I have fond memories of the development work that led to a lot of great things in modern gaming - the intensity of the first person experience, LAN and Internet play, game mods, and so on.
Not only did I get to play with these great international musicians, but I also had the opportunity to jam with the local celebrities in Toronto, people like the Walsh Brothers, David Wilcox, Kim Mitchell and the like. It was a great learning experie...
I did a play called Throne of Straw when I was 11, at the Odyssey Theatre in Los Angeles. It became really clear to me at that point that I enjoyed acting more than any other experience I was having.
The truth is that our unconscious minds are active, purposeful, and independent. Hidden they may be, but their effects are anything but, for they play a critical role in shaping the way our conscious minds experience and respond to the world.
I'd say the real turn in my career came when I did the Dolce & Gabbana International Ad Campaign playing Madonna's son, which was just an incredible experience and I still can't believe actually happened.
Meeting Helen Mirren was a fabulous experience. I had played it out in my mind, how I should greet her when we would be introduced. But the way we met was funny because I just didn't recognise her!
The excitement of the fans in Montreal, especially in the playoffs, I don't think you can get that anywhere else. For a hockey player, I kind of wish everyone could go through that and experience what it is to play there. It's very unique.
You can't dodge them all. I got hammered plenty of times through the years. But you just get up and keep playing. I can tell you from experience, though. Sometimes it hurts like hell.
I think early on in my career, I was heavily inspired by bands like Throbbing Gristle and Test Dept, and films of David Lynch, for example, where the soundscape plays a very important role in the listening experience.
Adult characters are all the things they've encountered over time. But kids haven't accumulated all the life experience, all the regrets. They tend to be more in the moment, more willing to play, to be joyful.
When playing any song in front of an audience, you're watching them experience it, and it changes. In a lot of ways, it's almost like the music is just the background buzz to what's happening between you and the audience in the room.
If a guy can play Guitar Hero with me and sit at home and watch the Food Network and read magazines with me, that's good. I don't think there are many guys that's fun for. It's a lot to ask.
Russia will occupy most of the good food lands of central Europe while we have the industrial portions. We must find some way of persuading Russia to play ball.
I like to say, 'Chop suey's the biggest culinary joke that one culture has ever played on another,' because chop suey, if you translate into Chinese, means 'tsap sui,' which, if you translate back, means 'odds and ends.'
Of course, with well-masticated food playing the role of social glue, it's absolutely essential that everyone clear their plate. Sod the starving kiddies in Africa - it's the overfed ones here we need to worry about.
I always had a knack for improvisation. I can write down the notes I play, but never really had a proper academic musical background. I suppose I'm blessed and cursed by the fact I have that freedom.
But, I don't think any arranger should ever write a drum part for a drummer because if a drummer can't create his own Interpretation of the chart and he plays everything that's written, he becomes mechanical; he has no freedom.
I think that there's a lot more freedom in the low budget, the independent films where, unfortunately, you don't have the money, necessarily, to get the orchestras in there to play a lot of stuff. But, you have a lot more freedom, very often.
The foreign press seems obsessed with the Freedom Tower, as if it was the only thing going on here. In fact, we're trying to keep a huge juggling act in balance, with the tower as just one of the many balls in play.
Blended-reality technology could play in a limited, walled-garden world, but history suggests that it won't really take off until it offers broad freedom of use.
In limits, there is freedom. Creativity thrives within structure. Creating safe havens where our children are allowed to dream, play, make a mess and, yes, clean it up, we teach them respect for themselves and others.
