Baxterblog

Baxter's back

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 16:41:02 -0700

Hi there. I'm back, after not posting since April. My life has been complicated for the last few months, both personally and professionally. But it's not something I ever wanted to write about; this was never an autobiographical, let-it-all-hang-out type of blog. One thing that's really helped me in these difficult few months was a steady stream of good, new music. So for a while, this will mainly be a music blog.

And why don't we start off with a new random ten? From the mp3 player:

1. The Absence of Your Company - Kim Richey - from Chinese Boxes.

2. Where Will I Be - Emmylou Harris - from Wrecking Ball

3. Shakey Ground - The Temptations - from The Ultimate Temptations

4. Golden Earrings - Wes Montgomery - from Impressions: The Verve Jazz Sides

5. Paris - James McMurtry - from Americana Master Series: The Best of the Sugar Hill Years

6. Real World - The Bangles - from Children of Nuggets

7. Frosty - Albert Collins - from Truckin' With Albert Collins

8. London's Burning - The Clash - from The Clash

9. Love Will Tear Us Apart - Joy Division - from No Thanks! (video: Ian Curtis biopic)

10. Kid Gloves - Voxtrot - from Voxtrot

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Thank you, Bob

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 11:56:03 -0700

Bob Worral was a hell of a guy.

He could make you feel like a lifelong friend after one conversation. Because he was intensely interested in other people, he could quickly find out which of his many interests overlapped yours, and soon you'd be talking like old friends. His friends and coworkers loved him for his humor, his outreach to others, his basic decency and the fact that any adventure you had with him was bound to make a good story.

When he married my sister Maryjo two years ago, they were determined to make it not just a beautiful day for themselves, but for everyone they cared about. They drew family and friends from all over America to St. Augustine, Florida, a city where they didn't live but whose beauty had impressed them in a trip the previous year. It was a great ceremony, a great day, and all us Baxters were overjoyed that MJ had found a complementary soul, someone who shared her taste for world travel and adventure.

Earlier this month, on a business trip to India, Bob spent a day at the Taj Mahal, and reckoned it one of the best days of his life. It was a monument to love, he later wrote in an email, and the love that built it was palpable everywhere.

Two days later, MJ got the call that Bob had died in his hotel room, apparently of heart failure. As new spread throughout the family, his company, and his friends throughout the world, everyone had the same reaction - no, not Bob.

One of the reasons I haven't been blogging lately is that I got stuck on this. I needed to write about Bob, but didn't know how, didn't feel I could do him justice. This is my best shot, and it's not enough. I enjoyed every minute I spent with him, but ultimately feel there weren't enough minutes. Thanks for everything, Bob.

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Random ten

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 04:29:19 -0700

1, Colorado - Stephen Stills

2. Believe In You - Amy Rigby

3. Broken Arm - Winterpills (available as a free download at the SXSW website - highly recommended)

4. Second Brain - Kaki King (different track available at SXSW - wonderful guitarist)

5. Here Comes the Night - Them featuring Van Morrison

6. A Fool For You - Ray Charles

7. Pickney Gal - Desmond Dekker

8. Exilio (Exile) - Thievery Corporation

9. O Silencio du Guitarra - Mariza

10. Without You - Kim RIchey

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Movie notes

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 05:26:56 -0700

The movie 300 is reprehensible, knuckle-headed, ridiculous, completely wrong, and totally awesome.

It's a movie you either go with completely and have a great time, or don't and find yourself continually amazed at how terrible it is. The second was my experience, but maybe I can offer some pointers about how to enjoy this movie.

1. Don't think deeply about it. Especially, don't try to link it to the politics of our day. The Spartans don't represent the United States, and neither do the Persians.

2. To the extent there is a message, it's a celebration of a grim, relentless warrior's code. The movie admires the Spartans' dedication and intensity, while trying not to concentrate on the evidence that they're, kinda, completely insane psychopaths.

3. Much of my lack of enjoyment came from the fact that the film celebrates values that are repellent to me. But they're supposed to be alien, extreme values. Keep in mind that nobody's going to come out of the theater and become a Spartan.

4. Every frame in the movie looks like it came from a heavy metal video. Similarly, the dialogue, characterizations, acting are as broad and unsubtle as a heavy metal song. It's a heavy metal movie. You could enjoy it on that level.

5. Cool fight scenes. Except for the final, everyone-dies battle, the fight scenes are kind of like Jackie Chan fights - each good guy has dozens of bad guys flung at him, but somehow manages to fight them one at a time, and only the bad guys get hurt. The relentless slow motion annoyed me, but at least it wasn't Michael-Bay-style fast cutting, my pet peeve.

