Converge - Dream Debris

From their recently released second record this year, Hum of Hurt. Though I have to admit, I'm familiar with all of about four Converge records, this is probably my favorite track among that lot. Total Cure Pornography vibes on that opening.

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Watch:

I started Giallo July yesterday with a viewing of one I've always heard about but never watched, Pupi Avati's The House with Laughing Windows. Here's a trailer:

This one moves at a pretty slow pace and seems to have taken some visual cues from Argento's Deep Red, which came out the year before, but regardless of that, I really dug this. The setting has A LOT to do with that, but also, I think I was just in the mood for some off-the-beaten-path Giallo. Like the kind that the entire film is in Italian! As I mentioned, the location is fantastic (and I feel like that's the biggest influence from Argento), and the end is pretty Giallo-brand bonkers. This is currently a buy or stream for $3.99 on Prime, and even though we all know buying digital movies is just asking to have your money (and your film) taken away, it's worth it even if you just watch it the once. 

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Playlist:

Tool - Undertow

Savages - Silence Yourself

Killswitch Engage - The End of Heartache

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

Alice in Chains - Dirt

Anthrax - State of Euphoria

Anthrax - Among the Living

X - Los Angeles

Converge - Hum of Hurt

Inferno - The Antropic Sophisms (On The Heights of Despair)

Windhand - Soma

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Card:

Back to my trusty Thoth deck for today's card.

Took today off to aid in recovery, but I'll be back writing again tomorrow. 

Napalm Death Tiny Desk Concert Fundraiser for NPR!

'Nuff said.

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Watch:

Mourning the loss of Sam Neil, and while there are a ton of genre flicks my mind goes to on reflex, I thought I'd post a trailer from a somewhat recent favorite of his I discovered thanks to Mr. Brown. 

Taika Waititi doesn't always blow me away, but this one definitely does.

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Read:

I finally caught up on Chris Condon, Andrew Ehrich and Charlie Adlard's Of the Earth. Man, this is easily sitting in my top five comics of 2026.

This is sweet Charlie Adlard widescreen comics, and the story by Ehrich and Condon is fantastic. There's a great interview on Fangoria HERE, and we review the first issue on Drinking with Comics HERE. Suffice it to say, major The Thing and Blood Simple vibes, and if you're as big a fan of both of those films as I am and you wonder what the intersection where they meet looks and feels like, look no further.

There's some fantastic prose in each book, as well. Excerpts from a book that gives more context to the Wildcatter myth. This is a monster book, folks, and it is extremely effective thus far.

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Playlist:

Judas Priest - Stained Class

Savages - Silence Yourself

Savages - Paranoid/Prayer (single)

C.na - Eclipse Mechanism (Instrumental) (single)

Anthrax - State of Euphoria

Squarepusher & Z-MACHINES - Music for Robots EP

Chappell Roan - The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess

Chappell Roan - Good Luck Babe (single)

Devil Master - You Worms' Vein Dilusions (single)

Devil Master - Ecstasies of a Never Ending Night

Lard - The Last Temptation of Reid

Thou - Summit

John Cale - Fear

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Card:

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

• Page of Swords

• Nine of Cups

• Nine of Swords

The card that's really sticking out here is the Nine of Swords, known as "Cruelty" in the Thoth deck. I ended up in the ER yesterday morning with what I was told by the attending physician is the worst pain known to humanity, male or female. I didn't know what it was when I went in, but goddamn, was I in bad shape. I do not exaggerate when I tell you I did not possess control of my body for a good three hours. I surrendered that control to the pain. It had me do things I could only observe as if from outside, through a misery-frosted window. I have a fairly high pain threshold, and I tend to handle my pain with obstinate stoicism, but not yesterday. No. A kidney stone brought me down. I was screaming, growling, puking, writhing like a man possessed. In fact, I would not be the least bit surprised to learn that in the Middle Ages, people confused kidney stone symptoms with demonic possession. 

Again, not embellishing here at all.

The Page of Swords and Nine of Cups indicate that all this torment wasn't for naught. I believe I'll have some major insights in the coming days as I continue to convalesce (I haven't passed it yet, but as of writing this at 8:35 PM Thursday night, I have not been in pain since the early afternoon).

New Music from Queens of the Stone Age featuring Nikki Lane!

Holy cow! New QOTSA and it features Nikki Lane! No idea if this heralds a new album on the horizon, but it's been a few years since In Times New Roman, so I'm guessing we'll see something sooner than later.

