Testermix - Spring '11

The early portions of 2011 threw several hard-and-fast changes at me, causing me to spend longer than usual tweaking this mix; I had a tough time finding exactly what I was doing in life, let alone on my iPod. Fortunately, I was able to steady myself enough to knock out a decent collection of tunes that covered the usual bases: a little classic rock here, a little ducklips music there, and a whole heaping helping of songs I play on Rock Band.

In fact, I'm going to resume my earlier Diversion 2.0 drinking game: drink every time Rock Band is overtly mentioned. Don't worry, I'll help keep track. Also, drink for the mention in the previous paragraph. The game starts NOW.

1) Blue Öyster Cult - "Burnin' For You"

When assembling these mixes, I generally compile a big ol' song pool out of whatever I'm listening to, and choose the songs that sound best together. Sometimes, if a song is cut, I try to sneak it into the next season's mix, to see if it would "fit" better with the other tracks. "Burnin' For You" is a prime example of this. I'd been trying to slot it in since at least Fall '10, and finally found it a comfortable place in this mix.

I like "Burnin' For You" for most of the same reasons I like "Ridin' The Storm Out" by REO Speedwagon, which is fitting because I used to get them confused with each other. Like "Ridin'," "Burnin'" is in a pleasant, easy-going key, and both get a chance to show off several guitar-gymnastic solos. The main difference between the two is that of intensity—"Ridin'" attacks the track with its constant bass drum back-beat, while "Burnin'" drifts by like the countryside during a lazy afternoon drive. Great melody, great song, and a great potential candidate for Rock Band.

Drink.

2) New Found Glory - "All Downhill From Here"

Ever since I put Story of the Year into the previous mix, I've started integrating songs from my high school years into my tracklists. Warped Tour staples New Found Glory made a big impression of me back during my sophomore year (the time when I was just starting to drink the Teen Angst Kool-Aid), and "All Downhill From Here" was one of my favorites, mostly because of its monstrous opening riff. The trippy music video is neither here nor there, but "All Downhill From Here" reminds me of driving my crappy Nissan Sentra to my friend's house in Amsterdam, hopped up on energy drinks and excited to talk obsessively about Magic: The Gathering and Alternative Press. Fortunately, I've since grown up and matured, and learned not to read AP under any circumstances.

3) ZZ Top - "La Grange"

When I was a kid, I think I used to get this song confused with Norman Greenbaum's "Spirit in the Sky." I was an idiot as a child. Anyway, there's an astronomically high chance you've already heard this song's main riff, which is good because there's not much else to "La Grange" besides it and some show-offy guitar work. That's far from a complaint, however, as both said riff and guitar work are fantastic.

"La Grange" begins quietly, with a snare-rim percussion rhythm setting the tempo and the lead guitar playing a understated version of the main riff. After the lead singer warbles a few bars of the melody, though, a huge-sounding fill throws the rest of the track into high gear, with the off-time guitars and galloping bass pedal driving the experience. From its down-tempo beginning to its kinetic main section, "La Grange" is my song of choice if I were to be involved in a car chase.

4) Dev - "Bass Down Low (Featuring The Cataracs)"

My love affair with Ke$ha is well-documented (and I like her music, too!), so what's to stop another ign'ant, duck lips'n white girl from invading my playlist? To be fair, Dev does sound different from her music-best-enjoyed-trashed sistren, as she's even more production-focused than nearly any other mainstream singer. Good thing, too, because The Cataracs are easily the best weapon up Dev's sleeve; they sampled her on Far East Movement's "Like a G6," propelling her into the spotlight, and provided the production work on all of her new album, The Night the Sun Came Up.

The main reason I like "Bass Down Low" is because its siren-sampling beat reminds me of a song from SSX 3 by Overseer called "Screw Up." I also dig the bending, 808-sounding synth that backs the chorus. Dev's lyrics are a shallow and anti-clever in the way the Ke$ha's usually aren't, but when the production is as stellar as it is on "Bass," silly things like lyrics don't bother me.

5) The Romantics - "What I Like About You"

Honestly, I don't have much to say on this song, other than that I've wanted to put it in a mix for some time but kept forgetting. Most of my memories of this song come from a compilation album my friend Luke and I used to listen to while playing Super Nintendo, and it's stuck with me for all of that time. Cheery chords, hand claps, and boy-likes-girl lyrics—what's not to like?

6) Mountain - "Mississippi Queen"

Like most near-ubiquitous classic rock songs, I first heard "Mississippi Queen" in a music game (Guitar Hero III, in this case), and played it enough to learn to appreciate the song's subtleties. "Mississippi Queen" is also featured in an episode of The Simpsons, which all but cemented its spot in my pantheon of Testermix songs.

"Mississippi Queen" has perhaps one of the greasiest-sounding guitar part in all of music, and is completely and totally awesome because of it. Seriously, everything about the main riff is unmixed, nasty-sounding, and completely unrefined, which gives "Mississippi Queen" indelible personality. I'm also a fan of the snare triplets that play during the back parts of the verse.

Drink. Well, half-drink; Harmonix didn't make Guitar Hero III.

7) Deadmau5 - "Ghosts 'n' Stuff (Featuring Rob Swire)"

Last year, for Christmas, I became partially obsessed with DJ Hero 2's setlist, with its cavalcade of song mash-ups and remixes. Highlights included Lady Gaga's "Love Game" vs. Kanye West's "Heartless," PCD's "Doncha" vs. Pitbull's "I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)," and Iyaz's "Replay" vs. Rihanna's "Rude Boy." Amid the torrent of familiar-sounding mash-ups, there was a remix of Lady Gaga's "Just Dance," which combined it with some organ-sounding song by Canadian DJ Deadmau5. One day, out of curiosity, I looked this organ-sounding song up on YouTube, just to see what it was like, and I've been obsessed with it ever since.

Honestly, it's the organs that get me. It's a simple, four-chord hook, but for reasons inexplicable to me it toggles some hidden joy button in my brain, and I'm powerless to resist. I went with the three-minute single version for this mix; Rob Swire's vocals give the song more direction, and the protracted running time is more conducive to cramming other songs onto the mix.

8) Quietdrive - "Way Out"

A small bit of trivia about how I assemble these mixes: generally, if an artist worked before, then dammit they'll work again! Case in point: "Way Out," which came of the thought process, "I put a Quietdrive song on the Winter '10 mix, so why not put them on this one?"

It's not like they don't deserve it, though. Quietdrive has been one of my favorite pop-punk bands since 2007, and if I decided to commemorate their new album by slapping a song on my personal mix series, then so be it. "Way Out" is a bit slower than most of my preferred pop-punk, but the less-aggressive tempo helps give the mix variety, and I like how the drums give the chorus an insistent, intense feeling.

9) The Police - "Roxanne"

Forget that tango one (you hear me, Kailey? Forget it!). The original Police version is where it's at, at least for my tastes. Yes, Sting's pained, lovesick lyrics carry over well to Baz Luhrmann's esteemed jukebox musical, but the Moulin Rouge! version lacks the best part of the song: the chorus. That wonderful soaring, harmonizing, bass-drum-driving chorus. It's literally the reason I listen to the song, and any version lacking it is woefully incomplete.

Oddly, the live versions of this song I've heard from Sting's solo career also lack the chorus. Whatever; it's his song, after all, and he can tweak with it as he sees fit.

10) Judas Priest - "You've Got Another Thing Comin'"

Get out your hip flasks, because here's drink #3. I played the hell out of this song on the original Guitar Hero during my freshman year of college, and did so again during my junior year in Rock Band, but on drums this time. I'm not sure if Judas Priest's brand of 80's epic metal is quite up my alley, but far be it for me to take away from this weighty, powerful-sounding track.

Every note, every beat, every word sung (yelled?) feel as heavy as the Iron Boots from The Legend of Zelda, and the palm-muted chugs of the rhythm guitar sound like a freight train. "You've Got Another Thing Comin'" has enough power to smash through a brick wall, and I can't help but dig on the cocky drawn-out, three-note phrase that makes up the main riff. Not into metal? Well, you've got another thing &c.

11) Artist vs. Poet - "Runaway"

Artist vs. Poet is a simple, fly-by-night power pop band that's no more memorable than the bag of Gushers I had with lunch today. But much just like said fruit snack, however, they're sweet, immediately likeable, and tasty right up until the very last bit. "Runaway" was my first Artist song, and fits well with my usual roster of power pop groups (I also included another of their songs, "Car Crash," on my Spring '10 mix. Must be the time of the season).

12) Journey - "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)"

One of the most recognizable keyboard openers in 80's rock and I first hear about it through Tron: Legacy. Yes, dear readers, my introduction to this Journey staple was not through a Greatest Hits compilation, nor through my local classic rock radio station (though it certainly didn't hurt the song's placement)—instead, I learn of its existence from a movie directed by a guy who makes video game commercials. Though, to be fair, they are stonking great video game commercials.

