Review: 12 Women (+ Bonuses!)

So, an insufferable asshole I know wanted me to "review" his newest CD, based mainly on the fact that I left the longest comment on his message board when he released his first album, Small Apocalypse.

I am admittedly not a "music person." My hobbies are games, books, chess, and computers. Don't get me wrong, I like music, and I listen to it a lot. I've just never had the acumen for picking out new bands and songs that several of my friends have (i.e., Chris, Melissa, and Paco). I love hearing new music (Melissa's website is great for that), but I rarely seek it out. Similarly, I tend to treat music as background noise. I can listen to a song fifty times and never pay attention to what it's about. There are songs I've heard hundreds of times over 30 years, that one day I'll actually pay attention to and be surprised by their content. So reviewing a whole album represents a unique challenge for me: I have to sit and concentrate on it. I have to close my book, turn off my game, and pay attention. I listened to 12 Women about a dozen times on the subway going to and from work over the past week and a half, and god damn me, it was only this morning, a scant two hours ago, that I finally got what some of the songs were about. I'm not implying that Oliver's work is byzantine or opaque, but that my powers of analysis are about as sharp as an Apple Mighty Mouse.

Still, let it never be said that I do anything half-assed.

12 Women takes as its overarching theme the idea of women in general, and the album examines the 'gentler' sex from a variety of angles. There seems to be a bit of a skew towards women in the late-teens-to-thirties demographic, but that's perhaps understandable. The songs:

35mm: The album's first track. Sounds like a single. Not that that's a bad thing, but it has that undefinable feel of being the song that attracts attention. Which seems to have been borne out somewhat by its appearances on Electrical Language and Pop Free Radio's top ten.

Watch the World Burn: Some of Oliver's songs remind me of They Might Be Giants, and this is one of them. Granted, I'm biased, since TMBG are my "favourite" band (as far as someone who is so musically deficient can be said to have a favourite band). It is also a good song.

Substance Abuse: Best song on the album. The female vocal backbeat is so cool, the content is edgy, and bonus points for Kate Storey's fantastic characterization of Substance with only four lines of "dialogue". The extro/lead-in to the next song is slick, too.

Pretty Girl on Roller Skates: This sounds like the second single to me. Not a bad song, but following Substance Abuse, it feels a little bland.

Mall of America: I didn't like this one at first, but it really grew on me, especially the creepy, haunting chorus (courtesy of my compatriot Lisa Gillam, I've learned). I've been to the Mall of America. It was a bit much, but for all its size it felt empty. Plus, where do they get off being such a huge mall and only having two video game stores, both of them Gamestops? WTF. That chorus sounds familiar, too, but I can't pin it down.

A Million Dollars in Her Eyes: Not a huge fan of this one. The backbeat was a little too hiphoppy for me, and the sample (David Bowie?) with Oliver's spoken addendum felt out of place.

Extraordinary Handcuffs: Sometimes, even when I'm really trying, my attention wanders. That happened with this song practically every time I listened to it. It just didn't hold me. When I finally caught hold of it, it reminded me of Oliver's older, Moonshine Flush material.

The Money: Something about songs focusing on money always turns me off. That song by Pink Floyd does the exact same thing. I think it's that cash register sound, actually, because a quick search for "Money" in my mp3s reveals many songs on the topic that I like. Anyway. Wo buxiwan.

A New Summer: Another slightly hiphoppy song, but I like it better than Million Dollars. I think because it's slower? My listening skills fail me.

Lady Liberty: The sole incorporeal woman on the album. The song interested me from the outset, because it's about New York, and I live in New York, and I like New York. The "too much, too many people" conceit in the song is a bit predictable, and seems to oversimplify the city a bit, but it's a song, what do I want? I do like the subtle "Another One Bites the Dust" bassline I keep hearing in there. I thought that was clever.

Clubmare: A song about the decadent, speed-sniffing club culture and the inherent emptiness implied by it. I think. The clubby, dancy main track is offset nicely by the folksy intro (which works really well in the context of a "this is how partying has evolved" sort of thing). I'd like to hear a full-song version of the intro. Also, nightclub, nightmare, clubmare, I see what you did there, clever boy. Nightnight would have been less effective as a title.

