Uno by Green Day

This past September Green Day released this album which we are told is to be the first of three releases over a period of just a few months. With Dos out soon and Tres not soon after over the last few days I have listened to this the first record a few times and would have to color myself unimpressed.

Truth told I have never been a big fan of the band so this is no surprise. I think that American Idiot was a good album and certainly Wake Me Up When September Ends was a great song and a powerful video but the truth is that song was a bit of a departure from much of what the band has done.

As the band settles well into middle age they, to my uneducated eyes, seem to be struggling to stay relevant. Certainly Billie Joe Armstrong's meltdown at a recent charity concert leads one to suspect that perhaps being a punk band twenty five years after it's beginning is a perplexing thing.

The album itself is pretty bland. A few driving beats, some naughty words, and Armstrong's unique voice can still barely make your foot tap. It is just all so predictable, nothing is new, it has all been done a million times. There is just nothing original in the sound.

That is not to say the band has no merit. Some songs are better than others on every album and this one is no different. The second song on the album is called Stay the Night and certainly it has some appeal. Perhaps my big issue with Green Day is that same damn speed guitar riff over and over. It all seems so forced, all the songs with f2*k in them like it was off a checklist.

Kill The DJ is a neat little number in that it is slightly different and if nothing else expresses a sentiment that we have all felt, certainly if we have gone to any club where all they play is that awful dance music. Better than that is Fell For You which sounds a bit like a cross between The Ramones and a fifties band if, that is, a fifties band was talking about pissing the bed.


The first single, and as the albums are so close together in their release dates, the song that might well be most remembered in this whole three album production is called Oh Love and it is certainly superior to the rest of the albums. With that in mind however it still is nothing special and after four listenings you really do not care if you ever hear it again.

Perhaps the second and third albums will be better, they are supposed to each have a theme so there is hope. If not however it seems to me we may be looking at a band that has stayed too long at the party.

The Shootist

With some time to myself this afternoon I was going through the Tivo to see what I had recorded to watch. I started the movie Diner but fifteen minutes in realized that, at least today, I was not interested in teenagers in 1959 Baltimore. I gave Network some attention, this had Faye Dunaway( looking twenty years older than her role in Bonnie and Clyde ten years earlier ) and great reviews but a half hour in, that I will never get back, it seemed dated and frankly a little too inside the bubble for my tastes and that too was discarded.

As I took the television out of Tivo mode the channel had been left on AMC. Lo and behold what was just beginning but The Shootist. A 1976 movie known as John Wayne's last movie the film caught my interest and I watched the entire thing.

I have to say that I am not a huge Wayne fan but have enjoyed some of his movies. This movie was different. Centering as much on issues of mortality and dignity at the end of it this movie is stunningly strong. Watching the scene between the Doctor who confirms for the aging gunfighter Books that Wayne plays and realizing that in this very scene we see perhaps the two biggest screen actors of the last fifty years acting out a scene acknowledging mortality is very powerful. Jimmy Stewart as the Doctor gives one late example that he might well be incapable of a poor performance and Wayne is perfect in his role.

The cast in this movie was directed by Wayne. Wayne wanted Lauren Bacall who, playing the boarding house matron, is understated and thus uncommonly affective. The scene of Bacall and Wayne out for a Sunday drive is very well done. Ron Howard also appears in the movie as Gillam Rogers, son of Bacall's Bond Rogers. Howard is wonderful in the role, caught between little boy fantasies of gunfighters and wanting to protect his mother and his feelings of sadness at the pending demise of this figure from an old west that is ending as the twentieth century begins.

Wayne went so far as to have a part wrote into the movie for a specific horse. He wanted his favorite horse, Dollar, in the movie.

If your looking for a typical Wayne shoot them up movie this is not it. There are some gunfights at the climatic end but this movie is as much a thought piece on mortality and how it affects us all, even those of us who seem bigger than life and thus bigger than death. In the end none of us are as Wayne himself found out three years later when he died.

This is an excellent, and very underrated movie.

Revolution Gets Better and Better

It is time for a full on endorsement of this television show. Each week it gets better and better and if you have not yet joined the show it is now time.

JJ Abrams, using his Lost formula, with back stories abounding while the story continually moves forward appears now to have every chance of success and will certainly be renewed for another season. With that guarantee of time the show now has the challenge of not bogging down and keeping the story moving.

With his background with Lost however, there is no reason to think Abrams cannot succeed.

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

Things Fall Apart was the first book written in what has become known as The African Trilogy was released in 1958. Earning respect as one of the first African novels, by an African author, written in English the book has become one of the most widely read books of the African experience.

