How do you get me to be excited about Sabrina, the Teenage Witch? One word:
SATAN!!!
Defying ALL fucking logic, I absolutely loved the first half of season one, and was pleased as a goat's paunch to hear there's a second half coming on April 5th. The severity of Sabrina's actions in the 8th episode especially sold me, and
I head back home to Chicago for a little over a week tomorrow. VERY excited. This year it is twelve years since I moved, and previously I have only ever gone home in October. Last year when my Uncle Phil passed away I flew home for about a week right after Christmas and realized I actually enjoyed being home in the winter. I wouldn't want to make a yearly habit of it, but there was one night that really made an impact on me. A Sunday, I drove up to the North Side of the city to see my sister and her boyfriend's new apartment. From the South Suburbs where I grew up and my parents still live, that's Lagrange Road to I-55 to the Dan Ryan 90/94. It had just snowed and the trip was stark, desolate and beautiful. I loved the empty trees, the way their branches crosshatch the sky, and the moon irradiates the clouds. I realized I missed winter, in a small way, and when K said she wanted to experience it I was only too happy to book this year's visit in December.
Along with the general vibe I'm interested in exploring in a winter setting, the trip also gives me the opportunity to do something I have wanted to do for years now, namely, film a Drinking with Comics in my old Chicago comic shop, Amazing Fantasy, with two of my best friends, two fellows that, unbeknownst to them, helped me conceive the concept of the show, just by always being the guys who stand around at gatherings with me, drink beer and talk comics. So Sunday, 12/09 we're planning on streaming live to Facebook from Amazing Fantasy in Modena, IL, with Mike Shinabargar and John "The Viking" Bickness. Can NOT wait.
NCBToo many comics out today to go into great detail. Here's my list:
If this is the return of Negan, I will be SO very happy!
Playlist from 12/04:
Opeth - Watershed
David Bowie - Station to Station
Ghost Cop - One Weird Trick
Emma Ruth Rundle - Marked for Death
The Veils - Total Depravity
The Besnard Lakes - The Besnard Lakes are the Roaring Night
Jim Reeves - The Best of Jim Reeves
Recently, I've had a brutal nostalgia for the late 00s. In some ways I find this odd, because that time period is largely a cold, lonely bubble for me. At the same time, I am a person who often enjoys cold, lonely bubbles, and winter always brings that out in me, so I guess this is all right on schedule.
The other thing about the time period in question is, by and large, the late 2000s didn't seem at the time like a hallmark era for new music. There was a definite feeling of lethargy and fraud as the digital file model began to destroy the industry we had known. Looking back now though, there was a lot of good stuff (not as much as now). Just look at a lot of the what's been creeping into these pages the last few weeks and you'll get a taste of what I was listening to during those years: LCD Soundsystem, Underworld, Burial, Kylie, Friendly Fires, Crystal Castles, Arab Strap. Lots of electronic, pop, and dance. I feel like the first decade of the new century, my second and final, ended when I fell back hard into metal, specifically black metal. The interest had been bubbling up again for a few years - Opeth and High on Fire were really the only 'metal' bands I listened to consistently during this time (Type O doesn't really count as the kind of metal I'm talking about and they're always a constant), and then really only closer to year's end. Somewhere around 2009 I got curious and began skulking through the metal sections of the few remaining record stores in the area. I discovered The Ocean Collective's Fluxion, the reissue, and from there it wasn't long until Blut Aus Nord blew my mind and sent me into a progressive Black Metal spiral. But as I said, most of that era was electronic music-oriented for me, and I'm falling back into those sounds pretty hard right now. Especially Burial's 2007 debut, possibly both the most iconic and enigmatic record of the era. Nosing around online for a track to post here, I found this:
I haven't had a chance to watch this documentary yet, but I can't wait to dig into the story of this album, because as I intimated above, I was still under the impression there was a cloud of secrecy around Burial and his music. I knew at some point an actual picture of him made some rounds online, but other than that I know nothing. Also, this is another little tidbit I found that blew my mind.
