Cool news to come from the Armada gig at the East Brunswick Club last night: Jeff Martin, Canadian songwriter of note, previously of Ireland, has landed in Australia as a full-time resident. Although the travelling troubadour said he didn’t know just how much time he’d get to spend here.

The gig itself, being recorded, was damn fine, although the amount of inane crowd chatter during and between songs could be a headache for the final cut.

Martin, with Wayne Sheehy on percussion and Jay Cortez on bass (and other bits ‘n’ bobs, such as mandolin and harmonica), was in fine fettle for the two-hour performance in a hot, cramped venue offering superb sound. Seated mid-stage throughout in black shirt and jeans, he paraded a host of instruments during the night, including a hurdy gurdy, esraj, oud (won in a Cairo poker game) and theremin, as well as mainstay Gibson guitars, a classic Les Paul and an Australian-made 12-string.

The set list, similar to last year’s tour with familiar banter, ranged from Tea Party favourites such as Sister Awake and The Bazaar, to his signature solo tune, The Kingdom (album review here), again dedicated to Victoria’s Black Saturday bushfires, and Armada tunes. He again offered crafty blends of NIN’s Hurt and Joy Division’s Love Will Tear Us Apart, and Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love.

One highlight was Coming Home, given extra gusto by his announcement of a move to Oz, and the closing encore song, Black Snake Blues, with Cortez on slide guitar.

In Sheehy and Cortez, Martin has found ideal complements, and, combined with the regularity of his touring, must bode well for the Armada’s future. Or so I hope.
]]> http://lookslikethesun.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/uma-das-musicas-mais-lindas-da-historia/ Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:17:26 +0000 Jessica http://lookslikethesun.wordpress.com/2009/11/19/uma-das-musicas-mais-lindas-da-historia/

“When the routine bites hard
and ambitions are low
And the resentment rides high
but emotions won’t grow
And we’re changing our ways,
taking different roads
Then love, love will tear us apart again

Do you cry out in your sleep
All my failings exposed
Get a taste in my mouth
As desperation takes hold
Is it something so good
Just can’t function no more?
When love, love will tear us apart again”

Love Will Tear Us Apart es lo que pone en la lápida de Ian Curtis, cantante de Joy Division. Presa de ataques continuos de epilepsia que no le dejaban ni cantar y a punto de divorciarse de su mujer, que estaba harta de la vida errante del rockero típico, en 1980 se colgó de una viga de su casa, tras algún intento previo con barbitúricos.

Todo había comenzado unos años antes, cuando el grupo se llamaba Warsaw y se cambiaron el nombre por el de las prostitutas judías de los campos de concentración nazis: Joy Division. Tuveron problemas con eso y con su afición por la simbología y el vestuario nazi, pero al parecer era todo provocación.

Solamente sacaron un disco, el segundo, Closer, ya fue póstumo, y el efecto mortaja debió tener algo que ver con el éxito fulminante de este single que tenemos entre manos. Se supone a Joy Division inventores del post-punk, que viene a ser igual de transgresor pero usando sintetizadores que hacen ruidos muy raros y que pueden considerarse cualquier cosa menos punk.

A mí no me gusta. Ya lo he dicho.

When routine bites hard,
and ambitions are low,
and resentments ride high,
but emotions won’t grow,
and we’re changing our ways, taking different roads.
Then love, love will tear us apart again.
love, love will tear us apart again.
You cry out in your sleep,
all my failings exposed.
and there’s a taste in my mouth,
as desperation takes hold.
just that something so good just can’t function no more.
But love, love will tear us apart again.
love, love will tear us apart again.
love, love will tear us apart again.
love, love will tear us apart again.

A história é que o ex-vocalista do Bush, e marido da Gwen Stefany, vai aparecer num episódio da série ‘Criminal Minds’.

E lá, com a cara branca e olhos pretos por conta da maquiagem, faz uma versão bizarra de ‘Love will tear us apart’, do Joy Division.

Mas é impossível alguma coisa ficar boa com aquele jeito arfante de cantar, né?

