Non Movie Related Post.

It may be a surprise to anyone who reads this and doesn't know me personaly that music is something I am far more passionate and concerned about than movies. Infact, I only make fun of movies because of the constant stream of shit that has come out in the last 5 years.

Anyways with the year closing in I figured it was time to post what I considered my Top releases of the year.


1. The Cute Lepers - Can't Stand Modern Music (1234 Go Records)
It was a sad day when The Briefs stopped putting out albums, but this record almost makes up for it.
This was the first release I got excited for this year. I even pre ordered 3 copies, of course I sold of 2 of those copies when my amp needed new tubes, but still evidence of my excitement. The album leads off strong with the kind of anthemic song "Terminal Boredom" which was released last year on 1234 Go Records, The only major department that the LP falls short in is the fact that "Terminal Boredom" was 1 of 4 songs that were previously released before this album dropped. I am pretty sure by now this record has been pressed twice by 1234 Go! and once more on a eurpean label, it's on just about ever colour of vinyl imaginable except black so you can even get it to match the walls in your living room.

2. The Black and Whites - S/T ( Douchemaster Records)
My friend Mike first told me about the band on the subway in the spring, on his advice I picked up this record that same and instantly loved it, The guitar riffs on alot of tracks are very catchy and fast, songs like "That Girl Aint No Good" and "Multiple Girls" are the kinds of songs that make you pick up the needle and playing them over. The band succesfuly calms it down with tracks like "Don't Wanna Go" and "So Torn Up Over You".

3. Gentleman Jesse and His Men - Introducing (Douchemaster Records)
Considering the S/T Gentleman Jesse EP was hands down my favourite record last year, this one was pretty much garunteed to be on this list. When the pre-order for a record like this goes up I guess you can say "I get so excited". From the minute I started listening I was sucked into a "Black Hole" of perfect power pop. This album has definately "Got me where it wants me". I think everyone on earth needs to own a copy of this record, so sit back, "Put Your Hands Together" and give this record the "Attention" it deserves, but you "Don't have to if you don't want to".

4. Teenage Bottlerocket - Warning Device (Redscare records)
This is one of those bands I really really really (yeah, 3 of them) got into this year. I wish I could
have gotten into them in early 07 so their stuff wouldnt cost me a fucking fortune now. 14 tracks of straight forward, catchy and fun pop punk. I am really bummed about missing their toronto show this summer but I am sure they will be back. As great as this LP is I don't think it compares very well to "Total" or "Another Way". I don't think I am alone in saying that "Pacemaker" is the standout track on this album.

5. Thee Make-Out Party - Play Pretend (Recess Records)
This is going to be another case of my friend Mike knowing whats good for me. I can't remember when but I remember him telling me I absolutely needed this LP. At first I didn't pay much attention to his insane ramblings about how great this album was but eventualy I decided to buy it. The problem was the local(ist) recordstore didn't was sold out. A couple weeks later I get an email from Mike saying the No-Idea distro had copies on sale for 6.99. You even get a
free random 7" with orders from NO Idea. it's a shame the 7" was aweful, but I guess there is a reason its free. Anyways, this record spent a solid 2 weeks glued to my turntable, just getting played over and over, before I got it the shitty myspace Rips on my Ipod were played over and over to but the songs still haven't lost any enjoyability.

6. Nobunny - Love Visions(Bubbledum Records and 1234 Go Records)
So this album gets released on Bubbledum Records and becomes a a favourite for many even though It was mastered poorly and you have to change the volume on every song. Towards the end of the year The good folks at 1234 Go decide to re-press it and boy was the end product amazing. Songs like "I am a Girlfriend" and "Chuck Berry Holiday" Illustrate Nobunny's ability to write musical gems.

7. Thomas Function - Celebration! (Alive Records)
On October 10th 2008 I ventured out to toronto to see the Ergs play a Legion Hall at King and Niagra Street. Statues put on an amazing set but are undoubtedly dwarfed by The headlining set on the Last Ergs tour before they call it quits in November. When that show ends another adventure begins. My 2 friends and I hop into a cab and tell the cab driver to take us to The corner of Spadina and College. We pay a discounted cover at the doors of the silver dollar room and walk in to see that the place is empty, deserted almost, We join a crowd of maybe 15 people watching a band that I can only describe as mediocre. But what followed was exciting and much anticipated. The Thomas Function's live set that night had all of the intensity of the LP and as few people as my bedroom. I don't know if having a packed house would have made the show more enjoyable, sure there would have been more people as into the set as I was, but its always nice to not get elbowed by some drunk asshole. Best track on the album is "Can't Say No" The long into builds into very catchy lyrics and a chorus that won't get out of your head no matter how many albums you hear that week.

