It's Officially Fevrier

We've all survived the first month of 2006; congratulations!

Exciting Things In February
- February 17, marking only 100 days before the Eskies’ pre-season
- Stars concert
- Relient K concert
- Groundhog Day
- Valentine’s Day
- installment of new terrible government
- five midterms
- Reading Week
- “I Am My Own Wife”
- “Guys and Dolls”
- Academy Awards buzz
- new albums from Belle & Sebastian, The Veronicas, KT Tunstall, Bela Fleck & the Flecktones, and The Eels
- more sleep (perhaps?)
- Grammy Awards (torturous, yes, but a sure self-esteem booster)
- release of Tristram Shandy: A Cock And Bull Story
- the exhibitions Edward Burtynsky, ItuKiagatta, and Building A Collection at the art gallery
- Olympic incredibleness

This is the month that marks the denouement of winter, thus providing me with much excitement. The days of puddle splashing, plant life, and bare legs are soon upon us, and I couldn’t be more delighted. Plus, the day upon which we recognize love, albeit rather perversely through food, expensive gifts, and anonymous notes, is soon approaching. Valentine's Day is the one day on which I can wear pink unabashedly, and stuff myself with my grandma's lovely heart-shaped cookies. However, the bliss that accompanies the slow waning of our Canadian winters (although Edmonton hasn’t experienced much of a Canadian winter this year, at least so far) will undoubtedly be tempered by the Conservative reign. I think I’ve pretty much come to terms with living in a country led by a man who wants to make buddies with a country that uses the plight of struggling nations to further its pursuit of wealth, but I’m certainly experiencing some lingering bitterness. Auspiciously, the Liberals have had good fortune in the optics department, with Martin stepping down relatively graciously, the whole Grewal-tape fiasco being dismissed by the RCMP, Gomery coming out with second innocuous report, and the question of Liberal leadership overwhelming any news coverage of Harper. But I suspect that we will be referring to Mr. Blue Lazer-Eyes as Prime Minister for at least several months.

While I was never a huge Martin-enthusiast, especially because he’s nowhere close to the excellence of my NDP, I will miss his endearingly awkward responses in interviews and pseudo-attacks on Bush. The best moment of his entire political career is indubitably his sole Nardwuar encounter, although any experience with a Human Serviette is bound to be the highlight of one’s life. Indeed, Martin was the only one of the three national leaders to take Nardwuar up on the challenge of the Hip Flip, and it was pure brilliance, though Nardwuar’s pronunciation of “the Hip Flip” was perhaps the best part of that whole segment. Shame on you Jack for snubbing a Canadian icon! I suppose childcare, increased health spending in the budget, refusal to cooperate in Star Wars, and significant agreements made with cities would rank as close seconds to “da Hip Flip,” as Nardwuar would phrase it.

The past few days have been enhanced by a series of completely unrelated, yet equally outstanding announcements, topped off by the Oscar nominations and Coachella line-up yesterday morning. Although the Oscar noms were exceedingly predictable, all of my fave performances of ’05 were recognized, and I’m hopeful that they’ll do well in a month from now. As long as my dear Philip, who is completely sublime and delivered an virtuoso performance as Capote, and the completely addictive Brokeback Mountain soundtrack get the honours their due, I’ll be satisfied. It is important to note, though, that the attendees of our Oscar party will, of course, focus a great deal of our attention on the pretty dresses and spledour of Jon Stewart. Last year’s caviar was quite a success, so we’ll have to top it with some similarly urbane dish, maybe escargot or some repulsively malodorous cheese.

As for the Coachella line-up, reading through it on NME yesterday was rather bittersweet. If the festival wasn’t so ridiculously close to finals, I’d totally check it out, but I would imagine that packing for a road trip during finals would be largely unwise. There are literally ten bands on the list that I’m not über obsessed with; I must say that I’m slightly perturbed at the fact that James Blunt will be performing. While the video for “You’re Beautiful” is close to being crazy good, his songs totally lack range, originality, and variability. In addition, I’ve read some seriously horrible reviews of his live shows on Guardian, NME, Pitchfork, and Spin. At least there’s the possibility of a sequel Coachella film, since the first one that’s about to be released looks incredibly enjoyable. I can only fantasize about how amazing it would be for a single DVD to feature performances by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!, Nine Black Alps, Seu Jorge, Wolf Parade, Metric, Franz Ferdinand, Sigur Ros, Cat Power, Deerhoof, The Editors, Minus the Bear, Imogen Heap, The Dears, Art Brut, My Morning Jacket, The Subways, Lady Sovereign, Ladytron, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Animal Collective, Devendra Banhart, and The Magic Numbers. The amazingness of such footage would likely kill me. Glastonbury is always a possibility, being much further from finals, and all of the rain this past summer that the Glasto-attendees faced even looked fun!

My beloved Strokes just completed shooting for their second First Impressions of Earth video, and it’s bound to be an improvement from the slightly confusing, slightly perturbing “Juicebox” video. I’ve actually come to the conclusion that “Juicebox” is my least favourite song on the album, and while it might be more palatable to mainstream radio in the States, I still haven’t recovered from the fact that it was their first single from FIOE. On the other hand, there were several other videos in the past year that more than made up for the disappointment that was “Juicebox.” I was particularly impressed by:

“Glosòli” – Sigur Ros
“Romulus” – Sufjan Stevens
“Your Ex-Lover is Dead” – The Stars
“Human” – Carpark North
“So Here We Are” – Bloc Party
“Honest Mistake” – The Bravery
“16 Military Wives” – The Decemberists
“Us” – Regina Spektor
“Middle of Nowhere” – Hot Hot Heat
“Do You Want To” – Franz Ferdinand
“At the Bottom of Everything” – Bright Eyes
“Easy/Lucky/Free” – Bright Eyes
“Mushaboom” – Feist
“Pink Bullets” – The Shins
“New Slang” – The Shins
“Don’t Save Us from the Flames” – M83

However, almost everything featured on Antville lights my day up, and there are a trillion more videos that I just completely neglected to include because of the limitations of my silly memory. There was a kafuffle with The Postal Service and Apple last week, as Ben Gibbard believed that a new Mac ad for the Intel chip was ripped of from the video for “Such Great Heights.” I watched the videos side by side, and they are remarkably similar, but the setting of the original Postal Service video in a computer factory did mean that a lot of obvious shots were taken. Thus, when Apple made this ad, a choice of a computer factory was quite logical, and some shots like those in the “Such Great Heights” video would have been just as obvious. But I do love Ben Gibbard immensely, perhaps as much as Steve Jobs, and it is therefore difficult to determine who to side with. Computer companies rip each other off daily; I’m sure stealing ad concepts from music videos is far from beneath them.

It’s Groundhog Day tomorrow, so we’ll get the final word on when spring will arrive then. Of course, aside from the absurdity of turning to Wiarton Willie to forecast the speed with which spring will arrive, it’s utterly absurd to have a single groundhog declare the weather fate for the entire nation of Canada. On a day when I wore ballet flats and a blazer to school, yet there was a severe blizzard in Newfoundland, one must question Wiarton Willie’s ability to foretell the weather conditions for all of Canada when the weather conditions tend to be rather uneven across the country. At least it’s an excellent opportunity to take in the sight of dolled up groundhogs and maybe even some Bill Murray on television tomorrow night. I anticipate a marvelous Groundhog Day outcome for you all; just be wary of getting trapped on the most curious “celebration” of our calendar.

Here’s hoping Willie sees no shadow tomorrow morning!