Okay, I’m not saying Bush had a better economic plan, but isn’t this totally misleading? I mean, of course there are fewer job losses–unemployment is at an all time high. We’ve passed the saturation point of job losses. The more important statistic is job creation which, as the graph shows, is basically flat and the same under both administrations.
Tags: Hip Hop, Obama drama, Picture of the day
1. Largehearted Boy has lots of live sets from Bonnaroo 2010.
2. Ugliest. T-Shirt. Ever. Look to the right.
3. Why we need more minority heroes in comics. Go here.
4. Music for Kids Who Can’t Read So Good reviews the two newly released Arcade Fire tracks–with downloads. Or go here for a recent Arcade Fire bootleg.
5. If you’ve not heard Yelawolf, one of the freshest relatively new voices in Southern rap, go to the always terrific Passion of the Weiss site, where they’ve got not one but two Yelawolf bootlegs for download. Run, don’t walk.
6. I like this song a lot. Dear Head on the Wall-Alejandro Escovedo
7. X-Ray soft-porn! (A calendar of pin-ups via x-ray.) Get it here.
Tags: Bootleg, Comic books, Go away, Hip Hop, Indie rock, Superheroes
First of all, let’s get this straight: The Pernice Brothers really are brothers. Joe and Bob, along with bandmates James Walbourne and Ric Menck and some special guests, already have six albums behind them and here comes number seven. They were originally discovered by Sub Pop but something happened and the band dropped away for three years before returning on Ashmont Records where they have stayed ever since. This record is a steady, honest collection of folky Americana that may remind you of old Rolling Stones, without the edge–or maybe Kris Kristofferson.
I liked this album a lot more than some of their more recent work–in fact, I’d say it’s easily their best record since their first. It’s a lot like their first, in fact, in that it’s less polished than their later work. Sometimes their lyrics border on the insipid (comparing a woman to the morning light, e.g.), but much more often the music is exactly the kind of thing you’d want to take a date to go hear on a Friday night. It’s not going to challenge you, it’s going to set a mood: Romantic, gentle, tender music. And God knows there are times when tender music is a must.
Tags: Americana, indie folk
Sometimes it’s interesting to see how people find my site. These are the most commonly searched Google terms used to find this corner of the internet yesterday:
| bestiality | 2 |
| vaginer | 2 |
| short actors that could be wolverine | 2 |
| phil collins | 2 |
| superhero rap battle part 1 song | 1 |
| “standing army” dvd | 1 |
| in my pocket lady daisey review | 1 |
| elvis | 1 |
| panda riot paper planes blogspot | 1 |
| sam baker cotton |
Very odd, eh? Here’s something cooler: My favorite documentarian has released a soundtrack to his latest production, 
“Floating: the Nathan Gocke Story.” You can get a taste of it, by the band Moonlit Sailor, along with songs by a bunch of other Deep Elem Records artists here, and check out a preview of the documentary here. It’s about a guy who gets a spinal cord injury while surfing, and tries to surf again. It premiers on Fuel TV on June 23 at 6:30pm.
And another free one is by Julian Shah. Get it here.
And finally, Fashawn’s tribute to Nas’ Illmatic. It’s new words over Ill beats, from a Cali perspective. As of right now, it’s one of my favorite mixtapes of 2010.
Here’s the direct DL link.
You can say “thank you” now.
Tags: Free Album!, Hip Hop, Mixtape, Movies
Hello and welcome to episode one of “Recent Reads,” wherein I review the trades I read since the last time I wrote a this kind of column. Since this one is the first, I thought I’d pick a trio that would be interesting to review together: Back to Brooklyn; Young Avengers Presents; and Pinocchio: The Vampire Slayer. I’m writing them up together because the first is a trade collection of a 5-issue miniseries (episodic long-form storytelling); the second is a collection of one-and-dones; and the last is a graphic novel, i.e., a single story told in one book. Oh, and all three are worth a read.
First, “Back to Brooklyn.” It’s actually labeled as a “volume one,” but I can’t imagine there will ever be a second. Damn near everyone dies in it. It’s a bloody crime story told by two of the masters of this genre: Garth Ennis and Brooklyn-bred Jimmy Palmiotti. The story is pretty simple: A Federal witness named Bob Saetta who goes back to Brooklyn to take care of loose ends. Specifically, the crimelord who has his wife and kid hostage. The crimelord who has a terrible secret that only Bob knows about. The crimelord who is Bob’s brother. The story weaves along, dropping information in bits and pieces, accented by the kind of tough-talk dialogue that makes Ennis and Palmiotti great. It’s not a perfect story: Overall, it’s pretty predictable, and pretty humorless. But criminal characterization is really what a reader hopes for from Garth Ennis, whose work on Punisher was special mostly because Frank Castle’s enemies were fully realized. And action-paced plotting is what makes a Palmiotti book so great. Both are here, in spades. It’s the conclusion that’s a little underwhelming–but I won’t give that away. The art is by Mihailo Vukelic, whose work I’m not otherwise familiar with. It’s quite realistic, and appropriate for a non-superhero tale, but it isn’t spectacular. I would have preferred something a little more shadowy. On a rating scale where a 5 is Batman: Year One and a one is War of the Hulks, I’m giving it 3.5 stars. Worth buying, reading, and sharing, but essential only for completist fans of the creators.
