Death To Smoochy

Ever since I first saw it in the theater back in my undergrad at UGA, I've been a big fan of Danny DeVito's dark comedy Death To Smoochy, so it comes as no surprise that it was one of the first films I was excited to show Suzi for her first time. All this said, to be honest, I've probably seen the movie two too many times at this point, as it doesn't really get me all that excited anymore, but I can separate this fatigue from how good it actually is, so I wouldn't say I've changed my mind about it. Ultimately, the cast is fantastic, the premise is unique (there are so few good satires made these days!), and it's always fun to see Robin Williams cussing in a movie (though I don't find it quite as entertaining when he's doing stand-up).

Anyway, great film, though it's amazing to me how quickly cheesily-narrated trailers like the one above have become passé... Now, I've only got One Hour Photo left to see to complete my early 2000's trilogy of dark Robin Williams films to rewatch. Too bad it's not on streaming Netflix...

GaTech Musical Instrument Competition 2011

I'm always on the lookout for cool atypical things to do in town, so when I heard about Georgia Tech's third annual Music Instrument Competition, featuring new instrument designs by a wide range of inventors (some of which were international), I knew this would be the sort of thing I wouldn't want to miss. Going in, I wasn't really sure what to expect...I knew there would be a concert featuring the top instrument designs, but I wasn't sure if the music involved would be original to the inventors, improvisatory, or performances of other composers' works. I could be wrong about this (as the information booklet about the event was poorly put-together), but I think the "pieces" were all by the inventors themselves, with most of them being improvised. That's not to say they were poor, but none of them ended up bowling me over either.

Anyway, obviously the real point of the whole event was the instruments themselves...I was initially going to write an entry for all eight finalists, but the post started getting especially long (and a bit too negative about the less-impressive entries), so instead I'm just going to talk about my top three, presented here in their concert order:

The Samchillian Tip Tip Tip Cheeepeeeee: My favorite instrument of the evening was actually less of a new instrument and more of a creative way to control notes using Max/MSP and Ableton Live. Basically, instead of playing fixed notes on a keyboard, each key press represented a certain intervallic movement either up or down, allowing for some really fast passages and presenting an interesting reimagining of the way we look at music. Plus, the music (and the inventor) was pretty cool. I would DEFINITELY buy this instrument if it were marketed commercially. As far as I'm concerned, it's right up there with the Axis 64, which I've been lusting after for awhile now.

The MindBox, Media Slotmachine: Basically an elaborate audio/video sampler patch controlled by a converted slot machine, the MindBox was easily the most visually-stimulating of the instruments on offer, if not the most flexible - I never got a chance to get my hands on it, but I have a feeling its practical musical applications would be a bit limited, at least until more A/V samples or patches were added. Still, I would love to have something like this as a patch/plug-in for a synth or software...

The Hexenkessel: More-or-less a converted timpani with an interactive touchscreen and the ability to control specific audio samples via a variety of built-in MIDI controllers, the Hexenkessel took what's easily one of the lamest solo instruments in the entire Western world and made it way cooler. That's not to say that it doesn't still sound like a timpani, but at least it's an improvement... ;) In all seriousness, doing this obviously took a lot of work, and if every instrument was updated like this, I have a feeling the classical world would evolve much quicker. Plus, the Hexenkessel featured what was easily the most thoughtfully-composed music of the evening, which was definitely a plus. And there was a smoke machine, people.

Anyway, the evening was pretty great, and although I didn't get to lay eyes on him, one of the judges was none other than synthesizer legend Tom Oberheim! I definitely plan on going back next year, and I highly recommend anyone in the Atlanta area try to make it as well.

15th Band-Recruiting Rehearsal

While it seems that the main struggle with band membership has been locking down a solid drummer for an extended period of time, there's one other piece that I've been stressing out about since the beginning but had put on the backburner since I could technically take care of it: that of a full-time keyboardist. While I didn't need someone who would be heavily into the creative process, I DID need someone to cover my parts while I was singing, with me only interjecting on keys once in awhile. The problem was that the parts I'm playing are full-on two-hand piano parts, often with seventh chords in more complex keys than most people who are only somewhat-proficient at keys would be capable of pulling off, so I had to find someone that could hold their own with jazz chords, improvisation, and music theory.

So what better place to turn than to one of my very own students, as that's exactly what I teach in lessons? I've written about my most-advanced keyboard student, Max, having graduated form high school and starting his undergraduate degree at Emory this past Summer, but it wasn't until February that he really became available enough to commit to trying things out with the band. Once he gave me the green light, I went to work transcribing the keys parts for all our current tunes (since he can read music as well as improvise), and soon thereafter we were running a rehearsal with Spangler that involved (for the first time) both of my keyboards set up running through my P.A. system from high school.

Let's just say that Max nailed the parts on his first rehearsal, blowing away Spangler and (eventually) Jeremy when they both saw how adept he was at covering my parts, almost as if it were me playing. Look, I'm not trying to brag or anything, but I do play parts that are far more complicated than the average rock band fare, and it's been hard to even get suggestions for a pianist who would be able to cover the material, so it's awesome having Max around. Now I'm truly free to focus on singing in rehearsals, and it's awesome, because although I CAN play keys and sing, but both parts end up being compromised in the process.

So, there you have it: keys (Max), guitar (Jeremy), bass (Doug), drums (Spangler), aux perc (Erich), and of course vox (me)...a complete band. Granted, we could still use Emily on backup vox and some lighter keys parts, but it's been so long since we've talked to her about band stuff that we're going to wait until we've got things rolling a little bit more, so as to not look like another false start. I'll keep you updated!

Matrix Brake Pads...

Roughly this time last year, I had a very expensive 50,000 miles maintenance check-up on my 2007 Toyota Matrix, so you can imagine how surprised I was a couple months ago to start hearing my brakes squealing quite loudly when I brake. Naturally, I took my car in to have it looked at, and the guys there said I needed to replace my rear brakes since only my front ones had been addressed in the maintenance service last year. So, although it was expensive and took a long time (as they had to have the parts brought in from another store), I went along with it, thinking my brakes were at risk of failing on me sometime soon...

Well, you can imagine how frustrated I was to find that my brakes were STILL SQUEALING immediately after my service visit and have continued to do so for the past month or so. I called the guy in charge of the repair a few days later (having thought it might just take a few miles to wear the pads in), and he told me he'd have me in to have it looked at for no extra charge in addition to taking care of a new computer issue that's part of a recent recall for my model. Well, I never ended up taking it in, because the the new computers were back-ordered, but I've now been told that the part's in, so I'm gonna try to make an appointment sometime sooner than later.

The good news about my brakes is that, according to the guys at the dealership who worked on my car, the squealing isn't a cause for immediate concern, as all my brake pads are working just fine, but it does concern me that they couldn't have detected the issue in the first place and that they don't seem to know how to fix it. I don't know...as long as there hasn't been any permanent damage to my car and they won't end up charging me for their misdiagnosis, I'll be fine with it. It's just frustrating. Makes me look like a chump driving around for two months with what sounds like unsafe brake pads...and of course it's annoying as hell!

