I want to blog sometimes and I don’t really like this one anymore so I think I will make a new one somewhere. I will keep you appraised of the results.

4 days…

I tend to make a distinction between “good” and “entertaining” when it comes to movies. Unfortunately I make this same distinction with music. I say unfortunately, because it is mostly a crutch for me to justify media that I am ashamed to like. Here is a glimpse of music that I consider to be highly (lolz) entertaining. So turn your speakers to 11 and your bass to 12 and take a gander at the wonderful world of techlectropop. You may notice that one of these is not like the others and if you don’t like it well then you can just deal.

Robin S - Show Me Love (Redlight remix)

Dance Area - AA 24/7 (Diplo remix)

Major Lazer - Keep it Going Louder feat. Nina Sky (Diplo remix)

Dizzee Rascal - Dance Wiv Me feat. Calvin Harris

Miley Cyrus/Notorious B.I.G. - Party in the USA

I’ve been listening to Lou Barlow’s most recent album for a full day now and I must say it’s pretty stupendous. I usually shy away from the indie/folk/country divide and so I was pleasently surprised to find a well rounded and captivating album. “Goodnight Unknown” was released in early October on the hypocritically indie label Merge Records. I wish I could tell you a cool indie story worthy of the quality that Lou Barlow provides, but sadly, I found out about him via KCRW’s Today’s Top Tune podcast. I’m a sell out, I know, but as I slowly make the transition from indie high school kid to yuppie/prep college student I find that it’s ok to listen to KCRW and NPR and not be considered “mainstream.” Good radio is the stereogum of the working crowd and I am fast finding it appealing. Oh well.

The Right

Pinback jumps to mind immediately upon hearing this song but perhaps that’s only because I’ve been trying to find a copy of “This is a Pinback CD” to no avail. It has a very distinct rhythym that makes me want to ride the train or go on a road trip. There isn’t a lot of diversity within the song but it’s strong and makes me feel good so check it.

Gravitate

It starts off a little slow and you will be forced to listen to some lyrics (ugh..) but that is over after a minute and a pretty sweet guitar riff starts up and the drums kick in for quite the symphonic sound. I’m still a little on the fence as to how much I like this song and it definitely stand apart from the rest of the album but for sure give it a chance.

I feel like you get the feeling for his sound if you actually listened to the two songs above (which you should) so I won’t really bother giving my thoughts on these two other than they’re good. They also have weird creepy videos to go along with them, but don’t let that detract from the music.

One Machine, One Long Night

Too Much Freedom

There’s also this kind of cool video documentary about the making of the album. It keeps the bizarre theme going but it is sort of interesting once you get three minutes in but nothing earth shattering by any means. It’s also long and for some reason he recorded his voice-over with a stereo microphone which really get’s annoying.

Last night I happened to catch the premiere of ABC’s new series V. The series is a remake of the sci-fi miniseries from the 80’s (which is my favorite decade that I have been alive for but do not remember at all.) The premise of the series is that a group of “Visitors” visit our planet. These visitors are scary scaly reptiles, but to mitigate the fear of such a different appearance, these aliens wear cloned human skin over themselves so that they can appear super attractive. The visitors arrive in vast spaceships that hover over the world’s largest cities while they wait to replenish their ships’ supplies and at the same time share their advanced technology with us. However, as we find out in the pilot, they are not as trustworthy as they might appear.

The main protagonist at this point appears to be none other than Juliet from LOST!!! She plays FBI counter-terrorist agent Erica Evans. My bet is that she will be leading the investigation into the Vs a-la Fringe or FlashForward. She has a son who is stupid and attracted to all the Vs so he buys into their bs manipulative spiel. You can compare his character perfectly with the son from the 4400. Speaking of the 4400, this show is made by the same guy and features Joel Gretsch but as a priest not an FBI agent.

We also have the main antagonist played by Adria from Stargate/Inara from Firefly. Her character, Anna, is the supreme leader of the aliens who lives aboard the main mothership which, incidentally, is above New York. She manipulates people and looks good while doing it. She’s pretty cool.

