I’m the crazy lady of Best Of lists~ so here’s another one.
But if you’re lazy, I’ve set up (almost) complete playlists on Xiami and YouTube.
Archives For independent
Last time it took me 2 years to get my 2012-2013 list out. LOL This year, I’m early. I’m pretty happy with my picks at the moment, so I hope nothing mind-blowing pops up in these last remaining weeks of 2014. In the meantime~ you know where to go.
I discovered Fifi Rong on the Xiami compilation, and though her track Parting Life (在离别中生活) isn’t my favorite, I did start to pay attention. So I’m all eager to listen to her new material now, which is available everywhere from Xiami, iTunes, Bandcamp and Soundcloud~
[bandcamp width=580 height=340 album=3479289225 size=large bgcol=ffffff linkcol=0687f5 artwork=small]
My favorite tracks are Wishes’ Fault, and there’s a certain haunting attraction to Breathless. LOL
Let’s see what comes off it by the end of the year~
I think I could work more on the 2013 list, but then it will be 2015! LOL I also hate that I don’t have my font pack at hand because this graphic is UHHHH-GLAY. My Frankenstein Computer is back! I’m so happy~
Anyway, here are 30 album picks by all different artists that released (almost) full-length albums these last two years. And here are all their covers in gallery form, and here’s a Facebook Gallery, it contains some playlists and iTunes links. And here’s a Xiami playlist, where you can (almost) access all the albums. And a Weibo post in case you’re there.
And here’s the YAM Magazine list that contains all my ramblings, with playlist/streaming and buy links.
Xiami had been pimping a new project they had going on for the last couple of days, and they’ve just revealed that it’s a 2-disc compilation featuring Chinese-Taiwan-UK Beijing-based indie artists. It’s a pretty good set that I’ve freely translated as the Seeking Light Compilation (寻光集, Xun Guang Ji) or in Español- Colección Buscando la Luz.
See, this is what happens when you have no official ‘christian’ name.
Check my English and Español announcements for translated group names and songs. Looking forward to exploring everyone’s discography.
You can get the album on Xiami.
Good news and bad ones~
First, about a week or two ago Yuguo announced that they were finally releasing their third full studio album Sunset Strip (日落大道), which seemed like it had been in the planning for ages [1].
It’s the 23rd in China, and it happened!
You can listen to the album (and download the songs) via Xiami.
Talk about experiences. Keeping an eye out for Korea’s Jambinai x)
I was finally doing some room cleaning, and ran into this plastic bag that had a whole bunch of the tickets of movies I caught while living/staying in Van. The results? Of course, I spent over two hours trying to make out some of the fade tickets, arranged them and put them in order of attendance.
The first movie that I caught there was Hulk at what used to be Tinseltown Cinemark. The first two columns cover my first year of studies. My maximum number of movies a month was 9 flicks in January 2004 (Cold Mountain, Big Fish, Peter Pan, 21 Grams, Along Came Polly, Monster, Butterfly Effect, The Cooler and Ginger Snaps 2), April 2004 (Hellboy, The Delicate Art of Parking, Kill Bill, Connie and Carla, Home on the Range, The Punisher, Dogville (twice) and Man on Fire), followed by July 2006 (Devil Wears Prada, The Omen,The Lake House, The King, PotC 2, Lady in the Water, Strangers with Candy, and an unidentified movie that’s already faded) with 8 flicks.
I really can’t remember exactly when I started out the Top Flicks About Chicks list on MUBI, but it must have been around the same time I wrote how Chick Flicks was a doomed genre in regards of critics. So it might be almost 4 years… and I’ve finally reached 300 titles in the list!!!
A Chick Flick should center on little girls, girls, young women and women… as students, as neighbors, as friends, as daughters, as granddaughters, as sisters, as mothers, as lovers. They are simply women. With that alone, we can tell all sort of other stories that have little to do with romantic comedies.
The purpose of the list, of course, was to encompass an array of female character — not only in the binary sense, since the list also includes men/boys who identify as women/girls… and viceversa — of various cultural, ethnic, social backgrounds. Not favoring one genre over the other, not valuing dramas over comedies… just simple stories about different women.
Though I’m sure the list could be longer, that’s 300 feature length films out of the 2896 (counting shorts) currently rated on the site- that’s roughly 10% so I suppose the list could expand to up to 500 or maybe 1000 once I reach 5000 or 10000 rated films on the site.
1. Treeless Mountain 2. Welcome to the Dollhouse 3. Juliana 4. Labyrinth 5. Fuckin’ Amal 6. Mirrormask 7. Gun Hill Road 8. Pariah 9. Bend it like Beckham 10. Swing Girls 11. The Land of the Deaf 12. Sunny 13. Whip It 14. Stoker 15. Maria Full of Grace 16. Breaking the Waves 17. My Marlon and Brando 18. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days 19. Dil Bole Hadippa! 20. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo 21. Kotoko 22. Violeta Went to Heaven 23. Skin 24. Raise the Red Lantern 25. Incendies
I picked 25 of the 300 films to illustrate some of the variety (I hope it’s AS varied as I intend the list to be), though I ran out of picks and couldn’t include any of the ‘older’ female characters. If I could pick 5 more, they’d be: Lemon Tree, Frozen River, Late Bloomers, Mother, For 80 Days.
