Theme Thursday - Minnesota

"Our State Fair is a great State Fair. Don't miss it! Don't even be late..." Just got back from the Minnesota State Fair. I know you NYC people are probably thinking "state fair? how quaint." But it's the 2nd biggest state fair in the country, which is pretty impressive considering we're definitely not anywhere near the 2nd biggest state. And it's definitely not a small town kind of thing. It takes place in St. Paul and seriously like everyone goes. You can get tons of different fried foods on a stick, lots of free junk, art and music, local radio/tv/politics, etc. But the main reason to go is the food. All the greasy goodness. mmmmmm...

So this is what I ate: french fries, a sno cone, mini-donuts, Dippin' Dots, ice cream, waffle fries, a hot dog, corn on the cob (so good!), lefsa (I realize most of you non-Minnesotans probably don't know what that is) with brown sugar, a milkshake, and a literal bucket-full of Sweet Martha's cookies (I didn't eat the whole bucket. I brought most of it home). Yikes. That's kind of gross. But it was so good. And keep in mind, these things were shared amongst 4-5 people usually.

Anyway, I wanted to still do Theme Thursday, so in the spirit of the Minnesota State Fair, our theme for the day is, well, Minnesota:

Minnesoter [mp3] - The Dandy Warhols - "The Dandy Warhols Come Down" (iTunes)

Secretly Minnesotan [mp3] - Tullycraft - "Disenchanted Hearts Unite" (iTunes)

Minneapolis [mp3] - That Dog (iTunes unavailable)

And we'll end the day with some pictures:

A classic Scandinavian desert. I have had this at many a family holiday.

Not that crowded since it was a Wednesday, but still look at all the people!

Biggest pig in MN. Gross.

Baby pigs! aaaawwww...

The Mounties. I like the lighting in this picture.

The midway at night

The view from the Ferris Wheel

Funky Town

Hello from Minneapolis, MN, where I am on vacation until September 5th. This means I may be a little flaky about updating until September 6th or so, although hopefully you'll forgive me since I've faithfully posted 48 out of the 51 days that this blog has existed. But to make it up to you guys, I'm going to do one super-duper Minneapolis-themed post - well, that and because I never like to miss an opportunity to promote Minneapolis.

Minneapolis is, in my opinion, the most under-appreciated/underrated city in the United States. Everyone refers to the Midwest as the "fly over states," with maybe the exception of Chicago. Maybe. Otherwise it's New York and Los Angeles with nothing in between. And it's true that, besides the Mall of America (*gags*), we don't really have many blatant tourist attractions. But that's what's so great about the city. It's not a tourist trap (Mall of America isn't even technically in Minneapolis...).

First off, we have a really great arts scene. We have the reknowned Walker Art Center and Guthrie Theater (though they are no longer in the same building), among many other theaters and museums/galleries. We have the infamous First Avenue, which thank goodness didn't close a few years ago. Everyone who's anyone has played at First Avenue. Prince (or the artist formerly known as...) filmed Purple Rain there. We have Garison Keilor's "A Prairie Home Companion," upon which the movie was based. We have the largest Fringe festival in the country with 164 shows in 2006 (sorry I don't know the 2007 numbers, but I'm sure they weren't that different). We have tons of independent movie theaters and we are one of the few states with our own public radio (for the longest time when I moved to NY I thought NPR was New York Public Radio because I just assumed all states had their own public radio like we do) - in fact, we have multiple public radio stations and just a few years ago they came out with The Current, a public indie rock station which I highly recommend. They play a really great variety of old and new. And the song Funky Town? That song is about Minneapolis and the guy who wrote it is a MN native. That's right. Minneapolis is Funky Town.

In fact, lots of famous people come from MN: Bob Dylan, Jimmy Jam, Judy Garland, Prince, Al Franken, Josh Hartnett, Jason Behr, Garison Keilor, Sinclair Lewis, F. Scott Fitzgerald, August Wilson, Winona Rider, Charles Schultz (there are freaking Peanuts statues everywhere in the Twin Cities because they were painted by local artists and auctioned off for charity), Kirby Puckett, Mitch Hedberg, the Coen brothers, Terry Gilliam, T. R. Knight, David Hyde Pierce (well, he's not from Minnesota but he lived there for a while and worked at The Guthrie), Jessica Lange, Steve Zahn, The Hold Steady, The Honeydogs, Soul Asylum, The Replacements, Atmosphere, Tapes 'n' Tapes, The Trashmen, The Suburbs, Semisonic, and I'm sure there's even more that I don't know about.

