Earn This

Rating: 2 and a half stars (out of 4)

With trailers for Christopher Nolan’s Inception getting me all in a tizzy in anticipation of its July 16 release, I wanted to watch his much-acclaimed Memento so I’d be fluent in all of his notable works.  Not having been a particularly large Nolan fan (neither of the Batmans thrilled me as they did audiences, and Insomnia had a flaccid script), I was nonetheless all-too-aware of the breathless praise that this movie had received, so I figured that I approached it, as I always try to, with relatively neutral expectations.

And as I watched and thought about it, my feelings adopted the kind of contradictory arc endemic in 2.5-star movies.  Little held much interest for me in the first half-hour or so; much of the midsection, though, left me excitedly awaiting the next scene so we could overturn more of the concealing cloth; but afterwards, though a few of its scenes ran through my mind, I wasn’t compelled to ponder it as I hoped I would.  That, in the end, is what limits Memento—it’s a one-watch movie, one that’s not nearly so philosophically fascinating as it should be (purports to be?), one that inevitably keeps you at such arm’s-length from the characters that, once you know all the details of the plot, you have little reason to come back for more.

Guy Pearce plays Leonard, a man with anterograde amnesias suffered after a blow to the head during an encounter that also led to his wife’s death.  The film annoyingly calls his condition “short term memory loss,” but it simply means that one has the inability to form new memories, while retaining the same capacity of memory for events that occurred before the injury.  To my knowledge, most people with said disorder do not ‘remember’ that they have the memory loss, in the way that Leonard does here, but oh well.

Pearce fanatically pursues his wife’s murderer to keep the story moving; but what’s most notable about the film, of course, is its structure: Nolan shows us the last scene, chronologically, and then backs up to show us the 5 minutes before that.  Lather, rinse repeat.  Each brief scene ends precisely when the last one that we saw ended, at which point the film backs up a few minutes again.  On some level, this does provide a bridge to the protagonist, as he of course doesn’t always know what’s going on. (Why am I holding a bottle of alcohol?  I don’t feel drunk…)

But reviewers and fans overstated the connection that the structure has with Leonard’s state of mind.  We, of course, remember what happens in previous scenes of the movie when we see the next ones.  The only time we share Leonard’s confusion is at the very beginning of each scene cut—but then when we see another character, say, we know who they are in the movie, and he does not.  Indeed, a key problem for me with the film is that the structure is merely a gimmick.  It’s a fancy way of dressing up a rather mundane story.  I’m always skeptical of such structures, for one basic reason: Is the story not strong enough to be told chronologically?

That said, that device is what helped me become somewhat interested in the goings-on, what probably turned this from a 2 to a 2.5-star movie.  It’s still a gimmick, but it’s not high on the list of reasons the movie doesn’t succeed—that would fall to the chronological story itself.  There are a fair amount of Shutter Island parallels, particularly in the climax, but the film doesn’t even sniff that movie’s visual richness, thematic breadth, or philosophical provocativeness.

What’s left is much more banal, a conventional murder mystery not given much enhancement by a cast of characters whom we never particularly care about, played by relatively obscure actors delivering fairly rote performances.  (Joe Pantoliano, as the mysterious Teddy, fares best.  Pearce, who projects a sort of Brad Pitt aura but with Tom Cruise’s voice, is fine, but I kept wondering why he never got more intense during Teddy’s climactic speech.)

As the film progressed—particularly as we learned more about the man named “Sammy” who had a similar condition as Leonard—I was indeed eager to see what happened; as I wrote in my notes, the movie “has me intrigued.”  What’s most interesting about the conclusion is not the resolution of the story, per se, but the philosophical/psychological concepts put forth about memory.  Memento doesn’t really advance this notion (when Leonard comments at one point, “The world doesn’t just disappear when you close your eyes,” it’s all said very un-philosophically and brusquely), but it’s all I had to cling onto.  Can one make a conscious decision to forget something?  Absolutely.  Dissociative identity disorder and its concomitant partial amnesia often occur when a person subconsciously doesn’t want to remember something (again, observe Shutter Island), but forgetting can be intentional as well.

Interesting points, but ones not advanced the way they should be.  I know that because, the more I thought about this movie, the less captivating it became.  My interest inexorably faded, frustratingly independent of my desires, like that opening Polaroid or one of Leonard’s own memories.

