The Beast Inside

 

I rewatched Kevin Tenney's 1988 classic Night of the Demons the other night, and ever since, Dennis Michael Tenney's closing credits anthem "The Beast Inside" has been stuck in my head. What was it about late 80s Horror flicks practically requiring a rock anthem? Did it begin the year before with Dokken's Dream Warriors, from A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors? Probably. I'd be curious to make or find a list of other flicks from this era that adhere to that trope. I'll bet there are many.

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31 Days of Halloween:

1) VHS 94 (don't waste your time)

2) The Mutilator

3) Demons 

4) Vortex

5) Possession

6) The Black Phone

7) Slumber Party Massacre

8) Antlers

9) No One Gets Out Alive

10) A Nightmare on Elm Street 84*

11) A Nightmare on Elm Street 2010

12) A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors

13) Satan Hates You

14) Night of the Demons

15) Lamb

16) The Company of Wolves

* Followed by The Movies That Made Us: Nightmare on Elm Street; not a Horror flick, but worth noting

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Read:

I've been pretty behind on my reading of late, partially because I've struggled with books I haven't really liked. Here's a breakdown of what I read and liked and what I've decided to give up on.

I was not expecting to dig this as much as I did.  Not since Grant Morrison's 3 years on New X-Men has anyone made the X-Books relevant to me again. Hickman's approach is a genius way of rebooting a major franchise without actually rebooting it, i.e. this new version doesn't eschew the long and varied history of the X-Men, but instead, strikes a vein of gold at that classic continuity's heart that we never knew was there but works perfectly to re-create these characters.

The first past of this two-part (oh why aren't there more?!?) Sandman/Locke and Key crossover came out back in March or April, so I almost missed this second part. I went back and re-read the whole thing in a sitting and was completely blown away. Can we get an ongoing Sandman title written by Joe Hill and illustrated/colored by Gabriel Rodriguez and Jay Fotos? Please? Preferably one that goes back to the days of Morpheus, although, with that line-up, I'd read a Brute and Glob book.

I didn't get a chance to grab these variants, however, I had to post them here just to share their beauty.

Now, onto a HUGE disappointment. Granted, when we're talking Clive Barker, I have to wonder if it's my own baggage that I'm bringing to the table that is preventing me from connecting with this one, however, The Scarlett Gospels just feels... like Barker paid someone else to write this in an approximation of his tone that gets the Horror and Gross shit, but totally misses the nuance.

Lastly, I don't know John Palisano very well, but I consider him one of my favorite people I met while hanging out with the L.A. chapter of the Horror Writer's Association, and his latest novella Glass House proved an interesting experience.

This is, I think, a deeply personal piece of experimental fiction that, through its first-person narrative, really digs into the uncertainty of modern life lived in L.A. I can't say everything about this book worked for me, however, it's a damn interesting trip, with some lovely prose throughout. 

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Playlist:

My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult - Confessions of a Knife

Dennis Michael Tenney - Night of the Demons OST

Type O Negative - October Rust

Type O Negative - World Coming Down

Crowded House - Don't Dream It's Over (single)

Unto Others - Heroin

 

Thanks to my good friend Jacob for turning me onto Unto Others, even though he did so with a degree of hesitation. And I totally understand that. There's something about this band - and from what I've heard especially this new album - that while I like it, leaves a question of authenticity lingering behind it. Maybe that will dissipate, maybe not. It reminds me a lot of Fear Factory, whose records never quite made the impression on me that a live performance at the beginning of their career did (opening support for Sepultura's Chaos A.D. tour). Either way, for the moment, while I'm getting to know Unto Others, I'm digging it, and especially their new album Strength, which was released a few weeks ago on Roadrunner Records and can be purchased HERE.

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Watch:

Hoping to catch this one at some point this weekend:

 

I've begun to get a bit suspicious of A24, and I'm not really sure that's fair. It started with Saint Maud's original trailer, which felt as though it was screaming the proclamation, "THIS IS THE NEXT HEREDITARY!!!" Because of that, I skipped seeing it at the 2020 Drive-in edition of Beyondfest, only to watch it earlier this year when it hit streaming and, turns out, I really liked it. So I don't know what my problem is. Hopefully, Lamb will prove me 100% wrong.