It's not just the synth that calls to me with "Separate Ways," though. The constant floor toms give the song an understated intensity, and the unusually-heavy-for-Journey guitar lets the audience know that the band means business. Of course, Journey's penchant for soaring vocals boosts "Separate Ways" into a sort of 80's rock overdrive, and, really, who can say "no" to Steve Perry's siren voice? Rawr.

13) Avril Lavigne - "What The Hell"

Oh boy. At least once per mix, I have one or two guilty pleasure songs that a masculine dude like myself should have no business liking. Yet here we have "What The Hell," Avril Lavigne's successful attempt to out-brat her 2006 hit "Girlfriend," and the catchiest damn song to make me do the most embarrassing actions while car-dancing. It's bad, and will go further undiscussed. Let's just quickly gloss over the song's excellent use of organs, simple melodies, and both "la-las" and "woah-ohs."

A anecdote story about this song: the first time I heard it, I was on a road trip with my friend Jordyn to Missoula from Helena, where we were to drop a friend-of-a-friend off at the airport. During the drive (a two-hour jaunt, which isn't bad for Montana), Jordyn idly mentioned that, oh hey, there's a new Avril Lavigne single out. Being morbidly curious, I decided to impulse buy it from Amazon with my smartphone. We listened to it once, and thought it was no big deal. Then once turned into twice, turned into five times, turned into the whole damn afternoon. All the while, we chatted about the various garage sales and Christmases it took for Jordyn to collect her entire catalog of Disney Animated Features, and how I was working on my own DAF collection. It wasn't until much later that I realized that my friend-of-friend passenger's first impression of me consisted entirely of Disney VHS packaging jabber and a continuous drone of "All my life I've been good! But now!"

Unsurprisingly, I haven't heard from her since.

14) Ray Charles - "Mess Around"

Many of my Testermix song choices are informed by Rock Band (drink), but this one was informed by, of all things, Family Guy. Specifically, the Return of the Jedi parody episode "It's A Trap." Specifically, specifically, it's the portion where, during the battle of Endor portion, an AT-ST driver reenacts a scene from Planes, Trains, and Automobiles where John Candy mimics playing Ray Charles while driving. Making this the most disgustingly meta pick on the whole playlist, and I'm going to stop thinking about it right now.

Anyway, "Mess Around" is a fun, manic little track, replete with lots of early Motown-isms like a sax solo and Ray's own signature piano playing. Lord knows why it made the final cut of this mix, but I like how it acts as a break in the action; 2:39 worth of lively soul music, and a small reminder of watching Family Guy with friends. Could be worse.

15) Eddie Money - "Shakin'"

I've already written at length about "Shakin'" and how it helped fish me out of an emotional torpor, so here's a quick summation of why I love it: "Shakin'" is the most erotic-sounding song I've ever heard. The floor toms, the sexy guitar, and the slinky sonic trailing-off that hallmarks most of the verse all give the impression that something is going to happen, and that's not even including the lyrics ("It got so hot we had to pull to the side / and did some shakin' till the middle of the night"). Rawr pt. II.

16) Foo Fighters - "Everlong"

Out of all of my favorite songs to play on Rock Band (drink), "Everlong" is an absolute blast. My antipathy towards most 90's rock is well-established, but "Everlong" has pacing and energy like few other tracks from the decade of VH1 and Furbies. Particularly, the drum-playing, which has a delightful, challenging series of bass kicks and drum fills—small surprise, considering what a talented dude Dave Grohl is on drums.

I honestly don't have much to say about this song, other than the melody ramps up perfectly from verse to chorus, and the backing instrumentation creates a wall of sonic intensity that complements the vocals splendidly. It's powerful, it's uplifting, and it's hard for me to actively listen to this track and not get chills.

17) Chali 2na - "Don't Stop (Featuring Anthony Hamilton)"

When I was younger, one of my favorite hip-hop groups was Jurassic 5, a six-member conglomerate from Los Angeles specializing in old-school-mentality rhymes and attitude. Unfortunately, the group broke up sometime in 2007, but several ex-members still carry the torch in their solo work. Chali 2na had easily the most unique voice out of the group (describing his deep baritone as the "verbal Herman Munster"), making him an ideal choice for a solo career.

"Don't Stop" was featured heavily on Bozeman's local Top-40 station, which makes no sense to me because of Chali's independent, underground roots. Que sera, sera. Anyway, the breezy flute-loop beat wouldn't be out of place in a J5 song, and 2na's Marianas Trench-deep vocals provide a pleasant cushion for the ears. I may not get a new Jurassic 5 album any time soon, but as long as I can still purchase music from its members, I'll be able to get by.

18) Fall Out Boy - "G.I.N.A.S.F.S."

A bonus track from Fall Out Boy's third major release, Infinity on High, "G.I.N.A.S.F.S." went unheard by me for nearly three years, on account of my poor decision not to drive to Billings and purchase the album at Best Buy, where it was an exclusive song. Most of the nice things I usually say about Fall Out Boy apply here: Patrick Stump's ramrod-straight vocal delivery of Pete Wentz's clever-but-self-consciously-so lyrics, Joe Trohman's strong guitar-playing, and Andy Hurley's erratic, energetic druming (which manifests itself in this song through some intensely-satisfying snare triplets). A quasi-hidden gem that I was all-too-happy to dig up.

A side note: I looked it up, and apparently the song title is short for "Gay Is Not A Synonym For S@%#$y." Yep, that's Pete Wentz, alright.

19) The Material - "What Happens Next"

<mushy, personal stuff>

During the beginning of 2011, I left my steady job at a large company here in Bozeman. The office culture was great, and I was working alongside many excellent people, but I couldn't get into the actual work itself, and departed in the face of becoming slowly, steadily miserable with myself. Unfortunately, I didn't have much in the way of a back-up plan, and would flounder around for work for a long while afterwards.

It was during this time that I bought The Material's "What We Are," the debut full-length album from a San Diego band I'd followed and enjoyed since 2007. The Material's juxtaposition of aggro guitar and punchy drums with pretty, feminine-sounding vocals suited me well in my post-employment blues, particularly "What Happens Next," a forward-looking, bittersweet tune about changes and moving on. It fit, and so it's here. It's a reminder of how things were, and the hope that things would get better.

</mushy, personal stuff>

20) Man Down Medic - "Extra, Extra"

Man Down Medic is a small, four-part band from Washington that I saw at a show during my sophomore year of college. Their music is everything I don't like about the indie genre, yet they've rearranged most of the egregiously twee stuff and make it sound palatable. Kind of like how a Bloomin' Onion tastes good, despite still being a damned onion.

Nearly everything about "Extra, Extra" is slight but pleasant, from the lead singer's voice to the simple melodies of the verse and chorus. What draws me in the most, though, is the synth/violin hook, which I find mildly exhilarating. I also dig how the female singer harmonizes with the male one during the chorus, and the memories is conjures of when I traveled to different towns to watch shows. "Extra, Extra" is a slight downer, but that's why it's near the end of the mix and not further up.

21) The Who - "Won't Get Fooled Again"

I'll be honest: some of these picks can get pretty impulsive, and similar to what happened with "Shakin'," I chose this song because I happened to be tired while listening to the radio one night. In this case, I was making my way home from a late night Bell-ringing (I have no words in my defense), and I came in during the ginormous instrumental break that takes up almost the entire latter-half of the track. I like to end my mixes with large, sprawling songs (it gives the ending a sense of finality), and I basically decided then and there that "Won't Get Fooled Again" would make this mix.

Another fun note: the end track is almost invariably this first song sequenced once the final pool of songs has been decided on, and often one of the first songs put into said pool.

At any rate, election season's coming up, so I don't need to get into the song's not-subtle jab at politicians and the fun game of American and/or British politics; seriously, if even I can get it, it must be pretty apparent. Instead, I'll mention in passing the organ (a recurring theme for this mix) and extended guitar solo, and briefly note how satisfying that extended musical break is.

Thanks for reading, and I hope to see you all during my next write-up.

Unless (*puts on sunglasses*) you get mixed up.

YEEEEAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Testermix 2011: Year in review

Loyal readers of Diversion 2.0 may remember my old series of mix CDs, titled Testermix. I used to make one for each season of the year (quarterly, if you will) as a means to keep track of passing time, capturing snapshots of my memories and mood through music. I also wrote about them on this very blog, partly because I wanted to explain my mentality for why I picked certain songs, but mostly because I needed something to write about.

Well, I continued to make Testermixes, though my write-ups slowed to a crawl. No longer. While it's a bit late to continue reminiscing about 2011, I figure reposting Testermix Spring '11 - Winter '11 will be a good chance to review what happened last year, and what I listened to. Plus, you folks get a phenomenal list of songs to track down on iTunes. Everyone wins!

Stay tuned during the coming weeks for various sonic flavors from the past four seasons. In the mean time, enjoy...



PS - You can thank Jordyn for reminding me to post my old mixes; she, too, is doing a mix series, and insinuated that I post these entirely more often than I do. You can follow her series at Popped Density.

