I subscribe to a lot of mailing lists.  I do this because, at heart, I am part of the entertainment business – well, I pretend to be.  I’m about five steps away from having no life at all, so I need to keep myself occupied with something.

One of the lists I subscribe to is the Scratch Records mailing list.  The company seems to do very well with its distribution arm, but its store…the store is a maze of press releases.  Independent bands/labels there tend to sell themselves with more hyperbole than a mortal can stand.  Also, the prices at Scratch can be awfully expensive and I’m not that rich or easily led a music fan.  I’m not trying to bash Scratch Records, but it seems the term “judicious editing” has never crossed the newsletter editor’s head there.  Am I wrong?  Take a look at selections from recent newsletters and TELL me I’m wrong.

UNDER PRESSURE-s/t  CD (Primitive Air Raid/PAR002) $10.50
Successive waves of tough guy metal dogshit and content-free straight edge pablum have rendered hardcore a dirty word for most discriminating 21st century music fans, but Canada has been at the forefront of the genre’s recent revitalization through such real-deal outfits as Fucked Up, Inepsy and Career Suicide. Winnipeg’s Under Pressure are set to continue this welcome trend with their newest effort, an eight-song ripper of quick, raw hardcore inspired by Poison Idea, Black Flag and Motorhead, delivered with smarts, chops and energy to burn.

What a bunch of overwritten ad copy.  Essentially, this bit of purple prose can be boiled down to its “FUCK THAT METAL/SXE BULLSHIT!  THIS IS HARD…TO THE CORE” lowest common denominator.  Is it good that I can recognize one of three local Canadian band names being dropped here?  Since when was Motörhead considered hardcore, by the way?  Makes sense to reference a speed metal band when talking about how old-school hardcore you are.  I know when I write a comedy script, I always study shows like Mannix and Baretta just to get that comic timing down.

Frankly, this reads like a grindcore band’s bio.  If Under Pressure aren’t grind, I’ll eat my hat.  At least the CD is “budget priced” for those bargain hunters.  Never mind that $10 is the maximum I’d ever pay for a CD – how can I pass up something that sounds like Inepsy or Fucked Up?  Could you?

NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS-The Good Son  CD (Mute/8417832) $32.99
We can’t get the cheaper Mushroom pressing any more, so we bring you this more expensive Holland import of Nick’s fine 1990 album.

NICK CAVE-The First Born Is Dead  CD (Mute/8417872) $22.50
Replaces the previous Mushroom version, but no change in price. From 1985, hear Nick sing the blues.

There is no reason to pay $32.99, even in Canadian dollars (seriously, the dollar’s been worth >$0.80 US lately, enough of the Canadian Tire jokes) for an import copy of a Nick Cave album.  I can’t believe people will accept paying more than $20 for something because it’s a limited edition or because it’s an import.  I can understand why imports are more expensive, but good lord!  I can buy seven used CDs for that price, and possibly those old Nick Cave releases Scratch Records is talking about!  How is this cheaper than my local record store or Music World?  The last time I paid $30 for a CD was when I bought an “import” version of Atari Teenage Riot’s Burn, Berlin, Burn!…IN 1997.  Now that I’ve said this, of course, Nick Cave fans are going to berate me for having bad musical tastes and I’ll continue to be shunned until I develop the mental illness of being a hipster.

THE USED-I Caught Fire  CDEP (Reprise/9362428872) $8.50
Kelly Osbourne’s grubby and unbearable ex-boyfriend returns with several anthems for the delusional youth. Tracklisting: 1. I Caught Fire
2. The Taste Of Ink (Live) (From Channel V – Australia) 3. All That I’ve Got (Acoustic Version) 4. Lunacy Fringe (Acoustic Version)  5. Alone This Holiday (Non-album Track) “It’s clear The Used know who they are now; they’ve found their voice. They are plainly aware of their position in the music world today, and it feels good. They’ve delivered the record their fans have been asking for- one that places them squarely on the top of a genre they’ve helped create”. That genre must be Nu Bad Music.

THE STROKES-Juicebox  CDEP (RCA/82876759722) $8.50
It took three albums for these turds to sing U2 [and The Cult/Doors] overtop of the Batman Theme. Ew. [Really, this may well be the single worst song ever]. The second track, “Hawaii”, is much better. Tracklisting: 1. Juicebox 2. Hawaii 3. Juicebox (Live In Rio De Janeiro, Brazil) 4. Juicebox (Video – Director’s Cut)

Why the hell would a record store based entirely on appealing to a specialized audience sell albums it hates like this?  What’s the point?  I know the music industry exists purely to make money, and independent record stores do that by wrapping themselves in friendly, trend-conscious images.  Even so, who’s going to buy something from a retailer that points out how much the album it’s selling sucks?  Is that good business?  Couldn’t the Scratch Records employee responsible for writing these album descriptions just list the album without the “don’t buy this” spiel underneath?  Frankly, if people want to buy The Used’s new EP, they will regardless of what anyone else says.  Maybe this is a Vancouver thing and I just don’t understand.

