Category Archives: Entertainment and music

Entertainment and music

Andina

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…Spanish for ‘Andean,’ is the distinctive sound of the Andes Mountains: Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Chile. Sometimes sung in Native languages, sometimes in Spanish, it is the most uplifting-sounding music I know.

You probably have heard one song of Andina origin, though you may not have grasped this at the time: El Condor Pasa, sung by many but made most popular by Simon & Garfunkel. The Andean condor is, naturally, one of the emblematic birds of the Andes. If you heard it accompanied by a flute, that approximated the pan-flute or pan-pipes that punctuate so much Andina. The genre contains a lot of fingered strings (I’m no expert on the different types of guitarlike instruments), sometimes violin, moderate emphasis on drumming, and rapid changes of pacing. Rarely is it a cappella, less rarely is it purely instrumental; mostly it is both sung and played.

Andina groups I like include Ecuador Inkas, Nativo, Quichua Mashis, Savia Andina, Illapu, K’ala Marka and Los Kjarkas. It can be difficult to find for sale, so when I trip over an opportunity, I buy some.

If you’d like to give it a try, visit this video of K’ala Marka up on some ungodly height just tearing it up. In spite of the modern touches and enhancements, if you are anything like me, you will feel and hear something ancient. If I had to pick a song and setting that emblemized what I love about Andina, that one has it.

Entertainment and music, Social comment

Hell’s Kitchen with Gordon Ramsay: a culinary Kobayashi Maru

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You all saw at least that much of the Star Trek movie in question, right? The Kobayashi Maru was a Starfleet simulator exercise meant to be unsolvable. The trainee could not win. The point was to see how s/he lost. I think that’s what Gordon Ramsay’s about on Hell’s Kitchen, his reality show whereby supposedly the winner gets to be head chef at one of his restaurants. (In reality, not so much. In reality, there’s a good chance that the winner will be more or less kept to the side at the restaurant and advised not to get in the way of the professionals.)

The main purpose, of course, is manufacturing entertainment; let us not self-deceive. Contestants are chosen not for ability to cook, but for likely personality conflict and entertainment value. Several are certain flameouts, and the game will be rigged to keep them around causing drama, conflict and meltdown. Hollywood is in the business of lying to you, and that’s actually praise for its skill; no, Tom Hanks wasn’t actually stuck on an island with a ball, but Hollywood used masterful skill to make it seem like he was. Let us just be realistic, and say without rancor that Hollywood is so much in the business of lying that the idea of truth mattering isn’t part of the game. Expecting it to value truth is rather like expecting major bank CEOs to place value on the public good, or putting an alligator with your chickens and expecting it not to eat them. What the hell did you expect?

Other deceptions include frankenbites (they can, do and will actually make it so you ‘said’ whatever they want), the fact that the whole thing is just a sound stage and that all the ‘diners’ are human props from the industry, and that Ramsay’s not a good tycoon restauranteur. His real-world restaurants keep eating flaming death, so to speak, financially, which suggests that he’s a great cook who could probably win the game running one or three restaurants. One cannot imagine that strong, confident people sit close to his throne and take the kind of abuse he slings on the show, so either we’re being put on and he’s great at pretending to be a complete jerk, or he perhaps has the flaw of hiring only people who will put up with inordinate crap (skill being a secondary hiring concern). That’s what insufferable employers end up with: the few whose main qualification is abuse tolerance. I’ve seen whole companies where that was the key trait for survival.

If it weren’t mostly fiction dressed up to look like reality, reality shows would not need draconian confidentiality agreements in which participants agree to be parted out for transplant organs, caned daily by professional Singaporean caners, forced to watch Honey Boo Boo Clockwork Orange-style, and pay $5 billion in restitution if they reveal the truth.