6. Xerxes - awesome. The bad guy of the year.

7. Whatever its flaws, at least it's not boring.

8. The movie founders on the contradiction between how seriously it takes itself and how ridiculous it is. Maybe you could see that as funny. There's a Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode here.

Here's an interesting analysis from film-and-comic writer John Rogers, who blogs as Kung Fu Monkey. And below is a video my son Evan showed me, which (and this rarely happens) we both think is hilarious.

Black20 Trailer Park: 300 - PG Version

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TMNT is a missed opportunity. The filmmakers have come up with a great CG visual style - terrific cityscapes, a great bad guy's lair, good character design - it's a style that one can imagine carrying the Ninja Turtles for a whole slew of movies. Then they have a script that wouldn't pass muster as a made-for-Cartoon-Network movie.

My son Andrew had been looking forward to this movie for weeks, and his first reaction was "That was awesome!", but later, he said "Dad, I was kind of disappointed in the movie." He had 2 complaints - there wasn't much of a part for Michaelangelo, his favorite turtle, and the bad guy turns out to be not all that bad. Andrew's a perceptive critic. Both complaints get to real problems with the movie.

When you've got a group of heroes, everyone needs some screen time and a story point. It's a sign of the writer's incompetence that he ignores Michaelangelo and Donatello to waste an enormous amount of time on the tense relationship between Raphael and Leonardo, a ridiculous subplot that too often pushes aside the main plot. Seems R. is angry that L. abandoned the group for a year to train in South America, despite the fact that he was ordered to do that by their master. Makes no sense, and something's wrong when your best, most carefully choreographed fight scene is between two of your friggin' heroes.

And the main plot? Well, it steals from about a dozen better movies, but it has its points. Billionaire Max Winter, who is really a three thousand year old warrior-king, is waiting for the stars to line up for some sort of power vortex to emerge; first he must capture 13 monsters, hire a ninja army to do his bidding, and bring 4 stone statues of his former generals to life. But when it turns out that Max has no evil plan, he only wants to restore balance to the universe, and the 4 generals are the only real bad guys, the tension goes right out of the film. To win, the Turtles don't have to defeat all those monsters, or the ninja army, or Max - they just have to beat the stone warriors, and not beat them so much as just push them into the vortex. Easy. Too easy.

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So are there any good movies around, besides these CG crapfests? Well, if Breach, is still playing your neck of the woods, I recommend checking that out. Chris Cooper is terrific as FBI agent and traitor Robert Hanssen, and the film gets up a good deal of suspense despite the fact that we all know how it turns out.

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The Apples in Stereo

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Sun, 25 Mar 2007 11:31:31 -0700

New Magnetic Wonder

The Apples in Stereo

There's a fine power pop album in here, but you have to dig through some layers of whimsy to get to it. The Apples have some catchy songs and put them across boldly,but they indulge themselves too much, mostly in between-track nonsense - instrumental fragments, unfinished-sounding songs, synthesizer doodles. Also, there are production quirks that could be disposed with, particularly on the vocals. Why would anyone use a vocoder in this era? I didn't like it with the Electric Light Orchestra, and I don't like it now. The Apples seem to continously say "Look how eccentric we are!" like that;s an added value. I'm too old for that crap, and the Apples should be too - they've been making records since the early 1990's.

My friend Kevin emailed me about this album, pointing out another interesting aspect: "It is interesting, though, that they seem to record their albums with all the record meters tweaked way up too high, as if you’re listening to them on an old stereo system where all or most music came through as if the volume on all equipment was cranked way up. I used to get that impression when I listened to WLIR (a once-great Long Island radio station) at times, so if you’re a fan of this band and you buy this new album...don’t think that something’s wrong with your player." His comment reminded me of this wikipedia article on "Loudness Wars" ; the tendency to master or remaster albums at high volume levels, despite the distortion and lack of dynamics that results.

Here's a link to the reason I began investigating the Apples, Robert Schneider's appearance on the Colbert Report.

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Connelly

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 21:19:58 -0700

Since I'm on a mystery kick, I thought it was time to give Michael Connelly another try. His work is bestselling and critically acclaimed, he's the leading light in the genre of Modern American Noir, but he hasn't moved me. I'd tried him twice before: the Edgar-Winning The Poet was gripping and suspenseful for most of its length, but as it wore on, the plot turns seemed increasing labored and unbelievable (I've had the same reaction to the books I've read by the other best-known Modern American Noir writers, Dennis Lehane and Robert Crais). I also tried his first book, The Black Echo; got halfway through, and put it aside. After a week or so passed and I hadn't gotten around to picking it up again, I realized I had forgotten too much of the plot and, rather than start all over again, I brought it back to the library. Think about that - I got halfway through a murder mystery, put it down, and never got back to it. This would never happen with Agatha Christie! Clearly, Connelly wasn't doing his job.

