Y E S! I am still alive! My mind has been occupied with my new job the last weeks, so I didn't really feel like updating over here. I will probably still do a belated review on october, though. One thing that convoyed me through the whole month was this:
t h i s r e c o r d k i l l s.
and I am going to see this boy live next week and you won't believe how excited I am for this. so excited, that I bought a ticket for 24 bucks for a band I don't even care about, but he is playing as their support. yeah...you get it.
I am observing a trend in the music scene, lately. Bands that have already released several albums suddenly come back to their roots and sound like their old selves again. And I don't really know, yet, what to think of it. Two bands in particular are MENOMENA and MEWITHOUTYOU with their current releases from 2012. While "Mines", MENOMENAs third release from 2010 was pretty different from what they had done before, imho, due to the split with Brent Knopf, their new release, "Moms" just sounds EXACTLY like "Friend and Foe" it has ALL the same elements just in other variatons. Now I could say, cool, that's the way I liked MENOMENA best, and I never really became a friend of "Mines", but on the other hand, it just somehow sounds like uninspired repetition. And the same thing occured to me while I was listening to the new MEWITHOUTYOU release a few days ago.. It took me a while to even dare to listen to it. On the one hand, my taste in music always keeps on developing, and recently I enjoyed more electronic artists than guitar-based sound, so I didn't really think I would be in the mood for it. On the other hand, this band means A LOT to me, and I am always very tensed when one of my all time favourites has a new release after a long time. And I am already questioning in advance, if the new sounds can compete with what I loved so much in the past. So I listened to "Ten Stories" today, and oh my, MEWITHOUTYOU put their cheerful singalongs aside and went back to the good old "Catch for Us The Foxes" and "A to B Life" times. But is that really a wise choice? Well, in the case of MWY, probably yes, because one thought came to my mind, while listening to "Ten Stories". Aaron Weiss is still one of my favourite persons on this planet.
And because I babbled so much about music, here are some videos to live up to my...uhm...humble thoughts.
It's octobaarrrr, peeps. The coolest month evaaar. And that's not because my birthday is waiting on the last of its days. Ok, yes it is. I really don't know why people keep complaining "uughhh, I'm getting older, screw this shit". I looove to celebrate birthdays, and mostly my own. ;) But as it is, I actually haven't planned anything, yet. This might have to do with the fact, that in less than a month my new job will start, and that's the only thing I can currently think about. I have only one week left at my old job, which is actually hard to believe. Then I will have some spare vacation days and then IT IS ON!
But October is also when all the TV shows are coming back for new seasons. I am already overcharged. I didn't dare to watch the first HIMYM episode, right on time, but then I thought, heck, I need to get started with this, before it's getting awkward. It hasn't been great, so far, but I still have high hopes for some glorious new episodes. But I am secretly hoping they will put this show to an end, with the last episode of this season. Then NEW GIRL started, too. And it has been satisfyingly hilarious. Then the 7th season of Dexter started, and I was massively disappointed by the last one, but damn, they are finally taking this series to another level of awesome. First episode was pretty good. And then I heard THE WALKING DEAD are also coming back, already? You gotta be kidding me? When am I going to have the time to watch all this? Not to mention the new season of AMERICAN HORROR STORY, which I am pretty curious about.
And last but not least, October is spooky time, and guess who loooves spooky time? Yeah, you got it right...but let's move on to the reviews of last month.
