ASS-SQUATCH (new photos below!)

My buddy, John Dryden writes, "I'm on another Kokanee job. The Sasquatch dude was a no show. I'm it again!!!" This is the second time Dryden has donned the Sasquatch costume (previously on Halfsquatch). By the way, I have the same sunglasses but I don't look like a complete twat when I wear mine (at least that's what I keep telling myself).

FLYING V UKULELE

I'm working with composer Brian Carson right now on a project. There's a scene which needed a little Polynesian flare added to it so Carson threw a little ukulele and Hawaiian slide guitar into the tune. This is his ukulele.

CAROUSEL: A CINEMA 21:9 PRODUCTION

Thanks Craig McEwen!


Watch this amazing piece of work created by/for Philips to promote their new Cinema 21:9 television sets (I now own 5 of them and I have to admit, they're very nice). There's some "in scene" commentary moments which I wish were a bit more insightful (they're actually kinda cheesy). I'm not exactly sure how they made it but I bet they used one of those computers.

SOME NEW BANDS!

Gio Corsi and Mike Ferraro submitted some CD covers a few weeks ago and due to the fact that I'm somewhat of a doofus and extremely busy with a million other things, I'm only now getting the opportunity to show off their goods. Gentlemen, I do apologize for not posting your works earlier.

Gio Corsi turned me onto Imperious Mare's Diverse Flora & Fauna. This CD has just sold over 100 cds on their first tour of the maritime provinces. If you're not familiar with Imperious Mare, I'm not surprised. This Nova Scotian experimental prog-rock group is comprised of 5 teachers (Math, English, Drafting, Biology and Drama) from Gaetz Brook Junior High. Students liken the music to "weird old stuff." I found it reminicent of your typical late 70's early 80's prog rock bands Neu!, Tangerine Dream, Can, early Genesis, Faust and dare I even say Gentle Giant. Considering that the cd only has 1 song on it (72 minutes in length) I found it a challenge to listen to it.




Mike Ferraro threw down a whole shwack-load of new albums for me to review. Debating Society's Something Always Happens didn't turn my crank whatsoever. It sounded like they wanted to be Motley Crew and Radiohead doing Cure songs. Not good. Early Morning Migration's Someone Elses Advice wasn't too bad actually. Reminded me of Sloan (another Nova Scotian band!) and The Carpenters doing Sonic Youth songs. I listened to Sweden & The Euro's new recording last night in bed and the atmospheric ambient electronica
promptly sent me off on a one-way ticket to Dreamland. It wasn't a deep sleep though as I could hear the music lulling through my brain. I was so relaxed that at one point I actually wet the bed. Normally when I do this, I get up and change the sheets and p. jammies but the music was sooooo rich and soothing I didn't want to move. Speaking of moving, I have just been evicted from my little apartment and I'm selling a few things. Anyone need a futon?

Finally we have Shrink Film You're Making Too Much Money. BOOOOOORRING. It's like a Bad Religion album. At first I'm like "Hey this is a pretty decent punk song." Then I'm like, "Is this the same song? I think this is the same song that fills up their other 14 albums."
Then I'm like, "I need a beer." And then another voice chimes in "You always need a beer." That's why I get along with myself so good.

MY NEW DOPPLEGANGER

I was visiting one of my favourite music sites, Passion of Indie Music and saw that I have a doppleganger (though cleaner cut and shaven) visiting that site as well!

PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES

At Halfsquatch, I only dwell in the world of truth and do not cater to spending my time thinking of funny things to do to people. That is beneath me. So even though it is April 1st, please do not take this post as a joke. IT IS REAL.

Author Seth Grahame-Smith took advantage of the Jane Austen classic Pride & Prejudice and added zombies. The book is in the public domain so he had every right to butcher it and I'm glad he did. Grahame-Smith extracted and added to lots of the books text so that the main characters don't just sit around and yammer on and on but now they do so with zombies at the parlor doors. The publisher, Quirk Books, is planning on doing more of this and I just may jump in and try it myself. I am a successful author and I do love zombies so I should merge my writing skills and love of zombies and hatred of classics and add some much needed spice to them. I might take Moby Dick and have old what's-his-face in a jetpack.

Here's the Amazon link to Pride & Prejudice & Zombies.

IF ATHEISTS RULED THE WORLD

The guys act out word-for-word text taken from an online Christian fundamentalist forum. AWESOME!

SUPER FAST FIGHT REFLEX

ROYCE & MARILYN TALK OPERA & CLASSICAL

These two elderly ladies share a hotel room (and bed) in LA. One is a sweet happy-go-lucky compliant woman and the other is a deluded crank. COMEDY GOLD! I have a feeling by Hallowe'en there'll be a couple of Royce's walking around yelling "Oh Shut Up!"

