Elderly Thespian

Music Review: The Dukes of Dixieland, The Oakridge Boys - When Dixie Meets Country

2012-02-11T07:26:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Certainly there isnothing inherently wrong with a labradoodle, I'm sure there are those that lovethem and rightly so, still I suspect there are those who prefer their labrasstraight, and their doodles unsullied. So when a couple of businesstypes get together and come up with the idea to mash together a couple ofstalwart musical groups from differing musical traditions, there are those whoare going to cry genius, and there are those who are going to have secondthoughts.

As the liner notes toWhen Country Meets Dixie tells it Dukes of Dixieland managerJohn Shoup and Jim Halsey, manager of The Oak Ridge Boys are having a casualconversation. Shoup asks: "Whathappens when you mix one of the oldest country stars with one of the oldestjazz bands?" "I don't know,let's try it," Halsey answers. Andso is born (drum roll) a new musical genre: "Country/Dixie," or"Dixtry" perhaps. When Country Meets Dixie, a twelve track albumfeaturing the Dukes, the Oakridge Boys, who it turns out appear only on foursongs, and an assortment of other country singers is the result.

And the result is analbum that has some impressive music, but in the end lovers of Dixieland arelikely to come away from it happy for the jazz, but wanting more of it, whilethe country fans are more likely to be content with their piece of the pie.Although like the doodle lovers they may well prefer their countryunsullied.

Of the four tracks withThe Oakridge Boys, there is a kind of "rumba-boogie" version of"Bobbie Sue" and funky take on their platinum single,"Elvira." Both will have you tapping your toes. Then there are twohymns--"Little Talk With Jesus" and "UncloudedDay." The latter opens with someimpressive work on the drums by J.J. Juliano and has a real New Orleans streetvibe.

The album opens withDukes pianist Scott Obenschain's jumping vocal on the Phil Harris classic,"That's What I Like About the South," which adds some nice solo workfrom the rest of the band and a terrific ensemble ending. Wesley Probst sings Tennessee Ernie Ford'sbouncy "Fatback Louisiana" and Ernest Tubb's "Nails in MyCoffin." Besides some mellow brass(Kevin Clark and Ben Smith) the pedal steel guitar of Nashville sessions star DavidSpires helps drive in some of those nails. "Back in New Orleans" gets a mellow laid back treatment from73 year old Bobby John Henry with some sweet work on the sax from Ryan Burrage.Callaway McCord adds a hot medley—"Jambalaya," "I'mWalkin'" and "Don't Mess With My Toot Toot"—which includes someof the most extended solo work from the Dukes.

Newcomer Lathan Moore isfeatured on three songs. "Are YouFrom Dixie" is a rollicking romp and "Can't Fight the Moonlight"is a sweet tender ballad. But, for me,it is his "Just a Closer Walk With Thee" which is the absolutehighlight of the album. It begins withRyan Burrage's clarinet and a bit of Alan Broome's bass, and then plays like aduet between the clarinet and Moore. The rest of the band gets in as well, butit is Burrage that steals the show. Thealbum is worth it for this track alone.

So, labradoodle? "Dixtry?" When country meets Dixie and you get a"Closer Walk" like the one on this album, or a "BobbieSue," or the "Jambalaya" medley, it's a great combination. Still, I can't help thinking how much I wouldhave liked to hear more from the Dukes.

Graphic Bios in Time for Black History Month

2012-02-01T13:32:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Technorati.

With Black History Month set to begin in February, parentsinterested in educational material for their children may want to take a lookat two new publications in the Campfire Graphic Biography series. Nelson Mandela: The UnconquerableSoul and Muhammad Ali: The King of the Ring, bothwritten by Lewis Helfand, are aimed at the older child. They focus on the biographical narrative toillustrate the importance of the men as dynamic leaders in the struggles oftheir people for equality and dignity as well as their contributions to theworld community. Both men are seen asinspirational figures.

Nelson Mandela, illustrated by SankhaBanerjee, begins in 1985 with the future South African President in PollsmoorPrison. It then goes back to his birthin 1918 where he was given a name we are told is translated as"troublemaker." It goes on tohighlight his early life, his political involvement with the ANC, his years inprison, and his role in shaping the new society after his release and the endof apartheid. Unlike most Campfire editions, ninety percent of this book is inblack and white. It is only at the endwhen apartheid has been defeated that the story bursts out in color.

The Muhammad Ali biography, illustrated by Lalit Kumar Sharma,also begins in medias res, with the young Cassius Clay setto fight Cory Baker in 1958, before taking readers back to the boxer's childhoodin Louisville, Kentucky. It talks abouthis early career and explains how he was encouraged to adopt a gimmick—predictingthe round he would knock out his opponent—to capture public attention. It describes his embrace of the Nation ofIslam, his championship fights, his refusal to be inducted into the army, andthe stripping of his title. It detailshis comeback and his public service throughout the world after retiring fromthe ring, ending with his award of the Presidential Medal of Honor.

Both editions include posters which can be detached from thebook. The Ali biography has aninteresting feature on making graphic novels, and an appendix discussing therecords some of the other boxers Ali fought and well as his daughter. The Mandela biography's appendix is aglossary and a reprint of William Ernest Henley's "Invictus," a poemthat Mandela looked to for strength during his darkest periods.

Music Review: Hit the Lights - Invicta

2012-01-30T17:46:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

"Earthquake," the first video from the pop-punkrockers Hit The Lights' upcoming album Invicta, has hit thenet. Shot at a variety of stops on theband's recent fall tour, the tune tones down the grit and fires up the pop. It is about as accessible as you can get andkeep your punk credentials, and it is a fairly accurate representation of thekind of music you'll find on the new album. There are songs that lean further to punk, and songs that lean more topop, but nothing that really goes all the way in either direction.

Omar Zehery, Hit the Lights' guitarist, explains: "The songs definitely have pop elementsto them but we made a conscious effort to make sure they weren't too polishedeither." Front man Nick Thompsonadds: "We weren't trying to shy away from pop-punk, we just tried to beourselves and write honest music." What they produced is a menu of new material that is sure to please oldfans and likely to produce new ones. Ifit doesn't quite reach the grandiose goal Thompson says the band was aimingfor--"the goal for this record was to be epic," it does manage itslesser aims. "We just wantedeverything to sound powerful and for it to be the type of album you can listento over and over and hear different things."

"Invincible," the album's opener using the bandpsyching up to take the stage as a metaphor for attempting to achieve greatthings. It is the kind of anthem sure to get audiences up on their feet at thebeginning of any concert. "Tonight wejump from greater heights; we're invincible, and it starts/Take the stage, feelthe blood rush through your veins, take a chance." "Oh My God," which closes the albumis about as close to classic punk as the band delivers. "Oh my god," the song ends,"I've found Hell in you." Otherpunk leaning tracks include "Gravity," "Take Control," and "FloatThrough Me" which opens with some interesting guitar work. Both feature big guitar and percussion.

Prettier, and I use the word advisedly, songs like "SoGuilty," "Get To You," "Faster Now," and"Should've Known" would have a hard time passing as punk. Other than a power passage or two, they couldwell be the stuff of American Idol pop rock. Not that there's anything wrong with that,simply they are a far cry from the punk aesthetic.

Joining Thompson and Zehery are Dave Bermosk (bass/vocals),Kevin Mahoney (guitar) and Nate Van Dame (drums).

If you're looking for Dead Kennedys, you might want to lookelsewhere. But if you like your pop rockwith an edge, or if the Sex Pistols take it a bit too far, you may want to givethis new Hit the Lights album a listen. Samplethe "Earthquake" video, it will give you a good idea of what the restof Invicta is like.

Music Review: Scorpions: Comeblack

2012-01-29T07:30:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Currently embarked on what the bandhas announced as its final tour before retirement, the Scorpions have puttogether an album of new recordings of their greatest hits combined with somecovers of the sixties bands who inspired them, as they say, to follow theirdream. They see Comeblack</i>, thenew album, as a kind of encore for their diehard fans. Perhaps it is nostalgia, but it is a partinggift many of us will treasure.

Of course, the band's own songshave already been recorded several times, but you can never have too much of agood thing. Classic power ballads like"Wind of Change" and "Still Loving You," to say nothing oftheir iconic anthem, "Rock You Like a Hurricane," never grow old, andthe band's new recordings makes you wonder why on earth they are even thinkingabout retirement. Front man Klaus Meinehas the kind of rich voice that echoes with passion, and it seems like a finewine to have grown richer with age. The guitar work of Rudoplh Schenker andMatthias Jabs is as good as it ever was, and that is just about as good as itgets. This is a band that can still sendthe chills up your spine with the whistling opening bars of "Wind ofChange."

Of the thirteen tracks on thealbum, seven are Scorpion hits. The fouradditional songs are "Rhythm of Love," which opens the album,"No One Like You," "The Zoo," and"Blackout." The rest are thecovers. Certainly, there are those whowould have preferred more of the band's own music, but it is something of atreat to hear them put their own take on some of the other landmarks of rock. Songs like Ed Cobb's "Tainted Love"originally done by Gloria Jones and T Rex's "Children of theRevolution" get a hard rock treatment that takes them in a dynamic newdirection. Small Faces' "TinSoldier" starts quietly, but it gets to rocking very quickly.

"All Day and All of the Night"echoes the Kinks until you get to the break for the guitar solos when it beginsto break out. The cover of "Across the Universe" is more like an homageto the Beatles than an attempt to put the band's own spin on the tune. The album ends with The Rolling Stones'"Ruby Tuesday." Somewhatsubdued at the start, it ends with some exciting harmonies that give the song anice twist.

There was a time when I consideredthe Scorpions a guilty pleasure. I wasunlikely to admit how much I liked their music. Listening to Comeblack makes it clear that there wasnothing to feel guilty about. There arefew rockers that can play with more abandon than Schenker, Jabs, bassist Pavel Maciwodaand drummer James Kottak, and I can't think of any vocalist I would ratherlisten to than Klaus Meine. If this isindeed the last of the Scorpion's encores, they are leaving the stage with atleast some of us wanting more. If youhave to go that's the way to do it.

Book Review: The Hunger Pains: A Parody, by The Harvard Lampoon

2012-01-27T09:49:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

I suppose it says something about contemporary Americanculture that some of the most popular works of fiction among adults in recentyears are book written for children and young adults. First there was Harry Potter. Then there was Katniss Everdeen. Between the two I would guess they've outsoldall the serious adult fiction that was published over the same period. It would be a lot easier to find an adult whohas read The Hunger Games than one who has even heard of letalone read A Visit From the Goon Squad. With the motion picture version of the firstof the books in the Suzanne Collins' trilogy ready to fill the gap left by theretirement of the Harry Potter franchise sometime in March, The HungerGames is about to find an evenbroader audience. After all there arealways those who wait for the movie.

The time then, it would seem, would be ripe to take anotherlook at this particular manifestation of the phenomenon—a look perhaps a bitaskew. And who better to take that look thanthe authors who have previously done the job for Harry Potter, the staff of theThe Harvard Lampoon? It may be that parody is not the sincerestform of flattery, but it surely is the sincerest recognition ofpopularity. Why bother writing a parodyof something nobody is familiar with? Parody only works when readers know what is being parodied. Harvard Lampooners know a target when theysee it: thus The Hunger Pains.

Like The Hunger Games, TheHunger Pains is the story of a teen age girl, Kantkiss Neverclean,who replaces her younger sister as one of her district's combatants in anannual duel to the death between youngsters from all regions of a dystopianfuture world ironically calledPeaceland. Unlike Katniss who is bothsmart and resourceful, Kantkiss is both silly and clueless. She stumbles from one absurdity to another,in an environment where the absurd is the norm, and she stumbles her way tovictory, all the time playing up to the cameras that are, in typical realityshow fashion, following the contestants around.

Most of the cast of The Hunger Games ishere to be ridiculed as well. PeetaMellark, the son of the local baker and her partner in the games, becomes PitaMalarkey, a tubby dependant glutton. Haymitch Abernathy, the last winner of the Games from her district andher mentor, becomes Buttitch Totalapathy, a compulsive gambler. Effie Trinket, her liaison with the gamesorganization becomes Effu Poorpeople. There's no point giving away all the jokes. You get the idea, and if youlike this kind of thing, you'll like The Hunger Pains. It is filled with puns, one liners and nonsequitors.

Unquestionably there is a lot of funny material in thisbook, but parody works best in small doses. At 157 pages, it loses some of its zest. Still, fans of The Hunger Games, with a sense ofhumor, will probably gulp the whole thing down in a couple of hours, just asthey romped from cliff hanging chapter to cliff hanging chapter in theoriginal. One thing for sure,The Harvard Lampoon has captured and skewered all of theticks that have endeared Suzanne Collins' trilogy to adults young and not soyoung. So let the games begin, or as the Notalks might say: "Ahse, leh ah Gaes bega!"

Music Review: Henrik Stadler - Brains on Fire

2012-01-25T08:32:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

If you're into the kind of long form experimental free jazzthat aims at an aesthetic that takes the music beyond any of the conventionsthat limit an artist's musical vision, you want to get hold of composer pianistHeiner Stadler's two disc release ,Brains on Fire. If you like jazz that looks as much to theinnovations of modern classical composers as it does to jazz innovators likeJohn Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Ornette Coleman, Brains onFire offers eight tracks recorded originally between 1966 and 19474that will literally blow your mind. If,on the other hand, your taste runs to something less avant garde,Brains on Fire is more than likely not for you.

Heiner Stadler is not exactly a household name. Born in Poland and raised in Germany, heemigrated to the US when he was 23. He settled in New York where his uniquemusical vision attracted a host of collaborators. His 1978 Tribute to Bird andMonk which features an ensemble of experienced talents like ReggieWorkman and Stanley Cowell was lauded by Downbeat. He has been cited as one of thosecomposer/arrangers taking the lead in the crossover of jazz and classicalmusic. His music has been compared toothers "responsible for shaping, a new, intelligent, post-free jazz,"musicians like Anthony Braxton and Alexander von Schlippenbach.

Besides selectionspreviously released on vinyl, the new CD release of Brains onFire includes three works never released before. Of the eight tracks, seven are Stadleroriginals and one, the cunningly titled "Bea's Flat," is a Stadlerarrangement of a Russ Freeman composition written for Chet Baker. Stadler himself plays on only five of thepieces—four with a quartet and one with a sextet. The sextet opens the first disc with "NoExercise." Stadler is joined by Workman on bass, Jimmy Owens on trumpet,Tyrone Washington on tenor sax, Garnett Brown on trombone and drummer BrianBrake. Owens and Brown are back in thesextet for "The Fugue #2" which closes the second disc; they arejoined by Joe Farrell on tenor sax, Don Friedman on piano, Barre Phillips onbass, and Joe Chambers on drums. Recordedin '66, this is the oldest piece on the set, and in formal innovation it is aclear illustration of the Stadler crossover.

The quartet consists of Stadler, Workman, Washington anddrummer Lenny White. Of their four tracks,Stadler says that "Heidi" is "one of the most satisfyingperformances I've initiated in its coherent integration of the written and theimprovised." "Love in the Middle of the Air" is a twenty minuteduet between Workman and vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater, which has the youngsinger showing the chops that were to make her a star. "Bea's Flat" is a 1974 recording byThe Big Band of the North German Radio Station conducted by DieterGlawisching. The variety of ensembles emphasizesthe adaptability of Stadler's compositions and arrangements.

Fairly exhaustive liner notes are the work of jazz critic,Howard Mandel. If anyone can explain theessence of Stadler's art, Mandel is the man for the job. Still even he advises listeners "to letthe music wash over you and to absorb as much as you can instead of analyzingthe format."

Movie Review: The Chaser

2012-01-24T09:07:00.000-08:00

At the risk of being a Johnny-come-lately, I would like tojoin the chorus in praise of what the South Korean film industry has beenachieving in recent years. Films likeBong Joon-ho's Mother (2009) and Kim Ji-woon's I Sawthe Devil (2010), have received plenty of critical attention, bothfor their absurdist mash up of violent themes with wacky comic elements andtheir fundamental technical skill. Theseare film makers who have studied the kinds of things Hollywood has been doingso successfully for years and found a way to go them one better. They cancompete effectively with our local product aesthetically, and they would morethan likely find a greater popular audience if it weren't for issues oflanguage.

If, on the other hand, you can live with subtitles, thereare some mighty impressive films waiting for you. Take for example Na Hong-jin's 2008 thriller,The Chaser. This is afilm which combines equal parts recognizable Hollywood tropes with innovativetwists enough to create something both comfortably familiar and entertaininglynovel. There are fast paced foot chases,but unlike Daniel Craig speeding after cars on foot in CasinoRoyale, in The Chaser people actually have to stopto catch their breath. There is a cutelittle child who gets attached to the hero, but who doesn't quite get awayunscathed. There are vicious fightswhich actually leave bloody marks on people. The hero is a cynical ex-cop who has become a pimp, while the villain isa youthful homicidal maniac who seems to go about his business with a childlikeinnocence. Prostitutes ply their tradebut the only nudity is the middle aged paunch of one the customers. This is a film that plays havoc with yourexpectations.

Like many of the other Korean films, it creates an aestheticthat mixes the horrific with the absurd; that combines Keystone Kops comedywith Chainsaw Massacre gore. It gets you smirking at ridiculous policemen by the dozens falling overeach other as they go off in all directions, most of them wrong, until you aresuddenly faced with the ominous results of their ineptitude. It doesn't shy away from bloody violence. Thesqueamish will clearly need to turn away. It is macabre in the best traditions of thegrand guignol.

If the ineptitude of the authorities is also intended as apolitical critique as some have argued, it is a critique that may well havesome resonance for American audiences as well. Police are not only inept, they are less interested in bringing a serialkiller to justice, than they are in using his capture to cover up their failureto protect a local politician from an irate protester. They are willing to break all the rules toprotect their reputations, but even with violating all sorts of civil rights,they are unable to do their job effectively. And after all, the most effectual character in the film is a pimp. This is a picture of a social order that hasgone in the wrong direction.

The Chaser was director Na Hong-jin'sdirectorial debut. He has since addedthe critically acclaimed The Yellow Sea to his filmography,a film in which he uses some of the same actors he used in TheChaser. Kim Yoon-seok whostars as the pimp plays a mob boss. Ha Jung-woo, who plays the serial killer, starsin the 2010 film as a cab driver in search of his wife and framed for a murderhe didn't commit.

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Music Review: Maynard Ferguson - New Sounds of Maynard Ferguson and Come Blow Your Horn

2012-01-21T12:30:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

If trumpeter extraordinaire Maynard Ferguson came along justa little too late for the height of the big band craze, the heyday of GlenMiller, Benny Goodman and the like, he got there just in time to catch the wavewell before it died, in plenty of time to make a name for himself with jazzlovers all over the world.

Born in Canada, he moved to the States in 1948 and played ina number of bands before joining up with the Stan Kenton Orchestra in1949. It wasn't until 1956, after someyears with Kenton and a stint in Hollywood, that he was called to New York tofront a band to play at the famed jazz club, Birdland. This marked the beginning of a career as abig band leader that lasted off and on until his death in 2006 even as economicsmade touring a large ensemble a costly venture.

Real Gone Music, a newly formed reissue company announcingthat it is "dedicated to combing the vaults for sounds that aren't justgone—they're REAL gone," will be releasing a single CD containing twoalbums Ferguson recorded with his big band for Cameo in 1963 after leaving Rouletterecords. New Sounds of MaynardFerguson first came out in April and Real Gone's reissue includes apreviously unreleased bonus track, "The Song is You." The second album, Come Blow YourHorn, was originally released in September of '63. The two albums along with the bonus have atotal of 21 tracks. Extensive liner notes by Bret Primak provide an excellentguide to the music and the performers.

New Sounds offers a playlist of classicbig band tunes played with style and showcasing the high register that Fergusonis famous for. It opens with the BillyStrayhorn favorite made famous by the Duke Ellington Orchestra, "Take the"A" Train." It includes aninventive arrangement of Ray Noble's "Cherokee," best known in theCharley Barnet version (Ferguson had played with Barnet when he first came tothe States); this version is a tour de force for the alto sax of LannyMorgan. Count Basie's "One O'ClockJump and the Tommy Dorsey theme song "I'm Getting Sentimental OverYou" round out what seem like a set of tributes to the big band era.

There is a funky arrangement of Herbie Hancock's"Watermelon Man" which features a nice interchange between Morgan andFerguson. Ferguson shows off his mellowchops as well as his high notes on an elegant rendition of the traditional"Danny Boy," and "Bossa Nova De Funk" takes the band inanother direction and features the song's composer Willie Maiden on tenorsax.

The tunes on the Come Blow Your Hornalbum, except for a six minute romp through "Chicago That ToddlingTown," are less well known. Thetitle song which ends the album was written for the Neil Simon play of the samename. Then there is the theme from TV'sNaked City and a couple of pieces from films. The "Anthony and Cleopatra Theme"from the Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton Cleopatra hasFerguson playing at the top of his game, and maybe at the top of his range.Elmer Bernstein's "Blues for a Four String Guitar" is fromThe Caretakers, and according to Primak the composerconducted at the session.

Maynard Ferguson may never have achieved quite the popularfame of a movie star trumpeter like Harry James, but jazz fans have longrecognized his technical virtuosity and emotional brilliance. If you like big band music, you'll love thisCD. If you haven't paid all that muchattention to the big bands, this CD will make you regret what you've beenmissing. Maynard Ferguson can play with the best of them, and he put together aband that swings.

Music Review: Jamie Ousley - A Sea of Voices

2012-01-18T10:26:00.000-08:00

If you like your jazz smooth and tuneful with a surprise ortwo here and there, you may want to take a look at A Sea ofVoices, a new album by double bassist, Jamie Ousley. Ousley is a professor of jazz bass at FloridaInternational University in Miami and tours internationally with the trio whojoins with him on most of the tracks on the album. Recently named "Best South Florida JazzMusician of 2011 by Boca Life magazine, he has played withthe likes of jazz legends Benny Golson, George Shearing and James Moody. Back Home, a previousrelease, was named "Best South Florida Jazz Release of 2010," by thePalm Beach Post.

A Sea of Voices is something of a conceptalbum. Ousley explains that he was looking for a way to "give back"with his talents and "make a tangible difference in the world" withhis music. The album was intended as anot for profit venture to benefit the environment. All of the ten tracks on the CD are waterinspired compositions chosen presumably to emphasize the need to protect waterresources. All profits are to be donatedto Sunshine State Interfaith Power and Light, an organization dedicated tomobilizing faith communities in Florida to care for the environment. Ousley says: "I could combine the worldsof diverse faiths and jazz to benefit a common cause that we can all unitebehind."