Rossdale também anda tocando ‘Landslide’ em seus shows. É uma das músicas mais chatinhas do Smashing Pumpkins. Bonitinha, mas chatinha, saca? E ao fim ele dá aqueles gritinhos arfantes enquanto as meninas gritam. Terrible.

__________________________________________________________

Joy Division, Love Will Tear us Apart

il 6 aprile alle 6,30  è morto all’età di 81 anni Ranieri III di Monaco.
Il re soffriva da tempo e verrà ricordato per sempre dal popolo monegasco per aver cambiato radicalmente il piccolo principato.

Per il mondo Ranieri III verrà ricordato per le nozze del secolo, per la storia d’amore che forse solo William Shakespeare il grande Bardo avrebbe potuto immaginare: le nozze del secolo. Il 18 aprile del 1956 sposa nella cattedrale di monaco la divina – l’unico aggettivo semanticamente corretto per descriverla – Grace Kelly, mai una donna ha messo piede sulla faccia della terra. Attrice all’apice della carriera, musa ispiratrice di Hitchcock la Kelly abbandonò una carriera avviatissima per amore del suo Ranieri. Ranieri III era lo scapolo d’oro di europa e riuscì a far capitolare la splendida Grace Patricia Kelly, figlia di un canottiere americano che partecipò ai giochi nel 1928.

La loro è la migliore storia d’amore raccontata finita in tragedia, durata solo 25 anni, finita non per una sbandata per una Camilla Shand-Parker-Bowles qualsiasi, ma per una sbandata nelle curve maledette di Montecarlo, alla guida dell’auto che cadeva nel burrone c’era Stéphanie, l’amata terzogenita dei Grimaldi. Sarà stata la maledizione che da secoli cade sul principato, ma la storia finisce in tragedia….

…”L‘aurora di questo giorno ne apporta una dolorosa pace;
e il sole, per pietà dei nostri mali, pare si rifiuti a risplendere.
Uscite da questi luoghi, e ite ad intrattenervi altrove delle vostre disavventure,
di cui taluna vi sarà perdonata, di tal’altra avrete castigo, avvegnaché
non fu mai storia più compassionevole di questa, di Giulietta e Romeo”.

…”A glooming peace this morning with it brings;

The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head:

Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things;

Some shall be pardon’d, and some punished:

For never was a story of more woe

Than this of Juliet and her Romeo”.

“Romeo e Giulietta” V – III

L’amore che Ranieri sentiva per Grace l’ha dimostrato nel giorno del suo funerale quando non ha smesso neanche un momento di piangere dietro al feretro dell’amata….nemmeno un momento mentre poggiava la nervoluta mano sulla bara coperta dalla bandiera della principesse grace. Il 17 aprile ranieri III sarà seppellito accanto alla sua amata Grace.

“…And if a double-decker bus
Crashes into us
To die by your side
Is such a heavenly way to die

And if a ten-ton truck
Kills the both of us
To die by your side
Well, the pleasure – the privilege is mine
Oh, There Is A Light And It Never Goes Out“

The Smiths - there is a light that never goes out

“When the routine bites hard

And ambitions are low

And the resentment rides high

But emotions wont grow

And were changing our ways,

Taking different roads

Then love, love will tear us apart again

Why is the bedroom so cold

Turned away on your side?

Is my timing that flawed,

Our respect run so dry?

Yet theres still this appeal

That weve kept through our lives

Love, love will tear us apart again

Do you cry out in your sleep

All my failings expose?

Get a taste in my mouth

As desperation takes hold

Is it something so good

Just cant function no more?

When love, love will tear us apart again”

il matrimonio del secolo

Bisoux,

la fille de poche

(originally posted on: 13/04/05 – modified on: 13/10/09

Take the time to watch Grant Gee’s gorgeous Joy Division doc from 2007. This is the best of what music journalism / documentary can be. Just beautifully edited, artistically conceived, revealing and fascinating. We all know that the band was iconoclastic but I think that the context of postpunk modernism at large and the redemption of a city through the story of a band is what makes this film transcendent. Also featuring a HUGE design hero of mine — Peter Saville.

