nightmare fuel?

I'm listening to Nine Inch Nail's cover of Queen's Get Down, Make Love and the intro is pure nightmare fuel.

Amazingly, brutally haunting.

Thanks Trent :l

"The Chain" - INSPIRATION!

I'm trying to figure out what goes into my novel writing process. It's mostly music and comics, intravenously pushed into my system by amps and my eyes, and then condensed into whatever the heck my novel turns out to be like.

I have no faith in the final product.

But why should I stop? I've been at this for nearly a year now, and to stop now it just ridiculous. Sure, the plot keeps getting twistier and more insane, but fucking come on, 'The DaVinci Code'?. I think I can provide something much more less shit than that, right?

...Right?

So anyway. Music. A lot of it. Nine Inch Nails to Led Zeppelin to Tiger Lou. Not any one genre, mind. Not all of it with lyrics. Some of it could be classed as noise-- I mean, Clint Mansell's instrumental scores are immense, same as Charlie Clouser's. And God knows I love me some Combichrist (though I'll admit, a lot of their instrumental stuff-- noise-- does sound so similar... I just don't care), and Nine Inch Nails are my bread and butter-- but check out Ghosts I-IV... not what you would expect from the guy who won a Grammy with the lyric "...gotta listen to your big time hard line bad luck fist fuck...", right?

(Obviously the 'Grammy committee' weren't all "Oh, 'fist fuck'! What the music industry has been missing!", but come on. Bear with me.)

So a lot of it is music. Inspiration. Good stuff.

And a lot of it is information. Stuff I've read and I've heard or I've seen. Characters are people I know, mixed and matched and smudged together so you wouldn't recognise them. My main character is someone I saw in a low budget horror film*. I saw him, half way through writing the novel, and I was like "Holy shit, what's he doing there?" because that was my guy. That was Taylor Mahn, all flesh and blood and broken pieces of spirit, that was him right there. How am I supposed to take that?

(I took it well)

(*'Masters of Horror: Dear Woman', by the by. Damn you John Landis, you ruin me! In an alternate reality Brian Benben would play the lead role in the film adaptation of my novel.)

And then the literary references. Come on. Warren Ellis, Neil Gaiman, James Robinson. I owe my style to them. Heck, one's a comic book writer (they're all comic book writers, but Ellis and Gaiman have at least had novels published!) but that doesn't stop him being an inspiration (some time soon I might take a break from the self deprecation and post up a list of Must Read comics, but until then...). HP Lovecraft, even though I'm not as knowledgeable about his work as I should be (I'm more knowledgeable about the man), is a big influence, as anything with gods and monsters should be. I mean, come on:

"Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn."

(That translates to "In his house at R'lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming." for those of you interested)

And then comes the television stuff. Oh, God. This is the worst. Supernatural, for instance, is not as big an influence as it looks like it should be. I started writing this before some of the major plot stuff started moving in Season Four, and I was reaaally pissed when things started coinciding. I don't want this to be fan fiction because that would just hurt, but it might appear to be, right? Not that Sam and Dean and Castiel (with a little help from Bobby) are running around trying to stop the apocalypse, right? But still, some of the characters are present (Lucifer, for one. Duh) that can cause people to point at me and say I'm a hack.

I don't want that!

(Really.)

But anyway, I'm posting this because I'm winding down from some hardcore novel writing tonight. Things are coming together. I'm prowling around the hardest scenes to write, so obviously I'm procrastinating. But soon I'll be done. I think I'll hit a year.

"Steal it!"

"I think, fundamentally, music is something inherently people love and need and relate to, and a lot of what's out right now feels like McDonalds. It's quick-fix. You kind of have a stomach-ache afterwards."
-- Trent Reznor (09/29/2005)

I tried. I gave up.

In The Clearing

“I can taste the rain,” he said.

The clouds had gathered over their heads as they had stood in the clearing, the two of them doing nothing but thinking, nothing but being together. They’d not noticed the blemish that had spilled out across the sky, they were too busy with the simple act of being.

“Feel it in your bones?”

John smiled at her. “Across my skin and tingling down my spine.”

This was their secret place when they were children. After school, on the weekends, whenever they had a moment free, this was where they would come. Hurtling down the hill with arms open wide, screaming with the defiance of youth, this was where they would come.

Tumbling through the brambles and pushing through the branches, searching for the magical spot, arriving where no one else would come. This was where they would spend their days watching the clouds drift across the sky in the day and the stars pass by overhead at night, the two of them content that this was all there ever would be.

“It hasn’t changed,” she said, “and neither have you.”

