Nina
EMMA
Filed under: Emma | Tags: a.v. club, AVQ&A, high fidelity, inventory, lists, pop culture, self indulgence, the suburbs
This following rant is ripe for the High Fidelity quoting so I thought it best to just get it out of the way in the title. And right here:
“A while back, Dick, Barry and I agreed that what really matters is what you like, not what you are like. Books, records, films, these things matter! Call me shallow, it’s the fuckin’ truth.”
And… here we go.
I’ve sung the praises of the A.V. Club before and I’ll most definitely do it again. Though my co-conspirator here at RLS doesn’t quite agree with me on this subject, I maintain the A.V. Club is an excellent, though admittedly self indulgent website: But aren’t all discussions of pop culture somewhat self indulgent? Isn’t that, in a way, why we love them? The A.V. Club has an incredible compilation of writers who continuously weave their own experiences into their critiquing without overpowering the topic at hand, which is something I am constantly working on in my own writing. It is hard not to get carried away when a piece of music, part of a film or TV show really speaks to you, and it’s always nice to feel like others enjoy the same pop cultural artifacts as you in an honest and relatable way.
The A.V. Clubbers do this “Inventory” thing, which is where the aforementioned thorough and amazing Zevon character study piece came from. In list form, they dig into some overlooked, maybe under appreciated, and only sometimes totally useless trends in arts and entertainment. Last week they took a look back at “12 pop-culture paeans to suburban living,” probably because this is the summer of the suburbs (seriously, today I saw a girl wearing a t-shirt reading “Raised in the Suburbs.” I was confused) or of the midlife crisis, to quote Nina. Then again, this week its something to do with sequels that needn’t have come into existence. So I can’t make much out of that one.
I can, however, take pleasure in reading this week’s AVQ&A, in which a reader sends in a question and a bunch of their writers respond. This one is titled “Love-at-first-sight art,” and the responses hit home. There are some songs, some frames of film, some quotes from a book (or any combination of the preceding) that you just experience once and its like a pile of bricks. Forever, wherever and whenever something reminds you of that piece of art or pop culture, you’ll remember its entrance into your life and how you felt at that moment.
Read it, and if its your kinda thang, check back each week. They always brighten my bad day.
Filed under: New Music, Nina | Tags: beck, broken social scene, james murphy, michael cera, scott pilgrim, soundtracks, summer of the midlife crisis, the national, the suburbs, video games, win butler, youth
At times, this feels like the summer of the midlife crisis. LCD Soundsystem, The National, and The Arcade Fire have put out excellent albums that I’ve been listening and relistening to, and like all good albums they’ve made their way under my skin. This means several times a day I find myself pining for suburbs I didn’t grow up in, wondering if I can raise a family that I don’t have, or deal with the fame I haven’t yet achieved…something is clearly wrong with this picture. Sometime after Union Pool reminded me that I’m still somewhat shy of the American drinking age, I realized that despite my fondness for melancholy white guys in their 40s, I’m still one of those “kids” Win Butler keeps singing about on The Suburbs…so what are these “kids” up to these days (besides getting off James Murphy’s lawn)?
The answer, with a resounding BOOM BANG POW, comes in the gloriously carefree Scott Pilgrim franchise – Bruce Lee O’Malley’s giddy graphic novel series about twentysomethings in Toronto. Besides being a really fun read, the series puts a brilliant spin on the usual tales of navel-gazing postgrads (working menial coffeeshop jobs, having relationships, playing in mediocre bands) by throwing in a barrage of video game tropes that haunt our ADHD-addled, raised-by-SNES minds. The result is something like Slackers set in a world where you can see your cash bar depleting above your head, find a save point before a perilous situation, and get experience points for getting hired. Awesome.
Of course this is being turned into a movie, starring the omnipresent and probably miscast Michael Cera, featuring the underrated Kieran Culkin and Mark Webber (anyone remember Designated Dave?) and being accompanied by a sweet soundtrack.
Standouts include the restless need-a-change-of-scenery song “It’s Getting Boring by the Sea” by Blood Red Shoes, the deliciously un-PC jump-around jam “O Katrina!” by the Black Lips, and the sleeper “Sleazy Bed Track” by the Bluetones. Metric adds a solid youth-in-revolt type track that wins points with lyrics like “our common goal was waiting for the world to end,” and the soundtrack curators win major points by adding Broken Social Scene’s hauntingly beautiful “Anthem for a 17-Year Old Girl,” which more than lives up to its title. Not stopping there, Broken Social Scene adds their two cents (or two loonies, in Canadian) by writing the film’s score and the music for fictional band Crash and the Boys (though you’d be hard-pressed to recognize them since Crash songs rarely make it to the one-minute mark). Scott Pilgrim’s own band, Sex Bob-omb, is done by Beck, who sounds like he’s having a great time garage-rocking out as a fictional twentysomething, and also adds two songs under his own name. The video game theme makes it to the soundtrack in the form of a chiptunes song. But even though this soundtrack is fittingly young and alive, no one can accuse it of ignoring its elders. Tracks by the Rolling Stones, T Rex, and Frank Black all make well-placed appearances.
The full album is available for streaming courtesy of the good folks at Spinner.
Pay close attention! If you listen carefully and press Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A at the right moment, you just might unlock a bonus level where you get to fight Michael Cera for a chance to win the key to unlimited nachos anywhere in Toronto! (No promises.)
