CrazySexyCool: The TLC Story - My Review

24 hours ago the first airing of TLC's biopic finished airing on VH1 and -- I watched most of it again as the super TLC fan (aka stan) that I am. I let it all marinate over night and I have some thoughts to share...

I think it'll be easiest to talk about the movie in terms of its' casting, pacing and how well it got the facts right.

Casting -

I didn't hear ANYBODY say that they thought the casting was good, when the three women chosen to portray Tionne, Lisa and Chilli were first announced. In fact, what I saw a lot of was "who the hell is Drew Sidora?" and "can Lil' Mama even act?" and "Keke Palmer looks nothing like Chilli!"

Interestingly, though, after the movie premiered in NYC and bloggers and other journalists got their hands on advance copies of the movie, I heard a different tune. Some freely admitted they were unsure of the casting but that after seeing the movie they changed their minds. Others pretended to have had no preconceived notions and only praised the film and its actors.

I'll certainly freely admit that when I saw the cast, I had my doubts. I expected that if Lil' Mama could act, even a little bit, she'd make a great Lisa. I had all the eye rolls and heavy sighs for Keke Palmer who said in one interview that she'd always been told she looked like Chilli and I wished to see how much makeup they planned to slap on Drew to lighten her skin enough.

Now that I've seen the film, I'm singing a bit of a different tune. Lil' Mama was good. She can act and she did Left-Eye justice given what she had to work with. Of the three, I think she did the best job in her portrayal. Keke actually does look like Chilli from some angles. She had the body and the "sexy" part down pretty pat. Her dancing was adequate. There wasn't too much to complain about. Drew -- well, I think Drew had the hardest row to hoe. Not to suggest that the other two could've been portrayed by just anybody, but Tionne -- she requires a certain savoir flair... Drew had moments where she seemed to truly channel the boss (T-Boz means "Tionne is the boss") but she had just as many where I didn't know who she was supposed to be, exactly.

I'll speak to pacing in just a moment, but it (and the editing, I'm sure) certainly effected the actors' abilities to do their characters justice. The ladies have always had great charisma and been very charming and funny, especially when with each other and especially in the group's early years. I didn't see that from these actresses -- I didn't feel like these were my BFFs in my head (as I do whenever I watch a TLC interview, even now). I felt like they all got along, but I didn't feel like they had spark between them or took on that ride-or-die mentality that TLC talks about.

There were certainly high points, though. Keke Palmer did Chilli's abortion storyline justice. I think she conveyed those feelings of loss and anger very well. Drew Sidora didn't get a lot of screen time to develop Tionne's story past her sickle cell, but her hospital scenes were gut-wrenching. Especially the first. Lil' Mama had a lot of scene stealing moments. Her charisma and her ball of light was very evident in almost every scene, including the ones where we saw them audition for Pebbles the first time. This says a lot of Lil' Mama's talent. The other two ladies had the advantage of spending time with the women they were portraying. Lil' Mama had to figure hers out on her own.

However, aside from the ladies -- the rest of the casting felt off. Pebbles is the exception to that. Rochelle Aytes was a great Pebbles, I thought. But Carl Anthony Payne as LA Reid was awkward and some of the other castings were just... did you see the guy who played Puff Daddy? Probably outweighs Sean Combs by 100 lbs, easy. The guy who plays Mack 10? He probably underweighs the real Mack 10 (at the time he was portraying him) by 100 lbs. And let's don't even discuss Evan Ross as Dallas Austin, except to say Evan Ross probably comes up to Dallas Austin's chest. Seems like they got the ladies casted and said "whoever can work can have the rest of the parts."

Pacing -

This is probably my biggest sore point with the movie. It should've been a 4 hours, 2-part miniseries like all the great biopics. The Jackson 5: An American Dream and The Temptations were both 2 parters. Cramming 20 years into 2.5 hrs require that a whole lot of things get left out or smashed together.

