Goddamn Bell Canada. As I’ve implied, I’ve been having telephone problems. There’s been static on the line for a few days now, and on Monday I came home to a dead line. It miraculously recovered later that evening and I called and made an appointment for a technician to come by and fix the static. That was to be last night. So I leave yesterday morning after reconnecting a couple jacks I had disconnected last year (long story) and all was well. I come home and my phone is again dead. Great. Good timing, I think, since I have an appointment with the technician scheduled for that evening anyway. The window given was 5pm-9pm, and since I only get off work at five, I nearly killed myself biking home to get back just before 5:15. No note indicating I’d missed the guy, so I figured I was good. Fast forward four hours and still no tech, no dial tone, and I’ve had to bail on any number of things I could have been doing. Me very unhappy. As soon as 9pm ticks by, I get my coat and hoof it down to a payphone at the subway station where I call Bell’s repair line and get a little snarky – justifiably so, I think. Turns out the repair person had come by in the morning and found no problem, and left me a message saying so. A message I would have gotten if, say it with me, MY PHONE WASN’T DEAD. And it doesn’t even address the point that the appointment was for him to check for problems in the wiring IN THE HOUSE, which isn’t something you can really discern from OUTSIDE THE HOUSE WHEN I’M NOT THERE. Fuck’s sake. It’s a damned lucky thing no one ever calls me… but if I’d wanted to order a pizza, there would have been Hell to pay. So now the Bell people are outside as I type, checking out my lines and getting me sorted out. Which is all well and good, but I was just about to leave for work and now I’m going to be late as I wait for them to finish up. Even when they help they don’t. Sheesh. I am going to look long and hard at switching to Sprint – does Candace Bergen still shill for them? I’ve always liked her. I’d trust her to advise me on my telephony needs.

Gret Kot’s upcoming book on Wilco has its own website. Learning How To Die hits shelves June 15, one week before A Ghost Is Born comes out. And in less happy news, the band has cancelled the first eight dates of their North American tour including their May 1 appearance at Coachella. They will be fulfilling their massive European tour commitments from the end of May through July, though.

Aimee Mann has finally run out of ways to re-package and re-sell Lost In Space and will be hiting the road this Summer and a new album this Fall in order to pay the rent.

4AD has the artwork and tracklisting for Rachel Goswell’s debut solo EP The Sleep Shelter, out May 10 in the UK.

Some concerts taking place in our fair town – The Wrens are coming back to the Horseshoe June 5, $10.50 advance, and The Dears are at Lee’s Palace May 7, tickets $15.00. Sadies/Blue Rodeo/Elevator psych-rock side-project The Unintended play the Horseshoe May 7.

The ‘Shoe will also host the Three Gut fourth anniversary parties May 28 and 29. The entire label roster will be making an appearance – Royal City, Gentleman Reg and Cuff The Duke play the first night, The Constantines, Oneida and Jim Guthrie the second. Tickets are $12 per night, on sale now. And as a sidenote, Royal City’s new one Little Heart’s Ease is out June 8.

Tom Verlaine is also coming to town, but it’s not with Television. He and Jimmy Ripp will play Music for Films at Innis Town Hall tomorrow, April 16, at 9:15. eye talks to Verlaine about the project here.

The joke is a little dated now, but William Shatner riffs on the old “I am Canadian” ads. From LHB.

The Exorcist in 30 seconds, re-enacted by bunnies. It is what it is. From Neil Gaiman(!).

np – The Shins / Oh, Inverted World

People whose wardrobe consist entirely of black rejoice – The Cure are going on tour this summer with a bunch of their dewy-eyed (or is that mascara-eyed?) followers in tow. Consider it an Ozzfest for the kids that the people who go to Ozzfest beat up at recess. Fansite Chain Of Flowers implies that Interpol and The Rapture have confirmed and there’ll be more bands to follow. North American dates in July/August. The Cure will be shilling a new studio album out in June as well as the release of their entire remastered catalog (the first four out on May 25), while Interpol should have their sophomore album out in September and The Rapture — well, I don’t really care about The Rapture, so I don’t know what they’re up to.

