Dogpatch Press

Fluff Pieces Every Week

Tag: games

Interview with LyricWulf, a top furry Youtuber who shares the positive power of music.

by Patch O'Furr

“If you’re someone who’s got something to share with the world, there’s no better time than now”

See more at LyricWulf.com

LyricWulf is one of the top furry Youtubers with over 100K subscribers. What’s special about his music?

Art, fiction and costuming are full of furriness. Music isn’t always recognized as a fandom thing, but a lot of other stuff depends on it. Dance and music videos are a big gateway for newcomers. Con dances are a crossroads for goers and might get the lion’s share of production budgets. Live events are glue that makes fandom stronger than just internet relationships, and furry dance parties are some of the biggest local meets where they happen.

Unlike other things in fandom, a lot of the music comes from outside (although that’s changing). But back in the 1970’s and 80’s, nerdy conventions featured “filk” music – folk songs with fandom inspired lyrics. That’s rare now, and dances are more like a hybrid with separate subcultures (like rave and DJ party culture), which makes “furry music” hard to define.

A recent series at Dogpatch Press asked 10 furry musicians “what is furry music?” It’s hard to say more than “it’s made by or for us”, but think about how it can evoke feeling by using visual aesthetic, being a soundtrack, or even representing animal sounds like Peter and the Wolf does.

A great response came from indie-pop artist ABSRDST.  His cartoon aesthetic (gay ducks with romance lyrics) wasn’t made for fandom, it was just welcomed after he got started (and that was mutual). He put it on a shirt that was especially popular. One of the team for a certain cartoon duck show even wore it to work. That seems like pure furriness, coming from inside rather than intentionally made for a certain target.

Some of the biggest mainstream names who have associated with furries are in music. Many pro musicians use fursuiters in music videos. Jello Biafra (ex Dead Kennedys) and Margaret Cho (from The Masked Singer) did the biggest interviews on Dogpatch Press. For unusual genre crossover, Ronan Harris of cult band VNV Nation gives special appreciation to furry fans, and metal band Periphery let a fursuiter fan sing for them. The biggest names who have used fursonas may be Violent J of ICP and Andrew WK (a wolf). Heavy metal can go well with wolves.

Today’s guest isn’t a metal wolf, he’s the cute and cuddly kind! Let’s look into why music matters with him.

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Interview with Cornbread Wolf, the super fursuiter of Georgia Tech games.

by Patch O'Furr

From Cornbread's photo gallery

From Cornbread’s photo gallery

Sports fans are notoriously devoted.  Fursuits are incredibly photogenic.  Mascots and fursuiting make a powerful crossover when they meet.

It happens at games when fursuiting fans get noticed for national TV.  Sometimes a furry gets to be a mascot with the sweet moves and personalities that seem to spring naturally from our cons.  There are even official, high-profile team characters commissioned from fursuit makers.

That’s all covered in the article series continued in the recent Q&A with Uncle Kage and Kodi of Midwest Furfest.  It started with 1) The beginning of mascots and fursuiting, 2) Fursuiting crossover with pro sports, and 3) The National Mascot Hall of Fame.

Cornbread Wolf brings the voice of a true furry fan to this story.  This isn’t about ordinary furmeets, or a safe way to support teams like everyone else.  He stands out in the crowd in a super powerful way by following two passions to the same place.  It’s a great example of my favorite thing, Street Fursuiting.  Find him on Furaffinity, Facebook, and Twitter.

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Furcadia had amazing funding success, so they’re throwing a party for you today.

by Patch O'Furr

photo-original

Wikipedia says that Furcadia holds “The Guinness World Records title for the longest continuously running social MMORPG.”  (That’s all the research you get, because I have to post this with mere minutes of preparation! Whee!)

Furcadia’s founder Dr. Cat (AKA Felorin) tells me:

“We hit our $250K funding goal to finish up our 32 bit client, and we’re throwing a HUGE celebration of it this Saturday (April 4)! The team will be live-streaming all day as well as doing stuff in-game, and we’ll be showing off some of the 32 bit editors and artwork we’ve been making, and more.”

More about this news is on their journal.

Their funding appeal achieved it’s highest level, offering stuff like “a full 32-bit client for Windows, new layout & user interface, Redo ALL of the default patch art in full 32-bit,” – new places to explore and more:

$250,000 – Super Super Awesome Bonus Level 

Getting this level of funding would be like a dream come true for us at DEP, Catnip and the whole community. We will all celebrate our accomplishments together!

I said to Dr. Cat: “2400 backers means $100 average, that sounds like a healthy amount each… I’m guessing it’s unexpected and awesome to hit the highest level.  Why now?  How is it budgeted?  Any local connection for this story?”

He said:

“Our core team lives and works in Alamo, California. (I actually commute to San Francisco for a day job at another game company currently.)  That’s Emerald Flame, our Executive Producer & Head Designer and Community Director (along with a lot of other hats), Game Designer Gar, and company founder, President, Programmer, Game Designer Dr. Cat. We manage a team of folks all over the country & the world, all of whom we met originally in Furcadia (that’s where I found Emerald & Gar too!) We have a team member in Southern California too, Ninja – as well as people in Canada, Germany, and England.

Our core team is still paid from Furcadia’s revenues, the Kickstarter & followup fundraiser money has gone entirely to pay a mixed group of a little fulltime staff with a lot of part-timers, commissioned pieces of art, and some volunteers to stretch the money as far as possible. We built Furcadia initially with two people and $50,000 back in the mid 90s, where most MMORPGs took at least a couple million to make, even then. We have a lot of experience getting the most out of a small budget – most game companies would take millions of dollars to do the amount of development work we are squeezing out of $250K. If we didn’t have a lot of people highly passionate about this game & willing to work at a modest rate (and also hugely talented), we couldn’t do what we do.”

Fangcon brings peace, love and music with a Woodstock theme, on November 6-10, 2014

by Patch O'Furr

 

FANGCON is “the only anthropomorphic convention located within the state of Tennessee”.  Draconis submitted an exciting notice about their third annual event, happening this weekend.

Personally, if I wasn’t hosting a paw-print furry Twister game myself this weekend… I’d make like a Husky and pounce on their “largest Fursuit Twister Mat the fandom has ever seen.”  Psst… Twister’s slogan is “The Game That Ties You Up in Knots.”  Teehee.   

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Q&A with master animator Michel Gagne, part 2. Another in a series for fans and Furries.

by Patch O'Furr

TSOR_cover_700hgtDogpatch Press interview series:  Artists, animation directors, DJ’s and event organizers, superfans, and more…

Animator Michel Gagne talked about his movie, The Saga of Rex, in Part 1.  In Part 2, he says more about the movie and his overall career.  He also says that his 2004 Anthrocon Guest of Honor experience is the only Furry experience he’s had.  But there’s plenty of reasons to consider him a fan and inspiration to things we also love…

Michel Gagne Q&A, Part 2

 

(Patch) – Will the movie stick closely to the Saga of Rex graphic novel, or are you playing with adaptation?  

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Q&A with master animator Michel Gagne, part 1. Another in a series for fans and Furries.

by Patch O'Furr

Dogpatch Press interview series:  Artists, animation directors, DJ’s and event organizers, superfans, and more…

This week, animator Michel Gagne gets a two-part interview.  (Part 2 here.)  You may have seen his work on movies for Don Bluth, Warner, or Pixar.  He was Guest of Honor at Anthrocon 2004In 2012, Kickstarter backers pledged $57,875 towards his own animated movie, The Saga of Rex. The result was a 4:00 teaser, released in 2013 as progress towards the Rex movie.  

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