Category: Blu-ray/DVD reviews

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Robert Pollard-Mania! #114: LIVE FROM AUSTIN TX

Guided by Voices
Live from Austin TX
2007, New West Records

We’ve talked a lot about why Guided by Voices went on a farewell tour in 2004, but there’s another reason that was in the air at the time that we haven’t sunk our claws into yet.

Robert Pollard addresses it twice during this set, notably during “Secret Star”. The song is one of the giants from Earthquake Glue and it’s built with a quiet section that, during the Electrifying Conclusion tour, became the platform for him to deliver what amounted to a sermon about the legacy of Guided by Voices while the band rumbled beneath. Much like the always-changing setlist (a mark of a good band), Pollard’s spiel wasn’t the same every night. It rose out of the moment. Ending this chapter of his life was a heavy thing and he didn’t need a script to talk about it.

(Does some crazy collector out there have a dusty CD-R on the shelf of nothing but Electrifying Conclusion tour versions of “Secret Star”? I hope so.)

In the sermon on November 9, 2004, before television cameras and under the bright studio lights of PBS’s Austin City Limits, Pollard says this fascinating thing: 

“Rock ‘n’ roll is for the kids. And all of the adults who think it’s for them, get out of the way. It’s for the kids. The kids are confused…”

That’s a 2004 time capsule moment. That’s a statement from when it was still considered undignified to grow old in rock music. One might get away with it as a solo act, particularly if their music “matures” for the effort (Pollard himself would soon play around with making his solo records more stark and singer-songwritery). Hardly anybody made fun of Lou Reed or Neil Young for aging, but performing under the guise of a band as the wrinkles around your eyes set in was somehow unbecoming.

Read interviews with Pollard in 2004 and when he explains why he’s ending Guided by Voices, he repeats the idea that he’s too old now to be a “gang leader”.

Today, nobody seems to care about that stuff. Why?

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PAIN DON’T HURT: Surviving the Texas Winter Apocalypse of 2021 with ROAD HOUSE

Most of the stereotypes about Texans are just not true.

I only wear my cowboy boots on special occasions such as weddings and barn dance night.

I don’t care that much about football (I only have three Dallas Cowboys tattoos; the fourth one on my neck doesn’t count because my cousin accidentally misspelled it as Dallas Cobwoys).

I’m also opposed to guns, except for in extreme cases, such as when a stranger shows up in town or somebody says that they don’t like Waylon Jennings.

There is ONE stereotype though that I will admit is 100% on the money.

Texas people don’t know shit about winter. Example: me.

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Chandu the Blu-ray Review

I got this on Blu-ray because it struck me as a great way to give another chance to a film that put me to sleep when I was 13. As a teenage classic movie weirdo dorkface, all Bela Lugosi movies I’d seen at the time were winners, except for Chandu the Magician from 1932. This movie STUNK. It was choppy and uninvolving–and actor Edmund Lowe’s impersonation of a piece of wood as the titular hero didn’t help.

What did I know back then, though? I didn’t know how to drive a car. I didn’t have any friends. I didn’t know that my clothes and hair looked stupid.

But decades have passed and things have changed. (I can drive now.) Maybe my opinion on Chandu has similarly changed.

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A Laurel & Hardy Party #1: “Unaccustomed as We Are”

(1929; director: Lewis R. Foster)

My Christmas gift to myself in 2016 was the Laurel & Hardy Essential Collection 10-DVD box set.

Christmas 2017, I’m finally watching it because that’s how I roll: Slowly, forgetfully and focused on things that no one cares about it.  I intend to write about EVERYTHING on this monster, even if one of the special features turns out to be a ninety-minute interview with Stan Laurel’s dentist. I will be here to report.

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Getting Lost With Bela Lugosi and The Invisible Ghost (Blu-Ray review)

People have been wondering why I’m in such a good mood lately. They tell me that there’s a glow to my skin and an extra spring in my step. They ask me if I’m in love or if I’m enjoying the spring weather or if I’m on prescription medication.

I honestly have no idea what these people are talking about.  My best guess is that I’m just happy that there’s  a really nice new Blu-ray for the 1941 movie, The Invisible Ghost, put out by Kino Lorber.

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