The Cowboy and the Hot Air Balloon

 

BIG thanks to Mr. Brown for cluing me in on the fact that there's a new John Doe record out on the always delightful Fat Possum Records. You can order Fables in a Foreign Land HERE. 

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Watch:

Warning: This trailer may give some plot points away.

  

Michael Shannon in the die-hard tropey creepy neighbor role? SOLD.

 

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Read:

I gave up on the book I've been slogging through for the last few months, Helltown by Jeremy Bates. It's well written, it just did not connect with me. I've moved on to a novel I've been wanting to read for years, and which only recently came back into print via Drugstore Indian Press. 

So far, at only about 200 pages into its 608-page runtime, this is every bit as majestic as I'd expected. Klein needs more credit - he's a master of his craft and appears to be setting up a magnum opus that I'd wager influenced Clive Barker's Great and Secret Show, another of my favorite novels. I'd commented on this edition back when I bought it last year, specifically on my fears for its binding, which for this many pages, seems weak. That said, so far so good. 

Also, it's interesting to note that the first and for a long time only story by Klein I had read, Events At Poroth Farm, seems to have been a short born of the author excising and reworking a section of The Ceremonies, probably due to frustration with the novel in its original form, misgivings he has shared publically on more than one occasion.

Also, it should be noted that in checking out DIP's website, I realized they have also reprinted Klein's most heralded volume, the looooooong OOP Dark Gods, which I plan on ordering ASAP. 

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Playlist:

Yerusalem - The Sublime

The Bronx - II

Guns N' Roses - Appetite For Destruction

Black Sabbath - Technical Ecstasy

Deftones - White Pony

Deftones - Saturday Night Wrist

Blut Aus Nord - Hallucinogen

Bexley - Lost in the Moment EP

Bexley - Eponymous

John Doe - Fables in a Foreign Land

Cypress Hill - III: Temples of Boom

Emma Ruth Rundle and Thou - May Our Chambers Be Full

Def Leppard - Diamond Star Halos

Def Leppard - High 'N' Dry

Bauhaus - In the Flat Field

Allegaeon - Apoptosis

Revocations - Teratogenesis

Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

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Card:

I always equate this particular card with emotional strength and support, so I'm reading this as it pertains to giving someone else the support they will soon need. 

RIP Ray Liotta

RIP Ray Liotta. This is probably my favorite "beating" scene in any mob-related movie.

Bauhaus 2022

 

My friend Eddie over at The Comic Bug attended the Cruel World fest a few weeks ago and it was on a video he shot that I first saw Peter Murphy's new look. Oh my god! These guys were already one of my favorite bands, but seeing Murphy here, I'm blown away. I mean, for a second I was like, "Why is Rob Halford singing for Bauhaus." Then I realized, no, I just hadn't seen a photo of Murphy since... well, probably some time around 2006 when Go Away White was released (an album I still defend vehemently). Anyway, in looking around on youtube, I found alleyc8Cat's channel with this full set. So cool they posted, and in looking at the other videos on the channel, I subscribed immediately. If you dig, give them a like and a follow HERE.

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NCBD:

I'd been wanting to see Jacob Gentry's Broadcast Signal Intrusion for some time now, so when it landed on Shudder recently, I moved it up the queue.     

 

The film takes place in Chicago in 1999, so major props for doing a great job taking me back to that particular time and place. Also, Gentry is very good at lovingly incorporating his cinematic loves in a way that is pleasurable to those who share the same feelings (Videodrome!), and overall, the story and concept are really cool. That said, this film has its share of problems, and despite liking it quite a bit, I have to admit that BSI feels like it ultimately falls flat on knocking down a lot of what it sets up. 

I’m not one who needs explanations - if you read these pages, you know that. However, there’s a certain pact a filmmaker enters with their audience when they introduce certain tropes/concepts into their film. By using certain known plot devices as red herrings, this film feels like it cheats a bit. Tone over substance, and while I’ll always err on the side of tone, elements of this film rub me a bit wrong. Ambiguity is fine unless it's substituted for story, and that's definitely the case here when it comes to anything other than the awesome setup:

"In the late 90s, a video archivist unearths a series of sinister pirate broadcasts and becomes obsessed with discovering the dark conspiracy behind them."

