The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3

So there's a new remake of the amazing 1974 original due out this year with Denzel Washington and John Travolta. Looks terrible. The original is one of the most taut and tension-filled crime dramas ever made. Robert Shaw and Walther Matthau facing off? C'mon! Matthau's most bad ass role next to Coach Buttermaker in The Bad News Bears.

And the main titles are amazing. Even danceable! If you're out there, M, I love your waitress dance to this.

The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (Main Titles) by David Shire.

Springtime; partially healed; finally.

Kicked It In the Sun by Built to Spill.

"Shouting and singing and hullooing his satellites the gregarious sun comes ranting upon the collective stage. After so many billion repetitions you might expect him to be getting the least bit perfunctory: but not he; no sirree. Like a conscientious actor determined to give the public full value for money, he rampages through his performance as enthusiastically as the first time he put on the act."

From Sleep Has His House by Anna Kavan.

Three Songs from Aki Kaurismäki's "Proletariat Trilogy"

I've been obsessively watching Aki Kaurismäki films lately. Not only are the films simultaneously bleak and uplifting - in a way that only eastern Europeans can effortlessly create - but the music selections from his films are always great (e.g., see below, Joe Strummer's "Burning Lights" from the wonderful film I Hired A Contract Killer starring Jean-Pierre Léaud).

Varjoja Paratiisissa ("Shadows In Paradise") (1986)

The Renegades: My Heart Must Do the Crying


Ariel (1988)
Casey Bill Weldon: W.P.A. Blues


Tulitikkutehtaan Tyttö ("The Match Factory Girl") (1990)
The Renegades: Cadillac


Bonus: scene from I Hired A Contract Killer (1990)

Waning Gibbous

The weight of the moon
at night
is heavy.
Looking up,
I see
that it is already waning.
Soon, there will be
unsettling nights lacking luminescence.

Current 93: Moonlight, You Will Say

Yeti sightings