Taking stock, Vol. 2
Hey, strangers! Here is what I thought of Rob Zombie's "Halloween," as well as the recent CDs by Aesop Rock and Avichi.
Several real posts are in the works, but to let you know that I'm still alive, I will share the complete, still-expanding list of musical acts which I've seen perform live so far this year, in order:
1. Withering Soul (x2)
2. Abigail Williams
3. Enslaved
4. Dark Funeral
5. Andreas Kapsalis Trio
6. Will of the Ancients
7. Vesperian Sorrow
8. Slough Feg (x2)
9. Vreid
10. Månegarm
11. Dark Forest
12. Gwynbleidd
13. Earthen
14. Shroud of Bereavement
15. Hordes of Yore
16. Mael Mórdha
17. Obtest
18. Rudra
19. Skyforger
20. Bal-Sagoth
21. Asobi Seksu
22. The Appleseed Cast
23. The Monocles
24. Margot and the Nuclear So and So's
25. Man Man
26. Twelfth Gate (x3)
27. Mindwarp Chamber
28. Lupara
29. Belphegor
30. Krisiun
31. Unleashed
32. Clad In Darkness
33. Epicurean
34. Rise Against
35. My Chemical Romance
36. Murder By Death
37. The Tossers
38. The Reverend Horton Heat
39. Secret Chiefs 3
40. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
41. Magical, Beautiful
42. Parenthetical Girls
43. The Dead Science
44. Dark Tranquillity
45. The Haunted
46. Lord Mantis
47. Yakuza
48. Genghis Tron
49. Kylesa
50. Plaid
51. Shellac
52. Iggy and The Stooges (x2)
53. Light This City
54. The Number 12 Looks Like You
55. HORSE the band
56. Shatter Messiah
57. Suspyre
58. Benedictum
59. Solitude Aeturnus
60. Lethal
61. Thurisaz
62. Novembers Doom (x2)
63. Saturnus
64. Martyr
65. Atheist
66. Brandon and pal @ Red Line Tap open mic
67. Emperor
68. River of Ashes
69. The Muzzler
70. HeWhoCorrupts
71. Fuck the Facts
72. Regurgitate
73. Valkyrie
74. Widow
75. Crescent Shield
76. Bible of the Devil
77. Mr. Blotto (x2)
78. Ion Dissonance
79. The Faceless
80. As Blood Runs Black
81. Cattle Decapitation
82. Cephalic Carnage
83. Decapitated
84. Necrophagist
85. Drop
86. Donna the Buffalo
87. Brazil
88. Bob Weir & RatDog
89. Rusted Root
90. Beach House
91. Grizzly Bear
92. Fujiya & Miyagi
93. Battles
94. Professor Murder
95. Iron & Wine
96. Mastodon
97. Clipse
98. Cat Power and the Dirty Delta Blues Band
99. Yoko Ono
100. The Ponys
101. Menomena
102. NOMO
103. Craig Taborn's Junk Magic
104. Jamie Lidell
105. The Cool Kids
106. Of Montreal
107. The New Pornographers
108. De La Soul
109. Voltar
110. The Decemberists and the Grant Park Orchestra
111. Something for Rockets
112. The Race
113. Oh My God
114. Pit Er Pat
115. Dirty Dozen Brass Band
116. Russian Circles
117. High on Fire
118. Ghostland Observatory
119. Chin Up Chin Up
120. G. Love (solo)
121. Son Volt
122. Charlie Musselwhite
123. Viva Voce
124. Sparklehorse
125. M.I.A.
126. moe.
127. Blonde Redhead
128. Satellite Party
129. LCD Soundsystem
130. Femi Kuti and Positive Force
131. Daft Punk
132. Sound Tribe Sector 9
133. The Roots
134. Regina Spektor
135. Roky Erikson and the Explosives
136. The Hold Steady
137. Yeah Yeah Yeahs
138. Spoon
139. Patti Smith
140. Interpol
141. Apostle of Hustle
142. Peter Bjorn and John
143. !!!
