Review of Firefrost Arcanum by Vesania

Conclusion

A blackened-death metal bandwagon band that does a great job. Something of a Vader side-project with corpse paint, windmill head-banging and minor Roland keyboard abuse. It shall not make you guilty of metal hand sign abuse, nay nay.


'Marduke's Mazemerising', performed live.

Review

• According to Wikipedia, this Polish super group shares the awkward blackened-death metal genre with Vital Remains. Genres mean very little to me, so I'll take Wikipedia's word for it.


• Vesania has also been compared with Dimmu Borgir. Everyone from Nightwish to Opeth have been compared to Dimmu Borgir, so this comparison doesn't really mean much. If you like the live video of the band, chances are you would like this album. There are no big surprises, with the overall feel of the album being similar to Marduke's Mazemerising.


• To me, Vesania comes across as a barbaric Emperor. Emperor has orchestrations integral to their big sound. Vesania has more primal riffs with keyboard parts added in the background to accentuate certain parts. Another exception is that there are no clean vocal parts.


• Many metal bands proved themselves worthy when it comes to writing full scale orchestra productions, but few have the budget to realise this dream. Personal preference tends to appreciate a keyboard sample orchestra more than big budget film score conductions. It allows the unholy trinity of guitar, bass and drums to carry the brunt of the assault, while the keyboards add the fire and brimstone aroma. Horror film music does appeal to me, but not in the same way that a metal album does. The beans should not touch the rice, if you know what I mean.


• Orion, who does vocals, also plays in Behemoth. While I am a big fan of Behemoth, I don't really like Nergal's vocals. I prefer Orion's death growl singing to that of Nergal.


• Daray from Vader fame plays drums. Nothing wrong with that.


• There is an interesting interplay between bombastic riffs and folk-inspired melodies. For instance, Algorfocus Nefas features a theme very similar to Anton La Vey's Battle Hymn of the Apocalypse. This "heaven and hell" juxtaposing always works for me.

Lerue Delashay's interpretation of 'Battle Hymn of the Apocalypse'.

Astute readers may note that I failed to deride religion in this post. This is not on purpose, and I apologise to regular readers. You could say I took a sabbatical from mocking religion. No pun intended.

Visit the official Vesania site for more information and a few downloads.

Track listing

1. path 1. mystherion. crystaleyes


2. path 2. introit algor


3. path 3. nova persei


4. path 4. algorfocus nefas


5. path 5. marduke's mazemerising


6. path 6. moonthrone. dawn broken


7. path 7. introit focus


8. path 8. daemoonion act II


9. path 9. introit nefas


10. path 10. dukedom black act I

Personell

Orion: guitars; voicals.
Daray: drums and percussion.
Heinrich: bass
Siegmar: keymaster
Annahvahr: guitars

Rating

Unpleasant dreams, darling Vampira (1921 - 2008)

It is simply impossible to foster a love for B-Grades without developing a crush on Vampira at some point. Vampira (Maila Nurmi) was a Finnish-born actress who is best known for presenting The Vampira Show. She passed away on 10 January 2008, aged 86. I learned of the sad news from the Vault of Horror. Excellent blog, read it sometime.



The Vampira Show
Maila constructed the character Vampira from various sources, including the evil queen from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, several silent era actresses and Morticia Addams from the Addams Family. During the show, Vampira would drape herself over a double ended Victorian sofa, with skulls and a pet spider, Rolo, her only company. Skulls and sofa would bask in her aura while she presented a film for the night. The film would be suitable entertainment for the off screen ghosts, and similarly suitable to torment her advertisers. Sounds like a dream date!

Plan 9 from Outer Space
Directed by Ed Wood, he of the dubious title "worst director of all time", Vampira reputedly refused to utter a word of the script because she found it too terrible. Ed Wood merely took her lines out, allowing her to appear as a cameo zombie. Sort of. Since then, the film has earned the dubious title of "the worst film of all time". That is simply not true. I can think of at least 5 films worse than Plan 9: Jurassic Park III is worse; Gigli is worse; Napoleon Dynamite is worse; Spawn is worse; Catwoman is worse. Then there is The Rookie, which for all its recycled footage and leather faced Dennis Quaid can't possibly be better than any B-Grade. I wish I had seen the Disney logo before I watched that crap. I got free tickets and I still want to be paid damages for the hour and a half or so I can never have back.

Vampira's Attic
Vampira had several battles with the film industry. At some point, she wanted to sue series which took her likeness and capitalised on it. Sooner or later, film makers declined working with her, and she opened an antique shop called Vampira's Attic. Apparently she was adept at making jewellery and clothes. She made a few adornments for Grace Slick and Frank Zappa among others.

