In his latest movie, The Woman In Black, Dan traded his Hogwarts uniform for a totally new role as a Dad.
Natalia brings you the latest news on Adele’s interview with Anderson Cooper, Kristen Bell’s interview on Ellen is auto tuned, Ladyhawke’s latest music video and much more!
Natalia discusses what’s new with Pharrell Williams and her thoughts on Karl Lagerfeld’s mean comments towards Adele’s weight. She also shows a roster of animals behaving like humans and, wait until you see the new size of coffee available at Starbucks!
Natalia dishes the latest news on the Juno Awards nominees, the upcoming Spiderman 3D film starring Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield and is Katy Perry hooking up with Tim Tebow? Watch today’s episode to find out.
When The Kooks are in the studio they’re focused and most importantly, sober. Watch Hugh and Luke explain their reasoning below.
The Kooks released a new album called “Junk of the Heart,” and you would think Hugh and Luke would be very excited about it. Well, they seemed rather indifferent to be honest. We spoke about that and why they don’t care about critics.
Natalia dishes the latest in entertainment news on Joan Rivers, Lana Del Rey and a brand new trailer for the movie Hunger Games.
Natalia talks about how Snooki might be pregnant, Nicolas Cage’s Cage Rage, Elisabetta Canalis is dating Steve-O and more for Feb 1, 2012.
Natalia dishes the news on Miley Cyrus breaking her tailbone, a 100 year old woman who plays the Nintendo DS to stay young and Houston, Texas contemplating a statute of Beyonce.
David Beckham debuts a new line of underwear, the worst dressed celebrity – Shy’m and Matthew Broderick is back as Ferris Bueller with a brand new commercial airing during the Super Bowl on Feb 5th 2012.
Daniel Radcliffe is back with his new movie The Woman In Black. It’s a bone chilling remake of a film from the ’80s. Ironically, Daniel actually scares very easily but he’s not afraid of ghosts. In this interview he tells us what really gives him the creeps.
Next time you’re struggling to make conversation, try asking this question: “If you could invite anyone (living or dead) to the perfect house party, who would it be?”
Graffiti6 is starting to make their North American invasion, and they are hitting up the Tonight Show. Does this sound familiar? Well the Beatles made the exact same journey over 40 years ago. Naturally, @jordans_life had to make some comparisons.
Nick plays World of Warcraft. Not only that, he’s the head of his guild, demonstrating that it IS possible to juggle being a hardcore gamer with being a top-selling recording artist.
During a LIVE interview on andPOP.com Nick Carter gave out a number and took phone calls from his fans. These were real phone calls from real fans who we gave exclusive access to one of the biggest recording artists of our generation.
There were great questions about music, fitness, the backstreet boys but the most popular question, however, was about his underwear. In this clip Nick talks about his his ‘Haynes’ and covering his fans with glow in the dark paint.
When releasing new music today, half the battle is online promotion. However, contests, signed merch and giveaways aren’t always the best solutions. When working on their latest album, Hedley came up with a brilliant idea, they decided to make trailers.
It’s hard to prepare for an interview with Hedley. So in this interview, we threw caution to the wind, got a 24 of beer and broadcast the interview live on our USTREAM (andPOP.tv). Eventually Jacob, Dave and @jordans_life ended up talking about hairy legs, their newest music video and more.
Diamandis from Marina and The Diamonds talks to us about her very serious disease. It’s called synaesthetic. And we lied, it’s not a disease. More like a cool condition. Diamandis explains further.
Would you be embarrassed if someone scrolled through your iPod? We sit down with Spee and Brendan to talk about the diverse music on their playlist.
AWWWW YEAH! Guitar Hero World Tour (GHWT) kicks ass! It seems Neversoft and Activision really got their act together after the disappointing release of Guitar Hero 3 for this Rockband competitor, with the release of GHWT in late October on the PS2, PS3, Wii and Xbox 360. This will be one tight review so I’ll get right to it with this Xbox 360 review. Because there are so many aspects to this game I’ll break it down as follows: I’ll talk about the instruments, the graphics, the music, the game options, and finally my overall feel of the title.
