p e n g u i n d e v i l

As always, pondering a way to get more music for less dough, I decided to try something that I hadn’t done for quite a while. Most of “my” music I listen to through the iPod, not in the home. But since I am most attracted to music in the LP format, this means that I have a lot of music that I haven’t heard much. So I’ve decided to expand my listening range by mp3ising some LP’s, which is a chore that I haven’t put much time into for quite a few years. Enough years, in fact, that OS 9 is now far behind me and the program that I used to use for this process, (CDSpinDoctor), is well beyond usable. So I scooted the stereo around a bit and searched around and came up with the program Audacity at Sourceforge. Well, it works very similar to the old CDSpinDoctor and it works well! Since it still is a bit labor intensive, I only did two albums, but they were good choices. Both were bands that I discovered via a free song downloaded out the on the internet, which led to getting a hold of the LP’s. What this tends to lead to is one song heard many times and the other songs heard rarely, or never. Well, now after getting these two great albums on the pod, I feel ready to burn some more!

Of all of these LP’s that I haven’t played (or only rarely), I picked two that I have long been waiting to hear in their entirety Eljudner’s “Daudingekvider” and “Moribund” by Koldbrann. Both are great additions to my mp3 arsenal and it’s great to have them available. What will be next?

In the name of this process I must give proper respect to two organizations, One is Sourceforge. I swear it seems like I get more and more software from them: Audacity, Abiword, Niceplayer, ScrobblePod, FFmpeg… The list goes on. They seem to have a program for every need and it’s a great project! All software should be open source… If only I had enough programming savvy enough to contribute to any of these projects.

And secondly, Northern Silence… not only are they a great label with tons of great stuff, but they are great to deal with. if you, like me, are stuck somewhere outside of Europe you probably know how hard it is to find quality Black Metal around on vinyl. And even with mail order you can have a hard time finding really great stuff… especially on LP. But Torsten has all sorts of baddies! It’s a great label with awesome bands, nice vinyl (hundreds of choices!) and lots of great shirts that not only aren’t available in the USA but they have them in sizes smaller than the elephantine sizes that tend to be available here. Highly recommended!

Well well well… Sometimes you really have to wonder. So lil’g went and commuted “Scooter’s” sentence? Taking just the blame and avoiding the worst part of the punishment? That makes Scooter a pretty lame fall-guy. Since I think everyone is of the thought that he took the blame away from the higher guys, it takes some gall for Bush to let him take his blame and then to let him off. But then again, what does it matter now how low his approval rating is?

But what’s really been setting me off are these neighbors across the way. Some horrid old middle-aged woman who talks loudly with a voice so horridly worn and wasted that it seems a joke, numerous little yappy dogs that yap and yap and a family tendency to play the tv loud with her front door open… Which is about 20 feet straight across from our windows. I mean, yeah they do seem to quiet down about 1 am, but the yapping, the tv yelling at us from across the way, the yelling/fighting and that loud cackle, some bastardized black metal lizard rasp of a lifetime of cheap cigarettes and straight liquor make her quite the neighborhood trash. I am not looking forward to a summer of having to keep our windows open with her out there. In fact, our immediate neighbors (the only people closer to her than us as their windows are immediately across from her porch) are moving across the hall to get away from this side of the building.

Speaking of black metal, I did manage to pick up a couple of things recently. Since I generally buy things that I haven’t heard before, I am never sure what I’m getting, even if I stick with those I know. But I risked it. I added Gorgoroth’s Twilight of the Idols. It is from 2003 and with a lot of these old bands I feel unsure of what to expect with their newer material, but this one? I thought it was great. Admittedly it seems more “approachable” than the older stuff of theirs that I tend towards, (Antichrist and Destroyer) but I thought it was pretty good, especially the first track, with some nice strong rhythms. But then, I like the couple of tracks I have heard off of their newer album Ad Majorem Sathanas Gloriam, so maybe they get better with age, or they are aging similarly to me. At times though, the clarity of the lyrics (in English) seemed a bit much. I do like to maintain the sense of foreignness when listening to this stuff, even if most of it now seems to be in English. On another plus side, the liner notes feature some of those wonderful Peter Beste, photographs…

Then I had a similar experience with Finntroll. I bought Nattfödd which is the most recent music I have heard from and liked it quite a lot, too. Though it was slower than their earlier albums and it lacks the catchy hits of Jaktens Tid, I think it is, all around, the strongest album of theirs that I have heard. So another lucky guess.

