In Treatment 3x06

Frances is still having trouble remembering her lines during rehearsal, even though she can quote them verbatim off stage. She’s afraid to come off as frivolous or ridiculous or pathetic complaining about forgetting her lines, about her stage director, about getting older, about not having had sex for two years, and what not. She is comparing herself to her sister who is taking her breast cancer in such great strides. Her teenage daughter seems to prefer her father and aunt over her, and has a boyfriend with whom she may start having sex. She felt her husband would lose interest in her the moment she got pregnant. It is fair to say that Frances is very insecure about herself and needs constant praise for what she does to maintain a sense of purpose. She has faced the loss of her husband (after he had an affair) and of her daughter, now her sister is dying, and the high risk that she may test positive for the breast cancer gene test may mean she might lose her breasts. Paul had called her sister Patricia to show his concern and realized Frances hadn’t been truthful when she told him she had been talking to her sister about seeing Paul. She confesses and promises to talk with Patricia before the next session.

Robert Plant – Band of Joy

Robert Plant’s latest album Band of Joy (2010) won’t grab you with hard-rocking riffs, won’t blow you away with heavy blues stomps, won’t wow you with pyrotechnic guitar solos. The music on this album is more subtle than that. Plant has had quite the successful solo career since Led Zeppelin, moving from hard rock via new-wave AOR to folk rock at the turn of the millennium. Last year his bluegrass collaboration with Alison Krauss even won him a Grammy for Album of the Year. Here we get an album filled with mandolin and banjo, wistful harmonies, and delectable percussion, where English folk and country & western meet, where rock and roll rubs shoulders with rhythm and blues, where spiritual and secular, where the sacred and the profane come together musing on love and life and the hereafter.

The album’s opening track is the swinging “Angel Dance,” originally by Los Lobos, which they give an electric bluegrass rocking treatment. The song encourages us to ease our worries, let the children dance, and after a good night sleep all will be better tomorrow. But Plant’s delivery hints at a more celestial, more angelic better day. His refelctions on the End of Time continue when we dive straight into “House of Cards,” by Richard Thompson (Fairport Convention), where they shake things up in a loose folk rocker that could just as well be Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi, with some Jackson Brown and CSNY thrown in for good measure. Plant’s sole original composition, “Central Two-O-Nine,” is reminiscent of the country blues of Lightnin’ Hopkins and Leadbelly.

On “You Can’t Buy Me Love,” originally by R&B singer Barbara Lynn (1965), Band of Joy sounds like The Beatles with a little gumption from The Kinks. (Don’t let the rockin’ ‘n’ reeling trick you, this is no ode to love.) They turn Jimmie Rodger’s country & western tune, “I’m Falling in Love Again” into 1950s country soul, with a Sam Cooke feel and Nashville slides. Milton Mapes’ “The Only Sound That Matters” becomes a forgotten Rolling Stones out-take from the late 70s. I’m not particularly partial to the Appalachian traditional that goes by various names, “Get Along Home, Cindy,” “Cindy, I’ll Marry You Some Day.”

For this Cricket the real high points come with the distorted feedback of Low’s “Silver Rider” (already nominated for a Grammy) and “Monkey,” which Band of Joy perform like dirges with Plant well-nigh whispering and Patti Griffin sighing in mourning. Another beautiful meditation on mortality comes with the cover of Townes Van Zandt’s last song “Harm’s Swift Way.” The album ends with two more contemplations on the passing of time. First, the arrangement by Plant and co-producer Buddy Miller of the traditional spiritual “Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down” is as gloomy and ghostly as it is menacing, with a subtle interplay between banjo and electric guitar. Lastly, Band of Joy remake 19th-century abolitionist Theodore Tilton’s “Even This Shall Pass Away” into a rollicking stomper with a grinding, buzzing bass, and screeching guitars from the Book of Fripp and Eno.

