Tag Archive for guide

Event, TV, Views

Lost in Translation: How Good Anime Goes Bad

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At the MangaNEXT convention, part of the team behind Underbelly ran a panel about bad anime. Specifically, the panel became a discussion between everyone in the room about what, exactly, makes a potentially good anime series go bad in translation.

The discussion routinely brought out three core issues found in bad anime. All involve translating material. While a poor dub and questionable localization can make a series go wrong in the international market, a poor translation from page (manga) to screen can be just as damaging.

The American parallel is simple. Think of comic book movies. How often do we really get solid adaptations of a story telling medium meant to be digested in 20 to 24 page installments? Even if you’re being generous, it’s hard to argue that there’s anywhere near a 50 percent success rate. For every Captain America: The First Avenger and The Dark Knight, there’s a Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance or Green Lantern. We’d be lucky at this point if it balanced out to one good comic book film for every bad comic book film.

Now imagine that issue happening in a print medium where new stories are coming out every week. The creators of manga are on a very tight production schedule to get their stories to market on time. This alone can cause inconsistencies or problems with the story as a larger work.

Take those individual stories and adapt them, week for week, into a TV series. Chances are, you can’t animate exactly what happens on the page. Maybe there isn’t enough material in any one issue to fill 22 minutes of TV time. Maybe the action is too extreme or happens in the background so you can’t focus on those subjects without major changes.

pokemonadventures Lost in Translation: How Good Anime Goes Bad

There are over 400 chapters (stories) in the Pokemon manga and over 700 episodes of the anime.

In the case of a lot of anime, there comes a point where the TV series has to continue when the manga is on break. The most popular manga can afford to go on hiatus for a few months as the creator works out where the story is going. The most popular anime, however, don’t get the same luxury. New stories are invented to fill the gaps left where the manga artist stops working.

These filler arcs can be the most problematic part of anime. The creators of the TV show either have to make stuff up or revisit old topics to keep the series going. This can mean new characters introduced who have no bearing on the plot or episodes that basically retell the same story with slightly different circumstances. Did two characters fight on a mountain? Great. They can have the same fight by the beach or in the woods with slightly different dialogue and actions.

The issue of adaptation is not a novel one for anime. Where the concept of bad anime really gets its common talking points is in the international dubs. US production companies buy the rights to air popular anime programs on TV. At that point, you quickly know if a story will sink or swim in America.

The problem with translating for America is that animation is still mainly viewed as a medium for children. Cartoons are for kids. If an anime has excessive violence, bad language, or adult content, it’s routinely altered to appeal to a much younger demographic.

25720612476175689124003 Lost in Translation: How Good Anime Goes Bad

You won't see this in a 4Kids dub.

The panel at MangaNEXT routinely got drawn back into a discussion of One Piece. This pirate adventure manga and anime series is arguably the most popular property in Japan right now. One Piece characters are used to sell all kinds of products and the series’ presence in the pop culture consciousness is unavoidable in all but the smallest towns. It is a very violent and dark series.

4Kids, the company that previously brought Pokemon and Yu-gi-oh! to America, thought they struck gold with One Piece. They dubbed the series and were eager to premiere it in the US. They also heavily altered the animation, rewrote characters, eliminated important plot points, and acted like the violent war between pirates for domination was a play date at the park.

4Kids was not content to just tone down the violence. Many companies have done that for the US market. They mop out the blood and change death or the afterlife to an alternate dimension.* With the changes 4Kids made, they might as well have animated a brand new show.

Guns were either replaced with less violent weapons or painted to resemble water guns. Any smoking–cigarette or cigar–was wiped away, often leaving a mysterious cloud surrounding the characters. Costumes were redrawn to be less revealing. Blood is non-existent. Alcohol is changed to resemble water or fruit juice. Non-central characters doing violent things are erased completely from the frame. Death becomes jail and any plot involving revenge–a big part of the series–suffers for no longer having a real motivation.

4Kids is one of the rare examples where the meddling became so bad that a company lost the rights to distribute a show internationally. Funimation was left to pick up the pieces and redub One Piece for an American audience. The differences in approach could not be anymore drastic. The new dubs of One Piece actually make sense and restore the original stakes of the series.

Aside from translating and altering content to meet US standards–real or imagined, anime programs are at the mercy of localization issues. For some odd reason, the standard method for translating anime to the US is to change everything to America. Rice balls become donuts. Common gestures are given parallels to American culture and characters say things that go completely against what’s happening onscreen just to sound more local.

The problem is that manga and anime, as media, are deeply rooted in Japanese culture. You take Japan out of the equation and the stories already start to suffer. No, we know that the carefully prepared sushi in the restaurant is not a table full of cheeseburgers. The characters are clearly wearing kimonos, not pajamas, and school uniforms are not the latest style trend that an entire school is wearing by chance. The more the series are shifted away from the daily life and culture of Japan, the more they start to strain their credibility.

Then there is the most tangible aspect of bad anime: the dubbing. Just be thankful at this point that foreign films are available with subtitles if they’re live action. Animation is almost a lost cause if you want to hear the original voices on TV or in theaters.

Dubbing is a tricky prospect because animation on mouth movements are done to match the voice actors. That means, for an effective dub, the words in English have to match the lip movements of the animation cued up to Japanese dialogue.

Underbelly took a good look at this topic last year. The video is NSFW, but it goes into how difficult it is to fill time. These problems can be caused by idioms that don’t translate into English, short phrases that don’t translate nearly as briefly in English, and long phrases that can be handled with only a few words in a dub. And don’t forget how often voice overs are added to explain the animated action onscreen. As in, narration just to add voices to the mix.

Adapting any material from one medium to another is going to pose challenges. Anime just suffers from a lot of meddling by the time it reaches an international audience. Strange things are bound to slip through. It goes from a comic to a TV show, then gets altered and rewritten to appeal to international audiences, followed by dubbing to make the anime sound as domestic as possible wherever you are in the world. The product that reaches America is about as far removed from the original idea as it can be.

When handled properly, a dubbed anime can be an enjoyable thing to watch. That’s rarely the case, especially when the series is targeted toward a younger audience. I know not everyone likes subtitles in anime. I prefer them just so I can hear the original unaltered audio. I may not be able to understand Japanese, but I can understand tone and inflection in a performance.

*That doesn’t make those changes right, but it’s standard practice at this point.

Thoughts? Any other examples? Love to hear them.

Books/Print, Event, News

Comic Book Obscenity Laws; or, the Case of Brandon X

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What do you use to read when you’re traveling? Do you pack up magazines and books or go all digital on your laptop or eReader? Do you ever stop at a shop in the bus station, airport, or train station and pick up a comic to read? An act as benign as carrying a comic book at an international border can be enough to get you in some serious legal trouble.

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund (CBLDF) had a table set up in the main hallway of the MangaNEXT convention. They had stacks of raffle tickets, artwork, pins, and pamphlets to raise awareness and raise money for this very issue. I spent a little bit of time talking to the workers at the table throughout the weekend to find out what was happening.