Rating: **** (out of 4)

Sorry, Shutter Island. Toy Story 3 is my favorite movie I’ve seen this year, and it’s not even close. I’m an unashamed Pixar fanboy, so you should probably take my reactions with a grain of salt. But here is my attempt to persuade you to see Pixar’s latest masterpiece, in bullet points:

• The design and creativity of Toy Story 3 is just on a higher plane than any animated film from any other studio. Pixar remains committed to visual storytelling, not far removed from silent films. The level of detail is stunning.
• The film’s ending is one of my favorites ever. After the third act twist, this film is on storytelling hyperdrive.
• Rarely if ever have I seen a film so thematically rich. Different elements of Toy Story 3 work as metaphors for all types of big concepts and struggles: love, community, death, capitalism, aging, family, cloning, and — more than anything else — loss. (Also, it has weird parallels to the holocaust.)
• Before last week, the king of blockbuster trilogies was either classic Star Wars or Indiana Jones as far as I was concerned. Others preferred the overwrought and overrated Lord of the Rings, and classic cinema enthusiasts sing the praises of the Man With No Name. But we have a new Best Trilogy Ever. Each of the films has a distinct flavor, yet the whole works greater than the sum of the parts because of its distinct thematic arc. Simply phenomenal.
• The movie parodies and influences in this film are spectacular. Any film buff (especially prison escapes) will be in heaven here.
• The older this series get — or maybe just the older I get — the better these movies get, and the darker they appear. This movie (intensely) contemplates a variety of toy deaths and afterlives.
• Every character gets his or her moment. In the centerpiece adventure of the film, all eight or so of the central characters contribute in substantial ways.
• The new villain (whose identity remains ambiguous until about the halfway point, so I will not reveal it here) is excellent, perhaps the best of the series.
• Pixar nerds will be in Heaven — there are Easter Eggs galore.
• Mr. Potato Head, usually content to be a smart-aleck with a couple of good sight gags, gets the funniest joke in the movie: one that ponders what the “essence” of a Potato Head is.
• Three friends of mine who claimed to not like the second Toy Story admitted to loving the third one, to the point that they’re ready to revisit the second film and reevaluate. So if TS2 didn’t do as much for you as it did for me, don’t be scared to check TS3 out.
• Trust me that there’s a satisfying, conclusive conclusion to this story arc that brings the series’ central conceit — toys that come to life and are loyal to their owner — full circle.
• Everyone in the theater over the age of sixteen was on the verge of tears, if not bawling. (And I’m not ashamed to admit that I felt tears streaming down my cheeks.) This film is as much a love letter to nostalgia and childhood as it is an animated adventure.
• Just see it. Even if you don’t end up as enamored with it as I did, it will surely evoke some response in you. 99% on RottenTomatoes and 96 on MetaCritic means almost nobody has disliked it — or even not loved it.
• A telling quote from the IMDb boards: “Seriously. Did anyone else just feel like their childhood just ended right before their very eyes?”
• Right now, the film is ranked #11 on the IMDb top 250, with a nontrivial chance to peak in the Top 10 or Top 5 (before inevitably dropping, as always happens on the IMDb list). My point is not that it’s one of the best movies ever, but that pretty much everyone adored it the way they adored movies like The Dark Knight and LotR3.
• Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the closing credits includes a Spanish version of You Got a Friend in Me by the Gipsy Kings. So unspeakably awesome.

Arcade Fire, EP (2003) – 2 stars

Funeral (2004) – 4.5 stars

Neon Bible (2007) – 4.5 stars

Within seemingly 5 minutes of breaking onto the music scene, the Arcade Fire lost anonymity.  David Bowie immediately proclaimed himself a major fan, festivals like Lollapalooza snapped them up, and U2 not only asked them to share stages on their Vertigo Tour but also played one of their tracks as the lead-in to every show.  This acclaim within the industry was matched by the feelings felt by both critics and the public towards the band’s debut album, which currently sports a score of 90 on Metacritic.

Overreaction?  Hardly.  The group’s early EP didn’t show much promise, but 2004’s Funeral is the kind of album that everyone should like and yet doesn’t feel tailored to the masses, one that revels in its influences and yet still sounds utterly original, one that makes earnestness and sincerity cool again.  Full of heart and bluster and pain and energy, it’s one glorious and dramatic journey into…death?