You were so awesome. You were like Rin Tin Tin -- The Adventures of Tintin

Longtime readers of Diversion 2.0 (I feel like there must be at least three of you at this point) know my affinity for adventure media—films, video games, whatever; if it reminds me of a Carl Barks Uncle Scrooge comic book, chances are I’m going to like it an awful lot. It’s with this mindset that I bring up The Adventures of Tintin, a motion-capture film version of Belgian artist Hergé’s famous newspaper comic strips, which, to my understanding, are to European audiences what Uncle Scrooge is to me. Produced by Peter Jackson and helmed by Stephen Spielberg (a man who knows a thing or three about putting together an adventure film), Tintin is swashbuckling and satisfying popcorn cinema, and if it’s not as good as Raiders of the Lost Ark, it’s at least as fun as Romancing the Stone.

The Adventures of Tintin is based on three volumes of Hergé’s work, and follows Tintin (Jaime Bell), a newspaper reporter with a penchant for finding hidden treasure, as he attempts to discover the secrets of a model ship with the figurehead of a unicorn. Along the way, he meets Captain Haddock (Andy Serkis), a boozy, blustery seaman with at least three catchphrases to his name (“Blustering barnacles!”), and the slinky, sinister Mr. Sakharine (Daniel Craig). Tintin and Haddock’s travels take them from France, to Morocco, to the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, though, disappointingly, there’s not a single sequence involving an old parchment map or a traveling red line.

Tintin and Haddock manage to get both into and out of several scrapes along the course of the film.
Motion capture animation, made popular by films like The Polar Express and Disney’s A Christmas Carol, has received a healthy amount of flak from audiences, mostly for the off-putting, Uncanny Valley appearances of its characters. I was concerned that I would spend most of Tintin distracted by its animation style, but after I got over the initial shock of the characters’ realistic proportions and cartoon faces, I was amazed by how good the film looked, and how fluid the action was. Far from an unnecessary stylistic flourish, Tintin’s animation gives way to fantastic, larger-than-life stunts and setpieces, like a harrowing motorcycle chase through a Moroccan city in pursuit of a falcon, or a kinetic, rain-swept duel between two enormous ships.

And how wonderful the set pieces are! Far from simply shooting them and cutting together the footage, Spielberg takes the freedom brought by animation and uses it to swoop in and out of the background, following characters as they leap, slide and run through the environment, all without a single break in the action. If Tintin succeeds on any level (and it does on numerous ones, I should think), it’s in the movie’s heedless, joyous celebration of movement and spectacle.

During many of Tintin's setpieces, the camera darts in and out of the action, which I rather enjoyed.
Tintin’s acting performances are solid throughout. I’m unfamiliar with Jaime Bell’s work, but I enjoyed his portrayal of the titular character, doing his best to power through the character’s inherent hollow writing. Craig is wonderful as the menacing Sakharine, to the point that I didn’t even know it was Craig until I watched the credits. The real show-stopper, though, is Serkis, who puts his motion capture experience from Lord of the Rings, King Kong, and Rise of the Planet of the Apes to good use, imbuing Captain Haddock with boisterous energy and personality, not to mention a ruddy good Scottish brogue. Helping round out Tintin’s audio package is a rousing score from composer John Williams, who uses his old-fashioned matinee sensibilities to great effect, while sprinkling in Middle Eastern motifs and playful jazz-era sounds reminiscent of his work in Catch Me If You Can.

For all its does right, though, Tintin doesn’t escape without a few blemishes. As I mentioned earlier, Tintin as a character has few distinguishing qualities, and while I get that he’s meant to be an audience cypher, he still feels quite dull onscreen. As a result, many of the character development scenes fall flat, especially early in the movie before the introduction of Captain Haddock. Also, while I was able to push past Tintin’s use of motion capture, I realize that some might still be weirded out by overall aesthetic of the characters, though I will say that Tintin looks miles ahead of other motion capture films I’ve seen.

Many characters sport bulbous noses and other exaggerated facial features, which clash a bit with their smooth, normal-looking movements.
Then there’s the matter of Captain Haddock, a character whose primary trait, apart from being a sea captain and a Scot, is his rampant alcoholism. Usually, it’s played to comic relief, such as when Tintin elaborately steals a key from a quarter of sleeping sailors, only to find out the key unlocks the ship’s liquor cabinet; or when Haddock’s foul, fermented breath is able to keep an airplane running midflight. At other times, Tintin gives Haddock grief about his constant drinking, in a darker, Rather Serious manner, making Haddock’s later scenes of comic drinking all the more surreal. Tintin’s treatment of Haddock’s alcoholism, ironically, is like that of a drunkard, weaving back and forth between hilarity and pathos. W.C. Fields, this film ain’t.

Still, for the couple knocks against it I have, I still enjoyed the heck out of Tintin. Even without having read a Tintin comic book, the movie still drove home a sense of adventure and excitement like few other films from recent years. The movie ends with the promise of a sequel, and I’ll be hotly anticipating Tintin’s further adventures.

Last but not beast -- Beastly (2011)

Squarely aimed to appeal to Twilight fans looking for more Paranormal Teen Romance, Beastly is a modern retelling of Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve’s “Beauty and the Beast” set in a posh New York prep school. While the idea of taking a classic fairy tale that has already received a pretty definitive update and melding it with pretty girls wanting sullen boys seems colossally wrongheaded, Beastly honestly isn’t as bad as it could be. That’s not to say that it’s not absolutely gosh-awful, because it is, but it’s gosh awful in exactly the right ways and wraps in a wonderfully slight 86 minutes, making for a delightfully gaudy and trashy slice of “teen” entertainment, as perceived entirely by marketing.

Beastly, as its title suggests, follows the story of the Beast, played by Kyle Kingston (Alex Pettyfer), an obscenely wealthy and vain son of a famous, parentally-distant newscaster (Beastly’s angle is to blame Kyle’s jerkwad nature on his daddy issues, which it works tirelessly in the first half of the movie before dropping entirely in the second). Kyle wins the presidency of some thinly-described school club, and celebrates by publicly humiliating the piercing- and tattoo-laden school “witch,” Kendra (Mary Kate Olsen. Yes, that Mary Kate Olsen), for being a pug-fugly heifer-face, or something to that effect. Kendra responds by turning the pretty boy Kyle into an equally piercing- and tattoo-laden creature of so-called ugliness, though by allowing him to keep his washboard physique and slender build, Kendra effectively makes Kyle a Suicide Boy.

Billboard Dad, this ain't.

Of course, Kyle and his father will have nothing to do with his new, alternative look, and he’s given a private condo overlooking the Hudson, so that he may be spared the humiliation of being seen by other, equally-shallow classmates. In fact, the only person who showed Kyle any non-fake affection before his transformation is the humble, down-to-earth Lindy (Vanessa Hudgens), who attends the prep school on scholarship, tipping the audience off that, because she’s not of privilege, she’s an actually decent human being. Kyle seeks Lindy out and saves her from a murderous drug dealer, letting her stay under his roof until the whole thing blows over. At first, Lindy doesn’t take to him, and balks at his attempts to buy her affection with increasingly-expensive gifts, but as he opens his heart to her, she begins to see his kinder and gentler side, and then it’s all over but the crying (which a friend of mine actually did during our most recent viewing).

You may have noticed my many oblique references to the many material goods featured in the movie. This is because Beastly is, first and foremost, lifestyle porn. I was honestly blown away by the constant name-dropping of expensive brands like Dolce & Gabbona, Prada, and more, as well as the pie-in-the-sky wealth on prominent display by nearly every character, including and up to Kyle’s sky loft condo, which must cost more in one month than I make in one year.

Love conquers all, especially if you're a bad boy with Jay-Z levels of expendable income.

The second thing Beastly is, or wants to be, is a movie about the Teen Experience; it valiantly attempts to punch up its workaday screenplay with modern, “hip” flourishes, and could not sound more forced if Diablo Cody stuck her head in midway through and began rambling on about Sonic Youth and her hamburger phone. Characters—grown characters—arbitrarily start speaking in “teen”-sounding neologisms (describing someone as “tool-y), and several important, plot-related shots are predicated on text messages, darting across the screen in a see-through montage promising dramatic heft (“Can’t be there 2nite. :(” The heart reels).

Combining white privilege, American teenagers, angsty romance, and wrapping it in a fairy tale guise sounds like the most surefire recipe for disaster that Man could possibly invent, but for some twisted, indefensible reason, it kinda worked for me. The over-the-top wealth and gratuitous “teen” vernacular works well with the fairy tale story, helping solidify the notion that the whole movie is a folk tale, but a modern one. Beastly doesn’t feel anymore “real” than Beauty and the Beast must have sounded to its original audience, but its heightened, exaggerated telling works well for the story, in the same way a pet-stained rug can, in the right venue, straight-facedly be presented as modern art.

In the weirdest, peanut-butter-and-sardines way, Beastly kinda, sorta works, though having a few drinks before viewing can't hurt.

