(Doing one of these as I'm still getting this month's reviews finished!)
Wham, bam! If I could shoot that damn dog I would too!
One of the release titles for the Nintendo Entertainment System, Duck Hunt is also the most famous NES game using the NES Zapper. When the trigger of that device shaped like a firearm was pulled in front of a CRT screen, the game would show a split-second screen where it detected roughly the location shot, compared it to the locations of possible targets on the screen, and applied results afterwards.
In Duck Hunt, there are three games modes, though the first two are repeats. You and your dog go out in the field and shoot at ducks. They fly around the screen, and if you manage to shoot one, your dog holds it up triumphantly. If you fail, the little shit laughs at you instead. In Game A, only one duck appears in each round of a level; in Game B, it's two. Game C swaps it all out for clay pigeons instead. In every level, you have to successfully hit a certain number of targets in order to gain access to the next. Like many games at the time, there was a limit; after Level 99, the game rolled back to Level 0 and broke shortly afterwards.
Even putting aside its fame as "the Zapper game", Duck Hunt is perhaps also well-known for having editions where it was packaged on the same cartridge as another game; on my personal copy, Duck Hunt came second, and the other game on it was Super Mario Bros. 1 (which I therefore had twice).
This is "Gaming Memories" for a reason; it's less a review proper of the game, and more a chance for me to reminisce on my experience with it, however far back in time that was. The reason I remember Duck Hunt so well is that, unlike pretty much every single other NES game I owned, it was super easy to teach to my parents. Almost like a precursor to Wii Sports Bowling, there wasn't much to explain, and then we could all have fun together. Just aim at the bird and shoot! Works for me. My parents were never big on gaming (well, aside from casual stuff and the aforementioned Wii Sports), so having even one video game to play with them was great.
On the plus side, Duck Hunt reentered public consciousness when the dog, aided by a duck, made it into Smash, of all things. Hey, every dog has his day. It was good practice for Banjo & Kazooie.
I’m glad to be almost done with these two reviews. I’m due to talk about something else. Alright, let’s end this!
Three Versus A Giant
Just in case you need to envision the sheer scale of what they're going up against.
Tails is very strong, but apparently, Knuckles is extra heavy due to all the muscle.
Team Sonic has an attack plan. Sonic will be the target of Eggman’s attacks, leaving Tails and Knuckles free to make their way in and disrupt his control – of the robot, and of the Master Emerald. All it takes is some light taunting and Sonic has the Death Egg Robot on his trail, which is just enough to let his two allies (it’s too early to call the echidna a friend proper, no?) sneak onto the mecha. Meanwhile, Tom and Maddie coordinate the efforts to clear the streets of Green Hills of any people, but choose to “borrow” a jeep to look for their son.
Man, people love to “borrow” in these movies.
What? Already tired?
Sonic stops in the wood to mock Robotnik, who admits to already be looking beyond world domination. The universe? The multiverse, even! Why stop at just one universe, right? I can’t help but see that specific line as a joke at the tendency for franchises to do multiverse stuff these past few years. We'll see about that the day they decide to add Blaze to this Cinematic Universe. To be fair, we've already had Sonic Prime, which played with the concept. I haven’t seen it, though.
Ivo Robotnik and Knuckles arrive on an island not that far from Hawaii, and plant the compass on a lock in the sand. A beam of green light shoots upwards, the seas part, and a massive temple appears from the waves. The beam is visible from Oahu, with Tom and Maddie calling out Commander Walters for focusing on Sonic instead of the mad scientist.
