Saint Maud and Her Zodiacal Light

There's a reason Sunn O))) named a song after Earth founder Dylan Carlson.  

I'm largely unfamiliar with Earth except for this album, which I picked up shortly after its release in 2014, and which became ingrained in my psyche in 2015 as I listened to it over the course of a year where my life imploded and then put itself back together (better). This song, in particular, and Rabia Shaheen Qazi's lyrics and delivery really resonated with me at that time. 

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Watch:

Well look what finally found its way to a platform where most people can actually see it:

 

I've had a lot of misgivings about this flick and the interminably long build-up to its release. First, A24 makes great stuff, however, I've developed a growing awareness of the films they release that seems to have the express intent of being 'the next Hereditary.' Seeing the Saint Maud trailer for the first time a little over a year ago marked the beginning of this suspicion and the feeling has only escalated since. 

Next, to have bypassed the usual VOD platforms where the everyman fan can pay to rent the film, A24 instead made a deal with West Coast cable channel Epix, where the film has remained exclusive for the last several months. 

Really? Being that no one I know that doesn't live in California has ever even heard of epix, I don't know where - if anywhere - this film was available elsewhere in the country, but I consider this a frustrating manuever on A24's part. I mean, all is forgiven if this helped put the film and its writer/director Rose Glass in a good place in a world where movie releases have become increasingly uncertain and unprofitable. 

Anyway, regardless of these misgivings, I watched Saint Maud yesterday. My reaction?

Wow. 

When religious lunacy replaces addiction, bad things happen. That's all I'll say, other than I really dug Saint Maud, and although I don't really feel as though the way A24 handled its release was warranted, the film is definitely worth watching if you're a fan of the more psychological take A24 tends to curate for their release.

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Playlist:

Earth - Primitive and Deadly

High on Fire - Blessed Black Wings 

Type O Negative - Dead Again

Windhand - Eternal Return

Zeal and Ardor - Stranger Fruit

Algiers - The Underside of Power

Arctic Monkeys - AM

Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not

Federale - No Justice

Madeleine Peyroux - Careless Love (single)

David Bowie - Scary Monsters (and Super Freaks)

The Dandy Warhols - Playlist

Cutting Crew - (I Just) Died in Your Arms

Cold Cave - Cherish the Light Years

Corniglia - Eponymous

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Card:

 

Yes. Perfect pull, as the paradigm of the past year died yesterday when, for the first time since early March, 2020, I walked to my coffee shop writing spot and put in a solid writing session. It felt awesome, and I'm going back today!

2019: May 28th Earth - Datura's Crimson Veils

Full Upon Her Burning Lips, the new album by seminal Doom/Stoner/Grunge band Earth dropped last Friday, and it's fantastic. First track, Datura's Crimson Veil is a one of the best lead-ins of the year. I was late to the party with Earth; 2014's Primitive and Deadly was the first album I got into by the band. That record had a very particular meaning to me at the time of its release, and the sound of Dylan Carlson's guitar on that record is forever ingrained in my psyche in a very positive way. It's no surprise then, as Full Upon... feels like a direct follow-up to Primitive (not necessarily a given with a band that has been around this long and reinvented itself as time has gone by; think Swans), I was immediately taken with the new album's sound. You can order directly from Earth's label Sargent House from anywhere in the world via their shop's web portal HERE.

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I finally dragged myself to the coffeeshop on Sunday and put in a solid couple of hours writing. It wasn't the most productive day, but the first day back after a hiatus never is. That's not what it's about; you have to re-establish the ritual and the inertia. Then yesterday knocked me back a peg. No problem, because as I write this I already feel as though today will be a productive day, I'll simply have to work for it.


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Playlist from 5/26:

Mastodon - Once More Round the Sun
Minsk - The Crash and the Draw
Minsk & Zatokrev - Bigod
The Cure - Disintegration


Playlist from 5/27:

Frank Sinatra - In the Wee Small Hours
The Doors - LA Woman
Drab Majesty - The Demonstration
James Brown - Hell

Card of the day:

With so much time off from writing, I'm frustrated by too many ideas, by being over-worked, and losing sight of my ability to organize. I have to take the first steps to introduce order - in this case the ritual of writing - and just suck it up until I am 100% back on track.

2018: September 20th

This song has seemed especially haunting to me lately. There's a cosmic reverie to the lead guitar that  reminds me of Zeppelin at their most mysterious, and also sounds - if you'll pardon the purple - like an impossible gaze into the abyss.

Issue #1 of Batman: Damned blew my expectations out of the water. The story at this point, which is teaming Batman up with John Constantine, begins perfunctory enough. What really seals this one is the art and the format - it's the over-sized magazine size Brubaker and Phillips use for the Criminal Specials, and Lee Bermejo's renditions of everything, especially the design for Batman's suit and his dark depiction of Gotham, are absolutely gorgeous.

Playlist from 9/19:

M83 - Hurry Up, We're Dreaming
Type O Negative - Dead Again
Jóhann Jóhannsson - Mandy OST
Earth - Primitive and Deadly
Angelo Badalamenti - Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me OST


Card of the day:

From the Grimoire: "Not knowing when to stop for the love of the "battle". Loud and clear.