8.The Goodnight Loving - S/T (Dusty Medical Records)
Drag is an amazing song. The end. Ok no, not really, for one this is just an amazing folk rock album. They put on a great live show and their bass player is 11 feet tall. I think 2 of the band's members are in The Midwest Beat. While its not cemetary trails it certainly doesnt disapoint. The only major short comming is the version of this album being released on an Italian Label. 1 different song and a new track listing order apparently. Put the damn song out on a 7" with an alternate recording of "drag". Seriously, having to buy a second copy of the damn record hurts the wallet.

9.Lemuria - Get Better (Asian Man Records)
I first heard this band on a split New Jersey pop punk wunderkinds The Ergs! Their sound contrasted with the Ergs! up beat catchy "Introducing Morrissey" and their cover of "Hey Jealousy" by the Gin Blossoms. I enjoyed that for the most part their sound was very mellow, I don't see to many female vocalists in punk and pop punk, let alone female vocalists with
very mellow, comforting voices. This is definately the kind of album that will put you to sleep in a good way.

10. Cheap Time - S/T (In the Red)
This is an album you will either love or hate. I absolutely love it, Lo-fi garage rock and roll at its finest. I think it is a real step up from their "Handy Man" single on Douchemaster Records. I would not recomend this album to those of you who think recording quality is everything.


Singles and EPs.

1. Marvelous Darlings - Demos 7" (Rat Patrol Records)
2. Suspect Parts - Seventeen Television 7" ( Deranged Records)
3. Teenage Bottlerocket/ Broadway Calls Split 7" (Adeline Records)
4. France Had the Bomb - World Of Mirrors 7" ( Dusty Medical Records)
5. Midwest Beat - S/T 2x7" (Dusty Medical Records)
6. The Ergs! - "That's it Bye" 12" ep (Don Giovanni records)
7. The Tranzmitors - S/T 12" ep (Deranged Records)
8. Demon's Claws - Fucked on Ketamine 7" (Rob's House Records)
9. Gentleman Jesse/ Joseph Plunket Split 7" (Rob's House Records)
10.The Goodnight Loving - "Up North Girl" 7" (Bancroft Records)

Re-releases
1. The Ergs!- Dorkrockcorkrod LP (Don Giovanni)
2. Nobunny - Love Visions (1234 Go!)
3. King Khan & The Shrines - The Supreme Genious of... 2x LP ( Vice Records)
4. Carbonas - Blackout 7" (Douchemaster Records)
5. Screaching Weasel - BoogadaBoogadaBoogada LP (Recess Records)

Props:
Douchemaster Records for all the great releases
Dusty Medical Records for the same reason
The Ergs for playing the best set I saw all year

Slops:
Matador Records for causing all that Jay Reatard Single Series drama.
Internet variant collector fan boys for making it harder to get certain records I wanted.
The Weirdies.

American Gangster, and the reason for such a tardy update.

I forgot my password, at least I thought I did. Turns out I can't read and never typed in my full email address when signing it.


American Gangster!

Starring Denzel something or other, and that violent Australian guy(like that narrows it down).Have you seen blow? Ok if so, Change all of the characters to black people and change all of the drugs to heroin. Seriously, minor details don't even matter. It was even in the same time period.
There are so many movies I would rather watch than see American Gangster a second time. The Goonies was a better movie. Josh Brolin, the guy who was in rudy(can't remember his name, he was samwise in Lord of The Rings) and that guy who never admitted to being molested by Michael Jackson but we all know he was and he cried on the first season of the sureal life because MC Hammer yelled at him, were all in the goonies. They find a treasure map and then go and find it, all in a small quiet east cost town, in the span of 1 day. I am sure these kids would have passed on the treasure adventure if the main character's ( Sean Astin, I remembered, I always do) parents weren't in serious financial trouble. What blew my mind was how it only took them 1 day to find this treasure. Those pirates must have been the laziest pirates ever, Second only to the laziness of any pirates who went looking for that treasure and didn't find it because they gave up by lunch time. The Goonies was the example of the perfect group of friends. Normal Main character kid, his older brother, his older brother's attractive girl friend, her slutty sarcastic bad girl friend, The fat kid, the weird kid, and the visable minority who tries extra hard to bring something special to the group. Oh and what about that mean Italian family who kept their freak son locked in the basement. That shit was fucked.


Ps. How come the map didnt show the fact that if you broke though like a foot of rock, you could get to the treasure from the beach? That would have cut the adventure down to like 45 minutes, and they would have never been attacked by the evil italians.
The End.

New Post New Post New Post New Post.

I died for about 2 weeks, And then took it very easy the next week, since I died an all.

