Friday Rambling

Sorry for the general lack of posts this week. I've been off my game. It happens.

I have been enjoying the previews of tracks from Wrecking Ball that have been showing up around the internet for 24 hour periods. At this point, we've heard the first single "We Take Care of Our Own" (already a victim of political miss-analysis, some things never change), "Easy Money," "Shackled and Drawn," "Jack of All Trades," "Death to My Hometown," and "This Depression." That, more or less, gives us the first side of the album.

"We Take Care of Our Own" has really grown on me. I have also loved, dearly, every track since. Although "This Depression" plods a little, for my tastes.

There's experimentation here, with Bruce using samples and such, but the core is the same sort of powerful storytelling he built his career on. After these tracks, I am extremely excited to hear the full album. I can't hope for it to be a late-era masterpiece like Magic, or The Rising, were, but Springsteen seems to come alive when he's mad. The Boss seems mad, and ready to make his point.

Cannot wait for the tour. Can. Not. Wait.

I am a fan of Edgar Rice Burroughs' pulp work. Love the Tarzan novels, and I hold a special place for the John Carter works, or the Barsoom series. Burroughs can never be accused of writing "hard" sci-fi, but his fantasy work is tremendous, full of energy and vast ideas. I've long wanted to see John Carter and Barsoom in a big-budget movie.

Well, Disney answered that call, with Andrew Stanton, of PIXAR fame, director of the utterly brilliant Wal-E, stepping into live-action features. I have no idea if this film will do justice to Burroughs' Martian adventures, and I do not intend to critique it  before I've seen it...

BUT...

Man, who titled this film? Who's running this marketing campaign?

Look, the Barsoom stories aren't nearly as well-known as the Tarzan books. You say "Tarzan," and EVERYONE knows who that character is. Unfortunately, "John Carter" doesn't inspire the same recognition. Hell, Disney doesn't even deign to put Edgar Burroughs name, which might be a selling point, on the marketing materials.

The name of the first book is A Princess of Mars, and, come on, how could you pass up that title for John Carter? A silly as the original title is, it literally drips with a pulp adventure feel. Which should be what this film aims to deliver. Marvel Comics, back in the 70's, did well (title-wise) with their series John Carter: Warlord of Mars, and Disney owns Marvel, now...use that

Then, the poster...OK, that must be John Carter...in a sea of red, which might make me think of Mars, and some indistinct figures in the background. Huh?

Look, I think they were going for "mysterious," which, I suppose is fine, but that usually works when there's some iconography you can hint at. A Superman poster with a blue, yellow and red streak into the air...that's cool. We get it, and it's powerful because...we all know Superman. There's an element of "can they make that work? Will the suit look silly?" but we know that image. Look, up in the sky! We know those colors.

John Carter? Who the fuck is that?

I still have hopes this will be a kick-ass, fun movie. I, however, am not positive on it's box office potential. I hope I'm wrong, as I'd like to see more of Burroughs work on film. Maybe somebody will do Tarzan right.

Yeah, yeah. Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle was definitely in the right direction. That said, Burroughs is not Jane Austin, and that film hedged a bit too much toward the Merchant Ivory side of things. Burroughs was a pulp writer, and you shouldn't try to wash that away.

I've been in tech all week, and barely touched the guitar. The worst part of this is that I'm really feeling inspired again. I managed to write a song during last weekend's long tech days that I think is really good. I've also gone back to lighter strings on the guitar, and my playing feels much more fluid again. I don't regret, at all, the heavier string experiment, but everything works better with the lighter strings (it ought to, I had the thing set up that way). I want/need to find the time to get rocking on my "one song at a time, until it's finished" plan. I feel like I can see the path forward, now. I just need to get walking on it.

Hopefully that'll happen this weekend.

Of course, I'm also back in class starting tomorrow. Meisner 2 at The Artistic Home. That's also exciting. I think my last few months in Meisner 1 have helped me keep sane, in terms of my acting career. It was hard, very hard, at times, but there's a challenge that class presents, which I'm enjoying wrestling with.

Sometimes I suck, sometimes I don't. Which, honestly, should be the motto for any actor.