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NCBD:

Great pull this week, with a couple of last-minute surprises!

Still walking that road to SIKTC 50. Digging this series - LOVE this cover - but as I've mentioned before, I'm in need of a reread all around to really cement some of the finer points of the rather intricate continuity that runs between all these books.

I cannot believe that, after re-reading the entire series last week, it ended up timed to coincide with the release of a new Rachel Rising one-shot!

The climax to our introduction to the energon-fueled Dire Technology of Crystal Ball. Smart money says this issue ends with Destro making a deal with the lord of illusions, but we'll see. 

Tracking to be in my top five of the year. I LOVE If Destruction Be Our Lot. So much!

Crap! A reminder that I completely forgot issue 2 of Chris Condon, Charlie Adlard and Andrew Enrich's Of the Earth! I mean, I walked into Rick's last month expecting it, but apparently their copies were damaged, and I guess they never got more. 

As has become my inadvertent habit, I just read the previous issue of Savage Sword a few days ago, so it was no surprise to find this slated for today. I don't know exactly how that happened, but I have kind of marveled at my unconscious mind's accuracy with this pattern. 

Here's another one I didn't see coming! New Last Ronin one-shot! Interesting, as just before seeing this, I decided to cancel my TMNT pull for this month's number 20, which is actually the 300th "Legacy" issue. I hate all this Legacy counting, but whatever, at this point I'm used to it. I will, however, still be picking up one-offs like this.

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Watch:

I so want this to be good. I was a weekly BEE Podcast listener for years before Ellis surprised everyone during the pandemic by reading his work-in-progress The Shards every week, and I've listened to those broadcasts at least twice since. This is the perfect Ellis novel to adapt, in my opinion. There's just one thing giving me pause.

Ryan Murphy.

I was never a die hard AHS fan; I love the Hotel, Roanoke and 1984. I jumped off Coven after three episodes, was mostly happy with the first two seasons, and had mixed feelings about Double Feature. Whatever the Cruisin' knock-off season was proved the last straw for me, and watching all the low-brow, tabloid series he's pumped out since (with the exception of The Beauty), I just can't help but feel hesitant about this.

We'll see on August 5th, I guess. I'm really hoping it works, though. Ellis is one of my favorite Authors, he's written some of my favorite novels - The Shards is one - and there's not an adaptation out there that I favor. 

Help me Ryan Murphy, you're my only hope.

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Playlist:

Steve Moore - Jimmy & Stiggs OST

Yerusalem - The Sublime

Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower

Mastodon - Once More 'Round the Sun

Spotlights - Alchemy for the Dead

Ennio Morricone - Black Belly of the Tarantula OST

Boards of Canada - Inferno

Ghost - Skeleta

Oranssi Pazuzu - Muuntautuja

Mastodon - Emperor of Sand

Mastodon - Marrow Deep (pre-release singles)

QOTSA - Easy Street (single)

Spotlights - Seance EP

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Card:

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

• Five of Cups

• Knight of Swords

• Four of Swords

Grief. Drive. Rest.

I haven't talked about this yet, but last Friday I was diagnosed with Fatty Liver Disease. It's actually not as severe as it sounds, but I have to stop drinking beer and really change my diet for the next several months to allow my liver to heal. After that, I'm planning to scale the drinking back. I've been doing 2-6 beers a night for over 20 years, so this really isn't a surprise. And it's a lot better of a diagonsis than the scare that led up to this suggested. I can stop when I need to - K and I just did a three-week hiastus in March - but the thing is beer is my nightly ritual. I don't chase intoxication, I just LOVE beer. Good beer, of course. But part of that love now means I have to let it go for a while, so we can be reunited when I'm healthy again.

All my jokes about Keith Richards' liver have come home to roost.

Also of note, found this card face up in the deck after I laid out the cards above, figured that was worth interpreting. 

In light of the reading above, I'm reading this as growing pains, as I have many.

M83 - Beauties Can Die

From their 2003 second album Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts, which I'm not sure I had ever listened to before, despite my obsession with this band starting with Saturdays = Youth and culminating on the follow-up Hurry Up, We're Dreaming. Great record, but it takes a little getting used to. You can steam the entire thing "Officially" on their YouTube page HERE (or just any of the streamers).

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Read:

Last week I picked back up on the re-read of Terry Moore's Rachel Rising that I started on New Year's Eve, 2025. I don't know how I got away from it for so long, because although I'd left off on issue 15, I re-read the entire rest of the forty-two-issue series in about a day and a half. 

