Thank you!

I want to take this opportunity to thank all my loyal readers over the last couple years.  I might not have the readership of say...Jezebel...but I'm proud that I've accumulated 5000+ site visits!  In the coming year I hope to increase the frequency of my posting, and develop stronger content.  Additionally, thanks for bearing with me as I contribute to the City Arts Blog in addition to Molo's Sketchbook!  I know it's a little weird to be directed from here to there at times, but I appreciate everyone who does.  I believe that the City Arts Blog (the CAB) has the potential to become a unified and comprehensive online community arts resource  more expansive and thorough then anything currently out there for Seattle.

Thanks again, and check out my latest posting on the CAB , about The Off Hours Reading Series.  

with respect,

Ryan Molenkamp

CHBP Sunday

Mad Rad and friends

 S (Jenn Ghetto)  performing on the Vera Stage

Book of Black Earth and a bunch of devil-eyed fans (fitting, no?)

Grand Archives on the Vera stage

MOLORAZZI @ Capitol Hill Block Party - Friday night

Damn that will-call line was long!  Thankfully I ran into my friend Kara and cut in halfway up.  Block Party...wow.  I didn't go last year, and I had for gotten how sardine-like the event was.  Even with a better layout this year, it was still insanely cramped to try to get up to the main stage at all.  Oh well, it's a concert, right?  Highlights for me were Shabazz Palaces and Champagne Champagne.  I really didn't get much out of seeing Yeasayer or even MGMT live, but then again, by the time MGMT came on, all the kids were freaking out and the crowd felt agressive - so I bailed.  Funny thing though, the sound from the 76 station on the back of the stage wasn't half-bad, and completely free.  So long as you didn't mind standing next to some cops.

Here's a couple pics from the event -

This is what all the bands looked like till the sun went behind the buildings

Shabazz Palaces!  Highlight was Butterfly's purple get-up

Champagne Champagne put on a great show

Everyone was envious of these guys.

"It's like a pretentious version of the Matrix"

I heard a guy say that to his date as we left the theater after seeing Christopher Nolan's Inception last night and it made me chuckle a bit.  With its clean, visual dazzle and dreams inside of dreams where reality can be bent and and morphed with various real-world implications-I'd say he had a good point.  But in this film there is no evil terminator machine army to defeat, in fact the only real enemy is the character's own memories. 

Okay, I'm going to stop myself here and redirect - by now you've seen the previews, probably read some reviews and decided if you want to go see the movie or not.  I say go see it.  It's a very smartly done film, even where it falls into familiar territory it still does so with skill and style.  The climatic sequence with several overlapping plot lines is worth watching just for the impressive ability of the filmmaker to keep it all going w/out confusing the hell out of the audience. 

Unfortunately there ate times when the film is just too focused on it's own beauty and the characters suffer for it.  When the occasional humorous moments appear, brought on by Ellen Page's Ariadne and Tom Hardy's Eames, we are reminded that these people are in fact, real, and not the "projections" that habit these dreamscapes.  More of that, and less slo-mo and we'd have a great film....

That being said, it's still one of the most imaginative and impressive things I have seen this year, and it beats the hell out of every other summer blockbuster to this point.  But no one has set the bar very high this year. 

There's always The Expendables.

Inception gets 3.5 Molos



PS  SPOILER ALERT:  Don't read this if you don't want to learn a little something about the ending.....but one of the most amusing experiences of seeing this film was when at the very end of the film, the movie ends on a highly ambiguous note, very highly, and a guy in the audience yelled out "ahhhhhh come on!"  which got the entire crowd laughing.  Good stuff. 

Hoot Hoot - Joey Veltkamp at The Living Room

Somewhere in the middle of my vacation I found the time to check out Joey Veltkamp's new show at The Living Room, It is Happening Again, which was very enjoyable and which I wrote about for the CAB.  Check it out here, with more pics!

Molorazzi @ Blitz in July

Head over to the City Arts Blog to check out my full report and pics from the Blitz last night!  Molorazzi-Blitz-aka-Sweatbox.  Here's a couple bonus pics from the night:

Daniel Carillo's installation in Gallery 40

Bad angle of one of Bette Burgoyne's amazing drawings

Is that who I think it is?

Diana Adams in the courtyard at Ghost

 Lauren, Amanda and Justin (eyes closed) outside of ACTION.