From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V11 #408 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Monday, December 2 2002 Volume 11 : Number 408 Today's Subjects: ----------------- you don't know dictionary [bayard ] Re: An introduction to time signatures for the non-musician [Jeffrey with] Re: Here Comes the Sun [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: more metre and rhythm [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: more metre and rhythm [Eb ] Re: Sign of the Times (prog-out still in progress) [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jef] time has come today [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: more metre and rhythm [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: fegmaniax-digest V11 #406 [grutness@surf4nix.com (James Dignan)] [More time signature stuff]: Re: 21st Century Schizoid Man ["Michael E. K] Re: Sign of the Times [Sebastian Hagedorn ] Re: Sign of the Times [Eb ] Re: Sign of the Times [Sebastian Hagedorn ] O/T: magical moment on Haight street ["Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a poin] more metre and rhythm / Om (Side 3) ["ross taylor" ] Reunions, rawk, and Rush (contains polite bashing) ["Rex.Broome" Subject: you don't know dictionary On Sat, 23 Nov 2002, Stewart C. Russell wrote: > > (Yeah, this one ought to get the word geeks out ...) can anyone explain to me why apparently "er" is a word, but "hmm" and "mmm" are not? ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 1 Dec 2002 22:46:26 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: An introduction to time signatures for the non-musician Quoting "Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" : > > 5/4 is heard occasionally on the radio: the already mentioned "Living In > The Past" by Jethro Tull, and the surprisingly not yet mentioned "Good > Morning, Good Morning" on Sgt. Pepper (what a great album for these > things.) If you can pick out the repetitions of 5 beats in either of these > songs, you have an excellent ear - there would be plenty of both "[nil]" > and 'squeezed' extra syllables if I were to try and illustrate these songs > using lyrical phrases. Another famous example also already mentioned is > Brubeck's "Take 5", which has no lyrics whatsoever, but the 5 beat > repetition exists nonetheless. So 5 is a but more ephemeral. To make this easier to understand, the second number (the 4 in 5/4) designates a *steady* beat. So even though Ian Anderson's words in "Living in the Past" fall into four-syllable patterns, they're spaced over 5 beats. Some might argue the song's really in 10/8 ("8" refers to "eighth notes," which are twice as fast as "quarter notes," which is what the lower 4 in a time signature refers to), as the number of 8th notes between Anderson's syllables works out like this: 3+3+2+2 = 10. "Good Morning Good Morning" changes time signatures nearly every measure, and is best saved for your advanced class. It's about feel, and different musicians may hear where "1" (the "downbeat") is differently. The verse of GM2 works out like this, where [&] is the offbeat: Nothing to do to save his life, call his wife in [drum] 1 & 2 & 3& 1 &2 & 3& 1& 2 &3 & 4 & Nothing to say but "what a day! How's your boy been?" [bah b-ba-ba-ba-ba] 1 & 2 & 3& 1 &2 & 3& 1& 2 &1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & Nothing to do, it's up to you [break] 1 & 2 & 3& 1 &2 & 1 & 2 & I've got nothing to say but it's o- kay 3 &4 &1 & 2 & 3& 4& 5& 1 & 2& 3 & 4& 1 & 2& Good morning, good morning, good morning-a So we have two measures of 3/4, one of 4/4, two of 3/4, one of 2/4, one of 4/4, one of 3/4, one of 4/4, one of 5/4, and two of 4/4. (The above is from memory and may be off a bit...) Someone said something to the effect of, "how the hell did [Lennon] think of this?" - He didn't. The Beatles didn't read music and proceeded intuitively: in the case of GM2, the musical rhythms folow the speech rhythms. I'm sure the rest of the band (and the hired sax players) had one hell of a time getting this one right - at first. Once you hear it the way Lennon does, it flows completely organically. > This is also why I am so gassed by "Strawberry Fields Forever", because > while a lot of songs which either change time signature during instrumental > breaks, or have an unusual time signature all the way through, it's unusual > to have a pretty song that stays in 4/4 most of the time but shifts and > changes while the melody is still underway without seeming jarring or > odd... if you don't listen for it, you won't even know it's there. I have > no idea how you come up with that kind of stuff, and it increases my > appreciation for the song. And it's at this point that I feel the technical > aspects of music theory break down and reveal their limitations. To view > Strawberry fields as going "4/4, 4/4/, 2/4, 4/4, 4/4, 6/8" is missing the > point... that's a contrivance, and it exists solely on an intellectual > level. The song goes how it goes, it wasn't created within that system, > it's not weird, it just is what it is. It's like trying to fill the round > hole of John Lennon with the square peg of objective rationale. (ouch!) Exactly. ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: This album is dedicated to anyone who started out as an animal and :: winds up as a processing unit. :: --Soft Boys, note, _Can of Bees_ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 1 Dec 2002 23:22:51 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: Here Comes the Sun Quoting Eb : > >and the "sun, sun, sun, here it comes" bit goes > > > >1-2-3-4,1-2,1-2-3,1-2-3,1-2-3,1-2-3-4-5 (repeat). > >I suspect from the structure and tempo that this is 4/4, 2/4, 9/8, 5/8, > but... > > Yeah, this bridge is a bastard to transcribe. Maybe the strangest > meter in the Beatles' entire catalog. The time is so peculiar that > I'm never even confident that I'm humming it correctly in my head. > (Actually, to me, it's a bit of a letdown -- it doesn't sustain the > melodic magic of the rest of the song.) > > "Sun, sun, sun, here it..." uses 11 eighth-notes. You can divide > these 11 notes in a number of ways, depending on your own quirks. The > counting feel of the divisions is 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2, but it's > probably best to just count them as one large 11/8 measure. Counting > it as a 6/8 measure plus a 5/8 measure doesn't feel right to me. > However, I don't think there's an absolute answer to this issue, > unless you just accept how George himself counted while playing it. > It would be interesting to know. > > ..."cu-ums." One 4/4 measure. The rhythm goes back to "normal," and > we regain a feeling of rhythmic comfort. This comfort zone is > sustained through part of the next measure, until the triplets enter > again. > > The above sequence repeats until the bridge is over. 7/8 + 11/8 + 4/4. Exactly. That's what I'd call it. Oh, re James' assertion that not much rock is in 6/8: you must not listen to Throwing Muses much, as they use that time quite a bit. There's another band I'm trying to think of who use it often - can't remember who. Oh - and yr classic rock'n'roll ballad is best thought of in 6/8, to my ears. One of my favorite "tricky" time signature bits is Radiohead's "Pyramid Song." Two factors at work here: the accents shift across the barlines in unexpected ways, and the eighth notes are "swung" (approximating a grouping of triplets with the first two beats tied), and the drums don't enter until quite a bit later. At first listen, the beat seems to be all over the place, nearly as bad as "Good Morning, Good Morning" or that bit of "Here Comes the Sun" described above. What's interesting is that once the song gets going, you realize the whole thing is actually in an oddly accented slow 4/4 (at least it makes more sense to think of it that way, with the beats stressing against the meter, rather than simply realigning the downbeats to the accented beats). ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: sex, drugs, revolt, Eskimos, atheism ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 1 Dec 2002 23:45:50 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: more metre and rhythm Quoting Eb : > For yeeeeeeears, I've had a rumpled sheet-music compendium called > "Beatles Complete." It's almost 500 pages, and it was pretty much the > blueprint for teaching myself to play "pop" piano. Is this that collection that purports to *transcribe* Beatles tracks? (That is, put down on paper the actual notes of the recording?) Most pop songbooks are the very loosest arrangements, with rhythms quite regularized, chords simplified, parts omitted, etc. If you play exactly as the notes are on the page, it will sound approximately like the Bowditch Falls Methodist Church Choir singing the blues. Most songbooks are intended for not terribly skilled amateur pianists and guitarists. The best way to learn to play (say) Beatles songs is to *listen* to them, and develop your ear and instrumental skills so that you can play them w/o recourse to written notes. All but a handful of (mostly prog) rock songs are only written down, if ever, after the fact. It's an "oral" medium. What someone was saying earlier about the spaces between the beats is very important: it's one reason why, for example, drum machines are useful only in certain styles of music: nothing that requires any sense of swing, for instance (unless you have a *very* skilled drum programmer). If anyone's trying to learn an instrument, I would strongly suggest getting only the basics from someone else or from a written score, and develop the rest by using your ear and learning to reproduce what you hear in your head by using your fingers. After you've developed a long way along that path, maybe studying up on arcane chords and odd written sources will be useful. But I think that for rock, if you learn that way, you'll be a very stiff, and harmonically uninteresting, player. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: PLEASE! You are sending cheese information to me. I don't want it. :: I have no goats or cows or any other milk producing animal! :: --"raus" ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 1 Dec 2002 22:13:16 -0700 From: Eb Subject: Re: more metre and rhythm >Jeffrey patronized: > > For yeeeeeeears, I've had a rumpled sheet-music compendium called > > "Beatles Complete." It's almost 500 pages, and it was pretty much the >> blueprint for teaching myself to play "pop" piano. > >Is this that collection that purports to *transcribe* Beatles >tracks? (That is, >put down on paper the actual notes of the recording?) Well, it doesn't really claim to print the *actual notes* beyond the basic melody, but it does suggest (poor) ways to play the accompaniment. But this was a blessing in disguise, because it forced me to figure out better ways to play the songs on my own. I eventually used the thing as just a "fakebook," reading the melodic lines and the chords posted above and doing my own thing with them. The printed parts were OK for picking up a few basslines, too. You should see the pedestrian "transcription" of "Within You, Without You." Hilarious. ;) In any case, I said it was the blueprint for me learning to play "pop piano" in general, *not* my blueprint for learning to play Beatles songs. Going through that book taught me loads about common chord progressions, etc., which was valuable information that I could apply elsewhere. OK?? >The best way to learn to play (say) Beatles songs is to *listen* to >them, and develop your ear and instrumental skills so that you can >play them w/o recourse to written notes. Jesus, this thread is pedantic. Eb np: Hot Hot Heat/Make Up the Breakdown (this record is FUN!) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 00:20:52 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: Sign of the Times (prog-out still in progress) Quoting Michael Wells : > Eb opines: > > It would be ridiculous to conceive a piece which alternates the time > > signature from measure to measure, for an extended period. > > Actually it's more common than you might think, though I suppose those of us > who spent a lot of time listening to Rush, King Crimson, Zappa and the like > heard it much more often. In the period immediately surrounding 'Tom > Sawyer', for example, the Rush catalogue is rife with examples: > Part VIII (Waltz of the Shreeves) of 'La Villa Strangiato' contains 20 > alternating measures of 3/8 and 6/8; Surely if they alternate regularly, they should be considered one bar of 9/8 (i.e., 10 bars of 9/8 for the whole passage)? > The entire introduction to 'Jacobs Ladder' alternates 5/4 and 6/4 measures, > cleverly echoed later in the song by alternating measures of 6/8 and 7/8; And why wouldn't that be 11/4 and 13/8? > Ps. and I haven't heard it in years, but ISTR Zep's 'The Ocean' alternated 4 > and 7 in the verses? Or was this mentioned already? The riff might be regarded as three bars of 4/4 and one of 3/4, or maybe better, 6/8 (if you consider it a fast four with the big whomping beats on "3"). Okay, I'll dump any remaining cred I have: "Playing in the Band" by the Grateful Dead is in 10/4, with accents shifting throughout. But since it always regularizes into a 10-beat pattern, I see no reason not to just call it 10/4. (Uh-and "Estimated Prophet" is in several different flavors of 7/4. Look, it was a long time ago and I was young and impressionable.) Anyone want to parse out the middle section of Yes's "The Gates of Delirium"? ;) ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: sex, drugs, revolt, Eskimos, atheism ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 00:26:44 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: time has come today Sorry to be Posty McPostalot tonight, but I forgot to add stuff to the other one(s)... Quoting James Dignan : > >>Try "i OF-ten DREAM of TRAINS when I'M a LONE" for a nice > >>lyrical iambic pentameter, or try Shakespeare. It's just > >>"ta DUM ty DUM ty DUM ty DUM ty DUM". Rather than nils, > >>you'll see Shakespeare stuff extra non-accented syllables here > >>and there. > > no. That would be true if IODOT was in 4/4, surely, but not 3/4 There's no necessary correspondence between poetic meters (including the meter of song lyrics) and time signatures, simply because singers can throw in as many rests ("nil" beats, to borrow PH Michael's term) as they want. > >It would be ridiculous to conceive a piece which alternates the time > >signature from measure to measure, for an extended period. I don't > >hear any ambiguity to the 7/4 section at all. > > "Light flight" by Pentangle has alternating bars of 5/4 and 7/4 throughout > the verse, according to the sheet music. Unless the sheet music specifically claims to be the composer's work, it's for shit: almost always after-the-fact interpretations. A technical-minded musician might think of a time signature; one less so inclined may just hear the feel. I can "play" along with (do accurate desktop finger-drumming) any number of songs whose actual time signatures I don't know until I sit down and think about it. Again, it's about feel, and learning to hear where that "one" goes. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: PLEASE! You are sending cheese information to me. I don't want it. :: I have no goats or cows or any other milk producing animal! :: --"raus" ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 00:30:22 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: more metre and rhythm Quoting Eb : > >The best way to learn to play (say) Beatles songs is to *listen* to > >them, and develop your ear and instrumental skills so that you can > >play them w/o > recourse to written notes. > > Jesus, this thread is pedantic. Usually, I spell my name "Jeff." I suppose it might be "pedantic" - but really, I was trying to move away from pedanticism of the sort that holds up a score or songbook as if it's the song. My point was, the song *is* the recording in rock: any score is almost always someone else's (usually lame) work. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: PLEASE! You are sending cheese information to me. I don't want it. :: I have no goats or cows or any other milk producing animal! :: --"raus" ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 21:07:21 +1300 From: grutness@surf4nix.com (James Dignan) Subject: Re: fegmaniax-digest V11 #406 >On 2 Dec 2002 at 11:40, James Dignan wrote: > > >> >>Try "i OF-ten DREAM of TRAINS when I'M a LONE" for a nice >> >>lyrical iambic pentameter, or try Shakespeare.> >> no. That would be true if IODOT was in 4/4, surely, but not 3/4 > >Jeez! > >Tell me you don't get what I said, or that this little ditty doesn't >sing perfectly to the verse melody of IODOT, or that it's not iambic >pentameter. huh? did I miss something in what you said? I was cram reading things, but... the Shakespeare fits perfectly to the melody of IODOT - but only if you change the stresses. It's shall-I-com-PARE-THEE-to-a-SUM-MER's-day *not* shall-I-(pause)-com-PARE-(pause)-thee-TO-(pause)-a-SUM-(pause)-mer's-DAY-(pause) >Now recite the first verse of IODOT exactly as it is sung, but >without notes -- just using conversational tones. Do you hear the >difference between the above and IODOT? Shirley, you don't. definitely. If you were reading the lyrics without keeping to the rhythm opf the song, you might go i-OF-ten-DREAM-of_TRAINS... which would be iambic. But once you add in the pauses to revert it to 3 time, you're adding in the second weakened stress: .-..-..-..-..-, making it dactylic. James Dignan, Dunedin, New Zealand. =-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-= .-=-.-=-.-=-.- .-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-. -.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-= You talk to me as if from a distance =-.-=-. And I reply with impressions chosen from another time -=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=- (Brian Eno - "By this River") ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 00:14:07 -0800 From: "Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" Subject: [More time signature stuff]: Re: 21st Century Schizoid Man At 11:40 AM +1300 12/2/02, James Dignan propounded thusly: >oh, and as for hard& heavy in some variety of 3 time, how about the >instrumental break from "21st Century Schizoid Man"? (or is this triplets >yet again?) Probably triplets - the copy in my mental tape player seems to be in 2/4 the whole way through, including that heavy-as-hell riff. Just as surprising as if it were in 3. So far I think this is the only straight 2/4 rock song we've come up with. But, boy, what a beaut. "RATS - [nil] - PAW - [nil] - IR - on - CLAW - [nil] - NEU - ro - SUR - geons - SCREAM - for - MORE - at - PAR - a - NOI - a's - POIS - on - DOOR - [nil] - TWENty - first - CEN - tury - SCHIZ - oid - MAN - [nil]" Mike - -- ======== We need love, expression, and truth. We must not allow ourselves to believe that we can fill the round hole of our spirit with the square peg of objective rationale. - Paul Eppinger At non effugies meos iambos - Gaius Valerius Catallus ("...but you won't get away from my poems.") "Moderation in all things, except Wild