I read this monthly, so while I have all the floppies, there are seven trade volumes collecting the full series and a recently released omnibus. This one is so worth your time. I mean, I think this is, in my humble opinion, the greatest Horror comic of all time. It's that good, and it's all down to Terry Moore's insanely relatable style and, the flip side to that coin, his absolutely nefarious approach to Horror. There are some insanely dark and disturbing themes, images and ideas in this book, but they never feel like they've gone too far. The overall story starts small and becomes brilliantly biblical, and those are two "B" words that usually do not go together in Shawn's world. 

The characters are fantastic and, again, so likable and relatable. Anyone who's read Moore's seminal Strangers in Paradise knows how great his characters are and make no mistake, Rachel, Jet, Zoe, Aunt Johnnie and Earl all feel like one fucked up branch of my interior family now, and I'm having a hard time letting them go. 

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Playlist:

Bauhaus - Gotham (Live)

Mastodon - Emperor of Sand

Bauhaus - Go Away White

The Dillinger Escape Plan - One of Us is the Killer

3Teeth - Eponymous

M83 - Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts

High on Fire - Electric Messiah

Russian Circles - Gnosis

Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will

Chicago - 25 or 6 to 4 (single)

Melvins/Helms Alee - Controlling Data for a Better Feeling Future

M83 - Saturdays = Youth

Pinebender - Working Nine to Wolf

Plague Bringer - As the Ghosts Collect, the Corpses Rest

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Card:

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

• Queen of Pentacles

• Six of Cups

* Ten of Pentacles

Emotion makes it difficult to rule the Earthly matters. A direct reference to spending money frivilously, of which, I have recently been guilty of. On a good path now, but have some make up work to do. 

Jogger - Napping Captain

From their only full-length album, 2009's daunting masterpiece, This Great Pressure. This one  is not on any streamers, and it's a goddamn shame, because in quiet moments when I fall under its spell, I think it might be the best album of the 00s.

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Watch:

Evil. Dead. Burn. Holy cow.

Mean. Not Terrifier mean, but brutal nonetheless. I believe I read a pull quote recently where either Robert Tapert or Bruce Campbell championed this as the most brutal in the series, and yeah, that's accurate. Which is saying something, given how brutal Fede Alvarez's film is. This is a dower, bleak film with mostly unlikeable characters and that rubbed me wrong at first, but eventually, the absolute bezerk approach to this won me over and I've already snagged tickets to see it a second time.

I was a pretty big fan of Director Sébastien Vaniček's previous film, Infested, and this felt like it had a lot of what I would now identify as his own unique style and worldview. 

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Playlist:

John Carpenter - Lost Themes III

Sinoa Caves - Beyond the Black Rainbow OST

Blackbraid - Blackbraid III

Gnarls Barkley - Atlanta

Jogger - This Great Pressure

Tangerine Dream - Sorcerer OST

Oranssi Pazuzu - Muuntautuja

Livin in the USA

Butthole Surfers - After The Astronaut

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Card:

Just one from the Thoth deck today:

Take control. 

Sisters of Black Mountain!!!

 

My friend Justin recently interviewed LA's Sisters of Black Mountain on his Trailer Punk Podcast. The idea of an all-female, Giallo-inspired group hooked me, and I have to say, I'm currently digging on their music quite a bit. You can check out the band on Bandcamp HERE and listen to the interview HERE.

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NCBD:

This week's pull looks like it could have been from my early 80s childhood! Let's get into it!

So now, this is pretty cool. I've never had a chance to read this issue of The Amazing Spider-Man that introduced The Punisher, but I've seen the cover on the wall behind a hundred comic shops. These facsimile copies are really neat for getting your hands on pieces of otherwise prohibitively priced items.

Titlating cover, bringing back Dr. Arkville and all, but all I really want is to see what Megatron is turning into inside that chrysalis!

Second issue of MASK! Not much else to say yet, but I dug the ruined space bridge at the end of issue 1, so let's see where this goes!

I'm digging this Manchurian Candidate storyline with Snake Eyes primarily because it takes us allll the way back to near the very beginning of the original series. 

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Watch:

The Giallo City-Wide Fever recently popped up on my radar, and I've been thinking about it non-stop. Currently streaming on a "channel" I'd never heard of before, Midnight Pulp, I'm planning to grab a subscription this weekend so I can watch. Here's the trailer:

You can read more about this one over on Bloody Disgusting HERE.