A few years ago, we were named the top tech city by Popular Science magazine because of cool things like the skyways, the lightrail, the fact that you can use credit cards pretty much everywhere - including cabs (unlike stupid New York where you have to carry cash with you at all times for everything, especially if you need to take a cab), and the stop lights that change depending on traffic or for emergency vehicles (also unlike NY where it takes emergency vehicles forever to get anywhere because they get stuck in traffic). We have a pretty awesome Science Museum. Not to mention we are a very industrial city. Tons of huge companies are based out of Minneapolis - Best Buy, Target, 3M (that's right, the post-it was invented in MN), Aveda, General Mills, Pillsbury, Caribou Coffee (which is way better than Starbucks), Sun Country Airlines (who are awesome!), Northwest Airlines (who suck), Land O'Lakes, Magnetic Poetry (yup random), Old Dutch Foods and Xcel Energy.

We also have lots of pleasant nature. We are the "land of 10,000 lakes" and I live within walking distance of the "chain of lakes," which are a bunch of interconnected lakes in Minneapolis. They're really nice to bike around. And pretty much where ever you live in MN, you're not going to be too far from a lake.

Whenever I go home, I have a huge list of things I like to do (although it changes depending on the time of year). For this trip, the list is as follows:

~Walker Art Center
~The Guthrie (I doubt I'll make it there, but I still haven't seen the new building and now my friend Emilie works there so maybe I can get her to show me around)
~Salsa Dancing at Famous Dave's in Uptown (or Loring Pasta Bar if I wanted to go multiple times each week but I'm not that good so I don't)
~Minnesota State Fair (best state fair in the country. People from other states come to our state fair. I realize most of you big city folk won't understand this and will think it's quaint or dorky, but it's not a "small town" kind of thing. Practically everyone from MN goes to the state fair. And I mean everyone.)
~Minnesota Renaissance Festival (maybe... although I kind of doubt it. Everything's so overpriced and I am going to blow a lot of money on the state fair.)
~Caribou Coffee as often as possible since it doesn't exist in NY - I had one in the airport literally right after I picked up my bags.
~Convention Grill - a very very delicious 50s-style diner (best grilled triple decker-grilled cheese and milkshakes that I've ever had)
~Davanni's - their white pizza is the best pizza around, with no nutritional value whatsoever
~If it hadn't closed... Sydney's - one of my favorite restaurants (*tear*)
~Drive around the lakes or bike if it's warm enough (I actually really enjoy driving since I only get to do it a few weeks a year now... Especially when it's warm out and I can just roll my windows down and blast some music and cruise).

And now some songs by Minnesotan artists:

1999 [mp3] - Prince - "Prince: The Hits 1" (iTunes)

Funkytown [mp3] - Lipps, Inc. - "Funkytown (iTunes)

Somebody to Shove [mp3] - Soul Asylum - Grave Dancer's Union (iTunes)

Test Tube Kid [mp3] - Honeydogs - "10,000 Years" (iTunes)

Closing Time [mp3] - Semisonic - "Feeling Strangely Fine" (iTunes)

Can't Hardly Wait [mp3] - The Replacements - "Pleased to Meet Me" (iTunes)

Like a Rolling Stone [mp3] - Bob Dylan - "Highway 61 Revisited" (iTunes)

One Of A Kind [mp3] - Atmosphere - "God Loves Ugly" (iTunes)

Ok, and now my vacation officially begins. See you all after September 5th. Tata dahlings.

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After the Jump

Yesterday was the After the Jump music festival at Studio B. I hit up some of the free day shows, of which the only band I knew before hand was Ra Ra Riot. But like a good little blogger I did some research to figure out which bands I wanted to see. Here is how my day went:

It was super super hot outside, so the walk to Studio B from the G train (that's right, the G train) seemed a million miles long, but when we got inside the relatively spacious club it was fairly empty and air-conditioned, so it was heavenly (as opposed to hot and crowded like the last time I was at Studio B for the CSS concert). When I arrived around 3:15pm - I've already seen the Teenage Prayers so I took my time getting up to Greenpoint even though the festival started at 2pm - I could only find one of the two stages -the main stage, which was currently empty - until I asked someone where the second stage was. Turns out everyone who was there was watching Jukebox the Ghost in a small, slightly hidden, hot room (so much for that empty air-conditioned feeling). I couldn't see them because I'm short, the room was pretty full, and the stage wasn't very elevated but I enjoyed the last few songs that we happened to come in for.

Next up, in the larger, air-conditioned room was Locksley. Locksley was the only band I went in thinking I was really excited to see (besides Ra Ra Riot) based on the stuff I had listened to on their myspace and whatnot. They seemed the most like my favorite kind of music (poppy rock 'n' roll). And I was right. I think they were my favorite band of the day. I immediately had a good feeling about Locksley before they even started playing because they just looked so good as a band. They all have really great style (in my opinion) and their sense of style is very unified as a group. They seemed like nice guys the way the talked to the audience beforehand and they were all pretty good-looking. As soon as they started playing I liked them even more. They were really good and I really did love their music.

