by Michael Frawley
managing editor
Lestat stirs again in Anne
Rice's enveloping tale,
Merrick, the newest book in
Rice’s continuing “Vampire
Chronicles.” After finishing her
very successful Vampire series, Rice
put out three other vampire books,
separate from the originals.
Armand, Pandora, and Vittorio,
however, were not as well written
or as well received as the original
series. But Rice has redeemed
herself with this newest dive into her
dark realm of blood and passion in
an exceptional crossover of her two
most popular series, the “Vampire
Chronicles” and the “Tales of the
Mayfair Witches.”
Rice is best known for these two
award winning series. Both ended
with room to continue each
respectively, but Rice ingeniously
decided to join the two in a
masterpiece of a crossover. Witch
versus vampire, who will win?
This book features the exploits of
one of Rice’s newest vampires,
David Talbort, who has become a
main character in newer vampire
books. As those of you who are
familiar with the vampire series will
Blame Canada
Eminem ’s presence on the
“Anger Management”
tour upsets Ontario
by Clifford White
staff writer
Rap superstar Marshall Mathers QI.
Tetter known as Eminem, was almost
Tanned from performing in Ontario
it Canada’s Sky Dome Thursday, No
vember 2. As one of the performers
jn the “Anger Management” tour
with Limp Bizkit and Papa Roach, he
was almost blocked by the Ontario At
torney General Jim Flaherty.
The controversy started after a Ca-
ladian woman downloaded the
apper’s lyrics from the Internet, then
lied a complaint with the hate crimes
.nit of the Toronto Police. The
voman, Valerie Smith, claims that
iminem’s derogatoty words on “Kill
fou,” promote violence against
vomen and also violate Canada’s hate
irime law under the “public ineite
nent of hatred” code.
“His lyrics seem to be a little bit
jver the line,” said Smith. “One ex-
ample is ‘I invented violence you vile,
venomous, vomital b* 1, *' , ‘’* f .’ If you
■eplace the gender insult with racial
nsults, you get hate propaganda.”
Flaherty asked that federal immi
gration officials keep Eminem from
»osi
ising into Canada. “The federal
•ovemment is looking into the status
jf [Eminem] entering Canada with the
possibility that [he] would come here
■tnd advocate violence against
Movies
Little Nicky
Men of Honor
Red Planet
Billy Elliot
11/10
Arts & Entert
know, David was made a vampire
by Rice’s old main character and the
brat price of the vampire world,
Lestat. David meets with an old
friend from his mortal life, Merrick,
the title character of the book.
Merrick is a member of a little
known bloodline of the great
Mayfair witches clan, and the book
deals with the vast history between
David and Merrick. The story
climaxes when Merrick maneuvers
David’s vampiric friend Louis (the
vampire who was interviewed in
Interview With the Vampire) into
giving her the “Dark Gift,” bringing
her into their vampire coven.
The book ends, as most of her
books do, with room for another
book to follow. Lestat wakes from
his stupor brought about by his trip
to Heaven and Hell in Memnoch the
Devil to lead his small coven back
into new adventures with a new
enemy, the Talamsca, an
organization which watches and
studies paranormal phemonena.
While it may seem that you would
have needed to read her earlier
books to make sense of her newest
offering, this is not the case. While
reading these earlier books would
greatly enhance the understanding
of the novel, Rice gives just enough
women,” Flaherty said.
Since Ontario’s hate crime legisla
tion excludes women, it was likely
that Eminem would not be kept from
entering the country, however. Be
sides, says Derik Hodgson of
Canada’s immigration office, “If all
people who made bad music were
kept out of Canada, we could’ve
stopped Disco.”
Despite the controversy, Eminem
has performed twice in Toronto in the
past two years. Of this performance,
the rapper and his entourage said, “the
show will go on.”
And it did. In true Shady form,
Eminem appeared on stage donning
a goalie mask and chainsaw. While
most comments on the situation were
held until the end of his set, he did
dedicate a song to Smith.
Fellow performer and Vice Presi
dent of Interscope Records (Em’s la
bel) Fred Durst, said that Limp Bizkit
has also been banned in some Ameri
can cities. “It’s always gonna be like
that,” said Durst. “I don’t really know
what to say, except I’ve seen
Eminem’s show and I listen to his
records, and so has my daughter and
so has my mother and you know
what? They giggle mid laugh at it,”
he said. “They don’t really take it to
heart. Some people do, Everybody’s
different, I guess.”
Video *
Annie Get Your Gun
Fantasia 2000
Perfect Storm
Pokemon 2000:
The Movie
background in
Merrick to
make it easy to
understand
All in all,
this book is a
great trip back
into the dark
and seductive
haven of Anne
Rice’s
vampiric
underworld
Her characte
are so we
developed thi
you feel the
pain and shai
in their jo
Her world is
viv i d 1
portrayed th
it makes o
wonder
vampire
really do wal
among u
Who know
you could
next.
Author Anne Rice
DMB delayed
New album scrapped
by Deanna Symoski
a&e editor
It might not be such a merry Christ
mas for those of you expecting the
new Dave Matthews Band album in
your stocking. The band had nearly
completed the album with a staple of
DMB production, Steve Lilly white, in
Charlottesville, VA., but at the last
minute decided to scrap the 13
Lillywhite cuts.