In a less black sense, I got the new album from 3 Inches of Blood, Fire Up the Blades. I am sure we all remember the great things I had to say about their previous release, Advance and Vanquish, and those still stand. While this new album is good, it’s just not as much greatness as the earlier one. Advance and Vanquish sounded like Maiden with more Rock added and all of the boring parts and dull songs removed… Like how Maiden should have sounded (except for the addition of a second, more modern style vocalist). This album continues the trend of improving on the 80’s sound, but is less Maiden and more standard heavy metal, which just doesn’t pique my interest as much.

And then to flee totally from Metal, another 3 years have gone by so there is another Beastie Boys album to pick up, The Mix-Up. I knew that it would be all instrumental, but with them, who knows what that might mean. Well, now we do. Instrumentals are the one area that I have maintained mixed feelings about with this band. Back in the day they put out some brilliant instrumental tracks like 33% God, but once Ill Communication came out they had moved into this “groovy funky” sound for those songs. Which I just don’t get into. Of course, The Mix-Up continues the ill communicationish vibe of “groovy funky”. Ill Communication was easily their low point and I never really did get into it. The Mix-Up is another one that will take some getting used to. I’ve played it a couple of times and it’s growing on me but only two songs stuck with me right off the bat, The Rat Cage and The Cousin of Death. Now in my mind, these guys can pretty much do whatever they want but with the average of 3 years between albums, if you think one is a miss, that’s a good long wait until you get to see what’s next. At least I’m not at all tired of To The Five Boroughs yet…

Always trying to keep things fresh, we are. Due to some (sort of foreseen) circumstances, we decided today to put off the East Coast move for an unknown period and settle in Portland. I imagine that we will head out there at some point, but for the last 3 years we’ve been planning on moving this summer it is starting to seem like the deadline has become the focus, not the preparedness. And we don’t feel prepared (in any way) to make this kind of move. It is an odd feeling to suddenly change directions after so much thought, but I think that we have done so much thought about it that it makes the decision to move seem almost unnatural, which isn’t how we want it to feel. I think that in the long run, this will be the wisest choice, but after getting so used to (and hesitantly excited about) moving to Vermont, it made me a bit sad when I saw the 802 video…

Since we are on the topic of music, as someone who listened to (more than) his share of Priest, Fate and Maiden back in the day, I thought I had known all the great bands of the era. Shocked I was this week when an ad banner (of all things) at last.fm introduced me to a band I’ve never heard of… 3 Inches of Blood, possibly the best of the 80’s metal bands! Once I heard a song by them, I was so excited by the wonderful sound that I rushed out and pre-ordered their upcoming new album (I think the first Roadrunner Records release I’ve purchased since When Satan Lives almost 10 years ago!). I couldn’t help but wonder how I had missed them back then…But it’s probably because they didn’t actually exist until 2000…

But they have a great 1980’s sound and it’s refreshing for me to find metal I can stand that isn’t either Black Metal or 25 years old… Ever since the sad day that Turbo was released, there’s been a great reluctance for me to accept regular heavy metal. So this brings me hope that I’m not just bitter, maybe it really has all stunk these last couple of decades and maybe there’s a chance that “nu-metal” will finally die out and be replaced by good music once again.

Well, well, well.. So the Beastie’s played a private party here in town 3 days ago. Now, I know, you’re thinking, so what? Well, settle in, it’s a long sad story. See, I have a hard time going to concerts. I usually change my mind day of show, figuring that I’d rather just stay home. But I always imagine that I’d break that tradition for the Boys. See, I first stumbled on them on the USA network in about 1985 when I encountered the “she’s on it” video. I then ran out and picked up the Rock Hard 12″ and they’ve been in my “big three bands” list ever since. And since their most recent album, To the Five Borough’s, is easily the second best of their career, attending a show should still be a going concern.

So, of course, I’m going to be checking them out whenever they come to town, right?