Gregory Pepper & His Problems - With Trumpets Flaring

One of last year's coolest discoveries was that of the collaboration between underground hip-hop producer Factor with indie songwriter Gregory Pepper (together as Common Grackle) on their album The Great Depression, so naturally I looked up the two musicians' solo work to see if it would also be something I'd be into picking up. While Factor's work didn't really do much for me, I came to find that it was Gregory Pepper's addition to Common Grackle that really caught my ear, as his solo project is quite similar, albeit without the cooler hip-hop beats scattered throughout that album.

That said, I definitely prefer The Great Depression to the album on review here (With Trumpets Flaring), as the hooks and textures in the solo project aren't quite as strong those in the collaboration. Add to this the fact that there are far too many short tracks on offer (seven out of thirteen hover around the two-minute mark or less!), leaving it hard to really get into a groove or even get to know what makes one track separate from another, as they all tend to run together a bit. Still, what's here IS solid, and I would definitely recommend it if you liked Gregory Pepper's work with Common Grackle. So, I'm giving it a low four, and I reserve the right to bump it down to a three if I change my mind later on...

Highlights: "7ths And 3rds"/"Drop The Plot"/"If You Try"
Rating: 4/5

Necromunda Games 3+4

I'm compiling the last two Necromunda games into one post because there isn't enough to write about either to justify a post for each. In summary, the third game featured some forgettable mission scenario where Andy ended up kicking my ass (I think it had something to do with him defending some sort of central part of the battlefield, but I really can't remember), and the fourth was this silly little formal shoot-off where two of my guys encountered two of his in the streets and had a stand-off until he shot at my guys and mine promptly took him out in like two turns without any drama or suspense.

All this said, we've more-or-less reached the decision that Necromunda really isn't as cool as we had hoped, especially not compared with our memories of the bigger titles Games Workshop puts out (Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000), so we're probably going to put our gangs on hold, possibly to give us a chance to try out another smaller-scale (but cost-free, because I already own everything we need) game they make called Warhammer Quest. My biggest gripes about Necromunda are the lack of variety between rival gangs (at least, without using the later Outlanders expansion pack), the unbalanced scenario types on offer, the claustrophobic multi-tiered tunnel fighting (which looks cooler that it is to play in), and the broken money-earning system in the game.

Oh well...at least we gave it a shot, even if it was only fun in a nostalgic way instead of being inherently entertaining/rewarding. Besides, Andy's gonna be in Barcelona for the next three months anyway, so maybe by the time he returns I'll be all revved up to give something else a go...

The Departed

My initial reaction to the over-hyped recent Ben Affleck film The Town was that it was both too similar and clearly inferior to Martin Scorsese's The Departed, so considering Suzi hadn't yet seen it, I was eager to show it to her. Unfortunately, while the film is most-certainly better than The Town, it's evidently also a lot more complicated, especially to someone who's not particularly familiar with detective/cop films, so I don't think she ended up liking it quite as much as I had hoped. I'm still convinced though that the film's a pretty stellar addition to the genre, as the plot has plenty of twists, the acting is commendable, and it pretty much lacks any weak points (given one doesn't find the plot too confusing).

So, is it worth buying in this age of cheap rentals? No, but not much is... I would still thoroughly recommend it to anyone that's interested, and I'm definitely interested in (re)watching some other solid Scorsese/Leo films like Gangs Of New York and Shutter Island.

Steve Aoki/Le Castle Vania @ The Tabernacle

Here I go again talking about my favorite DJ, Steve Aoki. A month and a half ago Suzi and I joined one of her friends and her boyfriend to see another Aoki gig, but instead of catching him at the painfully douchy Opera nightclub, we got to see him at the much chiller Tabernacle, where Suzi and I had recently enjoyed seeing Girl Talk. All things told, the show wasn't too different from seeing him at Opera almost a year before, apart from the venue change. This time around, I technically recognized a few more of his tracks, having gotten to know them in the interim period between shows, but we danced less, as we weren't really in the mood and Suzi's friends ended up taking off early due to the boyfriend not feeling well/not wanting to put up with Aoki's occasional screaming on top of the tracks (which I actually really enjoyed, especially this time around).

The three best things about the show though were buying the kick-ass Steve Aoki shirt shown above featuring his recognizable signature dirty-haired Japanese hipster look sans facial features, getting to briefly see (but not meet) Aoki backstage via our friend who works merch there, and catching the opening DJ, Atlanta's own Le Castle Vania, who rocked the shit out of the place, proving me wrong about Atlanta not having any stellar DJs. Sure, MJQ's regular guys tend to play some awesome shit, but this guy was on a whole other level. I would definitely try to catch him playing out live sometime soon, just preferably not at the 18+ "Fuck Yesss" held at MJQ once a month...

Second Full Rehearsal w/Spangler

While 2011 hasn't exactly started off all that well, one thing that has improved is the band situation. At this point, I've been having a weekly rehearsal with at least Spangler (our drummer) in addition to some other band-related meet-up, either with just our new keyboardist (more on this later) or studio time with Erich, all of this consistently for the past six weeks or so, so things are definitely looking up. As such, I'm not going to be writing about everything that ends up happening, but I do want to keep you up-to-date with the biggest developments, one of which was certainly our second four-person rehearsal with Spangler, once again at Doug's place.

The big step forward here was my decision to start playing three of our four main songs we're working on down a whole step to better accommodate my singing. For those of you that don't sing, a whole step (or two notes) down is actually a fairly big change for a vocalist, especially if some of the extremes of the note range are also in the extreme registers for the singer. Considering I tend to write high vocal lines that are only made even more taxing with the upwards key modulations I often put at the end of songs, it made a lot of sense pulling some of our tougher lines down.

Unfortunately, this has meant that everyone that plays notes (i.e. not the drummer) has had to relearn the songs on some level. On bass, this is easy enough, as Doug generally just plays single-note lines that could just be shifted down two frets, so no big problem there. On keys, this could be very difficult depending on how good the player is and how hard the new key is, but I've been fine, and even if I wasn't, I could just hit the transpose key on my synths to allow me to keep playing it with the old fingerings but sounding lower. The real problem is the guitar stuff, as Jeremy often likes to use open chords, which are often virtually impossible to truly recreate by shifting frets around, as you only have so many fingers to cover it all. Jeremy has temporarily solved this problem by tuning one guitar down a whole step, but the sound is a little flabby and unreliable intonation-wise, so I'm not sure this is the best fix for the long haul. We'll see.

Overall, the rehearsal went well though, especially vocally, as I can now sing for over an hour without wiping out my singing voice with all those high notes. You wouldn't think a whole step would make that much of a difference, but trust me that it does. Sure, some of the lower passages are now borderline too low to resonate as well as I would like, but it's a trade I'm willing to make, as the higher stuff easily makes a stronger impression.

