Now that that's taken care of, let's get into some comics!
NCBD has become a much bigger deal to me since Mike Wellman (AKA Mike Wahlman) and I resurrected Drinking with Comics. Here's what I'll be picking up today and (hopefully reading) before tomorrow at 7:00 PM PST when we live-stream the new episode and talk about all this stuff on our FB page! If you miss the stream, the edited episode will be up early Friday. That's the schedule we've set and are attempting to stick to for the foreseeable future. Now on to this week's books in...
PULL LIST:
I'm really feeling Spiderman lately, even though I'm not super into the way Peter Parker appears to be a teenager in his monthlies and an adult in the regular Marvel titles (as evidenced in The King in Black, which I broke down and bought all five issues of last week and overall enjoyed). Spider's Shadow is a kind of limited "What If" that asks What if Peter had become Venom. As for Non-stop Spiderman, this will probably be my last issue of it, however, the current Falcon and Winter Soldier show has my blood up for some Baron Zemo, and he made his appearance in the final pages of Nonstop #1, so I'm back for more Zemo!
I'm not really a huge follower of Red Fang - they're a solid band, they just don't really stand out to me. That said, I LOVE this video.
Read:
Pretty psyched to have been sent a digital copy of Osaka Mime from Behemoth Comics for review on our A Most Horrible Library podcast. This book looks NUTS, and I am all about finding out more everything I can about whatever the hell monster is on this cover:
Super cool. Chris and I should be reviewing this one on our new episode, dropping next Monday morning (Sunday night at Midnight if you do the youtubes).
A very special thanks to Behemoth Comics and creators Andy Leavy, Hugo Araujo, and Robin Jones for sending this our way.
Playlist:
Judas Priest - Firepower
Small Black - Cheap Dreams
Steve Moore - VFW OST
Card:
Significant in that I just sent a Beta copy of a short story I've been trying to solve for almost three years to my good friend (and constant beta reader) Missi. The story is 99.9% there but still feels incomplete; not start to finish, but something textural inside its narrative feels weak. I'm hoping Missi's insight will help me realize what, if anything it is (because it is totally plausible, when you've working on something for this long, to get into a headspace where you can't finish it, even when it's finished).
I'm back on this reassessing the 80s kick, wherein I dig back into a lot of the music I dismissed or, in some cases, openly mocked in my 20s.
The Scorpions were a staple of pre-Grunge radio and a band whose singles I had a particular affinity in my pre-teen years. It would have been around the age of six or seven that I first heard their stadium-packing single "Rock You Like A Hurricane," a song that, at the time, sounded like the heaviest thing imaginable to my young ears, and helped steer me into metal. By '91 however, all these operatic-style vocalist-driven guitar-heavy bands had worn out their welcome, and I never bothered to look any further.
Fast forward to last week when, while unable to stop listening to 80s-era Judas Priest, I went scrolling down the neon corridors of Apple Music looking for another comparable band to unearth.
Scorpions are where I landed.
Covered by Testament on 1997's Signs of Chaos comp, it was my good friend and Horror Vision cohost Tori who pointed me toward Scorpions' 1977 album Taken By Force, specifically mentioning this song. I was not disappointed in the track, and in fact, despite some of the Scorp's other 70s-era albums not striking a chord with me, this one 100% did the trick. More proto-metal than butt rock, even the ballad "Born to Touch Your Your Feelings" has a dark, ominous allure that reminds me a bit more of some baroque Opeth song at times than Winger (in music only, as I can't rightly compare the vocals). This makes sense; as far as I know, what put the Scorpions to bed in the early 90s wasn't a predilection for mascara and cheese, but endless rotation and what sounds to me now, looking back, like an over-reliance on Producers who grouped them in with everything else 'happening' in generic hard rock at the time. I.E. everything Smells Like Teen Spirit would obliterate in 1991. I'd still rather jam Teen Spirit on most days, however, there's definitely a place for some Scorpions in my world.
Watch:
After catching up on Falcon and the Winter Solider this weekend (Mardripoor!!!), wee watched two flicks this weekend, both of which I enjoyed more than I initially thought I would:
First, Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck in Roman Holiday. This stands as probably my favorite movie K has introduced me to. I loved it, and I especially appreciated that they 'stuck' the landing.
Next, the recently released Wrong Turn reboot, which I cover pretty extensively on the new episode of The Horror Vision that went up this morning.
