2018: May 19th 11:25

Chester Whelks absolutely kills it with a brief call-to-arms for reassessing one of the greatest albums by a hip hop artist in the last twenty years (in my opinion). READ IT HERE.

K surprised me a bit by asking to go see Deadpool 2 for her birthday yesterday. We saw the original on video about eight months ago and both liked it, K more than I. I may still be suffering fatigue from blockbusters and thus, eschewing all of them, I'd never begrudge my girl anything. Plus, there's something about the strange, Meta-soup that Reynolds has spearheaded here; my interest and enjoyment of Deadpool 2 - which I liked infinitely more than Deadpool 1 - lies in its comedy. Ask most of my friends and they will half-jokingly tell you, "Shawn hates comedies." This isn't completely untrue; the comedies I love - The Burbs, Airplane, Real Men, Ghostbusters, The Convent, The Big Lebowski (not a comedy but still shows up on this list! How's that?), are so well-made they make me hate most modern comedies. While I quite liked both Neighbors movies, Pineapple Express (maybe more for the shock of Gary Kohl as a villain than anything else, but still) and the Twenty-One Jumpstreets revivals, I find no reason for laughing at most of what comes out in the genre. Deadpool 2 was f*&kin' hysterical, and largely because it is so aware of itself. The tragic backstory that catalyzes most of the events in the movie are even delivered so hard-nosed I couldn't help but crack a smile. And sorry, Josh Brolin was born to play Cable. Just saying.

Yesterday's playlist:

Apex Twin - I Care Because You Do
Lantlos - .neon
Geto Boys - Eponymous
Merciful Fate - Don't Break the Oath
Eagulls - Ullages
The Ocean - Heliocentric
Neon Kross - Darkness Falls

Card of the day:

Emotion tempered with Intellect. Rain falls on the calm waters - emotions rousing the mind, stirring decisions beyond those made by sheer intellect. The reins in the Prince's hand, wresting control from the tumultuous forces threatening the calm - this should not necessarily be looked at as 'bad' - the creative process is a marriage of Emotion and Intellect; a tumultuous explosion that we must shape and control in order to actually record or define.

Broken Social Scene - KC Accidental

Broken Social Scene is one of those bands I'd always meant to check out but never got around to. Changing that tonight, thanks to Chester Whelks' write-up for this week's edition of the Joup Friday Album. Favorite song so far, because it reminds me a bit of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, without the severe gravity (not that gravity is a bad thing).

Karl Urban's Brief Message RE: DREDD Sequel

Once again, props to Mr. Whelks for throwing this little video my way. I signed the petition - LOVED Dredd. If you did too, go HERE and sign!

WEEN circa 1996 on Australian Radio

"Here on the Chocolate hotline..."

If you click on the previous WEEN link I posted this week, "Beacon Light", and follow the link that Chester Whelks left in the comments you can read about Aaron Freeman's upcoming record. I miss the hell out of WEEN, but I want them all to live great, healthy lives too. So I'm behind Aaron and can't wait to hear the new record.

"Eating a Lobster Hoagie on my house boat" - fan-fucking-tastic!

Joup Team-Up! Chester Whelks & I Talk Twin Peaks

image courtesy of cogito-ergo-doleo.tumblr.com

The inimitable Chester Whelks recently asked me about doing a two-man article pertaining to the final episode of Twin Peaks for our beloved Joup. This, of course, in honor of the aforementioned 25 Years since Special Agent Dale Cooper entered the Black Lodge. The link below will act as a mason jar of scorched engine oil; click it and you will draw back a crimson curtain. We will be known to you then and ready to talk about our own individual experiences with the series and that massive, massive final episode.

kcoR s'teL

Happy Twenty-Five Years (Not for Dale Cooper)

Dale Cooper entered the Black Lodge (in story time) on March 26th, 1989. He's still there, with the good Laura. What's Bob been up to running around in Cooper's skin? Well, most likely he's killed Major Garland Briggs and Pete Martel, but other than that... Mr. Lynch or Mr. Frost, would you care to weigh in on this with say... A NEW SEASON? Netflix in particular has expressed interest. Or what about a season of True Detective that intersects with the TP timeline, much as the fabled X-Files episode where Dana and Mulder enter the Lodge in order to... no, let's not get diminutive. The simple fact though is, of course, us fans will take whatever we can get, even if it's just a Georgia Coffee commercial.