I'll Find You There: Again, this sounds a bit like Oliver's older stuff. A nice solid love letter of a song.

(The repeated bits of the Pointer Sisters' Sesame Street numbers song were great. This was my favourite skit on Sesame Street, along with the ladybugs' picnic and the alligator king. Oh, hell, I'll just embed them all at the end.)

I thought 12 Women was a very good album, and you should both download it and throw a few dollars Oliver's way (he has a paypal account).

Final Score: 10

Also very much worth mentioning is Oliver's Gods and Devils collection of instrumental tracks. They're of uniformly high quality, but Ganesha's Last Stand and the most recent Mars Attacks really stand out from the crowd. Good background musics! Go give them a listen!

I have work that needs doing, so I'll quickly toss a few internet things at you and go.

Funniest detention slip ever, courtesy of Arnold's gmail status message.

A graphic representation of teh sex in Marvel's X-Men universe. No, not that kind of graphic representation, you hentai-craving sickos.

DARPA's new pet is a hummingbird-sized hummingbird drone. I want one.

And finally, I can't believe I haven't mentioned Lisa Gillam before or linked to her website. It's an atrocious oversight that I am correcting as I write this. Lisa's super fantastic, and she was kind enough to put up with my utter lack of musicality long enough to stand helplessly by and watch me butcher some Irish-Newfoundland songs at a couple of St. Patrick's Day parties in Taichung.

And, as promised, nostalgia in its purest, most concentrated form:



Get in touch! I'll be home in August!

Now fuck off.

Love Adam
We all live in the Mall of America, and we are fast asleep.

Flyin' solo!

Well, Katie's gone off to do her Montessori teacher training for the summer, leaving me to wallow in my own filth fend for myself for a few weeks. She'll come home on the weekends, though, so that's a good incentive for me to hide the bodies keep the place tidy.

I had a birthday. I got some cards from various quarters, a couple of games from Dad and Liz, and a slew of books I've been coveting from Katie. On my birthday proper, Katie took me down to Chinatown to one of the only games arcades in New York City (arcades having been pretty much slain by the current wild success of home consoles). We played $4 worth of games, Katie beat me down at Street Fighter II, we got some Häagen Dazs and headed up to Central Park, where we rented a rowboat and rowed around the lake for a bit. Then we went home and spent a goddamned hour trying to find a parking spot for the car because it was Puerto Rico day immediately went home and were happy and nothing was bad. Katie led me on a treasure hunt for the aforementioned books, then we went over to the park for a nighttime picnic! So fun! I loved my birthday.

Fun stuff:

I found a cool little toy on the internet that lets you create your own World of Warcraft-style item descriptions. Pretty funny for anyone who plays the game, mildly amusing for the rest of the people in the world. I created the item to the right. I think it's funny.*

[strained silence]

Fuck you guys.

Here's a little flash game that's cute and clever. It's called ClickPLAY!, and the framing story (such as it is), is that the poor neglected "Play" button, ubiquitous in flash gaming, has finally had enough and wants nothing more than to run away and hide. The object of the game is to click the little bastard. Fun!

Hefford tried to send me the link to this video a long time ago, but he made the miscalculation of sending it via Facebook. (Which, I must mention, was the source of many Happy Birthday wishes... some from my closest friends and relatives, some from complete or near-strangers, and some directed not to me, but [well-meaningly, I've no doubt] to Katie. Ahem. Facebook.) Either way, I can only hope for three things: 1. that they really are making Beyond Good & Evil 2; 2. that they will not release it only on the XBox 360, which I have no intentions of buying; and 3. that they will not release it too soon, because I do not have any money with which to buy a PS3.

Now, blogger is acting up, so I will cut this short and hope the post publishes without too much drama.

I hope to talk to you soon!

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
Never rub another man's rhubarb.

*The funniest part is that it's a Paladin-only item, but Paladins can't equip Fist Weapons! LMAO!

Not much!

I know, but what can I say? Work is work: project management is boring. Sarah and Beverly had a lovely visit. I'm looking forward to Rebecca visiting in August. I played the new Punch-Out!! at Nintendo World, and it was really fun. There's a new Super Mario Galaxy coming out. Yoshi will be in it.