144. Yo La Tengo
145. Modest Mouse
146. TV on the Radio
147. Pearl Jam
148. Knock-Out
149. Voodoo Glow Skulls
150. The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir
151. The Changes
152. The 1900s
153. Bloc Party
154. Centaurus
155. Swallow the Sun
156. Insomnium
157. Scar Symmetry
158. Katatonia
Several real posts are in the works, but to let you know that I'm still alive, I will share the complete, still-expanding list of musical acts which I've seen perform live so far this year, in order:
1. Withering Soul (x2)
2. Abigail Williams
3. Enslaved
4. Dark Funeral
5. Andreas Kapsalis Trio
6. Will of the Ancients
7. Vesperian Sorrow
8. Slough Feg (x2)
9. Vreid
10. Månegarm
11. Dark Forest
12. Gwynbleidd
13. Earthen
14. Shroud of Bereavement
15. Hordes of Yore
16. Mael Mórdha
17. Obtest
18. Rudra
19. Skyforger
20. Bal-Sagoth
21. Asobi Seksu
22. The Appleseed Cast
23. The Monocles
24. Margot and the Nuclear So and So's
25. Man Man
26. Twelfth Gate (x3)
27. Mindwarp Chamber
28. Lupara
29. Belphegor
30. Krisiun
31. Unleashed
32. Clad In Darkness
33. Epicurean
34. Rise Against
35. My Chemical Romance
36. Murder By Death
37. The Tossers
38. The Reverend Horton Heat
39. Secret Chiefs 3
40. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum
41. Magical, Beautiful
42. Parenthetical Girls
43. The Dead Science
44. Dark Tranquillity
45. The Haunted
46. Lord Mantis
47. Yakuza
48. Genghis Tron
49. Kylesa
50. Plaid
51. Shellac
52. Iggy and The Stooges (x2)
53. Light This City
54. The Number 12 Looks Like You
55. HORSE the band
56. Shatter Messiah
57. Suspyre
58. Benedictum
59. Solitude Aeturnus
60. Lethal
61. Thurisaz
62. Novembers Doom (x2)
63. Saturnus
64. Martyr
65. Atheist
66. Brandon and pal @ Red Line Tap open mic
67. Emperor
68. River of Ashes
69. The Muzzler
70. HeWhoCorrupts
71. Fuck the Facts
72. Regurgitate
73. Valkyrie
74. Widow
75. Crescent Shield
76. Bible of the Devil
77. Mr. Blotto (x2)
78. Ion Dissonance
79. The Faceless
80. As Blood Runs Black
81. Cattle Decapitation
82. Cephalic Carnage
83. Decapitated
84. Necrophagist
85. Drop
86. Donna the Buffalo
87. Brazil
88. Bob Weir & RatDog
89. Rusted Root
90. Beach House
91. Grizzly Bear
92. Fujiya & Miyagi
93. Battles
94. Professor Murder
95. Iron & Wine
96. Mastodon
97. Clipse
98. Cat Power and the Dirty Delta Blues Band
99. Yoko Ono
100. The Ponys
101. Menomena
102. NOMO
103. Craig Taborn's Junk Magic
104. Jamie Lidell
105. The Cool Kids
106. Of Montreal
107. The New Pornographers
108. De La Soul
109. Voltar
110. The Decemberists and the Grant Park Orchestra
111. Something for Rockets
112. The Race
113. Oh My God
114. Pit Er Pat
115. Dirty Dozen Brass Band
116. Russian Circles
117. High on Fire
118. Ghostland Observatory
119. Chin Up Chin Up
120. G. Love (solo)
121. Son Volt
122. Charlie Musselwhite
123. Viva Voce
124. Sparklehorse
125. M.I.A.
126. moe.
127. Blonde Redhead
128. Satellite Party
129. LCD Soundsystem
130. Femi Kuti and Positive Force
131. Daft Punk
132. Sound Tribe Sector 9
133. The Roots
134. Regina Spektor
135. Roky Erikson and the Explosives
136. The Hold Steady
137. Yeah Yeah Yeahs
138. Spoon
139. Patti Smith
140. Interpol
141. Apostle of Hustle
142. Peter Bjorn and John
143. !!!
144. Yo La Tengo
145. Modest Mouse
146. TV on the Radio
147. Pearl Jam
148. Knock-Out
149. Voodoo Glow Skulls
150. The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir
151. The Changes
152. The 1900s
153. Bloc Party
154. Centaurus
155. Swallow the Sun
156. Insomnium
157. Scar Symmetry
158. Katatonia
posted by SoulReaper at 1:19 PM
3 Comments:
Zombie's "Halloween" slices too deep
If Rob Zombie is such a big horror movie buff, you'd think he'd want to avoid helming a remake right now.
Yet, here's the industrial rocker's "reimagined" version of John Carpenter's "Halloween," the granddaddy of all slasher films, joining a recent cavalcade of horror revamps which includes "The Omen," "Black Christmas," "The Hitcher," "The Wicker Man," "Pulse," "When a Stranger Calls" and two installments of "The Hills Have Eyes."
Granted, this is not a direct re-make. At its onset, writer/director Zombie delves into the troubled past of serial killer Michael Myers, depicting the events which shaped him into a remorseless murderer. By the time Zombie gets to the event that began Carpenter's "Halloween," Michael's murder of his teenaged sister on the title holiday, he's already racked up a few victims.
Young Michael is an introverted loner who says he likes to wear masks because "they hide my ugliness." His loving mother, Deborah (Rob's wife, Sheri Moon Zombie), strips to pay the bills. The boy contends with Deborah's drunken, verbally abusive boyfriend (a well-cast William Sadler) as well as school bullies who taunt him about his mom's line of work.
Psychologist Dr. Sam Loomis (the reliably hammy Malcolm McDowell) tells Deborah he's worried about the boy. In his expert opinion, Michael's hobby of killing animals and photographing their corpses suggests a profile that might lead to future problems. Gee, ya think?
This origin stuff is more thought out than that in last year's awful "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning," but it has a similar dulling effect. By reducing the unstoppable murder machine that audiences have come to know over the past 29 years to your standard mistreated misfit kid who sits around making papier-mâché masks that look like rejected Slipknot costumes, Zombie demystifies an icon better left inhuman.
