So the past two days I've listened to Olivia Tremor Control's Dusk At Cubist Castle, and I think I liked it more these times than I ever had before. The Green Typewriters suite only has two tracks that are kind of dull, and the songs on the first half seemed more distinct than they had previously. Just a really good record. It made me happy. More than happy, it filled me with a feeling that I liken to an epiphany, if anyone else knows that feeling. I don't quite know how to describe it. I recommend listening to the album in half. It makes the second half seem less abstract and boring, and it doesn't leave you tired by the end.

Music this year I guess has been kind of lackluster, at least from my perspective. That new Modest Mouse record has a lot wrong with it. Sidenote: Apparently the Olsen Twins like Modest Mouse. When I first learned that, my world stopped making sense.

Looking at the Pitchfork best new music page for this year, the highest-ranked things were the new Loretta Lynn record produced by Jack White, the Madvillain record, and this William Basinski experimental ambient box set. There's other stuff closer to my general taste that ranked lower, which generally has been pretty disappointing, although the Les Savy Fav singles compilation has its moments. They haven't reviewed the new Mirah, because I guess it's not officially out yet, but that, while decent, isn't the masterpiece that I was, if not expecting, at least hoping for. She's had enough moments that I think she could make a great record as opposed to good records with great moments. Good records with great moments are all very well and good, but I guess not what I'm looking for.

Also yesterday, I watched Stanley Kubrick's Lolita, which was quite good. Funnier than the book, at least from my perspective. The book's all puns and "wit," the movie has Peter Sellers. Which... in the realm of older comedy, I'm thinking his stuff has aged the best. I haven't seen the stuff he did that didn't involve Stanley Kubrick, but those two Kubrick films make me laugh. You know what didn't make me laugh so much? The Producers. The Springtime For Hitler bit did out of context, but the movie as a whole didn't work for me. The whole Xero Mostel/Gene Wilder bits have this timing which just doesn't work for me, they're like coked-up vaudevillians. Anyway, Lolita, a good movie, and a good book. I like that Showtime tried to make a movie out of Lolita. Like, the first one had Kubrick and a script by Nabokov, and Peter Sellers and James Mason, so in their attempt to adapt Nabokov better than Nabokov did, they cast Melanie Griffith. Funny to me.

I guess the next two movies I'll see will be Secret Things and maybe Spartan at the Capital Theatre before returning to Philly. Spartan looks bad but if I can see it for free/part of a double feature it might be worth my time. Not super-new, but newer than most of the stuff I've been into. I wonder if Coffee And Cigarettes will still be showing in Philly by the time I get back, or if I'll have to wait for the DVD. If the latter, I don't know when I'll get around to watching it.

But mainly, yeah, older things, as the new things have been kind of disappointing. Actually, with the exception of Lolita, what I've been into isn't that old, it's just not new. Newness has a different set of standards. Sometimes these standards are lower, I find that when I go to the movies I'm generally expecting less than when I rent something, as when I'm renting something it's usually something "classic" and hyped beyond belief. I guess that what I'm craving now is something that can just be described as next-level shit, you know? Last year had some things like that. Granted, the year's still early. There's a Built To Spill record at some point I think, and a new Wes Anderson movie. Both of those could theoretically be amazing.

There is that whole feeling of looking forward to things that haven't happened yet, though. Today was an academic fair, and I know what class I'm going to try to get into- it's a thing on post-modernism, where you read books by Pynchon and Murakami and watch films by Godard and Bunuel, (I'm hoping not the same ones I've already seen, that they have at the school library, hence making me think that it probably will be the same ones) so that could be a fun time, I'm thinking. Granted, I don't know if I'll make it into that class.

I don't know. 2004. I hope it'll turn it okay. I suppose it is going okay, and there's nothing to suggest that'll change. I'm hoping something amazing happens.