My favorite part of Locksley was probably when, in the interest of "music education" (the charity theme of the festival), they brought the idea of "audience participation" to a new level and literally brought audience members onto stage to play with them for a cover of The White Stripes' Hotel Yorba. That was fun, although they had a lot of trouble getting people on stage. It was a relatively low-key and apparently shy audience. They couldn't get anyone to come up and play harmonica, but they did get a mildly reluctant guitar player (who's girlfriend volunteered him) and a much more exuberant tambourine player.

After Locksley, Bling Kong played in the hot, stuffy room. I also really liked their aesthetic (they had fun costumes). They chose to play their set list based on a "choose your own adventure story" that they told between songs, which I thought was a neat idea, and a great way to force the audience to participate. I didn't actually stay for their whole set because it was just so unbearably hot in that room. But I did like what I stayed for. They were a lot of fun. My only complaint (besides the heat) was the distracting visuals being projected on the wall next to us while they were performing. Their performance was interesting enough, and the flashy (and occasionally pornographic) images were more an annoying distraction than anything else. Stick to performing guys. You don't need porn and seizure-inducing visuals to make you cool.

Back on the main (air-conditioned) stage was Golem. While their Eastern-European/ klezmer-esque music is not normally the type of music I listen to often, I was still a little curious to see them perform. I actually pretty much loved them. They were so much fun, and they were all very talented and such characters. My two wishes: that the violin player would've shown more of his personality and seemed like he was enjoying himself at least a little, and that the upright bass player had more solos. But the lead singer was so entertaining and energetic, and most of them looked like they were really having fun. The bass player was possibly my favorite. He would bounce up and down fervently with the music and his poofy hair would bounce with him. It made me giggle.

Last in my concert day (I didn't stay for the whole festival) was Ra Ra Riot. Like I said, they were the only band I knew before I found out about the festival. I liked them even more than I thought I would actually. They had a really great band chemistry - probably one of the best band chemistries I have ever seen. Not only did it seem like they were all really having fun and really getting into their music, but they all seemed to genuinely like each other. They were joking around and shooting each other smiles all the time. It was almost like we, the audience, weren't there and we were observing the intimacy of a band practice session or something. Plus they get major props for utilizing two of my favorite instruments - violin and cello. And they were really cool-looking electric ones too. Overall, it was a great way to end a day of concerts.

Heiroglyphs [mp3] - The Teenage Prayers - "Everyone Thinks You're The Best" (iTunes unavailable)

Good Day [mp3] - Jukebox The Ghost (iTunes unavailable)
Why Can't I Be You (Why Not Me) [mp3] - Locksley - "Don't Make Me Wait" (iTunes)
Enter Bling Kong [mp3] - Bling Kong - "Do The Awesome" (iTunes)
Warsaw is Khelm [mp3] - Golem - "Fresh off Boat" (iTunes)
Each Year [mp3] - Ra Ra Riot - "Ra Ra Riot - EP" (iTunes)

I'd say it was a very good day - especially considering it was free. Although I did spend $5 on raffle tickets and not win anything... Sadness. But it went to a good cause. I'll finish up with some more pictures (I'm definitely getting a new camera soon because the focus doesn't work half the time - sorry most of these are kind of blurry - and it also wouldn't turn on at one point):

Locksley

I had to get a picture of his awesome white patent leather shoes.

The guitar player going over the guitar part with the random audience member that got pulled on stage.

The lead singer tries to entice someone up to the stage to play harmonica

"Music education"

Bling Kong

Golem

Ra Ra Riot

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The love part of my love-hate relationship with Facebook

Only a very quick post today because I am going to After the Jump Fest and I have a friend visiting from out of town today, so I'm just going to post a few songs I found via almost every college student's #1 internet procrastination tool: facebook. There are many times when I have been tempted to get rid of my facebook profile, but one reason I don't is that I've obtained a few pretty good songs via facebook, legally and for free.

Spinning [mp3] - Anne Heaton - "Black Notebook" (iTunes). I discovered this song on facebook's "iLike" app or whatever it's called. Most of the stuff on there isn't so great, but every now and then there's a decent song. I like this song, though I feel like singer Anne Heaton is trying a little too hard.

Struggle [mp3] - Scott Fisher - "Scott Fisher" (iTunes). Also found this song on the "iLike" app. Kinda reminiscent of Ben Folds.

City of Love [mp3] - Persephone's Bees - "Notes from the Underworld" (iTunes). This one I got via the free weekly iTunes playlist promotion that they did through facebook for a while. Again, most of the songs were shit, but every now and then there'd be a gem, like this one.

Ok, that's all for today. Off I go to After the Jump. Tata dahlings.

Dance Party - 8.24.07

First week all summer I've worked (for pay) 5 out of 7 days. Yay! I feel much more productive (although at the same time, paradoxically, I also feel like I haven't gotten anything done because I haven't had the usual massive amounts of time on my hands to run errands). But thank goodness it's Friday. I have a fun (albeit very very busy) weekend ahead of me and then a splendid week and a half long vacation! Huzzah!

