…taken in the shopping arcade in Leeds where Santiago’s is. Last night. At Boozey Dü. Brill.
Here's everything I've written so far about Time...
Time & Tide
Sunday, November 7th, 2010Something That Really Cooks
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010Went to see Back To The Future at the cinema a couple of weeks ago. The new polished print. It might have been something to do with the fact I’d been drinking ale at Nottingham Castle all afternoon, but I’ve never found the “make like a tree and get out of here” bit quite as funny. Proper tickled me.
It’s the second time I’ve seen the first BTTF on the big screen, but only the first that’s not been off a DVD. The one tiny tiny tiny tiny little criticism I had was that it didn’t seem that the sound had been given as much restorative/enhancing attention as the digital transfer of the picture. Back To The Future has some of the best and, in places, most subtle sound design around. From all the different 1950’s references popping up around Hill Valley through adverts, megaphones, conversations, and jukeboxes…through to Silvestri’s bombastic soundtrack…right the way to my favourite of all film/sound moments – the disappearing hand in the mid-8 of Earth Angel.
You know the bit…everything is going well and Marty is there strumming the chords…”This is for all you lovers out there”…George and Lorraine are dancing and then the annoying guy comes over and pushes George away. Discordant strums begin. Marvin Berry looks a little concerned. Marty looks at the photograph in the headstock of his guitar and sees his brother and sister have disappeared and that he’s next and…oh no….HE CAN SEE THROUGH HIS HAND. This is it. After all that effort it’s all over. And you didn’t even notice that while Marvin is supposed to be singing, “I fell for you, and I knew the vision of your loveliness”, instead the orchestra is going crazily, threateningly, terrifyingly all over the place but then George realises he’s just grown balls and the music all but disappears until he says, “Excuse me” and pushes the guy aside and part of the main theme build-up comes in and then stops as if teetering over a cliff and then George reaches in for a kiss and then you hear it…in the background…”I’ll be the vision of your happiness, Whoah whoah whoah” AND THEN THE WHOLE ORCHESTRA COMES IN and Marty can play the guitar again and everything accompanies that final chorus of Earth Angel…
Holy Smokes.
While writing that I got a massive Proustian rush. My heart rate is still going a bit mad.
It is without a doubt the finest marriage of story, picture, performance, soundtrack, sound design, and song. Something to aspire to. So it would’ve been the icing on the cake for them to really go to town on it…although it was still an amazing experience. Here’s the bit I’m on about…sound without image…
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I need to calm down. How about these posters by Jamie Bolton that I got sent this morning. Very minimal…very calming…
Ways Of Seeing
Sunday, September 12th, 2010
“The past is never there waiting to be discovered, to be recognised for exactly what it is. History always constitutes the relation between a past and its present. Consequently fear of the present leads to mystification of the past. The past is not for living in; it is a well of conclusions from which we draw in order to act.”
- John Berger, Ways Of Seeing, Pelican 1972
Speaking of John Berger, he’s just released a collaboration with John Christie and the mind-blowing Gavin Briars. Briar’s score is stunning. It’s called ‘I Send You This Cadmium Red‘ and it’s brilliant.
Sound It Out
Thursday, July 8th, 2010This makes me want to go to Teeside right now:
In fact, it makes me want to go to any record shop right now. But I’ve got too many things to do up here on the top floor of the mill I suppose.
There’s nothing like walking out of a proper record shop with a proper record.
Mailorder is exciting, but the online browsing/finding/buying experience isn’t as exciting as the physical one. I literally get goosebumps even if something looks similar to Red House Painter’s Rollercoaster LP. Derby has just got an independent record store back from the dead – BPM. From what I remember it was the main one once, dealt with everything, and then got marginalised by Way Ahead’s indie/rock A-Z prowess, and mainly dealt in House and Trance. Now it’s back it’s a one man job and is so far just full of fairweather stuff retrieved from fallen record shops or dead people. But there’s some gems. I got ‘Blood’ by This Mortal Coil last week on double LP. Beast of a record. Once the chap gets on his feet I can’t wait for the distributors to start chucking new releases his way.
On the flipside, I got this through the post today, and (as is now typical to point out on this here) there’s some nice links and thoughts on time therein lifted from the liner notes…
“Time Out is a first experiment with time, which may well come to be regarded as more than an arrow pointing to the future. Something great has been attempted…and achieved. The very first arrow has found it’s mark.”
- Steve Race
On The Inaccuracies Of The Back To The Future Related Twitter Meme
Monday, July 5th, 2010Today a lot of people have been sending me messages about today being the day that Doctor Emmett L. Brown would have ended up in had he not ‘got shot’ at the start of Back To The Future. They’re not far wrong, but today is not THAT DAY that hundreds of people have been retweeting about. Prepare for a geek-off…
For one thing, Doc never got to set the clock, so we couldn’t have seen it in the film. That’s why Marty ends up back in time, on the “red letter date” of November 5th 1955 (the day Doc Brown hits his head on the toilet and wakes up with the vision of the Flux Capacitor).
Here’s Doc saying how far he’s going into the future:
See there. Twenty Five Years To Be Exact. Damn straight. But…
Presuming he was going exactly twenty-five years into the future (can we presume that though, can we really?) he would have gone to October 26th. Check it:
That’s from when Einstein (the dog) went one minute into the future. Oh, and even at the end when Doc does go to the future, he’s heading for “about thirty years” which could mean anything. See you there though…
So…right year, wrong date. Fucking cool though. Hopefully I won’t get sued for using these pictures…and if I do, maybe I can pay the legal fees by doing paid public speaking on Why It Might Be Necessary To Ignore The Opening Of Back To The Future Part II In Order To Fully Enjoy The Sequels, And Why In Doing So You’ll Enjoy Them More, You’ll Even Enjoy ZZ Top’s Appearance In Part III When They Were Allowed To Keep Their Twirly Guitars When Huey Lewis Wasn’t Allowed To Keep His Mullet.
“Run For It Marty!”
