The 10 Greatest David Lynch Moments

**Contains mild spoilers**

Imagine you have a chart that shows all of the world’s movie directors.

One axis of the chart rates each director in terms of his/her long-term success and the other axis rates the weirdness of their films. Somewhere in the top right corner – the corner reserved for only the most successful weirdos – you’d notice a single dot all on its own.

That dot would be David Lynch.

The man has given us some of the most mind-boggling movies around. Numbers simply don’t go high enough to count how many people have exclaimed “what the f*** was that?” while the credits rolled on one of his movies or TV episodes.  Yet his career has spanned decades (6 of them if you count his early short films) and he has somehow maintained a comfortable level of critical and financial success ever since his breakthrough with The Elephant Man in 1980. It’s a balancing act so very few others have managed successfully.

Of course that doesn’t mean watching a Lynch movie is everyone’s idea of a good time. Many loathe his work, often claiming that all the befuddling insanity is just a way to distract impressionable viewers from the lack of meaning and substance beneath. And to be honest, sometimes it is quite difficult to defend his work.

“You see, the rabbits represent society and the couch symbolises … umm … actually I give up.”

But when you look at individual scenes rather than whole movies, ignoring the hidden meanings and just considering how the images on-screen make you feel, even a cynic would have to admit that David Lynch has made some highly memorable cinema. So let’s look at 10 of the most intriguing, brain-melting moments of his career …

Eraserhead (1977) – Unwrapping the Baby

When you have some kind of disturbing, devil-child creature in your bedroom and it falls sick – don’t try to help. You’ll only make things much worse.

“I love you, honey, but I’m going to have to insist we get a paternity test.”

The Elephant Man (1980) –He’s Not an Animal

It’s the peak of the cruelty that we see throughout the film, but the simple shout of “I am not an animal! I am a human being!” is delivered with so much desperation and power that it also becomes a moment of redemption.

Interesting trivia: The guy under all that make-up is the chest-burster from Alien … well not the chest-burster itself, but the owner of the chest that is burst.

Blue Velvet (1986) – Trapped in the Closet

Here Dennis Hopper shows why he was Hollywood’s go-to guy whenever they needed a psychotic weirdo.

A closet door just isn’t enough to protect you from a raging Dennis Hopper. The only officially recognised safeguard is a foot-thick layer of reinforced steel.

Wild at Heart (1990) – Punk Rock Elvis

A heavy metal concert suddenly turns into Nicolas Cage crooning a tender Elvis ballad to his girlfriend. If you expected that turn of events you’re a lot harder to surprise than I am.

“Just a quick song this time, babe. I have to go make Ghost Rider 2.”

Twin Peaks (1990) – Cooper’s Dream

The most iconic Lynch scene isn’t actually found in any of his films, but in the third episode of his TV show. It’s just a flawless piece of surrealism, which is made slightly less insane by the fact it’s a dream sequence – unless you happened to be watching the strange alternate pilot of the show. That version puts the scene right at the end and claims that it’s “25 Years Later”, which adds a whole new level of trippiness.

“Let’s Rock! … and by that I mean, let’s all act really f***ing weird!”

Lost Highway (1997) – The Mystery Man at the Party

Chances are, if you ever met this guy at a party, it would be one of the creepiest moments of your life – and I just mean if he talked to you about American Idol or something. If you had the actual conversation shown in the film, the ensuing mind snap would surely have you in a padded cell within the hour.

“Hey guess what? I’m gonna haunt your nightmares for the rest of your life! LOL!!!”

The Straight Story (1999) – War Stories

The least Lynchian Lynch movie has plenty of touching moments but none more so than this scene where two old-timers end up sharing their painful memories of the war.

Alvin pretended not to notice that his friend was checking him out.

Mulholland Drive (2001) – The Alley Behind Winkie’s

It’s hard to say what this scene has to do with the rest of the film, but as a piece of suspense-filled surreal horror it is in a league of its own.

“I had this awful dream where the director put me in just one scene and my character never appears again. It was so horrible. But it was just a dream, right?”

Mulholland Drive (2001) – Club Silencio

Lynch’s ode to Hollywood is so crammed full of wonderful scenes that it has the honour of holding two places in the list. In this – the moment where the film really takes a turn for the bizarre – our two heroines visit a club that is apparently made of pure nightmares.

