Thoughts of the month and
A Fistful of Soundtracks episode
previews for July 2002.
Jim
Aquino hosts and produces A Fistful
of Soundtracks (anytime at Live365.com and Sundays 2-4PM on KZSC
88.1 FM in Santa Cruz), writes for Silicon Valley Community Newspapers in San Jose and is scripting a remake of Oliver
Stone's Wall Street, starring
Martha Stewart: "Greed… it's a good thing."
Jive365
I've recently asked listeners of the
Live365 incarnation of Fistful to start sending me requests
so I can find out what the Internet radio audience wants to hear.
Since I don't include James Horner on my playlists very often
(the only Horner scores I've ever really liked are Star Trek
II, Glory and The Mask of Zorro), that's precisely
what several listeners have wanted to hear: some Horner. I don't
mind playing these guys' Horner requests — as long as they
don't request Titanic or The Perfect Storm —
but I'd like to see more listeners request the kind of soundtrack
music that I prefer to play: Ennio Morricone, blaxploitation soundtracks,
the funky Easy Tempo/Crippled Dick Hot Wax! stuff and crime jazz
composers like Lalo Schifrin, Quincy Jones and Henry Mancini.
A girl from Berlin wanted to hear Henry Mancini's "Lujon"
(a.k.a. the Sexy Beast love scene music) and a listener
from Sydney, Australia requested Isaac Hayes' Three Tough Guys
theme, which both delighted me because I want more requests like
theirs. (And can someone out there show some Herrmann love too?)
With Fistful, I'm trying to show that there's more to movie
music than just Horner and John Williams.
The Live365 listeners have been far
more responsive to Fistful than the KZSC listeners. I first
heard about Live365 a few years ago, so I regret not joining Live365
sooner. It's too bad I joined right when the RIAA started to bully
Internet broadcasters for their lunch money.
Rerun Lola rerun
TV can be pretty lackluster during the
summer. Besides The Simpsons, Futurama and sometimes
Farscape, there are only three other shows that I've been
watching regularly. They are…
The Wire
(HBO): This David
Simon series about compromised Baltimore
cops and the equally compromised drug dealers under their surveillance
is not as witty or poignant as Simon's signature show Homicide, but
it's far more realistic and consistent than Homicide was
in its last few seasons, when it succumbed to network pressure
to be more like a formulaic cop show. I like how drug lord Avon
Barksdale and his crew aren't as flamboyant as Homicide
big bad Luther Mahoney and his family, who were fan favorites
but were a bit too over-the-top for my tastes.
The Jamie Kennedy Experiment (The WB): Not a lot of viewers are watching this
genuinely funny cross between a hidden camera show and a sketch
comedy show, which is bit of a shame. But that also works to the
show's benefit because the pranks wouldn't be as effective if
the victims who are being "X-ed" by Jamie knew about
the show. Many of the bits — especially the one in which
Jamie poses as a tour guide and breaks into Bob Saget's house
— are funnier than much of what's passed for hilarity on
Saturday Night Live and Mad TV in the past couple
of years. Jamie's intros to the segments are remarkably short,
probably because he doesn't want to tell lame jokes before each
segment like Saget had to do on America's Funniest Home Videos
or like Dick Clark and Ed McMahon on TV's Bloopers and
Practical Jokes. Sometimes, we don't know why Jamie sets up
these pranks. Like why is that attractive Latina at the Italian
restaurant being hit on by Jamie — who's posing as the restaurant's
lecherous owner — during dinner with a boyfriend? Did she
ask Jamie to flirt with her to get back at her man, possibly because
he two-timed her? Or why is Jamie, made up to look like a pothead
surfer dude, bothering a teenage girl inside an eatery with his
loud cell phone? Is it because she herself has a noisy cell and
someone asked Jamie to give her a taste of her own medicine? The
skimpy X-position, if you will, makes things more mysterious and
interesting. My favorite characters are the bumbling Judge Jamie,
who looks and sounds like an elderly Ron Silver, and tell-it-like-it-is
talk-show host Virginia Hamm, a spoof of both mid-'80s-era Oprah
and Forgive or Forget host Mother Love. The white rapper
character Brad Gluckman is such a hit with the three or four viewers
who watch the show that he might be spun off into a movie.
Scrubs
(NBC): I sure hope they rerun that episode involving Erasure's
"A Little Respect." That Erasure running gag was one
of the funniest things I've seen all year. The dream sequences,
sight gags and musical numbers on Scrubs are not as overbearing
and irritating as the ones on Ally McBeal. The Scrubs
cast is one of the best ensembles on TV, and I hope the producers
don't screw up the ensemble and their chemistry by adding some
superfluous or ill-conceived regular to the show. Reluctant mentor
Dr. Cox, played by John C. McGinley, is my favorite character.
McGinley, Wiseguy's Ken Jenkins (Dr. Kelso), Roseanne's
Sarah Chalke (Elliot) and Clueless' Donald Faison (Turk)
are the most familiar faces from the cast. The not-as-familiar
Zach Braff (J.D.) and Oz's Judy Reyes (Nurse Carla) round
out the cast. I've known a few Carlas in my life: feisty, motherly,
kinda hot and underappreciated for their work.
More listener mail
Date: Sat, 01 Jun 2002 19:53:20 +0200
Subject: Hi Mr.Aquino
From: "Daniele Saguto" <dani@... >
Just my appreciation for your amazing iTunes radio.
I'm gladly listening to the great italian B-Movies soundtracks
that I love.
Daniele Saguto, Italy
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 14 Jun 2002 01:42:30 -0700
(PDT)
From: "Royal Burnell" <mainoffenderus@... >
Subject: Hi
First of all, I'm totally loving your broadcasts. Keep up the
good work.
With that aside, I was wondering
where you got The "every hero sohuld have a soundtrack"
sound bite.
That's a kick ass bite.
Thanks for your time & effort.
Jim here: The Fistful ID that
Royal's referring to includes a clip from the "That's my
theme music" scene in I'm Gonna Git You Sucka.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 19 Jun 2002 11:47:15 -0400
Subject: A Fistful of Requests
From: "freelance" <freelance@... >
Jim,
Love your format; we listen to it all day long here at Waters
Advertising
Agency in Newport News, Virginia. I found your station on Live365.com
and imported it into iTunes on the Mac. Glad to see that some
of the other
movie soundtrack buffs out there are actually creating stations
devoted to
them! Used to listen to Cinemascape, but it was too repetitive
and unstable.
But I did like the type of soundtracks they played; lots of Goldsmith,
Williams and Elfman, especially the Adventure and Science Fiction
varieties.
A few requests:
Hero Theme Day--Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Dick Tracy,
Raiders/Indiana Jones...
Space, The Musical Frontier--2001
A Space Odyssey, Star Wars, Star
Trek, Close Encounters, Alien...
Summer Blockbusters--
Independence Day, JAWS, Harry Potter...
SciFi--Blade Runner, Total Recall,
ET, Stargate, Terminator...
LoveThemes--Out of Africa, Somewhere
in Time, Titanic...
Celtic--The Chieftains (see their
collected Cinema music CD), Enya...
Danny Elfman (see "Music from
a Darkened Theater", a great Elfman
collection)--PeeWee's Big Adventure, Beetlejuice, Nightmare Before
Christmas...
BondThemes--Bassey, Wings, Easton,
Garbage...
And finally...please, please create
a new promo blurb for yourself. The
current one with gun and flute is frankly irritating and much
too overused.
Other than that, Jim, I have no negative comments--your station
is GOLD.
--
Mack Johnson
The Freelancer
Waters Advertising
Newport News, Virginia
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 21 Jun 2002 23:11:49 -0300
Subject: From Daniel (an argentinian listener)
From: "Daniel Estrada" <danymyself@... >
Hi ,if you (jim) are reading this, well...it´s one hell
of a program
what you are doing with a fistful of soundstuff .Keep it like
that man, or
improve it cause right now i´ve got no complains. Great
job !!!.
So now i ask you to put on the show
the soundtrack from the movie The
Cell (yeah, the jennifer lopez one) or the music from Braveheart
.
Anyway, you are a great company at those nights of re-touching
pics at
photoshop.
Bye, grettings from here, Buenos
Aires@Argentina.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Sun, 23 Jun 2002 17:15:21 +0200
Subject: Hello Jim
From: "Antoine" <antoine.nielly@... >
I'am from Paris, and i discovered your music. It's great!!!
Sorry for my bad English but i'am
learning!! lol
Have you the music of braveheart,
you know, with the bagpipe?
Thank!!!
Antoine!
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 04:21:24 -0700
(PDT)
From: "Matthew Seagle" <ogre_beef@... >
Subject: Request
hey!
I'd love to hear James Horner's "Aliens"
Theme and
Danny Elfman's "March of the Dead" from Army of
Darkness
Thanks
Matt
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 25 Jun 2002 15:30:22 +0200
From: "Agata Zwierzyñska" <agata@... >
Subject: international
a polish/dutch/english girl from berlin requests MANCINI'S LUJON
is that international enough ; ) ????????
luv agata
--
||||||http://www.xs4all.nl/~agata||||||||
Agata Zwierzyñska
Künstlerhaus Bethanien Room 245
Mariannenplatz 2
D-10997 BERLIN
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Julius Cruickshank"
<jcruicks@... >
Subject: request...
Date: Wed, 26 Jun 2002 15:36:10 +1000
Hey there Jim,
We're listening to you down in Sydney
Australia. If you can send a shout out to the guy's and gurl at
Two Way TV Australia we'd sure appreciate it - great show mate.
If you've got it we'd like to hear
the new music to Minority Report and Phils' want's to hear Isaac
Hayes Tough Guys core.
Take it easy,
Julius
Julius Cruickshank
Graphic Designer
Two Way TV Australia
--------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Richard Ryan" <Richard.Ryan@...
>
Subject: First Timer
Date: Mon, 1 Jul 2002 15:25:51 +0100
Hey Jim,
Tuned in for the first time today, just killing time at work.
Now into my
third hour and loving it!
Really enjoyed the stand-up and films show - and after hearing
on a Fistful
of Soundtracks that the Muppets had covered a porn film score
I emailed half
the office to pass it on. Much hilarity and a few extra listeners
for you
here in London, UK.
Cheers for the soundtrack to a great day,
Rich
Jim Aquino
July 1, 2002
© 2002 Jim Aquino
Playing on Fistful on KZSC in
July:
Minority Report (DreamWorks)
Road to Perdition (Decca)
Cowboy Bebop: Knockin' on Heaven's Door — O.S.T. Future
Blues (Victor)
Monsoon Wedding (Milan)
Spider-Man (Columbia/Sony Music Soundtrax)
Braveheart (Decca)
Cinema Italiano (Decca)
See previous "Intros"
June 2002:
On Fistful's fifth anniversary
May 2002:
On Spider-Man, "Fistful Internacional Month,"
Cowboy Bebop
April 2002:
On streaming, an April Fools prank, Room 222, Chuck Jones
and Billy Wilder
March 2002:
On Lalo Schifrin at Cinequest and Fistful getting streamed
February 2002:
On excerpts from a reporter's notebook-style diary