NPR had some interesting tidbits that I thought I would link to this week. For starters, The Beatles' 'Rubber Soul' celebrates its 40th anniversary this month and Art Silverman does a short piece about the tribute album "This Bird Has Flown" featuring audio clips from some of the new versions of the songs.With all the hubbub, I've gone and picked up the album again and started listening to it this week. Songs like "You Won't See Me" and "In My Life" all remind me why this is one of my favourite Beatles albums of all time, and my favourite period of their careers. Not too experimental, but not too reminiscient of '50s rock, either. And don't get me wrong, I love 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band' and The White Album, but, IMHO, for pure sit down and listen to it value, 'Rubber Soul' and 'Revolver' are where it's at.
Sticking with the music links for a bit, I also found this Death Cab For Cutie concert on NPR. It's about an hour-and-a-half and the audio quality is very good. I've only previewed a bit of it but the performances sound solid and when I have the time, I'm sure this'll be a treat to listen to.
USA Today had an interesting article on how well DVDs have been doing this year. With so many industry people making comments in interviews and on the web that it's the DVDs where the studios are making their real money, and considering how poorly theatrical releases did this year, I think the fact that DVD sales rose by only 8% is a kind of sobering fact - especially since there have been more DVDs released this year than any other.
Anyway, it's all in the article, so if you're interested, go check it out.
While searching for an anniversary gift for Johnny Bacardi I ran across this great site focusing on comic strips based on the popular British adventure series, The Avengers. Most of it is bibliographical information on the many comic book versions of the series, but there are some full strips you can view if you search around - what fun!If you've ever checked out DC's flash-animated Gotham Girls webisodes or seen Micah Green's video for "Family Circus" or watched an episode of The Venture Brothers than you know who Noodlesoup is. These guys are some of the best at what they do and I've loved just about everything I've seen from them. This week I ran across this article talking about how company founder, Jeff Nodelman, is leaving the company to pursue his own stuff. I thought it was an interesting read.
Taking a cue from Tom Spurgeon's Comics Reporter here's an interesting link to a contract that Dave Sim received from DC Comics regarding doing some work for Bill Willingham's Fables. He makes some notes in the margins and drafts a response for DC's legal dept. I got a kick out of some of the things Dave pointed out and the last paragraph where he explains that he never promised Willingham that he would do it 100% for sure but that he would negotiate in good faith with DC made me chuckle.
Here's an odd little interview with Identity Crisis writer, Brad Meltzer.
Here's a Chicago Sun-Times article on the carpet bombing of the Smurf village which I'm sure you've all heard of by now. I admire UNICEF for what they're trying to do, but I can't deny the weirdness of the direction they chose for the campaign.
Indie creator, Adrian Tomine, has edited a Manga collection featuring the work of Yoshihiro Tatsumi. He talks about it here in an article by The Village Voice.
The Book Standard talks to writer/artist, Charles Burns about his GN, Black Hole.
I mentioned the new Conan: Red Nails animated feature before on the blog, but ICv2 has this bit on some of the confirmed casting for the film now that it is officially out of the design phase of production.
Not to ignore the gaming world, popular anime, Samurai Champloo, will be making its way to PS2's in 2006, which is great news except that I own an XBOX (not to even mention that many of us are still waiting for one of the Cowboy Bebop games to make the long trip over to North America).I should also mention that Jeff Smith's Bone will become a video game courtesy of Telltale Games. More info on the game, based on the "Out From Boneville" storyline can be found here.
And with that, I'm all tuckered out for the day. Hope there was something interesting for everyone, there. I'll catch you all later!
mike
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