All posts by Kev Brock

I'm a musician, singer/songwriter, blogger, writer, poet, bodybuilder, movie lover, music lover, video gamer, history/political buff, conservative/republican, etc. I like to do a lot of things.
movies

Thought: I am upset that “Drive” was ignored for “Best Picture” nomination for the Oscars, watched it last night…

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In my Top 15 Best 2011  films list, I picked, “Girl With the Dragon Tattoo”, as my favorite no. 1 movie of that year. Well I think I changed my mind, and I plan on doing a little revision of that list and change it a little bit. I finally got to see, “Drive” last night, the new Ryan Gosling movie. The film impressed me so much that I now think it’s the best movie of that year. I thought the film was “Best Picture” worthy for the Osars for sure, and it got snubbed, big time. Albert Brooks was also snubbed for, “Best Supporting Actor”.

Ryan Gosling, (star of films like “The Notebook” and “Blue Valentine”) plays an un-named, Driver, who works as a stuntman for movies, he works for a car garage, and he’s also a getaway driver. His car garage owner, Shannon, borrows money from mobster boss, Bernie Rose (Albert Brooks), to buy the Driver a stock car to start up a race. The Driver starts to fall in love with his next door neighbor in his apartment building, a woman named, Irene, who lives alone with her son while her husband is in prison. The film focuses on the Driver, trying his best to protect Irene from dangerous mobsters who are trying to get at her, just to get to him.

Some people are saying the pacing to this movie is slow and boring, but I didn’t think it was. I thought the acting by the cast of this movie was pretty realistic. The characters in this film, actually felt human and real. Ryan’s character, the Driver, may seem like an ordinary and friendly guy at first, you’ll start to see that he’s no ordinary guy. He can become violent and has a bad temper, when messed with. Ryan does an excellent job playing a person with a bad temper, you certainly don’t want to mess with him when he’s mad.

I was most impressed with the action scenes in this film. You know how in most popcorn action movies, the action scenes are almost always fun and exciting? Well in this film, the action scenes will scare the shit out of you and they are quite disturbing, and graphic. Watch this film in surround sound and turn it up loud, the sound is pretty killer with this film.

I was also most impressed with the performance of Albert Brooks, he played a great badguy. The Driver was considered a hero, Albert played the evil mob boss. Albert Brooks should have gotten some type of award nod for his performance of this film. His performance was brilliant and Oscar worthy.

I was blown away with this movie. I wished I saw it in theater. There’s probably going to be a sequel to this movie and I’ll be sure to see the sequel in theater if they decide to do one. This was one of the best new action movies I’ve seen in a long time. I’m going to be watching this movie repeatedly on DVD. Glad I bought it.

Kev

music

This Day In Music: 2/5/12

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Musician Birthdays: Al Kooper (singer for Blood, Sweat and Tears, famous for hit, “Spinning Wheel”, born in 1944), Duff McKagan (bassist of Guns N’ Roses, Velvet Revolver, born in 1964) Bobby Brown (US R&B singer/songwriter, famous for hits “My Perogative”, “Humpin’ Around”, and more, born in 1969)

– In 1957: 5,000 fans greeted Bill Haley when he arrived from New York on the liner Queen Elizabeth at Southampton, for his debut U.K. concert tour. Haley was the first American rock artist to tour the U.K.

– In 1962: The Beatles played two shows, one at the Cavern Club at lunchtime and, in the evening, at the Kingsway Club in Southport. This was the first time Ringo Starr appeared live with the group after drummer Pete Best became ill.

– In 1967: The News of the World reported that Mick Jagger had taken LSD at the home of a member of The Moody Blues. Jagger sued the paper for libel.

– In 1983: Def Leppard’s album, Pyromania, started a 92-week run on the U.S. charts. It never reached #1, but sold over 6 million copies in the U.S. alone.

– In 1999: the members of *NSYNC made a guest appearance on Sabrina The Teenage Witch on U.S. TV.

– In 2003: Courtney Love blamed her bad language for the alleged air rage incident that led to her arrest at London’s Heathrow Airport. As she left Heathrow’s police station the singer said, “I cussed at a lady. My daughter always said I had a potty mouth.” When asked what it had been like inside the police station, the singer said, “It was fine. They were wonderful in there. It was like being on Prime Suspect.”

