UrbanMan vs City with your host Carl Meadow
I know, I know I’m a little late on this one but I just got a chance to watch it. Heavy Metal in Baghdad is one of the best documentaries I’ve seen period. After the movie ended everyone who was watching it with me sat in silence with our mouths open for a good 10 mins. The documentary follows the only metal band in Iraq, Acrassicauda, from 2003 – 2006. Playing heavy metal in a Muslim country has always been next to impossible (for example they arn’t allowed to have long hair and head banging to them resembles the way that Jews pray, and we all know the only Jewish – Muslim friendship out there is probably Chromeo). After the fall of Saddam’s Iraq there was a brief time where real peace seemed possible but that hope, as we all know, quickly died with the rise of the bloody insurgency. The band endures through being refugees to having all their instruments blown up when their practice space is hit with a scud missile. It will completely change your thinking about the war in Iraq and really gives you a good perspective of the generation of Iraqis growing up in the thick of it. If your a musician this will especially hit you hard. Below is the trailer for the film but you can buy it here, watch it on netflix here, or watch it for FREE here.
So holy shit this looks awesome. Is Mortal Kombat coming back again? Well possibly. When I first saw this trailer I immediately thought because of the quality and caliber of actors that this MF was a done deal and was in production, but not so much. Aparently this was a proof of concept done by Kevin Tancharoen to sell the suits at Warner Brothers the new darker concpt for the rebirth of Mortal Combat. Apparently Warner Brothers was ready to move forward with production when Threshold Entertainment (Hollywood Intellectual Property Management and Production Company who owns the rights to mortal kombat) filed new breach of contract lawsuit and stopped the thing dead (lawsuit fatality!). Buuuuut this trailer has been getting such a huge buzz online that I think someone is going to pick it up and pay off Threshold because when there’s that much money to be made in hollywood someone will find a way. For now check out this bad as look at the possible new Mortal Kombat movie.
Got some fre$h tunes here for you people. First up is this KiD Cudi jam that he colabed with MGMT and Ratatat for. You might know of KiD from the poker face sampled song Make Her Say he did with Kanye (kanyes verse is the nasty btw) or the Day N Night jaunt he did, either way this track is rad. Person L is the singer from The Starting Line’s new band… well I guess not new because this is their second album but believe you me this album is a solid mother fucker. It has an old school rolling stonesish feel too it mixed with bad ass, gasoline, and a cigar. This track will give u a good feel of what it’s about. After that we go on to Sleigh Bells which is a noise pop duo based out of Brooklyn, NY. Real interesting stuff, nothing really like it out there now. Geographer has a pretty unique style too, not nearly has hard has Sleigh Bells but still has a little of that electronic feel mixed with some old world cello action. Lastly I threw in some old school swing jazz from france from my man Django Reinhardt. His guitar style is so rad and a feel musicians can learn a lot from how he does his string slides and verbratto. It would be a great style to try to work into more modern music but is still dope in the orginal context. Oh yea and he only had 2 good fingers on his fretting hand… total bad ass. Enjoy!
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Entertainment System is melt your face awesome. There’s the basic idea that they’re a gamer band but if you’ve seen them before or coped one of their albums you know its way more then that. What I think makes it so epic, especially live, is the way they arrange the songs and crazy guitar harmonies they pull off. Not only are the jams bad ass but all the guys are just straight cool talented guys. They aren’t pretentious or egotistical, they just are all about playing the best shit they can fathom. Another uniquity about them is the amount of projects they’re involved in. Many of them play other instruments in other groups that sometimes even contain they’re entertainment system comrades. All in all good dudes, good music, gnarly show. Check them out at BIT GEN 5 Aug 14th at Sonar in Baltimore along with YEAR 200X, The Megas, This Place Is Haunted, Cheap Dinosaurs, The Ultraball, X Hunters, Rare Candy, Armadillo Tank, The Protomen and many more. Shit sells out so get you tickets here right now. Enjoy the vid.
