands on the Run and Bravo’s Project Greenlight. Bands on the Run lasted only one season and PGL recently ended its third and possibly final season if you believe Executive Producer Chris Moore’s prediction on his blog.

I know I cannot defend Bands on the Run as an exceptional television show. It was no better than most of the current ridiculous contest shows in which the contestants are asked to do things that have long since past the point of contrived or shocking. Had the winning band not been from my hometown I doubt I would have given this show a second look. But they were from my hometown, and I watched every episode. It was a guilty pleasure and those are never built to last.

Project Greenlight, however, was the first show in the reality genre that truly drew me in as a viewer. This was the best show on TV that you were regrettably not watching. I am baffled by the low ratings for this show. It was by far the most compelling reality show on TV and apparently noone watched it. This season in particular was fantastic. In the first episode, we met John Gulager who ultimately beat the odds and won the director’s spot after the world’s worst interview. Gulager is more outrageous than any of the dime store hacks that try to become the “crazy” one every year at the American Idol auditions. What makes Gulager different is that he isn’t suffering under the delusion that he might become a TV or movie star by being a wacky reality show contestant. He is simply the walking definition of eccentric. You can’t help but cheer on John Gulager. He was the center of this year’s Project Greenlight and I hope he makes it.

The same principle goes for the show itself. The show isn’t about putting these people in ridiculous situations that have no bearing on, well, reality. It pulls no punches. It is a document of a film being made by amateurs who are surrounded by seasoned professionals. It was the best reality show on TV.

If someone figures out a way to bring it back, do yourself a favor and watch. Until then I am sure network execs are busy trying to figure out how to option “Tiny House” from those Geico commercials. Awesome.