THE DAILY COLLEGIAN ALBUM REVIEWS `Bands for America ' In the wake of the Sept. 11 tragedy, many have wondered how they can help out. Many people ' sent donations, gave blood and saluted the heroic 'efforts of fire fighters, police officers and govern ment officials. .Countless star musicians came together for benefit concerts, but what could -...imusicians who are lesser known do to help the cause? With the release of the album Bands Ftor America, those less er-known musicians figured out what they could do: bring out an , album with songs on their reflections of the horrible tragedy , Bands For Ameri • •ca features many artists who have come to Crowbar, 420 E. College Ave., this semester, including Of A Revolution (OAR), Vir ginia Coalition and Strangefollt OAR. put the song "Hold On True" from its . album Risen onto this compilation. Even though ::the song wasn't specifically written for the disas -ter, the lyrics help the listener bring into perspec tive the American spirit of resilience—arid. _redemption. When OAR lead singer Marc Roberge sings, "We could have been so much better than before, - if we held on true," the listener can't help but relate the lyrics to mistakes Americans made leading up to the catastrophic events. Jack Johnson, who has worked with Ben Harp • er, has a song on the album called "Mud Foot ball," which also appears on Johnson's album, Brushfire Fttirytale.s. The song has Harper's bouncy style and lyrics that talk of a good old American, past time, playing some football with friends on a rainy Sunday. It doesn't get more American than that. The popular jam band String Cheese Incident offers up the track "Outside and Inside," from its album, Outside Inside. The song grooves with a bluesy guitar lick and mid-song jam that should be easy to listen to for fans of hippie music. The most touching song on the album is the acoustic and harmonica driven "On 9.11.01," by Garrett Dutton of G. Love & Special Sauce. He sounds genuinely overcome with all the emotions that come out of an action that is hard to com prehend. Anger, sadness and nervousness melt into one emotion as his voice travels throughout the simplistic song. "Flags flown at half-mast to remember the lives gone" these lyrics tell the pain. of all Amerksuis, including the obvious MOW, "I will ntit frorget this day." AU prott*biltetti' the CD litirgofitg tekraid The September 11th Flind. This fund was estab lished by The United Way of New York City and the New York Community Trust in order to focus on both short-term and long-term needs of those affected by the acts of terrorism. Additional infor mation on the fund is available at www.septem berlifund.ort MOVIE REVIEW `Ocean's Eleven' Fbrget every other heist movie that came out this year this one's got the goods. With a cast of astonishingly talented actors under the aston ishingly talented Steven Soderbergh's direction, the movie is everything you'd hope it would be: fun and fast-paced, slick and spontaneous, light and full of laughs. George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon and Julia Roberts are clearly hav ing a ball bouncing off each other, never taking themselves too seriously despite their Hollywood heavyweight status. In a remake of the 1960 Rat Pack movie, Clooney stars as the leader of a crew of criminals in an elaborate Las Vegas casino robbery, who tries to steal back his ex-wife in the process. The movie, which lasts 114 minutes, is rated PG-13 for some language and sexual content Wowed by Clebty Lenin, Associated Press GAME REVIEW `NBA Live 2002' Electronic Arts' latest sports game, NBA Live 2002, may not meet the standards set by Madden 2002, but it's a great game nonetheless. Bugs and nuisances abound. The rebounding is seriously screwed up, overtime games some times end before the extra period is played and the franchise mode lacks some of the capabilities of the season mode and vice versa. But Live 2002 has so much going for it that the problems are easy to overlook Michael Jordan's on the game as a Wizard, gameplay is smooth and the graphics are fantastic. Ftuthermore, rosters are extremely accurate, load times are faster than on other EA games, and overall playability is top-notch. The game doesn't get old. Despite the NBA's grueling 82-game season, the franchise mode stays fun through computer-proposed trades and a.plethora of stats that users can track Wowed by Justin Strand Reviewed by Caleb Shaeffer Return of the giants For better or worse, music's big names are back Reviewed by Dante De!Vecchio and Camille Lamb COLLEGIAN STAFF WRITERS dmd243@psu.edu, csll4l@psu.edu 2001 the year Stanley Kubrick predicted com puters with the minds of humans would be found on the moon. So maybe HAL isn't a reality, but some resurrected artifacts were found after a long, restful hiatus. The rock world was able to shake hands again with some of its biggest movers and shakers young and old. Nerd-rockers Weezer finally crawled out from their hiding place to give high schoolers in waiting a taste of intelligent punk rock. What people didn't expect was that Weezer would be the biggest disappointment since ... Weezer (and yes, that was the second self-titled CD the band released). The new Weezer checked in at just less than 30 minutes and provided little more than modern rock-pop songs with simple hooks and not much substance beyond that and that's after five years. Five years? Yes, five years and all Weezer could do was make a mediocre album. Yet another surprising band that gave up the fight to make "good" music was Athens' own RE.M., with its May release, Reveal. The album was laden with electronic texturing and lush instrumentation, and listeners could get lost in the jungle of sound. The band lost the simplicity that made songs like "Everybody Hurts" so pow erfuL Bjeork's Vespertine was, hi contrast, a refreshing new spin on the sound that has made the spacey artist a favorite among college students, soothing our overextended brains with its enchanting, intri cate and exotic melodies. This album gave a more personal insight into the cryptic star's persona, following up 2000's Selmasongs, the soundtrack to her highly acclaimed musical Dancer In The Dark. Artists trying to make up for lost time are the art-rock svengalis Radiohead. After finally releAs ing Kid A in October 2000 after a three-year synapse, the band further treated fans with Amnesiac in May 2001, an album featuring songs from the Kid A sessions that didn't make the cut. The