– In 2006: The Rolling Stones played three songs during the half-time show of the Super Bowl in Detroit. After the event, the Stones expressed their displeasure over having Mick Jagger’s microphone turned down to censor a line in the song, “Start Me Up.”

Politics/war

Romney not-surprisingly wins Nevada caucus…

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The state of Nevada is extremely popular with Mormons. It’s a Mormon state. That’s the only reason why he got a large number of delegates ’cause Romney has a lot of fellow Mormon supporters. Honestly, I have nothing against Romney being a Mormon, it’s just that I’m no big fan of his political issues. He doesn’t care for the poor and he enjoys firing people. Lots of other reasons why I don’t like him. I don’t agree with a lot of Romney’s political issues.

Tuesday will be Colorado and Minnesota, so somebody else may have a chance in winning those two states. If Romney ends up winning both of those states again, I’m gonna be pissed.

Hopefully, Rick will step his game up. Rick needs to improve his campaigns and debates if he wants to catch up to Romney.

Everyone wants to see Obama get defeated and have someone else get elected president, but Obama could be victorious in the President Election itself and he may get re-elected. I’m praying Obama loses too.

If Rick Santorum drops out of the Election before Nov., I’ll just vote for anybody randomly, just to try and help get Obama out of office. I’m happy for Rick that he wasn’t in Nevada today. He was busy campaigning in Colorado instead, which is good, more power to him. Hopefully, Rick, will get higher scores in Colorado and Minn. on Tuesday, or even better win both states.

Kev

 

sports

Superbowl Sunday is the perfect day to pig out…

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While my fitness nutrition is mostly healthy, it is not that perfectly healthy. It’s not like, I’m ever going to have a professional looking bodybuilder physique, anyway, so my meals aren’t that 100% strict. I do eat mostly healthy for the most part. I just had to get in decent shape so to do that, I had to change my nutrition to healthier like I always say.

Pretty much the only junk food I would touch are pizza, ice cream, chinese food and sometimes Mexican food like tacos/buritos. Sometimes fast food too. I gave up everything else like soda, potato chips, sugary snacks, etc.  Again, you can’t ignore junk food completely, it’s still okay to have like once or twice a week. Just don’t over do it. On the weekends, I’ll eat whatever I want, and I’ll never lose the muscle and the six pack.

So tomorrow on Superbowl Sunday, I’m planning to eat whatever’s on the table. I’ve been eating good most of this week anyway so I deserve a day off of the healthy nutrition. What am I doing for the Superbowl? Staying home watching the game. Possibly having a little party with some people coming over. So there’s definitely gonna be all kinds of food and stuff.

Looking forward to the game and of course, I want the Giants to win. I always root for our home NY team. GO GIANTS!!!

Kev

music

This Day In Music: 2/4/12

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Musician Birthdays: Alice Cooper (US heavy metal singer, famous for hit, “I’m Eighteen”, born in 1948), Clint Black (US country singer, famous for hit, “Like the Rain”, born in 1962), Natalie Imbruglia (Australian singer/songwriter, famous for hit, “Torn”, born in 1975)

– In 1955: Elvis Presley played two shows (7.30pm and 9.30pm) at Jesuit High School in New Orleans, Louisiana. Hank Snow was also on the bill.

– In 1965: The Righteous Brothers were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with the Phil Spector song ‘You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’. Also a US No.1 at the same time. In 1999 the PRS announced that it was the most played song of the 20th Century.

– In 1966: Bob Dylan and The Band played at the Convention Center in Louisville, Kentucky. This was the first date on a world tour which would become noted as Dylan’s first that used electric instruments, after he had ‘gone electric’ at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival.

– In 1968: Working at Abbey Road studios, London, The Beatles recorded ‘Across The Universe’. John and Paul decided the song needed some falsetto harmonies so they invited two girl fans into the studio to sing on the song. The two were Lizzie Bravo, a 16-year-old Brazilian living near Abbey Road and 17-year-old Londoner Gayleen Pease.

– In 1978: The Bee Gees started a four week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Staying Alive’. From the film soundtrack Saturday Night Fever, it gave the brothers their fifth US No.1, also No.1 in the UK.

– In 1983: Karen Carpenter died aged 32 of a cardiac arrest at her parent’s house in Downey, California; the coroner’s report gave the cause of death of imbalances associated with anorexia nervosa. The Carpenters 1970 album Close to You, featured two hit singles: ‘(They Long to Be) Close to You’ and ‘We’ve Only Just Begun.’ They peaked at No.1 and No.2, on the US chart. In 1975 – In Playboy’s annual opinion poll; its readers voted Karen Carpenter the Best Rock Drummer of the year.