Brandon X, as he’s being called, is facing serious legal trouble in Canada over comics. Specifically, he had a collection of manga on his laptop. Customs officials in Canada asked to see his cellphone, iPad, and laptop. It is within their rights and jurisdiction to search electronic media at customs. When the customs official saw the wide-eyed child-like style of manga, they interpreted it as child pornography. The CBLDF is not releasing the names of the titles in question, but they plainly state that these were not pornographic titles.

Comic Book Obscenity Laws; or, the Case of Brandon X

The logo for the CBLDF's work on the Brandon X case

Now, Brandon X faces a minimum sentence of one year in prison and having to register as a sex offender for having manga on his laptop. Let that sink in for a minute. A twenty-something guy could have a black mark follow him the rest of his life because a customs official wasn’t familiar with manga art. I can only hope that the trial makes it quite clear how absurd the charges are and Brandon X gets out unscathed.

There are a few takeaways from this incident. One, it is not isolated. Comic artists Tom Neely and Dylan Williams had books they were carrying over the US/Canadian border confiscated last May due to allegedly obscene material. One book featured two first year art students kissing–they looked too much like children–and the other book featured dark humor bordering on horror used as satire–naughty things with corpses. The books were seized and shipped to Ottawa to be examined for an official ruling on whether or not books already published in Canada were obscene material.

The second point is the nature of obscene material. It’s not enough at the US/Canadian border to explain how the wide-eyed characters of traditional manga art are not children. You have to prove, in context, the age of the characters. If they do anything even remotely romantic in nature (like kissing, as Neely and Williams learned), you will face problems caused by the allegedly obscene content. It’s not just child-like characters that can raise eyes of customs agents. Anything that can be deemed obscene–violence, sex, depravity of any kind–can result in legal problems.

The third point is a major one. Until last weekend, I had no idea this happened. Comics are comics, book are books, and so long as they’re published legally, there shouldn’t be a problem, right? Obviously, I was wrong.

initiationofsarah4 Comic Book Obscenity Laws; or, the Case of Brandon X

Is this image from The Initial of Sarah obscene because of the lack of context?

I took a look through my own laptop while working on this piece. In my screengrab folder alone (where I keep all images for online media writing), I found a picture of Homer Simpson tarred and feathered in his underwear, a handful of images featuring the young leads of Super 8 in tight quarters, a composite image of Nicki Minaj that looks childish on one side and overtly sexual on the other, and an entire folder of images of the animated opening sequence of The Happiness of the Katakuris in full eyeball ripping glory. How much of the content on my computer would be deemed obscene when I travel with my work?

What about the volumes on extreme horror and B-movie advertising that accompany me on all but weekend excursions? Are those obscene too? What about the webcomics in my bookmark folder or the archives of my own comic work? Some of those characters look like children even when they aren’t. Would I be facing obscenity charges if I crossed over into Canada today?

What we have with the story of Brandon X are two ways to help change this situation. First, you can give everyone you know a heads up about this issue. Share the CBLDF site, this post, or any information you find on issues of content censorship gone haywire. Knowledge is power and this subject is under-represented all over the place.

Second, you can consider joining to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. The money won’t just be going to Brandon X’s trial costs. It’s used for all aspects of their work. The goals of the CBLDF are to fight censorship and raise awareness of censorship issues facing comic creators and fans alike. The funds are split between legal and educational efforts. Memberships start at $25. You can also donate directly to the CBLDF for a minimum of $5 or purchase donated items from artists and writers in their shop.

The case of Brandon X is not an isolated incident. Unless we work to raise awareness of censorship issues and fight against genre bias, he won’t be the last person to get in trouble for owning a comic book.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Event, Music, Views

Chipocrite Explains Chip Music

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One of the guests at MangaNEXT was Chipocrite (aka Paul Weinstein), a chip music artist. Chip music is an interesting and often misunderstood way of producing music. I avoid the term style for good reason: it’s not one. It’s more of a catchall term for a way of creating music.

Chip music basically uses old computers or video game systems to make music. The most common choice is the Game Boy, though it is not the only option. Software is used to control and manipulate the abilities of the basic sound board to create loops of melodies, rhythm, waves, and effects that stack up to form music. It’s a restrictive medium that results in a lot of creative manipulation to make the music work. Think of it like using a really small synthesizer.

Chipocrite ran two panels at the convention explaining and demonstrating how to make chip music on the Game Boy. He described the process as “problem solving” songwriting and stressed that the process does not involve hacking. There are other music creation methods based in hacking. This is not one of them. Hacking is a possibility, but not really for the music creation process itself.* Think adding a light behind the Game Boy screen so you can play the music live. There’s really no way to expand on the sound capabilities of the system itself.

The software used is called Little Sound DJ. It’s a tracker interface, meaning it’s designed to piece the music together and follow it as it plays. Chip music is primarily a writing medium. It’s possible to perform with the software, but the bulk of the work is planning. What Little Sound DJ does is give you access to the the sound board on the Game Boy.

littlesounddjwave Chipocrite Explains Chip Music

The wave control screen on Little Sound DJ.

Chipocrite did a great job explaining how the control interface worked. The Game Boy has only four possible channels to create sound. Two of them can only go up and down like the notes on a keyboard. These handle the bulk of the melodic duties. The third is the wave channel, which can manipulate sound in any direction. It lets you very quickly bulk up the track with some quirks built into the Game Boy sound system. The fourth is the noise channel. This is static that can be manipulated to sound like drums. It only builds up with chains, loops, and layering from there.

Think of it like this. Do you remember playing games on a Game Boy? Even if a game had a musical score, it was very limited and probably only took up one track. All of the sound–objects, movement, fighting, blips on the menu screen, music, etc.–was built on these four channels. I’ve embedded an example to the right. Once you listen to even a short bit of the Kirby’s Dream Land 2 music, you’ll realize that chip music isn’t hacking. All people like Chipocrite are doing is using the tools that Nintendo themselves put into place to create Game Boy soundtracks.

The more I learned about the process, the more I started to wonder how live performance would actually work. People see chip music performances at concerts, cons, and festivals. What could these musicians do once the the songs are written and ready to go?

Chipocrite was asked about this and kindly improvised a live demo of how he could manipulate his song “I Quit” for a live performance. Forgive the shakiness of the video at first. I arrived to the panel late and didn’t want to cause a further distraction by whipping out the tripod or running around the room for a better vantage point.

How an artist chooses to write, use, and perform chip music is up to them. Chipocrite manipulates the tracks live and has also started to incorporate electric bass into his performances. He also started performing with a band called Cheap Dinosaur that uses chip music a another instrument like drums or guitar. Since the concept of chip music is a tool used to create music, the possibilities seem endless.

