A Dulcimer Genius

I no longer keep it a secret that I casually attempt to play the hammered dulcimer, an old folk instrument of questionable origin. Looking like a harp laid on its side, the dulcimer is played with two wooden hammers which are padded differently depending on desired sound. It creates the most amazing sounds, and its an instrument with incredible resonance.

While it's fairly easy for beginners to pick up, it takes time and practice to play properly and with any speed. The hammered dulcimer has brilliant potential to be used as an original and innovative instrument - here I'm thinking Chris Thile's incredible command and use of the mandolin - but I've rarely encountered instrumentalists who seem to bring the dulcimer to a new level.

That is why Max ZT is my hero.

He plays with speed, precision, grace and originality... not a bad combination, and as a result his original compositions are amazing to both listen to and watch. "Juice" is one of the few dulcimer pieces that really digs deep into my soul and makes me want to create music that sounds even half as good; this video is his senior performance at Bard College.



There's a reason Max was the 2005 National Hammered Dulcimer Champion, and that's it.

I only say "Juice" is my favorite because I haven't had the chance to hear much more of his music. But that will change soon: he has The Duo Project: Two Roofs (with Luke Notary on percussion) releasing on April 29. I'm very excited to hear what fresh sounds it brings, because I'm sure it will be a treat to listen to. It's only $10 -- definitely a deal.

I'm such a sucker for unique instruments, and I feel like I've barely explored the world of the hammered dulcimer. I'm sure Max ZT isn't the only creative player out there, he's just the only one I've seen (thanks to the Internet for that).

Instruments are amazing. More people should experience them.

Metro Station

I have few guily pleasures, but the pop-rock band Metro Station definitely counts as one of them. Chock full of underage-sex-obsessed lyrics and catchy, danceable beats and melodies, the band plays the kind of music nobody should like but everyone does.

Okay, not everyone; Metro Station is very juvenile and oftentimes very cliche ("California" is a song written by every high school band in the history of time; ironically, they live there). But that doesn't take away from the fact that their songs are absolutely catchy and have more than the potential to be stuck in your head for hours. They have a usually well-produced sound, mixing guitarist Trace Cyrus's spoken vocals with the sweeter melodies of lead vocalist Mason Musso. Fun trivia: the two met on the set of Hannah Montana, that obnoxiously popular show in which their younger siblings both star.

Rounding out the band lineup are the equally skilled Blake Healy on keys and Anthony Improgo on drums. The band isn't amazing, but their debut self-titled album is a great choice for long road trips that need some danceable beats. So as long as you don't mind singing along to lyrics about wishing you were older so your sexual acts wouldn't be illegal, it's a fair addition to your iTunes collection.

Five Things - Office Edition

Five things you need to have in your office:

1. Abusive stamps. Because life isn't complete until you can stamp envelopes with "This is F**CKING URGENT" in bright red ink.

2. Metal business cards. Nothing is more badass than a card with all of your vital info engraved in stainless steel. Though it may be a pain to carry them around.

3. Strange tape dispensers. With bold primary colors that a four year old would cherish, this how-it-works-esque tape dispenser will add color to any desk.

4. Baby ladybug staplers. These sort of have beaver teeth, but that adds to the odd charm. Your grandma would love a pair of these.

5. An affirmation ball. Similar to the magic 8 ball, this will provide much-needed positivity to boost your self-esteem after shitty meetings or depressing coversations with your boss. Yes, your breath is minty! And don't you forget it.

Note: funofficesupplies.com is not a good source of fun office supplies, just for the record.

Camp Jump & Yell

Harry and the Potters, Math the Band and Uncle Monsterface are three nerd-rock bands from Massachusetts and New York. This summer, they'll be hosting the Unlimited Enthusiasm Expo 08, something they've billed as "the DIY traveling summer camp circus."

Tour details haven't been announced yet, but the group will be stopping in Washington, D.C. on Monday, June 30.

The Bands
Based on what I've seen of the bands, it should be a good time for dorks who enjoy live music and dancing like idiots.

Harry and the Potters dress up like the famous boy wizard and perform as though Harry has traveled through time to form a band with himself. They rock out on guitars and keyboard (with the occasional saxaphone addition) and throw out a ton of nerd references to both the HP books and the real world.

Math the Band has amazing energy on stage and their music is exceptionally fun to dance to -- my favorite song from them is called the Water Cycle, with the ace lyrics: "Evaporation, condensation, precipitation, that's the water cycle / evaporation, condensation, precipitation and motorcycles!"

I'm less familiar with Uncle Monsterface, but they seem pretty interesting -- they're sock puppet rock. Way cool.

The Website
It's easy to tell from the number of exlamation points in their news post that the UE folks are really, really excited for this tour. I mean, they're filled with UNLIMITED ENTHUSIASM! And so are the fans of the bands, many of whom who have converged on the Camp Jump and Yell For Boys and Girls Forum.