FIRST IMAGE OF THE GOON MOVIE

KUTIMAN'S THRU-YOU ALBUM

This is perhaps one of the finest things I've seen on the web in a long time. The Israeli musician/composer/producer Kutiman (his real name is Ophir Kutiel) has an online album called ThruYOU where he took various samples and clips from YouTube and compiled/remixed and edited them to create his own compositions--which ROCK. His site also credits the 100's of people who "contributed" to his recordings by linking the original video sources so you can see what he started with. It's AMAZING. Click on the image above to launch his site. John Drdyen, there's even a jazzy flute bit on track 07, Just A Lady.

GE AUGMENTS YOUR REALITY

Thanks Craig "Pockets" McEwen


Pretty cool innovative and interactive viral campaign. Go to their site and print out the image they provide. Then hold up the printed image to your webcam and something magical happens. There's a web video demonstration on their site that shows it in aciton. This fella too has a video demo of it...

SONY BRAVIA: ZOETROPE

I wish I had the two zoetrope strips I made in my grade 12 film class. 12 images of a dreadlocked rastafarian's head turning 360 degrees. I also handed in a pornographic piece under the name Hugh G. Rection. A week later, when the teacher was calling us up to collect our projects and our marks, he called out for Hugh Rection. I honestly had completely forgotten so I didn't catch on. He kept calling out the name (he knew there was no one in the class by that name of course) until he finally said, Johnny. You're friends with Hugh right? Give his project back to him and tell him he got an "A+". Though he was cool about it, I was embarrassed that he knew that I did the mildly offensive animation. I bet it would have looked awesome on this:



Here's the making of:

DIAMOND DAVE SOUNDBOARD

Click the image above to launch your Diamond Dave soundboard!!

SASQUATCH SIGHTING

My buddy Jordy Starling took this picture of Captain Sasquatch the other day in Kelowna (I presume).

Jordy writes: "Hey Slut, as I was shopping for oddities at an auction I was startled to find myself browsing along with one of North America's great mysteries. I pulled out my low quality cell phone camera and snapped this elusive character. The auction itself was underwhelming but at least I walked away with some proof for all the non-believers."

A couple of questions: Was he shopping too or was he for sale? If the latter, how much?!

KATA HA JIME

Montreal DJ, Jean "Jimmy" Phillipe (aka Kata Ha Jime) is basically a douchebag. During the day Jean is a roller-blading courier and by night he djs various Montreal clubs playing shitty 1990's electronica. The thing is, he thinks the music is fresh. If he was playing it as if it was his "schtick" then it would be kinda fun, but because he's balls out serious it's embarrassing. On stage, the moron djs without a shirt, sucking on a soother while wearing his rollerblades. He roller-dances while dj'ing and it's just pathetic as he spins about spinning discs. He also has been known to wear silly hats, such as a jester's hat or one of those hats you see french skiers wear; looks like a hand; usually the middle finger extended. His first CD "Selling Your Children" is absolute garbage. It's a bit of Aqua meets Ace Is Base and Roxette and a whole heap of shit.

HIGH SPEED STEEL

John Dryden writes: "Holy fuck! I hate these guys so much! It's the "other" guys from Stone Temple Pilots, with a new singer, that sounds EXACTLY like Scott Whelan. With songs like "Trash The House" and "Party It Up" and the groaner, "Total Gang", I want to punch their collective faces. Here is an example of lyrics from Total Gang...

We are so a total gang
we'll kick your ass
if you say that again
We're a total gang

I think you get the point. These guys are retarded. Oh, and check out their shitty album cover..."

I have to agree. Though this band doesn't suck as much as Nickleback, HSS suck major donkey cocks and balls. To me, they're the equivalent of a harder-edged Honeymoon Suite. One of the worst album covers I have ever seen.

MALEWICE

Clint Butler's band Malewice has been getting some major recognition in the music rags.


Clint writes, "Here's the cover for my band Malewice's 6th album cover. We are known as pioneers of industrial country music, equal parts Throbbing Gristle and Rascal Flatts, Layering heart-felt, sentimental country lyricism with samples from slaughter houses and church bake sales we changed the way people thought about Country music and noises things make. "

BABUSHKA LADY

Babushka Lady's There Is No River has been considered a classic in the underground fantasy prog-rock world. Kind of Hawkwind, Gentle Giant, Jethro Tull and Uriah Heap with some obvious Pink Floyd rip-offs. An average Babushka Lady song is 88 minutes in length. With 34 members (at one point 56), the band couldn't tour unless they all paid for their own tickets to see their own show. In July 1978, the band made it into the Guiness Book of World Records by having the most members to ever be found dead in one hotel room.

DOME PUBLISHING

Jason Hopkins (ex-singer for Jason J-Hop and the Hopped-Up J-Walkers) has started a new band and have just released a new album! Congrats Jason! I can't wait to crank this and listen to it!

