Month: August 2011

Man’s Search for Happiness

Man’s Search For Happiness (1964). 13 min., sound, color. USA: Brigham Young University Motion Picture Studio, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

They don’t make them like this anymore. I came across this when I was a Mormon missionary, circa 2000.  It was dubbed onto an old VHS I found in a ward meetinghouse library in Reynoldsburg, OH.  I’ve never been able to find it again, but I recently was reminded of this movie and thought to check for it on online, and found it in seconds.  Weird to realize that in 2000 there was no such thing as finding or streaming a video online; now you can find almost anything.

The church remade this movie in the 80s and I think they still distribute that version, but it fails to match the weirdness and mystery that you will see here.  I love the surrealist/proto-psychedelic moments. To a 21st century father, the scenes of the birth and the babies in the hospital feel almost dystopic, but I guess that’s just how they did things back in the 1950s and 1960s in America.  There’s many other priceless moments, such as the awkwardness and bad acting of the old moustached guy as he is welcomed into the afterlife by his various kindred dead.

Plus, as weird as it all is, I think it’s also true.  I sometimes have a desire to be both ironic and sincere at the same time.  At no time is that feeling more relevant than as I watch this film.

Man’s Search for Happiness

Man’s Search For Happiness (1964). 13 min., sound, color. USA: Brigham Young University Motion Picture Studio, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

They don’t make them like this anymore. I came across this when I was a Mormon missionary, circa 2000.  It was dubbed onto an old VHS I found in a ward meetinghouse library in Reynoldsburg, OH.  I’ve never been able to find it again, but I recently was reminded of this movie and thought to check for it on online, and found it in seconds.  Weird to realize that in 2000 there was no such thing as finding or streaming a video online; now you can find almost anything.

The church remade this movie in the 80s and I think they still distribute that version, but it fails to match the weirdness and mystery that you will see here.  I love the surrealist/proto-psychedelic moments. To a 21st century father, the scenes of the birth and the babies in the hospital feel almost dystopic, but I guess that’s just how they did things back in the 1950s and 1960s in America.  There’s many other priceless moments, such as the awkwardness and bad acting of the old moustached guy as he is welcomed into the afterlife by his various kindred dead.

Plus, as weird as it all is, I think it’s also true.  I sometimes have a desire to be both ironic and sincere at the same time.  At no time is that feeling more relevant than as I watch this film.

Concerning Ice Cream Trucks

If an ice cream truck rolls up a residential street on a quiet Saturday Afternoon and no children run out to buy ice cream, it does still make a sound. And that sound is by turns nostalgic, melancholy, excruciatingly slow, and ultimately quite creepy. And now it’s stuck in my head.

Leave our kids alone, we’ve got all the ice cream we need around here.

Concerning Ice Cream Trucks

If an ice cream truck rolls up a residential street on a quiet Saturday Afternoon and no children run out to buy ice cream, it does still make a sound. And that sound is by turns nostalgic, melancholy, excruciatingly slow, and ultimately quite creepy. And now it’s stuck in my head.

Leave our kids alone, we’ve got all the ice cream we need around here.

RE: Rolling Blackouts

I realize in retrospect that my last post, although it made perfect sense to me, may have been slightly confusing without some context.

It was in fact a record review of sorts of the album Rolling Blackouts by Brighton, UK band The Go! Team.  However, I’m a little tired of/uninterested in writing traditional record reviews (see A Change in Focus), so instead I opted for a sort of extreme-reader-response criticism/fan fiction type of record review. I hope to do more such non-traditional record reviews in the future because they are a lot more fun for me than regular record reviews.  Besides, you can find good regular reviews all over the place, so why do I need to bother with them, too?

I also would like to state for the record that Rolling Blackouts isn’t anything like my favorite album of 2011 or anything; it’s just a record I had a quick desire to write about in this method.  I hope to add more “reviews” to the site, including those written about albums that actually are my most favorites, but we know I have a poor track record of providing steady content and publishing all the things I intend to publish. So, I still have to add this disclaimer about Rolling Blackouts in case I never getting around to posting about any other albums and in their absence it appears as if it is my ultimate all-time-favorite album because it’s the only one I’ve written and published about.

