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Monicker

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Posts posted by Monicker

  6. Posted

    This thread is like being in a mental institution. I feel sad but on the outside i’m laughing.

     

    If someone had told me years ago that one day there would be tiny cameras built into computers in people's bedrooms and they would willingly broadcast their madness to the entire world...

     

    Can you imagine being the person responsible for spawning videos like these, having that sort of cultural impact, and so quickly? How can anyone desire fame? 

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  7. Posted

    the grammys lost their credibility once and for all when psy and carly rae jepsen were nominated

     

    The Grammys lost their credibility in 1966. 

     

     

    She's eligible as long as the song hasn't been released prior to the film. The snippet we heard was a work in progress, so I believe it doesn't count (she's still eligible for a Golden Globe at least; Taylor Swift's Safe and Sound was a work in progress before she was approached to do the soundtrack, but she did however not sing a snippet on radio and I think she only mentioned this after the awards, but did Lana say specifically that it was written for Paradise? I seem to recall that she said it was something she was working on.)

     

     

    Ha, singing a bar of music during a radio interview is not relevant. That is not a "release" in any way, shape, or form. Don't sweat it on that front. However, if Y&B wins one of these awards i am going to bash my head into a table. And then cry. And then laugh.  I'm not sure in which order though. 

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  9. Posted

    I am totes here 4 TPD's shit. 

     

     

    gooble gobble, one of us

    You gotta admit this is pretty cool though:

     

    You know, before cuts were made, the original cut of the film had that scene starting with Prince Randian rolling that fucking cigarette. With his mouth. You know, because he had no arms or legs.

     

    Which leads to another moment in film:

     

     

    Happy Friday, Lana Boards. Hai Lana! 

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  10. Posted

    What the fuck is 14?

     

    Also, this is great. Her facial expression in that photo really seems to be appropriate to what i imagine she looked like (yeah, it already happened long ago, obviously) when she first came upon this here lil forum and she went through the emotions of shock, confusion, anger, sadness, hopelessness, back to anger, back to sadness, rage, and finally apathy. I've been saying it forever: she fucking hates our guts. If the entire worldwide Lana Del Rey community were a traveling circus, we would be the freaks from Tod Browning's Freaks.

     

    Who the fuck is evilentity? 

    1

  11. Posted

    Ha, i wasn't massacring you. Incidentally, i was contemplating the term "surf noir" just the other day and listening to that trve kvlt surf stuff on youtube, and i wanted to generally speak on the topic anyway. I think i may have even considered starting a thread. I like the term surf noir, and i have since i first heard it. I even like it applied to her in that same way that i like other things about her that i don't take too seriously, despite it not actually fitting musically. I feel like it's more of a conceptual thing than anything.  

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  12. Posted

    The pedant in me needs to weigh in here on the terminology (and i will suggest things that i think are truly befitting of the genre). 

     

    “Surf Noir” as related to Lana Del Rey is bullshit. I think there are very little to no surf elements in the Lizzy Grant stuff. It’s always seemed to me like it’s just a catchy, grabbing name she came up with that ultimately is meaningless.

     

    Let’s look at the term SURF from the genre of music and NOIR from the genre of film. Integral to surf music is a very straight, driving 8th note, fast 4/4 rhythm, though there’s definitely slower tempo surf stuff, and, of course, heavily reverberated electric guitars with lots of vibrato. There are other elements but those are the main, essential attributes, the telltale characteristics of surf music. And then there’s Noir, characterized by: darkness, shadow, bleakness, grit, mystery, and action. Carried out in ways that are expressionistic, gothic, off kilter, and even brutal.

     

    That said, i don’t think there’s much music that actually fits the conflation of these two descriptors. I think that specific coalescence of surf and noir most likely has to come in a modern context because most surf music/other styles that incorporated surf elements from the late ‘50s/early ‘60s tended to be rather “lightweight.” The idea of surf + noir seems like a pretty postmodern one to me. But, again, i don’t think there’s much out there that is truly fitting of that mostly imaginary genre, especially in the way of vocal stuff. 

     

    Here are a few things that, while having nothing really to do with the sound of the AKA album, are the closest to something that i think could be described as “surf noir.” Some of this stuff is a kind of natural evolution of Exotica: 

     

    A surf style cover of a song by the black metal band Burzum. Truly as surf noir as it gets:

     

    Actually, if you look up “trve kvlt surf” on youtube, you can find a lot of stuff in this style. Don’t fall for the joke in the description though--this stuff isn’t really from the ’60s!