Anyways, movies movies movies I guess. Well... Movie.


National Lampoon's Senior Trip. A classic from my youth.

Plot:
A class filled with delinquent highschool students ( and 1 smart one) are forced write a letter to the president of the united states on the subject of education reform. The president asks them to speak before the senate in Washington DC. The movie has every thing you would expect from a national lampoon highschool movie. The main character troublemaking bad boy, the uber stoner, the token black guy, the smart girl, the angsty lesbian girl, the stickler principal, the ditzy teacher who teaches some bird course, a computer geek and so many other cliches.

The bus driver is over a hour late and is also played by Tommy Chong. The trekie school crossing gaurd decides to follow the bus in hopes of killing the stoner character because he believes he is the klingon leader. When the students get to washington they soon find out that a certain senator is trying to make the president look bad in an effort to pass his own education bill and make a run at the whitehouse. Eventualy, The students foil his efforts, the day is saved and everyone gets layed. All in all it was a pretty funny movie, if you are mentaly retarded.
I am and I enjoyed it 10 years ago and I still love it.

Primeval.

Based on a true story my ass. This was just an hour and a half of shitty acting and shitty story line disgusing an attempt by Liberal Hollywood to talk about the civil wars and genocide in Affrica.

Guess what? They didn't fool me for half of a fucking second. Yeah there is alot of fucked up shit going on in that whole region but if you wan't to bring attention to it make a movie specificly about it, or better yet get George Clooney to talk about it on Entertainment Tonight or Some other show that is on while I am watching scrubs. Movies about serious world issues like that are fucking depressing.

If you are one of the lucky people who haven't seen this movie (I assume the vast majority of you are), this is what basicly happens. There is a giant crocodial in Burundi named Gustave. This is the true story part. There is a giant crocodial in Burundi named Gustave, its about 20 feet long. The thing about this is, there are a bunch of 20 foot crocodials in Africa. This one has killed and eaten over 100 people in real life. They said in the movie it killed over 300 including the wife of some old belgian sounding guy(played by the evil baron von wolfhausen from beerfest). Anyways some american journalists come to document the capture and kill of the crocodial. The Journalists are played by Dominic Prucel (The ugly guy on prison break(not that I find anyone on prison break attractive, I don't even watch the show, I just consider his face offensively ugly.), Orlando Jones (The guy who was funny and on Mad TV like 10 years ago when Mad TV was almost worth watching) and Brook Langton (Charlie Crews lawyer on the TV show Life). While trying to capture the camera man played by Orlando Jones goes off in the bush and witnesses a man with armed soldiers beheading a family with a machette. He films it and goes back to camp.
When he is in the camp the soldiers gaurding them over hear the journalists talking about the video footage and they are ordered by the warlord guy to get the computers. Eventualy shit hits the fan and its 30 minutes of them running from guys with ak47s and a 40 foot crocodial. In the end Orlando Jones dies(Its a horror movie and he is black, I was shocked he didn't die sooner) and Dominic Prucel and Brook Langton get out alive with a little African Refugee. The end credits are preceded by a message about civil war and conflicts in Africa and then something about the damn crocodial.
Let me finish by saying this, If I ever see this movie again I will probably eat a grenade.

On a more serious note. Everyone check out this band.

http://www.myspace.com/thomasfunction

Next time I will review a good movie for once. Which good movie? Well you will just have to get so bored that you check this blog out and see.

Kyle in real life.

I just watched this movie and I wasn't disapointed. First sign I was going to enjoy the movie was when I saw that Sondre Lerche did the sound track AND HE COVERED A PEET TOWNSEND SONG!!!(its almost like I am subtly shifting this to become a music blog...) I also love Steve Carrel. DID I MENTION DANE COOK GETS HIS HEART BROKEN. Oh man it felt good to see him suffer, even if it was fake suffering.


The movie itself wasn't very funny but steve carrel really tried. I guess its worth seeing if you have 90 minutes to kill.

Spidergenics.

Ever since I was a child I have feared one thing above all. What did I fear, you ask? Nuclear War? No. Aids? No, allthough the concept of that disease fucking floored me as a child. Spiders? Yes, dear god yes. Those godless creatures with 8 legs and a billion eyes, hellbent on killing everyone and everything they can. Yes a fear of spiders shaped my outlook on life and has left me a paranoid shut in lacking any social skills.

Well a few days ago it dawned on me. I have left Canada once, and that was to Ohio. My ecounters with spiders pail in comparison to that of people in other places. In South America there are spiders the size of dinner plates that eat birds. BIRDS. For some perspective look at it this way. bugs eat plants, spiders eat bugs, birds eat spiders, oh wait not anymore because spiders eat birds. These spiders should be exterminated before they become too powerful. Immagine if they evolve into winged animals? If these spiders could fly they would become the dominant species on earth. First the would invade, then start random killings, impose a curfew and before you know it form governments. We would be slaves to the master race.

