Music You've Probably Never Heard -- Ofra Haza

Hey y'all. It's time for some more music you've probably never heard. Y'know, when I pick music for this page, I generally choose artists who aren't mainstream to the normal audience. Therefore artists with their own popularity outside of the mainstream are still available for posting here. And that's why I'm picking Ofra Haza, someone who really deserved a lot more popularity that she got, and she did get a decent amount.

Ofra Haza was a Yemenite Jew, and she was discovered at the age of eight for her singing talent. Her voice has been described as nearly perfect. She sang mostly traditional Jewish songs, as well as eighties synthpop. During the nineties she drifted a little more into pop, but at the end of the day she was always better (in my opinion at least) at bringing out the wild sounds of the Middle East. Throughout the course of her career she released several albums, starred in a few films, and was offered to do concerts with Michael Jackson (which she turned down). She also provided vocals for the movie The Prince of Egypt, where she played the mother of Moses.

That's right, she sang River Lullaby: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GbI2Tlt55w

That's the thing. People know about this song, but they don't actually realize that she's got plenty of other stuff that's well worth listening to. There's plenty of things on iTunes for her. Her most popular song is by far Im Nin Alu, a traditional song that was rearranged for her and to really connect with mainstream worldpop sensibility. I personally prefer the original version, which is a more relaxed song that's fun to sing with your friends. The first line of the song declares "if all the doors on earth are locked, the doors of Heaven are always open". It's a beautiful Jewish song that's really touching.

Im Nin Alu (original): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2xNTzlFSk0
Im Nin Alu (Ofra version): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5px-ppcQDps

Ofra didn't start out popular. She starred in one film where she was the girlfriend of a very boring man, so the character burst out in song about how she is enamored of fashion, makeup and celebrities -- she's a frecha. Frecha is an arabic word that we don't quite have an equivalent to, but it basically means a shallow person only interested in the flashy things of life and having a good time. In certain communities this can be connotated into meaning "slut" or "loose", which is why the english title of this song is "the bimbo's song". It's kind of misleading, because that's not what the song is about and not something a girl like Ofra would stand for, but in any case the song itself is very fun. Though the movie has faded into pretty much obscurity, this song has remained Ofra's classic piece, one she is known for the most. I wish I had the outfit she wears in it.

Shir Ha'Frecha: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqAr-tfjwJY
Lyrics: http://www.hebrewsongs.com/song-shirhafrecha.htm

One of my favorite albums is Fantasy, a very weird eighties album that iTunes doesn't have (darn you iTunes!). It includes tracks like Yad Anuga, Fighter, a version of Galbi (Heart), and the title song Fantasy, which has the trippiest music video you've likely ever seen. I'm also going to include a later version of Galbi, because I like it better. Trippy eighties for the win!

Yad Anuga: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROoBR_WPxbg
Fighter: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5DO6N5UKwk
Galbi: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UnSh9N-qQY
Galbi (Sehoog Mix): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zgr0syGkR9I
Fantasy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOpBWPBz5GE

Here are some other great songs by her. One of my favorite ones is where she's literally singing out of the Bible, in Song of Solomon. It has no background music, making it one of her most remixed songs. It's just called Love Song. I wish I could put up the best remix, but it's no longer on youtube. I haven't really been able to find a very good mix of it, though one of the iTunes mixes is half-decent, if rather mellow. There's also Mm'mma, one of the songs I first found when I started searching for her work. This really shows off the extremes of her voice. A great mix was done of her song Taw Shee, and if you really want to party to something of hers, that's a great example. I also like Ma Omrot Einaich, a quieter, poetic piece. Check 'em out.

Love Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnYV0WFpiCg
Mm'mma: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFrxiCnXQnY
Taw Shee: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1nFFP3yODg
Ma Omrot Einaich: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoqR7_wDyr4

Oh hey, while I'm at it, check out Ya Ba Ye, a ridiculously awesome song about becoming famous and leaving home. Oh yeah, and here's this thing where she's hanging out with another Israeli singer, Aaron Amram. It's pretty awesome.

Ya Ba Ye: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jg1FCTyOck
????: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3epMfijuxJ0

Her last album to come out was a self-titled album that came out in 1997 and drifted into more mainstream pop. I'll go into detail for this album, because I actually have the cd. This too they don't have on iTunes. Sheesh, what is it with iTunes and not having the albums I want? The first track is Show Me, a song referring to Jewish traditions. It's pretty good. A bit fluffy for me, but still a fun piece.

Show Me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjDWbwQLyZI

Track two is Amore, a melodramatic piece that's still wonky enough to really be interesting. It's a romantic song, and if you're a lovey dovey sort of person (I'm not really) then you'll like it.

Amore: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UShLFn6ldAs

Track 3 is the worst remix of Im Nin Alu ever. First of all, it's only a little more than her classic remix, secondly, what it does add doesn't enhance the song at all. Just for the sake of completion I'll post a link, but don't bother with it if you don't feel like. I'll throw in another remix for you, one that I don't know the artist's name. For that remix, just ignore all the disturbia crap and listen to the song. That's my favorite non-Ofra mix of the song, and I can only hope that someone else gets the sense to make a good music video of it. There's forty bajillion mixes of this song on youtube, but as is the case with overremixed tunes, most of them are meh at best.

Im Nin Alu 2000: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0TKXyUbxPw
Im Nin Alu (ignore the video mix): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie68bJ-T-JU

Okay, so now we get to a good song. Sixth Sense is a song about hearing from God, and how much of a mystery it is. This song saddens me because I've heard from God some, and it kind of implies that it's impossible. That annoys me. But that's a personal problem, so go ahead and listen to it anyway.

Sixth Sense: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFK9W4iK5KE

My Ethiopian Boy is pretty good, but it annoys me with its pop-sensibility. It's just way too pretentious. As a demi-undergrounder, every time a celebrity sings or talks about foreign countries, I get dubious. I just don't trust famous most people to talk sensibly and realistically about different cultures. I mean, if you have a hard time going to the more country parts of the USA, then I don't trust you to take a logical stance about all people different from you. There's good and bad about all peoples, and glorifying more obscure peoples simply for the exploitation of it in your music just makes me sick. Okay, enough ranting. This song is....eh, decent, but it's way too pop. Ethiopian people are pretty pwn, though. Go google Saint Lalibela.

My Ethiopian Boy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iJILHGFa5o

Ah, now this is the real crown of the album! Track 6 is Ahava, the wonkiest and best song on the cd. I love it so much! It reminds me of eighties movies, where the lead characters are going through the weirdest crap ever. Think Labyrinth or The Never Ending Story (the first one, not the sequels). It's weirdness for weirdness' sake, and I can't get enough. This is a song to really listen to and enjoy how bizarre and pulsing this gets.

Ahava: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1Sjf779_XE

Next up is No Time to Hate, a song that I really should dislike more than I do. Honestly, it's silly celebrity lovey-dovey whatnot, and hate has its time and place. But once this song gets to the part "I hope you see as far as I see, I hope you see like I do", I just get all happy and silly. It makes me want to sing and twirl around like an innocent character in a weird movie who's trying to lighten up the lead character. If you're silly and/or pretentious, you'll like this song. No need to be uptight about it.

No Time To Hate: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-853aKmUJVQ

I gotta be honest, I always skip this next song. It's You've Got a Friend, just a remake of somebody else's work. This is way to tame for the great vocal range that Ofra had. I don't like it when artists do covers, unless that cover is basically a remix. There's no need to sing a song exactly the way the normal artist does, unless it's karaoke night or you're a celebrity impersonator. Trivia time: the way to say karaoke bar in korean is "noh-reh-bahng". Not that you needed to know that, but yeah. Next!

You've Got a Friend: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVX5Dz7NV1c

When the customizable internet radio on Yahoo.com used to be free, I would listen to this song a lot. You is a really dramatic song, and now that I've matured as a person, it's too melodramatic for me. Heck, maybe you'll like it. It's mildly hard for an Ofra song, but...eh.

You: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ki_NH1G_ePY

Yay! Give Me a Sign is my second favorite song on this album, and it reminds me of my oldest nephew because he was born at the time I started listening more to Ofra. It's really a gem, and if you only listen to two songs of these, listen to Ahava or this one. This is more calm and warm than Ahava, and it's also more sad. Something about it is so darkly tragic, as if Ofra knew she was going to die soon and is saying goodbye. At the Hebrew bit at the end....man, it's so sad.

Give Me a Sign: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGwz4p_ACuE

I think there's another song on this album, but I don't really remember it because it was too pretentious for me even in my pretentious days when I bought the cd. So yeah, none of that now. I doubt I'd find a link to it on youtube anyway. Honestly, I think if Ofra had lasted into the modern age of music, I wouldn't listen to her stuff. She was going the way of mainstream, and I personally dig her more eighties work. The pretentiousness was growing in her, just as it does with a lot of famous singers. People say you can't predict the future, but really there are some things that you should see coming. Like driving into a brick wall, for instance. People just tend to want what they want, and because they want it so bad they ignore all the warning signs and just go do that stupid thing, not regretting it until that stupid thing hits them in the face.
What are we talking about, again?

