the Buddy Holly Story was watched at our house this week. It’s junior high writing and the fact that it looks like it was filmed using spare set pieces from Happy Days made it easy to watch casually. The big treat is Gary Busey.
I don’t give a shit as to whether the real Buddy Holly was anything like the way Gary Busey played him; the character is good enough in its own right. Mr. Busey did all his own singing, even changing some of the lyrics. Apparently Busey got so into the role that he had trouble getting out of it; causing his wife to tell Buddy Holly’s widow that she had been sleeping with her husband (awkward!).
The scene where the Crickets come up with the band name during rehearsal may be pure fiction but it is quietly terrific as band practice vignette.
Some Trivia: Keith Moon died the same night he attended the movie’s premiere. One of the screen writers killed himself the night before the premiere. Gary Busey had a band in the Sixties with the unforgivably horrific name, Carp (is that comma properly placed?).
I watched part of R. Kelly’s ridiculous soul opera, Trapped in the Closet, this week. I can’t believe I hadn’t before for it is most excellent and to get sucked in you only need to watch the first few short chapters.
Was at band rehearsal so had to leave it. I’m looking forward to finishing TINTC and also to watching it with R. Kelly’s personal commentary which I admit is hard to imagine being worthwhile from what I read in an A.V. Club list of DVD Audio commentary types. In the A.V list, they give special attention to R. Kelly as a classic “narrator” type commentator which seems completely unnecessary given that the entire movie is sung like an opera and R. Kelly is already acting as singing narrator.
Btw I was excited to see the A.V. list, given that I have this idea to start a blog critiquing DVD audio commentary — anybody interested in contributing?
We produced this Shanghai triptych at the studio yesterday. One of my mates just got back from Shanghai with a couple of videos he took on his Blackberry. We watched this imagery while creating some music. In the case of the “two eyes,” the videos that sandwich this triptych, we also used the video audio as our rhythmic lead. Slapped it all together like so:
I’ve been loving the Jamman. Here, though, are a few drawbacks I’d like to correct when purchasing a similar device in the future…
1. Even though the device has a tap pedal allowing the user to set the tempo, AND the loop is controlled by this tempo – it has no midi interface to: see the bpm, set the tempo more accurately, or receive the tempo from an external source. You can convolutedly set a precise tempo by manually editing the data files via a computer.
2. The USB connection only functions as a way to control the pedal as a data storage device.
3. You can only erase your last overdub. I wish you could pin point overdubs and control them individually.
Recently watched Grey Gardens with commentary by one of the directors (the Maysles brother duo who also directed Gimme Shelter) and two of the editors. This is first in class commentary with a vantage point on the Beales family that may shape your own opinion.
THE BUDDY HOLLY STORY
Did you notice the mountains that were supposed to be in Amarillo? Har.
Paul McCartney produced a documentary called The Real Buddy Holly Story which you might enjoy, if you like you some Buddy Holly.
Your comma is properly placed.
TRAPPED IN THE CLOSET
This series starts off fantastic, but eventually devolves into self-parody somewhere around episode 10. Or would that be self-parody parody? I don’t know; I’m going to try not to think about how many layers that onion has. Anyway, about the time R. introduces a midget, you know he’s just phoning it in.
SHANGHAI
In parts, this sounds dangerously close to the sort of thing you used to deride ktru for filling their Sundays with.
DIGITECH JAMMAN
It would be a shame to comment on all of these except this one, but I can’t think of anything to say about this other than that I used to have a DigiTech two second delay that had a looping feature. I bought it in New York City in 1989 and it was subsequently stolen when my apartment was burgled in 2000.
A TANGENT
I also enjoyed Grey Gardens. You might also enjoy the Maysles’ Salesman. I did.
re: Buddy Holly – I might be more into Gary Busey now. There’s a line in the movie where he says “I like Elvis fine but I’m Buddy Holly.” Busey was once asked to sign an autograph with his name and Buddy Holly’s name to which he replied “I like Buddy Holly fine, but I’m Gary Busey.”
re: R. Kelly – a midget. Don’t tell me? I’m disappointed. I’m not surprised. And, now I must watch.
re: shanghai – well I’m not sure deride is the right word. I know of a thing Andy Walker would call “a KTRU Classic” which is that abstract stuff –which is a hard place sometimes to take yourself but yeah I’m there brother. You are a wise and observant dude.
re: jamman. – played with some folks tonight with the jamman. I’m starting to like its limits. Want something else, but I always like to ride the wild walrus so I think it’s a keeper. Where were we all those years ago? Fuck!
re: the Maysles – ah but did you like the commentary? That is the thing.
I also have one of those old 2 second Digitech loopers. In fact, I used to have 2, but I sold 1. They also had 4 and 8 second models.
You know, I don’t remember whether I watched the commentary. I suspect if it’s that good I would remember it, so probably not. Maybe I’ll throw that one back into my Netflix queue.
I go too far. Not sure it’s worth throwing back in the queue just to listen to the commentary. That might have to be part of the rating system: commentary so good, you should re-rent just to listen to it.
And by “Amarillo,” I mean “Lubbock.” Though, there are just as many mountains in Amarillo.