Sights & Sounds

Daily Dose of Movies – Brokeback

GLBT, Sights & Sounds /

I didn’t like it. I don’t see what the fuss was all about. Don’t flame me for it and don’t try and take away my GLBT membership card either.


I liked that it wasn’t the typical display of effeminate caricatures of gay men that we most often see. I liked that there was no happy ending which would have been pretty unrealistic, all things considered. I just don’t think it was worthy of all of the applause and the hype and the attention it has received. It was a B-movie about gay cowboys. A good B-movie but still a B-movie.


Ho-hum.


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Daily Dose of Music – With a Twist

2 Comments / GLBT, Melissa Ferrick, Sights & Sounds /

Sony is launching a new music label, Music With a Twist.  The line up will include GLBT artists "who have mass appeal and hit potential across all musical genres". 

What, exactly does that mean?  And do GLBT musicians want or need a separate label?

If it means they’re looking for GLBT artists whose music reflects who they are and where they’ve come from and truly resonates with the GLBT community, then heck yea.  Why not?  Colleen asks "Would Elton John jump at the chance to be on Music With a Twist?" – that’s not a fair question at all.  Obviously at this stage in the game, he wouldn’t.  Why would he?  He is gay, certainly, but his music doesn’t reflect his homosexuality, the GLBT culture or anything else that’s gay.  30 years ago would he have jumped, I think he might have.   The real question is would a group like our local group Redboy jump to join?  I haven’t talked to them but I bet you they certainly would.  I’ll ask TJ (the non lesbian boy drummer in the band) the next time I see him and get back to you on that.

If it means they’re looking for GLBT artists whose music is gender neutral and watered down for mass consumption, then I cannot imagine a GLBT artist wanting to be included on such a label.

Look at what happened to Melissa Ferrick and Atlantic.  Lesbian chic was in and still Atlantic didn’t know what to do with her.  They had a special gay marketing group and still they didn’t know what to do with her.  If this is more of the same, then Music With a Twist isn’t going to work for a lot of artists or for GLBT consumers. 

And speaking of Melissa and twists – Here she is talking about this little label and it’s looking like she’s either in or she wants to be in.    Which again answers Colleen’s question – Elton may not want in, but Melissa does. 

As Melissa will tell you during every performance, it isn’t about whether you are gay, straight, bisexual or transgendered – it’s about the music.  But she’s smart enough to know who got her where she is and what it takes to get her where she wants to go.  A solidly promoted alternative label like Music With a Twist can allow her to use the GLBT fan base in a positive way – and from there the music will do the rest.

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Daily Dose of New Music – Cowsills

3 Comments / Sights & Sounds /

Some of you are thinking Hey,  The Cowsills aren’t new!  Well you are right, they aren’t.  Some of you youngsters are probably just wondering what kind of group The Cowsills might be.  You’ve never even heard of the musical Hair, have you?  Whatever.  This isn’t about The Cowsills.  I’m not actually a huge fan of their music anyway.  (My children’s father was though, which I always found a little odd.)  This is about Susan Cowsill who joined her family’s band when she was pretty doggone young.

I was mindlessly sifting through the MF Yahoo Group email digests when I noticed RM talking about Susan Cowsill.  No way.  Is she still around?  Making music?  Folk music, even?  Interesting.  Since I had added "download new music" to my 101 things to do in 1001 days, I made a note to myself to check it out.

I did.  I listened to her album in the waiting room during TW’s latest endoscopy and I loved it.  Sure was better than Bond (which I’d also downloaded in my attempt to try new music).  It looks like she’s only got one album right now, which is too bad.  I’d like to hear more.

Pst… if you are a fan of The Cowsills you might want to click this last link and visit the memorial to Barry who it appears died in the Hurricane Katrina aftermath. 

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Daily Dose of Music – MP3 Players

Holidays, Money Talks, Sights & Sounds /

I mentioned in my ABC’s of 2005 that six MP3 players have come through our home this year and now you folks get my oh so knowledgable review. I know you’ve been waiting for this before buying your own MP3 players, haven’t you?

First, the iRiver H10. TW bought this for me for my birthday and at first I was just a wee bit disappointed because I really really wanted an iPod Nano. But within moments, disappointment was a distant memory and has never returned. The iRiver is easy to use, it’s quick and it’s sturdy. Love, love, love this little toy so very much. Loved it so much that I bought one for my oldest daughter for Christmas and I do believe she also loves it.

