Head Bands

A couple of weekends ago, I took a trip to good ol' Amoeba after a botched attempt to see the Bride and Prejudice. If you've never been there, it happens to be the best music store in all of Los Angeles. Whatever you might be looking for, they've got it. They might even have it in vinyl if you're lucky. Personally, I like that they've got thousands of used CDs in great condition for awesome prices. If there's something you've been looking for that they don't have at Virgin or Best Buy, you'll have no problem locating it at the treasure trove that is Amoeba.

Reason I went there, and the reason I've been looking for a lot of different music lately is because of Coachella. Seeing as I'm planning on attending this year, I thought it'd be a good idea to take a listen to a few of the bands that I've never heard before, and well, it's been an education. So far, I've enjoyed most of the music, but there are a couple that stand out the most.

My girlfriend will say that I'm a sucker for British bands. Actually, most people that really know me might say the same thing. Truth be told, I guess there is a disproportionate amount of Brit to my collection, but I'm not sure if I base my tastes on country of origin. That said, the two bands I've been listening to happen to be from the Isles. Fancy that.

Starting out of the gate for me are The Futureheads. Actually, I got the CD before I ever knew they were going to be at Coachella, but once I heard they'd be performing, I finally popped it in the CD player for a listen. What I found wasn't bad at all. What seemingly starts as another New Wave copycat turns out to be a solid Rock album. There's a chorus feel to some of the songs with overlapping harmonic backup vocals that culminates in their cover of Hounds of Love. This also happens to be my favorite track on the record and with good reason. From the simple guitar lines to the strong beat of the drum track, the tune isn't just listenable, but it's danceable too. How often (outside of Franz Ferdinand) can one say that? Good stuff if you like the aforementioned Ferdinand, but probably more in the vein of Men at Work on steroids.

The other CD in heavy rotation right now is Bloc Party's Silent Alarm. Yes, they're both British. Yes, they've both got the New Wave sort of vibe, but where The Futureheads create new from old, Bloc Party has less old and more of what makes them incredibly new. The lead singer has memories of Damon Albarn, but the music is nothing like Blur at all. It's more punk than post-punk, but there appear to be darker themes musically than most music that I've listened to lately. At times I'm reminded of the dangerous experimentation of At the Drive-In, but there's nothing that thematically difficult to understand or stream-of-consciousness to be found in Bloc Party, just amazing music and sincerity. You might like them if you like either of the bands I've mentioned.

There's still a few other CDs that I'm looking forward to in the next month. Beck being one of them and The Mars Volta being the other. I like to think that I have diverse tastes, but maybe it's a bit homogeneous from an outside look. There was a time when I would dismiss anything on a top 40 station, but I think I've been more welcome to a more pop sound. Funny thing, while I've accepted the more popular music, I've also made more of a shift towards keeping an eye on the independent scene. By no means do want to call myself "indie" per se, but I don't think I'd have heard about these CDs otherwise. Ultimately, I'm not sure what it is I like about certain music, but I'm always looking for something new. So lucky me, these new ones worked out pretty good. Anyone have other suggestions of music I might have missed lately?

Get Real Paid

OK, so now I remember why Beck is one of my favorite musical artists right now. I've been anticipating his new album since I heard it was going to be released soon, so when I heard he was having a concert at the Henry Fonda this week, I jumped on the tickets as fast as I could.

Boy, was I not disappointed.

The setlist he slapped together was to be expected. It was heavy on the new material, light on the old, but most of all, it was put together to get the audience moving. I really liked his new music. It's classic Beck: disco-funkadelic hip-hop blended with electronic beats in a country-western vein. Make sense? Well, at any rate, I wish he could have played another encore, and I wish that his opening act (Cat Power) could have been more dynamic and received with greater appreciation. Those are just minor issues though, the concert was fantastic, I'll buy the album when it comes out, and for sure I'll buy another ticket to his concert when he goes on tour.

Want to hear some choice Beck tunes? Ask and ye shall receive...

Sunny Day...

The Clouds Roll In
Originally uploaded by kardinalsin.

The weather. The weather for what seems like eons, has been terribly depressing. For me, that is. I'm not one to be happy when it rains. No, no. I'm not Shirley Manson, but I'm also not one of those who gets suicidally depressed when it rains.

But it does make me sad.

Cue the smile on my face when there was a forecast for an end to the rain and maybe even some sun in Southern California. A reprieve from the wetness and some happiness also for those in mud-smothered cities, it also meant another thing.

Snow.

So what did we do?

Packed to the Gills

What a Crowd
Originally uploaded by kardinalsin.

We headed out to Souther California's own Mountain High. The mountain was pretty packed. I mean, for a Thursday. How many of these people do you think had actual jobs, or lived in the area? How many were drawn by the prospect of fresh snow and a sunny day?

