The Midland Authenticity Dilemma Saving Country Music. Look, I am a staunch proponent of the idea that anyone, anywhere can make good country music, and we all owe it to the individual artists to judge the music on its own merit first before ever considering what type of back story or port of origin the artist happens to hail from. Saving Country Music commonly feature artists from the northern regions of the United States, from Canada, Australia, the British Isles, Europe. In our house, the granddaughters live with us, as well as our daughter, for the past 11 years. Santa gifts are in the stocking, the few gifts they receive are under. SCM featured a country artist from Iran recently. Some artists are from rich families, some from poor. Some paid dues, others much less. Some are black, Hispanic, multi racial, non gender specific, whatever. Ultimately you have to boil everything back down to the music and ask yourself, Is it good And its under this philosophy that I landed on the conclusion that when it comes to the music of Midland, the answer is, Yes, its good. Its not great, but graded against its peers in the mainstream and housed on major labels, Midland is a really solid, throwback sounding country band that makes you hopeful for the future of the genre and radio. But as time has gone on, I find myself disliking these dudes more and more because I cant beat back the obvious reality that were being misled about these guys. The bands publicists want us to believe Midland is a collective of road wearied Texas country lifers who are finally getting their big break and deserve to be elevated in stature due to their raging authenticity and cowboy esque ruggedness, and they have the photos to prove it. But unfortunately, this is just not true. Instead Midland is a machination of the big Music Row industrial complex, no different than most major label artists, is signed to Scott Borcettas Big Machine Records Taylor Swift, Florida Georgia Line, et al, with Shane Mc. Anallythe Max Martin of country music Sam Hunt, Old Dominion, et alwriting the songs, producing the music, and pulling the strings behind the scenes. Its all a facade, and the fact that they keep trying to ram Midlands authenticity down our throats makes me never want to hear their music again. IyzsTVx1TY/hqdefault.jpg' alt='Saving Santa Full Movie' title='Saving Santa Full Movie' />A lowly stable elf finds that he is the only one who can stop an invasion of the North Pole by using the secret of Santas Sleigh, a TimeGlobe, to travel back in time. This new movies variation on the saving Santa story is in no way related to Disneys Santa Clause trilogy. It is one of two Santathemed Disney liveaction. OCRegister. com covers local news in Orange County, CA, California and national news, sports, things to do and the best places to eat, business and the Orange County. The Hollywood Reporter is your source for breaking news about Hollywood and entertainment, including movies, TV, reviews and industry blogs. Young, actionloving international audiences are saving the day for studios, but what if the rest of the world gets sick of Hollywood spectacle Ive said it before and Ill say it again The only two artists out there that can truly boast 1. James Hand and Spencer Cornett, and Big Machine isnt rushing to sign either of those dudes. Authenticity arguments can be as tiring as the what is country arguments. But there are layers of authenticity that can either endear the artist to the audience, or perhaps hold them back. Saving Mr. Banks. Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson bring to life the untold true story about the origins of one of the most treasured Disney classics of all time. Josh Gad Calls Kristen Bell an Angel For Saving His Parents From Hurricane Irma. Luke Combs big breakout single Hurricane is godawful. But I think hes probably a pretty authentic guy. Hes not trying to present himself as anything but what he is, which is a good ol American boy singing some country tunes. There are some other folks that are more or less authentic in the mainstream. But what is making Midland so unappetizing is the subterfuge behind their story of authenticity, and how it just screams of marketing. A recent Taste of Country feature on the band includes the passage, The group went through some pretty hard financial times before they finally hooked up with a big time manager and got a record deal. They also learned how to avoid trouble and how to get out of trouble, they say. Asked to cite an example of trouble, they laughingly say, Getting arrested helping to get your bandmate out of a choke hold by a six foot six the guy that was the caretaker of the worst rehearsal space, it smelled just like urine, beer cans and garbage. Sounds pretty authentic, doesnt it Clearly the marketeers are trying to marry the hardscrabble experiences found in the bands lyrics written by Shane Mc. Anally to the bands back story. And this is just one of dozens of examples in the media. The specifics are not the issue. We can assume theyre true to some extent. Its how theyve been embellished and presented along with the parade of promotional photos that seem aggrandizing. For those that dont know Midlands back story, the band claims to be from Dripping Springs, TX, via California, via Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Theyre old buddies who played music in various other projects and ended up forming a band together when attending the wedding of bass player Cameron Duddy in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Now that should be the first red flag on how authentic and road weary Midland really is. Anybody who knows Jackson Hole, Wyominganyone whos actually been thereknows this is a super posh, and extremely expensive piece of the American West. Its where Dick Cheney lives. And to get married there One can only imagine the bill. You have to be a member of the elite class to get married in Jackson Hole, WY folks, trust me. But of course Jackson Hole sounds like this cowboy esque, magical Western American Rocky Mountain landscape, and it is. Its just one you and I could barely afford to stay a weekend in, let alone fly the whole family up to for an exchange of nuptials. Remembering the part of the Midland back story where this wedding is where the band formed, I was trying to verify the date and details and such when I happened onto an article in People Magazine covering the wedding. Thats right, the wedding where Midland was formed It was covered by People Magazine in September of 2. Without delving into the