Sefven Days of Steve: Day 7

We bring Seven Days Celebrating Steve Albini's career with a track from what is, in my opinion, one of the greatest production statements in Independent Rock history. Really, The Jesus Lizard's Goat, Liar and Down are all neck and neck for that honor, all produced by Albini. 

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NCBD:

Pretty robust week, considering how I've downsized. Here we go:

I could have sworn this book ended with issue five, but here we are at #6, and the end isn't for another month yet. 

Love this cover. Feels like this book was on a little hiatus, glad to have it back. 

This Untold Destiny of the Foot Clan book is proving to be considerably better than I originally anticipated. LOVING the art by Mateus Santolouco, so I'm here for that, at the very least. But I'm really interested in seeing where this Casey-Jones-with-the-bad-guys subplot goes, and overall, I dig seeing a continuation of The Foot's story without Shredder. 

I'll just eat my words and say this now: so far, I love this book. I'm still not hip to ANYTHING Marvel has done with Aliens in comic form, but this? This is a really cool "What If" continuation of Cameron's Aliens.

So checked out on these. Last issue of this series, which means it should just be two issues to go before I can get out of the X-books altogether. 

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Watch:

The first teaser trailer for Francis Ford Coppola's upcoming Megalopolis dropped earlier in the week. 

This is as far as I'll be going with trailers on this one. This film is slowly creeping into the role of one of my most anticipated films of the year. To read some of what FFC has said about this, I think this could be one of his greatest films (after Dracula and Apocalypse Now, of course).

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Playlist:

Various - The Void OST

Graveyard - Lights Out

Yerusalem - The Sublime

Lustmord - Much Unseen Is Also Here

Ian Lynch - All You Need Is Death OST

Adam Egypt Mortimer - The Obelisk

Chelsea Wolfe - She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She

Amigo the Devil - Everything is Fine

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• IV: The Emperor

• Knight of Pentacles

• Ace of Cups

Action; approach Earthly concerns with Intelligence, and an emotional breakthrough will follow. That's a bit fortune cookie vague for a reading, but I'm spent. 

Seven Days of Steve: Day 6

For these final two days of Steve Albini celebration, I wanted to highlight a few of the albums that his production made him sort of an extension of the band. So we start with Pigface's debut album, Gub, released thirty-three years ago next Tuesday. If I remember my history correctly, that's Albini tweaking knobs and creating those whirling synthesizer tones on the track. 

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Watch:

A short teaser for David Cronenberg's upcoming film The Shrouds recently dropped. It tells us nothing, and I'm fine with that. 

This ends up being superfluous, as there's nothing that can make me more excited to see David Cronenberg's new film more than the fact that it's David Cronenberg's new film. Still, I like to post stuff like this here for posterity's sake. Here's a synopsis:

"The Shrouds” centers on Karsh, 50, a prominent businessman. Inconsolable since the death of his wife, he invents GraveTech, a revolutionary and controversial technology that enables the living to monitor their dear departed in their shrouds. One night, multiple graves, including that of Karsh’s wife, are desecrated. Karsh sets out to track down the perpetrators."

Cronenberg's previous film, Crimes of the Future, turned a lot of long-time fans off, but I found it thrilling. One of the only truly transgressive feeling Cinema viewings I've had in a long, long time. 

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Playlist:

Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats - Nell' ora blu

Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats - The Night Creeper

Bossk - .4

Pigface - Gub

Big Black - Songs About Fucking

Robot God - Portal Within

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Five of Swords

• Queen of Swords

• Seven of Swords

What's with the three-card suits the last two days? Weird. Not the best picture I've taken, but I find the white of this Bound deck makes it a bit tougher for me to photograph. Anyway...

Swords are all about Air, Intellect and, in a practical sense, relationships. Fives are Conflict, Queen Emotion and Seven's completion (Netzach - Victory!). In other words let passion guide the argument to a solution, or, perhaps more pragmatically, if they won't listen, scream at them. 

Seven Days of Steve: Day 5

Big Black's Songs About Fucking stands with early Ministry as one of the stalwarts of the Chicago Indie Sound of the 80s. While it's easy to draw comparisons to Industrial music because of the drum machine, Albini's vocals help it remain not so committed to any one genre. It's some important DNA, though, and a perfect record from start to finish.

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Watch:

It had easily been 25 years since my first and only viewing of John Carpenter's Assault on Precinct 13. The film popped up on Prime recently,* and Saturday night, I fired it up and remained rivetted throughout the entire run time.

When I first watched this back in my 20s, I know I dug it, but this was one I never really sought out to add to the collection, and now I just can't understand why. Despite immediate tendencies to embellish and decry this as my new favorite Carpenter film, Assault on Precinct 13 definitely jumps up into that upper echelon on his work, along with Halloween, The Thing and Prince of Darkness. 

