The Wednesday Fiver
Posted on March 25, 2009 at 5:07 am | No Comments
A few bits of film, music, and tv-related goodness to mark the mid-week…
The 7th annual Independent Film Festival of Boston has just shared its initial list of films (narrative, documentary, and shorts), and unsurprisingly, it’s packed with gems. Take a gander, put in for vacation days with your boss (April 22nd-28th), and come back here in a couple days when I hope to have a full list with links and other info on each selection. Festival passes are also on sale, so have a look at your options. To tempt you further, the starter list of celebs who will be attending this year includes Chris Cooper, Benjamin Bratt, Bobby and Peter Farrelly, Kevin Corrigan, and Red Sox pitching legend Luis “El Tiante” Tiant. Many more are sure to be added.
Attention Joss Whedon fans, and more specifically, those of you who live in the Boston area: Joss is coming to town, and we’re invited. On Friday night, April 10th, the creator of Buffy, Angel, Firefly, and Dr. Horrible’s Sing-A-Long Blog (and yes, Dollhouse) will stop by the Harvard campus to accept the “3rd Annual Lifetime Achievement Award in Cultural Humanism” (or as Salman Rushdie, the 1st recipient, referred to it: “Athiestmas”). He’ll be speaking, playing clips from his work, taking questions (and, one assumes, providing amusing answers), and doing a signing as well. Everything but a hugging booth, although with Joss, you never know. While tickets have apparently been on sale for a few weeks, they’re shockingly still available as I write this they sold out while I was writing this, partially due to an early-day Twitter update that spread across the Boston-verse, and a Newbury Comics email. Essentially rendering the preceding paragraph nothing but a tease. Sorry ’bout that.
If you’ve been following director Edgar Wright’s blog, you know that filming for his on-screen adaptation of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim comics is underway, and he’s been teasing us daily with random images from the set. Well, Saturday’s entry was for the music fans. Two columns of post-it notes with band initials on them: From the comic, we’ve got fictional bands “SBO” (Scott’s band Sex Bob-Omb), “CATB” (Crash and the Boys), and “TCAD” (The Clash at Demonhead). The rest of the initials include “Bss”, “KT”, “MP”, “DN”, and the hard-to-guess “M” and “C”. Since the entire affair is so Toronto-centric, I’m going to assume “Bss” is for Broken Social Scene, and since Metric has already been mentioned in association with the film, let’s cross off the “M”. The others? Guesses are welcome. But what does the grid mean? A simple list of all the music? Or does it match up fictional bands with the real bands that will be providing their sounds? In which case: BSS would be Crash and the Boys; Metric would be The Clash at Demonhead (which makes sense, given the matching female lead singer/keyboardist of those bands). Food/sounds for thought. Bring it on.
Had enough time to digest that lots-to-swallow Battlestar Galactica finale yet? Given the near-instantaneous speed of view-review-analyze-criticize-recriticize that happens nowadays (thanks, internet!), you may have had enough reaction and reaction-to-the-reaction already, less than a week later. But if you haven’t, here’s a list of my favorite follow-ups to the two-hour conclusion of the sometimes-great-usually-good-occasionally bad sci-fi series…
Creator/writer Ron Moore’s farewell blog post A report from the final episode’s cast screening The Seattle Post-Intelligencer’s Q&A with Ron Moore. Alan Sepinwall from the Star-Ledger has a Q&A with Moore as well. The New York Times writes up the finale, along with the special Battlestar Galactica-fueled panel discussion that took place at the United Nations a couple weeks back. You can watch the two hour video of that UN presentation right here. The Chicago Tribune’s Maureen Ryan writes up the finale. The SFGate’s Tim Goodman reviews the finale at his Bastard Machine. Here’s Entertainment Weekly’s finale recap. EW’s PopWatch blog wonders what’s next for sci-fi on television? NY Magazine’s Vulture entertainment blog asks if the finale answered certain questions. Answer: Kinda. And when I want to talk teevee, I head to the TV Forum at the VHive, where you can find a healthy BSG discussion (both pro-finale and con, and everything in between). Start here.
TONIGHT! I’m heading to catch John Vanderslice vs. John Darnielle at the Somerville Theatre, for what I assume will be the polar opposite of a musical cage match. Expect shared songs, witty banter, and an overall air of mutual admiration. Will it be enough to fully exorcise any lingering pretension that Bono and his boys may have left behind on the theater’s stage? Yes, I do believe it will.
