Pop Papa

Tasty Tracks – Ray LaMontagne and Teenage Fanclub

Posted on January 22, 2011 by poppapa

From the Better-Late-Than-Never files, here are two tracks from artists (who have been around quite a while) that I’ve recently come across that are seemingly in constant rotation in the back of my head – and I’m all the better for it.

The first one, from Ray LaMontagne – is from last year’s God Willin’ and The Creek Don’t Rise, his fifth album. The track “Beg Steal or Borrow” is a rolling country song that has special significance as I can’t hear it without thinking of my son and the inevitable trials and challenges he’ll have to face as he grows into an adult. It’s a heartbreakingly beautiful song with a delectable use of the pedal steel guitar and melodies so strong it burns into your head. Think Joni Mitchell and Neil Young and you’re good to go:

Beg Steal or Borrow

Scotland’s Teenage Fanclub’s first album was released in 1990 and since then have issued nine albums with the most recent “Shadows” launching last year in 2010. I’ve always been aware of them but for some inexplicable reason, never really listened to their music. “I Need Direction” is off of Howdy! and hit only 48 on the UK Singles Chart and never got traction on the US charts. It’s a piece of pure pop perfection with a 60’s sensibility and verses conjuring The Byrds or The Mama and the Papas.

I Need Direction

Filed under: Music | Tagged: Beg Steal or Borrow, Howdy!, I Need Direction, Ray LaMontagne, Tasty Tracks, Teenage Fanclub | Leave a comment »

Calm Cool and Collected… Parenting

Posted on August 16, 2010 by poppapa

Heard a fantastic NPR segment this morning about how parents can best manage the drama and craziness of their teenage sons and daughters. The premise of the piece was based on a new book called Getting to Calm: Cool-Headed Strategies for Parenting Tweens + Teens – and from the four or so minutes I caught in the car – it’s an extremely helpful guide for navigating what are for some parents very tumultuous waters and uncovers the drivers for many infuriating aspects of teen’s behaviors. Apparently it’s not just about bad attitudes, being spoiled or disrespectful or carelessness or other commonly thought of drivers but simply an under-developed prefontal cortex.

Here are a few examples of the situations the book address and provides approaches for parents on how to handle:

When your teen is rude and sarcastic
When your smart teen does something really dumb
When teen problems drive a wedge between you and your spouse
When your teen is acting like a spoiled brat
When you’re worried you’re losing your teen
When teens are mean

The book, written by psychologist Laura Kastner and Jennifer Wyatt, is based on years of research so it’s not based on subjective opinions or lifestyle choices. What’s really helpful is that the book actually provides a blueprint on how to handle specific situations. So clearly one that you want to keep on your nightstand for several years.

Filed under: Behavior, Parenting | Tagged: calm parenting, Getting to Calm, Parenting, raising teenagers, teenage behavior | Leave a comment »

Kid Friendly Black and White Movies

Posted on July 27, 2010 by poppapa

I’ve written previously about the ever-increasing extremes movies are reaching to blow the audience out of their seats – with the nearly ubiquitous recent appearence of 3D, IMAX screenings and mind-blowing CGI animation.

There’s nothing inherently bad about how Hollywood is bringing more to the movie experience except there’s a risk that our children’s threshold for entertainment will be so amped-up they’ll not be able to appreciate less nuclear-powered eye candy. Ultimately the story has to reign supreme.

That was the big ding on Avatar. Despite the off-the-chart never seen before animation and visual experience – the story itself was nothing but a rehash of Pocahontas – which is a really good story in and of itself.

And there are a lot of amazing unforgettable stories collecting dust in the Classics section of Blockbuster (or virtual dust in the catalogs on NetFlix) that deserve to be watched. So what better way to emphasize the importance of really really good story telling than to see them unfold in glorious black and white. No Dolby or THX. No HD. No spine tingling eye-searing computer generated animation… just simple classic stories told in a simple voice and style.

Here’s a list of ten classics good for any kid over six or seven. We’ve only been through two of them (Casablanca and Pride of the Yankees – which my eight year old loved – partly because it’s about baseball/Lou Gehrig) but I’m committed to getting through them as part of my son’s education.