     

     

    Secret Chiefs 3 do a good amount of dark sounding surf stuff:

     

    I couldn’t find this song on youtube, but it’s on grooveshark: http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Book+T+Orbital+Ballroom+In+The+Hall+Of+Resurrection/4kZK13?src=5

     

     

    There’s a certain tension and some dark undertones in The Chantays version of Pipeline that i think can loosely fit a noir aesthetic: 

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=omG-hZfN6zk

     

     

    John Zorn also has done a good amount of surf related stuff in a kind of modern Exotica context that has a darkness and mysteriousness to it: 

     

     

    There’s this too:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ybz7kHdmi1k

     

     

    I’m sure i’m forgetting stuff but that’s all i can think of at the moment. Maybe try some Man or Astro-man? too and some Stereolab. Joe Meek often had elements of surf and he produced a ton of girl groups and singers. Possibly try some Vincent Bell too. Check out Jerry Goldsmith’s score to the movies Our Man Flint (1966) and In Like Flint (1967), they definitely have some elements of dark surf, and they’re both some of the best film scores of all time to boot!

     

    But, again, this stuff isn’t in a Lizzy Grant pop vein.  

     

    Oh! Maybe some Julee Cruise:  

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uq_ix7nfkc

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dINbJL9HoII

     

     

    By the way, on an indirectly related note, i saw recently on wikipedia that Kill Kill is being described as having elements of... ELECTRONICA? Who writes this shit? 

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  16. Posted

    This is a bit off topic, but... For some reason, when I listen to those three songs I picture colors in my head. One day, I decided to go Photoshop and select the exact colors I was seeing. This is it:

    COLORS.jpg

    The green is G&M, the dark blue is Body Electric, and the light is Bel Air. Surprisingly, they go together quite well. It's just a coincidence that I think that both the songs and colors go well together. Maybe I'm just crazy. I'm probably just crazy.

     

    Are you sure your brain is not just doing: Gods and Monsters = Green, Body Electric = (dark) Blue, Bel Air = (light) Blue? And Body Electric is a "dark" song, while Bel Air is "airy" sounding, i.e. light/sky blue. And G&M mentions a garden, which = green. 

     

    Not that there's anything wrong with that! 

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  17. Posted

    Oh you guys. 

     

    I never started this thread because...i don’t know, you know when you have too much to say that you’re just better off not saying anything at all? What would i even say here, Hey, i love The Beach Boys, they’re great? How much would i say? How could i ever keep it at a reasonable length? Would anyone even care? Where would i even start? (Don’t sweat it, Erik, you’ve written this out in your head a hundred times before). What would i say about the music that, even after the wealth of different stuff that i’ve been exposed to throughout my years, has changed my life more than any other, the recordings that have taught me more about music than anything else, the subject that i’ve, seriously, probably studied more than any other? 

     

     

     

    How do i convey the delicious paradox that is The Beach Boys? Not only a group with so many disparate sides, but also one of the best kept secrets in music despite simultaneously being some of the most well known music in the world. Those who know, know--usually musicians, composers, record producers, students of music. The joke is on everyone else, those who think they know and who dismissively toss them aside, unaware of what’s beneath the surface--what i and (don’t think i’m alone and crazy on this one) many, many others, believe to be the greatest, weirdest, most fascinating, confounding, innovative, idiosyncratic, diverse, contradictory, mindblowing musical group. The most incredible group of singers that have ever gathered around a microphone. The band that initially served as the vehicle for the greatest composer, arranger, and producer pop music has known--until mental illness and drugs took hold of him at the point when he was both at his artistic peak and sitting on top of the music world, forcing the group to come into their own as an actual band, who carried on, creating amazing, timeless music outside of and unconcerned with whatever was happening around them. The group who were responsible for so many firsts in the history of modern popular music for which they never get the recognition. Always a few steps ahead of their contemporaries, always inimitable, always in their own category, always following their own path. Truly befitting of the expression to march to the beat of a different drum. Not always brilliant, but irresistible in their imperfection, in their missteps, in their follies, in their head-scratching decisions, a charming and totally perplexing lack of quality control (Lana Del Rey anyone?)

     

    And what could i say about that magical, one of a kind vocal blend, those dizzyingly complex and absolutely sublime harmonies that somehow always manage to sound simpler than they really are, the unmistakable chord progressions, those unconventional and adventurous arrangements, productions that changed the way records are made, true experimentation and an audaciousness that followed the sort of muse that doesn’t say no to anything? All those songs that manage to simultaneously posses a spirituality, joy, sadness, youthful innocence, and sophistication, songs and recordings that nobody else in the universe could have constructed. I reckon that the world of music would be a very different and much emptier place had Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys not passed through.

     

    I don’t say all these things because i love the Beach Boys. I love the Beach Boys because of all these things.   

     

    So how about i just present you with a nice Monicker playlist of 26 Beach Boys songs you must hear before you die :) (assuming you’ve heard all the hits and singles, which you have, right, because i know you don’t have your head totally up your ass? RIGHT?) 

