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IS: Concrete Editor in Chief Jim Whalley
Event Editor Nathan Hamilton Assistant Editor Richard Simrn Arts Editors Katharine Clemow & Edward Mooney Film Editor Philip Sainty Music Editors Sarah Edwardes & Matt Sargeson TV Editors Tiro Barker & Kate Bryant
Event Chief Photographer/Dogsbody Eric Cartmen
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lt's ...
drama D ay After Thmorrow... Answe r the following... Day After 1bmorrow is in fact the second sequel to the film 'Today.' The long awaited concluding part of the Michae l Fish trilogy centering on three day s in the life of a BBC weatherman. True of False? For film information visit wwww.stercentury.co.uk or call the booking line on 01603 221900.
Corner! Stuff for nothing, nichts, niente, nada, niets... This week a plethora of violence-centred entertainment. Watch faceless millions drown, ancient armies battle, punch or shoot the shit out of each other. Ah, the best things in life truly are free .•• go find them!
Free
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Rob Lavine • Colin Griffiths • Paul Case • Edrnund Van Peebles ID • Nancy Trumpington • Stephen Davis
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Ah , the chance to waste countless hours and without spending any money. Apart from a little on ele ctricity maybe .
Cinema Tickets!
Fight Night 2004 the latest, greatest boxing game from EA sports. Realistically attempt to b eat the crap out of hard h as- - '"'""" like Lennox Lewis and Mulha:mn1a<1 Ali with only the of a spraine d thumb.
• Gary Budden • Dean Bowman • Dan Chandler • Tom
Pateman • Jemma Parish • Christo McCracken • Matthew Sparkes • The Mighty Atom • Elizabeth Brien
The Event is published fortnightly by Concrete: Post: PO Box 410, Norwich, NR4 7TB
The g e nerous chaps at Ster C e ntury Cine ma give you the chance to win one of five p airs of tickets to the g argantuan, much anticipate d Tray released on 21st May. For your chance to see it for free simp ly answer the following question.
Tel: 01603 250558
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t: ~ 1Nl 1J" [Ul [i7ftf
E-mail : su.concrete@uea.ac.uk
CINEMAS
Simply tell us who you would like to take a contract out on and why via/ e usual email addres s .
Games!
Contributors (in order of appearance): Pygge • Natty Bumpo • Bruce Worthington • Ludwig
We have three copies of the PS2 ve rsio ns of the game to give away.
Troy is based on what epic? a) The !Iliad b) The Odyssey c) Both and neither
A copy of the game c ould be yours if you answe r this simp le question, preferably correctly: Which 'JR' b oxing champ is the fa ce o f Fig ht Nig ht 2004? the
Free DVD! Spun , the most stylish comedy this year, come s out to buy on DVD and to rent on DVD and Video on 5th April 2004 from Pathe Distribution Ltd., who are giving you a chance to win the DVD. Just answe r the following: Why is euthanasia OK for d ogs and not for humans?
Remeinher, all entries to: su.concrete@uea.ac. uk
Printed by: Sharman & Co. Well, so long to you all. That was the year that nearly sunk Concrete. But, owing to all of our wonde rful talents and our ability to apologise for the previous administration, we're still here , fuelled by coffee (from our spanking new coffee machine) and ginger nuts. Wasn't too bad really, was it? Hope you all enjoyed it. I've certainly had fun. Most of the time. I'm off to try and rescue my degree now. Good luck in all your exams. Thankyou to all the people I should have thanked m ore than I h ave, owing to being in a stressed strop too often. Bottoms up , take care and love peace harmony and good hair days to all. I should shave more.
If that isn't enough to satisfy your appetite for p hillistinic big budg et eye cand y, there is also the chance to win another one of five pairs of tickets to see histrionic weather
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NB
Literature Condensed A Bluffer's Guide. We 've all been there ... it 's five minutes before the seminar begins and we haven't read a single bloody word of the book for that week. Wo uldn't it be handy to have a quick, easily disgestible guide to the Western World's greatest literary works with which to b luff o ne 's way throug h an otherwise red-faced couple of hours? Yes it would, don't argue.
This issue: Plato's Republic:
[Glaucon] "Absolutely, Socrates.'' [Socrates/ P lato] "You know, the human condition is a lot like living in a dark cave." [Glaucon] " C ertainly is, Socrates ." [THE END]
[Socrates/Plato] "Wouldn't it b e great if the entire world was run by people like me?"
[Socrates/Plat o] "Oh, and the universe is a spindle."
[Glaucon] "Yes, Socrates.'' [Socrates/Plato] "Poetry's bullshit.''
[Glaucon] "Couldn't agree more, Socrates."
12.05.04 -----------------------------------
Opinion 03
Welcome to the house of glum campaign looms.
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here are few things that are certain in life: death, taxes and Big Brother. Soon the summer will be upon us, bringing with it the latest series of the original and most cliched of all reality tv programming that is Big Brother. Our nation will be split in two as half of us turn off in disgust and the rest of us tune in... in disgust. We love it and we loathe it,lilce candyfloss but with more nudity. Through the years, Big Brother has injected more irksome nobodies into our public conscious than all those talent seeking fame contests put together. So why is it coming back for another series? Every summer our prime time Friends repeats and mind-numbing red top tabloids are snatched away from us and replaced with idle Big Brother chit-chat. This would be fine if there were anything actually going on to chat about, but there never is. The entire show to date has revolved around the possibility of two housemates having a quick bonk on camera. This would be fine, after all its only sex and death that keep us
looks into the eye of the latest Big Brother media storm ...
watching soaps, but Big Brother never delivers. We'd quickly lose interest in Hollyoaks if we weren't placated with reality defiant uppers and downers all laced with beautiful people. Big Brother has done everything short of, no wait, including paying its contestants to incite a bit of bed action and still no jollies. Yet again, we'll just have to settle for the far more titillating highlights of Big Brothers from around the globe. All this only leaves us wondering why they don't just import the best bits and save us all the hassle of having our own. As of yet the contestants have remained a mystery. As soon as we've seen them, the magical process of finding the next Brian, Jade and/or Craig can begin. If we're honest with ourselves, we don't want new people. We lilce to think we can keep up with the neverlooking-back, break-neck speed of the reality show when really we crave the familiarity of stock characters and re-runs. I get the shakes when Philip and Fern aren't all present and correct to join me at breakfast, my mind boggles at the concept of dealing with twelve new and entirely foreign faces greeting me at
the beginning of every series. Fundamentally it's just not right. Any writer worth tt.eir salt knows that you can't just change your central characters willy-nilly, its bound to cause unrest. Once we've endured the standard twelve weeks of each bunch of contestants, and through careful conditioning actually become fond of them, the assumption is made that we want to see more of them. At best they can become marginally successful in the sickly sweet world of midmorning entertainment, and let's face it, there are easier ways to get in to that industry which don't involve
that can be taken from this is that celebrity is a gift, and one that shouldn't be handed out frivolously. After the initial excitement of the opening episodes, we'll soon get used to the idea that Channel 4 as we have known it for the winter months no longer exists. However, the real insult added to this injury is the fact that by the time the final episode rolls around we 'll wonder how we'll cope without it. Banal as it is, it's a great time filler and completely unavoidable no matter how hard we try. Grim as it may seem, our summer will be filled with idle adolescent gossip involving Big
"The entire show, to date, has revolved around the possibility of two house mates having a quick bonk on camera" being filmed in the shower. At worst they can become figures of public ridicule who can only be on telly as a panto style baddie always accompanied by clouds of smoke, sickly green novelty lighting and organ music. The only useful information
Brother's latest undesirables, so we
might as well jump on the bandwagon willingly, rather than be run over by it. Oh, and in case you're wondering, yes everyone does find Davina annoying. Give the poor girl a break.
04 Feature
Bloody Norah Amy Wlnehouse is nothing to do with Norah Jones, alright? She talked to T b B nt about other things. t can be said, as it has been fre que ntly, that a Jazz-revival is taking place that is changing the face of British music. Norah Joans came to us with ' Come Away With Me' in 2002 and 'Feels Like Home' this year. Dido, constituting the 'new easy listening' segment, has been in our ears since she sang for Eminem on 'Stan'. But it wasn't until last year that we began to see what have curiously been d ubbed the "fruits of the Norah Jones phenomenon". These new acts include Katie Melua, Joss Stone, Jamie Cullum and Amy Winehouse. But in her self defence, and quite justifiably, Amy demands "what has Norah Jones got to do with anything?" With an album out, 'Frank', and a sell out tour that recently hit the Norwich Waterfront, The Event went to meet her. But how was this thing going to be approached? How do you go into a room for twenty minutes with one of Britain's hottest new acts , and come out with
some relevant feedback to the haphazard questions you coughed up over a pint, let alone your dignity? Well, as I found out (in no ambiguo us terms) it's easy with Amy! When I arrived at the Waterfront around lunchtime, it was raining.lt was a dull and miserable afternoon in Norwich. Those ones that have a way of strapping your soul to the bed whilst you body puts on its shoes and walks out the door. Lucky for me I was wearing tight pants. A car pulled up, tinted windows and chrome wheels. "Here she is" declared the Swedish journalist standing next to me. Talk about accumulating
"What has Norah Jones got to do with anything? " a broad fan base. At about 5' 3" she looked like an over excited 12 year old jumping out the car after a long journey, happy to finally arrive at her destination after a 7 hour drive from the Leeds Cockpit where she performed the night
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before. Before I could barely push the 'H' out of 'Hello' , she hurdles past with the rough, sexy grace of majesty that is her stage persona. " Oh No" , I think, "She's a Prima Donna, this will be a nightmare!" Not in the slightest. She might have had her character judged many times by the flirtatious , abrasive and controversial lyrics that make her album stand out, but as I walked into the dressing room I was greeted with a "hello darlin' , nice to meet ya" in an accent that tells you she is a London girl who knows ' the score' . harming, friendly, generous and gorgeous , she issues 'darlin's' , 'sweethearts' and 'babies' to me like I'm her next door neighbour, severely dousing the image of the 'tough Camden cookie' the press have come to label her with. But how does she feel towards the image that her album has helped to generate? " I sometimes make bad decisions and sometimes I feel in such a bad place that all I can do is just chuck shit around or sit down and write the way I feel - Or write the way I feel then chuck shit around! " In the fierce honesty that has become the trademark of her lyrical
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If there is anything you can criticise Amy for, it would be her tendency to push the offensive, or maintain the defensive . In one song, ' Fuck Me Pumps', it would appear the former is her goal. "Pumps is about me and my mate getting together and cussing all the people we always see in the clubsthe same people wearing the same clothes, sharing a brain. You know?" Fearing some further prejudiced rant, I decided to lay off more questions about that song. But Amy reassured me that the song was more a promotion of selfintegrity than a shallow piss-take of the Saturday night society. "I'm not trying to come down on anyone." So you're just reviving girl-power then? " I don't like girls that give girls a bad name. I'm just like , 'come on, you've got so much more to give people and your just like 'whatever! ' etc"' As for the concert: electric, groovy, exciting, and relaxing. It was unquestionable, as Amy performed, that she has a talent beyond her years that her generation will find it difficult to rival in terms of vocal appeal and sophistication. Like a tango, both the music and Amy's voice continued to compliment each other all night . In this dynamic display of talent , Amy's voice proved that she has the ability to be smooth and
The show gives me so much energy . .. I don't know about fame. I don't think I'm famous . All I know is that I love touring and I want to be on tour for the rest of my life.'
Tickets: £10 (£8 cone)
UEA students £5 ADDER ARKET THEATRE _ft.,lftDU
June 7th
St 7.
