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Archive for the ‘Environmentalism’ Category

Terry Moore–Five Years #6 (2019)

Posted in Abstract Studio, Bombs, Coronavirus, Death, End of the World, Environmentalism, Graphic Novel, Military, NPR/PRI/PBS, Quarantine, Russia, Skiing, Strangers in Paradise, Sylvan Esso, Terry Moore, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfinished series, Violence on May 21, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: SYLVAN ESSO-Tiny Desk (home) Concert #24 (May 21, 2020).

Is it possible to make dance music while sitting on a couch?  Is it possible also to dance to that music while sitting on a couch?

These pressing questions are answered in this Tiny Desk Home Concert

Sylvan Esso, the Durham, N.C., couple of Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn gives us three songs from their home couch using modular synths, a rhythm machine and Amelia’s heartfelt vocals.

Sanborn sits in front of box with all kind of wires patched into it. It’s an unholy mess and he manages to make the melody by pushing the buttons between those wires.

Meath sits in front of another box and supplies most of the beats. It’s neat watching her sing verses and then push a button as the drums enter or leave “Die Young,” a fun dancey song.  She answers one of the above questions in the middle of this song which has a “dance break” as Meath waves her arms and gently bounces on the couch.

“Rewind” is a slower song.  Sanborn walks off camera while Meath starts the simple drum rhythm.  I assume he’s playing a synth, although midway he picks up a guitar (how frustrating that he’s off camera–c’mon Esso!).

In keeping with Tiny Desk tradition, bands I actually like–like this one–do a set that is less than 15 minutes, while artists I’ve never heard of or don’t especially like ramble on for over 20.

So they have only one more song.  But before playing it, they plug their new release

This home concert stands in sharp contrast to Sylvan Esso’s remarkable new film, WITH, which features a host of their dear friends reshaping and reimagining their brilliant catalog of songs during the duo’s 2019 tour. Add that to your list of things to do while sitting on your couch, hopefully with someone you like.

After some technical troubles (the sound is totally wrong), they start “Radio” a very familiar dance song.  There’s more couch dancing and even some dancing from Sanborn as his finger move all over that cluttered machine.

[READ: May 20, 2020] Five Years #6

This issue makes everything seem like things are going according to plan, there’s even a lot of levity.

We see Rachel in Russia. The morgue attendant, Yana, has brought her home.  They speak Russian, although Rachel’s Russian “sounds ancient, like something she only heard at university once or twice.”  Yana wonders why she is not dead.

Rachel doesn’t die.

Then some short scenes: (more…)

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Terry Moore–Five Years #5 (2019)

Posted in Abstract Studio, Bombs, Coronavirus, Death, End of the World, Environmentalism, Graphic Novel, Military, NPR/PRI/PBS, Quarantine, Russia, Strangers in Paradise, Terry Moore, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfinished series on May 20, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: RAUL MIDÓN-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #23 (May 16, 2020).

Raul Midón performed a Tiny Desk Concert back in 2018.  He was solo then (the blurb says he usually has a band with him) and he’s solo here now.  So there’s not a lot of difference between the two.

Except that in this home concert he plays five new songs.

It kicks off with two tracks from The Mirror, an album released just as we entered our quarantine period in mid-March: “I Love The Afternoon” and “I Really Want To See You Again,” a song that poetically captures the joy of friendship.

For both of these songs, Midón plays a very percussive guitar.  Whether it’s actually slapping the guitar like a drum to open the first song or the way he practically has the strings slap back against the guitar as he plays his complicated melody, there’s all kinds of rhythm going on.

He also has a light, fast, handpicking style.  And in “I Love the Afternoon” he adds a trumpet solo just with his mouth.

Midón’s jazz-influenced vocal phrasing throughout comes to the fore with just his acoustic guitar as accompaniment, illustrating once again why he’s normally one of the bright spots on our musical landscape and even more so at this moment.

Introducing “A Certain Café” he says Boris Karloff played bass.  Then he stops himself and laughs, Boris Kozlov–that’s from too much old-time radio.  It’s a slower, pretty song with a much gentler playing style.

He says that “Disguise” has fluegelhorn on the record but he’ll replace it here with his vocal fluegel, which is pretty cool.

