A couple of days ago, I saw the film Bohemian Rhapsody in my local recliner theater.  I had a great time watching it.  Rami Malek's performance as Freddie Mercury was out of this world.  I also loved that the film was not a heavy-handed documentary but rather a rollicking rock opera.  It took some creative liberties, to be sure, but what movie doesn't?  This was meant to be a rock opera film, not a heavy handed thesis level documentary.  Basically, the reason I liked it is the reason many critics hated it.  I often felt that exhilaration I felt either seeing live bands or performing on stage myself, and that feeling is not easy to replicate in a movie (which is a more passive experience to me.)  And learning that Freddie Mercury was born Farrokh Bulsara (a Parsi whose parents were from Gujarat, India) makes him even cooler!  One of the greatest rock stars to ever walk this Earth was essentially my ethnicity.  Boss!

Queen is simply one of the greatest bands to ever walk this Earth.  Forget about Freddie's multi-octave vocal range for a second.  Brian May is easily one of the finest guitarists alive.  Roger Taylor is an incredibly dynamic drummer.  And John Deacon is one of the most underrated bassists out there.  If you take the bass out of any Queen song, it's trash.  Dude has the groove, the pocket, and the chops. 

Although I'm 26-ish chapters into Dances of Deception and am absolutely loving it, I'm reporting about something else I read yesterday: Archie vol. 4 by Mark Waid and my reaction to it is OMGWTF?!?!?!?!  in a good way.  That cliffhanger at the end... whew!  I simply cannot get over how good this series is.  Here's the crazy part- this series is making me question life itself.  I know that's hyperbole, but I've always been firmly "Team Betty" my entire life, but this series is making me rethink that.  Veronica is totally growing on me.

Last Wednesday, I got the comic I preordered: The Source #1.  It's a new series from Scout Comics.  I felt like a lot of whirlwind events happened with no time to explain what the hell is going on (much like how the protagonist is feeling), so I'm left with more questions and no answers.  Despite some shaky storytelling and what seem to be a couple of mistakes that weren't caught in the editing/proofreading phase, I'm interested enough to both see what happens next and hopefully get some exposition.  So, yeah, I preordered the next two issues at my local comic book store, because I think this series will get its sea-legs over time.

12 chapters into Dances of Deception (book 3 in The Dragon Songs Saga) and I'm loving it.  The first book was good, the second book was even better since the scope widened a bit and the characters matured.  And now the third book is opening up even more and getting into more globalized Game of Thrones style political intrigues. 

Oh, and I just finished Mark Waid's Archie vol. 3.  I enjoyed it, though I can see why many fans wouldn't, since it focused a lot on Cheryl Blossom's catfight with Veronica and didn't flesh out the Sayid/Betty arc, though it's easy enough to fill in the blanks.  Still, it had some good Archie/Jughead moments, gave some spotlight to Moose and Dilton, and it deepened Veronica's character. 

Take the coffee and mustard and dump em both in the toilet.

Best use of both those things.

https://img0.etsystatic.com/006/0/6329570/il_fullxfull.384113082_r0qx.jpg

When it comes to mustard, I  don't like yellow mustard.  I prefer brown mustard and wasabi. 

I just finished Orchestra of Treacheries and am looking forward to the third Dragon Songs Saga book.  It feels like I'm now in the part of the JRPG where the party gets split up and you play through their quests before they meet up again.  It also seems the author just released a book that takes place during the 2-year gap between books 1 and 2.  I may read that one eventually.  What can I say?  I'm invested in this series and the intriguing world it's created... warts and all.  I say that because the writing does have some noticeable flaws, some of which have made me shelve books in the past.  I could nitpick those flaws till I'm purple, but none of that matters because these books make me happily want to keep reading.

Arguments over "objective" vs "subjective" are seldom productive.  I'm of the belief that art can have objective qualities, but that it's pointless to claim that those qualities mean you must appreciate it.  The subjective aspect is simply more important.

I like this.  Great way of putting it. 

I also started tangentially thinking of why and how we each approach reading the way we do.  For example, my aunt is a retired geriatric psychiatrist (who still does some consulting at her hospital).  Because her job was so mentally taxing and draining, she never wanted to read anything too cerebral.  She just wanted to let her brain decompress.  Hence why her bookshelf has lots of trashy novels that you wouldn't expect a learned person to have.  I don't claim that my job is as mentally taxing as that, but working in special education is psychologically draining in its own right.  So that's probably why I sometimes enjoy the more schlocky/pulpy and less cerebral comics, manga, novels, games, anime, etc.

@Arvis - No, it was actually stemmed from a discussion I was having with some studio musicians I was working with the weekend before.  I was more thinking about this: http://www.rpgfan.com/boards/index.php?topic=8301.msg374566;topicseen#msg374566 (tl;dr- I liked a band when I was younger, I met the frontman at a festival, he was a complete tool, now I can't listen to his music any more without gagging.) 

I was also thinking about Jaco Pastorius from Weather Report, since our recording engineer is also an accomplished bassist and Jaco came up in our discussion.  Jaco is a god among bassists.  Bassists to this day are still trying to cop his licks and failing miserably.  Jaco was a revolutionary and I probably wouldn't be a bass player if Jaco hadn't revolutionized bass guitar playing. However, he was a raging asshole narcissist.  Sure "it ain't bragging if you can back it up" and he always backed it up, but I can't hero-worship a musician who's a dickhead.  Before Jaco played bass in Weather Report, their bassist was Alphonso Johnson.  Not only is Alphonso one of the finest bass players alive right now, but he is a warm and humble person despite being such an accomplished innovator himself.  My bass teacher introduced me to him when I was 15 and just barely starting out.  That Alphonso was willing to take the time out to chat with a wet-behind-the-ears kid like me about life and music inspired me to both be a better musician and be a better person.  I swore from that day on that if I ever got to his kind of level, I would want to make any kid who met me feel the same way he made me feel.  I'll never forget this one night after a Kryovax show when a kid came up to me all excited and said, "You were awesome!  I always wanted to learn guitar and start a band, but after seeing you, I want to play bass!" 

Regarding Sugiyama specifically, while I do think he's the worst kind of Old Man (being a war crime denying right-wingnut history revisionist and all) I never liked his music in the first place.  Ergo, I don't feel that emotionally shattering "my idol's fall from grace" type thing at all regarding him.  Sugiyama is like those bands I've seen or played shows with who are incredibly skilled at their instruments, play complex patterns effortlessly, and perform with studio level tightness... but I can't remember any of their songs.  In terms of music alone, I do think Sugiyama is overrated but I don't think he's a hack the way I think Motoi Sakuraba is nor an overrated hack the way I think Hitoshi Sakimoto is. 

Truth be told, I've never gotten on with the Dragon Quest series, period.  Dragon Quest is a series I should theoretically adore, but try as I might I could never get into it.  I've played a handful of games including the famed VIII, and though I agree that VIII is one of the finest JRPGs out there, I simply did not vibe with it at all.  It was like being on a date with a great girl but the chemistry wasn't there.  The only Dragon Quest game I enjoyed was Rocket Slime.  That game was super fun!