Live Show (Misc.) of the Year Nominations 2010

Although most of the shows I end up catching over the course of a year tend to be of rock bands, I do still make it out to the odd art music event, stand-up comedy show, DJ gig, or play, thereby necessitating this category. This year's list is as much of a mixed bag (genre-wise) as those of the previous two years, and I'd say the quality has stayed consistently high, so this is one category I'm not worried about. Here are the nominees:

Caleb Herron @ WonderRoot: I really don't see too much art music these days, but easily the best show of this sort I've seen in awhile was that of my coworker/buddy Caleb Herron with a one-man percussion performance at WonderRoot. The entire program was solid, with stand-out pieces by Alvin Lucier and Michael Gordon and even a piece featuring body percussion (and a bit of acting!). Great experience!

Patton Oswalt @ The 40 Watt: While I'm starting to lose my faith in seeing stand-up comedy live, Patton's show at Athens' famed 40 Watt was definitely superior to my much-anticipated Louis C.K. show, and despite still not being quite as solid as I wanted it to be, Patton's show does deserve to be on this list. Add in the fact that we accidentally met the man himself the next morning at breakfast, and it was a pretty sweet one-nighter in my old college town.

The Room @ The Plaza Theatre: I've been debating whether or not to include Tommy Wiseau's ridiculous cult favorite The Room in the Movies Top 5 or this one, but I ended up making it a "show", as the movie itself isn't anything to speak of. Rather, it's the live experience and audience interaction that's so incredible. Yes, I saw two screenings of the film this year, but the more-memorable was certainly the second (despite knowing all the gags), as Tommy Wiseau himself was there for meet-and-greets and a Q&A. Once in a lifetime experience? Quite possibly...

Scandal! @ Dad's Garage: I probably went to Dad's Garage improv shows more this year than in any previous years combined (thanks to my buddy Scott), but though many of those shows were pretty forgettable, one that certainly was not was one of a number of entries in the Scandal! series. Basically, the troupe starts out with a loose plot for a storyline and then improvises their way through something like ten episodes, in the process coming up with some pretty memorable stuff. From what I understand, Dad's Garage does this once a year, so I hope to catch most (or all) of whatever plotline they come up with in 2011.

Steve Aoki @ Opera: I've now seen Steve Aoki spin two times, but perhaps the best total-experience of the two was the first, that spent with Suzi and Kevin at the detestable Atlanta dance venue, Opera. While the music WAS really solid and we all DID end up dancing, a large part of our evening was spent talking outside, so that wasn't exactly what made the show so great (despite being fun in and of itself). Rather, it was the fact that Steve Aoki single-handedly convinced me that good DJ experiences could happen in Georgia, even at one of the shittiest clubs, and that's an impression worth nominating.

So, pretty much five different types of shows, all of which were quite memorable and worth repeating. Seeing as Suzi and I like to keep doing stuff like this all the time, I have a feeling 2011's list will be just as strong.

Giving In To Health Insurance...

Well, it's finally happened. After three years of my mom begging me to get health insurance (amongst similar recommendations by a handful of friends), I've finally bitten the bullet and given in to the man, so to speak, having gotten a modest Blue Cross/Blue Shield policy. I personally think the medical industry is generally corrupt and inefficient, riding off the losses of regular people across the country, so I resisted for a long time, but I'm afraid the reality of the situation in America is that I'm not going to be seeing universal healthcare the way I want it for a long time, so I figured I better start playing by the system's rules, for better or (most-likely) for worse. I hate gambling with my health when I am currently barely breaking even financially (I need more clients!), but whatever.

So, I spent a lot of time looking into various plans at BC/BS, including numerous conversations with my dad and a couple with my new BC/BS rep Brad, and now I'm the (somewhat) proud owner of a decent plan. I've already been to the doctor for a checkup (more on this later), but hopefully I won't be needing to use all my money's worth of monthly payments anytime soon. I hate paying for something that I probably won't benefit from, but I'm left with no other option. I'm starting to sound like a broken record now - I guess without going into more details about why I detest the healthcare industry, I really don't have much more to say...

Bone

Seeing as I'm getting much more into graphic novels, I figured I would actually ask for one for Christmas, one I had been wanting for a long time. The book is a large compilation of all 55 issues (or nine volumes) of the popular cartoonish-yet-Tolkien-inspired Bone series by creator Jeff Smith. I had read and loved one of the last issues back when I was in middle school, but I just kept the series in the back of my mind until finally getting around to asking for it this year. And let me tell you, I'm glad I did...

Bone is a black and white comic-strip-esque collection telling the epic journey of three cousins from Boneville who end up in a foreign land filled with dumb farmers, crumbling kingdoms, rat creatures, and of course, dragons. All three of the Bones have quite different personalities, but easily the most-likable is the modest Fone Bone, who ends up falling for the young human maiden Thorn and does virtually all he can do to help her and his cousins through the trials to come.

Short of telling you the story outright, there really isn't that much more to say other than I was thoroughly engrossed in the story by the end and didn't want it to end. I never would have pictured someone being able to make a viable cartoony version of The Lord Of The Rings, but Bone is all that and more, complete with plenty of character development and humor. I can't recommend it enough, even if you aren't into graphic novels or nerdy epic tails.

Best Worst Movie

While I was a reluctantly-big fan of the whole The Room experience, I'm not really the kind of guy who gravitates towards shitty B-movies to find some kind of ironic pleasure in them. That said, having warmed up to The Room (one of the oft-proclaimed worst films of all time), I found the idea of a documentary about the cult following behind such a stinker to be interesting enough to warrant watching. Well, such is the story behind Best Worst Movie, a documentary focusing on the little world of Troll 2, an Italian-directed American film about vegetarian goblins who turn their victims into plants before eating them... To make things worse, the movie doesn't actually feature any trolls (chalk that up to a discrepancy between the definition of both words in the two languages), and it isn't even a sequel to a film named Troll...rather it was a shameless marketing ploy to align itself with another franchise altogether.

Anyway, the documentary centers around the lovable star of Troll 2, George Hardy, who in real life is a goofy small-town dentist who at first truly embraces his cult status, only to become disenchanted by it when going on a more-or-less international tour to promote a resurgence of interest in the shitty film. As you would expect, Best Worst Movie follows George around as he interacts with old cast members, the delusional director, and numerous adoring fans, and while this is all interesting enough, it didn't really carry much weight considering neither Suzi (who recommended the documentary) nor I had actually seen Troll 2 itself.