Since I'm going on vacation next week (details to come), I probably will not be posting any dance party songs next week (or really posting very frequently at all for that matter). So I am going to do another 10-song playlist to tide you over - while there's a few newer songs in here, I've also packed it with some classics/faves of my past, particularly from two-ish years ago when I had certain friends that would host almost-weekly dance parties that were always a blast. It's been a while since I've been to a good dance party. Lately I've found myself feeling a little nostalgic for those days. Again though, for time purposes, I'm going to do a zip file. In the zip file will be:

Lego - The Maccabees - "Colour It In" (iTunes)

Sea Lion Woman - Feist - "The Reminder" (iTunes)

Can I Get Get Get - Junior Senior - "Hey Hey My My Yo Yo" (iTunes)

Don't Call Me Baby - Madison Avenue - "The Polyester Embassy" (iTunes)

Banquet - Bloc Party - "Silent Alarm" (iTunes)

Stress - Justice - "Cross" (iTunes)

Until We All Fall Down (Cubismo Grafico Pea Coat Remix) - Rondo Brothers - "Seven Minutes to Midnight" (iTunes)

Talk to Me, Dance with Me - Hot Hot Heat - "Make Up the Breakdown" (iTunes)

LoveStoned / I Think She Knows Interlude - Justin Timberlake - "Future Sex / LoveSounds" (iTunes)

B.O.B. (Bombs Over Baghdad) - OutKast - "Californication" (iTunes)

And here is the ZIP file for you. Tata dahlings. Have a good weekend.

Theme Thursday - Masochism

A few things before I get to Theme Thursday. 1. Photos and a detailed description of The Mp3 Experiment 4 are up on Improv Everywhere's site. 2. I got to see a preview (or well, my friend called it a preview but according to their website, the play runs August 8th to September 9th, so I'm not sure why she called it a preview) of Shakespeare in the Park's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" last night. It was very enjoyable, despite the slightly chilly weather (but hey, it's no more chilly than most of the air conditioned theaters). And it didn't rain, so that's good. The second half of the play is definitely way better than the first half, so don't leave at intermission (I overheard a guy at a restaurant later saying he left at intermission because he was cold and I told him he missed out). I literally laughed so hard I cried. My favorite part (and I think everyone's favorite part) was the play-within-the-play. The only thing I didn't like was how much music they incorporated, particularly at the very end when they ended it with a boring song instead of just the monologues. The music seemed unnatural. It didn't quite fit and a lot of those actors aren't singers, so it didn't even really sound that great. For the most part the acting was great, although I didn't like the way Mireille Enos overplayed the role of Hermia. I'd have to say my favorites were the workers-turned-actors (who put on the play-within-the-play toward the end). They were all such characters and cracked me up every time they did anything. A word of warning to you if you go though, you have to get in line for tickets (because they're free) by about 7am even though the box office doesn't open until 1pm. I tried to go to Romeo and Juliet but I got there at like 9:30am and was already way behind the cut-off point. Luckily I got these tickets through a friend, so there was no waiting in line involved (I love theater but I am not about to stand in line - or "on line" as New Yorkers like to say - for 6 or so hours). Anyway, now on to Theme Thursday.

Since nobody gave me any suggestions, and since I did sadism last week, I thought I would make this week's theme masochism. Music for Masochists? Yay aliteration. This one should be a lot easier. As I said before, a lot of songs about unrequited love have a certain masochistic undertone.

Let's start with a classic 90s pop song: Love Fool [mp3] - The Cardigans - "First Band on the Moon" (iTunes). This song and I have a sordid (and masochistic) history and so it was the first one I thought of. It's so catchy and upbeat, despite it's rather depressing premise. Maybe this song doesn't seem masochistic to everyone else, but staying with someone you know doesn't really love you is pretty masochistic in my book.

Another upbeat-sounding song: Again and Again [mp3] - The Bird and The Bee - "The Bird and The Bee" (iTunes). This song's masochistic undertones are more subtle. But the lyrics have that sense of repeating mistakes because you just can't help yourself and it hurts but you can't get enough of it. Lyrics: "You're so stupid and perfect and stupid and perfect. I hate you, I want you, I hate you, I hate you. Again, again, again." I'd say it fits.

Mama Mia [mp3] - ABBA - "ABBA Gold" (iTunes). This song is the epitome of that whole "not letting go when you really should" thing I have been describing this whole entry. This one's pretty upbeat too. Why are all masochistic songs so upbeat? Strange, right?

Kill! Kill! Kill! [mp3] - The Pierces - "Thirteen Tales of Love and Revenge" (iTunes). I don't know if this song is so much masochistic as just about not being able to get over someone. But I'm totally obsessed with The Pierces and have been looking for a excuses to post about them again. Seriously people, "Thirteen Tales..." is definitely on my list for best albums of 2007. Listen to it. Love it.

