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Post by Steve on Jul 17, 2011 9:30:11 GMT
The one that gets me wondering is authors who claim to have written their best work under the influence of drink... I think the trick is to have your germ of an idea first and then get slowly bladdered while you're writing. Alcohol's good for oiling the wheels, as it were, but I've never had a good idea while I was pissed. Plenty of occasions where something's seemed like a good idea at the time mind you but, come the harsh light of day, I've never been left with anything more than an almost tangible sense of regret and half a cold kebab (or possibly half a cold regret and an almost tangible sense of kebab). Fags are a useful tool, I always found. I mean, they'd kill you as soon as look at you obviously but the cliched image of the chain-smoking hack hunched over his typewriter, fag ends piled up three feet high in the ashtray, I'm sure there's something to that. There's nothing like a fag to focus the mind.
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Post by Steve on Jul 16, 2011 12:47:43 GMT
stone me - where did that four years go? Seems a lot longer to me, dem. Even though this one was pretty much all down to Rog, I'm still a bit shocked how little of it I actually remember. I was clearly already pretty well non compos mentis as early as #2. With that in mind, I don't really feel able to comment on individual stories but, you know, it's very nice to see someone else has taken the time. I would agree that 'Martyr's Window' was the highlight of the first lot and also that Victoria's story here in #2 was something of a head scratcher. I liked it though and it's a great shame that she never contributed any more stories after this one. Hope you're well, Victoria, wherever you are. You're synopsis for 'Kindness' actually manages to make it sound like a proper story (!) which, even with Rog bravely trying to plug the holes, I'm still not convinced it ever was. Interesting what you were saying about the cover of #1. In many ways I think the first issue was something of a Ripton showcase so it seemed - still seems - quite natural to me that he should have been on the cover. And I never really thought of The Filth being particularly "nasty-minded". I appreciate that you're using the term in a positive sense and obviously I'd have no qualms about being associated with such a publication. I mean, fuck knows, FC wasn't 'polite' or 'gentle' or 'quiet' or any of those other non-threatening adjectives that horror is sometimes saddled with, I just don't think, all things considered, we were especially 'nasty' either. Maybe people who didn't like the name were right all along and Filthy Creations does carry certain connotations that weren't necessarily intended. Thanks for the memories anyway, dem.
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Post by Steve on Jan 18, 2011 17:48:08 GMT
I'll admit upfront that there was a great deal of mystique surrounding A Clockwork Orange growing up, at least for me there was and I don't suppose I'm alone in that. So when I finally got to see it at the pictures around 1996 it was a big thing. Still, it could've gone either way - I could have come away thinking, "Is that it then? Is that what all the fuss was about. That Kubrick's a right tw*t and no mistake and so am I for wasting so much of my life wondering what it'd be like, etc." In fact I walked out of that cinema and I was buzzing. F**king great it was. And do you know why it was so f**king great? It was f**king great in the same way Ken Russell's films were f**king great when I first saw them. Excessive, extravagant, deliberately outrageous, obsessive, provocative, driven, personal cinema. Something you rarely saw, even back then when people still had ideas, and which you almost never see any more. Pompous? Pretentious? Yeah, gloriously. My other abiding Kubrick cinema memory is dragging my dad to see 2001 in the '70s when I was just a kid. God bless him, he sat through the whole thing without a word of complaint even though I knew, and he later admitted, that he was completely bewildered/bored by the whole performance. Me? I'd never seen anything like it. I nearly wet myself (the only film I did actually wet myself during was Ring of Bright Water but that's a story for another day). And as for The Shining failing to accurately portray the work of Stephen King - well, all I can say is thank fuck for that. No offence like.
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Post by Steve on Jan 1, 2011 4:21:29 GMT
Django >> Probably my favourite spag ( Steve will probably know if it was novelised). Don't believe so, no. I don't know what sort of release Django got in the US but it was effectively banned over here for many years as you probably know. I don't suppose any publishers would have bothered commisioning a novelisation under the circumstances. That's only supposition on my part but I've certainly never heard of one. The only Sergio Corbucci film I can think of which got the tie-in treatment was The Mercenary/A Professional Gun.