**
To wrap around back to a topic from a few days ago, during my recent re-watch of 28 Weeks Later, I found that it contains one of the most horrifying sequences I've seen on film. A lot of the horror is created in the camera work, but let's not gloss over directing a crowd this size; the sequence really gives you the feeling of utter helplessness that can accompany being stuck in a surging crowd. I've been there - not on this level, but in my teens I was at a Pantera show at Chicago's Aragon Ballroom where, after the show as everyone filed out of the concert area and down the double stairs that led to the ground floor exit, some stupid with a taser began to send wicked jolts of electricity running through the nuts-to-buts crowd. This was only a year or so after the AC/DC stampede that killed several people, so probably with that fresh in their minds, the crowd began to panic. Luckily, the situation never escalated beyond mere potential for disaster, and we all made it home safe after all.
Here's a little bit of that scene I'm talking about; it will suffer viewed out of context, so I'm really only leaving this here as a frame of reference for what I'm talking about. If it's been a while since you watched it, or if you haven't seen it, 28 Weeks Later is one of the most worthy sequels to a fantastic original film in recent memory, and very much worth your time. Plus, Robert Carlyle:
Playlist from 11/02:
Frank Sinatra - Ultimate Sinatra
Zombie Zombie - A Land For Renegades
Playlist - NIN between live sets (get HERE)
Opeth - Deliverance
Burial - Untrue
David Bowie - Low
Jóhann Jóhannsson - Mandy OST
11/03:
The Music - Eponymous
Burial - Untrue
Arab Strap - The Red Thread
Brainiac - Hissing Prigs in Static Couture
Polvo - Today's Active Lifestyles
Mastodon - Once More Round the Sun
Uniform/The Body - Mental Wounds Not Healing
Perturbator - B-Sides and Remixes, Vol. 1
Card of the day:
Instability. Situations that can lead to hot-tempers. This is a work-related pull, I think so I guess I should be on the look out for things that piss me off here and try to play it cool when I encounter them.
The B&W photography in this video is breathtaking. Directed by Katherine Dieckmann, who did a lot of the breakthrough REM songs back in the early 90s, with DP duties by Jim Denault, who, among many other things, shot more than a few episodes of seminal HBO series Six Feet Under and Carnivále, this video blew me away. Sharon Van Etten's new record Remind Me Tomorrow comes out January 18th, 2019 omg Jagjaguwar; you can pre-order the record and stream Jupiter 4 and another track HERE, and keep in mind, that's barely a month away at this point.
Early last year when Oz Perkin's Blackcoat's Daughter hit Prime streaming, I'd been waiting for the film for what felt like forever. When I finally sat down to watch it, the experience was a touch anti-climatic because, well, I fell asleep. Now, this happens sometimes - more and more often actually - and I never blame the film. The fact of the matter is I wake up while it's still dark out and work long hours and I'm just not able to hang sometimes. But during that viewing, I nodded off, woke up, rewound and finished the film despite my grogginess. And as often happens in situations like this, the movie suffered for it. But again, I'm always hesitant to blame the film when this happens. What I usually do is put the flick on the back burner, wait a good long while, and then try again.
So last night I re-watched Blackcoat's Daughter - formerly titled February (which I think is a much better title, despite the fact I'm not sure why the school would be going on break in February instead of December) - and I'm not entirely sure I think my narcolepsy during that first viewing was my fault. The pacing is slow but that's not really a problem, as some of my favorite horror films are 'slow burns'. This though, I don't know. Maybe the thing that makes me less forgiving is the fact that there is one thing about this film that I think completely ruins it. I don't want to go into spoilers, but there's a casting issue that I call complete bullshit on; the kind of subterfuge that doesn't work at all but was done simply to add a red herring element and keep the audience in the dark until the end. Makes the film fall into the High Tension category for me, where no matter how much I did like about it - and there's plenty, including a pretty powerful final twenty minutes - the film will never 'work' for me because of the filmmaker's reliance on a contrivance that is beneath the quality of the rest of the film.
Oh well. It was very cool however to revisit this and realize that the main girl has gone on to become Sabrina! Very cool surprise.
