music and movies.

This is a Monday blog. Sorry, nothing too exciting to share or report. I saw a great show on Friday, a band called Grizzly Bear who played at the Independent. I hadn't heard them much before, but Jennifer thought I would like them, so her, Heidi and I all went together. I'm so glad I did, it was an amazing show. They sound good on headphones, but seeing them perform is just amazing and I stand by that drugs or no drugs. The crowd was surprisingly not annoying, seeing as these guys are from Brooklyn, I was sure it would be packed with a bunch of annoying hipsters. But just a lot of mellow, pot smoking people that seemed to be enjoying the music. Grizzly Bear is four guys and they have a sort of beach boys/beatles/indie rock/psychedelic sound, really pretty, lots of harmonizing. The best part was that you could tell they were just into playing their music. Again, because of the whole Brooklyn thing, I thought they would for sure have a little bit more of a swagger, you know that "I live in the center of the hippest place on earth and I play music" thing that so many bands have these days. Nope. Not at all, just a bunch of guys really happy to be in SF and really excited about their music. You can stream a bunch of their songs on their website. Here's a video of them playing in a bathroom in paris (sounds pretentious, but i promise it's not).

The rest of the week-end was full of movies, making things and more movies. On Saturday Jennifer and I, a wee bit tired from the night before, had a movie marathon. We watched, Prime- which is one of the worst movies I've seen in a really long time, and not even in that so bad it's kind of good way. Your not missing a thing if you never see this film and the only redeeming thing about the entire movie is Meryl Streep, and even her character seems unrealistic and forced. I've been on a Woody Allen kick lately so we watched Broadway Danny Rose, which was good, but not as good as I remembered it. Although that chase where they get caught in the storage room with all of the Macy's Day parade floats is pretty great. And a movie you should all see as soon as you can, The Devil and Daniel Johnston, which is about Daniel Johnston's life and music career. I had never heard of him before at all, but just about everyone has covered his songs. Sunday brought cloudy weather which made me really happy. I stayed home, made stuff and later watched more movies with my roommates, The Heart is Deceitful Above all Things, I don't really care who JT Leroy is or isn't, I loved reading his/her book. As is often the case, the movie was just awful, so don't even bother. Read the book instead. And then, to end the week-end we watched Metal- A Headbangers Journey, which is just great. I had already seen this once before and it made me realize my love of hair bands in the 80's does not make me a headbanger. But if you like metal on any level, be it Motley Crue or Iron Maiden, this movie is worth watching. Oh and while we're talking movies, one of the best movies I've rented lately was Friends with Money, which has a cast of some amazing females and is written by Nicole Holofcener, who also wrote and directed Walking and Talking, which was one of my favorites in the late 90's. That's all. If you're in SF this weather is pretty perfect for movie watching. Although right now I'm walled in a cube and can't see outside. It could be 80 degrees and sunny and I wouldn't know.