Magic Jewball

(From my Google homepage today)

(From the NY Yankees any day)

In other news, I understand Chuck Knoblauch really, really likes garlic.

Black Star - Definition

I had my own mini-Digg effect this week when Brooklyn Vegan linked to my post about the Air show. By 11am I had as many visitors as I usually have in a whole day. Rockin’! We’ll see if any of them come back. In any case, I wanted to show my thanks to the BV site by telling my own vegan story which ties in with the iPod Song of the Week.

When I was a youngster at my first music industry job I had the thrill of eating lunch with members of a band I had idolized in my youth*, Killing Joke. We had a meal catered and brought up to the conference room and I sat with my salad or vegetarian dish or whatever and the guys from KJ also ate from a limited selection as they were vegan. One of them asked me if I was as well. No, I explained, I’m Kosher. Pardon? Well, I eat meat but it has to be killed in a Kosher way which means the animal feels no pain. They looked at me as if I had three heads. One of them laughed derisively at me. I was crushed.

But you know, I still love their music, despite the fact that my childhood idols snortled at my “kill ‘em but do it painlessly” way of operating. This song was my absolute favorite, and the streaming link is the 12″ version that I bought at my local record shop as a kid (B+B Music, they would just see me come in and start jacking up the price of their Depeche Mode imports). It’s typical Killing Joke, dark, ominous, gothic, and heavy yet danceable. When I was bored in class I used to transcribe the words to this song in my notebook. (”Red tears are shed on gray,” come on, the meaning is obvious!) That was before they laughed at me, naturally.

*Youth, get it? Ahahahahaha. Right.

Killing Joke - Love Like Blood

Apparently, there is something going on in New York at the moment called the High Line Festival which, according to Gawker, is THE festival of the year. Despite the fact that I subscribe to 475 blogs via feed reader, I hadn’t actually heard of it. Maybe I skipped over the hype because I once saw a documentary about the High Line and couldn’t figure out what the fuss was about. So how did I find out? I happened to find myself there this evening.

See, I went to see Air and TV on the Radio with some friends and that’s where I spotted all the “David Bowie presents the High Line Festival” posters. It didn’t seem to change anything about the show, I don’t think. If you don’t know Air, they are a gentle, trippy, ethereal, electronic band. What did that mean for me? Lots of pot smoke irritating my contact lenses. More spacey lights than the laser show at the planetarium. Mellowness.

Since we were sitting in record label seats, we ended up just behind David Fricke from Rolling Stone. You can always recognize David Fricke, even from the back, because of his Joey Ramone frame and never-changing shapeless 70’s hairdo. No one wanted to say out loud, “that’s David Fricke, isn’t it?” and so we Blackberry’d it to each other. Because we’re just that dorky. (Speaking of dorky, the first time I ever sat near David Fricke I didn’t know who he was, and my boyfriend at the time insisted he was in the Grateful Dead. We bet on it, he went up to David Fricke, asked him if he was in the Dead, and Fricke laughed and said, obviously, no.)

So I know what you’re thinking, “this is all a lovely story, Becca, but, uh, WTF is the High Line?” Why, it’s weed-infested former subway tracks! Doesn’t that deserve a festival? David Bowie seems to think so. Everyone says you have to walk along the High Line to understand its peace and beauty, but since almost no one’s allowed up there I’m not sure how you’re supposed to do that. You can read more about it here. I tried, but I think all the Mary Jane smoke killed my brain cells.

(Photo by ianqui @ flickr)

In conclusion, see Air. They were triptacular.

Actually you may know them if you’ve seen any of ten or more commercials in which their music has been used. Like this one, from a Nissan ad.

Air - Surfing On A Rocket

(I know you do!)

So, what’s the greatest movie about New York? If you recognized the title of this post, you already know where I’m going with this. Why, it’s West Side Story, of course. Thanks for asking, rhetorical question-asker! Recently, I figured out how to download TV shows from my DVR onto my computer and thus I am now equipped to illustrate and prove my answer. With clips! And more clips! What does this mean for you, besides slow-loading pages and feed reader people having to click over? Clips! And more clips!

And now, onto the clips. If the very intro to this movie doesn’t make you suck in your breath and call out landmarks, well, you’ve just never been here. Where are the twin towers? They weren’t built yet. And the neighborhood we pan down to? It’s all gone, razed to construct Lincoln Center. These folks could never afford to live there now.

Naturally, the entire film is completely dated, and not just because the hoodlums tuck their shirts into their pants. One of the best scenes in the film is at a community dance, where the two gangs go to meet up with each other and plan a rumble. Things look about to get ugly when Gomez Addams gee-whizes them into trying to get together in a friendlier way. Observe the results.

Mambo! Check out the thematic wear; the Jets wear blues and oranges, the Sharks wear purples and reds. Because Latinos are spicy! By the way, there were no black people in New York in the 1960’s.

Later, on the rooftop, the Sharks and their womenfolk engage in the best snappy answer song ever. Would that J-Ball could be this clever. Not to mention a statement about racism and the immigrant experience framed as a lavish dance number.

Of course WSS is also about love, death, revenge, family, friendship, loyalty and just to make it all the more fun, the whole thing is a modern-day retelling of Romeo and Juliet. Only dancier and with corny faux Puerto Rican accents. And most of all, it’s about the Upper West Side before gentrification came along and jazzed it up, so to speak. You know, a place where gangs meet up with their girls on the rooftops after the rumble and the gangleader tells his troops regarding their patch of UWS, “I say this turf is small, but it’s all we got, huh?” And Romeo and Juliet do their balcony scene on a fire escape. ::sigh::

Now go, queue it up on Netflix!

Today was a great day for the state of Israel and the Jewish people. My head is still spinning from the convergence of fantastic events. As you’ve come to expect from me, I will proceed to list them for you in a highly numerical format.

1. Lag B’Omer

The period between Passover and Shavu’ot is a solemn one in the Jewish calendar and is called the Omer (it’s also counted in a highly numerical format, as I have pointed out before by linking to the fabulous “Simpsons Counting the hOmer” site). There is, however, a break on the 33rd day when a plague ended. When I went to yeshiva, this day was celebrated by having outdoor sports contests which I never won. Let’s never speak of it again.

JVibe’s Counting the hOmer

2. Salute to Israel Parade

Down 5th Avenue in NY. I couldn’t make it this year, but you can always enjoy my fun pictures from last year.

Last year’s parade

3. My cousin has a baby boy

In Israel!

4. Sarkozy elected president of France

Likes Israel! (Might be good for France too, but this isn’t my topic today.)

Members of Knesset in Jerusalem welcome Sarkozy victory

5. Roger Clemens returns to Yankees

I know this is a stretch but I’m sure it benefits the Jews and Israel in some way. You’ll have to trust me on this. Hey, it’s benefited me and I’m Jewish!

Officially, I’m most excited about #3 but just between you and me, blogreaders, it’s #5 all the way. Shhh.

“This is the way I hold my hand to carry my big sack of money”

John Sebastian - Welcome Back (Theme from Welcome Back, Kotter)