Showing posts with label Massive Attack. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Massive Attack. Show all posts

Friday, April 17, 2026

Tom Waits & Massive Attack! 'Nuff Said!!


Tom Waits and Massive Attack??? Holy Christos - this is... wow. Just wow. 

No idea if this is harbinger to a full collaborative album. Most likely, Waits is on one track from the previously hinted at new Massive Attack album. Either way, listening to this on headphones while I type, this feels like balm for my soul.

You can read more about this single HERE.



Watch:

I finally had the chance to sit down and watch Steven Kostanski's reimagining of Roger Corman's Deathstalker. Not to dismiss a Corman flick from the 80s, but Kostanski's film renders the original irrelevant - especially with how goddamn hung up it is on SA.


The FX here are, as one would expect, top-notch. There are images in this film that unearthed shit from my imagination that must go back to early childhood. In particular, the red "licorice" armor guys. Coppola's Dracula in his wolf armor tickled this same nerve, too, but the feeling I get from Kostanski's work is vestigial. Add to this the surreal touches and odd humor he instills in everything, and we have us a winner.




Read:

About a third of the way through Stephen King's The Drawing of the Three, and it's even better than I remember it being.


"...but it was too late - they were tumbling backward thorugh that doorway, and the droning hum of New York City at night, so familiar and constant you never even heard it unless it wasn;t there anymore, was replaced by the grinding sound of the waves and the grating, questioning voices of dimly seen horrors crawling to and fro on the beach."

In my original discovery of these books, I think the "real world" of the titular three's world (our world) felt like a left turn when I read this, and of course, the year I read this, Wastelands came out, and that book has remained my favorite of the DT books since. Reading book two again now, I'm floored by how this hits the ground running. The whole beach/lobstrosity sequence ("Dad-a-chack? Did-a-chick? Drum-a-chum?") has stayed with me since that first read, and it's every bit as effective now, but the Eddie Dean on the airplane stuff is pure page-turning goodness. I can't wait to get deeper into this one, and the series in general. This is the reread I've been planning for years, and I'm jazzed about doing it now. 




Playlist:

Zombi - Shape Shift
Steve Moore - VFW OST
Liars - Drum's Not Dead
Atticus Derrickson - Black Phone 2 OST
Plague Bringer - As the Ghosts Collect, the Corpses Rest
Corrosion of Conformity - Good God/Baad Man
Steeve Moore - Jimmy & Stiggs OST
Tangerine Dream - Sorcerer OST
Genghis Tron - Dream Weapon
sunn O))) - Loser
Blackbraid - Celestial Womb EP
Massive Attack & Tom Waits - Boots on the Ground (single)
Nine Inch Noize




Card:

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


• Nine of Swords
• XI: Justice (Lust in Thoth)
• Eight of Wands

Nine of Swords = deception. Eleven here is Justice, a primordial urge we lust for in 2026, fighting against the tyrannical mega corporations that define our increasingly suffocating existence. But wait - there's a way out. But it's a formidable act of Will, and not easily achieved from within the belly of this giant, dying machine called society that's bleeding out and drowning us in its blood. 

Monday, December 18, 2023

Protection

 

I woke up with Massive Attack's Protection in my head. A pretty place to be but also an isolated and slightly forlorn one. Tracey Thorn's vocals play as the perfect accompaniment to the haunted music. Hearing this track always evokes the memory of listening to it on a bus in Bath, England, while we waited to find out what happened to another member of our tour that day. The woman never reappeared, and to this day, Protection carries with it the reminder of a now nearly two-decade mystery I will never have the answer to. 

Isn't that a perfect association for this album?




Watch:

I was in Dayton, Ohio, again over the weekend. We left Friday morning and upon returning yesterday evening, I had several packages waiting for me. One of those was my copy of Severin Film's newly restored and released edition of Gianfranco Giagni's 1988 little-known film The Spider Labyrinth.


There's a lot of talk of this being a "Lost Horror Classic," and I guess I can concede that. I liked the film, but classic? Well, not for me. This is kind of Argento-lite; I honestly thought it would be considerably weirder, or perhaps better said, utilize its truly weird portions more. Instead, there's a lot of "investigation runaround" that slows the flick down a bit. But again, still really dug this one, just not sure I'd recommend folks pay the sticker price for it unless you are an absolute Italian completist. 




Read:

I finished Richard Kadrey's The Pale House Devil over the weekend and can 100% recommend it for anyone who digs the "Occult Detective" genre, even if the two main characters, Neuland and Ford are hitmen instead of detectives. Hitmen who specialize in killing supernatural beings. 


This one is creepy and fun as hell, which is kind of Mr. Kadrey's specialty from what I've read of his work. Looking forward to seeing these characters pop up again, as this novella very much sets up the scaffolding for them to return. 




Playlist:

Blut Aus Nord - Disharmonium Nabib
Amigo the Devil - Everything is Fine
Beach House - Thank Your Lucky Stars
Cocteau Twins - Garlands
The Dillinger Escape Plan - Calculating Infinity
The Knife - Silent Shout
Fever Ray - Radical Romantics
Tuneyards - WHOKILL
Baroness - Stone
Mars Red Sky - Dawn of the Dusk
Deftones - Saturday Night Wrist
Brand New - The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me
War Curse - Confession
Calexico - Seasonal Shift




Card:

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


Four cards today because they literally slid out of the deck together almost in this exact positioning. In the case of four, I'm going to do something different and, since there's no clear middle card, I'll be reading left to right.

• Eight of Wands
• Nine of Wands
• Two of Cups
• Three of Cups

It doesn't look like I shuffled this deck very well - it is a brand new one I received for backing Jonathan Grimm's most recent Kickstarter (decks are still available at the link I posted at the top of this section). As far as interpretation goes, we see Transformation and Climax of the Will, followed by Collaboration and Growth of Emotions. I'm not entirely certain how to read that at the moment, but these are good ideas to keep an eye out for as the day passes. 

Saturday, April 1, 2023

Inertia Creeps


I had an unplanned Massive Attack day yesterday and it felt great! For a band - and in the case of Mezzanine specifically - an album that was long-time daily obsessions, it'd been a while since I dove into their murky sonic depths. Felt amazing to return to it and have it feel exactly the same.

Then, later yesterday (I typed this Friday during work), K and I sat down to Yellowjackets and lo and behold - "Inertia Creeps"! This and the use of Radiohead's "Climbing the Walls" - easily my favorite track from OK Computer - more than made up for having to hear papa couch in Season 2 Episode 1.




Watch:

A new Season of Slasher??? Oh wow - check this out:

 

I ADORE the 2021 Flesh & Blood season that Shudder picked up, and now the same creative team is turning their creative energies to Victorian England and what looks like a Jack The Ripper copycat? Sign me up!

Slasher: Ripper starts with two episodes next Thursday, so that means the back half of my week is a Slasher/Yellowjackets combo! 
             



Playlist:

Nabihah Iqbal - Weighing of the Heart
Massive Attack - Mezzanine
Liars - Drum's Not Dead
Motörhead - 1916
         



Wednesday, October 2, 2013

One Song: Protection on Milk Magazine Now

Well-respected Chicago Magazine Milk has gone online and I've got an article on it! I've wanted to do a series of pieces I call "One Song" for some time. The essential idea is I take one song and talk about it in relation to the world around me. First up, Massive Attack's Protection, the dark, brooding title track of the band's 1994 second album of the same name. Read One Song: Protection on Milk here. Then stick around the site and do some more reading. Some marvelous writing therein.

Saturday, May 4, 2013

Massive Attack - Be Thankful for What You Got



Massive Attack - what more is there to say. And there's nothing more to post, cuz I'm out. This feels like a good way to wind down another Saturday night.