FUN 100-Hit It & Quit  CD (Hockey Dad/HDR10) $10.99  
With “dance-punk” now a household word and Gang of Four crowding everyone’s “Favourite Band” list on MySpace, it is quite obvious that punk rock has nearly lost its fun side. Indeed, it seems that the heyday of mindless punk rock occurred when most of us were too young to buy clove cigarettes or Pabst Blue Ribbon. Enter Fun 100, five dudes who understand that punk without the pop is like dad without his minivan –it’s not taking you anywhere! Rocking out in church basements, public washrooms, houses, and sometimes even real venues, Fun 100 has been the pulse of the teenage heartbeat for the past four years. These guys are the real deal, their bedrooms ordained with hockey trophies, dirty laundry, and a whole lotta records. Adding synthesizers and a whole bunch of attitude, the band has picked up where the best pop-punk left off. Hit It & Quit, the group’s debut full-length, showcases the group’s superior song-writing and high-octane style. From the anthemic group chorus of “Hot Popular Girl” to the dance-inducing new wave of “Computer,” the record is a surefire instant classic. Look out for Fun 100 on tour for the better part of 2006. “Pure teenage zit rawk angst!” Nardwaur the Human Serviette  “Fun100 was headlining—they’re fucking amazing and still so young. Their songs are fast and filled with incredible things. They’re the Ramones and they’re the Exploding Hearts and they’re Blink 182 when you admit that yeah ok, sometimes pop-punk isn’t so bad… those little Abbotsford boys really know how to get the party started.” Terminal City  “True to their name, Abbotsford’s new wave pop-punkers Fun100 were a hell of a lot of fun to watch. Their ‘Computer’ song is about as danceable as they get and bonus points to the lead singer for wearing the same Mario Lemieux t-shirt that a friend of mine had in grade 7.” Only Magazine

Translation: it’s new new wave, and some people you’re supposed to like think Fun100 is tits.  At least the CD is $11, which is sensible enough.  I don’t know if Scratch Records or the distributed bands/labels set the prices, but punk and metal bands usually seem to understand the concept of “value.”

Well, some black metal bands are too in love with selling “limited edition pressings” of their latest missives for $30.  Is it really that clever to use “only 666 copies pressed” as a marketing ploy?  Does the average underground metal band actually sell 666 copies of anything?  I’m not being flippant – the sheer number of bands ripping off Carcass and Impetigo would worry even the most cretinous grindcore fan.

V/A-COMEDY BREAKS  LP (Filthstyle/FIL001) $17.50  
“Do you need a hook for your next song or need a solid diss for your next opponent in a DJ battle? If so, then this is the break record for you. Comedy Breaks features voice samples from Eddie Griffin, Richard Pryor, Rodney Dangerfield, Eddie Murphy and Dave Chappelle that will appeal to any producer, DJ or human with a sense of humor! The LP is packed with intros, outros, insults, skits about cops, women, racism, sound effects and more. A sure album for today’s creative music artist.”

I don’t understand why this is necessary.  I’m sure better thrift stores and charity shops have whole Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy albums for fifty cents or so, though they might not be easy to find and the albums are often in pisspoor shape.  Still, it’s more economical than paying almost twenty dollars to find out what the five fingers said to the face.

Richard Pryor made his own drugs.  May he rest in peace, and be remembered for more than saying “nigger” every fifth word in the process.

THE PINKY VIOLENCE COLLECTION  4DVD (Panik House) $99.99
Much anticipated collection of early 70’s Japanese exploitation gems. “Female bikers! Gang violence! Catfights!” are the promise to be delivered by these remastered, fully restored, uncut versions of DELINQUENT GIRL BOSS: WORTHLESS TO CONFESS / GIRL BOSS CUERILLA / TERRIFYING GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL: LYNCH LAW CLASSROOM / CRIMINAL WOMAN: KILLING MELODY. Extras include audio commentaries for each, trailers for each, actress and director bios, poster & still galleries, boxset bonus CD of Reiko Ike, and a 24 page booklet written by Chris D.
http://www.panikhouse.com/

I received this as a promo.  Either I’m extremely lucky or there’s no way that the 4-DVD set is actually worth $100.  Wow.  Frankly, this is why people go to DeepDiscountDVD and other discount DVD sites.  I tend to go the press route on some things, because there’s no way I can afford to be a film buff otherwise – I mean, Panik House releases some good stuff, but $100?  $40-60, possibly, but there is no way people are going to pay $25-30 for one DVD in 2005.  DVDs in cardboard slipcovers sell for a dollar, for crying out loud!

PART CHIMP-I Am Come  CD (Monitor/MON027) $15.99  
“Volume. It goes to eleven. Sure. Bleeding ear drums. Sure. But the use of volume is not a gimmick for Part Chimp. Volume and amps maxed out is needed to reach the sounds and feelings that ended up on their second LP I Am Come. Nearly becoming complete tape scramble, Part Chimp takes volume to the clipping point. After displaying their near ear drum bursting levels on their first LP Chart Pimp, Part Chimp have refined their sound, maintaining the walls of distortion, yet adding more hooks and harmony. The word evolution could be used here, but without being punny, let’s say Part Chimp have developed, but the inner ape is still with them. If Part Chimp’s debut was crusty punk fueled by an Ampthetamine Reptile crunch, then I Am Come is a highly refined offering, standing alongside distortion dwellers such as My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth, and Sunn0))). Recorded and mixed deep in the red by John Cummings of Mogwai, I Am Come is an unbelievable mix of dynamics, harmony, and dissonance.”

