The Oscars are this weekend, honoring the best movies of 2007. Since I don’t go to movies much, I thought I would show my favorite video of the past year – Feist’s “1 2 3 4.”
For those who never venture over to YouTube or have been in a cave every time the IPod commercial played, now you know why Feist is emerging out of the Canadian indie music scene to become an international star. You can see why Apple chose the video for the launch of its IPod video.
Like Madonna and Shakira, Feist makes very good songs with a limited vocal range and even better videos with her looks and screen presence. She is not the dancer that either Madonna or Shakira is, but few singers are. Feist shows great moves in “My Moon My Man” and “One Evening.” She also has great fashion sense. Check out the jacket in “My Moon My Man” and the stockings in “One Evening.”
But even a good singer with a great song can make a terrible video. That’s definitely not the case here. Everything comes together in “1 2 3 4,” Feist, her sequin blue outfit, the dancers, and the lighting. Patrick Daughters directs this video, made in a warehouse somewhere around Montreal. He has worked with Feist on others, including “My Moon My Man.”
I’ve watched the video countless times. In spite of different angles and dancers appearing and disappearing, I could not pick out any cuts whatsoever. After watching the making of the video, I found out there was none. It was all shot in one take with a camera on a remote control arm.
Obviously, it’s one of the more popular videos on YouTube, and it shows the site’s influence. Feist would get little airplay on most radio stations. Were it not for YouTube and the IPod commercial, I would have not heard of her. Now she’s one of the most played artists on my IPod.
I can only echo the comments left on YouTube – “simple yet beautiful,” “AWESOME!” “cool!”
Here’s a little video put together from the people behind Postsecret.com, a website project where people send in postcards telling their innermost secrets. Of course, many of those secrets deal with romance.
I have been tempted to write a post of the “Top 10 Sexiest Women I’ve Never Met.”
While I keep debating on other women, Emmylou Harris is definitely on the list. She just turned 60, let her hair go gray years ago, and wears simple clothes and little makeup. Yet she still looks better than most women half her age and sounds like an angel.
My favorite Emmylou song is “Queen of the Silver Dollar,” which was written by one of the my heroes, Shel Silverstein. But Emily has made it her own.
Wednesday night has become my favorite night of television this winter. I start the night watching basketball, particularly if the Magic are on. Then after watching my macho sports, I do a 180-degree turn of the channel to Project Runway.
To those who don’t know me, I bet your “gaydar” is picking up signals. Well, I’m not just heterosexual. I’m also considerably fashioned challenged.
Those that do know me also know my fashion knowledge consists of the color blue, Ralph Lauren, and the phrase “machine washable.” Were it not for those three and the women in my life, it’s doubtful that I would wear anything other than gym clothes.
But I have become addicted to Project Runway. It’s by far and away the best reality show out there. Other shows have backstabbing contestants and drama queens. Project Runway has drama queens of both sexes, but these queens can sew. Even more surprising, some of the designers are actually straight males.
But sexual orientation does not matter, nor does somebody’s popularity with other contestants. The show is all about design and creativity – how these designers make clothes, and how the clothes fit on the models. As Tim Gunn says, it’s how they “make it work.”
It also shows fashion in a most favorable light. Gunn comes across as a kindly mentor, a rarity in reality television. I would have loved to have him as a college professor. The designers are given a lot of creative challenges, sometimes even designing for women other than your typical models.
Of course, there is Heidi Klum.
Heidi is not only she drop-dead gorgeous; she’s also one hell of a model. A model’s main job is to make the clothes she is wearing look good. Heidi does the same for the rest of the show, wearing it like a Donna Karan dress and staying icy cool.
But she’s at her best when she dismisses the designer voted out each week. Forget Donald Trump saying “you’re fired!” or Jeff Probst telling someone that Tribal Council has spoken. Heidi tells the designer “auf Wiedersehen,” then gives them a hug and a kiss.
As one straight male said after being voted off, “It’s not too bad. I got a hug and kiss from Heidi Klum!”
I really wanted to hate this video, but it’s too good a song to hate.
I’ve never heard a song that I disagree with so much that I really like. This is a great blues tune that is, ahem, saucy. No pun intended. But if I buy it, download it, or promote it like I am doing here, am I enabling Amy Winehouse? Regardless of what she is singing, she really does need to go to rehab.
