Just for Fun

Now that I’ve moved and live too far away to walk to work, I spend a lot more time in my car than I used to, so I’ve found myself searching for CDs to listen to while driving. Since I haven’t made any alphabet mixes lately, I decided to go back to my old habit of making a mix every month or so of what I’m currently listening to. It can be anything new or old, just songs that have caught my attention over the past few weeks. Here’s what I came up with this time:

1. Baltimore to Washington… Woody Guthrie
2. Come On Hard… Gin Blossoms
3. The Weight of the World… Editors
4. Crash… The Ocean Blue
5. Car Crash… Matt Nathanson
6. Catch… The Cure
7. Places… Blue Merle
8. Jolene… Dolly Parton
9. The Night Starts Here… Stars
10. Dance With Me… Cabin
11. Twenty Four Hours… Athlete
12. Gravedigger (Live)… Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds
13. Be My Escape… Relient K
14. Carolina… Josh Rouse
15. Words… Doves
16. Ohio… Damien Jurado
17. Ragoo… Kings of Leon
18. The One I Love (Live)… Liz Durett
19. Someone to Love… Fountains of Wayne
20. The Bleeding Heart Show… The New Pornographers

Standing on the Mountainside

I spent the past two days at Red Rocks taking in the inaugural Monolith Festival, and other than some sore legs, I’d call it a rousing success. The festival had five stages (the main Red Rocks stage plus four smaller areas), and over the course of two days, I saw 19 bands. Having been to a few festivals in my time, I was pretty impressed with the efficient timetable by which the bands’ sets were staggered (and the fact that everyone basically stuck to it), especially since this was the organizers’ first shot at this. Over the two days, I caught bits and pieces of a lot of performances, but here’s who I stayed to watch play more than one song:

FRIDAY
Everything Absent or Distorted
The Broken West
Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Das EFX
Kings of Leon
Editors
The Decemberists
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Cake

SATURDAY
Nina Storey
The Little Ones
Meese
Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s
Ian Ball (of Gomez)
Lords of the Underground
Art Brut
Spoon
The Flaming Lips

Whew. When I look at that list, it’s no wonder I’ve been so looking forward to chilling on the couch today.

After hearing so much about them, I was really looking forward to seeing the Lips, and they didn’t disappoint. They put on a great show (although I could have done with a little less speechifying from Wayne Coyne) with smoke, lasers, confetti, streamers, and dancing aliens and Santa Clauses, and were a great way to end the two days. Kings of Leon were definitely the highlight for me, but I was impressed by The Broken West and Ian Ball (who did some great covers and solo versions of Gomez songs), really happy to finally get to see Margot & TNSAS, and had my interest piqued enough that I’ll try to see Editors and BRMC in a different setting. It was also very cool to discover some great Denver-area bands (Everything Absent..., Meese, Cat-A-Tac, Nina Storey)—there’s a pretty solid music scene developing out here. Overall, this was a great festival experience, and hopefully, next year’s will be just as good. Parking was a breeze, it was easy to move between stages (as long as you don’t mind climbing stairs... lots of them), the food and merch was fairly reasonably priced (although they could use some more variety in the food department next year), the lineup of artists was solid, and of course the setting couldn’t be more amazing. I’m already looking forward to seeing next year’s announcement.

As a side note, I was really pleased to see woxy.com as a sponsor of Monolith. As I’ve said before, WOXY was the local college radio station in Oxford, OH (where I went to school) for many years, and turned me on to a lot of the music I still love today. Through a series of strange events, WOXY was forced to go internet-only, and has twice been snatched from the jaws of bankruptcy. I talked to one of their DJ’s, Shiv, about the happy fact that they’re still in business, and we reminisced about Oxford. Then he gave me a free t-shirt (rather appropriately, the graphic is a phoenix emerging from the ashes). Sweet.

Overrated

Thinking back over the past few weeks, there seems to be a theme to the pop culture I’ve absorbed: too much hype. The most pleasant experiences were the things I wasn't expecting anything from.

Slan, A.E. Van Vogt. Apparently, this novel is an important part of the sci-fi explosion of the mid-20th century. Maybe so, but maybe readers had lower standards back then, too. Yikes. Thankfully, the genre has progressed quite a bit since those days. While the alienated-mutant-on-the-run-from-human-authorities theme was pretty familiar (having been repurposed many times since, most noticeably as the basis for the entire X-Men mythology), the writing was so stiff and stilted that I barely made it through the book.

Little Children. Why did the critics love this so much? It was creepy and disturbing, the narrator was jarring and disruptive, and there wasn’t much likeable about any of the characters. Guess that’s reviewer-code for “edgy” and “gritty performances”. Well, the Oscars can have this one.

