I watched "Let Me In," the American remake of the Swedish "Let The Right One In" a few nights ago and I still feel kind of torn up about it. It's the most oddly touching and sadly atmospheric film I've seen in ages and it's as much about loneliness and feeling out of place in the world as it is about vampires.

Never mind that it's amazing just for the fact that it's a remake that is possibly better than the original...Let Me In also is intriguing and terrific because it captures the feel of the early 80s better than any recent film I remember and it makes you care about its central character Owen (a young boy tormented by his classmates and pretty much ignored by his over-worked and beleaguered mom) so much your heart physically hurts.

Of course how you react to the film may depend on where you're coming from...I was Owen's age in 1983 (the year Let Me In takes place) and I didn't fit in at all in middle school. And while another child my age who was also a vampire didn't move in next door to me like one does in the film, I certainly can empathize with how quickly and deeply you can form an attachment to someone who is as lost and as lonely as you are...

I can't recommend Let Me In enough. But it is not for the faint of heart at all, so consider yourself warned!!:)

Beer in Outer Space?

Thanks to insomnia and specials about The Universe on the History Channel late at night, I now know that far far out in space there are "beer clouds."


And I was so full of wonder at this I just had to get a second opinion online:


"Scientists said the cloud, located near the constellation Aquila, contains enough alcohol to make 400 trillion trillion pints of beer." 



read more here


I don't drink alcohol, but I definitely know people who will be both happy and sad to hear this...happy that so much beer exists, sad that it is so terribly out of reach!!:)

George Michael's understated album Older received little critical or commercial attention when it came out in 1996, but I remember liking the album a lot...or at least most of it. My favorites included the surprisingly touching and beautiful "Jesus To A Child" and the more upbeat "Fastlove" and "Star People."

But the song that spoke to me most was "Move On"...maybe because I was in the midst of wanting to be out of love with someone I was hopelessly in love with. The song was (is) pretty much exactly what you'd expect it to be about it, except for the fact it's sung like something would be in a quiet supper club late late at night when the singer is lonely, world-weary yet still somehow rising above it all with something approaching optimism.

The best part, the part that is so vulnerable and lovely, is when George Michael sings softly at the end, "I'm going to be lucky in love one day...going to be lucky in love one day" over and over as "Move On" fades out.

You're never really sure if he's certain of this little fact or he's desperately hoping he will...

A good cry or two...

I bought Everything Changed seven years ago and it still gets me to every single time I listen. Where is Abra Moore these days? Her voice and her music are too good to not be heard on a regular basis!!!


"Every once in awhile, something's got to break to give," Abra Moore forewarns in the opening track amid a heavenly, uplifting, gorgeously melodic declaration of love. The line foreshadows what awaits on Everything Changed, the most emotionally arresting account of a relationship's rise and fall since Matthew Sweet's 1991 masterwork Girlfriend. Along the way are several irresistibly buoyant should-be pop smashes--"I Do," "Big Sky," and "Shining Star" could all scale the charts--balanced against the more measured melodic grace of "If You Want Me To" and "Taking Chances." The deepest cuts, though, are the straight-shooting piano ballads including the title track and "Family Affair," in which Moore cries out, "Don't take away the one love that matters," her voice quaking with unmistakable heartbreak. --Peter Blackstock


Also unbelievably heart-breaking and quite wonderful is Glen Campbell's brand new album Canvas of a Ghost. It just came out today so I'm still soaking it in and will hopefully be able to capture how good it is tomorrow...

Nostalgia doesn't pay well, but it sure can sound good:)

It doesn't pay to be both an insomniac and next to a computer with an open iTunes account. Last night, for some odd reason, I could not stop thinking about Scoundrel Days, an a-ha album I absolutely loved way back in 1986. I remember everything about it...buying it at my local Sam Goody back when record stores were all over malls, listening to it over and over on my Sony walkman late at night, finding an odd appeal in the forlorn and soulful sounds of songs like "Maybe, Maybe" and "October."

I'm not sorry I bought it. My iPod is slowly becoming a representation of not only current songs I adore, but all of the ones from my past, too. Some of the things I once liked are too dated now to really find fascinating (Miami Sound Machine's "Conga" just doesn't do it for me anymore), but some still sound as relevant as ever (Depeche Mode, Duran Duran, Joy Division...)


When I listened to it for the first time in at least ten years, I felt chills...Scoundrel still does it for me!

This review from allmusic.com's website is the best thing I've seen written about Scoundrel Days:

Review

by Ned Raggett

While not quite as strong as the band's debut, Scoundrel Days is still a-ha succeeding as a marketed "pretty boy" band which can connect musically and lyrically as much as any musical sacred cow. The opening two songs alone make for one of the best one-two opening punches around: the tense edge of the title track, featuring one of Morten Harket's soaring vocals during the chorus and a crisp, pristine punch in the music, and "The Swing of Things," a moody, elegant number with a beautiful synth/guitar arrangement (plus some fine drumming courtesy of studio pro Michael Sturgis) and utterly lovelorn lyrical sentiments that balance on the edge of being overheated without quite going over.

Although the rest of the disc never quite hits as high as the opening, it comes close more often than not. A definite downturn is the band's occasional attempts to try and prove themselves as a "real" band by rocking out, as on "I've Been Losing You" -- there's really no need for it, and as a result they sound much more "fake," ironically enough. Other songs can perhaps only be explained by the need to translate lyrics -- "We're Looking for the Whales" isn't an environmental anthem, and neither is "Cry Wolf," but both also don't really succeed in using nature as romantic metaphor.

When a-ha are on, though, they're on -- "October" snakes along on a cool bass/keyboard arrangement and a whispery vocal from Harket; "Maybe Maybe" is a quirky little pop number that's engagingly goofy; while "Soft Rains of April" captures the band at its most dramatic, with the string synths giving Harket a perfect bed to launch into a lovely vocal, concluding with a sudden, hushed whisper. The '80s may be long gone, but Scoundrel Days makes clear that not everything was bad back then.