CD REVIEWS
PATRICIA BARBER
Mythologies
Blue Note
9/10
Singer-pianist-songwriter Patricia Barber’s latest CD, Mythologies, is an 11-song cycle based on Ovid’s “Metamorphoses.” The musical accompaniment is supplied by Barber’s piano plus her usual quartet members: guitarist Neal Alger, bassist Michael Arnopol and drummer Eric Montzka, supplemented by a guest saxophonist, vocal soloists, a gospel chorus and a children’s hip-hop choir. Barber takes liberties with the Greek myths. For example, Icarus doesn’t crash in this version. In fact, the song is dedicated to Nina Simone and refers to her appearance at a nightclub outside of Philadelphia. “Hunger” glamorizes anorexia (“I’m gorgeous and grateful it’s ‘in’ to be thin”) and “Narcissus” is a sort of gay wedding song. "Whiteworld/Oedipus" has a contemporary political message. Playful, poetic, and profound, Mythologies belongs on jazz’s Mount Olympus.—Barry Bassis
Strike Anywhere
Dead FM
Fat Wreck Chords
7/10
Original party-punk label Fat Wreck Chords has had a bit of a conceptual overhaul in the past few years, since NoFX singer Fat Mike made his conversion from legendarily wise-ass West Coast skate-punk to political activist, starting up punkvoter.com. Snotty Canadian vegans Propagandhi are no longer Fat Wreck’s only revolutionary offering. Strike Anywhere have been playing politically charged melodic hardcore/punk since the late ‘90s, and it’s no surprise, with bands like activist folkie-punks Against Me! now on the label, that Dead FM finds them joining the Fat Wreck roster. The three-arrowed socialist emblem the band uses as its logo may be a little obscured on Dead FM’s cover, but the first track, “Sedition,” makes no bones about its political orientation. Strike Anywhere’s Lifetime-inspired melodies and resounding production place them firmly in the canon of Warped Tour pop-punk bands. However, the convicted, if not slightly quixotic, political lyrics give Dead FM an air of youthful gravitas alongside extreme accessibility.—Matthew A. Stern
DVD REVIEW
Lucky Number Slevin
8/10
What begins with enough staccato violence to make Takashi Miike jealous shifts into a rollicking black-comic take on the gangster film genre in “Lucky Number Slevin.” Bruce Willis, as the unflappable assassin Goodkat, appears in an empty airport and regales a traveler with a violent tale, then inexplicably snaps his neck. The subsequent events are best described by the term coined and bandied about throughout the film: a “Kansas City Shuffle.” Everyone thinks they’re playing everyone else for suckers, and a few are pulling the strings. At the center of the intrigue is Josh Hartnett’s Slevin Kelevra, who has a talent for remaining schmucky while in immediate danger, and has apparently found himself in the midst of a gang war due to a case of mistaken identity. The frenetic dialogue is what makes “Lucky”. Every villain in the film doubles as a vaudevillian, making banter that makes parts of “Lucky” seem like the bloodiest Zucker Abrahams and Zucker movie to ever hit the screen.—Matthew A. Stern
