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Did I mention that my discman died two weeks ago? My faithful companion since 2001 ( or possibly 2000, considering that it was originally absolut_69‘s baby that I stole away and paid him six months later), my ecape valve during final year examinations, Sunny Deol-infested bus journeys, my PRECIOUS little precious finally gave up. Was bound to happen, but I am not giving up easily. It’s off for repairs now, and the guy at the service center ( unauthorized, the Philips guys said they don’t repair discmans, especially not the Expanium, and DEFINITELY not this model.), the guy said the lens needs to be changed. I don’t have too much hope of it working for more than a year, new lens or not, and I am pretty sure it won’t be able to read any of my older Frontech mp3 CDs. But no matter. I am not giving up on you easily, precious.

It’s one of those unacknowledged laws that whenever you lack the means to listen to music, your urge to listen to music increases dramatically. I have been spending my free time ( Ha ha ha) revisiting some CDs that I hadn’t heard in quite sometime. Travis, Moby’s Play, Dixie Chicks, Bad Company, Jethro Tull, Van Morrison, Cowboy Junkies. Loads of Suzanne Vega too.

Has it ever happened to you that you hear a song, and then don’t hear it for a long time, and when you hear it again, it sounds completely different from what you had thought it sounded, in terms of the orchestration and the arrangement? That happened to me with Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, a song which I keep remembering because of the opening lyrics, that go – If I ventured in the slipstream, between the viaducts of your dream, where immobile steel rims crack, and the ditch in the back roads stop – Could you find me? Would you kiss my eyes? – the imagery just kills me, man. I heard it after a long time, and was really, really taken aback to find that it was not really as guitar-driven as I remembered it was.

And now for some venom.

I think it was V For Vendetta that did it, finally, but I realised that the ratio of returns to investment has been mindblogglingly low for all the movies I’ve seen in theatres this and the last year. Movies that I’ve loved and enjoyed, like Sin City, Hostel, The Devil’s Rejects, even The Corpse Bride have no chance of attaining theatrical releases in India. What do we get? Pap. Bile-inducing insults to my brain. Pixellated eye-candy with six tracks of digitized nonsense. So I say, enough. No more movies in theatres. No more paying inflated prices to be mentally assaulted for 90 to 180 minutes, and with cellphone ringtone interruptions too, to boot. Especially comicbook movies. I have been completely uninterested in Superman Returns ever since yada yada yada and I am not really interested in talking about it, thank you. If you see it and you like it, well, I am happy for you. Obviously you haven’t been reading Doom Patrol or All Star Superman, so I can’t really say I am too happy for you, but yeah, you should know that I have absolutely no problems with you watching Superman Returns. Nope, none at all. Not a teensy weensy bit. Honest.

The trailer for Spiderman 3? Not interested. Ghost Rider? Pah! 300? Ditto. Nacho Libre? Well, yeah, interested, but I don’t think it’s coming to theaters here, so there!

I was also more than a little pissed off because the last copy of Hanzo The Razor available at secondspin.com got sold off this week, as did the two copies of Varttina’s Miero. GRRRAH! My credit card’s maxed out, so I couldn’t pick it up. CD-WOW still has it, but it’s almost twice the price.

I am a man of taste. I shall now go home and listen to Himesh Reshammiya until I fall asleep. I have a presentation to make tomorrow morning. Er, today morning. I am in such an ebullient mood (Part of the reason: Roger Ebert gave Superman Returns two stars. I don’t really like the guy, but that didn’t stop me from grinning a lot on reading his review) that my technical presentation has taken on shades of a standup comedy routine. Wish me luck.

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35 thoughts on “

  1. Anonymous says:

    Douche

    “If I ventured in the slipstream, between the viaducts of your dream…” Sounds like a Carrier blurb, no?

    And if you have Travis discs, whytf did I download three albums for you last night?

    And think about it this way: When Superman Returns bombs (fingers crossed), *maybe* they’ll stop making comic book movies …unless they make Mandrake. Or Bahadur!

  2. I haven’t been following them closely, but what do Doom Patrol and All Star Superman have to do with enjoyment of Superman Returns?

    Ghost RiderSpider-Man 3 looks pretty sweet.

    So there.

    • Because without having read Doom Patrol and All Star Superman, one cannot believe in the concepts of love, peace and universal brotherhood. :-P

      Ah, don’t mind me, Brian. I am just becoming an elitist psycho. ( Though, in my defence, I am an elitist psycho who believes in love, peace and universal brotherhood.)

    • I am rather fond of listening to music off my mp3 CDs. I know the precise order in which the albums and songs are arranged in most of them, and ….

      Well, actually, I am just a cheapskate who does not want to spend money on mp3 players.

  3. Anonymous says:

    I havent been watching Superman Returns, or other comic-book-based-movies(or for that matter, any other movies:-). Do be nice enough to treat me sometime in return for my support of your tastes.

    Shamanth

      • First impressions: extremely ingenious and quite poignant, with moments of wild invention [eg, Vicious Cabaret]. But I will need to read it a few more times before I can come up with a more meaningful response than a few adjectives. Actually, that last proposition probably tells you what you want to know. :)

          • I saw the movie at around the same time you did. Didn’t like it, though there were a couple of visually stunning scenes. The plot just seemed confused and Natalie Portman annoyed me beyond measure.

            Man, I need a new userpic. The initial heady rush of the BOss Tanaka scene has worn off a little.

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