The Musical World of East Vancouver

SEATTLE RARE SOUL WEEKENDER

2007-11-15T14:26:00.000-08:00

Last weekend [Nov9/10/11] my wife Heather and I rented a car, reserved a hotel and headed down to Seattle. The main attraction [for me] was the Emerald City Soul Club hosted "rare soul weekender". The event promised to be an eye and ear opener as my need to hear rare soul has long been left wanting here in Vancouver.

By the time we got past the 60 minute border line-up, near rear enders and hotel check in, Heather and I headed over to the Lo-Fi Gallery on Eastlake to check the early hours of the "all nighter" which was scheduled to go until 4am.

I knew folks were coming in from far and wide for this event. Within a few minutes I ended up chatting to a rare soul collector from Preston, Lancashire, who then promptly introduced me to none other than Paul Sadot. Paul's name was instantly recognisable as the director and choreographer of "Once upon a time in Wigan" a four member cast tribute to the life and times at Wigan Casino during its heyday. Paul spent a few minutes decrying the ills of producing two UK tours, getting ripped off and losing significant wads of pounds sterling in the second tour of the play.

Without ever seeing the play, only hearing the inspired CD compilations, I urged Paul to pursue a screen play treatment a la "24 Hour Party People" or something similar. Then again, the only other film treatment on Wigan Casino is oft quoted as leading to its demise in 1981. If they can movies about Studio 54, why not Wigan Casino ?

Later that night I got talking to a young woman from New York who had flown in for the event. After mentioning that I thought I had traveled far from Vancouver, she casually asked "do you know Mr. M and The All Nighters ? I was gobsmacked ! I had several conversations over the weekend to this end, it seems between us and San Francisco's The Inciters, we are about the only Northern Soul tribute bands in North America.

Interestingly, the dance floor seemed to split in to two parts. One half dedicated t0 the more traditional Northern Soul dancers, the other half inhabited by "salsa" type dancers who danced with a partner. Turns out these salsa dancers were regulars at the monthly soul events at the Lo-Fi; interesting enough my band has been approached by the SFU Salsa club to play in January, an interesting cross over.

Saturday saw me returning to the "all-dayer" at the Lo Fi gallery. It was sparsely attended, since most people had stayed to the wee hours [4am] and closed out the venue earlier in the morning. I had a chance to talk to some of the organisers, whilst they seemed a little offhand-ish and even distrustful of a perfect stranger asking them all kinds of questions, it did soon dawn on me this was a fairly tight knit group of people. They listened to music and danced together, shared stories and had a wariness of possible exploitive individuals; Northern Soul has a long history of such individuals.

So when I mentioned Russ Winstanley's name as the inspiration for me to return to the world of Northern Soul , turns out this may not have been my best first step as an introduction. Russ's name want down like a lead balloon, especially with the English guys. Mr. Winstanley's recent foray in to the world of newly built shopping malls and Northern Soul was discussed as an exercise in silliness. Truthfully, I could not really tell if it was petty jealousy or genuine artistic motivation that inspired the harsh words.

Saturday night I headed off to see the legendary JJ Barnes at the CHAC at Pine and 12th. Luckily I was informed ahead of time he would not be on stage until midnight. So I turned up around 10pm to check out the dj and dancers and the people in attendance. Turns out there was a good mixture of the generally knowledgeable and generally inquisitive at the event. Sadly, the Brothers of Soul, whilst inspiring to be on stage for the first time in 35 years, really need to do some more rehearsing before their next gig, if indeed they have one. JJ Barnes was an absolute blast to see. The band was made up of both younger members and older, great trumpet player as a stand out, they held together and gave a great performance. JJ Barnes himself performed for over an hour; given the half dozen labels he has under his wing, JJ had a great repertoire to fall back on. In many ways JJ is perfect for the Northern Soul crowd, he has no major hits and a long career of rare classics, making him a cult favourite.