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style (she writes all her own music), she talks about writing the lyrics to 'Take the Box' , in which she had just broken up with her real life boyfriend and describes filling a box with contents that he gave her to take back. "I write songs that are purely autobiographical, and with 'Take the Box' I was at a point where I could do nothing else but write a song because I was so fucked up ." At 20, stunning and successful, you might be thinking this melodrama a little OTT. But the fact that she wrote an entire album about him and their relationship tells us that its importance to her isn't something that can be summarised anecdo tally. "There are songs that are just 'kill yourself' . But I'm so glad I can look b ack on my life and say, 'yeah, I was strong and I lived thro ugh that'. Anyway, I knew he was a dick-head".
sharp, smoky and pure, expressive and subtle. "The show gives me so much energy. When I feel like I'm doing the songs justice I feel like I am complimenting myself. It's the best feeling in the world!" Like Miss Jones, Amy has all the p otential of a s uper star. But it is unfair to assume that Amy has been or will be successful b e cause of No rah Jo nes's achievements. The facts present themselves clearly ; Winehouse and Jones are completely different animals in a brave new world of Jazz/Soul/Easy Listening. Questioned on fame, Amy said "I don't know about fame . I d on't think I'm famo us. All I know is that I love touring and I want to be o n to ur for the rest of my life." Wha t's Norah Jones got to do with anything ?
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06
Muddy Funsters
t's come to that time of year again. Night no longer starts in the middle of the afternoon, everyone you know is pretending to revise and, best of all, it's coming up to festival season. Ah, the joys of waking up in a tent, seeing inexplicably weird combinations of bands and gaffer taping cans of lager onto your chest to get them into the arena. But which festival to choose? Well luckily for you, the guide to your musical summer is right here.
Glastonbury he mother of them all, Glastonbury has been run since 1970 by Michael Eavis on his farm in Somerset, which is situated along ancient ley lines, meaning it's a mystical sight, something which is still felt by the revellers today. By far the biggest of the three main festivals, there are over a dozen stages d edicated just to music, as well as a circus, cabaret, and fields
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and fields worth of market and food stalls , meaning you really can go to Glastonbury and have a great time without seeing any music. As far as the music goes , the charitable donations it makes mean that the festival can't attract some of the big name American acts , but its history is littered by iconic performances such as Radiohead in 1997 , or Pulp two years before. Unfortunately demand has escalated to the extent where tickets are harder than ever to get hold of, but if you can't go never mind - it's all going to be shown on TV anyway. Who's playing (TBC) : Oasis, Paul McCartney, Muse, PJ Harvey, Chemical Brothers, James Brown.
Re ading!Leeds reviously dealing in bloated old heavy metal, the Reading festival was reborn in 1989 when Mean Fiddler took over the management and made it into a more youth-orientated indie festival. Since then, headliners have included Nirvana, the Beastie Boys and Eminem, and the musical flavo ur currently sits somewhere between indie, rock and punk. In 1999, the festival followed V's lead and began to be run on two sites, the other one being in Leeds. Like all the rest, it's become more corporate in recent years, and, along with the extra security restrictions that have been put in place this has diminished the festival's atmosphere.
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money (it is a day shorter after all) are advised to look elsewhere. Who 's playing: The Strokes, Dido, Muse, The Pixies , The Charlatans , N.E.R.D.
Despite this, Reading in particular still has a hugely devoted band of followers, many of whom have been going for ten or fifteen years , and a special blend of cheerfully anarchic spirit that's all its own. It may not have the variety of Glasto, but Reading 's strength is that it has the best staging, and is the strongest musically across all its stages, and it's this that will help it to survive longer than its younger challengers. Who's playing: The Darkness, The White Stripes, Green Day, Offspring, 50 Cent, Morrissey
Tin the Park he biggest musical event north of the border, T takes place in July and is renowned (as the Tennent 's sponsorship would suggest) for its massive b ooze consumption and party atmosphere. Being the only sizeable Scottish festival, it 's also managed to secure increasingly strong line-ups of late, this year attracting David Bowie , the Darkness and the Strokes among others . Only thing is though, unless you live aro und there anyway, are you going to be able to afford the staggering travel costs?
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V Festival
"t J'was started up to take advantage V of a Glastonbury-free year in 1996 and, effectively replacing the old Phoenix festival in the summer calendar, it has remained there ever since. V's gimmick was that it was a festival for people who wouldn't ordinarily g o to festivals , like parents or yo ung kids . It takes p lace on two days instead o f three, so you don't even have to miss any work if you drive up. V also prom otes itself as the cleanest weekend festival around, providing more showe rs for the campers, and employing more people to pick up litter. As for the bands, they tend mostly to be a mix of commercial indie and pop acts, spread among four stages. What V d oes lack, howeYer is atmosphere, and those looking for a real fes tival experience, or better value for
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.1\.moters Clear Channel, and built on punk and metal's chart success early in the decade, Download was set up to be a heavier alternative to Reading, and entices big names like Metallica, Linkin Park and a re-formed Jggy and the Stooges. Further to the bands, it's followed in Reading's footsteps by also laying on skating and BMX-ing displays alongside the music, and it all takes place at Donnington , scene of so many great past metal events.
Isle ofWight ry'lhe same one that played host to Jimi .L Hendrix, Bob Dylan and the Who in the late sixties, the IOW festival was resurrected two years ago by the local council (who of course closed it down in the first place) to boost tourism. Expanded since then to a three day length, IOW is more of an event for the older rock fan , with David Bowie, the Manics and, erm, the Who all rocking out in a safe, orderly fashion. Princes Trust Urban Music Fe stival robably the only opportunity Prince Charles and Durrty Doogz will ever get to meet , this is an indoor festival dedicated to black music. The bill is made up of a mixture of huge American names like Jay-Z and Beyonce and local chart talent, and graffiti displays and B-boy battles are also promised. The only drawback is the heavy Umbra sponsorship, although those looking for a ' foo tball inspired chill-out zone' or a 'football skilz assault course' may see it as more of a boon.
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Pizzas 2 for 1 Mon , Tue, Wed 5-8 with NUS
12.05.04
We Love .. . Horne lands aking over from Tribal Gathering, and being held over the May bank holiday weekend, Homelands features a mix of live acts (this year including Faithless, The Music and Scissor Sisters) and big name DJs , and all the action takes p lace in a series of big top tents . If all this sounds exciting, bear in mind that the event runs for seventeen hours straight, so only those with serious stamina (or, ahem, serious medication ) need apply.
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Following . the Brick Lane
DJ Yoda Interview ng with proving that collahoting with People Under Stairs and loving Johnny Bates Jazz e not mutually- exclusive, 80s pop-culture fiend DJYoda had a chat with The Event about his status as a top party DJ and which Gremlin he fancies most ... You seem to have a love for traditional hiphop but at the same time a desire to push back its boundaries. Is that fair comment? ''Totally - the way I see hip-hop is that it's always been the one type of music that takes in other types of music and makes something new out of them. I see myself as a hip-hop DJ, playing all the music influencing me in a hip-hop style.'' Is there a part of you that fears mainly being remembered as 'the guy who mashed up Rick Astley'? "If that's the case then, so be it, I'm happy with that. It's all music that I like! (laughs) If I'm remembered for playing something someone else thinks is weird it's cool by me.''
Katharine Clemow tells us what she learned when she met literary babe, Monica Ali, and asked her about her 'much-talked-about' novel Brick Lane. onica Ali was famous before she was published, which is both a blessing and a curse, and she shot to celebrity as her critically acclaimed and widely loved debut Brick Lane jumped off bookshop shelves across the country. Her name joined the ranks of the great and the good of British literature among cries for her book to be banned and others hailing it as one of the truest and most humane novels of the last few years. Once the initial circus surrounding the book's publication was over the trappings of life in the limelight have crept up on her gradually. She now gets stopped in the street, often mistaking fans for people she knew at school but doesn't recognise. As we discuss the quite staggering reception of the book she says 'you'd have to be a nutter' to expect any of it. For someone with her popularity and the number of nominations and awards that have greeted her short but illustrious and fast developing career she is as down to earth and happy to chat as one could wish a guest at the Literary Festival. The reason for the appeal of both the woman and the work is clear to see. She's witty and perceptive, considering my questions with her head tilted to one side and responding frankly and honestly. She also has a warm laugh that signals both her willingness to talk about some things and her reticence to 'go there' about others. She clearly loves discussing the book and it feels like we're gossiping about friends when I ask what she thinks happens to Nazneen, the heroine of her novel, once the story is finished. The sympathetic and inspiring figure of Nazneen is one of many creations that haunted the author as she went about her daily routines during the eighteen months she took to write the novel. Ali's British mother met her Bengali father in the north of England and the couple moved to Dhaka where they got married and their now internationally famous daughter was born. When she was a child the family moved back to England, to Bolton, and this two-part upbringing forms the background for
Ali's novel and the position she finds herself in of 'straddling two cultures' and being able to observe both with a rich and vibrantly dynamic perspective. Her Brick Lane teems with characters that are colourful and experience the full spectrum of life's ups and downs . They are amalgams of people she has met and people she has imagined but says they're all based on elements found 'in the dark recesses' of her mind. She loves them all, is forgiving of their failings and indulgent of their joys and woes and frustrations with the world. She's even fond of the complex but invariably devious and occasionally vicious Mrs Islam saying 'Even her, and she's a monster isn't she?!' She started writing by submitting short stories to a website but soon began to feel restricted by the length of them. On how the idea for the novel
abundance. Its colour and the rich vitality of the characters have made it a story that has touched hundreds of thousands of readers and its forthcoming translation into 26 other languages means its fan base will continue to grow beyond Ali's wildest dreams. element of the novel that ets it apart from many written today is the incluion of the traditional engali stories Ali was told as a child. Some of them have been modified to suit particular circumstances in Brick Lane, but several have been preserved on paper with sensitivity to the oral traditions from which they come that make them particularly vivid and memorable. Ali says the arrival of a new generation of her family in her
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If she wasn't a bestselling author Ali says she'd be 'scraping a living somehow' but that writing stories is far preferable to actually working for the bread. first came to her, Ali talks of her vision of the two sisters, Nazneen and Hasina, as a pair, deeply different in personality but 'completely inseparable' and both 'in pursuit of the same essential things; happiness I suppose.' Chanu, Nazneen's husband, was also central to the first conception of the story. The detail of Bengali culture and the modern Bangladesh that provides the background to the story and is deeply imbedded within the narrative came easily to Ali who already had a 'store of knowledge' gleaned from her lifelong interest in books on the subject. When she decided to embrace the bigger project of a novel Ali says it's 'not incidental' that her real desire to write coincided with the birth of her first child and the rush of creative energy that inspired. She also felt the need to 'carve out a private mental space' for herself while coming to terms with parenthood and the demands of a nursing baby. As for the plot of Brick Lane she says she 'didn't choose it', the story just asked to be brought to life. Life and energy are two things the novel has in
son Felix made her want to physically set down examples of the rich creative legacy handed down from her father's people. Her life is now busier than that of many working mothers and she's off to the States for a two-week publicity tour for the paperback in a few days. But it's a price worth paying for the knowledge that she need never work again and once the book signings and readings are over at the end of the month she'll have the summer to spend with her children. On what she would be doing if she wasn't a bestselling author Ali says she'd be 'scraping a living somehow' but that writing stories is far preferable to actually working for the bread, or should I say rice, on the table. She's currently working on a new novel and she wards off questions about it claiming 'it's a great pleasure not to have to talk about it' and reminding me that no one bothered her while she was working on Brick Lane. What she will give away is that it's 'another contemporary novel set in the UK' and with that we will have to content ourselves.