My Man (Medley) [mp3] - Regina Spektor - "Live at Bull Moose" (iTunes unavailable). I'd say this one fits the theme best so far. "My man don't treat me right... but he loves me, he loves me, he really really loves me..." And hey, this one's not so upbeat either.

Ok, that's all for today. Leave theme ideas for next Theme Thursday! Tata dahlings.

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MIA's "Kala"

Yesterday, MIA's much anticipated album "Kala" was released. Making this album wasn't easy for MIA due to visa troubles with the US (we wouldn't let her back in the country for a while, stupid US). However, she made the best of it and recorded bits and pieces of the album all over the world, therefore achieving a pretty sweet variety of sounds - sampling everything from Brazilian samba to Jamaican dancehall to Australian Aboriginal to disco. While she has said the album is less political than her debut album "Arular," it's still pretty political (I'd even venture say it's not any less political) and I've heard it speculated that MIA's visa struggles may have been a small influence. I've also heard people say that the political messages of this album are more mature than in, "Arular." I can see where people would think that. The thing that stood out to me immediately though as the biggest difference between "Kala" and "Arular" is the sparseness of the music. At first, I have to admit, it's kind of off-putting, but the more I listen to the album, the more each song grows on me despite the scantness.

I think my favorite song is probably Jimmy, the Bollywood disco remake and one of the less sparse songs on the album. Although I also really love the kids on Mango Pickle Down River, and her deep, monotone rapping and the slightly haunting whispering in XR2. I would say her songs are generally less catchy than "Arular" because of the minimalism, but that doesn't make them better or worse - it just means there are not really many obvious "hits" that I can pinpoint right now (besides Boyz, which is also less sparse). I mean, there's not a single song on the album that I dislike, there just aren't many that stand out as "above the rest" (which, again, is not a bad thing). Overall a very strong album and a great follow-up to "Arular." One thing is for sure, the girl still makes me want to get up and dance.

Track List:
1. Bamboo Banga
2. Birdflu
3. Boyz
4. Jimmy [mp3]
5. Hussel ft. Afrikan Boy
6. Mango Pickle Down River ft. The Wilcannia Mob [mp3]
7. 20 Dollar
8. World Town
9. Turn
10. XR2 [mp3]
11. Paper Planes
12. Come Around ft. Timbaland

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So You Think You Can Dance?

Television generally kind of sucks during the summer, especially for people like me who don't have cable and tend not to like reality TV. However, there is one reality TV show I've really gotten into and that is So You Think You Can Dance. Seeing as the season just ended a few days ago, I thought I would write a post about it.

I love this show for a lot of reasons:
1. The dancing is so much fun.
2. It actually takes a great deal of talent, unlike a lot of other reality/competition/game shows where people get famous for just being extreme personalities. You have to compete in all different kinds of dance, so almost no matter how much training you've had, you really have to learn quickly.
3. It's bringing dance back as a popular medium. There aren't really many famous dancers out there right now that people who aren't really into the dance world know.

I stumbled on the show toward the end of last season (2nd season) and was immediately addicted. I was really happy when Benji won, because I really thought he deserved it - although I really liked all of the final four last year and thought they were all amazing.

This season I started watching from the beginning, although I definitely missed a lot of episodes. I have to say, despite how much the judges went on and on about the level of talent this season, I didn't really feel most of them were all that spectacular and I was not as happy with the final four this season. My two favorites were Pasha (who was in the final 6) and Sara (who was in the final 8). Pasha had a lot of training so I'm not surprised he was so good, but he just seemed super sweet and down-to-earth. Sara was a B-girl with (I believe) no formal training and she just kicked ass round after round. I was so impressed. And she is one of the few girls who didn't rely so completely on her "hotness" factor (meaning she didn't dress like a slut at every opportunity, because she is plenty gorgeous). She was also one of the less ditzy girls, which was refreshing. I was very disappointed when both of them got eliminated and I have to say I think the voters made the wrong choice.

Unlike last year, where I had a hard time choosing who I thought should win because all of the final four were just so awesome, this year I had a hard time choosing because I really didn't like any of them. Of the final four, though, I was glad that Sabra won. Lacey is a good dancer, but she certainly had the training for it (I think she may have had more training than anyone else in the top 10 if not on the entire show in general) and she just seems so phony and she is always performing out to the audience instead of really living in the moment of the dance with her partner. Plus she doesn't even really seem to like dance that much. She quit numerous times in her life and only took it back up when her brother, Benji, won last year's show - seems like a competitive thing to me or fame-seeking moreso than a love of dance. Danny is also very good, but I didn't think he did so well across all mediums. He was good at what he did, but he had some trouble with other genres. And Neil... he actually is not really a very memorable person in my mind. I was really surprised when he was in the final four because I was kind of like "who?" I'm not going to give an opinion about his dancing because I honestly can only call to mind one of the numbers he's done (although I did like that one). Sabra was very good across all mediums, not fake like Lacey, and she has only been dancing for four years, which is pretty unbelievable. I think she definitely deserved to be in the final four. But I still wish that Pasha or Sara had won because those two stood out consistently to me as very good, whereas Sabra didn't really start standing out to me until the toward the end. If I had my way, the final four would've been Sabra, Danny, Pasha and Sara.

