Home Videos
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I Own Christmas 1997!
By
Joey Camire .
11.01.09 //
Home Videos
// I Own Christmas 1997!
By
Joey Camire .
11.01.09 //
Home Videos
Home videos, in my opinion, fall into the category of class notes. They’re great to have if something important transpires, but the majority of them are useless.
The truth is, home videos are just another example of our intense consumerism. As good patriotic Americans, we do our part by buying things. But with our compulsion to buy comes the desire to own and possess everything as well. It extends beyond our desire to own all the newest shoes or trends in fashion or books or movies. We try to own moments in time. To concretely possess memories in the real world.
Whether it is home videos of inane activities, or taking inordinate amounts of photographs, we try to hold on to moments for as long as we can. What makes it funny though, is that most people who take all of these home movies never go back and watch them. Who has time too? Is it really that cool to see a family BBQ from 1994? If you didn’t enjoy yourself at the original event, you probably won’t much enjoy watching yourself having a miserable time.
More than our futile desire to own un-own-able concepts, it’s our obsession with cataloging everything from the past that takes up a lot of our time. It forces us to take a backwards perspective and relive moments from yesterdays past with an odd nostalgic vigor, instead of placing that sort of passion into today and tomorrow.
Instead of watching people re-open a gift from their birthday or Christmas, why not just give them a new one. Instead of watching your children when they were young, and craving that connection with them again, why not spend time with them today. Infuse life into the world instead of hopelessly trying to relive old moments of joy.
Maybe I just don’t get it, cause I’m not cataloging my own life into a Dewey Decimal system. All I know is that I would rather spend time with people than sit and watch a video of myself spending time with people.
To determine if something is considered a classic, there are two simple questions that need first be answered:
1. Has it stood the test of time?
2. (And infinitely more difficult) Was it original enough to impact culture?
To me—and other 80’s babies like me—every piece of culture widely considered a classic either debuted before we were born or before we were old enough to really appreciate it as such.
But now we are older, able to see things better, clearer. So what about here and now? What about this decade? What will the people of the 2010’s and 20’s and 30’s and 40’s and beyond think about the culturally-relevant things of the 00′s after their initial release has faded? What albums will our grandkids still listen to after we’re gone? What books will they read? What films will they watch?
The following is a list of the top 75 pieces of pop culture created in the last decade (2000-2009) that, in my opinion, will become classics in due time. This is not a list of personal favorites, rather it’s one of things which I believe will be universally enjoyed and referred to by future generations.
They are without order nor explanation, as that would only up their subjectivity:
The film, The Dark Knight, directed by Christopher Nolan
The album, In Rainbows, by Radiohead (and while we’re at it….)
The album, Kid A, by Radiohead
The album, Hail to The Thief, by Radiohead
The album, Amnesiac, by Radiohead
The film, The Royal Tennenbaums, directed by Wes Anderson
The album, X and Y, Coldplay
The film, Lord Of the Rings (Trilogy), directed by Peter Jackson
The book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan
The album, Wincing The Night Away, by The Shins
The album, Stankonia, by OutKast
The album, Yoshmi Battles The Pink Robots, by The Flaming Lips
The book, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Safran Foer
The film, Supertroopers, by Broken Lizard
The album, Vampire Weekend, by Vampire Weekend
The film, There Will Be Blood, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
The album, Hot Fuss, by The Killers
The book, The Yiddish Policeman’s Union, by Michael Chabon
The album, Elephant, by The White Stripes
The film, Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind, directed by Michel Gondry
The album, For Emma Forever Ago, by Bon Iver
The book, A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini
The film, Old School, directed by Todd Phillips
The album, The Marshall Mathers LP, by Eminiem
The book, The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
The album, The New Danger, by Mos Def
The book, And Then We Came to The End, by Joshua Ferris
The film, Brokeback Mountain, directed byAng Lee
The album, Illinoise, by Sufjan Stevenss
The film, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, directed by Judd Apatow
The book, Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell
The book, Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell
The film, Almost Famous, directed by Cameron Crowe
The album, The College Dropout, by Kanye West
The film, Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, directed by Danny Leiner
The book, The Pact, by Jodi Picoult
The album, Silent Alarm, by Bloc Party
The film, Anchorman, directed by Adam McKay
The book, The Audacity of Hope, by Barack Obama
The film, Zoolander, directed by Ben Stiller
The book, Under The Banner of Heaven, by John Krakaur
The film, Wet Hot American Summer, directed by David Wain
The book, The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd
The film, Traffic, directed by Steven Soderbergh
The album, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, by Wilco
The book, John Adams, by David McCullough
The album, Feed The Animals, by Girl Talk
The film, Gladiator, directed by Ridley Scott
The book, The Five People You Meet in Heaven, by Mitch Albon
The album, Chunk of Change, by Passion Pit
The film, Requiem For a Dream, directed by Darren Aronofsky
The book, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, by Dave Eggers
The album, Takk, by Sigur Ros
The book, The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
The film, Children of Men, directed by Alfonso Cuaron
The album, Funeral, by Arcade Fire
The book series, Harry Potter, by J.K. Rowling
The film, WALL-E, directed by Andrew Stanton
The book, The Curious Incident of The Dog In The Nighttime, by Mark Haddon
The album, Absolution, by Muse
The book, Life of Pi, by Yann Martel
The album, A Rush of Blood to The Head, by Coldplay
The book, No Country For Old Men, by Cormac McCarthy
The film, O Brother Where Art Thou? directed by Joel & Ethan Cohen
The album, Tha Carter III, by Lil’ Wayne
The book, Me Talk Pretty One Day, by David Sedaris
The film, Little Miss Sunshine, directed by Jonathan Fayton & Valeri Faris
The book, Running With Scissors, by Augusten Burroughs
The album, Is This It, by The Strokes
The film, The Diving Bell and The Butterfly, directed by Julian Schnabel
The album, Dear Science, by TV on The Radio
The film, Memento, directed by Christopher Nolan
The album, Black Holes and Revelations, by Muse
The book, John Adams, by David McCullough
The film, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, directed by Ang Lee
I’m curious what’s missing from this list (a lot), or what’s here that shouldn’t be (hey, fuck you, it’s my list).
