Archive for the ‘Movies’ Category

Mojo Nixon, RIP

Thursday, February 8th, 2024

Psychobilly musician Mojo Nixon died yesterday at 66. “A cardiac event on the Outlaw Country Cruise is about right… & that’s just how he did it, Mojo has left the building.”

I saw him live a couple of times at SXSW, once with Jello Biafra in support of Prairie Home Invasion. “Mojo, why do you play SXSW? Ain’t no major label ever gonna sign you!”

Here’s a few tracks for the memories.

MST3K’s 14th Season Fundraiser Going Slow

Monday, November 20th, 2023

You may have noticed that Joel Hodgson and MST3K gang are having a new kickstarter for the next season (for values of “kickstarter” that include “not on the Kickstarter platform”). There are five days left and they are only 38% of the way to the first goal of $4.8 million, which will be six features and six shorts.

The last two Kickstarters they had blew past their goals.

This one? Not so much. Despite announcing that Plan 9 from Outer Space will be among the riffed films.

Donor fatigue? The Biden Recession? Not doing enough promotion? Not enough boost from a non-Kickstarter platform? Disgruntlement over how long it took people to get their promised rewards from the last campaign?

I think it may be some combination of all the above.

Maybe the usual Turkey Day festivities will kick it into higher gear. But if they don’t, this may be the first MST3K fundraising effort to fail.

I Saw Peter Gabriel in Austin Last Night

Thursday, October 19th, 2023

I saw the Peter Gabriel concert at the Moody Center in Austin on October 18. It was the third time I’d seen Gabriel perform live, and he put on a good show. We had tickets facing center stage in the mezzanine section, and they were quite pricey.

About half the songs are off the forthcoming I/O album, while the other half are from other parts of his career (“Sledgehammer,” “Solsbury Hill,” etc.). His tour ensemble was a mixture of old familiar faces (the always excellent Tony Levin, Manu Katche and David Rhodes) and new (cellist/vocalist Ayanna Witter-Johnson, who was very good).

They had an interesting multimedia setup with projection surfaces on different stage elements that they could move, as well as close-up cameras for projecting on either wing (and occasionally the giant circular moveable hanging surface that was the centerpiece of the set).

I think the best song of the concert was an absolutely killer version of “Digging in the Dirt,” which had a nasty, funky, bass-heavy sound to it. There’s not a version with great sound on YouTube, so this will have to do:

They also did an extremely good version of “Biko” as the final encore.

Here’s the set list, which seems to be constant across venues.

I think the last two shows of the tour are in Dallas tonight and Houston Saturday, and overall prices are a bit cheaper than the Austin show. It’s well worth catching if you’re a Gabriel fan.

As for the Moody Center, the sightlines are very good, the concession prices are exorbitant, and the seats are too small and not particularly comfortable.

Shoegazer Sunday: Slowdive’s “The Slab” (and first impressions of Everything is Alive)

Sunday, September 10th, 2023

Here’s “The Slab,” the final track from Slowdive’s new Everything is Alive album. But I should warn you that this is a case where the song of the CD is much stronger than the compressed version on YouTube:

I finally got the CD in this week, and I think it’s a very strong album, more consistent than their previous self-titled album, but only time will tell is something as strong as “Slomo” or “No Longer Making Time” emerges as particular favorites. (And the later only really twigged for me when it became such a burner live.)

Shoegazer Sunday: Slowdive’s “Skin in the Game”

Sunday, August 20th, 2023

Here’s another song off Slowdive’s forthcoming Everything is Alive album, due out September 1st.

William Friedkin, RIP

Monday, August 7th, 2023

No director probably ever had three films back to back as good as William Friedkin (who just died at age 87) did in the 1970s. The French Connection, The Exorcist and Sorcerer are each truly great films that stand the test of time. The first two made a ton of money (justifiably). The third one didn’t, but has one of the greatest, tensest scenes of all time.

Friedkin let the success of those first two go to his heads, and then a string of flops (including Cruising, a film that, like The Last Temptation of Christ, alienated its only potential audience) put him out of favor in Hollywood.

He also directed a pretty swell episode of the 1980s Twilight Zone reboot.

He had a wealth of talent, I just wish we had more first rate films from him.

Library Addition: Signed First of George Romero’s The Living Dead

Friday, June 23rd, 2023

A little out of line with what I usually buy, but I thought the limitation was low enough to be worth picking up.

Romero, George A. and Daniel Kraus. The Living Dead. Short Scary Tales (SST) Publications, 2023. First edition hardback, 322 of 400 copies signed by Suzanne Romero, Daniel Kraus, Vincenzo Natali and Francois Vaillancourt, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket. Hefty 736 page original novel set in Romero’s Living Dead universe. Now sold out from the publisher, though I do have one copy available through Lame Excuse Books.

Library Addition: Two PS Publishing Firsts

Wednesday, June 14th, 2023

Two PS Publishing titles, both bought from the publisher at the usual discount.

  • Hughes, Matthew. Ghost Dreams. PS Publishing, 2022. First edition hardback, #55 of 100 signed, numbered copies, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket.

  • Wallace, Edgar (Stephen Jones, editor). Kong: An Original Screenplay. PS Publishing/Electric Dreamhouse, 2023. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket. The original screenplay for King Kong, which evidently differs considerably from the final film. Slightly oversized (10 1/2″ high) and profusely illustrated, with a good 90 pages of notes from Jones, who worked from “Wallace’s personal copy of his original draft script with his own corrections and interpolations” plus “a boys’ story-paper adaptation of the film, preliminary production stills and art-work, and a colour portfolio of King Kong posters from around the world.” A couple of production sketches are from the lost spider pit scene.

  • I have both of these available through Lame Excuse Books.

    Shoegazer Sunday: hyperlilly’s “springs (the oracle)”

    Sunday, June 11th, 2023

    Hyperlilly evidently hale from Cologne, Germany. Not a fan of the video (static band shots + mild psych color filters), but the song reminds me of Auburn Lull crossed with a bit of M83.

    Wes Anderson’s Star Wars

    Thursday, May 4th, 2023

    I checked out of Star Wars after The Force Awakens was just “meh” and everyone told me the sequels were much worse and Disney proceeded to screw every single pooch. But here’s a Star Wars movie I would totally watch:

    Consider this your May the 4th post.