Next into our world was the Samsung YP-T8X purchased for the 10 year old for her birthday by her father and stepmother. It’s got a really nice display and it is shiny shiny. It plays video but she’s only got a 512mb player and that’s just not going to work. I don’t believe the display and shiny shiny is really worth the money money for that tiny player.

Oddly enough, TW and I had purchased a Creative MUVO for that same 10 year old’s birthday. Easy to use, batteries seem to last a pretty long time. The only problem is the buttons don’t feel “substantial”. They feel like they could be easily broken. But so far, so good. She likes the interchangeable color cases but seems to be sticking with the red. And, she’s had some fun with the voice recorder.

Next up, the iRiver T30 for Michelle for Christmas. Similar to the Creative but the buttons are more substantial. The menu navigation is a little tough to get use to at first (though that could be related to the fact that I’ve played with so many players in the last 3 months) but Michelle has it sussed and is thrilled with it. Nice loud sound, which she loves.

And last but certainly not least, Chris NEEDED the iPod Nano. He could not be persuaded otherwise. He’s an apple nut and loyal til the end. So, his father purchased the Nano. When it arrived, I did what I had done for all of the other kids, I started loading some music on it so they could listen to something besides the pre-loaded crud that arrives with these things. The nav wheel is sensitive! And there are soooo many menu options, I got lost quickly. Then the darn thing wouldn’t turn off and I had to reset it. Sheesh. (Did I mention my brief moment of disappointment at not getting a Nano never returned?) But, it is pretty and tiny and light and I knew he would love it – and he did. I just hope he doesn’t break it or lose it, he’s not the most ummm responsible of the six children… And, I surely hope iTunes is easier to use on a Mac than it is on a PC. What a pain in the rear that was.

There you have it, my MP3 player reviews. The one thing they all had in common was my pure HATRED for putting those little felty covers on the ear buds. That just stunk, with every single player!

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Daily Dose of Confusion – Cars

Holidays, Sights & Sounds /

Trying to drive a whaleyboy car is confusing! Wait, you’re probably confused about what a whaleyboy car is, aren’t you? Around here we call the Toyota Prius a whaleyboy car. We do that because TW made fun of me when I finally voiced my desire for a Prius. She says it’s ugly and looks like a whale. Fine by me, I can be a whaleyboy, the guys who drive the whales according to Chris Moore’s FLUKE (a really great book, by the way).

Priuskey

Anyway, those things are confusing! First, there is no key. There is a little square box that looks like any normal remote locking thingy for a normal car. You stick that thing in the slot and you push the power button. But you have to have your foot on the brake or pushing that power button is going to get you nothing but a few lights on the dash.

After you’ve pushed the power button, the only way you know for sure the darn thing is “running” is you see a READY light up on the dash (which is really FAR away from where you’re sitting compared to regular cars). The thing is so quiet, you truly do not know it is on.

PriusshiftThen there’s the shifter. One little knob and when you push it into “gear” it hops back into it’s “resting position” and stays there til you shift into some other gear. Scared the heck out of me. I thought I didn’t do it right and was trying to force it to STAY in the reverse position. While you’re backing up, it’s helpful that there is a constant beep beep beep til you shift into another gear. This helps you know for sure that it really is running because that READY light just didn’t feel like enough proof to me.

Confusing!

Shifting into DRIVE was no big deal, once I got use to the shifter bouncing back to it’s resting position. Parking was something else entirely. The shifter indicates NEUTRAL is directly to the left of the resting position. It isn’t. It’s left and a wee bit UP but not too far up ’cause that drops you into reverse. I never did master neutral but I came close doggone it. After it’s in neutral you push a button with a big P on it, which means park. Not to be confused with the POWER button which has to be pressed after you push P for park to shut down the magic, errr engine.

And if all of that isn’t confusing enough, there’s a gear marked “B” – what the? I got my driver’s liscense when I was 15, almost 30 years ago, and nobody ever told me there was a gear called “B”. According to the user manual, it’s what you use if you feel like the regular brake isn’t giving you enough “braking power” – my dad said, oh like a downshift. I don’t know. I was afraid to try it.

Weird!

PriusdashAnd then the display, wow. This really big computer screen that tells you how much gas you’re using, (when it says 99.9mpg while you’re driving it is really sort of freaky), tells you how much battery you are using and has little cars to indicate how much you’ve recharged since drving. You can make it display everything in English or French (hmmm no Japanese, odd eh?) and you can change the display colors from green to blue to beige to something else I can’t remember. (I chose green ’cause it’s Christmas ya know) And there are a zillion buttons for air conditioning, which is also the heater, and a zillion more buttons for the sound system. I shudder to think how many more buttons would have been there if we’d rented the one with the DVD screens in a zillion locations in the car! Did I mention these buttons are all on the TOUCH computer screen and not normal dash buttons????