The bands formed the Unlimited Enthusiasm website in February 2008 with a secretive intro of bizarre drawings and quotes. After a series of puzzles and clues, the site grew to become the Camp Jump and Yell hub it is now, without much purpose but a whole lot of enthusiasm.

The site has also recently added a Wiki, which offers a history of the clue-based website (used to drum up excitement building up to these tour date announcements and, presumably, future announcements for UE), a who's-who of the site, and some other weird stuff.

The Bottom Line
If you're into anti-corporate nerd-rock, live summer shows, lots of dancing and more geek references than you can shake a wand at, the Unlimited Enthusiasm Expo 08 is definitely an event to add to your calendar.

An indie rock summer day camp might be the perfect addition to your lonely corporate summer -- honestly, who could resist a chance to put on your glasses, take off your shoes and shout the quadratic formula to the high heavens while dancing to some sweet beats alongside a hundred strangers? Sounds like a good time to me.

Thoughts on Juno

The DVD for Juno (that teen-has-a-baby smash hit starring Ellen Page) released on April 15, and the promotional efforts were enough to remind me that I'd been meaning to see it. Conveniently enough, the film is currently showing at the University Mall Theatre in Fairfax (though why it's still out, I can't be certain). So I decided to watch the movie last night - way to be the last one on the bandwagon, right? - and I must say, I was pretty disappointed. It's not that Juno was bad -- it's just that the media hype had me expecting so much more.

The dialogue was fast and realistically unique, which was one of the biggest praises of the film from critics and casual fans alike. But I missed the outstanding wit that was supposedly there... Cody Diablo's script coaxed a few out-loud laughs from me, but as a whole it wasn't a particularly witty movie. In fact, I was more sad than amused -- where it didn't get laughs, the film earned a few tears. I think it works as an interesting look at people, but not as the fast-paced teenage-pregnancy charmer everyone seems to be claiming it is.



One of the other great praises for the film was the soundtrack, which featured a lot of Kimya Dawson. The music was passable; at times it felt cute and indie-appropriate, but occasionally I wanted a little more pitch and polish (for shame!). The soundtrack is probably a better buy than the DVD, though.

All in all, I think the praise for the movie ruined it for me. It's amazing how sometimes media attention can lessen the greatness of a work in some cases, and absolutely benefit it in others (and here I'm thinking of the slow-burning popularity of Across the Universe and Once, both of which I adore).

I guess I'll have to head to the Cinema Arts theatre for some off-the-beaten-path movies in the future. But then, isn't how this whole mess got started anyway?

The mainstream critics really know how to ruin a good thing.

Farewell, Skins

I don't watch much television these days, because I don't have the time and I get grossed out very easily. When I'm home I catch up on The Daily Show, Best Week Ever, and whatever season of Survivor is on. While I'm at school, though, the only show I've bothered to keep up with is the British drama Skins.

Skins is, at the core, The O.C. gone British, younger, and more amazing. It features a cast of very unique individuals and the characters they portray are beautifully realistic. What's even better is that, over the course of the two series [seasons], those characters develop like real people!



Unfortunately, Skins had its series finale two nights ago, and those characters won't be coming back. For series three, the creators of the show have decided to start over with almost a completely new cast. What a disappointment! My love for Skins was a love for the characters and the story. With a new cast - focused on Tony's younger sister Effy, who was mostly used as a rarely-speaking plot device - I'm just worried that the magic is going to be gone.

It's funny, because if the people behind the show had decided to end Skins and create a new show following a similar set of characters and their lives (basically, what they're doing for series three), I would have had no problem with it. But by calling it Skins, I feel like I'm being lied to. How often will they change casts, and therefore change stories? I don't like the unpredictability factor.

So I won't be watching series three of Skins, but I do highly recommend hunting down series one and two and enjoying the original story. It feels fresh and enthralling, and it's a nice escape from reality. The DVDs don't offer special features you can't already find online, which is a shame, but the show itself is definitely worth owning if your DVD player is the proper region.

The Best Damn Thing

Avril Lavigne has a new video for her latest single, the title track from her most recent album "The Best Damn Thing." Full of pink glitter, faux cheerleader-punk attitudes and glitzy twelve-year-old glam stylings, it's a real keeper of a video.



I'm actually - dare I say it - disappointed with the video? I feel like it's missing some of the fun that the the over-the-top song features (I mean, seriously: "I hate it when a guy doesn't understand / Why a certain time a month, I don't wanna hold his hand!").

When the album first dropped, the assistant style editor for Broadside (GMU's school newspaper) and I wrote a fabulously scathing review full of brilliant turns of phrase -- I only wish their website would properly archive content so I could link to it here. Ah well. Suffice it to say that I was not a fan, but it's definitely grown on me. The ridiculous factor totally won me over.

Anyway, the video could be better. My fingers are crossed for getting to see her on tour; while I ridiculed her latest musical efforts for a while, I understand now that it's all just meant as fun music. That works for me -- I know every word.