“You’re The One” ends the set with a beautiful guitar introduction.  I was disappointed to hear that he raps the verses because the chorus is really catchy.

[READ: May 20, 2020] Five Years #5

This issue has two components.

In the first, Zoe is taken to see “Rachel’s” body. She fantasizes about killing Vlad in two spectacularly violent ways.  Zoe obviously realizes the body is not Rachel and the morgue attendant signals her in someway–although I can’t decipher it.

As they leave, Vlad offers Zoe a job since she has so much talent and potential.

Then we see Tambi parachute out of the sky with someone (is that Kathchoo?  It’s hard to tell). (more…)

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Terry Moore–Five Years #4 (2019)

Posted in Abstract Studio, Ashley McBryde, Bombs, Coronavirus, Death, End of the World, Environmentalism, Graphic Novel, Military, NPR/PRI/PBS, Quarantine, Russia, Strangers in Paradise, Terry Moore, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfinished series, Violence on May 17, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: ASHLEY McBRYDE-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #21 (May 14, 2020).

Ashley McBryde is the latest country singer who I enjoyed very much until she started singing.

Ashley is charming and funny.  She tells us that she and her band mates self-quarantined and then washed their hands in front of each other for 20 seconds.  And she is so happy they did because she had taken it for granted hearing other people sing with her.

She even drew her own little Tiny Desk sign (she googled it) because she was supposed to be behind the Desk but was denied.

We were scheduled to host a Tiny Desk performance by Arkansas-born country singer Ashley McBryde on March 31. Obviously, we had to postpone McBryde’s visit.

McBryde sang four songs (which I assume is one more than she would have gotten at an actual Tiny Desk).  All four songs are country songs.  Which means they are catchy and have (mostly) interesting lyrics, but that Arkansas twang is just too much for me.

The first song,

“Hang In There Girl” which opens both the album and this set — is a perfect song for this moment, not that there’s ever a wrong time to hear someone sing, “Trust me when I say, you’re doing fine.”

Matt Helmkamp plays a solo, so I guess it is nice to have three guitars.  Chris Harris sings nice backing vocals.

Before the next song she says that they are playing live and she even made a setlist.  But that she misspelled “One Night Standards” as “Standars”  NPR called it “one of our Best Songs Of 2019.”

For “Velvet Red” Harris switches to mandolin and has to tune all eight strings–“it was in tune when he bought it” and they play the bluegrass- (and wine-) inspired love story featuring “basically all of the rule-breaking.”

McBryde is sporting a “Wash Hands Please” T-shirt, and encourages everyone to follow CDC guidelines before ending the set with “Sparrow.”

She’s very funny and I’d enjoy watching her banter between songs.  If she is going to have a proper Tiny Desk soon, what songs will she play if she played all of these already?

[READ: May 16, 2020] Five Years #4

This book’s voice over is by Kachoo.  In addition to getting everyone up to speed about the Phi bomb, she has been sitting on the beach for hours.

Francine doesn’t like it.  She knows what a visit from Tambi means (I haven’t seen Francine this angry in a while–I didn’t like it).

Francine is distracted so the girls get to take advantage of it: “can we have ice cream [for breakfast]?” “Mm Hmm.”  The scenes with the girls are the only levity in this dark issue. (more…)

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Terry Moore–Five Years #3 (2019)

Posted in Abstract Studio, Bombs, Death, End of the World, Environmentalism, Frances Quinlan, Graphic Novel, Hop Along, Russia, Strangers in Paradise, Terry Moore, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfinished series, Violence on May 16, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: FRANCES QUINLAN-Tiny Desk Concert #974 (May 13, 2020).

I Wanted to like Hop Along, but there was something about them that I didn’t.  I think it came down to Quinlan’s voice which I almost like but I think ultimately don’t.

That’s true here too, although I like it better on these quieter songs than the bopping of Hop Along.

Quinlan is a Tiny Desk veteran, having played here in 2015 with her indie-rock band, Hop Along. You could argue she has even more Tiny Desk experience than that; as Quinlan pointed out during her set, a can of Hop Along-branded beer has been sitting on the Tiny Desk shelves through numerous previous concerts, including Lizzo’s.

This time around, she performed songs from her debut solo album, Likewise. She was accompanied by two musicians who played on Likewise: her Hop Along bandmate Joe Reinhart, on bass and guitar, and Molly Germer on violin.

