Stand Up Comedy

On Sunday, April 4, 2010, I performed Stand Up Comedy for the first time in my life. It was a very interesting experience to say the least. Performing at Improv Boston, located in Central Square, it was a contest for $1000, paid for my the movie Death At a Funeral. The contest called for comics with a limited amount of experience, to write jokes about families and funerals. Funerals, the best topics to write about. People asked me about the fear element of doing stand up; being able to get in front of a crowd and tell jokes. It was not actually that element that scared me, it was the bright lights in my face that were a killer. Once I got as accustomed to them as I could, the rest of the show went fine. The worst word to say is "can't" because that means you believe it is impossible to perform a certain action. I just said that I would give this show my all and that is as much as I could do. I did not win the contest but the crowd loved it, including a judge who was in disbelief that this was my first time doing stand up. It was defiantly a lot of fun, and that is all that matters.

The Boston Independent Film Festival: An After-the-fact report.

The Boston Independent Film Festival has been going on since April 21st and ends tomorrow on the 28th. The last film, Mic-Macs, a comedy from French director Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Amelie, City of Lost Children), screens tomorrow at 8 o'clock. The festival held a great deal of films of all genres, from documentary to feature length. The films where shown at four theaters throughout the greater Boston area: the Somerville Theater, Brattle Theater, Coolidge Corner Theater, and the Institute of Contemporary Art.

Being a poor college student, I was only able to attend one of the films, Searching for Elliott Smith, a documentary, funnily enough about musician Elliott Smith. The film screened at 7:30 on April 26th at the Somerville Theater. The film told an interesting story about a very great musician. Though initially it starts off with a rather humorous tone, the film shifts to tragic as it discusses Smith's suicide. This was a heart-wrenching film as friends and colleagues of Elliott give testimonials. The story was very interesting, especially for Elliott Smith fans. It gave very intriguing insight into his enigmatic personality.

Next year, I hope to know of this event in advance, so that I'm able to attend more of the screenings.

Wilbur Theater

The historic Boston theater, located in the heart of Boston's Theater District, this is the center for traveling comedians. Here are some...

4/19-4/24: Russell Peters
5/1: Sommore
5/6-5/7 Bill Burr
5/9- Aqua Teen Hunger Force Live
5/15 (two shows) Jay Mohr
5/21 (two shows) John Lovitz
5/22 (two shows) Tracy Morgan
6/12 Christopher Titus
6/18 (two shows) Mike Epps
7/2 (two shows) Craig Ferguson
7/17 (two shows) Aziz Ansari
7/30 Nick Cannon
8/10 Gabriel Iglesias
9/10 Tom Green
9/18 Kevin Nealon
9/25 John Oliver
10/02 Mario Cantone
10/10 Dick Gregory
10/23 (two shows) Bob Marley

BYOP

Boston Area Youth Organizing Project (BYOP) is a non-profit youth organization that strides to provide social change available to all ages in Boston. BYOP inspires aspiring youth to get up and organize against any oppression implemented by the Boston Public School (BPS) system. BYOP’s youth organizing team centers its attention within their residing schools as a means to be apart of their community and to reform and hold weekly meetings held for BPS students. As a youth-led and adult-supported organization, BYOP, hires student organizers during seasonal celebrations that are organized by the youth and are voted in by the youth community as well. BYOP also holds weekly meetings open to the entire community. These meetings are held to lead the youth, as well as the adult community collectively, to seek reform for the Boston community.

Alcest announces US tour

Black metal and shoegaze seems like it would be a terrible combination. However, France's Alcest pulls off this combination quite fluidly. The "band", really a solo project of Neige, a popular man in the French metal scene, effortlessly paints pictures of serene landscapes and youthful vigor. To say that Alcest is some of the most beautiful music currently around is not an exaggeration. Now, in support of their upcoming album Ecailles De Lune, Alcest has announced a brief ten day tour of North America

According to the musician's Myspace, stops on the tour include:

"

Apr 22 2010 8:00P Bar Octobre G1K 3B3, Quebec Apr 23 2010 8:00P Hard Luck Bar Toronto, Ontario Apr 24 2010 8:00P Reggie’s Rock Club Chicago, Illinois Apr 25 2010 8:00P Beachland Ballroom Cleveland, Ohio Apr 26 2010 10:00P The Rex Theater Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Apr 27 2010 8:00P Kung Fu Necktie Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Apr 28 2010 8:00P Cafe Nine New Haven, Connecticut Apr 29 2010 8:00P The Studio At Webster Hall New York, New York Apr 30 2010 8:00P Underworld Montreal, Quebec May 1 2010 8:00P The Democracy Center Cambridge, Massachusetts

Needless to say, I will be hitting up the Cambridge date and you should too if you have any passing interest in unique sounding music.

