Fiber Fool

Okay, so I didn’t survive in the way one would think. I was not a participant in the insanity that is writing from scratch, recording, mixing, and releasing for free on the web a 20 minute or 30 track album in 24 hours. However, I had to live in the house where said insanity was taking place. Drew and Jessie managed it in about 22 hours and they even slept so it went better than I had anticipated. I provided cookies and even went on a malt run and was official photographer. Jessie was fueled by Rock Star (and sometimes vodka) in addition to the cookies and malt.

When you put Drew and Jessie together (and in some cases add alcohol, though that is not a necessary catalyst) these two can be a hoot (and often no one can get a word in edgewise because they are on such a roll). I was feeling awful on Friday when the insanity began so I was actually a fly on the wall for a lot of their writing in the early phase. I often found myself laughing at Jessie’s sarcastic and silly lyrics (many of which made it into the final album without being cut).

They have a definite ear worm on the album (a fav track so far it seems) and several of the songs I would love to see worked on a bit more to either make it a bit longer or just to flesh out the backing track some. It is a fun album and I’m rather impressed in the quality given the time constraints. I think having those time constraints can be a good thing and force you just put something out there without being too picky and overall I think it is a pretty darn good album.

If you enjoy quirky lyrics with a good melody and guitar backing (acoustic, electric and/or bass in any given track) I encourage you to check out the debut album of Spandex Jellybeans - Watermelon (yes, that was what Jessie chose). They are both on facebook so if you’re there and you like the album pop in there and say hi! Or leave a comment on Drew’s entry about the experience at his blog.

I did start feeling better over the weekend and did a fair amount of the spinning you saw yesterday and I knit on Mashup Madness V2.0. It seems those cables checkered in the lace just don’t show up when you are knitting it, but if you step back they actually pop pretty well on the stockinette lace. Today, I’m off to knit on it some more at My Sister Knits later this morning. Hopefully this week I’ll actually get to knit more than about four rows. The last couple of weeks have been really busy so I’ve stepped up to the plate and helped customers with their knitting mistakes and qustions when Cathy O. has been busy with other customers. Even though I’m not paid it feels good to share my experience with others though and was kind of fun to have encouraged a few sales.

Well, this past week has had some activity to spark the holiday spirit. Of course the fact that we got snow early last week and it has actually stuck around for a few days has helped as well. I still haven’t gotten around to decorating, but I think I will before too long.

On Thursday evening we made a jaunt over to CSU’s Center for the Arts and attended the first part of a Jazz Classics Concert. The concert itself is not billed as a holiday concert, but the each choral jazz group (of which SIL3 was a member of both) had one jazz arrangement of a Christmas song on their program. We went last year for the entire concert. The jazz group was good, but not so jazzy sounding, but it was the first year of a jazz choral group at CSU. This year they had the jazz groove going. It was a pleasure to watch. And wow, has SIL3’s voice matured and rounded out for jazz singing. We had her sing a few jazz standards at our wedding and she did a lovely job, though you could tell she mostly studied opera. On Thursday night, she sounded like a jazz vocalist! It was quite impressive! We had other things to do so we did not hang around for the bands this year, but have heard tell that they too have improved over last year.

Then, last night we headed over First Presbytarian for their 21st annual handbell holiday concert. That was a great way to kick up the holiday spirit. The handbells sounded lovely and it is always entertaining to watch the amazing coordination required to pull off the songs. In addition to the church’s handbell chorus there was a small configurable group of 6 people from 5 Front Range cities who played some amazing pieces such as Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy! It was even more amazing to find out that they mostly practice on their own with recordings of the other people’s parts! WOW!

The cap to the evening for DH was that he discovered a friend of his who had rung in that choir previously and moved has since moved back and I got to meet them (and their FOUR kids) and DH got to reconnect. I think they will be nice people to add to our social circle. I don’t know a lot about her husband, but I know that she loves to cook and bake so there is a nice common interest right there!

To cap the evening off for me, we came home and DH made me open my Christmas gift from him. Yes, it was only December 3rd, the first Sunday in Advent. I was a little leary, but his reasoning made a lot of sense. I’ll hold off on revealing what it was until tomorrow but I think you’ll all see what the rush to open it was. I’m actually kind of thankful because I’m one who likes to inspect the packages and try to figure out what is inside and this one was driving me nuts.

Hmmm, I wonder if I describe it if any of you would guess…. It was about shoe box sized, but just a tad taller than normal, and it weighed in probably somewhere around 5-6 pounds. It definitely felt heavy for the size. Oh, and one other tiny hint that may be of absolutely no help whatsoever, but it has me slightly intimidated and it will definitely require a lot of reading on my part, if not a class… Any ideas? :-)

In reading, I finished Anne of Windy Poplars and checked out two mysteries from the library, the next William Kent Krueger, Boundary Waters, and a John Sandford. I’ve been exhasted and busy with DH’s five days off from work so the WKK hasn’t been going as fast as I would like it to, but I got to catch a bit last night while I was baking our lasagna and raspberry peach cobbler.

