Somos - Prison on a Hill

The third feature length album from Boston's Somos hails their return to the Tiny Engines label 

For fans of rock music with pop sensibilities there are many a flavour for you to sample in recent years; from present day stars Chvrches, The 1975 and Cigarettes After Sex to the more renowned Jimmy Eat World and Blink 182; the collison of rock and pop is there for all.

Yet rock music has been taking on a political slant of late, away from the personal subject matter there is now a roar of defiance to the current and frustrating political climate, where ambivalence is above ambition, you need only look at the recent work of Ezra Furman and Jim James as evidence of this.

Somos hail from Boston and with Prison on a Hill they have crafted a work that is of cross-over potential; full of driving guitars riffs, gliding electro synth and anthemic sounds.

They have taken a view of the world and are commenting on it strongly, from 'Mediterranean' which comments on the rise of far-right movement in Europe, 'Iron Heel' they examine an authoritarian rule in a post-fascism world.  The best political songs are those that are not overtly political from the outset, when you only know after the fact do those songs gain greater credence in their seriousness.

Stand out single 'Untraceable Past' shows the pop song as rock anthem, both infectious and blissful - you need only look at British contemporary Mystery Jets whose most recent work is also a political statement of Britain in this Brexit age.

Throughout the album the passion comes across in the songs, the lead vocalist Michael Fiorentino gives authority to the songs helped by bandmates, Phil Haggerty (sadly deceased in August at the age of 28) and Justin Hahn on guitar. This trio embodies the spirit of this slow building movement and are standing at the junction of pop and rock making noise and being heard.

The track 'Young Believers' serves as the embodiment of Somos' ethos and following Haggerty's premature passing carries extra weight and resonance; the band will return stronger no doubt but hopefully this album will find a home in people's hearts as such works come along rarely. This combination of three minute art form with classic indie sound.

Prison on a Hill is out now from Tiny Engines
My thanks to Will Miller (Tiny Engines) for the review opportunity.

Stronger

Released on Digital Download from 2nd April and available on DVD and Blu-ray from 9th April, the David Gordon Green directed Stronger starring Jake Gyllenhaal is released from Lionsgate.

Based on the true story of Jeff Bauman, a survivor of the Boston Marathon bombings in 2013, Gyllenhaal plays Bauman from the day prior to the attack to the brutal aftermath of the attack which left him with a double amputation of his legs above the knee; the story follows his journey to learn to walk again and the rekindling of a loving relationship with his on and off again girlfriend Erin (Tatiana Maslany).

Bauman has to overcome many physical as well as emotional obstacles to regain the strength in his upper body to enable him to utilise the prosthetic legs available to him on his insurance plan.

Gordon Green has shot many films of independent spirit and about the outsider, and this kinship to the outsider holds him in good stead as we follow Bauman closely - not holding back on the difficulties Jeff has in his two bedroom flat he shares with his Mum, Patty (Miranda Richardson) from going to the toilet to the stairs up to the flat.

The film is shot through a gritty grey lense with little colour shown, Boston only coming to life during major sporting events and when there are big gatherings of people in a sense of community.  When Jeff is away from these large groups and alone with family or Erin, it is a grey lonely world he occupies.

Gyllenhaal does really well with the role bringing steel to the role with his matinee face being put to the test by extreme close-ups deployed by Green, and he has the expressive range to bring gravitas to the moments such as his breakdown in the elevator during a hockey game.

There are some trite moments that scream of patriotism and there is a bigger story to be told about the whole Boston Strong scenario that grew out of the rubble of the bombings, the symbol of the Red Sox winning the World Series that same year; yet it is the quieter stiller moments of this film that will stay with you such as the clash between Erin and Jeff in their car when she shares some good news.

Gyllenhaal seemed to be a front runner for an Oscar nomination but sadly he got lost, partly due to the weight of the film not being strong enough to support his performance. This, however, should not detract from a very workmanlike film that will keep you entertained nonetheless.

Stronger is released on 2nd April on Digital Download from Lionsgate

Bold Boston sign Brad Stevens

As if Boston has not had enough awe inspiring sporting headlines in recent months.  Starting with the Boston Marathon bombings, then the Aaron Hernandez murder charge, then fan favourite coach Doc Rivers leaves Boston after ten years to become Head Coach of the Los Angeles Clippers, then on draft night the Brooklyn Nets trade for Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett in a move that ended a golden era that brought one NBA title coupled with the continuing trade rumours involving Rajan Rondo.