Lauren wore the long black dress, chosen for solemn occasions such as these, and his jacket was over her shoulders, keeping her warm. Her shins were a light patchwork of scratches, the folly and belief of invulnerability that one could carry over from childhood failing her as they had journeyed here.

“It’s weird being home,” he said simply. He didn’t think he would ever come back, but with events turning out how they had, he simply didn’t have a choice. He loosened his tie, looked up at the sky, and his smile drained into a look of sorrow. “I’m sorry it took me so long.”

She walked over to him, hugging herself warm. “You’re here now.”

“I… I’m sorry for your loss.”

She shook her head. “You’re here now.” Her hand found his shoulder, and she squeezed, and for that instant they were no longer the grown-ups they so much wanted to be when they were young. For that moment, he had just turned fifteen, she was still fourteen, and they were alone in this mystical clearing, where bird sounds carried softly and trees creaked reassuringly.

“I think I love you,” he had said, nearly tripping over the words as a boy in his position so often would.

“Don’t think,” she had replied, and the moment of youthful infatuation faded and time pulled back and they were together, older, wiser, and brought back home by a mutual loss. They were no longer just turned fifteen and still fourteen. They were no longer tripping over words and sending half glances. He stood up as the rain finally burst down from up above, and reached over to her cheek, and instead of turning back the clock, or lingering in the moment, the years passed and they were grey and even wiser, together as the storm broke miles away.

It Won't Give Up, It Wants Me Dead

Is there a scientific name for the constant repetition of the same old mistakes? Do you ever do that? Just keep doing the same thing again and again, and you know you're doing it, and you hate that you're doing it, but you do it none the less? Or you see something, or someone, and you've experienced something negative about them before, and yet you keep looking?

You see a student of Creative Writing use "Your" when it's supposed to be "You're". And I'm sorry, but you're doing this even when you scream and shout and kick that what you want to do is write on a professional level... and yet you can't fully string a sentence together? I see people making mistakes again and again, blindly, or maybe willingly, and it just... drives me to insanity. Don't cut corners! Don't take the easy, lazy way out.

It makes my head hurt.

I don't like people that tell and tell and don't show. I think we, as "word-smiths", as Creative Writers, shouldn't fall back on the proper and correct name for something that we're describing. I think words are used too freely, like "oh, but they're big and important, so why shouldn't we use them?"... I have an answer. Because we're better than that. We should be, I think. Maybe.

It's like a really brutal, angry form of masturbation. Like you're screaming at yourself while you're doing it, but you keep doing it (if you're following the metaphor still, shame on you) because you can't help it. So bad it's good.

Oh, who am I to say anything?

I Jump From Every Rooftop, So High, So Far To Fall.

This is old. I wrote it when I was home alone, last year some time, because I had this niggling feeling in the back of my head that yes, there was someone at the bottom of the garden looking at me. And yes, he was getting closer.

The Man Who Wasn’t There

I caught my first glimpse of him when I was pissing. I leant back, looked out the window to my left, and I saw him, caught an idea of him by the garage, at the bottom of the garden. I didn’t see all of him, I saw a snippet, but what I did see, I knew. Because that was everything I was fearful of, this whole concept of fear came together at the bottom of the garden, and it was just… Standing. He grinned. Winked. Stood and watched, and then as I noticed that he noticed that I had noticed him, I leant back forward, piss nearly spilling off the toilet and onto the floor. I controlled myself. Regained composure, and then leant back, peeking out the window like a scared child (which, in all honesty, I had become). He still stood there. He grinned. He winked. I closed the blinds, turned off the bathroom light, and I left. I left the bathroom, and I went into my bedroom, I closed the curtain (he was just within eyeshot, I saw him, lurking, still near the garage), and locked my door. The light stayed on. I didn’t sleep.

The next day, I looked out my window at first light. Nothing. In the bright light of the day, the worries of yesterday had faded, though, I think, not completely. I saw a shadow by the garage. Maybe the door was open. I didn’t want to check, why would I? If I checked there might be something there. The bottom of my garden was a fearful place. There were corners. Shadows. Places things could lurk and hide and wait. The day ached on, and I didn’t do anything. I sat and I waited for the night. Because, I thought, the night brings comfort. Comfort because it meant the day was coming sooner. When the day was here, I’m uncomfortable in the knowledge it’s going. When it’s not here, I’m fearful, because it’s not here, but then the cycle turns and continues and moves on and I’m stuck. Constantly afraid. Constantly on edge.