Bow much have you been influenced by American turntahlists such as Z-Trip, whose loves for Eighties pop music is well-documented? "A lot of what I do is influenced by 0-Bert, who's probably the best scratch DJ. His first mixtape, Pre-School Breaks, cuts up samples from films and mixes them with hip-hop tracks. My Eighties Megamix CD was influenced by DJ Slipmat's Rock The Kasbah album, too." Bow do you keep all of your audience happy all the time? ''You can never keep everyone happy when you play live, but because I play a wide variety of stuff everyone always tends to always find something they like. No, hardcore UK hip-hop heads don't really get into Johnny Hates Jazz, funnily enough ... " Do you mind proving your true love for the Eighties by naming your favourite Goonie, Gremlin and Breakfast Club member? (Laughs) "Alright - my favourite Goonie is Chunk for obvious reasons, my favourite Breakfast Club member has got to be [Emilio] Estevez, probably, again another classic choice ... " And you favourite Gremlin? "Er... I don't know if it'll sound way too dodgy." It's the one who dresses up like a woman in Gremlins 2, isn't it? ''Yes! (laughs) I'm going to have to stick with that now I've said it, aren't I?" Afraid so. U you could pick two albUil\ll with which to make your Grey 1Ubum (where underground hip-hop DJ Danger Mouse took the vocals from Jay-Z's Black 1Ubum, the music from Beatles' White 1Ubum and remixed them together), what would they be? "Good question! Off the top of my head, I'd take the vocals from Biz Markie's The Diabolical Biz Markie and the music from a Johnny Cash Best Of.. .. It'd be country-meets-hip-hop and, no, I have no idea what 'colour' it would be!" Finally, who do you reckon would win in a fight: Data from The Goonies or the real Yoda? (Laughs) ''Yoda, I think. If you've seen Star Wars Episode 11 you know he can shoot lightning out of his hands - that would kick Data's arse. His 'Pinchers of Power' just wouldn't be enough ... "
Alistair Lawrence
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08 hard enough you can find a few possible benefits should you ever decide to put down the joypad and enter the real world.
Gaming our lives away?
cording to a study carried out at ospitals in New York, surgeons ho regularly play computer games make 37% fewer mistakes and work 27% faster than surgeons who don't. Keyhole surgery relies on, amongst other things, careful control of joysticks
AE ver since the days of Pong in the 70s people have been investing/wasting large amounts of time and money on computer games, and the advancements have been huge. Games have become larger, more complex and far more personalised. Garners are encouraged to wander around and explore environments freely, games like GTA: Vice City offer an entire city to play in and , should you so desire, to destroy and pillage, while calmer titles such as Harvest Moon 2 Jet you control almost every aspect of the 30 year lifespan of a character - running a farm as you see fit , socialising, finding a wife and raising children. Computer games have re alised the goals of those flawed , choose-yourown-adventure-books by allowing
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1.MARGHERITA
garners to make the decisions as to what they do and how they behave. Of course you don't have to simply control an individual, many games allow you to control armies, nations and even worlds, while games like Black and White or the more serious SimEarth let you influence the entire evolution of various species. This increasing size, complexity and scope of computer games, combined with their rapidly improving graphical capabilities , is causing them to become more akin to movies, the key difference being that games are under the control of the player. Immense plotlines have been crafted, ranging from spooky-mysterysolving (Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem ) to sci-fi adventuring (Metroid Prim e). The voices (and sometimes faces) of Hollywood actors are becoming commonplace in our video games - Bruce Wi llis, Dennis Hopper, Ray Liotta and Lu cy Liu are just a few of the celebrities to have turned up in games. It 's also become standard procedure for any big action movie to g e t the computer game treatment (often with poor results - see E.T. for the Atari 2600) and occasionally for a computer game to be influential enough to war-
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(If you fancy becoming a surgeon then the study recommends the Super Monkey Ball games) . If that doesn't sound like your thing then you can always become a professional competitive computer game player, the members of South Korea's team make up to $100,000 a year through corporate sponsorship, their games attract huge audiences and are broadcast live on cable TV if you do well you might even get to play at South Korea 's 'Annual World Cyber Games' and do your country proud. It also looks like the military could have a use for our computer-gaming skills, they've recently had successful test-flights of their 'X -45 r ob otic combat plane', an un-manned plane, piloted from the safety of a military base by what is essentially a guy with a joypad and TV monitor. So even if your failing your degree due to a persistent MarioKart addiction there may still be some hope of a lucrative career using those [ahem) carefully honed joystick skills.
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"even if computer games are killing us slowly, the chances are we'll continue playing them "
rant a movie franchise or TV series (again, often with poor results - see The Mario Brothers Movie and the Mortal Kombat TV series). The Street Fighter game franchise even spawned a novelisation of the plot of the game, which was, as you may well have guessed, completely awful. The quality is, however, beside the point. It is clear that computer games are now able to greatly effect popular culture and are profitable and influential enough that Hollywood has taken notice. With computer games improving at the .rate they are , Hollywood getting in on the action and all the money being made, one has to wonder if all those years of playing will ever pay off. Aside from having fun at the time, are there any real benefits to playing computer games? To be honest, even if computer games prove to be killing us slowly every day, the chances are that we 'll continue playing them , but in the name of justifying this timekilling pastime and all of those years spent indoors trying to do the mayhem levels on Lemmings, if you look
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12.05.04
WIDE RANGE OF KEBABS, B AND EXTRAS AVAILABLE - PLEASE CALL FOR DETAILS
Features 09
Ugly Ducklings
Cinefile
Fitzcarraldo no. 43
Recognition should focus on ability rather than a well-stocked vanity case, says Paul Case as he looks at a current trend in award nominations
all. There is no consistency in their opinion. It is run by a bunch of suited cigar chomping monkeys who give a Best Picture Oscar to an acutely observant film like Fargo in 1996, and then the following year give the same award to maudlin, insulting drivel like Titanic, which beat both Boogie Nights and L.A. Confidential. When Michael Douglas married Catherine Zeta ]ones, he immediately set about trying to get her an Oscar, though he failed with Tra/lic, he finally succeed.e d with Chicago. Anyone who thinlal this is justified obviously has severe deficiencies in their capacity to make judgements. The purpose of this article is not to moan about the stupid, moronic, i~ ramus-led, trite, and altogether bafllin.g inconsistencies of the Oscars. Nor is it to highlight the idiocy of Rocky beating 7lui Driver to Best Picture; or the complete lack of recognition given to Se7en.lnstead, the beef is with the Best Actress award, which is, noticeably, being awarded exclusively to women! Something rotten in Denmark there, don't you think? But the absurd sellism that is prolifezating the Academy is not worth entering into here (though wby men can't get a Best Actiea award. still deserves exploration). It's not the fact mainstream 'attractive' women are being given o.car., DO siree. It's because, recently, they'Te been getting them for being bold enough to 'dirty themselves up a bit' you know; like Damon Albarn U8ed to do before he discovered the sitar and started jamming with Third World countries. "Gosh", say the Academy, "look at that actress! She's fit, really fit. But... she's hideous and morally ambiguous in this film. My, isn't she brave?" It's almost as though a1.'ting has something to do with playing different characters. The most recent victim of this absurdity is Charli.ze Theron in the crit-
she was nominated by the geelc squad that is the Academy of Science Fiction. Fantasy and Horror films (despite the fact that a James Bond film fits into none of those genres). Anyway, that's beside the point. Yes, she's very good in Monster's Ball, but far too much has been made of the fact that she's a fine young filly who mucks herself up a bit. Well, the implication here is that she'd get an Oscar for getting out of bed in the morning. It is the same as Theron she cries, she opens her heart into a performance and is awarded for it. But the Academy is clearly patronising in this respect, and the equally patronisingly liberal reaction - ''Wow! A black woman getting an Oscar" - was also implicitly in full force.
Fibc&- what?
h se are good performances. t backs up the idea that Academy is horribly vacus is the fact that mediocre p ormances are awarded as well. Check out Sharon Stone in the overrated, overlong and over-indulgent Casino. She's great in it when she's regarded as an object by the camera, but when she's required to act she just
Yes, you knowledgeable person. Herzog's obsession with the South American jungle has seen three major features of his produced there over the years. It has also led to his unwitting involvement in civil Wars, tribal warfare, prostitution rackets organized by the local clergy and endless bouts of disease and natural turmoil.
"Gosh", say the Academy, "look at that actress! She's fit, really fit. But ... she's hideous and morally ambiguous in t.his film. My, isn't she brave?" It's almost as though acting has something to do with playing different characters. ically acclaimed Monster. For her portrayal of serial killing prostitute Aileen Carol Wuornos she was not only given an Oscar but at least seventeen billion other awards from various film festivals. Please understand it is not the quality of Theron's performance that is being criticised here (because it is pretty damn good), but the dubious motives and opinions of the Academy. Never mind the fact that Christina Ricci, as her girlfriend Selby, puts in a performance of equal power. Hardly any review of Monster avoids mentioning that Theron is in fact very attractive and has been uglified (yes, it is a woid) for the film. But is it so surprising that the make-up is such an achievement in the postL'l'OR era? Fmm this point of view, there is more than a whiff of condescension that accompanies the awanl The suited monllteys are amazed at the fact an attractive woman refuses to act bued on her appearance. This ezposes a shocking- and obvious- point: that the Academy is a shallow waste of everyone's time. But if it were just Theron. there would be 110 foundation for such a critique. Thanldully, there's more; so much more that it is just plain wrong. Halle Berry, in the cracking film Monster's BaD, puts in a very good performance as a woman completely broken inside by the death of her son and her husband. Anyone who's seen The Flint:stones movie knows just how attractive this young lady can be. She's also an official Bond girl in the worst titled movie ever, Die Another Day, for which
goes haywire. She storms about, cries, snorts coke, cries a bit more and storms about with little conviction. And, yet, because she's an attractive woman putting in a less than attractive performance, the Academy gives her a nomination. So why do they do this? Well, to prove that, you know, they're not shallow or anything, and are hip enough to not just give nominations to pretentious thespians. But if they are consciously making the decision to nominate m ore idiosyncratic performances, then shallow is exactly what the Academy proves itself to be, simply because it is still based in !the realm of appearances, rather than the quality of the performance itself. And this leaves us one argumentdefininq, behemoth of a final question: Is the establishment 110thing more than Neolithic in its attitude towards women? It eeems they would rather give a pretty actress who 'does clown' an Oscar over a pcMerful performance by a less than glamorous, but truly professional, one. With this in mind, the reason for some of their decisions, such as Tom Hanks' Oscar for .Rm路est Gump, become clearer. Also, arisa Tomei's Best Supporting Actress for My Cousin Vinny in 1992 sees an awrage performance in an average film, whilst a powerhouse performance by Kathy Burlce in 1997's Nil By Mouth is completely ignored . The Oscars may foster the image of 'leading' ladies, but they certainly aren't leading the way when it comes to equality between the se:zes.
Brian Sweeney Fit:zgerald is a cheery Irish entrepreneur whose tongue-twister of a name is pronounced with a Spanish rendering by the locals in his chosen place of residence - Iquitos, a rubber boom city deep in the Peruvian rainforest, thousands of miles up the Amazon.
What's it all about then?
Fitzcarraldo's one love is opera. Everything he attempts, including a failed trailsAmazonian railway, are ruses only calculated to make money for his major project, the building of a huge, opulent opera house in Iquitos. The ice trade is failing so he turns his talents to rubber. Unfortunately the only rubber areas left unclaimed are those situated the wrong side of a great series of rapids - the Pongo de Mortes. .Ill, I see; I tldnlt.
He buys a derelict boat, reconditions it and sets sail, in the wro.n g direction!! Oooh exciting. He plans to sail the boat up a parallel river and hoist it up one side of the intervening mountain and down the other, to end up upstream of the rapids. Then he'll get loads of rubber, make a mint and build an opera. Bmmm, what?