It all started off pretty well. I felt like we were getting to know the ladies. Lisa's dad gets killed off in the first 10 - 15 minutes and we meet and then lose Crystal Jones in almost the very same scene. But once they hit the Fanmail era, the movie seems to hit warp speed. Tionne meets Mack 10, Chilli gets pregnant, has a baby and Tionne also gets pregnant, while they find a new manager and Lisa begins to take trips to Honduras, all seemingly in the same 15 minutes. You can barely keep track of what's happening with one storyline before the next one hits a bump and gets all crazy.

I was especially upset with the fly-through of Lisa's funeral. I know that's a fine line to walk. We don't want to make it a dog and pony show and we know what funerals are like, but who spoke? What was said? Who showed up? We got no glimpse and what we did see we already knew. Tionne and Chilli cried through the whole thing.

The pacing also hurt character development. We see Chilli's mom all of twice, but she's clearly been a huge part of Chilli's life. Same for T-Boz's mom. The pacing also causes the film to fail to help us understand certain plot points. For example, Lisa drinks through the whole movie. Almost from the first time we see her, she's drinking. A cursory TLC fan is probably aware that, at minimum, Lisa had an unhealthy relationship with alcohol -- but for as many times as we see her drink and we see Tionne frustrated by it, we never address it head on. What did the other two really think of it? How did the diversion center help or not help? If I weren't a TLC fan, would I really have caught that Lisa had a drinking issue from the movie? I'm not sure -- which is my point overall.

There as also Lisa wishing the other two listened to her ideas more. She mentions wanting to do futuristic things in the early part of the film, and then again when she argues against Creep as a single. Later we hear Chilli remark "we're finally doing her futuristic stuff and where the hell is she?" The pacing made it hard to keep up and understand if you didn't already know what was going to happen or what the issues were.

However, the pacing did get it right early in the film, as I mentioned. Especially around the development of Perri "Pebbles" Reid. I think some people criticize the film for spending too much time on Pebbles and how she did the girls dirty, but I argue they probably didn't spend enough time. We see the tricks she employed to keep them in the dark about their contracts as well as the tricks she used to, in a sense, cheat them out of their money. All of that is important to the story and good pacing helped bring it out.

Facts -

If you follow me on twitter -- for the hour I did get to tweet, I dropped as many TLC fact gems as I could. I knew the movie would take some artistic license, and the script writer was quick to make sure everyone knew the difference between a biopic and a documentary. Overall, the facts were pretty on (all things considered). They dramatized some things of course and skated over others as necessary.

There were little things like -- Larry. I'm convinced -- and unless Tionne or Chilli themselves tell me otherwise, this will be my opinion -- Larry was meant to represent Sean Newman. I remember when Lisa first started dating Sean. I found any picture of them together. My favorite entertainer and a fine ass man? No issue from me. But I don't recall ever hearing Sean Newman was married. Larry is though. That's the artistic license at work, and that's fine. (there is, of course, the chance that I'm just wrong, either about it being Sean or about Sean not being married, but this is my post so I"m right).

Where the facts really got iffy for me was less in actual truthiness and more in the omission of certain things. Going back to the pacing, they rushed Lisa's storyline of feeling like her group didn't listen to her. As I mentioned earlier, there were 3 references to Lisa wanting to do more futuristic type things. One occurs on the set of the Creep video. It is true that Lisa wanted to film her portions of the video with tape covering her mouth and it is true that she didn't like Creep as not only the lead single, but a single at all. What isn't shown (and to me is an issue of fact) is that Lisa disagreed with the message of Creep altogether. She recorded a rap to be added to the remixes of Creep that preaches the exact OPPOSITE message of the original song. She may have wanted to do something more futuristic, but she wanted it done to something other than Creep.

And what about poor Crystal Jones? We didn't even get to see them kick her out of her own group. At least not the way it actually happened...

But they did get some facts really right. Like with Pebbles. I know some think they made her look like a terrible person for no reason, but one thing I've never seen or heard is Pebbles deny that she had them sign contracts that put them at a serious disadvantage. She's sued and she's whined and she's made excuses but I've never heard her out and out deny it. Them facts is facts, period.

