Category: 2002

2002, Music

Mass Romantic (2000) by The New Pornographers

Will never understand the big deal with power pop. I’ve listened to many power pop albums over the years and I just don’t get why people like it so much. I can only conclude that the people who love power pop – and get way too excited by records like this – like different things …

1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, TV

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997)

When I was younger and had recently fallen in love with serialized TV dramas, I had this idea that I was going to write a book about the antecedents of the Golden Age of Television. (At first this was going to be about the Golden Age of Television, but that book already exists.) This book …

2002, Movies, Music

I Am Trying to Break Your Heart (2002, Sam Jones)

As a big fan of Wilco, and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, it’s crazy it took me this many years to watch this movie. But it’s possible that the intervening years gave me some clarity with it, that I might not have had when I was first falling in love with this band (more than a few …

2002, Books, Non-Fiction

Theodore Roosevelt: A Strenuous Life (2002, Kathleen Dalton)

At long last, I have finished this mammoth, exhaustive one-volume biography of Theodore Roosevelt. Given the depth of this one, I have to wonder about the detail of multi-volume biographies. Anyway, why would I read such a thing? Well, I read this because TR is my dad’s favourite president. I had mixed feelings about him …

2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2008, TV

The Wire (2002)

It’s been about 10 years since The Wire finished and 16 years since it started. In that time, I have managed to watch the first three seasons four times (I think), the fourth season three times and the notorious fifth season twice. (The only other dramatic show I have ever watched more than once is Deadwood.) I …

2002, Movies

Ônibus 174 (2002, José Padilha, Felipe Lacerda)

Bus 174 is a low-budget, overlong documentary about a bizarre hostage-taking incident in Brazil that was watched by the country on the news. The story itself is compelling in many ways but the actual film about the incident is kind of a mess. We might call it “completist” as it’s a 2.5 hour movie about …

1995, 2002, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2009, 2014

Augusta Read Thomas: Selected Works for Orchestra (2014) by Various Artists

This is a compilation of performances of some of Thomas’ writing for orchestra. I got this from the library by accident but decided to listen to it anyway.

2002, Books, Non-Fiction

Fast Food Nation (2002) by Eric Schlosser

Much of what Schlosser covers in this boo I was already familiar with, thanks to things like Food, Inc. But I’ve never read a book about the industrialization of food before and, as books are wont to do, Schlosser covers this in much more detail than any documentary you’re going to watch.

2002, Movies

Blissfully Yours aka Sud sanaeha (2002, Apichatpong Weerasethakul)

The hype would have us believe that this is one of the great films of the 21st century. At this point in my life, I have seen a lot of deliberately paced, enigmatic foreign films set in tropical idylls. Watching this, I am stuck wondering what it is that has made this one the one …

1899, 1900, 1911, 1922, 1934, 2002, Music

Symphony in F; Suite No. 2; etc. (2002) by Gustav Holst, performed by Munich Symphony Orchestra conducted by Douglas Bostock

This is a collection of both short and long orchestral works by Holst. It’s a scattershot collection, like so many others.

2002, 2014, Books

A Guide for the Perplexed (2002, 2014) by Werner Herzog with Paul Cronin

Werner Herzog is probably my favourite filmmaker. It’s not that I think he’s “greater” or “better” than others, but that when I see a Herzog film, I know I’m going to see something different, whether it’s his newest film, or some old short of his I managed to find. His films are always provocative, usually …

2002, Books, Non-Fiction

The War of Art (2002) by Steven Pressfield

I don’t for a minute believe anything Steven Pressfield says about the nature of our universe or the nature of inspiration. Like so many “self help” books, Pressfield’s advice is founded on a completely unsupportable metaphysic – I find myself utterly disagreeing and rejecting his metaphysics while finding his practical advise utterly useful and inspirational. …

2002, Music

Alice (2002) by Tom Waits

So expectations were going to be high for something like this; a “lost” album from a theatrical production in Hamburg ten years earlier. No doubt many people came to this expecting the “lost masterpiece” that we almost always associate with the work major artists don’t record / release at the time of conception.

1807, 1824, 1842, 2002, Music

Grand Sonata for Piano and Violin; 20 Variations… (2002, CBC Records) by Carl Czerny, performed by Anton Kuerti and Erika Raum

I am certainly not at the point where I can truly judge a performance of a work by the standards of professional musicians like these, and it is especially hard when I am unfamiliar with the work. But I like this. I feel like this CD – and another by Kuerti of straight-up piano sonatas …

2002, Music

Steal this Album! by System of a Down (2002, American)

The internet is a funny thing. You’d think that people want to hear the music their favourite bands want to release, as opposed to things their favourite bands haven’t finished. But alas, that’s not how most people think. Most people just want, want, want.

2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, Movies

The Best Movies of the Aughts (2000s)

Now that we’re through the Aughts, here are my picks for best movies of the decade. The ones that make the initial list are movies that I rated a 10/10. The runners up are 9/10s, and the honourable mentions are 8/10s. Many of these movies I have seen only once, and remember that in 2000 …