Video of the Day: Local Natives, “Who Knows, Who Cares”
These people are having a better day than you are. Even the guy with the Freddie Mercury ‘stache. Scratch that — especially the guy with the Freddie Mercury ‘stache.
– Lang
AMC’s “The Walking Dead” tackles zombies with brains, guts and plenty of bite
Frank Darabont’s “The Walking Dead” has brains, guts and plenty of bite. The series, debuting at 9 p.m. Sunday on AMC, has the potential to redefine onscreen zombie sagas by fleshing out its living characters and, rather than simply engaging viewers in the standard video-game mechanics of an undead story (can you get from A to B without getting chomped? How many stumbling corpses can you kill along the way?) “The Walking Dead” asks serious questions about morality and the lengths people might take to survive the zombie apocalypse.
Based on Robert Kirkman’s comic book series and executive produced by the author, “The Walking Dead” centers on Deputy Sheriff Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln of “Love, Actually”), who experiences a brutal twist on the Rip Van Winkle story: a shootout with fugitives lands him in the hospital, comatose. When he wakes up after an untold number of weeks, his IV drip is dry, the EKG is silent and nobody will respond to his requests for help. But as he stumbles through the hospital, clearly a facility ravaged by some terrible fate, the tell-tale signs of an encroaching horror become all too obvious to Rick: bodies stripped of flesh down to the bones, warnings written in human blood on double doors bulging from the insistent pushing of groaning, determined forces on the other side.
To read more, go to NewsOK’s Television Blog.
Video of the Day: Allo Darlin, “My Heart is a Drummer”
Elizabeth Morris delivers a sweet, delectable pop song — cute as a cardboard cutout heart, or perhaps several of them. From Allo Darlin’s self-titled debut, out now on Fortuna Pop.
– Lang
Music Review: Kings of Leon, “Come Around Sundown”
Rating: 74
It’s hard when a band gets big, and Kings of Leon are now the ruling elite. Having started with a rough-cut, Southern punk sound that came across like the lower east side of Macon, Ga., the Kings jettisoned that rawness in favor of stadium-ready majesty on 2007′s “Because of the Times” and the following year’s “Only By the Night,” becoming one of the biggest rock bands in the world. “Come Around Sundown” finds Caleb, Nathan, Jared and Matthew Followill in the middle ground, re-embracing elements of their younger selves while still aspiring to U2 levels of grandeur.
The latter is most apparent from the beginning on “The End,” as Caleb sings of displacement and rejection over buzz-saw guitars and an ambient synth swell, and on the effervescent “Radioactive,” which might be as close as any recent band has gotten to “Joshua Tree”-era heroics. These moments are frontloaded and reach their apex on the album’s centerpiece ballad, “The Face,” but the downshifting found elsewhere on “Come Around Sundown” is a welcome surprise.
The doo-wop chord progressions on “Mary” deliver unexpected sweetness, but the real payoff comes at the halfway mark with the crying slide guitar and rural romance of “Back Down South,” a beautiful track worthy of classic Gregg Allman. Throw in bright rhythmic experiments such as “Pony Up” and the celebratory “Birthday,” and “Come Around Sundown” finds a way to satisfy the masses while tipping a hat to the original fans who remember Kings of Leon when Oklahoma was their second home.
– Lang
Blu-ray Review: “The Exorcist”
Rating: 92
Some horror films lose their power to chill over time, a consequence of outdated effects or formerly scary ideas becoming quaint or commonplace. But after nearly four decades, William Friedkin’s “The Exorcist” is still nothing short of terrifying. Since its original run in 1973, audiences made do with increasingly washed-out prints and home video editions, although a 2000 restoration returned some of the vivid color of pea soup to the proceedings. But little will prepare longtime fans for this new Blu-ray version, which includes the original edit and Friedkin’s cut.