So Ramsay puts roughly eight males and eight females, all opinionated, boastful, overconfident, foulmouthed, mostly fat, mostly eccentric chain-smokers (in other words, restaurant cooks) onto two teams divided by gender (thus destroying the natural balance of complementary gender traits). He then gets them up at boot camp hours to perform challenges that may sometimes mean zero to the culinary art, but will be funny to watch, such as tackling pigs. The losing side gets some charming penalty, something like ‘scrub spotless the inside of the trash dumpster behind the homeless shelter,’ and of course has to prep both kitchens. The winning side gets pampered, though in one case they were forced to meet Celine Dion without pointing out that she couldn’t sing, which I wouldn’t call pampering.

Obviously, the show has little to do with finding the best chef. If it did, they would not cast prep cooks and fry cooks and line cooks and culinary students and others who, sweating and shirtless, shovel coal into the boilers of the world of dining. (Now picture all the current contestants as stokers on the Titanic. You’re welcome.) The very worst thing about the show’s editing is Fox’s shameless cliffhangering, which seems done by a 12-year-old to appeal to 10-year-olds. You always expect the trashiest of trashy from Fox, and they do not fail to disappoint here. Lots of “My decision is…” [commercial break] and plenty of “The person leaving Hell’s Kitchen is…” [to be continued]. Fox: always low standards. Always.

We don’t see something like 95% of what goes on, but what is weird: even through the deception, contrived stress, and all the other stuff that’s hardly relevant to deciding who can cook and who can lead, Ramsay does accomplish one thing. He does find out who can face stress and keep cool enough to continue trying to retrieve the situation. I can grant that a chef might need that property above many others. In at least this one way, his culinary Kobayashi Maru seems to serve one authentic purpose.

Other than that, well, entertaining bullshit remains bullshit. And yes, I admit to watching it. There are worse character flaws.

Entertainment and music, Scumbag studies, Social comment, Sports

The Pac-12 Networks, a.k.a. the Not-works

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In July 2011, with many college sports programs playing musical conferences and engaging in games of chicken with each other, the recently expanded Pacific-12 Conference (UW, WSU, the Zeroes, OSU, Utah, Colorado, Cal-Berkeley, Stepford, ASU, UA, USC and UCLA) announced plans for a TV network like what the Big 10 (which has more than ten schools) has deployed. Great, we said, we want to see more football and have our conference doing what big-time conferences do. Revenue sharing would help the smaller market schools, etc., etc. Let’s see the show!

The assumption, which we could not know was flawed, was that we would be able to see the show. In the words of the immortal, unbearable Lee Corso:  “Not so fast, my friend.”

Fourteen months later, the 2012 college football season kicks off. The Pac-12 has failed to reach agreement with just about everyone, which is a pretty good sign the conference got very greedy. A number of games are televised on the Pac-12 Not-works, but very few people can watch them on TV. A few clever souls find other ways, naturally, but only the hardest core of fans would do that. Those who do, find out that the Pac-12 Not-works have sold zero advertising, so the not-work fills the space with commercials for itself. Yes. I must have seen the Stanford swimmer’s segment a dozen times. Every few minutes, its ten viewers are treated to advertising telling us how fantastic the not-work is.

That isn’t marketing. It’s masturbation, and comical masturbation at that. Seriously: while having failed in your most basic mission, which is to get on TV so you can sell advertising, rather than spare me a bunch of commercial breaks, you are going to go on and on about your virtues? Do you not understand that when the only advertising content you have to offer is to rhapsodize yourself, you have failed? You are a conference comprised of twelve research universities, all with educational claims to fame and pride, which attract some of the best and brightest people in the world, and you leave the house without your pants? Mr. Larry Scott, you are a Harvard graduate. For the gods’ sake, put some trousers on. No one needs to see you this way.