I know that's why we went in the first place. Rain all week and being cooped up makes for a tad bit of cabin fever, so taking the day off and doing a little snowboarding was a welcome, welcome kink in the routine.

Indeed, the snow was nice, the weather was awesome, and there was no work to be found...

Happy Happy

Helmet Heads
Originally uploaded by kardinalsin.

That made us very happy people...

Bleh

Don't feel well at all today, so I'm staying home from work, and resting my bones. I was planning on drawing a bit to try and relax, but instead I'm stranded in my bedroom with nothing but my computer to keep me companion. Damn sore bones. I'm going to spend some time on WebMD to figure out what's going on...

Trippy Toy Store

S2K Transformer
Originally uploaded by kardinalsin.

This week's assignment for the Toy Design class was to visit the nearest Toys 'R' Us establishment, take some notes, and basically get an idea of what we want to do for our final assignment. Going there, I already had a little idea of what I want to do (write me for more info, or I'll probably just talk about it later), so I focused on the related sections of the store mostly, but being the horrible toy maniac that I am, I found myself distracted several times.

For instance, here we have what Hasbro has come up with to kind of revitalize their transformer line: Alternators. What they've done here is take their existing characters and pair them with some of the popular contemporary cars. This one is enticing because it's the transformer version of my car. Awesome. I also was amazed at how much more detailed and complex Legos are these days. They had these lego dinosaurs that I would for sure have eaten up when I was younger. It makes me wish I was a kid again!

There were tons of things I took away from my visit, but something that became more prevalent while I was there was the propensity for what our instructor refers to as "watch me toys." These passive toys are troublesome to me, because they leave very little to the imagination, and how are children supposed to develop their own creativity when their toy does all the acting for them. Now, one could assume that this trend started with Tickle Me Elmo, or you could also theorize that with the popularity of video games and other electronic media, toy companies have tried to make an impact by bringing lots of flashiness to their wares. It's depressing to hear my instructor talk about it, in the sense that creativity gets swept under the rug at larger companies in favor of marketing, and that's something I really wanted to apply to the class.

Thing is though, with all this pessimistic talk she's still been able to make our tasks engaging. Most of all, she's been very pro-creativity so far, and I really like that. As the class progresses, I'll have tons more to share, and hopefully I'll get better ideas too. Here's to creativity!

100 Things I Love About Comics

A lot of different places I usually look into have been doing this, and in honor of performing my oh so nerdly duty, I thought I'd have a go. I feel like there's tons more that I'm missing, but what they hey. Here they are, in no particular order:

1. Will Eisner
2. The Ultimates
3. Planetary
4. John Cassaday
5. James Jean
6. Andy Diggle
7. Neal Adams
8. Art Adams
9. Jim Lee
10. Chris Ware
11. Warren Ellis
12. Old GI Joe comics
13. Wednesday afternoon walks from Campus to the store
14. Meltdown Comics
15. Dave Johnson
16. Astonishing X-Men
17. Lee's Comics
18. Mark Millar
19. Alan Moore
20. Grant Morrison
21. Spider-Man
22. Brian Michael Bendis
23. Michael Avon Oeming
24. Adam Warren
25. Joe Casey
26. Ed Brubaker
27. Brian K. Vaughan
28. Ex Machina
29. Watchmen
30. The Dark Knight Returns
31. Sin City
32. Blankets
33. Krazy Kat
34. Calvin and Hobbes
35. Charles Schultz
36. Boondocks
37. Bryan Hitch
38. Liberty Meadows
39. Frank Cho
40. Mike Allred
41. Steve Skroce
42. Geoff Darrow
43. Dave Gibbons' The Originals
44. Katsuhiro Otomo
45. Yukito Kishiro
46. Blade of the Immortal
47. Kenichi Sonoda
48. Masamune Shirow
49. Osamu Tezuka
50. Hayao Miyazaki
51. 100 Bullets
52. Body Bags
53. Marvel Knights Spider-Man
54. Adam Hughes
55. Ed McGuinness
56. Joe Madureira Archives
57. My Will Eisner Sketchbook
58. Ale Garza
59. Invincible
60. Red Son
61. An organized collection
62. Alan Davis
63. The Kuberts
64. John Romita Jr.
65. Walt Simonson
66. Mahfood
67. Scott Morse
68. Dan Clowes
69. James Kochalka
70. Tony Millionaire
71. Rick Mays
72. Hardcovers
73. Travis Charest
74. Moebius
75. Blacksad
76. Alex Ross
77. Mike Wieringo
78. The Fantastic Four
79. Jack Kirby
80. Curt Swan
81. Stan Lee
82. Steve Ditko
83. Justice League Unlimited
84. Batman
85. Bizarro by Piraro
86. Non Sequitur
87. Preacher
88. The Invisibles
89. Philip Bond
90. Demo
91. Cameron Stewart
92. Cully Hamner
93. Carl Barks
94. Marvel Kubricks
95. Early Image Comics excitement
96. Hulk Hands
97. Jimmy Corrigan
98. 1989, Batman
99. DRAW! Magazine
100. Frank Quitely

For even more fun, google some of these guys and see what turns up. Here's the original inspiration.