In Green Hills, Wade, patrolling the town on a cheap electric scooter, stops by the Mean Bean for coffee, only to find the place closed. A quick peek under the blinds and the place’s new life as a lair is exposed, with Agent Stone caught red-handed playing a dress-up game on a picture of Robotnik. Cowboy costume, a French maid outfit, or the Black Mamba from Megamind… You see that scene and try to convince me there’s no homoerotic text between these two! That scene originally went for much longer; originally, Wade would call Tom to figure out what to do, Tom would tell him to NOT go in there alone, and radio interference would make Wade hear the opposite. This explains why Tom and Maddie rode with G.U.N. back to Green Hills, whereas the final cut of the film doesn’t indicate why they went home specifically when there was a threat on the horizon. Wade bursts into the shop, threatening Stone with his weapon. Hey, he did something right as sheriff!
Officer Whipple on the case!
Into the unknoooooown-!
With no portal rings to get to the temple, Sonic has to face his fear of water and run across the ocean to reach the source of the beam. Hey, cut me some slack, the kiddie pool I sent them hasn’t arrived yet! He gears up, then speeds off. It’s a tough moment for him, one that ends with him seemingly not reaching his destination. The waves become too strong and he's overwhelmed – but he lands on the correct island.
...Jesus tap-dancing fucking tabarnak de câlisse de Christ.
If I come out of the theater swearing like that, it was either extremely bad, extremely good, or extremely memorable. The first and last rarely overlap; the last two, it's much more common.
The Monkey, directed by Osgood Perkins (who also made Longlegs, released last year) and released on February 21st, is a film adaptation of a short story by Stephen King first published in 1980 and then added to the Sketon Crew collection released in 1985. I talk a lot about games, movies and music on here, but I rarely mention how much of a reader I am - I got tons of books to get through, and Skeleton Crew is one of them. From what I've read about it, the stories in that one are particularly messed up, perhaps moreso than in other King short story collections I've read. Your... your life changes when you hear about Survivor Type. If you value your sanity, don't Google it.
Just in case you don't know what to expect from The Monkey, the tagline says enough: "Everybody dies, and that's fucked up". King himself loved it and described it as "batshit insane", so...
The story
Twin brothers Bill and Hal (both played during childhood by Christian Convery) grew up without their dad, a world traveler who up and left one day, leaving behind a treasure trove of souvenirs from his trips. The brothers have a strained relationship with each other, with Bill behaving very much like a bully to his younger brother. Digging through the souvenirs, the brothers find a blue round box containing an antique drum-banging monkey toy. "Turn the key and see what happens", says the box. Well, they do, and since nothing happens, they dismiss the thing as broken.
Yep, it's that part of the movie that's coming. It's likely you already know what I mean.
Cut back to Rachel’s wedding. Tom gets humiliated at volleyball by Randall and his groomsmen, all shaped like they spend their lives at the gym. Randall calls them his squad. When the groom goes away, Maddie and Jojo show up; the latter, acting as ringbearer, shows the spouses’ rings to Tom. He pulls a little magic prank by making one of the rings disappear, then summoning it back. After the girl has left, he looks back at the “squad” and ponders on how his son doesn’t really have a team of friends like this.
Adorable as ever, always by his friend's side.
Sonic and Tails, meanwhile, fly across Siberian mountains and reach the secret temple of the owls. Can I quickly say that, among the major celebrities voicing characters in these films (Ben Schwartz, Idris Elba, Christopher Lloyd and Keanu Reeves), I’m glad they kept Colleen O’Shaughnessy for Tails? It feels like a consecration. Like a tacit admittance that nobody could voice Tails better than her. In an age where entirely too many animated movies (or animated characters in live-action films) use A-list celebs as voices to get butts in theaters, there are still times where career voice actors get their moment. Even better, I think Tails shines a lot more here (and in cartoons like Sonic Boom) than he gets to in most games, where he’s a side-character. Movie!Tails is very close to all other versions of himself, not deviating much when compared to Sonic and Robotnik; even the whole "bullied about his two tails" part is taken from the booklet of his first game appearance.
Wonder whether this thing is scanning for a hedgehog specifically, or for anything that's NOT an echidna.