In terms of the acting, there’s nothing abrasively “bad” about Beastly, though I’m certain there’s little that can be truthfully described as “good.” Both Pettyfur and Hudgens bring little insight and depth to their characters (beauty isn’t the only thing skin-deep), but their aggressively bland performances truly, honestly contribute to the above fairy tale stylization. More active and altogether interesting are Kyle’s blind tutor Will (Neil Patrick Harris) and live-in maid Zola (Lisa Gay Hamilton), who both act as cyphers for Lumiere and Mrs. Potts from the Disney version, respectively. Since both actors realize that most of the audience will not care one iota for their collective existence, they give comically broad performances that don’t necessarily gel well with everyone else in the movie, but still entertain nonetheless.

For reasons my brain will never, ever feel good about, I actually enjoyed Beastly, in a sort of avante garde, tongue-in-cheek way. I will never own it on DVD, and my enjoyment and recommendation comes with a big ol’ asterisk, but if seen for what it is (or, perhaps, what it isn’t), Beastly is a satisfying, amusing exercise in the realm of so-bad-it’s-hilarious filmmaking.

Now groove, sucka! -- Sucker Punch (2011)

In Sucker Punch, the main protagonist suffers from a dissociative identity, in one moment occupying the persona of a 1920s bordello girl, and in another, becoming a badass super soldier garbed in fetish-y schoolgirl gear. How interesting, then, that the movie also suffers from a dissociative identity, unable to decide if it wants to be a look into the struggles of an oppressed young woman rebelling against the system, or an elaborate effort to see how much stereotypical nerd-wank director Zack Snyder can cram into the space 110 minutes, which is easily twenty minutes longer than it should be.

Okay, maybe that’s a bit harsh. For Sucker Punch certainly isn’t the worst film I’ve seen this year, and, at a stretch, “works” the way I think it intends to. When all is said and done, though, Sucker Punch simply doesn’t satisfy me, and what should be a fantastic piece of escapism instead glides past my interest like a sparrow into a closed window.

The main plot of Sucker Punch concerns Babydoll (Emily Browning), a young woman put in a mental institution after the death of her mother by her slimy, sleazy stepfather (Gerard Plunkett). Stepdad bribes an orderly (Oscar Isaac) to have her lobotomized in five days’ time; that the orderly is only too happy to oblige is because, I dunno, video games didn’t exist in the 1950s and he needs a break in the monotony every once in a while.

After a yet more exposition, the setting changes, revealing that the mental institution is, in fact, a 1920s bordello, and Babydoll is the new arrival. Babydoll is told that she is to work in the bordello, dancing until the High Roller (Jon Hamm) comes for her in five days’ time. After a set of lessons, Babydoll discovers that her dancing is so wildly captivating, it locks everyone watching into a trance, and she soon uses her newfound abilities to concoct plans of escape. Helping her along the way are overprotective Sweet Pea (Abbie Cornish), tomboyish Rocket (Jenna Malone), sweetheart-type Blondie (Vanessa Hudgens), and introverted Amber (Jamie Chung).

They're like the Spice Girls, but with more heavy artillery. And misogyny.

What makes Sucker Punch unique, and what comprises its entire hook, are Babydoll’s dances themselves, which are not actually shown to the audience, but are instead interpreted as a series of elaborate fantasies involving World War I trenches, bipedal mechs, towering castles, zeppelins, zombies, Vulcan cannon-wielding samurai. It’s an impressive cocktail of otaku imagery, and the film’s biggest draw.

On paper, Sucker Punch looks like a breezy, breathless mash-up of everything Zack Snyder thought was cool when he was twelve—an empty-headed thrill ride meant to blow away the audience with its eclectic universe and bombastic action. In execution, though, it buckles under the weight of its own mythos, laboring far too long on affairs in the bordello, and generally acting as though the audience did not attend for the express purpose of watching a fishnet stocking-clad B-52 pilot shoot a dragon in the face with a small-arms handgun.

Seriously, for a movie that sells itself as a fantastical voyage into a patchwork quilt of fan service, it spends a healthy chunk of time (too much, in fact) on the plight of Babydoll and her four cohorts. Ironically, even with the extended character moments, the film’s treatment of Babydoll and co. never becomes meaty enough to become emotionally invested in; each girl has only one or two personality traits, and are difficult to distinguish between after a spell, leaving me to differentiate between them by their different hair styles.

None of the central cast makes much of an impression, creating confusion when they become buried under a mountain of CGI.

Hell, even the much-vaunted fantasy sequences are hard to get worked-up about after the novelty is worn out, due to its lifeless execution. Tearing through a wave of Helgastian soldier with the help of steam punk gadgetry and Modern Warfare-style guns-with-scopes should be damn invigorating, but instead feels tired, drifting from one shot of mind-bending action to another in the sleepiest was possible. Without the ability to sell themselves as fun or entertaining, the movie’s bread and butter—its set pieces—end up feeling like so much cinematic masturbation.

Which is a shame, because the action and scenarios are all outstanding ideas. Perhaps it’s because I, like Snyder, was also once a twelve-year-old boy, and can appreciate how Awesome is the notion of throwing together so many disparate elements of nerdy iconography. And while I feel like the fantasies could have been more exciting, Snyder does a good job of keeping the action clear, refraining from the jump-cuts and shaky-cam that many contemporary action flicks use as a crutch.



The film's over-the-top, nonsensical style is commendable, whenever it isn't suffering from its milquetoast action.

I also can’t fault Snyder for what he wanted to accomplish with the bordello bits, either. Wall-to-wall CG shots of pretty girls using martial arts and heavy firearms could get pretty tedious, pretty fast, and I dig the literal notion of creating a fantasy in order to cope with a difficult situation, but most of the chatter about escape and the High Roller drag the movie down like so many pounds of cinder blocks. Ultimately, Sucker Punch turns into one big game of Why So Serious, plodding where it should be springing, and effectively sucking the joy out of what should be a bats@%# crazy good time.

In truth, perhaps that’s the reason why I’m most frustrated by Sucker Punch. This is a movie I should be hard-wired to like, but its desire to be both a dour character study and phantasmagorical action flick bogs it down. Perhaps it’s worth renting in order to experience the film’s many flights of fancy, but don’t be surprised if you start inventing coping-fantasies yourself.

Give it away Now: Spoilers in Video Games

Naturally, this post contains SPOILERS about several popular games and movies. However, most of them are from properties at least ten-years-old (aside from the Batman: Arkham City plot point that inspired this article), so there’s a good chance you’ll be alright if you read this.


Last week, on Friday, September 30, Kotaku published a preview on Batman: Arkham City, a recap of author Kirk Hamilton’s experience with a build he was playing at PAX. Upon release, the article was met with cries of dissent and barely-stifled indignation. The reason: the article’s headline and accompanying graphic revealed that, during the first act of Batman: Arkham City, the Joker dies.

Sifting through the comments, one can easily pick out a common thread between them: there should have been more warning, the twist shouldn’t have been so obvious to people who may not have wanted to read it, etc. The developers were cool with Hamilton writing about the event, so it’s not as though he was out of line regarding what he should or shouldn’t have said, but Arkham City fans appeared to think differently, at least in regards to how the article was titled.

This post isn't a complaint about Kotaku's decision-making in publishing, nor is it meant to put Kirk Hamilton on blast for his Arkham City article (which, incidentally, is a well-written and informative preview focused largely on the game's play mechanics). Instead, I want to take a larger look at spoilers and their place in the gaming press.

PARTY FOUL!

If you follow the gaming press, there's a good chance you come across many small spoilers every day. Every preview on The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, every review of Resistance 3, every editorial about the latter half of Rage contains potential spoilers, spoilers of where you'll visit and what you'll do when you get there. More often than not, these are minor, relatively harmless spoilers that won't upset any but die-hard dry-runners (I remember hearing a Game Informer podcast where an editor reminisced about some readers complaining when they mentioned that you would get missiles in an upcoming Metroid game. Come on).

Different, though, are major spoilers about certain, plot-crucial moments. More often than not, they're warned about ahead of time, but sometimes, like in the God of War 3 episode of G4's Feedback, they can come out unexpectedly. There’s a joked-about “Spoiler Statute of Limitations” that says revealing twists for older games is fine (e.g. “Aerith dies at the end of disc one” isn’t a party foul anymore anymore), but discussing major story elements of games that are new are off-limits (particularly, games that haven’t come out yet).

Oddly, some story elements first considered spoilers end up perfectly acceptable to talk about as the series goes on. When Assassin's Creed first released in 2007, several publications ended up bending over backwards to avoid discussing the Desmond portions of the game, instead conveying that the title was a period piece, and not set in the near future. Now, Desmond's role in the series well-known, and is an often-discussed aspect of the series.

Back in 2007, everyone pretended that this was a historical fiction series. Now, it's generally accepted that Assassin's Creed is straight-up sci-fi.

Why do folks get so worked up about spoilers? For me, it denies me the opportunity to discover the material for myself, and to react to it within the context of the game/movie/whatever. Granted some spoilers don’t phase me too badly (“No, I am your father”), because these moments are often integrated into the public narrative of the piece (is there anyone who doesn’t, at least partially, think of The Sixth Sense as “the movie about where Bruce Willis is dead”). New games/movies/etc. don’t have the opportunity to establish their identity yet, and certain big moments, when taken out of context, can detract from both the individual moment’s impact, and the impact in the larger context of the experience (e.g. the nuke scene from Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, or the scene in Andrew Ryan’s office in BioShock).

