REINDEER_JAMZ

A Scratched CD-R Found In An Abandoned Sleigh Labeled “REINDEER JAMZ” – Exactly 45 minutes of xmas music you didn’t know you wanted to hear, picked with the imp of the perverse spinning the ol’ music genre wheel. We’ve got rock, pop, blues, sure… but we’ve also got Christmas reggae, Halloween monster holiday cheer, drum-n-bass, dubstep, vaporwave, a weather report, punk rock and a musical program from a children’s psychiatric hospital.

If that sounds like the holidays to you, click on the image or link above to download and enjoy! Tracklist is in the file’s id3 tags.

The Signal: EP168

The Signal: EP168 – Exactly 45 minutes of tunes to close out one of the longest decades of this year. This time around we’ve got some pop archeology, “library music,” Turkish funk by way of Sweden, a one-man band, an unpronounceable electronic alter ego and much much more!

Download by clicking on the link (or image) above. The file is available only for a limited time. If you’re interested in the tracklist, it’s in the mp3 itself, in the id3 tags. There’s a mailing list as well but I’ve stopped using the platform I used to use, so for now I’m just sending it from my personal email. To get added, you’re going to have to actually reach out to me. Mailing list members, The Tuned In, are among the first on the planet to know when a new mix is posted, and they get a permanent archive link and the entire playlist, delivered to your inbox. Can you imagine?

How to Purchase Games on Itch and Give Them to Strangers

a guy holding a microphone... it's just decoration so this post isn't all text, don't worry about it

Did you know you can purchase games on Itch that you can give to ANYONE? All you need is access to a burner email address. Here’s how it works:

1. Find an RPG designer you love and pick one of their games on itch. It may even be on sale! Doesn’t matter if you already own the game.

2. Purchase the game—and maybe thrown in a tip!— and click the “Give this [game] as a gift” checkbox. <– Very important

3. Go through the steps of payment, however you’re paying. You’ll be prompted to give an email address for your recipient. Enter your secondary/burner email address. NOTE: Make sure you have access to this email account! Do NOT use the email associated with your Itch account!

4. Click the Send Gift button and an email will be sent to your secondary email account. Go open that email inbox to receive the confirmation email.

5. In the confirmation email, right-click and copy the email address behind the “download page” link.

6. Paste that link somewhere publicly. The first person to click on it will claim the gift and add it to their itch account. Easy!

NOTE: I suspect that you can’t use the same email address twice because all subsequent purchases to that email will go to the person who claimed the first gift… the email is likely now associated with their account. Best practice: use new emails for each public gift

TIP: If you have a Gmail account, you might be able to take advantage of this trick: youremail@gmail.com and youremail+WHATEVER@gmail.com go to the same inbox, but are treated as distinct email addresses in other systems.

Add a + and some new words to your email and you can invent infinite email addresses!

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Categorized as Webloggery

Stop Doomscrolling

Hey. This could be a good week to step away from the news, gather some supplies, take a month-long ride on a boat to Darkskull Island, and finally capture the creature known as the Ape of Blood and Mist that has eluded all others from time immemorial. Practice self-care.

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Categorized as Webloggery

Deep Red

Over the last couple of years, I’ve watched a lot of Italian giallo movies. Giallos tend to be quasi-thriller, semi-slasher, kinda-horror films, stylized, exploitative, and way over the top.

If nothing else, the genre offers up a wealth of fun titles: All the Colors of the Dark. Kill, Baby, Kill! Hatchet for the Honeymoon. The House With the Laughing Windows. The Strange Colour of Your Body’s Tears. The Perfume of the Lady in Black. The Red Queen Kills Seven Times. Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key.  

The best-known giallo to U.S. audiences is probably Suspiria, Dario Argento’s dizzying supernatural thriller. Suspiria makes its mark with a hypnotic (or just repetitive, depending who you ask) soundtrack and a blaring oversaturated color palette. Anytime anything happens, the screen is drenched in color. Why be subtle when you can just light entire scenes bright glowing red? The genre already showcases stylized, over-the-top violence, so why not go nuts with the visuals to match? It may not be good, strictly speaking, but it’s definitely memorable.

But never mind Suspiria (and definitely don’t mind the terrible po-faced 2018 remake, unless you enjoy watching a film zoom straight up its own ass on a rocket blast of bombastic self-importance). Suspiria is usually classed as more of a horror film, for its supernatural aspects. 

But the same director also made what might be the ultimate pure giallo film, Profondo Rosso, a.k.a. Deep Red. Deep Red hits every giallo formula note perfectly, cogs clacking like a roller coaster climbing to the top. It’s also a thriller so strained and tissue-thin, it almost becomes a comment on the genre. 

I’m going to spoil almost the entire plot of Deep Red now, in the sense that I’m going to tell you what happens in most of it. But at the same time, I can’t spoil this plot for you any more than I can spoil a bowl of alphabet soup. One is about as coherent as the other.

Continue reading Deep Red

the one who disagrees

I’m the one dentist in five who disagrees. My thick carapace is festooned with the broken harpoons of those who came before you, trying to change my mind about chewing gum. Try your luck, oh fool, and I’ll bury you in Poseidon’s flower bed.

The Signal: EP167

The Signal: EP167 – Exactly 45 minutes of the sounds I’m listening to this month. I mean.. not ALL of the sounds, but a representative sampling. We’ve got dreamy pop, French fuzz, psychobilly and garage rock from Austria, beats from around the world, cumbia, a touch of vaporwave and revival tent charlatanism… and more!

Download by clicking on the link (or image) above. The file is available only for a limited time. If you’re interested in the tracklist, it’s in the mp3 itself, in the id3 tags. There’s a mailing list as well but I’ve taken it off its old platform, so for now I have no idea how you’d join without contacting me directly. Mailing list members, The Tuned In, are among the first on the planet to know when a new mix is posted, and they get a permanent archive link and the entire playlist, delivered to your inbox. Must be nice.

The Quick and The Grave: a rules-light RPG

Hey! I wrote a little game about grave robbing! It’s fun! Unless you can’t get past any moral hang-ups you may have against grave robbing!

The Signal: EP166

The Signal: EP166 – Exactly 45 minutes of songs for when the world is sick and fire. We’ve got some bass and beats, some theremin-infused dub, a reggae cover of a 90s Pumpkins hit, German disco, rock from Sudan, Japanese-infused hip-hop from India, doo wop and roots country. There’s going to be something you love.

Download by clicking on the link (or image) above. The file is available only for a limited time. If you’re interested in the tracklist, it’s in the mp3 itself, in the id3 tags. Or, if you sign up to be a member of our mailing list, The Tuned In, you’ll be among the first on the planet to know when a new mix is posted, and you’ll get a permanent archive link and the entire playlist, delivered to your inbox.