At the entrance, Tails reads a legend engraved on the walls, about the Echidnas using seven Chaos Emeralds to forge the Master Emerald, an item that can make its wielder manifest desires into reality. The Owls rose up, believing that no group should possess such power; they stole and hid it. Owls and Echidnas have fought ever since, with the Echidnas attempting to retrieve their artefact. Within the temple is a giant owl statue, which Sonic activates through a puzzle whose answer is on the map they were carrying. After detecting their presence, the statue gives Sonic a compass that indicates the location of the Emerald.
Sheesh, he just started and he's already a snowboarding expert!
Their joy is short-lived, as they are targeted by an army of egg drones. Robotnik and Knuckles come down to steal the compass. Banter ensues, Robotnik fires a missile, Sonic tosses it back at the statue. He flees with Tails, destroying a drone on the way and using a piece of it as a snowboard. He goes down the slopes, while Tails flies off. Knuckles smashes another drone to get a board for himself, then gives chase. Sonic barely breaks a sweat against Eggman’s armada, no matter how many there are; but the echidna, that’s a whole other story.
They both mean business, but one is acting a lot less silly than the other.
Sonic and Robotnik stare each other down. It doesn’t get serious until the mad doc threatens Tom, Maddie and even Ozzy. In full defender mode, Sonic jumps to punch Robotnik in the face – he could do anything else, but he knows how much the roboticist hates it. However, before the hedgehog can reach his target, the human moves out of the way and in comes a red echidna, who promptly punches Sonic across the room and through the wall and flat-screen TV. Robotnik presents his new ally, Knuckles. Sonic tries to fight again but gets punched through another wall and into the backyard for his troubles. The doctor has claimed Sonic’s movie night popcorn bowl and munches from it evilly while the aliens duke it out. The hedgehog is no match.
He doesn't even look like he needs any effort to hold Sonic in place. Damn.
You know that saying, “unstoppable force meets immovable object”? You get one guess as to which is which. A charged spindash from Sonic barely phases Knuckles, who holds the balled hedgehog in place without effort and punches him to the ground like he was nothing. When he warrior has the hedgehog held against a tree, he talks about how he can restore the honor of his ancestors by reclaiming the ultimate power. The prying ears of an Eggman are instantly titillated by that descriptor. Knuckles continues, saying that Longclaw – Sonic’s tutor before he fled to Earth – and her tribe were enemies of the Echidnas. However, before he can smash a hedgehog’s face in, a police car comes through the fence and crashes into the red barbarian.
Eyes on the road, kid!
Will say, sending a cop car down a ravine is an... extreme measure, but hey, the situation required it.
Out pops Tails, who urges Sonic to climb aboard. They drive off, with Tails pushing the pedals with electric devices since he’s too short to reach them. Knuckles gives chase and is surprisingly fast for someone without super speed. During the chase, Tails explains that the echidna believes that Sonic holds the key to the Master Emerald – an artifact that Sonic says is just a bedtime story! This exposition is cut short when the warrior lands on the cop car and takes it apart. To get rid of him, Tails sends the car plummeting down a cliff, but he grabs Sonic and flies away with his helicopter tails. The echidna, incapable of catching them, latches on to the cliff.
Guess it's a good moment for me to discuss this film, since I mentioned Paddington in my Sonic 1 review, not even two weeks ago. Full disclaimer, I heard great things about this film franchise, but I hadn't seen any of them until very recently (as in, December last year or this year). Even then, I only really caught the latter half of the first; that said, I did see the second film in full; you know, the one that temporarily dislodged Citizen Kane as the best-reviewed film of all time? Yep, that one.
This Paddington movie wasn't directed by Paul King like the previous two; Dougal Wilson took over the role. Considering the reputation those two films have, Wilson had big shoes to fill.
The story
Paddington (voiced by Ben Whishaw) has been living in United Kingdom with the Browns for several years now, to the point of being properly adopted by them. (Sounds a bit like the other movie I'm reviewing lately. Fun coincidence, that.) He has even achieved an extra step by getting an official passport! The bear himself hasn't changed much; eternally sweet and without an ounce of malice in him, Paddington keeps landing into shenanigans solely due to his own clumsiness.