Night came sooner than expected. I must have, somehow, fallen asleep. I sat in the back of the house, and tried to read. It was the warmest room we had in this cold, echoing place we called home, and at night, there was a cosy sense of security. The wind outside didn’t bother me, and why should it? The doors were locked, the curtains closed, and the windows sealed. I stood. I didn’t know why. The book didn’t engross me, piffy non-fiction fiction that was wasting the paper it was printed on. The wind didn’t irritate me either. I was pulled toward the doors, and when there, I pressed my hands against the cold glass. The wind whistled louder then. I looked out across the darkness. The grass waved in synch with the wind, and for a minute it didn’t click that one was causing the other, and I wondered why the two were dancing together like old familiar lovers… I breathed out, one long breath, and the glass blurred, and as my reflection obscured then vanished, I wiped my finger down, only to see, framed by the gap I had created, what was beyond the grass. The bench, beside the old shed, was not unoccupied. He sat there. His suit immaculate, his grin constant, and even in the wind, blowing so hard, he did not shiver, he did not shy away. He stared at me. I stared back. He winked. The curtains close soon after. I shivered, not from the cold, and made doubly sure all the doors were locked. I go again without sleep. Merely because.

The day winded on. Too quickly, it felt like. The night came sooner than expected, and I found the centre of the house, wrapped myself up good and proper in a quilt, and I sat. If I looked, he got closer. If I looked, he’s there. If I sat, and I didn’t look, and I didn’t wonder, he couldn’t exist. He couldn’t… Be. I didn’t sleep. I couldn’t sleep. If I slept… If I slept… There was no logic behind why I didn’t sleep. If I slept, tomorrow would come sooner. If I didn’t sleep, tomorrow would come slow and steady. If I slept… He would come sooner. He was there. I could feel it. Probably on the path. Probably on the grass. Probably pressing his face against the cold window. Probably breathing hard and heavy and streaking his finger down the glass pane. Probablys. Probablys.

Fourth day. Was it the fourth day? Could have been the twentieth, the way I was feeling. Drained and dead inside, hoping that the day will end and just end. No more. No more after that. Just… Infinite nothingness. No fear. No nothing. I sat at the computer, buzzing screen before me. I type something on the screen. I caught and then I stop. I caught a glimpse of him and I paused and thought about the words that left me. Who was he? What was he? Why? Why was he taunting me? Following me? Why did no one else notice that this man was standing in the middle of my garden in the middle of the night with the smile and that wink and that suit? Why? I caught my first glimpse of him when I was pissing. The words flowed out like they had to. Like a tap that was left running. I turn to my right, to the door that lead to the garden, and there he is. There he stands, on the porch, watching me tell the story of him and his haunting. I looked away. And stared at the screen. My eyes grew heavy, but I kept writing. I turned, and he was gone. Was he gone? Maybe I was too tired to tell. If I slept… Why hadn’t I slept? There was no logic behind why I didn’t sleep. I should have slept. Should have slept the worry away. I saved the document under a non-descript title. Piffy non-fiction fiction and all that. I stood up, and entered the kitchen, and I hoped a glass of water would drown the dread inside my chest. And quite simply, there he was. Standing inside my house. Down the hall. In front of the mirror, his suit was immaculate, his grin wide and his skin so pale and dead. His face looked stretched, pulled at the back and stapled on. His eyes were thin and black and penetrating. "Hello," he said, as he took a step forward. His voice was soft. Too soft. I took a step back, and he took a step forward, "I have, if you hadn’t gathered, been watching you." The glass in my hand shattered on impact to the floor. "And I don’t mean to bother you, but I need something from you--"

I Escape Every Now And Then

Anyone else loving the fact that the CAPTCHAs on blogger sound like real, awesome words? Literary bastardry that when translated reveals whole new worlds of wonder in the grammatical world we live in?! IMSLOWT! SHIGFER! SHUGGOTH! CTHULHU! Does anyone see where these things are taking us?! They want us to say forbidden words capable of resurrecting dark gods and old beings from beyond the veil of reality!

CAPTCHAS WANT TO KILL THE WORLD.

Track #1: Nine Inch Nails - Love Is Not Enough

This is track one of your weeks soundtrack. More to follow.

I got my arms a-flip-flop-flip!

Where does my blog fit in the "blogosphere"?

Well... just between yours and yours, I think. The only people who would read this blog are people who know me. I'm not famous (not yet anyways, and I don't have any real intentions of being famous right now) so it's not like people who don't know me are going to know me, or search for me, so I'm just here for my friends. I'm not here for strangers. This isn't the place for it. On the group blog I'm part of (blog-o-tronik), maybe, because that's where a number of people blog, and so their friends might read my blogs, and my friends might read theirs. That's the gamble.

I'm not here to be read by strangers. I don't write to be read by strangers. If you're a stranger, and you're reading this blog, well, all the power to you, don't be a stranger! Comment! Let me know who you are! Let's be friends. I'm putting myself out there, return the favour, let's all get along nice like.

