Sad Sack Serenade: December 6th

Happy December radio listeners! This was my last broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF 90.1FM for the year, but I will be back in the new year with more unhappy pop tunes on a different day at a different time. Keep checking back to find out when exactly it will be. The rest of December and the first week of January will feature Maddie doing a super rad jumbalaya of sorts, I don't know exactly what he's doing, but he's got good taste. Anyway this is what I played to cap the year off:

Smog - In the Pines
Land of Talk - Color Me Badd
Melaena Cediz - Falling Down
She & Him - Take It Back
Mates of State - Love Letter (Nick Cave cover)
Sparklehorse - Hundreds of Sparrows
The Mountains and the Trees - More & More & More
Patrick Watson - The Great Escape
Tegan & Sara - I Can't Take It
The Watson Twins - Tell Me Why
Oasis - Half the World Away
Mogwai - Cody
Rosie Thomas - All the Way to New York City

Mp3 of the show: 1st half hour/2nd half hour.

Thanks for listening everybody. Try to enjoy the holidays as best as you can. Talk to you again in the new year!

Sad Sack Serenade: November 29th

Hey radio lovers, thanks for being with me today, I really needed you today and you were so gentle and sweet. This is what I played on CJSF 90.1FM:

Cass McCombs - Morning Shadows
Colleen and Paul - Paper Days
The Abbasi Brothers - The Sound of Silence
Gregory and the Hawk - A Century is All We Need
The Caretakers - Blue Skies (song for Afghanistan)
Broken Social Scene - I'm Still Your Fag
Annie Lou - Heavy Heart
Constantines - New King
Emily Haines & the Soft Skeleton - Reading in Bed
Brian Eno - Small Craft on a Milk Sea
The Age of Rockets -Pétales Aiment la Saleté
Joshua Radin - Starmile
Blonde Redhead - My Plants Are Dead
Golden Smog - Strangers (Kinks cover)

Mp3 of the show: 1st half hour/2nd half hour.

Podcast all of the shows, "like" us, and tweet about us from our CJSF program page.

Thanks for listening everybody. Tune in again next week... or else!

Sad Sack Serenade: November 22nd

Hello everyone. Today's show was a little rough, but we made up for it by having an awesome guest on the show, a local musician by the name of Riun Garner. That was a totally improvised thing by the way, he just came in with his friend who is a CJSF volunteer and we were like, "let's get him on the show" and so we did and it was wonderful. Congratulations to whoever won the tickets to Rian's show, and I hope you had a good time. It was a pleasure to have him on Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF 90.1FM.

Anyway this is the tracklisting:

Lost in the Trees - Walk Around the Lake
Susan Cogan - Farewell
Death Cab for Cutie - No Joy in Mudville
Riun Garner - Up To and Down
Winter Gloves - Glow in the Dark
Ryan Adams - Starlite Diner
Ray LaMontagne - A Falling Through
Eels - Elizabeth on the Bathroom Floor
Conor Oberst - Breezy
Casey Mecija - Dear Prudence (Beatles cover)
Riun Garner - Cranberry Field
Grizzly Bear - All We Ask
Ra Ra Riot - The Orchard

Get an mp3 recording of today's show in two parts: 1st half hour/2nd half hour. You can also "like" the show, tweet about us, and podcast the show using your favourite client on our CJSF program page.

Hear about all of the shows Riun plays and listen to his music on his MySpace page.

Thanks for listening everybody, and thanks to Riun for joining us. Be sure to tune in again next week Monday at 1pm PST.

Sad Sack Serenade: November 15th

Today was the best show ever. Seriously, this has been the most relaxing, insightful, and pleasant sounding broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade in history I think. So pleased that it went so well despite the fact that I was functioning on zero hours of sleep. This is what I played on November 15th on CJSF 90.1FM:

The Dojo Workhorse - The Universe
Tom Waits - I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You
Frou Frou - Only Got One
Deer Tick - Twenty Miles
Feist - This Is How My Heart Behaves
Carolyn Mark & Tolan McNeil - Irish Bar
Cocorosie - Grey Oceans
Hayden - Between Us to Hold
Julie Peel - Strings That Tie To You (Jon Brion cover)
The Flaming Lips - Do You Realize??
Women - Penal Colony
The Mountain Goats - Get Lonely
Wilco - Cars Can't Escape

Mp3 of today's show available in two parts: 1st half hour/2nd half hour.

You can also podcast every broadcast, "like" us and tweet about us.

Thanks for listening everybody. Tune in again next week Monday at 1pm. If you don't tune in then I will play nothing but Kesha the week after.

Sad Sack Serenade: November 8th

Here's the tracklisting for today's broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF 90.1FM:

Taken By Trees - Tell Me
PS I Love You - CBEZ
Michael Franti & Spearhead - Have A Little Faith
The Stormalongs - Dark Blues
The Weakerthans - History to the Defeated
Of Montreal - Casualty of You
The Antlers - Epilogue
Peter Bradley Adams - For You
Little Birdie - It Kills Me
The Mountains & the Trees - Goodbye Little Town
The Jesus & Mary Chain - Just Like Honey
The Weepies - Add My Effort

Mp3 of the show available in two parts: 1st half hour/2nd half hour.

Why not request a song for next week? Leave a comment below.

Sad Sack Serenade: November 1st

Tracklisting for Sad Sack Serenade on Monday November 1st from 1-2pm PST on the radio CJSF 90.1FM from Burnaby, BC.

Son Volt - The World Waits For You
The Lions - Remember
Ólafur Arnalds - Þú Ert Sólin
Mavis Staples - You Are Not Alone
Minus the Bear - Hold Me Down
Luke Doucet and the White Falcon - Magpie
Field Mouse - Where You Go
Justin Rutledge - Turn Around
Attack in Black - I'm Going to Forget
Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse - Insane Lullaby (featuring James Mercer)
The Acorn - Cobbled From Dust
Little Birdie - These Days

Mp3 of the show available in two parts: 1st half hour here/2nd half hour here.

You can check out the details of Little Birdie's November 9th show here. If you liked the Field Mouse song I played you can download the whole album for free from her Bandcamp page and donate whatever you can to support her.

Tune in again next week, or don't. Does anybody listen to this show anyway?

Sad Sack Serenade: October 25th (and 11th)

What a great show this week. I kept promises and played lots of good songs with no hiccups and gave away tickets to save salmon. Well maybe a couple hiccups, there was some weird static for a couple seconds, and I called Dark Night of the Soul (the Sparklehorse and Danger Mouse) collaboration Dark Was the Soul by accident. Der.

Here's the tracklisting for today's show (October 25th):
Foals - Spanish Sahara
Vic Chesnutt - Flirted With You All My Life
Zachary Lucky - Small Town Streets
The Decemberists - Cocoon
Yo La Tengo - By the Time It Gets Dark
Baby Eagle - River Bank Sitter
Band of Horses - Marry Song
Colleen and Paul - Shouldn't I Breathe
Lambchop - A Hold of You
Ben and Bruno - New Friend Song
The Anthemis - Photographic Memory

The mp3 of the show for your archiving and remixing or ignoring pleasure is available in two parts: 1st half hour/2nd half hour.