There has been an occassional movie viewing recently too, the most exciting of which was a trip to a matinee viewing of The Devil Wears Prada on Wednesday afternoon. It was a good movie with funny parts, some painful parts and a nice life lesson in the end. If you haven’t seen the previews, a top of the class journalist student from Northwestern interviews for an assistant position at a top fashion rag in New York City, but she is your home town midwestern girl and not into fashion and she manages to get the position. She works under the long-time editor of this rag who has the entire office under her thumbnail. Andy comes into her own in the nine months she spends at the rag and learns some valuable life lessons. Stanley Tucci was great and I enjoyed watching Simon Baker on the big screen. Meryl Streep did an amazing job playing an over demanding boss and Anne Hathaway was very believable as a naive midwestern girl new to the big city. This movie certainly doesn’t demand a big screen, but the fashions which play a huge role in this film certainly looked great on it. I would definitely recommend it as a fun fluff movie and I think most guys would tolerate it, DH liked it. There was even a group of four guys (sans women) at our showing on Wednesday.

Last week we also took in two films from the 1940’s. The first was Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House that I recorded off of TCM. It stars Carey Grant and Myrna Loy. It is a comedy about the frustrations of buying and building a home. It was almost a bit depressing to me given that we have several projects in progress on our own home that are now on hold until the financial situation improves. But it kind of made me of think of The Money Pit, but done better and not quite as over the top with the campy factor. Then late in the week we had SIL3 over before she headed to Italy for a couple of weeks of a master’s class in opera and we watched The Maltese Falcon. We own that one and I wasn’t so much in the mood for an old film that evening so I did a lot of knitting on that first Trekking sock and wandering in and out of the room. But it is a fun mystery movie.

In music, I wanted to point you to the Sources Collective’s blog. It is DH’s and he has started a podcast there as well and plans to post a new original song each week. He has started with two songs he did as part of an electronic music class he took in the late 1990’s and I’ve been consulted on the next song he’ll be releasing soon. So, go check it out, please and spread the word if you like what you hear. Oh, and all the stuff will not be electronica, the next piece he’s mixing right now is guitar. (EDIT: He is having some trouble with the RSS and some of the file access and may be doing some troubleshooting on that today, but it is my understanding that there is no trouble in listening to the files with the streaming player there on the site or to download by clicking on the MP3 graphic.)

For a more on-topic podcast that is new on the scene, check out the new Lime n Violet, a fun conversational knitting podcast from Lime and Violet of course!

This past Friday we watched Mrs. Henderson Presents. Dame Judi Dench was nominated for an Oscar for her portrayal of a rather ballsy widow in WWII-era London who opens a theater for her widowhood hobby. She hires Vivian Van Damm (Bob Hoskins), an opinionated but known Dutch Jewish producer to put on performances at her theater, the Windmill. Together, the two of them stir the feathers of much of the London west-end when they start having nude tableaus in their shows.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie! They did a wonderful job in filming, costuming, and make-up to create a stark contrast between the streets of London in 1937 into WWII and the theater life. While the end of the movie which occurs during WWII can be a bit heavy there were plenty of moments that made you smile or even laugh that kept me from feeling that the movie was depressing. And Pop Idol, Will Young, as their male singing lead at the Windmill, Bertie, was a great casting decision. His voice was great and his dancing and facial expressions seemed spot on.

Bottom Line: If you dislike the late 30’s and early 40’s era or if you dislike musicals you might want to give this one a pass. But, if you enjoy Dench and Hoskins and like music and are looking for a heartwarming story I’d suggest you give Mrs. Hendserson Presents a watch sometime.

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Also, a couple of weeks ago I finally picked up the first major label release of a Denver band called The Fray. I’ll admit, I often enjoy songs that get radio play. I know that isn’t very “indie” of me and I’m probably not selective enough if you ask DH, but I enjoy bands like Dave Matthews Band, Barenaked Ladies, Coldplay, Train, Keane, Lifehouse, etc. So it is no surprise I like The Fray.

What is a surprise is that it took me until they reached national radio play level for me to hear of them. I generally consider DH and I relatively tuned into the local music scene. We probabaly aren’t as tuned in as DH was before he met me because we don’t go to concerts nearly as often now. But since The Fray is a Denver band I am really surprised I hadn’t heard of them earlier.

Chances are if you listen to radio you’ve heard at least one of two tracks - the title track, How to Save a Life or Over My Head (Cable Car). I’ll go out on a limb and say if you like either of those tracks you will quite likely enjoy the entire album. There are all kinds of descriptions of this group in terms of mixes of other bands. I hate to do that because it implies they are not original, but the album does not feel like a rehashing of someone else’s style. At the same time it does make you think of other artists - the mix is strong on piano like Keane but the overall feel makes me (and many others if you poke around for other reviews) think of Coldplay. Ultimately they are a pop/rock group, but this album is well put together with a variety of tempos mixed together to form a consistent whole when listened to from beginning to end. While some of the songs are catchy they don’t feel hokey, they feel sincere.

Bottom Line: If you enjoy Coldplay but find their albums a bit repetative; If you like Keane but would like a bit more variety of tempo; If you like emotional lyrics by a male vocalist with strong piano and drum back-ups then I strongly suggest you give this album a listen. It has been in very frequent rotation since I got it.

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Coming Up (but I haven’t had custody long enough for a review)…