Supply and Demand: I Hate You

In January, it was announced that the Broadway play RENT was going to close on June 1, 2008. At the end of March, that final run was extended until September 7, 2008.

That should be a good thing; I mean, the musical is amazing and I'm glad so many people will have the chance to experience it. But my best friend and I purposefully bought tickets for May 27, which we thought would be in the final week of the play.

It's not that I regret buying the tickets, but we spent a lot of money with the expectation that we would be seeing one of the last performances of the show on Broadway. I guarantee that we would have bought the tickets for three months later had we known -- the problem is that they only extended the run due to huge sellout rates for the supposed 'final' shows. While this makes many people happy, it's like giving the middle finger to all of those ticket buyers.

The next blow was when it was announced that Adam Pascal and Anthony Rapp will be reprising their original roles in the national touring production of RENT in January 2009. I would definitely rather have put my dollars towards seeing that.

It's unfortunate, really, because the problem feels inescapable. If I hadn't bought the tickets, and neither had anyone else, the run wouldn't have been extended and I would never have gotten to see RENT. But by buying the tickets and ensuring the extended run, I've stuck myself in a situation I'd rather not be in. And in the end, I'd rather travel less and see original cast members on tour.

Lesson learned: you will always be screwed by the mythical forces of supply and demand.

Take That, April Fool

Last week was home to one of my least favorite holidays: April Fool's Day. People seem to have decided that jokes about being in car accidents qualify as pranks, and the holiday has lost its elementary school appeal.

To me, it's basically just a chance for everyone to lie, and nothing makes me more mad than when businesses invent fake products in honor of the 'holiday.' ThinkGeek, one of my favorite companies, had a brilliant product included in their e-mail newsletter: the Personal Soundtrack T-Shirt. Imagine a shirt that could, with the press of a button, add background music as the soundtrack to your life! It sounded believable to me, seeing as they have shirts that display available Wi-Fi and that move in time to ambient sound.

After sending them an e-mail praising the shirt, I went off to Tennessee for a few days and thought little of it. When I went back to examine it more carefully, I discovered it was never real -- April Fool's Day had struck again.

But this story has a happy ending for all the prank-holiday haters like myself: the t-shirt received such an "overwhemling popular demand," according to the website, that they're working on turning it into a real product. Here's the blurb from their site:

"Looks like we're the fools here. The Personal Soundtrack T-Shirt was originally an April Fool's Prank... but due to overwhelming positive response and hundreds of e-mails screaming to "make the damn shirt already" we're putting this item in to production ASAP. Keep in mind our army of robotic factory monkeys are a bit slow, and it might take them some time to make the real version of this nifty product. Also although we'll try to keep the Personal Soundtrack T-Shirt as close as possible to what you see here, the final version might deviate slightly in appearance, features or price. Capiche?"

You may have fooled me, ThinkGeek, but I'll have the last laugh. Power to the [geek] people!

We Are Wizards

So, this weekend I took a trip with Delma from the Northern Virginia Harry Potter Meetup Group [DADA] and her children to see the East Coast premiere of 'We Are Wizards' at the New York Underground Film Festival.

As a quick note: this is the final year for the festival, which has taken place for a decade and a half. Be sure to keep an eye on Migrating Forms, the next step for two of the NYUFF directors (Nellie Killian and Kevin McGarry).

'We Are Wizards' was nicely shot, though it didn't have a very cohesive storyline. It began telling the story of several Harry Potter bands - full disclaimer, I am a wizard rocker and friends with the Horntail family - and they were entertaining and served as a good introduction to wizard rock for the uninitiated. The story then gets a bit lost, delving slightly into fan culture and then focusing on the Warner Brothers controveries. While I loved the archival footage illustrating 'the man,' I wanted a bit more resolution on how the battles were settled; it felt like quite a lot of buildup for not a lot of answers.

Seeing the film was a great experience, though, because I fall along the line of the film's subject matter and so did a great deal of the audience. For those of us who were familiar with the story, it was an amazing chance to watch our history documented and see hidden glimpses of the stories behind the people we know and love. It was almost like watching Rocky Horror at times - audience members calling the Christian woman a witch when she motioned towards her 'crystal ball' and singing along with various wizard rock lryics. The moments focused on Brad Neely (creator of an audio commentary track for the first HP film titled 'Wizard People, Dear Readers') brought some of the biggest laughs of our showing, with his high-pitched warble retelling the story of Harry P.



All in all, it was a great weekend - though I was too young for the after party, for shame - and I thoroughly enjoyed the film.

Bonus: We stayed at the Hotel Le Bleu, which is a nice hotel stuck with little consideration to location in Brooklyn. It had a very sleek, modern design and classy color scheme, but failed to differentiate between bedrooms and bathrooms. Open showers and frosted glass doors make it much more appropriate for those with close relationships than for near strangers.