Category — Stuff I Like

I’ve been trying to see Ben Folds perform live for about ten years now, and just like my attempts to score Chik Fil A breakfast, I have been consistently thwarted.  Until last night, when a friend and I watched him hammer on his piano for two hours at the House of Blues in Atlantic City.

The setlist for the night was mostly material from Way To Normal, or the fake version thereof, with most of the older material coming from Rockin’ The Suburbsand Songs For Silverman, though a few classic Ben Folds Five songs snuck in as well.  The show kicked off with “Bitch Went Nutz” the ‘fake’ (and I know some who say ‘better’) version of Normal’s “Bitch Went Nuts,” and then played through “Effington,” “Sentimental Guy,” and “Annie Waits” (the first instance of the audience - who was pretty energetic all night - just really going nuts over a song) before pausing to say hello to the crowd.

I don’t remember the exact order of what came next - blame it on driving back to NEPA after the show and then falling into a coma until around noon today - but I think I’ve got most of it, though I know the order is off:

Alice Childress
Cologne
Bastard
Still Fighting It
Lovesick Diagnostician/Dr. Yang (with the former going directly into the latter, like he’s been doing at basically every show this tour)
Free Coffee (along with a demonstration of how he creates the 8-bit kind of sound the keyboard has on that track by putting Altoids tins inside his piano)
Kylie From Connecticut
Landed (which seems like a very odd follow-up to “Kylie”, but the songs are really two sides of the same coin)
Rockin’ The Suburbs
Zak And Sara
Not The Same (which had a huge amount of audience participation - Not only did a group of people near the back shout out the refrain ["You were not the same after that"] at what seemed like sporadic intervals, but Folds split the audience up to do the choral bits in the song, and that ended up being a lot of fun)

In the middle, we were treated to some “fucking scary taxicab stories” - involving an elderly cabbie who started driving erratically when she could not find her oxygen mask and, this one in the form of a “Rock This Bitch”-esque extemporaneous song, a cabbie in Pittsburgh who played the clarinet while driving his cab.

The encore was “Army,” “You Don’t Know Me” (with Jared - and much of the audience - doing Regina Spektor’s vocals), and “Underground,” which made most of the fans sitting around me freak out a bit.

I had a great time. Unfortunately, I didn’t get any pics worth posting (lots of blurriness).  Folds had a ton of energy, and it definitely transferred to the audience in a cozy venue like the House of Blues.  Our seats, which weren’t the best, still gave us an awesome view of the stage and we could see everything without needing to watch the monitors.  In particular, being on the right side of the room, I could actually see Ben’s face as he was singing, and most of the time, he was smiling.

Last night was easily one of the best shows I’ve been to - maybe not as great as EC was a few years ago, but definitely firmly in my top 5 concerts.  Folds is still touring - he’s going to be in Syracuse Sunday night - and he’s working on a new album with novelist Nick Hornby (another perennial favorite) too.

Here are a few videos from last night that I found on YouTube.  Enjoy:

I did something that I haven’t done in a few weeks - go to the movies.  Here’s what I saw:

Observe and Report - I’ve been chomping at the bit to see this film since I saw the trailer in front of Friday the 13th back in February, and it plays like Jody Hill’s Taxi Driver.  The movie is dark and uncomfortable and no character is legitimately likable but there is something sympathetic about the ’screw-up who wants to make good’ vibe that cuts through the crass and downright abominable presentation of the film.  Seth Rogen and Anna Faris do their jobs very well here, and Danny McBride’s brief appearance is hilarious.  Well-made, but messed up.

Fast And Furious - YES. Frivolous. Disposable. Pretty. Fun. Awesome.

‘m doing a meme-type thing today.  Saw this over at The Book Smugglers (found Ana and Thea through the Scott and Jean thing we did at Alert Nerd, and immediately started reading their site daily) and figured that I’d join in.

1. What author do you own the most books by?

It’s a photo finish between Stephen King and Terry Pratchett, but I think Pratchett noses King out just barely.

2. What book do you own the most copies of?

The Fellowship of the Ring and The Princess Bride (it’s a tie).

3. What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Batman.  But in a viking way, not in a yaoi way.

4. What book have you read more than any other?

Lord of the Rings.  For a long time, I read it once a year.  Give it a few years, and the winner here will definitely be Walden.

5. What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

The Silmarillion.  I’m a dork.

6. What is the worst book you’ve read in the past year?

A Darkness Forged In Fire by Chris Evans.

7. What is the best book you’ve read in the past year?

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss.

8. If you could tell everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?

I’m going to cheat and throw out two.  One for the literary side of me and one for the genre side.

The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon (honestly, read it.  It is the most beautiful melodrama I have ever read)

The Lies of Locke Lamora, by Scott Lynch

9. What is the most difficult book you’ve ever read?

Honestly?  Ulysses.  I’ve always thought that the ‘best novel ever’ thing comes from pretentious critical airs more than it does the genuine quality of the book.  It’s still quite good, but it’s a labor to read.  Seriously.

10. Do you prefer the French or the Russians?

French.

