It’s British cultural history day here at Chromewaves!

24 Hour Party People – the book – isn’t the source material for the Michael Winterbottom film, as I’d originally thought. It’s actually a novelization of the film. It’s the novelization of a pseudo-documentary of real events, written by the guy who was the main character of said film. Um, okay. Tony Wilson, the principal of Factory Records and legend in his own mind, wrote the book as a sort of companion piece to the film, I guess. As a piece of writing, it’s rather a mess. Here’s a guy writing about himself in the third person as he details events in the past, and then in the first person when he offers some commentary from the perspective of the present. Furthermore, it’s written the way he (presumably) speaks, a big mash-up of asides, anecdotes, and sounding too clever by half. But once you’ve grown accustomed to having Wilson as your guide, there are some insights to be gained.

Since it’s actually written by Wilson, and not being passed through a filmmaking crew, you can assume you’ve got a direct line into his grey matter, more or less. You get his thoughts and recollections on things that couldn’t be conveyed or properly expanded upon in the film – for example, how badly the suicide of Ian Curtis shook him, the depth of his admiration of mad producer Martin Hannett or the vision of house designer Peter Saville. Characters who got only a passing mention or brief appearance in the movie are fleshed out, their importance to the story articulated. It also gives him more room to make his case for the “Shaun Ryder as the next Yeats” theory, which I’m sorry, I still don’t buy. Prat? Yes. Genius? Not so much. I’m not saying to go out and buy the book, but if you like the film, it’s worth putting a hold on it at the library. Go on, I’m done with my copy.

Stayed up and watched Mike Leigh’s Topsy-Turvy last night. I’m not entirely sure why I rented this – the reviews were good, though I’m hardly an afficianado of musical theatre nor was this anything like any of the other Mike Leigh films I’ve seen. That said, I still enjoyed it well enough – a very well executed historical drama/comedy about the making of Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Mikado. But in the future, I’m going to have to be careful to NOT start 2h 40m movies at 10:30 on Sunday nights…

It’s municipal election day here in Toronto. Everyone who lives in the 416, go out and vote. For Miller, preferably. But if you’re going to vote for Tory, don’t go to any particular trouble to make it to the polls… democracy is overrated anyway.

To everyone else, go out and do something productive today. Like have a bagel or something.

np – Whiskeytown / Faithless Street

For all the crowing I’ve done about scoring front-row centre tickets for last night’s Belle & Sebastian show at Massey Hall, it would have all been for naught if they put on anything less than a stellar show.

Whew. Dodged a bullet there.

Rasputina started things off with their unique blend of classical goth-punk. I really don’t know what you’d call it. Two girls in medieval garb absolutely rocking out on cellos with a drummer backing them up. Cellos can sound an awful lot like distorted electric guitars, and can get damned heavy. Along with their original material, they closed with covers of Heart’s “Barracuda” and CCR’s “Bad Moon Rising”, which sounded particularly sinister. Different and impressive.

I find it near impossible to reconcile the notoriously reclusive and mysterious band that produced Tigermilk and If You’re Feelin Sinister with the finely-honed pop orchestra that performed last night. Charming and engaging, frontman Stuart Murdoch was bouncing all around the stage throughout the whole show, dancing and shimmying like a dervish. To all the fans who’ve sworn off the band for their new ‘upbeat’ sound, sorry but I don’t this band is capable of doing many mopey bedsit anthems anymore… they’re just too happy and having too much fun. Example – an audience member calls out for the Jackson Five’s “I Want You Back” and Bob Kildea starts goofing on the bassline, Stevie Jackson on the guitar riff and Murdoch sings a quick lyric. The audience roars, the band sort of shrugs (figuratively speaking) and off they go. Massey Hall security be damned, there was no way the crowd wasn’t getting up and dancing for this one. Now maybe the audience member was in the know and the band had already had this one rehearsed from other shows, but from my vantage point it was totally off-the-cuff. Definitely A Moment (note capitalization there).

That sort of interaction was a prime example of the whole night – the band having a great time onstage, feeding off the sheer adoration of the crowd. It didn’t hurt, of course, that it was maybe the best sound I’ve ever heard at a concert, and I had a totally unobstructed view of the stage. Handy for getting photos, as well. All these shots were taken flash-less. I love it when bands have great light shows, the colours are so pretty… I seem to get developing a steadier hand on the camera, though maybe that was just a perk of sitting. And while I hate to be the guy who walks out of a show going, “But they didn’t play this, or that, or that”, they didn’t play “I’m A Cuckoo”. Some mild disappointment there. Oh well, I’ll get over it. The just-under two hours of great music compensated somewhat.

But of course, there has to be one moment of non-love noted, for me at least. ‹non-love› To the girl who got invited onstage to sing a tune and insisted on doing one of her own songs – I’m sure that was a real thrill for you, but in the future, please jerk off on your own time. I didn’t pay $60 to attend a coffee house open mic night, thanks. ‹/non-love›

Postscript – Chart talks to Chris Geddes about the new B&S record.

