WHILE I POWERED through shoveling by listening to Motorhead, the music that soundtracked most of Snowmageddon 2.0 came from the 12k label.
Run by all-around artist Taylor Deupree, whose work encompasses sound sculpting, graphic design and photography, 12k specializes in minimalist electronic music that often beats with an acoustic heart. There's also a D.C. connection with the New York-based 12k: In 2000, Deupree teamed with the District's own internationally known microsound guru Richard Chartier to form the LINE sublabel, which focuses on installation works and digital minimalism.
WHEN AUSTEN BLAKE switched from hockey to figure skating at the age of 7 to fulfill his father's wish that he master the technical skills associated with the sport, he never thought he'd be wary of going back to the puck-and-stick world.
But after only a few months of nailing jumps and bettering his technique, Blake was hooked.
"I just never ended up going back," Blake said. "I love jumping and spinning; it's one of those sports where you feel like you can actually fly."
And years later, the 19-year-old Blake is putting those skills to work as a skater with Disney on Ice's "100 Years of Magic" production, which comes to the Verizon Center on Wednesday, Feb. 10. Though Blake, who grew up in Knoxville, Tenn., was accepted into a couple of different universities in Washington, D.C., he's putting college on hold to keep touring with the production, which also includes his older brother, Adam — one of his biggest inspirations when it comes to skating, Blake said.
Continue Reading "Wish Upon a Star: Disney on Ice, '100 Years of Magic'" »
ALLISON MOORER'S SEVENTH album, "Crows," is a bundle of contradictions.
On these 13 songs, the Alabama native sings in a big, soulful voice that never sounds especially expressive or commanding. She writes capably about specific situations that never quite feel real or immediate. The results are lovely but rarely engaging: a major artistic statement that makes little impact on the listener.
This is especially discouraging because Moorer has spent 12 years making smart, accessible country music that emanated from the head as well as the heart. The sister of singer Shelby Lynne and now the wife of Steve Earle, she made an auspicious debut when her song "A Soft Place to Fall" was included on the "Horse Whisperer" soundtrack and garnered an Academy Award nomination.
In recent years, however, she seems to be floundering creatively, culminating in the regrettable 2008 covers album "Mockingbird," which whitewashed such gritty hits as Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" and Nina Simone's "I Want a Little Sugar in My Bowl."
"She reserves the right to be sullen," Moorer sings on "Just Another Fool," describing a girl who doesn't bow to the demands of the men chasing her. "Crows" certainly entertains that indulgence: It's a deeply sullen album full of tastefully written, slickly produced songs about loneliness, memory and loss, yet as surely as Moorer sings about those matters, she rarely conveys the emotions associated with them.
For all its brooding, "Crows" has little payoff.
Continue Reading "Not Much to Crow About: Allison Moorer, 'Crows'" »
IF YOU WERE asked what the world's two biggest film industries are, you'd probably say India's Bollywood and America's Hollywood.
But number three is a little tougher. Mexico? Iran? Nope — try Lagos, Nigeria.
We don't learn much about how it got that big from the documentary "Welcome to Nollywood" (out now on DVD) since the film runs less than an hour, but it's an appropriately fast-paced intro to a film industry that's as bare-bones and DIY as a modern one can be.
Continue Reading "Cinema's Real Nigerian Princes: 'Welcome to Nollywood' Documentary" »
COMPARED WITH PORTISHEAD'S fantastic 2008 album "Third," Massive Attack's fifth and newest LP, "Heligoland," is a perfect example of the student surpassing the teacher.
Both bands were prominent in Bristol's mid-1990s trip-hop scene, with Massive Attack widely regarded as the grandfather of the movement upon the release of its outstanding 1991 album "Blue Lines."
Then both bands took long hiatuses: Portishead's previous studio album was released in 1997, and Massive Attack has been focused on soundtrack work (the Jet Li flick "Unleashed" and a Hurricane Katrina documentary titled "Trouble the Water") since its 2003 snoozer of an album, "100th Window".
But where Portishead modernized its trademark sound with a new urgency and uneasiness on "Third," Massive Attack's "Heligoland" sounds more like a re-tread of its 1990s sound rather than a reinvigoration.
Continue Reading "Tripped Up: Massive Attack, 'Heligoland'" »
"ARMY WIVES" HAS performed such ratings wonders for the often ignoredLifetime channel that the network made the unprecedented move to renew the series for a fourth season before its third season had even aired.