The Connelly I chose, somewhat randomly, was Angels Flight, a 1998 novel featuring LAPD Detective Hieronymous "Harry" Bosch (naming his detective after Hieronymous Bosch gives you an idea about how he sees LA). The victim is a controversial black lawyer whose career is based on suing the LAPD; Bosch must not only solve the murder, but manage the case's racial tensions and navigate the department's political hierarchy who want to clamp down on embarassing information while making the investigation look open and honest. A lot on his plate, and sometimes, it seems like the murder mystery takes a back seat to the politics. The book was well-written, the Los Angeles background is vividly evoked, and Connelly knows police culture. But it was almost totally humorless, and Connelly seems to just pile on the darkness, rather than let it grow from the plot, For instance, Bosch's marriage during the book is cracking apart, but it doesn't have anything to do with the plot or the themes - Connelly just seems unwilling to let even a little light into the story.

(Small, extremely distasteful spoiler in next paragraph)

The turning point for me came around page 300, when Bosch's team uncovers a child pornography web site and child rape becomes a plot point. When I reached this part, one of my kids came into the room where I was reading and started clowning around. Suddenly, I realized I could no longer pretend I was enjoying this book, or that I was turning the pages out of anything but a sense of duty. It was time to bail. I skimmed the last few chapters to see how the plot turned out, closed the book and set it aside to return to the library. And I think it will be a while before I give Michael Connelly another try.

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Premonition - I've got a bad feeling about this

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 05:57:56 -0700

Yesterday, I heard a radio commercial for the new movie Premonition. It contained this phrase: "Critics say, Premonition is a sensational supernatural thriller. Four stars." It didn't name the critics who said these things, I couldn't find them at the page for this movie at Rotten Tomatoes, though I did find phrases like "some sort of record for dreary ridiculousness" and "senseless, incoherent thriller." Since only 6% of critics give Premonition a positive rating, I'm skeptical that anyone, anywhere, gave it four stars, unless it was out of 100. Sony Pictures, which made Premonition, got in trouble once before for making up a movie critic; I'm thinking it's time for them to get in trouble again.

A larger question here is, what's this movie about? And I don't mean the plot - woman wakes up to find her husband killed in a car crash, wakes up next day to find him alive, realizes something has gone wrong with space and time and tries to save husband from the inevitable - I mean what's it really about? It's part of a trend - last fall's Deja Vu was also about preventing a death which had already happened, the upcoming film Next has Nicolas Cage seeing visions of a disaster he must prevent, the short-lived tv series Day Break worked the same theme, and one of the heroes on Heroes can change the space-time continuum to avoid tragedy. We're beyond coincidence here, and taking a peek at the zeitgeist. It looks to me like people are scared. They're looking at the tragic disaster in Iraq, at global warming and other ecological turning points, at how ill-prepared America was for Katrina, at the fact that Osama is still out there, and it becomes pretty clear that this is all not going to shake out well for us. And what some people, at any rate, want to hear is that the disaster that is clearly out there for us, isn't really out there for us.

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End in Tears, by Ruth Rendell

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 21:54:25 -0700

End in Tears: A Wexford Novel (Chief Inspector Wexford Mysteries (Hardcover))

Ruth Rendell

Mystery writer Ruth Rendell is one of the best at what I think of as the Modern British Style, which combines elements of the police procedural and the deductive whodunit. End In Tears is the latest book in her Inspector Wexford series, which she started in 1964. Wexford solves crimes in the fictional village of Kingsmarkham, and the latest book shows that the classic English village mystery has had to adjust to the times. Kingsmarkham has become racially diverse, drugs and urban sprawl are altering the landscape,and, most pointedly for this case, family units have fragmented and reconstituted in unexpected ways. The traditional-minded Wexford views all this with bemusement, and sometimes alarm, and his viewpoint is as important to the book's success as his crime-solving skills.

This isn't the best in the series, and someone coming new to Rendell may want to start with some older classics - my favorites include Death Notes, Speaker of Mandarin, and perhaps my favorite, The Veiled One - but it's a good example of Rendell's ability to write a mystery with a familiar, comforting outward appearance but an unsettling center.

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Music notes, with the random ten

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 22:43:08 -0800

Hi, I'm back. Trying to get back into the habit of blogging, with some record reviews and a random ten.