We saw a few movies recently. We went and saw Up in the theatre, watched The Wrestler at our friend Donna's house, and watched The Graduate the other day.

Let us review them!
Up was great. It was a great movie. It was great from top to bottom. And it was in 3D. And it was great. Up is the kind of movie every other movie wants to be. It was a great movie. Go see it.
Final Score: 10

The Wrestler was a very good movie. Mickey Rourke was robbed. The depiction of the pro wrestling culture was a little shallow, but it was geared to people who don't know anything about wrestling. (Watching it with two Montessori teachers was an experience all its own: "Do they really cut themselves??? Ohmygod.") Bonus points for featuring Ernest Miller as the Ayatollah in the final fight. Bonus bonus points for Marisa Tomei as the strung-out stripper love interest.
Final Score: 10

I honestly didn't know what to make of The Graduate. Good music, good actors, decent camera work and cinematography. I think it may have been that Dustin Hoffman was just a little too inscrutable. Is the message of the film that women are over-emotional, fucked-up people with no will of their own? Is it that the best way to get the woman you want it to be a fucking creepy motherfucker (lol) and stalk the shit out of her? I always heavily criticize the 'forced romance' plot device (also called "I love you so much for no reason!!!!!<3<3<3"; style="font-style: italic;">Transformers for a really stellar example), but it seems here that it's the entire reason for the movie. Anne Bancroft was so good at the beginning of the film (back in an age when a cougar was a cat), but Mrs. Robinson dissolves (devolves?) from "confident, interesting older woman with some emotional baggage" into "paranoid wicked witch" mode at the first hint of competition from her daughter. Too bad. Really, the movie fell apart in the second half. Katie brought up a good point when she said, "Where is he getting the money for all this?" Driving around in his Spider, buying an engagement ring, I felt it really hard to relate to young Benjamin. Bonus points for KITT as the dad, Mr. Roper as the landlord, and Dr. Leo Marvin as the guy who says, "Shall I call the cops? I'll call the cops."
Final Score: 0

We went to see some theatah as well, catching a performance of "Sophistry", featuring our favourite actress, Ellen Dolan. It was quite funny, even if it couldn't really settle on what kind of play it wanted to be.

I consistently say that my friends are almost universally more talented than I am, and an excellent example of this is Oliver Benjamin Thayer. Oliver (or "Jolly Ollie" as he likes to be called) has just released his second full-length album, entitled 12 Women. You should go to his website and download it, along with his previous effort, Small Apocalypse. SA scored a perfect ten on this very website (Small Apocalypse, not South Africa [although that gives me an idea {see below}]... too much World of Warcraft has got me using shorthand for everything... lfm hVH 1heal 1dps gtg.... eep!). Jolly's been after me to review his new CD, but my headphones are broken, so I need to get new ones so I can listen to it on the train... it's a whole big thing. So, 12 Women review coming soon.

You know, I've only ever reviewed movies and one CD. I think I'll try to review some more diverse stuff. Like, I dunno, countries, books and... um.... people. That ought to be good for a laugh. Wanna see something (or ~one) reviewed? Leave a note in the comments section, and I'll take it under advisement.

Also (serious face), my grandmother hasn't been well lately, so if you know her think a good thought at her, and if you don't, think a good thought at someone else who may need it.

Well, I have to get back to waiting for a shipment of books from the client which was "sent out a week ago" but we still haven't gotten it, not that that's a big deal, you know, I mean, we've only got editors in Barcelona, Mexico City and Berlin waiting for stuff we need to send them after we receive it, and oh, we aren't getting an extension on the deadline, well that's just hilarious arrrrrrgh work. As always, I'm both disdainful of and intimidated by Facebook, so you may need to actually talk to me in order to let me know what's going on in your life. We have skype, and we love talking on the computer, so leave a comment or send me an e-mail, and we can set up a date.

Parting shot: bizarre, yet real.

One last thing.

See more funny videos and TBT Videos at Today's Big Thing.

When I was a kid, speaking in tongues was a good way to get burned at the stake.