Dance Single of the Year Nominations 2010

Onto the singles categories of my yearly Top 5 lists. Unfortunately, 2010 wasn't quite as great a year for dance music, as I had almost entirely stopped actively looking for songs in the genre on iTunes. Still, I managed to pull out a decent enough list with the smattering of dance tracks I ended up including in my three otherwise indie-rock compilations for the year. On some level, I was tempted to include highlight tracks off of a handful of more-obviously dance albums from the year, but seeing as these singles lists are meant only for individual tracks I bought (separately from their album), I figured I would continue keeping the two categories entirely separate. Anyway, here we go:

The Bloody Beetroots (Feat. Steve Aoki) - Warp 1.9: It's no secret that I'm a huge fan of Steve Aoki and his Dim Mak record label crew (which includes The Bloody Beetroots), and seeing as this hard-hitting, moody floor pounder is probably the most club-ready tune on this list, it was a no-brainer picking this one for this year's Top 5. The track is deceptively simple (recreating the tone of its synths still alludes me), but it's often this sort of aggressive simplicity that makes a track like this so powerful.

Die Antwoord - Enter The Ninja (DJ Fishsticks Remix): While the South African rap duo Die Antwoord might actually just be another of their gimmicky ploys designed to get a rise out of people, that doesn't keep this fantastic remix of the already-decent lead single off their new album from making you want to dance (with a big grin at that!). It's the cheesy trance synths and arpeggiated lead line that takes the whole thing over the top, and I love ever guilty pleasure second of it!

James Blake - CMYK: I don't find too many chiller dance tracks I end up falling in love with, but when I do, they really stick with me. Sure, James Blake's "CMYK" doesn't stay chill-chill for too long, but the overall vibe lasts the entire track, his sense of harmony is refreshing for the genre, and the little ambient weirdness goes a long way in making this track unique.

Robyn - Don't Fucking Tell Me What To Do: While everyone's talking about how amazing Robyn's recent work has been, the only track that really appealed to me off-the-bat from iTunes clips was this ode to negativity in our busy world of multitasking. What I love most about this track is its minimalist retro vibe, being almost reminiscent of some of Technotronic's darker material from back in the day.

RuPaul - Never Go Home Again: While this is a total guilty pleasure, I do find that RuPaul actually makes some surprisingly-good bubblegum dance pop, and considering that Suzi pointed out how much RuPaul kinda sounds like The Goose himself as one of the tracks for our St. Augustine roadtrip, I figured this song wouldn't make a bad last entry in the Top 5 this year. It's cheesy, but it builds well and the chorus is pretty catchy.

So there you have it. Certainly not the best Top 5 I've had in the dance genre, but it'll suffice. Let's hope this year I can find some more compelling stuff to listen to!

Grease @ JCHS

One of the most rewarding things about teaching music lessons is seeing your students starting to use their talents, whether it be on piano or guitar itself or just flexing their musical muscles in general. So, when I found out one of my most-talented students was going to have his first acting/singing role in his high school's production of Grease, I made sure to show up to support him, especially considering the musical had a big impact on me back when I was in high school, having seen it for the first time my Freshman year.

Overall, the show was solid, despite having the expected high school production level of talent discrepancies from singer to singer (the best vocalists being the guy who played Danny Zuko, one of the funnier T-Birds, and especially the girl who played Rizzo). The sets were particularly good, even having a mock-up car on stage for a couple scenes, a vinyl-record-shaped portal set high above the stage for the narrating DJ to pop out of for various narration, and lockers for cast members to come out of (à la You Can't Do That On Television). The worst element of the show (at least on the night I saw it...opening night) was the balance between the onstage (though hidden) instrumental musicians and the vocalists themselves. That said, this very well may have been addressed over the next few performances...

Easily the highlight of the show for me was seeing my student Harrison rocking his duel role as one of the T-Birds and Johnny Casino, the lead singer of the band hired for the school's big dance. As such, he had to play guitar while singing in addition to learning the T-Bird dance moves and looking the part for both characters. While all of this was good, what really stood out was Harrison's singing as the Elvis-esque Johnny Casino, being more in tune than many of the "more-vocally-experienced" cast while also seeming quite confident, despite this being his first show ever. Now, while I teach Harrison piano (not guitar or voice), I do feel that at least a small part of his musical competence/confidence came from our nearly three years working together, but clearly the work he put in for the show is all his to brag about.

Overall, it was a rewarding night out, seeing one of my students come even further into his own. Thanks again to the family for the ticket!

Necromunda Game 2

Back to tabletop battle game nerdom... While our first game was fun enough, we learned quickly from that experience and made sure the following game was on a smaller board, allowing for much more action. While I lost the first game pretty soundly, I slaughtered Andy's gang in the second. I can't remember what the name of the scenario we were running was, but basically Andy had to get a smaller contingent of his guys from one side of the board to the other before a couple small groups from my gang could take them out. At first we thought this was going to be super easy for him, but it turned out that I rolled to have all of my guys eventually on the board, which was clearly enough to stop his group of four or so from making it across.

So, after losing in the first game, it was nice to see I could pull out a big win, but honestly, I feel like it had more to do with the scenario being grossly unbalanced...but whatevs. Oh, and I ended up capturing his gang leader and ransoming him for all of Andy's cash, which was fun... ;)

Capitalism: A Love Story

I've already written about how much I love Sicko, Michael Moore's documentary on the inherent problems in our healthcare system here in the States, and I'm proud to say I own it, so I was pretty excited when I found out his next feature was set to expose the problems in America's greed-fueled brand of Capitalism, tongue-in-cheekily entitled Capitialism: A Love Story. So, this is what I chose as my first previously-unviewed Netflixed film, and I have to say that I was sorely disappointed: not only was the film simply not as inspired as Sicko (which was actually praised by both sides of the aisle, so to speak), but it failed to make a convincing argument, to the point that some of the assertions almost seemed fabricated.

Listen, I'm certainly no fan of our country's corrupt political-economic system at all, but I was hoping this film would help corroborate some of my feelings instead of giving me my first glimpse of how many other people probably view Michael Moore's work, as half-baked arguments unreasonably biased towards a liberal perspective. Granted, I don't hate the man or think he's totally full of shit like the conservative haters do, but I think he was reaching a bit too much with this film. Add to this the fact that he tried to frame himself as a concerned Catholic (despite no apparent indication of his beliefs up to this point) to drum up the "What Would Jesus Do?" argument against Capitalism, and you've got one secular liberal who definitely sees this as a step backwards for the man's work.

All this said, I still want to check out Bowling For Columbine, but I think I might skip Fahrenheit 9/11, as it always struck me as extremely biased (and perhaps a bit too propaganda-like...). Perhaps Moore is one of these creative types who consistently alternates between making really solid films and really weak ones? Everyone seemed to love Bowling For Columbine and Sicko, while the other two fell in-between. Hmmm...

