MOVIE REVIEW ★★★★ / 4 Reviving the Rock-afire Explosion
Do you remember the Rock-afire Explosion? Think back to Showbiz Pizza Club or Chuck-E-Cheese. They’re the animatronic band behind the curtain in the big room where you ate crappy pizza. You sat spellbound, soaking up the noise and music, all the while trying to scheme up ways to extract more tokens from mom and dad. On stage, the really scary life-sized gorilla played the keys and the one-toothed bear sang kid songs.
News Briefs
Tomorrow, MIT Resonance hosts the ICCA Northeast Semifinal tournament at Kresge Auditorium, 8 p.m. The MIT Chorallaries will compete against seven of the best a cappella groups in the country! Tickets can be purchased online at www.varsityvocals.com.
CONCERT REVIEW Video Game Orchestra
Video game music is familiar. It’s even more familiar when a dark screen flashes the large bulky letters at the same time, or when it’s associated with its mascot, Sonic the Hedgehog. But instead of sitting in front of a television watching an pixelated blue hedgehog in snazzy red sneakers run into gold rings, I’m sitting in a dark concert hall watching a 40-piece orchestra, a rock band, and a chamber choir perform music from not only <i>Sonic the Hedgehog</i>, but also <i>Donkey Kong</i>, <i>Silent Hill</i>, <i>Myst</i>, <i>Metal Gear Solid</i>, and <i>Final Fantasy</i>, just to name a few.
MOVIE REVIEW ★★ ½ / 4 Watchmen Simplifies, Distorts Original Novel
There is a scene in <i>Watchmen</i>, directed by Zack Snyder (<i>Dawn of the Dead</i>, <i>300</i>), when Laurie Jupiter, the crime-fighting heroine of the story, pounds against an ornate glass structure in anguish at a horrific revelation, screaming “No!” with each impact. I too exclaimed “No!” in my mind while putting my face into my palms several times during the course of the 2 hour, 43 minute film.
CONCERT REVIEW Punk Rock and Folk, All Rolled into One
Girl power incarnate Eleni Mandell is currently on tour promoting her latest record, <i>Artificial Fire</i>. Stopping in Cambridge last Sunday, Mandell and her band provided an energetic performance and stayed true to the intricacies of their studio recordings.
CONCERT REVIEW Phamily Reunion
The four and a half years of waiting are over: Phish is back. Better yet, they sound good; I mean <i>really</i> good. Phish’s farewell tour in 2004 exposed a band at its absolute worst. As drummer Jon Fishman (whose surname inspired the group moniker) later admitted, their final concert in Coventry, Vermont was one of the “greatest train wrecks in live music history.” Pianist Page McConnell wrote a letter to fans last summer hinting at a reunion, and last October Phish uploaded a video to their website making a reunion official with a run of three shows at Hampton Coliseum in Virginia, a prized venue of the band.
RESTAURANT REVIEW Hipster Dragons and Funky Haikus
A blizzard may keep me from going to class, but I refuse to let the elements hinder my food critiquing endeavors. So, I braved the cold on Monday night with a friend to try Myers+Chang, an Asian fusion “funky indie diner” in the South End. Run by owner and chef Joanne Chang and executive chef Matthew Barros, the place gives off an upscale yet casual, retro-modern feel, with mod off-white cushiony seats and pink, borderline-kitschy bar stools. Bright pink dragon designs adorn the glass exterior, and inside are red and white lights amidst white bauble lanterns. We were pleasantly charmed before the food even arrived by the playing music, which included Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely” and Death Cab for Cutie’s “A Lack of Color.”
CD REVIEW Ben Folds Lets You Play the Producer
The Ben Folds fanbase has spoken: 2008’s <i>Way to Normal</i> was TOO LOUD and we want our money back; or, at least, a remix.
Phish Friday (and Saturday and Sunday, too!)
Tonight, legendary jam band Phish will perform their first concert in over 4 years at the Hampton Coliseum in Virginia. Their highly-anticipated three night residency will answer the question on every hippie’s mind: is Phish good again? If you’re not already on your way down to the venue, then don’t worry. Head to <i>http://livephish.com</i>, where you can download free mp3s of each night’s gig. Check out next week’s edition of <i>The Tech</i> to read about the highlights from the weekend and predictions for Phish’s upcoming summer reunion tour.
