Sufficient Cynic

Connecticut has been socked, again, by some behemoth of a snow storm, this time going by the name of "Denis".  I thought it was only supposed to be about half a foot, which at this point, seems like the equivalent of an inch.  I would have leapt around like some quarantined leper suddenly set free had it only been six inches.  As it stands, I walked out the door, sloshed through some newly melting snow and simply stared at my plowed in car.  When the snow is packed in up to the windows, I just don't even know where to start.  To fight through the frustration, I like to imagine that after this horrific winter is over, I'll get to finally have a fantastic year, including trips to places that are sunny in February and March, and perhaps some outdoor music festivals where I actually get to stay out in the night and it's a balmy 68 degrees, listening to fantastic music.  I feel like this is a song I would hear at  one of my imaginary festivals.  It's about the onl…

It may sound odd, but I received the soundtrack to "Il Postino (The Postman)" as a birthday present when I was in my early teens.  I had never heard of Pablo Neruda, and, to be honest, I'm not even sure I had seen the film at that point.  But Neruda's words have since turned my head inside out and upside down with their beauty.  In a world where it's sometimes difficult to find the simple elegance of language, Neruda's poems make it easy.  I still sometimes find it difficult to believe that anyone could see the world this way, but every time I listen to this soundtrack, or read some of his poetry I'm so thankful that he did.

Matt Nathanson is usually an earworm for me anyway.  I've been into him since I first met him when I was on the Student Programming Council at Marist (yeah, I WAS that awesome) and have listened to him on and off in intense phases over the years.  He always reminds me of a time when things weren't what they are now.  I downloaded his most recent album, Some Mad World weeks before I went to India in 2008 and it was pretty much my soundtrack to my 3 months there.  His songs aren't always happy, but they're always comforting to me.  This one I just like singing really loudly in the car to and the title describes the way this week has felt.  Sorry for the overdramatics, but it has just been, one of those weeks, for lack of more description.

The video's a little artsy, but I love the song enough to let it pass.  My recommendation, listen to it first with your eyes closed and then watch the video.  I'm thinking you'll listen to this song more than once:

I've just finished watching Pirate Radio for the second time (I was one of the few who saw it in theaters, I think and the second time I have HBO to thank).  I've been meaning to buy it for a while, but due to my extensive Amazon wish list have been rather slow in getting to it.  A few weeks ago I had asked the question "what's the greatest film soundtrack?" and had several great suggestions.  If you have an additional suggestion, feel free to comment here, I don't want anyone to feel left out.  But Pirate Radio has to go on the list somewhere.
I've long had faith in Richard Curtis.  People scoff at the romantic-comedy genre, a genre which has seemingly just gotten worse once it was officially shortened to "romcom" a move for which I almost entirely blame Ashton Kutcher, but for a while from the late 80s until the early 2000s, some romantic comedies were quite good.  Richard Curtis wrote Notting Hill (don't lie you know you've watched i…

I would appreciate anyone's help with this.  After watching the last episode of "24/7 Penguins/Capitals: Road to the NHL Winter Classic" (which is what all cool people do on Saturday nights, duh!) I've come to two conclusions:  I will never understand why I like film and televised shows ABOUT hockey and rarely watch the NHL myself and I KNOW I've heard this music somewhere else before.

It came on around the 37/38 minute mark and I literally stopped everything and searched for about an hour and a half.  I mean, after all, that's what I literally get paid to do.  I couldn't find playlists anywhere.  HBO only has the episode 1 playlist up so far, and I actually couldn't rest knowing that this mystery song lay somewhere out there in the great beyond, but still hidden from me.  I stumbled across a website that had several songs that the "24/7" series uses regularly and started taking some chances by putting the song names into Youtube.  I found a…

Even if it is technically the wrong day of the week.  Today was my personal Monday, so I get to have this song stuck in my head; plus does anything say "rainy day" more metaphorically than the first day back to work after a holiday?

On the surface, Rabbit Hole should be one of those movies that you should only see once in your life, mostly out of fear and necessity.  The premise sounds like it should be one of those movies that's only loved because it's important , but in reality, after seeing once your heart, or maybe your soul can't bear to be torn apart like that again.  I feel this way about several movies, perhaps most recently Revolutionary Road.  Sam Mendes 2008 contribution to the Academy awards was certainly full of fantastic performances and brilliant cinematography, but let's face facts, it also packs a wallop.  It's not just depressing, it seems to me to stealthily point out how everyday life slowly beats our dreams into submission.  It's not a feeling that I would want to sink into repeatedly.  In fact, I'm pretty sure that they are prescriptions available to help cope with that feeling, mainly Zoloft.  I'm getting sidetracked though; I don't want anyone to think t…

This song didn't lodge itself into my head the way these things normally happen, or maybe it did, I don't know.  I was listening to a random I-pod playlist on the way home, one I hadn't heard in a while, and this song came on.  I remember the first time I heard it was on So You Think You Can Dance (commence mocking if you must, but that show makes looking forward to summer even more necessary).  It was played during some boy's audition and I just remember getting phantom punched in the sternum.  Painful, yes, but also kind of great.  It's not your typical fast-paced or catchy chorus, and I'm sure this won't be for everyone, but hope those who like it will eventually find themselves with a future earworm.

The best part about the new year's is the amount of lists that can be produced.  "Best of" lists, "Worst of" lists, "Lists of" lists.  Alright, so the last one I made up, but don't be surprised if that becomes a buzz phrase of 2011, I'm calling it right now.  Since I'm still feeling motivated (in fairness it is only the 22nd hour of New Year's day, but I'm feeling good about 2011) here are a couple of lists I've come up with for digital posterity's sake.

The Year that Was (2010):

Top 5 Movies:

1. Inception
2. The Social Network
3. Black Swan
4. True Grit
5. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt. 1 (in all fairness, there was a good likelihood that as long as David Yates made something closely resembling a movie this was going to make the list)

Top 5 Singles: Essentially the songs that I heard the first time and said to myself, "If I don't download this immediately, my life will be slightly missing something."

…