Turkey." - Evel Knievel ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 02 Dec 2002 09:27:05 +0100 From: Sebastian Hagedorn Subject: Re: Sign of the Times - --On Saturday, November 30, 2002 17:30:37 -0700 Eb wrote: > On the other hand, my god...could "Panic Room" possibly suck more? Of course it could. At least we had some good acting (I thought both Jodie Foster and the daughter were great) and a few nice camera shots. I agree that it's a disappointment, but that's mainly because I've come to expect so much from David Fincher. My infatuation with Jodie Foster has all but been cured - she's made so many forgettable movies in the last decade. But she's still a great actress. So, I give you that the script sucks, but didn't you see any redeeming values? > Disappointed with "Ali" and "The Curse of the Jade Scorpion," as well. Yeah, I enjoyed them while I watched them but they didn't stay with me. What's funny is that in the case of Ali I'd expected it to last. - -- Sebastian Hagedorn Ehrenfeldg|rtel 156 50823 Kvln http://www.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/ Non regalate terre promesse a chi non le mantiene. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 00:31:22 -0700 From: Eb Subject: Re: Sign of the Times >Sebastian: >My infatuation with Jodie Foster has all but been cured Somewhere, Quail is sobbing right now. >So, I give you that the script sucks, but didn't you see any redeeming values? Well, it was a thorough showcase of Foster's various plastic surgeries.... Eb ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 02 Dec 2002 09:46:02 +0100 From: Sebastian Hagedorn Subject: Re: Sign of the Times - --On Monday, December 02, 2002 00:31:22 -0700 Eb wrote: >> So, I give you that the script sucks, but didn't you see any redeeming >> values? > > Well, it was a thorough showcase of Foster's various plastic surgeries.... Are you serious?? I wouldn't have expected her of all people to resort to plastic surgery. I don't follow the "entertainment" news so I haven't heard anything about that. It didn't occur to me seeing her in "Panic Room", either. - -- Sebastian Hagedorn Ehrenfeldg|rtel 156 50823 Kvln http://www.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/ Non regalate terre promesse a chi non le mantiene. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 00:04:51 -0800 From: "Michael E. Kupietz, wearing a pointy hat" Subject: O/T: magical moment on Haight street So, I'm walking down Haight street today, feeling low, and I pass a a guy who's got a table with a glass harmonica setup - you know, where they fill glasses with different amounts of water and play tunes by running their fingers on the rims. Well, he had like 50 glasses, the table is covered, and he's playing these little jazzy riffs, so I stopped to check it out. As soon as I stop to listen, he launches into a note-for-note cover of "Great Gig In The Sky". He's got the whole song down - piano parts, guitar parts, everything. (He told me afterwards he learned it off the sheet music.) It was unspeakably beautiful. Every once in a while I remember that life in San Francisco seems to have more than its share of moments of utter magic. Mike - -- ======== We need love, expression, and truth. We must not allow ourselves to believe that we can fill the round hole of our spirit with the square peg of objective rationale. - Paul Eppinger At non effugies meos iambos - Gaius Valerius Catallus ("...but you won't get away from my poems.") "Moderation in all things, except Wild Turkey." - Evel Knievel ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 02 Dec 2002 13:05:49 -0500 From: "ross taylor" Subject: more metre and rhythm / Om (Side 3) It's always fun when the metre of the lyrics & the rhythm of the music are completely different. The 1st example I think of is "Eleanor Rigby." The lyrics of the verses are mostly dactylic (strong-weak-weak) in a way that gives the impression of a waltz w/ a few beats that aren't sung: ^ _ _ ^ _ _ Eleanor Rigby ^ _ _ ^ _ _ ^ _ _ picks up the rice in the church where a ^ _ _ ^ _ _ wedding has been ^ _ _ ^ _ _ lives in a dream ^ - - ^ _ _ waits at the window ^ _ _ ^ _ _ ^ _ _ wearing a face that she keeps in a ^ _ _ ^ _ _ jar by the door ^ _ _ ^ _ _ who is it for? While of course the music is 4/4. Robert Penn Warren (in Understanding Poetry) felt he could see & mark as many as five different levels of stress on syllables, & felt it reasonable that different people would hear such levels of stress differently, given how hard it is to quantify emphasis in English. I bet that at least in jazz, w/ lots of kinds of percussion & cross rhythms, it's sometimes hard to say exactly what the main beat is at a given moment. - --- Because it is a mystical poem dealing w/ blowing laundry, and so similar to the last verse of the