And here's the tracklisting for Nick's show on October 11th:
Elliott Smith - Angel in the Snow
Jane Weaver - My Soul Was Lost
Calla - Initiate
Gorky's Zygotic Mynci - The South of France
Secret Machines - Money (That's What I Want!)
Barclay James Harvest - The Sun Will Never Shine
Shilohs - Havin' A Good Time
It Kills - Sailors
Le Husky - le Monde est Rouge
Sunn o))) O Boris - The Sinking Belle
Julie Doiron - Glad to Be Alive

I unforunately could not find the links to the mp3 of Nick's show, so if you missed it you'll just have to take my word for it that it was awesome.

Talk to you guys next week at 1pm on CJSF 90.1FM

VIFF 2010 in Review

I regret that it's taken me as long as it has to post even this meagre review of my experience at the 29th annual Vancouver International Film Festival. Alas, I am both lazy and lately plagued with self-confidence problems, which often negates my ability to convey my opinions in a non-ambiguous manner. I have learned a great deal in my year and a bit at university, and I feel as though with each new piece information or theory or historical tidbit I absorb, paradoxically the less prepared I am to offer my comments on films or music or anything else. I hope readers of this document will read it as little more than a written history and categorization of my personal experience at VIFF 2010.

I have never been able to attend a film festival with a full pass to all the films, and now that I have, am quite certain that there is no other way to approach attending a big event like VIFF. My pass gave me the flexibility to see films at the spur of the moment if I wanted, but also enabled me to see my top picks if I was dedicated enough to line up early. Although I didn't get to see everything I wanted, I felt pretty satisfied with what I did come away with, a diverse selection of 26 feature films from a variety of countries. My one regret is that I didn't pick a more eclectic crop of national cinemas; I didn't get to a single film from Africa and only two from the Asian film category. At the same time though, I think I had a better experience seeing the films I was interested in than I would have if I forced myself to go to see films that hadn't really caught my fancy.

The film selection crew at VIFF did a fantastic job this year, and I was extremely pleased with the programming categories and the overall quality of the films I saw. I only saw three or four movies that I would dub as duds, undeserving in my opinion of being included in the festival. Although, unlike last year, no breakthrough favourites emerged from the festival, I was still very fond of the vast majority of the films I saw and would be more than happy to see them again or recommend them to friends.

So without much further ado, these are the films that I saw in their entirety, rated very roughly by letter grade:


GRADE A
Another Year (UK, Mike Leigh)
Certified Copy (France/Italy/Belgium, Abbas Kiarostami)
Inside Job (USA, Charles Ferguson)
Armadillo (Denmark, Janus Metz)
Our Life (Italy, Daniele Luchetti)
Fathers&Sons (British Columbia, Carl Bessai)
Winter Vacation (China, Li Hongqi)

GRADE B
Biutiful (Spain/Mexico, Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu)
Me, Too (Spain, Alavro Pastor and Antonio Naharro)
The Woodmans (USA, C. Scott Willis)
Rubber (France/USA, Quentin Dupieux)
A Somewhat Gentle Man (Norway, Hans Petter Molland)
Win/Win (Netherlands, Jaap van Heusden)
Snow & Ashes (Quebec, Charles-Olivier Michaud)
Heartbeats (Quebec, Xavier Dolan)
Curling (Quebec, Denis Cote)

GRADE C
Good Morning to the World! (Japan, Hirohara Saturo)
Incendies (Quebec, Denis Villeneuve)
Two Indians Talking (British Columbia, Sara McIntyre)
King's Road (Iceland, Valdis Oskarsdottir)
The Woodmans (USA, C. Scott Willis)
ReGeneration (USA, Phillip Montgomery)

GRADE D
Severn, The Voice of Our Children (France, Jean-Paul Jaud)
Uncle Brian (Ontario, Nick McAnulty)
The Tree (Australia/France, Julie Bertucceli)
Monsters (UK, Gareth Edwards)
The Strange Case of Angelica (Portugal/Spain/France/Brazil, Manoel de Oliveira)


A few specific comments on individual films...

Probably my most anticipated film of the festival was Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu (Babel, 21 Grams, Amores Perros)'s new film Biutiful. It was difficult to not compare this new work with his three previous films because they are so extraordinary and so moving and so entrenched in my memory, and in relation to those movies, Biutiful isn't quite on par. That said, see this film because it is still a pandora's box of interesting themes and emotional issues well worth exploring. But if you are a fan of Innaritu's previous work, don't go expecting the same sort of clarity of ideas and poignancy.

Inside Job I would say is by far the most important film that played at the festival. Everyone interested in the future of economics, politics, and the vitality of democracy in the world (this should be everyone) needs to see this movie because it explores every cranny of the corruption inside the world's economic trendsetter and the unsound base on which the country has been built. Charles Ferguson is a vital American filmmaker, and a gutsy one at that.

Armadillo is a particularly relevant film for Canadians in light of our withdrawal from Afghanistan next year. It contains some of the most extraordinary and candid documentary footage I have ever seen. The way in which this film structures itself and develops character is so effortless it almost fooled me into thinking it was a narrative work of fiction.

If I had to choose my favourite movie at the festival, it would be the Chinese film Winter Vacation. A third of the audience walked out during the screening I attended because it was so slow and aimlessly plotted, but I drew a lot out of the striking and unique mise-en-scene. This was by far the most original work I saw, it had a fantastic sense of humour, and the underpinning social commentary and nihilist philosophy I thought were conveyed in a very artful manner. A valuable insight into the psyche of the youth in China.

Destined to become a cult favourite was the midnight film Rubber. Anyone can tell just from the plot description that this film is outlandish, hilarious, and completely unconventional, but I think a lot of people missed how clever the self-reflexive elements of the film were. This is a comedy with something to say (albeit something simple) about the medium.

Young Xavier Dolan is a tremendously exciting talent to watch. Although Heartbeats is not as insightful or inspired as last year's I Killed My Mother, it is still a creatively ambitious and fun and definitely post-modern work that continues to develop a distinct cinematic voice.

Good Morning to the World! and its 23 year old filmmaker Hirohara Saturo was the surprise winner of the Dragons & Tigers Award. Even though I was not particularly struck by the film, I commend the Dragons jury for rewarding an obviously talented young student instead of gifting the award to one of the more obvious candidates like Cannes winner Poetry or the blockbuster Aftershock. Saturo, who I was privileged to hear speak after his film, is a smart young man with some terrific ideas, and will certainly be someone to watch in the future.

I was post puzzled by the superb audience reaction and my film theory professor's praise for Denis Villeneuve's new film Incendies, Canada's submission for Oscar consideration this year. I was not impressed with Villeneuve's pedestrian direction and the film's awkward weaving between time-lines, but more importantly I thought this work demeaned the tragedy of the historical conflict and the real life victims of violence by making the film's major tragedy a thing of chance or hand of God event in the style of a Greek tragedy. I seem to be alone in this assessment, so by all means see it for yourself. I look forward to a discussion with someone about it.

The Ontario production Uncle Brian I thought was an accidentally morally reprehensible work. It was clear to me after the Q&A that the filmmakers had no concept of the codes of representation their movie took on. To give on example, the final frames of the film brutally victimizes the main character at the hands of an angry, violent, repressed homosexual. I was disappointed that the VIFF programming committee thought that the shock factor of this film's content made it worthy of inclusion at the festival.