This one is raw! There's a scene that dropped my jaw (you know the one). Not that JC can't be brutal, but holy smoke muffins! And through the entire siege portion of the film, there is definitely that 'the calm before the storm' eeriness that percolates through Halloween, as well. The scene where the station receives the "Cholo" is just creepy A.F.

*I feel like amazon has been listening to me through the apps on my phone and actually sought to rectify my major gripe, namely that along with commercials in all their original programming now, most movies have migrated over to freevee. FUCK freevee.

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Read:

Took some time this weekend to re-read James Tynion IV and Joshua Hixson's The Deviant before diving into the newest issue that came out this past Wednesday.

Reading this again, I have to say that The Deviant strikes me as possibly one of the creepiest psychological nightmare mind-fuck series ever published in comics. Five out of Nine issues notched and if this is going where I think it's going (but not necessarily how it's going to get there), Michael and Randall's stories are becoming more and more entwined, not just with each other, but with the Horrors of loneliness and social isolation that seem to have created a world of sad, deadly men. 

Michael is telling us everything point blank; we're just not listening. It feels like this is exactly what it would be like to know a killer. I can say this because I knew one in my teens, and while looking back on his behavior with adult eyes after the fact, it becomes clear the signs were there all along; he wasn't steeped in killing the way a serial killer like the killer in The Deviant is. 

You don't need to have had that experience, though. Tynion and Hixon's tale unfolds in such a character-driven way that we're drawn into their world and their lives. You can imagine being in Michael's boyfriend's shoes, the signs that are literally all over the place, but how do you put that together? How do you learn to distrust and fear people you love enough to properly interpret these silently telegraphed confessions?

We'll see.

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Playlist:

Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats - Nell' ora blu

Big Black - Songs About Fucking

Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats - Blood Lust

Uncle Acid & the Deadbeats - The Night Creeper

The Jesus Lizard - Down

Steven Sanchez - Angel Face

Amy Winehouse - Back to Black

Ian Lynch - All You Need Is Death OST

Tim Hecker - Infinity Pool OST

Black Sabbath - Paranoid

Moon Wizard - Sirens

Alice in Chains - Sap

Alice in Chains - Jar of Flies

Gold Class - Drum

Etta James - 

Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings - Give the People What They Want

Chuck Berry - Berry on Top

Various - Romantic Night in Playlist

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot Deck, which you can buy HERE.

I had a hankering for Grimm's Bound Tarot, so I broke that out for today's Pull.

• Page  (Princess) of Pentacles

• Two of Pentacles

• Seven of Pentacles

Interesting. The first day back with this deck in months, and my entire Pull is Pentacles? Money has been on my mind - for both good and hesitant reasons. It's good right now, but I feel as though there is a shoe hanging above a drop of about 1000 feet. The Page/Princess indicates security, the Two partnership and the Seven Completion. That bodes pretty well, but I'm still feeling things out as I go along. 

Seven Days of Steve: Day 4

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Seven Days of Steve: Day 3

1000 Hurts was the first Shellac album I bought, and the one-two of "Prayer to God" and "Squirrel Song" really explains the band's style: light and dark, baby.

I keep feeling like I want to write more about Albini's passing, but I just don't have it in me to say anything that doesn't sound trite other than this sucks. 

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Seven Days of Steve: Day 2

Mr. Brown sent me a link to this live performance in 1986 the other night, shortly after we touched base about Albini's death. The performance speaks for itself.

 

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Watch:

As much as I dug on Moritz Mohr's Boy Kills World the other night, what really set my heart a flutter was seeing a trailer for Nikhil Nagesh Bhat's Kill beforehand. I'm posting it here for posterity's sake, but my advice is do not watch it; as excited as I am to spread the word about this awesome, awesome film, the trailer just gives too much.

 

I saw this on opening night of 2023's Beyondfest and was completely blown away. Ever since I've been hoping Bhat's unflinching action flick would get a national US rollout, and it looks like that is indeed the case. 

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Read:

I caught and inadvertent book recommendation from Stephen King and Joe Hill on Twitter the other day, and I'm stoked to finish up Stephen Graham Jones' Indian Lake Trilogy and move onto this one. 

While completely unfamiliar with Keith Rosson, the description for this one grabbed me right away. I LOVE anything that deals with a Hand of Glory. Here's part of the blurb from the Publisher:

When leg-breaker Hutch Holtz rolls up to a rundown apartment complex in Portland, Oregon, to collect overdue drug money, a severed hand is the last thing he expects to find stashed in the client’s refrigerator. Hutch quickly realizes that the hand induces uncontrollable madness: Anyone in its proximity is overcome with a boundless compulsion for violence. Within hours, catastrophic forces are set into motion: Dark-op government agents who have been desperately hunting for the hand are on Hutch’s tail, more of the city’s residents fall under its brutal influence, and suddenly all of Portland stands at the precipice of disaster. . . 