Styles of clothes and cars notwithstanding, this “Exorcist” looks like it could have been shot last year. The digital remaster means viewers can see every crack in the walls of the Iraqi ruins where Father Merrin (Max von Sydow) first encounters the ancient devil statue. Regan’s desiccated lips and self-inflicted wounds still shock, and the special effects hold up beautifully on the digital transfer — as Regan (Linda Blair) sends all her belongings flying across the bedroom and later levitates over her mattress, the effect is still just as seamless and horrific.
In addition to Friedkin’s fine director’s cut, which adds 10 minutes and slightly improves the film’s continuity, the Blu-ray offers great commentary tracks from Friedkin and the book’s author, William Peter Blatty, along with the feature-length documentary “Fear of God: The Making of ‘The Exorcist’” and a 40-page booklet. Comprehensive and generous as the extras might be, the star attraction is still the shockingly sharp restoration of the film itself. If anything, eliminating many of the signs of age makes “The Exorcist” even more immediately frightening — the distance of time can no longer protect you.
– Lang
Music Review: Belle and Sebastian, “Write About Love”
Rating: 84
Belle and Sebastian are weighed down by the iconic status of 1998′s “The Boy with the Arab Strap” and 1996′s “If You’re Feeling Sinister,” the two albums that cemented Glasgow’s Stuart Murdoch as the literary-minded heir to Morrissey, but ever since, the band’s sound has become brighter and more complex. “Write About Love” is Belle and Sebastian’s eighth studio album, and it expands on the group’s R&B flirtations, resulting in a mod’s paradise of retro-pop with resonant grooves.
“Write About Love” opens warmly with “I Didn’t See It Coming,” a bright blue-eyed soul anthem in which Murdoch and Sarah Martin sing about the simple joys of living on love, extolling one another to “Make me dance, I want to surrender.” As it turns out, duets such as “Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John” (with Norah Jones) and the title song (featuring Carey Mulligan) offer the obvious high points: Jones and Murdoch blend beautifully, and Mulligan, the star of “Never Let Me Go,” is a spirited foil. When Murdoch tells Mulligan to “get on your skinny knees and pray,” and she sasses him back with “maybe not today,” the chemistry is undeniable.
While not as obviously democratic as 2000′s “Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like a Peasant,” “Write About Love” gives Murdoch’s bandmates great showcases such as Martin’s breezy “I Can See Your Future” and the infectious Stevie Jackson entry “I’m Not Living in the Real World,” which bounces along like a lost Lemon Pipers single. Belle and Sebastian have not mounted a full-scale reinvention, but Murdoch and his mates are only becoming more assured as purveyors of intelligent pop, and with “Write About Love,” it shows.
– Lang
Video of the Day: The Books, “I Didn’t Know That”
Musically, the shred-and-paste aesthetic of The Books might remind some listeners of David Byrne and Brian Eno’s “My Life in the Bush of Ghosts,” but with laughs. Rebuild your swing to this second single from “The Way Out,” which features far fewer preschool-age threats of violence than their previous track, “Cold Freezing Night.”
– Lang
Video of the Day: Tahiti 80, “Solitary Bizness”
This is the title track to the French pop band’s new EP, which is out today and serves as a strong preview of “The Past, The Present & The Possible,” due Feb. 22. You already love Phoenix, but you should share the love with these guys.
– Lang
Tahiti 80 Solitary Bizness from Tahiti 80 on Vimeo.
Static, Episode 38: Green Corn Revival
Today marks the launch of the new Static site at http://static.newsok.com. Go there, and see the all the improvements we’ve made, especially the “submit your band” button, which is something that all musicians looking at this should exploit immediately. I’m happy to feature Green Corn Revival for the Season 3 premiere — they invited us to their studio in downtown Hydro, where they performed three songs from their debut disc, “Say You’re a Sinner.”
Please enjoy, and while you’re at it, follow Static on Twitter @GeorgeDLang and on Facebook at STATICmusic.
