mandag, august 20, 2007

Greetings to the Autumn - Yoyoyo Acapulco in concert

My friends in Yoyoyo Acapulco had a blasting year of success this year, suddenly having a rather good lineup with gigs this summer. I went to see theire last one this year and it was a real success. In fact it was so good that the crowd was screaming for more songs, but since Yoyoyo Acapulco is a fresh band they had no more songs so they had to re-play a song. This drove the crowd insane and we got live ukulele breaking on stage! The Yoyoyo Acapulco way. I also got the new 7” inch from them and so should you.

They now pronounce the summer for over and Gausdal-Indie is a music genre that has come to stay!

Rush Hour 3 (movie)

The first movie in this series became an instant hit. The spectacular "fun" action of Jackie Chan combined with Chris Tuckers voice made a funny and catching buddy-movie. The second Rush Hours tried more or less to copy the first without too much luck. Typically for sequels it that they don't put enough in it but just copy what worked last.

Now for the third installment I just read some reviews that got bottom scores. Whatever that reviewer had for dinner that day I have no idea. Fact is: Rush Hour 3 is and action comedy and that’s what we get: Loads and loads of fun. It might not be brighter than a lot of sexual jokes, but it is done in a nice way and it gets us laughing all the time. In between and sometimes together with the gags we get some nice and spectacular action. While Jackie is quite old and can not show off like he used to, they more than make it up with the usual nice tricks here and there and a really awesome fighting scene in the end. While maybe the marital arts is not top notch, it completely breath takes you when combined with the scenery and sound-fx. Too bad it is not taken further.

Some action movies can really learn something here. Oh and the story? It sucks, but who cares?

Drammen Elvefestival (music festival)

As if I just could not get enough music in my ear I just had to go and see this happening, mainly because of the main star of the evening: Joe Cocker. The evening started off with:

Bjørn Eidsvåg.
He is the preacher who became a musician instead. He is getting very old and that one can see, but he knows the secret to continuous success: A good backing band - in fact all musicians that evening knew that. In general his music is a bit too boring to be interesting for most of us. But unlike studio albums a little live show and some good musicians behind can do wonders. And when he does good we know it will be an awesome night.

Åge Aleksanderesen & Sambandet
Aleksanderens' is somewhat Norwegians version of Bruce Springsteen. In many ways this was a real highlight of the evening. He has a extended record of songs witch are loved and known by most of the Norwegian citizens which means that the audience will be totally thrilled form song 1. When the backing band is also allowed to play freely on all songs and put in fun, multiple guitar solos and sax solos wherever they feel for it you get some really good and traditional Rock'n'Roll. I definitely think that studio music producers have something to learn here!!!

Joe Cocker
Joe Cocker does not leave much to chance so there is little room for "playing" with the songs. There is the occasional sax solo but his sax player sucks and could easily have been changed with the one from Sambandet. Except for that his band plays his tunes in more than perfect ways. Joe himself sings out of his full lungs and I have no idea how he manages to keep it through. The things he does with his voice is amazing, pushing it far beyond the studio records and keeping it above excellent at all times. Respect. He also has a weird way to play air guitar, maybe I should challenge him for a gig one day.

fredag, august 17, 2007

Major HW/SW crash

I had some major HW/SW crash so I lost a lot of stuff. You will notice that some of the picture links on this blog will not work anymore and those pictures are forever lost. Hope you all enjoyed them while they still where there.

:) The Don

Øya Festivalen 2007 (music)

This year I gambled and bought festival tickets before the program was announced, this to be sure to get tickets. In a way this was a total bummer as there were no bands there that I would die to see. Yes there were some big bands and a share of good smaller bands, but none of them which I would die to see. We were up for four and a half day of festival and music! I can tell you that I was totally exhausted quite already on Friday and on Saturday I was about lost. I have a feeling that next time I will do less. But who knows by this time next year I might be all up for it again.

