7 Things That Irk Me In The Twilight Saga.

As I was looking through my local events paper this morning (no good bands coming here, no good movies coming out this weekend) there was a cut out poster for the new Premiere of Breaking Dawn part 1 featuring Edward and Bella pretty much naked and wrapped around each other as per usual. My mum and I both flinched.
"Part 1. How original." I snickered.
In honor of the new Twilight movie (honor isn't the right word, but craptastic didn't fit my flow of words), I have to admit something very shameful I did around a year ago.
I read every single last page of the Twilight Saga. No joke. And almost barfed when I finished, 'cause that stuff is ridiculous, disturbing, wrong, and poorly written.
So Here's 8 reasons why it's disturbing in no particular order.
NOTE: This isn't hating on Twilight fans (only the crazy ones who throw things at you if you don't like them. I've met some of those). Just the horridness that is Twilight.
Some of these are for the books, some of these are based from the movies.

1. The Vampire mythology is all wrong. Vampires don't sparkle, they aren't fairy princesses. They also by nature don't want to spend their life in high school over and over as Edward does. That's wasting your stupid immortal life. And boring. All the time in the world and you picked to go to school? That's just messed up.
2. The acting in the films is some of the worst I've seen. The first movie was on FX the other day (I was going to see if Wilfred was on) and I burst out laughing a couple times at the stupidity of the screenplay, the acting, and reminding myself I read this piece of work. Kristen Stewart has no emotion what so ever, and couldn't convince me of anything she was saying. Robert Pattinson is particularly wooden and there's really nobody else in the film to alleviate any of this. That one Taylor kid shows up twice, and he's here just to show off his six pack (which I will admit is kind of hot, but no me gusta).
3. Edward and Bella's relationship is....disturbing. He watches her while she sleeps. He stalks her everywhere because he "just knows" that she's going to get in trouble. I just can't stand to think of anyone I ever date watching me sleep. It's completely wrong. And yet, girls are all "EDWARD IS THE HOTTEST AND SWEETEST AND KINDEST AND MOST CONSIDERATE VAMP EVA OMGZ". Not really.
4. Bella has issues. She can't do anything without Edward, tries to kill herself when he leaves her "for her own good" or something like that doesn't make sense, and she literally only cares about her precious fairy boy friend. The only person who exceeds Bella's level of obsession with Edward is Edward's obsession over Bella. She was not fun to read about, she annoyed the living life out of me, and was depressing in all ways possible.
5. When Bella has her demon baby, it grows up really fast because Stephanie Meyer is a cop out and Jacob starts to be in love with it or something. It's disturbing. I constantly wish I'd never read these stupid books, but I really really really wish I'd never thought to pick up Breaking Dawn. Ugh.
6. If there's one thing that was only mildly bothersome while reading the books, it's that Bella's dad isn't in the picture. At all. She has no parental guidance and it shows. That's unrealistic to me. Parents are never not involved when their kids fall in love with sketchy vampires. It was like Stephanie Meyer just said "I hate parental guidance, but I don't want to kill them, so let's just have all the parents be super spaced out." Not particularly sure why this bothers me so much, but it does.
7.Every single time I walk into a bookstore, there is some girl wearing a "Bite Me" shirt browsing in the young adult section for RPatz posters. She'll see me and smile ravenously, bounce up to where I'm picking my latest escapes and ask with much enthusiasm "Don't you just love Twilight?" and smile in anticipation of the imaginary fangirling we're about to do.
"No, I found them disgusting." I mumble and wonder where they put the Neil Gaiman books.
She will then promptly insult me and bounce away, off to pay for her hundreds of dollars in merchandise.
I can't do into a book store without this happening. No joke. It sucks. Yes, I know, not completely related, but close enough.

So what I'm really trying to say is.........
1. These books are disgusting.
2. These movies are horrid.
3.....


HARRY POTTA FO'EVA!

-Randi

Quick Announcements

-I'm going to be blogging more in 2012.
-My cat is a murderer.
-I'm watching more movies to review.
-Happy?

Ceremonials Review!

Florence and the Machine are bank after two years with the mind-blowing Ceremonials!

The numbers are the track numbers on the disc, keep that in mind.

1.IT’S HERE AND I LOVE IT! Here’s a track by track review for Only If For A Night. I’ll be posting all the song reviews here and then at the end of the week I”ll put them all together into one post.

Only If For A Night is one of my favorite songs on the album. From the cascading pianos to the great backing vocals, this song really convinced that the sophomore slump wouldn’t affect FATM like so many others. 

