C.D.s: SOME LOUD THUNDER, by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

(Originally posted on Yelling About Music, http://www.questionablecontent.net/rlblog/index.php)

Every business has its clichés, the music business not the least of them. Among the most persistent in music is the idea of the "difficult second album": the idea that …

C.D.s: WHAT I'M TRYING TO SAY IS: on "getting" Charlie Parker

Humanity's been making art for a long time now. And for just about as long, it's been talking about art. And rediscovering old art: it's often tempting to think that we live in a golden age of awareness of what went before us; but remember the various rediscoveries of …

Film: BANG BANG, YOU'RE DEAD: thoughts on Hot Fuzz and Hollywood vengeance

Everyone worries about violence. Even people who perpetrate violence habitually or frequently, tend to do so because they believe that they're pre-empting violence that will surely be coming to them or their loved ones or whoever. The rest of us just worry about getting …

C.D.s: THE FINE ART OF THE ALBUM: thoughts on the Decemberists

I’m going to tell you a couple of small things about myself in this review. Well, this Virb thing is technically a blog site I guess, but still . . . Anyway, I’m talking about music here, and music is nothing if not personal, so – I’m going to tell you a couple …

Film: BOBBY, written and directed by Emilio Estevez

So it turns out I did go and see it on Sunday night. It went a little better than when I tried to see the film on Friday night: Friday was a bit of a wild day in Melbourne, and it finished off with an electricity substation catching on fire and blacking out a large …

C.D.: ETIQUETTE, by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone

It would be inaccurate to say I’ve been thinking long and hard about what film, C.D., or T.V. show would be the first to be honoured with a review on this site – if “honoured” isn’t too grand a term. I only set up the site this afternoon, barely three hours …