Writers of the Boston Globe must have been hoping for a little bit of downtime following all the news, and we nearly forgot that the Boston Bruins lost the Stanley Cup finals to the Chicago Blackhawks. And then the Celtics GM Danny Ainge announced another blockbuster, with news of the replacement for Doc Rivers.

Many people speculated it would be Brian Shaw, a worthy assistant due his time at the helm, but Ainge surprised everyone by hiring a man from College Basketball, and not just anyone, but the highly regarded and proficient Brad Stevens from Butler, who has guided the Bulldogs to two National title games and game one long range three shot away from upsetting Duke.

Stevens has been at the helm for many Cinderella stories, but now he himself is living a fairytale. This is Cinderella staying for the night, getting drunk on Jager bombs and waking up next to Prince Charming and not minding the look of each other.

Stevens is 37 years old, he will be 38 on October 22nd, a few days before the season begins.  He is now the NBA's youngest head coach and will more than likely have players nearer to his age, than other coaches.  Yet he comes to the big dance (the proper one) with an amazing record behind him from his College days, taking Butler from the Horizon League nobody to tournament wonder story to college mainstay.  This has been cemented by Butler being inducted into the newly restructured Big East.

Butler liked the guy so much they gave him a contract to remain the head coach until 2021-22 and leaves with a .772 percentage after six seasons.  Stevens must heed the warnings however from past college coaches who have had less than thrilling times in the NBA such as Rick Pitino whose own time at Boston was one of infamy, a four year stint that ended 102-146 from 1997-2001 before he returned to the college ranks and Louisville.

For Boston, it can be construed as a gamble to hire a player who has only worked with college athletes and one without any experience of working with professional players either as a player or assistant coach (very similar to Chip Kelly's hiring) and yet they have a young, highly professional man of integrity and character who will get his players drilled.  Luckily, he will mostly be starting from scratch with new players and faces - even if they keep Rondo, the Celtics are one of the teams expected to be in the NBA draft lottery next year to get the No.1 pick which is expected to be Kansas Jayhawk, Andrew Wiggins.

In the worst case scenario, Stevens should be given at minimum two years with this and next year's draft picks to create a mood and positive environment; Boston is going through a transition and young Brad deserves a little bit more than the title of transition or a flash in the pan.  Should it all end in tears, Stevens will easily snap up any high end Division I college basketball job due to his great work ethic and results.

Think of it like David Moyes replacing Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United; the young new manager needs time and no sense of impatience nor upheaval.

This article first appeared on UK American Sports Fan website, click here for link

Lamenting Liverpool

Liverpool FC are supposedly in crisis, they have one point from there first 3 games. They have failed to score in two of those games, they gifted the one point to their opponent in the other.  They have just offloaded a certain striker.  Yet this is Liverpool, they play to full houses, they still have quality in the squad yet this is a crisis.

You may detect a whiff of sarcasm in that opening paragraph, mainly because this is not a crisis.  This is a team in transition.  Over the summer, the decision was made to inject fresh blood into brand Liverpool by the Fenway Sports Group (FSG) led by John Henry, who owns the Boston Red Sox.

They sacked legend Kenny Dalglish and hired Brendan Rodgers from Swansea City, who elevated the southern Wales team from the Championship to the Premier League; leapfrogging Cardiff and playing football that was both beautiful and profitable.  Rodgers employed the tactic of tika-taka football like Barcelona, using a lot of possession to frustrate opponents yet being clinical with finishing; in their first season in the Premier League, they were safe with something to spare winning many friends and respect from fans.

Rodgers needed to get some talent in, yet for some reason the funds that were available to King Kenny - who bought Carroll, Downing, Henderson, Adam - were seemingly this time unavailable to Rodgers.  Rodgers did manage to bring one stalwart of his Swansea side, Joe Allen with him; and they were able to swat away admirers of Martin Skrtel, Daniel Agger and Luis Suarez to remain at the club.

Now Rodgers has a side with general quality, but no impact players apart from Andy Carroll on the bench, then Liverpool made the costly decision of letting him go to West Ham on loan for the season.  Carroll's debut for the Hammers on Saturday for an hour before an untimely hamstring injury, showed him at his best. A fearsome aerial target who brought fear to the Fulham defence, his mere presence led to two goals coming from set pieces as West Ham maintained a 100% home record.

Liverpool on the same weekend at home to Arsenal looked toothless and lifeless in attack.  Rodgers system of 4-2-3-1 is all well and good for keeping possession and soaking up pressure but if you do not have the right people doing the right jobs it will come with no end result.