Runaway Jury is actually the first John Grisham movie I’ve ever seen, which is remarkable since there’s, like, five million of them, aren’t there? When this came out, I remember all the hubbub about this being the first film starring Gene Hackman and Dustin Hoffman – while both fine actors, this was never something that struck me as a dream pairing or something, not like DeNiro and Pacino in Heat. Now Samuel L Jackson and Laurence Fishburne, that’d be interesting. I’m still not convinced they’re not the same guy. Their one scene together – in a washroom, no less – was decent but wasn’t all that, y’know. It’s not a watershed performance for either actor, their parts are pretty standard aw-shucks good ‘ol boy and cackling, hand-rubbing nastyman archetypes and they could have phoned them in. The movie itself was alright – decent enough mainstream thriller fare, though fairly predictable and I was disappointed with the headfirst dive into the deep end of the schmaltz pool in the last act. Not to sound like a cynical bastard, but I preferred it when everything was morally ambiguous. A decent enough way to while away the 24-less evening, anyway.

I also got my set of Sports Night DVDs just two days after ordering – now that’s service. I only caught a few episodes towards the end of the show’s all-too-brief first run, so most of this is all new to me. Coming to it as a fan of The West Wing, it’s interesting to see a younger Aaron Sorkin at work – it’s obviously his hand guiding things, but it’s definitely rawer and less refined, though I’m only three episodes in so far. Some random thoughts – I knew I’d seen Peter Krause before Six Feet Under, he plays co-anchor Casey McCall. Robert Guillaume’s Isaac Jaffe certainly has more than a little in common with Martin Sheen’s Josiah Bartlett – Sorkin does like to keep a tough but wise father figure around his ensembles and have them portrayed by heavyweight actors. Sabrina Lloyd is just too cute and the fact that her character falls for the uber-geek Joshua Malina certainly makes her more endearing… I said it before and I’ll say it again – TV shows on DVD are the best thing since… something really really good. Like Nutella.

Wanna know what consitutes a productive morning? Rewiring the phone jacks in my apartment between packing lunch and having breakfast. I think I’m now able to cancel a service call scheduled for Friday evening and save about $100. Yay me.

np – Pernice Brothers / The World Won’t End

Hey – I dunno if there’s any audiophiles reading this thing, but if so, I could use some help. I currently have a pair of small bookshelf speakers which sound wicked good for music but are finding themselves overpowered on the low end when I’m watching movies – like the woofer making flapping noises. Not so good. So I’m looking for a new pair of speakers – bookshelves, ideally, since I like compact and have a good pair of stands anyway. I’m not prepared to dive in on a whole home theatre 5.1 setup, both because of finances and practical considerations (no room!) and will be keeping my good old NAD 302 for an amplifier. 25 watts doesn’t seem like much but it’s plenty of juice for my needs right now. So, with no sub, what’s my best option for good full-range bookshelves that will do music and movies well? I’m more interested in detail, imaging and accuracy than I am in artificially boosted bass or excessive ‘warmth’. I listen to– aw hell, you know what I listen to. Price, of course, is a factor but not the most limiting – I’m willing to invest some money to get a good pair of speaks that’ll last me a long while, including when I do get around to doing the home theatre thing. The Szabos I will hang onto for a music-only system down the line. And, if no one has a specific recommendation to make, even manufacturers or decent websites with reviews that will help me make a decision are appreciated. I’ve always tried to avoid getting too into audiophilia because it’s the sort of thing I could really get carried away with, but it looks like it’s time to at least dip my toes in the pool, so to speak.

The reunited MC5, now known as DKT/MC5, will be at the Phoenix June 9 to promote the release of the Sonic Revolution: A Celebration of the MC5 DVD scheduled to come out July 6. In addition to original members Wayne Kramer (guitar), Dennis Thompson (drums) and Michael Davis (bass), they’ll be joined by a variety of rotating guest vocalists. So far North America will be getting Mark Lanegan (Screaming Trees, Queens Of The Stone Age) and Marshall Crenshaw.