Here is part 1 of 10 :: (Click the video after playing to jump to YouTube and watch all 10 parts. It is TOTALLY worth watching.)

- – – – – – – – – - - – – – – – – – – - - – – – – – – – – - - – – – -

Ultimamente ando ouvindo muito Joy Division – eu já conhecia antes, mas só fui realmente parar para ouvir recentemente – e acho que é uma banda maravilhosa para mim e o marco do rock depressivo para todos os fãs fiéis que idolatram a figura inimitável e mártir da esquizofrenia Ian Curtis, vocalista e front man do grupo. Muitos odeiam quando se transforma uma pessoa na imagem da banda, mas a história do Joy Division não pode começar de outro jeito senão pela conturbada vida de Ian.

• Adolescência

Ian Curtis sempre foi uma pessoa isolada e um tanto exótica, também era muito inteligente e sempre o melhor da sala e tinha basicamente um amigo, Tony Nuttall, o qual estava sempre ao seu lado. Viviam a tomar remédios controlados para se drogar e ouviam Rolling Stones e David Bowie, mas nada se comparava ao amor de Ian pelos cigarros e seu outro vicio de se maquiar e passar tardes e tardes trancado no quarto ouvindo seus artistas favoritos.

• Joy Division

Ian nasceu no Memorial Hospital, Old Trafford, em Manchester, em 15 de Julho de 1956 e sempre sonhou em ser um rebelde sem causa e morrer jovem, igual seus maiores ídolos. Logo que conheceu Deborah [namorada de Tony na época], Ian se apaixonou, a conquistou e casaram ainda jovens e se mudaram e então Ian pensou seriamente em uma carreira musical, mesmo tendo um ótimo emprego como assistente social e após um show dos Sex Pistols, ele conheceu os outros integrantes do que viria a ser Warsaw e posteriormente, Joy Division – o nome vem de um antigo hábito nazista: Joy Division era o nome dos estabelecimentos em campos de concentração onde ficavam as mulheres judias esperando serem estupradas o dia inteiro pelos soldados.

• Fim

Após todo o caos, o Joy Division se despontou como uma grande banda e chegou a tocar com gigantes como The Cure… Mas as crises financeiras [o contrato do grupo rendia miseras 12 libras por semana] e pessoas [como o caso extraconjugal de Ian com Annik levando ao fim de seu casamento com Deborah] fizeram com que o vocalista caísse em depressão profunda estimulada pelo desespero de criar sua filha e lidar com dois amores e a banda. Outro fator marcante foram seus ataques epilépticos que o assombravam desde a adolescência e no dia 17 de Maio, após ouvir The Idiot de Iggy Pop, olhar fotos de sua filha Natalie e escrever uma carta dizendo o quanto amava Deborah e odiava Annik e assistir um filme chamado Stroszek de Herzog, Ian Curtis se suicida enforcado na sua cozinha aos 23 anos de idade se tornando aquilo que ele sempre quis ser; preferiu ser um mito a um símbolo vivo.

Aqui para download o primeiro EP do grupo, An Ideal For Living      Download

1 – Warsaw

Si Scott 'Stag'

Here is a sneak preview of three pieces from of the upcoming show by artist Si Scott (one of my new faves!) at Electrik Sheep. This is some really beautiful work. After killing it with Seb Lester’s font wizardry, this is a fantastic follow up. Great work at the Sheep, your crew is doing wicked keeping it fresh! I want the Stag! Beautiful line work, it’s mesmorizing!! How much? Check it out HERE

Si Scott 'True Love'

Si Scott 'Leash Called Love'

Zum 30 jährigen Jubiläum einer meiner allerliebsten Songs verneige ich mich vor dem  Sänger und Bandgründer Ian Curtis, dessen Band Joy Division mich lange Zeit auf dem Weg des Erwachsenwerdens begleitet hat. Leider hin und wieder auch begleitet von seinen Dummheiten.

