Eat this black music and tell me how it taste now.

Songs new to last week's Billboard Top 50 singles chart.

#11 (debut): Jonas Brothers, "A Little Bit Longer"
A tender ballad about how no one understands the pain of Jiminy Jonas' diabetes. Sounds like Coldplay's "Yellow" sung by Prince's Camille. Their best song yet.

#21 (debut): The Game feat. Lil' Wayne, "My Life"
"Take me away like a bullet from Kurt Cobain." "I'm from a block close to where Biggie was crucified." "And you wonder why Kanye wears Jesus pieces?" "Hated on so much, Passion Of The Christ needs a sequel. Yeah, like Roc-a-Fella needed Sigel!" "Why did John Lennon leave the Beatles?" "Fuck Jesse Jackson, cuz it's ain't about race now!" "I see my sons and put on that Kanye smile." "Shooting at pictures of Don Imus for target practice." When his starfucking is this colorful (Kanye can share his mama now), I'm actually disappointed that he can't make it swing.

#46 (from #57): Jazmine Sullivan, "Need U Bad"
Dub no Keyshia Cole mon.

The Battle Of Algiers
Unflinchingly shows the horror of torture and terrorism, and suggests they are the inevitable outcome of colonialism. You can see why they announce the lack of any documentary footage, both for honesty's sake and to show off the realism. You can also see why the film has been accused of inspiring political violence, and why it was shown at the Pentagon in 2003.


Dahmer
The movie ignores the near-decade between his first and second killings (when he was flashing and fondling teens at state fairs) and the straight dude who got creeped out by his advances and called the cops is turned into a trusting twink, so it's tempting to accuse the film of pushing a "straight society made him into a murderer" platform. But the movie doesn't hide his monstrosity - we see him put his hand in a victim's chest cavity - so much as avoid the pious "no, you should NOT sympathize" moment most films on the subject matter soothe the audience with.

Dahmer may gloss over the depth and the duration of his sex criminality to make his sexual frustration more sympathetic, but the reason I feel conflicted about the streamlining and alterations is that it succeeds. Jeremy Renner's Dahmer is both yearning and sociopathic, while director David Jacobson plays up the homoerotic satisfaction of the murders, daring to lose the audience in order to show how Dahmer may have seen them. Anti-heroic trash like Hannibal should be more offensive to any viewer, but fictional amorality is treated differently than a film (especially a biopic) that aims for something other than nasty kicks. The proof of Dahmer's greatness may be how hesitant I am to call it great - that I'm searching for a reason to disqualify its effect.


Modern Times
Artful - if episodic - slapstick that's easy to overrate for its flagrant socialism. Paulette Godard's lively "Gamin" helps things from getting as saccharine as they can with Chaplin, but for 2008, this is still pretty sappy.


Neil Young: In Berlin
The last concert of Neil's Trans tour, and the last time he'd stomp around the stage with a voice modifier - instead of a guitar - miming to "Transformer Man." As for the old school chestnuts, the band isn't Crazy Horse, but Neil is still Neil, even with the new wave necktie. The movie also doubles as Nils Lofgren's E Street Band audition tape - has anyone done high kicks on Young's stage since?


Manic
The Good: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zooey Deschanel, Don Cheadle. The Bad: Every troubled youth cliche you can think of. The Ugly: Shaky-cam close-ups and nothing but.


The Pope Of Greenwich Village
'80s Mickey Rourke is such a magnetic douche (the missing link between early Marlon Brando and early Bruce Willis) that you have to forgive Eric Roberts for swallowing the scenery whole. After all, shouldn't the Johnny Boy in a Mean Streets knock-off be more attention-grabbing than the Charlie? Their nuttiness must have been contagious - Mean Streets knockoffs usually don't end with Burt Young doing somersaults, let alone "The Summer Wind."


The Laughing Policeman
A Dirty Harry movie without a right-wing hero, just two bickering cops wandering through a lurid maze. It's morbidly fascinating, but Walter Matthau is more fun in Charley Varrick and The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three, the crime films he made immediately before and after (after this crass trilogy, it's no wonder he stuck to Neil Simon and kids' movies for years after). The real star of the movie is Bruce Dern, who seems like he's trying to piss off anyone who dares to share the screen with him.


Sleuth
Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine play murder mystery mind games and scream about British social class for over two hours. Possibly entertaining if you also need forty-five minutes to figure out each thuddingly obvious twist.

Like I said, ain’t nothin to the pain. We can change that last name. What's happenin'?

Songs new to last week's Billboard Top 50 Singles chart.

#8 (debut): Jonas Brothers, "Tonight"
Monday was day one of Jonas Brothers Week on TRL, and girls screamed for five hours straight outside the building. It's not a sound a person is supposed to hear - I'm pretty sure it's used in audio torture. This is part of why it pisses me off that for all their high chart debuts, they've yet to release a halfway decent bubblegum track. It's unconscionable that they can't even work up a "The Right Stuff." Follow along, guys: "oh, oh, oh-oh-oh." It's easy.

#29 (debut): T-Pain feat. Lil' Wayne, "I Can't Believe It"
After the robot vomit of "Got Money," I'm shocked at how pleasant a Roger Troutman giggle this second collabo is. Pain sounds like he's phrasing his vocal to exploit the quirks of autotune, rather than just flipping it on out of fashion. Lil' Wayne sounds stoned and amused enough to play along.

