| [img] As referenced earlier, there are reasons why this joint is called The Pop View. Chief among these is that I love pop culture and by that, I don t just mean I love movies, music and so on. I mean that I love little indie films and big dumb popcorn movies. Yeah, I love obscure bands, but it doesn t mean that I don t also adore some massive hit singles. I believe as Dan Le Sac says, Thou shalt not stop liking a band just because they become popular. You re not going to [. ..]
| | | 5:25pm | | | | Neither of these is new, but haven t I already established that we work at the slow-and-steady pace here? I love this Feist video for the song 1234 because it s simultaneously simple and complex. It s set on an empty soundstage with one continuous camera shot, but there s some complex staging to the whole thing. For example, note how the dancers become color coordinated at one point. It reminds me of Michel Gondry s video directing style. [.. .]
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| | | | | | 4:58pm | | | | Last September, I wrote an item entitled Culture Wars Redux, in which I anticipated the arrival of a couple books that would ramp up the old Culture War ( Rock n roll is destroying our kids! ) to a new level ( Hip-hop is responsible for the death of thousands! ). In my new Spot-on column, I take a look at one of these books, Dinesh D Souza s The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11 . Taking the Culture War to DEFCON 3 Traditional wars are usually about a few reliable things: [. ..]
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| | | | April 26, 2007 | | | | 6:23pm | | | | One of the controversies surrounding the Virginia Tech shootings was the package that Cho sent to NBC. It included video of him ranting and posing; NBC aired it and then other news outlets re-aired it, branded with NBC s ID. A negative reaction quickly followed and the media scaled back on its use. A debate ensued over whether NBC made the right choice. A new Pew poll shows that respondents approved of NBC s decision: According to the Pew Research Center s News Interest Index, 49% of those polled said they approved of NBC airing the [... ]
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| | | | April 23, 2007 | | | | 6:05pm | | | | On Friday, I posted my latest Spot-on piece, which focused on the pop culture fallout of the VT shootings ( Seeking Tragic Answers in the Aisles of Best Buy ). On Friday, Stephen Hunter wrote a great piece on how Seung-Hui Cho might have been influenced by movies. Hunter is a former soldier and a gun owner and he is one of the only film critics in the entire country to write intelligently and knowledgeably about guns in movies. Did you catch the new Mark Wahlberg movie Shooter ? That s based on one of Hunter s Bob Lee [.. .]
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| | | | April 18, 2007 | | | | 6:05pm | | | | [img] I recently posted an item about the release of the movie Grindhouse , a double bill directed by Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. My pal Dan Dorman then followed with two lengthy comments, which has now prompted me to respond with this lengthy post. Mind you, neither of us has seen Grindhouse, but from what I can tell, seeing that movie won t invalidate our remarks. Dan raised a number of issues, generally taking Tarantino to task. The two of us have had this discussion before, so this is familiar ground. Let [... ]
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| | | | April 17, 2007 | | | | 7:07am | | | | [img] Last summer, I did a little mini series of songs with piano in them. As I said at the time, the piano may seem delicate for rock, but it is a percussion instrument and it also has great range of expression. Here s one cut from the brand new LCD Soundsystem album Sound of Silver and one from Regina Spektor s album from last year, Begin to Hope. Imagine the piano payer starts a riff with his (or her) left hand, a driving rhythm that repeats, propelling the song. It can be Willie the Lion Smith [.. .]
| | | 6:35pm | | | | I ve been really busy lately and never got around to posting these Easter photos. You may recall that last year, I captured some images from my town of Laurel, MD of front yard Easter displays. I was up in Bellrose, Queens, NYC this year and took a few more shots. [img] [img] Tags: Easter, decorations
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| | | | | | 1:54pm | | | | My new post went up over the weekend at Spot-on and it s all about how the turmoil over Don Imus has spread to hip-hop. I could see that coming very quickly over the course of the week. Partly, it s a racially-driven phenomenon. There are plenty of white folks who don t understand how a brotha gets to drop the N-bomb with impunity while they can t. The answer is that tribe members get to use the language and you don t. Gay men can call themselves queers with pride; you don t get to. But the other part [.. .]
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| | | | April 13, 2007 | | | | 8:33am | | | | Sad news last week that director Bob Clark and his son were killed in a car crash in Los Angeles. If you read the stories over the holiday weekend, you noticed that some articles listed him as the writer-director of A Christmas Story (1983) and some as the writer-director of Porky s (1982). This article shows the conflict between choosing which of these two films should serve as the legacy. Either way, I wanted to highlight a few of his other movies. Children Shouldn t Play with Dead Things [. ..]
