Black Veil in the White Room.

SOMETIMES WHEN YOU find yourself in a hotel room in a strange city looking to do your work, you find they have a pretty kickass stereo but no Ipod input.

And since you don't travel with CD's anymore, you find yourself poring through a strange list of CD's available at the Front Desk.

This can get into odd philosophical territory, as you realize, "oh my God, how many albums has Bublé put out?" And then there's the dagger in the heart that is every single Diana Krall title.  But eventually you make your choices. And sometimes, shamefully, it's a CD you yourself own but have long since forgotten about.

And that's how I came to marvel at the wonder of the Chieftains' 1995 duets album, "The Long Black Veil."

Where to start on this 15 year old wonder?  Mo Ghile Mear (Our Hero) -- maybe the last non-bullshit song Sting ever recorded?  Tom Jones' reading of Tennessee Waltz?  Mick Jagger on Long Black Veil, Sinéad O'Connor on The Foggy Dew?  And on and on, for nearly 59 minutes.  A revelation.

If you don't have it, I suggest clicking above & buying it.  That is all.

Somebody Always Finds a Way

WAY TOO MUCH sunshine to waste. So today let me just share a thought.  When I saw "Unforgiven" I thought, "clearly nobody is ever going to be able to make a Western that's any good ever again."  And then Milch made Deadwood. And I thought, "Okay, now everything's gonna be a retread." And then Graham Yost channels Elmore Leonard and comes up with Justified.

Similarly, I thought when I saw "Shaun of the Dead" that that had to be the last zombie movie ever.  Cue  Zombieland.  And I hadn't even read World War Z yet.  Now AMC's got a new series coming up called Walking Dead from Frank Darabont (based on a graphic novel, I know.)

Vampires were utterly played out for me, especially the My-Little-Pony-Tweelight kind, and then I saw Let the Right One In.

Whether it's modern dress Shakespeare, or a teen romcom or a costume drama or vampires or a buddy picture, just because 90% of everything is derivative, and just because most of the time knockoffs suck, doesn't mean there's no way to do something with a fresh take. There's always a way.

So...are you going to find that way? Or settle for being a hack?

Writer Ear Candy: Oh, Zooey.

DOESN'T HELP YOU if you're one of those "must work in silence" people.*

But if you're like me, and spending another day staring at the same chunks of guide-prose willing them to make more elegant sense, there's probably not a better soundtrack than the delightful new album by She & Him.  Volume Two is now being streamed as a preview here on NPR.org.  

And unlike many goodies available to the U.S. domestic market where they don't have universal health care and coloured money, this link works from Canada.  Enjoy.






*Freak.

Oh Yeah, All Right.

SOMETIMES WHEN DADDY is snowed under it's the little things that help recharge. Like taking a little time out just to be a face in the crowd.

So the kids aren't buying CD's anymore, hmm? Whatever. Some of us remember the smell of vinyl and the feel of three chords and the truth, baby.


Heh heh. He played "Rebel." Heh heh.

Make it last all night.

Rebecca Eckler knocks up Judd Apatow

FOR WHAT it's worth, I've met Rebecca Eckler a few times. Back in the previous life, when she wrote for the National Post and I worked at the Sci-Fi Station, she came by and did an article on us and talked to me and some of my compatriots. Eckler and Leah McLaren have taken heat for years for being the young pretty female writers at their respective papers (the Post and the Globe.) Sometimes the criticism shot their way made me feel a little oogy, because you could never quite lose the feeling that at least part of it was sexist in nature. Ie: if the reporters were male and young and good looking, there wouldn't be quite the focus on the looks, or the dismissal. Then again, the young male writers probably wouldn't specialize in the confessional stuff. And both McLaren and Eckler did trade in a certain kind of solipsistic...

Oh, who knows? Anyway...

The news that Eckler is suing the makers of Knocked Up for copyright infringement on her similarly titled memoir is cringeworthy for a number of reasons.