I will say, there are three points in this film where it makes like it’s going to do something so tropey it knows the audience will roll their eyes, then it intentionally doesn’t do that. Those three instances helped BSI gain a lot of ground in my good book, but also made me wonder if the film is that self-aware, couldn’t it have been refined a bit more?

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NCBD:

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Playlist:

Cyndi Lauper - She's So Unusual

Joe Doe - Fables in a Foreign Land

Blut Aus Nord - Disharmonium

Peter Gabriel - Melt

Mastodon - Hushed & Grim

Zombi and Friends - Vol. 1

Zombi -Shape Shift

Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

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Card:

Too tired to interpret this now, so just recording the Pull for posterity's sake.

Moonage Daydream

 

I mean it like it is. Like it sounds.

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Watch:

This. Looks. Incredible. 

I don't think I was even aware this Bowie doc was on the horizon. 

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Dollar Bin:

One of my prized possessions is a beat-up old copy of Marvel Age Annual #2. This pretty much monetarily worthless periodical celebrates the first 25 years of Marvel Comics, and as such, it looks back on many key moments from Marvel Comics, as well as offering little one and two-page spreads that tease upcoming storylines in Captain America and Uncanny X-Men, among other titles. Because I love this book so much as a document of an era in my life, I recently jumped on another Marvel Age when I found it in a Dollar Bin.

Okay, I didn't exactly find this one in a Dollar Bin,  as while I did purchase Marvel Age #44 for $1.00, it was not from a physical shop's bin, but from an eBay seller. Still, cost-wise it counts, and it's timely (see last week's Dollar Bin).

Inside there is pre-release news on the then-upcoming, original eight New Universe titles, as well as articles hyping the Mutant Massacre, G.I.Joe vs. Transformers, and a Spider-Man vs. Wolverine 64-page one-shot special. Pretty cool to go back and read this stuff. Also, the layout and design of all the 1986 Marvel Comics, with their key-character border around the cover image, has always been something I love very much, probably as they lined the shelves at the time I really fell in love with reading comics.

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Playlist:

Alustrium - A Monument to Silence

Yard Act - The Overload

Carpenter Brut - Leather Terror

Tones on Tail - Everything

Mastodon - Hushed and Grim

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Card:

The personification of a lot of issues I've had on my mind after a week-end of consciousness-raising viewing.

7 Days of Ozzy - Day 7: Therapy

 

And for day 7 of our 7 Days of Ozzy, I had to go with something a little bit different. Love the first Infectious Grooves album, and especially this track, which benefits enormously from Ozzy's vocals. I'd say this is similar to Sting's contribution to Dire Straits' "Money for Nothing" - you just can't imagine the chorus being sung by anyone else.

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Watch:

Saturday night Beyondfest & the American Cinematheque held a free advance screening of Chloe Okuno's new film Watcher at the Aero Theatre. Holy smokes - a fantastic psychological thriller with a gut-punch ending. LOVED it! 

The cinematography and direction in this one are fantastic, as are all the performances. The film really gives you a feel for the slow-motion paranoia that upturns Maika Monroe's Julia's life after she moves with her husband to Bucharest - a city she's never been to where most people speak Romanian - a language she doesn't speak. This isolation feeds directly into her paranoia, so you really don't have a sense of what's real and what's imagined in Julia's escalating panic, stoked by the fact that a serial killer stalks the city in the background of their lives.

Afterward, Maika Monroe and Karl Glusman did a Q&A moderated by Heidi Honeycutt. The two stars discussed filming in Romania during the Pandemic, the endless beauty of Bucharest, and how they prepared for the isolation and paranoia of the film. I can't recommend this one enough. 

Distributed by IFC Midnight, Watcher opens wide June 3rd on 500 screens - the company's largest theatrical opening to date.

Then, in keeping with the themes Watcher introduced, K and I took in a matinee of Alex Garland's new film Men.

Bold Horror Statement*: If The Witch and Midsommar kicked off the current zeitgeist resurgance of Folk Horror, Men is it's apex. Not to say it's better than them, but it seems to coelsce so many of the themes and images into an entirely new thing.

 

I'll be seeing this one on the big screen again.

..........

* Props to Shock Waves and Colours of the Dark!