wonderful "Om" on Side 3, here is part of a poem by Richard Wilbur called "Love Calls Us to the Things of This World" -- [...] Outside the open window The morning air is all awash with angels. Some are in bed-sheets, some are in blouses, Some are in smocks: but truly there they are. Now they are rising together in calm swells Of halcyon feeling, filling whatever they wear With the deep joy of their impersonal breathing; Now they are flying in place, conveying The terrible speed of their omnipresence, moving And staying like white water; and now of a sudden They swoon down into so rapt a quiet That nobody seems to be there. The soul shrinks From all that is about to remember, From the punctual rape of every blessed day, And cries, ``Oh, let there be nothing on earth but laundry, Nothing but rosy hands in the rising steam And clear dances done in the sight of heaven.'' [...] - --- Ross Taylor Join 18 million Eudora users by signing up for a free Eudora Web-Mail account at http://www.eudoramail.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 12:43:48 -0600 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: more metre and rhythm / Om (Side 3) Quoting ross taylor : > Because it is a mystical poem dealing w/ blowing > laundry Is that some sort of tantric euphemism? ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html :: sex, drugs, revolt, Eskimos, atheism ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 10:53:18 -0800 (PST) From: drew Subject: hairy...well, never mind > From: Eb > > Been catching up on junk movies, over the long weekend. For those who > think I'm a sci-fi/fantasy basher, lemme just say that I think the > first "Harry Potter" film is going to be watched by new generations > of kids for a long, long time. A classic of its type. You may be right, but I hope they read the books instead. The second film was slightly better, but the first one was an enormous letdown for me. The books don't skimp on letting you know that Harry is special and has an unusual future ahead of him, but somehow I still got a sense that he was an underdog who would have to prove himself instead of riding on his heritage. Both the films (and especially the first one) have everyone elbowing each other out of the way to lick his feet, and shots of the wondrous world of Hogwarts (which I'll wager is a much bigger attraction than Harry himself for both kids and adults) are often traded for huge, looming closeups of Radcliffe's just-adequately-emotive face. And the John Williams score stank to high heaven. Alan Rickman is terrific though he underplays the role a bit, but I'm surprised at how lifeless Richard Harris and Maggie Smith seem in both films. Maybe because the script adaptation of their roles is so skimpy. I had high hopes for the second film, but apart from a handful of new supporting roles (plus Kenneth Branagh, who's easily the best part) this one was pretty much more of the same. I'm looking forward to the third film, which is based on what's probably the best of the books so far and is being directed by someone who might have a smidgen more talent. I'll grant that when I imagine seeing the films without having read the books, I figure I would have been pretty psyched. I will say in Columbus' favor that his literal- mindedness in translating the books was the right choice, and when he lets Rowling's material speak for itself a lot of the charm still comes through. And while the casting doesn't thrill me, it's never horribly wrong. The kids' movie I saw last night was The Witches, directed by Nicholas Roeg, starring Anjelica Huston on crack and featuring Rowan Atkinson and Jane Horrocks in cute supporting roles. I think if I saw this as a kid I would have totally freaked; probably because of Roald Dahl, this is one dark little story. Extremely well-crafted scary movies are sometimes a little less scary because you get the feeling that someone responsible is guiding you by the hand through the movie, and you don't really expect it to leave movie conventions or go off the rails at any point. When movies feel slightly off-kilter like this one does, you're a little more on-edge; it has some parts that are really scary not just because of their content but because you get the feeling that what would be averted in the nick of time in any other movie might not be in this one. Near the end of the movie I thought the happy ending wouldn't come, and if it hadn't I would have found it pretty unsettling. Cool stuff. - -- drew at stormgreen dot com http://www.stormgreen.com/~drew/ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 10:58:24 -0800 From: "Rex.Broome" Subject: Reunions, rawk, and Rush (contains polite bashing) James on "valid" reunion albums: >>The Clean - Vehicle? It's the only Clean album I own and I really like it... James, didn't