Encounter #78: Fancy Footwork (remix'd)

A little old, but everybody's favorite success story, Chromeo, matched with everybody's favorite John Landis production, the "Thriller" video, and everybody's favorite animation technique, stop motion marionettes?, makes for fine fun. Also, DISCODUST has this remix by Russ Chimes up right now that's pretty dope. --RWK

Songs #16: No difference

These 91 seconds are probably my favorite moment on cLOUDDEAD. This fugue of sorts, written and performed and recorded by Dose One, without partner Why?, end the six minute dirge that is the sixth track, "I promise to never get paint on my glasses again (pt.2)", which is really just the b-side of the third cLOUDDEAD 10-inch. See: the self-titled album is just a collection of six 10" records. But, magically, there's a cohesion. It remains a favorite despite my withering interest in most other anticon. releases (although that Alias remix of "Nude" is kinda dope). I thought about putting up the text of these lyrics-in-the-round but I like the idea that anything, like a song, can be a poem. Especially since this is a "song" very much about its lyrics, about language, in addition to being about a mood and a tone, to say an affect. It's hard not to think about that cover when you hear the final line. --RWK [Cross posted on VINYL]

cLOUDDEAD - I promise to never get paint on my glasses again (pt.2) - EXCERPT (zshare)

[Pic: A scan of the unfolded cLOUDDEAD album cover, a Gerhard Richter.]

Encounter #77: Licky

This video is a couple weeks old, the song older than that. But, you know, the song is fun and the video's got girls acting silly so why not throw it up? --RWK [via]

Title sequences #6: Panic Room

Another Fincher, I know. Seemed fitting, though, given the sequence posted below. Fincher always ups the ante on his heroes. [Sequence by The Picture Mill] --RWK

Title sequences #5: North by Northwest

Blam! One of the most iconic sequences ever. Tell me you aren't ready for some wow after that! [Sequence by Saul Bass] --RWK

Title sequences #4: Catch Me If You Can

Clearly an homage to the guy I've used twice before in #1 and #2. When this started up that first time I saw the picture, I knew it would be a fun, good movie. As Cuy said yesterday, Leo really can carry a film. But, yeah, this sequence does what a lot of the Bass/Hitchcock sequences do, as well as the Pink Panther sequences, which kind of tell you about what Spielberg is after from the get go. Viewed with such inheritances in mind, the picture is even better, I think, since it kind of negates all those silly psycho-biographizing reads. Or, at least, tempers such an impulse. [Sequence by Kuntzel, Deygas, Add-A-Dog Studios and Nexus Productions] --RWK

Title sequences #3: Alien

This one is maybe the best so far. But why? Why is subtlety so much more attractive than flash? Maybe it's just I prefer this kind of insinuation-horror to the plain ugly horror of Se7en. I don't know. The horror genre is still an odd thing for me. All I know is this music is scary, too. Way scarier than Trent Reznor. [Sequence by Saul Bass even though I'm sure Ridley Scott's ad man mind played a part in its design.] --RWK

Title sequences #2: Se7en

This was a favorite movie of mine in middle school and early high school. Now I'm afraid of it. But I still think I'm going to watch the entire David Fincher ouevre in May, and maybe chronicle the adventure, too. Dude has an eye, that's for certain. [Sequence by Kyle Cooper] --RWK

Title sequences #1: Casino

My memory is foggy but it tells me this is the best thing about this movie. However, I think I may like this picture more a second time, if only because I would be more generous. And cuz I'm into the idea of it as an argument for the operatics of cinema. It would be great to see real big and loud in The Nestrick Room. Or, you know, The Castro. [Sequence by Saul and Elaine Bass] --RWK