Best Song Ever of the Week

This one's an oldie, but a greatie. "Enola Gay" [click for MP3] from Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - better known as OMD.

I was recently re-introduced to this song via the animated docunmentary, Waltz with Bashir:

The rest of the score to this movie is similarly awesome, along with mesmerizing original music, there a song by PiL and a re-working of Cake's "I Bombed Korea", as "I Bombed Beirut."

Now if you want to figure out the English translation for the dialogue in this scene, then go see the movie already.

Trailer Park Tuesday

Check out the trailer for this rad looking independent socio-romantic comedy. The movie is set in San Francisco and was directed by Barry Jenkins:


Shot on digital video. Stars a Daily Show correspondent. Holds SF's racial stratification in contempt. Wow, this movie's got all the right ingredients. Looks like Before Sunrise except less earnest and divorced from reality.

And as this NY Times feature on the film alludes to, Medicine for Melancholy fits nicely within a recent trickle of neorealist-ish and super localized American independent movies. See Ballast, Wendy and Lucy (& Old Joy), and Goodbye Solo (& Chop Shop).

Happy Chinese New Year!

Gong hei fat choi!

Let's celebrate the year of the ox with 60s Japanese garage rock band, Ox:


Here's some video of how they celebrated in Hong Kong in 1953.

Join the Snuggies (or Die)!

No, not "The Smoggies" - admission to this cult comes free of any environmental guilt:


Read your Stonecutters manual all comfy and anesthetized:


Also, check out this rare photo of the Snuggie shipping dock.

MLK in Comics

Read the full 1956 comic here.

Read about Ho Che Anderson's "King" graphic novel series here. And more awesome art here.

For a soundtrack, listen to the I Have A Dream Speech [right click for MP3 to full speech].

I had a dream...

...and Spider-Man and Barack Obama came to me in that dream. They told me that I have nothing to fear but our own inner nerd.

For other dreamy Super-Presidential team-ups, check this out. Clinton hits the pages of Superman, Reagan gets sent up in The Dark Knight Returns, Nixon in Watchmen, amongst a couple other gems.



Here's a couple panels from the issue, now available in stores (if you can find one):

Big Black Love

Anybody catch the premiere of season 3 of "Big Love" last night? I didn't, but the trailer for the long-awaited season looks poly-mazing! Featuring the Black Keys song, "Lies".

Er...uh, I don't live in Canada...

Hey, non-USAers, ever find yourself trying to watch the latest greatest SNL skit or catch a Howard the Duck on hulu, but then you're told by the internet police that "this video is not supported from your current location"?

Well, there's a solution: Hotspot Shield. Just download a free! simple program and it blocks your IP origin and watch away.

PC Magazine rates the program as one of the best free software programs of 2008.

The program will also protect your data from prying eyes on the public airwaves when you're on a Wi-Fi hot spot.

Pizza Party Anyone?

Does anyone still do pizza night on Friday nights? Order a pie, and maybe rent a movie? Or is everyone hooked into their virtual reality sets nowadays?

Which reminds me, does anyone still play "Pizza Party"?

Number Six: R.I.P.

I missed this yesterday, but Patrick McGoohan died. He was 80yrs old.

McGoohan created and starred in one of the best television series of all time - "The Prisoner". Weird, stylish, and smart, it puts more recent sci-fi mind-benders like "Lost" to shame.

The show is actually getting updated and will debut on AMC in 2009. Bad news: Jim "Jesus" Caviezel plays the McGoohan character #6. Good news: Ian McKellan will play #2. Hopefully it will do some justice to McGoohan's vision, or will at least shine some light on his amazing work in the '67 series.

Glenn Kenny has an interesting celebration of his legacy on his blog:

Much, I dare say most, of McGoohan's film work is in "genre" stuff, but in every performance, he's got a rough, almost (if you will) kitchen-sinkish presence; he is always somehow naked. It could make for some weird but bracing contrasts.

Check out this clip:

Patrick also guest starred on "The Simpsons". A great honour. A great synthesis of two great shows.

Yes.

In Toronto right now, truer words were never spoke.

No wonder this illustration won a contest over at Drawn!

Best Song Ever of the Week

Here it is, pop gunning's first mp3 of the new year!

Unfittingly, it's a humble cover of last year's best hit song. Pale Young Gentlemen do MIA's "Paper Planes" [click song title for MP3].

If your ears agree, you can hear this Madison Wisconsin band's new tuneful album Black Forest (Tra La La) on their website.

Part of Your Complete Breakfast (?)

By golly, can you believe what they were feeding the youth of the mid 20th century!

In the new millennium, we're selling and buying a new image - one that stresses nutritional value, organic certification, etc.:

Sure, you can still get Fruit Loops and Alpha-Bits, but the market has turned against the multi-colored excess and questionable attitudes of yesteryear (ie. cutey orientals selling Rice Krinkles). Ergo, no more free Freakies inside.

Here are 100 other box designs. Or for a million more trips down nostalgia lane, head to the Imaginary World. Via Drawn!

Post script. That whole "part of your complete breakfast" line has to be one of the most shrewd and enduring marketing tactics eva. It's right there along with pricing things on the 9s .

One of these presidents...

is not like the others:

The President Elect might as well be hanging upside down....

Source.

1st Team Allstars: Albums of '08

After much wringing of hands and gnashing of teeth, here it is... the 10 best albums ever (released in 2008)!

Fucked-Up, The Chemistry of Common Life – Hardcore gets caught in swirling shoegaze; as beautiful and brutal as a house getting torn apart in a tornado.

Video / Myspace


Born Ruffians, Red, Yellow, & Blue - At first listen, this kind of unabashed pop might seem a bit disposable, but it eventually reveals itself as a gem of a debut.

Video / Myspace


Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Lie Down in the Light – It's tough to make a low-key folk album this interesting, but Will Oldham does it with tunes that come together as much more than just background music.

Video


Wild Beasts, Limbo, Panto – Keeping it real dramatic, Wild Beasts debut a solid and polychromatic sound in the tradition of fey British rock.

Video / Myspace



Vampire Weekend, Vampire Weekend – Another of this year's great debut albums, it promises great things to come from a band who does simple real well.

Video / Myspace


Sigur Rós, Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust – The Icelandic quartet spring back to relevance with a sneakily joyful album. The best since their Ágætis Byrjun.

Video / Myspace


Ladyhawk, Shots – Dark and paranoid without being melodramatic or self-indulgent. A no-bullshit rock album for the young and the restless.

Video / Myspace



Destroyer, Trouble in Dreams – Dan Bejar follows up his indomitable Rubies with an album that's as sweet as it is drunk.

Video / Myspace



TV on the Radio, Dear Science – Probably their most consistently beautiful album since their debut EP Young Liars. Immediate and rousing.

Video / Myspace



Why?, Alopecia – A tangle of hip hop and rock where every lyric is worth rewinding for and catchy hooks are everywhere. Essential for 2008 and beyond.

Video / Myspace