Seriously Amy (and anyone else who agrees with the song), go to rehab. Spend the 28 days, don’t drink, and repeat the BS they tell you to repeat. You won’t miss the drinking, and your life will get better. Try it.
Truthfully, orange is not my color. But I am going to wear my orange shirt on Friday.
It’s not because I’m a Gator fan. The ACLU is holding a nationwide protest to close the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay and asking concerned citizens to wear orange in support of the effort.
While most people think of the ACLU as a liberal organization, this cause is actually the most conservative and patriotic that I can support. It’s not out of sympathy for those imprisoned there – there are truly some evil people there. But there are also some innocents held without cause.
Rather, it’s to help preserve the U.S. Constitution and civil rights. Our government is torturing prisoners and holding them without due process. It is ignoring the Geneva Conventions, putting our troops at risk in later combat.
Some say that water-boarding and other interrogation techniques get prisoners to tell the truth. Water-boarding gets prisoners to say exactly what the interrogators want to hear. Pour water over somebody long enough, and that person will confess to witchcraft.
Others say it is to fight terrorism. We have enough troops in Iraq and Afghanistan fighting. But our best weapon in the war on terrorism is our respect for liberty and the law. We have win the hearts and minds of Muslims, who value the Qur’an even more than most Christians love the Bible. How can we show them we respect their ways if we don’t value our own laws?
Holding people without trial or without the guarantees of the Geneva Convention makes us a weaker country, not stronger. Wear orange for your country. Wear it for liberty.
Much to my delight, Barack Obama won in Iowa by eight points over John Edwards. The alleged front-runner, Hillary Clinton, came in third.
The results did not surprise me. Hillary represents a problem to a moderate Democrat like me. Her views on most issues match mine more than any other candidate, including Obama. She is a capable Senator. But, there is a problem – I find it hard to like her.
I want to like her. I’m tempted to vote for her just to piss off the right-wingers and neocons who gave us W and the incompetants. Yet I am beginning to see why she gets under people’s skin in a way people far more liberal than her do not.
Unlike her husband and Reagan (a.k.a “The Great Communicator”), Hillary has a communication problem. Some people who have met her say she is charming in person. But she sure does not come across that way on television or in interviews. She measures every word she says, trying to control all around her. Everything she does comes across as staged.
To make matters worse, she is paranoid of the press. Face it, being a president requires someone who is part manager, part salesman. It’s apparent she doesn’t like selling, and her management skills seem to be lacking by the way her campaign is going.
Consider how her family campaigns for her. Bill is trying to work his old magic, but his message is suspect. He cheated on Hillary and lied about it. Now he is telling people what a wonderful president she’d make.
And Chelsea? Being a Stanford grad and a pleasant-looking young woman, she can obviously speak out for her mom. In fact, I would love to hear her speak up on Hillary’s behalf. Chelsea could show the side of Hillary that the rest of us don’t see.
Other candidate’s children are campaigning for their parents and speaking to the press. If either of my parents needed my help getting a job, I would bend over backwards to help, particularly if the job was leader of the free world. Chelsea is out on the campaign trail, but she would not even grant an interview to a nine-year-old reporter!
But my real problem is neither Bill or Chelsea, it’s Hillary. It’s not that she voted for the war in Iraq, it’s that she never read the intelligence report prior to voting or had an aide read it and brief her. And her message – what message? It’s ironic that her husband’s greatest skill – communication – is her greatest weakness. And it’s a great enough weakness to cast my vote elsewhere.
How about a new band that takes you back to London in the sixties? These girls are the Pipettes, and they put the Spice Girls and Banarama to shame. Every time I watch this video, I half-expect to see Austin Powers working his mojo.
Of course, I have no idea what “pull shapes” mean. Is it like shagging?
That’s what Bright House says – even though the cable network is only televising half the Orlando Magic games it can. The cable provider only carries Sunshine Network, the longtime Magic broadcaster and sister network of FSN.
The Magic sold the rights to carry most of its home games to FSN, which has the Magic games that Sunshine does not. Negotiations between Bright House and FSN are going nowhere. FSN wants to be a first-tier network (channels 13-71) like ESPN. Bright House wants to offer FSN on its digital tier, in the 100s. While ESPN is the national cable leader, few networks offer the state coverage that FSN has, such as the Tampa Bay Rays and the University of Florida.
It’s bad enough that Bright House doesn’t carry all the Magic games and to ignore the angry calls of sports fans. But to run commercials saying how you are carrying games is insulting.