So, would I recommend this film? Not unless you've seen Troll 2 and have loved it for what it is. Still, I applaud the documentarians for their solid job introducing us to the cult phenomenon behind Troll 2...I just wish it had been about The Room instead. =)

Serious Distractions

I'm getting a tad behind on blogging (in the sense that I'm not doing multiple posts a day in my attempt to catch up for all my missed posts over the past year), and it's pretty much due to a number of serious distractions in my life that I've had develop in the past few weeks. Things like trying to keep my finances up-to-date, working on the mc chris mash-ups, using my new TV (with Netflix - more on both later), hanging out regularly with Andy before he leaves for Spain, and preparing for and celebrating Valentine's Day. But the most serious of them all is trying to ride this recent wave of progress for my band, including rehearsing with Spangler and the rest of the guys, transcribing keys parts and creating synth patches for our new keys player, writing new material (and lyrics), recording more demos, and spending time at Riot.

That said, I do want to try to keep pushing ahead with my blog, but band stuff is taking top priority after work and Suzi, so until things start to settle down a bit, I have a feeling one post a day might be all you'll get on a consistent basis.

Kanye West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

While Kanye's last effort, 808s & Heartbreak, truly lived up to all of his endless boasting about being the musical second coming of Christ, his newest album, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (MBDTF), shows us what 808s would have been had Kanye been making the same claims without quite as much to back them up. That said, MBDTF is still a solid album. How's that? Well despite Kanye's unappetizing penchant here for self-aggrandizing lyrics and the album's lack of unity, there are still some great moments on offer, albeit clearly (despite most critics' assessments of its value to the contrary) falling way short of his previous outing.

On MBDTF, Kanye seems to have lost any ground he made on 808s with regards to personal maturation and instead has reverted back to talking about his dick, making a nun cum, and how much of a monster he is. Sure, the whole dark twisted fantasy bit does seem to justify all this, but even if the album really did manage to live up to the concept, it wouldn't have been a smart time to release such ridiculously unrelatable lyrics, with Kanye's public track record so stacked against him. Maybe some people think this is him being ironic, but I just don't think it's clear that he's in that level of control of his judgment these days.

On top of this is the near endless and bland repetition of musical material on most tracks (with an average track length of six minutes!). Sure, you could say 808s was very repetitive, but in addition to all of its material being very well unified in style and artistic direction, one thing it had going for it was its cold mood and minimalist synthesizers, all of which worked together to justify a slower, near-trancelike texture for what amounted to a very somber (and sober) album. By contrast, MBDTF's repetition is almost always of more soulful, livelier (albeit not necessarily happy-sounding) rootsy music which doesn't fare nearly as well when repeated to this degree. Plus, the lengthy outros for tracks like "Runaway" and "Blame Game" end up nearly ruining these otherwise solid (if not stellar) tracks for me, all because Kanye evidently doesn't know when to say "stop."

All this said, I do like the album, despite the fact I'm railing on it pretty hard. I think I'm being so negative is because I found MBDTF to be a pretty sizable disappointment after the nearly-flawless 808s, and because EVERYONE seems to think this album is god's gift to man - it's getting old, people, and someone needed to jump up and put some realistically-negative light Kanye's talents. Here's hoping he gets things under control for the next outing, but I'm kinda doubting it considering how much the critics seemed to eat this one up...

Highlights: "Dark Fantasy"/"Runaway"/"Lost In The World"
Rating: 3/5

True Grit

Having had a bad year for movies in 2010 and not having been that impressed with my first cinematic outing of the new year (127 Hours), my buddy Andy and I decided to go see the new remake of True Grit, and I'm glad we did, as it could be a contender for my Top 5 this year. That said, it's nothing exceptionally amazing, it's just a really solid Western, combining great acting with solid action and a surprisingly irreverent sense of humor, most likely due to the Coen brothers' involvement.

The main plot device of a girl hiring a bounty hunter to avenge her father's murder is basically just an excuse to set up an odd-couple storyline featuring the bitter drunken old man (played by Jeff Bridges) going on a trip with the headstrong 14-year-old girl. Sure, their relationship (and their connection to Matt Damon's Texas ranger character) is interesting enough, but what really makes this movie special is in the details...the time-accurate (for the original film) racially-insensitive humor, the tidbits of unnecessary-to-the-plot dialogue, and more than anything, the fact that the movie never makes any true mistakes, even allowing for the somewhat tacked-on ending.

So yeah, if you want a solid Western with fantastic acting and dialogue, plenty of humor, and just the right amount of action, then don't miss out on True Grit. It's probably not as great as the critics are making it out to be, but don't let that stop you from checking it out. And no, it's nowhere near as good as No Country For Old Men, but then again, not many movies are...

Girl Talk @ The Tabernacle

I don't make it out to too many DJ sets these days, but one that I'm really glad I didn't miss was that of infamous illegal mash-up artist Girl Talk. My exposure to his work had mostly been sparse up until recently when Suzi's friend Cassy was playing his album Feed The Animals at her birthday/Halloween party. Listening to it in the background, I was constantly being impressed by the variety of familiar samples being worked into a mostly-rap musical collage, but when I eventually picked up the album and listened to it in the foreground, I was disappointed by all the key clashing between samples, the lack of variety with the rap stuff, and the fact that most of the good moments were far too brief. So, buying tickets to go see Girl Talk do his thing live was a logical decision, as I wanted to see what it was really all about.

My first impression (before he even came on) wasn't a strong one, as the crowd was largely a bunch of barely-legal-to-drinks, many of whom were dressed up in tacky 80's garb. The reason this was frustrating is two-fold: first off, these kids were too young to really remember the music of the 80's, and secondly, Girl Talk doesn't actually play that many samples from that decade (rather, it's mostly the 90's), further reinforcing my belief that the kids didn't know what they were talking about.

That said, the show itself was kinda amazing, both musically and as a means for some cultural evaluation. See, the place was absolutely packed, and Suzi and I weren't really feeling like cramming in with the group to try to dance, so we just hung out in the balcony (which also had plenty of people) and took it all in.

One of the bigger points that hit me was that despite Girl Talk's use of mainly Top 40 rap, there were virtually no black people at the show, leading me to believe that they either hadn't heard the word about him, or worse, found it to be a bastardization of their beloved hip-hop, having a skinny white guy mixing it up with white-friendly samples from yesteryear to a bunch of spoiled frat/sorority kids who might even see the whole thing as a sort of half-joke.