#42 (from #55): Rick Ross feat. Nelly & Avery Storm, "Here I Am"
His best bad Biggie, proof that he can ride a spry beat with his oafish kingpin b.s. Guaranteed to be overpraised by folks who think it's mandatory to indulge this shit.

#44 (from #48, missed it last week): Keith Urban, "You Look Good In My Shirt"
Wow, the fruity enthusiasm of Tom Cruise and the faceless enthusiasm of Lenny Kravitz combined with authentic Australian twang.

#49 (from #59): Yung Berg feat. Casha, "The Business"
Imagine cheap CGI robot porn. Now imagine that the droids won't shut up.

#50 (from #61): Leona Lewis, "Better In Time"
Whitney Houston cries "My daughter! My sister! My daughter! My sister!" while Grandpa Clive grins demonically.

LOL Homoeroticism

"Using women (and not only women) as plot functions may be a clue as to the shallowness of many movies, even of much better movies." - Pauline Kael, in her review of American Graffiti, which I coincidentally read a few hours before seeing Pineapple Express.

Pineapple Express is the shallowest of the better Judd Apatow productions, and not just because of Amber Heard's negligibility (solely representing the lead's irresponsibility is one step above solely representing his heterosexuality). Seth Rogen has praised test screening, but I wonder if extended time spent in that process (LA resident and long-time buddy TJ saw the movie many months ago, well before the red band trailer leaked) secured non-stop laughs at the expense of tone; the film seems more wanton than intended.

'Non-stop laughs' is part of why I feel a little bad about complaining. Rogen frequently gives interview love to Adam Sandler, and he may be doing that as a defense against high expectations, similar to Chris Rock's "hey, I think Eddie Murphy is funny" quotes. Compared to Opera Man's ouvre, or the cinematic output of any SNL class, Apatow's productions are regularly remarkable, with only two Jake Kasdan-directed turkeys and some Frat Pack b.s. mussing up his post-Freaks & Geeks track record. But as his improv-based style of joke packing is normalized, they'll either have to risk seriousness or find new ways to be zany. Walk Hard was bad Zucker, and the upcoming Year One sounds like bad Python, so Pineapple Express should be commended for taking on action comedy and not sucking outright. But the bumbling, surreal violence is only fitfully transcendent (David Gordon Green may be more of a visual stylist than former Undeclared writers, but his movies are still static and talky), and James Franco's beaming dealer - the kind of manchild you'd neither want nor expect to mature - is the only truly fresh character in the film.

As the comedy posse's gifts become familiar, their weaknesses become more grating. The second act bro-squabble, Superbad's sole groan, is tiredly reprised, and the LOL homoeroticism is getting pathological. Bystanders don't "eww" when characters accidentally imitate gay sex anymore, but the notion of two men being physically or emotionally intimate is still played purely for laughs. Superbad actually dealt with the emotions in a close male friendship and Jonah Hill has a career-wide subtext of repression (at the very least, his character should come out in the sequel). But in Express, the eyebrow-lifting insinuations seem like easy gags. None of these guys would say homosexuality is wrong, but there's no sense of whether they're mocking straight unease with gay specifics or coasting on it.

It's also distressing is that, for the first time, excellent comic actors are used as props. The hotel staff in Forgetting Sarah Marshall were all given great comic personas, so why cast Ken Jeong and Bobby Lee, possibly the two most recognizable Asian-American comedians not named John Cho, and then use them as Renny Harlin extras? Rogen told Hill to stay away from Transformers 2, but Michael Bay would have pulled a little more panache out of Gary Cole and Rosie Perez if they were his villains. Why hire them otherwise, right? It's possible the DVD bonus features will be chock full of supporting shines cut for time, but to see the atmosphere of comic generosity decrease around the edges is disheartening - I don't want Rogen to wind up riffing into a black hole like Chevy Chase in Fletch and beyond. The fifth or sixth best Apatow film (there is Talladega Nights...) is nothing to avoid, but I hope we haven't completed the canon.

I signed my name on your left boob. Now go get that tattooed, I'll be back soon.

Songs new to the Billboard Top 50 Singles Chart over the last two weeks, if they didn't fall off after the first (sorry, Jonas Brothers).

#26 (debut): Shwayze feat. Cisco Adler, "Corona And Lime"
Cisco Adler compares a lucky lady to booze while Shwayze lists regional female stereotypes and announces his sexual availability. They tour frequently, you see.

#34 (from #39): Jordin Sparks, "One Step At A Time"
Empowerment theme from Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants 2.

#36 (from #55): MIA, "Paper Planes"
MIA isn't merely a Global Gangsta exhibit at the Tate Modern: her music is now being used as catchy hip-hop violence in a popular action comedy trailer. So the question is whether she can make her exceptionally catchy art piece cross over outside of an action comedy trailer.

#38 (from #52): Kid Rock, "All Summer Long"
Lyrically he's a bore ("we were trying different things/ and we were smoking funny things"), but his best track in years updates the Licensed To Ill aesthetic by stealing chestnuts to recall - rather than embody - the glory of youth. Sadly, his memories of 1989 fail to include his high-top fade.