Ian Curtis wurde 1956 in Manchester geboren.  Schon sehr früh kam er mit Drogen in Verbindung und  schluckte vor allem Valium in riesigen Mengen. Daher auch seine Epilepsie, mit der er auch sein kurzes Leben lang zu kämpfen hatte. Bereits als Jugendlicher hatte Curtis die Wahnvorstellung, noch vor seinem 30 Lebensjahr das Licht der Welt wieder zu verlassen, ähnlich seinem Idol Van Morrison. 1976 gründete er die Band  Joy Division. 1979 schrieb  Curtis den Song “Love will tear us apart”. Veröffentlicht wurde er kurz vor Curtis tragischem Selbstmord 1980.  Der Song sollte einerseits eine Antwort auf den Grammy-Gewinner-Hit Love Will Keep Us Together von Captain & Tennille von 1975 sein,  aber gleichzeitig auch eine Art  Bechreibung  der Beziehungsprobleme, die  Curtis mit seiner Frau Deborah hatte.

Love will tear us apart war auch der Satz, den seine Frau auf den Grabstein von Ian Curtis schreiben lies.  Der Grabstein wurde Juli 2008 gestohlen.

Joy Division fand sich zuerst unter dem Namen Warsaw zusammen. Der Name war eine Inspiration des Songs Warzawa von David Bowie 1977. Die Idee, eine Band zu gründen, fand während einem Sex Pistol Konzertes in Manchester statt.  Der spätere Name Joy Division leitete sich von einer angeblichen Prostituierten-Riege der deutschen Wehrmacht ab, die im Roman The House of Dolls des ehemaligen KZ-Häftl ings Yehiel Festil  beschrieben wird. Auch aufgrund ihres Kleidungsstils im Stil der 30er Jahre mußte sich die Band immer wieder gegen Nazi-Vorwürfe wehren.   Joy Division waren eine der wichtigsten Bands der Post Punk-Bewegung . Nach dem Selbstmort Curtis´ gründeten die drei verbliebenen Mitglieder 1980 die Band New Order. New Order haben diesen Song wieder aufgenommen, ebenso U2, the Cure, Nouvelle Vague, Nick Cave und viele viele mehr. An das Original kommt leider keine dieser Versionen heran.

2007 wurdeDas Leben von Curtis verfilmt. ” Control” war das Regiedebut des Rockfotografen Anton Corbijn.

Love will tear us apart

Saw The Time Traveler’s Wife today. It’s… not a great movie. If you never read the truly fantastic book by Audrey Niffenegger, you’re not going to know what the fuck is going on there. Nor will you care. In fact, you’ll desire time travel to take you out of the theater. And you’ll probably never want to pick up the book.

And that, I think, is the film’s greatest flaw.

Adapting a novel is tough work. So few works of prose are really created to be cinematic, and this novel, with dual perspectives, is equally tough. The screenwriter here gave me the same sense when watching some of the latter Harry Potter movies (of which I’ve never read the books): Here’s a list of all the big scenes that have to be in the film because they’re huge in the book. Why are they huge in the book? Sorry, we don’t have time for things like character development or story arcs.

Here’s the gist of how the novel starts: Henry, 28 years old, works in a library in Chicago. One day a 20 year old woman comes in looking for a book. She’s young, gorgeous, and her name’s Clare. She recognizes Henry instantly. She’s ecstatic to see him. He, however, has no clue who she is, and has never seen her before. That throws her for a loop for a moment because she’s known him her entire life, and has been in love with him since she was 6 years old.

Henry’s a time traveler. It’s a genetic disorder, something called chronal displacement. One moment he’s here, and then: he’s not. Poof. Vanished into thin air. Leaving just a pile of clothes wherever he stood. He travels to the past, the present, and the future, constantly anchored in by the big events: Clare, the woman he’ll fall in love with and marry. And his mother, who dies tragically when he’s a young boy. He constantly travels back to the site of her car accident, probably hundreds of times. But you can’t change the past, no matter how hard you try.

And realistically, you can’t change the future either.