 

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31 Days of Halloween:

1) VHS 94 (don't waste your time)

2) The Mutilator

3) Demons 

4) Vortex

5) Possession

6) The Black Phone

7) Slumber Party Massacre

8) Antlers

9) No One Gets Out Alive

10) Nightmare on Elm Street 84*

11) Nightmare on Elm Street 2010

12) Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors

13) Satan Hates You

14) Night of the Demons

* Followed by The Movies That Made Us: Nightmare on Elm Street; not a Horror flick, but worth noting

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Playlist:

Type O Negative - October Rust

Unto Others - Mana

Unto Others - Strength

Allegaeon - Apoptosis

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Card:

A quiet moment of union amidst an ever-expanding storm of chaos. 

Emma Ruth Rundle - Blooms of Oblivion

 

New music from Emma Ruth Rundle, off the fourth-coming album Engine of Hell. Pre-order HERE.

 

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31 Days of Halloween:

1) VHS 94 (don't waste your time)

2) The Mutilator

3) Demons 

4) Vortex

5) Possession

6) The Black Phone

7) Slumber Party Massacre

8) Antlers

9) No One Gets Out Alive

10) Nightmare on Elm Street 84*

11) Nightmare on Elm Street 2010

* Followed by The Movies That Made Us: Nightmare on Elm Street; not a Horror flick, but worth noting

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Playlist:

The Ritual Howls - Into the Water

Revolting Cocks - Beers, Steers + Queers

Trouble - Snake Eyes (single)

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me

Ghost - Prequelle 

Dr. John - Remedies

King Woman - Celestial Blues

Steve Morse - VFW OST

Type O Negative - Origin of the Feces

Type O Negative - World Coming Down

Type O Negative - October Rust

Specimen - Azoic

The Final Cut - Consumed

The Sisters of Mercy - Floodland

Fields of the Nephilim - The Nephilim

The Wake (US) - Nine Ways

Anthrax - Spreading The Disease

Unto Others - Mana

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Card:

 

Always a welcome image, although I really have no idea how to interpret this at the moment. Things have been slow AF since I returned from Nashville/Chicago. As I write this, it's the first time I've been able to sit down and work on writing. The day job has been difficult, to say the least, and it's draining my creative juices on a pretty much continuous fashion. Ad to that almost a week straight of Beyonfest - NOT complaining - and I just haven't had time to set anything up for success. 

Antlers Ablaze

Some more Type O is appropriate for this Autumn-ish LaLaLand weather we've had since K and I returned from Chicago. 

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NCBD:

This book gets crazier with each freakin' issue. Ghost-powered military weapons, weapons of destruction made from haunted houses, spectral Monopoly dogs. WTF

Kang. 'Nuff said.

I almost skipped the first issue of Maze Book. Then, after subscribing to Jeff Lemire's substack newsletter and getting a "process" entry that detailed how he came up with and executed the look of the book, I ran back out and picked it up. Turns out, I loved that first issue, so I am in!

The penultimate chapter of this cool little throw-back Spidey title. I loved seeing the Puffball Collective in this story, and the last issue sent me running to dig out my copy of Incredible Hulk #377. How cool is that?

The end of this War of the Bounty Hunters series. Pretty cool, but I'll not be continuing on with any more Star Wars books for now.

After reading House of X/Powers of X on the plane last week, I am SO into this new, Jonathan Hickman-revamped X continuity. I won't be picking up most of the ongoing titles, so this is the book for me.

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Watch:

Monday night was closing night for Beyondfest 2021, and they went out big with the world premiere of Guillermo del Toro and Scott Cooper's long-awaited nightmare Antlers. 

My quick, spoiler-free review just went live via The Horror Vision,

That puts my 31 Films of Halloween list here:

1) VHS 94 (don't waste your time)

2) The Mutilator

3) Demons 

4) Vortex

5) Possession

6) The Black Phone

7) Slumber Party Massacre

8) Antlers

9) No One Gets Out Alive

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Playlist:

Dr. John - Gris-Gris

Dr. John - Remedies

Rebirth Brass Band - Why You Worried 'bout Me? (single)

Mastodon - Leviathan

White Lung - Eponymous

White Lung - Sorry

Type O Negative - World Coming Down

To Answer The Black Phone, You Must Walk On Guilded Splinters

A couple of years ago, Mr. Brown turned me onto Gris-Gris, one of the darker Dr. John albums, and it's become a staple of my annual Halloween listening. Check out the album closer, "I Walk on Guilded Splinters" creates a creepy A.F. atmosphere.