It was 2007 when I started searching for Ofra Haza's music. I was thinking about the movie Prince of Egypt, and I wanted to check out her singing again. That's how I noticed her other songs, and also how I found out she was dead. She died in April of 2000. There's some weirdness to her death, and you'll see it listed as the flu at some websites. It doesn't take a lot of investigation to find out more details. Apparently she had AIDS. Her husband that she married in 1997, Doron Ashkenazi, was not a good choice, to say the least. Ofra was not the sort of person to sleep around or do drugs, but Doron did them, and quite frankly I don't understand why Ofra married him. There's a lot there that isn't talked about and I can't say.

From what I have learned, apparently Doron didn't want her to get treatment because he was afraid of the stigma AIDS brought with it at the time. If only he knew that the stigma of being responsible for his wife's death would be so much worse. In interview with Ofra's sisters revealed that Doron was afraid to bring Ofra to the hospital even during her very last days, and that they were afraid of him. It's difficult to be mad at Doron, though, because after everything was over, it's quite obvious that he was deep in guilt. A year and a half later he was still very upset about it, and he died from heroin use. I'm almost willing to classify it as suicide.

Heck, this whole thing was a big case of people not turning away from the brick wall they were driving straight for. People, look at what you're doing now, and look at what the results of that will be. Don't just do something because you really want to do it. Think about how this will affect not only you, but other people. Your fate is not yours, but the fate of everyone you meet. You can either be light or darkness, a small bit of happy or slap in the face. Maybe you want to be mad at someone who wronged you, but what will that result in? Screaming at them won't gain you an apology. It will only result in bitterness and anger. Sleeping around will result in emotional turmoil, drugs will result in the loss of motivation and soul, and compromising principles results in a lack of backbone. You know when you're doing something stupid, so stop it.

The bridge of Shir Ha'Frecha says that the fate of every frecha is a good apartment and an ideal husband. If only that were true.

RIP, Ofra.

What is it with artists I like dying? I really need to stop liking people. I totally hate DJ Redlight. Yeah. He sucks.

Music You've Probably Never Heard -- Grab Bag

Hey y'all, it's time for more music you've probably never heard! This week I'll be doing a grab bag mix of different songs I listen to from various artists, but I don't listen to much of the artists themselves. There's lots of reasons for this, depending on each artist, but these songs are still well worth listening to. Mostly I tend to be listening to harder things (either that or foreign pop), but this should include other genres I listen to as well. But like all of my posts, this too is about expanding what you listen to and learning that there's a lot more out there than the boring trash they play on the radio.

Let's start with a song I can guarantee you likely haven't heard, because this is done by a rising artist in California. This is pop, and I guess I'll call it garage pop because the band isn't professional. He's called Pitch Michael, and the song I listen to of his is called "The Happy Song". I love this song because it's just completely silly, and you have to listen to it. Michael is the main singer, and his brother Levi is also in the video, along with their friend Jamal. The main reason I don't listen to more of their songs is because they don't have that much up there on youtube. I met Levi a couple of years ago, and he's a pretty cool guy, and he showed me the video. Really, this is just too cute to miss.

The Happy Song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-Ys0KhvWWM

The next artist I is also a youtube group, and they're called the Klein Four Group. I don't know much about them, only that I found them one day when I was looking for nerdy parodies of popular songs. Honestly, this occapella group is magnificently skilled, though I suspect that they no longer exist because not only do they have little up on youtube, but they also sing in a college, meaning at some point they're going to graduate. That doesn't mean that this song doesn't deserve a listen. Despite the "Four" in their name, there's actually five guys in this video, and they're singing a love song about complex math. Seriously, you practically need a degree to understand it. That however, does not stop the absolute adorableness of this song from showing through. It's nerdy, but very skillful.

Finite Simple Group of Order Two: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BipvGD-LCjU

Let's go back to a professional band, shall we? This next song is something from Gabba Front Berlin. It is in the speedcore subgenre, and speedcore is questionably not music. Seriously, it's known for being around 1000 beats per minute. It will give you a serious headache if you listen to it too long. That said, I have found one speedcore song that is actually good and poetic, artistic, even. This song is called Lacrima Mosa Est, also known as Speedcore Lacrima. You can find it by both names on Youtube. Honestly, this song is beautiful: hardcore and pulsing and yet soothingly smooth. I don't listen to other GFB songs, mostly because I don't care for songs that dwell on darkness, and heck, speedcore will make your brain blow up. Warning: this song is for the hardcore only. If you are not hardcore, do not click the link.

Lacrima Mosa Est: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmwkAEHFB60

The next song is from Doctor Who. Now, everyone has heard the Doctor Who theme at one point or another, even if they don't know where it's from. That's not the song I'm talking about. Those of you who are not nerds will not know this, but Doctor Who is going through its second reboot after several years of not being on the air. For this reboot, the British National Orchestra has gotten involved because this is a show Britain really cares about. It's classic for them. Normally I'm not huge into orchestras, but one song in particular written for the character Rose Tyler is gorgeous, and I just had to buy it off of iTunes. It really stands out as something gorgeous and dramatic. You just have to listen to this song. Don't worry about not being familiar with the show, just let whatever images come to mind what will as you listen to this song.

Doomsday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8DURP5xQCA

Let's get more into the electronic arts, as if I don't put up enough electronica as it is. This trance piece, however, deserves mention. Trance is not a popular genre, and the divided halves of trance hate each other, making it even harder to get into. This track by The Traveler and In Motion is absolutely perfect, despite the genre's history. It's meditative, passionate, determined, and absolutely wonderful. This song is called Believe, and the few lyrics it has are very meaningful. Give it a listen. The main reason I don't listen to more of this band is because very few bands in the electronic realm manage to aspire to popularity in any circuit, simply because there are so many of them. They tend to have one song that really pops, and the rest sink into whatever fanbase they have that already exists.

Believe: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LozT2iHIu7E

Like I said earlier, I love foreign pop. Korean pop in particular is a favorite of mine, and even if you don't understand a word of it you can't help but try and sing along in whatever broken korean you're familiar with (or think you're familiar with). SNSD is a band of nine girls, and one day as I was puttering around youtube I came across Gee. I looked up the lyrics, and this is a silly love song about melting for a man that doesn't know she exists. It's a really sweet, fun song that really digs itself into your brain without letting go. I don't listen to this band, mostly because it's generally too sugary for me, but this one song reminds me of my man, and how he makes me feel.

Gee: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7mPqycQ0tQ

Now, I'm an Irish person, and I love my ancestors. They are crazy people and I love them for it. Now, there are two types of Irish styles that are distinctly of the culture: one is to have a really depressing and/or violent song with an amazingly upbeat tune (their national anthem, for example), and the other is to write a very depressing tune about a personal tragedy. This song falls into the latter category, and it about an Irish battle against the British invaders. Britain and Ireland have had a very bad history, and for over 700 years Ireland has had to deal with some sort of oppression from their neighbors. I will get into this in a later post, but for now suffice to say that the two haven't always been best friends.

This particular song is beautiful and very poetic. Few songs can describe war in such a poetic and yet accurate way. It's lovely, a work by Sinead O'Connor and the Chieftains. I don't really listen to the Chieftans because they're just not what I'm into, and even though Sinead has a great voice, her weird and often contradictory life kinda throws me off. You can really tell that she's the person so desperate to be accepted that she's too willing to be malleable.

The Foggy Dew: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zF1KoIQVK5g

Now, Tricky Disco is a band I like very much. I do want to give them their own entry in this blog, but I really can't. Not a lot of their songs are available on youtube, or even iTunes. Plus, this band has changed their names time and time again, so as Tricky Disco they only have so much out. However, I do want to present to you two of their self-titled songs (pretentious, no?) which I like very much. The original is very plunky and wonky, and the music video is even more trippy. It's fun stuff, and it doesn't take itself seriously. The second mix is my absolute favorite, and I just love how story-esque it is. It's fun and beautiful, and very contented.

Tricky Disco: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKTEXhc6IyY

Tricky Disco (Plone Mix): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rT_SwIpK4pc

Okay, one more song. This one is by Trip Lee, a rapper. Normally I'm not into rap, but this track really got to me. Like I said in my last post, I am a Christian, so I do listen to Christian tracks. I really love this one, as it's a song about not being stuck on yourself, because life is not about yourself. In fact, it's about everyone besides yourself, God and people. A lot of people don't get the whole "to live is Christ and to die is gain" sort of thing. It's like this: if you're saved, you can just die and go to heaven, right? Good for you, but only you. The whole "to live is Christ" concept simply means you're being like Christ. You're giving up on your life and your happiness to give to others what they could never discover on their own.