She came to star in a few documentaries about schlock. Eventually these culminated in a documentary all about her, entitled Vampira: The Movie. This documentary is said to contain the last recorded interview with Maila.



Unpleasant dreams, darlings
I offer my condolences to her family and friends. Her official site asks that those who wish to show their appreciation of her life forward donations to the Much Love Animal Rescue in her memory.

Shock (1953) review

Director
Alfred L. Werker

Cast
Frank Latimore
Lynn Bari
Vincent Price
Anabel Shaw
Charles Trowbridge

Shop for Vincent Price films on DVD at Amazon.com!

Plot
Janet Stewart (Anabel Shaw) lapses into a state of Shock after witnessing a murder. Her concerned boyfriend finds her unable to speak, unable to cook and unable to clean. The unable to speak part soon loses its novelty and he becomes perturbed because she is unable to cook or clean. Instead of becoming sexually liberated, he decides to seek help in the form of Dr Cross (Vincent Price), a specialist on afflictions of the mind, among them Shock. It turns out Janet witnessed a murder and the gruesome details of the horrendous crime left her in a state of Shock. Dr Cross offers to help Janet in his private asylum, but all is not ponies and rainbows, nay nay. As Janet comes to her senses, slowly regaining her ability to perform minor domestic tasks, she recognises Dr Cross as the perpetrator. More Shock!

Review
Vincent Price is the undisputed king of horror actors. If his eerie hypnotic voice and intimidating tall frame are not enough to give anyone the creeps, his Brylcreem hair most definitely is. Shock is a film noir film. This does not necessarily equate it with the glamour of Hollywood, but it does have vintage black and white charm.

The performances are over the top, with long Pinter pauses during dialogue. Likewise, the exaggerated gestures contribute to the otherworldly feel of the film. The film is dated, but give Shock some credit - it came out in 1953. I think the plot is a brilliant idea and even listed it as one of the films I feel Hollywood should remake. Some peculiar innovation is evident in the dream sequence. It is always fascinating to see how much variation the limits of black and white offer.

The over the top performances are a pleasure. At one point, the doctor who first discovers Janet concludes: "I think she suffers from ... Shock. All it needs is a little DUN dun DUUUUUN! each time the word shock is mentioned, although I admit it might detract from the dramatic irony.

Those interested in how gender roles were instilled by the media during the fifties would note what a sweet housewife Janet portrays. Even in her dreams, she has a man who is ready to sweep her off her feet while she is content to sweep nothing but the porch. Her man is a working man, and one in uniform no less. What an Utopian domestic vision.

Conclusion
The film is dated. Vincent Price is as charismatic as usual. This alone makes Shock worth seeing. The film is not particularly graphic, relying more on the suspenseful feeling of 'what-if' doctors are reckless with their authority.

Rating

Lady Frankenstein (DVD)

The nubile Lady Frankenstein returns from boarding school where she achieved her medical degree. She follows in the proud footsteps of her father, also Dr Frankenstein, by animating freshly deceased animals like rats, burglars and rapists. He looks more like a hair-plug infested soap opera star than a doctor, which is all good because soap operas do need to animate corpses from time to time.



Soon, Lady Frankenstein improves on the controversial methods of her father and starts animating corpses left, right and centre in a hapless attempt to satisfy her lust. See, the Lady loves the dead, in more ways than one.You can tell the animated corpses from the normal humans by their gigantic latex heads, but that looks almost as wrong in print as what it looks like on screen. The lady might as well call her town "Frankenstown" after a short while, and if you care for a plot, you might lose what pray little there is between the body swapping, the retired porn stars, the gigantic latex heads and last but not least, the retired porn stars.

The film is directed by Mel Welles, who is perhaps best known for his creepy performance in Little Shop of Horrors (1960). His acting career did not always fare so well, but his fluency in 5 languages proved to fare very well in Europe. This is how he came to direct Lady Frankenstein (actually entitled La Figlia di Frankenstein) in Italy.

Cult writer Edward di Lorenzo writes the script, which is often considered the zenith of his artistic achievement. He currently teaches script writing at an American university. Many argued that Lady Frankenstein provided a feminist alternative to the Frankenstein films, with many opposed to such arguments on account of the female nudity. I guess feminists do not like getting naked, and judging by the looks of some, I do not want them to get naked either:


Andrea Dworkin, the radical feminist. I would love to see Mike Tyson try his dating tricks on her.