From the monthly archives: October 2011
Village of the Damned (1960): The often spoofed, and once terribly remade, movie where a gang of blond-haired, creepy children are born at the same time, conceived when an entire town mysteriously falls asleep for a few hours. The original film spends a good deal of time dealing with the sleeping population and the military’s inept attempts at trying to learn what is causing the slumber (including flying a plane into the “sleep zone”…at least the pilot snoozed through his fiery demise). That silliness notwithstanding, this was very well done, right down to a fairly tense ending where a self-appointed teacher, and somewhat of a father figure to the children, plans their destruction.
Night of the Living Dead (1968): The classic that started the zombie craze, this truly holds up as an exceptional movie, building tension through the oncoming ghoul menace as well as through the character flaws of each cast member. Additionally, I always believe the best zombie movies are the ones where I sit and think, “what would I do here,” which Night enables quite freely.
Mutants (2009, French): Another “virus” flick that turns everybody into flesh eaters, the first ten minutes of this movie teases that it will depart from the standard script that so many of these films follow by isolating two characters as one tries to keep the other from dying of the slow-acting illness. Eventually it falls apart to stereotypical characters (the gun-happy control freak, the helpful-psychotic, the tough, then not-so-tough girl, and the ever-late-arriving army) and, perhaps worse, the horrid “look at us we are running” camera that 28 Days Later inflicted on the world (I think the Rage virus would have been more tolerable in the long run). Points for effort, but shame that they couldn’t see the interesting idea through to the end.
On a road trip to Toronto and back to see Amon Tobin’s fantastic ISAM show, the iPod was set to shuffle on the “under 6 minute” playlist, basically with access to every song on the machine 5:59 or shorter. I decided to transcribe this list while watching Night of the Living Dead; here are the 338 songs from the trip.
Note that I typed this pretty fast and with a few glasses of wine under my belt, so there are some potential typos. Also, for some tunes without track listings (usually if ripped from a live show), I just left the song title as a question mark.
(1) Amon Tobin – Stoney Street
Skinny Puppy – pasturN
Boredoms – 15
Boredoms – U-Bus
Beequeen – The Last Song of the Dodo
Amon Tobin – Hey Blondie
The Honeymoon Killers – Gimme Some Money
Gaudi – Nusrat Feteh Ali Khan – Dub Qawwali Remixes, Bethe bethe Kese Kese
Robyn Hitchcock – President
Mission of Burma – Peking Spring
Nico Tribute track
Jay Reatard – Nightmares
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Goda Grannar
Mark Eitzel – Sacred Heart
Dreadnots – Dream Time Two
(16) Walt Mink – Factory
Elevator to Hell – Morning Clouds
Sonic Youth – In The Mind of the Bourgeois Reader
Talking Heads – Paper
Pat Metheny – Part 5
Tom Waits – Flash Pan Hunter
Minutemen – Nothing Indeed
Sebadoh – Temptation Tide
Kronos Quartet – Webern: 5 Satze, Op. 5-1 Heftig Bewegt
Cursive – Art is Hard
R.E.M. – Harborcoat
Husker Du – Tell You Why Tomorrow
The Fiery Furnaces – Right By Conquest
(29) Tomorrow is Already Here – First Words
The Fiery Furnaces – Whistle Rhapsody
The dB’s – Change With the Changing Time
Stereolab – Tomorrow is Already Here
The Flaming Lips – Brain Damage
Oneida – I Will Haunt You
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Skolsangen
Sebadoh – Rebound
(37) Minor Threat – Salad Days
Motorhead – Stay Clean
Rasputina – Sister Sleep
The Boomtown Rats – No Hiding Place
Appendix Out – The Harp Key
Pit Er Pat – In : in : Anno IVxx
Carter USM – Falling on a Bruise
Kid Silver – 24 Last Days of the Lilac
Miss Violetta Beauregard – The Dirt Between My Feet’s Fingers
The Afghan Whigs – Night By Candlelight
The Paper Chase – …And All The Candy You Can Eat
Lightning Bolt – Captain Caveman
Kronos Quartet – Elizondo /Jesus: Cuatro Milpas
Underwater Culprit and the House of Assassins – Muswell Hillbilly
The Paper Chase – What’s So Amazing About Grace
(52) Tera Melos – Kola Kola
Cranium – Untitled
Butthole Surfers – Creep In The Celler (live)
The Ponys – I’m With You
The Fiery Furnaces – Evergreen
Clint Mansell – Xibalba
Barn Burning – Weatheredbound
Neurosis – Locust Star
Liars – Plaster Casts of Everything
Warren Zevon – ?
