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A Hundred Dollars and a T-Shirt: A Documentary About Zines In the Northwest US

Watched A Hundred Dollars and a T-Shirt DVD: A Documentary About Zines in the Northwest DVD.

I found the DVD at the Portland Zine Symposium a couple of months ago. Produced by Microcosm Publishing, the documentary mostly covers DIY publishers mostly in Portland, Oregon, but also around the Pacific Northwest. It discusses the reasons why people either handwrite or print out stories and articles they've typed, cut and paste them on to an 'original', and then photocopy then staple the copies and distribute them either at local shows or independent bookstores. The documentary features mostly interviews without any narration, and some "re-enactments" while the interviewees were telling stories, like the one about a girl breaking into her dad's office to use the copier. There was more disdain for the Internet—which some think encourages writing without considering the effects—than I expected, and the only reference to weblogs was to "webzines" (which are so 1998" and LiveJournal. I point that out because the way they describe zine culture is very similar to the way bloggers define theirs: started by nerds who don't any respect for The Man and did it without having a business model in mind with a 'do-it-yourself' attitude. Also, there is no real "big picture" interview by an academic, and the history of how zines started seems to depend on who you ask. That said, it's a good introduction to zines and the people and places behind them.

American Splendor

Watched American Splendor DVD.

My second viewing of the movie, I again loved how it mixed documentary interviews with acted scenes (the bulk of the movie), frames from Harvey Pekar's comics, on which the movie is based, the comics being based on his daily life. As with most second viewings, I noticed a little more, and this time had the ability to pause and read the comics that went by too fast the first time. I won't pretend to understand the graphic novel scene, only having flipped through a few and read through one, but I've liked what I've seen, particularly of the stuff that's a little more real than superhero or crime-fighting stuff.

White Teeth by Zadie Smith

Finished reading White Teeth by Zadie Smith

Really great book, which I bought at Powell's Books late at night and started reading at the Portland Coffee House that night. Bought it because late one night the month previous I saw the made-for-TV special based on the book, but only the second half, so I wanted to know how it started. The second half of the book differs enough from the series—the principle example being the back-story about the French doctor and the denouement of that thread—to make that part of the book worthwhile too. Really great insight into immigrant British culture caught between their two "homes" as well biraciality (if that's a real word) of Irie, one of the principal characters of the novel.

I've already quoted from the book twice: once about the twentieth century, and another about teenage smokers, and I'm keeping track of the author's mentions in weblogs.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

Watched Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard at Bard on the Beach.

Of the three Shakespeare plays I've read, Hamlet is my favourite, and after having watched Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead the movie, I decided to see it performed in the legitimate theatre. It was really great, really funny, my favourite part coming at the very end, where Rosencrantz says "here must have been a moment, at the beginning, where we could have said ... no." Hopefully I didn't ruin it by blurring out the last word before the actor did.

For those who don't know, the play centers around two minor characters of Hamlet who, obviously, get starring roles in this one, and find themselves meeting The Players, and then all of them finding themselves with the play Hamlet (without really knowing it). It's your basic recursive play, also touching on so many subjects it's hard to fit them in a paragraph, much less a sentence, but they include the nature of chance, reality, memory, acting, sanity, and, overall, death. The actors from the Bard on the Beach production of Hamlet played their scenes in this play (the actors who play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern play, respectively, Guildenstern and Rosencrantz in Hamlet), and the only significant part that was "missing" from my experience having seen the movie was the puppet show.

They announced during the play that tickets were sold out, but the couple whom I sold my second ticket to was able to get in (meaning that they were able to themselves get a second ticket from someone), so I understand there's still a chance to see it this year. If not, hope that they put on a production next year, and if they do, I imagine I'll attend again.

Milan has an excellent review of the play, performed earlier at Bard on the Beach this year.

Let It Die

Purchased Feist's Let It Die on iTunes Music Service.

Pinder is still months ahead of me: he commented a Coolfer article about Feist, calling her "very Smiths / Belle and Sebastian". I heard "Mushaboom" on KEXP and one thing—looking at the del.icio.us tag for 'feist'—led to another—finding an article on CBC Radio 3 about her which has three live tracks (as much as I like the studio version of "Mushaboom", the live version of "Intuition" with the siren in the background as she signs "uh oh" is most poignant)—and then finally to buying her album on iTunes Music Service.

The album art for iTunes Music Service Canada is different from that of the American release, shown both in the Amazon and Coolfer links below. You can see the album cover I have in my iTunes the 'import' release page on Amazon.com.

Getting Things Done

Finished reading Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen.

The phrases "open loop" and "next action" are now ingrained in my head, but even after reading the book and various articles on both the book and the system, I don't feel motivated to make collection baskets (real or virtual) or 43 folders. The ideas are interesting, though, and has got me thinking about the things I worry about that could be settled if I write down what they are and what I can do about them.

City of God

Watched City of God DVD.

The obsessions with everything Brazilian continues. (See my article on Brazilian woman, a brief review of a compilation of Brazilian music for more on the obsession.) City of God is an excellent movie, beautifully shot, with plot twists some of which were obvious (like who killed the people in the motel) and some not. It was not as violent as I expected it, at least in terms of what they showed. There are certainly moments of horrific violence which occur just off-camera, and justifiably so, since the story is told from the point of view of Rocket, who is an outsider to almost everything that happens in it, except, of course, at the very end. If you get a hold of the DVD, stick around for the hour-long documentary on the favelas, which are characterized as a war-zone. I've never been to one, and never will be to one, but it makes me wonder if people like Diplo, who includes the word "favela" in his baile funk compilations—see the Pitchfork review for Favela Strikes Back to see what I mean—have ever been to one. The scene in the documentary of the policement escorting a subject up a favela, with the women of the neighbourhood following them (so that the police won't execute the suspect), then back down, is easily the documentary's most haunting. City of God, the second half starring Seu Jorge as Knockout Ned, is a beautiful, complex, sometimes scary film about the poorest areas of a poor country.

Endtroducing

Received DJ Shadow's Endtroducing... (Deluxe Edition) double-CD in the mail.

Mutual Slump seems more subdued, and features the Star Wars related quote at the beginning instead of in the middle. (It's longer too. Woman: "Do you feel like Darth Vader?" Man: "Yes." Woman: [laughs] "Then I'm Princess Leia, five feet under.") It's weird hearing that and "Building Steam with a Grain of Salt" without the overdubs, because I kept expecting the scratches and vocal samples, like the quote about the music flowing through him (in BSWAGOS) and the Xanadu quote in "Mutual Slump". The alternate beats are far too shorts: they are rough cuts, but really great rough cuts. A note about this: I bought this online from djshadow.com, and even though I got a t-shirt and a poster and a sticker with it, $50 USD seems like a bit much, and that's not even considering I had to pay $12 Canadian for customs. That said, the remixes included are required for DJ Shadow completists, and the album contains much more detailed liner notes than the original. That said, I've been meaning to buy this, my favourite album of all time, again, because the copy I have has so many scratches from the hundreds of times I played it, combined with my customary mis-handling of CDs.

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