The book begins in the period of time of the 1890's. The main character is Okonkwo, one of the titled men and leaders of his tribe, the Umuofia. The tribe, while fictional, is modeled after the author's own tribe. Some of the experiences of the characters are also reflective of things that Achebe saw in his life in his village.

The book is divided into two parts. In the first part we learn much about the Tribal life if Okonkwo and his people. We learn about his compound, a part of the village carved out specifically for his family. In this compound he lives in his obi, which is the man's hut surrounded by his three wives, each of who have their own tent. We learn about his daily life and the life of his tribe.

While we read about some abhorrent practices of his tribe, such as when twins are born the still breathing infants are left in the woods as they are thought to be evil, we also see that much of the tribe's life is caring and gentle. The yam is the main foodstuff of the people and all work in their family plots in the garden area to grow them.

The author mixes many local lessons of tribal life into the the story with legends and sayings which correlate with their life but are not a stretch for ours either.

At the end of Part 1 an accident occurs and Okonkwo must pay the penalty. Still as he is exiled from the clan for seven years it is interesting to note that the same people who at daybreak will, by custom, burn his buildings and tear down the walls of his compound, will come the night before and help him to pack up his things and transfer his yams to a friends barn. In short custom must be followed but it is not personal. Perhaps we could learn from this.

In Part two Okonkwo travels to his mothers home village. Here he is welcomed by a cousin, his mother being long dead. It is interesting that when he hears of his cousin's exile he is welcomed with open arms. It was a female offense, that is one that does not result in a permanent exile. It again shows that in only modern civilization is prison considered an answer to a crime.

Part two predominantly shows us the influence of the white man on the tribes. A missionary appears and in a great shock to his system Okonkwo's oldest son becomes a Christian and is thus disowned by his father. Eventually seven years pass and when he returns to his home village, looking forward to earning his titles again, planting his crops, and in general rejoining his life where he left it Okonkwo is shocked at how much life has changed. A great deal of the tribe has either joined the Christian faith or become accustomed to living side by side with the Christians and their new adherents.

Eventually a crisis occurs and Okonkwo's part in it will again change his life forever. The book is well written and offers an unfiltered look at both the culture of the African tribes as well as how these same tribes were affected and changed forever by the influence of the white men and Westerners.

The Cure's Greatest Hits

80's music nostalgia is rampant these days. For someone like me who graduated in the early eighties that makes sense of course. The eighties certainly saw a great variety of music. The early eighties for us cool kids meant Van Halen before Jump brought them to the whole world's attention, Bruce singing Nebraska and not Born in the USA, and of course the first last album by the who It's Hard which featured Athena and Eminence Front. The ultimate test of course is did you buy The Final Cut by Pink Floyd and if you did, did you get it?

With all that however what I find one of the more enjoyable trips down 80's nostalgia is the melancholy music of the second half of the eighties. On the First Wave satellite station it often seems between The Cure and The Smith's with a little Thompson Twins thrown in they have time for little else. And surprisingly for me, that is just fine.

Maybe it is because while I was aware of these bands the first time around they were not overplayed on my floor in college. Whatever the reason The Cure in recent weeks has certainly become turn it up music in my vehicle. My kids look at me and say " Really Dad?" It is kind of a two fold look. Not just this is awful but this is not your normal awful music. So I will be the first to admit it is a stretch.

However as the saying goes the heart wants what the heart wants. Listening to The Cure's Greatest Hits album this morning there is no doubt of my being dead on in my assessment.

I cannot listen to Close to Me without tapping my foot. The stomp beat, post Clash and the absolute unique voice of Robert Smith on Why Can"t I Be You is infectious. Now truth be told this music is not for everyone. I have a friend who I am sure would revoke my membership in the he man club if he read this but I think it is well known I am pretty open when it comes to music.

Eventually The Cure went a tiny bit more mainstream or mainstream went a tiny bit more Cure and songs like Just Like Heaven became a success on the mainstream charts. Smith's vocal is a little clearer but he still had the breathy quality you either appreciated or did not. He certainly was not going to change. The peak of the mainstream success, rightly so, came about with " Lovesong" which by any standard is a great performance.

Also on the greatest hits album is one of my favorites. Lullaby, perhaps because it does not make any effort at being liked, it is odd, and Smith's voice is the voice that we remember when he was just the hardcore groups. The Cure really never got enough credit for the cleverness of their songs, the beats, the music itself, much stronger than was thought. Smith's voice, so original, tended to dominate everything else.

One cannot neglect the poppy " Friday I'm in Love " which appeared like a bolt of sunshine in the early nineties. You had to sing along, it was infectious, but the question for most Cure fans was what the hell is this. Did Mr. Smith finally get some anti depressants. No matter the song was one of their most popular and with the contrast to previous records it certainly was original.