– In 1984: Culture Club started a three-week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Karma Chameleon’ the group’s 5th US Top 10 hit, also a No.1 in the UK.

– In 1984: Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble kicked off their 114-date ‘Couldn’t Stand the Weather tour’ at the War Memorial Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee.

– In 2003: Courtney Love was arrested at Heathrow airport for ‘endangering an aircraft’ on a transatlantic flight. The singer was said to have hurled abuse at the cabin crew on the flight from Los Angeles to London after her nurse who was in an economy seat was barred access to sit with Love in the upper class cabin.

– In 2004: Police questioned Noel Gallagher after a photograph of him trespassing on a railway line appeared in a newspaper. The Oasis guitarist was in a studio in Cornwall recording the bands new album when he took a walk along the railway line. British Transport Police said ‘he was setting a bad example.’

 

Local music

Young bands & musicians shouldn’t get too far ahead of themselves in music…

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In facebook the other day, I put up a post ranting about how other young bands are getting all this success (getting lots of fans, being part of battle of the bands competitions, maybe even getting some fame and opening for national acts, etc.). I left out the bands names so I wouldn’t get into any heated flame wars with their fans in facebook. They would probably figure out who I’m referring to anyway.

In the post, I admitted, I sometimes get a little jealous of them but in a good way. I do want all that stuff myself for my own music. Yes, I would like to be signed to a small indie label someday, perform on large stages in front of thousands of fans, open for some national acts, I wish I had a very large following, etc. I’m not rushing it and don’t want to get too far ahead of myself.

If all that stuff, don’t happen to me, I’m all cool with it. I’ll just stay happy playing music. After I wrote all that, a guy replied back and said, “Well said, because you create art, you already are a success”. I agree.

Thing is, I can’t tell whether I’m a successful musician or not. I’ve always had mixed opinions with my music over the years. You either love it or you don’t. Over the years, I’ve been made fun of and people bashed me saying I had no talent and was accused of not being a musician. I was also ignored by a lot of people no matter how hard I tried to promote my music and my music dreams were shot down by a lot of people too.

I believe I’m already am a successful musician, the way I’m looking at it. Like I said before, I’ve played over 30 gigs in the past. Shared the stage with almost all the bands and solo acts around the area. I’ve played almost all venues around here too. I had radio airplay with one of my older songs from the past, did a radio interview and had the opportunity to perform on a local TV show for Public Access. I also played on a few huge festivals. Plus, pretty much all local musicians all over the place know who I am and pretty much all of them, follow my blog. People are talking about me, either good or bad.

I think that’s pretty successful don’t you think? Seriously, think about it a few minutes. I think I had a successful music run. Of course, there will be some that will disagree with it and say all that stuff is nothing, but that’s alright. No matter what you think of my music run, I was very proud of it.

I may have not been signed yet, or may have not played Coachella or Lollapalooza, I may not have won Battle of the Bands or any of the stupid radio contests, but I was successful.

Then, of course, other people won’t see it. They would think this band here and that band there is something special and they would think that band has something good going, and I would get ignored completely. No Metroland cover. No local press coverage. Even though I didn’t get anything back from my music run, I was happy with it and I did accomplish things greatly.

I still have lots to learn and lots more to go to get success in music. I’m trying. Trying very hard. Not rushing things, taking my time. Success and getting well known don’t happen over night. It’s a long long road. I also want to get better at playing the guitar and singing before I go any further in my music dreams. Another example of not getting too far ahead.

It’s just that too many young bands are living in fantasy worlds. Thinking they’re something special and they look at music like a popularity contest. That’s never been me. I didn’t care about popularity or success, I just wanted to play music and enjoy myself. If I don’t get any of those huge opportunities other bands are getting, that’s cool with me. I’m just happy sitting here in this room, with my guitar and creating art. I think that’s being successful more than what other bands are doing.

Bands can be insane sometimes, and the way fans look at music can be too. I’m not afraid to tell the truth about this stuff. Young bands should take their slow time and not rush themselves. I’m 35 right now and I don’t even have a band yet, but that is something I would like to do down the road. See? Not getting too far ahead of myself.

