Get off my case motherfucker!

As I've droned on about in other pages of this blog I'm a huge fan of Italian cannibal/zombie horror and have been ecstatic seeing some of the more notable "classics" get the deluxe re-release treatment on Blu-Ray. Movies that were only seen as a scratched, beaten negative in the smelliest dives on 42nd Street or via cloudy nth-generation VHS dubs are now being scanned into high-def with a host of fun bonus shit for sleazeophiles like me. Umberto Lenzi was the auteur behind 1981's Cannibal Ferox (astute trash cinema historians will know it by its VHS title Make Them Die Slowly), a poor man's cash-in on Ruggero Deodato's epic Cannibal Holocaust. While much has been written about the two directors' individual style, Lenzi was clearly the knock-off king of the two, riding an established genre wave to its inevitable completion. Cannibal Ferox effectively ended the minor Italian cannibal cinema renaissance - it's a mean-spirited canker sore of a film that features absolutely no likeable characters spitting spiteful dialogue from one to another with contempt and a sneer. It's a riot. And that's not even counting the inescapable violence that supposedly got this gem banned in 31 countries. Gluing the whole thing together is a solid synth-funk soundtrack by one "Budy Maglione," also known as composer Roberto Donati. Donati was a Lenzi regular in the early 80's, scoring his other cannibal/Guyana mishmash Eaten Alive! and oddball comedy Daughter of the Jungle. While nowhere near as coherent a soundtrack as provided by Riz Ortolani for Deodato's jungle films, Donati effort is much more poppy and terribly catchy. Some of the NYC jingles almost sound like they were recorded for some 1980's L'eggs commercials - they are that kitzchy (to be honest I think Donati was trying to sound like Ortolani's "Do It To Me" from La Casa Sperduta Nel Parco but that's just me). Anyways, the actual soundtrack is only 20 minutes or so long but there are a host of alternate takes to keep you interested - enjoy a trip down tit-piercing, dick-cutting, brain-eating memory lane.

Los Últimos Canibales

The Dude abides...

Awesome record from Detroit one-man musical extraordinaire Dude. Shit, this motherfucker flies solo, dig? You only wish your home-grown 4-track recordings could lick the guava like this fucking guy. If you haven't realized, I was pleasantly surprised by Dude's amazing debut of which I stumbled upon after many drunken hours surveying the tripe on bandcamp. Influenced by a myriad of bands ranging from the Beatles to the Bee Gees (c'mon tell me you can't envision the "Spicks & Specks" chords during the opening to "In The Next Pocket"), Dude is channeling the vibe Ween and Beck brought to the forefront a decade ago. An easily listenable album worth some of your hard earned duckets. Enjoy.

iamdude

R.I.P. Krug Stilo

Man, what a drag it was to hear David Hess passed away on Saturday. Not only was he the lead villain in two of my favorite movies (Last House On The Left and the incredible House On The Edge Of The Park) but he was an accomplished musician who composed one of my favorite horror flick soundtracks (the aforementioned House... er... Last House). And he seemed like a cool guy to boot; enthusiastic over his cult stardom, a horror convention regular, never one to turn down a fan. There's already a wealth of info online regarding his early days as a songwriter for Elvis and Mercury Records A&R rep so I thought I'd skip all that and upload two albums of his - the soundtrack to Last House and his 2001 release Caught Up In The Moment. LHOTL is an amazing album, it reeks like a bad acid trip, full of post-60's influence but way way darker - the untitled "Road Leads To Nowhere"' ditties are almost suicidally bleak. "Ice Cream Song" could easily be used today as some random commercial ditty for Old Navy. "Sadie And Krug" is a wonderful polka-ish tune in the ilk of Zappa's "Jewish Princess" - and the full songs at the end of the album could have easily passed on some random England Dan & John Ford Coley LPs without turning a head. Caught Up In The Moment isn't always my cup of tea, some of the songs are a bit cheesy on the symbolism ("Animal Dreams" for one) to the point that you could imagine Trey Parker singing them. But he is easily redeemed with the hilarious "High" (my personal fave), "Vagabond" and "Nice Girl" - all which dip into the welcome territory of of his 70's sound. Actually, to any Ween fans who read this - he is on par with Chris Harford's music if that means anything to anyone. Anyways, check him out, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. You passed too early Dave, thanks for the memories and the music.

1972                                                                 2001

Currently watching: Look
Currently listening to: The Book Of Mormon

Back For Some Air...

Wow... it's been like two months since my last post and nothing to show for it. Yard still looks rough and my laundry list of home improvement projects hasn't even had the dust blown off it. Oh well - still got all summer to catch up I guess. Anyways, regardless of my failures as a suburban homeowner, I've found myself revisiting this great CD during my hours of (apparently useless) lawn mowing and mulching. Flashback 1992: Driving home through the night to New England from spring break in Fort Lauderdale (a fun 16 hours of munching mini-thins and Diet Pepsis), my college pals and I ended up on some oldie station which had us deliriously singing along to some fun tunes including Mungo Jerry's "In The Summertime" and Jerry Reed's "Amos Moses". Once back at school my roommate was obsessed with finding "that 'Summertime' song" on a single so we blindly hit some of the downtown record holes. Man, how was shit accomplished without the internet back then? We didn't know the artist, the song's real name or even remember how it really went (give us a break, there was a week's worth of alcohol poisoning eating away at our short term memories) yet through a stroke of luck we found some old store owner who knew exactly what we were talking about and presented this CD. Interestingly, we didn't just find Mungo Jerry's one-hit wonder on the album, we found the entire setlist of the radio show we heard. I guess enthusiasm for the job waned around 3AM on that South Carolina oldie station and the DJ simply pressed play on the CD and ran (or slept). The songs are still great 20 years later (and shit, they were already 20 years old back then) and get me chuckling nearly every time I hear 'em, partially from the absolute schlock of it all but there's also a bit of nostalgia. R. Dean Taylor's "Indiana Wants Me," Jerry Reed's aforementioned "Amos Moses" and, yes, even Partridge Family's "I Think I Love You" are my faves - a perfect snapshot of 70's kitsch. And if you can take another boring anecdote, this CD actually kept an old girlfriend and I together through the throes of our 54th or so breakup - Bobby Sherman's über cheesy "Julie, Do Ya Love Me" happened to come on random play right as we were slamming doors to go our own way... "Honey you cried the day I left you, even though we knew I couldn't stay" boomed in the background and yes, our love saw the light. We finally broke up two years later, effectively ending one of the worst (and longest) relationships in my life, but that's beside the point.

C'mon Get Happy

 
Currently watching: Barton Fink

Currently listening to: Ween Chocolate And Cheese