FUN!!!

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Daily Dose of Music – Decade

GLBT, Melissa Ferrick, Sights & Sounds /

At the risk of making it look like I’m writing a MUSIC blog, or more likely a Melissa Ferrick blog, I’m writing another entry about music and Ferrick. I’m going to try really hard not to post about music (or Melissa) until at least after Christmas. Surely I can hold out a couple of weeks, can’t I? Maybe write about gay marriage or queer blogs or why boys are smelly but smell is no the prime indication that you are a boy or have a boy or maybe even that us/them piece about homeschool and school at home? Surely. But until then, Melissa it is.

Awhile back I talked about ordering two copies of Melissa’s DVD, Decade. Well I did and they arrived on Saturday to applause and whistles. Well no, not really, but Michelle did jump up and down and say “Thank you Mommy” about ten times. Which is high praise from an almost 16 year old.

Michelle and the half kid who half lives with us watched “her” copy upstairs and TW and I watched “our” copy in the bedroom on TW’s laptop (first time we’ve ever watched a DVD on a laptop in bed). It was cool, the DVD not the DVD on laptop watching part.

Really interesting to see Melissa and her “big break” – opening for Morrissey when she was 23 and unknown. How young and out of place she looked at the photo shoot, the makeup, the hair, the kiss Atlantic record executive butt nervousness. No wonder she was less than clean at that time of her life. And “Happy Song”, gosh I apologize for ever making fun of it or giggling about it (but I won’t apologize for having giggled and laughed at “Favorite Person in the World” cause that’s just one weird song for MF, ya know?)

From her big break to WAR to Right On Records and Brian – man I miss Brian. That’s pretty much what the entire second part of the DVD had me saying. I felt like a broken record. I miss Brian. I miss Brian. I miss Brian. I hope Brian Winton is doing a vanity search and comes across this post so he knows I MISS BRIAN. Pretty amusing and amazing watching MF and Brian setting up the studio at her parents’ house (too bad there wasn’t more footage of mom and dad, ya know?) and thinking about Valentine Heartache coming out of that big event. Cool, really cool.

Melissa – Decade was worth waiting for. I’m glad I bought two copies and I’m probably going to go ahead and order that third copy, just in case something happens to these two…

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Daily Dose of Music – Not so Random 10

Holidays, Kid Talk, Sights & Sounds /

Today I’m dropping some music onto Jenn’s iRiver, it’s her Christmas present, so do not tell!), and it’s fun but difficult at the same time. I haven’t spent much time with her in the last 4 years so there are huge blanks where I have no idea what her favorite songs were. Sniff sniff! It will be fun to see her reaction to what I’ve downloaded for her and more fun to hear what she will want to download for herself.

Here’s a random 10 list from what I’m downloading for her:

1) Every Breath You Take – Police (number 1 when she was born)
2) Ice Ice Baby – Vanilla Ice (man she loved Vanilla Ice lol)
3) Lump – Presidents of the United States (we loved it when this came on MTV!)
4) Like a Virgin – Madonna (she adored Madonna, wanted to be Madonna!)
5) I’ll Make Love to You – Boyz II Men (…hahaha family joke)
6) When I Come Around – Green Day (reminds me of her and Audrey and Chanae too a little bit)
7) Changes – 2Pac (yes dear, he really is dead)
8) Wannabe – Spice Girls (I can’t bring myself to put Mmmbop on there so this will have to do)
9) Wonderwall – Oasis (I think she wore this CD out)
10) Strawberry Wine – Deana Carter (for Jenn AND Ronnie because I heard that this was their song about the time they were married)

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Daily Dose of Music – Carnival

Melissa Ferrick, Sights & Sounds /

OK I was thrilled and honored to be included in the Carnivial of Roaches but this newest honor is even BIGGER. I was included in the Carnival of Music!

Why is this even bigger? First, because I had no idea – I didn’t submit anything! Wow! And second, cause I am STILL a Ferrick Fan and hope folks click into my post and from there listen to her music.

Thanks Elisa! Now everyone run over and click all of the links in the Carnival of Music!