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Playlist:

Perturbator - Lustful Sacraments

Final Light - Eponymous

Pigface - Gub

Shellac - Excellent Italian Greyhound

The Jesus Lizard - Down

The Jesus Lizard - Liar

Big Black - Live at CBGBs 7.13.86

Warning - Watching From A Distance

Witch Finder - Forgotten Mansion

Soviet Soviet - Endless

Soundgarden - Badmotorfinger

Crispin Hellion Glover - The Big Problem

Big Black - The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape

John Carpenter - Lost Themes IV: Noir

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• XI: Justice (Lust in Thoth)

• XVII: The Star

• Knight of Cups

I thirst for something more. I see it in the online lives of people who I admire, and I want that for myself. The trick is not to fall too hard for the illusion of other people's lives. Everyone has successes and failures. The Star reminds me that, from the grimoire, "Create unto and within yourself a Universe, shaped of your strengths and built on your accomplishments as a foundation." The Knight of Cups, or the Will of Emotions/Firey aspect of Water, further clarifies that the aforementioned Lust can seem like it is deserved (Justice), but that's emotion talking. Nothing is deserved, it is earned. 

RIP Steve Albini

 

This one hurts. I'm starting Seven Days of Steve today, but don't have anything else to say. 

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The Mysterines - Sink

 Out June 7th, you can pre-order the new album Afraid of Tomorrow HERE.

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NCBD:

Another fantastic Wednesday means comics! Comics! COMICS! Let's get into this week's pull:

The return of James Tynion IV's The Deviant. I feel like this one is going to be a sleeper this year; I just don't know anyone else reading it, which may just be my limited world-slice. Let it just be said if you're not reading and you count yourself a Tynion fan, you're missing out. 

Apparently, this is simply a re-packaging of last Saturday's FCBD Energon Universe special, so I may have both sitting in my box at Rick's (I don't go anywhere near actual comic shops on FCBD anymore; haven't in years). I'm fine with having both, and I hear there are some juicy spoilers inside this one. The cover art alone gets us something we have not yet had in the line - Optimus vs. Megatron! Hell, the only time we've even seen ol' Megs is as Cobra Commander's prisoner/science experiment down in the murky depths of Cobra-La, so I'm betting this will explain how that happened and how Megatron lost both arms.

The penultimate issue of Laurence Campbell and Ram V's The One Hand. This and The Six Fingers have been the year's most delightful surprises so far; can't wait to see where these books end up.

LOVE this cover. 

Just end already. Jeez.

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Watch:

Over on Francis Ford Coppola's YouTube channel, the filmmaker released a "First Look" and official synopsis of his upcoming Megalopolis. 

The clip reveals nothing story-wise. That said, the elements of composition at play on the screen are gorgeous. Also of note is the score, as credited to Osvaldo Golijov, who appears to be fairly new to a project of this size. What we hear sounds awesome!

We've been hearing about this for years; if you double-click the video above and read the summary in the description field on YouTube, this sounds like an 84-year-old master bestowing his most ambitious project on the world. 

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Playlist:

Alice in Chains - Facelift

Windhand - Eponymous

Turquoise Moon - The Sunset City

Calexico - Even Sure Things Fall Through

Trombone Shorty - For True

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Three of Cups

• Six of Wands

• V: The Hierophant

In a nutshell, Threes points to Growth and Sixes to Support. The Hierophant often implies "something more;" read that as the Divine if you like; I see it more as Occult, or hidden, influences, similar to XVIII: The Moon. I'm looking at everything right now as pertaining to a stressful situation with work, and in that regard, there's more of a balm here than I would have anticipated. 

Black Pyramid - Bile, Blame and Blasphemy

 

A YouTube rabbit hole last night led me to discover Black Pyramid's music. The new album Paths of Time are Vast drops this Friday; this one is a fantastic entry into the Stoner/Doom set. You can pre-order the gorgeous vinyl edition over at Totem Cat Records HERE. I got mine!

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Watch:

Over the last three days, I've seen two flicks in the theatre. Both were fun as hell for totally different reasons. First up, The Fall Guy!

I grew up a big fan of the Lee Majors' tv show in the 80s, so I was interested right off the bat. Throw in Gosling and Blunt, and the fact that this was directed by Stunt Man David Leitch sealed the deal. Very fun flick! A little weird in the pacing, but I was never not entertained. 