Fans of Led Zeppelin may look for clues all they want as to what a Led Zep come back may sound like. They won’t find it here. And may I remind them of Walking to Clarksdale? Case in point. It speaks volumes for Plant that he resists hopping on the reunion bandwagon to milk that cow for what it’s worth and bring home the fat bacon (to mix a few rustic metaphors). Plant’s voice is obviously unmistakable, but don’t be fooled by reviews talking about “misty mountains” and “battles of evermore” and “houses of the holy.” Referencing over a century of musical history, Band of Joy is as timeless as it is fresh. With Pro Tools easily setting sessions in Abbey Road, Carnegie Hall, the Athenian Acropolis, or a Tennessee barn, Miller decidedly evades an overtly slick production in favor of a crisp and clear sound that’s loose and intimate, and entirely in the here-and-now. Let’s be grateful Plant continues refusing to wallow in the nostalgia of his gloriously excessive yesteryears! Get the album now! (It’s downloadable for only $1.99)

Dexter 5x05

“We all have something to hide,” Dexter intones. That’s one of the show’s premises from which it draws its attraction. In some way we all are a little bit like Dexter, hiding in plain sight “some dark place we don’t want the world to see.” That is something he shares with Lumen – and they both are victims of terrible circumstances that have happened to them. She tells him there were others, not just Boyd and she wants Dex to help her kill them. Having no clue as to who these accomplices might have been he pays a visit to Boyd’s house. He finds someone else has ransacked it already, leaving blood as he cut himself smashing the window – and finger prints. When he checks the prints in the database, they match with none other than Lumen herself. She beat Dexter to it. Next he breaks into her motel room and finds she’s been keeping tabs on Boyd’s former cell mate due for parole, one Robert Brunner, who did time for rape and torture. Dex worries she might try and kill him on her own. He finds the guy under the Julia Tuttle Causeway (a sex offender colony), tranquilizes him and prepares to kill him. Then he realizes Brunner is wearing an ankle bracelet monitoring his whereabouts. He could not have been involved in abusing Lumen.

Meanwhile, Deb and Sierra are trying their might to get any leads on the Santa Muerte machete murders. They learn that one of the Fuentes brothers has an eye tattoo on his hand. There’s a great scene with Deb and Mazuka in a tattoo parlor. You just got to see it. When Sierra checks ATM footage, she realizes the victims were all freaking out while withdrawing maximum amounts from their accounts. It gives them another clue, which brings them to a home where they discover two maggot-infested decomposing bodies. It’s too gross to watch. Imagine the stench! I’m not too keen on Deb and Quinn becoming friends with benefits. Her penchant for the wrong types is getting painfully obvious. Moreover, Quinn has recruited a suspended colleague, Stan Liddy (Peter Weller) to keep tabs on Dexter. Then there’s the growing suspicion between LaGuerta and Batista. She is working hard to get the Internal Affairs charges dropped, but he worries she is having internal affairs of a different kind. For her part, Lumen goes looking for Brunner under Tuttle Bridge intending to kill him on the spot. Dex stops her in the nick of time. He then convinces her to return home to Minnesota and even got her a plane ticket. Yet when she is searched at airport security she panics and hails a cab back to Miami.

Burn Notice 4x15

Sam and Jesse are heading to Santa Domingo, to get in on the auction, check out security, and steal the list Michael is dying to get his hands on so he can finally find out all the names of the people behind his burn notice. He can’t come, because, “when you’re burned,” as every opening sequence reminds us, “you’re stuck in whatever city they decide to dump you.” So, Michael is quarantined in Miami, and he sure cannot afford raising eyebrows skipping town and heading to the Dominican Republic for three days. Justin Walsh, the, um, “auctioneer,” otherwise known as “covert intelligence thief,” isn’t very forthcoming about his security. He just hints that he’s using a moving loop to keep the list safe. Sam reckons that means Walsh is using a motorcycle relay, with various bikes going round until he has sold the list. To keep track of any bikes circling the neighborhood, Sam and Jesse recruit “field operatives” among the locals for a few bucks, and soon enough figure out the pattern of bikes.

Meanwhile, Michael’s brother Nate happens to be back in town, looking for some cars stolen from friends of his. Of course, the story turns out not that simple. One of the cars contained twenty kilos of heroin. Michael got himself new clients. And Fiona is in on the job. Michael visits an old acquaintance, who helps him to the address of the crew who swiped the car, called Buckwild’s, and asks for a little favor putting the crew out of commission. As is to be expected, things don’t go exactly as planned. The car wasn’t stolen by Buckwild’s crew, but actually by one of the kingpin’s henchmen. Michael is able to get his clients scot free, though, when he finally retrieves the car. Then he and Fiona fly to the Dominican Republic – evading customs – and help Sam and Jesse steal the list, well, actually a flash drive, and rush back to Miami. Now what is Michael going to do with the information?