Janelle Monáe - The ArchAndroid

Onto my sixth album of Q1 2011 - Janelle Monáe's concept album The ArchAndroid. Having loved the Noisettes' somewhat stylistically-similar Wild Young Hearts, I was initially attracted to this album by its futuristic android asylum theme and some of the hooks from the 30 second clips on iTunes, but once I got down to actually working my way through this lengthy album track-by-track, I started to kinda just wish it would just end. Sure, the orchestral bits are all really nice, but I feel they would have served the album better had some of the middling regular tracks been left out. One alternative to this approach would have been to only include the first half of the album (releasing the second later), as The ArchAndroid technically represents Suites II and III of a three-part concept album set begun with Monáe's previous album's Suite I.

And then there's the fact that the concept itself doesn't really seem all that convincing...I get that she's supposed to be an android in the future, but the lyrics and musical style BARELY allude to this, and if it weren't for the album title and the liner notes, I would probably have no idea what was going on at all. And, why does Athens' Of Montreal get their own track, apparently devoid of Monáe's presence at all? Still, there are some solid moments, especially amongst the slower or more-orchestral tracks, and Janelle's voice is truly great, but this is no album I would recommend to anyone...not because it's bad, but rather because it lacks anything that keeps me coming back to it.

Highlights: "Faster"/"Oh, Maker"/"Say You'll Go"
Rating: 2/5

Predator 2

Believe it or not, the first movie that I ended up watching on Netflix by myself was none other than the questionable sequel that is Predator 2. Growing up, I was a big fan of the Predator franchise and actually loved this movie, but as an adult, I can clearly see how inferior it is to the first. Still...nothing will change the somewhat warm feelings I have seeing the Predator stalking an unlikely Danny Glover through an urban landscape, complete with the ridiculous cast, including the likes of Gary Busey and Bill Paxton.

A handful of the movies I'll most-certainly be writing about in the next few months will be of the same ilk as Predator 2: movies that I once loved during my middle/high school years but that just can't stand the test of time. As such, I'll probably try to only watch these kinds of films every once in awhile, as they don't really offer much more than a bit of nostalgia.

HiFi Magazine...

I've been trying to keep this under wraps until it officially came out, but starting in April with their debut of their first print-copy installments, I'm going to be a published album reviewer! And believe it or not, this was all possible via my blog! Back in January, I received a Facebook email from the editor of the HiFi Magazine blog and soon-to-be bi-monthly publication saying that he had profiled my blog to see if I would be the sort of writer he was looking for for his new magazine, and liking what he saw, he offered me a slot as a guest writer, largely contributing to album reviews and the occasional special article. Now, although I'm not set to be paid until the magazine picks up a few proper sponsors, I do get free digital copies of the albums I review, and seeing as I don't have much experience writing past this and other blogs and my seven years in college writing papers, I felt this wasn't such a bad deal, at least for the time-being.

Anyway, having accepted the position, in January I was assigned four albums to review, all of which will appear in the March/April issue, coming out soon in certain locations (TBD). So, despite having done these reviews a few weeks earlier in my blogging chronology, the reason I put this post in at this point is because, unbeknownst to me at the time, one of the articles I contributed to ended up getting published online on Valentine's Day, being a love song themed post. So, here's my first time guest-writing for someone else's publication, albeit another website:

HiFi Magazine Jukebox: Favorite Love Songs

I, along with a few other guest writers, was asked to submit up to four favorite love songs for the article, but I guess it turned out that it was just the editor and me who ended up getting in material on time, hence most of the posts being from him with four from me. Anyway, it was really cool seeing my work somewhere else online, and I'm really looking forward to the first issue of the publication. I'll keep you up-to-date!

Insomnia

Up first on the streaming Netflix list was the 2002 American remake of the Norwegian film Insomnia, starring Al Pacino, Robin Williams, and Hillary Swank. Notably, this was one of three or so films that came out at the turn of the century casting Robin Williams as a villain (the other two being Death to Smoochy and One Hour Photo), and as such, I saw all three back when they came out and liked them all, so I recommended Suzi join me watching those she hadn't yet seen.

The premise of Insomnia is pretty straight-forward: Al Pacino plays an accomplished detective who is called in to solve a particularly-violent crime in an otherwise peaceful small town in Alaska during the time of the year when there's virtually no darkness, leaving Al Pacino's character at a strong disadvantage as he continually worsens with less and less sleep, failing to quickly adapt to the constant sunlight. Naturally, the premise is enhanced with a few complications and twists, leading up to a climactic ending, but ultimately, while Insomnia IS good, it didn't quite stand up to my memory of it, leaving me wondering if I might actually appreciate the original Norwegian version better.

So, check it out if you're interested in well-acted detective stories with an interesting twist, but you might want to consider the Norwegian version if you don't mind subtitles/foreign films, even though I haven't seen it to vouch for it.

Streaming Netflix

The newest time-wasting development in my life is easily Suzi and my discovery that the streaming Netflix app on my Xbox is not only free for us (linking to her hard copy Netflix account) but also A-MA-ZING, letting us pull up any of thousands of decent movies on-demand, most-often streaming at decent speeds. Sure, there can be connection issues at times, rewinding/fastforwarding can be a bitch, and using the application turns my TV screen green afterwards (which seems to be fixable only with an Off/On), but these are small gripes for the ability to watch a ton of movies for free on a whim.

Perhaps the only real gripe (if you could call it that, all things considered) with the service is that the list of films available for streaming, despite being large, leaves out a ton of movies I've wanted to watch, including plenty of older films I would have thought would have no advantage to being DVD only (which I assume is done for hard copy sales purposes...). Even still, I've managed to find plenty of movies I'm down to watch, and have a feeling the restrictions might actually make it easier to find some more-or-less hidden gems I wouldn't have otherwise looked for.

Now, while I do use the Xbox app with Suzi when she's at my place on the weekends, and we've certainly watched quite a few thus far (seven, I believe), I'm naturally here at my place more often than she is, allowing me to watch quite a few by myself (I count seven as well). So, since Suzi says I don't need to help her pay for her Netflix subscription, I feel it's best if I don't take too much advantage of this offer by watching way more movies on here than she's been able to see with me, so I'm kinda using this guideline to help curb my potentially-imbalanced amount of time spent on movies (versus career-related stuff). Still, in my defense, I've virtually stopped playing video games for the moment, so I guess you could argue that Netflix has kinda taken over.

Anyway, streaming Netflix is awesome, and I would totally buy it myself if Suzi canceled her subscription. Just know that a TON of movie reviews are about to come your way, but as always, I'm gonna try to make sure none are back-to-back, so as to mix things up a bit.

