The Kills Live From The Basement!!!

 

"Mutha fucka must'a thought it was live music week. It ain't live music week, is it Marty?" 

"Yeah, man. It's live music week." 

Well, Marty and Drexel have spoken. It's live music week. Here's a nice, tight live set from The Kills, originally published on the From The Basement youtube channel, which you should definitely check out and subscribe to HERE.

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NCBD:

My picks for this week's NCBD:

After last week's Hellfire Gala, well, shit. I can't wait to see this. I'll admit, I did not expect the landscape of X to be so completely changed in just one issue. Looking at a lot of the books launching after this, I'm not super interested in how the X Bullpen is choosing to explore this new playing field, however, I maintain my hopes that the core books will continue to turn out awesome entries into this aptly named Fall of X saga on a monthly basis.

The final issue of TMNT's The Last Ronin: Lost Years. In comics, possible future spin-offs are pretty common, and in general, I'd say I'm a fan. That said, there's so much of this kind of story out there, it feels a little overdone these days, and I tend to stay away from them. In TMNT's case, I really feel like they did it right. I don't know if I need a constant line of these Last Ronin stories, but I'd definitely be up to revisit the world again at a future date.

A Thessaly one-shot written by James Tynion? Yeah, sure. I want that. Thessaly's always been a Sandman Universe character that fascinates me. She's brutal and sexy and seemingly has no fear, which always makes her showing up a bit fretful for the characters already in play in any given story. Since this ties into the current Nightmare Country storyline, I'm curious to see whose blood Thessaly spills. Also, curious to see her and The Corinthian interact, as I can't remember off the top of my head if that's ever happened before.

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Read:

I finished my re-read of Stephan Graham Jones's My Heart is a Chainsaw yesterday and immediately jumped into this year's sequel, Don't Fear the Reaper. It's funny - last year when Chainsaw came out, I was sick, home from work for a week, and read it in three days. This year, I'm not only working, but hammering out a novel, so I had to read it more piecemeal. Didn't affect the sheer joy the novel inspires in me, but I also wanted to state it out loud, so no one out there reading this thinks Chainsaw is anything but one of the greatest Horror novels since Pet Semetery. 

Only a couple chapters in so far, and I already can feel I am standing at the precipice of a masterpiece. I don't know how I can love the sequel more - and I don't want to jinx it - but the broadening scope Jones starts laying out in Chapter Two: Dark South Mill has me positively giddy with excitement at where the novel will go.

 

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Playlist:

Underworld - Beaucoup Fish

The Kills - Live From the Basement

Arctic Monkeys - The Car (thanks Josh!)

Goblin - 2013 Tour E.P.

Zombi - Shape Shift

Mammon XV - Woes and Winter's Breath

Silent - Modern Hate

Meg Myers - Sorry

Steely Dan - Aja

Calexico - The Black Light

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• IV: The Emperor

• V: The Hierophant

• Page of Cups

Decisiveness in the face of dogma and institutions we adhere to in our daily lives. In other words, decide against the grain of the life I've set up

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Duration:

I've kind of messed up the days I'm doing this report, and this is a week old now, so I'll post the current report tomorrow.

Better. Not great, but better than last week, and I'm making leaps and bounds in the actual mechanics of the ending, which again is known, but not yet written. I've gone back through the entire novel, shoring things up, installing alignments that will hopefully carry me into a successful first draft of that ending.

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Alice Donut - Mother of Christ Live

From Alice Donut's 1994 Live at CBGB's album Dry Humping the Cash Cow. Fantastic double-disc capture of Donut in their prime. Mr. Brown gifted me this on vinyl and a few years ago and from first listen, the recording and performance blew me away. I wish I would have seen Alice Donut live, but alas, that never happened. I don't know their discography nearly as well as I should, with a large part of my time with the band having been eaten up by a preoccupation that bordered on obsession for a while in the late 90s with their 1992 masterpiece The Untidy Suicides of Your Degenerate Children, which is start to finish, one of the best and most underrated albums of the 90s.

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Watch:

I've been waiting for Stewart Thorndike's Bad Things to hit Shudder since reading an article in the most recent issue of Fangoria. I wasn't the biggest fan of Thorndike's 2014 film Lyle, but I definitely liked it and felt as though, my opinion aside, this was a director to watch.

 

This flick looks unnerving as hell, and all the references I keep seeing to Gayle Rankin's performance evoking Jack Torrance, well, sign me up.            

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Playlist:

Sigur Rós - Ágœtis Byrjun

Dungen - Ta Det Lugnt

Boards of Canada - Tomorrow's Harvest

Alice Donut - Dry Humping the Cash Cow

The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast - S7E21: The Top of the Heap

Metallica - 72 Seasons

Odonis Odonis - Post Plague

Deftones - Koi No Yokan

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Card:

• III: The Empress

• 0: The Fool

• XIII: Death

Lots of BIG influences are afoot today. Keeping my eyes open for signs to the contrary, but this seems to suggest a fork in the path; institution vs. change.

