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Posted on 11.11.07 by hardrockchick @ 9:47 pm
Guns ‘n Roses didn’t write Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door. Nine Inch Nails didn’t write Dead Souls. But I heard the covers before the originals, and it was NIN’s cover of Dead Soul’s featured on The Crow soundtrack that made me aware of Joy Division. Back when I still read liner notes, of course. Joy Division created some amazing works in their 4 short years. Their influence can still be felt today- She Wants Revenge, Interpol, LCD Soundsystem, to other eighties and nineties bands such as NIN, The Cure, Bauhaus, and Depeche Mode. Under Review is a short documentary that covers the band from it’s start as Warsaw to the post-Curtis New Order. It features rare video footage of the band and interviews with several writers who were familiar with the whole scene at the time. Consider it the Cliff’s Notes to Joy Division. No former members are interviewed, making it very much an outsider’s perspective. And, due to it’s length, there are any full performances. However, it is a worthwhile watch if you have 70 minutes to spare. So, I’ve been waiting for this film for about 6 months. It’s a beautiful film shot in black and white and involved all of the people that should be involved in a work of this nature: it’s based on the book by Curtis’ wife, Deborah There are frame by frame remakes of the famous ‘So It Goes’ performance, glimpses (and I mean glimpses) into the inspiration for ‘She’s Lost Control’, ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’, and ‘Isolation’, and insight into the situation that lead to Curtis’ suicide. One’s expectations for the film must be framed by the fact that is based on the book that his wife wrote- who he had cheated on and treated rather poorly. Thus, this gives the film less us a life story lens (there are no childhood or family life incidences that could have been influences), making it feel much more like a love story. Granted, this is a huge factor in Curtis’ demise, but it definitely makes me wonder how laden the film is with a biased perspective. Bookmark to:
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; it was produced by both Deborah and Tony Wilson, directed by Anton Corbijn- a Joy Division fan and director of fantastic music videos such as 
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Posted on 07.07.07 by hardrockchick @ 10:36 am
Have you seen Transformers yet? It’s pretty entertaining, if you’re willing to look past the usual Michael Bay cocktail of gross product placement and foul depictions of women and African-Americans and just enjoy the sounds and sights bonanza that it is. So did you see that Strokes shirt that Shia LaBeouf is wearing for half of the movie? It’s from 2001. The Strokes have been struggling for a while now. Can Transformers save The Strokes? Kinda hard when they aren’t even on the soundtrack. Bookmark to:
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Posted on 05.23.07 by hardrockchick @ 7:31 pm
It must be cool to be such a shapeshifter of an actor that Johnny Depp can maintain his coolness for so long…and talk his friend Keith Richards into playing a part in a Disney movie. I’d love to see how that convo went….”Keith, will you play my dad in this pirate movie?” Bookmark to:
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Posted on 05.23.07 by hardrockchick @ 7:18 pm
There’s a movie being made about Iggy Pop. Guess who’s playing him? No, not Jonathan Rhys Meyers. Nope, not John Cameron Mitchell. It’s Frodo. Mr. Elijah Wood. Poor kid is picking up a lot of flak for this role. He’d better pull it off. There are several other music biopics in the pipeline somewhere. The success of Ray and Walk the Line have caused a lot of money to be thrown at this ‘genre’. Not that I’m complaining. Here’s what I’m looking forward to: The mysterious Jimi Hendrix biopic: rumored to be directed by Quentin Tarantino, and often rumored to star either Andre 3000 or Lenny Kravitz (Gary Dourdan who plays Warrick on CSI would be another good choice). This film had been plagued by many problems, mostly, obtaining right to the songs. The film seems to be dead in the water. Gospel According to Janis, starring Zooey Deschanel, whom I love. This one is for real, and will be coming out in 2008. Strangely, Pink was originally supposed to star in this. The director is none other than Penelope Spheeris, who also did The Decline of Western Civilization. Control, about Joy Division’s Ian Curtis, just debuted at Cannes this year. Sure to be uplifting, it stars Mark Smith from 24 Hour Party People. Don Cheadle will play Miles Davis The one that I will watch most closely is the planned Kurt Cobain biopic. Rumors are that it will star Ewan McGregor. I can see that. Courtney, please don’t fuck this up. Spike Lee is rumored to be directing the James Brown biopic. Bob Dylan, Marvin Gaye, and Tupac biopics are vague rumors. Others I would expect to spring up are Willie Nelson and Elliott Smith ones. How about Dimebag Darrell? Bookmark to:
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Posted on 03.17.07 by admin @ 6:00 pm
I feel like I had been waiting to see 300 for about 300 years. I heard about it way back, when a teaser trailer was put up featuring the track ‘Just Like You Imagined’ by NIN, and it was all over our fan forum. Yeah, we’re nerds like that. So, despite lukewarm reviews, I really enjoyed the film. Seeing it on IMAX is a must. That year of post production made for an absolutely stunning film, but what really nailed it for me was the score. Done very much in NIN spirit, it was gritty and loud. Tyler Bates is a masterful composer. If the images weren’t enough to do it for you, the sound sent you over the edge. Like the Persians in the movie. Bookmark to:
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Posted on 03.15.07 by admin @ 10:52 am
So, I’m a little behind times with this review, but hey, I’m the only one I know that likes a good horror film. But I can’t bring myself to see one in the theater by myself. If House of 1000 Corpses didn’t convince you that Rob Zombie can make a damn fine horror film, then The Devil’s Rejects certainly will. A seventies style slasher with cleverly placed classic rock tunes and another terrific Tyler Bates score. Watch this and you’ll see: Bookmark to:
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Posted on 02.12.07 by admin @ 3:57 pm
Whew, that was a long title. You might initially think ‘What does this have to do with hard rock music’. Patience. The annual SF Indiefest kicked off with the San Francisco premier of David Lynch’s first feature length film since Mulholland Drive, Inland Empire. Lynch nailed it again. His work on this film is especially impressive for two reasons: he shot the entire film on a consumer DV camera, and the score and soundtrack were created without the assistance of his usual collaborator, Angelo Badalamenti. The music in Inland Empire was more mainstream than in his previous movies, containing dance sequences to Atomic Kitten’s ‘The Locomotion’ and Nina Simone’s ‘Sinner Man’. Beck’s ‘Black Tambourine’ was also featured. The eerie song that sticks with you was written and performed by Lynch himself- “Ghost of Love’ which contains the line from the preview ‘Strange, what love does…’. The music was fitting for the film, which, like Mulholland Drive, was much more dream like than his darker, harder films, Wild at Heart and Lost Highway. The soundtracks for Wild at Heart and Lost Highway are a Hard Rock Chick’s dream. Nic Cage and Laura Dern dancing around to Power Mad- I could watch an entire movie just of that. And Trent Reznor’s collaboration on the Lost Highway soundtrack is phenomenal. This is one of the things that I love best about Lynch films- the give and take of the visual and the auditory. After the film (all two hours and fifty something minutes of it), we went over to the afterparty at the Porn Palace. This is one of kink.com’s studios, which is occasionally opened up for events. Quite a trip. It was here that we were treated to the mash up extraordinaires, DJs Adrian & the Mysterious D. Having frequented BootieSF and some of their other events, I know that I’m in store for some good stuff. First we got some free drinks, then we took some free photos in the imeem photo booth (see below). Then came the music served up with some anime porn (which I have been told has a name- Hinta- which in no way fits). So I got a little fix of NIN, even if it was mashed with Fergie. Now if we could just get an all industrial music night going in a wickedly cool space like this. that picture on the right is not a proposition- I thought we had to pay!
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