The Afghan Whigs covering Polica? I haven't thought about Polica since... well, since HERE. So f'king cool! The Whigs also released a Still Corners cover. I've always loved the way, every once in a while, out of the blue, these guys will release a couple of covers. Very cool. Hoping this means there's new music on the way.
Watch:
Last night I took in a viewing of Mike P. Nelson's (why can't I think or say that name without thinking of Craig T. Nelson?) new remake of Silent Night, Deadly Night.
I'll tell you right off the bat, I'm not much of a fan of the original. It's fine, just so sleazy it's not really my thing. That said, this film has a sequence that's getting some press where Santa kills a whole shit load of nazis.
Pretty fucking satisfying, in 2025, where nazis apparently think they're an identity choice or a protected group, to be getting so many stories lately where nazis get killed. Because, you know, the only good nazis are dead nazis. We all know that, right?
Anyway, as for the rest of the movie... It was AWESOME! I really dug this one. Go in blind, and if you can, see it in theatre. This is not a straight remake of the original film; writer/director Mike P. Nelson really does something different and, in my opinion, awesome, even while still incoporating the many of the main plot points of the '84.
Playlist:
Brand New - Daisy
Barry Adamson - Cut to Black
Sumerlands - Dreamkiller
Phil Manzanera - Listen Now
Dreamkid - Daggers
Oranssi Pazuzu - Muuntautuja
Arcade Fire - Everything Now
Phil Collins - Face Value
Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons
Faetooth - Labrynthine
Mondo Decay - Nun Gun
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Ten of Pentacles
• XI: Justice
• II: The High Priestess
Lasting stability threatened (or perhaps earned) by intuition. Wow. Literally applies to my thoughts right before writing this. Don't overthink a good thing and thus, sabotage it.
New music from Nothing! Lead single from their upcoming album A Short History of Decay, out February 27 on Run For Cover Records. Pre-order HERE.
NCBD:
A nice, tight list of great books today. Let's get
I guess I'll be leading every Transformers entry in these pages with, "Look at that cover!" because hot damn if Dan Moya isn't turning out some of the most elegantly pleasing covers in all of comics at the moment. I was a little concerned about switching out the analog space-dust style of Jorge Corona and DWJ for this more polished look for the book. However, it's been incredible so far.
Jason Aaron is out, and Gene Luen Yang takes over writing as of this issue, backed by Freddie E. Williams II and Andrew Dalhouse on art. I will miss Juan Ferreyra's art; Ferreyra's look was new to me and gave the book a bold new look that I think we were all ready for with 2023's continuity-adhering relaunch. Now, it looks like the new team has once again reinvented the book from the ground up, and I find myself once again happy that I didn't jump off when the issue counter got reset.
Minor Arcana continues to thrill me with its seaside vibes and mysterious characters.
Always a great thing to see Cobra Commander rising from the ashes of his missteps. Also, to have Copperhead feature so prominently on a cover makes my heart sing - one of me favorites, he is!
Watch:
I finally had the chance to sit down and watch David Cronenberg's latest film, 2024's The Shrouds.
After a few initial misgivings, I ended up really liking this. It reminded me a lot of Cronenberg's novel, Consumed, which I am a fairly big fan of. There are a few nuances to Vincent Cassel's acting choices (which might have more to do with an otherwise solid script), but overall, The Shrouds starts in a relatively small place and expands into a very Cronenberg-esque conspiracy. I've been thinking about his predilection and approach to conspiracy lately; most of his films deal with secret cabals and their agendas. Starting with Consumed - unless I'm missing something - those conspiracies become global, moving away from small groups of rag-tag conspirators to incorporate global countries. North Korea is a major force in Consumed, and both Russia and China may or may not figure heavily into The Shrouds. Fifty years of making films that have grown in budget, scope and acclaim have helped David Cronenberg become a Director with global urgency, and that is on full display here.
I watched this on the Criterion Channel app, but it's likely available elsewhere as well (although Criterion is becoming a must-have channel in our house, so I'd just recommend signing up for the trial and checking them out).
Playlist:
Steve Moore - Jimmy & Stiggs OST
Blackbraid - Blackbraid III
Willie Nelson - Oh What a Beautiful World: The Songs of Rodney Crowell
Deadguy - Near Death Travel Services
Fever Ray - Eponymous
Brian Eno - Ambient 4: On Land
Stone Angel - Eponymous
Carter Burwell - Blood Simple OST
Tim Hecker - Infinity Pool OST
Nothing - a short history of decay (pre-release singles)
Mondo Decay - Nun Gun
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Page of Swords
• XIV: Temperance
• Eight of Cups
Agility again. Agility tempered with emotional control. Or, perhaps, Agility achieved through emotional distance?
Man, I remember when I used to go out of my way to try and find videos without ads to post here. Now they all have ads. Funny thing about that - I've never monetized any of my channels on YT, but the videos with the most hits still get ads. Why? Because, you can't monetize until you have considerably more followers than I have, but if a video gets the hits, YT will monetize it and reap the rewards.