     

    But first, forget whatever you may know--the striped shirts, the misleading “clean cut” family-friendly image, forget the uncoolness (don’t be fooled, The Beach Boys were, in their own way, cooler and more “out there” than anyone), forget the sensationalist stories, forget the abusive manager/father of the three Wilsons, forget the word genius, forget the mental illness, the drugs, the eccentricities, forget the mythology of the most famous unfinished/unreleased album of all time, forget the tragedies, forget the obesity and staying in bed, forget the bathrobe, forget the misinformation, the hero and villain mischaracterizations, forget the family feuding and lawsuits, forget the years of brainwash, overmedication, and malpractice, forget Phil Spector, the Charles Manson stories, and the stupid Beatles comparisons/validation.

     

    All that matters is what’s there on tape. And it’s all brilliant: the early surf and car stuff that your parents listen to on the radio, the avant garde stuff the music world marvels at, the melancholic stuff that has provided refuge to so many loners over the last 50 years, the amazing, just-as-great-as-anything-from-their-heydey obscurities that history forgot once the band was swept under the rug after 1967. How many artists do you know who had a stretch of at least nine albums in a row where they take on a different style on each one?

     

    But then most of the world doesn’t give a shit, and five decades on The Beach Boys continue to be reduced to just one fraction of their output, telling only a very small part of the picture. Far too many people expect little to nothing from them. The story of The Beach Boys, like most good ones, is one of tragedy and triumph. 

     

    Anyway...here are 26 songs you may have never heard but i wholeheartedly think you should. 

     

     

    In The Back of My Mind (1965)

    The Little Girl I Once Knew (1965)

    Please Let Me Wonder (1965)

    And Your Dream Comes True (1965)

    You Still Believe In Me (1966)

    I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times (1966)

    Our Prayer (1966)

    Surf’s Up (1966)

    Cabin Essence (1966)

    (1966)

    (1967)

    Little Pad (1967)

    Wind Chimes (1967) 

    Let The Wind Blow (1967) 

    Little Bird (1968)

    Time To Get Alone (1969) 

    All I Wanna Do (1970)

    Fallin’ In Love (1970)

    Cool, Cool Water (1970)

    Big Sur (unreleased version) (1970)

    4th of July (1971) 

    A Day In The Life of a Tree (1971)

    ‘Til I Die (1971)

    All This Is That (1972) 

    Steamboat (1973)

    I’ll Bet He’s Nice (1977) 

     

     

    Damn, this is a great compilation if i do say so myself. 

     

    The+Beach+Boys+brian++the+mirror+boys.jp

     

     

     

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  18. Posted

    Matt! It’s nice to have you back :). I’m glad to see a cinephile such as yourself praising Spring Breakers as much as you did. I’m especially glad that you singled out the last shot and that it impacted you so much. That last shot, man. I’m still thinking about it. It’s not hyperbole when i say that it's one of the very best last shots of any film i’ve ever seen.

     

    Gosh, i can just go on too long about this movie. And i think i'll do that because i have nothing better to do at this hour...

     

     

     

    I consider this movie essential viewing for many reasons--skip that Gatsby tripe and watch this instead! :D--but at the very least simply because there's really no other movie like it, and that’s saying a lot considering its director. 

     

    I saw it twice, each time having had a very different experience, and liked it even more the second time around. The first time i saw it alone in a mostly empty theater with people who were either confused by it or disliked it and didn't "get" it. The first viewing affected me a lot more on an emotional level. The second time i saw it in a packed Brooklyn theater with my girlfriend and five of her friends and there was just a very different energy in the room. For example, the hilarious opening sequence, which i love, was met by a lot of laughter from the audience, but during my first viewing the audience just sat there in a matter-of-fact silence. I found it more over the top the second time. I also noticed a lot more, especially things dealing with the distortion of time throughout the film (particularly in the last few scenes), what Korine has referred to in interviews as "liquid narrative." He has continually stated that he wanted this movie to feel like a drug experience, and i think he succeeded in that. But i think the very heavy use of repetition is one of the aspects that confuse/annoy a lot of the film's audience. If you go to any youtube video related to the movie, 95% of the comments are from people saying it’s the worst movie they’ve ever seen, ha. The movie deals a lot with disassociation and a kind of disconnect from reality--Spring Break for the four girls is like a spiritual experience--but it seems that’s mostly lost on the average movie goer. I think when most people go to the movies they get too caught up with believability, and this film purposely employs a lot of absurd pretenses that make one question its reality. 

