More lazy quickie album reviews...

Some of these I should have written about months ago. I don't care. Here we go:

Yo La Tengo - I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass - I thought Mogwai were a lock for the year's funniest album title with Mr. Beast, when along came Yo La Tengo with this sentence that looked for sure like it had to be a joke. Sonically, the album is all over the place in a way that they haven't been since 1997 (when you-know-what landmark album was released), but Yo La Tengo are about as good at ten minute guitar freakouts as they are at three minute pop gems and subtle, introspective ballads. It makes from some strange juxtapositions here and there ("Daphnia" into "I Should Have Known Better," which isn't a cover of the Beatles song, is particularly jarring), but all of it works.

Paul Simon - Surprise - Paul Simon is not exactly en vogue among the nation's youth, or anybody under the age of 50, probably, but I love him just the same. Even so, who could have seen this coming? That it's his best solo album since Graceland is a given, but that doesn't quite express how good it is, even if it's an appropriate comparison, since, like Graceland, it comes as a somewhat radical reinvention and a new direction for an artist who needed one. And this from a guy that pretty much everybody thought was over the hill after Rhythm of the Saints was released. Surprise is quite a... well, you know.

Justin Timberlake - FutureSex/LoveSounds - I'll admit it! I like it! Ok, I like the first half, really, and most of that credit should probably go to Timbaland, who still has a great flair for making some very weird things sound very accessible. The best moments are fascinating because the in-your-face sexuality is betrayed by the weird, robotic, and sometimes abrasive grooves. Seriously, "Sexyback" is not sexy at all, but I love it anyway for the heavy distorted disco beat and those weird filtered vocals. Meanwhile, "My Love" is probably the coolest song I've heard all year, and "Love Stoned" is a great experiment in how the same words can change meaning with context. The lyrics are often laughably bad, and the second half drags to the point where I can barely finish it in one sitting, but it's a lot more than I ever expected from the star of *NSYNC.

The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls in America - Blah blah blah liquor blah blah blah anthem blah blah Springsteen. I never thought I'd see the day when it would be hip to be influenced by Bruce Springsteen, but here we are. I will gladly welcome it. This is big, huge rock and roll done right, and everybody needs a fix of that once in a while. And if it eventually results in a few more hipsters with whom I can talk about the genius of "Jungleland," I have no problem with that either.

Zero 7 - The Garden - I honestly can't recall whether or not I've talked about this one on this blog before, which seems about right. Jose Gonzalez (the man with the most generic Hispanic name in the world) is a great fit for Zero 7, and Sia Furler is still churning out her soul-by-numbers, but they've lost their charm since Simple Things as they've veered away from down-tempo jamming and more toward faceless adult contemporary pop. That said, "You're My Flame" and "Futures" are still great, and their version of Gonzalez's "Crosses" is about as good as the original, which was outstanding itself.

One more thought about Cory Lidle...

You don't need me to tell you how strange and tragic Cory Lidle's sudden passing was. Instead, I'll leave you with a memory of my favorite moment during Cory Lidle's tenure with the Phillies.

It was a game earlier in the 2006 season against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. Cory Lidle wasn't even pitching (I don't remember who was). It was a fairly normal game, when Julio Lugo of Tampa Bay attempted a bunt that rolled foul, and suddenly the home plate umpire turned toward the Phillies dugout and waved his arm, ejecting somebody, and Cory Lidle ran out on to the field screaming about something.

I've watched thousands of baseball games in my brief time here on this planet, and I can't ever recall a player getting ejected from a game he wasn't playing in in a non-brawl situation. We found out after the game that apparently Lidle took offense to Lugo attempting a bunt hit with two outs when his team had a four run lead and yelled at him from the dugout.

And that's why Cory Lidle was one of my favorite Phillies during his time here. He wasn't a Cy Young pitcher (though when he was hot, he bore a very strong resemblance to Greg Maddux), but he knew how to play the game, he knew his role, he was always open and honest (even if it got him into trouble, as it did mere days before his death), and he called bullshit when he saw bullshit. Baseball could use more guys like Cory. He'll be missed.

One more thing: while we're on the subject of the passing of former Phillies, condolences are in order for the family of Johnny Callison.

Remember several months ago, when Cory Lidle was famous mostly for being thrown in with Bobby Abreu in that infamous trade to the Yankees?