*Actually, you could hack the Game Boy to create sounds. You just wouldn’t be able to manipulate them through software anymore. It’s called circuit bending and it’s a discussion for another time.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Books/Print, Event, Views

Everybody’s Welcome: MangaNEXT and Instant Community

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Over the weekend, I had the pleasure of participating in a convention called MangaNEXT. I wasn’t entirely sure what I was getting myself into when I applied for a press badge to this convention. I just knew that the subject interested me.

Manga are Japanese comic books. They cover a wide variety of topics and are targeted to every market imaginable. There are manga for boys, manga for girls, manga for young men, manga for young women, manga for men, manga for women, etc., that all break down into many different subgenres and interests, likes sports, cooking, fantasy, or romance. Traditionally, the new manga start out in magazines. These magazines contain many stories in each weekly or monthly issue. The popular stories are then collected in tankoben, or volumes–small books of an individual title. Think of them like comic book anthologies. You get multiple issues in one book.

While I had an interest in the form and exposure to a few titles, I really did worry about what I was getting myself into. Did I know enough to even get anything out of the convention? Would I recognize any of the guests or cosplay? And most importantly, would I have to say “manga” before figuring out how people were going to pronounce it in this area?*

manganextpressbadgeschedule Everybodys Welcome: MangaNEXT and Instant Community

My credentials and the tankobon-styled convention guide.

Any fears I had dissolved quickly when I showed up to the central office to pick up my press credentials. Before I even had the chance to introduce myself, one of the many MangaNEXT staffers asked me what I was looking for. I was directed to the table where a trio of staffers were finishing up preparations for the press office. They could not have been nicer about greeting me and handling a few last minute details. Within a few minutes, I was presented with my freshly laminated press badge with my name front and center.

The name thing initially struck me as odd. Most conventions I’ve been to just hand out badges categorized by your ticket type. A press badge would just say press, while a one day badge would say one day or the valid day of admission.

Not at MangaNEXT. The purpose of this convention seemed to be fostering a sense of community among manga fans. Why shouldn’t you be able to walk up to someone and introduce yourself? You’re all there for the same reason. The ice breaking is done as soon as you go up the escalator to the heart of the convention.

This concept was confirmed when Ezra, the convention chair for 2012, delivered a lovely tribute to the culture of manga fans during the opening ceremonies. “It’s all about the love of manga and standing together and all the fans [uniting]!” Looking around the room, I could see the variety of people being united by an interest in manga. There were children and adults. There were people in elaborate cosplays and people wearing everyday clothing. No matter what the motivation for attending MangaNEXT was, everyone was welcome.

beatrice Everybodys Welcome: MangaNEXT and Instant Community

This cosplayer doing Beatrice from Umineko no Naku Koro ni gladly posed for photos every few steps she took.

This broad reaching approach resulted in a wide variety of engaging content all weekend long. Of course MangaNEXT had an Artist Alley and a Dealers Room. Most conventions do. And yes, they were packed with fans scoping out good deals on manga, art, autographs, and accessories all weekend long.

What stood apart was the range of panels, workshops, and activities to participate in. You could spend an hour learning about the breadth of apocalypse-themed manga. Maybe you wanted to learn all about paneling your own manga from an art teacher in a workshop that quickly filled to standing room only capacity. Perhaps meeting a variety of international manga artists and having a chance to win one of a kind artwork was more in your wheelhouse. Or maybe you just wanted to show up, dress up, and party all night long. These activities and so much more were readily available throughout the convention.

I unfortunately had to duck out early on Friday for music work, forcing me to miss out on panels about surviving cosplay emergencies, coloring manga, cartoon adaptations of video games, and ballroom dancing. I also knew that I couldn’t do any interviews because I was on call for another production that might have needed a last minute rehearsal during the weekend. I knew that I could not waste any time the rest of the weekend if I was going to get the full experience of the convention. Here’s how my Saturday went down.

I started off with back to back panels run by fans. The first was a loosely moderated discussion about bad anime. The panelists (the creative team behind YouTube series Underbelly) went toe to toe with audience members about how the shows went so wrong in translation and edits. The next panel (members of Disorganization XIII) became an engaging look at the fan fiction community through the lens of literary criticism. Cheekily titled “From Mary Sue to Shakespeare,” the goal was to open a fanfic writer or fan’s eyes to the context of the community as a whole. Both panels really set the tone for the rest of the weekend. As fans, we’re all equal and we all have valid opinions.

From there, I shifted over to the larger panel room for back to back Q&A sessions with Japanese manga artists. Tomo Maeda (Honey Blood; Black Sun, Silver Moon) and Makoto Tateno (Yellow, Romeo/Romeo) were met with a mix of fans, press, and curious con-goers who all had equal opportunities to ask questions and meet the artists. The artists took all of the questions in good humor, from queries about the process of creating manga to personal interests and inspiration.

I knew I wanted to see how the workshops were run, even if I myself had not considered creating manga before. First up was Jen Lee Quick (Off*Beat) doing a Q&A session about selling a manga or comic with a story bible. She generously handed out copies of the original story bible for Off*Beat. She also spent a lot of time engaging with the participants one on one about the creative process and any concerns they had.

creatingmanga Everybodys Welcome: MangaNEXT and Instant Community

Meta manga from a manga convention about creating manga at a manga convention

Lily Hana (Farewell Feeling) ran a workshop called “Creating Manga from Start to Finish.” Instead, it became a workshop for the attendees on whatever they’re interested in. She polled the audience and spent the workshop teaching us all about panel layout in manga. She gave individual feedback on everyone’s storyboards and patiently answered any question thrown at her. She even put up with my nonsense which, in case you can’t tell from my…art(?), was a literal biography of showing up and getting the last seat for that workshop.

As if lessons in creation and easily accessible panels weren’t enough, I also chose to attend a few of the more specialized panels. The guys who run Spiraken Manga Review sped through an hour long panel on post-apocalyptic manga because the schedule fell behind. Their breakdown of different varieties of the apocalypse was still very engaging. Erin Finnegan (Anime News Network) also raced through a panel but for a very different reason. She set out to discuss the wide world of unusual manga genres and schooled the large audience on everything from pachinko manga to educational business school manga.

Saturday night ended with a series of events for the fans. Instead of a traditional Masquerade (think cosplay onstage), MangaNEXT introduced Iron Cosplay. Teams of four were pulled out of the audience to put on manga/convention themed skits. One team had to tell a giant robot story featuring a Final Fantasy hero, Derpy Hooves, a Time Lord, and a ballet dancer. In fifteen minutes, they came up with a crowd pleasing performance about a Time Lord abducting Derpy Hooves and a Final Fantasy hero to fight the evil giant ballet robot destroying the city. The hosts kept the event moving with live dancing and interactivity while the groups prepped their skits.

