I love Troma Films. Lloyd Kaufman is one of my heroes. There's not much else I can say really.
If anyone is ever curious about why I am a warped individual, I think the blame can be pointed at Troma.
Being the late night tv aficionado in an era when being such a thing was rewarding, it was inevitable that I would come across these purveyors of perversion, comedy, and graphic, weird violence.
After Toxic Avenger I kept my eye for anything Troma.
I'm just going to mention a few faves and keep this simple.
So let's start with Toxie. Two words; must see! A nerd, a vat of toxic waste and POW New Jersey's first super hero.
I originally saw a cut version on regular television. I was in for quite a surprise when I finally rented the uncut VHS.
A high school next door to a nuclear power plant, mutations, and anarchy. Classic.
Tromeo and Juliet, better than Leo and Claire's version! And narrated by Lemmy!
I honestly don't remember anything about Troma's War other than i laughed my ass off and it was violent.
Apparently it features the highest onscreen kill count.
A scene from Street Trash. Back to that in a minute.
Nuke'em High alum.
Surf Nazis Must Die is my third favorite Troma film, maybe more for sentimental reasons than for the fact that it was a good film. I mean, it is, but not quite as intense as Toxie or Nuke'em.
I think the title says it all.
That looks like it probably sucks.
Hi, Lemmy!
Lemmy provides that much needed English flair to Tromeo and Juliet, in Kenneth Brannagh's absence.
Cafeteria food sucks.
More Nuke'em...
Did you know Samual L Jackson starred in Def By Temptation?
Yep. He has been in everything.
Redneck Zombies. That's it. Red. Neck. Zombies.
Mysterious street booze turns bums into diarrhea...Street Trash!
The face that would become The Toxic Avenger!
Almost forgot Sgt. Kabukiman NYPD. How?!?
Mainstream happens! Marvel Comic's 1st issue. It actually kicked ass...and didn't last long.
Hell, there was even a kid's cartoon called Toxic Crusaders with a toy and comic spin off.
Stranger In Our Town By The Gun Club from the epic album The Las Vegas Story.
If you're new to the Gun Club and Jeffery Lee Pierce and like what you hear, you should purchase and/or listen to the albums in the order they were released.
1st Fire of Love
2nd Miami
3rd Las Vegas Story
4th Death Party EP
5th Everything else, but not essential
Also, before Mr Pierce passed away he was working on his autobiography, Go Tell The Mountain, which was posthumously published by Henry Rollins/2.13.61.
One of my all time favorite zombie novels, from 1993. I actually scrapped a zombie novel I was working on at the time, because this was so good, mine felt pointless.
From Publishers Weekly
This apocalyptic horror story is set during the Bush Administration but in the very near future. As a spectacular comet passes the earth, it leaves in its trail a virus that infects humans. The virus causes the dead to resurrect and become cannibalistic zombies, while the living contract a debilitating sickness. In the space of days, major population areas worldwide are gripped with panic and rioting as the newly undead search out human flesh for their insatiable appetites. Those who can attempt to escape to the countryside. In gory interludes that become repetitive, Nutman's ghouls spring back to life and dine on whatever human is in their path. At the center of the story is Dominic Corvino, a U.S. covert agent and assassin. After dying in a political intrigue, he is resurrected and makes his way to CIA headquarters to find the country now in control of zombies like himself. Corvino, though, is more interested in resolving his psychological travails and avenging the deaths of former lovers than embracing the ugliness of the New Order.
from Wikipedia; Rawhead Rex is a 1986 British/Irishhorror film directed by George Pavlou and written by Clive Barker. The film is about a monstrouspagan god's bloody rampage through the Irish countryside, and based on the short story by Clive Barker that originally appeared in vol. 3 of his Books of Blood series. Pavlou and Barker had previously worked together on Transmutations (also known asUnderworld).
There was a tv series when I was a kid that played on USA, hosted by Robert Englund and later re-ran on MTV hosted by Stephen King, all about horror in cinema which is where I learned about Dario Argento, Clive Barker and many others. Rawhead Rex was featured on the program and the sight of that giant freak carrying a severed head through a trailer park put the movie at the top of my get list.