One other big thought that I spent some serious time with is admiring how successful Girl Talk had been at actually doing what I had envisioned for illegally-mixed music back when I first started using turntables in Bloomington for my Master's. When I was first getting started, I had spent a considerable amount of time fretting over how to pull this all off without getting into serious legal trouble and ultimately ended up losing interest, but evidently he's doing pretty well for himself, so I would love to pick his brain someday...

The thing is that Girl Talk is actually doing something quite amazing live: from what I could tell, nothing was pre-planned...he was just triggering his samples in real-time (even without headphones) and feeding off the crowd. Sure, the tracks were all beat-matched and were probably organized at least somewhat loosely by key or style, but he was still really focused on his work, despite jumping around in place like a coke-fed maniac. While I had problems with his performance on recording, I didn't notice any major problems live, living up to my expectation that his live show is what he does best. This still doesn't excuse not ridding his albums of key clashes and trying to perfect them to a greater level of detail (unless of course he was going for that improvised feeling), but it does help me better understand what all the fuss is about. Finally, this was all on top of some pretty solid improvisatory video work (most-likely by someone else) on a giant screen behind him, even featuring some people from the crowd with hand-drawn hats and glasses drawn on them.

Overall, it was a pretty unique experience, even if you didn't like the music. No, I didn't really dance much, but that's beside the point...I still got more out of this show than I do at most other big shows that come to town, and that's saying something. Seriously, if this show had taken place in 2010, it certainly would have made one of my Top 5 lists, though I'm not sure which, as DJs usually go under the Miscellaneous category instead of Pro Popular Music. Anyway, I highly recommend seeing Girl Talk live...just be warned that the crowd might be a turn-off if you're not in the right mood.

Live Show (Pro Popular Music) of the Year Nominations 2010

As I've already mentioned, my Pro Popular Music live shows were a bit few and far between this year (especially concerning particularly good shows), but I still managed to drum up a respectable list regardless. All of the strongest offerings occurred in the latter portion of the year, but I guess this is common, as tour schedules tend to be a bit off in the Summer months. Anyway, here's the list:

Foxy Shazam @ The Tabernacle: Fitting for the beginning of a list of iffy nominees is a show where I only caught the last song of their set due to an unexpectedly-early start time, and that's precisely what happened with Foxy Shazam's opening slot for Courtney Love's band Hole's stop in Atlanta. So, while I was quite pissed off that I missed the show (which was the only reason I bought the ticket), their last song was EXTREMELY well-performed and singlehandedly convinced me that the rest of their show must have been amazing. So, this is sort of an honorary nomination, but whatever.

Julian Casablancas @ Center Stage: Also fitting for an iffy list is Julian Casablanca's series of drunken onstage mishaps he called a solo project (including wildly throwing his beer into the air, only to land on a synthesizer, knocking it out of commission and therefore causing the band to cancel two or so songs). Still, Julian's album is one of my faves of the year, and the live show captured the experience well enough. Plus, he played that killer Christmas song, despite being in early Spring!

Metric @ The Tabernacle: Onto the real contenders. While Metric did rock the house with great performances of the few tracks I knew (instead favoring some older songs whose albums I don't yet own), what put this show over the top was the aforementioned Sealions opening slot, my lyrical inspiration via Emily Haines' quite-inspired lyrical presence, and actually briefly meeting her after the show (with a bunch of other fans and my friends in The Orkids). Overall, a great time out.

Ra Ra Riot @ The Masquerade: In what might be the best show of the year, Ra Ra Riot's intimate performance with their hippier opener Givers proved to me that The Masquerade CAN still be a great venue for live shows, so long as the band is in the Hell portion of the club, not Heaven. Sure, I ended up going to the show alone and the band lacked the kind of energetic stage presence that would have pushed the show over the edge, but this was one of my favorite new band discoveries of the year, and the show did not disappoint.

Two Door Cinema Club @ The Loft: Finally, another big contender for show of the year, Two Door Cinema Club's headlining slot (with the awkward and sometimes-decent GROUPLOVE opening) at The Loft proved to be as good as I had hoped, especially as far as their distinct guitar stylings are concerned. Yes, the music did all start to run together by the end, and I was worried for a minute that my buddy Ryan wouldn't end up liking the band (whom he had come to see trusting my judgment), but this is one of my favorite bands of the year, and the show did what it was supposed to.

So, a long list of quasi-maybes and negative caveats about all five shows, but yet, still an enjoyable collection of experiences. Here's hoping that 2011's will be significantly less iffy!

First Full Rehearsal w/Spangler

I'm not 100% sure about this, but from looking back over my blog and my far-from-complete calendar (in addition to trying to simply think it through), I believe our recent 2nd rehearsal with Spangler as our drummer was our first where we've had over three people at a band rehearsal since late 2009. If this is true, I had no idea the band had been stagnating so much. I mean, sure...Erich and I did plenty of studio time, Jeremy and I had done a few creative jam sessions at my condo, and we had auditioned a couple of drummers, but really, what kind of band are you if you haven't met with your basic core of players (vox, guitar, bass, and drums) in over a year?!? Yes, drummers have been extremely hard to find, but this is ridiculous!

Anyway, after having tried out and thumbs-upped Spangler with just Jeremy and me there a week or two before, we got Doug involved and had a nice little rehearsal to start getting things rolling again. Since then, Spangler and I have had two one-on-one part-tweaking sessions at his place, and we're supposed to have another full band rehearsal this Friday (fingers crossed it'll actually happen!).

We're still in need of a capable full-time synth player, and once things get rolling we might pull Emily back into the mix for some backup synth/vox work, but we'll probably rarely get an opportunity to have Erich join us on aux percussion, at least not until we change our rehearsal times to evenings instead of Friday noonish. Still, this is the best shape we've been in in over a year, so hopefully this thing will take off sooner than later...

Everything Is Illuminated

I should warn you that the trailer above, while good for the most part, features that horribly inappropriate-for-an-art-film trailer narrator guy, and as such, makes the movie look like a kids' film. Anyway, Everything Is Illuminated is this fantastic film adaptation of a road-trip novel concerning Jewish heritage in Ukraine, starring Elijah Woods and the lead singer of famed indie-gypsy band Gogol Bordello, Eugene Hütz. I had first seen the film as a rental back when I lived in Bloomington, and seeing as Suzi likes weird movies in foreign countries, I figured this might be good to show her.

