“Artifact” – My Obsession With A Significant Documentary (A Review)

Title: Artifact

Genre: Documentary

Rating: 5/5 Stars

I was introduced to Jared Leto via my daughters love for his band “30 Seconds To Mars”, and was hooked, even more so when I saw him in “Dallas Buyers Club” as the beautiful, transgender Rayon, marvelously brought to live by Jared. If you have not seen “Dallas Buyers Club”, you have missed out. But I regress. What I really wanted to write about today is the documentary “Artifact”

Essentially, this movie is about the band, their struggle to get a fair contract with their recording studio and them being sued for 30 Million Dollars as a result. On a deeper level, this docu shines a light on the world of greed, the status of the music industry and how we as consumers of the music should be aware that our habits of wanting the product as fast and as cheap as possible, make it harder and harder for an artist or a band to make a living making music. It is a wake up call to anyone who wants to be a musician, to become proactive before making any decisions of signing on with labels, and to have a clear understanding of what they are getting into.

 

The movie is also a statement of perseverance and continuing drive to create songs despite the circumstances. I consider this movie essential to be viewed by anyone who wants to work within the music industry, may it be on the artist side, or on the producing side.

The movie is available on iTunes, Amazon and Google Play. Downloaded, talk about it, play it, but pay for it. Be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem.

 

A Tale Of Two Cities

Today’s Daily Prompt asked us to think of two cities, we would choose to split our time in, if we had to choose only two cities.

Those two cities for me are Los Angeles and London.

Los Angeles, the city of dreams, the city for dreamers, and also the city in which the most contacts and work is available in the industry all of my family members are working, or want to work in. Our business is based out of that town, our employee lives in a section of the beautiful patchwork of little towns that actually make LA. I have a daughter who wants to get into film and acting, a son who is beginning to design video games, and well, you know already, that I write – anything from film reviews to screenplays, to my Urban Fantasy Series “The World Walkers”.

30 Seconds To Mars made a short film about Los Angeles, set to their song “City of Angels”

Now to the second city:

London, because I think of it as hub, a place to start from to be able to connect with any part of Europe should be choose to, and they speak our language (duh – or do we speak theirs, that is probably a little more appropriate to say). It has the energy of New York, minus the attitude, the traditions I love about Europe, and the history that comes with it. From there we could take short travels to nearby Ireland, or hop over to France, revisit Barcelona, or my favorite vacation spot in the whole world, Lake Garda – think Northern Italy, beautiful, but large clear lake, mountains, and not too far away from Verona (second favorite vacation spot). It is far enough away from those of my past, whom I do not want to reconnect with, but close enough to reminisce in the parts of my European upbringing, which I cherish.

You can take a video tour, via this documentary:

W Is For What Now?

The weird, wackiness of the A to Z Challenge is almost over, so it is time to contemplate what to write about in the wake of it, and most importantly how much.

With my head always in the midst of some kind of art form, may it be a really good book, or a movie I can hardly wait to share, there will be plenty to write about.

So when it is over, and it is over soon, I have planned for you the following:

 

A book review of “The Hero” by Robin Carr

A more thorough dissection of the documentary: “The Artifact”

 

Flash Fiction – I will again participate in the Friday Flash Fiction, so watch out for new, exiting really short stories

A look at Joss Whedon’s “In Your Eyes”, which is currently available on Vimeo, a rather unconventional release, but we should expect the unconventional from Joss by now.

and I will be talking about a few projects that others are working on, but I am happy to support in any way I can, especially because they deal with some important issues, such as bullying.

 

What have you planned to write about, once the challenge has been completed?

Have a wonderful week!