Games still function even if the story is spoiled, though. Even if I were to find out what happens at the end of Dark Souls before finishing the game, I can still enjoy the title as a journey, having fun with the combat and world-building, and taking in the game as an experience. Perhaps this is why the gaming press is less concerned with spoilers: at the end of the day, games are meant to be played. Compare this to movie press: the average film-goer attends movies on the basis of their narratives (compared to, say, the sound design or the cinematography), so it behooves critics to reveal as little about the fine details of the film's plot as they can (less, in fact, than many trailers). A video game, on the other hand, lives and dies by the strength of its gameplay, and ancillary plot details won't steal the fun from solid game design. Some games suffer more than others by having their story spoiled (I would personally punch anyone who ruins the ending of Alan Wake for me), but the actual gameplay itself often compensates for a less-compelling narrative.

Even if I knew how the story ended, I could still enjoy the gameplay.

Part of why I think this Batman story has been so harshly attacked is because video games so often lack quality, spoiler-worthy narratives. Some game stories are as predictable as the sunrise: Mario will always rescue Peach, the Pokemon trainer will always defeat the Elite Four, and that plucky girl you met up with at the start of your quest is probably a princess in disguise. Batman is an unusually character-driven property, and Arkham Asylum provided an involving story that well-utilized nearly every character involved. Fans were likely hoping for similar involvement in the story, and became agitated at the apparent flippancy with which a perhaps-major story point was revealed.

For me, it ultimately comes down to choice. Sometimes, I don't mind when I find out crucial details of a game's plot in advance, especially if I don't plan on playing through it, or I'm not particularly invested in the game's story (e.g. Gears of War 3). However, there are other times where I'll go to absurd lengths to protect myself from dreaded "thpoilerth;" when Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows first released, I spent most of the two days it took me to finish the book in my room, cut off from communication in case my friend's manager at Pizza Hut stole his phone and texted me a list of which characters died (something my friend warned me he would do and, in fact, did).

My point being: spoilers are far less offensive when I choose for them to be spoiled. If I choose to go on Wikipedia and read about the plot of a game I don’t have time to play, I am willing to incur any penalties or cheapenings that happen if I do decide to play it. However, if someone on the street were to walk up to me back in 1997 and blurt out that Sheik is actually Zelda in disguise, I’d be more than a little ticked off. I should be able to choose if I want a major plot point revealed to me ahead of time, and not a moment before.

On the other hand, I think I would have preferred to know that I wouldn’t be playing as Snake the whole time.

[Originally appeared on VGTribune.com, October 7, 2011]

Oh, Oh, It's Magic -- Magic: The Gathering: Duel of the Planeswalker 2012

I've been a fan of collectable card games for over ten years, ever since I bought my first booster pack of Pokémon TCG cards. I'm not sure if it's my latent Montanan predilection for gambling, or because my affection for board games has never truly gone away, but collectable card games have always scratched a gaming itch I can't find anywhere else. Unfortunately, CCGs require two things I, for the most part, lack: an involved community with whom I can play my cards, and a large chunk of disposable income for accumulating new cards.

Fortunately, Stainless Games has me covered with their series of Magic: The Gathering games of Xbox Live Arcade. With their two Magic titles, Duel of the Planeswalkers and Duel of the Planeswalkers 2012, Stainless provides a refined Magic experience, eschewing the deck-building that can be intimidating for some (i.e. me) in favor of pre-built, balanced decks, while still allowing for a degree of customization, and retaining the series’ deep rule set and satisfying gameplay.

I cut my teeth into the original Duel of the Planeswalkers back in 2009. The turn-based, strategic combat helped ease my mind when I was stressed, and it even helped me through a post-hangover New Year’s Day. My excitement turned palpable when Stainless announced a follow-up title, Duel of the Planeswalkers 2012, earlier this year; it eventually released on June 15, 2011. I held off buying it at the time because I was playing through DotP’s third DLC pack, and didn’t want to overwhelm myself. When it finally showed up on the Xbox Live Deal of the Week for half price earlier this week, though, it was unavoidable: I purchased it immediately, and have been loving it ever since.

Yeah, they're just cards, but use your imagination, and it looks like this.

The most immediately-noticeable thing about Duel of the Planeswalkers 2012 is the updated UI. Stainless has cleaned up a good deal of the mess from the original Planeswalkers, streamlining the HUD that shows your cards, life, and what phase of your turn you’re in. Stainless has also made the proceedings go back faster; Plainswalker 2012 has far shorter loading times than the first title, and on a whole, the game seems to clip by faster than its predecessor.

The new cards look exceptional as well, highly detailed for your zooming pleasure (let’s face it, half the fun of magic is checking out the awesome artwork on the cards). The decks from Duel of the Planeswalkers have been heavily overhauled for their appearance in Planeswalkers 2012, largely keeping the same theme, but adding new cards to the mix. Stainless has also added a few new, more unique decks, like a Black/Blue/White artifact deck, or a Blue/White Creature Deck.

Of course, graphical polish and new cards aren’t the only things Planeswalkers 2012 has to offer. The game’s single player campaign has been given a dose of player choice, allowing gamers to occasionally choose between two different deck types to play against, or offering a host of puzzle-like one-on-one challenges. In addition to the main campaign, there’s a revenge campaign, which simply re-orders the AI opponents, and a new Archenemy campaign, which pits three players against one super powered one. It’s neither the deepest nor the most original single player game, but it’s a step-up from the previous iteration.

Clashing art. Go with it, alright?

I haven’t had time to check out the multiplayer yet, but my enthusiasm for online Duel of the Planeswalkers died after one-too-many folks who bailed on my game when it looked like they wouldn’t win. Bummer.

For gamers who like collectable card games, now is a great time to pick up a digital iteration of the best one out there, and for 400 Microsoft Points ($5), it’s an absolute steal.

We'll Be Right Back, After These Messages

As you have no doubt realized by now, I have been less-than-punctual in my delivery of my Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge entries. I could give a full explanation of why my performance has been so slack, but there's a good chance it would sound something like HOWL HOWL GARGLE HOWL GARGLE HOWL HOWL HOWL GARGLE HOWL GARGLE HOWL HOWL GARGLE GARGLE HOWL GARGLE GARGLE GARGLE HOWL SLURRP UUUURGH COMPLAINING, so I'll instead refrain.

I have, though, taken steps to open up my free time, so I fully intend to get back on the wagon with posting, if only to expedite progress on my nearly-ten-months-old Disney blog series. Look forward to future praises, grousings, and general words on cheap Blu-rays, songs, and, yes, even video games.

End of line.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 16

Day 16 - A Sequel Song

Occasionally, certain songs become popular enough to warrant a follow-up. The need to create a song with thematic ties to another, earlier song makes absolutely no sense to me, but it's been around for a good chunk of time in pop music. Sometimes the relationship is explicit to the point of being tedious (e.g. "The Devil Went Back to Georgia"), and sometimes you hardly even know it's there.

Kelly Clarkson - "My Life Would Suck Without You"



Hands up: who here knew this was a sequel song? Without looking at the Wikipedia page? I sure as hell didn't; why would I? Lyrically, it's a standard, if rather catchy, getting back together anthem. But no, dear readers, it's not just any getting back together anthem, but instead is the follow-up to her massive 2004 hit "Since U Been Gone."

Why make a sequel to a song that went number two nearly four years prior to "My Life's" release? We may never know, but I can take a guess. Clarkson's 2007 album, My December, was a grandiose, epic piece of Evanescence-y alt-rock, and despite garnering largely positive reviews and eventually going platinum, it never posted the same numbers as her previous album, Breakaway, nor did it produce as many hit singles. After such an experimental (and controversial) project, I imagine the label wanted to return to something a bit more secure--from this, we retread the familiar ground of one of Clarkson's biggest singles, written by one of the most successful pop songwriters of the last generation. I have literally no proof to support any of this, but it makes that most sense as to why "My Life" sounds so incredibly different from every other song on All I Ever Wanted.

Anyway, "My Life Would Suck Without You." It's a catchy bit to pop-rock, carried by a simple, driving guitar line, constant (if artificial) drum and cymbal track, and an occasional swooping synthesizer. All of this is augmented by Martin's titanic-sized hook that peaks in all of the right places, and Clarkson's soaring vocals, as passionate and energetic as anything one can hope from the most successful alumnus of American Idol. It's a perfect track for white-girl car-dancing, which I've indulged in occasionally, and I'm not even a white girl.

Goodness knows how legitimate it is as a sequel song (though apparently Max Martin wrote it explicitly as a sequel to "Since U Been Gone;" kudos to him for not having the gall to call it "My Life Would Suck Without U"), but it's a damn fine slice of late 2000's pop all the same. Who knows what the future will hold for Stronger, but as long as Clarkson keeps her ear for tight, energetic anthems like this, I'll be happy.