Last Night’s Playlist (Tourfilter DJ Night @ River Gods)
Posted on March 20, 2009 at 7:59 am | No Comments
Chalk up another great Tourfilter night at River Gods, where I played a couple hours of songs by bands that are coming to town in the next month or two. I felt like I scrambled to pull this playlist together, didn’t have as much time to work on sequencing as I’d hoped, but it ended up feeling just right. Lots of people asking “What band was that?” (or texting – you can request artist/song/show info via msgme while a song is playing), and that’s really what it’s all about.
Especially well-received were the very first song (a new Say Hi track) and the Pomegranates‘ “Corriander“, which sounded so, so good over the RG speakers. Also gave me great pleasure to play my favorite Now, Now Every Children track, “Have You Tried“, for the gathered crowd, along with Let’s Whisper‘s “Dylan’s Song“. Details on when and where all these bands are playing is right here…
Bradley’s Almanac
Tourfilter DJ Night playlist
Thursday, March 19th, 2009
@ River Gods, Cambridge, MA
01. Say Hi – “November Was White, December Was Gray“
playing Monday, March 30th @ the Middle East Up
02. Damien Jurado – “Gillian Was A Horse“
playing Thursday, April 16th @ TT the Bears
03. Crooked Fingers – “Your Control“
playing Saturday, April 11th @ Berklee Performance Center
04. John Vanderslice – “The Minaret“
playing Wednesday, March 25th @ the Somerville Theatre
05. Jennifer O’Connor – “Here With Me“
playing Monday, April 13th@ the Paradise
06. Let’s Whisper – “Dylan’s Song“
playing Friday, May 1st @ TT the Bears
(presented by Bradley’s Almanac)
07. Loney, Dear – “Airport Surroundings“
playing Wednesday, May 6th @ Great Scott
08. Margot & the Nuclear So & So’s – “As Tall As Cliffs“
playing Tuesday, April 7th @ the Paradise
09. Longwave – “Sideways Sideways Rain“
played last night, Thursday, March 19th @ the House of Blues
10. Mates of State – “Fraud In The 80s“
playing Tuesday, April 7th @ the House of Blues
11. Dean & Britta (ex-Luna) – “Words You Used To Say“
playing this Sat., March 21st @ the ICA Boston
performing Songs for Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests
12. Mountain Goats (John Darnielle) – “Autoclave“
playing Wednesday, March 25th @ the Somerville Theatre
13. Neko Case – “The Tornado Loves You“
playing Saturday, April 11th @ Berklee Performance Center
14. Now, Now Every Children – “Have You Tried“
playing Friday, May 1st @ TT the Bears
(presented by Bradley’s Almanac)
15. Pomegranates – “Corriander“
playing Thursday, May 14th @ TT the Bears
16. Robyn Hitchcock & the Venus 3 – “I’m Falling”
playing Monday, April 13th @ the Paradise
17. Morrissey – “Interesting Drug“
playing Sunday March 29th @ the House of Blues
18. The Hush Now – “Roleplay“
playing Friday, May 1st @ TT the Bears
(presented by Bradley’s Almanac)
19. Six Finger Satellite – “Dark Companion“
playing Saturday, April 4th @ Great Scott
20. The Faint – “Some Incriminating Photographs“
playing Wednesday, April 8th @ the House of Blues
21. Superdrag – “Filthy & Afraid“
playing Saturday, April 11th @ the Paradise
22. Tanya Donelly – “Kundalini Slide“
playing Thursday, March 26th @ the Brattle Theatre
as part of Wes & Eugene’s Cabinet of Wonders
23. Telekinesis – “Coast of Carolina“
playing Monday, March 30th @ the Middle East Up
24. The Thermals – “Now We Can See“
playing Thursday, May 7th @ the Middle East Down
25. Wild Light – “California On My Mind“
playing Wednesday, April 8th @ Great Scott
26. Faces on Film – “Beginners“
playing Wednesday, April 8th @ Great Scott
27. Thalia Zedek – “Lower Allston“
playing Saturday, April 18th @ TT the Bears
28. Age Rings – “Barthink“
playing Friday, April 3rd @ Great Scott
29. The Wooden Birds – “False Alarm“
playing Saturday, April 18th @ TT the Bears
30. Wye Oak – “Family Glue“
playing Thursday, May 14th @ TT the Bears
31. You Can Be A Wesley – “Creatures“
playing Friday, May 1st @ TT the Bears
(presented by Bradley’s Almanac)
32. Asobi Seksu – “Familiar Light“
playing Monday, March 30th @ the Middle East Down
33. The Broken West – “Auctioneer“
playing Monday, March 30th @ the Middle East Up
34. Bloc Party – “So Here We Are“
played last night, Thursday, March 19th @ the House of Blues