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From the Double Gone Chapel by Two Lone Swordsmen
From the Double Gone Chapel by Two Lone Swordsmen
2004 | Electronic, Pop
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"This was the basis for the baseline in Sleaford Mods, fucking great stuff. Stuff like 'The Lurch'. They did a cover of the Gun Club's 'Sex Beat', that's great. Most of Weatherall's work is bass heavy, it's solo stuff. Wrong Meeting, the album that came after this, that's bass-led. There's a rockabilly feel to it. But with From The Double Gone Chapel it's 80s synths, bass, car alarms. The inner sleeve, which is just a coffee stain and a packet of Marlboro Lights next to it, that really influenced me. Same with Mike Skinner's sleeve where he's just sat in his flat with a pint, it's just fucking brilliant. That's how it is, he's not pretending to be anything. Those things merge, all of it is a big melting pot. I think I've hit it good with the albums that I have chosen for you as far as my contribution to Sleaford Mods. I mean, Andrew, whatever he makes, I go with. Initially, when we started doing Wank, the album before Austerity Dogs, I would have said to Andrew that I want a big heavy bass and I want a dusty Wu Tang thing. He took that on board and made it his own, then he would bring these slices of music to me and I thought the sound wasn't something I'd really go for, but it was quite good. I don't tell him anything any more, he just gets on with it. This the band I've been trying so hard to get into. I think we've been very lucky, regardless of the hard work and the shit me and Andrew went through, it was luck as well. I feel quite grateful that it happened to us."

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TT
The Taken (Celestial Blues, #1)
2
2.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Even though I'm not especially fond of angels, I decided to try out this new series based on my previous experiences with Vicki Pettersson's work. Sadly, after an intriguing first chapter, any enjoyment I may have expected never came knocking (guess it was too busy knockin' on heaven's door).

Meet one of the two main characters, rockabilly girl Katherine "Kit" Craig. She's an eternally optimistic and peppy reporter whose best friend and co-worker, Nicole, was just murdered while following a lead. Our other MC is a haunted Centurion angel named Griffin Shaw who ushers the newly murdered into the afterlife, otherwise known as the Everlast, while bemoaning the murders of both himself and his wife Evie back in 1960. After making a mistake concerning Nicole, he's been sent back to earth as a human with some angelic senses still intact. Kit and Grif soon meet up and begin investigating the circumstances around Nicole's death, whilst Griffin seeks out any details involving his own.

Problem Number One:
The Cardboard Characters
Character development is supposed to unfold over the course of a book, in this case it actually appeared to deteriorate as the book went on. Kit never developed into anything but one of those annoyingly chipper people you just want to hit with a sledgehammer, while Grif started promisingly enough but then stagnated. They were both very shallow characterizations, and on top of that, I never understood Kit's actions or reactions to just about anything. I never felt her sadness about her best friend's death, whom she rarely gave a passing thought, believed she was smart (by the end, I thought her a dolt), or seem in any way human with nary a rational thought in her head. About mid-way through the book, Grif tells her he's an angel after they kiss, so what does she do? Does she a) run away screaming, b) think he's a few feathers short of a goose and tell him to get hell out of her house and life, or c) have a calm Q&A session followed by giving him a whatfor that consists of "I won't kiss you again" and "you're watching me walk out that door (in her own house) because you can't handle any emotion blah, blah, blah by pretending you're an angel" and then proceed to attend a charity event wherein she acts and converses normally, like nothing happened? If you picked "c" *ding ding ding*, you're a winner! Because as we all know, any sensible guy will pull out the "I'm an angel" trick and expect a woman to believe him. *rolls eyes* Never was it ever crystal clear if Kit thought Grif was either crazy or a liar. It was all a bit hazy, but what can you expect from someone we're never allowed to know? All we discern is she dresses and lives (somewhat) rockabilly, but it's all a veneer to her hollowness inside, which led me to dub her Rockabilly Barbie.
<img src="http://i272.photobucket.com/albums/jj183/piscesrain/reviews/RockabillyBarbie.jpg">;
Because that's all she is and nothing more. The only character that I found a little more well-rounded was the secondary character Bridget Moore and the two Centurions introduced close to the end. Everyone else was either forgettably two-dimensional or they were a caricature, a la Caleb Chambers and Paul Raggio.