Playlist from 12/01:
The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir
Judas Priest - Fire Power
Impaled Nazarene - Suomi Finland Perkele
Emma Ruth Rundle - Marked for Death
Card for the day:
And just like that, the cards reflect that after calling myself on my own BS yesterday, I had a killer 2+ hour writing session, made serious headway, and intend on doing the same today.
New Astronoid out February 1st on Blood Music. Saw these guys open for Zeal & Ardor a few months ago. Very good. Can't wait for the album! Thanks to Heaven is an Incubator for tipping me off to the imminent release.
Finally got around to the first movie-and-a-half of my 28 Days double header. We watched 28 Days Later last night; K had never seen it before and it's been a few years for me. This flick is still top of the line for me. I love the way it's shot, I love the cast, and I love the way Alex Garland's story progresses in a very Romero-but-not-Romero way. What I mean by that is, there are plenty of cues from the godfather of the undead: the shopping spree, conflict with other humans, soldiers... the scene where the Ragers infiltrate the soldiers' compound during dinner reminds me so much of Day of the Dead when the zombies are in the mines. But nothing in 28 Days Later feels regurgitated or rehashed. Maybe that's because it's from the perspective of a different country. As similar as our culture is to Britain's, there's a lot of differences that make each distinctly unique, if you look below the facade (Maybe you don't even have to look that deep). Also, I think there's a certain panache to the writing and directing - it's not necessarily because the film was 'big budget'; I'm not even sure it was a big budget at the time of its production. And as an aside, it's been sometime since a layman like I could mentally juxtapose the concepts of 'Big Budget' with 'independent' in cinema, probably because today, unless you're making a pre-franchised flick that will play in China, you're basically not big budget. But that also doesn't make you independent; ask a filmmaker like Joe Begos - a true indie - if he considers half of what people call indie actually indie, chances are he'll say 'Nope.'
Anyway, with the first one down I was raring to get into the sequel, which I'd only seen once, but then we both fell asleep during 28 Weeks Later. Not the movie's fault, it was late. From what I did see, I can attest to the fact that 28 Weeks' opening sequence is just as awesome as it was the first time I saw it, with ramifications that echo very nicely through the film. I hate splitting movies into more than one viewing, but this is a loaner from a friend and I've had it forever, so we'll be finishing it from where we left off, later today.
Heads Up: Mandy just hit Shudder. If you have the service, watch it.
Russ Lippitt, author of the graphic novel Showdown, has a kickstarter going for an awesome board game based on the Showdown series, which revolves around hot rod racing in hell. That description doesn't really do it justice, so for more info, check this out:
Playlist from 11/30:
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Your Funeral... My Trial
Gimes - We Appreciate Power (Single)
The Besnard Lakes - A Coliseum Complex
Electric Youth - Innerworld
Boy Harsher - Country Girl EP
Iggy Pop - The Idiot
Sepultura - Chaos A.D.
Sepultura - Arise
Ghost Cop - One Weird Trick
Sepultura - Beneath the Remains
Emma Ruth Rundle - Marked for Death
This is interesting. I've had a fairly non-productive week, writing-wise. Part of this is work's been a bitch, but... that's not really it at all. Back in early October, I hung out with an old friend for the first time in a while and he told me about Stoneydelivery.com. Yes folks, these are the joys of living in a state that has legalized marijuana. Stoney Delivery is basically the amazon of pot; I ordered some CBD stuff for pain and a vape pen of Sativa while at work one day, around 1:00, and by the time I got home it'd been delivered, free shipping to boot. Now, I'm not a huge pothead. I was when I was younger; most days I skip it simply because I generally don't write while high, and I try to write everyday, so the one cancels out the other, no problem. Also, I detest cannabis culture. No kidding. Hate it. But you can't blame the plant for the cult of garish losers started in its name, so for years my pot consumption has been relegated to two event types: watching movies (especially in the theatre), and listening to music. One of the best musical experiences I've had in recent years was bringing Deftones' Koi No Yokan home the day it came out, smoking, and listening to it laid out on my living room floor, my stereo speakers loud enough to engulf me. Same with QOTSA's ...Like Clockwork.