11. Shakespeare, Milton or Chaucer?

I’m going to say Shakespeare, but a little voice in my head is shouting “Chaucer!”

12. Austen or Eliot?

No contest.  Austen.  What?  I’m a sap sometimes.

13. What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Contemporary American non-genre fiction.  I’ve read some of the stuff I’m ’supposed to read’, but I’m much more interested in my sci fi and fantasy and whatever else.

14. What is your favorite novel?

The Great Gatsby.  I think that says several things about me, some of them sad.

15. Play?

I have a soft spot for Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy.  It’s much more economical than Hamlet, the play that borrows liberally from this one.

16. Poem?

Uncomfortable confession: I’m really into poetry sometimes. I even wrote a prolific amount of it in my early 20s, and not the rhyming-couplets-or-blank-verse-about how I like a girl or whatever; I wrote a short sonnet sequence, for instance, in lieu of doing a final for one of my classes, and it was good. I had a few things published (in the college literary journal), and I still hoard copies of it obsessively against people ever finding them.

This will shock those of you that are expecting Keats or Shelley here, but my favorite poem is probably The Elegy of Fortinbras, by Zbigniew Herbert.  Herbert is one of my favorite poets, and although I don’t speak Polish, listening to his work in the original language is really something.  I’m also a big fan of Heaney, and his translation of Beowulf is beautiful at times.

17. Essay?

Thoreau, Resistance To Civil Government.  Yes, I have a favorite essay.  Seriously, read it.

18. Short Story?

A Very Short Story by Ernest Hemingway.

19. Non Fiction

Walden, or Life In The Woods by Henry David Thoreau

20. Graphic Novel?

Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O’Malley.

21. Science Fiction?

William Gibson’s Bridge trilogy.

22. Who is your favorite writer?

Nick Hornby.  Probably because of all of the uncomfortable “That’s me!” moments I have when I read his stuff.

23. Who is the most over rated writer alive today?

Stephanie $%#^%&* Meyer

24. What are you reading right now?

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, once I find a copy.

25. Best Memoir?

I don’t read a lot of memoirs.  Sorry.  But I do really like Night.

26. Best History?

Founding Brothers or maybe The Killer Angels.

27. Best Mystery or Noir?

Technically sci fi, but George Alec Effinger’s Budayeen books are some of my favorite noir, but to go more traditional, I’m going to also say The Long Goodbye (which has one of my favorite first sentences in books).  I also just read another noir fi thing called The Electric Church that impressed me, but I wouldn’t call it the best.

I’m not going to tag anybody, but feel free to do it on your own if, you know, you want to.

Oh, and hey, be my GoodReads friend.  You know, if you want.

There’s a flashback in NextWave to a moment where Captain America literally orders Monica Rambeau to cook him dinner.  It’s a goofy, irreverent tweak at the way that Marvel’s female characters were portrayed in the Silver and Bronze ages, where they were almost always played as The Girl, involved in a romance with a teammate (or a triangle between several teammates) and the voice of domesticity on their teams.

You’d think it would be a step forward for the women of the Marvel U to have their own all-girl team book.  In fact, looking strictly at the surface, that’s a little empowering, yeah?  But wait, this is the same publisher that did this, so let’s not be too hasty.  Marvel Divas is a book about four superheroines who are apparently boy-crazy and love shoes.  And it’s both written and drawn by men.  Which doesn’t bother me.  What does bother me is that the author, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa (best known for his broody, supernatural swashbuckling over in the short-lived Nightcrawler series from a few years back), pitched the book to Marvel as “a lot of hot fun,”  and apparently Marvel was all, “hot fun sounds great!”  What about some hot character development and less of a straight Sex and the City lift?

What?

Listen, I’ll be over here re-reading Ultra.

Because when am I ever on time for anything?

Because a bunch of my writerly friends are doing this, I’ll pretend that I’m a writer, too, and share some scripty bits from the comic book that I’m working on with Matt Springer.  It’s still needs some reviseration, but I like this beat.

Panel 1: The Lab. Large, half-page panel. View from above, the Angerfish armor laid out on a table, looking like an autopsy patient.  Dr. Garcia, as-ever in his white lab coat, officiates the proceedings.

GARCIA: This is Angerfish.
McFLY (radio): Angerfish is in the hospital.  This is his suit.
GARCIA: Just so, Martin.  His suit.  And it’s amazing.

Panel 2: The Ops Center (OC).  McFly is in front of the giant screen, where Dr. Garcia’s ‘autopsy’ of the powersuit is the main attraction. McFly’s slouched in front of a table, and he’s tinkering with something we can’t see, a soldering iron in one hand.  Trish hovers in the background, watching the screen.

McFLY: It looks ridiculous.  And putting the nuclear power cell in the esca?  That’s stupid.

Panel 3: Back to the Lab, with Dr. Garcia looking up, quizzically.

GARCIA: Esca?
McFLY(radio): The dangly bit.

Panel 4: Back to the OC, McFly now tinkering in the background, Trish stepped up to the foreground.

TRISH: It’s thematic.
AL (OS, radio): It’s obvious he didn’t build this himself.  He thinks he can talk to dolphins.
TRISH, McFLY: He can’t talk to dolphins.