Interview
Only Love
New Way Back
Many Worlds
“Mad Men” Recap: 413, “Tomorrowland”
So, a few months of our time, about a year in “Mad Men” time and 13 episodes ago, a newspaper reporter asked the question, “Who is Don Draper?” Each episode has offered part of that answer, but with “Tomorrowland,” we learn that Don Draper is exactly who he was before this extraordinary season: a man most comfortable selling a sweet, unrealistic dream, even if he’s the customer. We’ve seen him flirt with the full embrace of life in the real world, even if that embrace was not his idea, but as we’re soon to find out, Don Draper’s “Tomorrowland” is really Fantasyland, and this episode is Mr. Draper’s Wild Ride.
At the man cave, Faye Miller is leaving to go to work, and Don is lying in bed, sweaty and freaking out about the cratering going on at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, and telling Faye that he’s got “a sick feeling” in his stomach. Faye, who at this point is probably the third or fourth most knowledgeable living person when it comes to Dick Whitman’s life, tells him he might feel better if he can settle with the past, acknowledge who he really is and move on into a brave new world as a Richard Donald Draper Whitman kind of guy. But Don is going to California with an aching in his heart, and Faye is not part of the equation. “I’m going to miss you,” he tells her. We all will.
As morning commences at the gleaming SCDP offices, Joan is pushing the mail cart through the empty expanse with a slight scowl on her face when she reaches Lane’s office. Lane is looking rather smug and self-satisfied as he hands her an envelope and tells her that, by unanimous decree, the partners have decided to make her Director of Agency Operations, which is essentially what she’s been doing anyway. Then he tells her that there will not be a pay bump commensurate with her now-official new title, and she tells him, “Well, it’s almost an honor.” With Fortunate Son off at the M*A*S*H unit and an ongoing development going on from within, Joan could use the extra cash, but no one at SCDP is taken for granted quite like Joan Holloway.
Well, maybe SCDP will be able to afford a pay bump for Joan sometime in the near future — if they remember to do it. This is because Don and Pete are meeting with the American Cancer Society and pitching an idea for anti-tobacco messages. The key PSA would feature parents and children doing family things, but always with cigarettes in the hands and the mouths of the parents. It would run during “American Bandstand” and it might have a good beat and you could dance to it, but the message would resonate: cigarettes would always get between them and their parents, the cigarettes will win, and their parents will die. The board questions it, pointing out that teens hate their parents, but Don — and this is classic Don — tells them that teenagers are sentimental: “Have you heard their music?” (cue laughter). They are mourning the loss of their childhood, and they are now feeling their mortality.
Back at SCDP, Roger yells, “Did you get Cancer?” Ah, the hilarity of the domestic Silver Ferret. Don and Petey are getting happy as they discuss how to exploit the ACS board for ad dollars, and they lean on Ken Cosgrove to talk his future father-in-law into bringing Dow Chemical to the agency. Kenny’s not on board: he tells them that his fiance is his life — “literally my life” — and that he will not let business jeopardize his relationship and that he’s not Pete. Petey gets one of his faces and shoots fire out of his eyeballs at Ken.
Up at Ossining, Glen shows up as the Salvation Army is carting out some furniture. He asks Carla if he can say goodbye to Sally. Carla is not wild about letting Krazee-Eyez Killa into the house, but since Betty is at the store, she figures it can’t do much harm. Yeah, whatever. So Glen goes up to Sally’s room and they have kind of a sweet goodbye — at first, when Sally tells him she’s going to California, he thinks it’s permanent, but when he finds out she’s just moving to Rye (home of Playland), he’s all cool with that, because in two years he’ll be driving a muscle car to Rye and threatening Sally’s virtue. But then when Glen leaves, he runs into his arch-nemesis. Betty screams at him, and he hits her hard with the cold-ass truth: she is against anyone else being happy because she’s personally incapable of true happiness. Well, that and Glen gives her the super-creeps. Carla probably should have left the room right about then, because Betty would have fired all the appliances if that’s all she had around her. So Betty fires Carla, the woman who raised her children.