I could go on and on and on -- and I have already. Overall, I give the movie a 7.5/10. Not too shabby, but could've been better. If VH1 releases it on DVD, I want the director's cut, with all extended and deleted scenes, plus behind the scenes, interviews and makings of the MTB single as special features. That's a MUST for my collection.

Everything I Know About Cheating I Learned From 90s Girl Groups

This post has been bumping around in my head for several days now. It all started when my iPod got off on some old Destiny's Child and played "With Me." I guess I hadn't ever REALLY thought about the lyrics, but take a look at the chorus:

Do you ever wonder when he dont come who he goes to see?
And why in the middle of the night he leaves you alone, leaves you alone?
Do you ever wonder when he dont come home who he goes to see
And why in the middle of the night he leaves you alone
Everything he likes is with me

What REALLY got me was a line in one of the verses where Beyonce sings that if SHE were the woman this song is directed to, she woulda been told ol' boy to get gone. Destiny's Child had the nerve to have Parts 1 AND 2 to this song, just in case you needed to be told again that your man had stepped out on you.

Anyway, I got to thinking about the way Alicia Keys got ethered by the general R&B fanbase when she married Swizz Beats and how so many people felt personally offended and let down that she would write a song like "Karma" and then date a married man (and later marry him before his divorce was final enough for us outsiders). Ok so yeah, maybe she was wrong... would we have loved her more if she'd been like some of our favorite girl groups and been 100 with it?

Take our favorite Unsung girls, SWV. They had a few questionable songs, including "You're the One"

I know that you're somebody else's guy
But these feelings that I have for you
I can't deny
She doesn't treat you
The way you want her to
So come on stop fronting
I wanna get with you
What your girl don't know won't hurt her
Anything to make this love go further

An admitted favorite song of mine is Xscape's "My Little Secret," which, as we all well know is all about the fun in creeping...

I like being in the same room with you and your girlfriend
The fact that she don't know, that really turns me on.
She'll never guess in a million years that we got this thing going on

Welp...

TLC, an all time favorite group of mine is of course famous for their song "Creep" which, while about creeping on your man cause he's creeping on you is still about creeping...

Though I might mess around, it's only cause I need some affection
So I creep, yeah just keep it on the downlow
Said, nobody is supposed to know.
So I creep. Yeah, cause he doesn't know what I do
And no attention goes to show...

A little known fact is that LeftEye didn't like this song. She disagreed with the premise all together (recall she [accidentally] burned her boyfriend's house down because he was cheating). In fact, her raps on the remixes to this song are the antithesis to the point of the song. She raps about the consequences to creeping instead of the causes.

In 1996, a forgotten duo called Changing Faces told their neglectful man they had somebody else in, yeah... that's right... "I Got Somebody Else"

I got somebody else
The one I've waited for
He gives me loving, all that I wish for
I got somebody else
Someone who's really sure
I'm so in love
He's all that I wish for

We seem to like it better when the lady has a reason to step out, no?

Bad Boy's bad girls, Total, got right down to it with "Bet She Can't"

Am I badder than your girl?
I hit you with the yes-yes-y'all
Yes-yes-y'all
Bet she can't do it like I do it,
'Cause when I do I throw my back into it.
And if you doubt me then let me prove it,
'Cause I can turn you out.

If you're the girlfriend, I don't know how you compete with that.

I know I'm missing a few. Something about the 90s pulled out every type of girl group you could think of and many of them sang something about stepping out on their man, while also having a few tracks about their man stepping out on them. Did I miss any of your favorites?

Cross posted at Time In My Brain

Eclectic Tastes

For the last couple of years, I've been a part of something called live tweeting during the Grammy's. Essentially, live tweeting is tweeting about an event as it happens. So live tweeting the Grammy's means tweeting your thoughts and opinions as they happen.

For the last couple of years, there's been a point in the show where half of my timeline (TL) complains about the music they're hearing and the other half lambasts the first half for not having a wide array of musical tastes.

I find myself in the 2nd half more than the first. I don't love every genre (techno makes me nauseous, for example) but I am open to all types of music and I do love genres outside of what I should like, stereotypically (rap/hip-hop and R&B).

