Random Musings

The “Big Two”

Monday, 16 January, 2012 - Leave a Response

This is completely random, and it might not even make sense to anyone, but in my opinion there are some bands with what I like to call the “big two”.

This means that the band has two extremely big hits, usually in the same album, and I can never decide for myself which one is better than the other.

Here are some of my favourite examples:

“She Loves You” and “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” (by the Beatles):

I don’t know which was the bigger hit worldwide, but I know that both of them were huge hits for the Beatles in 1963. For me there is no contest – I’ll take “She Loves You” over “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” anytime. I can’t explain it, but “She Loves You” just does it for me.

“Wonderwall” and “Don’t Look Back in Anger” (by Oasis):

Both songs came out from their epic “(What’s The Story) Morning Glory?” album, and both remain two of Oasis’s most recognisable songs. One was sung by Liam, and the other by Noel. Which was the bigger song? Which one is more recognised worldwide? I don’t know.

“The Man Who Can’t Be Moved” and “Breakeven” (by The Script):

I absolutely adore both these songs, and I consider them masterpieces in their own right. Which one do I like better? It all depends on my mood and the time of day, really.

“Where The Streets Have No Name” and “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” (by U2):

Which is the bigger U2 song? It’s anyone’s guess. Two of the greatest songs from one of the most epic rock albums of all time – “The Joshua Tree”. I like “Where The Streets Have No Name” best.

“Somewhere Only We Know” and “Everybody’s Changing” (by Keane):

From Keane’s “Hopes and Fears” album. Probably still two of Keane’s most famous songs. I personally prefer “Everybody’s Changing” a tad more than “Somewhere Only We Know”.

There are so many more examples, and I could go on and on, but I think you get the idea by now. =)

Categorized in Band, Music, Random Musings and Songs

The 3 Degrees Of Handphone Sins

Thursday, 12 January, 2012 - 3 Responses

Ah, handphone etiquette – one of my pet peeves!

I’ve got a lot to say about this one.

I stumbled upon this very interesting article today from the New York Times (here), about how an entire classical music concert was abruptly halted by the conductor of the New York Philharmonic because of an inconsiderate concert attendee who refused to turn off his phone even though it had been ringing non-stop for about 5 good minutes during the concert performance.

I mean, seriously?

This is a concert by the New York Philharmonic at the Avery Fisher Hall in New York City, and this is probably one of the last few concert venues on earth you’d expect to find such neanderthalic behaviour.

What gives?

It’s bad enough you didn’t heed the call to turn your phone off at the start of the show, and worse still that when it rang for a good 5 minutes, you for whatever inexplicable reason decided to let it keep ringing.

In my opinion there are 3 degrees of handphone sins:

1) Forgetting to turn your phone off or put it to silent mode, and it rings during the concert.

Firstly folks, on a separate note – what’s the difference between turning your phone off and putting it to silent?

Why can’t we all just turn our phones off instead of putting it to silent and risk having the vibrations disturb people during the concert?

It’s not as if you are going to take any calls or answer any messages during the performance right?

Er…right?

Anyway, I’m fine with either turning the phone off or putting it to silent, although personally I always switch my phone completely off throughout a performance.

(Saves phone battery too.)

Forgetting to do either is a big sin, but I understand that it could happen to the best of us.

2) Forgetting to turn your phone off or put it to silent mode, and it rings during the concert. And you still let it ring.

This is highly unforgivable.

This is exactly what happened in the Avery Fisher Hall, and I’m sure you must have experienced this at some point in your life too.

What brings a person to not want to turn his or her handphone off even though it’s making so much noise that it can be heard three rows away?

Are they really so engrossed in the performance that they can’t hear their own phone ring, even though fifty other people around them are all clearly distracted by it?

It boggles the mind.

Perhaps they are trying to “act blur” and hope the ringing just stops and no one is able to exactly pinpoint who the culprit was, because by taking their phone out and turning it off, they are immediately being recognised as the guilty person?

3) Forgetting to turn your phone off or put it to silent mode, and it rings during the concert. And you still let it ring. And finally, when the ringing stops and we all heave a sigh a relief and turn our attention back to the performance, we hear a loud “HELLO?? WHO IS THIS???”

OK to be fair, this has never happened to me at a concert before, but it has certainly happened in smaller functions like at a wedding ceremony or a regular church service and stuff like that.

Words truly fail me whenever I encounter such a scenario.

All I can do is shake my head and sigh.

Anyone who commits handphone sin number 3 is truly a “champion” in every sense of the word.