SO WHAT YOU’RE SAYING IS PART CHIMP ARE LOUD?!  I’M SORRY, I COULDN’T HEAR YOU!  MY EARDRUMS ARE BLEEDING THROUGH MY BRAIN, THEY’RE THAT LOUD!  I HAVE I MIGHT BRAIN THINK DAMAGE!

I’ve always considered Sunn O))) to be one of the stupidest names I’ve ever seen in metal.  How am I supposed to pronounce O))), anyway?  I know, the band’s name is pronounced “sun.”  The O))) is not pronounced and the band appropriates the name and logo of an amplifier brand, that’s not the point.  It looks ungainly in print.  Some people use a zero (0) for the circle, others use an upper-case O.  Some use three )’s after the circle, others two or four (five if the particular music scribe is demented.)  Sunn O))) are well-loved by people and they have a sizable fanbase, but the name is just one step up from Frantic Bleep.  I’m not kidding.

HAEMOTH-Kontamination  CD (Southern Lord/SUNN47.5) $16.50  IN MONDAY  
“[T]he brand new fithy, sickening burnt offering from the French Black Metal Underground terrorists: Haemoth. Brittle trance inducing cold blast of black metal with a lethal injection of extremely killer riffs. First official USA release ever. CD is limited to 2,000 hand numbered copies. Haemoth support all that can contribute to the ruin of the human being, every form of vice, and don’t give a fuck to the means used top reach that point. Any form of vice, destruction and hate have to be preached. Haemoth encourages every act, physical or spiritual which could carry to the decline, blasphemy or pain. To become one with Him, the interior death is inevitable. the weak ones don’t have their place here. May they burn in hell…”

Yeah, yeah, yeah.  This black metal band hates everyone, Satan is God, the clichés all familiar and cozy like a bed of nails.  Frankly, it’s better when black metal bands go WAY OVER THE TOP, because…well, I’ve never understood the appeal of black metal and why people take what any musician says seriously.  Note the limited amount of copies.  Not overshooting your press run is kult.  I’m going to masturbate in front of your hogtied mom now while sacrificing a goat with a sword made of skulls and pure chocolate FOR SATAN, because I’m kult.  And evil.  Buy my album.  I’m not trying too hard to offend you, really.

I swear, most black metal albums are backstory first, image second, musicianship waaaaay in the back.  It’s why I can never take extreme metal too seriously.  I think I’d be mentally retarded if I did.

THE INVISIBLE EYES-Laugh In The Dark  CD (Bomp/BCD4096-) $15.50  
“Take heed! Here be music for troglodytes and spacemen, monks, drunkards and sophisticated hip shakers alike. Primordial fuzz and reverberous caterwaul teetering on the precipice. New hymns by new primitives. A laugh in the dark, a shot in the arm and a kick in the ass. You can’t hold it in your hand, but it feels pretty good nonetheless. The twang and the thump, the rumble and the wail; the hypnotic sound of things breaking, oscillating and coming apart. There goes Bo and the Duchess in a whirling vortex of feedback held together with duct tape and safety pins. Somewhere over yonder a lonesome organ plays a hauntingly familiar tune while a tambourine can’t stop shaking. “Just what the world needs to hear,” said Greg Shaw.”

So…what sort of music do The Invisible Eyes play?  I hate these long, meandering bios.  They say absolutely nothing, yet make out like they’ve revealed a profundity that only gods would be able to see.  I’d like to know what a certain band plays, what neat genre I can file the band under, and what I should expect from an album.  This seems to be an indie rock album, so why can’t the label say so?  Greg Shaw, Bo and the Duchess might like this album.  Since when do they speak for ME?

Frankly, if Scratch Records doesn’t kick me off its mailing list after this, I’ll be pleasantly surprised.  Those wacky Vancouverites and their expensive tastes, they’re adorable.

This article stiffed when it made its Blogcritics debut.  That’s the problem with writing for a big site like Blogcritics.org – the music version of MY List of Lists (the ‘my’ is in upper-case for a reason, which is totally lost on Blogcritics editors) did reasonably well despite me not having a good feeling about it.  I thought the television version would do just as well and it died on its ass.  You know what the article needed?  More insults directed at local Southern towns.  Anyhow, to those backwards hicks in Atlanta, Georgia, TBS IS GAY!  TURNER BROADCASTING SYSTEM?  MORE LIKE TURNER BUTTREAMING SYSTEM LOL AM I RITE

Great.  Now Robert Novak is going to e-punch me.

SHOW THAT HASN’T DEBUTED AND STILL LOOKS LIKE IT COULD DAMN NEAR SAVE NBC: Deal or No Deal’s rules are a bit convoluted, to say the least.  Deal or No Deal looks like Endemol USA threw Jackpot, $ale of the Century and Let’s Make a Deal into a bran tub and added in some nonsense backstory whenever the need arose.  Still, the UK version of Deal or No Deal is killing all its competitors in the ratings.  Hell, even with Howie Mandel hosting, it looks like NBC just stumbled onto a winner.

Still…Howie Mandel?  Donny Osmond did well on Pyramid and Richard Karn made Family Feud watchable again, but this is just taking the piss.  No one thought Billie Piper could act, either.  It’s funny how second careers work.  I still would have preferred Peter Tomarken.