It was good to note the improvement of sound quality compared to the event over at the Lo-Fi. Given the preponderance of 45's at this event and their "temperamental" nature, the DJ's generally don't back que their records in fear of damage, some even eyeball the que, which I found to be the DJ equivalent of walking a tightrope with your eyes closed. Several times we heard the thumpty-thump of the needle falling off the record, it merely added character to the event. Needless to say not one CD nor any 12 inch vinyl was present for the whole event, talk about hardcore ! DJ's need to spend some time listening to the audio quality coming out of the speakers, not just to the song itself and for gawds sake watch those levels.

Sunday, saw us popping in to the "swap meet" at the Lo-Fi which was a tad on the lean side. I ran in to a DJ from Vancouver who had travelled south to see about half a dozen boxes of very expensive 45's, he looked disappointed to say the least; six hours of driving for 20 minutes of record browsing pleasure. I chatted with him for a while and we talked about the soul nights I had been putting on at the Purple Crab. He seemed a bit more cheerful after our conversation - funny I had to go all the way to Seattle to find another soul fan from Vancouver.

We were soon back on our way to Vancouver, ahead of the oncoming storm that cut off power to 150,000 in Greater Vancouver. We stopped off in Bellingham and bought some used duds for me, nice little town Bellingham, especially with the loonie doing so well. After a ninety minute stop at the border, no sooner had we got back to Vancouver the wind picked up, the lights flickered and the worst storm of the season was upon us.

To Pay Tribute or Not to Pay Tribute

2007-08-08T10:59:00.000-07:00

To Pay Tribute or Not to Pay Tribute

I have often toyed with the idea of forming a tribute band. A tribute band is not a cover band, it is a homage to the original artist or in my band's case a genre of music. Tribute bands can make great money, a friend of mine in England, who plays in an Abba tribute band gets £300 per night and has 20 gigs lined up for September.

However, there is a little voice inside me that says there is a morality to tribute bands that kinda cuts off my nose to spite my own face. Can we pay tribute and still move forward ? Do we damage the future of music by looking too far in to the past ?

Certainly, if you look at todays average 20 something they have a far greater musical choice than any previous generation of music listener. Indeed, if Facebook profiles are any indication of what 20 somethings' are listening to, it amazes this 45 year old as to their musical voraciousness.

Today's kids are listening to everything from Bill Haley and the Comets onwards. In many cases the original performers have long retired to the "great gig in the sky". Or at the least, performers are rarely touring and when they do it is in an audience unfriendly venue. So when a tribute band rolls in to town, music fans have a chance to experience, at some level, the original performance of a particular band or genre of music in a venue that affords some level of interaction between the band and audience.

However, the level of "tribute" varies from one act to the next. In my English friends case, Abba have long since broken up with no threat of ever getting back together. Combine that with an extremely mainstream appeal and the recipe for a lucrative career in the Abba tribute business can be a sure thing. There are of course many other bands and performers ready to give the Abba tribute a try and only the best and most authentic tributes will rise to the top.

So if you are out shopping for a tribute band what are the things to look out for ?

Authenticity - probably the most sought after attribute for any tribute band. Instrumentally, a band can play note for note as per an original recording, however vocals are often the most challenging. A tribute bands greatest strength lies with a vocalist that can accurately mimic the originals. However, vocal interpretation is only complete with a look-a-like impression; not only do you have to sound like Rod Stewart or Tina Turner, you have to look like him or her also, preferably at the peak of his or her career.

An authentic tribute band can actually be more of an authentic experience than the original performer. This sounds totally ludicrous, sometimes it is true. Take one of my favourite bands Thin Lizzy. There are several Lizzy tribute bands in the UK, some of them sound better than the current ensemble acting under the Thin Lizzy moniker. In this particular case the "real" Thin Lizzy has no original members, Scott Gorham joined in 74, John Sykes joined in 82 and Phil Lynott passed away in 86, the original drummer Brian Downey retired years back. The current Thin Lizzy are a far cry from the band at its creative peak in the late 70's.

Queen is another example of how the tribute band genre actually pushed the original members in to touring. The plethora of Queen tribute bands actually roused Brian May to reform the band and set out on tour with Paul Rodgers and Roger Taylor [the original drummer]. Apparently the Queen tour was a great success both financially and as an audiences experience.

Do musical tributes stifle musical growth ? If history tells us, we are selective in how we learn from the past, visiting recent musical history is no different and is subject to a great deal of interpretation.

