So, Michael Jackson, as many of you have probably heard, passed away earlier today. Amazingly, this story has captured the attention of everyone who has a television. I guess the notion of a younger generation fighting for their freedom in Iran has become old hat.

Okay, I’m not trying to be a wet blanket. For better or for worse, Michael Jackson had an incredible impact on most people my age and older. Jackson’s influence on pop culture was immense, whether people knew it or not. Jackson helped to shape MTV and the music industry of the past 25 years or so, gave record label executives the idea that they could make huge piles of money by showcasing an artist. Unfortunately, there was something that was lost on most people when they tried to emulate Jackson’s success: the man was incredibly talented. The videos were used as a means of bringing awareness to Jackson, rather than serving as an ad. It’s an important distinction: initially, for Jackson, the videos were an exclamation point on an incredible product. If you took away the videos, you’d still have something amazing. For many artists that followed (and sadly, for Jackson as well) the video became representative of the artist. All polish and no depth. As I said, Jackson fell prey to this as well, as his career going into the 90s and onwards languished, despite even bigger and bigger budgets. It didn’t help that he became increasingly eccentric as time went on, becoming more renowned for his bizarre behaviour than for anything musical. I guess, you could say that Jackson could be seen as a microcosm of the music industry and, if you do, you have to wonder if this means if we can officially state that the ‘business’, as we know it, now has an official time of death.

I mean, honestly, think about it. The ‘majors’ have been losing more and more money as time has gone on, much like Jackson has. MTV has become more about spectacle and the bizarre than anything truly engaging or artistic, being more interested in foisting the likes of Steve-O or Speidi upon us (ironically, MuchMusic has gone to streaming non-stop Jackson related material since his death was announced. I’m unsure if the same can be said about MTV down in the States, but I find it to be incredibly sad that I was surprised to see such heavy coverage done for Jackson, particularly in this day and age. The last time I recalled this sort of 24/7 coverage being bestowed on a musician was with Kurt Cobain’s death) Both the industry and Jackson became embroiled in some ugly legal issues, mostly pertaining to money. For Jackson, it had mostly to do with bankruptcy, for the record labels, it had more to do with suing grandmothers and teenagers. There are a lot of parallels that can be made and, without meaning to sound incredibly ghoulish here, it is strangely appropriate that Jackson’s passing came when it did. A movement that he embodied and signified, far more than anyone else, has come to an end, just as he himself has passed away.

That’s without going into Jackson’s own personal issues, something which I think most people are unqualified to be doing. I did like what Bob Lefestz had to say in his e-mail newsletter, though: “He missed his childhood and now he’s gonna miss his old age. How fucked up is that?”

Sorry for the lull in posts, folks. Parents visiting from out of town and moving create a lot of time that gets eaten up that could have been used for the Internets. I guess that’s what this whole ‘having a life’ thing is about. Anyway, I’m settled in, so we are no longer experiencing technical difficulties and posts should be coming up in short order.

Cheers!

Came across this while watching the Stanley Cup Finals tonight.

I’m usually not one for crass commercialization, but I would so be buying tickets for a movie adaptation of this.

I was a little surprised to hear that David Eddings had passed away. I never really read a whole lot of David Eddings stuff, to be honest, but one of his books, The Ruby Knight, was one of the first fantasy novels I had ever read (with The Hobbit and LOTR being the two that preceded it.)

What was more sobering for me, though, was doing some reading up on other authors out there and realizing that we’re going to be closing the book on a great deal of speculative fiction authors. While it’s exciting to think that there’s going to be new writers establishing themselves and doing new things within the genre, it’s quite saddening to think that a lot of recognizable names are getting up there in age.

Piers Anthony is 74.

Terry Pratchett is 61, but was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s 2 years ago.

Ursula Le Guin is 79.

Jack Vance is 92.

Michael Moorcock is 69.

Robert Jordan passed away 2 years ago.

This post is probably more than a little morbid, but it was the result of stumbling around and checking out some other authors which I am familiar with.

RIP David Eddings.

So Montreal is all abuzz with the announcement that Jacques Martin, former GM of the Florida Panthers, has signed on to become Montreal’s latest head coach. Rumours are buzzing around (in French) that Jacques Lemaire is going to be signing on as a ’special advisor’ and that former Habs head coach, Mario Tremblay are going to become a part of the Habs new coaching staff.

That’s all well and great, but as someone who isn’t a huge fan of the Habs, that whole drama, along with the handwringing going on in Montreal with the notion that the Habs are going to become a boring trapping team doesn’t really interest me. Unless Bob Gainey makes some solid personnel moves and makes the team tougher, hiring Lemaire isn’t going to have a huge impact for the Habs. Instead of being an offensive, ‘high octane’ team that gets ragdolled, they’re going to be a defensive, ‘conservative’ team that gets ragdolled. Good to see that Gainey is at least addressing the defensive problems that plagued the Habs last season, I guess.

What is far more interesting to me, as a Canucks fan, is that this could possibly signify Bouwmeester being on his way out the door in Florida. Jacques Martin had been trying to get the talented youngster signed to a deal all last season but was rebuffed. He made the decision not to trade Bouwmeester at the trade deadline, choosing instead to keep him for a bid to make the playoffs. At the time, it looked like a gutsy move that showed that Martin wanted Bouwmeester and that he had faith in his club to make the post-season. That didn’t pan out, as the Panthers didn’t make the playoffs and Bouwmeester, who has been the subject of rumours that he wants to play either for a winning team or in Canada, can’t be too happy with having his season end after 82 games played yet again.

Martin’s signing as head coach comes as a bit of a surprise, so you have to wonder if something precipitated this decision. Either ownership down in Florida told Martin that he was on his way out and gave him an opportunity to leave gracefully, or perhaps Martin realised that there is no way he was going to be able to retain Bouwmeester and knew that his dismissal would be pending and got out of Dodge as a result. While you could say that I’m reading too much into all of this, all signs do seem to indicate that Bouwmeester is not coming back and that Panthers management have given up on trying to retain him. (Sidenote: It also seems to nip in the bud many of the Phaneuf/Bouwmeester rumours I keep hearing about, assuming that what his agent is saying is true.) So, with the knowledge that Bouwmeester won’t be back, it’s not much of a stretch to think that since Martin’s gamble didn’t pay off, his days in Florida were numbered.

This makes me optimistic that perhaps, just perhaps, the Canucks have an outside chance at landing Bouwmeester. Then again, I was hoping against hope that the Canucks would make a push for Scott Hartnell several seasons ago and, well, the Flyers had to go and break my heart. Bastards.

Recap: So, this is going to be a relatively small update. I didn’t want my first post to be incredibly long, so I had to split up Curtis’ exploration of the town into 2 pieces. There’s not much going on at the moment, as everything mostly consists of just talking to people. Curtis has already explored half the town and is going to check out the rest of Spielburg. Will the rest of the town’s inhabitants be as elderly, rude or unhygenic as the ones Curtis has already encountered? Let’s find out!