I’m in the midst of a busy week partly due to a busy weekend with IndieCade and Culture Collide (just the Block Party in Echo Park), and also because the Raveonettes are in town and I have already attended 2 shows (the El Rey and Sonos Studio) and have one more tomorrow night at the Belly Up. Attending several shows in a week was normal for me a few years ago, but now it’s a little exhausting.
Still, it’s nice to be enjoying good music and hanging out with friends again. The bands were really good at the block party, though the event did seem a little smaller. More food trucks though. Toyota Antics usually sponsors the event, but this year it was S O Terik and Red Bull (who I think have been involved before).
The bands I saw were Nikki and the Dove, School of Seven Bells, Of Montreal, and the Wombats – who I’d never seen before and was looking forward to the most. In previous years, I’ve bought the wristbands and only attended the block party. This year, I decided the day before to just attend the block party (though I was tempted to buy wristbands again because the line up was good). I’m glad I went since it has been awhile since I have been to a show, and all the bands I wanted to see did not disappoint. My pictures could have been better, but I hadn’t brought my good camera.
Before even getting to the block party, I went to IndieCade 2012 for the Festival Day on Saturday and Game U on Sunday (both in Downtown Culver City). The Festival Day was free to the public and very crowded, but there was a lot of free drinks and snacks and of course, plenty of indie games to try out. Sony was there with lots of Vitas, PS3’s and Xperia Plays with various games of many genres. Me and my boyfriend got into playing an electronic music puzzle game, but it was only for Xperia Play (or Sony Mobile).
There were plenty of interesting games, though the best thing about the event was probably for my boyfriend to talk to developers and get inspiration and ideas on how to do his own game development projects. Of course, it was cool to see all the different platforms people are making games on. I especially liked the little boxes that you matched up to disappear and responded to movement. There were some cool iPad games too. We didn’t really sit in on any panels, but I don’t think we missed out on much.
