Pink: Funhouse Tour - Live in Australia (2009) Review

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Pink: Funhouse Tour - Live in Australia (2009) Review
Let me start this off by making it clear that I'm not like most others that would be reviewing a Pink cd or concert video.
I am a middle-aged man in my 50s. I'm not exactly her demographic and I'm not a dirty old man either. I'm a retired musician and still make a buck or two as a writer and I wrote Pink off as another of the cookie cutter pop princesses that have littered the music business ever since Madonna first got watered down by Brittany Spears. Then I heard/saw the video for "Don't Let Me Get Me" and realized that she was anything but cookie-cutter. It was her Declaration of Independence from what the music industry wanted her to be. I bought the cd the next day and heard "Family Portrait." From that point on I was a fan. Good music is hard to find and Pink makes some VERY good music.
Now, on to the Blu-Ray concert. It doesn't look like Pink knows what she wants to be when she grows up. The first handful of songs she performs are in the standard diva mode we've seen from hundreds of others from Cher on down. With a big flashy stage and a heavily choreographed dance troupe she bounces and bops through some pretty generic modern dance music. In the midst of this is "Don't Let Me Get Me" and another of her big hits, "Just Like a Pill." Although the original rock arrangement sneaks in here and there the songs are designed to get her target audience of teenaged girls jumping and happy. There isn't anything wrong with any of this section if you're in the age group that likes that sort of thing. Understand, it's just not the sort of thing I'm into. It's also the sole reason I docked the video the 1/2 point in my subject header.
BUT!
No matter how old you are - even if you're an old coot "enduring" this video with your kids or grandkids, DO NOT LEAVE THE ROOM. There is an absolutely gorgeous extended piano movement that is placed to allow Pink time for a costume change. When she re-emerges the pianist (who is also the musical conductor) and the violinist join Pink for a slightly altered and riveting version of "Family Portrait." From this point forward you are in for a rare feast to the ears and eyes. There is a very personal acoustic mini-set in which Pink plays several songs dealing with the heartache of the failure of her first marriage. They are sprinkled with some lengthy banter with the audience that is just a touch too long in parts, but the songs themselves are nothing short of gorgeous. The fact that her voice isn't pure and perfectly pitched makes the emotional tone of them all the more vital and real. As a performer myself, I wondered how she was going to be able to transition back into giving her audience more of what they came to see. She does it by a lesser-known Led Zeppelin song that interweaves gentle vocals with sudden explosions of the heavy metal that made the Zep legendary. She handles the very difficult transitions in vocals extremely well, doing Robert Plant proud, disappearing during the final extended solo for another costume change. From that point forward she and the band kick into high gear. As others have mentioned, she does indeed perform "Bohemian Rhapsody" in its entirety only unlike Queen, she and the band remain on stage and sing through the very difficult operatic central section. The song is subtly enhanced with some of Queen's original vocal tracks but the live singers MORE than hold their own. Just when you begin to wonder if Pink isn't human at all, her voice breaks for a brief moment toward the end. She smiles over at the drummer with a brief, "what can you do" look and then finishes the song perfectly. Almost any other performer would have been finished at that point, knowing they'd taken it as far as they could. Pink is literally still getting warmed up.
In addition to kicking up the energy even further, you should keep in mind that Pink also (well harnessed because of insurance requirements) executes a fairly intricate single trapeze act some 25 feet above the floor WHILE SINGING. Although lip synching is rampant amongst female vocalists nowadays, Pink does NONE of it. You can hear her gasping for breath as the songs and athletics progress. She even tosses off a joking threat that she's going to start lip synching so she can do 9 shows a week with matinees.
The lady performs for almost 2 solid hours and never once lets up. Her voice only falters once or twice during the entire night and more than once she performs lengthy acrobatics high above the stage and audience. This is a woman at the absolute peak of her performance capacity and she is one of the few people I've ever seen that could pull a show like this off once, let alone for an entire world tour.
