Last night I finally finished watching the final hour of the top-notch Martin Scorsese documentary No Direction Home, which follows Bob Dylan from his earliest beginnings, to his rise as a folk singer, through his controversial 1965 tour when he started to go electric. For someone who didn’t grow up seeing images of the young Dylan and the world he inhabited, I found it to be a fascinating character study and a look at how the world has changed in the past 40 years.
I can’t recommend this film highly enough. Scorsese unearthed a treasure trove of previously unseen film footage and audio recordings, and weaves it all together with honest reflections from Dylan himself. I thoroughly loved it.
“It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry” (Take 9) – Bob Dylan (alternate version they talk about in the film that is much more upbeat than the bluesy album version that Dylan came up with after recording this take)
“Like A Rolling Stone” (live in Manchester) – Bob Dylan (last song performed in the film, where the crowd calls him Judas — and he plays even louder)
And regarding the subject of this post, the six degrees of Bob Dylan; Online magazine Coudal Partners is hosting a very cool contest where you try to connect various famous people to Bob Dylan in as few steps as possible. Today’s is J. D. Salinger, but see how quickly uberfans have been able to connect Zimmy to past challenges like Mary-Kate & Ashley, David Beckham, and Bugs Bunny. If you win the day’s entry, you get a copy of his new album Modern Times. All of those winners are in the hat to win the complete catalogue of every single Dylan album on Columbia (47 of ‘em). Put on your thinking caps!
As for me, I am off to California this week on vacation (hurrah) and I have an early flight this morning into SFO. Hence the posting time (or maybe I’m just up *really* late on a Friday night doing something cool other than packing? Naah . . .)
The Departed is Martin Scorsese’s visceral new flick: 2 1/2 hours of a tightly intelligent plotline, fascinating character studies, lots of caffeinated jump-cut cinematography, more “f**ck”s than you can shake a stick at, and a greater nunber of brains being blown out at close range than I personally care to see.
I guess I’ll never infiltrate the Boston mob (because all the violence truthfully left me feeling a little nauseated), but the soundtrack left me elated and tapping my foot furiously in my red velvet rocking seat. Here is a sampling of what you’ll hear, woven into the film at exactly the right places. The soundtrack is really superb, just what you’d expect from Scorsese: The Rolling Stones capture that rough & tumble Seventies inner-city swagger, while Van Morrison lends his pipes to a lovely live version of Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb” during a scene of gnawing loneliness and aching lust. John Lennon’s in there, as are the Isley Brothers, the Beach Boys, Dropkick Murphys, Patsy Cline, and even Nas. It’s a real joy to listen to.
“Comfortably Numb” – Van Morrison live w/ Roger Waters (1990, Berlin)
Speaking of soundtracks, keep those fantastic comments coming for that contest I opened up on Friday! I am immensely enjoying all the articulate and passionate rambles about the movie music that you love. I’ve added several films to my Netflix queue that I’d overlooked, and have been re-appreciating the classiness of the Rushmore soundtrack all weekend. Keep it up, and it’s gonna be delightfully hard to nail the winner.
I recently got to see Little Miss Sunshine at its opening screening here in Colorado Springs, and I was pleased as punch with the quirky, bright, eclectic music throughout, provided mainly by DeVotchKa and Sufjan Stevens. I was even more pleased (and instantly knew I would have to write something about this) when our local paper The Gazette ran an article about DeVotchKa’s Colorado heritage. It spurred me to take a closer listen to the so-called “indie rock with a circus-polkacabaret-Eastern-European spin” featured in the film.
For a movie like this, you are looking for music exactly like DeVotchKa: it has to be jangly and a little weird, not afraid of experimentation but catchy & likeable — just like the characters in the movie. Music producers for the film heard DeVotchKa on Los Angeles radio and sought out the Denver band, who ultimately ended up writing the bulk of the film’s soundtrack alongside composer Mychael Danna.