Our Feature Presentation (25/50) -- Tangled (2010)

Of the over 50 films part of the Disney Animated Features canon, Tangled led me on the biggest emotional rollercoaster. I first caught wind of the project back in 2009, when it was titled Rapunzel, and, indeed, there was a Rapunzel teaser trailer that made its way onto the Blu-ray release of The Princess and the Frog. What happened from there, no one can truly know, but here’s what conventional speculation and Wikipedia tell us: The Princess and the Frog was a mild box office success, rather than the titanic megahit it was supposed to be, and Disney execs got a bit gun shy. The Princess and the Frog was marketed as a back-to-roots labor of love, similar to projects released in the 90’s; since that didn’t seem to work, Disney decided to give audiences a new vision of its Rapunzel project. From this bit of decision-making came one of the worst promotional campaigns I’ve seen in film, now titled Tangled, with trailers that made the movie out to be a hip, snarky take on the classic fairy tale, a la Shrek.

My antipathy for Shrek doesn’t run as deep as some in the blogosphere, but if there’s one thing that absolutely does not belong in a Disney project, it’s snarky, hipper-than-thou “attitude.” Granted, it’s not like Disney hasn’t attempted hipness, but the Disney Animated Features brand has lived and died by its sincerity, and even its most irreverent projects have had a strong emotional core. Fortunately, Tangled, turned out to be one of the most sincere projects seen from Disney in quite some time, with strong characters, a good story, and the sense never to posture as “above” the material.

Old-fashioned, yet still fresh, Tangled is an absolute goodie.

Tangled begins with a narration, where we learn about a centuries-old witch named Mother Gothel (Donna Murphy) and magical flower that keeps her young. The local queen is expecting a child, though, and needs the flower to deliver the baby (in lieu of Rampion, I suppose), so the flower is found and given to her, and she safely delivers a happy baby girl. Gothel, however, steals the child, whose hair now possesses the flower’s healing power, and raises her in an old, obscure tower. Brokenhearted, the king and queen begin a tradition of releasing a series of paper lanterns every year on the missing princess’s birthday, as a way to remember her, and to find her if possible.

Cut to eighteen years later. Rapunzel (Mandy Moore) is now a beautiful young lady, content with living in her tower, but for one thing: more than anything, she wants to see the lights that appear in the sky on her birthday. This would require leaving the tower, which, to Gothel, is completely out of the question. After a large row that ends in Gothel angrily telling Rapunzel that she can never, ever leave the tower, Rapunzel appears defeated in her desire to see the lights in person.

Ah, but enter Flynn Rider (Zachary Levi), a crafty thief who has just stolen a crown belonging to the lost princess. After ditching his accomplices, the Stabbington brothers (Ron Perlman, Armie Hammer-style), Flynn hides himself in a non-descript tower… where he is promptly knocked over the head and captured by Rapunzel. Rapunzel offers Flynn a deal: if he will take her to see the lights, she will give him the crown. What follows is a bit of a road movie, where Rapunzel and Flynn learn about themselves, and grow closer together.

 

Prototypical Disney tropes and quippy dialogue meet in the best way possible, kinda like Rapunzel and Flynn in this scene.

I mentioned in my The Princess and the Frog write-up that Princess had an old-but-new approach to Disney filmmaking, a self-conscious throwback to the pictures of the Disney Renaissance, peppered with newer narrative ideas and details. Tangled, by contrast, has a new-but-old take on its conventions as a Disney feature; while it’s built with new-fangled, gorgeous CGI and 3D effects, it’s made with a much more traditional (and, frankly, much more Disney-esque) story progression, cast of characters, song style, the whole nine. I think it’s this sheer, unadulterated Disney-ness that gave Tangled such success; Tangled is the second-highest grossing Disney feature in the United States (after The Lion King and Aladdin), and gets the jollies of more people I personally know than any other Disney film of the past ten years (though The Emperor’s New Groove comes close).

And yet, for a movie so unabashedly sincere, Tangled is incredibly funny in a completely 2011 way. Small, slick lines creep their way into the dialogue (“Frankly, I’m too scared to ask about the ‘frog.’” “‘Chameleon.’” “Nuance.”), and it has a penchant for quotable deadpans like few other films in the Disney canon (“You should know that this is the strangest thing I’ve ever done!”). Tangled never tries to be above its fairy tale material, though, and gracefully treads the line between clever and smirking (as opposed to many of its contemporaries, which go for out-and-out troll face).

Good lines about in Tangled. 
"Oh mama, I have got to get me one of these."

Helping to sell the humor is Tangled’s cast of well-rounded, enjoyable characters. Rapunzel operates straight out of the Ariel school of strong female protagonists, but she’s given the chance to develop her character more often than not; I love her little “Eeep”s, and the scene where she rebounds between ecstatic and remorseful (“Best day ever! … I am a terrible human being.”) is one of my favorites. Flynn is a suave, Han Solo-esque rogue who isn’t quite all that he seems (original as sun in the desert, I know, but it works for him), and Levi gives an extra “aw, shucks” charm to him. Mother Gothel is a powerful diva of a villain, equal parts dangerous and drama queen; I also love her faux-motherly relationship with Rapunzel, and she manipulates her through guilt without Rapunzel’s knowing. Even the by-now-requisite animal sidekicks manage to stand out, using silent comedy to the best possible effect. Pascal, the chameleon, uses small, specific movements to sell his character’s humor, which Maximus, the horse, performs in huge, broad strokes—in a way, it’s almost like having Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton in the same movie.

Speaking of non-vocal parts, I want to use this paragraph specifically to talk about Rapunzel’s parents, the king and queen. Both the king and queen are rarely seen in in Tangled, but they have one of my favorite scenes in the movie—it’s near the two-thirds mark, just before the first lantern is about to be released to the kingdom. The queen (whose resemblance to Rapunzel is remarkable) comes to fetch her husband. She fastens his cloak, meeting his eyes with a weak, sad smile, and we see a single tear fall from his cheek. Though the filmmakers do nothing to explicitly spell it out, we are able to glean exactly what is going through the king and queen’s mind: that what has been alluded to as a yearly festival is, in fact, a painful and vivid reminder of how, eighteen years ago, their only daughter was taken from them, and that time has done nothing to dull their hurt. Dear readers, it lasts all of twenty seconds, and it is HEARTBREAKING.

Their screen time is very brief, but the king and queen both create a lasting impression, at least for me.

Moving on. The animation in Tangled is absolutely gorgeous. In particular, the film makes delicious use of color, particularly the deep greens of the forest and royal purples of the kingdom. There are also a multitude of small details that help give the world its place, things like the textures on Rapunzel’s wall and Pascal’s scales, the small floating particles in the water, and the individually detailed hairs on Rapunzel’s head (they even get disheveled during a scene of conflict). Character animation is stellar as well; everyone looks soft, and different from other CG animated pictures. Lastly, Tangled makes perhaps the best use of 3D I’ve seen in any movie, and though I don’t feel like I’m less involved when I watch it at home on 2D, I sure wouldn’t mind paying to see it in 3D again.

Tangled also happens to be an excellent-sounding film. I consider myself a small Alan Menkin fanboy, and his score for Tangled is exceptional, especially the way he uses the score to punctuate gags and action moments. The songs aren’t stone-cold classics, but are more than pleasant, and while I don’t expect to find someone on the street humming “I’ve Got A Dream,” I could certainly understand if they wanted to.

I was pretty terrified when Tangled came out, but since then, it’s not only assuaged my doubts, but also has moved on to become one of my absolute favorite Disney films; not bad for a movie that just came out less than a year ago. Excellent characters and humor, fun songs, and a story that is all-but-guaranteed to leave a warm, gooey feeling inside the viewer, Tangled comes highly recommended, and is an absolute must-see for folks who are worried that Disney has lost its touch.

Top Three Songs

1. “Mother Knows Best (Reprise)”
2. “When Will My Life Begin”
3. “I’ve Got a Dream”

Favorite Scene

• Rapunzel first leaves the tower

Favorite Character

• Pascal

The Jar Jar

• Old Man

How I Watched It

With all of the prosal love and kisses I gave Tangled, you’d better believe I snagged this one the first day it was available. Tangled comes in three flavors: a single-disc DVD, a double-disc Blu-ray plus DVD, and a four-disc 3D Blu-ray that comes with the 2D version, a DVD copy, and a digital copy. My Samsung is not 3D-compatible, so I was more than happy to save ten dollars and buy the double-disc edition.

As expected, Tangled looks bloody fantastic in high definition. Colors are bright and saturated, and the small details I mentioned earlier are easy to spot with the enhanced resolution. I couldn’t use the surround sound with my review, but I have no reason to believe it would be anything less than at-least-pretty-good.

For a film that just came out last year, there is a surprising lack of bonus features. Included are several surprisingly-lengthy deleted scenes, a few alternate openings to the movie, and a small making of featurette, “Untangled: The Making of a Fairy Tale.” The featurette is hosted by Mandy Moore and Zachary Levi, and is all of twelve minutes long, and though it does have a few interesting bits, it’s too kid-centric and EPK-happy to be of much educational use to anyone.

