This one goes out to my mom, who took me to see Die Hard With a Vengeance because I was too young to drive, and who also let me watch our tape of the original Die Hard when I was home sick from school one day over what had to be strenuous objections from my father, who was likely worried it would corrupt me (which it did, but in an awesome way). So, thanks Mom.
Clickety-click.
It kicked all manner of righteous ass.
And Joss Whedon was there.
Because, sometimes, birthdays are pretty wonderful.
After a certain point, age no longer feels to be the milestone it was in youth. Each passing year as a child is somehow indefinably but unequivocally different from the one before it; this year is a new one, and there will be changes. But a lot of that mindset comes from simply being in school, and after the rush of freedom at 16, the liberation of 18, and the poor choices of the night you turn 21, there aren’t many more signposts to so clearly mark your progress from birth to death. The next big number is probably 30, but there’s a lot of fast water between here and there, and not a lot of points to stop and catch your breath. However, I have found another one of those signposts:
• Today I am 25 years old, meaning:
• I am now too old to be on “The Real World.”
This is a weird thing to realize, not least because every member of my generation has, at some point, thought about what they would put on their audition tape or just what it would be like to live in the house, be one of the roommates, become superficially friendly with intellectually challenged people before stabbing them in the back with a withering confessional, get drunk on camera, etc. The show has been a cultural touchstone for people my age, who have never lived in a world without MTV, and though it isn’t what it once was — or maybe I’m too old to care — it still serves as a kind of clearinghouse for the current generation’s prettiest and dumbest people.
As I’ve gotten older, though, I’ve come to realize that the dichotomy between the thought of being on the show and the actuality of being cast would probably perfectly fulfill the maxim: “Having is not often so pleasing a thing as wanting; it is not logical, but it is often true.” You have to be 18-24 to be on the show (though, weirdly, the rules only say you “should appear to be between the ages of 18-24,” which is confusing, since I doubt like hell that a young-looking 30-year-old would be let anywhere near the show), which means there’s a good possibility that getting cast would mean spending 4 months in a house with at least one 18-year-old, who are generally pretty insufferable people. Where’s the fun in that? I’m surprised the age cutoff isn’t 22, since the possibility of watching a 24-year-old and 18-year-old interact would be like watching a big brother babysit their younger sibling. Every day. For months.
Which is the bigger picture, and the even weirder part about getting just a day older this time around: I don’t even think I would want to be on “The Real World” anymore. Sure, my sister and I used to think about being on the show — I maintained that I would be the laziest roommate ever, sleep in constantly, and not get laid; basically, my current life plus some rapid-fire editing and B-roll of downtown exteriors — but that was in high school. Even the occasional discussion of the show in college was more about how crazy it had become than anything else.
Still, it’s weird to think that from now on, the kids on that show will always be younger than me (except for the oldies they bring back for the challenges, like Timmy, who’s clearly 39ish). I suppose as I get older I’ll get accustomed to the fact that people in the media are more and more likely to be born after I was, and I guess that’s okay. But it’s just weird to realize that I’m really starting to slide out of whatever demographic MTV hopes to capture.
Maybe that’s a good thing.
Title: “Heart Transplant” (or, possibly, “Boning for Marrow”)
Cast: A handsome man of stunning athleticism and below-average intellect, age 29ish; a dozen or so physically attractive but culturally unaware women aged 25-31
Logline: One lucky bachelor searches for true love in a flock of beautiful women, but there’s more to these ladies than meets the eye.
Synopsis: The show would follow a pretty typical format for arena-dating programs: group dates, one-on-one time, quizzes about a woman’s favorite puppy, etc. But the twist is that each of these women has a terminal illness, a fact that isn’t revealed to the bachelor in question until he makes his final choice, eliminating all but the tanned and vapid creature with whom he plans to carve out a short-term relationship based on sex and shared interest in wine. The woman who wins will receive money for medical care and treatment of her disease, while the rest of the women will have to make do on insurance or whatever. At the end of the series, the 11 losers will be arranged before the bachelor, who will then have to apologize to each one for unwillingly condemning them to possibly dying sooner than they’d have liked. The host, an affable Ralph Garman type, will intro the women with something like, “You all remember Jenny, who as it turns out as cystic fibrosis.” The bachelor’s complicity in the dark fate of the women would eventually lead to his own depression, making for a sad follow-up/reunion show in which it is revealed that he and the winning bachelorette wed five months after the show but divorced a year later.
So, NBC, I’m ready when you are.
