Today on 4-30 Dave Matthews pays back the enviorment, Led Zepplin breaks a record and Keith Moon was a nut.

Today Willie Nelson turns  75!!!  Happy Birthday Willie!

All info provided by www.thedayinmusic.com  

On this day of April 29

Decided to give you guys some music history it’s pretty intreasting to see who did what back in the day.

Go here to see what happened on 4-26

The good about The Forbidden Kingdom is it has Jet Li and Jackie Chan in it.  The bad about The Forbidden Kingdom is they did not know how to adequately fit a story around them.

I could not tell you how long martial arts movies have been coming out of China, but it has been quite a while.  They have been successful enough that they have found a cult following around the world, stars from these movies have come overseas for movies produced in America as well as other countries, and we have even gone as far as to create our own.  These movies that are created with a Western influence are different enough I do not fully consider them to fit into the same league as those from China, and those attempts at capturing the style normally fall short.

That is where the problem lies with The Forbidden Kingdom.  It is a Western creation that is supposed to feel like it is from Asia.  We just do not have the same feel for it as they do.  What does not help is that you have Rob Minkoff as a director and John Fusco as a writer.  I am not saying they are bad at what they do.  They both have had successful works.  Minkoff’s directing credits include Stuart Little 1 and 2, The Haunted Mansion, and The Lion King while Fusco has written the scripts for The Babe, Young Guns II, Hidalgo, and Crossroads (the 1986 movie, not the one starring Spears).  What I notice in these credit is a lack of Asian-type or martial arts movies.

The Forbidden Kingdom starts off with a boy named Jason Tripitikas, played by Michael Angarano.  He is a fan of Kung Fu movies, which it wonderfully shown by the tribute to the genre through a number of posters covering the walls of his room.  It is painful to watch him stumble through the introduction of the movie where the other characters are quite flat and stereotypical, almost to the point that I thought the thugs who force him to help rob a pawn shop run by an old Chinese man were stripped out of a Boston version of Grease.

When the movie finally gets interesting is when Tripitikas finds himself thrown into ancient China where he meets up with Lu Yan, a wandering drunk played by Jackie Chan, The Silent Monk, played by Jet Li, and Golden Sparrow, portrayed by Yifei Liu.  From this point on, it seems to be a tribute to Jackie Chan and Jet Li’s roles throughout the years, including a wonderful introduction of Lu Yan entering by Jackie Chan reviving his Drunken Master role.  The one disappointment I can find here, but is a treat for a select few, is most people who see this movie probably have no idea about the references that are made such as this.  Chan and Li do an excellent job, and they end up stealing the show.

Overall, the movie is somewhat average in its plot.  There is nothing special and next to no character development, but then again, that is not why people are going to see it.  They want to see Chan and Li face off, which they do is an excellently choreographed fight seen in a temple.  The portion of the movie involving them evens out the pain of sitting through the first few moments of the film which seem to stumble by, but I am a little disappointed that it does not seem to take full advantage of the talent available.  I found this movie to be a fun outing, but I do caution people on what to expect when they walk in.  Personally, I saw a lot more potential than what was put on the screen but still managed to enjoy it.

I know this is coming out a little late, but you know the old say, “better late than never.”

The first thing to make not of about this movie, as with pretty much every other movie that is based on a book, the book is far superior. (just a side note, the book is called Bringing Down the House, not 21) That being said, 21 was still an enjoyable movie. For those of you who are not familiar with it, it is about a group of MIT students who took Las Vegas for millions. This is a dream for millions, but this was a reality for a select few.

The book is based on the real life group from MIT. The movie decided to take liberties on this and develop its own plotline. For one, in the movie the main character, Ben Campbell, decides to join this group in order to earn money to pay for school. Apparently, it is a little bit of a stretch to think somebody would do this because they wanted to make more money. All kidding aside, it did create a more dramatic effect by giving the character more to lose by being caught.

The movie was clever in capturing particular elements from the book, even though the adaptations for the movie were not as realistic as the book. For one, in real life, the team ran into a problem when riots broke out in a casino due to an incident during a boxing match at the MGM casino. In the movie, the incident was a fight at a blackjack table, and they only referenced the real life incident.

Overall, this is a movie that is worth checking out. It definitely does not fall into the category of a big budget special effects feature that flood the theaters during the Summer Movie Season each year, but it does have an intriguing story. On top of this, I would also recommend reading the book Bringing Down the House to see where this movie came from.

Check out the best band in the 80’s to kick your fucking ass this summer coming to a city near you! The band that did a lot of drugs and drinking have dates set and bringing thier friends Papa Roach, Buckcherry, Trapt and Nicki Six’s band Sixx: A.M.  Click here for tour dates.

From punknews.org 

Today marks the seventh anniversary of Ramones frontman Joey Ramone. Joey passed away from complications due to Lymphoma on April 15th, 2001 after fighting the disease for four years.

On November 30, 2003, a block of East 2nd Street in New York City was officially renamed Joey Ramone Place. It is the block where Hyman once lived with bandmate Dee Dee Ramone, and is near the music club CBGB, where the Ramones got their start. Hyman’s birthday is celebrated annually by rock ‘n’ roll nightclubs, hosted in New York City by his brother and, until recently, his mother. Joey was buried in Hillside Cemetery in Lyndhurst, New Jersey.

 R.I.P. Joey you are missed!