Hooray, Halloween is almost heeeere. What better way to greet the final stretch than to wake and stretch with this bonafide monster mash, courtesy of the great master of make believe, stop-motion model animator, Ray Harryhausen? (Added bonus: Tito Puente!)
More rousting clips of Harryhausen’s creations under the cut.
I haven’t been so overjoyed by a piece of music news in a very long time:
Jeff Mangum, the fragile, brilliant musician who created In the Aeroplane Over the Sea and On Avery Island, has not performed the material publicly since 2001… until now. The notoriously reclusive Mangum finally broke several years of radio silence this month to revisit some Neutral Milk Hotel songs with his old friends from the Elephant 6 crew on several stops of their Holiday Surprise Tour.
Ariana Osborne just broke my brain with this clip from The Worst Witch, a 1986 made-for-TV movie starring baby Fairuza Balk as a witch-in-training and our preternatural beauty A-lister Tim Curry as a tambourine-wagging warlock in a bat bow tie. Abracadabra:
See, now, this is one of those times where I honestly don’t know whether I’m really turned on, or embarrassed to the pit of my soul. Maybe a bit of both? (You know what I mean, yes? So bad, it’s good? So wrong… yet so right? )
If you’d care to watch the entire movie, well… we won’t hold it against you. It’s under the cut.
The voice of exotica singer Yma Sumac is so effing redonk, it’s almost beyond human comprehension. In her heyday, she recorded an astonishingly wide vocal range of more than four octaves, from B2 to C?7 and could hit notes in both the low baritone and upper coloratura register. You know how certain singers have claimed the ability to shatter crystal? I can’t find the article offhand, but I’m pretty sure Sumac actually did that once, in a controlled scientific environment. Callas and Sutherland ain’t got nothin’ on this self-styled Inca princess from Peru (at least in the glass-breaking department).
Sumac in The Secret of the Incas (1954).
On groggy mornings when your nose is plugged up and you’re afraid nothing will crack through the crust covering your cerebral cortex short of a Neti pot of liquified Naga Jolokia, try some Zoila Augusta Emperatriz Chavarri del Castillo-flavored exotica instead.
Oodles more vocalese noodles under the cut.
G’morning! Prepare to be speechless:
Miss Tandi Iman Dupree, ladies and gents. Is that an entrance or what?
No doubt, many of you will have already seen this invigorating clip, shot at the 2001 Miss Black America pageant in Atlanta, Georgia. It was Tandi’s dream to become Miss Black America, and for years she hustled her butt off, giving memorable performances at drag events across the continental U.S. Shockingly, her rendition of “Holding Out for a Hero” did not win Miss Dupree the crown, and she passed away (from AIDS complications, according to the Associated Press) before achieving her goal.
I’m just grateful to have the footage, especially on a cold, murky morning like this one. For many of us, Miss Dupree will always be a reigning queen.
Pay no mind to the occasional tumbleweed blowing across you screen, comrades. The three of us are neck-deep in Issue 02 deadlines right now. Come Tuesday or so, postings should pick up again.
Meantime, please enjoy a rare clip of David Bowie speaking on behalf of his fellow nelly boys back in 1964. This was our reigning Preternatural Beauty King‘s first ever television appearance. He was 17 years old.
Aw, darlin’. I’ll carry your handbag any time.
Here’s an even more delectable baby Bowie tidbit, via Siege:
Getting busted for pot with Iggy Pop in NY, 1976. (Frank Sinatra, eat your heart out.)
And since Halloween draws ever nearer and you’re (hopefully) not at work, there’s one more for the road under the cut…
Quoth the Kaoru: it’s almost Halloween, which is basically Goth Christmas. Well, in that case, we’d better start dishing out the holiday goodies. First up, a heaping, tentacular helping of The Dunwich Horror:
Ganked from the excellent Nightchillers site, thanks.
If you’ve never seen this campy Corman-produced adaptation of Lovecraft’s famous tale, you might want to Netflix it in time for your pumpkin-carving party.* Produced and shot in 1969 in the immediate wake of Manson Family shenanigans, it’s often pooh-poohed by Lovecraft purists for being too cornball. But in my opinion, Dunwich Horror is actually one of the better adaptations of old Howard P’s oeuvre** with its sumptuous matte paintings, capable-if-hokey performances from the cast, a beautiful score by Les Baxter, and a couple of genuinely creepy moments. Lovecraft stories lend themselves really well to the pyschedelic era.
Yes, he really did just say “horrendipity.”
