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Reading, Wellington, and whatever else – teenblog@wcl.govt.nz

Month: December 2009

STAMP!

stampy

We’ve enhanced our personal brand at the Teen Blog this week by getting a fancy new stamp made, there it is, just up a bit. Nice isn’t it? Expect to see it upon official looking pieces of paper at teen events, various flyers and other things deemed stampable. Like my hand.

Best Of 2009: Top Albums

Thanks to everyone that voted for their favourite albums of 2009, this is what we ended up with:

5. Green Day – 21st Century Breakdown

4. Paramore – Brand New Eyes

Basically wonderful. Took me awhile to get into. But the musical talent has improved and they are now more then just a catchy CD. (Although it is VERY catchy) Hayley’s voice as intense as ever. The addition of Taylor was awesome with better guitar and drum beats. Looking forward to the concert.

– Jess

3. Rihanna – Rated R

2. Glee : The Music Volume 1

1. Lady Gaga – The Fame Monster

It was a very close run thing between the Glee kids and Lady Gaga, but in the end The Fame Monster came out on top. Go to our bebo page to hear tracks from the top five. Thanks again to the voters, in particular Jess for her review, and congratulations to Lady Gaga for topping a list as prestigious as this one. See you next year!

Cee Dees

rihannaRihanna has really stepped up with sass, aggression and belligerence on her latest, Rated R, and this makes sense given recent headlines about her personal life. A cathartic release that Rihanna can be well proud of, but with such strong material, the real winner is the listener. Will it be a late contender for Teen Blog album of the year?

chris brownThe reason for much of Rihanna’s very public turmoil is Chris Brown, who also has a new album out, Graffiti. This fares far worse – musically and lyrically – and it’s hard to feel any of the sympathy Brown so obviously and clumsily courts on the record.

cobra starshipCobra Starship got their start by recording the title track to Snakes On A Plane, they then turned the subsequent success into While the city sleeps, we rule the streets. If you enjoyed Hot Mess, their 2009 effort, you’ll want to pick it up. More witty, hip dance-punk.

lady gagaEvery single person who’s submitted reviews or votes for the best music of 2009 post has mentioned Lady Gaga, usually suffixed with “of course”. Need I say any more? Well, yes actually, as that would be a very short and lazy review. Although with that last sentence padding things out a bit and this one too, I could get away with just saying that The Fame Monster is here and that you’ll likely need to reserve it.

Fall Out Boy have now released five studio albums, one live album, and three eps over their eight year career. Sounds like it’s time for a greatest hits album to me, and look at this, Believers never die is just that. A gold star goes to the person who can name the fictional character who played the fictional fictional character in the never completed fictional fictional movie that appeared in an episode of a fictional TV show that Fall Out Boy named themselves after. If that makes any sense.

Disney Channel actor and now pop star, Selena Gomez, originally broke into the entertainment business by appearing in Barney & Friends. Kinda like Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Justin Timberlake starting off in The Mickey Mouse Club huh? Anyway, she now fronts Selena Gomez & The Scene who debuted with Kiss & Tell earlier this year.

Finally some Pop Idol alumni have CDs appearing in the catalogue, American runner up Adam Lambert with For Your Entertainment and Australian winner Stan Walker with Introducing Stan Walker.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Best of 2009 (Movie) Review: Star Trek

Star Trek: the movie

Having grown up with the original series on TV but not really a Trekkie, I wondered if I would like this new movie. The answer is a resounding Yes! It is great. Lots of action, romance, aliens and the never to be forgotten 3rd man on the mission who never comes back (what was his name again?).

~ Raewyn

Best of 2009 Review: The Reformed Vampire Support Group

The Reformed Vampire Support Group, by Catherine Jinks

“Zadia Bloodstone stood over her victim. Tall, lithe, beautiful and ready to kill! A magnificent vampire, fighting evil in the world. And my creation, my alter ego if you will. Hi, my name is Nina and I am nothing like the Zadia I write about in my books, except that I too am a vampire. A sick looking, skinny being, who got infected back in 1973 after drinking too much at a party and wandering off on my own to puke, only to be found by Casimir, an ancient European vampire. I still live with my mum and the only time I get to go out is every Tuesday night when Father Ramon picks me up and takes me to a meeting of the Reformed Vampire Support Group. We live on guinea pig blood, take supplements and totally zonk out between dawn and dusk every day – not the glamorous life you thought huh! But one of our group is missing, so maybe I will have to use some of my Zadia-side afterall, find the answer and save the rest of us from foul play!” If you like vampires, badies and werewolves this is a fun read with a twist.

