In Which We Look Back On The Week That Was And The Week That Wasn't

The Week In Review

If winter has too many holidays, summer doesn't have enough. The ones it does have are self-serving. Awards for mothers, presidents, and independence. It's all a little over the top, a bit too self-congratulatory. All she did was bring you into the world.

Here at This Recording we had a memorable week, one that just kept going on. "Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so," wrote Douglas Adams. We hate time travel, but it's what life is: travelling through time. It's the inexorable result of whatever God or Charles Darwin did to us. Travel through the week now:

"Time is a waste of money," wrote Oscar Wilde, but then again, he had some strange ideas about a lot of things. I wouldn't take him too seriously.

• Dick Cheney broke down Lost and Star Trek and pretty much everything else you were thinking of.
• Barclay wondered if we were as beautiful as this one.
• Whittaker Chambers dug deep into the story of K.

"Time spent with cats is never wasted," said Colette, who obviously has never seen my parents' golden retriever swim in the water.

• Will dispensed with some Saturday maxims. I learned so much. It meant a lot. Thanks.
• Molly Young touted the merits of Keira Knightley.
• Lambert may have killed steampunk.

Sometimes I think back on things that happened, that will happened, that won't happen, and I get so angry. Like I missed a lot of opportunities to play Halo 3 this week. I will never get that chance back...Or will I?

• Ben Lambert did Disneyland the hard way. This is a video post you shall always remember.
• Joyce Cary told us how to get around Westminster Abbey the literary way.
• It was all about The New York Review of Hooks for awhile there.

I feel like everything sort of just boils down to the episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation where Picard lived out an entire life before finding out it was just a simulation. Instead of being super-annoyed, he was totally gracious about it. I hope I'll have the good sense to thank my jailers when they release me from this prison we call life, or in Will's case, Williamsburg.

• It was a This Recording post we'll never forget, when Danish shared the fifty top singles of 2009 so far.
• Andy talked to the man behind the crossword puzzle.
• Frank O'Hara was among us.

 You can find last week's Week in Review here.

from this top tumbl

"Key" - James Blackshaw (mp3)

"Bled" - James Blackshaw (mp3)

"Arc" - James Blackshaw (mp3)

In Which It Was Altmanesque If Nothing Else

The Week In Review

I thought about getting a clone, but then what would my intern do? Optimally, my clone would look like Shelly Duvall, except she wouldn't age quite as badly.

Did you read everything from Altman Week yet? Everything will be back to normal soon: Molly will be blogging about Nas and Kelis, Dick will be chiming in about Lost, it will be just like the usual but fresher, more sure of itself.

Harris Feinsod on Quintet

Harris made me really want to watch Quintet, so I downloaded it here. Much of it I didn't understand, the rest aroused me quite a bit.

Gabriel Milner on Buffalo Bill and the Indians

This just brought back Deadwood flashbacks. Did you read the piece Alex did on that? It praised Al Swearengen a little too much.

Molly Young on The Long Goodbye

Thankfully Molly reviewed this movie, as Elliot Gould is too handsome for any of our other writers to contemplate. I liked how he was Ross and Monica's dad on Friends. God wasn't Friends great? Georgia's shots at Magic Molly were so unjustified.

Dick Cheney on Lost

It appears there was Cheney this week. My apologies. I guess my computer prescreens commentary about Daniel Faraday being a pedo. Daniel Faraday is an immortal hero to the cause of time travel and I will not hear him disrespected in this fashion.

Karina Wolf on The Player

The Player is probably the greatest Robert Altman film. No one was more obsessed with satirizing his own business. Have you ever read William Goldman's chronicle of one season on Broadway, The Season?

It's my favorite book of his, after the screenplay to The Ghost and the Darkness. He does an awesome essay on Harold Pinter's The Homecoming, but he also notes that 75 percent of everything on Broadway that year was about Broadway. No one loves a backstage comedy more than I, but the people behind A Prairie Home Companion should be murdered for the film they made.

