Not only is this one of the best songs I have ever heard, but I am PRETTY sure from the video that the person singing is a midge!!!!!!! Armin van Buuren is a DJ, so in following with my last song love, David Guetta and Kelly Rowland’s ‘When Love Takes Over,’ I am obviously on more of a dance song kick. While I really luckily have no emotional connection to this song, like the last one I am just really impressed with the talent and the ability to just suck on my brain so it never goes away! Good job Armin and the little dude! Good Job! Watch after the jump (aka.. just click “continue reading”)

When I was at AOL Music I did a series of “AIM Interviews” over AIM with some pretty awesome (and some kinda awesome) people. Popping up my interview with Hilary Duff. Enjoy.BrendanInMusic: Hey there 
WithLuvHil: hello
BrendanInMusic: how are you today Hilary??
WithLuvHil: pretty good! had to wake up early!!
BrendanInMusic: that must be tough, do you have a lot going on in prep for the album release??
WithLuvHil: yes! i have been doing a radio tour> two citys a day
WithLuvHil: lost of interviews! fun though
BrendanInMusic: well as long as it is fun, any cool places??
WithLuvHil: i was in arizona and it was really nice, the weather> then to dallas and i am from tx. so it was cool to be there for a little while. and chicago! those have been my fav so far!
WithLuvHil: and of course NYC
BrendanInMusic: awesome! what has the reception been on all of your new music
BrendanInMusic: it’s definitely a new sound for you
BrendanInMusic: many people calling it very Kylie
WithLuvHil: it is! i got to have so much fun. this is the first time i actually wrote the whole record! i got to just be really honest play with new sounds. i think it has kind of suprised people in a good way.
BrendanInMusic: we love what we’ve heard so far, it sounds great!
WithLuvHil: thanks!
BrendanInMusic: was it a hard transition for you at your age starting with a young audience to evolve your sound?
WithLuvHil: no it kind of feels just like a natural progression. it feels right. but it is weird kind of growing up with everyone watching you grow up. they think i am like planning all this out but really it is just how i feel and who i am
BrendanInMusic: what do you think has influenced you through all of this?
WithLuvHil: the reason i wanted to do more of a dance record is because i cant wait to go on tour again and want to do a show with the live feel from before but with dancers and i wanna dance and have a choreographed show
BrendanInMusic: when will you go on tour??
WithLuvHil: also other artist and wanting to do something diffrent to challange myself
BrendanInMusic: thats awesome, what did you find the most challenging from this record?
WithLuvHil: i was a little nervous to be so honest! when i started writting, i would stop and be like( whoa do i want people to know this about me?) but then i kept it all and let go being scared to be judged! no ones perfect and we all have problems and i am just like everyone else
WithLuvHil: it was so much fun!
WithLuvHil: i covered a lot of ground on this record
BrendanInMusic: very cool 
BrendanInMusic: in general you’ve been big in the public eye over the past few years
BrendanInMusic: but at least mostly positive!
BrendanInMusic: how do you feel you’re portrayed??
WithLuvHil: thats kind of a hard question to answer myself. i feel like i should ask someone and get back to you! ha! i think pretty positive though. i dont like to live my whole life and things i do and people i hang out with all in the public eye for people to talk about.
WithLuvHil: i am not out there doing really crazy things, ya know
BrendanInMusic: haha well that’s a good thing then 
BrendanInMusic: do you consider yourself a rolemodel??
WithLuvHil: yes. people always say that to me and its very flattering. at the same time it can be alot to live up to. i am just trying to figure out who i am in my life.
WithLuvHil: i dont really feel the same pressure as i used to about it though. i just want to make my self happy. if people like me they like me and if they dont they dont. or maybe look up to me is what i mean.
WithLuvHil: sorry dont feel like going back and deleting all that stuff
BrendanInMusic: well its a lot to look up to, you’ve sold millions of records, stared in movies
BrendanInMusic: is there something else you want to accomplish??
WithLuvHil: there is stuff that i have not accomplished within those things like a certain role or a diffrent sounding record.
WithLuvHil: i dream up all kinds of things
BrendanInMusic: what’s you’re wildest, or favorite dream of that sort?
WithLuvHil: i dont know if i could tell u specifaclly because i have been so focused on this record. but i know especially in movies i want to do something really dramatic or unexpected. i just did a movie in bulgaria and got to play this really out there girl who is totally the opposite of who i am and it was so amazing i cant wait to do more stuff like that.
BrendanInMusic: can’t wait to see that!
WithLuvHil: thanks! me too!
BrendanInMusic: so this record… what made you decide on the title??
WithLuvHil: i think it sounds strong! dignity is something we have to work on our whole lives to have if we want it. its not an easy thing to have all the time and it can go away really fast. but, you can get it back if you want. i just think its intresting and it is something i hope i always strive for
BrendanInMusic: that’s pretty strong!
BrendanInMusic: what can fans expect from the whole album
WithLuvHil: it really sums me up and is self explanitory. it was intresting to make a record half in a realationship and half not! lots of emotions happy,sad,lonley, strong. also lots of family matters happend to me this year i feel alot of people will realate to and living in la there is alot to write about!! some funny thing. all of it is done to dance music so its fresh. there is no ballad on the record
BrendanInMusic: very cool — what made you choose with love as the first single??
WithLuvHil: i have a fragrance that came out around christmas time it is called “with love” i wrote the song for the commercial i shot for the perfume. i loved the song and wanted to release it as a single
WithLuvHil: as well
BrendanInMusic: awesome, it sounds great
BrendanInMusic: so what can we expectto see soon, tour new movie???
WithLuvHil: thanks! it is pretty catchy
WithLuvHil: i will be touring over the summer!!! i miss tour and cant with to be on the road again. it is the greatest feeling! the movie i did in bulgaria is called “Brand Hauser” it is with John Cusack and Marisa Tomei, also Ben Kingsley. that sould be out in 7 to 8 months i think. also and animated movie called “Food Fight”
BrendanInMusic: awesome! we can’t wait to check it all out! it sounds great 
BrendanInMusic: i know how busy you are so thanks much for chatting today
WithLuvHil: thanks the album is out april 3th.
WithLuvHil: i had fun too
BrendanInMusic: great!! we are looking forward to april 3!
BrendanInMusic: have a good one  thanks again!
WithLuvHil: bye!