Video Game of the Year Nominations 2010

As my time with video games progresses, I'm starting to realize that my interest in and prioritization of gaming comes and goes in waves, often due to becoming more invested in my band or simply because my TV or Xbox broke down for a hot minute. As such, 2010 followed the recurring trend of me being kinda apathetic about games until Spring, at which point I returned with a fury, squeezing a bunch of games into the back half of the year. While it may be that no year will ever beat the stellar first four months of so of gaming back in 2008 when I first got my Xbox, 2010's list has a great chance of being the runner-up for a long time, as the year was packed with some incredible gaming experiences. Here's my Top 5:

Batman: Arkham Asylum: Anyone that's into gaming knows that franchise games almost always end up sucking, but somehow the guys at Rocksteady Studios managed to make not only a game that did Batman justice but that could also compete with the big boys in terms of gameplay, graphics, storyline, and voice acting. The only negative thing I can really say about Batman: Arkham Asylum is that it's not exactly the kind of game that begs to be replayed, but the first experience was particularly strong, landing it firmly on this list.

BioShock 2: While 2008's (for me, not retail) BioShock became one of my favorite games of all time, I wasn't quite convinced that its sequel would stack up to quite as solid of an experience, especially considering the somewhat lukewarm critical reception it was receiving upon its release. Fortunately, I finally gave the follow-up a shot, and I'm glad I did! While it certainly isn't as striking as the original, BioShock 2 ended up winning me over with its gameplay refinements and shift in perspective (especially by the end of the game), and as such, I'm still itching to go back for more.

DJ Hero: It's no secret that I'm a HUGE fan of the recent DJ Hero franchise, so it should come as no surprise that both games made it to my list this year. While DJ Hero 2 was clearly the better game in terms of gameplay, the original was what captured my imagination, initiating a year-long fascination that still hasn't entirely subsided. Apart from this, if I were to name one element of the game that is better than its sequel, I would say DJ Hero's tracklist my actually be a bit stronger and more varied than the follow-up's. It's really too bad I can't lump the two games in together...

DJ Hero 2: While my first impression of DJ Hero 2 was that its presentation seemed to be a bit of an afterthought when compared with the clever graffiti-inspired look of the first and that the calibration mechanism was HORRIBLE (still is), it didn't take long for the game to win me over, offering yet another incredible soundtrack but featuring gameplay improvements leaps and bounds above the original. While DJ Hero has more-or-less waned on my to-play list, I'm still hammering away at its successor to this day.

Mass Effect 2: My all-time favorite game on the Xbox is the original Mass Effect, so it's clear why its sequel made it to the list. Like DJ Hero and BioShock's sequels, Mass Effect 2 featured numerous gameplay improvements, making the action much more third-person shootery without sacrificing the game's superb RPG elements. While the story and music aren't as strong as in the first game, the character list is PHENOMENAL, and all of the tie-ins to its predecessor (by looking at your save file from those playthroughs) are groundbreaking. Looking forward to hitting up Mass Effect 2 again sometime soon, especially with the new Liara-themed DLC!

So, what we really have here is a year full of fantastic sequels, especially if you consider Batman: Arkham Asylum to be another installment in a long line of Batman games. There's no question that DJ Hero wins the award for best new IP, but I'm still pondering which game will come out on top this year overall. It's a really close one, and I would be so lucky to have 2011 this full of great games.

Graveyard Bday Party

One of my girlfriend's best friends is this former costumed-character-actor-for-kids'-parties (think Disney and the like) who - predictably - has an interesting collection of friends and whom recently had a birthday shindig worth writing about. The first stop of the evening was at the birthday girl's Turkish boyfriend's swanky loft where some pretty heavy mixed drinks were being poured, allowing everyone to pregame before hitting The Graveyard, a hipstery bar in East Atlanta. There, our group had a couched section reserved, complete with table service, allowing for most of the remainder of the evening to be spent here.

Some of the more-interesting personalities that night were Luis and his coterie of near homo-erotically-dancing guy friends (despite being straight - hell, they were doing it right in front of his girlfriend), an older girl from Augusta whom I believe said I looked like Freddie Prinze Jr. and would get "poked" if I were to dress that well outside of the city, and the black-clad lead singer for a local band who is easily one of the coolest people Suzi has introduced me to. It was his styled, gothy house we ended up at after the bar after giving him a ride back...it was here that I learned that he calls his vinyl collection his "children".

But easily the highlight of the evening was this crazy hairdressing gay guy Suzi's friend had known for years named Damion (we like to call him Damion-and-on-and-on), who was pretty far gone by the time we arrived and whose antics were enough to fuel a healthy dose of inside jokes for the indefinite future. His loud River Dance-inspired kicks (in The Graveyard amidst innocent bystanders), his hogging of the vodka bottle (snatching it away when I tried to grab for it), and his on-again-off-again ups-and-downs were all pretty unforgettable, all of this aside from his strange fashion choices and general rambling.

Anyway, it was a pretty memorable and fun night, the likes of which I certainly wouldn't mind repeating.

Modern Family: Season 1

This post is perhaps a bit premature, as I haven't yet managed to watch EVERY episode of the TV show Modern Family, but considering that I've seen at least half of Season 1 and that the show isn't available via streaming Netflix (rather, I watched whatever episodes Suzi happened to have checked-out out at any given time), I'm just gonna go ahead and talk about it now, as I'm not sure if or when I'll actually manage to watch the entire first season.

Seeing as I don't watch actual TV and have virtually no idea of what's on these days (at least, compared with my peers), I have no clue as to how well-known this show is, so I'm going to go ahead and describe it briefly: Modern Family is a comedy that follows the character Jay Pritchett (played by Al Bundy star Ed O'Neil) and his children's families in a sort of The Office-like faux-documentary, complete with characters occasionally talking to the camera as if they were being interviewed. There are essentially three families involved: that of the father and his new Hispanic wife (with her extremely mature-for-his-age son Manny), his gay son and his flamboyant husband Cam, and his daughter with her three kids and hysterical husband Phil.

Ultimately, though there's no particular gimmick going on in the show to lure someone in, it still manages to be really captivating, as the characters work so well together and the writing is really solid. The show is more-or-less episodic, having few connecting elements between episodes, so it's the kind of show that you can pick up anywhere without feeling like you missed too much, which is perfect for me, as I don't like getting roped into giant TV series' season-long tales.

Overall, I love the show and totally recommend it to anyone that's interested. A second season is coming out soon, and I'm definitely looking forward to checking it out once it hits DVD.

Dead Island Trailer

I don't usually follow game trailers, as I find they don't really tell me too much about a game (at least not reliably), but in watching some game stuff on GameTrailers.com, I became aware of one that I really had to see: the cinematic trailer for the upcoming zombie game Dead Island. I'm not really a zombie fan and I most-likely won't end up playing this game, but I have to admit that the trailer is fantastic and must easily be one of the most dramatic game trailers I've ever watched. Sure, there's a lot of blood and guts stuff going on here, but...well, just watch it and you'll see what I'm talking about.

Syncope...

...or fainting, as it's more commonly known. It's a popular story amongst my friends that I fainted back when I was in 6th grade during a session of sex-ed in which we were discussing menstruation. As you can imagine, it was the kind of thing to be truly embarrassed about back when I was growing up, and on some level, it still is. That said, I thought fainting was going to end up being a once in a lifetime kind of thing...until recently.