SCRUBS Tonight

Don't forget to watch Scrubs tonight. It's the episode that we got to witness taped LIVE. Funniest show on TV right now and definitely not to be missed.

Outlets Outlets

Apparel Outlet
Originally uploaded by kardinalsin.

Coming back from Santa Barbara, we stopped by the huge Camarillo outlets for routine shopping madness. It's one of the biggest ones in Souther California, and now there's another reason to go. Namely, the new American Apparel outlet.

For those not familiar with AA, check out their mission statement:

American Apparel is a vertically integrated manufacturer, distributor and retailer of T-shirts and related products. All of our garments are cut and sewn at our 800,000-square-foot facility in downtown Los Angeles.

We are trying to rediscover the essence of classic products like the basic T-shirt, once an icon of Western culture and freedom. Our goal is to make garments that people love to wear without having to rely on cheap labor.

Every aspect of the production of our garments, from the knitting of the fabric to the photography of the product, is done in-house. By consolidating this entire process, we are able to pursue efficiencies that other companies cannot because of their overreliance on outsourcing.

Our downtown Los Angeles factory, now considered the largest sewn-products facility in the United States, is a design lab where creative ideas, efficient manufacturing techniques, and concepts for designing and selling T-shirts are developed and put to the test. The challenge for companies like American Apparel is to establish new ways of doing business that are efficient and profitable without exploiting workers.

While apparel is a universal necessity that transcends almost all cultural and socioeconomic boundaries, most garments are made in exploitative settings. We hope to break this paradigm.

Pretty admirable, and pretty accessible too. They offer tons of basics for great prices (at the outlet at least) and they're not bad looking either. I'll look into their stuff more, as I know a few of my friends are into their stuff as well. Maybe you'll see one of their shops open up near you.

B 'n' B

Wow oh wow, this weekend was cracking! Spent an early Valentine's Day with Grace in the wild northernly hamlet of Santa Barbara taking in some wine at the Bachelor's pad and eating awesome food at a fancy schmancy Bed and Breakfast. As lodging experiences go, this is the first time either of us has ever been at a B & B, but it was decidedly romantic and completely awesome, if not just for the privacy, but for the deliciously homemeade french-style breakfasts we had both mornings we were there.

Sadly, I neglected to plug in the old digicam so we went a little analog and grabbed a disposable cam for the trip. We'll see if I can upload the pictures soon, but if anything, the memories alone are enough to keep me happy. If anyone wants to see some scenery, feel free to drop me a line...

Most importantly, we got to relax. That was probably most satisfying aspect of the trip after the room and board. It was enough to make me forget the whole debacle with my car, and probably formed some ideas about lodging in the future (at least in G's mind).

Happy V-day to everyone else out there, hope it's a good one!

CROOKS

While I was in class tonight, some poor waste of human space cut a five-inch long gash into my convertible top. Awfully pissed doesn't even begin to describe how I'm feeling right now.

Simon is the New Tetsuo

A great advantage of living in Los Angeles is how many advanced screenings and sneak previews one gets to watch. As this is the film entertainment capital of the United States, many international releases, hard-to-find pictures, and independent movies are relatively easy to find, and sometimes, if you're lucky, free! Yesterday, after having been notified and bought tickets about a month ago, we were able to check out Katsuhiro Otomo's new feature-length animated film, Steamboy. Brought to the Egyptian Theater by the American Cinematheque and Ain't It Cool News, the audience was able to catch this spectacular piece of science-fiction a full month before wide American Release. After taking in a few interesting commercials and a brief introduction, we were thrust knee-deep into what was probably one of the best animes I've seen in the last year.

Before getting into it, I'll go into a bit of background. I've written about Mr. Otomo before, a bit briefly, but it cannot be emphasized enough that he is one of the most influential mangaka in Japan and one of the most stunning comic artists I've seen. His first and only other completed anime, Akira, brought the art form to Western Shores, opening up the floodgates which haven't closed since. Based on the much easier to understand manga of the same name, Akira expands upon themes presented in an earlier work (Domu) and combines them with the popular theme of science's place in humanity. Revolutionary for its time, the themes are still present in Steamboy, but are considerably less dense, and less emphasized.

