http://blogcritics.org/ A sinister cabal of superior bloggers on music, books, film, popular culture, politics, and technology - updated continuously. en Copyright 2005-2007 by the authors Fri, 23 May 2003 13:52:23 EDT http://backend.userland.com/rss Blogcritics.org custom software http://blogcritics.org/ Phillip WinnSunday, August 26, 2007, marks the switch of all Blogcritics.org article feeds from full-content to short-content. This is the result of several converging factors, and is unfortunately a permanent decision (as permanent as any decision can be on the web, that is). We are aware of all of the reasons that this is a Bad Idea, and we are aware that some of you will be quite upset about having to click on something to read the free content, and we're sorry. Unfortunately, despite great effort, full-content feeds are not currently economically viable. 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Administration0@blogcritics.org Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:00:00 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/05/23/135223.php AmblongusHaving watched the trailers for a million bad movies and video releases on TV, I've grown subliminally aware of Earl Dittman of Wireless Magazines, who is always resorted to when no critic of any note can be found to provide an enthusiastic quote. Maybe it's because there have been a particularly large number of these lately -- Maid in Manhattan gets "funniest romantic comedy of the year" from him -- so I found myself wondering who the hell this Dittman character was and why no-one I know has ever seen or heard of Wireless Magazines. Entering his name in Google saved me the trouble of a full-scale investigation: a couple of recent articles have been published asking the same questions: Searching for Earl Dittman, anti-critic Earl Dittman Exposed - Film Criticism’s Greatest Shame Neither article manages to prove or disprove the existence of either Dittman or Wireless Magazines, although there is a possibly that it may have a circulation of one or two video stores, possibly somewhere in Houston. The skinny on Dittman: he was one of the "blurbmeisters" whose fawning raves were referenced in the class action lawsuit brought against major movie studios in 2001 by Citizens for Truth in Movie Advertising, and he has been regarded as a joke or worse since the mid 90s -- and yet his insanely uncritical raves continue to be used in ads, trailers and promotions. It does appear that no film has ever been made that Dittman does not regard as the greatest advance in motion picture history since the last one.Beware though: once you have become aware of Dittman you will be drawn into watching every trailer and scanning the back of every video and DVD box in search of his priceless prose.Postscript: eFilmCritic runs a regular CriticWatch column and it seems that Dittman isn't the worst film whore. But there is definitely something special about him ("doing a Dittman" has a nice ring to it) and the mysterious Wireless Magazines that seems to be rarely that first folios of Shakespeare.... Video5544@blogcritics.org Fri, 23 May 2003 13:52:23 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/05/22/151751.php AmblongusSince Al's having withdrawal symptoms, I thought I'd share. Today's Austin American-Statesman has a report and pictures from last night's triumphant Dixie Chicks concert at the Frank Erwin Center. Note the F.U.T.K. t-shirt that Ms Maines is sporting, which was also glimpsed on the local K-EYE news last night and during the live feed to the Country Music awards. I think you can all work out what this acronym stands for.... Music5522@blogcritics.org Thu, 22 May 2003 15:17:51 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/04/11/101236.php AmblongusThe Guardian's Alexis Petridis goes against all expectations and finds something nice to say about Madonna's American Life today. Here are the good bits: Finally, and most importantly, she starts coming up with the sort of sublime pop melodies that are noticeably absent from the first half of the album. "Nothing Fails" has a wonderful choral finale. "Intervention" marries a New Order-like ambience to a chorus that one of those Swedish pop factories would kill to come up with. The closing "Easy Ride" is fantastic.And:American Life's best tracks make a mockery of virtually all other current pop music.It does read like he's striving for something nice to say about it, however, as he makes the rest of the album sound totally risible -- a track about "Hollywood" not being as wonderful as some people might think, sung in a fake little girl voice, plus "songs about how great her kids are, what a tragedy her mother's early death was, and what an all-round credit to the human race Guy Ritchie is". I'm sure there'll be a few thousand more reviews before it's released, but the signs don't look too good for it being anything other than Music Part 2. Which is a damn shame. As much