The actual "remake" part of the film fares better. Scout Taylor-Compton, in the Jamie Lee Curtis role of stalked babysitter Laurie Strode, is a genuinely agreeable heroine. Zombie knows his way around a murder sequence, too, giving the graphic (and, compared to the original, far more frequent) violence here the intimately unpleasant edge he displayed in his last film, "The Devil’s Rejects." His predilections for shaky camerawork and painfully obvious classic rock hits on the soundtrack are, unfortunately, also in full force.
Give Zombie credit for anticipating criticism for what could only be perceived as tampering with a classic. At several points in his "Halloween," we see characters watching the 1951 sci-fi favorite "The Thing from Another World." It's as if Rob's reminding the audience that the venerated John Carpenter filmed his own "reimagining" back in the day. The difference, of course, is that Carpenter's 1982 "The Thing" actually expanded on the original film's concepts, whereas Zombie merely frontloads his version with backstory and peppers the flick with enough cameos by cult genre stars to keep horror geeks grinning.
Carpenter filmed his 1978 indie chiller on a $325,000 budget. The film made roughly $47 million at the domestic box office, which still ranks among the most impressive budget-to-box office ratios in history. Zombie's studio-approved "Halloween" cost about $20 million, and while it has its moments, it's too fixated on Michael Myers the man for his trademark mask to seem anywhere near as frightening.
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Aesop Rock, None Shall Pass (Definitive Jux)
In the world of indie hip-hop, the name Aesop Rock conjures strong reactions. The Long Island MC's notoriety comes from his distinctive deep, stuffy-nosed flow, dense with wordplay and what can seem like tangents. Delivered over artsy, occasionally abstract music, Aes Rock's rhymes are for language lovers and juxtaposition aficionados - who, in theory, would be every hip-hop audience, right?
Nope, the mainstream still favors lame sex and money fantasies, and Aes Rock would give those folks a headache. His fifth LP is as cynical and immediately impenetrable as his 2003 disc Bazooka Tooth, although nowhere near as tense and mechanical-sounding.
For example, take lip trickery like, "I was a dark, dumb student/No hooky rookie day-trippin' on visions of chickens/That look like R. Crumb drew 'em/They grew him in the royal dirt of Suffolk County's flooring/With the blood of an alcoholic clergyman in his forearms." That's how he starts "Catacomb Kids," a tale of youthful shenanigans that's one of several songs Aesop Rock produces himself here. He shows a preference for rubbery funk, with "Citronella" bolstered by big band horns and the more ominous "Five Fingers" floating on psychedelic guitars.
Longtime producer Blockhead leaves distinctive fingerprints as well, his highlights including the jogging-paced title track's pulsing keyboard, the percolating percussion of "Bring Back Pluto" and the earthy funk of the pirate-metaphor-heavy "The Harbor is Yours."
Other guests range from labelmates El-P, Cage and Rob Sonic to John Darnielle of indie pop favorites Mountain Goats, but this is entirely Aes Rock's show. In his catalog, "None Shall Pass" lies somewhere between the fractured futurism of Bazooka Tooth and the wry, warmer discontent of his earlier work. It's smart, acerbic, restless and definitely not recommended for 50 Cent fans.
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Avichi, The Divine Tragedy (Numen Malevolum Barathri)
DeKalb, Illinois is not known as a black metal capitol, although the revered cult act Judas Iscariot once hailed from there. If the college town ever decides to trade corn for corpse paint, however, Avichi will be counted among its most notable hordes.
This is yet another one-man American black metal project, led by onetime Nachtmystium guitarist Aamonael. Rather than the insular, weird sort of sonic intimidation favored by his West Coast peers, Avichi goes for straightforward grimness and mostly succeeds.
The first half of Avichi's debut is much faster than the second, bringing to mind the early years of Norwegian masters Satyricon, Darkthrone and Enslaved. The best of these tracks, "Messianic Deliverance," begins and ends with a tense, rousing guitar riff which sandwiches cold blasting and dissonant midpaced meandering, all of it oddly catchy without being overtly melodic.
The relatively languid and sedate instrumental "Prayer to Release" announces the slower, moodier second half of Tragedy. Aamonael's mournful riffing prods the dirge "Aeonic Disintegration" into an ever-darker cavern, while session drummer Xaphar (ex-Avidost, also ex-Nachtmystium) contributes a tribal roll to "Taedium Vitae" that makes the tune feel more like the sludgecore of Isis or Neurosis than black metal.
The disc's biggest flaw is its intro and outro tracks, which sound like digitally manipulated gong sounds. Two minutes of this at the beginning are ominous and build suitable tension, but five minutes at the end dampen the final song's impact and are, frankly, irritating. If Avichi can ditch such amateur avant-garde impulses and integrate its divergent but equally dismal personalities, this outfit could be deadly.
So, what did you think of Peter, Bjorn and John?
They were very good. I only got to see a few songs before heading off to see !!! (this was at Lollapalooza), but what I saw was very catchy and had a lot of energy. I have yet to hear the record, but I've gotten nothing but positive impressions. And you know I love the Swedes... even when they're not playing death metal.
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