First of all, the whole song is a beautiful poem like a vivid fever dream. I love the inclusion of the title in the song as well (dancing on tiptoes, my own secret ceremonials).

The instrumentation is lush but not cluttered.  There’s a piano riff, the signature harp, thundering drums (have no fear, they’re prominent but not obnoxious) and hints of bass.

It’s danceable, the loveable melancholy drama-rama of Florence and the Machine, and a very strong start to one of the albums of the year (this, along with 21 and Who You Are are my albums of the year). I’m thinking this might be the next single after No Light, No Light.

2.Song number 2 and lead single of Ceremonials.

Shake It Out was the first official single for Ceremonials released a couple weeks before the album. I’m pretty sure I already posted a review for this song but it won’t hurt to give it another go.

Shake It Out is kind of like Dog Days from a more mature mind. Florence has aged since Lungs, which is perfectly logical and fine with me. It’s anthemic and tribal and primal. It took some time to grow on me.

This is the big introduction the latest obsession instrument on Ceremonials: The big churchy organ. On Lungs it was the harp, and that still has moments on Ceremonials, but the organ is the instrument of the hour. It’s quite nice and works so well with the tone and songs.

Shake It Out is not my favorite on the album, and I don’t really know why. Don’t get me wrong, I love love love love it, but not as much as Heartlines, What the Water Gave Me or Breaking Down. Again, I’m not entirely sure why. Still thinking about it.

But still a wonderful song! The video is beautiful and I love the guy randomly dancing with the chair.

3. What The Water Gave Me might be my favorite track from Ceremonials. The harp is spotlighted again, the guitars are vintage and twangy, there’s an absolutely amazing bass line, and the organ comes back even more psychedelically gospel than before.

What The Water Gave Me has been described as a scrapbook of a lot of things by Florence Welch herself. There’s drowning, Virginia Woolf and I like to think of the period of time before a tidal wave when this plays. Or mermaids. This is a mermaid-in-love-with-a-human type kind of song.

I love how the song just elevates you and makes you feel bursting with some kind of emotion that resembles happiness over such a dramatic and melancholy topic. But when you look at the water, you automatically want to just leap in and stay there forever, and just be carried away by it. Or at least I have. Florence + The Machine get that perfectly.

One of the standout tracks of Ceremonials for sure.

4. ever Let Me Go is the obligatory but amazing ballad on Ceremonials. The album’s been moving pretty fast up until now, and this song really is one of the standouts.

The songwriting reminds me of mermaids, but in a different way than What The Water Gave Me. Maybe the siren has killed the man she’s in love with and she feels remorse possibly. I don’t know if they ever did, but that’s what I picture, cheesy I know.

The drums and background vocals lean a bit toward the eighties power ballads. But that’s ok, because in all honesty I like those sometimes. It’s a kind of slow dance song.

The lyrics are insanely beautiful and make me so envious I hadn’t written them. It’s hugely romantic and if you’re writing a romance for NaNo this month, I recommend this song. Great for snogging under the moon.

A solid cut from Ceremonials all in all.

5. Breaking Down is one of my most favoritest tracks from Ceremonials, not going to lie.

I love the sharp strings (They remind me of Swimming Song) and the slightly out of tune piano and just that feeling of going down.

This is one of two experiments in old soul/R&B type songs. Flo said she was listening to a lot of Otis Redding and such, and it’s more apparent on the next track but kind of so here. 

I just like that the song is happy and yet you can feel the sadness in it. It’s kind of like wonder-band-song of the year Foster The People’s Pumped Up Kicks. It’s like FATM’s take on that. It’s something catchy and light if you want it to be and something else deeper if you need it to be.

One of the best cuts. No doubt in my mind.

6. Lover to Lover is by far the blusiest soulful song on Ceremonials. Flo’s love of olf soul/funk/R&B is worn on her sleeve here while still making it her own song.

The song is very piano and bass driven and features a kind of gospel choir to give Flo something to paint on. There’s a great organ as well, much like the rest of Ceremonials, played by the ever excellent Isabella Summers.

If anything, I’m not the biggest fan of the lyrics. I don’t really know why, because I love the song, but the lyrics just don’t impact me like a lot of other Ceremonials cuts. But the chorus soars and it’s so danceable that it’s easy to forget.

7. This might be the best on the album. It’s drama and soul and dance and poetry in that signature Florence way, and very reminiscent of the fan-favorite Howl from Lungs.