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Watch:

Last night was my second night at Santa Monica's Aero Theatre for Beyondfest 2021, where we saw Scott Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill's new film The Black Phone.

Based on a Joe Hill short story from his debut anthology 20th Century Ghosts, Derrickson and Cargill's adaptation is fantastic. It lengths the fairly concise short story without weakening it. In fact, the flick is so strong that, re-reading the story this morning, I'd have to say it's the perfect kind of adaptation that takes nothing away from the story, but stands strong on its own.

In typical Beyondfest fashion, after the credits rolled and the lights came up, we were treated to an hour+ discussion where Mike Flanagan came out and spoke to Cargill and Derrickson about their creative approached to the film, what Joe Hill and his family thought of the adaptation of his story, ("Joe called us and said, ""Yeah, dad liked it.""), and all kinds of other great stuff.

31 Films of Halloween:

1) VHS 94 (don't waste your time)

2) The Mutilator

3) Demons 

4) Vortex

5) Possession

6) The Black Phone

7) Slumber Party Massacre

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Playlist:

Mastodon - Teardrinker (pre-release single)

Sam Hain - November Coming Fire

The High Confessions - Turning Lead Into Gold with the High Confessions

16 - Dream Squasher

My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - Confessions of a Knife

John Carpenter - Lost Themes III: Alive After Death

Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon

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Card:

The cards are re-iterating what they told me yesterday because the event in question is later today. Just keep telling myself, "One and done. One and done."

Possessing the Vortex of Mercy

 

My trip has pushed my October waaay back; I'm only just now starting on any semblance of an attempt to do 31 Days of Halloween. My good friend Missi suggested doing 31 Movies instead of days, that way, I can make up for the days I miss by watching extra on the days I have time. Sounds like a pretty good plan, but before I get into my list, here's an often-overlooked track from Sisters of Mercy's seminal Floodland album, always an October staple in our house.

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Watch:

Last night was my first night of Beyondfest 2021 at Santa Monica's Aero Theatre (The Egyptian is, sadly, still under construction). This will most likely be my last Beyondfest, since we're aiming at completing Operation: Escape From L.A. by April of next year. That said, if I get to keep working for the same company I do now by reconfiguring my position to be solely work-from-home, I might be able to persuade my boss to fly me out next year. One can hope. Anyway, last night we saw Gaspar Noé's new film Vortex. Starring Dario Argento, Françoise Lebrun and Alex Lutz, Vortex is an insanely profound piece of Cinema that painstakingly chronicles the daily lives of an elderly couple in Paris who are slowly succumbing to the Horrors of age. Not a Horror film proper by any imagination, I still think it will easily be the scariest film I've seen in years. I say this because, of course,  I may love Horror flicks, but adulthood and life experience make it pretty hard for a movie to scare me (not impossible, though). What does scare me? Losing my memory, my mind, my youth, and my health. And of course, putting topics like this on display is Noé's bread and butter.

Next up was the West Coast Premiere of the new 4K restoration of Andrzej Zulawski's 1981 classic Possession. I hadn't seen this film until earlier this year - not for lack of trying, mind you - but last night was my third viewing in six months. Seeing Possession with a crowd put an entirely new spin on it for me - while there are obvious absurdities in the film that evoke mild laughter, a lot of the more serious aspects of the failing relationship between Sam Neil's Mark and Isabelle Adjani's Anna came coaxed pretty big laughs from the crowd, and of course, that can be infectious. During my previous two viewings I had interpreted many of these same scenes as dire to the point of anxiety, so it was interesting for a different interpretative lens. That's not to say the entire film had that effect. Quite the contrary. This is a harrowing film, and that sentiment was never very far away,

So, here's the list thus far:

1) VHS 94 (don't waste your time)

2) The Mutilator

3) Demons 

4) Vortex

5) Possession

 

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Playlist:

The Chameleons UK - Strange Times

Crowded House - Eponymous

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me

Black Sabbath - Paranoid

Trust Obey - Fear and Bullets

Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats - Blood Lust

The Sisters of Mercy - Floodland

Deafheaven - Infinite Granite

David Bowie - The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust

Rebirth Brass Band - Why You Worried 'bout Me?

