Happy New Year, IWBYB readers! I don't want to waste too much space on what a year it was. I choose instead to look to 2008. Hopefully, the year in music will be just as amazing as it was in 2007, which was a pretty darn terrific year in music from Spoon to M.I.A. to the National to Of Montreal and Lupe Fiasco and everything in between (Shins, Blonde Redhead, Spank Rock.) Here's hoping that the impact of Radiohead's distribution plan isn't so deeply felt that I can't buy CD's anymore. Let's also hope for a swift end to the WGA strike in Hollywood, because I need my 30 Rock. I also look forward to more great work by the Coens, Haynes', Lumets and Cronenbergs and pray I don't see a week as bleak as the one that took away Bergman and Antonioni. Let's hope to see our favorite bands live and our teams in the finals (again.) Finally, I hope that anybody reading this accomplishes what they want to and realizes what they need to. I know I'll try.
Just for fun, here are some links to my 3 favorite videos all year:
Justice on Kimmel
Alanis does Fergie
Boom Goes the Dynamite, my favorite video of any year, and my 2007 catchphrase.
Monday, December 31, 2007
Emery Bored
Not much of a story here folks, but when you have a headline all written for you like this, sometimes you have to put something under it. The fact of the matter is that Ray Emery is bored and not looking much like the hero he was last year. This problem speaks to three things: New Number One Martin Gerber’s talent, Ray Emery’s attitude problem and coach John Paddock’s mishandling of certain situations.
The first issue is really no issue at all. Last year, when Gerber stumbled out of the gates, I stayed in the minority, believing he would improve, remembering how good he had been. The only problem was having such a highly-paid talent play backup. Emery, however was playing great, helping the Senators get to the final and earning a raise.
Ottawa has bad luck with goaltending. From the weird inconsistencies of the talented Patrick Lalime to Dominik Hasek’s untimely injury, bad luck in net has been a plague. Now they find themselves with two talented goalies having their hot and cold streaks at the wrong times. Currently, they have two big ticket goaltenders in a hockey market where it is very hard to trade a goalie. (Ilya Bryzgalov, no slouch himself, had to be claimed off waivers to get some playing time in Phoenix.)
The big difference between cold streak Gerber and cold streak Emery is that Gerber was all class riding the bench and Emery is throwing tantrums and showing up to practice hungover. I blame Emery for his negative attitude and certainly don’t think his coach should pander to him, but I think the situation could have been avoided.
Although Paddock hasn’t approached Guy Carbonneau levels of talent mismanagement or John Tortorella abuse, his decisions have been unjustly insulting. From pulling Gerber out of a game that he was winning, to starting him on back to back nights, making it unnecessarily clear who was number 1, to not pulling Gerber at any point in an 8-6 loss the other night, his decisions regarding this conflict are creating unfortunate distractions for the team. The Ottawa Senators are in a very good position right now, and can afford to hand some starts to Emery to get his game back and hopefully move forward with the tandem that they paid for.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
A Pakistan Primer
Benazir Bhutto was assassinated today, shot during a suicide bombing. (Only in the Middle East, I tell you.) This event that made me realize that I know next to nothing about her. All I really knew was that Bhutto was a significant female political figure in the Middle East. So I got to digging. Here is A Dummy’s Guide to the Assassination of Benazir Bhutto and What It Means:
-Pakistan has nuclear weapons.
-Ms. Bhutto, the daughter of a former Primer Minister became leader of the Pakistan Peoples Party and was elected Prime Minister twice.
-She was the first woman elected to lead a Muslim state.
-Both times she was removed from office due to corruption. The first time was 20 months after her election; the second time was 3 years after her election.
-Corrupt or not, she was at the helm during a very significant period of peace and is seen by many to be the only hope for future peace in Pakistan.
-Elections were to be held January 8 in Pakistan, which is currently run by dictator Pervez Musharraf. This is where things get a little tricky and the conspiracy theories bubble up.
-On one hand, Musharraf was key in having the corruption charges dropped and granting Bhutto amnesty, ushering in her return to Pakistan from exile. It is thought that they may have been in talks to develop a coalition government-each receiving support from different factions in Pakistan. His power has been unstable since the coup that brought it to him. She was under house arrest prior to her assassination, and this may have been his way of protecting her.