Yes, it's outlandish, confusing, and long. A famously awful intetpolation. filmed in Berlin long after the original footage, has Fitzcarraldo explaining his plans with the help of maps, dividers and copious diagrams to the boat captain, who in a previous scene had seemed totally aware of the plan. This is a rare example of Herzog bovring to audience pteiiSure after test screenings they were totally lost.
Well, as with most Herzog films, the end is not the saccharine cli.Jtiu: of Hollywood so it does not spoil anything to say he fails, dismally. He manages his own small victory though and the pig gets the armchair. Wllat?
Just watch it, and afterwards get hold of Butden of Dreams, Les Blank's documentary on the making of Fitzcarraldo, which, UJlbe.. lievably, came out two years before the film it documents, and shows only a few months of the six years of turmoil that Herzog, Kinski et al underwent.
12.05.04
Features 11
people don't want to get into acting because they want to shine, they do it because they want to be in something that is uniformly good, and my taste was always towards stories and films and performances and plays and productions where everyone works towards the whole, and it doesn't mat-
advertising, ahead of Lucy Liu's. Even so, he prefers not to think of it as proof of stardom, "I don't really think of it as carrying a movie because I think that would scare me to death." He found the shoot stressful and tiring, but relished the chance to develop a character across an entire film, noting "it was
Northam on acting and fame: " People don't want to get into acting ... to shine, they do it because they want to be in something that is uniformly good. If someone [has] .. . no lines and one entrance, they can still give a performance that adds texture and meaning." ter if someone comes on with no lines and only one entrance, they can still give a superb performance that adds texture and meaning to the whole thing. I suppose that's another reason why Happy, Texas was such a contented experience, everyone was treated with equanimity." Happy, Thxas, a 1999 independent comedy about two escaped convicts (Northam and Steve Zahn) who have to pose as gay pageant organizers, is a film he regularly cites as his favourite production to date. Notably, for an independent film, very little business was involved: "It was, strangely enough, relatively uncom~n;;j~;;~!)~~~~~;;~~~;;;;~;j~i;};~~~~;J~~~~~![;,;;n~~;;.-1 Plicated,andisupposebythatimean money was raised privately - the director's family put most of the ----~----~----~~----------------~-------""1. money up for it. Everyone involved with it just wanted to do the film. It
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c=~===::...:====~==-==-===:.:::.===-======::.:=.:==:...:==---- was a bit of a sea change; it came at an odd time in the history or developEnglishman abroad can be many things: refined, thuggish, sun burnt, unnecessarily particular regarding toast preparation. In Hollywood, however, British actors can usually look forward to being shoved into one of two pigeon-holes: nasty villain, or effete period poser. Almost a decade after first hitting Tinsel Town in The Net (playing the bad guy), it's a prejudice
Northa.m On Hollywood: "I think I'm more at sea than I was a few years ago." Jeremy Northam knows only too well. Speaking to Concrete just hours before jetting off to Sweden to start his next project, a post-Vietnam black comedy titled Guy X, the star recalled one phase when matters became particularly difficult: " I found myself a couple of years ago being offered things like Enigma, Possession and Gosford Park, all of which are different periods and I can rationalize in my head that they're different kinds of period movies, but whether they're themed by the audience as period movies I don't know.
ment of independent movies because we tried to make an unashamedly populist film in independent mode as it were. And for some people, the purists of independent film, it was considered not quite right because no one could believe that this was the film that people wanted to make." Unfortunately, while he has the talent and outlook of a character actor, Northam also has the looks and charm of a leading man. The result is that few in the industry, or audiences in general, know what to expect from him. Has he found this to be a problem?
Or there's Winslow Boy and An Ideal Husband, which to me are entirely different characters, but they're both called Sir Robert, they both have seats in the houses of Parliament and we even shot them on the ;;ame set. I think that's been quite tricky, and it's sometimes been quite heavy to deal with afterwards, in the sense that you hope that people will see past the trimmings of the story and look to the heart of it." As an answer it's typical of the many Northam offers over the course of the 30-minute phone conversation - eloquent, thoughtful and frequently . ' p lenty of people tell you what you amusing, but also somehow worried and uncertain, as if he's still not sure should be doing. I always have a whether getting into the novie business was a good idea at all. great difficulty ' Considering the success he has with the time-lag involved in making enjoyed, such reservations might something. For instance, Cypher was come as something of a surprise. just released on DVD here, but I shot Since The Net he has steadily built an 路 that film three years ago. I had a couimpressive filmography, alternating ple of friends who saw it recently and between a range of cor.temporary said very nice things and talk about it roles and accepting the Period Pound as if it's a recent thing, but it's long when it allows interesting work or col- gone from my imagination. And in terms of that adding to or diminishing laborations. But while he admits to gaining in confidence in front of the from a broader image of one's self as camera, when it comes to the politics a commodity in the market place, givof Hollywood, "I think I'm more at sea ing yourself a brand identity, it's totally baffling to me because it's hapthan I was a few years ago." Perhaps this is became, despite pened such a long time ago." the evidence to the cont:ary (there Rushed into production to beat are a number of worryingly posses- the then-imminent Hollywood strikes, sive Jeremy fan-sites on the interne!) Cypher is the nearest Northam has yet Northam resolutely refuses to believe come to carrying a movie, with his he is a film star. In his \'iew, "Most name featuring prominently on
lovely knowing that main things are not going to be cut." Though it received good reviews, the film fared poorly at the box office, a victim of the situation following the strikes' cancellation when studios discovered they had more product than they needed. The low-key release suited Northam perfectly. "There was a time when I thought I had to get out and about and be seen about the place and I was never happy doing that, I find it a tremendous waste of time and energy for me. I'm 42 now and I think I'm a bit long in the tooth for running around in that way." Actively pursuing work has rarely been Northam's style. Having studied English at university (and done very little drama) he turned work experience at the Bristol Old Vie into a place in their theatre school, quickly graduating from there to a series of increasingly prestigious stage roles, including stints at the RSC and the National. It was at the latter that he not only won an Olivier Award for Most Promising Newcomer (in The Voysey Inheritance) but also had the unenviable task of taking over as Hamlet when Daniel Day-Lewis suffered a nervous breakdown. Then, after 15 years of stage acclaim (with the odd TV mini-series thrown in) movies came knocking. "I was at the RSC for two years and I was approached about a film which was never released in cinemas - some people would say thank God - about the life of a British composer called Peter Warlock. It took about 6 months for us to get the green light. It was all very complicated. We had to start shooting while I was still performing at the RSC and I had to go straight from there to Canada. We finished just before Christmas 1994 and I had been approached by an agent on the strength of a screen test from that. So I went to America to see if I should sign up with this agent and got The Net completely out of left-field four days later." Ever since, the film roles have been frequent and varied, to the extent that Northam's forthcoming appearance in Harold Pinter's Old Times (directed by Roger Michell at the Donmar Warehouse Theatre) will be his first stage work in five years. In the interim, Guy X has his full attention. The production, based on the novel No-one Thinks of Greenland by John Greismer, eo-stars Jason Biggs and Natasha McElhone and falls into the 'quirky, independent'
side ofNortham's career. Biggs plays a soldier who, thanks to a bureaucratic error, looses his identity. Northam plays the morally shady commanding officer of the Greenland army base where events transpire. He describes Guy X as "about as dark as you can go and still be comic." he time of the interview e film was at "that range sort of period here you haven't met ybody yet. Your imagination is going one way with the script and you're getting last minute script changes through the post that there's been no discussion about and it's all a bit bewildering." Usually, he says, such confusion resolves itself. In the case of Possession, the film he made in 2001 with director Neil Labute and Gwyneth Paltrow, it didn't. "It was completely rejigged. You'd find yourself in a dubbing studio uttering words you'd never seen before wondering how it was all going to go together." Labute, who had made his name writing and directing character comedies such as In the Company of Men, had little experience of period drama. " It was quite a weird experience for him, it wasn't his natural medium and he treated it bravely as a sort of experiment. I always think of him as someone who isn't afraid to try something outside his usual remit." If the production was new to Labute, it may be the nearest thing that exists to a
'Jeremy Northam movie': major female eo-star, hugely successful director trying something different and, inevitably, a period setting. When it comes to his leading ladies (to date the list includes Paltrow, Bullock, Liu, Sharon Stone, Kate Winslet, Mira Sorvino, Uma Thurman and Robin Wright-Penn), Northam insists there isn't "any grand design. People have tried to put me with different people. I think people are trying to find central relationships between characters that spark in some way, and sometimes they do, sometimes they don't." Less random is his choice of directors, on several occasions agreeing to slightly dubious projects if they led to interesting collaborations. "I worked with Norman Jewison last year [on The Statement] and that was a great thrill, even if the film wasn't universally liked. And I worked with Sidney Lumet [on Gloria] , who's a massive hero of mine and again it's a pity the final product wasn't what it could have been, but I wouldn't have swapped the experience for anything." It would seem that Northam has carved himself a niche as an actor who can be relied upon when a great director wants to delve into the past. So how were Steve (Spielberg), Bob (Altman) and Dave (Mamet)? Invited to play a quick game of name association, Northam tried to sum-up his experiences with the trio. Having played a judge in Spielberg's ill-fated slave
drama Amistad he says, "He's so fast on the set. I said, 'how do you manage, being so fast?' because he looks at one rehearsal and then says 'right, we'll put the camen here' and then once he 's made the first choice, the logic of where the camera goes next is partly dictated. And he said, 'yeah, sometimes I'm lOo fast' , 'but what do you do
"Ivor Novelle was a little bit easier because people generally don't know him and Altman was a little bit naughty because the one thing Ivor Novelle never did was sing." Working on The Winslow Boy with Mamet was more relaxed. ''We had a hilarious time on that. I'd like to work on something that is predominantly
Northam on the curious passage of time: "Cypher was just released on DVD here, but I shot that film three years ago. A couple of friends saw it recently and talk about it as a recent thing, but it's long gone from my imagination." then?', 'well if I'm lucky, I can re-shoot'. He said sometimes you find yourself sitting in a dubbing studio wondering 'oh God, vrhy did I do it like this?' But incredible energy, we were doing up to thirty set-ups a day." Altman's Gosford Park was similarly overwhel.nling: "Like being part of a great circus. He manages to engender this amazing collective atmosphere around what he does. Extraordinary." Compared to the other real-life figure he has ?layed [Dean Martin in American TV Movie Martin and Lewis]
Mamet's writing. This was predominantly Ratigan and he had huge respect for what Ratigan had to do and he has a very distinctive approach to acting that descends from his own thinking and training and that takes a certain amount of time to get used to. It was great fun." Here, then, is why Northam is in the movies. For all his anxiety and doubt, cinema has allowed a great actor to work with some of the greatest dramatic artists of the last 30 years. That he's managed this largely on his own terms should cheer him up no end.
t a bottle DRAW EVERY MONDAY NI
12.05.04 ,
12Creative.Writing - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Writing. Found Poem 1 I want to be written grandly To balance on the tentative light of dawns to speak of Angels in cloud formations and the heartbreak of unused shoes. Bear with me. He always focuses downwards like this Onto the everyday: used teabags and scuffed skirting boards. Poking about in bins for the leavings, stirrings; evidence.
Second Band Bookshop Yes! There you are. I can speak with you in old bookshops, among the others you point out. I mean, it is the only place I might sit with you, since that last bodged, paDruntifarewell. The only place, if I do well, where I could tell you all about it, side by side. Whispering. Perhaps enough, but not much. I pay and leave again with more books than I came for, troubled we may be losing touch. NattyBumpo
Sleight of Band I want to pinch up your hurt as a party magician might a silver coin, from behind an ear: Circle the hollows of his palms and reveal thin air! - 'it's gone!' But we know the coin would rest in a secret recess, Hidden from childlike eyes. Instead we must be patient. 'No, we're not there yet,' you say. 'Give it time'.
Butch Worthington
Search Actually, I suppose clouds slide by Jndifferently. They're not really Angels at all but poised water, waiting to cool and fall.
