Academy Awards

...And the award for biggest snoozefest goes to: The Academy Awards! The Oscars telecast from last Sunday was a long, dull bore of epic proportions. The movie's weren't that exciting (The Departed-Martin Scorsese films corrupt people) and the hosting was perfunctionary (Ellen Degeneres did OK). The only exciting moment was watching expected winner Jennifer Hudson win best supporting actress for Dreamgirls. When Oscar winning former Vice President Al Gore comes off like a live wire, you know you're in trouble.

Ultimately, the problem with the Oscars extend to modern film itself. The winner's just seem so predictable that it's hard to get excited or feign interest. This is one of the big reasons why the film industry is financially faultering, they aren't pushing to make great movies most of the time. I understand the appeal of heavily marketed paint-by-numbers filmmaking as I have seen both Just Friends and She's The Man in the past two days. Both movie's play it safe with story and let their young actors cut loose a little to keep things interesting. While they succeed on that level, it's hard not to remember the thousands of other movies I've seen just like them.

2006 will be remembered as the year of inspired competency. I mean, it's not like Scorsese hasn't made a mob film before. But film seems destined to follow music into a place of decentralization where one piece of media cannot hold mass interest. While niche market movies are usually the best ones, in the end it's sad because media is one of the few things that tie together the lives of different people. The Oscar's theme of memorable tag lines ("Do ya feel lucky, Punk", "Rosebud" and so on) underscores this.

Hopefully, some of this trend will turn around and some mass consumption entertainment will become popular. Even a resurgence of Transformers will be welcomed if this summer turns out well. Every family will go back to buying their kids robot dolls that turn into suitcases or end tables. After all, Autobots fight battles to defeat the evil forces of...the Decepticons! It will be annoying when it hits, but it will be nice to see some common ground in entertainment again.

The French are in Love!

Recently I have two French films about Love. Not love, but Love with a capital L. Now, it may seem like saying there's a French film about amour is like saying there's beef in hamburger but I can't remember a French film on the topic before. I've caught two films with similarities and differences but both are involving and effective.

The first is An Affair Of Love (1999) about a man and woman who meet anonymously through a newspaper ad. They don't trade personal information or even names, they meet on a weekly basis to have sex without any strings attached. The arrangement works for a while but the two begin to fall in love with each other. Sadly, the insecurities that led to their original meeting begins to take its toll on their relationship. The movie is cynical yet human and filled with regret.

The second film is Jet Lag (2003) starring Jean Reno and Juliette Binoche. The two meet in an airport during a plane strike and bad weather, a simple contrivance to bottle these two characters up together. Reno plays against type as an uptight frozen food entrepreneur (he usually plays griping, rugged spies). Binoche also plays against type as a superficial beautician (she usually plays passionate, caring women on the cusp of danger). The first half of the movie crawls along slowly with only the power of these two excellent actors to carry the film. But, once the two stop avoiding each other and begin to interact the emotional investment in these actors pay off. This is the first romantic comedy I've seen in a long time where I actually cared about whether or not they were together. Just goes to show what can happen when good actors are allowed to cut loose.

These movies go through similar motions but come to different conclusions. Both show a glossy, slighly upscale world where emotionally guarded people can come together. While neither film is particularly earth shaking, I recommend both of them.

One Foot Out The Door and Number 56

The latest from the rumor mill is in...the Van Halen reunion is not confirmed despite the press announcement because no one has signed anything yet. So, instead of going back to 1984 we may end up in 1996 where Diamond Dave made a public appearance with the band at the MTV awards and found himself fired the next day. Officially, the tour with no announced dates is on hold but at least it's not cancelled. All I can say is I am looking forward to their tour, but if it doesn't happen then they just need to stay gone. Hmmm...I wonder if it's too late for Police tickets?

A few random items, Corrine Bailey Rae's new single "Like A Star" is an outstanding song! Filled with sensuality mixed with a R&B / Jazz sensibility, the song is touching even though I can't understand a word she says.

I've been re-examining John Mayer lately, for most of his career I've written him off as a hack version of Dave Matthews. Mayer's music mainly consists of jaunty acoustic guitars, loping beats and mush mouth vocals just like Mr. Matthews but without the jam band mentality. The lack of originality matched with the pandering to his largely female fan base via "Your Body Is A Wonderland" and "Daughters" made him very annoying. However, after hearing his guitarwork at the Grammys and CMT Crossroads I decided to pick up his Try (2005) disc. On Try, Mayer's jones for Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan serves him well with a rawer take on his borrowed sound including some exciting guitar solos. Coupled with his recent Curtis Mayfield wanna be hit "Waiting For The World To Change" has made Mayer an artist worth a second look.

Lastly, I can finally resume the favorite CD countdown I started way back. Another commercially successful artist who took a chance while at their peak popularity is at Number 56:

Toto - Isolation (1984)

In 1984, Toto was riding high off winning six Grammy Awards in 1982 including both Song and Album of the Year. To highten their prestige, Toto wrote the soundtrack for the David Lynch movie Dune. It seemed Toto was unstoppable and had a great deal of momentum going into their follow up album Isolation, which at the time was more commonly known as Toto V. Despite this, Isolation ended up a Gold record with one top 40 hit. What happened?

Well, a change in Lead singers hurt the band a bit. Lead singer Bobby Kimball was fired from the band for rumored drug problems. After auditioning various vocalists, it came down to two singers: raspy voiced Eric Martin and multi octave wailer Fergie Fredericksen. In the end Fredericksen won, resulting in poor commercial sales and one of my favorite albums of all time.

Fredericksen struck me as the love child of Journey's Steve Perry and Yes' Jon Anderson ( I know, that sounds like one ugly kid). His multioctave voice soared over the songs with power and grace. But, like Jon Anderson the man had no sense of soul. Where Perry or Kimball used their R&B sensibility to punctuate feeling into their music, Fredericksen just wailed. On top of this, Fredericksen's arena rock sensibility replaced Kimball's pop R&B feel resulting in complete alienation of the Adult Contemporary crowd Toto captured with Toto IV (1982).

Ironically, Fredericksen is one of the main reasons I love Isolation. Hearing this band of accomplished musicians race through Arena rock anthems like "Angel Don't Cry", "Carmen" and "Change Of Heart" is downright thrilling. Particularly "Angel Don't Cry", a hard rocking track with scorching guitar from Steve Lukather and duelling keyboard solos from David Paich and Steve Porcaro. Through it all, new guy Fergie belts out the songs with style.

The problem was by 1984 there wasn't much of an audience for this type of music, it was already being replaced by Hair Metal bands from LA. Compounding the problem are the strong R&B numbers, "Lion" and "Endless". Fergie sings both soul ditties with a robotic style of phrasing that ruins any chance for the songs becoming hits despite the fine groove laid by the rhythm section of Jeff and Joe Porcaro. Encouraged by their #1 hit "Africa", David Paich sings lead on two silly songs. The bizarre "Stranger In Town" became the sole hit single peaking somewhere in the 30's of the top 40 chart. "Holyanna" doesn't fare much better, telling the tale of an 80's teen girl gone wild to the beat of Old Tymey music.

At least Lukather is consistent in delivering a fine power ballad, "How Does It Feel" complete with orchestra backing. While the flaws in the record put off many, I found these mistakes endearing. The stilted R&B and weird songs give the record real character and sets up the harder rocking tracks well. Toto would quickly retreat to an all Adult Contemporary album after Isolation with a new singer, but it was too little too late. And although they lost their audience, this album remains an all time favorite AOR record for me.