SHOW THAT’S DRAGGING NBC DOWN BY BEING ON WAY, WAY TOO LONG: Where should I start?  Is there a continual need for ER?  Has Will & Grace ever been funny?  What the hell happened to Saturday Night Live that it’s become more unwatchable than MadTV?  Why tease people by announcing that Jay Leno is going to stay on The Tonight Show until 2009 when Leno and Conan O’Brien are unfunny now?  (Oh, I’m sorry, did I step on a sacred cow?  I’ve tried to watch O’Brien recently, but the show just isn’t that funny to me.  Coked-Up Werewolf fans will now tell me how I’m homosexual.)  Should The West Wing even be on anymore, considering the creators abandoned the show a few years ago?  Kill a few of those Law & Orders, too.  Slash and burn, NBC, slash and burn.

COMEBACK THAT I CAN VOUCH FOR: The Simpsons.  I’m admittedly a fan, and others think the show has become death.  Still, no show on its seventeenth season should be doing as well as The Simpsons.  The show has finally become comfortable in its pacing as Al Jean seems to have perfected the show’s current formula – The Simpsons is more political, respectful of its past, and has rediscovered the joy of an Albert Brooks voiceover.  The Simpsons isn’t trying to be Family Guy redux like in the Mike Scully “era,” and the show has stopped trying way too hard to relive a past it can’t possibly duplicate.  Sure, The Simpsons makes a dumb continuity error or two these days (uh, Homer never went to college?  I guess Scratchy never finally killed Itchy, then), and it’ll never be what it was.  No show could ever be what The Simpsons was, but it looks like the writers are writing better scripts to justify Dan Castellaneta’s ridiculous salary.  Expand my brain, learning juice!

COMEBACK THAT DIED ON ITS ARSE: Family Guy has become this decade’s Ren & Stimpy.  It’s nice to see that Seth MacFarlane’s prodigal son returned to Fox, but lately MacFarlane’s been letting spitefulness run his product.  We get it, MacFarlane, Fox censored the show way too much.  That does not to any degree explain the inane feud Family Guy has with The Simpsons.  It doesn’t explain why random characters (usually Peter) are in a naked scene more often than absolutely necessary.  Hell, if Family Guy’s going to show Brian having sex with a woman eventually, at least say that Brian’s father is the puppy mill owner or something.  Alternatively, how about not including any more allusions to bestiality and pedophilia ever again?  I’m not a prude, but do the staff writers think any off-colour joke they can get away with is automatically funny by the joke’s being?  Maybe I have FULL-BLOWN AIDS.

I still think Family Guy is funny (and I do watch American Dad regularly, so I really shouldn’t complain about anything Seth MacFarlane does), but the show has become louder, cruder and more surreal than Mike Scully’s run on The Simpsons.  MacFarlane has the talent, but he’s become John Kricfalusi redux in that he thinks louder, cruder and more sexually explicit is the way for Family Guy to go.  It isn’t, but does he know it?  Family Guy became a hit because of the show’s endearing randomness, but there’s a limit to how far it should go.

Ren & Stimpy Adult Party Cartoon proved to the world how much of a disturbed individual John Kricfalusi had become by 2003.  I don’t want to see Seth MacFarlane become another Kricfalusi.  The world doesn’t even need one Kricfalusi at this point.

LONG-RUNNING SHOW WITH THE BRIGHTEST FUTURE: The Doctor Who revival just recently found a home on American television, but CBC showed Doctor Who shortly after it debuted in the UK (no surprise, since CBC funds the show.)  Oh, “new” Doctor Who looked dire in development – Billie Piper acting, a Big Brother parody being the focus of one of the episodes, Russell T. Davies helming the metaphorical TARDIS.  It’s the weirdest thing, though – Billie Piper can act well, and the Big Brother parody turned out to be one of the strongest episodes of the series.  Give Russell T. Davies credit – he managed to revive Doctor Who successfully, which is really quite an accomplishment.

The show’s far from perfect.  Russell T. Davies shouldn’t be writing scripts for Doctor Who, bad satires on pop culture that his scripts are.  That Bad Wolf thing caught on among the limeys, though, didn’t it?  What an amazing show, the Slitheen notwithstanding.  I’m supposed to be scared of farting baby-headed aliens that explode when vinegar hits them?

RELATIVELY NEW SHOW THAT NEEDS TO DIE NOW: The War at Home is awful.  It isn’t that the show is worse than the other dysfunctional family sitcoms Fox is fond of airing.  It’s not funny, though, and it makes a terrible bridge between The Simpsons and Family Guy.  What’s the point of airing King of the Hill, which has somehow remained in first-run against all odds, at 7:30PM?  If King of the Hill hasn’t died in that time slot yet, there must be something to that show.  It’s kind of sad when The War at Home can’t be better than Malcolm in the Middle at its worst, but I’m sure The War at Home’s weak ratings will assure the show’s quick death.

ASSORTED CLAPPED-OUT BANGERS: That 70’s Show has long since exhausted its supply of “Eric Foreman Kelso Bob Pinciotti makes smart ass remark/Red threatens to kick Bob’s ass/Fez thinks he’s a ladykiller” jokes, yet it goes on like the mutant version of Happy Days that it is.  I can’t even fathom why Kevin Spencer is still on the air recycling that one plotline of Kevin acting sociopathic and Kevin’s parents being dirtbags.  20/20’s title should be changed to John Stossel and Elizabeth Vargas Give Myths and Lies a Break.  Survivor and The Amazing Race have had good runs, but their times have passed and so has the entire reality TV genre.