What will end up being a ridiculous series of posts, I changed the phone designs a bit, instead of a notification list, i thought interactive widgets were really where it was at… millions of changes ahead but thought it would be interesting to share the process…

So I wrote an insane amount of info on my thoughts on the state of cell phones right now, but I figured I would try and illustrate exactly what I wanted. This is no easy task especially since I have never done this before, but I am working out the kinks but wanted to get a quick draft done to show I am actually putting my money where my mouth is! Any thoughts are VERY welcomed…..

In 2007 Apple introduced one of the biggest products in history which “revolutionized” (I hate using that word, but there’s not many others that can work in its spot) cell phones and the emerging smartphone business permanently. From the day Steve Jobs had his keynote introducing the phone my mouth instantly watered and I was determined to get one…asap. The phone had amazing features, went beyond what any other phone could do and was just plain old cool. A lot has changed since then, and with the latest announcement of the Windows Phone 7 series I figured I would take a long winded approach to what I think is good and bad about the 3 major players– the iPhone, Android and Windows Phone.

When the iPhone came out, much to my disappointment in myself, I demonstrated self-restraint and waited after the phone was released… at least until they lowered the price and then it was adios Verizon, hello iPhone. I loved it, there wasn’t really anything NOT to love about it, well other than the fact that it was on AT&T and I was living in the Hoboken/Manhattan at the time and that area was not their strong suit. In fact, it was horrible reception. BUT, the phone was in fact worth that small price, until I actually moved to Manhattan and I couldn’t get cell service on my walk to/from work and was spotty at best in my apartment. Just not a feasible reason to keep a phone, even if it was the “Jesus Phone” since it really just didn’t work where I was.