A young musician can see a tribute band and be inspired to start his or her musical interpretation of the genre in a more contemporary style. Musical trends are cyclical in nature and never really fade away. There can be no replacement for an original performer, however in some cases a tribute could be the only legacy of that performer and it is often better to pay tribute than to let a memory fade in to musical history.

Opposingly, a poor quality tribute will do the original performer a great disservice. Nothing is worse than paying good money to see some singer make a complete hash of a classic song. Therein lies the rule of thumb for a tribute band - can you do the original material justice ? The life of a tribute band could and possibly should be cut short due to lack of authenticity, we have all heard the originals and have similar frames of reference and thus expectations for that music.

Mr M and The All Nighters on TV already

2007-05-07T13:49:00.000-07:00

We have now played several gigs, April 10th saw us at the world famous Yale Hotel for a Tuesday night recording session. April 27 saw us return to the ANZA for another VeloFusion event and April 29 saw us playing for the Canadian Students for Darfur event on the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery, which also led to our first albeit brief tv appearances on Global and CTV.

This week finds us in search of some new horn players. We hope to be back gigging in the next few weeks, with events in June lined up ready to go.

Mr M and The All Nighters new line up first gig

2007-03-12T16:07:00.000-07:00

Mr M and The All Nighters make it past their new line up gig intact - so far.

We played our first gig with 5 new members on Wednesday March 7th at the WISE Hall. It was a small crowd, but appreciative nonetheless.

We shared the event with Lily Come Down, Brent Rheult, Sayde Davis, The Wind Whistles [Tom and Liza]. The music was excellent, kinda folky, but then the other volunteer organiser [Ryan] who brought in all the other bands runs the folk show at CJSF.

We had a gaggle of great speakers including Dennis Perry and Ned Jacobs from the Eagle Ridge Coalition, Randy Chatteree from doRAVright and Anna Hunter from Anti Poverty Committee.

Here are few photos and a video excerpt. Stay tuned for more gigs from Mr M and The All Nighters.

Mr M and The All Nighters

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In other band related news, we have been working on some polished demos. Singer Alex and I and hopefully a few more of the band members will be working on demo versions of Uptight, Heatwave and Higher and Higher.

Sunday I went to see the Heaven and Hell tour at the Pacific Colisseum, it was a great gig, I sent a short review to the Heaven and Hell web site....

Having seen a number of bands on a "reunion" type tour this one ranks the highest, some of those other bands should really not be touring at all. The Heaven and Hell reunion tour started off with a bang, big stage presence, lots of energy and an audience starving for more.

Has it really been 13 years since these guys played together ? Musically the band was tight, lights and sound all were beyond compare If anything the vocals were a bit low in the mix.

I first saw Ronnie back with Rainbow in 76 at the Liverpool Empire, however it was my first time seeing the other band members live, so at long long last I finally got to to see the legendary Tony Iommi on stage, no disappointments there at all.

I often feel honoured when a band starts or ends its tour in Vancouver, I know its partly to do with geography, however I think there are a few thousand other headbangers in Greater Vancouver waking up with smiles on their faces this morning.

Keep on rockin'
Ian in Vancouver

Mr M and The All Nighters 2

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Mr M and The All Nighters soldier on....

2007-02-12T15:32:00.000-08:00

In the Jack Black movie "Rock School" the show starts off with the lead characters band being stolen from underneath him. Well my experience with Mr M and The All Nighters could have been just like that opening scene. Luckily, I took precautions.

My band Mr M and The All Nighters played two gigs since forming at the end of September 2006. We played in front of friends at Adanac Co-Op on January 6th and at the Betty Krawzwyk benefit event at the ANZA on Jan 26th. Both gigs were great fun, the audience loved us and we had people dancing right from the first song onwards.

Yet, contentment within the band was not to be. Everyone, bar the drummer and myself have left the band and now we soldier on with new recruits.

Figure, you throw in 10 people together and hope they get along; it does not work on reality tv, why should it work in real life ? The band really did have a lot of things to its credit, however the patience of some of its more "talented" members to deal with those less endowed was often in short supply. It seems I had far more patience with people's inadequacies than others and I was less prone in asking people to leave for the good of the band, apparently a flaw in my personality.

