I just bought a stylophone.

I can't wait for it to arrive!!!!!!!!!!

Farewell to a comedy genius.

I like stuff because its got subtitles aka I am a tit.

Once when I was younger a friend of mines Aunt, who according to herself is a 'film buff'(when people refer to themselves as film buffs you pretty much know they are twats) suggested that I go see this Gérard Depardieu film 'The Closet'. It was a comedy and it dealt with gay rights etc and was really good because it was French. Thats what she said. Its good because its French. Anyway, I trusted her because you know I was a young eager film studying git and probably wanted to appear like I was smart and I probably thought going to foreign films made me look cool. So I went to it at the local film theatre that plays all the arty stuff....Rialto I believe it was called, and what I saw on the screen was essentially a really long episode of Friends, with hysterically unfunny (ha) obvious and boring comedy. You know that look in Empire Strikes Back when Yoda says 'You will be' to Luke inside that little hut thing and looks all pissed off and evil and shit. That was the expression on my face for pretty much the whole film. That was as close as I got to laughing. That expression. Anyway everybody seemed to think that film was great and I thought it was shit and I couldn't understand, so I kept asking people and their answer was always, 'but the french make cinema with so much more heart/flare/integrity/insert- whatever-you-want-here-if-you-say-this-sentence-for-real-but-prepare-to-look-like-a-cunt-in-the -process.
Anyway. This weekend I spent a lot of time watching movies, because well, I'm not drinking at the moment and I need something to distract myself. I watched, in order: The Orphanage, After Hours, Hansel and Gretal, and Alice doesn't live here anymore. (I have a bit of a Scorsese thing going at the moment because I am reading a book about him)
This really only has to do with the Orphanage.
Firstly lets get one thing straight. Del Toro did NOT direct this. He presented it. Its the same old trick they did with Tarantino and films like Killing Zoe and Dusk till Dawn. This is a trick instigated by Miramax films in the 90s (off the back of Tarantino) to make fucking idiots think they are watching the next Pans Labyrinth. If you thought Del Toro did, do me a favour and go die a bit.
Now I know your probably thinking 'Well here goes Greg on another hate the film everybody likes rant' and I can understand that. But let me clear this up, I don't hate this film. It looks pretty, and I wasn't bored. There is a but though. It was just another hack job of a ghost film. There was nothing particularly exciting about the script, or the acting and the direction wasn't earth shattering. If you wanna good ghost film get out 'The Devil backbone' (which actually is Del Toro) or if you wanna watch this film but can't be bothered with subtitles rent 'The Others'.
If you want to be different and not watch any of these just go to your local DVD shop and look for anything with a brownish monochromatic cover and Gothic or Times New Roman-ish font in the thriller section. Brown reminds us of old and old reminds us of ghosts!
Anyway, I'm not bagging the film too much, its worth a watch, but I don't think its as brillant or as scary as everybody makes out. I felt the need to have a rant about it now though because I went outside for a smoke earlier and one of my work colleagues asked what I watched. When I said I watched a few films including 'The Orphanage' they said. 'I love Del Toro films, I thought it was brilliant and Spanish cinema is great.'
I'd like to tell you that I tripped said person or something, but instead I smiled thru gritted teeth and came up here and bitched about it on this shitty blog.
Anyway if your interested, the best film I watched was 'Alice doesn't live here anymore', which is weird cause its a film about a single mother going on a journey to discover herself after her husband dies. Sounds boring, but wasn't over the top in anyway. The human relationships seemed really real and was a great slice of life bit of cinema. If this film was made now (and not by Scorsese) it would be a fucking train wreck of monumental proportions and have Jennifer Assfaceton in it. Is it me or has she completely cornered the market on being shit in nearly every way? Anyway it would have turned out like this.

I have to say next was 'After Hours' which is another Scorsese film, this time a comedy. Anyway its quite surreal and has a really good picture on the wall of a shark eating a mans cock in one scene. I think that alone makes it a good movie.
The Korean film 'Hansel and Gretal' was better than the Orphanage. It got a little long towards the end, but it was shot beautifully, and for the first half was creepy as fuck. It got a little over sentimental, but I think the acting and uneasiness for the first half overshadowed that.
I didn't love it, but again it was well worth a watch. Plus you'll seem like you're smart cause its got subtitles.

A joke
A Catholic Priest and a Rabbi are walking through the forest when they come across a young boy tied to a tree.
The Catholic priest says: 'Shall we screw him?"
The Rabbi says: "Out of what?"

