Monday, April 7, 2014

Summoner: Phoenix / Hendricks Gin: Martini / Captain America: The Winter Soldier

I don't know if this counts as prep work or if it's just an afternoon of easy wins or what it is.  I guess it's a random assortment of things that I wanted today.




Summoner: Phoenix
Magnetic Eye Records
 
Melodic metal is a tightrope. Too polished and you sound like a shitty pop-metal band, too dirty and the melody starts to go out the window. Summoner walks this tightrope with what seems like extreme ease. They blend a spacey psychadelia with galloping rhythms and vocals that are just gruff enough give them great crossover appeal. Heavy but not extreme would be the best way to put it I suppose. Summoner just put out a second album called Atlantian which is also great but when I saw that Magnetic Eye was doing a $10.00 special on this album in a clear base with "oxblood" splatter I couldn't resist. I mean look at that! It's gorgeous and worth every penny. I wasn't sure the best way to photograph something that was clear so I left my hand in there so you could see that it is in fact clear. Phoenix is an easy listen for fans of all sorts of rock genres. It's got big riffs, spaced out interludes, harmonized guitar leads, and great melodic vocals. Think, early The Sword with a bigger psych influence. There is a lot of quiet on this record, not usual for metal I know but the quiet is important here. The albums' 3rd song, "Let the Light In", comes at you in waves. The swirling guitar effects and reverbed out vocals give way to huge crashes of well timed and built up distortion. The tremolo picked ending section sounds like Explosions in the Sky and serves to add another nuance to the world that Summoner builds on record. This song is probably the best at combining all of Summoners pieces into a greater whole. The flow of the album is impeccable-- cinematic would be a good word for it. The words as well as the music are telling stories here and that is not an easy thing to do when writing songs. There is a great deal of fore-site involved in putting something this cohesive together.  All of this up and down and thematic writing does not make Phoenix cumbersome however. Letting this album spin 2 or 3 times in a row wouldn' be difficult at all. The changes in dynamics, interesting guitar textures help to ease you through the flow of the record. There is also nothing that really beats you over the head and makes you feel like their overdoing it, it's moderate in the best way possible. Phoenix is a great casual listen but if you're willing to really open your ears and mind to it, it's an even better in depth listen.




 Hendricks Gin Martini
5.5 oz Hendricks Gin
.75 oz Dry Vermouth
Dash of Bitters
2 Bleu Cheese suffed Olives

This is a pretty classic Martini with a couple of easy twists. Well the bitters isn't really a twist so much as it is a throwback. Bitters is something that people use in their Martini's but I think the practice died off. While it's true that too much bitters and you will completely kill the cocktail, a quick hit will add a nice kick to the end as well as a lingering, spice. The bleu cheese olives were something I saw on an episode of No Reservations. It was a hotel bar in Bombay India so you know that's a proper gin Martini. Although I thought it was super weird at the time, when I saw the jar of bleu cheese stuffed olives at the store I had to try it. I tell you this, once you make a martini with a bleu cheese stuffed olive you'll never turn back. The salt from the cheese and the briney olive mixed with the sharp herbal taste of the gin are a perfect combonation. I've done with with Vodka martinis as well and it's still good, but I'm far more into Gin than Vodka, strange seeing as I'm of Polish descent and all. Gin just has more flavor-- the floral and herbal tastes in the gin make for a super refreshing cocktail and Hendricks is the best. I use just enough dry vermouth to color the gin a little bit and give the cocktail some texture. Add all liquid ingredients to a tumbler with ice, shake and strain. I can already hear the yelling from across the internet. Yes, I shake my martini's. No, I don't think I'm James Bond. I don't shake the hell out of it I just shake it enough to chill it, get a few ice shavings in there and mix everything properly. "You know that waters it down more right?!?!" say the million voices from the internet. Yes, I'm aware. This is 6.25 oz of booze, (a standard shot is about 1 oz), you can do with a little water in it and a few ice chips to keep it a little colder. I also believe it spreads out the flavor, doesn't make everything so concentrated and make the whole cocktail taste more rounded and easier to enjoy. So sue me, I like my maritini's shaken. If you want to stir it be my guest, I'm not going to hold it against you.




Captain America: The Winter Soldier Vol. 1
Author: Ed Brubaker
Artist: Steve Epting

Record cranking and cocktail made, it's time to settle in with something familiar comic-wise. I used to love Captain America as a kid. I had a subscription and everything. As with most things though, you get older, more cynical and things start seeming less appealing. I had a conversation with my friend Brian of The Suicide Dolls when the first Avengers movie was coming out about which character people would find the least believable. I said Thor. Don't get me wrong, they did a good job in the end but seriously why is this god coming down to fight on the side of earth? Not just Earth but America... he was a Norse god for Pete's sake. And yeah Natalie Portman is hot, but are you telling me there are no better looking wenches on Asgard? I just don't believe it. Brian said Captain America. He just didn't believe that in this day and age people would relate to a do-gooder-boy scout fighting for truth, justice and the American way. I said, "this is a solder that the government pumped full of experimental drugs in order to create more impressive propaganda and beat the hell out of nazis, how is that not plausible?". I think I swayed him. So now we're getting a second Captain America movie, entitled "The Winter Soldier", so I figured I ought to read the comics so I can see how any liberties Hollywood takes.

I gotta tell you, this first volume does not have "blockbuster" written all over it. It does portray Cap in a more realistic, and big screen ready, "war is hell" honest-to-god-veteran sort of light, most of the issues in this collection are built on flashbacks and setup of current events. Brubacker takes his time with this story. He's trying to build intrigue and make you guess at what's coming next. He doesn't just blurt out who the bad guy is and what the secrets are that the good guys are keeping. He makes you wait and lets the suspense mount. While he does build the intrigue he also makes you wanna yell "GET ON WITH IT!". The amount of flashbacks in this book border on tedious. He does manage to put them all in proper context and bring everything together in the last issue or so. There is some blurring of reality versus flashback that drives the point home but it all could have been collected within panels at a time not pages.

Despite the long winded-ness of some of the story, Brubaker does make you want to continue on. You want to know what happens next rather than just saying "to hell with it". Cap is likeable as a more human character, less boyscout and more a PTSD suffering solder who has seen too much and had more asked of him than should be asked of anyone, (super soldier or not). Like most good soldiers though, he fights on for the good of the common man, (whoever that is). Also this story takes some pretty bold steps right off the bat. I don't want to spoil it but there is death and espionage and internal affairs, just not a heck of a lot of action. Brubakers writing is good it just appears largely unedited.

The art is also a high point, nothing that's overly stylized but there are palpable changes during flashbacks and time periods which is very important. The colors are darker and everything is just detailed enough to feel real and honest. Red Skull also looks completely awesome. As one of the most sinister and iconic villains of the Marvel universe I think that is of the utmost importance. So I'm pretty sure I'm not prepped for the new Captain America movie at this point. What I do know is that The Winter Soldier Vol. 1 made me want to be prepped, so I'll have to head back down to the comic shop for Vol. 2 before I hit the theaters.