Fashonistas

Oh I had another one of those rare moments on the subway. So I got onto a packed N train... pushed my way all the way in, and saw a brown hat fall to the ground. I did what came natural... I asked the people sitting where the hat had fallen if it was any of theirs. All three told me no. So I tapped on the shoulder of the lady in front of me. A blond woman, talking to another blond woman, in her fifties, decked out in the NYC uniform of all black and wearing enough makeup that I could have written bill was here in her cheek, turns around looking very annoyed.

"Excuse me... did you drop this?" I ask.

"Does it look like it would be mine." the woman said in a nasty condescending manner, " Never where brown with black..."

I felt a jump in my blood pressure. I had the thought flash through my head that this woman had never been punched in the face. Not that I wanted to punch her in the face... no really I didn't. It was more about what realizing someone could punch you in the face does to you. When I was an 9 year old kid I was playing basketball with some family friends. My brother was there and two other kids. One of whom I thoroughly enjoyed teasing, cause he was a big meathead. After teasing the shit out of him he looked down at me (yeah the kid was a year older, a foot taller, and outweighed me by 40 pounds), and said "Say one more thing... just one more thing."

What does an 9 year old Bill do?... well I got right in his face (as close as I could, I was on my tippy toes) and said "Thing!" He pulled back and cold cocked me squarely in my face, which erupted like a fountain with blood... outta both nostrils if I remember correctly. Upon hearing the story I got little sympathy. One can learn a lot from getting punched in the face. You could learn a sense of humility. Maybe have a realization that sometimes people will side with the puncher, and not the punchee. Or you can just learn that if someone makes a threat, no matter how unlikely... you better be ready to duck.

Well anyway the lady's friend, who looked much like a twin sister with slightly less makeup, piped up brightly with "I guess he knows what field we're in now."

My sarcastic mind desperately wanted me to pipe up with "Doctors...? no.... Diplomats...? no.... Social Workers...? no.... I could never tell you work in fashion." But instead of speaking up my eyes flittered downward and noticed the first woman's bag. It was a brown louis vuitton bag, the usual leather design, with a bottom made of leopard print, gaudy gold handles, and a big gaudy gold zipper. It looked kind of like the bag to the right... but even more busy. Now those of you who have discussed the issue with me know I find louis viutton bags one of the more ridiculous things people take great pride in. The bags look just plain silly and you paid a ridiculous amount for a bag with some dude's, not your but some stranger's, initials on it. So I couldn't resist some teasing. "Excuse me," I said in as polite a voice as I could muster, "I wouldn't want you to make any fasion faux pas, so I figured I should point out your bag is brown."

She looked down at her bag flustered, while her friend started to giggle. "This Bag. This bag is a work of art!" She said with the fake dignity of Samantha from Sex in the city.

"What make's you think that's art? Is it cause you paid a grand for it? As far as art goes I've never really been able to tell the difference between vuitton and Duchamp." (look to the left to see Duchamp's most famous work) Her friend giggled a little more and then we were mercifully @ the Lexington station where the twins got out. I moved into the crowded car a little further and stood in front of one of the women whom I'd offered the hat to earlier. She was pulling a wrapped bag out of a Macy's shopping bag. I noticed the big red tag that said YOUR FREE GIFT on the bag. I asked, "Is your bag a work of art?" She looked up at me and with a pout that looked, oh so real, shook her head slowly, then burst out laughing.

Menomena

Went to the Bowery Ballroom last night to see Menomena, who were quite good,but I'll get to that. The opening act was Land of Talk... a band that looked like they were sleeping under the stage for a week... and were woken up suddenly and expected to play immediately. Clearly this band had been on tour for a while, and had not found the money in order to have nice hotel rooms and let's say shower. But it didn't matter, this band proved once again that Canada's music scene is superior to the American one. They didn't blow me out of the water by any means, but they were solid, straight up indie rock. I'd like to hear the music in recorded form. The lead singer was a girl wearing an eighties outfit that looked like she'd robbed Deborah Harry, but she had a voice that sounded (I could be hearing things) but Stevie Nix. Which was quite a treat. The base player had a beard that you can only get away with if you are a civil war general or a relief pitcher from the seventies. their songs particularly worked when he harmonized with the lead, but that could be because I had the Stevie Nix thing in my head and it sounded more like Fleetwood Mac that way.