The Browns around him, however, have changed quite a bit. Not so much Mr. Henry Brown (Hugh Bonneville), who still works in risk assessment and insurance. However, his daughter Judy (Madeleine Harris) is preparing her transition to a university, with Mrs. Mary Brown (Emily Mortimer, replacing Sally Hawkins) distraught that one of her kids is leaving the nest. For her son Jonathan Brown (Samuel Joslin), it's the complete opposite issue; he's learned well from educative toys and became somewhat of an inventor, but only uses his creations to "chill" in his room and leave it as little as possible. Meanwhile, Mrs. Bird (Julie Walters) tends to the house.
Consensus on the first Sonic movie was that it was surprisingly good, considering its troubled production. It fell into the same traps as other family films starring CGI characters, but it was otherwise a promising first step into a franchise. We knew it would become a franchise, judging by the surprise appearance of Miles “Tails” Prower in the stinger. And indeed, there have been plans as early as between the first two films to expand into a potential Cinematic Universe. Which I thought that was an early call to make. Guess it makes sense to think that big though, since the Sonic universe is pretty large. Thus, so far, every Sonic movie’s stinger has showcased a character from the games joining in the next film.
I reviewed the first film; we're on to Sonic 2. The film was released in North American theaters on Apil 8th, 2022. There’s a LOT to say yet again, so let’s jump in.
Portobello Purgatory
…AKA the Mushroom Planet. Doctor Robotnik has been trapped in this world for eight months. The “home by Christmas” deadline? Looks like that failed. At least, he has used his super-genius intellect to adapt to this environment, even finding subsistence from the surrounding mushrooms. His attempts at making a drinkable coffee with the stuff, however? Not great. Love his Rube Goldberg machine, though. He may claim he doesn’t want company, but the vaguely face-shaped rock he named Stone says otherwise. Hey, in isolation, everybody needs a Wilson.
In short, Robotnik is trying to recreate the EMP blast that led him to Sonic, hoping it will bring others to him. Smart.
The doctor has scavenged his flying ship for parts and has set up camp. The blue quill he has kept still has plenty of energy. He has been hard at work, building a beacon atop a giant mushroom. Because I’m thorough, I looked up the film’s deleted scenes, and found out that in the original script, Robotnik tripped out on the shroom juice and hallucinated the Stone head talking to him. (You can see Agent Stone’s actor Lee Madjoub, in the bloopers, with his head all done up like the rock, so that scene got far into production before getting scrapped.) Even better, this bizarre moment leads to the scientist getting the idea to build a beacon. Sure, it sounds like something he could have thought of without drugs, but it would have been even funnier if drugs were the reason. Maybe they figured this would push the boundaries too much for a family film.
The only way this could get more stereotypical is if the mime went "Sac-" "Sacrebleu!" ....Ah, come on.
Sonic has sent Tom and Maddie home through a portal ring, but the battle with Eggman, I mean Doctor Robotnik, is far from over. The doc's flying ship has the power to go just as quickly as the blue blur. Finally, a challenge. When we left off, Sonic was running through the streets, dodging blasts from the doc’s machine. Passing under a bus advertising trips to France, Sonic gets an idea and, still speeding through the town, summons a portal that takes him… yep, you guessed it, to France. However, the ship is also fast enough to follow into the ring and resume the chase. Complete with mandatory Eiffel tower cameo and Robotnik yelling an “Excusez-moi, monsieur!” at a mime he almost crashes into. Geez, could you be more stereotypical?