#46 (from #93): Shwayze feat. Cisco Adler, "Buzzin'"
Shwayze describes the mix of love and resentment he feels for a groupie trying to "cage him in" while Cisco Adler nods and strums sympathetically. They tour frequently, you see.

"Formula 409"

Electric Six, Flashy. October 21.

1. Gay Bar Part Two
2. Formula 409
3. We Were Witchy Witchy White Women
4. Dirty Ball
5. Lovers Beware
6. Your Heat is Rising
7. Face Cuts
8. Heavy Woman
9. Flashy Man
10. Watching Evil Empires Fall Apart
11. Graphic Desginer
12. Transatlantic Flight
13. Making Progress

Monster
My only complaint is that, judging from every photo I've seen, Aileen Wuornos did have eyebrows. I'm pretty sure Charlize Theron would have been convincing as a psychotic, traumatized street hooker in love without this extra bit of uglification.


The Misfits
Marilyn Monroe moves to the desert and fries the brains of three alcoholic cowboys (Eli Wallach is the criminally underpromoted third), forcing them to acknowledge their nihilistic lifestyle if they have any hopes of getting her in bed. I can't imagine any other actress making this work.


Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry
Lunatics piss off The Man by driving fast! The Man is played by Vic Morrow.


Vanishing Point
An existentialist pisses off The Man by driving fast! The Man lacks physical embodiment.


Step Up 2 The Streets
Any dance movie that avoids either lifeless wide-shots or rhythmless hyper-editing gets points from me, however mindnumbing the plot.


The Good Girl
Not sure whether to blame the star or the script, but if there's an inner logic (or an intentional absence) to how this married thirtysomething cashier deals with getting knocked up by her mentally unstable teenage lover, I missed it. Good performances from the cast members who've made good movies since.


The Sweet Hereafter
The only Atom Egoyan film I've seen aside from Felicia's Journey. While Egoyan certainly doesn't do wrong by the subject and location, I'm pretty sure The Death Of Children and The Great White North would be plenty effective without his artful pauses, blaring flutes and recitations from The Pied Piper.


Sunshine
The first two thirds do well enough by 2001 and Solaris that it's laughable when third fails at Alien and Jason X.


Home Of The Brave
A modern day The Best Years Of Our Lives, directed by septuagenarian Irwin Winkler like some Lifetime Original Movie. Chad Michael Murray seems more comfortable in this context than Samuel L. Jackson, who really needs a better script (this one's crafted by Harvey Weinstein's assistant on Shakespeare In Love), and 50 Cent, who really needs to never make another movie. Jessica Biel might be too gifted for this shit, or merely too hot.

My pitch for the next Batman movie: Batman runs into a female cat burglar with a vicious sense of humor, who mocks his choice of wardrobe with her "Catwoman" outfit and calls him out on the corny, put-on rasp he's been pushing on those who cross his costumed path (Commissioner Gordon, when asked, tells the hero he was afraid to bring it up). Upon discovering that Batman and Bruce Wayne are the same person during a snoop through Morgan Freeman's office, Catwoman decides to fuck with him "in real life" as socialite Selena Kyle. Kyle has no desire to exploit her knowledge for personal gain (she's got money and knows how to get more), she's just amused by this rich, agile stud that's obviously got issues if he's leading a double life and both personas are an act.

With Catwoman/Kyle making him more than a little insecure (while some cartoonish nutball, like the Mad Hatter or somebody, provides the necessary explosions), Batman finally stops talking like Cookie Monster and admits to himself that Wayne is the costume and that, deep down, he's the goddamn Batman, promptly kicking everybody's ass.

The details are open to negotiation, but what's key is presenting the caped crusader's vocal constipation, which pulled me out of The Dark Knight's rush in a way no plothole or clumsy attempt at profundity could, as the character's Bad Idea Jeans instead of Bale's.

And hold onto your words, 'cause talk is cheap. And remember me tonight when you're asleep.

Songs new to last week's Billboard Top 50 singles chart, and the top debut.

#47 (from #62): Secondhand Serenade, "Fall For You"
Emosogynist whiner aims for adult contemporary, or as Allmusic's Stewart Mason put it, "much like Five for Fighting or Dashboard Confessional both musically and in theory." The single was originally released over six months ago (I recall catching its mix of lingerie and faux-hawked douche between episodes of Degrassi on The N quite a while back), but none of the usual sources are crowing about whatever cross-promotion helped finally push it into the Top 50. Yet.

#72 (debut): Toby Keith, "She Never Cried In Front Of Me"
As his wife re-marries, Toby Keith complains that he had no idea that she was unhappy living with him. Seriously, why didn't she ever cry or something? What is he, a fucking mind reader? Thanks for nothing, lady. Toby would have been a great husband if you'd just, like, cried and yelled or bonked him on the head or something. But no, according to him, you just kinda wandered off while he wasn't looking. I guess.

I normally love infomercials where some has-been teams up with a TV Guide Network reject to interview Time-Life Box Set fans and Remember When. Glen Campbell's Classic Country and Mark McGrath's Buzz Box are personal favorites. I somehow missed this one while it was on TV, and Christ, does it break my heart. Peter Fonda was in three hit movies in 2007! Does he owe money or something? After Ulee's Gold and The Limey, he's earned Ghost Rider and Wild Hogs. But this? Was this necessary?

