Monday, April 27, 2015

Secret Chiefs 3 - Agenda 21



From their imaginary Giallo film soundtrack. Love this record.

I was very hot on SC3 back when I first heard them, circa 1998 when they and then fellow Web Of Mimicry band Estradasphere turned Chicago's Double Door into a fire-swinging, book-reading, chair-surfing sideshow of insanity. Since then I've only followed either band periodically, primarily in the case of SC3 because before this record - which is a masterpiece of a different sort - the more SC3 records I bought the more I missed the Patton part of an equation in what seemed like the natural continuation of Mr. Bungle. I don't think that's entirely fair, but it was my interpretation of events at the time.

Friday, April 24, 2015

Daredevil Nightcourt Intro



Being that I am both a huge fan of the new Marvel/Netflix series Daredevil AND the classic 80s sitcom Night Court (it holds up unlike any other sitcom from the era, except maybe Cheers) this made my day.

So Tonight that I Might See



Tommy from Heaven is an Incubator does a marvelous column over on Joup called Endless Loop. It's great - the idea being one that I can most certainly relate to: songs that you can listen to over and over and over again without getting tired of. This week's entry is Fade Into You by Mazzy Star. I love this song and the entire album it's on. Back in the day... well, I won't even bothering trying to describe what it means to me because if you follow this link right here and read Tommy's words I think you'll find that once again he nails it. I'm off work sick today and the first thing I saw when I woke up was this post. It inspired me to put on the song and then the album. I am now in the middle of my fourth go-through with the entire thing. It's perfect for how I feel today, so I have to thank Tommy for blindly hitting the right chord for me. Like I said, I love the entire record, however the title track is my own perfect Endless Loop from this one. There's something about its quasi-Doors desert psychedelia of it that just grabs me and never lets go, like it's always been playing in the static just below my conscious mind since the first time I ever heard it, waaaay back in that magical land called the 90s.

The Lovecraft Alphabet



There's a plethora of Lovecraft-inspired Facebook pages I follow and somewhere on one of them last night in the throes of fever I found this. Woke up and saw it in a saved blogger draft, laughed my snot-ridden arse off.

Thursday, April 23, 2015

HELP identify this song - It's not Pallbearer



This is driving me crazy. So I have been meaning to check out the band Pallbearer for some time but they consistently fall off my radar. Earlier today a good friend told me I needed to check them out, that he had fallen in love with them when he saw them live recently. I go to youtube, find this link and fall in love with it immediately, then realize that A) there's only about 2:18 of the hour long track that has sound on it and B) that it's not Pallbearer. I've tried figuring this out with Sound Hound and Shazam - no luck. The style sounds so familiar but I can't place the band or song definitely enough to dig that last stretch to an answer so any one out there that can give me any info on this it would be very greatly appreciated!

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Zombi - The Zombi Anthology



This was released via Relapse Records today. If you remember, this is the band that had an amazing recreation of John Carpenter's The Thing done stop motion with old school 3 3/4 GIJOE figures as a music video last year. That was my intro to their music and I've been waiting on this new record for what seems quite a long time. Well, it's here!

Sunday, April 19, 2015

Drinking with Comics #22 - now with DJ KIRKBRIDE!!!



Join us as we drink Modern Times Brewery's spectacular beer and talk to comic writer DJ Kirkbride about Amelia Cole, Never Ending, The Bigger Bang, co-writing, the evolution of writing comics and that pesky Batgirl/Joker cover controversy that was such a big deal a couple of weeks ago!

Thursday, April 16, 2015

The Walk Slow



I've been meaning to post this for a couple weeks now. MAN! When you're a musician there's nothing like the love and joy that can come from being in a band. You sling it out with three or four other guys, saddle all your hopes and dreams together and try to shoot an arrow into the side of the world that actually sticks. It's hard; it takes a level of commitment and determination that is not easy and can drive some folks apart. But other folks, well, it makes you bond as strong or stronger than family. That's always been the case with the guys I slung it out with my former bands in Chicago. I've known Sonny Vee since forever. He was in Wink Lombardi and the Constellations with me ("which one'a youse guys is Wink?") on through the short-lived Second Attention, he slung it out for a while in Infinite Vision and that's where we met and added Joe Grez to the cabal of maniacs - which included Mr. Brown and Monsieur Viderstrom - who ended up forming Schlitz Family Robinson. Anyway, that was a long time ago. More recently, and I use that word loosely here for sure, Joe and Sonny and I were in The Yellow House. We came pretty close to... something. But the industry was kicking and screaming as the internet, MP3s and Napster all took over and in just a little over a year and a half (fact check Joe - I'm bad at quantifying the passage of time) that slipped away too. But not before we recorded and self-released one full length and two e.p., all of which I am still enormously proud of. Anyway, Joe and Sonny are back in a new band, The Walk Slow and hearing them, seeing this video, it makes me so incredibly happy that I just can barely even think straight. These guys are the real deal - back in '01 Grez used to say, "next to no one in music knows how to be cool anymore" and sometimes I feel like that too. But when I hear something like this, well, I know that's just the scarred side of the otherwise brilliant coin.