Now imagine the variety of panels, workshops, and events I didn’t get to at MangaNEXT. I didn’t get a chance to visit the manga library or watch the judging in the Hall of Cosplay. Every time I chose one panel, I was forced to skip two or three other panel events happening at the same time.

communityatmanganext Everybodys Welcome: MangaNEXT and Instant Community

A group of cosplayers start an impromptu meet up at MangaNEXT

Now imagine hundreds upon hundreds of people navigating all these different events. There were people who seemed to unwittingly travel in groups the entire convention and people who never even got to see each other. Strangers joined forces to act out moments from popular manga and anime. People were talking, laughing, and just having a good time with like-minded con-goers.

No matter where I went at MangaNEXT, I was made to feel welcome. It didn’t hurt when a few guests and convention attendees recognized me either from NYCC or, by name alone, from Sketchy Details. But even total strangers who had no idea who I was or what I was doing there were inviting.

All conventions have their own unique feel to them. The events inevitably take on a life and persona of their own. I haven’t felt this comfortable at a convention this large in a long time. MangaNEXT welcomes everybody with open arms.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

*The answer is “mahn-gah,” as what we translate from Japanese as “a” is typically pronounced as “ah.” And yes, that does mean that “ahneemay” is closer to the pronunciation of “anime” than you might typically hear. More importantly, I wasn’t the only person trying to get the word right this weekend.

Film, Reviews

What You Missed: The 84th Annual Academy Awards

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If you don’t have a Twitter account or chose not to join in during the show, you missed 3+ hours of nonstop snark, whining, excitement, and schooling in what these categories actually are. This is why you follow funny and serious entertainment writers on Twitter.

But more importantly, the 84th Annual Academy Awards went off last night in bland style. Billy Crystal did nothing new with his hosting shtick. That means his shtick didn’t get funny until the producers allowed him to start improvising one liners in response to the ceremony. Say what you will about the unfortunate “insert yourself into the movies” montage. I can’t think of another host who is so good with bringing out the pun-filled groaners. Actually, I can’t think of another host in recent memory who actually got the audience to literally groan at groaners.

The big surprises of the night happened in the technical categories. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, suspiciously not nominated for Best Picture despite a slew of nominations, took home Best Editing over The Artist and Hugo. Those two films split the other categories that normally go to the overall winner. Hugo won most of the technical awards–including an upset in Cinematography–while The Artist took Director/Actor/Picture. The last time a film won Best Editing without a Best Picture nomination was The Bourne Ultimatum at the 80th Annual Academy Awards.

Though it had a 1/3 chance, many on Twitter seemed surprised by The Iron Lady picking up Best Makeup. I default to Nathaniel Rogers over at The Film Experience with a refrain he’s made a few times this season. Best equals most in some categories. That un-moving mask of old age and Alzheimer’s disease and a ton of fake teeth is more than a subtle chin/nose/earring cover job and less than flashy CGI. However, this was a year where the Academy swung for practical makeup, not digital makeup, leaving The Iron Lady as the winner of Most Practical Makeup in a Feature Film.

As an aside, if you watched the ceremony and have not seen The Iron Lady yet, you got your first good luck at the deathly visage of old Margaret Thatcher in the film. Do you see why they hid that part from the trailer? It doesn’t look too good. Have you ever seen a Best Makeup nominee not have any photos or video available that show off the flashiest makeup job in the picture? There’s always a first.

394x700jpgcb323298 What You Missed: The 84th Annual Academy Awards

Meryl Streep goes method: be the Oscar; win the Oscar

Speaking of The Iron Lady, I chickened out and went against my instincts in the past few days. On Thursday, I resigned myself to Viola Davis winning for The Help, hoping for the better of the two front runners to win out. However, had I stuck with my nomination day instincts, I would have correctly picked Meryl Streep to surprise.

It’s not really a surprise. Oscar voters love it when well known and well loved actors play real people. What did it take for Julia Roberts, Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, and Sandra Bullock to win Oscars? Real life characters. Whether they deserved to win for those roles is another question. It took real life characters to get them there.

There’s a corollary that makes Meryl’s win even more obvious in hindsight. The Oscar voters also love actresses doing real life characters with radical makeup transformations. Marion Cotillard and Charlize Theron both won for intricate portrayals of real life characters through thick layers of makeup. These performers often have to rely a lot on body language and handling a wide range of physically taxing actions to get recognized in spite of the prosthetics and paint.

Put those together and what do you get? Meryl Streep winning another Oscar for playing a real life character through a lot (tons, really) of makeup. I joke about her inability to really move her face for most of the film, but her physical presentation of the ravages of age done with a consistent body posture from the height of Thatcher to her rapid decline is strong. I just wish the screenplay and direction justified that much work on character development.

As another aside, I went 14/24 with my predictions from the day of the nominations. This was before The Artist started to sweep and The Descendants began picking up a lot of Adapted Screenplay momentum. I also did not want to believe The Help would be an Academy Award winning film, so Spencer did not even factor into my calculations. If I did it again yesterday, I would have gone 17/24 and have been slapping myself for underestimating Hugo in Visual Effects.

What You Missed: The 84th Annual Academy Awards

Ludovic Bource mixing in the studio

To me, the big surprise of the night was learning that Best Original Score winner Ludovic Bource (The Artist) has no formal training. Now I’m wondering what direction he was given to write the music for that film. Was he given a list of references and he just copied the ideas? Did he hunt out scores from silent pictures and get to the ideas himself?

The Artist‘s score is very derivative, which I thought was an homage to the period. Now I’m beginning to wonder if that choice was an accident. They did have to use excerpts from Vertigo for the most modern and serious moment of the film. Was that always the plan or was it a backup out of necessity? I want to give Bource the benefit of the doubt, but the voice over about not having any formal training gives me pause.

Not to say people without formal training can’t write music. Jill Scott can’t even read music and she comes up with beautiful songs in her own way. It’s just, for such a mannered and referential score, did this composer really have the goods to do this on his own? The Artist is the first time Bource composed a score by himself for a narrative feature. He normally has a co-writer or only contributes one song. It’s an odd issue to get hung up on, I know, but it’s one that sticks out for me.

But more importantly, here are five things we got instead of performances by the Best Original Song nominees.

  1. Emma Stone hamming it up for the length of “Man or Muppet” about her first time presenting at the Academy Awards.
  2. Billy Crystal joking about how much money was wasted on building a large projection orchestra score prop for the music categories.
  3. Zach Galifankis and Will Ferrell doing shtick with cymbals and white tuxedos to introduce the Original Song nominees.
  4. Five minutes of Cirque do Soleil paying tribute to movies nominated fifty years ago for Oscars.
  5. Gwyneth Paltrow and Robert Downey Jr. joking about live documentaries for the length of “Real in Rio.”

Dear Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences,

I know you’ll never revamp that horrid Original Song scoring system. Just kill the category at this point. I promise you the music people who watch will get over it. Bring back adapted song score and relax about the inclusion of a minute or two preexisting material in otherwise original scores.

Thanks in advance,

Robert

In conclusion, the Oscar telecast did one thing amazingly well. When last year’s Best Actor and Best Actress winners took the stage to introduce this year’s nominees, it was beautiful. Watching each nominee get a moment to be recognized on live TV made all the nonsense worth it. Consider cutting back on filler and actually taking the time to say nice things about all of the nominees in every category.

