Frank Black Teenager of the Year 30th Anniversary Tour

 

Got my tickets to join some of my best friends in the world for Frank Black's Teenager of the Year 30th anniversary tour. Mr. Black even has Lyle Workman back! 

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Watch:

Damian McCarthy first impressed the absolute hell out of me in 2022 with Caveat, a direct-to-Shudder film about a man talked into wearing a harness in an old house on a small island in Ireland. The man is supposedly been hired by a friend to watch his niece, but there are all kinds of WTF surrounding that idea, and the film, for all its slow-burn tendencies, rapidly escalates into a terrifying dirge of haunted guilt and bad decisions that culminate in...

Well, read the book. Or, ah, watch the movie. 

McCarthy's new film Oddity was on my radar but just barely, and I was SHOCKED and delighted to find that it opened at our Clarksville Regal this past Thursday. 

So far, it is neck-and-neck with Robert Morgan's Stopmotion for my favorite film of the year. I would post a trailer, but no. PLEASE, go see this in the theatre (it will most likely be gone after this week due to Deadpool) and DO NOT read, watch, or listen to anything about it. Go in blind, and I think this will smack you in the gob the way it did me—so much so that I have tickets to see it again tonight. 

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Play:

I've had Playdead's Inside for a couple years now, and while I have played and enjoyed it, it wasn't until this past weekend that I really fell in love with this game. Described as 'dream-like' in all the solicitation copy I've come across, I have to say, that's the perfect description. 

 

A week or so ago, my good friend Maddie messaged me about this game, saying that she remembered I had mentioned it and that she had recently become enthralled. This had me pull the game back out and pick at it off and on for a few days. Then, this past Saturday, I sat down in a darkened room with a beer and Adam Egypt Mortimer's The Obelisk on my turntable and the way the game and the music melded... it was just incredible. I left the sound up so I could hear all the atmospheric sound effects - hurried footsteps through standing water, giant industrial cranes and elevators moving and clanking, explosions, and, yes, dream-like wind and breathing - and my consciousness just folded into this world. It was beautiful. 

I don't want this one to end.

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Playlist:

Fear - Live For the Record

Frank Black - Teenager of the Year

Black Francis - Svn Fngrs

Death Cab for Cutie - Narrow Stairs

Frank Black - Eponymous

Tomahawk - Mit Gas

The Dillinger Escape Plan - Irony Is A Dead Scene E.P.

Ministry - Rio Grande Blood

The Dillinger Escape Plan - Calculating Infinity

Justin Hamline - The House With Dead Leaves

The Replacements - Pleased to Meet Me

The Besnard Lakes... Are the Roaring Night

Adam Egypt Mortimer - The Obelisk

M83 - Before the Dawn Heals Us

Zeal & Ardor - Stranger Fruit

Concrete Blonde - Eponymous

Phil Collins - Face Value

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Knight of Wands 

• Four of Pentacles

• Six of Pentacles

The firey aspect of fire, pure white hot Intellect, stripped of all other human trappings. Here, it's being applied to Earthly matters, as we can see via the two Pentacles or Disks cards that follow. Four of Disks indicates stability, and the Six support or balance. What this tells me this morning is the balancing act I now maintain Monday - Friday may require an extra dose of reasoning to maintain. Not sure if this means this will be a heavy spreadsheet week (I'm only half joking and all cringe when I reference a spreadsheet in relation to the Tarot), or if I'll just have to side step emotional reactions to things that will require logical consideration instead of capricious emotion.

Man Man - Alibi

 

LOVING this new Man Man album, Carrot on Strings, which you can order HERE.

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Watch:

Holy smokes - Arrow Video is releasing The Last Starfighter on Blue Ray!

You can order the Blue Ray HERE. There's also a 4K HERE. I LOVED this flick as a kid. We didn't have cable but one of my Dad's friends did, and he used to record me movies onto blank VHS tapes that I would then watch over and over and over. The Last Starfighter was one of those, along with Predator, The Ghostbusters and Romancing the Stone. Somehow, though, it never made it into my adult collection. Going to remedy that real soon. 

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Playlist:

T. Rex - Electric Warrior

Various - Mulholland Drive OST

Liars - WIXIW

Man or Astro Man? - Live Transmissions from Uranus

Mr. Bungle - Disco Volante

T. Rex - The Slider

Angelo Badalamenti - Dark Water OST

The Besnard Lakes - ... Are the Dark Horse

Simple Minds - New Gold Dream

Hot Stove Jimmy - Theme For a Major Hit

T. Rex - Eponymous

Frank Black - Teenager of the Year

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Ten of Cups

• V: The Hierophant

• X: Wheel of Fortune

Earthly fruition from a fleeting opportunity. I'll be keeping my eyes out for this one. I still try to take negative events - or, at least events I perceive to have negative connotations - and spin them positive. NOT always easy, but seeing this is a reminder to be on watch for something today.

RIP Bob Newhart

Sad news today, hearing about the passing of one of the funniest comedians of all time. I grew up watching the 80s Newhart show Newhart, and a couple years ago K and I began rewatching it from the beginning. We made it somewhere near the end of the fifth season before the preparations for our move across country knocked it off our radar. Here's a reminder it's about time to get back into it, as my goal is to get all the way through, so I can re-experience the greatest television ending of all time. 

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New Music and a DIY Synthesizer from A Place to Bury Strangers!!!

From A Place to Bury Strangers' upcoming album Synthesizer, out October 4th on Death by Audio. Pre-order HERE.

The INSANE thing about this pre-order is there's a version of the album that comes with the electrical component to turn the album sleeve into a DIY synthesizer! How awesome is that?

 

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NCBD:

My biggest NCBD Pull in a while. Let's dig right the f**k in!

What a salacious cover! Haha, this book has taken a really "off the rails" turn as of the last issue, and I'm here for it. Loving this cross-country journey with JC and his 'friends,' especially with all the weirdoes they meet along the way. Issue 6 really backed up my Shade The Changing Man: The American Scream comparison, and I'm happy to see where it goes from there.

Okay, going by the cover, we have A) Destro, B) the "Crimson Twins," and B) a metric sh*t ton of B.A.T.S. I can't think of a better formula for a Destro comic. After reading the second issue of Scarlett, I'm still not loving that book - but will definitely stick with it - but I am 100% ALL IN on Destro!

The final issue of Jeff Lemire's weird fiction opus to childhood, giant bug-men and, ah, crime. 

Again, this cover just sells the F*CK out of this one. Am I the only one getting a visual homage to old-school issue #73 here? That issue was the kick-off to the original "Cobra Civil War," and this issue's solicitation on League of Comic Geeks begins, "WAR WITH SERPENTOR!" Good things await. 

The final issue of what has turned out to be a very excellent mini-series that has me kind of rethinking my ideas about jumping off TMNT. I think I will be picking up Jason Aaron's new number one next week. 

Another final issue to what also turned out to be a total sleeper for me. Loved the tone of this whole series: the stakes are high, but there's a touch of comedy in the lining. Well-played Mr. Riser!

The end of another arc for What's the Furthest Place From Here? Thinking of re-reading this again from the beginning, but I guess that would be better suited before it comes back in a few months. I haven't seen any solicitations for its return, but there's no way this is the end. 

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Watch:

This looks like it might be this year's equivalent to Titane. Seeing this trailer twice now, 

I'm really excited about both the movie and the fact that, suddenly, Autuer Horror directors and the companies that distribute their films appear to be taking a much less revealing approach to cutting trailers.

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Playlist:

Tones on Tail - Everything!

The Damned - Night of 1000 Vampires: Live in London

Zeal & Ardor - Wake of a Nation E.P.

T. Rex - Electric Warrior

Jim Williams - Possessor OST

Saigon Blue Rain - Oko

Various - Mulholland Drive OST

A Place to Bury Strangers - Exploding Head

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Two of Wands

• X: Wheel of Fortune

• Page of Swords

Partnership or duplicity? You can't struggle against the grain and hope to find out; you have to physically use your intellect—i.e., put it into action outside of your head—to root out potential deception.

Great. Another work pull. I hate that I've been absorbed into an uncomfortably corporate environment again, where everyone's actions are suspect. 

Nox Novacula

 

From the upcoming album Feed the Fire, out August 2nd on Artoffact Records. 

I'd never heard Nox Novacula before, but I'm digging both this song and the video. You can pre-order from the band's Bandcamp HERE.

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Watch:

Friday night, I finally saw Kathryn Bigelow's first film, 1981's The Loveless. 