The album's ten tracks are a mix of Ousley's owncompostions, a classic from the American songbook and a few tunes you wouldn'texpect on the typical jazz compilation. Of the five pieces written by Ousley, the smoking hot "Steam"is the highlight. "Hymn ofTides," which opens the album, features a cascading piano that echoes thetidal movement and "Loving Beauty" shows off the trio's lyricalsensitivity. Joe Davidan is the pianistand his work is stellar. Austin McMahonhandles the percussion. "WithYou" shows what the group can do with a Latin American beat and "HolyWater" has a spiritual hymn like quality. While I must confess I'm not quite certain how "Loving Beauty"and "With You" relate to the water theme, I'm certainly glad they gotthemselves included.

There is a really nice arrangement of Irving Berlin's"How Deep in the Ocean" by Davidan. And then there are the surprises—the songs you don't expect on a jazzalbum. Cold Play's "Swallowed inthe Sea" begins with an ominous sounding bass intro and takes the song ina quite interesting direction. Countryclassic "Rocky Top" gets a decidedly non-country treatment, and thenthere is a haunting version of the iconic folk gem, "Shenandoah" withan almost mystical vocal by Nanami Morikawa. Carlomagno Araya is percussionist on "Rocky Top" and"Swallowed in the Sea." Thelast piece on the album is "Alfonsina y el Mar," and it featuresGabriel Saientz on piano.

All in all A Sea of Voices makes for somevery fine listening. It speaks well forthe state of jazz around the country. There is more excellent music around than you might suppose.

This article was first published at Blogcritics

TV Review: An Idiot Abroad 2: The Bucket List

2012-01-13T09:20:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

An Idiot Abroad 2: The Bucket List, thesecond installment of what looks to be a growing franchise for the man with theround head, Karl Pilkington, debuts Saturday, January 21 at 10:00 PM on the Sciencenetwork. The series which runs foreight episodes through March 10, once again documents the ludicrous adventuresof the hapless Pilkington as he roams around the world dealing with an array oftorments arranged especially for his delightful anguish by his own personaldevils, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. This new series has the eternally duped Pilkington older and a littlewiser, but not nearly wise enough.

Pilkington is harassed into agreeing to another round ofadventures from a bucket list of things to do before you die, but only if therules change, and he gets to decide where he goes and what he does. Of course, the very idea that he would expecthis tormentors to follow any rules he set up is just another reason he makesthe ideal butt for Gervais and Merchant. They may have to do a little more convincing and conniving, but only alittle. He doesn't have to do anythingon the list he doesn't want to do, but the things he does choose never seemquite what he thought they would be. Atwist here, and suddenly what seemed simple, becomes more complicated, morefrightening; a twist there, and it becomes more humiliating. Certainly, there will be those who find nodelight in Pilkington's humiliation, but just as certainly there will be thosethat can't get enough. And since thefirst series was the Science network's highest rated show, there must have beenthe latter aplenty.

In the first episode Pilkington chooses what seems to be aharmless stunt from the list. He willspend a night alone on a desert island. The desert island, it turns out, is notquite the exotic paradise he might have hoped for. Along the way he has to deal with bungeejumping, land jumping, arse boarding, native dancing and some skimpy nativecostuming. Pilkington's unease as he triesto explain himself to the local tribesmen without insulting them is the stuffof high comedy; his dancing in a foliage adorned jock strap is about as low as comedy gets.

The second episode has him traveling to Russia to hop aboardthe Trans-Siberian Express. He startsout happily content in a first class compartment, only to find himself bootedinto third class, cramped into a tiny middle bunk bed. Along the route, he gets buried alive byRussian healers, wrestles with a Mongolian heavyweight and gets a ride in acentrifuge. Finally he ends up in China,the place he announces he hated most after his first visit. This time he visits a dwarf village, and helikes it much better. So much betterthat he puts in a call to Gervais' buddy Warwick Davis, a dwarf himself forsome politically incorrect badinage.

Much of the humor in the show comes from Pilkington'soddball ideas about the world, the things he sees and the people he meets. Volcanoes, he opines, are useful places toget rid of unwanted furnishings. Happiness, he says, is like a cake; too much and you get sick ofit. A bathroom is a great place for some'me' time, a place where your girl friend won't walk in on you. He seems to take his nonsense so seriouslythat is difficult not to laugh at him.

Future episodes have him in Thailand getting made over bythe lady boys, wing walking on a plane in the US, taking a ride on the world'ssteepest roller coaster and meeting a gorilla after a journey through a tangleof African forest. At times, the humorseems a mite mean spirited if not downright cruel, but then this is a Ricky Gervaisproject so it would seem that viewers should have a fairly good idea of what toexpect. Besides, mean spirited or not,the show is funny. So be warned, ifwatching the humiliations of silly man is not your idea of fun, this is not ashow for you. If you don’t mind a goodlaugh at an"idiot's" expense, tune in on the 21^st.

TV Review: Downton Abbey

2012-01-12T08:21:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Whoever thinks there is any truth to the idea that you canput lipstick on a pig, but you can't. . . .had better think again. Some pigs not only wear their lipstick well,it turns out they get a lot of people forgetting their porcine rootsentirely. Two cases in point: first, there is the British import justpremiering its second season in the U.S. on MasterpieceTheatre, Downton Abbey; second there is thehomegrown award winning series recently announcing its breathlessly awaitedfifth season, Mad Men. Turns out you can take what has been one of the least respected TVgenres, the oft ridiculed soap opera, set it back in the past, dress it up withsome fancy period costumes, and viewers will not only eat it up, but so willcritics, and when push comes to shove, they'll win themselves an award or two. People who wouldn't have been caught deadwatching General Hospital or As the WorldTurns will be tuned into PBS with breath baited. They will be looking forward to March, theannounced date for the return of Mad Men, with feverishanticipation.

And I must confess not only was a sitting in front of mytelevision for the arrival of the Downton Crawleys and their servants, but myown temperature elevated considerably at the news of Don Draper's imminentreturn. Moreover, as far as the returnof Downton Abbey is concerned, I wasn't disappointed. It is two years later, and WWI israging. The episode opens on the Sommein the midst of the battle. Clearly thestakes for the new season have been raised. Social issues remain front and center, but now they are played outagainst a background of life and death. The right dress for dinner and who serves important as it is is lessimportant than it might have been two years earlier. Class divisions are beginning to break downmore rapidly. The new world that wasbeginning in the first series is gathering steam.

There are still those who aren't ready to accept it. The irascible dinosaurs like the DowagerCountess of Grantham, played with a knowing gleam by Maggie Smith and thefaithful butler, Mr. Carson may not be quiteready to deal with the new order. But,if it was only Matthew Crawley, the unwilling heir to the estate, who seemed tobe ready for the changing social values in the first series, now there is awhole crew of converts. Lady Sybil takesup nursing. Lady Edith learns to driveand takes a hand in some local farming. Achauffer can even look to make advances to the daughter of the house, and alady kiss a farmer. This, after all, isnot a social tract.

To be sure, the major story lines are picked up withrelish. Matthew is now engaged, but LadyMary has clearly had second thoughts about him. Another romantic entanglement seems inevitable,despite new attachments showing up for each of them. Bates and Anna beginmaking plans for their future until his estranged wife shows up to make wavesand the honorable valet sacrifices himself for the honor of the Granthams. We can only hope, along with Anna, for hisreturn. The duplicitous lady's maid O'Brien and the scheming ex-footman Thomasare working their way up to their old tricks. The dowager will continue to tryto run things for the family, and Lady Grantham will assert herselfgently. It is the war, however, thatdominates the first episode—the horror of battle, efforts on the home front,patriotic fervor and craven cowardice. It looks to be a promising season: world shaping events with a dollop ortwo of soap.

Let's hope that Mad Men's return slatedfor March is as auspicious. Those of uswho have been feeding our addiction replaying the first four seasons on Neflix areimpatient for news. What happens to Donand Megan? Does the agency make it past the Lucky Strike disaster? Will Betty and Henry stay together? What happens. . . . well, there are a lot ofquestions, and like any good soap opera, if you can keep your audiencesalivating with anticipation, you've done your job. Downton Abbey has done it;Mad Men has beendoing it for four seasons, there's no reason to suppose they won't continue.

Book Review: Liz Weston, The 10 Commandments of Money

2012-01-10T07:59:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

The 10 Commandments of Money: Survive and Thrive inthe New Economy, now available in paperback, is online financial guruLiz Weston's guide to building economic security in today's post real estatebubble environment. It acknowledges thatwe live in a new world where what had been standard financial advice in thepast is no longer valid and gives commonsense advice about the strategies andactions that offer the best opportunity for the good life. Her advice seems practical, although it isn'tnecessarily simple. More often than notit involves either a lot of homework for the individual or the help of aprofessional. Still, there are steps anordinary person can take and if one is willing to put in the time and the effort,Weston's "10 Commandments" would appear to offer readers a good shotat building and preserving the kind of nest egg that is part and parcel of theAmerican dream.

After a short introduction in which she points out thefailures of the past, the book is divided into ten chapters, each explaining insome detail the best way to handle finances as we move forward. Her advice isn't necessarily original, ratherit is often a compendium of strategies she has collected and sometimes modifiedfrom a variety of sources. So forexample, in the first chapter where she discusses creating a budget that willwork in the "real world," she uses as her base the work of HarvardUniversity's Elizabeth Warren. Laterwhen she talks about buying and selling real estate she refers to the work ofIlyce Glink. She is always careful toacknowledge the sources of her ideas both in individual chapters and in anappendix which points to them and others for further study.

Among the topics she discusses are budgeting, credit, retirement,insurance and education. She introduceseach chapter with a statement about what had conventional wisdom, a statementabout how that wisdom had changed during the bubble economy, and what the newrules should be. On debt, for example,the old rule: "All debt is bad. Payit off as fast as possible." Duringthe bubble: there is no need to worry about paying off debt; there are betterthings you can do with your money. Thenew commandment: pay off bad debt, use good debt. Her basic thesis is that when debt isinescapable, as it seems to be for most of us, it is important to recognizethat not all debt is equal. Some debtsare more expensive than others. Somedebts come with more dire consequences for failure to make payments. Common sense then dictates which debts to payoff as quickly as possible and which to keep in abeyance.

This is the kind of practical wisdom she dispensesthroughout the book. She points out theimportance of early retirement saving by illustrating how contributions appreciateover the years. She explains theimportance of higher education, but points out that it is not necessary to buymore education than you need to meet your goals. She guides readers through the morass ofstudent loans, bankruptcy laws, mortgage options, insurance and even cell phoneplans. Although at times she seems to berepeating herself, since there is a good deal of overlap in some of thechapters, her writing is always clear and easy to understand.

Each chapter ends with a list of actions readers can take toimplement their goals, although some ofher advice seems easier to follow than others. "Exhaust federal student loans before seeking private educationloans," she advises at the end of the chapter of education. She has already explained the advantages offederal loans in the meat of the chapter, so it is absolutely clear why shemakes this recommendation. On the otherhand after explaining about the necessity for communication in her chapterabout marriage, she points out that when conflicts arise, it is the problemthat needs to be attacked, not the marriage partner. Good advice, although sometimes human naturegets in the way.

Of course, in the end, there are no rules that will work foreveryone. Generalizations aredangerous. Individuals must evaluateeach and every one of these commandments and apply them with care to their ownparticular situation. Besides as thisbook, itself, demonstrates, yesterday's truisms may turn out to be today'sfallacies.

DVD Review: Dr. Willoughby

2012-01-06T07:43:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

The British sitcom Dr. Willoughby whichonly ran for six episodes in 1999 on ITV deserved a better fate. A backstage comedy with much of its humorplayed off stereotyped characters it is nonetheless a funny half hour with alot more laughs than a lot of the comic fare you're likely to find on TV today.

The series stars Joanna Lumley, perhaps best known forAbsolutely Fabulous, as actress Donna Sinclair who plays theeponymous heroine in Dr. Willoughby, a cheesy afternoon TV soapopera. Sinclair is a bitchy aging divawith very few if any redeeming qualities. She is demanding, rude and jealous of those around her. She throws herself at younger men. She is the kind of prima donna who is quitecapable of sabotaging a young actress whom she feels is getting too muchattention while stooping to stealing rolls of toilet paper from the supplyroom. The contrast between the vain,conniving, and insincere Sinclair and the calmly competent surgeon she plays onthe show is a big part of the fun. Sinclair may be every bit the cliché, stillLumley manages to make her come alive.

Sinclair is surrounded by an ensemble of familiar back stagetypes. There is the dim witted insecureco-star worried about his role on the show, the naïve ingénue, a womanizingexecutive producer, a trouble making cleaning lady and a producer whosegreatest desire is to be somewhere else. They are the kinds of back stage types that have long been the fodderfor show business comedies. Dr. Willoughby is not a showthat looks to mine new fields. It maymake a politically incorrect joke here and there, but by and large it sticks tothe tried and true. It is just as happyto get its laughs out of a raunchy joke as some shows would be from insightinto character. These are broadly drawncharacters played broadly by a competent cast of talented actors.

Story lines in individual episodes revolve around thingslike Sinclair's jealousy over the amount of fan mail others are getting, herreaction to a scandal rag story about her, and her co-star's problems with hisex-wife's alimony. In one episodeSinclair sneaks off for some cosmetic surgery leaving the rest of the castthrilled at her absence and speculating about what might be wrong withher. In another, she forces her producerto hire an inept young actor she fancies only to discover he's gay. Sub-plots deal with things like late contractrenewals and product placement. IfDr. Willoughby doesn't quite rise to the level of shows likeRicky Gervais' Extras or The Larry SandersShow, both of which deal with similar material, it does a nice job onits own terms.

The DVD from Acorn has all six episodes on a single discwhich runs approximately 144 minutes. Subtitles are available, but there is no bonus material.

Music Review: Various Artists - Bar-B-Cue'n Blues

2012-01-04T13:45:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Lovers of traditional blues will want to check outBar-B-Cue'n Blues one of series of compilations ofremastered recordings of some of the great blues masters originally scheduledfor release last fall from Catbone Unreleased. The album, like others in the series, features fifteen previouslyunreleased tracks by the likes of John Lee Hooker, Howling Wolf and MuddyWaters as well as some lesser known names, eight different artists in all, andwhile there will be those who might have preferred complete albums devoted tothe individuals, it is hard to complain about the opportunity to listen to somevery fine blues that might well have gone under the radar otherwise. It's no use looking the proverbial gift horsein the mouth organ.

These are lovingly restored recordings worth checking outeither for aficionados looking to fill holes in their collections or casuallisteners looking for an introduction to the genre. If there is anything to complain about, it isprobably the liner notes. Aside from aphoto and some sketchy information about the performers—some of whom are noteven represented on the specific album, there is no information about thespecific tracks, either about the songs themselves or the performances. A word or two about the date of the originaland the musical accompaniment would have been welcome. Still it is the music that's important, andthere is a lot of good music.

The album opens with Chicago bluesman, Billy Boy Arnold's"Catfish." Arnold, who hasworked with the likes of Bo Diddley, is also represented by "Dirty MotherFurriers,"an almost seven minute swinging electric romp with lyrics thatwon't make it on NPR and "Sweet Miss Bea." Harmonica virtuoso JamesCotton—"Superharp," according to his website—has two tracks: a sweetblues, "So Glad I'm Livin" and the up tempo "You Know It AintRight." There's some boogie woogiefrom Jimmy Reed, "Boogie in the Dark" and an old home "GoneFishin." Trumpeter Jack Milman's"Tom and Jerry" is an easy going instrumental, although this is oneof the tracks where it would clearly have been nice to have the names of themembers of the ensemble. Rock and rollerLittle Richard shows up with "I Don't Know What You've Got," notquite as flamboyant as some of his pop hits.

Then there's the big three. Muddy Waters does "I Feel So Good" and "All Aboard,"a song that echoes the train. HowlingWolf's "Louise" is a classic and he adds a playful "Built forComfort." The album is rounded outJohn Lee Hooker's "Sally Mae," introduced with a throbbing guitar anda six and a half minute blast of blues improvisation on "Should Have BeenGone."

What Bar-B-Cue'n Blues lacks in depth, itcertainly makes up for in variety. Itgives listeners a nice mix of representative artistic home cooking. These are the folks that have worked in theroadhouses and the bars; they know the fields of Mississippi and the streets ofChicago. They are the "blues"collar workers, and it is a shame that some of these names are not even betterknown. An album like this only serves toillustrate how large the field of really fine blues musicians is.

Book Review: Hurt Machine, by Reed Farrel Coleman

2012-01-02T08:03:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Hurt Machine is the seventh in ReedFarrel Coleman's Moe Prager detective series, and given the opening in whichthe sixty plus Prager announces just after a pre-wedding party for his daughterthat he has been diagnosed with cancer, it may well turn out to be thelast. Bur when his ex-wife and partnerturns up at the party and asks him to look into the murder of her estrangedsister, an EMT who had been disgraced after she and her partner refused to aida dying restaurant worker, Prager is embroiled in a complicated chain of eventsthat has him dealing with her colleagues in the fire department angry that shehas given them a bad name, reluctant witnesses and old friends eager to helpwith his investigation as he tries to find her killer. There are a lot of discoveries to be made,and just when you think you've come to the truth, there's something else todiscover. Coleman is very good atkeeping readers guessing.

Set mostly in Brooklyn and Manhattan, Coleman is almost asadept at creating a sense of place as a master like George Pelecanos is withWashington,DC. Brooklyn especiallyalmost functions as a character itself. Whether he is talking about the boardwalk at Coney Island or the newlyupscale Park Slope, the Belt Parkway or Stillwell Avenue, stickball orring-a-levio, this is as realistic a portrait of Brooklyn as you are likely tocome across. He knows the finer points of Nathan's French fries and thesubtleties of Brooklyn pizza. He knowsthe bars where the firemen drink and those that cater to the ordinarylocals. If writers are able to stake aclaim to a locale, Coleman has a good case for making Brooklyn his own.

Grown old and sick, Prager is no rough guy private eye. He is as likely to collapse from too much toeat and drink as he is from fighting with some younger tough. There are women, but his current girl friendis in Vermont and the young beauties he comes across in his investigations callhim grandpa. Still, if he is not nowwhat he has been, the years have brought him what the poet calls thephilosophic mind. He has a knack forputting his insights about the human condition and life in general in pithy,almost epigrammatic, tidbits of wisdom. "It is the great folly of humanity, the search for self- knowledgeand significance." "Time tothink is life's Petri dish." "Only in retrospect is life a simpleseries of easily connected dots." The book is filled with this sort of philosophizing.

Nonetheless, Prager is committed to finding the truth. It is almost as if he is looking for one lastmoment of action before what might be the end. Like Tennyson's "Ulysses," it's not too late to seek a newerworld. He is dogged in his pursuit of themurderer, what he has lost in physical power, he makes up for with the streetsmarts he has gained over the years. Still he is old, and there is always a question about how he will holdup and whether he is equal to the task.

The problem I have coming to a book like HurtMachine without having read any of the others in the series is allthe references to people and events that seem to have been treated in theearlier novels. I have the feeling thateverything would be more meaningful to me if I understood more about therelationship between Prager and his ex, if I knew more about Nathan Martyr whoturns up as a restaurant owner late in the investigation, or if I knew whathappened to Prager's first wife. While Iam bothered by not knowing as much about such things and many others, it isworth noting that the Hurt Machine is quite good enough tomake me want to read the first six to find out what I've been missing.

Book Review: Van Gogh: The Life, by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith

2011-12-28T14:40:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Contumacious is not too strong a word to describebiographers who subtitle their tome, eight hundred and fifty plus pages thoughit may be, "The Life" as do authors Steven Naifeh and Gregory WhiteSmith: Van Gogh: The Life. "The Life" suggests that here the readers finally have thedefinitive version, the last word—everything we ever wanted to know about whatwas surely one of the most tortured of lives. Clearly that is not the case. Forall its length and detail, it postulates a controversial theory of the artist'sdeath which is sure to raise at least some hackles and generate somebiographical blowback. "Van Gogh: ALife" might have been a more appropriate title.

Viewers of 60 Minutes are most likelyacquainted with the authors' theory about Van Gogh's death. Long thought to have been a suicide, Naifeh and Smith treat that idea as littlemore than a tall tale made legend by Irving Stone's novelization and the filmthat followed, Lust for Life, and a legend filled with holes. While their argumentsare presented with conviction, they are arguments, even though they have beenaround for some time, by no means accepted by all Van Gogh scholars.

Based primarily on a prior scholar's 1956 interviews withRene Secretan, an octogenarian who came forward near the end of his life toexplain his own role in the painter's 1890 death in what he claimed was anattempt to correct some of the romantic liberties taken in the film. Although Secretan doesn't seem to haveconfessed to anything other than harassing the painter whom he and his youngfriends considered nothing short of a crazy man, he did have access to the kindof gun that people thought must have been the weapon Van Gogh used, a weaponthat was never found. Add to this a lotof circumstantial evidence including the facts that none of the painter'sequipment was found at the site where he supposedly shot himself, thepeculiarity of trying to commit suicide by shooting yourself in the stomach,Van Gogh's somewhat less than adequate statements about what he did, as well asa number of other tidbits, and you've got the makings of a case.

A case at least for an accident—Secretan was hassling thepainter and the gun went off. He wasfrightened and ran off. The authorsnever really accuse the young man of actually murdering the painter, but theyare clearly of the opinion that however it happened, it was Secretan and hisgun that were involved. Their theory mayconvince some, it may not others; one thing for sure, it will sell books.

In general, the picture they paint of the artist is not veryflattering. For most of his life he isshown as demanding and self absorbed to the point that he was completely unableto get along with anyone, be it family, friends or fellow artists. Even his brother Theo who supported him formost of his adult life was unable to deal effectively with his extravagantdemands both financially as well as emotionally. Certainly though many of his problems werethe result of his mental state, the Van Gogh pictured in this book would havetested the patience of a saint, let alone a normal human being.