-This, however, seems unlikely. Most see her as his opposition, and she has been outspoken about his dictatorship. Musharraf was holding up the process of a fair election by earlier declaring a state of emergency. He also passed a law imposing a 2-term limit on Prime Ministers. Both Bhutto and candidate Nawaz Sharif had served 2 terms already. Also her house arrest came just hours before she was meant to appear at a rally against the state of emergency.
-Whether they were keying up to be allies or remained bitter enemies, the fact remains that PAKISTAN HAS NUCLEAR WEAPONS.
-This event could cause instability in the Middle East.
-Further, that is. Could cause FURTHER instability in the Middle East.
-The question of who is behind the assassination (could be Al-Qaeda. Quickly: When the U.S. cut and run in their war against Afghanistan to focus instead on Iraq, the Taliban was able to get into Pakistan, a country that helped create them. Bhutto even supported them initially. The fact, however, is that Bush seems to support Musharraf, so it is hard to say why they would want to eliminate his adversary. Musharraf, obviously, could also be behind it. It’s certainly one way to win an election) may be a moot point. The real issue is that this assassination could galvanize Bhutto’s supporters, a large and downtrodden group. This would be a reasonable excuse for Musharraf to implement martial law.
-And all of this instability, all of this FURTHER instability, could lead to a civil war in a country that HAS NUCLEAR WEAPONS. Apart from the sad loss of a powerful and important woman who may have been a key to unlikely peace, the truthful maybe of the previous sentence, a sentence featuring the words ‘instability,’ ‘nuclear’ and ‘war,’ is worth keeping in mind.
-Also, the paternity of Jamie-Lynn Spears' child is still unclear. For more information, you could log into Fox News for the first half of the day, while most other sources were covering the assassination.
-Pakistan has nuclear weapons.
-Ms. Bhutto, the daughter of a former Primer Minister became leader of the Pakistan Peoples Party and was elected Prime Minister twice.
-She was the first woman elected to lead a Muslim state.
-Both times she was removed from office due to corruption. The first time was 20 months after her election; the second time was 3 years after her election.
-Corrupt or not, she was at the helm during a very significant period of peace and is seen by many to be the only hope for future peace in Pakistan.
-Elections were to be held January 8 in Pakistan, which is currently run by dictator Pervez Musharraf. This is where things get a little tricky and the conspiracy theories bubble up.
-On one hand, Musharraf was key in having the corruption charges dropped and granting Bhutto amnesty, ushering in her return to Pakistan from exile. It is thought that they may have been in talks to develop a coalition government-each receiving support from different factions in Pakistan. His power has been unstable since the coup that brought it to him. She was under house arrest prior to her assassination, and this may have been his way of protecting her.
-This, however, seems unlikely. Most see her as his opposition, and she has been outspoken about his dictatorship. Musharraf was holding up the process of a fair election by earlier declaring a state of emergency. He also passed a law imposing a 2-term limit on Prime Ministers. Both Bhutto and candidate Nawaz Sharif had served 2 terms already. Also her house arrest came just hours before she was meant to appear at a rally against the state of emergency.
-Whether they were keying up to be allies or remained bitter enemies, the fact remains that PAKISTAN HAS NUCLEAR WEAPONS.
-This event could cause instability in the Middle East.
-Further, that is. Could cause FURTHER instability in the Middle East.
-The question of who is behind the assassination (could be Al-Qaeda. Quickly: When the U.S. cut and run in their war against Afghanistan to focus instead on Iraq, the Taliban was able to get into Pakistan, a country that helped create them. Bhutto even supported them initially. The fact, however, is that Bush seems to support Musharraf, so it is hard to say why they would want to eliminate his adversary. Musharraf, obviously, could also be behind it. It’s certainly one way to win an election) may be a moot point. The real issue is that this assassination could galvanize Bhutto’s supporters, a large and downtrodden group. This would be a reasonable excuse for Musharraf to implement martial law.
-And all of this instability, all of this FURTHER instability, could lead to a civil war in a country that HAS NUCLEAR WEAPONS. Apart from the sad loss of a powerful and important woman who may have been a key to unlikely peace, the truthful maybe of the previous sentence, a sentence featuring the words ‘instability,’ ‘nuclear’ and ‘war,’ is worth keeping in mind.