Problem Number Two:
The Relationship(s)
I'm expected to believe in a possible relationship between Grif and Rockabilly Barbie, err I mean Kit, but there's not much there to believe in. Like the characters, it was shallow with the same descriptions reiterated over and over again. Basically it's a case of telling instead of showing. I felt no love, maybe some attraction, but that's all she wrote. Likewise I never bought that Kit and Paul could ever have gotten far enough to be married, they were just too different. Most people don't do a 180 after they get married, the seed of who Paul really was deep down inside would have already been there and if Kit was even a fraction astute, she should have caught that. All this served was to be a plot point in the book.

Problem Number Three:
The Plot(s)
The main plot involving Nicole's death and Chambers had a "been there, done that" quality to it. The plot didn't shock me or seem like anything new, I've come across the same before or at least plots that were very close, and it wasn't even told in a fresh way. So I wasn't as affected by anything in the book as I probably should have been, partially due to the indifference I felt and the fact that I figured out everything long before the author dropped, what I guess she thought, were informational bombshells.
The book had three major plotlines: Grif and Evie's deaths, Nicole's death/prostitution ring, and Grif and the Pure Anas' philosophical moments. They weren't juggled well at all. Ms. Pettersson should have picked only one and paid more attention to developing that specific plot and the characters. The scenes with Anas (or Anne) especially didn't mesh with the other stories and felt as if the author was overreaching the boundaries set up by the book. One scene in particular was extremely bizarre and pointless to the book as a whole.
Where was the noir? I've seen enough film noirs to know it ain't here.

Problem Number Four:
The Ending
What happened at the end is what I'd expect in a book that's exclusively romance and not in a mystery/urban fantasy hybrid, which made the rushed ending seem even more ridiculous and sappy. It was incredibly unbelievable to the story and didn't seem to set up the next book in any way. Also, one of the plotlines was all but left dangling with no foreshadowing or anything. Poor, poor, poor execution. Don't expound on a storyline if you're not going to finish it up or at least leave it dangling in a way that makes the reader want to come back. All that boring set-up for a completely stupid and cheesy ending. I expected rainbows and unicorns to pop out at any moment.

Overall the book felt more like a rough copy than a finished one and definitely could have used a few more goings over. Several descriptions were rushed and chaotic or simply poorly done so that I was scrambling to picture what was going on. The book is almost 400 pages and it is simply too long. With so many storylines, I'm not sure how they managed to both crawl and have very little action at the same time. I was going to give this two stars because I didn't hate the book, that would imply that it elicited any feelings what-so-ever, but the truth of the matter is that there isn't one thing I really liked about the book either. The only way I'd read a sequel to the bafflingly-named Celestial Blues series is if it featured different leads like the aforementioned Centurions, and even then I'd cautiously dip my toes into the book.

Originally reviewed: June 29
Received: Amazon Vine
  
In Heaven by The Meteors England
In Heaven by The Meteors England
1981 | Rock
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"I heard this around second year at school, I must have been about 13. I bought it on vinyl and just caned it. The production on it is great. The Meteors were completely obsessed with 1950s music, doo-wop, rockabilly. And they were purists, you know. They despised people like the Stray Cats and the Polecats and the more charty bands of the time. Nigel Lewis, the bass player, I was quite influenced by his voice. In early Sleafords stuff I try and mimic it a little. It still sounds great. It's almost comical, lots of horror references. The Meteors invented psychobilly, there weren't any psychobilly bands around before them. It would be interesting to talk to Nigel Lewis, I tried to contact him but he never really got back to me. He left after the first album and they went to shit after that really. Well, now it sounds alright. But they got more thuggish, it wasn't very intelligent. There was a little bit of nerdiness about it at the beginning. Once Nigel Lewis left, P Paul Fenech got really arrogant and it married itself to the scooter scene at the time, which was predominantly white lads on scooters, pilot jackets, skinheads. It wasn't a very nice scene at all. There was a streak of racism, very misogynistic as well, just not very intelligent. Scooter rallies were quite hostile environments, you know. I went to one in Donnington in about 1984 and Desmond Dekker played and there were skinheads trying to get onstage and batter him with pieces of wood. It was just terrible. There was a little mod contingent but it was mostly this new breed of second generation mods who turned out to be scooter boys and psychobillies as well, the two things merged almost, it wasn't very nice. I was interested in the scooter thing and mod thing but I wasn't too taken with this, ""Oh fuck off, get your tits out!"" thing, and there was a lot of that. It just wasn't very inspiring."

