Covering the crossroads of music and film.
The Intersection
Intersection: Charlotte Gainsbourg, Beck
By Brandon Kim on 11/02/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Man those Scientologists have it all. First Beck got to date Winona Ryder adding his name to a list that has more prestige than a list of Nobel laureates in this country (Johnny Depp, Christian Slater, Daniel Day Lewis, Matt Damon, David Duchovny). Beck then got down for a duet with the illustrious Jane Birkin, cover girl, singer, actress, hot moaner, and one of the most incredible women in the world. Now he's hooked up with her daughter, Charlotte Gainsbourg, who is all of the above and more, to produce her new record "IRM." I recently had to undergo an... MORE »
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Chuck Prophet's Top movies of all time + rock and roll.
By Brandon Kim on 10/23/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
I asked Chuck Prophet if he could list a few of his favorite films for me while he's finishing up a documentary about the ill timed (swine flu) trip to Mexico he took to make a record. Read this bad ass list he wrote up and if you need a breather, give a listen to this jam, "Sonny Liston's Blues," off his record ¡Let Freedom Ring! - due out Oct. 27. It's gonna take an aspirin! "Sonny Liston's Blues," by Chuck Prophet. These are movies that I've lived with and return to again and again. I've included a couple of... MORE »
Hotel Chelsea, Stanley Bard, Sam Bassett
By Brandon Kim on 10/16/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
I made my way through the city at night to the Hotel Chelsea, that inn of legend where so many writers, musicians, and maniacs of all disciplines made their mark. If New York was the 20th century's creative center, the Hotel Chelsea was it's white hot core. Mark Twain, Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clark, Roy Lichtenstein, Allan Ginsberg, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Arthur Miller, William Burroughs, Hendrix, Joplin, Warhol. They say Sid Vicious stabbed his girlfriend to death there in '78. [Stanley Bard inside the Hotel Chelsea, from Sam Bassett's "Stanley Bard] I'd never been there before, only walked by.... MORE »
Q&A with Jim Sampas: Film, next frontier for Jack Kerouac
By Brandon Kim on 10/14/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Last month I wrote about the documentary "One Fast Move or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur," a trip through the places, physical and otherwise that inspired Kerouac's 1962 novel, Big Sur. It features a soundtrack by Benjamin Gibbard (Death Cab for Cutie) and Jay Farrar (Son Volt). Check that and a trailer out here. [The original Dharma Bum, Jack Kerouac] I recently had a Q&A with the film's producer Jim Sampas, whose Uncle happens to have been Jack Kerouac. Sampas encouraged me to throw the ipod out the window. I like his style. Dig that below and check your local... MORE »
Mark Ruffalo, Orlando Bloom film scored by Montreal psyche band
By Brandon Kim on 09/28/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Actor Mark Ruffalo ("You Can Count on Me," "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Zodiac") has turned to directing with an intriguing film called "Sympathy for Delicious." The film stars Ruffalo himself, Laura Linney, Juliette Lewis, and Orlando Bloom as a rockstar named The Stain. If that's not strange enough, actor Christopher Thornton wrote the screenplay and plays the role of the paralyzed, DJ Delicious, who "gets more than he bargained for when he seeks out the world of faith healing." Thornton is actually paralyzed in real life. (The Besnard Lakes. Photo by Chris Gergley) Canadian rockers, The Besnard Lakes,... MORE »
Bishop Allen's Justin Rice
By Brandon Kim on 09/21/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Justin Rice from Brooklyn's, Bishop Allen, has been piling on film roles for awhile but in the last year has begun to make an actual career out of it. Rice most recognizably appeared with his bandmates in 2008's "Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist." They performed as themselves after Michael Cera's band plays at the club. Since then, in 2009 alone, Rice has acquired three indie credits, the forthcoming "The Mountain, the River and the Road," IFC film's "Alexander the Last," and the recent, "Harmony and Me." (Bishop Allen. Photo by Sebastian Mlynarski) His music is generally used if not prominently... MORE »
One Fast Move or I'm Gone: Kerouac's Big Sur
By Brandon Kim on 09/10/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
A friend warned me not to read any more Kerouac in college or I'd end up dropping out. I guess he saw warning signs. I thought he was projecting his own weaknesses on me. I could keep my experiments with mysticism separate from daily duties, merge a search for truth with institutional learning. What's a couple more years of school, it's all I ever knew anyway. Life is more stable than that, I'm more conformist than that. The copy of The Dharma Bums on my desk could not actually alter my life - only a sap would fall for that.... MORE »
Music and war games, Forgotten Hope, Marlene Dietrich, Play!
