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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 21, 2004)
E & A: Improvisation central to performance Continued from page 6 person’s comments and translating them into battle-style rap. Larsen’s longtime friend and col laborator, Abilities, forms the DJ half of Eyedea & Abilities. Improvisation is a fundamental element of their performances, and Abilities’ frantic beats meld seamlessly with Eye dea’s syllabic rampages, chasing each other around the stage and playing off of each other in a flawless call-and-response style that makes every show worth seeing. According to Abe Nielson, pro gram director for the WOW Hall, during the duo’s last Eugene concert the hall was only about 80 people short of maximum capacity. Nielson said that it wouldn’t surprise him if their upcoming show sold out. “I love Eugene,” said Larsen, who is excited to return. “Kids there are re ally into what we are trying to do.” Eyedea & Abilities’ last full-length album, “E&A,” is currently available through Epitaph Records, a smaller label that is currently the home of artists such as Converge, Sage Fran cis, Nick Cave and Tom Waits. Eyedea & Abilities will be per forming tonight at the WOW Hall with lllogic & DJ Przm, Los Nativos and The Ramsey Bros, featuring Ms. Su’ad. Doors open at 8 p.m. and the show starts at 8:30 p.m. Tyanmurphey@dailyemerald.com ajpiH>mn or>zooni GO TO WWW.THRASHERPRESENTS.COM FOR A FULL SCHEDULE AND TO FIND OUT HOW TO GET TICKETS BEFORE THEY GO ON SALE NEW ALBUM ‘FUTURES’ FEATURING ‘PAIN OUT 10/19 WWW.JIMMYEATWORLD.COM recover & A THORN FOR EVERY HEART TUESO NO\ Cm 7:00PM DOORS ALL AGES BAR WITH ID Col. Clctypool's Bucket Of Bernie Brains les Cloypool, Buckethead, Bernie Ulorell and Brain O 3 — JJ<ZUI-I-U VlhltUUI When asked what his plans would be if President Bush were to win the election, Director Michael Moore reacts during a pre-event press conference Monday afternoon at the Lane County Fairgrounds. Erik R. Bishoff Photographer Moore: Cheap shots override good points, critics say Continued from page 5 listen to Moore field questions from the cream of the Eugene press corps. Most of them were simple prompts for pre-scripted answers (“What are your plans for election day?”) with a few attempts to get Moore to say something outrageous. Moore looked pretty much like he does on movies and television: ruf fled, poorly shaven and with a look on his face that says, “I just woke up, give me an update on reality.” After the conference, we all rushed into the main hall for the big event. Like most political rallies these days, the atmosphere was somewhat rock-concert. Moore came onto the stage to heavy ap plause (according to a head count, there were no Republicans inside the event center, unless you count Billionaires for Bush). His voice sounded hoarse from the tour; I must admit a little respect for the guy considering he’s not getting paid for this. Right off the bat, Moore started hit ting Bush Jr., mocking his debate per formance, his foreign policy and the way he talks. Moore depends too much on cheap shots for his “shtick” to work, picks easy targets and mocks more than he dissects. In the current election lingo, he was “ener gizing the base,” or in other words, “preaching to the choir. ” It is easy to see Moore’s appeal. He’s charismatic, self-depreciating and doesn’t take himself too serious ly. Or at least he didn’t used to take himself so seriously. These days he’s full of righteous indignation over the war in Iraq and the Bush presidency. He looks over things, makes slip-ups for the sake of an argument, paints black and white pictures of the world and engages in general raDDie-rousing. in ms vision, tne Re publicans are the rich and powerful minority that are ruling over the good and generous poor majority. But if you took a poll of the working class in this country, what would the demographic look like? Not as liber al as Moore seems to believe. For all of this, he does make good points. “The only time I’ve seen this guy (John Ashcroft) stand up for the Con stitution is when he ordered the FBI to stop searching gun files. And to this day the FBI has not been allowed to find out if any of the 19 hijackers had purchased any weapons,” he said. This balance between the good points and the distortions has been what Moore’s more sympathetic critics have been harping on. Every other mild-mannered centrist seems to say, “Having so many factual er rors in his movies only makes it harder to believe him when he’s right.” His less sympathetic critics tend to focus on other aspects of Moore’s personality. Some critics have taken a more sophisticated ap proach, calling his films propaganda and saying that nearly everything he says is an outright lie. Of course his films are propagan da, but by definition, so is any form of media that expresses a viewpoint and attempts to influence public opinion. But Moore didn’t talk about his critics much, other than a few jabs at Bill O’Reilly (an excel lent propagandist in his own right). He mostly spoke about the impor tance of voting and even had a few good, “We will fight them on the beaches” moments. But for the most part, it was all just preaching to the choir. ryannyburg@dailyemerald.com Searching for great food? 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