The extra features range from being valuable glimpses behind the scenes to a somewhat silly explanation of the history of "shredding the nar." (Pinkspeak for playing face-melting guitar) Make no mistake. This lady is an artist at a time when most of her contemporaries are either complete studio-enhanced frauds or so self-obsessed with their own talents that they become intolerable. Pink is the real deal and (despite some four-letter language in her lyrics that might make you a little careful viewing the show around small children) this concert video is worth three times what you will pay for it. I don't care if you're a young teen lion or one of the tame and toothless tabby-cat baby boomers, this blu ray concert joins Stop Making Sense and The Last Waltz as one of the three absolute best concert videos on the market. It is a MUST see.
So is Pink a teeny-bop pop icon or a hard-edged rock queen that will help bring back the rock sound that has been dead for well over a decade? I don't think she knows. She shows both personalities at various points in the show.
I'm convinced that she doesn't know what she'll be when she grows up.
After watching her talent, athleticism and musical diversity in this concert I deeply hope she never finds out.Pink: Funhouse Tour - Live in Australia (2009) Overview

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Puss In Boots Review

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Puss In Boots ReviewGiven the worldwide success of the Shrek franchise, it was only a matter of time before we started seeing spinoffs, and so it comes as no surprise that the fall of 2011 sees the release of Puss in Boots. The feline lover-and-fighter quickly became an enormously popularly character following his initial appearance in Shrek 2, with his swashbuckling ways, his flirtatious voice (provided by Antonio Banderas), and his secret weapon - big, adorable eyes which turn grown men to jelly - and this new movie focuses solely on him. Directed by Chris Miller, the film again features Banderas as the leading voice, and is a prequel of sorts, telling the story of the events leading up to Puss's introduction to Shrek and Donkey, from Puss's point of view. The cast features the voices of Salma Hayek as Puss's paramour Kitty Softpaws, Zach Galifianakis as Humpty Dumpty, Billy Bob Thornton and Amy Sedaris as Jack and Jill, and even Guillermo Del Toro as the mysterious Moustache Man.
Taking over from Harry Gregson-Williams and John Powell on musical duties is another of Hans Zimmer's Remote Control alumni, English composer Henry Jackman, who has already attracted a great deal of positive attention for himself following his generally very good work on the likes of Monsters vs. Aliens, Gulliver's Travels, and two other scores from earlier this year, X-Men First Class and the new Winnie the Pooh movie. As good as those scores were, Puss in Boots is clearly his best work to date. Taking his cues from several film music contemporaries as well classical composers Manuel de Falla and Maurice Ravel (whose Bolero is probably the epitome of Spanish classical music), Jackman's score is a wonderfully entertaining, high energy action-adventure score, topped with an appropriately healthy dose of Latin fire.
The first thing long-time film music fans will notice is how much of a similarity there is between this score and James Horner's Zorro scores, The Mask of Zorro and The Legend of Zorro. This is clearly intentional - temp track bleed-through at worst, loving homage at best - but is also wholly appropriate in a sort of neo-satirical way, acknowledging the fact that Banderas plays both Zorro and Puss, and that Puss is clearly a Zorro clone. This sense of tongue in cheek self-awareness runs through the entire film - and the entire Shrek series, really - and helps dispel the notion of the score being a "Zorro rip-off" and nothing more.
Written for a large orchestra with emphasis on strings and brass, as well as a vast array of Spanish and Mexican specialty instruments and percussion items, Jackman's score starts out with the energy turned up fully, and rarely lets up throughout the score's 66-minute running time. Upon hearing the opening cue, "A Bad Kitty", with its flashing guitars, flamenco-style hand claps and foot stomps, trembling castanets, resounding trumpet calls, and swirling string writing, you know what kind of experience the score has in store.
The main theme - a heroic fanfare with a romantic and passionate flourish - first appears in this cue, and is prominent throughout the rest of the score, appearing in many guises, and being played in numerous different instrumental combinations. The B-phrase of the theme is the one most clearly inspired by Horner, and generally tends to appear at moments of great emotion or pathos, where it plays as a recurring motif for Puss's heroism and gallantry, in cues such as the outstanding "Honor and Justice", the stirring "Confronting the Past", and the big finale in "The Great Terror" - the latter of which even manages to make use of Horner's favorite tension-builder, the shakuhachi bamboo flute.