Strange behavior is often tolerated in great artists. It is the price you have to pay forgenius. Van Gogh's problem was that notuntil the last few months of his life that his greatness was even begun to berecognized. For most of his life, he wasconsidered little more than a mad man. His work was ridiculed. Hisimpassioned ideas were derided. Hisbehavior was outlandish. Naifeh andSmith are meticulous in documenting the disasters that followed him from hisearly career working in art sales, his flirtation with religion, and hiseventual devotion to art, but through it all Van Gogh is presented as such ahead case that one has to wonder how it was he ever managed to create any ofthe masterworks for which he has become so loved. Not only does one have to tolerate genius;one has to tolerate all those crazies who may turn out to be not so crazy afterall. If anything, the reader comes awayfrom this life, recognizing that often there may be very little differencebetween genius and madness.

Book Review: War Horse: The Making of the Motion Picture

2011-12-21T07:20:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Michael Morpurgo's1982 young adult novel War Horse, certainly moderatelysuccessful at the time, has sky rocketed in acclaim in recent years both in itsown right and perhaps even more importantly as an inspiration for artisticadaptation. First there was thetheatrical tour de force adapted for Great Britain's National Theatre by NickStafford, which in its Broadway incarnation was the winner of the Tony Awardfor Best Play and is still running at Lincoln Center. And now, opening on Christmas Day comes themuch ballyhooed film adaptation by director Stephen Spielberg.

Perhaps because ofthe National Theatre production's innovative solution to the problem of puttinghorses on the stage through the use of giant puppets, it generated a fascinatingdocumentary called Making War Horse. The film, available on DVD, besides dealingwith the story itself, stresses the creation of the puppets in collaborationwith the Handspring Puppet Company and the training of the puppeteers necessaryto create the illusion of lifelike horses. Not to be outdone, the film too has generated not a documentary as ofyet but an elegant "pictorial moviebook," War Horse: TheMaking of the Motion Picture. No puppets it's true, but more than 140brilliant photos from the film in their place.

Divided into threesections the book takes you on a visual journey first through the film's story,then its production and finally gives a short nod to the history of horses inwarfare. "Joey's Journey"outlines the basic plot of the movie with stills from the film, comments fromthe filmmakers and even an excerpt or two from the script. There are individual photos of the large castand brilliant shots of the British countryside. But the really exciting visuals are those capturing the interaction ofmen and the horses first on the farm and then at war.

The second sectiontakes you behind the scenes. While itdoes provide some interesting insights like the ten different horses playingthe role of Joey and the shot of the makeup artist working on one of the equineactors, the whole section runs little more than a dozen pages, much of it takenup with commentary. "The History ofWar Horses" uses illustrations from history to highlight the role ofhorses from ancient Egypt through World War 1, with the emphasis on the latter. As history it is little more than a sketch,and at best will whet the interested reader's appetite for something moresubstantial. Still this is after all abook about the making of a movie, and one can't expect a historicaldissertation.

There areforewords by Spielberg, producer Kathleen Kennedy, who seems to have been theoriginator of the project, screenwriter Richard Curtis, and authorMorpurgo. Curtis has an interestingtidbit about how his film Four Weddings and a Funeral beatout Spielberg's Schindler's List for a French foreign filmaward, the kind of anecdote you can dine out on. Morpurgo talks about the writing of the noveland somewhat fetchingly confesses his preference for cows over horses at thetime he was writing. One imagines recentdevelopments may well have changed his mind.

If the filmmanages to garner the same kind of critical acclaim as the play, this is a bookthat may well share that popularity. Although it is quite well done in its own right, it seems to me that itssuccess is clearly tied directly to the success of the film.

Music Review: Jimmy Owens - "The Monk Project"

2011-12-13T14:21:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Thelonious Monk is a good example of one of those musical geniuses who early on in their careers created a sound that was considered experimental and cutting edge but with the passage of time has become standard fare on the jazz menu. The innovative young pianist composer became the revered grand master, and after his death in 1982 nothing short of a legend. And nothing says legend like fellow musicians paying tribute to your music by making it their own. It's one thing when people copy what you've done; it's quite another to use what you've done as an inspiration to build upon and create.

Trumpeter Jimmy Owens' TheMonk Project is just such a tribute. "Thelonious Monk," hesays, "is one of the world's premier jazz artists and composers. Many of his compositions provide (even thebest) jazz artists with musical challenges, such as the opportunity to maneuverthrough difficult chord changes and execute unusual melodies. I chose compositions that people may haveheard before, however, when I arranged the pieces I wanted to give them adifferent feeling than how they have been performed in the past." Owens has taken the music and transformed itinto something new, yet something still quite recognizable. But more importantly, something that mightwell have brought a smile to the face of the legend. The Monk Project is jazz asit ought to be.

The trumpeter leads a septetconsisting of Wycliffe Gordon on Trombone, Marcus Strickland on tenor sax andHoward Johnson on the tuba and baritone sax. Kenny Barron is on the piano, Kenny Davis on bass and Winard Harperplays drums. It is a group that combinesveteran talent with new young voices—age and youth, a winning combination. They feed off each other as though they havebeen playing together for years, and in some cases they have.

There are ten tracks on the albumbeginning with a swinging arrangement of "Bright Mississippi." "WellYou Needn't" follows featuring Owens on the flugelhorn and the septet'srhythm section. Owens and Barron have infact played together for years and it shows. A funky "Blue Monk" is a real show stopper with some down anddirty trombone from Gordon. This is oneof the highlights of an album filled with highlights. The group's take on"Stuffy Turkey" is treated more playfully, in contrast to the lowdown "Blue Monk." Kenny Davisgets an opportunity to get out front on the bass.

"Pannonica," one ofMonk's most elegant melodies, is slowed down some in Owens' hands and achievesan almost more impressive eloquence. Theyfollow with an up tempo version of "Let's Cool One" with Strickland'ssax featured in the opening solo. "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)" will haveyou bopping and nodding again with some low down improvisation. Owens and the combo play around with rhythmson the complexities of "Brilliant Corners," and the album followswith a contemplative (what else would you expect) take on"Reflections." A ten minuteride through "Epistrophy" which gives each of the seven a moment toshine ends the album with style. Scheduled for release in January of 2012,The Monk Project is an album to keep your ears open for.

Music Review: Rob Morsberger- Ghosts Before Breakfastt

2011-12-11T11:13:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Along with the announcement of next week's digital releaseof Rob Morsberger's latest album Ghosts Before Breakfast,comes the shocking news that that the singer is suffering from braincancer. "As I was finishing off myrecord," he says,"I unexpectedly received a diagnosis of grade 4Glioblatoma. . .the worst manifestation of the most malignant kind of braincancer. This is not a survivable illness." Given this kind of tragic news, a criticalreview of the album might seem like a gratuitous exercise. That is not the case, not for theartist. For the artist life goes on as long as the art goes on. And IfMorsberger is anything, he is an artist. If his last album, the intellectually challenging Chronicle ofa Literal Man, didn't prove that, this latest can't help but do thejob.

Ghosts Before Breakfast welds thepatented density of Morsberger's allusive lyrics and subject matter to avariety of musical styles both within and between songs. These are songs that will keep listenershumming along as they puzzle over meanings. These are songs that will keep listeners humming along as they puzzleover meanings. This is true art, and thereal thing is never easy. There areeleven songs on the album, and the more you listen, the more you recognizethere isn't a loser in the bunch.

The title song, which opens the album, was written as ascore for a 1927 silent film of the same name by Hans Richter, a Dada artistand abstract filmmaker. The chorus ismade up from titles of some of Richter's other films and most of the rest ofthe song reels off lists of images associated with abstract art. "The song," Morsberger says,"is really about making art, and being an artist." This is followed by "The GreatWhatever" a song that rants against a god that allows a world of sufferingwith a Latin beat. Images like thewizard behind the curtain, the terrorist who looks to god for instruction, thewatchmaker whose watch has gone wrong fill the song, but despite it all thenegativity some sort of spiritual practice is necessary. "The Distinguished Thing" is acelebration of the novelist Henry James who died lamenting that there werestill so many stories left untold, a lament that must cut close to home.

"The Wild Wind" is a musical tour de force thattraces the history of the singer's hometown from the time of the Indians upthrough the 20^th century in a variety of musical styles from rock toragtime. "A Man of Much Merit" is based on a letter from CharlesFloyd, the only man to die on the Lewis and Clark expedition and "RocketScience" is a tongue in cheek nod to some of the older rocket songs. "Celebrity Artist" is a satiricturn where Morsberger reminds me of the They Might Be Giants sound (anothername to go with Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Randy Newman and all the others he isnormally compared with). Speaking ofDylan, "For Heaven's Sake" is a ballad that comes close to his growl,except that Morsberger sounds a hell of a lot better. "Cobblestones," on the other hand,is a more personal ballad and vocally is much simpler, almost sweet in itssadness.

"Christina InYour Salon," a song about ChristinaAlexandra, 17^th century Queen of Sweden, ends the album in thetypical Morseberger manner: you want a song about a cross dressing intellectualwho studied with Descartes? I can writeit for you. The next to last song on thealbum "Feather in a Stream" is a personal statement that almost seemsto have been written with his health problems in mind, although his publicityseems to suggest that these were all written before he knew about thecancer. The metaphor of the feathercarried willy nilly down life's stream is compelling under the circumstances,and the lush orchestration which ends the song is spiritually elegant. Were it me, I would have ended the albumhere.

Music Review: Duduka Da Fonseca - Duduka Da Fonseca Trio Plays Toninho Horta

2011-11-30T14:27:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

I must confess that before receiving a copy of Braziliandrummer Duduka Da Fonseca's latest album, I was unfamiliar with his previouswork and that is my loss. Not only hashe been playing with some of the biggest names in the jazz pantheon—GerryMulligan, Herbie Mann, Lee Konitz, Joe Lovano, among others, not only has hetoured with his world renowned countrymen Antonio Carlos Jobim and AstrudGilberto, but his 2009 CD Brazilian Trio – Forests wasnominated for a Latin Grammy. A musicianwith that kind of resume should not fall below the radar.

More importantly a musician that can come up with a musicaltreat like his newly released Duduka Da Fonseca Trio Plays ToninhoHorta demands attention. Joining the drummer on this set originally recorded back in 2009 arepianist David Feldman and bassist Guto Wirtti both of whom he had worked withwhen they played on an album for Brazilian sax player Paulo Levi. Talking about that session in the linernotes, Fonseca says: "We started the session and I said to myself, 'Wow!!This rhythm session sounds so right!! It feels like a walk on IpanemaBeach." Back in New York, he goeson, he thought it would be a good idea to do a trio project with them, and hewas absolutely right. Feldman is adynamic young pianist with a lyrical sensitivity and Wirtti handles the basswith finesse.

Fonseca's next big idea, as he continues to explain it, wasto devote their record to the music of Brazilian singer/songwriter/guitarist,Toninho Horta. While Horta may not havethe same kind of worldwide recognition accorded to the likes of Jobim, Fonsecasays that he "touches my heart with his amazing music." Indeed, you can hear it in theirplaying. Horta's music and Fonseca'strio seem a perfect fit. Horta, himself,writes that they transformed his songs "into true instrumentalpearls," and adds "the conceptual innovations of groove, melodicinterpretation and form left me truly enchanted."

Listen to "Aqui,Oh!," the first of nine tracks on the album and then listen toHorta's own version on Myspace andyou'll get some idea of the kind of transformation he's talking about. They play down the dance rhythm and turn itinto a vehicle for some inventive solo improvisation by Feldman. Indeed, Feldman's sensitive phrasing is frontand center on nearly all of the tracks. More often than not Fonseca himself iscontent to remain in the background. The only lengthy drum solo is on the lastsong on the album, "Retrato Do Gato," an up-tempo swinger that alsofeatures some nice interaction between drummer and pianist. Wirtti gets a chance to highlight the bass inthe intense, atmospheric ballad "Moonstone." He also gets in some licks on the upbeat"Francisca." "De Ton PraTom" has the sound of something out of the great American songbook while"Luisa" takes you right back to its Brazilian roots.

If you like your jazz on the mellow side with a Latin vibe,this is an album you want to listen to. Horta's music and the Fonseca's trio: this is a marriage made if not inheaven at least on a heavenly beach.

Music Review: Liz Childs - Take Flight

2011-11-29T12:53:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

The thing that intrigued me the most about jazzvocalist/pianist Liz Childs' second album Take Flight wasthat among the seventeen jazz standards and tunes from the great Americansongbook , the kinds of songs you would normally expect from a jazz singer, shehad included two pieces from Leonard Cohen and one from Bob Dylan. Having just reviewed a CD from Monika Borzym,another promising young jazz vocalist, that featured an unlikely repertoire ofmusic from the likes of Fiona Apple and Amy Winehouse, I was interested inseeing what Childs was doing with this material.

There is nothing wrong with songs that are tried and true,but there is something important to be gained both for the artist and the genrewhen they broaden their horizons. Jazz,after all, is in a real sense about breaking away from the same old sameold. It is about taking a piece of musicand making it your own. Childs takes uson a biting ride through Cohen's iconic "Hallelujah." At times hervoice fairly reeks with bitterness and scorn, at least until the very end. "Famous Blue Raincoat" is a wistful haunting gem. Childs invests both lyrics with an emotionaltruth that is nothing short of mesmerizing. Bob Dylan's "I'll Be Your Baby Tonight" gets a swinging oldstyle treatment with some nice guitar solo work from Ed MacEachen. Truth to tell, I wouldn't have minded a fewmore of these kinds of songs.

Not that there's anything wrong her work on the standards,she has a voice that rings with bell like clarity, that can move from intense passionto playful girlishness with equal appeal. She takes a lyric and plumbs its depth weaving sweet scat arabesquesaround its melodies. Two good examplesare the songs which open and close the album. Jimmy van Heusen's "It Could Happen to You" and "You'd BeSo Nice to Come Home To," the Cole Porter classic, both highlight herscatting talents. Her vocal play on"fire" and "desire" in the Porter tune is a kick. There's a nice little obligatory bossa novain Antonio Carlos Jobim's "Dindi." There is even a nod to the blues with Bobby Troupe's "Baby All theTime." Among the other standards on the album are Porter's "Just Oneof Those Things," Lorenz Hart's "Lover," and Toots Thielemans'"Bluesette," each getting a fine reading.

The album takes its title from an original piece byguitarist MacEachen, who also is responsible for arranging ten of the songs onthe CD. "Take Flight" offerssome nice opportunities for interaction between the singer's scatting and thecomposer's guitar.

Childs is backed by MacEachen, Dan Fabricatore on bass andAnthony Pinciotti on drums. She,herself, has decided to escape from the piano for this album. "I wanted," she says, "toexperience the freedom to explore singing without being constricted by sittingat the piano, and to be able to more completely respond to the band as avocalist only. So, that's what this CDis the start of." If this is anyindication of what she can do standing at the front of the band, one can onlyhope to hear more from her in the future.

Music Review: "Les Contes d'Hoffman" - Metropolitan Opera

2011-11-28T11:12:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritic.

The first I ever heard of Jaques Offenbach's LesContes d'Hoffman was back in a music appreciation lesson in gradeschool. The teacher would play melodiesfrom a variety of classical compositions and we would be given a lyric to singalong as a kind of mnemonic device to help us remember the melody. Here is the lyric from the Offenbachopera. It is still embedded in mymemory: "Barcarole from Tales of Hoffman written byOffenbach." While some might wonderhow this kind of thing could lead to anything like appreciation, somehow itdid. Indeed one of the first recordingsof classical music in my budding record collection some years later was analbum of highlights from Hoffman, an album that has long since disappeared, tobe replaced by a full cast recording led by Placido Domingo which has alsodisappeared.

Now along comes a remastering of a monaural recording of aDecember, 1955 Metropolitan Opera radio broadcast of the opera conducted byPierre Monteux and starring the magnificent Richard Tucker as Hoffman, a trioof all star sopranos--Roberta Peters, Rise Stevens and Lucine Amara—as his three loves, and MartialSingher as his various nemeses. Andwhile I am not sure that Offenbach's opera gets the same kind of respectaccorded to some other composers, I am sure that Les Contesd'Hoffman is not only filled with romance, drama and humor, but withsome brilliant music as well. Moreimportantly, this is a recording that does it full justice.

The opera begins with a prologue in which the poet, Hoffman,meets his rival for the love of the prima donna, Stella and is coaxed intotelling the stories of the three great loves of his life. The first act deals with his love for Olympia,a mechanical doll, who he is tricked into thinking is a real woman. The second act in this production takes placein Venice and tells of his love for the duplicitous courtesan Giulietta who hasbeen bribed to steal his shadow. Act IIIis the story of Antonia who suffers from an inherited weakness that may killher if she sings. In the opera'sepilogue, Hoffman resolves to give up Stella an devote himself to hismuse. The stories are all adapted fromthe actual stories of the fantasist, E.T. A. Hoffman.

The highlight of the prologue is Tucker's aria in which hetells the story of the dwarf, Kleinzach, as is his beautiful "Allons! Courage etconfiance—Ah! Vivre deux" in the first act. Roberta Peter's first act rendition of the famous"Les Oiseaux dans la charmille" in which themechanical doll keeps running down and has to be rewound is appropriatelydoll-like. The second act opens with thefirst of appearance of the "Barcarole" theme sung by Rise Stevens andMildred Miller as Hoffman's muse. Echoesof the theme are repeated in the wonderful sestet that closes the act, and itreappears as an orchestral interlude at the between the third act and theepilogue. Singher's aria,"Scintille diamante" and the dramatic duet betweenStevens and Tucker are the highlights of the second act. Act III has a number of wonderful momentsincluding Lucine Amara's opening aria,"Elle a fui, la tourterelle!" and the stirringtrio with the mother's voice (Sandra Warfield), Antonia and the evil Dr.Miracle (Singher). Then, of course,there is the dynamic finale that ends the epilogue.

Les Contes d'Hoffman is probably one ofthe most accessible of operas and in the hands of this wonderful cast it shineslike a jewel. Altogether it is aproduction to be savored.

Music DVD Review: Les Paul - Live In New York

2011-11-22T08:59:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

For those of us old enough to have been around when Les Pauland his wife Mary Ford were making hits like the legendary "How High theMoon," it is wonderful to see that a 90 year old guitarist with arthriticfingers and a mischievous personality can still have audiences standing on lineto hear him play. And deservedly so, LesPaul may not be the player he once was, but he can still get you tapping yourtoes and bring a smile to your face. LesPaul is a showman. Nowhere is thatclearer than in Live in New York, a DVD recorded from liveMonday evening shows at the Iridium Jazz Club in honor of his 90^thbirthday.

These are intimate performances, up close and personal, inwhich Paul and his trio pianist, John Colianni and either Nicki Parrott or JayLeonhart on bass, assisted by Lou Pallo, rhythm guitarist are often joined bysome pretty fine musicians from the audience. There's a little of the patented Paul banter, a lot of fine music and abunch of laudatory interviews. Les Paulwas not only a ground breaking instrumentalist, his pioneering development ofthe electric guitar and multi-track recording in a real sense created the musicindustry as we know it. He was a forceto be reckoned with. If as Paul quipsduring the set, there are millions of people who think Les Paul is a guitar,this DVD will do a lot to remedy the situation. Listening to the likes of Bonnie Raitt, Steve Miller, and BuckyPizzaarelli talk about his playing and his influence makes it clear just howimportant that force was.

The DVD manages to capture some really special musicalmoments. Steve Miller, who explains thathe has known Paul and Mary Ford since he was a boy of five, sings a heartfeltversion of the Nat 'King' Cole hit, "Nature Boy." Jazz singer Sonya Hensley does a swingingtake on "Route 66," and Jose Feliciano chimes in with a passionate"Unchain My Heart." KeithRichards shows up in an earlier clip, plays a little guitar and sings somethingcalled "Pork Chop Blues." There is some sweet guitar give and take with Tommy Emmanuel on"Blue Moon," and some fancy mandolin picking from Dave Grisman on theDjango Rheinhardt classic, "LImehouse Blues." Bassist Nicki Parrott chimes in with a sexybluesy "Happy Birthday, Lester" and there is even a tap dancing AndrewNemr keeping time to Paul's playful "Cherokee." It is a concert of straight up jazz and bluesplayed with style and joy.

Add to this, besides longer interviews from some of theguest performers and friends, bonus material that includes nine audio tracksfor download as well as video of some of the old Les Paul and Mary Ford TVgigs. There is a sample of the littleshows they did for Listerine that has them doing one of their biggest hits,"The World is Waiting for the Sunrise." Paul also does a solo on "Dark TownStrutters' Ball" which is just a small indication of what he could do backin the day. There is also film of thecouple's appearance on the highbrow Sunday afternoon cultural icon,Omnibus which has Paul taking a comic turn explaining multi-trackingto host Alistair Cooke before he and Mary play "How High theMoon." A "Soundie" ofPaul and his trio playing "Dark Eyes" shows just how quick fingeredPaul could be when he was young, although the picture quality leaves somethingto be desired.

To understand just how significant an innovator Les Paul wasyou just have to look at Bonnie Raitt's face as she listens to some the oldrecords during her interview. One looksays it all.

Music Review: Carmen, Metropolitan Opera 1952

2011-11-21T07:00:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

If Georges Bizet's Carmen is not the mostpopular opera in the standard repertoire, it certainly is one of the two orthree in contention. Deservedly so, ithas a tempestuous love story in an exotic setting, gorgeous melodies and asmagnificent a starring role as any diva lover could hope for. Although the composer's last opera, he died acouple of months after its premiere, was something of a critical failure whenit opened, its popularity has only grown ever since. Today a staple in opera houses all over theworld, there are recordings aplenty available: no mezzo soprano worth her saltwould give up a chance to sing the lead. From Maria Callas who never performed the roleon stage and Leontyne Price in the sixties to contemporaries like AngelaGheorghiu whose voice some feel is wrong for the role, there are Carmen'senough, great ones and some not so great, you would think to fill any recordcollection.

You would be wrong. There is never too much of a good thing. Perhaps the mezzo best known for her Carmen back in the fifties was RiseStevens. She sang the role at theMetropolitan Opera 124 times and in 1952 appeared as Carmen on one of the firstof the televised Met productions. There isa 1951 recording of one of herperformances, but while praised for her performance,the sound leaves something to be desired, and there are some complaints abouttenor Jan Peerce. The new release of aremastered February 16^th1952 Metropolitan Opera radio broadcast underthe direction of Fritz Reiner comes then as a welcome addition to the opera'sdiscography. Although there does seem to be a earlier version of this broadcaston Walhall Eternity Series.

