2018: November 10th

When a Tom Waits jag comes on me like it has of late, usually a Pixies bender isn't far behind. Other than the obvious connections (moments of obvious musical influence, covers, etc), for me this is due to the fact that I discovered and was really into both discographies around the same time. Weird thing though is both are normally summer music to me. That said, it was 88° in LaLaLand yesterday, so summer is never really far behind here during the day.

Although my familiarity with Surfer Rosa has long ago smoothed away many of its deliciously uneven edges, sometimes when I listen to it - like right now as I write this - I really hear it again for the first time and realize what an unbelievably odd record it is. All the Pixies stuff is left-of-center as far as rock music goes, but this one is really, really out there at times. And I love it.

Besides spending the morning listening to The Pixies, I'm re-reading Sam Keith's seminal comic book series The Maxx. God, I love this comic. I was introduced to The Maxx via MTV's mid-90s animation show Oddities, the second season of which was an animated adaptation of the first dozen or so issues. Reading this now, I'm kind of tripping off the fact that every time I go back to the book and read the issues that were adapted, in my head, clear as day, I hear all the actors' voices as I read the lines. It's very cool, and makes these occasional revisits even more spectacular.

We had an excellent episode of Drinking with Comics last night, and I'm hoping to get the episode up on Apple Podcasts this weekend.

Playlist from Friday, 11/09:

Ethyl Meatplow - Happy Days, Sweetheart
Deerhunter - Microcastle
The Chameleons UK - Strange Times

Card of the day:

The aforementioned 88° isn't helping the fires burning in Malibu and spreading to the surrounding areas. If you look to the sky outside our apartment, you can see a hazy orange glow irradiating what is probably most of the greater Los Angeles area by now. Creepy then, that the Ten of Wands comes up. Taken from a website I sometimes turn to for interpretation purposes, "Oppression and restriction, showing the fire on the grounds of the Earth, where they cause an uncontrolled, destructive burning."

2018: November 9th

I'm in an Ethyl Meatplow mood this morning, so I started the day off with their Barry Adamson-produced, 1993 record Happy Days, Sweetheart before I move into Daniel's Pick for the Joup Friday Album. Now, I've had Happy Days for a long time, considered myself a fan of both Meatplow and Carla Bozulich's Geraldine Fibbers, but I guess I've never really dug around on youtube for more stuff by either because I'd never seen this live footage before. This is one for the annals of history folks, 90s underground awesomeness, short-lived but amazing nonetheless. And really, could Carla Bozulich be any hotter than she is in this video?


Playlist from 11/08:

Various Artists - Twin Peaks Limited Event Series Soundtrack
The Chameleons UK - Strange Times
Tom Waits - Bone Machine
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - B-Sides & Rarities Vol. III
Boy Harsher - Country Girl EP
The Body - I Have Fought Against It, But I Can't Any Longer
Jóhann Jóhannson - Mandy OST


Card of the day:

Breakthrough. I've got a meeting this morning that could use one, and a lot of writing to do this weekend that could benefit from my plotting breakthrough from earlier in the week carrying through to a few more smaller epiphanies.

2018: November 8th - New Boy Harsher!

The new album Careful drops February 1st, 2019 on Nude Club Records. 

Had a really nice night just reading in bed for an hour or so last night. The next DwC is tomorrow, and I've a gaggle of stuff to catch up on. First and foremost, as I've already talked yesterday about Blackbird, let me tell you the other new book I'm really hot for right now is Dead Rabbit:

Gerry Duggan and John McCrea. A retired criminal/vigilante thief finds he has to reinstate his life of crime to pay his wife's medical bills. Shit goes wrong. It's great.

Playlist from 11/07:

Algiers - The Underside of Power

Metallica - ... And Justice For All

Deafheaven - From the Kettle Onto the Coil

Briqueville - II
Deafheaven - Ordinary Corrupt Human Love



Card of the day:

This card always speaks of things gone out of control to me. It also reminds me a bit of Ash being taken down by the three mini-Ashes in Army of Darkness. And believe it or not, that seems a pretty good place to start, because a lot of times I understand things better if I run them through a familiar lens, and film is a very familiar lens to me. So, in Army of Darkness, Ash fucks up, tries to play it off and ignore his mistake, and it ends up coming back to haunt him as these three mini-doppelgangers that bite and chew at him. Nothing important. But it's his lack of taking these little nuisances seriously that ends up leading to full-on Evil Ash, who is a Huge threat to him. So, what's the card saying? Take care of the little stuff - don't let it build up, or it will come back three times the size and way more serious. I think that's a health cue for me, specifically pointing to the two problems that persist - my sarcoidosis and my still-not-right left hamstring. I've made serious inroads to finally get back to taking care of both of these, but it's going to take a serious chunk of my already limited time. That's okay. This is a reminder that it's worth it.

2018: November 7th

Exhalants are a band I recently discovered via KXLU. Their 2018 Eponymous album shot to my top ten of the year the first time through, the same way Protomartyr's Under Color of Official Right did four years ago. That's really where comparisons end between those two, although they both hail from a still-vibrant indie scene that hasn't been dashed by The Spectacle's appropriation of the label as a 'genre' that includes bands who dress like they traveled here from 1930s Poland. Exhalants remind me a bit of Shellac, the Jesus Lizard, and an entire smattering of bands from the mid-to-late 90s that comprised the Touch and Go/Drag City/Thrill Jockey scene and made honest, insanely creative music unrestricted by genre trappings or rockstar agendas. Go to their Bandcamp HERE and support this awesome independent band (Hurry - there's only 9 of the random colored 180 gram vinyl editions left of the album because I just bought one).


The Drinking with Comics crew had our pre-show meeting last night. This has become something I always look forward to, as we sit around, drink beer and have dinner and swap books so we can all have read the same stuff for the show. Yesterday Chris brought a new book called Blackbird I had heard of but not read, and I IMMEDIATELY fell in love with it. Look at this art:

I don't buy books just for the art either, which is probably why after looking at #1 upon release last month I passed on it. That said, after reading the first issue last night, I am anxiously awaiting 3PM so I can hit the Comic Bug and pick up my own copy of #1 and #2, which comes out today. Also for NCBD, a continuation of Cullen Bunn's 2014 mini-series The Empty Man. Loved this when it was monthly four years ago, and was always kinda hoping in the back of my mind that it would continue.

Playlist from 11/06:

Ghost Cop - EP
Exhalants - Eponymous
Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles II
Tom Waits - Rain Dogs
Tom Waits - Bone Machine
Tom Waits - Swordfish Trombones
Steve Moore - The Mind's Eye OST

No card today.

2018: November 6th

I'd never heard of Ghost Cop until the most recent newsletter from comic's scribe Warren Ellis, which you can subscribe to HERE and which will make your life better. The Eponymous EP is excellent, really atmospheric electronic music that reminds me of a lot of the more electronically inclined groups and artists I submerged myself in during the 00s. Look for some of that stuff to float back up to the surface of my listening habits.

If you visit Ghost Cop's bandcamp, their new album is up for pre-order.

Lots of Deadwood news yesterday, and as it so happens, the moment K and I finished 31 Days of Horror, we jumped directly back into season 2, so this is perfect timing. This is K's first go-through with Swearengen and the crew, my second or third. I figured out I'd previously watched roughly the first season and a quarter multiple times, but I don't think I've ever gone through the entire cycle more than the first time, which was after it aired. This might be my favorite non-Twin Peaks show folks. Swearengen is easily one of my favorite characters, but the idea of revisiting these folks ten years down the line show continuity wise with a movie is bittersweet; still not sure why HBO/Milch didn't just keep going in the first place. It's always difficult to go home again. Twin Peaks did it well, by becoming something the original show was not. In my head, I consider Season Three of that show more a new 18-hour DavidLynch movie than a revival of Twin Peaks, which it certainly is in some respects but... I digress

Looks like almost the entire cast is coming back for this Deadwood movie, and I don't want to sound like I'm not elated to have a chance to see these folks again, it's just timing, you know? Still, excited.

Playlist from 10/05:

Tom Waits - Rain Dogs
Preoccupations - Eponymous
Preoccupations - New Material
Massive Attack - Mezzanine
Ghost Cop - Eponymous EP
Tom Waits - Mule Variations
Tom Waits - Swordfish Trombones

Card of the day:

Fire of Fire - Pure, communicative leadership. Ideas. Can represent highest idea - again, exactly what I'm aiming at with Shadow Play, and book one is where it starts. It doesn't matter that this is 8 years since I started it (with a year off in the middle, which made me a much better writer), it has to be perfect so it sets up the bigger picture, which is kind of so big - to me - it feels unwieldy.

2018: November 5th

It's been quite some time since I went on an honest-to-goodness Tom Waits kick. Probably the last time was about four years ago when Mr. Brown lent me the 33 1/3 book David Smay penned on Swordfish Trombones. Anyway, I feel a full-on Waits jag coming on, so here's first salvo.