Runnin' Up That Pyramid
The fight is later taken to the Great Wall of China – that one was on Sonic’s bucket list, he wanted to run on it! Sure, he’s being hunted down, but it just makes his tourist visit more interesting, right? Still unable to flee, Sonic summons another portal, this time into Egypt, running towards the Pyramid of Giza. Fun fact: Those are damn close to civilization, so if the movie wanted to be accurate, instead of large areas of sand near them, Sonic would basically be running through streets again. He could stop by the KFC right by the Pyramids if he wanted, but that stuff would be worse for his colon than the chilidogs were. No, not speaking from experience. Meanwhile, Robotnik has gone full trigger-happy and blasting whatever’s in his way, including the Sphinx! And then he has the gall to call Sonic out for running up the side of the pyramid? Even a sand-tornado buffed up by the hedgehog’s fast running isn’t enough to deter the wacko!
Can hardly get more ominous than that.
Sonic summons a final portal at the top and gets blasted into it by his enemy. He crash-lands, wounded into Green Hills’ main street… late into the evening. When Tom and Maddie were falling through Sonic’s portal, they landed on a pile of hay in a farm, and the day was still bright. Yet, it’s almost night now? Have Sonic and Robotnik been fighting around the world for literal hours, and we were just shown a few minutes? Is that what happened? I mean, I’d believe it if it was stated anywhere.
"....Hi honey! Uh... you ever wanted a pet hedgehog?"
Tom arrives in San Francisco and parks his roofless truck in front of his sister-in-law’s house. His wife Maddie had been staying at Rachel’s with their dog, Ozzy, while looking for an apartment. He hides Sonic in a blanket and knocks at the door. Rachel (Natasha Rothwell) tries to block his way, but Maddie is willing to let him in. Reminder that Tom Wachowski is currently wanted and considered a domestic terrorist. Robotnik having the full power of the U.S. Government backing him is scary. The sisters argue some more, but Rachel’s daughter Jojo (Melody Niemann) greets “uncle Tommy”, hugging him. Finally, one happy voice in here! Heck, even Ozzy is barking like crazy at the blanket in Tom’s arms!
The arguing continues while Ozzy tugs at the blanket, pulling it off and revealing the unconscious alien to all. Rachel faints. Ah, finally some silence in here.
Obviously, the live-action filming was done before VFX, and thus, before the design change, so the acting puppet was of Ugly Sonic. This one doesn't look too bad, I guess.
Okay, we’ll resume the plot after a moment, I just want to address something again. One aspect of art is that we enjoy the end product but rarely realize just how hard it can be to get there. How much work goes into it. That’s especially true for visual effects, where the goal is to either not notice that something was changed, or to make the audience believe that what was added really was there. The latter is the goal that live-action films with CGI characters strive to achieve. In my opinion, one of the best ways to do this is to have the animated characters have believable physical interactions with the human characters. In my opinion, the more these unreal characters interact with the real world, the better it feels.
A lot of that trickery can be achieved using puppets or stand-in actors. As an example, at the end of Guardians of the Galaxy, when Drax pets Rocket, it’s James Gunn’s brother Sean sitting there in a greenscreen jumpsuit, positioned to account for Rocket’s size. The Sonic franchise? It’s puppets; the bonus features on the DVD for the Knuckles miniseries shows some behind-the-scenes with puppet Knuckles. It’s great. I love me some behind-the-scenes.
For the "There's a fish on my head" bit, Ben Schwartz took inspiration from co-star Jim Carrey's Dumb and Dumber.
Tom still can’t believe everything that’s happening. That the alien is real, and that some madman pulled straight out of science-fiction threatened them with attack drones. Sonic presents himself and explains about the portal rings (more advanced cultures use them to travel between worlds – hey, what do you mean we’re not advanced??), and that he needs them to leave Earth. Tom stops the car on the side of the road and tells Sonic to find San Francisco himself by going west. Sonic speeds away… and returns wet, with a fish on his head. He crashed right into the Pacific Ocean.
...Did he really run from Montana to the Pacific, a 14-hour drive... in 3 seconds??!?
Considering how far Montana is from the Pacific, it should have taken him more than a minute to come back.