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Playlist:

Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven 

Vitriol - I-Vii

Gnarls Barkley - Atlanta

Low Cut Connie - Livin in the USA

Steve Moore - Jimmy & Stiggs OST

Ghost - Skeleta

Deafheaven - Lonely People With Power

Greg Puciato - Mirrorcell

Ian Lynch - All You Need Is Death OST

Mastodon - Blood Mountain

Russian Circles - Gnosis

3Teeth - Eponymous

Sisters of Black Mountain - Singles Playlist

Niro - Porto Venere (Thanks Tommy!)

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Card:

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

• Seven of Cups

• 06: The Lovers

• Nine of Swords

Too many ideas create anxiety, making it hard to relax. Seek the arms of your person to help. This is HUGE. For just over a week, I have had insane sleep anxiety, and it's driving me crazy. 

QOTSA on KEXP

 

Been trying to get to this QOTSA KEXP session for what feels like a few weeks now, so I'm putting it here and hoping to listen before this posts. Thanks to my good friends Mr. Brown and Mr. Joshua (Mr. Joshuan? Thank you, Mr. Joshua) for putting this on my radar, as my algorithm did not.

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Watch:

A trailer dropped for the next Bobby Fingers video. It's been a long time coming, but I can tell you that, as a member of his Patreon, there was a period between the previous two videos where he actually suspended Patreon payments because he wasn't working on anything, so that, plus the fact that he's posted numerous teaser images and updates, suggests that something BIG is coming. 

I'm with you regardless, Mr. Fingers, but The Wait is killing me!!! After the Jeff Bezos boat episode and its cinematic flourish, I'd predicted we might very well be getting a short film from Bobby Fingers within too long. Is this that? K and I went through the trailer twice, trying to interpret the imagery for clues (one of the Patreon subscribers' previous updates, from late last year, teased the next video would involve Mrs. Fingers and Rats. "Lots of rats."), But, thankfully, the trailer provides a lot of seemingly disparate elements, and we did not read into the comments to see any of the guesses that end up there.

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Read:

Last Wednesday, I walked into Rick's Comic City Clarksville to find that they'd pulled all the issues of Marvel's early 80s ROM: Spaceknight comic from their back issue bins to have ready for the inevitable hunts that will come after Robert Kirkman recently announced ROM is joining the Energon Universe in an upcoming issue of Void Rivals (we talk about it on Drinking w/ Comics HERE). Fortunitous for the, as the issues that had magically matched up with several I already possessed, so for a very nice price, I brought home well-loved copies of ROM 35, 49-61.

This is further down the "Hobby Shop Sci Fi" well I prattle on about now and again, and while it's cool that Kirkman is bringing it back around again for a new audience, I'm beholden to the old run. Bill Mantlo plays all the editorial Shooter-era edicts a book like this suffered from and still manages to create a unique, engaging story.

Although I will say, I am not much of a fan of the Starshine character in her original form. I much prefer the bloodthirsty version that takes the stage in issue 51, after her hometown is massacred by Dire Wraiths.

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Playlist:

DJM Trio Project

FILM50 Project

Quicksand - Bring on the Psychics (pre-release singles)

Mastodon - Emperor of Sand

Perturbator - Lustful Sacraments

Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons

Boards of Canada - Inferno

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Butthole Surfers - Pioughd

The Besnard Lakes - ... Are the Roaring Night

Foxy Shazam - Dark Blue Night

Etta James - Second Time Around

Ghost - Skeleta

Dio - Holy Diver

Savages - Silence Yourself

Bee Gees - How Deep is Your Love? (single)

Blonde Goblin - Worlds to Burn

Russian Circles - Gnosis

Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

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Card:

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

• Page of Pentacles

• Eight of Wands

• King of Pentacles

Advice to strike while the iron is hot in regards to Earthly concerns. Literally JUST did that before I drew these cards. The master of abundance represented by the King definitely feels appropriate.

New Music from Low Cut Connie!!!

 

New Low Cut Connie, out today! Buy HERE.

 

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Watch:

Happy July 3rd, everyone! Also known as Return of the Living Dead day!

I'll be watching this tonight in celebration and jamming the vinyl soundtrack while I type this.

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In other viewing news, I rewatched Gavin Polone and Andrew Kevin Walker's much-maligned Psycho Killer the other night. I love this flick; no, it's no SE7EN, but holding it up against that film is like holding everything Shamalamadingdong does against Sixth Sense.  

I do think I figured out the elements that caused many in the Horror community to lambast this film.