Rebirth Brass Band - Rebirth of New Orleans

Cold Cave - Cherish the Light Years

Motley Crüe - Theatre of Pain

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Card:

The Wheel, in my current mindframe, tells me what I already know: I'm repeating myself. I need to politely step away from a pretty nice opportunity that may come up tomorrow. Tempting, but it's not the road I currently plan on walking. No need to go around and around again, expecting different results.

Monkey Chow Mein

 

I know nothing about the band Cherubs, but the Apple Music algorithm threw this track at me yesterday and I really got into it. From the 2015 album 2 Ynfynyty off Brutal Panda Records.

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NCBD:

I really dug the first issue of Marvel's Alt-Timeline story Dark Ages, so I'm picking up number two!

Funny, there's clearly a 'Dark' aesthetic at work for October over at the House of Ideas. Here's the beginning of this Darkhold storyline which is supposed to feature Dr. Doom pretty front and center. It's been a while since I've read a story with Doom, so this should hit the spot!

The story in this book is pretty bizarre. I don't know that I think the scripts are 100% doing it justice IMO, however, the art reminds me so much of JH Williams III's work on his and Alan Moore's Promethea that I'm enjoying it quite a bit. Look at that cover!

Love this book, so far. You can hear Chris Saunders and I talk about it more in-depth on one of the most recent episodes of A Most Horrible Library Podcast HERE or wherever you listen to Podcasts.

This book gets increasingly addictive with each issue. I can't wait to see how this all plays out.

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Playlist:

Tunic - Quitter

Cherubs - 2 Ynfynyty

Windhand - Soma

Cash Audio - The Orange Sessions

Immortal Lee County Killers - These Bones Will Rise To Love You Again

Gram Parsons - Grievous Angel

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower

Type O Negative - Dead Again

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Card:

Operation: Escape From L.A. is formerly underway at our house, and I feel as though this is a reminder that although the next five months will be hectic as we begin to shed possession and streamline our lives for the move, we need to apply focus and aim for accuracy. If not, I'll end up getting rid of a lot of stuff that might bite me in the ass down the road. Plus, chaotic energy can damage a plan as surely as not having a plan can unravel what should otherwise have structure.

Mastodon's Drinking Tears Again

 

This very well might be my favorite Mastodon song ever. I'm sure some folks will say the band is mellowing I can't wait for Hushed and Grim to drop on October 29th (pre-order HERE).

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Watch:

I was just getting back into town when VHS '94 premiered at Beyondfest yesterday. This one was kind of off my radar for a while - I have mixed feelings about the original VHS series -  overall I do very much enjoy them, but there's no arguing that as the series progresses, the results become an average of diminishing returns. Still, now that this new, 90s-set entry has arrived, I find myself excited to see it. 

VHS '94 hits Shudder tomorrow.

 

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Playlist:

The Allman Brothers - Idlewild South

Windhand - Eponymous

Black Sabbath - Sabotage

Black Sabbath - Children of the Grave

Small Black - Cheap Dreams

Ghost - Hunter's Moon (single)

Mastodon - Teardrinker (single)

Converge and Chelsea Wolfe - Blood Moon

Various - The Devil's Rejects OST

The Black Queen - Infinite Games

Boards of Canada - Geogaddi

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Card:

The last two weeks I have been given over to eating and drinking to excess. Now, who does that sound like to you? Putting things back into a regular routine and moving forward on multiple projects I just haven't had a chance to get to. Still, the temptation is always there, no?

New Converge and Chelsea Wolfe, New Ghost

I've been away traveling so I haven't really been keeping up on ANYTHING I normally post about here. So, in the interest of playing a bit of catch-up, here are the two big tracks that dropped this week - that I know of. The Ghost track is good, but it continues to move them further from the sound they achieved on Infestissumam and Meliora. That said, I'm still super excited for whatever eventual album will be released to accompany the tour they recently announced. 

 Next and more excitingly, here's a track from a forthcoming collaboration album that sees Chelsea Wolfe working with Converge. I had no idea this was coming, but after listening, I can not wait for this album. Thanks to Heaven is an Incubator for posting this a couple of days ago, otherwise, I would have completely missed it.

 

Pre-Order Bloodmoon: I HERE, it drops on November 19th, which is really not all that far away.