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Post by Steve on Dec 31, 2010 17:14:33 GMT
Never did get round to reading all those books that I meant to read in 2010. Managed to watch a few films but, things being what they are these days, they were mostly of the How To Train Your Dragon and Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs variety. All quite charming, you know, but not really anything we need concern ourselves with here. Somebody very kindly gave us their old telly because the kids were embarrassed to watch the miniscule, do I look f*ckin' HD ready?, steam-powered contrivance we used to have sitting in the corner. Hasn't made a great deal of difference to me though, I must say, as the only thing I ever watch is Come Dine With Me. I suppose what I'm really saying is I've got nothing for you. Lots cracking off on the personal front but this isn't the place for that. Anyway, here's a couple of pictures of us on holiday in Cromer this summer - it was one of those 'saw this and thought of you' moments as I'm sure you'll appreciate... Happy New Year to one and all. You're still beautiful and don't let any bastard try and tell you otherwise. P.S. Just thought of a pertinent highlight - daft bugger that I am - going into Waterstone's (always a slightly depressing experience these days) and coming face to face with old Spanky the cat leering at me from the cover of The Pan Book of Horror Stories. Never thought I'd see him on a British high street again in my lifetime. Sincere thanks to those who made it a reality. Time for a drink I reckon.
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Post by Steve on Dec 28, 2010 18:12:02 GMT
I know I'll probably regret getting involved but can't resist the compulsion to a try and pick a few bones out of all this. First bone - and seemingly one of some contention, though for the life of me I can't really see why - is this business of Dem's signature. I've no intention of trying to put words in Kev's, or Christine Campbell Thomson's, mouth but my understanding of the quote in question is that it's not saying that there's anything wrong with 'literature' as such. Simply that for her own purposes, Campbell was more interested in a good creepy yarn than something more 'literary'. She was simply meeting what she saw as a need. After all, as she says; "For those who wanted something high-brow there was plenty". This could be viewed as an 'anti-intellectual' stance in some respects but it's certainly not sneering. In fact, it doesn't make any kind of judgements at all. It merely, as I read it, states a personal preference. Bone #2 is this from Andy; Here on the other side on the channel most of the discussion about genre literature is just an exercise in rose-coloured nostalgia... done by a few over 40s mostly on the internet. Quite honestly, Andy mate, I'm not sure things are so very different 'over here'! At least, that's exactly why I signed up to Vault however many years ago it was. That, and it was friendly, and fun, and never took itself too seriously. I've always thought "an exercise in rose-coloured nostalgia, done by a few over 40s" was a great idea. I did back then and I still do. Do I have sufficient time, energy, moments of sanity/clarity, to properly devote myself to such a board? Sadly no, I don't. I'm too knackered and too unstable to be of much use here any more but that doesn't stop me loving the place. Obviously, if other people are looking for a discussion with a bit more depth than I am, then good luck to them and I'm not so sure that you can't find that here as well if that's your thing. There's no shortage of very knowledgeable people contributing to Vault. And to finish... I was looking at my bookcase just now - and picked five titles out at random with my eyes closed. They were Zoltan Hound of Dracula, Boot Boys, Inseminoid, Blight, Crossroads: A Warm Breeze (yup the one with Benny in it)... That says it all for me really. Blight? Is that the one with the rampaging mutant moths? God bless you, Mr Noose. And Boot Boys... and Crossroads novelisations... Vault isn't just about having an interest in this stuff and coming together to bang on about it, it's about having a passion for one thing and talking about it here and, through the very act of being here and sharing and participating, learning to love all kinds of other lovely old shite. It's going into a decrepit bookshop looking for that old horror anthology you're missing and coming out with a carrier bag full of Confessions books and Art of Coarse whatever it may be books and a biography of Ed 'Stewpot' Stewart... and, well, if you don't understand what I'm talking about there's really not much more I can say. Is Vault anti-intellectual? The board taken as a whole? No, of course it bloody isn't. It's precisely what people on this thread have been saying the horror genre is. Namely, a broad church. Are there people here who have no interest whatsoever in intellectualising their passions? Yes, it seems to me that there are. It's not a stance, it's just a personal thing. If any dividing lines have been drawn I suggest that they've been drawn around Vault and not from within. And that's fine, you know. Some of the labels that have been attached to us in the past may have been crass and frankly uninformed - and, personally, I'm as anti-crass stupidity as I am anti-intellectual - but the day Vault starts to worry what people think of it will be a very sad day indeed. Now, where's me tablets?
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Post by Steve on Sept 15, 2010 10:54:23 GMT
I think it's the obsessive nature of his writing that's earned him the Poe tag rather than anything to do with his writing style as such, which I'd agree comes across as resolutely modern - particularly when compared to Poe's florid, classical stylings.
"I reckon his best stories aren't the train ones, but the bizarre erotic stories - "Burning Wedding" or however you'd translate it (Plomienne Gody)"
Well, I'd translate 'płomienne' as flaming or fiery. 'Gody', I think, could be translated in one sense as wedding - or maybe pairing? - but as far as I know is mostly used these days in relation to wedding anniversaries. I see someone has translated it as "Nuptial Flames", which seems suitably suggestive. I married a Pole once and that was certainly fiery - and not always in a good way. But that's more than enough about my first flaming marriage...
Ryszard Janiak, asuming it's the same Ryszard Janiak, is a collector of contemporary art and so forth. It's a shame that Grabiñski's published work isn't more widely available, let alone the unpublished stuff.
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Post by Steve on Sept 12, 2010 9:40:07 GMT
You see, I'd be happy if they were trying to force crisps down my gaping maw because I like crisps and am always open to offers where savoury snacks are concerned. I mean, if you've got some crisps you need to get rid of (no questions asked) I'll be only too glad to take them off your hands - literally, like a voraciously peckish duck at a riverside picnic. In all fairness I should say upfront now though that I'm not overfond of prawn cocktail. What are Amazon's prices like anyway? Competitive? I mean, would you say there were any distinct advantages pricewise to buying, say, your Monster Munch from a reputable online retailer rather than from Mr Booze up the road because some of his offers are very reasonable. Have you tried those Kettle Chips? They're nice, they are. But I digress. Mind you, Amazon started it - look at this; "Because you said you owned The Third Black Book of Horror, recommended for you: In Loving Memory - The Complete Fifth Series [DVD] starring Thora Hird". What's all that about? They're having a laugh surely...
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Post by Steve on Sept 12, 2010 8:49:44 GMT
Much(ish) talk of Edogawa Rampo of late puts me in mind of Stefan Grabiñski, "the Polish Poe" - seems these pesky Poes get everywhere. Anybody have any thoughts on Grabiñski they'd like to share while I'm trying to string a few sentences together concerning his Dark Domain collection? Read it recently back to back with Arabella Randolphe's Gothic masterpiece, The Vampire Tapes - from the sublime to the frankly hilarious and compelling evidence, were any needed, of just what a broad church this horror lark really is. Ah, there's no business like it...
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Post by Steve on Sept 11, 2010 10:08:45 GMT
Vault patrons may be aware that Amazon offer 'personalised recommendations' to customers based on previous purchases and other items you might have shown a vague interest in at one time or another. Very good of them, I'm sure, but I'm wondering why, on signing in this morning, they're trying to flog me a silicone spatula (medium) in an admittedly striking shade of cerise. Now you'll no doubt be surprised to learn that I'm not a big buyer of kitchen utensils generally. What's more, just supposing I was to find myself short of a spatula and the boss had invited himself to dinner at short notice and that big promotion I'd had my eye on for years was hanging by a thread unless I could whip up a hasty (and tasty, not to mention entirely hypothetical) Victoria sponge then, even with guaranteed next day delivery, I'm unlikely to be looking online to meet my emergency cake mixing needs. So why should Amazon have me marked down as a man with an eye for a cerise spatula? Further investigation reveals that said silicone spatula (medium) has been "recommended for you because you rated... The Mummy's Shroud and Dr Blood's Coffin". It remains to be seen whether my 5 star rating for The Abominable Dr Phibes will yield yet further recommendations for a delightful khaki milk frother or a charming set of bri-nylon egg poachers (large).
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Post by Steve on Aug 20, 2010 5:58:46 GMT
I was catching the bus home from work yesterday and happened to see someone with a newspaper bearing the eye-catching headline, "INVASION OF THE GIANT RATS". Couldn't make out much more without going and sitting next to (or directly behind) the person in question and leaning over uncomfortably but I believe there was something about two and a half foot rats? Could anyone kindly supply the details?
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Post by Steve on Aug 15, 2010 6:08:10 GMT
Very much looking forward to both of these, particularly the Crowley as - at some risk of ridicule - I've always rated his shorter fiction. With its 49 stories, many of which "appear here for the first time", The Drug is potentially a very exciting proposal indeed. Will it lead to a long overdue critical reappraisal of Crowley as a writer? Probably not, as opinion one way or the other seems far too deeply entrenched for anyone to be shifting their position at this stage in the game and Crowley himself has long since passed into the realms of Godhood or grotesque self-parody depending how one is inclined towards the old bugger. Does anyone know yet if this collection includes the Simon Iff stuff? Other than 'The Beckoning Fair One', I must admit I don't really know my Onions (excuse the abysmal pun) that well. I suspect this new collection will largely be an exercise in seeing just how well the rest of his oeuvre measures up.
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Post by Steve on Jul 21, 2010 8:09:16 GMT
The one that blighted my childhood, and I'd be interested to hear if anyone else remembers this, was a play or one-off drama that was shown one afternoon in the 70s (sorry I can't be more specific). I must have been off school that day for some reason because I can't believe anyone in their right mind would've put this out when impressionable children such as myself might normally have been watching. My recollections are a little clouded with time - although I've still not managed to completely erase it from my memory some thirty-odd years after the event - but basically there were these boys about the same age as I would've been at the time, living in the north of England as I was at the time, who try to scare each other with a story about something nasty in the coalshed or outhouse or whatever it may have been. I might add that we had various outbuildings, including a very dark coalshed, in the backyard when I was a lad. Anyway, either as a result of a dare or a joke, one of the boys ends up getting locked inside this shed and it all ends very nastily. I don't know whether it was because I could relate to these kids so easily and it all played into my own childhood fears of being confined in the dark with whatever it was that occupies dark spaces when you're little, but this thing utterly terrified me and made going for coal on cold, dark wintery mornings even more traumatic than it had been previously. Still, it hasn't done me any harm - he says, reaching for the Fluoxetine.
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Post by Steve on Jul 21, 2010 6:12:32 GMT
I still have a jotter kicking about with mostly sf stories but they were generally very visceral. Reminds me of the still, as yet, unfinished sequel to The Incredible Melting Man I started when I was about 12. It was very densely plotted - there was this man and he was really, you know... melty. Seem to remember some bosoms as well and... well, that was it basically - this bloke melting all over this woman's bosoms. What an opening chapter that was. I don't write 'em like that anymore...
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Post by Steve on Jul 18, 2010 9:09:06 GMT
Who Could Kill A Child is a film that could probably only have been made in the controversial, experimental, anything-goes period of the mid-seventies. According to Serrador (in an interview in House of Hammer I think - see how all these things link together?)... Ah, memories! When I was... oh, about 10 or so, I suppose... I used to do my own 'magazine' called, wait for it... Horrorscope. Wrote it all out myself longhand in biro, drew all the pictures, stapled the bastard. Circulation of 2 or 3. Remember my dad leafing through one copy and being a bit taken aback by an article I'd written (well, it was really more of a paraphrase of that same HOH article you mention) about Who Could Kill A Child. I think he was ready to call in a child psychologist. I'd never seen the film at the time of course, I just thought it sounded... interesting. When I did finally get to see it years later I was a little bit disappointed, to be honest. Not that it's a bad film at all, just that I think I'd built it up in my mind to some sort of semi-mythical status - you know, it was one of those films that I'd heard about (ususally courtesy of HOH) but never thought I'd get chance to see. It still amazes me that you can get just about anything on DVD these days - I'm assuming this is true of WCKAC - or at least find it on the internet with little or no fuss. It's like when I saw Driller Killer for sale in the local pound shop once - probably cut to ribbons but still, this stuff was considered dangerous back in the day, if not actually obscene. These days it seems it's about as dangerous as a garden gnome. I digress...
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