The Streets on Fire

Mike Skinner insists that his final album as The Streets, Computers and Blues, will be "dark and futuristic" and though neither of the first two releases have displayed that, it looks promising. The first single "Going Through Hell" is a triumphantly rockin' good time. But I've been more impressed with the second song released.

You know how if you send a facebook relationship request your facebook will read "in a relationship" while the request is in limbo, even if it has not been agreed upon?Well Skinner turned that phenomenon into a really clever and catchy song called "OMG". Needless to say, I'm excited.

A Continuation on 'Ordinary People?'

I have continued to break ground on the topic I opened up yesterday so I will continue to post my thoughts in hopes of further revelations. In my last post, 'Ordinary People?' I spoke of being attracted to characters without defining that attraction. So I will attempt to work towards that definition.

I can comfortably state that a romantic comedy's success does not depend on having a crush on the characters. I have enjoyed several romantic comedies without those feelings. And the one character that I do harbor crush-like feelings for--Glee's Rachel Berry--did not have my best wishes as she neared her relationship with Finn Hudson.

However, I cannot recall enjoying a single romantic comedy without finding the primary characters likable. I can't recall ever thinking, "Those characters rub me the wrong way, but I really hope they get together. They could use each other." Even those who have earned my pity have done so with some kind of charm (Little Children, Me and You and Everyone We Know). Have you ever found yourself invested in a fictional romance between two unlikable characters?

Ordinary People?

I've seen a couple romcoms this holiday season: Morning Glory and How Do You Know. I found neither to be satisfactory. One of the reasons is that I found neither films' bumbling-yet-appealing character to be the latter. Rather than being awkwardly adorable, both Rachel McAdams and Paul Rudd were so obnoxiously grating that I was not able to feel for either of them. As a result, I had little to no interest in their stories.

I could not understand why their respective love interests were interested in them at all. Don't get me wrong, I don't think attractiveness necessitates elegance. I have been attracted by the quirks of others (and I hope that there are those who don't find my awkwardness to be completely repellent). Is it possible that the characters simply weren't my types? Were any of you loyal readers won over by the characters?

Neither film garnered many favorable reviews so I don't think the dissatisfaction was completely due to my taste in people. However, I'm left with the question: do the characters of a romantic comedy need to be attractive (in appearance, behavior, spirit, etc.) in order for the film to be a success? If so, that spells doom for any hope for diversity in the genre.

The goal of virtually all films is profit. This is accomplished by attracting the greatest possible audience. So it would follow that studios (unless supremely altruistic) would only pick up romcoms that featured characters congruent with modern notions of beauty and acceptability. It's not breaking news that most films feature beautiful, white, thin/muscular, heterosexual characters but I personally never factored personalities into that equation.

Perhaps there is a general "type" to win over movie goers or Oscar voters. If so, what incentive would producers have to feature any other type of character? Are we subjected to a parade of characters that not only look the same but embody similar essences? Which types of people and personalities are ignored by mainstream entertainment? Which people are ignored in reality as a result? These questions stem from a thought that I am far from articulating, let alone concluding, but I am fascinated by it. Any thoughts? Am I making sense?

My Semester at The Onion

So this past semester I interned with The Onion, writing for the Chicago A.V. Club. I got to write some neat stuff, so here is my semester in review.

Here’s the first piece I wrote. Only one of my sentences was spared by supervisor’s editing. Guess which one and you’ll win a hug from me!

Only my second month into my internship, The A.V. Club knew where to find a writer with some street cred for this one.

2010 was apparently a big year for creative burlesque shows in Chicago. I wrote pieces on Burlesque shows inspired by Pink Floyd and Super Mario Brothers.

I got to write about some really cool things that I never would have heard about. A charity Rock Band tournament and a restaurant masquerading for Halloween.

My supervisor told me to “have fun with this one.” I knew that meant, “you better make this one funny.” Guess what? She liked it! Hooray! Easily my favorite piece.

And on my very last day, I had the pleasure of writing about a tribute screening of one of the silliest men of all time.

Their was some pretty boring stuff in there too, but all in all I had a good experience.

Number One with a Dull-et

So just about every “Best Albums of the Year” list has Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy at number one and I don’t like it.

The album’s first single, “Power,” is really groovy. Whoop-da-dee-do. One good song. “Runaway” is one of the worst Kanye songs I have ever heard. I want to puke every time I hear it. Kanye’s lyrics are ridiculous. Normally I can get past his self-important spewing of hot air because he has such a good ear for what sounds good, but not this time.

I can already hear the dissenters asking, “But isn’t ‘Monster’ a great song?” No! It’s not even the best song with that title.

And I’m sick of all the credit he’s getting for “working” with Bon Iver. He’s just taking an artist that all white people like (what ethnicity are music critics?) and including several minimal contributions by him. Name dropping. Shooting fish in a barrel. Call it what you want, either way it’s uninspired.

Do you know why “Lost in the World” sounds good? Because “Woods“ is a great song. Kanye just threw some drums and rapping (that don’t even sound that cool) over it. It’s like a school cafeteria serving In N’ Out burgers for lunch. “Mom, lunch was awesome today! On my list of top 20 school lunches of the year, it was number 1!” Of course it was. It was great when that lumberjack-looking cafeteria worker from Wisconsin did it last year. Now some hot shot from Chicago decides to wrap those same burgers in shiny rapping and he’s being hailed as the greatest chef in the world.