Thanks to the great Chester Whelks for forwarding the above video to me.

image courtesy of twin peaks.wikia.com

David Lynch - Twin Peaks 25 Years Later...

So I'm not entirely sure how I missed this. Obviously, if you drop by here at least once in a while you'll see my output is waaay down. So busy. It's work, and it's reaching 412 usable pages in my novel and still going strong (probably about double that when you add exploratory/what's getting tossed or re-worked). Then there's Drinking with Comics. Then there's comics. Today was the return - after 8 years - of David Lapham's Stray Bullets. I woke up at 4:30 AM, got to work by 5:41 AM, left work at about 2:45 PM, drove to The Comic Bug, picked up my pull list, which included the looooooong awaited Stray Bullets #41, which finally gave closure to an 8 year cliffhanger and wrapped up the Hi-Jinks and Derring-Doo phase of the book and saw, also today, the launch of Stray Bullets: Killers #1. Lapham promises it gets better from here. I believe him. I'm really sorry to say good bye to Virginia Applejack though, even if only for an issue. Anyway, more about SB in Thee Comic Column this week on Saturday. For now I brought it up to say I gave myself a day off, came home from the shop, smoked and read my comics. It was nice, oh so nice.

In the interim my friend Chester from Joup sent me this link and I was just blown away. I'm very close to a re-watching of Twin Peaks and this might just be the thing that puts me over the edge.

Chester Whelks and the Sunday Song Poem

image courtesy of bostonphoenix.com

Okay, for my money this is the strangest, most interesting and actually kind of downright frightening column I've been reading lately. Over on Joup Chester delves into the art and history of the Song Poem. If you - like I - don't know what that is then go here to the inaugural edition of the column and read Mr. Whelks' description, then go through the other four posts (thus far) and acquaint yourselves with... well, madness.

Column 2 Non Violent Taekwondo Troopers

Column 3 Octopus Woman Please Let Me Go

Column 4 The Crime Shows

Chester Whelks Interviews Gloom Balloon on Joup

Chester Whelks conducts a fantastic interview with Patrick Tape Fleming of Gloom Cookie on Joup here.

Buy the Gloom Cookie record You Make Me Feel Like A Natural Disaster/Fix the Sunshine Parts 1-7 on their bandcamp here.

Polvo - Light, Raking

The inimitable Chester Whelks wrote a review of Polvo's newest record for Joup back a few weeks ago. Go here to read it.

The Only In Utero Review You Need

image courtesy of http://www.taringa.net/

Great review of the reissue of an arguably classic record by Chester Whelks on Joup.

Al Cisneros - Ark Procession

This is so not what I was expecting but I really dig it. Al Cisneros is an often over-looked giant in the underground metal scene, hailing from such insanely awesome and influential bands as Sleep, Om and Shrinebuilder (I really want another Shrinebuilder rekkid guys!).

This is from Mr. Cisneros' first solo EP, available on 8/20 from the always wonderful Drag City (the label which, incidentally, just released Andy Kaufman's Andy and his Grandmother, which Chester Whelks wrote a fantastic review of on Joup here).

Chester Whelks interviews Paul Colilli of Simply Saucer...

... I'd never heard Simply Saucer. However, after hearing them and reading the interview, as Chester says, I am an instant convert. Colilli has a new solo record which I've embedded above - go here and you can purchase it on his bandcamp. Read the interview and check out another track that Chester embedded on Joup here.