The first time I ever went to Death Guild was when Forrest Black and I were out in San Francisco for Bat of House of Usher’s Zine Slam. We were there promoting Blue Blood in print and also my antisocial punk rock humor zine BLT or Black Leather Times.
This was like more than a decade ago, so when Vampira Bat and Nixon Sixx suggested dropping promoter Decay a line, I was thinking he might not remember me. Pretty much the first thing he ever said to me in person was to give me grief for not publishing an article he wrote and submitted to my zine BLT. His article was fine and contained some punk education; it just didn’t fit the BLT format. So the first thing he emails back to me yesterday is his cell number and the pledge “I promise not to give you shit about the story I submitted to you guys in 1990.” So we are two veterans who do indeed remember each other.
As most Blue Blood readers probably know, we are celebrating our fifteen year anniversary this year. Death Guild is also celebrating their fifteen year anniversary. Death Guild DJ Margo was even a covergirl for one of the older designs of BlueBlood.net. The moral of the story here is that having perserverence and longevity means that somebody somewhere will always remember it if there was that one night you drank too much, that one person you said that thing to, the time you gave someone a mohawk you were not supposed to, that guy you threatened with a shotgun, or potentially the weird factoid about that person they always confuse you with. If you stick …
The Whitby Goth Weekend began around 13 years ago, and was originally only held once a year in October. It became so popular, that the organizers decided to hold it every six months. It has grown so much that one shop can take enough money over the 2 weekends that it doesn’t need to open for the rest of the year.
People travel from all over the world to come to the small fishing town. One person we met had traveled from Alaska! First time visitors maybe a bit confused when they first arrive in the town, as each side of every street has a different name (due to the person that was asked to draw up plans for the town was paid by the street name, so he named as many streets as possible.)
This Weekend.
Most people start the weekend early, arriving on the Thursday. It’s a night of meeting up in a bar with old friends or making new ones.
Friday is when most of the festivities start, when the Spa Pavilion hosts the first night of the bands, and for those that don’t want to see the bands, there was a burlesque night at the Metropole Hotel. There were several other events like bands playing in social clubs and bars.
Saturday daytime saw the dedication of the Sophie Lancaster Memorial Bench, which is situated near the WhaleBones on the West Cliff. There was also a Charity Bungee Jump called the Dracula Drop, for the Royal National Lifeboat Institute. The Goth weekend has got a long reputation of donating to local charities, usually the local Cat & Dog Shelter, but also this year there was the campaign for S.O.P.H.I.E. (Stamp Out Prejudice Hatred and Intolerance Everywhere) which was trying to get …
So right now FUSE is playing a block of Nelly videos. I find Nelly ridiculously hot. Hot like sexy, not hot like kindling. I’m not even sure if I like his music, but I certainly enjoy his videos. They’ve got productions values! (Bonus cool points to anyone who gets the movie reference there.)
So I was sitting there, letting the purple hair dye set in my hair, watching the Hot In Here video, and I suddenly realized that at least part of the video was shot inside a particular nightclub on Hollywood Blvd. Specifically, it was shot inside the Basque nightclub a couple blocks from me which burned down a day ago. Holy firemen of irony, Batman!
I was all trying to go to sleep at like six in the morning and I couldn’t figure out WTF was up with all the helicopters. I mean, my neighborhood has been a little weird lately, but this was just ridiculous. Turned out they were all the news copters shooting the fire and the literally two hundred and ten firemen and countless arson investigators and other officials dealing with the fire. Apparently, the building’s core was super old and had like poisonous resins or something on some of the burning wood. Not the best air quality where I live in Los Angeles for the past day.
But I really think the copters should have been blasting Nelly singing Hot In Here while they flew over my place. That would have totally made it all okay.
I have never ever smoked marijuana, but I loved Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle. That is a seriously hilarious movie and I really enjoy the buddy vibe between the friend who is concerned about consequences and the friend who just wants adventure. I have those two friends debating in my head all the time.
If you must smoke pot while you watch Harold and Kumar, I recommend renting Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle now. If you do not require the sweet herb for your movie experience, then you will be pleased to know that the sequel, Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, opened this weekend.
Forrest Black and I are going to be on Night Calls for our third or fourth appearance Friday, April 25, 2008. The show runs from 4pm to 7pm and is broadcast live, so you can phone in and ask impertinent (sexy) questions if you dial toll free 1-877-205-9796.
Our hosts for the day are going to be Christy Canyon and Vanessa Blue. This will be my first time meeting Vanessa Blue, but last time adult legend Christy Canyon gave me some interesting insights. Among other things, we were chatting about what it was like being . . . unusual in the Washington, DC area. At the time Blue Blood was founded, a person (okay, one of my unsavory pals generally) could be thrown out of Springfield Mall for having a nose ring. Christy Canyon told me that it was much more progressive in Los Angeles and somewhat surprising to Angelenos that being able to express yourself even by wearing a painted leather jacket is definitely not always easy elsewhere. And that went double in the early 90’s.
