Pop culture roundup: Mike McCartney! David Letterman! The Saint!
Paul McCartney's younger brother, Mike, is performing a one man show around Britain.
“It’s a celebration of me being on this Earth for 70 years. I’ll be telling you about the other side of Liverpool, of painters, folk singers and poets.”
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Hear 21-year-old David Letterman's college radio show! And his Amish beard!
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Spyvibe has the skinny on Amazon's reprinting (and Kindle-izing) of Leslie Charteris' "Saint" novels.
“It’s a celebration of me being on this Earth for 70 years. I’ll be telling you about the other side of Liverpool, of painters, folk singers and poets.”
It promises to be a much happier visit than his first visit to Derbyshire many moons ago.Indeed, Mike recorded a couple of quite good LPs (one featuring Jimi Hendrix) with the Scaffold and on his own (helped out by Paul). He's also an excellent photographer, having published a couple of great early days collections focused on the pre-fame Beatles.
“I broke my arm on a Scout camp in Hathersage when I was 13,” said Mike.
“Up until then, I used to play drums with The Quarrymen (who later became The Beatles) when they came to our house. I was probably The Beatles’ first drummer.” Injury didn’t stop the second McCartney son from following his dream of making music.
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Hear 21-year-old David Letterman's college radio show! And his Amish beard!
Though only a five-minute clip, this recording showcases not just Letterman’s preternatual microphone presence, but his way with the near-psychedelic walls of sound effects, seemingly free-associative speech, and pure wackiness that so came into its own in the late sixties and early seventies.
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Spyvibe has the skinny on Amazon's reprinting (and Kindle-izing) of Leslie Charteris' "Saint" novels.
Amazon imprint Thomas and Mercer will publish a whopping forty-nine Saint novels by Leslie Charteris this summer. The new Amazon Saint library will arrive in two waves, releasing books on June 24th and July 29th in paperback. Kindle editions already came out on March 18th.
...In addition, Mulholland recently published thirty-five of the Saint titles in the UK with more modern cover designs.
Pop Stuff: Captain America: Winter Soldier
What I've been reading, watching, hearing, etc.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
After the so-so "Iron Man 3" and entertaining but inconsequential "Thor: The Dark World," Marvel turns things up a notch with the second Captain America film.
This is the best second installment of any of the Marvel movies, having the advantage of being able to place its hero in an entirely different context from the first Cap film. We saw some of Cap's interactions with the 21st century in "The Avengers" movie, but here the "man out of time" theme has more space for development, and it serves as a commentary about what's happened in, and to, our world since World War II.
Cap is the heroic symbol of the Greatest Generation (at least in the Marvel Universe), and represents the American ideals of fairness and freedom at their best. But modern-day America in the film looks much like our own -- a nation obsessed with security, often at the expense of liberty. The film's political commentary isn't terribly sophisticated and it's not at all heavy-handed. But it's there, and it works, making this -- S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarriers and the debut of the high-flying Falcon aside -- the most realistic and down-to-earth Marvel film to date.
Chris Evans strikes a nice balance between bemusement and grim disappointment as he learns more and more about what's become of his country over the 60 years or so he's been in deep freeze. In a funny scene early on, we see him jotting down things to learn about and catch up on, that he's missed between 1945 and 2014: the moon landing, Thai food, Marvin Gaye albums. But he can also lecture his "younger" colleagues like they're ignorant whipper-snappers, getting in a heated debate with Nick Fury about a plan to take out threats in death-from-above drone fashion "before they become threats."
There's more suspense than super-heroics here, though there are plenty of those, too. The key villains here aren't super powered, but they are super evil. And though Evans holds our focus, there are nice supportive performances, too. Samuel L. Jackson gets plenty of screen time, and plenty of action as Fury. Same with Scarlett Johansson as the Black Widow, who has nice chemistry with Evans. Anthony Mackie is good and likeable as Sam Wilson, the Falcon, acting as a foil and equal partner -- not an obnoxious sidekick -- to Cap. And Robert Redford, after many years, gets to play a politician again -- this one with formidable power and skills.
With Marvel making so many films with so many characters, there's a danger of all these films becoming repetitious, of losing the individuality of these different heroes and what makes them tick. This time out, at least, they've made a film that stands on its own, that comments on aspects of our world, and provides some genuine intrigue and suspense.
After the so-so "Iron Man 3" and entertaining but inconsequential "Thor: The Dark World," Marvel turns things up a notch with the second Captain America film.
This is the best second installment of any of the Marvel movies, having the advantage of being able to place its hero in an entirely different context from the first Cap film. We saw some of Cap's interactions with the 21st century in "The Avengers" movie, but here the "man out of time" theme has more space for development, and it serves as a commentary about what's happened in, and to, our world since World War II.
Cap is the heroic symbol of the Greatest Generation (at least in the Marvel Universe), and represents the American ideals of fairness and freedom at their best. But modern-day America in the film looks much like our own -- a nation obsessed with security, often at the expense of liberty. The film's political commentary isn't terribly sophisticated and it's not at all heavy-handed. But it's there, and it works, making this -- S.H.I.E.L.D. helicarriers and the debut of the high-flying Falcon aside -- the most realistic and down-to-earth Marvel film to date.
Chris Evans strikes a nice balance between bemusement and grim disappointment as he learns more and more about what's become of his country over the 60 years or so he's been in deep freeze. In a funny scene early on, we see him jotting down things to learn about and catch up on, that he's missed between 1945 and 2014: the moon landing, Thai food, Marvin Gaye albums. But he can also lecture his "younger" colleagues like they're ignorant whipper-snappers, getting in a heated debate with Nick Fury about a plan to take out threats in death-from-above drone fashion "before they become threats."
There's more suspense than super-heroics here, though there are plenty of those, too. The key villains here aren't super powered, but they are super evil. And though Evans holds our focus, there are nice supportive performances, too. Samuel L. Jackson gets plenty of screen time, and plenty of action as Fury. Same with Scarlett Johansson as the Black Widow, who has nice chemistry with Evans. Anthony Mackie is good and likeable as Sam Wilson, the Falcon, acting as a foil and equal partner -- not an obnoxious sidekick -- to Cap. And Robert Redford, after many years, gets to play a politician again -- this one with formidable power and skills.
With Marvel making so many films with so many characters, there's a danger of all these films becoming repetitious, of losing the individuality of these different heroes and what makes them tick. This time out, at least, they've made a film that stands on its own, that comments on aspects of our world, and provides some genuine intrigue and suspense.
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