2004-08-29 - 3:28

French platypus

Since last I wrote, I caught another concert: Death From Above 1979, with Controller.Controller opening, at Zaphod's. Very cool. We went mainly because Laurie is a fan of Controller.Contoller and she played their EP enough to make me interested. After the live experience, they've won me over, for sure.

Death From Above was a total unknown for me; but I thought that they were great. The band is just a rhythm section, with the drummer/singer going a million miles an hour and the bassist kicking out a huge sound. Despite the limited instrumentation, the duo remained interesting for the duration of the night, earning a strong crowd reaction with their noisy set. It's not too often that you get the opportunity to mix it up in a little mosh at Zaphod's.

(I wrote a short recap of the show for my other site; but this entry summarizes it well enough.)

I saw Control Room last weekend, which is a documentary about Al Jazeera and their coverage of the war. That was a very well made movie that was mostly observational in style, rather then directing the viewer to a conclusion. Any news organization will have its own perspective or bias. Al Jazeera comes across fairly well in the film, though, being presented as just another news channel, rather than the propaganda outfit that its critics accuse it of being.

The movie profiles some very interesting characters, including a chain-smoking producer who plans to send his children to live in the U.S., a star reporter, and a very sharp U.S. military spokesman who is openly introspective in his reactions to the war. Control Room shows the interactions between those characters, as well as a behind the scenes look at the workings of Al Jazeera, making for a fascinating movie.

On the downside, I managed to once again sit by the most obnoxious person in the theatre. The lady behind me felt the need to voice her reaction to everything that happened in the movie. Her main reaction of choice was scoffing and sneering every time an American was seen on screen, whether or not they had said anything yet.

Her insecure need to audibly advertize her point of view was annoying enough; but it was particularly offensive considering that it contradicted the spirit of the movie that she will have undoubtedly professed to enjoy. Jeering at someone and dismissing his point before it has even been made, simply because he's wearing a U.S. military uniform, is somehow better than discounting a news channel simply because it is run by Arabs? Her attitude is the flip side of those people who know nothing about Al Jazeera, yet were upset that the station was granted a Canadian broadcast license.

At any rate, I'm sure that we can all agree that talking in a movie theatre should be a capital offense.

Other than the concert and the movie, not so much has been on the go lately. Laurie picked up Upwords, which is a take on Scrabble. So far, as usual, Laurie has tended to win, although I did squeeze out a victory last time.

This week has been a return to the old days for me--with Laurie out of town for a few days, the place is rather quiet. I did get together with Flett today, though, for another guitar-b-cue. Good stuff.

J.