CONCERT REVIEW When Sound Worlds Collide
Collage New Music, performing in Longy School of Music’s Edward M. Pickman Concert Hall this past Monday, articulated contemporary voices in music with a unique and refreshing ability. This isn’t a complaint about contemporary music performances: it’s not difficult to see that most contemporary music is performed by competent musicians and that it takes a very talented musician to play contemporary music in the first place.
INTERVIEW Hsunami Merge the Old with the New
At the CSC Chinese New Year banquet, the closing performance featured Hsu-Nami, a group named after founder Jack Hsu. The band labels itself as part of the “progressive Asian soundscape.” An instrumental rock band, they feature a traditional Chinese instrument called the erhu. The erhu is sometimes called “southern fiddle” and its sound can be compared to that of the Western violin. The usage of an amplified erhu lends a touch of classic Chinese folk to the predominantly rock songs.
CD REVIEW Nels Cline Drones On…
You either know Nels Cline as the thin-framed lead guitarist for the alt-folk collective Wilco, or as one of LA’s most experimental composers of avant-garde jazz guitar fronting the Nels Cline Singers. Either faction of Nels-fanatics would find something new in the accomplished guitarist’s latest endeavor, <i>Coward</i>. Though Cline’s canon dates back to 1979 (including myriad collaborations, trio projects, and a fraction of the Wilco discography), this is his first true solo album in that he composed all of the music and plays all of the instruments.
CONCERT REVIEW Antony Delivers, Johnsons Support Outstandingly
I touched Antony Hegarty’s ass. Both hands, both cheeks.
MOVIE REVIEW Waltz With Bashir
I made a mad dash to the Kendall Square Cinema one cold day during IAP to see the Academy Award-nominated film by Israeli director Ari Folman, hoping to witness cinematic art and escape my obligations for the day.
CD REVIEW Hoobastank Hasn’t Grown Up
Hoobastank is a lot like the hula-hoop. Everybody knows that they still exist somewhere and that people used to really like them, but it’s been so long since they’ve done anything remotely memorable that no one actually knows what’s happened to them. Clocking in at a tepid thirty-eight minutes, <i>For(N)ever</i> resembles a married couple’s 25th anniversary night activities: too short to be satisfying, but mediocre enough that you’re still glad it’s over quickly.
CD REVIEW ‘Artificial Fire’ Is Raw and Honest Art
Two years after the success of her 2007 Zedtone release <i>Miracle of Five</i>, Eleni Mandell is back with her latest work, <i>Artificial Fire</i>. If you take a quick listen to <i>Miracle</i>, you might not imagine that the same artist is the mastermind behind both albums. However, that’s where Mandell’s strength as a songwriter and band member comes through.
CD REVIEW The Bad Plus, Plus One
Jazz is a genre that consistently flirts with risk-taking. Whether this manifests itself in compositional structure, instrumentation, harmonic choices, or transcending implicit musical boundaries, The Bad Plus is a group that has done it all. Since the release of the group’s first record on the Fresh Sound / New Talent imprint, the critic community has argued over the true categorization of these three veteran musicians from Minneapolis. At the very base, they are indisputably a jazz group. But what causes most listeners to question this blanket classification is The Bad Plus’ penchant for risk. Boasting a catalogue of astounding original compositions (each member plays piano and writes for the whole band) and an arsenal of jazz-tinged rock and pop covers, The Bad Plus explores more musical territory than most of their jazz or indie contemporaries. This past summer, at the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, Netherlands (an event I was fortunate enough to attend) Reid Anderson (bass), Ethan Iverson (piano), and David King (drums) announced the upcoming release of their new album, <i>For All I Care</i>. They also mentioned that they’d had a surprise waiting for the audience backstage. Seasoned Bad Plus fans are no stranger to the antics that this trio brings to the stage, but there’s just one thing that fans were not expecting: Wendy Lewis.
DANCE REVIEW MIT Natya Presents Shakti: Women of Power
Last Sunday MIT Natya performed their annual show in Little Kresge, entitled <i>Shakti: Women of Power</i>. Natya is purely devoted to Bharatanatyam, a classical dance tradition originating from South India. The show utilized the art of dance to convey the stories of three women in Hindu mythology who have had notable impact on the status of women. Bharatanatyam is an extremely technical and challenging dance form that incorporates percussive foot movements, which often complement the rhythm of the drums in the accompanying music.