THE BOOKS I HAVE READ:
CROSSED by ALLIE CONDIE
So this is the follow up to Allie Condie's first book from the "Matched" series, and I already reviewed that one a few months ago, and was positively surprised. The second book reminded me a lot to the second release from the "Maze Runner" series, "The Scorch Trials", because of the whole wandering through deserted places thing. All in all I think it was a solid follow up, but I remember being a little disappointed at the end, since the whole efforts of the characters seemed somewhat senseless, sort of like the sysiphus methaphor used in the book. But I better judge the whole series altogether, when I have read the last book. (4/5)
FIRST COMES LOVE by KATIE KACVINSKY
Uhh, cheesy romantic cover! But I have to admit, that was actually the reason, why I gave that book a try, and I'm glad I did, because I really enjoyed this book, and it was actually the first book, I finished within 24 hours. I guess the story isn't even that special. A vigorous girl taking a challenge on a boy who rather wants to be left alone. I guess, sometimes it's just really the way a book is written, to make me fall for it. And this one did. (5/5)
HOLIER THAN THOU by LAURA BUZO
Alright, this was pretty disappointing. Although from the storyline, it could have been so interesting. A book with a more realistic touch, about a girl, talking about her job as a social worker in a psychiatric ward, and experiencing that she is getting more and more distant from her former highschool friends. But when you might think, that this would be a very emotional and touching book, the author just manages to let you feel no empathy at all for the protagonist. At this very moment, I didn't even finish the book, and started a new one instead, but I still think I am able to give it a rating, since I read 80% of the book. (2/5)
THE MOVIES I HAVE WATCHED:
AMOUR
Ugh, so intense. I really don't know, but there was a time I decided not to watch any more movies that are expectably emotionally disturbing. But then again, all the great stuff you are missing out on! And AMOUR definitely is one of those movies worth watching. But then again, I am literally having nightmares about this, just like the...oh wait, I don't wanna spoil anything. But yeah, this is a Haneke as you might expect it, horrifying but great. (8/10)
J'AI TÚE MA MÈRE
The second movie I watched as a french original this month, I am quite proud of myself. I really wanted to see this one, as I had already enjoyed Xavier Dolan's "Les Amours Imaginairs" lately. And yes, I am – more than ever – in love with this boy and his filmmaking and I am looking forward to what he might be capable of in the future. (8/10)
EAT PRAY LOVE
This was such a disaster. I did not expect this movie would disappoint that much. But it's kinda like with the character of Kirsten Dunst in Melancholia. I did not buy it for a second, how Julia Roberts tried to play a depressed person. Don't even get me started on her motives! The only good thing about this movie was Javier Bardem, for whom I had to wait until the very end, to come crawling out. And then he played such a dull character, oh my. Knowing of what he is actually capable of (No Country for old Men, Biutiful etc.) this was even more disappointing. (4/10)
THIS MUST BE THE PLACE
Ok, I got to admit, I am still a bit confused by this movie. Until this day, I didn't really comprehend, in what relationships all the characters stood to each other. But in some way, this movie impressed me. Probably because I hadn't seen something like this before. And Sean Penn was really amazing and 10 times more convincing as a depressed person than other actresses I have mentioned. (7,5/10)
REVOLUTIONARY ROAD
This was a bit disappointing aswell. I can't even really explain why. Maybe I just thought, my goodness, why are these characters both so immature? But then again, I like both Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio as actors, and they at least made me enjoy the movie. (6/10)
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS
This was probably a typical Woody Allen movie, where I can mostly not identify in any way with the characters. But at least, when the time travelling part of the movie started, it got at least a little bit funny. (6/10)
I wanted to do this for a while now: showing you the reason(s) why I am in love with instagram, or more specificly its users. So I collected some pictures from my favourite photographers and I am going to introduce them to you in the following weeks.
The first artist I want to give an introduction about is @miltoncross and he pretty much already delivers what I love about following so many different strangers on instagram: the WANDERLUST. I, myself haven't been able to travel much in the last few years, but I have this constant desire of travelling as many foreign places as possible. My parents never shared this desire, so our holiday trip destinations never went across the german border. (ok, we were in Austria once, but come on!) When I was a teenager, I had the chance to see London, Paris, Budapest and Copenhagen without my parents. But not much has changed since then. I was always so jealous when my classmates in school were talking about trips to Spain, Egypt, Greece a.s.o. But hopefully this is going to change in the near future. Meanwhile I keep enjoying the many terrific moments captured by those pilgramers (as they call themselves) on instagram.
Okay, peeps. I think it's finally time for that huge announcement, I've been hoping to do for a while now. I will start a new job in November with a very amazing and impressive company and to say I am very much looking forward to this is a big understatement. On friday, right on time for the weekend, I've been given a firm offer, after being interviewed three times (I guess they wanna be super certain, about who they want to work with). The funny thing about this is, that I was being introduced to the job offer via Xing, so yeah, you can probably count me to one of the few people who found their new profession via Xing. And you guys know how much I love the internet, and the fact, that it now provided me with a new job is just super incredible!
Okay, lots of exaggerations in this post, huh? But the awesomeness proceeds as I am going to meet one of the coolest people in the world in less than a week. On friday, 14th of September, here in Munich, there is going to be an introduction to the german release of "The Fault in Our Stars" by John Green, which I already described as one of the most impressive and affecting books I have ever read. (if not THE most..) and the author himself will be there and I am sooo excited!