People won’t be talking about Saving Face today. They’ll be talking about how funny the Bridesmaids cast was introducing the nominees for Documentary Short. Make the event a celebration of film artists and the whole ceremony will have a lot more worth than just a statue or a line on a DVD/Blu-ray box.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Music, Views

Evolution: “I’ll Take Care of You” by Bobby Bland to “Take Care” by Drake feat. Rihanna

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How far down the rabbit hole have we gone if artists like Florence + The Machine are covering a song by Drake? A song that is adapted from a dance remix of a cover of a blues standard by Gil Scott-Heron? How about if the song has now spawned a new version where Gil Scott-Heron is reintroduced into a song that Drake covered without much other change? This is where the story of Drake’s single “Take Care” ends for now. The song was officially released as his fourth single off his second studio album Take Care last Tuesday and is starting to make headway in the charts.

The story starts fifty-two years ago. Brook Benton is a rising star in the music industry. He’s a singer/songwriter who began working for Mercury Records. He just released his most successful singles to date, “It’s Just a Matter of Time” and “Endlessly.” He writes a new song around 1960 called “I’ll Take Care of You” that just tugs at the heartstrings.

It’s a declaration of love and protection over a small blues ensemble. A piano, drum kit, electric organ, some strings, and a guitar fight against a very smooth vocal. The organ is the singer’s inner monologue confirming his desire to do everything right in a relationship. Any doubt disappears when the organ kicks in. Bobby Bland, a touring blues musician on the brink of success, records the original version of the song. It only reaches #89 on the Billboard charts, but it makes enough of an impact to be covered again and again. You can listen to the original version of the track here.

Flash forward to 2010. Gil Scott-Heron releases his final album I’m New Here featuring a cover of “I’ll Take Care of You.” He really gets into the blues feel of the song. The backing band–synth strings, real strings, drum kit, piano–keeps the rhythm while Scott-Heron feels his way through the meaning of the song. His understanding of the style of the piece is remarkable. He gets a lot of emotion out of a grumbling bass vocal that seemingly doesn’t care where the band is. Gil Scott-Heron is so caught up in the song that nothing will stop him from getting his message across at his pace.

In 2011, Jamie xx releases a remix album of Gil Scott-Heron’s I’m New Here called We’re New Here. Jamie xx modernizes the blues standard without minimizing the strength and impact of Scott-Heron’s recording. He sets the meandering vocal in time with the more upbeat dance backing while paying tribute to the more dynamic organ style of the Bobby Bland original.

Perhaps most intriguing about this track, now called “I’ll Take Care of U,” is the almost-Latin breakdown at the bridge. Jamie xx takes the chorus of “I’ll Take Care of U” and breaks it apart into a salsa beat. The result is a crazy moment that sounds like it was ripped out of a Pitbull track rather than based in a blues song. It takes a special kind of DJ/producer to reinvent a song this much and make it work.

It just so happens that Jamie xx and Drake are friends. Drake decided he wanted to include a cover of “I’ll Take Care of U” on his second studio album. Reworked with new verses, the song is now called “Take Care.” Drake and Rihanna take turns rerecording Gil Scott-Heron’s vocals as reworked by Jamie xx. The result is a fifty-two year old song taking on a brand new meaning. It’s no longer one person’s unrequited declaration of unyielding affection. Now it’s a song of commitment in a relationship. Both members are present and they’re both on the same page. It’s a lovely and unexpected twist on what became a Blues classic.

And that’s how you go from a poor-performing blues track from 1960 to a hip-hop track with enough resonance that artists are willing to cover it on live TV appearances.


Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Film, Views

Anatomy of a Jump Scare; Or, The Woman in Black goes BOO!

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I saw The Woman in Black last night for my reviews over at TYCP. They seem to be updating monthly, which means a big batch of reviews will probably go up next week.

stillfromthewomaninb006 Anatomy of a Jump Scare; Or, The Woman in Black goes BOO!

Jump scares abound in The Woman in Black

One thing stuck out for me like nothing else: the jump scares. That film’s entire shaky foundation is built not on plot but on the efficacy of the jump scare. For some people, a horror film is automatically good if it can make people squirm, jump, or scream during a screening. I think that’s a misguided look at the genre at best. However, a good jump scare can be the crown jewel in a solid horror film.

If you’re not sure what I mean by a jump scare, perhaps it’s best to define by example. Arguably the first jump scare in horror cinema happened in Cat People, one of my favorite films of all time. A woman is walking down a dark and empty street. She becomes convinced that someone is following her. She walks faster, trying to escape whatever she thinks is behind her. She pauses long enough to catch her breath and BAM!–jarring unexpected change of events onscreen.

Even without knowing the full context of the film, the scene is startling. That is the blessing and the curse of the jump scare. Chances are, if you catch the audience off guard, you will scare them. A cat jumping out of a dark hallway or a ghastly apparition appearing in a mirror is going to cause a reaction. But if you have no substance beyond the jump scares, you’re doing nothing but jumping out of a closet and screaming “BOO!” for ninety-plus minutes like a four year old.

The problem with The Woman in Black is that director James Watkins is all too good at creating a jump scare. He’s so good at it, he doesn’t really do anything else. How he layers the jump scares once the horror element takes over the film is remarkable. He just opts not to do anything with the plot or characters beyond the boiler plate of the story. Yes, we know Daniel Radcliffe plays a widower/lawyer who has to take care of paperwork in a deceased client’s haunted house. And? Anything else? Anything? Bueller? No. That’s it.

Yet, despite its lack of narrative and character development, The Woman in Black has been getting disproportionately good reviews. It’s the “I was scared, therefore it’s a good horror film” syndrome that gives more nuanced horror films a bad name. Many people still think that horror only exists to scare and any plot or character development is secondary to the specter screaming “BOO!” in that dark closet.

When used correctly in the context of a solid film, a jump scare is a potent weapon in the horror filmmaker’s arsenal. There are certain elements that are almost always present in a jump scare that all but guarantee success.

First, there’s a music or sound cue. You would think telegraphing the scare with music/sound would hurt its efficacy. It doesn’t. The point of the score/sound design in that moment is to set you up for…well, you don’t know. It could be nothing. It could be another character coming in. It could be an attack or a flicker of lights or the beloved pet of the main character hopping out of a room. The music/sound plants the seed of the terror yet to come.

Second, there’s a tightly controlled camera. The object of this is to make you think everything is safe even when the music lets you know it’s not. If you can see everything in frame, where could the jump scare possibly come from?

Third, there’s a pause in the action. Everything becomes too calm for its own good. You know as soon as that character stops moving or the camera comes to a halt that something–anything–will happen.

Fourth is the scare itself. At this point, if you’ve done everything right, you could have a paper airplane hit the central character and get a jump scare. It’s not the cause of the scare but unexpected arrival that puts the audience out of its seats for that fraction of a second.