Anyway, the show seems to be hitting all the right buttons in terms of current sci-fi popularity as well as making it easy for the creators by being a remake. It is hugely similar to LOST, Fringe and Flashforward going so far as to steal the pupil dilation opening from LOST. However, this is not made by JJ Abrahms. Despite this, it has to potential to be confusing as the narration skips back and forth to different times. This is not to say that the characters are time traveling, but rather we see the present and then some things that happen in the future. This works pretty well, especially as it satisfies the viewer’s desire for answers while still preserving the plot lines.

It seems to have a ton of potential and I really liked the first episode, however, I am biased because I like the ridiculous amount of recognizable sci-fi actors.

I quickly am becoming infatuated with Music Videos on a level once reserved only for magazines. After going out of vogue from 1998-2008 I now am able to appreciate them again. Gone are the trashy cookie cutter dancey danceness of Brittney Spears and the Spice Girls and in are the phantasmagorical video-synths that hearken back to our perception of the 80’s. I really think that the music video allows for so much creativity that it has the potential to do so much more than most mediums. Perhaps I am giving them too much credit as the vast majority are still pretty bland and I am probably just expounding upon the topic because of my own desire to direct music videos or to do anything creative. I also should say that I consider a lot of today’s commercials to be the same thing as a music video. Anyway, I thought I would share some music videos that I particularly like.

The first time I watched this video I thought it was stupid and quit about halfway through. This is probably due to my longstanding infatuation with the original version of this song, or rather the version that The Talking Heads performed in the film “Stop Making Sense.” However, I recently got over my grudge upon discovering that Miles Fisher (the guy in the song/video) is none other than Jeffrey Graves from Mad Men! Crazy. I then came across an article about him at ValetMag.com and how could I resist such obvious signs. Anyway, it seems to me as though Miles Fisher is kind of a douche bag and is almost exactly his character on Mad Men but perhaps I am casting judgment too quickly.

Here is the link to the article regarding him from Valet:

http://www.valetmag.com/culture/music/2009/get-to-know-miles-fisher.php/

What a powerful movie. Max Records is the shit. Spike Jonze is the shit. Go see it.

Karen O (of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs) is pretty awesome. If you couldn’t already tell from the picture above, she likes to dress like a grunge equivalent of Lady GaGa. Anyway, I snagged a copy of the Where the Wild Things Are OST and it is done entirely by Karen O (and the Kids) At first you may assume the “Kids” moniker belongs to what sounds like kids screaming in the background MGMT style, however, that is wrong. The “Kids” are actually two guys from the YYYs, Bradford Cox from Deerhunter and Atlas Sound, Dean Fertita of Queens of the Stone Age and the Racontours, Greg Kurstin from the Bird and the Bee, and a bunch of people I don’t know. The gist is that it’s a ridiculously talented group of musicians. Also, Karen O used to date Spike Jonze! Despite all this, and the fact that it’s the where the wild things are OST, I was very hesitant in listening to this. I think it had something to do with not having seen the movie yet and not knowing who Karen O was at the time. So I saw the movie and downloaded the album and have been quite pleased so far.

Unlike many OSTs, this one feels far more connected to the film than I was expecting. It may be due to the sections of dialogue taken straight from the movie but I think it is that the music really captures the essence of Max’s story. Because there are so many different talented musicians I also get the feeling that they created this music solely for the film. When there is one person doing a soundtrack it is easy to pull from pre-existing songs or to make a new song and try to fit it in. However, I like to think that this was a democratic group and thus they all contributed to something new and unique.

Capsize

I have a thing for songs where they spell words. While that may be the only reason why I like this song, Karen O does her “ooooooh” (like a ghost) sound and you just can’t not like that.

Hideaway

Probably my favorite song off of the album. Hideaway is very slow and uses cymbals so darn well. It brings to mind the scene in Lost in Translation where Bill Murray is driving in a cab to his hotel. Karen O really demonstrates her ability to have a super cool voice.

Sailing Home

This song is only a minute long. Despite that, it is my second favorite song from this album.

Building All is Love

All the trailers and hype kind of ruined All is Love for me. Luckily there is a second version of it on the album that is much better.