Maybe I will write more about more movies as time allows. Check back to find out.

Tell me about your experience at VIFF! What did you see you loved/hated? Do you think I'm totally out to lunch on some of my comments? Let me know.

Sad Sack Serenade: October 18th

I keep forgetting to mention on air that you can get the tracklistings and mp3s of the show on my blogspot. Well you can, and here it is for the show on October 18th on Cjsf 90.1FM :

Joshua Cockerill -All You Need to Break Your Heart
Nine Inch Nails - Ghosts II (track 12 on disc 1)
Gianna Lauren - Nightmares
TV on the Radio - Family Tree
Angus & Julia Stone - For You
All-Time Quarterback - Rules Broken
Fire Next Time - Chorus of Crows
The Dandy Warhols - Sleep
Forest City Lovers - Tell Me, Cancer
Christopher Smith - Gently Gently
Grizzly Bear - Service Bell

Here is a link to filmmaker Gregory Bayne who I mentioned on the show is letting people watch his film Person of Interest for free. Definitely give this great film a look.

Download an mp3 of the show in two parts: Part one here/part two here.

Sad Sack Serenade: October 4th

Tracklisting for Sad Sack Serenade on Monday October 4, 2010 on CJSF 90.1FM radio broadcasted from Simon Fraser University on the top of Burnaby mountain:

Wintersleep - Encylopedia
Rilo Kiley - 85
Land of Talk - Quarry Hymns
Okkervil River - A Stone
Sage Francis -The Best of Times
Copeland - The Day I Lost My Voice (The Suitcase Song)
These New Puritans - Time Xone
Amiina - Rugla
Titus Andronicus - Four Score and Seven
Heatmiser - Plainclothes Man

Mp3 of the show available in two parts: First half hour / second half hour.

Thanks for listening. Tune in again sometime.

Sad Sack Serenade: September 27th

What's up you miserable crowd of musicphiles. This is what played today on Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF 90.1 FM from Simon Fraser University in Burnaby:

Jonsi - Boy Lilikoi
Tiny Vipers - Slow Motion
Jon & Roy - It's Gonna' Be Fine
An Angle - Angry Drunk
Sufjan Stevens - The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us!
Jamie Lidell - Coma Chameleon
The Planet Smashers - Whining
The Replacements - You're Getting Married
The National - All Dolled Up in Straps
The National - Anyone's Ghost
Dr. Dog - Shame, Shame
Architecture in Helsinki - It's Almost a Trap

Mp3 of the show available in two parts: first half hour / second half hour.

As always, thanks for listening everyone. Tune in next week on Monday from 1-2pm PST, and be sure to tell all your friends about the show so they're not jealous of your awesome listening experience.

Sad Sack Serenade: September 20th

Hey radio listeners,
This is what I played today, Monday September 20th, on CJSF 90.1 FM from Simon Fraser University in Burnaby:

Born Ruffians - Sole Brother
Azure Ray - Don't Leave My Mind
Blitzen Trapper - The Man Who Would Speak True
The Microphones - I Want Wind to Blow
Cocorosie - Gallows
Modest Mouse - Dramamine
Nina Nastasia - Cry Cry Baby
Ohbijou - Make it Gold
Michou - Summer Night
Karyn Ellis - Low
The Avett Brothers - I and Love and You

Download an mp3 of the show in two parts: 1st half hour  / 2nd half hour.

This was the second show of the year, and I felt really good about the way things went. Last week was pretty rough, you'll notice I didn't even post the links to the show here on my blogspot because it was so bad, so it was nice to have some improvement. Be sure to tune in again next week on Monday from 1-2pm PST online http://cjsf.ca or on the radio device at 90.1FM.

Thanks for listening everybody!

VIFF 2010

I'm going to be volunteering at the Vancouver International Film Festival this year, and while I'm a bit nervous about the work I'll be doing and fitting it all into my busy schedule, I can't wait to take advantage of the opportunity to see a bunch of exciting films. Last year the crowds were huge, which should make the volunteer job a major headache, but it is always a lot more fun to share the cinematic experience with a big group of people. My first impressions of VIFF last year were great, and I hope this year will be just as positive.

These are the movies I have on my radar to see, although I can't imagine seeing all of them. If you think I'm missing a gem, or you want to insist that I not miss one already on my list, give me a shout. If any of my friends reading this wanted to go see something with me, then send me a message and let me know!

• David Wants to Fly
• Fathers & Sons
• Biutiful
• Inside Job
• The Tree
• Certified Copy
• Heartbeats
• Waiting for Superman
• Another Year
• Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
• The Illusionist
• My Film and My Story
• Snow & Ashes
• Strange Powers: Stephin Merritt and The Magnetic Fields

Happy festivaling everyone!

New Film Project - Your help needed!

If you follow my Twitter feed or have spoken to me in person recently you may have discovered that I'm working on a new feature film project. For those of you haven't heard already though, I would like to formally announce that there is a new production in the works and tell you a bit about it. Further to that I would like to appeal to everyone reading this for their help in making the film as well.

The new film is about personal identity. It is an exploration of the notion that we are never truly ourselves, that our personalities are not really who we are in our heads and in our hearts. Who we are can more actually be described as the sum of the expectations other people have for us, and the expectations we have for ourselves. The expression of what we actually think and feel is constantly being mediated against those expectations. We use masks and create personas that do not truthfully reflect our character, but paint a picture of who we think we are or are supposed to be. As Kurt Vonnegut suggests at the beginning of Mother Night, "We are what we pretend to be" and by extension, not whatever identity we keep up bottled up inside. This is, as always, very personal subject matter for me. I often feel confused by the person I have grown to be, how I got to be that way, and how faithful I am to my inner self (whoever that is).

We hope to explore these ideas through the study of one individual going through a bit of an identity crisis of his own. This individual is, or appears to be, the unpleasant stereotypical choch (also known as a chach, chauch, chongo, etc). I think we're all familiar with some variation of a choch and carry our own preconceived notions of what they're like. But the protagonist choch of our film has no feelings of love for himself. He hates all those choch qualities he exhibits that we have all come to be familiar with and despise, and it feels to him that this choch persona is a betrayal of who he really is inside his head. The film follows this character over the the course of six days as he confronts his own reflection in his aviator sunglasses.

As of now the script is prepared and all of the main parts have been cast minus one. Right now we're trying to cast this last part and assemble costume pieces, props, and a few locations before we get shooting. It's going to be a difficult test to see if we can shoot the whole film before the end of August when I leave to go back to Burnaby for school, but I'm very excited to delve into the material and get filmming in a manner that is going to be very different from my previous projects. I've already enlisted the talents and time of a number of actors and crew members, but I still need help pulling together some resources. If you or anyone you know can loan us or help us in any way with acquiring any of these production requirements please let me know via email (brendan.prost@hotmail.com).

Cast:

• One male, 18-25 years old. Significant speaking role. Skilled at character improvisation. Available on the evenings and weekends. 
• Lots of one-line roles, walk-ons, background work for males and females of all ages.

Crew:

• Always looking for willing helpers to hold the boom, lights, etc.

