"My Life Everyday" - First Draft Lyrics & Other News

I decided to post some lyrics that were written for a possible song in the first episode. These lyrics are a work in progress and subject to change. Right now we're tossing around different musical routes to take with these lyrics if we decide to use them. We're thinking about a rock n' roll vibe, possibly a Jason Mraz-type musicality, or even a David Yazbek like folky feel. We've got plenty of time though, we'll see how things pan out.

"MY LIFE EVERYDAY" (Lyrics by Aaron J. Amendola, first draft finished 6/13/09)

Christian
A SECTION
Any distance can be a journey
if you're not accustomed to the trail,
and I'd waltz right down that hallway
if I was sure I wouldn't fail.

So I'll stay inside and press continue
Just the same as yesterday.
Don't look at me with your pity
This is my life everyday.

I wake up and check my mail here
Look, everyone's my friend
And with all the work I've piled up
I'm afraid there's no room for pretend

And while I'd love to get fired up in a musical soiree
I'm more content with my comics
This is my life everyday.

B SECTION
Don't think that I'm sullen,
don't think that I'm sad.
This way of life isn't just passing through
and I don't see it as a fad.

C SECTION
The outside world is scary if you're socially unaware.
I'd rather sit at home & watch cartoons while enjoying Solitaire.
I'm a stoic member of my own army with a dorky croix de guerre.
I'd reject the physical challenge while playing Double Dare.

A SECTION
50 feet can seem like miles
if inside is all you know.
It doesn't bother me cause
I don't think that I have to grow.

So I'll chill inside with a red bull and all my superfriends.
Even if I have thoughts of breaking away,
this is my life everyday.
This is my life everyday.
This is my life everyday.
--------------

So the entire LAN'ded dev team is now hangin' out in sunny New Hampshire! We'll be here for the whole summer and maybe even longer depending on how things go. We're planning on getting a ton of work done, as long as nobody in our dev team gets swine flu...so we'll see. I'm currently listening to the broadway show "Next To Normal" and I have to hand it to Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey. They've just got a fantastic show on their hands. I've been amazed by Mr. Kitt repeatedly and this show is no fluke, he really writes music that amazing all the time. Do yourself a favor and check him out here.

And because a post here can't exclusively be about Musical Theatre and LAN'ded, I must mention that the Ghostbusters video game was released this week. I received the Ps3 version and Kyle opted to get the Wii version. I'm happy to say that we're enthralled with both copies and I can only imagine what impact our fanboyism will have on future scripts concerning ghost jokes.

Also, a special word has to be said about LAN'ded dev team alum Ashley Laverty, who's children's show "Dotty Dot" is going to be produced in NYC in the future! Ashley is, as I've said up and down before, a phenomenal writer and performer and this is just a testament to her gifts.

Hope all is well in the rest of the 49 states! And I hope you all have your dork clocks set to go off next week when Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen tears up theatres! Sayonara!

Never slime a guy with a Positron Collider.

Hey there everyone!

News is trickling out of the LAN'ded front more and more as the summer goes on it seems. A constant re-working of the 3rd draft gets more and more of my attention every day and the past week was no exception. After reading (several times) the way that the first episode sounds, I find myself constantly unhappy with the lyrics to the first major song of the show. After writing 8 different sets of lyrics (yes, 8) I think we may have found something that works or at least we're one step closer to what will become the final text.

I've been working on putting together a video-blog to keep track of our pre-production adventures and you guys can expect that sometime before the end of the month (hopefully, we'll see). As you probably know, the Ghostbusters video game comes out in 4 days and who knows how much work I'll get done after I get my hands on that. I've waited over 20 years to become a Ghostbuster, and I'm determined to relive every memory I have from Venkman, Stantz, and Egon.

Check back for more news next week!

The World Begins With You

HEY EVERYONE! Just as promised, here is the first draft of out new pilot for LAN'ded. It's been made for convenient download HERE as a PDF. I'll also re-link to our "trailer" script HERE!

Tomorrow night is the big trek to New Hampshire, where the LAN'ded creative team will be setting up shop for the summer. What's even more fun is that it'll be the first time that I meet David face to face rather than video chat over the internet! Crazy how we get things done so far away from each other. Just imagine what'll get done when we're all living in the same house!

