Shine a Light

I finally went and saw the Stones/Marty Scorsese concert film "Shine a Light" last night.

The concert was filmed at the Beacon theater here in New York City in October of 2006 as part of former President Bill Clinton's 60th birthday celebration.

The start of the film shows Scorsese and the Stones planning the logistics of the concert. The movie goer also gets a glimpse into a Stones rehearsal for the show and Scorsese and his crew setting up lights and cameras in the Beacon theater. We also see the Stones being introduced to Hillary Clinton's mother Dorothy Rodham and Bill and Hillary's ten year old nephew, plus the thirty VIP's that the Clinton's brought to the show.

Out of those scenes, I really liked seeing the planning and the setting up for this show cause it reminded me of on a whole other level of course, of the planning and setting up of the MEANY Fest special guest shows. The scenes were the band is being introduced to Hillary's mother and nephew and the thirty VIP's felt a little pretentious to me. As did the crowd shots during the performance scenes, there seemed to be some very young beautiful people in the audience that night who looked as if they didn't know who the Stones were and were playing it up for the cameras and it made me wonder if they were actual fans or actors!

The performance scenes sans the crowd shots of the beautiful people are really fantastic, watching the Mick and the boys, makes you realize what a kick ass band the Stones still are after some forty five years and many personnel changes! Jack White of the White Stripes, Christina Aguileria and blues man Buddy Guy are the three special guests that come out and join the Stones for a song. My only other complaint about this film was they gave Christina Aguileria the wrong song to sing! She sings "Live With Me" from "Let It Bleed" and while I like Miss Xtina, I think her voice would have been better suited for "Gimme Shelter". When she sings her bits on "Live With Me" she does that annoying vocal vibrato acrobatics thing were she sings a word and has to sing every note with in that word, it kinda ruins that song and I totally hate that!! Plus she was trying to make her voice sound gritty and rock like and it just wasn't working! I will say Miss Xtina and Mick together on stage was pretty sexy! Buddy Guy, was really great, he sang "Champagne and Reefer" and Jack White did a bang up job on "The Loving Cup". Even though he looks like the undead... Jack White is so freakin' hot!!

One of the things I really loved about watching the performance footage was watching both Keith Richards and Charlie Watts on stage. They both are really great characters of rock and roll and just two of the greatest sidemen ever. The energy, musicianship and stage presence for all the Stones is just amazing to watch!!


"Shine A Light" is further proof that the Rolling Stones are the greatest rock and roll band and Keith Richards is the coolest guy ever! And the performance footage is worth seeing this film on a big screen!! Worth the $11.00 for sure don't wait for it to come on HBO!!

Arlene's show this weekend....

To all the souls who won't be heading off to the beach or the mountains this memorial day weekend and are staying in New York...come on out to Arlene's Grocery this Saturday night 5/24! It's a GNYC night on Saturday at Arlene's. The warm up to summer fun starts at 7:15pm.

On the bill are:

Dr. Mary
Mornings
Afterdawn
Bludik Von Kremdip
Westgate
Underwhelmed
The Cliffs

Arlene's Grocery is located at 95 Stanton Street between Ludlow and Orchard. The show is 21 and over and it's a ten dollar cover charge.

Go Ask Amy.....

Usually when I get bored at work what I will do is look something up on Wikipedia and click on all the links associated with that article. I just saw a film with Richard Gere called "The Hoax" which is a true story about Clifford Irving an author who claimed he was writing a biography on movie mogul Howard Hughes with Hughes full cooperation. Irving, got a one million dollar advance on the book and there was a lot of hype surrounding the publishing of this book, because at the time Howard Hughes was very reclusive and known to not give any interviews to anyone. As it turns out the whole story was a hoax and Clifford Irving faked the Howard Hughes interviews and was arrested for fraud and embezzlement.

Anyhow last week I was bored at work and I looked up Clifford Irving and clicked on all the links associated with his article on wikipedia. One of which was literary hoaxes. One of the articles linked under literary hoaxes was an article about a book that came out in the early 70's called "Go Ask Alice". The book is supposedly the diary of a teenage girl from a nice upper middle class family who got mixed up in the world of sex, drugs (namely weed and LSD) and rock and roll and died from a drug overdose. The book for many years was a pretty controversial book for kids (12 to 17 year olds were its target audience) to read and many schools across the US banned the book because of it's frank description of sex and drug use. And as it turns out the woman who "edited" the book was a devout Mormon and she is thought to have been the real author of the book.