I'm not here to blow your minds (though maybe I'll try...), I'm here to talk. Rant. Complain.

Thing is... I deleted my blog last year. Blogs distract me. I spend too much time on them. I post too much (as you might have noticed). That's the reason I deleted my blog. I might delete this blog. I might have to, they're too distracting. Twitter... I don't like already. I enjoy Twittering on there, obviously (Follow me!), but there comes a point where I'm just... talking. And I don't know why.

I guess blogging is about self/impulse control.

I don't have any. So that's why it's not a good idea for me to do it.

Problems have solutions, you know.

I have finished that script I was twittering about earlier in the week. I think I've settled on a name, third time being the charm and all that. Originally, it didn't have a title, then the first part was called "Echo", then I figured out a name for it all could be "The Backwards Assassin" and now I've settled on "Echo Chambers". It might make sense if you ever see it (meaning, if I ever post it up).

I think I'm happy with it. It's fast, violent, and bloody. Just right, no?

Anyways, as to warrant some interest, here's Page One:

Panel One:

A foetus floats in the womb. A spark of life. Potential. We open the book with life. I think you can probably guess how the book will end. Or maybe I’m messing with your head?

Narrator 1): When he died, he saw two lives flash before his eyes.

Panel Two:

The previous image of the womb seems to split into two, now running side by side with each other, like film stock flickering and splitting in the centre, the white of the page is visible underneath. Something is happening. Something that is not good.

Narrator 1): This was slightly disconcerting for him.

Narrator 2): (As you can imagine.)

Panel Three:

The eyes of both foetus’ open. We’re closer to them now, the foetus’ looking away from each other, not focusing on anything.

Narrator 1): They were both his.

Narrator 2): (That was the weird thing.)

Panel Four:

Two sets of eyes latch onto the reader. They’re exactly the same, and the eyes… are eerily full of clarity.

Narrator 1): To his recollection, he’d only lived one life.

Narrator 2): So if you asked him if it was interesting viewing…

Panel Five:

We segue into the present. James Larsen is bloodied and bleeding, his eyes are both red, blood vessels burst (if we can have the eyes of the foetus’ seemingly meld into this one image, awesome), creating an unearthly appearance to this battered man. His lip is torn, his face a mess of knife slashes and internal fluids. He’s been beaten so close to death that he looks fragile. A few days beard growth covers his face. The overwhelming feeling right now? Doom. Blood should be everywhere. Claustrophobia should set in.

Voice 1): (off-panel) THIS’LL BE LIKE KILLING MYSELF. SORRY, JAMES.

Narrator 1): …He’d have to say yes.

Beside You In Time.

We are already gone. Our lives are an eye blink in the universal view of the universe, the multiverse, the bulk, the bleed, all the things that separate our realities from one another. We’re dust in the wind, already, after living what we think are long and fulfilled lives, but when people look back, will we matter? Of course not. We are not the great, we are not the few, we are the many, we are the masses (some cultured, some uncultured), and when has the many meant anything? The direction of the world is dictated by a few voices, not the shouts and screams of the rest of the world. We’re lost in a sea of noise, but the thing is, we are the noise, and we just don’t want to admit it.

We could be special.

We won’t be.

The universe hates us. It reaches down through the sky and pushes us into the dirt, into the mud, and we let it. We should attain for higher things, we should want to be gods, rulers of our own little piece of land.

We stalled in our ascension. And it was all going so well too.

We split the atom. We cloned a living being. We shot into the waiting embrace of the stars and then… and then…

…We stopped.

But why should we? Why did we?

We should make new life forms. We should search for life in the dead oceans of Mars and we shouldn’t stop till we find evidence of our brothers and sister lying in the dust. We should shoot sleeper-ships into the stars and travel for thousands of years until we reach that first star on the left… why are we stopping with just imagination? Imagination and creativity and the desire to do something enormous are what made us who we are.

We have the dreams. We’re learning every day. So we should never stop. Imagine. Create. Imagine. Create.

Never stopping. Never faltering. Never fading.

We shouldn’t be dust. We should be gods.

Oh, we will never die.

I thought I would share with you something that one of my friends has blogged. The following is something that I find quite inspiring actually, and was really impressed with when I first read it. From Ramon Villalobos' blog "Such Is Life", presenting "SUBMIT", a statement of intent that is just plain brilliant, not only in application to it's original context, but for an artistic standpoint on so many levels:

The following is my artistic statement for a sculpture class. My "art" will all fit this general theme. I am going to share it with you.

SUBMIT.

