Nine Inch Nails announce live DVD and Blu-ray

Following the release of the Live 2013 EP, and several videos of performances and behind the scenes action from the Tension 2013, Nine Inch Nails have released a 90 minute video from their performance in Los Angeles last month. This also just happens to be one of the concerts I was planning to attend if I found myself in Los Angeles that week, but sadly the trip never went ahead.

The above video also serves as a promo for the expanded concert set for release next year on DVD, Blu-ray, and digital distribution. According to the nin.com minisite, and Facebook the full concert will be releases, with 5.1 surround sound audio mix, as well as additional content.

I'll be aiming to get the Blu-Ray, as I want to experience the Los Angeles show in full-HD, which will be the next best thing to actaully having been there myself. Hopefully I'll be able to catch Nine Inch Nails on a future European or North American tour, as I doubt they'll be heading to South Africa any time soon.

September 3 music, gaming and movie releases

Tomorrow there are quite a few things being released that I am really looking forward to adding to my various, ever-growing collections. 

First up is Nine Inch Nails' ninth* studio album, Hesitation Marks. I've ordered both the regular and deluxe versions of the CD, because I am a huge collector of Nine Inch Nails related media (but let's leave that for another post when I can share pictures of my entire NIN collection). While I'll have to wait a few weeks to receive the physical editions, I can at least take solace in the fact that I'll be able to download lossless versions of the complete album, as well as the alternative mix, some time tomorrow. Till then I'll sit and listen to Came back haunted, Copy of a, and Everything a few times.

Then, the console version of Diablo III is also hitting shelves tomorrow. I pre-ordered a copy quite some time back in order to secure a copy of the artbook advertised by my local games retailer. Although my copy will be ready for collection tomorrow morning, I wont be able to get to the store until the weekend. While I'm hoping the week will pass relatively quickly, at least I know I should have enough time to finish Diablo II.

Lastly, The Lords of Salem is getting released on DVD and Blu-Ray tomorrow. I haven't seen the film yet, but it's on my list of things to watch. At present The Lords of Salem doesn't have very favourable scores on IMDb (5.2/ 10), but then again, even Rob Zombie's House of 1000 Corpses and The Devil's Rejects only score 5.8/ 10, and 6.8/ 10 receptively. Both of which I'm quite fond of too.

While writing this I realised that I am quite happy to fork out my cash to buy music (either digital or physical CDs) and PlayStation and PC games, but I'm a bit more reluctant when it comes to buying movies. While I do have a small collection of DVDs, it's nothing compared to my CD collection. I may even have more PS3 games now than DVDs. Considering I only bought my PS3 in March, its a good reflection of the where I've been investing my free time and spare cash. I've also come to realise, that after watching a movie I've enjoyed, I tend to buy the novel the film is based upon, rather than the DVD of the film itself. One notable exception is Ang Lee's Life of Pi, for which I'd like to buy the Blu-Ray and the book.

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* Some sources may say it's Nine Inch Nails eighth studio album, but I consider Broken to be an album, not just an EP. 

I'm now the proud owner of a PS3

My girlfriend's DVD player stopped reading discs a few weeks back. We thought that buying and using one of those lens cleaning discs would have done the trick. Problem is that since then, the tray of the DVD player has stopped opening when the eject button is pushed, so we are unable to load the lens cleaning disc. This means makes the problem a little more complicated.

Since we'd been talking of upgrading the DVD player to a Blu-ray player for some time, I decided to spoil Em, and buy her a PlayStation 3 to replace her decrepit DVD player. OK, that's a bit of a lie. I bought a PS3 as an upgrade to a Blu-ray player, and so that I could play games.

A local supermarket chain had a discount of R1000* off the price for the 160GB PS3 bundle that included a second DualShock 3 controller, and the following three games; Gran Turismo 5: Academy Edition, God of War III, and Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction.

So far I've only played GT5 for a couple of hours, unlocking four cars, and reaching level 5 in the A-spec mode. I think I'll wait until I've played GoW I & II before starting GoW III. In the meantime I'm already looking for some deals to purchase in order to expand my library of games. I'm considering purchasing Borderlands 2, Need for Speed: Most Wanted and possibly Batman: Arkham City. Given the price of games, and that I may not spend that much time playing, we'll have to see how many of these titles I end up acquiring.

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* R1000 is roughly equivalent to USD107, or EUR83.