Cadence Weapon Tron Legacy Mixtape

I would probably be remiss if I failed to mention that Cadence Weapon has released a pay-what-you can mixtape of him rapping over some beats and riffs of the moment, trading space with Buck 65, Shad, eating donairs and about hanging out with Daft Punk for Tron Legacy. It's pretty sweet and low key.

Get it here.

Song of the Day: Cadence Weapon, Real Estate

'cuz, I made a deal today. I sold some real estate.

Song of the Day: Crocodiles, "Hearts of Love"

Like the Beach Boys meeting up with the Jesus and Mary Chain at a Sonic Youth tribute show.

This Memory Brought To You By...

It's late and I'm trying to watch an early film by Akira Kurosawa. Generally, the famed Japanese director succeeds in taking me away to wonderful, fantastical places, but tonight his presentation of post-war Tokyo is doing little to conquer my own imagination and memories, spurred on by a cup of warm apple cider.

I suppose everyone has their own wonder food. Proust had his little madeleines, capable of taking him back to his childhood. For me, every sip of apple cider contains within it the memory of every other swallow. The initial taste, sweet on the tongue, is of my first trip to Calgary's Kensington District in the fall of my Grade 10 year. As a kid from Calgary's northeast, Kensington seemed otherworldly. I forget what movie I had gone to see with my friends, a mix of boys and girls thrown together. We barely knew each other and couples were still sorting themselves out. After the movie, we had stopped at a coffee shop. I ordered apple cider with a stick of cinnamon in it. I don't think I impressed anyone that night.

The next few sips bring wonderful memories of lying in bed, deep in winter, well past midnight, reading William T. Vollmann's excellent novel, The Atlas, with only my cider to keep me company as I ride Vollmann's vivid prose across snowy Japan and frigid Manitoba.

Then come phantom memories. Ice skating at Olympic Plaza. Snow forts. Things I'm pretty sure I never did.

Finally, as the cup cools, the satisfaction of sitting snowed-in at Lake Louise, writing happily as my wife knits nearby, drinking cider and watching the sun cross the lake, no one else in sight.

Escapist

I am pleased to say (if belatedly) that I managed to complete last weekend's goal of writing a new wedding scene for my novel. I estimate that the revision of the novel, as a whole, is at close to 80% finished. It took having a fairly miserable head cold and getting snowed in at a deserted hotel, listening to the new Girl Talk album on repeat to get the new chapter done, but boy does it feel good (or maybe it's the meds). Once the weather cleared, leaving behind only the -30 conditions outside, spending most of the day staring out of the window at this particular view also helped.

Of course, being holed up in a lonely hotel working on a novel as I was, made me think of this heartwarming little movie.

Song of the Day: Titus Andronicus, Richard II

"But there's only one dream that I keep close

and it's the one of my hand at your throat."

Deathly Hallows, Unreviewable

David Harris, the editor over at Spectrum Culture, has written a review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part One. In his introduction, he suggests that there will be countless reviews of the movie, and questions the need to review it at all. I would like to take this a step further and state that the movie is probably unreviewable.

Let's think about this for a second. Yes, it is still possible to issue a technical review of the movie, commenting on things like camera angles and sound editing, but my understanding is that this is still largely the same technical team that has been responsible for several of the other movies. Similarly, the director and writing team have already had a chance to express their views on a variety of themes and motifs in the Harry Potter universe. I think it would be a reasonable to assume that their work here will continue what they have already established elsewhere. Thus, every viewer of the past movies has the necessary experience to determine whether, based on the earlier movies, they want to see the new one.

Further, it is common practice for some to comment on the degree of faithfulness of the movie to books, or the creativity in the adapting or the sequencing of different parts for a movie audience, but the whole film-in-two-parts aspect of The Deathly Hallows suggest that we can only really evaluate Part One in the context of how well it works in conjunction with Part Two.

Finally, while there is a legitimate review to be written for the small segment of population who have not read the books nor viewed any of the movies but (for some strange reason) decided that Episode 7 of 8 is where they want to be introduced to the world of JK Rowling, those few people are in need of a review written expressly from the viewpoint, for that purpose. I would suggest that few of the writers reviewing The Deathly Hallows are capable of such a feat.

For most of us, if we have watched the previous movies, or read the books, then we have already either made a heavy emotional investment in the movies, or else dismissed them long ago. No rewiewer can adequately express the degree to which The Deathly Hallows will live up to our own expectations.