Other people I liked who got voted off rather early so I can't really say too much about them were Ricki (voted off in the first round of the top 20... I think he could've gone really far if he had made it past that round and I think Cedric deserved to go a whole lot more than he did. Plus he seemed like a really interesting character), Hok (who made it to the top 12 and was such an interesting character, seemed like a very nice guy, and did very well in the various mediums for a B-boy. Plus I'm a sucker for accents), Kameron (I knew somebody who knew him, so I felt like I should route for him, and he just seemed like a cool guy) and Jessi (who I actually hated at first and was not that impressed by, but I felt really bad for her when she couldn't dance because she was in the hospital and then she got eliminated. I felt like she did really well in her solo and when she re-did the dance with Pasha and she didn't deserve to be kicked off that round because the other two girls' solos sucked. I think she probably got eliminated because she was a "liability" to the show).

The two things I don't like about the show:
1. Mary Murphy. That woman is possibly the most annoying woman on earth. Every time she speaks I want to gouge my eardrums out with a fork.
2. The ration of dancing to extra stuff. So much talking. When the judges are critiquing that's one thing. But there's so much inner-promoting (ie of Hairspray) and I just wish that there was more dancing and less other stuff, because the dancing is what's so awesome about the show.

I'm glad they got picked up for one more season though. To keep with the music theme, I will post an artist that the show introduced me to, Roisin Murphy:

Night of the Dancing Flame [mp3] - Roisin Murphy - "Ruby Blue" (iTunes)
Rama Lama (Bang Bang) [mp3] - Roisin Murphy - "Ruby Blue" (iTunes)

Here are some good "highlights reels" of sorts for the third season. Not that these were necessarily my favorites, but they're all pretty good. The last one on here is one of my all time faves though because it's really cool and it is my two favorite dancers together:

Oh, but I have to say for this one that, as happy as I am that they used "The Moment I Said It" by Imogen Heap (one of my favorite songs of all time), I'm not sure I like the dance that was choreographed for it. And I thought that the dance at the end with the flowers wasn't really that impressive. I felt like people only praised it so much because of the fact that the choreographer was like "this is about my father who passed away last year." I mean, you can't say it's bad after she says something like that:

And from Season 2, the Benji/Travis one at the end of this one is one of my faves. And I think one of the Roisin Murphy songs is in this one (it's in one of the season 2 highlights reels):

And the park bench one is probably my all time fave from both seasons (I know a lot of people love it, but it's just really beautiful and truly moving):

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One-Man Dancing Machine

Yesterday was the last of the McCarren Park Pool Parties for the summer, so I felt obligated to go despite the dismal weather. I definitely didn't stay the whole time though because it got downright cold the longer it rained, but I did catch YACHT and that made me really glad I went. Hailing from Portland, Oregon, YACHT consists pretty much of one guy - Jona Bechtolt (although his girlfriend joined him for the last two songs).

I'll admit, when Bechtolt first took the stage, all by himself, I was skeptical. It was just him. He didn't even have a DJ (the music played from his laptop). I wasn't so sure one person with a microphone could sustain the energy necessary to entertain the crowd, especially in the cold drizzle that started right as he took the stage. While I admired his courage, I thought it would be really hard to keep the energy level up without anyone else on stage to interact with or bounce energy off of. However, Jona quickly proved me wrong. He was a one-man dancing machine. He just never stopped grooving and he was so much fun to watch. Not only that, but he was funny too. Some of his lyrics made me laugh, and in between songs, he interacted with the audience.

Or maybe I shouldn't say he proved me wrong. I think he knew it's hard to keep the energy up as just one guy on a stage so distanced from the audience (it's a pretty significant drop from the stage to the audience), so at one point he sat down on the edge of the stage and had a "Q & A" with the audience - which was hilarious by the way, his improved answers were great - and then he even came out and danced in the audience for one song.

His girlfriend, who's name I don't know, is pretty cool too. She also just danced it up for the last two songs she was on stage for and had a blast. Although, I have to admit, I was a little disappointed when he said the word "girlfriend" because I definitely developed a bit of a crush on him as he performed... Hehe.

It's Coming to Get You [mp3] - YACHT - "I Believe In You. Your Magic is Real." (iTunes)
See A Penny (Pick It Up) [mp3] - YACHT - "I Believe In You. Your Magic is Real." (iTunes)

And the cute video for "See a Penny (Pick It Up)" - his girlfriend is the girl who picks the penny up at the end:

And more pictures:

Jona dancing (yeah, I know it's blurry. My camera sucks...)

Jona standing on the partition between the photo pit and the audience

It's like "Where's Waldo?" but "Where's Jona?" This is when he was in the audience.