B & D, Kix and Dunn. Honky tonk heaven, double shotgun.

Songs new to last week's Billboard Top 50 singles chart.

#38 (debut): DJ Khaled Featuring Akon, Rick Ross, Young Jeezy, Lil' Boosie, Trick Daddy, Ace Hood & Plies, "Out Here Grindin'"
From wikipedia: This song originally featured Lil Wayne in place of Young Jeezy. The version with Young Jeezy in place of Lil Wayne will be the official single version. Plies' verse has been moved to Lil Wayne's part. The version with Jeezy's verse was recently released on Jeezy's mixtape "The Prime Minister". The reason for Lil Wayne's verse being removed is allegedly because of him not being able to attend the music video shoot, however, Plies did not attend the shoot either, yet his verse was maintained. I swear to God, this is more interesting than the track.

#41 (from #53): Blake Shelton, "Home"
The arrangement is more easy listening (forget adult contemporary) than conscionable, but his voice is warm and convincing enough that I'm very tempted to check out more of his stuff, especially since he willingly named an album Pure BS.

#45 (from #53): Alan Jackson, "Good Time"
Wow, Alan is country's Ice-T and its Soulja Boy! Shouldn't a dance number that pushes past five minutes swing just a little?

#46 (from #55): Taylor Swift, "Should've Said No"
Second single in a row telling off a loser soon-to-be ex, with "Picture To Burn" more fun and this more affecting than anything delivered by former standoff queen Avril Lavigne. Josh Clover's pious clucking over ill-informed critics praising Miranda Lambert (ignoring the presumably informed critics that put her at the top of country mag polls) kept me from having much interest in his blonde of choice (the hardcore shitkicker/author of Madonna anno domini voiced a fear of clueless country dilettantes trying to play catch-up), but I'm glad she's kept crossing over long enough for me to catch wind. Maybe I'll like Lambert even more!

The Oscar
Buy a novel about a pimp-turned-actor who will stop at nothing to get an Oscar (imagine Get Shorty as a cautionary epic). Pay Harlan Ellison to adapt, adding money lines like "Will you stop beating on my ears! I've had it up to here with all this bring-down!" Cast dramatic legends like Jill St. John, Tony Bennett and Milton Berle. Sprinkle heavily with cameos. Overbake. Serve.


Club Dread
A relaxed horror spoof that's not as good as comedies that make you laugh every five seconds, but a lot more likable than the ones that try and fail. Major points for scoring the movie with Jimmy Buffett parodies sung by Bill Paxton.


The Contender
Great actors, windy speeches, major issues, absurdly contrived subplots, liberal fantasies both self-adoring and masochist. All that keeps the film from just being a watchable throwback to the glory days of Henry Fonda is Joan Allen's palpable frustration with institutional sexism. This would be guaranteed $100 million and a best actress Oscar if it was coming out this Christmas.


After The Thin Man
Aside from a young Jimmy Stewart's climactic freakout, there's nothing of interest aside from the boozy, hilarious leads, which makes the movie excruciating when they're away too long. Oddly, this is exactly how I feel about Strange Brew.


The Love-Ins
Tim Leary, as played by Not Richard Burton, gets the Wild In The Streets treatment. LSD freakouts (complete with psychedelic, Alice In Wonderland-themed ballet sequences), riots and miscarriages are milked for maximum drama, so it's disappointing when the public assassination of a hippie demagogue occurs with a minimum of fuss in the final minutes.


The Fog
I don't remember anyone saying Halloween should have had fewer teenage girls and more fog.

I've never really understood reviews of dance albums by dance critics, and based on claims like "this is the most original American dance album in a long while," they won't be making more sense any time soon. I'm not exactly a DFA nut, but Hercules & Love Affair seems no more surprising or original than that Nike mix. Crafting songs out of an inclusive but not overly eclectic dance-floor mindset seems pretty status quo for the crew, and the fact that I zone out when the beat goes away makes me question how much more there is to it. But that doesn't mean the peaks aren't a lot of fun. I've never cared for Antony's blubbering in a ballad context, but over horns and Tim Goldsworthy Eno-disco his quivers don't have to hold the weight of the world. Unlike a lot of forum folk, I prefer the album version of "Blind" to the "Frankie Knuckles" and "Club" mixes, but then I'm a dilettante, a Remain In Light fan, and see above.

I'm slipping into the lava and I'm trying to keep from going under, baby.

Songs new to the Billboard Top 50 singles chart, and some Camp Rock shit.

#5 (debut): Jonas Brothers, "Burnin' Up"
Sophomore-album Maroon 5 meets sophomore-album Hanson, only less dynamic. David Carradine, Robert Davi and Danny Trejo guest star thanks to Joe Jonas' self-confessed love of "classic '80s pulp fiction shit."

#9 (from #11): Demi Lovato & Joe Jonas, "This Is Me"
Happy for you.

#19 (from #91): Sugarland, "All I Want To Do"
Is Fergie country now? Is Rob Thomas a woman now? I don't get it.

#31 (from #20): Jonas Brothers, "Play My Music"
I can't decide if hearing a Jonas scream for freedom rock over digitally neutered pop-punk is fascinating, unpleasant or both.