Boredoms – 8
Yo La Tengo – A Worrying Thing
Tricky – My Evil Is Strong
Mercyland – Mr. Right
(66) Rasputina – Christian Soldiers
Tom Waits – Midtown
Grifters – Re-Entry Blues
Luna – Moon Palace
(70) Mark Eitzel – Aspirin
Blind Willie McTell – Talking to Myself
Motorhead – Over the Top
Rasputina – Wicked Dickey
Frantic Mantis – Obsessive Online Community Drones
Clint Mansell – Supermarket Sweep
Archers of Loaf – Assassination on X-mas Eve
DJ Shadow – Mutual Slump
Jessica Bailiff – For You
R.E.M. – Shaking Through
Subtle – Hand Replacement
American Music Club – Hello Amsterdam
Robyn Hitchcock – Freeze
(83) R.E.M. – Carnival of Sorts
Cursive – The Farewell Party
The Fiery Furnaces – Cousin Chris
Yakuza – Obscurity
Archers of Loaf – Mutes in the Steeple
Enduser – Not So Distant Drums
The Books – Venice
Serena Maneesh – Un-Deux
The Afghan Whigs – Going To Town
Hella – Welcome To The Jungle, Baby, You’re Gonna Live
Kustomized – Film
Rasputina – Five Fleas
(95) The Kinks – Give The People What They Want
Frank Black – Two Reelers
The Residents – Another Land
Xiu Xiu – Don Diasco
American Music Club – I Broke My Promise
Sonic Youth – Shadow of a Doubt
Laetitia Sadier – Summertime
(102) Bob Geldof – Attitude Chicken
Ministry – N.W.O.
Butthole Surfers – Graveyard
Deerhoof – ?
The Honeymoon Killers – World Gone Mad
(107) R.E.M. – I Believe
Snog – Are You Normal Enough
Underwater Culprit and the House of Assassins – Sleeplessness Awaits
Sebadoh – The Freed Pig
Sugar – Every Little Bit Helps
Deerhoof – The Pickup Bear
Siamese Temple Ball – Untitled
The Boomtown Rats – Up All Night
Cursive – Let Me Up
The Fiery Furnaces – Sing For Me
Cursive – Driftwood: A Fairy Tale
(118) Mission of Burma – Good Cheer
Bob Mould – Poison Years
Luna – Sideshow by the Seashore
The dB’s – PH Factor
Sunny Day Real Estate – 5/4
Tommy Stinson – One Man Mutiny
Cabaret Voltaire – Control Addict
Nico – Nibelungen
Deerhoof – Spiral Golden Town
Stereolab – Mellotron
Skinny Puppy – daL
Tommy Stinson – It’s A Drag
(130) Skinny Puppy – Nature’s Revenge
The Spiny Anteaters – What You Can’t Say
Lou Reed – Cremation
Blind Willie McTell – It’s Your Time To Worry
Zongamin – Serious Trouble
Slint – Warren
Cursive – The Recluse
Mark Eitzel – Go Away
Talking Heads – Memories Can’t Wait
Howard Hello – Interlude
(140) The dB’s – Ash
Knut – Ads
Sparklehorse – Sad & Beautiful World
Deerhoof – Satan
Radiohead – Lucky
Radio 4 – Grass is Greener
Pigalle – Dans La Salle Du bar Tabac De La Rue Des Martyrs
Miss Violetta Beauregard – Indie Bad Gabber Good
Amon Tobin – Verbal (Boom Bip Remix)
Tom Waits – Innocent When You Dream
John Cale – From Nico Tribute
The Honeymoon Killers – Kaw-Liga
Sparklehorse – Ghost of his Smile
Oneida – Black Chamber
Black Dice – Buddy
Clint Mansell – 2 Pi R
(156) The Replacements – Swingin’ Party
The Ex – Oskar Beck
Dengue Fever – Shave Your Beard
Carter USM – 2 Million Years B.C.
