Album Rating: 4.0

Not their best, but has some of their best moments for sure. Tunic and Disappearer especially stand out

Album Rating: 5.0

Kool Thing, Tunic, Mote, Dissappearer, Mildred Pierce. Love all those tracks to death. This album always feels underrated to me.

Album Rating: 3.5

only cuz their 80s stuff is so fuckin good, if this was somebody elses album it would be their best

[2]

Album Rating: 4.0

disappearer rules so hard

Album Rating: 4.0

hell yea one of their best songs perioddddd

Album Rating: 4.5

M I L D R E D P I E R C E

Album Rating: 5.0

Mildred Pierce rules so hard. Stylish ass riff. And the noise freakout at the end is such a pleasant surprise. I always enjoyed Sonic Youth's aesthetic, both sonically and visually. They are just the epitome of cool.

Album Rating: 4.3

been obsessed with "Tunic" since I first heard it in Irma Vep and godddddddd i need to listen to this

Album Rating: 4.0

Neeka have you heard A Thousand Leaves?

irma vep

Album Rating: 4.3

I have not heard any of their albums :/

Album Rating: 4.0

Oh, fix that if you like Tunic

Album Rating: 4.3

will do (:

@tec was that a DISS

Album Rating: 3.5

Yay I love Irma Vep! @neek if it is I will eat my hat, tec's Ws are common and notable

not at all neek, irma vep is among my 30 or so favorite movies ever (and if i were to create such a specific list, it'd undoubtedly be in the top 5 'greatest closing sequences' of all time)
quite honestly i'm not sure why i commented simply 'irma vep'
i feel like i had something in mind but now i have no idea
maggie cheung is a godsend

irma vep
this album gets a little too much discourse for its (still banging) 'pop' SY qualities and not nearly enough for its edgy overcast atmosphere (don't think the yoof had anything quite in its vein at this point except maybe Candle and Trilogy?)! Kool Thing and Mote might bring the thunder, but Tunic/Disappearer/Cinderella/maybe the closer are the soul of this one
and also extremely importantly, finally gave Senor Porco the time he deserved last night (at my girlfriend's request but still) and he is top 5 swine without a doubt. Piglet and Babe can get wrecked

Rewatched 20 Jan 2018
Second viewing, up quite a bit in my estimation, mostly because my major snag from the first time—the tonal obscurity—was no longer an issue having been somewhat prepared for it. The film is still a mishmash of themes and accounts, but it's a glorious mishmash with such a subtle, undercutting parlay of humor and shared confusion between the characters and the characters-playing-characters that trying too forcefully to “decrypt” IRMA VEP's more delicate offshoots and tête-à-têtes (as I did the first time) yields diminishing returns. The key is to calibrate your senses to those of Maggie Cheung—in one of the most brilliant, semi-disillusioned "as herself" roles in cinema—whose genuine perplexity rings twofold: [1] both Maggie and the French must use a non-native tongue to communicate, resulting in many inaudible and/or misunderstood phrases and potentially unintended white lies in the form of cordial, affirmative nods (I haven't seen a film that captures the awkward displacement of minor language barriers quite as accurately as this), and [2] the overall lack of purpose/vision/coherency/faith surrounding the fictional LES VAMPIRES remake from everyone on the crew, giving Maggie a lingering reservation about why she's even involved in this hopeless French project (as a Chinese actress, no less) that nobody seems to support. The most bizarre moments—e.g., the dream-whimsy jewelry heist, the closing director’s cut sequence—tingle like a phantom limb, but discreetly deconstruct the border between Real and Fantasy, a bifurcation that seems to exist purely within Maggie's psyche. Oftentimes "films about films" (especially ones where the real-film director assigns themselves a fake-film director proxy) come off pompous and overly pointed; the commentary on French cinema and Assayas's production struggles are loud and clear, but never feel didactic or obnoxious because in spite of his frustrations, he's still (clearly) having a good time. Only one thing registers even louder than the growing snafu: His desire to construct a film with the sole purpose of indulging in his muse, Maggie Cheung. (In that sense, I’m reminded of Godard, Karina, and UNE FEMME EST UNE FEMME.) But (!) instead of making a film about practically nothing, Assayas makes a film about remaking a film that was already made 80 years prior—that no one's really asking for—thereby registering an extra layer of obfuscation, which is ultimately kind of genius. This is good, hearty comfort food, but not “you only like this because you grew up with it” comfort food. It’s like, “grandma’s recipe is so good that Campbell’s offered her a million dollars for it” comfort food.

Album Rating: 4.5

recent revisit and I had to bump this to a 4.5

Re Porco: god bless. Favorite Miyazaki (tho -> grain of salt, i'm not the biggest fan overall tbh). I will say it's one of the \very few\ instances where I genuinely prefer the English dub over the native language + subtitles, if only because I'm not remotely joking when I say I think it might be Michael Keaton's single best contribution to cinema.