Another one of a thousand instances where I could have just posted Jarvis Cocker's "Cunts Are Still Running the World." Talk about a theme song for the human race, eh?
Anyway, I recently figured out how to add songs to a playlist on Apple Music so they don't take up the home screen, so I'm recreating all the playlists I made on Spotify - which I only ever subscribed to for October and, after the news a few months back, will never sub to again. I started with my gratuitously named, "Proto Music: The Best of 80s Radio And The Archetypal Foundation Of My Head" playlist, which contains all the songs from 80s classic rock radio that made me who I am today. This song is on that playlist. This song is in my head when I write, even if it has been a few years since I last listened to it. This song is a fucking masterpiece without a genre or any comparable peers.
Watch:
With news of Netflix buying HBO, I have to say, I feel like bad things are coming. Maybe I'm still sore at HBO because I had to cancel my subscription last month after having it since 2019. It was probably time anyway, but when I ended up locked out because I share it with my sister and she uses it more than I do, I got pretty pissed when I received an email that basically said, "This isn't your account." I mean, my name is on it! Anyway, I started thinking about whether it would just be cheaper to buy physical copies of what I can't live without and, yep. It is. In HBO's case, I Marie Kondo'd their lineup and realized it's just Doom Patrol and Primal, and I grabbed Doom Patrol complete for about what I was paying for two or three months for a sub I almost never used (no wonder they thought my sister was the owner).
Netflix will no doubt prove more difficult, as they're pretty anti-physical media. I'd suggest that if there's anything you really love on HBO, grab it now, as the same ethos is likely to carry over once the merger is complete.
Anyway, I see a soon-to-be future where I have Shudder and Criterion, nothing else. Speaking of which, I watched Kiyoshi Kurosawa's latest film Cloud this past Friday night, and was pretty blown away. I posted the trailer a while ago, and honestly, you're better off just going in blind, so here's a gnarly poster I found:
I picked up heavy David Cronenberg vibes from this film. There's a subtle thread of foreboding that hangs over an opening hour that will feel drudging to some. Personally, I was enraptured by the minutiae of the main character's life. I took my own advice and went in blind - I never did watch that trailer I previously posted - and really had no idea what this film was about. There's a very scheduled, day-to-day pace that eventually evolves and then begins to ooze with suspense as that invisible dread slowly manifests in a very odd fashion. There are so many head-scratching elements to this film. Yet, not only do all of them work within the context of the story and characters Kurosawa sets up, but, as a whole, Cloud somehow encapsulates an abstract representation of life in 2025.
Read:
Closer to the beginning of the year, I finally began making my way through Weird Walk's beautiful hardcover book, Weird Walk: Wanderings and Wondering Through the British Ritual Year.
The book is divided into four parts by season: Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, and I'd fallen into the strategy of picking it up for a chapter a morning during each of the corresponding seasons. I fell off in Autumn, but after a concentrated sprint over the last week, I finally caught up. I wanted to make specific note of one of the entries for Autumn: Ottery St. Mary.
Ottery St. Mary is a town in Devon where every November 5th, the inhabitants hold a ritual where flaming tar barrels are passed from hand to hand through the streets. The origins are apparently unclear, but the thing about this particular entry in the book that struck me is the idea that this all relates back to ancestral memory of fire as an element that helped develop our consciousness into what it is today.
That really strikes a chord. Maybe it's just my propensity for falling into the British idea of "The Haunted Season" with increasing intensity these past two years, but I'm really connecting with this.
Playlist:
Miles Davis - Ascenseur pour l'échafaud
Miles Davis - Sorcerer
Ulver - Liminal Animals
Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta III: Saturian Poetry
Hotei - Shin Jinginaki Tatakai Soshite Sono Eiga Ongaku OST
D'Nell - 1st Magic
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
Nordicwinter - Whispers of the Frozen Abyss (single)
lords. - Bleeding Out (single)
Faetooth - Labyrinthine
Hangman's Chair - Saddiction
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Page of Swords
• Five of Cups
• Four of Wands
Lots of imposing vertical lines in this one. On every card. Feels like there's a bit of a progression there, even in the perspective on the cards as they flow from left to right... I'm picking up something, but not sure what. I've never read the cards like this before. Definite movement. Let's look at the cards themselves.
Page or Princess of Swords' inclination toward mental agility juxtaposed with the grief often associated with the five of cups. That's deep emotion that can threaten the stability of the four of wands.
The movement may be a system - a rhythm - of countering the grief. Above, I outlined the cards in the cadence of the traditional three-card pull: center-left-right. Following the left-to-right rhythm, we'd have Grief overcome by mental agility (discipline?) that leads to stability. I'm not entirely sure what the source of the grief is - pondering that gives me a bit of trepediation - but I guess I know how to approach it if and when it rears its head.
I first heard GZA's Liquid Swords sometime in the late 90s. A dude I used to skate with back then bumped this one often, and it made an impression pretty much right away. This was back well before streaming, and I never had a full cassette dub of the entire album, but the title track, "Shadowboxin'" and "B.I.B.L.E." all followed me around on various mix tapes and burned CD comps for years.