 

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NCBD:

I wasn't home to get the books in my pull, however, my second all-time favorite comic shop is the one I spent my 20s going to on the South Side of Chicago. Amazing Fantasy in Frankfort and my good friend Mike Shin set me up with a few things to read while I was in town.

Definitely the end of my interest in this title. The conclusion of Nick Spencer's run and the Kindred Saga was satisfying, but it also showcases the insanely convoluted continuity that weighs heavy on Spidey's main book. Perfect jumping-off point.

A surprise last-minute pick-up. Going forward, I might be trading Spidey for X-Men. The plotting in this new Inferno series - which, why couldn't they just come up with a new name, instead of rehashing the title of my all-time favorite X-Book storyline - is fantastic. I LOVE what Hickman's doing with Moria McTaggert, and what it means to the backstory of these characters. Very cool so far.

Almost missed this one. Look at that JHWIII cover! Hot damn!

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Playlist:

Lots of Billy Joel and lots of Bob Segar, though I've sought none of either out. Both artists appear to be following me.

Cowboy Bebop: All. Bets. Are. Off.

I have been known to make fun of Bob Segar. But I have NEVER made fun of this song. Goddamn does this KICK.

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Watch:

Jesus fucking Christ. How do you follow this? Well, I guess with this:

Thanks to Mr. Brown - these both slipped right by me.

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Playlist:

The Byrds - Full Throttle

Gram Parsons - Archives Vol. 1: Live at the Avalon 1969

Flying Burrito Brothers - Gilded Palace of Sin

Gram Parsons - Grievous Angel

Sleaford Mods - Spare Ribs

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me

Blanket - Modern Escapism (pre-release singles)

Reflections - The Color Clear

Cindy Lauper - She's So Unusual

X- Under the Big Black Sun

Miss Piss - Self Surgery

Emma Ruth Rundle - Marked For Death

Chris Isaak - Heart Shaped World 

The Replacements - Tim

King Woman - Doubt EP

16 Horsepower - Brimstone Rock

Various - The Devil's Rejects 

The Allman Brothers Band - Idlewild South

Palms - Eponymous

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Card:

Direct commentary on all the disparate people I met today in the outskirts of Nashville that 100% convinced me I will most definitely be living here in less than a year.

Type O Negative - Live

As of today, we are officially into my favorite time of the year (even though you'd never know it in LaLaLand)! Here's some live Type O Negative to start the season right.

 

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NCBD:

Once again, here we are - New Comic Book Day. Here's what I'll be picking up/probably picking up:

Not sure I'm picking this one up - I'm looking to shed some of the books I'm reading, and especially after reading this, seems like a good time to jump off. Not that I necessarily believe the veracity of this report, but with Disney running the Xenomorph show now, I don't necessarily think this is out of the question, either. Reading that the other night, I couldn't help picture a "Baby Xenomorph" phenomenon a few years from now. Ugh. I love me some Grogu, but wouldn't want to see anything like that - or any type of 'good guy' Xeno - in any capacity. 

Loving this series.

I've really been enjoying reading a Peter David-penned comic again. Between his epic, years-long run on The Incredible Hulk through the 80s and early 90s, and his creator-owned Fallen Angel series over at DC and then IDW in the 00s - I'll really have to talk about that here again soon because it's criminally unknown - David informed a large aspect of my comic taste, and reading his familiar style feels a bit like a snuggly blanket. 

This second arc of That Texas Blood has been a great mash-up of Texas Noir and spooky occultism, a combination that yields excellent results.

One issue left of The Last Ronin after this one. Such a great take on the kind of anti-utopian, out-of-retirement series first popularized by Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns back in the 80s. A lot of the books since that have applied similar approaches to mainstay characters have merely felt like they were checking the Dark Knight Returns boxes, following Miller's formula. And that works just fine, sometimes. But it's nice to get a book like The Last Ronin, which does not feel like that at all, and yet it still takes me back to what comics felt like when I was reading them 30+ years ago, back when all those dark approaches were first hitting characters that had formerly occupied a decidedly more upbeat or 'positive' approach. 

Still not 100% sold on how long I will follow this new X-Men series, but I'm staying due to that one throw-away shot of the High Evolutionary in issue #1. Here's to hoping he pops up soon, in a more involved capacity. The Evolutionary War remains one of my all-time favorite crossovers - probably because, besides that and the original Inferno, I don't much care for crossovers. Anyway, it isn't that I'm not enjoying this series. As my first window into the new, Jonathan Hickman-designed X-Verse, I'm curious and enjoy 'looking around,' trying to ascertain the new status quo and how it's changed the characters I've known for most of my life. That said, re-reading Grant Morrison's New X-Men a few months back, everything post-Chris Claremont about Mutant Books that isn't penned by Morrison feels a bit... anticlimactic? Is that the way I'd say it? Maybe.

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Playlist:

Type O Negative - October Rust

Type O Negative - Bloody Kisses (Digipak Version)

Plague Bringer (Chicago) - As the Ghosts Collect, The Corpses Rest

Danzig - Eponymous

Boris - No

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Card:

 Many voices, all of which combine to create a world. This is what I do.

Boris & Merzbow Take You on a Journey

 

One of the records I received as the Relapse Records 30th anniversary golden ticket winner that I've only just been able sit down and really listen to is the Boris/Merzbow collaboration 2R0I2P0, which apparently translates to RIP 2020. It's a kind of tough, noisy record, however, there are moments of sheer, sublime majesty within. This is one of those.

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Watch:

 

What the actual f*ck is going on with Ghost? I'm certain these new webisodes are leading up to an album announcement, and I can't wait! Also, I'm enjoying the return to their weird approach to viral marketing they've long been famous for.

 

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Playlist:

Bridge City Sinners - Here's to the Devil

Boris and Merzbow - 2R0I2P0

Bohren and Der Club of Gore - Sunset Mission 

Bohren and Der Club of Gore - Patchouli Blu

Bohren and Der Club of Gore - Piano Nights

Bohren and Der Club of Gore - Dolores

X - Under the Big Black Sun

Russian Circles - Memorial

Kowloon Walled City - Container Ships

Palms - Eponymous

Danizig - Eponymous

Type O Negative - Origin of the Feces

Carpenter Brut - Carpenterbrutlive

Type O Negative - October Rust

 

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Card:

A warning about obscuring things, which perhaps is to remind me about the changes coming over the next year. I'm hedging some bets and need to be sure to keep others' well-being in mind while doing so (this is all work related). 

Straight to You, Beyondfest. Straight to You

I threw on the Bad Seed TeeVee youtube station yesterday afternoon and let various iterations of Mr. Cave and his band/s wash over me while I finished laying out a friend's novel that I've been working on editing. It was a pretty great mix of Nick Cave, ranging from classic Birthday Party live footage to Grinderman to this track, which I've not heard in I don't even know how long. It lifted my day's transition into evening, and I thought I'd share.  

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Watch:

Rejoice, for it is upon us once again!

Beyondfest 2021 tickets went on sale Friday, and luckily I had the day off because it took me two-and-a-half hours to get through the bottleneck on the American Cinematheque's website. I'm out of town for almost half of this year's fest, but there was NO WAY I was going to miss attending this year, as if our plans materialize, I will no longer be a resident of LaLaLand come next year's. 

So what did I get? 

Tickets to the West Coast Premiere of the new 4K presentation of Andrzej Żuławski's 1981 CLASSIC Possession. I am so excited to see this film - which I'd never seen before earlier this year and have now watched twice - on the big screen!

Also, the West Coast Premiere of Scott Derrickson and Robert C. Cargill's Adaptation of Joe Hill's The Black Phone, another film I've been anxiously awaiting. 

That's it for now, however, as always with Beyondfest, there are a pretty extensive number of free, RSVP day-of screenings I'm eyeing, and although it's nice to be back in an actual theatre for this year's fest - last year's was at the Mission Tiki Drive-In out in Montclair - it feels like a loss to have this fest not be at the Egyptian Theatre. That said, with a large portion of this year's films at The Aero, I'm uniquely positioned nearby due to the proximity of my work. So stealing off for a free afternoon screening shouldn't be all that difficult.

Also, holy hell - did you see this?!?

What a cast! Holy cow, I guess I didn't realize we were getting a new GDT film this year, and by the looks of it, this ups the ante even from his previous, the stunning The Shape of Water. Between Beyondfest, now this, and let's not forget Edgar Wright's Last Night in SoHo, the last quarter of 2021 are looking good for theatrical viewings.