Not that the satellite and cable providers are any prizes in the area of doing what’s best for viewers. DefectiveTV, which is what I have, engages in a ‘playground recess hair-pulling skirmish of the month’ with some content provider just about every month, taking its message to the blacked-out channels to explain how those nasty stupids at (insert network name) have been unreasonable, pulled their content, and tried to force us all to pay through the nose, but only DefectiveTV stands Promethean in defense of our fair prices and sweet reason. Yeah. When every recess, the same kid is always in a fight with someone, always comes whining, and never takes any responsibility for even being half the problem, guess what. It’s obvious where most of the problem lies.

The much-vaunted Pac-12 Networks are Not-works. They are a failure. At this point, we would be better off without them, since the games they show would otherwise be picked up on other channels, all of which seem not to consider themselves too ultra-special to get a deal worked out and be on the air.

Every year, it is a little more about pure greed and big money, and a little less about athletics and education. I will always wish UW well, but I can see a day where, if this trend continues, I simply won’t care about watching the sport. At which time I will cease to be an advertising consumer, be it for idiotic pickup truck commercials appealing to my machismo, idiotic insurance commercials appealing to my gullibility, or idiotic beer commercials appealing to my pedestrian tastes.

Mr. Scott, you and your networks are a failure.

The best ass-covering you could come up with was to blame it all on the other side, and sick your athletic directors on the public, encouraging them to switch providers. (For some of us, with no provider in our areas that carries the Not-works, a non-starter.) “Waaaaaaah! They started it! Waaaah! Punish them!”

It’s looking positively Congressional.

Just another area of America in which the stupidity of the public is taken on faith by the wealthy and powerful, and where, if said public notices something wrong and complains that ‘this is bullshit,’ the public is fed a line of crap and told to stop being difficult.

I’ll give you difficult. Mr. Scott, so far you have boloed this exercise. You are a no go at this station. You snubbed BYU/Utah, the perfect regional, rivalry and research fit for the conference, simply because a Mormon school icks out Left Coast schools, with all that honor code and right-wing political stuff–as if that were relevant at all to research or athleticism. Instead, you brought in Colorado, which is about as Pacific as Wyoming and has a minimal existing rivalry relationship with Utah. Mr. Scott, if this is how you roll, I wouldn’t hire you to manage a Division 5 conference, much less a I-A BCS conference. You have failed. The results speak for themselves. You are the John Boehner and Nancy Pelosi of collegiate athletics. Enjoy that prestigious distinction.

In the meantime, Commissioner Scott, go to hell.

Entertainment and music, Social comment

I admit that I watch Big Brother

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Yeah, it’s true.  Can’t try to deny it.  But I often ask myself:  why?

BB was about the trashiest ‘reality’ TV going until Jersey Shore came along (that I do not watch, although my nephew does, much to my nausea).  So, some partial answers:  why do I watch this crap?

  1. It’s on three times a week, which means at least sometimes, it’s something my wife and I can do together.  (Lest she sue for libel, I must add she is less interested in it than I am.)
  2. It confirms all my cherished stereotypes of Hollywood, always trying to ‘change it up’, always looking gaudy and overdone, never able to leave stuff be.
  3. It does amaze me to see what people will do on camera, how they will act.
  4. If I didn’t admit to a certain schadenfreude watching people (who volunteered out of avarice to) suffer, I’d be a liar.
  5. Most seasons, there is at least one contestant I can root for.  This season it’s Shelley, the middle-aged outdoor company executive.
  6. Julie Chen’s utter irrelevancy is pure comedy.  She tells them time’s up, they disobey her, nothing happens.  They award the prize and chaos ensues, making her look silly.

I don’t kid myself, of course, that I’m seeing much that’s real.  Past season contestants are obviously coached.  We have reason to believe the producers have influenced outcomes in the past, and one can be sure they’ll do so again.  It’s not a house; it’s a sound stage.  The rules look flexible depending on ratings.  And does anyone believe the ‘America Votes’ results are above board?

Fair’s fair, though.  Whatever’s wrong with it, they have me watching it.  Ergo, they must have something going on in my eyes, or I’d ignore the whole thing.

