In the grand pantheon of stupid ideas, I would have thought a Psycho prequel that moves the action to 2013 would be chief among them but god help me I enjoyed the shit out of Bates Motel.
Just one of the many babes on “The Norman Conquest.” Also, ewww.
This TV season in particular is set to become the psycho-killerest in history with not only Bates Motel dusting off the Norman Bates saga for another go, but none other than Bryan Fuller tackling America’s favorite cannibal, Hannibal Lecter (and for network TV no less.) Then lest we forget, Kevin Bacon slumming it on Fox’s The Following, which in its first season has already set the bar for silly serial killering the likes of which Dexter could only darkly dream of. But I belabor a simple point, Bates Motel has mad potential to be both the most intense and silliest of these silly, horrible shows that I continue to watch in spite of myself. I am the problem, after all.
Yet, the strangest thing about the show has nothing to do with the psycho-killer-to-be, and everything to do with Norman’s instantaneous status in town as a total chick magnet.
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LA Noire is a selfish little bastard of a game. It invites you over to its home and suggests that you play cops and robbers. For a while things are great and everyone is having fun but then wouldn’t you know it, LA Noire doesn’t like your ideas or the choices you make so it ignores them and suddenly you’re just a player in a very elaborate overwritten play. But man does it start out like the goddamn second coming (editor’s note: of Police Quest.)
Investigator Maya is on the case!
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This didn’t sound drunk enough. I’ll re-up it later.
I’ve never been to a show where the featured artist brought audience members on stage to have a cheesecake eating contest. Thank you, Lily Allen. Hopefully the winner is as thankful for his prize, a cheesecake. Oh, and a kiss n’ hug from our hostess with the mostest.
That wasn’t even the strangest thing about the night of song and dance rump shaking. It’s been so long since I’ve seen a cigarette in person, that when I saw the smoke I actually thought at first Lily was some sort of half dragon half person chimera. She is a smoker. Big time. Half a pack. Puffs in between verses, sips of wine, a chorus sung with a lung full of smoke. Ah to be young and cancer certain. Here’s the catch. Contrary to what you may have heard about Lily, girl can sing.
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It took me two years to commit to a Wii, but I was an early (the earliest?) adopter of singer Hitoto Yo and her weird ass punctuation (referenced in today’s entry title). For three albums now I’ve held out hope that she could return to the exclamation marks of her debut single “Morai Naki,” a blissful update of Asian folk with the slightest tinge of R&B, but her latest album Key is more an ellipses which leaves stronger punctuation firmly locked away in the past.
The spoken word interludes which seemed harmless in Hito Omoi‘s ”Hito Shian,” are embarassing, damaging and worst of all invasive; on Key. Hitoto has a way with words but she always sounds like she’s reading to a classroom of sleepy toddlers. Toddlers who would probably enjoy the light and easy rhythms of this album.
“Chandelier” has Celtic textures which work well with Hitoto’s clear vocals, but “moonlight” may be the least consequential song she’s ever recorded -the very definition of filler. Only it doesn’t fill, it just sucks. But not in the way “Kingyo Sukui” sucked, which was in a catchy, stupid, weird and annoying way (I loved that song!) Consider it a consolation prize that retro rocker “Chabangeki” managed to sneak on the CD at all.
It hurts to see a girl with so much weird energy and a penchant for dressing like someone’s couture-loving grandmother settle for songs like “Shiori,” a fine song though it may be, that try to relive her most commercial moments from “Hanamizuki.” At this rate she’ll be singing that song on Kouhaku every year, locked out of putting any newer material into the running.
On a side note check out Hitoto’s videos for “Tsunaide Te” and “Tadaima” as both are fragile and gorgeous art.
