Really hilarious byplay between these two: they’ve obviously become quite good friends as they play the US and Ireland together. I felt almost like I was at another “Boy Least Likely To” concert (where the two lead singers – or the lead singer & the number two, who knows – poked fun at each other all night).
Barnes is the “only lap slide guitar player in Ireland”, among other things (according to Mulvey). He’s got a gruff, low voice he uses sparingly. His guitar playing is crazy. Mad skillz. Mulvey was in very high spirits and absolutely bouncing during some songs. At the end, they did five or six songs together, most of which they had never played together before, and Mulvey wouldn’t even tell Barnes what song it was before he started — only what key it was in. Not that it made a damn bit of difference!
Truly talented musicians yet they will likely live in obscurity for years, given their place in the “folk” singer/songwriter small world.
Daily Archives: January 22, 2007
In Concert: Prairie Cartel
Nan’s brother’s band’s latest incarnation. Formerly Caviar, formerly Figdish. It’s quite amazing to watch the transformation of Mike and Blake’s music together as the years go by. I started going to Figdish concerts…let’s see…1995 maybe? Figdish was pure rock. Caviar added in a little bit of sampling, a little bit of electronica, more pop than rock. Prairie Cartel is solid rock with a big dose of electronica. Like Beck and The Glimmer Twins thrown into a blender together with a little dash of Snow Patrol on top. Anthemic choruses.
Whether you like these guys’ music that much (as much as me) or not, they’ve been playing together for so many years, they KNOW how to put on a show. Compared to the three or four 12-teen bands that went on before them, the contrast was remarkable. You might not become their biggest fan, but you’re not going to walk away from the Prairie Cartel without feeling that these guys played their hearts out and completely harmonically so.
Big Screen: Dreamgirls.
More a real “musical” than, say, Walk the Line or Ray, both of which featured singing but only when the actors were on stage. Whereas this has those random “I’m talking to you but wait, now I’m singing to you!” moments.
Eddie Murphy was GREAT. Not a character you really LIKED but he did a great job and he was one of the most humorous parts of the movie, which in some ways I felt was missing some humor. One song that went on way too long, and when I checked afterward, I wasn’t the only one who felt that way… Jennifer Hudson was pretty impressive and the movie only affirms the fact that Beyonce sings about as well as…J Lo. Or me. Or you. Anybody can sound “good” mixed correctly; only some people can sound “great” and neither one of them falls into that category; Jennifer does.
Really hated Jamie Foxx in this, and not all because of who he was playing. Seemed to have a really sullen sticking-out-his-bottom-lip, barely-moving-his-mouth thing going on.
Overall, good performances, good singing. Seems like a bunch of real-world stories (Supremes, Jacksons, etc.) all sort of thrown into one fictional story. Ddn’t realize it was a stage play first. Interesting.
Big Screen: Pan’s Labyrinth
Contrary to what ALL of the reviews I read said: I did NOT find this to be a horror film. I did find some of it GROSS. And some of it BRUTALLY VIOLENT. But NONE of it caused me any undue horror. I was fully prepared to be screaming, shaking, grabbing the arms of people next to me, having nightmares later and perhaps being unable to sleep. None of which ensued.
It was really good. Really compelling. A mix between the reality of the adult world fighting a war against fascism (led by sadists) and the child world of trying to find a place where you feel safe and loved. Reality mixed with faery (to use their sp) tale mixed with little girl’s (mis)perceptions. Intriguing.
The captain/stepdad is truly brutally sadistic and some of those scenes were hard to watch (I had my hands strategically over my eyes to block out all but the subtitles). And one of the faery sequences is soooooo gross. But still: not that scary and certainly not as scary as the reviews had led me to believe.
The little girl is just lovely and beautiful and expressive and I hope she grows up to be a rich and famous actress one day. I imagine this is what Audrey Tatou looked like as a little girl.