“It’s all an illusion! … Except that lady’s hair. That’s totes real.”

Inland Empire (2006) – Dying on the Streets of LA

After 2 hours of craziness where something or other happens, Laura Dern’s character is stabbed in the stomach with a screwdriver and dies on the street while the homeless people next to her talk about totally unrelated topics. It doesn’t sound so amazing when I say it like that, but it’s the most captivating scene of the film.

“Hey can you shut up about the bus to Pomona for one second and call an ambulance?! I’m kind of dying over here.”

So what do you think, Lynch lovers? Have I chosen well? Do you have any interesting theories about the meaning of these scenes?

I Wrote a Hit Novelty Song!

Ok that’s an exaggeration. But by my standards it’ pretty true. You may remember, back in November, I posted a whole bunch of songs from my Soundcloud account. A few people listened to them but they didn’t exactly capture the imagination of a generation or anything like that.

Or did they? …

Well, no they didn’t. But that one song was played 757 times in four months, and the next most popular song was played only 22 times. In this age of viral videos reaching billions of views that might not seem very impressive, but it’s now probably the most popular song I’ve ever written –  a big surprise seeing as I did nothing to promote it.

Frustratingly, I have no idea how or why this happened. Without upgrading my Soundcloud account (ie. paying $$$) all I can tell is that most of the people playing the song are from the USA. I don’t know if there’s a group of kids out there who’ve adopted it as their own personal anthem, if it’s just people passing it on to each other to laugh at how bad it is.

Someone somewhere may be calling my song “The Room” of bad music. Honestly it would be an honour.

So what is this magnum opus that has captured the hearts and minds of hundreds of music fans? Well, it’s just a silly song I wrote five years as a joke. Here it is if you’re curious …

 

Incidentally, if there are any budding film-makers out there (or people who just enjoy having a bit of fun with a camera/animation etc.) I’d love to have a video to go with this track. I’ve thought about doing one myself but I’m sure I’ll never get around to it.

Anyway, now that I’m talking about my own music I may as well keep going. So here are few extra bits of Andy Music News …

New Song: I’ve written and recorded a brand new song for my band. It’s the first time I’ve done so in over a year. It’s a little pop ditty about feeling trapped in a bad situation (for me it was my stint in hospital a few years back).

 

Youtube Bedroom Recordings: I’ve started a tradition of doing a straight-to-camera recording once a month. They’ll mostly be covers but you can expect a few originals too. The playlist below has all of the recordings so far, but keep an eye on my Youtube channel or my band’s page if you want to hear the new stuff as it’s added.

 

That’s it for now. I have some other ideas but it’s all hypothetical at this stage so I’ll keep it under my hat for now. In the meantime, are there any other musos out there looking to show off their work?

50 Followers!

I have a confession to make.

The more observant of you may have noticed the little counter in the top right, which used to brag about my 344 blog followers, has suddenly changed its tune. Now it implores you join a tight-knit community of a mere 50 followers. How did the figure drop so suddenly? Well the truth is, the lower number has always been far more accurate.

You see, WordPress has a feature called Publicize, which automatically adds new posts to your Facebook wall and Twitter feed. That sounded pretty good to me so I enabled it - not realising that every one of my Twitter followers and Facebook friends would suddenly be counted as followers of my little ol’ blog.

I had increased my readership by ten-fold instantly.

Of course, it was all a lie. For one thing, I can tell from my blog stats that no one has ever checked out my blog after reading one of my tweets … so Twitter followers are not blog followers.

But that only eliminates 18 people, so perhaps we can count that as a tiny white lie.

However, being a modern man of this computer age, I do have quite a few Facebook friends. A handful of them are the biggest supporters I’ll ever have (which I’m grateful for) but it’d be fair to say that the vast majority couldn’t give two shiitake mushrooms about my blog.

“Hey, he stole our not-quite-dirty joke!”

Like many of you out there, I have people on my friends list that I haven’t conversed with in six years, except for a quick ‘hello’ message when I first added them. How many of those acquaintances are eagerly awaiting the next instalment of my inane writings? I’m going to guess at a big, fat zero.