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Slumber Party Massacre II (1987)
Slumber Party Massacre II (1987)
1987 | Horror
8
7.3 (3 Ratings)
Movie Rating
I, and I can't stress this enough, fucking love Slumber Party Massacre II. It may not be as cinematically mature as the first one, but it's 100% more entertaining and batshit crazy.

The lead characters, as per usual, are walking, talking, cliché slasher victims, but much like the first, they benefit from a decent slab of development, and feel like a believable group of friends. One could argue that the amount of times we get to see their band play is a little over the top but it sort of works.
Some of the shooting style is completely bizarre. A lot of characters talking directly to the camera which is a little cringey, but mainly uncomfortable. This style is also adopted for an extended dance sequence about half way through. Honestly, it's all a bit bizarre but kind of in keeping with the sheer absurdity that is eventually thrust upon the audience.

That absurdity is of course, this movies antagonist, simply credited as The Driller Killer. This dude is dressed head to toe in leather, with a rockabilly style quiff, and sports a huge drill as his weapon of choice, that happens to be mounted upon a demonic looking electric guitar, a guitar he likes to rip solos on whilst simultaneously piling up bodies. I can't truly describe how ridulous this villain is, but he's certainly memorable, full of one liners (surely a direct reaction to the popularity of Freddy Krueger), and you guessed it, even gets himself a musical number (whilst still drilling people to death of course)
This completely off the rails approach to the slasher sub genre is what sets the movie apart from a lot of its peers, and is the reason why it's become such a cult classic.

Slumber Party Massacre II is a movie that was never going to win academy awards, and is considered by many to be another trashy slasher. Personally, I think it's a blast. It doesn't take itself too seriously, the killer is low-key hilarious, it has some decent practical gore, and encompasses everything cheesy but magnificent about 80s horror. It deserves unconditional love.
  
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Justin Young recommended track Dancing Queen by ABBA in Gold: Greatest Hits by ABBA in Music (curated)

 
Gold: Greatest Hits by ABBA
Gold: Greatest Hits by ABBA
1993 | Rock

Dancing Queen by ABBA

(0 Ratings)

Track Watch

"I didn’t really know about ABBA when I was growing up, they’re one of those bands you think you’d get into through your parents, but my parents didn’t listen to them. I think the first time I heard them properly was in Muriel’s Wedding, obviously that wasn’t a cool thing so they became a kind of guilty pleasure, but when Mamma Mia! came out in my late teens I was ‘Damn, all of these songs are so fucking good.’ “I have this list of songs in my head that I think are perfect, obviously that’s completely subjective, but they’re untouchable pop masterpieces like ‘God Only Knows’, ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’, ‘Waterloo Sunset’ and ABBA have so many of them. There’s a humanity in their songs but they also feel like ‘how could anyone have made something so perfect?’ The writing, the production, the arrangements, even the way their voices sound, it has the same effect as when siblings sing. Their voices are unbelievable, sometimes I think ‘is that a weird harmony?’ but it’s just the way their voices sound together, it’s incredible. “This song makes me well up because it’s so perfect, but it’s also so silly, it makes me want to throw my hands in the air, I want to dance when I hear it and I want to smile. You feel silly when you hear it, you feel camp and like a character in Muriel’s Wedding or Mamma Mia! when it comes on. It’s an amazing feeling and that is the power music isn’t it? “The other thing you have to remember is that one of the things that made The Beatles so amazing and such an interesting proposition and a reason why people really like The Velvet Underground as well, is because they changed the way songs were written, they rewrote the rulebook. Before then all music essentially sounded the same, everyone was using the same three or four chords and melodies, that kind of Rockabilly and Rock and Roll, all operating in the same framework, even the blues, The Stones and The Beach Boys, until they started breaking the rules too. But ABBA were making this music only ten or twenty years after pop music as we know it began to exist and it’s so innovative. “You know when people talk about their favourite bands? They’re a band who if you’re in a car, someone could put on an hour of ABBA and I’d like every song and there’s bands who I consider to be my favourite bands who I couldn’t say that about. It’s banger after banger, I guess it depends what mood you’re in, actually I was listening to them in a car the other day and someone told me to turn it off! “It’s mind-bending how good they are when they’re at their best. I think music is more often than not written about as art, but it’s also entertainment and whilst what they do is this incredible art it’s also so entertaining. It’s funny, we’ve been speaking about music for the last half an hour but this is the first time where we’ve talked about music making us happy and that’s really important. Music should make you happy and ‘Dancing Queen’ definitely does that."

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