Category: REVIEWS

Expatriates and Creative Bitching

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I’ve often got this song on a loop in my MP3 these days when I ride the subways: Before you read the following, seriously, listen to this song, check out the lyrics, of which the following passage grabbbed me (hard, by wrist) when I first heard it: I understand the culture’s Of a different kind, But here [the] word celebration Just doesn’t come to mind! This resonates with me in the context of the story the song tells: a band that describes itself, in its early days, as “a bunch of immigrants jamming” who met at “a Russian wedding in …

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Great Black Music, Ancient to the Future

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The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians has long used that line to describe their music: “Great Black Music, Ancient to the Future” and their membership has, over the years, included people who I’d say deserve that appelation: music I hope is remembered, is fundamental to the interesting things that come in the future of innovative, intelligent music. But for the latter half of the phrase, “ancient to the future,” it’s always brought to mind Steve Coleman’s music. Coleman is a badass alto saxophonist, as you can see in this clip: … and with his various groups over the …

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Start Wearing Purple

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I know, I know, I’m way behind. Anyway, somewhere in the comment boards at Scott Eric Kaufman’s excellent Acephalous–my favorite, er, can I call it an “academic blog”?–someone teased Kaufman, asking “d’you think you maybe like Gogol Bordello too much?“ Which made me immediately go and look ’em up, and man am I glad I did. Here’s one of the songs that amuses me to no end: While this may be the first rock song I’ve heard that when the singer busts out a little braggadocio, proceeds to references both Diogenes and Foucault (let alone Passepartout, a Jules Verne character, …

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Hollyday?

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UPDATE: Hollyday apparently is still out there. He’s been teaching school for a while now, but (according to articles more recent that the one I linked, but which I can’t find now) he is apparently thinking of recording again, maybe making a comeback of sorts, though not on the scale of his original, brief career as a professional performer… There are a few updates out there, if you search for them. ORIGINAL POST: Surely I’m not the only person who remembers this guy? Well, Christopher Hollyday now apparently works as a band teacher but still gigs occasionally. (He was always …

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“… the somewhat lumpen kind of pseudo-magical realism that mainstream writers… tend to write when they want to extrapolate to make political points…”

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Mainstream writers don’t trust their readers to make connections. Sf understands that the human mind is an intrinsically metaphorizing machine, and that therefore you do not have to labor the connections to make your point. That’s why Suzy McKee Charnas’s work or Le Guin’s better novels are better and more intelligent and persuasive about women’s oppression than, say, The Handmaid’s Tale [1985]. The polemics and satire in Perdido Street Station don’t undermine the secondary world I create, I hope. China Mieville said that in an interview in 2003, so please, before you get out the pointy sticks, don’t blame me. …

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But How Can I Forget

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Have I mentioned My Little Airport? Excellent little Hong Kong indie band, at least from the album The OK Thing to Do on Sunday Afternoon is to Toddle in the Zoo. I’m definitely picking up all three albums. The best I can describe their music is it’s cute, twee, blippy, clockwork, breathy, girly, indie-pop. (In disarmingly unabashed Engrish, among other languages.) I also really like this song: Get this widget | Track details | eSnips Social DNA

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Notes for Korean TV Production:

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UPDATE (31 Oct. 2013):  The video linked in the original post is gone. I think this is mostly the same one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb1ITUzW4NU ORIGINAL POST: <video unavailable> Brown-skinned people are either poor children with hearts of gold or scary witch-doctor/fortune-teller types, which is natural since brown-skinned people are all poor and have inborn magical abilities. No other brown-skinned local people besides poor children and scary witch-doctor/fortune-teller types should be included in shots. If they absolutely must do so, have them appear for no more than one second at a time, and in the background. Have your Korean characters talk to the …

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Another Good One Gone

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Yeah, we only really hear about the famous people who we lose. The not-famous people, those are personal tragedies, but the famous ones, they’re not so much tragedies to us as a moment to pause and reflect about how a human being could be excellent. Or maybe I’m just cold? Or distracted? I mean, obituaries and goodbyes propagate through the blogosphere and people mostly post videos of the person singing or ranting, or choice quotes from their books, or whatever. Maybe people are moved to tears, maybe not. Me, I just kind of pause and go, “Huh. Another good one …

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Weirdest Fanfic Evar!

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Wait, not the weirdest fanfic ever — I’m scared to even consider what that might entail. But is the weirdest fanfic ever by me. Not that I’ve written much before this. I’ve never felt even the slightest bit moved to write fanfic, ever, but this scene, this weird neo-Saturday cinema serials thing, just popped into my head, very loosely based on this TV show I’ve been watching. Don’t click on the link: if you don’t know the show, the weirdness won’t hit you (though you should check out this program, it’s worth watching). And if you do know the show, …

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