Monday Music and Musings

Good Monday to you my friends....

Analog Kid - Rush

This is a classic Rush song and one that I always enjoy. Though to be fair I have to admit that I enjoyed Rush more when I unaware of the political leanings of their main lyricist N. Peart. I suppose I should be charitable because of his age when he wrote most of their music. But anyway this is still a pretty great song. 

  I hope the day is finding you well and that you are recovering for yesterdays festivities. I know that often the Super Bowl is the most watched even of the entire year. I would love to see a study done as to how many people miss the Monday after the big game. I suspect that the offices in most of greater Seattle are going to be pretty empty today. I would imagine that a good chunk of Denver will be empty as well but probably out of sadness rather then recovery from the happiness. I have watched nearly all the Super Bowls since I was 10 or 11 and I can't recall anything ever being that bad. I was shocked. I don't Seattle is that good but I never thought of Denver as bad either.

Magic - Ben Folds Five

A great song by the Ben Folds Five. I love basically everything Ben Folds and the Ben Folds Five has ever done. 

So I suppose I should address something that happened yesterday that for me was far more impacting than anything that happened in the Super Bowl and that was the death of Philip Seymour Hoffman. It isn't unusual for me to get emotional about something. I am not afraid to show my emotions. I wear them on my sleeve and my open face and anyone who knows me knows that over the stretch of time they are going to see me either laugh loudly and openly and they will see me with tears in my eyes. This is the reality of my being.

Rod Stewart - Maggie May

I do not listen to a lot of Rod Stewart and this song is coming from a film soundtrack. I believe it is Almost Famous. But it is a great song. I really should check out the rest of his music because I do love this song.

But, while I am emotional I usually do not react to the deaths of famous people that I do not know. I just never have. I am not sure why. I suppose on some logical level I never knew them and they did not know me and so why get worked up about it. But it wasn't like I was making a choice to not be emotional of these events I just wasn't. What was odd about yesterday was as news began to pop up on Facebook and different people begin sharing links to news articles about Philip Seymour Hoffman being found I began to find myself getting sad.

The Angels Are Singing In Heaven Tonight - Ralph Stanley II

A great bluegrass number and a nice thought. 


I cried for the death of a very talented man and I cried at the memories I have of his many wonderful performances and of the many films that he has been in that have been a big part of my life as a lover of cinema. I am not going to speculate as to the nature of his death. We all have demons and we all handle them in different ways. But I am saddened by and I miss him. It is very hard for me to pin down a favorite film or performance of his that I liked better than any others but I think that for me my top 5 Philip Seymour Hoffman performances in now real particular order are.

Almost Famous

The Big Lebowski

Pirate Radio

The Master

Magnolia

There are many more but for me those are the performances that I think of when I think of him and his acting. I am sad that he is gone and I will be revisiting these films again soon.

I do not know what else to say. It may be uncool of me to be sad about this and so be it. I am going to sit her and be uncool. I think I am in pretty good company.

See you tomorrow. 

Oh Brother...

One of my favorite films of all times is the Cohen bro's "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou" there is just something about it that I find so uplifting and special. A large part of that is the amazing soundtrack and the soundtrack for this film is truly an amazing one. I find that often for me, a great soundtrack can made a poor film a far more enjoyable one for me. I am sure that it isn't the same for other people.  But for me the use of really good and effective music just transcends anything else in the film. If I had to pick my top three film and soundtrack experiences and believe me that the experiences go together, sure you can listen to a soundtrack without watching the film, but just try to watch a film without a soundtrack attached to it. I think you will not enjoy the experience at all. But anyway my top three in no particular order "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou", "Almost Famous", and "The Royal Tenenbaums."  They are all so good. It is no coincidence that the directors of these films also have other films that have amazing music in them as well. Though to be fair the Cohen bro's are not known for it as much as Camron Crowe is and Wes Anderson are.

 There are times that just hearing a certain song or even part of a song from these soundtracks will drive me to tears and I do not mean that in a bad way at all.  I love the effect that these songs have on me. I love that about film and music in general that the impact can last beyond the initial viewing experience, which maybe why I love books and film and music so much.

Now, this wouldn't be my blog if I didn't throw up some videos for your viewing and listening entertainment. So here we go.

From "Oh Brother, Art Thou"

Big Rock Candy Mountain

Down To The River To Pray

I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow

Oh Death

Music from "Almost Famous"

I've Seen All Good People

Every Picture Tells A Story

That's The Way

I'm Waiting For The Man

Songs from "The Royal Tenenbaums"  A lot of what makes this soundtrack so effective is the score by Mark Mothersbaugh, I think that he is amazingly talented.

These Days

Police and Thieves

Needle in the hay - This is a song that I will never be able to listen to the same way I again. But I love the song.

Thanks for reading and listening folks.