As for the film itself, on the surface Little Miss Sunshine is a humorous look at a quirky family road trip (kind of like a very dysfunctional Partridge Family with less singing and more porn?). While there are wildly funny parts, and it is being billed as a comedy, there are also interactions and lines of dialogue which cut a lot deeper than that. In keeping with the #1 rule of moviemaking, the road trip is never just a road trip, but instead a path to some sort of redemption for each character involved. Overall it was a satisfyingly idiosyncratic flick that fosters some deeper thinking as well (topics like parenting, failure, unreturned affections, self-image, child beauty pageants, all that good stuff).
BONUS: One other reason why I love Steve Carell (who shines in this movie): Watch as he interviews himself about the filming of Little Miss Sunshine, with great background music of “Walkin’ On Sunshine” and The Flaming Lips:
(This just reminds me how I can’t wait for The Office to return.)
The exciting thing about exploring different kinds of music beyond your own personal niche is that you sometimes find common threads in the most unexpected places. Take the fantastic 2001 documentary Scratchfrom writer/director Doug Pray, which traces the musical and cultural evolution of turntablism & record-scratching from its ’70s roots in New York, through the ’80s craze and early ’90s, into the state of the genre at the start of this century and beyond.
As a music lover, I found it be a fascinating look at a world that I didn’t know much about, but one that traces common elements of the creation of music, the passion behind a new sound, the fury to create something fresh. It is a vastly entertaining 84 minutes that flies by to a consistently thumping background of interesting beats, with appearances by many of the major players in this scene from its inception to today (DJ Shadow, Cut Chemist, Mix Master Mike, Z-Trip and more). Filmed mostly in hallowed haunts of the hip-hop scene in New York and San Francisco, I also was tickled to see several places I know from California – from freeways and suburbs to Amoeba Records and The Fillmore. Visually, the variety of filming locations were interesting and authentic.
Throughout the film, the most-mentioned “revelation moment” in the interviews was the 1983 Grammy-nominated hit “Rockit” by Herbie Hancock. This was the first time that the sound of the scratch had made it into a song that was a commercial hit, and many were electrified in listening to that scratch for the first time. Mix Master Mike (of the Beastie Boys and solo DJ) recalls a sentiment oft-repeated throughout the film: “What is that zig-a-zig sound? I knew I wanted to do THAT.” Scratch captures some of the early passion and the fire that spread when this music was first created and played, and I related to the feelings of urgency in hearing a new sound.
Self-confessed record junkie/NY ad exec/DJ Steve Stein (aka Steinski) says he remembers thinking when he first heard these sounds: “There is nothing in this music that I don’t want to hear. This is music that I’ve been waiting all my life to hear . . . and I didn’t know it.” That’s a quote that could just as easily be applied to the birth of the rock ‘n’ roll sound, but here the same sentiment is cropping up 20-30 years later in the birth of turntablism and hip hop culture.
One thing that resonated with me was the assertion that scratching together records is just another way of making music: a turntable instead of a drum kit, different samples and breaks instead of guitar riffs and bridges. I had never thought of that before, and it is a fascinating concept. In the film DJ Swift explains, “The turntable is a musical instrument as long as you could see it being a musical instrument. You’re dealin’ with notes, you’re dealin’ with measures, you’re dealin’ with timing, you’re dealin’ with rhythm — It’s just, you know, different tools but the outcome is the same: music.”
I also recognized some of the same fiercely independent spirit in the production of this new sound, one that could just as easily be applied to garage rock bands of my youth. Producer Billy Jam from Hip Hop Slam Records said of the early days, “If you’re doing something and no one even gives a fuck about what you’re doing, and you’re just doing it in your bedroom for yourself, it’s like how you really feel, it’s like a painter goin’ crazy — That’s what happened and that’s why they would come up with this. It wasn’t like ‘Will this work at the club Saturday night.’ It was ‘Well, what sounds good to me and these people in the room with me?’”
My favorite segment of this documentary (that I completely related to & loved & appreciated) was entitled “digging.” The filmmakers followed DJ Shadow, Z-Trip and others as they go on the hunt through hundreds and hundreds of stacks of old vinyl, looking for that perfect beat, that hook, that break to insert into their mix to make it truly unique. DJ Shadow takes us to his favorite record store in Davis, California that has a basement filled to the rafters with old, forgotten pressings. He says, “This is just — it’s my little nirvana.”