There’s something weird in the first song”Your Reply.”  From time to time a note rings flat or out of tune.  I can’t decide if it’s intentional or not.  And the middle of the song sounds like bassist Joe Reinhart is just messing up all over the place.  Although he does add a nice solo at the end.  I do like the melody at the introduction of the chorus though.

She tells a joke about Presidents Day that I don’t get.  I don’e even know if it can be classified as a joke.

The second song, “Detroit Lake” has a note that sounds wrong but which I is intentional–it’s part of the opening guitar melody.  This song is primarily just Frances and Molly Greene adding interesting violin textures.  Mid way through, Reinhart starts adding nice bass harmonic notes.

She tells us a fun fact that George Washington did not have wooden teeth–they were made of animals and other people’s teeth.  How about that.

“Lean” opens with a pretty guitar melody and Quinlan’s whispered vocals.  Reinhart switches to acoustic guitar to flesh out her sound nicely.  This is my favorite song of the set as it feels the most complete.

[READ: May 15, 2019] Five Years #3

The voice over for this issue is by Tambi.  She is going to Washington D.C. to meet Ivy Raven and Julie Martin, two characters from the Echo series.  Julie Martin is the living Phi bomb.

Ivy reveals that there’s an alloy in the bomb that affects those around Julie.  It messes with their DNA. If you’re a threat to her, it destroys you.  If you’re not, well, Ivy looks younger and radiant.

Turns out the Cleopatra papyrus (from SiP XXV) has gotten out and seven countries are developing their own phi weapons programs. (more…)

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Terry Moore–Five Years #2 (2019)

Posted in Abstract Studio, Antonín Dvořák, Augustin Hadelich, Bombs, Death, End of the World, Environmentalism, Graphic Novel, John Adams, Josef Suk, Kuang-Hao Huang, Strangers in Paradise, Terry Moore, Tiny Desk Concert, Unfinished series, Violence on May 15, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: AUGUSTIN HADELICH-Tiny Desk Concert #973 (May 11, 2020).

This tiny desk is another duet for piano and violin.  This pairing of instruments is always lovely.  This particular pairing is quite beautiful.

Grammy-winning fiddler Augustin Hadelich [brought] his beautiful Guarneri del Gesù, built around 1744.  The violin, once owned by the famed virtuoso Henryk Szeryng, has been called one of the finest concert violins in the world.

Hadelich has been called one of the finest concert violinists in the world. Born in Italy to German parents, he studied at Juilliard in New York. His sweep of the top awards at the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis in 2006 launched his career.

Hadelich plays a piece by contemporary composers and two older pieces.

With his discerning pianist Kuang-Hao, Hadelich put the 276-year-old del Gesù through its paces in the propulsive “40% Swing” from John Adams’ Road Movies.

This piece is fast and propulsive (“it’s all about the joys of driving on a fast highway”) with lots of super fast bowing and lots of bouncy, sometimes discordant chords from the piano.  It’s five minutes long but it seems exhausting.

He made the instrument croon sweetly in Dvořák’s “Humoresque,” a chestnut of old world charm, especially in violinist Fritz Kreisler’s beloved arrangement.

This piece is like a sweet dance.  You can just see people dresses up and dancing around a ballroom to this song.

A burst of energy returned to round out the set with the bustling “Burlesca,” by Czech composer Josef Suk, a favorite pupil of Dvořák who later became his son-in-law.

This piece has the same stately feeling of the Dvořák piece  although it feels less formal, especially with some of the very fast runs that both the piano and the violin perform.

[READ: May 14, 2020] Five Years #2

Issue #2 is very different from Issue #1.

It is narrated by a dead woman.  Although this woman died when she was ten years old, forty-five minutes later she was back.  The doctors said it was a miracle. That’s because they can’t see Malus.

We see a woman named Rachel approaching a man and then speaking in Russian.  She wants names.  When the man resists, a young girl named Zoe does something horrifying with a pair of pruning shears. (more…)

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Terry Moore–Five Years #1 (2019)

Posted in Abstract Studio, Art, Bombs, Braxton Cook, Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, Coronavirus, End of the World, Environmentalism, Graphic Novel, NPR/PRI/PBS, Phony Ppl, Quarantine, Sex, Strangers in Paradise, Terry Moore, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Tom Misch, Unfinished series, Violence on May 14, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: BRAXTON COOK-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #20 (May 8, 2020).