Hellsongs
First off was Hellsongs on the club night. This Swedish band plays soft and intelligent covers of old Hard Rock Classics, a must for the ear and soul. I hope to see them again sometime.

The Captain & Me
While this band certainly had some problems getting fully synched (I think the members change quite a lot) they had a lot of fun on stage and some of the songs was really entertaining, but at other times everything just turned into rumble and porridge. A band to watch for the fun and the cheer of playing.

Theatrefall
This young band was really funny to watch. I think they had too much time playing computer games because at times that was what it sounded like, a bad composed computer tune. Even if the songs where not the best, the beat and the fun made up for it so I quite enjoyed them.

Astroburger
This was once a promising band in the league of Run Dog Run, but whatever happened it lost that. The music is somewhat a tale back in time to what was going to be big once a time but never really got there.

Run Dog Run
Is like Astroburger just better. In a way I think this is the early beginning and the legacy to a few other Norwegian bands that have managed to take it further. I feel somewhat lucky to have seen them at least once.

Subway Safari
The last thing on the club night was this interesting big band. It was a good show and good music to dance to. Something I can recommend if you’d like a good night on the town.

Bare Egil Band
The main festival was started with "Ikke bare bare Egil band" and while I would have preferred to see "Hurra Torpedo" again, Egil shows us again that he is completely mad and gives us a blasting and funny concert.

Tinariwen
I really enjoyed this band. What an interesting music genre: Gerillja Blues. It was also really good for dancing, so I danced. The band members were around the festivals afterwards and easy to spot because of the burkas.

Woven Hand
A good show. A lot better than I had expected it to be.

Bonde Do Role
Surprisingly fresh and impudent.

Nine Inch Nails
I do like Nine Inch Nails and the concert was quite good, problem is that it is like they play the same song again and again. There are just so many bands that have taken this song style further.

Gogol Bordell
This is quite a funny show and worth to see. It started off well and just got better.

Eagles of Death Metal
Surprisingly good again. Not only funny but catchy.

Tool
While I am not the biggest Tool fan, I acknowledge that the last Tool album was quite good and so was this concert.

Spoon
Much better than I thought. The live performances beat the album versions big time.

Heroes and Zeroes
Good band. Just as expected.

Anja Garbarek
This was probably the biggest surprise for me. I knew that this woman made some crazy music, but this was all beyond my expectation. She played up there in the league of Björk. Really nice stuff!

... And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead
Average good band.

The Jesus & Mary Chain
Just about what to expect from them.

Roky Erickson & The Explosives
While my brother loves this band and so does many others, in fact there were 3,5 extra number, its not really my style.

Timbuktu & Damn
Timbuktu had been DJing all night and obviously he must have been just as tired as I where. This affected the start a bit. But after some jumping around and screaming Swedish in our ears it all became a real enjoyable feat. "Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die"

Killing Butterflies
Interesting band, Deserves a look.

Bjørn Torske
This is somewhat a special feat seeing Torske running around on a stage instructing people to play one track loops. Exchanging synths and sequencers with real people, real instruments (to some extend). It sounds really well but the songs had no real build up, no kick off, to repetive. If Torske can iron out this it will be a killer.

Melvins
Played better than in Barcelona and ATP (last year) but still, definitely just noise for me

Maribel
Too pink for me.

The Besnard Lakes
There have been quite a few good bands coming from Canada. This one sounds promising on paper but the performance was a bit to washy for my taste.

Skambankt
This band surprised me again. A great rock band that sounds better than Ingenting did.

Bloodlights
Pretty good!

Lady Sovereign
A lot of you like her. But not quite my taste.

A princess and her angels

There has been a lot of fuzz in the media after Princess Märtha stated that she could communicate with animals as well as she was involved with this schools that teaches people to get in touch with Angels.

One of my friends even got so frustrated about the guarantee that the school gave (it has been removed) that all students would manage to get in touch with angels.

I think this is all funny. While I am not going to take any side in the discussion I think it is funny because it makes such fuzz.

