LIFE: A Night with Lights #MMSxLIGHTS

Lights did a special, free show sponsored by the new minty M&Ms on August 28. It was my third time watching her perform this year.

The lineup to get into the venue for door's open was a long one filled mostly with restless youths and some parents. I met my girlfriend in line with a bag of A&W and luckily she was standing fairly close up front. This meant that we were entitled to a standing space close to the stage once we were permitted to enter [because that's how General Admission tickets work, Toronto. Right? RIGHT? /s]

At 8 PM, DCF took the stage. With a band! A drummer and a guitarist joined him, and he played the songs I was familiar with from the last two Lights' concerts I went to. It was certainly different to hear him play with an actual band instead of a background track. The music still had its pop and hip-pop sensibilities, with drum loops playing alongside the live drummer along with some delicate electric guitar work. However, I still don't much care for his voice. He just doesn't have a passion and timbre in his vocals comparable with some of his contemporaries. I want to hear him belt out like Tyler Carter, but instead he sounds like a talented karaoke singer. Use your diaphragm, man.

Leave your mans

Our girl Lights was next and her presence, voice, band, and music was what it was all about. The venue was the smallest one I've seen her play at, and it managed to be a different experience because of it, even though I've seen this setlist twice already. This time, there wasn't much flashiness on stage; she didn't change her outfit once, the lighting was basic, and she just seemed happy to be there despite the humidity. It felt like I was watching any of my favourite "emo" bands playing, since there was a focus on the music and performance of it all. Her standout performances were "Up We Go" and "Moonshine," with the latter getting an emotional moment from her since it wasn't a single on her new album and we all knew the words.

She's powerful

I enjoyed this concert, especially since it was free, but it was a pleasure seeing her again as always.

THE FIRST PURGE: What worked for me?

I've been a big fan of the Purge series since its inception, catching all of them in theatres except for the first one (the original film from 2013, not The First Purge (2018)). I'm not into it necessarily for the thrills, or the satire, or its themes (all of which are interesting), but I am into it for the world building. It is both a foreign and familiar one, packed with enough lore for me to think about for weeks over.

I almost feel that the film was made for people like me. The First Purge will satisfy your every craving for more information about this universe. The characters are interesting, the plot follows along seamlessly as the stakes become ever increasing, and it's all gushing with lore and gore. The soundtrack is superb, reverberating and grimy, with memorable cues. 

The film has lots of characters from somewhat different walks of life. The event takes place on Staten Island, NY, and focuses on male gangster Dimitri (Y'lan Noel), a female community leader Nya (Lex Scott Davis), and her brother Isiah (Joivan Wade), among some other characters. From the other perspective, the government, we have the woman who "creates" the Purge Dr. May Update (Marisa Tomei). Dimitri's story is excellent, and his character experiences some real changes throughout the ordeal, as does Isiah. On the other hand, Nya, as important as she was, plays it a bit stiff, and her delivery sometimes didn't match the danger and intensity of the scene.

Source: Universal Pictures

Additionally, Dr. May's portrayal is confusing. She's not exactly sympathetic, so the conclusion to her arc doesn't make much sense. She stresses that The Purge is merely a scientific experiment, and hopes that people participate in the violence, but is surprised and disappointed once she figures out the government intervened. 

We see how the American people are being shown the Purge through the TV, versus what is actually happening. The film portrays the media almost like another character, with the goal to subdue the world to what's happening. I suppose it's about how fake news can be a real problem, and how a free press is important, since the media in this world is so obviously controlled by the government.

There's some great scenes in here, like one o

f the Purge parties near the beginning of the event. I really wanted to be there, it just looked like so much fun. It turns out that most people's ideas of purging was just a big, fun party. Violence is not the catharsis of the original purge, but instead, hedonism. An interesting touch, and it confuses our strange Doctor as they watch from above. There's another great scene, as Dimitri's gang unravels the mystery of new combatants into the arena that has become Staten Island. It's filmed with heavy fog (from a smoke grenade) and they come out, guns blazing (I'm talking massive guns in both hands). What follows is essentially a sword fight, with sound effects lifted straight from your favourite Medieval-period movie, and it was just so awesome to watch. 