After years of trolling the regular stacks and hearing references to “let me go check the basement” from the owners, Shadow finally got the guts to ask to see the basement himself, and has been coming back several times a month ever since. He says, “It’s an incredible archive of music culture. I couldn’t believe that there was still something like this, a cache this large. And it’s largely untouched.” Musical archaeology, baby.
This film also talked about the element of fun & surprise in scratching. Each artist wants to find something awesome that they can use, dropped into the middle of a mix, to just blow their audience out of the water. There was a passionate and enthusiastic story in the film, about the early days of seeing this music performed in a live setting. Zulu Nation grandfather/musician/cryptic dude Afrika Bambaataa apparently has a reknowned ability to uncover the perfect deep cuts to add to a mix: One night at a club in NYC, he handed the DJ a record and told him to play cut 2 – “The Clapping Song” by Shirley Ellis. “And everyone went crazy,” the story says. The perfect sound at the perfect time.
Since I was a wee child in 1983, I had never heard the backstory behind the famed Lessons, which were produced in ’83-’85 by Double Dee & Steinski — the first records made entirely from other records. Their innovative purpose was to be fodder for the turntables, a collection of sounds to scratch into others. Watch for the entertaining segment (and mindblowing to Steinski himself, who says “it was never intended to be done live!”) where DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist recreate the Lessons in a live setting.
Look, just this month the kids have all gone a bit nuts over the supremely enjoyable, ADD-inflicting sounds of the mile-a-minute mashups of Girl Talk, showing the debt that modern music owes to these guys who pioneered a fresh sound — even though their parents said “For God’s sake, be careful with that turntable needle. And don’t scratch up our records!”
Let me start by saying that although I am a force to be reckoned with with certain kinds of puzzles and games (Jeopardy, um, checkers), I HATE the New York Times crossword puzzle (and no, I am not using that word too strongly). Clues like “slant differently” and “Banquo, e.g.” just make me feel stupid. So I avoid it and we are all happier people. That being said, Wordplay made me want to give it a second chance and sharpen my pencil.
Wordplay is a new documentary about championship crossword puzzlers that I saw this weekend. No, really. AND here’s the rub: It is actually vastly enjoyable and entertaining with quite the deluxe soundtrack (you knew I was going there).
From the opening notes of the perfectly placed Cake song (“Adjectives on the typewriter/He moves his words like a prizefighter/The frenzied pace of the mind inside the cell“) to the Eels & They Might Be Giants in the middle,Talking Heads covers by Shawn Colvin (has Sunny come home yet?) and the original compositions by Gary Louris (The Jayhawks & Golden Smog), it’s fantastic.
This movie explains what the little nerds of Spellbound aspire to when they grow up. It’s crazy to hear these people speak in such reverent terms of their annual gathering in the Stamford, CT Marriott; it is the Holy Grail, American Idol, and the prom all rolled up into one. But it’s played with a light touch by director Patrick Creadon, and is overall a lot of fun to watch. You end up rooting for your favorite competitor, and as my friend is rumored to have said, “I never expected to cry in a movie about crossword puzzles.”
If I cried at all, by JOVE, it was due to laughing at Jon Stewart, who stars in the movie as well as other crossword-puzzlers like the Indigo Girls, Bill Clinton and (Yankees’ pitcher) Mike Mussina. Jon Stewart’s comments about what he perceived famed Times crossword puzzle editor Will Shortz to be like before he met him were worth the price of admission alone: “You picture this guy who’s like . . . 13, 14 inches tall, doesn’t care to go more than 5 feet without his inhaler. But then you meet him and, wow! He’s tall. He’s like the Errol Flynn of the crossword puzzle world.” I wonder if I could somehow get Jon Stewart to come live at my house.
