My top twenty-one of 2021 (and 21 days).
Some of the things I loved last year, and part of this one. No order, no criteria. Not even based on release date, just that I discovered them during Pandemic, Part 2. I kept it to items you can experience too, and mostly online.
How to do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy by Jenny Odell
This book shifted my thinking without telling me how to think. Odell, a multi-disciplinary artist whose work involves acts of close observation, explores “the ways in which attention (or lack thereof) leads to consequential shifts in perception at the level of the everyday.” She assembles and recontextualizes such separate themes as labour movements origins and bird-noticing at the KFC. My life is better for paying attention to my attention.
Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003)
Thom Andersen assembles close to 200 clips spanning nearly 100 years, from the silent era to modern times, to form this essay on film, culture and urbanity. It builds to a statement that rings as true today as when Andersen first made it. YouTube hacks mimic its style but not its skill. This instantly established itself as my favourite documentary and may be the first Blu-ray I buy.
Having a whole theatre to myself for Fast 9 (2021)
It was like a private screening. I don’t want to spoil anything, (He wanted to kiss Helen Mirren, amitrie?!) so here’s ten Vin Diesels saying ‘family’.
SOAK, STRIPE, SPLATTER:
Collecting Colour at the AGA
An exhibit of the bright and the pale, the geometric and the organic. Recommended to me in a description both practical and emotional (via dating app, so they may not suck!). This deceptively simple exhibit is worth playing hooky for. On until January 30.
Twenty Years Gone: Joel Plaskett Emergency Revisits Down at the Khyber (2021)
What can you do when a pandemic hits? Get the band together and re-record the first LP. This time around the songs have a perfect patina. I love the comfortable performances and the intimate (but rocking) recording. The 2021 release I kept returning to, “in Edmonton, Alberta or home in Halifax.”
MSR Lightning Explore snowshoes
To paraphrase Ferris Bueller, they are so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking some up
The Big Sleep (1946) & The Long Goodbye (1973)
Begrudging nihilism done two ways. Raymond Chandler adaptations, both written by Leigh Brackett, 25 years apart. The dames in the ‘46 picture have ‘enough sex appeal to stampede a businessmen’s lunch.’ Philip Marlowe forever.
Angel (1983) hosted by Joe Bob Briggs with David Gordon Green
VHS kids know the cover but not the movie. This has the grab of a Law and Order episode, but one that sticks with the victim and her friends. Filled with rich characters—played by a cast worth the wiki—the film makes you care more about the “misfits” than the murder. Depictions of sex-workers and LGBTQ folks that are “realistic” and caring, not problematic—by 2021 standards, not just for a 1983 exploitation flick.
I watched this as part of Joe Bob's Halloween Hoedown on Shudder. The conversation with director David Gordon Green made me love directors again. My conversations with others watching almost made me love Twitter.
Make My Day Episode 84: Pep Talks with Ron Funches
A positive podcast shifts its format for “that guy with the giggle”. If you want to feel good about yourself, strange concepts, and inanimate objects, press play. And it’s hilarious. Nice guys win!
Charlie Brown's America by Blake Scott Ball
A short history of American society and history, told by how America related to Peanut’s and Charles Schulz’s own complex, subtle statements; where he was resolute and where he was wishy-washy. I learned about everything from civil rights, to Vietnam, to how corporations shifted environmental responsibility onto the common customer.
Fans helped Schulz integrate the strip. Schulz helped readers hate the war. Historian Ball doesn’t speculate either; access to correspondence with PTA-members and presidents inform this great read. According to his Twitter, his next subject is Batman!
WTF - Cancelled Comedy. Marc Maron w/ Kliph Nesteroff and David Bianculli
For me, the most important podcast episode of the year. I’m not going to say too much, because these three say it best. “Marc talks to comedy historian Kliph Nesteroff and Smothers Brothers biographer David Bianculli about the history of comedians complaining they “can’t say anything anymore” and what it looks like when they actually do get canceled for speaking their minds.”
If anyone thinks Chappelle deserves defending or that laughter is threatened by societal progress, tell them my “punch line” forms on the left, and send ‘em this. (One of a few items on this list via my pal Lindsey (#1 person of my 2021, if I’m reviewing.))
Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones
If I came into money to option film rights, I would have this book bought before the check cleared, and the next call would be to the makers of Reservation Dogs (which should be on this list too).
I love and identify with (some) werewolves, and Jones presents a well-thought lycanthropic life, but this isn’t just a coming-of-age-and-then-transforming tale.
“Explicit Native American topics; common themes of belonging, coming of age, hereditary trauma, survivance (active survival through creative resistance), colonialism, and the import of history continue to appear throughout his narrative fabric.” - Kristina Baudemann
Juliana Hatfield - Blood (2021), Sings The Police (2019), Sings Olivia Newton-John (2018)
If Hatfield was Gen Z instead of Gen X this catchy attack on 2020 would have millions of words about it online. When you need a break from beating Trump bloody, check out her tributes to the songs that shaped her. (Yes, let’s get physical. Please!)
Kim Cattrall in a closet full of movies.
Speaking of crushes, Kim Cattrall talking about films gives me butterflies. And those butterflies are horny.
Teenage Sequence - All This Art
I love low-budget, one-shot music videos, and I love Dewan-Dean Soomary’s pulsing beat and rapid fire cynicism. As much about systemic racism as it is his own neurosis, it’s serious and sharply humorous. If you’re in a position to do so, sign him, you racist.
On Bandcamp and queer/trans label Get Better Records,
Kid Congo & The Pink Monkey Birds - He Walked In
Another simple music video, this one from a still-vital legend. If Jenny Odell’s book didn’t teach you paying attention feels good, this ode song friend and bandmate will.
Two tweets I think about everyday.
David Huntsberger - Big Nothingness (2021)
“Placed into a virtual reality, Huntsberger takes us through an hour-long stand-up set about life, where we came from, worlds that may exist outside of our own, and some of the issues with this current existence. All while trying to determine what is reality and what is imagined.”
And talks about marshmallow orgies. This comedy concert took advantage of the pandemic to add magical animations and a strange but wonderful story device.
I Don’t Like Mondays podcast
An unprepared British husband & wife reviews every Garfield strip. They’ve made it through 23 in two years! To quote a new friend “This is so cute I can barely stand it.”
Developing emotional maturity
Damn, does it make life better. 10/10 recommend doing the work. I’m looking forward to the sequels.
Historically Black College & University Bands
If you boost your EQ, you deserve a soundtrack. For me, no one beats Southern University Marching Band. Tracks in this 2012 Rap Mix include President - Young Jeezy, Work Hard Play Hard - Wiz Khalifa , Swimming Pools - Kendrick Lamar, and Turn on the Lights - Future.
Just open the channel and hit play, or someone with a flute may step to you, and you do not want that.