And yet, the third-season debut for "Wives" last June drew 22 percent fewer viewers than the season two premiere a year earlier.
So, what gives?
The show is still touted as Lifetime's most successful series, and one drop in ratings doesn't necessarily signal a decline in the drama's overall popularity. But the unfortunate side effect of having five main families to follow in the series is that once you get past the character-development of the first season, each character is knee-deep in his or her own drama, leading to lots and lots of plot lines to follow.
The show's third season (out today on DVD) starts out with all the unfinished situations from the previous season: a runaway daughter, a family moving to Belgium, a marriage falling apart due to extramarital affairs, a business in jeopardy and a new mother facing deployment.
Whew.
That's a lot to follow for one show — especially one that made an impact early on by not being full of the soap opera dramarama that one would expect from a female-centric show.
Continue Reading "Commanding Drama: 'Army Wives,' Season 3 on DVD" »
WHEN IT'S COME to infectious electro-pop singles over the past few years, virtually no one has done it better than London's Hot Chip.
The five-piece band, helmed by co-vocalists Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard, was a promising but goofy indie-dance act at the start of the 2000s, but grew stronger and more singular over time. In 2005, Hot Chip linked up with the influential DFA Records and since then has been responsible for a stellar run of tracks — giddy, mixed-genre earworms like "Over and Over" and "Boy From School" from 2006's "The Warning" album that simply demanded to be played on repeat.
Hot Chip's 2008 LP, "Made in the Dark," was an overstuffed grower of a record that featured the band's most successful song to date, "Ready for the Floor," which eventually hit No. 6 on the U.K. singles chart. By that point, though, critics and fans began to wonder if Hot Chip was merely a singles band and whether its albums could match the high bar set by its individual tracks.
The group's newest record, "One Life Stand," should quell any doubts.
Continue Reading "Demanding a Replay: Hot Chip, 'One Life Stand'" »
IN 2007, YEASAYER'S debut, "All Hour Cymbals," sounded like the end credits for some lost teen apocalypse movie from the '80s, like "Night of the Comet" or "Dead-End Drive-In."
Often dismissed as second-tier indie innovators bridging the hackeysack and ironic T-shirt sets, the Baltimore band were perhaps not as gutsy as Animal Collective nor as catchy as Vampire Weekend, but its organic synthesis of Afro-pop guitars, tribal percussion, catchy hooks and especially that cinematic sweep distinguished the ensemble from its peers and has made their follow-up one of the most anticipated releases of 2010.
"Odd Blood" doesn't lose that theatrical flair, but it does clear away some of the cobwebs that cluttered Yeasayer's debut. Instead of the DIY world music of "All Hour Cymbal," Yeasayer creates a shinier, spacier amalgam of postpunk synth effects and hippie noodling that only occasionally elevates what is the album's worst trait: clunky lyrics.
"Now the world can be an unfair place at times," sings Chris Keating on "Ambling Alp," "but your lows will have their complement of highs." This is some serious Lifetime movie uplift, and the chorus is especially egregious: "Stick up for yourself, son / Never mind what anybody else done." But the song is a burst of sneaky reggae rhythms, glassy New Wave textures, and expressive vocals that are all bracing enough to compensate for the songwriting, even to suggest that generosity of spirit, no matter how awkwardly expressed, is their greatest attributes.
IF YOU'VE EVER seen an episode of "Real Sex" on HBO, "Nip/Tuck" on FX or "Dr. 90210" on E!, then you've basically seen "Boobs: An American Obsession."
In a lot of ways, the documentary on our cultural obsession with breasts isn't really that surprising: If you have breasts, you know how you feel about them — and if you don't, you know why you like them.
It's just that simple.
But "Boobs: An American Obsession" tries to go deeper than that.
Continue Reading "Breast in Show: 'Boobs: An American Obsession' Documentary" »
WEDNESDAY: You could always Netflix that foreign film you missed — but let's be honest, you've got all the "Star Trek" movies in your queue and it might take a while. So check out the French Embassy's screening of "Je l'aimais," in which an elderly man tells his jilted daughter-in-law about the passionate, illicit love affair that changed his life.
And yes, there are English subtitles.
» Maison Francaise, 4101 Reservoir Road NW; Wed., Feb. 10, 7 p.m., $8 or $5 for students and seniors; 202-944-6090.
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