#36 (from #30): Joe Jonas, "Gotta Find You"
"I was watching Taxi Driver, and thinking about people likes Travis Bickle and John Hinckley, and I realized that stalkers are really just lonely, troubled people who don't know how to find happiness and tend to fixate on fantasy. This song is an attempt to empathize with that mentality. I realize the irony that by doing this, I run this risk of courting a similar fixation from members of my own fanbase. But I wouldn't want that kind of selfish concern get in the way of a greater good. And the only thing that gets me through the day is believing that the art I create is worth personal sacrifice." - Joe Jonas

#43 (debut): Sugarland feat. Little Big Town & Jake Owen, "Life In A Northern Town"
Was this done for, like, charity?

#49 (from #62): Jason Mraz, "I'm Yours"
Precocious hackeysack reggae: better or worse than Sugarland and the Jonas Brothers? If the hackeysack reggae artist in question interrupts his come-ons for a scat break? Worse.

Teeth
This vagina dentata fantasy is more comedy than thriller, but part of what makes it so good is how the film never totally surrenders to camp. Even as the heroine's would-be assailants have their extremities dispatched in comically appropriate ways, her confusion, horror and disappointment are treated sympathetically. And even if the film had gone cold on her, watching a jackass cry "...moooomm?" into an intercom after losing his dick mid-coitus would still be priceless.


The Man Who Knew Too Much
A happily married couple's daughter is kidnapped by Peter Lorre when they accidentally stumble across his plan to kill the Archduke Ferdinand of 1934. A fun early Hitchcock, and unsurprisingly superior to Hitch's own 1956 remake starring Doris Day and Jimmy Stewart. Better than Ransom, too!


The Ruins
Even in quality horror films, there's frequently a moment late in the film where the main characters take stupid pills so that the film can come to a violent close (think "we have to go back" or "oh no, the dog got out!"). The Ruins wisely begins with boneheaded choices (starting with "hey, let's ask some guy to drive us into the middle of the Mexican jungle and leave us there!"), so that the majority of the movie can be devoted to the misery of the stuck & fucked. Thankfully, more attention is paid to their increasing panic than the evil CGI vines.


21
A white male math genius is seduced by a hot blonde (and Kevin Spacey) to join another brilliant white guy and two goofy Asian sidekicks in counting cards in Vegas and only Vegas, despite repeated threats of execution from the town's sole security chief. This tale is "inspired by" a large group of mostly Asian students that counted cards in casinos across America for over thirty years, before dropping out because of non-violent bans and more profitable real estate opportunities. This idiotic whitewashing (which I swear I wasn't aware of beforehand, though I did think the film would be better if the supporting actors were the leads) wouldn't be so grating if the leads, Jim Sturgess and Kate Bosworth, had at least as much charisma as a cast member from One Tree Hill. No movie from 2008 should have you actively regretting when Kevin Spacey (who - fun fact! - has made three incredibly shitty movies with Bosworth) leaves the screen.

While this tip won't be of assistance when Sturgess, who keeps hundreds of thousands of dollars in the ceiling tiles above his dorm bed, fucks up his nerdy friends' science project (what price success?), it does help to get through the movie by adding "...in bed." to anything Spacey says to his young male apprentices. I.e., "The only thing worse than a loser is someone who won't admit he played badly...in bed." Yes, I was that bored.

Maura's dour review of CSS's Donkey inspired me to finally check out the album's first single, "Rat Is Dead," and - surprise! - I love it. The song simulates that early '90s DGC moment where femme-friendly, post-Pixies alt-rock got to be radio filler. And as it's more Silversun Pickups than DFA, I'm not shocked this could feed a backlash. It's tempting to agree the song pales to "Let's Make Love" or "Alala," but judging by how often I've played it over the last two days, it's affecting me in an equal if totally different way. Lovefoxxx's vocals are still giddy, but the "rock" production ironically makes "Rat Is Dead" less transgressive than their earlier singles, which pushed demented fun in your face. "Rat" would have sounded common fifteen years ago, but the warm drive of the riffs are as welcome and beautiful now as they were on Last Splash or Star or whatever your nineties nugget of choice is. Maybe it's nostalgia caused by the machismo of modern rock, but what A&R wanted from Sonic Youth in 1994 I'll be happy to take from CSS now.

Your mind is in disturbia: it's like the darkness is the light.

Songs new to the Billboard Top 50 singles chart that aren't from Camp Rock (we'll see what's still around from that cultural landmark next week).

#10 (from #70): Miley Cyrus, "7 Things"
The "but I love you anyway!" twist initially made me miss the mercilessness of Avril Lavigne, but Cyrus' lyrics are more colorful and schizy than the old pro's (if not up to "my best friend Leslie said 'Oh, she's just being Miley'"), and musically she gets more out of a similar mix of country vocals and studio punk-pop. Seeing as how this shot above anything from Camp Rock, she may actually be breaking out of the Disney ghetto. Eep.

#18 (debut): Rihanna, "Disturbia"
Had Chris Brown written this paranoid club jam for the second biggest Shia LeBouf film of 2007, I might have gotten into the song as some 21st century Ray Parker Jr. As re-release filler for Rihanna in 2008, this lacks that cheese appeal. Unless her Jacko dance-dread proves deeper upon each listen, I'm guessing this will sound best in an ultimate party megamix.