-Also, the paternity of Jamie-Lynn Spears' child is still unclear. For more information, you could log into Fox News for the first half of the day, while most other sources were covering the assassination.
Monday, December 17, 2007
No Bells for You
I recently took an extra-enthusiastic (and fairly ignorant) Spoon fan to task for some amusing behavior witnessed during the same show that I had to endure some extra-drunk (and completely oblivious) revelers getting all up in my space. In their defense, they were at a rock concert. In the venue’s defense, security gave the boisterous pair a glare that shut them down. I enjoyed that, but have come to expect occasional drunken stupidity at the type of show that I enjoy. If a Tori Amos concert-intimate, that is-were the type of show I enjoyed, I would find bad behavior grating.
Fortunately, so does Ms. Amos. You can check out a better report here than I will provide you (complete with video.) The gist is that two girls were coming and going, talking on their phones and generally abusing their front row privileges. So Tori kicked them out. It’s that simple folks. We’re trying to have a society here. So behave, already, or you’ll be shown the door.
Stomp
First things first: the NHL is cracking down on violence and the Philadelphia Flyers are having none of that. But, whatever the Philadelphia Flyers are guilty of (hits from behind mostly, a little cross-checking), it doesn’t compare to the latest psychotic act from New York Islanders goon Chris Simon. Prior to this, Simon had been suspended 7 times for a total of 40 games-basically the equivalent of three 2007 Flyers. That number will go up for this stabby stomping.
I had felt good about hockey this summer, when the NBA was dealing with gambling referees, the NFL was ignoring Michael Vick’s gruesome hobby, and the WWE (notarealsportbutwhatever) was suffering through a tragic familicide and accusations of encouraging steroid abuse. (The MLB, for their part, had the usual doping questions to hide from.) Hockey was looking pretty clean until it started up again.
But instead of focusing on the negatives, like why in the world violent acts seem to be increasing proportionally to the league’s efforts to eliminate them, I would like to commend the New York Islanders organization for the correct handling of an unusual situation. Instead of waiting for the league to measure intent against prior record into a sum of games, they sent Chris Simon to counselling for an indefinite amount of time, allowing him to (hopefully) take care of some issues knowing there will still be a place on the team for him, but not for his brand of justice. It’s refreshing to see a team that can balance their responsibilities to both their player and the league.
I had felt good about hockey this summer, when the NBA was dealing with gambling referees, the NFL was ignoring Michael Vick’s gruesome hobby, and the WWE (notarealsportbutwhatever) was suffering through a tragic familicide and accusations of encouraging steroid abuse. (The MLB, for their part, had the usual doping questions to hide from.) Hockey was looking pretty clean until it started up again.
But instead of focusing on the negatives, like why in the world violent acts seem to be increasing proportionally to the league’s efforts to eliminate them, I would like to commend the New York Islanders organization for the correct handling of an unusual situation. Instead of waiting for the league to measure intent against prior record into a sum of games, they sent Chris Simon to counselling for an indefinite amount of time, allowing him to (hopefully) take care of some issues knowing there will still be a place on the team for him, but not for his brand of justice. It’s refreshing to see a team that can balance their responsibilities to both their player and the league.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
White Girl
Today’s people-who-should-really-think-twice-before-they-speak-to-reporters news is brought to us by Angelina Jolie. Whenever I used to walk by the supermarket tabloids and see cover stories about how she loves her adopted babies more than her biological child, I used to think, “She may be eccentric, doesn’t seem very nice and hasn’t made a good movie in 10 years, but nobody should write dirt like that about someone’s children.” It’s pretty much the lowest form of tabloid journalism, literally, therefore, the lowest of the low. It didn’t cross my mind that it could be true, but then, “it could be true” never crosses my mind when I’m reading in the supermarket aisle.
As turns out she’s said as much recently, and twice! That the second quote makes it sound like she shops for orphans the same way she would for dresses (“This one has PERSONALITY!”) is probably just context. I do find it alarming that she doesn’t see any harm any making comments like these. I try not to concern myself too much with the plights of celebrity children, nor do I have any real interest in celebrity gossip. I find this notable only because Jolie, for all her flaws, seems like a fairly intelligent woman, who should be savvy enough to watch what she says.