The next act was Field Music. This band clearly had more talented musicians, more honed song writing skills, more practice, and more time together as a band. In other words I hated it. So I went to go read some of a Bill Bryson book a friend lent me downstairs on one of the couches. After a smoke, and returned upstairs and got a spot, and the most curious scene was displayed behind me. Their was a guy who was a dead ringer for John Cusack, but with long hair... like in Being John Malkovich... he was standing next to a guy who was clearly a dead ringer for Ewan MacGregor as Obi Wan beard and all, and a woman who could pass for Angelina Jolie standing in front of the two of them making a triangle, or triumvirate of celebrity look-a-likes.

A guy asked me if they could pull off their sound live... I really didn't know. The truth is they didn't pull off their sound live, it sounded stripped down, which actually made it better. Instead of being distracted with all the noise, hesitations of silence added an incredible amount to the music. This little pockets of nothing gave you a moment to collect your thoughts and wait for the next barrage. Few bands out there, especially in a trio, are as reliant upon one another for their music to work. Songs were written and played in turn by all three members, but what each member added to the others songs could not be replaced. This is a formula that rarely works for long stretches as everyone in the band realizes they could have their own band (which would be sad, cause none of these guys would sound as good without the others in my estimation). The Drummer in particular seemed to have a ferocity on stage. I rarely notice the drummer, and in most bands that's not a band thing, there just seems to be something a little more musical about this one. The band also interacted with the crowd cracking jokes, attempting crowd participation, and even bringing out a birthday cake. I also am always interested in rock music that veers away from traditional instrumentation. Songs could go on without any guitar, or bass, and often included a sax or xylophone. All in all an invigorating performance.

They also had a fucking great tour poster.

300

Let me start by saying I just read the comic book... and really enjoyed the merciless nature in it. And if I were a 12 year old boy this movie would be the most fucking awesome creation in the history of man. It had everything, buckets of blood, multiple beheading, creatures, incredibly hot writhing naked women, freakish pimply old guys who like gold, and a big fat dude with swords for arms... That's right swords for fucking arms. AWESOME.

Sadly I am not a 12 year old boy. So let me sum up 300 through my 30 year old eyes. The basic plot revolves around this group of guys with CGI abs and pectoral muscles who like to scream and yell a lot, as well as cut off the heads of various things. There's lots of slow motion killing, with emphasis on the CGI abs. There's a lot of homoerotic images (did I mention the CGI abs?) including one of the 8 foot tall bad guy standing behind our king and hero with his arms caressing his shoulders making statements like "and you will feel my all mighty power." I was the only one in the theater who found this funny at all, much to the chagrin of the entire theater as I gigled for about a minute and a half. This movie though a faithful adaptation of the comic book's images, is a big fat pile of crap. The fact that the Iranian government felt the need to condemn this big pile of doggie dookie is even more reason to laugh.

And lastly, the fanboy issue. This is the director that is going to bring Watchmen to the screen. Please somebody stop that from happening, this director does not have the depth to bring a story like Watchmen to life. If you haven't read it... well read it... it's the reason the term graphic novel was invented.

More Korean Movies

So on the strength of the Host I rented another Korean movie. This time it was Save the Green Planet. This movie was all over the place, at times disturbing images of torture, at times a comedic farce, at times 70's horror, at times sci fi... I could go on. Somehow the filmmakers managed to make it work. This was largely done through creating phenomenal characters all of whom one, oddly enough considering the sheer peculiarity of all the characters, could relate to.

Basic premise is this... crazy guy kidnaps head of gigantic company and tortures him believing him to be an alien bent on destroying the world. However it is clear that there are all sorts of other reasons why this crazy guy has been kidnapping and killing people that make much more sense. So is this fella an alien or not, is roughly what you wonder as you run through the movie. Be prepared for grotesqueries however, but it's definitely worth a look.

Broken ankles and broken doors

In honor of the pain I feel in my knee I'm gonna relate a story about my broken ankle.

In the summer of 91" the bulls were making their first championship run, and I was thrilled.
Playing basketball during halftime of an eastern conference finals game at my friend Hinkley's place I went up for a lay-up, while Hink's father shot a ball... I have to give him credit he hit nothing but net... however I was directly under the basket as the ball fell towards me. I dodged, but landed funny turning my ankle, some thing I'd been known to do. After watching the game and getting driven home, the pain and swelling made me realize this was not my usual problem. A trip to the emergency room proved it.