First, any time writers sue other writers, it's bad. Second, it taints the rise of a guy who's done a lot for refreshing movie comedy in the last little while. Third, because you know at least somebody is going to try and make this a little Canadian vs. The Big American kind of thing, and I hate, hate, hate that shit.

But finally, the reason why it makes me slap my head is that it's probably completely bogus.

Now, there's going to be no shortage of people bashing Eckler, so I want to link to the story she wrote for Macleans, because I think at least it paints a sympathetic portrait.

Here she writes about the similarities:

The movie Knocked Up features a woman named Alison who becomes pregnant after getting drunk. While she gets drunk going out celebrating a promotion at work, I got drunk, and knocked up, celebrating at my engagement party. Both my book and the movie feature one night of passion and the nine months that follow. Fine. Whatever. But what got me was the fact that "Alison" was an up-and-coming television reporter; in my book I was an up-and-coming newspaper reporter.

There were other similarities that hit close to home. In my book, I have a best-friend- with-screaming-children named Ronnie, who I go to often for advice. In the movie version, Alison has a sister, named Debbie, with screaming children, who is her sounding board. Both "Alison" and I did numerous pregnancy tests. What also got my back up was that Ben, the man who gets Alison knocked up, is not only Jewish, but from Canada, like my man. (I still can't figure out why the fact that someone was Canadian would add value to any movie.) And then there's this one scene in the screenplay and movie, where Alison and Ben are having sex. Ben stops. Ben, in the screenplay, says, "My dick is like, four inches away from its head. What if it kicked on purpose 'cause it didn't like it?" I actually wrote in my book about a joke I once heard, "A man and his pregnant wife had regular sex throughout her pregnancy. When their son was born, the father held him in his arms. The baby looked up at his new father and, without warning, punched him. 'See?' said the baby. 'Now you know what it feels like to be bonked in the face.' "

Now. What the whole article does well is give you a feel for how sweaty and awful it must feel to be in Eckler's position. My heart goes out to her. It really does. But in that excerpt above, you start to see a lot of the inherent problems in this kind of thing.

Simply put: in the realm of "originality," none of the concepts she's talking about are that off-the-charts original. Calling a story of an accidental pregnancy Knocked Up? It's clearly the vernacular way to describe that situation. Having a character with kids as a sounding board? A Screenwriting 101 choice that most writers would look to make. She even admits that she heard the joke about the baby punching his father from someone else. Of course she did. We've all heard that joke. She makes other, similar points -- the image of a martini glass and a pacifier -- a simple, easy image that encapsulates the character she's talking about.

Right there in the excerpt is the line that blows everything away: Apatow's wife was pregnant at the time he was writing. And as for the "why make him Canadian and Jewish?" Well, by now you've probably read something about Apatow's comedy other half, Seth Rogen...who's...umm...Canadian. And Jewish.

Sigh.

I know that everybody thinks that their pregnancy experience is a unique and beautiful flower. But like weddings, like christenings, like most passage life experiences -- essentially, every one is the goddamn same.

The simple truth is that none of the concepts in either Eckler's book or the similarly titled movie are that original. They're both derivative, and recognizable. That's why she sold her book. That's why he sold his movie.

Once you get past that, it all comes down to execution.

In fact, this is what I was talking about a few weeks ago the last time when we talked about ideas, and where they come from, and the difficult concept of originality in film and tv media.

It's also, by the way, a spoke of the whole fanfic argument. The fanficcers continue to link here and go off stamping their feet on their little livejournals about what a big ol meanie I am. But this kind of ugly fight, this kind of thing, is exactly what skeeves me out about fanfiction so much -- and especially the out of touch members of the community who write extensions of stories already written and turn around when they show up on the real show and ask, "hey! did they steal from me?"

Originality vs. Derivative work. Ideas vs. their execution. Being hired vs. writing on the side. Fanfic vs. Spec Scripts. All of these can be nuanced arguments -- but not when you're coming from an utterly emotional, not-grounded in the real world kind of place. A professional attitude is just that. We don't get to stamp our feet. And we better think three times before filing a lawsuit for copyright infringement.