My first musical love is DEFINITELY R&B. That's what I grew up with, that's what my friends all listened to, it's my first love. But as I've grown, I've come to appreciate and love other genres as well, and it's been interesting re-counting my steps to this point. What re-counting my steps has done is made me a little more sympathetic to folks who don't get down with cross-genre love. I think it's harder to learn to love music you don't already love later in life. I think that even though many of us hip-hop fans long for some of hip-hop's better years and us R&B lovers really really wish we could go back to singers who can sing and songs that are about something, we continue to check for the newest and the latest because we remember those great albums that got us through our first break ups and our first heart aches and were there when we came into our own... We have longevity with these genres and it's hard to see other genres in that light.

There are several moments in time I can look to as explanation for how I came to love music as a whole instead of just one genre. One thing is that when I was growing up, my mama didn't listen to a whole lot of radio and when she did it was a Christian music station. She played a lot of Michael Bolton in the car when I was growing up and we listened to a lot of gospel. For a number of years, if I heard a Top 40 station or an urban station it was because I was in someone else's car.

In the 4th grade I became friends with some of the "tough guys" in my class. They were what we might call "trailer trash" now but back then they served as some cross between personal body guards and really good friends. One kid, Jamie, probably had a little crush on me back then. I probably had a little crush on him as well. He LOVED Green Day. He talked about them every day and so that I could contribute to morning convos about Green Day I began watching a lot more MTV (and football, because I wanted to talk about that too. First team I liked were the Packers because Jamie liked them). Of course watching MTV led to being exposed to a lot of other bands like and unlike Green Day.

When I was in middle school, a time that is the epitome of trying to be cool, some of my friends stopped listening to our local popular (and only) urban station and began listening to a very new Top 40 station. I followed suit. Of course, I was in middle school at the time of what some people call R&B's heydey (every decade before 2000 there's someone who will say it was R&B's heydey) and so of course I heard a lot of that on this station, but I also got exposed to more pop music that I found myself really liking...

Probably the ultimate experience was moving to a new school where the kids overwhelmingly liked non-urban and older music. Here, I was exposed to the likes of Led Zepplin and the Grateful Dead. I wanted to know what they were talking about and I wanted to prove that I did know about artists who weren't black and so I began watching a lot of VH1 to supplement the little bit of knowledge I did have.

But you know what was really effective was my willingness to give new music a chance. That was in part thanks to my mom who had begun exposing me to other music but also an openness I had to step out and be different. I stayed on top of what was hot on urban radio, but I also made sure that I was listening to music I liked, regardless of the artist. We don't always allow ourselves to step outside of the boxes we get put in. We let unsaid expectations dictate to us what we and what we consume.

I do not consider myself better than anyone because I like a wide array of music. I'm simply just happy that I do.

Oh and one more thing: If you watch the Grammy's and don't see the artists you love on stage performing or winning, I suggest you start buying their albums instead of downloading them for free when the leak the week before.

Something That Makes Me Feel Better

Music. I did a whole post on how much I love music.

One of my older cousins used to have an amazing CD collection. I aspired to have as much music as she did, when I was younger. I used to go to her house and sit for hours just listening to her records. Hearing "Sumthin' Wicked This Way Comes" by TLC made me fall in love with music. I can't tell you what it was, but I distinctly remember that moment, on my cousin's couch, reading the liner notes and lyrics (ya'll remember when artists gave a sh*t and put lyrics in their liner notes?). SWTWC was the last song on the album, but by the end of Andre 3000's verse, I was in love. Without fail, music makes me feel better every time. I don't care if it's a song that is slow or fast. I don't care about the genre (for the most part). Music does it to me every. time.

Sometimes music says something for me in a way I'd been trying to, but couldn't. Sometimes I hear song lyrics that perfectly describe my feelings and I had no idea I was feeling that way. I love it when a song reminds me of a good moment in time and even the songs that remind me of less than stellar times are good to me. I love how I can be in one place and hear a song that acts like a time machine and takes me to another place.

On Day 1 I mentioned how J and I used to use music to communicate with each other. I have CDs upon CDs upon CDs that I made for him or he made for me. Sometimes it gets hard for me to put into words what I'm feeling, good or bad, and it's always nice to be able to send someone a song and say "here. listen to this."