Sonic: Instant joy. Tom: Instant regret. I don't blame him.
Tom, you should have told him to go southwest! With an angry Sonic pleading for help, Tom relents and agrees to drive the hedgehog to San Francisco. Woo, road trip! Classic ‘90s trope, alongside the “you might be wondering how I got here” from the intro! If Google Maps is to be believed, it’s a 15-hour drive... assuming Green Hills is close to the bottom edge of Montana.
Late in the evening, Tom stops at a gas station to call Wade from a phone booth and tells Sonic to wait in the car. Oh, you don’t tell that to a kid with ADHD. Especially not when the station is right next door to the Piston Pit, a biker bar that looks like the coolest damn thing the poor lil’ hedgehog has ever seen.
He makes even speaking on the phone look threatening.
Tom talks with Wade, but learns that Robotnik, Stone, and several secret agents are in the Green Hills Station, listening in. The doctor grabs the phone and threatens Tom. I love the detail that, of all things he could be mad about, Robotnik hates to be punched in the face. Which Tom did, earlier. Like, I get that it’s a basic tenet of this Robotnik’s worldview of using the machines born from his brains to beat down any brawns, but specifically, getting punched is a trigger he carries since childhood. And for all his intelligence, he does NOT have the emotional sanity to respond any other way than “must hit back tenfold”. Tom hangs up in the middle of the doctor’s tirade.
Better get this show going, I’m not even 10 minutes into the film yet!
A Day in Green Hills
Green Hills, Montana? Looks like British Columbia, Canada, to me.
Sonic presents Green Hills and its people. First Tom Wachowski, who’s the sheriff but helps with anything around town; Sonic nicknames him “Donut Lord”, since Tom likes donuts so much. Tom’s wife Maddie (Tika Sumpter) is a veterinarian; however, Sonic nicknames her “Pretzel Lady” due to her yoga, which he can’t replicate. There’s Crazy Carl, the only one who has figured out Sonic’s existence (and can only draw a very Sanic-esque version, love the meme reference here), but nobody believes him. The hedgehog even watches from Tom’s window when the cop puts on a film. Sonic likes to pretend he’s got all those friends who never heard of him, but deep down he’s a lonely kid who just wants to talk to someone.
Oh my God that's Sanic. That meme has gone PLACES.
Awww. Hey, this film came out around Valentine's Day, I'll say that makes it count with the holiday.
Tom gets home after work. He chases some raccoons out of the trash cans outside his home, then comes in. He’s greeted by Maddie holding a letter from the San Francisco Police Department. Tom loves working in Green Hills, he’s continuing the Wachowski family tradition as town sheriff (and, to be fair, he IS the most competent member of its force). But he feels that he would be more useful in San Francisco, where much more is bound to happen. He opens the letter – he’s accepted! Maddie shows him a “you tried” cake… then realizes her mistake and pulls out a “Congratulations!” cake instead. She never had a doubt!
She mentions that she started looking up apartments on Zillow. 4K$ a month? That’s a bargain! (Yeah, this movie is a bit… blatant in its product placement. Zillow was intentional, but Olive Garden, which is name-dropped twice, was meant as a recurring gag.) She offers to fly to San Francisco with their dog Ozzy and look for a place to stay. She mentions how much they helped each other as a couple before, and how much they’re willing to help each other in this new development.
It's on the screen for four entire seconds. And name-dropped. (...And now I'm guilty of it too, dammit.)
I enjoy Tom and Maddie’s relationship, it's so nice and sweet. They’re adorable and I bet they’d be fun to watch even in a movie without some CGI character running around. That said, they are original human characters in a Sonic movie; they’re not the reason fans walked into theaters. Human-focused adaptations are common, and when it comes to live-action it’s especially notable. After all, special effects are expensive, and these CGI characters are nothing but VFX (because that doesn’t count as “animation” proper), so having more scenes with only live-action actors can help cut the costs.