For some reason I feel like Richie Blackmore in the early incarnations of Rainbow. Every album Rainbow recorded was with a different set of musicians, some of whom hardly played on the albums at all. Hopefully keeping at least one of the singers will keep some continuity, it seemed to work for Richie, at least for a while.

The funny thing is I've been working on a website for the band, with profiles and sound samples and the whole bit; now most of the band members are gone, such is the rock and roll lifestyle.

Mr M and The All Nighters is now in the process of working with some new members, we hope to be back performing within a few months. It's all good fun until some loses an eye....

A community band in name only....

2006-10-12T23:31:00.000-07:00

So my time with the Carnival Band has come to an end.

I'd like to say it ended in a fiery crash with guns ablazing, tears being spent, but it was more of a fizzle, not unlike a dud firework at halloween.

The new God's Monkey CD is out. Half covers inspired by the Carnies, half originals inspired by my own imagination. Sadly, it was the inspiration from the Carnies that brought my time with them to a close, turns out my ongoing nemesis Marcos X considered my inspiration a theft of his talent. Amongst other things he accused me of stealing his arrangements of cover songs, when in reality I downloaded the MIDI files from a free site and used them.

When a community operation like the Carnival Band is actually run by a petulant and petty dictator like Marcos X, everyone loses, especially the other players in the band that have to contend with his demeaning persona. The public are also fooled in to believing how great and wonderful the band must be, whilst it remains so in concept it is an idealistic and superficial notion as the band stands today. But hey its only music right ?

The last few months with the Carnies have been kind of quiet. The last real gig was at the Pride Parade in August and only half of that was functional thanks to a dodgy generator. We played the Britannia Centre's 30th anniversary on the 7th of October and this was my final event with the band.

I have benefited greatly from the last 11 months of being an active member of this band. My guitar playing has increased a 100 fold, hell I can even play the off beat. I have benefited from playing with other musicians such as Ross Barrett and his sons Tim and Nathan, Steven Lester Smith, Brandon Walker, Bryan, Dan Vie and many others who shared their talents and skills freely.

However, there was a more mean spirited aspect to some of the members of the band, call it paranoia or insecurity. I'm still convinced some of these people still believe I am an undercover Vancouver police officer, [something I was accused of from the start] despite the fact the VPD does not hire people with disabilities.

Then there is Marcos X himself. An obviously talented and skilful musician who taught me an incredible amount about playing, yet he seemed to resent everything he gave. Marcos X taught me a lot about how not to treat people in a band, by setting himself up as leader beyond reproach he continues to dominate the band much to its sad demise.

I now move on to other projects that have thankfully been brewing over the last few months.

Mr M and the All Nighters is this project and it looks like it is getting a full head of steam with gigs now booked for late November. Bringing a little bit of Wigan to the West Coast will be a pleasure on my part and we have a fine cast of players to help out with the task.

June update

2006-06-25T11:55:00.000-07:00

The Carnival Band have been playing lots, I'm usually out there even on the parades with my cowbell. I've played just about every stage gig with them, from the Peace March on June 24th, the Car Free Day on Commercial Drive, Rick Hansen event at Plaza of Nations, Point Grey Fiesta Days, Maple Ridge Children's festival and many more.

The band continues to finds its legs after Dan Vie has moved on. The band was precariously perched on a triumvirate leadership of Dan, Ross and Marcos, this has shifted somewhat with numerous others taking up the slack of the absent Dan. A role to which I gave some consternation and effort to, however after setting up several gigs and a radio interview I was advised to step back and concentrate on my playing. I reckoned I could do both equally, sadly those that have been in the band longer [although with much less "life" experience deem it not so.

With a few more new members of the band now involved, it seems I am not the focus of certain band members attention. Bands are often socially challenging, even for people with a plethora of social skills, TCB are no different. This has been a a great eye opening experience for me in many ways, my playing skills have increased dramatically, but also adjusting to the various relationships within the band has been challenging. I had to break up an argument at last practice between a new member and a more experienced member, reminded me of my days of working at the SFU pub.

