Kick me, Kate...

I am the worst Kate Nash fan around.

First off, until this afternoon, I was not aware she had a CD (My Best Friend is You) coming out Tuesday. Second, and worst of all, until about five minutes ago, I had no idea she was coming to play the Mod Club at the end of this month. Thanks to my epic clueless-ness, I am now ticket-less and sad (it's sold out!)

Thank god her new video ("Do-Wah-Do") is endlessly cute (It's like Catch Me If You Can meets Jackie Brown -  with choreographed dances). Otherwise, I might have to huddle in a corner and judge my totally disconnected myself.

Mood Music: "Mariella" by Kate Nash

Two Day is the greatest...

 

I have two truly awesome pieces of news to share. First off, She & Him's new CD, Volume 2 is out today! Second, the dynamic duo is coming to the Phoenix on June 9 - and I gots myself some tickets this afternoon! Can you say study hall hula hoop party time?

Mood Music: "Don't Look Back" by She & Him

She & Him & Love..

Photo: BeatCrave

One of my favourite bands, She & Him (otherwise known as the dynamic duo that is M. Ward and the divine Miss Deschanel), is releasing a new album (Volume 2) at the end of this month and I, for one, can't wait. I loved their first CD and am seriously digging their first single off their new record, "In the Sun". Their songs are very 60s and soulful - pretty much the musical equivilant of a perfectly-fitting vintage cocktail dress. I don't know about you, but I love me a good retro-chic frock (especially on Zooey - she's been my girl-crush for years!).

Last week, the duo released a second song from their new album called "Thieves". It is actually gorgeous. I think it may even be better than "In the Sun". Listen and love.

P.S. - How adorable is the Volume 2 artwork?

Mood Music: "Why Do You Let Me Stay Here" by She & Him

Meet my valentine: Mr. Mayer...

 

(With his hair short and shaggy and his vest looking all plaid 
and nerdy, John stole my heart before I ever heard a thing.)

While millions of couples were off getting mushy over shared desserts at various over-priced bistros last night, I had hot date with John Mayer.

John was a perfect gentleman throughout the evening, keeping the conversation light and genuine and the tunes smooth and sweet.  I'm pretty sure we had some eye-relations a few times and he almost gave me a carnation. I think I'm in love (again).

Mood Music: "Assassin" by John Mayer

Wild Things, you make my heart sing..

I finally got to see the Spike Jones version of Where the Wild Things Are this weekend. And to paraphrase one of my favourite Wild Things, I could have eaten up, I loved it so!

I can't pinpoint the exact moment or thing that made me fall for this beautiful movie because honestly, there is so much that is right about it. Karen O's soundtrack is goosebump-enducing(Please, listen to it now!). The landscape that provides the backdrop for Max's adventure is beyond epic. The monsters, or rather, Max's wild friends, are so real-looking it's out of control. Max Records' performance as the king of the Wild Things is almost too perfect (How old is this boy?! He conveyed so much emotion in this movie, sometimes I forgot he was just a kid!) And the story, oh, the story, is just the most heartbreakingly bittersweet and beautiful thing I have seen in a long time (I am tearing up just thinking about it).

From the minute the Warner Brothers logo appeared wonderfully vandalized by Max's wild drawings during the opening credits, Where the Wild Things Are just stole my heart. And if you still have a childhood innocence buried somewhere within your supposedly grown-up soul, it will steal yours away too. At least for a few hours. And you know what, that's enough. Because when it comes down to it, we're all like little Max, with his raggidy old wolf suit and makeshift crown. Sometimes we just need to get away from the harsh realities of life for a while and get a little wild.

Mood Music: "Hideaway" by Karen O and the Kids

Reese's (deliciously summerlicious) pieces = too cute for words!

I am not a fashionista by any stretchy jeans of the imagination but I have to admit, I am totally gaga for Reese Witherspoon's summerlicious printed skirt-tank-gladiators-over-sized bag combo.

The girl (actually, I should say, lady cause she looks so damn classy) usually looks gorgeous but this is one the cutest (and simplest) looks she's rocked in a while. I know I will never be a fashion sasspot but I hope that one day I can at least pull something as effortlessly chic. I am dying for one of those flattering high-waisted printed skirts but I have yet to find one that doesn't make me look like I have the hips of a non-surgically enhanced Octomom. I don't care what anyone says, hourglass is NOT the perfect shape.

Mood Music: "Love With Anything Else" by Old Springs Pike

Anthropologie's really got a hold on me...

Yesterday, I went to the new Anthropologie store at the Shops at Don Mills and fell in loverly about 140 times over.

I have been to the store several times in the States before, but I never fell as hard for the quirky looks of this upscale Urban Outfitters as I did last night. The moment I walked in, I was hooked. As I walked around the store, I was absolutely positive about three things. First, the dresses were ridiculously adorable vintage-inspired masterpieces of bohemian sass (and I'm putting that lightly). Second, that the funky styles were straight off the backs (not literally, but you know what I mean) of my favourite quirky girly style icons - Zooey Deschanel, Kate Nash and Charlotte Charles - complete with the flattering hourglass silhouettes and whimsically colorful patterns. And third, that I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with them (Bonus points if you catch that reference!)