This song is very well written, and I just love the background music. In a lot of raps the background music is so ridiculously boring that you couldn't possibly listen to the song without the words. That, I think, is a failure of the genre. Some artists are better than others about the background, but I think too much these days gets put out there without being artistic enough. And then there are those that just rip off some classical piece. Lame. Honestly, rap is in the electronica family, it can afford to be more original. There are some artists out there that understand this, but there are also a lot that don't. I dunno, popular music is going through a really bad period right now, and I feel that a lot of genres are being churned out while being only slightly more distinctive than pop. Country music is the biggest victim of this. Rap sort of evades this, but not entirely.

Gah, I need to post the link before I go all ranty.

To Live is Christ: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CRXnYwJoFg

Write Club - Writing Characters

Hey y'all!

Now, as I was writing my The Princess and the Frog review, I really wanted to write an exercise on what makes a good villain. However, that would be skipping a step: what makes a good character in the first place?

The first thing to remember is, even though we're dealing in the realm of fiction, the characters must be real. You can fake the setting, fake the science, and even fake natural abilities, but you cannot fake a soul -- a person's mind, will, and emotions. These are what a reader relates to, what ties an audience to your story. People hate fake characters who act unnaturally or make weird contradictory decisions. You must craft interesting, realistic people, so that no matter what weird nonsense your environment brings to them, your readers are on board.

So, first let's do the easy part. Character building! This is what makes your story work: characters. If you have boring or otherwise flawed ones, or just forget about them alltogether for the sake of your plot or your philosophical rantings, then that's bad. Fleshing out these characters and treating them as real people lend an extra dimension to your work that allows you to create a better work of fiction.

How do you create a character? There's really no concrete way of doing it. Mostly it falls under how you are inspired. Let's start off with looks.

So you're walking around one day, doing something (I personally find being at work surprisingly inspiring) and you get this image of a person in your head. This person is not a person that exists already, but is someone who intruigues you as a writer and inspires you to start typing away at the computer. What does this person look like? Skinny? Big? Dark-skinned? Light-skinned? That one shade of biracial that looks like so many ethnicities you can't guess which one it really is? Are there any distinguishing flaws that make this person unique? Long arms? Ugly nose?

There's a lot to consider in the looks department, and it's a good lead off into personality. Usually being inspired for looks only happens with your main characters, those you want to base your story on. Trouble is, you're not always going to have inspiration come so easily, and there's going to be times when you need to just quickly write up a character for your plot. That brings us to the second starting point: purpose.
For example, your lead female character has to go to a cafe and meet with a friend so that you can set her up to meet your lead male. So in this case the inspiring factor is the purpose of the character to your plot. You come up with these characters when you want to get something done. Like, you want your lead to be more guided, so you create a wise character. Or if you want people to sympathize with your main group, you create some redshirts.

In the case of the lead female going to the cafe, you have to arrange it so that she has the desire and/or obligation to meet with this character. Is this someone she works with or just knows? Is it a guy or a girl? Is this meeting for some important reason, just hanging out, or plain coincidence? Does the lead really want to meet with them? By determining how you want to answer these questions, you determine how this side character is fleshed out. It can be a coworker that they always gossip with, or maybe a creepy guy trying to sell them tupperware. Whatever best serves your purpose.

Purpose also exists for your lead character, but since the lead character's purpose is to carry out the story, side characters generally require more thought when it comes to the topic of purpose.

The next thing that can inspire you is environment. Say you're reading a book or watching TV, and you see there a place you really want to write about: maybe the desert, the rainforest, a specific city, etc. Or maybe you've imagined in your head a new fantasy or science fiction world that doesn't follow natural physics or politics. Either way, at some point you're going to have to ask yourself what kind of people live there and how exactly they live. Nobody in the desert grows cranberries, and nobody in Ireland uses chopsticks, so reality is the biggest checkpoint here, even in a fake world. Let's say your world has flying cars. In this world, nobody would string out their laundry to dry, and someone would invent rooftop or flying gas stations. These are just natural results of having flying cars, and you have to treat each environmental aspect keeping the environmental potential in mind.

So how do these affect characters? There's plenty of difference between someone from a city and someone from a farm, so you must realize the natural results of city living or country living, or Bangkok living or Ireland living. Someone from the city would be more accustomed to regular shopping, for example. Someone in a city of flying cars would be more impatient and want to get to a destination faster than someone who lives in 1883 and only travels in carriages. One of my managers at work grew up on a farm and became very accustomed to animals, and she even owned a pair of killer ferrets that actually killed a guy that broke into her house (I am so not making that up).

Mostly this comes into play when you're trying to create background characters, like when your lead is jumping into a new environment. However, don't underestimate the need for this in a main character. Too many people forget that the lead too is a person from a given environment, making him more able or less able to handle new things and new people. This kind of writing flaw easily results in a generic, boring lead that is pretty much a carbon copy of the author in question. In the realm of fanfiction, we call such a character a Mary-Sue.

Next is personality - how a character thinks, feels, believes, and reacts according to new situations. Now, while environment is a big factor in a person's personality, the spirit within a person is greater still. If you don't believe me, look at siblings. They grew up in the same environment, but are they the same? No. So is this person domineering? Reclusive? Optimistic? Self-pitying? An exercise freak? Really, this category is the most obvious, fluid, and easy to screw up of all the determining factors. It's obvious because everyone knows that your character is going to have to have a personality, it's fluid because personality can go in any direction, and it's easy to screw up for any number of reasons. I'll get more into that later. Being inspired by a certain personality is also something that happens for the more important characters.

And then there's overall tone. This is a harder starting point, as it refers to your book rather than the character itself. So, you're staring at your computer because you want to write a book that gives off a certain aura or tells certain themes. Think of the movie Chicago. The best way to describe the overall tone is sarcastic and tragic -- it's a story of the supposedly corrupted justice system told in extravagant broadway style. If you were the author settling down to write a story like this, you would have to take the premise and tone to create relevant characters. In Chicago's case, relevant characters are people like Roxy, the lead character who would do anything, even murder, to get famous. Since the tone of this movie is very dark and ironic, they obviously have to make it so that the bad guy, namely Roxy, wins her murder case even though she is guilty, while the innocent Polish girl is condemned to death. Therefore one must make Roxy to be a determined, selfish starlet, and the Polish girl must be innocent, kind, and Catholic.

Think about this for your story. Are you trying to write a happy book? Are you trying to create a book with a sense of bitter victory? A sense of horror? If so, you must pick characters that will accentuate the emotions you want to create in the fiction. For example, you can't put a jolly, singing baker into Chicago. That would just not work or have any relevance to the plot.

Going by tone is a very difficult way to start your story, particularly for newer authors. Unless you have the overall plot fleshed out very well, it's generally better to start with a character and let that character decide the tone, not the other way around. If you can do it and create a good fiction, that's good and well. Just start wherever inspiration comes and work from there.

Lastly, you have employment. While this is relevant for all characters, you'll probably think of it more when it comes to side characters who are more defined by their jobs. Let's say your main character comes to a bakery. If the baker in charge is relevant to the plot, then you have to think of how being a baker affects that person. Maybe they're more picky about the quality of grains that they eat, or maybe they always tells stories about making the perfect torte. You must consider not only how that job changes a person, but why that person would want to take that job in the first place.

Let's look a character who was badly executed: Martha Jones from Doctor Who. Notedly, I did not like this character, and it's very easy to tell that the character's true flaws didn't so much come from actress Freema Agryeman, but from the writers. Let me explain.

Okay, so we are introduced to this character in the episode Smith and Jones, in which the space police (space rhinos with lasers) teleport Martha's hospital to the moon. Martha is in fact a doctor in training at her hospital, and the Doctor immediately notices her because she is the most intelligent and steady-minded of the hospital's occupants. Martha makes a great first impression in this episode, but summarily becomes a shallow rip-off of previous companion Rose.

What's particularly relevant to the failures of the Martha character is the fact that Dr. Who's writers never considered how being a doctor affected Martha. Now, being a doctor is not something you can just randomly do. It takes a lot of things: patience to get through the extra school, an ability to cope with potentially terrifying wounds, a desire to help people, and possibly an urge to make good money. None of these factors ever seemed to apply to Martha, other than some patience. She's easily disgusted, inspired more by adventure or the doctor himself rather than helping others, and she has no particular concern for money. In fact, the last shot we see of her is running around with husband Mickey and huge guns fighting off Sontarans. A doctor with huge guns? While not mutually exclusive, these two characteristics are awkward paired together, especially with a chick lacking in unnecessary machismo. She had cool hair though.