I'm always amused when I peep someone else doing it. I've definitely been in the car on multiple occasions with many couples who had entire conversations using the radio in the car!

I love using music as markers in my life. Destiny Child's first album (which is self-titled) reminds me of the move my mom and I made when I was 14 because I would bring that CD with me and sit in what was to be my new room while she did work on the house. When I hear "No More Rain in This Cloud" by Angie Stone, I think of my first year at a new school. Hearing just about anything by Helen Baylor or Michael Bolton from the early 90s makes me think of trips to AL to see family.

I love making my own ringtones out of what I'm listening to and assigning them to friends based on what makes me think of them. Sometimes it's ironic, other times it's on point.

Music isn't far from me at any given moment and I rely on it to get me through most days. Some folks use drugs or alcohol; they ride a bike or swim; they write (which I do as well) or sing; I listen to music to get away from what's happening right now and to feel better.

Lisa "Left-Eye" Lopes

I'm pausing a self-imposed "break" from life for this post... I'll be back, in some form or fashion, sometime later this week...

Beyond a shadow of a doubt, we've not seen anyone like Lisa "Left-Eye" Lopes before or since her death. I say that as a stan, but also because it is very true. It's unfortunate that her genius is often overshadowed in the telling of her life's story by failed relationships and mistakes in personal choices. We forget that she was the creative force behind TLC from the condoms they wore in the early days to the set design on their Fanmail tour, which happened to be the last tour they did as a trio.

Sometimes I wonder if Left-Eye's genius ever would have truly been celebrated and recognized. Shortly before her death, she had signed to Suge Knight's Tha Row records and was recording under the pseudonym "N.I.N.A." which stood for "New Identity Not Applicable." We all know that while Death Row Records at one time ran the music business with regards to gangsta rap, we also all know that Suge Knight had a way of picking artists at their low points and screwing them over in the end.

But, we won't dwell on what wasn't, only what was. Check out a few of my favorite Left-Eye raps below...





You can also go here to read more of my thoughts...

What I'm Listening To...

From time to time I like to share what I'm listening to.

Many of you will recognize these artists, especially if you watched the Grammy's last night. I was a bit disappointed in how many people in my timeline had nothing good to say about the non hip-hop/rap acts. There is a lot of good music out there that is not hip-hop or rap and I'm always taking the opportunity to expose people to what slices of it I've discovered.

Kings of Leon - Use Somebody


Zac Brown Band - Chicken Fried


Adam Lambert - Whataya Want From Me

Untitled

Every day I say I'm going to post.

Anyone who follows me on Twitter knows I recieved bad news about a week and a half ago...

I know that one way for me to deal with it is to write about it, but I'm not quite ready for it. I will, though... I will.

I'm sure everyone has great Labor Day plans and I hope everyone enjoys theirs. I have plans, but I'm kinda dreading it... I know, I know... makes no sense.

New Brandy leak... I'm loving it. I hear Megan Rochelle recorded it first, so I wanna hear hers, but here's B-Rocka's

I <3 Music

NE-YO ft Peedi Peedi - Stay
Uploaded by chanmany. - See the latest featured music videos.

It took me a minute before I realized this song was about music (yes, even though he says "music" at the end of the song)...

Over the past couple of weeks I've been jotting down some thoughts I have about what I feel about music. I've wanted to do a lot of things with my life. I know there's one path in life that I'd be particularly great in; however, I've always had a love for music that I had a hard time explaining. I don't play an instrument (though I did take piano for years -- I quit because I hated practicing), can't sing and though I've tried, couldn't make a "beat" if my life depended on it (man, that's way harder than you might think). I still have always wanted to be involved in music, and so I figured a role in A&R would be perfect for me (I still do, btw...). Anyway, here's the whole shebang I've written out thus far. It's mostly just as it looks in my blackberry, but I edited it some and made it look pretty for all of you...

I think I like music so much because it let's me feel. The right song can have me nodding my head subconsciously. The right song can speak to my heart and make me feel something so deeply inside.

