Total Rubbish

I have no idea how I ever ran farther than 100 meters before I got an ipod. Seriously. I’ve had portable music players since the days of the Sony Walkman, but until the ipod came along nothing was small enough, light enough or shock resistant enough to run with.

My first run with one was a revelation, I have to say. Running to me is not a ton of fun, most days. Cycling is pure zen bliss but running? It’s hard work. The ipod made running a little less like work and a little more like something approaching fun. Thank you Apple.

Some tunes are better than others to run to, of course. Like what? Like these, for instance:

• Range Life – Pavement. Beautiful slacker anthem about L.A. Hearing this one well into a long run is bliss, crappy vocals and all.
• PDA – Interpol. NYC hipsters lay it down.
• Flying in a Blue Dream – Joe Satriani. Way over the top guitar hero histrionics, but it makes you feel like you’re in a Warren Miller film. Awesome.
• Irish Blood, English Heart - Morrissey. Ah, Mozzer. No matter how short of breath that I may be, when this comes on I’ll sing with ye.
• Enter Sandman – Metallica. I actually think Metallica are shite, but this song rules.
• Driver 8 – R.E.M.  Early R.E.M. just does it for me, and this is one of their finest, er, worksongs.
• Crystal Wrists – Peter Murphy. From Deep, which has been on heavy rotation with me since 1990. Pure genius.
• Learn to Fly – Foo Fighters. Sure it was a ‘hit’ but it’s a great mood lifter so it’s perfect for injecting a little energy into the old jog.
• Little Sister – Queens of the Stone Age. Great chorus on this one and it sounds brilliant even through crappy Apple earbuds.
• Still in Love – The Stills. From their absolutely brilliant first effort. Propulsive pop purloined from the New Order School of song writing.
• Every Day is Hallowe’en – Ministry. An old batcave dance club fave. I’m pretty far from goth but this song is still great 25 years on.
• John the Fisherman – Primus. From the creators of the South Park theme song, so you know it’s weird, but man these dudes can really play. Heavy.
• Joe the Lion – David Bowie. Featuring the guitar stylings of Mr. Robert Fripp, this is a gem from Heroes. Motors right along.
• Surgical Focus – Guided by Voices. Drunken genius Robert Pollard’s singular take on the arena rock anthem format puts all those other wannabe rock stars to shame.
• Working Class Hero - Green Day. That’s right, not the John Lennon version. GD kick this one out with something approaching actual conviction, surprisingly.
• Lust for Life – Iggy Pop. Like, come on. No running playlist should be without this song.
• God Put a Smile Upon Your Face – Coldplay. The only decent song this band has ever written, IMO. They are vastly overrated, so this one must be a fluke. See below.

As you may have guessed, I prefer the guitar-heavy stuff when I run, but there are also some good trance-type tunes that are great for zoning out to if you have to do a long one. I prefer stuff from Massive Attack, DJ Cheb I Sabbah, Delerium, Talvin Singh, and a bunch of other Indipop club stuff.

Tunes to avoid:

• anything by Neil Young. Guaranteed to bring you right down.
• Brian Eno. Unless you run in your sleep.
• Coldplay. Because they suck. Hard. With the one exception noted above.

So there you have it, sports fans. My next post will be about the quest for the perfect pair of running-friendly headphones.

admin Running, Sports music, Running, slurm

Oh lucky me. I’ve been airlifted in to replace a fallen comrade in one of the finest running races in North America, if not The World. That would be the 117th edition of the venerable Around the Bay race in Hamilton Ontario Canada. Some quick facts:

• First held in 1894
• Distance: 30 kilometers
• Cool factor: Very High
• A Map

For me, this is doubly cool because I have not done a real road race since breaking my leg and ankle just over 2 years ago. I ran the Corporate Challenge this year but that doesn’t count because it’s not really part of any circuit and the distances are wonky. Plus they don’t use chip timers, so feh.

