From: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org (loud-fans-digest) To: loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Subject: loud-fans-digest V2 #127 Reply-To: loud-fans@smoe.org Sender: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-loud-fans-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk loud-fans-digest Thursday, April 4 2002 Volume 02 : Number 127 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [loud-fans] dvd ?? [Miles Goosens ] Re: [loud-fans] 24 (only very mild spoilers) [jenny grover ] [loud-fans] ANTONBarbeau greeeets the new dog, smiles into the laser spray and offers a ham in mortgage. (fwd) [Jeffre] [loud-fans] Microphone Help [Michael Mitton ] =?iso-8859-1?Q?Re:_[loud-fans]_Microphone_Help?= ["=?iso-8859-1?Q?Chris_M] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 03 Apr 2002 17:54:51 -0600 From: Miles Goosens Subject: Re: [loud-fans] dvd ?? At 03:08 PM 4/3/2002 -0800, me wrote: >bummer. i saw AMELIE last night and was hoping to buy the collector's >edition DVD set..... but it's region 2. AMELIE did enough business in the US that it will almost certainly be released in the same form here. Amazon has a July 16 date for the domestic DVD, though there's no information in the listing about the collector's-editionality of it. We finally saw AMELIE about a month ago. After thinking it had sneaked out of town, we realized that it had pulled off a far more difficult sneak: from the art-house-friendly theaters (the Belcourt and the Green Hills 16) to three mall-fare theaters. We actually had to drive around looking for 10 minutes to find the behind-new-development behemoth that was closest to us ("Is it behind that Best Buy?" "I don't think so." "Is it behind the Bath and Body Works?" "I can't see the Bath & Body works for these five SUVs!"), and the ticket counter guy made sure to ask us "You *do* know it's in French?" in a tone that made it clear that he couldn't fathom why someone would watch a film in French or Mexican or Ay-rab or what have you. Anyway, we adored AMELIE on so many levels. Melissa and I both put it at #1 for 2001. We had worried that it would be too saccharine, but it never disappointed us. I'd say that having a love of play and affinity for whimsy is a huge plus when viewing this film. Tied for #2 would be GHOST WORLD and the out-on-DVD-just-a-week-ago DONNIE DARKO. Melissa and I spent about five hours of our Saturday with the DARKO DVD. Without saying too much (and saying almost anything beyond what I'm about to say is saying too much to people who haven't seen the film and need to be totally surprised by it), after listening to writer/director Richard Kelly's commentary, both during the film itself and on the many deleted scenes, I don't think he made the movie that he thought he made. In fact, neither Melissa nor I thought that the film meant what he thought it meant. Including some of the more explicatory/didactic deleted scenes would tilt things his way, but even then, there are things about the story as filmed and in Jake Gyllenhaal's performance that work against it. I sort of wonder if the finished product ended up being something that he didn't intend it to be, and he hasn't entirely caught on to this yet. One of the film's huge strengths is that it permits, maybe even *requires* the audience to do heavy interpretive work. For that reason, in this case I'd almost recommend that DVD viewers eschew one of the main reasons to own a DVD, and forgo the customary extras of commentary, deleted scenes, and website materials. It ought to be whatever film you just saw, and don't let Kelly -- or me, or anyone -- make it into something else. (On the other hand, *do* watch the "Cunning Visions" section of the extras - -- skip watching the basic version of the videos, which can get tedious, even if it's intentional tedium, and go straight for the "director's commentary" version, which is anything but.) later, Miles The " ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 03 Apr 2002 19:29:26 -0500 From: jenny grover Subject: Re: [loud-fans] 24 (only very mild spoilers) Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: > > And there have been shows where > relatively major characters *have* been unexpectedly killed off: Joss > Whedon (Buffy, and Angel) is fairly notorious for it. Indeed, it does happen. I will never forget my shock when Tessa was killed by a random act of violence in Highlander, and I still can't believe they killed off Javier Vachon in Forever Knight. Sometimes nothing is sacred. Jen ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 03 Apr 2002 20:46:37 +0000 From: Dan Stillwell Subject: Re: [loud-fans] 24 (only very mild spoilers) jenny grover wrote: > > I still can't believe they killed off Javier Vachon in Forever Knight. Sometimes nothing is sacred. It wasn't just Vachon who died during the final six or so episodes of Forever Knight. For some reason the producers saw fit to kill nearly everyone - Vachon, followed by the young blonde vampire, Nick's partner Tracy, and (horrors!) Natalie and Nick in the finale. Only LaCroix and possibly Janette (who was out of town) survived the purge. Some fans agreed in the FK newsgroup that the final episode never happened or occurred in an alternate universe. Dan ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 03 Apr 2002 22:03:56 -0500 From: jenny grover Subject: Re: [loud-fans] 24 (only very mild spoilers) Dan Stillwell wrote: > It wasn't just Vachon who died during the final six or so episodes of > Forever Knight. For some reason the producers saw fit to kill nearly > everyone - Vachon, followed by the young blonde vampire, Nick's partner > Tracy, and (horrors!) Natalie and Nick in the finale. Only LaCroix and > possibly Janette (who was out of town) survived the purge. Damn! I never saw all that. When it was originally aired, and in its first re-run on Sci Fi, we never could get the channels it was on. I saw an ep here and there, and now they are airing it on Sci Fi again, weekday mornings, so I'm just catching up on it all now. I saw the one where they killed Vachon Sunday night. They were doing a marathon, but it seemed all out of order and I only got to see a couple of them. That all sounds pretty darn brutal, though! Jen ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2002 21:18:03 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: [loud-fans] The "Louie, Louie" Pieta Or: Why Writing