(Photo and information from www.myspace.com/alcestmusic).

Red Sox Clinch Season Opening Night

Dustin Pedroia
(Photo from plymptoncrushbaseball.com)

The Boston Red Sox clinch their season opener with a 9 to 7 win over their rivals the New York Yankees. It didn't look good for the Red Sox in the first couple innings and was no where near a good start for Josh Beckett who allowed 5 runs to score in 4 3/4 innings played. Kevin Youkilis hit a 2 run triple in the 6th inning. CC Sabathia also allowed 5 runs to score. Jorge Posada hit a home run in the top of the 2nd and hit an rbi in the 7th to increase the Yankees lead 7 to 5. Dustin Pedroia hit a 2 run home run over the green monster to tie the game at 7 in the 7th. Again in the 7th, Posada dropped a pitch and Kevin Youkilis scored for the Red Sox to take the lead at 8 to 7. In the 9th Jonathan Papelbon closed and the Red Sox won 9 to 7 over the Yankees.

BREAKING NEWS

Donovan McNabb is NO longer a Philidalphia Eagle. He has been traded to the Washington Redskins for 2 draft picks. McNabb is said to be angry about the trade and why wouldn't he be. He has given his life to that franchise and he feels like he has been betrayed by the franchise that has been his home since being picked 2nd overall from the Eagles back in 1999. This will change the face of the NFC and the NFL for that. For me, a New England Patriot fan, it will be weird not seeing McNabb either in the huddle or on the sideline.

Chris Webby

Christian Webster or Chris Webby, is an aspiring rapper who has been blowing up mainly in Ct and Ny. Although he is listened to all over the country, Chris Webby is an unsigned rapper who is playing on a lot of peoples ipod's in the tri-state area. He grew up in the suburbs Norwalk, Ct ans that was where he started his career so far. He dropped his first album called "The White Noise Lp" on April 30th, 2009 and was available to download on datpiff.com. Chris Webby opened up for a Lupe Fiasco concert at Hofstra University where Webby goes to school. In addition, he also released another album called "Teenage Mutant Ninja Rapper", which dropped in the fall of 2009, and again Chris Webby opened for someone else, it was Ghostface Killah at the Nokia Theater. Chris Webby raps about the average life of a college kid chilling, parties, and girls. Chris Webby does private shows, but you must talk to the manager to arrange it. Listening to Chris Webby is very easy, you could either go on his myspace which is www.chriswebby.com, his youtube channel http://www.youtube.com/user/ForTheBurbs and he even has a facebook page where his fans can write and hear updates about Chris Webby. His youtube channel has every song that he has put out including both albums and a little something extra.
(Picture from www.chriswebby.com)

Pure Pwnage

Pure Pwnage started out as an internet tv show, which was watched by millions of people. Recently their popularity has increased and they were offered to make the internet tv show into a televised tv show which airs at 7pm in Canada. That is the only problem, people from all over the world watched this show when it was available on their website, but now its becoming more difficult to watch their favorite internet characters. Some people has started posting the episodes after they air on tv, and placing them on youtube for people to watch. It makes it much easier to follow the show. The main character of the show is Jeremy, he has a brother Kyle who has the camera, and fps Doug who has been Jeremy's best friend since they were kids. They continue to add new characters to mostly every episode. The show is about Jeremy who is a pro gamer and Kyle follows him around with the camera showing people what Jeremy does during the day and night. Fps Doug is also a pro gamer but mainly plays first person shooter games unlike Jeremy who plays mostly everything. This show will make you laugh, smile, and even make your abs hurt. The video game humor is hilarious and make any gamer laugh till they cry.
The link to their website is http://purepwnage.com/ which all the internet episodes of the show can be found.
(Images courtesy of complex.com and facepunch.com)

Pokeman, Yes, it's Back.

Does "Gotta catch'em all" ring a bell? If so, you grew up in the 90's.  The biggest trend with college-age kids is re-living childhood, and lately with a new "Heart-gold" and"Soul-silver" games for the Nintendo DS, Pokemon has regained it's popularity with college crowd. Recently "Pokemon Profile Picture Month" overtook facebook and estimates of 100,000 kids changed their profile picture to a picture of their favorite pokemon. However this Pokemon is not the same as it was ten years ago. It has basically the same gameplay, however this new Pokemon has almost five-hundred different "species" of Pokemon to catch, compared to the 151 of older games. With this new game comes the "Poke-walker" which is a small pedometer which allows the player to train his or her pokemon as they walk around in real life.  However, this tiny bit of plastic does more than that, because each player keeps their pokewalker on their person, (usually clipped to a belt or hat) other pokemon players can identify them, and then use the pokewalker together to get a free in-game gift per day. Pokemon players can meet new players though this, and it creates a makeshift community of Pokemon players, most of which are surprisingly older than twelve. The Poke-walker also encourages physical activity, as more steps opens up more levels and worlds for the player. This is the first time a video has honestly gotten kids to exercise more, as the only way to access these levels is to take a certain amount of steps. There have been other attempts at this in the past, like the Wii, however most Wii players play sitting down, only moving their wrists. Overall Pokemon has become more than just a game, it's become a culture of friendly reminiscent teenagers, who train their pokemon in between classes and work.