Well the article about this book had me intrigued. And so this weekend as I was making my rounds I stoped off at the McNally bookstore on Prince Street and picked myself up a copy, when I asked the girl who worked behind the counter in what section of the store I could find a copy of the book; she looked at me with a straight face and said "you didn't read this book in secret when you were in the fifth grade...every kid did"!! And I looked at her with straight face and said no I just read the article about this book on wikipedia last week. Once I got home I dug right in and the book made me seriously laugh it read like a really bad after school special. You can tell a lot of urban legends about weed and LSD grew out of this book.

I just had a vision in my head as I read it of this story getting the John Waters treatment on film. I could see Britney Spears as "Alice", Patty Hearst and Tab Hunter playing the parents and Lindsay Lohan as the best friend "Chris". I'm surprised John Waters hasn't turned this book into a film already with Divine as "Alice" and Mink Stole as "Chris".

Very campy this book!!

Two GNYC shows at the Mean Fiddler and Arlene's this weekend. Details later this week.

I leave you with a clip of the Jefferson Airplane preforming "White Rabbit" at "Woodstock"...the lyric "Go Ask Alice" in "White Rabbit" is were the book gets its title from.

Friday Reading.....

Interesting article from the current issue of Rolling Stone; the article is all about how licensing music to films, TV shows and advertisers is what is making musicians money over CD sales and downloads in this current shitty economy.


Rock's New Economy: Making Money When CDs Don't Sell


For Austin rockers Spoon, 2007 was a breakthrough year — but not because they sold a lot of records. Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, their album on the indie label Merge, garnered more radio play than any disc in their 15-year history and earned them an appearance on Saturday Night Live. So far the disc has moved just over 250,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan — about half of what Spoon's manager, Ben Dickey, believes it would have sold even five years ago. "But as far as the band is concerned, the record is a hit," says Dickey.
The reason? CD sales are no longer the yardstick the band uses. While hip-hop and pop artists ranging from Jay-Z to Britney Spears have long used recordings to sell every- thing from perfume to liquor, rockers are only just starting to think of album sales as a component — rather than the sum of — the commercial equation. Spoon have been actively licensing their music for use in films, television shows and a Jaguar commercial, making money, gaining exposure and moving up from clubs to 3,000-seat venues.

Album sales are down 25 percent since 2000, leading to widespread predictions of the record business' demise. But smart artists and managers are finding new ways to reach fans and make money. "For some bands we represent, there's more licensing income than record sales," says Carol Sue Baker, whose Ocean Park Music Group has been connecting independent artists with music supervisors for movies, TV and advertising agencies since the early 1990s.

The rest of the story is linked here:

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/20830491/rocks_new_economy_making_money_when_cds_dont_sell

Curvy Girls Rule!!!

A non music post for the day.

One of the reality shows that I will cop to watching is "America's Next Top Model", the addiction started when my friend and her yoga studio were featured on the second cycle of ANTM. Ever since then everyone knows were to find me on Wednesday nights at 8pm, I even watch the marathons on VH-1. And I always take Tyra, Miss Jay and Mr. Jay's advice about posing with your eyes in pictures, walking and just being fierce in general!! Yes I'm a geek I know!!

Anyway being a curvy gal I always routed for the plus sized gals on the show and in the past seasons the curvy gals on the show have always been meh, they have been pretty with blah personalities (Diana from season eight) or have been straight up annoying (Robin from the first season). Tocarra was the only really memorable plus sized gal from ANTM that is until Whitney from this season!

I liked Whitney from the get go! She is classically beautiful with the blond hair and has a great body and she has confidence.

***SPOILER***

I was so happy that she was named the winner last night....bout time us curvy gals got some love!!

Now I know the gals that win ANTM really don't go on to become supermodels, but I was just so happy that Tyra and the gang chose a plus sized girl this year!!