Next up, Boy Kills World.

 

This flick is NUTS! Reminded me a bit of the same energy in Guns Akimbo, so if you dug that one, definitely check this one out. The action sequences are all pretty insane, but the final battle is one of the best-choreographed fights I've ever laid eyes on. 

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Playlist:

Jim Williams - Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched OST

Jim Williams - Possessor OST

Greenhaus - The Unmistakeable Sound of Sloth

Black Pyramid - Paths of Time are Vast

Stone Rebel - Interstellar

Witchfinder - Forgotten Mansion

Cartoonist Kayfabe 

Windhand - Eponymous

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All You Need is Lankum

 

As I reference below, my days have been filled with elemtns of Folklore of late, and one of the musical accompaniments for this is Dublin's band Lankum. One of the things about Paul Duane's All You Need Is Death that struck me during the screening at last year's Beyondfest was the score by composer Ian Lynch. Last week when Invada Records put the score up for pre-order (HERE), it led me to discover Lynch's band Lankum. I've been listening to their most recent album False Lankum ever since. A feast for the ears, you can listen to and purchase the record directly from the band over on their Bandcamp HERE. Really cool stuff, perfect for the thunderstorms we've had on an almost nightly basis of late. 

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Watch:

Over on The Horror Vision, we had the chance to interview Writer/Director Paul Duane last week. Mr. Duane's latest film, All You Need is Death was one of the highlights of 2023's Beyondfest, and after re-watching it now that it's available on VOD, we were all very excited to pick his brain about the film, Folk Horror, Documentaries, you name it.

Mr. Duane is a gracious man, and his film a marvel that will no doubt stand at or near the best of the year when I compile my list in December. Very much looking forward to seeing what else he does, as he teases a bit of what he's working on in the episode.

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Read:

We recorded a new episode of The Horror Vision Presents: Sticks & Stones, our Folk Horror sub-show that had been dormant after two episodes Ray and I did in early 2022. Folk Horror is a huge topic, and had proved difficult for us to get a handle on after the veritable explosion of new films in the sub-genre back late 2021/2022. The purpose of this episode, then, was to use two films at the opposite ends of the Folk Horror spectrum to define what Folk Horror is to us and how we would cover it going forward. One of the two films we chose was Djordje Kadijevic's Leptirica, AKA The She-Butterfly. 

After watching this film for what was my third time, I found myself interested in reading the story upon which it is based, Milovan Gilsic's After Ninety Years. There is a fairly recently published translated version by James Lyon available on Kindle for a pawltry $4.99, so I went ahead and ordered it.

Not sure when I'll get around to actually reading this, as the stack for the year just continues to grow. Still, it's nice to have it close at hand for when I do. This Serbo-Bosnian Vampire folklore is fascinating, especially when you consider it not only pre-dates Bram Stoker's Dracula, but also served to inform aspects of F.W. Murnau, which I won't elaborate on here, as Professor John Trafton delivers a bit of show-stopping information during the course of this upcoming Sticks & Stones episode, so keep an eye out of that.

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Playlist:

High on Fire - De Vermis Mysteriis 

Gary Moore - Still Got the Blues

Black Sabbath - Eponymous

Black Sabbath - Master of Reality

Robot God - Portal Within

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - PetroDragonic Apocalypse

Opeth - My Arms Your Hearse

Motörhead - 1916

Black Sky Giant - The Red Chariot

Mountain Realm - Frostfall

Lankum - False Lankum

Sunn O))) - Domkirke

Godflesh - Purge

John Carpenter - Lost Themes IV

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Knight of Swords

• Ten of Wands

• Ten of Cups

Earthly matter abound, distractions from more intellectual pursuits should be minimized until such time as I can clear some bandwidth for them. 

Brigitte Calls Me Baby - Eddie My Love

 

Man, what a fabulous music video. From This House is Made of Corners, available HERE.

 

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Watch:

X-Men '97 has been the biggest shock of the year for me, and this week's episode RIPPED!

More and more, I'm seeing this cartoon as a very suitable replacement for the current X-Books. I might not have Krakoa, but I have a new continuity based on ones I previously know, with enough surprise story architecture to really keep me guessing. Also, this show has some teeth! Was not what I was expecting from a cartoon on Disney + but then again, as I'll talk about in a moment, maybe Disney has come around on embracing more mature content again (remember The Black Hole?).

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NCBD Addendum:

Garth Ennis and Jacen Burrows on Get Fury?

Get Fury is a sequel of sorts to Ennis' Fury series as well as his Punisher: Born, Punisher: The Platoon. It opens in 1971 during the Vietnam War. Colonel Nick Fury has been captured by the North Vietnamese. The U.S. Army's solution to making sure he isn't successfully interrogated? Send Captain Frank Castle on a Black Op to assassinate Fury. Sounds right in Garth Ennis's wheelhouse, no?

