Winning the Polyglottery!

Meanwhile, in Chichén Itzá...

2012-12-21T03:00:00.000-08:00

Concert Countdown

RazzmaSnazz: Tail of Two Kittehs

2012-11-06T09:15:00.000-08:00

“Oh! Well, I never! Was there ever a cat so clever as magical Mr. Mistoffelees?” —Rum Tum Tugger

Games in Verse: ‘Dynamite Duke’ (1990), Sega Genesis / Mega Drive

2012-10-05T03:00:00.000-07:00

The World's First-ever Game Review Poetry Column:
Classic Games, Classically Reviewed—as Only a Fop Could
The Fop’s Rating: ★★★½ (Out of Four Stars)

Pixelated Uzis, Y’all

Square yellow high top fade,
Shooting green drums,
Tick, tick, tick—
Granadan charlies, dead or alive,
Burn through your glass belly,
Passing powder as the ever-chambered round,
Blazing black, up and disappearing.
For mega crush, charge “B” and release.

Manhole covers sit forbearing,
Lightpoles, props forgotten
In a town occupied
As a hostage to be shot,
Gnarled, banged and granting
To you, red Duke,
No bullet better used
Than the one now fired.

It’s high time to punch a man with a mohawk.
Boss battles pare to the fist,
Maybe from a barrel overheated
Or conscience later nagged
From the floor-full stacks
Of lead-templed goons
Still men yet.
Ah, the hell with ’em.

You got an iron fuckin’ hand,
Whose grip, feel, flight and fire
Cock as a gun to gleaming shoulder,
Stem-wound, haymaker-stout and recalling
A “D” bomb and time none better
Than jabbing some gas grill man or clear-domed freak
With an aching-yellow dynamite dose.
Some dukes are kings. ❂

Games in Verse: ‘Altered Beast’ (1988), Sega Genesis / Mega Drive

2012-09-06T06:00:00.000-07:00

The World's First-ever Game Review Poetry Column:
Classic Games, Classically Reviewed—as Only a Fop Could
The Fop’s Rating: ★★★★ (Out of Four Stars)

Golden in an Iron Age

Up and out the craggy dirt,
Phalanx eons passed, Titan standing,
‘Rise from your grave’
Like a heather-ton sandaled foot.
Dust, granite, souls as satyrs:
Blood-purple higher skies
Snap as Zeus’ hurling hand,
Twitching, never glitching,
As god-makers wile and compass you.
‘Bigging balls’ make you strong.

They glow blue-white, waft and weave,
And out the mouth of a she-wolf
If you hit her right.
A power no lesser gained at Remus’ sup
Than three in hand, muscles bulging.
Take ’em on,
And be a man no more.
Be a god, a beast—
A ’tweener hybrid, Golden Age chimera.
And all for a girl.

No marble, stone, or mortal prone to fail
Could bear so high and hot a power.
Knossos and Rhodes dare only watch
And the Gemini writhe and dream
At your roaring, Vesuvian grace.
O god,
O beast—
Fired as a knave, cuirass bursting—
Athena calls your name
As a hieron sybil: ‘Press start and continue!’

Still Hades’ halls teem, have at you.
They break and twist, fluted Grecian,
With a Phobos stare, harangued and deadly.
‘Welcome to your doom!’
This is it.
No gorgons great, cyclops tall or hydra,
Neither Apollo and Phaëton, trident or Triton,
Nor Artemis’ crescent, or the great Zeus above
Could ever so challenge
So altered a beast. ❂

mxdwn Moment: The Darkness - Hot Cakes

2012-08-27T19:00:00.000-07:00

“The album’s giddy cover art does wonders in exposing the farcical content within. A trinity of buttered-up babes sunbathing on a heaving stack of breakfast cakes—covered, of course, in a thick, glistening maple drizzle—seems to pose a one-upping question in visual form: Why ‘Pour Some Sugar on Me’ when you can dump the whole Denny’s on her? And dump The Darkness does—with dippy, decadent abandon.”

mxdwn Moment: Anywhere - Anywhere

2012-07-29T15:00:00.000-07:00

“Whether its North African, Meso-American or Old English, Anywhere wriggles like a Sahara mirage—and satisfies like a heavily curried feast for the weary world traveler.”

mxdwn Moment: The Cult - Choice of Weapon

2012-06-05T21:15:00.000-07:00

“After the mustached ones have claimed all the red man’s land and women, the Cult’s singer is left only to wail like a coyote, ‘Save what you learned/Suspicious soul to return!’ Wise words, He Who Rocks My Socks.”

