Entertainment

April 2011 - Posts

  • RED Heart: Entertainment: Sign Up for Band Camp(aign)!

    By Lisa Chau, 22, reporting from Ann Arbor, MI, on a thrilling documentary film-to-be—that you can make happen

    My marching band days were filled with crushed-velvet rainbow leotards, six-foot flaming flags, and the constant jeering from my peers for being someone who took my concert flute to band camp for fun. I can still conjure the tinge of embarrassment I felt whenever we stood before our unenthusiastic audience for halftime shows.

    Thankfully, the trailer for Richard Barber's up-and-coming documentary about high school marching bands in New Orleans, The Whole Gritty City, struck a chord in my former band-geek heart. It opens with the bold sound of roaring brass instruments, taking me right back to the many times I exhaled teenage frustrations right into my own instrument — and was greeted with calming resonance.

    "Once that band gives you that down beat…just for that brief two or three minutes, you forget every problem you had. You have no cares in the world." – Wilbert Rawlins Jr.

    But here's the coolest part—you can help make this film happen. (Yeah, particularly you out there who might have mocked a girl with a flute at some point.) In a final push, until April 12 on Kickstarter, your donation (the minimum is only $1) helps fund the final cut of this promising project. Plus, if you pledge $15 or more, you get an on-screen thank you in the film's credits.

    Barber's doc launches us into the lives of high school marching band students. But what it's really about is how music and performance can provide a bit of happiness in a world filled with troubles. These kids in New Orleans need a minute to forget that their sisters and brothers were killed, or that their homes had been swept away overnight. The bands give them a chance to celebrate what Katrina could never take away: their city's jazz roots.

    This doc is a great reminder to us all that there are ways to momentarily escape from our troubles, and that we're not alone in the struggle of what we call life. If that's not a reason to sign up for band camp(aign), then I don't know what is.

  • RED Hearts: Entertainment: Different Strokes?

    By Alison Smith, 20, reporting from Brooklyn, NY, on the return of the band that made her favorite album of the last decade

    The Strokes are back after five years, two months, and 19 days -- some of us pay attention to such things -- with their album Angles. Last time I wrote a RED Hearts on the Strokes, it was to call their 2001 debut, Is This It, the album of the decade.

    While Angles doesn't reach that legendary level, it does introduce an album in tune with the progression of band's catalog. For the first time, some Strokes other than the singer Julian Casablancas had a part in writing songs, and the contributions show -- with the occasional disconnected result, but usually in good ways.

    Angles opens with a reggae beat on the incredibly catchy "Machu Picchu"and the line "I'm putting patience to the test," a sentiment not lost on fans who have waited for this album. It marks a clear change of era for the Strokes -- these are no longer Lower East Side boys calling back to the '70s. This time they've jumped to the late '80s.

    Where their last album, 2005's First Impressions of Earth, dealt with falling in love and growing up, Angles seems to mainly address absence and discomfort, contrasted with upbeat music. Lyrics often reference past songs such as the line on the lead single "Under the Cover of Darkness": "I've been out around this town/everyone's been singing the same song for ten years," calling back the decade-old line from hit "Last Nite" ("I've been in town for just about fifteen minutes now"). And it's true: Julian, Nick, Nikolai, Albert, and Fab aren't indifferent newcomers anymore. Instead they're veteran musicians forced to live up to their past successes while taking on a new form of democracy.

    It's a big job for the boys, one that comes with its positives and negatives. On the whole though, I really like Angles. Instant favorites include the bass-heavy "Taken For A Fool" and the quietly powerful "Life is Simple in the Moonlight." While the Strokes have expressed deep divides among them and resentment for the recording process, Angles can't help but feel like a promising new beginning for the band. While I won't hold my breath, I hope we won't have to wait another half-decade for another Strokes album. Until then, I'll have Angles on repeat.