The Beatles – Savoy Truffle
Chainsaw Kittens – Mouthful of Glass
Thuja – Track 10 (The Deer Lays Down Their Bones)
Kustomized – Handcuffs
Marillion – Heart of Lothian
(165) Tom Waits – Danny Says
The Honeymoon Killers – What Thing?
Spiritualized – No God, Only Religion
The Kinks – Don’t Forget to Dance
Butthole Surfers – Suicide
Radio Thailand – Blow-Dried Pop Collage
The Afghan Whigs – Honky’s Ladder
Johnny Cash – First Time Ever I Saw Your Face
Pat Metheny – Part 3
Tommy Stinson – OK
Pit Er Pat – Gated Community
Blind Willie McTell – Lord Send Me An Angel
Jay Reatard – Fading All Away
The Boomtown Rats – Another Sad Story
Skinny Puppy – Morter
(180) Boomtown Rats – Joey’s on the Street Again
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Far Jag Spy I Ditt Paraply
Bob Mould – Heartbreak a Stranger
Faust & Dalek – Remnants
Mike Watt – Funnel Capped Man
Mean Reds – Teenagers Only Zone
The Velvet Underground – I’m Set Free
The Kinks – To The Bone
Deerhoof – Six Holes on a Stick
Serena Maneesh- Simplicity
Smart Went Crazy – Blackbird B-Side
The Kinks – Victoria
The Pogues – Lullaby of London
(193) Poster Children – Music of America
DJ Shadow – Best Foot Forward
Sparklehorse – Ballad of a Cold Lost Marble
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Naturen
Nico – Ari’s Song
Warren Zevon – ?
Minutemen – No Exchange
Boredoms – Which Dooyou Like?
Butthole Surfers – Space
Smog – Stick in the Mud
The Dead Milkmen – Smokin’ Banana Peels
The Replacements – I Hate Music
(205) Minutemen – West Germany
The Clash – 1-2- Crush on You
Stereolab – The Seeming and the Meaning
Enablers – Sudden Inspection
Cheer Accident – Men’s Wide Open
Caribou – Hello Hammerheads
Warren Zevon – ?
Subtle – Middleclass Stomp
Peter Holsapple / Chris Stamey – Song for Johnny Cash
Smog – What Kind of Angel
(215) The dB’s – She’s Not Worried
Low Pop Suicide – Bless My Body
Thymme Jones – Dissimulation
Pigalle – Dans Les Prisons
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – In Kommer Gosta
The Fiery Furnaces – Uncle Charlie
The Paper Chase – The Song Will Eat Itself
Cursive – A Disruption in our Lines of Influence
Amon Tobin – Surge
(224) R.E.M. – Crazy
Cabaret Voltaire – The Set Up
Yo La Tengo – Shadows
Subtle – She
Amon Tobin – ?
Sparklehorse- Cruel Sun
Boredoms – Roku
Amon Tobin – Hot Korean Moms
Sebadoh – Forced Love
Tommy Stinson – Destroy Me
Husker Du – Charity, Chastity, Prudence and Hope
The Who – Armenia City In The Sky
The Flaming Lips – The Gash
Butthole Surfers – Kuntz
(238) Laibach – NSK
Death Cab For Cutie – We Have The Facts and We’re Voting Yes
Walt Mink – Turn
Laibach – Zhonghua
R.E.M. – Orange Crush
The Who – 5:15
Themselves – Out in the Open
Tom Waits – Telephone Call from Istanbul
Robyn Hitchcock – Queen Elvis
(247) Butthole Survers – Creep In the Celler
Speedy West – Indian Love Call
The Boomtown Rats – Fanzine Hero
The Kinks – Celluloid Heroes
Jesus Lizard – Thumbscrews
Black Dice – Chicken Shit
The Who – Love is Coming Down
Pixies – Allison
Sparklehorse – Hammering The Cramps
Cursive – Mothership Mothership Do You Read Me?