 

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Beaucoup Fish

 

I cracked out the Underworld the other day for a writing session and got to wondering where the seemingly found-sound sample at the beginning of Beaucoup Fish's track "Jumbo" came from. Leave it Reddit to supply an answer. From a Drowned in Sound interview with Karl Hyde from 2010, you can read all about it HERE (the specific reference to the sample is in the final paragraph of the interview).

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Watch:

I have this list of things friends recommend to me. I always feel a bit bad, because it sometimes takes me years to get around to a lot of it. But I do try to get around to as much of it as I can. Case in point: it's gotta be three years since Mr. Brown recommended HBO's Painting with John, a short-episode show where Lounge Lizards co-founder and Jim Jarmusch regular John Lurie pontificates on everything from New York to sunsets to Barry White, all while working on his iconic watercolor paintings. Here's a trailer:

   

I put this one last night when it was too late to start a movie, and K and I both kind of fell in love with the show. Lurie has fascinated me, ever since Mr. Brown gifted me No Pain For Cakes, the Lounge Lizards 1987 album that just hit me at the exact right time. Painting with John has kind of done exactly the same thing.

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Playlist:

Jóhann Jóhannsson - Mandy OST

Haunt Me - Dying in Your Arms

Jed Kurzel - The Babadook OST

Jammes Luckett - May OST

Sandrider - Godhead

Metallica - 72 Seasons

Spotlights - Seance EP

A001 - Necro (single)

Brand New - Science Fiction

Underworld - Beaucoup Fish

Underworld - Riverrun Project

Godflesh - Purge

Secret Chiefs 3 - Le mani destre recise degli ultimi uomini

Naked Raygun - Over the Overlords

Etta James - Third Album

Low Cut Connie - Tough Cookies: Best of the Quarantine Broadcasts

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Talk to Me

 

Another new Ghost of Vroom track dropped two days ago, and it's probably my second favorite from the pre-release singles for the upcoming album Ghost of Vroom 3, out September 1st on Mod y Vi Records. You can pre-order the vinyl from Doughty's website HERE.

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Watch:

Last night K and I saw Talk to Me at the local theatre. I am still thinking about it. This was one of those films that afterward, I didn't come home, open a beer and throw something else on. I dug right into those articles in the new issue of Fangoria that I'd been saving. 

Luckily, after seeing the trailer back when it first hit the internet, I have not watched it since, so I barely even remembered anything about this one. There's hype building around it that's turning some folks off, but I'm here to tell you, that hype is deserved. I've seen Beyondfest post on their socials numerous times declaring the first feature by twin brother directors Danny & Michael Philippou as the best Horror film of the summer, and Fangoria put it on the cover of that aforementioned new issue. Also, I've heard there is a lot of viral marketing that somehow I was fortunate enough to have missed. So I went in pretty virgin.

Even if you're inundated with the marketing, I'm recommending you see Talk to Me and you see it in a theatre. The sound design is a large part of how effective the film's unease is - it's LOUD and SHARP and often pummels you in short, declarative bursts. No explosions - just visceral, meaty stabs of sound. The performances are all fantastic, and the overall manner in which the plot unfolds felt fresh to me. 

The Philippous have created a Horror Prop that, in my opinion, has similar potential to Hellraiser's Lament Configuration, so we'll see if we get a sequel. 
            

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Read:

This morning I discovered that there's a new novel on the horizon from Jonathan Lethem, author of a couple books I adore, namely Motherless Brooklyn; Gun, Occasional Music, and Amnesia Moon. Not to mention his batshit crazy Omega the Unknown for Marvel back in the early 00s. 

From the official Publisher's solicitation for the novel: 

"On the streets of 1970s Brooklyn, a daily ritual goes down: the dance. Money is exchanged, belongings surrendered, power asserted. The promise of violence lies everywhere, a currency itself. For these children, Black, brown, and white, the street is a stage in shadow. And in the wings hide the other players: parents; cops; renovators; landlords; those who write the headlines, the histories, and the laws; those who award this neighborhood its name. The rules appear obvious at first. But in memory's prism, criminals and victims may seem to trade places. The voices of the past may seem to rise and gather as if in harmony, then make war with one another. A street may seem to crack open and reveal what lies behind its glimmering facade. None who lived through it are ever permitted to forget. Written with kaleidoscopic verve and delirious wit, Brooklyn Crime Novel is a breathtaking tour de force by a writer at the top of his powers."