Non-B&S related – Ryan Adams is touring Rock N Roll and Love Is Hell next month. Chances that he’ll have Elton John in tow again this time? Pretty slim – unlike Ryan himself. Hey DRA – better lay off those wagon wheels! Torontonians get their chance to call Ryan a fatty and request “Summer Of 69” at risk of being beaten to death December 10 at the Opera House.

Liz Phair is doing an acoustic in-store at the Sunrise at Yonge and Dundas next Saturday at 1pm, in advance of the show that evening at the Guvernment.

np – The Sleepy Jackson / Lovers

I managed to get up this morning without a hint of ill effect from the half-pitcher of Keiths I finished off last night. Not a huge amount, but more than I usually take on a half-full stomach. Puttered around a bit, paid some bills, went clothes shopping. The excitement never stops around here, I tell you.

I finally got into the couple movies I rented earlier this week but hadn’t had a chance to watch. The City Of Lost Children is a wonderfully dark fairy tale from French director Jean-Pierre Jeunet, best known for making Amelie. It’s the story of a carnival strong man who teams up with an orphaned girl to rescue his adopted little brother from the clutches of a mad scientist who kidnaps children to steal their dreams. On the way, they encounter all sorts of weird and wonderful characters including evil co-joined twins who run a gang of thieving street urchins, a half-dozen narcoleptic clones and a talking brain in a fish tank. Visually, it owes a lot to Terry Gilliam’s work, but was still plenty creative, fresh and equal parts funny and creepy. I enjoyed it quite a bit and am going to have to get a copy of Alien Resurrection, which was also helmed by Jeunet.

You may notice I’ve taken to adding links in the sidebar to the Allmusic.com entry for the albums I’ve recently bought, where applicable. In case you were wondering about them. I’m also going back and adding the links to the rest of my collection, in the music section.

Belle & Sebastian tonight – but first, I needs to rustle me up some dinner…

np – The Wedding Present / Watusi

Conan O’Brien is in disccusions to bring Late Night to Toronto for a week next February. That would kick some serious ass, hopefully I wouldn’t have to kill too many people to get tickets.

Suede have split. While Coming Up had its moments, I’d say they should have given up after Bernard left the band. Ah well, we’ll always have “Animal Nitrate”.

I seem to be all about the EPs lately. My last four pick-ups have all been short-players.

• Ted Leo & The Pharmacists – Tell Balgeary, Balgury Is Dead
  
  (Mostly solo Ted on electric guitar – sounds like old-school Billy Bragg. That’s a good thing.)
  

• Ryan Adams – Love Is Hell Pt. 1
  
  (Haven’t heard Rock N Roll yet, but this is a lot less glossy than Gold. Sounds good, pretty dark.)
  

• Spoon – The Way We Get By
  
  (Short! Haven’t watched the videos yet.)
  

• Yo La Tengo – Today Is The Day!
  
  (Nice to see Ira didn’t throw out all his distortion pedals after all.)
  

Accidentally hit ‘off’ on my alarm this morning instead of ‘snooze’. Whoops. But that’s okay, I don’t usually accomplish anything in the mornings anyway…

np – Yo La Tengo / Today Is The Day!

In good keeping with my ongoing Billy Bragg fixation, I borrowed Man In The Sand from the library. It’s the film about the making of the Mermaid Avenue records by Bragg and Wilco, and while not the best documentary in the world, it still has merit. Simultaneously a biography of Woody Guthrie and the writing and recording of the albums, it offers some further insights into the life of the man and the process of selecting, arranging and recording what would become the two Mermaid Avenue albums. It also touches on the well-publicized tensions between Bragg and Wilco during the sessions, which seemed to centre on matters of final mixes and song selection. In the scenes where both Bragg and Wilco are actually working together to create the songs, they seem to be getting along just fine. Artists – what’re you gonna do. Most libraries should have this film available to borrow – it offers enough insights into the two albums to be worth requesting – but all in all, Bragg’s “Talkin’ Woody” tour was more entertaining.

NOW and eye both had chats with Belle & Sebastian about Dear Catastrophe Waitress in advance of Saturday night’s show at Massey Hall.

Cheeky monkeys. Check out Chopster – Lambchop’s new website. Look for their new albums (yes, plural) Aw, C’mon and No, You C’Mon to come out February 17th – the perfect ‘sorry I forgot Valentine’s Day’ gifts.

Starflyer 59 is nothing if not prolific. The follow-up to this year’s Old is entitled I Am the Portuguese Blues and will be released January 27.

Pitchfork has a review of Per Second Per Second Per Second… Every Second which either means that copies of the album DO exist and are circulating, or that PF is part of the conspiracy. It’s quite a positive review too, which actually makes me feel better as if anyone was going to tear apart a record that was too glossy or overproduced, it’d be them. I don’t expect to have the album before next week’s show, though. Even if I mail-ordered it today, there’s good chance it wouldn’t show up until after the concert. I’ll probably have to get it there.

np – Ted Leo & The Pharmacists / Tell Balgeary, Balgury Is Dead