By Brandon Kim on 09/08/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Over the long weekend I was looking for a little entertainment and was pleasantly surprised by the new release of one of my old favorite games. I would be remiss not to mention it here, for it is a tale of passion, music and intense geekery. If you're one of those people who wants to ban shooter games, or watches hours of vapid television but think video games are for fools, we can still be pals. (WWII bombshell, Marlene Dietrich) The game is called Forgotten Hope, originally a mod* for the blockbuster EA title, Battlefield 1942, the game that changed... MORE »
The Swell Season, "Make art, make art!"
By Brandon Kim on 09/02/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
The Swell Season are Glen Hansard (from Irish band, The Frames) and Marketa Irglova (a classically trained Czech pianist and vocalist). They entered the spotlight last year with two Grammy nominations and an Oscar win for Best Original Song, "Falling Slowly." That win was for the indie film, "Once," for which Hansard and Irglova also composed the score along with the original soundtrack work. They played the film's two lead characters too! (The Swell Season's, Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova). If you missed their Oscar speech/debacle you missed the feel good moment of the season. Thanks to the Academy you... MORE »
Royal Flush Festival: Film, Music & Art
By Brandon Kim on 08/28/2009
Filed under: Music Flicks, The Intersection
The Royal Flush Festival is playing its hand of independent film, music, and underground art this coming October 15th-18th at Anthology Film Archives and other venues throughout New York. Founded in 2005 as the E.Vil City Film Fest, it merged with Royal Flush Magazine (the music, art, and culture rag that looks like a comic book that I imagine conservative Christian parents confiscate from their daughters) and changed it's name. Along with some very promising films, highlights include a rock poster art show to coincide with the New York premiere of "American Artifact: The Rise of American Rock Poster Art,"... MORE »
Video Premiere: The Dandy Warhols
By Brandon Kim on 08/10/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
We've got an exclusive for the Dandy's "And Then I Dreamt of Yes" video directed by Mark Helfrich up today. An editor since the 80's ("Rambo: First Blood Part II," "Predator," "Red Dragon," all the "Rush Hours") I talked with Helfrich about how he came to direct a music video and we ended up obsessing over water nymphs together - the ones in the video are actually Dandy Warhol fans who answered a casting call. (The Dandy's drummer, Brent, playing with water pouring out of his kit) The video and interview are both here! MORE »
Michael Penn
By Brandon Kim on 08/07/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
I recently had a conversation with musician Michael Penn, maker of critically acclaimed albums, composer of P.T. Anderson films, husband of Aimee Mann. He's as intense as his brother Sean, if all those Charlie Rose interviews I've watched are any indication. For our purposes here we kept it light - the catalyst for our chat was IFC's comedy mini-series "Bollywood Hero" after all, for which wrote three songs. But in an amnesiac age where the most common catch phrase is going forward, Penn is an artist with a crisply realistic view of history (and the brand of "monopoly capitalism" we've... MORE »
Dinosaur Jr. Over It!