National Treasure. Nicolas Cage in a Jerry Bruckheimer production. Two guys that are emblematic of everything wrong with Hollywood. Of course they’re making a sequel. It was good to shut my brain off for a couple hours, I guess, but that’s definitely all I got out of this.

American Dreamz. This spoof of reality singing shows one was actually decent, although there were probably some inside jokes I missed because I’ve never watched American Idol. Given that tradeoff, however, I was happy to miss some of the humor. And seriously, why does Chris Klein keep getting roles?

Blades of Glory. Will Arnett gets the funniest line of the year: “Not only did we embarrass Marky Mark, we let down the Funky Bunch.” The movie was stupid and silly, but sometimes stupid and silly is all you need. Besides, who cares if the movie was any good? Jenna Fischer in lingerie! If I wasn’t on Team Pam before (which I was), I sure as hell am now. Yowza.

Superbad. Not as funny as all the hype, but still good for a lot of laughs. Michael Cera (of Arrested Development fame) is going to be hurting when he grows out of being able to play the awkward teenager, but for now, he’s got that role locked down. And of course, Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow continue their hot streak.

And speaking of those two, September 25 is now looking like the most geektastic day of the year, and Apatow and Rogen are involved. Not only is Halo 3 finding its way into the hands of millions of gamer geeks that day, but Knocked Up hits on DVD. Something tells me Seth Rogen may be celebrating by playing a little Halo himself. (And by something, I mean the fact that I played an online game of Halo 2 with someone I’m 99% sure was him recently.) On the other hand, he’s a big Hollywood star, so he’ll probably celebrate with coke and hookers. Hookers who play Halo. Or something like that. That’s what I would do, anyway.

Wilco at the Fillmore Auditorium. And now we get to the pleasant surprise. I’ve always had a hot and cold relationship with Wilco’s music, but I saw them in Columbus, OH about 8 years ago on a double bill with Matthew Sweet. I was there for Matthew, but I remember Wilco putting on a pretty solid show. So I knew they were capable performers, but no memories from that Columbus show could have prepared me for the show they put on Saturday night. The lineup of the band has changed somewhat over the years, and they seemed a lot more willing to rock out, putting two and three guitars to work on songs that are definitely more mellow on the albums. Plus, not only is new lead guitarist Nels Cline an amazing player, smoothly handling a wide range of styles from Neil Youngish to Brian Mayesque, he’s got the showmanship thing down, too. I had a great time, so much so that I finally gave in, went home and hit iTunes to fill in the gaps of my Wilco collection. And now I know I’ll enjoy it all.

Summer Reading (and Watching and Listening)

In between naps and bodysurfing, I cranked through a lot of stuff at the beach:

Books:
Back in the USSA, Kim Newman and Eugene Byrne. An interesting idea that held my attention for 3/4 of the book, then lost me at the end. This book is a series of short stories that tie together at the end, but the overarching idea is flipping the script of the Cold War: At the end of World War I, Russia peacefully becomes a democratic monarchy in the British vein, while the US is taken over by a Socialist Revolution. The stories largely imagine how well-known Americans and Russians’ lives would have differed, but like many of Newman’s books, fictional characters appear in this world as well (i.e frequent humorous appearances by Jake and Elwood from The Blues Brothers).

The Children of Hurin, J.R.R. Tolkien. A “history tale” from Tolkien’s early days. Having previously read two incomplete versions of this story in The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales, I was prepared for the fact that this wasn’t going to be The Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, but it was nice to read a complete and polished version. Being a Tolkien geek and a completist, I always like to fill in the backstory gaps.

The Devil’s Teeth, Susan Casey. In retrospect, maybe not the the best book to read right before a beach visit, but I had just finished watching Discovery’s Shark Week and wanted more scary fishes. Casey documents her time chasing Great White sharks through treacherous waters off a remote and dangerous group of islands 30 miles west of San Francisco. Non-fiction, but it reads like a good novel. I highly recommend this one.

Lisey’s Story, Stephen King. King just keeps getting better with age. Ever since I read The Green Mile and Bag of Bones, I’ve been convinced that in 50 years, King will be as much a part of the average American Lit class curriculum as Faulkner, Vonnegut and Salinger. Lisey’s Story did nothing to change my mind. King’s ability to interject the supernatural into everyday life just gets better with age.

DVDs:
Summer of Sam. I bailed on this movie after half an hour, but I can’t decide whether it was because of John Leguizamo (who I mostly can’t stand) or if it was just plain bad. Spike Lee is usually pretty hit or miss with me, but I find it hard to reconcile the fact that the guy who made this stinker also made a masterpiece like The 25th Hour.