To be honest, I’m a bit bummed by this release’s supplemental extras. Perhaps it would make more sense if Tangled had flopped at the box office, or if it was made a while ago, but Tangled was the 10th highest-grossing film of 2010, and the third-highest-grossing Disney film domestically. I suppose they figure the kids wouldn’t watch them anyway (they’re probably right), but I would love for more info about Tangled, especially since it has such a long and complicated development history.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 15

Day 15 - A One-Hit Wonder

The term "one-hit wonder" is a bit annoying, because it is terribly vague. Is it only an artist that had one, and only one, single? Perhaps an artist that only had one single in the Top 40? Maybe the artist had other singles, but they were all overshadowed by their grand uber-single. It's a rich tapestry. Regardless, today's entry is on a band primarily known for one, and only one, ultra-ubiquitous single.

Crazy Town – “Butterfly” 



I was ragging a bit on the 90’s the other day; I’ll add a few more qualifications onto it. I don’t think I’ll mind too heavily when 90’s nostalgia comes back in, but I think, musically, I’ll be much more receptive to tracks from the late 90’s and early 00’s (The Offspring, Coolio, Good Charlotte, etc.) than from the early 90’s (Mariah Carey, Boyz II Men, Milli Vanilli, etc.). There are a few reasons for this, the largest one being that I did not listen to much music from the early 90’s, and thus have no prior attachment (another smaller one: I hate that stupid keyboard sound). Ah, but the late 90’s, now we have some semblance of awareness on monsieur Testerman’s part (hell, I’ll even be cool with Cleopatra).

One late 90’s song that I will be receptive to entirely without irony is Crazy Town’s number-one hit, “Butterfly.” A staple of middle school dances and house parties everywhere during the days of Palm Beach County, “Butterfly” is one of the only songs I can think of where the rock/rap genre of music actually sounds fun. Consider: Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit (gah, those names), Saliva; all were angsty buggers with copious amounts of yelling thrown into their lyrical flow. Great for dudes who were into ostensibly heavier music (like me), but not so awesome for folks who were already sold on the concept of “constantly sounding angry.”

“Butterfly,” on the other hand, has a playful, light delivery, and its white-boy cadence sounds much more appealing since it lacks any pretensions of being “hardcore.” The song’s instrumentation is pretty damn catchy too, with its slightly-hypnotic bass line and dreamy guitar riff acting as the melodic center points. Coupled with the turntable interlude and serviceable drums, and it’s perhaps the most conceptually-pure form of the dreaded late 90’s rock/rap, and its lack of drop-D chugs make it all the more satisfying.

Lastly, and I’m giving it its own paragraph to mark its importance, is the chorus. If the success of “Butterfly” can be attributed to any one element, it’s the chorus, a smooth-as-1999-will-permit series of corny lines that gel into one big, satisfying slice of Just Go With It (as opposed to Just Go With It). Perhaps it’s a generational thing, but singing along with “Butterfly,” especially with other people, feels incredibly cool (it also feels incredibly stupid, but the two emotions create a nice synergy together).

Crazy Town, for all intents and purposes were never heard from again. They released a follow-up album, Dark Horse, in 2002, and a total of four more singles, but none of them ever charted on the Billboard Hot 100. Apparently they are fixing to release a new album for the first time in nearly ten years. If they end up touring to promote it, I bet I can guess at least one song they’ll play at their show.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 14

Day 14 – A 10’s Song

Alright, we’re about a year and a half into the new decade, which doesn’t leave with much to write about (unless you were clever about this challenge and picked a theme). Still, I’m nothing if not persistent, so here we go!

Kanye West - "Power"



An innovative producer and creative wordsmith, Kanye West is one of my favorite rappers of the past ten years. However, because of his rather unfortunate penchant for acting like a jackass, I find that his music is best enjoyed in a bubble, willfully ignoring his comments about George W. Bush vs. black people, or his musings on exactly which music video is the greatest of all time. 

"Power" was Kanye's first single released after his self-imposed exile following his notorious interruption at the 2009 VMAs. I had a good deal of interest vested in this song when it first came out; not only to see what the reaction to it would be, but also whether or not it would be any good. I had given his previous album, 808s & Heartbreak, a pass, and I was ready for some new content (Kan-tent?) that I could actively care about.  Fortunately, "Power" came through.

Like most of my favorite Kanye West songs, "Power" has some stellar production work. "Power" samples what sounds like Native American chanting and mixes it with huge-sounding drums and a warble-y guitar, giving it a hugely unique sound, and one that stands out many modern rap songs in that pop space. Lyrically, it's a return to Kanye's more specific, personal writing style that was prominent on his first two albums, and while lines that are very particular to Kanye West make it hard to forget exactly who is performing the song, I do enjoy some of his lateral thinking punchlines ("Everybody, we rollin'/With some light-skinned girls and some Kelly Rowlands").

My only gripe with the track (apart from how pleased Kanye sounds with himself during most of the song--then again, we are talking about Kanye West) is the two-minute outro portion of the song, which takes a perfectly radio-friendly hip hop single and extends it into over-indulgence. In fact, I have this problem with nearly every track on the album this song comes from, My Beautiful, Dark, Twisted Fantasy (ugh, even the title is self-consciously overbearing). Most of the songs say everything they need to in 3-4 minutes, then stick around anywhere from 1-5 minutes for the apparent sheer, unadultered hell of it (seriously, there's no reason why "Runaway" needs to be nine minutes long). It's this faux-epicness that keeps me from giving it more than two or three casual listens.

Still, I dig "Power" overall. The production is great, the chorus works, and the song just feels good. It's also one hell of a trailer song.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 13

Day 13 – A 2000’s Song

The Aughts (are they seriously called that?) are still pretty fresh to do musical post-morctem on, but I will say this: the early 2000’s pop music scene was pretty well-saturated with rap. Granted, it’s not like rap has really gone away since then, but it seems like, between ’02 and ’05, a constant revolving door of new Yung Schmos or Lil Shawtys had a new single tearing up the charts. We’ve since segued into more dance-heavy territory, but I’ll never forget the period of time where the best way to dance was simply to pull your pants up and lean back.

Chingy – “Right Thurr”



Remember Chingy? Probably not. But if you listened to the radio during the summer of 2003, there’s a good chance you’ve heard him, and his breakthrough single “Right Thurr.” “Right Thurr” is an ode to a lady, a lady who Chingy hits on repeatedly through the course of the song, though where she stands in relation to the lyrics is a bit dubious (One line: “I’m thinking ‘bout snatching you up, dirty, and make you mine.” The very next line: “Look at her hips, look at her legs, ain’t she stacked?”). The production is nothing special, with only a slightly acid-sounding synthesizer giving it any character at all, and the lyrics are pretty inane at best (“I swooped on her like an eagle swooping down on its prey”).

What, then, made “Right Thurr” so popular that it managed to climb all the way up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100? Bugger if I know. If I had to posit a guess, though, I would submit that “Right Thurr” benefited from The Ke$ha Effect. The Ke$ha Effect (in addition to sounding like a 3D IMAX concert movie) is what happens when a song is so dumb, listeners start taking to it ironically, only to become caught up in the song on a legitimate level. The difference here is that while Ke$ha can be reasonably defended on a musically creative level, I’m not sure how adamantly I can come to the aid of “Right Thurr,” a song whose primary appeal is dumbness for the sake of being dumb, without any clever behind-the-scenes design decisions.

I remember liking “Right Thurr” during the height of its popularity, but time has not been kind to it. Nor, indeed, to its artist; though he is apparently still active and working on a new album, Chingy hasn’t had a Top 40 single since 2006’s “Pullin’ Me Back.” It’s just as well, I suppose—after all, not everyone can be Ludacris or Jay-Z.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 12

Day 12 – A 90’s Song

I briefly skirted by my mild antipathy for 90’s music during Day 11, so I think I’ll clarify my position today. I don’t hate 90’s music or anything, I’m just not a very big fan. I enjoy Native Tongue hip-hop from groups like A Tribe Called Quest and Black Sheep, I appreciate the developments happening in pop music near the turn of the century, and I have no doubts in my mind about the quality of 90’s country music, but that’s about where my enthusiasm ends.

For one thing, I’m not a big fan of the R&B movement that happened during most of the early 90’s. For some reason, groups like Boyz II Men and artists like Mariah Carey never caught on with me, and most songs put out during this time sound terribly dated today—while songs from Boston and Steve Miller can arguably stand toe-to-toe with modern rock ‘n’ roll artists, I wouldn’t think twice about wanting to put a song from someone like Janet Jackson up against one from someone like Beyonce (hell, I wouldn’t put it up against one from Kelly Rowland).

Second, I’m not a fan of grunge. Perhaps it’s because I’m a pop music fan, and grunge runs almost counter to the idea of pop music, but artists like Soundgarden, Nirvana, and Pearl Jam simply don’t have enough melody for me to care about them. Not to mention their slightly unorthodox vocal stylings.

