The Good, The Bad and the Acid

 

From the forthcoming album Shapes of Midnight, out September 18th on Killer Candy Records. I'd tell you to pre-order HERE, but all formats have been sold out since about three minutes after it went on sale last month. I grabbed mine day-of release from the bezos corp. 

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Either the kidney stone returned (still haven't found a "doctor" that can tell me if it passed, or my fatty liver acted up and I was couch-bound for much of the weekend. So what do you do when you're in mildly agonizing discomfort? Watch the Sergio Leone Spaghetti Westerns, that's what!

I started Saturday with A Fistful of Dollars. I have this one on DVD, and it felt like coming home again, with the scratches on the film and an almost vinyl-like hiss on the soundtrack at times. I watched these with my Dad when I was a kid, and have revisited a few times over the years; they've always remained somewhat holy to me, but I don't often find the time to sit down and give myself over to the unique rhythms of Leone's classic trilogy. 

When I reached For A Few Dollars More, I watched part on DVD, then moved downstairs and had to resort to Prime, which currently includes all of these. I will say, as much as I love the nostalgia of those old DVDs, seeing the restored picture on these... wow. There's just no comparison.

This sequel is probably my favorite of the three. Lee Van Cleef's Col. Mortimer is a fantastic addition, and Leone embraces the first film's popularity and uses the resultant bigger budget wisely. Nothing showy, but you can see the money and the fact that Leone is becoming a better filmmaker.

Now, we get to the best film of the three. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly is a damn masterpiece, and the only thing that gives For A Few Dollars More the upper hand in my heart is that, while it's awesome to watch Leon really up the ante on this third one (the bridge!), I feel like the late-in-the-game Union/Confederacy battle with hundreds of extras could have been cut. Again, I think it's Leone stretching his legs and settling into the role of a Hollywood filmmaker. Eli Wallach's Tuco, however, really helps keep the third movie in the series neck and neck for my favorite. 

Either way, while I'm not happy about being in discomfort and getting next to nothing done all weekend, rewatching these felt like a great reset and recharge. Nothing like reconnecting with something from your deep past. 

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Yesterday I reread Peter Milligan and Kieron Dwyer and Dennis Janke's three-part Dark Knight Dark City that ran through Batman 452-454 in August and September of 1990.

During that initial publication period, I was buying Batman, Detective Comics and the newly launched Legends of the Dark Knight more than ever before. Some of this was still riding the wave of buzz Tim Burton's Batman had generated a year and some odd months prior, and some of it was a succession of storylines within these titles that caught my eye. Even at 14, I had a fairly robust interest in the Occult (still tempered by the dying clinging of religion at that point), so this was a no-brainer. Couple that with the buzz that this series would feature a decidedly more "Adult" version of a pretty goofy character, and Dark Knight Dark City proved similar to J.M. DeMatteis and Mike Zeck's Kraven's Last Hunt in that some of what I found in those pages blew my mind.

18th century devil-cults that  featured Thomas Jefferson as a member? Scantily clad sacrificial victims on black altars? A cartoonish villain that executes innocent security guards with a bullet between the eyes? Batman forced to perform slit a choking baby's throat in an emergency tracheotomy? Zombies????

Of course, all is not as it appears, but the journey to the revelation is quite the ride. This Barbatos (aka Barbathos) would reappear in Grant Morrison's epic seven-year run, which endeared me to it even more. But this dark storyline was possibly the first place I saw Batman run up against such devilish forces, and it thrilled me!

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Playlist:

Marilyn Manson - One Assassination Under God Chapter 2

Zeal and Ardor - Devil Is Fine X

Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats - House By the Grave (single)

Blackbraid - III

Blackbraid - II

Roughly Enforcing Nostalgia - Front Door Doxologies

Servotron - No Room For Humans

Brown Whörnet - Emena Pesticide

The Ocean - Solaris (pre-release singles)

The Ocean - Holocene

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

The Mars Volta - Deloused in the Comatorium

The Caretaker - A Stairway to the Stars

Primus - Frizzle Fry

Man Man - Life Fantastic

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Card:

One from the Thoth deck:

Balance creative fire with ambition and mastery.

