Sinking Ships Since the Dawn of Time
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I realized this morning that there is not a single day in my life that I do not think about my having had cancer. This is not to say it scares me- its just on my mind. Of course its time for my yearly scans and I have been avoiding them like I always do. What does it all mean? I just had to get that out.
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Disparite group of characters comes together under unusual circumstances. All are hurt in some way and slowly warm up to each other. Have them hurt each other but then bring them back together so that they all see that they are exactly what they needed. Let them heal each other, cut to credits.
With that said, The Station Agent was really good. Requisite quirky characters: People (and self) hating Dwarf, desperately social, talkative Cuban-New Yorker, Artist/Yuppie Housewife who’s lost her child. I don’t know how far outside of formula you can really go with character movies like this, so maybe pointing out its cliche is moot. However, the characters were all pretty well drawn and very empathetic. The Dwarf hates everyone, but the cuban needs to be everyone’s friend. Cuban serves Cafe con Leche to Yuppie woman, who initially blocks him out- until she almost runs over the dwarf- twice! Nice little flourishes featuring the adopted daugher from Lovely and Amazing and the dwarf’s love of trains. The dwarf’s name is Finbar, btw. Jen from Dawnson’s Creek has a bit part as a library employee pregnant and messed up with the wrong guy. Dwarf guy was in Elf and other things I guess, Yuppie/artist is Patty Clarkson and was also in the awesome All the Real Girls. I don’t really mean to sound so disdainful, the movie was funny and touching and I wholeheartedly recommend it. As a rental that is.
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I finally got a taste of the screwy new USB naming scheme this past weekend. It is truly one of the most evil things ever. I was chekcing out Mini Disc players and I noticed that they were “USB 2.0 Full Speed,” and thought “That is totally sweet.” But then I looked at the fine print on the back of the box, which stated: “USB 2.0 Full Speed is the new designation for the USB specification previously known as USB 1.1. It should not be confused with USB High Speed, which was previously known as USB 2.0.” So how many people are buying USB 2.0 Full Speed devices thinking they’re getting actual high speed peripherals. Crizazy.
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I’m literally missing my most heavily anticipated concert/movie of the year so I can finish my homework, and I haven’t even been slacking off this week!
Update: Decided to skip my homework and go anyway. I have to say I enjoyed it a great deal, though Text of Light ultimately isn’t the most involving film, the music was generally perfect and well considered. Very organic and even though DJ Olive was at a laptop for most of the movie everything seemed to gel quite nicely. Tim Barnes in particular seemed to be really listening to what everyone was doing. Near the end they did the “lets get really loud now to close it off thing” which seemed a bit forced, but overall it was pretty great.
I missed most of the first film whose soundtrack featured Micah Gough late of the Pittsburgh jazz combo 40 stories. It was from ‘95 so I assume it was something local. The second film, by Bruce Connor was called “Looking for Mushrooms” and was an amazing bit of humanity completely saturated by the drones of Terry Riley. I love Riley and completely fell into this movie because of his trance music. It was totally sweet, as the kids say. The movie seemed to be shot at like 2 frames a second and gave you just long enough to absorb each image until it jumped on a bit.
According to the Cortical Foundation the soundtrack was culled from Poppy Nogood and the Phantom Band All Night Flight Purple Modal Strobe Ecstasy with the Daughters of Destruction, which I own. It was much more saturated and loud than I remember it. Speaking of Poppy Nogood, I’ll never understand why they decided to split that album into little chunks that break in between tracks in a way that totally jars you.
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that the new Strokes Album really sucks? Style goes a long way in rock’n'roll but with this album they very quickly succeeded in removing all content outside of said style. Not that I expected them to ever be able to come close to the little gem that is The Modern Age, but this shitstorm gets them on the cover of rolling stone?
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This is probably not a weird thing:
Tonight, Dawn and I decided to dine at our local hardcore old-skool Kazansky’s Deli. Turkey Clubs were the theme for the evening. Nothing so weird there right? But wait..there’s so much more. Kazansky’s recently installed a little bar and big-screen tv for football games, and this evening behind the bar were two incredibly skinny-yet-buxom young ladies, chatting up the untucked shirt masses. These girls were covered in makeup and had skin-tight miller light t-shirts on, tied up right underneath their boobs with the rest falling out up top. They were so chatty and weird, I couldn’t believe it was real. I said to dawn, “Is miller light renting out girls now?” Sure enough: part of tonight’s nfl feature- which we spied on a sign as we headed into the night- was “Genuine Miller Girls.” Do I not go to bars enough to know that this is something that happens? The humanity!
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Whats up with The Ladytron putting out a mix cd? Can I put one out too? How does a band get to put out a compilation of music they like? Those degenerate pricks!
Speaking of degenerates, I picked up the Michel Gondry DVD this weekend. It is unfortunately not complete, but it has a lot of really amazing work and is utterly hilarious. Some of the videos interpret music so literally it is like you are watching the music play out before you, yet in a way you’d never considered. Great great great stuff. Spike Jonze’s real name is Adam Spiegel.
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Say what you will about filesharing, all of the music I buy today is due entirely to the fact that I’ve read about it or heard about it, sampled it via Soulseek and decided it was definitely good enough to own. And really, how is that any different than requesting it on a college radio station or something? Except that I can get the whole album. Nonsense…
Anyway, the new Rachel’s album is actually pretty good. I couldn’t really stomach them much after the Sea and the Bell’s, but I decided to download it based on the pitchfork review. Yes, I almost always completely disagree with Pitchfork on every count. Still, they grab my interest enough to get me to check something out. I’m glad I did. While they continue to be a sort of catch all post-rock orch-pop ensemble, they are willing to grab out for new sounds and generate a pretty interesting picture. I didn’t initially like it but one night I was walking to my bus stop from class- one of those frozen windy nights last week, and it really hit me. Melencholy and weird and oh so tasty. Lots of piano driven music that delves a little more heavily into what we recognize as minimalist territory. I hear Steve Reich all over it, but I am of course a huge Steve Reich fan. But there is a gamelan in that shit man, I mean come on. A lot of the melodies also kind of reach back into your subconscious and tell you to remember things- John Wiliams soundtracks? Themes from Back to the Future? I’m not sure where from, but I know I’ve heard it before. Apparently the found sounds and field recordings that I initially chalked up to a Godspeed ripoff (well, i guess they still are, but fuck Godspeed) are the result of people sending them “recordings of sounds meaning to their lives and environments.” Quite a few of them are actually interesting or touching. Lots of disconnected modernity to ponder. From the album’s description at Southern it looks like the package is mui importante as well, so the mp3s will simply not cut it. Christmas is coming people. I also got my hands on their collaborative re-doing of Full on Night with Matmos. That track was always the centerpiece of their early work, so I was happy to hear it again. Songs for Egon Schiele will be dinner music at our wedding. This is great music for a city winter. And winter music is where I’m living right now. See also: Little Earthquakes, And then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out
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Using RendezvousProxy and Putty I am now able to stream my iTunes library from work to my my device at home! Through SSH! 2048-bit encrypted! At full bitrate!
I’m installing panther on my G4 tomorrow. Can’t wait for the Quartzy goodness.
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