Peter Biskind on M*A*S*H

I never got M*A*S*H. Was it Korea or Vietnam? Did it even really matter?

Tyler Coates on Nashville

Tyler is so sensitive about his picture placement. After he sent along that photo of himself next to the soundtrack for Nashville, I resolved immediately to put it on the blog. Also, Tyler's shots at McCabe and Mrs. Miller are totally inappropriate.

Alex Carnevale on Gosford Park

Why don't I ever get invited to hunting parties? You don't see that many hunting parties nowadays. A lot of game nights, a lot of doing shots out of girls' belly-buttons, but not so many hunting parties. Huh.

Molly Lambert on California Split

Lambert's really upset about the whole Nas and Kelis thing. She's taking it really hard. The least you can do is read her review of California Split, which I have never seen. It does look like the greatest film ever made though.

Chad Perman on Brewster McCloud

Brewster, you wanted it all. You wanted to fly. Cartman wanted to fly but then became a psychic. The Wright Brothers wanted to fly and got an entry on Wikipedia for their troubles. R. Kelly wanted to fly, but he really just wanted to poop on some chick. Seal wanted to fly, but then he married Heidi Klum.

Wolverine and 17 Again review

Looking back, these two movies had the same plot, actors, characters, and ending.

Georgia Hardstark on McCabe and Mrs. Miller

I don't like this movie either. But I do like 3 Women. It is the best Altman movie about the best subject:

"Don't Slow Down" — Matt and Kim (mp3)

"Cutdown" — Matt and Kim (mp3)

"I'll Take Us Home" — Matt and Kim (mp3)

"Turn the Boat Around" — Matt and Kim (mp3)

In Which This Week Everything Was Nothing And We Had To Watch It

The Week In Review

This Recording is the theater of all my deepest desires, most of which entail dark travails and a massive expense account. When I was at Yankee Stadium last week I took a bath that cost $40. I also had some pizza and other assorted appetizers. I sat in the bleacher section and brainstormed articles for you to enjoy later in your private life. My public life becomes your private life.

In my first life, things were more relevant and important to my existence. Rome in those days was the theater of all my struggles and ideas, as Andrew Zornoza once termed it in these pages. I was a titan of Rome, now I just blog hard and I need your support. Buy a CapGun for christ's sake. I'm tired of looking at you.

If I couldn't be myself, I'd be Ingmar Bergman, who no doubt would have recommended these articles to others using Google Reader had it been invented already.

Who would you be if you couldn't be yourself?

• Lauren explained why Adventureland was sexist and racist.
• Lambert expressed her considerable anger at the one known as Adam Lambert.
• The history of the sketch comedy group The State.

Don't forget these sterling blog entries:

• Susan Minot taught us the meaning of sex.
• Brittany surveyed the oeuvre of Kazuo Ishiguro.
• Melanie nailed the appeal of Mitch Hedberg.

Real life imitates fake life, which creates history. It is so easy to invent important statements like this, which will later by chronicled by my biographer as evidence I thought I was more clever than I am. I was always overrating myself, even back in Rome. Enjoy these:

• James Cook discovered Hawaii: would you like to know more?
• Anna told us why the Topshop phenomenon is just so overrrrrrated.
• Who knew Gossip Girl was all about international relations. Claire says so.

Basically the world is unfolding as it will, and all we can do is stop, look around, and read the blog entries on various subjects of interest.

• Alex detailed the ongoing miracle that is Stephen Hawking's life.
• Molly on the meaning of Pink Wigs and Lady Gaga.
• Get excited for Robert Altman Week.

Have you heard the new Maccabees album? Besides the Patriots selecting safety Patrick Chung, it was the highlight of my weekend. Happy Sunday, readers.

"Love You Better" — The Maccabees (mp3)

"Bag of Bones" — The Maccabees (mp3)

"Dinosaurs" — The Maccabees (mp3)

The Maccabees myspace