Eckler vs. Apatow shows the scorched earth result. I'm pretty sure that Eckler probably won't work in Hollywood now. She probably will have trouble optioning or selling any future book to the movies. And you know what? It does suck that now she probably could never sell film rights to her book. That's a pain. But it happens. As for Apatow, I'm not gonna be too worried about him, but... his movie is now under a cloud, whether there's merit or not to the suit.

The only one who comes out ahead in this thing, is, predictably, the lawyers.

Of course, there's the bogeyman lurking in the background. Dan Brown might have cadged from a whole bunch of better non-fic books (like, say, anything by Karen Armstrong) when he was writing his DaVinci brick. Or he might not have. But the guys who sued him didn't prove their case.

Then there's Art Buchwald...oooh...now there's a bogeyman to be feared. Because he won. The producers of Coming to America had to settle with him.

Occasionally, someone does try to rip you off.

But the Occam's Razor explanation -- usually -- is that similar experiences lead to similar stories being created at roughly the same time.

Which is all the more reason why -- if you're a powerless and just-starting-out writer, you may as well swing for the fences in the originality department. If you'd written Pan's Labyrinth I bet you could have shopped that script for a lot longer without seeing something similar on screen than if, say, you'd written that definitive slacker working in a video store movie.

Jenny Eliscu has a Potty Mouth, and I, for one, Love Her All The More for It, Despite What My Father Says About How People Who Swear Aren't Smart.

Friends of mine will readily attest that I have always been a technology jinx. For the last several times I've bought an Ipod or Apple product, for instance, they always seem to refresh the line the very next week.

So it is that here in Vancouver, I managed to take delivery of a Sirius satellite radio the day before the XM/Sirius US merger was announced.

I'm a tool.

So now, for now, I have both XM and Sirius. (I bought the Sirius because they had a great promo on with the CAA, so shout out to affinity marketing there.)

I love satellite radio. It is a boon for my daily commute, and it feeds my music jones in such a way that my music consumption has changed in interesting ways. I don't buy as many CD's as I used to; but the ubiquity of the satellite radio playing good stuff but wanting to hear that good stuff on my own schedule has driven me to buying more Itunes downloads. I don't know what the relationship is, exactly, but it's different and I'm happy with it.

I feel like I'm forming some interesting impressions of the differences between XM and Sirius. But I'm not ready to go full bore blogging about them yet, beyond saying that I don't understand why Howard Stern does not immediately replay his program on a 3 hour delay for the West Coast on channel 101. Listening to him starting at 3 am is not really an option. I also am overjoyed that I can get the truly superior CBC Radio 3, which I previously only enjoyed via my Itunes Radio tuner.

What I do want to say, however, is this: Sirius' Left of Center channel kicks ass. And the ass kickingest feature on the channel has got to be one of their DJ's, Jenny Eliscu.

Jenny Eliscu (pictured at left; please note the star tattoos) is a writer for Rolling Stone. She hosts a show on Sirius. She's like the hot girl who works in the Indie record store who you never would have the courage to talk to, never mind ask out, but who secretly sets your heart aflame when you buy something and she likes what you're buying and looks up and gives you that smile that says, "you've got good taste."

Jenny Eliscu is funny, yo. And she likes to swear while she's talking trash about the Arctic Monkeys. Matt Pinfield is cool too, but he's bald, like I will be soon one day, so sorry Matt, for me it's Jenny...oh Jenny, Jenny, you are seriously my new media crush. Keep on rocking the potty mouth and playing those mad tracks.

You Say You Wander Your Own Life...

INSPIRATION comes from funny places. As does context.

I have a friend who gets ideas from opening the dictionary, and pointing to a word at random.

Another, has gone on Ebay and bought old phone books, like, from the forties, for major North American cities. He says the ads help him think.

I've been known to mouse through my copy of the Complete New Yorker to try and get something going. But I've also written before about the inspiration-generating power of music.

A writer friend of mine hits random on his Ipod, and goes with the first song he gets. Something in the lyric, something in the tone just sets him off. I've used his method myself and it rocks.