Safety Last – 1923 w/ Harold Lloyd
Mr. Deeds goes to Town – 1936 w/ Gary Cooper
You Can’t Take it With You – 1938 w/ James Stewart
Boys Town – 1938 w/ Spencer Tracy and Mickey Rooney
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington – 1939 w/ James Stewart
The Pride of the Yankees – 1942 w/ Gary Cooper
Casablanca – 1942 w/ Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman
Bells of St. Marys – 1945 w/ Bing Crosby
Christmas in Connecticut – 1945 w/ Barbara Stanwyck
It’s a Wonderful Life – 1946 w/ James Stewart

Filed under: Children, Movies | Tagged: black and white movies, classics, kid friendly movies | 1 Comment »

Tasty Track: Lovesick by Lindstrom and Christabelle

Posted on July 16, 2010 by poppapa

They’re a Norwegian collaboration laying down some pretty groovy electro disco that I “discovered” after finally Shazam’ing the track from the 2010 Cadillac CTS-V commercial. I had seen it a few times and the music totally hooked me. The vocals are lazy/hazy female sing/talk pacing that “resembles the half-awake sister of Kim Carnes” – that’s a quote from Andy Kellman’s review on eMusic – which is dead on. Anyway – the album Real Life is No Cool is great if you’re into “mixing Balearic beat, space disco, house and new wave”. Enjoy…

Lovesick

Filed under: advertising, Commecials, Music | Tagged: Cadillac CTS-V, electro disco, Kim Carnes, Lindstrom & Christabelle, Lovesick, Tasty Track | Leave a comment »

6 Degrees of Black Sabbath

Posted on July 14, 2010 by poppapa

I’ve now officially crossed the threshold of being obsessed – here’s another great hack that came out during The San Francisco Music Hack Day back in mid-May. It’s called Six Degrees of Black Sabbath. It’s simple…. just type in the name of two musical artists and see how many “degrees” they’re separated by (just like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon). For music geeks – it’s a colossally beautiful time waster. Try to see how many degrees you can get with your pairings… the more degrees – the more obscure the connection. I’ve been using it as part of my son’s musical education – want to know how Pete Townsend is related to Black Eyed Peas or how Keith Moon is related to Timbaland? – just punch it in, sit back and let it be revealed. What’s surprising in messing with this is discovering instances when two totally random and unrelated artists are actually pretty closely connected… here are a few examples:

Paul Anka to Geddy Lee: 6 steps (total surprise on this one)

Jimmy Page to Lady Gaga: 7 steps

MGMT to Juice Newton: 9 steps

Pat Metheny to Colin Moulding (from XTC): 18 steps

Have at it. If you get a connection that’s more than 18 steps – post a comment – I’d be curious to see it!

Filed under: Music, Technology | Tagged: Black Sabbath, music connections, music hack, SF Music Hack Day, Six Degrees, Six Degrees of Black Sabbath, Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon | 1 Comment »

Trends We Really Like: Personal Music Showers

Posted on July 13, 2010 by poppapa

Just came across this – Japanese Burger Kings are installing what they’re calling “musical showers” that allow customers to plug in their iPods and other MP3 players into jacks built into the walls where the music is played from a cone above the table and it audible only by those under it. No longer do you have to be subjugated to corporate muzak or generic pop music mixes designed to offend (or delight) no one.

Each table can have its own music thing going on without disturbing anybody else. Given that with my iPhone, I constantly have lots of playlists and songs at my finger tips at all times, I’d be up for this being in every restaurant, book store and other retail outlets where one hangs out. Let’s hope this catches fire.

Filed under: Music, Technology | Tagged: Burger King, iPods, Japan, MP3s, music showers, retail music | 4 Comments »

Fantastic Flix for Kids

Posted on July 12, 2010 by poppapa

Been meaning to write a post on Fantastic Mr. Fox – Wes Anderson’s marvelous screen version of the classic children’s book of the same name by Roald Dahl. Although it’s been out for about eight months (Nov 2009), we recently saw it and instantly fell in love. Both my children, one eight the other four, were mesmerized by the colors, characters and overall visual approach – and the storyline kept myself and my wife glued to the screen – which is rare when watching a kids’ flick. It helps greatly when the voice talent includes George Clooney (as Mr. Fox), Meryl Streep,long-time collaborators Bill Murray, Owen Wilson and Jason Schwartzman.