Painkiller – Executioner
The Fiery Furnaces – Cabaret of the Seven Devils
(259) American Music Club – California Dreamin’
Deerhoof – Hot Mint Air Balloon
Danger Mouse & Sparklehorse – The Man Who Played God w/ Suzanne Vega
Talking Heads – Life During Wartime
Grant Hart – Charles Hollis Jones
The Books – Smells Like Content
Amon Tobin – You=B9s a Jaco Pastorius looking Motherfucker
Meg Lee Chin – Nutopia
The Kinks – Art Lover
Neil Young – Do You Know How To Use This Weapon?
Tom Waits – Shake It
(270) Appendix Out – Many Legged Boatman
Rasputina – We Stay Behind
Death Cab for Cutie – Sleep Spent
The Replacements – Nobody
Archers of Loaf – Freezing Point
R.E.M.- The Flowers of Guatemala
Caribou – Bees
Foetus – The Need Machine (Franz Treichier Mix)
Clare & The Reasons – Wake Up You Sleepy Head
The Books – It Never Changes to Stop
(280) Boredoms – Bod
Boredoms – Pop Kiss
John Cale – Wasteland
R.E.M. – Begin the Begin
Clint Mansell – Stay With Me
Mike Watt – Hell Building Man
Mission of Burma – Weatherbox
Talvin Singh – Disser/Point Mento.B
Mission of Burma – One Day We Will Live There
Garret Gengler – Beliefs Never Heard
(290) Tom Waits – Union Square
Black Dice – Twins
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Om Ni Tycker Jag Undviker Er
Stereolab – Lo Boob Oscillator
Nuno Canavarro – O Fundo Escuro De Alsee
Mazzy Star – Umbilical
Snowpony – Easy Way Down
Toad the Wet Sprocket – Brother
Tom Waits – Redrum
Chainsaw Kittens – Hold
(300) Radio Thailand – Dongrek Apparitions
Perfect – Alternate Monkey
Archers of Loaf – Toast
Tim Buckley – Morning Glory
Knut – 7.08
The Paper Chase – The House is Alive and The House is Hungry
The Kinks – David Watts
(307) Jeff Buckley – New Year’s Prayer
The Fiery Furnaces – We Got Back the Plague
Garret Gengler – White Bird
R.E.M. – Letter Never Sent
Joe Walsh – Half of the Time
The Honeymoon Killers – The Hawaiian Boogie
Husker Du – Standing in the Rain
The Kinks – Do You Remember Walter?
Sonic Youth – Waist
Kustomized – Hound
Mark Eitzel – Live or Die
Chainsaw Kittens – Death Out at Party Central
Brian Tyler – The Mummy’s Eye
Edit Piaf – Un Monsieur Me Suit Dans La Rue
Dengue Fever – Hummingbird
The Red Krayola – A Tale of Two
Sonic Youth – Shoot
The Clash – Jail Guitar Doors
Low Pop Suicide – Philo’s Snag
Minor Threat – Seeing Red
Tom Waits – Hold On
Perfect – Turn it Up
Tom Waits – More Than Rain
Pixies – In Heaven
Sunny Day Real Estate – The Blankets Were the Stairs
The Replacements – More Cigarettes
The Honeymoon Killers – Oh Yeah!
R.E.M. – Talk About the Passion
Mission of Burma – Possession
Mean Reds – Penis Flower
Philemon Arthur and the Dung – Fed Spargris
(338) Warren Zevon – Searching for a Heart
Night of the Demon: This movie has bookends of a giant demon that make the animatronic animals at Chuck-E-Cheese look like Disney’s top of the line effects. It is a shame, too, because the movie itself is pretty well done in all other ways. The story is fairly standard, a man (who is pretty annoying and easy to root against) becomes cursed and scheduled to die in a few days and has work to transfer the curse to the evil-bearded bad guy (who is actually easier to like than the one we are to care about). With pretty nice camera work, decent dialogue, and some fairly creepy moments, this 1957 film was a pleasant surprise…even if the demon didn’t sing “Happy Birthday” to me.