So Don and his meddling accountant are discussing the sudden influx of cash he’s experiencing through the magic of real estate sales: the house in San Pedro and the Draper-Francis homestead in Ossining, which means Don can finally buy someplace to live other than his Village man-cave. But then Betty calls to tell him that Carla is canned, which means she cannot go to Cali with Don and the kids. Don goes bonkers at Betty’s summary judgment on Carla and insists that she be rehired for the trip, but Betty says Carla will “poison the well” — as if the well was all potable and tasty. Don has meetings, he tells her, and without Carla’s help it will be impossible to do business. So Betty — and this is rich, kids — tells him he should not take them, that “they’re used to it.” She’s played that one before, but never more inappropriately or with more bratty spite than here, since this is all her doing. That one belongs in the hall of fame.
Across the hall, Joyce (who’s really just there to be deus ex machina) comes to Peggy’s office to introduce Carolyn Jones Like Morticia (Cassandra Jean), a model who was just fired off a Topaz Pantyhose ad, along with the agency producing it. Harry is oh-so comforting and solicitous to the comely Carolyn Jones Like Morticia, but Harry is a schmuck and it’s not really working, and besides — there’s money to be made here, damn it! Peggy and Kenny decide it’s time to get themselves to Topaz and collect some pantyhose money.
As for California, Megan the Sex Robot has been checking into child care for Don’s trip, and she’s found that the hotel has services to handle the older kids but won’t take care of the baby, and vice versa — nobody wants chocolate in their peanut butter. So Don has a really great, Edison-inventing-the-light-bulb epiphany: why not pay MSR to take care of his kids in Cali? I mean, talk about all the comforts of home! MSR’s happiness sensors light up like her beloved Paris.
Kenny tells Peggy that the Pantyhose Men were impressed that he had found out so quickly about the failed campaign and agreed to take pitches. Meanwhile, in the sunny funland of California, Don comes in from a long day of business meetings and sees Megan the Sex Robot sitting on the bed with the kids, whom she’s taught a delightful French children’s song — one that sent little Eugene to slumberland. Don tells her, “You’re like Maria Von Trapp,” and in case you’ve forgotten, “The Sound of Music” was like “Inception” and “Toy Story 3″ rolled into one box office extravaganza in 1965, but it was also a kind of male wish-fulfillment fantasy: a virginal nun-wannabe comes to take care of the children, teaches them to sing and keeps them out of Daddy’s hair while he’s off at war — what was not to love? But Julie Andrews had none of the expert-engineered seductive power of Megan the Sex Robot. She knew he’d love seeing her lead the children in lilting Francophone song. Everything is going according to plan.
So then Don takes the kids with him to check out Anna’s house, where Stephanie is getting everything packed up. Sally notices the “Dick + Anna, ’64″ painted below the pretty flowers on the wall, and asks Don/Dick who “Dick” is. He tells her it is him, that is “my nickname sometimes.” Well, I’m sure some people have called him Dick other than Anna, but it wasn’t because he was their friend. As a lovely parting gift, Stephanie gives Don a tiny blue box. It is a solitaire diamond ring — the ring that the real Don Draper gave Anna before the Korean War. Oh yes, rubbing hands together in mock movie villain pantomime, everything is going according to plan.
Don is sitting on the bed with the kids, planning the next day’s trip to Disneyland when Megan shows up at the door with her old French Canadian college friend — they’re going to the Whisky a Go Go, possibly to see the Doors or the Lovin’ Spoonful. But that’s nothing like the rocking taking place in Ossining, where Henry is getting drunk and yelling at Betty for firing Carla. Betty protests, telling him they need a fresh start, but Henry says “There is no fresh start” — that “lives carry on.” She’s shocked — shocked! — that Henry isn’t on her side. Henry, who is showing a promising streak of nihilism that might save him in the end, tells her “Betty, no one is on your side.”
