8 I Friday, Nov. 13, 2009 ALBUM REVIEW ‘Attention Deficit’ Reviewed by Jim Warkulwiz COLLEGIAN STAFF WRITER Washington, D.C., rapper Wale has recently been taken under the wing of some of hip-hop’s greats, performing with the likes of Jay-Z, Kanye West and Talib Kweli. He has also released several acclaimed mixtapes with rhymes that feature more than run-of-the-mill lyrics about spending money and sleeping with women. The question is if Wale could impress on his first full-length album, “Attention Deficit.” ff. i m£i j Courtesy of amazon.com Throughout the album, Wale blends hip-hop styles with influences like the social conscious ness of “backpack” rap, similar to A TYibe Called Quest, and pop hip-hop, similar to Lupe Fiasco. Songs like “90210,” which talks about how some women feel the need to put up a facade to feel appreciated, and “Shades,” which talks about discrimination within the black community because of different hues of skin color, rank among some of the most socially conscious songs of the past decade. Lyrics with this much pur pose are seldom heard in rap today. The song “Chillin’,” featuring Lady Gaga, is what contributes to the pop side of Wale, a club jam that can be thrown on at any party. Although it had been released long before this album’s debut, it remains relevant as a catchy club song. However, things start to go sour when Wale becomes too involved in trying to please this party scene, giving off the sense that he was try ing to appeal to everyone. As sensitive and introspective as the rapper can get, there are times when his lyrics become absolutely repugnant. Simply put, the more emo tional Wade does not aim to be Lil Wayne. So why is he trying to imitate him? Songs like “Pretty Girls” and “Let It Loose” seem contradictory to Wale’s deeper side, chat ting up girls in the club and having them flirt with the promoter so they can go to the VIP section. Wale seems to be doing too many things at once that take away from the product as a whole. It’s when he keeps a balance in his songs, like“ Mama Told Me,” that the album is a hit. What the up-and-comer needs to do is find and perform for the audience he wants and stay away from pleasing everyone else. But aside from some noticeable novice mistakes, this debut album is a good listen. Grade: B- Download: “Mama Told Me” and “90210” To e-mail reporter: ]|wsl3o@psu.edu :qk REVIEW ‘Pilgrims: A Wobegon Romance’ Reviewed by Stefan Orzech COLLEGIAN STAFF WRITER The most striking facet of “Pilgrims: A Wobegon Romance,” the latest novel from Garrison Keillor, is that it somewhat unintention ally constitutes an attempt toward a modem adaptation of Chaucer’s “The Canterbury Tales.” Lake Wobegon, for readers unfamiliar with Keillor’s work, is a fiction al place in Minnesota that Keillor has used as a set ting in several of his books and on his radio show, “A Prairie Home Companion.” “Pilgrims” courtesy of amazon.com presents 12 Wobegonians, all of various professions, including a farmer, a carpenter and a barkeeper. They are interestingly enough not even pres ent in the United States but en route to Italy, where the usual wit and charm so typical of Keillor ensues The novel also contains Gary Keillor, a charac ter in many ways identical to the author himself, much as how Chaucer can be viewed as a charac ter in “The Canterbury Tales" as well. Finally, as implied by the title, these 12 charac ters are likewise embarking on a type of pilgrim age. Yet, it distorts too many similarities with Geoffrey Chaucer's text to construct for itself a parallel identity, and the components that make this novel unique will interest modem readers to a greater extent. Like Chaucer, Keillor begins the book with a prologue of sorts, yet the latter is much shorter and does not delineate every character but sim ply the main few. Maijorie Krebsbach, an English teacher among the 12, provides more access to the story, along with the character Keillor him self. In addition, rather than the sequential struc ture with which Chaucer organized his work (i.e. where each character's tale is proceeded by a prologue), Keillor applies a more fluid approach. He weaves in and out of several characters’ heads within a few pages, rather than utilizing merely one perspective. Finally, Keillor as a character has much more direct interaction with the reader than Chaucer. Aside from the correlations and disparities that one might draw between the two texts, “Pilgrims" is foremost its own entity, and it stands relatively well upon bookshelves. It is admittedly a little weaker than its Wobegon pred ecessors, but Keillor’s writing retains its familiar ability to provide an, at times, humorous and enjoyable read that will leave his fans and other readers anything but woebegone. Grade: B + To e-mail reporter: spol3o@psu.edu Movie ‘st Reviewed by Kristen Karas COLLEGIAN STAFF WRITER George Clooney sits down in a mili tary uniform, eyes intensely focused, neck muscles bulging. Suddenly, the chewing goat he’s focused on topples over onto the floor. It’s difficult to decide whether to laugh out loud or to stare at the movie screen thinking, “What?” That’s exactly how you’ll feel for the entirety of “The Men Who Stare At Goats,” a wacky, at times hilarious, but mostly disjointed film that takes viewers on a wild and slapstick but confusing ride. The film, based on a nonfiction book of the same name, stars Ewan McGregor as Bob, a journalist who stumbles upon a story about a secret Army operation focused on creating a unit of “supersoldiers” with powers that include the ability to pass through waiteand step the heart of