The problem for Rodgers and most importantly Liverpool is that they have a personnel issue.  The players there are not the right ones for the job.  At Swansea, he had men like Neil Taylor, Leon Britton, Gylfi Sigurdsson who could do a job in linking up with Nathan Dyer and Wayne Routledge whose pace was second to none, whilst Danny Graham would be that goal poacher up front.

Liverpool unfortunately have a midfield general in Steven Gerrard who has always been more combative than  creative; he is good in a fight but he has never had a good touch and his wayward pass led to Arsenal's first breakaway goal.  That goal was also helped by a wayward defensive display by Glen Johnson at right back. Whilst Rodgers must like the idea of having Johnson bombing forward, he must not neglect his defensive duties that left Messrs Skrtel and Agger exposed as Lukas Podolski scored his and Arsenal's first goal of the season.

Also, Pepe Reina is having a bad time or crisis in confidence.  In midweek he dropped a shot from a Hearts player into the net, adding to the number of goalkeeper errors occurring so far this season; but he was to blame for allowing Santi Carzola to seal the game on 68 minutes as he was down too slowly and it ricocheted into his net.

Rodgers would be better served, using Martin Kelly when available at right back and morph Johnson into a right winger like Gareth Bale did for Tottenham in those nights against Inter Milan. With Johnson and Stirling down two wings you have the pace of Dyer and Routledge replicated.  It does bear a question as to why they did not pursue Scott Sinclair who has been sold to Manchester City, when he clearly wanted away.  Whilst Allen is a good player, he will not win you matches like Sinclair possibly can.

So is Rodgers to blame for raiding his former club for the wrong players?  Liverpool are not in crisis, they just maybe put themselves in that position.

THE TOWN is Ben's Town

'Sometimes you can't change who you are. You have to live with what you've done'.

Words spoken by Ben Affleck's character, Doug MacRay in a voiceover to conclude Affleck's second directorial effort - a spirited and atypical cops and robbers movie; with shootouts, double crosses, love interests and well acted/directed set pieces.

The reason I quote that line of dialogue is that I found it oddly fitting for Affleck's career that went into a very weird direction with Bennifer/Gigli and the 'Daredevil' venture (which in time I feel will begin to earn some praise), has finally found some credibility and some respect. It started with 'Hollywoodland' and then with his first directing bow 'Gone Baby Gone', that garnered greater praise than some of the films he acted in.  Critics were blown away by the expertise shown in the film which featured his brother, Casey, in the leading role, Affleck now returns with another crime picture set in Boston but with him in front of the camera; this step is inevitable and will ultimately lead to comparisons with Clint Eastwood who also took control of his career by directing pictures he was comfortable with and sometimes reserved his best performances for himself.

Affleck leads a group of four hoodlums who rob banks and security trucks, all done in disguise and professionally done leaving no trace of DNA evidence to limit forensic techniques, they get away with cash and leave no trace of their existence. This frustrates the chief detective of FBI Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) who wants to get results and after some leads he starts to track down Doug and his crew, including the sociopathic Coughlin (Jeremy Renner on electrifying form).  We start the movie at the start of a new heist on the bank run by Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall), after she opens the vault in their scheme she is taken hostage, which is not normally part of the plan.

After the crew worries, MacRay follows her and makes contact to make sure she does not know anything. The only thing she does remember is a Fighting Irish tattoo on the back of Coughlin's neck, and this is used as a brilliant red herring when there is a conversation between him, MacRay and Claire - you feel the truth will come out at some point and Affleck frames the tattoo in the centre of the picture, to make us really on edge but this proves a ruse for us all, but this is indicative of Affleck's burgeoning creativity with the source material. A tattoo may be a trick/motif put into the screenplay, but the director chooses to put it front and centre to trick his audience.  MacRay and Claire fall in love leading him to doing one last big job for his boss, the Florist (Pete Posthelwaite) who tells him if he doesn't do the job, his new girl will look a whole lot different.

The stakes are raised and the net tightens as Frawley gets closer to the crew to take them down on the last job, which is taking a 4 day takings of Fenway Park ('Boston's cathedral') which is close to $3.5m.  The action set pieces as the crew try to escape are expertly done, and there is an even pace throughout the film with no rushing or manipulating of the audience's investment into the film - we have come so far with the characters we are entitled to a perfect ending and resolution.

The ending may be a bit unusual in that it is not what we expected, and it may not be perfect. And to paraphrase the quote at the start of this review, you may not be able to change. But maybe Affleck is done with that chapter of his life, and is ready to be reborn as a renowned actor-director, and 'The Town' makes sure that 'Gone Baby Gone' was no fluke.