Fishtown’s snake man
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Fishtown’s snake man
As the years go by, I see less and less live music. I wasn’t always such a curmudgeon, but lately I get more out of listening to music at home than I do from braving the cold, cramming into a club, and listening to a few hours of opening bands only to be shoved aside by latecomers who didn’t want to listen to a few hours of opening bands.
This attitude is disappointing to Type E, who thinks I’m remiss in my wifely duty to attend shows with him. He’s been nagging me to see Jukebox the Ghost since they released their first record in 2008, and when he learned that the band was making a Fishtown appearance at Johnny Brenda’s, subtle hints arrived in the form of catchy JTG mp3s mysteriously appearing in our shared Dropbox.
One of these catchy mp3s convinced me to make the oh-so-long walk to Johnny Brenda’s for the show. Hold It In just might be the perfect pop song.
So much fun. Jukebox the Ghost is a trio: guitar player, drummer, and keyboard player–the incredibly talented Ben Thornewill. Luckily, we were in the balcony and could watch as he played the bass lines, played the leads, and sang, all while having fun with the audience.
Highlights of the show: Hold It In (of course) and Temptation, a New Order cover performed with a joy that infected the entire audience.
Jukebox the Ghost is everything that’s good about Ben Folds, synthesizers, Europop, and The Beatles. And, I’m sure, many other things I lack the musical background to identify. But most importantly, they’re entertaining. And isn’t that why you go out on a Saturday night?
I’ve been going through old blog entries, tweaking them for this new(ish) space, and I came across yet another short animation link: La révolution des crabes by Arthur de Pins.
Pachygrapsus Marmoratus, a depressed crab species that “never asked to be put on Earth,” cannot turn, so they are doomed to forever walk sideways, always following the same path. Some paths are better than others, so quality of life depends on where a crab happens to hatch.
This inability to change course is a species-wide bummer until a pseudo intellectual among them rises and instills pride into his fellow crabs by preaching the merits of straight-line walking. As it turns out, however, the ability to turn and set a new course actually is possible for those smart enough and motivated enough to do it. Somewhere along the way in this five minute piece, you realize the crabs are just a metaphor (the title is a giveaway), which makes the end slightly depressing.
Had I seen this 18 years ago, there would have been subsequent deep, late-night conversations about the symbolism and underlying philosophical and political themes. Since I watched it now, however, I’ll just throw up the YouTube link and call it a night.
Tonight, The Secret Cinema presented an amazing program of short cartoons: Surrealism in American Animation. Awesome, awesome, awesome, even if you don’t buy the program’s premise that surrealism in the cartoons of the 20’s and 30’s is related to the rise of Surrealist art.
Each piece in the program was a testament to the creativity of early animators, and I liked most of them better than Logorama, this year’s Oscar-winning animated short.* Here are the toons I remember, and happily, most of them are on YouTube (although this format doesn’t do justice to many of the brilliant details).
The Secret Cinema event came two day’s after I saw Kristy Graybill of MiNDTV give a computer animation workshop at Philly’s Free Library. As part of the discussion, Kristy pointed out that stories and artistic concepts trump animation tools and techniques. So true. Long live creative animation!
*The technical execution of Logorama is top-notch, and it’s a very clever way to display logos, but it lacks a good story. It didn’t deserve to beat out some of the other nominees.