Great Big Sea show

Went to a great show tonight at the Paramount Theatre in Denver. Great Big Sea (a band from Newfoundland) played, and I got to see them again for the first time in a couple years. Great show! It was the first time I've been to the Paramount and I really enjoyed it. It's a great old style theatre and had a nice ambiance for the concert.

The show in itself was incredible. They just put out a new album called "The Hard and the Easy" a CD of traditional Newfoundland folk tunes. The first set was mainly off of their new CD, and then their second set was more rock tunes from all of their other CDs. If you haven't heard of Great Big Sea you should definitely check them out. Their vocals are incredible and they blend really well together. They came back
for two different encores, the second one they all started at the front of the stage & told the audience to be quiet, and then did an acapella song (I think it was called Mr. Brown's Daughter) with no microphones or anything. Really cool.

Anyway - it was a great show, great venue & we had great seats. The next time their back in our neck of the woods you should definitely check them out.
Great Big Sea's website

"The Chronicles of Narnia" movie review

Tilda Swinton rocks. Easily the best part of the movie. She was so good at being so evil, and she blew me away in the last battle. I don't think they could have cast anyone better as the White Witch.

So on to the rest of the movie. There aren't many movies that I've seen that I consider better than the books that they're based upon. This was definitely an exception. I read the Chronicles of Narnia a short time ago (all of them) and thought that they were okay, but nothing exceptional. Each book is so short, it seems like nothing much happens and there's really nothing in between the things that do happen. After reading them again the first time in years, I was skeptical of the movie and how they were going to make a two hour epic out of it. Well they did, and they did a pretty good job. When reading the book, CS Lewis does a good job of making the children really annoying and making you get pretty much fed up with them on the first part of the story. The same is true in the movie. The kids are annoying (and I'm not saying anything about the actors - they were great - it was just the parts written) in the first two thirds of the movie, and then they get a lot better. Liam Neeson is a great voice for Aslan, as well as the actors who do the voice for the Beaver (Ray Winstone) and the Wolf (Sim Evan-Jones).

Overall I thought the movie was really good, great visuals, great sounds, and battle scenes that were definitely up to par with what has become the norm with all of the recent epic movies.

I give it a high 7 out of 10. The annoying part the kids played took some away from it for me, but Tilda Swinton was awesome. The movie in itself is worth seeing to see her coming into the last battle in her chariot.

"Wallace & Gromit" movie review

I give this 9 out of 10 stars. I might even go 9+. Its a great movie, I loved it. But for totally different reasons than why I loved "City of Lost Children".

"Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit" just made me smile the entire time. First of all, I love Wallace & Gromit and have seen all of their shorts, so when I heard that there was finally going to be a movie, I knew I had to see it. Saying that, I find it hard to believe it took me this long! I guess that's what happens when you have other things to do in your life. The animation is incredible, and the voice talent does a great job. Helena Bonham Carter is perfect for her part. The comedy is great and there's a lot of little subtle visuals and lines that just had me busting out laughing. I particularly liked the "dog fight" at the end.
Check this movie out if you're in the mood for just an overall good entertaining movie. Great family movie as well.

"Aww. The bounce has gone from his bungee."

"City of Lost Children" movie review

"I had a weird dream"

Little bit of an understatement. This was a crazy movie. Really dark, think Terry Gilliam at his best. Jean-Pierre Jeunet is quickly becoming one of my favorite lesser known directors. His visuals, set design, and color schemes are incredible. Think of the color schemes of "Amelie" and then go to the opposite spectrum of dark and twisted. Ron Pearlman does a great job in it (he's Hellboy in the movie of the same name) and the young actress Judith Vittet is incredible. The story is truly unique about this super intelligent guy who was created from a test tube but the person who created him left him and created him without the ability to dream. So he kidnaps children to try to see into their minds and what they are dreaming, but when he trys to get into their dreams they become only nightmares.

There's a lot of great memorable scenes in the movie, but one will stick out in my mind for quite sometime. For those of you who have seen it, you'll know what I'm thinking about, but since I don't want to give it away, I'll just say that looking yourself in the eye while you're dying would really freak me out.

If you're a fan of dark movies (I was a huge fan of "Dark City" and this is kind of in the same vein) you should definitely check it out.

I give it 8 out of 10.

Happy Groundhog Day

Today is February 2nd - Groundhog Day! So go celebrate by doing whatever it is people do on Groundhog Day. I guess it's a big thing out east, especially in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, but if you happen to live no where close to that little town, celebrate in your own way.