WORST NEW SHOW: Popcultured with Elvira Kurt is a Canadian show, so Americans are lucky not to see this.  Imagine a Talk Soup variant with a bad host.  Hal Sparks’ name is thrown around a lot, but there are some John Henson, Aisha Tyler and Greg Kinnear haters out there.  Now imagine the host being a female Canadian stand-up comic whose entire routine revolves around the fact that she’s a female Canadian stand-up comic, but she’s a lesbian so the routine is somehow “edgy.”  Visualize a cast and writing staff around her that yell “THIS IS BAG” and “THAT GUY FROM INXS IS A TOTAL PENIS” at random intervals.  Do you have that image in your head?  Somehow, Popcultured manages to be worse than even your imagination can conceive.  Isn’t Canadian television amazing?

BEST NEW SHOW: The Colbert Report by default.  I’m not fond of the show myself, but some think The Colbert Report is already better than The Daily Show.  It’s good to see Stephen Colbert put something on his resumé that isn’t “voiced an implied homosexual.”  He has a nose for hard news, alright!

UNINTENTIONALLY HILARIOUS SHOW OF THE YEAR: Friday Night Smackdown is the comedy program of the year.  See Undertaker appear in Randy Orton’s mirror…BUT HE’S NOT BEHIND ORTON!  EVIL!  See The Dicks rub baby oil on their chests!  Behold the greatness of The Boogeyman!  Behold the godliness of the Smackdown Juniors!  It’s like WWE executives are aware of how bad Smackdown is, and they’re making the show as deliberately surreal as possible.  That doesn’t mean the show’s any good, as Friday Night Smackdown is somehow worse than WCW Thunder at this point.  Yeah, I said it.

WHY BRAND EXTENSION DOESN’T GENERALLY WORK: ET Canada is a success for Global, but the world did not need a Canadian counterpart to thirty minutes of wasted space.  It just makes for sixty minutes of wasted space.  MTV Canada was made redundant by CHUM Limited’s purchase of Craig Media, but the channel pointlessly lives on as Razer.  Another MTV Canada might debut by next year, never mind that no one needed the first one to begin with.  The Apprentice: Martha Stewart proved that not every show helmed by Martha Stewart is going to be an unqualified success, but that’s probably because the show is mediocre.  My Big Fat Obnoxious Boss debuted in the wrong year.  As for MSNBC, what’s the point of throwing money at that channel?  Just merge it with CNBC and focus on putting out a credible news product, because MSNBC is never going to beat CNN or Fox News in the ratings.  I wonder why NBC Universal bothers keeping its America’s Talking variant afloat.

BEST TV TREND: There isn’t one this year.  Oh, the wags are going to say “well, the old guard of television news is finally gone.”  I can’t take network television news seriously when CBS is thinking of having Katie Couric host CBS Evening News.  Is someone taking the piss at CBS Corporation or did Dan Rather drive everyone there insane?  If CBS News is planning to throw money at any passing fancy, how about hiring Kenny Mayne?  He’s as good a choice as any.

WORST TV TREND: North American versions and/or ripoffs of British ‘programmes.’  The American version of The Office is rather mediocre – the cast is trying hard to make the show work, but Arrested Development tries harder.  Martin Short’s Jiminy Glick character seems like a ripoff both of Alan Partridge (not Ali G, that’s another can of orgasm) and Short’s own Brock Linahan.  Strictly Come Dancing did well as Dancing with the Stars and people like Wife Swap, but why can’t ABC show the original British programs instead of trying to Americanize them?  Finally, could someone explain the title Canadian Antiques Roadshow?  I can’t believe Canadians are that insular.  Then again, CBC does produce the program, so that might explain things.

By the way, I remember first seeing Hugh Laurie on Black Adder when I was seven or eight years old.  It’s hard to believe that he’s the title character of House, M.D.  It’s harder still to imagine how he puts up with that show becoming more outlandish every episode.  I’m waiting for Dr. House to contract ovarian cancer.

LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE CBC LOCKOUT: Absolutely none.  As soon as the lockout ended, it was back to the forced “diversity” and myopic Canadianism common to the MotherCorpse.  Not every Canadian is liberal-minded, and we don’t all like Sarah Slean and poorly-written lawyer shows.  CBC Television is the closest thing to broadcast vanilla at the moment.

REST IN PEACE: Arrested Development.  Fox promoted the show like hell, but the ratings never materialized.  No one will see a show both smart and stupid like this for a while.

Tobias Funke was too good for this world.  He is the world’s only analrapist, after all.

KANNIBAL
METROPOLIS INTERNATIONAL PICTURES, 2001: KABOOM ENTERTAINMENT/CAJUN PICTURES, 2002
4:3 WITH SLIGHT LETTERBOXING, 76 MIN., ENGLISH WITH SPANISH SUBTITLES
SUMMARY | THE POLISHED TURD ONLY EXISTS TO EAT…MONEY.