I’ve always wanted to do the ATB but have never been fit enough to do the 30k distance by the end of March, when the race is held. I still won’t be fit enough, but that’s ok because I’ll be part of a 3-person relay team (me plus @ltorvi plus @indigirl) and will only have to cover the final 10k. Mind you, the final 10k includes a nasty uphill section on the way back into downtown Steeltown, so it won’t be a dawdle. But still. Ten kay should be within reach.

Running the 3rd leg means hanging about with not much to do whilst the first 2 legs are run, but since they probably won’t have a beer tent for relay runners (until after the race, at least) I should still be good to go once it’s my turn.

Big ups to @pipesdreams for tagging me to take her place on the squad, though I would have just as gladly taken her place (mostly) in Boston instead. That’s Boston as in “PAX” and not as in “marathon“.  I say ‘mostly’ because she’s going with her manservant and, well, you know. D is a good guy and all but I’m not that into dudes. Plus it’s some kind of gamer/comic geek thing and I don’t have the geek cred to hang with that crowd so I would have to bail and see whassup in Beantown instead.

admin Running

So right away you know this is a serious review just because I called it a ‘film review’ and not a ‘movie review’, right? I have to call it that since I went to U of T about 100 years ago and emerged with a degree in Cinema Studies. That means I can never call a movie a movie, at least not in print. Movies are films, and collectively must be referred to as ‘cinema’.  If I lapse into the speech of the common folk at any time, a secret alarm goes off in Bart Testa’s bat cave and he sends a T.A. in trench coat to kick my ass with a Bolex wrapped in mail bag. And that leaves a mark. So ‘Film Review’ it is.

I went to see the new Guy Ritchie -directed version of Sherlock Holmes today. In spite of my fancy film degree I don’t go to a lot of movies, er, films these days, and after today’s experience I know why. SH looks like it cost 100 million to make – huge set pieces, brilliant CG, lots of attention to detail and very consistent mise en scene (I threw that one in there just in case Bart happens to see this review) throughout. There were some splashy fight sequences cleverly done in the style that Mrs. Madonna has become known for (see Snatch) and some rather decent work from Robert Downey Jr. (anyone know who the hell RD Sr. is?) and Jude Law, but these still could not raise Sherlock Holmes above the level of ‘ok timewaster’ for me.

It’s cut from the same old cloth that so many action films are lately – the spate of live-action comic book movies has somehow infected how all big budget action flicks are made now. Characters are not well developed. Dialogue is about as natural as a 1940’s gangster flick. Villains are 2 dimensional and uncomplex, basically Pure Evil in a jar. It’s all such rubbish.

I know nothing of the Sherlock Holmes ‘franchise’ – apparently there was a television series? Plus of course there have been many previous tries at bringing Arthur Conan Doyle’s character to the big screen, with varying degrees of success. So it’s not like I was disappointed by the lack of faithfulness to the original (or whatever prior version of Holmes one considers as the template). I was just disappointed that this latest version, in spite of its huge budget and A list cast, came out so flat. It’s not a bad movie film, but it should have been so much better.

Imagine if this had been in the hands of a different director, say, David Cronenberg. With a tenth the budget I bet he could have delivered ten times the results. I shan’t be seeing this one again.

admin Uncategorized culture, film, rubbish

It’s been quite a while since I’ve been a regular blogger, and maybe the name gave it away but I’m still not sure about diving back into the ’sphere with this one. To be a ’successful’ blogger, so the current wisdom goes, one must focus on a single area of expertise rather than spout off about whatever strikes one’s fancy. That presupposes that one even has an area of expertise, though, doesn’t it? I’m not sure I do, so I’m going to attempt to write not about what I’m expert at but rather what I’m interested in.

So, what am I interested in? Lots of stuff. Art, architecture, design (graphic, web, packaging and industrial), cycling, physics, astronomy, religion (though I’m not a follower of any religion) and maybe just a little bit of Canadian and Toronto politics. Not exactly a focused list, is it?

So, wtf? Let’s give it a shot.

admin Uncategorized general, intro, slurm