    1) The egregious-as-hell scene with the tank semi that flips onto its side, takes out the fleeing female and then explodes. It's fun, but it's a bit much for a film that otherwise holds itself in a dead serious repose.

    2) The pregnancy subplot. Not needed AT ALL. 

Other than that, man, this one swings so fucking big and, I think, hits it out of the park with such an ambitious third act. Georgina Campbell is always fantastic, and James Preston Rogers is the stuff of nightmares. Oh yeah, Malcolm McDowell is fabulous as a sort of modern Aleister Crowley/Anton Lavey stand-in.

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Read:

I am just now, three months into the publication run, getting to read the unearthed and completed finale to Rick Veitch and Michael Zulli's Swamp Thing run from 1988/1989, published nearly 40 years later as Swamp Thing: 1989.

Original proposed Michael Zulli cover for issue #88

Cover to the recently released issue #88

Full disclosure: while I've been aware of the Veitch/Zulli run since I read the Moore run that Mr. Veitch penciled some of back in the early 00s, I've never sought it out and, in fact, I don't think I knew that Veitch walked away due to censorship by then newly combined Time/Warner entity that owned DC Comics, or that those issues never saw the light of day and, in some cases, went unfinished. This reminds me more than a little of that Warren Ellis Hellblazer issue with the school shooting that finally came out back, oh hell, a long time ago now. 

So why was DC so worried about Swamp Thing meeting a certain historic carpenter in 1989? Five words for you:

The. Last. Temptation. Of. Christ.

Here's Paul Schrader, who wrote the screenplay adapting Nikos Kazantzakis' novel, talking about the blasphemous aspect of the story:

   

The effect the film had on Swamp Thing is the big takeaway I have after reading Stephen Bissette's afterward in  Swamp Thing 1989 issue 88, and it makes a ton of sense, even if it is still deplorable. I was thirteen in 1989, but I remember the nightly news hullabaloo surrounding Martin Scorsese's film featuring Willem Dafoe as Jesus, Harvey Keitel as Judas Iscariot and David Bowie as Pontius Pilate. I wouldn't see the film until the early 00s, but I remember that people did not like the way Christ was portrayed, so while absolutely nothing blasphemous occurs in Veitch/Zulli's comic, no corporation was going to publish a comic with the cover above so soon after Scorsese's film.

So what did DC publish instead of the original Swamp Thing issue 88? Well, it's a bit confusing, but apparently Veitch/Zulli's issues 88-91 were shelved and never finished and instead, Doug Wheeler and John Totleben stepped in and continued the course of events that had played out through the early issues of Veitch's run, where Swampy is lost in time. Wheeler's 88 deviates by omitting the Elemental's meeting with Christ, which, again, really only treated the Christ man with the utmost respect.  

Funny that, as far as we've come to see this finally published, they still did not use that original Zulli cover. 

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Playlist:

Melvins/Helms Alee - Controlling Data for a Better Feeling Future

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Dean Hurley - Anthology Resource Vol. 2: Philosophy of Beyond

sunn O))) - Loser

3Teeth - EndEx

The Dillinger Escape Plan & Mike Patton - Irony is a Dead Scene

The Dillinger Escape Plan - Dissociation

Spotlights - Love & Decay

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Card:

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

• Two of Swords

• Page of Wands

• Queen of Cups

New Music from Russian Circles

While I've dabbled in Russian Circles music over the years, it wasn't until seeing them live with Young Widows last year that I really "got it." Hearing this new track from their forthcoming album Nine, out August 28th on Sargent House. Pre-order HERE. 

This is heavy. As. F*CK!

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NCBD:

Great week! Let's get into this right away, as the first book is one I've been waiting on with gritted teeth and several others have felt a long time coming!

The book I am most looking forward to - Geoff Darrow's Shaolin Cowboy returns with a new series! Every panel of every issue of every series so far has been a work of unparalleled art, and I expect The Shaolin Cowboy: Staying A.I. Alive to be no different. 

Ordained is an action movie in comic form (already been optioned) and it has not disappointed me yet. Who isn't up for watching a Priest beat the tar out of a bunch of mobsters? 

Jeff Lemire's Minor Arcana returns to start a new arc! 

I'm not a regular FF reader, but my good friend and Drinking with Comics co-host Mike Shin picked this as a book to watch out for a few months back when the solicitation dropped, and here's why: 

"Johnny Storm has had some incredibly bad ideas in his time, but every once in a while he also has an incredibly good idea too. Unfortunately, it's hard to tell which is which until you're neck-deep in their consequences, and by then it's usually too late. We mention this only because in this issue, Johnny convinces his sister Sue to go along with a scheme to use her powers to turn the flesh of his skull invisible, so that when he flames on he can pass himself off as the Ghost Rider and settle some old scores. What could possibly go wrong?"