From birth, people in modern society are taught to believe that individuality is the ultimate goal of self growth. To be special. To be unique. To be loved.

Ironic that, considering the social equation that is supposed to produce a product of idiosyncratic behaviors is the same that creates the rampant conformity that spreads through civilization like the poisonous venom coursing through the veins of a snakebite victim.

But why is that so bad? If this contradiction should be resolved, why not eliminate the indiviuality that is throwing the balance of things asunder?

Submit.

Submit the the current sociopolitical landscape.

Submit to the bitter reality that there is no control, people are just groups of atomic firestorms going through the motions set into effect by the big bang.

Submit to beautifully uniformed chaos.

Submit to the vacuum of truly original human thought and submit to the concept of a universal subconscious that controls us all.

No one is special. No one is unique. No one is loved.

There is no real meaning of art. There is no real meaning of god.

There is no Jesus Christ. No Ward Cleaver. No Superman.

Submit.

Everything is going to be okay. Nothing could be any other way.

Submit.

Submit.

SUBMIT.

Happiness In Slavery

I might stand corrected.

I love horror films, I think we've established that from the rant I posted last December, but really... I just want them to work. I want us to stop cannibalising old plots and films, I want us to move forward, and do something brilliant.

I want horror to be special again.

But I might stand corrected with a few of my points from the previous blog (Help Me. I Am In Hell) due to the fact that I've seen parts of the new Friday the 13th. And the thing is... it doesn't look bad. It looks... awful... but that's because in this day and age we can't take masked serial killers seriously.

I mean honestly, in Saw, Jigsaw, our villain/anti-hero, wears a pig mask and has a clown puppet called Billy. Those aren't scary (well they were in the first film, the scene with Cary Ewes in the parking garage and Jigsaw crawling out of the back seat... guh, and when the director does that irritating quick IN-YOUR-FACE cut/cut/cut shoot style...), they're funny. If you turn off the sound (ignoring the sultry tones of Tobin Bell) you've got this clown puppet yapping away. Horrifying-- Not.But we don't have masked serial killers walking the streets. No urban myths and legends really have those kind of terrifying figures (Obviously ignoring the Hook Man legend, but even then, he doesn't wear a mask, he wears a hook. Go figure) that instill fear.

Anonymity should be scary.

Films like When A Stranger Calls are scary because we don't know who the hell is doing what, and by the end of the film, we still don't. He's, like Michael Myers before him in Halloween, a "Shape", ethereal, ghostly, but when he strikes... he strikes hard and vicious. To be honest, the sequences without actually seeing the "Prank Caller" in When A Stranger Calls are the scariest. When we actually see him, he's a human being, and he's just there. Real. It looses something. Faceless serial killers are the best, in that we don't know who they are, or why they're doing what they're doing. Why is Jason killing? Because he nearly drowned and, oh, because of one the funniest quotes of the film: "Kill for mother!" Thank you Pamela Voorhees. And thank you, shades of Psycho (another film that brilliant in it's anonymity, and not diluted by the eventual reveal of "Mother" Bates)!

I don't like knowing why the killer is killing. Certain films work like that, "discovery horror", as I've just decided to call it, where-in the story is moved forward by a mystery, but others, not so much. I'm going out on a limb and declaring the remake of House Of Wax as "discovery horror", as we eventually discover the history of the Wax Town, the twins, etc, but what really matters is how fucking horrifying a lot of the murders are. How happy was I when Paris Hilton got skewered by a phallic symbol? Tres. One of the weaker murders, sure, but some of the events in that film were really bloody scary. The guy at the piano, his mate finding him, prodding his cheek and then-- oh, if you've seen the film, you know what I'm talking about. God. And Elisha Cuthbert's fingers!! Shit. That was a scary-ish film!

So Friday the 13th. I was a bit fanboy-ish outraged at the idea of Jason running. But now, thinking about it, so what? So what if he runs? That doesn't matter, does it? I mean, I may prefer my slow moving serial killers, Michael Myers, aka The Shape, the classic Voorhees... but fast moving can be scary too, in different ways. Freddy Kruger of Nightmare on Elm Street fame jumps around like a freaking ADD afflicted twelve year old, and he's terrifying, the "ugly clown", that glove, the close ups on his massacred face... scary as. The zombies in the remake of Dawn of the Dead and in 28 Days Later (one of the greatest British films ever made) too, are scary in a different way. They will get you. And there's no fun in that. I like zombies that loiter about and then won't stop till they eventually find you, moving in herds, never stopping, slowly but surely catching up with you. In Dawn of the Dead, they just... ran... and it was disappointing. Where was the suspense? Where was the horror?

