Gary Floyd

I prefer Corgis, but Pugs will do. I finally gave these guys a listen, and it didn't do it for me.

It's Marvin, what do you expect?

Teraphonic Overdubs by Chris Joss may be my favorite album nobody talks about this year. It's got a certain cheese/chintz factor, but it also has the fake 60's/70's movie/tv score factor I love so much.

I normally don't like Pitchfork, but I love this.

wacky internet picture.

Ebert's review of "North" is one of my favorite movie reviews ever. He really hated that fucking movie, and I love him for it. Speaking of Ebert and Schneider, I loved it when Ebert was on Stern, and Rob calls in to try and diss Ebert, only to fail miserably.

I also love that album, though I think Before and After Science is Eno's best album.

21.) Messiah of Evil (1973) Plot: In the California town of Pointe Dune, Arletty Lang (Marianna Hill) is looking for her reclusive artist father (Royal Dano.) So, what's with the undead town's people? And who is the Messiah of Evil? Review: Night of the Living Dead meets the works of H.P. Lovecraft in Will Hyuck's underrated cult classic. While you won't finds piles of gore here, you will find a creeping sense of dread and a nice little gothic horror tale made for about $80,000 or $100,000. What works in the movie,as I mentioned already, is the sense of dread. You know there's something about the townspeople-they are flat, emotionless, pale, and bleeding from the eyes. When something does happen, it leaves an impression, especially in two setpieces: one in a supermarket, the other in a . The movie also gets away with some social commentary. The supermarket scene-the undead feasting upon uncooked meat-anticipates Romero's commentary on consumerism found in his masterpiece Dawn of the Dead. Also, like Let's Scare Jessica to Death, Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things, I Drink Your Blood, and Simon, King of the Witches, "Messiah of Evil" serves as a commentary of the hippie movement. Here, the dead seem to be not only a veiled commentary on consumerism gone mad, but also the fact that in the end, the hippie movement, no matter how it denied it, was a sense of conformity. The movie does have it's flaws-poor acting, an annoying, warbly song-but the one flaw that hurts the movie some is the narration. We don't need a narrator to explain what's going on here people. Still, it's an underrated gem, and deserves a look. Director Hyuck went on to write American Graffiti and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Then he did Howard the Duck, and his career never recovered. Rating: 8.5/10 Yep, the Writer/Director of Howard the Duck did one of the most underrated zombie movies of the 70's. See it-it's not hard to find online, and it's public domain. Next Time: Dead Heist

K.O.A.Birthday

Stay classy GOP

-Richard Laymon's book "The Woods Are Dark" -New garbage cans (old ones are filled with holes, and no matter how much I try, they refuse to be clean) -A few DVD's

Happy birthday Steviekick.

20.) Sugar Hill (1974) Plot: When the mob kills the boyfriend of Sugar Hll (Marki Bey), she turns to Mama Maitresse (Zara Cully) and Voodoo god Baron Samedi (Don Pedro Colley) for revenge. Review: The only Blaxploitation movie to involve zombies other than Petey Wheatstraw, "Sugar Hill" and it's PG rating may mean that it isn't as graphic or fun as say, Petey, Dolemite, or Coffy, but it's still a lot of fun regardless. For one thing, the movie, much like a Rudy Ray Moore movie, doesn't take itself too seriously, and has a lot of fun with genre conventions (the stereotypical white Southern villains for example), and also offers som fun one liners ("hope you like to eat white trash!") It also helps that the performances from Bey and Colley are a lot of fun-especially Colley, who hams it up with the best of them. The zombies themselves aren't flesh eaters, but instead gray, cobweb covered ex-slaves with machetes who do Sugar's bidding. It might not be a classic, but "Sugar Hill" is a nice guilty pleasure that, while not standing up to the likes of Cotton Comes To Harlem, still offers some fun. Great theme song too. Shame it isn't on DVD yet. Rating: 7.5/10 A fun cult nugget from the 70's that should please Blaxploitation fans. Next Review: Messiah of Evil

Eh, it won't last long.