Blink-182 – “Josie (Everything’s Gonna Be Fine)”



You know what was good in the 90’s, though? Pop punk. Granted, it was a different breed than the more emotionally-tinged tunes of Fall Out Boy and Jimmy Eat World (your mileage may vary), but the basics were there: fast-paced, energetic songs built with an attention to melody. The 90’s begat many-a decent pop punk acts, including The Offspring, Good Charlotte, and Green Day, who arguably ushered in the whole movement altogether.

Helping lead the post-Green Day pop punk charge was a certain trio called Blink-182, who, in a sea of similar acts, managed to differentiate themselves and achieve both fame and forture as follows: while most late-90’s/early 2000’s pop punk groups wrote bratty, snarky songs about, I dunno, how girls are chubies, or something,* Blink-182 wrote bratty, snarky songs about poop and penises. Again, your mileage may vary.

Occasionally, though, Blink produced semi-romantic love songs, shedding much (though not all) of their sophomoric sensibilities while hanging onto their knack for a good hook. “Josie” is one such track. Really, it’s a very sweet, earnest song about a guy who likes his girlfriend, which seems much more original when delivered vis-a-vis Mark Hoppus’s blazing-fast bass-playing and Travis Barker’s signature spazz-drumming. The verse melody is pretty hummable (notable, especially compared to other modern pop punk songs), and “Josie’s” mixture of romance and unbounding energy make it feel like a can of Monster bought for Valentine’s Day.

Pop punk is a different landscape than it was during the second Clinton administration, but I still enjoy “Josie” and all of its rough edges—similar to the song’s protagonist, “Josie” takes me away to a better place.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 11

Day 11 - An 80's Song

Aw yeah, this is where it's at. It seems like contemporary culture is awash with 80's nostalgia (Hot Tub Time Machine, Conan the Barbarian, etc), and as long as that means it's cool to blast songs from Eddie Money, Rick Springfield, and The Outfield, cashing in on the memories of baby-boomers can only be a good thing (though I also dread the inevitable 90's nostalgia wave of the late-2010's and early-20's, during which we'll doubtlessly see the revival of grunge, Married... with Children, and JNCOs). Anyway, here's an 80's gem I discovered during one of my regular Helena trips last year (thank you, Greg Kihn).

The Scorpions – “No One Like You”



One reason why I like 80's music is because of its preponderance to flat-out “go for it.” This is particularly true with the Glam Rock movement (Hair Metal, for those keeping score at home), with wicked-hot licks, shredding guitar solos, and soaring choruses; and no one made better Hair Metal songs than The Scorpions. There were bands that made “better” music, as well as groups that certainly were more “metal,” but, to me, nothing screams “The 80’s!” more than titanic riffs from the likes of “Rock You Like a Hurricane,” “Big City Nights,” and “Dynamite.”

My favorite, though, is “No One Like You,” a track that reaches the same giddy heights of “Rock You Like a Hurricane,” but shows far greater indulgence to my music cred, because it is slightly more obscure. From the outset, the song kicks open the door with a squeal-y, gnarly-sounding riff that morphs into a dual-guitar harmony, reminding me of the SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron theme song, and being all-the-better for it. Also, as a fan of instrumental start-stops, I like how the guitars drop in and out of the song, providing greater dynamics and sound-variety.

Unfortunately, I don’t think over-the-top metal antics like The Scorpions could work nowadays; there’s too much of a temptation to be ironic, or to position one's self as “better than” the material (minus The Darkness, but every rule has to have an exception). Part of what makes bands like The Scorpions so great is how sincere they are—if he says he’s gonna rock you, you’d better be damn Skippy that he’s gonna rock you, pretensions not included. Still, even without additional entries in the Glam Rock sweepstakes, songs like “No One Like You,” “Holy Diver,” and “Run to the Hills” are still quite rockable to this day. Do yourself a favor: find the nearest drop-top you can, and blast this song while it’s still summer.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 10

Day 10 – A 70’s Song

Can you dig it?!

Or perhaps “jive turkey”?

There must be some sort of 70’s slang that I can use incorrectly here to cover for my lack of a compelling introduction. At any rate, today we’re covering a song from the 70’s, a decade notable for spawning a number of hit movies and TV series that were later remade in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. But I digress.

The Knack – “My Sharona”



Nana NANA na NA na NA nana NANA, nana NANA na NA, NAAA NANAnaaaa.

You're welcome.

“My Sharona” is a song whose popularity has always surprised me. Granted, I think it’s totally awesome, and it’s one of my favorite songs from the period, but it’s been both parodied covered a good deal more than I would have assumed fashionable for a near-one-hit-wonder from the late 70’s. The music snob in me wants to make a crack about how what’s good and what’s popular not often being the same thing, but he can go eat one; “My Sharona” is good because it’s good.

Aside from its iconic guitar lick that I so graciously transcribed in the first paragraph, “My Sharona” has a few tricks up its sonic sleeves. For my money, I love the tom-driven drum part; it gives the song a slightly-off-kilter, but still-driving energy, as well as makes it sound pretty distinct. The vocals aren’t exactly American Idol-caliber, but they have a raw edge that works well with the completely unsubtle sexuality pervading the track. Finally, I know I talked about a guitar solo being a deciding factor in a song for me last time, but damn, the time from 2:47 – 4:15 is pure fret-tapping magic.

And before you ask, I totally was NOT introduced to this song by that one Harmonix game, okay? Weird Al’s “My Bologna” came way before that.


As a side note: I hear that there's a part in Super 8 where the kids arbitrarily break into an acapella rendition of “My Sharona.” Yet another reason I'm sorry I didn't get to that movie while it was still in theaters.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 9

Day 9 – A 60’s Song

The times, they are a-becoming different, here at Diversion 2.0. Today, we’re checking out a song from the sixties, a decade of extreme edginess that sounds way tamer now than it was then.

The Beatles – “Can’t Buy Me Love”



I wanted to avoid putting a song from The Beatles here. I really did. Unfortunately, there’s not a whole lot of love lost between me and sixties Motown doo-wop groups, at least to the extent where I have anything significant to say about them. Then again, I don’t have a heck of a lot to say about The Beatles either, other than I enjoy their earlier, pop-oriented acts more than their experimental flights of musical fancy. At least I’m more familiar with The Beatles than, say, The Isley Brothers.

I first heard “Can’t Buy Me Love” when I was twelve, off of the 1 compilation released during the same year. 1 was my first exposure to The Beatles, partly because my mom listened primarily to country music over all else, but mostly because I was a clueless bugger who liked to play Super Nintendo. I’m not head-over-heels in love with The Beatles like most of the English-speaking world, but I can appreciate a good hook, and The Beatles were nothing if not full of good hooks.

“Can’t Buy Me Love” is one of The Beatles’ earlier pop recordings, and is one of my favorites. I dig the quick-ish tempo, which gives it more energy than something like “From Me to You,” and I like the melody just a smidge better than other songs at the time. The guitar solo is good fun too, and, in my opinion, pushes it over the top from other songs in The Beatles’ early catalogue. And, of course, it’s fun to play on Rock Band.

New life drinking game rule—while reading Diversion 2.0, drink every time the term “Rock Band” is mentioned.

Anyway, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention The Beatles Rock Band, Harmonix’s tribute to The Beatles and their career, which commercially undersold and doubtlessly failed to pay back the astronomically expensive cost to license fourty-seven Beatles songs, as well as three full albums for DLC. Shame, though, for it was a goodie. I split this game with a few friends in college, and we had several good nights of ordering wings from Pizza Hut and jamming to the likes of “Helter Skelter” and “Day Tripper.” Then the disc got misplaced. Bugger all.

To wrap up, I’m not a huge fan of The Beatles, but I respect how influential they’ve been to the modern music scene, and admire the incredible staying power their songs have had. You know who’s better, though? The Be Sharps.

Revenge of the Thirty-Day Song Challenge - Day 8

Day 8 – A 50’s Song

We’ve entered the decade-creeping portion of the challenge, where we’ll look at songs from each of the X0’s up until present day. Spoilers. Anyway, I decided to start with the 50’s, since it was the birth of rock ‘n’ roll, and I figured more people have Elvis on their iPod than Glenn Miller.

Barrett Strong – “Money (That’s What I Want)”



My 50’s musical exposure isn’t incredibly deep, and I sometimes need a little something extra if I want to discover new tunes from that era; the proverbial spoonful of sugar for my medicine. In the case of “Money,” I caught it on an episode of Tiny Toon Adventures, during an episode dedicated mostly to animated music videos (to music whose copyrights had coincidentally expired. Hmmm…). The song was sung by Montana Max, an egotistical little twerp whose lust for cash knows few bounds; thematically, it makes a ton of sense.

There’s nothing super special about “Money,” other than a catchy melody and fun guitar line. I certainly enjoy the old-fashioned, bluesy song structure, and dig the guitar riff used during most of the song, but I’m a bit perplexed by the absurd amount of cover versions made of this song. Maybe they thought it was cool because The Beatles did it too?

Whatever. “Money” is a fun bit of 50’s rock ‘n’ roll with a good hook, decent instrumentation, and an old-timey charm; and despite it being in constant rotation at my work’s muzak station, I still enjoy listening to it. Go figure.