But Jason Voorhees runs in Friday the 13th. And I don't know, really, I don't mind. I've not seen the entire film, I want to, sure, but I've not got round to it. As long as he doesn't, I don't know, dance about, I think I can be ok with it. So whilst I'm not a big fan of nu-horror, shallow and dilute as it is, I think I can abide it.

(Cross-posted here)

I can feel their eyes are watching, in case I lose myself again.

This is one of my all time favourite songs of all time.

That is all.

Help Me. I Am In Hell.

I am sorry. I am so sorry.

Horror is being stolen from us! Seriously! Look at the genre, and look in the direction it’s going. Vampires?

Bloody Twilight.

Yeah, you see where I’m going with this? Wait, Saw, you say? It’s pantomime. It’s a form of pornography. What was the last good horror film you saw? For me, I recently purchased The Hamiltons, and whilst it was good, it was a form of teen-horror, and I just don’t think that’s a viable form for the genre.

I rented out Hatchet, the tagline reading: “It's not a remake, it's not a sequel, and it's not based on a Japanese one. Old school American horror.” Firstly, it was crap. Recycling old plots and cliches into something that was derivative and almost like the bastard child of Friday the 13th and CRAP. Secondly, since when has making awesomely terrifying horror films become a spiteful game between America and Japan? Asian extreme cinema is some of the most horrifying stuff put to film! Audition (Ôdishon)? Ju-On? Ringu? We’re siphoning ideas from some talented creators, and I just wish we had the know-how to do something amazing. Call backs to “old school American horror” are all well and good, but what are these call backs? Remakes of The Hills Have Eyes? Texas Chainsaw Massacre? They tried to revitalise the Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th franchises (together, Freddy Vs Jason, remember?) but that didn’t do what they wanted it to do, so look what we’ve got to look forward to now. A remake of Friday the 13th. And if you've seen the trailer, you'll know that Jason runs. He runs! Serial killers don’t run. They teleport. They shimmy through reality and end up in front of you no matter how fast you run or how far you fall over ahead of them. That is horror. Making these horrors viable, giving them the ability to run? Ruins horror for me.

Zombies don’t run fast. 28 Days Later and Dawn of the Dead were good watches, but give me the original Romero over Snyder Dawn any day. Oh, and the new Nightmare on Elm Street. With Billy Bob Thornton over the legend of horror that is Robert Englund (phwoar, check out that sexy IMDB)? Hell, I’ll watch the remake, but withour Mister Englund? I'll be sorely disappointed. If I'm not, I'll share that fact with all of you in 2010...

Vampires used to be dirty little bastards, Near Dark for instance (a vampire film quite well known for not even mentioning vampires), or The Lost Boys as an example. Why do we have Twilight? And why is it popular? Because it's a pandering piece of crap targeted at the susceptible market of "tweener" girls, who claim to buck the trends but therefore support another one. Oh, so individual, oh, such liars. The first horror film I ever saw? It has to be a toss up between Nosferatu (I was small. It haunted me) or The House on Haunted Hill (I’m not sure which, but they are the ones that stuck to my brain like a scab refusing to fall off). First time I saw House I was scarred (SCARRED!) by the scene with the basement, the blind/deaf/mute housekeeper and the tapping on the wall... Think about it, I was 6 or 7, and my dad puts that on. Thanks, terror. Vincent Price is for the win, all right, but this is the stuff that put me on the path I’m on now with Psychotronik. I love the classics. I hate seeing potential wasted.

Right, so I should probably say, I’m not the kind of person who knows intimate details about Bill Gaines or Ed Wood, and I’m sure they’re all swell folk, they did their jobs well (though, Plan 9… eh…) and we owe b-movie horror and horror-in-comics to them in some way or another (Bill Gaines ran EC Comics, after all, and we all know how that ended up… well, I say all of us, I mean those of us in “the know”) but we need to be the people pioneering the genre. Not Psychotronik, not just us, but I’m talking about all of you, all of you who want to write horror stories, don’t look back at what’s come before, look forward. Don’t go for the cheap scare, the exposed bone, the torn flesh, go for the scare, the terror. That’s why America is jealous, I think, of Asian cinema. Because they’re scared. And they can’t recreate it. They don’t have the right frame of mind for it. Remakes of Asian cinema are rubbish, I think we can all agree. The Grudge? I remember having a running joke with my friends about that ghost-in-the-bag. Think about it from a sideways perspective, stop thinking “this should be scary” and just watch. It’s pretty friggin’ hilarious. Anyways, before I go off track once again, we need to pioneer the genre. We can’t just let it stagnate, and we can’t patronise the viewer. Twilight… crap, I don’t want to see it because vampires sparkle. Vampires. Do. Not. Sparkle. But I kind of do want to see it, because this is how the genre evolves. “Old school American horror” should be good. It should take what made the genre so aggressively pioneering and keep it modern, reinvent itself. I’m sick of traps designed to kill, to punish, to teach. I’m sick of blood spraying into someone’s face unnecessarily; where's the foreplay? And talking of foreplay, I'm sick of blatant, overt sexual horror. It's for pre-pubescent kids who want to have a cute little bit of masturbation whilst seeing red. Hostel is gore porn. Saw is gore porn. We need more than pornography for this genre to survive. We need pioneers. So get to it.

