Snob Music Review: The Golden Upturned Nose Awards - Music Division

I can't say that I listened to a lot of music this year, or at least not a lot of new music. Also, most of the new stuff has been of the indie-rock hipster variety. I'm going to try to change that next year.

I reckon this year has been more of a 'where's the beef?' kind of thing, as I found most big releases disappointing: Radiohead, Arcade Fire, Feist... all of them were duds in my books.

Anyways, here's a list of the albums that I listened to the most, and thus worthy of the coveted Golded Upturned Nose Award - Music Division:

LCD Soundsystem- "Sound of Silver"
The National - "Boxer"
Spoon - "Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga"
Panda Bear - "Person Pitch"
Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova - "Once Soundtrack"
The Most Serene Republic - "Populatiaon"
Do Make Say Think - "You, You're a History in Rust"

We thanks all of those that submitted their work for consideration.

It Takes Two To Make A Thing Go Right...

True Subatomic Fans will know of my affinity for all that has to with units and constants.

Thus, we were happy to read this interesting article about the three natural constants that are all we need to define pretty much everything in the physical universe.

Of course, there's our good ole pal c, the velocity of light. Then there's h, the work-horse Planck's Constant. If you didn't know, Planck's Constant gives the ability to calculate the energy of a certain frequency of light. Then there's also G, the gravitational constant.

I never really thought about other constants, but when I do, I can totally see how all other constants can be understood in terms of these three (or two depending on how you look at it).

Perhaps there's no new physics involved here, but at least it's changed the way I think of these constants, what they mean, and how astonishingly simple (yet it isn't at all) the Universe is.

In Transit

Midnight at IAD
Originally uploaded by subatomicfilms.

My voyage back to Toronto turned into a big debacle, and involved me spending the night in Washington-Dulles airport. That sucked. A lot.

Now I am back at my parent's place in Toronto, and things are fine. I've been sleeping at least 9 hour days and just sorta hanging out. For the first time in a while, I feel that I can enjoy myself, free from stress.

So I will.

Climbing Mountains

Today, a massive personal accomplishment happened. My writing partner and I finished the first draft of our feature screenplay!

I would say that we started at the end of the summer, and it's taken us this long. It's a relief, as I set it as a goal and it was achieved.

I'm also happy in terms of it being a first draft. I mean, there are tons more work to do with it, but as one of my writing teachers says about first drafts: don't get it right, get it written.

Now comes the arduous process of rewriting and then trying to get it made!

Snob Music Review: Radiohead: In Rainbows

Is it just me, or does this album kinda suck?

Church of St Luke & St Matthew

Church of St Luke & St Matthew
Originally uploaded by subatomicfilms.

It's been a really busy couple of days. The semester is winding down, and with it comes deadlines and commitments.

I worked on a 2nd Year shoot for the past couple of days. Yesterday, we shot in the Church of St Luke & St Matthew in Brooklyn. It is absolutely beautiful, but sadly it's deteriorating. I bet about 50 years ago, it was as grand as any of the 'big' churches in this city.

This weekend is going to be absolutely crazy though, with the amount of work that has to be done. However, it should have moments of big fun.

Crazy Cat Problem #3

Watching Snow Flakes
Originally uploaded by Ewwwww.

My crazy cat Theo told me that he had a dream last night that he (AKA ‘little baby’) was enormous, and I shrank extremely small to mass m. Theo turned me into a cat toy by attaching a spring (with some spring constant k) to my back and suspending the spring vertically from a door knob. He held me in his paw such that the spring was not stretched. He lets go, making me oscillate to a max distance of 20cm from the release point. If I oscillate at more than 1 Hz, I will lose my grip and fall into Theo’s giant claws. Are Theo’s dreams of play or homicide?

Baadasssss!

Autographed!
Originally uploaded by subatomicfilms.

The department hosted the legendary Melvin Van Peebles tonight. The man, I can truly say without any hyperbole, is one of the greatest individuals in the history of mankind. A true renaissance man.

His bio just can't even begin to touch on some of the fascinating tales (some of which he brought out tonight).

I mean, he self taught himself how to make movies, moved off to Mexico, moved back to San Francisco where he worked on the city's trolley's wrote a book with photos about his experience. That caused him to move to Holland and work on a PhD in Celestial Mechanics. While there, his shorts got some attention in France so he moved there. Wrote a few books, made a few films. Moved back to States and completely revolutionized the American film industry with 'Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song'. Then moved to New York and became a trader on Wall Street, wrote some Tony award winning plays, wrote some more books, collaborate with some rappers... etc...
completely CRAZY.

But he is a complete original. No bullshit, no pretense just genuine curiosity and passion.

He treated us with an unfinished cut of his new film, literally straight from the editing room. As usual, it had some moments of complete genius.

I played lame fan and got my DVD signed.

Definitely a night to remember.