Friday, Friday, Friday! I've yet to pick up my comics this week, so nothing to say about anything that most of you care about. I guess it's time to talk about other things for a bit.
First up, music!
I've always been fond of a good cover and I've decided to arbitrarily pick a few that are worth noting for those of you whose musical taste has some confluence with my own. These are all 192kbps MP3 files that you can right-click or control-click and select "Save as" or "Download linked file as" to have deposited on your desktop or appropriate folder. If you like these, I recommend seeking out albums by these artists.
Who didn't love the cartoon Jem? OK, I didn't, but I thought the theme song was the balls when I was a wee lad who would turn it off immediately after the opening and go make giant Lego spaceships to be tossed off the back deck. Anyway, local synthpoppers Freezepop did a version of the opening tune and stuck it on their last album. I really like the break into the Misfits' portion of the song as it sounds like a 9 year old trying to be truly evil.
Reggae act Chosen Few shows up quite a lot on those Trojan Records box sets I buy impulsively whenever I find myself needing a little island riddims in my life. Their cover of the theme to Shaft makes me smile every time I hear it. I mean, you didn't think anyone would improve on the badassery of Isaac Hayes's original, but here we go. It's certainly better than that lifeless 2000 version that Hayes cranked out for the Samuel L. Jackson flick.
You know how I like the new Doctor Who program, right? The only way that they could improve it is to use the Orbital version of the theme. A live favorite for years, they finally put it on their otherwise-pretty-awful album The Altogether.
I fucking hate Pink Floyd. I just want that out there, because it makes me really feel conflicted over the version of "Comfortably Numb" that the Scissor Sisters put on their debut album. I shouldn't like this record one bit, but I think it's brilliant. Strange that it took Bee Gees-styled vocals and disco licks to make me know all the words to a twenty-three year old song.
I have no issues with the fact that I love Erasure. Their covers album Other People's Songs is loaded with interesting interpretations of standards from a broad spectrum of British pop. Like me, they love Trevor Horn and decided to pay homage with their take on "Video Killed The Radio Star" by the Buggles. Yes, I know it was the first video played on MTV. Everyone knows that. Stop acting like you're some kinda goddamn genius because you remember something from the Pink section on a trivia pursuit card.
Finally, extra irony alert! The Pet Shop Boys decided to cover a song by My Robot Friend that paid homage to the smartest men in pop. Their version of "We're The Pet Shop Boys" delights the hell out of me as it's the ultimate in rock and roll egotism while still maintaining their humor.
Even more finally, I'm going to urge you all to check out Mastermix.org for a fascinating collection of old-school mastermixes (as the name rather implies.) There's several gems here, especially the "The House That Jack Built" and anything touched by the Latin Rascals, who were just insanely talented. You can even check out the copyright-infringing Lesson series from Double Dee and Steinski.
Now, movies!
We've got a new work project up as well. We're doing online movie reviews whenever we get a chance now. You can jump directly to mine by clicking here. A lot of these are remixed from the blog, but I'll be putting up new ones there as well, so check it out.
First up, music!
I've always been fond of a good cover and I've decided to arbitrarily pick a few that are worth noting for those of you whose musical taste has some confluence with my own. These are all 192kbps MP3 files that you can right-click or control-click and select "Save as" or "Download linked file as" to have deposited on your desktop or appropriate folder. If you like these, I recommend seeking out albums by these artists.
Who didn't love the cartoon Jem? OK, I didn't, but I thought the theme song was the balls when I was a wee lad who would turn it off immediately after the opening and go make giant Lego spaceships to be tossed off the back deck. Anyway, local synthpoppers Freezepop did a version of the opening tune and stuck it on their last album. I really like the break into the Misfits' portion of the song as it sounds like a 9 year old trying to be truly evil.
Reggae act Chosen Few shows up quite a lot on those Trojan Records box sets I buy impulsively whenever I find myself needing a little island riddims in my life. Their cover of the theme to Shaft makes me smile every time I hear it. I mean, you didn't think anyone would improve on the badassery of Isaac Hayes's original, but here we go. It's certainly better than that lifeless 2000 version that Hayes cranked out for the Samuel L. Jackson flick.
You know how I like the new Doctor Who program, right? The only way that they could improve it is to use the Orbital version of the theme. A live favorite for years, they finally put it on their otherwise-pretty-awful album The Altogether.
I fucking hate Pink Floyd. I just want that out there, because it makes me really feel conflicted over the version of "Comfortably Numb" that the Scissor Sisters put on their debut album. I shouldn't like this record one bit, but I think it's brilliant. Strange that it took Bee Gees-styled vocals and disco licks to make me know all the words to a twenty-three year old song.
I have no issues with the fact that I love Erasure. Their covers album Other People's Songs is loaded with interesting interpretations of standards from a broad spectrum of British pop. Like me, they love Trevor Horn and decided to pay homage with their take on "Video Killed The Radio Star" by the Buggles. Yes, I know it was the first video played on MTV. Everyone knows that. Stop acting like you're some kinda goddamn genius because you remember something from the Pink section on a trivia pursuit card.
Finally, extra irony alert! The Pet Shop Boys decided to cover a song by My Robot Friend that paid homage to the smartest men in pop. Their version of "We're The Pet Shop Boys" delights the hell out of me as it's the ultimate in rock and roll egotism while still maintaining their humor.
Even more finally, I'm going to urge you all to check out Mastermix.org for a fascinating collection of old-school mastermixes (as the name rather implies.) There's several gems here, especially the "The House That Jack Built" and anything touched by the Latin Rascals, who were just insanely talented. You can even check out the copyright-infringing Lesson series from Double Dee and Steinski.
Now, movies!
We've got a new work project up as well. We're doing online movie reviews whenever we get a chance now. You can jump directly to mine by clicking here. A lot of these are remixed from the blog, but I'll be putting up new ones there as well, so check it out.