you recently mention upcoming reissues of their earlier stuff? How about: Pylon, "Chain"? If you liked early Pylon, this was completely up to snuff. Also, I dunno how you wanna divide up Wire's output, but at least twice they formally ceased to exist and reappeared rather spectacularly. Ignore their current incarnation at your own peril! _________ Kay: >>So Im not advocating small towns, but I am less than enthused over the >>anonyminity of big cities. I remember as a kid feeling isolated, and not >>liking it much. I think one's childhood is often a "grass is always greener" scenario. I think about that when I try to figure out whether I want my kids to grow up in the city (LA or otherwise) or not. Dunno. The small town drove me crazy, but my wife and I are more, um, "cosmopolitan"/"worldly" than my parents were, and the world is different now, so maybe that would change things. Dunno. My parents were/are fabulous, though, worldly or not. ________ Eb on "Here Comes the Sun": >>Yeah, this bridge is a bastard to transcribe. Maybe the strangest >>meter in the Beatles' entire catalog. I nominate the bridge of "She Said She Said", having tried to lead several talented rhythm sections through it with mixed results. Mind you, this seems to be my lot as a musician-- mediating between creative self-taught guys who sometimes write in odd time signatures without realizing it, and more technically proficients musicians with a little less grasp of instinctive creativity. Comes from having a foot in both worlds, which is handy, but it can take up a lot of time in a band situation. Vis a vis time sigs, not much to add other than to note that, in the realm of more esoteric electronica, one more and more often hears 3/4 or 6/8 samples grafted over 4/4 beats with interesting results. It creates either a "swing" feel or slots into syncopated funk beats rather nicely. I hear this all the time, but the only two examples I can think of right now are "Fish" by Mr. Scruff, which switches halfway through, and "Rabbit in the Headlights" by UNKLE with (shudder) Thom Yorke on vocals. ___________ Mike on Rush: >>You know, one Rush fan to another, I'm not sure what it is that keeps them from being widely thought of as one of the great rock bands of the 70s. As a non-fan, I'll try to 'splain the major beefs without devolving to fan-bashing or sweeping generalizations (imagine that!). Aside from Geddy's voice being an acquired taste which many, myself included, just aren't going to acquire, Rush are in many ways to place where two widely disliked strains of rock converge-- strains I'd call "prog" and "rawk". "Prog" I think is self-explanatory, and the reasons why it's disliked are well-known; "rawk" involves a particular processed guitar tone that simply makes me queasy in and of itself... the kind of big '70's arena crunch that characterizes Boston/Night Ranger/Journey et al. I'm sure that many arguments can be made that place Lifeson's (sp?) playing and sound outside that box, but that's what I hear when I hear Rush and I can't get past it to appreciate the finer distinctions. (I should note that I have this same probolem with Brian May, whose band itself is much more in line with my tastes. Cheap Trick is really the only band I've found so far where the material gets me past "that sound".) If you follow orthodox punk dogma, these are two of the three prongs of '70's rock nastiness that punk was meant to eradicate (the third being singer-songwriter mush or hippie-dippiness). This dogma is of course BS, and I'd love to hear about any band or artist who actually articulated that as a goal and stuck to it, but as a quick shorthand for the anti-Rush mentality it has some validity. My other, more personal problem with Rush is that, for a group much lauded by its adherents for its complexity, their lyrical concerns (and the way they express them) seem very juvenile to me... over-intellectualized angst, alienation expressed in sometwhat trite science-fiction terms, aimed straight at the D&D set, broadcasting its cleverness in a way that whitewashes/short-circuits the basic visceral thrill of rock and roll as I prefer to experience it. (See the Rush-related "conversion scene" in the movie "SLC Punk" for handy dramatization of this.) A college roommate of mine, who shared my obsession with Neil Young and certain flavors of proto-punk, spent a year trying to convert me into a Rush fan, replete with dense explications of the lyrics, so I do know whereof I speak, to a certain extent. If this sounds a lot like my recently-aired grievances against Smashing Pumpkins-- ding ding ding, we have a winner. Was that polite enough? I do so love you guys. - -Rex "should I just call it "prawg"?" Broome ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V11 #408 ********************************