Aversion chats with Snow Patrol. Will I regret not going to their show next week? I’ve put it on my ‘maybe’ list – I’m liking Final Straw alright, but I’m not over the moon about it. And while a good rock show is nice, so is not being up till 2AM on a work night. Convince me. Interview link from Largehearted Boy.

4AD seems to have gotten around to erecting their own Pixies minisite. Not a whole lot in the way of content, but there is a contest to win cool Vaughan Oliver-signed stuff. Huh huh… I said ‘erect’. From The Real Janelle. Oh, more on Pixies – tickets for the Toronto/Mississauga show at Arrow Hall November 24 will be a reasonable (relative to my worst fears) $35 and be available this Thursday at Rotate This and Sonic Temple in addition to Ticketbastard, so I’ll actually be able to go for under $40 (less transportation). Not bad.

Delusions Of Adequacy talks to Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene about Beehives, politics and pop culture in general.

Some dude at The Independent compiles his top 10 movies about music. I’m not sure what I’d bump, but I am aghast that The Commitments didn’t make the cut. From Tbonedotcom. Gothamist is also hosting a spirited discussion about the list.

Okay, now stealing the presidency was one thing. Being asleep on the job when 9/11 happened? Hey, that wasn’t the fault of just one man. Invading and occupying Iraq under false pretenses and making a debacle of the whole thing? Boys will be boys. BUT BUMPING 24 FOR A SPEECH ABOUT AND FILLED WITH CRAP?!? For the love of God, people south of the border, vote this guy out in November. It’s obvious that he’s totally out of control and must be stopped. Fingers are crossed that Global will still be running the new episode as scheduled, otherwise we’ll have to wait till Sunday at 9.

Some links from Kyle, who needs to start another blog that he won’t permit me to link to. A Whole Lotta Nothing has a big-ass mp3 of Jon Stewart appearing on Al Franken’s radio show last week, and The Eye has a large repository of nice and long live and interview Quicktime videos for your, er, eyeballing pleasure. Like what artists? Too many to write – click on the link and see for yourself.

np – Centro-Matic / Love You Just The Same

“So, self, what did you do with your Easter long weekend?”

“Well, self, I watched a crapload of movies.”

I rounded out this weekend with an impulse rental of The Matrix Revolutions – despite my utter revulsion for The Matrix Reloaded, I had every intention of seeing the final installment at some point – just not in the theatres for $15 or whatever a movie costs these days. Why? For the same reason I’ll eventually see Star Wars: Episode III – I have to see how it ends. It’s this same compulsion that had me watching Beverly Hills 90210 for more than three years even though I pretty much loathed the show. Anyway. I was so uninterested in The Matrix by the time Revolutions came out that I don’t think I even took notice of its release last Fall. And while I still think it made bushelloads of money, I wasn’t the only one so disinterested – I don’t recall there being nearly the amount of water cooler discussion about the third one as there was that summer for Reloaded.

Surprisingly, Revolutions didn’t induce nearly the amount of rage as Reloaded. It could be that my expectations were lowered so far that anything remotely redeeming counted as a big plus. One problem I had, however, was remembering what the hell had happened in Reloaded, so effectively had I blocked it from my memory. A brief, “Previously, on The Matrix” recap would have been welcome. Oh well. Considered strictly on its merits as a sci-fi film, it was alright. The effects were spectacular, moreso for the ‘real world’ battle sequences in Zion than the now-cliched bullet-time fights in the Matrix. The dialogue was still horribly ponderous and collapsing under the weight of its own pretentions, but that’s sort of to be expected in unambitious science fiction. And that’s where most of the problems with the last two Matrix films lie – no ambition. The promise of the first film, the potential it had to be a watershed science fiction film for the 21st century was quite handily betrayed when the Wachowski brothers opted to make a high-budget kung-fu flick (with robots and undergraduate-level philosophy essays) instead of something really groundbreaking and revolutionary. What could they have done to satisfy that promise? Fucked if I know – I’m not a screenplay writer, but that’s rather the point. It should have been something no one had ever thought of or seen before, and it wasn’t. Ridiculously high expectations to be sure, but it’s their fault for setting the bar so high in the first place.