I had a cast put on at the emergency room, and an X-ray taken the next day after my last final on the last day of classes my freshman year of high school. When the Doctor came out to show me the X-ray he pointed to a less dense area with an obvious crack running through it. "See here kiddo." the doctor said pointing, "That's your growth plate, the cartilage that hardens into your bones. You have a crack running through it. Because I got a nice picture of the growth plate I can tell you something, and I've got good news and bad. Good news is you aint done growin'. Bad news is it's about an inch."

My family left for a family vacation a week later... after my brother, while learning to drive, hit the broad side of a bus. Instead of hitting the breaks, like a normal human, my brother hit the gas scraping the entire passenger side of the van against the bus. So on the 12-hour drive... my brother, mother, father, two grandmas, and my ankle and me had to climb through the driver side door every time we had to eat or pee.

When we finally got up there we got a new little motor boat and my mom had taken to dragging my brother behind it in an inner tube. My mother, seeing how left out I felt decided to wrap a garbage bag around my cast and drag me around as well. Well... a garbage bag is not exactly watertight so my cast got soaked. The itch inside my cast was unbearable. I remember undoing a wire hanger and sticking it down my cast to scrape my leg. When I finally got the cast off we found what was itching, some sort of fungus, my leg was a dark greenish color with red lines where I was scraping at it. My leg looked like some sort of Christmas ornament. euck.

painful subway performers

So I played vollyball tonight. I don't know if it's metaphysically possible to fake out one of your own body parts, but I think I achieved it. My entire body went right and my knee went left. So I finished the game I was playing and hobbled to the subway not even changing out of my nasty sweats.

On the train here in New York there are often performers who attempt to get money from you by putting on a show. Mariachi bands are some of my favorites, as well as doo wap singers. Some are thoroughly irritating though... like the drum lady. Her drum is a drum with a busted top that she's placed duct tape over the top of. She bangs on it loudly with i a manner that lacks any sort of skill. And then she sings off key something like "I'm poor," "so I'm banging on my drum." " I got no money," "won't ya give me some." It never fails that when she walks into my car I'm exhausted and have a headache. Bad drumming is not good for a headache. Another variety are the kids who dance in the subway. They flip, throw around the small kid they have with them, and even mock ballet. Well tonight, right after they threw a 8 or 9 year old kid head first into the ceiling of the train ("Anybody got some aspirin?" one of the kids said after, making me chuckle), a guy flipped over his head with expertise... and landed square on my foot. Owww. I hope the kid didn't turn his ankle, but damn that hurt.

Andrew bird: Armchair Apocrypha

So I downloaded a copy of Andrew Bird's new record Armchair Apocrypha (don't worry Mr. Bird, when it comes out for real next Tuesday I will buy the record... I like the higher quality sound and Jay Ryan's artwork... see to the right. Go to birdmachine.com to buy). This album is a step beyond the Mysterious Production of Eggs, which I thought was one of the best works of 2005. Andrew plays the guitar, violin, keyboards, and whistles through the whole album, yielding a soft rock masterpiece. Mr Bird's lyrical delivery is fantastic, sometimes evoking both sorrow and laughter at the same time, a feat hard to deliver.

Andrew Bird is also one of the finest live acts around. The process by which he plucks out a rhythm piece on his violin, will record and loop it, then record something else and loop it, then he will actually pick up whatever is the lead instrument and play. The process by which the crowd hears the song constructed is fascinating. Add on to that if a mistake gets through, it's fun to see the artist and the crowd deal with the loop of a mistake every 15 or so seconds.

Andrew Bird plays Webster Hall on Thursday May 17th.

When You Wake Up Feeling Old

So this weekend was a waste of sorts... save sunday night. I spent the day on friday at the college of Staten Island learning to perform ovarectamies and castrations on mice. Fun huh... Well it took two hours to get home in rush hour traffic and I had a headache... A friend whom I was supposed to meet up with saw a play the night before that was dreadful, and had a hangover herself. So she came over we ate some gyros, and had a couple of beers. When she left I figured I'd get an hour sleep ion before I went to see Matt and Kim @ the Bowery Ballroom.