See, the real problem back in sex-ed was that I don't deal well with the thought of blood or even sometimes our insides (I would be a HORRIBLE surgeon), but considering that I have had a fortunate record of not needing any serious hospital time, I've been able to avoid seeing too much of the stuff for most of my life. Granted, every once in awhile I get my blood work done, but although this does commonly make me light-headed, I'm usually okay if I would just hang around the room for a minute afterward.

Well, seeing as I am newly insured, I figured it wouldn't be a bad idea to go ahead and take advantage of it by scheduling a routine checkup, complete with bloodwork. This should have all been fine, but the catch here was that my new doctor asked me to fast, possibly for the first time in years of having my blood taken. Combine this with the fact that he had a REALLY hard time finding a vein (after poking me and even turning the needle around a few times), and though I consciously asked for us to take a moment for a breather, the next thing I knew, I was being resuscitated by the doctor and his assistant, drenched in sweat, with a greenish hue and the near-uncontrollable urge to vomit...

As it turns out, I ended up staying in my room at the doctor's office for a whole hour (even taking a short nap) waiting until I stopped feeling noxious, or at least enough that I could drive safely back home. To make matters worse, the doctor never ended up getting any of my blood (!), so he sent me to a separate lab facility to have my blood taken once more three days later! Fortunately, this time it went really easily, largely due to not entirely fasting (I avoided cholesterol and fat that morning).

So, while the whole experience did shake me up quite a bit (it took me about six hours to finally get back to feeling normal that day!), I think I've more-or-less gotten over my newly-discovered fear of passing out while getting my blood drawn. Let's just hope things go better next time... ;)

Necromunda Game 1

Onto Andy and my first Necromunda battle between my Van Saar/Orlock gang. To begin, it should be noted that, unlike the army lists found in most of Games Workshop's other games, the six different gangs found in Necromunda's core game are almost identical except in terms of their storyline backgrounds (which are inconsequential to gameplay) and which special abilities your troops MIGHT get when they level up, a factor that honestly rarely makes a difference. I do feel the game would be much stronger if they had taken the time to make the gangs more varied, but whatever.

Our first game was a more-or-less standard gang fight where you won by either incapacitating the opponent's entire gang or (more likely) breaking their morale, causing them to run away with their remaining members. Having not played Necromunda in awhile and being more used to the scale of Games Workshop's bigger games, we ended up making the battlefield way bigger than it should have been, essentially making it hard for our guys to even get within firing range with one another. We fixed this problem in our following games by greater limiting the boundaries of our board.

Ultimately, I don't remember the details of the game too much other than Andy pretty squarely kicked my ass, even to the point of permanently killing off one of my guys (although every game features guys going "Out of Action", this rarely results in a member actually dying, thus being removed from the roster). Fortunately, I started with one more guy than he did (due to spending my starting points differently), so since then we've had the same number of members.

So, it was a fun game, albeit with a bit of a learning curve: not only did it take longer to play due to not yet being too familiar with the rules, we both probably would have approached things differently with a little more experience, including making the board smaller.

The Stacks: Replacement Vizio HDTV

If you follow me on Facebook, you're probably painfully aware that I had a seven-week span where I was TV-less due mostly to Vizio's poor handling of replacing my TV while still under my automatic first-year warranty. My initial 47" HDTV stopped showing anything on the screen in mid-December, so by late December I had set up a case for review with the company with their assertion that I would have a replacement within two weeks. So when I returned from San Francisco the week after Christmas, I was expecting to only have a short wait before returning to my video games and movies, but obviously this wasn't how things turned out.

Fortunately, I finally got my replacement TV (a different model) about a week before Valentine's, and I'm happy to report that it's fantastic (though not really worth that long of a wait, in my opinion). The reason I got a totally different model, and part of the reason why things got delayed so badly, was that they couldn't scrounge up a B-stock version of my original model, so they eventually had to give in and give me a slight upgrade. The biggest difference between my new TV and the old one is the contrast ratio: my new model is 50k:1 while the old one was only 20k:1. As it turns out, this seems to be the element that I was complaining about when I said that everything in a movie seemed to move like it was shot as a documentary...for whatever reason, the higher contrast ratio has seemed to fix all this! Also, video games look better, and the remote is cooler, so despite a slight difference in the coloring of the unit (it's all black instead of having a silver part that I liked on the old model), I would say this unit's noticeably better, not just on paper.

Let's just hope it doesn't die on me in nine months as well...

Linkin Park - A Thousand Suns

Sometimes you end up falling in love with an album only to later realize that it was just more of a passing fad for you. Well, such was the case with Linkin Park's first album Hybrid Theory, which I absolutely devoured back when it came out only to find it a bit too easy to listen to later on. While the band's second effort was a bit of a disappointment, causing me to generally write them off, their third offering came back with a vengeance, enlisting the help of producer/guru Rick Rubin to strip away the more gimmicky elements of the band, allowing them to focus greater on their message and sound.

Enter the band's fourth full-length album, A Thousand Suns, yet another Rick Rubin-produced outing, this time a concept album concerning war and its aftermath. Upon first listen of clips online, I wasn't very convinced, but when I was assigned the album review for HiFi Magazine (more on this later), I gave the entire album more of a chance, and I have to say I love it. Sure, it's full of ballady slow songs with only a couple of the distinctive nu-metal-inspired tracks the band's known for, but the quality is high throughout (with only an exception or two). More importantly, the ligament tracks which add most to the album's concept, featuring famous speeches by J. Robert Oppenheimer, MLK, and Mario Savio on top of some great instrumental sections, are easily some of the best moments on offer, showing the band's growing maturity and singularity of focus.

Ultimately, while I might not like the music of this album quite as much as that of their last effort (Minutes To Midnight), the overall effect of the album is quite striking. Thus, what we have with A Thousand Suns is a good sign that the band is growing, and I'm proud to say I continue to be a fan of their work. Keep it up, guys.

Highlights: "The Requiem/The Radiance"/"Waiting For The End"/"Blackout"
Rating: 5/5

Big Fan

It's no secret that I'm a big fan of comedian Patton Oswalt, but short of unknowingly "seeing" his performance as Remy the Rat in Pixar's Ratatouille, I really had no idea that he was a respectable actor. That is, until Suzi introduced me to his artsy film Big Fan, directed by one of the writers for another acclaimed sports film, The Wrestler. The film basically follows Patton's character, a HUGE Eagles fan who has virtually no life outside of his fandom, as he deals with the fallout of his injuries at the hands of his team's star player, including the potential loss of his presence on the team were Patton to sue.

Overall, the film is well done, including Patton's leading role, but though it's probably one of the better films Suzi has shown me, it didn't real speak to me as much as it earned my respect. That said, I would certainly recommend it to anyone interested in the premise, darkish movies in general, and/or sports fanaticism.

