Sundancing!

This is a post about the Sundance Film Festival.

I forgot it comes to Utah. It seems like such a big thing, a monolithic event, something so far removed from the place that I call home. So I went and saw some movies.

The Island-A Russian film by Pavel Lungin. It was very visually arresting and good. Also incredibly religious, yet miles away from a lot of overtly religious films.

The Animation Showcase- Everything they showed ranged from really good to flat out amazing.

Ghosts of Abu Ghraib-A documentary about the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. Depressing and Heartbreaking at times, it made you feel for both the abused prisoners and the low-ranking officers who pepetuated it. It also proves just how big a cunt Donald Rumsfeld is.

Fido-A movie about domesticated zombies. It was pleasent enough, a couple of good jokes, Dylan Baker was good, but it fell apart at the end.

The last Thursday a few friends and I journeyed to Park City (we went and saw the SLC showings) to see Of Montreal and some other bands play a free show.

Park City is a weird city. Main street has the kind of charm that the small mountain towns I went to in my youth had, albeit in a more cosmopolitan way. However, every building had faux rustic wood paneling, which was contrived and ridiculous, especially on a Burger King.

Anyways, on to the show.

West Indian Girl played first and were horrible. Maybe the cold made me less tolerant of their lame stage banter and Coldplay/Muse wannabe music, but they really sucked.

We ate at a deli and i had fish and chips. It was good

Of Montreal was real good, I would like to see them inside and not in the freezing cold. I must confess to being unfamiliar with them, but they were good. The singer wore a dress in the cold, so that one me over, plus they had a pretty good Prince rip-off song.

So there you go, that was Sundance.

Burning Down the House!

The past few weeks I've almost burnt down my apartment, not once but twice. The kitchen here is woefully small, which is fine since my roomate doesn't cook. So I only use the front two burners, on the two back burners we store out twin George Foreman grillz, the toaster, and whatever else accumulates (Cat pot-holder, empty liquor bottle, etc. etc.).

The first inceident occurred a few weeks ago, I was preparing tea while calling my dad, absently I turned on the burner, the rear burner. A few seconds later, right as I reached my dad's voicemail, the cat pot-holder caught on fire. There was a five minute message left on his voicemail which consisted of me coughing and saying fuck( a word he does not appreciate) intermittently.

The second incedent happened last Sunday, I was preparing tea (again), this time talking on the phone to a friend. I turned on the wrong burner (see a pattern here?). A little bit later, I smelled smoke, ran over to see what was happening. The toaster was on fire, not just burning, it was engulfed by flames, as was, tragically, the cat pot holder, which was finally destroyed. As was my roommate's toaster.

Farewell cat pot-holder, your whimsy brightened many a cold night.

Like it Matters

2k6 has come and gone, and these first few weeks of 2007 are filled with fond rememberances of that year which has faded into memory and trown away Britney Spears calenders. You know what that means, Top Ten Lists! Let's ignore for a momant the irrelevance of assigning and almost arbitrary numerical ranking for a group of events or pieces of art.

So here's my list of top ten albums of 2K6, the first five of which I belive have a lot of staying power. The other ones are albums I liked a lot.

1. The Clipse-Hell Hath No Fury
The Clipse pretty much just rap about cocaine, but that's ok, because they do it with more grit, realism, nihilism, and almost-dispair than anyone else. Malice (real name Gene, dig the dichotomy) and Pusha-T are on top of their game with witty and clever wordplay. Let's not forget about the beats, The Neptunes combination of minimalism and weird sounds sync up perfectly with the rhymes. Trill is no doubt one of the most fucked up sounding rap songs ever.

2. Joanna Newsome-Ys
The white aesthete in me really wanted to put this number one. This is still one of the most incredible and beautiful albums to come out in a long time. Ms. Newsome is a classically trained harpist who has teamed with classical arranger Van Dyke Parks to add orchestral arrangements to her songs. Lyrically whimsical, but also very emotional and honest, many of the songs span 10 or more minutes. Only Skin is one of th most emotionally affecting songs I've heard in a long time.

3.Ghostface Killah-Fishscale
Ghost is the best MC on the planet. I wrote about this a while back.

4.TV on the Radio-Return to Cookie Mountain
I wrote about this a while back. My feelings have not changed, it is still outstanding. They are playing here in March. I am really looking forward to it.

5.The Hold Steady-Boys and Girls in America
While the Clipse rap about selling coke, The Hold Steady sing about the kids and fuck-ups who buy it. Hookier than last year's Separation Sunday, but still mining the same anacronistic classic rock style they've perfected. Craig Finn is one of the best lyricists in rock today, and his stories are by turns comic and poignent.

6.Bob Dylan-Modern Times
Mr. ZImmerman's late career renaissance continues. Better than Love and Theft but not quite as good as Time out of Mind, Bob still is one of the best songwriters ever. He'll never repeat his earlier genius, but he sounds younger than ever on this record.

7.Boris-Pink
Boris are from Japan, and sometimes they play droney Sabbath style songs and sometimes they play shorter, faster songs. Pink is a combination of both styles, and it works perfectly. And it's fucking loud, one of the best rock records in a long time.

8.The Lawrence Arms-Oh! Calcutta!
Lyrical Punk rock at it's finest. The Lawrence Arms are one of the best punk rock bands going today. They also put on an excellent live show.

9. The Nice Boys-S/T
The Nice Boys play a kind of outdated power-pop that has no right to be as good as it is. The songs are catchy and fun, which is a quality that sometimes gets forgotten in music today.

10. Sonic Youth-Rather Ripped
No longer playing songs that devolve into free-form noise jams, Sonic Youth give us 11 of their most melodic songs ever.

Other Stuff I liked
Neko Case-Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
The Marked Men-Fix My Brain
Cat Power-The Greatest
Comets on Fire-Avatar
The Thermals-The Body, The Blood, The Machine
Bonnie "Prince" Billy-The Letting Go
Van Hunt-On the Jungle Floor

Call it a Comeback

So, it wasn't a haitus, my mothlong abscence from blog-land. Call it laziness, call it apathy, call it what you will, I just didn't feel like blogging. But now it is a new year, and with it brings promise

Here's a brief list of things I considered blogging about.

• How much I hate the winter, and cold in general
• The mixed feelings of having a warmer than usual winter
• Some random post about music
• Thoughts about the Holidays

So now its 2K7 and I've made some resolutions that may or may not last.