Brooklyn Crime Novel drops on October 3, and can be pre-ordered on Indiebound HERE or wherever books are sold. 

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Playlist:

Sigur Rós - Ágœtis Byrjun

Sandrider - Godhead

Sinéad O'Connor - I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got

H6LLB6ND6R - Side A

Ghost of Vroom - Ghost of Vroom 3 (pre-release singles)

Zeal & Ardor - Stranger Fruit

Zeal & Ardor - Eponymous

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Card:

• Knight of Wands

• Six of Swords - Science

• XV The Devil

Will applied to Will, a strengthening of resolve and a healthy dose of knowledge - possibly from a less-than-ideal source or possibly even a dodgy source.

Because I didn't ask a specific question, I have to read this as applying to my current writing project. If you read these pages, you know that's how I usually do Tarot. The specific question thing always seems a bit... dodgy to me (look! The cards are already sussing things out). It works, for sure, but I've never seen Tarot as a mystifying oracle, i.e. Omnipotent third party. I mean, I don't know that anyone who seriously studies the cards looks at them that way, but that's something that's definitely in the air. that said, I've done a specific question or two lately and the resultant Pulls have been spot-on, so it does work. The thing is, that just means I already know the answer to the question, anyway...

How this relates to the current project? Not so sure yet. I'm thinking it has to do with the ending, which exists in a theoretical way, but doesn't quite have the steam behind it for the prose to manifest yet. Perhaps I need to carouse some other works of fiction to look for some kind of jumpstart phrase or idea?

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RIP Sinéad O'Connor

The most Punk Rock musician of the 80s and probably the 90s has passed away, and while I'm not a very active fan - I love her first two records, but they tend to emotionally destroy me, so they don't make it into regular rotation very often - I have long considered O'Connor one of the most important figures in modern music. Her passing feels like a death knell for music as a form of expression. Not the actual act of making and releasing it, but the philosophical aesthetics that go with it. Or, SHOULD go with it. Is there anyone today that would take the opportunity of a lifetime as a guest on the most watched pop culture tv show and use it to express their beliefs about the horrors being committed by major social institutions, all at the risk of destroying their career? I think not. 

I'm glad I got to see that infamous SNL performance live, when it aired, as well as her performance earlier in the evening of This is the Last Day of Our Acquaintance, the song/performance that, to a 14-year-old metal head, affected me in a way I wasn't able to understand until I was considerably older. 

RIP. As Kevin Smith would say, big bucket of win, Miss O'Connor. You traded your own stardom for the chance to make the world a better place. You are from a world that no longer exists.

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Watch:

About a year ago, I fell down a rabbit hole reading about Sinéad O'Connor. One of the things I found that really increased my already weighty respect for O'Connor was that, in 1995 when Late Night TV Discussion Forum After Dark did an episode titled "Ireland: Sex and Celibacy, Church and State", O'Connor called into the show to join the discussion, then took a taxi to the studio and joined in person ten minutes before the end of the program.

This just blows me away. This woman was the epitome of Punk Rock at a time when Punk rock was becoming a fashion statement. 

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Playlist:

 Cristobal Tapia De Veer - Black Mirror: Black Museum OST

Chelsea Wolfe - Hiss Spun

Deafheaven - Ordinary Corrupt Human Love

Sinéad O'Connor - I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got

Sinéad O'Connor - Lion and the Cobra

White Lung - Paradise

White Lung - Eponymous

Zeal & Ardor - Stranger Fruit

Metallica - Lux Aeturna (single)

Blackbraid - Blackbraid II

Death Grips - No Love Deep Web 

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New Music from The Kills!!!

 

From the 7" New York/LA Hex. Took me a bit to warm up to this track ("New York" has a more classic Kills sound). You can go HERE and get this one from Domino Recordings. I'm hoping this means there's a new full-length from the band on the way.

I love the video for this one; it's funny how, as happy as I am to have left L.A., and experiencing what a mixed bag it is going back for work two weeks at a time periodically, all the imagery here feels so familiar that it kind of acts as a balm for the piece of me I left behind there. Don't mistake that for homesickness; as I've taken to telling anyone who asks, L.A. is officially a post-apocalyptic city, and living there amounts to little more than sheer madness to me now. That said, it's something, to be able to walk the streets of a SciFi Dystopian version of one of the world's most iconic cities and see it with your own eyes. All of those textures are present in this video, so much so, it almost feels like the band are characters in a movie the song is from. 

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NCBD:

My picks for this week's NCBD!!!

I keep saying I'm going to drop this book, but I'm still here. The previous issue scratched enough of an itch that I can't quite bring myself to jump from ol' Flamehead's ship just yet.

Another year, another Hellfire Gala! Can't wait to see what big changes spring from this one.