Cast:
It is always a great time when I'm able to join in on the monthly Dread Broadcast. So many inspiring Horror fans coming together to discuss their passion, recommend new or overlooked stuff, and just generally geek out about the genre!
This episode, our featured guest was Kyle Valle, Director and co-writer of ZombieCON Vol. 1. Because I'd been out of town, I didn't get a chance to watch the screener he sent to the group, but he and co-writer Erin Áine sent me a screener earlier this week, so I'll be posting about that soon.
After Kyle's segment, we had a good mix of return panelists and newcomers, all of whom helped fill up a notebook page of suggestions for upcoming books, movies and comics to check out.
I love being a part of this so much, and hope everyone gets a chance to check the Dread Broadcast out.
Watch:
Yesterday I invoked PTO from work and took my Dad to see Quentin Tarantino's fourth film in its new, ultimate form:
I hadn't seen either Kill Bill volume since the theatre, and while I remembered some things very vividly (Boss Tanaka's death; the burial; Elle's other eye), there was a lot I didn't remember. My initial takeaway from these flicks back in the day was excitement before their release and satiation upon release, but they never really resonated with me beyond that.
It's funny what 20 years will do.
Two decades down the spiral of cinema archeology, understanding filmmaking and fight choreography, not to mention a much better understanding of the influences and references that go into these films, and I have to say that, while Reservoir Dogs will likely always be my favorite QT film, I now see Kill Bill as his best. Especially when viewed as originally intended - a four-hour and thirty-five-minute film (that graciously includes a 15-minute intermission perfect for a trip to the john and a power-up at the snack bar). The entire Tokyo sequence is beyond belief - I mean, the sheer depth of field that Robert Richardson's camera has to capture with the choreography is staggering. Also, the original O-Ren Ishii origin animation sequence has been extended by 7.5 minutes, giving us the closest we've had yet to a Tarantino-directed anime episode.
Kil Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is in theatres for at least the next week, and I'm already plotting whether or not I can manage sneaking in another viewing. Either way, Lionsgate has a Blu-ray in the works, and once that drops, I will finally add this one to the collection.
Playlist:
Blut Aus Nord - Hallucinogen
Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons
The Seatbelts - Cowboy Bebop OST
Sumerlands - Dreamkiller
Telefon Tel Aviv - Immolate Yourself
The Police - Synchronicity
Gaerea - Loss (pre-release singles)
Fever Ray - Eponymous
GZA - Liquid Swords
Mondo Decay - Nun Gun
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• XI: Justice
• Page of Swords
• XVI: The Tower
Weighed down by Earthly concerns, fight back and don't fall into old patterns.
From their album Thirst, released earlier this year and burning up my ears for the last few months. I was new to Slow Crush this year, so it felt fantastic to fall in love with their previous album, Aurora and then have this drop shortly thereafter.
There's a moment near the end of this track that makes my heart soar! You can pick this up over on the Slow Crush Bandcamp HERE.
NCBD:
A nice, tight NCBD pull this week.
Another hiatus looms after this issue and I'll be using part of that time to re-read the entire SIKTC series to date.
One night last week, instead of editing, writing or watching, I put on some music, opened a beer and lay down on the floor of my office with a stack of comics. It was glorious - I haven't done that in some time. One of the accomplishments of that evening was to finish my re-read of the first Orphan series and then plow through the two issues to date of Bath of Blood, so I am primed and I am psyched! James Stokoe has a legend on his hands here, and I can't wait to get my hands on this third and penultimate issue.
I also recently completed reading the Deluxe Criminal Vol. 1, so I'm happy as all hell to have this special "Giant-Sized" issue landing this week.
As Mike Shin and I discussed on a recent episode of Drinking w/ Comics, Dreadnok War has breathed new life into the Energon Universe's GIJOE title, and the end of last issue felt like a herald of some pretty dark shit. So yeah, fire up your chainsaw hand and let's go!
Playlist:
Carter Burwell - Blood Simple OST
Secret Chiefs 3 Traditionalists - La Mani Destre Recise Degli Ultimi Uomimi
Steve Moore - Jimmy & Stiggs OST
Ritual Howls - Ruin
Drain - ... Is Your Friend
Deadguy - Near Death Travel Services
D'Nell - 1st Magic
Krofon - Los Ochentas (single)
Jim Williams - Possessor OST
Deafheaven - Lonely People With Power
The Saxophones - No Time for Poetry
Slow Crush - Thirst
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• XXIL: The World
• XI: Justice
• Seven of Wands
It can be difficult to realize when something has ended successfully, because success can create the urge to continue well past necessity. Recognize when something is over, hail it as a success (or failure) and move on.
This actually may apply to something that is about to happen. Weird.
From their 2024 album, I Will Commit A Holy Crime: Tandem, which you can order from their Bandcamp HERE.