Well, yes, as the album’s title, and overall thematic breadth, reflects the passing of several family members within the band, which is headed by Win Butler and his wife Regine Chassagne.  Joined by a bevy of other musicians and vocalists, they create soundscapes with a host of orchestral instruments.  Minimalist, they are not; and their ambitions are so wonderfully refreshing in a age of simplicity in music.  Starting things off is the first of 4 “neighborhood” passages that reflect the band’s wistfulness; on the opener, stately piano underscores Win’s gradually crescendoing vocals about the hope of children to escape family strife through friendship.

The band clearly wants immediacy, wants to cling to something positive, wants respite from torpor and sadness.  A couple songs submerge songcraft for instrumentation that’s too hard to parse (the second “Neighborhood,” for example, doesn’t stick in the mind); but the revelatory power put forth on tracks like “Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)” and “Rebellion (Lies)” uplifts listeners, no matter how ambivalent the subject matter—yes, the Fire has that men-from-the-boys quality of being able to make darkness life-affirming.  Butler eschews the kind of detached, stoic cool that pervades much of 2000s music and hit peaks of intensity instead: when he cries on Power Out, “Is it a dream, is it a lie? / I think I’ll let you decide / Light a candle for the kids / Jesus Christ, don’t keep it hid” the feeling is overwhelming.

And then there’s “Wake Up,” the U2 fade-in that inspires no reservations whatsoever about that band’s taste.  An epic, pull-back-on-the reins rock anthem, filled with color and energy, it’s one of those songs that sounds as though it could have been written anytime in the last 30 years—or the next 30.  As he does on “Rebellion,” Butler encourages people to persevere through tragedy, once again expressing nostalgia for foregone innocence (“Now that I’m older / My heart’s colder / And I can see that it’s a lie”).

A few years in the making and less grandiose, 2007’s Neon Bible imparts a cloudier, murkier hue upon listeners, replacing epic feelings with more down-to-earth ruminations.  Like on all great sequels (Joy Division’s Closer, the second and third Bourne movies, etc), they’ve accurately determined just what to include and what to change.  You can hear Joy Division in its (occasionally) cavernous darkness, you can hear U2 in the earnestness and anthems, you can hear Bruce Springsteen (“Antichrist Television Blues”), but you can also hear no one.  Just as with the first album, Neon Bible doesn’t really sound like anybody.  It’s just The Arcade Fire.

I vividly remember my first listen to Bible, being blown away by the effect of the added atmosphere, not believing how macabre and gloomy and thrilling those first four songs sounded.  “Black Mirror,”—there’s your Joy Division ominousness, given liftoff—and “Keep the Car Running,” unleashing mandolins and all kinds of exuberant fun, eliminate any possibility of a let-down.  And when the bottom drops out of the breathtaking “Intervention,” at the 2:01 mark, the same thing will happen to your jaw.

In a somewhat similar vein as Funeral, the band still gets into trouble with their propensity for limpid, virtually guitar-free mood pieces (“Neon Bible” in particular; the best of these is “Ocean of Noise,” in no small part thanks to the excellent line, “You’ve got your reasons / And me, I’ve got mine / But all the reasons I gave were just lies to by myself some time.”)

Indeed, Butler’s lyrics have a way of covering up the band’s minor imperfections.  They’re a little broader than on Funeral, but still personal, still vivid.  The “Power Out” vocal intensity comes on “Intervention”—“Been working for the church while your life falls apart / Been singing ‘Hallelujah’ with the fear in your heart.”  But not every song matches them appropriately; when “Windowsill” accelerates, he cries, “The windows are locked now, so what’ll be it be / A house on fire / Or a rising sea?” an image that conjures up far more emotion than the instrumentation—they need a little less gray, a little more guitar.

But that line resonates with the listener, in part because it’s surprisingly reflective of the band’s career.  Funeral is the house on fire, Neon Bible the rising sea; but they’ve always taken their dystopia with a different bent than most.  Their worldview is best summed up by the top line on ATB: “Into the light of a starless sky / I’m staring into nothing, and I’m asking you why.”  Rather than simply reflecting misery, they’re always asking why, and always staring ahead, irrespective of what looks back at them.  With their pivotal third album set to be released this August, the world cannot possibly predict what they will see next.