Willem Dafoe's debut performance and you can pretty much see that he's going to be a force to be reckoned with. I LOVED this film and have to wonder if it wasn't also an influence on David Lynch, which kind of blows me away, as I'd always thought of Kathryn Bigelow's most important work coming after Lynch's, but this would definitely rearrange that. 

Also, hot damn is this a great soundtrack. Robert Gordon - who plays Davis in the film - lays down a Rockabilly extravaganza the likes of which I'd not heard before. There's stuff here that bridges the greaser/beatnik aesthetic, which kind of runs together socially a bit during the 50s before counterculture became driven by capitalism. 

Can't recommend this one enough, and it's currently included with prime. Would make a fabulous double feature with either Paris, Texas or, as I chose to do Friday night, Lynch's Wild At Heart. 

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Read:

I finally got around to reading Dan Watters and Lamar Mathurin's four-issue Cowboy Bebop series, which Titan Books published a few years ago. 

Really fun stuff. I'm sure I've talked about this here before, but even though I don't go in for very much animation, the original Cowboy Bebop cartoon is one of my favorite things of all time. Also - and this was a total surprise at the time - I really liked the live-action Netflix show this series is based on. Watters really captures the spirit of both shows, and Mathurin just nails the perfect blend of how the characters look in the cartoon and how they look played by actors. The story revolves around - what else - a heist and a bounty, but snakes into some serious Grant Morrison territory just enough to have made this feel unique but still very much in the spirit of the show that does indeed transcend the genre.

You can order a trade of this direct from Titan Books HERE.

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Playlist:

Tim Hecker - Infinity Pool OST

Mars Red Sky - Eponymous

Brainiac - Predator Nominate

Genghis Tron - Dream Weapon

Blut Aus Nord - The Mystical Beast of Rebellion

The Atlas Moth - Coma Noir

Eagulls - Eponymous

Megadeth - So Far, So Good... So What?

Jawbox - For Your Own Special Sweetheart

Justin Hamline - The House With Dead Leaves

Zeal & Ardor - Wake of a Nation E.P.

Death Valley Girls - Under the Spell of Joy

Forhist - Eponymous

Fen - Dustwalker

Donny McCaslin - Beyond Now

Suicidal Tendencies - Controlled By Hatred/Feel Like Shit... Déjá-vu

Deafheaven - Sunbather

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• XVII: The Star

• Eight of Pentacles

• IX: The Hermit

XVII is a much needed reminder - "Create unto and within yourself a Universe, shaped of your strengths and built on your accomplishments as foundation."

Eight of Pentacles - Earthly transformation, and IX is the concentration needed to achieve it. In other words, finish the book!!!

New Music from The Jesus Lizard!!!

 I'm behind everything by a couple of days. Had a friend in town earlier in the week, and between catching up at work after a few days off, digging back into finishing Black Gloves & Broken Hearts after five days away at a crucial point in the novel, and recording podcasts for both MaXXXine and Longlegs, I just haven't had time to do anything else. So here's some awesome new music by one of my all-times. You can pre-order the new album RACK from Ipecac Records HERE, it drops September 13th.

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Watch:

In the past week I have seen three movies that I expect will define much of 2024 for me. First, MaXXXine, which I've now seen twice on the big screen and am planning for another round:

I'm in the final stages of editing a HUGE episode The Horror Vision just did on this one. Ti West has been a favorite of mine since I first saw The Roost in 2005, and to see his very distinct filmmaking on the big screen for the first time since I caught The House of the Devil back in 2009 at the old Laemmle's on Sunset (after waiting for it for something like 3 or 4 years), but with a much bigger budget and not in a limited art-house release (I'm in Clarksville for hell's sake; I seriously doubt Hosue of the Devil played in Clarksville, haha) was an awesome experience. MaXXXine has some issues, but none that blind my love for it or the director.

Although I saw Nikhil Nagesh Bhat's Kill last September at opening night of Beyondfest 2023, I am counting my viewing this past Sunday on a big screen in Nashville as the first salvo of what may very well be my favorite film of the year.

This film takes the "Surprise, I'm getting married" trope of Indian Cinema and uses it to propel the best Action-Horror film I've seen since Dog Soldiers, easy. See this on the big screen if you can, and don't worry about the run time. It's a little over two hours, and I won't feel it AT ALL.