Joining Stevens is a stellar cast directed by TyroneGuthrie. Richard Tucker is the spurnedlover, Don Jose. Micaela, the sweet peasant yang to Carmen's yin is sung by Nadine Conner. Carmen's friends at thefactory, Frasquita and Mercedes are played by Lucine Amara and Margaret Roggero. Zuniga, the head of the guards is OsieHawkins. Paolo Silveri is the toreador,Escamillo.

Conventional wisdom has it that Stevens indeed made the roleher own both with her voice and her acting. Her Carmen is both sexy and cruel, and she carries it off withconsummate skill. Whether in herentrance with the famed "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle" or herseduction of Don Jose in Act I's glorious "Prѐs des remparts deSéville" she justifies everything that has been said about her. It is a compelling performance. Richard Tucker, a tenor with a rich vibrantvoice, makes Stevens a wonderful partner. His "Flower Song" at the end of the second act is one of thehighlights of the opera and his first act duet with Amara is a thing ofbeauty. Paolo Silveri, of course, hasthe crowd rousing "Toréador, en garde!" and he is spot on. The stirring chorus just before the end ofthe last act is another high point. There may well better recordings ofCarmen, but this is a truly excellent performance and itstands up well still after all these years.

Music Review: Oscar Peterson - Unmistakable

2011-11-20T07:34:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

However Sony Masterworks andZenph Sound Innovations managed to do it, and I'll do my best to try to explainit, the release of Unmistakable a collection of what theyare calling "re-performances" by deceased jazz piano virtuoso OscarPeterson has produced some remarkably fine music. The great Oscar Peterson died in December of2007 at the age of 82 after a long productive career, so while the album makesuse of some of his unreleased recordings made in the '70's and 80's, it is notPeterson who is doing the "re-performing." What we have here is the result of theapplication of modern technology to artistic innovation, and if this is anyexample of what the technology is capable of, there will be a lot more coming.

Those readers only interested ingood music played brilliantly and not much concerned with how it was recordedand those who think the whole thing is just too spooky can skip ahead to thenext paragraph. According to the Zenphpublicity, the company "uses computer software to transform recorded musicback into live performances, replicating what was originally played but withvastly improved sound quality. Theystart with video recordings as well as some privately recorded performances. Then as their website describes it: "We transform musical performance into data and then render itinto sound, which can be used in completely new ways. Our proprietary platformexpresses musical performance as malleable data. Rendered from this data, audiocontent is liberated from “frozen” recordings—creating immersive andinteractive capabilities comparable to those of high‐resolutioncomputer graphics." Ileave it to you to decipher what that may mean.

What you seeif you are in the room with the piano is the various keys moving as if beingstruck by invisible fingers. What youhear is some very fine music. The piano is programmed to play the particularpiece just as it was played by the original performer. . Zenph has already used this technology tocreate re-performances by Rachmaninoff, Glenn Gould and jazz legend Art Tatum. Of course, exactly how this is accomplished isstill Zenph's little proprietary secret Had the technology existed back in theday, we could have re-performances of Mozart, Beethoven or Franz Liszt.

At any rate,while Peterson was still alive back in 2007 representatives of the company metwith him to show him how their system worked. At the time they used the recorded re-performances of Peterson's idol,Art Tatum, to let him hear what theirprocess sounded like, and "hearing his hero playing live again after allthe ensuing years brought Peterson to tears." It impressed him enough that he spent theafternoon working with the team from the company and listening to somere-performances of his own playing.

AfterPeterson's death his wife helped with the selection of songs for this album. Ofall the material made available to the team, they selected performances fromtwo different concerts: a mid '70's concert at the Eastman Theatre in Rochester,NY and a 1980's concert from Munich. They also used a performance from the CBC TV series OscarPeterson and Friends. Theactual recording contains 16 re-performances, eight in stereo and the sameeight repeated in binaural stereo for earphones. It is as beautiful a recording of solo piano jazz asyou are likely to hear.

The songs areall classics. The album begins with"Body and Soul" and a signature speeding romp through "Back HomeAgain in Indiana." It ends with theBenny Goodman theme, "Goodbye." In between there is a Duke Ellington medley that starts with "Takethe A Train" and includes "In a Sentimental Mood," "C Jam Blues," "Lady of the LavenderMist" and "Satin Doll" among others. Gershwin's "The Man I Love,"Anthony Newly and Leslie Bricusse's "Who Can I Turn To," Victor Young's"When I Fall in Love," and Dizzy Gillespie's "Con Alma"round out a very strong album.

DVD Review: Making War Horse

2011-11-19T12:00:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Making War Horse is a very conventionaldocumentary about a very unconventional play. Written, filmed and directed by David Bickerstaff and Phil Grabsky, thedocumentary tells the story of the multiple award winning National Theatreproduction from its inception to its critically acclaimed premiere. War Horse is an adaptationof Michael Morpurgo's young adult novel dealing with the military's use ofhorses in WWI. And although it was thewinner of the 2011 Tony Award for best play, it is considered by many lesssignificant as a dramatic piece than as a theatrical spectacle. Indeed, in an interview on CUNY'sTheater Talk, Nicholas Hytner, the National Theatre'sartistic director, confessed some surprise that the play had received theaward. It wasn't that he wasn't happy tohave won; it was simply that he seemed to agree that it was the play'sspectacular staging that made it exceptional.

It is that exceptional staging that is the central concernof Making War Horse. Thedecision to use life size puppets to get not only the horses but other animalsas well on stage was no doubt the crucial element in the show's success.Co-director of the production, Tom Morris, had seen the work of a South Africanpuppet company, Handspring Puppet Company, and was looking for a vehicle inwhich he could utilize their puppets. Morpurgo'snovel was suggested by his mother. Itturns out mothers always know best. Ifthe spectacular use of puppetry is the best part of the production, the film ofthe puppeteers working to capture the horses' movements, three puppeteers toeach horse, is the best part of the documentary. Just as the audiences in the theater canmanage to ignore the visible puppeteers as they create the illusion ofgalloping horses on the stage, so too can the viewer of the documentary. Even on film the effect is breathtaking.

All well and good, but how do you adapt a story where themain character is a horse and everything comes from that horse's point of viewto the stage? Morpurgo, himself,confesses to his own skepticism when he found out about the project. Hytner says: "There was no question everof the horse speaking. So, that was a challenge . . .the necessity of finding astory which put the horse at its center but which denied the horse a speakingvoice." It was left to writer NickStafford to turn the horse's first person account into a third personnarrative. Morpurgo explains that heused the horse's point of view because an animal would experience the horrorsof war without taking sides. Stafford alsohad to find a way to make this idea that war is not really good for anyoneclear as well.

While the actual documentary runs a little under 50 minutes,the DVD does include over 70 minutes of bonus material. There is a lengthy interview with Morpurgothat covers among other things his thoughts about war, his writing methods, hisfeelings about adaptations and his limited role in the production. A short feature on the process of getting theplay on the stage includes extensions of interviews with co-directors Morrisand Marianne Elliott and writer, Stafford. Some of the material is a repetition of what had been included in theactual documentary. There is also ashort feature on the Handspring Puppet Company which includes some interestingmaterial on how the puppets were made, how they are maintained, and how theyare operated.

A section called "Video Diaries" consists of somecandid film taken by Tom Olié, one of the puppeteers. It begins with the first day of rehearsalwhen the cast and crew gather to introduce themselves and ends with the finalcurtain call before the production moves from the National to the New London. Together with a short behind the scenesfeature which silently roams around backstage they give some interestinginsight into what is happening on the other side of the curtain. Finally thereis a video of the puppeteers visiting an actual military horse troop to get arealistic sense of the animal's movement, a War Horsetrailer and an image gallery.

A film adaptation directed by Steven Spielberg is due intheaters in December. The cast includesDavid Thewlis, Jeremy Irvine, Bernard Cumberbatch and Emily Watson—no puppets.

Music Review: Harry Belafonte - Sing Your Song

2011-11-18T14:06:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Thefirst Harry Belafonte albums I ever bought must have been back in the latefifties. There were two of them--Belafonteand Calypso. At thetime I was into The Weavers and Leadbelly and Harry Belafonte was another voicein the folk singing army that was beginning to make itself heard around thecountry. I remember tucking the LP's innext to a well worn copy of The Weavers at CarnegieHall. The first time I eversaw him perform was on the stage of a Brooklyn night club called the Town andCountry. I remember thinking at the timethat this was kind of a strange venue for a folk singer. Later the Town and Country became the homebase for a troop of female impersonators called the Jewel Box Revue, definitelynot the place for a folk singer.

Ibring this up because it seems to me that back then at the time he was making abig name for himself, there was a sense among some of us in our ignorance thatthere folk singers that were activists like Seeger, Lee Hays, Ronnie Gilbertand Fred Hellerman, and Belafonte wasn't one of them. There was a sense that there were folksingers who were authentic like Leadbelly, and the sweet voiced Belafontewasn't one of them either. Next thingyou know he's in Hollywood making movies and he's a movie star, again not quitewhat we had come to expect from the typical folk singer.

Ofcourse, it turns out that one thing that never seems to have concerned HarryBelafonte was playing to other people's expectations. So when he turns up marching with MartinLuther King, Jr. and we discover that he's been a civil rights activist allalong, those of us who really knew little more about him than"Matilda" were kind of shocked. The extent of what many of us didn't know, or maybe didn't want to know,is made abundantly clear in the HBO documentary, Sing YourSong aired earlier this October. Not only was the man a fighter for civil rights in this country, but hewas a humanitarian involved in the struggle for social justice around theworld.

Inconjunction with the documentary and the release of an autobiographical memoir,My Song, Sony Masterworks has released HarryBelafonte: Sing Your Song: The Music, a compilation of some of his mostprized recordings which serves as a kind of musical companion to the film andthe book. The album's 16 tracks featureselections from his earliest efforts through to some of his later work. It includes classic Belafonte like the"Banana Boat Song," "Sylvie," and "Jump Down, SpinAround." There is the plaintivelullaby like "Scarlet Ribbons" and the raucous "Man Smart (WomanSmarter)." There are the calypsofavorites "Jamaica Farewell," "Mama Look A Boo Boo," "Cocoanut Woman," and of course"Matilda."

Theset includes "My Angel," a duet with Miriam Makeba sung in Swahiliand a comic duet, "A Hole in the Bucket," with Odetta from his 1959TV special, Tonight With Belafonte. "Island in the Sun" was written for the film in which thesinger starred. The latest songsincluded are the title song and "Can't Cross Over" from his 1977Turn the World Around album.

Forthose unfamiliar with the singer's work, this album has a generous selection ofhis best. You couldn't ask for a betterintroduction. For those of us who haveloved him for years, it offers a good opportunity to replace some of those worndown scratched LP's with the sounds of our youth. Either way this album is a joy.

TV Review: American Masters - Woody Allen: A Documentary

2011-11-14T08:11:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

To look at the short 'shlumpy' septuagenarian hiding under afloppy hat as he makes his way about the Brooklyn streets of his youth, it'shard to think of him as the model of the comic genius. To listen to his self effacing comments onhis life's work, it's hard to imagine him in the role of the dynamo filmmakerwho has managed to turn out a film a year for longer than many of us have spenton this earth. To hear the roster ofcinema greats and near greats who come to praise him as a great collaborator,tolerant director and sensitive writer, it's difficult to reconcile theirdescription with the director who makes casting decisions in seconds and firesactors he is unhappy with. To listen tohis quick witted dead pan quips, theexistential angst he claims as a world view seems ludicrous.

This is the paradoxical portrait of Woody Allen thatdirector Robert Weide paints in American Masters—Woody Allen: ADocumentary that premieres on PBS in two parts, Sunday, November 20from 9-11 and Monday, November 21 from 9-10:30. Weide, an award winning filmmaker, has directed , written and produced in a variety of combinations documentaries onMort Sahl, W.C. Fields and Lenny Bruce among others. Most recently, after his 1999 comedy special Larry David: Curb Your Enthusiasm for HBO, he has served asthe director and executive of the spin-off series that has been running foreight seasons. He is a man whounderstands comedy and knows how to work with comedians. Perhaps this is why the notoriously publicityshy Allen was willing to provide him with the kind of access necessary to makethis film. If so, Allen made a wisedecision.

Not only is Allen willing to sit down and talk about hischildhood, his parents, his various wives, although there is only a mention ofhis current family, and his career, but he even has nice things to say aboutMia Farrow, at least as far as her abilities as an actress are concerned. As far as other family matters are concernedthe film talks about them, but Allen does not.

He talks about how he began his career as a young highschool student writing jokes for news paper columnists and graduated to writingfor TV shows and comedians. He explainshow he was turned into a stand-up performer despite his queasiness about gettingup on stage. Weide intersperses clipsfrom some of his early stage and TV appearances; Allen may have been unsure ofhimself in his own eyes, but one thing for sure he was funny. Clips from his stints with Dick Cavitt arehilarious; hilarious enough to make you wish he had somehow found the time tokeep doing stand-up. While Weide doesmention his playwriting, and there are some clips from Play It Again,Sam, that and his fiction writing get short shrift. It is his career in film that gets the bulkof the discussion, and how can you blame Weide? If your choice is between the New Yorker and PenelopeCruz, there really isn't much of a choice.

He talks about how he got involved with movies and hisunhappiness with what the studios did with his first film, What's NewPussycat?, which led to his demand that he be given complete controlover his future projects. Thedocumentary then goes on to examine his development as a filmmaker through hisearly sketch-like comic turns to his great character driven comedies and hisattempts at more serious drama. It looksat his successes; it looks at his failures. It interviews people involved in the films, and it gets him to talkabout what he was trying to do and about what he thought he actuallyaccomplished. If the people he workedwith—the Diane Keatons and the Scarlet Johanssons, the Sean Penns and the ChrisRocks—are generally effusive, in their comments, Allen, himself, always gives the impressionthat he didn't do all that much. If hehas one of those Hollywood egos, he does his best to hide it.

While the film follows fairly conventional documentarytropes—talking heads, family photos, film and video clips, when you havetalking heads like the actors from Allen's films and clips from Loveand Death and Manhattan conventional tropes are nothing to sneezeat. Besides although the spine of thefilm is generally chronological, Weide is perfectly willing to break into thenarrative to make a point or add a current perspective on something thathappened in the past. It is a neatlyconstructed with an insight, wit and intelligence worthy of its subject.

TV Review: Top Chef - Season 9

2011-11-13T13:43:00.001-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

When 39 chefs showed up in Texas for the premiere episode ofthe latest edition of Bravo's culinary reality hit Top Chef,the show's faithful had to know that change was afoot. In eight previous seasons the show had alwaysstarted with a number of contestants in the teens. Once in awhile they'd find a way to eliminatesomeone immediately, but 39 chefs meant that either we were in for one hell ofa long season or something new was going on. Turns out that season nine was going to begin with a series of cookoffs, and only 16 of the chefs were actually going to get to compete on theshow. Fans were going to be treated to akind of pre-competition competition.

All well and good, the chefs were divided into three groupsand rules were announced. The firstgroup was introduced and given a task. They cooked, and then presented their dishes to the three judges. A majority decided if the chef deserved to gofurther, go home, or cook one more time in a kind of consolation round. Each group would go through a similarroutine. One of the judges changed foreach group. Chefs were sent home forfailing to get their food on the plate; chefs were sent packing for overcookedshrimp. The very first chef was senthome for butchering his butchering. Theywaded through two groups on the first episode, the third and the consolationgroup on the second to get to the chosen 16. It seemed little more than an attempt to squeeze two more episodes outof a popular show—no harm, no foul.

Until the end of the second episode that is: perhaps takinga cue from Survivor's "Redemption Island," itturns out that the end for at least two of the chefs isn't the end at all. They are going to be given a shot at cookingtheir way back, not quite onto the show, but into a weekly competition with theshow's loser. The winner will keepcooking, possibly all the way into the finals, as long as they keepwinning—this in a segment called Last Chance Kitchen!. Fine, like "Redemption Island," itcould add a little spice to a show that might be getting bland as it ages. As an innovation it doesn't seemunreasonable.

Except for one thing: Last ChanceKitchen!, it turns out is not being broadcast on TV. No, as the show ends, viewers are teased withthe news of the competition and then told to go over to Bravo.com to see whathappens. Bad idea: first of all as someof the chat indicated those of us who rushed to the website had a littletrouble finding the segment (a problem that seems remedied as I write). Secondly the competition—the two chefs made apizza—was really too short to create any drama. The whole episode lasted a little more than five minutes. But most importantly, if Last ChanceKitchen! never becomes a partof the regular show, someone, like the winner of this first test could actuallywin Top Chef without ever appearing to TV audience until theend of the season. It is, after all, asthe website announces a secret competition.

Now while the comments on the website seem to indicate thatmany of those who took the trouble to go on over, have no problem with theidea—indeed many seem to like it just fine, I think the secret needs to bespilled. The popularity of this show isbased not really on how well the chefs cook. Let's face it, the TV audience has no idea how well they cook. We can't taste their dishes. The popularity of the show is in theattachments we form with individual chefs because of their personalities. We root for those we like; we root againstthose we dislike. In some sense how theycook, while it may be important for Tom and Padma, is irrelevant. The show's producers seem to understandthis. They managed to give quite a bitof air time to Andrew the Texas chef who it turns out is the last man sent topack his knives and who turns up as the Last Chance Kitchen!winner for his cheese-less pizza.

The question is how are they going to keep up the interestin him or in future winners if they keep it secret. Second chances for losing contestants are afine idea. It is working well forSurvivor. They needto find a way to incorporate it into the regular show. Perhaps have done so and we'll see it workingout next week. If not, it is somethingthat needs to be rethought.

Music Review: Bess Rogers - Out of the Ocean

2011-11-10T11:34:00.001-08:00

Originally published at Blogcritics.org.

After launching a successful Kickstarter campaign with adynamite video to raise the funds for her second full length project, songwriting pop/folk/punk rocker Bess Rogers is out with the results. Out of the Ocean is in areal sense a concept album. Rogersexplains that her inspiration came from Your Inner Fish, abook by paleontologist Neil Shubin, which takes a compelling look at humanevolution. Oliver Sacks describes thebook as "an intelligent, exhilarating, and compelling scientific adventurestory, one which will change forever how you understand what it means to behuman." Rogers notes that the"book is about our evolution from life as far back as pre-historic fishand microbes and how that has affected our bodies and our lives now." The book, she says, obsessed her:"I started to look at everything we do in life as a product ofevolution, and many of the songs on this record were inspired by that idea."

While it is certainly worthwhile to know about Rogers'inspiration, it does tend to channel response to the album. This can be a good thing, but it can alsocreate something of a problem. In my owncase, the more I listened to the songs, the more evolution inspired content Idiscovered. The more I discovered, themore I looked for. I began to lose sight of the music, and over intellectualize,ending up with a first draft critique of her remark about "many" ofthe songs being inspired by the idea that went like this:

"Many" may be something of an understatement. My own sense is that not only every one ofthe eleven songs on the album has been inspired by her obsession but that eventheir order on the record reflects an evolutionary theme. In a sense what Rogers has done is to create ametaphoric analogy between human physical evolution and the evolution ofemotional relationships. As humanityevolved physically, individuals evolve emotionally in a kind of variation ofontogeny recapitulating phylogeny. Justa few examples: The disc opens with a little introduction of less than a minutecalled "One Step Free," which gets the speaker out of the depths ofthe ocean and leads into "Standing Tall" where "a little bit oflove" keeps her dry, keeps her alive and fostering evolutionary growth."Weak Link" deals with a kind of smothering enabling love thatweakens its object and prevents it from becoming part of the evolutionarychain.

You get the idea. This kind of academic gibberish, even if true, which is debatable atbest, is little more than pompous posturing. The song lyrics are available on Bess Roger's website. Readers are welcome to check them out anddecide what they all mean for themselves without third party mediation. Besideswhen you come right down to it, there are some really fine songs on this album,whether they are related to the evolutionary theme, or whether they're not,they still make for some mighty fine listening.

"In the Waves" is a kind of other worldly mermaidsong that seems to offer an escape from the darkness and pain of the earthlyworld. "Math and Science"looks at the physical underpinnings of emotions like love, and happily assertsthat whatever the reasons, love is a lot of fun: even if it's "all justmath and science/I will offer my compliance." "I'll Be Gone" rocks with thepassion of love gone bad. The album endswith two acoustic jewels—a softly beautiful "Second Chance" and"Brick by Brick" which begins softly and then builds to an anthemiccrescendo. A pop flavored"Anchor" with a theme that contrasts with the point of "WeakLink" is available for download on the singer's website.

Rogers sings and plays a variety of different instruments ondifferent tracks from ukulele and electric guitar to Moog synthesizer tomelodia. Chris Kuffner, who produced thealbum and joined in the writing of "Math and Science," also plays anumber of different instruments, as does keyboard player SaulSimon-MacWilliams. Elliot Jacobson andAdam Christgau are on percussion on various tracks. Other contributors include—Ingrid Michaelsonand Allie Moss (vocals), Ian Axel (piano on "Anchor") and Dave Eggar(cello).

Whether you want toindulge in fish out of water philosophizing or you prefer listening to somefine songs with tuneful wit, Out of the Ocean is an albumthat deserves your attention.

Book Review: A Dangerous Method, by John Kerr

2011-11-09T08:21:00.000-08:00

Originally published at Blogcritics.org.

Don't be mislead by the fact that John Kerr's AMost Dangerous Method now re-titled A DangerousMethod has been made into a movie starring Viggo Mortensen, MichaelFassbender and Keira Knightley into thinking the book is some sort of romanticnovel. It is not. Don't be deceived by the cover of the newlyreleased Vintage paperback which plants Knightley firmly between Fassbender andMortensen into thinking this is the story of some epic love triangle. It is not. The book is not fiction. There issomething that might qualify as a love story, but it is less the centralconcern of the book than it is an interesting sidelight.

That said, what, then, is it? A Dangerous Method is aserious historical account of one of the most significant relationships in thedevelopment of the theory of psychoanalysis, the friendship and eventual animositybetween perhaps the two most important figures of the movement, Sigmund Freudand Carl Jung. It traces thatrelationship through their letters and their writings, and through the writingsof their colleagues and critics. Itshows how they attempted to foster the growth of the discipline, how theirideas developed and how those developed ideas and their outsized personalities graduallypulled them apart. Their collaborationbegan in 1907 by 1913 they were hardly on speaking terms.

