The War For Reality

Thanks to Heaven is an Incubator for retweeting this and bringing such an eloquent, albeit chilling, crystallization of current events to light. My prediction: with all the Reality bending already in place, it will not matter whether trump is reelected (although let's not let that stop us from tossing him out the door); we're going to see an increasing escalation in violence from both sides and within the next ten years the 50 states as we know them will change. I'm not sure what that's going to look like exactly, but I (once again) point to Greg Rucka and Michael Lark's Lazarus or the USIDENT of Richard Kelley's Southland Tales as possible examples. "Oh, but that's just silly. Those are science fiction," you say? Friend, we're already living in Sci Fi land. When someone can stand up and say "Day" when it's clearly "Night" and a large part of the population will believe him despite the empirical evidence of their senses, I say all bets are off.

Isolation: Day 200

Musick:

 
Well, we pulled the bandage off last night and finished Halt and Catch Fire. Easily one of the best shows I've ever experienced, and it really reminded me a lot of Six Feet Under, which K has never seen. We're going to move that one up the list, however, now is the time to really double-down on The Boys. I watched Season One last year without her, so this year I've been slowly rewatching that with her in preparation for moving into Season Two. Can't wait, even if the pop culture saturation point with it is riding an annoying level of saturation.

Rewatching Six Feet Under scares me a little bit. I loved the show, however, by the end it had very much changed the way I looked at Death in a tangible way, and with it, how I look at life. Not necessarily bad, but from about halfway through the second to last season, the show really gets heavy, and I'm not sure I can take the emotional beating until at least after November (and maybe not then, depending on how things go).

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NCBD

There's a number of great things out today:

The Boys: Dear Becky Issue 5, just in time for my engagement with the show. This book was obviously brought into existence to coincide with and capitalize on the show, however, I'm fine with that. Ennis is telling a story and flexing his absurdity muscles, so it's about what I would have expected. I don't love it, but I didn't love the entire comic series either - only the first six issues and the last year's worth, with the Butcher mini-series, included in that. Those were the facets of the saga I thought were fantastic. The rest had its high points but was a little too much of Ennis trying to out Preacher Preacher, if you know what I mean and I think you do.

I love this book, however, after reading 1-5 in a straight shot last month, there are some serious hinks to the writing. Usually, art will not make up for that in my book. With Mercy, the problems don't outweigh the good, especially with this art. It's fantastic.

Really digging this series so far, and meaning no disrespect whatsoever to Jacob Philips or Chris Condon, it fills the hole left by Criminal's end quite nicely.
 

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Playlist:

Deftones - Ohms 

Dame Fortune - Am I a Warrior (single) 

Molchat Doma - Etahzi

Not a heavy music day yesterday, because over on the Bret Easton Ellis podcast, Mr. Ellis has begun reading his newest novel in a serialized fashion. He hasn't given a title, and it wasn't until this newest episode - the first hour or so of which is the reading (followed by a fantastic interview with Hollywood Legacy Executive Peter Bart) - that Ellis even quantified that that's what he's doing - serializing his new novel. The story is a purported memoir, though at this stage I'm fairly certain it's about as much of a memoir as Lunar Park is. That's fine - Lunar is my second favorite novel of all time, right behind Gatsby, and I find Ellis' ability to sync real life with narrative both riveting and powerful. 

The book has to do with something terrible that happened to a teenage Bret Ellis and his close friends 1981 in Los Angeles, and how those events line up with a serial killer dubbed "The Trawler" who stalked LA at the time. Ellis has said everyone's names have been changed, and even the killer's nome de plume is made-up, although was bandied about early on in this larger than life horror's earliest days of activities.

I'm fascinated, and can't wait for more. You can click over to Ellis' Patreon HERE to sign up and get the podcasts. Worth every dime (roughly $3 a month I believe for the silver tier, which is what I have).

 

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Card:

New ideas, new journeys afoot.

Isolation: Day 199

Musick:

I spent the previous two nights re-watching the 1986 Transformers Animated Movie. The first night, I had it on and, halfway through, K came in and sat down. I was tired, wasn't able to finish, and was totally stoked when, last night, she professed a desire to watch the entire thing with me. 