I know how anemic UR has been since the redesign earlier this year.  Well, that’s because I haven’t had any inspiration or reason to write an article for UR.  Well, that was the case until I came across what MJSimpson.co.uk called “very possibly the worst British horror film ever made.”  That’s a strong condemnation, but after seeing Kannibal, he may not be wrong.

I’m quite well aware that there may be worse filmmakers than Richard Driscoll (not the vicar from EastEnders, mind) out there.  Bill Rebane films are damn near unwatchable.  Andy Milligan already ravaged Britain with his period pieces.  In fact, Driscoll’s oeuvre only extends to a few films, most notably 1985’s The Comic.  None of that matters, of course – if this film is any indication of how bad Driscoll is as a filmmaker, he could yet become one of the infamous names of terrible cult cinema.

Kannibal is about Gideon Quinn’s quest to avenge the deaths of his wife and unborn child by tracking down the Thereshkova crime family and assassinating them one by one.  Georgina Thereshkova leads the crime family after the “death” of her mother Valentina by Quinn.  (Note: Valentina Thereshkova eventually turns out not to be dead, but “mutilated” – teeth are growing out of her bottom lip, such is the quality of the makeup on display in Kannibal.  Like hell this is a spoiler.)  The Thereshkovas are involved in prostitution rings, drug smuggling and pornography, the softcore porn being thrown into the film pretty much constantly.  There’s, like, lesbians kissing and everything!

Gideon Quinn, of course, is a master of disguise.  He also has a taste for fava beans and a nice Chianti.  Get where this is going yet?  That’s right, Richard Driscoll has taken what he likes about Thomas Harris’ Hannibal Lecter series and Ridley Scott’s Hannibal, bunging said elements onto film.  That’d be ignorable if Kannibal wasn’t so poorly made and haphazardly assembled as to be an insult to cult filmdom.  I’m honestly not overreacting – the acting reaches Andy Milligan Players levels of inanity.  For those not familiar with Andy Milligan’s work…well, think of the worst aspects of community/dinner theater and magnify them by a factor of two or three.  That’s Andy Milligan, and by proxy Kannibal.

Andy Milligan, of course, never had a budget of more than $10,000 with which to shoot a film.  Driscoll’s film, by comparison, is extremely well-shot.  Technically, Kannibal is well-done and expensive-looking for an independent film.  It’s just that the scenery is lush and Peter Thornton’s cinematography fabulous at the expense of everything else.  The dialogue is pitiful, the “tits” haphazardly bared, the gore often incredibly unrealistic-looking and the whole enterprise just cynically assembled from start to finish.  Kannibal looks expensive, and it’s obvious most of the money was spent on location shooting and post-processing.  It’s bad filmmaking and I don’t like it.

I’m not going to dwell on what MJSimpson.co.uk has already said about the film.  Lucien Morgan’s turn as Inspector Lewis Reid is, quite frankly, mind-boggling in Morgan’s uncanny ability to accent exactly the wrong words in a sentence.  Linnea Quigley’s character comes across more like a generic Nazi dominatrix and less like an actual Russian.  I could go on about how bad the acting is across the board, but Vass Anderson’s role as the head of Thereshkova’s American operations seems to be the best of the lot.  Vass Anderson is given a few minutes of screen time.  Morgan and Quigley are given whole soliloquies in which to ham-fistedly deliver their lines.  Amazing.

As for Driscoll’s acting…well, he really isn’t acting.  In fact, he seems to be imitating Anthony Hopkins, but his acting’s the least of the film’s problems.  The man wrote, directed, produced and starred in Kannibal.  That would be acceptable if Driscoll knew what the hell he was doing in any capacity.  In the making-of bonus feature included on this DVD (which is the height of ego), Driscoll compares Kannibal to an “opera version of Tosca.”  Driscoll comes across as a British Joe Eszterhas, except Joe Eszterhas is self-aware and revels in the fact that he writes sleazy films.  Driscoll makes exploitation films and thinks they’re art because the mise en scène is pretty.

Speaking of Joe Eszterhas, there’s a chapter in Kannibal that comes across as a full-blown ripoff of Basic Instinct.  Seriously, Kannibal’s seventeenth chapter is titled “Basic Instincts.”  It’s a distillation of Kannibal itself – hell, here’s an MP3 of the most odious part of the chapter.  Inspector Reid comes across as the world’s worst interrogator.  During his spiel (in which Lucien Morgan’s enunciation is worse than Linnea Quigley’s, AND LUCIEN MORGAN’S PLAYING A BRIT), he allows Georgina Thereshkova to answer his questions with what amounts to a “I don’t know, you?”  Every single time.  The overacting is so obvious as to be damn near oblique.  The conversation sounds like Morgan and Quigley are graduates of the Steve Roman School of Acting.  HEY YOU, HAVE YOU NOW OR HAVE YOU E-EVER BEEN INVOLVED – INVOLVED IN DRUGS?  Then the lawyer comes in and says “AH HA!  I THOUGHT SO!  YOU AND MY WIFE, FOOOOLING AROUND!”

Yes, I’m going on a tangent and referencing SCTV.  That last paragraph is still more entertaining than anything I saw in Kannibal.

