8.20.09
8:46 pm
I watched Casino last night.
Somewhat by accident.
It was one of the first five or so movies I put on my Netflix queue back in, oh, I don't know, 2005?
We also received Hairspray.
We need to pay more attention to the passage of time, specifically with regards to our Netflix queue.
The problem has since been rectified, but, I must speak for a moment about Casino.
Why is Martin Scorsese lauded?
I mean, yeah, the movie was long and Robert DeNiro was in it, but...why?
It just felt so...typical.
I guess maybe that's the point of his films?
Like, anyone can do a gangster film, but Scorsese can do a three hour gangster film.
Not sure.
The Departed was pretty good.
One thing that kept bothering the hell out of me: the number of music cues.
Jesus Fucking Christ, if you played some sort of drinking game linked to the number of times the music shifted in a scene you'd die.
Pick a song.
Stick with it.
Roll camera.
And hey, Joe Pesci as a mobster hot-head?
Brilliant!!
Eh, whatever.
I remember hearing this spoken of as "Sharon Stone's Oscar film" and it definitely felt like that, xmax.
So afterwards I watched some of Basic Instinct 2, just to put things in perspective.
Her legs look like skin bags full of cottage cheese.
*SHUDDER*
Anyway, Beck has been doing some interesting stuff lately.
He redesigned his website (http://www.beck.com/) and has been updating it with excellent little tidbits every two days or so.
One is a section entitled "Irrelevant Topics", which is Beck just talking to some other person in the industry about nothing in particular. The first was him and Tom Waits and the second was him and Will Ferrell.
There's also something called "Planned Obsolescence" which is...like a mix tape, but a mix tape of stuff Beck listens to, which is...enlightening.
Only problem with that is Beck doesn't allow it to be downloaded, a problem Beck (or his label) seems to have with a lot of things.
The other two sections are far more intriguing and fun.
About a year ago, Beck released "Modern Guilt", a Beck-does-a-60's-album album.
Pretty cool stuff.
Not as long or lush as some of his other ventures, but good.
A few months ago, when he and his band returned from Japan, they went into the studio and re-recorded the album in a more acoustic, stripped down fashion and they've been posting it, a track at a time for the past month or so.
Some of it doesn't translate as well (Walls), but some of it allows you to see the song without all the Pro Tools (Chemtrails).
Along with "Modern Guilt Acoustic" Beck has introduced "Record Club".
THIS is the shiznit.
Beck got together with a bunch of other music people (including Giovanni Ribisi and Nigel Godrich) and, in a day, recorded, in its entirety, "The Velvet Underground & Nico".
He plans to do this again and has already with Sonic Youth's EVOL and some other album with MGMT..
I think Prince should do this, because, for all his prolificacy, he's just not doing a lot of good stuff.
Every three albums you get two or three memorable songs and that's just sad.
BUT Prince's recent cover of "Crimson and Clover" was the bomb.
And Foo Fighter's cover of Prince's "Darling Nikki" is also the bomb.
I'm just saying.
The only problem I really have with Beck is (and again, this could be him or his trundling, prehistorically out-of-date label) the stinginess.
When "Modern Guilt" came out, you could go to Beck's myspace and listen to thirty seconds of the new single.
Thirty seconds.
The single was already on the radio and on iTunes (and the whole album had already leaked to the torrent sites), but you could only hear thirty seconds of it.
Along with this is the plan to release a limited edition EP with some of the acoustic versions of the "Modern Guilt" songs on it.
Uh...
The same songs that I can hear on the website for free?
The same songs that, like all of the Record Club and Planned Obsolescence, can be downloaded from a torrent site about an hour after it's posted?
No, I'm not going to pay you for five of these ten songs.
This speaks directly to either Beck's lack of business savvy and disconnection from the modern music fan or that of his label.
I'd like to think it's his label that's not only out of touch but scrambling for already-tried-and-failed methods of raping a few more dollars out of the fans because the idea that Beck is the one saying, "yeah, let's charge them extra for this too" really fucks with the friendly-if-a-bit-vacant-hippy-spaceman -funk-folkster image he's created over the years.
Fingers crossed that the next Record Club with be They Might Be Giant's "Factory Showroom".
Beck could kick the shit out of S~E~X~X~Y...
Also, last week I had my first on screen gig since the Rock Band 2 thing last year.
NOT ONLY did I get to actually act, but I even got to improv.
It was...freeing.
The whole thing was rock solid except for the fact that I had a tiny piece of silicon from my ear plugs stuck in my right ear, cutting off any and all sound.
A little disorienting, but nothing world ending.
That should be all over CNN.com in the coming weeks.
AAAnd I just received the "Davidoff Hot Water" spots.
God damn.
They are just straight up beach porn with my dripping-wet-love-taco voice trailing along at the end.
As soon as they're released, I'll post a link or something.
Tomorrow morning I record yet another VO for the Adrenalina folks.
They like me and pay me so I like them.
It's as simple as that.
Thinking about seeing Inglourious Basterds this weekend.
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