Watch:
Holy smokes! How did I miss the trailer for Julia Ducournau's third movie, Alpha, when it dropped last month? Here it is, and I'm happy to say this follows Neon's trend of assembling trailers that show me enough to make me want to see the movie (I would see anything Ms. Ducournau without knowing anything other than her name is attached), but not in any way that tells me anything substantial about the film. Yay Neon!
This looks remarkable. Ducournau's voice is so strong it permeates every shot herein.
Read:
With the year coming to a close and my reading all over the place, I didn't want to start another novel, per se, but this is the time of the year I read a lot, so I cracked out another of the Weird Tales I purchased back in May.
This is the Thomas Ligotti issue, back from around the time Ligotti first exploded on the Weird/Horror literary scene. Opening story, "Netherscurial" is a great example of why Ligotti was heraled early on as a kind of wünderkind - so many familiar, Lovecraftian tropes, all turned on their ear and used to build something new and truly horrifying.
"The problem is that such supernatural inventions are indeed quite difficult to imagine. So often they fail to materialize in the mind, to take on a mental texture, and thus remain unfelt as anything but an abstract monster of metaphysics? an elegant or awkward schematic that cannot rise from the paper to touch us. Of course, we do need to keep a certain distance from such specters as Nethescurial, but this is usually provided by the medium of words as such, which ensnare all kinds of fantastic creatures before they can tear us body and soul. (And yet the words of this particular manuscript seem rather weak in this regard, possibly because they are only the drab green scratchings of a human hand and not the heavy mesh of black type.)
But we do want to get close enough to feel the foul breath of these beasts, or to see them as prehistoric leviathans circling about the tiny island on which we have taken refuge. Even if we are incapable of a sincere belief in ancient cults and their unheard of idols, even if these pseudonymous adventurers and archaeologists appear to be mere shadows on a wall, and even if strange houses on remote islands are of shaky construction, there may still be a power in these things that threatens us like a bad dream. And this power emanates not so much from within the tale as it does from somewhere behind it, someplace of infinite darkness and ubiquitous evil in which we may walk unaware."
The story is also peppered with truly epic and disturbing illustrations by Harry O. Morris.
You can read the full story on Ligotti's website HERE.
This record is beyond fantastic. Order HERE. I'll have more to say about this later. Right now I'm prepping to get up and drive to Chicago tomorrow for a second Thanksgiving on Saturday.
Watch:
Rounding out Noirvember with a rewatch of the entire Cowboy Bebop original series. Doing this always makes me wish there was more than there is, but it also really underlines how the limited run and the longing it creates when it's over really help make this show immortal.
It will spill over into December, but that's no problem. I love the place this takes me in my head. I always love taking it back to the first episode, where it's just Spike and Jet, and then rolling through in order, watching how things build, and the other characters filter in. Such chemistry, and the music. Oh, the music!
Playlist:
Oscar Peterson, Joe Pass, Ray Brown - The Giants
Joe Pass - Intercontinental
David Lynch & Alan Splet - Eraserhead OST
The Cramps - Stay Sick
Gylt - I Will Commit A Holy Crime: Tandem
Witchfinder - Hazy Rites
David Bowie - Hunky Dory
Oliver Nelson - The Blues and the Abstract Truth
Mai Yamane - The Real Folk Blues (single)
Seat Belts - Cowboy Bebop OST
Etta James - Third Album
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• V: The Hierophant
• King of Swords
• XV: The Devil
Cut through the bullshit by paying attention, applying yourself, and not being misled by dodgy thinking. Don't blame others for B.S. Seek the truth - it's not always nice looking, but it is always the better alternative.
Yeah, I know that sounds like an elaborate fortune cookie at a stoner-owned and operated Thai place, but I just don't have a lot in me at the moment. I can feel that this is directly referencing elements of my life, but it's hard to completely lay it all out at the moment. As ever, I'll carry it with me and try to apply in the day-to-day.
I've never been very interested in Rob Zombie's musical solo career. Truth is breaking up White Zombie when he did was obviously a smart thing for him, but that first album set a tone each one since that I've tried to listen to matched - two or three good songs, nothing I can't live without - and that's about it.
That brings us to the lead single off the upcoming album, The Great Satan, out February 27th on Nuclear Blast Records. You can pre-order HERE.
Maybe this record will be the one. I really want to connect with RZ's music, especially coming off another viewing of 31 a few weeks ago that left me remembering what I like about his style, as opposed to what I don't. Anyway, I'll probably wait until the album's release before considering throwing down the money for a physical copy. Just to be safe.
NCBD:
A very light NCBD. Also, notably, the final issue of Catacombs of Terror that I'm likely to buy; the series has maintained the level of quality set by its predecessor, Epitaphs From the Abyss. However, I'm looking to cut some costs after the end of the year, and comic subs were a great place to start. Mainly because I've run into storage space issues once again.