After the first episode I was really expecting her to become a really smart medical doctor because she becomes exposed to alien life and alien scientific advances, but the writer(s) forget all about that plot. It's as if she had never been a doctor at all. Other writer problems resulted in Martha being the worst companion on the show I've seen (I haven't seen that many of them, to be fair). I might get more into that later, but the lesson here is to remember that personalities determine jobs and jobs affect people.

And speaking of "PEOPLE", here's a handy acronym for ya:
Personality - a character's mind, will, and emotions. Their soul, essentially.
Environment - the natural and technological surroundings that affect a character.
Overall tone - the feelings that you want your book to give off.
Purpose - what your character is supposed to do for the sake of the plot.
Looks - the appearance of the character and how it affects them.
Employment - what a character chooses to do and how it affects them.

You can be inspired by any of these things, but the point is you'll have to decide all of them, subconciously if nothing else, if you want to create a good character. The best way to do this is to remember that your character is a real person. Treat them as if they are more or less rational people capable of choosing their circumstances on their own.

There are a lot of common problems that go along with noob writers. Don't feel too bad if you do these things, because no one starts off perfect, but at the same time learn from whatever you can. Let's name some problems.
Dull characters.
These are the absolute worst. Notedly, this problem is an indirect problem, meaning that you as the writer start off with someone in your head who interests you very much. There's no reason in the world a reader can't do the same, except that you for whatever reason have trouble making this character look as interesting as you picture them. Here's some good ways to spice up your characters.

- don't overdescribe them. I absolutely hate it when an author is forever describing their character. It's like they're trying to convince you that their character is interesting. When you introduce them, describe their looks, but don't feel the need to redescribe them every chance you get. This applies to personality traits too. In one book I read, the author kept on describing how one chick, Val, was tough. He did it at every mention of her, without even bothering to refer to any of her other personality traits. That book was a dull pile of sludge, and tough chicks are very stereotypical in the first place.

- give them interesting dialogue. Let them talk like people. If you have to, react to a situation the way you normally would, then think about how the character does. Like if you would go "that's interesting" because someone is talking about boring stuff, what would your character do? If they're more open about their opinions, they might go "you're boring" or change the subject, or even walk away. Just let them do things that are natural. Don't feel like you have to make them sound extra intelligent or clever at the risk of being dull.

A very common error is the contradictory character. I hate them so much. Okay, so if your character is a real person, they are going to do things that you might not agree with. Commonly you'll want your character to do something, but you'll realize that your character would never do that. Like say, if your character is a bona fide cosmopolitan city girl, she'll likely have a huge problem with going to the poorer parts of China. The poorer parts of China, while awesome in my eyes, are annoying and frightening to a girl who would be scared even to go to Iowa.

Gah. I seriously hope that people from New York City aren't as narrow-minded and culturally stunted as Hollywood makes them look these days. Honestly, in the movie Have You Heard about the Hendersons? it makes the two leads look just about as ignorant and self-superior as a coddled teenager. The movie is about this NYC couple that goes out into a midwestern state because they witnessed a murder. They end up staying with the sherriff, and as they pick up the sherriff's wife after she buys a rifle, the yankee woman exclaims, "oh my God, it's Sarah Palin!"

One, Sarah Palin is by no means scary. Two, owning a rifle is not scary. Getting raped because you didn't have a rifle is. I really need to meet some NYC folk just so I can get that retarded stereotype out of my head. I've met upstate New Yorkers, and they're pretty cool. I friggin' hate Hollywood.

Okay, okay, there's a point to all of this. Basically I'm saying that steer very clear from Hollywood stereotypes. Hollywood thinks that all yankees are glitzy and self-righteous, all people outside of cities are hicks, and all Americans are ignorant unless they're rebelling against something, most likely the law (which in turn is always incompetent). Stereotypes limit your story and cause the audience to disconnect with your story. It's really best for your story to disregard all stereotypes, unless some of your characters happen to follow them. Don't make any of your characters generic. Let the readers see their hearts and motivations, then even if they seem close to a stereotype, your audience will never notice. No one in real life is a stereotype, so don't force fake ones into them either.

Oh, I almost missed the point I was trying to make in the first place. If your character needs to do something out of character, give them a legitimate reason. Don't just have them go, "I hate the country" and then pack up and move to Leadville, Colorado. Perhaps you can make it so a family member is dying, and they need to go, or perhaps the company they work for wants to scout out some land for a business. Maybe your character gets a new boyfriend who wants to drag her out of the city to go ride horses or somesuch. Or maybe your character goes through a deep experience that just plain changes her heart. Make it legitmate, y'all.

Another character I sometimes have a problem with is the lead character that doesn't have an arc. An arc is change - at the beginning of the story the character is one way, and at the end they are another because of all the changes they've gone through. This isn't always a problem, particularly for side characters, but it's pretty much a requirement for the characters you want your reader to get to know. There was this one fantasy book I tried to read, but it was so terrible that I couldn't finish. The male lead was a self-righteous, arrogant bastard, so much so that I couldn't get past the first chapter. I skipped to the end just for the heck of it, and he was still arrogant and self-centered. It really was a piece of trash. Oh, and that brings me to another point: don't make characters that your readers hate. Love to hate is one thing, but straight out hate is too much.

The most noobish thing a writer can do is make all of the characters the same. It happens so dang often...or maybe I just read too much fanfiction and not enough published work. It's very uncreative for each character to have the same kind of thinking that the others do. Two people who encounter the same pile of facts can very well come to two different conclusions. Similar, perhaps. Maybe both of them can be true conclusions, just different pieces of the truth. Or maybe they both come up with crap. The point is, people each operate under different sets of rules from others. You can't have everyone be smarmy, self-righteous spies. You can't have all of them ignoring authority. You can't have all of them accepting a given piece of news. You can't expect everyone to be as accepting as you to the same thing.

The two easiest similarities to fall into are speech and reaction. I hate it to death when everybody talks the same. For some reason when characters talk the same they sound extra smarmy, as if the writer is trying to make them sound all clever. Bah. That ain't gonna work on nobody. And make an extra effort to create characters who have different beliefs than you. Bad writers tend to make it so that only the bad guys disagree with their individual beliefs, and this is the first sign of noobish, propaganda writing.

One mistake is pretty forgivable, as long as you go back and edit. That's losing track of your characters in the plot. It's like, you want the plot to get forward, but you just get so impatient that you forget to properly develop your characters' reactions to what's going on. Sure, maybe you have an interesting plot thing, like a car chase on the edge of the grand canyon, but that's not why the audience gets excited. They get excited because they are in touch with the characters that are driving around and trying not to fall down America's most famous gulch. A car chase there is just a stunt if they don't care about the characters.

The last mistake I'm going to get into today is judgementalism. Oftentimes the writer has a group that they very much hate, and they're writing their book just to show why all the readers should hate that person/group/organization too. For example, a lot of people today hate those that are rich, never once suspecting that they are indeed being bigots. Maybe some rich guys are corrupt, but that's no reason to think that all of them are. The guy who runs Chick-fil-A, for example, is a nice guy who really wants to make a family-oriented restaurant. He sent me his autographed biography. Chick-fil-A recently helped with a local promotion for Stop Child Trafficking.org. They're always doing stuff like that.

A lot of the time people will write about how much Christians suck, though as one I am able to say that what they think Christianity is does not describe reality. They like to make mockery of the church for whatever reasons of their own, but they have no understanding of it, nor of good Christians or how much the faith has changed the world. The Western world owes much of itself to this belief system. Look, guys, if you have a question about Christianity, ask a real Christian. Ask me if you like. Don't just accept the opinions of people who are anti-Christian, or those that simply call themselves Christian but are really just super-religious kooks. Trust me, you know the difference between a real Christian and a kook.

Heck, you can even find good people in evil groups. There was this one Nazi in China trying to protect the Chinese civillians from Japanese occupiers, and he had no clue that Germany was then oppressing the Jews in an equally horrifying fashion. You can read about it in the book The Good Man of Nanking, but I don't recommend it. That book is so darn depressing. It's just the story of rape, murder, and theft without let up, and it will leave you feeling way unclean.

That's another thing I don't get. Apparently a lot of people these days don't like Jews. There's this guy, Alan Dershiwitz, who wrote The Case for Israel, and he was saying that there's a lot of Anti-Semitism going on in colleges and universities today. Look at the Palestinian-Israel conflict. Apparently all these "educated" people are saying that Israel is horrible, but it's really difficult to say this when they don't torture people, they don't freak out if someone says something dumb about Judaism, and they don't commit terrorism. The Palestinians, on the other hand, frequently attempt suicide bombings. They even rape women and then tell them that they only way to regain their family honor is to go be "martyrs".

They'll send people with aids and other diseases too, so that if a fragment of their bone gets a Jew, that person will be sick. They also stack the statistics of how many "civilians" die at Israeli hands by not allowing injured people to go to Israeli hospitals (who help anyone who comes in), and counting "martyrs" and victims of their own bomb mishaps as Israeli kills. Heck, an Arabic sheik actually made friends with Hitler, hoping to extend the "final solution" down to the Middle East if the Nazis won the war.