I'm happy to report that my second viewing of the film was also great, and I still recommend the film to anyone interested in this sort of thing. The film mixes some very serious subject matter with plenty of absurdities resulting from the cooky Ukrainian tour guides showing Woods' character around. As such, the highlights tend to come from Hütz's character and that of his grandfather, while Woods' delivery of the awkward Jonathan is solid. One highlight this time around was realizing that Liev Schreiber, an actor whose work I'm beginning to like very much, was the director of the film and the writer of its screenplay adaptation from the original novel. Impressive...

Anyway, check this one out if you haven't already. Good stuff.

Random Grammy Quote

Actually, the following is from an op-ed writer for the NY Daily News made after the show (which I found via Googling), but I found it interesting nonetheless. It should be noted that I myself did not watch the Grammys (and never really do), as I find their collective taste more inaccurate than even MTV's and the show's kinda stuffy. Here's what the NY Daily News had to say:

"Giving more prizes to Lady A than anyone (even Lady G!), continues a pattern of rewarding Nashville that began last year with 4 big wins for Taylor Swift (including the vaunted Album of the Year prize). The power base of that southern city has greatly increased in the music industry of late if only because, in this, the age of internet piracy, country fans are the largest block of folks who still actually pay for music. That's because their fans tend to be either older or just slower with technology."

Wow. Not that I disagree too much about the people living in this part of the country, but let's be honest: there are bumpkins and other internet-illiterates everywhere...I don't know that this is a safe conclusion to be making regarding illegal downloading, but whatever.

A: The Color @ Highland Inn Ballroom

The guitarist in my band is also an accomplished drummer, and seeing as a lot of bands are in desperate need of drummers (including us up until a few weeks ago), he often ends up filling in on drums for other projects. Since I met him, he's does so for Sick Figures, Tim Brantley, and now another friend of his's band called A: The Color. In fact, Jeremy initially asked me to fill in on bass for them, but with the combination of my current level of busyness (prioritizing my own group) and the fact that the group's bluesy prop approach isn't that up-my-alley, I opted out, suggesting a couple others bassists I know.

Anyway, Suzi and I made it out to their show at the Highland Inn Ballroom about a month ago, and though it took the sound guy and perhaps the band a minute to warm into their set, once they got rolling I was pretty impressed. Sure, I'm not that into bluesy rock, but they did a good job with their material and would probably be received well by people into the genre. Above all, I was impressed with the vocalist's range and style, as it's not that common to find guys who sing like that in local groups.

Overall, it was a good set, and I imagine I'll end up seeing the guys play again sometime soon.

Little Children

One of my favorite movies during my time in The Netherlands was Todd Field's Little Children, a drama telling the story of suburban marital unease and how, ultimately, everyone's life ends up getting turned upside down by the titular little children. Naturally, I love a movie like this, one that somewhat-implicitly extols the virtues of life in the city sans offspring, or to be negative, casting a sorrowful eye on the false utopia that is suburbia, so it's no surprise that I both own the film and was down for rewatching it with Suzi (who had also seen it, albeit awhile ago).

All this said, Little Children is that not-too-uncommon type of art film that you never really get excited about watching until you're actually watching it. In this case, it was the omniscient narrator who really made that switch for me with his sly laying-out of what's going on in the two main character's minds at pivotal moments. Also, while I'm not a big Kate Winslet fan, I do really like Jackie Earle Haley (in yet another one of his twisted roles), and I was excited to realize (for the first time) that the male lead in the film, Patrick Wilson, is the same guy who so adeptly played Watchmen's Night Owl. Perhaps one reason I never made this connection is because Wilson gained a noticeable amount of extra weight for that role, whereas in this film he's definitely in shape.

Anyway, sure enough, watching the film again proved to me why it's in my collection, and I highly recommend it to anyone out there who likes a good art film, especially if you can relate to the whole suburban settling-down dilemma so commonplace in our country.

iTunes 90-Second Clips

As you know, I use the iTunes store pretty much exclusively as my method for sampling new music before buying, essentially listening to the first three or so tracks of every release that comes out in the Alternative category every week. While this certainly used to take a fairly long time back when the clips for each track were only 30 seconds apiece, iTunes has now bumped up the sample length to 90 seconds, essentially tripling the amount of time it takes for me to get through the new releases. As such, I kinda gave up on strictly listening to everything that came out, instead clicking on whatever looks familiar/interesting. While I might still be able to find a few great albums this way, the change kinda bums me out because I'm afraid I might end up missing a number albums I would've never thought to give a shot.

I suppose iTunes bumped up their clip lengths to give people an even better idea of what they were getting themselves into, expecting customers to see it as an improvement. Sure enough, I wrote them a complaint saying that while I understand their motivation, there are people like me who are put-off by the change, so a good compromise would be to update the store's preferences so that you can choose whether you prefer short clips or long ones. It wouldn't be entirely true of me to say I don't enjoy the longer clips (in fact, the new length has made it possible to rule out a number of albums earlier on, also creating fewer surprises when I actually buy them), but I really could benefit from having a shorter clip length for my initial search for tracks.

Oh well. Guess it's not going to change anytime soon. In the meantime, I'm still looking for new stuff, but I have a feeling I'm going to end up relying more-heavily on the artists I've already heard of, or at least via recommendations on the web.

The Sea Inside

The third of Pam's movies that Suzi and I watched (and the last of our group of foreign language films) was the Spanish film The Sea Inside, featuring Javier Bardem in the true-story role of Spanish quadriplegic Ramón Sampedro, who spent 29 years trying to earn the right to be euthanized due to his condition. While the topic is certainly intriguing and I've loved Javier Bardem in everything I've seen him in (this being my fourth film of his), I was left feeling kinda 'meh' about this one.

Why? Because as interesting as it might be to see a film about a topic as provoking as euthanasia and the fight to die when one wants, the film is (after all) about a frickin' quadriplegic! He can't move! Sure, there are daydream sequences that help alleviate this problem, but most of them end up playing out in a somewhat-cheesy way. Sure, the acting was totally solid, and the film had high production values, but I just couldn't totally get into the film. It was a bit too mushy for me (though not in the typical way) and didn't take enough risks...maybe it's because it was based on a true story, not wanting to embellish too much?

Anyway, if the premise interests you and you're looking for a slower-paced film with solid acting, I'd say try it out. Otherwise, rent some of Javier Bardem's other work first.