It's an odd feeling, thinking not just about storage, but the likelihood of what I will re-read in my lifetime. I can definitely stand to trim my collection - my CLZ Comics account that I use to track it shows I have 532 unique series and 3,177 comics nested within, and I know for a fact I haven't logged everything. Still, there are 2 full long boxes and no less than 32 short boxes in my office, taking up space. About half of that is out of the way in a closet, but the other half... forces me to get creative. I've been able to maintain a fairly stable status quo by enacting several purges over the years, and while it's true some of the stuff I purged I regret, overall that regret won't keep me from doing what I have to do to stay sane. Because, you see, I'm also a bit of a neat freak and anti-clutter totalitarian, so my collector's impulse runs 100% against that. Cognitive Dissonance galore.
Watch:
I stumbled across the trailer to Chinese Director Bi Gan's upcoming film, Resurrection, the other day and had to post it here. I know I usually trash-talk trailers, but when you have zero frame of reference, sometimes they can be awe-inspiring and help you find new things. Such is the case here:
I am unfamiliar with Director Bi Gan's previous film, Long Day's Journey Into Night, but apparently I need to remedy that ASAP, because his new film looks visually amazing!
Playlist:
Oliver Nelson - The Blues and the Abstract Truth
Charles Mingus - Three of Four Shades of Blue
Rob Zombie - Heathen Days (single)
Barry Adamson - Cut to Black
Perturbator - Age of Aquarius
Denison/Kimball Trio - Neutrons
The Saxophones - No Time for Poetry
Miles Davis - Ascenseur pur l'échafaud OST
The Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat
Ulver - Liminal Animals
Ulver - Weeping Stone (pre-release single)
Jordan Patterson - The Hermit
Ashes and Diamonds - Are Forever
Spotlights - Rarities
Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons
Slow Crush - Thirst
Ashes and Diamonds - Are Forever
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Six of Cups
• Ace of Cups
• Eight of Pentacles
The act of creating vacuity to communicate with the unconscious can lead to an emotional breakthrough, but requires a level of concentration I am currently lacking.
A lot of indications lately that it would be to my benefit to resume practicing mediation. I'm not sure why I am so damn reticent to do so, but I am.
From the 1958 soundtrack to Louis Malle's Ascenseur pur l'échafaud, which I'll get into in a minute below.
Watch:
Big Noir weekend. Here's the playlist:
I started Friday night with a film my good friend and Horror Vision cohost Prof. John Trafton recently put on my radar - Louis Malle's 1958 Elevator to the Gallows, or, properly in French, Ascenseur pur l'échafaud.
I knew nothing about this one; I basically took a list of films John had mentioned on the most recent episode of The Horror Vision - our Noirvember episode, which you'll see posted in the little widget to the right - and started looking them up on the Criterion Channel. When I hit this one and saw a pre-Kind of Blue Miles Davis did the score, well, I didn't really need any more convincing. Also, I've been trying to watch a few French and Japanese Noirs this month, but haven't really had any luck. This proved to be precisely what I needed.
We start with a love triangle not unlike the one found in Blood Simple. Employee and the boss's wife, boss needs to be taken out of the picture for the other two to be happy. Only where Blood Simple takes a somewhat straight-ahead path - somewhat - Elevator to the Gallows has all kinds of interesting twists and turns that include grand theft auto, stolen identity, and multiple senseless homicides. Can't recommend this one enough; it really set the vibe for our weekend.
Next up, a British Noir made at the famous Pinewood Studios back in the early '60s. Basil Dearden's 1962 All Night Long caught my eye because of the cast, which includes Charles Mingus, Tubby Hayes and Dave Brubeck. Yeah, that's right, and they all perform on screen throughout the film. The film takes place in a swanky London loft where a whole scene of professional Jazz musicians gather to celebrate the first-anniversary party for two of their own. Only one of their number is a jealous bastard who manipulates everything and everyone to try to break them up. Patrick McGoohan - whom I inadvertently got back to on Sunday with a rewatch of David Cronenberg's Scanners - schemes to break up the marriage for his own devious reasons. McGoohan is a phenomenal cunt in this - his performance is fantastic and really anchors the film in a different kind of Noir than we're used to.
Saturday night was Orson Welles and Joseph Cotton in what I still say is probably the most beautiful black and white film I've ever laid eyes on. Carol Reed's 1949 masterpiece, The Third Man, filmed among the bombed-out ruins of post-war Vienna, uses shadow in ways that leave me speechless. Robert Krasker's Cinematography burns the city onto your retinas, and even though this one takes a little while to really get going, it's easy to see why this is the BFI's "Greatest Film of All Time." I don't know that I'd go that far, but as I mentioned up top, The Third Man is by far the best black-and-white film I've ever seen.
Next, Seijun Suzuki's 1966 iconoclastic Japanese Crime Noir, Tokyo Drifter. This is another film I'd heard John mention previously, way back on an old episode of his podcast This Movie Saved My Life, where he and cohost Miles Fortune discussed it as a film featuring elements of the Yakuza film spiced up with elements culled from the classic Western and Secret Agent genres as well.
This one lives up to all that and has a main character who sings his own theme song throughout the film, to boot.