One of my favorite “ultimate package” movies –creative camera work, smoking soundtrack, clever script– is the Stephen Soderbergh-directed Out of Sight (1998), based on the novel by Elmore Leonard. I always enjoy watching this one, with George Clooney’s perfectly charming bank robber role, Jennifer Lopez’s badass federal marshall chasing him down, and the variety of characters that intersect the hunt (Ving Rhames, Don Cheadle, Steve Zahn). Mix in a heavy dose of sexual tension, crime sprees, greasy trunk rides, “short little Latin fellas,” and magician’s assistants, alongside the signature jumpy cinematography, chronology leaps, and quick edits that are typical Soderbergh (Oceans 11, Traffic). You’ve got a stylish winner.
Coming as a precursor to the retro-influenced high stakes sounds of the Oceans 11 series, here David Holmes has crafted a hot Miami-laced soundtrack that has received more spins on my player than any other soundtrack I own, especially in the summertime. Here are a few samples — the soundtrack is a feisty blending of old-school soul, funk, and R&B mixed with tension-filled instrumental mood music (and nary a J. Lo song in sight).
I’ll leave you with a quote that always gets me: even though it’s really just Dr. Doug Ross and Jenny From The Block, the story from Leonard and the direction by Soderbergh captures such a great sense of kismet in the doomed connection between their characters.
Clooney’s character says:
“It’s something that just happens. It’s like seeing a person you never saw before – you could be passing on the street – you look at each other and for a few seconds, there’s a kind of recognition. Like you both know something.
But then the next moment the person’s gone, and it’s too late to do anything about it, but you remember it because it was right there and you let it go, and you think, ‘What if I had stopped and said something?’ It might happen only a few times in your life.”
J-Lo: “Or once.”
Clooney: (long pause) “Why don’t we get out of here.”
Not much hard-hitting musical coolness today – instead, let’s talk about music the whole family can love. Last night my creative friends had the idea (very late in the evening) to rig a projection of The Incredibles onto the wall on the side of their house in the backyard using the borrowed equipment from the high school where one teaches – and you always WONDERED what your teachers did afterhours! Ha! There were s’mores and my hair still smells campfirey good.
But I was reminded of this post-in-progress that I started last week as I listened. Have you noticed that animated/computer-generated films are focusing more on their soundtracks in recent years? It’s a far cry from “Under The Sea” in the Little Mermaid from the days of my elementary school youth (now I am SO gonna have that song stuck in my head all day).
Is it perhaps because all the cool teenagers of the ’80s and ’90s are growing up, having kids (see the fabulous grups article), and want to sit through obligatory movies-with-their-offspring without wanting to poke the bendy straws through their eardrums?
I heartily enjoy the trend towards decent music (and even a few adult jokes in the subtext) in these animated films. Superb songwriter Randy Newman‘s continuing involvement with recent animated films has brought newly focused attention to the audio portion of these flicks. Subsequent Pixar (and Dreamworks) movies have capitalized on that trend, from Shrek to Shark Tale to the recent Cars. Even The Incredibles tapped composer Michael Giacchino (Alias theme song – mp3) to do the stealth techno instrumental soundtrack.
So, in borrowing a page from (sm)all ages today, here is some music from recent kid films that doesn’t suck. On my next “decide what you want to do with your life/shadow a professional day” (wait, I’m not in high school anymore, dang) I want to learn more about making movie soundtracks. How cool of a job would that be?
Visit I Guess I’m Floating for a few more of those. Also, the Cars soundtrack (out June 6) is loading up on the big names in alt, rock & country. I can’t find any preview tracks to share with you, but it’ll have Sheryl Crow, James Taylor, Jimi Hendrix, John Mayer, Chuck Berry, and Hank Williams, as well as the obligatory Randy Newman score. None of this will alter your world, but it’s pleasant enough to pass the time. Which is, I guess, what kids’ movies are looking for.
Although I definitely would argue that all this cool music started back with the Muppets:
Now *I* know this, but a lot of you often greet this concept with disbelief: You don’t have to stop being rockin’ when you become a mama. This is the fundamental idea behind a fascinating (in-progress) documentary by Jackie Weissman for Rock Mama Films, out of Portland, Oregon.
Weissman became interested in exploring the intersection of artistic passions and oft-all-consuming parenting responsibilities after her son was born. As she began reading about rocker mamas who were doing the balancing act, she became inspired.