Edmund Pygge Please send contributions (written, visual, whatever) to: concrete.eventeditorial@uea.ac.uk, happy scribbling.
I should have written it down. I came here to remember. It remains elusive. Like a book lent to a lost friend, it's gone for good. Maybe someone else has it now. Damn, where's it gone? They say that if you leave an object in a place long enough, then, eventually, the exact sub-atomic circumstances may occur to allow a complete disappearance. It probably won't happen in reverse. So this sitting in annoyance is so much
wasted time. I should have written it down.
â&#x20AC;˘
Perhaps if I start looking for something else, I'll find it parked under a pile of half-remembered faces Or stuffed in a box of friends' numbers. It can happen this way:
You look for the thing you're after now and find something else you wanted the other day. I remember!
Buy "fltÂŁM.
It was something about not having enough time. Hmm. I didn't want it anyway. LudwigVan Peebles m
Blessing May life return your effort. But if not may you learn To swallow the burn of bitter disappointment And stick up two fingers at the wind.
Trumpington 12.05.04 _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _Nancy __ _...._._ _ _ _ _ __
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Feature 13
n
es
started work on a short film about an unknown American singer-
songwriter called Gary Jules it was just a satisfying side-project during his year abroad. That was until he got back to Britain and heard a familiar voice on just about every radio station in the country ...
aat year started out Hollywood on a block where you're as weird and just kept get- likely to get mugged as anything else." ting weirder. Early on I The whole scene enchanted me, but found myself diacuasing there was another reason why I kept North Wales caravan .. returning. Just prior to my first visit to parks with Mike Myers, the Hotel Cafll, I had finished shooting and eleven months later and editing an interview for television with former UCLA student and current I was dancing round a radio, trying to multiply seventy-seven Blackburn Rovers goalkeeper Brad by twenty-five. Confused? So was I. My Friedal, and I was keen to keep up some nine months at the University of creative momentum. When Gary Julea California in Loa Angeles was characterised by unusual incidents, but each moment confirmed to me that studying abroad is one of the best things a person can ever do. This particular story focuses on Gary Julea, just one of many laid-back Californians I had the pleasure of meeting. Julea stands out because in December he released his first single in the UL It sold 236,000 copiee in one appeared wearing a UCLA sweater week and secured him. and his friend everything began to slot into place. Michael Andrews, Jut year's coveted A few weeb later the camera was Christmas Number One. rolling and Gary Julea was sharing the I first heard the Gary Julei version of first part of what is turning out to be Mad World in March 2002. Paul, a fellow quite a story. Dropping out of college UEA film student with his finger on the aged nineteen, Julea did not graduate pulse of obBCUie American moviemak- until he returned to UCLA ten years ing, brought round an imported copy of later to study English Literature: ~·I conDonnie Darko, which featured the song. aider it to be the beat· thing I've done After that we told anyone who'd listen with my adult life,'' he said. As my friend how highly we thought of the film but Christine jogged out onto Cahuenga not until my friend Lora, her finger on Boulevard to put quarters in the meter, the pulse of American folk-rock, bought Julea explained how Mad World was Julea' album while visiting me in LA did supposed to be Donnie Darko'a inconI sit up and take note. spicuous end credit song until at the last A week later she was extolling the moment it was moved into the picture: virtues of his repertoire dawn the phone ''They wanted a U2 song but it was too and, trusting her judgement, I decided ezpenaive so by some weird twist of the not just to buy the album but to track universe it ended up in this perfect spot this man dawn. in the movie." Little did we know then And this is how I came upon what I that the weirdest twists were still to consider to be the best-kept secret in come. LA: The Hotel Cafll. It was spring 2003 Although by that time my favourite and Gary Julea and his band had a songs were the ones Julea had written Tuesday night residency at this unpre- himself, there was no denying that Mad tentious one-room venue where singer- World performed live was an excepsongwriters perform within touching tional, arresting experience. Even with distance of an audience seated at small city traffic rolling past outside, the first tables, crouching against walla, and few bars of the piano intro put everyleaning in from the Hollywood street thing into a creepy slow motion. Ten outside. I loved it so much I kept coming seconds in and newcomers were surback, every Tuesday night for the next reptitiously dialling friends and turning two months. their phones to the front of the room. It Nothing in America gave me more was too special not to share. pleasure than listening to Julea' sOngs, Later, in December, when, with the surrounded by friends I felt privileged surprise UK release of Mad World just a to know, in "a teeny room in the heart of few days away, Gary Julea played London's Bush Hall. His performance, supporting Aqualung, earned an en~ two minutes of passionate applause and suggested that I wasn't the only one who liked what I heard.
"There's no voodoo, no mystery business stuff behind it, it's just the music that did it by itself."
F
r Julea it's the most satisfying art of what he does: "I go lay somewhere and ten peole come. The next time I ome they've each brought three or four friends. It's the cooleat way
because you know nobody did it for you. There's no voodoo, no mystery business stuff behind it, it's just the music that did it by itself." Realising that the footage 1 shot in Loa Angeles was only the beginning of the story, I began to plan ways of expanding the film. When Mad World topped the Christmas charta I was dumbstruck. Gary Jules had gone from grassroots LA to primetime TV and Top of the Pops! Text after text bombarded my phone. Why? Because back in November I had entered my own mad world and bet seventy-seven pounds on Gary Julea to be Number 1 at Christmas. The odds were 25-1. Two months and three Gary Jules shows later my bank balance was a new colour and I was standing behind a camera in Glasgow's beautiful Cottier
Theatre shooting another interview for a film I'd love to finish once Gary Julea slows down long enough for me to catch up with all he has achieved. Travelling the length and breadth of the country to gather material and savour the music that rocks my (mad) world has seen my funds dwindle but it has been worth every penny. Those Tuesday nights at the Cafe helped me make sense of a city unlike anything else I'd ever known. As Julea explains, "It's just a bunch of working people, a bunch of broke, empty people. These people came from all over the world to try and do something. They weren't satisfied with where they were and they came here to try to do something else. And no matter how it ends up I think there's something really beautiful about that."
,-
14 Film -------------------------------
n Helsing is a stupid, stupid movie. How could the idea of putting Dracula, the Wolfrnan and Frankenstein's monster into one film not be stupid? To be fair, however, director Stephen Sornrners was not aiming to create art; his aim was to make the ultimate B-rnovie (B-rnovies, of course, being the epitome of stupidity) . Remember the bit in Speed where the bus literally flies over a gaping chasm? Pretty stupid, right? Van Helsing tops that when a horse drawn carriage magically leaps over a vast gap of death . Somehow the film gets stupider after this point. All the Romanian peasants speak fluent English and don't have enough sense to move away,
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spected by his peers and with a arge cult following, Jirn Jarrnusch as an almost unique status in contemporary American cinema, which no doubt arises from his position as both pioneer and veteran of Indy filmmaking. There are few directors in the world who would have the ability, or the audacity, to assemble such an impressive cast of actors and musical celebrities, as Jarrnusch has done for his latest film Coffee and Cigarettes, only to set them to the banalities of sitting around smoking and drinking coffee. If this is unconventional - even unthinkable subject matter for Hollywood, then it is all the more appropriate for the increasingly antithetical Indy film culture. Coffee and Cigarettes is really eleven very short films shot in a
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rather than stay in a place where they are hors d ' oeuvres for Vampires. Though it is never explained why Dracula can only be killed by a werewolf's bite, it 's lucky for the hero that a werewolf happens to bite him. Luckier still is that there's a cure for lycanthropy lying around the castle. Despite evidence to the contrary, there is a plot somewhere; something to do with Dracula trying to bring to life some Vampire spawn things that resemble the Bat-Gremlin from Gremlins 2. The vampire spawn things are born dead, because the Count has been copulating with his sexy Vampire 'brides' (who don 't even have the good decency to get their kit off; at least Francis Ford Coppola knew that if you're going to make a rubbish vampire movie , it needs naked lady vampires) . And if this doesn 't make sense; wait to discover that Dracula needs Frankenstein's monster (who is in hid-
ing) to unlock the secret of life and unleash his horde of rubbish bat-things on the world. Oh, and Kale Beckinsale's family are trying to kill Dracula , or all her family will have to stay in purgatory forever ; or something. As for Van Helsing himself, apparently he's the 'left hand of God', has been alive at least as long as Dracula, but he can't remember his shady past. Luckily all this plot exposition is condensed into about ten minutes of the film 's two hour-plus running time , sometimes even whilst a fight is going on. It 's clear what Sornrners' priorities are ; and a decent script or storyline are not high on the list. Instead, priority is given to massive srnackdowns with CGI monsters that look as if they've just walked out of a PS2 game (Van Helsing on PS2 is out now kids!), followed by cool looking gadgets made by bumbling sidekick Car! (a Victorian version of Q), and Kale Beckinsale looking foxy.
The special effects can look horribly false, which is unforgivable in a movie that relies on its style to compensate for the lack of substance. Having said that, the werewolves look impressive and the final. showdown between a werewolf and Dracula's demon-bat-form is impossible to dislike if you have an ounce of testosterone in your body. Van Helsing is akin to being stabbed repeatedly in the face for two and a half hours . It never pauses for breath, characterisation, or coherent plotting. It is, without doubt, one of the stupidest films ever made. Every cliche imaginable is gleefully trotted out, which is fine, because that's the point of this movie; but Van Helsing does not so much embrace cliche, as bear hugs it and never, ever, lets go.
stripped down black and white aesthetic, which nevertheless retains a stylishness that is somehow typically Jarrnusch, and bound together thematically into an awkward whole. Indeed, it is this sense of awkwardness that pervades the film on all its levels and forms its atmosphere. For example the presence of such figures as Bill Murray, Steve Buschemi, Roberto Benigni, Steve Coogan, lggy Pop, Torn Waits and The Wu Tang Clan, all playing themselves, is extraordinarily jarring within the low budget and prosaic setting of the anonymous run down cafe. In Jarrnusch's world, Bill Murray can be found, apparently in hiding after the phenomenal success of Lost in Translation, waiting on the Wu Tang Clan in an everyday cafe. Much of the pleasure of the film arises from this ironic inversion and degradation of the celebrity persona. Much of the film takes the form of a meditation on the issue of fame, so in one story a rich, famous, beautiful and glamorous journalist meets up with her slovenly cousin in the milieu of a five
star hotel lounge. The meeting is unsurprisingly tense and awkward , thus encapsulating the spirit in which the film constantly and ingeniously juxtaposes the glamorous with the banal. In this manner, each part of the whole seems to become a self-reflexive microcosm of the overall project of the film, which seems to be a demonstration of the difficulty with which human beings communicate. As such, the film often seems like an elaborate social experiment in which Jarrnusch attempts to find out what would happen if, for example, you placed two musical legends such as Iggy Pop and Torn Waits together in cafe. The answer, apparently, is that they would end up hopelessly insulting one another in the process of searching for a topic of conversation. This story also amusingly begins and ends with a moment of artistic jealousy in which each of the singers covertly examines the cafe's jukebox in order to assure themselves that the other hasn't got his record on the play list. The film bristles with such subtle touches that create
complex character relations within such a minimal framework . Throughout the film cigarettes and coffee are deemed to be bad for you and yet they are simultaneously made synonymous with the act of socialisingthe overhead shots of coffee cups and smoking ashtrays on chequered tablecloths are as incredible as they are banal. A misanthropic message or so it seems, and it is not the first time that American Indy cinema could be accused of this , although the White Stripes' unexpected discussion of the humanist principles behind physicist Nikoli Tesla 's vision of the world as a giant 'acoustical resonator' could be seen as a potentially redeeming positive philosophy. Ultimately, however, as the film goes on to demonstrate that even though things are bad for us, whether they be smoking, drinking or talking, we are likely to carry on with them regardless .