So now the kids are nestled all snug in their beds with visions of anthropomorphic mice dancing in their heads. Speaking of the Lovin’ Spoonful, Don hears Megan the Sex Robot return from the Whisky (it had only been open about a year and a half at this point), and one suspects Megan wanted Don to know she was back. He knocks on the door under the pretense of not being able to watch TV with the kids asleep, and wondering if she might be willing to help him plan the Disneyland trip. She makes googly eyes and jokingly and saucily asks if she should be a part of such “high-level discussions.” He’s in, and very much like Flynn.
In short order, after some discussions of her pain-in-the-ass college friend and MSR’s teeth(!), they’re kissing. MSR asks, “Are you sure we should be doing this?” But Don hasn’t stopped thinking about her, he says, and now he can’t stop doing anything else. Bwah-ha-ha-haaaa. Everything is going according to plan.
Now, as juxtaposition, Betty is all alone — nobody is on her side except her, because she’s lying on her side, in the fetal position, on Sally’s twin bed. Oh, to be young again and have a daddy figure to take care of everything and not yell at me when I’m being unbearable and impetuous. Well, it seems that papa’s got a brand new bag.
So, in post-coital repose, Don asks MSR if this is how she imagined things turning out. Her Nexus-6 circuit board sends a positive message, to which Don responds by pointing out that Megan knows nothing about him. This would be a perfect time for Edward James Olmos to drop an origami crane on the bedside table and yell, “But then again, who does?” But Megan says she knows enough: “You have a good heart and I know that you’re always trying to be better,” she says. Don wants to know if this is just a one-off, like their roll on the mid-century modern furnishings in his office. She assures him that there will not be a malfunction.
This is not the only seduction going on: the Topaz guys are being sold by Kenny and Peggy, who was smart enough to wear the product to the meeting and had some strong ideas — the hilariously named Art Garten likes what he’s hearing. But at the Johnie’s Coffee Shop at Wilshire and Fairfax (home of your favorite indie-film restaurant scenes), Sally’s not liking what Bobby’s selling (something about her being fat), and she knocks over a milkshake. Don reacts loudly, proving there’s not much air between his and Betty’s styles of parenting, but Megan Von Trapp the Cybernetic Sex Nanny has things under control, insisting there’s no use yelling over spilt milkshake. Hmm, Don thinks: this one can shield me from the headaches of parenting, and she’s expertly programmed to fulfill my fantasies — I’ll take her!
We then quick-cut back to New York. Don is sitting at the foot of the bed while MVTCSN is recharging. When she awakens, Don tells her that he’s been awake for a few hours, and could not sleep because he’s cannot stop thinking about her and “I feel like myself when I’m with you,” whatever that means. But our favorite ad man really pours it on, and when he says “I am in love with you, Megan,” it’s probably the exact way he imagines she would like to hear it. He brings out the little blue box, and asks her to marry him. She looks confused, but again, everything is going according to plan. She says yes, and if this were a much lesser show, we’d be hearing the echoing voice of Faye Miller right now: “You’ll be married again within the year.” At first, he tells Megan the ring had been in his family for awhile, but that’s, of course, not exactly true, but by Don’s standards and situation, it’s not exactly untrue, either. As Don gets up, Megan lies there like a ’60s film siren, her eyes peeking over the sheets, her smile fully visible nevertheless. Mission accomplished.
At SCDP, Don summons the Silver Ferret, Lane, Petey and Joan to his office to announce that he and “Miss Calvet” will be getting married. Of course, no one knows this name of French extraction, so Joanie pipes up to tell them it’s Megan. She’s invited in, prances over to Don in a slinky red dress as part of the coronation, and after the applause, the Silver Ferret tells Don that this is how their kind live. Indeed, Don has followed in Roger’s footsteps by marrying his secretary, and when I say “his secretary,” I mean “Don’s secretary.” Ida Blankenship died for you, Megan!
Kenny tells Peggy that the word from Art Garten is awesome — they loved the second and fourth ideas, and they want to see something in a week. They go to Don’s office, where there is much rejoicing. Don is as ebullient as he’s ever been this season as he congratulates the two, but Peggy is bewildered by the new reality: Don has thrown over her idol, Dr. Faye Miller, for this year’s model. Don thinks he’s being crafty and complimentary by telling Peg that MSR “has the same spark” as she does, and that Megan looks up to her, but Peggy just sees it as Megan taking the old way to success while Peggy is in the trenches.
Megan then tells Don that Faye has called again. Don has been ducking her, but Megan tells him that waiting will not make things easier. Meanwhile, Peggy goes to Joan’s office and the two commiserate about the impending nuptials. Joan tells Peggy that she’ll probably have to train Megan as a copywriter, and Peggy gripes that the engagement completely overshadowed the Topaz signing, which is the company’s first new business since losing Lucky Strike. Sharing a smoke, Joan tells Peggy that she learned a long time ago that she should not try to gain all her satisfaction in the workplace, to which Peggy retorts, “That’s bulls—,” and they laugh, finally finding some common ground after the unpleasantness a few episodes ago.
And now comes “the talk.” Don is on the phone with Faye, asking if she’ll meet him for coffee. She’s not buying it: Faye knows what is coming, and she does not want to sit through coffee after he breaks up with her. When he tells her he’s met someone, he’s fallen in love and he’s getting married, she starts to cry, asking who it is. He asks her, “Does it matter?” as if he already knows how little regard she’ll have for his choice in life. She tell him, “I hope she knows that you only like the beginnings of things.” They hang up, and she sobs uncontrollably. She might have been smart, accomplished and seductive in her own right, but Dr. Faye Miller, at least in some ways, overplayed her hand. She wanted Don to embrace the truth, and that was a bridge too far. It was far too easy to marry someone who has cartoon bluebirds draping daisy garlands over her when she rises every morning.
So Joan calls Frank Burns over in Vietnam to tell him about the engagement and everything else that is happening, and he asks her when she’s going to tell the office about her own news: the upcoming baby. Yes, Joanie’s going to give birth to a beautiful baby, and it’s going to be tough for Frank Burns when said baby comes out of the womb with silver hair, begging for a martini.
It is now 7 p.m. in Ossining, N.Y., and the house where Don and Betty Draper (but mostly Carla) raised their children is empty except for Betty, who is standing in the kitchen, primping for what is supposed to be a surprise encounter with Don. Don is there to meet the Realtor ™ for a walk-through, but Betty claims she forgot a few things. Don supposes she also forgot the Jameson he kept over the oven, and they share a drink out of one of the kids’ duck-shaped plastic cups. Betty starts to reminisce with Don about the old days, then lets loose that “things aren’t perfect.” Oh, but they could be, couldn’t they, Betty? Grace Kelly back with her prince?
But then, this isn’t a fairy tale, Gracie. Don tells her that he met someone and he’s getting married. She assumes that it’s Megan, since she went with him to California. Well, that didn’t go well. Betty picks up her stuff and goes to Rye, and Don lies in bed, with Megan recharging next to him, thinking about the life he left and the one ahead of him in Season 5.
All told, this was the greatest season of “Mad Men” to date. Recently in the comments section, I predicted that the next season will likely begin in 1967, with Don and Megan the Sex Robot-Draper in their beautiful new home in Connecticut. My first thought was that they would move to a stately, two-story Colonial on a large tract, but given the glass-and-metal sensibilities of the Time-Life Building and his new bride, I think he’s building a maze of modernity out there. Perfect for ice storms and key parties in a few years.
It will be a long time before we recap “Mad Men” again, but I’ve enjoyed this greatly. Next week: “The Walking Dead” begins. I’ll see you here.
– Lang
