What a day it has been, what a rare mood I’m in; why it’s almost like I have been recovering from a chest cold. That’s right, earlier in the week I had some kind of weird chest thing which made me hack and cough so much that one of my co-workers told me my voice sounded “sexy like Vin Diesel.” I of course ruined that by immediately saying “I am Groot,” which none of my other co-workers understood, but at least I was pleased by it. Here’s what else I was pleased by this week.
* * * * *
Comics: In my desire to read everything on my buckling shelves, I dug into my volume of The Thing: Project Pegasus, which collects Marvel Two-in-One #42-43 and #53-58. This is exactly the kind of Bronze Age Marvel offering that makes me smile; in each issue The Thing is paired with at least one other costumed hero (or villain) such as Quasar, Thundra, Deathlok, Giant-Man, and Man-Thing. Aside from that team-up goodness, this volume has one other big thing going for it: art from John Byrne (inked by Joe Sinnott) and George Perez (inked by Gene Day). It’s fun to see early art from these giants of superhero comics, especially Perez, whose tendency to draw everything at its exaggerated height makes even a four-page sequence involving a Project Pegasus security team meeting vibrate with energy. As a story pure and simple, it’s pretty forgettable, but as a study in comics art and comics art history it’s a great read.
Music: It’s hard for me to be objective about Belle and Sebastian; though I wouldn’t say I’m obsessive about the band, I have basically every one of their albums and for months, was looking forward to the recently released Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance. Belle and Sebastian is a band with a reputation for being precious and twee, and though they generally write pleasant-sounding songs, they’re not really a band that makes music I want to dance to. Until now, that is. Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance cuts a broad swath, including some Euro-pop and disco-inspired numbers such as “The Party Line” and “Enter Sylvia Plath” that made me groove while driving in my car. The band sounds cleaner and more expansive too, right from the intro track “Nobody’s Empire,” with Stuart Murdoch’s vocals clear as a bell and each instrumental layer sitting right in the sweet spot without overwhelming anything else. And the seven-and-a-half-minute “Play For Today” — with guest vocals by the very talented Dee Dee Penny — is a toe-tapping synth-filled number that still contains lyrics like “Love is a fraud that’s misunderstood; work is a sentence, family’s a drag, this house is a trap.” Yep. It’s still Belle and Sebastian under there, all right.
Television: After nearly three episodes of The Nightly Show, I am happy to say that Larry Wilmore has a dedicated viewer in yours truly. Understandably, his late-night talk show is a little rough around the edges. The opening segments where Wilmore skewers the news and current events in his monologue feels a little on-edge, but I think that’s just Wilmore’s nerves occasionally getting the better of him in this first week, and I feel he’ll settle into the position after a little while longer behind the desk. The panel segment is where the show really gets to shine, with Wilmore letting four guests opine and joke about the topic of the day. And the final segment, “Keep It 100,” where Wilmore asks each panelist an extremely difficult question and then challenges them to be real and truthful, is very compelling. Asking Talib Kweli, for instance, if hip-hop music is part of the problem or part of the solution, and then watching the man struggle to find an answer, was eye-opening. I won’t compare The Nightly Show to its predecessor; it’s too early for that. But I will say that it’s a show worth watching and I’m excited to see what it becomes.
* * * * *
That’s all for me this week, friends; I’m going to drink some tea and finish that episode of The Nightly Show. Until next time, click here and dance to Belle and Sebastian’s “The Party Line.” It’s good, I promise. I’ll see you in seven days.