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| | | | April 6, 2007 | | | | 9:29pm | | | | [img] Grindhouse opens today. I ve been surprised by people I know who are eager to see this movie. I m not sure if it s legitimate love for the work of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez or if it s unfamiliarity with the subject matter. The movie attempts to replicate a typical moviegoing experience from the Seventies, with a double feature of exploitation films, plus coming attractions for other like movies. Yes, Kurt Russell is in it, but it s not the Kurt of Sky High (2005) and Executive Decision (1996), [... ]
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| | | | | | 9:29pm | | | | | | | 8:15am | | | | Here s just another brief glimpse into my life and how I run my mouth (see previous example here). I work in an office. I ll sit in a meeting listening quietly perhaps engaged fully, perhaps at half-speed, because not everything is pertinent to my job. But then someone refers to KC The Sunshine Band as that one-hit wonder. My brain instantly switches into high gear. That s not true, I protest. They re not some favorite band of mine, even if I have defended disco music once or twice in the past. KC [.. .]
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| | | | April 3, 2007 | | | | 11:43pm | | | | As if I didn t have enough trouble feeding words into this thing, I have agreed to write a regular column for Spot-on, run by my friend Chris Nolan. It s interesting, because Spot-on is a family of bloggers, who cover various topics from locations around the world, and yet it s (intentionally) a lot like a stable of syndicated columnists. It s a different kind of writing than I do here, so this will be quite an experiment. My first entry was written a little while ago, but it took awhile to get up. It s not super timely, but [. ..]
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| | | | | | 6:15pm | | | | [img] Speaking of radio, as I was, one of the other great shows of all time is Chicago Public Radio s This American Life . It s funny and touching, often at the same time. A few weeks ago, the TV version of the program debuted on Showtime, thus providing one of the best reasons to subscribe to a premium service since The Sopranos (final season starts Sunday!). The TV version of TAL is great. This clip demonstrates that they ve found a visual version of the rhythm they do on the radio. But [. ..]
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| | | | March 31, 2007 | | | | 2:11pm | | | | The state of radio today is pretty sad (see here). One bright spot in the landscape is Indie 103.1 in Los Angeles, which plays a truly alternative blend of rock music. And the best show on the station is Jonesy s Jukebox, hosted by Steve Jones of seminal punk band the Sex Pistols. In the past few months, Jonesy has started a new weekly feature called Jonesy s Jukebox Jury which I have become completely hooked on. A panel listens to a new song without knowing who the artist is and then rates it pants (bad) or mustard [.. .]
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| | | | March 26, 2007 | | | | 7:37am | | | | [img] Wild Hogs has become quite successful, especially for a comedy released in March, earning more than $123 million in its first three weeks. As a movie, it is what it is. If you’ve seen the trailer, you know exactly what you’re getting. But it s worth giving the film a brief examination for what it says about men. The male population has been taking its cues from movies right from the beginning. They teach both boys and men learn how to behave. There s a certain type of movie about confused [.. .]
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| | | | March 21, 2007 | | | | 5:50pm | | | | Following up on the songs from Manic last week, I thought I d clarify a point. I said that some of the songs on the Floor Boards EP sounded a little like Soulwax and Blinker the Star. Here are two relevant songs for comparison. In all likelihood, you ll listen and not recognize the similarities. Or you may think I m spot on. Either way. Soulwax are a Belgian group better known for their mash-ups and DJ activities under the name 2 Many DJ s, but their rock songs are pretty good. The song Scream is from the [. ..]
| | | 9:15am | | | | I like EPs. Sometimes it s a great way for a band to start off, with a few really good songs, than a 70-minute album with a bunch of filler. Manic is an LA-based band, featuring drummer Ryan Green, guitarist/keyboardist Zane Smythe, bassist Nate Perry, and vocalist/keyboardist Paul Gross. They recently released their debut record, the Floor Boards EP. In their bio, the band discusses their sound: “We are a fairly tech-heavy band,” says Smythe, shedding light on his band’s sound. “We use a lot of gear. Our bassist has a keyboard. Our drummer has [... ]
| | | 8:46pm | | | | [img] Writer-director Craig Brewer s last film Hustle Flow (2005) garnered a great deal of attention, even scoring some awards for a film that is a combo of Blaxploitation and an up-from-the-gutter music biopic. It s hard for me to tell if he is subverting stereotypes or if they re subverting him. ( H F was previously discussed on this blog. ) My pal Dan Dorman says he s the new Michael Schultz, the director of Cooley High (1975), Car Wash (1976) and Which Way Is Up? (1977). Maybe. I saw [...
Keywords: Pop View, Boards Ep, Quentin Tarantino, Los Angeles, Floor Boards Ep, Culture War, Dan Dorman, Robert Rodriguez, At One, Pop Culture
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