Americans today don’t give a hoot about progressive rock.  Our parents grew up on Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd; the lucky ones collected vinyl from Kansas, ELP, and King Crimson.  Those heirlooms have clearly not trickled down yet here the way they have in experimental music havens scattered around Japan and Northern and Western Europe.

That makes it hard for Spock’s Beard, the international superstars from L.A. now in their eighteenth year, left standing as the proverbial prophets not accepted in their homeland.  Things seemed even bleaker in 2002 when frontman and brainfather Neal Morse departed from the group after six albums.  But now, with the release of X, the stalwart boys look to reclaim their crown as kings of the formerly-and-elsewhere-beloved genre.

Naturally, as their tenth album, X references their fifth: V.  Having run out their record deal last year, the band opted not to re-sign with any label just yet.  Instead, they funded and produced the album themselves and with the help of established friends in the industry.  Most of the money for the endeavor came from hopelessly devoted faithfuls like me who willingly shelled out up to $200 for various pre-ordering options offered before any recording took place.  Now that the finished piece of work is in our hands – 10 months later – was it worth it?

Ha.  “Worth it” would be an understatement.  This is the first post-Neal album that merits favorable comparisons to the band’s earlier work.  And that is the highest praise available.

Understand that this brand of prog comes with intricate time signatures, some eccentric keyboards, and long songs.  (The 8 tracks on X add up to over 78 minutes, near the capacity of an audio CD.)  Neal Morse was primarily a singing keyboardist, so, upon his departure, resident Moog master Ryo Okumoto attempted to maintain the key-centric attitude of the band to mixed results.  Drummer-cum-replacement-lead-singer Nick D’Virgilio then spent an album pretending he was a rock star before the guys managed to find their feet post-reconstruction.  This new album shows them gelling like never before and finding excellence as a fundamentally bass-driven band.

Two featured 16-minute tracks on the record are subdivided into movements.  Both “From the Darkness” and “Jaws of Heaven” are odd in that they forego the sort of blazing introductions or overtures that the band has historically employed to signal an incoming epic.  They hop right into things, the former beginning with a hard rock feel and the latter as a mournful western ballad.  At four movements apiece, though, the songs have plenty of time to pass through various moods and genres.

“From the Darkness” suffers slightly from a cut-and-jump approach to transitions that, while not disorienting in execution, leaves one feeling that they have just listened to four disconnected songs.  The abstract and vague lyrics (arguably a problem on half of X‘s tracks) don’t imbue any greater sense of unity in the story D’Virgilio spins.  Vastly superior in this regard is “Jaws of Heaven,” whose segues are fluid and whose movements feel related by recurring motives while each exhibits a unique musical character.  The third movement is particularly compelling: stirring far-off drums complement sparse guitar strokes and a soft voice, all held together by the persistent and understated bass.

Both suites conclude in powerful fashion.  Either would have been perfectly suited to end the album, an honor granted to “Jaws of Heaven.”

Four-stringer Dave Meros contributes his writing talents to “Edge of the In-Between,” a modest tune at 10 minutes long.  While not demarcated into sections, the song moves through a progression of passages with entrancing continuity.  The listener is never jilted by the undercurrents moving from a rollicking 4/4 chorus to an expansive 7/4 jam to a slowed-down bridge that alternates between dainty piano and sludgy bass.  The recapitulation that follows is reminiscent of the grand effect captured in “At the End of the Day” on V, a compliment not to be taken lightly.

Meros on bass and D’Virgilio on drums click so well that it’s easy to get the impression they are featured in every song on the album.  Soaring keys and crunching guitars are thus enabled to reach their full potential on every lick.

A strong case can be made that the standout track is “The Emperor’s Clothes,” nearly the shortest at under 6 minutes, beating out only the shifting and dramatic instrumental romp “Kamikaze.”  Written by guitarist Alan Morse (with added touches by his brother Neal!), it is a perfect example of great lyrics perfectly matched by effective musical arrangement.  The song tells the first half of the well-known story from the point of view of the tailor who has never sewn but has a plan to cash in: “Well you’ve never seen clothes / Like you won’t see those… ‘Cause the fabric’s so fine / It’s like it’s not even there.”