I thought I didn’t know who Braxton Cook was, but I have actually seen him as support in three different Tiny Desk Concerts: Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah in 2015, Tom Misch in 2018 and Phony Ppl in 2019.

Braxton Cook is a Juilliard-trained, genre-jumping artist whose music feels both contemporary and timeless. This time around, Cook takes the center seat, so to speak, from the comfort and safety of his sunny New Jersey home.

He plays four songs and all kinds of instruments in this concert.

Cook says he usually performs his original work with a full band, but obviously that isn’t an option in the time of social distancing. So instead, the ambidextrous talent uses loops to support his vocals, saxophone and guitar throughout the laidback set.

“Shooting Star” is set to a backing saxophone loop as Braxton plays guitar and sings.  It’s a smooth jazz song and he plays a sweet solo over the end while the loops slowly fade.

For “We Major” he starts a saxophone loop, lays down some keys and then plays a sax solo over the top.  It’s a pretty instrumental and the saxes intertwine nicely.  I love that he manages to get the whole song to stop abruptly on time.

For his Tiny Desk (home) concert, Cook jumped around his discography, performing tracks from his 2017 album, Somewhere in Between, all the way up to his latest project, 2020’s Fire Sign.

“Never Thought” is for his wife.  He’s got a looped guitar and a live guitar.  He sings a smooth R&B love song and then lays down a sax solo at the end.

Closing out this cozy session, Cook dedicates the stirring “Hymn (for Trayvon Martin)” to everyone affected by the current pandemic.

I feel like I have heard “Hymn (for Trayvon Martin)” somewhere before. It’s anj instrumental in essentially two parts.  It begins as a fast and pretty saxophone piece.  After a bit, he stands up and begins a lengthy looping section.  It’s slow and mournful and really lovely–the sax is the perfect instrument for it.    melody.  He loops a slow part and then plays a beautiful slow solo over the top.

[READ: May 14, 2020] Five Years #1

I loved Strangers in Paradise.  I started Rachel Rising, but now realize I never finished it.  I saw that Terry was creating Five Years, but I had no idea it tied in to the rest of the stories in any way.  Apparently it brings all of his different stories together.  So, I’m glad I discovered this just as he finished Issue 10.

I clearly need to start, if not the whole series, then at least the other two series to fill in some missing pieces, because this story went from vengeance and personal vendettas to global annihilation.

This issue opens with Katchoo, Francine and their two girls on a beach.  The voice over talks about nuclear bombs including the fascinating detail that there were so many nuclear explosions in the ’50s that two new isotopes are now in the atmosphere that didn’t exist before Hiroshima.  Oil paint made since the war contains these isotopes, It has become a foolproof way of testing for forgery in the art world.

That is fascinating. (more…)

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Fiona Maazel–“I Incriminate Myself So No One Else Can” (Harper’s, May 2020)

Posted in Adam Schlesinger, Coronavirus, End of the World, Environmentalism, Fears, Fiona Maazel, Fountains of Wayne, Friday the 13th, Harper's, Ice Nine Kills, Mother's Day, Parenting, Short Story on May 13, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: ICE NINE KILLS-“Jason’s Mom” (2020).

I heard about this song from Metal Sucks who hilariously showed the three ways this song is perfectly timely:

  1. Paid tribute to one of the song’s writers, Adam Schlesinger, who died of COVID-19 last month.
  2. Paid tribute to the original Friday the 13th film, which turned 40 years old this weekend.
  3. Paid tribute to all of the world’s moms in time for Mother’s Day.

Ice Nine Kills’ songs are usually pretty heavy, so this acoustic number is quite a change (The video even shows the drummer using a hand drum rather than a kit).

It’s also an opportunity to hear how well they can sing (and harmonize).

But really, the fun of this song is in the lyrics

Jason, do you remember Camp wasn’t so great?
The counsellors had lots of sex while you drowned in the lake
But one woman stood by you when your life was taken
Yeah, she slaughtered them all and even killed Kevin Bacon
I’m making sure that she’s appreciated
She did it all for you and was decapitated

And of course, the twist on the chorus:

Jason, can’t you see the love behind her killing spree?
Whether her Head’s off or not
I’m in love with Jason’s Mom

Sometimes violence can bring people together with humor.

