The Weekend in Reviews
Saturday night a bunch of us headed out to Charlottesville to see Ego Likeness and Bella Morte play. The opening band was a local duo called Tacit Act with a heavy VNV Nation influence. They were good, and had an excellent stage presence, which is more than I've come to expect from openers.
Ego Likeness took the stage next and were amazing. I immediately regretted not catching their shows at any of the Wicked Faires past. A mistake I will not repeat. They were fantastic, and when I visited the merch. booth during Bella Morte's set, Donna was about the sweetest person on earth, and the whole band signed the CD I bought.
Bella Morte was good and I enjoyed their set, but there was nothing especially unique about them. They were very good at what they do, but what the do is very similar to what a dozen other bands are doing. Plus their bass was up way too high an it was physically uncomfortable to be too near the stage. Oh, and the front man kept shouting things like, "Make some noise, Charlottesville!" and that's just never impressed me. I get that everyone has a stage personality that's probably a little different from their day-to-day personality, but front men who open every show by screaming, "Hello [Whatever Town We're In Tonight]!" strike me as trying too hard... and trying to hard to be boring and predictable which is really unimpressive.
In any case, I enjoyed their music, but was not compelled to buy any of their merch, and almost certainly won't make a point of seeing them again (unless they're touring with, say, Ego Likeness or Voltaire, or such).
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Last night baronmind and I finally went out to see X-Men: Origins. I enjoyed it. Now, before any of you pelt me with rotten fruit, let me explain myself. I've always enjoyed the X-Men. I watched the cartoon as a kid and one of the first comics I read with any regularity was X-Factor (one of the few available to me at the time). I read the first few Joss Whedon X-Men, but, frankly, lost track of the plot pretty early on. What I'm saying here is that I like X-Men but am not actually very familiar with the universe. I know a bit more about Rogue and Storm, but only because they were my favorites on the cartoon, so I have a few odd comics about them.
What I'm saying here is that I was never particularly bothered that they gave Rogue Jubilee's relationship with Logan or completely changed the origin of Phoenix. I'm sure this new movie screwed up the history from the comics, and certainly raised some questions for me about the continuity as already established by the movies... but mostly* I don't care. It was an interesting story with some neat fight scenes and I got to see a lot of Hugh Jackman without his shirt on.** I didn't have terribly high expectations for this movie after the crap-fest that was X-3, so really? I was pretty pleased.
*Mostly. I need to rewatch the first two X-Men movies again. There are a couple of things I think were said in them, but which I may simply have inferred.
**And even a little Ryan Reynolds, who I've always thought was really hot. The question of the movie's quality aside, I was glad to see him in a non-comedy role.
Ego Likeness took the stage next and were amazing. I immediately regretted not catching their shows at any of the Wicked Faires past. A mistake I will not repeat. They were fantastic, and when I visited the merch. booth during Bella Morte's set, Donna was about the sweetest person on earth, and the whole band signed the CD I bought.
Bella Morte was good and I enjoyed their set, but there was nothing especially unique about them. They were very good at what they do, but what the do is very similar to what a dozen other bands are doing. Plus their bass was up way too high an it was physically uncomfortable to be too near the stage. Oh, and the front man kept shouting things like, "Make some noise, Charlottesville!" and that's just never impressed me. I get that everyone has a stage personality that's probably a little different from their day-to-day personality, but front men who open every show by screaming, "Hello [Whatever Town We're In Tonight]!" strike me as trying too hard... and trying to hard to be boring and predictable which is really unimpressive.
In any case, I enjoyed their music, but was not compelled to buy any of their merch, and almost certainly won't make a point of seeing them again (unless they're touring with, say, Ego Likeness or Voltaire, or such).
____________________________________________________________________
Last night baronmind and I finally went out to see X-Men: Origins. I enjoyed it. Now, before any of you pelt me with rotten fruit, let me explain myself. I've always enjoyed the X-Men. I watched the cartoon as a kid and one of the first comics I read with any regularity was X-Factor (one of the few available to me at the time). I read the first few Joss Whedon X-Men, but, frankly, lost track of the plot pretty early on. What I'm saying here is that I like X-Men but am not actually very familiar with the universe. I know a bit more about Rogue and Storm, but only because they were my favorites on the cartoon, so I have a few odd comics about them.
What I'm saying here is that I was never particularly bothered that they gave Rogue Jubilee's relationship with Logan or completely changed the origin of Phoenix. I'm sure this new movie screwed up the history from the comics, and certainly raised some questions for me about the continuity as already established by the movies... but mostly* I don't care. It was an interesting story with some neat fight scenes and I got to see a lot of Hugh Jackman without his shirt on.** I didn't have terribly high expectations for this movie after the crap-fest that was X-3, so really? I was pretty pleased.
*Mostly. I need to rewatch the first two X-Men movies again. There are a couple of things I think were said in them, but which I may simply have inferred.
**And even a little Ryan Reynolds, who I've always thought was really hot. The question of the movie's quality aside, I was glad to see him in a non-comedy role.