These days though, even most album releases have become harder to coordinate the time for a stoned first pass through. Apple has changed how I listen to music - not for better or worse mind you, simply altered - and my writing has continued to increase, while my time feels perpetually diminished. So, along comes this delivery service and suddenly I'm smoking pretty much every day. The vape is discreet, consistent, and not overpowering. With the actual pot I have accrued over the years (myriads of different strains left at my place by friends, all kept snug as a bug in a rug inside an Iron Maiden Number of the Beast lunch box; who says irony's dead?), smoking is always a toss up and an inconvenience. First, the building we moved into back in March is a serious 'No Smoking' building, and I'm not the kind of A-hole who will inconvenience others just to make myself happy. What this means is before the vape, I'd have to take a small walk to take a drag or two off my one-hitter. And the effects of the weed itself was always inconsistent because of so many different kinds, so I never really knew if two hits would leave me lackluster and tired or induce a full-on schizophrenic episode. Now though, it's the same every time and once I figured out my preferred dosage, it became easier and easier to partake. Coming off being sick two weeks ago, I'd garnered a fair bit of inertia, the kind that tempted me to return from work and read or sleep or watch a movie - all things I can do while high - instead of walking to my spot to write. Also, I'm nearing the end of the book and there's finish- line anxiety. This week I became lucid and realized I'd found an excuse three out of the five days not to write. And that's bullshit. I call bullshit on myself.
Which leads me, at last, back to the card of the day. As soon as I saw the Six of Cups Pleasure, I wondered if it might actually be a warning against too much pleasure. For clarification I pulled another card and what do you know, my hunch was apparently correct because:
There you go. Lazy is as lazy does.
The good news is, well, look at all this insight. It's good to call yourself out on your own bullshit. Also, I had a pretty good session last night and plan on writing both today and tomorrow (this long-winded reflection is a step in the right direction; notice my blog suffered the last few days as well). But I always dig when the cards are that upfront with me. It keeps me grounded and reinforces there's a reason I do this, you know, because as a method around our conscious mind and all its hang-ups, they work. You just have to listen when they speak.
Wow. Just wow. I saw this dropped last night, stopped everything I was doing, put in headphones and closed my eyes, went off to Grimes World. The textures at work in this song feel three-dimensional, no doubt based on her use of the stereo field, as well as a knack for choosing sounds of all kinds - many not traditionally 'musical', and using them to really fill out the sonic space. If this is any indication of the new album, it is going to be a perfect step forward from Art Angels.
Re-watched Hereditary a couple of nights ago. My god, even though Mandy is probably my favorite film of 2018, this is far and away the best film. It lost none of its ability to traumatize me, and really opened up more interpretation-wise with this second viewing. I'd imagine I'll be talking a lot about this come our 'year's best' episode of The Horror Vision. Two observations:
1) Toni Collette had certainly better at least be nominated for best actress.
2) Watching the deleted scenes, you see how good writer/director Ari Aster is at 'killing his darlings.' Not that any of the deleted scenes were darlings necessarily, but watching what he shot and then removed, you see how he was originally trying to flesh out Peter and Steve's characters more, and how he pulled back and gave us only what we needed. The inclusion of any of those deleted scenes would have, in my opinion, hurt the movie's power, so Aster knew exactly where to draw lines and how to intuit when he had enough.
Pretty impressive for a first movie.
There's some criticism out there that Gabriel Byrne's Steve in particular, is a poorly written, two-dimensional character. I for one disagree. He is exactly what the movie needs him to be. I stuggle with this some time in my own work, the idea of adding more to make sure my point gets across, or to ensure a character is 'fully realized.' Then I watch something like this and see that with restraint great things can come. Spaces in the character can evolve, spaces that draw people in the way the people in their life do. We all interact every day with people we only know in one particular role, or way, and it doesn't diminish their role or strength in our lives. Why wouldn't the same be true for characters in a film?