Well, seemingly wrong. With my history I feel that even had this weeks show not been a private party, I probably wouldn’t have gone anyway.

I must, sadly, list my failures in this regard to attend the local Beasties shows… Here are the ones that I can think of:

1) (no) Roseland Theater for LTI tour. I changed my mind, though most of my friends went.
2) (no) Coliseum. With RUN-DMC on the Together Forever Tour. I didn’t get around to it.
3) (no) Lollapalooza (with the monks) Didn’t go. I can’t stand the thought of festivals.
4) (yes) Salem Armory. Had to go. Couldn’t miss them 4 times! Oh, and L7 was playing too…
5) (yes) Rose Garden (Hello Nasty). Went to that one.

So since then it’s been a quiet 7 years, with no shows to worry about. Then I learn of that secret show three days ago, and then next month (on what seems to be their only American tour date for 2007) they’ll be right up the river for the Sasquatch festival which I won’t be going to. Oh well. At this point, why worry. I’m still just feeling some reeling from the unexpected show.

Boys Live…
Image from w+k blog
The King and Mike…
Image from w+k blog
very blue…
Image by Bgirl*555 In more media news, The Sopranos debuted tonight. Well, I wasn’t super fond of the episode, but I think that was the intention, to leave people with big questions about what’s just about to happen. I kept waiting for more of Paulie and to see Sil. Instead, Janice and Bobby, over and over… I can’t stand Janice or any of her storylines.

In non-media news, I have recently discovered that those big blow up birthing balls (or exercise balls, whatever they are), make great everyday seats!

Does this page need more color?

First off, I received multiple shocks this week when I learned that Michael Anthony had been booted from Van Halen! First shock was that it happened (have eddie and alex no shame?) and the second shock was that I had no idea. Yes, admittedly, I haven’t paid them no mind since Diver Down came out… But still! He was my old favorite example of “cushiest job in the world”. Of course, it’s not traumatic like it was when they hammered the last nail in their rock coffin and fired Diamond Dave back in ’85, but still surprising. To fire a 30 year member of the band and replace them with someone 15 years old? Let lil’ Wolfie start his own darn band! Well, whatever, I just had to gripe. Really the band should have retired 20 years ago before becoming a lame pop machine.

Oh, but what about movies? Not too many and none too dramatically memorable.

But let’s see:

We rented The Hunting of the President. I thought it was alright. Basically lots of information about how big a fraud the Whitewater scandal was. How nothing wrong even happened, how corrupt the grand jury was, the creepy ties between all of these people… The Arkansas Project, the current Bush Administration, Reagan judges, the American Spectator… Of course, like all of these, it only goes to remind us how corrupt people in power (and people wanting to be in power… See: Kissinger) can be. But it was good to watch.

The Shop Around the Corner. Well, this was pretty cute. I thoroughly enjoyed the funny little plot twists and the thought that you could support yourself well and a half dozen full-time employees with a sparsely filled shop selling knick knacks certainly beckons one to think of the good old days! Anyway, it’s the story of a couple (Jimmy Stewart!) who work together and dislike each other yet have unknowingly fallen for each other via mail. Of course, it all rotates around if they will discover each other (the truth!) in time. There are some wonderfully fun performances (I particularly like Frank Morgan as the shop owner) and also suspicion, infidelities and false accusations. Another good and fun romantic comedy drama where Stewart plays the arrogant fool.

Then continuing on the King path, we watched The Storm of the Century! Certainly one of the better Stephen King TV miniseries, though plotwise it was rather the same idea as Needful Things. The story, while interesting, seemed a bit overdone for what the twist ends up being. I feel like sometimes you can get people to agree to things without killing lots of them first… But what do I know? Anyway so a bad man comes to town and people start dying. It doesn’t take long to realize he’s behind it but he won’t tell people why… He basically just says, you’ll have to wait to find out what I want, but in the meantime, I’ll kill some more…. Then a storm comes along and cuts them off and chaos and paranoia ensue! The acting is mediocre, but it doesn’t look as cheap as most of them and it’s quite watchable.