Jona's girlfriend joins him on stage

They get down low

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Mp3 Experiment 4

Yesterday I discovered, rather last minute, the Mp3 Experiment 4 and so I decided to go. I've always wanted to go to something "mysterious" like this. Created by Improv Everwhere, this is an annual event (different each year) in which you download an mp3 from their website and go to a specified location with specified things at a specified time and once you get there, you (and everyone else there for the same purpose) listen to the mp3 and follow the instructions.

Here were the directions for this mp3 experiment:
Date: Saturday, August 18
Location: The World Financial Center Plaza by the North Cove Yacht Harbor
Time: The event will begin at exactly 4:00 PM. Arrive early and remember to budget time for weekend subway service delays. The event will be over at 4:36.
Wear: A Red, Blue, Yellow, or Green t-shirt.
Bring: A watch with a second hand; a digital camera or camera phone (if you own one.)
Instructions:
1. Download the Mp3: Click Here to Download (you can listen to it if you want to see what you missed for those of you who didn't go).
2. Load the track onto your mp3 player (iPod, etc) or burn to a CD for use with a “Discman.”
3. Do not listen to the track.
4. On Saturday, wear a t-shirt that is one of the following colors: Red, Blue, Yellow, or Green. (I wore blue)
5. Pack a digital camera or camera phone, if you have one. Keep it stowed away until directed to use.
6. Bring a watch with a second hand (or use your cell phone if it displays seconds.) Before you leave, sync it up to this atomic clock. (I had no clock with seconds or even a watch I could sink up to the atomic clock, which became problematic).

7. Anytime before 4:00 PM, arrive at World Financial Center Plaza and find a seat. Sit anywhere one would normally sit - park bench, concrete seating area, steps, etc. Spread out and don’t sit too close to others who look like they might be a part of it.
8. At exactly 4:00 PM, press play.

Some of the highlights of the various things we were instructed to do were play twister on the tiles of the plaza, find and skip around the "German tourist," parade to a park giving strangers thumbs up and high fives (the people there who didn't know about the mp3 experiment were SO confused...), play human darts (form a dart board shape with our various colors and then yellow were the darts who had to push their way to the center) and played freeze tag.

It was silly and the basic point was to make a fool out of yourself and be ok with it since there were so many other people doing it too, but it's always nice to have an excuse to be a little silly and I had lots of fun and I'm so glad I went. It was such a beautiful day too, I was so happy to be outside. It was 70 and sunny, and there was a nice breeze since we were by the water. I spent the rest of the day walking around because I just couldn't stand being inside. And now some photos:

The parade of colors as we went from the harbor to the park area

We were instructed to photograph a person in blue standing next to person in red.

We were instructed to photograph as many people as possible with nobody in yellow in the picture. I almost did it but people were moving as I took the picture, so there's a sliver of a guy in yellow in the background.

There's no one in yellow in this picture, but there's not that many people in this picture either.

People chilling out afterwards.

Maybe I will post more pictures later, once they put some up of the various activities (I couldn't take pictures while engaging in most of the activities). I went and looked at the stuff they did in previous years, and I have to say the past years actually looked even more fun (they had more crazy characters and stuff), but it was still plenty of fun, and I will definitely go next year if I can.

Oh, and while I was on my way there I saw that fire on Liberty Street and tons of firetrucks racing for it. Craziness. Tata dahlings.

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Singin' in the Rain

Sorry to be updating rather late... I've had a rather interesting (and kind of long) day. I will explain why tomorrow (but I'll preview it by saying I played freeze tag and twister in a park with hundreds of strangers).

Anyway, so last night was a free concert at the South Street Seaport as part of the "River to River" concert series. Unfortunately I missed the first band (Takka Takka) because I had to work until 7pm, and The Forms only played for like 10 seconds so I felt like I didn't even see them play, but I did get to see The National play their full set, which was the main reason I went anyway, and they were fabulous.

When I first got there though, it started pouring just as The Forms were going on. It didn't pour for very long, but then again they weren't on stage for very long. Maybe 2 or 3 songs I think (half way through the first song I got a text message and when I had finished replying to the person, they were like "ok, this is going to be our last song." I was very confused).

The good thing about the rain is that the crowd thinned out a lot so I was able to get up pretty close to the front. Not that it really mattered... The bad thing about the rain is that everybody puts their umbrellas up, which are impossible to see over, regardless of how close I was. Luckily, it stopped raining just in time for The National.

Since I didn't really get to see the first two bands, I will stick to talking about The National. They are from Brooklyn (woot! represent!). They have this intensity to them. It's really interesting to watch. You can tell they really love what they're doing and they love the music they're playing. They get so into it, it's like they're completely absorbed in their own music. They also switched instruments a lot, which showed that most of them are multi-talented, so I have a great deal of respect for them.