From there I hopped over to Sprint, who still to this day has the absolute best network I have experienced and I love them. I was praying of a Sprint iPhone. Then Apple introduced the iPhone 3G (still on AT&T) but this time I was residing in Connecticut where I still am today and had no will power on an instant switch to get the precious iPhone back. There were minimal noticeable changes other than on the back end which just made the phone move a little faster. Nothing that really bothered me but always nice to have that done.

As some time went on, companies were busting their asses to catch up to the iPhone, newer smartphones were being released what seemed to be a few a week! It wasn’t until Google unveiled their Android platform did phones (in my opinion) take a step in a new direction. Up until Android phones were introduced, other than adding backgrounds to some phones or rearranging some icons, you really couldn’t do that much at all to really snazz it up, or just make it YOURS. I of course jumped ship. I have the Moto Droid right now, and I do like it, though as always there’s room for improvement. And lastly yesterday Microsoft introduced their new Windows Phone Series 7 system. I figured it was time to pit these phones against each other based on my own opinions on what needs to happen to make this really work.

The iPhone was the first in a class of its own. Its features and look software and hardware were just so impressive at launch….in 2007. Since that time, it has held it’s same user interface from 2007 and while there has been some changes to the hardware, it is pretty much the same phone they introduced in 2007. 3 years ago! In tech years that’s an eternity. Apple is a company of pure innovation and  has shown no true progress in 3 years. Apple. Please. STEP IT UP. Phones now offer animated widgets, the ability to update Facebook with out going into a Facebook app, realtime weather, alerts on the lock screen. The same icons sit in the same spots with no sign of a change. My hoped had been lifted before the introduction of the iPad, however it was literally just a stretched out iPhone, even the little icons were the same size on the same type of main screen which are dwarfed in comparison, the only step forward is the addition of a background! Woo. Apple had such a great chance to really drop a WOW bomb with this and to me and many others it fell flat. Sure it would be great to have if I was commuting compared to just a regular iPod, but there’s really no feasible use for me in its current state.

What chaps my ass is that Apple has just an unbeatable operating system– Snow Leopard. the UI (user interface) is beautiful, it’s fast, it really sets the standard compared to what is currently out there. So the question is why aren’t they taking the impressive features they have and moving them to the iPhone? Apple is always striving to go 2 steps forward, so why aren’t they doing this with the iPhone, why are they in such control that after 3 years you can’t even change the background of your home screen. The only customization you can make is the background on the lock screen and where certain icons can move.

I am not the only one on this rant, its all over the Apple and techy blogs. TUAW had visitors submit an open letter type of what they want to see in the 4th generation of the iPhone.

The theme is obvious on what people want. CUSTOMIZATION. FUNCTION. NEW LOOKS.  The picture to the left is something someone submitted as an ideal “lock screen” for a new iteration of the iPhone. I think that while it stick with the same look of the iPhone it is so great to see all of your current alerts and important information right there with out having to even fish around for them on the phone itself. That functionality would be a huge improvement. Beyond that they need to take a step forward on the way the iPhone operates in the users eyes. No the icons don’t need to CHANGE, but widgets are key, they are interactive and easy to use. They need to take their attention to beauty and make the UI just that. New and beautiful. I am a MAC 100% but yes, I have abandoned the iPhone. Until they step up the game and really take this to a new level, I honestly feel like it’s old technology at this point, which is strange because it set the standard for NEW technology when it came out!

Also on a separate note– PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE expand carriers in the US, every other country has options, not us. AT&T is NOT a great carrier, their prices aren’t competitive and you have more of a chance of me coming back faster if you were on Verizon or Sprint than staying with AT&T.