 

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Playlist:

Black Sabbath - Eponymous

Joseph Bishara - Malignant OST

David Lynch - The Big Dream

Sparks - Lil' Beethoven

Mannequin Pussy - Patience

Canadian Rifle - Peaceful Death

Lana Del Rey - Norman Fucking Rockwell

Pale Dian - Narrow birth

Ghost - Impera

Revocation - The Outer Ones

Blut Aus Nord - Disharmonium (Undreamble Abysses)

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Card:

Confirmation on an inkling for investment.

7 Days of Ozzy - Day 6: Suicide Solution Live from the Randy Roads Tribute

 

Because I had to pull something off the Live Randy Roads Tribute Album. Classic.

I remember the first time I heard this - or one of the first times it made an impression beyond, "oh, Ozzy. Cool" - some friends and I were outside at my neighbor's house. This kid was two years younger, rich AF and a total latchkey whose parents' bought him all kinds of shit to make up for the fact that they were never home. They were the first people I knew who had an inground pool, and this thing was huge, with large gazebos on either side of it and a massive wooden deck that ran all the way around the pool and then snaked around the back of the house. This would have been circa Freshman or early Sophomore year. We were smoking cigarettes and drinking Keystone in those gross-ass tall cans it came in. I was buzzed and sitting in a gazebo, staring at the flames on the tiki torches that were staged around the pool at regular intervals. My Tribute dub was playing from a boom box further down the porch but we had it loud, and I remember thinking that I felt like I was there, at the show.

Good memory.

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Watch:

This show is nuts, and I'm happy to see it coming back for a third season.

  

 

All things considered, I'd rather David Fincher return to Mindhunter, but we all know that might not happen. In the words of William DeVaughn, be thankful for what you got. 

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Playlist:

The Mysterines - Reeling

La Hell Gang - Thru Me Again

Anthrax - Attach of the Killer B's

Anthrax - Spreading The Disease

The Jesus Lizard - Goat

Kate Bush - Hounds of Love

Ozzy Osbourne - Tribute (Live)

David Byrne and Brian Eno - Everything That Happens Will Happen Today

Windhand - Eternal Return

Dean Hurley - Analog Resource Vol. 1

Joseph Bishara - Malignant OST

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Card:

Lots of feminine energy, which is good. Ruthless determination can be a bad thing; sometimes passion needs to be tempered and Will focused. And sometimes you need to ask for help.

7 Days of Ozzy - Day 5: Little Dolls

 

While posting yesterday's track, I ended up inadvertently listening to the entire Diary of a Madman album for the first time in, well, in a very long time. And I really enjoyed it, the entire record. 

This is one that kinda got beat to death in my late teens. I dated a girl for three years in/after High School who had two older sisters and they were all HUGE Ozzy fans. So much so that the oldest sister had a boyfriend who kind of modeled his life after Ozzy. His Mustang even had vanity plates that read "Im Ozzy 1" if you can believe that. Anyway, Diary was a staple of our lives, and so I guess it just became associated with that version of me and that time in my life. Nearly thirty years later, I've apparently reclaimed it, free from any nostalgia associated with that particular version of me. Which is pretty cool, to kind of hear something again, for the first time when you knew it so well to begin with. And Little Dolls was a track I don't think ever really clicked with me as being all that great, but last night, hearing it again, listening to the words and that glorious chorus, well, it felt a bit like a small, unimportant (in the grand scheme) epiphany. Which was nice.

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Watch:

Another new flick hitting Shudder at the end of July. Really looking forward to this one:

 

As is my growing custom, I watched the first minute or so, got a feel for how good the cinematography and tone are and then clicked off. Trailers are increasingly frustrating pleasures that are better after you see the movie.

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NCBD Addendum:

A couple things I picked up that I forgot to list or didn't expect to buy:

I still love the entire physical presence of these TMNT "Best of" Books.

A new Shaolin Cowboy book! I read the second series (I think it was the second one), back circa 2015 (I think) and loved it, so when I saw this new number one, I couldn't resist. Will also fill the void left by Orphan and the Five Beasts returns at some undisclosed time in the future, as I just re-read the first arc again, and really loved that, as well. 

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Playlist:

Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

The Mysterines - Reeling

Small Black - Moon Killer (pre-release single)

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Card:

Again? Okay, so seeing this, I went to my Thoth deck to pull a clarifier. Here's what I turned:

It's a little on the nose as an interpretation, however, I take this to mean whatever it is I'm supposed to be learning or picking up on is right in front of my face.