[READ: May 10, 2020] “I Incriminate Myself So No One Else Can”

This is a weird little story.

The sum total of the action is that a six year old girl is on the top of a slide in a playground. She is crying, getting more and more frightened.

Her mother is standing nearby desperately wanting the girl to get over her fear–to demonstrate internal fortitude.  She is getting angry as the girl screams louder and louder and other parents move in to see what’s wrong.

The story is, of course, the background of the mother. (more…)

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Jonathan Franzen–“Why Birds Matter” (National Geographic, January 2018)

Posted in Birds, Caracara, Coronavirus, Crows, End of the World, Environmentalism, Essays, Gloria Steinem, Jonathan Franzen, Lyrebird, MILCK, National Geographic, Nell Zink, New Zealand fantail, NPR/PRI/PBS, Peregrine Falcons, Quarantine, Red Knot, Roadrunners, Thick-billed Murres, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert on May 10, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: MILCK-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #19 (May 7, 2020).

I only know of MILCK from NPR. They talked about her “movement-defining anthem ‘Quiet'” which she played in 2017 at the Women’s March.  It was powerful and very moving.

Aside from that song, though, I hadn’t heard anything else from her.

And now, here she is at home singing “her most recent singles, ‘Gold’ and ‘If I Ruled The World.’  She also plays an unreleased song, “Double Sided” which she says is her most personal yet.

Many artists are sincere, but MILCK might be the most sincere performer I’ve ever seen.  That sincerity comes across as she speaks between songs, but also in her lyrics.  I love this couplet from “Gold.”

Don’t mistake my confidence for arrogance / don’t mistake my self-respect for disrespect.

Then she moves on to the brand new song

For this deeply moving Tiny Desk (home) set, recorded at her home in Los Angeles, MILCK performs those two recent singles, along with an unreleased track called “Double Sided,” a gorgeous tearjerker about the necessity of loving one another regardless of our faults and weaknesses. MILCK’s songs of empowerment, unity and understanding have never resonated more.

“Double Sided” is a powerful song and she is definitely moved by the end.

For the final song, “If I Ruled The World” she introduces it by quoting Gloria Steinem.

Gloria Steinem said that dreaming is a form of planning and this song is dreaming and imagining what our world could look like.

The song a capella for the first verses.  This is significant because so far every song of hers that I’ve heard has been about the lyrics.  But it’s here that you fully realize what a great voice she has.

Having said that, the lyrics are pretty great, too.  As I said, they are very sincere.  But it’s wonderful that there are serious ideas coupled with more lighthearted ones

Jenny wouldn’t hate her figure when she’s small, or when she’s bigger
She’d be kissin’ on the mirror, and the WiFi would be quicker
Everybody would recycle, fewer cars, and more bicycles
No more fighting for survival, you would hear this song on vinyl

You’d see a doctor if you’re sick, Mary, don’t you worry ’bout it
‘Cause there’d be no crazy bill, no more thousand dollar pills

All the sexist, racist, bandits would be sent off for rehabbin’
And instead of feeding fear, we’d be feeding half the planet, damn it

If I ruled, it would be less about me, more about you

As the blurb says,

I can always count on MILCK for a good cry. … the Los Angeles-based singer digs into and bares the ugliest sides of human nature, but leaves you feeling nothing but gratitude and awe at just how beautiful life really is.

If you’re not moved by these songs, you’re not really listening.

[READ: May 8, 2020] “Why Birds Matter”

At one point I subscribed to the print edition of National Geographic.  There are so many magazines that I like but which I never have enough time to give attention to.  National Geographic was one of them.  Each issue is packed with amazing pictures and fascinating stories that go along with them.  And every once in a while I would see a dozen or so yellow spines staring at me, accusingly.

I remember when this issue came in and there was a cover story from Jonathan Franzen, which I was excited to read.  I didn’t have the time to read it when it came in.  Later, when I remembered that I wanted to read this cover story I honestly couldn’t remember what magazine it came from.  I was sure it as Harper’s, but searches proved otherwise.

Finally I did a search on his articles and this came up and that was it!

