Issue 47: Don't Bother Me, I'm Thinking
By Medulla Vesuvius

The Greatest Sham of All

You wanna know one of Medulla Vesuvius’s favorite things to do?

I like to come home from a hard day at work on the construction site, turn down the lights real low, light some short-bread scented candles, draw a hot bubble bath and drift away to a wonderfully relaxing world of pleasant thoughts. But the only way to get to that world is when I am accompanied by my silky-voiced friend, Delilah.

The little plastic radio by the tub is permanently tuned to her show, lifting me up with dedications to special people and stories of love-both lost and regained. Her soothing voice is like a fresh-smelling balm in a mad world at war.

But last night I realized that Delilah has been surreptitiously poisoning my mind with a seemingly innocent little song by Whitney Houston called “The Greatest Love of All.” Here are the full lyrics:

I believe the children are our future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride to make it easier
Let the children’s laughter remind us how we used to be

Everybody searching for a hero
People need someone to look up to
I never found anyone who fulfill my needs
A lonely place to be
So I learned to depend on me

PRE-CHORUS
I decided long ago, never to walk in anyone’s shadows
If I fail, if I succeed
At least I’ll live as I believe
No matter what they take from me
They can’t take away my dignity

CHROUS
Because the greatest love of all
Is happening to me
I found the greatest love of all
Inside of me
The greatest love of all
Is easy to achieve
Learning to love yourself
It is the greatest love of all

I believe the children are our future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride to make it easier
Let the children’s laughter remind us how we used to be

PRE-CHORUS & CHORUS

BRIDGE
And if by chance, that special place
That you’ve been dreaming of
Leads you to a lonely place
Find your strength in love

I heard two major issues with the lyrics of this song: 1) short of the entire solo catalog of Syd Barrett, (the insane original mind behind Pink Floyd), I don’t think I’ve ever heard a more muddled mess of non sequiturs and confusion. 2) Besides how the song says what it says, what it attempts to say is equally as upsetting to a particular type of person. I would be that type of person. Let’s get to some specifics.

Look up there at that first verse. “The children are our future.” No qualms about that. Assuming they aren’t outlived by their parents, children inherit tomorrow’s past. If I hadn’t heard this song before I would have predicted from this first verse that it was going to be about the innocence of children and how we could learn a lot about life through their instinctive happiness.

And I would have been wrong in that assumption.

For, where does this song go from there? Oh, it just starts talking about mentors and how the singer never found one. Double-u Tee Eff?

That’s a pretty drastic subject change, to say the least. But it seems we’re going from bad to worse, for in the pre-chorus, (”I decided long ago…”) the singer confesses a pretty isolationist individualism that is followed by the coup de grace: a non-specific paranoia. (Who exactly, I wonder, is the “they” who is trying to take away the singer’s dignity?)

I want to stop for a moment and regroup during this descent into madness. Let’s approach this song with a little more tenderness and just accept for a moment that the propositions follow each other naturally for a moment. What is the appropriate response to innocent children and a learned self-sufficiency? Why, it’s learning to love yourself of course! Is that really the greatest example of love we can fathom? To unconditionally serve and protect and wish the best for and praise and worry about and long for…yourself? Mother Theresa would have kicked your ass for even thinking that.

Let me tell you why this song is so subversively nefarious. All of the preceeding mental imbalance and monstrous egotism is delivered in such a lovely package- undulating electric piano and highly memorable melodies lulling you into a noncritical sleepy aesthetic coma. It’s a Trojan horse of the music world. Just think of Apollo Creed cranking his right arm like a windmill to distract you and then sucker-punching you with the other hand.

That is “The Greatest Love of All.” Stay far away.

You’ve been warned.

Issue 47: Sydney Brown's Sixty Seconds
By Sydney Brown

Sydney Brown’s Sixty Seconds

Back in the saddle again. There was a lively discussion in my last column which was a nice change of pace. So this go-around, I plan on intentionally trashing a good movie just to get the discussion going.

Here we go, lots of smaller films this time:

The Ten (2007) Paul Rudd, Gretchen Mol ***

The creators of Wet Hot American Summer return with an equally goofy film. Ten vignettes chronicle the ten deadly sins, and naturally as with sketch comedy films, some are hit-and-miss. This movie is infamous for featuring Winona Ryder having sex with a ventriloquist dummy in a hilarious sequence. Absurdist humor isn’t going to appeal to all or even some, but there are some big laughs that come out of nowhere. Courtroom banter between an annoyed judge and the jury foreman is a highlight.

Gerry (2002) Casey Affleck, Matt Damon *

Two guys named Gerry get lost in the woods. That’s the movie. Roughly two things happen in the entire film, one of them being the “shock” ending that will only make you angry for wasting so much time with it. I do suggest it though, if only to see how long you can last without hitting the fast forward button. I lasted twenty minutes. It’s a 100 minute film. There are 100 shots. I’d almost guess there are 100 lines of dialogue. Imagine taking 100 minutes to read this column. Now imagine watching someone else do that. In the desert. That’s Gerry.

Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003) *

So long and boring, I’d rather watch Gerry. At least it was over quicker. And only ended once.

Rambo (2008) Sylvester Stallone, a ton of dead Burmese ***

Rambo takes missionaries to Burma only to have to single-handedly rescue them and kill tons of evil people in the process. You know what you’re getting into with this, and if you go into it expecting an old-school 80’s film, it doesn’t disappoint. Quite possibly the most violent mainstream picture I’ve seen, with a reported 236 onscreen deaths in a span of 90 minutes. I had some free time, I didn’t count near that many. Horrible dialogue, shoestring plot, and I enjoyed every minute of it. Absolutely craptactular.

The Heartbreak Kid (2007) Ben Stiller **

Ben Stiller is a 40-something bachelor who marries the love of his life only to discover he doesn’t know her at all. And then he meets the real love of his life on their honeymoon. Decent but unspectacular Farrelly brothers movie. It has some genuine laughs, but the film is way too long and pretty much collapses in the final half hour when the wife completely disappears. And the grossout humor looks pretty desperate so many years after it worked well in There’s Something About Mary. Not as bad as it could have been, but not a real winner either. I actually had given this **1/2, then I remembered Carlos Mencia was in it, playing the very stereotype he is so “against.”

Dopamine (2003) ***1/2

Excellent small film about a computer programmer (Randall) who believes love is just a chemical reaction who meets a girl (Sarah) who needs love to fill an empty void in her life. Witty, believable, a rare indie film that doesn’t feel indie. Film highlighted by a riveting scene where Sarah pours her heart out to a webcam unaware if she even has an audience. Wonderfully understated performances helped by a script that is smart but never too smart nor pretentious (*cough* Juno *cough*). Sarah in a sense is Juno all grown-up, without the wisecrackiness and quirkiness. I’m sure I just invented a word there. A very pleasant surprise that I’ve probably now ruined by building it up so much.

-Sydney Brown

(I have never seen LOTR. Any of them. It was a joke. I’m sure as far as long, boring fantasy films go, it’s the tops.)

Issue 47: Tournament of Villainy
By Rascal Stallion

Lord Voldemort vs Kim Jong Il

Name: Tom Marvolo Riddle/Lord Voldemort		Name: Kim Jong Il
Occupation: Dark Wizard	vs.	Occupation: Supreme Commander of the Korean People’s Army
Origin: Harry Potter		Origin: His mother

Kim Jong Il was terribly excited. He had been a member of the Evil Bastard Club for quite a while but this would be his first meeting abroad. He was in England for some political junk when their local chapter had their monthly meeting. Since his dues were paid up he was allowed to attend their meeting in lieu of his regular South East Asia one.

It would be quite different for Kim Jong Il, though. He was used to being the top dog at his branch, especially since that bastard Pol Pot died 10 years ago. He was sure he was evil enough to fit in but he was a little worried they might not like him or respect his evilness.

Kim Jong Il walked into the meeting room and was a little dismayed to see he was the first one there. Still, he had nowhere else to go for a while so he just sat down in his usual seat. Still, it wasn’t too cool to be the first one there. He would rather be fashionably late. Just as he decided to go visit the water fountain to pass some time he heard the door open.

Lord Voldemort strode in and was appalled to see Il sitting in his seat, the coveted spot at the head of the evil table. “Who dares sit in the seat of Lord Voldemort?” bellowed Voldemort in an especially evil third person.

Kim Jong Il rose to his feet and Voldemort’s outrage doubled as he discovered it was a muggle who had trespassed in his seat. Without hesitation he aimed his wand at the diminutive dictator and cursed him. He cried out “aveda kedavra!” and a bright green flash erupted from the wand. The flash struck Il and killed him instantly. Then, as if nothing had happened, He who must not be named then turned to one of his assistants and asked that a replacement chair be brought in immediately.

Back to tournament bracket

Issue 46: Don't Bother Me, I'm Thinking
By Medulla Vesuvius

Book Review- Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece

Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece by Ashley Kahn, 2000 Da Capo Press, 218 pgs

A mere handful of seconds ago I got done reading Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece by Ashley Kahn. This book is a loving tribute that tells the story of what has proven to be one of the most popular jazz albums of all time. Kahn does a really good job of setting the scene in the studio but that’s quite literally not the whole story. He also gives some of Miles’s history as a musician and bandleader, from wet-behind-the-ears bebop sideman fresh off the bus to New York to his seemingly inevitable years as lost heroin devotee to his ascent to unlikely pop culture icon before discussing the album’s impact and legacy.