This song reminds me of a mixture of all of Lung’s standout moments. And I hate comparing the two so I’m just going to keep it to this one song. Anyway, the drums form Cosmic Love and Howl, that kind of feel as My Boy Builds Coffins, the harp sounds like Rabbit Heart, and yet No Light, No Light sounds new and futuristic. 

As far as lyrics, this is again, a strong moment after the two lyrically weak songs beforehand. I think this is one of Flo’s more personal songs that doesn’t sound as abstract to the casual listener, which is why it’s perfect for the next single. Plus, think of the video! I love Flo’s videos, and I plan on doing a post for those later.

If you’re only planning on buying a few songs from Ceremonials, this would be one to get. Cannot wait for the video and single hype to come for this one!

8. This is where the Flombies attack me……

I don’t like Seven Devils. 

I’m trying to justify myself here, because a lot of people are raving that this is the best song on the album and that it’s just the best, but I don’t really see that. 

I think it’s not musically interesting, and the piano riff becomes annoying after a while. Maybe I just haven’t listened closely enough in the two full days I’ve had the album, but this one has not stuck with me. If my mind changes, I’ll let you know, but for now, this one is filler.

NOTE: After more days spent with the album, I know find this song more bearable, but still, not the best cut considering everything else. A bit disappointed with this one.

9. After the musical yawn that was Seven Devils, this song really put my faith back into the album.

Heartlines is battling for my favorite song off Ceremonials. With the same drums from Rabbit Heart and a kind of epic battle feel, Heartlines is a knock-out.

Florence described this song as mermaids vs. pirates, and she communicates just that. But at the same time, I think this song is where Florence really knows she has impacted her Flombies a lot. “Just keep following the heartlines on your hand-keep it up-I know you can” and other lines really lead you to believe she really cares. If there’s one thing I would like to see more of from FATM is that kind of fan relationship the  Heartbeats with Jessie J, or something like that. Just because  I think it'd be cool. But off the fan ramblings.

Again, standout track. One of Flo’s all time best.

10. The most dazzling song that really does remind you of illuminations and prisms and science.

Once upon a time, people thought Ceremonials was going to be called The Chronicles of Science and that it was going to be all about molecules and quarks and atoms. Strangeness and Charm helped thing theory along, and then Florence said she was working on a song called Spectrum, so we were all getting THE CHRONICLES OF SCIENCE hyped up. Or at least my group of Flombies did.

While the thread of science has largely been abandoned for that of drowning and water, Spectrum is one of the few vestiges of that short era in FATM history.

Where Heartlines is a tribal dance, Spectrum is some kind of alien ritual type dance for me.  The beat is faster, making for more of a dance of a madwoman/man which you are when you listen to a Florence record.

I like the vibe of being strong in the song. It’s a great song to work-out to and it makes me feel like I could run a marathon to the moon. Please don't make fun of me for that, I'm just telling the truth.

On another note, this song is most reminiscent of the album cover to me. With the sparkly dress and mirror type of view. Oh and she mentioned “silver in our lungs” which to me seems like a kind of metaphor to Lungs itself. Maybe that’s just me.

If there’s one thing to complain about this song it’s that Rabbit Heart register of Flo’s voice. I’m not particularly fond of that range on her. She can’t sing it live and it sounds a bit too squeaky for my taste.

One of my favorite and highly recommended.

11. Alll This And Heaven bears a big resemblance to Between Two Lungs, with the spritely piano and soaring chorus. This sounds like it could be form Lungs, which isn’t a bad thing seeing as there needs to be a song the really bridges the gap between two albums (get my pun? I’m just the best right?) 

If anything, the rhythmic timing here is completely weird to me until the song really gets rolling. It messes with your head.

Anyway, like I said, Between Two Lungs resemblance, but it’s for the better. B2L was one of the weaker tracks of FATMS debut and this seems like it’s stronger sister track.

 You feel as if you could fly through fluffy clouds when listening to the chorus, it’s just that big and beautiful. Love love love this song.

12. Leave My Body is what Seven Devils should have been. Kind of dark and brooding but also elevating you to higher ground just as the lyrics as well.

There’s a great lyric in here: “I don’t want your future, I don’t need you past.” 

That’s really what I needed to say to a few people here and there and I really love thi song. One of the great gems of this album.

The instrumentation is bass-y and there’s the gospel choir again, and it makes for a strong closer to the standard album.

Bonus Tracks

Remain Nameless- This one hasn’t clicked with me yet.I usually love electronic music but this one is just kind of a yawn right now. I’ll try to listen to it more closely, but meh so far.