If the price tags had been $100 less, I would have bought at least 5 of the summery frocks. But they were mighty expensive, leaving me with no choice but to admire them from afar (and briefly from underneath the extremely flattering lights of the change rooms). For now, I guess I'll have to settle for working some make-shift Zooey bangs (Vi showed me how to get em' goin'!), rockin' the occasional Kate-ish Forever 21 frock and eating amazing amounts of amusingly alliterative pie.

P.S. - Speaking of Zooey, is anyone else super-pumped for 500 Days of Summer?

Mood Music: "Why Do You Let Me Stay Here?" by She & Him

Say "Hello" to the most adorable show on Earth..

ABC has finally awoken from their ridiculously long lapse in logical thinking (too bad Ned can't revive the alive and brainless) and begun showing the final three episodes of Pushing Daisies. And I couldn't be happier (Whoa. Whoa! I just got visions of "Thank Goodness" from Wicked right there!! Loves it!).

This week's episode, the oh-so-sharply titled "Window Dressed to Kill", was absolutely quirktastic and loverly. The plot itself was rather delish (Ned figures out that he doesn't not love Olive while Emerson and Chuck try and solve some department store deaths) but the best part of the episode was Kristen Chenoweth's latest mid-scene musical outburst. Lionel Ritchie's "Hello" has never sounded so genuinely heartbreaking and fresh. And thanks to Olive's delightfully golden hat, I have never been so overwhelmingly eager to don a furry beret in the midst of summer.

I can't wait to see what the gang from The Pie Hole have in store for us next week when we get one step closer to the end of another unjustly cancelled underdog of a (terrific) series. Can you say, story of my life? I love to love the unloved.

Mood Music: "Birdhouse in Your Soul" by They Might Be Giants

Glee, you sure are terrific!

Tonight I experienced the televisual equivalent of complete geek euphoria.

The show is (most aptly) called Glee and it is a musically inclined breath of quirk-filled fresh air. It's the perfect mixture of Popular, Mean Girls and Freaks and Geeks (the high school is even called McKinley!) with a sprinkling of High School Musical (is that another Troy Bolton I see waiting to burst out of the locker room and into a inspirational power ballad?). And that's just the beginning.

The cast includes two original cast members from my favourite Broadway shows: Matthew Morrison (The Great White Way's original Link Larkin in Hairspray) and Lea Michele (Spring Awakening's first Wendla). Oh and the pilot episode alone features not one, but two (!) Journey classics: "Lovin', Touchin', Squeezin'" and of course, pop rock's pièce de résistance, "Don't Stop Believin'".

My friend Melissa once claimed that I had a serious jonesin' for underdogs. I laughed it off but after watching this show, I totally see it. Like those other McKinley castoffs I love, the kids from Glee, are not the privileged kids with the perfect hair and ludicrous lack of genuine problems or social awkwardness (see: 90210, The O.C. - both of which, I can't stand). They are the under-appreciated, the misunderstood, the down-trodden, the nerds, the freaks and the geeks all wrapped up into one. And I absolutely love them for it.

P.S. - Forgive my punny title. I couldn't resist. You should be happy I didn't do something involving the phrase "Gee Whiz!". Cause I was totally thinking about it.

Mood Music: "I'm Alright" by Kenny Loggins

I wanna, wanna, wanna, wanna be...KATE!

Yikes-a-bee! Kate Bosworth is a goddess!

Mood Music: "Alice Childress" by Ben Folds Five

To infinity and beyond with Charlie the wallflower...

Recently, I re-read one of my all-time favourite books (alongside A Complicated Kindness, To Kill a Mockingbird and The Color Purple), The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I cannot explain to you how beautiful this book is. You have to experience it for yourself. It is like My So-Called Life if Angela were a boy named Charlie and she listened to a lot of The Smiths.

I feel like this book was written for me and about it me. I mean, my name isn’t Charlie (but that is my all-time favourite name for a boy). And I’m not a boy And my life isn’t nearly as tragic as his is. But, Stephen Chbosky writes what I think and what I feel.

Here are a few words of Chbosky wisdom:

We accept the love we think we deserve.

Sometimes I look outside, and I think that a lot of other people have seen this snow before. Just like I think that a lot of other people have read these books before. And listened to those songs. I wonder how they feel tonight.

I walked over to the hill where we used to go and sled. There were a lot of little kids there. I watched them flying. Doing jumps and having races. And I thought that all those little kids are going to grow up someday. And all of those little kids are going to do the things that we do. And they will all kiss someone someday. But for now, sledding is enough. I think it would be great if sledding were always enough, but it isn’t.

I think it was the first time in my life I ever felt like I looked “good”. Do you know what I mean? That nice feeling when you look in the mirror and your hair’s right for the first time in your life? I don’t think we should base so much on weight, muscles and a good hair day, but when it happens, it’s nice. It really is.