The thing that makes the book work so good is that beyond that simple set up of time travel, this is a mature story of romance between two people. And like any real romance, for every happy moment the couple is allowed, they’re forced to live through two moments of pain and suffering. In fact, the ending is absolutely heartbreaking, and what makes it worse is the fact that we’re told what will happen well in advance of the moment it happens. But there’s nothing we can do because just like Henry, we’re slingshot throughout the narrative, going along for the thrilling ride.

None of that applies to the movie, I’m sad to say. Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams, who play Henry and Clare, are great actors. I can’t even begin to think of how much worse this movie would be without them to just make it all… nice. And “worse” is too harsh. Confusing? No, that’s not it.

Even Ebert, who seems to enjoyed the film enough, questions many of the logical flaws of the film’s story in his review, all of which are actually addressed or not present in the book.

Let me put it this way: It’s like someone tried to adapt a synopsis of the book, and not the actual book itself.

In that, they succeeded, which is a shame because this really wouldn’t have – or, shouldn’t have – been that hard to bring to the screen properly. In fact, had it been done so right, this would’ve been that new, crazy tragic love story that people go to see over and over again. I believe that’s why the book became such a mega best seller.

One last night, about the music: In the novel, Henry and Clare are going through what you might call their present day courtship in the 90s, but are both obsessed with the great American punk bands of the 70s. In fact, some of Henry’s preaching about the primal animal rebellious spirit of mankind being turned into music and called punk rock is a bit ridiculous, but you get the point. The man knows his shit. It’s such a shame that instead of that, in the film, you get a single by Lifehouse of all bands.

Odder still: In the film, not only is the song used, but members of Broken Social Scene actually perform a cover of “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” In fact, it’s the first dance of the newly married Henry and Clare as family and friends watch. It’s… kind of creepy. A touch romantic, yes, but really creepy. Perhaps as it should be.

(From Business Wire)–New Line Records will release the official soundtrack from the film “The Time Traveler’s Wife” via digital download and Amazon.com’s Disc On Demand program Tuesday, August 11. The soundtrack’s emotionally moving lineup features 23 tracks from the motion picture, which will be released in theatres nationwide on Friday, August 14.

The soundtrack includes the memorable Lifehouse song “Broken,” featured in the film’s trailer, as well as a cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” performed by Broken Social Scene, whose members (Kevin Drew, Brendan Canning, Justin Peroff, Andrew Whiteman) make an appearance in the film as a wedding band. Rounding out the soundtrack, the album includes 21 selections from the score composed by Mychael Danna (“Little Miss Sunshine,” “(500) Days of Summer”).

A perfect companion to the timeless love story, the motion picture soundtrack will be available at all digital retailers on August 11.

“The Time Traveler’s Wife” is based on the best-selling book about a love that transcends time. Clare (Rachel McAdams) has been in love with Henry (Eric Bana) her entire life. She believes they are destined to be together, even though she never knows when they will be separated: Henry is a time traveler — cursed with a rare genetic anomaly that causes him to live his life on a shifting timeline, skipping back and forth through his lifespan with no control. Despite the fact that Henry’s travels force them apart with no warning, Clare desperately tries to build a life with her one true love.

“The Time Traveler’s Wife” was directed by Robert Schwentke (“Flightplan”) from a screenplay by Academy Award^® winner Bruce Joel Rubin (“Ghost”), based on the novel by Audrey Niffenegger. Nick Wechsler and Dede Gardner produced the film, with Brad Pitt, Richard Brener, Michele Weiss and Justis Greene serving as executive producers. The co-producer is Kristin Hahn.

Heading the film’s cast as Clare and Henry are Rachel McAdams (“Red Eye,” “The Notebook”) and Eric Bana (“Star Trek,” “Munich”). “The Time Traveler’s Wife” also stars Arliss Howard, Ron Livingston and Stephen Tobolowsky.

www.thetimetravelerswifemovie.com

Poster for (500) Days of Summer

Note: The following post about (500) Days of Summer and why I was not charmed by it contains spoilers. I will also adhere to a list-like format for the sake of brevity. However, if you wanna read it as some dig against the sleeper rom-com’s indexical use of number-play, texts are bendy.