On a cheerier note, we watched The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio. This was a fun and entertaining movie. The true story of a mother who enters contests to help support her family due to her knack for writing jingles and her drunken husband’s inability to take care of things. It’s a roller coaster ride of ups and downs and Julianna Moore is great as the mother will stop at nothing to keep her head high and her family afloat and Woody Harrelson (ugh) is also pretty good as the father whose failures lead him to stop at nothing to drag his family down. It is: engrossing, fun, sad and a great glimpse into some of the charming aspects of yesteryear (primarily, when you actually had to do something to win something, not just send in a proof of purchase).

We went to the theater to finally see the new Jim Jones Documentary, Jonestown: The Life and Death of the Peoples Temple. If you’re familiar with this stuff, it’ll be pretty be what you’ve seen in the other documentaries and with Powers Boothe in the Guyana Tragedy. This one features some unseen footage (some good early days of the Temple stuff and film of Ryan’s visit and departure) and some good new interviews with survivors and family members. Both of us can’t get enough of Jim Jones… And watching these totally brings back memories of watching it on the news. Man, the things people do to belong. I feel bad for the kids and I’ve aways felt sorry for Rep. Ryan.

Anyway, though I don’t mention it much, we do tend to watch alot of DTvD’s. It’s been more interesting this week so here’s what we’ve been up to. We have set out to watch all of The Sopranos again, in order. This week we’ve done the first season and maybe half of the second season. Though I’ve seen these seasons all too many times it’s as good as always. I’m also thinking hat the second season isn’t as bad as I’ve remembered it to be. We also grabbed the first volume of the SCTV Dvd’s. We’ve watched some of those and, yes, as my teenage memory would attest to, I do like them alot more than SNL. John Candy? Rick Moranis, Eugene Levy? And the always brilliantly funny Catherine O’Hara! it’s pretty much all just very funny and it’s a real pleasure to be able to watch Bob and Doug MacKenzie again!

ready for vermont…
sctv episode 1
Plus we got the sets of the first season of Perry Mason! High highly recommended! Yes, I know that it’s on TV everyday (heck it’s played weekdays at noon on channel twelve for all of my rememberable life), but this beats it! It turns out that the broadcast episodes each have as much as 10 minutes chopped out! What?! And Perry seems nastier and sneakier here, which I like. Anyway, the best TV series of all time has finally struck DVD and even if you watch it on TV you owe it to yourself to pick these up! 30 years of watching and I’m no where near sick of it!

Then we trotted off to the theater for For Your Consideration. Um. Not too good. The story of some folks working on a small film (story of a Purim homecoming in the south) when buzz starts spreading that some of them might be under consideration for Academy Awards. It’s about them running around wanting to get Academy Awards, then they start getting press and then the Academy Awards come. I think everyone did a good job with the acting and all and there was some fun make-up but the movie just seemed to be missing something Like somewhere to go.

Yes, I know it’s been too long, but there’s been a lot of stuff going on that I won’t bother to mention here, but there are some less exciting things that I will mention… Finally…

So I watched Much ado About Nothing. Silly, yes, but very cute. Branagh was easily the high point. He was soo enthusiastic you could feel it through the screen and most of the characters were well played. of course, the exception? Keanu was the low point. He’s basically had two good roles, Ted “theodore” Logan and Matt. Everything else stinks. No, not the movies he’s been in… The job he’s done in those. He’s been in some darn fine movies, but whenever he’s on the screen I don’t think anyone can think anything except, why’d they get this guy to stumble through this role, just pray that he doesn’t say anything! So aside from his crippling scenes, it’s a fun film!

Then, probably for the first time, I witnessed Goodfellas in the theater. I’m sure we’ve all seen this (though, while I was watching it I couldn’t help but wonder if anyone there had never seen it before). Anyway, it was what it is: probably Scorsese’s finest film (though that point could be argued with about a half dozen other movies), a cornucopia of Sopranos actors, brilliant lines, great (truish) story, the peak of Pesci’s tough guy roles, one of De Niro’s 6 great roles of the last twenty years, Ray Liotto’s awesome breakthrough role (though that should have been Something Wild)… Really, it is just a great film: beautiful, well cast, great script, music utilized to perfection… A flawless movie and one of the best gangster films ever.