GaryBudden
Dean Bowman
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htungl The Longest Day is soon to be :released on DVD in a special dition to commemorate (:read: cash in on) the 60th Anniversary of the DDay landings. Schnelll Schnelll To the high stzeet. This is as ambitious as films get: an all encompassing panoramic view of a day many consider to be the most important in modern history. It became the obsession of Hollywood behemoth Darryl F. Zanuck who enlisted, not one, but four directors and assembled the most impzessive cast in cinema history; calling in favours from the stars whose careers he had launched. Based on Cornelius Ryan's factually turgid book it follows zeal stories from the perspectives of English, American, Fzench and German troops. Thousands of extras, tonnes of equipment and use of helicopter photography, innovative in 1962,
make it cinematographically awesome. It is a documentary style approach, Zanuck uses b\w photography :reminiscent of wwn newsreel footage (which was later colourised, though this edition stays with b\w) and has actors speak their native languages so a lot of the film is subtitled. Unlike later attempts at the same subject matter like Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan, theze is no narrative other than history itself and it is heze the film's scope becomes its greatest flaw as well as its most impzessive featuze; on a first viewing, it may appear disparate, treating the audience to a confusing series of cameos. On the other hand, :repeat viewings may leave the viewer disappointed at the lack of an end-assuch, which is exacerbated by this editions lack of extras, though this is at least indicative that it is enjoyable. Admittedly, it is not one for those
who dislike war films and it must be watched in the context of the nations' psychological war wounds (only two decades old) weze still raw. In the moze conservative film making times of the early 1960s, dialogue is often cliched and the scenes of war are, not glorified, but too comfortable. Later films like Ryan and The Thin Red line :remake graphically depict war in all its absurd and gory detail. Heze instead, those that are killed get it quick and cleanly. On a lighter note, it also suffers from cultural stezeotyping. The Americans are vociferous, Brits eccentric, French dashing, Germans awkward. This, however, :remains the great charm of war films: easily unambiguous. The Nazis are evil, and we are to believe that all Germans are smug to the extreme and either limping, monocled, ridiculously overweight; or borderline psychotic.
It's an impressive narration of history but perhaps not as true to :reality as Zanuck would have liked. Worth buying to see the film in the DVD quality, but for a special edition, it lacks the featuzes that would stzengthen the films failings. Richard Simm
Need Driving Lessons? Tired of getting lift or catching buses?
I'M DRIVING! ck Cannon plays Devon Miles, a Harlem high school student who is so talented on the snare drum that he's been awarded a full music scholarship to pzestigious (and fictional) Atlanta A&T University. Football may be the state :religion in Georgia, but we soon learn what Devon goes in more or less knowing - down heze, halftime :really is game time. People cheer the bands as ferociously as they do their gridiron heroes, and there's an annual BET Classics competition between schools that earns the winners $50,000 and a year's worth of bragging rights. It's clear which way the movie - and Devon - will go, from his defiance of authority to his conflict with drum major Sean (Leonard Roberts) to his romance with a pzetty psych student/cheerleader (Zoe Saldana), but director Charles Stone m and the sczeenplay by Tina Cordon Chism and Shaun Schepps, from Schepps' story, make the journey very compelling. Stone knows a thing or thzee about showmanship himself, with amazing Busby Berkeley overhead shots of the bands playing in moving formation, with choreo-
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graphic routines that are frequently jawdropping in their skill and intricacy. By the time we see them playing for the crowd on the field, we appzeciate the fact that the band members (even the :reserves) are athletes and dancers, as well as musicians. Drumline succeeds as a good example of the young-man-beats-the-odds genze; as an often-fascinating look at a world most of us take for granted, and as a new form of slam-bang musical entertainment. Dan Chandler
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:11.02.04
16 Aibums ._....................................................... . . .. . Danger Mouse The Grey Album You say you want a revolution, well you know we all want to change the world, and this is exactly what the Beatles did to popular music half a century ago. Many of you might have heard about The Grey Album, but most likely not have heard 11. and although it can be downloaded from the Internet, you will have very little chance of buying this album from a local record shop. The infamous Danger Mouse has perhaps taken plagiarism to the extreme by fusing The Beatles' White Album Wlth Jay Z's The Black Album and , rem arkably, produced a completely different album in the process. Locking himself away in his small apartment. Burton, the man behind the Danger Mouse enigma, states " I spent the first three or four days just dissecting the White Album, taking e ve ry drum kick, e very snare, everything. Some tracks have eight different Beatles son gs on them; a kick from one, a hi-hat from another. a snare from a different one, a handclap from somewhere else. There's no hip-hop drum in this." The simple reason why this album is so brilliant is the fact that it's composed from two brilliant albums. The While Album, although erratic in places and produced at a time when The Beatles were all going in different musical directions, has had a remarkable influence on other artists. In recent years, we have seen bands like Radiohead drawing from its many styles, for
D12 D12 World If you were expecting an album of ditties all like the irritatingly catchy My Band you'll be sadly disappointed. This second offering from the Dirty Dozen follows a similar pattern to their debut Devil's Night. Erninem continues to illustrate his production skills whilst enlisting the help of some new and happening talents such as Chicago superstar Kanye West and other Shady stablehands like Obie Trice. The rest of the boys maintain their exceptional standard of lyrical flow and content although at times they may be criticised for pushing the boundaries of taste a little too far; this is certainly not an album for the e asily offended!
Seeming, at times, to borrow beats from the 8-mile soundtrack, each song sounds reassuringly influenced by all members of the band rather than simply being an ego trip for Erninem. Good to see that the boys have genuinely presented an album where each track can be distinguished from the othe r, something that other mainstream hip hop outfits around at the minute could take inspiration from! Overall, D 12 World doesn't really take us anywhere new de spite being outstandingly tight and a great album to appreciate lyrically, at times shake your ass to and, above anything else, laugh a t. Boasting 21 tracks with 2 UK exclusives supplemented on 'the bonus disk, this album also represents great value for money. ]enuna Parish '
The Beta Band Heroes to Zeros This is the third album from the bandidos, not including The Three EPs, or any number of other EPs for that matte r. Never the ones to follow usual industry procedure - branding their first full album as the worst record that year for example - it is hard to pin the band
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down, e ither musically or p hy sically. They shun cameras and are quite hard to catch live. So for most the constant b ut thin trickle of music is appreciated only on CD.
Good Charlotte and QOTSA's most recent albums) you can kind of guess where this album's going. But, despite some impressive riffs and clever lyrics these boys still can't escape the age-old pattern of screaming hatred towards that first girl who broke their hearts. A good album for the collection but not really anything we haven't already heard before and will no doubt continue to hear for some time yet! Dig out your Converse All Stars, vent some EMOtion and don't forget that scarf! ]enuna Parish
example the piano in Karma Police comes from the intro to Sexy Sadie. Jay Z'S lyrical rhythm is brilliant, the force and style of the words create a hypnotic rhythm all by themselves, but layered over the heavy riff of Helier Skelter and Ringo's thudding drums; they just mesmerise the listener. The two albums arranged together often conflict with one another, creating a soaring energy. Perhaps fans of both albums think this composition is sacrilege, and as a b1g Beatles fan I found it weird to hear a familiar intra shoot off into a lyrical overload; but as Jay Z says, " If you don 't like my lyrics you can press fast-forward"; but I had no intention to, The Grey Album promotmg the appreciation of the brilliance of his style. As Danger Mouse says, "I was just screwing around", and whether this album will start a revolution, like The Beatles, is doubtful. But what this album does achieve, which is rare m modern mus1c, is the ability to break through musical barriers and create a truly original concept album. This album has the potential to introduce two seemingly opposite audiences to new genres. Many people who have no interest in hip-hop might all of sudden grow a new appreciation, and who knows, a few people might even begin to appreciate that little Liverpool band.
TomPateman
staying in. Graham's previous four solo albums have been diverse musical explorations into areas away from Blur, but the reunion with past Blur producer Steven Street sees a return to the pastures of pop. Bottom Bunk especially is straight back to that blurry land of swirly Harnrnond twist pop, and Graharn obviously has a growing confidence in his vocals. Hopefully it will appeal to a wider audience than past solo efforts and spread the word of Coxon's quirky charm. After a few listens the songs and melodies ended up sticking into my head making me wish the summer really was here.
Christo McC.racken
Lou Reed Animal Serenade The voice is immediately recognizable the same one that called you in to dry the rain seven years ago is now warbling over twelve new tracks. There's more guitar this time , less crazy peiCUSSion b ut a strong throb bing beat forms the basis of most tracks. The songs therefore feel a little more produced, a studio effort rather than a recording of garage jams. This is a little disappointing. The scratch sound appealed - pointing to the po!'sibilities of just playing and seeing where it takes you, and it sounded fun, except for choking on vitamin tablets. It's just a different sound. More curt, more gloss. The cameo from dogs and traffic sounds on Out-Side points to the earlier style but the studio cleanliness overpowers it. This perhaps more the influence of producer Nigel 'Radiohead' God.rich than the band; it might be time they placed more confidence in their more experimental style as showcased on the EPs that crop up from time to time, Meanwhile wait for them to ble ss Norwich with a visit, or stump up for a trip to the capital.
Graham Coxon Happiness in Magazines This album's a bit like the five point palm exploding heart technique, five listens and you're hooked. Quintessentially English, idyllic but dirty; it throws a multidirectional subversive punch in the face of the usual drivel currently contaminating the airwaves.
There's a certain altlaction about a live album which draws you in; it may be the naked display of talent, the sense of atmosphere or the improvised jam sessions. Whatever it is, live albums p ut artists to the test: stripping away the mimetic routines of fluffy untalented bands in the hope of finding the truly gifted musicians. Many do not fall into this category, and are thrown by the wayside along with the complex gadgetry that puts them in tune; Lou Reed's new compilation, 'Animal Serenade', recorded at the Wiltern, Los Angeles, is however one that passes this test and makes the grade.
took place that day, is particularly strong in it's social-omens. The thought-provoking poetry of the songs is framed by an impressive, entirely live, band. Reed's spoken-word song style bounces of crystal clear telecaster riffs, to create a sound of laid-back rock, which escapes the distortion of overused guitar pedals. Where some artists escape from the inferiority of their craft within such noise, Reed has the confidence to shine through; and so h e should. Matthew Sparkes
Sugarcult Palm Trees and Power Lines A lot of people are very sniffy about pop punk, but there was actually quite a lot of it released toward the tail end of the 90's on that kicked arse. But now pop punk is mostly used to d escribe whiny, annoying , identical so unding bands with overtreated vocals and stylists. If one band are to blame for this, it's the Alaris, who stole the victim rationale and lack of melody from emo, then combined it with a genre whose two biggest advantages were its bratty defiance and big tunes. Can you see the problem? This isn't punk - it's power pop seeing a therapist.
EdMooney
Story Of The Year Page Avenue Up and coming boys Story Of The Year hail from St Louis and highlight the sort of band hugely popular and positively thriving in the mainstream at the moment; a very e mo sound drawing influence from bands such as Funeral For a Friend, Lost prophe ts, The Used and at times Saves the Day. The first single Until the Day I Die will undoubtedly do well and is already maxing airplay on Mtv2. Signed to major label Maverick and produced by Eric Valentine (the same guy responsible for
Graharn retains his san:astic, cynical lyrical style and the music ranges from shouty punk rock to cinematic nostalgia trips through tinder lands via brooding blues laments. He rants about the tabloids on the pro-gunk People of the Earth, which sounds like a doom punk Led Zeppelin. That's followed by Hopeless Friend, a beatlesesque magical mystery tour heralding the benefits of
For the Beatniks amongst us, vainly trying to discover classic sounds resonant of Dylan or Clapton, this is a decent find. Reed claims songs such as Street Hassle, to be a 'great monologue set to rock, something that could have been written by William Burroughs or Tennessee Williarns', and whilst this may be a little ambitious of Reed, the songs do have this poignant quality, echoing strong political and social concerns: The Day John Kennedy Died, which conveys profoundly Reed's account of the events which
And of course, Sugarcult are one of those bands, though there are times when they could just as easily be All American Rejects, New Found Glory or any hundreds of others. There are a couple of good moments. The sparkliness of Head Up could work with less rigid production, while Destination Anywhere sounds like a darker Green Day, but everything else fails completely. It's one thing to be irritating, but what really dooms this album is its inate soullessness - you never believe that they're singing about real human emotions. Call it pop punk or mall emo, it sucks either way.