Props:

• Posters and other paraphernalia that a choch might have in his room.
• DVD seasons of Entourage. 

Locations:

• Restaurant patio
• Gym
• Restaurant interior
• Bar/club/pub interior 

Costume pieces:

• Anything a choch might wear (jeans, t-shirts, muscle shirts, shorts, shoes, etc)
• Gold looking necklace
• Large garish belt buckle
• Aviator sunglasses
• Black rimmed hipster glasses (preferably with no prescription lenses)

Thanks everyone for reading and passing the word along.

Generation Why - DVD Promo Video

Check out this video I made to help promote the wide release of my film, Generation Why, across three different platforms.

Buy it on DVD for $10 at http://generationwhythefilm.com
Rent a digital stream at http://www.indieflix.com/film/generation-why-30482/
Host a screening for free at http://openindie.com/film/generation-why

We need your help now more than ever. Please spread the word, and consider buying a copy of the film.

Generation Why - Opening Titles

This is the opening title sequence from Generation Why, which we've released to help promote the recent release of the entire film across three platforms:

Get the DVD here: http://tiny.cc/genwhydvd
Rent from Indieflix here: Indieflix
Host/request screenings here: http://openindie.com/film/generation-why

Sad Sack Serenade: Episode 5

Hey everyone,

So today's broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF was the last one for a while, because I have to go home to Calgary for the summer. But don't fret, because I'll be back on the air when school at SFU starts up again in the fall. Thank you all very much for listening the last month or so. I had a great time sharing music with all of you.

This is what I played today:

Radiohead- High and Dry
Papilonette- The Decline
Stars- The Life Effect
Phono D'Enfant- With You
Nico- These Days
Raised By Swans- How Do These Hearts Unfold
The National- Wasp Nest
William Fitzsimmons- We Feel Alone
Peter Katz (with Glen Hansard)- First Of The Last To Know
The Weepies- Nobody Knows Me At All
Elliott Smith- All My Rowdy Friends Have Settled Down (Hank Williams cover)
Patrick Keenan- Pillstorm
Beck- Everybody's Gotta' Learn Sometime

You can download or stream an mp3 of the show in two parts:
Part One Here/Part Two Here.

Thanks again listeners. Have a swell summer.

Sad Sack Serenade: Episode 4

So in case you couldn't tell today's show was pre-recorded. Not only that, but the station started it late and so the whole thing didn't play. Sorry everyone.

This is what I played before it got cut off:

Belle & Sebastian- Sleep the Clock Around
Karyn Ellis- Be My Girl
Cuff the Duke- All That Fails and Fades
Joel Wilaby- Mercy
The Flaming Lips- Mr Ambulance Driver
Built to Spill- Liar
L. Pushinsky- Heart Shaped Cookie Cutter
Death Cab For Cutie- Your Bruise

You can listen to the show in two parts, but keen in mind part one will not be my show until about 10 minutes in:
Part One/Part Two (abridged).

Thanks for listening everyone. The last show is next week. Unfortunately it too is likely to be prerecorded because I have to drive home to Calgary on that day. But we'll see if I can stay to do the show.

Generation Why at the Calgary Expo & Edmonton Pop Culture Fair

We’ve nabbed a table at the Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo as well as the Edmonton Pop Culture Fair this spring to spread the Generation Why word.

Mike and Cody will be at the Expo in Calgary on Saturday April 24th and Sunday April 25th chatting with people about the movie and selling DVDs, t-shirts, and buttons.

Brendan, Mike, and Cody will be doing the same up in Edmonton on Sunday May 2nd.

If you are in either city during those days, definitely swing on by and get your hands on a sweet digital video disc and t-shirt! And if you're super keen on the film, we could use your help to help tell people about the film too. So find our table, and we’ll set you up with leaflets and a t-shirt so you can go around and direct people to our table. If you can’t make it, then tell your friends about it instead. In fact, tell your friends about it even if you are going. Drag them along!

RSVP to the Calgary event on Facebook.

Sad Sack Serenade: Episode 3

Hey everyone,
This is what I played today from 2-3pm PST on my radio show "Sad Sack Serenade" on CJSF:

Yes Nice- A Ghost or a Knife
Four Tet- Slow Jam
We Are the City- Time, Wasted
Metric- London Halflife
Gentleman Reg- Oh My God
Drive-By Truckers- Daddy Needs A Drink
The Unthanks- Because He Was a Bonny Lad
Billy Bragg & Wilco- Someday Some Morning Sometime
Tegan and Sara- Call It Off
Pavement- Here
Tim Chaisson and the Morning Fold- Slippin' Away
Karen O and the Kids- Hideaway
Tanya Philipovich- Secret Fiction Romance
Julie Doiron- So Fast

You can download the whole show as an mp3 in two parts:
Part one here/Part two here.

Personally I really enjoyed the music from today's show, really cooled me down after a rough week, and I hope it did something positive for you too. Tune in again next Thursday for the last episode of Sad Sack Serenade from 2-3pm PST.

Your host,
-Brendan

Sad Sack Serenade: Episode 2

Honestly today's episode of Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF was a bit of a trainwreck. The show started off rough, and then was immediately completely derailed when the power went out at the university and we were off air for about 10 minutes, and later I played the wrong song, and then I was unable to play prerecorded PSAs so I had to read them out loud... gaah. Sorry everyone. Next week will be better I swear. Also, I think it is good to learn to love someone or something for its flaws as well as for its positive attributes, so maybe this rough episode will help you learn to love the show more!

This is what I played:

Final Fantasy- Midnight Directives (cut off by power outage)
Final Fantasy- Keep the Dog Quiet
Jonsi- Sinking Friendships
Camera Obscura- Lunar Sea
Laura Merriman- Go On Now
Attack in Black- Years (By One Thousand Fingertips)
Alejandro Escovedo- Sensitive Boys
Jenn Grant- You'll Go Far
Broken Social Scene- hHallmark
David Torn- At the Mall (from the Lars and the Real Girl soundtrack)
Aimee Mann- Guys Like Me

If you'd like you can get an mp3 of the show in two parts:
Part one here/Part two here.

Be sure to tune in next week for the third broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF 90.1FM or online at cjsf.ca between the hours of 2 and 3pm PST.

Sad Sack Serenade: Episode 1

Hey everyone,
I hope that you all enjoyed the first broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade on CJSF 90.1FM and got a good feel for what the show is going to be like in the future. In case you were wondering, this is what I played:

Hayden- Never Lonely
The Cardboard Nationals- Truth
Broad Way Sleep- Too Late
The Age of Rockets- Avada Kedavara
Constantines- Time Will Be Overcome
The Autumn Portrait- Goodbye Apathy
Sarah Slean- Get Home
Emily Haines & the Soft Skeleton- Telethon
The Album Leaf- We Are
Faded Paper Figures- I Fell Off My Name
Gregory & the Hawk- Like Daddy, Like Daughter
Clea Anis- Heartdrops
The Polyphonic Spree- Scream and Shout

An mp3 of the show is available for download in two parts.
Part One Here/Part Two Here.

Please leave me your comments, suggestions for improvement, requests for songs for next week. And be sure to tune in next week from 2-3pm PST on 90.1FM in Burnaby or online at http://cjsf.ca to hear the second broadcast of Sad Sack Serenade.