I wasn't disappointed when I got home from the video store! The movie was creepy, violent, and weird and I had little context for what I was seeing, which heightened the thrill. Unlike the slashers of the day, Rawhead reached back to pagan lore and delivered an earthy devil that brought down havoc on an Irish countryside that didn't look so dissimilar to my home in the Tennessee countryside.
By today's standards (and I guess by 1987's standards) Rawhead's look was a bit wonky up close, but the movie still holds up pretty well. Back in 2010 Barker had mentioned that he wanted to remake Rawhead, but I've never heard anything else about that.
Rawhead also showed up in the excellent Nightbreed comic from Epic.
Here's the trailer followed by the best scenes compiled by a fan...
One of my favorite bands of the last decade has been Grafton from Columbus OH. Their 1st two albums made my top ten of the year when I wrote for Sponiczine and their 3rd album continued to thrill. All three are available on iTunes, if your local record store is lame.
If you are thrilled off your ass by what you've heard and want to know every intimate detail of the lives of the men of Grafton, check out my article from Sponiczine over at Path Of Most Resistance. You should also check out Dead Canary Records' site!
No secret I'm a huge Batman fan and one thing I really love is his gallery of rogues. In my top ten is this sumbitch-Killer Croc. Over at Ultimate Comics, in Chapel Hill, I saw Croc's new action figure and my son helped me get my jaw off the floor after seeing the staggering $50 price tag. Damn, I thought we were in a recession. Ok, I didn't pay much less than that for my deluxe Swamp Thing from last year, but that's Swamp Thing! Oh, and they had the new Mr Freeze as well...
Dusty Rhodes vs Abdullah the Butcher ca. '83. Back when a match was a bloodbath and the competitors didn't look like underwear models. This is the compelling wrasslin' I grew up on!
From their first film, Phallus In Wonderland, Gor Gor by Gwar.
This movie was so over the top gory, cartoonish and offensive, I kept the VHS hidden for years, because I knew how much trouble I'd be in for bringing something like Gwar into the house. Hell, Alice Cooper and Iron Maiden were BANNED in my house! Amusingly, I could actually watch the most violent Stallone and Ah-nold films, but there better not be so much as a nipple any where! Much less giant mutant dongs, geez!
Just for fun, here's Gwar on Joan Rivers' Show
And on Alex Winter's The Idiot Box (MTV's best show ever..?)
The Abyss? Leviathan? No children, if you're looking for underwater sci-fi action look no further than Deep Star Six!
This was a super fun movie from 1989, directed by Sean S Cunningham (Friday The 13th). At the bottom of the ocean a crew on an experimental underwater base disturbs a giant creature that starts trying to kill them and destroy the base. Claustrophobic and hopeless, this giant monster flick was one that always held a special place in my heart. Good cast, good concept, good directing, good writing. Missed opportunities? Needs more gore. If you like giant monster movies, you couldn't ask for anything better than Deep Star Six.
Keep watching the sky, nerds!..And don't go in the water.
I love action figures and I collect Batman and Frankenstein and snatch up obscure or rare comic and horror figures when I can. I also love checking out custom jobs, because like a lot of collectors I have my own wish list of characters that will never get an official release. I'm also a writer and artist with my own characters that I'd love to see brought to life in plastic...well there's good news for all of us underground/indie/amateur/armchair creators...
Each extremely poseable BLANX figure comes ready for you to customize. Featuring an alternate head and two extra pairs of hands. The possibilities for customization are endless!
These are 3and3/4 inch figures (aka 80's GI Joe size and they are only...$6.99.
This bald bastard to the left is Alpha and currently the only one available, but more body types are on the way if Alpha does well. SO SUPPORT!
Check out the gallery for what others have pulled off!
When I was sixteen and transitioning from metal to punk the thing that was always missing was the horror. The Ramones had a great song about the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but I had spent the last five years immersed in Alice Cooper and Iron Maiden. I missed the theatricality of metal, but punk rock was hitting me where I lived. I started with the English bands (Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Damned, The Exploited) and then started getting the American hardcore bands (Black Flag, who I saw on the punk episode of VH1's My Generation, and Dead Kennedys, who I learned about on an anti-metal Christian documentary). Black Flag music was the soundtrack of my life and continue to inspire me to this day, I don't care which singer we're talking about, which album-it's all Flag and all powerful.
One day, in a lame ass record store, in that lame ass mall in Oak Ridge, I found it...Little black rectangular cassette case, neon greenish yellow skull, and song titles like Teenagers From Mars, I turned Into A Martian, Skulls, Die Die My Darling, Ghouls Night Out. Somehow I knew the Misfits were a punk band, but that's all I knew (I had no idea this was Danzig's old band, this was pre-internet). Misfits Collection became my obsession, it had two big things that made me happy-aggressive music and horror lyrics. I kept checking back at the three record stores in Oak Ridge until I got my hands on Walk Among Us, Evil Live, Earth AD and Legacy of Brutality. Then I was given the bad news; that's it. That's all there is. There's nothing else out there that the Misfits recorded. I couldn't believe it. About three years later I found a bootleg vhs tape called Video Hell which featured a great cable access show appearance, an unreleased Flipside Video that was very dark in the wrong way and the video below...
I don't remember the exact order of things happening or what year was what, but Collection 2 was released and then the box set. It wasn't much longer that word got around that the Misfits would be reforming without Danzig and was touring and had an album coming out. There was no end to agonizing over whether they'd be any good without Danzig, and while many people would argue, I think Michael Graves did an admirable job for two great albums.
I got to see the Misfits live at the Middle East in Cambridge MA while I was living in Boston. This was the Jerry Only/Dez Cadena (Black Flag)/Robo (Black Flag, Misfits)/Marky Ramone(Ramones) line up and oh hell yes I had a blast! They tore through every greta Misfits' song and Dez took over vocals for a slew of Black Flag tunes and at the end of the first set Robo stepped out from behind the drums and Marky took over and they ripped through a bunch of Ramones covers and ended with a rousing rendition of Monster Mash!
Say what you want about the 1950 Project, I thought it had some good moments, not what I was looking for though, but this year we finally got our new Misfits album, Devil's Rain. For me; two thumbs up! Skeptical? Try out this fan made vid for the title track (featuring footage from the 1975 film Devil's Rain starring William Shatner and Ernest Borgnine (God rest his soul, you were awesome, Ernest!)...
I'm a big Sucklord fan and you should be too. Besides awesome toyage and reality tv star power we can soon add on-screen psycopathic killer of super heroes to his list of sick accomplishments. Villain starts shooting this fall in New York City, just the poster alone has me hooked. Check out Monster Pants for the latest news.
Whatever happened to Dangerous Toys? This is their video from '89. I remember them fondly and this video hasn't betrayed my memories. I think Teasin' Pleasin' was their bigger single, but this is the better song.
I've been a cartoon fanatic for as far back as I can remember. Even the most serious work I've ever done in my life as had some sort of twisted sensibility inspired by Loony Tunes or Woody Woodpecker. Scooby Doo has always been at the top of my list of favorite toons and I've tried to follow every series. The last series that ran on Cartoon Network was excellent and I really dug the two live action films.
Scooby and the gang certainly fostered a love of the bizarre and creepy, but growing up, Mystery Inc. wasn't alone in bring the monsters to my living room. Here's my 3 favorites
So the reviews of The Amazing Spiderman are pretty encouraging. I'll miss the old cast, but we must move on brothers and sisters! Todays Sound Attack is a double shot of the Ramones! First up their cover of the Spiderman theme from the 60's cartoon series (originally found on the Saturday Morning Cartoon tribute album).
Next up is a sweet fan made vid of I Don't Wanna Go Down To The Basement!
Aw yea, Titans! Just got the latest Horror Hound; the Metal issue with a sick Rob Zombie cover painted by Jason Edmiston!
Featuring a new interview with Alice Cooper, a retrospective on House of a 1000 Corpses, the sickest Death Metal album covers, the collision of metal and horror movies and more sick crap than you swing an outta ammo shotgun at!
I've been dying to see The Dark Knight Rises since the closing credits of The Dark Knight rolled and now we're down to the last couple of weeks! So in honor of impending awesome I'm putting up my ten favorite Batman stories!
What? No Frank Miller in the top ten...sorry. Year One and Dark Knight Returns are in the top twenty. (I pretty much enjoyed Dark Knight Strikes Again for the most part, but All Star Batman sucked). The Shadow of the Bat; The Last Arkham is worth hunting down as is the two parter Detective Comics which introduces Cornelius Stirk who made a return in Kevin Smith's great Batman; The Widening Gyre.