When it comes to music, there's melody people and there's lyric people. (or at least there used to be; with the latest evolutions of the music biz I'm not so sure now) Lyric people will forever be surprised by that wedding they went to where the couple's song was "Every Breath You Take." Music people just shrug.

I'm guessing you'll agree without too much trouble that most writers probably tend to be lyric people.

So it was that I found myself at Vancouver's Orpheum last night.

The Orpheum is a beautiful Vaudeville-era house, opened originally in 1927. Since 1977, it's been government owned and is the home of the Vancouver Symphony. Not as much history as Massey Hall in Toronto, maybe, but just as much personality. If you've ever been in the Wintergarden Theatre in Toronto, you get an idea of the ornate interior. It's just a beautiful place to see a concert. And the acoustics are amazing.

Last night was the final night of the North American tour for English trio Keane. Keane had a rough year last year. Then, most of their North American tour was canceled so that lead singer Tom Chaplin could get rid of his demons in rehab. I'm sure all the snickering about the band being "for people who thought Coldplay was too hardcore" didn't help.

But Tom Chaplin was in fine voice last night, and the Vancouver crowd was raucous, appreciative and incredibly vocal. (Seriously, I'm used to going to concerts in Toronto, whose crowds are notoriously deadly)

I got into Keane when I was in South Africa in 2004. Cape Town hews way more to the British cultural orbit than the American, so I was hearing Hopes and Fears and its signature tune, "Everybody's Changing," all through the summer of 2004. Then I came home and got to hear it hit radio in Canada six months later. No Matter.

"Everybody's Changing" is a soaring song of despair. It's about dislocation, and longing, and not knowing where you fit, and seeing everyone else around you moving forward while you can't figure out where you are, or where you belong. It's exactly the kind of catchy melody + lyrics that connected with a guy tooling around in the worst car known to man, working crazy hours in a strange city as far from home as he'd ever been. Pile on the fact that the guy was seriously questioning aspects of his relationships and friendships, suffering from a bit of heartbreak and moral tiredness, and you've got a glorious soundtrack of despair. With keyboards!

(Guess I never got over that Howard Jones phase. Not really.)

Keane's Hopes and Fears is so much a part of my South Africa experience, from paying an insane amount of Rand for it at the Waterfront CD Wherehouse, to playing it all through my post-work week driving through Stellenbosch and the Western Cape of Africa, that I can't seem to separate it out from my memory. "This Is The Last Time" calls up memories of winding my way through Camps Bay or trying to dodge the taxis as they barrelled down the road in Seapoint. "Bedshaped" is the song I'd listen to as I watched the Atlantic crash from my window, wondering, "how is it that I came to be here, at this moment, on the Southern Tip of Africa?"

Flash ahead Two and a half years - and I'm in another rented house. This one's even bigger than the flat that I had in South Africa, which was easily twice the size of my condo at home. I'm also alone in another city, working on a totally different show. So...everybody's changing, do I still feel the same?

Well. Yes and no. WC Dixon wrote an affecting piece a while back about the dislocation involved with working in this industry in Canada. I hadn't really thought about it before then, but he's right. I think it's hard for writers working and planted in L.A. to understand just how fluid you have to be if you work in Canada. The vagaries of tax credits and production mean you're always going somewhere. The Corner Gas writers traipse out to Saskatchewan for several months every year. I'm in B.C. Someone else will be off to Winnipeg for something or other.

When I was in South Africa, much as it was an adventure, I found myself wondering if I was putting off life by doing these sorts of things. Then I came back, and did grinding development work for more than a year, where I didn't go anywhere or do much of anything exciting. So you can't win.

But standing in the Orpheum last night, tapping my feet, while the good-looking and waaaaayyy younger than me crowd sang along, I realized that this time, I didn't feel the same dislocation. I've made peace with the bouncing around and the moving, because that's my life. And that's my adventure. So be it.

And then they played "Everybody's Changing" -- 2nd song in.

It was great, but...second song?

Guess I have to work on the timing of my little life moments, is all.