27632565 Anatomy of a Jump Scare; Or, The Woman in Black goes BOO!

The central character must react to the jump scare to cement its impact.

The most important element is the fifth element: the follow-through. It’s not enough for the jump element to flicker into frame and disappear. That’s too subtle to put the audience on edge. If you miss it, you’re out of luck. The best jump scares see the central character reacting in some way. You see the scare happen, then you see how the scare effects the central character. If it’s just their pet cat playing ninja, they’ll scoop the kitty up, scruff up its neck, and send it on its way. If it’s the film’s villain, they’ll recoil in horror, jump back, or try to get the image out of their head.

How the character reacts is not as important as having a reaction. The tone could shift suddenly–a character laughing would put the audience at ease while a character writhing in terror would ratchet up the tension–but the jump scare will have been cemented as effective. The reaction even forces the viewers who missed the jump to react to what happened onscreen. They know something bad happened because the character is responding in a different way to her surroundings.

From there, the director either throws another jump at the audience or continues the action from where it left off. The Woman in Black chooses the former approach for a solid twenty minutes of running time. That sequence is the highlight of the film and does wonders to wipe away the bad memories of the dull first half of the film where nothing happens.

Perhaps the most famous example of this approach comes from Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. Little Danny is riding around the hotel on his big wheel. He turns the corner as the music swells and BAM!–creepy twins appear out of nowhere. Does Kubrick let it rest on the sudden appearance of the ghostly figures? No. He turns the knife in the psychological wound four times before he pulls out of the scare.

In some circles, jump scares have a bad reputation. There’s a good reason for this. All too often in big studio pictures, the jump scare is the only scare. The films don’t even do anything new. How often have you seen a recent film where the cat jumps out into the hallway or the crow/raven flies in through the window/attack/fireplace? Too often. And did those films do anything else to scare the audience? No.

The jump scare is not a substitute for substance in a horror film. It is a tool to enhance the overall work. The Woman in Black does enough novel things with the device to temporarily cover for a lack of plot, but it all too quickly falls back into the limp puddle of dreary style over any substance that made the first half of the film a chore to sit through.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Film, Views

Breaking It Down: 84th Annual Academy Awards: Best Makeup

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You never know what you’re going to get when the Oscars narrow down the field for Best Makeup. I broke down a lot of the specifics over at The Film Experience a few months ago. I also bet heavy on whimsy and nostalgia in my predictions and was dead wrong.

The final nominees are Albert Nobbs, The Iron Lady, and Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows: Part 2. It seems 2011 was a year that the Academy valued three elements above all else: transformation, realistic injuries, and hair.

firstharrypotteranddeat Breaking It Down: 84th Annual Academy Awards: Best Makeup

Reinventing characters in battle scores Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 a nomination.

With the exception of The Iron Lady, the three nominees really did put a lot of narrative emphasis on a good and realistic trickle of blood from an injury. In order to preserve the surprise of those superb effects, I will leave that aspect of the nomination like this: horror directors could learn a lot from watching a high-button period fantasy and a modern epic fantasy film. Less is more when it comes to gore and the goo should never overpower the rest of the narrative.

More important was the creation of realistic full body transformations through practical makeup effects. Albert Nobbs uses a lot of interesting practical makeup effects to transform the two women disguised as men. Prosthetics were formed of the ears to cover the piercings of Glenn Close and Janet McTeer. They each received nose and chin prosthetics to angle out their faces more. The rest was a deft hand with painting to show the damage of years of hard work on the two women’s faces.

The Iron Lady did three sets of full prosthetic transformations for the Thatchers in three different time periods. Each time, the actors portraying the married couple really did look just like Margaret and Denis Thatcher. The nose and teeth appliances for the pair didn’t change much throughout the film. The final transformation, however, of Meryl Streep into the elderly Margaret is breathtaking (until you realize her face can’t move). The old age makeup looked real. Aging an actor that much is an extraordinary challenge. Visually, there were no flaws in that design.

With Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2, the key is that big transformation scene. Ron Weasley is done up with a strong beard and a bit of painting to look like one of Bellatrix’s assistants. When the characters all return to their original forms, their faces are disheveled from the rapid transformation. Add in all the new werewolves, warlocks, ghosts, and mythical creatures fighting on both sides and you see where transforming characters and actors alike would be recognized.

albertnobbsmiawasikowsk Breaking It Down: 84th Annual Academy Awards: Best Makeup

Subtlety and realism nets Albert Nobbs acclaim.

Hair design was key to the makeup transformations in all three films. In Albert Nobbs, Glenn Close and Janet McTeer done superb short wigs to define their character. Albert’s perfectly set coiffe is immediately put at odds with the wild stringy hair of Hubert. That’s not even getting into the elaborate hair designs of the Mrs Baker and the illustrious guests of the hotel.

In The Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher is defined by her hair. The early curls of the former Miss Roberts give way to the shorter, more encased designed of Prime Minister Thatcher. In her modern state, the hair is grayed, unkempt, and thinning. The hair is battered and bruised as her life goes one, telling her story better than anyone else in the film even dares to try.

The challenge with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 is figuring out what, exactly, the Academy considered new. Surely Hermoine’s surprisingly thick curls after transforming back from her impersonation of Bellatrix LaStrange count for something. Same as the calm and relaxed–perfectly white–hair and beard of Dumbledore from beyond the grave. A new ghost emerges with a unique hairstyle and all the major characters are shown with their hair disheveled from an unending night of battles. Most of the new elements come not from character creation but character reinvention in the face of war.

Breaking It Down: 84th Annual Academy Awards: Best Makeup

Three pairs of facial prosthetics win The Iron Lady a nomination.

Collectively, the three films really did focus on practical effects. Harry Potter, of course, used its digital wizardry to finish off Voldemort and processing to turn the new ghost transparent, but the rest was laid by hand. It’s refreshing to see a field of nominees that are driven by practical, not digital, makeup.

My prediction is The Iron Lady winning because more is sometimes mistaken for better. My personal preference is Albert Nobbs because the work is so subtle and believable.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Film, Views

Breaking it Down: 84th Annual Academy Awards: Best Original Song

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Last year, I went into painstaking detail to explain how the voting in Best Original Song works. Essentially, all music branch voters watch all of the eligible songs and score them from 6 to 10. Songs need to score higher than 8.25 to qualify. If no song scores that high, the category is skipped. If one song scores that high, it and the next highest scoring song are the nominees.

At this point, I think they should just get rid of Best Original Song at the Oscars. I can think up more than five songs that easily deserved recognition off the top of my head from 2011 films: “Marcy’s Song”* in Martha Marcy May Marlene, “Life’s a Happy Song” from The Muppets, “Man or Muppet”^ from The Muppets, “Real in Rio”^ from Rio, “Never be Daunted” from Happythankyoumoreplease, “Star Spangled Man” from Captain America: The First Avenger, “Lay Your Head Down” from Albert Noobs, “So Long”* from Winnie the Pooh, and “Another Earth”* from Another Earth. Of these, the songs with asterisks didn’t even get screened for the Academy and the songs with carrots are the nominees.