Those days are just about over, I would think.

It's really bizarre, because I was reading about the crash, before they knew who the pilot was, and was shocked that an airplane flew into a building in Manhattan. Then I refreshed the page to see if anything had been updated, and saw that not only was the pilot somebody I'd heard of, it was somebody I knew a lot about, and had been rooting for for a couple years. It was somebody I'd seen pitch in person plenty of times. So weird...

You may or may not have heard about TMX Elmo, which is the 10th Tickle Me Elmo (hence the X), and which may or may not also be "Xtreme." Toy manufacturers have informed us that it will be this Christmas season's sensation, and as dutiful consumers, we as Americans will rush to the stores and buy it. And you may think to yourself, another Tickle Me Elmo? Didn't we already have that fad?

But maybe you haven't seen this thing in action yet...



I mean, seriously... wow. I thought Elmo in Muppet form was enthusiastic, especially in comparison with his Sesame Street pals like Oscar the Grouch, or the morose Telly. (The inestimable Cookie Monster, of course, possesses a manic insanity all his own.) But this doll is an onslaught of noise and disjointed robotics, not so much ticklish as epileptic. It's easy to see why little kids will love it (for a week or so), and why dogs will be terrified of it (forever).

It's hard to imagine that this sort of thing would exist at all if Jim Henson was still alive (happy belated 70th, by the way, Jim), for reasons I'll go into at a later time, but here we are.

Boards of Canada - Trans Canada Highway

This may shock you, but there has been a new Boards of Canada release on the market since May, and I only bought it last week!

Now, keep in mind that the delay was due to the fact that the release in question is an EP, titled Trans Canada Highway, in the great tradition of highway-themed concept albums such as Kraftwerk's Autobahn, and, um... Kraftwerk's Trans-Europe Express. Ok, maybe not.

At any rate, Boards of Canada have proven in the past that they're perfectly capable of releasing EPs just as good as LPs, as shown by Twoism, Hi-Scores, and especially the sublime In a Beautiful Place out in the Country, so this release is not at all to be feared as a refuse bin for b-sides (or, at least, the b-side equivalent of a band that sees no point in releasing singles).

If you've been a reader of this site long enough, you know by now that there's no point in even questioning whether or not I will like a Boards of Canada release, and Trans Canada Highway is no exception. It begins with "Dayvan Cowboy" from 2005's The Campfire Headphase, which is getting a second or third round of appreciation from me right about now. It also ends with a "Dayvan Cowboy" remix by Odd Nosdam, and even the remix is good, taking an already fantastic song and turning it on its head to provide 9 minutes of eerie, suspenseful beauty.

The middle section is what we might call B.O.C.-by-numbers (but, you know, not the other B.O.C.). At this point, if you've heard Boards of Canada, you can guess what these tracks will sound like. If you haven't, good Lord! What are you waiting for?! "Left Side Drive" is a Geogaddi-style number, with glacially shifting patterns (and if you're struggling for a description, let's say one of Brian Eno's ambient pieces with a slowed down hip-hop drum loop). "Skyliner" goes back further, to the Music Has the Right to Children days, with its busy drum beats and wavery synths. The other two tracks are short vignettes, which, true to form, are just as worth hearing as the rest of it, even if they may not be substantial enought to warrant description here.

The only thing here that's really worth noting is that the guitars of The Campfire Headphase seem to have been a temporary phase, as they're nowhere to be found other than the title track. Whether this is a sign of the band's future or a brief look into its past is anybody's guess. Either way, I'll be waiting for LP #4.

An uneducated movie review...

I just did something quite unlikely. I watched a chick flick. By myself. By choice.

The film in question is In Her Shoes, and I'll admit that I watched it as much because I knew it was filmed in Philadelphia as because I'd read a couple reviews of it awhile ago that said that it was baiscally "a chick flick, but not a chick flick."