Radio Show: March 26th (My Last Jumbalaya)

Hey everyone,

This is what I played today on CJSF 90.1FM from 1-2pm PST.

A Horse and His Boy- Sidewalks
The Besnard Lake- Albatross
Reverie Sound Revue- An Anniversary Away
Kings of Convenience- You In Me
Sonic Youth- What We Know
Meaghan Smith- I Know
Hot Chip- Thieves in the Night
Spoon River- Buried in the Sun
The National- Bloodbuzz Ohio
The New Pornographers- Crash Years
Agnostic Mountain Gospel Choir- Go Back Home
Farnfarlo- Fire Escape

The show is available to download and listen to as an mp3 in two parts:
Part One/Part Two.

Correction: The album that the Agnostic Mountain Gospel Choir song came from was a compilation of live recordings from CJSW in Calgary, not CJSF in Burnaby. My apologies. Check out the record here.

This was my last live Jumbalaya show, as I'll be passing off the slot to a new volunteer who has been patiently waiting for his time to shine. Thanks to everyone who has listened on air or who have checked out the podcasts here on my Blogspot. I've really enjoyed my first few months on the radio, and I can't wait to get started on my new show, "Sad Sack Serenade" which will air Thursdays from 2-3pm PST. Be sure to tune in then. They'll be more information about that show coming soon.

Radio Show: March 19th

Hey everyone,
This is what I played today on CJSF 90.1FM from 1-2pm PST:

Jay Farrar and Ben Gibbard- San Francisco
Matthew Barber- Comeback Baby
Lightspeed Champion- Deadhead Blues
The Zolas- The Great Collapse
Sparklehorse- Gold Day
Big Star- Thirteen
Hawksley Workman- We Aint No Vampire Bats
The Swell Season- The Rain
Jason Collett- Lake Superior
Carolina Chocolate Drops- Your Baby Aint Sweet Like Me
Sarah June- Brand of Bitterness
Elevator Music- Going Away Party
Get Away Girls- I Was a Desert

You can download/listen to an mp3 of the show in two parts:
Part One/Part Two.

I hope everyone enjoyed today's show, in particular the tributes to Mark Linkous and Alex Chilton. Sorry if I got too emotional, but I just think it's very sad to have lost those two talented musicians. Make sure if you haven't heard their stuff you go out and give it a listen. Keep their memories alive.

Be sure to tune in next Friday from 1-2pm for another Jumbalaya.

Radio Show: March 5th

Hey everyone,
This is what I played on CJSF 90.1 FM today, a show full of big name artists.

Spoon- Before Destruction
The Riptides- Dial M For Murder
Jason Collett- Almost Summer
Zeus- How Does It Feel?
Woodpigeon- Empty Hall Singalong
Shearwater- Black Eyes
Yeasayer- Madder Red
Radio Radio- Hayo
Vampire Weekend- Horchata
Sarah Jaffe- Clementine
Nature Moves Faster- Wicka Wicka

If you want to read the two articles in The Peak I was talking about, they can be read on their website: "Fervent Student Group Debate Erupts During Board Meeting" by Kendra Wong, and "SFPIRG May Face Loss of Student Levy" by Sam Norris and Carolina Dubanik.

You can listen/download an mp3 of the show in two parts:
Part one/Part two.

Thanks for listening everyone, be sure to tune in next Friday from noon to 2pm for "The Price is Euanator" when I'll team up with Euanator radio for a game of "guess that tune"!

Request a Screening of Generation Why on OpenIndie

Thanks to the hard work of Kieran Masterton OpenIndie officially launched today, which means you can now visit Generation Why's film page to request a screening in your area!

Get on over and show your interest.

Radio Show: February 24th

Today on CJSF 90.1 FM at noon there was a very special two hour double-trouble show, where myself and Euanator Radio joined forces for a unique mash-up of music and fun conversation. If you listened, we hope you enjoyed the show, because we very much enjoyed teaming up to entertain you. We'll definitely be doing it again.

This is what we played... (see if you can guess which songs I played and which Euan played!)

AFI- The Torch Song
Horse the Band- Science Police
D.O.A.- Donnie Brook
64 Revolt- You Can't Hold Us Back
Basia Bulat- Heart of My Own
Felix- Ode to the Marlboro Man
Hey Rosetta!- Red Heart
Rammstein- Rotersand
Oomph- Land in Sight
In Extremo- I Disappear (Metallica cover)
Crosstide- Angeles (Elliott Smith cover)
Hellothisisalex- Paper Horse
Cold Cave- Youth and Lust
Mono Inc- Planet Shame
Revolting Cocks- Keys to the City (Vegas Mix)
Left Spine Down- You Can't Stop the Bomb
The Paperbacks- Stars (For Claire Massey)
Broken Social Scene- World Sick
Bishop Allen- The Ancient Common Sense of Things
Mutiny Within- Awake
Age of Evil- Cruel Intentions

You can download an mp3 or stream the show in 4 half hour segments:
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four

Be sure to tune in next week when I'll be on the air live at 1pm for my regular Jumbalya show. Just me this time, but it'll still be lots of great tunes and bizarre banter. Thanks for listening!

Radio Show: February 18th

This is what I played on CJSF 90.1 FM radio on Friday February 19th (apologies, both the Contra songs suck ass):

Horse the Band- Lord Gold Wand of Unyielding
The Magnetic Fields- Walk A Lonely Road
A Lesser Panda- Molecular Man
Dan Magnan- Unnatural Progression
Fanfarlo- Harold T Wilkins or, How To Wait for a Very Long Time
Deadmau5- Mr G
The Album Leaf- Blank Pages
Contra- Biotapestry X
Cat Mountain- Drunk on Gasoline
Los Campesinos!- The Sea is a Great Place to Think of the Future
Stars- Going Going Gone (Live)
No Age- Losing Feelings
Contra- Slime

You can download and listen to the whole show in two parts:
Part one/part two.

Be sure to tune in Friday February 26th at noon when I will be DJing for 2 whole hours with my pal the Euanator! It's gonna' be the sweetest tag team radio show in the history of rock and roll!

Radio Show: February 12th

Hey everyone,
This is what I played today on CJSF 90.1 FM radio from 1-2:25pm. Extra long show today. I improvised for a bit after my show was supposed to be over because I had to fill the time until the guy doing the next show showed up. He was late!

Bibio- Cry Baby Cry
The Hoa Hoa's- Looking for Sun
The Neckers- Share Secrets
Acres and Acres- Polar Bear Song
Brand New- At the Bottom
Land of Talk- Sixteen Asterisk
Kris Kristofferson- Hall of Angels
The Robot Explosion- Voice On Tape
Jupiter One- Volcano
Language Arts- White Socks in Birkenstocks
Sweetwater- Waiting at the Crossing
Amiina- Ásinn
Chasing Bright Lights- Snakes
Axis of Conversation- All We Make is Enemies
The Apples in Stereo- Same Old Drag
The Apples in Stereo- Rainbow
The Wooden Sky- Something For Us in the Night

You can download and listen to an mp3 of the show in 3 parts:
Part one/part two/part three.