New Music from Godflesh!!!

From the forthcoming record Decay, out September 25 on Relapse Records. Pre-order HERE. 

Going back to that health update from Justin K. Broadrick back in early March, this is the penultimate Goflesh record. That gives me chills.

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R.I.P.:

We had an erroneous sneak peek at this post on Wednesday when I pasted in the wrong code, but here's my tribute to Reggie Fucking Banister. R.I.P. 

Back in 2016, I got to briefly say hello to Reggie (from a distance - lots of people and I was extremely concerned with adding to the swarm) on the sidewalk outside L.A.'s Egyptian Theatre. Beyondfest premiered Phantasm: Ravager as part of a double feature with the then-newly restored original Phantasm. I remember reading shortly thereafter that he'd had some health concerns, so maybe ten years on, this was for the best. Either way, sucks to lose such a legend. I always wished we might get a Reggie/Ash crossover at some point when Don Coscarelli began talking about doubling down on Phantasm again in the early 00s. Nothing really came of that, but maybe someday we'll see a comic or something. Either way, I bring it up because Reggie is up there with Campbell for me, as far as 80s Horror Hero Icons.

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Last night K and I went to see the 20th-anniversary 4K restoration of Neil Marshall's 2005 film The Descent. Here's the trailer released in anticipation of this new theatrical run:

As a diehard Dog Soldiers fan from shortly after it hit video in 2002, I'd been waiting for a new Marshall film and was overjoyed that his sophomore film received the huge theatrical rollout his first film should have. I don't necessarily have to agree with the consensus that seems to consider this his best film - I dig it, especially after seeing it again on the big screen 20 years later - but it's no Dog Soldiers. It's always bothered me that I've pretty much never cared for any of Mr. Marshall's subsequent films, but he is a definite craftsman and I always (almost) give them a chance.

Watching this for the second time on the big screen, twenty years later, a couple of things occurred to me:

    A) I don't think I've seen this since its theatrical release in 2006, and considering the impact it had on me then via what I've carried with me since, I think I missed A LOT of subtext and nuance that first time around. 

    B) Much like Open Water, The Descent affects me. I have a thing about tight, underground spaces (never been in one, not wanted to be in one) the same way I have a thing about large bodies of water. The film exploits that - to great effect, and the result is a genuinely visceral experience. Everything from the point in the film where Holly takes point, all those claustrophobic shots of the girls wiggling into and through some of the most insanely tight holes - not gonna use the word passages for anything that small - is tantamount to any fear I reserve from a viewing of Friedkin's The Exorcist. But it's a different kind of fear, one that I feel less in my mind's eye and more in my body. This serves the film well, so that when bones start a'breakin' and blood lettin', I'm already there.

One final note - for a 4K restoration, the film looks fantastic, but the sound is abysmal. Maybe the worst sound I've ever heard in the theatre. The dialogue through the first act of the film - i.e., pre-cave - is buried so deep in the mix of the score I gave up trying. The mix gets a bit better once we're inside the cave, but even then, everything feels like it has a thin layer of sonic gauze over it. Shame, because this is otherwise a five-star film. Not sure if that's a problem with the source that couldn't be fixed or if my theatre somehow dropped the ball with their equipment. Either way, it definitely detracted from the overall experience.

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Playlist:

Steve Moore - Jimmy and Stiggs OST

Carlos Rafael Rivera - They Will Kill You OST

Godflesh - Selfless

The Cramps - RockinnReelinInAucklandNewZealandXXX

The Cramps - A Date with Elvis

Godflesh - Purge

The Cramps - Flamejob

Man Or Astroman? - Intravenous Television Continuum

Godflesh - Living/Ending (single)

The Ocean - Fogdiver

Godflesh - Eponymous

Mastodon - Live at the Aragon

Justin Hamline - This Machine Kills Music

L7 - Hungry for Stink

Sewer Mutant Podcast - Sam Keith Tribute

Jarvis Cocker - Further Complications

Blackbraid - Arte Concert Summer Breeze Live Stream

 Spotlights - Seance E.P.