Finally, I can’t discuss the 3 degress of handphone sins without mentioning one of my pet peeves in theatres:

Pet Peeve: Replying to messages during a play such that the glare of the handphone causes a huge distraction and disturbance to all around you.

This if one of the biggest pet peeves I have when it comes to theatre performances, and IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME.

Some people seem to think that it is perfectly OK to do this, but as far as I’m concerned the glare of the handphone in a completely dark theatre is so distracting that I find it an extremely inconsiderate act.

(Sometimes the glare even hurts my eyes a bit, especially if it is near to me.)

And nope, I’m sorry – messaging only during scene changes is still not acceptable.

I understand your good intentions but that is still a no-no.

Unless your child is about to be delivered, or there is an emergency in the workplace or at home, or aliens have just invaded the earth, I don’t see why you can’t wait till the end of the play or at least till intermission to reply that message.

Besides, if it were really that urgent you’d probably leave the theatre and not still sit there messaging away.

Categorized in Music, News and Random Musings

Review: “iChestnuts 15″

Wednesday, 11 January, 2012 - Leave a Response

Event: “iChestnuts 15″ by Stages
Venut: Jubilee Hall, Raffles Hotel
Run: 5th Jan – 21st Jan 2012

A Good Ol’ Roasting

It’s kinda amazing when you think about it – the “Chestnuts” spoof comedy franchise has lasted for 15 years, and on this 15th anniversary of the show, “iChestnuts 15″ goes the whole nine yards in reminding us how far they’ve come by interspersing the show with reenactments of a choice scene from each of their past 14 shows.

The show was part current-affairs spoofing, part retrospective – a celebration of the long and proud heritage of this most precious of local theatrical comedy franchises.

“iChestnuts 15″ is clearly a testament to the genius and tenacity of Jonathan Lim, who remains the lone common factor in the show’s storied history, for were it not for his brilliance in writing, directing and acting, this show might hardly have been able to survive for so long.

The current iteration of the show stars Jonathan himself, Rodney Oliveiro, Judee Tan, Dwayne Lau, and Judy Ngo, who was the only one not present in the previous episode.

New topics which the show covered include a chunky segment called “Into The Booths”, which was a mash up of last year’s Dream Academy production of Sondheim’s “Into The Woods” and the General Elections.

The opening segment of the night was a spoof on recent local army horror movie “23:59″, and even if you did not catch the movie (I didn’t), it was still highly entertaining in its own right.

The musical “Wicked”, of course, makes an appearance too and I very much enjoyed Judee Tan’s strong rendition of “Defying PAP”.

I thought the vocal work was marvellous…

Click (here) for the rest of the review at “Buttons in the Bread”.

Categorized in Arts, Singapore and Theatre

The Thing About Concerts

Monday, 9 January, 2012 - One Response

I’ve finally decided to buy tickets to the Roxette concert.

Woohoo!

Well, actually my going to the concert was never in doubt.

It’s just that I needed to lock down a friend who would go with me, and I finally managed to do that today.

Roxette here I come!

As far as I’m concerned, there are basically 2 types of concert acts – the “In Their Prime” acts and the “Past Their Prime” acts.

“In Their Prime” acts are those that are either currently at the peak of their success or are on their way to the peak of their success.

“Past Their Prime” acts are those that you go to secretly hoping they will just stick to playing their 10-to-20-year-old hits and stay away from playing any of their new material.

(Although sadly, based on experience, most “Past Their Prime” acts will usually always insist on playing their new material, much to the chagrin of the audience. That’s just the way it is.)

Roxette definitely falls into the category of “Past Their Prime” acts, cos their last great hit was, what, in the mid-90′s?!?

Nonetheless, you go to a “In Their Prime” act concert with a different mindset from going to a “Past Their Prime” act concert.

For the former, it’s like “Man, I can’t believe I’m experiencing them live! This is the best moment of my life!!!”

For the latter, it’s like “Dude, just run through your songbook of greatest hits and we’ll be really happy customers. Don’t worry about the new stuff. We’re not too hot on those.”

Let’s see now, of all the concerts that I can remember having gone to, how shall I classify them?

“In Their Prime” Concerts I Remember Going To:
- Coldplay
- Maroon 5
- Jason Mraz
- Blur

“Past Their Prime” Concerts I Remember Going To:
- Air Supply
- Oasis
- Rick Price
- The Cranberries
- Mr Big
- Faye Wong

Sheesh.

Have I really been to so few concerts in my life?

I don’t even remember going to any other concerts other than the above.