The one wish I had was that whoever was mixing the sound had turned the bass down a bit and turned the violin up a LOT. I couldn't hear it hardly at all except for during the quieter parts of songs, or when the violinist would get very feverish and aggressive about his playing. I really would've liked to hear more violin. And for two songs they had a trumpet and a trombone, which I couldn't really hear either. I was very annoyed at whoever was doing the sound mixing.

All in all though, a fabulous show and a fabulous night (once the rain stopped).

Mr. November [mp3] - The National - "Alligator" (iTunes unavailable)
Fake Empire [mp3] - The National - "Boxer" (iTunes unavailable)

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Dance Party - 8.17.07

Thank goodness it's Friday! This week was the first week since May that I worked (almost) full time, and besides that I've been rather busy. I had forgotten how tiring working full time and maintaining a social life can be. So now to kick off the weekend with some dance tunes. These are mostly kind of laid back dance tunes because that's what kind of mood I'm in, but hopefully that's ok.

Hot Girls in Good Moods [mp3] - Butch Walker - "The Rise and Fall of Butch Walker and the Lets-Go-Out-Tonites" (iTunes). As I've said before, I seem to be on a rock kick lately. This is another song that makes me want to hop on a motorcycle and go play pool at some seedy dive bar. It's also probably the closest to country music I usually get. You could line dance to this one.

Starz In Their Eyes [mp3] - Just Jack - "Starz In Their Eyes - Single" (iTunes). I'd like to dedicate this song to one Ms. Lindsay Lohan and one Ms. Britney Spears. 'nuff said.

Shadows [mp3] - Honeycut - "The Day I Turned to Glass" (iTunes). I wrote about Honeycut in my entry about funk. I didn't include this song though because it has more of a disco sound to it. Definitely still funky too, but it didn't quite fit with the other songs I had posted. This song makes me want to don bell-bottoms and disco. It's also a great song to listen to if you're walking somewhere.

Bones [mp3] - Editors - "An End Has a Start" (iTunes). This is a great upbeat rock song, but it still maintain a kind of "pretty" quality, which some rock songs lack. It has a bit of an 80s quality to it too. It's not the ideal dance song necessarily, but I think it's dance-able so I threw it in.

Ok, tata dahlings.

Theme Thursday - Sadism

Today's theme is (drum roll please): songs for sadists. That has a good ring to it. Should be an album title. If I hadn't just changed my blog name, maybe I'd consider it. No, it wouldn't really fit with most of the stuff I post.

It's already kind of a song title: Songs for Sadists Without a Place to Sit Down, by Charles Bukowski from "70 Minutes in Hell." Too bad I can't find a working sample of the song to listen to anywhere, so I have no idea what this song actually sounds like...

The bands that came up when I Googled "songs for sadists" were unimpressive so I'm not going to put them on here. If you're that curious, you can Google them yourself.

But the point of this theme is not to find songs that have sadism in the title. The point is that some songs just have a sadistic nature. This is actually surprisingly hard. There are tons of songs about masochism out there (hell, every song about unrequited love but the person just can't stop loving them and keeps going back for more rejection has a hint of masochism in it), but not as many on the sadistic side - I suppose those are more controversial if you're talking about getting pleasure out of other people's pain.

Let's start with the song that inspired me to pick this theme -

Smile [mp3] - Lily Allen - "Alright, Still" (iTunes). Now, this jolly-sounding tune may not strike you as sadistic sounding, and it is a song about smiling and recovering from being dumped, but listen to the lyrics: "at first, when I see you cry, yeah, it makes me smile." Definitely a little sadistic. Or at least full of schadenfreude. So maybe our theme is sadism/ schadenfreude because sadism has that kinky sexual undertone, and I'm not sure how many songs I could/would want to find about that.

Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) [mp3] - Eurythmics - "Greatest Hits" (iTunes). I know I already used this song for the first Theme Thursday, but with lyrics like "some of them want to abuse you, some of them want to be abused," how could I not use this song? And it's a great song. It deserves to be used twice.

I Can't Decide [mp3] - Scissors Sisters - "Ta-Dah" (iTunes). Another song I've already posted... Damnit, I should've thought of this theme earlier so I wouldn't be reposting these songs for this theme. Oh well. Choice lyrics: "I could bury you alive but you might crawl out with a knife and kill me when I'm sleeping that's why I can't decide whether you should live or die..."

The Cell Block Tango [mp3] - Chicago, the Motion Picture Soundtrack (iTunes). Ah yes, a song every girl loves and every guy gets uncomfortable listening to. Very fitting. Very fitting indeed. "You know some guys just can't hold their arsenic." He definitely had it coming... *evil laugh*

Schadenfreude [mp3] - the original broadway cast of Avenue Q (iTunes). Yet another musical. Not my favorite number from Avenue Q, but still a good number nonetheless. And obviously it fits with the theme.

Enjoy. And, as always, feel free to leave me ideas for next week's Theme Thursday. Tata dahlings.