Now does that sound fun or does that sound fun?

The Event Horizon sequel marches on, and the depravity continues. Loving these covers and the art in general, and I'm looking forward to seeing where this takes the mytholgy of the film.

Last but not least, I'd all but forgotten about Gabriel Hardman's Batman/Green Arrow/The Question prestige format book Arcadia, but here it is, the final issue. Overall, I think this will read better as a trade, but I'm a sucker for the prestige format, so I'm looking forward to a full reread before cracking into this final issue.

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Watch:

A trailer for Robert Eggers' Werwulf dropped two days ago and, as per my custom, I am posting it here but not watching it. This one releases on Christmas - CHRISTMAS! - and we already have a trailer? This is bound to get beaten to death well before the film lands, so I am doing my best to avoid all contact for now.

Nothing this man has done has disappointed me in the least, so I want to preserve as unspoiled an experience as I can with this one. 

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Playlist:

Infinity Frequencies - Between Two Worlds

The Caretaker - Theoretically pure anterograde amnesia

Boards of Canada - Inferno

The Atlas Moth - The Old Believer

John Carpenter - Lost Themes IV: Noir

Throbbing Gristle - Once Upon A Time

Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta II: A Dialogue with the Stars

Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta III: Saturian Poetry

Russian Circles - Station

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Card:

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

• Eight of Cups

• Two of Swords

• 01: The Magician

Eight of Cups - the glasses start to spill, the vitality is threatened: Time for a recharge before the spark of creativity returns. 

I'm in the midst of a recharge from writing after doing a pretty straight stint, day in, day out. That is the goal, but it definitely feels like it's time to fill the well.

Mastodon - Jaguar God

 

Thinking about this guy a lot lately.

 

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Watch:

Rewatched Richard Bates, Jr's Excision last night:

Still hits just as hard as it did the first time.

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Read:

Last week, I mentioned I'd begun a reread of Grant Morrison's Seven Soldiers series for upcoming episodes of Drinking with Comics. I spoke of the pleasure I've found in realizing this doesn't just hold up, but surpasses my initial response upon reading it monthly upon release circa 2005. I also mentioned my surprise that, unlike last time when my favorite titles in the series would have skewed toward the more Occult-based characters (Zatanna, Klarion), this time, I found the two books I'd "tolerated" before now at the top of my favorites list. One of those is Manhattan Guardian; the other is Shining Knight. Shining Knight, in particular, has blown me away this time through, and nowhere is that more evident than in the third issue:

The issue begins with an FBI agent leading a specialist into the lock-up where the LAPD are holding Justin, the titular Knight, last of Arthur's Round Table, flung forward in time after a melee in Castle Revolving. They talk a bit about the Knight's Sword, which the expert classifies as coming from Deep Time, essentially confirming the Arthurian aspect, and then this happens:

I'm only really remembering some of the finer points in the series as I go, so this whole Civilization Iteration angle surprised me. I've always been fascinated by the idea that human civilization has come and gone in great swathes over the history of this planet, and to see Morrison so eloquently tie this idea into this series really made everything about it resonate even more than it already has. 

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Playlist:

The Caretaker - Theoretically Pure Anterograde Amnesia

Gnarls Barkley - Atlanta

Sisters of Black Mountain - Amdusias (single)

Sisters of Black Mountain - Spirits of the Dead (single)

Mastodon - Your Ghost Again (single)

Mastodon - Blood Mountain

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

Johnny Jewel - Ageless E.P.

Silencio - End of the Glass (single)

Chryta Bell - Sycamore Trees (single)

Mastodon - Emperor of Sand

Mastodon - Leviathan 

Metallica - Garage Days

Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons

Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta II: Dialogue with the Stars

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Card:

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

• VI: The Lovers

• Seven of Swords

• 17: The Star

Collaboration opens up new vistas that lead to enlightenment. 

New Music From PJ Harvey!

New single from PJ Harvey! Her first new music since 2023. No definitive album announcement, but I'm pretty sure it's coming. 