The Tingler: Vincent price discovers the tangible creature inside all humans that makes us scared. The creature is hard to catch because it is susceptible to screaming and disappears inside us when we yell in fright, so it takes the frightening-to-death of a unable-to-scream deaf-mute to bring The Tingler to the surface where it can be captured by Price (with the help of the deceased’s drunken, wiener husband). With the assistance of Price’s disloyal wife, The Tingler escapes. Of course, all anybody has to do to stop The Tingler is scream, so it isn’t really much of a threat. The wiener husband pretends to be a threat, and the dead deaf-mute gives the camera a scary look near the end of the film, so I guess she might be a threat. I kinda sliced my finger holding the DVD I recorded The Tingler on; not enough to draw blood, but it I guess that was a bit of a threat…so at least something about the movie was threatening.
Ministry – Lava: Starting off the Random Eight loud and seemingly angry.
R.E.M. – Walter’s Theme: Upbeat little track from the Dead Letter Office outtakes album, and about my favorite era of the band.
Underwater Culprit and the House of Assassins – Eden Express: This is from the second album of Jason’s band, Your Days Are Numbered, which is a much quicker, louder version than what appears on the debut Gallons of Perception.
Mission of Burma – Let Yourself Go: The band that never ceases to release great music.
The Fiery Furnaces – 1917: Strange song from the ever, ever strange Blueberry Boat.
Crainium – A New Music For A New Kitchen. Or, How I Raised Myself Up From The Dead, and You Can Too!: Let the title speak for itself on this one.
Ondekoza – Yumigahama: From a collection of fun, interesting Japanese drumming.
Husker Du – Ice Cold Ice: Ending the Random Eight loud and fast.
Pontypool: A common premise these days: a virus infects the population and turns them into zombie-like critters who cause wackiness. But, this movie has two interesting twists, the first being that the virus is spread by language and people talking, and the second is that nearly the entire movie is filmed inside a radio studio with a morning DJ learning of the disaster and attempting to deal with it. This movie performs an excellent feat of letting the viewer’s imagination create 90% of the tension and is one of my favorites to watch when it pops up on cable, especially this month.
House on Haunted Hill: The original staring Vincent Price, there is actually a fair amount of tension between the cast members in a suspense, who-dunnit type of story through the first hour or so of the flick. Unfortunately, the horror is pretty comical, even by Price standards, and by the end it manages to make an episode of Scooby Doo seem more complex than a Ingmar Bergman movie in comparison. Sadly, even the vat of acid in the basement, which brings a nasty couple of folks to a dismal end, manages to fall second in the “worst household feature” to the razor-wire room in Suspiria, which will hopefully make it to this review collection soon.
Rec: Another virus movie, and another that is well done. A television soft-story news couple (cameraman, interviewer) follow an emergency response team to an apartment building where they find themselves locked in with a crew of folks and a rapidly-spreading rage-infecting virus. This Spanish movie was later remade as Quarantine, nearly shot for shot, but for some reason I can’t quite put my finger on, Rec seems to have a much greater impact on me. This is another one I would certainly recommend.
I spent a little time this afternoon contemplating if I could cross a stream by foot without hurting myself. With a week’s worth of rain, the water levels were pretty high and I doubted my balance enough to save the idea for a dryer day. However, as I looked down at the water, I saw this fellow sunning himself. He seemed quite unfazed by me, and let me snap a number of pretty close shots without flinching.