As for the film itself, as I implied – it was actually okay. Nothing really special, but okay. Better than Reloaded, anyway. Gone were the totally superflous fights (no, “You do not truly know someone until you fight them” bullshit) – while there was still lots of fighting, they at least made the attempt of making it relevant to the plot. There was less pointless talking – everyone managed to be cryptic and corny much more concisely. The battle for Zion was pretty damn impressive for visceral carnage value but the final showdown between Smith and Neo was rather silly. I will give the Wachowskis credit for choosing a slightly ambiguous ending, even if they do dress it up in more cliche. So, no vitriol from me this time. Just a shrug and a couple hours killed – and wishing that these films would have been something I actually cared about.

Elvis Costello’s Almost Blue is going to be in the next batch of Rhino reissues on August 17 – I’m really curious to see what goodies will show up on the bonus disc. I’m betting that an album of old country covers will have some damned cool outtakes. After this one, the next one I’m waiting for is King Of America – I already have the Rykodisc edition, but a lot of the Rhino extras have been different from those on the Ryko, so hopefully there’ll be enough there to make it worth my owning two copies of one of his best albums (IMO, of course).

The Strokes are on the cover of the new Magnet. Booo. What is this, 2001?

I thought these stitches were supposed to dissolve? They sure don’t feel like they’re going to dissolve. It feels like there’s a couple of macrame classes going on in the back of my mouth. Grrr.

np – Neil Young / On The Beach

Ridley Scott is one of those sacred cow directors I have a good time picking on. While much of it is just to get his fans riled up, I do have genuine reservations about his work. He’s an amazing technical and visual director, but I find his storytelling average and his attention to character generally weak – they function alright within the larger context of the film, but don’t have a whole lot of depth on their own. So his decision to make Matchstick Men, ostensibly a character-driven comedy, had me intrigued. I didn’t want to see a train wreck of a film to prove me right, but did want to see if my knee-jerk opinions were accurate.

I found Matchstick Men to be an interesting film, muchly because of Scott’s hand. Like most of his work, it looks amazing – it’s very stylishly shot and the artiness of the camerawork is somewhat incongruous with the story, giving the whole thing a slightly surreal feel. Nicolas Cage and Sam Rockwell do well as a pair of small-time grifters. Cage walks the line of overacting as Roy, the lead con artist with an encyclopedia of neuroses and tics – his quirkiness seems a little overdone, particularly the obsessive-compulsiveness, but that’s the sort of territory in which Cage excels, so it turns out alright. Rockwell isn’t developed nearly as much and remains the smooth-talking smart-ass wingman for most of the film. Alison Lohman is impressive as Cage’s long-lost wanna-be con-artist daughter, and not just because she’s a 24-year old convincingly playing a 14-year old. While she doesn’t quite look 14 (at least as I remember 14-year old girls looking), she more than compensates through Angela’s personality.

The story is charming and moves along well, and while the big picture may not hold up scrutiny (not even twelve hours on and I’m finding fairly large problems with it even though while watching it I bought it wholesale), it does remain entertaining and compelling throughout. I think a lot of that is due to Ridley Scott being out of his element and having to do things differently than he would in a large-scale sci-fi epic. It feels a little like a career tuba player taking a swing at the trumpet. Matchstick Men is recommended if you promise not to think too heavily on it.

So there was no further Neko Case this weekend as I confirmed what I’d always suspected – I am an old man. No way was I going out at 2AM and staying out till 5 or 6 in the morning or however late they played. It is some consolation to me that I hear the set lists were near identical to the shows at Lee’s last week, so since I had such a good time at that show, this one couldn’t possibly have been better. Or at least that’s what I’ll tell myself. Getting loads of sleep is a perfectly fine consolation prize, though.

np – Galaxie 500 / On Fire