back story of either of the other two members of the band, the fact that Cameron Duddys wedding, and the place where Midland was formed, was covered by People Magazine, should tell you just how bogus the idea is that Midland is a band of hard luck, hardscrabble characters. Cameron Duddy was a product of the ultra rich and power elite even before Midland was formed. The groom, 2. Jackson Hole ranch owned by Duddys step grandmother, actress Connie Stevens, says the People Magazine article. Duddy, who recently won an MTV Video Music Award for directing Bruno Mars Locked Out of Heaven, is the son of cinematographer Christopher Duddy and Renee Axotis. His father wed Stevens daughter, actress Joely Fisher, in 1. Cameron Duddys winning MTV Music Awards for directing Bruno Mars videos in 2. I thought he was supposed to be slagging it out in honky tonks at that time Thats what were being told at least. Hes also directed videos for Fifth Harmony and Jennifer Lopez. And we havent even gotten to the part about the bands frontman, Mark Wystrach, and his Soap Operaunderwear modeling career. But lets stick to locations for a moment. A lot has been made about how Midland is from Dripping Springs, TX. A passage from a recent Rolling Stone feature on the band states, Later, the pair moved to the small town of Dripping Springs, about 3. Austin, to board their four horses. Its in this town of less than 2,0. Duddy and Wystrach relocated in 2. In that wide open country, they built a rehearsal space and started writing around the sound that they heard on the Jackson Hole porch, touring behind these new songs at any Texas honky tonk that would have them. Just like Jackson Hole is portrayed, you would think Dripping Springs is some backwater with cowboys riding their horses down a crumbling Main Street. In reality, Dripping Springs is one of the most expensive white flight suburbs in the entire state of Texas. And nothing about it is wide open country. Once again, if you had been there, you would know. Its 2,0. 00 residents is a technicality due to the tiny city limits. Maybe Midland lived in a shack, but nobody relocates to Dripping Springs due to hardship. People leave it because its become so expensive since rich, California transplants like Midland keep moving there. If youre familiar with the Nashville region, this would be the equivalent of claiming someone grew up on the mean streets of Franklin. And anybody who actually knows about living in the country, knows that one of the most expensive things that one can own is a horse, unless its a rescue animal. And Midland had four of them when they moved to Dripping Springs. Jumanji Movie Review Film Summary 1. Jumanji is being promoted as a jolly holiday season entertainment, with ads that show Robin Williams with a twinkle in his eye. The movie itself is likely to send younger children fleeing from the theater, or hiding in their parents arms. Those who do sit all the way through it are likely to toss and turn with nightmares inspired by its frightening images. Whoever thought this was a family movie the MPAA rates it PG not even PG 1. The film is a gloomy special effects extravaganza filled with grotesque images, generating fear and despair. Even for older audiences, there are few redeeming factors, because what little story there is serves as a coathook for the fx sequences, which come out of nowhere and evaporate into the same place. Advertisement. The film opens in 1. What if someone digs this up a shadowy worker asks. God help them hes told. We flash forward to 1. Alan finds the chest in a construction site and opens it to discover a board game named Jumanji. He rolls the dice and is instantly fascinated with the games supernatural powers. The pieces on the board move themselves. Buy Migration Hq, Dvd, Divx, Ipod, there. The game communicates with ghostly messages that float into focus in a cloudy lens. And Alan is attacked by a cloud of bats. Another flash forward, this time to the present, as two other kids find the game in an old mansion that has been abandoned for years. This is none other than Alans childhood home, and when the kids begin playing the game, Alan materializes. He has been in limbo all of this time, growing to manhood, and is now played by Robin Williams. His first words Wheres my mom and dad Ah, but theres no time for sentimentality now. He makes friends with the children, Judy Kirsten Dunst and Peter Bradley Pierce, and together they begin to explore the world of Jumanji, which contains jungle terrors. They will be attacked by lions, monkeys, rhinos, elephants, giant insects, poison darts, plants that strangle them and other plants that eat things, snakes, birds, mosquitoes, thunder and lightning, and it goes without saying spiders. They will wrestle with a crocodile and Alan will almost be gobbled up by a pool of quicksand that appears in the middle of the mansions floor. Other characters make their appearances. Theres Van Pelt Jonathan Hyde, a big game hunter who has also been captured by the game Aunt Nora Bebe Neuwirth, who has adopted little Judy and Peter somehow it is inevitable that they are orphans, and Sarah Bonnie Hunt, who was the little girl who played Jumanji with young Alan on that fateful day in 1. The town shunned her because she insisted on telling the truth about her experience with the board game. Advertisement. The basic notion of the film two kids have lots of scary adventures with Robin Williams must have sounded good on paper. But the technicians have filled the screen with special effects, both conventional and animated, in such a way that the movie is now about as appropriate for smaller children as, say, Jaws. Its not bad enough that the films young heroes have to endure an unremitting series of terrifying dangers at one point, little Peter gets converted into a monkey that looks like a Wolf Man, and goes through the film like a miniature Lon Chaney, with a hairy snout and wicked jaws. This image alone is likely to be disturbing to small children. To me, it looked like gratuitous cruelty on the part of the filmmakers toward the harmless young character. The underlying structure of the film seems inspired by or limited by interactive video games. There is little attempt to construct a coherent story. Instead, the characters face one threat after another, as new and grotesque dangers jump at them. Its like those video games where you achieve one level after another by killing and not getting killed. The ultimate level for young viewers will be being able to sit all the way through the movie.