In the age of CGI-based animated spectacles on IMAX screens in mind-blowing 3D – it was a very nice change of pace to see a movie using stop motion to tell the story. It feels so different and precious (in a good way) – considering the amount of effort and painstaking detail necessary to bring the dolls used in the movie to life. And if you’re familiar with Mr. Anderson’s work – Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou – then you’ll immediately notice the director’s highly recognizable and unique style in this movie.

The other remarkable aspect of the picture is the eclectic and surprising soundtrack with songs ranging from The Beach Boys, The Rolling Stones, The Bobby Fuller Four, Burl Ives and magical original music by Alexandre Desplat – the French film composer who has scored over 100 films including The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Julie and Julia, Syriana, The Golden Compass – to name just a few.

We rented it once but then went out and bought it as this movie will be (and has been) watched many times over. If you’ve got kids of any age – I suggest you do the same.

Filed under: DVDs, Movies, Music | Tagged: Alexandre Desplat, children's films, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Roald Dahl, Wes Anderson | Leave a comment »

The Best Beer Ads from Brisbane

Posted on May 28, 2010 by poppapa

Dads like beer. Dads like beer commercials – especially from Australia. Here are the top 10 beer ads from down under. They’re all pretty funny – displaying the unique Aussie humor and some of them are pretty ingenious. My faves are #8 Carlton and #6 Tooheys. Good day mates!

Also – just recently at this year’s Clios (the Academy Awards for advertising) the best in show Grand Clio television ad for 2010…. is a beer ad from Australia:

I personally think that the Old Spice’s “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” spot was better – funnier, more memorable. Proof: compare their respective YouTube views – over 10 million for Old Spice and 80K for Boag’s Draught.

Filed under: advertising, Cocktails/Drinks, Television | Tagged: Austrailian beer, beer, Clio winner, TV ads, TV advertising | Leave a comment »

It Don’t Mean a Thing if it Ain’t Got that Swing…. Including Rock.

Posted on May 27, 2010 by poppapa

Here’s a super cool music hack that I came across while perusing BoingBoing from last weekend’s San Francisco’s Music Hack Day. It’s called Swinger from Tristan Jehan, PhD from MIT Media Lab. It effectively takes any song and transforms it into a swing version of the song. For those not familiar, a swung note or shuffle note is a style of playing, mainly in jazz-influenced music, where notes with equal written time values are performed with unequal durations, usually as alternating long and short notes. Therefore, a swing or shuffle rhythm is the one produced by playing repeated pairs of notes in this way.

So the magic of The Swinger is it converts any song into a swing song, through a program written with a bit of python code. It does this by taking each beat and time-stretching the first half of each beat while time-shrinking the second half (so it takes songs written say in 4/4 time and transforms them into unequal durations – creating a swing rhythm). The effect is almost magical. Here are some examples (I’ve included the “straight” version of White Rabbit for comparison):

Jefferson Airplane: White Rabbit “Straight”

Jefferson Airplane: White Rabbit

Metallica: Sandman “Straight”

Metallica: Sandman

Guns and Roses: Sweet Child O Mine

The Beatles: I Will

Filed under: Music, Technology | Tagged: Music Hack Day, python code, The Swinger, time-stretching | Leave a comment »

Random Tasty Tracks

Posted on April 26, 2010 by poppapa

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything but here’s a quick post on a few tracks that I’m fixated on. Three very different bands; one a group from Brooklyn, a Danish indie outfit and a duo whose one half is a movie star. They’ve all been around – some for several years but I recently discovered them and feel compelled to share.

The first track – Across Your Knee by Robbers on High Street, is a tightly crafted rock/pop tune that randomly conjures up Nick Lowe and Rockpile which I pleasantly can’t seem to move beyond. The second track by The Figurines lingers hours if not days after hearing it – a dark plaintive track with a chorus refrain that sticks to the ribs. On the other end of the spectrum is She & Him brought to life by Zooey Deschanel (Almost Famous, (500) Days of Summer, Yes Man and much more) who partners with country folk artist M. Ward on a fun, kitschy yet highly melodic ride channeling Beatles (Dear Prudence)… luv it. And as always, enthusiastically endorsed by the local munchkin authorities….

Robbers on High Street – Across Your Knee