The Beast With Five Fingers: Although receiving third billing, Peter Lorre steals the show and brings a certain amount of respect to in what, by the title, probably should have been an laughably silly movie. Don’t get me wrong, it was a laughably silly movie, but probably one of the earliest where a dismembered hand causes havoc amongst an isolated group of people. Really, for the first forty-five minutes or so, the movie is actually fairly suspenseful and creepy with smart dialogue, great music, and reasonably strong acting. By the end it kinda all goes to Hell, but not a very intense Hell…probably just the one where people who farted in church go.
Dream Home: A very gruesome, dark satire about a woman, trying to afford a flat in Hong Kong where real estate has skyrocketed, decides to murder neighbors in attempts to lower property values. If one is into gore, the displays of unique, albeit clumsy ways of killing people might be worth the viewing. But on the whole, I found it a bit pointless and hard to maintain my interest.
Ju-on: The first theatrical Japanese movie, following the television movies and preceding the U.S. remake The Grudge, this has grown to be one of my go-to movies when I’m looking for something creepy on a late Saturday night. Admittedly, the first time I watched this, I felt it was miserable just for the sake of being miserable, and that still might be true. But I’ve also grown to appreciate it as an extremely disturbing movie, easily warranting the role of a Halloween must-see.
House of Wax: A few years ago, I haphazardly said that it would be nice if Vincent Price were given a posthumous honorary Oscar award. Nicole gave me a look I’ve become very familiar with – the one where she is obviously thinking that I’ve just said something very, very stupid, but doesn’t have the heart to tell me so. I’m not sure I’m entirely wrong on my opinion, but House of Wax doesn’t take too many steps to prove me right. Even if one were to cut out the gratuitous “let’s show everybody that this is a 3-D movie” scenes (which would reduce it to about 40 minutes at best), this one is just stupid beyond words. At least, stupid beyond my words, even if those words speak of an honorary Oscar.
The Shining: There once was a point in my life when Kubrick’s (drastically different) interpretation of Stephen King’s novel was easily one of my five favorite movies. From the quarter-century-plus since I first saw the movie on network television, there have been dozens of reasons posed as to why it is a terrible movie, from King’s own annoyance that it departed too far from his original message, to criticizing Nicholson for being too obviously crazy from the movie’s onset (which, in all fairness, is a reasonable criticism…he does seem the type to murder his family even without a crazy, haunted hotel prompting him). And while the movie has lost much of its impact for me over the years, I still remember the first time I saw the low-angle shot when a limping Nicholson, trudging through snow under the glow of only a flood light in attempts to hack his family to pieces, simply terrifying me. Add a fantastic terrified performance from Shelley Duvall and Kubrick’s directing truly in its prime, and this still easily qualifies as an October classic.
Nothing is more fun than the horror, and horrorish, movies that pop up on cable during October. We’ve already seen a few good ones; I’ll do my best to keep my mini-reviews up to date as the month continues.
It! The Terror From Beyond Space: Wearing a strobe-inducing jacket, John Carpenter appeared on TCM the other night to introduce this fossil. With some bad science, rampant sexism, and goofy rubber costumes, It was pretty bad, and Carpenter admitted as much. But it was also interesting as, with a creature sneaking aboard a spaceship and killing crew members, it appeared to be an early inspiration for the famous Alien.
12 to the Moon: This one had everything, from overlay graphics that incorrectly bled through each other, to self-luxury in waterless shower scenes when everybody suddenly realized they were dirty, to anti-heroic abandoning of lost and dying peers, to Palin-esque
scientific interpretations that were likely disproved in biblical times. Plus I think my cats were offended by the actor-kitties that were taken to the moon simply to procreate. Finally, I can’t be sure, but I think it was set in the same exact spaceship as It!, which was released two years earlier.
Frankenstein: Embarrassing as it is to say, I’m not positive I ever sat and watched this movie through from beginning to end. This is sad, too, as this was a fantastic movie. Tension, creepiness, and just danged good storytelling, I’d put Frankenstein up against the majority of modern movies for quality and fun.
Contemplating Silent Wishes
Contemplating Silent Wishes, the second release from Fertanish, presents minimalist, experimental rhythms and sounds that patiently travel through a complicated and mesmerizing composition.
Zero Zero Three
Stray