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Playlist:

The Hives - Veni Vidi Vicious

Type O Negative - Origin of the Feces

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me

Type O Negative - October Rust

Bridge City Sinners - Here's to the Devil

Sleep - Dopesmoker

Sunn O))) and Boris - Altar

Boris and Merzbow - 2R012PO

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Bad Seed TeeVee Feed

Nico Vega - Lead to the Light

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Card:

Caught between two two major forces, unable to make a decision. Consult the inner voice that arises from introspection. In other words, I'm smart enough to make my decision, I'm just not trusting in my gut.

Monolord - The Weary

I'm not a huge Monolord fan - in fact, I kind of don't understand why I don't like them more than I do based on all the ingredients they create their music with. I think it has a bit to do with how fanatical I am about Windhand, and the fact that you can really only listen to so many Doom/Stoner bands and feel a unique rush from them. Whatever the case, by saying all this, it is definitely not my intention to derate or downplay them. Monolord is a solid fucking band, with a couple really great records. I just get winded listening to them after only a song or two (most of the time).

This new track, however, is fantastic and feels just different enough that maybe this is their release I'll really become hung up on. Either way, Your Time to Shine drops October 29th on Relapse Records, and you can pre-order your copy HERE. 

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Watch:

 

Beyondfest announces their line-up tomorrow. It's 9/29-10/11, so I will be out of town during roughly half of it. I think at this point, the movie I want to see the most is Julia Ducournau's Titane. This is one of those films I have read next to nothing about and the trailer, which I saw on the big screen before The Green Knight last month, looks amazing without telling you anything about the film.

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Playlist:

Perturbator - Dangerous Days

Ghost - Enter Sandman (Cover)

Monolord - The Weary (pre-release single)

Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower

Metallica - Eponymous

White Hex - Gold Nights

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Card:

Affirmation that although I keep rewriting the same damn section of the new book, my efforts are not wasted. 

Control Room in The Obelisk

 

Although I've been able to spin this one a few times since the vinyl arrived about a month ago, I've not had a chance to really sit down and digest Adam Egypt Mortimer's The Obelisk. That changed a bit tonight, where I carved out a small niche of time to read the final issue of Rick Remender and Jerome Opena's Seven to Eternity.

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NCBD:

Pretty mellow week this week, which is how I think it's going to go from now on. Lots of series ending or me jumping off. Here's what's on tap for today:

I'm not 100% on this one, but it's a one-shot and kinda hard to pass up a book on Bouchh, especially when you read the solicitation and realize the armor Lea wore in Jedi came from a pre-existing Bounty Hunter.  Which, of course, makes me ask what was their story? This, apparently, is just that.

This book is a staple of my monthly reading. Love the story, love the art.

The first issue sold me. 

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Watch:

 

I never got around to reading anything past the first trade of this series, and that was a looooong time ago. Since then, and through series like Saga and Paper Girls, I've very much become a Brian K. Vaughn fan. After watching the first episode of the new FX show on Hulu (they dropped three this week, I only had time for one), I'm definitely going to give the show a chance.

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Playlist:

The Plimsouls - Everywhere At Once

Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower

Perturbator - Lustful Sacraments

X - Under the Big Black Sun

High on Fire - Snakes For The Divine

Jerry Cantrell - Brighten (pre-release singles)

The Marias - Superclean, Vol. II EP

Adam Egypt Mortimer - The Obelisk

Bohren and Der Club of Gore - Sunset Mission

 

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Card:

Lots of fortification against encroaching neuroses. Time to find my inner Lion (or cat).

Mastodon - Pushing the Tides

 

New Mastodon before year's end and it's a double-fucking-album! In general, double albums don't work out so well, but Mastodon inspires enough faith in me that I don't think that will be the case with Hushed and Grim, dropping October 29th. Pre-order in the band's store HERE.

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Watch:

Hell, what haven't I watched in the last two weeks? Laid low by what definitely turned out to not be COVID-19, I still spent a week and some change on my couch. I read three books (well, read one and finished reading two others), and watched something like 15 flicks. For most of those, you can see my Letterbxd. What I specifically want to mention here are two readily available new flicks that I absolutely loved, Ben Wheatley's In the Earth, and James Wan's Malignant.