Entertainment and music

Grand Theft Auto games

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Yeah, they are totally anti-social.  Even if you don’t do half the awful things you could do, the bottom line is you’re still playing a complete thug.  Why would anyone enjoy this? I ask the same question about some types of movies, so one ought to be able to answer the question oneself.  My answers:

  1. Part of playing a game is to be something you are not, in real life. Driving like a maniac and aggroing the police is not my normal day. My normal day involves editing people’s writing, or thinking of ways to market my editing of people’s writing.
  2. The radio soundtracks alone are hilarious, especially the talk radio parodies.
  3. You do accomplish a lot of things that don’t have to be destructive, such as races, stunt jumps, ambulance driving, taxi driving and firefighting.
  4. It blows off a little of life’s steam in a safe environment.

Yeah, it would probably be more holistic and cosmopolitan of me to start a botanical herb garden, or serve biscuits and gravy at a shelter, or go do yoga.  But since I won’t, there’s always this.

Entertainment and music

The Alpocalypse

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No, it isn’t an invasion of South American camelids that resemble mini-llamas and produce trendy wool.  My musical main man, “Weird Al” Yankovic, has a new CD coming out very soon.  We wait years for these.  And if you’ve never seen Al in concert, you have missed an experience.  Nonstop entertainment, even during the every-number costume changes.  A hardcore trouper’s ethic (he had the flu when I saw him), great band chemistry and a total commitment to a great show.  My wife was meh over the idea, but became a concert convert.  I don’t even like concerts much and I liked it.

Here’s the track listing:

1.Perform This Way
2.CNR
3.TMZ
4.Skipper Dan
5.Polka Face
6.Craigslist
7.Party In The CIA
8.Ringtone
9.Another Tattoo
10.If That Isn’t Love
11.Whatever You Like
12.Stop Forwarding That Crap To Me

Any questions? That last, in particular, hit a resonant frequency for me. People used to constantly forward stuff to me in the belief that it was funny or important. Whether or not I had editing work on my plate, it got so irritating, and then I’d ask them to please stop, at which point they’d think I was a killjoy. That’s not how that works.

Entertainment and music, Social comment

M*A*S*H Iraq

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How long will it take for us to see this show? It took nineteen years from the Korean armistice to the M*A*S*H premiere.  (Hogan’s Heroes took twenty, which reinforces the evidently unofficial timeline.)   With Hollywood doing more recycling (of ideas, since it has no new ones) these days than your typical granola Oregonian, it is just a matter of time.

If it’s the 1990-1991 Gulf War, the necessary time has elapsed, yet the problem there is you have months of buildup followed by about three minutes of blowing the other side to hell followed by a decade of periodic bombing–difficult to structure a show around, unlike Korea, a war whose stalemates, steady casualties and periodic cease-fires made actual dating of events in the show rather nebulous. We are, of course, well overdue for a Vietnam sitcom.  My guess is that the networks are too chicken there.  I think they don’t give Vietnam vets enough credit.  They have had, after all, thirty-five years to think about it.  Who thinks they have not done some processing?

If it’s the 2003-2009 Gulf War/occupation, of course, the necessary 19 years for society to accept comedy mixed with its tragedy have barely gotten a start.

Either way, I’m available to edit the underlying material.

Entertainment and music

The joy that is “Weird Al” Yankovic

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Alfred Matthew Yankovic dominates the field of parody music so completely that Bob Rivers (who is very funny) is barely worthy to help set up the stage for his show.  He has been doing this all my adult life.  There is a combination of friendly kidding, social commentary, and an absolute performer’s ethic about Al that makes him fundamentally appealing on every level.

If you ever get to see him in concert, it’ll be a superb expenditure of your entertainment dollar.  It’s not just a concert; it is start-to-finish entertainment.  Al crawling around on the stage singing “Like a Surgeon” while his chunky drummer Jon “Bermuda” Schwartz stands out front topless except for a silver cone bra? If Madonna has any guts at all (and I suspect she does), she would laugh herself to tears and be in danger of wetting herself to see it.

