The Brown Note

“A film is – or should be – more like music than fiction”
-Stanley Kubrick

The next LUC Briefing will be on the subject of: Animals

i. The Long Goodbye

In a move that is either an inspired piece of cinematic brilliance, or time-saving laziness, the score for Robert Altman’s 1973 film of The Long Goodbye consists of just one song, played in many different styles throughout the film. John Williams arranged all manner of variations, from jazzy efforts, to crazy mariachi music, although as it was the early 70’s there is no dubstep remix. You can get the idea from this montage

ii. Rappin’ For Jesus

Considering all the wild, wonderful and dubious things that LUC has ever shown, it says something that nothing has ever elicited a reaction nearly as shocking as this music video produced by a church outreach programme. There is no way of understanding the thought processes behind this – just make sure that you are not eating or drinking around the 35 second mark. Trigger Warning: Potentially lethal levels of awkwardness.

iii. Jazz As Visual Language

Leamington Spa’s very own Nicolas Pillai has just launched a book about Jazz as seen through the filter of cinema and TV. You can get it straight to your Kindle from Amazon right now, or for more info check out this interview with London Jazz News…

“Simply put, this is a book about how jazz has been mediated through film and television. We often ask ourselves, what is jazz? This is a question reflected by these film and television representations. Through image composition and editing, they present that question in visual terms: what is jazz? How has its meaning changed over the decades? What is its significance to the people who play it, who finance it, who listen to it or dance to it?”

LINK: http://www.londonjazznews.com/2016/11/interview-nicolas-pillai-new-book-jazz.html

iv. Just by Radiohead is probably the best music video ever

I know OK GO have made all those incredibly clever and entertaining videos and that R Kelly produced the demented disasterpiece that is Trapped In the Closet, but for LUC’s money the apex of the short form musical video is Jamie Thrave’s film for Radiohead’s 1995 release ‘Just’. Watch and enjoy.

v. Drinkenstein

Did you know that Sylvester Stallone and Dolly Parton once made a country and western musical together? If not it may be because the UN convention on human rights was used to cover it up.

The film in question, Rhinestone, features Parton teaching Stallone to be a country singing sensation as part of a bet with her sleazy manager over whether she will sleep with him. Yes, I know, the drugs in the 80’s must have been amazing. You may study this clip and assume that Stallone was labouring under some kind of contractual obligation, apparently not as he is credited as co-writing the script.

vi. The Time That Steven Seagal Played The Blues At Warwick University

There is not much to add to this, except that his band is called ‘Thunderbox’

vii. The Importance Of Music in Cinema

There is probably no better illustration of the effect of music on the experience of cinema than watching the lat few minutes of Star Wars without the stirring orchestral send off.

viii. Searching For The Brown Note

From an article on vice.com:

“There are dozens of YouTube videos claiming to be the real brown note, mostly with comments saying they don’t work – but occasionally the odd positive response turns up among the “South Park brought me here” messages. Commenters in these instances claim the noise cured their constipation, or that the brown note caught them by surprise and really worked, but were these historically trustful anonymous YouTube trolls telling the truth?”

Article: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/in-search-of-the-brown-noise