I have been incredibly lucky in my life. I was born into privilege (middle class/upper middle class in one of the safest large cities in the world) and I have been very lucky in terms of personal tragedy: I have suffered few major injuries/illnesses, and my family has been pretty much free of them as …
Category: 1981
8 Eyed Spy (1981)
This is my first experience of Lydia Lunch. My understanding is that it is a record she made with the band she formed to tour her debut solo album, released the year before. (A few of the recordings are from the tour itself, it seems.)
Brideshead Revisited (1981)
This is a nearly unprecedented 700 minute TV adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited. It is about as good as it gets for these British “chamber” TV shows, and is a reminder (when you watch it) that we are seriously missing out because more classic literature isn’t adapted into TV miniseries.
Vox Humana? / Finale / Fürst Igor Strawinsky (1991) by Mauricio Kagel, performed by Ensemble 2e2m, Lyon National Opera Chorus conducted by Paul Méfano
This record collects three of Kagel’s longish “choral” pieces. Kagel was a weirdo is the best ways.
Face Value (1981) by Phil Collins
Phil Collins has had one of the weirder careers in pop rock, starting out as a prog rock / art rock drummer (who even played jazz fusion, at times) and then becoming a massive pop star. It’s an unusual arc to be sure, and this is the record that began the shift from the one …
Dare (1981) by the Human League
I have rarely ever sat down and listened to synthpop. Really, the only album I’ve ever listened to is Violator. And listening to Dare, I really want to go back and downgrade my rating of that Depeche Mode album because, though I think the songs are better, it’s rather shocking how little the genre progressed …
Miserere et. al (1994) by Henryk Gorecki, performed by John Nelson et al.
This is a collection of Gorecki’s choral music, mostly performed by choruses from Chicago. (Yet another release where the performers differ from track to track! I really need to get over this.) Fortunately, I wouldn’t have known that, if they didn’t tell me. So that’s something.
The Prowler (1981, Joseph Zito)
This is one nonsensical film. Yes, most if not all slashers have at least the odd implausible moment (like the scene in seemingly half of them where the girl runs further into the house instead of out the front door) but this one has moment after moment after moment of flat out ridiculousness. Take, for …
Lola (1981, Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
I didn’t like the Blue Angel much but that doesn’t seem to matter. Fassbinder’s take is so much more interesting. Aside from telling a compelling and humourous story, featuring fine acting, he does his usual thing where he finds interesting techniques to tell the story. Three things are particularly notable: first, there are the cuts …
Vernon, Florida (1981, Errol Morris)
This is sort of indescribable (in a less interesting way than Fast, Cheap and Out of Control). It’s a portrait of a town I don’t particularly have any urge to go to now. It lacks narrative of any kind and so is a precursor to many fly-on-the-wall documentaries (though here they talk to the camera). …