This is not a new story. The quarrel between the two great theorists has been explained before,perhaps not in the same kind of detail, but explained nonetheless. What is new is the emphasis on the roleplayed by Sabina Spielrein, the young Russian woman who first became a patientand mistress of Jung's, then a psychoanalyst herself, and a confidante ofFreud's. Spielrein came to the Swissclinic where Jung was practicing for treatment of what seems to have been"psychotic hysteria." In thecourse of the treatment, she, as it seems many patients do, developed aromantic attachment to her therapist, and Jung didn't manage to maintain hisprofessional cool. Now while, Kerrdemonstrates that that romance and the psychic themes resulting from it playedan important role in the formulation of some of Jung's ideas, ideas that wereto result in the eventual break with Freud, it is the ideas that are the focusof the book, not the love affair. Thepoint to be made here is that this is a study of ideas, not a soap opera.

Indeed for those with no familiarity with these ideas thebook may be tough sledding. Kerr is atrained clinical psychologist, and he doesn't hesitate to use the jargon of thetrade. "Phylogeneticinheritance" comes trippingly from his pen along with such other felicitousphrases as "the clinical phenomenology of neuroses," "thepsychological structure of introversion," and the "temporary effluxesof sexuality." Certainly there is nothing wrong with this kind oflanguage, but it does not exactly make for an easy read for the generalreader. Add to this a cast of thousands(excuse the hyperbole), a gaggle of psychologists and psychoanalysts from allover the world who are referred to throughout the book, and who are very hardto keep track of if they are little more than names. It is one thing when you're talking aboutwell known theorists like William James, Ernest Jones and Alfred Adler, it'squite another story when you're talking about Ludwig Binswanger, Eugen Bleulerand Josef Breuer. It is not that thesemen are insignificant or unimportant; it is simply that they are not householdnames and there are so many of them.

To be clear, this is an excellent book, filled withinteresting information. It hasexcellent analyses and critiques of some of the seminal ideas of some of themost original thinkers of the early part of the twentieth century. It provides a compelling look at thepersonality and character of the central figures and shows how their work wasaffected by it. It looks at their flaws;it looks at their merits, and it makes considered judgments. And over its intellectual history itsuperimposes the narrative of a young woman who became involved with two of thecentury's giants and may never have quite gotten the recognition she deserved. It is simply not a book to breeze through onthe beach.

DVD Review: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

2011-11-08T07:31:00.000-08:00

Review first published at Blogcritics.

John Le Carré speaking in a 2002 interview included as abonus feature on the DVD release of the BBC's 1997 production of his Cold Warspy novel Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy described ArthurHopcraft's dramatization as perhaps the best realized adaptation of any of his novels. Too often authors are disappointed with whathappens to their work in the hands of others. The demands of popular cinema and television are rarely the same asthose of fiction; changes are inevitable. Though there are those times when the adaptation is better than theoriginal, the real question for the author at least is how well those changeskeep to the spirit of the original, and there is little question that this sixpart mini-series is just about as close to the original as any author couldreasonably expect.

Of course fidelity to source is no guarantee of dramatic quality. Sir Alec Guinness and an ensemble cast offine British actors given a taut script and stylish direction are the guaranteeof that. The story concerns the searchfor a mole in the upper echelon of the Circus, the secret British spyagency. The title refers to thechildren's rhyme which is used as a code for the four major suspects. Guinness plays George Smiley, forced intoretirement after what seems like a major foul up with an agent sent behind theIron Curtain, and brought back to investigate the agency for thegovernment. Smiley, the hero of other Le Carré novels, isnot the swashbuckling James Bond stereotype. Old and weary, he is as unlikely a hero for a spy thriller as you'relikely to find. He seems more like amild mannered civil servant than a secret agent. What he lacks physically,however, he makes up for with brains and dogged determination. Like Tennyson's "Ulysses," thoughover the hill, he is still ready "to strive, to seek, to find and not toyield." It is a role made forGuinness, and he is masterful. Hisperformance alone is worth the price of the DVD set.

He is not alone. Fromthe opening prelude of the first episode, when the four main suspects individuallymake their entrance into a meeting room, each actor making the kinds ofspecific choices that go to the heart of their characters, it is clear thatthis is a cast that knows what it is doing. The names may be less familiar to American audiences, Ian Richardson,Michael Aldridge, Bernard Hepton, and Terence Rigby, but they are typicalexamples of the high quality so often characteristic of British acting. They manage to invest their characters withboth a lifelike realism and an indelible individuality, and this is true forthe rest of the cast as well. You caneven get a look at a bearded Patrick Stewart as a Russian agent in a scenewhere he never utters a line of dialogue in the series' fourth episode.

A contemporary remake of the novel with Gary Oldman asSmiley and including Colin Firth, Tom Hardy and John Hurt among others, alreadya box office hit in England, is scheduled to open in the U.S. in December. With the great success of the TV mini-series,it has a lot to live up to. It does getan R rating for some sexuality and nudity, both qualities absent from the '97production, but there are certainly elements in the novel that might justifytheir inclusion. More importantly itseems to have avoided turning Le Carré's novel into a thriller of the Bournevariety. And although some may complainthat Tinker, Tailor, Soldier,Spy--1997 and 2011 are both thrillers without thrills, if the newversion is as adept in its creation of character as its ancestor, it will go along way to demonstrating the dramatic value of a more adult take on the espionagegenre.

Book Review: The 50 Funniest American Writers, edited by Andy Borowitz

2011-11-07T07:08:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Oddly enough, readers of The 50 Funniest AmericanWriters according to Andy Borowitz will quickly discover that onlyone of the writings of this superlative group included in the anthology seemsto have been published prior to the 20^th century. Although eleven ofthe writers were born in the 19^th century, they don't seem to havegotten funny until the after the new century turned. It would seem that other than Mark Twain whomanaged to be funny in 1879, Americans were too busy doing other things to befunny. Still, it may be somewhatcurmudgeonly to voice any complaint about Borowitz's selections in the light ofthe introductory essay in which he points out that it is really impossible tocreate a "funniest" list that will satisfy everyone, so he reallydidn't try. These are simply writings bywriters that make him laugh. Besides,the only reason he even suggested the project was because "best oflists" were sure fire money makers. In effect don't complain, make your own damn list.

Clearly criticism of what is not included is off limits, butso it would seem is criticism of what is included. You can't say that some of the pieces are notall that funny. First of all Borowitzthinks they're funny, and second of all these are a collection of pieces by the"funniest" writers, not a collection of funny pieces (despite whatthe unwary reader might expect). Youcan't say that some of these writers—Sinclair Lewis, Phillip Roth, CharlesPortis--may have written a funny piece or two or even a dozen, but when shoveis met by push their claim to fame is not their power to create laughter. I mean how do you define funniest? Is it the man who wrote one really funnyessay, funnier that the woman who wrote a gaggle of moderately funny essays anda short story that got a few chuckles?

There is no point in going on without seeming little morethan a quibbler without a sense of humor. Under the circumstance the only reasonable course of action is todescribe what does lie between the covers and let you, dear reader, come toyour own conclusions. Borowitz limitedhis selections to prose: essays, short fiction, excerpts from longer works likememoirs and novels—no poetry, no dramatic works, no stand-up routines. There is satire, both political andsocial. There is parody. There are witty gems and attempts at wittygems. There is humor intellectual and humor sophomoric.

Of the 50 selections there are some that stand out (thereare some that fall flat but with 50 to chose from, the dreary few are forgivable). The anthology begins with Mark Twain'sconfessions of his wicked deeds as a prelude to making a presidential run andends with Larry Wilmore's advice to some future president about how toapologize to blacks for slavery without really apologizing. Between the two there is Sinclair Lewis'ssatiric account of crass middle class culture in a section from his novelBabbitt, the O. Henry story that could have been the modelfor Home Alone, "The Ransom of Red Chief," and aRing Lardner description of a conversation between two old acquaintances whohave nothing to say to each other. Thereis a parody of noir detective fiction by S. J. Perelman and political satire byMolly Ivins. There's a clever bit aboutdeploying vowels to Bosnia from The Onion and an overly longpiece about stereotyping from the National Lampoon.

My own highlights: "Vacation '58" a story by JohnHughes (yes, the movie guy) which was to become the basis of theNational Lampoon vacation series. George Carlin has a rant about the misuse oflanguage by broadcasters called "If I Were in Charge of the Networks"that is both funny and informative. Asection from Lenny Bruce's How to Talk Dirty and InfluencePeople destroys any idea that a comic's life on the road is in anyway glamorous. Woody Allen's send up ofthe Mafia, "A Look at Organized Crime" is a good example of hisearlier work and very funny. Peter deVries story of one man's attempt to get his wife to play straight man for himat dinner parties had me laughing out loud. This has to stop: Dorothy Parker, James Thurber, E. B. White, HunterThompson, Bernie Mac, David Sedaris—if you can't find something to make youlaugh, you have a problem.

In an interview on NPR, Borowitz talked about The50 Funniest American Writers as a bathroom book. I don't know about bathroom, but it isprobably a book you want to dip into from time to time, read an essay here, astory there. Reading it all at oncetends to get you jaded. You begin tosuffer from the law of diminishing returns, and suddenly things aren't quitethat funny. You may not want to keep thebook in your bathroom, but you might well want to keep it handy and read apiece or two to take a break from War and Peace.

Music Review: Phil Collins - Hello, I Must Be Going

2011-11-06T15:17:00.000-08:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.org

There are at least three good reasons for classic rocklovers to take a hard look at Audio Fidelity's latest release in its 24K+GoldCompact Disc series, Phil Collins' Hello, I Must BeGoing. First of all there isthe music. Second there is the soundquality. Third, even if you think allCollins' music sounds the same, the discs in this Audio Fidelity numbered andlimited series may be collectibles waiting to happen.

First things first, the album's ten tracks are samples ofCollins at his dramatic, albeit resentful best. If you like what Collins does, and while it may not be hip to admit it,I have to say I do, how can you not want a pristine version of the ultimatebitter kiss off anthem, "I Don't Care Anymore?" The album is filled with a lot of the samekind of venom nurtured art: "I Cannot Believe It's True," "DoYou Know, Do You Care?," "It Don't Matter to Me." There is no muse like a woman, even one youare divorcing. You have to wonder who itis the singer is listening to in "Thru These Walls." How the upbeat cover of the Supreme's"You Can't Hurry Love" managed to make its way onto the album is opento question, but it does at the least offer something of an antidote to the overallsweet bitterness.

The sound quality on these Audio Fidelity discs isexceptional. As their website describesit, their process replaces the "irregular plated surfaces of standardaluminum discs" with a perfected layer of 24K gold free from "anytype of physical defect." Masteredin this case by noted audiophile music restoration specialist, Steve Hoffmanthe CD aims for what he calls a "lifelike" sound. In answer to a question on his website,Hoffman says: "I want that 'breath of life.' That’s what I want. If itsounds like a fake approximation of nothing that’s alive—that is not it for me.I want it to sound like, (and it doesn’t matter if it is Buddy Holly or Blood,Sweat and Tears or The Doors) I want it to sound like they could be standing inthe same room where you are listening." While there are those who argue there are superior re-masteringprocesses, the sound on the Audio Fidelity discs is impressive enough for me.

Finally therewill be those who, as I suggested in my review of the Audio Fidelity release ofJames Taylor's Sweet Baby James, will not even bother to cutopen the shrink wrap on their CD. Limited edition, numbered, and nestled in what the manufacturer calls"deluxe packaging with see-through slip cases," these discs are primecandidates for collectors. A quick check on eBay shows that there is indeed amarket for past issues. The Band'sself-titled album, for example, is on sale for $89.99. Given contemporary interest rates, therecould be worse ways to invest your money.

Seriously, theAudio Fidelity 24K + Gold series offers a selection of some of the best classicrock mastered with expert care. Hoffmanis on record as saying his goal is for the music to sound"alive." As far as this ear isconcerned, it is a goal he has reached.

Some Thoughts on Kate Atkinson's Jackson Brodie Novels

2011-11-05T08:38:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at http://blogcritics.org/books/article/book-review-started-early-took-my/

Early on British crime novelist Kate Atkinson found aformula for success and she has followed it with consistency ever since. If it works, and believe me it does work, whylook for trouble. Her first novel,Behind the Scenes at the Museum won the Whitbread Book ofthe Year in 1995, but it was with the introduction of Jackson Brodie, theprivate detective with a tough guy exterior masking a compassionate inner nature, in the 2004 CaseHistories that she hit her stride. Three other Brodie novels have followed; each garnering their share ofboth critical and popular success. Indeed, the first three of the books have been adapted for TV by the BBCin the six part series Case Histories that is currentlyrunning on PBS.

Essentially the Atkinson formula involves weaving together avariety of seemingly disparate story lines and then showing how in fact theywere all somehow related. Think ThomasHardy's famous poem "The Convergence of the Twain." You've got the Titanic; you've got theiceberg: two separate strains moving inexorably to their meeting at sea. Reading Atkinson is like working on a puzzle,trying to figure out how she is going to weave it all together, and it isfascinating how she manages to do it—the first few times, anyway.

I first came across Atkinson when I reviewed the second ofthe novels in the Brodie series, One Good Turn. I was duly fascinated, fascinated enough torun out for a copy of Case Histories. In 2008 when her third,When WillThere Be Good News, came out I was still on board even though, bythis time, there was little surprise that all the diverse strains came togetherat the end. It was only a question of how she would get it done. Still, you had to admire the author'singenuity and skill.

Having just finished Started Early, Took MyDog, Atkinson's latest, I must admit to something less than fascination. It is not that the book is poorly done. It is certainly as well put together as herothers, perhaps even better. Set inLeeds and moving about the Yorkshire area there are the obligatory diversestrains. Jackson Brodie is searching forthe birth parents of an adopted woman living in New Zealand. A retired police woman, Tracy Waterhouse,buys a child of a local prostitute. Years ago when Tracy was first starting police discovered a child in thelocked apartment of a murdered prostitute, and the investigation was handledoddly by upper level official. Anelderly actress working on a locally shot TV series is having significantproblems with her memory. Some of theconnections seem obvious, but of course things are never quite thatsimple. There will be, trust me, therewill be something to surprise.

The problem is that by now, at least for Atkinson followers,the thrill of that surprise is probably gone. You expect it. You know it's going to happen, so when it comes, itdoesn't have the same kind of shock value it had the first time. It's not that you've figured out how thingsare related. You may have sorted outsome of the relationships, but even knowing they were all going to cometogether, you would have had trouble with some of them. It is simply that knowing the ship and theiceberg are going to meet one more time is not quite as exciting as it was thefirst time, the first two times, or even the first three times.

This is not to say that there aren't other qualities toadmire. Atkinson createsmulti-dimensional characters rooted firmly in reality. She is interested in human relationshipsbeyond those integral to the plot. Shecarefully evokes a sense of place. Shehas a sense of humor, and she manages to move the narrative along withalacrity. Reading her books is always apleasure. It is simply that the bestreading of one of Atkinson's Brodie novels is the first one. The others are fine, but there is nothinglike the first time.

Book Review: "One Good Turn," by Kate Atkinson

2011-11-04T07:54:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at The Compulsive Reader.

One Good Turn, the latest tour de force from Kate Atkinson, raises some interesting questions both about fictional genre and structure. First of all there is the question of just what exactly is it. Pity the poor bookseller that has to decide in what company to shelve the novel with: mysteries and thrillers or fiction. In its subject matter the book would seem to belong with the genre titles. On the other hand, in the way it treats that subject matter, literary fiction would seem more appropriate. More often than not, genre fiction–mystery, romance, oater–tends to the formulaic, the stereotyped and the conventional. Readers have certain expectations and the genre writer is honor bound to meet those expectations. Every once in awhile an author comes along and uses the substance of the genre, but eschews the formula, indeed, takes the reader’s expectations and turns them on their head, in effect using the genre to critique (as one of Atkinson’s characters critiques her mother’s dinner) itself.

One Good Turn has much of the same kind of murder and mayhem that fills the pages of the conventional thriller. It has many of the same character types: a hulking neanderthal goon, a wily hit man, a persistent ex cop-ex detective with a yen for police work, a mysterious foreign beauty, a crooked real estate tycoon. It begins with an enigmatic act of road rage that balloons into a succession of seemingly random complications that eventually turn out to be not quite as random as one might have thought. But then along with these more or less conventional elements, there are characters like the wife of the unscrupulous builder who is developed well beyond the type. She is a woman who seems to have "gone from youth to old age and had somehow managed to omit the good bit in between." Her life was a "series of rooms that she walked into when every one else had just left." She bakes Christmas logs that no one else will eat. She likes to bid on eBay and be in at the end of the sale. She makes her own chutney from gooseberries she picked herself. There is the mystery writer whose "life had been lived in some kind of neutral gear. . . .He had never strived for greatness, and his reward had been a small life." Unmarried, he daydreams of a wife and family out of the forties. He is prissy in his personal habits, doesn’t smoke, drink or eat meat. These kinds of character details do not normally make it into genre fiction, yet they are the kinds of details that bring a character to life. Moreover these are not incidental characters. They are central to the novel, as significant, if not more so, than their counterparts in more conventional fiction. Even the more typical of Atkinson’s creations are not quite drawn to type. Her ex-detective is tough and smart, but not quite tough enough and not always as smart as he needs to be. There is a bright female police inspector who is the unwed mother of a fourteen year old shop lifter. In general her characters have a rounded lifelike quality that distances from the norm of the generic mystery.

In a kind of meta- critical fashion, Atkinson has Martin Canning, her "small lived" mystery writer constantly complaining about the junk he is writing, even including puerile passages by way of illustration. Nina Riley, the heroine of his series provides a solution to the crime: "So you see, Bertie, the murder weapon that killed the laird was actually an icicle taken from the overhang on the dovecote. The murderer simply threw it in the kitchen stove once he had used it–that’s why the police have been unable to find it." When in a jam: "Well, Bertie, this is quite a scrape we’ve got ourselves into here, isn’t it?" Canning wants to write something where every page is a "dialectic between passion and reason." He wants to write something that goes beyond mere escapist entertainment. Now while the portrait of the successful writer of popular fiction who wants to chuck it all and write serious literature is not particularly novel in itself, it does highlight the differences between the conventional genre and the work we are in the process of reading. Well, Bertie, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.

These differences are further highlighted by the structure of the novel, a structure conveniently symbolized in the story itself by the recurrent image of the Russian nesting dolls which Martin had purchased on a trip to the Soviet Union: "But mostly there were dolls, thousands of dolls, legions upon legions of matryoshka, not just the ones you could see but also the ones you couldn’t–dolls within dolls, endlessly replicating and diminishing, like an infinite series of mirrors. Martin imagined writing a story, a Borges-like construction where each story contained the kernel of the next and so on. Not Nina Riley, obviously–linear narratives were as much as she could cope with–but rather something with intellectual cachet (something good)." What is being described here is, in fact, a paradigm for the structure ofOne Good Turn, where what we have are stories containing the kernels of other stories, where we are not immediately privy to the connections.

Atkinson presents the reader with a series of characters who seem to have little to do with one another, only to gradually reveal deeper and more significant relationships. Some might argue that what she provides is merely a series of coincidences, but she is prepared for that. Coincidences, one of the characters asserts, are merely events waiting for an explanation. There are no coincidences; there are connections. We may not always see the connections between events, but those connections are always there. In effect this is a philosophy of coincidence. One is reminded of the nineteenth century historian and social critic, Thomas Carlyle, who argued that all human activity is connected, that every action of every being has its effect on everything else, were we but able to see it. The advantage of the novelist is that she can show these connections, these dolls nesting within dolls.

The structure of One Good Turn reminds me most of last years’s Academy Award winning film, Crash. A diverse group of seemingly unrelated characters are spotlighted in separate scenes. The film moves back and forth between these sets of characters, until gradually relationships begin to unfold, relationships that become more and more significant the more we learn.

One Good Turn is set in Edinburgh during the height of the end of summer tourist season. It is the time of the Edinburgh Festival, the Fringe Festival, the Book Festival as well as the Royal Tattoo. Crowds of people jam the streets and the hotels. But while Atkinson is herself a resident of Scotland, her picture of Edinburgh and its festivals is anything but flattering. The Tattoo is a charade for the tourists. The Fringe is as often as not characterized by pretentious work in shabby venues, second rate has beens, disgruntled American high school students "playing The Caucasian Chalk Circle to an audience of two men. . . ." Up and down the Royal Mile from Holyrood to the Castle, she presents little to warm the hearts of the local Chamber of Commerce (if they have such organizations in Scotland). The Edinburgh she describes is not the most charming of places.

Her prose is rich in irony and allusion. Of a patient in a coma, his wife muses about the possibility of "recycling" his body parts. Fellatio sounds like an Italian musical term. Children go to school in the late summer heat because in the sixteenth century John Knox "saw a kid bowling along the street with a hoop. . ., and he thought, that child should be suffering in a hot, airless classroom in a uniform theat makes him ridiculous." She fills her pages with references to both high culture and pop, the classic and the contemporary: The Cowboy Junkies and the Goldberg Variations, Ozymandias and Harry Potter, The Twilight Zone and William Blake, MTV and Agatha Christie. Her prose is lively and contemporary, never banal.

One Good Turn is a book filled with turns and surprises. It will keep you turning pages, and it will get you thinking–surely the best of two worlds. More than likely it will get you, as it got me, itching to get a look at the rest of Kate Atkinson’s work.

Music Review: Sir Roland Hanna - "Colors From a Giant's Kit"

2011-11-01T13:10:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at http://blogcritics.org/music/article/music-review-sir-roland-hanna-colors/

Back many more years than I would care to remember, I took acollege music appreciation course called "Piano Literature of the RomanticPeriod." Neither a pianist myself,nor even particularly knowledgeable about music in general, I thought it wastime to learn something about the music written for an instrument I had alwaysloved to listen to. The course turnedout to be a comprehensive introduction to some of the most thrilling music everwritten—some of it for piano and orchestra, most for solo piano. There is something about the solo piano inthe hands of a skilled artist playing the works of master composers that canpaint emotional colors like no other instrument. Think of Rubenstein playing Chopin, Lang Langplaying Beethoven.