Because I like sharing music that I love, and being introduced to new music by my friends; because I crave your validation; and because it’s a lot easier than coming up with more original content, it’s time once again for an alt-country playlist from yours truly. This compilation, to the best of my recollection, came together in the summer of 2006; I remember playing the track list for a friend on my iPod while driving through the mountains of northern Arizona on the way home from the Grand Canyon last year. That means the list came together about a year after the creation of the previous one, which I guess is a good enough time to spread out a little, incorporate some new bands, and also shine some light on old favorites (the attentive among you will notice a near constant presence of Old 97′s on these lists; that’s the way it’s gonna be). It’s a slightly longer list than the others, coming in at 22 songs but still short enough to fit on a standard 80-minute CD. I think a big part of this is that this is the first mix I made after purchasing my iPod, so the ease of bouncing around from track to track within a digital playlist instead of listening to a CD from beginning to end seems to have influenced the assembly of the songs; in other words, it feels more like a jukebox of tunes instead of a somewhat more cohesive attempt to make a good alt-country mix. As a result, it’s probably the weakest mix as far as overall flow, but it’s a solid collection of hits, and I couldn’t bring myself to trim any. Sue me. As always, I’ve provided iTunes links where possible; as always, feel free to share any music you think I might like or just post a comment to shower me with sincere praise. In retrospect, I realize these mixes have been getting (to me) slightly less accomplished with each iteration, but I have some other stuff in the works that I think you all might enjoy. Like I said, I need the validation. Anyway, here it is:
Alt 4.0
1. “Won’t Be Home,” Old 97′s — A great, fuzzy opening from the group’s Drag It Up. Solid driving song.
2. “Another Travelin’ Song,” Bright Eyes — I like Bright Eyes. Tough.
3. “That’s Not the Issue,” Wilco — Man, sometimes I forget Wilco used to rip out these amazing little country tracks. It’s enough to make me really miss old-school Golden Smog (which is coming later down the list).
4. “My Winding Wheel,” Ryan Adams — Wonderful, easy song.
5. “The Charging Sky,” Jenny Lewis & the Watson Twins — I couldn’t take this album out of my stereo for a couple weeks after I got it. I keep hoping I’ll run into Jenny Lewis out here, though the odds that she shops at my Ralphs are pretty slim.
6. “Still Feeling Blue,” Kasey Chambers — This is one of my favorite Gram Parsons songs, and I love Chambers’ cover. It’s a good reminder of how country is often built on songs that get passed around and recorded by multiple artists, like the blues.
7. “Streets of Where I’m From,” Old 97′s — Solid, yearning bar rock.
8. “A Kiss Before I Go,” Ryan Adams & the Cardinals — In and out in just a couple minutes, and fantastic along the way.
9. “Sin City,” Uncle Tupelo — Speaking of great covers, here’s another Parsons track from his days with the Flying Burrito Brothers. Love it.
10. “You Are What You Love,” Jenny Lewis & the Watson Twins — A kind of shimmery pop-country that’s downright heartbreaking.
11. “Live Free,” Son Volt — Trace is still the best album you haven’t bought yet. So go buy it.
12. “If I Had a Boat,” Lyle Lovett — Why did I not get into Lyle Lovett until the past couple years? I’m a moron.
13. “Making Love With You,” Old 97′s — A fantastic track from Down to the Promised Land, a comp from Bloodshot Records’ fifth anniversary. The double-disc set isn’t too bad, but it’s worth buying just for this song.
14. “What a Crying Shame,” The Mavericks — I love this album. It’s straight-ahead country from 1994, featuring mainstream two-steps and some Latin influences. Wonderful song.
15. “Roses Are Blooming,” The Hollisters — I sing this in the shower a lot. I don’t know why.
16. “Hung Up on You,” Fountains of Wayne — I’ve liked Fountains of Wayne since their debut in 1996; I have many good memories of playing Quake III late at night at a friend’s house while listening to “Leave the Biker” (yeah). They play brilliant power-pop, and every now and then they fiddle around with some country tunes, and the result is usually pretty great. Case in point: This track, which features pedal steel from Robert Randolph.
17. “Let It Ride,” Ryan Adams & the Cardinals — Arguably the best single from Cold Roses.
18. “Crazy Arms,” BR5-49 — Writing all this has made me realize just how many covers are on this mix, including this song, which has been recorded by just about everybody. This is a great treatment by BR5-49; if I were going to start a retro-country band, it would be a little like BR5-49. We would play in Oplin, and we would blow you away.