The soundtrack has not been noted thus far in the…well, one review of Kannibal that I’ve read.  Patrick Bird and Jon Klein’s original compisitions sound like they were performed by some cut-rate pitchshifter clone.  If it turns out Bird and Klein performed the songs themselves, I’ll be amazed.  Either way, the compositions are terrible industrial metal with “fuck God” lyrics or decent ambient pieces, depending on the scene.  Why the hell Richard Driscoll hired two producers most well-known for mastering a Joy Division concert album to compose music for Kannibal, I don’t know, but it isn’t a good idea.  The original compositions and the classical music pieces used to fill out the soundtrack sometimes overwhelm the dialogue, which is a problem usually occurring in high school videos done on a basic editing studio.  Kannibal’s a lavish production, so why is it full of problems like this?  Did anyone care about making a good film, or was Kannibal just a paycheque for the people involved in making it?  My money’s leaning towards the latter.

Overall, is Kannibal the worst film ever made?  That’s doubtful.  Does Kannibal deserve the level of lambasting that it’s received?  Of course it does.  Kannibal is indicative of the worst sort of independent film there is.  Sure, there are hundreds of independent films ripping off a style, director and/or another film, but the worst one can say about those films is that they’re derivative.  Kannibal’s trying to be a literal copy of Hannibal, which makes the film redundant by its very existence.  If not for the all-around incompetence on display here, Kannibal might have been ignorable.  With Richard Driscoll at the helm, Kannibal approaches legend.  The man truly is as shit as others say he is.

kaBOOM! Entertainment
Cajun Pictures

Last year I did something for what would become URBMN where I linked to every top-five list that Google News linked to, in an attempt to show that critics’ tastes aren’t as wide-ranging as one would normally be led to believe.  I found out that Pink Martini were set to take over the world (they probably have by now) and that Texarkana music fans are, by and large, idiots.  Still, this seemed like too much work for not enough notoriety.  I’m some nobody with an opinion, set tastes in music and a hankering to get my name out.  Yes, I’m like 98% of the people who have ever written a blog.  I’m well aware.

I’ve decided this year to come up with my own personal most/least-of lists for URBMN and Blogcritics, ones that I hope are more engaging than “Bloc Party made our white asses at The Stamford Circle Jerk dance all night” and “Kelly Clarkson’s ‘Since U Been Gone’ is an abortion set to music.”  Whether this is more successful as a series of articles than what I wrote last year is up for debate.  Best-of lists are fine and dandy, and I haven’t paid much attention to music lately to warrant talking about it like every other newspaper music critic.  To that end, here are some closeminded rants about what I don’t like about “teh radio” and such.  Enjoy!

THE BAHA MEN AWARD FOR POSSIBLE CAREER-NEGATING SINGLE: If Black Eyed Peas had come out with “My Humps” as their first-ever single, they would have been laughed off commercial radio.  People remember Thomas Dolby for “She Blinded Me With Science,” which is not representative of his work at all.  The Baha Men are actually a credible world-music band, but all anyone remembers them for is “Who Let the Dogs Out” – and they’ve been around for more than a quarter-century.  ”My Humps” is a godawful novelty song, pure and simple, one that could have killed Black Eyed Peas’ reputation had they not already written “Let’s Get Retarded.”  They’ve become the Hanna-Barbera of hip-hop.

“The song’s intentionally stupid,” some people might say at this point.  So is Sir Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back,” but Sir Mix-A-Lot had the advantage of being over the top.  I’m supposed to take “My Humps” seriously as music.  There’s quite a difference between stupid and clever.

MOST ANNOYING SINGLE: Jason Mraz’ “Wordplay.”  Is that song supposed to be cute?  It’s the “One Week” of 2005.  I know Mraz is famous for his folk-rap songs, but “Wordplay” still seems like a novelty song that hit big on radio simply because it was a novelty song.  Mraz and Barenaked Ladies pretty much trade on the same “cute, clever” pop image, and I can’t escape either “One Week” or “Wordplay” when I’m listening to my local top 40 radio station.  I guess it doesn’t matter – Mraz sold thousands of albums on the strength of “Wordplay.”  That still doesn’t make the song not annoying.

SONG I GOT SICK OF EXPRESSLY DUE TO HEARING IT THOUSANDS OF TIMES AS PART OF A COMMERCIAL: Gorillaz’ “Feel Good Inc.”  I forget just what exactly the song was supposed to sell.  I was ambivalent about the song before I had to hear it ad nauseam as part of some marketing campaign for…I don’t know, I think it was shoes or something.  It’s always shoes.  Or something from The Gap.  I don’t take note of this stuff.  All I know is that commercial made me hate Gorillaz with a passion.

ARTIST THAT IS STRANGELY OMNIPRESENT DESPITE THE ARTIST’S LATEST ALBUM BEING RELEASED LAST YEAR: Green Day have really been inescapable as of late, haven’t they?  Grammy recognition for Best Rock Album, the fact that at least four songs off American Idiot seem to have charted, and critical adulation to boot.  The success of American Idiot all seems a little reflexive to me – an anti-Bush album?  The indie and punk crowds being, on the whole, left-leaning?  A band known for its supposed immaturity suddenly “coming of age?”  It’s still Green Day.  Their concerts feature a bunny dancing to Village People songs.  How mature could Green Day really be?

Green Day seem to be more popular lately than they were in 1994.  Fine, “Wake Me Up When September Ends” is a decent song, and I’d rather “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” chart than that godawful, Cancon-friendly crawl of emo clichés coming from Simple Plan.  Still, would some of the critics still love Green Day if the band sang about George W. Bush saving Iraq from tyranny?  Think about that for a second.

