We May Be Gods, Or Just Big Marionettes...
Dec. 3rd, 2006 01:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miko2...but the sun never sweats!
My ex roommate Tom called me up yesterday and invited me up to his place to watch Hawaii play Oregon State. The game was on ESPN at 9 pm. Tom's not really much of a sports fan, but since he worked for the University of Hawaii for two years he likes to root for them, and he was in Hawaii last week with his parents and they'd watched Hawaii beat Purdue, and suddenly he wanted to watch them on their only nationwide television appearance this season (they do have a bowl game coming up in Hawaii later versus Arizona State).
So anyway, I got to see his place. He's unemployed at the moment, but otherwise he's doing okay. One of the things he asked me is if I'd watched The Return of Spinal Tap yet. I hadn't. This was one of several dvds that he'd given me the week before Midwest Furfest... what with the con, and Thanksgiving, and everything, I'd forgotten I even had it.
So I watched it last night after I got home. It's basically two hours of concert footage, all taken from the band's last ever concert appearance (which, strangely enough, was on my birthday), interspersed with some short interviews and bits. There are some jokes and such during certain songs (they have problems with the Stonehenge monument again during that song... this time, the monument is too big to fit in the front door). But mostly it's a concert video, not a movie. Much to my disappointment, they don't do "The Sun Never Sweats" from Break Like The Wind, but they do a nice mix of songs from their earlier cd (the soundtrack from the movie) and Break Like The Wind.
For those who don't know the Spinal Tap story... there was a movie, This Is Spinal Tap, in 1982 about a fictional metal band, starring Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, and Harry Shearer. However the movie nailed heavy metal so well, and they created such a complete back history for the band that they became a part of the history and lore of heavy metal itself. "Turn it up to eleven" is a standard phrase that everyone in rock understands. "None More Black" is the name of punk band, taken from David St. Hubbins's description of the black cover of Spinal Tap's albumn "Smell The Glove" in the movie. ("How much more black could it be? The answer is none... none more black.") At least one, if not more, eighties heavy metal compilations includes a song from Spinal Tap. "Nigel Tufnel" appears in the actual rockumentary Joe Satriani: The Satch Tapes. More recently (2006), he appeared in a television commercial for Volkswagon. The band has appeared in an episode of the Simpsons, and their song "Tonight I'm Going To Rock You Tonight" is featured in the video game Guitar Hero II (if you finish the song correctly, the drummer explodes). Some people didn't realize that the band in the movie wasn't real, and likely some still don't realize it.
To make things more complicated, all three actors wrote and performed the songs themselves, blurring the distinction between "is it a real band, or is it fake?" a bit further. Then in the early 90's they went a step further... they released a new cd, "Break Like The Wind", and mounted an actual tour. At this point, while it's still Guest, McKean, and Shearer playing the roles of the members of Spinal Tap... it is, at the same time, an actual rock band on tour.
They did a lot of interviews and tv apearances during the tour. I got to see a couple of them, and they were, as always, hilarious.
Anyway, the footage from "The Return of Spinal Tap" comes from the last show of that tour. Fun stuff, although not likely to hold the attention of anyone who isn't already a big fan of the fictional band.
Today I did a bit of research online. There are some nice fan sites about the band out there, the best of which is probably spinaltapfan.com. There's also a very complete wikipedia article on the band, which contains absolutely the most complete and up-to-date discography of the band, both fictional releases and actual releases. From here I learned that I don't actually own everything available from the band after all. I have the movie soundtrack, and I have Break Like The Wind, and I have "Back From The Dead" which was an internet-only song release from around 2000 I think (a good song btw). But it turns out there are various bootlegs of Spinal Tap out there, most of them going by the name of "None More Black" and containing three cd's worth of music not found on the two commercially released discs. "Back From The Dead" is one of those tracks, of course, but there's also stuff taken from various television apperances and live recordings from various spots on the tour, including (I believe) most of what's to be seen on "The Return of Spinal Tap".
Anyway... I guess I'd have to descend into the murky world of bootleg cd trading if I wanted to get my hands on these "None More Black" bootleg cds... so I'll probably never own them, but at least it's on my list of goals I'd like to accomplish one day. I was able to download a few things from some internet sites that I didn't already have, including several songs and soundclips and a lot of pictures and wallpapers. I designed my own lj icon of bassist Derek Smalls, as you can see. ^_^ And I've made a folder of all of the extra Spinal Tap material I have called "None More Black".
Just to complicate things even further, the same three actors also perform as The Folksmen, a fictional folk group with its own back history who appear in the movie "A Mighty Wind". The Folksmen would open up for Spinal Tap on their tour, and thus they have a small cameo at the begining of "The Return of Spinal Tap" in which they're backstage practicing their song "Blood On The Coal" (which you can find on the "A Mighty Wind" sountrack, which is also a lot of fun). And actually, some of the tracks on the three-disc bootleg "None More Black" are songs by the Folksmen.