I honestly didn't think we'd ever get another Garth Ennis Fury series like the MAX one from the turn of the century. I'd heard a story from someone inside the industry that basically puts the reason George Clooney turned down an early role as Fury as his reading that Max series. With the recently announced "Red Band" Werewolf by Night series coming in August, are we back to Marvel embracing a similar approach as they did with Max? Certainly, Disney has seemed to relinquish all concerns about cross-pollinating R-Rated material with their family-friendly aesthetic - when I sign in to Disney + now, I see everything on Hulu right alongside all the Disney stuff. So obviously, they've made the decision we all knew they would and embraced Marketing over brand optics.

As Hunter would say, "Works for me."

Get Fury is a 3-issue mini-series; the first issue hit shelves yesterday. 

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Playlist:

Ian Lynch - All You Need Is Death OST

Jim Williams - Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched OST

High on Fire - De Vermis Mysteriis 

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - PetroDragonic Apocalypse

Wach - Quae Infra Volo Videre (pre-release single)

Oranssi Pazuzu - Live at Roadburn 2017

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Card:

Checking in with Missi's Raven Deck for the first time in a while this morning. Just looking for one card to summarize the day:

I'm choosing to interpret this as straight beauty and good vibes. A bit hippy-dippy, but I'm in a "broad strokes" mood.

NIB for NCBD before FCBD

'Nuff said.

 

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NCBD:

I've spent a bunch of time tightening up my Pull list for the coming months, and I'm happy to say I'm all right jumping off so many titles. The books that really move me these days are Kirkman's Energon Universe titles, anything Brubaker and Phillips or Lemire and Sorrentino do, and a few titles beyond. There's always the chance I'll find something interesting on the wall at the shop, or that my erstwhile AMHL cohost Chris might shoot me a message about something I'd missed altogether, but for the most part, I'm feeling a distance from monthly comics again, and that's fine. Here's this week's Pull, complete with two FCBD editions that won't be available until Saturday.

 

The FCBD special for the aforementioned Energon Universe, and I can say I am excited as all hell to see Megatron on the cover. The idea that such a massive character has only been glimpsed once so far—and not even in his normal book—blows me away. Kirkman and crew have plotted these titles meticulously and, in doing so, raised expectations to a crescendo. Is now the time when those expectations pay off? I doubt it, but we'll see.

Possibly the last regular-continuity TMNT title I'll be reading for some time, if that's indeed what this book is. I know there's some occurrence of a character called The Night Watcher somewhere in the past continuity, but I am unfamiliar with or forgetful. Maybe the late 90s iteration that was written by Gary Carlson? 

WTFPFH? returns! Glad to have this one back, as the snarky approach to mystery, mayhem and the apocalypse is exactly the kind of thing I'm in the mood for at the moment. Something about Spring puts me in the mood for Indie comics. 

One more after this. As I said last week, and probably the week before, I'm really just counting the days to see this era through to the end, especially after seeing THIS. Good lord - all this wonderful potential, thrown away for a return to the status quo the X-Books drove into the ground for the better part of five decades. Ugh. They're even going with a design that harkens back to that horrible cover layout from the mid-to-late 90s. 

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Watch:

Paul Duane's All You Need Is Death just hit VOD and, of course, I rented it and watched it twice over the last few days. 

After the screening at last year's Beyondfest - hosted at the Los Feliz 3 theatre - this film left a deep impression on me and I'd harbored an itch to return to it again ever since. I can tell you the film is even more gratifying in its ambiguity; there's so much here, such a deep dive into a subculture that both does and doesn't really exist, that I kind of feel like I'm uncovering something that shouldn't be seen while watching this one. Also, Ian Lynch's score is OUTSTANDING. 

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Playlist:

Black Sabbath - Eponymous

Robot God - Portal Within

Gary Moore - Still Got the Blues

The Damned - Night of the Living Damned

White Zombie - Astro-Creep 2000

Jim Williams - Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched OST

Alice in Chains - Eponymous

Lankum - False Lankum

Ian Lynch - All You Need Is Death OST

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Card:

For this first day of May, I felt a pull back to an older deck, and picked up my beloved Thoth for the first time in a while (this one gets more difficult to satisfactorily photograph every day, as the cards are worn and bent with use and love):

• Ace of Cups

• Three of Disks: Work

• Nine of Cups: Happiness

I also felt the urge to break out Crowley's definitive text on the deck, The Book of the Thoth and do some actual reading for today's interpretation.

