Beginning a month of spooky posts, we start off our October offerings with David Cronenberg’s The Brood.

While the Canadian filmmaker had already established his horror cred with films like Rabid, The Brood was the first film to bring mainstream credibility to the the fantasy/horror auteur that would go on to create Scanners and Videodrome. Mixing a family drama with a psychological gore-fest, The Brood defined the personal terror and body horror themes that have marked Cronenberg’s more mature work.

Happy October spookfest viewing. Here is The Brood…

Stay Awake!

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My last post about Leonard Cohen’s early recordings has me excited to curate this conversation about someone we all seem to care so much about. Leonard’s not everyone’s bag and it’s really wonderful to see so many folks interested in the man’s complex, felt lyricism.

Not sure if I can find more unique documents to share about the man, but this film is another great take on Cohen’s beginnings that I’ve never seen before. This one delves back just a little farther into the roots of Cohen’s aesthetic which can seem mysterious and even self-generated without a closer look.

When we think about Bob Dylan’s work, it’s easy to draw the line directly through Ramblin’ Jack Elliot to Woody Guthrie and then out from there to the 1000 starry points that make up the constellation of American vernacular music. As a Canadian with a connection to the French language, Cohen’s music is particularly European, but it all starts with his high school Country/Western band, The Buckskin Boys. In Cohen’s songs, Hank Williams drinks a shot with Allen Ginsberg and Federico Garcia Lorca while the Buddha reads the Torah to L. Ron Hubbard. Here, Ray Charles’ rhythm and blues becomes entangled with the chanson traditions embodied by Jacques Brel, and they both find their place in the exquisite verses and high melodies of this most gifted singer/songwriter.

Here is Leonard Cohen’s Lonesome Heroes…

Stay Awake!

Please subscribe to my YouTube channel where I archive all of the videos I curate at Insomnia. Click here to check out more Cinema posts.

This week: Pussy Riot update, the slow television of Norway, Detroit bark city?, Matt Forney is a massive dick-bag, Dark Wallet and BitCoin: a good idea?, and a Canadian Astronaut snorts at Hollywood.

Personnel – Joe Nolan, Kim Monaghan, and Ken Eakins

[powerpress]

Links:

• Pussy Riot Hunger Strike – Link
• Norway does TV…wrong – Link
• Investor to Create a Forest in Detroit – Link
• Matt Forney – Modern Caveman – Link
• Dark wallet – Link
• Canadian Astronaut booted out of screening of Gravity for heckling – Link

Interludes:

Dissolved, End, Messer Chups

I’ve been off the blog for a few days, enjoying some adventures in real life away from the keyboard. In the meantime I missed an important birthday that I wanted to make note of.

On October 18, Chuck Berry turned 87 years old! While rock ‘n’ roll is infamous for its one-hit-wonders and too-young-to-die casualties, Chuck Berry is still kicking — a living legend and a constant reminder of the music’s roots. The undeniable architect of rock ‘n’ roll electric guitar playing, it’s hard to think of a musician whose made a larger, longer impact than Berry.

Berry created a style of guitar playing that mixed insistent, infectious rhythm strumming with sinewy lead lines and archetypal riffs that blended the two approaches into a singular force. When you add to that one of the most important song catalogs produced by anyone, and some of the best lyric writing in the history of the form, there’s a reason why we’re still talking about a man who made his first splash on the scene more than half a century ago.

In 1969, legendary filmmaker D.A. Pennebaker trained his lens on Chuck when he was playing in a festival in Toronto, Canada. Pennebaker included part of Berry’s performance in the festival film, Sweet Toronto. In 2012, Berry’s full performance was reassembled and released on DVD as Rock ” Roll Music and credited to Pennebaker and his wife, filmmaker Chris Hegedus.

In honor of Chuck’s special day, here is the film in its entirety.

Please subscribe to my YouTube channel where I archive all of the videos I curate at Insomnia. Click here to check out more Music posts.