Album of the Decade: Is This It?

~ Devanshu Mehta ~ Leave a comment

tshirt-sweatshirtOn the 28th of January, 2002 I attended a concert by The Strokes. I bought the tickets on a whim– the only songs of theirs I had heard were “Last Nite” and “Take it or Leave it” on the radio (94.7 The Zone in Chicago, now an Oldies station!). They were good, but so what? Their first album Is This It? came out late 2001, notable for the song “New York City Cops” being removed at the last moment because of the attacks of 9/11 (you could find it on the other side of the Atlantic). They were credited, at the time, with the resurgence of rock (that never quite came).

The concert was at a place called the “Web Theatre” in Phoenix, AZ, named after a failed dot-com venture where someone envisioned synergy between live performing centers and their web site. Didn’t quite work out.

I went alone– having recently moved to a state where the only people I knew were my parents– and sat in the balcony. Of course the General Admission area below was where the *real* fans were.

Julian Casablancas, The Strokes’ singer, let me know. “Are you hear to watch a f***in’ opera?” he screamed at the people in the balcony, halfway through the concert.

Not at all. Continue reading →

My Weekend: Bergman, Reitman, the Coens and Disney

~ Devanshu Mehta ~ 2 Comments

I watched four movies this weekend (a winter tradition), three in the theater and one at home, and they couldn’t have been more different from each other. I’m not sure if the four movies are in four separate quadrants, but they certainly wouldn’t feature on any double bill.

I already dealt with the Coens’ A Serious Man at length in an earlier post here. Here are the rest:

The Princess and the Frog
If hand-drawn Disney musicals were a significant part of your past, then this will make you optimistic for the next generation. It’s not in the same league ’90s Disney, but evokes a simpler time– like setting Cinderella in jazz age New Orleans.

One observation: this movie could have been made in any decade. It’s not like Shrek or Kung Fu Panda, where the style of the movie and currency of the jokes date it.

Up In the Air
Jason Reitman (Juno, Thank You For Smoking) is now 3 for 3 in my book. Each of his movies is one of my favorites for the year in which they came out. Up In the Air is in the spirit of Juno— a caustic insight in to human nature. And in the spirit of Thank You for Smoking— a caustic insight in to what human beings will justify in the name of their corporation. And what corporations will justify, period. This movie rides on the back of great writing and direction and three strong performances– Clooney as the frequent flier Ryan Bingham, Vera Farmiga as a female version of Bingham and Anna Kendrick as an aspiring Bingham.

I also saw Wild Strawberries by Ingmar Bergman, but I need some time to chew on that one before I write.

A Serious Man

~ Devanshu Mehta ~ 4 Comments

(If you’ve already seen the movie, you may want to scroll down to the spoiler zone.)

A Serious ManA Serious Man is the Coen brothers’ (Fargo, No Country For Old Men, The Big Lebowski) latest film, and it’s a lot of fun. It is a Jewish parable of sorts, with two Jewish parables contained within. It’s the story of Larry Gopnik in a Minneapolis suburb in what is most likely 1970 (there are clues). He teaches Heisenberg’s uncertaintly principle as his day job, and lives it at home.

“But I didn’t do anything,” he insists when the Columbia Record Company continues to ship and bill him a record every month. And that’s the story of his life. His marriage, his kids, his work life teeter on the verge of disaster.

But he didn’t do anything.

This is the kind of story I can imagine my grandmother telling me– without all the naughty bits, of course. But my grandmother’s version would have a punchline, or a pat ending. It would leave me with a lot of questions, but would at least leave me with one great takeaway line, a moral, some truthiness that I could live by or live with.

But the Coens don’t leave you with anything but questions. Maybe this is the difference between a Jewish parable and a Hindu one? I don’t know, I’m a goy.

This movie did make me think about two things about movies in general:

  • How soon after watching a movie should you be able to comfortably answer the question “What did you think”?
  • How much of that answer, if answered right away, depends on the ending?

With this movie, it took me a day or two and I’m still not sure I can honestly tell you what I think about the movie. I don’t know if it’s a 4-star or a 5-star movie. And the ending made it unsatisfying at the time– I walked out expecting at least one more scene– but that ending is what might push it from 4-star material to 5-star. It is a fantastic gamble.

Todd McCarthy in Variety said, “This is the kind of picture you get to make after you’ve won an Oscar.” I’m not sure that’s true. The Coens have been making movies like this before the academy paid them notice, but he may have a point about the cast. Before the Oscar, they would have needed a few big names in there– if only indie big names, like Coen favorites John Turturro or John Goodman or Steve Buscemi.

SPOILER ZONE
If you haven’t seen the movie, turn back now, for here there be dragons. Continue reading →

My Experiments With Loops

~ Devanshu Mehta ~ 3 Comments

Or loops na prayogo.

Earlier this year, I created two pieces of music using Garageband and my voice.

My Experiments with Loops

The first one was simply an experiment. I took many built-in loops in Garageband, and layered them in to something I found compelling. Every sound you hear is a loop that came with Garageband.

[audio:https://devanshumehta.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/01-my-experiment-with-loops.mp3%5D

Blue Skies

Next, I went one step further. I mixed my own voice (and some audio clips from movies that expressed the sentiments that I thought were shared by the music) with more loops and created something I call Blue Skies.

[audio:https://devanshumehta.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/blue-skies.mp3%5D

Enjoy.