Sword and the Sorcerer. One of the favorites from the old days. I recall how strangely the scene on tomb island lodged itself in my head! Yes, all these years later, of course, the effects and sets and costumes seem shoddy for how I remembered them when I was 14 but… It is a grand film. Maybe it looks abit hokey, but they certainly tried for a grand scope storyline, with narration and everything. A must watch classic for folks into these things! Non-stop & crazy action, like an old pirate movie. Oh yeah, the swords are ridiculous (especially the three bladed sword but also the baddie’s sword), even silly. But It’s the best movie of it’s ilk. Well, excepting the Harryhausen’s.

But where’s the promised sequel? Tales of the Ancient Empire? It’s about the longest wait for a sequel, even longer than Doctor Detroit‘s!

this really stayed with me…
sword & the sorcerer 04:54
Well, Paul hadn’t seen any of the RM films, so I started him off with the best. Mudhoney is the classic small town derring-do movie, and a perfect Russ Meyer film. It’s got it all, grainy black and white, the girls, the dialogue, the action, the sleazy rough’n’tumble story, good guys and bad guys, good girls and bad girls, great actors in fact, the same actors as a good deal of his other films… I suppose one either likes RM or doesn’t but this “knight in shining armor” story just takes the cake. A classic, 40 years running!

now who’s mister nice guy…
mudhoney 14:07


look who’s bogarting that jug…
mudhoney 24:45
Of course, a showing of Get Shorty was in order. Boy, but talk about a guilty pleasure! I never get tired of this thing and I probably sit down to it about once a year. At this point it’s funny to see James Gandolfini pre-Sopranos and it features Travolta rehashing his Pulp Fiction role, Gene Hackman being awesome as always, Danny Devito having lots of fun, obviously. It’s basically, as one should expect from Elmore Leonard, nothing to take seriously but certainly lot’s of fun, with lots of action and yet another great supporting role from Dennis Farina!

Love Actually. Was this a film? It seemed more like a half dozen or so unrelated vignettes all tied together in a vague fashion. Sort of like a long & “serious” & British “Love American Style”. Okay, maybe I’m being a bit harsh. It certainly lacked any form of substance, but it had some charming moments… I just can’t stand Hugh Grant and it seemed such a terrible waste of Alan Rickman’s talents.

U-Turn. Ok. Well, this is one unpleasant film filled with unpleasant people. But I like it! I don’t like Nick Nolte, Sean Penn or Jennifer Lopez, and the badly overdone Billy Bob, and all their characters were horrible people, but they played horrible people soo well! It’s probably my favorite Nolte role, he’s alot of fun in this. And I love the old, “one thing goes wrong, and then everything goes wrong” story. And city slickers getting taken by a bunch of small town hicks is always fun to watch! It keeps us from taking too many rural roadtrips! Anyway, my only big complaint is, of course, Oliver Stone… His dopey (artsie?) cinematography style is tiring and dumb. Why shoot a shot from the roof and then a close up on their mouth? Then maybe a close up of an earlobe and then… Well, you get the picture. Dumb cinematography, irritating editing, but some nice bright colors!

Then I went out on the town and took in Celtic Frost. Okay, somehow, I’d never heard them before. And though they weren’t bad at what they do, I’m not really into it. Twenty years ago I may have had a different story but now? They were good at it though, I thought of them as sort of an 80’s hard rock act with some death metal edges. The singer fellow was another problem. Just didn’t dig him at all, bad look (black suit? black shirt? Black around his eyes and a black stocking cap pulled down to his eyes? What?) The goth guitar player who barely moved? Well, the rhythm section was good: the drummer seemed fine, immersed as he was in a cloud of fog, but the high point was the bass player. Great “rasputin” look, tons of enthusiasm, really the star of the show. Though I didn’t generally dig the vocals alot of the music was good, the stage setup was good (I haven’t seen a show with fancies like fog and lights moving around for a long time). More to my speed was 1349. Skinny pants, big black boots, corpse paint and all (though only one guitarist had the spikes, he had a gnarly enough set to make up for the rest). They had that evil energy and were a blast to see, though the sound could have been mixed clearer… Sagh opened the show. I was expecting good things, what with the bands strong pedigree, but instead it was just old style hard rock. Well played, but nothing at all to get excited about.