B-side compilation may not have had the cohesion of its predecessor, but songs like the jazz-tinged "Life in a Glasshouse" and the off-beat piano lull "Pyramid Song" prove Radiohead's genius even more convincingly. The world of hip-hop also saw the return of some of its powerhouses ready to shake up music and even a few booties in the process. DMX came from almost obscurity with The Great Depres sion. Fueled by the now heard-round-the-world anthem of self-identity, "Who We Be," the album shows a more laid-back and introspective rapper. Unfortunately, it's just not as exciting and basical ly just dull. DMX was much better off barking in songs at least then he got people's attention. P Diddy (or the artist formerly dating J. Lo) also dropped a new album, P Diddy & the Bad Boy Family, this year. It is clear that he's still hav ing issues with people remembering the names change, hence his latest single, "Diddy." Well, peo ple may now know how to spell his name, but they also now know that he still can't rap very well. One mogul who actually didn't disappoint was Missy Elliot with her lastest release, Miss E ... So Addictive. Featuring her partner in rhyme, Tim baland, Elliot one again shakes up the world of hip-hop with crazy beats and incredible lyrics. Songs like "Get Ur Freak On" and "Whatcha Gon' Do" challenge the traditional rap sound and cre ate an atmosphere of sound perfect for nodding a head and throwing some hands in the air wav ing them like you just don't care is optional. And then there's pop music. The king of pop has come forth to take back the throne from the boy-band regime. Despite all odds, people are apparently willing to open their hearts again to the prince of plastic as his aptly titled Invincible continues to rock the album charts. Britney Spears' Britney ... need we say more? The pop prima donna has once again pumped out a collection of formulaic sure-fire hits, barely pausing a breath after the overwhelming success of her sophomore Oops! ... I Did It Again. Marc Anthony's recently released Libre, the vocalist's first studio salqß recording in four years, commanded stellar reviews and promises to bring a new flair to a genre in need of a revival. Enter ing the charts this week at No. 57, the "reflective" Alumnus's novel a pleasurable read with a twist Reviewed by Reid Coploff COLLEGIAN STAFF WRITER I trcl47@psu.edu I'm normally wary of authors who want to send me their books for review It just normally seems that the books would be uninteresting and wouldn't appeal to a college audi ence. Something about the e-mail I received from Gary Greenberg, author of Dead Man's Tale (Cosmic Café Press), struck me differently. "I majored in journalism, rugby and beer at PSU and graduated in 1976," he informed me. I read on and the book actually sounded intriguing. So I went ahead and had him send me a copy. It turned out to be the right deci sion. Dead Man's Tale is a wonderfully fun story with a plot full of so many twists that it's probably impossible to provide any sort of concise synopsis. Our lovable protagonist is Dan Tally, a former A Aiwileid R.EM., left, released a substandard album in May. Weezer, right, also released a disappointing album sounds of this latest effort are expected to cause a have to ride it tonight," an excerpt from the stir in the weeks to come. album's title track She tackles sex and eroticism On the Latin theme, Enrique Iglesias delivered with a sense of humor and a lot more class than Escape, a powerful pop-dance album littered with competitors like Lil' Kun. Euro-disco beats and strong vocals. His "Hero" There's more ... Paul McCartney's Driving retains a ranking of four on the singles charts Rain, Jewel's This Way, Sting's ...AU This Time, while the album continues to hang in the top 10. new this very week ... heck, even Bell Biv DeVoe is Janet Jackson's resurfacing with All Fbr You coming back with a new album this month. This has kept a strong hold on the charts since its semester has been filled with all sorts of blasts release. After a four-year lull following The Velvet from both the near and distant past, reminding us Rope, Janet has bounced back with an ever-sexy of where we've been and perhaps making us image and daring, lust-laced lyrics, for example question where the hell these performers have "Got a nice package, alright/ guess I'm gonna been. college football star at Temple who once ran back two punts for touchdowns against Penn State, tying a NCAA record (Don't worry PSU won 56- 17.) He is currently a reporter working in Miami. After an odd phone call Tally is made into a tar get of a hit man and he has no idea why. There's Prescott Sterling, the mad scientist who has created a machine that can read minds and just might have found the door to the afterlife. There's Moses Jennings, the aspiring religious leader with enough skeletons for a dozen closets. And there are many more. returned to the limelight to tackle sex with style in 'All For You,' her first album in-four-yeah Greenberg then takes the reader on the run with Tally as he tries to stay alive and find out just why people are trying to kill him. Along the way we are introduced to more interesting characters than I can name here. There's Valia Thomas, the young woman who communicates with the dead and works as a drawbridge oper ator. With all of these characters running through the pages, it's not hard to understand why Dead Man's Rile is such a fun book to read. Greenberg does an excellent job of creating characters that readers are interested in and this of course keeps the pages turning. By the end of the novel this reader found himself wanting to fol low the characters (at least the ones that survive) further to see where life takes them. In a time when far too many books are filled with boring, two-dimensional characters this is a quite refreshing change of pace. The only thing that really needs to be said is that this is a fun read. It does contain important topics, suCh as its lengthy discussion on the afterlife, but the topics are never too weighty to drag the book down.. Dead Man's Bole is currently available Only through Greenberg's Web site at www. counkcafe. cam. For anyone looking for a quick and enjoyable read for the upcoming break perhaps they should try a bit of a different path than going to Barnes & Noble and browsing the new bestsellers. Some times taking that chance pays off. THURSDAY, Dec. 6, 2001 120
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers