Eagulls - Tough Luck

Man, I feel like the world was a better place when Eagulls were still making music. I never saw anything that explicitly stated they'd broken up, but 2016's Ullages feels like a looong time ago. Maybe one day they will heroically swoop in from the Post Punk aether and bring us another ten or eleven-track album of raw, angry British fire. Until then, love what they gave us.

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Watch:

This past Saturday, I had an impromptu French Zombie film double feature that began with a first-time watch of Yannick Dahan's 2009 IFC-released The Horde. Holy smokes, this movie is an adrenaline roller coaster:

I loved everything about this one, and can only marvel at the fact that other than my cohost Butcher on The Horror Vision, I don't remember hearing anybody talk about this one. Available right now on Tubi, this is SO worth your time, even if, like me, you fancy yourself 'over' the Zombie thing. La Horde is like 28 Days Later on weapons-grade meth. All the performances are intense, the set design is fantastic, and the characters are endearingly repulsive. Streaming right now on Tubi, but I'm definitely ordering the DVD soon (the bluray is OOP and pricey in the aftermarket).

When The Horde ended, I needed something to cool down with, so I went entirely the opposite route and re-watched Dominique Rocher's 2018 The Night Eats The World, which is currently on Prime.

 

This film definitely takes its cues from Romero's Dawn of the Dead, using one character to explore the quiet, sad side of a zombie apocalypse. This one's a bit of a heartbreaker at times, but its portrayal of human frailty is a beautiful reminder of the social aspects of our species and what would happen if we lost all access to other people. To this end, Anders Danielsen Lie gives a riveting performance.

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Playlist:

Witchfinder - Hazy Rites

Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower

X - Los Angeles

QOTSA - In Times New Roman

Steve Moore - Christmas Bloody Christmas OST

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me

Type O Negative - The Least Worst Of

PC World - At Heaven's Gate (pre-release single)

Skinny Puppy - Last Rights

Mars Red Sky - Eponymous

Intronaut - Habitual Levitations (Instilling Words with Tones)

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Oracle:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE. Just a reminder that Grimm's new Tarot Deck, The Hand of Doom Tarot, is both gorgeous and live on Kickstarter right now. Here's the LINK.

• Eight of Swords

• XIX - The Sun

• Nine of Cups

Eight of Swords often indicates change through conflict. Couple that with revelations promised by The Sun, and the Climactic, Emotional moment, and I think this pull is meant for someone I know who has been doing  A LOT of incredible self-discovery of late. 

Porridge Radio - Sweet

From Every Bad, out on Secretly Canadian March 13th. Pre-order HERE.

My cousin Charles turned me on to Porridge Radio while I was in Chicago, and they made a huge impression pretty much from the moment he hit play on "Sweet." I immediately felt an Eagulls vibe from their music, and being that lately, I've had frequent lapses into "Where are they now?" reveries concerning that band, this comes at just the right moment.


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The good folks at Omnium Gatherum - publishers of Robert Payne Cabeen's brilliant novel Cold Cuts, just put up a cool title sequence and I had to post it. Love this.



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It's time once again for...

Season Four, Episode Six, "Sanguinarium" guest stars Richard Beymer and puts him at the heart of a Medical Coven of Black Magick Practitioners. That sounds a bit mixed up, but keep in mind, this is back in the days when television writing didn't have to do super accurate research on things like Black Magick, witches, etc., in order to incorporate them into a major network show. Thus, a lot of lore gets its wires crossed. That's fine for the era, but would no doubt be chased out of town today (ever read an article by one of the Occult practitioners who rally against Hereditary for the allowances the film makes with Paimon?). "Sanguinarium" is a pretty cool episode that takes Mulder and Scully through a world that is equal parts plastic surgery and black magick, and its bloody, a bit more gorey than I would have expected, and fun. Plus, Ben Horne. Always a win.

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Playlist:

Antemasque - Eponymous
Talking Heads - Remain in Light
Lloyd Cole and the Commotions - Mainstream
Porridge Radio - Every Bad (pre-release singles)
Porridge Radio - Rice, Pasta, and Other Fillers
20 Watt Tombstone - Wisco Disco
Algiers - There is No Year
The Great Old Ones - Cosmscism
Barry Adamson - As Above So Below
Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats - Wasteland
Ulver - Nattens Madrigal
Ulver - Teachings in Silence

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No Card today.

2018: July 9th

I had a notice in Google to 'rediscover this day' for June 24, 2016 - two years since I saw Eagulls at the Teragram Ballroom in DTLA. That means it's just over two years since Ullages came out, so hopefully these lads have a new record in the wings. I'd like that very much. In the meantime, HERE is the Google Link to my very mediocre photos of the show (I share these merely for posterity's sake, and have never claimed to be any kind of photographer).

I finished Lauren Groff's The Monsters of Templeton over the weekend. Very good novel; first thing I'd categorize as "East Coast Lit" that I've read in a while. No genre trappings at all; nothing wrong with genre, in fact, I guess you could say that 'lit' is kind of a genre to me. The idea comes from working in a book store for five years - I read voraciously and definitely began to see a difference in what was in the Fiction/Lit section and what was in the various genre sections. And of course this isn't a blanket policy. But, you know, William S. Burroughs' Science Fiction is different from John Scalzy's. Neither is better than the other, they just come from different angles. Or, all that's shite. This is the inner workings of my own head, don't think I'm subjugating anyone else with these parameters.

Anyway, it really put me back in a lit frame of mind - I've put off reading almost anything I'd categorize that way for years, from the time I began to write heavily plotted material I considered more genre than anything. Irvine Welsh has released four or five novels in that time and although he's one of my favorite writers, I've avoided them completely. However, after Monsters fired me up again on the lit 'flavor', I broke out Norman Mailer's The Deer Park. This a novel I've had on the shelf for some time. From the first sentence I was in love; The Deer Park is kind of The Great Gatsby in the Southern California desert, a tale of the vices of 1950's Hollywood that has Fitzgerald written all over it. I love it. And I know Gatsby isn't Fitz's Hollywood novel, but there are HUGE similarities, especially, it seems, with contemplations of morality.

The playlist from 7/08/18 was a short one:

Anthrax - Sound of White Noise
Johnny Jewel - Digital Rain
Chromatics - Night Drive


Card of the day:

From the grimoire: "Can represent desire for rebirth or a new beginning." Interesting that I've started the new short I'm working on, "Please Believe Me," three times already, slightly tweaking the way I bring the reader into the world. And it's been a journey so far, a lot of subtle changes in the way I present the characters.

2018: May 17th 6:59 AM

Yesterday I dug out Eagulls' second album, Ullages, for the first time in quite a while. I really liked the album when it came out, but it was somewhat the wrong time for me to fully invest in it - I was still riding too high on the frenetic burst of their debut, and the dour vibe, while glorious, was perhaps too much of a downer at the time. Enjoying sadness can be tricky, and definitely requires a particular mindset; without that mindset there is no enjoyment, only Zoul. I mean, there isn't a proper enjoyment, more of a sulking. For me at least.

I stuck to it though, and it helped me process the tracks in a different context when I saw the band live about a month after Ullages came out; the band absolutely killed it, and all the new songs sounded fantastic, intermixed with tracks from the first record to inject a bit of pep and throb amidst the otherwise seriously downtempo tone. Going back to the record now, after some time away and inherent expectations have faded, I'm falling into the sullen British craft of the record and it feels exquisite.

Playlist from yesterday:

Jamiroquai - Return of the Space Cowboy
Eagulls - Eponymous
The Mars Volta - Deloused in the Comatorium
Eagulls - Ullages
Nachtmystium - Addicts: Black Meddle Pt. 2
Nachtmystium - Silencing Machine

Card of the day:

From the Grimoire, "Overcoming opposites - attraction. Recognizing what belongs together - union."

Check. A confirmation that K and I need to carve out a little more time together, as of late it's been difficult, with her Mom fully moved in and my writing constantly. Her birthday is tomorrow, and I intend to make this a very special weekend.

Tennis System - Such a Drag

Seeing these guys and Adult Books open for Eagulls tomorrow night. Psyched.

Eagulls - Velvet Official Music Video

The second Eagulls record caught me by a bit of a surprise; the band's 2014 eponymous debut is a frenetic celebration/re-appropriation of late 70s/early 80s Post-Punk sounds, most especially The Cure's Pornography. New record Ullages is considerably more down-tempo and depressing. In a GOOD way. Where the debut is still a bit more accessible Ullages is growing on me - not that I didn't like it to begin with, but it tends to usher in a bit of a Pall over my mood. Well, today was a completely rainy, overcast day in LA and as such this record fit perfect. Which reminded me they released a video recently that I hadn't gotten around to seeing.

Eagulls Cover Stone Roses

Mr. Brown forwarded this to me a while ago but I've been so busy and admittedly pretty flighty in my down time as a result so I'm just getting around to this now. Eagulls are fantastic, and although I'm not the world's biggest Stone Roses fan I am a fan, particularly of this song. So it's a match made in heaven really.

My Top Ten Albums of 2014

Tuneyards's Nikki-Nack is #1and Protomartyr and Jenny Lewis make an appearance. Read the full list over on Joup! Then go over and read Tommy's from Heaven is an Incubator, also on Joup!

Eagulls - Live Performance on KEXP

Okay, I hate to use genre monikers, especially when you get into sub genres, as I'm about to, however there are a few of these that I find extremely helpful and on the nose when discussing similarities between certain bands/scenes. One is Post-Punk. I know, usually you slap "post" on anything and it immediately sounds pretentious. That's fine; pretension is sometimes warranted and sometimes good. ESPECIALLY when discussing Post-Punk groups such as Gang of Four, Bauhaus, Savages, Wire, The Teardrop Explodes and Magazine. There's been quite a resurgence in Post-Punk these last couple of years and Eagulls definitely fits into it. Expect more of these guys here; like I said earlier, I am in hardcore love with this record.

Eagulls - Soulless Youth

I am absolutely in LOVE with Eagulls debut 2014 record. Oh my. As Mr. Brown said after sending this my way, they'd make a great double bill with Savages.