Unplugged. Out of Control. Depressing. Gloomy.

... These are the words to describe what I've been listening to and what I've been watching. No, I'm not sad. I'm not depressed, not really. It's the Holiday time of year and I can't wait to hang out with my relatives and eat eat eat...

but over the past couple of days, I've enjoyed the dark, gloomy side of life watching some rather depressing films of music icons; anti-heroes.

The first of which is the newly released Anton Corjbin film, "Control." The film was named after Joy Division's song, "She's Lost Control" which is terrifyingly what happened with Ian Curtis's life, the main character of the film, and lead singer and song writer for the influential post-punk band, Joy Division. For those who don't know of them, following Curtis' suicide in 1980, the three remaining members dissolved their band name, and started anew under the title of "New Order." Now, I'm sure you have heard of them....

Joy Division was the guiding light for the post-punk rock scene of the late 70s and early 80s, and the easily the main influences of today's popular alternative music from bands like Interpol, British Sea Power, The Hives, Franz Ferdinand, and the Killers, who cover Joy Division's "Shadowplay" for the film's soundtrack...

but the film isn't all about the band. It's about the life and dreams.... and depression of Curtis. On the outside, he's got a rising rock star career, a legion of devoted listeners, and even has been on John Peel's BBC radio... but on the opposite side is a normal Manchester kid who's battling epilepsy, suffering through a falling apart marriage and an affair, and all the guilt that it brings...

It's an interesting story, and Corjbin films it in film noir style which makes it even more captivating. There's plenty of good music, and Sam Riley not only looks like Ian Curtis but plays the role very well. He even sings... :)

http://www.controlthemovie.com/

Sam Riley as Ian Curtis

Then there's the other DVD I recently purchased.... Nirvana's landmark MTV Unplugged performance in New York on November 18, 1993. Everyone's heard this performance before, I'm sure, but it was finally released on DVD this Tuesday. It features the set in its entirety and unedited.

It's freakin' brilliant. It's also painful, depressing, and heart wrenching to watch. I don't think I've been moved by any concert DVD this way. The Muse Hullabaloo DVD definitely made me excited and ecstatic, and the Flaming Lips DVD made me smile, but Nirvana's live performance just makes me want to weep.

The performance is uncanny. The side of Nirvana seen here, and mostly Kurt Cobain, is so raw and so powerful, but in a completely different way then their normal electric guitar, punk, grunge sound... we're talking unplugged, acoustic here. And its fantastic.

Yada yada, i'm sure this has been read about, heard of, and whatnot so many times, but I just have to say how great this set is.

And yea, during the performance of "Pennyroyal Tea" where Kurt decides at the last second to do it solo.... it made me almost shed a tear. Maybe I did. It was that powerful.

Kurt Cobain

Sigur Ros - Heima / Hvarf

While the first ever Sigur Ros official DVD isn't out til later this month in the United States, their new EP/Live record Hvarf/Heima is out and it's fantastic. It is worth every penny you pay for, and I recommend everyone to buy it now!

The Heima DVD, which means "at home" is slated for release in 2 weeks and looks like its packed with visual and aural pleasures that'll be incredible. It's already received critical acclaim at various film festivals, and I just can't wait to get my hands on it. The best thing is that most stores will carry this DVD, including Best Buy and Circuit City.

Please also check out Screaming Masterpiece, which is another great documentary on Iceland's amazing music culture.

yay new xbox 360

Yay Best Buy processed my warranty request in-store and now I have a new xbox 360! Yay, i can play video games some more now. So NERDY! I ended up paying a little bit more and upgraded to the 360 Elite edition, which comes with hdmi port and cable, and a bigger 120gb hard drive. It also is in limited edition black color. yaa... i guess this will go well with my limited edition red Nintendo DS. :)

new blog probably in the near future

As my web host switches to an all new adminstration interface, i will probably be switching over/back to WordPress. I had used Word Press for about a month before switching back to Blogger. I guess the last time I used WP i was trying to figure out the multi-user version of it and that was pretty complex and buggy. So I'll probably re-start with a single user version. Maybe by year's end.