Source: Universal Pictures

Despite all that, the film is padded with some extra characters that actually detract from the world-building and narrative. Two characters are added for our sympathy, but having them dead I think would have made the story more tragic, thus making the ending more satisfying. There's one scene at the beginning I would remove entirely, an interview with a potential Purge candidate. She never comes up in the movie again, and I assume they cut her murders or something from the movie but forgot to cut her introduction.

Altogether though, my complaints are minor to the film. It's short at just over an hour and a half, and its problems are easily forgotten from the rest of its awesomeness. If you're a fan of the series you'll love this movie. 

LIFE: Vans Warped Tour @ Flats @ Budweiser Stage (July 17)

When I was in highschool, I attended the 2007 Vans' Warped Tour in highschool in 2007 at Barrie's Molson Park. My choice of line-up was Protest the Hero, k-os, and Coheed and Cambria, and probably many others I can't remember. So many people attended, and I was amazed by it all, especially for the main stage where Coheed played. The crowd, to me, echoed crowds like the pictures of major Metallica shows I'd seen on the internet.

This is all probably just my memory and not what actually happened, and I was plainly reminded of that when I attended the final leg of the tour in Canada this year on July 17.

To start off, this was a Tuesday, and just as I suspected, plenty of kids filled the meager Flats @ Budweiser Stage.  The first band on the main stage was announced to be Issues, playing at 11:30, and my friend and I had no intention of getting there that early. Our fault, but it still sucked.

When we got there, after taking a walk around the premises, we stopped to see Harm's Way - a fairly heavy band that I've never heard of before. The crowd they gathered was thick pretty thick for the middle of the day. Their energy was intoxicating, however, the music sounded a bit generic. Still a great way to get hyped at the start.

 Next to them performed Tatiana DeMaria, who began her set maybe halway through Harm's Way The contrast couldn't be more evident. She had an Avril Lavigne The Best Damn Thing Vibe, which was awesome. She gave it her everything, though, and it was intoxicating to witness.

We caught Selfish Things afterwards and genuinely enjoyed tail of their set. It wasn't their first song that caught us, and we walked away from them heading to Senses Fail, but as they played a "Song 2" cover from Blur, they reeled us back in. Respect to these guys, but, a lot of bands would be doing covers today.

We tried to watch Senses Fail. Look at the view. When we got their, they played a medley starting with "Toxicity" by System of a Down and including a Limp Bizket song. Altogether, they were good, but I'm completely unfamiliar with their work. I'm sure they were good from what I could see!

We went about this for the rest of the evening, shifting from the main stage to another. That's why we saw We the Kings. We just wanted to check out who was on the main stage at the time. They were alright. Look at the crowd though.

We were getting exhausted at this point, but seeing Everytime I Die, though, changed things. The band was superb, a love letter to the tour and their fans. We unfortunately felt the need to leave early, however, to watch Sum 41.

No regrets there! They came to kick ass and play music and they did just that. It was the anniversary of "Does This Look Infected?" and they played the whole thing, from "The Hell Song" to "Hooch." It was emotional, nostalgic, energetic, and epic. Halfway through it, they inflated that oversized skeleton flipping all of us off. The crowd ate it all up. I wish I made it to the pit for them. I'm excited for their upcoming album now to be honest. Pop punk's not dead.

We took a bit of a break, but went back to the main stage to watch Underoath and got there while Reel Big Fish still performed. After them was Simple Plan, and wouldn't you know it, they rocked it. Playing their "hits" and new material, it made me wonder why I didn't care for them before. Serious respect to them, they controlled the stage.

Finally I can talk about Underoath. What a performance! Give these guys all the credit. While it wasn't as energetic as Sum 41, I won't forget how they played, the connection they had with the crowd, the setlist. I'm surprised I even got a photo in, I was dancing so much.

It's too bad the tour is ending, but I suspect something will come along to take its place. It reminded me how much fun these things can be. I hope whatever comes next is only better. 

FIREWORKS - What worked for me?

"Fireworks, Should We See It From the Side or the Bottom?" [known as just "Fireworks" in English] is a movie in which I have mixed feelings about, for once.