If this is true for the classical piano, it is no less truefor the jazz piano, where the artist is as much a creator as he is aperformer. Sir Roland Hanna is just suchan artist. Let me begin by acknowledgingmy ignorance. I had no knowledge ofHanna, until one day an album of his arrived as they say "over thetransom," but once I had listened, it was clear I had been missing a trulyexceptional talent. Colors From a Giant's Kitis a collection of fourteen solo tracks recorded by Hanna before his death in2003. While Hanna may not have theachieved the same kind of public acclaim as some of the more noted jazzpianists—the Keith Jarretts, the Oscar Petersons, the Monks—a little surfingmakes it clear, that he is what is known in the trade as a musician's musician. The people who know know about Hanna. He has played with the Thad Jones-Mel LewisOrchestra and Benny Goodman's band among others. He has accompanied singers like Sarah Vaughnand Al Hibbler. He has composed worksfor the piano and orchestra and has soloed with some of the major classical orchestrasin the country. This was a pianist thatdeserved a lot more attention.

The album is a diverse mix that shows the range of Hanna'smusical interests. There's nice little traditional blues and a modernist take on the old time rag in his owncomposition, "20^th Century Rag." He takes "Cherokee," the swingclassic made famous by Charlie Barnet, and first turns it into a romanticballad before making clear he can swing it as well. He jams his way through jazz standards like"Robbin's Nest," "In a Mellow Tone," and a richly evocativeversion of Billy Strayhorn's "Lush Life." There is an almost impressionistic take onColtrane's "Naima." Then there are his own compositions: the album'stitle song is an upbeat romp. "NatalieRosanne" is a sweet ballad. "AStory Often Told But Seldom Heard" is an eight minute tone poem withechoes of classical modernism.

And in a way this may be the most compelling thing aboutboth Hanna's playing and his composing. His work reverberates with echoes of the classics from a variety oftraditions. Throughout the album youhear the influences of not only "Piano Literature of the Romantic Period,"not only of Liszt and Rachmaninoff, but Satie and Gershwin and probably a bunchof others as well. He takes theseinfluences and mixes them with Scott Joplin and Duke Ellington and he producessomething all his own. As some of themore experimental voices in modern jazz go, he may be a little tame. He may be a little too traditional. But for anyone who finds themselves thrilledwith that Romantic piano music, Sir Roland Hanna (the Sir by the by accordingto Wikipedia is an honorary title bestowed on him by the president of Liberia)is someone you will want to get acquainted with and Colors From aGiant's Kit is a good place to start.

Music Review: Various Artists - ZZ Top: A Tribute from Friends

2011-10-31T14:31:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Covering another artist's hits can be a trickybusiness. If you simply mimic theirperformance, you invite the wrath of those who have made a fetish of theoriginal, while leaving yourself open to the question of why you bothered inthe first place. Who after all needs acheap imitation? If you make the songyour own, you will still rile the fetishists, and you may or may not come upwith something to compete with the original. Still if you do come up short, you will atleast have failed on your own merits. Thechoice seems obvious; the only question is how far from the original should youstray.

In an interview on the Canadian talk show, Paul Simon wasasked about why he chose Aretha Franklin's cover of "Bridge Over TroubledWater" for his new album Songwriter. His answer was that the singer's soulfulrendition was as good as "Artie's." She didn't copy; she created, andshe won a Grammy for it. The greatnessof her performance was that she honored the song as a work of art with morethan one possible interpretation.

ZZ Top: A Tribute from Friends is analbum filled with the kinds of covers that honor the work of "that littleold band from Texas," honor it with performances that may not make youforget the originals, but might have you saying they were as good as Frank'sand Billy's and Dusty's. The "friends"featured on the disc are a mixed bunch of some of the finest on thecontemporary scene and represent a wide range of musical genres from as farapart as Wyclef Jean and Jamey Johnson. And if Jean's "Rough Boy" may be a bit too mannered for sometastes, Johnson does a job on "La Grange" that is eight minutes ofrocking power. He takes the song to another level. It probably didn't hurt that Billy Gibbons issitting in with guitar and vocals.

Of the eleven tracks on the album, some stay closer to home,some stray further away, but each and every one sheds some new light on theband's musical genius. Grace Potter andthe Nocturnals deliver a "Tush" with a whole new point of view (talkabout sexy). Filter's "Gimmie AllYour Lovin'" is a roaring re-imagination of the classic all their own asis Duff McKagen's Loaded's lowdown "Got Me Under Pressure." Daughtry handles the combined "Waitin'for the Bus/Jesus Just Left Chicago" with style. Mick Fleetwood, Steven Tyler, John McVie,and Jonny Lang, calling themselves TheM.O.B., get together to open the album with an all star stab at "SharpDressed Man" that has some really nice energy. Nickelback's "Legs" does fulljustice to the classic. Mastodon's"Just Got Paid," Coheed and Cambria's "Beer Drinkers and HellRaisers" and "Cheap Sunglasses" by Wolfmother round out thealbum. There isn't a loser in the bunch.

The story told aboutthe band's reaction to the idea of the album is that when the ZZ Toptriumvirate was told that a tribute album was in the works, they asked,"Who are we paying tribute to?" How's that for modesty? Want more? "Then we found out that a bunchof great artists were paying tribute to us and we were in disbelief. For the past 40 or so years, all we've doneis get out there and crank it and try to have a good time while doing so. . . .Now comes A Tribute From Friends and we're so delighted thatour music resonates with these great musicians whom we so admire."

ZZ Top has been cranking it out and having a good time. The Friends playing their tributes cranked itout and had a good time. Listen to theCD; you may not crank it out, but you'll have one hell of a good time.

Music Review: Patrizio Buanne - Patrizio

2011-10-28T08:44:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Patrizio Buanne - Patrizio on Blogcritics.

Uncork a bottle of wine. Turn down the lights. Put Patrizio, the latest album from Italian heartthrob, Patrizio Buanne on your stereo if you still have one, your iPod dock, if not. Sit down next to your lady, and wait for her to melt. Clearly that's what the singer intends, and he's got the goods to make it happen. There are some up tempo numbers on the disc, but romance is what Buanne is all about. It is really what he's always been about. He flirts with his audience, sure he jokes at times, sure he teases at times, but flirting—flirting always. And why not? The man is as sexy as they come and he has the voice that makes women swoon, if women still do that, and turns men green with envy (which indeed they still do).

Although some may be disappointed with this new album because it strays quite a bit from the Italian standards that the singer is probably best known for, it is the singer's attempt to broaden his repertoire. He doesn't neglect his bread and butter entirely. There are some songs with something of an Italian pedigree--"Make Love," "Americano" and "Maybe This Summer"—but they are all sung in English. "Never, Never, Never," a lovely duet with Reneé Olstead, does have a couple of verses sung in his native language, and then there is his cover of the Rosemary Clooney classic "Mambo Italiano" which at least has an Italian title and an Italian reference or two if it doesn't quite deliver the romance of the romance language. He doesn't completely ignore his Italian roots, but he might as well have. So If you're looking for "O Sole Mio" or "Al Di La," you're in the wrong place.

On the other hand, if you're looking some very sexy versions of some standards and a newer song or two sung in the best traditions of the romantic crooner, Patrizio is for you. He does a nice job with Patsy Cline's classic, "Crazy," and Bryan Adams' "Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?" reeks with husky passion. "Fly Me to the Moon" is delivered as a smoldering ballad. Dianne Warren's newly written "Why Did You Have to Be?" is right in the singer's wheelhouse. Buanne says he aimed to present his "passion for interpreting any great song—no matter if Italian, American or new." He wanted, he says, to open himself up artistically. Despite the unhappiness of some fans, this is an album that proves he was right.

It is hard to blame an artist for wanting to stretch, to show what he can do. If this album is any example, Patrizio Buanne can do a lot. Sure he is something special with the music of his country and the way he sings it, but what Patrizio shows is that if he keeps at it, he will be just as special with " any great song—no matter if Italian, American or new."

DVD Review: The Hour

2011-10-27T09:24:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics.

Think 60 Minutes mixed with a touch of Broadcast News in a stylish British spy thriller set against the backdrop of the Suez Canal crisis and the Soviet crushing of the Hungarian Revolution in the 50's and you've got a sense of what you're in for in the six episode BBC production The Hour now available on DVD. It's got spies and secret agents. It's got a bit of sex. It's got a bit of betrayal, and it's got shocks and surprises enough to keep you guessing about what's going to happen next. All in all, it is a thriller in the best British tradition.

In the opening episode, the BBC is starting a new hour long investigative news journal called The Hour. Ambitious young beauty, Bel Rowley (Romola Garai) is chosen to produce the show. Her friend, colleague, and unacknowledged love interest, the earnest idealistic Freddy Lyon ( Ben Whishaw) comes along with her as a reporter although her had hoped for a more significant role. The cynical Hector Manning (Dominic West), less qualified professionally but with a made for TV face signs on as the show's anchor. If this doesn't remind you of Holly Hunter, Albert Brooks and William Hurt, check out Broadcast News again. Manning, although married, is not above making the moves on an attractive woman, and so you've got the perfect set up for a nice little love triangle. Then when a terrified old friend pleads for his help, Lyon becomes involved in soviet espionage, coded messages, traitorous moles and political intrigue, all played out against the production of the new TV show and the budding romantic rivalry.

Whishaw, with his slight almost undernourished physique, is a most unlikely hero for the typical thriller, but as a journalist with a passion for his craft and its importance in a democracy he is entirely convincing. Garai as a woman trying to make her way in a man's world is appropriately feisty even if it is hard to see how she can succumb so easily to West's seductions. Clearly he is a charmer, but one would think someone in her position would be more hardened to that sort of thing. West, no doubt best known for his performance in The Wire, is at his best as a self centered ladies man. They are joined by an excellent supporting cast of low key British character actors. Anton Lesser turns in an effective job as the network's head for the newly developing show. Juliet Stevenson is intense as a stoically bereaved mother, and Tim Pigott-Smith is subdued as her guilt ridden husband. Julian Rhind-Tutt is appropriately slimy as the government's liaison with the media. Anna Chancellor is right at home as a hard-nosed foreign correspondent.

Set back in the 50's, The Hour will, of course, invite comparison with Mad Men and this season's Mad Men wannabees. And, indeed, there is plenty of cigarette smoking. Like Mad Men, The Hour is very good at holding the mirror up to the period. The From the typically amateurish set for the new show to the small screen TV's scattered through clubs, offices and homes, from the flowing dresses, the hair styles and the bright toned makeup, the show creates a sense of time reminiscent of the films of the period. Moreover the newsreels and the references to the events of the day all over the world—the Eisenhower election in the U.S., Israel's invasion of Egypt, Anthony Eden's government—give the show as convincing a historical reality almost as if were made at the time.

Included on the two disc DVD set are two extra features: a behind the scenes look at the production and a making of special.

Music Review: Paul Simon - Songwriter

2011-10-26T19:14:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

In celebration of Paul Simon's 70^th birthday on October 13, Sony/Legacy is releasing Songwriter, a two disc set of 32 songs spanning the composer's fabled career from the sixties to the present. The songs on the album were chosen by Simon himself, and although they include a number of his most famous pieces, this is not a greatest hits collection. Tom Moon, in the liner notes, contends that the album "features commercial landmarks alongside ambitious and often criminally under-appreciated compositions." Now this may be something of an overstatement, but it does, as Moon goes on to explain, allow Simon the opportunity to highlight some of his lesser known songs, songs that are sometimes "overlooked." Whether this will make up for the omission of a ton of fan favorites is problematical.

Disc one, which contains most of the 'hits' that Simon decided to include begins with "The Sound of Silence" from a live 2011 performance where Simon plays some interesting harmonic games with the melody. It is a clear indication that this is not going to be a simple recycling of material. There is of course no Garfunkel and that is unfortunate. This is followed by "The Boxer" from the live concert in Central Park and Aretha Franklin's soulful cover of "Bridge Over Troubled Water," the only cover on the album. Other classics included in the collection are "Mother and Child Reunion," "American Tune," "Kodachrome," and "Still Crazy After All These Years." The first disc ends with three songs from Simon's African collaboration "Graceland," "Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes," and "The Boy in the Bubble." I would, myself, have put in a word for "The Myth of Fingerprints," but I suppose a third and fourth disc would have been necessary for all the songs I would have put in a word for.

The second disc begins with four songs from The Rhythm of the Saints highlighted by the much praised "Spirit Voices" with its Portuguese interpolation by Milton Nascimento. There are a couple of songs from Simon's ill-fated Broadway venture, The Capeman. If the music represented here, the dramatic "Born in Puerto Rico" and the doo wop throwback, "Quality," is any indication, one has to wonder why the show didn't do better. The album ends with selections from his 2011 release So Beautiful or So What including the title song. If the music on this disc is not as well known, it is nonetheless indicative of the composer's range and the continued variety of his interests.

Tom Moon's liner notes provide a lucid critical evaluation of Simon's work. He talks about the composer's lyric brilliance, emphasizing his sense of humor. He stresses the composer's eclectic musical passions. "Simon's songbook," he suggests, "can be appreciated as the journey of restless songwriter searching for new ways to communicate, driven toward new musical settings for his ideas." Simon has never been one to keep repeating his successes. No doubt he could have kept turning out the kind of music that made the duet's name a household word back in the sixties, but that is not the way of the true artist. The true artist is always looking to exceed his grasp.

Paul Simon is the true artist. Songwriter, with its classic songs and its new works that may yet become classic, is simply one more demonstration of that fact. Certainly there will be those that object to this or that inclusion at the expense of this or that omission, but the more one listens to the newer pieces, the more familiar they become, the more likely those objections will disappear.

DVD Review: The Last Happy Day

2011-10-25T18:13:00.000-07:00

This article was first published at Blogcritics

In an interview with Otherzine experimental film maker, Lynne Sachs talks about realizing "that there was a pattern emerging in my work, a rhythm between films that were open to changes brought by the times and films that followed a very clearly defined vision or concept. " Later in the interview she relates what she is trying to do in her films to the avant garde poet, Gertrude Stein's desire to "create provocative ruptures between the sign and the signifier, between the way we are taught to speak (to communicate) and the way we ultimately choose to express ourselves (art)." Sachs says that her aim is to do the same kind of thing with images and sounds, and one way to do this is to get rid of the traditional chronological narrative and instead tell a personal story through patterned imagery.

What she comes up with is illustrated in her recently released DVD of her 2009 documentary essay, The Last Happy Day, which also includes four of her shorter films as well. The Last Happy Day aims to create a portrait of her distant cousin, Alexander (Sandor) Lenard, a Hungarian doctor who had kept his Jewish identity hidden from his family when he married. With the threat from the Nazis growing, he fled to safety in Rome, helped rescue other refugees and eventually began working for the US Army's reconstructing bones of dead American soldiers. Later, fearing a WW III in Europe, he moved to the Brazilian countryside. It was there that he turned out his Latin translation of Winnie the Pooh, a somewhat strange undertaking, but one that was to garner him something more than his five minutes of fame.

Sachs' documentary rejects the normal grammar of the genre. The Last Happy Day uses some historical war footage, sometimes straight, sometimes in negative, sometimes superimposed over other images. There are no expert talking heads. There are two family members who speak, Lenhart's son and his second wife, but their commentary is limited, and the wife an elderly woman points out that what she says may well be untrue. Memory, she adds, often betrays us. She can't always tell truth from fantasy. Instead most of the information comes from Lenhart's letters read as voiceovers. There are shots of contemporary children playacting the Pooh stories, and one of them does some of the background narration as well. All this has the effect of downplaying the narrative and foregrounding the visual imagery.

But for real commitment to visual imagery, two of the shorter films eliminate narrative continuity altogether, substituting a completely visual syntax instead. A Georgic for a Forgotten Planet is a visual homage to Virgil's poem using settings from New York City, juxtaposing images of typical city life with less typical flowers and gardens. One comes away from the film with telling images embedded in the imagination. The enigmatically titled Sound of a Shadow, a collaboration with her husband, takes a similar look at Japan, creating what Sachs calls a "visual haiku." The visual image is the language of both films. It is a language both highly personal and open ended. It is language that can be fraught with meaning for some, meaningless for others.

And therein lies the rub, indeed the rub for much of such experimental work in art. There are those audiences that will have no truck with Gertrude Stein's "ruptures." They want things to maintain their meaning. These are audiences that will have trouble with some of Sachs' work as well. For them a random collection of images will simply be a random collection of images, and nothing else.

That's the nice thing about The Last Happy Day, while it makes its points with arresting images, it gives the viewer a narrative hook to help navigate through them. Everything in the film from the Bach score, to the horror of collecting human bones, to the beauty of the Brazilian countryside, everything is there in support of a personal vision. Nothing seems random.

Music Review: Eddie Daniels and Roger Kellaway - Live at the Library of Congress

2011-10-24T14:02:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Eddie Daniels and Roger Kellaway - Live at the Library of Congress on Blogcritics.

You might be forgiven for thinking that an evening featuring a clarinet and piano duo in a jazz recital might have a limited appeal. It is after all an instrumental combination you're not apt to come across very often. Indeed the clarinet itself has lost something of its cachet since the heydays of Benny Goodman, Woody Herman and Artie Shaw. Well, if you had been thinking that way about clarinetist Eddie Daniels and pianist Roger Kellaway's February 25^th concert recital at the Coolidge Auditorium of the Library of Congress, you would have been wrong—wrong in a big way.

Daniels and Kellaway are two musicians who deserve to be much better known than they are, and the CD release of that February concert by IPO Recordings could do much to remedy that. This is not their first collaboration, they worked together on the critically acclaimed 2009 album, A Duet of One, an album Bilboard lauded as "a wondrous duet date featuring extraordinary musicians taking chances and thankfully succeeding on all levels." Live at the Library of Congress makes it clear that that previous album was no fluke. Two fine albums should mean something. These are albums where the dialogue between the clarinet and the piano is at times playful and quirky, at times lyrically mellow, at times technically brilliant, and always musically inventive. These men are virtuosos with their instruments and they know how to work together.

This was an exciting concert and it makes for an exciting album. The set list, nine pieces in all, is a mix of original compositions three by Kellaway, one by Daniels and works by a variety of other composers from Thelonius Monk to Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim. They begin with an eight and a half minute romp through the Gershwin's "Strike up the Band," treating the familiar tune with some a variety of inventive rhythms. They end with a Kellaway piece, "50 State Rambler," which alternates familiar sounding lines with edgy modernism. In between, there's an unlikely funky exploration of "America the Beautiful" and a lyrically expressive version of "Somewhere" from Westside Story. Kellaway's pieces show a similar kind of variety. There's the simple lyricism of "A Place That You Want to Call Home" and the dynamic energy of his "Capriccio Twilight." Monk's "Rhythm-a-ning" with a clarinet quotation or two makes for a moment of wit and some of the accompanying grunts might remind you of Lionel Hampton. "Etude of a Woman," Daniels' tune, is combined with Sondheim's "Pretty Woman." It has a haunting melody that seems strangely familiar.

The World Clarinet Alliance called the event a "landmark concert." In a Jazz CD Review of A Duet of One, Tony Augarde says: "Daniels and Kellaway fit together like hand-in-glove." Perhaps that is one way of making sense out of the album's cryptic paradoxical title, and if it was true then, it was equally true in February. The concert at the Library of Congress is nothing short of an eye opening revelation. You can take a clarinet and a piano, put them on a stage alone together and make wonderful music, you can that is if you've got Eddie Daniels playing that clarinet and Roger Kellaway playing that piano.

Music Review: Barefoot Truth - Carry Us On

2011-10-23T10:11:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Barefoot Truth - Carry Us On on Blogcritics.

If like me, Carry Us On, their latest release, is your introduction to Barefoot Truth, you are in for one hell of a ride. At times quietly contemplative, at times filled with passion, at times alternating between the two, this is some emotionally powerful music. Barefoot Truth, a Connecticut product, melds roots music with rock, adds a bit of jazz and funk, some blues and even something pretty close to rap in a recipe for some fine listening. It is no wonder they have blossomed brightly with some eight million plays on Pandora as their publicity proclaims. In a USA Today interview the band's guitarist, Jay Driscoll said: "Pandora has created an avenue for us in music. All of a sudden people we had never met before were buying our music online and asking us to play in their cities." If that success results in an album like Carry Us On, it couldn't have come too soon.

Music and lyrics of the 12 tracks on the album are the work of a variety of combinations of members of the band, although the one name that comes up most often, even in a case or two as sole creator, is drummer and vocalist Will Evans. Driscoll is featured on the Weissenborn slide guitar as well as electric and acoustic. Andy Wrba plays upright and electric bass and some electric guitar. John Waynelovich (Wayno) is on piano and organ, and Garrett Duffy plays harmonica. Both join in with vocals. Some of the tracks add in horns or violin and cello.

A quick check on YouTube shows that at least some of these songs have been around for awhile. There is for example a duo guitar version of the album's opener, "Roll if You Fall." You can compare it with the official slickly produced video for its latest manifestation on Carry Us On on the band's website. It is a song that speaks for itself. I don't know that it needs the glossy production, but I don't know that it hurts. On the other hand the rawer live performance of "Drink to You" from a 2009 Bates College gig doesn't have quite the polished drama of the studio production on the album which builds to a climax that is little short of an anthem.

This is a band that is at home with a variety of styles. Whether it's the funky "Reelin,'" the jazzy "Hesitation," or the reggae "Eagle Front," they deliver the goods. Whether they play stripped down, low key roots with a catchy melody like "Rope" or add a little dramatic passion augmented with some strings like "Changes in the Weather," they rock. "Reach" is a beautiful simple melody with a beautifully earnest lyric. "Misled" begins with a little bit of scat and swings with a message about the courage to go on in spite of growing old and feeling "the weight on his shoulders." "The Ocean" rocks with a vision of a paradise on the beach and ends with a harmonica solo that at its very end suggests an ironic message. "Solitude" has a rough bluesy vibe. Variety is the key.

I read somewhere that Barefoot Truth is the best band you never heard of or something to that effect. I have to say whoever it was said it, was right.

Book Review: The Instructions, by Adam Levin

2011-10-22T08:10:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Book Review: The Instructions by Adam Levin on Blogcritics.

I guess the first thing to be considered, for many perhaps the only thing to be considered with regard to Adam Levin's massive novel The Instructions is length. Although not quite matching James Joyce who needed 760 odd pages to chronicle the events of one day in Dublin, since his 1,000 plus tome covers four days in Chicago and environs, Levin has produced one hell of a long book. Of course you could argue that since Joyce deals with two characters, not counting Molly, and Levin deals with only one, it is necessary to divide the pages in Ulysses by two and those of The Instructions by four in order to get a more accurate comparison. Then of course why not count Molly? In which case, the numbers are closer. Then again it may well be necessary, for accuracy's sake, to think about words on the page. After all Ulysses in the Modern Library edition hasn't quite the page size of the Canongate edition of The Instructions. It doesn't come close in bulk either: simply holding Levin's book to turn the pages is something of a chore. Suffice it to say this is one long book.