Bursting and driving trombones ring in the song and are later joined by french horns, a string quartet, and a number of wonky synthesized sounds to complement the core rock instrumentation.  Besides all this, there is a cheery a cappella section in the middle ended by a frenetic xylophone run.  Tempo jumps add to the effect of a song that is thoroughly fun.  Even the basic beat seems to recreate a circus parade!

Finally, a nod must be given to “Their Names Escape Me.”  The perfectly eerie mood created, so befitting of a song whose lyrics tell of a judgment and inquisition (“Tell us the names of every traitor who / Took up arms against the nation…”), continues and grows in tension as the band first sings the song proper, then moves into a list of names.  D’Virgilio captures in the tune my name and the names of every other contributor to the recording fund, all the while keeping legitimate music going underneath.  As the names are sung, the key raises steadily and the arrangement thickens until the eventual unearthly fade-out.

Led by Meros and D’Virgilio, with all intellectualism and virtuosity intact, X is a highly melodic and engaging product.  Finally, Spock’s Beard has recreated epics better than past efforts penned by Neal such as “Flow” and “The Good Don’t Last.”  Attempts to do so have been made on every record since his departure; only here have they paid off.  It is thrilling, after eighteen years, to see the boys raise the question of whether their greatest work lies behind them or ahead.

I have a little sister who’s about to graduate from pre-school, so my mom has seen the whole spectrum of kiddie TV shows. When I asked her to describe Yo Gabba Gabba in one sentence, this is what she said:

“It’s what I imagine LSD flashbacks must be like.”

The surreal Nickelodeon show is about dancing and singing and grooving. The average episode features a bunch of songs with gratingly simple beats and shout-along melodies. While the show has been a hit with pre-schoolers, winning the little-kid demographic at its time slot (if not trumping juggernauts like Dora the Explorer), the show has developed considerable buzz as a hipster favorite, in large part because of some points my mom was touching on: its phantasmagorical absurdity and straight-faced wackiness.

Yo Gabba Gabba that taps into some of the most primitive reasons we watch moving pictures: shapes and sounds and rhythms and colors. My goodness, the colors: As you can tell from the picture I decided to include, Yo Gabba Gabba stretches across the rainbow and saturates everything. It’s bright and fun and, as main “character” DJ Lance Rock, likes to say, it’s “awwweeeesoooooooomme!”

Another key to the show’s popularity with the young twenty-somethings is that it’s been a fertile ground for inspired guest starring. The pilot featured Biz Markie in “Biz’s Beat of the Day.” Though he’s best remembered for his semi-novelty track “Just a Friend,” in which he whines and wails, Biz Markie has slightly more cred as a funny freestyler and beatboxer.

Markie threw himself into the role so unabashedly, and fit the vibe of the show so well, that it really worked and set a precedent for having stars of various caliber on the show acting like they really want to be there and make kids get up and move. Another representative example is Elijah Wood, who is not only a random enough celebrity to be cool and unpredictable, but is introduced as “Elijah,” not “Elijah Wood, star of upcoming animated film 9, coming to theaters this September!”

Most celebrities on Yo Gabba Gabba are there just for the fun of it, not for self-promotion, which adds to the charm. There’s no sly references to the guest’s real life persona or even acknowledgment that anyone is famous or notable. It’s just someone else to sing a “Dance-y Dance” song.

Here’s an incomplete list of guest star appearances. I love how eclectic the collection is:

• Biz Markie
• Fashion designer Paul Frank’s Julius the Monkey
• Andy Samberg
• The Aquabats
• The Aggrolites
• Hector Jimenez
• Smoosh
• Devo
• Sean Kingston
• Tony Hawk
• Shiny Toy Guns
• Rahzel
• The Shins
• Melora Hardin (actress from The Office)
• Jack McBrayer (actor from 30 Rock)
• Jimmy Eat World
• Hot Hot Heat
• The Ting-Tings
• The Roots
• Jack Black
• Weezer
• MGMT
• “Weird Al” Yankovic
• Sarah Silverman
• Black Kids
• of Montreal
• Mos Def
• Mix Master Mike (of the Beastie Boys)
• Solange (Beyonce’s little sister)

Pretty impressive list, huh? Many of the more high-profile appearances have come in the past  several months. I doubt it’ll be long before Jay-Z or Tom Hanks makes an appearance. I’m not the only one to have noticed the strange popularity of the show. The hipsters’ fixation, like the show itself, is quite amusing and worth keeping an eye on.

