Niki N. Phaser

               Alice Cooper is best known for… almost everything he does, his name being one of the quintessential pillars of heavy-metal. His 1991 album, Hey Stoopid  (the title refers to drug addiction), didn’t receive as much attention as his 80′s work, probably because of the grungy circumstances of those days. But, when you draw the bottom line, you realize that the album contains some of the master’s most recognizable hits, like the title track, Feed My Frankenstein or the symphy Might As Well Be On Mars.

                The horror-like intro (phasy pads, high piano keys, door effects), the classic whiny guitar solos suitable for hair metal ballads, they extend the song to a seven minutes length, but it all goes so fast, as if you are listening to a three minutes no.1 pop hit. Might As Well Be On Mars is what you would call a classic heavy ballad: it’s about love, heartbreak, alienation (as the title suggests), but from that ‘tough guy with long hair’ perspective: “You’ve, turned my world into a dark and lonely place, Like a planet lost in space”. It’s torch song for biker chicks, yes, but of the best quality. If you are familiar with Cooper’s Poison, you can expect the same kind of big loud, but romantic chorus, that anchors the track in mainstream and makes it appealing to non-rockers.

MIGHT AS WELL LISTEN TO IT

Cameron Crowe’s teen classic, Say Anything… is turning 20 this year (to continue our string of anniversaries). To mark the occasion, the film is being (re)released on Blu-Ray and DVD, of course and we all know that it’s not Cameron’s style to offer us something without any bonuses. This new edition will come with all the extra material you would want and some of it, available for the first time. For those of you who are not familiar with the movie (do you still exist?) it will be a good chance to get acquainted with the quintessential teen romantic comedy of the 80′s. For those of us who are already hooked on lines like “Bitches, man!” or “I gave her my heart and she gave me a pen”, this will be an opportunity to go even deeper in the genesis of this feel-good classic, that even inspired the name of the band Say Anything, as well as creating some of the most circulated clichés in the world of romantic comedy — the boombox pose is a pop icon, no doubt about it. But, then again, Cameron Crowe’s movies were always sources of pop culture iconography, whether is visual or just verbal. And to paraphrase (again) the film’s tagline, “To know Cameron Crowe is to love Cameron Crowe’s movies”.

Say Anything… TRAILER

Even before the release of The Dark Knight and, if I remember correctly, even before the death of Heath Ledger, there was a lot of buzz about his performance as Batman’s nemesis, The Joker. The shock of his untimely death, mixed with that buzz, created a suited environment for the birth of something… well, mythical, Hollywood style. When the movie came out, there was no disappointment, Ledger’s performance was as cool as everyone expected, even more. He received the entire package of acting awards and a new movie legend was born.

But since then, The Joker’s Glasgow grin has become a bit of a pop culture icon, finding itself on plenty of pop art items. I am not talking about Heath Ledger, who might or might not become the James Dean of our generation, but solely about his Joker, who makes Jack’s Joker a Joke… (some pun intended). Not only do we see his face on T-shirts and other clothing, but it actually became a hip thing to wear Joker-type make-up, on special occasions, like weddings and funerals… just kidding, but you do see plenty of Joker faces at concerts or clubs or whatnot. Youtube is filled with “Joker make-up tutorials”.

This face of evil might just become the next big thing in iconic pop images. Take down your Don Corleone and Scarface posters, replace them with the “Why so serious ?” series. Tatoo artists, start practicing Heath Ledger’s face lines. Pretty soon, it will become one of those images that few will remember where it came from, but they’ll know it’s cool to sport it. And the truth is, it is cool. I’m hesitant in claiming that it will equal the Che mania, but there will be a few bands in the future that will reference some of Joker’s lines, some parodies very soon, Halloween masks, the make-up craze will hit the mainstream and you’ll see a buch of pop stars all looking like pretty sexy versions of The Joker doing machine-gun moves and wetting their lips after every word. Just keep an eye on the process to see it unfolding step by step in front of us… And if I’m wrong I’ll probably delete this post, so no one will know…

SEE THE SIGN OF THE COMING