When the Android phones were coming out, I obviously kept a very close eye on what was going on. The first one that splashed in the US was the T-Mobile myTouch 3G, that didn’t get much of my attention because I don’t see T-Mobile as a carrier with any quality service (as far as actual network and coverage is concerned). Sprint took on 2 quickly after, the HTC Hero which I did drop my iPhone for which was heavily touted in the press as the hottest and most quality phone on the market. Well, despite some of its positives, it just did not work fantastic, there were too many bugs and I had to have 2 replacements within a month and 1/2. Not a good relationship. I decided to make the jump (again…yes) to the Motorola Droid. Verizon and Motorola made such a significant splash with this phone, especially targeted to the lack of features that the iPhone had in comparison. It was a direct slap to Apple, and I think they had proper grounds. I like the Droid, I am satisfied with it, it is powered by widgets, it has a lot of fun things you can add to customize, however for me it is STILL behind. Why is the grid so defined and spaced out, why are the icons SO small, if this is all customizable, why can’t I arrange things in a funky order? Why must I have the icon AND text for the icon. Little picky things yes, but for the customizable phone it definitely limits what you CAN customize. I want cool. It’s getting there, and yes it’s in its infancy stage with a lot of development ahead of it, early adopters pay that price, but I think that the potential is there. There’s one company below who is developing something for Android that I am really excited about…

Here is something that a company TAT has developed for the Android platform which I think should have been something integrated from the start. And it’s STILL not ready, but I definitely put my e-mail in to get on board when it DOES surface for consumers. The video does a much better job illustrating the differences, and it still isn’t “perfect” but it is a lot more customizable than the minimal “customizable” features of the Android system as it exists today.

This is the first interface that I actually think is ATTRACTIVE, FUNCTIONAL, and USER FOCUSED.

Lastly, the newest phone series to be announced, the Windows Phone. I was excited for the announcement to see what exactly they had up their sleeves, as they are coming from behind I expected them to have something really mind blowing in store for us. I absolutely love the interface they have for the Zune so I assumed that it would be just as great if not better. There are aspects of the phone that lean on that but if you want to scroll alllll the way back up to the top above my rant, you can see the home screen of the Windows 7 phones. What on EARTH were they thinking. Some say its simple but effective, I say its boring, has its positives by showing alerts but oh my god is it boring. There’s no life to it. I couldn’t have been more disappointed. The rest of the features are quite attractive so why did they make the home screen so damn boring. As expected they are only the software side of this. That is Microsoft though. Regular phone makers will be taking the operative system and using it for their phones, so really nothing special. Blah.

My recommendation. GOOGLE– Work with TAT asap, even looking through their other works they are really talented and have an amazing knack for some killer UI. With their ideas executed it would be a hard phone to beat when on the right hardware.

APPLE- Wake up, the iPhone was revolutionary in 2007. It’s 2010. Time to reinvent this wheel. It’s not broken but it needs to be fixed. Something FRESH AND NEW. PLEASE.

WINDOWS- Ugly. Come on, show some creative spirit.

For me, I am sticking with my Android but will no doubt head back to the iPhone when it reinvents itself.

Yesterday I popped on the blog and realized it had been forever since I had any updates! My bad!!! Not that there’s people clamoring for more of my drawn out stories, but still, I am getting back on the wagon and you shall see a lot more shortly!!!

So there are plenty of people for some strange reason stalking this blog. COMMENT ALREADY! Start some conversation. The only people who seem to want to converse are spam bots that want to talk about cialis or other enhancement drugs. I spend a good chunk of time deleting these spam posts.. about 50ish a day, just a pain in my ass, so I added the captcha field to the comments. I know… everyone HATES captcha, but this one is very basic, but just in case, here’s a picture that tells you EXACTLY how to do it.

The latest update to the house in honor of Mike and the upcoming Colts appearance in the Super Bowl…

Since my birthday last year I have been begging for the Apple Tablet. It was the worst kept secret in the tech world and as I am a gadget junkie I HAD TO HAVE IT. Well yesterday Apple FINALLY introduced their ‘iPad’ (please, enough maxi pad jokes… even I am not doing them.). I kept up with the live blogging and then watched their product video. The only thing I have to say… WHAT A DISAPPOINTMENT. I was SO SO SO excited for a revolutionary product and they came with a repurposed iPhone/iPod Touch. Don’t get me wrong, its a beautiful piece of equipment, and from watching their official video, but it doesn’t deliver to those who wanted something NEW, the “NEW CREATION” they were touting. I think part of it was alllllllll the rumors that have been surrounding it since last year, the fake mocks etc but, it’s safe to say I will PROBABLY not get this iteration of the product. Though who knows on that. I will say watching the video makes it seem MUCH cooler so who knows…