Shameless – Series 4

When we return to Chatsworth Estate, it is Lip’s 18th birthday – except he finds out it is actually his 19th, because his parents delayed his birth registration for a year. He is in for quite a day! Frank accidentally sets Sheila’s kitchen on fire. Kevin and Veronica are arrested in Romania trying to adopt a baby illegally. The Irish mobster Maguires moves in next door. Frank’s first wife Monica decides to move back in after nearly six and a half years. Marty returns with the little baby from Romania, making his way back across the Continent hitching rides. So, crammed in the same house now are Monica, Frank’s four sons – Lip, Ian, Carl and Liam (well, Ian isn’t biologically his) – and Debbie, Carol, Marty and Sue (his girlfriend) and his new baby, plus Lip’s girlfriend Mandy and their baby Katie, too. Honestly, I have no idea what Monica is doing, but Frank never told Sheila he never filed the divorce papers – and that the bigamist is now married to both of them. Sheila is understandably upset by Monica’s return. She dreams of going Kill Bill (parts one and two) on Monica, but she opts for a more subtle approach – trying to get Monica back with Norma. To make it worse, Frank can’t keep it in his pants for too long, and soon is sleeping with his first wife again. Monica wants Frank to tell Sheila they never divorced, and isn’t legally married to Sheila. He can’t handle the pressure or the guilt. But when Sheila catches Monica having a cocktail sausage, she puts two and two together: Monica is neither a vegetarian nor a lesbian, but has been having sex with her Frank. Knives fly, and Frank too. And if that isn’t enough, Sheila and Monica decides it’s up to Frank to choose between them, neither will share. The kids group together in favor of Sheila, of course, Monica left them over six years ago, and Sheila is the best thing to Frank. In the end he chooses Sheila, but when she discovers he is still married to Monica she leaves him for good.

Meanwhile, Jamie Maguire came back from his ten-year prison sentence for murder. Instead of return to his criminal family, he decides to work at the Jockey. Sexy kitten Karen plays cat and mouse with the former jailbird, always playing hard to get, even though she’s the easiest piece on the estate. Knowing he is a Maguire, she doesn’t trust him one bit, but is clearly fancies him – and he is all over her. Then he proposes out of the blue. He’s spent ten years in prison, he doesn’t want to waste anymore time, he knows what he wants out of life: her – and who can blame him? She’s a well right piece of ass. What endears him to her is when she realizes he hasn’t had sex since he went to prison! Naturally, the Maguires use any means necessary to make sure Karen stays with Jamie, which includes manipulation, threats, and tortures. Paddy Maguire fears for his life when three of his former inmates all die within the span of a week under suspicious circumstances. He needs to calm his nerves, but scares the shit out of his doctor. So he prescribes him “placeboesque anti-depressants” for a “pretended depression by proxy”! In the end, Paddy learns it was Jamie who took them all out, because they were planning on killing Paddy and taking over his shady ventures.

In other news, Kash Karib gets himself in such financial trouble, he has to lay Ian off from the convenience store. Yvonne is livid when she finds out Kash has taken out loans on the shop and their house. She never wants to see him ever again. The situation is so serious, they stage his suicide – and he is indeed never seen again. Ian runs into a girl who just stole ten grand worth of scratch cards off the Maguires and now the Gallaghers have to hide her up their attic. When she finds out, Mandy is forced to choose between the two families. She stands up for Lip and Ian, but eventually her father finds out anyway. Even though he’s gay, Ian feels attracted to the girl, and they end up sleeping together. He rushes off with her. She wants to leave town with him, but he feels it’s not right. He returns to his charming gay ways fast with one of the Maguire sons. They snort up post-coital and get caught by Paddy. Briefly Kev’s ex-junkie/prostitute sister Kelly shows up unannounced at the Maguires, not realizing her brother’s in jail in Eastern Europe.

The story of Frank and Monica plays out throughout the whole season. Never mind what Frank sees in her, I cannot figure out why Monica ever decided to return and make everybody’s life miserable. Frank prefers to avoid the whole situation and stay in Sheila’s house. It’s none too surprising that he has to leave there, as Sheila has put up the house for sale. Now he has to move back in with his kids, his not-so-estranged wife and her bird Norma. Debbie tries to wedge herself between Frank and Monica – to the point her mother pushes her to find a lad and get laid. Carl rather wants his family back together and will do anything to get rid of Norma. For her part, Monica plays Frank against Norma. Her bird takes it a wee bit too far, tying Frank up and taking him to the police station on account of attempted rape. “Have you seen her?” Frank exclaims, “yourself?” After Debbie’s had a good word with her, Norma drops the charges on the condition that Franks stays away from Monica until they’re back together – and she even throws in a grand to sweeten the deal! “How much do you love her now, eh, Frank?” The deals falls through, though, when Monica pleads Norma to drop the charges or else she won’t ever forgive her. So, Monica is here to stay, alas.