The date is also the traditional day of Candlemas on western calendars. This was the date 40 days after the birth of Christ where the Virgin Mary would have gone to the temple to attend a ceremony of ritual purification and present her child to the temple.

Some traditions and superstitions surrounding Candlemas are that traditionally it was on the eve of Candlemas that all Christmas decorations were taken down for any traces of holly, lights, trees and anything else Christmas-like after Candlemas would bring death and misfortune in the coming year. (So all of you people who still have your Christmas decorations out, take them down already!) Also it was traditionally found that good weather on Candlemas Day meant another 40 days of winter, which is where the tradition of Groundhog Day originally comes from.

Also, Groundhog day marks the 6 week mark to another lesser known and even lesser celebrated holiday, St. Urho's Day. St. Urho is a fake legend that the Finnish made up when immigrating to America and wanted their own holiday to keep strong ties to their Finnish culture. (Some people think they were jealous of the Irish & St Patrick's Day) Apparently he is celebrated because he drove out all of the Grasshoppers from Finland...similarities?

Anyway a little fun trivia for you today on Groundhog's Day.

And by the way, Phil saw his shadow today, so hope you haven't got all of the skiing out of your system just yet.

End of an Era

Thursday night I went down to Boulder to see the last Newcomers Home show ever. I've been following these guys and have been a huge fan ever since I saw them open up for Seven Nations three years ago on Valentines Day. Since then, I've seen them play a ton of shows and have a ton of great memories. Small acoustic shows in Nederland, Boulder, Fort Collins, shows with the full band at Octoberfests, Irish Fest in Denver, and of course a ton of great shows at the Boulder Theatre.
Thursday's show topped them all. You could tell they were having a great time up there and got pretty emotional during several songs knowing that this was an end of an era for them. They played from 8:00 to 11:30 and played a lot of their older songs off of their first two CDs that I had never heard live, so that was a special treat for me. Looking throughout the crowd you could see several people dancing a singing along to all of the songs that they all knew.


It'll be sad not to see the band as a whole again, but I wish all the best of luck to Katie on her solo work in Nashville, Tim & Laurie with The Blackthorn Project, Andrew with his concentration on session work where ever that may take him, and Scott & Brian with all of their side projects.
Thanks to all of you for several great years - I'll always be a fan.

"The Graduate" movie review

Man, it seems like I've been incredibly busy recently and haven't been able to write that many movie reviews. This past week has been fairly crazy and lacking in sleep - so much so that I think I'll retire after finishing up this entry. But anyway for the first time in awhile (I always feel like I'm not getting the most I can from Netflix if I let my three DVDs sit on the table for more than a week) I had a couple free hours and wanted to watch a movie. The movie for tonight was The Graduate.

Now, I know what all of you are thinking - especially those of you who know how much of a movie buff I am - "You haven't seen The Graduate"??? Nope. Never got around to it. So now that I have finally gotten around to it, here's my review:

I give it a 6 out of 10. As it happens, being an old movie, its a bit slow. Not that I'm saying all old movies are slow and need to have crazy action, explosions, chases and what not to make them good. 12 Angry Men is one of my favorite movies of all time, and that stands alone with a solid script and great acting. The Graduate was just a little slow. The acting was great. Dustin Hoffman especially. Loved his nervous portrayal of the character in the first half of the movie, and then the change over his character in the second half.

The music - and this is coming from a person who thinks that the soundtrack and the music in the movie is one of the most important things (i.e. Garden State, any Wes Anderson movie) - was good, but my expectations had been built up so completely by this unforgettable Simon & Garfunkel soundtrack that I was expecting a little more. "The Sound of Silence" was played three different times in the movie! "Scarborough Fair" was played at least four times! So I thought it was kind of weird that they chose to use a few songs several different times.

But above all, my favorite thing about the movie, was finally seeing the original of what so many movies in our day and age have been quoting from. Seeing the original just made me laugh so much harder and appreciate those movies that quote it. I didn't realize that Old School is mimicking The Graduate when Will Farrell falls into the pool. And in Wayne's World at the wedding in the church, its a complete reference to the end of The Graduate. And although I've always been a fan of both of those more recent movies, seeing those scenes in The Graduate made me appreciate it even more.

Check it out if you've got the time. As everybody says "It's a classic".