I have heard Fantasm described as ‘the Japanese Beck.’ It’s a comparison that sounds kind of ridiculous but is also kind of appropriate. It’s inappropriate inasmuch as Cornelius had been releasing music with Flipper’s Guitar well before Beck was known to most of us (is Beck, therefore, the American Cornelius?) but it is appropriate inasmuch …
Month: September 2017
Tubthumper (1997) by Chumbawamba
If you were alive in 1997 you heard “Tubthumping.” You’ve probably heard it even if you weren’t very old then. It came out of nowhere and, unless you were in the UK, the band then vanished from the public eye soon after.
Brokeback Mountain (2005, Ang Lee)
I think it’s probably hard to discuss Brokeback Mountain without talking about the hype: this film is considered by many to be a landmark either in Hollywood with regard to LGBTQ topics, or in LGBTQ cinema in general. Now, I don’t know much about the history of LGBTQ cinema – just what I got from a …
2012 (2009, Roland Emmerich)
It’s a testament to the endless credulity of human beings that this film got made as a blockbuster, with the budget that entails and the all-star cast. The Mayan Apocalypse thing was some the worst horse shit I’ve heard the intelligent people I know spew, and it drove me crazy that I knew people who …
Sweet Oblivion (1992) by Screaming Trees
As I feel like I am always saying, the problem with hype is that you hear the hype before you hear the music.
Down Colorful Hill (1992) by Red House Painters
I do not know the history of slowcore, as I am only familiar with a few bands (5 or so tops) that would be considered slowcore and who existed in 1992. So I find myself unable to assess whether or not this is an important record in the development of the genre, given that lack …
Toronto International Film Festival 2017
This year, I saw the fewest movies at TIFF that I have seen since I first started attending the festival around a decade ago. The reason for seeing so few films will become apparent in about a month. Here is my round up of the films I saw at the 2017 edition of The Toronto …
TIFF 2017: One of Us (2017, Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady)
I have seen a few Ewing-Grady documentaries so far and I have always found they tackle fascinating subjects but I have never loved the way in which they tackle them. Though I appreciate their attempts at breaking outside of documentary norms and customs (to a degree) I also sometimes find their attempts to do so …
Secret Chiefs 3 Live at The Great Hall September 14, 2017
This was my second Secret Chiefs 3 show, in a much better venue than the last time. It was also a very different experience and I’m not sure whether that’s because SC3 are doing something different on this tour (apparently they are here opening for Dead Cross) or whether the venue made them.
White Privilege
Yesterday on Quora, I found perhaps the best short summary of what white privilege is that I, as a white male Canadian, have ever read in my life. I have embedded it here for your perusal because I really do think it captures this concept better than anything else I’ve read on the subject. Also, …
TIFF 2017 Racer and the Jailbird (2017, Michaël R. Roskam)
This is an entertaining, albeit slight, amalgam of the bank heist genre with one of those romances where the two alpha leads, who do risky things in their professional lives, fall in love with each other, but which is pretty much entirely ruined by an absolutely bonkers left turn (well, a series of left turns) …
Strangeways, Here We Come
To say I dislike The Smiths would be an understatement. I don’t hate them so much as I hate the aura around them and this idea that they somehow saved British music from itself (and synthesizers! don’t forget the synthesizers), almost like a younger, hipper Bruce Springsteen (because Springsteen saved rock music from disco, don’t …
The Perfect Prescription (1987) by Spacemen 3
Programmic music is often hard for, whether it’s some Romantic composer trying to conjure up a storm or a picnic, or someone trying to show me what a drug trip is like, I often find the concept unnecessary to my enjoyment of the music.
Music for the Masses (1987) by Depeche Mode
I agree with the general consensus that Martin Gore is perhaps synthpop’s best songwriter. At least at this “mature” stage of the band’s career Depeche Mode sound most like the band willing to leave the confines of their genre to serve his songs. I find his lyrics to be, on average, significantly better than the …
TIFF 2017: Omerta (2017, Hansal Mehta)
What a mess. Where do I begin?
Earth Sun Moon (1987) by Love and Rockets
I love Bauhaus and, initially, I think I found it hard to get into these guys simply because they are not Bauhaus, which is unfair. It’s unfair because these guys are very much their own band, particularly with the wind instruments. (By the way, that flute solo is hilariously Ian Anderson, who I would have …
Actually (1987) by The Pet Shop Boys
Full disclosure: I don’t love synthpop and I don’t like most dance music, electronic or otherwise. So this was likely going to be a chore for me.
Ice Cream for Crow (1982) by Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band
If you have come at the Captain through his earliest works, this record might feel like not much or a man settling into his mid life. It’s far less radical than his most radical work of the early ’70s, wherein he basically pioneered the intersection of blues and free jazz and other things.
Forever Now (1982) by The Psychedelic Furs
This is my first Furs record so I cannot comment on whether or not it’s some kind of sell out (doesn’t sound like it!) or some kind of compromise of their earlier sound, which I have never heard. I can comment on the music and try to comment on the context, as I am an …
Under the Blade (1982) by Twisted Sister
If you grew up in the 80s as I did, you were inundated by certain music videos and two of them were “I Wanna Rock” and “We’re Not Gonna Take it.” And through my entire life this is all I’ve known of this band, aside from Dee Snyder testifying before congress, which definitely upped my …
Brooklyn (2015, John Crowley)
This is a well made and affecting drama about an Irish immigrant’s journey to Brooklyn, New York in the very early 1950s.
TIFF 2017: Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood (2017, Matt Trynauer)
This is a very conventional documentary about a man who claims to have been a pimp and a prostitute in Hollywood for 3-4 decades.
Tiff 2017: The Death of Stalin (2017, Armando Iannucci)
Iannucci’s new film is, as I understand it, a bit of a left turn for him: it’s an adaptation of a graphic novel based upon the real event of the title. Though I had no such fears, one could be understandably trepidacious about Iannucci turning his satirical eye to something historically accurate.
The Dreaming (1982) by Kate Bush
Where has this been all my life?
In Praise of Cultural Appropriation
This article is about the accusation of “cultural appropriation” being thrown around at works of art. I may not be entitled to write this.