By Brandon Kim on 07/10/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
There's something inherently pleasing about watching pals having a good time, doing what they do. It's buddy magic. It's why "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" is so damn good, and why people blamed Yoko when the Beatles broke. It's why Dinosaur Jr's video for "Over It" feels so right. Not only is it so good to see J Mascis, Murph, and Lou Barlow hanging together, as if no one was ever kicked out of the band, but they exude a coolness that only a matured group of dudes can embody while still ruling at youthful endeavors. I had to... MORE »
British Sea Power re-score 1934 film
By Brandon Kim on 06/30/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
"Man of Aran" is an early documentary film by Robert J. Flaherty depicting the rough, sea-sprayed life on the Aran Islands, "wastes of rock... without trees... without soil" off the western coast of Ireland. Flaherty had already won acclaim for his even earlier, 1922 documentary "Nanook of the North," considered an important milestone in filmmaking. Chances are good you've not seen either of them unless you went to film school, but the latter is as much a part of vernacular as "Birth of a Nation." I'd never seen "Man of Aran" until recently. The excuse was that it's been re-released... MORE »
DJ Spooky
By Brandon Kim on 06/24/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
IFC's Aaron Hillis recently spoke with DJ Spooky (aka Paul D. Miller) about his film project "Rebirth of a Nation" which is his scored, cut up, and remixed interpretation of D.W. Griffith's notorious 1915 film, "Birth of a Nation." I haven't seen it yet but I like this past quote about it from Margo Jefferson in the New York Times: "Silent film scores were grandiloquent, meant to heighten what we saw on screen. Mr. Miller's score, by contrast, deflects our responses, then alters them. A hip-hop drum beat pulses. (It sounds African and urban American.) A wash of industrial sound... MORE »
Timothy Saccenti (Part 2)
By Brandon Kim on 06/16/2009
Filed under: Introductions, The Intersection
Yesterday I put up some video work by director/photographer Timothy Saccenti, if you haven't seen it take a look. He's an artist of great depth and though he'll lament how poor our internet bandwidth is and is fully on the digital cutting edge, his roots lay in darkrooms, covered in emulsion, with silver halide sprinkles. He's working on a ton of stuff, and has his sights on a feature film, which I hope to have more on in the future. Here's most of what we chatted about the day his new video for Chairlift came out. BK: Tell me about... MORE »
Timothy Saccenti (part 1)
By Brandon Kim on 06/15/2009
Filed under: Introductions, The Intersection
Timothy Saccenti is a photographer and director who's been doing some impressive, meticulous work in the music word. His beginnings in photography have lead him down a path crowded with artists like TV on the Radio, Erykah Badu, The Rapture, Grandmaster flash, and Black Mountain. Directing music videos was a natural turn for Saccenti and though he may still be a photographer at heart, he's been extra alluring lately with his motion work. His videos for Jamie Lidell's "Another Day" and Battles' "Atlas" are the fantastical works of an artist who has both clear vision and technical mastery at his... MORE »
More Music Supe
By Brandon Kim on 06/09/2009
Filed under: The IntersectionYesterday I took a look at music supe Tracy Mcknight, a perfect specimen for me to shine my rather thick spectacles upon. Here's part two of that look, now with media. Aside from a few huge movies like "Hotel Rwanda," and some high profile documentaries like Oscar nominee "No End In Sight," McKnight's roster is lined largely with indie films. These are a few with great/interesting/both soundtracks I hope you got the chance to see, and if they slipped by you, now you can. I wish I had a sweet editing suite, cause I'd put together one of those montages... MORE »
Music Supervisor: Tracy McKnight
By Brandon Kim on 06/07/2009
Filed under: Introductions, The Intersection
Tracy McKnight was not aware of the job of music supervisor when she set out to find her way in the world. She thought she'd eventually work in fashion or cosmetics, perhaps something she dreamed of at 30,000 feet while working as flight attendant. Instead, she landed a job at a NY recording studio as the night manager during college and it set her on a career path in the music industry. The thrill is still evident in her voice when she talks about it. (Left: Lisa P. first struts on screen to the Rolling Stones in "Adventureland," Miramax films)... MORE »
Jeff Buckley: 15 years of Grace
By Brandon Kim on 06/04/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Fifteen years it's been? Thanks for rubbing that in Sony BMG. Though I suppose there's few better ways to celebrate aging and failing at love than to dust off the Jeff Buckley records. Or check out the new 15th anniversary re-release, Grace Around The World. Whether it goes beyond a label cashing in on fans or not is for you to decide, but even the budget version includes a DVD of previously unreleased TV performances from the U.S., the UK, Germany, Japan and France. Handily, it also has a CD with the audio versions of all those performances so you... MORE »