Which brings us back to the movie. Steamboy is neither supremely high tech nor is it terribly unique in its steam-based theme, but that doesn't matter at all, its the characters and usage of this technology that get bonus points. One in a family of self-taught scientific geniuses, Ray Steam works in his grandfather's old workshop on inventions of his own while his father and grandfather are busy conducting experiments for the O'Hara Foundation. A mysterious package arrives from his grandfather followed also by two mysterious gentlemen with motives of their own. From there, the plot just barrels along viciously. Simple in concept, it only gets more twisted.

Animation-wise, the combination of hand-drawn and computer generated imagery is perhaps the most seamless to date. Production IG has really outdone themselves this time and what we've seen in Ghost in the Shell 2 and this film are just scraping the barrel of what the combination is capable of. What Titan AE and many others have tried to do, Mr. Otomo and IG have accomplished, which turns out to be pretty awesome stuff.

Having already seen one hyped anime this year, I was hoping this movie would be much less heavy-handed, and a ton more fun. I wasn't at all disappointed. Mr. Otomo has stated this movie was made in stark contrast to the dirge-like tone of Akira, non-stop action and fun fun fun. It's jam-packed with insanely imaginative ideas and designs. I mean, there's a steam-powered automatic dog-walker! Each action sequence also has been meticulously designed for highest impact also. From the get-go, we have a chase through the streets of a small town English Village with Ray piloting a steam-motorized unicycle and a self-propelled military tractor which destroys house, train, and everything in its sight. Even with the rapid pace, Mr. Otomo doesn't forget to make his characters three-dimensional. Motivations are complex, people get hurt, there is the true feeling that there is sweat and blood behind every exertion. I really expect nothing less from someone who created the complex protagonists from Akira.

What would be most interesting to see now would have to be the American dubbed version of the film. The version we saw was the Director's Cut with full Japanese Dialogue. Seeing the list of actors cast (Patrick Stewart, Alfred Molina, and Anna Paquin) makes me glad they're sticking to the English roots of the film, but I wonder how Ms. Paquin will do as Ray Steam. I know it's common practice to cast women in the young boy's role in most anime, but I have yet to see it accomplished in an American feature. Truth be told, I'm hoping these actors can capture the intensity of the original cast, and in doing so maintain the intensity of the film. I was thoroughly impressed by the movie, and have once again seen affirmation that the traditional hand-drawn animated form is not dead.

At least in Japan...

Overall Score: 4 out of 5 stars

Simon is the New Tetsuo: Postscript

On a side note, any movie with dialogue like "Cripes" and "Drat" has a special place in my heart...

Chew On This

Haven't done one of these in a while, but what the hey, here's a Free Will Horoscope for you to chew on:

VIRGO (Aug. 23–Sept. 22): Rural communities in southern Louisiana celebrate Mardi Gras with even more anarchistic exuberance than the festivities that take place in New Orleans. Roving gangs of masked revelers stop cars and good-naturedly demand money and gifts from drivers. Clowns with feathered headdresses knock on people's doors after midnight, begging for ingredients to make gumbo. Mardi Gras out in the sticks "is a lot like tickling," says professor of folklore Barry Ancelet. "When you get tickled it makes you laugh, but it also makes you feel uncomfortable." I expect it'll be that kind of week for you, Virgo. No harm will be done in the end, and the "tickling" will loosen you up, even if it sometimes annoys you.

As much as this 'tickling' is supposed to lighten a person up, it doesn't inspire a warm feeling. As a matter of fact, It invokes weird visions of being tickle-tortured in childhood and collapsing in a tearful fit of laughter. At the same time, just like the horoscope says, it makes me feel uncomfortable.

Maybe it's a sign that I need to loosen up a little more personally. I've never been one to open up to many people emotionally, really. It might stem back to the junior high days where no secret was ever kept longer than a minute. There were times when I was embarrassed, laughed at, picked on, and suffered many a similar injury any nerd in junior high went through. I don't look back on it with bitter eyes, but it might have something to do with whatever insecurities or inability to connect with strangers I possess today. As a matter of fact, when I think about junior high, most of what I remember are the friends I did have, and wonder what the heck ever happened to a lot of them.

This blog, however, has been an exercise in opening up in a way. There was a time, as some of you might now, when the blog was more of a depository for links and miscellanea found on the 'net, and maybe even a place for me to stash ramblings of poetry and prose. Today, it's evolved into a forum of sorts, just like any blog, of interests and critiques. My only real problem with this blog is its lack of focus. The past everyday format made it easy to update, but I still think it would stand better as a part of something larger.

Maybe I should finish that website I was working on...