Formed in the late 80's Dome Publishing has gone through many phases, from it's electro key-board album "Yes!" to it's hard and heavy death metal album "No!" Dome Publishing is now a Euro-Pop Rock band and when asked who their favorite influences were, they replied, "We don't listen to music, we make it, that's Dome Publishing mother*-expletive deleted*!!"

PRESSIG

Colin Lorimer has a band called Pressig and they most definitely know how to rock.

Colin writes: "Kind of retro garage underground with a bit of a Devo influence."

GROOM'S CAKE

Your pal Colin Beadle's band "Groom's Cake" has a new album out.

Colin writes: "Here's the cover for my bands new album. We're called GROOM'S CAKE. We're a Canadian electro-funk group. Famous for our live performances. Our drummer once did a show without touching a single drum. your pal, Beadle. "

THE DAVID PEOPLE

Here's John Dryden's album design for The David People.


John writes "The David People are two man noise band. Some of their songs are absolute crap, but this album contains a few gems. I wish they would concentrate on more gems than the other shit they are capable of. Well produced, they sound bigger than they are."

NEW BANDS ON THE BLOCK

I've done some graphic design in the past and my favourite job and passion is doing CD jacket artwork so when my buddy JP sent me the instructions on creating new bands and album work, it got me back into the graphic design swing (I've been too busy with other jobs and awesome chores to take on graphic work). Here are 3 new designs thanks to the JP Randomizer...

LYSYLTRANSFERASE "The Worlds Of Time"

Lysyltransferase are similar to Dead Can Dance meets Bauhaus. Not a big fan of this band's music at all as it's kinda sappy with a faux-dark gothic edge and cliche lyrics.


Prulas are a Swedish electroklashy type band. Crystal Castles meets Boards of Canada.

Gatsugi Station rock. Despite the flowery jacket design, the music is pretty kick-ass punk. A little Bullfight in Mexico/At The Drive-In and a bit of The Hives. Politically charged punk.

MORGAN, UTAH

Thanks J.P. Holecka!

Here's the album artwork I did for the band Morgan, Utah.


Who the hell are Morgan, Utah? Here's who they are:

1 - Go to "wikipedia." Hit “random”
or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2 - Go to "Random quotations"
or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.

3 - Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”
or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

4 - Use photoshop or similar to put it all together.

Here's the original image by "Architekthura."

THE GOON MOVIE POSTER

Here's a movie poster for David Fincher's & Blur Studio's take on Eric Powell's The Goon!!! I can't wait for this movie!!

INTERVIEW WITH HALF-LIFE 2 "ESCAPE FROM CITY 17" CREATORS

CLICK HERE for details on what Toronto's Purchase brothers spent their $500 on to create their viral hit video (1.5 million hits in just under a week) and hear what Half Life 2 creators Valve had to say.

ROCKET SHIP VASE

On Valentine's Day I brought home some flowers for my lovely lady and again realized that our flower vase situation sucks. Either the vase is bigger than a punch bowl or too small; able to only hold one flower stem. So I said to myself, "We need a better vase." Well check out how cool this vase by Martin Bu is!


I mean this is fucking perfect for my home! It's something that everyone in the world can get excited about and when it's sitting on my dining room table and guests come over, they just won't shut up about it!

HALF LIFE 2 MINI-SERIES

Here's a mini-series based on Half Life 2. It was filmed on a $500 budget...

MIKE MCKINLAY'S DUNLIN BIRDS

My friend Mike McKinlay makes me super mad. He's always filming something cool, he's got a great eye, he's an amazing skateboarder (he just kicked ass at an Anti-Social skate competition and won a trip to Hawaii), and has incredible shoes. Here's a photo I took of the guy in a full-pipe in Drain, Oregon.


One day Mike and I went out for lunch and he said to me "I'm thinking of filming a dark gothic nature show on crows. About a month later he's filming crows and a few months later he's done and he's got this incredible documentary. Last week Mike spent two days out at Boundary Bay filming Dunlin Birds. There's only a small window of opportunity where the numbers of dunlin birds amass to the point of ridiculousness and Mike got a hot tip on when these days were so he went and spent two days filming the birds. What you're about to see is absolutely astonishing. It's mesmorizing, captivating, magical and almost unreal. It gets to a point where you think it's some kind of CGI particle effect! I wish you could see it at full resolution! Mike and birds make a great team.



Below, Mike takes flight on the Boom Boom Huck Jam half-pipe in Tony Hawk's garage.

666th HALFSQUATCH POST

MONKEY BEACH

Here's a one-sheet cover I designed for the feature live-action sceenplay Andrew Duncan and I wrote. The screenplay is based on an amazing Canadian novel Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson. The novel was nominated for 2 of Canada's most prestigious literary prizes (Governor General's Literary Award & The Giller Prize). Our script is finally finished and is in some big-wigs' hands.
I hope we've at least captured the essence of this incredibly complex, beautiful and haunting story.