#38 (debut): Flo-Rida feat. Will.I.Am, "In The Ayer"
Maybe Flo-Rida could join the Black Eyed Peas. They'd be like a pop-rap Legion Of Doom.

The Best Man
Henry Fonda (who sure played a lot of thoughtful liberals) and Cliff Robertson's Joe McCarthy are somehow vying for the same party's nomination. The film pretends to be cynical but then has Barack Obama beating Hillary Clinton by giving his electoral votes to Dennis Kucinich. A good reminder that people (in this case, Gore Vidal) were writing melodramatic political exposes about the media's love of scandal and lowest common denominators well before Aaron Sorkin.


Basquiat
Trite biopic juiced by celebrity cameos. As in the Prestige, David Bowie pulls off a cartoon of a cultural icon by making their emotional distance oddly cuddly; it's a neat trick he could probably win an Oscar for if he did it more often. Director Julian Schnabel keeps stealing star Jeffrey Wright's moments for himself (why let the actor express loss when you can have his inner child run past him and dissolve?). Despite all the drugs, sex, racial conflict and art, the only real edge comes from a spacey, vicious interview of Wright by Christopher Walken, who always seems to give his most surprising performances in otherwise weak Oscar bait, i.e. Catch Me If You Can.

I tried to post this video on here last night, right before Buddyhead took down the YouTube. They've also since taken down a copy on Vimeo. Who knows how long this link will last, but I pray their remix of Guns'n'Roses' recently leaked "If The World" won't ever truly go away. The amazing thing, if you haven't already heard the track, is that they didn't change the music at all. Easily my favorite remix of the year. (Thank you, ONTD.)

My hands don’t like to be unemployed, they like to work.

Songs new to last week's Billboard Top 50 singles chart, and the top debut.

#35 (from #52): Estelle feat. Kanye West, "American Boy"
It's a shame this isn't Kanye West feat. Estelle. She's a fine sound effect on the chorus, but her jazzy refinement is so much less immediate than his American smirk that the song suffers when he's away too long. Better than Duffy, but no summer jam.

#46 (from #53): Kenny Chesney, "Better As A Memory"
His voice put me to sleep before the initial arrangement (spacey keyboards and a minimal guitar riff that had me hoping for some country Joshua Tree) even had a chance to bland out. Maybe that's why I can't remember ever hearing a song of his before.

#49 (from #54): Flobots, "Handlebars"
"These guys sound just like Cake. You don't know Cake? HE'S GOING THE DISTANCE! HE'S GOING FOR SPEED! Oh come on, you kids don't know Cake? I'm totally making you listen to some Cake when we get home. If you like this, you'll love Cake. Seriously."

#62 (debut): Plies feat. Jamie Foxx & The-Dream, "Please Excuse My Hands"
I'm not yet sold on the godliness of emphysematic stream-of-consciousness punning, so I guess that Plies (which I will always pronounce plee-AYS, thanks to my little sister's dance classes) is my pop rap messiah by default. (every critic has to have a pop rap messiah, right?) All four of his charting singles are horndog valentines with a hook hero on the chorus. First T-Pain, then Akon, Ne-Yo and now Jamie Foxx and The-Dream. (Don't waste two on a track, dude! This only leaves R. Kelly before you're down to Omarion or Chris Brown.)

I assume Plies raps about something other than giving orgasms on his albums, but I like that he hasn't felt the need to make sure pop fans know. Whether you find him better or worse than the similarly reliable but lyrically forgettable Flo-Rida probably depends on whether you find lines like "I call my baby 'wet-wet'" amusing or gross. Me, I'm laughing.

The Deer Hunter
The first hour and a half is some Best Movie Ever shit. The opening wedding sequence revels in male camaraderie with neither ironic distance nor romantic exaggeration. Michael Cimino's camera surveys the boisterousness without calling attention to itself or providing comment. Everyone is so vibrant and likable that, for the first time in film history, I even had affection for George Dzundza. When the movie suddenly moves to Vietnam, Cimino shows the POW nightmare with equal respect, knowing that the contrast expresses more than enough anti-war sentiment.

Following this powerful work, the last hour thirty feels like a flawed sequel by a different director. Everything's buried in gentle finger picking and violins, when the first half had almost no score at all (something I didn't even notice until the music began to intrude). The film devolves into convoluted soap opera as characters are put through repetitive, overlong scenes in hopes of reaching a grand climax, as if Cimino didn't think the film was an epic yet. He eventually settles on a shot of shattered friends singing "God Bless America," a move that almost capsizes the film, despite its masterful beginning. Cimino's sudden fall from grace isn't surprising after watching The Deer Hunter, but becoming aware of his potential now makes it tragic.


The Signal
Well-meaning adulterers search for each other as a TV signal causes its viewers, including the cuckold, to turn murderously delusional. I was already impressed by the movie's look (drained but not overbearing) and intelligence before I learned it was filmed by three young directors from Atlanta (each helming a third of the film) for $50,000. Despite the windy last third, the character work is unusually affecting for a horror film of any budget.


Drugstore Cowboy
Following a junkie and his gang from pharmacy robbery to pharmacy robbery probably felt a lot more edgy in the "Just Say No" era, but its the embarrassing, Lynchian interstitials that date the film. Even with those gratuitous moments and an overlong third act, the lively, nonchalant scumminess feels fresher than Gus Van Sant's later To Die For. The actors (even Heather Graham!) are uniformly energetic without descending into tweaker parody.


