The City of Angels. After listening to "Los Angeles, I’m Yours" by The Decemberists (see radio.blog) I was struck by how a song can strike at the heart of a city, or any place, for that matter. So start thinking now, I’m about to ask you to share what song or songs best capture the essence of where you live, or where you have lived, or even a place you’ve only visited.
Paul Hester, drummer for Crowded House, committed suicide this weekend. An icon of the 80s and 90s, Crowded House (and its predecessor, Split Enz) put out some fantastic pop tunes. Sad to see the stars of younger years disappear.
This topic was already covered to some extent in the Novelty Songs thread. I like novelty songs, but they can wear thin after awhile. I know people who don’t like humor in music at all, though, and I could never really understand that. What I love most are the bands and songs that can combine both seriousness and humor together.
Wow. I’m tempted to see this, if only to mock it relentlessly. The NY Times review was suitably merciless. I think with this we can officially deem Sandra Bullock’s career to be dead (though some question whether it ever really existed). *laughs mercilessly*
Today my office officially broke out the Easter candy. Jelly beans, Peeps, and malted eggs. I’ve always enjoyed Easter candy more than Halloween candy.
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Over the past couple of months, Capital One has been running ads featuring David Spade in full-on, "look how clever I am" mode. If you haven’t seen these ads, please stay clean. His schtick is basically to come up with a thousand "clever" ways to say "no" to customers. "I predict a no-storm". "Marco, Pol-no". No thank you.
A little tourney talk thread to get you through the week.
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Josh Whedon, creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, has signed on to direct the Wonder Woman movie. Who should play Wonder Woman has been debated and speculated about on the Internet for years now.
Shortly after I got my iPod, I got tired of the earbuds that came with it and decided I wanted something that sounded better and blocked noise. Bose makes noise-canceling headphones for about $250.00. Shure makes some nice in-ear phones for about half that. But I am a cheapskate.
So I made my own.
For years and years, I never really cared much for instrumentals. I thought they were boring. Here are some songs that changed my mind.
Ted Leo does his own version of Kelly Clarkson’s Since You’ve Been Gone, mashing it with Maps by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. He calls Clarkson’s work "an amazingly sharp pastiche of what’s happening in music right now." Listen to it now while you can, at UGO.com.
Also, if you’re in NYC, you’re already too late to come listen to Jeff Tweedy talk about the future of the media.
I found out the most amazing tidbit today, one that will save me quite a few dollars a month: the local public library allows you to request a hold on their DVDs. This may be old or unexciting news to you all, but when I rent three or four movies a week–well, it makes me happy.
But that’s not the subject of this post.
Okay, so I’ve set up an NCAA tournament pool for you all interested KBers, and it may be just a few. I’ve also invited some co-workers. http://games.espn.go.com/tcmen/frontpage
It will ask you for a location and nickname – so just make something up. The name of the group is Kultur Tourney and the password is "redmen" Enjoy! And Steve, deal with it just a little longer.
Yesterday I was informed that we will indeed be having our 10-year high school reunion this summer. I’m definitely going.
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Everyone knows someone who speaks almost entirely in quotations from movies. Perhaps you are one of these people yourself. My four-year-old daughter took her first step down this path today.
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In my opinion it is the best show on television. However, it has without question the most foul language of any film or TV show I’ve ever seen.
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Okay, so there used to be a category for sports that regrettably nobody used so I’m sticking this one under pop culture. It is my contention that March and October are the two best months of the year sportwise. Well, March is here and so is the NCAA Men’s Basketball tournament, the best sporting event in all of sports.
The best covers, in my opinion, are ones that completely reinterpret a song. Especially if it makes you notice things about a song you never had before.
I finished it again this weekend. I’ve read it twice in the last ten days. I’ve listened to it two more times on audio tape as I drive to and from work.
I don’t own any Fiona Apple posters or T-shirts, though I have a couple of her albums. Her last effort, When the Pawn…., was interesting and stands up to repeated listens. So it’s too bad that you’ll never hear her new album.
Just a note on some additions to radio blog. Susan has added three new songs from albums I have recently purchased:
I finally got around to watching Shrek 2 this weekend. No, I won’t bore you with a review — I can’t imagine anyone else hasn’t seen it yet who actually wants to.
One thing that I did notice was that the pop culture references seemed to either be very recent (Spiderman, Lord of the Rings) or from an era that speaks to my generation (Funkytown/Changes/Holding Out for a Hero/Flashdance). In particular, as I listened to Jennifer Saunders’ version of Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out for a Hero,” I started thinking about the Footloose soundtrack.
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I made a comment over at another board that I frequent to the effect that Napoleon Dynamite is a Mormon movie. When asked for details, I realized that I couldn’t really explain why, other than the fact that I know that the filmmakers are LDS. So I put it to you, gentle KB readers: Is Napoleon Dynamite a Mormon movie? Why or why not?
Not all of us are LDS (I don’t think), and I’m pointing my evangelical friends this way, so try to explain for a general audience.