MAGFest 13

Events, Game Music

Know Your MAG – Kirby’s Dream Band

January 7, 2015 | Brenna Wilkes | Comments Off on Know Your MAG – Kirby’s Dream Band Share this Know Your MAG – Kirby’s Dream Band

More Know Your MAG coming your way, and this time we’re focusing on a bunch of guys in pinky puff suits that bounce around on stage, jamming on their instruments while occasionally and inexplicably farting stars.

Okay, so that’s a bold-faced lie, but it’d make for an even more entertaining stage show than the guys in Kirby’s Dream Band already put on.

The six guys that make up the band are just regular dudes who know how to rock, comprised of Erich Beckmann on Drums, Andre Beller on Bass, Ian Luckey on Keyboards, Mike Montemarano on more Keyboards, Ryan Munz on Guitar & Ryan Olson on more Guitar. (Because why ever limit yourself to just one?) These gentlemen not only give a franchise that doesn’t see nearly enough spotlight on stage (Kirby), but also rock out a bunch of music from other games too, just to inject something other than pink puffiness into your lives.

Kirby’s Dream Band will be a secondary performer at MAGFest 13, and we’ll let you know when they and every other performer goes on as soon as we get the released schedule. In the meantime, check out KDB’s work and start falling in love in time for MAG!

Kirby’s Dream Band – Bandcamp
Events, Game Music

Know Your MAG – The Tiberian Sons

January 5, 2015 | Brenna Wilkes | Comments Off on Know Your MAG – The Tiberian Sons Share this Know Your MAG – The Tiberian Sons

It’s that time of year again; time for Know Your MAG! MAGFest 13 is under 3 weeks away, and there are a lot of new bands and performers this year, and bands we never got to cover this year that we might know a bit more about, so let’s not waste any more time!

Some bands are created specifically for debut at MAGFest, with either the intention of sticking solely to the music and gaming festival as a fun hobby, or to use it as a stepping stone for greater stardom down the line. New band The Tiberian Sons is one of those that are a little of both groups that will be a secondary performer at MAG 13.

The four-man metal band is made up of Colorado-based Tony “Prince of Darkness” Dickinson, formerly of Dwelling of Duels Live, on primary guitar and drummer Travis Moberg, guitarist Connor Engstrom from the mid-west, and Quebecois Max “Wild_Cat” Noel on bass. These men hope to melt your eardrums and thrash your soul into silly-putty with their symphonic metal melodies. By their own admission, however, ” The Tiberian Sons are NOT in fact a Command & Conquer cover band, they just think C&C is metal as #%&$”. (Bassist Noel confesses that the band suggestion “Pud’s Dudes”, a parody of Dickinson’s PuD’s DuDs album, was pitched and subsequently rejected prior to settling on their current name. A shame.)

The Tiberian Sons will be playing on Sunday amongst the other secondary bands performing at MAGFest 13. We’ll keep you updated for exact times and days of all performances when they are released, and be sure to register for MAG if you haven’t already!

The Tiberian Sons – Youtube

Disclaimer: The author has a casual friendship with at least one member of Tiberian Sons outside of the MAGFest professional arena.
Events, Game Music

MAGFest 13 Complete Music Lineup

December 18, 2014 | Brenna Wilkes | Comments Off on MAGFest 13 Complete Music Lineup Share this MAGFest 13 Complete Music Lineup

As of yesterday, the entire music lineup for next month’s Music & Gaming Festival, aka. MAGFest 13 has been completely revealed to the public. The large assortment of musicians and performers consists of 14 featured bands, 9 supporting bands, 15 chiptune artists and 7 DJs, including one of this year’s special guests Yuu Miyaki of Katamari Damacy fame. That’s a whole lot of music to cram into just a few days, so here’s a complete rundown of who’ll be performing on stage:

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Miscellaneous

MAGFest 13 to feature Katamari Composers and LonelyRollingStars

September 30, 2014 | Brenna Wilkes | 2 Comments Share this

After a bit of a lull in announcements, MAGFest has dropped a nice assortment of features for their upcoming MAGFest 13 event in January. Or should I say, rolled up a nice assortment.

Yuu Miyake and Yoshihito Yano, both the composers of the Katamari Damacy series and both veterans of Namco Bandai, will be featured as special guests at the festival. Miyake will be be the featured DJ during the late-night DJ dance party, whereas Yano will be a special guest speaker with a panel for all Katamari fans to gather and listen to tales of how the music of the series came to be. As if that wasn’t enough, MAG 12 performers and super band LONELYROLLINGSTARS will be featured performers during this year’s concert lineup after nearly creating a crowd katamari of their own during their set last year. (now featuring guitarist Ryan “Mega Beardo” Postlethwait stepping in for a retired Grant “Stemage” Henry)

MAGFest 13 will be held on January 23 – 26th, 2015 with tickets and hotel rooms available, but better to get on them sooner rather than later.
Game Music

MAGFest 13 Officially Opens Registration w/ Machinae Supremacy

August 8, 2014 | Brenna Wilkes | 2 Comments Share this

MAGFest 13officially opened to the public for event registration and hotel reservations as of yesterday afternoon. The music & gaming festival, being held this year at a slightly different time a bit later in January and on a Friday to Monday stretch instead of the usual Thursday to Sunday, announced the start of their pre-event hype with the return of Machinae Supremacy, who debuted at the event last year as one of the headliners. Supremacy released 6 minutes of music from their upcoming album “Phantom Shadow” just last month, and is sure to have some of this new material primed and ready for MAG 13.

As usual, MAGFest will release more guest and band announcements within the coming months, so keep an eye here and on our Facebook page for updates. Pre-Registration for MAGFest 13 starts at $40 for full event admission with various supporter and group options. Rooms at the Gaylord National Harbor are currently open for reservation as well. (though are experiencing some difficulties through the website, so be sure to check with MAGFest about any booking issues) With Machinae being announced first, who knows what other big names could grace the halls and stages of the Gaylord this year.
Chip Music, Featured, Game Music, Indie Music

New MAGFest 8.5 Event is Launching This September

July 8, 2014 | Michael Hoffmann | Comments Off on New MAGFest 8.5 Event is Launching This September Share this

The creators of MAGFest, the Music and Gaming Festival, have launched another event that will take place from September 12-14 at the Hilton Mark Center in Alexandria, Virginia. Unlike the regular MAGFest event, which takes place in National Harbor, Maryland every January, this event is taking place at the original MAGFest venue this fall. A few years ago, the main MAGFest event was moved to the National Harbor location, when the festival got bigger and required a larger venue. This new event aims to bring back the vibe of the early MAGFest days to current day festival attendees. Essentially a smaller and more intimate setting for game and music fans. MAGFest 8.5 will be happening in addition to MAGFest 13, the latter of which is set for late January.

For those of you not familiar with MAGFest, it’s a festival, as the name implies, dedicated to games and music. The event features tons of concerts from videogame cover/remix bands and guest appearances by some of the top videogame composers in the world. Past composer guests have included Nobuo Uematsu, Yuzo Koshiro, Chris Huelsbeck, and Tommy Tallarico.

Because of the smaller venue size for MAGFest 8.5, the tickets are going to be limited to only 2000 attendees. If you’re interested in getting out to this event, grab tickets and hotel reservations while you still can. Guests and music performers have yet to be announced. Information on hotels and tickets can be found at the MAGFest 8.5 website.