So yeah, Facebook friends are not blog followers.

Also – with Publicize on – WordPress counts readers as followers just for asking to be notified of new comments on a single post. While it’s great that a post of mine can incite such sparkling and witty conversation that people don’t want to miss a moment of it – it should be obvious that followers of a single post are not blog followers.

And that’s how we arrived back at the magical 50. In all honesty, the true number should be a bit lower because of the few “spam” followers I have, but that all gets a bit difficult to quantify so let’s put that one in the “too hard” basket.

So why did I leave the 300+ figure up for so long, knowing it was dishonest?

Firstly, I’d hoped it would attract more people. After all, no one wants to jump on an empty bandwagon. It’s only when you see a bandwagon overflowing with people – preferably so crowded that some are falling off and being crushed under the hooves of passing horses - that you think “there must be something really special about that bandwagon”. That’s when you run after it, carefully avoiding the hoof-crushed bodies in your path.

“Thanks for freeing up a spot, sucker!”

Jeff Heimsath Photography

The second reason was simple jealousy. Previously I’d come across some truly awful blogs that had only been going for a couple of weeks yet had hundreds of followers – which was disheartening because I’d been at it for a year and had a readership barely in the double digits. So when my own stats suddenly increased and I realised the likely explanation for the other bloggers’ instant “popularity”, I thought “well if they’re going to do it, I may as well do it too”. I’d decided that the blogging world was full of dishonesty, so there was no problem in dabbling in it myself.

Which you may recognise as the same logic used by every awful person ever.

But today I’ve turned over a new leaf. I’ve confessed to the lie and decided to be thankful for what I’ve got. After all, 50 followers isn’t bad. If I apply that to the world of music - it’d be like playing a show every week and being guaranteed 50 somewhat interested people showing up each time – which would make me pretty happy. The Internet may have skewed my perception of what defines creative success, but I have to remember I’m dealing with real people (or spambots). Making a genuine connection with a handful of people should be motivation enough. In other words, just because a 15 year-old kid in a Glasgow basement can blatantly steal a badly photo-shopped picture of David Hasselhoff riding a kitten, put it on his Tumblr and get a million views – doesn’t mean that should be my baseline for what justifies the effort of typing stuff on the internets.

So, to my followers out there - thankyou, thankyou and thankyou again! As we approach the third year of this blog, I hope to keep bringing you things to read that don’t make you sigh in boredom or punch the monitor in disgust.

If that sounds like a good plan, I’ll see you next time!

The 10 Best Songs from Perth

In the Pines (the music festival put on each year by RTR FM) is arguably the biggest day on the Perth musical calendar. This weekend it celebrates its 20th birthday with an old-school line up featuring many bands who’ll be reforming just for the show. I thought I’d take it as an opportunity to revisit Perth’s recent musical history too – so here are the 10 most awesome songs this city has produced in the last two decades …

Jebediah – Harpoon (1998)

Here’s where it all started for me and many others. This was the song that really cemented Jebediah’s position as the most influential Perth band of the 90′s. At least, that’s how I remember it.

Sleepy Jackson – Good Dancers (2001)

Luke Steele, who’d go on to greater success with Empire of the Sun, brought together his love of lush production and catchy melodies with this track – mixing it with just enough of his trademark quirkiness to create a true pop masterpiece.

Tucker B’s – Bish Bosh II: The Bosh Bosh (2002)

I used to write a lot of loud, obnoxious rock songs. At least four of them were just blatant attempts to plagiarise this track’s incredible opening riff.

Fourth Floor Collapse – Sun (2003)

Fourth Floor Collapse never quite made it big like a lot of people were expecting. Their singer had a voice to die for and he loved to wring every bit of emotion out of it that he could, but unfortunately that was all too much for the average punter. It makes sense then that this unusually bright and sunny sounding track should be their most well-known.

Snowman – You Are a Casino (2006)

A divine piece of high-energy psychosis from one of my all-time favourite Perth acts.

The Panics – Don’t Fight It (2007)

Rock and pop is often designed to get the listener to do something – dance the night away, fight the establishment, proposition the teacher they’re hot for … but sometimes it just makes you want to curl up and not do anything again forever. And that’s okay too.