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Daily Dose of Music – Melissa Ferrick

Melissa Ferrick, Sights & Sounds /

I don’t think I can consider myself a Melissa Ferrick groupie any longer. I am just not feeling it. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a huge fan: the iRiver is overloaded with Ferrick music, the cds in the car are 90% Melissa, the big kids all have Melissa cds, RJ’s favorite song is Anything, Anywhere, the big kids have Ferrick stickers all over their guitars, and we still spend hundreds of dollars to see her shows. I’m just not feeling compelled to bust my rear (and my family’s) in order to see every show in the southeast.

I found this post about someone else who is just not feeling it. He had another awesome post about Melissa love and the contrast between the two is a lot like how I was (or am?) feeling.

I think it stems from the huge letdown of the cruise. (I’m not doing a blame thing here, just stating the facts) Before the cruise, I was still feeling the DRIVE (excuse the pun) to see her EVERY CHANCE I GOT and working schedules and finances in order to do that. After the cruise, the next time I saw her was at Calliope Fest and she was terrific but some spark was missing – from her and from me, I think.

Months have passed, she hasn’t played Florida much at all and that’s probably part of the lackluster feelings as well. She is in Florida now – we don’t have tickets. We didn’t go see her in St Augustine yesterday (or was it the day before? another sign of my lackluster feelings, I don’t even know which day she was playing). We did spend a gazillion dollars to see her twice in Atlanta last weekend, and I’m glad about that.

The Atlanta shows were good. Really good because the spark seemed to be back in Melissa. That happens to her when she’s playing with someone she is really enjoying – and oh boy is she enjoying Natalia. (I’m not enjoying Natalia all that much, too much twang going on in her sets and it’s bridging over to Melissa’s. That’s another thing that happens with Melissa…think about Brian and the really hard and loud drums. That was awesome, loved it, but when things fell apart with them “personally” she was all about how bad that was for her music. OOOOOK. I suspect the same thing will happen at some point with Natalia, not that I’m hoping for bad things for Melissa, I’m not. I just suspect it will happen. She has a track record, doesn’t she?)

I love that the shows were “DRIVE-FREE”. (Sorry to all of you young follk who need to hear Melissa sing it, go grab some boots and move on, please) I love that she’s singing the old songs, she sang Happy Song for goodness sakes, one of the few songs we’ve never heard her do on stage. She didn’t sing Bad, Bad Girl which was a little disappointing because it’s a good song. She only sang Other Side during the second show.

The new songs, they’re still growing on me. None of them has grabbed me the way the songs from The Other Side did when she first began to play them at her shows, long before the cd was released. Stuck drives me insane because I was STUCK on that darn boat and didn’t want to be there once she was “un STUCK. Stabbed is a good song but her rant about that Atlanta artist who is stabbing people in the back is a bit tiring, Melissa throwing stones? And it was really bad in Atlanta because the artist in question is, well, in Atlanta. Tell the story of how it was written and let it go, that’s fine. Or just stop telling the story Melissa – like you have about Nebraska and Brian. Let the music speak for you. I love Brian. I love the “artist who stabbed you” and that’s just not going to change, ya know? The other new ones, like I said, they’re growing on me – unfortunately I’m not seeing enough live shows to have them grow on me really quickly. The cd is due out in the spring, and I’m looking forward to it but not dying for it…

The DVD, Decade, on the other hand I am REALLY looking forward to. I’m about to pre-order two copies and should probably order four. Everyone in the house will want one and of course we’ll lose one, break one or scratch one like we always do with these things. It’s been a long time coming and maybe that will inspire some groupie like feelings again? And if it doesn’t, that’s ok. I will always LOVE Melissa Ferrick and her music and she’s scheduled for Tampa in March – we’ll be there, probably.

(For those of you who may find your way in through searches for Melissa, here is a really BAD boot of Pumpkin Time – Natalia’s song with Melissa on Flugelhorn. Enjoy, sorry it’s not a better copy – it was an experiment with the iRiver.)

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Daily Dose of Music – Random 10

Sights & Sounds /

I’m not seeing any messages from the cosmos in this 10, are you?

Take Your Desire – Anne Heaton
Selfish Side – Melissa Ferrick
Mr Tambourine Man – Bob Dylan
Should Have Been the One – Antigone Rising
Saw Red – Sublime (W/Gwen Stefani)
Good for Me – Natalia Zuckerman
Polly (Unplugged) – Nirvana
Ten Cent Wings – Jonatha Brooke
Melissa Etheridge – Refugee
Wasted Word – Kris Delmhorst


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