Knower - Do Hot Girls Like Chords?

After posting about  Genevieve Artadi last week, my friend Garrett introduced me to the band Knower. While yes, that is a terrible name, this is a fantastic band, and Ms. Artadi provides vocals. I really don't know anything beyond the two tracks Garrett shared with me so far, but I'll be digging today.

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Watch:

I wasn't interested in this one until I saw John Carpenter is doing the score. 

Not a bad looking flick by any means, and odds are I would have gone to see it in the theatre just to go. The movie pass really makes that a no-brainer. But A24 has achieved that same connotation with me that Touchstone Pictures did in the 80s and Fox Searchlight did in the 00s - they have such a specific tone MOST of the time that they begin to feel as though there is an A24 checklist behind the production of each one. Again - there are definite exceptions to this. Most of their BIG releases still feel unique and important. But a lot of the 'fodder' that fills the calendar between those releases feels... rote. Will that be the case here? Well, I don't know, but I'm down for a non-Carpenter film scored by Carpenter, so I'm in.

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Playlist:

Final Light - Eponymous

Oranssi Pazuzu - Muuntautuja

Willie Nelson - Pretty Paper

James Last - Christmas Dancing

Various - I'll Be Home for Christmas

Calexico - Seasonal Shift

Rodney Crowell - Christmas Everywhere

Bing Crosby - Merry Christmas

The Bangles - All Over the Place

Dreamkid - Daggers

The Smashing Pumpkins - Luna (single)

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Extra Acme

Nat "King" Cole - Christmas with Nat King Cole

NIN - Pretty Hate Machine

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Card:

Today's card for study is VII: The Chariot.

Here's what I have written in the Grimoire for this one:

"The Chalice/Grail - origin of ideas (mushroom???) origin of Imagination and with it, Creativity."

This card represents a new idea or path as the outcome of an ordeal. Whereas The Fool is fresh, this is a beginning rooted in what came before, hence the chariot imagery. A vehicle, which can also be a door or method of transport.  Seeing this means you should get excited, but you should also recognize that change is coming.  

Crowley offers this, which I quite like:

"The canopy of the Chariot is the night-sky blue of Binah <THe Great Mother>. The pillars are the four pillars of the Universe, the regiment of Tetragrammaton. The scarlet wheels represent the original energy of Geburah which causes the revolving motion."

It's good to encounter passages like this in The Book of Thoth, as so much of it is nonsensical, Crowley talking a lot to convince everyone how much he knows that we don't. He also equates this card to Cancer, and while I don't traffic in Astrology, he continues, "Cancer is the cardinal sign of the element of Water, and represents the first keen onrush of that element." This fits my own interpretation, so I wanted to double-down and mention it here. 

Better Lovers - Drowning in a Burning World

 

Absolutely LOVING the debut album by Better Lovers, Highly Irresponsible! You can snag the record from the band HERE, or listen on all streaming platforms. This shit will wake you up!

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31 Days of Halloween:

K and I got to see Hereditary on the big screen again last night. My third overall viewing of Ari Aster's breakout debut, and it still totally fucking ROCKS!

The fact that Toni Collete's performance was overlooked by the 'Industry' just solidifies what a pack of cunts they are.

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1) The Killing of a Sacred Deer

2) The Houses October Built (2011)/Texas Chainsaw Massacre (50th-anniversary theatrical screening)

3) Loop Track

4) It's What's Inside/LONGLEGS

5) The Babysitter/Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

6) The Hitcher/Lost Highway

7) GDT's Cabinet of Curiosities: Graveyard Rats

8) V/H/S Beyond

9) Killer Klowns from Outer Space

10) Terrifier 3

11) Summer of '84

12) Rosemary's Baby/Suspiria ('77)

13) Daddy's Head

14) Undead

15) Moloch/Tea Cup (episode 1)/ Evil Dead 2

16) Smile

17) Laura Hasn't Slept/Smile 2

18) Terrifier

19) The House of the Devil - Last Drive-in Presentation (original air date April 26, 2019)

20) The Woods

21) Rob Zombie's 31

22) Carrie 2: The Rage

23) The Bride of Frankenstein (1935)

24) Planet Terror

25) Baron Blood

26) The Blob ('88)/ The Thing/Tremors/Abigail

27) Halloween Kills

28) Over the Garden Wall

29) Hereditary

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NCBD:

Not much on my pull today. In fact, only one book. Is this the best we can do the week of Halloween, publishers? Really?

Okay, then, allow me to talk a bit about some books I picked up while in Chicago over the weekend. As usual, I stopped in at Amazing Fantasy Comics, and so far, my favorite thing I picked up was the first four issues of Horror Anthology Epitaphs From the Abyss.

This is Oni Press's revival of EC Comics, and I wanted to pay special attention to the editorial "mission statement" in the first book:

"From the earliest stages of this project, we've agreed amongst ourselves that it would be a fool's errand to try and produce a knock-off simulacrum of the original EC titles... Instead, we've challenged ourselves to imagine a world where the Comics Code never unceremoniously amputated EC's publishing line at the end of 1955 and, through that lens, what kinds of series and stories EC Comics would be producing for a new generation of readers eager to disturb and discover in the year of 2024."

Talk about the right way to approach an undertaking of this magnitude!!!

Look at these covers, courtesy of Lee Bermejo (issues 2-4) and Andrea Sorrentino (issue 1). Absolutely fantastic, and inside? Well, let's say where the revived Creepshow comic (and show) mostly leaves a lot to be desired, Epitaphs from the Abyss is a great read that takes familiar characteristics of the age we live in and turns them against us (even more than we already do ourselves!). 

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Playlist:

Sumerlands - Dreamkiller 

Revolting Cocks - Beers, Steers and Queers

Various - The Daptone Super Soul Revue LIVE at the Apollo

Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats - Blood Lust

Dinosaur Jr. - Sweep It Into Space

Deafheaven - Infinite Granite

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Card:

Today, we're going to take a look at XX: The Aeon.

From my own personal Grimoire: "The Pivotal Sequence - what comes next is upon you!"

Another note I have that catches my eye right away is "Holography- multiple outcomes contained within a whole."

For Crowley, this card was all about Nuit, arched above Horus, the Crowned and Conquering Child. Nuit is the doorway to the new Aeon. So much of Crowley's work revolved around the Age of Horus. Did it come upon us? Probably. Did it affect us? Definitely, although these kind of subtle energies never manifest as anything as gaudy as a flying saucer landing on the white house lawn or some politician tearing away their flesh to reveal a scaly visage beneath (not yet, anyway). These energies creep in through the back door of the human collective unconscious and change the world by changing us over time. I'm reminded immediately of Donald Tyson's bone-chilling essay, "Enochian Apocalypse" (read it HERE). I'm also reminded that in his Book of Thoth, Crowley has this to say, "... the child Horus is born... he is also solar in character, and is therefore shown coming forth in a golden light." To which I drew an arrow and wrote in the margins oh so long ago, "UFO???"

Now, that's not to say I believe in UFOs (or whatever they're called now), but the idea for the card is something arrives that will change your perception of what is real or possible. The very definition of a new Aeon, eh?

2019: New Track from Upcoming Uniform and The Body Collaboration

This new album from Uniform and The Body is shaping up to be on my year-end list again. Man, these guys really create a sonic space. This sounds like a cosmic Suicide to me, and it juxtaposes nicely with the first track released from the album a few months ago.

Everything That Dies Someday Comes Back drops next Friday on Sacred Bones. Pre-order HERE.

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A few nights ago I received the Ronin Flicks Blu Ray copy of Richard Stanley's Hardware that I fought ordering for about two months and finally gave in to. This is a 4K transfer, and I've gotta tell you, looking at most of the scenes, I can't believe what an outstanding job this turned out to be. Also, the second disc is packed with extras that will probably take me forever to get around to. For $35, this turned out to be a steal.

I won't waste time posting a youtube rip of this beautiful scan here, so instead I'll post the theme song (again), from PIL:



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Playlist from 8/05:

The Budos Band - Burnt Offering
Alice in Chains B-Sides Playlist
Opeth - Heart in Hand (Pre-release single for In Cauda Venemum)
Opeth - Deliverance
Opeth - Damnation
Opeth - Still Life
Alice Donut - The Untidy Suicides of Your Degenerate Children

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Card of the day:

Another spread. I've doubled-down on my Tarot reading, so I'm trying to rebuild a more complex relationship with my deck. To do this, I pulled out Crowley's Book of Thoth and have been re-familiarizing myself with the cross-relationship between the Thoth Deck and the Kabbalistic Tree of Life.

This spread then, largely introduces the idea that after moving on from the Queen of Swords and her perceptive but possibly misguided analysis, there is a futility with new ideas being sluggish, and uncooperative (the Knight of Disks). From Crowley, "These three cards (speaking here not of the three that I drew, but Atu XIII Death, XIV Art, and The Devil) may therefore be summed up as a hieroglyph of the processes by which idea manifests as a form."

No lie, I have two almost-finished short stories that are rooted in, what I feel, are really cool ideas, and which start and unfold in a way I am very happy with, but which I cannot end, and which have become more and more sluggish (again the Knight) as I try to resolve the problem. This means, whenever I'm thinking, especially of writing, I have two huge open loops distracting me. I don't want to take the time off from Ciazarn, but I very much need to address this soon, or I'm just collecting psychic debris, falling more and more out of tune myself; becoming the Knight of Disks.

No Thanks.