as I find her increasingly ludicrous and sappy, part of me still wants her to make an amazing comeback and play a part in dragging mainstream music away from the antiseptic, self-congratulatory constrictions that now make it such a anodyne sham.... Music4514@blogcritics.org Fri, 11 Apr 2003 10:12:36 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/26/134814.php AmblongusTwo more contributions for your wartime compilation MP3 collection -- or to help you decide which of your old favorites you can take down to Goodwill and claim never to have really liked in the first place.REM weigh in with The Final Straw, which is only slightly less obique than most of their material. Pleasant enough but what is he saying? Even having the lyrics doesn't help.The Clash's Mick Jones (although it must piss him off to still be refered to that way after all these years) and, um, Sigue Sigue Sputnik's Tony James have got together to produce Why Do Men Fight. Notable for being the only one of this wartime batch with a sense of humour, incorporating as it does a Slade sample....I can't give a deep musicologist opinion of these songs because my connection is so flaky I can barely hear more than a few seconds of either at a time. Over to you technologically advanced (or employed) critics for that... Music4119@blogcritics.org Wed, 26 Mar 2003 13:48:14 EST http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/24/164542.php AmblongusThe NME reports that Hot Hot Heat's song "Bandages" has been removed from the BBC Radio 1 playlist because of a "prevalence of the word 'bandages' in the song". Not having heard the song I'm at a loss to understand how the word "bandages" can occur in a song at all -- it's hardly the most mellifluous word and doesn't rhyme with much. But I'm sure there are sensitive souls who, when they're not watching 24 hour coverage of missile attacks and bombing raids need protecting from the terrible word. Music4040@blogcritics.org Mon, 24 Mar 2003 16:45:42 EST http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/24/101018.php AmblongusAccording to his letter in Saturday's Guardian, Scottish novelist Iain Banks, author of Dead Air, The Wasp Factory, Complicity, The Crow Road and plenty more, has apparently destroyed his passport and sent the remains to Tony Blair as a protest at Britain's involvement in the invasion of Iraq....Update: Bank's latest novel, Dead Air doesn't seem to be available in the USA. Try Amazon.co.uk. Books4034@blogcritics.org Mon, 24 Mar 2003 10:10:18 EST http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/23/234855.php AmblongusThe figures are in (via Soundbitten). The Dixie Chicks' Home has gone back up to Number 4 in the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart since that remark and remains at Number 1 in the Top Country Albums. All those conservative blowhards jabbering away have probably earned the Chicks another couple of limos and holiday homes each. Pats on the back all round -- you sure showed them! Music4029@blogcritics.org Sun, 23 Mar 2003 23:48:55 EST http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/21/095820.php AmblongusJust when you hoped the Dixie Chicks controversy had died down comes the biggest and silliest story of all:South Carolina House members say the Dixie Chicks should apologize for lead singer Natalie Maines' criticism of President Bush by performing a free concert for troops.Nothing too different from what was being said by a thousand others. But....Republican state Rep. Catherine Ceips introduced a resolution Wednesday calling for the country music trio to perform for South Carolina troops and their families. Note that this is not for Texan troups as an apology for being a Texan band that said a Texan president was an embarrassment to Texas but for South Caroline troops....the resolution, which passed the House on a 50-35 vote and left some lawmakers angry and others confused.Nothing like devoting House time and resources on the eve of a war to debating a pop concert to make lawmakers angry and confused, I guess. But it does seem a novel way of getting entertainers to play in places they wouldn't normally go. Find some remark they made about anything anywhere -- regardless of its connection to your state -- and pass a resolution demanding they make amends. Music3983@blogcritics.org Fri, 21 Mar 2003 09:58:20 EST http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/21/093134.php AmblongusThe entertainment business reels from the news that comedy rockers Tenacious D won't be going to Scandinavia to take part in television promo and instore appearances because of the war, Donatella Versace won't be attending the Oscars, Lisa Marie Presley has cancelled a promotional tour (for what?) and Madonna is "fine-tuning" her "American Life" video to make sure that there isn't anything going on in the world that she isn't cashing in on.Meanwhile, Evan Dando has tried to use the "Bash Bush in London" gambit to