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Wednesday, November 09, 2011

Across The Pond and Beyond - Rick Allen from Def Leppard

Some of the most inspirational stories that I have ever read or heard seem to have one common theme to them.

That common theme is rising up from a hardship or a tragedy or some other event filled with raw emotion to become a better person.

Kind of like the phoenix rising up from the ashes, if you will.

I find stories in which people can find inner strength during the most trying of times to be remarkable. The own personal struggles that one has to go through to become better people really inspires me to become a better person.

And those challenges can vary, depending on the person and the circumstance.

Sometimes, it takes a natural disaster for people to come together and support one another as they struggle to rebuild their debris-scattered lives. We certainly saw that after the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004. There were charity drives, rebuilding missions, and more importantly a lot of support and hope for the people who lost almost everything in the disaster.

Years ago, I survived a natural disaster that struck my area. In January of 1998, a severe ice storm struck the area, which destroyed train tracks, blocked off many roads, shut down public transportation, and plunged most of the area in darkness for several days (in some places, several weeks). And yet the one thing that I can remember the most about that event was how everyone came together and did everything possible to try and make the experience as painless as possible from staying on the radio airwaves to update people on the situation, as well as using generators to keep some stores open during the disaster. On one hand, it was a rather terrible experience to go through, but on the other hand, it made us stronger. Well, that, plus the fact that we had our exams cancelled that semester.

Sometimes the struggles can be more personal. I've already talked about my own experiences with being bullied in school shaping my current personality. I wish it didn't happen, but I'm glad it did because it made me a stronger person who doesn't allow other people to treat him horribly anymore. Sometimes, the event could be someone walking away from an abusive relationship finding their own inner strength and realizing that they don't need anyone to make them happy. Sometimes they're diagnosed with a potentially fatal disease such as cancer, and they find a way to beat it, or overcome it, and it really changes their perspective.

I find stories like this to be inspirational. If they can get through events that have every potential to destroy them, and they find inner peace and strength out of it to come out of the other side better than ever...that's awesome.

So for today's blog entry, I want to discuss a percussionist of a British band that sustained an accident that really could have ended his career before it began. However, through the support of his bandmates, as well as a lot of hard work and trial and error, he not only managed to survive the aftermath of the accident, but ended up gaining even more confidence than ever before. This confidence would lead to the band releasing one of its biggest albums of all-time, scoring the band their first number one hit, and having continued success years after the fact.



This is the story of Rick Allen. Long-time drummer of the band Def Leppard.

The subject of today's edition of Across The Pond And Beyond.



Rick Allen was only fifteen years old when he joined the line-up for Def Leppard in November of 1978. His mother spotted a personal ad in the newspaper put out by the band. The ad had the title “Leppard Loses Skins”. The band was looking for a new drummer after their original drummer quit. Allen auditioned, the band liked him, and he left school to join the band as its full-time drummer.  Allen became the fifth member of the band to join at the time, joining lead singer Joe Elliott, bassist Rick Savage, and guitarists Steve Clark and Pete Willis.

In September of 1979, the band opened for Sammy Hagar at London's Hammersmith Odeon, and would also perform as a supporting act for AC/DC just a couple of months later, developing a following among British hard rock and heavy metal fans.

However, by 1980, when the band released their debut album, some fans were turned off by the perception that Def Leppard was trying too hard to attract an American audience. By recording songs like 'Hello America', and touring in the United States more often, fans were initially appalled, and took their displeasure out against the band. At a performance at the Reading Festival (a rock festival in England), the band was pelted with beer cans during their entire set!

During 1981, their fortune would turn around. A second album was released on July 11, 1981 entitled 'High 'n' Dry'. Produced by Robert “Mutt” Lange, the album helped the band define their sound, and by 1982, their videos began to be featured on MTV as some of the first heavy metal videos played on the network.  Despite a shake-up within the band when Pete Willis was fired one year to the day Def Leppard released 'High 'n' Dry' to be replaced by Phil Collen, the band continued to be highly successful in their native England, and the band went on a European tour during 1981 and 1982.

By the beginning of 1983, the band's third album, 'Pyromania' had been pressed and released, and catapulted the band into stardom with the lead-off single Photograph, released in early 1983.



The band's third album ended up selling six million copies, to hold down the number two spot on the American album charts (Michael Jackson's Thriller album kept the album from the top spot). By 1984, Def Leppard was considered to be one of the best rock bands at the time, and all the members of the band were riding high off of the massive success.

It seemed as though nothing could derail the success of the band, and for then 21-year-old Rick Allen, the future seemed bright, and nothing could stop him.

Then came the night of December 31, 1984.

That night, Allen and his girlfriend were on their way to a New Years Eve party at his family's home in Sheffield, England. On the way there, they were passed by a driver in an Alfa Romeo. According to Allen, the driver had been egging him on the whole time, and refused to let him pass. A street race soon progressed, and Allen, sped up in a rage, hoping to finally overtake the driver. But during this street race, Allen got careless. He ended up losing control of the Chevrolet Corvette he was driving, sailed over a stone wall and crashed into a field. He and his girlfriend survived the crash, but Allen was thrown from the wreckage into the field. Because of a faulty seatbelt, during the crash, Allen's left arm was competely severed from his body.

Miraculously, a passerby who happened to work as a nurse arrived on the scene, and Rick Allen was taken immediately to a hospital so he could be treated for his injuries. However, doctors were unable to successfully reattach his left arm.

Rick spent three weeks in the hospital, and spent about another six months recuperating from the accident. However, with the loss of his left arm, he became incredibly depressed. He didn't think that he could continue as the drummer for Def Leppard with only one arm, and he had resigned himself to be replaced as the drummer at any moment.



It wasn't until a visit from Joe Elliott that Rick's frame of mind began to change.  Instead of feeling sorry for himself, he would try to use what happened to him as a way to re-examine his drumming style. Allen and Elliott sat down with a group of engineers to design a custom made drum set to help Allen feel at ease behind a set of drums again. After some experimentation, Allen discovered that he could play some drum rhythms with only one hand using his left foot to play the snare drum. Another supporting figure in Allen's life at the time was Jeff Rich, who was the former drummer for the band Status Quo, and together with Allen, they designed an electronic drum kit Allen could play using one arm. After electronic drum manufacturer Simmons designed the kit for Allen, he made his return to the stage in 1986 during a performance at the 'Monsters Of Rock' festival. The set was well-received, and it helped Rick see that he could stay with the band despite what happened.



In 1987, the band released their fourth album 'Hysteria', which would eventually become one of Def Leppard's biggest selling albums, with twenty million copies sold worldwide. It was also the first album released since Allen's accident.

And it ended up being one of Rick Allen's finest moments. To be part of the band, and not only rising above his life-changing accident to thrive. I mean, isn't that inspirational? I know it is for me.

I mean, just take a look at one of the videos made for one of the biggest songs off the 'Hysteria' album to see what I mean.



ARTIST: Def Leppard
SONG: Pour Some Sugar On Me
ALBUM: Hysteria
DATE RELEASED: September 8, 1987
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #2

Check out any of the clips of the video that focus solely on Rick Allen and his drumming. He seems really at ease, he kept with the beat. I mean, just comparing this video with the one for Photograph in which Rick still had both of his arms, there wasn't a whole lot different. Rick seemed like he was really into the performance during the Photograph video, and was comfortable with the beat. In the Sugar video, Rick was still very much the same way, but yet it was somewhat different.

Whereas pre-accident Allen was drumming along, having a good time because of the beat of the music and energy of the crowd, post-accident Allen was at ease for a slightly different reason. I think it was because of the fact that not even losing his arm could stop Rick from doing what he loved best.

And what he did best was being the drummer of a successful band. A band that actually managed to score their one and only number one hit on the Billboard charts in 1988 with 'Love Bites'.

The band Def Leppard still performs and records today, and despite the death of Steve Clark in 1991, the band managed to regroup and release another album in 1992, which spawned their successful single 'Let's Get Rocked'.

Over the years, Def Leppard's success in North America has dried up, but they still perform at concerts and rock festivals today. And although artificial drum beats have dwindled in popularity since the early 1990s, Rick Allen has changed the way he plays the drums as well, favouring a more acoustic sound, achieved by using electronic pads to trigger samples made from recordings of his acoustic drums.

Perhaps one of Rick Allen's greatest moments came on June 14, 2009, when Allen headed the Download Festival with the other members of Def Leppard. Towards the end of their set, lead singer Joe Elliott dedicated the set to Rick, mimicking Rick's comeback performance back in 1986. Following that dedication, the crowd erupted in an ovation that lasted well over five whole minutes. Rick Allen was so moved by this that he had tears in his eyes. This was probably a moment that he would never forget.

For it not only celebrated the work of a drummer that was ranked number seven on a list of the 100 Greatest Drummers of All Time in a list published by the UK website Gigwise.

It celebrated the achievements of a man who made the most out of an accident that changed his life twenty-seven years ago.

Someone who didn't let losing a limb define who he was...instead using the incident to become a better drummer, and a better bandmate to Def Leppard.

The phoenix rising out of the ashes.


Tuesday, November 08, 2011

Sideways Stories From Wayside School

It has just dawned on me that it's been almost six months since I started the Pop Culture Addict's Guide To Life blog. I'm not quite there yet (the official six-month mark will take place on November 24th), but it's fast approaching.

I guess part of the reason why I've managed to keep this project going for almost six months now is partly due to you guys. All of you readers who have clicked on the links that I've posted in some areas of the Internet, and who have followed this blogging venture have inspired me to keep writing about the things that influenced my childhood and my life, and for that, I want to extend a little gratitude to you. If it wasn't for your support, and your reading my blog posts, and leaving comments, and even suggesting topics for me to discuss, well, there would be no blog! So, once again, thank you!

Over the last few months, I've had fun choosing topics to talk about in this blog, and I would hope that I have come up with a wide selection of ideas to talk about for people of all ages to relate to. From 1939's The Wizard Of Oz to Selena Gomez's hit song Who Says from 2011, there really is something for everyone.

And with theme days for movies, music, video games, television, cartoons, and even international pop culture references, there isn't a shortage of topics to be found...at least not yet.

Though looking over previous blog postings, I have noticed that I haven't really done a whole lot of discussion on books and literature. Sure, I've done features on Dynamite Magazine and the advertisements on the back of comic books, but other than that, I haven't really done much of a feature on books and reading.



And, I think that I would like to attempt to change that. I've been thinking about making a few theme day changes in the near future. In all likelihood, they'll take place after the new year. I've already featured a change or two that I'm planning for the new year. The feature that I did on the board game Clue is one possible topic change.

I've also been toying with the idea of coming up with a theme day for books, magazines, newspapers, and other things that people can read, and I think that in the new year, I'll make that more of a priority. I mean, it would be kind of silly for someone who wants to make it in the world of writing to not feature some of the authors and books that influenced my own writing style, right?

So, for today, I'll be turning the Tuesday Leftovers day into a feature on one of my favourite novels growing up, and its a novel that some people may not have heard of.

Come to think of it, it was written by an author who not a lot of people may have heard of either. At least not until one of his books was made into a very successful 2003 movie starring Shia LeBeouf.



The author in question is named Louis Sachar. He was born in 1954 in East Meadow, New York, moved to California with his family at the age of nine, and attended college at the University of California, Berkeley to earn a degree in economics. However, along the way, Sachar's career path changed a bit along the way. He would eventually attend law school, graduated with a degree in law in 1980, and ended up doing part-time legal work while working on various personal projects.

Those personal projects ended up being children's books.

It wasn't until Sachar was in high school that he really wanted to become a writer (coincidentally, it wasn't until high school that I actually wanted to become a writer as well). Sachar was inspired to become a writer after being influenced by such authors as Kurt Vonnegut and J.D. Salinger.

Sachar would end up writing quite a few children's books over his lifetime. In his early career, he would balance writing with his other day-to-day jobs that he worked over the years. By 1989, he had managed to have enough success to pursue his writing career full-time. Some of the books he has written over the years include 'Johnny's In The Basement', 'Sixth Grade Secrets', 'There's A Boy In The Girls Bathroom', and his 1998 book, 'Holes', which is probably Sachar's most famous work, and which was turned into the movie with Shia LeBeouf that I eluded to earlier in this blog entry.

But for this installment, I actually want to talk about his first book project. And the inspiration behind the book project is actually one in which I can kind of relate to in my own personal life.

When Sachar was attending college, he, like many other college students out there, managed to get a job working part-time at Hillside Elementary School as part of a work study program to earn college credit. According to Sachar, he felt that it was a great deal. Earning college credit without having to have homework, midterms, or final exams. Just helping out for a few hours in a classroom filled with second and third graders. He even got to supervise the lunch hour recess outside in the schoolyard where the kids of the school gave him a rather interesting nickname.

He was known as Louis The Yard Teacher.

Now, here's a true story. I may not have had a cool nickname like 'Matthew The Milk Monitor' or something similar, but like Mr. Sachar, I too worked at an elementary school on a volunteer basis. In fact, I was a volunteer at the very same school I had attended as a youngster.



The year was 2003 and my nephew was a student in kindergarten at the time.  During that period, he attended Commonwealth Public School (the school that I myself attended between 1987 and 1995).   I was kind of in between jobs, looking for work in a rather dismal economic situation for my hometown at the time. My resume wasn't exactly considered to be all that remarkable at the time, and was probably one of the reasons why I didn't have much success in the job market. However, I had been told by a couple of people that having volunteer work listed on a resume could help improve my chances, so in 2003, I agreed to help out in my nephew's kindergarten class, as well as the class next door. It wasn't much...I just helped the kids with art projects, helped them open up their drinkboxes, helped them build huge towers of blocks. Things like that.

It was definitely an experience to be had, and I ended up doing the volunteer work off and on between 2003 and 2004 at my old elementary school. It's funny how when I was a child, that building was the source of a lot of hurt feelings and being made fun of. But yet going back years after the fact brought forth a whole new feeling. Whereas the thirteen year old me hated going to school for fear of being made fun of and harassed on a day-to-day basis, the twenty-three year old me saw it as a new experience. A renaissance, so to speak.

If anything, those few months that I spent volunteering at my nephew's school kind of put things in perspective, and made me realize that maybe things weren't as dire as I thought. And besides, all the kids that were in two classrooms that I helped out in were awesome. Sure, some of them misbehaved, but it wasn't anything that I couldn't handle. If anything, it kind of made me feel kind of important being there for the kids. I really enjoyed my time there.

And Louis Sachar must have really enjoyed his stint as Louis The Yard Teacher too because he used those experiences as the basis for his very first book.

Although he borrowed the character names from actual students at the school he worked at, and based one of the characters after himself, Sachar claims that the storylines in his first book were completely fabricated. The reason being that Sachar felt his own personal experiences were too dull to put into a book, and that he had no choice but to make it up as he went along.



That book was Sideways Stories From Wayside School. Although completed in 1978, it took a while for the book to become popular. It was only after the book began being promoted in Scholastic book clubs and school book fairs that it started to gain in popularity. The book became so popular that two more Wayside School books were released in 1989 and 1995 respectively, and the book spawned a cartoon series called Wayside in 2005.



The book detailed life at Wayside School, which was supposed to have been a normal elementary school with thirty classrooms in a one story building. Somehow, when the blueprints were read, the builders misread the layout, and as a result, Wayside School ended up being thirty stories tall, with only one classroom on each floor.

The way the book was designed was exactly the same as the school. The book contained thirty stories about thirty characters inside the school. The book had thirty stories, just like Wayside School.



(Well, okay, technically there's only twenty-nine stories, as the builders forgot to build the nineteenth floor during the construction of the school. Chapter 19 was about the teacher who taught the class on the nineteenth floor, Miss Zarves.

Miss Zarves did not exist.

The majority of the stories were based on the classroom at the very top of the building on the thirtieth floor. Each chapter was about a student in the class, as well as the two teachers they had throughout the year as well as Louis The Yard Teacher, who happens to have the last chapter in the book.

Initially, in chapter one, we learn that the classroom on the thirtieth floor was Mrs. Gorf, an evil teacher who would turn her pupils into apples if the children misbehaved in any way. Eventually, she does turn them back into humans, but when the students misbehave again, she attempts to turn them back into apples. But when one of the students holds up a mirror, Mrs. Gorf turns herself into an apple, and is promptly eaten by Louis! This sets the stage for the next chapter, when the class is taken over by Mrs. Jewls, the teacher on the thirtieth floor for the rest of the book.

Mrs. Jewls has a grand total of twenty-eight students in her class, and as you read the book, you'll not only see how weird and backwards the school really is, but you'll also recognize a lot of the students as having the same characteristics as some of the people you went to school with yourself.

For instance, I know that some of the kids I went to school with were kids who took great pleasure in picking on the other kids. There's a few kids that are like this. Chapter 20 for instance introduces us to Kathy, a girl who hates everyone in the class, even Mrs. Jewls. She's more or less the bitter student who doesn't have a nice thing to say about anyone, but it's also revealled that she brings a lot of the hatred on herself too. There's Terrence (Chapter 26), who likes to insult kids with such sayings as 'Drop Dead, Ketchup Head' while kicking all the school's bouncy balls over the fence. He gets his comeuppance in the end of the chapter when Louis kicks Terrence over the fence. And in Chapter 27, we meet Joy, who steals lunches, and purposely gets fellow student Todd into trouble. The so-called mean girl of the group.

Of course, we meet Todd in Chapter 5 of the book, and Todd is the troublemaker of the school, having always gotten into trouble in class. Ironically enough, Todd is more often than not the best behaved kid in Wayside School, but because the school was built a little bit sideways, the way things ran were sideways too. Mrs. Jewls had a discipline board (similar to the broken rules list my second grade teacher used), where if you were bad, your name was added. If you got in trouble two more times, then you actually got sent home early on the kindergarten bus.

Which if this were a normal school would be swell, but apparently going home early was a real punishment. Anyway, in almost every chapter of the book, poor Todd would get sent home each time.

Some of the students would have some rather entertaining quirks. Sharie (Chapter 4) would always fall asleep in class, and one time fell out the window during a power nap. Thankfully, Louis saved her, but Sharie scolded him for waking her up during her nap. John (Chapter 17) could only read books upside down until a whack on the head flipped his brain right side up. Paul (Chapter 10), had a habit of pulling the pigtails of Leslie, who herself tried to sell her toes to Louis in Chapter 18. There was Rondi (Chapter 13), who kept getting complemented on her missing teeth, Bebe Gunn (Chapter 6), who once drew three hundred and seventy pictures in an hour for art class, and Sammy (Chapter 14), a student who wore a bunch of smelly raincoats and was nasty to Mrs. Jewls and was eventually revealled to be a dead rat.

Yes...apparently dead rats can be enrolled as students.

One student in the book ended up changing his name with another student (Nancy, Chapter 28), you met Eric Bacon, Eric Fry, and Eric Ovens (Chapter 22), and Joe (Chapter 3), who can't count in order, but still arrives at the same number each time.

There's many more students featured in the book, but just based on the descriptions, can you imagine what life at Wayside School would end up being like? It would be kind of crazy, and insane, and fun all at the same time.

I think part of the reason why I enjoyed the book so much was that despite all the dead rats, and apples, and sideways arithmetic that appeared at Wayside, there were always people that I could relate to. In fact, what really got me was how none of the students (except for maybe Kathy, Joy, and Terrence) never really harmed each other, or went out of their way to make anyone else feel bad. Sure, there was some good-natured ribbing, but for the most part, the classroom worked well together. In fact, for a perfect example of this, you should check out the chapter on the student known as Maurecia (Chapter 9). It's probably my favourite chapter in the whole book.

Really, I recommend this book, Wayside School Is Falling Down, and Wayside School Gets A Little Stranger. The books are well-written and very creative, and are loosely based on a true story.

And hey, Louis Sachar inspired me in a way. He and I had quite a similar experience in our lives. If he could use that experience as a stepping stone towards having the career he wanted, maybe it's time that I made that happen too.





Monday, November 07, 2011

Monday Matinee - Aladdin

For today's blog entry, I thought that I would take this opportunity to ask all of you a question. You don't have to feel obligated to record your answers in the comment box down below, although if you'd like to, you're more than welcome to.

Today's question is...if you had been given the ability to have three wishes, what three things would you wish for?

(Keeping in mind that the only restrictions for the three wishes are that you cannot use the wishes to wish death on anyone, bring someone back from the dead, or make someone fall in love with someone else.)

That may seem quite easy for some people to come up with three things they desire most out of life, but for other people, having only three wishes may not seem like enough.

There's really a lot of ways that people could go when it comes to being granted three wishes. I imagine some people would have wishes that were purely materialistic. They would want a new house, a new car, lots of money, expensive jewelry, an advance copy of the new Call Of Duty video game...you know, things like that.

Sometimes people would choose to wish for more practical things, such as wanting to find a decent place to live, or wishing for a good job, or money to go back to school.

And sometimes, people would want to wish for something miraculous, such as world peace, or curing the illness of a loved one.

There's really no shortage of choice out there for people. If you were granted three wishes, how would you use them up?

I thought about this for quite some time and as I was doing some research on this blog entry, I managed to come up with three wishes of my own that I would use for myself (and no, I did not use the cop-out of having one of my wishes be for more wishes...that would be cheating, and dodging my question).

What are those three wishes? Well, the first one that I have is that I would love to be able to find a way to explore more of the world. Not with the hectic pace that some of the contestants on The Amazing Race see the world, mind you, but a more relaxing pace. I've really only seen just a small part of this big, beautiful planet that you and I call home, and to me, that's never really been enough. Of course, in order for one to see the world, one would have to find a way to be able to afford to pay for it, and well, I haven't managed to win the lottery yet. So, yeah, that would be my first wish. My first wish would be to see the world. Who knows, maybe my first wish will allow me to look at the world through different eyes. A whole new world, if you will.



What an appropriate song to post for this blog entry! The song, recorded by Peabo Bryson and Regina Belle hit the top of the Billboard charts in March 1993, and happens to be the main theme song for the Disney movie that is featured in today's blog.



The song 'A Whole New World' comes from the soundtrack to the movie Aladdin, which was released in theaters on November 25, 1992.

(And just on a side note, Aladdin happens to be one of my all-time favourite Disney movies, so I was really looking forward to doing a piece on this film anyways!)



The movie itself was unique in that the two lead characters were voiced by people who very well could have been newbies to the voice acting scene. The voice of Aladdin, for instance, was played by actor Scott Weinger. If that name sounds somewhat familiar to some of you, you may remember him from his role as Steve Hale on the television sitcom Full House during the sixth and seventh seasons of the show's eight year run. Prior to Aladdin though, he had only made appearances on Life Goes On and a failed television sitcom. As for Princess Jasmine, she was played by Linda Larkin, another relative newcomer to show business, having only had guest appearances in Murder, She Wrote, and Doogie Howser M.D to her credit.

And yet, watching the movie, it's hard to picture anyone else in the roles, isn't it? Both Scott and Linda did a fantastic job in the movie.

Of course, you had your big named heavyweights too. Both Frank Welker and Jim Cummings made appearances in the movie, and both of them have had humongous success in the world of voice acting, as had Jonathan Freeman who played the evil Jafar. Gilbert Gottfried's voice is easily recognized as Jafar's sidekick, Iago.

Of course, the really big heavyweight was the casting of Robin Williams as the Genie, which Williams agreed to do to show his gratitude in response to the success he enjoyed starring in the Disney/Touchstone produced Good Morning, Vietnam. He did have a couple of conditions though. He agreed to do it provided that his name or image wasn't used to promote the film, and that the character he played would not take up more than 25% of the space used in the promotional materials for the film, including movie posters, toys, and even the cover of the VHS tapes when the film was released on video.

Here's one of the promotional posters for Aladdin. Can you see where they completely ignored Robin's demands right off the bat here?



I'd say that's a bit more than 25% of the poster, don't you?

Apparently Williams wasn't too pleased by this, and in the weeks after Aladdin was released, he and Disney had a falling out that reeked in bitterness. In some of the future Aladdin projects, Dan Castellaneta (who you may know best as Homer Simpson), took over the voice of the Genie, but when Jeffrey Katzenberg was fired from Disney and replaced by Joe Roth, Disney issued a formal public apology to Williams, who accepted.

The soundtrack for the film was absolutely incredible as well. I mean, you already heard one song up above, but there were twenty other original songs and compositions that appeared on the soundtrack and in the film, which showcased the work of composer Alan Menken, and songwriters Tim Rice and Howard Ashman, both of whom had worked on Disney feature films before. In fact, it was Ashman who actually came up with the idea to make Aladdin into a movie. Sadly, Howard Ashman passed away in March of 1991 due to complications from AIDS, so he wasn't able to see his work pan out on the big screen. Ashman's death was the reason behind why Tim Rice was brought onto the project...to finish the work that Ashman had started.

The end result was a film that had a lot of heart and a powerful message.

The movie is about a young street kid named Aladdin who along with his sidekick, a monkey named Abu, has to resort to stealing things from the marketplace in the kingdom of Agrabah. One day, he happens to bump into Princess Jasmine, who had arrived in the marketplace after being frustrated with her privileged, yet suffocating lifestyle at the palace of Agrabah. Though both of their backgrounds are as different as night and day, the two find themselves having quite a lot in common, and Aladdin manages to save Jasmine from losing her hand from a merchant after taking an apple without paying for it to feed a hungry young boy.



Alas, the newfound friendship between Aladdin and Jasmine is short-lived when Aladdin is arrested for thievery. Despite Jasmine's pleas for Aladdin's release from custody, but Jafar, the Grand Vizier to the Sultan of Agrabah (the Sultan being the father of Jasmine), tells the princess a rather cruel lie, saying that he had been executed for his crimes.



In reality, Jafar had planned to use Aladdin in his quest to get the magic lamp inside of the mystical Cave of Wonders. It was rumoured that the magic lamp contained a genie who had the power to grant its holder any three wishes they desired. Jafar wanted to get access to the lamp so that he could use the powers to take over control of Agrabah. But any attempt to get a thief inside the cave lead to disaster, as anyone who tried to get inside was promptly killed. Only a 'diamond in the rough' could enter the cave to retrieve the lamp.

And Aladdin was that diamond.

In the disguise of an old man, Jafar releases Aladdin and Abu from the prison, and takes them to the Cave of Wonders. After getting a warning from the tiger head at the front of the cave, telling Aladdin and Abu not to touch anything except for the magic lamp, the two head into the depths of the cave, a salivating Jafar standing close by. With help from a magic carpet, who Aladdin and Abu found on their way through the cave, Aladdin manages to get his hands on the lamp. But when Abu carelessly grabs a ruby from the cave, the cave starts to collapse on itself. The carpet manages to be a huge ally in helping Aladdin and Abu escape to the entrance, but their escape is short lived as Jafar tries to kill Aladdin in order to get the lamp. Cleverly, Abu manages to bite Jafar, which distracts him long enough for Abu to steal the lamp from Jafar, but the end result has Aladdin, Abu, and the magic carpet remaining trapped inside the now collapsed Cave of Wonders.

Feeling trapped, and maybe even a little bit claustrophobic, and with his only friends being a monkey and a carpet, Aladdin decides that maybe the best thing he could do is rub the lamp to see what happens.

What happens is this.



Now, I don't know about you, but if some larger than life blue guy happened to pop out of a magic lamp and was as in your face as this guy was, I may want to run and hide. But, you know, the guy had pizzazz and charisma. How could you not love him?

And, Aladdin (after tricking the genie into letting them out of the cave without using one of his three wishes) decided to use his very first wish to transform himself from street kid to rich prince, so that he could have a better shot at love with Princess Jasmine.

You see, there was a rule that had been crafted into the book of laws for the kingdom of Agrabah, which stated that the princess could only marry someone who was already a prince, or who was descended from royal blood. The problem was that unbeknownst to Aladdin, Jasmine was sick and tired of being set up with the spoiled, jerky princes by her father. Aladdin was different, but Jasmine believed Jafar's lie that he was dead. And yet Aladdin mistakenly presumed that Jasmine was only interested in guys who were rich and royal.

Hey, there's a life lesson...never change who you are to attract someone else's affections. It never works.

Aladdin also hears what one of the genie's wishes was, which was to be freed from the confines of his magic lamp. Remember this for later.

And of course, when Aladdin strolls into the palace as Prince Ali Ababwa, Jasmine is immediately turned off, thinking him to be no better than the suitors she kicked to the curb.

And to think that if it wasn't for the idea of social customs, and silly rules designed to keep people from growing, and learning about themselves, Aladdin and Jasmine would not have nearly the struggles they faced.

You know what? This inspires my second wish. My second wish is for everyone to have the courage to be true to themselves and follow their hearts no matter what. I honestly believe that a lot of us don't pursue our dreams is because we had restrictions placed on us, or because we were told by others that it wouldn't be possible for us to achieve those dreams.

So, my wish is for people to find that inner strength and their resilience to pursue their dreams.

Okay, so this is two wishes down. One to go. But first, we need to see how Aladdin...oh, I mean, Prince Ali woos Jasmine with help from his magic carpet.



Of course, Jasmine starts to see through the Prince Ali disguise, and somehow figures out that Ali and Aladdin are one in the same, but Aladdin lies to Jasmine, and says that he sometimes dresses up as a commoner to escape the pressures of palace life, which Jasmine can definitely relate to.

But, Jafar ends up capturing Aladdin immediately after his outing with Jasmine, and he tries to kill him by drowning him in the ocean. But thanks to Aladdin using his second wish, the Genie saves his life. Aladdin soon discovers the evil plot that Jafar has planned, and runs to the palace in the hopes of exposing Jafar's true colours. However, when Iago manages to steal the lamp away from Aladdin, bringing it to Jafar, the genie is forced to become Jafar's master, reluctantly being forced to grant his first two wishes, which were to become Sultan of Agrabah, and to become a powerful sorcerer. He then uses his powers to enslave the former Sultan and Jasmine, and to expose Aladdin and banish him out of the kingdom.

Of course, this doesn't seem to stop Aladdin. For Aladdin also had Abu and the magic carpet with him. He flies the carpet back to Agrabah in an effort to rescue Jasmine from Jafar's clutches and to get control of the magic lamp back again. Jasmine tries to distract Jafar with a sultry dance long enough for Aladdin to hopefully seize control of the lamp again. Unfortunately, the plan didn't work out and Jafar transforms himself into a giant cobra, determined to squeeze the life out of Aladdin. Jafar thinks he has won, and he boasts about being powerful. Aladdin comes up with a spur-of-the-moment plan to tell Jafar that he thought the genie was more powerful than Jafar, so Jafar uses his third and final wish to transform himself into a genie.

And, it is this final wish that ends up being the end of Jafar...well, at least until the next sequel. Let's just say that genies aren't nearly as...um...free...as people think.

So now Aladdin has one final wish left to go...there really was nothing stopping him from using his last wish as a way to finally become a real prince in order to marry Jasmine. But his decision to use his final wish in a selfless manner by...

...ah, well, rent the movie and see it yourself. :D

But you know, that's probably how I would use my third wish too. I know there's a lot of things that I do want in my life, but honestly if I had used up two of my three wishes, I would like to think that I would use my last wish to grant someone else's wish, whatever it may be. I think that would be a great way to use a last wish.

And if my last wish ended up helping so many other people in the process, then it would be worth it.

I guess that's the reason why I wanted to choose Aladdin as the subject for today, aside from the fact that it is one of my favourite Disney movies. It's really a movie that has a great message. It shows people that they don't have to lie about themselves to make a good impression on others. It shows people that they don't need material things in order to feel great. And probably most important, it shows people the true meaning of friendship and sacrifice...and it shows people that escape is possible in any bad or dire situation if you have the courage inside yourself to make it happen.

Hmmmm...maybe that's a lesson that I need to imprint in my subconscious.



Sunday, November 06, 2011

Sunday Jukebox - Weird by Hanson

Welcome to Sunday, November 6th, and to those of you who turned your clocks back one whole hour, I hope you all survived...though given that you got an extra hour to rest and relax, I can't see how any of you would have struggled.

For today's topic, I have a story about a band who seemed to come out from the 'middle of nowhere' and dominated the charts throughout much of 1997 and 1998, then seemed to disappear for a while. The band of brothers certainly hasn't given up on their musical dreams and still tour today, but they're not quite as popular or successful as they were back in their heyday.

But before we get into further discussion about this band, as well as the song that I plan to feature, I want to tell all of you a little bit of a story about my life and times that is linked to this Sunday Jukebox entry.

I was what you would consider to be a rather...upon lack of better word...whimsical kind of kid. I tended to like things that other kids had no use for, and partook in activities that not a lot of other kids wanted to take part in.

I mean, a few days ago, I wrote about how I ended up getting the ancient game console known as the Intellivision, when everyone else in my class had a Nintendo. And, I also talked about how I was made fun of and ignored because my video game system was one that was older than even I was. They had thought that I was weird for not having a Nintendo. But that's fine. That was their opinion. My opinion clearly didn't match theirs as I loved my Intellivision. But, no, I was the weird one.

There were other instances in which I was classified as being the weird kid in the class though. By the time I was in sixth grade, I was the kind of kid who basically stuck to himself, doing solo activities. Of course, there was nothing wrong with this, as many kids probably did a lot of things by themselves all the time. I know when I was younger, one of my favourite activities was to stick around the house, grab my favourite book, and sit on the front porch to read it. Another favourite activity involved turning on the garden hose on hot summer days to cool off in the backyard. Yet another activity that I took part in was getting an early interest in writing by using Crayola crayons and lined paper in the house. Again, I thought they were typical activities that most kids my age did.

But according to some of the neighbours that lived on my street at the same time my family did, they considered it weird that I chose to spend my free time off to myself rather than around other kids. One nasty woman who lived across the street from us even went to my parents, and told them that she thought it was strange.

I mean, first of all, who the hell asked her opinion? I was only a little kid back then. Secondly, I did have some childhood friends but the problem was that they all lived quite far away, and it wasn't exactly ideal to drop in on them all the time, and lastly, a lot of the kids who did live close by me (with some exceptions) were the ones who used to beat me up or made fun of me. Whatever would make me WANT to have anything to do with them?

I guess in some way I was too young to understand what the nosy neighbours were like back then because admittedly I was in my own little world back then. It's not until becoming an adult that I realized that the neighbours opinions about me were anything but justifiable. They may have thought that I was weird for not playing with other kids when I was younger (a blatant disregard of fact-checking, by the way), but you know, I find their opinions just as weird right back. To make judgments on someone without even getting to know the people they are...yeah, that's weird to me.

You know what else is weird? Today's blog subject.



ARTIST: Hanson
SONG: Weird
ALBUM: Middle Of Nowhere
DATE RELEASED: March 16, 1998
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #31



You know, the song 'Weird' by the band Hanson (who you may remember as the band behind the infectious 1997 single MmmBop), may not be their most well-known, or even their highest charting single ever released. But of all of the singles that Hanson has released, I would say that this one is probably my favourite single by the group, just because the lyrics really hit close to home. Even the video has examples of people, places, and an underwater subway car scene...things that some people may consider to be weird.

But, is this really the case?

I mean, let's take a look at how Hanson came to be. Hanson is made up of a trio of brothers, who all happen to have the last name of Hanson. (Go figure, really?)



Anyway, the trio is comprised of Clarke 'Isaac' Hanson (30), Jordan 'Taylor' Hanson (28), and Zac Hanson (26). When the band was at the height of their success, they were aged 17, 14, and 12 respectively. They started out performing in and around their hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma when they were young children. Their first performance in front of a crowd was back in 1992 at the Tulsa Mayfair Arts Festival. The three boys all began learning music the same way that a lot of kids learned music, which was through piano lessons. Shortly after, Isaac got his hands on a guitar, and Zac borrowed an old set of drums, leaving Taylor to assume the role of keyboardist. The band started up the way many bands did back in those days...rehearsing and playing in the family garage. The group even managed to release a couple of independently produced albums in the mid-nineties before getting their big break in the summer of 1996.

That summer, the band was a scheduled act at the South By Southwest music festival in Austin, Texas, where they were signed by manager Christopher Sabec, who promptly tried to get them signed to a record company. Many of the record companies passed on the trio of brothers simply because they declared them as nothing more than a novelty act, or because they didn't believe they could garner the success needed to sell a lot of records.

I guess in some ways, the record companies found them just a little bit too...weird for their tastes.

But then fate stepped in. And fate's name was Steve Greenberg, who was a representative for Mercury Records. He happened to be at the Kansas State Fair at the time that Hanson was performing on stage, and with backing from Greenberg, the band was immediately signed to a contract with Mercury Records.



During the last half of 1996 and first half of 1997, the band recorded their first mainstream album, an effort entitled “Middle Of Nowhere”, and the album first hit stores on May 6, 1997. That same day was declared 'Hanson Day' in Tulsa, Oklahoma by the governor of the state at the time, Frank Keating. The album was hugely successful, with the lead single, MmmBop staying on the airwaves for most of 1997.

But again, we're not here to talk about MmmBop. We're here to talk about 'Weird'.



And, basically, the song Weird is one that has a really powerful message, which is why I enjoy it so much.

And the reason being that it's almost kind of a song that described how I felt as a kid. Particularly the bridge of the song.

Sitting on the side waiting for a sign hoping that my luck will change
Reaching for a hand that can understand, someone who feels the same
When you live in a cookie cutter world, being different is a sin
So you don't stand out, but you don't fit in. Weird.

Boy...if a song didn't speak out like that one, and resonate a chord in me, I don't know what one will.

Do you know how long I waited to try and find people who could understand who I was, why I was the way I was, and still accept me and all my quirks? It took a very long time. Of course, part of that was due to me finally allowing myself to tear down that wall that I had built up to try and deflect all the names and terrible things that happened to be because I was supposedly the 'weird' kid. Still though, to be able to try and find someone who could understand the frustration over being unlike everyone else around me was a bit of a challenge, especially since some of the people who were a part of my life back then weren't necessarily those of the open-minded variety.

So, yeah...I can identify with that song lyric, as I can the following one.

You know, sometimes I consider my schoolyard years to be like living in that very same cookie cutter world that the band sings about in 'Weird'. A world where being different wasn't necessarily a sin, but it wasn't exactly embraced with open arms either.

So, what was the best way for me to counteract that? I tried to hide into the background, stayed away from where the crowds were and kept to myself.

I didn't stand out, but at the same time, I didn't fit in.

Weird, no?

The truth is though that at times, every single one of us feels 'weird' at some point in our lives. And also, keep in mind that the very definition of 'weird' is in the eye of the beholder.

I imagine that when Hanson first came out with the song 'MmmBop', a lot of people found the song to be a bit 'weird' because the chorus was basically just the word 'MmmBop' repeated a whole bunch of times along with some other words that may or may not have been in English. But looking back on the song now, it's actually got a pretty good beat, and surprisingly seems to hold up very well. But while one person may have seen Hanson as 'weird', other people may have deemed them a great band.

I imagine that there were things that I did in my life and times that other people have deemed weird, but there are others who would say that it wasn't the case.

Again, there's nothing wrong with being weird. Sometimes the people who are deemed the weirdest of the bunch can also be the most creative and interesting people one could meet. Conversely, some of those people who take pride in their normalcy could end up being anything but. Again, it's all a matter of perspective.

But just as Hanson says during the song, isn't it strange how we all get a little bit weird sometimes?

I say no. I don't find it strange at all that everyone can have feelings of being weird.

I actually find that quite normal.


Saturday, November 05, 2011

Saturday Morning: That's So Raven

Before I get into talking about today's blog topic, I want to just offer up a little reminder for most of you reading this.

For a good number of you, November 6th (tomorrow) is the date we are supposed to turn our clocks back one whole hour, beginning at two in the morning. Since most of us probably won't be up at 2am, most of us do this the night before. So, just to once again reiterate this message, don't forget to set your clocks back one hour this weekend.

Now that this has been said, we can continue. Ironically enough, this entry is sort of contrary to the Daylight Savings Time practice we'll be observing this weekend. Whereas this weekend is about turning the clocks back, this blog entry is about looking ahead into the future.

How many of you have wanted to gaze into the future, wondering how your life would turn out? If you were granted the opportunity to see your future unfold right in front of your eyes? If you were given flashes of visions that would be linked to an event happening in your direct future, would you want to know?

I'll admit that when I was growing up, the idea of wanting to know what the future held was there. Everyone wonders what kind of people they would grow up to become ten, twenty, even thirty years down the road.

And, here's a 'shocking' admission. Anytime I tried to see my future, I would end up being completely wrong. I remember being ten years old, and predicting that I would be rich, famous, and married by the time I was 25, and well...that didn't happen. But, maybe my calculations were off that day. ;)

But I'm not the first person who have made incorrect predictions about what the future would hold. I mean, look at Miss Cleo who boasted that if you called her now, you would get a free psychic reading that would change your life forever. She managed to build a pretty lucrative business out of fortune telling before being exposed as a charlatan in the early 2000s. She wasn't even Jamaican!

Oh, and there's Harold Camping who predicted that the world would end not once, but twice in 2011. And yet when May 21 and October 21 came around, surprise, surprise, we're all still here, just as I expect that we'll all still be here in 2013 despite all the 2012 theories out there. Last reports state that Camping has now 'retired' from the business of predicting the apocalypse, but really, would we have really believed him a third time anyways if he had dropped another phony date?

The point is that as far as the future goes, for the most part, it is uncertain and unpredictable. We all can make predictions about how we think or want the future to be (in some cases, those predictions are more of a public spectacle than others), but most times those predictions don't usually amount to anything. I mean, if we could all predict the future, the odds of winning the lottery would greatly increase, right?

But what happens when you have a Saturday morning sitcom that features a girl who can see into the future? And what happens when the visions that this girl gets aren't exactly clear? Sometimes people can see into the future, have a vision about something that is going to happen, but can't quite understand what the meaning is, or misinterpret the vision completely, but in the case of this show, most of the time, it leads to hilarity, confusion, and sometimes can get the beholder of the vision into major trouble.



The name of the show is That's So Raven, and it just happens to be the subject of today's show. Part of the reason why I chose to talk about this show is because my goal with this blogging project is to bring up subjects from different eras and genres in the hopes of attracting an audience made up of all ages. But I also wanted to showcase this television series because I actually kind of liked it. And besides, it greatly showcases the life lesson that I want to feature in this blog for today, which is...

...the future isn't always set in stone. Only you can examine it, interpret it, and follow it to the best of your ability. Don't predict it, just live it.

Wow...that was kind of epic.



The show was named after its star. Raven Symone played Raven Baxter on the program, and for those of you who are at least as old as I am, you probably may remember Raven Symone best for her role on The Cosby Show, where she played the role of Olivia from 1989-1992. 



Wasn't she cute?

Or, if you're a little younger, you may remember her from the TGIF sitcom 'Hangin' With Mr. Cooper', which aired from 1992-1997. And she also made quite a number of guest appearances on several television shows over the years in everything from A Different World to Bill Nye The Science Guy.

The idea for That's So Raven was conceived during the summer of 2001. The basis of the program had shades of 'I Love Lucy' incorporated into it, as the program was designed to have a lot of slapstick comedy and sight gags blended into the show, but with a twist. The main character was to have supernatural abilities and the ability to see into the future. Sometimes these visions were very clear, and foreshadowed an event, but others were not quite so clear.

During the development of the show that became That's So Raven, the name of the show, as well as the main character was changed at least twice. Initially, the show was titled 'The Future Is On Me', where the main character was to be called Dawn Baxter. Then the show's name was to be known as 'Absolutely Psychic', and the character's name was changed again to Rose Baxter. Finally, when it was revealled that Raven-Symone had won the part of the main character, the character was changed to Raven Baxter, and That's So Raven became the show's official title.

The show's pilot was filmed during the summer of 2001, and during the 2001-2002 season, the first few episodes were filmed. Now, here's an interesting fact about the debut of the show. The show actually debuted four months earlier in Europe than it did in North America. Disney Channel UK began broadcasting the program in September 2002, but the American version of the Disney Channel chose to wait until the new year to broadcast the show.

On January 17, 2003, That's So Raven debuted on the Disney Channel, and the show was actually responsible for a series of 'firsts' for the Disney Channel during its entire run.

First #1 – The program was the highest-rated show in the history of The Disney Channel. As of November 2011, the show still performs well in syndication. The program was the first one in the history of Disney Channel to score a viewing audience of over three million people.

First #2 – The program was the first show ever aired on the Disney Channel to reach one hundred episodes (prior to this, the most a Disney show could hope for was 65 episodes).

First #3 – The program was the first sitcom to air on Disney Channel.

First #4 – The program was the first to have a direct spin-off (in this case, it would be the show Cory In The House, which ran for two seasons).

First #5 – The program was the first to be shot on videotape, use a multi-camera format, and filmed in front of a live studio audience.

I guess looking at all that, the show was groundbreaking for its time, wasn't it?



The show also seemed to have a cast that really gelled together and worked together very well, which helped sell the show. I mean, Raven-Symone's portrayal of Raven Baxter was quite memorable, just because Raven was such a loud personality. She was feisty, stylish, and often uses expressions such as 'Oh snap!' and 'Oh, no he didn't!'. She often has visions that may or may not be clear, and her attempts to figure out what the visions were lead to some rather awkward moments, a lot of disguises, and a whole lot of everything going wrong. Want some examples? Okay.

Now, unlike a lot of shows dealing with the supernatural, in which they are forced to keep the secret of their powers, this doesn't happen in That's So Raven. Although the vast majority of the public are unaware of Raven's powers, most of Raven's family and her two closest friends knew all about her visions, and more often than not, became the unsuspecting victims of the very visions that she saw.



Take Raven's best friend Chelsea (Annaliese van der Pol). Chelsea was always a kind-hearted vegetarian environmentalist who loved animals and nature, but let's just say that her elevator didn't quite rise up to penthouse levels. As a result of this, sometimes Raven took advantage of her, and the two friends have gotten into fights because of it. But when Raven had a vision of Chelsea's art project breaking (which happened just seconds later), Raven dressed up in silver clothing and face paint to stand in for the statue until the art exhibit was over.



Raven's other best friend, basketball player and aspiring rapper Eddie (Orlando Jones) was also a victim of Raven's lost in translation visions. Once, at Eddie's birthday party, she had a vision that Eddie's divorced parents were getting back together again, but the vision proved to be mistaken, and almost ruined the party. But the misunderstanding was cleared up, and Eddie and Raven were cool again.



Then there are the visions surrounding her family. Raven had a traditional family which had her father Victor (Rondell Sheridan), mother Tonya (T'Keyah Crystal Keymah, who left the series during its final year), and younger brother Cory (Kyle Massey), who found themselves getting wrapped up in Raven's visions as well. In most cases, these visions lead to a whole lot of trouble for Raven.



When Raven has a vision that Victor is going to be fired from his job, Raven tries to go over to his workplace to try and stop the event from going on. Sadly, Raven's efforts only serve to get Victor fired anyways (thus proving her vision true). By the end of the episode, Raven, Chelsea, and Eddie manage to help Victor get his job back, but this would be a good example of how Raven's visions could have devastating consequences because of misreading them.

Or when Raven and her mother went off on a spa day, and Raven discovers her favourite singer, Miesha, is vacationing at the same spa, she has visions that she will end up meeting her under some wacky circumstance, but can't quite figure out what those are. Of course, when Miesha's dog happens to jump into Raven's bag, and she's accused of dognapping, it leads to chaos. Surprisingly enough, the episode ended off on a positive note.

So, here's something that is rather interesting. Despite Raven's visions usually leading to trouble, everything worked out in the end anyways.

Whoa...a second life lesson at work here! When something goes wrong, in most cases, the damage can be repaired over time if both parties are willing and able. Wow, I'm getting better at this life lesson thing than I thought!



And besides, in some cases, Raven's visions did end up proving to be very helpful. When she had a vision of Cory shoplifting from a store, coupled with Cory's strange reaction to a monkey keychain Raven had found (not realizing that Cory had stolen it after succumbing to peer pressure), Raven dressed up as a police officer to make her vision come true by convincing Cory to stop hanging around the friends who told him to steal, and to convince Cory to return the keychain he stole.



And when Raven and Chelsea were applying for a job at a trendy boutique where Chelsea ended up getting the job despite Raven having a better application, Raven was confused, yet happy for Chelsea. But when Raven had a vision of the saleslady telling someone that she didn't hire black people to work for her, she knew that she had become the victim of discrimination, and set out to use that vision to prove her point.

Raven's visions were pretty sporadic looking back on it. Sometimes, the visions were crystal clear, while other times, it was hazy.

But you know what the one common denominator for all of these visions was? Every single vision she had came from a direct result of an action that Raven did to set everything in motion. In that sense, she became the beholder of her own destiny. She was the one who controlled the visions, rather than the visions controlling her.

And really, isn't that the ultimate life lesson here? Not to let fate control you, but for you to control fate?

Think about it.

And, don't forget to set your clocks back!