This is my first film by Seijun Suzuki, but it will not be my last. Also, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that, if, like me, you're a Cowboy Bebop fan, this film will endear itself to you just by how much it obviously influenced Shin'ichirô Watanabe in the making of that.
Playlist:
The Rolling Stones - Some Girls
Patti Smith - Horses
John Cale - Fear
Sharon Tandy - The Best of Sharon Tandy
Ashes and Diamonds - Are Forever
Pepper Adams - Encounter!
Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures
Peter Peter & Julian Winding - Copenhagen Cowboy OST
Pessimist - Burundanga EP
Spotlights - Rarities
Miles Davis - Ascenseur pur l'échafaud OST
Ell Fitzgerald - The Best Of (Vol. 2)
Bohren & Der Clob of Gore - Sunset Mission
Tubby Hayes Quintet - Down in the Village (Live at Ronnie Scott's Club1962
Charles Mingus - Blues & Roots
Oliver Nelson - The Blues And The Abstract Truth
Perturbator - Lustful Sacraments
Hangman's Chair - Saddiction
Bohren & Der Club of Gore - Patchouli Blue
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Eight of Swords
• XIV: Temperance
• IX: The Hermit
Restrictions come from feelings of imbalance caused by isolation. Isolation is good, but can often perpetuate at toxic levels in our culture today.
I'm not really sure what this means at the moment. I am pretty isolated sometimes, even from the people in my everyday life. I'd imagine this is a reminder to 'get out of my head' a little more often.
A couple of days ago, Heaven Is An Incubator posted a track from the band The Saxophones' new album, No Time For Poetry.
Blew me away.
An hour later, I was starting on my second go-round with the record. This one is incredible. Not like anything else I've heard in some time. Think Loveage meets Combustible Edison meets... I don't know. Those are just pointers in the general direction, as this group is very much its own thing. Can't thank you enough, Tommy!
Watch:
Wednesday night, I watched a movie where an unkillable old man kills the F*CK out of a company of nazis in 1944 Finland. Such a satisfying watch! If you know Jalmari Helander's bizarre Christmas film Rare Exports and you haven't seen 2023's Sisu, do yourself a favor - watch it as soon as you can.
What's the hurry? Well, I say watch it ASAP because I think you'll love it. I mean, who doesn't love dead nazis? Also, if you watch it soon, you can do like I did last night and hit a local theatre for the brand spankin' new sequel, Sisu: Road to Revenge:
The sequel might just be more insane than the first!
The 'suspension of disbelief' factor is super high with these films, but that's fine. Jalmari Helander knows how to make bloody AF action films FUN! I can't recommend seeing this on the big screen enough. Not only is Jorma Tommila back to kick all the evil arseholes to hell, but Stephan Lang and Richard Brake come along for the ride!
Playlist:
The Fixx - Phantoms
77s - All Fall Down
The Plimsouls - Everywhere At Once
David Bowie - Hunky Dory
John Cale - Helen of Troy
Garland Jeffreys - Ghost Writer
The Rolling Stones - Beggars Banquet
The Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat
The Saxophones - No Time for Poetry
Combustible Edison - I, Swinger
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Queen of Cups
• XVII: The Star
• Ace of Wands
Deep emotional fulfillment follows your accomplishments; however, we don't always recognize our accomplishments or our fulfillments. It's one of modern humanity's fated flaws that we never appreciate what we have, never stop to appreciate what we have instead of looking forward for 'more.' Remember that and try not to lose sight of what you have to be grateful for.
This past Monday morning, a text from a good friend put John Cale's 1974 album Fear back on my radar, and I have to say, I'm not sure how I've gone so long since last listening to this. This ended up setting up a whole "70s NY" day on the stereo. I needed it!
NCBD:
Big Pull. Let's go:
Dreadnok War Part 2! Already! I either didn't realize or forgot this book was going bi-weekly for the duration of this event. An event which, might I add, is off to a really good start. As Mike Shin and I talked about on a recent Drinking with Comics, Issue 13 was easily the best issue of the Energon Universe's G.I.JOE title to date. Hope they keep it up!
This one started strong but really suffered during the middle, so I'm hoping the story will come back around again at the end. I love the art, but it limits how the story is unfurled. There is a lot of "You're telling me everything, but I want you to SHOW ME!"
I find the unrelenting pace of Larazus: Fallen almost intimidating at this point! Hahaha. Seriously, I'm spending November reading the three Criminal Deluxe Editions, but I may make Lazarus my re-read project in December or January. Can't wait to catch up!
The first issue of this was fantastic, so I'm excited to see where it goes. I believe I read this won't be an issue-to-issue series, but rather it will jump around and chronicle High Strangeness across the 20th-century American landscape.
The Laphams have me hooked on their small-town, Southwestern Crime story.
One of the VIP titles of 2025, Michael Walsh, James Tynion and friends have crafted one helluva bloody good time with Exquisite Corpses.
Watch:
Not much in the way of movie news lately, or at least nothing I care about. Here's a trailer for Edward G. Ulmer's 1945 Noir Detour.