Top 5...Phillip Seymour Hoffman

I like movies and music and books and many other things that I can use to make myself feel cooler then you. Now while that may bother some people I am okay with it because that is who I am. At my core I am sure that I am not really cooler then anyone but when I am in the middle of listening to some music that I love or a film that has captured me completely none of that really matters. Once I surface from that little world I wonder sometimes if maybe it is too much of an escape and I would be better served too focus my energies on other non pop culture things. But that is a conversation best left for another day.

One of my favorite films of all time is "Almost Famous" it is a film that for me captures both music and the power of film together. I realize that it is not a film for everyone but for some reason it works just perfectly for me and one that I watch almost as much as both "Fight Club" and "Quadrophenia". As I was watching it today I was reminded of how much I enjoy Phillip Seymour Hoffmans work in the film as Lester Bangs. This led me to today's blog post.



                             THE TOP 5 PERFORMANCES OF PHILLIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN


5: Hard Eight

4: Boogie Nights

3: Magnolia

2: The Big Lebowski

1: The Master


I have to give special mention to two films of his that I think exist separately from the 5 above and those are 'Almost Famous' and 'Pirate Radio'. I think his performances in both of those films are just great.

Watch those previews and if you get a chance watch those films. I think you will enjoy it.

Film Friday

So I went to see "The Hangover II" this week. Now for me it was not really a choice. I love Zach Galifianakis and I really enjoyed the first film. That being said I am not sure that I will be on board for the third. But I am not here to talk about the problems with sequels. I have rattled on about that before.

I wanted to talk about the music in the movie. I am always amazed when I see a film and the music that they chose for it is so effective. I do not know if I am just more affected by it then others but most of the time I just love a good music montage. I know most people feel like it is lazy directing to use one but there are times that it can work so effectively and often with songs that you wouldn't think would even work in the movie that they are being used in. I am also a big fan of music parody as well. That is if they are done intelligently with some cleverness. But in films when the music is correctly tied with the scene it can be breathtaking and tear jerking. Here are some of my favorites in no particular order of preference.



I love when this cuts into the slow motion. One of the few films that I actually like Gwenneth Paltrow in.



This just makes me hurt. I really think Wes Anderson is a genius when it comes to his use of music in film. "The Royal Tenenbaums is amazing because of that.



Back before Jack Black became a caricature of himself. I love "High Fidelity"



The visuals are just amazing in this one. The movie goes on a little long but there are some amazing scenes in it.



Amazing, amazing scene. Not much I can say about how effective this is.



So many great scenes set to music in "Almost Famous". I think this maybe Camron Crowes best film.



This scene makes me want to love Kate Hudson. It just works.

There are many, many scenes that I could have shown you. I may have to do this again. You guys have a good weekend and see a movie.

Thursday (Film as Life)

I am going to try to do some writing late on Wednesday night since I do not feel all that sleepy. I am not sure why. I did go to bed very early one night this week and I think I may have filled up my reserves due to that. But what I wanted to write about was a movie that I finished watching today. You see I go out in to the garage everyday after work and I sit there for anywhere from 1 to 3 hours. No, I am not meditating, what I do is take care of my two Ferrets. I get them out of their cage and clean it and feed them and play with them for a little bit. What I also do is sit and relax and often if I am not reading I will watch a movie on my laptop from my vast collection of DVD's. So I thought why not use this as an opportunity to let my readers know what kind of films I like and why I like them.

This week I have watched just one film and that was Cameron Crowes Almost Famous now he wrote and directed this film. It is basically a loose autobiography of when he was a teen aged writer for Rolling Stone magazine. This is also a very dramatized version of his first tour experience I believe with the Allman Brothers. Now, I enjoyed the movie in the theaters but when it was released on DVD it was released in a directors cut bootleg version that is 162 minutes long. So I often watch it in a couple of sittings. Not because it bores me because it does not. But I just like to use my time a little better then sitting through a movie that long in one sitting.

I love music. I love movies. When I was younger I worked in a movie theater and I gave serious thought to attending film school. That dream never came true but I still love a good film. (Or even a bad film, I.E. Con Air) But, this movie tied it all together for me. It had music and film and I am a sucker for a good movie that can blend the two. I feel like it is very important for a movie to have the right combination of the two because the wrong music can absolutely destroy a film and the right music can take that film to a completely different plane. I realize that not everyone feels this way and I may be guilty of liking some lower quality films just because I enjoy the music that it is surrounded by. Often if I have enjoyed a film I will also buy the soundtrack because listening to that will often take me back to the place I was when I first enjoyed that film.

I just realized that I have gone on for quite some time just giving you the background of why I like movies and music together so I think I am going to stop here and I will discuss more about Almost Famous on Friday. If any of you who read this think this approach is going to be interesting please let me know. I always like some feed back. Or even if you have some films you might think I would like please feel free to tell me about them.

So I will talk to you on Friday about Almost Famous . I do not know about you but I am looking forward to it.