My Chemical Romance - Danger Days: The True Lives Of The Fabulous Killjoys

My second album of 2011 and one of the five I received from my family for Christmas was My Chemical Romance's third studio release, Danger Days: The True Lives Of The Fabulous Killjoys. Ever since I first discovered My Chemical Romance back in the Summer of 2005, I've considered them one of my favorite guilty pleasures, mixing their emo/punk vibe with great lyrics, superb performances (especially on the vocals), and material that's a clear step above that of their peers. I still consider both of their first two albums 5/5's, so you can understand why I had high hopes for this new release.

Unfortunately, the band didn't quite hit the mark with Danger Days. It's not that the album sucks, but it lacks the inspiration and creativity of their first two releases, and offers me little reason to listen to it in lieu of its predecessors. The album is a sort of concept album in the sense that there are three skits featuring a goofy post-apocalyptic radio DJ, all of which loosely suggest the theme despite the fact that the lyrics don't seem all that different from those found in the bands' previous outings. Still, I was listening to the album during our Southern Snowpocalypse and while playing a bit of Fallout 3 at my parents' house, so the theme was certainly a bit reinforced, albeit artificially, by my surroundings.

Ultimately, the strongest parts of the album are where the band offers something new (at least, for them), with little touches like the opening track's incessantly punky "Na Na"ing, "Planetary (GO!)"'s heavy dance-rock beat, "Destroya"'s hints of Smashing Pumpkins and world music, and "The Kids From Yesterday"'s Michael Jackson-esque snare hits. Apart from these and one or two other tracks, the album isn't that memorable, but it's well-produced despite it's lack of inspiration. I wouldn't recommend it, but you probably won't hate it if you do pick it up. Here's hoping the next outing is a return to form for the MCR boys...

Highlights: "Bulletproof Heart"/"Planetary (GO!)"/"Destroya"
Rating: 1/5

The Comedians of Comedy

My other gift for Christmas from my buddy Dave was the comedy tour documentary Comedians of Comedy featuring Patton Oswalt and friends Brian Posehn, Zach Galifianakis, and Maria Bamford. While there are some bits from actual stand-up time itself, most of the film is a sort of travelogue of what happened with the comedians behind the scenes: in tour vans, at the hotels, and having meals. As such, the film gives you the rare glimpse into the touring lives of today's mid-level comedians, but naturally, while we do see them in some less formal settings, it's clear they're still trying to entertain.

Overall, the documentary was pretty entertaining, despite not knowing much about Brian Posehn and Maria Bamford...I did enjoy their material, but I wish Patton had taken a bit more of the spotlight. One interesting thing about the film is that, at the time, Zach Galifianakis was nowhere near as huge as he is now, but it's nice to see he's still more or less the same awkward weirdo he is today. Anyway, it was a nice watch. Sorry the trailer above isn't actually a trailer...couldn't find one, as the film was probably pretty moderately marketed.

Thanks for adding to my Patton obsession, Dave!

Roll Domo Roll

If you don't recall, the board game I gave Suzi for Christmas was based on the popular Japanese television station mascot, Domokun (Domo for short). While Domo has been popular in the States with nerdy Japanophiles for awhile now, I didn't end up hearing about him until Suzi and my first date. Ever since, I've known Domo was fair game for a gift, but it wasn't until Christmas that I got around to it: seeing as we'd been talking about playing a board game or two in the near future, Roll Domo Roll seemed like a decent idea, despite not knowing anything about the game.

So, we've played it a few times now, and it's really pretty simple. Basically, on each player's turn they roll seven dice: six have three of the characters from the Domo TV ads (the misbehaved monster Domo, a rabbit named Mr. Usaji, and a girl weasel named Tashanna) in varying quantities (Domo being the rarest and therefore most valuable) and a seventh die that indicates whether you get a bonus that turn or an apple (which means you don't collect any coins). Basically, you end up rolling and re-rolling the dice quasi-Yahtzee-style hoping to walk away with the most coins in the end. There's a mild gambling element to the game, but it wasn't very well-implemented, so we generally ignore it. The game is built for 2-4 players, and we have a feeling it would be more fun with four, but two is still good enough.

Overall, I'm glad we got it. It's a simple, silly little game, but it's cute and short, therefore making it easy to justify playing a couple rounds to kill a little free time after a DVD or some TV. Wouldn't recommend you go out and buy it unless you're a huge Domo fan, but do check out so Domo videos on YouTube. Here's one to get you started...

Live Show (Local Popular Music) of the Year Nominations 2010

And here we go, back into Top 5 nominations, this time for 2010: seems like I just finished 2009's list (and I did!...back in Dec 2010), but I am making a promise to myself this year that I won't take nearly the whole year to finish up this year's list, so fingers crossed! Up first is a set for live shows I saw this year, broken up (as always) into three categories: Local Popular Music (i.e. generally unsigned bands), Pro Popular Music (nationally-touring bands), and Miscellaneous (everything else, from classical/art music to stand-up comedy and DJs).

While Pro Popular Music nominees were somewhat few-and-far-between in 2010, I caught PLENTY of local shows (I count 29, each one featuring at least a couple bands), but due to the fact that they all start to run together a bit, the Top 5 list wasn't that much easier to pick out. That said, every show on this list was very worthy of being here, so thanks to all these great local(ish) bands for some great experiences. Here we go:

Baby Baby @ The Drunken Unicorn: If you can't tell by now, Baby Baby is my new favorite band in town, and considering this was the show that started it all for me (having initially gone just to see another one of my faves: Parachute Musical), this is easily my favorite shows of theirs. In fact, I find it hard to believe someone could have experienced their set without absolutely loving what they have to offer, at least in terms of stage presence/energy. These guys are amazing, and I truly hope the very best for their career as a band.

The Falcon Lords @ Star Bar: Though I haven't caught one of their live shows in quite awhile (that needs to change!), The Falcon Lords continue to be one of my favorite bands in town, blending a sharp sense of humor with genuinely-catchy surf-rock-meets-dancey-party-rap that's pretty fucking infectious. And to top it all off, considering this was their showy CD release party complete with Falcon dancers and robots, there really hasn't been a better time I've seen them. Two years on the Top 5 list and counting!