(To digress for a moment: if the kind of Talmudic analysis merely hinted at in this opening paragraph is not your cup of tea, if you think of it as nit picking, you probably aren't going to care much for The Instructions. A good many of the 1,000 plus pages are taken up with precisely this kind of analysis of what characters say, what they write, what they do. Hardly anything—whether a wink, a nod, or a casual remark—goes unanalyzed. End of digression.)

Length doesn't particularly bother me. When I finish one book, I start another. It really makes no difference how long a book is. Still, if you are going to spend the time on a book of this length, might you not be better off with War and Peace or Don Quixote? Back many years ago, a professor of mine once suggested a standard by which to test a work of literature. Ask yourself, he said, does the value you get from it justify the work you have to put into it. He wasn't necessarily talking about length only, he was talking about all the effort necessary to read a work and understand it. While this is a fine standard to measure a work's value, it is necessary to read the book and do all the work before making your judgment. If that judgment is that it wasn't worth the effort, you've in effect wasted all that time that might have been put to better use. On the other hand, as a critic, if I have done all that work and discovered that it was worth the effort for me, how can I know that all readers will end up with similar results?

(Digression: Talmudic analysis seems to be catchy.)

Now that you know that this is a long book and that length isn't necessarily a drawback as far as I am concerned, let me tell you a little bit about what is a book, for better or worse, like few others you may have come across. The Instructions is the story a charismatic 10 year old Talmudic scholar, Gurion Maccabee, who has managed to get himself expelled from a number of Jewish schools for fighting and encouraging others to engage in violence. Moreover, he suspects he may be the messiah and through his magnetic personality, his brilliant reasoning, and his physical abilities he has been able to get others to believe in him as well. As the novel begins, he has been placed in a special program for students with behavioral disorders in a public junior high school. The other students in the program are all older than him, but here too he manages to become their leader in a fight against what they feel are the unfair regulations imposed on them by unreasonable authorities.

This struggle becomes entwined with the need for Jews to defend themselves from anti-Semitism and fight for righteousness. Gurion distinguishes between Jews and Israelites. Jews are those who accept their situation, and either through fear or complacency, refuse to fight for righteousness. Israelites are those who commit to the struggle. Indeed, it seems that you don't even have to be Jewish to be an Israelite. The novel goes on to describe the "Gurionic War," the revolution of the Israelites against the perversions of justice, perhaps fulfilling the prophecy, "and a little child shall lead them."

The novel itself is presented as scripture in the voice of the ten year old Gurion, and herein lies a problem. Rarely, if ever, does he sound like a ten year old. Whether he is speaking to a teacher or one of his fellow students, he always speaks with a maturity beyond his years even if his ideas aren't always as mature as his voice. The book even calls this to the reader's attention by including a faux letter from Philip Roth, one of Gurion's favorite writers, saying that he doesn't care for what he thinks is the elder Gurion putting his ideas in the mouth of the young boy. The trouble is the faux Roth is wrong. This is indeed the boy speaking, and the reader needs to accept his wisdom beyond his years. In a sense, it is this incongruency that underlies what some have seen as the comic element of the novel.

In the end there is much that is entertaining in this novel and there is much that is annoying. There are laugh out loud moments, clever word play, and brain teasing logical labyrinths. Then there are the times when enough is enough, when another page and a half analysis of the meaning of a touch on the arm or a ten page justification of the failure of one friend to help another is simply redundant. There will be those who find the entertaining parts worth putting up with the rest, but I suspect they will be a limited group of readers with a specialized tastes. Think of all those readers who never managed to finish Infinite Jest.

TV Review: Independent Lens - Donor Unknown

2011-10-20T12:31:00.000-07:00

Article first published as TV Review: Independent Lens Presents Donor Unknown on Blogcritics.

More than likely the first thing that will occur to many viewers of Donor Unknown, the documentary scheduled to premiere October 20^th on the PBS series Independent Lens, will be last year's Oscar nominated comic drama, The Kids Are All Right. The Hollywood film is in many respects a spiced up fictionalization of some of the very issues raised in the documentary. Children of sperm donors eager to know something about their paternity manage to discover the donor's identity and arrange to meet him with interesting results. Certainly the film embroiders upon the basic theme moving into other issues as well, nonetheless the basic theme of sperm donors and their relation to the children they father is central to both.

Donor Unknown follows the 20 year old JoEllen Marsh the daughter of a lesbian couple from Erie, Pennsylvania as she learns about her 'father,' sperm donor 150, from the profile he submitted when he began donating sperm at a sperm bank in California and then discovers an organization, the Donor Sibling Registry, that helps children of donors locate half-siblings from the same donor. Soon when she discovers a half sister, their story hits the front page of the New York Times and a gaggle of other half siblings enter the scene. Donor 150, it seems was, something of a stud in the world of sperm donation—although it may well be that he is the norm. Records it seems are not very carefully kept.

Coincidently 150 who is living the life of a Beach Bum in Venice, California happens upon a copy of the Times front page in a coffee shop. He, it turns out, is something of a Bohemian. He lives in a broken down RV with four dogs and a pigeon, animals he treats like his children. Indeed, he calls them his family. He talks a lot about spirituality, and he is a believer in some very strange conspiracy theories. He seems a pleasant enough person as he is shown in the documentary, but not necessarily someone you would want as part of your life if you were planning to live more or less conventionally. After some thought, he decides to contact the Donor Sibling Registry and make himself available to the children. Some take the opportunity, some don't. The meeting between JoEllen, who chooses to take the opportunity and her 'father' as well as some of the other children makes for some touching TV.

Perhaps most interesting are some of the moral questions raised by the film. Some of these will be available for discussion on the Independent Lens website for the show. What are the implications of reproductive services sold for profit? The sperm bank shown in the film for all its seeming professionalism seems just a mite sleazy with its "wink wink" masturbatoriums" larded with a range of audio-visual stimulants. Should sperm donors remain anonymous? What rights do the children of donors have? What, if any, are the obligations of the donor to the children? As far as secrecy is concerned, what are the obligations of the sperm bank to the donor, to the children? As Wendy Kramer, Executive Director of the Donor Sibling Registry, and the mother of a child fathered by a sperm donor, says in the film "secrecy implies shame." Clearly these are questions that have no easy answers.

Directed by Jerry Rothwell,Donor Unknown is a sensitive exploration of some growing social issues as they plays out for one young woman as she searches for her ancestry and her family. When the director of the California sperm bank glibly announces that his organization has probably been responsible for at least 60,000 births since its inception and in ten years it will probably be responsible for 60,000 more, the size and importance of the issues are clear. While Rothwell's film doesn't provide answers, it does highlight the issues, and this it does very effectively.

The 99:Beginnings - Islamic Superheroes

2011-10-18T14:32:00.000-07:00

Article first published as The 99: Beginnings - Islamic Superheroes on Technorati.

The 99, Teshkeel Comics's effort to create a Muslim superhero comic book series modeled on those long a staple of western pop culture, is the brainchild of Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa, a Kuwaiti psychologist and business man educated in the west. His story—the development of the idea and his efforts to make that idea a reality, his successes and his setbacks—is the subject of the documentary Wham! Bam! Islam! to be aired on the season opener of PBS's Independent Lens, Thursday, Oct. 13^th at 10 o'clock.

Al-Mutawa's idea was to create a comic that would present the positive values of Islam. The members of The 99 were each to represent one of the 99 attributes of Allah. Each attribute would endow the hero or heroine with a super power, which they would use to fight against evil. The 99: Beginnings is a special issue devoted to the introduction of all the 99's members and the group's back story.

The heroes come from countries all over the world and they range in age from sub-teens through to the early 20's. Some examples: Jabbar the Powerful, whose power is supernatural strength, is 19 and grew up in Saudi Arabia. Wakila the Guardian, whose power is the ability to turn discrimination back on the offender, is a ten year old girl from Bhutan. Darr the Afflictor is a 22 year old from the U.S.A. who is in a wheel chair as a result of an accident his family had with a drunk driver. His power is the ability of inflict or absorb pain. Most of the issue is spent on these introductions. It shows them dealing with the initial recognition that they have an unusual power. It really doesn't show them in action in a full blown narrative.

What there is in the way of story comes from the group's leader, Dr. Ramzi Razem. He describes his own early fascination with the Noor stones which are the sources of the powers. As a young boy, he was taken on a trip to Andalusia where he heard stories of the Caliphate of Cordoba and Seville's great centers of learning and culture, especially the Husn Al-Ma'rifa, the fortress of knowledge where the stones became part of its golden dome. The explanation of how the stones got their powers and how they came to the fortress, its eventual destruction and the stones' dispersal over the world is intertwined with the introductions of the various heroes. It is this legendary tale that is by far the most interesting and exciting part of the issue.

The comic itself is drawn much in the style of the western models. This is intentional. The Independent Lens documentary introduces some of the Marvel Comics veterans that Al-Mutawa hired to being his vision to fruition. Visually there is little to distinguish The 99 from Superman and his ilk. It is in the positive representation of Islamic values through this team of engaging, young multi-cultural heroes that the series aims to distinguish itself.

Music Review: Leni Stern - Sabani

2011-10-16T19:07:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Leni Stern - Sabani on Blogcritics.

To get a good idea of the feeling you get from Leni Stern's latest foray into the realm of world music, Sabani take a look at what she has to say in her note to her song "Papillon," a song that has nothing to do with either Steve McQueen or escaping from Devil's Island. She writes about a friend whose very sick wife had told him that if there were such a thing as reincarnation, she would like to come back as a butterfly (papillon of course means butterfly). Stern recounts how she met the friend in New York restaurant to see how he was holding up, and when they left, she "collided" with a few butterflies that then began flying about her friend. "It happens a lot," he assures her. An uncanny occurrence, to say the least yet this is an apt illustration of the other worldly quality that haunts much of the music on Sabani. Both music and lyrics have a quality that borders on the mystical.

Foregoing the larger ensembles of her earlier fusions of jazz and world music like her last, Sa Belle Belle Ba, the eight songs on Sabani, which means three, are all put in the hands of a trio. The performances are tight and lean, stripped down to raw essentials. Joining Stern, who plays the electric and acoustic guitar, the n'goni (a small African lute), the tiple (a small guitar) and does vocals, are Haruna Samake on camela n'goni and karignan (a ridged metal coil rubbed with a metal rod) and Mamadou Kone aka "Prince" who plays calabash, talking drum and shakers. Stern says they have played so often together that it comes "effortlessly." "I don't know why I waited so long to record like this." Together they manage an almost unique sound that eerily coats the familiar with the alien, just as her songs often coat the familiar English with foreign hooks and phrases.

Of the eight songs two—"The Cat Stole the Moon" and "An Saba"—are instrumentals. The first refers to a Mali children's version of Trick or Treat; the second means the three of us. The album opens with a broken hearted lament, "Still Bleeding." "The memories that still are haunting me, are tearing me apart." "Sorcerer" describes the magical world of the forest open to those who can talk to the spirits, someone who can throw stones for her to read her future, so she can see. One remembers the story Stern told about the sorcerer in connection with her last album. "Like a Thief," inspired by the gypsy stories of her childhood, works on a series of similes: love is like a "thief in the night," like fog that rises from the fields," "like an undertow that grabs you." It is a mystical force fraught with danger. "I Was Born" describes a hunger and a restlessness that no amount of possessions can satisfy. Born to a "universe of elegance," you need someone to set you free. "Djanfa, the last song on the album, features Malien singer Zoumana Tareta. The title she tells us means betrayed.

All the songs on the album were written by Stern alone or in collaboration with the other members of the trio. They have the kind of poetic lyrics that demand to be listened to with some attention. That's one of the best things about this low key trio ensemble you can actually understand the words. It would be a real shame if you couldn't.

Book Review: Music on Film: A Hard Day's Night, by Ray Morton

2011-10-15T07:34:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Book Review: A Hard Day's Night: Music on Film Series by Ray Morton on Blogcritics.

Limelight's Music on Film series attempts to pack most everything an interested reader would like to know about a single film associated with music into a convenient pocket sized book. The little books are not aimed at scholars. They do include bibliographical information, but they do not document sources either in the text or in end notes. They are equally interested in the celebrity gossip and the facts about the production. This is a series by and large meant for the general audience.

Joining his earlier study of Amadeus is author Ray Morton's look at the 1964 Beatles classic A Hard Day's Night. Essentially, the book's main point seems to be that director Richard Lester and the Beatles managed to produce a masterpiece despite low expectations from the studio and the business people who greenlighted the project. United Artists decided to back a film with the band on the theory that they could profit from a cast album even thought they though the band wasn't successful enough to make the actual film profitable. They engaged Lester as director and Walter Shenson to produce with the understanding that they come up with a film that was cheap and quick. They wanted to make sure it came to theaters before the band's novelty flamed out.

What screen writer Alun Owen, Lester, and the team he and Shenson came up with was an innovative film that in many ways changed the whole concept of the rock music movie model forever and had a lasting effect on the way those films are still done today. The fact that the Beatles were now going to make their American splash with their appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show more than likely would have made whatever they came up with a success; that they came up with a work of genius was gravy.

Morton talks about the band's beginnings and the early personnel changes. He deals with the early successes and then he gets to the actual film. There is a chapter about the initial idea for a movie and its implementation. He explains how the idea of a fictionalized documentary based on the Beatles' actual claustrophobic life escaping from the teenage mobs that haunted their every move came about. He describes the creative team and how they came on board. He talks about the music, how it was chosen and how it was used in the film. Then he gives a blow by blow analysis of the nearly two months of shooting, some insight into the post production, and a short discussion of its critical reception.

Of course he throws in any interesting little tidbit about the shooting that he can dig up. For example, a 13-year old Phil Collins turns up as an extra in the movies concert scene. The noise was so loud that a recent filling in the tooth of a cinematographer throbbed so violently that the tooth suffered nerve damage and had to be pulled. Paul had a scene in which he popped in on an actress rehearsing which was eventually cut from the film in part at least because his acting was too stiff. For the most part the boys were at their best when they were being themselves. They had winning personalities which came across on the screen.

Morton explains Lester's feelings about each of the four. Paul was trying too hard to be a "good" actor. Ringo was the most natural. John, he felt, had the most electrifying personality, and George was "the most accurate performer." In general their TV experience must have helped in making them comfortable in front of the camera, and though their inexperience necessitated some accommodations, their natural effervescence made up for any technical problems. In the end Richard Lester and the Beatles were able to create a film that was so good it transformed its genre and Ray Morton was able to create a nice little book to explain how they did it.

DVD Review: Art of the Western World

2011-10-12T18:19:00.000-07:00

Article first published as DVD Review: Art of the Western World on Blogcritics.

If you're looking for a general introduction to the history of art in western civilization you can't do much better than Art of the Western World, a nine part documentary which appeared on PBS in 1989 and is now available on a three DVD set from Athena. Narrated by historian Michael Wood the series moves from the Greeks and Romans through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance right up to modern times with stops at every significant period in between. It looks at architecture, sculpture, painting and even some of the more modern forms like collages and installations. The whole set runs for 513 minutes, but even at that length, it covers a field so vast that it would be hard to do more than provide an overview, a kind of guide for further study. Still, in an accompanying bonus booklet, producer Perry Miller Adato insists that it is more than a simple introduction. With all the scholarly expertise gathered for each episode, he is confident that "it can supply students who already know the subject with new insights."

He may well be right. Recognizing the impossibility of showing the viewer everything of importance in any given period, the filmmakers have chosen to spend their time focusing on several representative examples in greater detail. They pay some attention to other pieces to give some idea of the breadth of period, but their focus is on specific works and their place in the culture of the period. For example, in the episode on the classical ideal in Greece they feature the Parthenon, for the Gothic period, the cathedral at Chartres, the early Renaissance, Donatello's statue of David. Later episodes take intensive looks at David's "Death of Marat, "Seurat's Pointillist masterpiece, "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte," and Picasso's revolutionary Cubist innovation, "Les demoiselles d'avignon." Concentrating their efforts in this way allows them the kind of close analysis that often yields "new insights." One may not always agree with their choices, but none seems completely egregious.

Rather than cluttering up the screen with talking heads, they generally find one or two experts on any given episode —professors, curators, art historians—to explain the significance of what we are being shown. For the most part their choices are excellent, not only do they know their stuff, but their explanations are usually lucid and their presentations are quite animated. This is not to say that some of their commentary is not open to question, what discussion of art is not subject to opinion. Watching Robin Middleton from Columbia University romping around Syon House is nothing if not entertaining. Listening to Griselda Pollock's Feminist critique of 19^th century French female nudes is illuminating. Italian art historian Germano Celant's assertion that post-modern art demands faith from its audience in the same way that religion does, if a work is in a museum you have to have faith that it belongs there, is nothing if not controversial. Wood, himself, is an engaging host who projects his own sense of the import of his subject.

The central thesis of the series demonstrates the relationship between a work of art and the social values of the culture in which it is produced. In monarchial societies portraits of rulers show them on rearing horses controlling them with one hand it emphasize their power. Formal gardens surrounding neo-classical buildings in the age of reason point to the culture's passion for order in the universe. Genre painting develops from a desire to mythologize the ordinary. Pop art emerges as a critique of consumerism. Certainly some of the specifics are open to objection, but the general notion that a work of art is some in some central way a product of the environment in which it is created is undeniable.

Since the series is over twenty years old, there are occasional problems with the picture quality, but these are few and far between and there are some spectacular shots of works of art that more than make up for them. They linger over paintings, panning slowly to catch as much detail as possible. They circle free standing statues to illustrate their every curve and angle. They roam through and around the great architectural monuments of the world. They use the camera to document the environment surrounding the work. Often they show something of the settings and scenery that provided the artist's inspiration. If the color might have been better in a shot or two, it is never so bad for so long that it becomes anything more than a minor annoyance.

As PBS documentaries go, Art of the Western World is one of the best. It manages to paint a cogent picture of an extremely large subject without oversimplifying it and talking down to the audience. Moreover it allows viewers a taste of the variety of art that may well have them hungering for more, no mean accomplishment.

Music Review: The Decemberists - Long Live the King

2011-10-11T20:04:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: The Decemberists - Long Live the King on Blogcritics.

Indie folk rockers, The Decemberists are slated to release a six track EP, Long Live the King on November 1^st. The album is made up of a selection of outtakes from the band's hugely successful The King is Dead. It is a collection of songs which echo the random selection of material that some critics noted in that album which moved the band away from a concept album like the 2009 The Hazards of Love. Moreover like The King is Dead, the new release is a country folk rock blend that shows off the band at its accessible best. There may be a lyric or two that Decemberist critics might find too cutely literary, but if they are they are never intrusive. And though, for my money, there is nothing on the new disc with the power of a song like "Down By the Water," there are those that come darn close.

The EP begins with a darkly dramatic post Civil War story ballad of death and vengeance, "E. Watson." It is a spare arrangement perfectly suited to the both the material and Collin Meloy's vocal performance. Backup vocals are by Laura Veirs and Annalisa Tornfelt. "Burying Davy," another stark dirge adds an almost cacophonous dissonance that complements the emotional disturbance of the lyric. "I4U & U4Me," a home demo, is an up tempo riff for two screw ups who were made for each other. I guess a phrase like "sticky wicket" is the kind of thing that bothers those that object to the band, while fans more than likely find it ironic. It is after all only one phrase. "Foregone" has a tuneful old fashioned quality that feels like it's been around forever. It has a melody that really seems familiar, like a song you should know. "Row Jimmy" is a twangy Grateful Dead cover. "Sonnet" is a lilting enchantment that ends with a chorus of braying horns that contrasts ironically with the verse.

All in all, it says a lot about a band, if it has outtakes as good as these and if it happens to have any others lying around, I have no doubt fans will be happy to get them. The six tracks on this EP can only make their mouths water for more.

Luckily for them, whether the band has more or not, The Decemberists will be appearing for the second time on PBS's Austin City Limits on October 22^nd. The published set list doesn't include any songs from the new EP, but it does feature music from The King is Dead as well as guest artists Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings. Also available from NPR's Live Concert series is the band's set from the 2011 Newport Folk Festival and a short Tiny Desk Concert from June. Both of which can be downloaded as podcasts.

DVD Review: Dracula: The Vampire and The Voivode

2011-10-05T15:11:00.000-07:00

Article first published as DVD Review: Dracula: The Vampire and The Voivode on Blogcritics

With the popularity of all things vampire in recent years, it should come as no surprise that the icon of all vampires, Dracula, would be once more resurrected to garner his share of the attention. Dracula: The Vampire and the Voivode, a documentary produced in association with the Transylvanian Society of Dracula, is just the latest to jump on the vampire bandwagon. The film is not concerned with modern manifestations of the genre like True Blood and Twilight. What it is concerned with is the Bram Stoker, his 1897 novel, its relation to Transylvania and to a 15^th century Wallachian prince sometimes held up as Stoker's model for the undead Count. Essentially the documentary aims to separate the facts about the vampire, Count Dracula and the Voivode(Prince), Vlad the Impaler from the fictions.

Using the typical talking heads—everything from scholars to tour guides—the film visits sites from the author's life, places actually mentioned in the novel and places that may have been the actual sources for scenes in places that Stoker had never seen. It is well known that Stoker had never been to what he called Transylvania, what we call Romania. His descriptions of the countryside at the beginning and end of his novel came right out of travel books he may have been reading and his vivid imagination. There is, as the documentary makes clear, no castle near the Borgo Pass. There is in fact no Castle Dracula. The Castle Bran now often touted as the original of the Count's ruined edifice has nothing to with either Stoker or even Vlad. As some scholars suggest it is more likely that Stoker based his description of Castles he was familiar with in Ireland and Scotland.

Whitby, on the other hand, the seacoast town in England where the ship carrying the Dracula coffins comes aground, was in fact the place where Stoker wrote a good deal of the novel. Its landmarks—the harbor, the 199 church steps and the graveyard at St. Mary's Church—are places the novelist would have actually known. The same is true for most of the British settings. Perhaps the most interesting thing about these settings, both those that he knew and those that he didn't, is the local attempt to capitalize on the association with Dracula. Whether it's the walking tour of Dracula sites in Whitby or the erection of a faux Castle Dracula in Romania, if you can see your way to making a buck, fact or fiction, it doesn't make a lot of difference.