Watch the video here to see just how cool you think it is…

I am not going to lie. I am restless waiting for the big Apple event in 2 weeks where they have a new “product” unveiling. Everyone and their mother assumes it will be the longtime rumored tablet. There have been such a ridiculous amount of rumors, it’s hard to pretend it doesn’t exist but it’s also hard to pretend that it’s not out there! Well, Valleywag has taken things a step further by putting out a bounty for proof! It’s pretty insane and pretty HEFTY in the cash category, but I love that I am not the only one DYING for this.

Plenty of people consider American Idol to be a guilty pleasure. I am not one of those people. I am a proud American Idol lover. Last year I was bored during a show of songs I didn’t care about though, so I decided to “live blog” during the show. Well, to my surprise people were amused by this…even my HUMOR! Got me… I decided to keep it up and continue to live blog on American Idol and it actually started to draw in quite a bit of people from around the net, and even world! Hundreds of people were reading it. How the hell did that happen? While it wound down towards the end, I decided that since this is Simon Cowell’s last year on American Idol, it was probably the last year it will actually be relevant, so another year of live blogging it is.

I was pretty “on point” last year with my predictions of who would be voted off… yes… I am that good, through out the ENTIRE competition I was a Kris Allen obsessed fan. I didn’t think he’d overtake Adam Lambert for the win but was SHOCKED and PLEASANTLY surprised. Kelly Clarkson, Kris Allen, and Daughtry will remain my top Idols, and we shall see about this year…

Paula Abdul’s departure didn’t kill me as much as it did some, yes I will miss some of her drug induced splurges, however she “cleaned up” (as much as she could) last year so it wasn’t even that great, and I do get sick of her really idiotic clapping. I also have always liked Ellen so I think she will bring an interesting dynamic, I think she will be critical than most think, but constructive criticism, unlike Simon who calls it like he see’s it, but never goes the next step by saying what would FIX any issues, and the few times he has, he tells them it didn’t work…

Kara I think is just bipolar in her criticisms, she seems to try to final all the faults in great performances and all the positives in the bad ones making it seem like the good ones weren’t great and the bad ones were good. Stop trying to play a mix of Paula and Simon. It doesn’t work. Randy. You are in my dog house. I don’t want to hear anything about being pitchy or anything related to your dogs or who you’ve worked with in the past. We get it. You were a producer to big stars. Congrats. I am also not QUITE ready for Ryan Seacrest’s bad jokes or Ford commercials that I think are completely stupid (sorry Mom), but it’s TIME so I have no choice!

Live blogging will only begin with the Top 12, there’s just nothing to say about crappy auditions, though could have some good comments on some of the guest judges during the auditions like Posh and whoever else did it too. I will keep updating my post as I go through out the show, usually after the judging of a performance, with the newer comments on the bottom (just to keep it in an easier chronological order) only on performance nights! I will also add the “Dial Idol” results the MORNING AFTER which predicts the person being kicked off and their margin of error. They are usually on spot, but last year there were way too many “too close to call” moments.

Let’s see how this season goes! Will next year be X-Factor live blogging instead??

I was introduced to so many comedians this year, but Tucker Max’s book that was released in January of 2009 is definitely taking the award for best book of the year. They even made it into an indie movie, I haven’t seen it yet, but I am DYING to. If you have a sense of humor and don’t care about a guy admitting and describing his douche bag ways. READ THIS.

If you know me at all, you know that I have a healthy (unhealthy) obsession with one artist Alanis Morissette. Every album has something different to offer and has its own amazing charm. in 1998 Alanis’ international sophomore release ‘Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie’ was released after the insane pressure of following up the biggest selling debut album of all time. The album came at the height of an Alanis drought and as a 16 year old seemed to hit my own personal “emotional” roller coaster moments. Every song on this album was pure perfection. None of the songs really shined for a public single success, but the album sold pretty well though in no way matched its predecessor (though anyone who thought it could was fooling themselves).

