I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: BLEACHERS-Tiny Desk Concert #648 (September 12, 2017).

I didn’t realize that Jack Antonoff, lead singer of Bleachers, was the lead guitarist (but not singer) for the band fun.

I really don’t like the lead sax by Evan Smith on two of the songs.

I particularly don’t like the sound of the sax on “Everybody Lost Somebody.”  When the sax is gone, the song which is otherwise just piano (Mikey Hart) sounds pretty great.  Antonoff’s delivery is quite interesting on this song, it reminds me of The Mountain Goats’ John Darnielle–an almost-speaking, somewhat arch style..

After the song ends, Antonoff asks, “How often you guys do this?”
Bob says, “We got another one in an hour.”
Then he continues, talking about how NPR seems like a nice place to work.

For the second song, “Don’t Take The Money,” Antonoff says: “If you ever see Bleachers live, it’s two drum sets and it’s big and it’s kinda like this big statement that I could hide behind the tears with this big rock show. But the songs are written like this.”

This is kind of funny since the drums are played on a boombox and are quite loud.  The synths really fill the room, too.  Oddly the song segues into the chorus of Queen’s “Radio Gaga.”  Of the threes songs this is my favorite.  There’s no sax and Smith is playing along on a second set of synths to really make a full sound.

My favorite part of the song is at the end when he tries to get the boom box to stop.  He hits the button (trying to get a percussive sound), but it doesn’t turn off.  He and the pianist turn it into a cool improvised ending.

He says, “that’s cool we’ve never played that song like that.  That’s how it’s meant to be.  In some ways.  That’s what I love about playing live is to trick people–trick them into getting really sweaty and then going home and having weepy moments.”

After the song, Antonoff talks about the live show.  The blurb helps out:

“My manager says, ‘When you play for 1,000 people, don’t talk to one person. It’s only cool for them,'” Antonoff said. It was offered as an apology — he had just finished aiming a monologue about the link between dancing and crying at a single NPR staffer in the audience — but it was also a perfect encapsulation of the connection Antonoff’s songs create. Bleachers makes truly conversational pop, songs that sound expansive but retain a sense of intimacy, even when aimed at the masses.

This final song is called “Foreign Girls” and he tells the band, “I guess we’ll do it… like we talked.”  The sax is back and is almost obscured by him “la la la’ing” but it does peek through.

It’s interesting hearing them like this, but I don’t know what they sound like all big and dancey, so I can’t really compare.

[READ: October 1, 2016] Ms Marvel: Super Famous

Confusingly, this book collects issues 1-6, but they are definitely not the first issues one to six.  This is a whole new story line which follows the previous books and is listed as Volume 5.  The book has three artists: Takeshi Miyazawa (issues 1-3) , Adrian Alphona (part of issue 1), and Nico Leon (issues 4-6).  And it starts off almost where the last series ended.  Except it’s 8 months later and a few things have happened.

Like Ms Marvel has officially become an Avengers (there’s a cool two page spread of them coming down the alley (although I don’t recognize some of them, actually).  And Ms Marvel is doing pretty well.  However, Kamala, the girl who is Ms. Marvel is having a hard time keeping up with schoolwork, friends and family while fighting crime at night.

Oh and somehow in the last 8 months, her best friend/crush Bruno has started dating a wicked cool girl named Mike.  How did she not notice this romance blooming?  And can she take it out on Bruno?  Well, she can until she looks up and sees her image (well Ms Marvel’s image) on a billboard.  And this has her fighting mad, even more so when she finds out who is responsible for the billboard.

Turns out it is a bunch of developers creating Hope Yards–a plan to clean up Jersey City by making it unaffordable for undesirables.  And what’s worse is that the people protesting the unannounced building of Hope Yards are naturally associating her with the project.

As the story progresses, she notices that some of the people in the area are acting really weird–red eyes and zombie-like voices.  And it seems to have something to do with this purple goo that she discovered.

Soon enough she finds out just who is behind the Hope Yards Development and Relocation Association (I love when bad guys are obvious like that).  They have made a spray that is turning everyone into zombies.  And just as she is about to take them all out she sees that one of them is Bruno–he’s been taken over!

Before Bruno was kidnapped he left Kamala a clue, and it involves the girlfriend Mike.  While Kamala and Mike aren’t talking really, Ms Marvel has no problem talking to her (and even offering advice about Kamala).  Turns out Mike is as much of a techie science nerd as Bruno and they are able to do something that helps the zombies.  But it’s never that easy (especially since when everyone wakes up they’re still mad about Ms Marvel selling out).

One other thing that’s been keeping Kamala busy is that her brother has been dating (or trying to date as far as religious practices go) a young lady.  She is an African-American Muslim.  And they don’t know how to tell each other’s parents (both kids are devout in their own way, just with different religions).   And Kamala is supposed to be a chaperone/helper/something to help her brother and Tyesha get together.  (Tyesha is super cool and makes a Dune reference that gets Kamala pretty jazzed).   It’s an exciting family meeting with Kamala’s parents freaking out but being happy that their son is happy.

Some phone calls dampen the atmosphere. How can she possibly help people, be there for her brother, do school work and be a good friend?  If only there were three of her. Cue Bruno in the lab.  He has been able to sample some of the DNA from these golems that have been around since the last book (created by Loki–you’ll have to look it up).  He has made the material into a reasonable human shape, and Kamala gets the (not so) genius idea to make copies of herself to show up in class and at parties.  The clones can say a few words and look reasonably like her.  What could go wrong?

Well, if her family, at this wonderful party, gives her a drink of any liquid, thing could get squishy (which must be pretty intense to witness).

People notice her acting weirdly, but the problem is that through some kind of contamination, they have begun replicating.  And soon there are thousands of Kamalas running around.  And they are Kamala right down to her powers.  Uh oh.

The final chapter shows Bruno trying to help out by making something that can defeat an army of Kamala droids.  With unfortunate consequences.

Help is going to have to be called.  Fortunately for everyone, Kamala is able to call people pretty quickly.  Unfortunately, Bruno and Mike are able to Summon Loki as well.  He may be funny but he;s not very helpful.  It’s time for Kamala to confess that’s he can’t do it all.  Will the Avengers still let her fly with them?

I really like this story a lot. The diversity of the cast, the age of Ms Marvel and now her connection to the Marvel universe makes it all the more exciting.  I’m, also glad that even though she is joining the Marvel universe, we’re not expected to know everything about the ins and outs of the mythology.  If you know it, it’s like an Easter egg.

With so many threads wrapped up it feels like there won’t be any more of th is series, although if I know Marvel, I’m sure there will be.