Kick Ass

I suppose this is pretty funny, what with the gore being so cartoonish and outlandish. The satire of Spiderman isn't really that clever - troubled teen and all. He just sounds totally self-absorbed.

It lights up when Hit Girl's on the stage, though. God I love her. I wanna adopt her. I wanna write an email to the producers to give her her own movie. And the bat signal send-up joke was hilarious.

The comic references aren't particularly clever either. Neither is the dorky "supervillain".

Duran Duran - Live at Hammersmith '82

Kinda weird releasing this as they only released two albums at that time. Most of the songs are from the stellar first album so that's fine with me. My main problem is that the guitar is mixed way too high and the vocals mixed too low. Another problem is that it's shot in 16 mm footage so it looks grainy. Comes with videos of the Rio era - which only two I don't have - Lonely in Your Nightmare and My Own Way. Also has some Top of the Pops footage which are pretty boring cos at that time, there are no pervy cameramen looking up the audience's skirt (that practice only started in 1984).

The 'Oo - The Kids Are Alright

Mainly good archival footage of vintage 'Oo performances, though mostly of singles and not a single good album track such as Armenia City in the Sky or Pure and Easy. Highlight here is the recording process of Who Are You? (the song) and a wacky take on Barbara Ann, which is funnier than the serious 1966 A Quick One outtake. Also has disjointed interviews and it looks as if The Beatles' Anthology took its cue from the Pulp Fiction-style chronology here

Melvins:-

Houdini - The first three songs aren't very interesting. Things pick up a bit with the Kiss cover (Goin' Blind) but it all gets crack-a-lacking from "Honey Bucket" onwards. I really like the stoner-ish "Hag Me". But otherwise, pretty interesting grunge-metal (even if they predated the Seattle scene). The 10-minute percussion piece "Spread Eagle Beagle" really tries my patience, though.

Stag - Lotsa interesting song and chord structures lift this up from other by-numbers music of this ilk. Love the synthy bits on "Hide" which is somewhat funny as you don't usually hear them in a metal song. Just a small step down from "Houdini" as it doesn't have a good stoner song. Also would like this more if it had more off-beat material such as the Chipmunks-ish "Captain Pungent" and the slowed down folk-blues "Cottonmouth" (which is too short, anyway).

The Cure - The Top - got this on a whimsy as I thought the rest of the album would sound like "Caterpillar". Boy, was I wrong. As it is, it's not bad, though, the booming guitars is prescient to later songs like "Lovesong". I love the chaotic "Give Me It" and the military-style blast of "The Empty World". The only weak song is the meandering dirgey title track but even then, it's not something which annoys me.