Monday, April 13, 2015

ANT MAN!!!



Much more invested now. Michael Douglas, I first fell in love with you as an actor when I saw Romancing the Stone as a child (it was that, Ghostbusters and Predator on a regular rotation for years. Just ask my Dad). I am very happy you are still here and doing what you do best sir!

Saturday, April 11, 2015

Let's Talk Valiant Comics


Valiant comes in general and the unbelievably awesome Rai: Welcome to New Japan specifically are the topics of discussion in this week's edition of Thee Comic Column over on Joup.

Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Peter V. Brett's The Skull Throne



Whoah! I've been so immersed in writing my own book for so long that I have seriously fallen out of any semblance of contact with what my favorite authors are doing. First, a week or two ago I realized that Irvine Welsh has another novel coming out in in the U.K. next week* and now I see via a message on Goodreads that the forth book in Peter V. Brett's Demon Cycle hit the stands on March 31st!

WHAT???

Crap - after wolfing down book three, The Daylight War back... oh my, was that two years ago already? - I swore before the next one fell into my hands I would re-read the entire series to refresh myself.  Well, that did not happen and I have been once again caught unprepared and unaware. That however, will soon be remedied.

I talk about how I met Mr. Brett here - he actually gave me a copy of the first book in this series, The Warded Man and I am forever grateful to him for it.

.............

*I still haven't read his last one! I have never been this behind on Mr. Welsh's novels

Sunday, April 5, 2015

The Unseen Twin Peaks...


I caught wind of this a few hours ago and took to FB and twitter right away. Wanted to post here as well, as this is pretty much the running record of the parts of my brain that consume and have a relationship with media. 

David Lynch has officially left the Twin Peaks revival because Showtime will not provide the budget he feels the show will require to do properly. I'm normally weary of hashtags but I'm taking to social media with a few to voice my displeasure (read: abject sorrow) and try to goad showtime into righting their wrong. I would greatly appreciate anyone who could reiterate these tags on FB, twitter, Instagram... wherever.

‪#‎fuckshowtime #‎givelynchthemoney‬ #‎savetwinpeaks‬

OR... a couple years ago the head of Netflix voiced interest in bringing this - among a lot of other shows - back. They did with Arrested Development and incurred quite a bit of good will doing so, showing they're superior attitude to major terrestrial television networks (things of the past). So how about Netflix swoops in and takes Twin Peaks and Lynch away from showtime? That'd give them another huge boost in good will and show their superiority to cable networks as well.

Night (Zola Jesus & Dean Hurley Remix



From Lost Themes.

Sunn 0))) - Domkirke



This morning's listening. I have this on vinyl back from when it hit limited release via Southern Lord circa 2008 or 09 but I was happy to find it online as a digital because this morning's writing session is all about headphones.

Friday, April 3, 2015

Ash vs. Evil Dead Teaser







I can't wait for this. That said, I also still want Fede Alvarez to do a part 2 in his end of the Evil Dead-verse. I want more Mia, and holding out that she and Ash will eventually team up.

AMY (Winehouse) Documentary Trailer



I found out about this upcoming doc on Amy Winehouse just yesterday and I have to say it felt like eerie prescience. Back to Black is never far from my mind and it was about a week ago that I pulled it of the shelf for the first time since probably November. I've always loved this record and as time has passed that love has matured in a way that - just the morning before my wife tagged me in a revelatory post on this film's existence - felt emotionally epic. Watching this today I have to say that the feeling deepens once again. If the film is even half as sophisticated and effective as the restraint and technique used to cut this promotional short is, well, we'll have a winner.

Directed by Asif Kapadia, produced by James Gay-Reese. Can't wait.

Thunderstorm



This makes me insanely happy. I miss rain...