help relaunch his career. And Lee Ryan of boyband Blue, who can normally be counted on to contribute something deep at times like this (he was the one who came out with "Who gives a f*** about New York when elephants are being killed?" regarding 9/11) has greeted the outbreak of hostilities by announcing he wants to have sex with an alien. (Most of these links stolen from No Rock 'n' Roll Fun, which you're already devoted readers of, I assume....) Music3982@blogcritics.org Fri, 21 Mar 2003 09:31:34 EST http://blogcritics.org/archives/2003/03/19/085003.php AmblongusA name from the past that wasn't mentioned at the rather depressing induction of the Clash into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame or any of the eulogies to the late Joe Strummer was Alvaro, the Chilean with the Singing Nose. "Who?" I hear you ask. "Strummer was a punk, he didn't have anything to do with singing gnomes...."Nose. Singing Nose. Here's the story.Alvaro Peņa-Rojas was born in Chile in 1943 and released a couple of singles there 1965 there in a band called Los Challengers, followed two years later by "El Twist del Infierno" as a member of Los Bumerangs.In 1973 he fled Chile after Pinochet's fascist coup and took his saxophone to England, where he met up with Joe Strummer (who at the time went by the rather unpunk name of "Woody" Mellor) to form El Huaso and the 101 All Stars -- named after the squat where they lived at 101 Walterton Road, Maida Vale, in north London. The band, whose name became shortened first to the 101 All Stars and then the 101ers, played fast, earthy r'n'b, what was then known, not always approvingly, as pub-rock. The band played for two years, released the still listenable "Keys to your Heart" on Chiswick before splitting early in 1976. Their last two gigs were supporting a bunch of upstarts called the Sex Pistols. It was seeing the Pistols that made "Woody" suspect that playing old Chuck Berry riffs in sweaty London pubs was a dead end and the future lay elsewhere. So when Mick Jones and Paul Simeon came around asking if he wanted to form a band with them he didn't need to be asked twice....For pub-rockers the 101ers gave birth to some unlikely musicians. Aside from the renamed Strummer, other members went on to join the Raincoats, PIL and the Passions, whose "I'm in Love with a German Filmstar" is an early goth favorite around these parts and about as far from gutsy r'n'b as you can imagine. One of their guitarists, Martin Stone, even made the strange transition into a literary character and now crops up in novels by Michael Moorcock and Iain Sinclair.But Alvaro was the most unlikely of all. He put away his saxophone and recorded the curious, infamous Drinkin My Own Sperm, 500 copies of which were released on his own Squeaky Shoes label in 1977 -- and mainly disapeared without trace. (I remember seeing it mentioned in Zigzag when it came out and was mildly intrigued, but they didn't have it in the local branch of Virgin so I probably bought something by the Residents or Devo instead and forgot all about it.) Ever since, punks and collectors have been intrigued, confused and horrified by this record. Expecting some sort of outrageous proto-punk grail they've spent up to several hundred dollars on what turns out to be mostly rudimentary piano thumping, nursery rhyme flute-tooting, minimal percussion and "ridiculously schmaltzy singing". What I've heard of this album could be considered "outsider music" but for the fact that it is playful and catchy, even when it's as disturbing as the title song. "Don't worry about the bum notes," say the sleeve notes. Only 200 copies of the follow up, Mum's Milk Not Powder, recorded in Germany in 1978, were released. This features Alvaro on piano, percussion, bass and nose-whistle and a friend on drums, percussion and "washing the dishes sounds". You just know that Joe and Alvaro had well and truly parted ways musically by this point.Unnoticed by the rest of the world, Alvaro has gone on releasing tapes and vinyl. To celebrate his 50th birthday in 1993 he put out a single called "I'm not so young anymore" (b-side: "Watching the fridge defrost"). In 1997, twenty years after its original release Drinkin... (I'm not typing that title again) came out on CD and may still be available. I've think he's now returned to Chile after all these years with the Pinochet regime out of the way. He's had a website for years, although most of the useful information is in Spanish or German, which explains why this piece is so patchy. There are some audio samples of his songs if you're feeling brave. It's fun to finally hear the title track of his first album after all these years, to hear what else was going on when we were all pogoing to the sond of his old bandmate bashing on about white riots and London burning with boredom -- although I wouldn't recommend you played it too loud in the office.... Music3917@blogcritics.org Wed, 19 Mar 2003 08:50:03 EST