It was hard to go into the screening for this movie objectively. I had some misgivings about this movie that I catalogued prior to attending a Saturday matinee screening. They are as follows:

1. The preview is really fucking twee.
2. The oft-mentioned post-coital musical number, complete with marching band, animated bird, and ironic use of Hall and Oates’s great but over-used “Dreams Come True.”

Still from the dance sequence; image courtesy of paisleypetunia.com

3. A friend mentioned that Gordon-Levitt’s character moves on from Summer with a girl named Autumn. Seriously.
4. Same friend made quite the indictment on race and whiteness.
5. The “vintage” clothes — while Deschanel and Gordon-Levitt are in adorable outfits, they seem less vintage than Anthropologie’s upper-middle-class version of vintage. Everything is so tidy and worn once and unlived in. It just made me miss my friend Kit, who almost exclusively wears amazing thrift-store dresses (many of which I know she’s worn multiple times). Her look is much more comfort-based and much less polished. I think I would’ve responded to the outfits if there were at least one loose thread or frayed cuff, especially since Summer is probably not cashing fat checks as a personal assistant to the head of a greeting card company. Sigh. I know; it’s a movie.

But my big problem going in was the self-conscious music geekery. Examples:

1. Gordon-Levitt wears the “Love Will Tear Us Apart” Joy Division t-shirt in one scene. GET IT? Ugh. Such an obvious visual joke. I think if there’s gonna be a music geek dramatic irony t-shirt joke, maybe having him wear a My Bloody Valentine t-shirt would have been better. But is there really a need?

Still of Gordon-Levitt wearing an in-joke

2. A friend said that Summer quotes a Belle and Sebastian song in her high school yearbook. Blech.
3. When they break up, Summer casts her and Tom as Sid and Nancy, respectively. Ain’t nothin’ skid row about these two.

In addition, I tend to have misgivings about movies and TV shows that make music geekery — and its quirky application — so central to informing characterization and narrative (see also Juno, Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, and Flight of the Conchords). It might be contrarian, but I feel instantly resistant to these kinds of texts because I feel like I’m supposed to like them because of the music geekery. But I need more than that. While I enjoy movies like Adventureland and High Fidelity (among others like Velvet Goldmine, Times Square, Dazed and Confused, and recently Hedwig and the Angry Inch), the music geekery is actually most interesting in the peripheral.

As an aside: it seems the people of my acquaintance who have the most vitriol toward this movie are also the most personally invested in music culture. They’re also pretty cool, but wouldn’t describe themselves as such. This perhaps gestures toward how pejorative and subjective the word “hipster” has become within my generation.

To stay positive, three things about the movie made me hopeful anyway:

1. The leads are appealing.
2. Summer doesn’t want to be in a relationship.
3. Apparently director Marc Webb made iPod playlists for the leads for each scene to help get them into character. This is interesting to me, especially read alongside playlist auteurs like Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, and Wes Anderson, who use music to create scenes and develop characters.

With that said, I hated this movie. So much so that I was relieved that I saw it for free. 

I was pretty turned off from the start. Principally because the trailer and the opening sequence stress that this is not a love story. But that’s a lie. It’s completely a love story. It’s just not between Gordon-Levitt’s Tom and Deschanel’s Summer. It’s between first-time feature director Webb and first-time screenwriters Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber and how goddamn clever they can be. Just how goddamn clever?

1. There is a marching band and a girl named Autumn.
2. There is a black and white French film that plays in the middle of the movie that turns into Tom’s life story as he sees it. I think they’re going for Godard here, but in my limited knowledge of Godard, this seems too cheap for him. He seems like the type who’d have celebrity culture gatecrash into real life, not have real life imitate a French film.
3. Summer and Tom like to have dates in Ikea, playing house in the showrooms. I will overread this as a Pavement reference.