Kev

 

Politics/war

Thought: How Rick Santorum can still win the GOP…

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Some of you may think that Rick Santorum, or even Newt Gingrich or Ron Paul may not have a chance of getting ahead of Mitt Romney in the “GOP Race”. The other candidates STILL have a chance in getting ahead of Romney. Romney has 75 delegates so far, and if you look at the website, all you need, is “1,144” delegates to get to the GOP. The GOP election needs to do all the states in the US, they only did 4 so far. For Ron, Newt, and Rick, they would need to win a lot more states if they want to get ahead of Romney. This is still just the beginning of the GOP race. They still have ways to go. The GOP race won’t end ’til the end of June.

Today is the Nevada caucus, and I’m looking forward to seeing who will be victorious on that state. I’ll be following the rest of the GOP election. While the other guys still have a chance in getting ahead of Romney, I’m still rooting for Rick. So hopefully he’ll win Nevada today.

Kev

movies

Film Review: The Grey

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Starring: Liam Neeson

Directed by: Joe Carnahan

Today, I decided to hit the mall to check out, “The Grey”, finally. I’ve been looking forward to this film for a long while and it’s finally here. Before the film, I went to shop around. I picked up three movies on DVD, they are: “Drive”, “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark”, and “Warrior”. I also picked up the first two “Walking Dead”, books from the Comic Depot store. Since I’ve been watching the “Walking Dead” religiously on AMC, I figure it’s time to finally start reading the books.

On with my review of, “The Grey”:

Plot/synopsis: John Ottway (Liam Neeson) is a wolf hunter, who works in Alaska. An oil drilling team is threatened by the wolves. On the last day of the job, John gets ready to fly back home with the drilling team, and Alaska is in the middle of a huge blizzard. The plane tries to fly through the blizzard and crashes in the middle of nowhere. The team must try their best to survive, from a dangerous pack of wolves that are all over the place. 

I did like this movie a lot. It was fun, entertaining, thrilling, and scary, all at the same time, however, there were a few little disappointments. I’ll explain that a little later in this film review, but I want to talk about what I liked about it first. Liam Neeson was the only big name star in this film. The rest of the cast were unknown actors. I thought the cinematography was brilliant, it was a very dark movie. I thought the film was acted by the cast very well. The film was also action packed, violent and can get gory at times too.

It’s a survival movie. It will remind you of the movie, “Alive”, big time. When I was watching this movie, at times, I thought I was watching that movie, “Alive”, that starred Ethan Hawke. Back to “The Grey”, the film had different emotions and feelings. It had a little bit of comedy and enjoyable stuff to lighten up the audience after the dark stuff going on. Plus, there are some emotional and sad scenes too, mixed in with the scary & dark scenes.

Liam Neeson’s acting is great like always. I’ve admired his acting for years and been a fan of his for a long time. Ever since Liam’s wife, Natasha passed away, the guy kept working on films like crazy. He’s a workhorse for sure, and the man is on fire. This is his best new role, yet!

What I didn’t like about the film? Well, the film was a bit too predictable, especially the ending. I saw the ending happening ever since the movie started. I won’t spoil it for you, but you’ll probably figure it out anyway. Ask yourself this, does the film end with a happy ending?

Another thing, is this story line with the wolves. In real life, I’m sure the wolves don’t attack people and eat people alive. Wolves are actually afraid of people. In this film, they made the wolves look like evil monsters, when in real life, they are actually innocent animals. It’s just a movie, I guess. The wolves were done in CGI, of course. If they made the wolves a little more realistic and not make them like monsters, then the film would have been a little better.

Other than that, I did like the film a lot, there were just a few little things in it that should have been better.

Score for “The Grey” = *** (3 stars as in “Good”)

Kev

sports

Report: Joe Francis of “Girls Gone Wild” fame wants to block Madonna’s new song…

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Madonna is planning to perform one of her new songs on her upcoming new album at this Sunday’s Superbowl game, a song called, “Girls Gone Wild”, but Joe Francis happens to own the trademark for his business name. He sent her a, “cease and desist letter”, trying to stop her from playing the song.

Read the full story, here.

Oh give me, a fucking break. I think Madonna, legally has the right to use the song, so she’s safe. There are plenty of songwriters and musicians from the past who used the same title.

If he’s going to sue Madonna, then he may as well sue country singer, Travis Tritt.

Kev