RobLavine
Singles 17
I Choice
Beas e Boys
British Sea Power. 26/04/04, The Waterfront
Check lt Out
It's a fine line between genius and stupid, and Tramp Attack walk it like a tightrope. 1471 is a riotous paean to the redial function on a phone ("Could it be I've missed a treat I Or something I don't want to hear"}, combining manic B52s style shout-pop with some rather fine yodelling. Their deliberate eccentricity is as an endearing as it is eventually infuriating, and 1471 is either a work of misunderstood genius or a joke to rival label-mate Justin Hawkins' catsuits. Either way, it sounds like the aural equivalent of an accident in a paint factory, and is none the worse for that.
Sarah Edwardes
Kasablan: Filthy
Kasahian - Club Foot ''Wanna take control of me? I You're dealing with the enemy'' come the vocal shots at the the start of Club Fbot, Kasabian's third release and pledge for world domination.A jungle of throbbing bass and drums, Kasabian are doing for rock what the Chemical Brothers did for dance, give the whole thing a facelift with the surgical scars put on display proudly. A filthy track destined to turn the walls of Lockstock into more of the sweaty, perverse little dungeon than it already is.Huzzahl
The lcarus Line - Party tile Baby 011
Incubus - Talk Shows on Mute
If any band have tried in recent years to put a soundtrack to screwed up debauchery, it's The Icarus Line, who've managed to make LA hellraising hip for the first time since River Phoenix collapsed outside the Viper Room. Sounding eerily reminiscent of both Primal Scream and the Rolling Stones, this is a weirded out mess (but in a good way}, the uneven time structures, buzzing guitars, and Joe Cardamone's howling vocals all mixing into a strangely compelling whole. Whether their music will ever be able to crawl out of the shadow of their offstage antics, however, is another matter.
Incubus have had a chequered history, turning from grungey nu-metal pioneers into schmaltzy ocean-line crooners without so much as a whiff of an apology. Desperately seeking mass appeal, Talk Show On Mute plumbs new depths of blandness from the doe-eyed stoners, new bassist Ben Kenney smartly robbed of his rhythmic potential as if somewhere in Incubus land, Brandon Boyd was calling the shots and saying: "Remember, I'm the pretty one who does all the interesting shit- don't rock the gravy train" . But that couldn 't be right... could it? Don't bet the farm on it Dorothy.
RobLavine
Matt Sargeson
Kelis- Trick Me Now it's one thing for decent songs to be sung by attractive puppets, but when the singer's actually got personality, something good can be transformed into something great. Kelis is still one of the most individual soul voices in pop right now, and she shows it here. Not one of those female singers who try to reach as many notes as they can in a single bar, she instead infuses every single word with a distinctive feeling, and the effect is sublime. The music meanwhile mixes SO's ska rhythms with contemporary R&B production, and put together the effect is just about akin to pop genius.
apos distinct th lyrics of th 1r delivery band compli mentary aspects are also reflect d m the t structure Half way thro gh the set, th 1r gwtanst Nob e took the stag to I ad the band. The songs took a turn for the melodic and softened the tone of the set ) UBI at th nght pomt, only to turn round agam and begin an upwards crescendo towards the final finish. The last song featured a lot of band audience m eraCtion as the lead smger went crowd surfing, and the keyboardist/drummer (who was kitted out m a pseudo military style rerruruscent of the Captam Beefheart/Franlc Zappa era) took his drum mto the crowd and marched round, stoppmg only when he found a member of the audience who was sat down looking glum m the corner. Woes betide anyone who doesn't enJoy themselves m the presence of this band. Philip Salnty
lr._._._._._~ijijiiiii-:D nankoJones-Dance The Walkmen - 7'1Je Rat
Matt Sargeson
Tramp Attack: Stupid
Live Review
The lcarus Line: Debauchery
The Dead 60s -You're Not tile Law
Phantom Planet- Big Brat
The Specials were a great band. The Dead 80s certainly think so, on the evidence of You 're Not the Lsw. From the opening wail of distant police sirens to the quiet menace of its ska beats, this has the sound of a thoroughly modern reworking of Ghost 1bwn. Despite being persistently overshadowed by its influences, You 're Not the Lsw remains an atmospheric slice of urban melancholia, a sparse, stripped and spooky throwback to a post-punk era of muftled sloganeering and dub-reggae. It's an engaging debut that promises much more - and better - to come. Meanwhile, the sound of the suburbs just got political.
They used to boast Rushmore star Jason Schwartzman as a drummer and the lead single from their first album California is currently getting most of you moist during the opening credits to The O.C., so get poised to endure much oafing about by Tim Cash on TOTP on how Phantom are going to be 'the next big thing'. Big Brat sees the band leaving behind their sunshinepop sensibilities and embracing the noise-disco of the Yeah Yeah Yeah's and the Rapture. Which is a shame because the Yeah Yeah Yeah's and the Rapture actually do 'noisedisco' well enough for all of us. A disappointing turn of affairs that won't fool the kids.
"You've got a nerve to be asking a favour I You've got a nerve to be calling my number", yells the fantastically named Hamilton Leithauser on this blistering powerhouse of a single from The Walkmen's second album. Bitterness oozes through his pores as the insistent, driving momentum of The Rat rattles towards its jolting conclusion. The Walkmen are the missing link between The Strokes and The Stooges, emanating the kind of brittle standoffish attitude that only New York art punks truly know how to master. The time is right for them to capitalise on the success their former band Jonathan Fire*Eater deserved but never quite achieved.
Sara1J Edwardes
JTWR: VItriolic
John the White Rapper Ourtime Fresh from an appearance supporting UEA's own Stonasaurus and nationwide up-and-coming hip-hoppers Goldie Looking Chain at the Arts Centre, JTWR'a debut single is a vitriolic mission atatement to bring a "real" voice back to UK hip-hop and to make his way through the dangers of the music biz. More Jehst than The Streets, John the White Rapper has released a strong debut with a catchy hypnotic backing track and a bmgeoning lyrical now that should be checked out by any and all who don't mind moving to Kid Acne, Diversion Tactics or Vinyl Dialect et al. One to watch for D-1-Y hip-hop heada.
For those who thought the last words in Canadian rock were "Bryan" and "Adams" , meet Danko Jones, a man on a mission to put the knuckle back into knuckleheaded and the rawk into rock 'n' roll. Against the backdrop of a thunderous, mesmeriaing three note riff, a growling Jones sets his sights on the woman with "a swing in her atep and a thing in her thigh" who, appropriately, "likes to dance". "Dance", he shouts, just in case we haven't got the idea. "DANCE." The effect is as cheesy as a giant gorgonzola statue of Andrew WK, but is strangely compelling nonetheless.
Sara1J Edwardes
Danko Jones: Growling
--------------------------------12.05.04 RobLavine
Sara1J Edwardes
Matt Sargesou
7'1Je Mighty Atom
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aving seen a virtually soulless production of Swan Lake last year, I approached David Nixon's creation for the Northern Ballet Theatre with caution. I shouldn't have worried. The NBT visit the Theatre Royal twice a year, with a repertoire including Romeo and juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, A Christmas Carol and Wuthering Heights. Swan Lake is the latest in a long line of fantastic performances, with a young, beautiful and extremely talented company, an orchestra that might have been born to play Tchaikovsky's music; and an art department that deserves medals for the incredible sets and costumes. The boy-meets-enchanted-swan-princesssaves-her-with-power-of-love story is a great fairy tale, but the image of women in feathered
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rick Lane is a story about fate and freewill.
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It narrates the paths of two sisters, one
doing what she's told and the other following her heart, who take very different journeys from the Bangladeshi village they grew up in. It follows Nazneen to London where she makes an arranged marriage with a man more than twice her age, and Hasina who elopes with a man who says he loves her. The story of Nazneen's life of cooking and cleaning, her dual indulgence of and irritation with her husband Chanu's quests for selfimprovement and social mobility, and her increasing struggle between her deceased mother's mantra that women exist to suffer and her own feelings of rebellion and dissatisfaction is a heartwarming one. She is a complex character, one of a delightful host that brings the grey tenements of Tower Hamlets to life. They hurt each other and help each other and the parallel worlds of Nazneen's corner of London and her sister's varying abodes in Dhaka abound with sharply drawn, lovingly detailed creations. The writing is funny and compassionate; Ali has a flair for creating drama and intensity in the simplest of circumstances. The moments where Nazneen is described experiencing life as a woman rather than a
tutus and men in tights has defined the public's idea of ballet for years. Nixon's reworking of the story therefore takes away the fairy tale element, and the story of a young man named Anthony is told, set in society America in the early 1900s. There are no wicked sorcerers, no spells, no men in shiny tights and frankly, insubstantial tunics. The swan princess instead appears to Anthony as the image of female perfection and the chance to escape into his imagination as he becomes more and more torn between his duty to marry, and his forbidden love for his best friend Simon. It is everything that stiff classical ballet isn't. Powerful, dark, emotional and extremely sexy, it quite literally had me on the edge of my seat. Ballet might not be for everyone, but if any company can change the stereotypical ideas of tutus and feathers, it's the Northern Ballet Theatre, and I would most definitely advise you to keep an eye open their next tour.
Elizabeth Brien
daughter, wife or mother stand out as particularly poignant and delicately portrayed. Subversive acts such as using her husband's razor to shave her legs help develop the reader's understanding of her and the daily struggle she encounters between her duties and her desires. Her wish to be seen, while needing to appear the retiring figure of the traditional Muslim wife, contrasts with Hasina's overt beauty that mark:: her from birth as one to whom life will always bring hardship. The style of writing varies throughout the novel and reflects Nazneen's developing English vocabulary and faltering confidence in her role in British society. A substantial part of the story is told through Hasinas' letters to her sister which detail the various predicaments of her life in Bangladesh and respond to unseen letters outlining events in Nazneen's life. Hasina's spontaneous nature is reflected in her ungranunatical Bengali, translated as broken English, and the author says she did this so the reader was put 'as close to her heart as possible'. The intuitive, sensitive relationship between the author and the characters is one of many aspects of Brick Lane that make it a rare find and the progression of events towards the last chapter make it a book you won't want to put down but will be loath to finally finish. It is an exploration of identity, how to find your place in the world, be it through obeying or defying, and it's a journey everyone who has done either will enjoy.