One of the interpretations of the Minor Arcana or "pip" cards I've strayed from in recent years is how they relate to the Sephirotic Tree of Life. The sephiroth are something I consider when I really dig in, but I'm realizing I've strayed in keeping them as part of the mental mechanisms I utilize to "Divine on the Go," a terrible turn of phrase, but an accurate one, as I'm usually busy and in a time-crunch when it comes to these daily pulls. Thumbing through The Book of Thoth and landing on the Three of Disks first, I'm immediately reminded of Binah's association with the 'Threes." Binah, the great mother, strengthened here by Mars, we see the transmutation of water to a solid strong enough to support a three-sided structure. 

Take that with the Ace of Cups, which is instantly an "Emotional Breakthrough" signifier for me, always has been, almost to a fault. Going deeper with the book, however, I'm reminded this Cup is the counterpart to the Ace of Wands: the first represents the feminine aspect of the sexes, the second the male. The Ace of Cups also relates strongly to the Moon, and the idea of hidden energies formulating new realities.

Round all that out with the Nine of Cups, which would be the Yesod of the Sephiroth. Nine is also the number of the Moon, so we have a lot of Moon here. Checking my Moon tracker, I see we are in the Third Corner of Waning; this moon is 23 days old. I'm stepping off on a huge tangent, but I find that funny, that my inclination to pick up not just Crowley's deck but his treatise on it, as 23 is possibly the most famous number ascribed to the mid-twentieth century Magician-cum-Charlatan. 

The Nine of Cups also forecasts culmination and success—Crowley uses the word "perfection," but I will not—so my interpretation centers around the idea that this spread is a way of assuring me that inner tensions that begin at the office and meander through my household are on their way to a more stable status quo. That's kind of a little from a lot, but distilling this stuff down is the job.

Saigon Blue Rain - Visions

When I posted that Ships in the Night track last week, I fell down a rabbit hole that led me to the band Saigon Blue Rain. Instant infatuation. Their 2023 album Oko would have been on my top ten of the year list if I had heard it in 2023. Regardless, I'm really digging the music this two-piece makes. You can check out and support Saigon Blue Rain on their Bandcamp HERE.

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Watch:

Last Friday, K and I got to see Ridley Scott's original Alien on the big screen for the first time. It was magnificent.

I've seen James Cameron's Aliens considerably more times than I have Scott's Alien; both are fantastic films, but Aliens was the first of the series I remember seeing, and that initial viewing - somewhere around the time it came out on VHS circa... 1987? - blew me away. I'll never forget sitting in our living room watching it on a Saturday afternoon with my Dad, both of us held taut by the absolute non-stop thrill of the film. Alien is, of course, not the same kind of movie. Alien is quiet, slow-burning and eerie. As a special introduction to this 45th-anniversary theatrical run, the film began with a sit-down conversation between Fede Alvarez and Ridley Scott. During their conversation, Scott mentions how he'd never been interested in Science Fiction until he saw Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey several years before and how that film was such an influence on Alien. I never really thought about that before, but watching the film with that in mind last Friday, I'd say the entire First Act is Scott's version of 2001. It was all about creating the illusion of Space Habitation and Travel, and the technology that goes with that. 

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Read:

Sunday I finished Ivy Tholen's Tastes Like Candy 2: Sugarless. FANtastic book! I've said it here before, Ms. Tholen's prose is so inherently readable, her books almost read effortlessly. 

Next up: just like last year, I'm jumping directly from Ivy Tholen to Stephen Graham Jones. I'm raring to dig into the third and final Indian Lake book, The Angel of Indian Lake; however, first, I'm going to re-read last year's Don't Fear the Reaper to really set the stage for the finale to Jade/Jennifer Daniels' story.

Sixty pages in, and this one just fits like a glove. Another effortless read, SGJ's books have become part of a well-spring of Horror fiction for me. His work, along with Laird Barron's and Nathan Ballingrud help balance me as a writer. These guys are masters of their craft, and their work explores the intersection of the Horrifying and the Weird that has obsessed me for most of my life. 

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Playlist:

Fever Ray - Radical Romantics

Metallica - 72 Seasons

Metallica - ... And Justice For All

Mannequin Pussy - I Got Heaven

Various - 4.28.24 Spotify Playlist*

Frankie and the Witch Fingers - Data Doom

The Beta Band - The Three E.P.'s

Bexley - Eponymous

Mazzy Star - So Tonight That I Might See

* made to shuffle

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Nine of Wands

• VI: The Lovers

• Six of Swords

A lot of climax and support, with VI there to indicate a harmonization of opposites - or perceived opposites. This feels like more heartening news concerning my recent anxieties, which remain vague due to the public nature of this forum and the... watchful eyes that abound out in the world today.