Strangeness and Charm- It’s so nice to hear a studio version of this, but I think the live version had so much more energy. If you can get the Live at the Wiltern copy of this song, it’s better. But not dissing this version, it’s very clean and has it’s sparkling moments.

Bedroom Hymns- A deliciously blasphemous bluesy tune from some part of Florence she hasn’t put into music yet. If Lady Gaga and Madonna think they use religious imagery well, they just got blown away by Florence. I love the bass and drums intro.

What The Water Gave Me Demo- I love this track, not going to lie. I love the album album version more, but this a fun, dance-y take, on a great song. It’s interesting to see where the song started and ended.

Landscapes (Demo)- How this didn’t make the standard album is beyond me. A great song with wonderful poetic lyrics in true Florence style.

Acoustic tracks- I haven’t kept track of them all, but my favorite acoustics are Heartlines, Shake It Out and Breaking down. I know some people have complained of not liking big song after big song but these track really throw in some relief. I personally like the big sound, but hey, these are really beautiful pieces. Shake It Out is especially great acoustic. It’s mainly guitars, keys, and  harps for these, and they’re truly highlights and a worthy addition to the deluxe editions.

Hope you enjoyed!

-Randi

Harry Potter Summer Memory (Part 2)

And not only is this my fiftieth post on my blog, I've decided to  make this post pretty darn special and recall one of those events that changes the way you think about stuff.

It was  this summer that I had to break it off with a friend that had long abandoned me for a cooler crowd. I don't want to do any name-calling on the Internet. This post is not to rag on this person. This is to tell my side of the story about one of the events that seems to have shaped my adolescence.

Lets call the girl Tuesday. I think that will do.

Tuesday and I met when I was younger and she younger than me by a year. She seemed nice enough. We talked some. And then I found out she liked Lord of the Rings. Now I had an obsession with LOTR, not to mention my first crush on Elijah Wood was still in tact (and still is) so we get to talking. And apparently, Tuesday had been living under a rock, because I asked her if she'd read Harry Potter, and she didn't even know anything about the Boy Who Lived.
So I start explaining all things Harry Potter to her, and her eyes became wide with excitement, and within the next three months she finished them all. And she became more obsessed than I was. Which is saying something, as I'm the crazy chick who has a wizard rock project.
And for a while, everything was great. We wrote, well, I wrote a Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter musical (I still have them. I hope to preform one of them someday) and she gave occasional input. We read some of the same things. But Harry Potter was really the only thing we had in common. And I mean the only thing. Tuesday didn't care much for music (except for Taylor Swift), and I probably cared too much about certain artists (I'd just discovered Florence + The Machine.... if you know what that feels like, cut me some slack). I was into weird hipster films and she was still watching Megamind.
And then we just stopped hanging out. She didn't call to have me over or spend the night or anything. And I didn't either. The only way we talked was over the phone when Tuesday was really bored. And that's where the real trouble began.
Tuesday called me up one day, and started going on about how she'd been trying to change her image, to be more girly at her mom's insistence. I told her I believed one shouldn't have to do that and it turned into a very big argument. She told me people thought I was a lesbian, I could get a boy-friend if just wore some make up. That I could be as pretty as a beauty queen. But I didn't want that.
That thread continued for while with lots of continued phone hang-ups, name-calling, and exasperation. And then the Midnight premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 came. Tuesday allegedly had tickets. And if you've been reading closely, you know that some friends took me with them and I cried and it was great.
But Neville's story really stuck with me after the movie. How he grew from a scared kid to a super hero who led a rebellion against one of the most powerful wizards of all time. And when Tuesday called me the next day, saying she'd forgotten about the premiere and didn't go and simply wanted to know every detail. But for some reason the conversation veered off and I ended up hanging up on her after she called me a whimp that played too much music and watched too many movies for her own good.
That night I was flipping through Philosopher's Stone, and read that famous Dumbledore quote:
"It takes courage to stand up to your enemies, but even more to stand up to your friends."
And then something clicked.
When Tuesday called again, I refused to talk to her. She left a snarling message for me, but I was done. And with that it was over. I took a page out of Neville's book, and I think I'm better off now.
I still see Tuesday at church. We don't talk. I think she's happy with the arrangement. She's got new friends and so do I. I'm trying to move on as best I can. You just have to be bulletproof in situations like this.
But Tuesday, if you are reading this, which you probably aren't, but that's ok, I do forgive you. I understand that you want to go be a popular kid and you weren't happy with being a nerd with me anymore. But you really left me high and dry. But I'm better now. So much better than I used to be. You really did pull me down. I don't think you meant to at first, but you did. But I'm happy to say I've learned from experience.
It's ironic how the thing that brought me and Tuesday together also gave me the courage to break it off. Thanks Neville, and thanks J.K. Rowling.