Feel free to post your own list and/or comments on mine.
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Top 5 Reasons To Look Forward To An Economic Depression
By
Joey Camire .
11.22.08 //
Top 5
// Top 5 Reasons To Look Forward To An Economic Depression
By
Joey Camire .
11.22.08 //
Top 5
The current economic downturn has been an absolutely unavoidable topic of conversation since September. The conversations range from the bleak and somewhat morbid, much like Husayns post on the future, to complete and utter denial. You can’t escape people making their own uninformed hypotheticals or predictions based on their paltry knowledge on the topic of economics.
“Oh really? Is that how the markets trending? I’m glad you’ve been keeping up with it, but if you wouldn’t mind pouring my coffee, I can be on my way.”
The truth is, as much as I’m hoping we somehow perform a little economic “coitus interuptus”, I think there are still things we can look forward too if we don’t manage to pull out. Maybe it’s just my hopeless optimism, but here are the top 5 things you can look forward to in an economic depression.
1) No Job
Let’s keep it real with each other, no one really likes to work. You may be one of those people who says “OMG I love what I do”, but even you still hate getting your ass out of bed on a Monday morning. Oh sure there may be stresses that come with not having the job, but at least you won’t have to deal with that Prick you call boss. And honestly, it’s hard to be stressed when you are sitting on ass watching Full House re-runs… John Stamos is so dreamy.
2) Weight Loss
We both know you’ve put on a few pounds in the past couple of years. I know, you want to get to the gym, but your life is sooo busy how can you find the time. In fact you are so damn busy, you only have enough time to stuff your face with take out from the chinese place across the street. Why is it that none of the chinese employees are as fat as you? Well either way, you won’t be able to afford that anymore. Even though ramen noodles have just as much MSG, they have no nutritional value, so you’ll lose those pounds in no time. You should have been fasting anyways, you are a slob.
3) No need to hide your alcohol problem
During a depression everyone boozes. From Mormons to middle schoolers. Everyone. Even the people with money are in the bottle. If you don’t have an alcohol problem, you should probably get one, just to fit in. It’s pretty much like an Irish funeral, everyone is sad and everyone is ‘snockered’.
4) You don’t have to feel bad for living in your parents basement
As great as it was to move out of your house once you made it to adulthood, everyone quickly realizes that living at home was a whole hell of a lot easier. Everything was taken care of. The thing is, for some reason your mom never really loses that maternal instinct. Now that you have an excuse to move back in, your mom is totally going to cook you some delicious chocolate chip pancakes to soothe your pain. She will also starch your undies, because that helps too.
5) No Bills
Oh, you will still be getting them, but you won’t be able to pay them so you don’t have to feel bad about it. You just ride things out until everything gets turned off. Once that happens just go home and collect on those sweet flapjacks.
The way I see it, a depression will be pretty much like undergraduate college all over again. You have no Job, but you don’t care because you are hammered all the time. You are lean and svelt because you found a way to sustain yourself on vodka and $.18 pouches of freeze dried noodles and salt. You have so much debt you are collecting, but you don’t have to pay it now, so who really gives a shit? Oh yeah, and you get to go home to Mom and Dad’s loving arms when things get tough. Honestly, it sounds like a good time to me.
I guess there are a few people we owe an apology for coming down on them so hard, when all they were doing was looking out for us. Thanks AIG, we owe you.
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A song about the future… and unicorns!
By
Joey Camire .
11.16.08 //
The Future
// A song about the future… and unicorns!
By
Joey Camire .
11.16.08 //
The Future
Here is a little ditty I’ve written about the future.
I always knew I had it in me to be a rock star, it was only a matter of time.
This one goes out to every music teacher who ever failed me. So just about all of them.
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And if you are now dying to download this, which you clearly are, here you go.
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