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
I think Katie might need an intervention for her addiction to Intervention.

Quick & Dirty

Hi!

This one has to be quick, because my sister, Sarah, and her friend are coming to visit in, like, four hours.

We're all settled into the new apartment. I have pictures, but my internet connection has been a total dick for the last couple of weeks. (Plus, I'm ascairt to post pictures without Katie's input.)

So, you'll have to be happy with another walkthrough.

Here are some extra videos to eat your time.

First, a lovely staged... thing... that I saw on Melissa's website.

Sound of Music Train Station @ Yahoo! Video

Next: an equally lovely, but longer, "keep your chin up" video that will make Katie and people like her cry, perhaps.

Finally, less likely to make people cry, but more likely to be 'full of teh winz': a reboot of the G.I. Joe cartoon, called "Resolute". It's supposed to tie in loosely to the new Joe film. There are many parts. This is the first.

A link to a flash game: ScaryGirl.

And a closing photo of Kitty and Fauntleroy at our old apartment.
Farewell! More substantive posts to follow!

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
The phone is ringing....oh my god. Get it together....

A video is worth 4830 pictures.

So, here:

Come visit!

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
My paladin is at level 75. Like you care.

Movin' on up.

Well, here we are. I've got a lot to cover, so this is going to be a long one. Go make a cup of tea or a rum and coke or something, because you're gonna need about half an hour.

After a couple of weeks of abortive stops and starts, Katie having called in family members as diverse as her mother, her step-aunt, and her step-cousin for advice and support, it looks like we've finally nailed down a new apartment in Manhattan.

I've had a song going in my head since yesterday.

Yeah, that's the one.

(While we're not actually moving to the East Side, it's debatable whether the second storey qualifies as "the sky", and I don't like fish, I still feel some kinship with George and Weezie.)

Backstory: when we first moved to New York, the chief concern for Katie and her mom in doing the apartment hunting (I wasn't a part of the process because I was busy in Newfoundland securing legal entry to Murka) was proximity to my place of work, in Queens. Now, as we've learned since, Queens is the largest borough in New York City, and the neighbourhoods of Astoria and Glendale are quite a ways apart from each other.

Regardless, it was in Glendale we ended up, surrounded by the dead. Glendale is a lovely, quiet neighbourhood. Our landlady is an absolute sweetheart, if a little slow-moving when it comes to repairs and such. (Which, I suppose, is similar to criticizing milk for being white.) We have neighbours whose company we legitimately enjoy.

BUT, the hour-and-a-half commute is killing us. I work in DUMBO, and Katie's on the Upper West Side. We needed to move.

We found the 'perfect' apartment last Saturday. A two-bedroom around the corner from family/friends Emily and Derrick. $1500 a month. $1250 broker's fee. We felt we could swing it, got the application in on Monday, lost out to someone who applied on Sunday.

Pewp.

But things work in weird ways. After the fact, I was researching the management company (who would have effectively been our landlords) on one of the internets, and lo and behold, scores of blog posts about how XYZ Management are "a bunch of fucking slumlords" and "stay far away from 000 Something Ave [the very building we were looking at]."

Days pass. Craigslist was pored over. E-mails were sent. On this Saturday past we looked at apartments in our desired neighbourhood again.

The result was an absolutely massive one-bedroom on the same block as the one we missed out on (but not in the same building). The rent is only slightly higher than what we're paying now, and it includes heat and hot water (which we currently pay for separately). Plus, no broker's fee. 25 minutes will get Katie to work, about 45 for me. We sign the lease on Thursday. (There was a bit of additional drama regarding some unreasonable expectations on the landlord's part regarding what constitutes 'adequate' personal savings, but we were lucky enough to know some very cool people who proved clearly that teamwork makes it happen.)

So, that's the big news from New York. So long dental plan Glendale, Lisa needs braces hello, Inwood! Photos, videos, and hilarious commentary on several local street names forthcoming (i.e. the intersection of Seaman and Cumming LOL).

On to the rest of the world.

A fantastic birthday present that you can actually buy and read:
There are also, allegedly, ninjas in it. Adam want.