When her son was three she undertook this documentary to track women such as Kristen Hersh from Throwing Muses (who has four sons, ranging in age from 19 to 2), Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney (who often takes her son Marshall on tour with her), and Zia McCabe of the Dandy Warhols through their daily lives of rock ‘n’ roll, diapers, and skinned knees.
The segment of this short trailer that I found most fascinating, although all three of these women rock, was the final piece featuring Kristen Hersh of Throwing Muses fame. I appreciated her perspective with what she had to say:
“The challenges of motherhood are only . . . eating and sleeping! It’s kind of a lot to give up — showering, stuff like that (laughs) . . . shaving your legs. But how could you ever care? It’s not over quickly, like people say — not if you’re paying attention every minute of every day. But the fact that it will be over? That’s . . . that’s just crazy. You have no right to complain about giving up everything if someday that amazing universe is gonna be over.”
In the ’80s and ’90s, Kristen Hersh, along with contemporaries The Pixies and The Breeders, helped lay down some important groundwork for the indie punk/rock sound, and Kristen proved from age 19 onward that the girls can rock as hard as the boys. She continues to rock now as a talented mama.
“Money has so polluted the music world that my overwhelming urge right now is to divorce money from recorded music. Over the last 2 years we’ve been relying on standard ‘industry’ channels to help us educate listeners about 50 Foot Wave and we’ve met resistance every step of the way — caused by little other than money — and to an extent I’ve never seen before. So we’re sending free recordings off into the world to do their work. If people enjoy these songs and are excited by them, we ask that they share them with others.
“The music business is about fame and huge profits — egos and greed. Music itself, is not.”
Awesome. Also, if you are in Portland, you might check out the soundtrack release/benefit party on Saturday, May 20 at the Bettie Ford Lounge (1135 SW Washington). Director/Producer Jackie Weissman will host the fete, joined by local rock mama Zia McCabe of the Dandy Warhols, and all the bands on the Rock N Roll Mamas compilation CD.
Rock on in that amazing universe, gals.
Image header copyright Rock Mama Films, LLC.
Oh, and thanks to one of my favorite rockin’ mamas, Clea, for the heads-up on this interesting film.
So I watched Grizzly Man the other night, the unsettling documentary of Timothy Treadwell, who lived among the grizzly bears in Alaska’s Federal Preserve for 14 summers. His last summer with “his friends,” he was introduced to how seriously bears take the concept of friendship, and he was eaten, along with his girlfriend.
I thought it was an interesting film, one that left me feeling a bit uneasy and maybe even a little angry (?) at Treadwell’s misguided passions. He claimed repeatedly that he was “protecting” the bears, even though officials point out that the bears were not in any great danger (and it is unclear how him camping out near the bears was protective to them). He gave them weird names (Mr. Chocolate, Aunt Tabitha, Sgt. Brown), spoke to them in baby talk when they would look askance at him (“Don’t you look at me that way, Mr. Chocolate! You STOP that!”), and even orgasmically felt the fresh steaming crap from a grizzly (“It came FROM her! It was just INSIDE OF HER!”).
I was left with perhaps a feeling of sadness, too, because Treadwell clearly had these gaping emotional needs that the bears somehow filled, but it eventually killed him, rather gruesomely. As one reviewer wrote, “His death was pointless, avoidable — and quite possibly what he wanted.”
One bright spot in the film was definitely its soundtrack, by British musician Richard Thompson. It’s a lovely acoustic symphony with strings, steel guitars, and MOOD. Treadwell’s footage which they used was breathtakingly gorgeous, and this soundtrack captures some of that feeling. Here is the (short) opening track off the soundtrack as a sample. Recommended for a lazy weekend & available on eMusic.
So I finally got around to watching Elizabethtown. I had been hearing about this ever since, oh, last August, all about how Ryan Adams had a bunch of music in it, blah, blah, blah. And then I remembered in a flash of glee that my Uncle Dave used to be the big impressive principal at E-Town High School (as those of us in-the-know call it), so I was doubly excited.