The Descent. Yes, maybe by now you’re sick of hearing me talk about this one. Well, two things, this was the first time that I’d seen the US version and the first time I’d seen it in a theater… I have to say that on both counts it was a step down. Aside from the, of course, truncated ending I think that some of the film from the car accident has been removed. In terms of the theater experience, well… It didn’t seem as scary. Now one might say that it’s because it’s the third time I’ve seen it but, I feel that it had more to do with projection. I think that watching it on a TV, where it’s smaller and darker, alot of it is more indistinct, which make it a bit creepier. On the big screen, everything is bigger and brighter so it looks clearer and becomes less scary… And the sets don’t look quite as convincing.

Still it’s a darn good horror movie… Maybe just watch the UK edition at home.

Lastly, led on by exciting previews, we watched Secret Window. Well, I don’t want to give too much away, though you’ll probably figure it out yourself quickly enough. Yes a “thriller” but a quite predictable one… And another Stephen King story on film. For a movie version of a King story, it wasn’t bad… But it doesn’t have much to hold out.

Since it seems to be all the rage, I will throw down my current 50 favorite albums. I overthought it soo much that I got trapped in a looping list that went no where. Then I thought: write something down. So, here are the ones that I’ve been listening to lately or at least thinking highly of at the moment.

01) AC/DC – Flick of the Switch
02) AC/DC – High Voltage
03) The Ames Brothers – Destination Moon
04) Beastie Boys – To the Five Boroughs
05) Bethlehem – Dictius Te Necare
06) Big Black – The Hammer Party
07) Big Black – The Rich Man’s 8-Track Tape
08) Billy Squier – In the Dark
09) Butthole Surfers – Independent Worm Saloon
10) Butthole Surfers – Psychic Powerless
11) The Click – Down & Dirty
12) Dark Funeral – The Secrets of the Black Arts
13) The Darkest of the Hillside Thickets – Cthulhu Strikes Back
14) Def Leppard – High ‘n’ Dry
15) EDM – Endless Dismal Moan
16) EPMD – Strictly Business
17) Gary Numan – Telekon
18) God & Texas – Criminal Element
19) Her Space Holiday – The Young Machines
20) Ice Cube – Death Certificate
21) Immortal – Blizzard Beasts
22) Jethro Tull – Aqualung
23) Jethro Tull – Living in the Past
24) Jethro Tull – Warchild
25) Judas Priest – Point of Entry
26) L7 – The Beauty Process: Triple Platinum
27) Love & Rockets – Earth, Sun, Moon
28) Melvins – Houdini
29) Mudhoney – Superfuzz Bigmuff
30) Murder City Devils – Murder City Devils
31) Neutral Milk Hotel – In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
32) Nomeansno – 0+2=1
33) NWA – Straight Outta Compton
34) Pink Floyd – Dark Side of the Moon
35) Pink Floyd – The Wall
36) The Pixies – Surfer Rosa
37) Portishead – Portishead
38) Postal Service – Give Up
39) Puerto Muerto – Songs of Muerto County
40) Queen – A Night at the Opera
41) Roxy Music – Avalon
42) Saturday Looks Good to Me – Every Night
43) Scorpions – Lovedrive
44) Tom Waits – Rain Dogs
45) Tubeway Army – Replicas
46) Ultravox – Vienna
47) Vargsang – Call of the Nightwolves
48) Violent Femmes – Violent Femmes
49) Wagner/Solti – Die Walküre
50) XTC – Drums & Wires

I know that I oft quote that 1983 was the big year for records. I say this due to one particular evening when I checked the release dates of the albums I had just played. Well, I don’t remember which albums those were (it was a number of years ago)… But I remember my conclusion. I am retrospecting on the moment this evening and I am not sure about my conclusion.

So… 1983.