-Randi

Harry Potter Summer Memory Part 1

 know, I haven’t finished the Director’s  series I did, but I figured I could start another series since I am a DISTRACTED genius.

Summer 2011 was Harry Potter summer for me. The premiere, the coping, the friends I lost and made, it all happened.

But today I want to concentrate on a one of a kind totally awesome most amazing HP-related thing I did: Hogwarts Vacation Bible School.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with  VBS, it’s basically this thing that goes on for a week and it’s got a theme and kids go and learn about God and Jesus and all that cool stuff.

So a local church here in town chose to eschew those lame themes and do a Hogwarts Vacation Bible School, which was a very bold move on their part. 

I don’t actually attend this church (I go to one down the street) but I play music for them at their cool midnight church service and my sister went to pre-k and Kindergarten there.

But they were having this thing. So I went and helped.

It was so adorable.

The main room was decorated like the Great Hall and Hermione taught you songs and Dumbledore told you stories in the basement and Professor Snape gave you challenges to do and it so frakkin’ adorable. The four hoses were re-named after the four gospels. I was very impressed. And as far as the lessons, they were using symbolism from the Harry Potter books to teach Christian values and principals. I also heard John Granger came to speak at the thing, but I missed that bit.

I brought along one of my friends and we did house-elf duties, and I was playing Kreacher and she was playing Dobby.

But what was so cool is that this church had the boldness to do a Hogwarts Bible School. A lot of other churches wouldn’t let their kids go, because they think Harry Potter is a how-to Wiccan Handbook.  But on further inspection, this was a perfectly legitimate church outing. I was so impressed.

-Randi 

Hipster Movies

-So I want to see all these crazy underground movies lately. And a lot of people are, to put in meme terms, "coming at me bro". Just because you went to  see Transformers 3 and I went to go see the King's Speech doesn't mean the world is going to end. I honestly don't see the problem. Do hipster films translate to, like, Black Swan or something? I don't even know. Either way, nothing shall deter me!

The Great Week of Movie Watching! Part 1

Hi everyone! I've been watching a ton of movies lately, new and old. So I'm gonna sum 'em all up in a four part series.



The Help- First of all, I loved the book to the point of suffocation and this movie had high expectations. And it got as good as it could get. I'm not going to go into plot detail, just general over-view.
1. There's one of thing that the movie has that the book didin't: Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, and Emma Stone with an amazing cast of supporting characters. I forgot the name of the lady who played Celia Foote but lawdy she was funny. The ending made me want to cry more than the book did and I really loved watching it. Like, I never thought WHEN IS IT GONNA BE OVER!?!?!? I loved sitting in the theater with my mum and laughing and crying and listening to other people have the same reaction

NOTE: The following review is writted (that was on purpose) by my fantabulous brother CALEB...

Schindler's List- I spent most of my life hearing about Schindler's List as a really great, really graphic, really emotional kind of movie. but in my whole life, I had never seen it. so Randi got it off Netflix. I watched it, and I must say that it was one of the best I've seen. I love Liam Neeson for his always epic acting, and this movie's probably his best (that I've seen at least. I've yet to see taken, which I was told is great). The black and white is hard to get used in a way, but it's not a negative at all. The picture quality itself is just as good as any movie made today and seeing that kind of quality in black 'n white is definitely a great effect. Color is used only twice in the movie, both times to show significant important things. If you wanna see what the holocaust was like, the closest depiction of it is this movie. No hidden violence here. All shown, all the time. Best movie I've seen in a while.

KEEL BEEL VON AND TWO (otherwise known as the two part film known as Kill Bill)-  Quentin Tarantino has one of the best imaginations. Ever. I know, ranking such abstract things as imagination is super unfair. But Quentin Tarntino must be something of a genius. I think so anyway. But alas, I'd never seen Kill Bill, which is like his second most popular, well-loved, well-reviewed film (first goes to Pulp Fiction obviously). So I invited my best friend, the Diabolical Diabetic overe to watch them with me. And I loved them more than I loved the previous two movies. It had everything I love: Action, drama, weird swords, weirder people, long lost kids, tricked-out trucks, assassins, crazy asians, all done tongue in cheek. I won't give anything away, 'cause youu need to see these for yourself. It's a thrill ride fo' sho'.

That concludes part 1!

Love and sonic screwdrivers,
Randi