19.) Erotic Nights of the Living Dead (1980) Plot: Like you're watching this for a plot synopsis. Review: Porn and Zombies? Yep, it's been done before: Porno Holocaust, Erotic Orgasm, Naked Lovers, and to a far lesser (and grosser) extent, Porn of the Dead are proof that some want to see flesh eating cadavers and people fucking in the same movie. Hey, whatever gets you off, I guess. Now, from the man who gave you the notorious Anthropophagous and it's sequel Absurd comes (pun intended) "Erotic Nights of the Living Dead." First, how does it work as a porno? Well, there's a memorable sequence involving a woman, a wine bottle, and a cork. Other than that, this is rather tame. Sure, there's sex, but for the most part, it largely isn't that hardcore-George Eastman (who also wrote the movie) even keeps his pants on during sex. Also, the sex itself isn't really that erotic. So, how about the zombies? Well, the good news is, they are great, and quite creepy. Nearing the end, the movie even builds upon some atmosphere, and the gore is pretty good (yes, we do see a guy getting his cock bitten off.) However, the scenes of the undead doing their thing (no, the zombies don't fuck) are often inter cut with sex scenes, which ends up being distracting as a whole. That ends up being a problem, as it becomes clear that director Joe D'amoto* doesn't know what kind of movie he wants to do. In the end, it doesn't work that well as a porno, and as a zombie movie, it works better. However, the two just don't see eye to eye. * Apart from Anthropophagus, D'amato also directed "Porno Holocaust" and "Erotic Orgasm. He's mostly known however, for directing the MST3K favorite Ator The Invincible. Rating: 4/10 A missed opportunity to say the least. Who keeps their pants on during sex anyway? Next Time: Sugar Hill.

Criterion is releasing "Vampyr" Tuesday, and re-releasing "Salo" August 26. I'm totally getting "Vampyr."

Pet rats are awesome. My 5th grade class had one, and it was the cutest thing.

18.) Let's Scare Jessica To Death (1971) Plot: Jessica (Zohra Lampert) is let out of a mental ward, and moves into a country home with friends. So, what's with the strange drifer girl (Gretchen Corbett)? Or the vampire in the lake? Or the townspeople with those odd scars? Review: The term "lost classic" gets thrown around a lot, especially in the horror genre. Hardcore fans such as yours truly love to mention movies like Vampyr, Horrors Of Malformed Men, The Strange Vice of Mrs. Wardh, and others as examples of why we should continue to dig for great but overlooked horror movies. One movie that gets thrown around by such fans is John Hancock's 1971 classic "Let's Scare Jessica To Death." The movie itself is not a gorefest-bloodshed is quite limited within the movie-but what it lacks in disembowelments it makes up for in creeping dread and atmosphere. Throughout most of the movie, we are unsure what is real or what is a dream, as Jessica's paranoia reaches a fever pitch level, and the atmosphere clouds over the viewer, up to the conclusion. The dead in the movie are not rotting corpses bent on destruction, but are instead undead townspeople who you can't trust, bringing to mind the classic Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Also, just like Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things, Messiah Of Evil, and I Drink Your Blood, "Jessica" serves and a condemnation of hippie culture-and may be the biggest middle finger-the biggest proverbial fuck you-to the culture, as it reveals many of the things that destroyed it, and it wasn't authority figures either: bickering, in fighting, egos, the looming sense of comformity, acid drenched delusions, paranoia, and more figure into the movie. The overriding message of the film seems to be that even without authority and police figures, the hippie movement was doomed to fail from the get go-only it would end up destroying itself instead of the other way around. "Let's Scare Jessica To Death" is a great horror movie, and deserves it's cult reputation. Rating: 9/10 One of the best horror movies from the 70's you haven't seen or heard of. Recommended. Next Time: Erotic Nights of the Living Dead

I think that the problem I have with the album is a similar problem I had with Hip Hop Is Dead: The production largely sounds lazy. It works on some tracks ("Queens Gets The Money") and Doesn't on others ("Make the World Go 'Round") Also, the album has both two potential best songs of the year ("Queens", "Fried Chicken") and two potential worse ("Sly Fox", "Testify"-ugh, I'm going to pretend that one doesn't exist for now.) It's not a bad album, it's just so-so.

I'd go on about how much I loved it, but everyone else already said it all.

"I GOT SHOT!" "I got shot!" "NO, I GOT SHOT, FOR REAL!" "No, I got shot for real!" I am so disappointed you guys referenced that before I could.

Advanced word has been mixed, as it's been playing in the festival circuit for a while. I'll see it if I have a chance, though I don't have high hopes. Then again, Lovecraft isn't exactly the easiest author to adapt.