19. “Today’s Teardrops,” Fountains of Wayne — The last cover of the bunch: A Ricky Nelson song covered by Fountains of Wayne in concert and released on their B-sides collection Out-of-State Plates. Also a good shower song.
20. “Passionate Kisses,” Lucinda Williams — It would later be covered by Mary Chapin Carpenter, who had a pretty big hit with it, but Lucinda’s original remains amazing. However, iTunes only seems to have this live version. Deal.
21. “Please Tell My Brother,” Golden Smog — Someone please play this at my funeral.
22. “Maria’s Bed,” Bruce Springsteen — For Devils & Dust, the Boss just went acoustic and changed all the references to Jenny/Elizabeth to Maria, but it totally worked. This was a great collection of Southwestern alt-country, and his best conceptish album since The Ghost of Tom Joad.
I’m not sure why Too Far to Care isn’t on iTunes. I think you should all write letters to Steve Jobs asking that he put it on there, and also that he send me an iPhone. Thanks.
And, what the hell, here’s a music video for track 10:
• The posters advertising a “tour” to Yavin are somewhat inaccurate, as Yavin was actually a gas giant, and the Rebel base was on Yavin IV, one of the moons. Duh. They also feature a shot of Luke on a tauntaun on the poster for Hoth, as well as shots of Bespin, but the ride itself renders that nonsensical, since the tour clearly takes place during the Battle of Yavin, before the Alliance relocated to Hoth or anyone went to Cloud City. Again: Duh.
• The pilot was a droid named Rex, but is it really likely that the piloting of a human transport ship, even one belonging to a tourism company, would be left up to a droid? Sure, the R2 unit up top helped out, but you’d think it would be a better idea to have a human behind the actual wheel.
• The instructional video that instructs tourists to buckle up and avoid using flash photography features a child taking a photo of a Wookiee, who is startled by the flash but just whines/growls about it. At the very least, the Wookiee should have yelled at the kid, and probably should have actually ripped off his arm as a warning. That would have been good.
• Who’s running this tour, anyway? The ship at one point jumps into the fray during the battle outside the first Death Star, which begs the question as to which side actually owns the tourism company. At a time of even small-scale war, it doesn’t seem feasible that the Rebel Alliance is willing to pony up the credits to run tour ships throughout the galaxy. They sorely lack the infrastructure needed to mount a serious attack; they had something like 25 X-wings, tops, at that battle.
• It also doesn’t seem that likely that the Galactic Empire is running the tours, because since when do they care about showing people a good time? I guess it’s possible the tours are being run by some kind of third party, a nonpartisan organization that leans toward the Rebellion, but you’d think that if they really supported the Alliance then they’d volunteer their tour boats for supply transports until the war is over. Ships are hard to come by, you know.
[No, it's not this one, though that's a close second.]
I could watch this over and over again. And I have:
I tried to work in a flannel board reference, but I couldn’t quite do it. Ah well:
Clickety-click.
Well, this seemed to go over well last time, so here goes nothing. Today’s mix is the second real alt-country mix I made, and I assembled it sometime after moving to L.A., though the specific date remains fuzzy; I didn’t learn about Shurman until I saw them open for Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers in November 2004, so it’s safe to assume this list came together sometime in the spring or early summer of 2005. That places its birthday a solid 18 months or so after the creation of Alt 2.0, and it’s always interesting to see the bands that showed up again versus the ones that are “new” to one of these mixes. (Being pretty anal about things like this, I already envisioned making myself an ongoing series of alt-country mixes. I’m okay with this.) Aesthetically, I don’t think is quite as strong as my previous mix; I usually try to cool things off a bit by track 4, whereas this one doesn’t calm down till track 6, making the first third of the album a little top-heavy. But it’s still pretty listenable. Again, I’ve provided iTunes links where I could, but some of these are going to be tougher to come by. Go by your local Amoeba/Waterloo/whatever and root around. That’s when you’ll find the best stuff, anyway.
Alt 3.0
1. “Petty Song,” Shurman — The track I have is actually from their EP, which went our of print but was put briefly back into production a few weeks after I emailed their site and inquired whether they’d be selling any more. Was I singlehandedly responsible for inspring them to press up more copies? Yes, yes I was.
2. “W. Tx Teardrops,” Old 97′s — When I saw Old 97′s at the El Rey a couple years ago, bassist Murry Hammond, who does lead voclas on this and a few other songs, said before launching into this tune that “This is for anybody who’s seen those tornado warnings in West Texas.” I was the only one to launch a “Woo-hoo!” when he said that, which was mildly embarrassing, but not so much it kept me from singing along with every word.