I didn't realize it as a kid, but one of the things about the Transformers cartoon that I still love to this day is just how much the creators borrow from Jack-Kirby once the movie was released. The continuity's jump from mostly Earth-bound events to a lot of deep space locations all have a distinctly "Kirby-esque" feel, and Unicron, well, an obvious loving homage to one of Kirby's greatest celestial creations, Galactus. Which leads me to ask the question that now occurs to me for the first time: Who would win in a fight, Unicron or Galactus?

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Play:

Confession: I spent too much $$$ on some toys recently. I have certain weak spots, and I've psychoanalyzed myself enough to know that because as I was growing up, we didn't have a lot of money and I often couldn't have the figures or toys that I wanted, I've been more than willing to buy some of this stuff as an adult. Plus, the toy tech is so awesome now that all these figures look like they did in the comic or cartoon; gone is the edict that to make a toy 'playable' it can't look like it's supposed to. Case in point, the Hasbro Pulse website has been both a blessing and a curse since I recently discovered it. I've ordered a few of the new GIJoe: Classified figures - they all look amazing - but last week I upped my involvement by paying to get into the premium tier so I could grab these two little gems, both 'exclusives' at the virtual Pulsecon 2020 event:

The cost of all this wasn't too insane - a little over $100 - but seriously, it's like someone pulled the Quintesson Judgement Pit right of my 10-year old Shawn's cranium. I had NO control (this was also reflected by the Lust Card yesterday, I believe, but it was too much to go into for yesterday's post).

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Playlist:

Type O Negative - Life is Killing Me 

Fields of the Nephilim - The Nephilim 

Fields of the Nephilim - Elizium 

Deftones - Ohms 

The Smith - The Queen is Dead 

Arthur Ahbez - Gold

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Card:

The good ol' Princess of Disks pops up again. I feel as though I've seen this one a lot lately. Today, I get the impression this is intimating I need to look for practical solutions to a certain hink in my narrative for Shadow Play: Book Two.

Isolation: Day 198 - New Pixies!

Musick

Being that I'm more of a Frank Black/Black Francis fan than a Pixies fan - though that wasn't always the case and really, I love both so it's kind of splitting hairs - their ongoing reunion has been bittersweet to me. Bitter, because I would love to hear another Black Francis/Grand Duchy/Frank Black (with or without The Catholics), but instead most of the previous decade has been a continuous run of new Pixies material. Which is also great, although I've received each album in different degrees of infatuation. The first one back, Indie Cindy, is a perfect return. I love it absolutely. Head Carrier and Beneath the Eyrie have required a bit more of a loving curve, but thanks to Mr. Brown, I dig both - although I haven't had enough of a Pixies binge in a while to really get to know either album like I do the others. Now we have a new 12" and the first 'single' I absolutely LOVE. So bring it on guys (and gal), I'm ready for whatever you have coming. 

But I'd still love to get a new album from Mr. Black sometime soon.

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Read:

I finally made it around to reading The Autumnal #1 from Vault Comics. Written by Daniel Kraus, with art by Chris Shehan, this is another one of those books, like The Plot and Black Stars Above, that has helped define Vault as the destination for Indie Horror Comics.

Now, those are non-consecutive pages. I just wanted to give you a feel for the art and the characters, both of which I absolutely love so far. Kat Somerville and her daughter Sybil remind me a lot of people that would know the family from The Devil's Candy, another family set I adore. Maybe it's because I've chosen not to reproduce that I love seeing stoner families who love one another and set a good example.

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Playlist:

Deftones - Ohms 

Alice in Chains - Dirt 

Mastodon - Medium Rarities 

Low Cut Connie - Hi Honey

The Blues Brothers - Briefcase Full of Blues 

Black Pumas - Eponymous 

Mannequin Pussy - Patience 

Bob Mould - Blue Hearts 

Alice in Chains - Sap

Alice in Chains - Jar of Flies

Concrete Blonde - Eponymous

OGRE Sound - A Field Recordist's Guide to Summoning Lesser Demons

Portishead - Third 

The Devils Blood - The Thousandfold Epicentre

Alice in Chains - Eponymous 

Pixies - Hear Me Out (single)

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Card:

Spontaneity and Enthusiasm. Two attributes to contemplate this week as I shift into the second Act of the second Shadow Play book.