In some sense the same is true for the association of the fictional Dracula with the historical Vlad. In Search of Dracula, the pop scholarly study from the seventies by Raymond McNally and Radu Florescu, sought to set up the vicious Romanian price as the prototype of the Stoker's vampire Count. They point out that his father was known as Dracul (devil or dragon). The addition of the 'a' to the end of the name was indicative of the diminutive. Vlad would have been known as Dracula, little devil or son of the devil. While all this may be conceded, and it also may be conceded that Vlad was a cruel and inhuman tyrant, there is absolutely no evidence, either in McNally and Florescu's book or anywhere else for that matter, that Vlad had anything at all to do with vampirism—not in fact and not in fiction. This is a point that the documentary makes repeatedly as its central thesis. Stoker may or may not have gotten the name Dracula from references he read, but if he did that seems to be all he got.

There is some attention to Dracula in the cinema. There are shots of Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee. There is some classic footage from Nosferatu. There is some attention to Stoker's precursors in fiction: Polidori's The Vampyre, the penny dreadful Varney the Vampire, and Sheridan Lefanu's Carmilla. But the documentary is less concerned with the history of the literary genre and its modern cinematic adaptations than it is with Stoker and the myths surrounding his novel. There is a great deal more time spent on the life of the author than there is on these other vampire stories.

Dracula: The Vampire and The Voivode presents a fund of interesting information, but nothing that seems particularly new. Fans of vampire lore and the horror genre in general will have come across most of what this film talks about already. They may not know the details of Stoker's life—his inability to walk as a child, his years as a civil servant in Ireland, his career as a theatrical manager in London, but then they may not care all that much. On the other hand, if they do this documentary has all they could want to know and more, not to mention some nice shots of Irish and Romanian scenery.

TV Review: Independent Lens - Wham! Bam! Islam!

2011-10-04T15:26:00.000-07:00

Article first published as TV Review: Independent Lens - Wham! Bam! Islam! on Blogcritics.

PBS's award winning Independent Lens series opens its tenth season on October 13^th at 10PM with Wham! Bam! Islam!, a documentary about a Kuwaiti psychologist and entrepreneur educated at the Columbia Business School who beieved he had a way to help reinforce positive traditional Islamic values in youngsters around the world. What Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa had in mind was a Western style superhero comic book in which a team of superheroes, gathered together from all over the world, each exemplifying one of the 99 attributes of Allah, would join in a struggle against the forces of evil. His aims were both practical and idealistic. The 99, the title he gave his comic, he hoped would create a successful financial venture while providing positive role models for Muslim youth.

The film, directed by Emmy Nominated documentarian Issac Solataroff, follows Al-Mutawa as he pitches his idea and raises seven million dollars from investors around the world to start up his company. He attracts a creative team that includes a number of ex-Marvel comic veterans to complement the local Muslim staff. They are especially careful to make certain that nothing in the content of the comic violates any of the tenets of Islam; this in the light of some of the violent reaction of Muslims across the world after the publication of offensive cartoons in the Danish press. Al-Mutawa acknowledges that while he too found the cartoons offensive, he nonetheless believed in freedom of speech. Still he understood that even unintentional offensive material in his comic would defeat both his purposes.

Careful consideration had to be given to the costumes of the superheroes. The tight spandex, standard uniform for their Western brothers and sisters, wouldn't do for the Muslim sensibility. They had to consider whether the women would wear burkhas or veils. They had to be very careful about how they dealt with the application of the divine attributes to human characters. They had to think about the representation of Holy places. While some might consider this censorship, it is clear that this kind of self censorship is no different from what goes on in the West, even with its freedom of the press. Both financially and idealistically, it would have made little sense to antagonize the very audience you were trying to impress.

In a world where tensions between Muslims and the West seem to dominate the headlines daily, Wham! Bam! Islam! is the kind of film that just might help to create the kind of atmosphere that would encourage greater understanding between the different cultures. Not only does it illustrate how Western popular cultural tropes might not be all that alien to other cultures, but it also demonstrates that central values—tolerance, compassion, understanding—are common to all true believers in all religions. As one of the Bahraini investors in the company's recapitalization points out, it is hard to beat an investment that will bring in a profit and do some social good at the same time.

The story of The 99's initial successes, near catastrophes and eventual rebirth makes for fascinating viewing. Reactions from the comic's readers vary from eager children thrilled with the characters to college students debating the comic's orthodoxy, from the Saudis' unwillingness to license the book for the kingdom to a break dancer's rant about stultifying traditions. Through it all the dominating figure is the man with a vision, a man unwilling to give up on his goal even when things seem to be falling apart around him. Naif Al-Mutawa may not be a superhero, but as far as this documentary goes, he is hero enough.

Comedy Review: Lewis Black, The Prophet

2011-10-03T07:14:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Comedy Review: Lewis Black - The Prophet on Blogcritics.

Lewis Black's The Prophet, released this week by Comedy Central, certainly has some funny material—unfortunately it would have been a hell of a lot funnier twenty years ago when it was recorded. What you have here is comedy as history. The album was recorded late in 1990 as the irate comic toured the country delivering his patented political tirade on the current state of the union, current in 1990.
I have nothing against Black's politics. Indeed, I find myself agreeing with almost everything he has to say. The problem is that he is saying it about Dan Quayle. He is saying it about George Bush. He is saying it about Ronald Reagan. And agree with his or not, it's old news. Political comedy loses something as it recedes into the past. Jokes about the Exxon Valdez disaster make more sense when everyone knows what the Exxon Valdez disaster was. I suspect that that might not always be the case with all of Black's current audience, and even those who do know are more likely to be more interested in the BP oil spill. Political humor needs to be current; I can't imagine anyone showing reruns of The Daily Show in 2030.

There are other things on the album. There is a rant about excessive Christmas celebration. There is some equal opportunity mockery of bar mitzvahs and Jewish food choices. There's a short bit about banning smoking. It's good stuff, but it doesn't make up for the dated political material.

Black is a funny man. His comedy albums have won a number of awards. There were Grammys for Stark Raving Black and The Carnegie Hall Performance. Who knows? Twenty years ago The Prophet might well have won a Grammy of its own.

Music Review: Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band-Nine Tonight

2011-10-02T08:44:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band-Nine Tonight on Blogcritics.

Those of us who can't get enough of that old time rock and roll, the kind of music that soothes the soul and gets you reminiscing about days of old are in for a treat. No one plays that old time rock better than Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band and no one has ever played it any better than they did on the 1981 album Nine Tonight which feature live recordings taken from concerts in Detroit's Cobo Hall in June of 1980 and Boston Garden in October. And now in tandem with the release of a remastered edition of Seger's other signature live album, Live Bullet and his continuing North American tour, Capital Records is releasing a remastered Nine Tonight as well. Between the two albums you can get yourself some electric performances of the best of Seger's music, and the best of Seger is just about as good as you can get.

Whether they are rocking out on classic pieces like "Old Time Rock and Roll" and "Let it Rock" or one of Seger's own tunes—soon to be classic in its own right—like "Her Strut" or "The Fire Down Below," this is a band that knows what rock and roll has been and they know how to take that tradition and build on it. They play up tempo with a joy and abandon that echoes through the audience like a tidal wave. The ballads will have you arms up and swaying to your iPod. Even the darker songs are played with a throbbing passion that can hardly be contained. Just listen to the sax highlights (it may not be the Big Man, but the aptly stage named Alto Reed will do in a pinch) and the guitar solos on "Mainstreet," as dramatic a plaint as you'll find on some of the best of the best of Springsteen.

These are songs that have become so much a part of the rock heritage that all you need to do is hear the opening chords and you're already singing along. There's the guitar passage that opens "Night Moves," the piano that begins "Against the Wind" and "We've Got Tonight." Really, you could almost list every one of the seventeen songs on the album, there doesn't seem to be one that doesn't belong in the rock pantheon. An album that includes all of the above plus "Hollywood Nights," Rock and Roll Never Forgets," "Feel Like a Number," and "Fire Lake" might just as well be called "Seger's Greatest Hits Live." Even a song like "Betty Lou's Getting Out Tonight" which may not have the reputation of some of these others is a frantic romp that has the band rocking with abandon. It is no wonder that this is a multi-platinum album; the wonder would be if it weren't.

There has been some complaint from Seger perfectionists who argued that the original CD's edited version of "Let It Rock" should have been replaced with the unedited track that was used on the original vinyl album, as long as you were remastering you might as well do it right. Although somewhat mollified by the addition of a bonus track—a live version of "Brave Strangers" from one of the Cobo Hall concerts—their preference would have been for the unedited "Let it Rock." You can see for yourself, the full ten minute plus version from the vinyl is available on YouTube. My own feeling is if the edited version is the price you have to pay for the new album, it's well worth it. This is the kind of album that makes you wish that you didn't know now what you didn't know then.

Music Review: Anastasia Barzee-The Dimming of the Day

2011-10-01T06:45:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Anastasia Barzee-The Dimming of the Day on Blogcritics.

The Dimming of the Day, the debut album of actress/singer Anastasia Barzee reminds me of nothing so much as John Keats' "Ode on Melancholy." Keats, a poet who believes that all emotions should be experienced as strongly as possible, explains that melancholy should be savored. Don't try to drown it with clichés. Don't try to make yourself feel better. When sadness comes as it always does revel in it. It is only the person who has experienced the depths of true melancholy, who has a palate fine enough to burst "joy's grape." And where is the truest melancholy to be found? It is to be found in the transience of beauty, in the transience of love.

Speaking about her album Barzee explains that she has a "real connection to songs that have moved me—made me think about loss, regret, abandonment, and ultimately finding joy." These are songs that "tell the story of what love really is—with all its pain and promise." They are songs that speak to the intensity of melancholy and the depth of joy that must inevitably come. It is almost as if the singer were channeling the poet.

The songs she has chosen range from Broadway to pop, from contemporary folk to jazz and country, thirteen songs from an eclectic mix of contemporary song writers: Richard Thompson, Jimmy Webb, Kate Bush, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Paul Simon just to name a few. Her interpretations are emotionally charged; she is after all an actress of note. She knows how to use the kind of subtext that creates dramatic sincerity without going over the top. She is a singer in control of her instrument and she demonstrates that control on each and every song.

Of course there are those songs that stand out. Her duet with Brian D'arcy James, with whom she co-starred in White Christmas, on the album's title song, Richard Thompson's "The Dimming of the Day," echoes with some very nice country harmonies. Their voices have a harmonic blend that even Linda and Richard might envy. She captures a nice country vibe in Randy Newman's "Feels Like Home" and adds a powerful performance of Jimmy Webb's "All I Know."

Her swinging jazzy take on April Smith's "Terrible Things" with a sparkling trumpet solo work by Greg Gisbert is one of the few upbeat tunes on the disc, and it showcases another side of the singer. "Summer Me, Winter Me" has a soft Latin beat and features some fine solo saxophone from Steve Wilson. She does her own version of a sultry cabaret singer with the jazz standard "Don't Go to Strangers," again with some nice saxophone backing. James Shelton's "Lilac Wine" gives Barzee a chance to play with a bit of tipsy sexuality that clearly shows her ability to create a character. All you have to do is compare this voice with the voice that sings the album's opening song, Kate Bush's "The Man With the Child in His Eyes," and you can see how adept Barzee is at singing in "so many voices not her own."

Keats is right, paradoxical as it seems, joy and melancholy are indelibly entwined. There is no doubt a great pleasure and joy in listening to a talented artist pouring her heart out in song. Anastasia Barzee is just such a talented artist.

Music Review: Foreigner-Feels Like the First Time

2011-09-30T14:01:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Foreigner - Feels Like the First Time on Blogcritics.

For classic rock fans the new three disc set from Foreigner may be something of a mixed blessing. What you get, with an exception or two, is multiple versions of the band's greatest hits. One disc, Acoustique: The Classics Unplugged, has the latest manifestation of the band running through a stripped down acoustic version of their songbook. The second, Juke Box Heroes is a set of "brand new digital recordings" of the band's greatest hits. Live in Chicago is a DVD filmed in March of 2011 with some bonus features like some backstage footage, interviews with the band and video of two of the band's acoustic performances. Taken altogether, the set gives you an awful lot of Foreigner, perhaps more than any but the band's most fanatic followers might want. Others might prefer just a little bit more variety in the repertoire. Great as many of these songs are, do we really need three versions of "Feels Like the First Time" and "Cold as Ice?" After all, out of three hours of music, more or less, there are only two new songs and one cover of another artist.

Although founding member of the band Mick Jones has said he's surprised that it has taken this long for the band to do some acoustic recording, it may take even more time for listeners to get used to it. The idea of a band reworking its material is not new. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Certainly part of the appeal of classic rockers doing their hits is nostalgia, and reworking the material while it may have other rewards doesn't push that button. There is something about listening to songs like "Jukebox Hero" and "Double Vision" unplugged that seems just a bit off. Even ballads like "Waiting for a Girl Like You" don't immediately seem to have the same kind of energy of the originals. Interestingly the band in the DVD interviews clearly recognizes the emotional appeal the music has for their audience. Perhaps then it should come as no surprise that the immediate reaction to the reworked songs might be disappointment. In fact the least disappointing track was the cover of the Elvis Presley bonus track, "That's All Right."

The newly recorded material on the second disc and the performances on the DVD are another story. While there may be some who would prefer remastered versions of the originals, the band in its latest incarnation is no second rate copy. Besides Jones on guitar and keys, Jeff Pilson plays bass, Tom Gimbel, guitars and reeds, Michael Bluestein, keyboards and Mark Schulman, drums. Former lead singer, Lou Gramm might well object to the branding, but over the years life goes on and bands change. Foreigner as now constituted is playing as well as it ever did. Kelly Hansen, Gramm's replacement, has the vocal chops to do full justice to the music. Moreover he is a charismatic performer who knows how to take the stage and work the audience. When they plug in, Foreigner can still rock with the best of them. "I Want to Know What Love Is," Urgent," "Head Games:" these are the songs you remember, the way you remember them.

Comedy Review: Patton Oswalt, Finest Hour

2011-09-26T08:38:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Comedy Review: Patton Oswalt - Finest Hour on Blog critics.

If you were to look at Patton Oswalt's August interview with the A.V. Club you might get the idea that success and family have mellowed him a bit. If you listen to Finest Hour, his latest album from Comedy Central, you'll find you were wrong. Mellowed, no doubt, is a relative judgment—but there is no sense of the word, where it would be applicable to Oswalt's standup routine, not unless you would consider allowing that the Bible was a really great read especially if you were into torture porn a mellowing. And who knows, perhaps he has, at least by his lights. In the interview, he says, ". . . my feelings on religion are starting to morph. I'm still very much an atheist, except that I don't necessarily see religion as a bad thing." If this is mellowing, Oswalt himself recognizes it may not evident to all audiences. "So, that's a weird thing that I'm struggling with that seems to be offending both atheists and people that are religious."

The one group he won’t be offending is the Oswalt fans. They know what to expect—more than likely they would be offended if they didn’t get it. No need to worry, Finest Hour delivers patent Patton. Whether he is riffing on Jesus' super powers or gays as portrayed in romantic comedies, he happily hammers away at pretentious platitudes. Clearly much of this will not go down well with believers; one man's platitudes are another's cherished creed. Believers be warned, offense is likely.

Not everything in the set is controversial. There is a funny piece on weight loss groups and William S. Burroughs and another about an engorged Axel Rose. He makes fun of himself when he has a little problem with the word, brewery. He talks about parenting, about the span museum, about sweat pants and hygiene, but most of the best material is either controversial or raunchy. There is his politically loaded analysis of arguments good and bad against gay marriage, which gets him going on the authority of the Bible. His bit about strippers and comics is a winner, and his description of interrupting two crackheads in a somewhat indelicate act while walking his dog in New York which ends the show is hilarious.

The set, which was recorded at the Moore Theatre in Seattle, Washington in May of 2011, has been featured as an hour special on Showtime and is scheduled to be shown on Comedy Central next year. According to Oswalt's website the album contains about ten minutes of material that isn't included on the TV show. If it's "The Horror of New York City" track, it is probably the best part of an extremely fine album. If the audience in Seattle felt Oswalt had mellowed, if it was offended by the show, you couldn't tell by their reaction.

Music Review: Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band-Live Bullet

2011-09-25T14:12:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Music Review: Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band - Live Bullet [Remastered] on Blogcritics.

Often considered the album that finally got Bob Seger and his band a long overdue national acclaim beyond Detroit and the state of Michigan, Live Bullet has been released in a re-mastered version by Capitol as the sixty six year old singer and the Silver Bullet Band embark on the second leg of their current North American tour. Originally recorded in Detroit's Cobo Hall in September of 1975, and released the next year, the band rocked out on a mix of original Seger written songs some of which were to become rock classics and covers of icons like Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley fed by the electric energy of an enthusiastic audience. What they ended up with was a multi-platinum album that together with the '76 studio album Night Moves made Seger and the Silver Bullet Band a household name.

The concert included a quintet of live versions of songs from his 1975 album Beautiful Losers. There was the popular title song as well as a high powered rollicking "Katmandu" and a dramatic driving "Travelin' Man," two of which were destined for greatest hits compilations, and the other should have been. Also from that album there are the lesser known "Jody Girl" and a cover of Tina Turner's "Nutbush City Limits." From his Back in '72 album, the set includes another Seger standard, the classic "band on the road" song, "Turn the Page" and a funky version of Van Morrison's "I've Been Working." From '72's Smokin' O.P.'s, the band expands Chuck Berry's "Let it Rock" into an audience pleasing eight minute plus medley which closes the concert with an explosive climax. They also play a Bo Diddley medley and Seger's own "Heavy Music" from that album. The Bo Diddley-Chuck Berry vibe is up front in Seger's "Get Out of Denver" from his Seven album, and there's also a subdued bluesy change of pace in "U. M. C.". Then there's "Ramblin' Gamblin' Man" from Seger's first album.

Added as a bonus track to this new CD is a live version of "I Feel Like Breaking Up Somebody's Home" which had been recorded at the Pontiac Silver Dome in 1976. It is a down and dirty blues that has been recorded by the likes of soul singer Ann Peebles and mellow voiced blues man Albert King, but seems tailored for the grittier voiced Seger and deserves more attention. It is a nice addition to what is already a nicely varied set list.

Not all live concerts deliver the goods for a successful record. Sometimes the band is busy trying to promote unfamiliar new material that disappoints the audience. Sometimes they seem to be phoning it in. Sometimes they seem to be playing for themselves and the audience be damned. But when the band is on its game, when the audience is tuned in, when the music is memorable—when all these planets are aligned, there is magic. Live Bullet was magic when it first came out; Live Bullet is magic today.

Book Review: A Man of Parts, by David Lodge

2011-09-23T08:50:00.000-07:00

Article first published as Book Review: A Man of Parts by David Lodge on Blogcritics.

Born in 1866, deceased, 1946, prolific British author, H. G. Wells' life spanned a period of radical social and cultural change in England and the world in general, and few lives were more in tune with those changes both publically and privately than Wells. He was able to achieve intellectual and political influence in spite of his lower class beginnings. He was a popularizer and disseminator of scientific knowledge. He was a socialist and pacifist. He wrote popular and serious fiction, journalism and criticism, history and political tracts. He supported women's rights. And with all of his intellectual pursuits, he still had time to pursue a sybaritic sexual private life with the gusto of a randy satyr. A firm believer and practitioner of free love and open marriage, the story of his life is the story of his hopping from one bed to another during and between hours set aside for writing, thinking and conversation. His is a life made for a novel.

David Lodge, not quite as prolific as Wells, but prolific enough in his own right, knows a good subject when he sees one. His new novel, A Man of Parts, is his attempt to capitalize on that good subject. It is a fictional representation of the life of Wells, and since Lodge is a literary scholar of some note, it is based on a good deal of solid research. And that may be a problem for many readers. This is a novel that reads like a biography. The author protests right at the beginning that he has taken the novelist's license to invent in things like character's thoughts and feelings and that he has even taken the liberty of portraying events that should have happened. This may be true, but most of what has been invented is presented exactly as it would have been in an academic biography. The voice of the writer is the voice of a scholar. His methods are the methods of a researcher: the book is filled with quotations (undocumented it's true, but documentable). There are few conversations. There are few dramatized scenes. Little is shown, much told.

Perhaps realizing this, Lodge creates a self questioning internal voice which appears at times in the course of the novel to question Wells—something like what one of the great Victorians called "the dialogue of the mind with itself." It is a probing voice that challenges Wells' interpretations of events and relationships, a voice that questions his motivations and explanations. It is a way to add some dramatic tension to the narrative, and is an effective way to remind the reader that this is fiction not fact.

Still the book contains a lot of material that could pass for, if not fact, at least for non-fiction. There is a good deal of explanation and critical interpretation of Well's ideas as expressed in his work, not only the famous pieces, but from almost everything he wrote. Moreover there is also a good bit of criticism of the work of many of the other literary figures that pass through the book's pages: Henry James, Arnold Bennett, George Bernard Shaw, Rebecca West, as well as a number of lesser lights. This shouldn't be unexpected, literature was one of the central elements of Wells' life and he was surrounded by literary lions, and Lodge, after all, is a literary critic of some note. But it is not the average novel reader that will be enthralled with a discussion of Well's criticism of Fabianism in "The Misery of Boots."

On the other hand what may well be of greater interest to that average reader of novels could be the other central element of Well's life, the man's sexual adventures. As prolific as he was a writer, he was equally prolific in the bedroom—his various studies, hideaway cottages, hotel rooms, and even al fresco—if the gossip is to be believed. Suffice it to say, the women in his life were legion. There were long term relationships; there were one night stands. There were young infatuated virgins; there were celebrity seekers. There is enough of the titillating in this man's life for an epic to compete with Frank Harris, but this book isn't it. It's not that the lovers aren't there; they are. It's not that we don't follow them into bed, we do. It is simply that the descriptions of sex and the discussions of sexuality are G-rated. In this age of rampant pornography, A Man of Parts contains some of the least sexual descriptions of sex one could imagine. Whether that's a good thing or not, I leave to the individual reader's moral convictions; I am only interested in pointing it out.

At the end of the day, this is not a book for every reader. There are many who will be fascinated by the life of Wells and Lodge's literate portrayal of him and his contemporaries. He is dealing with sensational material, but he eschews sensationalism. He is more interested in ideas and psychology than he is exciting the reader. Lodge writes with wit and insight. If you're looking for adult ideas written in stylish prose, this is a book you want to read. If you're looking for something more sensual, you may want to look elsewhere.