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Card:

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

• Nine of Cups

• Seven of Swords

• Nine of Swords

Be careful what you wish for? The strategic victory you spent so much time finagling may make things worse.

Definitely a work pull. 

New Music from The Ocean!

From The Ocean's forthcoming record Solaris, out September 25 on Pelagic Records. Pre-order HERE in the States or HERE elsewhere. 

I knew there had been a bit of an exodus from the band within the last year or two, but hadn't seen the new line-up until this weekend when I stumbled on the pre-release singles. Nothing against those who left, but this is the most excitement I've felt for an Ocean release since 2013's Pelagial.

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I say this as someone who checked out on Marvel's MCU pretty much with Civil War, which I wasn’t a very big fan of. I’ve liked some things about a few subsequent films (of which I’ve only seen a few), but overall have been saddened to watch a carefully planned, confident approach to a blockbuster universe become tiresome, meek and rudderless. 

I LOVED Brand New Day and consider it the first Marvel movie I’ve actually liked - one that gave me repeated chills - since Age of Ultron (I really dug Raimi’s Dr. Strange: Multiverse of Madness, but not as a Marvel movie, as a Sam Raimi movie. Regardless, even that didn’t come close). 

I’d go so far as to say Brand New Day is the second best MCU movie thus far, coming in right behind the original Avengers film. Was it long and prone to indulgences? You betcha. But I was here for all of it. Best of all, almost none of the cameos were fan service - they all (mostly) played a role in the overall story. Which, after the exhausting (but not un-fun) Deadpool Loves Wolverine, was nice. I'm still all about street-level Marvel, which basically, at this point, means DD, Frank Castle and Spidey. Would be nice to see something else added to that list eventually, but for now, I'm happy keeping up with this little corner of things.

There are a couple huge ideas/plot points this film intentionally leaves hanging, and I'm a bit bummed that I'll have to wait until all the Avengers: Apocalypse Now Buddy B.S. is over before we likely get another proper Spidey flick. I find myself begrudgingly curious about Dr. Doom and Battleworld, so maybe I'll eat my words and watch that simply to stay in with Spidey's adventures in the "big potatoe" tier of the still hobbling overall MCU. I'd love it if they just left Peter alone and firmly entrenched at street level, but I guess that was never going to happen, so...

All right, Doom. Thrill me.

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Playlist:

Quicksand - Bring on the Psychics

Face to Face - Don't Turn Away

Firewater - Ponzi Scheme

Justin Hamline - This Machine Kills Music

Show Me the Body - Alone Together

Zeal and Ardor - Devil is Fine X

Pigface - Gub

Pigface - Welcome to Mexico Asshole

SOD - Speak English or Die

Anthrax - Cursum Perficio (pre-release singles)

John Carpenter, Cody Carpenter & Daniel Davies - Cathedral

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

The Ocean - Precambrian

Aphex Twin - Richard D. James Album

Various - The (S)hit Factory: Disc 1

Sepultura - Chaos A.D.
Sepultura - The Cloud of Unknowning EP

The Ocean - Pelagial (Instrumental)

The Ocean - Solaris (pre-release singles)

Bohren and the Club der Gore - Sunset Mission

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Card:

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

• Four of Wands

• Six of Pentacles

• Knight of Cups

Completion and success, but at a cost. 

Gatta Morta - Black Hall

Gatta Morta is a new band featuring Buzz Osbourne (Melvins), Jeff Pinkus (The Butthole Surfers, Melvins) Coady Willis (Big Business) and - totally new to me - Clinton Jacob from Chicago band Mr. Phylzzz.  I was unfamiliar with Mr. Phylzzz until Mr. Brown mentioned them to me in relation to news of this EP, which is on sale via Amphetamine Reptile and most likely long sold out. Pre-order whatever is left HERE. If you missed it like I did, you can wait a year or so, and Ipecac will probably put out a version as well.

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Na Hong-jin's Hope looks a bit like another A Quiet Place analog; however, I'd say the similarities are probably how the film secured a wide release in the States and are likely played up for the trailer. Either way, looks pretty rad:

Hoping this one will find its way to me here in Clarksville, but I suppose I'd be amenable to a drive if I have to.

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I finished Stephen King's Wolves of the Calla two nights ago and, after reading the corresponding chapter about the book in Bev Vincent's The Road to the Dark Tower, immediately picked up Dark Tower Book Six: Song of Susannah. 

Here's another one I've only read once, and not since it was first published over twenty years ago. A lot of Wolves... came back to me as I read, but I also retained more of an idea of that novel than I did with this one. I remember King himself making an appearance, but with some of the crosstalk between books that pepper Bev Vincent's handling of these last few, I am getting a sense I remember very little of both this and the final book. 

Song of Susannah is a paltry 400-something pages compared to Book Five's 709 and Book Six's 800+, and that's not a complaint. I still have two Talisman novels to read after this (three once Other Worlds Than These drops in October) and based on a tidbit Vincent mentioned that I'd never heard before - namely that the Crimson King actually first appeared in Insomnia, a book Mr. Brown read when it came out while we were in our Senior Year of High School and I've been curious about since - I think I'll be adding that nearly 800-pager to the year's list. There's a cheap first edition hardcover in an antique store near me that has my name on it. After that, I'm considering rereading The Regulators and then finally diving into Desperation (following the announcement that Sam Raimi will be helming an adaptation of that), both of which I have hardcovers of. There's also the Robin Furth/Jae Lee comics that broaden the overall Dark Tower series, all of which I've read but not since publication.

Shit - I'm exhausted and yet also jazzed just by putting these plans down on paper. 

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Playlist:

The Black Keys - Magic Potion

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Drain - ... Is Your Friend

Secret Chiefs 3 - Book of Horizons

United Future Organization - 3rd Perspective

Carlos Rafael Rivera - They Will Kill You OST

Secret Chiefs 3 - Hurqalya (Second Grand Constitution and Bylaws) 

Ween - God Ween Satan Live (disc 1)

Tomahawk - Eponymous

Burning Witch - Crippled Lucifer (disc 1: Tower)

The Ocean -Phanerozoic  I: Palaeozoic

The Ocean - Solaris (pre-release singles)

Morphine - The Night

Miles Davis - Bitch's Brew

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Card:

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

• 16: The Tower

• 18: The Moon

• Knight of Pentacles

Drawing the Tower has plenty of connotations, just in common with what I'm reading, but aside from that, I can see that I'm in for some ying and yang balancing and possibly some unexpected developments pertaining to my goals, which is great, because things have been tough. My health hasn't been great - it's undetermined whether I've passed this stupid stone, may have another gestating, and there's a persistent discomfort in my left stomach that's freaking me out. All this has left me pretty on edge, run down and just generally morose. Yesterday was different, though, and hopefully the cards herald a change. 

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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I got a late start for 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 I still really dug it. The setting has A LOT to do with winning me over, 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. 

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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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.

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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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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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.

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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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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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

New Music From Sleep!

 

Big Sleep news. Matt Pike is out, replaced by Bubba Dupree of Void. Also, Dale Crover from Melvins on drums? This new track is interesting, but there's a lethargy here that feels a bit ominous. I'll have to wait for the full album. In the meantime, this is being released as a flexi disc along with a Sleep comic book, put out by Third Man Records. You can pre-order the comic HERE. The link to the bundle that includes the music comes up 404, so it's probably sold out.

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From Writer Robert Bolesto and Director Agnieszka Smoczyńska, the team that gave us the delightfully messed up film The Lure (which The Horror Vision and Projexploitation crossed over to cover in great depth HERE):

I can only hope this hits theatres by me, even if it means driving to The Nuart in Nashville. I love that this feels a bit like The Lure, but also strikes me as having similar DNA to Ryan Kruger's Street Trash! There's so much energy on screen, and again, we have someone at work making a trailer who knows how to show us enough to whip us into a frenzy of expectation, but give nothing away.

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Read:

I finished the third book in Stephen King's Dark Tower series, The Wastelands. Still one of my favorites of the series, but it took me longer to read than I anticipated. Next up: Wizard and Glass, the last of the books in the series that I've previously read more than once. 

Once we get past this one, it's all first-time re-reads and not since Wolves of Calla, Song of Susannah and The Dark Tower each released. This endeavor has been a long time coming, and I've still got a pretty good head of steam. 

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Playlist:

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Brian Eno - Ambient 1: Music for Airports

John Carpenter - Lost Themes IV: Noir

Perturbator - The Uncanny Valley

Tomahawk - Oddfellows

Melvins/Helms Alee

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

Boards of Canada - Inferno 

Perturbator - Age of Aquarius

Final Light - Eponymous

Greg Puciato - Mirrorcell

Lard - The Last Temptation of Reid

All Them Witches - House of Mirrors

Converge - Hum of Hurt

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Card:

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

* Seven of Wands

• Page of Cups

* Eight of Wands

Positive results are the result of good communication. That said, it can be difficult to say what needs to be said to achieve those positive results.

As is often the case, I'm not picking up what the cards are putting down at the moment, so this one will sit on my desk until morning, just as a reminder.

New Music From Mastodon!!!

I don't know how I feel about post-Hinds Mastodon, but I'm willing to give it a chance. If this single is any indication, though Hinds will be missed, the band is a survivor.

No word on a new album, but they have a big tour with Deafheaven, so something is coming.

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Watch:

Check this out! Someone has been creating new episodes of the original Transformers cartoon series I grew up with, in an attempt to show Hasbro there is interest in bringing it back. The best part? I looks exactly like the old series and picks up where that final "Head Masters" mini-series left off!

I can't really wrap my head around how this is possible. Are they actually drawing and animating this stuff? Is this AI? The only discrepancies I notice are some of the voices, but even most of those are pretty damn close. 

You can dig in on the Fanatic Film Channel HERE.

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Plastic:

While randomly scrolling through IG last Friday, I discovered that my prayers had been answered. No, he's still alive and in office - I mean the other prayers. Yep - Mattel has finally released an updated MOTU Slime Pit!

Now it's called the Fright Pit - not exactly sure why - but I don't care. I've seen a side-by-side comparison to the original and this is bigger AND has green LED lights! I can't wait to put this thing next to my OG Slime Pit. This is truly my favorite toy ever and something so deeply ingrained in my pscyhe that, well, it's a little weird. 

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Playlist:

Revocation - Netherheaven

Boards of Canada - Inferno

Mastodon - Your Ghost Again (single)

Mastodon - Hushed and Grim

Metallica - Kill 'Em All

Boards of Canada - Campfire Headphase

Slayer - Seasons in the Abyss

Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons

The Sword - Age of Winters

Perturbator - Lustful Sacraments

Blood Mother - Eponymous (pre-release singles)

Mastodon - Your Ghost Again (single)

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me

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Card:

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

• Ace of Cups

• 13: Death

• Five of Pentacles

Emotional breakthroughs bring change, but to fully give over to a change, you have to become unto a chrysalis. Everything must feed that change. 

Holy shit. This is literally an affirmation of something I've been struggling with in Shadow Play Book Two. Something I solved earlier tonight. 

When All Reason Departs, We're Left with an Onslaught

I was stopped cold when I realized the robotic vocal samples in this are direct quotations from Aleister Crowley's Magick: Liber ABA. 

There's a wonderfully dark throughline of spirituality gone awry on this record, and while I feel like I've only just started to scratch the surface, it's proving to have quite a hold on me. I listened to Inferno multiple times in a row yesterday, and each go 'round felt different.

 

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NCBD:

A light week and a welcome respite after last week's financial apocalypse at the store. I never got around to posting a "NCBD Addendum," but let's just say my wallet got hit upside the head. 

Is this new Event Horizon series bi-monthly? I had forgotten all about it. 

Finally caught up on issue 2 last weekend, so I'm primed for a new chapter in Andry, Daniel and House's Seaside Horror tale, Estuary!