That is all.  Thank you for your time.  We now return to our regular Froz-T-Freez programming, still in progress.

RE: Rolling Blackouts

I realize in retrospect that my last post, although it made perfect sense to me, may have been slightly confusing without some context.

It was in fact a record review of sorts of the album Rolling Blackouts by Brighton, UK band The Go! Team.  However, I’m a little tired of/uninterested in writing traditional record reviews (see A Change in Focus), so instead I opted for a sort of extreme-reader-response criticism/fan fiction type of record review. I hope to do more such non-traditional record reviews in the future because they are a lot more fun for me than regular record reviews.  Besides, you can find good regular reviews all over the place, so why do I need to bother with them, too?

I also would like to state for the record that Rolling Blackouts isn’t anything like my favorite album of 2011 or anything; it’s just a record I had a quick desire to write about in this method.  I hope to add more “reviews” to the site, including those written about albums that actually are my most favorites, but we know I have a poor track record of providing steady content and publishing all the things I intend to publish. So, I still have to add this disclaimer about Rolling Blackouts in case I never getting around to posting about any other albums and in their absence it appears as if it is my ultimate all-time-favorite album because it’s the only one I’ve written and published about.

That is all.  Thank you for your time.  We now return to our regular Froz-T-Freez programming, still in progress.

Rolling Blackouts

A crew of high school cheerleaders find a vintage 1980s boombox underneath the bleachers, with a mixtape of old-school hip-hop auspiciously cued up in the deck. When one brave girl presses play, hoping it might be just what they need for their new routine, they are mystically transformed into The Go! Team, which is something like Charlie’s Angels and the A-Team put together, but even cooler; they vow to use their newfound powers to become great MCs and also save the school from lameness. To achieve their aims they join forces with the ‘60s pop-loving sophisticates of the rival school’s marching band, and together they conspire to hijack the big football game mid-play-mid-field with a guerrilla marching cheer block party. It was the best Homecoming ever, and also the best episode of Glee that I’ve never seen. Bethany “Best Coast” Consentino and Satomi “Deerhoof” Matsuzaki guest star.

The Go! Team – T.O.R.N.A.D.O. from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team – Voice Yr Choice from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team – Buy Nothing Day from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team – Apollo Throwdown from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team
Rolling Blackouts
Memphis Industries
Released: January 31, 2011

http://www.thegoteam.co.uk/

Rolling Blackouts

A crew of high school cheerleaders find a vintage 1980s boombox underneath the bleachers, with a mixtape of old-school hip-hop auspiciously cued up in the deck. When one brave girl presses play, hoping it might be just what they need for their new routine, they are mystically transformed into The Go! Team, which is something like Charlie’s Angels and the A-Team put together, but even cooler; they vow to use their newfound powers to become great MCs and also save the school from lameness. To achieve their aims they join forces with the ‘60s pop-loving sophisticates of the rival school’s marching band, and together they conspire to hijack the big football game mid-play-mid-field with a guerrilla marching cheer block party. It was the best Homecoming ever, and also the best episode of Glee that I’ve never seen. Bethany “Best Coast” Consentino and Satomi “Deerhoof” Matsuzaki guest star.

The Go! Team – T.O.R.N.A.D.O. from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team – Voice Yr Choice from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team – Buy Nothing Day from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team – Apollo Throwdown from memphis industries on Vimeo.

The Go! Team
Rolling Blackouts
Memphis Industries
Released: January 31, 2011

http://www.thegoteam.co.uk/

Mural on Outside South Wall of Java Cow Coffee, Park City, Utah

Banksy (British, 1973?- ). Untitled, 2010. Stenciled spray paint on stuccoed wall. Java Cow Coffee, Park City, Utah, USA.