I’m almost tempted to wish that Kanye would just write another “Jesus Walks”, but I know that he would just negate it’s refreshing message with another public display of narcissism.

You want to hear something that was gradually released throughout the year without a nauseating culmination? Check out Robyn’s Body Talk. I may be biased but I have never found so many toe-tappers on one album before.

How Emma Watson Ruined Harry Potter

In her Harry Potter fantasy saga, author J.K. Rowling describes the character Hermione Granger as bushy haired and bucktoothed. In fact, young Granger’s teeth are so fugly that after Draco Malfoy enlarges them as a prank (in Goblet of Fire, I believe), Hermione instructs the school nurse to shrink her teeth to a more normal size, rather than their hideous original appearance.

The casting director for the Harry Potter movie franchise apparently has never picked up one of the books because he or she cast the stunning Emma Watson as Hermione. Nearly all viewers have come to acknowledge Watson’s beauty, though the most perceptive were able to detect her sublimely good looks back in the Sorcerer’s Stone days. In the series’ finale, The Deathly Hallows, the romantic tensions have moved to the forefront of the drama, making Hermione’s miscasting a much more obvious distraction.

In The Deathly Hallows, Harry and Hermione journey through the countryside. Just the two of them. Two heterosexual seventeen year-olds of opposite sexes traveling alone in the woods (staying in the same tent no less) is just about the perfect hook-up scenario. The catch: Harry’s got a fiery redhead at home and Hermione’s jonesin’ for a Weasley of her own.

The Deathly Hallows Part 1 film attempts to play off this tension by inserting a scene of Harry and Hermione flirtatiously dancing with one another while the world around them goes to hell. I’m sure the intent of the scene was to get the audience to think about the characters' motives—especially in light of their respective ginger romances—but my mind was nowhere near that.

If I were reading the book I might have thought, “But aren’t they just friends?” But after an hour or so of watching Watson majestically glide across the screen, all I could think was, “Why wouldn’t Harry try to hit that?" Sure, Ginny’s blossoming into a fine young woman, but Harry’s got a bona fide ten in his own tent! I’m sure director David Yates wanted suspense, but what he got was an entire audience muttering, “It’s about time.” The only thing that took me by surprise was that I had been replaced by a short, spectacled British boy in the fantasy I have enjoyed for years.

I may not even bother to see Deathly Hallows Part 2. I may, instead, opt to imagine myself inserted in the nude make out scene with Hermione for two and a half hours. I would save ten dollars and be far more prepared should the situation ever arise in reality!

KT Tunstall Suits Up

KT Tunstall got her big American break in 2006 when contestant Katharine McPhee delivered a surprisingly horizontal rendition of her hit song "Black Horse & The Cherry Tree" on American Idol. From there, Tunstall's debut album Eye to the Telescope went multi-platinum. Tunstall's second album, Drastic Fantastic, slipped under the radar—way under—in comparison to her debut. If it weren't for the occasional Eye to the Telescope tracks gracing the radio, one might be compelled to forget about Ms. Tunstall altogether. Fortunately for her fans, she won’t settle for that.

Tunstall's third studio album, Tiger Suit (released Oct. 5 in the US) is the Scottish singer-songwriter's most ambitious effort. "Hold On," the lead single from Drastic Fantastic, was basically a "Black Horse & The Cherry Tree" retread. There is none of that this time. Tiger Suit is clearly a different animal. The very first ominous synthesizer chord makes it very clear that this is not your, um, older sister's KT Tunstall record. Except it kind of is. She still has that honest folky singer-songwriter dynamic and still dabbles in upbeat country blues, but she explores so much more. Tunstall has never shied away from electronic experimentation, her live shows are loaded with samples and loops, but she really pushes herself in that area on Tiger Suit. There are moments at which Tiger Suit could pass for an Imogen Heap album (though Imogen did trade in the electronics for all natural instruments on Ellipse).

The album’s opener “Uummannaq Song” takes no prisoners. The aforementioned synthesizer and echoing “oh oh oh’s” set a vast stage that Tunstall confidently commands, wailing through a powerful chorus. “Uummannaq Song” is poised to be the crown jewel of Tiger Suit until “Fade Like a Shadow” comes around. Perhaps the most cheerful-sounding song ever written about lost love using vampiric imagery, “Fade Like a Shadow” hits with an infectious wall of sound sprinkled with a delightful xylophone line. Not all of Tunstall’s emotions are masked by upbeat pop tunes, though. “Lost,” “The Entertainer,” and the sparkling “(Still a) Weirdo” provide pitch-perfect contrasts to the toe-tappers. “Weirdo” is the confession of a person woefully coming to terms with inadequacies and the inability to measure up. Think Radiohead’s “Creep” with less angst and more heart.

Tiger Suit is a bit uneven, but that speaks more to the excellence of the standout tracks than the deficiencies of the others. Not only does it serve as the vehicle for a few wonderful tunes, but Tiger Suit is also a delightful 43 minutes of music.