Return to Necromunda

A few months ago, I confessed to having nerdily partaken in a tabletop battle game called Warhammer back when I was in my teens (and even a little when I was an undergrad), but although I've always wanted to get back into it (assuming I had the money and time to support the hobby), I never really thought I would start it up again. Turns out there are a couple Games Workshop (the maker of Warhammer) games that don't require a monetary investment after the initial game purchase, one of which is the gang-based RPG set in the future called Necromunda. So, now that my old high school and Warhammer buddy Andy is out of the Navy and therefore back in town, I halfway jokingly suggested I relearn the rules to the game and we try to play a few games, thinking it probably wouldn't end up happening.

Well, I was wrong: Andy and I have spent three evenings in the past six weeks or so building our gangs up over the course of three different battle scenarios, using proxy figurines to stand in for the actual models we're "supposed" to be using. I'll write more about the individual conflicts soonish, but I'm just going to lay out the basic premise behind the game here.

As I said, the game is gang-centered, meaning each player uses a certain amount of allotted points to build a starting gang (complete with a leader, heavy weapon users, and rookies in addition to average gang members, picking weapons for each). Then you play one of about 10 scenarios and keep records of how each ganger did and how bad their wounds were. In between games, you can visit some of your gang's territories to earn money to buy more gear/members, and your guys can either die from their wounds or gain experience points to eventually achieve new skills or better stats. Ultimately, the game is very much like Games Workshop's Warhammer 40,000, with the main exception being that you have a gang of only about 10 models instead of a larger army unit. Also, due to its focus on individuals, there are more specific rules concerning wounds, getting hit, and hiding.

Overall, the game's pretty fun, but I would probably enjoy it more if we were using the real figurines. That said, the game is more-or-less out of production and the figurines that ARE available are really too pricey to warrant buying considering Andy's going to Spain for three months in the near future and will possibly be leaving for grad school not too long after that. Still, I'm glad to be playing again and look forward to getting in at least one more battle with Andy before he leaves for Spain.

Movie of the Year Nominations 2010

Onto the Top 5 movies for 2010. As you've heard me complain on many occasions, I wasn't too pleased with the movies I saw over the course of the year, finding the quality level solidly below the standard set by the previous two years. That said, I did like the following five films, just not as much as I wanted to...

Easy A: If you had told me that I would be putting a high school movie in my Top 5, I would have either assumed it was exceptionally moving or that my year totally blew for movies, the truth being somewhere in-between. Yes, Easy A was nearly perfect for the genre, and I would definitely recommend it and watch it again, but it's not the sort of film I'd want to add to my DVD collection, I don't think...

Kick-Ass: While superhero films tend to suck, especially those of characters I know nothing about ahead of time, Kick-Ass was actually pretty solid, combining good casting, a unique story, great action (with some surprising violence), and even a respectable role for Nicolas Cage. Sure, it fell a little short of the depth of a Dark Knight or Watchmen, but it still is one of the best superhero flicks I've seen in the past few years.

The Social Network: Yes, everyone's talking lots of hype about this film, much of which I think it inflated, but at the end of the day, The Social Network was a unique film about something so relevant it's hard to imagine it not captivating audiences. Naturally, none of this would have been possible without a great script and great performances, and they certainly could have done more with the whole social networking element of the story (instead of how the business deals went down), but these points don't diminish the fact that it's a stand-out film.

Summer Heights High: For the first time in three years of Top 5's, I'm allowing a TV show to make it on the list, partly because it truly deserves to be there quality-wise, and partly because Summer Heights High is an intentionally one-season show, featuring only eight episodes, making it feel like more of a cohesive story that's ultimately not too much longer than a typical movie. Anyway, the show is absolutely fantastic, and I continue to reference parts of it in everyday situations, having left a strong impression on me, perhaps more so than any other nominee in this list.

Up In The Air: The long-standing beacon of hope for this year's collection of viewed movies, Up In The Air was an early-2010 screening that has stayed on the list ever since due to its theme of not being tied down, one that resonates with me very strongly. Sure, the movie might end a little less than ideally, but the cinematography, acting, and premise are all solid gold to me, and as such, I can't recommend the film enough.

So, even if you could argue that these five films are pretty solid, I would counter that the rest of the films I saw this year were so far off from being Top 5 material that it's a little embarrassing and perhaps statistically improbable, having seen roughly 40 films this year. Whatever...with the recent addition to streaming Netflix to my weekly regimen, the quality of movies viewed in the first couple months of 2011 has already skyrocketed, so hopefully 2010 will just be remembered as a bad year rather than the beginning of a decline in my ability to pick quality films...

Art Papers Auction

The first art show my girlfriend and I made it to in 2011 was the annual Art Papers Auction, a big-deal art event held in a very large warehouse featuring the works of many a local artist, all of whom have to be invited to participate, which is an honor in-and-of-itself. While Le Suz is usually involved every year, she chose not to pursue an entry this time around, instead planning on submitting something for next year's event. Anyway, as always, a number of her friends were there (including an ex!), many of whom had art up, and it was good chatting with them. Also, there were some great restaurant booths set up as a means of sponsoring the event (or vice versa?), the highlight of which was certainly the food from HOBNOB, a newish gastropub in town.

Anyway, not much more to report about the evening other than how impressive the event was. Definitely looking forward to returning next year with some of my girl's art up!

Sealions @ The Earl

I've already acknowledged that one of my favorite live shows of a local band last year was that of Sealions' opening slot for Canada's Metric at The Tabernacle, so it should come as no surprise that I wanted to go see them again, this time at The Earl with my friend/new drummer Spangler following one of our first few rehearsals. I believe we were a few minutes late to the show due to Spangler leaving his ID at home (he just got a new one and had misplaced it), but we caught most of it.

Onto the show. There isn't too much to report that I haven't already said about the band: they've definitely grown a lot since upping their membership from a two-piece to four, and I think they've gotten a lot better about their stage presence, etc... Granted, The Earl (or at least on this particular night) doesn't have quite the clarity in its soundsystem as that of The Tabernacle, and naturally the show was on a smaller scale, so I wasn't left with quite as strong an impression, but nevertheless, I liked the band enough to buy their CD and eventually go up to the two frontmen afterwards, introducing us and our new project and asserting that we would love to stay in touch with them in hopes of one day opening for them.

Overall, a fun night out, and great to be back on the networking bandwagon now that band stuff is finally starting to get off the ground. Hopefully much more of this to come!

Super High Me

I first saw the popular Super Size Me in a campus theatre in Bloomington shortly after moving there in 2004, and I've always bragged that it actually made me want to frequent McDonald's more, as the franchise did the right thing after the film and cleaned up their act by offering many healthier options and eliminating the supersizing option altogether.

Well over six years later, my girlfriend ends up putting on Super High Me, comedian Doug Benson's attempt to replicate the experiment laid out in Super Size Me but replacing McDonald's with weed. Now, did this make me want to go smoke a bunch of pot? No, but the movie was kinda fun, despite not having a very good ending or having much to say.