As turns out she’s said as much recently, and twice! That the second quote makes it sound like she shops for orphans the same way she would for dresses (“This one has PERSONALITY!”) is probably just context. I do find it alarming that she doesn’t see any harm any making comments like these. I try not to concern myself too much with the plights of celebrity children, nor do I have any real interest in celebrity gossip. I find this notable only because Jolie, for all her flaws, seems like a fairly intelligent woman, who should be savvy enough to watch what she says.
An Inconvenient Suitcase
I still consider Al Gore a hero of mine. From the time before the 2000 “election” when he called environmental disaster the number 2 threat to the United States (behind, guess what, terrorism,) I thought this could be the greatest thing to ever happen to my continent: an environmentalist as President of the Free World.
Disappointing, then, that he is so frequently criticized by the depleting faction of Bush apologists that refuse to see the future as a time worth thinking about. He can take it, of course. But why, Al, do you make it so easy for them sometimes? He can charge whatever he wants for speaking engagements, and I’ll bet that a lot of that green isn’t just “lining his own pockets,” but also being spent on research. (Although at approximately $7000 a minute, he should have the cash by now to save the planet himself.) Even worse, in my opinion, is using two separate modes of transportation for him and his luggage. Isn’t the whole point of his rhetoric that some sacrifices have to be made for the greater good? In any case, I still love Al Gore, but nobody should have to tell him to smarten up.
And, as an aside, I feel about as sick and dirty as I should using a link that shills for Ann Coulter to dis Al Gore.
Disappointing, then, that he is so frequently criticized by the depleting faction of Bush apologists that refuse to see the future as a time worth thinking about. He can take it, of course. But why, Al, do you make it so easy for them sometimes? He can charge whatever he wants for speaking engagements, and I’ll bet that a lot of that green isn’t just “lining his own pockets,” but also being spent on research. (Although at approximately $7000 a minute, he should have the cash by now to save the planet himself.) Even worse, in my opinion, is using two separate modes of transportation for him and his luggage. Isn’t the whole point of his rhetoric that some sacrifices have to be made for the greater good? In any case, I still love Al Gore, but nobody should have to tell him to smarten up.
And, as an aside, I feel about as sick and dirty as I should using a link that shills for Ann Coulter to dis Al Gore.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
Not in My Universe
(Apologies to anyone out there who reads IWBYB. Production was stopped briefly due to home computer issues and not, as has been speculated, in sympathy for the Writer's Guild of America. Computer problems now fixed, production has resumed.)
I remember one autumn, back in high school, desperately reaching for cool in the newsstand, when the Generation Next issue of Rolling Stone crossed my eye. It contained barely any copy, but photo after photo of alternative artists like Afghan Whigs, Sugar, PJ Harvey and, uh, Tony Toni Tone. This was a first, early step toward discovering my own aesthetic, though it’s clear now that they were only capitalizing on the alternative nation, growing stronger after the unifying suicide of Kurt Cobain. But, to me, this was like a book of magic. Which is why I can look at the controversial Camel “Indie Rock Universe” advertorial and fondly reminisce about that nearly-15 year old tastemaking issue.
Unfortunately for Camel, times have changed, and they are getting into trouble for their own stupid decision to design their pullout like a high school notebook. Which means doodles. Which means illegal. Cigarette companies are no longer allowed to target children through advertising, and this includes using cartoons, a condition that was likely specifically passed to destroy the phallic-faced Joe Camel character. Now, I don’t imagine a lot of kids read Rolling Stone anymore. I can’t even really imagine who does. But wrapping a cigarette ad around a notebook design seems phenomenally stupid. The cartoons, for their part, big up the irony.
The Indie Rock Universe itself is pretty amazing, in a shallow and random way. Over 200 bands are listed, and it includes everybody who’s anybody in the world of hip music, alongside some pandering crap like Fall Out Boy (actually that whole planet kind os stinks.) I combed the list and Regina Spektor is the only name I couldn’t find on it. And the crazy thing is that Camel has not only opened itself up to liability in every state that carries Rolling Stone magazine. They also didn’t get the artists’ permission to attach them to its product, which could open them up to liability from nearly every act out there (besides Ms. Spektor) that is not making enough money on CD sales anymore. Thank you Big Tobacco!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)