// Category Archive for: Feminism

Assemblog: January 25, 2013

Evil Dead

New this week on Popshifter: Paul gives reasons to care about the upcoming Bioshock Infinite and ponders choice in the virtual world of gaming; I recommend the new Ty Segall reissues (The Traditional Fools, Reverse Shark Attack) from In The Red Records; Melissa loves Hard Core Logo, but not the sequel, and is over the moon for Don Rich and Buck Owens; Cait praises Rosie Flores’s new album Working Girl’s Guitar; and Julie describes the “exquisite collection of songs” on Wildlife, the new solo album from Gudrun Gut.

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Music Review: Gudrun Gut, Wildlife

By Julie Finley

Wildlife is the new album by Gudrun Gut, released on Gudrun’s very own Monika Enterprise label. Her last musical outing prior to this was her collaborative project known as Greie/Gut Fraktion (a partnership with Antye Greie), but Wildlife is an actual solo outing (her second official solo album since I Put a Record On from 2007).

Wildlife is an exquisite collection of themes that are definitely in touch with nature. What I mean is that the focus is on nature in more than one context. No, this is not a tree-hugging manifesto; it has more to do with being aware of your surroundings, in a physical, as well as an emotional manner. It focuses on the vulnerability of humans, as well as all other living organisms.

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Music Review: Rosie Flores, Working Girl’s Guitar

By Cait Brennan

Rosie Flores is one of a kind. Fiercely independent, passionate, and soulful, Flores is a top-tier guitar virtuoso whose always-interesting work bridges blues and country; rockabilly and surf; and Southern California cowpunk and Tex-Mex to create her own strikingly original sound.

In the mid-’80s she fronted a great full-on Hollywood all-girl cowpunk outfit called the Screamin’ Sirens, but as fun as it was, it barely hinted at what was ahead. In 1987 Warner/Reprise released her solo debut, Rosie Flores, a pitch-perfect set produced by Dwight Yoakam’s producer and guitarist Pete Anderson. It was a brilliant pairing, and the record received near-universal praise from critics.

But despite the label’s effort to angle Flores as the female Yoakam, she was impossible to pigeonhole, and the following year she hightailed it to Austin, where she formed a new band featuring fellow luminaries like Junior Brown on pedal steel. Austin and Flores were nigh made for each other, and 1995’s Rockabilly Filly cemented Flores’s place in the firmament with a mighty collection of tunes featuring giants like Wanda Jackson and Janis Martin (the “Female Elvis,” whose work Flores has championed on many occasions.)

Flores is one of the finest guitarists alive, with nitro-fueled guitar solos that evince an expressiveness and fire that few of her contemporaries can match. Her custom “SteeltopCaster” guitar rings out like lightning on her new album Working Girl’s Guitar, a blazing set of rockabilly, rock, and blues classics interspersed with some fine new originals.

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Assemblog: January 18, 2013

Bates Motel

New this week on Popshifter:
J Howell likes the new Atoms For Peace single “Judge, Jury, and Executioner”; Cait raves about The Definitive Shoes Collection; JG Thirlwell gives us his Best Of 2012; Emily says John Cale will always be cool; Chelsea suggests Erin McKeown newbies check out her latest album Manifestra; I interview Resolution directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead; give my Top Ten Picks for 2013 movies and the Sundance Film Festival; and discuss new music from Adam Ant, Iceage, and Suede.

Remember when I said I wasn’t going to talk about the Oscars? I didn’t lie, but I do want to talk about something Oscars-related (though technically, it’s just about awards in general).

Over the last few months, we’ve seen a lot of “Best Of” lists for movies. Some of these are even compiled and counted and used to determine the “Best Movie” announcement for a particular group or publication. In that way, they’re sort of like mini-awards ceremonies, except no one goes home with a gold statue.

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Music Review: Erin McKeown, Manifestra

By Chelsea Spear

In 2012, musician/activist Erin McKeown made headlines for crowdfunding the production of her latest album, Manifestra. Unlike many artists whose crowd-sourced work becomes a three-ring circus, McKeown has strong musical bona fides. For almost two decades, the singer/songwriter has released a compelling body of work and dabbled in jazz, electronica, and folk. The spine of her work has always been her great skill at songwriting, which blends the tunefulness of Tin Pan Alley songwriters with her own irreverent charm, and her confident, minimalist guitar playing.

Manifestra extends the democratizing concerns of crowdfunding to some of her most explicitly political material to date. While I find many protest songs challenging—mostly because of the need to simplify complex issues into a three-minute time range and force them into a difficult format—McKeown escapes this trap by finding the human scale within the societal problems she describes.

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Blu-Ray Review: Lost Girl, Season 2

By Less Lee Moore

As much as I love genre fiction, I’ll admit that most mainstream genre movies and TV shows are fairly sexist. Even if they don’t obviously reinforce stereotypes or display misogynist behavior, the violence enacted against women is often in higher proportion to what their male counterparts must endure. Enter Lost Girl, a Canadian-produced TV show whose title might seem to indicate more of the same, but which is a delightful and welcome entry into the world of genre television.

Lost Girl was created by a woman (Michelle Lovretta) and many of the episodes are written and directed by women. In addition, the gender makeup of the principal cast is half female and half male. The main character, Bo (Anna Silk) is a succubus who is trying to find her way in the world of the Fae (also known as fairy folk) while not committing to either the Light Fae or Dark Fae.

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Assemblog: January 4, 2013

The Place Beyond The Pines

New this week on Popshifter: We’ve got Best Of 2012 lists from me as well as Megashaun. You can also peruse all our Best Of 2012 lists, if you’re so inclined.

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Best Of 2012: Less Lee Moore

Noomi Rapace and Rooney Mara as Lisbeth Salander

2012 was the year of the woman. Women dominated the best of music, film, and TV.

The most significant figure for me in 2012 was Lisbeth Salander, the Steig Larsson-created character of the Millennium trilogy of novels, who also appears in the original Swedish film series and David Fincher’s newest film incarnation. Critics and fans may fight over who was better, Noomi Rapace or Rooney Mara, but both were outstanding at portraying my personal favorite female character of the last couple of decades. (Ms. Rapace had the added distinction of playing the more than worthy successor to Ellen Ripley when she inhabited the role of Dr. Elizabeth Shaw in Ridley Scott’s misunderstood but brilliant Prometheus.)

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Assemblog: December 14, 2012

Tron: Legacy still from The CillianSite

New this week on Popshifter: I provide a Krampus primer and talk about what works and what doesn’t in V/H/S; Paul puts together a playlist for “Music To Make You Human”; Chelsea recommends the reissued A Charlie Brown Christmas for listening and gift-giving; Danny is stoked for Dave Grohl’s upcoming documentary Sound City; and Lisa recommends 666 Park Avenue if you’re not already watching it.

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Assemblog: December 7, 2012

Despite The Gods

New this week on Popshifter: Danny is not very fond of the film 360, out now on home video; Chelsea is over the moon about the new Big Dipper album, Big Dipper Crashes on the Platinum Planet (and shares their new video for “Robert Pollard”); Lisa voices unpopular opinions about It’s A Wonderful Life; Cait raves about the new white vinyl 7″ from Concrete Blonde; I express admiration and frustration for Take This Waltz; and Elizabeth talks about Community, Disney, Netflix & Verizon in a new installment of “TV Is Dead, Long Live TV.”

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