I discovered this one last year for Noirvember and just had my second viewing the other night. A nice, tight little Noir with all the elements you've come to expect from the genre. Ulmer's not reinventing the wheel here, but that's not really what Noir is about. If we want that, we fast forward to Neo Noirs. Or how about, Sci Fi Neo Noirs?
I cracked Ridley Scott's Blade Runner out after watching Chinatown this past weekend. It just seemed like the perfect follow-up to Polanski's film. This film still feels fresh and beautiful. Only one problem, and I'm looking at Warner Bros home releasing as the guilty party. Ever heard of DVD rot? I have the Blade Runner Ultimate Edition 5 Disc collection, and when I went to fire up the disc with the US and UK Theatrical cuts, the Anti-Piracy statement came up, and then literally nothing else.
Okay, fine. I moved on to the version I usually watch, the Final Cut. I made it to Roy's arrival at JF Sebastian's place and the disc stopped.
AHHHH!!! I looked this up online and found that there are apparently a lot of issues with DVD Rot Warner Bros. discs produced from 2006-2008. The Ultimate Edition came out in 2007, so this puts what was once a fairly expensive set squarely in the affected timeline.
Fucking Warner Bros! I LOVE the packaging on this one, so this hurts. Thinking I'm going to suss out any issues with the remaining discs, then try and find a Blu-ray copy and just transfer those discs into this package. That said, if the Blu-rays were also manufactured in 2007, well, am I just setting myself up for future failure? Why does this shit have to be so difficult!
Playlist:
John Cale - Fear
Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat
Roxy Music - Eponymous
Brian Eno - Here Come the Warm Jets
David Bowie - Hunky Dory
Talking Heads - Remain in Light
Iggy Pop - The Idiot
Television - Marquee Moon
The Rolling Stones - Some Girls
Teenage Jesus and the Jerks - Live 1977-1979
Mastodon - Crack the Skye
Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures
The Cramps - Stay Sick
Failure - Fantastic Planet
Roxy Music - For Your Pleasure
Ministry - HOPIUMFORTHEMASSES
Soundgarden - Louder Than Love
Young Widows - Power Sucker
Massive Attack - Mezzanine
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Nine of Swords
• II: High Priestess
• Queen of Pentacles
Conflicting Wills can be assuaged with nurturing. Those who oppose you do not have to be your enemy.
From their 1996 album Fantastic Planet, which is really pretty new to me here, thirty years after its release. Failure was never really on my radar in 1996. About twelve years ago, I remember reading something Heaven Is An Incubator wrote about them and wondering how I'd missed them. I gave Fantastic Planet a spin back then, but it didn't leave an impression. Also, that would have been before the advent of Apple Music, so I'm unsure how I listened. Regardless, I would not have had the ability to relisten as often as I can now.
I played Fantastic Planet through once this past Friday morning because Mr. Brown and I decided to hit next year's Space Echo concert and see Baroness, Spotlights, and, with Failure headlining, I figured it would be a good time to take another dip in their sound.
On my first go-through, I instantly understood why/how I had missed these guys. I actually think I was aware of them to some degree in the early to mid-90s, but here's the thing - I was DONE with this sound by 1996. Just done with it. By the time Nirvana's In Utero came out, I was pretty finished with anything that shared DNA with their sound, be it in songwriting, production or both.
I'm not saying Failure is a copycat band. Not at all. However, the production on this album definitely owes something to the zeitgeist sound of the day, which is all based on Nirvana's sound. "Alternative" radio beat that shit to death in 1994-97, and just that through-line would have been enough for me to turn my nose up at this back then.
Back to the present, by the end of that first listen last Friday, I found I wanted more, so I played FP through a second time. By the end of that, I was hooked (album opener "Saturday Savior" has been in my head all day as I write this on Saturday). It's nice to go back and find something from that era to look at with fresh eyes, so to speak, because the only bands from the "grunge/alternative" watershed that I followed were Alice in Chains and Soundgarden. The two that, in my opinion, have the most distinct sound. Now that we're thirty years away from this sound, though, I can hear this album for what it is. Pretty fucking great.
Watch:
We continued the Noirvember celebration this past Friday with a double feature of two Noir classics: one from the original era of the genre and one of the Neo-Noir persuasion. First up, Joan Crawford and Jack Carson in Mildred Pierce. I adore this film, and recently picked up the Criterion Blu-ray as part of the current Criterion sale.
I love this film even more now that I've realized the actor who plays Monte is also the screenwriting cop in Arsenic and Old Lace. I guess I'd never watched these two films close enough together before to pick up on that. So many classic Noir elements, from the covetous nature of many of the characters to the lighting, which has stayed with me since K first showed me this one when we began dating.
Next up, Rian Johnson's debut, Brick.