Drying the Rain & Washing Your Hands

 

Wow. I hadn't heard The Beta Band in ages, let alone their big single "Dry the Rain." Then, sitting in my coffee shop writing last night, a brief interval of silence between songs on my headphones had me stop and say, "Wait, I remember this..."

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Watch:

I took yesterday off and had that rare combination of energy and perseverance well into the wee hours of the morning, so I was able to watch a handful of films. 

Listed as Lockdown Tower on Shudder but also known as simply The Tower, Guillaume Nicloux's claustrophobic nightmare is Lord of the Flies meets Dawn of the Dead without the children or zombies. The inhabitants of a highrise tenement discover their building is surrounded by a black void that consumes anyone who steps across the thresholds of every egress from the building. Doors, windows - there is no way to leave. We start from the moment the phenomenon begins and travel forward through time with these people, seeing how the building's ecosystem evolves. Or, more accurately, devolves because, as Nick Cave sang, "People just ain't no good."

Next up, Jenn Wexler's The Sacrifice Game.

I loved this one. Between The Sacrifice Game and 2018's The Ranger, Jenn Wexler has become one of my favorite modern directors. Looking at her credits on Letterboxd, she's had a hand in a lot of films I've adored over the previous ten years; from Robert Mockler's Like Me, to Ana Asensio's Most Beautiful Island, to Larry Fessenden's Depraved, Ms. Wexler has left an imprint on the current state of Independent Horror that cannot be denied, and with the polish we see on The Sacrifice Game, I think she's poised to eventually make a breakthrough similar to what Ti West has done with his X trilogy. That makes me super happy and excited to see what may come of such an opportunity.

I have no idea what led me to re-watch Metallica's Some Kind of Monster the other night, but I turned it on and found I could not turn it off, despite the fact that it made me feel super gross about having a goatee in the 00s.

 

This is such an illustration of a band so far out of touch with themselves, their music, their fans, and just the actual reason people make music that it's super hard to watch. Especially considering that, while I still love their old stuff and refuse to acknowledge everything after their self-titled (which in itself I have a conflicted relationship with), I genuinely like their two most recent records. I think one thing this documentary showcases, besides how up their own asses this band was in the 00s, is that Bob Rock was the worst choice for a producer they ever made. This guy... wow. Not that hooking up with Rick Rubin helped do much besides draw a caricature of their sound for a while, but it seems like once Rubin's Engineer Greg Fidelman took over as the band's producer, things changed for the better.

The highlight of the film is when Robert Trujillo comes on board. The guy is just seems so down-to-earth, and he is an absolutely outstanding bass player, which you can see clear as day in this film.
 

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Read:

TMNT 150 ended up being a huge disappointment to me. It sucks to say that, but it's true. I could draw so many similarities to the mess Kieron Gillon is making of the X-Books at the moment, but it would sadden me further to do so. I half-read 150, bagged it, and am happily jumping off for what comes next. We'll always have this mammoth run of (roughly) 12 years of a vast, intricate, and emotionally charged TMNT run. 

Sophie Campbell has been co-writing with Kevin Eastman since Tom Waltz left after the series hit issue #100; she's taken it to some great heights - as have all the writers and artists on the title since it started in 2012 - and the thing I've loved so much about this series is the expansion. This is by far the longest, deepest look into a Turtles continuity we've ever received, and I've loved it. Time to let it rest, before it overstays its welcome like so many long-running comic continuity's do. Yeah, I know I was hoping for Jason Aaron's upcoming run to continue in the current world, and I'm still glad it will, but this milestone issue and all its time-travel/QNA deus ex machina convinced me it's time for me to go.

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Playlist:

CCR - Cosmo's Factory

Windhand - Eternal Return

The Veils - ... And Out of the Void Came Love

Justin Hamline - The House With Dead Leaves

Windhand - Eternal Return

Moon Wizard - Sirens

Metallica - 72 Seasons

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• XV: The Devil

• Five of Swords

• Five of Pentacles

The Devil again, and this time, I'm inclined to think it's because I completely missed the point of the previous Pull. I now believe I am the source of the misinformation, because I'm not approaching anything rationally. The two Fives bear that out, as Five is often conflict, and here it would be conflict of Intellect (Swords) and Earthly concerns (Pentacles).

Cosmo's Sugarless Long Legs

 

How about a little Creedence Clearwater Revival to start our day? Woke up insanely early - haven't managed more than five hours of sleep a night in a while - and sat on the back porch with coffee, Ivy Tholen's Tastes Like Candy 2: Sugarless (it's awesome!) and CCR's Cosmo's Factory, which is every bit as awesome an album as the cover photo is awful. But hey, it was 1970!