My motivation for watching this one, as I've not seen any other entries into the series (except maybe the first way back when it came out on video) was simply as an act of balance.
On THV's previous episode, my cohost Butcher gave the film a bad review, and as an attempt to provide the benefit of a second perspective I decided to install a 'Second Chance' policy on the show. This is where when one of us gives a new film a bad review - which is totally acceptable and not something the second chance is meant to overturn - someone else will watch and review it as well. In some cases, this will add a possible positive review, and in some, I suspect it will only strengthen the argument against. However, the internet is awash with negativity, especially in regards to movie criticism, and I want our show to be held apart from that rampant, often collegiate negativity. Bad reviews are inevitable in film critique, however, I want our criticism to be better than just name-calling and rampant negativity.
Playlist:
Judas Priest - Firepower
Judas Priest - Hell Bent for Leather
Judas Priest - Screaming for Vengeance
Guns N' Roses - Appetite for Destruction
Alice in Chains - Facelift
Pilotpriest - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Zombi - Cosmos
Blanck Mass - No Dice (single)
Scorpions - Black Out
Anthrax - Persistence of Time
Deftones - Saturday Night Wrist
Foster the People - Torches
White Lung - Paradise
Razor - Live! Osaka Saikou
The Rods - Live
Steve Moore - VFW OST
Card:
Balance is exactly what I am striving for this week. Last week was a manic roller coaster wherein I accomplished absolutely nothing and tied my stomach into a knot that finally untangled yesterday after nearly 9 hours of sleep and a cleaning frenzy.
A little old-school Deftones for you. Love this album, but I've fallen into the habit of forgetting about it due to the fact that Apple Music ranks it as "Various Artists" and, thus, puts it in with the "V" artists instead of my other Deftones stuff. Of course, I still have the CD, but with the car stereo out of commission, those aren't nearly as handy as they used to be.
Great track. I love the crickets. I'll forever be grateful to Jacob and Jeremy from Blue Karma for convincing me to give this record another chance, back in '06.
NCBD:
Since Mike Wellman and I brought back Drinking with Comics, I've been buying way more stuff than I normally do. Big Two stuff, even. Later tonight we'll be live-streaming another DwC NCBD run-down on our FB channel, with the edited video to follow tomorrow. In the interim, here are the two surprise big hits this week, both of which I absolutely LOVED.
I don't think I've ever liked a Geoff Johns comic before, but then again, everything I'd be even remotely familiar with would be DC, and I wanted to give the man a chance. Glad I did, because Geiger's first ish knocked my socks off! Great art, and a really cool story, with a super-intriguing final image that guarantees I'll be back for more.
An anthology comic that centers around a cursed (?) silver coin and the various lives it affects, each issue by a different creative team? Well, if this first installment was any indication, I'm in for the duration. I love that this is the second historic (1978) rock band comic horror comic I'm reading at the moment, Home Sick Pilots being the other (90s).
Playlist:
Judas Priest - Hell Bent for Leather
Judas Priest - Screaming for Vengeance
Blanck Mass - Animated Violence Mild
Anthrax - Persistence of Time
Black Sabbath - Heaven and Hell
Judas Priest - Firepower
Valkyrie - Fear
Windhand - Grief's Infernal Flower
Deftones - Saturday Night Wrist
Card:
Insatiable. That feels about right because I'm really unable to concentrate, I'm eating too much, drinking too much, and not writing enough. I think I've run out of patience for this stunted COVID existence. I've been attempting to sign up for Vaccination, but it's mostly just making me frustrated as all hell. Looking toward the horizon and hoping to see better days and a return to productivity.
I follow a man who goes by the handle Jomparantala on IG who has totally made me reassess a lot of the music I grew up with in the 80s but later dismissed. I won't say I ever totally gave up on Judas Priest - Living After Midnight remains a song I never stopped turning up to eleven whenever it comes on, although it's been so long since I listened to any radio station that would play it, so while it lingers on an old playlist, it's been a minute. Seeing Jom post about Priest yesterday, I definitely see myself firing up some today.
Watch:
Somehow I totally missed the fact that Neil Marshall's The Reckoning hit VOD two months ago! What the hell?!? I feel like I waited for this forever, then I let it fall off my radar. Well, that will (hopefully) be remedied this weekend. Here's the trailer. Love those plague masks, right?