mxdwn Moment: Extra Life - Dream Seeds

2012-05-14T01:30:00.000-07:00

“...The stuff of ‘never tell a soul’ secrets, occult rites in the New England woods and sepia-toned little girls in Victorian babydoll dresses. You know, basically all the creepy shorthand imagery custom-built to scare the hell out of us.”

mxdwn Moment: Electric Flower Group - The EPs

2012-04-13T12:15:00.000-07:00

“...With the flip of a switch, Electric completes the unlikely circuit between Type O Negative’s musky baroque and The Strokes’ punkish balladeering—all while compacting The Green Mile into Nightmare On Elm Street. If this sounds odd and enchanting, mission accomplished.”

mxdwn Moment: The Unthanks - Diversions, Vol. 1

2012-03-27T19:20:00.007-07:00

“When songs like ‘Bird Gerhl’ and ‘Spiralling’ by epicene shy guy Antony Hegarty are so straightforwardly covered—right down to their torch song slowness and every eerie nuance—you’re left puzzled and lamenting, ‘I liked this better… when it was called Antony and the Johnsons.’”

Drawing Inspiration: Jean-Michel Basquiat [ρ]

2012-02-29T12:15:00.003-08:00

～PROFILE～

Painter / Graffiti Artist / Brooklyn's Shooting Star

Tagged around Lower Manhattan as SAMO©

Haring's friend

[Drawing Inspiration is a portrait-and-profile feature highlighting the outstanding figures of the art world—and!—my monthly contribution to the art and design blog, Illustration Pages.]

mxdwn Moment: Howlin Rain - The Russian Wilds

2012-02-24T13:20:00.002-08:00

“Loaded with tiny details, unexpected turns and surging solos, it’s an album that deserves many listens to fully take in—a boozy, richly-adorned Fabergé egg of manly guitars and red-in-the-face bravado. It’s brash and sweaty music for sure, but nuanced and carefully put together all the same.”

mxdwn Moment: POLIÇA - Give You The Ghost

2012-02-19T14:00:00.001-08:00

“The sad truth is despite POLIÇA’s highly polished and often riveting sound, their spell is routinely broken by the vocalist’s inscrutably inarticulate performance. Making matters worse, her vocals are often caked with thick layers of delay. What was intended to heighten the cosmic sex appeal only deepens the locutional nightmare.”

mxdwn Moment: But You Won’t Want to Leave

2012-02-07T14:45:00.000-08:00

“They’re not just Phosphorescent’s backup band. Earnest folk rockers Virgin Forest deliver a quiet stunner with Easy Way Out, an effort whose enduring strength is drawn largely from its rustic and solemn execution. Recalling everyone’s favorite party game Jenga, if you pulled any more tabs from this music’s structure, it might just fall apart. But that’s the lovely, Spartan beauty of it.”

mxdwn Moment: A Dorky Dimebag of Fun

2012-01-27T18:15:00.000-08:00

“With their 10th studio album, What Happened to the La Las, care-free prog rockers moe. prove they’re like a well-worn pair of boots: comfortable, still kicking, and down for a good time.”

mxdwn Moment: The Dark Knight Rocks?

2012-01-16T21:00:00.000-08:00

By Owen Schumacher

“Released in tandem with the omnipresent pan-platform game Batman: Arkham City—which you’re probably breaking from right now—comes what essentially serves as the mega-hit’s quirky sidekick, the trendy and colorful soundtrack. It’s a “various artists” romp with all-original material performed by a cross section of acts, including Serj Tankian, Coheed & Cambria, and Bruce Wayne’s personal favorite, Daughtry.”

Drawing Inspiration: William Blake [π]

2012-01-16T10:15:00.000-08:00

～PROFILE～

Painter / Poet / Mystical Weirdo

Assumed to be nuts by his contemporaries

Huge influence on Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan and Jim Morrison

A Freemason?

Remember: Albion is divided into four Zoas

Wikipedia Bio
[Drawing Inspiration is a portrait-and-profile feature highlighting the outstanding figures of the art world—and!—my monthly contribution to the art and design blog, Illustration Pages.]

Sega Mega Drive: Altered Beast Edition

2011-12-27T00:30:00.000-08:00

I command you to rise from your grave and rescue my daughter, Hermione. She's the one with the pink peplos. While you're at it, bring me back a gyro sandwich, OK? —Zeus' Uncle, Nic

Drawing Inspiration: Hans Memling [ο]

2011-12-12T10:15:00.000-08:00

～PROFILE～

Painter / Giant of Medieval Painting

Wounded in war and nursed to health by The Knights Hospitaller

Studied under Van Der Weyden

Painted the best Last Judgment

Wikipedia Bio

[Drawing Inspiration is a portrait-and-profile feature highlighting the outstanding figures of the art world—and!—my monthly contribution to the art and design blog, Illustration Pages.]