The premise is identical to Super Size Me except that Doug Benson was already a big pothead before the 30 days of continuous pot smoking, so he had to spend 30 days detoxing beforehand to better see what type of effect the 30 days on the drug would actually have. In the process, they run a whole bunch of tests in both months to see if his scores improved or worsened with prolonged weed consumption. [Spoiler] Unfortunately, neither portion of the film has any truly drastic results, and everything turns out fine in the end [End Spoiler].

To add a little more social commentary to the film, they do a number of pieces on the state of legalized marijuana in California, largely focusing on the Federal government's attempts to snuff it out despite State law. All things considered, I would only see this film if the subject interests you, as it's not exactly documentary gold. That said, I'm sure you weren't expecting it to live up to Super Size Me anyway, so I guess this comes as no surprise.

Hellogoodbye @ The Masquerade

As the first professional band's show I've seen in 2011, I couldn't have done much better than the epic (yes, epic) evening presented by Hellogoodbye and their (count them) FOUR openings acts. Yes, this was nearly live band overkill, the likes of which neither I nor my buddy Jim (who joined me for the show) would have ever ended up expecting. The lineup was as follows:

Almost Legendary (Atlanta)
Now, Now (Minneapolis)
You, Me, and Everyone We Know (Baltimore)
Gold Motel (Chicago)
and of course...
Hellogoodbye (Long Beach, California)

As you can imagine, remembering enough about each band to allow me to write much about them is difficult in-and-of itself, and considering I don't want to write a novella here about the show, I'm going to briefly describe each of the openers, followed by a paragraph about Hellogoodbye.

Almost Legendary is a pop-punk band that sounds like every other pop-punk band. It's not my style, and although they're convincing enough pulling it off, I don't think anyone should be making this music anymore (even the pros), as it hasn't evolved in years...so that's that. Now, Now is a female duo (plus a male drummer who is clearly secondary) who smack very strongly of Tegan & Sara. They were good at harmonizing and fun enough to see live if you missed your chance to see their evident inspirers (so-to-speak), but they're ultimately nothing amazing. You, Me, and Everyone We Know was actually pretty solid, perhaps sounding the most akin to their headliner. The singer also gave a really strong performance, despite fighting off an allergic reaction and looking like an odd visual addition to the band. Finally, Gold Motel is a girl-fronted group whose sound was fine, but I couldn't help thinking it would be improved if their guitarist/back-up vocalist would just take the female singer's place. Overall, despite how it might sound, I actually thought this was a pretty solid set of openers, even considering how many of them there were.

Now onto Hellogoodbye. Anyone that was paying attention to indie-pop a few years ago might be rolling their eyes knowing how saccharine sweet their first album was (though I did like it as a sort of guilty pleasure), but 2010 saw the release of a new album with a surprisingly new direction, possibly landing it in my Top 5 for the year. Thus, I was very excited to see the band play, and I have to say that they couldn't have done better in my eyes. I think Jim even liked them, despite not knowing their material prior to the show. They played most of their new album plus maybe 3-4 old songs, so I was singing along the whole time. I would definitely go back to catch them, as their stage presence (especially the lead singer's banter between songs) augmented the already great music to make for a really fun night.

Jason Mraz - We Sing. We Dance. We Steal Things.

Jason Mraz is the type of artist I would have never given a chance if it hadn't been for one of my guitar students requesting to work on the music from his album We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things, and as such, although I did end up enjoying playing the music, I didn't get around to picking it up (or in this case, asking for it) until this past Christmas, probably a year or so after I was first introduced to it. Sure, the album is poppy in that laid-back John Mayer/Jack Johnson kind of way, but it also has some pretty catchy moments, so I gave it a chance.

The verdict: the album is at its best when Mraz is accompanied by his funky brass band on the sort of faster tunes that make you want to dance a bit, and it's at its least-inspired when he's hovering in that no-man's land between the vibe of these tracks and his more-stereotypical slower ballads. There are a couple decent slower tracks I like, but the gospel and reggae influences can be a little too much for my taste. Fortunately, the album flows well from track to track, and none linger for too long, so it's an enjoyable enough listening experience regardless. Ordinarily, I would probably give a CD like this 2/5, but since it's almost too easy to sing along with, I'm bumping it up to a 3.

Highlights: "Make It Mine"/"Butterfly"/"The Dynamo Of Volition"
Rating: 3/5

Irina Palm

My girlfriend Suzi is a big Netflix fan, always having three movies out at a given time, and seeing as I was watching a number of her films, she asked if there was anything I would like to show her, essentially letting me pick a few myself. Everything Is Illuminated was probably the first in a handful of movies that I loved and figured she might also like that we've watched recently. Another was the film featured here, Irina Palm, a multi-country collaborative indie film about an older British woman who turns to giving handjobs in a strip club in order to fund her dying grandson's expensive Australian medical procedure, much to the distaste of her friends and family who eventually find out her secret. In other words, totally up Suzi's alley... ;)

Anyway, the film is pretty awesome, both in terms of the strange plot and the character interactions (particularly between Irina and her quasi-love interest employer at the strip club, Miki). I first saw the film in the theatres in The Netherlands and had been itching to see it ever since, and as predicted, Suzi ended up liking it. Definitely would recommend it to anyone that likes their indie films a little twisted.

Healthy Lifestyle Changes

Seeing as my six-week-long sinus infection/cold at the end of 2010 kinda shook me up (plus, I won't be able to afford getting sick like that when the band starts playing shows), I started making a few lifestyle changes to help my immune system and overall health. Yes, I finally got health insurance, but on top of this, I started trying to go to bed/wake up earlier, I replaced my shower curtain (which I had let accumulate far too much mold), and I started showering with the doors closed to act as a humidifier until I eventually splurge and buy a real one. But perhaps the biggest change has been my daily dose of a vegetable supplement to help give me the veggies that I unfortunately don't care enough about cooking to prepare, along with some probiotics, antioxidants, and a handful of hippie-ish superfoods (wheat grass, barley grass, alfalfa, acai, etc).

The product is called GREENSuperFood by AmaZing Grass, is mostly-organic, and comes in powder form to mix in another liquid for flavor (I use apple juice). In addition, the powder itself is berry flavored, just to help out the strong veggie taste. Honestly, it doesn't taste bad, and I've noticed a few changes in how I feel, mainly during the first two weeks of taking it. The primary change has been feeling hungry all day long. I'm not sure if this is a sign of just getting more/better sleep (along with more nightmares, evidently because I'm actually going into deep sleep more often) and therefore need more food to sustain me, or if it's the probiotics that are speeding up my digestion, but regardless, I've been finding myself real low on blood sugar more often than usual, so I'm having to keep some protein bars around, just in case.

Overall, I do feel healthier, and though this isn't exactly a cheap fix, it's certainly cheaper (both monetarily and time-wise) than having to buy all organic produce and getting my daily requirements via my own cooking... Regardless of how you look at it, it's an improvement, and considering I've even started seeing progress in my singing voice, I'm not about to stop. Fingers crossed that my next serious illness is now much farther away that it would have otherwise been...