And then there’s icky touches of whimsy that feel forced and disingenuous. Being cute and fanciful is tricky business, mainly because being charming on camera has to seem effortless. The exemplar for me is Jack Lemmon straining pasta with a tennis racket in The Apartment. Here are a few examples that miss the mark:

1. This movie has a narrator (who, as my friend Karin astutely pointed out, is far from omniscient or objective — he’s basically there to align the audience to Tom). In general, I hate movie narration. It reminds me of what I learned from “Charlie Kaufman” in Adaptation. With some exceptions, narration is profoundly lazy storytelling and filmmaking.
2. Tom has a blackboard covering an entire wall of his bedroom. So he can be close to his true passion. Drawing buildings.
3. Summer is so much a fan of artist René Magritte that she’s actually arranged a bowler hat and an apple on her coffee table.

Magritte's "The Son of Man"

4. Tom wants to be an architect, but is somehow saddled with a job at a greeting card company. To convince Tom of his true passion, Summer has him draw a landscape on her arm.
5. After Summer breaks up with Tom, he quits his job at the greeting card company after a rousing boardroom speech about how the industry feeds lies about romance to mankind. When he storms out, his wiseacre friend does the slow clap. (Aside: I actually predicted this by starting my own clap about five seconds before actor Geoffrey Arend did it on screen – gold star for me!)

And then there are things that make no sense:

1. Summer and Tom first get to know each other at a karaoke bar. Summer does “Sugartime,” a delightful little tune from the late 1950s. Apparently she wanted to do “Born to Run,” but they didn’t have it. Then Tom does a rendition of “Here Comes Your Man” by The Pixies. What karaoke bar has The Pixies but doesn’t have any Bruce on hand? The Boss is who drunk people turn to when they don’t wanna sing Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” again.
2. It takes Tom twenty days or so to work toward his dream of becoming an architect. Primarily because he starts drawing and making lists on his blackboard and reading books at coffee shops.
3. Tom rags on Summer for liking Ringo best. Who doesn’t like Ringo?
4. This movie takes place in Los Angeles? Really? Locals and natives, help me out. I’ve been to your fine, sunny city several times. I’ve even been in the vicinity of where some scenes were shot. It never looked like New York to me.

And finally, there were four things that I found interesting, but did not think were well-executed. As they were related to issues of gender and age, these missed opportunities made me the saddest.

1. Summer really doesn’t want a relationship with Tom and stresses that from the very beginning. There’s mention of her parents divorcing when she was young, but I think she just wants to be alone and be independent and figure out what she wants in life (both maybe explain why she cries at the end of The Graduate before breaking up with Tom). I thought this was awesome. . . . At least I thought this until she gets married to some guy at the end for some reason.
2. The movie seems invested in making a commentary on how men objectify women, how movies abet that process, and how it results in men not really knowing the women they claim to love (I think Michel Gondry’s Science of Sleep was trying to make a similar statement, and failed in my estimation for similar reasons). Tom’s “expectations vs. reality” split-screen sequence is made all the more poignant after the scenes where Tom (along with the camera and the editor) have cut Summer into fragments (her smile, her hair, her laugh, her eyes, her knees, etc.). Because, for all his obsession, Tom never really knows Summer. He may think he sees her everywhere, but he never really sees her. Instead, he sees creepy images like this one.

Summer through Tom's eyes; image courtesy of 500days.com

3. Tom has a wise-beyond-her-years kid sister. Too bad she’s not really a person. A good precocious girl is my kryptonite (I love you, Linda Manz).
4. Summer isn’t really a person either. That’s too bad because I think Deschanel could have easily made her one and does fine with what she’s given (as does Gordon-Levitt). I also think this movie would have been more interesting if this sort of character was the protagonist.

Again, I think Summer’s lack of embodiment is part of the point — Tom wants Summer to be a manic pixie dream girl that can save him from his mediocre, humdrum existence, but she never performs as he thinks she should. Thus, Tom becomes obsessed with a woman he never actually knows.

But we, the audience, never really get to know her either, in part because the production personnel seem similarly vexed by her (as I think Tom is really just a stand-in for one of the screenwriters), but mainly because they are so bewitched by their words and camera tricks to give their characters any genuine motive or meaning.

One of the great untouchable bands has been Joy Division.