The theme is especially adept at appearing in action settings, but has a mischievous edge to it in cues such as the playfully seductive pair of "Kitty Softpaws" and "Kitty-Cat Break-Out", and even a more pathos-laden stripped-down flavor in "Team Effort". In the flashback sequence of "The Orphanage", it runs through a variety of different guises as Puss recollects his kittenhood, and his first steps on the road to fame as a swordfighter, prior to him finally receiving the boots that will become his trademark; the variety of orchestral color and inventiveness in this cue, and the gamut of emotions Jackman squeezes into just over four minutes, is impressive indeed.
The action music, which first appears in "Chasing Tail" but features much more prominently in the score's second half, generally tends to be big, bold and lively, with strong rhythmic elements and a genuine sense of drama and adventure. Cues such as "That Fateful Night", the stirring "The Wagon Chase", "The Magic Beanstalk", the enormous "Golden Goose of Legend", and the aforementioned "The Great Terror" could have successfully appeared in any serious live-action western without much alteration. Similarly, the surprisingly dark "I Was Always There" uses the guitars and accordions in a different way altogether, ramping up the tension levels, before building up into a tragedy-laded and unexpectedly emotional finale.
The haunting trumpet calls, whistles, electric guitars and harmonicas of "One Leche" are excellent pastiches of vintage spaghetti western-era Ennio Morricone, and similar ideas carry through the likes of "Holy Frijoles" and parts of "Confronting the Past". Similarly, the very brief "Jack and Jill" has flavors of Hans Zimmer's `hallucinating Jack Sparrow' music from the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie, although this is just a passing nod and a wink. There is also a twinkling, magical motif for the Jack and the Beanstalk sequence that reaches its zenith in "Castle in the Clouds" and the first half of the aforementioned "Golden Goose of Legend", where the soaring central melody tends to be accompanied by all manner of chimes, cooing choirs, and celestial superfluities. In a way, it's a shame that the Jack and the Beanstalk motif is destined to overshadowed by the Latin flair of the Puss theme, because it's good enough to be a main theme in its own right, and is likely to be forgotten amongst all the panache elsewhere.
In addition to his own work, Jackman also collaborated with the Mexican guitar duo Rodrigo Sánchez and Gabriela Quintero, collectively known as Rodrigo y Gabriela, whose contributions to Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides earlier this year were strangely muted, but who are on top form here. Their two showpiece cues, "Diablo Rojo" and "Hanuman", are simply sensational; the speed and precision of their performances are nothing short of breathtaking. This is exactly the stuff I wanted to hear from them in Pirates of the Caribbean and didn't get, but fans of their work will absolutely love what they have brought to this project.
The album finishes with "The Puss Suite" - a superb and highly enjoyable remix of the main theme underpinned by a more contemporary electronic beat and enlivened by a Crimson Tide-style male voice choir and an occasional "olé!" befitting Ricky Martin or Enrique Iglesias - and "The Giant's Castle", a restatement of the fairytale Jack and the Beanstalk theme which ends the score with an appropriately magical tone.
Despite my protestations to the contrary and my assertations that it's an intentional homage, I suspect that many people will have issues with how similar Jackman's theme is to Horner's Zorro scores, and that it will result in many people decrying Puss in Boots as nothing more than a poor imitation. For me, however, to do so would be a huge injustice and a slap in the face to Jackman and all the work he has put into this score. The orchestral inventiveness, the fantastic use of the guitars and other Spanish specialty instruments, the outstanding Jack and the Beanstalk theme, and the show-stopping contributions of Rodrigo y Gabriela combine to make Puss in Boots one of the most unexpectedly engaging and entertaining score of the year, and confirms my earlier thought that Henry Jackman is poised to follow in the footsteps of Harry Gregson-Williams and John Powell as possibly the most talented composer to emerge from Remote Control for many years.Puss In Boots Overview

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