All of this is just to say that every person in the world is an individual. They decide whether or not they will be honorable or evil. Do not throw everyone in a pot and say they're all jerks. And even if they are evil, portray them with depth. Don't just take your own unresearched bigotry and make a public hate out of it. Not only does it damage your story and make it two dimensional, it also encourages people not to think about what they believe. Fiction is not merely the result of public notions, it's also the cause of it. Please be careful what you write, and do research before you call anybody out.

Music You've Probably Never Heard Before -- DJ Micro

Hey y'all. It's time for some music you've probably never heard of! This week I'll be talking about a dj whose music for some reason reminds me of Christmas. No, he doesn't do Christmas music (that I know of), but listening to one album in particular always brings up images for me of walking through the light rain with my mom's Christmas present heading home as fast as I could. A guy tried to give me a ride, but I didn't know him.

The artist I'm talking about is DJ Micro. I love his work, and my favorite album of his is My Frequency 001, the aforementioned "Christmas" album. It has several tracks on it that I like, in particular the first four. It starts off strong with Born to Synthesize, a very thematic piece that's intense but not overly hardcore. It's a perfect description of a dj. Listen to it and you will see: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDlCcfeGLr0

Track two is my favorite of the album, Sun is Coming Out [Intrance Remix]. This is a very motivating piece that is so much fun and energizes you with a bright cheer. I absolutely love it. I can't find the album mix, but here's the mix I could find: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJ0dC9qHgyM

Revolution [Alphazone Remix] is a pumping piece that might scare people off at first. It's hard, intense, but overall a great track. To me it brings back memories of having such a sore throat that I could barely talk around Thanksgiving. Yeah, that was a crazy year. Staying up late plus drinking lots of dark soda will murder your voice, just fyi. The song however, is very intense, and about two and a half minutes in the song really starts kicking in and going nuts. This track is totally party. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWHaHRzpf10

Track 4, Screaming Inside (Yatari Vocal Mix) I didn't actually record on my computer. I just felt like it was a bit too weird lyricwise. This song actually has lyrics, and those of you who aren't easily weirded out by the overly poetic techno lyrics will still like it -- I can be weird about that sort of thing. Still, its a very melodius tune and is very relaxing. That's very necessary after the energy of the first four tracks. And it must creep other people out too, 'cause it's not on youtube.

Next is Awakening, a still relaxing song that doesn't quite entrance as well as the previous track. It's nice, energetic, but it feels pretty standard. Don't you think so? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFNVa3nMOSE

Electro Buzz is back on track with a pulsing beat that really brings to mind adventures and Christmas and cold wind. Or maybe I'm just nuts. I just love the beat. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgsIpWtDVEM

Blind Visions [Arcadia Club Mix] isn't as good, but it's okay. It's still fitting in with the odd feeling of the album, it just doesn't stand out as well. It's still a lot of fun, though. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpk6PFKcMkg

Fury is a song I don't like. It's not interesting, sort of annoying, and goes on for seven and a half minutes. It just doesn't have the uniqueness or fun of the majority of the tracks on this cd. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6quRP-78N0

Broken [Pitch and Sulfer's "Back in Time" Remix] is like track 4 in the sense it has silly techno lyrics. In this case they didn't creep me out. It's a good track, but the title is a bit extensive for a track that's not the best ever. It's good and chill, but not great. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0e9HWpfEKQ

I've heard more than one remix of Intensify, so I wasn't really into this when I first heard it. I think I like this mix better, but I still find the song itself to be really corny. It's wonky, so it's a song that some people will really like and others will really dislike. See what you think: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZDtgEQSRBI

I'm Alone [Ronski Speed Mix] I was immediately drawn to, because Ronski songs are really meditative. The trouble is, this particular song is a little too mellow and drawn out for being at the end of this album. Listening to the whole album and then coming to this song leaves the listener with a sense of exhaustion. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJQvpiNs4vA

Now, I'd heard another version of Inside of Me, but this one is the Original Vocal Mix. This song was the reason I bought this cd in the first place, because I'd heard the more popular version of this song on internet radio. This version, however, was less pop, and it took me a bit to get used to the difference. First of all, it has verses. For this album it really does need more words, and it really brings together the real meaning behind the song. It's more adventurous and strong a mix than the bubblegum version I heard first, and it's not as pop-accessible. This is the case where I really learned to get deeper into electronic music and mature as a listener -- good bye pop songs! Unfortunately, I can't find this mix on youtube. Yeah. Not so pop-accessible.

So I like this album, but I have to be very honest. It starts off great, but towards the middle it gets bogged down and tiresome because there isn't as enough variety in the middle tracks. It really doesn't recover until the very last track, making this album one more for middle to hard electronic listeners. I'll continue to listen to this as I wrap Christmas presents, but it's not something I can recommend for everyone.

But heck, that ain't the only stuff that Dj Micro has done. Why don't I dig up some stuff for you on youtube for those of you less accustomed to harder or more electronic pieces?

Inside of Me (Radio Edit) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgMR-1oHymg
The World Around me - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIMiC1ieYaA
Stargazer - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E8x3tRJaig
I'll Fly with You (with Gigi D'Agostino) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d82iTBPbwD0
Breathe in You (Deep Amazing Vocals) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-vCEu2RyEI
DJ Micro (with Mark Aurel) The Sun Dominator Remix - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toXPpm601cs

Overall, DJ Micro is not for those who aren't into techno or hard trance. But hopefully it will expose you to new insights on how the hard trance world works.

The Princess and the Frog Review

Hey y'all! Time for another review.

So I finally got around to watching the new princess movie, The Princess and The Frog. I like this movie, but I'm a bit sad for it's sake that it wasn't able to come out fifteen years ago, around the time when Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid were the Disney princess movies of the day. Those two were the true epics of the Disney princess series, expertly telling stories we've already heard in fresh and fun ways. Modern times have hit Hollywood hard, and most movies today that haven't come out of Pixar suck. Good movies seem to be few and far between, so I was automatically dubious for this new movie. I call this the "let's make it an epic but forget we're telling a story" syndrome.

Remember, movies are epic because they tell a story, not because the person wants them to be an epic. In fact, the surest way to make your movie stink is to think it's the awesomest thing ever before you actually make it. Humility makes you work harder and you get a better result.

Fortunately, The Princess and The Frog seems to have escaped a lot of the suckitude that clings to modern movie making. It's a return to the good ol' days of 2D animation, a true artform that I desperately hope is not forgotten in the future. So the first thing I'll be talking about is the looks of this movie - simply put, they're great. Disney has lovingly designed several interesting characters and settings, my favorite of which being the forty bajillion dresses they made for Charlotte and Tiana. Some lady at the company was having the time of her life designing all of these things. Every moment in the movie was a pleasure to look at. Quite frankly I liked it better than that Avatar nonsense, mostly due to the fact that I didn't get a headache after watching TPATF. It was made with love, not arrogance. See? Look how much money they saved by not wasting ten years on HD nonsense.

So the story of this movie is that young Tiana is a marvelous cook living in the poorer side of New Orleans with her parents, and it's her dream to make a restaurant that anybody can come in and enjoy. Her father dies of unknown causes (to the viewer, anyway) and Tiana is left to work as hard as she can to finally buy a building and get her dreams started. The coming of Maldonian prince Naveen is pretty much a non-issue to her, though her friend Charlotte, the daughter of a rich New Orleans business man, is head over heels for the guy without even having met him. Through trickery and mistaken identity, both the prince and Tiana end up as frogs and have to find their way to humanity.

Now, for the first part of this review, I won't get into spoilers. Suffice to say that the story was pretty good, though the execution could have gone far better. There was a lot of creativity put into certain things, particularly the little details. There were things like Charlotte's quirky mannerisms as a spoiled girl, villain Shadow Man's equally evil shadow, the fun and completely hilarious Duke, the fact that a firefly was in love with a star, and many other things. However, this film in many cases misses the big picture, which is too create another classic princess story so that Tiana can join the ranks of Aurora, Belle, Mulan, and the rest (is Mulan really a princess?). While this movie was fun, it just wasn't the epics or at least good tales of the past. Hence the modern movie suckitude thing.

Most of my problems in this movie weren't the dialogue, which was fun and southern, just like I like, but three main things: misuse/underdevelopment of characters, non-sticking songs, and the overhammering of the movie's themes. Oh wait, and there was also huge pacing issues.

Let's start with the most spoiler-free of these: the music. Now, I didn't have a problem with the songs in or anything in this movie, and they were very good in their own right. Trouble is, I won't remember them. Think about it. Each of the princess movies have at least one good song that really kicks with the audience. My theory is that the people like these songs because they have little to nothing to do with the plot.