With my own music I have been steadily re-intrumenting cover songs for my new CD "Casino Club". Numerous jazz and blues standards will be on the new CD, including Afro Blue, Chameleon, Watermelon Man, Footprints and there will be a few originals thrown in the mix; If I'm lucky i might be able to get some of TCB members to guest.

I am totally addicted to this myspace thing....

April continues to ROCK

2006-04-07T09:50:00.000-07:00

The Carnival Band gigs are coming thick and fast. This weekend we play the Port Moody Arts Festival on Sunday. The last few weeks have been busy, we played benefit gigs for Edmonds Community school and played the Fools Parade at April 1st [in the rain].

The motto of the Carnival Band should be "the community band that can be found playing in all weathers, in all places and for all kinds of good causes." We have played in snow at the North Van Mardi Gras, pouring raining at the Fools Parade; this summer is sure to see extreme weather also and all kinds of good causes.

Guitar wise I have invested in a Boss GT-3 muli fx box. This is certainly an advancement over my Zoom 505 pedal, however the principle is basically the same. I was much impressed with the GT-5 FX built in to the Boss BR 1600 recording unit. I gave it a try for the first time last night and already I can see it expanding the sounds I use and which songs it will work on with the band.

I've also expanded on the web on to myspace.com, apparently 68 million others seem to think this is the place to be. I've already added "Shakira" as my friend and that can't be bad :-) I like the way the music automatically plays on the music section, good idea. See links to the pages.

My playing continues to improve, I've benefited greatly from the guitar lessons of Eric Chuang. Eric's Berklee trained and plays in various jazz outfits around town. Thanks to Eric I now know my way around the fret board much better than I did 3 months ago.

This summer promises more fun with the Carnival Band. My end of summer recording sessions will probably compromise of some of the jazz standards I play with the band plus some of my own material, I have to include the song "Afro Blue" for some reason it does "it" for me.

Update with the Carnival Band

2006-02-07T15:03:00.000-08:00

Turns out the Jan 20th gig fortuitously turned out to be not my first guitar gig with the Carnival Band, but last night at the El Cocal on Commercial Drive was.

The gig is part of the monthly event put on by the Cocal hostess Elizabeth and the band and is often used to bring in new members. The stage at El Cocal is commonly termed "cosy" especially with about 20 members in the band. Without the room for a music stand in front I had to keep my back permanently to the side of the audience, apart from the few songs I knew without the music to guide me.

Judging volume is tough. Whilst I have more than enough power to drown out the whole band on my 70 watt Fender Roc-Pro amp, I spent the night controlling the volume on my guitar, something that I have not had to do during practice.

Standing in the same place for the three sets proved tough by the end of the night, but not as hard as I thought it might be; there is little or no room to move on stage, which does not help. The one solo I managed to squeeze out was fraught with "issues", but out it went nonetheless, next time will be better.

More practice is certainly needed, keeping up with the sight reading will be a challenge. The chords are getting easier to play and I find my left hand automatically moving in to place without too much premeditation. [I guess the guitar lessons are paying off].

I've included a pic taken by band leader Dan Vie, I look solemn, so does everyone else.

First gig Jan 20th

2006-01-13T13:11:00.000-08:00

My first gig with the Carnival Band will be January 20 at the Arts Club theatre Backstage [Granville Island]. The CB hit the stage at approx 11.30pm or so. This should be interesting, I don't think I've been up that late [outside my apartment] in a while; but this is the music biznus and I am ready with the coffee.

Rehearsals with the CB have been going well. They are a great bunch of people to work with, they have a great time on stage and the audience pick up on it right away. There are about 40 songs in the song book, I've got to about half of them. There is a wide range of music to play, right from Fire by Hendrix to a 15th century dance, with lots of classic jazz, afro-carib-new orleans-cuba in between.

Check out my stage gear, tastefully created by KHL, she is such a talented woman :-) Perfect timing in so many ways.

This thing with the CB has been a long time coming, finally, finally it looks to be a reality.

Update with the Carnival Band

2005-12-20T21:19:00.000-08:00

I've now seen the Carnival Band play three times including the Nov 19th municipal election event at the MLC. I've been to three band rehearsals at Britannia three times also and I'm hooked on these guys.