Hope you enjoyed the show. Be sure to tune in next Friday from 1-2pm for more awesome music!

Radio Show: February 5th

Hey everyone,
This is what I played today from 1-2pm PST on CJSF 90.1FM with my special guest co-host, Cass Grant.

David Bowie- Cat People
Jay Reatard- It Aint Gonna Save Me
Porcupine Tree- Drawing the Line
Thee Silver Mt. Zion- I Fed My Metal Bird the Wings of Other Metal Birds
Final Fantasy- Midnight Directives
Do Make Say Think- Think
Kid Cudi & Vampire Weekend- Ottoman
Mission of Burma- Blunder
Lake of Stew- Pretty Sarah
Tindersticks- Falling Down a Mountain
Our Hearts Are Big- Kids in Africa

Listen to the whole show in two parts:
Part one/part two.

Radio Show: January 29th

Hey everyone,
This is what I played on CJSF today from 1-2pm:

Amy Millan- Old Perfume
Grand Archives- Topsy's Revenge
Woodhands- Pockets
Islands- Vapours
Social Code- Real Girl
Devendra Banhart- Baby
The Fast Romantics- Sleepy Jean
The Swell Season- In These Arms
The Action- Let You Down (All the Way)
Said the Whale- Holly, Ontario
A History Of- National Tectonic
The White Wires- Pretty Girls
Alex Cuba- If You Give Me Love

You can listen to the whole show in two parts:
First half hour/second half hour.

Enjoy and be sure to tune in next Friday from 1-2pm for more great tunes!

At A Loss For Words: The Development and Importance of Visual Language in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey

This is a research essay I wrote in my first semester at Simon Fraser University. I thought it might be of minute interest to those with an interest in Stanley Kubrick or 2001 who just wanted to scratch the surface of what there is to delve into. Forgive the formatting.

“Every critic… who has attempted to come to terms with Stanley Kubrick's work has been made painfully aware of the limits of his own discourse. To describe a film in words—which is to say, to present to the reader in conceptual terms a series of associations of animated images—is in itself a challenge. With films which their maker has always described as a ‘non-verbal experience’ the task is rendered even more difficult. And the refusal often shown by Kubrick to comment on his art comes from his desire to conserve a margin of mystery and uncertainty. His is an oeuvre that both demands and defies analysis” (Ciment 7).

I am grateful to Michel Ciment for providing such a convenient excuse for the inevitable failings of my essay on American film writer, director, and producer Stanley Kubrick. As he says, there is a tremendous challenge that comes with trying to describe the work of Stanley Kubrick, in particular his 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey. After a study of twentieth century art movements within a variety of mediums, I assumed that I would be able to dissect 2001 with relative ease. Instead after viewing the film several times and reading numerous articles and books on the subject, I found myself frustrated trying to align this film with any one particular movement. My struggle to label and categorize the film, coupled with my readings of the diverse reactions and interpretations critics and historians have had to it, and to all of Kubrick’s work, has lead to my realization of the scope of 2001’s greatness as a work of art. With 2001: A Space Odyssey Stanley Kubrick fully exploits the potential of cinema as few directors have ever done. To see the way in which he combines sounds and images to communicate ideas is to be awed by the ability of man to externally express whatever he can hold in his head. This is the power of film, to articulate ideas and emotions that are beyond the representation of theatre, music, literature, sculpture, or painting, by inventing a language unto itself. I believe that Stanley Kubrick’s use of this visual language in 2001: A Space Odyssey is a reinvention of film form, and that the film’s excellent reception is a reflection of changing culture attitudes within the United States. What will follow in this essay is an examination of the impact and influence of 2001, why it resonated so well with audiences at the time, and a close look at this visual language that Kubrick uses to create one of the most impressive art films in the medium’s history. It is the inability of writers, such as myself, to put into words the experience of viewing 2001: A Space Odyssey that ultimately sediments it as great work of art. So please, forgive me if I’m at a loss for words.

Familiarity with Stanley Kubrick’s early life sheds some light on how he developed into the kind of filmmaker he would be in later years. Kubrick was an academic underachiever, and was unable to attend college because his marks in high school were so poor. A Graftflex camera from his father on his seventeenth birthday gave the young Kubrick some early direction. One of the first snapshots he took, of a newspaper vendor standing mournfully next to a headline announcing the death of President Franklin Delanor Roosevelt, got him his first job as a photographer for Look magazine. Kubrick spent four years working for Look travelling America, developing into one of the finest photographers the magazine had on staff. His talent as a photographer is intrinsic to his success as a film director in later years. Understanding the effects of different lenses, how light acts on camera, and how to dynamically compose figures, was all knowledge Kubrick garnered working for Look. Even early in his career Kubrick’s visual acuity was evident in the beautiful noir lighting of Killer’s Kiss (1955), and the innovative camera movement using wide-angle lenses in The Killing (1956). He continued to progress as a visual filmmaker throughout his career, pioneering special low-light lenses for the candlelit scenes in Barry Lyndon (1975), warping perspective with different focal lengths in A Clockwork Orange (1971), creating elaborate, long steadicam shots in The Shining (1980), and producing his own visual effects for 2001: A Space Odyssey. Kubrick’s early career as a photographer is the key to his success as a filmmaker because the visual element of his films is so essential, perhaps more so than any filmmaker during the period. If his work is characterized by one overriding trademark, it is that they all speak to the audience with visual language. His ability to convey narrative, thoughts, and feelings, using just images is largely the reason why 2001: A Space Odyssey, a 140 minute film with only forty minutes of dialogue, is able to hold the viewer’s attention and invoke any kind of reaction at all.