Observe! The Cajun Crawler: "Like a Segway, but with a dozen creepy feet."

Let us discuss free games. Those who care not for games can go fuck themselves may skip this part.

There is something called Dwarf Fortress. The sheer size and scope of the game causes my head to spin. I spent a few minutes reading the tutorial, and I fear it. I fear it in the way I once feared World of Warcraft, a primal fear that my very soul would be devoured were I to venture too near its blinding brightness. Having proven that I am man enough to both play World of Warcraft and also lead a sensible and reasonably normal life at the same time, I edge closer to Dwarf Fortress each day, and my anxiety grows. I fear I am lost.

More accessible, less potentially-time-consuming, are our friends the Flash games:

In Music Catch 2, you must catch yellow notes while avoiding red ones. Music plays. It is soothing.

Loops of Zen is also soothing, in a maddening sort of way. Turn things until they make no sense. Suddenly, a breakthrough, and you see the pattern briefly before being thrown to the next meaningless jumble of lines. Is that zen? I am ignorant.

Bowja the Ninja 2: In Big Man's Compound is not particularly soothing, but you can take your time and you never die. I finished it in about fifteen minutes. A standard click-on-the-right-thing-at-the-right-time game.

Ultimate Crab Battle is not soothing. It is batshit insane. Good God. Never let go of the A key.

There seems to be something of a vogue going around the video game websites lately. Chemistry.
I Heart Chaos has assembled a periodic table with video game characters instead of elements. It's colorful and fun. It will serve as a desktop background.
The reason I call it a vogue rather than an oddity is the fact that someone else created a thematically-similar if less brightly-colored periodic table featuring a timeline of game console controllers. It's interesting to look at, but less ideal for downloading and sticking on your computer's desktop.

People who play video games are often very, very stupid. Nothing evidences this truth more than fanboyism, wherein a person chooses a side and then sticks with it through thick and thin, the nerd equivalent of rooting for a given pro sports team.

Nor do I claim to be immune to fanboyism. In my formative years, I had a NES, and my neighbour Darrell Whitten had a Sega Master System. He thought the Sega games were great, and I knew that a system featuring Mario, Link, Final Fantasy, Dragon Warrior and Startropics had to be superior. Even now, in my sage wisdom, I refuse to consider purchasing an Xbox 360, not because I have any particular affection for Sony's ridiculously-priced monolith, but more because I think Microsoft has quite enough money (which they use to create hilarious pranks like Windows Vista), thank you very much.

That said, the way some people talk to each other about video games makes my heart hurt. "HAY U GUISE R ALL GHEY WITH UR HOMO PS3S LOL" or "wii is so gay its only for littel kids", and their ilk succeed in offending on many, many levels. Which is why it was refreshing to find these cute cartoons on, of all places, the IGN comment boards. (Do not click that link. It is not worth your time.) I repost them here in the spirit of camaraderie.
The Xbox 360 sick in bed with the Red Ring of Death made me laugh out loud, and the last one reminded me that I really am going to have to pick up a second-hand Dreamcast sometime in the future.

A shout-out is due to the person who created Fuck You, Penguin. Good work, lad.

I will leave you with the frank and honest statement that I do not know what the fuck this is.

But I very much want to watch the whole thing.

That's all! Exciting times ahead!

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
You'll need to have _six months'_ rent in the bank to even be considered. Fuck. That.

Penis. No, I mean... wait...

Well, we might as well go ahead and get it all out of our systems. Doctor Manhattan, like most males, has a penis. He rocks out with his cock out. I was afraid that they would wimp out and make him wear clothes through the whole film, but they didn't. Good for them. It was mildly irritating when, during dramatic moments, the chuckleheads sitting in front of us would notice Jon's blue manhood wagging about and burst into Beavis-and-Butthead style "uhuhuhuh" laughter.