3. “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road,” Lucinda Williams — I really like Lucinda Williams, and have spent some decent time with a few of her albums, but I feel (and my buddy Collins agrees) that she’s a fantastic artist whom we’re probably supposed to love when we actually just like her. Don’t get me wrong; Car Wheels on a Gravel Road is a classic, and West is pretty amazing. But sometimes it’s like I like the idea of Lucinda better than Lucinda herself. But this is still a good song.
4. “Miss Williams’ Guitar,” The Jayhawks — Whenever I hear the glittery electric guitar, I always am secretly pleased that I placed this song directly after the one by Lucinda Williams. Because I am like that.
5. “Jackie,” The Pistoleros — This is a fantastic band out of Tempe, Arizona, fronted by brothers Lawrence and Mark Zubia, and their debut album featured some songwriting assistance from Radney Foster and The Jayhawks’ Gary Louris. The Zubias also used to be in a band with Doug Hopkins, who went on to play with Gin Blossoms. I just find that interesting, is all. Their first album, Hang Onto Nothing, is definitely worth seeking out.
6. “Dancing With the Women at the Bar,” Whiskeytown — When I sing along with this song, I wonder what it would be like if my father had actually seen the moon and “heard the sound of the strip” calling out his name, instead of just being a completely likable salesman in central Texas. That would’ve been weird.
7. “Tear-Stained Eye,” Son Volt — Beyond fantastic. A pure, sweet, easy kind of country.
8. “This Flower,” Kasey Chambers — Ditto.
9. “Doubting Thomas,” Nickel Creek — I remember liking Nickel Creek in high school, mainly because they played great music and were about my age, meaning they were either really talented or I hadn’t really applied myself (probably both). I still think they’re a great group, and I like how their sound and subject matter has matured, as in this song, about the conflict between faith and doubt.
10. “Full Moon Over Dallas,” Maggie Brown — I nabbed a free copy of this album from work on impulse, mainly because it looked halfway decent, which it is. But I’m a sucker for songs about Texas, I guess.
11. “Rain King,” Counting Crows — Bam, right in the middle of the album, I drop some stout mid-’90s alt-rock on you. And it totally works. I love hearing songs like this in new contexts like this one, where its mild country inflections are enhanced by the rest of the list. Fountains of Wayne have recorded some great country songs, too. I also will always wish I had the range of Adam Duritz.
12. “No Depression,” Uncle Tupelo — You pretty much can’t beat Uncle Tupelo covering the Carter Family.
13. “Are You Still in Love With Me?,” Tift Merritt — Sad, sad song. When this comes on, I feel like I should pull over and find a quiet bar and drink myself stupid.
14. “Blinding Sheets of Rain,” Old 97′s — A great, low-key two-step.
15. “Gold Watch and Chain,” Nitty Gritty Dirt Band feat. Kris Kristofferson — The iTunes link goes to the tribute album The Unbroken Circle, but I actually got my copy from a compilation called This Is Americana, a fantastic record being sold for the ridiculously stupid price of $2, which means you should all go buy it right now. Right. Now.
16. “My Heart Is Broken,” Ryan Adams & the Cardinals — I loved Jacksonville City Nights with a passion; it was easily the best of the three albums Ryan Adams put out in 2005 (second place was Cold Roses, while the off-putting29 ran a distant third). This is a quick, efficient song that gets in and out in just over two minutes, and I love it.
17. “Virginia, No One Can Warn You,” Tift Merritt — If anyone can put me in touch with Tift Merritt, I’d appreciate it.
18. “Last Hard Bible,” Kasey Chambers — Kasey Chambers has this thin little voice that fires like a cannon, and the tight harmonies on this song are excellent.
19. “At the Bottom of Everything,” Bright Eyes — Sometimes I launch into the monologue at the beginning of this song at the office. It weirds people out, but not as much as when I say it while sitting in an airplane. Anyway, great song, great album, etc.
So, there you go.
It’s the middle of the month, and that doesn’t just mean payday. No, it’s time once again to get all religious, and that means it’s time for:
Jesus, Etc.
Managing Editor, Pajiba
Online Film Critics Society
Houston Film Critics Society
I'm a film and TV critic. I love movies, books, music, TV, good food, games, my wife, my cats, and my dog. (Not necessarily in that order.) I write about whatever's on my mind.
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