Wednesday, December 18, 2024

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Features

FEATURES

Consumers succumb to escapism

America’s tastes have gone downhill. Don’t worry though, this time I’m not complaining about food - this one’s about TV. Our need for more channels and nonstop entertainment is disturbing.

FEATURES

Revisited for die-hards only

Chances are, if you own a DVD player you own a copy of “The Matrix.” Along with “Gladiator,” it seems to be one of the movies they really should just package along with every new DVD player.

FEATURES

Band chronicles smashing career

’Tis the season for no new music and greatest hits releases. Traditionally, record companies don’t like releasing new music by big name artists right before the holidays, so what fans are usually left with are greatest hits compilations.

FEATURES

Bleachmobile disappoints on latest

Americans love Japanese culture. From anime to action figures, people stateside can’t help but import every little thing that comes out of the land of the rising sun. And often, that fetish for the other culture goes both ways. Just as things such as “Dragonball,” “Pokémon” and “Gundam Wing” have fused with our Saturday morning cartoons, American pop and rock music has merged with Japanese entertainment.

FEATURES

Like film, album leaves streaks

The Wash Soundtrack (Interscope) Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg might be bumpin’ again, but “The Wash” is often washed out. Dre and Snoop’s umpteenth collaboration provides the straight West Coast stuff that fans expect from the rap veterans who steer the nation’s gangsta direction.

FEATURES

Art Apartment features Holocaust exhibit

On Nov. 9, 1938, anti-Semites ran through the streets of German-held territory setting fire and laying waste to anything Jewish in a massive planned pogrom known as Kristallnacht, or The Night of Broken Glass. Until last year, Susan Hensel, director of The Art Apartment, hadn’t been able to express this tragic event with her art.

FEATURES

Rap college tour canceled at Auditorium

After driving two hours from the city of Sturgis, 17-year-old Chris Moses was disappointed when he discovered the hip-hop show scheduled for Friday night at the Auditorium was canceled because of promotional and technical problems.

FEATURES

Sloan impresses many at State Theatre

Detroit - Less than half of my chocolate milkshake was left after Chris Murphy took a few huge swigs and reached for another one of my french fries. The part-time frontman of the band Sloan, one of the most popular exports from Canada, is also an expert of getting ketchup out of the bottle, hardly spattering me at all with the tomato extract. The gangly, secondhand clothes-donning, scraggly haired group of guys were obviously not your average run-of-the-mill hockey fans sitting down for a burger at Johnny Rockets restaurant on a Friday night in Detroit. This lead to recognition from passers by. But the rock band doesn’t mind the attention, as long as people don’t pry too much into the members’ personal lives. “I’m into attention,” Murphy said.

FEATURES

Ours performs Saturday night

While it may not have performed in front of a sold-out house, the rock band Ours played a high-energy performance Saturday night that rattled the walls of the Erickson Kiva.Playing a majority of the material off its latest album, “Distorted Lullabies,” Ours played for more than an hour and cruised solidly through the singles “Drowning,” “Sometimes” and “Here is the Light,” among others.

FEATURES

Roundabout Way to perform at Common Grounds tonight

Common Grounds, in the basement of Akers Hall, features Roundabout Way on Saturday night. The five-piece band, made up of four MSU students and a Central Michigan University student, is optimistic it will be the next big thing, so if you want to catch them before they get famous, this is your chance. “We are going to be the next big thing out of East Lansing,” said guitarist and songwriter Brian Urnovitz, a telecommunication junior.

FEATURES

New Line Cinema to release first in trilogy of The Lord of the Rings series

Sure, Harry Potter grips millions with wizard frenzy.But “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, arguably a king of the fantasy genre, will soon leap from book to the big screen too.History senior Andy Miller has read the series several times and considers himself a fan. “Fantasy writers are always trying to create their own worlds, but none are as original as Middle-Earth,” he said.Middle-Earth is the fantasy realm in which the tales are based.

FEATURES

Theres something about Harry

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” smacks the big screen tonight, and enthusiasts of all-ages are expected to stampede to the film’s much-anticipated premiere. Psychology senior Stephanie Wilson gushes for Harry Potter, living proof that he’s a magnet to more than the average fourth grader. “It’s simple, but it hooks you in,” said an enthusiastic Wilson of J.K.