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Watch:

Osgood Perkin's upcoming film Long Legs is one of two flicks coming this summer that I've now seen the teasers for a few times and I can honestly say know how to do a 'teaser' right (Fede Alvarez's Alien: Romulus is the other). Check it out:

 

These teasers tell you absolutely NOTHING about the film, but 100% get me charged up to see it. I wasn't a fan of Mr. Perkins' previous two films (I tried with The Blackcoat's Daughter multiple times; it cheats!), but they are well-made films and that's on me. I'm hoping Long Legs blows me right the F away. Certainly seems like it will.

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Read:

As I mentioned above, I'm trucking along on Ivy Tholen's Tastes Like Candy 2: Sugarless and it is fantastic! 

This one starts out like a typical Slasher sequel and then abruptly takes a left-hand turn. It's not what I thought it was going to be at all. You can order a copy HERE, and it's free on Kindle Unlimited at the moment.

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Playlist:

The Devil's Blood - The Thousandfold Epicentre

Moon Wizard - Sirens

Telekinetic Yeti - Primordial 

Windhand - Eternal Return

Witch Skull - The Serpent Tide

Jim Williams - Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched OST

Bryce Miller - City Depths

Saigon Blue Rain - Oko

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Ten of Swords

• XV: The Devil

• 0: The Fool

Not exactly the cards I wanted to see with what's on my mind. Ruin, lies/misperception/bad optics/a new journey. 

Ships in the Night - The Fire

I had no pre-existing idea of Ships in the Night when this popped up in my youtube feed, but upon hitting play, I was definitely hooked. It's definitely nothing new - we've been recycling the 80s for longer than that era's aesthetics lasted the first time, but it continues to provide something some of us seem to need. Making peace with the past, perhaps? Either way, I'll be checking out more of Alethea Leventhal's music on the Bandcamp right over HERE.

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NCBD:

The final issue of Duke before we switch over to follow the story in next month's Destro mini-series. I'll never be able to score this cover, but I'd like to.

Just f*cking end already. Goddamn me for my completionist leanings.

Thank god you've returned, SIKTC. Help me wash the taste of Fall of X from my mouth.

Me thinks this issue of The Six Fingers is going to be a bit gnarly. 

It's over. TMNT 150. Wow. I started reading this book in 2012 when they were three issues in and I haven't stopped. What a ride - still the best reboot of a preexisting property I've ever seen. 

Again, this last little bit of the Krakoan era is just killing me. 

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Watch:

I've been in the mood for Folk Horror again lately - seems to be a recurring taste this time of year - so I consulted my Severin Films' All the Haunts Be Ours and pulled out one of the few films in it I had not watched yet, Brunello Rondi's Il Demonio from 1963:

I feel like the B&W photography in this film is second only to that in The Third Man. A revolting, frustrating tale of a woman persecuted and exploited by her community, this one will piss you off even as it leaves you swooning over the imagery on the screen.

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Playlist:

Zeal & Ardor - Eponymous

Zeal & Ardor - Devil Is Fine

Zeal & Ardor - Stranger Fruit

Melvins - Tarantula Heart

Moon Wizard - Sirens

Moon Wizard - Ukiyo (single)

The Veils - ...And Out of the Void Came Love

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Page of Swords

• Eight of Wands

• XVI: The Tower

Page or Princess of Swords is fitting: Just. Breathe. Things are a mess. Impetuousness. Overcome by the rapid communication suggested by the Eight of Wands. This leads to a paradigm shift. 

New Music From Zeal & Ardor!!!

New full-length GREIF is out August 23rd. No pre-order yet, but I'll be watching like the proverbial hawk.

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Watch:

This past Sunday, K and I met my parents at the local theatre to see Guy Ritchie's newest film, The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. Here's the standard trailer; it doesn't show too much:

 

Another super solid, big-budget action flick by Mr. Ritchie. This type of flick isn't usually my bag, however, I've maintained since the advent of the Pirates of the Caribbean films that there's room in my life for the occasional big-budget, studio action film if they sate certain personal affectations of mine. I couldn't specifically explain that other than to say, "I know it when I see it." Guy Ritchie almost always fits like a glove. I suspect that has  A LOT to do with my love of his seminal film Snatch - one of my all-time favorite flicks, and I'm fine with that bias. 

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Playlist:

Doobie Bros. - South City Midnight Lady (single)

Judas Priest - Invincible Shield

Zombi - Direct Inject

The Devil's Blood - The Thousandfold Epicentre

The Damned - Night of the Living Damned

The Ocean - Heliocentric

The Ocean - Anthropocentric

Ike Reilly - Poison the Hit Parade

Zeal & Ardor - GREIF (pre-release single)

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