Photo from:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Pokéwalker.jpg

The Sky Moves Sideways

This Friday marks the achievement of one of my life long ambitions: the completion of the English progressive bock band,Porcupine Tree's discography (at least in terms of full length releases). Finally that dream was realizes when I caved and purchased their third album, The Sky Moves Sideways at my local Newbury Comics. This marks the end of my long arduous quest to buy things. So how does this, the last piece of Porcupine Tree full-length (at least until the next album), compare to their other releases? Results are generally favorable. As a fan of both the band's earlier, more psychedelic releases and their newer, more modern progressive rock, I had high expectations for this album. I am grateful to say that they were, for the most part, met.

As you may be able to tell from the album's cover art, it falls under the label of "earlier, more psychedelic" work, being the third album, released in 1993. The more accessible sound did not come to fruition until 1999's Stupid Dream. Adamantly displaying this psychedelia is the first track, the beginning half of the primarily instrumental monolithic title song. While an eighteen minute and thirty-nine second opening track may deter the casual listener, the sheer amount of diversity contained in this piece is more than enough to keep the attention of those who commit to the track. The song also has a section with very well done vocals with an interesting echo effect on them. From there, the album goes through more accessible, but equally well done material. The main riff of "Dislocated Day" is particularly engaging. The album concludes with "The Sky Moves Sideways [Phase 2]", the continuation of the introductory track. Though this song is significantly shorter at a mere sixteen minutes and forty-nine seconds, this one is less accessible as there are no vocals and significantly more ambient sections. However, if one is able to make it this far into the album it is obvious that they were enjoying it enough to find the last track to be equally as incredible as the rest. If I would be forced to find something negative to say about this, I'd say it's the fact that the title tracks make everything else seem like filler.

Regardless, fans of psychedelic and progressive music should check out this release because it's very enjoyable.

(Photo from: http://images.uulyrics.com/cover/p/porcupine-tree/album-sky-moves-sideways.jpg)

Fenway Park

Fenway Park has, and hompefully will always be one of the gems of Boston. Home of the famous Boston Red Sox, it has been located just outside of Kenmore Square since 1912. However, an interesting side note, when this stadium opened, it was not the front page article in Boston newspapers because, the same week it opened up, the inframous Titanic sank. When it comes to the shape of this stadium, it is weird to say the least. This most peculiar shaped of baseball fields is a hitters dream because of how small it is in size compared to other stadiums, but makes an outfielders life sometimes miserable. If a ball is hit into right field and gets stuck in the corner, it is not rare to see an inside the park home run. There have been many famous players that have come through this stadium, and despite that, there are only eight retired numbers in Fenway Park's long history. These names include Bobby Dorr, Carl Yastrezmski, Joe Cronin, Johnny Pesky, Ted Williams, Jim Rice, Carlton Fisk, and every stadium has number 42 retired, Jackie Robinson. The stadium has many major features, none more famous then the 3 main features: the Green Monster, Pesky's Pole, and the Lone Red Seat. All have played a part in Red Sox and baseball history. Despite its classic nature, the stadium has gone through renovations to protect its original form. Since May 2003, the stadium has not had a game that has not sold out. If you want to get a taste of classic 20th century baseball history and Boston history, try to go to a game or take one of the tours of the stadium.

(pictures taken by me at the Prudential Center Skyview)

If you asked someone twenty years ago that a reggae singer would be at the forefront of hip hop/reggae movement, would be a Hassidic, Orthodox Jew, you might snicker, laugh, or even make an offensive comment. Well, Matisyahu has shown a changing world when it comes to the youths view on religion and people of a different culture then yours. The society we live in is, for the most part, the anti-xenophobe, a great direction for our people. A Hassidic Jew, he has combined reggae, hip hop, rock, etc. into something beautiful. Influenced by his earlier love of Phish, he started going into music and combining it to his rather recent love from being an Orthodox Jew. He began getting national fame from his breakout hit "King Without a Crown." He would later come out with hits such as “Youth,” and “Jerusalem.” His recent hit is a song for hope and optimism called “One Day,” a song that inspires hope with words preying for the day that the world shall stop violence. It would be used as NBC’s song at the Olympic Games. He is a great musician, one that inspires hope to people.