I also made myself an early birthday present, and purchased this amazing box set (thanks to credit cards, I was able to buy it on Amazon.com since it's only available in the US.)
www.amazon.com
I know I already own "Looking for Alaska" and "The Fault in Our Stars" but I might aswell sell my previous editions. Both of those books are also signed by Mr. Green. And I still don't own "Paper Towns" and "An Abundance of Katherines". And the price is just super appealing to NOT wanna buy this!
Soooo, I actually waited a little while to be able to finally drop some big news in this post, but nooo, decisions are STILL to be made, and so I keep waiting patiently and use the spare time today and write some words about the last month. But waiting was basically all that happened in August, besides my parents visiting, but this I already mentioned in one of the last posts. So since there is nothing much to talk about, I thought I could share one of my musical discoveries for which I am already dying to hear more in the forseeable future. So far, the only thing existing by this artist called TWIGS is a tumblr blog and two videos on it and the web doesn't spill any infos about the girl many people are already comparing to Aaliyah. Well, I just really like her addicting mix between R'n'B and electro.
Well, I bet you already wondered what kind of cheesy romances I have been reading last month, you shall be released. ;)
THE BOOKS I HAVE READ:
REASON TO BREATHE by REBECCA DONOVAN
This was an exciting read about a teenager being physically abused by a family member and I am still trying to figure out how to rate this book properly. I was very drawn to all the characters, none of them was dull or uninteresting, but at some points I just couldn't comprehend some of the protagonists actions. Nevertheless it kept me guessing and wanting to read on. (3/5)
THE STATISTICAL PROBABILITY OF LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT by JENNIFER E. SMITH
The first time I heard of this book about two teenagers who meet on an airplane in one of John Greens many video blog entries, as one of his personal recommendations. A friend of mine had read it, too, but told me not to expect too much. And in the beginning it actually was a bit boring but it grew with every page and, yes, my eyes got a little wet. (4/5)
MY LIFE NEXT DOOR by HUNTLEY FITZPATRICK
This also was a recommendation by the friend mentioned above, who fell madly in love with the Garretts Family that is pictured in this book. And I think I fell in love with them, too, especially 4-year-old George, who is an adorable precocious toddler scaring himself with world end scenarios, but in a very hilarious way. Oh and of course there is a lovestory, in particular with the protagonist Sam and one of the Garretts family members (in fact there are 8 siblings). But of course all is not well in teenage wonderland, because Sam's mother, a politician on an election campaign, who is sorta disgusted by the huge and catastrophic Garrett family. All in all a hilarious but also dramatic book worth reading. (4/5)
MY LIFE IN BLACK AND WHITE by NATASHA FRIEND
I have the least memory on this book, since I read it in the beginning of the month, but I remember that I hardly liked it. The story is about a girl who looses her appeal, when her face gets injured in a car accident. And when you think, ok, this character will probably try to make the best of her life, the whole book is just a whiney tantrum thrown by a immature teenager, and you ask yourself, what kind of message the author wants to deliver, since it seems to be all about the obsession with beauty. (2/5)
THE MOVIES I HAVE WATCHED:
PROMETHEUS
Holy smokes, that was pretty neat! There weren't exactly answers too the many questions a viewer might have had in advance, but who cares, haha! I love movies where you are left behind with theories and stuff. And since there will be sequels I don't doubt much about the answers to follow.
What I loved about this movie were the visuals. Those holograms from the past! Or these little flying tracker-thingies, veeery nice! And we need to talk about Mr. Fassbender. Somewhere in an online review a person wrote, that fassy played his role so convincing, that you really had the feeling, he was and android. And that's exactly what I thought, during the movie. Well done, Fassy! Well done, Ridley Scott. (9/10)
BOY A
Andrew Garfield plays the role of young adult, who has recently been released from jail, after he took part in the killing of girl as when he was still a child. And as hard as this sounds, Andrew Garfield plays his role so you feel empathy towards this person who comitted such a horrible crime. Probably one of his best perfomances. (8/10)
PARANORMAN
Oh my, this was really awesome and hilarious. An animated film about a little boy who can see dead people, and has been chosen to save his town from a witch's curse. I reeally loved the characters in the movie but I wondered if it might not have been a little too scary for 6-year-olds sitting in the cinema with us. But none of them seemed disturbed afterwards, so maybe I'm just a little bit hysteric. (8/10)
THE 5-YEAR-ENGAGEMENT
Honestly, did this movie reeeally have to be sooo loong?! I really don't see any reason that justifies the length of 2 hours for a comedy like this one. There were some funny scenes, yes, but in the end I was a little disappointed by Mr. Segel. (6/10)