So I laid down at like 8 PM to catch a nap... and woke up at 3 AM. Obviously I missed the show. On Saturday while I should have been working on a paper I spent most of the day playing baseball on my playstation. It was a beautiful day and I thought of taking my bike out... but I didn't. Considered doing some yoga... but I didn't. Considered going out to see a movie at a friend's place... but I didn't. But all things said the cubs went 23-5 that saturday.

The Host

So apparently the monster movie is not a lost art. The Host is a new film out of Hong Kong (brought to America by billionaire/Dallas Maverics owner Mark Cuban) that breaks mmany traditional monster movie taboos. The monster was created with a little help from Weta Digital (the fellas that did the Lord of the Rings movies) and is one of the most original monsters I've seen on screen. Basic premise... asshole America dump chemicals and the like into the Han river and create a mutated beast. Unlike most movies featuring a monster this one is out in the open doing acrobatics through the whole movie. Within the first 15 minutes the carnage begins.

The main characters are a family of misfits, a forest gump like fool, his wise grisly father, award winning archer sister, drunk revolutionary unemployed brother and his bright daughter. There is some serious overacting but it's intended to be funny (I think) so if you start laughing when everyone is crying, don't worry it is funny. Tremors is the closest thing to this movie I can think of, but it's definitely not as straight forward comedic as that (maybe some of it's lost in cultural translation). There is also some obvious anti-American themes in the movie, so if you can't deal with the fact that much of the world hates it when our troops set up shop, don't bother with this one. If you haven't figured it out, by the time the extremely lazy eyed idiot scientist is on the screen you will have no choice but to accept the film makers do not like the American government at the least.

My only real complaint with the movie is the the lack of some editing, some scenes drag on, and the movie could have used a little pacing. Probably could have had 15 minutes or so cut, but all in all more than worth the 11.50 NYC movie prices.

Phil

Don't you have some work to do... I know you like my insights but two hours...?

Sparklehorse

So I saw Sparklehorse last night... and they were incredibly disappointing. I saw them before and they blew the roof off the Bowery... but last night they were just flat. The band had the energy of a dieing caterpillar. Mark Linkous said he was sick... which might have explained why he sung all the songs into a distorted microphone, depriving the audience of a more clear view of his usually enchanting voice. The set list was mostly made up of the slower variety of Sparklehorse songs, and when it came to the few rock songs they played it sounded as though they were a 45 record being played @ 33 speed. I'll give the guy a break, depression is a bitch... but hopefully when he rolls through town again he'll have another show like the one at the Bowery. They are one of my favorite bands, they have a catalogue of music that shows a range few bands have. Sparklehorse have songs ranging from rock, to creepy ballad, to country crooning, to electronic pop, to just plain strange, and it's nice to hear all of that live.

Car Towed

So my car got towed... on Tuesday night couple outstanding alternate side of the street tickets. I honestly did not believe they would tow me so quickly, and I was waiting for the old income tax refund to pay off some of my more extraneous bills. Well anyway we you come home to see your car gone first thought is "did someone steal my car?" After the shock of that you realize you have a couple of tickets and go check to see if they towed it.

I found out that I had to go to Jamaica queens to get my car. I also found out that they took exactly no credit cards... Which is ridiculous. So I took a shitload of cash out the bank, went to class, gave a presentation on visual perception, and solicited a ride via the blackboard. Clearly when you tow some one's car you want them to have to go somewhere impossible to get without using a subway and two trains. I got to the place where I immediately had to leave to go get exact change. The lady who worked there was one of these gruff no nonsense types of people... a trait that happens when your job requires you to deal with a large number of pissed off people at your job. After paying two weeks salary to get my car I got a sheet of paper telling me where my car was... which was no where near the place I was. No I was off to Whitestone NY, in the far northeast of Queens.

So I paid a car service 28 bucks to take me to the middle of nowhere to get my car. Where it was cold.. everyone smoked.. and some guy was very pissed off about the damage to his car. I was terrified that my registration wasn't going to be in my glove box and I wouldn't be able to get my car. The whole process took about 4 hours. Moral of the story.. pay your tickets immediately if you can't afford them... If you can afford to have tickets pay a high priced attorney to fight the city and rack up all the tickets you'd like.