Oh, this is going to be a big one. I knew it would be, I have so much to say about it. Besides, the time couldn’t be better, with Sonic 3 being in a hot competition with Disney. (God, I hate the very concept of Mufasa. I’m so glad Shadow kicked that movie’s teeth in, even if just for a few weeks.)
If you’ve been reading this blog since 2020, then you know that I’ve been rather closely monitoring the Sonic movie-verse, publishing a quick review of each film shortly after seeing it in theaters and even going out of my way to get the Knuckles mini-series on DVD. I have a soft spot for the film franchise, owing to reasons I’ll get into before discussing the movie proper. It helps that I’m a fan of the game franchise it takes its inspiration from. In fact, there is so damn much to say… I’ll get to it right away!
The background
Sonic has been a successful franchise since the ‘90s, so talks of a movie have existed since that decade. Live-action, of course; there has been one animated film in 1996. I won’t get through all the details, but after some time at Sony, the movie rights changed hands, landing at Paramount in 2017. Jeff Fowler was set to direct; it would be his live-action debut. He already had experience with the Sonic franchise, having directed the animated cutscenes for 2005’s Shadow the Hedgehog. Casting-wise, I won’t discuss the whole timeline of who joined when, other than Ben Schwartz joining to voice Sonic in August 2018, when principal photography took place the following month and ended in October. The finished product was set for release in theaters in November 2019.
Pictures resurfaced of concept art featuring other actors as the human lead, such as Mr. America’s Ass, I mean Captain America, Chris Evans; but he was likely too busy. James Marsden was announced in May. I only bring it up because of the picture.
Which shows a design not as bad as, but still relatively close to, Ugly Sonic.
Go here for Part 1. Continuing today with the remainder of the albums from the mystery box.
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard – Live in London ‘19
The members of KGLW have released more bootlegs in 2024 than ever before (37!!), which makes their previous 14 bootleg-friendly live concert releases pale in comparison. The way the bootlegging program works is that the band openly offers the stems and files on their website, free to download, and any label can use them to create their own variant of any album made available, be it a live concert, a demos collection, Teenage Gizzard (which I discussed), or Polygondwanaland. The band’s one request is to be shipped copies of the created variant, to sell on their label p(doom) records’ own website.
Their most productive year for those, prior to 2024, was 2019. That year, the band’s albums were the boogie and blues-inspired Fishing for Fishies, and the intense thrash/doom metal of Infest The Rats’ Nest. Along came six live “official live bootlegs” recorded between July 12th and October 14th, three of which (Brussels, Adelaide and Paris) were released in January 2020 to amass money for a charity fighting the Australian Bushfires. The other three (Asheville, London and Milwaukee), released in late 2020 or in 2021, also prominently feature tracks from 2019's studio releases.
I heard them all. And despite being the only one I own out of those six, Live in London ’19, recorded at Alexandra Palace, might be my least favorite. I know live bootlegs aren’t the place for incredible sound quality (…or might not have been, but then again, compare this to the sound quality of their 2024 live output), but even here it doesn’t feel so great. Maybe it’s because I’m a lyrics guy and I like to understand the lyrics when I listen to music that has them, and it’s a bias.
Don’t get me wrong, this album has lots of fan favorites from King Gizz’s discography. The Mind Fuzz Suite (though it’s missing its finale!), Evil Death Roll, Rattlesnake and Float Along – Fill Your Lungs are examples. However, when compared to the other live bootleg albums from that year, London ’19 has little that makes it stand out. The longest track, Crumbling Castle, while still my favorite, doesn’t even reach 11 minutes. Very few songs here are given the jam treatment, so it feels like it just doesn’t have enough of what makes KGLW concerts interesting.
If it’s only your first or second time hearing a live performance from the band, it’s fine on its own. However, at the time, there were already plenty of live bootlegs with more adventurous setlists. Honestly, it’s only middling in comparison to the rest of their output; on its own, it’s pretty good and does feature the range of their sound from the time (let’s just say, they’ve expanded it a lot in 5 years).