I found an online copy of the magazine through my library (it has since been published in a book) and finally got around to reading it.  So imagine my surprise when it was actually quite short.  There’s an accompanying (amazing) photo essay that makes the entire “article” some twenty pages.  But his text is barely five picture-heavy pages.

Nevertheless, he makes so many point better than I could and better than I could even try to summarize that I’m quoting extensively because I think it’s that important.

(more…)

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Georgina Beatty–“Shelter Seekers” (The Walrus, April 2020)

Posted in Argentina, Canadian Content, Coronavirus, End of the World, Environmentalism, Funny (ha ha), Futility, Gang Starr, Jeru the Damaja, Marriage Trouble, NPR/PRI/PBS, Pigs, Quarantine, Scholarship, Short Story, The Walrus, Tiny Desk (Home) Concerts, Tiny Desk Concert, Volcanoes on May 7, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: JERU THE DAMAJA-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #16 (April 30, 2020).

I’ve always liked Jeru the Damaja’s name; I find it very satisfying.  It’s amusing to me that with a name like that he raps about positive things.

He used the concert to share his inspiring philosophy of self-knowledge. Jeru drops lyrics about what it takes to achieve self-actualization in tough conditions for not just himself, but for the culture.

I don’t actually know any of his songs; this is a “medley of his classics.”  Jeru’s got a great, deep voice that adds a lot of strength to his lyrics.

Like Black Thought, Jeru sits in a chair, surrounded by his gear.  Unlike Black Thought, Jeru is in motion pretty consistently bobbing and waving his hand like he does care.

He starts with 50 seconds of “Can’t Stop the Prophet” after which he says “we need a superhero and we forget that the superhero resides within us.”  he encourages everyone to be creative in this time because idle hands do the devil’s work.  This is his lead into the 90 seconds of “Ain’t The Devil Happy.”

His prescient lyrics remain as relevant as ever as he addresses the deepening fissures of socioeconomic inequalities exposed by the coronavirus crisis.

He even updates the lyrics of “Scientifical Madness”

Mind Jah lick you with disease
So I inflict MC’s like Ebola Corona
Or some other man made cancer

He says he doesn’t want to be inside, but he’s grateful that he has a place to be because living outside is “So Raw.”  I really like the slow grooving beat of this song.

After the 90 seconds of “My Mind Spray” he says his mind is always working.  He’s always wondering if this and if that. But the old saying goes “If if’s were fifth, we’d all be drunk.”  In the song “If” he adds “If if was a spliff, we’d all get smoked up.”

He closes his set from his home in Berlin with a new song, “The Power,” and offers up a message we all need: “No matter who you are, the power resides in you…We can overcome anything if you put your mind to it, you just can’t get in your mind too much.” The prophet cannot be stopped.

“The Power” is a full song which was inspired by a things his mother used to say that he didn’t understand until he got older: “nothing matters except for how we treat people.”

[READ: May 6, 2020] “Shelter Seekers”

This story is written as a letter to the “scholarship liaison officer.”

The letter writer received a $4,000 Daniel White Foreign Study Scholarship via the Government of Canada.  The money was to fund three months in Argentina to study how the region is “adapting its approach to housing in the interest of sustainability.”

This letter is the final report which is “unconventional in form, long overdue and in excess of the stipulated two-page limit.”

The writer left her husband for three months to undertake this challenge.

On the flight to Patagonia ($1,297) she read the Award Holder’s Guide.  She imagined building clay houses and hanging out with her fellow researchers, drinking Fernet and Coke.  She even considered the idea of an affair with an attractive researcher.  (more…)

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Robert Kondo and Dice Tsutsumi–The Dam Keeper: Return from the Shadows (2019)

Posted in Adventure, Animals, Children's Books, Cities, Completed Series, Death, Dice Tsutsumi, End of the World, Environmentalism, First Second :01, Fog, Foxes, Frogs, Graphic Novel, Hippos, NPR/PRI/PBS, Parenting, Pigs, Rex Orange County, Robert Kondo, The Dam Keeper, Tiny Desk Concert on April 8, 2020| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: REX ORANGE COUNTY-Tiny Desk Concert #961 (March 18, 2020).