Drawing Inspiration: Francisco Goya [ξ]

2011-11-27T20:15:00.000-08:00

～PROFILE～

Painter / Printmaker / "The Sleep of Reason..."

became deaf mid-career from... lead paint?

An artist in protest

Died alone, leaving his Black Paintings

Wikipedia Bio

[Drawing Inspiration is a portrait-and-profile feature highlighting the outstanding figures of the art world—and!—my monthly contribution to the art and design blog, Illustration Pages.]

Goodbye, Libya's Rose

2011-10-24T00:00:00.000-07:00

"Colonel Gaddafi's daughter phoned her father after learning of his capture – only for the call to be answered by a rebel who told her: 'Old Fuzzhead is dead.'"

Drawing Inspiration: Jacques-Louis David [ν]

2011-10-14T15:15:00.000-07:00

～PROFILE～

Painter / Talented Jerk

Father killed in a duel

Supporter of Robespierre, then Napoleon

Signed over 300 execution orders during the Reign of Terror

Left with facial scar from a sword wound

Wikipedia Bio

[Drawing Inspiration is a portrait-and-profile feature highlighting the outstanding figures of the art world—and!—my monthly contribution to the art and design blog, Illustration Pages.]

Candies From Heaven Pt. III

2011-09-27T12:30:00.000-07:00

THE SPITTING MACHINE

Candies From Heaven Pt. II

2011-09-21T09:00:00.000-07:00

MAMMON FROM HEAVEN

Sega Genesis: Space Harrier II Edition

2011-09-19T18:00:00.000-07:00

I wanna bring you to life, but I don't know how—except to paint you with a mouse and view you on a backlit screen. —Modern Pygmalion

If you have a background in modding old consoles and the wherewithall to turn this fantasy into a reality, e-mail me. And yes, I'll pay you. (In the hundreds and not the thousands. Let's not get crazy.)

If you don't care about me or my dream, I guess Billy Joel put it best (as usual): Sometimes a fantasy is all you need.

Winning the Polyglottery!

Meanwhile, in Chichén Itzá...

RazzmaSnazz: Tail of Two Kittehs

Games in Verse: ‘Dynamite Duke’ (1990), Sega Genesis / Mega Drive

The World's First-ever Game Review Poetry Column:Classic Games, Classically Reviewed—as Only a Fop CouldThe Fop’s Rating: ★★★½ (Out of Four Stars)

Pixelated Uzis, Y’all

Games in Verse: ‘Altered Beast’ (1988), Sega Genesis / Mega Drive

The World's First-ever Game Review Poetry Column:Classic Games, Classically Reviewed—as Only a Fop CouldThe Fop’s Rating: ★★★★ (Out of Four Stars)

Golden in an Iron Age

mxdwn Moment: The Darkness - Hot Cakes

mxdwn Moment: Anywhere - Anywhere

mxdwn Moment: The Cult - Choice of Weapon

mxdwn Moment: Extra Life - Dream Seeds

mxdwn Moment: Electric Flower Group - The EPs

mxdwn Moment: The Unthanks - Diversions, Vol. 1

Drawing Inspiration: Jean-Michel Basquiat [ρ]

mxdwn Moment: Howlin Rain - The Russian Wilds

mxdwn Moment: POLIÇA - Give You The Ghost

mxdwn Moment: But You Won’t Want to Leave

mxdwn Moment: A Dorky Dimebag of Fun

mxdwn Moment: The Dark Knight Rocks?

Drawing Inspiration: William Blake [π]

Sega Mega Drive: Altered Beast Edition

Drawing Inspiration: Hans Memling [ο]

Drawing Inspiration: Francisco Goya [ξ]

Goodbye, Libya's Rose

Drawing Inspiration: Jacques-Louis David [ν]

Candies From Heaven Pt. III

THE SPITTING MACHINE

Candies From Heaven Pt. II

MAMMON FROM HEAVEN

Sega Genesis: Space Harrier II Edition

The World's First-ever Game Review Poetry Column:
Classic Games, Classically Reviewed—as Only a Fop Could
The Fop’s Rating: ★★★½ (Out of Four Stars)

The World's First-ever Game Review Poetry Column:
Classic Games, Classically Reviewed—as Only a Fop Could
The Fop’s Rating: ★★★★ (Out of Four Stars)