Playlist:
The Replacements - Tim
Ted Leo and the Pharmacists - Shake the Sheets
ACDC - Highway to Hell
Alabama Shakes - Sound and Color
sElf - What a Fool Believes (single)
Santigold - Eponymous
The Clash - Train in Vain (single)
Talking Heads - Sand in the Vaseline
Protomartyr - Under Color of Official Right
Protomartyr - The Agent Intellect
Moonlover - Ghost Bath
Deafheaven - Sunbather (single)
Judas Priest - Killing Machine (single)
Zombi - 2020
Goblin - Dawn of the Dead OST
Card:
Everything lately has pointed to self-control, something I've been in short supply of lately (he types as he opens another beer at 11:04 PM moments after setting alarms that being at 4:05 AM)
While I've picked at a few albums by The Replacements over the last five years or so, I've never really fallen for any. Until now. Holy cow! I'm reminded of when, in 2009, I fell hard into The Smiths decades after many people my age did. A friend pointed out that both The Replacements and The Smiths are bands that classmates with older siblings tended to get into when we were younger, and with both of us being the oldest in our houses, that avenue to some of the more sophisticated music of the slightly older classes was cut off from us. That sounds about right, however, I definitely believe you find things when you need them. That was definitely true of The Smiths, and it feels equally accurate for The Replacements, or so far, their 1985 album Tim.
I love falling in love with older bands because I tend to go through these intense exploratory periods. One album at a time becomes an obsession, and within that microcosm different songs tend to cycle through as favorite obsessions. Currently, I'm stuck on "Swinging Party," its subtle lyrics and shimmering guitar, but I've already moved past "Kiss Me On the Bus", and seem imminently bound for "Little Mascara" to commandeer my obsession.
Watch:
With only a handful of episodes left of Penny Dreadful, K and I made the joyous mistake of watching the first episode of Servant on Apple TV. Five episodes later we are HOOKED and not going to be able to go back to Penny until we blow through both seasons of this show. The tone, the ambiance, the characters! I'm a big fan of Lauren Ambrose's character Claire on HBO's Six Feet Under, so it's nice to see her again.
Playlist:
The Replacements - Tim
Garbage - No Gods No Masters (single)
The Joy Formidable - Into the Blue (single)
The Joy Formidable - AARTH
Zombi - Cosmos
Zombi - Shape Shift
Zombi - 2020
Card:
No capacity for interpreting this at the moment, because I'm worn out from being up too late watching Servant!
I really dig this new single by The Joy Formidable, a band I don't know all that much about. Not sure if this is the precursor to a new album from the band, but I'll be investigating their back catalog now, so either way, it's all new to me.
Watch:
It's been a few days since I posted here. Busy as hell. I did find time to watch a few things this weekend, however, the thing that I must discuss is last week's season two opener of Shudder's Creepshow. I can't express how much this episode lit up all the goodwill in my brain. It had everything, including a full-on entry into the Evil Dead mythology, which I don't think any of us were expecting.
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Next up, Mike Wellman and I have returned with Drinking with Comics! It's been difficult to bring this show back, as it's primarily a live show with an audience that, well, for obvious reasons we can't do at the moment, however, for the moment, we're going to do a weekly NCBD round-up on Thursday nights. It will stream live on our FB page, then appear Friday morning on youtube. Here's last week's episode, where we talk Man-Thing, Stray Dogs, Shadecraft, and even find some time to dig into Tomahawk's new record because, you know, you gotta listen to something while you're reading all those comics:
Playlist:
The Replacements - Tim
Alice in Chains - Dirt
Small Black - Duplex (single)
Run the Jewels - RTJ4
Suburban Living - Always Eyes (single)
Godflesh - Pure
Satanic Planet - Baphomet (single)
Tomahawk - Tonic Immobility
Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Asunder, Sweet and Other Distress
Human Impact - EP01
Megadeth - So Far, So Good... So What!
Pixies - Doolittle
Flogging Molly - Float
Zombi - Cosmos
S.O.D. - Speak English or Die
Mr. Bungle - The Raging Wraith of the Easter Bunny
Howard Shore - Crash OST
AC/DC - Highway to Hell
Ghost - Meliora
The Bangles - All Over the Place
Card:
Here's a fella I see quite a bit on these daily pulls. Time to take control of the more willy-nilly, emotionally compromised elements of my Work and steer things back in an orderly direction.