The concept for this is, well, a bit staggering. Here's a quote from the YouTube video that explains the genesis of the song:

"The song had already been taking shape as part of Harvey’s next album, when Professor Brian Cox invited her to write a song for his ‘Emergence' world tour. Recorded with a full orchestra at Miraval Studios in Provence, Voyager takes its name from the NASA probes launched in 1977, still traveling through interstellar space nearly 50 years on. The music highlights the interplay between swelling string arrangements and pulsing synthesizer signals stretching out into the cosmos: icy, ethereal, and pensive, yet threaded with an unmistakable humanity. Across it, Harvey contemplates our small, fragile place in the universe; a 'pale-blue dot', a flake of snow, dust in a sunbeam, and finds in that vastness a quiet plea to choose light and to choose love."

Polly Jean is always full of surprises. I love that. 

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Watch:

I guested on The Average Reviews again last night to discuss Sleepaway Camp, one of the great summer camp slashers ever!

We really had a blast with this, and I even picked up some insights on the film that had previously never occurred to me. 

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Read:

When I walked into the comic shop Wednesday night, I had completely forgotten that this was coming out this week:

Here's the solicitation blurb: 

"Legendary comic book creator John Byrne returns to the title he first drew 50 years ago, Uncanny X-Men, with this one-of-a-kind new graphic novel series, X-Men: Elsewhen. This three-volume graphic novel series picks up the story from Byrne’s original run, taking the characters in new and unexpected directions."

This is just crazy to me, and I tore through the first few chapters in short order. It had me GLOWING all night, because despite the lack of Chris Claremont, this felt exactly like that era of Uncanny X-Men, and it was fantastic to revisit.

There are two more of these coming to complete Byrne's new run. The really crazy thing is, Byrne did this for him. He started it and for most of the duration, worked on it without thoughts of publishing beyond his website, Byrne Robotics, which you can check out HERE.

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Playlist:

Jim Williams - Possessor OST

John Carpenter - Lost Themes IV: Noir

Algiers - Eponymous

Gnarls Barkley - Atlanta

D'nell - First Magic

Tangerine Dream - Sorcerer OST

John Carpenter - Prince of Darkness

John Carpenter and Alan Howarth - Big Trouble in Little China

Mastodon - Emperor of Sand

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Card:

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

• Six of Pentacles

• Two of Wands

• King of Pentacles

The Caretaker - Theoretically Pure Anterograde Amnesia

I spent a lot of time with The Caretaker yesterday. From reading an old interview in an issue of The Wire from 2009, to listening to the entire Theoretically Pure Anterograde Amnesia boxset, which is waaaay OOP but available on Bandcamp HERE. 

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NCBD:

Wow - seems like every week's pull has been a doozy, and I've been cutting back. So many great creator-owned titles hitting the market lately. Here we go...

I did not love the six-part Quintesson War storyline, though I liked it more rereading it the other day than I did as it came out. Big shake-ups, HUGE really, so I don't know why I was left feeling... underwhelmed. 

I really should have waited for this one to hit trade, but I guess after DC holding it on for so long, I wanted to make sure I actually got my hands on it as soon as I could. 

The first issue of Red Roots had me. I mean, had me. Second issue was great, but also introduced an element of what miiiight be high fantasy? Let's see how #3 shakes out. I'm hoping for more of a Seven to Eternity than Tolkien vibe. 

The twists and turns in the new Condon/Phillips Weird Fiction/Mystery are great. Can't wait to see how this all comes out. 

And so the epic battle concludes! This book has been just the right kind of crazy, schlocky, video game fist-fight punch-em-up I'd hoped for when I signed on. Sad to see it go. 

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Playlist:

Steve Moore - Jimmy & Stiggs OST

Trailer Punk Podcast - Torture Gallery Interview

John Carpenter - Lost Themes Vol. 1

Leather Strip - The Pleasure of Penetration

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Boards of Canada - Geogaddi

The Caretaker - Theoretically Pure Anterograde Amnesia

Gnarls Barkley - Atlanta

Algiers - The Underside of Power

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Card:

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

• Two of Wands

• 05: The Hierophant

• Five of Wands

My point of view is my dogma. Break it in half and learn something new.

It Follows

From what I can tell, combing through my metadata, I've never posted anything from the band Silent's 2021 album Modern Hate. My good friend Jacob turned me onto this a few years back, and it's an album I find myself returning to again and again. I chose the above song for reasons that will be obvious in a moment, but the entire album is fantastic. There's some modern Post Punk that relies too heavily on the past, or tries to reduce the "genre" to a checklist. Silent does not do this. They feel breathtakingly authentic. Also, this album reminds me a lot of Savages' 2013 Masterpiece Silence Yourself, which I've kind of stopped listening to because it makes me mourn what could have been with that band. 