Categorized in Band and Music

Ministers Pay Cut

Thursday, 5 January, 2012 - 2 Responses

Just some thoughts about the ministers’ pay cut.

Firstly, I must applaud the move and say that it is a step in the right direction.

Let us give credit where it is due.

They were clearly keen to appease the public with this move.

There will be those who will still say “Not enough! Cut more!”, and while I do feel that the current salaries are still too high (we’ll get to that point later), many a times I’d like to ask these people:

“So, what will it take to make you keep quiet about ministers’ salaries? $1 million a year? $100,000 a year? $10,000 a year? Will you name a figure that will make you happy?”

There will never be an answer to this.

You can never please everyone.

Okay on to my point…

I still feel that the ministers’ salaries are far too high.

I have never been comfortable with the idea of pegging ministers’ salaries to the top earners in Singapore.

What’s the rationale for that?

Why hasn’t anyone brought up the idea of benchmarking our ministers’ salaries to that of other world leaders?

Surely that is a fair and logical way of looking at things?

And we haven’t even taken into account the size of our tiny nation as compared to the superpowers of the world.

Hasn’t anyone realised that our leaders earn far more than any other leaders in the world?

Consider the fact that even after the salary revision, our PM still earns more than three times that of Hong Kong’s Donald Tsang (who earns about US$550,000 a year), the world’s next highest-paid political leader.

Julia Gillard, David Cameron and Barack Obama earn even less than Donald Tsang.

I’m not sure if I’m the only one who finds this all a bit ridiculous.

I find this hard to swallow.

The problem with political leaders earning exorbitant salaries is that it generates a lot of dissatisfaction and unhappiness on the ground, and this has clearly been the case the past few years.

The issue of high minister salaries was a hot button topic at the recent GE.

It’s hard to fully embrace your political leaders when you know they earn much more in one month than most Singaporeans earn in one entire year.

It creates alienation and it distances you from the common people.

How is a leader expected to empathise with the ordeals of the poor and the less-privileged of society when they themselves are millionaires many times over?

Will they have the moral ground to stand before these people and say “Don’t worry, I feel your pain”?

And will they necessarily retain a sense of humility and eagerness-to-serve when they are being so handsomely-paid?

I’m not saying it’s impossible, but it is extremely hard.

I think these are the issues we need to look at.

Categorized in Politics and Random Musings

Wedding Proposals (Part II)

Monday, 2 January, 2012 - One Response

Kkat shared an interesting link in a recent comment (here), and the article is entitled “Proposal Planners: If You’re Ready to Pop the Question”.

It’s about a new line of professionals who specialise in planning your wedding proposal.

So whereas in the past we used to only have wedding planners, now we have “proposal planners” as well.

So what happens is that for a fee, they will help you dream up the perfect proposal scenario, and at the same time assist you in executing it as well, depending on the constraints of your budget.

Hey this sounds right up my alley.

If you think about it, it’s no different from writing up a playscript and having actors act them out, don’t you think?

I definitely think that this is something I could be good at, ha!

And it sounds really fun too.

Anyway, I was just thinking about the whole notion of wedding proposals recently.

They way I see it, it’s quite a simple affair actually.

I don’t know what the fuss is all about.

You see, for the ladies, they are in 1 of 2 states: Either they are “ready” to accept your proposal or they are “not ready”.

It’s as simple as that.

What I mean is that after being together with you for a certain period of time, she might reach a point where she tells herself “OK, I am now ready to get married to you, so if you propose to me anytime after today I will definitely accept.”

Get my drift so far?

So on that fateful day when the guy finally decides to pluck up the courage to execute his grand, elaborate song-and-dance routine known as the wedding proposal, he should realise that his girlfriend is essentially either a) ready to marry him, or b) not ready to marry him.

It’s completely binary, if you think about it scientifically.

So what’s there to be nervous about?

You mean that sneaky flash mob dance routine you engineer would be the deal-clincher?

Or that heart-wrenching speech you make in front of two hundred people would sway her from a “I don’t want to marry you” to “OK, let’s get married now!”?

Or maybe you should have ordered her the lobster instead of trout over dinner?

You get my drift now?

Any girl who’s rational would have thought about it in advance, about whether she is ready to marry her boyfriend.

Surely the form of wedding proposal would not be instrumental in her decision to marry him or not, right?

No one bases her decision on whether she wants to marry him from how elaborate or impressive the proposal was, right?

If you’re ready to marry, you’re ready, and if you’re not ready, then you’re not.

I’m just sayin’.