This is one album where I find almost IMPOSSIBLE to pick a favorite song but here are my TOPS of the 17 track album:

1: Front Row
5: Sympathetic Character
6: That I Would Be Good
10: I Was Hoping
12: Would Not Come
13: Unsent
17: Your Congratulations

I was watching Sound of Music on TV and realized I thought it would be great to start putting together a list of things in my “classic’s” category, mostly for my own reference and anyone else that may be curious. Sound of Music is the first entry in the movie category, but I will round out tonight with a nice helping of media

Well I have been trying to think of the best way to wrap up my favorite songs of 2009 and I know many of them probably didn’t even originate in 2009, so I used Last.fm to check out what I exactly listened to and here it is. The artists in the top 10 won’t surprise anyone but the #1 artist MIGHT…..

]]> http://brendangrimaldi.com/2009/12/20/top-50-songs-of-2009/feed/ 0 http://brendangrimaldi.com/2009/12/14/new-car-jackpot/ http://brendangrimaldi.com/2009/12/14/new-car-jackpot/#comments Tue, 15 Dec 2009 00:56:07 +0000 Brendan http://brendangrimaldi.com/?p=694

Today I got to pick up my new car, a 2010 Volkswagen CC which I love, such an amazing ride, very luxurious in and outside. EXTREMELY happy!!! WOO!

Hey AOL. What happened since I left. Things weren’t going too bad. You were taking strides on the look. Not fast enough mind you but not disasterous. Now today I wake up to THIS. THIS is your new branding/logo? Who on EARTH suggested this, and WHO could have POSSIBLY said “OOOH NICE, LET’S DO IT” and who let them do it?!?!?! Bad. F-. Way to screw the pooch on this one.

Ok famous people, if you’re on the A list or the Z list, you still don’t have the above law ability to drive drunk and then get mad when caught. Publicity DUIs are also very transparent, it’s pathetic really.

Did you know… the white and yellow lines on the road are NOT just grafitti! They are the outlines on where your car should be, in things called LANES. They are there for a reason. If you are in a LANE, you need to stay INSIDE these lines. Swerving between lines is not acceptable behavior.

Just because you are in a “parking” lot, does not mean you go 1 MPH while looking for your own parking space.

Ok, I’m a nerd, and I admit it…about SOME things. This week we have out font/typography week in our Visual Aesthetics class, so I had put together this image with my favorite fonts. Just sharing.

Ok, so much to the shock of many, I have stepped down as an iPhone owner to embrace a new technology (and a much cheaper monthly payment) and I now have the latest phone ‘HTC Hero’ which runs the new Android technology made by none other than internet giant Google. It’s awesome and really steps things up from the iPhone world, therefore now things can’t be caught by iPhone… I don’t have one! I felt iCaught was the best I could do at 7:30 am to change it. Just an FYI for ANYONE who cared

The whole point of this is now the category Caught by iPhone is now iCaught… I know. Thrilling blog post. Not to mention I am moving from iPhones 2 megapixel camera to a 5 megapixel!

It’s about damn time. This better keep up!

Come on… don’t suck now!

I am still flying high getting an A for my first Masters class! WOO! One week left until my Visual Aesthetics class starts so decided to play around with my class webspace landing page, felt anything was better than the “Click here to enter blog” text. Tell me what ya think!

http://thegrimaldi.quicm.net/

So, Miley Cyrus’ Twitter departure is pretty much the most talked about thing on the blogosphere and in entertainment news. This is news? Who cares. How has some tween’s Twitter become so important to anyone. How has Miley Cyrus become this phenom where this is even relevant to the universe?  Twitter is the IT thing, and social networking interactions by celebs tend to dominate news, it is really where we are going, but to spend so much time focusing on a 17 year old’s Tweets drives me insane! Stop the madness, how did we let this social media have so much power over everything!?!?!?!

Oh and thankfully she created a rap to explain her departure… PHEW… hopefully we can all understand…