Undeclared. Another Judd Apatow project, this series was on Fox for the blink of an eye back in 2001. Featuring pretty much everybody from Apatow’s previous series, Freaks & Geeks, Undeclared also has great guest spots from some turn of the century comedy royalty: Will Ferrell, Adam Sandler, Ben Stiller, Amy Poehler, and of course, a young Seth Rogen (P.S. I can’t wait to see Superbad), as well as guest directors like Jon Favreau and Jay Chandrasekhar (of Super Troopers fame). Although it’s still unpolished here, that same trademark Apatow sweet/raunchy back and forth is peppered throughout the series. Definitely worth the rental if you like any of Apatow’s other work.

The Host. This Korean monster movie is a perfect example of why sometimes it’s better to just let a movie be a movie and not have to be an “event.” If The Host was made in the US, it would have probably ended up being some giant summer tentpole, and all the whole focus of the movie would have been the overly CGI monster and giant battle scenes. Instead, the monster is mostly shown in brief glimpses, and the movie stays focused on one family’s attempt to rescue a young girl who has been captured by the monster. It’s not often that I’d call a monster movie “sweet”, but that’s exactly what The Host is.

Music:
All good, for different reasons that I’m too tired to write about right now.
Stars, In Our Bedroom After the War
Galactic, From the Corner to the Block
Ted Leo / Pharmacists, Hearts of Oak
Foamfoot, Live at the Troubador 1-8-94
Dave Matthews & Tim Reynolds, Live at Radio City
Editors, An End Has a Start

Classic

I just got back from a week in Ocean City, MD, and as much I enjoyed the week of napping on the sand, I was glad to make it home for last night’s MLS match between New York and LA. It turned out to be the kind of game that MLS’s head honchos had to be drooling over when they signed David Beckham: more than 66,000 showed up at Giants Stadium and were treated to nine total goals in a 5-4 New York victory (conveniently in a game between the teams from the two biggest TV markets in the nation). Beckham played the entire game and set up three of LA’s four goals, but LA continued their streak of generosity, bringing in the fans at someone else’s stadium, but then graciously allowing the home team to win. New York took full advantage, using the opportunity to show off their own offensive star power, getting a pair of goals each from Juan Pablo Angel (a less-heralded import than Becks who’s been making a big impact on the field this year) and Jozy Altidore (the latest US wünderkind who turned heads at the recent Under-20 World Cup), as well as a world-class strike from Clint Mathis. As a DC fan, I would have been happy to see these two teams grind each other down to a painful and exhausting tie, but as an MLS fan, this was a fantastic game to watch. Check out highlights here.

Stargazing

46,ooo+ fans showed up at RFK tonight to see some dude named David Beckham finally start earning his paycheck. Shrugging off the distraction of the rays of golden light and choirs of angels that instantly appeared once Beckham and The World’s Most Expensive Ankle touched the pitch, Luciano Emilio managed to score his 11th goal in his last 10 games, and DC United played a solid match to earn the win. Good times.

Coming into this game, United was averaging 17,720 fans a game. So if 5,000 or even (dare we dream) 10,000 of those extra 29,000 fans from tonight decide they liked what they saw and come back for more DC games, this whole Becks experiment may actually be worth something after all.

Best moment of the night: DC’s very vocal and tuneful supporters group the Screaming Eagles had this message for Beckham. Given the amount of prominent display that it got on ESPN2’s cameras tonight, whoever came up with that banner should never have to pay for their own drink in DC again. Hi-larious.

Solid As A Rock

Rush at Red Rocks. At this stage in their career, most bands are either long-retired or playing greatest hits shows in Branson. Rush is one of those rare groups who have managed to continue to record decent new music—nothing earth-shattering, but certainly not embarrassing in terms of their legacy—while still managing to play enough hits to please their fans. Having long ago moved beyond the necessity of an opening band, Rush hit the stage right at 8:00 and played two sets totalling more than 3 hours. The set list was evenly split between the well-known crowd pleasers (Tom Sawyer, Freewill), the new stuff (I don’t know any song names, but it doesn’t really matter as they all sound the same anyway), and most enjoyably for me, some really deep tracks that they dug out for the hardcores (A Passage to Bangkok, Witch Hunt, 4 of the 6 tracks from Permanent Waves). Unfortunately, as great a venue as Red Rocks is, last night the wind was blowing hard and playing havoc with the PA system, but despite some dodgy sound, the show was entertaining, and the people-watching was fantastic (think tons of drunken redneck metal fans mixed with a thousand dorky guys in their 40s air-drumming along with Neil Peart’s solo). It wasn’t the best show I’ve ever seen, but for a bunch of guys getting closer to 60 than they’d probably care to admit, it rocked pretty hard.