What makes a classic song is not relevance, but the expression of a spirit or natural urge that lives within your audience. Either that or the sheer catchiness of the song. Catchiness is the reason why Snow White's known song is the song of the dwarves, with their "heigh ho! Heigh ho! It's off to work we go!" People who have never seen the movie have hummed that song to themselves at times. Going to another of the old ones, Sleeping Beauty's song was one of the least remembered ones, but still a good one - "Once Upon a Dream". This song was slightly plot-relevant, but in the end it was simply a song about knowing the man you love because you've dreamed about him all your life. It's beautiful on its own, and you don't have to know the movie to understand it.

From Cinderella, you have that song that goes "a dream is a wish your heart makes when you're fast asleep" and "bibitty bobitty boo". Songs were not as necessary in Cinderella as the story itself, but these songs caught on, one for its silly dream commentary and the other for its magical silliness. Beauty and the Beast had a similar couple of very popular songs (though all the songs were good) in its title song and Gaston's gloriously arrogant tune. The Little Mermaid too had a pair, one dramatic and on silly, in "Part of Your World" and "Under the Sea", with the added bonus of "Poor, Unfortunate Souls". Pocahontas had her "paint with all the colors of the wind" song, the title of which I'm not certain. Mulan, in my opinion, had the catchiest soundtrack of all these movies, and every song is a gem without intefering with the plot. They even seemlessly help it move along. Second place goes to the movie Aladdin.

So the trick is, the best way to make catchy songs is to not tie them too closely to the story, but let them be their own things that really resonate with the viewer's feelings and struggles or else be so fun you can't help but sing them to yourself. If you have to see a movie to understand the song, that's bad. Unfortunately, TPATF songs are like that. They have too much to do with the plot without the catchiness of a silly Disney song. The closest thing to an independent song is Shadow Man's "Friends on the Other Side", which had the potential to be good, but again this song is forced by poor story planning to tell the backstory of both Naveen and his servant. I really do like "Almost There", especially the cartoon segment that goes with it. It's a fun song sung very well.

And so, let's go into the more spoilerific issues. Specifically, the poor story planning. Most of these problems centered around Naveen's servant Lawrence, who is given easily the dumbest role in this movie. His motivations are never expressly given other than in Shadow Man's song, where we are told rather than shown the sufferings of the servant. Keep in mind that since Naveen is out of money because his parents cut him off for being so spoiled, Lawrence is the only one still watching out for the young prince. Naveen obviously trusts this guy, and this guy has to care for Naveen in some way, because why would you follow a broke dude all the way to a new country otherwise? Is he under orders by Naveen's parents to watch out for him? We are given not so much as a line of this guy's backstory, or the relationship between him and Naveen.

Now, for much of this movie Lawrence is pretending to be Naveen. Why? The Shadow Man claims that the servant was being pushed around his entire life and offers him the chance to become free of his servitude -- by making him a Naveen fake? Wouldn't the servant rather do what he wants to do than pretend to be someone else? This could possibly be believable, but the movie at no point sets up a specific grudge against or jealousy for Naveen. This guy seems like a normal, fairly generic servant, not someone capable of taking over someone's life and doing evil things.

Also, I find it weird that the servant would trust Shadow Man. He was the one reluctant to listen to anything Shadow Man had to say, and Naveen was the trusting one. But as they both try to get what they want from Shadow Man, and Naveen ends up turned to a frog. Now, if the Shadow Man was willing to trick the prince, why wouldn't the servant think to believe that his own magical "gift" was likewise a trap? The servant has already seen Shadow Man's corruption, so why would he trust him, especially since Shadow Man treats him with contempt before he takes the deal?

Also, if Lawrence works so hard, why is he fat? You'd think he'd be skinny. And why does he want to marry Charlotte? She's pretty high maintenance, and he does not need a high maintenance girl.

So yeah, this one character brought a lot of flaws to the movie all by himself. But let's talk about the things I like before I get on another of my rants. Tiana herself is a really great character, and I love how frogs creep her out. I also love how she's kind of crazy about making her own restaurant especially when nobody else sees what she sees. She's a great addition to the princesses. Another great aspect is how cooking totally takes her out of her situation. When she's in the midst of trying to get Mama Odie to turn them back human, she takes a moment to taste and critique gumbo despite all her worries. She seems pretty phobic of disgusting things, which makes sense with her foodservice notions. Tiana's mom is pretty awesome, but I wish we could see more of her.

Another interesting character was the Shadow Man himself. Wait, his name is Dr. Facilier? Eh, I'll just call him Shadow Man. Anyway, this is a really fun character who has a great gimmick of a living shadow. He thin, gangly, and totally trippy. In a scene that's sure to scare the children, he introduces himself and his magic in a perfectly evil way.

The trouble there is that he's a perfect villain -- and they don't let him be it. Let me explain. The thing that makes a villain so absolutely delightful is the fact that he triggers the fight-or-flight response in us. Facilier could do this very well, and had the potential to be the great monster that Ursula from The Little Mermaid was. The trouble is, one of the reasons a villain is scary is because of control; you're afraid that they can kill someone or ruin your life or make someone you love suffer. The trouble with Facilier is that he's not in control. He not only has to keep violent spirits at bay, but he has to make sure the servant keeps Charlotte occupied without telling her the truth, find Naveen so he can keep the trinket that allows the servant to pose as him going, stop Tiana from ruining everything, and hope that he doesn't die in the process.

Shadow Man has so many plates to keep spinning and yet he's almost never directly hassling the protagonists. He almost kills Charlotte's dad, kills Ray, and tempts Tiana. Other than that he's just pulling strings and trying not to get pwned by these "friends" of his on the other side. I found myself wishing he would do more.

The saddest thing is that Dr. Facilier is wonderfully crafted. They put details on him like disturbingly ratty hair, blue eyes, and wonderfully gangly movement, but they never really allow him to be the crazy evil bastard that we all want him to be. He barely even knows that Tiana exists until the end of the movie. If they made Shadow Man meet her at the beginning and made it so he had to find froggy Naveen instead of those plot-cheat shadows doing it for him, then this movie would be improved significantly. I will point out that Shadow Man was at her job at Duke's at the beginning, so he's probably seen her around and doesn't regard her as much. Heck, him being all condescending to her dreams at that point would have made a really good moment in the beginning and would really establish a more specific hatred between the two characters.

That's the thing. I feel like a lot of the characters were misused in one way or another. Louie the alligator is almost never useful, and the writers are always thinking of convenient ways to keep him from being a benefit. Not only do they make it so that he can't find Mama Odie, but he gets too distracted by pine burrs to save anyone from the bayou bumpkins, and spends much of the rest of the movie playing in a band. He never is in the same scene with Dr. Facilier, nor does he even appear in the final confrontation. Ray is so busy stealing the scene that Louie doesn't get a chance to do anything of importance.

I never liked Ray. I mean, it was sort of creative that he would be in love with a star, but it's also creepy and sad. How sad is it that he's in love with something that's probably Jupiter and he could never possibly be with in his life? There were other characters, particularly froggy Tiana and Shadow Man, who needed the time spent on this character. They should have cut him out of the movie, or left him as just a colorful bayou character. And it was sick when he became a star next to Evangeline. That was gimmicky and a disrespect to the movie as a whole. Thing is, this is a princess movie. The movie spends too much time focused on other characters, and cutting the irrellevant Ray from the movie would give us more time to get to know the more important characters, like Tiana and Naveen.

Naveen in particular needed some attention. All we know about him is that he's lazy and likes music. How about a little more, like a secret hobby that somehow becomes important? Maybe he whittles or designs clothes or works on cars or something. He doesn't seem to have the depth of character that a lot of the princes have, and we don't get a chance to see what really makes him tick. He's pretty much a happy-go-lucky caricature. I'd have liked to see him angry or upset, just to provide his character more dimension.

I liked this movie, but one of the things that got on my nerves was the pacing. Now, as for the early part that shows young Tiana was paced well, but once she gets older, the movie continually gets more and more hyper. Tiana managing her way through traffic to work, shuffling dish after dish impossibly well, Charlotte coming in with her endless prattle, Prince Naveen coming in and doing his dancing and playing...it just gets more hyper from there. This isn't too bad for a while, but after a time it's kind of annoying. It doesn't feel like the movie takes appropriate times to settle down when it needs to.

There are times when nothing would beat a good dialogue, but the writers put the characters through some sort of hyperactive thing. Like when the frogs have just escaped the party, and Tiana and Naveen are telling each other the truth (Naveen has no money and Tiana is not a princess) as they float over the bayou with the balloons. Instead of having a good dialogue, the two have to say bits of the truth as they dodge falls, a bird, and crocodiles. I'm especially insulted that they made the event that brought Naveen and Tiana together was a chase from bayou bushfolk. One, just because people live in the country doesn't mean they're ignorant, and two, it doesn't really seem to be enough to make Tiana start falling for Naveen. Three, why is the alligator, the most intimidating of the bunch, steered away from actually helping aid the escape? Four, would pine burrs really stick in an aligator's hide?

