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"Enigmatic Rap (Piano Version)" [mp3 removed]
Somewhat inspired by a piano rendition of Gary Numan's "Are 'Friends' Electric?" I heard a while back, but without the emo vocals that came with it.
For those who might've lost interest or faith in Lost (new watchers, never mind, you'll never get up to speed): the series suddenly rocks anew. A deft exercise in Tarantino-esque narrative manipulation, last night's installment "Exposé" recapped three seasons of the show through the POV of two minor, expendable characters, including a revisitation of the infamous pilot episode's "crash on the beach." (Which means the producers shot footage from that expensive opening for use many shows later in the story arc? Seems so.) What critic tedg calls "folding" abounds--one of the expendable characters guest-stars in a TV trash series called Exposé, a clip of which is seen at the beginning of her back story, an equally trash noir tale of a jewel heist she pulls off with another island crash survivor, all framed within Lost's own Survivors vs Others uber-narrative and climaxing with a macabre, Poe-like ending. Russian toy dolls-within-dolls that figure prominently in the story mimic the nested plots. Humorously, only the comic relief character Hurley has actually watched Exposé, but loves it.
Last week's show, "The Man From Tallahassee," also a keeper, featured flashbacks--finally--explaining how John Locke got in the wheelchair he mysteriously no longer needs. One wishes the writers would cut the poor bastard a break--the scheming cult leader Ben Linus (Torwald) immediately undermines Locke's moment of decisive heroism involving the Others' submarine: played again.
"Sorting is the new Breakdance."
(the graphic is from Wikipedia, that line is from Crystalpunk, via cpb:softinfo)
YouTube of Ryuichi Sakamoto and his wife Akiko Yano playing an old YMO standard together at the piano. Back in the day I couldn't get my sophisticated record collecting friends interested in YMO or Sakamoto. They just couldn't go there. I'm glad to see that people are still discovering them/him through the Net or what have you. [/self pitying reminiscence]
What I'm listening to now: Barbara Morgenstern. The Grass Is Always Greener, Nichts Muss, Fjorden are the ones I've heard. Kind of Slapp Happy-era Dagmar Krause meets To Rococo Rot but an original songwriter as interested in texture as tonality. The "transposition queen"--you never know where her key and chord changes within a song are going to take you, but it's not meandering, it's completely focused and intentional. Lyrics in English and German, alternating.