UPDATE: Upon writing this, I happened to look up Savages on Apple Music - as I periodically do - just to see if there's any new music. Holy smokes, folks - THERE IS! Any guesses as to what my music pick will be for this Wednesday?

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Watch:

I will never understand the hate this film gets. K and I rewatched it again this past Friday, and goddamn - It Follows still chills me to the core:

 

There's so much to talk about here: The liminal photography of Gregory Crewdson as a schematic. Disasterpiece's score comes out of the 00s hauntology vibe but with a decidedly more narrative-driven structure. The influence of John Carpenter's original Halloween, which I don't think I ever noticed until this viewing. How the film moves through events at a pace that, while slow and steady, also burns through ancillary information in elliptical edits that refuse to hold anyone's hand and never sacrifice clarity in the doing. A masterpiece, through and through. 

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Read:

I am currently rereading Grant Morrison's ambitious Seven Soldiers from 2005 and, to my utter shock, LOVING it. I mean, loving it more than I did the first time (which is surely because the last time I read this, it was in monthly installments. Those publication gaps do not help with Morrison's famed approach to story compression.

I read this series with fervor as it was released in 2005, but I would also say I was definitely suffering from a hearty case of Fan Inertia for Grant Morrison. That wore off some time ago, and in fact, a recent reading of Multiversity had me convinced I would look back and hate this as much as I did that series. I almost sold these issues to avoid experiencing that. 

Boy, am I glad I didn't do this.

Whereas Multiversity just feels unintelligible for most of its run (except maybe for those basement-dwelling, card-carrying life-long DC comics fans that love Booster Gold and late 70s Hawkman comics. I'm being a glib cunt, I'll admit, but there's something so... off-putting about so much of comic fandom, and there are, in my opinion, far more avenues in the DC village than in Marvel's that trade on that level of commitment that wears "off-putting" as a badge of honor. One of the special talents Morrison has always brought to the table is taking cringe-worthy characters and reinventing them as sleek, cool new versions of themselves. Here, he does this in earnest, transforming, for example, both Manhattan Guardian and The Shining Knight into fantastic stories with fantastic characters. And while there's a lot of that, "No time to explain/Story compression" at work, I'm not lost like I was in Multiversity. And I'll say, I fully acknowledge that part of my issue with Multiversity is I'm not smart enough to understand some of what he's doing (the "Watchmen" issue, for example), but I also just feel like there's a lot of that superhero book gobbledegook that I hate; you know, the "final battle, bunch of shit happens, none of it makes sense because we don't fully understand their powers anyway" stuff that you find in my ambitious superhero projects. There is a bit of that in the lead-up to Seven Soldiers - JLA: Classified 1-3, which I began my reread with, but it's excusable once you hit the Zero issue because that just ticks along perfectly. There's even a battle that doesn't feel gobbledy at all (maybe because the heroes all die).

I specifically call out Manhattan Guardian and Shining Knight here because I believe in my first read, I liked those books the least. So far, I've read the JLA: Classified 1-3, Seven Soldiers 0, and the first two issues of Manhattan Guardian, Shining Knight, Zatana and Karion the Witch Boy, and I distinctly remember liking the latter two more than the previous. Not so this time. Not that there's anything wrong with Zatana or Karion, but they don't feel as triumphant because they feel closer to what I would like. I just look at the characters and titles of Guardian and Knight and instantly sense that these books will face a far greater uphill struggle to earn my approval. But they definitely do so, and they do so in spades. 

I'm really looking forward to digging into the rest of the series, and as this reread is homework for Drinking with Comics, I'll post our discussions here when they air. 

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Playlist:

Pilot Priest and Electric Youth - Come True OST

Boards of Canada - Inferno

The Veils - Total Depravity

Mastodon - Hushed and Grim

Foxy Shazam - Dark Blue Night

Kyuss - Sky Valley

Blood Mother - Eponymous

Converge - Hum of Hurt

Jucifer - I Name You Destroyer

Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta II: Dialogue with the Stars

Silent - Modern Hate

Willie Nelson - Dream Chaser

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Card:

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

I posting a spread that, literally, jumped out of the deck at me. This is a lot more than I normally try to interpret. 

 • Knight of Wands

• Three of Swords

• Three of Pentacles

• 14: Temperance

• Two of Pentacles

Faith and passion are a solid foundation for change through Art.