 

I loved this flick. Wheatley seems to never disappoint - I even dug his recent remake of Hitchcock's Rebecca he did for Netflix - and this is a bit of a return to his previous dabblings in UK Occult/Folk Horror, only this time, with a technological twist I found very much needed. Folk Horror is becoming a bit like Steampunk, i.e. there's a checklist of images and themes associated with it, and all a filmmaker needs to do is add those ingredients to produce an entry in what is becoming a somewhat tiresome set of tropes. A Classic Horror Story attempted to do this as well, I believe, but failed, while Wheatley conjures what could easily be seen as a sister-work to some of what Warren Ellis did with his and Declan Shalvey's comic series Injection.

I had no interest in seeing this but changed my mind for review purposes (The Horror Vision's deep-dive on Malignant drops tomorrow). In a nutshell, the only things I liked about the first 33 minutes of this flick were DP Michael Burgess' cinematography and Joseph Bishara's score. Then, around 40 minutes I understood what Wan was doing and totally fell for the film. 

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Playlist:

The Cars - Eponymous

T. Rex - The Slider

Concrete Blonde - Bloodletting

Concrete Blonde - Eponymous

Electric Wizard - Dopethrone

Sleep - The Sciences

Ghost - Prequelle 

Powerplant - People in the Sun

Pearl Jam - Vs.

Emma Ruth Rundle and Thou - May Our Chambers Be Full

An Autumn for Crippled Children - The Long Goodbye

Blut Aus Nord - Hallucinogen

Anthrax - Spreading The Disease

Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower

Mastodon - Pushing the Tides (pre-release single)

Perturbator - Lustful Sacraments

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Card:

This makes sense - I've recently found a new path into the second Shadow Play book, which was very much needed. 

Dreaming of A Dream Away

If you listened to Bret Easton Ellis' The Shards, you know that it ended this week. And if you listened to that ending, you'll know why I posted this song. 

*The counterargument says Bret is referencing Blondie's "Dreaming", but I feel that one mindful comparison between these songs makes it pretty clear that he's referring to this one).

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NCBD:

ASM #73: One left after this. I have NO idea what the hell is about to happen, but I sure as hell am enjoying the build-up. 

Deadly Class #48: Each of the last two issues literally dropped my jaw at one point, so we'll see. My guess is the series will end at 50 and Rick Remender is just being very protective of that fact. There's also a part of me that thinks this might be the end. We'll see. The book definitely feels as though it's winding down, and with it being the last of the original Giant Generator books Remender launched back in 2014 (I think) when he announced his departure from Marvel and sole focus on creator-owned stuff, it definitely feels like we're in the home stretch.

Defenders #2: The first issue was pretty cool, and Javier Rodriguez's art very much reminded me of J.H. Williams III's art on Alan Moore Promethea, which is a HUGE compliment and HUGE pull for me on this one. Rodriguez creates a very interesting and unique visual world, and I can't wait to see more of it.

The Last Ronin #4: At this point, I'm definitely needing a reread of the entire series just to get the proper context for this new issue. I'll end up reading it anyway (I won't be that ill-prepared, as Last Ronin is, at its heart, a classic story archetype, which is why it's so damn fulfilling to begin with), and save the reread for after the next (final) issue hits. 

The Me You Love in the Dark #2: I really loved the set up in issue one, so let's see where this one goes. Rooted in what feels like classic Haunted House tropes, I'm pretty sure this will do anything but hit the standard marks. 

MOTU: Revelation #3: Super tight story so far, a perfect accent to that Netflix series, which I find it hysterical to watch all the MEN cry about its storyline following... gasp! - a girl! Gimmie a break. One of the best things about the new show is I only had to hear "By the Power of Grayskull!" Once. Well, twice, but if you watched it, you know what I mean.

The Nice House on the Lake #4: No idea where this one is going, but I'm really enjoying how it appears to be taking its time, developing the situation through the development of the characters

Star Wars: War of the Bounty Hunters #4: This one's been so-so story-wise, but it makes up for that by being the first comic I've read featuring the one group of SW characters I never get tired of: The Bounty Hunters! (obviously)

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Playlist:

K's Zeal and Ardor Playlist

Miranda Sex Garden - Fairytales of Slavery

K's 60's Playlist

David Essex - Rock On

T. Rex - The Slider

The Cars - Eponymous

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Card:

Moving into a new chapter.