My Own Private Idaho
Hustler River Phoenix looks frustrated and wrestles with narcolepsy while hustler Keanu Reeves does his surfer Shakespeare thing. It's nuttier and more indulgent than Drugstore Cowboy, but I'll take that over the passive stolidity of Van Sant's later experimental works.


Be Kind Rewind
The film-shoot sequences are among the cutest I've ever seen (I love that the reference points range from Last Tango In Paris to Rush Hour 2), with Michel Gondry making his trademark visual inventions more affecting by showing their seams. But for the first half of the movie, everyone in Passaic, New Jersey appears to be functionally retarded.


Rounders
Matt Damon and Edward Norton play poker sharks of varying self-destructiveness in an upscale Mean Streets. Excessive narration and Gretchen Mol keep the film from taking off, and we can probably blame Harvey Weinstein for both. John Malkovich has a lot of fun with a Russian accent.


Town & Country
In this fascinating conflation of late Woody Allen and the Farrelly Brothers, a bevy of thirtysomething sexpots (and Goldie Hawn) make it impossible for a geriatric Warren Beatty to remain faithful to Diane Keaton, while Garry Shandling (coming off like a Billy Crystal grotesque) wrestles with his budding homosexuality. Between the disastrous sex comedy and countless crane shots (the only visible display of the film's $100 million dollar budget), I want to believe this movie was actually directed by Johnny LaRue.

With whom?

I don't know how anyone could claim to regret seeing The Happening. How can you regret laughing your ass off? I can't imagine a more ridiculous (which is tantamount to "hilarious" in my book) movie coming out this summer, not just for its plot but the dialogue ("I see you eyein' my lemon drink!"). It doesn't lose steam, either. Rich (and I'm eternally grateful he agreed to see this with me) left for five minutes to get some food and missed a man calmly feeding himself to a lawnmower, as well as Mark Wahlberg (who hasn't been in as entertaining a bad movie since The Big Hit) apologizing to a rubber plant. The last movies I can remember seeing twice in the theater are The Blair Witch Project and Battlefield Earth, so it's no surprise I'd consider giving The Happening a similar honor.

SPOILER!!!! The last words in the movie are "Mon dieu!"

Inside fish sticks, outside tartar sauce. Pocket full of celery, imagine what she tellin' me.

Songs new to last week's Billboard Top 50 singles chart, and the top debut.

#31 (from #76): Pussycat Dolls, "When I Grow Up"
Wouldn't this declaration of ambition be more appropriate on someone's first album? Wouldn't it have made more sense for the vocal hook to be "meow meow meow meow?" (the non-Nicoles being pussycats, you know?) Neither change would actually make the song any good, but it would show a little more thought on the part of its creators.

#36 (debut): Young Jeezy feat. Kanye West, "Put On"
I won't tolerate Young Jeezy for allegedly being the best unimaginative hernia sufferer in rap, but it's charming when he briefly drops food metaphors I don't entirely grasp. Kanye does not improve the song by pondering fame through a vocoder.

#49 (from #56): David Banner feat. Chris Brown and Yung Joc, "Get Like Me"
Despite the failure of last year's "Speaker," David Banner would like you to know that he's doing nicely (the proud owner of a several cars), and that he can still get people like Chris Brown and Yung Joc to appear on a status report.

#50 (from #62): Three 6 Mafia feat. Project Pat, "Lolli Lolli (Pop That Body)"
It's a little odd to hear Three 6 Mafia pretending to be Flo-Rida feat. T-Pain, but "like Barack Obama said, yeah, it's time for a change!"

After Hours
Griffin Dunne goes to Reagan-era Soho in hopes of getting laid, and barely escapes with his life. I'd probably mind that this urban fantasy puts him at the mercy of lunatic art chick after lunatic art chick, but Terri Garr, Catherine O'Hara, Linda Fiorentino and Rosanna Arquette are so much fun that any misogynist pathology underneath is drowned in almost Harold & Kumar levels of whimsy.


Body Of Evidence
An erotic legal thriller that consists entirely of Madonna fucking Willem DaFoe, Julianne Moore gritting her teeth and Joe Mantegna yelling "objection!" Everyone gets naked except Joe Mantegna and special guest star Frank Langella, who still gets to describe being sexually dominated by Madonna. The courtroom frequently erupts in hubbub. Every once in a while, a character reminds you the film is set in Portland. So awesome.


Down By Law
I didn't think I'd get all the way through a Jim Jarmusch film starring John Lurie (as a pimp? please), Tom Waits (as a hipster DJ, ugh) and Roberto Benigni (double ugh). But the affectations diminish once the characters meet up in prison, and, as he probably knows, Jarmusch's long takes are always easier to take in black and white.

Got memed! (Thanks, Alfred.)

“List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring. Post these instructions in your blog along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they’re listening to.”

I'm taking this as an opportunity to write about seven of my Top Ten Singles Of 2008 So Far, ignoring "Pork And Beans," "Beat It" and "I Will Possess Your Heart" as I've already said plenty about them.