Finally, Oz Perkins' Longlegs... I'm not really sure how I feel about this flick after seeing it last night. It's fantastic, no doubt, but something about all of Perkins' films creates a disconnect in me. 

You'll read this is the scariest movie of the decade. I think that's a bit much. But it is extremely unnerving, and everyone turns in a fantastic performance, especially Nick Cage, who defies all possible expectation and description with his performance.

The only other really big films I'm still waiting on for the year are Fede Alvarez's Alien: Romulus, Francis Ford Coppola's Megalopolis, and Robert Eggers' Nosferatu. I know there will be other, unexpected greats that filter in here and there, but for now, those are the horizon line. All in all, so far it's been a pretty great year, with Kill and Stop Motion duking it out for my favorite thus far.

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Playlist:

Various Artists - The Void

High on Fire - Cometh the Storm

Dean Hurley - Anthology Resource Vol. 1: △△

Kim Carnes - Bette Davis Eyes (single)

Scorpions - Rock You Like a Hurrican (single)

The Dillinger Escape Plan - Option Paralysis

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• XIV: Temperance

• XX: Judgement

• Page of Wands

XIV is Art in the Thoth deck, a variation that projects a slightly different connotation for me. Having only used Thoth for the first 17 or so years I've been familiar with the cards, this recent switch is something I've not quite worked out yet. Art usually suggests synchronization, often of disparate elements into a pleasurable outcome. Temperance, on the other hand, suggests Balance, which is and is not the same. Seeing this card here and thinking about it, I take this as a definite nod to balance some of the uneven and, frankly, negative emotions/thoughts that have ruled my head of late. Taken with XX - ACTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES - and the Page (Princess) of Wands, or the Earthly aspect of Fire, I'd say this is a Pull that suggests I really have some work to do on myself in order to regain the mental/emotional balance I've kind of misplaced the last two weeks or so

David Lynch & Chrsta Bell - The Answers to the Questions

 

A second 'single' from David Lynch & Christa Bell's upcoming Cellophane Memories album dropped yesterday, complete with an animated video by Lynch himself. So far, both tracks from this have defied all manner of expectations and/or predictions. 

Cellophane Memories is out August 2nd on Sacred Bones Records. You can pre-order the album HERE.

 

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NCBD:

I didn't post for NCBD last week because there was only one book on my list, and I didn't end up hitting the shot to grab it. Part of that is no doubt that, with only one issue out so far, Scarlett has not inspired the same kind of "Gottasee" that the Cobra Commander and Duke mini-series did. 

On to this week, which is also a light one:

LOVE this cover for Garth Ennis and Jacen Burrows' Get Fury #3. This has been a solid book so far; it's cool to see Ennis return to both Nick Fury and Frank Castle with his trademark flair for the violent and the grotesque.

The last couple issues of Daniel Warren Johnson's Transformers have really opened the book up, with new characters, new agendas and new subplots aplenty. I like that we're spending a lot of time with a good mix of Gen 1 and later characters and that in hindsight, the storytellers can really introduce anyone at any time, unlike the original Marvel comic that, while I love it, was more beholden to introducing and highlighting characters as they were introduced in the toy line. 

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Watch:

Neil Marshall has a new film on the way. Co-writer and star Charlotte Kirk leads the cast of what looks like a high-energy heist-gone-wrong flick. 

Duchess hits VOD on August 9th; I haven't loved most of Neil Marshall's output over the last few years. Starting with 2020's The Reckoning, his films have seemed... safe? Not sure if that's exactly the word I want, but it will do. Last year's The Lair was a touch better, but really just beat-for-beat skinning of Dog Soldiers, with the story and action transposed to the desert where the characters fight demons (or whatever it was) instead of Werewolves. Still, I'll always give this man's films a chance, just based on Dog Soldiers and The Descent.

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Playlist:

Ministry - Hopiumforthemasses

Double Life - Indifferent Stars (single)

Matt Cameron - Gory Scorch Cretins EP

Justin Hamline - The House With Dead Leaves

Amigo the Devil - Yours Until the War is Over

Moon Wizard - Sirens

Zombi - Direct Inject

Trombone Shorty - For True

Huey Lewis and the News - Sports

Ozzy Osbourne - Diary of a Madman

Various - The Void OST

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Hand of Doom Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

• Ten of Pentacles

• Nine of Cups

• Eight of Cups

Stability becomes wealth.