Panel 5: Trish and McFly share a ‘we just said the same thing at the exact same time’ look.

Late last week, DC Comics did the unthinkable: they took a bold step forward in social media and started a new blog, The Source.

I like it, and I’m probably one of the most vocal and rational critics of the way DC navigates the Internet.  It has good exclusive content, is updated regularly and doesn’t constantly indulge in the “READ THIS LINK” style of reportage that the publisher’s Twitter account consists of.  On top of that, it’s got a killer design.

It’s good to see DC taking some steps to connect directly with its base, and it looks like - maybe - taking their time was worth it.  I’ll be watching to see what kind of legs it has.

We’re having a bit of a thing over at Alert Nerd in honor of the fictional marriage of Scott Summers and Jean Grey (in an issue of Uncanny X-Men that came out on March 30, 199whatever) and we’ve been asking our nerdy friends what their geek sacred cow (their “Scott and Jean are the best couple evar”) is.

Because I’m a contrarian, I talk about the Jean Grey/Wolverine romance.

Read all about it here.  And I encourage you to post your own, too.

As I watched the end of Fanboys last night (and there are SPOILERy things following hence), I thought to myself that The Phantom Menace was maybe what killed poor Linus, that maybe he’d have held on longer if he hadn’t seen it early and known what a departure from the Original Trilogy it was.

That musing aside, Fanboys isn’t a film about Star Wars.  Not really, though a comprehensive knowledge of both Star Wars and late-90s Internet culture are recommended to get maximum enjoyment out of the film.  It’s about a friendship between five people and the commonality that manages to bring them back together even when they’re scattered to the winds for months or years.  I have friends like that, who due to scheduling differences or distances don’t talk to me as often as I might like (and vice versa).  The movie’s not perfect, but it has some solid, geeky laughs and an emotional core that not many movies with its focus or budget successfully muster.  And Kristen Bell in a slave girl Leia outfit - that was pretty okay, too.

Last House On The Left is a pretty standard grindhouse remake - the film looks more attractive but is less impactful and I never find myself caring about that poor girl or what line the family is crossing.  Like When A Stranger Calls, the thing that gives the original power is the thing that everybody knows about already, and that really dilutes any attempt to recapture its vengeful goodness.  The sort of horror represented by Last House only really works when it has two key elements: empathy and catharsis.  This has neither.  There’s a glimmer of a cathartic moment, when John appears in the kitchen, claw hammer in hand, and helps his battered, terrified wife to her feet, but it’s too short and the audience has to wait too long for the payoff that inevitably comes from it.  Which is in fact my problem with most of the second half of the movie.  It should be twenty minutes shorter.

But that’s not what I want to talk about today.

In the theater last night, there were no fewer than 3 children that I estimated to be under 12 years of age, sitting dutifully with their parents.  This bothered me immediately, but really, really bothered me once I heard a little girl audibly ask “why the man was doing that” during the rape scene.  Which means the parents let her watch that scene without covering her eyes or removing her from the theater.

Seriously.

Fuck. You.

Is the world so desensitized to its own ugliness that any parent can walk into a theater with a little girl and think “She can handle the R-rated slasher movie.  Screw Hotel For Dogs or The Jonas Brothers.”  If that is your only viable choice for seeing a movie with your elementary-aged child, stay home and call Child goddamn Services to come pick the kids up.  Then you can watch whatever you want, you callous shits.

I think that Watchmen may be impossible to review.  I’ve read reviews praising what other reviews panned and damning what others deified.  I have friends who have seen it and loved it, loved it except for the ending, hated the whole thing, and a few who refuse to see the movie because they feel that making a film adaptation of Watchmen is misguided.

After having seen Watchmen myself, I have to cast my vote with the latter.  At least in the sense that the movie, as good as frequently is and as faithful to the text as it can be, is ultimately a gutless retelling of the comic’s plot that pares out the things that make Watchmen really resonate as a ‘graphic novel’ (or ‘maxi-series’, depending on when you first read it and in what format).

The sleek cinematography, complete with director Zack Snyder’s trademark fetishistic slo-mo, blood, violence and nudity are all present on film.  The pirate comic, the streetcorner, the backing material are mostly gone or severely diminished.  The first group are the things that I loved about Watchmen when I was ten years old.  The second are the things I like about the comic now.  I like the control and complexity in Moore’s script and in Gibbons’ layouts and pencils, things that are by the very dint of being filmed absent from the film.

Watchmen the film is ultimately a very slick looking, very bombastic presentation of all the things I loved when I was ten.  As a film adaptation of the main plot, it is entertaining; I don’t hate it.  The acting is mostly solid (with Malin Akerman being the weak link in that chain and Jackie Earle Haley and Billy Crudup both doing an particularly great job of bringing two very difficult characters to life), the action looks nice (and I’ve always secretly been a bit of a sucker for Snyder’s slow motion antics), but it’s hollow in comparison to its source - very much like the bulk of the Harry Potter films in a lot of ways.    I liked it.  I’ll watch it again.  It was entertaining.  But it doesn’t hold a candle to the original.