This is part 8 of the Relient K retrospective

(I wrote a review of Forget and Not Slow Down about a week ago. Since then, I’ve been doing some research on the album’s origins, and I believe the results make it much more moving and devastating.)

I generally like to keep my nose out of other people’s business, but because  Forget and Not Slow Down is such an emotional album, I figured it could be valuable to try and figure out what events caused these emotions to better relate to its often abstruse lyrics. My poking around was not in vain. Here’s the story, as I understand it, but feel free to disagree with my speculation and assessment. I’ve linked to all the sources I used in reaching my conclusions.

Back story:

Matt Thiessen is generally known as one of the nicest dudes in music. He takes his Christianity seriously. Everyone was thrilled when he proposed in a most adorable way to radio host Shannon Murphy. She used her blog to keep her friends, and the world, updated on their engagement. But a few months later, she revealed that the two had split after she discovered “a few things about Matt that I just simply could not handle,” though she noted that she still believes he has an “amazingly huge heart.”

The break-up went down pretty quietly until Murphy got a new gig and started talking about an ex-boyfriend who cheated on her. Though she declined to use a name and vocation to identify who she was referring to, people made the connection.

Towards the end of the next year, Relient K’s sixth studio album came out. Thiessen says he wrote it when we went to a cabin in the woods for a couple of months to do nothing but reflect and pray and write. Forget and not Slow Down was the result, and it came out to pretty strong critical acclaim, with few media sources rating it worse than 4 out of 5 or the equivalent.

On the morning of the release on Shannon’s radio show, she directly implicated implicated [edit: this link is dead, I'm looking for another version of it, because this is the crucial piece of the puzzle] him as a cheater, although she noticeably avoids saying anything else negative about him. She also reveals some tidbits that add some serious poignancy to the album: the couple always used to travel to Savannah, GA — and there’s a song on the album called “Savannah.” Perhaps most devastatingly of all, “Baby,” a 40-second outro to Savannah, was the song Thiessen originally wrote for Murphy to play to her at their wedding.

Over the next few weeks in interviews, Thiessen frequently expanded on the album’s meaning, though he declined to delve into specific details regarding his personal situation. Of course, some fangirls refuse to believe Murphy is telling the truth because Matt is, like, so amazing. Others have taken a more reasonable view that neither of them are saints, and it’s pretty clear Matt likely betrayed her trust in some way, and they were not a perfect match anyways.

I suppose it’s theoretically possible that she’s completely BS’ing and slandering Thiessen, but he’s never really disputed her claims of adultery, and a few passages in the album more or less confirm her claims. So how does this information affect the listener?

Re-interpretation

More than anything else, these details of Thiessen and Murphy’s break-up make Forget and Not Slow Down a personal and powerful album. My initial reading of the album was as a broad, over-arching look at the concept of saying goodbye and pressing on. But, after hearing Murphy talk about the album, I think there’s a lot of value in the album as a reflection on their specific relationship.

If Thiessen in fact perfidiously caused the end of his relationship, then the words of the album carry much more weight — particularly considering his saintly public image before the scandal broke out. I think there’s something poignant and ironic about the leader of the most spiritual and positive of bands committing an act of great betrayal, then having to dealing with the consequences. It gives the album very high emotional stakes and some genuine substance.

Other great RK albums have been reflective and regretful, but on smaller levels. Forget and Not Slow Down is paradigm-smashing for the band in its gravity. This was evident to a certain extent when the I interpreted the album broadly, its songs as abstractions. But, with this new backstory, it’s clear that never before has Relient K been so acute, specific, and painful. The album works much stronger as a look at Thiessen’s specific shame and regret and recovery than as a detached meditation of these concepts.

A few of the most telling passages:

A lion on his side, was it the lying or his pride which brought him down?
Once the king of beasts, but now they feast on the thoughts beneath his vacant crown
Trying to decide, was it the lying or the pride which brought it down?
To be alone, to be dethroned, believe me I know all about it now
from “Sahara”

This passage works as a general image of pride and sin, but works especially well considering the scandal and isolation surrounding Thiessen’s life. As the king of Christian rock (in terms of both quality and mainstream success), and one album removed from his biggest and happiest album, he sank to his lowest, and he’s still not sure if it was “lying or his pride which brought him down.”

