Revival Retro Events announced Revival 2013 a few months back and as the event draws near they have revealed their ‘mostly finalised’ floor plan. The event focuses on retro gaming and will host a large selection of arcade machines, consoles and computers. Traders, signings and talks from veteran of the gaming industry round off what is set to be a fantastic weekend. Retro GT will be in attendance and we hope to bring some new designs to shows off.

Revival takes place in Wolverhampton on the weekend of 18 – 19 May. Tickets are available at: www.revivalretroevents.com and they also have a dedicated Facebook page.

Having been put out of my misery about the bands who would be playing at Silicon Dreams (in which regular readers will know I have an interest…) I was able to concentrate on the rest of the event.

A DJ set by Hoffman is always a high point of any party – as a professional, he only plays the very best parties! – and seeing as he’s a scener too, he’s a popular man. My husband knows both him and his wife, SaVannaH, so this was a particular treat. I’ve seen several Hoffman concerts on the stream before but never managed to meet him until this party.

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Last month I blogged about the upcoming Silicon Dreams and Vintage Computer Festival event scheduled for early July. Today came the eagerly awaited announcement about the musical component of that event.

Earlier today, Silicon Dreams’ Facebook and Twitter feeds carried the news of which musicians will be headlining this event.

I’m pleased to be able to share with you that the evening’s entertainment will be An Evening with Martin Ware. Martin was the founder of Heaven 17 and you can expect some of their music to have an airing during the course of the evening too.

In the grand tradition of this festival giving two-for-one value for money, there will also be a performance by Northern Kind. Martin will kick off with a question and answer session, then Northern Kind will perform a preview of their latest album, before Martin returns to close the evening.

More details available in the press release linked above.

The main compos started with the ASCII and ANSI graphics, where people show off clever pictures made with text graphics.

Next up was the executable old skool music entries, which evoke memories of 80s synthpop, Jean-Michel Jarre and Mike Oldfield.

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*Blocks out the whatever-it-is cheap schlock-cop-TV garbage the still-drunken scroller group are watching and attempts to concentrate on the Pink Floyd-ish melodies floating up from the front of the hall.*

The rest of Friday evening was pleasurably occupied by a rerun of previous demos and competitions and a DJ-set from Alkana, which was melodic and earwormingly hummable without being too loud. The scroller group concentrated on getting severely drunk and quit trying to play their stuff louder than everything else once the volume of the main speakers was uprated to ‘deafening’.

The night shuttle was a welcome way to get home and several hours of sleep followed.

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OK, we’re in. E-Werk, Saarbrücken, otherwise known as a music and gathering venue of some repute. Metallica have played here, so I hear. The place is full of nooks and crannies and has loads of character.

Machines are now set up (two laptops, two Ataris) and in full working mode. Greetings are being exchanged and new friends made. Writing from now on this weekend will be carried out to a background of bleeps, whistles and pings, electronic music and, frankly, sometimes irritating tape loops. A scroller on a machine behind me is playing something which sounds like a bad accordion hoedown and recapping the news since the last Revision party.

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A drive of twelve hours, across five countries, with road signs in at least six languages. A Eurotunnel crossing, a fast food meal and too little tea, but we’re here.

The intrepid party including your blogger at large has fetched up in Saarbrücken to attend the Revision Easter demoparty and digital arts gathering in the E-Werk building.

The hotel receptionist switches fluently from German to French to English according to the needs of her clientele and is unfailingly polite in all three languages. The predominant language of staff and guests is German, the cleaning staff appear to converse in French and everyone has at least a few words of English.

The hotel is clean and warm, the beds comfortable and the twin duvets presently rather inviting! So, upon finishing my latest glass of wine, I shall be removing myself in the general direction of that destination.

No, no, not that I’m back here and posting again.

Something much bigger than that.

A ZX Spectrum running a Twitter feed. Image copyright P Thomas 2010. Image copyright also asserted by Colin Bell for
an almost identical image. Guess we both have good taste…and good cameras!

Gamers, geeks and retrofans who enjoyed the original Vintage Computer Festival GB held in association with the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park in 2010 will be thrilled to hear that a new festival, Silicon Dreams, is scheduled to take place in Leicestershire over the weekend of 5-7 July. I suspect, given my previous knowledge of these events (read ‘regular gatecrasher and chaos-causer’) that it will appeal to many of those who attended PlayExpo in Manchester last year too. Organised by the same team which brought you the Bletchley Park extravaganza (and Beeb@30) this weekend promises to be an unmissable mix of gaming, talks, presentations, music and all round geekery. Silicon Dreams is billed as a celebration of the silicon chip and is really two festivals in one, as it will also incorporate the Vintage Computer Festival GB 2013. *Wild cheers at the thought of another weekend like that! Sensory overload, anyone?*

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