At the end of the season Lip, the smart one of the family, gets offered three scholarships to choose from so he can go to the university. But where does that leave Mandy and their baby? We will have to wait and see. This leads me to one aspect of the show I find myself struggling with: the loss of my favorite characters. First we saw Fiona and Steve leave, then Kev and Veronica, and Sheila soon after. I adored them, and miss them on the show. Now Lip is leaving for college. That leaves Frank and Debbie (oh, yes, and Karen, too, for obvious reasons). I care much less for the remaining characters. I don’t know where Marty and Sue went. The Maguires are too much of caricatures, and next season we’ll have to deal with Yvonne and her kids. Still, Shameless is one of the most heart-wrenching, delightful, endearing shows you’ll ever see, full of humor and human emotions. You may have heard that HBO is preparing an adaptation for American TV, which is quite a shame. Why can’t Americans get used to the accents, throw in subtitles, and enjoy the original? I would urge you to do yourself a favor and check out the U.K. version before they start airing the rip off, no matter it will feature William H. Macy in the role of Frank Gallagher.

Gossip Girl 4x10

There’s another party on the Upper East Side, Thanksgiving, and as the Macy’s parade is winding down Manhattan, and the scent of traditions hangs heavy in the autumnal air, people are preparing for dinner at the van der Woodsen-Humphreys. Not seen since the Chuck’s Saints & Sinners Masquerade Ball is Serena and no one knows where she’s been. Well, Juliet Flatchester sure knows where S is – she’s up in a cheap motel in Queens, practically overdosed on drugs and booze. When she finally comes to, S dials 911 and ends up in the emergency room. Once again it’s the Brooklynites who realize this does not sound like something Serena would do, that’s something is off, but Blair and Lily assume it’s business as usual, just Serena acting out. Apparently that’s what you do when you’re blowing off steam, you take painkillers, sleeping pill, anti-depressants and you wash them down with a bottle of vodka. Lily decides to send Serena into rehab.

Goodboy Dan believes Serena, who moreover tells him that the last thing she remembers is that she had made up her mind between Nate and him in his favor, and they skip out together. Meanwhile, Juliet makes Vanessa tell off Jenny, so she can take the blame. Plus, she sends a photo to Gossip Girl S snorting a big line of coke – or so it seems. Apparently everyone has forgotten that S supposedly kissed both Nate and Dan at Chuck’s party, even though she wasn’t able to get it. So, when she sees that photo of herself, Serena figures if she can’t remember doing coke, she may have done a whole lot more she can’t remember. So she volunteers to return to rehab. Jenny still is the only one to realize Juliet was behind Serena’s bender, and tells Blair before she returns upstate to stay gone. Also splitting town are Vanessa and Juliet. Now Blair only has Dan to turn to, to save Serena and bring down that stalking Flatchester. Mind you, I still don’t know what has motivated her and her brother to set up Serena. It’s getting so ridiculously over-the-top annoying, I am glad the season is almost over.

Modern Family 1x09

This is the episode in which we are introduced to the Great Fizbo! Who is he? It’s Cameron the Clown, who we learn is a trained Auguste clown. It’s Luke’s birthday and since the whole family is going to be together for Thanksgiving, Claire and Phil decide to pull all the stops this year. Phil gets a climbing wall, bounce house, snow-cone machine, balloons, you name it. Meanwhile, Jay and Gloria encourage Manny to approach a girl he likes, but she has eyes only for Haley’s boyfriend Dylan. For his part Dylan is more interested in “Jungle Tanya,” the animal trainer who’s entertaining the kids with chameleons and snakes. No one flirts with Haley’s man, of course, so she jealously releases jungle girl’s scorpion. The ensuing hilarity gave me some hearty chuckles – even if the slapstick was rather stiff. Floppy Fizbo runs for cover, freaking out Phil, who like any sane person is scared of clowns and bumps into Jay, who was just showing Luke how to use the crossbow he gave him for his birthday, which sets of an accidental arrow into the bounce house, which traps Manny’s girl inside, but as a true man of action Manny saves the day – except that Luke tripped over the beads spilled from Claire’s arts-and-crafts table and breaks his arm.