August 2019

There were 8 posts published in August 2019 (this is page 1 of 2).

The Pick: A Face In The Crowd

After ringing in this new podcast by reviewing Olympus Has Fallen, this week we’re talking about a movie that’s a little less, well, dumb. A Face In The Crowd saw legendary director Elia Kazan and writer Budd Schulberg teaming up once again after the success of On The Waterfront. As we discuss, A Face In The Crowd didn’t make quite the same splash as that classic, but now feels more and more ahead of its time with each passing year. We’ll also discuss the merits of Andy Griffith’s larger than life performance, the early rise of television, and try to get to the bottom of what exactly Vitajex is.

The Pick: Olympus Has Fallen

Ever since Top Ten Thursdays ended back in 2016, we here at Mildly Pleased have been a bit inconsistent with our podcast output. With this new show The Pick, we hope to change that. It seems doubtful we’ll do this show every week, but I think we could strive to post one every week we don’t post a Rokk Talk or some other show of ours. Anyways, the format is pretty simple. Each episode, one of the three of us will pick a movie to watch for any arbitrary reason, and then we’ll talk about it in-depth as we figure out whether it was pick-worthy or not. In this “trial run” episode, we talk about Olympus Has Fallen, the first movie in what is now an inexplicable trilogy, due to this week’s release of Angel Has Fallen. Continue reading →

The Bald and the Boisterous

Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw

I’ve had a bit of trouble settling on a verdict for Hobbs & Shaw, the first(?) Fast & Furious spin-off film. On one hand, it is a very silly, over-the-top buddy cop action movie. On the other, it seems like the product of a bunch of bad decisions that just had to be followed through on because: money. It’s a movie where Dwayne Johnson pulls a helicopter out of the air, like Captain America. It’s also 135 minutes long and feels like it. Is this too much of a good thing?

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Rokk Talk Ep. 21: Woodstock

Fifty years ago today a bunch of hippies got high, slid around in the mud, and listened to Country Joe and the Fish… Or so we thought! Turns out there was more to the story. A festival was had Wood-something? Well apparently they made a movie about it and John and Colin watched it. Not only that, but they watched the long-ass edition. Check it out and hear what they had to say.

R.I.P. David Berman

This one’s particularly hard for me to process.

As you may have noticed, I just reviewed Purple Mountains, the fantastic self-titled debut from David Berman’s new band earlier this week. The album’s only been out for about a month, but it’s already become one of my most listened to albums of the year as well as one of my favorites. I’ve just been listening to it constantly, because the lyrics are so god damn funny and wise and raw, where you know that the person writing them was clearly brilliant but also in a lot of pain (hence, my not-so-subtle review title). Continue reading →

License To Killjoy

Bedouine – Bird Songs of a Killjoy

There was something very assuring about discovering Bedouine, the project of singer/songwriter Azniz Korkejian. First, because there’s something inherently calming about the familiar, but nonetheless striking way she sings and plays guitar. Secondly, because after seeing videos online of her performing, despite being a relative up-and-comer, she looked to be about my age. Granted, I can’t actually find her age anywhere, but I did find an interview where she refers to her 20s as a thing of the past. Which isn’t that important, I’m just getting a little burned out on 20-year-old indie phenoms playing bedroom pop. Apparently, Korkejian spent much her early adulthood working as a sound engineer while music was nothing but a hobby, which explains why these songs are so casual but also so effortlessly pretty. Continue reading →

Patience Is A Virtue

Mannequin Pussy – Patience

I’ll be moving to Philadelphia in the next few months, and though there are plenty of things I’ll miss about Seattle, I will not miss how it’s become an increasingly hard place for musicians (or non-rich) people to live. Philly, on the other hand, seems to have been a bit more hospitable to its music scene in the past few years. Or at least, this would explain the countless Philly indie bands to break out recently, which has to some extent made it feel like the underdog version of Brooklyn, musically speaking. I can’t say whether I’ll be going to a ton of smaller shows in Philly, since that’s never been something I’ve been great at keeping up with. But a band like Mannequin Pussy has me intrigued to see what other new artists the city has in store.

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