Originally, the new songs were sup
posed to be released before the band’s
summer tour, where much of the ma
terial was showcased. However, pro
duction bumps delayed the album
Napster settles
BMG funds new version for part ownership
by Clifford White
staff writer
Napster and Bertelsmann music
company , have called a truce. The
two companies will create a new
regulated version of Napster.
Bertelsmann, which also owns BMG,
will loan Napster the money to de
velop the new and improved program
and will become part owner. They
will also establish a royalty payment
system under the new system and
make BMG’s catalog available for
trade. Bertelsmann has also agreed
to drop all charges in their copyright
infringement lawsuit against Napster.
Thomas Middelhoff,
Music *
Dm Hill
The Offspring
Usher
Baby face
Beatles
Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
D-Cru
Marilyn Manson
Ricky Martin
Prodigy
Sade
%
ainmeni
until December. Now in Los Ange
les, DMB is working on an entirely
new album with pop producer Glen
Ballard.
“They wanted to go to the next level
as songwriters and musicians,’’ says
Bruce Flohr, RCA A&R executive.
“Plus, even the hardcore fans have
never heard these songs, and it’s hard
to keep anything this band does a se
cret. Glen is giving the band a focus
and tightening every song.”
This new album is likely to include
the cuts “Angel,” “When the World
Ends,” and “I Did It," and is now
slated for a February release. A
Valentine’s Day present, perhaps?
Bertelsmann’s chairman and CEO
said, “Person-to-person file sharing
has captured the imagination of mil
lions of people worldwide with its
ease of use, global selection of con
tent, and community features.
Napster has pointed the way for a
new direction for music distribution,
and we believe it will form the basis
of important and exciting new busi
ness models for the future of the
music industry. We invite other
record and publishing companies,
artists and other industry members to
participate in the development of a
secure and membership-based ser-
DVD*
nnie Get Your Gun
Fantasia
Fantasia 2000
Perfect Storm
Pokemon 2000:
The Movie
Em
Fid(
by Deanna Symoski
Idiots
Revolt!
How
taking over America
I never liked Tom Green. Not only did I think he was mean-spirited,
he was a complete idiot and I couldn’t believe anyone would waste
their time watching this guy, even though lots of people did.
However 1 softened, eventually or crumbled —under the popularity of
Tom Green. I even began to watch entire segments from time to time.
Sometimes, I even laughed. Admittedly, the K-Mart loudspeaker show
was kind of funny, and 1 did enjoy the episode where he painted his
parents’ house plaid. Plaid. They were teenage pranks, and no one
really got hurt. Besides, I thought, this is just a phase. Stupidity this
severe will never catch on.
Hey, what do critics know?
From Jackass to “Jay Walking,” the new trend in television isn’t
violence or sex but outright stupidity. More and more, people are
reveling in their dumbness and television execs are falling all over
themselves to get it on tape.
What started out as a popular segment on The Tonight Show has
perhaps kickstarted the idiots’ revolution. Leno takes a camera crew to
the street and asks random people to identify world leaders or answer
basic history questions. It is obvious information, and people at home
are baffled that these “random people” don’t know the first president of
the United States was George Washington. To put people’s priorities in
perspective, he then asks them pop culture trivia, like who the president
of the WWF is—this they get.
It was funny for awhile, and I enjoyed those segments because I
couldn’t believe people were so dumb. But then I realized that those
people looked a lot like me. They were often college students, “hot and
trendy” like those of us here at Behrend, and they didn’t know jack!
Nice image for the rest of us. The show, however, latched on to the
success of the segments and ran with it, exploiting stupidity and turning
it into the ultimate joke.
Watch any of MTV’s programs these days, and the music channel
(term used loosely) would have mainstream America believing (ien.Xers
are all a bunch of hair-brained daredevils. The show Jackass . hugely
popular since its premiere this season, has taken stupidity to new
extremes. Not only are the stunts dangerous and often disgusting, in
some cases they are downright cruel.
1 can’t begin to imagine what thought process prompts someone to
cover themselves in human feces, and I don’t really care because I have
the option of turning the channel, which I do. The disturbing part is that
so many people find this entertaining.
Playing with “poo” is something my moronic friends would have
done in the early part of our high school years. It might have been
funny then, but eight years later, these sorts of stunts have lost their
appeal. What’s scary is that we have all suddenly become so proud of
our collective lack of brain power.
The state of things must be bad when I am forced to think that Tom
Green is mild. Did 1 mention I don’t like Tom Green. I don’t, but
compared to the base, brainless things I have seen idiots carry out on
television, Tom Green doesn't seem so bad. Plaid, at least that’s
creative.
I like to laugh as much as anyone else, but it’s important to realize
what we are laughing at. The media may well be turning our generation
into a joke, and we, apparently too stupid to notice, are ignorantly
agreeing by buying into the punchline. I’m not saying we all have to
watch Frasier , but Ed might be a welcome change for those of you who
don’t still play with crap.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2000
*dumb ’