1. People gets pissed of because she states that she masters as well as can teach others in the art of communication with angles. This is funny because Norway has a government church that has angels all over the place. (Common to everybody that knows about Christianity). Some of the profiled members of the church has also been one of the hardest opponents to Märtha. That is understandable of course as The Church wants to have monopoly on the Angels. But for others, why do we so easily accept the Angels of the church and at the same time attack Märtha's Angels?

2. The Angel Guarantee which was argued to be a promise they couldn't keep (2 person sent formal complains to our consumer council. One of which is my friend) This is of course good enough, there is a law against advertising lies as well as a law against selling something phony. But then why is it that every place around has the "Best Hot Dog" or "The Best Kebab"?

3. There is a third thing as well that I found funny but I don’t remember it right now. But for sure Martha has been able to get a lot of attention to the school, to the royal family and to the problematic about New Age Waves.

Of course Märtha is still on my good-girl list so if she ever get tired of Ari she can count on me ;)

Chandra Vikram - Sacred Games (book)

This is one of the long books I was complaining about earlier. Although this was the best one of them and in the en I managed to finish this almost 1000 page book.

It is some kind of mini epic story. Through jumping back and forth in time and place we follow an Sikh policeman all the way from when his mother was young, till when he manages to prevent a major disaster for Bombay and India. We also follow one small time bandit making his way into becoming on of three major gang leaders and we also watch him fall. In addition to this we get the opportunity to follow other people lives that gets involved in the story.

The writing style is fairly involving and a lot of things are happening during the book. The progress is somewhat slow but the writer manages to keep the reader interested in the stories while he tells more about the Indian way than of the actual main plot.

There are some main themes that the writer points out several times: The major one is the relationship between Hindus and Muslims, while I don't think the writer tries to pick side in the struggle or maybe he does? There is also the indifference between other groups, for example Sikhs.

The main villains story is probably the biggest part of the book, and is somewhat India’s version of The Godfather (but not quite) - the funny thing (or sad) about the whole villain story is that everybody tricks him all along and in all his greatness he is just a fool.

There is also a theme that I think the writer is eager to tell is that a good person (the main detective) which chooses to live a somewhat good and righteous life will succeed in the end (even if it will be a hard way, and many tough choices to make) and may even be able to save The World.

And there is the last thing that I think the writer tries to ask us: "Why save all this?", meaning all this crazy things that goes on in the world. Why? This is much clearer than in the usual hero saves the world story and it gives it that extra edge.


This book is a irritating masterpiece. A book that will keep sticking in your head long time after you finished it.

This book is for anyone that can be bothered to read large books and a must for all Crime Book Lovers.

The Cutter (movie)

It surprises me that Chuck Norris somewhat have managed to have some revival to popularity, mostly because he is absolutely hopelessly hard. How could this be, the man whose main audience is 13 years old kids with pimples (no offence?)?

So I sat down and watched this piece of crap movie.

Let’s start with he bright side. Somewhere in the process the original script must have been quite good, and however wrote it must be totally angry for the way its been fucked up. However you can see its brilliance shine through at certain places. But then for the rest its been cut into unrecognizable pieces and the story (surprise) does not even stitch together.

The camera angel are always bad, always wrong always spot on. Chuck is old and out of shape, it doesn’t have to be anything wrong with that since there are several oldies around and a lot can be done with a little of movie magic. But there is no magic. The whole thing is just plain awfully silly.

This woke up the curiosity in me. The reason why people make bad movies are always a mystery. Of course since I have tried it myself I know it is not easy - but still. So I sat down and watched an old classic: "Missing In Action". This is supposed to be one of the better Chuck Norris films.

To my surprise, except for a much younger Chuck the movie was just as bad in every way. Can it be that it is the same team behind? I would not have guessed. So to sum it up, while other B rated action heroes during years of B movie making sometimes actually have managed to touch the A movie heaven, Chuck's highlight is still to be beaten by Bruce Lee.