First off, GHWT is directly competing with Rockband 2 this time around by offering a full set of instruments, guitar drums and microphone. The Microphone is nearly exactly the same as the mic from Rockband 2, they both function just as well, both are wired USB microphones and both work on each game. The new Guitar Hero Guitar is by far my favourite video game controller I have ever touched, the look of the faux wood finish, the weight and balancing of the controller, the addition of a star power button (to avoid premature star power activation) the response and feel of the brightly colored Guitar Hero known buttons, strum bar and whammy bar all feel and look fantastic. There were no problems in terms of awkwardness or missed notes due to malfunction. The two main aspects that make this guitar better than the rest are as follows, first off, its 100% wireless, with an Xbox button and control system you don’t need another controller to set up from powering up the system to playing. The big feature for me however was the introduction of a slide bar! Much like Rockband had the mini-flushed buttons for solos and quick maneuvering, Activision took it one step further by introducing a single slide bar for the same purpose. With this bar you can slide your finger up and down the notes to connect fast tap-ons and pull-offs, tap the keys themselves or double finger for those hard to play songs. It feels amazing and while it takes some getting used to, the game is ultimately that much more fun to play if you feel like your rocking out that much harder. The Guitar Hero World Tour experience isn’t over until we discuss the brand new Guitar Hero drum set, designed and engineered with the help of top drum professionals such as Travis Barker of Blink 182 and Chad Smith of Red Hot Chili Peppers fame. This drum set, which is also wireless (aside from the wire going from the bass pedal to the drum set) features three QUIET (compared to RB’s loudness) pads, a bass pedal that only moves an inch to counter the breaking pedals of RB, and two cymbals to round out the 6 note drums of GHWT. Extra features include Velcro bottoms on the bass pedal (a simple innovation) so you can place it anywhere without it moving, a full controller set on the drum set itself, and my personal favourite advancement in terms of video game music-ology, touch sensitivity! If you hit the pads hard, they make a louder more distinct sound (and in some cases, a different sound all together) to make the drum experience that much more realistic.
Graphically, I think GHWT finally got their act together, I was thoroughly disappointed by the visual aspect of GH 3 but this time around I felt they finally let go of their obsession with characters such as Axle Steele and while they are still around, players have the ability to create their own custom avatars. This isn’t what got me excited however, it was the many surprise guest characters in the game I had no idea would show up. Superstars such as Jimi Hendrix, Ozzy Osbourne, Sting, and my personal favourite Zakk Wylde to name a few would join your band temporarily to give you the rock out sensation of a lifetime. Other graphics include the motion and fluidity of the characters, not just the band but the repetitive (but acceptable) audience as well. They all move realistically and I feel as though they are actually playing the songs! Even before the band starts if you mess around with the drums, the drummer more or less follows on screen. Motion captured celebrities do their trademark moves and look and feel as though you are watching them live in concert. Speaking of live concerts, a big improvement over the last Guitar Hero are the venues, rarely do we see inexcusable sponsorships (like AXE or Pontiac) and now we’re introduced to real rock venues such as Ozzfest and AT&T Park. Real sponsorships are provided and sometimes updated but the big difference to me is that this time around, the encores aren’t as lame as Guitar Hero 3’s change of scenery ever so slightly. Another cool aspect is the Tool inspired stage, made in collaboration with the band.
Now, this IS a music game so the audio is of course, key. GHWT did not fail by offering more songs than they ever have before, and it’s not just so-so tunes you’ve never heard of, we’re talking big hits! Songs like American woman, Are you gonna go my way, Purple Haze (live edition no less!), Stillborn, The middle, Hotel California, Dammit and much much more. In fact, that’s only a small sample of the whopping 86 songs that initially come with the game, not to mention the constant stream of downloadable songs in the future as well as future game releases like Guitar Hero: Metallica coming out soon. The soundtrack is amazing, the guitar drums and mic all sound responsive, and with the proper setup, you could experience the greatest musical feeling you’ve ever achieved in your basement.
GHWT has yet again expanded their modes of play in this one, aside from the expected single player experience (which was yet again revamped to have more of a path connection without forcing players to play what they don’t want to (like the first Rockband did), career mode can be played on any instrument as well as the ability to have friends join in on your career when they come over for a visit so you can keep unlocking songs without having to take turns, or even worse, make your friend wait on the couch while you unlock more on your own. Of course while you play songs in career mode, you earn cash and items which can then be used to update your custom avatar (if you made one). New to GHWT is the ability to play band career mode online, with them being anywhere in the world, new options such as no-fail mode and no bass pedal mode as well as differing difficulties between band mates lets you play with anyone anywhere at any time. Other options include quick play mode where you (solo or with friends) can play a set list of up to 6 songs of any of the songs you have already unlocked in career mode (or through codes). My favourite new mode gives players the ability to create their own music! In the Music studio, players can write and share their own custom created songs online. You create track over track utilizing different music styles chosen by you and can create lead, rhythm, bass, and drum tracks to be played back in game. You can also utilize the GHMix mode to create distortion and other nifty effects. These songs will be played back in expert mode and GHWT will automatically convert them to easier difficulties as you play on medium or hard mode. The best part, you can go online and download other people’s creations for free!
All in all I think Guitar Hero World Tour could be considered the best music game out there to date, they definitely take the ‘most improved’ award in my book. Overall every aspect of the game has been improved upon Guitar Hero 3 and even many aspects over Rockband 2! While some issues still linger (my Guitar Hero drum’s blue pad isn’t sensitive enough and the USB calibration tool they sent me did not fix my issues) This is definitely a step in the right direction and shows proof that with Harmonix going on to Rockband, Guitar Hero’s franchise is not done yet! If you’re a fan of Guitar Hero, Rockband or music in general, you owe it to yourself to at least pick up the software for this great title, if you’re fresh to the virtual music scene, pick up the entire kit today! Right now! Don’t wait another minute! Besides, what else are you going to play until the good stuff comes out in March?
Gameplay: 5/5
Graphics: 4.5/5
Sound: 5/5
Replay Value: 5/5