Sunday Bandcamp - OGRE Sound - The Field Recordist's Guide to Summoning Lesser Demons

With a name like this, there was probably no way I wouldn't like this record, which I have heard of before but erroneously attributed to being one of the many musical projects of Nivek Ogre, which it is not. No, OGRE sound is the work of Robin Ogden. I fell sideways back into this album this morning through a story on Bandcamp about Ogden and Dallas Campbell's just released score for the classic George A. Romero film Night of the Living Dead. The article, written by J. Edward Keyes, can be read HERE and very much has me thinking that when I do my annual watch of NoTLD on Halloween, I'll be scoring it with this. 

But back to Lesser Demons. This is a super creepy, super inventive use of field recordings arranged for keyboard/synthesizer. Parts remind me of the Italian classic Ain Soph - Rituals album, other parts remind me of a nightmare, or the score to a seriously well-done cinematic nightmare, take your pick. Either way, wow. 

The Horror Vision: Quick Spoiler-Free Review of Brandon Cronenberg's Possessor

It's 3:33 AM and I'm exhausted. I've been up since 5:18 AM - woke up late on purpose knowing full well I'd be up well beyond what I am normally capable of on a work night, regardless of the fact that I am off tomorrow. After work, my good friend Ray and I went to the opening night of Beyondfest 2020. Not really opening night, as the rest of the fest doesn't start until 10/02, but still, the crazy MF's that run the fest brought out the big guns for the West Coast Premiere of Brandon Cronenberg's new film Possessor. This was one of if not my most anticipated film this year, and it did not disappoint. This is also only the second time I have hung out in person with a friend since March (last weekend K and I went out to finally see our other Horror Vision host Anthony, his girlfriend, and their new baby), so it was very much a 'win-win.'

Beyondfest is calling this year's festival the "Fuck COVID Edition" and in keeping with that, they obviously were not going to be able to have it at the Egyptian as usual and observe social distancing, so instead, the fest this year is being held at the Mission Tiki Drive-In Theatre. What a great place! Granted, it's 50+ miles from our home, but Ray drove and we made the trip in roughly an hour and twenty (considerably less on the way back), and a fantastic time was had by all. Above is our ten-minute, spoiler-free review on youtube. You can also hear it - and all our other episodes - on any Podcast Platform, including Spotify which, if you look in the upper right-hand corner of this blog, you will see a widget for that will take you directly to the review. 

What we don't discuss on this quick-take episode, but Ray and I both plan to bring up on the next full-length Horror Vision is that tonight's show was a double feature, and the second movie was an old John Frankenheimer film starring Rock Hudson from 1966 called Seconds. This was also fantastic, so here's the trailer:

Okay, I've still got a new Deftones record to try and get through before I go to bed... Nope. I'll save that for tomorrow. 

Isolation: Day 195 - New Zeal and Ardor!

Musick:

Fuck yes! I'm loving these new songs. These plus "Baphomet", whick K and I heard the band premiere live at the Roxy two years ago now, are going to make for a great new set of tunes.

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Watch:

I'll be driving out to Montclair this evening for the Premier of Brandon Cronenberg's new film Possessor, and in celebration of that, last night I rewatched his first film AntiViral.

There is no other film out there like this film. It's a fucking masterpiece, and so much closer to reality than I can believe. However, I remember thinking the same thing when I watched it eight years ago, and since we haven't progressed into this future anymore in that time, I'd have to say Antiviral feels almost like an alternate timeline Earth, albeit one that really brushes up against ours.

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Playlist:

The Veils - Total Depravity

The Thirsty Crows - Hangman's Noose 

Emma Ruth Rundle and Thou - The Valley (pre-release single) 

Zeal and Ardor - Tuskegee (pre-release single)

Ozzy Osbourne - The Blizzard of Ozz

Also, I don't want to sound like I'm kneeling before the algorithm, but this week's Apple Music "Favorites Mix" based on my listening turned out pretty sweet. I spent a good deal of time the last two days with Audible's Sandman adaptation - yes, I'm going through it very slowly to make it last, however, once I hit The Doll's House - my favorite Sandman story and one of my favorite stories ever regardless - I've been unable to get it out of my head. here's that mix:

 

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Card:

A nice inclination for my first night out in the world since this entire 2020 fiasco began. I can't pretend I haven't become a little agoraphobic again, and driving 54 miles out to spend an evening in a drive-in theature, while inherently awesome sounded, fills me with a small modicum of dread. Here's to holding this card's image in my head all day and using it to sooth any 'rough patches.'