a goat just by staring at it When Bob meets Lyn Cassady(Clooney), a former member of the unit, the film takes viewers through two back-and-forth stories: Cassady’s vague secret mission in Iraq with Bob tagging along, and the Reviewed by Kevin Sullivan COLLEGIAN STAFF WRITER Over the course of the three min utes and 13 seconds of “Hate Everyone,” Max Bemis twists his own words around, evolving from world's greatest self-proclaimed misanthrope into a burgeoning humanist in a few breaths. This indecisiveness is a running theme in Say Anything's eponymous self-titled third album, a hodgepodge of styles and contradictory lyrics. Of course, this is what the pop-punk Roky Erickson and his band have always brought its audience. Much like the bipolar singer’s erratic behav ior, his music is constantly riding the wave of its catchy pop appeal and its own unpredictability. At any moment, it seems it could all fall apart into an incoherent mess or generic rubbish. “My hair cannot commit to one pop ular genre of music,” he sings on ■‘Crush'd,” an upbeat, synth-infused acoustic rock song. Bemis' musical work, like his always-changing coif fure, is fresh but still accessible and purely confined within pop constructs. The very same song has its let- downs. Lazy cliches abound. T have a flashback origin of how Cassady’s “New Earth Army” began. In small bits, the present-day por tion of the film is fun. Clooney is an absolute pro at this kind of character He has a knack for combining quirk with charm in a way that is both believable and incredibly watchable. His bickering with McGregor is also a hoot. The two actors share a won derful chemistry that is the driving force for most of the film. Watching Cassady nonchalantly torturing Bob or driving him crazy while trying to decide which direction to take at a forked road is a riot. The problem with their scenes, however, is that they lack a concrete story. You won’t remember much about why the two are traveling through toe desert beyond their witty interactions with each other, and you’ll quickly tire of watching their car mal function more than once. But you will remember the flash backs, the oddball scenes that need more flesh. The backstory is intrigu ing, but if it is based on a true story in part, then why not give viewers more of the real thing? While it’s hard to believe that most of the psychic Anything n’t say m can’t let it go,” rings the chorus, making its way to the equally languid conclusion, “Did it hurt when you fell from heaven, girl?” This is not an isolated incident, and it becomes a problem because of how much the band relies on Bemis’ wittily disaffected banter. His musical narra tives often introduce characters for a single line and to no effect at all the horny bus driver in “Ahhh ... Men,” for example. The man has sexual frustration. Get it? Though the lyrics are occasionally spot on, they constantly revolve around Bemis’ former sexual exploits and self-loathing desire for death. It’s unfortunate, because he hints at hav ing a deeper understanding of love that he seems too insecure and self conscious to share with listeners. Musically, there are things to cap ture audiences of earbud wearers. Unfortunately, Say Anything is front heavy. giving up all its treasures during total crush on you, baby/ and I The Daily Collegian portions happened, it isn’t entirely implausible that a unit like this might have existed. Instead of giving view ers a taste of the strange truth, the flashbacks are at times so outlandish .(particularly a scene where the sol diers are instructed to freely dance instead of keeping formation) that they borderline on ridiculous. Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey have roles as integral members of the unit’s beginning, but their characters are underused and one-note. Bridges, in particular, could have used more development as the hippy officer who created the operation. Ultimately, the film's main plot gets so separated from the flashbacks that by the time Clooney and McGregor meet up with Bridges and Spacey in the present, it’s difficult to remember what exactly is going on. “The Men Who Stare At Goats” is a film in every way as strange as its title. It’s a mess a well-acted and sometimes laugh-out-loud mess—but too unfocused overall to let you leave without scratching your head. Grade: C+ To e-mail reporter: kgksoos@psu.edu the first half of 'he record before falling back on itraight-ahead jp rock elements >r the final side. “Fed to Death'’ he album with a , from a simple hard rock, taking .ynth-pop crossover before ending on an equally concise piano-only outro. But Bemis gets self-conscious halfway through the tune, stopping the song in full swing to give himself a spoken word pick-me-up. For all of the singer’s intentionally ironic lyrics, this prideful self-criticism perhaps acci dentally beats them all. “Wait a second." he mutters. "I can't write the same damn song over and over again." From here, he destroys the com pletely unique musical idea the band was building in favor for guitar and keyboard rock n' roll. The rest of the album plays out the same way. showing a band that has run out of ideas halfwav in. “Say Anything” is more focused than 2007's jumbled Tn Defense of the Genre,” but it's almost too much so. The group seems to be circling back and forth between high ambition and generic lows, almost taking the lyrics “Do Better" to heart: "We could do better, we could be the greatest band in the world." Grade: C + Download: Less Cute' To e-mail reporter: kjssoB9@psu.edu
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers