Maryland Juice recently caught the London-based band Citizens! at their very first show in New York earlier this week. Check out the awesome music video for their song "True Romance" below. The description for the piece notes that it was cut using footage from the "1987 Telugu movie 'Pasivadi Pranam' starring the legendary Chiranjeevi." I think it blows Gangnam Style out of the water (just my two cents!):
P.S. WATCH THIS - If you haven't yet seen "Slapped Awake for Fifteen Days," it is a strangely hypnotic use of 1 minute & 45 seconds of your time. I caught this video when it had a few thousand views, and I now see that it has over 1 million. Find out why below:
#OccupyLife: The Montgomery County Young Democrats have a limited number of free movie passes to see an award-winning feature-length documentary (see reservation form below). "Trash Dance" is screening at Silver Spring's AFI Theatre this Saturday night at 5:20 pm. The movie is part of a line-up of numerous film screenings during the annual DC Labor Film Festival (Oct 11-18 at the AFI Theatre).
Trash Dance won the "audience award" at this year's AFI Silver Docs festival and has been getting rave reviews on the festival circuit. Here's a brief synopsis of the film:
Maryland Juice recently picked up a piece of art at a fundraiser for a jazz project in my neighborhood. The print below is called "Modern Day Warrior" by the JaH-HaHa art collaborative, and it jumped out at me due to the subversive imagery of Guy Fawkes/Anonymous. What I didn't know when I picked up this piece, is that the JaH-HaHa collaborative is based in Annapolis and comprised of artists Jeff Huntington and Jimi Davies (aka Jimi HaHa). Jimi HaHa happens to also be the singer/guitarist from the band Jimmie's Chicken Shack, who I once booked to play a show at Tufts University (where I did my undergrad work).
In any case, check out the print below, along with a quick flash-back to the Chicken Shack:
If you haven't already seen the latest viral video sensation, check out this YouTube marriage proposal. It may be the coolest "I do," that I've seen yet. I'm not one who thinks televised or sports game proposals are cool, but the guy below did it right. Another example of a format reboot from my generation. God bless hipsters (hahaha):
Maryland Juice spent Saturday night checking out 21st century populist art in Baltimore's Charles Village neighborhood. My friend's brother is part of the Baltimore Rock Opera Society (aka BROS), and he invited me to check out their latest production Valhella (dates: 5/13, 5/18, 5/19, 5/20 - Autograph Playhouse, Baltimore - tickets).
Maryland Juice brought a camera to the show, and so I made a short video to give readers a taste of the rock musical (see below). But first, let me provide you a bit of background about BROS, because I think their creativity and entrepreneurial spirit reflect our generation's ethos. Their website states:
Baltimore Rock Opera Society (BROS) is the next evolutionary leap in Baltimore’s musical theatre scene–a highly energetic troupe of actors, writers, musicians, and artists founded in 2007 with the sole mission of producing original, live rock operas in Baltimore....
Essentially plays interspersed with rock songs, Baltimore Rock Opera Society performances maximize production value within a “do-it-yourself” budget. Homemade set pieces and costumes create an awe-inspiring visual context in which actors and musicians tell the story. Each song in a BROS rock opera drives the plot while drawing viewers in through interaction with performers....
BALTIMORE BREW: On Friday May 11, the Baltimore Rock Opera Society will premier its latest original production, Valhella: The Ragnarokkoperetta, another of the group’s torrid tales of superhuman heroism and suffering. The show is loosely adapted from Norse mythology and executed in pursuit of what composer Richard Wagner, the misty godfather of the BROS’ artistic vision, called gesamtkunstwerk – that mashup of spectacle, ritual, dance, music, theater and other artsy stuff that is opera at its most extreme....
Earlier this week, a few dozen of BROS’ mostly twenty-something cast and crew gathered at the Autograph Playhouse on west North Avenue, a former 285-seat neighborhood movie house transformed by a new stage and lots of red paint on the walls, for what theater professionals call a “stumble through” of Valhella....
While BROS is still in engaged in its own epic struggle for immortality, it has been producing its stupendous productions on the cheap, budgeted at just $10,000 apiece, which is about what they earn in ticket sales.
VALHELLA VIDEO PREVIEW: If you want to see what the Baltimore Rock Opera Society is able to do with $10,000 and a lot of volunteer effort, check out Maryland Juice's Valhella video preview:
On my way to see Valhella, I stumbled upon a series of street murals in Charles Village, including one work in progress. The artist allowed me to photograph him at work (see below):
CHARLES VILLAGE STREET MURALS - BALTIMORE, MD 5/12/2012
Maryland Juice today decided to provide readers with the opportunity to watch a free 90-minute feature film today. The award-winning documentary "Life in a Day" is available to view online below. Note that I paid money to see this in the theaters, so ya'll are getting off easy!
Synopsis: On July 24th, 2010, thousands of people around the world uploaded videos of their day to YouTube to take part in Life in a Day, a historic cinematic experiment to create a documentary film about a single day on earth.
Oscar-winning director Kevin Macdonald whittled down over 4500 hours of footage into a 90-minute film that wowed audiences at the Sundance Berlin and SXSW Film Festivals earlier this year.
Now, after releasing in theaters around the globe, the film has returned to where it all began. Watch it for free, and be sure to explore the channel to learn more about this amazing piece of cinema history.
