Why? Not To See a Scary Movie

I now remember why Jack Nicholson has always given me the creeps and why I hate scary movies. On Saturday the Uptown Theater was screening The Shining at midnight, and foolishly I went to see it with several of the Blogulator crew. There I sat, clutching on to Brigitte's hand for dear life while nearly everybody around me, including Brigitte, fell asleep (turns out, when you get to your mid-twenties you have a hard time staying up late, even on Saturday night). At least the good thing about older horror movies is that the music makes it incredible obvious when you should start covering your eyes. I appreciate that kind of courtesy. So naturally, when the little boy started writing "redrum" on the wall and picking up the knife, I was watching only through a tiny crack between my fingers. Just as Shelley Duvall's character wakes up and sees through the mirror that "redrum" is actually "murder" backwards, Chris grabbed my shoulders, causing me to scream out loud. The entire theater thought that I had also just discovered the clever semi-palindrome and was scared by it to the point of screaming! Very embarrassing.

Other than that anti-climactic scare, I think this might be one of the most frightening films. Not only does it have Jack Nicholson going crazy, it's got ghosts, a killer, and some sort of freaky supernatural power that I don't know very much about and can't control. I thought that the movie wouldn't be all that scary since I had read the book as a kid and already knew what to expect. So I thought it would be easier to convince myself that Jack Nicholson was not going to ax through my door and peer through the hole with one crazed, bulging eye, screaming, "here's Johnny!" But after taking our seats in the balcony, I remembered that I had not actually finished the book. In fact, I realized that I had self censored my reading material in middle school, not because the book was scary, but because there was a pretty graphic sex scene in the book that I didn't think my mom would want me to read. Maybe that was a good idea though. As the child who had nightmares from watching Unsolved Mysteries, I probably couldn't have handled The Shining as a 12-year-old.

WHY?

In addition to the midnight movie this weekend, I got in touch with my 12-year-old self at the Why? concert on Sunday night. I had forgotten how dreamy, (albeit creepy), Yoni Wolf is. Seeing him on stage at the 7th Street Entry made me, for a couple of hours, revert back to the days when I was overcome with faint-in-the-middle-of-a-concert, tweenage obsession over the hear-throbs in bands liked. I only wish they made Why? pillowcases, like my New Kids on the Block ones, that I could put on my bed - I also wish that it were not totally inappropriate for me to do something like that at my age.

I must not have been the only one crushing on the unusually handsome master lyricist, though. It has been a really long time since I've been to a concert where the audience actually yelled things like, "take your clothes off," at the band. And while I agree with the crowd and would have loved to have caught glimpses of Yoni Wolf's bare chest through what little gap there was between the two ridiculously tall boys in front of me, it would have made for a strange juxtaposition with the dark, suicide-pop tunes they were pumping out.

Why?'s half Hip-Hop, half synthy-pop was perfectly complimented by the two local opening acts, Heiruspecs (Hip-Hop) and Gospel Gossip (pop/rock). When Why? finally took the stage, they kicked off their performance with my favorite new Why? hit, The Hollows, off of the latest record, Alopecia. The record was recorded here in Minneapolis with help from local Fog musicians Andrew Broder and Mark Erickson. Unfortunately, we did not get to see the Fog guys play along on stage, but they did have an extra member with them. Normally Why? is a three piece, consisting of Doug Mcdiarmid and Josiah and Yoni Wolf, but they are playing with fourth member Austin Brown for the tour.

I was really impressed by Yoni Wolf's ability to play drums while standing up and singing at the same time. Every song had so much passion behind it, from the drum beats to the maraca shaking to the pure concentration and energy put into singing each song. After they finished Gemini Birthday Song, it looked like Yoni didn't have anything left. It was as if performing that song had taken everything out of him.

I was also really impressed with the audience's knowledge of the lyrics. Every song was a sing-a-long. And they got almost as sweaty from the effort of singing every tune in the midst of a sold-out Entry crowd as Yoni himself. I just wish the guy in front of me hadn't been passing so much gas in such a crowd!

Well, they are about to kick me out of the coffee shop, so I guess that's it for now. Now all I need to do is find a way to trick Yoni Wolf into dating me.

This entry was posted by Lady Amy, on Monday, April 07, 2008. You can leave your response.