Last Friday I saw them play at the Fairview Pub on Broadway. I've not been in the Fairview since 1983, needless to say it has changed a fair bit since. The other band on the night "All Purpose" provided an interesting sound with some good vocal arrangements ranging from rap to more traditional soul styles. Musically the drummer and sax players seemed to provide the talent, the DJ seemed a little superfluous. The CarnivalBand hit the stage at midnight and went through until 2am, however being the old geezer I only made it to 1am.

The practices have been going well and getting better every time. I finally got some music and have been able to get up to speed on a few of their songs from the CD. There are also a few covers including Hendrix's "Fire", Herbie Hancock's "Chameleon" in a much shorter form than the original. My sight reading speed is increasing and I am getting in to the groove more rhythmically; which is pretty good for an old rocker like me and somewhat essential for the CarnivalBand.

I will be taking the kids down to Granville Island to see the CarnivalBand at the Winter Solstice event Lantern Festival. The next rehearsal is January 9th.

Audition with the Carnival Band

2005-12-01T11:36:00.000-08:00

Last Monday I spent some time with the Carnival Band. These guys have been around for a few years playing parades, clubs, protests, marches etc. Last Saturday I saw them play at the Maritime Labour Centre sans a guitar player, an email got me in to the rehearsal at the Britannia Community Centre.

Last night I got a call saying they want to see more of me as they couldn't really hear me in the rehearsal, so I will be going in for another rehearsal in two weeks.

Here is their site http://thecarnivalband.com

Update on the 2005 recording session

2005-10-26T21:54:00.000-07:00

I am just wrapping up my 2005 recording session at my home studio. I have about an hours worth of music, with a few cover songs and even some tracks with vocals. I rented a BOSS 1600 recorder/mixer and recorded some guitar and vocal tracks to the songs previously recorded using Reason 2.5 on the G3 laptop.

You can have a listen to some of the new tracks at
http://soundclick.com/godsmonkey

This recording session faced several challenges. Especially around trying to fit in recording sessions around yoga classes and helping my g/f move in to the apartment and taking care of my 10 year old daughter, plus the two dogs.

As with other recording sessions, this session is step in yet another direction. I feel my music is a little tighter, a little more accessible. Have listen and drop me a note on what u think.

The new musical project is called God's Monkey and the new cd is entitled "Good for All Creatures".

Feedback on the Burnaby Blues and Roots festival

2005-08-15T11:17:00.001-07:00

Well done to the City of Burnaby for an excellent Blues and Roots festival this year. The performances were excellent, the weather was perfect and audience was well behaved.

However, I was considerably disappointed to see the corporate logos of Chevron and Telus adorning the sides of the main stage.

As the largest polluters of Burrard Inlet, Chevron do not need to be rewarded by having their corporate logo associated with such fine music. Likewise Telus' current labour dispute of locking out workers and potentially shipping Burnaby jobs offshore, should also not be rewarded.

I also found it offensive to see small children walking around Deer Lake with Gateway Casino balloons and decks of playing cards.

Whilst I enjoyed the performers immensely, much better than last year; the increased corporate presence was a reason NOT to go to the event next year, regardless of the performers.

I strongly suggest the organisers take a look at the Under the Volcano festival in North Vancouver to see how the real community can put on an event. Otherwise the Burnaby Blues and Roots festival is in severe danger of becoming an overly corporatised event; which is a contradiction of what blues and roots are supposed to be about.

Instead of large multinational corporations, invite non-profit community groups to attend, this would fit more with the messages sent from centre stage.

Finding lurve on Craigslist

2005-08-10T14:30:00.000-07:00

In less than one month I will be 43 years old.

In the last 29 years or so I've met many people through all kinds of circumstances.

Just over a month ago I went searching for a new bike on Craigslist. Whilst visiting the site I read through some of the personal ads, most were tacky and reasonably offensive, so I thought I'd place my own there just to see if anyone responded.

Within 48 hours I had at least half a dozen responses. The first of which I arranged to go out for a bike ride the following Sunday. As a precautionary measure I also made arrangements to meet 3 other potentials later that same week.