I have to offer however that a couple of songs are inexplicably missing. Fascination Street which featured Smith in full Smith voice and has been offered in multiple versions for the hardcore fans certainly should be on this compilation. The obviously missing song in any collection of The Cure's Greatest Hits however is not including Pictures of You. When I think of everything that makes one think of music from The Cure this song has it. When Smith sings" I've been looking so long at these Pictures of You that I almost believe that they're real" captures all the sadness and depression that good or bad encompassed so much of the music of The Cure.

This band made many memorable songs, when you look over a list, you are shocked to realize just how much music they made. With Morrisey touring to stand out reviews in the states right now one wonders if a reborn Cure might not be far behind.

Brownville Girl by Bob Dylan

Brownsville Girl is one of those songs that Bob Dylan could record. Appearing on his Greatest Hits Volume III as well as appearing originally on the 1986 album Knocked Out Loaded the song was co written by Dylan and the playwright Sam Shepard.

While the album itself was not received that well the song is regarded as one of Dylan's best epic songs. Epic being one of the best of the many story talk songs that Dylan has recorded over the years.

Dylan sings about a girl that he still remembers, we assume over the passage of time, and in the course of telling the story of that girl we hear some lines that are classic Dylan. We hear the line " you always said people don't do what they believe in, they do what's most convenient and then they repent." If you think about that line it is as close to the truth as you will hear in a song.

Early in the song we learn about Henry Porter, who while the hero of the song waits for him to return, his woman tells him that " even the swap meets around here are getting pretty corrupt."

Most noted in the song is Dylan's continual references to a movie that he saw and remembered starring Gregory Peck. Throughout the song the protagonist keeps coming back to this point, that he remembers the movie, would see it over and over, and how he would see Peck " in anything, I'll stand in line."

The song will occasionally find it's way out of a playlist of mine or on a special day perhaps even on a satellite channel I am listening to. It is one of those songs that you never turn off, it is a sit in the car and listen to the end kind of song. How many songs can you say that about.

For me a great deal of those songs come to us from Bob.

Red by Taylor Swift

The music industry has seen it's profits continually shrink over the last decade. The answer is evident of how to solve this. Simply put the industry needs a few more Taylor Swift's.

Her fourth album debuted recently and shot to the top of the charts with sales of over a million in the first week. Compared to what other acts are selling over the duration of their albums runs this is remarkable.

It is not news that Swift is popular, ever since her single Tim McGraw took off a few years back her career has just gotten bigger and bigger. In our house my daughter knows all her songs and sings them constantly. I should say that there is a comfort in the fact that I can know my thirteen year old is listening to albums that I need no fear of the content.

With her fourth album Swift has not really broken any new ground. One song is a bit more adult, she sings " you can say anything as long as you say it with your hands" but that is about as risque as it gets. Of course much of the persona you see could be contrived and she could be a drug swilling, promiscuous twenty two year old but nothing seems to indicate this to be the case. Her appearances on television shows are cute, laughable, and her songs and voice match the personality shown.

She sings about her past relationships which are many, in ways that makes you think these could have been the same things she would have written in her journal were she not a successful recording artist.

The new album finds Swift branching out a bit more. The single State of Grace has U2 style guitars and could easily be a song a " real" singer sings.

Songs like I Knew You Were Trouble are among my least favorites but are unbearably catchy, in fact it gets my daughters highest approval.

Swift does not record songs that are not catchy. It does not seem like there is any filler on the album. On first listen I identified a few songs I thought that were just filler but on second and third listen to write this I realized that could not be said. In short her voice, her sense of melody, and one must not forget the songs she sings and writes are like earwigs. You cannot get them out of your head.

Begin Again is a song any teenager wanting to get back with her old partner can appreciate, a few adults could as well and the first single is perhaps the most infectious single of the year. When Swift sings We are never getting back together it is impossible not to sing along.

Other songs include the title cut Red which appears to be the second single but with a Swift album it is hard to know what are really the singles. Treacherous could easily be the flip side to Begin Again, same tone, could even be part of the same relationship.

The song that might be the most easily missed in relation to it's future success is called All Too Well. This is a sweet song, Swift's breathy voice fits it perfectly. The fact is all the songs have merit and one could review them all with a smile.

This girl is incredibly talented. Will she as he approaches her late twenties feel the need to sex it up so that she can be taken seriously. Let us hope not. Her songs are sweet, her personality ( that we see ) is sweet, and honestly, even if it is an illusion, does not the world need a little more outward sweetness.

I like the album but I love to hear my daughter singing the songs. That is worth more than one can realize until they witness it.