DC is relaunching Deadman under the penmanship of Ice Cream Man's W. Maxwell Prince. I have the complete Kelley Jones Deadman on my shelf because it's Kelley Jones, so I'm not necessarily attached to the character. Still, I'm curious.

Love the cover, love the book. Fraction and Jimenez are tearing shit up in their Batman book, and I'm here for it.

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Watch:

I caught the trailer for Adam Wingard's new film, Onslaught, this past Saturday ahead of Backrooms. Looking forward to this one:

Serious (and obvious) Terminator vibes, and I'm okay with that. Wingard is a curious Director; I'm a huge fan of some of his work, other stuff... not so much. This looks like it will be a blast, and I'm not expecting anything other than unmitigated violence.

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Playlist:

Adam Egypt Mortimer - The Obelisk

Émilie Leviensaise-Farrouch - Censor OST

Ian Lynch - All You Need is Death OST

High on Fire - Death is this Communion

High on Fire - Cometh the Storm

Boards of Canada - Inferno

Blut Aus Nord - Ethereal Horizons

Revocation - New Gods, New Masters

Revocation - Netherheaven

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Card:

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

• Six of Wands

• 06: The Lovers

• Nine of Pentacles

Victory comes from a connection, collaboration, but not at the cost of independence. 

The World Becomes Flesh Here in the Backrooms

Friday, Inferno, the first Boards of Canada album in 13 years, came out. I drove to the theatre to see Repo! The Genetic Opera listening to it.

Saturday, I woke up and had a 1:30 PM screening of Kane Parson's Backrooms. I drove to the theatre listening to something else, planning to make my next engagement with Inferno more than just a thirteen-minute dalliance within which I could not fully grasp the entire eighteen-track sequence. Since first being introduced to The Backrooms by good friends circa January 2024, I'd struggled to pinpoint what, exactly, the show reminded me of. While rewatching it last weekend, I realized The Backrooms reminds me of a visual translation of Boards of Canada's music. There's the glitchy, fuzzy, analog technology represented in both, as well as that haunting liminal space, of transition, of between.

When my screening of Backrooms ended, I was shocked to hear "The World Becomes Flesh" from Inferno as the score for the film's end-credit crawl. Not only did that cement my anecdotal theory that Parson (née Pixels) was influenced by BoC's music, but the group held the release date of their first album in thirteen years to coincide with the release of the film.

Wow. Analog ghost worlds, baby. Analog ghost worlds...

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Watch:

Most everything I have to say about this is above. Well, except of course that I really dug the adaptation to the big screen.

Previous YouTuber-to-Director endeavors like Iron Lung and Skinamarink made me a bit nervous, but holy cow, Parsons delivered something that the others, in my opinion, did not.

He turned what is essentially a tone-piece into a cinematic motion picture. One of the best examples of what I'm talking about is character development. I think this was what I was most worried about, but he nailed it. Clarke and Mary are both fantastic characters, and it made Backrooms a much better film than I think anyone expected. This is an unparalleled success, and I can't wait to see where Parsons goes from here. 

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Playlist:

Boy Harsher - Careful

Napalm Death - Resentment Is Always Seismic (A Final Throw of Throes)

Boards of Canada - Inferno

Silent -Modern Hate

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Mother's Milk

Boards of Canada - In a Beautiful Place Out in the Country EP

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Card:

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

• King of Pentacles

• Ace of Swords

• Three of Wands

Earthly matters may dictate much of my life and keep my brain running in the circles of coping with the world, but it only takes a moment of perfect mental clarity (read: vacuity) to kickstart a new adventure free from the confines of the daily 'grind.'

New Music from The Veils!

Another fabulous new track from The Veils. I still haven't seen an announcement pertaining to a new album, but my eyes are open. 

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Watch:

Eli Roth is really hit-or-miss with me. When I first heard about his new film, Ice Cream Man, the person who told me about it described it as an adaptation of W. Maxwell Prince's Horror Anthology comic of the same name, published by Image Comics. Turns out that's not the case; this is a new, original film from Roth. And where, a few years ago, I would have approached a new Roth movie with more trepidation. After Thanksgiving, though, I'm willing to give the guy the benefit of the doubt. I can't say I've cared for anything else he's done movie-wise, but I love to listen to Roth talk, and his short-lived Las Vegas Goreatorium was one of my favorite things when I experienced it circa 2012.