My first date went very well, so well in fact we arranged to meet again the following Wednesday. That Wednesday night went so well I sent a courtesy email to the other three that I had met someone and was going to see how it went.

Over a month later my Craiglist found date and I are still going strong, in fact very strong. Having tried Yahoo, Date.ca and others, who knew a free ad on Craigslist would be the place I would find the right person for me ?

Oh yes the bike is working great also, I ride it every were I go.

A Sad day in Space

2005-07-20T13:40:00.000-07:00

Today they announced that Jimmy Doohan had died at age 85.

One of Vancouver's most famous characters made his claim to fame as Commander Montgomery Scott in the Star Trek series and movies.

He was not Scottish !

A remarkable man, sired a child at 80, with his wife aged 43, who said time travel was not possible ?

Only if we could all so boldy go !

Apparently, it is also the anniversary of Neil Armstrong stepping on the moon in 1969.

War of the Worlds

2005-07-09T23:23:00.000-07:00

OK Tom Cruise is a bit of dork and his acting skills are questionable, however in WOTW he plays a dork and does it very well.

First of all I am a Sci-Fi nut, I recognise the important contribution HG Wells made to the literary world and to the world of sci-fi. I also recognise the importance of George Pal to the genre of sci-fi movie making and his contributions to the movie world.

Spielberg's WOTW certainly has a different interpretation from Wells' original book and Pal's movie version. Spielberg naturally adds his own twists and turns without losing the audience. The similarities to the original book are harder to recognise, but they are present. Spielberg captures the relationship of the father and the children very well; in doing so creates a similar personal struggle experienced by the narrator character in Well's original. The battlefront is not only on the worlds stage but also in the personal lives of the main characters, Wells and Spielberg emphasise this angle particularly well in their own styles.

Needless to say I identified with Cruise's character and his relationship with his daughter, being a 42 year old with a 10 year old daughter. Albeit, I don't have Cruise's roguish good looks nor a daughter with the personality disorders or her ability to scream in perfect pitch, thankfully.

There are some very silly moments in this movie, such having the ability to drive through the wreckage of the crashed jet in a perfectly unscratched Dodge caravan, where did all the jet fuel go ? Maybe the aliens took it out of the plane before it crashed. The Martians looked stereotypically alien, however their tripod ships were perfect.

The strongest point of the movie is the first person perspective that Spielberg chose to use, it was about the only similarity to the original book. Both Spielberg and Pal chose to add secondary characters to the first person singular narrative of the original, it worked in the best interest of both movies.

I've seen this movie twice, I took Lizzy with me the second time and it scared her, it was Dakota Fanning's character who scared her the most !

All in all a great adaption and tribute of the 1953 movie and a not so obvious, yet none the less decent adaptation of the original book.

First Big Bike Ride of the Year

2005-07-03T23:07:00.000-07:00

First big bike ride of the year turned out to be longer than originally planned. Was supposed to be my traditional Canada Day ride down to Canada Place then around Stanley Park and back home.

Well, after meandering around Stanley Park I decided to change my flight plan and head over the Lions Gate bridge in to North Vancouver, then back through North Van and over the Ironworkers Memorial bridge back in to East Vancouver.

All in all a three hour round trip. The new bike performed well, my old Cadex was stolen a few weeks back. The new bike is a hybrid type, a Giant Cypress, about 4 years old.

At one point I tried to take a short cut beside a creek, ended up getting "tight" with some blackberry bushes and some nice big scratches down my good leg. I then tried to push the bike through a narrow path next to the same creek and ended up slipping down in to the creek about 5 feet below me. All good fun...

I am going to do the Galloping Goose trail in Victoria this summer, come hell or water high.

Dr Who will never be the same

2005-06-28T22:45:00.000-07:00

The return of Dr Who a dozen or so weeks ago was the mark of something significant in my life.

Little did I know the return of the good Doctor would make Tuesday nights tv viewing such a pleasure - Corrie, Dr Who and Da Vinci all on the same night all following each other, almost a perfect nights viewing; the only thing missing was the new series of Battlestar Galactica :-)

Little did I know my daughter Lizzy would also fall for the good Doctor in a major way.