Limelight
Digital Man
Entre Nous
Mission
Freewill
The Main Monkey Business
The Larger Bowl
Secret Touch
Circumstances
Between The Wheels
Dreamline

Intermission

Far Cry
Workin' Them Angels
Armor And Sword
Spindrift
The Way The Wind Blows
Subdivisions
Natural Science
Witch Hunt
Malignant Narcissism > Drum Solo
Hope
Summertime Blues
The Spirit Of Radio
Tom Sawyer

Encore
One Little Victory
A Passage to Bangkok
YYZ

F’ed Up

1. Fire Exit… Mitch Hedberg
2. First Try… Tracy Chapman
3. Fingers Of Love… Crowded House
4. Fortress Around Your Heart… Sting
5. Forget About It… Alison Krauss
6. Fire Island, AK… The Long Winters
7. Fake… The Frames
8. Florida Silver Springs… The Impossible Shapes
9. Forty Mile Town… Eric Johnson
10. Fans… Kings of Leon
11. Fake Palindromes… Andrew Bird
12. Four Winds… Bright Eyes
13. Fall On Every Whim… Longwave
14. Flowermound… Collin Herring
15. Four-Eyed Girl… Rhett Miller
16. Friends of P… The Rentals
17. Finest Role… The Samples
18. For What It’s Worth… The Cardigans
19. Fake Empire… The National
20. Find The River… R.E.M.
21. Forever Young… Youth Group

Moviemaking

1. Casino Royale. I watched this DVD again the other night, and my original review holds up pretty well. I was struck again by the grittiness of the film as compared to previous Bond flicks, and also by the fact that even though I knew it was coming, that torture scene still made me cringe.

2. The Good German. Steven Soderbergh and George Clooney have had some pretty interesting collaborations, and while they haven’t all been successful, there’s usually at least something worth taking away from the movie. In the case of The Good German, they attempted to recreate the post-war noir films of the 40’s, with pretty amazing results. The lighting, the camera angles, the use of stock footage, even the dialogue and the way it was delivered were spot on. There were times that I had to remind myself I was watching a modern movie. Clooney and Cate Blanchett were particularly good, but it was a little tough to imagine Tobey Maguire as an asshole who beat his girlfriend (he’s just too nice to have a dark side). The plot was decent, but it was really the achievement in filmmaking that kept me interested in this one.

3. The Simpsons Movie. So, here’s where I stand on the Simpsons. I’m not a regular watcher, and haven’t been for quite some time. I can’t quote chapter and verse like some people I know, but over 19 years, I’ve come to realize that the strength of the show lies in its supporting characters. All the personalities around Springfield add layer upon layer of humor to the show, and as the show has gone on longer and longer, these characters have gotten more and more play. After all, there only so many times you can tell the same stories about Bart, Lisa, Homer, Marge, and even Maggie. So it was a bit of a surprise that the secondary characters remained so, well... secondary in the movie, especially when it came to which characters had relatively big roles (Comic Book Guy, Cletus), which had surprisingly small ones (Mr. Burns), and which had none at all (where were Principal Skinner, Snake, and Sideshow Bob?). But the writers were able to make a sharply funny movie by focusing on the core Simpsons family and keeping the story tight. They could have easily gone off on plenty of tangents along the way, but by keeping the secondary characters in the background, it made me appreciate them that much more when they did pop up on screen. Aside from that, the movie was typical Simpsons—sharp, witty social commentary wrapped around a basic story of Homer doing something idiotic with dire consequences and then redeeming himself (only this time he had 3 times as much time as usual to get things right). The audience at yesterday’s matinee was laughing out loud for most of the movie. Plus, the animation was super-crisp and looked really good. Based on the credits, I would hope so, because it looked like they had more than 1,000 animators working on that thing. I have to admit, I was skeptical when this movie was first announced. I figured they were 10 years too late with this one. But the movie proved me wrong, and I’m happy to admit it. After all this time, The Simpsons have still got it. Cowabunga, dude.

Odds and Ends

1. There’s a trailer up for the new Wes Anderson movie, and not a moment too soon. I think I’ve had my fill of sequels and car commercials masquerading as movies based on toy commercials masquerading as cartoons. More original and quirky, please.

2. I’ve currently got major nerd love for The Venture Bros. DVDs. The show is part of Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim lineup, and intelligently spoofs old shows like Johnny Quest and the Hardy Boys while working in as many geektastic sci-fi and fantasy references as possible. It’s also got a great retro visual look that I love. Entertainment Weekly recently gave the show some love in their EW 100 issue. Definitely worth checking out.

3. David Beckham finally made his debut in a Los Angeles Galaxy uniform. No confirmation on whether he actually walked on water after the game. I feel no need to add to what’s already been written, but hopefully now the focus can go back to the soccer. There were some great MLS games this weekend that were completely overshadowed by ESPN’s over-the-top Becksturbation.