     

    I've noticed that the movie seems to have fallen into a weird gray area that’s alienating to a lot of different audiences for different reasons. I think for a lot of the more “savvy” crowd who weren’t going to the movie just to watch Selena Gomez and Vanessa Hudgens, the movie didn’t have a clear enough commentary. But i appreciate that. I like that, as with all of Korine's other films, there is no heavy-handed preachiness, which would have been far too easy to do with a movie like this. As he’s said in press conferences, why do you need a filmmaker to tell you that murder is bad? I like that he's both celebrating, condemning, and just observing these cultures, this world. It’s ultimately about a feeling, a certain tone. He’s turning genres and tropes on their head while the movie is still immersed in those very genres and tropes (which, of course, is part of where the brilliance of the last shot lies). There’s a certain self awareness that comes through, which works with the bit of self awareness that James Franco brings to his character and performance. 

     

    By the way, Matt, that Selena Gomez scene you referred to was sprung on her like 15 minutes before they shot it. She had no idea they were gonna do it, as Korine intentionally kept it from her. So that’s her real reaction on camera, she was genuinely scared being there in that location--which was a real place that Korine found just the way you see it in the movie.  

     

    I really didn’t know anything about these girls before this movie (except for Rachel Korine), but i like them, i think they’re cool, especially Selena Gomez. These  actresses could have so easily used this movie and its publicity as nothing more than a calculated career move, as so many others in their position have done, but, after watching pretty much every interview with the cast, it really seems that they genuinely believe in the movie and really got it. They've all taken every opportunity to go out of their way to mention Harmony Korine by name and sing his praises as a filmmaker. That is really commendable in my book, and for that, in addition to how well they did in the movie, i have a great deal of respect for them.  

     

     

     

     

     



    it was my first korine film, so i'd be interested to hear how people with more knowledge of him would rank it within his body of work

     

    I recommend Mister Lonely, Gummo, and Julien Donkey-Boy in that order. I haven’t seen Trash Humpers yet so i can’t comment on that one. I still think though that Mister Lonely is his most fully realized project where, even more than any of his other movies, he really develops a unique film language. The movie has its own internal logic that dictates a very different world and kind of reality.

     

    If i had to rank his films it would go:

     

    Mister Lonely

    Gummo

    Spring Breakers

    Julien Donkey-Boy

    Kids (which he only wrote, not directed) 

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  19. Posted

    all people, regardless of age will still have the propensity to act out when someone blatantly fucks with their emotions

     

    Who was fucking with whose emotions? Aaron LaCrate, by being a dork on Twitter and people taking the bait, was fucking with said people’s emotions? I don’t really know what to say if what he did is considered fucking with people’s emotions. That sounds histrionic to me, but hey, we all have vastly different reality tunnels, and we can't dictate to each other what is and isn't a suitable reaction. I would try to put yesterday’s incident in perspective though, and examine how a big portion of this fan base gets when a leak is on the horizon. It seems to me that this isn't even about the music anymore, and that it hasn't been for a while now, but rather more about an obsession with a celebrity. If you sincerely think that this guy was fucking with our emotions, i would maybe spend more time away from the internet. I don’t mean that in a patronizing way at all, as i often give myself this same piece of advice.  

    5

  20. Posted

    Ahem...

     

    Allow me to quote myself from just a few pages back:

     

    I wonder if some of these smaller producers who worked with her in the past realize how crazy Lana Del Rey fans are. 

     

    Some of you become fucking vicious and completely blinded by a sense of entitlement when the mere prospect of a leak arises. Jesus christ, it’s just a fucking recording. Take a step back and look at your shitty, childish behavior.  

    11

  22. Posted

    RIDING HIS WHITE PONY NAMED KEVIN.

    WAIT, MAYBE KEVIN IS K. OMG.

     

    And K is just a pony. All right, mystery solved. Reality pales in comparison to the fantasy. Next. 

     

    Ponies, for some reason, always make me want to cry. 

     

    white_pony.jpg

    13

  24. Posted

    This many sound like a dumb post but, I didn't know there were brass instruments in the orchestral version.

     

    There aren't :) . From what i can tell it’s: full string section, (prepared) piano, celesta, tube bells, bass drum (though i don’t think it’s a real one--i think it’s programmed), and i think there’s some sort of synth bass, as well as some soundscape stuff. It’s funny because not only do they show the french horns where they’re not heard, but they also show timpani (interestingly, there are timpani in the other version of the song), and from 1:25 to 1:34 they spotlight violins in a part of the song where it's just the cellos and basses, and the violins and violas are tacet (not playing). 

     

    Music videos are an illusion  :godlaugh:

     

    Also, just to be pedantic, the other version of Y&B is just as “orchestral” as this one, it’s just that they’re specifically calling this arrangement the “orchestral version.” 

    5

  25. Posted

    Damn, i’ve been looking for diamond stick-on tears for so long to do a photo shoot, and i haven’t been able to find them anywhere. Claire’s sort of had something that might have worked but they, of course, looked so cheap. Where the hell can i get some like these? TPD, you’re good at finding this kind of thing online...HELP ME?  :hooker:

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