~ Raewyn

Best of 2009 Review: Ghost Medicine

Ghost Medicine, by Andrew Smith

The first sentence of Ghost Medicine reads I can see myself lying in the dirt, on my back, on a warm, starry night, with my feet up on those rocks, ringing a swirling and noisy fire, listening, laughing, seeing the sparks that corkscrew, spinning above me into the black like dying stars, fading, disappearing, becoming something else; my hat back on my head so I can just see my friends from the corners of my eyes, which says a lot about the book (so I don’t have to, but might anyway).

This is quite different from a lot of other Young Adult literature: the writing is intense, poetic, slooow, at times brutal, and nearly always completely excellent. The story is simple; an idyllic summer (hard work on the farm, horse riding, nights outside by the fire, good friends, rather a lot of tobacco chewing) turns tumultuous and dangerous after a series of encounters with the local bully boy (who is unfortunately also the sherif’s son). The characters are a well drawn, the detail is great (especially the horsey stuff), and their predicaments are believable. Read this book if you like things slow and chilled out, but don’t if you don’t.

I also liked:

Front and Center, Catherine Gilbert Murdock & Perfect Fifths, Megan McCafferty – because they were DJ and Jessica Darling’s last hurrahs.

Shiver, Maggie Stiefvater – because it was so darn sweet.

Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins – because it was much better than I thought it was going to be, and I really want to read the last in the series now.

Fragile Eternity, Melissa Marr – although I actually thought Ink Exchange was better (but that was last year). You can read the prologue for Radiant Shadows (another bad title!) here.

Solace of the Road, Siobhan Dowd – a classic road trip story, where Holly/Solace starts out in search of one thing and finds something else entirely better. I think this is the last of Siobhan Dowd’s books to be published, which is sad.

What They Always Tell Us, Martin Wilson – a well-written, down-beat story of two brothers working through very different stuff.

Fire, Kristin Cashore – this was good, although I didn’t think it deserved its rave reviews. Nice to see Leck a bit more (the prologue is creepy!), but I thought that someone who could control people’s minds should have been a bit more dangerous.

The Bride’s Farewell, Meg Rosoff – because while it’s no How I Live Now, Meg Rosoff is still a brilliant writer of stories about girls who know how to look after themselves in harsh circumstances.

And that makes 10, so that’s like my Top 10 Books of 2009.

~ Grimm

Best of 2009 Review: From Somalia with Love

From Somalia With Love by Na’ima B Roberts.

This is a lovely story about a young Somalian refugee girl who lives in East London with her Mum and brothers and extended family. It is about her adapting to the Western lifestyle and trying to keep her Muslim identity. Things change for them all when her father is found and is coming to London to be with them. There is conflict between the two cultures. It is a story about being a teenager with two different cultures and trying to find out who you are. It is also about growing up. A good story for the cultural story part of NCEA writing logs.

~ Brigid

Bebo Playlists

Have you been wondering what ever happened to the playlists that used to be at the end of every new music post? Well, they’ve been moved over to our new bebo page (that’s right, we have a bebo page, why not add us?), in the ilike box over to the right. This week it’s a Glee filled playlist, as it seems to be everyone’s favourite at the moment.

While I’m here I’ll remind you to get your votes and reviews in for your favourite albums of 2009, post them in the comments here. There’s going to be a “year end music spectacular” mega post created using you input going up sometime after Christmas, so look forward to that.

Short short story competition: nearly at the finish line

Hello! The closing date for the short short story competition is nearly upon us (5pm Monday 21st), so if you’re writing make sure you email us your story before then. To refresh your memory about the rules, visit here; to refresh your memory about the prize pack, visit here.

Have fun.

Ps If you’re bored now that there’s no school and things we’ve got a few ideas of books to read while sitting in the sun wearing sunblock and eating nice things.

Best of 2009: Stephanie’s Picks

Stephanie, being busy buying books (lucky for some!), has offered up these two thought-provoking titles as her favourites of the year (plot summaries included from the catalogue):

Wintergirls, by Laurie Halse Anderson

Eighteen-year-old Lia comes to terms with her best friend’s death from anorexia as she struggles with the same disorder.

Hate List, by Jennifer Brown

Sixteen-year-old Valerie, whose boyfriend Nick committed a school shooting at the end of their junior year, struggles to cope with integrating herself back into high school life, unsure herself whether she was a hero or a villain.

Glee

The first soundtrack to Glee (there’s a second one out, I think, in the US?) is now in the library catalogue. You can reserve it here. Lots of people want to listen to it! (Apparently Kurt does an amazing cover of Defying Gravity.) Tres exciting, do admit.

Things people search for the most

Here is a new list of the Top 10 things people search for in the library catalogue (and here is the old one!). The catalogue is called Easyfind as it easily finds things (obvs) and also recommends similar things.

So here they are, in order of popularity. 