Bank Holidays – Like a Piano (2007)

Lush strings and one of the finest female voices in Perth pop history combining to form pure musical bliss.

Mile End – Rumblefish (2008)

This is the original, slightly more lo-fi version of the song I’ve raved about twice before already.

Sugar Army – Tongues in Cheeks (2009)

Right from the intro, with its short a cappella teaser and accelerating drumbeat, you know this is going to be something special. This is also the best music video of the lot, and perhaps the best video created for any local band.

Emperors – Favourite Colours (2010)

It’s a bit funny that the latest song in this list may be the one that sounds most like it’s from the 90′s, but who cares when the songwriting is this flawless?

All right, now it’s your turn. I know that at least a few of you reading this are afficionados of the Perth music scene. So, what are your own favourite tracks?

Or if you’re an out-of-towner (which is incredibly likely, seeing as half my readership is from the USA now) what songs would you use to introduce me to your own local music scene?

And hey, before you go, here’s some more writing featuring Tucker B’s and Snowman, Jebediah and Sleepy Jackson, Emperors and Mile End.

The 2nd Annual GIT Awards (Good Internet Things)

It’s time to discover what thing on the internet I enjoyed the most this year. In other words …

‘A Hole in the Head’ Presents the 2nd Annual:

And the nominees are …

Xkcd: The comic with the loveable stick-man stayed as addictive as ever, and even found time to push the boundaries of what a web-comic could be with this amazingly detailed strip (if it only takes you a minute to read it, you’re not doing it right). Bonus points for the awesome spin-off, What If?, which answers an impossible science question each week.

Dinosaur Comics: It uses the same six pictures every week, and has done so for 10 whole years, yet it’s still funny. If you’re not sure how that’s possible … well neither am I, actually.

T-Rex is super excited about this nomination.

Cracked: Last year’s winner of the GIT award got me even more hooked this year. Being a highly collaborative site with a huge number of articles means it has more than the ocassional misfire, but when the hits are as perfect as this one who really cares about the misses?

Everywhere Once: I don’t really read travel blogs but this one is just too brilliant to ignore, even if the travellers are yet to venture beyond North America.

Postsecret: A lot of what I like on the web can be accused of being cynical or coldly intellectual, but sometimes I just want a bit of human weakness and honesty. In times like those I can always get my fix by scrolling through the anonymous postcards here.

Also, there’s a lot of this.

Calming Manatee Tumblr: Speaking of touchy-feely stuff, did you know that manatees are really kind and smart? Seriously, if you’re not feeling so great, this is the blog for you. I can’t guarantee that it will fix all your problems immediately but it will almost certainly fix all your problems immediately. Also, make sure you’ve read the interview I did with the manatee!

Let Me Tell You About Science (NSFW): On the opposite end of the spectrum, this blog fulfills my need to learn about complex things while being shouted at over and over again with lots of swear-words (example headline: “Why Spiders are Not Scary and You Are a F***ing Idiot if You Think Otherwise“).

Humans of New York: One of the world’s most vibrant and varied cities as seen through the eyes of one photographer. The main drawcard is the pictures and captions from the Big Apple, but I also love the longer stories and the diversion the blog took when he travelled to Iran.

“I like your hat.” “Take my f***ing photo.”

Sometimes Interesting: It’s just what it says in the title – except from what I can tell it’s always interesting. Specialties include abandoned sites, forgotten controversies and disturbing moments in history.

Marking Time: The subtitle The Afghan and Iraqi Wars as Seen by Those Who Live Them says a lot, but it’s not as heavy-going as you might think. Our tour guide is a social scientist who picked up plenty of great anecdotes while being deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq to help the US army understand the local culture.

Evil Squirrel’s Nest: A cool little blog that is totally obsessed with squirrels. It’s worth checking out, even if it’s just for the weekly comic strip.

And the winner is …

VSauce is the first Youtube channel I’ve ever bothered subscribing to. It’s a weekly video blog by a guy named Michael Stevens. The videos are mostly just him talking to the camera but they’re all incredibly interesting. Each one has a provocative title like ‘What if the Sun Disappeared?’ or ‘Should You Eat Yourself?’ but they all end up spanning a range of topics – usually related to science and the world around us.