Yes, it’s true. Only two songs were deemed worthy of an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song. More than likely, only one song scored 8.25, allowing the next highest scoring song to join it on the final ballot. Not to take anything away from these two songs (they’re strong nominees), but there were so many narratively significant songs in films this year that there easily should have been five nominees.

Take, for instance, the title song from Another Earth. A man who has no recollection of the car accident that killed his wife and son has fallen in love with the young woman responsible for the accident. He takes her to the university performance hall he used during his tenure as a music professor and plays an original song inspired by her. It’s a huge moment in the film, absolutely essential to the story, and the music branch decided that it wasn’t significant enough to even make the long list.

Or take “Marcy’s Song” from Martha Marcy May Marlene. Talk about essential to the story of the film. The song is how the cult leader convinces Martha to stay at his commune. He woos her in song and she falls head over heels for the charismatic leader. This song made the long list, but did not make the shortlist for the music branch voting.

If, in a year where critics were forced to discuss the use of original songs in many films, the Academy cannot use its strange nomination process to get more than the bare minimum of nominees in Original Song, then what’s the point in having the category any longer? There have never been enough musicals released in a year to kick in the complimentary prize Original Musical Score (since the latest iteration of that prize was added to the possible Oscar categories). Why even pretend that there’s a reason to honor vocal songwriting anymore if the voters do not believe that there are more than two or three worthwhile songs for the past few years? It’s a waste of time and resources at best and an insult to the hardworking songwriters at worst.

The only good thing I can say about the choice of two nominees this year is that the two songs are actually used in significant ways in their respective films. These aren’t the songs that play over the closing credits (although, used properly, those can be quite an effective way to bring catharsis to the audience). These are the songs that drive their respective stories forward.

The first nominee is “Man or Muppet” from The Muppets, written by Bret McKenzie. Walter, who has spent his entire life living among humans, and his brother Gary, a human obsessed with everything Muppets, are forced to choose if their loyalty to The Muppets is more important than their relationships with family and friends. It’s a highlight of The Muppets because of the mock-music video staging and fantastic sight gags. The song itself is a strong introspective rock ballad spinning the “Man or Muppet” concept in an interesting direction. It’s the eleventh hour anthem of a film that refuses to just be a full blown musical like it should be.

The second nominee is “Real in Rio” from Rio, written by Sergio Mendes, Carlinhos Brown, and Siedah Garret. It’s the big opening number for a film that has a surprisingly strong score. It introduces the Brazilian rhythms that dominate the score, shows off the birds, and gets you excited for the rest of the film. It’s quite a clever composition that would be at home in a stage show. It’s the “Bonjour” from Beauty and the Beast or “Tradition” from Fiddler on the Roof. “Real in Rio”‘s purpose is to let the audience know the tone of the film, how the music will work, and what the story is going to focus on. It’s an old-fashioned film/musical scoring technique used to great effect here.

Here’s where the category gets strange. If more voters just listen to both songs, “Real in Rio” could easily win. It’s a flashier song that stands up by itself better than “Man or Muppet.” If more voters watch the films to see the context, “Man or Muppet” could easily win. Its narrative purpose is stronger and it’s a much more engaging scene than the big bird dance number of Rio.

Both films are only nominated for Original Song and both films fared will with critics. Rio grossed almost twice as much money at the box office domestically, but The Muppets came out more recently. It’s really a toss up as neither of these songs were favored by critics groups or major precursors for Original Song nominations. I’d bet on “Real in Rio” pulling a surprise win just because it’s more exciting out of context.

In conclusion, I believe we can all agree that this category needed more “Star Spangled Man.”

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

News, Web

Stop SOPA/PIPA

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Regretsy, one of my favorite humor sites, might win the award for best Anti-SOPA/PIPA campaign for the scheduled 18 January blackout protests.

regretsysopa Stop SOPA/PIPA

A satirical take on the intrusive SOPA/PIPA legislation.

An exaggeration of the SOPA/PIPA legislation? Barely. And that’s the scary part about this proposed legislation to censor the Internet.

I am a huge supporter of Intellectual Property Rights law. I believe that the United States does a poor job of upholding existing legislation and educating people on what IPR law is. Essentially, IPR refers to a series of laws protecting works of the mind. It’s easy enough to stop someone from stealing a television set from a department store. It’s much harder to stop someone from stealing a work of art.

How does this theft occur? Have you ever streamed a TV program off of an unlicensed site (essentially anything that isn’t the channel’s homepage, Hulu, or Netflix)? You broke IPR law. Have you ever downloaded a big Hollywood movie from a website? You broke IPR law. Did you ever find the perfect photo for your website, scrubbed away the watermark in Photoshop, and claimed it as your own? You broke IPR law.

Essentially, IPR laws are designed to protect creators of content the way larceny laws protect department stores from theft. Unfortunately, for a long time now, the government has been swayed by large entertainment companies to mutate the original intentions of IPR laws. Companies like Disney fought for an extension of the protection period when their earliest and most successful creations, like Mickey Mouse, were going to fall into the public domain.

Instead of allowing creative people to invent, design, and develop original ideas without the threat of them being stolen in their lifetime, IPR laws now protect corporate interests for at least 95 years after their work is originally published. That means the latest album from a manufactured pop act won’t fall into the public domain until long after most of us are dead; that is also, probably, long after anyone has any interest in using the material on the album for new work.

Apparently, outlasting all but the humans who reach the oldest age isn’t enough for large corporations like Rupert Murdoch’s Newscorp or Apple. Now, they’re trying to strong-arm the US government into censoring the Internet.

Indeed, the US government should be doing more to battle online piracy. It’s a serious problem that helps no one. There is no way the quality of the programs is anywhere near their original broadcast or projected level when downloaded off of some backalley pirating site.

Instead of pressuring the government to do more, they’re pushing for legislation that could, effectively, kill any dissenting voices on the Internet. Here’s how SOPA/PIPA would actually work in two different examples.

1) Someone uploads Haywire to a website and encourages people to download the entire film. Relativity Media issues a take-down notice with the government and the person’s website is shut down through the server. A message appears on the website to anyone trying to visit it letting the visitor know the site has violated IPR law and has been shut down according to SOPA/PIPA. The site cannot go up again until the owner proves they are not in violation of IPR law.

2) Someone writes an unfavorable review of Haywire on their website. It goes viral. Relativity Media issues a take-down notice with the government claiming the writer is violating their IPR. The government shuts down the website through the server. A message appears to anyone visiting the website that the writer broke IPR law and the site has been shut down according to SOPA/PIPA. It is now the writer’s responsibility to prove they broke no IPR law in order to ever have their site restored.

The first example is what the supporters of the legislation says will happen. The second example is what will start to happen under the provisions of SOPA/PIPA. How?