Here's my feeble attempt on Xbox Recovery

So here I go... about to head down to best buy and see if this Product Replacement Plan actually works, even though its under someone else's name...

Two things to be upset about

And they both involve local markets... Seattle Sonics and Microsoft

1. "I'd love to find a way to keep the team there," he said, "because if the team moves, there's not going to be another team there, not in any conceivable future plan that I could envision, and that would be too bad." - David Stern, NBA Commissioner

I think Mr Stern has been smoking too much crack lately because he's gotta be crazy to believe that Seattle is not a good market for the NBA. It can't be worse than Oklahoma City, or New Orleans, or Charlotte for that matter. Charlotte has failed twice in the past 5 years too....

This whole Sonics relocation thing is getting more and more absurd by the day. Clay Bennett seems to be a PR nightmare as he doesn't seem to care about anything people offer him, the Seattle city council keeps saying the wrong things as well, and then the NBA itself just flat out bluntly sides with the owner. This that this that this that. ARgh.

I just wished Mr Bennett would take a chill pill on his $500 million arena demand and listen to whats on the table. First, Key Arena doesnt really need to go away, perhaps a smaller scale remodel could work. Its nicely located in the heart of Seattle and has been a fine site for 40 years now. Second, why do we need to spend $500 million on a basketball arena?? Think about it, Qwest Field was $360m and Safeco was just over $500m (because it had cost overruns AND it is a TRANSFORMING stadium for crying outloud - well it has a movable roof, but its sorta the same thing)

Finally, he needs to formally meet the other arena proposal teams, namely the Muckleshoot tribe. He also needs to hear out what the potential investor/buyers have to say... I'm sick of this ignore everything and demand it all attitude.

ARgh.


2. MY XBOX 360 DOES NOT WORK.

It's been working fine for a while now, but today, while playing my brand new game, Call of Duty 4, the color started fading in and out and was totally discolored with random tints of random colors.... Now, the video is completely gone, though sound and controls still work. I can hear the system running!

Yea, but the video is out. I tried VGA (my typical setting), Component, and standard AV settings against my TV and nothing works. It all had the discoloration and now are all blank screens. My original xbox console works fine, DVD player works, and regular TV works fine... so its not the TV and its not the cables... its the hardware. The GPU must be shot. Man....

And of course, the 360 is out of 1 year warranty, and even though Microsoft now has a 3 year warranty, it only covers if the xbox is completely inoperable, by way of red rings of death. Mine's probably 90% there, but it still has sound and something obviously works; i just cant see what I'm doing... so I'm not covered.

Luckily (maybe), the console has a Best Buy warranty attached to it. But... of course there's a BUT... i purchased the 360 on ebay so the warranty's title is under the guy who originally bought the 360 and it was never changed over (mostly due to my laziness). I hope the Best Buy store doesnt care for this and just processes this through... cause I'll be annoyed and sad if it doesnt.

ARGH!

lucid imagination

Tonight I watched Michel Gondry's The Science of Sleep which is one crazy imaginative ride in the most literal of ways. The premise of the film is about Stephane, a guy who dreams and dreams and dreams, and "inverts his dreams with reality" as his mom says. He meets his neighbor, ironically named Stephany... and the lucid dreams continue like no other. He's in a constant battle between what he dreams and what's actually happening in the real world, all the while trying to hook up with his neighbor, who shares some of his out of this world creativity and cookyness.

The movie shares alot of similar traits to Gondry's big hit Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, but the surrealism is about it. The movie hits on different ideas and all of which is outstanding. I don't know what to feel in the movie, as it seems like it's fun and imaginative, and comedic at times, but it has such an awfully sad and melancholy mood to it through out. You feel so sorry for Stephane and for me, I can almost relate to so much of what he's going through all the time. It's one of those movies that make you sit back and think about your own life, I guess. Maybe it's cause I'm alot like him, one who dreams about wonders, thinks of things I want to build but sometimes may never really do it, and just wants to play play play and then can never figure out what to say at the right moment or any moment for that matter.... ya.

Tokyo Photo Gallery

Japan [10-2007]

Tokyo Motor Show 2007 Gallery

Tokyo Motor Show 2007