I'd not watched this one in some time, and was thrilled to see how well it holds up. A very clever approach to updating the Neo Noir formula and applying it to the Southern California High School vibe, not unlike Rob Thomas' Veronica Mars, of which I am also a pretty big fan. Here, though, Johnson makes the choice to have his teenage characters talk in a quasi-Mickey Spillane dialogue; this could have gone way wrong, like that one guy's Romeo and Juliet movie from the '90s. Instead, it just really works, principally because the performances are so strong. Joseph Gordon Leavit stopped being the kid from that shitty sitcom about aliens, and Nora Zehetner, Luke Haas, Noah Fleiss, Noah Segan and Matt O'Leary all knock it out of the park.
Read:
Last December, I stumbled on Hellbore Magazine. A fantastic Occult/Folklore/Folk Horror magazine with articles on everything from Haunted Sites to Nigel Kneale. My primary contact with Hellbore was twitter, which I denounced earlier this year, and it wasn't until recently I found them on IG. Glad I did. Check out this offering they have up on their site at the moment:
How could I not procure a copy of this for my overfilled bookshelves? You can check this out and order it on Hellebore's site HERE.
Playlist:
Orville Peck - Appaloosa
Failure - Fantastic Planet
Failure - Comfort
Odonis Odonis - Eponymous
The Velvet Underground - Sister Ray
The Velvet Underground & Nico - Eponymous
Slow Crush - Thirst
Sylvaine - Nova
Willie Nelson - Oh What A Beautiful World
The Volume Settings Folder - Negotiating Obstacles EP
Mars Red Sky - Eponymous
Dean Hurley - Analog Resource Vol. II: The Philosophy of Beyond
Perturbator - Age of Aquarius
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
I'd never heard of Vulture Feathers before this popped up in my feed, probably because YouTube's spying algorithms observed me mentioning Felte Records recently. Whatever the case, this song is fantastic, so I gave their 2025 album It Will Be Like Now a whirl yesterday and quite liked that, too.
Last night K and I took in the local premiere of Osgood Perkins' newest film, Keeper. Here's another brilliant trailer from the fine folks at Neon, who honestly, do the best trailers in the biz at the moment. Watch without fear of spoilage:
Just like their trailers for Perkins' Longlegs, this trailer shows me so many images that get my brain going, "WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT???" but in no way tells me anything about the plot of the movie. Brilliant!
So how was the film?
The trailer is better.
I'll elaborate that, like the other, pre-Longlegs Perkins films I've seen, Keeper is extremely well made. So much time is spent on building tension, though, that the tension build up begins to dissolve. When shit finally goes off, it's too little, too late.
Read:
Yesterday I finished Christopher Buehlman's The Lesser Dead. I'd started this mid-October, but apparently forgot to log it here. Then, once I saw GDT's Frankenstein was coming our way, I set this down about halfway through and re-read Mary Shelley's novel just for comparison's sake. Once I finished that, I hopped right back over to Buehlman's fantastic tale of vampires living in the tunnels below the subways in late 70's New York City.
I've mentioned here before how I have a thing for stories that take place underground, so when my good friend Chris Saunders mentioned this one to me back in September, I pretty much ordered it on the spot and moved it to the top of the pile. The Lesser Dead does not disappoint. If you've ever read Anne Rice's Vampire novels, you know how lush they are in the description of New Orleans over a span of several centuries. Just thinking the words "Interview with a Vampire" conjures immediate mental imagery of the Architecture and copious bougainvillea. Well, there's a very similar lush extravagance in Buehlman's novel, only it's for the dirt and grime of late 70s NY, both above and below ground. He uses cultural touchstones like the TV show Soap and Studio 54 to really anchor the world above ground, and dark, moldy opulence-gone-by of the New York buried beneath the streets to flesh out the world below ground. The novel is gorgeous, riveting, and the narrator, Peter, is so likable and easy to read, you'll blow through this in a matter of days and want more.
Playlist:
Steve Moore - Jimmy and Stiggs OST
Blackbraid - Blackbraid III
Ritual Howls - Ruin
Vulture Feather - Pleasant Obstacle (single)
Vulture Feather - It Will Be Like Now
David Bowie - Reality
The Ocean - Even Deeper (single; NIN cover)
The Ocean - Phanerozoic I: Palaeozoic
The Ocean - Phanerozoic II: Mesozoic / Cenozoic
Dance with the Dead - Driven to Madness
White Hex - Gold Nights
Card:
From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.
• Five of Cups
• King of Swords
• VIII: Strength
Man, didn't I just have this same pull recently? No, so there are apparently a lot of guitars in this deck. Not a complaint, and really, the fact that I interpret every card with a guitar at first glance as an edict to pick up my axe and make music tells me more than the rest of the spread does.
That said, A) it's really cool to see these in their actual B&W. These days, I almost always shoot by colored light, so it's cool to be reminded of the actual deck's vibe, as it is awesome! B), I'd say this is pretty clearly a three-card sequence suggesting I turn my back on some emotional hang-up, dig in my heels and apply my Will to something that feels like it has power over me. That's a little scary, and I'm not going to make any rash decisions, but it's good to be reminded of how we hold ourselves hostage.