Students Maybe Should Not Be Taught by Former Graduate Students Who Are Also Music Critics: So, my students had just read Walter Benjamin's "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" (look, it's in a standard comp reader, so I'm not completely to blame), and one of my students, who'd played in a band, was arguing that even though his band played cover songs, they too had that unique existence in time and space that Benjamin calls "aura," which he restricts to original, non-mechanically reproduced artworks (to oversimplify him vastly). Well, of course...I realized - because each *performance* is unique in time and space...and after a brief digression wherein I wondered aloud whether Robert Fripp had read Benjamin (relating it to his well-known distaste for recording devices at Fripp's concerts), I made the observation that, for classical painters, conventional subject matter functioned much as the rock'n'roll lingua franca does for cover bands. Give me a Last Supper with a drum solo! Okay, I'm going back to work now... - --Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society www.uwm.edu/~jenor/ADS.html ::[clever or pithy quote]:: __[source of quote]__ np: Saturnine _American Kestrel_ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2002 23:45:33 -0600 From: steve Subject: [loud-fans] Got HD space? Buffy The Musical mp3s - http://www.buffyworld.com/buffy/music/ - - Steve __________ "Miyazaki's latest animation feature (co-winner with 'Bloody Sunday' of the Berlin Golden Bear) more than justifies his status as Japan's most revered culture hero. What starts out as a fine example of the through-the-looking- glass kids' adventure genre becomes almost Shakespearean in its lyricism, breadth of vision and humanity." - Tony Rayns, Sight & Sound ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 00:38:56 -0600 (CST) From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: [loud-fans] ANTONBarbeau greeeets the new dog, smiles into the laser spray and offers a ham in mortgage. (fwd) Hey! Someone's been reading my mail... - ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 03 Apr 2002 21:34:43 -0800 From: Anton Barbeau (the artist, TRYING TOO HARD, tries hard not to try so hard.) - ------------- Truly, this is a paradox. (And how the ducks got there, I'll never know.) ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 02:12:30 -0500 (EST) From: Michael Mitton Subject: [loud-fans] Microphone Help I have a question for those with recording experience, as I have no knowledge of recording equipment whatsoever. I'd like to try recording me singing, and playing acoustic guitar. Currently, I'm using the free microphone that came with my "Learn Spanish" software, plugging that in to the mic input on my computer, then mixing the tracks with some simple, free software. While my singing or guitar isn't too good to begin with, the microphone certainly isn't doing me any favors. So, can anyone recommend any specific microphones? Or at least what I should look or look out for? I need to mic both my voice and my guitar. Also, I'm told I need a pre-amp or something like that inbetween the microphone at the computer. Any recommendations there? (My soundcard has both a mic input, and a line input.) And finally, I am fairly price conscious for all of this, since I can't get excited about spending a whole lot of money on a project that, at best, is self-satisfaction and possibly a Mother's Day gift. Thanks! - --Michael NP The Church "After Everything Now This" http://www.filmatters.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 02:30:12 -0500 From: "glenn mcdonald" Subject: RE: [loud-fans] Microphone Help > I am fairly price conscious for all of this, since I can't get > excited about spending a whole lot of money on a project that, > at best, is self-satisfaction and possibly a Mother's Day gift. I won't tell your mother that "Mother's Day gift" seems to mark the lower boundary of your budget, nor will I attempt to put a price on "self-satisfaction", but if the two of them in tandem are worth 119.98 post-paid to you, you can afford the tools to potentially change your life. http://www.marsmusic.com/store/product_template.jhtml;jsessionid=EHW3CQS 1LQCJOCQDBZASFEY?catid=cat340013&prodid=prod510087&primarySkuId=14470 glenn ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 4 Apr 2002 01:38:32 -0600 (CST) From: "=?iso-8859-1?Q?Chris_Murtland?=" Subject: =?iso-8859-1?Q?Re:_[loud-fans]_Microphone_Help?= I am no pro, but here are a couple of ideas, especially for the low budget. I believe a condenser mic is supposed to be better than dynamic mics for recording acoustic guitars and vocals, but these tend to be expensive, and I've done plenty of recordings that I feel happy with using dynamic mics from Radio Shack (in particular, they have one that is supposedly a copy of a Shure SM57). However, I'm thinking about getting a Nady SCM900 (condenser) from musiciansfriend.com for $70 to see if it is better. As far as a preamp, you might try an ART Tube MP preamp. They also have these for $70 at musiciansfriend.com. I've got one and it makes a world of difference for home recording - it really lets you get the level of signal you need. cm > I have a question for those with recording experience, as I have no > knowledge of recording equipment whatsoever. I'd like to try recording > me singing, and playing acoustic guitar. Currently, I'm using the free > microphone that came with my "Learn Spanish" software, plugging that in > to the mic input on my computer, then mixing the tracks with some > simple, free software. While my singing or guitar isn't too good to > begin with, the microphone certainly isn't doing me any favors. > > So, can anyone recommend any specific microphones? Or at least what I > should look or look out for? I need to mic both my voice and my guitar. > Also, I'm told I need a pre-amp or something > like that inbetween the microphone at the computer. Any > recommendations there? (My soundcard has both a mic input, and a line > input.) And finally, I am fairly price conscious for all of this, > since I can't get excited about spending a whole lot of money on a > project that, at best, is self-satisfaction and possibly a Mother's Day > gift. > > Thanks! > > --Michael > > NP The Church "After Everything Now This" > > http://www.filmatters.com ------------------------------ End of loud-fans-digest V2 #127 *******************************