1. Twilight
2. New Moon
3. Book
4. Jodi Picoult
5. My Sisters Keeper
6. The Lovely Bones
7. Lovely Bones
8. thriller
9. Cherub
10. 24

I think it’s pretty cool that about a third of them are for items in the YA section. (The 11th on the list is Stephenie Meyer and the 12th is Eclipse.) SO significant.

Here are some of the searches that didn’t get an results. They are also called ‘orphaned queries’, depressingly.

‘ultamate biplane’, ‘stunt biplane’, ‘the profet’, ‘stephine meyer’, ‘shime’, ‘build chicken coop’, and ‘rock n roll swindle enter your query here’.

Write About Music

It’s nearly the end of the year and in the blogosphere that can only mean it’s nearly time for year end lists, favourite books, movies, Kanye West outbursts, pretty much everything will be ordered from one to ten. 

I’ll be counting down the top ten YA CDs of the year in a week or two and I’d love to have some contributions from you all. Send in a review of your album of the year, or even just a list of your favourites, results will be tabulated and a list produced. When the post goes up the best reviews will be included so you can print it out, stick it on the fridge and say “Me, I’m famous. I contributed to a stupidly pseudonymed blogger’s slightly meaningless year end list. What did you do this year, huh?” and all your friends will say “Damn ______ is totes for the win and they also have really awesome taste in music.” So get to it!

The cut off date for submissions will be Monday the 28th of December at midnight.

Listen To These

karen o and the kidsThe Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Karen O has teamed up with an all-star cast of indie rock noteworthies to score (probably) the most anticipated children’s movie ever. Where the wild things are : motion picture soundtrack, is the result. And what a result it is! For fans of shouting, stomping and making a wild rumpus.

them crooked vulturesAnother all-star cast teaming up this week are Them Crooked Vultures with their self-titled effort. With Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters and Nirvana), Josh Homme (Queens Of The Stone Age, Eagles Of Death Metal, Kyuss) and John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin) on board you can probably hazard a guess at what this sounds like. You’re right by the way.

cascadaCascada is a Euro-dance trio with an impressive string of hits to their name. Evacuate The Dancefloor is their latest effort, I don’t think the point is to evacuate the dancefloor though, rather to rush onto it. At least I would imagine so. Basshunter fans might enjoy, it’s very popular anyway, evidenced by its long reserve queue.

New Zealand drum and bassers Shapeshifter have a new one called The System Is A Vampire. There are drums, there are basses, there are even bits with singing – all of which adds up to some very popular local drum and bass. Expect to hear this blasting out of boy racers’ cars all summer long.

Ministry Of Sound’s Annual series continues with The Annual 2010. The new installment is mixed by John Course, The Aston Shuffle & Goodwill and includes music from the likes of Mika, Bob Sinclair, Wolfmother, Dizzee Rascal and others. Sure to be a hit over summer.

New Zealand dub pioneers Salmonella Dub return with Freak Controller. It’s a generous two-disc affair packed full of dubby-dubness from the scene veterans. The second CD includes a song called Bungle Fun, which raises a smile at Teen Blog HQ.

The Vans Warped Tour has been in existence for a long time now, and has helped break many, many nu-metal acts over its run. Who will be the next big shouty band to take over airwaves? Two CDs of contenders and other, longer tenured bands await on Warped tour : 2009 tour compilation.

Speaking of bands making it on the Warped Tour, The Used rose to popularity after a strong showing while on it in the early part of the decade. Before that they were homeless, so hey, large collections of shouty men with drop-tuned guitars travelling around are beneficial to society. Sort of. A tighter more polished screamo sound from The Used on Artwork.

World Cup Draw Announced

The draw for the Fifa World Cup 2010 was announced last night, see the groups here. The All Whites must finish first or second in their group to advance to the knockout stages, getting past Italy, Paraguay and Slovakia to do it. A tough ask, but not entirely impossible. My pick for the final is Spain over The Netherlands, what do you think?

2009 Short Short Story Competition Update!

Hello,

Quick update: the 2009 Short Short Story Competition is here – your chance to win a Cirque du Freak prize pack. Due to popular demand we’ve extended the entry age range to 12 to 18. All you have to do is write a short story of 350 words or less containing these three things: “paramount”, “freak” and “violet”. Easy. Entries close on Monday 21 December. For all the details have a look here.

Have a good weekend!

John Green’s New Moon Review

John Green, author of Looking for Alaska, Paper Towns and An Abundance of Katherines, recently went to see New Moon and had some opinions about it, some of them good, some bad, and some quite amusing (with a nice mention of Taylor Lautner at the end, we noticed. V.). Here’s the clip:

 

Here it is in its natural habitat, and you can read more of his opinions on Stephenie Meyer at his blog, here. Both Paper Towns and Looking for Alaska are being made into movies (incidentally).