I read about Rex Orange County (the low-key British pop star born Alex O’Connor) in some random article which basically said if you’re over twenty you’ve never heard of him, but if you’re under twenty, you think he’s the greatest thing ever. (My 14 year old son had not heard of him).

I didn’t read anything about his music, but I assumed he was a hip hop performer or the like.

So imagine my surprise when he turned out to be an English dude who sings like Stevie Wonder and (in the Tiny Desk at least) has music that sounds like it comes straight from the 70s.

“Loving Is Easy” features Michael Underwood on flute and Johnny Woodham on flugehorn sounding for all the world like a mid 70s AM hit.  Is he really popular with the young kids?

There was a palpable connection between the 21-year-old singer and [the crowd of millennial and Gen Z staffers that gathered early for Rex’s soundcheck]  that I don’t see often at this stage in a musician’s career. My guess is that they see themselves in him: introverted and shy, with the audacity to write and sing about his innermost thoughts.

I really feel like this blurb is overselling his openness.  I mean, most singer-songwriters bare their souls, so I’m not sure what makes him any different.  But the blurb really pushes his honesty

We’re in an age where young people are uninhibited and unafraid to address emotions, simple or complex. In that sense, his latest LP, Pony, is timely. He spoke with NPR and shared that he was incredibly unhealthy mentally throughout the making of the album. But there’s an arch to Pony and by the time we get to the final song, “It’s Not The Same Anymore,” he seems at peace with his new reality.

But what’s so intense about these lyrics?

Loving is easy
You had me fucked up
It used to be so hard to see
Yeah, loving is easy
When everything’s perfect
Please don’t change a single little thing for me

I mean, not much, so let’s not get carried away about how revolutionary he is.

I was instantly surprised by how white his band seems.  The band is dressed all in white and they are a remarkably pale bunch.  Drummer Jim Reed has the bright red cheeks of the overheated.  And Michael, Johnny and lead guitarist Joe Arksey are all blond and very pale.

Between songs, he seems like he has never been in front of an audience before with the awkward way he introduces these songs.

Up next is “Pluto Projector” in which Rex switches to guitar and  Underwood switches to piano.  There’s a moment in the middle when bassist Darryl Dodoo plays a slap note.  It’s really the only notable bass in the show.  Woodham plays a muted trumpet solo which is followed by a guitar solo from Joe Arksey that I was sure was bass, but it’s just a weirdly muffled guitar sound.

For “Always” Rex moves back to piano and he sounds even more like Stevie Wonder.  This song features sax and a non-muted trumpet.  There’s some great horn melodies in this song and I like the way he plays some piano parts in the middle.

There’s this awkward introduction.  Okay I only have one more now, and then I’m gonna go…  Let’s play the song that’s called “Sunflower” now.

“Sunflower” is “older,” meaning it dates all the way back to 2017.  He’s back on guitar with a nice echo.  The beginning of the song is guitar and flugelhorn.  Then in the middle, the song picks up the tempo and becomes the catchiest thing all show.  I’m not that keen on the rhyming/talking middle part–it seems oddly forced, but that’s okay.  There’s a jamming section at the end with a flugehorn solo followed by a sax solo

Rex did not blow me away, but I was pleasantly surprised by his sound and that kids actually like it..

[READ: February 21, 2019] The Dam Keeper Book 3

Kondo and Tsutsumi have both worked at Pixar, which may explain why this graphic novel looks unlike anything I have ever seen before.   I have (after reading their bios) learned that this was also a short film.  I’m only a little disappointed to learn that because it means the pictures are (I assume) stills from the film.  It still looks cool and remarkable, but it makes it a bit less eye-popping that this unusual style wasn’t made for a book.

For part three, the final part, our heroes, Pig, Fox and Hippo are trying to get back home to save Sunrise Valley.

This third part is a lot of travel, very little dialogue and, honestly some fairly confusing action.

Pig has been given a plant by the moles and he hopes to use it to find the smoke monster.  Fox and Hippo say the heck with that and choose to head home.

Fox and Hippo are on Van’s ship.  They are brought inside to meet Van’s children.  The room is full of dozens of children of all different species.  As hippo puts it:

Erm.. these are your kids?  But they don’t look like you or Van how is this possible?

Van;s wife says that all of the children were abandoned for being different so Van took them in. (more…)

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