What I found most interesting is how well Kahn talks about matters of musical aesthetics for non-specialists. I’ve always been a little unclear about what exactly jazz musicians are doing when they play. But after reading this I feel slightly more enlightened. Kahn laid down the basics of jazz tradition so as to show what exactly Davis and his bandmates were shrugging off, (the convention of lining up improvisation with regimented, repeating chord progressions) when they went off in this “modal jazz” direction. Maybe unintentional is Kahn’s assertion of piano player Bill Evans’ often underappreciated conceptual contributions to this landmark work. It is easy to come away from this book thinking that Bill Evans, with his unflashy minimal style, is the guy who convinced Miles to slow down…

Also interesting was how enigmatic Miles became immediately after this album, very quickly choosing to speed up tempos when presenting this music live. Maybe he got bored. In the wake of even more free music by his former bandmate John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman, what was “revolutionary” about modal jazz quickly seemed merely “evolutionary.” Here’s a great quote:

After the wild ride Bird and Diz [Charlie "Bird" Parker and Dizzy Gillespie] had taken jazz on in the mid-forties, pushing the envelope of harmonic and rhythmic invention as far as it would go at that point, Miles and other cohorts had pulled jazz back to a cooler, blues-spirited extreme. That pendulum swing, from the apogee of bebop to the high-water mark of modal jazz, constitutes a period of unparalleled creativity in jazz. From that perspective, many see Kind of Blue as more of a goodbye to an age that has passed than a vision of the future.

“That album was really the end of the bebop era, you know?” remarks Quincy Jones. “Kind of Blue was the voice of that era-from ‘48 to ‘59- it was the highest culmination of the standards of the time.” Amram adds: “I’ve always felt that Kind of Blue was Miles’s valentine to Charlie Parker…a farewell, a moving on from that whole experience.”

Two recommendations:
1) Go out and buy a copy of this album. Live with it for a couple months. Alternately listen to it closely and then not listen to it as background music.

2) Read this book and witness a writer coming this close to defining the indefinable “magic” contained in the sounds.

Issue 46: Various and Sundry
By Clancy Lass

Not That Kind of Girl

Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Thriller…Those aren’t my genres. Or weren’t until I was introduced to you, my dear J.J. Abrams, and your Bad Robot productions. Oh, how I will follow you and your pop culture phenomena to the ends of the earth. How you dangle unknown actors in my face, tie me into story lines and tease me with unbearable cliff-hangers. I love you. I hate you. I can’t live without you.

It all started in 1998 with Felicity. I had nowhere to go. The tangled dorm life of a bookish girl embroiled with the bad boy, the good boy, the quirky roommate, the gay friend and the pseudo-depressive best friend; it was irresistible. I even contemplated a perm, desperate for Keri Russell’s locks.

Because of you, I actually watched Underworld because Scott Speedman was in it. And I followed you to Alias because Noel’s nerdy girlfriend was playing the lead, so you are also responsible for Jennifer Garner’s success. That’s when you really did a number on me. That isn’t my type of show: espionage, crime, judo, ridiculous stories involving death and resurrection of the same person more than once.

And yet I couldn’t turn my eyes.

You are responsible for Greg Grunberg. If you said “Who the hell is that?” you are not worthy of Nerd City. Go sit in the corner and think about what you’ve done. Greg is J.J.’s go-to cameo boy: the funny guy in Felicity. The best friend in Alias. The pilot on Lost. Matt Parkman in Heroes. That’s right…soak up the shame.

Lost had been on for several weeks before I finally decided to take a look, finding out you were the producer. I thought it was Survivor, but with Matthew Fox crying, and it didn’t sound appealing at all. Yet I was instantly hooked. Then you screwed with my heart by adding Him. You know of whom I speak. My dear, sweet Ben (Michael Emerson.) Oh, how I long to have him manipulate me on a weekly basis. You are a genius. And now he is a pop culture phenomena all on his own. In fact, may I be so bold as to suggest a face-off between Michael Emerson and Michael Emerson for the Tournament of Villainy: Zep Hindle vs. Ben Linus? William Hinks vs. Allan Shaye? Gerry Rankin vs. Henry Gale? All his characters have a charming yet chilling educated civility to them…much like Magneto. …But I digress.

Now, I’m theatrically entranced by Cloverfield.

Little planned dialogue, a handheld camera, and not the cheese of Blair Witch Project; just good, simple fun and very little cursing, which surprised me from what I can assume was largely ad-libbed.

What I enjoy most is that you use largely unknown actors, gain sympathy with them because we know so little of their talents, we buy them as the person you tell us they are, then catapult them into stardom. I love it. I love how you take as much risk in the casting as you do in the concepts themselves.

I love you and your Science Fiction sexy.

Just add in a little more Ben.

Even though I’m not that kind of girl.