John C. profile picture

John C.

One vile task after another

About Me

"It is a treadmill, squirrel-trap culture - drugged and frenzied with the hasheesh of industrial servitude and material luxury. It is wholly a material body-culture, and its symbol is the tiled bathroom and steam radiator rather than the Doric portico and the temple of philosophy." —H.P. Lovecraft

My Interests

Movies (black and white, horror, noir), obscurist rock, playing bass in conceptual bands, cocktails, karaoke, trivia, working out, reading, gallivanting, puns

I'd like to meet:

Horror movie fans, rock 'n' rollers with one foot in the grave and monomaniacs with intriguing obsessions. Whimsical conspiracy theorists and left-wing smart alecks. Spiritual types with a sense of humor. Gym rats striving to keep the reaper at arm's length. Hopeless comedians.

Music:

Guided by Voices, Easybeats, Yardbirds, Fairport Convention, Curt Boettcher, Gene Vincent, Willie Nelson, Yo La Tengo, Wire, Louvin Brothers, Big Star, Badfinger, Small Faces, surf, psych, Townes Van Zandt, the Misunderstood, Zombies, Kinks, King Crimson, Pretty Things, Per Se, Judee Sill, Mission of Burma, Dead Moon, Quasi, Nilsson, the Shins, Uncle Tupelo, Cramps, Spirit, the Move, XTC, Wipers, Flamin' Groovies, Karen Dalton, Little Feat, Feelies, Dylan, Robyn Hitchcock, Neko Case, Stones, Modern Lovers, Paul Revere & the Raiders, Link Wray, Peter Gabriel, Todd Rundgren, Elliott Smith, Sweet, Black Sabbath, Merle Haggard, Tom Waits, Adventures in Stereo, Throwing Muses, Thin White Rope, Camera Obscura, Tomorrow, Pink Floyd, Gram Parsons, Crabby Appleton, War, Parliament, UFO, Fred Neil, Tim Buckley, Young Fresh Fellows, Richmond Fontaine, 10cc, AC/DC, Laika & the Cosmonauts, Velvet Underground, Chet Baker

Movies:

Chinatown, Murder My Sweet, Out of the Past, Curse of the Demon, Bride of Frankenstein, Repo Man, The Big Lebowski, Big Trouble in Little China, The Last Picture Show, Southern Comfort, Kiss Me Deadly, The Wild Bunch, Night of the Living Dead, Ed Wood, Double Indemnity, The Godfather, Apocalypse Now, Sweet Smell of Success, Children of Men, Urgh! A Music War, Midnight Cowboy, Dr. Strangelove, Once Upon A Time in the West, Raging Bull, American Splendor, The Abominable Dr. Phibes, Legend of Hell House, The Haunting, Aliens, Duck Soup, Phantom of the Paradise, Horsefeathers, Coffy, Evil Dead II, Glengarry Glenross

Television:

Mystery Science Theater, The Simpsons, Colbert Report, Arrested Development, The Daily Show, The Office, My Name Is Earl, Deadwood, Invader Zim, Spongebob Squarepants, X-Files, The Addams Family, Night Gallery, Green Acres, The Night Stalker, The Sopranos, Blackadder

Books:

Jim Thompson, SJ Perelman, Michael Slade, Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child, HP Lovecraft, Carl Hiassen, James Ellroy, James Thurber, Kinky Friedman, Raymond Chandler, Chuck Klosterman, Willy Vlautin, John Connolly, Roald Dahl, Paul Collins, Larry McMurtry

Heroes:

Johnny Cash, Groucho Marx, Vincent Price, Bobby "The Brain" Heenan

My Blog

Horror Movies

In the immortal words of Frank Zappa, "I love monster movies." Cheaply made, poorly written, it doesn't matter. In order to be a truly memorable spectacle, the one thing a monster movie needs is visio...
Posted by John C. on Sat, 07 Oct 2006 01:11:00 PST

Zipper's Revenge

I didn't get to see the actual carnage being wrought; I arrived late and by then, the cops had pretty much chased everyone away and the bikers had roared off into the night. But the message was crysta...
Posted by John C. on Thu, 05 Oct 2006 09:10:00 PST

Roommate Rumble

Roommates, like elections and rectal exams, are a necessary evil on this swingin' little mudball we call home. Surely the world would be infinitely more blissful if we could all live in relative solit...
Posted by John C. on Thu, 05 Oct 2006 08:53:00 PST

Crash Landing

I was sitting with Feo, a twitchy Mexican guy, and his toxic girlfriend whose name escapes me (Mona? Donna? Lana?). Feo was hoping one of the nearby hookers would sell him some crank, but it was a dic...
Posted by John C. on Thu, 13 Jul 2006 12:07:00 PST

If This Van's A-Rockin...

I was reminiscing with a friend of mine over at least four too many beers, when he hit me with this bizarre tale of virginity's end. He hails from some midwestern wide spot in the road (Dog Dick, Iowa...
Posted by John C. on Fri, 16 Jun 2006 03:27:00 PST

Ghost story

Tony the Indian's Ghost So here's a story that I heard a long-ass time ago, told to me by Feo, a biker dude who used to sell pot to us All-American high-school types. Feo was kind of an awful perso...
Posted by John C. on Wed, 01 Feb 2006 03:57:00 PST

Latest weird dream

The dream opens at a community college located in the mountains. I don't know which mountains, but the scenery is fantastic and the campus itself is quite picturesque. I'm skulking around in the alley...
Posted by John C. on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST

So many bad decisions

Ive got a gift. Almost every decision I make, every action I take turns out to be a hideous blunder. Ive discovered through trial and numerous errors that my capacity for screwing up is nigh infinit...
Posted by John C. on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST

My ER diary

Sheesh! A few lousy abdominal pains and the next thing I know Im strapped to a gurney heading for Frankensteins laboratory like Lou Costello. But how did this happen? Will my body reject the baboon he...
Posted by John C. on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST

Legends of the locker room

Gym class is one of those necessary evils that either help a young man grow into a normal, productive adulthood or forever traumatizes him into a mewling little weasel, doomed to live at his parents ...
Posted by John C. on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST