Nothing for All

Originally published at John Joseph Adams. You can comment here or there.

GUEST OF HONOR
New Orleans, LA
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Originally published at John Joseph Adams. You can comment here or there.

From the official website of the Horror Writers Association:

The Horror Writers Association is proud to announce prolific anthologist John Joseph Adams as the Editor Guest of Honor for the World Horror Convention (WHC) 2013. In 2013 the HWA is hosting WHC as part of the Bram Stoker Awards™ Weekend in New Orleans from 13-16 June. [...]

HWA President Rocky Wood said, “John Joseph Adams is the type of anthology editor readers love – they know each of his books will be filled with well written, interesting tales to captivate them during their precious reading hours. We are very pleased that John has accepted our invitation to be World Horror Convention Guest of Honor, where he is likely to find 300 horror writers, all eager to impress him with their wares!”

Adams joins previously announced Guest of Honor Ramsey Campbell and Toastmaster Jeff Strand on the Guest list.

Obviously I’m thrilled and grateful to be selected for such an honor, and the timing couldn’t be better with Nightmare scheduled to launch in October. I’ve never been to a World Horror or to New Orleans, so it should be quite a trip!

In related news, it just so happens that I have a story in inventory by my co-GOH Ramsey Campbell, scheduled for issue #2 of Nightmare!

Originally published at John Joseph Adams. You can comment here or there.

As of 9:24am Pacific Time yesterday, the Nightmare Magazine Kickstarter is funded! Due to the $245 pledge by sf author and all around great guy John Scalzi, we’ve now reached 100% funding. So a big thanks to John, and to the rest of you who pledged. (Also a special thanks to Arachne Jericho, who obviously had the same thought as John, but was about two seconds too late to be the one that put us over the top.) A big thanks too, to our largest donor, George Peyton, who purchased a lifetime subscription to Nightmare and to Creeping Hemlock’s entire list of books.

Although we’ve reached our goal, there’s still time–11 more days–to pre-order an issue or a subscription, or to get one of our limited edition chapbooks (which will only be available to people who pledge via the Kickstarter).

For more information about Nightmare, you can visit www.nightmare-magazine.com or follow us on Twitter @nightmaremag.

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Note to writers: We’ll be opening to submissions soon. Stay tuned for updates.

 

I chatted with Young Guy checking out my groceries re: the new Spiderman Reboot.

The young guy was really excited about it, but I wasn't, so we quickly moved over to The Avengers and its various sub-movies. (Young Guy agreed that Thor was only "OK" but that Captain America rocked, and neither was as good as The Avengers.)

All that set aside, I've been trying to decide why I couldn't care less about the reboot of Spiderman. Not interested in going to see it. Probably won't even rent it...Sad, huh?

So here are my tentative reasons:

Reason the First:
I've never been a big Spiderman fan.

Reason the Second:
Didn't we just do this???

In this decade of endless reboots and 'reimaginings', I've warmed to some and not others. Star Trek was a great idea, and well done. I loved that first Batman movie (not the second, though.) I'm looking forward to Prometheus. I'm even curious about the possible reboots of Bladerunner and Highlander (although Ryan Reynolds? Seriously?)

But it just seems too soon to 'reboot' Spiderman. It almost seems disrespectful. Tobey Maguire's not even dead yet.

Of course, I'm out of the loop...so I suspect there are a lot more reboots out there. Which ones should I plan on watching?

Trying to whip my new short story into shape. I need to get it into the mail by Tuesday morning to make the deadline. I also posted two new book reviews at Onyx Reviews: Long Gone by Alafair Burke and Flashback by Dan Simmons. The latter garnered a lot of negative—acrimonious even—reviews because of its right-wing conservative stance, but I enjoyed it for the most part. I don’t believe the book’s politics are necessarily Simmons’ but even if they are, it doesn’t matter. He posited a future where certain things happened, extrapolating from contemporary pressure points, and went on from there. He could have picked a different set of stressers and pissed off a different political faction. I am a moderate liberal, mostly, but I didn’t find my hackles rising…much. Writers like Tom Clancy irritate me much more, for some reason.

We went to see Men in Black III yesterday. We went to a 3:45 showing. I expected the multiplex (17 screens) would be a madhouse and that there would be a queue to get into that particular showing. Instead, we walked straight up to the box office, had no line at the concessions stand, and entered a mostly empty theater twenty minutes before showtime. It never did fill up. There was a much larger audience when we saw The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel at an earlier screening the previous week. We’d seen the trailer for MiB3 and thought it would be amusing.

It was. It wasn’t the best. movie. ever. or anything like that, but it was a lot of fun. Will Smith was firing on all cylinders, and Tommy Lee Jones was his usual cranky self. The revelation was Josh Brolin playing a 29-year-old version of Agent K (Jones). Some reviewers speculated that Jones might have dubbed in the dialog, but that is apparently not the case. Brolin deserves some sort of award for the way he mimicked Agent K’s voice and demeanor while at the same time playing him as a looser, less uptight version of him. Michael Stuhlbarg (Boardwalk Empire) plays a character named Griffin who experiences reality in five dimensions: he can see every possible variant of reality, all at the same time. He is charming and full of energy. He reminded us of a younger Robin Williams and was dressed like Williams’ character from The Fisher King. Lots of cool and gross aliens and whiz-bang effects. For the most part they set aside the problems inherent with time travel and just inject Agent J back into 1969. There are a couple of scenarios that deal with the issues a black man might face in that era, and then they drop that, too, all for the better. And there is a poignant revelation toward the end that surprised the hell out of us.

The only negative thing I have to say about the film is the 3D experience. I can’t say that it enhanced the film one little bit and we had to wear these stupid glasses for two hours, which is a pain when you already have to wear glasses. The best 3D effect was the billboard that told you to put on your 3D glasses—those glasses really popped out of the screen. There were a few 3D trailers: who on earth thought The Great Gatsby needed to be in 3D? The estate footage looked impressive with the added depth, but not much else seemed to be the better for it. I haven’t seen many films in 3D in recent years—I think Coraline was the last one. It had a few impressive moments where ghostly apparitions seemed to emerge from the screen and float around the theater. In general, I’m not sure I’m sold on the concept.

Originally published at Bev Vincent. You can comment here or there.

All I have to offer the world is inside those books. That's it, the absolute and dubious sum total of my ability to offer aid to anyone. If what you're looking for isn't in there, you need to look elsewhere. I can't save you. I can't even help you. All I can offer is my stories. And anyone who asks more of me is overstepping boundaries they have no right to cross.

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I've had much worse birthdays than yesterday. readingthedark came down in the late afternoon. We had dinner at Tortilla Flats. We played an absolutely abominable game of "World of Warcraft" Monopoly (and why the hell are the Draenei represented nowhere in the game?!), and, in theory, Geoffrey won. We had some frozen caramel and cashew ice-cream pie thing. I got stoned. We talked too much. I got to sleep just as the sun was rising.

My thanks to all the "happy birthday" wishes yesterday. There were something like four hundred via Facebook, and, honestly, that just freaks me right the fuck out. Thank you for being there.

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Spooky is still having a Caitlín Was (Most Years) Actually Born on the 27th of May Sale in her Dreaming Squid Dollworks and Sundries Etsy Shop. Cool and bow-tie stuff, with FREE SHIPPING, which will run through Monday. In order to take advantage of the sale, you need to use this code during checkout: CRKBIRTHDAY. Buy something bow tie, kittens!!! No, really!

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Looking back from -08, here is what I will say: I want such very simple things. That's actually true. Instead, my life has presented me with a baffling array of complexities. I didn't say that quite right. "Baffling complexities" isn't actually what I mean. If the cosmos had some collective consciousness, if all our gods and goddesses and demons were anything more than fairy tales, they might understand what I meant to say. Those things I wish I had, though – those things I still hope for to the point I feel ashamed and ungrateful for not being gladder for what I have instead – they are so simple they might take your breath away.

Breathe In,
Aunt Beast

http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/05/27/graduation-song/

http://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=18708

Away from the Internets for most of the day because my niece Cecilia is having her high school graduation ceremony. See you all tomorrow. In the meantime, here’s “The Paper Chase,” one of my favorite graduation-themed songs, from the (now defunct) The Academy Is… (the ellipsis is part of their name).

I wrote about Fast Times at Barrington High, the album this song is on, here.

Have a good Sunday.

Everybody seems to be at cons, or on vacation, so I thought I'd play the Time Machine game.

Last night, went to see Avengers. Since there's no use talking about it without spoilers, here's the cut and the spoiler warning.
( Read more... )

I’ve picked up a number of new albums over the past few months, all of them welcome additions.  Some of them will mainly just flesh out my randomizing library, but two in particular have entered heavy rotation.

First of these is Skeleton Key, a great, under-appreciated band that combines funk grooves, grungy guitars, and inventive auxiliary percussion into a distinctive and infectious alternative pop sound.  This band’s catchy riffs and melodies are tightly arranged, propelled by an undercurrent of rattletrap machinery, as pots and pans and scrap metal punctuate the beats — imagine Fat Albert’s Junkyard Band repurposed as a heavy alternative group, with Tom Waits occasionally producing, and you’ve got the general idea.  Gravity is the Enemy (2012) is their first full-length studio album in ten years, and it’s aptly named.  Frontman Erik Sanko’s voice is rawer, and the rhythm section’s usual clockwork precision has a heavier weight than usual, as if the band is valiantly resisting entropy.  While a few numbers don’t quite know when to quit, for the most part I’m finding it highly listenable and addictive stuff.  My favorite tracks:  “Museum Glass,” “Human Pin Cushion,” “Little Monster,” “Everybody’s Crutch,” “Every Hero.”

The second comes from Darth Vegas, a band I had high hopes for when I special ordered their debut album nine years ago.  This Australian postmodern ensemble found its way onto my radar when I read them described as a Mr. Bungle descendant that models itself on the Star Wars cantina band.  That first album was fun, but then I lost track of them.  Now, not only is that debut album finally available on iTunes, they’ve got a new one that’s even better (by a longshot), Brainwashing for Dirty Minds (2012).  This album is an endlessly inventive kitchen sink of instruments and influences, borrowing liberally from jazz, metal, ska, lounge, and…well, just about every other genre.  This is deeply weird music with a perverse and playful sense of humor, from its opening spookhouse jazz-metal number “Gritos Dulces,” to the demented 70s gameshow Latin of “Music for a Haitian Voodoo Priestess,” to its utterly silly album-ending Nintendo 64 medley of themes from every track.  This band will annoy the shit out of some people, but I love it…and is that the best band name ever, or what?  Favorite tracks:  “Gritos Dulces,” “Prokletsvo Gummina Kokoshke,” “Music for a Haitian Voodoo Priestess,” “Kopf Verloren,” “Waltz of the Pumpkins,” “Swami Salami,” “Things That Go Bump in the Night.”

As for other recent album pick-ups, I found the new Meshuggah album, Koloss (2012), an inessential extension of their cacophonic math-metal repertoire — some good tracks, but nothing all that groundbreaking compared to some of their mindblowing earlier releases.  After a while, this stuff just starts to sound like the same thing over again.  Similarly — in a really different way — the full-length Dumpstaphunk release Everybody Want Some (2010) fleshes out their presence in my iTunes nicely, but probably won’t work its way into heavy rotation.  I think I prefer funk as a flavor, rather than a focus, and a full album sometimes feels like too much of a good thing.  Happy to hear their tunes kick up now and then, though.

That’s probably why my second Tribal Tech grab, Thick (1999), is more welcome.  There’s plenty of funk flavor here, mixed in with jazz fusion and accomplished instrumental improv — but not so much of any one element to get stale.  Probably not as impressive as Rocket Science for me, but still good stuff.  And the same can be said for Tribal Tech bass player Gary Willis’ solo album Actual Fiction (2007), an impressive showcase for his chops, more jazz-funk fusion with some interesting sampling and mixing giving it a unique spin.  Stand-out track for me is easily “Eye Candy.”  Good albums, all, with the Darth Vegas definitely standing out as an early favorite.

Related Posts:

• Album: Vehicle by miRthkon
• 15 Albums Meme
• No Such Thing as Too Many Notes
• Six New Albums
• Film: Message from Space

Originally published at CHRISTOPHER EAST. You can comment here or there.

So the whack factor ran a little higher yesterday. All to the good. After sleeping quite late (by my standards) and a morning workout, I met up with @howardtayler for a leisurely lunch off-site. We had a terrific conversation about writing, life and the value of kindness. Howard also did nifty caricatures of both our waitress and her manager. It was hilariously fun to watch them react with such delight.

Walking back from lunch, we passed a pretty radical steampunked car.



More photos later when I have the bandwidth to upload them. (That would not be right now, unfortunately.)

Back inside, I hooked up with Ellie Copperbottom of the League of S.T.E.A.M. to host a High Tea. Which was a blast, and very odd at the same time. After that, I recorded a brief podcast interview with them. Then I wound up down in the Vendor Room signing books, where we all but sold out of my stock at the table of Off the Beaten Path Books. Gail Carriger and I crossed paths there again.

Dinner consisted of me and a very helpful concom rep making a White Castle run. Sixty dollars later, the League and I were pigging out hard. From there, things devolved into an evening of music, hot tubbing (well, warm tubbing), drinking, and electroshock therapy. I managed to enjoy an electric kiss with a lovely young woman, as well as try out the new sport of electric motorboating. Plus people were doing shots off Boba Fett's icy head, but I eschewed that particular pursuit.

Today I have an author panel and a reading and a day of hanging out.

So, yeah. A lot of fun here. A lot of fun.

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Photo © 2012 Howard Tayler, used with permission.