Well, there were some classics released that year that I well-over listened to in the years that followed: Shout At The Devil, Melissa, Suicidal Tendencies, Balls to the Wall, Holy Diver, Fastway, All for One… But then I thought, well, also that year were some bad omens: Lick it Up, Pyromania, Bark at the Moon and Metal Health (though yes, I did like it at the time)…

So I was thinking, was ’83 the album year of my youth? Well, which were the albums of that era I listened to the most then and since…

Ace of Spades (1980), For Those About to Rock (1981), Point of Entry (1981), High n’ Dry (1981), Denim & Leather (1981), Don’t Say No (yeah, I know… But, hey, it was 1981!), Blackout (1982), Restless and Wild (1982), Fistful of Metal (1984), Don’t Break the Oath (1984).

This paints a different picture. Yes, it does show 1983 to be a peak year in musics greatest era (as I heard on KGON today, “We play the greatest music ever recorded” ), the albums that I listened to the most were actually released in 1980, 1981, 1981, 1981,1981 and 1982 (and then Shout at the Devil from 1983). I guess that 1981 is the Album Year for me. It makes sense, thinking about it. Aside from my interest in Devo (though I attended my first solo concert, the New Traditionalists tour in 1981) and Blondie, my interest in music didn’t really gel until I saw the video for Let’s Get it Up on Casey Kasem’s top ten.

But yeah, on to movies…

Murder Set Pieces doesn’t have the highest production values and it’s not well acted. It surely has the feel of “get all your friends to participate” to it. The regular scenes are a little boring and, to be honest, just splashing a lot of blood on people isn’t really all that. There are a few scenes that are gruesome but, like the title implies, they come across more as sets than anything else. The gore in his hidden room doesn’t look like it might be there due to his gory activities… Looks more like “Let’s put this here and that there, it’ll look gory” to me. But that what this is. A loose plot surrounding gory scenes. Similar to the oft-loathed Saw but, thankfully, not as dumbly overdone. Still though, there is blood and related activities. All that and then more of that. Blood blood blood… Lots of daylight scenes of Las Vegas, if you’ve ever wondered what it looks like there. I’ve been a couple of times and, like the movie shows, it’s not much of a sight for daylight.

And finally, after much putting off, I watched Quadrophenia. I was buoyed but some fond memory of liking it way back whenever it was that I saw it. Anyway. I wasn’t quite as hot for it this time. Don’t get me wrong, I like it, you can’t go wrong with the Who, sure none of the character are very sympathetic, but it’s still a good movie. Lots of cute vespas, boys and girls who dress nice. I guess I actually like it, no questions. It just wasn’t quite as good as I remembered it.

Part 2 of the great trilogy! I watched Aliens. The second of three films which I consider to be the only film trilogy without a weak point (well, the only trilogy with only one weak point, more on that later). This must be the one I have seen the most, maybe the movie that I have seen the most. This was my first time out with the Directors Cut and, though it was very odd to see the pre-aliens attack Hadley’s Hope, I liked it all just fine. Still though, the always lame scene with Ripley and Mama-bug and the Loader and that terrible, terrible line that Ripley utters… They forgot to get that scene out of this. But I cannot wait until it’s time to take on the Directors cut of Alien3! As I already like the film quite a bit, all the talk about how much better this cut makes it is exciting!

Anyway… baby, it’s cold outside. And I must add that, being involved in a small business, the forecast of freezing rain no longer sounds fun.

Friday I went to some new place called the Hawthorne Theater to see Vader! Damn that was a good thing. I know they’re a bit more Death Metal than my usual listening, but they’re just soo damned good. Anyway, it was good to go. I only go to one or two shows a year and I’ve seen very few metal shows, so it was quite nice.

Well then, onto movies…

Werewolves? Samurai action? Monsters? How could one go wrong? Well, one could. I did. Kibakichi. At first, it seemed slow but with potential. Some nice scenery and cinematography… Though the picture seemed muted and dark. Well. That was the best part. Slow, boring. A couple of good fights scenes that were thrown off a bit by the monster effects being what they were. Anyway, it seemed like a good idea, but I wouldn’t recommend it. If you want action and werewolves, I’d suggest just watching Le Pacte des loups again… Maybe the ol’ library needs a bit of culling.