Baby
It’s all that I can do to
Thank you
Cause every time you wrapped those arms around me
I felt I was home cause
Everything made sense when you were with me
from “Baby (Outro)”

Tossed off as an outro, I dismissed “Baby” as generic post-breakup pining until I learned the song’s origin as the song Thiessen wrote for Murphy to play at their wedding. What a harrowing inversion of the song’s initial concept: a bittersweet farewell at the abrupt conclusion of their relationship instead of at the beginning of their marriage. Thiessen has said in interviews that recording this album was overall a positive experience, but I can’t imagine that was true for “Baby.”

I’d rather forget and not slow down
Than gather regret for the things I can’t change now
If I become what I can’t accept
Resurrect the saint from within the wretch
Pour over me and wash my hands
Pour over me and wash my hands
from “Forget and Not Slow Down”

“Resurrect the saint from within the wretch” is the key line of the album, I think. It best sums up the album’s tone: regretful and defeated, but still looking for the right way to respond. He doesn’t shy away from the fact that he did something wrong, but he considers that the most therapeutic option is to move on rather than linger on his guilt. There’s also some nice imagery of absolution there (“Pour over me and wash my hands”) which reflects a lot of passages in the Bible.

I met the devil and I stared her in the eyes
Her hair had scales like silver serpents
I, a statue, stood there mesmerized
I took the fire escape and made it out alive

Yeah I still burn from time to time
But I’ve a healing hand against my side

Blisters on my feet I crawled back home
Frozen from the sleet, burned sand and stones
Nourished back to life by life alone
With one shake of the mane regain the throne
from “(If You Want It)”

These are the closing lyrics of the album, and they’re most beautiful Thiessen’s ever written, in my opinion. That first stanza is about as poetic and archetypal as any admission of guilt, and he follows it up not only with a re-affirmation of faith and healing (second stanza) but that dazzling coda. Those last four lines call back the lion image from “Sahara.” They also present an idea unusual in the modern rock-and-roll landscape, which tends towards angst and self-deprication: That the very act of living, even in misery, is valuable.

That’s how Forget and Not Slow Down is still a distinctly Relient K album, even as it confronts a major transgression by the band’s leader: It stays rooted in optimism and an a love for life more unquenchable than ever.

Revised rating: 4 and half stars (out of 5)

The Spider-Man reboot is currently casting, and director Marc Webb is on record as going for an actor much lower profile than Tobey Maguire to take the titular, masked role. Sci-fi blog io9 suggested that the next Spidey be a non-caucasian. Some commenters threw out the name Donald Glover from the TV show Community and the comedy troupe Derrick Comedy, perhaps in part because Glover jokingly tweeted that he wouldn’t fight a movement to get him the part a few months earlier.

Glover happened across the article and the comment, and he tweeted again that he would love to be considered for the part. He started to push the twitter tag “#donald4spiderman” and it went mildly viral. After organizing two twitter-bombs to get the tag as a trending topic (though he didn’t reach his goal of cracking the worldwide top ten, #donald4spiderman peaked at #3 in the US and #1 in Chicago), the blogs are ablaze with discussion about whether such a casting — and, more generally, a non-white Peter Parker — would be a good thing.

I’m here to tell you that Donald Glover being cast as Spiderman wouldn’t be a good thing… it’d be a great thing. Here are ten reasons why I think Sony should take the chance to nab Glover:

1. Glover is a really talented actor
   He’s focused on funny roles so far in his career, but his characters have occasionally had moments of drama. Glover’s always nailed them. Plus, he’s an incredibly gifted physical actor. Unlike Tobey Maguire, who always felt a bit stiff in his set pieces, Glover would be a natural with the running and jumping and flying.
2. The reboot really needs a twist
   The awful fan reaction to Spider-Man 3 coupled with the gushing love for The Dark Knight has rendered the Spider-Man franchise virtually irrelevant. Coming back with smaller names, a smaller budget, and a director best known for a Zooey Deschanel film wouldn’t help; there’s almost no way it will gain any box office traction… unless, of course, you give the public a reason for a reboot. For example, changing the race of the character.
3. Glover, like Peter Parker, is a city-dwelling nerd
   Think of some of the most memorable blockbuster roles of the past few years: Downey in Iron Man, Rourke in The Wrestler, Bridges in Crazy Heart, etc. Most of them have had some sort of connection between actor and character. Glover’s connection to Parker is that he, too, is a nerd from a New York. It’s not particularly poignant, but these little touches matter.
4. The race of Peter Parker doesn’t really matter…
   There’s nothing distinctly white about Spider-Man, aside from the fact that he’s always been white. In fact, there’s nothing about Spider-Man that has any notable ethnic or racial element to it. He’s not defined by his race or his background. Basically, Glover’s blackness does nothing to contradict or affect his legitimacy as Parker.
5. …and, in fact, the character might gain some poignancy by being a minority
   Unlike Superman and Captain America, Spider-Man isn’t much of a patriotic symbol. If anything, he’s symbolic of the dismissed and struggling lower class being more powerful and meaningful than commonly recognized. That’s why I think it makes good sense to have a minority Spidey: Many of the character’s underlying themes match the traditional challenges of upward mobility for urban, minority youth.
6. Glover has franchise-like star power
   He’s not quite Will Smith or Denzel Washington, but he’s got that inherent likability and energy about him usually reserved for much more polished stars.  Throw in his good looks, his popularity with the people he works with, his obvious passion for entertaining (he’s also a rapper), and you have someone who could be headlining movies for decades to come, provided his acting chops grow as his resume does.
7. Glover has a strong network of high-potential grassroots comedians
   Glover not only works with a comedy troupe, he does a lot of non-mainstream standup and improv. He’s a part of a network of entertainers — starting with his comedy troupe — that are ripe with talent. A major film studio tapping into that network could earn great dividends and acquire a large pool of new talent. This happened with the former Freaks and Geeks cast not long ago when Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen started making it big, and their whole posse found their way into leading roles and big-time popularity, not to mention huge bucks for the lucky studios who found that gold mine.
8. The world is ready for a new tone for superhero movies
   Maybe I’m off on this assessment, but I think some people are starting to grow weary of the “gritty reboot.” Iron Man spiced it up with the dynamic, energetic Downey, but Hulk was a downer, and I get the impression that most of the upcoming superhero movies will focus on the dark elements to cash in on The Dark Knight’s popularity. And while I think establishing high stakes is important, and a solid focus on the struggles of characters makes for compelling storytelling, I don’t want to lose the fun-ness of comics. With a comedian but gem of a talent like Glover, you have a real shot to blend the serious with the fun instead of trying to out-Nolan The Dark Knight.
9. Controversy is easy press
   The comic book movie horizon has never been more crowded. With at least a dozen promising comic franchises coming to the silver screen in the next three or four years, it’ll become harder and harder for individual comic movies to command buzz they have the past three or four years. Doing something bold like casting a black Spider-Man is a surefire way to get people talking about your film.
10. Glover loves Spider-Man, and would pour his heart into the film
    A self-avowed “black nerd,” Donald Glover has said he loves Spider-Man. He’d leave everything he has out on the celluloid, and would probably do it for a lot less than the other actors being considered, even the unknowns. From his I Am Just a Rapper mix, to underground comedy gem Mystery Team, to his clever writing on 30 Rock, to his continued excellence on Community, Glover’s projects tend to go for broke. All of his projects are passion projects, and Spider-Man would be no exception. You’d get 110%, day in and day out.

Bonus Reason: It would get people watching Community
So this last reason isn’t really an argument of why it would help Sony, but it would be a great side effect of the casting. The only reason The Office ever took off was because Steve Carell had a star-making turn in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and fans hungry for more of the actor started tuning in and telling their friends how funny the show was. For the brilliant Community to survive to graduation will probably require some lucky breaks. Buzz around Glover for being cast as Spider-Man would definitely be a start.

I’m not going to guarantee a Glover-starring Spider-Man movie would be great. I’m not even 100% sure he could pull off a role with that kind of emotional range; after all, he’s done almost entirely comedy. But there’s enough upside to seriously consider him. With the recent enthusiasm surrounding him and the buzz about whether Parker could be non-white, Sony would be smart to just give him an audition.

In the mean time, join the Glover-approved Facebook group. Or just go watch his La Bilbioteca rap with Danny Pudi again.