Foe Destroyer @ 529: This year's way-out-of-state nomination is North Texas' Foe Destroyer, whose catchy brand of quasi-prog, synthy indie-pop really caught my attention at one of the random shows I went out to see on a whim (seems like 529 is a good place to catch great out-of-state indie bands, as I saw one of last year's nominees - San Fran's Sugar & Gold - here as well). Anyway, the guys are all fantastic musicians who really know how to walk that fine line of keeping their technical prowess from ruining their solid songwriting. Looking forward to seeing them again when they're back in the area.

Sealions @ The Tabernacle: Technically this show is getting listed in two different Top 5 categories, as this was their big opening gig for the nationally-touring Canadian band Metric. Both sets were amazing, but I felt it would be fairer to split them up categorically. Anyway, I had previously seen Atlanta's Sealions at Star Bar back when they were a duo with a drum backing track, so you can imagine my surprise when they nearly blew away their headliner with their newly filled-out lineup and rocking attitude. The guys certainly made me proud for the city, having such a strong band open for a serious national act.

Today the Moon, Tomorrow the Sun @ Picaflor: Last year's category winner (and Most Influential Moment!) still kept the punches rolling with at least two fantastic shows I managed to catch this year, the stronger memory being their gig at the tiny Picaflor art gallery with another notable performance by This Piano Plays Itself. The show was intimate and featured a handful of new, heavier songs that really blew me away, and as such, landed them on the list for a second year in a row. Keep it going, guys!

So, another great year of live shows featuring a couple old favorites, one big new discovery, an out-of-towner, and an evolved local gem. While some of my Top 5 categories weren't nearly as strong in 2010, I'm proud to say that Atlanta's local music offerings are still delivering in a big way. Looking forward to more this year!

127 Hours

One of the big critical favorites this year was James Franco's near-one-man-show in 127 Hours, the biographical film about mountain climber Aron Ralston's true story of being caught in a canyon alone and eventually having to break/saw his arm off in order to live since no one had any clue where he was. Seeing as the story seemed pretty unique and I was curious to see why everyone seems to think James Franco is one of the best new actors in Hollywood despite me having only seen him in the Spier-Man films (with only-acceptable performances) and his admittedly-strong supporting role in Milk, I ended up going to see it a month ago.

While I really wanted to like the film, I didn't end up loving it. I mean, it was certainly memorable and wasn't bad at all, but it didn't really move me either. James Franco certainly did a great job and it was superbly shot (especially the occasional quite-creative camera angle or other bit of cinematography), but it didn't really rise to more than these elements for me. It was also pretty nice seeing Clémence Poésy in something outside of the fantastic In Bruges (one of my personal favorites), but naturally she didn't get a big role in this film, as it really was all about Ralston himself.

In the end, I wouldn't necessarily tell anyone to rush out to see 127 Hours, but I wouldn't discourage it either. If the story intrigues you and/or you like James Franco, go see it!

14th Band-Recruiting Rehearsal

The last time I wrote an update about our search for a drummer here in The Grand was back in mid-November concerning Scott (Brady's brother), and that post was itself a few months behind, having jammed with him at the end of August. So, a little over four months later, we had our next drummer audition, this time with someone that's actually working out!

One night when out to dinner at the Blue Frog Cantina with my friends Adam & Sandra (of The Orkids), I was introduced to their roommate Spangler, who (as it turns out) was not only a drummer, but one who has music degrees, likes to play with bands, and happens to like Philip Glass and minimalism in general. Sounded like a good combination, and I'm happy to report that it's working out: Jeremy and I had our first rehearsal with him the first week of January (at Spangler's house, which he shares with Adam & Sandra), then a full band rehearsal (at Doug's) a couple weeks later, and a rehearsal a couple days ago with just the two of us (again at Spangler's).

In addition to understanding more complicated rhythms/time signatures than are often found in rock music, Spangler's also pretty good at coming up with his own parts and can certainly hold his own on a drum set. Add to this the fact that he's really excited about getting the band off the ground and has the free time and commitment to make it happen, and we've got a real winner here. Our biggest problem in the past has been finding someone who meets all those criteria, so after a year and a half (minimum) of looking for the right guy, I think we've finally found him.

Let's just hope I'm not counting my chickens before they hatch here... Fingers crossed!

Uffie - Sex Dreams And Denim Jeans

One of my New Year's resolutions (if you could call them that) was to start blogging about each individual album I listen to in 2011 and beyond instead of just writing quarterly wrap-ups (which I'll do as well).

Up first in 2011 is a disc I actually bought in 2010 but ended up postponing due to unexpectedly rushing mc chris's album into an earlier slot so I could start working on Suzi's mash-up project. What initially attracted me to Uffie was her work as a guest vocalist on a number of stand-out Ed Banger (a French indie-dance record label) singles, almost all of which she added a lot to. So I picked up her debut album Sex Dreams And Denim Jeans thinking it had some promise...

Turns out it's pretty weak. It's not so much the musical quality of the album (featuring the production talents of a revolving cast of Ed Banger guys but yet somehow still being very cohesive) but Uffie's immature teenage vocals (though she is in her early 20's now, she was a teen when they started recording in 2005). Uffie keeps ranting about how awesome she is, never really making any points that anyone else could relate to, therefore making it hard to connect with the album despite its decent sound. Speaking of which, there were three main producers for the album (Feadz, Mirwais, and Mr. Oizo), the most consistent of which is certainly the highly regarded musical oddball Mr. Oizo with his awkward glitchy beats and creative patch-making. Feadz's (who is evidently Uffie's boyfriend?) material is hit-or-miss, but Mirwais' only good track is the one featuring Pharrell's guest drop "ADD SUV".

Overall, the album was a bit of a letdown, but I'm sure Uffie's potential next album will be more mature (as she'll be older) and her guest drops elsewhere will probably continue to be stellar.