Mark Gormley is a genius

Mark Gormley is a singer/songwriter. Some people say he started singing in the 70s. I feel like potentually he became a burnout in his early years and his promising career took a nose dive when the drugs and the drink got too much. He could have been bigger than Elvis. After leaving the scene all together he could have fled to Tibet and become a monk. Everybody thought he had just dropped of the face of the earth.....but he's back.
My favorite part of Mark is his music videos (although who am I to hassle as I can't seem to even finish the damn things) which consist largely off him standing with his hands by his sides on a green screen comped over a poorly chosen background and looking decidedly uncomfortable. If you watch closely you can catch the quick glance off to the side "Are we filming?" faces.
Lens Flares feature quite a bit as well.
I also like the presenters of the show and really want to watch it. I gather that its some kind of cable access show. Its billed as the most important music show on television. Mark is quite the celebrity on it. I like the idea that perhaps it could actually be really important musically in the future, like Tony Wilsons old show on the bbc or even John Peel. That would make me look quite the fool.
I do feel quite sorry for the guy though. I mean his voice isn't bad if your into that really generic hippe shit that came out after Vietnam, and it just sort of seems like this random fan who works at a TV station has some how told him its a good idea to make these music videos and poor old Mark who did a bit much acid when he was a hippie just doesn't have the anything left upstairs to fight back with.
All in all. Genius.



I found the above one quite sad cause he ends up on the moon without his woman.







I think I need to take a leaf out of these guys books and realize its quantity not quality.
Also of note, Lyndall just pointed out he has a perfect balls on his face chin.

Panda Bear

So I have been listening to the Panda Bear album Person Pitch, and enjoying it a lot. I am having a musical join the dots. I knew that Panda Bear was part of Animal Collective, but stylistically there is a lot more repetition and filtered out echos and delays. Obviously being one guy its all made from samples and loops. It sounds acoustic and natural, but quite clearly isn't. I'd say I have been enjoying it even more than Merriweather Post Pavillion. I have been wondering why all morning.
Anyway I just noticed that the top four artists listed (I guess as influences) in the inside cover are Basic Channel, Luomo, Dettinger, and Wolfgang Voigt.
Basic Channel was one of the first of the European minimal techno record labels and when it began consisted of Moritz von Oswald (see post below about the classical record label business) and Mark Ernestus.
Luomo is Sasu Ripatti, also known as Vladislav Delay. Luomo is his slightly more pop orientated house/techno/experimental project.
Dettinger, who releases on Kompakt and Wolfgang Voight who started Kompakt with Michael Mayer.
The whole album sounds to me like something Villalobos would make if he was born in California and surfed. I recommend it.

Fuck, Shit, Cunt.

Today is depressing and looking at my screen and working on this fucking rubbish looking film is feeling similar to what I imagine injecting cyanide into your eye ball with a needle designed for hippos may be like.
I wish I got to design the movie posters/dvd cover for it so I could include that as the quote hook line across the top.
Here's an example on one of my favorite films.

La Llorona - Beirut

Off the new album coming out at the end of the month. I just got tickets to their show in London in May. It sold out in a couple of hours so I feel lucky and in an extreme state of pure pump.

Animal Collective @ Koko

I took Lyndall to this for her birthday. It was at Koko, which I think was pretty perfect for it as it has those sweet high balconies that you can look right down onto the crowd/stage from, but it still has some big ass speakers up there so you can hear everything nicely. (I have photos I'll add to this soon)
My good friend Brett loves these guys all to death. I have had a love/hate relationship with them I guess. I find I have to be in the perfect mood to listen to them. When I am its good, if I'm not I won't give them another chance for a month.
I think this gig has changed that. It was awesome.
Something about all those mechanical instruments large synthetic thunder rolling basslines and the tack-tack-tack-tack of the drum stick on the drum and the foot pedals and the volume, and the melancholy and the happiness.
I think perhaps I have been treating them more as a background band instead off a turn the volume up to eleven kind of deal and that was my mistake.
So Brett, I hope it makes you happy that I think I have found my latest musical love affair.
Well them and Tape, who I can't stop listening to at the moment either.

Techno makes it onto oldest ever record label in the world.

Carl Craig and Moritz Von Oswalds original remix of Ravels- Bolero has had another remixing with two new versions by Craig himself in his C2 guise and also Ricardo Villalobos.
Villalobos mix is called the Polyhof which apparently is a sort of horse-riding/family vacation camp popular in Germany and the Netherlands. I find that funny, but on listening to it I can kinda see why.
Recommended.