Do you enjoy the holidays with your family? I don’t mean your mom and dad family, but your uncle and aunt and cousin family? Personally, I do. There are several reasons for this. First, I am very interested and fascinated by how everyone loves each other, but no one really likes each other.

Maybe these are my glory days, and I’m not even realizing it because they don’t involve a ball.

There is this one photograph of Sam that is just beautiful. It would be impossible to describe how beautiful it is, but I’ll try. If you listen to the song “Asleep” [by the Smiths] and you think about those pretty weather days that make you remember things, and you think about the prettiest eyes you’ve known, and you cry, and the person holds you back, then I think you will see the photograph.

There's something about that tunnel that leads to downtown. It's glorious at night. Just glorious. You start on one side of the mountain, and it's dark, and the radio is loud. As you enter the tunnel, the wind gets sucked away, and you squint from the lights overhead. When you adjust the lights, you see the other side in the distance just as the sound of the radio fades to nothing because the waves just can't reach. Then, you're in the middle of the tunnel, and everything becomes a calm dream. As you see the opening get closer, you just can't get there fast enough. And finally, just when you think you'll never get there, you see the opening right in front of you. And the radio comes back even louder than you remember it. And the wind is waiting. And you fly out of the tunnel onto the bridge. And there it is. The city.

Quoting from The Fountainhead: 'I would die for you. But I won't live for you." Something like that. I think the idea is that every person has to live for his or her own life and then make the choice to share it with other people. Maybe that's what makes people "participate".

Patrick started driving really fast, and just before we got to the tunnel, Sam stood up, and the wind turned her dress into ocean waves. When we hit the tunnel, all the sound got scooped up into a vacuum, and it was replaced by a song on the tape player. A beautiful song called "Landslide". When we got out the tunnel, Sam screamed this really fun scream, and there it was. Downtown. Lights on buildings and everything that makes you wonder. Sam sat down and started laughing. Patrick started laughing. I started laughing. And in that moment, I swear we were infinite

And my all time favourite: After the song finished, I said something. "I feel infinite." (NOTE: I swear to god, if I ever get a tattoo, those words will be it. I’m dead serious.) And Sam and Patrick looked at me like I said the greatest thing they ever heard. Because the song was that great and because we all really paid attention to it. Five minutes of a lifetime were truly spent, and we felt young in a good way. I have since bought the record, and I would tell you what it is, but truthfully, it's not the same unless you're driving to your first real party, and you're sitting in the middle seat of a pickup with two nice people when it starts to rain.

From one wallflower to another, Charlie, I love you.

Mood Music: “Nights in White Satin” – The Moody Blues

Confessions of a Rock Star groupie...

You can argue with me until the end of time, but I will ALWAYS defend the awesomeness that is Rock Star. It's actually really entertaining - and often times even hilarious (Is that Marky Mark rapping again or am I daydreaming?) And the songs (oh the songs!) are way too amazing to belong to a fictional band. Oh, and Mark Wahlberg is a stone fox in it like usual.

If you're still not sold, watch this scene. It gives me goosebumps (and often times, a few tears) whenever I watch the movie. I totally lose it when Jennifer Aniston's character, Emily (You don't know how much my pre-teen self loved the fact that Marky Mark was repeatedly saying my name) starts to choke up. Perhaps I'm a cry baby but I love me a good reunion scene. Especially when it involves a very Eddie Vedder-esque character named Chris serenading a girl with my name with a particularly beautiful Verve Pipe song.

Chris sings, "I know I can be colorful. I know I can be grey. But this loser's living fortunate, cause I know you will love me either way." This line totally speaks to me. Because even though this movie isn't perfect, I will never stop loving it. (Cheesiness totally intended.)

Mood Music: "We All Die Young" by Steel Dragon

Sundays love..

"Wild horses, we'll ride them someday..."

No matter how many times I hear it, that one line will never stop breaking my heart.

I have been in love with the song "Wild Horses" for as long as I can remember. Even though I practically worship anything The Stones touch, The Sundays' cover will always blow the original out of the water for me.

Perhaps it's because this version appeared in one of the most beautiful Angel/Buffy moments. Or maybe it's because it's featured prominetly in Fear, a Mark Wahlberg-Reese Witherspoon thriller from the 90s that really shouldn't have been a large part of my middle school life, but nevertheless was.

Either way, this cover is and will always be my favourite song of all time.

Mood Music: "The Road" by Jackson Browne

A cup o' Gilmore...

I think I am in love.

Just the sight of this cup makes me want to go to one of Taylor's town meetings. Or make a pit-stop at Al's Pancake World. Or pigout on leftover Chinese and watch old movies. Or do an all-night dance-a-thon at Miss Patty's. Or go to Friday night dinner. Or grab an extremely large cup of coffee at Luke's. Rory! Lorelai! Get me to Stars Hollow, stat!

Mood Music: "Let Go" by Frou Frou