Over the weekend K and I watched the newest Jane Mansfield documentary, Mansfield 66/67. Fantastic! Along with the legendary actress, the film also serves as an exploratory dispatch into Anton Lavey and the Church of Satan, so it's fascinating. I've always bristled at Satanism, which of course has nothing to do with the devil and everything to do with worshipping yourself, which I feel leads to rampant Narcissism. That said, I've also always had a soft spot for Lavey as a public figure. The hilarity that the man instills to those that 'get it' is epic. This is especially apparent in the documentary, as the film spends a lot of time talking about and interviewing people from Mansfield's life about the supposed 'curse' Lavey is said to have put on Jane and her husband at the time (both of whom died in that nasty, Chihuahua-killing cash), all the while showing him dressed in his devil suit, little more than stylized PJs. Lavey was laughing at everyone that took the 'evil' aspect of his publicity push seriously, because he's telling you up front it's a joke by dressing like that.

Not a lot of folks got it though.

Playlist from yesterday:

The Veils - Total Depravity

The Ocean - Phanerozoic I: Palaeozoic

Deafheaven - New Bermuda

Deafheaven - Ordinary Corrupt Human Love

Roni Size - New Forms (disc #1)

Darkness Brings the Cold - Devil Swank, Vol. 1

Card of the day:

Threes are solid numbers, and it takes a foundation to acquire abundance. This is the path I've set myself on; there are SO many distractions vying for our money, my job for the next year is to minimize what I allow myself to purchase because I'm starting to think about the need for a foundation in the physical plane, ie a domicile. 

2018: November 4th

Has it really been two weeks since I saw Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds? That show and the Bad Seed's performance of Shoot Me Down inspired me to pull out the B-Sides and Rarities, three volume box set released back in 2005. It'd been a while since I really dug into this one, so I put the three discs in the ride and have been flirting with it on a somewhat regular basis. I forgot how much I love some of the songs on these discs! Come Into My Sleep is one of my favorites; originally released as a B-Side to (Are You) The One I've Been Waiting For?, from 1997's The Boatman's Call. This is classic Bad Seeds suave - the vibes carry the song, nice slinky bass line from Martyn Casey and Cave's trademark literary lyrics. So good.

On the exact other side of the musical spectrum, Mr. Brown sent me a link to a fantastic article on the 30th anniversary (eek!) of ...And Justice For All. Read it HERE. I might detest the band now, but I didn't then; Justice is where I draw the line, although I seem to waiver between thinking it's genius, and rolling my eyes at four white guys playing like they have sticks up their bums. Either way, it's musical history at this point, and the article's well worth a read. Also, the remaster really brings out the vocal effect Hetfield used on his voice in the verses for Eye of the Beholder, which changes the feel of the song a bit from what you probably know.

Just finished the second issue of Sam Keith's Batman/The Maxx crossover. Man, I think this is shaping up to be a proper sequel - or at least continuation - of the original Maxx/Julie storyline that disappeared after issue #20 of the original Maxx comic. If you read that book and can remember back to the mid-90s, issue #21 jumped ten years into the future, jettisoned Julie and Maxx (for the most part), and focused on an older Sarah, a man named Norbert, and Iago, the giant Banana slug. This new series seems to be following Maxx and Julie several years down the road from that twentieth issue, with Maxx reiterating several times that he had long ago lost contact with Julie. Admittedly, it's probably been six years since my last re-read of the original series, so I might be mixing some of this up. I think I'll start another re-read now, to accompany this new series. If you're curious about the timeline, as always Comic Vine is a great resource. HERE's their page for The Maxx.

And look at this cover gallery for #2.

Playlist from yesterday:

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - B-Sides & Rarities, Disc 3
Matthew Dear - Playlist (culled mostly from Black City)
Kate Bush - The Dreaming
Intronaut - Habitual Levitations (Instilling Words with Tones)
Metallica - ...And Justice For All
Weeknight - Post-Everything
Nine Inch Nails - Bad Witch
Health - Death Magic

Card of the day:

If The Fool is the beginning of the journey, The Magus is the moment the novice becomes acclimated to the idea that the journey is no longer a transitory one, but transformative. This is life, and life is what the cards attempt to guide us through, revealing secrets that are, generally, right in front of our face the entire time. Magick isn't special; for most of us most of the time, it appears magical, like fireworks in the sky, but if you can tap in and pay attention, all the answers are with you, you've just been conditioned to ignore or chosen not to see them. Maybe you've never learned that the answers are even there. The Magus can help.

As usual, I apply my interpretation toward my writing and take this as a signifier that my work on the book goes well; the answers to ALL the continuity problems have always been close at hand, it's just not until I slow down and actually methodically think about the situations and characters that the answers come clear. And for the most part now, they have. With minor re-writing (further proven they were nearby the entire time) I've managed to scrape off the 'passable' patina and find the golden road through the heart of my little story about shadows and reflections wanting to switch places with us.