Due to popular request, I have installed a discussion feature for all posts. At the bottom of each post you’ll find an area to add your feedback and opinions. Discussion is strongly encouraged, feel free to let me know what you think. Additionally, if you have any ideas for topics you would like to see covered on the site or just want to say hey, send me an email: tbrad054@gmail.com
3 years agoFor years I have quietly faced an irritating struggle, a metaphorical battle if you will, to defend the pride of my own name. Day in and day out screenwriters, television producers, authors and advertising executives send waves upon waves of idiots named Todd out into our popular culture. All us decent people named Todd can do is try helplessly to fend them off.
Considering the fact that “Todd” was the 88th most common male first name in the United States in the 1990 Census, it seems a little hard to believe that it would be such a cesspool of douche-bagginess. Yet for some reason, every writer in the entertainment industry has decided that every loser/idiot/nerd will be named Todd. Movies, TV shows, commercials - take your pick, the complete shitting-on of the name Todd covers a pretty wide range of media. Even George Carlin (r.i.p.) had a punch to throw:
Some poor kid even complied a list of some of the characters he noticed named Todd that were complete morons in shows and movies. Highlights include:
The list goes on and on, and that’s not even mentioning perhaps the single-handedly most irritating Todd from Wedding Crashers. The amount of times people have come up to me and said “The painting was a gift Todd” is retarded. While we are talking about people saying the name Todd, we can also talk about how many times people have called me “Tom” or “Ted,” neither of which are even close to Todd. And no, Todd is never short for anything. And that includes Toddford, which someone seriously asked me once.
Considering that most of the examples from that list are from the 90’s, it seems that this struggle to fight for the name Todd is going nowhere soon. Hopefully, we can get a few successful Todds out there to gain some credibility back (The CEO of Palm is actually named Todd Bradley, so that’s pretty solid). Until then, when you come across a Todd that isn’t a jackass loser, give him a high five. If he is, the chances are you’re watching TV.
3 years ago
Last night I was fortunate enough to get a ticket to see Jose Gonzalez perform live at the MFA in Boston. Definitely one of the better shows I’ve been to recently, and I highly recommend catching him live if you get the chance.
Jose Gonzalez kicked off the Museum of Fine Arts’ ”Concerts in the Courtyard” summer series, which will feature Grupo Fantasma, Beth Orton, and the Grizzly Bears (to name a few) over the next few months. After selling out a 7:30pm show, Gonzalez put on an encore act at 10pm, which sold out literally minutes after I bought my tickets. Although the forecast of rain moved the show inside to the auditorium, the event manager from the MFA assured us that “If we imagined hard enough and were on the right drugs, trees would start growing off the stage and we would never know the difference.”
Honestly, I can’t picture the show being any better outside. The acoustics of the auditorium were great, adding to that rare experience when a performer somehow sounds even better live than on tape. Born in Gothenburg, Sweeden, Gonzalez is an indie-folk singer and songwriter of Argentine descent (hence the name Gonzalez). Coming into the show, I was only vaguely familiar with Gonzalez’s work. After being introduced to his song “Heartbeats” from the famous Sony Bravia commercial, I was convinced enough to cough up the $20 to see him live. Gonzalez did not disappoint. In front of a packed auditorium, Gonzalez serenely swung from song to song, taking an occasional break to tune his guitar and quietly say a few words to the crowd.
It really was quite an experience to hear what this guy can do with just a microphone and an acoustic guitar. He definitely has one of the most impressive voices I’ve heard, with a certain hard-to-describe pitch to his voice that you won’t hear anywhere else. Gonzalez played a great variety of songs from both his 2003 debut album “Veneer” and his latest 2007 release “In Our Nature.” With the occasional help from two fantastic bandmates (whose names I didn’t catch, but I assume they have been touring with him) Gonzalez put on a great hour and a half set. What’s fun about Gonzalez is that he does some great covers. I didn’t even find out until after the show that “Heartbeats” is actually a cover of an original version from fellow Swedish rockers The Knife. He covered a pretty wide range of music, including Kylie Minogue and a cool rework of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” My favorite song of the night was his cover of Massive Attack’s “Teardrop.” I love this original song, and Gonzalez’s slightly slower and more mellow take on it was a very pleasing end to the night.
