For those keeping score, I’m 0 – 6 when it comes to seeing Frightened Rabbit live. The Universe will not let it happen.
2 weekends ago I was in Las Vegas. That Saturday, August 20th, I was checking out Pollstar to see if any bands I knew were playing. I was surprised to see Frightened Rabbit on the list. I could finally see them live! They were opening for Death Cab for Cutie (alright), so technically it wouldn’t be a full set. But, I would still count it – Frightened Rabbit Live! The show was at 8pm. Kinda early. That means they would be getting on stage at 9pm and probably play for an hour. The trouble was, I had reservations at Cut for 8pm. You can’t rush Cut. It just doesn’t work that way. So yet again, I missed Frightened Rabbit. I think we were finished at Cut around 10pm. If the show had started at 9pm, I could’ve theoretically made it and finally seen Frightened Rabbit. But as it turns out Las Vegas is a baby and they start shows early so the headliners can get on stage by 10pm. I thought you were cool, Vegas.
Live and Let Die is the introduction to Roger Moore and the 70s. After the disappointing showing from Connery in Diamonds are Forever, the producers must’ve said “Fuck it” and decided to change everything. No more Aston Martin’s, instead you get big honking pimpmobiles. Could you imagine Bond wearing a reversible coat and tear away pants? Or how about constantly smoking obnoxious cigars? Well, this is what you get – plus more racial stereotypes than you can stomach in Live and Let Die. And for the most part, I enjoyed it.
Live and Let Die starts with an amazing theme song, Live and Let Die by Wings. The song is definitely too good for the so-so titles. I would say the titles were terrible, but the skulls really save it. So it’s passable.
The Bond in Live and Let Die is not really a good spy. He sort of stumbles from scene to scene. The upside of this is that you don’t get those long and boring detective sequences. Instead everything is kept light and fun. You get to see Bond get called “honky” as he tries to blend in to a club in Harlem. And it’s not a boring surveillance mission in a hang glider when you’re smoking a giant cigar.
The bad guys, aside from their general incompetence, were entertaining as well. My favorite was Whisper, a fat henchman who is a low talker. I believe he had the most attempts at failing to kill Bond. Yaphet Kotto, whom I know from Homicide, was a pretty good drug lord. I really enjoyed the way he talked. Plus, he has an underground lair with a shark tank and a monorail.
My biggest complaint about Live and Let Die is the cartoonish elements sprinkled through out. At one point Bond is trapped on an island, surrounded by alligators. How does he escape? He runs across the backs of the alligators naturally. In the opening sequence, a spy is killed by hooking up his headphones to a plunger style detonator, and then plunging. It’s too Wile E Coyote for me. And as Whisper is sitting on a couch, Mr Big shoots it with an compressed gas capsule and the couch expands in size and finally explodes. And the way that Mr Big dies is unforgivable. It really takes you out of the film. But Raishad, if that is unforgivable, how could you still say that you enjoyed the film? Well, easy.
It was the boat sequence. The boat chase at the end of the movie is exciting and really well done. I’ve never been on a speed boat before, but after witnessing that sequence. I want to be chased by bad guys on a speed boat and do amazing jumps. Again, the cartoonish elements threaten to ruin this sequence with the introduction of a local sheriff, but he’s easy to forget about when a Bond sacrifices his boat to cause a chasing boat to jump into a swimming pool and then he steals another boat! Also, Jane Seymour.
My trademark notes page:
On the Official Bond Chart
From Russia With Love
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
Dr. No
Goldfinger
Live and Let Die
Thunderball
Diamonds Are Forever
You Only Live Twice
Raishad will return next month with Blogalongabond #9, The Man with the Golden Gun.
July’s Bond is Diamonds Are Forever, and it proves that not only diamonds are forever, but Diamonds Are Forever feels like forever.
Diamonds Are Forever takes us into the 70s. After the amazing Lazenby reminded us how awesome Bond can be, Connery was called out of retirement for one more case (of Just for Men hair coloring). I’ve never seen Diamonds Are Forever before, but I was familiar with the criticisms. Diamonds Are Forever is definitely a step backwards and to the side. But, I did find myself enjoying it. My main criticism of previous Bonds have been the investigation, mainly how boring and tedious they were. But I really enjoyed Bond figuring things out in Vegas. In fact, it was the ending, the assault on the oil rig that really put me to sleep.
The worst thing in Diamonds Are Forever is not Bambi and Thumper or flabby Bond, it’s the opening credits. The high point in the Bond credits have been Thunderball, and since then they’ve been getting worse. The naked ladies are unimaginative and the song by Shirley Bassey is atrocious.
Here is my trademark notes page:
On the Official Bond Chart
From Russia With Love
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
Dr. No
Goldfinger
Thunderball
Diamonds Are Forever
You Only Live Twice
Raishad will return next month with Blogalongabond #8, Live and Let Die.
*Phew* Finished with hours to spare
I’ll be going to Vegas in August. I’m looking forward to playing the slots with an elephant.
June’s Bond is On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and what a wonder service it was!
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service was an amazing Bond. George Lazen-bond takes over for Sean Connery, and aside from the super lame “This never happened to the other fella”, really shines. There’s something about Lazenby that works. It was kinda nice to have a Bond that didn’t have to rely on jetpacks. This is a Bond who can face a spider without a giant pane of glass between them. Fearless.