One time I told my ex that I missed him in a place I couldn't get to. It ached - it was like an itch I couldn't find. That's how music can make me feel sometimes.

Sometimes it can give me words I didn't know I had. It can help me name what's wrong and how I feel and what I need. Music makes the nonsense so clear sometimes

Music is the one thing that has made me feel ok to cry. I'll never forget putting "Miss You So Much" by TLC on repeat shortly after getting their CD. I don't know why, but it made me think about my father it really made me realize that I did miss him and it hurt how much I missed him. I didn't understand why he wasn't there and I cried. I cried hard. That's been the only time I've cried about him and his absence (it hasn't stopped hurting though).

When it's me and the music I know I can be emotionally raw. I can sit in a room with music and whatever I do, whatever my reaction is is ok. Music doesn't ask me why or need to know the backstory. It just sits there and let's me do it.

Oh and the passion. I loved someone, once, with as much passion as you hear in all the good music. I miss that passion so much and I've found it again in the music. The only problem is that it's not my passion. It's always meant for someone else.

I have spent a long time perfecting my emotional wall. It's perfect. Most people can't even see it, at least not at first. But then it's all they see and I can never not have it when they're around. That's not the case with music. It doesn't see a wall because truly when I'm with it, there is no wall, can be no wall.

Sometimes I hear just the right song at just the right time and my heart is so relieved. It's hard maintaining a stoic front. People say they want the softer side of me, but when it shows they rebuff it. This is partly because I spend so much time hiding it but at the same time it makes me want to keep hiding it.

Sometimes it's not even the words, it's the note. The note sounds like how I feel and so the song is how I feel.

This is still a work in progress, but it wasn't until I started writing this that I realized where my love for music comes from...

MJ - The Man, The Icon, The Legend

I'd be remiss to not say anything on the ol' blog about Michael Jackson. At the same time, what can I say that hasn't been said? The timing of his death is ironic -- Thembi said what I'd been thinking and that's that he died before he could make his true "comeback" whether it would've been during his 50-date tour in London or if it would've been some other time... I think we were all, whether vocal critics, or silent supporters, waiting on him to snap out of it and get back to the MJ we all loved and revered.

Maybe what we all failed to realize was that in being as amazing as he was, he had to give a whole lot of himself including what some of us might call his sanity. In any case, no matter what, Michael Jackson leaves a legacy that deserves respect. As much as it broke my heart to see pictures of him in the last decade, to watch his physical appearance change so drastically as if he hated everything he was, that was his life and those were his demons. They weren't for me or anyone else to comment on, though -- because we all felt we could -- we did anyway.

Now that he's gone, I'm interested in watching the way the mainstream media (MSM), who as Rippa points out, was so much a part of MJ's downfall, will give him respect while taking it away all at the same time. Whether he "got off" for crimes he actually committed or not -- none of that has bearing on the amazing musical genius he was or what sort of everlasting effect his efforts will have on music forevermore. Unfortunately there are some out there who will try their darndest to make sure it does.

Ultimately, I say nevermind to all of them. The truth of the matter is, if we all really do start with the "Man in the Mirror" we'll find that probably in our own sort of way, we weren't all that much better than they were at times.

R.I.P. Michael -- it doesn't matter if they give you your props today or 20 years from now, because your work will forevermore, as it always has, speak volumes for itself.

What I'm Listening To

Like I need another weekly thing to forget to do...

But I like sharing music, so here are the Top 10 songs (in no particular order) on my iPod this week:

1.

When I Go Down (Album Version) - Relient K
2.

Never Really Ever - Maysa

Thinkin Bout My Ex - Janet Jackson
4.

All The Things (Your Man Wont Do) - Joe
5.

Why R U - MAIN - Amerie
6.

Buttnaked - Adina Howard
7.

Everybody Know - Sparkz ft Muddy Watters
8.

Pride & Joy - Jon B
9.

Kissing You (Remix) - Total feat Puff Daddy (This is the remix, I prefer the original version, but both are hot)
10.

Pretty Wings (uncut) - Maxwell