Categorized in Love, Random Musings and Relationships

Favourite Romantic Comedies Of All Time

Friday, 30 December, 2011 - 7 Responses

Romantic comedies happen to be one of my favourite genres of film.

I love the frivolity of it all, and the fact that for all its predictability, it still never fails to make you go “awww”.

(Well, at least the good ones do that.)

I say “frivolous” because at the end of the day, it’s all about the love lost and found between one man and one woman, simple as that.

I can’t say that I’ve watched a whole lot of romantic comedies in my time, but I would say I’ve watched enough.

My favourite ones are as follows, in no particular order:

1) “When Harry Met Sally” – The first of Nora Ephron’s great trilogy of romantic comedies. I love this for the extremely witty dialogue, and the fact that Billy Crystal is just one of the funniest dudes ever. Meg Ryan was still kinda young-ish, and in my opinion hadn’t really blossomed into a full-fledged movie star yet, but you could see the potential in her nonetheless. My favourite scene was when they were having the argument about the “wagon wheel coffee table”, LOL!

2) “You’ve Got Mail” – How can you go wrong with this? Meg Ryan in the irresistible prime of her life, plus Tom Hanks, set in New York City, with a refreshingly new take on the rom-com angle, tapping on the start of the internet age and all that. Beautiful storytelling, great setting, incredible actors.

3) “Serendipity” – I truly believed that Kate Beckinsale was the most beautiful woman on earth when I first saw this film. I absolutely loved the whole notion of “serendipity” of which this movie was based on, and John Cusack is one of the great “average Joes” of romantic comedy. More “romantic” than “comedy”, but an absolute emotional journey nonetheless. I can’t believe that I only recently found out that Jeremy Piven starred as the buddy in this film. I never knew that!!

4) “My Best Friend’s Wedding” – Couldn’t possibly do a list without Julia Roberts in it, could we? In my opinion, this is still the greatest Julia Roberts rom-com ever. I love the whole sentiment of the film – about how we don’t know how to cherish the things we have until we learn that they are taken away from us. The scene on the boat, when they say “the moment passes you by”…well, that is the stuff that classics are made of.

5) “500 Days of Summer” – The most quirky and unconventional of rom-coms I’ve watched. But still one of the best, nonetheless. Also one of the most painful and hard-hitting rom-coms as well. Don’t get me wrong, it’s incredibly funny and entertaining, but the entire storyline is actually a very sad one.

6) “Music & Lyrics” – This film is very special to me because it was the film that made me decide to start dabbling in songwriting. I actually started the Songcraft songwriting circle two months after watching this film. If I had never watched this film, I would probably never have started songwriting. I’m glad that Hugh Grant appears at least once in my list, cos no one does dry humour like Hugh Grant. Never been a big fan of Drew Barrymore though (which explains why I could never bring myself to like “50 First Dates”). The film itself isn’t particularly fantastic or incredible, just your predictable slightly-above-average rom-com, but the subject matter and the fact that it starred a very in-form Hugh Grant allowed this film to make it to my list. Plus the fact that it got me started on actual songwriting. So you could say that this film actually changed my life significantly.

7) “27 Dresses” – Can’t have a list without Katherine Heigl, can I? This is my favourite Katherine Heigl film of all time, and judging by the way her career is panning out, it will most probably remain my favourite Katherine Heigl film of all time. I like this movie because it deals with the subject of weddings, and it’s about how Heigl is always helping others with their weddings, but never meets any luck of her own. Then finally one day she finally gets the dream wedding she’s been hoping for – not without any trials and tribulations, of course – and that final shot in the movie is just incredible. (You have to watch it to know what I’m talking about. It has something to do with the title of the movie.)

Categorized in Love, Movies and Relationships

Proposal From “Runaway Bride”

Friday, 30 December, 2011 - 6 Responses

ST left a comment a few posts earlier (here) and shared this interesting clip from “Runaway Bride”, which showed a rare occurrence of a lady proposing to a man.

Now I’ve never seen “Runaway Bride” before (I’m guessing it’s one of the more missable of Julia Roberts’ romantic comedies?), but I found this scene strangely unwatchable.

Unwatchable in the sense that I found it boring and difficult to sit through.

I guess it doesn’t help that I’ve not seen the movie before and that I do not know the context of the scene.

Firstly, I think this clip shows us why it is just unnatural for a woman to propose to a man.

The dynamics just seem plain awkward.

I think we can all safely agree that a man is supposed to be the one doing the proposing.