Maybe this comment on one of the videos sums it up best – “VSauce teaches me more than actual school.”

So for being superbly informative and entertaining, and for making everyone wish Michael was their science teacher, I bestow VSauce with this year’s prestigious GIT Award!

VSauce Man is too distracted by creepy floating soccer balls to celebrate.

Congratulations to the winner and all the nominees. But don’t be disheartened if you missed out. Just keep doing Good Things on the Internet and maybe you’ll win next year!

Hey there! Now that you’ve finished this post, how about taking a trip back in time to last year’s awards ceremony?

I <3 ‘Please Like Me’

I’ve avoided talking about TV series on this blog so far, but I had to mention how much I enjoyed the debut season of Please Like Me. It was only 6 episodes but I’m going to go ahead and say it was the best Australian comedy to hit our screens in years.

“They like me! They really like me!”

The show followed comedian, Josh Thomas - who most Australian viewers would recognise from Talking ‘Bout Your Generation - as he hung out with his friends, dealt with family crises, and came out of the closet. It provided plenty of laughs and had an undeniable warmth to it, despite many of the characters clearly having trouble displaying emotion in a healthy way. It touched on issues of death, suicide, depression, racism, homophobia, infidelity and divorce but without ever feeling trite or over-dramatic. In fact, much of the comedy came from how characters didn’t react to these things (in the very first scene where Josh’s girlfriend dumps him, he is more upset about having wasted $19 on a sundae).

“This $19 sundae is suddenly pretty f***ing humiliating.”

Disney Food Blog

It was great to see a show about young people that didn’t feel like it was written from an older person’s perspective (the creators started writing the show at around age 20) and even though it didn’t shy away from the negative stereotypes attached to the younger generation (like Josh being constantly on his phone at inappropriate times) it showed that their problems are still very real.

Did I just exclude myself from the younger generation? … Oh well … I guess I had to rid myself of that delusion one day.

So, I’ll be eagerly awaiting more episodes and stubbornly ignoring the possibility that it might not get picked up for another season. If you missed it, you can watch all 6 episodes for free here (may not work for those outside Australia) but if you did catch it be sure to let me know what you thought!

So Many Gigs!

I’ve been to some amazing gigs in the last few months. I’ve been too lazy to review them but here’s a quick retrospective, complete with the bad photos I took on my phone and cheap digital camera …

So we start with the ethereal beauty of Sigur Ros at the Belvoir Ampitheatre from back in November.

After that I flew all the way to Melbourne to see Radiohead - one of my all time favourites. I’d been waiting about 15 years to see them and they didn’t disappoint.

Another special and very unique gig was the Summer Swing Smackdown, which featured four bands on four separate stages all surrounding a central dance floor. There were some amazing dancers there (including my little brother) so we just kept clear and watched, but it was a great night nonetheless.

From swing to funk. We rang in the new year in style courtesy of the Perth Funk Club house band.

I then travelled down to Busselton for Southbound Festival with the sneaking suspicion that I was too old and cranky to still be going to festivals. The Hives helped remind me that it’s usually worth dealing with the crowds and little annoyances.

And the Flaming Lips blew my mind as always.

Back in Perth, Weezer gave me my first concert experience at our flash new arena. They had a no frills approach but the songs really spoke for themselves – especially when they played the whole of their amazing ‘Blue’ album from 1994.

Sarah Blasko also showed off her new album with a full orchestra in the serene surrounds of Kings Park. It was quite a treat to kick back to some great music while ducks wandered around our feet.

Later on, Deerhoof put on a mighty show for us at the Rosemount Hotel and I managed to get a slightly awkward photo with Greg Saunier (one of my favourite rock drummers – him on the left).

At Red Hill auditorium, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds showed us that they’re not ready to mellow out just yet – pulling out many of the loudest songs from their huge back catalogue. The venue had some logistical problems and it was a long drive, but being able to watch the band with the city lights in the background was quite spectacular.

We also enjoyed ourselves at The Jacksons, but the photos from that were so rubbish I couldn’t bring myself to upload them.

So what will the rest of the year bring? It seems unlikely anything could top the recent run of stellar gigs but you never know!

Liked this? Have a look at these other posts about Radiohead, The Flaming Lips, The Hives and Deerhoof.