For a counterpoint, watch Rob Zombie's Halloween - RZ spends so much time ensuring that we understand William Forsythe's Ronnie is white trash that it becomes overkill and, frankly, derails the movie.
Playlist from 11/29:
The Doors - Strange Days
LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
Kylie Minogue - Fever
Cocksure - Be Rich
Emma Ruth Rundle - Marked for Death
Grimes - We Appreciate Power (Single)
The Besnard Lakes - The Besnard Lakes are the Roaring Night
Card of the day:
Another card I see a lot. I'm curious if this convergence of regular cards I've pulled during the year are rallying to clarify a point I've missed?
A few weeks ago Chasms released the single "Divine Illusion." To read about the track on their bandcamp, the revelation that the track was a closing chapter to their shoegaze/industrial sound. What could possibly come next? Well, listen. I don't necessarily know what you call this, other than beautiful. Can't wait for the album. Pre-order HERE on Chasms' bandcamp.
Playlist from 11/27:
Ghost - Meliora
Mastodon - Once More Round the Sun
Mastodon - Emperor of Sand
Lebanon Hanover - Let Them Be Alien
Playlist from 11/28:
LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
Deerhunter - Microcastle
The Doors - Strange Days
Mastodon - Once More Round the Sun
Ghost Cop - One Weird Trick
Thought Gang - Eponymous
I pull A LOT of sevens. I don't know if this was always the case, or if now that, for about the past year I have been doing mostly daily pulls, it's just more obvious. Probably the second. Netzach is one of the Sephiroth I feel a natural inclination to, that one step beyond the perfection of Tipareth, which represented a certain time and place in my life that is now past. This is the Post-Self Number for me, in a way, as I count that bygone time/place as the first real iteration of this version of this ego-scaffolding I call 'me'. Now, what's that mean for today? Well, despite it's negative facade, I don't think this is a negative card at all. I think today's pull is just reminding me I'm Post that previous self, and this in turn will prevent me from doing what has been increasingly tempting to me of late, namely making music. I haven't picked up a guitar in close to two years maybe. Well, there's been maybe two dalliances with the acoustic that sits on a stand in my living room, but that's it. Nothing serious and no intentions. A lot of the music I'm listening to now has been inspiring my musical drive, but it's on Shut Down. I've made the deal with myself that when I finish the book, I'll maybe spend a little time on music.
New Le Butcherettes! Very 90s sounding, not in a bad way. New album comes out February 1st.
New episode of The Horror Vision went up on Sunday. You can find it on Apple, Spotify, and Google Play, as well as at TheHorrorVision.com. This episode is our reaction/interpretation of Luca Guadagnino's Suspiria remake. Other topics include The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Shudder's Dead Wax (which I LOVE), and the Indiegogo for The Barn II, which is fully funded as of 11/21 and now Indemand, which apparently means you can still contribute and secure cool rewards. I still haven't seen the first Barn yet - it's been on the list for at least a year if not two now, so what the hell am I waiting for, right?
NCBD this week isn't as light as last week, but it's light. Check out this gorgeous cover for TMNT 88:
Die! Die! Die! has been hit or miss with me so far, but the opening discussion between two high level US government officials in issue #4 may have permanently endeared this book to me. It's kind of a more violent, more philosophical approach to GIJOE and I find myself wondering if that was the goal. The real shocker here is that Stray Bullets Sunshine and Roses is on issue #40. Where the hell does the time go? It wasn't that long ago that David Lapham's brilliant B&W crime comic had been on hiatus for 9 years and we were jumping at joy with the announcement of its return via Image. Now we're 40 issues in on the second or third volume of this new series. And you know, it's still awesome.
Playlist from 11/27:
Monolord - Rust
Mastodon - Once More 'Round the Sun
Mastodon - Emperor of Sand
The Knife - Silent Shout
Mudhoney - Digital Garbage
Gogol Bordello - Gypsy Punks Unite
Ghost - Infestissumam
Godflesh - Post Self
Card of the day:
Gonna be an emotional day? Doesn't feel that way. There's a passivity here when it's water on water, however the passivity acts as a perfect transformer for other energies, maybe some that lack emotion.