ARTIST THAT CAN’T POSSIBLY MEET THE HYPE: How about metalcore bands in general?  How many bands do we need that sound like Dillinger Escape Plan?  Shadows Fall and Lamb of God have major label deals and music publications like Exclaim! and Spin have long since trumpeted the virtues of this sort of music.  Look what happened to Cave In, though – their major-label debut didn’t sell near as many copies as RCA thought it would, and Cave In were punted off the RCA roster rather quickly afterwards.  I don’t know if I’m speaking out of jealousy or not – death metal and grindcore bands rarely if ever get major label deals (they never will, but that’s another issue altogether), but metalcore’s being groomed as the next budding mainstream fad?  It seems like a case of major labels trying to anticipate the next big thing.  If metalcore succeeds in the marketplace, the major labels will trumpet it as the evolution of metal.  If it fails, who cares?  Just throw metalcore in the rubbish bin next to Nashville Pussy and The Unband.

ARTIST THAT SEEMS TO MEET THE HYPE: Kaiser Chiefs are the real deal.  They’re the best thing to come out of the “new wave” revival bandwagon by dint of the band actually having a personality.  I’m not huge on what people are calling new wave these days – The Killers and Franz Ferdinand are better than a lot of what’s out there, but it’s not like self-consciously “weird” bands like Tubeway Army or Devo are suddenly breaking into the top 40 again.  ”New wave of new wave” seems like a contrived attempt to bring back an era of music that will never be duplicated – The Sex Pistols can only exist once, after all.  The Kaiser Chiefs could become legendary in their own time, or they could be the modern-day Dexy’s Midnight Runners.  The future’s wide open for them.

STUPID INDUSTRY PRACTICE: Sony BMG’s attempts at implementing Digital Rights Management.  That whole secretly installing what amounts to malware on one’s computer wasn’t good publicity for the monolith, was it?  Sony BMG then tried to put another, worse malware program past people, which is either ignorance or stubbornness on the company’s part.  What’s the point of implementing DRM when the solution to file-sharing is worse than file-sharing itself?  Didn’t Sony BMG executives realize how stupid this would make the company look?  More to the point, did the executives actually care?

SMART INDUSTRY PRACTICE: Warner Music Group finally admitting that the major music labels try to influence station managers and radio DJs (like the computerized playlists haven’t completely taken over by now) through some sort of financial incentive.  Sure, pay-for-play isn’t going to end now, and using the term “payola” just leads to wags making Alan Freed jokes and acting unsurprised about how the music industry sells itself.  Frankly, Sony BMG and WMG admitting to payola is redundant in the face of the Internet, Cubase and CDR/online-based labels.  At least more than one major label is at least trying to look above-board now, and that’s all that matters.  Frankly, I’m amazed that the music and radio industries haven’t merged with each other yet.

COMEBACK THAT EVERYONE SEEMS TO HAVE A HARD-ON FOR, BUT I CAN NEVER FOR THE LIFE OF ME UNDERSTAND: The Pixies.  I know they reunited last year, but their live DVD recently came out and they’re in the process of recording a new album.  Could somebody explain to me what is so great about this band?  This is why I stopped following indie rock around 1998 – I don’t have a problem with Frank Black, and from what I’ve heard of The Pixies I don’t have a problem with their music, but some fans call them THE MOST AMAZING BAND IN THE HISTORY OF FOREVER.  I can’t remember a reason for people liking The Pixies beyond “THEY’RE SO GODDAMN COOL, THEY ARE LIKE GODS AND IF YOU HATE ‘EM YOU’RE GAY” or “FRANK BLACK IS SUCH AN ASSHOLE ON STAGE!  HE’S DREAMY!”  They’re a late-1980s indie rock band that broke up before they outlasted themselves, not the second coming of God.  David Bowie and Kurt Cobain may like The Pixies.  Neither of them speak for me or my tastes and never will.

COMEBACK THAT I CAN ACTUALLY VOUCH FOR: Johnny Cash is quite popular among people lately, considering his death and the biopic about him that recently came out.  If it means one of the best country singers of the 20th century is coming back into vogue, then that can only be a good thing.  Cash was true to himself, and he was as truly “counterculture” in the 1960s as he was when he released American IV: The Man Comes Around in 2003.  It’s sort of sad that Johnny Cash’s popularity might be the highest it has been in decades two years after his death, but anyone who can cover a Nine Inch Nails song and actually make the cover better than the original deserves all the plaudits (s)he receives, posthumously or otherwise.  Cash is just too good to have something as transient as death keep him down.

ARTIST THAT CRITICS THINK IS THE DEATH OF MUSIC WHEN THE ARTIST ISN’T THAT BAD: American Idol’s Kelly Clarkson and J.D. Fortune off Rock Star: INXS.  So what if they won contests and had insta-fame thrust upon them?  Yeah, I’m sure no other aspiring musician secretly wants to have marketing campaigns behind them.  There are worse things in the music industry to worry about than those two figures of fun – you know, like DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT.  I guess things like DRM are too heady for light reading.  Er, I mean “Since U Been Gone” is an abortion set to music.  Yeah, that’s the ticket.