Daily Archives: August 14, 2009

Edinburgh Fringe Reviews Week 1 Part 2

  By ekilko | August 14, 2009 - 4:48 pm | Comedy, Comics, Featured Post, The Arts, The Culch, Theatre
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In this blog I will be looking at Seawall, Luck, Foil Arms and Hog, Stefan Goalaszewiski, Des Bishop, Rich Hall, Sammy J and Les Infant Terrible. Two pieces of advice for anyone coming over – bring a jacket and book your shows as things are selling out! Also the awards have started. The Trav have one 4 so far including a fringe first for Orphans and Internal. This weekend some of the shows leave and new ones arrive which means the turnaround rhythm that we had will be disrupted! Seawall is a thirty minute show at the traverse that will enthrall. I had seen Simon Stephens’ work last year and clearly he has skill with the monologue, a kin to McPherson. Irishman, Andrew Scott performs this one man piece about his relationship with his father in law, his family and god. Scott has you hanging on his words only to … There’s more →

Uncanny : “Goodbye” by Kristinia DeBarge

  By Will | August 14, 2009 - 11:00 am | Music
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Title: Goodbye Artist: Kristinia DeBarge Label: Mercury Release: single August 10 2009 / album August 17 When I was a kid I read “Little Heroes” by Norman Spinrad. The plot pivots around the creation of a successful AP (artificial personality) for a music label to replace troublesome pop and rock stars. I mention this because I’m wondering if Kristinia is real. Because the song has a major uncanny valley problem. The voice is heavily synthesized. Yes, there are “electronic yodel” effects to bring the song up to date, but the synthetic tweaking doesn’t stop. Ever. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that the Yamaha Vocaloid Lola is the actual singer (or maybe the more advanced Marianne), after all they are used quite a bit as fake backing singers, but they have problems with range. Given that Kristinia DeBarge is the daughter of James DeBarge of 80′s R&B group DeBarge (never … There’s more →