This trailer does a good job of not oversharing or selling, but one thing really got me here - the blood snow angel. So yeah, I'll take two scoops of f*cked up sh*t on a waffle cone, please.  I just hope it tastes as good as that turkey from a few years ago.

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Playlist:

Jóhann Jóhannsson - Mandy OST

sunn O))) - Loser

Flying Lotus - You're Dead

Boy Harsher - Careful

Émilie Leviensaise-Farrouch - Censor OST

Metallica - Kill 'Em All

Iggy Pop - Lust for Life

The Veils - Little White Bird (Fragile World) Single

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Card:

One card from my trusty Thoth deck for tonight, 'cuz I'm tired. 

Read between the lines.

Obsessed with New Music From Anthrax!!!

I knew this was coming today, but I had no idea how great it would be! These guys really just don't slow down. I love the track, which is the lead single from their forthcoming first record in over a decade, Cursum Perficio, due out September 18th. No pre-order yet, but it's coming.

I love the track, especially the production. First listen was on headphones and I recommend it - you can really hear all the instruments and voices in their own space, but expertly mixed. And Frank Bello's bass - man! Sounds so good.

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Watch:

I knew nothing about Curry Barker or his feature film debut, Obsession, going in. All I'd seen was this trailer and an announcement that A24 had tapped him to helm their upcoming Texas Chainsaw Massacre. 

Obsession is a deeply unnerving film. There's definite DNA here from the first Smile film - of which I am definitely a fan - but Barker has a knack for thwarting expectations and really doing something different with some of the tropes you'll think you recognize, but won't. Also, I am a huge fan of sustained tension, and once this film kicks into the tense stuff, it never relents. There aren't many exhales, and there are times when, by manipulating those aforementioned tropes in different and unexpected ways - like say someone standing in a dark corner watching someone else - Barker creates these delirious ripples in the anxiety, to a greatly disorienting effect. 

I walked out of the theatre feeling like I needed to smoke a cigarette (I don't smoke) or take a shower in order to put something between myself and what I'd just endured. That's something special.

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Read:

After the first episode of The Terror: Devil in Silver last week - which we are reviewing weekly on The Horror Vision, first episode HERE - I picked up the source material and blew through it in just a few days. 

Victor Lavelle's The Devil in Silver is an absolute masterpiece; as much an exploration and reflection on humanity, mental health and the failing system we have in this country for Mental Health. It touched me in ways I'm not sure anything has ever. Also, there's a helluva monster involved, but it is kind of secondary to the mental health themes, which Lavelle really shows insight into. He builds extremely strong characters, and I was hooked; I couldn't put it down. I found myself reading while lying around on the couch with the TV on at night, or until I was falling asleep face-first in my iPad. This one derailed me from my Dark Tower for a few extra days after finishing, as it's still echoing in my head. Great feeling. 

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Playlist:

Napalm Death - Resentment is Always Seismic (A Final Throw of Throes)

Blood Mother - Night Fires (single)

Sleep - Sleep's Holy Mountain

Emilie Leviensaise-Farrouch - Censor OST

Iron Maiden - The Number of the Beast

Iron Maiden - Killers

Mascara - Going Postal

Mascara - Hla-11Tf single

Mascara - Cameo Blue Estate EP

Mascara - Eponymous EP

Flower Language - Thrown Into Air

Electric Wizard - Super Coven

Helmet - Aftertaste

Boy Harsher - Careful

Double Life - Indifferent Stars EP

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Card:

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

• Page of Wands

• Four of Swords

• Four of Wands

Will and Intellect. A strong power base or foundation for creating something lasting. A spark from which something sustaining can be created.

Seems like a writing pull, but I'm having trouble matching it up with... oh. Actually. No. I'm not. Can't talk about it yet, but this is a good reminder about a project I'm working on.