Turns out my anticipation was for no good reason. The movie is tolerable, its salvation largely being the soundtrack, and also because Cameron Crowe just *knows* how to make a movie. I mean, all the elements are there – adversity of mythic proportions, family illness, quirky relatives, and even a perky love interest who shows no end to the depth of her random comments and bed-a-bility. What’s not to like? Well, the low point for me in the movie = Susan Sarandon tap dancing. Well, most of it was really speedy tap-dancing because it was on fast forward. Holy Moses. Did I mention it was at a memorial service? There was some poignant sighing in the crowd, some tears for the exuberant display of LIFE in the face of DEATH — aaaaand we’re done. No.
While most of the movie was drivel, and even a little annoying (his sister in the film was unworthy of the name Heather because she bugged the crap out of me), the best part of the movie was absolutely the last 20 minutes where lead guy sets out on a roadtrip with many CD mixes made by aforementioned perky love interest girl to accompany his every vista and curve in the road. Also included with the CDs is a heavy-handed and, let’s face it, unrealistic handmade “roadmap”/scrapbook that I kept thinking she would have NO time to make, what with the rigors of flight attending, talking to lead guy on the phone at all hours of the night, painting her toenails, apparently knitting her own hats, and just generally being adorable (which is hard work, let me tell you).
But what this roadtrip was really about for me was the glimpse it offered into the always fascinating musical mind of Cameron Crowe, who undoubtedly is THE best soundtracker in the known world. One reviewer referred to it as “Crowe’s gold-standard back catalog tastes,” and that is exactly what he has. I want to be his friend so we can ride around in his car and listen to his iPod on random. That would be fun.
The best part about the last 20 minutes was not just hearing Crowe’s mixes and feeling the flow, but also seeing what images he chose to juxtapose alongside those songs. It tapped into my unfulfilled dormant desire to have an epic road trip with The Perfect Soundtrack to accompany all the amazing things I was seeing. Like I’ve said before, I wish my life had a soundtrack. This is pretty close. Here are a few gems I enjoyed, either played or mentioned in that poetic and sprawling segment:
That’s Life – James Brown (first song of the journey – I love how it starts out with the trademark James Brown “Hey!” and then a little “Unh!” and a “One more for the road!“)
Don’t I Hold You – Wheat (“Some music just needs air. Roll down your windows.”)
Words – Ryan Adams (right after lead guy drives across the Mississippi and there is a mention of Jeff Buckley. Also notable is the use of ‘English Girls Approximately’ at the Farmer’s Market – I absolutely LOVE that song and was stoked to hear it in a movie)
Sugar Blue – Jeff Finlin (singin’ about stuff like the “raven’s song that breaks the night” – lovely and rough-sounding)
Salvador Sanchez – Mark Kozelek/Sun Kil Moon (scrawled in the scrapbook list of songs, but I don’t think it was played in the movie itself?)
Name: Heather Browne Location: Colorado, originally by way of California Giving context to the torrent since 2005.
"I love the relationship that anyone has with music: because there's something in us that is beyond the reach of words, something that eludes and defies our best attempts to spit it out. It's the best part of us, probably, the richest and strangest part..."
—Nick Hornby, Songbook
"Music has always been a matter of energy to me, a question of Fuel. Sentimental people call it Inspiration, but what they really mean is Fuel." —Hunter S. Thompson
Mp3s are for sampling purposes, kinda like when they give you the cheese cube at Costco, knowing that you'll often go home with having bought the whole 7 lb. spiced Brie log. They are left up for a limited time. If you LIKE the music, go and support these artists, buy their schwag, go to their concerts, purchase their CDs/records and tell all your friends. Rock on.
Last night I finally finished watching the final hour of the top-notch Martin Scorsese documentary No Direction Home, which follows Bob Dylan from his earliest beginnings, to his rise as a folk singer, through his controversial 1965 tour when he started to go electric. For someone who didn’t grow up seeing images of the young Dylan and the world he inhabited, I found it to be a fascinating character study and a look at how the world has changed in the past 40 years.
The Departed
One of my favorite “ultimate package” movies –creative camera work, smoking soundtrack, clever script– is the 
Name: Heather Browne