Forrest Black and I are in the second guest time slot and will be going on around 5pm. Forrest Black and I will be chatting with Christy Canyon and Vanessa Blue about BlueBlood.com in general, about our photography in specific, and, if experience is something to go on, we will definitely be talking about sex. Our friend Darklady from Portland will, through an odd bit of synchronicity, be on in the 4pm slot, and it is a good show, so I recommend tuning in from the start. Darklady will be promoting her upcoming Masturbate-a-thon (yes, you read that correctly) and I bet I have a lot more to tell …
One Missed Call is a movie based on the Japanese horror film Chakushin Ari where people receive phone calls, apparently from their future selves, with information about how and when they will die. The flick stars Los Angeles DJ Shannyn Sossamon and actor/writer/director Edward Burns.
Corporate Goth is a familiar expression in East Coast cities where people tend to separate their playtime from their workdays. I was living and working mostly in Washington, DC and Baltimore when I founded Blue Blood in print. I did primarily contract design work and most of the companies I worked for were conservative federal contractors, management consultancies, and lobbyists. My hairstyle at the time consisted of only natural colors, albeit definitely not colors which would appear striped together in nature. On my own time, I believed that shirt was spelled L-I-N-G-E-R-I-E. Heck, one of my neighbors harangued me from across the street, telling me I belonged in a whorehouse for what I wore just to clean my car. (I called the cops on her.) But, when I was seated at a computer in someone else’s place of business, I might not have looked like the most standard employee (or contractor). My clothes might have tended towards a darker palette and my hair was not really a businessperson’s cut, but it was usually businesslike enough. (When I worked at EDS, my manager did complain to my agency about my sexy stockings.)
This might go without saying, but I’m going to state the obvious here: I read a lot of cyberpunk at the time. I loved William Gibson and John Shirley and Richard Kadrey and Norman Spinrad and Pat Cadigan and Walter Jon Williams and George Alec Effinger and of course Bruce Sterling’s Mirrorshades anthology was seminal. The list goes on, but one of the salient points of the emerging cyberpunk genre at the time was that it acknowledged both street culture and corporate culture. Cyberpunk was, in many ways, first and foremost a sociological study of how the human …
I’ve written about writer/director/producer Sean Abley’s Socket movie here before, when it first hit the festival circuit. Now the movie is out on DVD and available from TLA Video. TLA Releasing put out Socket and the TLA media empire is descended from the Theatre of the Living Arts experimental theatre group in 60’s Philadelphia.
A couple of days ago, Sean Abley and a couple hundred of his closest friends got together at MJ’s Bar in Silverlake to celebrate the release of Socket on DVD. The event was hosted by promoter Jovy Janolo and producers John Carrozza, Doug Prinzivalli, Matt Mishkoff, and of course Sean himself. The VIP goodie bags included an interesting-looking DVD of a spooky movie called Amnesia, a coupon for a discount on TLA releases, and a pass for thirty free minutes of VOD which promise to “put the HARD back in hardcore DVD.” Blue Blood’s Forrest Black had the honor of receiving the final goodie bag of the night. The doorman apologized to me and told me he guessed I’d be re-gifting because the stuff in there was for, you know, jacking off. I was expecting the DVD and such to be more like what I would get at a regular business convention for web professionals, but TLA in general and Socket and Amnesia in specific appear to be for the purposes of movie movies and not jack off vids. Then again, I couldn’t get the VOD site to load, so maybe my tender sensibilities would have been scalded. Oh, and I’m a chick, so I guess I’m expected to care whether fictional characters romance and fuck exactly who I would personally want and be able to romance and fuck. …
The DVD of the movie version of Stephen King’s The Mist came out this week. I think it is interesting that Stephen King is such a brilliant writer, yet his work does translate to the screen. It is rare that a good book can become a good movie. I think the key is the remarkable sympathy in Stephen King’s prose. I find it difficult to read his work because his characters are so likable and understandable. And then, of course, horrible things tend to happen to them, it being horror and all. Having horrible things happen to bad people can produce a certain schadenfreude, but watching bad things happen to people you like, people who make sense to you, can be painful and sad. King seems to have a unique comprehension of the human condition, which allows him to make people see what makes others tick in a sympathetic light. You always know why a Stephen King character would do the things they do and there is a certain strong and unusual comfort and appeal in that.
The movie version of the novel The Mist maintains a good sense of tension, as terrified townfolks try to figure out what is menacing them from inside the fog and try to make sense of why monsters would be after them. As neighbor turns on neighbor, The Mist asks the age old question of who the true monsters are. Bonus points for creepy religious zealotry. Triple word score for casting Emmy award-winner Andre Braugher, known for his role as Det. Frank Pembleton in Homicide Life on the Street, as Brent Norton.
Writer/director Frank Darabont has also done the successful adaptations for Stephen King’s The Green Mile, The Shawshank Redemption, Nightshift Collection Volume One: The Woman in the Room, and a variety of …