LANDy
By Brandon Kim on 06/02/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
I had a dream about Adam Goldberg and forgot to tell him when I talked to him the other day about his debut record as LANDy. I must have been too frantic. So I'll tell you. (Left: Taken at dinner the night before his IFC interview, the censor is his touch.) The night I confirmed I'd be interviewing him, I dreamed I was in my childhood basement - a 2,000 sq ft wood paneled realm of wonder complete with multi-colored linoleum floor and a long bar with lots of stools and tiny white lights. My friends were there, with Adam,... MORE »
MTV Movie Awards: highlights & crack ups
By Brandon Kim on 06/01/2009
Filed under: Here comes the gravy!, The Intersection
It's been clear for a long time that teenage girls cast the deciding votes on most of MTV's programming, and certainly the winners at their awards. This could not be more evident this year with "High School Musical 3: Senior Year" (it hurts just typing that) cleaning up in the wake of "Twilight" sweeping nearly everything else. (Left: Bruno blows out his skirt, and everyone present. Photo by Getty Images) Still, my love for MTV, forged long ago by Michael Jackson and Dire Straits videos continues to burn, even if it's kind of a heartburn now. Last night's Movie awards... MORE »
Blood: The Last Vampire
By Brandon Kim on 05/28/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
I'm a sucker for Vampire pictures so I had to look into French director Chris Nahon's new feature, about a tormented "teenage" girl (sweet 16 but going on 400) who hunts Vampires. "Blood: The Last Vampire," is an adaptation of an anime film of the same title released in 2000 by director Hiroyuki Kitakubo. Set in Japan the story follows Saya, our half-human, half-vampire geriatric teenage protagonist as she confronts vampires who've infiltrated the population at a US Air Force base. Producer Bill Kong ("Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," "Hero") brings the Hong Kong magic, kick flying, and excessively elegant fight... MORE »
Angel Antichrist: Charlotte Gainsbourg
By Brandon Kim on 05/27/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
Many incredible people sit at the crossroads of music and film, most unsung, overshadowed by big stars and bigger products. Some attain a degree of celebrity and some are truly fascinating. But few inhabit these crossroads more provocatively than Charlotte Gainsbourg. And I am not aware of any filler, poor quality or tasteless work to come out of her career as either an actress or a singer (though some would argue appearing half dressed with her Father, Serge Gainsbourg qualifies). The cool chanteuse and award winning actress ("Jane Eyre," 21 Grams," "The Golden Door") seems to have taken a risk... MORE »
The Dø
By Brandon Kim on 05/26/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
This European duo might not normally get my attention but they met working on a French film soundtrack in 2004, and after a few more collaborations decided to form The Do together. They're also absurdly attractive. In the interest of pointing out synchronicity whenever it occurs, no matter how minor, the film they met on was "Empire of the Wolves," by director Chris Nahon who I was just reading about (regarding his new film "Blood: The Last Vampire") when this Paris/Helsinki twosome came across my desk. Maybe we'll all meet in a bar in Morocco in 5 years and fall... MORE »
"The Road" : Nick Cave, blow my mind.
By Brandon Kim on 05/20/2009
Filed under: Reel to Reel, The Intersection
It seems this much delayed mystery picture by director John Hillcoat has a firm release date of October 16th (latest by the Weinstein Company anyway), and a trailer surfaced last week that on first viewing looks and sounds very promising. (Left: Viggo as The Man, in John Hillcoat's "The Road.") The cast is incredible, and includes: Viggo Mortensen (swordsman, nude fighter, brought back the cleft chin) Charlize Theron (prettier when ugly?) Robert Duvall Guy Pearce Garret Dillahunt ("Deadwood" multi-role villain, "well that's one fer you Wiald Biell!") Molly Parker (also from "Deadwood") Michael K. Williams ("The Wire's" badass, unforgettable Omar)... MORE »
Mama take this badge off of me
By Brandon Kim on 05/13/2009
Filed under: The Intersection
All the hubbub about Bob Dylan lately has inspired me to listen to a bunch of his records, something I don't normally do. I have some favorite Dylan songs and give props but, I've never been a big fan. You see, I had the unfortunate experience of having some friends and acquaintances who just loved him so much they purposefully left little behind for me. I'm sure there's some parallel in your life. Allow me to indulge in this illustrative tale. There was one guy in particular who aggressively hoarded Dylan to himself. The kind of guy who hosts a... MORE »
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