OH GOOD LORD..... NO PLEASE...JUST GO AWAY!!!!!!!

I just read in the Gothamist blog that the MTV series "The Real World" will be shooting it's 21st season in Brooklyn this summer! The speculation is that MTV will be filming in Williamsburg. I stopped watching that show after I graduated high school and realized it's got to be one of the dumbest, phoniest shows on the face of the planet, that was after the San Fransisco season! And most of the people that "star" on "the Real World" especially the people on some of the more recent seasons are some of the most obnoxious, vapid morons known to man!!

So to my fellow New Yorkers get ready for seven twats hand picked by MTV casting to be invading The McCarren Pool parties, shows at Pete's Candy Store, Union Hall, Southpaw and The Williamsburg Music Hall and bars all across Williamsburg and other parts of Brooklyn and Manhattan!! And I wonder if the "job" the gang gets is doing booking for the Williamsburg Music Hall or if it's a city related "job" like working with kids at a city run day camp.

I can totally predict how these episodes are gonna go; the token innocent suburban rich spoiled girl from the mid-west is gonna get drunk at the Black Keys McCarren Park show and make out with the token bisexual wild child girl. The next episode the gang will be at Pete's Candy Store for a show and the token bisexual wild child girl will hook up with some dude in a really shitty band, that MTV paid Pete's Candy Store to put on their stage, then the token bisexual wild child girl and the guy in a shitty band will go back to the apartment and get event drunker and have sex on camera; all in front of the token innocent rich spoiled suburban girl who will act all traumatized by the experience but not really; cause the token rich innocent suburban spoiled girl really wanted the dude in the shitty band all to herself and so now she's pissed at the token wild child bisexual girl and they get into a fight . Throw the token angry bitchy girl into that mix and a fight starts on camera between all three girls and the token really nice guy will break up the fight. In the following episode the token douche bag conservative republican jock from Texas will get into a fight with one of the locals at Union Pool, the token gay guy will get into fights with the token douche bag conservative republican jock guy over his sexuality, then in the next shot we see the token gay guy at a bar in Chelsea complaining to his friends about the token douche bag conservative republican jock; the token bitchy girl will call her boyfriend to talk about how much she hates her roommates. And then; the token really nice guy and the token douche bag conservative republican jock will find some skanks from the south shore of Long Island hanging out at The Alligator Lounge (those girls went there just to get on the show) get drunk with them and bring them back to the apartment and the douche bag jock will hook up with one, the token nice guy just talks to the other, he meets the real love of his life while riding his bike on the Williamsburg Waterfront. And it's reveled in that episode that the token bitchy girl has an eating disorder.

See there!! I can write episodes of "The Real World" and make it look real!! That's how predictable this show has gotten!!

Anyway I urge hipsters and non hipsters of Billysburg and elsewhere to unite! Let MTV know we don't want their trite and contrived shitty show shooting in Brooklyn or anywhere in New York for that matter! Time for MTV to end this mess of a show and not make anymore of these douche bags household names!!

http://gothamist.com/2008/05/13/real_world_broo.php

Video Tuesday....

My Morning Jacket freakin' rules!! Check them out from this past weekend's SNL episode doing their new song "Evil Urges" from their new up and coming album of the same name. My Morning Jacket is so amazing in every little way!! My Morning Jacket is just a really good straight up rock and roll band!!




The next video is for Scarlett Johansson's debut single "Falling Down" from her album of all Tom Waits covers called "Anywhere I Lay My Head". I really like Scarlett Johansson, she's a great actress and she's beautiful, but I honestly don't know what to make of her singing. It's interesting in a sort of good way, the music of the song is really cool and I sorta like her vocal on this song and it's far better then the Five O'clock Heroes/Agnyes Dean song. But still.... I'm not blown away, Miss Scarlett should stick with her day job!!



And the last video for the day! Even if his political views were liberal just like mine, I would still hate Bill O'Reilly! The man is an arrogant,tightly wound, windbag, jackass! This clip just proves that!! My theory why old Billy freaks out in this clip, is cause none of his associate producers would massage his body down with a loofah in the shower! We all know how much he likes his associate producers to massage him with loofah in the shower!!