The rest period in-between graduation and the NH job has been fantastic. First off, Star Trek was probably the best movie I've seen all year. After the disappointing Wolverine, Star Trek was a breath of fresh air that I'm probably going to see again and again if my wallet allows it. On top of that, I finally found the time to complete the game "The World Ends With You" for the DS. I'd be lying if I said the game wasn't superb from top to bottom. From presentation to the themes/messages the game was trying to get across, it was just fantastic. Bravo Square-Enix, bravo. I can't help but compare Neku (from TWEWY) and Christian, funny how inspiration and parallels comes from the most unlikely of places.

As I did last time I was home, I'm leeching internet from a local Panera. I've become one of 'those' people who get food at Panera and leech their Wi-Fi signal for hours. Only today I am not getting food from Panera, I'm instead going to trek (no pun intended) over to BK and get a special commemorative glass with Captain Kirk on it because I'm still reeling from the movie. At this point, I have four LOTR goblets and 2 Star Trek glasses to furnish my Chicago home when I move there and set up shop. I wouldn't have it any other way.

See you guys in 700+ miles!

~ Aaron J.

Just some DLC...

I stumbled across this thread over at the NeoGaf forums and just got thoroughly inspired.

The reason? It seems like more and more each year interactive media takes bigger strides towards becoming a veritable artform. Mass Effect seemed to really give gamers a run for their money as far as providing an entirely open-ended narrative and Bethesda does some incredible stuff as far as creating a illustrious landscape for which a person to use paint on.

As I looked on and saw some of my favorites (like the Mirror's Edge, Tetris, and Persona 4 ones) really evoke alot of creative attention. It just seemed to be like Christian would devour this stuff. Frankly, I do, so Christian would. ;) Not to make his character indulgent, but nobody can deny that some TLC went into creative some of those knock-off Criterion Collection covers.

This just adds to the argument that interactive media is making a stand in becoming art. Look at The Guild. Besides opening the door for alot of webseries out there, Felicia Day has also created a show that centers around interactive media. Two birds with one stone. Nice job. She's cute too, can't fault her at all for that.

In other news, a few members of Imaginary Trends are making the move to New Hampshire for the summer to do some work. While we will be in the middle of nowhere, I think we'll be publishing some...interesting works online. I'm personally packing up my comics and games so that I'll still retain a good amount of dorkness even a few states away from home.

Also...we've been getting good responses to the trailer script that went up last week. I'm going to begin formally writing our third draft in the coming week. Got any suggestions? Send them in...

Download "NEW GAME", the first piece of the third draft of LAN'ded!

I figured it's almost Easter...so what would the Last Supper look like in Christian's world?

A few people in the reading cast have requested that they see this "new script" I just drew up over the last week and so I figured why not just post it? After reading through this short 11-12 page script with Kyle, we've decided that this works really well as a "trailer" of sorts. A precursor to the first episode. Something that sets up the characters and universe better than trying to cram it into the first episode.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD "NEW GAME" AS A PDF FILE!

On a side note: I was lucky enough to receive a Sony PSP (I named her Peach, my DSi is named Daisy) over the weekend, and I decided that it would only be fitting that I get the game that inspired the character Lenneth in LAN'ded: "Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth." You may wonder why I decided to name the creepy landlord after a Norse Goddess in a video game, well, to be honest it just felt like it fit. Also, I'm a big fan of VERY cryptic/far-fetched references. Speaking of references, the entire third draft will concentrate on a larger variety of references. Emulating Spaced, I was aiming to insert references to things associated with Christian's world throughout the first season and while I was successful with that, most of the references were video game based. In this third draft a bigger concentration will be placed on referencing every facet of his dork culture. Working at a GameStop, I'm prone to have gaming on the brain, but I have to remember to spread that out. :)

Some ideas that I expect to explore in the third draft of LAN'ded include, but aren't limited to:

1. Christian holds a funeral for his broken Xbox 360, candles, priests, and all.
2. Izzy brings an (imaginary) pet home.
3. Natalie forms a coalition for imaginary friends. Sort of like a union for imaginary friends.
4. Dr. Cortex and Wally take over the kitchen. (Cut from initial reading script, will be more developed.)
5. More songs. We had 5-6 songs for the entire first season. We received some feedback asking us to have a theme song and some fill-in music and tunes elsewhere. Let's see what happens...

There's been talk of storyboarding "NEW GAME" so people can get a better idea of how everything will look. Think you guys would want to see those?

I'll leave you with two things:

1. If Carmen Sandiego and Where's Waldo had a child, would we ever find him?

2. Here's a picture of our Dr. Cortex, Wally, and Natalie taken from the reading staged last week at the Rauh Theatre. There's more to come later...

~ Aaron J.