Chris Brown, "Forever"
We've only got one night to double your pleasure, double your fun, and dance forever. Again. We've only got one night to double your pleasure, double your fun, and dance forever. Read it slowly. We've only got one night to double your pleasure, double your fun, and dance forever. This the biggest lyrical vortex in pop since the Backstreet Boys' "empty spaces fill me up with holes." It's so insane that I sometimes forget Brown opens the second verse with "it feels like we're on another level" and rhymes it with "we could be two rebels." Thanks to the blithe, carefree music and Chris Brown's jubilant delivery, resistance is futile.

Coldplay, "Viva La Vida"
Watch out, Arcade Fire! Thanks to you, these guys have figured out how to make grand music without being messianic or singing about love, and their leader doesn't sound like a turkey when he gets excited. The perfect song to celebrate the existence of term limits to.

Gnarls Barkley, "Run"
I enjoy the zebra-stripe sequence, but the goofy video gets in the way of the lyric, which does apocalyptic dementia even better than Dick Valentine. With every listen this song sounds better than "Crazy," better than "Hey Ya," better than just about anything I can think of. No other song sounds more awake to the world at large; it's as fun as a fire alarm gets. Where Electric Six is trying to live in the nightmare, Cee-Lo still thinks there might be hope, but only if we run(!).

The Hives, "T.H.E.H.I.V.E.S."
Interscope, are you really just going to throw "Tick Tick Boom" in a bunch of action ads and then call it a day? I know "Throw It On Me" stiffed, but come on, this song has fluke novelty hit written all over it! You said this was going to be a single in February, so fund a video! Put it in ads! It's perfect for The Gap! They got together with Pharrell and made you a classic, now do your damn job!

MGMT, "Time To Pretend"
Indie is the new alternative, but what I'm psyched for is when it becomes the new alternapop. Between Myspace shrinking bands down to a four-song introductory EP and labels of all sizes trying to hook their acts up with advertising companies, I'm thinking bands are going to learn how to focus fast, leaving us with a bunch of cool songs from disparate sounds that only have some vague social context in common. Indie used to be about using your collegiate leisure time to find the diamonds in the coal, now the bands have some impetus to do it for us.

Nine Inch Nails, "Discipline"
The Slip inspired me to finally revisit Trent's pre-With Teeth full-lengths, and I was surprised to find I enjoyed Pretty Hate Machine even more than his recent arena boogie, thanks to his punkest vocals and late '80s percussion tracks that undercut any metal power-tripping (a flaw that sinks much of The Downward Spiral, despite the extreme production detail that also fails to keep Trent from hitting the wall on The Fragile). I originally took "Discipline" for "Only, pt. 2" but its contradictions are far more interesting than that sum-up would imply. Why is he more comfortable than ever with pop on pop's terms now that no one's asking him to conform? And how awesome is it that he decided to give the evidence away?

Trina, "Single Again"
Sometimes I'm inordinately bothered by female self-contradiction (Xtina's "words can't bring me down so don't bring me down," for instance), sometimes I'm not, like when Trina tries to act triumphant after getting dumped. Sure, she's clearly not as over it as she's claiming, but it's hard to fault her mix of heartbreak, anger and dismissive disgust. Maybe it's because she doesn't throw in self-pity.

And now to pick seven other blogs to send the meme on to.

Blackmail Is My Life

Kitty Power

Her Jazz

b-r-double o-k-lyn drama

what?

Mind Your Own Goddamn Business

Flaming Pablum

Looking for that magic rainbow on the horizon.

Songs new to Billboard's Top 50 Singles chart this week, as well as those that debuted last week and are still on it now.

#9 (from #3): David Cook, "The Time Of My Life"
The only song from last week's American Idol deluge to remain in the top 50 this week, so I guess I should acknowledge what is basically the theme to yarl's Super Sweet 16 (if we count the "Sex Type Thing" as its birth). Congratulations, yarl, on your debutante ball.

#13 (debut): Lil' Wayne feat. T-Pain, "Got Money"
There might be some excellent rapping here, but I can't get over the unpleasant combination of laryngitis and autotuning.

#32 (from #43): The-Dream, "I Luv Your Girl"
The only song not by a guy named David to debut last week, and its rise is bittersweet. I'm a big fan of Love/Hate (no recent r&b album sounds like it was more fun to record), but I'm not feeling this edit. The song was slight enough without tacking on a horrendous, minute-long grunt from Young Jeezy and removing the falsetto "fuck that n---a" hook. Judging from the latter alteration, I guess "Ditch That" doesn't have much chance of being released as a single, unless they use the word "trippa" instead, like I do (cuz I'm a PC dork).

#40 (from #51): Kardinall Offishall feat. Akon, "Dangerous"
When I lock eyes with an attractive girl at the club, I do not like to imagine Akon standing in the corner, watching the both of us and singing "Dangerous" by Wyclef and the Ying Yang Twins.

#41 (from #53): K.I.C., "Get Silly"
You know what the Hokey Pokey always needed? Orchestra stabs and a slower beat!

#42 (from #57): Keyshia Cole, "Heaven Sent"
I'm no angel, and she's no Mary.

#43 (from #56): Chris Brown, "Take You Down"
"With You"'s smiley inanity got me to the campfire, and "Forever"'s smiley inanity got me to dance (the Wrigley's ref wrapped in an oxymoron was too much to resist), but this smiley inanity will not get me into his bed. Neither will that guitar solo.