Next, Young Avengers Presents. This is an uneven affair–a collection of one shots. You’ll find the work of Ed Brubaker paired with Paco Medina, and stories by Matt Fraction and Paul Cornell, and as you’d expect, these are very good. Others, though, are less interesting. Ultimately, Young Avengers are a team concept, and writing about them as individuals just doesn’t have as much appeal. Still, the stories have a surprising amount of depth to them, particularly the closing tale about Kate “Hawkeye” Bishop and Clint “Hawkeye” Barton (in his Ronin phase), by Fraction and Alan Davis. If you only buy this for this story, it’ll be worth your 
money.
Finally, huge ups for Dustin Higgins and Van Jensen’s Pinocchio the Vampire Slayer. It’s funny, appropriate for anyone 10-years and over (if you’ve got 10-year olds who dig vampires, that is), and the black-and-white artwork is fascinating and nonlinear. I like artists that straddle the line between conceptual and literal, and Van Jensen is a master at this. (It’s also a style that particularly lends itself to black and white.) As for the story, it makes perfect sense, doesn’t it? He’s made of wood that continually grows, with a point at the end, every time he lies. Perfect for slaying bloodsuckers! I’m sure you’re tempted to write this off as a concept-heavy nonstarter, but give it a chance. The splash page, which provides a one-page synopsis of the original Pinocchio novel, should suck you in, and the quick hunt that follows it should keep you intrigued. With costars like a ghostly cricket and two evil, shapeshifting businessmen, I think it’s safe to say this is not like any other book that’s come out this year.
Tags: Comics review, Garth Freakin Ennis
One of the few books I still buy in issue form is Daredevil. I also just finished re-reading the entire Bendis-through-Brubaker runs. It’s some of the best work you’ll ever read. The Bendis run is best read in chunks because nothing much seems to happen in any one single issue, despite the fact that the art is groundbreaking and the “wordless” issue, early in the run, is fantastic. But over the course of the run, the story develops inexorably, gradually, and surprisingly. It’s longform storytelling unlike anything in comics (other than, perhaps, Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead). Through his term, Bendis brought Murdock to his knees, exposing his dual identity to the world (way before Civil War got the idea) and gradually turning him from a morally “chaotic good” character in to a chaotic neutral one. At the end of the run, Bendis put DD in jail. Which is where Ed Brubaker came in. Now frankly, I think they could have kept DD in jail a lot longer—I think there were a lot of story elements that could have been explored there—but Ed’s run is solid nevertheless. He continued to show Murdock’s slide down the moral scale, ending by positioning him as the head of his lifelong enemies—and Elektra’s compatriots—The Hand. That’s where current writer Andy Diggle signed on. Diggle is doing a good job so far—he may actually be better than Brubaker.
But here’s the rub: It’s so good, the editors have noticed. And never ones to leave money on the table, Marvel will be expanding the brand in July to include, “Shadowland” and “Shadowland: Blood on the Streets.” It’s kind of annoying, frankly, because I feel like I’m being forced to buy more stuff. It may make me go to trades on DD. I can’t tell if reading the Shadowland books will be essential to understanding the main title. But griping to one side, the various series actually look like they’re going to be great. I love “street” stories, and that’s what it’s all about. For those who don’t know, Daredevil is now the leader of The Hand, and he is cleaning all the corruption that Osborn allowed into Hells Kitchen during Dark Reign. In so doing, he’s built a prison under the city for all the folks he captures.
Blood on the Streets will be written by Antony Johnston and penciled by Wellinton Alves, and will feature the intriguing line up of Misty Knight, Paladin, Shroud and Silver Sable. The crew are trying to stop Daredevil’s Hand from killing unconvicted mobsters. For the uninitiated: Misty has a bionic arm and sword and was a partner of Power Man and Iron Fist back when. She also appeared in the Iron Fist series by Brubaker and Fraction. Paladin’s name tells you pretty much what you need to know about him. Shroud is a mystical dude who is kinda like Cloak, and Silver Sable is a karate kinda character from wayback.
Marvel also revealed that Elektra Natchios will figure into the main “Shadowland” story and will even get her own one-shot, “Shadowland: Elektra,” written by Zeb Wells. Zeb did a decent job on the “Dark Reign: Elektra” mini, but I wouldn’t say that that series was a total keeper. The book will also feature Bullseye and the great old drunken ninja, Master Izo—one of my favorite Brubaker characters.
So, there’s certainly good talent lined up here for the various series and tie-ins. But it’s not clear how much they’ll tie in with the main DD book. Diggle has revealed that Murdock won’t appear in “Blood on the Streets,” but clearly the Hand will be in there. Marvel has made some disastrous continuity screw ups lately, revealing in tie-ins the endings of Siege #4 and Heroic Age #2 before those books came out—let’s hope they figure it all out here. And let’s hope Shadowland/Blood can be read on their own merits as well. Because I intend to wait for the trade collection to read it.
Tags: Comic books, Daredevil