Secondly, I found the scene unbelievable, because…why in the world does Julia Roberts need to propose to anyone?

It’s not as if no one wants her to marry him.

It’s just like when Topher Grace decides to walk out on Anne Hathaway in that scene from “Valentine’s Day”…I mean, which guy in the right mind walks away from Anne Hathaway?

So therefore, when a scene is not believable, I won’t feel particularly drawn into it.

And I still don’t think I will want to watch “Runaway Bride” any time soon. =)

Categorized in Love, Relationships and YouTube

Best Band Discovery of 2011

Monday, 26 December, 2011 - Leave a Response

I know I’m a bit slow, but my best band discovery for this year has definitely got to be The Script.

I’ve been listening to their eponymous album, and I absolutely adore “The Man Who Can’t Be Moved” and “Breakeven”.

I think they just might be the greatest band to come out of Dublin since U2.

Don’t you just love it when you discover a band that is just so incredibly amazing?

Back in the 90′s, I used to discover more amazing bands because back then the great emerging bands tended to come along more frequently.

Nowadays the great emerging bands tend to be few and far between.

Keane was my best band discovery of 2009.

The Script is definitely my best band discovery of 2011.

Categorized in Band and Music

Wedding Proposals

Friday, 23 December, 2011 - 18 Responses

For some strange reason I have been coming across a few wedding proposal video clips on social media the past week or so.

Recently there was one about a flash mob at the Singapore Flyer, which was actually a wedding proposal in disguise.

(It’s 12 minutes worth of epic drama, I couldn’t bring myself to watch the entire thing.)

Just today I came across another one (here) – much more subdued, but equally touching nonetheless.

I realised it’s actually pointless to use the word “touching” or “sweet” to describe wedding proposal videos, because honestly speaking, which proposal video isn’t right?

The only proposal video I’ve ever come across that wasn’t touching or sweet was the one (here) where the woman did not accept the proposal.

That one was really sad.

Poor guy.

Anyway, I’ve given this some thought, and I’ve come to realise a few things.

Firstly, successful wedding proposal videos will always be enjoyable to watch, because the ending is always happy.

It’s one thing that we can never get enough of.

No matter whether it was tastefully done or cheesily done, whether the idea was a good one or a ho-hum one, as long as she said “yes” or nodded her head in the end, then the ends justify the means.

There will always be the same two protagonists, and they will always play the same roles, and there will always be the same things in the video to look out for.

The plot points are always exactly the same:

The girl will be unsuspecting.

The guy will be nervous as he prepares his carefully planned-out stunt.

There will be the “Huh?” phase for the girl whereby some kind of strange stunt is pulled on her and she won’t know what’s going on for that brief moment.

She will finally hit “realization” point and figure out what is going on (and what is coming up).

She will play along with the whole song-and-dance.

When the jig is over, the guy will summon up enough gall to start his monologue about a) how long he’s known her, b) how much she means to him, and c) how he can’t bear to live without her.

The guy will go down on one knee (required), and pull out the ring box that is handily tucked in one of his easily-reachable pockets, and while flashing the ring, ask her if she would marry him?

The girl will then cover her mouth with one of her hands, pull the “I’ve never been more surprised in my entire life” look, pretend to give his proposal some serious thought, and while dabbing the tears from her eyes, accept his ring and finally say “YES”.

He gets up from one knee, they embrace, and the video’s background music suddenly rises to a loud crescendo.

Cue applause and cheering from friends all around.

It used to be that you needed to pull off an impressive, creative, memorable wedding ceremony with the snazzy wedding video and all that.

But is this yet another new “must have” item nowadays?

Apart from the wedding video, do we also need to have the snazzy proposal video as well nowadays?

Cos some of these proposal videos I’ve seen are really very professionally done, and must not have been easy or cheap to produce.

It’s literally like a short film.

Whatever happened to those simple good ol’ fashioned proposals over, say, dinner for two at Swensen’s whereby the guy just casually asks “Shall we apply for a HDB together?” or something like that?

Or that stroll in the park late at night when the guy suddenly whips out the ring and just outright asks her?

Must everything be professionally filmed and turned into a viral video nowadays?

I dunno if I’m right, but it seems like weddings, and now proposals, are turning into a game of “see who can come up with the most creative video”.

We Singaporeans are competitive like that.

If ever I had to propose, I don’t yet know how I would do it, but I would reckon I wouldn’t want it to be filmed, nor would I want to do it in front of all of our friends.

That would just be plain awkward.

Hey, if I could get away with it, I wouldn’t even want to be the one doing the proposing. =)