The L.A Story

Radiohead Gives It To Us, In Rainbows

 It has been over a month since Radiohead released their latest album In Rainbows. It is the band’s seventh, and once again they’ve proven brilliance in its release, both musically and economically. If you have not heard, their album is available only on their website, at inranbows.com. And you pay what you want. It’s free, direct from the band to you. This has inspired much talk in the music industry and was not expected by anyone. But after the announcement, it made sense that Radiohead would be the band with both the pull and balls to do it.

            This is a band that emphasizes capitalism as an enemy, and has been ashamed in the past, simply for being popular in a very profitable industry. But they care nothing more than producing quality and meaningful music, while reaching as many as possible with their message. Money does not enter that equation. It has in the past, because to release a record, you had to go through a label for distribution. With people downloading the music anyway, Radiohead seized the opportunity to let the industry and the rest of the world have it.

            The band has already made it over the hump of fame and fortune. During the Ok Computer tour in 1997, they became the one of the biggest rock bands, gaining a mass audience, critical acclaim at home and abroad, and virtually every award in music, including a Grammy for Best Album of the Year. Director Grant Gee documents their early years in the film Meeting People Is Easy. The band experienced a feeling of betrayal to themselves and all their music was about. They never once thought of tailoring their music, but felt a change in character, as their status increase in the industry and the public eye. And before that change ruined their art, they took off 3 years before releasing another album.

            Since then they have remained under the pop radar, and still managed to establish a huge following with their constant evolution and unmatchable live performances. In Rainbows is a smack in the face to the music industry. Studies show that over 60% paid nothing for the album. 4% paid between $12 and $20.  The rest paid somewhere in between. What they made cannot be determined yet, but they sold millions and reports indicate that they may have made as much or more than ever.

            The album itself is beautiful, going back to their earlier usage of guitar and instrumentals rather than computer generated dance beats. Leader singer, Thom Yorke, continues to impress, insisting that his listener think about the world and how it pertains to us as a collective. His voice has never sounded better and the absence of electronics and technology seems bitter sweet.

Second song, Bodysnatchers: “Has light gone out for you, cause the lights gone out me. It is the 21^st century, it is the 21^st century.” Then the final song, Videotape, seems a tribute to the past and everything we once knew about technology. “This is one for the good days, I have it all here in red, blue, green. In red, blue, green.”

Radiohead has once again kept up with the constant change, and even propelled it in ways others have tried to prevent for years. There’s no doubt that their actions will inspired a mass change in how people release and acquire music. And at the same time, they give the people who do not normally take a chance on Radiohead a taste of their genius.        

Thanks For Holiday Hype

  Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, the most American of holidays. You might say, “What about July 4th?” What about it? We all have birthdays. I give it to Turkey Day. It celebrates and blends the American virtues with our flaws perfectly, and without shame; family, food, television, generosity, delusion, hype, and excess. But like any other day, it depends how you look at it.

Thanksgiving will try to be as traditional as possible. We’ve got the feast, relatives, football, vacation, left-overs, and the feast. People will eat. Kobe will hand out some turkeys. There’ll be a parade. Movies will open and money will be made. We will celebrate each other, and how we are thankful for what we have. The media and other corporations will exploit it, trying to squeeze dollars from you and me, the people who just want to be together. It’s inevitable. Food, travel, and vacation will be purchased. Then, the very next day, capitalism at it’s finest. Sales.

People are homeless, children are stupid, cars are everywhere, and we give are hard earned cash to the people that will not solve our problems. Now buy your turkeys, see your mother, and watch some T.V, but don’t let them get you. After tomorrow, it’s all over. My neighbor is already putting up his damn lights. I was eating sushi earlier and heard Michael Bolton sing Frosty. Soon it will be that pressure to shop and more cars than there is road. New toys, games, music, clothes, and bigger wastes of time that will be forgotten before remembered. Yes sir, they push Christmas like Nino Brown pushes crack. I hate to even say the word. Jesus must be rolling in is grave. Some birthday. Humanity manipulating each other only to bring out the worst in them selves at the expense of one of our most cherished relatives.  

But hey, happy holidays! Let’s get though the warm up, where the shopping has not yet begun, and we can focus on what’s important. For me, it’s the people I know. I thank the world that I have people in my life who accept, appreciate, and at least pretend to understand me. If you can say the same, thank who ever you’d like, because we all have problems, but to face them alone is a tragedy and unnecessary with so many of us here. Continue the holiday spirit year round, that way they can’t push this hype on us, making us betray the values we once held dear.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving. Share it with your loved ones, and help a comrade if you see one in need. Keep your eyes peeled, they’re out there. You have a computer, what do they have? Give my love to Mom and take it easy on the sauce. And when you finish feeding that fat face with yams and hams, watch the idiot box, and remember, it’s all being said for your paycheck. And don’t mind Bush. He’s just trying to get your mind off the war. Yes, we’re at war. Now go back to the kitchen, grab a roll, stick some turkey, stuffing, and mashed potato in that piece, and dip it in some gravy.

Do You Know What You Are Getting?

It is the season for movies with substance. We made it passed an excruciating summer, putting up with garbage like Transformers. Now get ready for the real directors of big budget Hollywood that use money on talent, not effects. What to see? Lions for Lambs, Robert Redford’s first film since The Legend of Bagger Vance. A good flick I thought, but I’m bias, I golf. It was definitely no Quiz Show. Not since then, has Redford given us a must see film.

                I knew nothing about it, other than, it’s Redford’s film starring Tom Cruise and Meryl Streep. A political drama I think. Good enough for me. Cruise plays a Senator, who has a plan to win the war on terror. Streep, is a reporter, who gets an exclusive interview with the Senator, and will be the first to tell the nation about this new plan. Meanwhile, Redford, who plays a college professor, is trying to convince his most promising student, why he should care about his Political Science class. He uses the lives of two former students, who chose to go to Afghanistan, as examples of how diverse and complicated the system all is, of which the young pupil thinks he has all figured out. These two soldiers are ironically at the head of Cruises military proposal.

            The three stories are wonderfully woven together in an attempt to show our current situation abroad, and how it pertains to people on all levels, from the Senators who initiate the war, to the soldiers who fight it, and how each citizen, particularly those with social awareness, is responsible for what happens, even if their actions are futile and do not inspire change.

            I left the theatre thinking, short. “Did you like it?” I asked my girl.

            “It was okay.” She thought it was too preachy. “Blah, blah, blah!”

            I understood. It was very preachy. It was all preachy. In fact, that was the whole point. The ideas expressed in the film are far from new ideas. It has all been done before. But not like this. The film emphasizes the media’s responsibility to the people, and the people’s responsibility to think. Education is criticized, as the film points out that we are a nation taught by television. People in this country accept what is given to them, leaving little room for change. Instead of television as a educational tool, it is a manipulator of the masses.

            “Yeah. I heard it before,” she said.

            “Is he lying?”

            “No.”

            Well maybe it’s good to hear some truth, no matter how preachy. While one may think he’s preaching to the choir, another may think I don’t even sing. Plenty have never heard these perspectives, and never would if not for films like Lions for Lambs. In the future, when this terrible past is behind us, or not, we can look back and see whose side we were on. Who sat back and watched the world die, and who stood up and tried to save it. And even if all of our efforts amount to the same inevitable conclusion, at least one of us can say, “at least I did something.”