It was one of those things where I ended up liking it despite a number of reasons I shouldn't. First of all was the on-the-nose symbolism with shoes. Sisters with nothing in common have to walk a mile in each other's shoes, and so do grandparents who argue with their son in laws, and husbands and wives, and blah blah blah. Every time director Curtis Hanson (8 Mile, L.A. Confidential) cut to a close up of a person's feet, I got that much more infuriated. And speaking of cheap symbolism, is it possible not to notice Cameron Diaz' character wearing less and less makeup as her entitled slutty bitch character "matures" and "learns life lessons" and whatnot? Or how about the way Toni Colette's stuck up career woman consistently loses weight in accordance with throwing off her careerist shackles and "learning to love life" and such? (Colette, by the way, looks just fine even when 25 pounds heavier than normal.) Oh, and here's a scene nobody saw coming: when Diaz gets a job at a retirement community and befriends a blind patient by reading to him, who could possibly have foreseen the morning when she comes into his room and finds... *gasp* he's not there! His stuff has been packed up! "Was he moved?" she asks, as if there's going to be some sort of surprise when we find out that he's died.

And yet...

Shirley MacLaine is still adorable. She's a little more wrinkly and less irresistably cute at the age of 72 than she was in, say, The Apartment, back in 1960, but honestly? I'd still hit that. Toni Colette is cute too, in what magazine writers would probably call an "unconventional" way. Both, of course, are great performers. I found myself considering turning the movie off halfway through, but honestly wanted to know what happened to the characters, which I suppose is a testament to Jennifer Weiner's book, which I've never read. Not to spoil anything, but the quarreling sisters kiss and make up, the couple that everybody knows is going to get married gets married, and the grandmother and estranged son in law make up too. Hooray! What a great, mushy, feel-good ending!

I've already mentioned the couple reviews I read that described In Her Shoes as a chick flick, but not really, but how is a movie that ends with a wedding in which every single main and secondary character is present not a chick flick?

In the end, though, I'd rather expect a chick flick and sort of get one with In Her Shoes than expect a comedy and get a chick flick, like, say, Wedding Crashers.

Of course, I forgot to mention what might have been the most fun part: picking out the Philadelphia landmarks! Colette goes to the Italian Market in South Philly, and she also goes to a Sixers game and then talks with her boyfriend about how the Sixers have no three point shooter at Pat's Steaks after the game. (Real Philadelphians, of course, know that most corner pizzerias make a cheesesteak just as good as Pat's, Geno's, or Tony Luke's, and that the Sixers have a three point shooter, they just have no defense.) And Toni Colette actually takes a run up "the Rocky steps," or as non-tourists know it, the Art Museum. I've seen a few film crews at the Art Museum, but I'm pretty sure that this wasn't one of them. Oh well.

Thoughts and crap about 9/11... on 9/11

Every year on this day for the past four years or so, I've tried to do some remembering, some reflecting, some figuring out what the hell everything means. I've never really recorded any of that anywhere, though, until now, I suppose.

Five years is an interesting anniversary (and if you don't know what I'm referring to, I have no idea what planet you live on) because it's far enough away to allow us to reflect somewhat less emotionally than we may have before, but it's still close enough that everything still seems so vivid in our minds. We all predicted that day back in 2001 that we would always remember exactly where we were when we found out. I still remember, clear as day. I was in English class in my senior year of high school. The principal made an announcement over the PA system to let us know what was going on, and my teacher immediately pointed out a grammatical error that he made, which was some remarkable composure since his son worked in the Pentagon at the time.

So what's it all mean? I'm not one to say, and there are a million other talking heads who think they are, so I'm not going to offer a grand analysis of what 9/11 means in the long term. What strikes me the most when I think back, though, is how quickly our collective grief and shock turned into national pride, the kind of which I'd never felt before. I never felt so earnestly proud to be American, and I never have since then, and probably never will again.

What makes me angry now is that patriotism and national pride have become political statements, and I don't know what's worse: that there are politicians on the right who drape themselves in the American flag to keep people from questioning the horrible things that they support (hello, Patriot Act), or that there are many people on the left (myself included, often times) who have a knee jerk reaction against the very word "patriotism," who think that being proud to be American is somehow a conservative ideal.

Aside from that, I think I'm bothered a bit by how otherwise "normal" everything seems, which just doesn't seem right somehow. All the remembering and newspaper articles and TV specials feel a little forced, but at the same time, I think I would be unhappy if it became just another day. It's going to be weird when our kids see 9/11 that way, in the same way that we see December 7, 1941.

I don't know, I started writing this with a lot of thoughts, and they've kind of dwindled down to nothing. Time to step down from my soapbox and let life go on.