Katharine Clemow
his year sees the 25th anniversary of the Drama department at UEA and the end of the first decade of the Studio. The Studio has played host to a colourful parade of comedy and tragedy performed by the best of UEA's talented actors and actresses to crowds of appreciative spectators. However the last few months have also been witness to clouds of warning growing above the slanty-roofed building as the Drama department has come under threat due to consistent financial loss over a considerable period of time. As well as a celebration of all that has been, Bard's Bites is part of the campaign to raise awareness of the value of the department and all that it offers the University and wider community. It is hopefully a sign of many more great dramatic offerings to come. In an interesting move those organising the five day event have decided to take the play to the people and the Amphitheatre in front of the Music School will be the scene of men in tights (and others in jeans) performing snippets from the range of the repertoire. The extracts will be
T
irst a few caveats. Being a Joyce lover is a dangerous task these days. Few read his work. People who will never open Finnegans Wake know that it is five hundred pages of neologistic gibberish. Some will know of the Molly Bloom soliloquy, one of the longest sentences in English literature, but few will get to the end. English students pay lip service to Ulysses as the 'novel-to-end-all-novels' but never find the time to pick it up. Those who run for cover at the sight of a difficult idea label it all 'pretentious' . Joyce, though, was deadly serious about this revolution in thinking and writing he spearheaded. He had some laughs along the way, but it wasn 't, as seems to be generally held, one big egotistical joke. So, if you're afraid of Joyce , or disdainful , try one of his earlier works. Dubliners, a collection of short stories, makes a gentle introduction to Joyce 's Dublin universe, cutting into bitesi.ze portions his later monumental style. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man introduces Joyce himself as Stephen Dedalus, and slowly brings you into the language and ideas of the later works. The process is accomplished through the unusual technique of telling the story not only through the growing child's eyes but his lan-
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performed by students from all years on the Drama progranune and there will be five or six short pieces a day. In an additional twist the audience will have to guess which plays they're from, which acts and scenes, and who the characters in them are. Sholto Morgan who is heavily involved with the project and infectiously excited about using open-air drama to welcome in the summer suggests everyone who goes to watch the shows takes part in the competition because Waterstone's Bookshop has generously donated a twenty pound book voucher for the winner. Entrance to the performances is free but any proceeds will go to helping UEA join the National Campaign for the Arts. This will hopefully help to secure the Department's future and ensure those inclined can spend many more sunny days following a cart and a troupe of players to a grassy knoll where they can be entertained by the wit and the weeping central to what makes the Bard the best. For a taste of the finest pleasures of the summer to come head for the Amphitheatre at lunchtime from the I Oth to the 14th of this month and forget the stresses and strains of exams and dissertations in some cultured fun and an icecream in the great outdoors.
Katharine Clemow
guage as well. Previous, and many future, bildungsromane cannot avoid the fallacy of having their infant characters speak with a remarkably adult voice , and intelligent insight. Portrait however has you considering the world from innocent eyes which see so much but can offer no analysis. Events and issues including homosexuality, religion and the political antagonism of Dedalus' relatives are watched and reported in a childish language that slowly gets more sophisticated as the child grows older. The book probably appeals to those garretdwelling few who might consider themselves to be artists and thinkers. It also helps to be Irish, and Catholic. Those who fall outside this remarkably privileged group may wonder at the pre-occupations of the adolescent Dedalus - long discussions with teachers about aesthetics, sin and nationalism - and get lost in the many obscure references. Fight through this. Dedalus also spends a lot of time with prostitutes , writes pornographical snippets and leaves them in public places for people to find and read, and spends a lot of time doing very little at university. Oh, and he drinks a lot. Dedalus as a young man, and as a slightly older one in Ulysses, is a good friend. A touch distant and unpredictable, maybe, but he thinks your thoughts with you and reminds you that life is not struggle, nor loneliness, nor a one-way ticket to mediocrity and ignorance. His curiosity and an enthusiasm to explore ideas despite the fearful consequences are uplifting. Edward Mooney
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19TV/Games
Best of the TV Reviews: Rest
I am not an animal Monday, 1Oprn BBC 2 Written by Peter Baynham and featuring the vocal talent from the likes of Steve Coogan and Simon Pegg this bizzarre animated comedy loolaJ set to become another Monkey Dust for the BBC, as most critics have come out in favour of it pre-airing. Set in an animal vivisection unit it centres on the lives of six talking animals, a horse, cat, monkey, sparrow, rat and dog, who are liberated by animal rights activists and then have to survive life in the zeal world It's uncertain how this will go over with the general public, but loolaJ set to be an interesting if unusual comedy.
Have I got news for you
Thursday 10pm ITV1 t would happen if, in the search for a quality meal', you bought yourself lober, caviar, truftles, a pound of saffron, a few quail eggs, a bottle of champagne, chucked it all in the blender and gave it a whirr. You'd end up with an unpalatable mess. Or a bad hangover cure. As you chewed it (or, more likely, sipped it through a straw) them may be the odd flash of something across the tongue that you liked but, overall, you'd have to admit, the meal would be a disaster. Unfortunately for the people at rrv, and their viewers, this seems to have been the logic behind the creation of the All Star Comedy Show. Even more unpleasantly, they wasted considerable funds hiring far too many of the best chefs in order to spoil this dodgy broth. The programme aired last Thursday just didn't hold together at all. That the writers' differing styles didn't gel was clear, the joins were awkwardly visible. Instead of being entertained, attempting to work out which writer may have been responsible for that last misfile became the amusement. The format, a traditional sketch show, is one that encourages variety. The freedom it allows comedians can have stunning results; the opportunity of throwing ideas around, trying new things, following a joke to its own conclusion and
The continueing succeses of the guest presenters in this excellent new series of the topical quiz show reassert the benefits of loosing Angus Deaton. Last weelaJ guest was W.zlliam Hague, and it loolaJ likely to be another high profile presenter this week
Later with Jools Holland Another week of Jools Hollands smooth blend of blues and pop, this week featuring the musings of Alicia Keyes, Snow Patrol and Alanis Morissette.
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a diverse and insightful glimpses at UEA life that almost makes you feel nostalgic , (although what for I'm not sure.) Nexus shows great insight into campus life and does well to highlight some of the more interesting sides of it. There is a high level of finesse in the production as the camera-work never detracts from what the makers are trying to show the viewer. It is true that there were some sound issues on the tape that Concrete mceived but this could just be down to the tape or the mcording equipment but that is the only technical problem that was on evidence.
Games Review:
ere's a very fine line between inspiration and plagiarism; to mimic a style is one thing but to dizectly rip it off is quite another. I still haven't decided which side of the fence Singles: F7irt Up Your Life is on, bearing so much resemblance to The Sims that it could be mistaken for a modem add-on pack. I'm sure the lawyers of both finns are battling things out as you read this. The concept of Singles is quite straightfor-
the ability to 'sketch' characters quickly and energetically can be exciting in the right hands. Do it well and the audience are kept consistently on their toes (think: Monty Python, The Fast Show). It is fresh and vibrant, a welcome tonic to the staid, stodgy sit-coms that comprise the majority of the TV comedy staple. Do it badly, however, and it is almost upsettingly dull and certainly miserably discordant. The format heavily punishes evidence of a lack of originality or creativity, with skits coming thick and fast the pacing needs to be right and the laughs reasonably regular. But, obviously, they need to be unexpected Or familiar but varied, when it comes to running gags - or at least fairly original. None of these were really the case in Thursday's mish-mash. Them were too many instances of inexpert efforts to repeat the successful recipes of other programmes; in particular, attempts at catchphrase comedy, such as the "monkey trousers" of Vie Reeves' grotesquely unsuitable boyfriend character addressed to the frightening (and perhaps cynically cast) Leslie Ash. Hopefully pubs and playgrouds will not be full of immitators. It beggars belief that, with so many wellregarded writers (at least ten 'strong') assisting in Reeves and Mortimer's comedy kitchen,
something a little more invigorating and nourishing couldn't be cooked up. The skit involving comforting a friend was the worst example. it was painfully bad. You could virtually hear the dust being blown off as it went shuftling and stumbling along lilce a wobbly geriatric towards the anticipated fall flat on the nose. At times it felt like chewing on cardboard; the tastiest laugh all evening in fact came courtesy of the Mint credit card advertisement in the commercial break. However, like nuts in dog poop, them were a few morsels hem and them worth munching along for- the honking nose of Reeves' unhappy clown was probably the high point. It was moments such as these that mcalled just what Reeves and Mortimer are capable of, but overall the experience was woefully dull. With any luck this will herald the beginning and end of the notion that 'names' are more important than 'craft' in British comedy. We all know they can all do better, stop wasting our time with this rubbish and work a bit harder. Natb.an Hamilton
Nexus UTV
rriday, 9 .30prn BBC 2
Friday, 11.35prn BBC 2
All Star Comedy Show
Nezus News was interesting, it's nice to see footage of events that occur on campus such as the teachers strike, and shows the effectiveness of having a student TV society as it gives an intriguingly different perspective from the other student media on campus. Picnic in the Park 1904 is a fun little piece of black and white slapstick that works well and gets plenty of laughs, though it certainly seems a little bizarre, but the quality of the production is very high. One of the best shows was the Nexus UTV and Christian Union segment where the emphasis is on mgular students with some fascinating results, the majority of students are seemingly terrified of the word religion, taking pains to stress that they are not religious but they don't seem to have a problem with faith, though faith in what is never made clear. The Music show is a good look at a campus musician and although the sound levels and the lip syncing on the video is a bit off its well done and the musician is surprisingly original. SOC Mart If is very funny, the interviewer asks the most relevant and important questions, such as will the GameSoc attack the Tai Kwon Do
society? Is Anime pom? Should the Green Party rename itself as, after all, green is the colour of toxic waste? And finally, best of all do the young Conservatives have anything interesting to say? (No, in case you were wondering) . The final segment, Norfolk Skies is an eccentric little piece, three students disappeared without a trace in 1977 after reporting strange lights in the sky, and Paul Hayes our intrepid reporter thinks that them is a conspiracy going on by the University to cover up alien goings on. We hear from the Unions Intrusion Countermeasures Officer, a position that few students remember voting for. It comes together well and especially when the bemused looking students, who didn 't believe that them was any possibility of seeing UFO's over campus, are confronted with the the shocking facts that several unconnected people have seen "things" in the sky over campus. All in all Nexus has produced a diverse range of good quality programs and it will be interesting to see what they come up with next. TimBarJcer
Singles , ÂŁ14.99 PC
wani; to build a relationship between two people to the point of marriage. Think of The Sims: Hot date - Adult Edition and you get the idea. To start with you have to pick the couple that you want to play the game with and there are a small selection of men and women to choose from . Them is even an option to develop a lesbian relationship between two women, which most blokes will likely try just for the hell of it. The first similarity to The Sims that you'll notice is the interface. It's not just a very similar design to The Sims, it also boasts plenty of identical featuzes within it, such as the various bars denoting a character's hunger, fun, sleepiness levels and so on. Things start slowly, with your two characters moving into a disorderly makeshift apartment together. To progress a relationship you have to cater for all the needs of your chosen avatars, keeping all the happiness bars at a reasonable level. Due to the restrictive and one-track natuze of the game, this quickly becomes boring. Your daily routine becomes a chore with so little to do Initially, toying around with various romantic
and sensual options provides some brief entertainment but being mquimd to perform them again and again becomes increasingly tedious. You can develop your apartment to a limited extent and give your characters an assortment of trendy but useless junk. These serve little purpose really, as the contentment bars can be sated with just the most basic of equipment. Where Singles really comes into it's own is in the graphics and animation. The visuals are positively sizzling and can be thoroughly explored with the versatile albeit fiddly camera viewpoint. Both the human models and the surroundings are impressive pieces of artwork and the character animations, although a little stilted at times, manage to replicate real life movement very well. As you might expect, Singles is not just about the game play, but also about satisfying the desims of virtualvoyeurs. This means no Sims-style fuzzy blurring in the shower but rather the
game is geared toward showing off as much digital flesh as possible. A choice of clothes is available, or you can just walk around naked if that appeals. Plus, when in the shower them is plenty of rubbing of breasts and the like and things also get pretty frisky in the bedroom as the relationship develops. Fans of The Sims will find some entertainment with Singles: Flirt Up Your Life , as will pre-pubescent youths who manage to get their grubby mitts on a copy. For anyone else, it can be moderately entertaining to make a virtual couple fall in love but the unspectacular nature of the overall game experience makes this an unessential purchase. Dan Chandler
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