Highlights: "ADD SUV"/"MCs Can Kiss"/"Ricky"
Rating: 1/5

2010 In Review

Here we are nearly crossing the threshold into 2011 with the blog. Yes, it's been an off year for blogging, but hopefully you can tell I've been trying to remedy that lately. Anyway, 2010 was easily one of the best years of my entire life, and while I'll be doing a more thorough look at the top media of the year with a set of upcoming posts, let this list serve as a shortlist for nearly everything else. Here we go:

Around Town: Brew At The Zoo, Flux, Walton Reunion, Chomp & Stomp, Suzi's shows

Band: continued recording @ Riot, drummer auditions (Caleb + Scott)

Friendships (New): Kevin, Ryan Delehanty, Jim & Katie

Friendships (Old): Andrew + Co. in BMore, seeing Bas in Miami and Dave in Houston

Gear: new cell, Red Ring of Death, Prophet '08, new GPS, broken TV

Gigs: Khalil's wedding, birthday medleys, Timber Ridge/Dickerson, Nora's wedding, Tin Roof, Metalhead, piano for Nic, cover band, mc chris mash-up

Health: strep throat, pink eye false alarm, six-week cold/sinus infection

Living Situation: bought my own condo at The Stacks!, lots of new furniture

Relationships: lots of Match dates, stint w/Morgan, bliss w/Suzi =)

Self-Image: grew beard around moustache, swoopy hair, lots of new clothes (esp. hat and sun/hipster glasses)

Trips: Baltimore, St. Augustine, Miami, Philadelphia, Houston, Chattanooga, NYC, San Francisco, plus four trips to Athens

Weddings: Khalil, Ryan Hunter, Estel

Work: new Music & Arts gig, solid income all year

Seriously, an astounding year. I moved into my own (amazing) condo, I began what's clearly the best relationship I've ever had, work was great (I got coworkers for the first time!), traveling was the best I've had since living in Europe (if not better), I made some new very-close friends, I ended up doing a lot of extracurricular freelancing, and I refined my wardrobe quite a bit. One big omission on the list this year is that of a category dedicated to stuff that happened with my family, but seeing as this often had something to do with Dad's health, it's good that things were pretty uneventful this time around. Sure, band stuff stagnated WAY too much (it's picking up now though), I got pretty sick a couple times, and I've had some serious trouble with my Xbox/TV, but none of that could really tarnish such an incredible twelve months. Here's to another!

New EPs (2010)

EPs weren't as big a part of my music-listening life in 2010 as they were in 2009, and as such, I only had six releases to blog about this year, so I decided to just present them all in one post instead of breaking them up into two installations for the first and second halves of the year. I don't know what it was, but I couldn't seem to find many EPs that really struck me as must-buys. Anyway, here's the list:

1. Isles & Glaciers - The Hearts Of Lonely People (5/5)
2. The Long Blondes - Guilt (2/5)
3. The Hours - Ali In The Jungle (3/5)
4. Ozomatli - Ozomatli Vs. KCRW Soundclash! (2/5)
5. There For Tomorrow - Re:Creations (5/5)
6. Owen Pallett - A Swedish Love Story (4/5)

So, seeing as there weren't enough albums to really expect a good spread of scores, there are no 1/5's this time around, but that was true of last year's bigger selection of 10 EPs too. I would definitely argue that the 5/5's this year are a good step below those from 2009, but not giving out any 5/5's isn't how my grading scale operates, so whatever. Both of them were in the punk/emo vein, but they were both solid: Isles & Glaciers reminded me strongly of The Used album to which I awarded the Best Album of 2009 (Lies For The Liars), and There For Tomorrow's electronic/rock hybrid rework of a handful of tracks from their otherwise bland pop punk album was certainly commendable. Owen Pallett's EP also featured the unofficial theme song to Suzi-and-my trip to San Fran, so that's pretty notable.

Otherwise, the rest was pretty forgettable, but I'm glad I at least got this many EPs in this year, as I consider the medium extremely important for rising indie music, allowing artists to make more dud-free albums on a more regular basis than feature-length studio albums. Seeing as this year's EPs were more-or-less replaced by a bunch of compilations of downloaded singles that were pretty decent themselves, I'm kinda on the fence about whether I need the EP to return as a big favorite for 2011, so long as the singles keep picking up the slack. We'll see...

New X-Men: Ultimate Collection Vol.1

The world of comics can be a confusing one, not only for their storylines and character-development, but also in how they're distributed. As I forgot to mention in my recent post on the subject, for Christmas my buddy Dave gave me the first trade paperback (TPB) installment of Grant Morrison's well-received New X-Men storyline. Now, the weird thing about this (which I just had to clear up myself), is that prior to Morrison's joining the writing team, this book was actually just plain old X-Men (not to be confused with Uncanny X-Men, the original line). Seeing as Morrison had a big overhaul in mind for the series, switching gears from focusing on the adult X-Men themselves to having them become the teachers of a whole new class of teammates, I guess they decided they would change the name of the comic in the middle of its run (starting here with issue no.114). It eventually goes back to plain-old X-Men and then becomes X-Men: Legacy, but somehow it's all still the same thing...

Onto the story at hand. The TPB Dave gave me is the first of three compilations comprising Morrison's complete run with the series, essentially encapsulating a large macro storyline. This installment revolves around Professor X's strange twin sister he supposedly killed in the womb before they were born, Cassandra Nova. Basically, Cassandra is out to destroy everything Charles has worked for, effectively killing off most of the world's mutant population and making life hell for Charles and the X-Men. There are a couple other key players here, including the incredible sun-wielding Xorn, the mutant wannabes the U-Men, and (randomly) the space-faring Shi'ar.

Overall, the story is very good (perhaps the best X-Men line I've read, up there with my guilty pleasure Longshot), but with the combination of the Cassandra Nova elements and the presence of the Shi'ar, things do get a little weird/hard-to-follow at times. Still, I plan on buying the other two releases in this story-arc once I've finished some other pressing reading. In fact, seeing as this set is actually technically a continuation of the X-Men line I used to collect religiously growing up, I might even consider trying to connect the large gap between my last-purchased issue from my youth and this set, probably with whatever TPBs that might be out there.

Thanks to Dave for the great comic! Graphic novels are quickly becoming one of my favorite forms of entertainment, so keep 'em coming!

New Albums (Q4 2010)

Almost done wrapping-up 2010's backlog of posts, so it's time to hit-up the last quarter's round of albums:

01. Everything Everything - Man Alive (2/5)
02. Ludo - Prepare The Preparations (3/5)
03. Mason Proper - There Is A Moth In Your Chest (1/5)
04. Ra Ra Riot - The Rhumb Line (4/5)
05. Common Grackle - The Great Depression (4/5)
06. Rosaline - The Vitality Theory (1/5)
07. M.I.A. - Maya (2/5)
08. Hellogoodbye - Would It Kill You? (5/5)
09. Girl Talk - Feed The Animals (2/5)
10. Arcade Fire - The Suburbs (3/5)
11. mc chris - mc chris Is Dead Black (4/5)
12. Oh No Ono - Eggs (3/5)

Overall, this was a weird quarter, having only one really strong stand-out album (Hellogoodbye) but a number of solid fours. The two biggest disappointments were Everything Everything's debut (which sounded amazing as clips online but got annoying with full track-length listens) and Girl Talk's last album, which sounds WAY better as background music at a party than when listening carefully whilst driving. Also disappointing was the mixed bag that was Arcade Fire's The Suburbs: basically, if they had just left out the middle tracks and kept the ten or so tracks comprising the front and back ends, it would have been a 5/5. The biggest surprises were falling in love with mc chris' music (largely due to my mash-up project) and Common Grackle's charming genre-defying album.