In general I don't like television, 99% of it is utter bollocks, but once in a while something good comes out of it; the return of Dr Who, with Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper is finally something good on tv.

Tonight was Eccleston's last episode, time marches on but not for Eccleston in the show, we knew early on he would be going, it was sad to see him go still, Eccleston made an excellent Doctor. I hope the new guy can put his own mark on the series.

The series will return with the "Christmas Invasion" a christmas special recorded before Eccleston left the show. Until then Tuesday nights will not be the same with without old big ears and a northern accent.

Bike Stolen one week ago today

2005-06-23T09:16:00.000-07:00

Last week I had my bike stolen from the back of my van.

The thieving bastards tried the drivers door, then bent the top of the door in order to reach the lock and failed. They then simply smashed the drivers side sliding door and lifted the bike out of the back.

They had time to put the front wheel on and ride off. They were seen by numerous people including my neighbour who got a description.

I called 911 and the police arrived in a timely fashion. They took a statement from me and my neighbour.

Today, exactly one week to the minute, in a somewhat desperate move I stood outside, only idiots would show up at the same time. Sure enough they did not show up.

Now I am out $300 for the ICBC insurance deductible and out a perfectly good Cadex mountain bike. The bikes previous owner [a neighbour] also had the bike stolen, yet he recovered it, since it is rather unique looking. I hope to see it on the road at some point in the future and have it back in my possession one day.

Is Rachel Marsden the sign of the end ?

2005-06-22T10:05:00.000-07:00

Rachel Marsden and I have some history - we both attended the same university.

Now this infamous right wing commentarian is writing for the National Post and I am still at the same university - there is no justice.

Rachel has found herself a niche as the Anne Coulter of Canadian Politics. She has the looks and charm of a female preying mantis searching for a new mate, Gurmant Grewal is her her latest victim. Why would anyone in their right mind hire this woman ? Is it because of her sparkling personality, her razor sharp wit ? Or is it her ability to convince men who with too much "loin-think" she is the best person to do the job ?

Eastern Canada should be warned about Ms. Marsden or surely they will suffer the same fate as numerous men in the west.

Commercial Drive with Lizzy

2005-06-19T21:17:00.000-07:00

After a number of years people decided to have a festival on Commercial Drive - since the Italian festival died this has been sadly missing from the cultural east side.

The weather cooperated once again and thousands of people turned out to check out the displays, performers and the food. It should be mandatory to close off the drive every Sunday and let people take part in the things the drive has to offer, I am sure the local merchants would appreciate it.

I volunteered at the Citizens Against Freeway Expansion table and talked up a storm with people, who for the most part are dead set against any kind of freeway expansion and twinning of the Port Mann bridge. We had some good media exposure as Global and 24 hours spent some time at our position.

Tons of people signed the petition which will be sent to provincial and federal ministers.

After doing my time, Lizzy and I headed off up the drive to check out the rest of the event. This was my first time back in the area after the May 17th election.

We picked up some ice cream and headed back to my place, which is located 50 feet from the freeway.

Sonja and Tegan's Wedding

2005-06-19T03:19:00.000-07:00

Sonja is an undergrad student in the Arch dept at SFU, she got married on Saturday to her long time partner Tegan.

The wedding ceremony at St Pauls Anglican church in the West End was simple and to the point. Sonja and Tegan looked beautiful in their wedding dresses. My Iranian friend Lilly attended her first gay wedding and she had a great time.

The brides attracted a lot of attention as they took off on their 2 seater Heinkel scooter, along with their "mod" buddies over to the Maritime museum for the reception.

Finally a wedding reception with some decent music, I would expect nothing less from Sonja's friends. Some great Northern Soul classics made me feel sad at the loss of the great Wigan Casino, where I spent a considerable part of my youth. Good to talk to the DJ who was familiar with Russ Winstanley, although he had never been to England.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/manchester/going_out/clubbing/2003/08/21/wigan.ram

The weather cooperated for the outdoor event and a good time was had by all. The food was great and the booze was a flowing and the music made it all happen.

I musta have eaten something spicey, since I am now up at 3.30am typing this in some discomfort.