Anyway, Al’s working on a new album.  He decided to parody Lady Gaga. Evidently Her Highness did not approve.  Well, it’s always worse if you don’t laugh along.  So Al just put the song “Perform This Way” out on Youtube for us all to enjoy.  And if you think I would deny you a link here, then you think I am very mean:

“Perform This Way” by “Weird Al” Yankovic

I believe few of my editing clients have the faintest idea how much of their work has been reviewed or edited to the sounds of Al.

Entertainment and music

Scandinavian metal

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Okay, not all of it is Scandinavian.  Not even sure it all qualifies as metal.  My moods are very heavily shaped by music in all forms, but lately people have been turning me on to a wide variety of new music.  Today I’m going to share some tunes with you.

Alestorm:  Scottish pirate metal.  Favorite track:  Keelhauled.

Dalriada:  Hungarian folk metal.  Favorite track:  Világfutó Szél.

Faun:  German/Celtic folk metal.  Fave:  Unda.

Korpiklaani:  Finnish folk metal.  Fave:  Wooden Pints.

Nightwish:  Finnish folk metal.  Fave:  Over the Hills and Far Away.

Turisas:  Finnish Viking metal.  Fave:  Stand Up and Fight!.

Týr:  Faroese Viking metal.  Fave:  Regin Smiður.

None of it has to do with editing services, but neither must everything posted here. Enjoy.

Entertainment and music, Scumbag studies

Alestorm, and piracy

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My friend Jennifer turned me on to this Scottish pirate metal band not long ago.  A lot of metal bands can’t sing, so they seem to just smoke about eight packs of cigarettes and then sort of yell/croak.  Alestorm’s better than that, and their instrumental work is quite good.  While their lyrics are up and down at times, they’ve really grown on me.

If I had to pick an Alestorm tune to win you over, it would be Keelhauled.  If you have anywhere within you a streak of the buccaneer, you may enjoy the video and tune.

Most pirates, by the way, met pretty ugly ends.  The pirate game had very few winners.  A lot were surprisingly incompetent.  Pirate trivia:

Blackbeard (aka Edward Teach) once raided the Tidewater coast for VD meds.

William Kidd was railroaded in a miscarriage of justice.  In a fair court of law, he would have walked rather than hang.

John Taylor, a calculating sort, actually won at piracy.  In 1721 he took the Nossa Senhora do Cabo with a retiring viceroy and a fortune in diamonds, then had the sense to buy a commission in a South American navy.

While the skull and crossbones was a common motif, most pirates designed their own flags.

The sickest pirate in history might be either Edward Low (probably hanged by the French; merci) or Jean-David Nau, aka François l’Olonnais (put to a messy death by Central American Indians).  Both were prone to the kind of brutalities that would make a Gestapo interrogator wince.

The Age of Piracy was in fact a rather short one, from about the 1690s to the 1720s.

A privateer is a sort of legal pirate, essentially a hired commerce raider in wartime.  Kidd was one.  What makes a pirate a privateer is a Letter of Marque.  I think the US last issued Letters of Marque in the War of 1812, though the Confederacy handed them out like samples.  It is rumored that during World War II, at least once, someone asked President Roosevelt for a Letter of Marque.  Ron Paul (and no, I am not on his bandwagon) has seriously suggested the issuance of Letters of Marque as a way to combat Somali pirates.

Personally, I think it would be a great idea.

Some clients demand that their editors sign NDAs, evidently fearing that someone whose reputation depends upon a basic expectation of integrity would suddenly pirate or plagiarize their work. One might point out that one should worry more about whether one’s work were worth pirating than the possibility of it being pirated, but that’s a tactless response. In one case I have signed an NDA, because I understood the logic and was legitimately exposed to trade secrets essential to my client’s endeavors. Beyond that, no one has asked it of me. I guess I’d take it case by case.