Doing this again this year! Same concept as last year. I feel it’s just right to do this, as though I am doing my part to promote Needlejuice, a record label that has its big names, but also a lot of lesser-known artists that can benefit from the spotlight. Needlejuice Records, from Nashville, specializes in indie artists, providing physical versions of these artists’ albums (in vinyl, cassette and CD formats, and beyond). They have a Bandcamp, a website and a Discord server. From 2021 to 2023 ('24 was too busy a year for them to do it), they sold mystery boxes through which they pass their overstock, even adding extra goodies. Each mystery box I purchased contained three vinyl records, three cassettes and three CDs, with a bonus vinyl test pressing and an extra surprise.
In my previous article, I said I wasn’t sure why it took me a full year before ranking the albums from the first mystery box I purchased. I do have an answer; before making this list, I want to make sure I understand each album within the wider context of its creator’s discography. Which is a fancy way of saying that, like the madman I am, I shove every studio release from each artist into a single Spotify playlist and listen at random, getting a good feel of each artist’s stuff and giving me a new perspective on the album I received. I even plan to check which albums I enjoyed the most in that playlist, and will buy those too.
Why yes, my music collection is big, why do you ask?
I purchased a second box in late 2023 and received it in early January 2024. This has given me a year to hear these albums several times (some more than others) and do that deep discography dive. I threw into that playlist every studio album from these artists, and for good measure, I also included any new albums from artists I had already heard (from the previous list) and who had new stuff out.
Another 11 albums, once more ranked from favorite to least favorite. Remember that if I rank an artist lower, that doesn’t mean their stuff is bad – it can just be that it didn’t click with me. Maybe it will click with you. Oh, and the previous article was too long, so this time, I’m splitting it into two parts. Starting with…
Nick Lutsko – Swords
The sad clown says it all.
Nick Lutsko, from Chattanooga, Tenenssee, has been releasing music since 2012. He made a name for himself providing comedic songs for Netflix and CollegeHumor, including a longer stint making satirical tunes for entertainment company Super Deluxe. He has albums that are satirical, albums that are more comedy/horror (he has released a few songs every Halloween since 2021), and the occasional serious one, with today’s album being an example of the latter. He performs live with The $100K Band.
Keeping up with the news, even if to do funny stuff with it, means being constantly exposed to everything messed up about the world. Lutsko came out of a long period of writing satirical songs, I paraphrase his words, “disillusioned with the zeitgeist”. If there’s a group of people that’s painfully aware of the state of the world, it’s comics and comedians.
Swords is an odd beast; Lutsko hesitates to call it a concept album, though the signs are there. Each title is a single word starting with S (so… S-words?). Most songs are about a deeply troubling aspect of the world we live in. Starting with self-destructive willful ignorance (Sideshow) and xenophobia (Superior) and moving on to social media addiction (Straitjacket), hopelessness (Sometimes) and more. If the lyrics to Software, the closing track of the album’s original version, were too subtle, the video spells it out: It's about the general unwillingness to prevent school shootings from happening so damn often in the U.S.. Ouch. The songs are tied by recurring motifs and lines, and the instrumentation to many tracks incorporates circus-like music in some capacity. The result is indie alt-rock/progressive pop that sounds incredible from beginning to end.
Although this album has elements of his career up to now, it also stands as his most serious. The cassette I got included the tracks from “Seven Inch Swords”, a minidisc follow-up that includes Spineless, a song so good I keep thinking it’s part of the original Swords. It also includes two demos and two live versions. I think Swords is his best work so far, and I love it, even though he himself admits to it being “a bit of a bummer”.
If you want to hear more from him, Nick has the satirical Songs on the Computer duology; and he compiled his recent Halloween songs onto HAUNTED, released in 2024. He has also been working on a follow-up to Swords titled Ends, and I am HYPED for it. One single has already been released.