Check back later this week for some pictures from the show, and be sure to check out Gonzalez live.
Here are some links with some more info on his tour, MFA’s summer concert series, and some videos:
3 years ago
M Night. Shyamalan is doomed. Ever since finding overwhelming success with his 1999 film The Sixth Sense, Shyamalan’s portfolio looks more like a stock market index graph than a steady line of progress. Unbreakable couldn’t live up to the creepiness of The Sixth Sense, but then Signspulled through and assured Night another top spot. Viewers watched his stock plummet with the release of both The Village and Lady in the Water. Smack dab in the middle of a forthcoming blockbuster summer, and taking on The Incredible Hulk for the top weekend box office hit, The Happening faces a tough battle to save Shyamalan’s name.
It’s no surprise that many critics have already dismissed The Happeningas another piece of egotistical Shyamalan garbage, as evidenced by its current 20% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes (a rating system Matt Watkins would be happy to explain to you). I happened to have enjoyed this film. Now let’s be clear - I can fully understand why this movie is getting trashed by reviewers across the country, and I don’t blame anyone who says that this movie is just plain stupid. Those familiar with Shyamalan’s work however, should find little disappointing about this film.
The always lovable Marky Mark (Wahlberg) takes center stage as a quirky high school science teacher in Philadelphia. After a great opening scene (which I won’t ruin here like a certain Boston area newspaper review did for me before I saw the film) the creepy epidemic is uncovered. The cause of the nuisance is probed rather quickly, although the characters never seem to fully grasp what is going on around them (isn’t that supposed to be what makes a good scary story?) The movie doesn’t get much more complicated as it continues on, and at about 25-30 minutes into the film you will face a decision. If, at this crucial juncture, you buy into the film’s plot, then I stand by the position that you will enjoy the rest of this film…more or less. However, if you decide to start questioning the validity of the plot (the role of water in Signs comes to mind here), then you will most likely hate this movie and end up trashing it on forums everywhere.
Regardless of which road you choose, there still seems to be some universally pleasing details. Where Shyamalan succeeds is in expressing his own unique style. Too often directors extinguish that little fire inside of them that makes his/her film unique, opting instead to blow shit up and reproduce whatever sells. Shyamalan stays true to his form, something you’ve got to give him credit for (speaking of credits, pay attention to the opening ones - they are weird in an awesome way). I love how Shyamalan uses some of his traditional suspense techniques. I don’t consider myself a huge Shyamalan fan so I’m sure there’s a few things I didn’t pick up on, but keep an eye out for his use of reflections and homemade video footage. At times, I found the screenwriting a bit odd, but Wahlberg and Deschanel do a great job of making the main characters real. This is monumental stuff for scary movies, because the more human and real the characters are, the easier it is to picture ourselves in their shoes.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid The Happening will fall victim to the laziness of most movie-goers. Too often we put down movies that land outside the box because they confuse us and could never happen in real life. But sometimes it’s nice to watch a movie that is a little out there, especiallywhen it is a scary movie. The beauty of storytelling has always been in its ability to provoke our imaginations. What does that say about us if we can’t enjoy a movie because it does have a storybook ending laid out for us? One thing is for sure, and it is that like all of Shyamalan’s flicks, The Happening will get you thinking. In my opinion, that’s never a bad thing.
3 years ago
Very busy week, more daily updates coming soon…
And the Celtics finally won on the road!
4 years agoIt was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
When the Boston Celtics landed not only former UCONN three-pointer god Ray Allen but Timberwolves beastly Kevin Garnett too, everything seemed in place for a championship run. Paul Pierce and the Boston Celtics had been struggling to finish with a record over 500, let alone a postseason birth. Up until this year, the Celtics had practically been a joke in an already weak Eastern Conference. So Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen landed in Beantown, and the “Boston Three-Party” jumped out to a great start and flat out dominated the league. 66 wins later, the Celtics found themselves with the best record in the NBA and home court advantage throughout the playoffs. Not bad considering they went 28 and 54 in the 2006/2007 season.
And right from the start of the playoffs, the Celtics kept on cruising. That is, until they finally had to leave the Garden in friendly Boston and travel on the road to play. And then things got ugly. It is literally like watching two different Celtics teams – one with confidence and power at home, and another with poor shooting and horrible defense on the road. Drudging on to force two game sevens on their way to the Eastern Conference Finals, the Celtics have gone 0-6 on the road. Because I’m a Celtics fan I won’t go into specific numbers here, but their FG% and PPG are embarrassingly lower in road playoff games. And it’s not exactly because KG and Pierce aren’t stepping up, it’s because they can’t figure out how to play defense on the road and brush off the crowd noise. Because of their failure to win even one game on the road, the Celtics have backed themselves into a corner and made winning game sevens essential.
But so far, that’s working out fine for them.
No team has ever gone winless on the road and went on to win the NBA finals. Will the Celtics be the first? Doubtful, considering how well both their potential opponents in the Western Conference are playing. Not to mention the fact that many analysts have the Detroit Pistons winning the series, since they’ve proven they have the talent and bench to hang in there and win on the road. But so far they’ve done what they do best – win at home, lighting up the Pistons in game one this past Tuesday. Don’t be so quick to think that Boston’s inability to win on the road is going to get in their way of getting to the NBA Finals. Since they’ve locked up home court advantage throughout, it really doesn’t matter that they can’t win on the road. Until they reach the finals, the Celtics have proven that they can tough it out through seven game series and emerge with a W, even if it means getting beat down on the road (even by the Hawks).
Game two of the Celtics Pistons series takes place at 8:30pm EST tonight, in Boston on ESPN.
4 years ago
A couple of months ago I stumbled across a website called imeem while looking for a song I wanted to listen to online. I was skeptical at first, because after finally finding the song I wanted to listen to I learned I had to register and make an account before I could hear the whole thing. I gave it a try and made an account (free to do) and have since been pleasantly surprised and visiting this site at least once a day.
Simply enough, imeem is awesome for listening to music. There’s always those one or two singles I would hear on the radio and want to listen to, but not enough to actually buy them (yeah I know its only 99 cents off itunes, whatever I’m cheap). True, most people prefer just to use torrent systems and download songs for free, but I’ve yet to embrace that system for reasons I won’t go into here.
Enter imeem. Just type in the artist, album, or song name and a huge list of user-hosted files comes up, free to stream as many times as you would like. Think of it as any other p2p music sharing site, excpet you cant download the songs off of the site (at least not legally, I’m sure there’s a way to do it if you look hard enough).
The range of genres imeem covers is pretty incredible, and I’ve easily found everything from new Kanye singles that aren’t even out yet to electronic and 90s rock. The site also features a pretty good range of music videos, if for some reason you can’t find them on YouTube or prefer not to use it.
Another feature that I love on imeem is that it is a social network as well. The whole idea of uploading songs and sharing them is built around a community, and users are free to create homepages and playlists of their favorite songs to share with others. This is pretty useful, and a lot of users make playlists of entire CDs along with traditional mixes. Imeem also offers a pretty extensive friend system with constant status updates and different groups for different interests, similar to what facebook and myspace offers.
The bottom line is if you are looking for a easy and free way to stream music, I highly recommend you check out imeem. Its stupdily easy to register and figure out, and the ability to make your own playlists makes it very tempting to keep coming back.
4 years ago