I for one do not wan't to have to welcome our spider overlords.

This whole 3 day panic attack has got me thinking about other animals that could easily take over.

Sharks, We are lucky the are confined to the sea. I would like to personaly thank the japanese for fishing these killers into extinction. Sharks serve a role in our society too. Any animal that kills surfers can't be all bad.

What about bears? I was at a cottage recently and I heard some of the neighbors talking about bears wandering around. I was terrified, bears are not something I am equipt to deal with. I have read that bears cannot run downhill, well neither can I so I am still fucked if I am attacked.

By now I bet you are wondering, "Doesn't this asshole just do shitty movie revies?" Well here is one.

10 things I hate about you. Great movie. Apparently it was based on a play by some guy named shakespear. It had everything you could hope for in a movie.

A Nick Lowe cover, A Cheap Trick cover, highschool drama, heath deadger, a stereotypical neurotic jewish character. I seriously watch it when ever I get the chance.

Superbad was only kind of bad.

I don't think bad is the right word, lets go with "not nearly as funny as I assumed it would be because like a retard I took everyone's opinion seriously all the while forgetting how many tools made filled my age group". That's really long so maybe overrated will do.

I actualy enjoyed this movie alot more the 3rd time watching it. Some of the dialouge is really well writen and unlike most movies where dick jokes are among the main themes this one wasn't mentaly retarded. I am having trouble saying terrible things about this movie. I would see it if you haven't ( I would also invest in a home that wasn't under a god damned rock(I am assuming not seeing superbad and living under a rock are mutualy exclusive)).

I think thats all for now.

Vacancy.

What the fuck. Seriously. I only caught the last 30 minutes of this and I am glad. I might have had to drink a bottle of cleaning product if I sat through the first hour of that piece of shit. I don't know if anyone else even bothered to see this piece of crap. If there was some brilliant plot I missed because I didn't watch it from the beggining please tell me.
First of all why is the gun on display in the motels front office loaded? Secondly When that guy was choking the girl before she gets the magicly convienient gun why didnt she hit him with the hammer, or better yet why didn't he shoot her with the gun he had and was too slow with to shoot her when it was too late. Why the fuck did Luke Wilson live? More importantly, why did Owen Wilson live?
Drillbit taylor looked fucking stupid too. I don't expect much as far as movies go from either of these two brothers. My favourite part of wedding crashers was when a Weakerthans song played in the end credits. I feel pretty fucking angry when ever I see Owen Wilson and his fucked up nose.
Jeremy Hotz is brilliant. I really hope they end up making more episodes of "My Life and a Movie" Or I just hope I can catch him doing stand up in toronto soon.
That's all for now. I am probably to angry to sleep.

Every so often...

A movie will come out and be pretty good. I won't see it in theaters because I am not the type to pay $10 to sit in a sticky chair and put up with people being obnoxious behind me. Of course I won't buy it when it comes out on dvd because I don't like the idea of paying $15-20 to see a movie once, but 6 months later it is on the movie network. So I just saw "The Kingdom" and I enjoyed it. Jason Bateman's sarcasm helps pretty much any movie win me over. I still have a "Teen Wolf 2" poster on my wall. Basicly if you haven't seen the movie and don't mind a very quick run over of the plot here it is.

Terrorists attack an american compound in Saudi Arabia. FBI blackmails saudi diplomats into allowing them to investigate on Saudi soil. SHOCKER! AMERICANS AND SAUDIS HAVE DIFFERENT CULTURES. Shoot out, the good guys win and go home.

Paul Weller should have never started the style council.

Risk is a pretty lame way to take over the world.

Seriously, I hate it. At the same time, I kind of love it. I am probably going to play again tommorow night. I think I should be alot better at it. I am usualy good at games that involve strategy and planning. I just can't roll dice above a 4.

I still hate bluetooth headsets.


I got my amp back today. two weeks ago my Vox AC30CC2 just stopped working. Apparently it was poorly saudered(sp?) 16 days and 85 dollars later it is back and working again :)

Pictures to follow.

And God Said "Let there be nonsense"

Bluetooth head sets might be the single worst invention in the last 15 years. I can't think of anything more asinine looking. Before when I would be walking down the street I had a pretty good way of judging the likely hood of being stabbed by a crazy person. How you ask? They would usualy be talking to them selves. Now I have no idea if someone is speaking to their best friend or taking orders from the angel of death.

It is an unnerving experience to wonder if you will have a brush with death at any moment.