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service isn’t perfect though. I found the opening credits a step backwards. There were plenty of nudey ladies, but no amazing song. Nipples are great, but I want something to get me excited about the movie. Also, the middle investigation section does drag on a bit. OHMSS does for heraldry what The Phantom Menace did for taxation of trade routes. We do see some brilliant Bond womanizing though. So it’s not a total bore.
But you forget all of that boring heraldry nonsense because once Bond reunites with Tracy, OHMSS kicks it into overdrive. If I had never seen Inception, this would have been the finest arctic attack sequence ever committed to film. And you know what else works? The love story. Tracy is definitely the best Bond girl of the series. Bond would not have quit the service for any of his previous floozies. Also, she has a great rack.
Trademark notes:
On the Official Bond Chart
From Russia With Love
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
Dr. No
Goldfinger
Thunderball
You Only Live Twice
Raishad will return this month with Blogalongabond #7, Diamonds Are Forever. You see, this Blogalongabond was late.
So yea, this is at least 6 months late. I was planning to finish this playlist up months ago, but I just didn’t get around to it. It’s just been sitting there, taunting me. And now that I’m getting ready to start a new playlist for a road trip to see the last shuttle launch, I just need to finish it. Draw a line under it and move on.
Here is my Top 12 of 2010. Notice that it’s not 12 tracks. I’ve decided to get rid of that requirement and just go with the the limit of 80 minutes, 1 CD-R, but I’m still keeping the name. It’s gothistory.
And as you can tell from the very Thunderball-like poster, it was not a groundbreaking Bond. The gadgets were uninspired. Suitcase Helicopter *YAWN* Cigarette Gun *YAWN* The best piece of hardware in the movie was the Toyota 2000GT, and all that had in it was a video phone. No machine guns or ejector seats or anything cool. And the girls weren’t particularly memorable. How am I supposed to remember a name if it isn’t a double entendre?
I think the best thing from You Only Live Twice is the theme song. You will have to click this link to experience it because I can’t embed it. But as good as the theme song is, the actual titles have taken a step back compared to Thunderball. We’re still working with sexy silhouettes, but it just feels a little staid.
Also, the main impression I get from You Only Live Twice is that in 1967, everyone was talking about cigarettes and how terrible they are for you. Cigarettes make for a better villain than Blofield and SPECTRE.
Here are my trademark notes
Thing we learn from You Only Live Twice, Bond will not eat oysters unless their is a possibility of sex afterwards. Idiot!
On the Official Bond Chart
From Russia With Love
Dr. No
Goldfinger
Thunderball
You Only Live Twice
This ranking is tough, because I think Thunderball overall is a better movie, but if I had to choose between Thunderball and You Only Live Twice to watch again, I would pick You Only Live Twice 7 times out of 10.
Raishad will return next month with Blogalongabond #6, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
And no, you haven’t stumbled upon a blackhole and ended up 1 month into the past. I’m just late as usual. But I have a good excuse: I was working on my class project and just didn’t have time.
So Thunderball… Everything you’ve read is true. It’s just way too long. It has some brilliant parts (rhymes with bits), but Terence Young just wanted to show off he could film fight scenes underwater. Speargun/air hose slash. It get’s tiring. I complained in Goldfinger that James Bond isn’t really a spy. In Thunderball, he spends too much time spying.
Anyways, the best things from Thunderball – silly gadgets and the start of the really cool James Bond titles with silhouettes of naked ladies.
My trademark notes page
On the Official Bond Chart
From Russia With Love
Dr. No
Goldfinger
Thunderball
Raishad will return this month with Blogalongabond #5, You Only Live Twice.
Last Thursday, I saw one of my favorite bands, British Sea Power, at my favorite venue, The Loft.
Opening for British Sea Power were the Colourmusic. They were okay.
After the Colourmusic, were A Classic Education. I saw them at SXSW. I enjoyed them a lot at SXSW and at The Loft
And then British Sea Power took the stage
It was a killer set
If you’re down with the BSP, you know the track “All In It”/”We Close Our Eyes” from Do You Like Rock Music? It’s a building chant
We’re all in it
and We’re all in it
and We’re all in it
and we close our eyes
It works excellent as both an opener or closer. That night, they decided to use it as a closer. It was great. A Classic Education joined in. And I also decided to join them on stage. Along with a few members of the audience, including the couple who had their first date at a British Sea Power show and were now engaged (Awwwwww).
I was in the front, and Noble, the guitarist, was gesturing like he wanted me to get on stage. I assumed he wanted the girl to the left of me. So she went up first. But he was still making motions, so I went up too. And then most of the front row. Here’s proof
And I know I promised a real review last month, but again time just got away from me. So here’s my patented iPad notebook page
Like the previous Bond films, I had never seen Goldfinger. So I can watch it free of nostalgia. And overall, I enjoyed From Russia With Love a lot more. Goldfinger had some good moments, but it didn’t feel like a complete movie. Honestly, I would recommend watching The Simpsons episode “You Only Move Twice” instead.
On the Official Bond Chart
From Russia With Love
Dr. No
Goldfinger
Hopefully, Raishad will return this month with Blogalongabond #4, Thunderball. I haven’t seen Thunderball either, but what a great name!
