Friday Random Ten

Busy day ahead, to my surprise. Lots of tiny things just piled up until I had to deal with them today, and no later.

But first, a cup of coffee, check the email, and shuffle the iPod (now at 20,140 songs - just added the 10 songs of the most recent Sparks album, Hello Young Lovers - which is GREAT, this morning). Hope it's some exciting music this morning, I need to get pumped . . .


1. "Don't Start Me Talkin'" - New York Dolls - In Too Much Too Soon

For just a moment, I thought it was "Pills" from their first album. Okay, they pretty much have one sound. But it's a great sound and no one else has got it quite right since.


2. "Il Est 5h. Paris S'eveille" - Jacques Dutronc - L'Essentiel Dutronc

Love that Jacques. What odd stylistic range he goes through . . . hard rock to the lightest of pop fluff to folky ballads (like this) to strange electronica. I like that his lyrics are usually in simple enough French that I can follow over 50% of them, and struggle at the rest -- makes me work at trying to get my French better.


3. "My Body" - General Strike - Obey The New Wave (1980 and all that - UK DIY etc.)

Great little percussive/electronic/odd vocal track from a great little comp of similar Brit post-punk singles from mostly unknown groups (The Flying Lizards are about the most famous on there). Too short, maybe - just feels like it's going somewhere and just stops -- giving a great transition, though, into--


4. "Chris Cross" - Jimmy McGriff - Electric Funk

Slick with rough patches. Funk with dirty electric piano. Kind of obscurity that will show up in a Tarantino movie someday before I get to do anything with it. Gotta remember this for party dance mixes.


5. "Computer Alarm" - Neil - Neil's Heavy Concept Album

"And now, another in our series on people who've totally sold out to the media and gone all commercial and heavy -- this week, Neil!"

A little link track from the comedy album starring that dirty, filthy, stinking hippie from The Young Ones. Here, he smashes the evil computer alarm clock his brother gave him that he hates, but not before he hears the newscast that mocks him.


6. "The World's The Arrow" - BPeople - Petrified Conditions

No idea who these people are, when this is from, or where I got this (downloading drunk again?). It's good, cool, dark, slow, crawling rock. Vocalist a little . . . off and icky when he gets loud on the chorus though. Not so bad, just breaks the mood a bit.


7. "White Lightnin' (It's Frightnin')" - The RPM's - Pebbles Volume 10

Oh, this is some great snotty teenage garage punk. Got some kind of horn in there, too. Trombone? Odd.


8. "With Our Love" - Talking Heads - More Songs About Buildings And Food

Oh, nostalgia. High school. Alt radio. Used to not like this track and this album that much. Very different now.


9. "I Witnessed a Crime" - Johnny Cash - American Outtakes

Low-fi, but stereo, bootleg of unused tracks from early Cash/Rick Rubin sessions. This, a great reading of a song I don't otherwise know, featuring one of the Z.Z. Top guys (Billy Gibbons, is that his name?) on good, solid rockabilly guitar, very Sun Records. Nice reading, but feels like a tentative run-through in a bunch of ways. I can see why it wasn't used.


10. "Inner City Blues" - Sarah Vaughan - The Trouble With Modern Girls

Sarah goes funky 70s in a great soul track. From a WFMU DJ premium.


Okay, still have emails and postings to deal with before getting out to errands . . . gotta hit it.

Friday Cat Blogging

Well, I'll be borrowing a digital camera from someone soon, as I need to document something else for sure (post coming up on that), so maybe I'll have some new and better photos of the fuzzythings by next week.

In the meantime, I'm cleaning out the old folders and files . . .


Here they are, full of ennui, trying to figure out what to do next . . .



And more cute boredom . . .



Well, he may be fine with that, but she's gonna go DO something . . .

The Murder of Crows, etc

So another show I'm working on opens at The Brick tonight. I did the light design again, which is simple and deep in a way I don't get to do much - the show is basically a play composed of three sequential monologues done at center stage without much movement (believe me, it works and is quite theatrical). The new house plot I've put up at The Brick works very well, though I have to do some slight hang/focus tweaks once the current shows are down. I think anyone coming in to do a show at The Brick will be pleased with what they can do with what's up there on the grid.

It's the third in Bryan Enk's series of adaptations of James O'Barr's Crow stories for the stage. The other two were at Nada in 2000 and The Brick in 2005. He should be getting to the next one later this year (this piece is a kind of interlude featuring the main characters from the previous two and the next one).


THE MURDER OF CROWS
Inspired by the work of James O'Barr
Written and Directed by Bryan Enk


performed by
ADAM SWIDERSKI
BRITTON LAFIELD
and
JESSICA SAVAGE


10.30 pm
Friday, March 23/Saturday, March 24
Friday, March 30/Saturday, March 31


$5.00
70 minutes with no intermission


The Brick Theater
575 Metropolitan Ave
Williamsburg, Brooklyn
L to Lorimer/G to Metropolitan/Grand


MORE INFO


Also, there are only two performances left of Bouffon Glass Menajoree, which got a nice review from Garrett Eisler, The Playgoer, in this week's Time Out New York. I was a little taken aback to see myself mentioned on The Playgoer's blog in the context of possibly being some kind of "conflict of interest" for Garrett in reviewing the show, as I'm a fellow theatre blogger. Well, there are theatre bloggers and then there are THEATRE BLOGGERS, and Garrett is in the latter category, for sure. I wasn't even aware I was enough on his radar to count in any kind of "conflict of interest" (I'm not on his blogroll), but it's nice to be mentioned.

Bouffon Glass Menajoree plays at The Brick tonight and tomorrow at 8.00 pm. Check the link for more info.

Ian W. Hill's Hamlet, next steps

And finally, here in the midst of "posting day," a brief post in line with what this whole blog was supposed to be about in the first place.

So, Ian W. Hill's Hamlet proceeds apace. Tomorrow and Monday evening I have four hours set up (on each day) to meet with and read people for various roles. I have 15 actors scheduled, and am waiting to hear back from another 2 if they can make it, and I have to make separate arrangements with one person who definitely can't make it.

These are all people I've worked with before (except for one) and I could cast the play four or five different excellent ways with them. I'm lucky.

I need to work on myself and my performance some more now. I'm going to start experimenting with hair colors as soon as I can, but I have to borrow a digital camera from someone so I can share with you the various stages I go through there.

I have also started the "Hamlet Exercise Regimen" on top of the dieting I've been doing for a few months. Now, every day, an hour of Dance Dance Revolution, ten minutes of situps, and as many pushups and deep knee bends as I can do. Can I lose, oh say, 60 pounds by the time we open in June? Probably, and I'm sure as hell going to try (well, I'm trying for 80, but that's . . . unlikely).

Currently cast: Hamlet (me), Horatio (Rasheed Hinds), Polonius (Bryan Enk), Rosencrantz (Daniel McKleinfeld), Guildenstern (Edward Einhorn). 13 more needed. Looking good.

Now to add in the memorization regimen every day . . . I'd love to be off-book before the first rehearsal. I should be. I'll try.