Simple. SOPA/PIPA puts the burden of proof on the accused. The accusers only have to file paperwork claiming their is an IPR violation for a site to be shut down. They don’t have to prove anything. The violation could be a spambot posting a link to a piracy website, a commenter posting a stolen image in the comments section, an actual IPR violation by the site owner, or the crime of following fair use policies for negative commentary.

Fair use is not defined by the context of the use but the content. It is fair use to use a screengrab of a film or an excerpt of a novel in a review. It is not fair use to stream an entire album or upload an episode of a TV show to your website without permission.

Unfortunately, according to SOPA/PIPA, if you mention a copyrighted work, you could be shut down if the owner of the copyright doesn’t like your tone. I’ve been barred from free tickets for a production company’s Broadway shows because I wrote a negative review off of a free ticket. If SOPA/PIPA passes, I could be shut down for using the images they provided to me or even just mentioning the name of their show because they don’t like my review.

Forget about the world of bloggers for a moment. SOPA/PIPA will likely shut down sites that protesters in Internet-censored nations like China use to provide real information about government policies and protests to the world. SOPA/PIPA will shut down search engines for daring to include sites that might have IPR violations in their search engines. SOPA/PIPA will shut down Wikipedia for using images from political rallies and writing criticism of a political candidate.

SOPA/PIPA is not really about IPR law. It’s about controlling the spread of information. If you want to be able to freely discuss media, news, and events on the Internet, you have to contact your congressional representative and senator and tell them to stop supporting SOPA/PIPA. SOPA is on hold in Congress but PIPA is still being debated by the Senate. Both bodies are willing to change the language to skirt by or slap their choice legislation into something guaranteed to pass, like Medicare legislation or defense spending bills.

Unless you want to wake up to an Internet where you can’t access anything that isn’t PR spin, you need to take action against SOPA/PIPA.

Music, Views

The Calculated Dubstep Invasion

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The music industry, at large, is trying to make Dubstep fetch for a wide audience in America. It’s one of those dance genres that people know by sound because it’s difficult to describe. Essentially, dubstep is layered dance tracks remixed to be highly syncopated. It typically uses big manipulated/processed bass lines and tiny little snippets of recognizable samples. The intended result, near as I can tell, is to get the listener to move.

After the unexpected Best New Artist nomination for Skrillex, I had to start digging around. Sure enough, the calling card effects of dubstep are starting to be tossed at Top 40 club-friendly acts to make them more appealing.

Flo Rida’s new single uses the digital processing typically reserved for bass manipulation on the vocal sample used as the hook. Skip ahead to 2:40 and you’ll hear a full-blown dubstep breakdown replacing a bridge on the song.

Rihanna’s new single is also pulling in some dubstep elements. Around the 2:30, you hear some strange syncopated synth rhythms start bouncing around an otherwise typical reggae-kissed Rihanna single.

Dubstep remixes are starting to get radio play during CHR/Top 40 shows where the DJ is allowed to mix the tracks. I’ve been hearing a lot of this “Till the World Ends” by Britney Spears feat. Nicki Minaj remix when stuck in traffic on a Friday night.

So what would be the ultimate end game for this attempt to push dubstep onto the masses? Actually promoting dubstep artists. It’s all well and good to go touristing in another genre for that new sound. Remember the dance hall craze a few years ago? It’s even better if a new trend can help the people who have made their careers in the genre.

Dubstep artists are in demand for remixes and have been for years. Britney Spears, La Roux, and a bunch of other artists get deconstructed and transformed into something new when official remixes come out. Shoot. I just wrote about the Remixed, Non-Classical category at the Grammy Awards and there’s dubstep aplenty in there.

Is it possible for a dubstep song to take off as a standalone crossover single? I’m not sure. People like a hook to be able to sing along with and you don’t get that in dubstep. What you do get is a very unique and recognizable mostly-instrumental track that could crossover to music video play on the mainstream networks. There is no reason why MTV2 or Fuse can’t start sprinkling in dubstep videos into their playlists.

Well, there is a good reason. Dubstep artists rarely get music videos. They release their tracks and they perform live. That, combined with remixing and DJ gigs, is their source of income. Maybe labels will be willing to take a chance on promoting a dubstep artist for Top 40 crossover if this trend really takes off in a big way.

Thoughts? Love to hear them.

Music, Views

Grammy Award for Best Remixed Recording, Non-Classical

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A sign that your awards ceremony has too many categories? It takes someone who loves strange awards 13 years to discover an interesting category exists.

Believe it or not, the now titled Best Remixed Recording, Non-Classical category has been on the books since 1998, when no specific song was nominated. It was a category honoring people who remix songs professionally. In 2002, the category began specifying which recording was nominated.

The category caught my eye this year because of Skrillex’s nomination for Best New Artist. It seems that, slowly but surely, what I’ll refer to as Dance music has gained a big foothold in the academy. With new categories come new waves of voters, allowing lesser-known Dance artists like MGMT and Skrillex the chance to get some mainstream recognition.

This year’s nominees are worth taking a look at to get a feel for the category. While I’m not a fan of some decisions–like eliminating gender-specific performance categories entirely–made this year in reducing the bloat of the Grammys, a trimmer awards ceremony allows more categories to shine. Lots of embeds below the jump.

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Music, News

Going Gaga for Laurieann Gibson

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Last week, news broke that long-time Lady Gaga collaborator Laurieann Gibson was fired. The reasons have yet to be officially announced and we’ll never know the whole truth. Some reports say she was fired for comments on Twitter defending her work. Others say she was fired for expressing negative opinions on the set. Others say that she magically transformed into an uncompromising diva stereotype because she got her own reality TV show. I believe that a combination of these factors might have resulted in Gibson’s replacement.

While I’m not ready to sound the death knell for Lady Gaga’s career because of this, I would be foolish not to point out how influential Gibson’s choreography and conception of Gaga has been on Lady Gaga’s success. I’ve read some write-ups of the news that suggested Gibson contributed nothing memorable or iconic to Gaga’s artistic identity. That’s a seriously short-sighted view of the influence of Gaga’s only choreographer as a dance act. It’s even more short-sighted when you realize that Lady Gaga is not a particularly gifted dancer.

The most iconic choreography is seen in the “Bad Romance” video. No one performs “Bad Romance” in the original style without the broken down unnatural looking choreography.

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Theater, Views

Everything You Need to Know about the Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark Lawsuit

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Here we go again. The troubled production of Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, currently taking in over $1million a week on Broadway but now assumed to have cost $75million to produce is in the headlines again. This time, Julie Taymor has officially filed a lawsuit against everyone who was ever involved in the book of the show. Why? They haven’t paid her and they broke her contract.

Here is everything you need to know about this lawsuit that might make have some interesting repercussions for future troubled productions (you know there will be more).

1: The Lawsuit is Not Frivolous

If you think breaking a contract with a writer is a frivolous lawsuit, you are mistaken. If you think stealing copy-written material is a legal action, you, too, are mistaken.

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