The Official TV Thread - Because We Need It

[Ayinger]

I heard about this TVad for Wilkinson Sword shavers for women but had to see it to believe it....



"...all you see are Tulips on the mound..."

need one say more?

[Ayinger]

. . . b e r y w n ! ! ! . . .

[Ayinger]

PBS stations are airing tonight what sounds like a good doc. on Patti Smith:



Shot over 11 years by acclaimed fashion photographer Steven Sebring, Patti Smith: Dream of Life is a remarkable plunge into the life, art, memories and philosophical reflections of the legendary rocker, poet and artist. Sometimes dubbed the "godmother of punk" — a designation justified by clips of her early rage-fueled performances — Smith was much more than that when she broke through with her 1975 debut album, Horses. A poet and visual artist as well as a rocker, she befriended and collaborated with some of the brightest lights of the American counterculture, an often testosterone-driven scene to which she brought a swagger and fierceness all her own.

Patti Smith: Dream of Life, winner of a 2008 Sundance Film Festival Award for Excellence in Cinematography, is a riveting, intimate telling of Smith's long, strange trip. She may not be the only middle-class Jersey girl to have made the leap to New York City in pursuit of artistic dreams, but she may be the only one to have emerged — and survived — as a multifaceted poet, artist and rock star. Through performance footage, interviews, poems, paintings, photographs and Smith's voice-over reminiscences, Dream of Life reveals a complicated, charismatic personality wrestling with the paradoxes of being an artist in America and of being a woman in a male-dominated music scene.

Smith also wrestles with the tragedies — the deaths of her husband and brother — that brought her back to New York and to performing. Layering Smith's words over innovative camera techniques, the film explores how one woman discovered herself through music, how she survived tragedy, how she raised two children and how she endeavors in a quest for peace, for herself and for the world.

In telling Smith's story, Sebring plumbs the history of several important cultural movements. Smith's collaborations and close friendships with poets William Burroughs, Gregory Corso and Allen Ginsberg, photographer Robert Mapplethorpe and musicians Bob Dylan and Michael Stipe reveal the links that make her a bridge between the Beats, the punk movement and musicians of today. The colorful moments in Dream of Life are plenty: Smith as an angelic street urchin, reciting "A Prayer for New York" in footage from 1975; a jam session with her 1970s collaborator, playwright Sam Shepard; Smith reading an Allen Ginsberg poem at Ginsberg's funeral; and Smith hanging out on the beach with Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Shot in lush, textured 16mm film, Dream of Life is a vibrant chronicle of rock history and the story of a bold woman who would not be denied on stage or off. It is also the story of a survivor whose creative intelligence thrives more than 30 years after the world first became aware of her.

"A few weeks after I met Patti in 1995, she invited me to see her perform at Irving Plaza in New York City," says Sebring. "I was completely blown away; she wasn't the person I had met at her home in Detroit. She had been this really sweet, almost innocent woman. And then at Irving Plaza, she was raging, spitting music and spewing poetry. It was fantastic. After the show, I asked her, ‘Has anybody ever filmed you?' I didn't know at the time that there was so little documentation of her aside from concert footage.

"I kept shooting as Patti's life kept changing; over the years, we've become like brother and sister," Sebring says. "They call her the punk poet prophet. Well, I'm one of her soldiers, or one of her messengers. I want to turn people on to Patti Smith."

[RocDoc]

jersey girl by upbringing, but she's actually born in chicago.

i saw her at the canyons formed by the tribune tower and some other building at the chicago river on a beautiful night and when she came on, looked across the rowd, said 'oh, chicago, city of my my birth...' and rawked OUT.

i hope they're replaying it cos right now we're up at the wisconsin dells...land of snowtubing and waterparks...

even if they HAD a pbs station available at this hotel, i doubt i'd get a chance to watch...we've got 'Up' going right now.

[RocDoc]

THIS is hilarious:

Leno Slams NBC: "A Complete Disaster"

<sub>In his first show since NBC announced they were pulling the plug on the 10:00 p.m. "Jay Leno Show," and moving him back to his former 11:35 p.m. slot, Leno didn't hold back.

"Welcome to 'The Jay Leno Show.' As you know, we're not just a show anymore, we are now a collector's item," he began.

Leno went on to slam NBC's decision making process. "NBC said the show performed exactly as they expected it would and then canceled us. Don't confuse this when we were on at late night and performed better than expected and they canceled us. That was totally different,"

"Supposedly we're moving to 11:30. Even this is not for sure. My people are upset. Conan's people are upset. Hey, NBC said it wanted drama at 10:00 -- now they've got it! Everyone's mad,"

He ended his monologue with one last insult. "I take pride in one thing. I leave NBC prime time the same way I found it -- a complete disaster."

UPDATE: A few hours later, Conan O'Brien also blasted NBC, making references to an 'abusive relationship' and laughing at the network's financial woes. Click here to watch.

www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/11/leno-announces-his-show-w_n_419524.html</sub>


'NBC wanted drama at 10:00...'

he said it as a joke, but that's the absolute truth in a PR-stunt sort of a way...and with nbc not muzzling either leno or conan, it sure looks like they'll simply let it play for all the publicity they can get...it doesn't get the same 'omg, he's rippin' NBC a new asshole'-reaction it would have a few years ago.
or at least it probably shouldn't.

i'd be VERY surprised if nbc's not complicit in this...

'GIVE it to us, jay...up the cooloo, yeah!'

[Ayinger]

Still not enough to entice me to watch Leno....

[RocDoc]

you're a hard man, don.

[Ayinger]

Just noticed that the ENCORE cable network is running the It Might Get Loud documentary tonight:

....a simple story of 3 generations of guitar players getting together, discussing technique/instruments/history....and, oh yeah, jamming a bit together.


And speaking of rock documentaries, I caught this one on VH1 last week and it is a BLAST ---

Somewhat insightful to the man and what he (and MOTORHEAD) brought to the music world but funny as hell in a number of spots.