(Originally posted here, "Help Me. I Am In Hell" 21/12/08)

Rape It, Snake It, Don't Let Go!

Tonight's musical score is provided by a number of artists. I'll give you a run down of three, but I'm sure more will occur to me later (Akira Yamaoka, Deftones, Reuben spring to mind immediately).

Playing right now are Combichrist and their album "What The Fuck Is Wrong With You People?", which I described, when offering it to someone, as "angry, industrial, vulgar, heavy and horrifying." It's brilliant. I got into industrial big time about two years ago, firstly through Angelspit (the second of tonight's major contributors) and through them to this band, which is a complete mess of samples, heavy beats and industrial metal.

(Pick: In The Pit)

Angelspit is one of my all time favourite bands. I have all their releases, the debut EP Nurse Grenade and the two albums, Krankhaus and Blood Death Ivory. They never let me down. Thing is, I'm tired of all the stuff I hear on the radio. Nothing does it for me like these bands. I want something that's not populist, for once. That doesn't mean that once/if these bands begin to get major radio airplay I'll stop listening, but I just want something I enjoy, and I don't want to pollute my mind with... pop music.

(Pick: Skinny Little Bitch)

Old reliable and permanent staple of my listenings, Nine Inch Nails play pretty consistently throughout the night, and I'm wandering back into With Teeth territory, though you can't go wrong with Ghosts I-IV ("a soundtrack to daydreams") when you want to lean back and just get some writing done.

(Pick: Home off With Teeth, and from Ghosts III, 24)

I Woke Up Today To Find Myself In The Other Place

Oh, this isn't the script I was talking about, this is something I wanted to share because I'm happy with it. This is a script for an untitled project I'm hammering away at, one that was coming quite easily until the repeated laptop-shut-downs-of-a-few-weeks-ago. As you can see, this isn't straight forward prose, it's not a film script, it is in fact a comic book script. There is reason for this. Roy said he'd do the pencils but he's got a kid and wanted something cleaner. "Something cleaner". I'll have to think on that. Anyways, here it is:

Page One

((Two long panels take up this entire page.))

Panel One:

Caption 1): “Legend as it.” Have you ever started a story so? “Legend has it that…”

Caption 2): These are not truths. These are myths. Like they say, “legends”.

Tight shot on Gawain’s face, blood dribbling from his nose, stubble surrounding his jawline, he’s sweating, tired, but he’s determined, angry, and ready to fight.

Gawain 1): Come on then you bastard!

Gawain 2): Come on!

Panel Two:

Caption 1): I start this story differently:

Caption 2): “Truth, as I have learnt it to be, has it that…”

Caption 3): …This is not a myth. This is not a legend. This is the truth of a world that you are not made to comprehend.

Bors, bigger, larger set, sword in hand, grins, his hair cut close to his skull, and a scar running three inches from his forehead up, an old battle wound, healed badly. He’s not unattractive, rugged more like, and he has a beard that starts as a moustache above his lip, down to his chin, and then up as sideburns to his ears. He doesn’t stop smiling throughout this entire sequence. He’s also young, though you couldn’t tell from the way he acts, and the way he looks.

Bors 1): You fight with your head, that’s good, boy.

Bors 2): Your sword arm is strong, little runt of a thing like you, wouldn’t think you could lift it higher than your knee!

Bors 3): But you still fight like a little girly girl.

Page Two:

Panel One:

Gawain lunges low for Bors, hoping to rise up beneath Bors’ centre of gravity, and gain the advantage from being smaller set.

Panel Two:

Bors brings up his knee, slamming it into Gawain’s chest.

Gawain 1): uuuhtt

Panel Three:

Bors then throws Gawain behind him, rolling with the momentum of Gawain himself.

Panel Four:

Gawain hits the cold stone floor hard, dust rising up as he collides.

Gawain 1): hhfff

Panel Five:

He looks up, and sees a sword levelled at his jugular.

Gawain 1): uhh.

Panel Six:

Over Gawain’s shoulder, we see Bors lower his weapon, and put out his left hand for Gawain to pull himself up with. Bors still grins.

Page Three:

Panel One:

Gawain smiles, and pulls himself up.

Gawain 1): Thought you asked me if I wanted to do some light sparring.

Panel Two:

Bors pouts, and points to himself apologetically.

Bors 1): Kid, there’s no such thing as ‘light sparring’.

Bors 2): You have war, and you have sparring.

Bors 3): You ain’t dead, so I guess we sparred.

Panel Three:

Gawain sheathes his sword, in pain. Bors does the same.

Gawain 1): You’re fucking insane.

Panel Four:

Bors laughs.

Bors 1): HA!

Bors 2): BullSHIT! I’m honest!

Page Four:

Panel One:

Bors points to the scar running down his forehead.

Bors 1): Kid, you don’t want to ugly up your face ‘cause you ran into something unprepared.

Bors 2): I’m teaching you how to survive, not how to fight.

Panel Two:

Bors’ face suddenly turns serious.

Bors 1): But I wasn’t kidding.

Bors 2):You need to grow up.

Bors 3): In war, any shite goes. Your mother is a whore. Your dad is a queer. And your sisters?

Panel Three:

Gawain’s lip twists up, uncomfortable with where this going.

Gawain 1): I don’t have any sisters.

Panel Four:

Bors slams his finger into Gawain’s chest.

Bors 1): Your sisters were in your enemy’s bedroom last night being fucked twelve ways to Eden and by God they loved it.

Panel Five:

Bors shrugs.

Bors 1): Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not.

Bors 2): Horrendous shite is thrown around and you need to take it in your stride.

Bors 3): Rules of fucking engagement, isn’t it?

Page Five:

Panel One:

Bors nudges Gawain in the ribs, and his grin returns.

Bors 1): Now, let’s go get something to eat, I’m starving, and the banquet will be starting soon downstairs.

Bors 2): Go wash up, and meet me downstairs.

Panel Two:

Bors lowers himself somewhat, and punches Gawain in the arm.

Bors 1): And don’t worry!

Bors 2): I won’t tell anyone how easy it was to get under your skin!

Bors 3): HAHAHA

Panel Three:

Gawain places his hands in his pockets, and leaves Bors as he continues to laugh, his laughter echoing out in the background, behind Gawain himself.

Bors 1): HAHAHAhaha

Gawain1): Under my skin.

Gawain 2): Right.

Panel Four:

Gawain continues to walk forward, into shadow, an uncomfortable look upon his face.

Gawain 1): …Like that would happen…

See the animal in his cage that you built , are you sure what side you're on?

It’s that first moment, that lingering second of breathlessness that’s followed by silence… alone, the only friend you can count on being yourself, the only safety net your own instincts… it’s then that you know you’re in the right place, at the exact right time. You should be feeling lost, adrift in a sea of doubt, but you don’t; for that lingering second, the one where you try to breathe but find yourself unwilling… you know what you’re doing is well and truly right. It’s all anticipation after that. If you hesitate, you fail. The first slither of hesitation is infectious, reaches down into your gut and makes you feel like you can’t do this… but if you just accept that what comes next is only natural… that you can do this, that the laws of gravity, the laws of physics, the laws of common sense, that all these laws don’t apply. So you’ve accepted, you’ve felt the anticipation, and you take the first step--

And you fly. You soar above the world and your hands pierce the clouds and you arch up toward the place where up is no longer up and space is a hairsbreadth from your nose, and you move forward till the moon is like the sea and you keep moving… because without hesitation, anything is possible.

If only that were true.

Less Concerned About Fitting Into The World... Your World That Is.

This is important.

Eight years old, but very important:

Grant Morrison's "The Geek Shall Inherit The Earth" is an article/essay that I printed off and had pinned to my wall for a few years (before the grand de-postering of the bedroom. I never did recover from that. Boo)

An excerpt:

Several cloned sheep, a few embryo harvests and a sequenced human genome into the new century and the class geeks are beginning to look like the only reliable guides to this overlit, super-accelerated Matrix simulation we are all learning to live in.

I admit, yes, it's about, in part, comic books, but it's really about how underground culture isn't underground anymore. Everything is mainstream. What was the popular saying... "if you think it, there's porn of it somewhere on the internet"? So yes. We are the mainstream. All our ideas are making the world what it is, and that's not going to change.

None Of Them Can Stop Us Now.

"You get ideas from daydreaming. You get ideas from being bored. You get ideas all the time. The only difference between writers and other people is we notice when we're doing it. You get ideas when you ask yourself simple questions. The most important of the questions is just, What if...?"
--Neil Gaiman on Ideas