Starring Dean “Uh Oh, Sam” Stockwell in his most brooding role short of Yueh in Dune, a rather weary-faced-but-supposedly-virginal Sandra Dee, and the even wearier-faced Ed Begley (his final role, R.I.P.), Dunwich Horror is worth renting for the gorgeous animated title sequence alone. Other highlights: the sight of young, yog-sothothelytizing Stockwell’s torso covered in pseudo-runic sharpie scribbles, Sam Jaffe’s “GET OFF MY LAWN” geezerdom, and Gidget clenching her butt in the throes of orgasm on the altar at Devil’s Hopyard.
Other Coilhouse posts of possible interest:
*Or if you’re really cheap, you can watch the whole thing on YouTube.
**Not that that’s saying much, really. Other than ReAnimator, what’ve we got that’s not just crotch-punchingly horrid? Hmmm, let’s see… actually, I wouldn’t turn my nose up at any of these: The Resurrected, Die Monster Die, The Unnameable, that Night Gallery episode Pickman’s Model, and the amazing Call of Cthulhu indie movie that came out recently. Can you guys think of any others? A great suggestion from commenter Jack: Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness.
There are two kinds of people in this world. People who truly appreciate the subtle, sophisticated humor of Benny Hill, and people who should just crawl back into bed right now and cry themselves to sleep because they’re obviously hopeless, sub-human degenerates.
Er, wait. Perhaps I’ve got it backwards…
Well, anyhoo. If you’re still reading, good morning! Show me your knickers! Time for a painstakingly curated, unflaggingly tasteful assortment of undercranked “Yakety Sax” mashups, starting with this inspired pairing of Slim Shady and Boots Randolph with a whole lotta Whovians.
Now, click beyond the jump, or else I’ll pinch your butt!
[No one visits Coilhouse to read some blowhard’s soapbox rant, so I’ll keep it as brief as possible. The following missive is addressed specifically to our young, able-bodied, opinionated American friends of voting age who still aren’t 100% sure they’ll make it to the polls on November 4th. If that description doesn’t directly apply to you, please don’t waste your time reading any further. You might want to watch this charming video of a frolicsome chihuahua instead. Thanks!]
An Open Letter to the Basilica of Latter Day Apathetics (American Branch)
We’re in deep doo doo, loves. Up to our necks like the polar bears and the Dow. Every time one of you says “why bother voting when the system is so corrupt” or “all of the candidates are disingenuous scumbags, anyway” or “the whole thing’s rigged” or “what difference does it make”, we all sink a little deeper into the muck. Not okay. While I may share your doubts and your lack of trust, your personal defeatism mustn’t drag us any further down than we’ve already gone.
I do know a tiny handful of conscientious, some might say radical objectors who refuse to take part in U.S. elections because they want to see the system fail. While I don’t share that desire, I can at least respect their strong convictions. But let’s face it. Anarchic leanings are not generally the reason why folks in our demographic don’t cast a ballot. Far more commonly, people (especially young, moderate-to-liberal-leaning people) fail to vote because they can’t be bothered. The true obstacle preventing them from registering, reading up on the propositions, researching the various platforms and making the Herculian effort of slinging their asses over to the polls is plain old, limp-wristed lethargy.
Perhaps it’s naive, but I remain convinced that the inertia anchoring millions of otherwise rational and compassionate Americans to their armchairs on election day is one of the biggest reasons why our “democracy” needs air-quotes in the first place. Please, if you haven’t yet registered to vote, put aside your premature world-weariness for five minutes and GET ‘ER DONE. There’s still time, but it’s running out. In many states, the deadline is October 4th. That’s tomorrow.
I’m far from confident or enthusiastic about the way our country runs its elections, and this soapbox is an awkward perch for me. But I know one thing for certain, my young, able-bodied, non-voting American friend, and I really hope you will believe me:
Cynicism will not protect you from disappointment. It will not shield your loved ones from harm or neglect. It will never heal your community, fix the ailing economy, or return any semblance of dignity to this country.
Your indifference is not a safety blanket; it is a shroud.
Your vote is your voice. Say something.
Imagine if, one crisp autumnal morning, young Amelie imbibed fifteen espressos and ran off with Edward Scissorhands to the magical realm of Gothenburg for an impetuous holiday of snowflake-on-tongue-catching, pirouettes and miniature pony-fondling. Who better to provide the soundtrack than this trio of whey-faced moppets known as Detektivbyrån?
The lads perform their Orff-Schulwerkian ditty, “Generation Celebration”.
Released earlier this month, their new album Wermland has already risen to the top of the charts in Sweden, and it’s a delightful, chiming romp. I just want to put ’em all in my pocket.
More floppy-haired glockenspielunking under the cut.