On the other hand, yesterday I watched Slow Fade. That was a good one. Well shot, some of the old Carlito Brigante “they pulled me back in” action… The Daniel Lam soundtrack (hey! The DVD comes with a CD even!) techno music was good, some nice camera effects and kind of a hazy feel to the whole thing… Not really visually, but you kind of start feeling a bit hazy like our protagonist. Anyway I thought a nice film. Engaging, good looking and some good action.

I went to go and see Pride & Prejudice. My first time with that story. I actually liked it a good deal. It looked very nice, it was well acted and directed. I quite liked the lead fellow, Mister Darcy, and I surely got wrapped up into the who will get whom routine. Actually, it made me want to read the book.

We’ve also been watching the Wonder Years. I wasn’t too familiar with the show but now, after about 14 episodes in 2 days, I’m getting the hang of it. Pretty good for a TV show. Something that wouldn’t be too horrible for children to watch. it’s very thoughtful and well intentioned.

I watched Animal House. I hadn’t seen it in quite a while. While I admit that it loses a bit of its spark as the years have worn on, as do most comedy’s, it is still a classic that I get a good deal of enjoyment from. At this point though, I no longer think it is a film that I would recommend to just anyone.

These last two days though, I also went through Scarface. I really must pick up the DVD sometime. These old fullscreen VHS tapes I have just don’t do it justice. I remember watching it again a couple of years ago and being rather nonplussed, it didn’t seem quite to be able to grab me like it had before. This time though, I really got into it. I feel like it’s one of Pacino’s best roles. He seems to really get into the part and it looked like he had a lot of fun (“yell everything, spit while you do it and be sure to use the F word constantly”). I also always get a kick out of seeing F. Murray Abraham as a cocaine dealer. The soundtrack though, I soo cannot imagine Giorgio Moroder ever being considered the right music for a movie. Some music dates really badly.

Then last night, I finally got around to watching Shaolin Soccer. I started it a bit a few months ago, when I was obsessed with Kung Fu Hustle, and I wasn’t too moved. This time around though, I was very entertained. They really are very similar movies and though Kung Fu hustle I do still prefer, I would strongly recommended Shaolin Soccer to anyone who liked it.

Today, taking advantage of the funny weekends I also finally watched The Testament of Doctor Mabuse. The 1962 version. I definitely liked it a lot. There are soo many old European crime movies (by the way, did I really read at imdb that Pacino is in a re-make of Rififi? When, oh please when, are they going to stop pillaging the classics of the past to make a buck? Yet another cruddy overblown hollywood travesty on the way… Of course, maybe it’s a different Rififi. They’d better stay away from Melville though, If I ever hear about a re-make of Le Samourai there will be hell to pay)… Anyway. It was very good. I mostly like seeing Gert Frobe playing a role aside from Auric Goldfinger… Though of course, I now feel an urge to watch Goldfinger again. It also made me ponder the series as a whole. I admit that I haven’t really looked into it but it seem that there must be 10-20 Mabuse films. That would be an interesting (yes, and I bet tiring) process to watch them all. Anyway, this one was really a fun film. Though I do not have the courage to tackle the original silent version, I must get my hands on the Lang talkie from 1933.

On another kind of viewing, I went out Sunday to the Doug Fir, where I hadn’t been before. It was a mighty cool place, possibly a bit too hip for me to like, but I made an exception for it. I just thought it was just really nice. I think it would be a neat place to take out-of-towners.

I saw Adelaide and Her Space Holiday… Adelaide was pretty good, kind of an electro-shoegazer kind of thing. I thought their music was good and I always like bands that have projectors as part of their shows. The projected imagery was more secondary then the other concerts I seen with them (Butthole Surfers, Godspeed and, the best of the music films combos I’ve seen, Yo La Tengo at the Guild Theatre playing with the films of Painleve, which was really incredible… (Oh, and I guess I could count the silly video montage Ozzy used at the Ozzfest I attended) but I still like the effect. The Young Machines is all that I had heard of Her Space Holiday but it seems that I do like his songs quite a lot. Some of the lyrics are a bit too honest and sad and the music is good and interesting. Surely worthwhile if one is into this kind of thing. Plus he had double LP’s for sale and that always pulls me in. Anyway, though I only got to maybe a show a year now, I still think that it was a really good show.