Thou shalt not disparage them, or have the audacity to cover their work. The intimidation factor is at 11.

So, I was pleased to hear Canada’s Broken Social Scene suitably melancholy cover version of Joy Division’s anthem, “Love Will Tear Us Apart”, for a new movie, The Time Travelers Wife.

Anchored by a sparse piano and played at a slower tempo, Kevin Drew’s vocals provide just the right atmosphere to invoke the ghost of Ian Curtis and the Factory Records boys finest hour.

Here it is, let me know what you think.

Broken Social Scene have recorded an interesting cover of Joy Division’s epic Love Will Tear Us Apart. The track will appear on the soundtrack of The Time Traveler’s Wife. Hear it for yourself, via Pitchfork, HERE

Tickets go on sale tomorrow for the October gigs (in Glasgow and Manchester) of Super Furry Animals.

Lineup for the Fistful of Fandango festival in London confirmed for next month. Includes Art Brut, Eugene McGuinness, Herman Dune and Hatcham Social. More details HERE

Dan Deacon, Deerhunter and No Age have been touring together and you can see some footage below.

Broken Social Scene ha traido al 2009 desde el año 1980 el clásico track de Joy Division: “Love Will Tear Us Apart”, todo con el fin de que este aparezca en el soundtrack de la película The Time Travelers Wife, que no me acuerdo del título en español pero que ya tiene espectaculares en el Periférico. (D.F.)

Para más información, (porque no voy a repetir lo que diga Pitchfork), métase usted a este link:

http://pitchfork.com/news/36132-hear-broken-social-scene-cover-joy-divisions-love-will-tear-us-apart/

Ahí pueden escuchar el track! La reinterpretación instrumental de BSS me gusta muchísimo, porque a pesar de ser un track  clásico, covereado hasta el cansancio, la banda canadiense logra replantearla con la personalidad muy intrumentalizada que siempre los ha distinguido. La voz del cover, es decir la voz de Kevin Drew nada más en este corte, comparte la gravedad y pesadez de la canción original, habrá que darle varias escuchadas para saber si sí gusta…

the pitch-folk are streaming BSS’s cover of joy division’s “love will tar us apart” from the upcoming the time travelers wife soundtrack (no comment on the movie, other than rachel mcadams is as radiant as ever). yeah, we know that “love…” is joy division’s eternal calling card, but BSS’s piano-heavy take on the substance standout is as fresh sounding as anything else kevin drew and co. have done.

download:

broken social scene – love will tear us apart

- sunbear

great list on ‘hey yo’…. thanks to dp i will have ‘no diggity’ stuck in my head for the rest of august. while we’re on the subject of covers, here’s a couple more worth downloading. also included is the mp3 for that radiohead cover of ‘ceremony’ that I posted a while back.

Kid A (Radiohead Cover) – John Mayer

All My Friends (LCD Soundsystem Cover) – Franz Ferdinand

There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (Smiths Cover) – Röyksopp/Erlend Øye

Love Will Tear Us Apart (Joy Division Cover) – Jose Gonzalez

Ceremony (New Order Cover) – Radiohead

A good cover is distinct and fresh without losing the essence of the original. Once the melody hits, the listener should have an “Oh! I know and love this song!” moment. It’s also nice when a cover clears up a few lyrics that have previously gone misheard.

I hope The Klaxons (pictured above) receive some much deserved street-cred for playing Blackstreet.

No Diggity (Blackstreet Cover) – The Klaxons

Heart It Races (Architecture in Helsinki Cover) – Dr. Dog

Don’t Stop The Music (Rihanna Cover) – The Bird and The Bee

Good Life (Kanye Cover) – Nite Club

Love Will Tear Us Apart (Joy Division Cover) – Nouvelle Vague

I’m Good I’m Gone (Lykke Li Cover) – Friendly Fires

Playground Love (Air Cover, Acoustic) – Phoenix

Blame it on all the sun I recieved this weekend, but I am in this sentimental lovelost mood, call it part nostalgia for past times but also the great hope for something new on the horizon…