And yes, we have a movie breaking plot hole. Isn't it weird that nobody in New Orleans is worried about Tiana's disappearance? Wouldn't her mom notice that's she's not around? The first thing she would do is go on over to Charlotte's, as that would be the last place anyone would have seen Tiana. Then Charlotte would notice that her friend is missing and send off search parties for her, promising a reward to whoever did. Charlotte has already shown that she considers Tiana a friend, first by invading her work at Duke's and then by leaving "the prince" in favor of helping Tiana get a dress to wear instead of the one ruined by the crash into the pastry table. I highly doubt she would plan a wedding without thinking at some point of Tiana, either to gossip or to have Tiana be a bridesmaid. For that matter, Tiana made a mess of her room and left her dress on the floor as she turned into a frog, so wouldn't it seem weird to Charlotte that her room is this way? Wouldn't she guess that something horrible happened to Tiana? Isn't at least Duke mad that she didn't show up for work?

Man, Duke was so dang funny. I loved that guy, and we only get to see him for two seconds. Not fair.

Another character who suffered from misuse was Mama Odie herself. Now, I don't like how this character portrays magic as a good or viable thing, but as a guiding character she is important to the plot. She comes in one scene and then disappears basically, and yet her absense is missed. Why would Tiana and Naveen get married and let her officiate if she wasn't a relevant, kind guide? The movie doesn't take the time to emphasize this side of Mama Odie, and other than her song, we don't know much about her. She feels underused.

Now, I'd like to take the time to say that screen time does not equal quality or getting to know a character. A character can be on screen for most of the movie and yet we know nothing about their mind and they wander as a generic person that does things only based on vague hollywood morality, like the leading character in Avatar. I compare Mama Odie to the Oracle in the Matrix, because her role should have been a lot like the Oracle's. See, the Oracle appears only in one scene, but because she is properly built up through the dialogue and her words have great relevance to the Matrix's plot, she doesn't feel underused. She did what she needed to do, and did it well. While I do think that Mama Odie should have been given more time to show guidance and kindness, with proper build up she would need only a little more. And she's really fun too.

What do I mean by build up? It can mean anything -- like for a powerful character, you have other characters talk dramatically of this power. Perhaps they're afraid or impressed. Or you can have a scene where your already introduced characters are doing something, and this newcomer can show up and automatically change the mood, giving the audience a lasting impression of who this person is. A more complex example comes right from Aladdin. So Aladdin comes in as Prince Ali Ababwa (sorry for the spelling), with his magnificent parade and bold song by the Genie. We have the sultan rushing around to let him in, and Jafar frantically trying to keep him out, when finally the "prince" comes in, expecting a good welcome. Then princess Jasmine comes in, angry that she's being treated like a prize. This tells us in one instant, without even mentioning Jasmine's name, what sort of person she is. She's efficiently portrayed, only on screen for a minute as this is developed.

The song, "When I'm human" could really have been cut from the movie. It's not a bad song, but it's just totally unnecessary. We already know Tiana wants a restaurant, we already know that Naveen is lackadaisical, and we already gather that Louie wants to hang out with humans. So why have the song when it introduces nothing new? You could replace it with a song where Louie sings about the bayou and what sort of people that live there, with a significant portion dedicated to the stories surrounding Mama Odie. She could use some buildup.

You know, if Charlotte hasn't seen her fiance since they were engaged because the servant couldn't pose as Naveen, wouldn't she be mad? And how does Tiana recognise Naveen as a human when she sees him at the Mardi Gras parade? She only saw him once as a human and she didn't even know it was him. For all she knows, Charlotte could be marrying some other dude she knows nothing about. Even more so, how does Raymond know that this is Naveen? He's never seen human Naveen and he didn't even have a chance to look at newspapers or something, yet his dialogue shows that he clearly knows that this is the prince.

Why is the servant being arrested at the end? How do they intend to prove in court that he was imitating a taller, skinnier, black man when he's a rotund, balding white guy?

Wow, this movie has a more or less onscreen death. That's gotta be a Disney first. Oh, and look, Ray turns into a star. How pointlessly cheesy. This I feel is a bad transition from the failed attempt at breaking the spell to Tiana's and Naveen's wedding. People like to say that Lord of the Rings had too many endings, but this movie I feel is the opposite. It goes too quickly from one thing to the next, without really dwelling on it. I mean, there should be a moment where they reflect on spending the rest of their lives being frogs, and Tiana has to tell her mother the truth of what happened. Naveen should at least try to tell his parents what's going on.

Honestly, I would have loved it if they gave his parents and Tiana's mom a bigger role. They should have a couple of scenes where they get to know each other. Naveen's parents could be there for Mardi Gras, and they meet Tiana's mom as she's looking for her daughter. That would be cool.

I have a better scene in mind for the transition to the frog wedding. Tiana should be all like "I guess my dream is over..." and then Naveen says something like "But we're still together and that's what counts" and he pulls out his makeshift ring, something that was totally cute. Then they go to Mama Odie and ask her to officiate or something, and Mama tells them how proud she is that they learned to look for what they needed and not what they wanted.

Also, they needed to dwell a little longer on the scene where Tiana gets her lilypad dress. That dress is awesome, and because of its magical nature it deserves more than three seconds of screentime. They should at least dance or something in the swampwater before it cuts to their human wedding. Why can't she wear that at the human wedding instead of that boring rope thingy? They could say that Charlotte had it made for her or something.

When Mama Odie says "by the powers vested in me", what powers is she talking about, and who gave them to her?

Also, the movie never lets go of its themes. It is almost always talking about dreams and people's desires without taking a break to just dwell in the reality of the world. It's constantly pushing the themes of the movie in your face about working hard and remembering what's important. That's fine, but it gets way overdone.

Since this is a children's movie, I'll ask another question for its ratings: would I let any hypothetical children of mine watch this? Sadly, no. I like this movie, but I don't like how it portrays voodoo magic. Evil magic appears in the other princess movies, but those are very generic magics. However, if you go to New Orleans you will encounter voodoo in some way. People like to malign the spiritual, but it's indefinitely more important than most people realize and has a greater affect on your life than you know. On this note, I do like the part where Shadow Man is consumed by his own magic. Still, I'm not going to let any hypothetical child watch this movie until they have a significant understanding of logic and spirituality.

Okay, so I say all this, but really it doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy this movie. It was cute and fun. I like to nitpick, but as concerns this movie, my nitpickery is not with anger as it has been with some of today's movies. I simply love nitpickery for its own sake. The plot in this movie had problems, but it didn't suck. And that makes all the difference. If I was stuck on a plane for fifteen hours, I wouldn't mind this movie at all. I couldn't watch it over and over again like I can Rab ne Bana di Jodi, but it didn't make me want to shoot myself like Caddyshack. This story is fun. A lot of people will tell me to just shut off my brain and enjoy a movie, and yet in most cases the movie is simply too stupid or plot-holed to be enjoyable -- like Transformers or Iron Man. Only in this movie have I so far been able to validate their comment. I can enjoy this movie despite everything I say about it, because it's a princess movie that's fun and with characters that are based in reality and interesting.

Here's some favorite moments from The Princess and the Frog:

- "Dance with me, fat man!"

I just love this moment, where early on Naveen insists that his servant dance with him on the street. There's something so lighthearted and fun about it that just makes me laugh.

- "When a woman says later, she really means never."

Charlotte tells this to a suitor, and I had to laugh because most of the time this statement is true.

- Tiana's temptation.

Honestly, I can say that this was my favorite scene in the movie. I love how Shadow Man is just placing the restaurant in Tiana's hands for the trinket, and Tiana's resistance. It's one of the few times when Shadow Man is being a real villain and Tiana is directly resisting her own desires for what she knows is right.

- Tiana with a hammer.

This part near the end cracks me up. Tiana's eagerly swinging a hammer as she has just bought the building for her restaurant, and the look on her face is just so crazy that I had to laugh. Honestly, I really like Tiana as a character. She's really cool, and a great addition to the others. And she doesn't annoy me like Belle does. Jasmine does a little too. I dunno, Beast and Aladdin do a good job of getting them to chill out.

Summary: Fun characters lovingly made, but with huge ridiculous plot holes. I'll give it a 6.5 out of ten.

There is a problem with this rating though. Thing is, I've seen all the other princess movies as a child, so they have nostalgia attached to them, so they get a ratings boost from that alone, or so you'll say. Okay then. I'll go back and review them as an adult. It'll take me a while, and I'll post other blogs while I'm going along, but yeah, fair's fair. That, and I don't have all the Disney movies. We'll see how it goes. I will give The Princess and the Frog this notation, though: it's the most beautiful princess movie to date.