West

Lucinda Williams

This is the record I've been hoping Lucinda would put out for some time - melancholy without drowning in self-pity, meticulously crafted but seeming to come straight from the heart, and sung without the exaggerated twang LW has been affecting recently. Her best since Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, and maybe better, (Speaking of Car Wheels, there's an interesting deluxe edition which came out last year, with a extra live disc of a concert mainly repeating CWOAGR's songs - fine alternate versions that help me listen to these familiar songs with fresh ears. A good way to buy it if you don't already have it; if you don't have any Lucinda, though, I'd start with the self-titled one - which, shockingly, looks to be out of print.

The Sermon On Exposition Blvd. [Fold-out Digipak with 14 page booklet]

Rickie Lee Jones

Rickie Lee Jones' new album is very experimental and sometimes difficult. Read the story behind it here - briefly, the vocals are mostly improvised, taking off from the words of Jesus, though you usually couldn't tell. Forget about ABAB verse forms, or choruses - Rickie's stream of consciousness melodies and lyrics take some getting used to, but is worth the effort. The music behind it is more rock than she usually does, kind of resembling the more folk-rockish moments of the Velvet Underground.

All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone

Explosions in the Sky

Explosions in the Sky are an instrumental guitar band, best known for their work on the soundtrack to Friday Night Lights. That's probably their most accessible work, because the tracks are short - on their own albums, tracks can go on for 12 minutes or more, and need that space to develop. The intensity rises and falls, crescendos crash and then quieter moments take over. It's all very hypnotic and enjoyable; recommended for listeners who like Phillip Glass and Steve Reich, but also like rock'n'roll.

And this week's random ten:

1. The Good's Gone - The Who

2. Drivin' Wheel - Junior Parker

3. Do You Realize?? -The Flaming Lips (video link)

4. Locked Out - Crowded House (video link)

5. Hard Times - Ray Charles

6. Sing Me A Song - Willie Nile

7. Love & Affection - Joan Armatrading

8. Paris Train - Beth Orton

9. Persuasion - Richard & Teddy Thompson

10. Be Here Now - Mason Jennings

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Book of the week - The Italian Secretary

nobody@vox.com(Baxter) — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:23:28 -0800

The Italian Secretary

Caleb Carr

When I was about 12, I read a book that really changed everything for me, affected my relationship with literature, set me on a path that I still travel to this day. I wish I could say that the book was something cool like On the Road or The Brothers Karamazov or Journey to Ixtlan. In fact, it was Agatha Christie's Murder On The Orient Express.

It was the first time I'd read a real, grown-up mystery, with a carefully constructed plot, and I was fooled completely. What especially got to me was that the solution was so unexpected, yet upon immediate rereading it seems that Christie was trumpeting the truth at every opportunity. I began reading all the Christies I could get my hands on - and there are a lot of them - and branching out into Ellery Queen, John Dickson Carr, Rex Stout and others. It turned me from an occasional reader into a voracious one. It made me feel intellectual, and connected to the adult world. And it helped me through a period when I started to realize I was seriously depressed, but not ready to talk to anyone about it.

As I got older, my reading habits broadened, but mysteries have always been a staple, something I continually return to. It's a little surprising, then, that I haven't really reviewed any mysteries on this blog. With this week's book, and going for the next, say, 4 or 5 weeks, I'll be reading and reviewing just mysteries, and talking a little about my history with them.

And what better way to start than with Sherlock Holmes? Surely the most written about fictional character of any kind; the number of authors who have tried to continue the adventures of Doyle's character must number in the hundreds. After The Seven Per Cent Solution became a bestseller, writers seemed to compete to fix Holmes up with the most unlikely real-life character, or come up with some other outrageous gimmick (someone wrote a novel alleging that Holmes was a visitor from the future, another that he was Jack the Ripper). Recent entries into the game include a short novel by Michael Chabon , an acclaimed nonmystery about Holmes facing old age, and an encounter between Holmes and Father Brown. Caleb Carr, best known for his superb historical mystery, The Alienist, takes the tack of trying to duplicate the feel of authentic Doyle in The Italian Secretary, and captures the atmosphere and dialogue quite well. The mystery here involves the slayings of an architect and a workman at Queen Victoria's Royal Palace of Holyrood, in Edinburgh, Scotland; the gruesome deaths resemble the slaying, centuries earlier in the same palace, of David Rizzio, the Italian music teacher and secretary of Mary Queen of Scots. The book takes too long to really get started, with 100 pages devoted to setting out the politics and court life of Victoria, and the backstory of Rizzio. Once Holmes and Watson arrive in Scotland, though, the game is really afoot, and the book becomes a pageturner, though the satisfactions of the plot are secondary to being in the presence of the two greatest detective story characters ever created.

Read a good mystery lately? Let me know about it.

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