Also worrying was the large number of small children in the theatre as we watched this (deservedly) R-rated movie. I'm frequently amazed at how poorly some people parent their children. In a similar vein to the legally brain-dead parents who allow their kids to play games like Grand Theft Auto and then act surprised when they stab their sister over a Nintendo DS (or not), Katie and I actually sat next to a group of four children, aged approximately 6-11 years. One of the kids was sucking his thumb, and another took a fairly expensive nap. Meanwhile, on screen, Nite Owl is putting the blocks to Silk Spectre in the Owlship, Rorshach is planting a meat cleaver into a child-killer's forehead, everybody's saying "fuck" and "shit" like they're contributing to this website, and let's not forget Doc Manhattan's big blue thang. Sigh. And yes, I'm aware that I'm being sort of hypocritical, accusing people of bad parenting when I don't have kids myself, but fuck that. This movie was not appropriate for kids, based solely on the level of violence.

Which leads us neatly into my brief critique of the film. If you plan on seeing it, have never read the comic, and don't want things spoiled, then go watch the movie or read the book and come back afterwards.

I liked it. I can actually make this faster by saying that I liked it all, with the exception of the following elements:
• Malin Åkerman - was apparently cast more for her physical resemblance to Silk Spectre II then for her acting ability; successfully took one of the two most important and deep characters from the comic book and reduced her to two facial expressions; such a shame.
• the violence - I am a big fan of fictional violence in general, but the comic purposefully veered away from excess in favor of a more realistic portrayal; Nite Owl pulled a Jet Li, busting-the-elbow-through-the skin move that made no sense; Silk Spectre stabbed a guy in the throat; the violence was a bit over-glorified, where I think its portrayal as ugly-but-sometimes-necessary would have been more effective.
• the "super" heroes - in the novel, there was Doctor Manhattan, and then there was everyone else; there was exactly one superhero (perhaps two if you count Ozymandias' metahuman reflexes, but that's more of an amazingly-well-trained thing, like Batman), but in the film, the Comedian, Nite Owl, and Silk Spectre all exhibit greater-than-average strength, which I thought was silly and tried to drag the movie into the same genre with Batman and Iron Man, where it does not belong, any more than the comic should be placed on the same shelf with the latest X-Men crossover.
• the ending - I don't think it was bad, it was just different; the replacement of the giant alien squid with Ozymandias' vilification of Doctor Manhattan made sense in that it kept Jon as the lynchpin which the entire story turned on, and that's fine; I just felt that the catastrophe lost a lot of its viscerality, since, in the novel, the alien squid thing dies and kills half of New York, but it doesn't actually destroy anything: there are just piles and piles of twisted human bodies; the movie sanitizes this a bit by having large portions of several cities be vaporized, resulting in a (perhaps satisfyingly?) cleaner rebuilding-New-York shot towards the end that wears its post-September 11th sensibility plain on its sleeve.

All that said, I liked the film, and I will watch it again when it becomes available on DVD. Therefore...

Final score: 10.
(I know that was a lot to read. Sorry; here, have some pictures and videos.)
We had guests. Paul and Stephanie trekked down from Halifax for a week, carting wee little Colin along for the ride. Sadly, Colin is a drunk. Shame. We actually didn't get any photos of the trip, so I'll have to hit up Paul's flickr... stream.. or whatever. It was lovely to have visitors, though, and we can't wait to darken their doorway someday soon.

Speaking of wee little things! Our oven gave out a couple of weeks ago. We told our landlady. Nothing happened for a while. Suddenly, we're told we're getting a new stove! Hooray, right?
Not so much. Now our kitchen looks like it had one of its teeth knocked out. Christ's sake. Ah, well. I hear Inwood's nice...

The internet continues to vomit forth its bounty.

Shopping Cart Hero doesn't do lots, but what it does, it does well. Go down the hill, go up in the air, try not to die.

Don't Shit Your Pants probably doesn't need much explanation. If you've ever played Maniac Mansion, Police Quest, or any of those old Sierra or LucasArts games, then you should be fine.

Someone very clever mocked up an intro for a faux-80s Saturday-morning Watchmen cartoon.

There is a person in the world who performs video game theme songs a cappella and with a ukulele, and this person is, alarmingly, not me.

In more distressing news, sadness suffuses my soul:
Without the Green Lantern Ring, how will I open my beer defend the Earth from aliens? *whinewhine*

We'll have to depend on Kitty, I suppose.

That's all the time I have today, kids! Keep in touch!

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
Not enough mana!