Please note that the scores above will be changing as soon as I've had time to re-listen to my entire year's list of albums and adjust rankings accordingly.

Lockup: Extended Stay Corcoran

While Suzi and I were in San Francisco, we were actually pretty jet-lagged, never really getting over the three hour time difference and essentially staying on Atlanta time the whole time. As such, when it got to be 9pm or so, we were already pretty wiped, feeling like it was midnight, so one night we ended up staying in relaxing and watching TV. To my surprise, the show we ended up watching, Lockup: Extended Stay Corcoran ended up becoming one of my favorite shows I've seen in awhile. And seeing as we caught a marathon, we might very well have seen the whole season, or at least a sizable chunk of it.

Anyway, Lockup is a reality program about life in America's prisons, the "Extended Stay" part being an off-shoot of the show particularly focusing on long-term incarceration. Corcoran is a notable California State prison, and as the intro segment above tells you, it features a lot of gang/race-related animosity and violence amongst inmates. As such, there is a whole cast of available gang affiliations like the Bulldogs, the Mexican Mafia, and the Aryan Brotherhood, all with their own distinctive look and internal politics. The clip above (start around 3:00 to see the best part) is about one particularly dangerous Mexican Mafia member who brutalized some guy in his cell and then used his bleeding body as a stand on which to cook grilled cheeses. Crazy...

Easily my favorite part of the show though was this segment about the GBGs, or the Gay Boy Gangsters, most of whom were kept in the section of the prison designed for people who would otherwise be heavily targeted by other inmates. Yeah, I couldn't believe it either, but there is a whole group of gay guys who have united to have their own "gang", presumably to help protect one another. The chief guy they interviewed from the GBGs was this fat, totally stereotypical gay guy whose gang name was "Wicked" though he looked like he wouldn't harm a fly (he probably just liked the name because of the musical...). In his segment, he was mainly concerned with his budding supposedly-secret relationship with some Hispanic guy who was probably only pretending to be gay to get special treatment.

Anyway, the show is pretty amazing, and you should definitely check it out if you can. Couldn't stop watching!

San Fran Winter Getaway w/Suzi

For one last traveling hurrah before ringing in the New Year, Suzi and I decided to take a just-slightly-before-NYE trip to San Francisco, returning to Atlanta just in time to have a mini two-person NYE celebration here (we booked our trip this way because it was a lot cheaper flying home before the holiday). Also, seeing as Suzi's Winter holiday is her only one lengthy enough to justify a larger-scale trip, we made this our longest vacation ever at a total of four nights. We were initially debating between SF and Southern Spain (as they were both fairly warm for this time of year), but we decided Europe would be a bit too much of a strain on the wallet with all the traveling we had done this year. Alright, here are the Facebook albums:

San Francisco Trip w/Suzi (Part I)
San Francisco Trip w/Suzi (Part II)
San Francisco Trip w/Suzi (Part III)

Overall, this might very well have been Suzi-and-my best trip this year, right up there with the nearly-flawless Baltimore trip. Unlike our last big-city trip (to NYC), San Fran had none of the horrible weather, gloomy atmosphere, and frustrating transportation problems, but still managed to be as charming as ever. Granted, it was pretty windy, and we were both getting over being sick, but I have yet to visit San Francisco without totally falling in love with it, and this trip was no exception. There were a few things we really wanted to do but ran out of time for (Alcatraz, the Anchor Steam Brewery, and the Palace of Fine Arts being chief amongst them), but seeing as we both had such a good time, I anticipate we'll be back someday to try these out together.

In the end, there couldn't have been a better end to the fantastic year that was 2010, and I really hope we get to take many more amazing trips like this one in the year to come.

mc chris Mash-Up

Onto the DIY project for Suzi's main Christmas present. As I've mentioned before, Suzi's favorite rapper is this diminutive white Irish-American guy named mc chris who often raps about nerdy stuff. Well, in thinking about what I could do for Suzi's main gift as a labor of love, it struck me that instead of doing a regular DJ mix for her (which I haven't done since the Summer of 2008), I could attempt my own version of a Girl Talk-inspired mega-mash-up, featuring mc chris' a cappella vocal tracks from the album mc chris is dead. For those that don't know, Girl Talk's approach is to take a bunch of rap a cappellas and put them over tons of samples from non-rap sources, often featuring twenty or more songs in the course of four or five minutes.

Well, the undertaking was a bit more than I had expected, as I not only had to import mc chris is dead (both in its original form and the a cappellas) into Ableton and beat-align them, but I had to find enough suitable outside material (figuring out their keys and BPMs beforehand for compatibility) and do the same with them, all of this before I could even start the actual construction of any of the 10-plus tracks I was planning on mashing-up. Suffice it to say that I'm still working on the material, but I DID get one entire track done in time for Christmas, and though I was disappointed with how long it had taken me to do just that much, Suzi loved her gift, as she had no clue any of it was coming.

Here's how it went down: After celebrating Christmas with my family, Suzi and returned to my place for our own gift-giving time, and as my last present, I handed her the burned CD with the mc chris mash-up on it, saying she probably already had it (being the big mc chris fan she is), but that it was the new single off mc chris' upcoming mash-up album. Considering I sold it pretty well, Suzi believed me and got pretty excited, so we went out to my car to listen to it (preferring my car speakers at such a late hour). After checking it out and seeing that she loved it (BTW: I'm not going to tell you what I mashed it up with until I've finished the whole album and have given it to mc chris himself), I told her that it was actually me that did it, and she freaked out.

Basically, it went perfectly, being perhaps my favorite Christmas present I've ever given anyone. I'm still working on the rest of the tracks from the album, but I've gotten stuck on the second track, as it's a lot more involved than any of the others. Still, it should be finished soon...I'm eager to see what she thinks of this one. Naturally, she couldn't possibly be as stunned as she was the first time since she now knows I'm working on it, but hopefully she still loves it. =)