Let's see what I can remember:
Snow White
Sleeping Beauty
Cinderella
Beauty and the Beast
Pocahontas
Aladdin
Mulan
The Little Mermaid

I think I shall do Mulan next.

Notedly, I'm still including Aladdin even though the princess is not the focus of the movie, and Mulan's in too, even though Mulan technically isn't a princess. I like to think she counts though.

Music You've Probably Never Heard before -- Turtles

Hey y'all!

Okay, so for this week I picked a band that is very close to my heart. They're not exactly unpopular, but they never achieved international fame, and indeed were only starting to come to fame in their own country when they had to disband. The band I'm talking about is Turtles. Not "the Turtles" the annoying 70s band in America, but Turtles the kpop trio from Korea. I kind of hate how generic their name is, but other than that they're awesome. Their name in korean sounds an awful lot like "go boogie", and that's their first album's title. Cute, isn't it? Keum Bi sang, Z-E rapped, and Lim Sung-hoon, AKA Turtleman, did both.

So I first heard of this band when I spent two months in Korea. It was when their fifth album had come out, Oh Bang Gan Da, and their song "Sing La La" was playing in the stores we went to. Everyone else on the trip was taken up by Wondergirls and their song "Tell Me", but I liked Turtles better. The deep male vocals contrasted with the light feminine chorus was really intruiging to me. I remember sitting somewhere it was playing, and I thought that I might never hear this band again, because at the time I didn't know their names or the title of their song.

I came home, and a few months later I decided to try looking up "sing la la la" on youtube because that part of their song was in english. I was delighted to find out not only did youtube have this song with a translation of the lyrics, but they also had several other videos of their music up. I immediately hoped to stick with this band, following them throughout the years as they got more famous and did more albums. Unfortunately, I also found out through my searches that Turtleman had died April second of a heart attack. He was found dead in his apartment by the manager at the age of 38. He was the lead of the band, so there was no chance that the girls could continue without him. His wonderful goofiness and delightful voice brought a lot to the group, and he was unable to see the success that this band would surely have gotten as they became more widely known.

He was loved a lot, and there were many heartbroken fans upon hearing of his death. It's sort of evil how people filmed parts of his funeral and you can see how Keum Bi and Z-E were crying their eyes out. And did they really need to put so many photographers there? Sheesh, give the family some privacy...
　
So this band only has five albums out, other than the remix album, compliations, and a Christmas album. iTunes recently put kpop in their stores, and they have a lot of Turtles on there. However, one of the really annoying things about iTunes is that they have some of their albums out under the english "Turtles" and some can only be found by either looking them up by their Korean name. I usually got to youtube and copy/paste the proper korean letters so that I can find these albums. Hopefully they've fixed it since last I looked.
　
iTunes has their first, fourth, and fifth albums up, as well as a remix album. If you don't wish to buy any of these, you can try them out on youtube first. I'm going to be reviewing all of the albums that I can, and I'll put up links to whatever songs I can.

Their first album is one of my favorites. It features Su Bin instead of Keum Bi, who joined the band for their second album. It's a moderately relaxed album compared to the more hyper later ones, but it's wonderful and a great intro to Turtleman. I bought this album on ebay before iTunes came out with Kpop, and this is good because it means I have a copy of the lyrics (in korean, but I'm trying to learn it anyway) and because I have the actual cd. Ebay is very unreliable for having these albums, and I was lucky to snatch it up when I did. Given that this album coincides with my true love's R&R from his deployment, it has a lot of personal significance for me.

There are a couple of rap segments, the "Turtles free" songs, but I didn't care for those on this album. They were just too abrasive for me, and freelance rap tends to be riskier. Other than these, the group does some romantic songs, as well as some fun and motivational songs. Turtles has always had a message of working together and doing the right thing in their work, and this album is no exception. "You Can Do It" comes to mind, and is the corniest song on the album. I still love it. "Hip Hop Revolution" is another track in the same vein, but is more successful and less corny. The songs that really gave this band their fame are two rap remixes of the industrial age Korean classic "Four Seasons" [version 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwBGVwWmtSY ] , which depicts the life of a factory worker in the days when South Korea was going industrial. It's a haunting song, made very cool by the rap. Also check out "Everybody Boogie" [link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT-_Ma0jdRE ].
　
By far my favorite song is Hyanggiroun Chueon, a song that inspired me to write. I have no idea what it means, only that it's haunted and optimistic piece that reminds me of a clear morning, free of yesterday's hurt. I really should translate this one.
　
Unfortunately, I haven't heard much from the second album, Turtles Vol. 2. It's not on iTunes and I only found this on youtube, -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-XviHCYATI . Crap, I love this song! It makes me want to be an extra in the music video.

 Turtles Vol. 3, another not on iTunes, has several videos on youtube. These include the fun and vibrant "Bingo" [linkie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDdYAzCqCfY ] which is about enjoying your life even though it's hard. This song is so much fun that I don't know how anyone couldn't love it. Another is How Many, my favorite of this band for all albums. Again, I don't know what this song means (given my love for non-worded music, not surprising I still like it), but it has to be about helping others, at least what I gather from the music video. It's about a guy helping a blind girl, who fails to understand what he has done for her. It's actually very sad, as you can see here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWFa7Vr-t_o . Ashipjiman [listen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rI_rWaku5CA ] is a cool hip hop beat that simply but effectively done.

Turtles Vol. 4 is the album that really helped get Turtles on the scene, and they won their first award for their song Bihaengi or "Airplane" [listen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-o64pntFJs ]. This is the most contented song I have ever heard in my life, and it's pure bliss to listen to. Also, the "Turtles Free" songs on this album are a lot better. Turtles Free 4-1 is more of an introductory piece, but 4-2 is absolutely terrifying in a wonderful way, and it's a total contrast to the usual happiness of Turtles music.
"Funny", the second track after Turtles Free 4-1, is a fun song and perfect to exercise to. "Yeah" [linkie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NWveCsTIdo ] is another fun one. There are more mellow songs on here, the best of which is "To My Half", a song that now brings me to tears because of this youtube video -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zQfYUpI-DY&feature=related.

The songs "Trip", "Remember Me", and "Move" are three fun tracks that are well worth listening too, but "Must" is too silly even for me. It's fun, but not my preference. This album competes with the first for being my favorite, though if I hear more of the third then I might change my mind.

The remix album is okay, but I really only like the first track of it. I've been listening to techno for years, and I know when songs don't need mixing. Unfortunately, that hasn't stopped a lot of artists from doing so, particularly noob mixers who can't tell which songs they should let alone. Some songs are just too good to do that too. Then again, if you get a good artist then they can surprise you. I'll go more into that another time.

Turtles Vol. 5, Oh Bang Gan Da, is okay. It ventures too far into the mainstream pop realm, and honestly all singers are better the further away they stay from today's terrible pop. The title song is pretty good. "Sing La La" is one of the two songs that stick out in popularity, and of course I love it. It's about letting yourself have fun and dance, but the music video is about shopping too much. Seriously, you've got to see it. Why not when you can just click this link? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IdBipSIl2qs

The other song is "My Name", a song about being just [link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I48Z1mWogYE ]. It's a little harder than their normal songs, but it's very passionate. It reminds me of waking up early, and I need to figure out how I can make it my alarm on my phone.

There are a few good song on the fifth album, as well as a couple of corny ones. It's a grab bag of good and okay, making the album suffer overall from the lack of song cohesiveness. I would get into the specific tracks, but I don't know how to spell these in english letters. There's the "Miami Remix" of Sing La La, but this is really unnecessary and not that well done. There's also "Logo Song Collection", which I feel is an unnecessary shout out to their record company. I'm still glad I have it, though, and it's well worth listening to.

Overall, for people my age this is a hearkening back to the music of the eighties/nineties, in a sense, because these songs are happier and about love, rather than the depressing, boring songs of today that are about sex. Foreign countries, please don't copy America's or Britain's music of today, and keep an eye on Europop. We're going through a very bad period right now and I don't want you to have to do the same thing. Honestly, music is about communicating your soul for the blessing of others, not about sex or wearing stupid outfits. If the music isn't more important than the artist, then the music suffers. Mozart and Beethoven are remembered for their skill, not their extravagance. Don't reward people that croon endlessly about dull things to dull music. So what if music like Turtles is sillier or Techno isn't as pop-accessible? Too many genres today sound like mainstream pop, like country, R&B, and others. You, the listener, are the one that decides where this ends.

Turtles is a happy, fun band that I will always love and treasure. I heard that the girls are joining up with this other dude to make a new band, and I really hope they succeed. I will definitely look into that and have a listen.

For those who want to see a full discography of the band, here you go:
http://community.livejournal.com/k_profile/1846.html
　
　
　
Saranghamneedah, Lim Sansaengneem.