On the one hand, the dialogue was excellent. The kids in the movie (I believe around 12 years old) appropriately sound their age, right down to calling one another "dumbasses." It's not over-the-top like South Park, but it doesn't shy away from the language either. They also speak differently among one another than they do in front of adults. The main incident framing the story involves these kids wondering if fireworks are flat or round when they explode, and I simply love that. The reactions this question gets from everybody involved is just great.

On the other hand, the movie almost doesn't have a plot, and by that I mean, none of the characters are active agents in the story. The macguffin, a beautiful glass time-travelling ball, is actually the object that resolves conflicts and moves the plot forward, and the main characters are pulled along for the ride. Norimichi has an interesting problem to work through, and I enjoy the musings of Nazuna. I just don't remember any of their problems truly being addressed or resolved by the end; it's unsatisfying.

The quality of the animation is excellent and blends 3D CGI and traditional-looking animation for some interesting effects. The movie is well edited and directed in that sense, and I can get past the plot problem because of its beauty.

I would recommend this movie for something light and beautiful to watch on an ugly, stormy day.

YOU WERE NEVER REALLY HERE - What worked for me?

"You Were Never Really Here" might be my favourite movie of the year. It's a complete masterpiece of visual storytelling with barely any dialogue and a superb score.

Nothing I've seen this year has been quite like it. Joe's backstory is given through flashbacks and Joaquin Phoenix's marvelous performance. At no point does anyone ever ask him, "Hey, remember the war you were in?" Since the movie is adapted from a novel, this is the strongest point for me to take home after watching it. I'm sure the novel deals with Joe's backstory in a more straightforward way, but the plot in the movie is only the present and that's the story. I need to keep this in mind for my own work. Though I've done hours of world building, only some of it is truly ever a part of any story I tell. I only really need to bring it out to build character.

The soundtrack and score also works with each scene naturally and envelops the audience. Johnny Greenwood laid out some master work here. Sometimes, it even breaks the fourth wall, and normally I'm not a fan of that, but for once I actually liked that. Perhaps I'm coming around to it. It's right at the very beginning of the movie and it's such a good song.

The plot is fairly straightforward, based on what few scenes there are that are needed to depict it. The devil's in the details here, and it's totally worth the watch.

WRITING: Lessons from editing

In a previous post I spoke about the difficulty of editing one of my longer pieces into something shorter for an assignment.

It ultimately started when a friend read it and told me her focuses that I shaped the edit around. I had several trajectories of where the story could head based on what would be cut, but I'm glad the direction it took based on her objective feedback.

Unfortunately, this meant cutting my first scene entirely. There was far too much description and detail, and (while I love it and still do and think there's nothing wrong with it,) for this short-short story format it wasn't really necessary. In the process I learned a lesson about writing a beginning. When I was first writing it, I went back to add the extra detail scene because my main character's felt too artificial, like they didn't arrive there at the same time or something. In the re-write/cut it was far more natural, since the story was completed and I knew what the characters would be accomplishing,.

I ended up keeping all the elements that were important to me: the plot, side plots, and a random tangent. I learned that a reader won't know what I cut, what was changed from the older versions. While I do appreciate the detail I ended up scrapping, it's taught me a lesson on what's really required to write a story. It doesn't take much, really, just a character and a problem. All that detail I created can be added to the wiki.

My Reading and Writing Goals for July 2018

My reading and writing goals for July:

• Blog at least twice a week
• Edit my wiki at least once a week
• Enjoy summer

Blaring heat from the sun led us into a beautiful beginning to the month of July. Yesterday I saw a beautiful fireworks display at Amesbury Park, which is something I haven't checked out in years. The show lasted twelve minutes and progressed to an impressive finale.

About last months goals: I only completed one of them. I didn't end up blogging at least twice or three times a week like I wanted (but I was close), I didn't finish reading my novel, and I didn't submit a short story per week to my class (one week missed). However, I did edit my "long" story and submitted it as my last assignment. It was a task far more difficult than I thought it would be. 

For July I'll focus on keeping things simpler. I'll still try blogging at least twice a week. On top of that, I'll make a weekly edit to the wiki, and I'll keep track of what I do and mention it in next month's goals post. Lastly, I'll be starting on my Novel Writing class this month. It's also my birthday month, so keeping things simple for now while I don't know my workload or plans yet is probably the best route.

Happy July! 

A squirming Smokey