Kubrick’s clout within the industry, and his well-documented reclusive lifestyle, both had an influence on his art. He rarely granted interviews, did not present his work at festivals, did no public speaking, and published no writing on film theory or criticism. He never lived in Hollywood, and after the success of 2001, moved to the English countryside with his family and worked largely from home. This isolation from the rest of the world allowed Kubrick to work without any outside influence. He was not a slave to critics, his peers, pop culture, or mass media. Such isolation prevented Kubrick from ever becoming overly self-referential, or from having his artistic vision clouded by external pressures. The singularity of vision within all of his films can be partially attributed to this hermitic lifestyle, but also to his reputation as an expert film craftsman. The commercial success of almost all of Kubrick’s films from The Killing onward (with the exception of Barry Lyndon, which flopped at the box office, but recovered its costs through home video sales) granted him unprecedented autonomy over his own projects, free from the meddling of the studios that financed him. Not only did he have final cut over every film he did from Dr. Strangelove (1964) to Eyes Wide Shut (1999), Kubrick also would often refuse to show his movies to studio representatives until as late as ten days before the public release. Metro-Goldwyn Mayer, the studio that released 2001, had so much faith in Kubrick, that even though the budget during shooting doubled from $5 million to $10 million, an exorbitant sum for the time, they never even approached Kubrick to discuss how shooting was progressing. Because Kubrick maintained such a tyrannical grip over his finished product, it could be said that he got closer to achieving his original vision than any film director could. This atmosphere that Kubrick was permitted to create is unprecedented in film history, and the artistic freedom he was given is a very large reason why every film he directed after Dr. Strangelove was so unique, and often so controversial. Only with this kind of artistic freedom could Kubrick conceive of such an unconventional and innovative science-fiction film like 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The 1960s saw the death of the golden age of Hollywood cinema, and a transitional decade before the explosion of American independent film in the 1970s. Cinema audiences were steadily becoming younger with the surge of the post-war Baby Boomer generation. This youthful audience hungered for new and inventive films that broke away from classical tradition, which led to the rise in popularity of arthouse cinema, and in particular the work of foreign masters like Antonioni, Bergman, Fellini, Polanski, and Kurosawa. It was at this time that Stanley Kubrick released his philosophical science-fiction mind-bender, 2001: A Space Odyssey, four years after Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb struck a powerful chord with Cold War audiences, and rocketed Kubrick to the forefront of American filmmakers. To the surprise of most industry professionals, 2001 was an immediate commercial success, grossing $138 million after two releases in the United States. Critical reaction however was decidedly mixed, and early on slanted more to the side of complete bewilderment and animosity. This clash between reviewers and audiences was not entirely unforeseeable however, as Barton Palmer would later point out, “the crisis in the industry coincided with the changing demographics of the cinema going public” (Palmer 14), and “the 15-25 year olds who had responded enthusiastically to European art films, characterized by ostentatious visual and aural stylizations, responded similarly to 2001” (Palmer 13). It could be inferred then that the commercial success of 2001 was the first instance of a new generation of filmgoers asserting their tastes and interest in the cinema. Kubrick’s unusual approach, while entirely suited to the appetite of young audiences, did not provoke a very positive reaction from film critics, who are generally an older crowd. By disregarding certain Hollywood expectations for mainstream films, such as a narrative driven, character-centred screenplay, Kubrick presented a piece that defied analysis in traditional terms. Although the technical perfection with which Kubrick orchestrates his symphony of sight and sound was impossible to miss, “the film’s attractive qualities, including its visual appeals, were not generally promoted by prominent reviewers” (Palmer 14). The themes and ideas of 2001 were expressed in a way so new, so contrary to popular understanding of the medium, critics didn’t know how to respond. As per all avant-garde art works of any age, and of any form, 2001: A Space Odyssey “challenged the analytical and critical acumen of journalists and reviewers at the time” (Palmer 16). Many film critics and older audiences would recant their negative responses to the film in later years, as Kubrick’s vision of cinema as a visual and auditory art form began to be adopted to some extent by many of his slightly younger contemporaries like Spielberg, DePalma, Scorsese, and Coppola. Steven Spielberg would confirm 2001’s importance to him personally in the documentary Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures (2001), saying that “it was the first time the motion picture form had been changed. It wasn’t a documentary, and it wasn’t a drama, and it wasn’t really science-fiction” (Harlan). With 2001: A Space Odyssey Kubrick had challenged everyone’s notions of what film could be.

Not only had Kubrick’s film sparked a revolution in film form, but the content of 2001 had some very radical implications as well. Hollywood had always been successful translating novels and plays to the screen, and creating historical dramas from real life events, but never before had the large, sometimes abstract ideas of 2001 been dealt with onscreen. Although, as previously stated, it can be difficult to define what exactly the film meditates on so thoughtfully, but one can say that “2001 offers a sweeping, if provocatively reductive, and ultimately ambiguous representation of human history that is deeply Spenglerian in its faulting of Enlightenment values, such as progress, humanism, and even civilization” (Palmer 15). These post-modern concepts in 2001 display a youthful population who were beginning to see themselves, and the world they were living in differently. Spurred on by these burgeoning post-modern North American ideas, there was a rebellion by the young generation of filmgoers against old stories and the standard content of what had been put on film. “The evolving tastes of a younger audience led to a different kind of American film: visually sophisticated, intellectually engaging, intriguingly disconnected to genre, and unmindful, as appropriate, of conventions that had for more than four decades determined the shape of the American commercial product” (Palmer 23). I believe that this taste for more intelligent and aesthetically sophisticated cinema, that bore so many similarities to European films from previous years, is indicative of an American culture renaissance of sorts after World War II. While before the war, art movements had seen their start in Paris, Zurich, and Berlin, before jumping across the ocean, afterward we see the United States as the starting point for new innovations in art. These innovations included abstract expressionist painting in the 1950s, and the reactionary pop art movement in the 60s led by Andy Warhol. I think that the popular reaction to 2001: A Space Odyssey reflects this uprising of American culture as the dominant and most influential force in the world. Not just in terms of art and media, but in terms of political ideas and economic structures as well. 2001 had done what young people had wanted cinema to do since the end of the 1950s; it “challenged the clichés of the brain and consciousness dominating the literature, science, and popular writings on the brain” (Landy 94). This proud sense of intellectualism that arose in America after their successful campaign in World War II I believe manifested into a desire for a new kind of film that they could be proud of, and exhibit on the world stage as art, and not just commercial fare. In Kubrick, they found a filmmaker who could stand with European directors as an equally relevant film artist. It is my belief that the excellent public reception to the content and form of Kubrick’s film marks the coming of age, the maturation of an entire nation that would eventually become the only world superpower after the demise of the Soviet Union twenty years later.

After exploring the significance of 2001: A Space Odyssey, the next logical step is to discuss what it is about the way the film was constructed that wowed audiences. Unlike most American filmmakers, Kubrick speaks to his audience using a visual, and not a verbal vocabulary. He reaches back to the earliest days of the medium and takes advantage of, what was then regarded as, the most exciting aspects of film. Kubrick’s vision of what a film should be is taken from a time when it was not influenced by theatre, literature, and other art forms. Prominent in 2001 is what Balazas refers to as the “first international language… the language of gestures” (Balazas 98). In the Dawn of Man sequence at the beginning of the film, men dressed in primate suits use their actions in a precisely directed way to tell the viewer what is going on. Subtle gestures reveal Moon-Watcher (the main primate)’s thought process as he plays with the bones at his feet, slowly realizing their potential as tools and weapons. Kubrick underscores the significance of this moment in history with striking camera angles, slow-motion photography, offbeat edits, internal montage, and Richard Strauss’s iconic Also sprach Zarathustra (better known as the theme music to 2001). The thirty-minute Dawn of Man sequence showcases how Kubrick is able to not only convey story material without words, but also explore very large metaphorical ideas. In this case, gesture helps to snap the viewer to attention, and invites speculation as to the image’s meaning. The triumphant pounding of Moon-Watcher on the ground, the epic qualities of the music, and the fantastic cutaways to the falling boar suggest something beyond what is literally being presented. In this case, I believe it speaks to the paradoxical evolution of mankind. With every step forward comes a step back; with the discovery of a tool comes a weapon. The scene then ends with Moon-Watcher tossing the bone into the air, and Kubrick using a brilliant match cut to leap us to a new scene, thousands of years into the future. We understand the change in time and space without titles or words, but simply through this magical edit, a tool of this visual language. The Dawn of Man sequence provides a brief overview of the way Kubrick deploys visual technique to convey the substance of a scene, but there are many more instances that could be examined.

The infamous Stargate sequence in the fourth act of 2001 is also an ideal representative of the way Kubrick uses visual and auditory language. So unconventional is this stream of hallucinogenic colours and misrepresented landscapes that it calls to mind Dada films from the 1930s by artists like Man Ray or Marcel Duchamp because it is “more like a nonrepresentational experimental film than a mainstream movie” (Grant 80). It is a series of images that makes no effort to accurately represent time or space, nor does it provide any comprehendible narrative information, both essential elements of Hollywood film production. “The very length of the sequence seems motivated by the desire to immerse us in a visual experience rather than to convey narrative information, and advance the story, the primary goal of classical narration” (Grant 80). The combination of such extraordinary sight and sound seems to communicate directly with the subconscious mind, moving the audience’s train of thought into abstraction, and pushing the limits of the audience’s cognitive abilities. “The spaces he created are stylized, other worldly, strange, ironic, and often terrifying—not just in terms of visual design, but for the ability they have to convey large feelings and ideas” (Mamber 68). This sentiment seems to echo Balazas’s belief that verbal language cannot express everything that human beings think and feel. Kubrick’s film, the Stargate sequence in particular, seems to indicate that he felt the same way. There were themes that Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick wanted to touch on that were so large and abstract, they called for a more ambiguous exploration of the ideas, rather than a literal discussion. “Kubrick purposely chose to convey the meaning through visual sights and symbols, aiming at both the conscious and unconscious aspects of the viewer, rather than explication through text. By making what is essentially a silent film, with language used sparingly to convey certain necessary narrative cues or to act as a counterpoint to visual messages, Kubrick made it more difficult to determine what he intended” (Gilbert 34). The challenging nature of 2001 that Gilbert refers to is created through the use of visual language, and is largely the reason why audiences responded to the film as well as they did in 1968, and why it went on to become such an influential work.

More than almost any other film in history, you need to see 2001: A Space Odyssey, and I mean that in the most literal sense possible. If you have ever gone to bed watching a film, and let your eyes close while you drift off to sleep, you might one day realize that you can understand what is going on in most mainstream motion pictures without actually seeing the images. The structure of most Hollywood cinema centres so heavily around dialogue, that you could close your eyes and listen to Double Indemnity for instance, and understand the plot, character motivations, and a great deal of the action taking place in the film as well. Stanley Kubrick, with his background in photography, offers a completely different form of film with 2001: A Space Odyssey. His mastery of visual imagery, developed during his days as a photographer, gave him the skills to create a film that, quite literally, must be seen. His independence over the production of his films gave him the artistic freedom to defy conventions of narrative cinema, both in form, and in the breath and abstraction of the content. The combination of his artistic freedom, and his visual panache, culminated into the creation of a film that was released at a moment when young American audiences hungered for a new method of expression in the cinema. With 2001 Stanley Kubrick had provided an intellectual and creative stimulus for a population that had been given the same kind of films, inspired by theatre and literature, for four decades. With the same film, he confounded critics, altered audiences, and inspired a new generation of filmmakers to fulfill the potential of cinema that Balazas described in the medium’s early years. By opening up a whole new world of expression using visual language, Kubrick makes possible the articulation of a whole range of emotions and philosophical concepts that may never have been filmable before. It must be said after examining the contextual history of 2001: A Space Odyssey that it was a film that truly broke new ground with its emphasis on visual expression, and that Stanley Kubrick was able to make significant strides towards moving film forward as an art form. Unlike many of Kubrick’s films, 2001: A Space Odyssey can be read to have a positive ending, particularly in regards to the future of art when the credits roll. Like the Starchild at the end of the film, 2001 “emphasizes that humanity will not be bound by the conventional laws of science, by paradigms that seem to insist on a limited human trajectory, and that once the journey of discovery begins, we need not be drawn back to or fall back on primitive condition” (Tellote 51).


Bibliography and Works Cited
2001: A Space Odyssey. Dir. Stanley Kubrick. Metro-Goldwyn Mayer, 1968. DVD.
Balazas, B. "Visible Man, or the Culture of Film." Screen. Oxford UP, 2007. 96-108. Print.
Ciment, Michel. Kubrick. London: Collins, 1983. Print.
Gilbert, James. "Auteur with a Capital A." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 29-42. Print.
Grant, Barry. "Of Men and Monoliths: Science Fiction, Gender, and 2001: A Space Odyssey." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 69-86. Print.
Landy, Marcia. "The Cinematographic Brain in 2001: A Space Odyssey." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 87-104. Print.
Making The Shining. Dir. Vivian Kubrick. Warner Brothers, 1980. DVD.
Mamber, Stephen. "Kubrick in Space." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 55-68. Print.
Nelson, Thomas A. Kubrick: Inside a Film Aritst's Maze. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1982. Print.
Palmer, Barton. "2001: The Critical Reception and the Generation Gap." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 13-28. Print.
Stanley Kubrick: A Life in Pictures. Dir. Jan Harlan. Warner Brothers, 2001. DVD.
Tellote, J. P. "The Gravity of 2001: A Space Odyssey." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 43-54. Print.
Tzara, Tristan. "Dada Manifesto." Art in Theory 1900-2000. Wiley-Blackwell, 2003. 252-57. Print.
Walker, Alexander. Stanley Kubrick Directs. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1971. Print.
White, Susan. "Kubrick's Obscene Shadows." Stanley Kubrick's 2001 : A Space Odyssey : New Essays. Oxford UP, 2006. 127-46. Print.

Radio Show: January 22nd

An even better show than last week! This is what I played on CJSF today from 1-2pm PST.

The Nix Dicksons- Working on the Weekend
The Apples in Stereo- Can You Feel It?
Young Galaxy- Smoke and Mirror Show
Big Pink- Velvet
Paper Cranes- Telephone
Kings of Convenience- Mrs Cold
Converge- Dark Horse
Prairie Cat- Just Cuz
Hot Little Rocket- Volcanoe
Crissi Cochrane- Mexico
Dojo Workhorse- Ohio
Devil Eyes- Akuma Gyoshi

Listen to the podcast of the show in half hour segments:
First half hour/second half hour.

Radio Show: January 15th

I've been hosting "Jumbalayas" (new music mashup shows), on Simon Fraser University's radio station, CJSF 90.1 FM, for a little while now, and I think I'm getting pretty decent at it. It's tough to pick consistently great stuff from the options that we're given (we have to choose from the newest 900 CDs in the station, 35% of which has to be Canadian content) but it's fun discovering new tunes. If you're interested in finding out what I play, I'm going to start posting the tracklist on here, and links to podcasts of the show.

You can listen to today's show online in two separate half hour segments:
First half hour/second half hour.

This is what I played from 1-2pm today:
The Mountain Goats- John:1
Taken By Trees- My Boys
You Say Party, We Say Die!- Monster
The Shagbots- Kildo Martinez
Lou Barlow- Sharing
Tom Waits- Singapore
Owl City- Cave In
Cam Penner- All of Yesterday
D.O.A.- Beer Liberation Army
The Rural Alberta Advantage- The Ballad of the RAA
The Zolas- You're Too Cool
Jay Reatard- It Aint Gonna Save Me

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Be sure to tune in next week from 1-2pm PST on CJSF 90.1fm, 93.9 cable, or online at cjsf.ca to hear me on the air live!

Say It Again - Teaser

This is a friend's short film project I did PA work on. Looks great.