Chip Zdarsky and Jacob Phillips's Newburn returns after what feels like a year-long hiatus (might have actually been just that). This is a fantastic crime book, and I'm curious to see where the big picture will go.

After an initial setback getting my hands on the first issue of the latest installment in Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino's Bone Orchard Mythos, I acquired and read Tenement issue one last week. LOVED it, and now I'm fortunate enough to be able to dig into issue two so soon after what proved to be a very provocative set-up.  

The final issue of The Seasons Have Teeth! This series was a surprise hit with me, and I can't wait to see how it ends. The monsterizing of each individual season has been super cool, and from the glimpses shown across the various covers for issue 4, Winter may be the most insane design of all. 

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Watch:

While I ended up coming down on the "Yes, I like this," side of the fence for David Gordon Green's Halloween Requel trilogy, I will say hearing that his next project was basically doing the same thing for The Exorcist excited me. I've never seen Exorcist Two: The Heretic, and despite trying four or so times, I abhor the monstrosity that is William Peter Blatty's Exorcist III. I know at some point in the early 00s, two cuts of a prequel came out, but I've never bothered with those either. So, being that I have always considered William Friedkin's original cut of The Exorcist the scariest film ever made, I would like to see someone who has proven he can learn from others' mistakes and give us new installments in otherwise lifeless, iconic franchises.

Pretty sure this will be fantastic. I wasn't so sure of that at the beginning of the trailer (yes, I watched it, but I won't ever watch it again, and when it comes on the next time I'm at the theatre, I'll be getting up to leave the room).

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Playlist:

Forhist - Eponymous

Witchfinder - Forgotten Mansion

David Lynch & Marek Zebrowski - Polish Night Music

Ruby the Hatchet - Planetary Space Child

Rick Derringer - All American Boy

SQÜRL & Jozef Van Wissem - Only Lovers Left Alive OST

Snoop Dogg - Doggystyle

Sigur Rós - Ágœtis Byrjun

Sigur Rós  - ( )

Deafheaven - 10 Years Gone

The Kills - New York/LA Hex 7"

NIN - With Teeth

Portishead - Third

Metallica - 72 Seasons

Crystal Castles - II

Chelsea Wolfe - Spun

  

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• VII: The Chariot

• Knight of Pentacles

• XV: The Devil

Emerging victorious from a trying time; sheer force of Will pulls me up and out of the darker side of my brain. A perfect encapsulation of this past Sunday/Monday, when I underwent what I can only describe as a complete Bi-Polar, manic episode. Keep in mind, I've never experienced or been diagnosed with Bi-Polar. I've always considered myself lucky that my brain chemistry, for the most part, has been even. Not sure what happened over the course of those two days, but I think it had to do with too much caffeine and too much social media/phone in general. I'm backing off communicating for a while; this won't affect this blog, but if you know me and I don't answer messages online, don't take it personally. I'm trying to put my head back on straight.

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New Music from Colter Wall!

 

Really digging this new album from Colter Wall that dropped yesterday. Major props to Jonathan Grimm for turning me onto this guy. You can order Little Songs directly from Colter's website HERE.

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Watch:

 I have had a rough time trying to get into Junji Ito's work. I tried the 2000 adaptation of Uzumkai titled Spiral and didn't get very far. I recently attempted the new Netflix series adapting several of Ito's stories, and hated what I saw of it. So many people I know and respect love Ito's work though, so I keep periodically trying. What I need to do is pick up one of the collections of his Manga, however, I have such a pre-existing and totally unfair prejudice against Manga from my five years at Borders Books that I can never get myself to actually buy any of them. Now, there's a new Adult Swim adaptation of Uzumaki coming out, here's the trailer:  

Just based on this 'trailer' - which is really just a scene from the series - I think this may be my entry point into Ito's work. There's something so stark about this; a friend has talked to me at length about the mystery of Uzumaki, and it always sounds fascinating and urgent, which is kind of the vibe I get here. No release date information yet, but Uzumaki will air on Adult Swim, which is of course one of the "Hubs" on Max. 

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Playlist:

Colter Wall - Little Songs

Cristobal Tapia De Veer - Black Mirror: Black Museum OST

Flying Lotus - Yasuke

Rina Mushonga - In A Galaxy

Future Islands - Singles

Godflesh - Purge

Cristobal Tapia De Veer - Smile OST

Assembly Line People Program - Eponymous EP

Deadguy - Work Ethic EP

Godflesh - A World Lit Only By Fire

Blackbraid - Blackbraid II

Drug Church - Hygiene

Aerosmith - Pump

Black Sabbath - Eponymous

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Knight of Wands - The 

• Two of Swords

• Four of Pentacles

I don't have the perspicacity to interpret this today, so I'm just leaving it here for future reference.

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