I like my new icon. ^_^
My ex roommate Tom called me up yesterday and invited me up to his place to watch Hawaii play Oregon State. The game was on ESPN at 9 pm. Tom's not really much of a sports fan, but since he worked for the University of Hawaii for two years he likes to root for them, and he was in Hawaii last week with his parents and they'd watched Hawaii beat Purdue, and suddenly he wanted to watch them on their only nationwide television appearance this season (they do have a bowl game coming up in Hawaii later versus Arizona State).
So anyway, I got to see his place. He's unemployed at the moment, but otherwise he's doing okay. One of the things he asked me is if I'd watched The Return of Spinal Tap yet. I hadn't. This was one of several dvds that he'd given me the week before Midwest Furfest... what with the con, and Thanksgiving, and everything, I'd forgotten I even had it.
So I watched it last night after I got home. It's basically two hours of concert footage, all taken from the band's last ever concert appearance (which, strangely enough, was on my birthday), interspersed with some short interviews and bits. There are some jokes and such during certain songs (they have problems with the Stonehenge monument again during that song... this time, the monument is too big to fit in the front door). But mostly it's a concert video, not a movie. Much to my disappointment, they don't do "The Sun Never Sweats" from Break Like The Wind, but they do a nice mix of songs from their earlier cd (the soundtrack from the movie) and Break Like The Wind.
For those who don't know the Spinal Tap story... there was a movie, This Is Spinal Tap, in 1982 about a fictional metal band, starring Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, and Harry Shearer. However the movie nailed heavy metal so well, and they created such a complete back history for the band that they became a part of the history and lore of heavy metal itself. "Turn it up to eleven" is a standard phrase that everyone in rock understands. "None More Black" is the name of punk band, taken from David St. Hubbins's description of the black cover of Spinal Tap's albumn "Smell The Glove" in the movie. ("How much more black could it be? The answer is none... none more black.") At least one, if not more, eighties heavy metal compilations includes a song from Spinal Tap. "Nigel Tufnel" appears in the actual rockumentary Joe Satriani: The Satch Tapes. More recently (2006), he appeared in a television commercial for Volkswagon. The band has appeared in an episode of the Simpsons, and their song "Tonight I'm Going To Rock You Tonight" is featured in the video game Guitar Hero II (if you finish the song correctly, the drummer explodes). Some people didn't realize that the band in the movie wasn't real, and likely some still don't realize it.
To make things more complicated, all three actors wrote and performed the songs themselves, blurring the distinction between "is it a real band, or is it fake?" a bit further. Then in the early 90's they went a step further... they released a new cd, "Break Like The Wind", and mounted an actual tour. At this point, while it's still Guest, McKean, and Shearer playing the roles of the members of Spinal Tap... it is, at the same time, an actual rock band on tour.
They did a lot of interviews and tv apearances during the tour. I got to see a couple of them, and they were, as always, hilarious.
Anyway, the footage from "The Return of Spinal Tap" comes from the last show of that tour. Fun stuff, although not likely to hold the attention of anyone who isn't already a big fan of the fictional band.
Today I did a bit of research online. There are some nice fan sites about the band out there, the best of which is probably spinaltapfan.com. There's also a very complete wikipedia article on the band, which contains absolutely the most complete and up-to-date discography of the band, both fictional releases and actual releases. From here I learned that I don't actually own everything available from the band after all. I have the movie soundtrack, and I have Break Like The Wind, and I have "Back From The Dead" which was an internet-only song release from around 2000 I think (a good song btw). But it turns out there are various bootlegs of Spinal Tap out there, most of them going by the name of "None More Black" and containing three cd's worth of music not found on the two commercially released discs. "Back From The Dead" is one of those tracks, of course, but there's also stuff taken from various television apperances and live recordings from various spots on the tour, including (I believe) most of what's to be seen on "The Return of Spinal Tap".
Anyway... I guess I'd have to descend into the murky world of bootleg cd trading if I wanted to get my hands on these "None More Black" bootleg cds... so I'll probably never own them, but at least it's on my list of goals I'd like to accomplish one day. I was able to download a few things from some internet sites that I didn't already have, including several songs and soundclips and a lot of pictures and wallpapers. I designed my own lj icon of bassist Derek Smalls, as you can see. ^_^ And I've made a folder of all of the extra Spinal Tap material I have called "None More Black".
Just to complicate things even further, the same three actors also perform as The Folksmen, a fictional folk group with its own back history who appear in the movie "A Mighty Wind". The Folksmen would open up for Spinal Tap on their tour, and thus they have a small cameo at the begining of "The Return of Spinal Tap" in which they're backstage practicing their song "Blood On The Coal" (which you can find on the "A Mighty Wind" sountrack, which is also a lot of fun). And actually, some of the tracks on the three-disc bootleg "None More Black" are songs by the Folksmen.
I like my new icon. ^_^