JAPANESE FACTORY

Check out these awesome photos of a factory in Japan. INCREDIBLE!

LA MACHINE

Click here to check out what awesomeness these piloting gang-lords are operating...

KID ON DRUGS vs. CHRISTIAN BALE

THRILLBILLIES BIG WHEEL BACKFLIP

THRILLBILLIES BIG WHEEL BACKFLIP

LOOK AROUND YOU: WATER

This is a brilliant BBC series with Peter Serafinowicz (Shaun of the Dead, The IT Crowd)

BALLADEER: MARK GORMLEY

Thanks Bernie!

Prepare yourself. As the song begins, the video shows Mr. Mark Gormley preparing to sing his song Little Wings. Pause the video at this point and look into Mark's eyes and try to listen to your mind's third ear as to what his voice is going to sound like. Once you have it in your mind, push play. I bet milkshake will come pouring out your nose even if you haven't even had a milkshake in months.

ADVENTURES OF MUTILATOR

Thanks MJwho!

I haven't seen this in like 15 years! HILARIOUS!

FIZZI POP

Thanks Dariotown (makers of Italian Spiderman)



German soft drink commercial from the late 70s featuring a suspicious crocodile stalking a young boy. The add [sic] recieved [sic] many complaints upon it's [sic] original release.

Fizzi Pop was eventually recalled across Europe after it was found to contain dangerous levels of a particular red die [sic] also used in military uniforms. The company that made Fizzi pop now makes flea collars.

WATER POWERED JETPACK

THANKS ANDREW HUDEC!


Amazing New Water-Powered Jet Pack - Watch more Free Videos

ZOMBIE ZOMBIE MUSIC VIDEO

ELECTRONIC ROAD SIGN HACK

Click here to find out how you too can hack the next electronic road sign. Hmmmm...me thinks my sign would be "BIGFOOTS AHEAD."

NBS NIGHTLY NEWS CIRCA 1970

Thanks Nathan!

LET THE RIGHT ONE IN

I don't get to see as many movies as I'd like as I'm usually swamped with personal projects, amazing chores, family life, work etc. but I watched Let The Right One In last night. I'm not a good movie reviewer-guy (nay, I am much better at reviewing movie trailers to upcoming bad movies), so I'll leave you with these to read instead. All I can say is that the performances of the two kids are great and that I enjoyed it. It's a very subtle, slow-moving Norwegian film. The director claimed that he at first considered making it a silent film altogether and in a sense it truly could work as a silent film. The film is definitely slow-moving and drawn out, but I still liked it.



The film, based on a Swiss book Let Me In, is well-crafted and has a real retro feel to it (not because it's set in the 80's; more so, it has a real retro feel to the film-making because it didn't rely on fast-paced action sequences, flashy whiz-bang editing, cgi (there's a very tiny bit involving some cats) etc. It might have been the director's intentions to utilize the same cinematic techniques and artistic qualities of the period that the movie is set in. In other words, if you watched the movie not knowing it was made last year, you might mistake it for some obscure Norwegian 80's horror flick. The movie doesn't spell anything out for you either. You have no idea where she's from, how she got to be a vampire, or who her older "friend" is (though I have a hunch who he is which I bet the book would reveal) and it works.

Supposedly an Americanized version of Let The Right One In is being made. Also, though I haven't read anything in the Twilight series, I have a feeling that the romantic horror of LTROI far surpasses that of Twilight. As one critic wrote: "There's no going to the prom in this romantic horror." No, the awkward "romance" between mortal and immortal in LTROI is realistic and sad.

CAN WE TALK BATTERIES FOR A SEC?

Okay, I just realized something: I have no idea HOW THE FUCK batteries work?! Magic? I guess I could do a Google search and learn but fuck that. Batteries: little magic cylinders. Go get some today!

STAR WARS RETOLD BY SOMEONE WHO HAS NEVER SEEN IT

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it) from Joe Nicolosi on Vimeo.

EXTENDED WINGSUIT FOOTAGE

I've posted this before but here's an extended version of it...


wingsuit base jumping from Ali on Vimeo.

ROBERT "CHECK 'N GO" SYLVESTER vs. DAVID "SNAP 'N GO" PROEBER

Robbing banks and being chased by the fuzz is a little out of my comfort zone but if I knew photographer David Proeber was going to be taking snaps of my run from johnny law, I might reconsider. Just to look as cool as this gun-toting, chain-smokin', denim-donnin' mad-man! Look how fucking awesome these photos are! These photographs are going to make David Proeber and his subject Robert Sylvester famous!


From what I understand, Robert Sylvester, 57, a suspect of robbing a Check 'N Go in Bloomington, Illinois was being chased down the interstate by the man when photojournalist David Proeber happened to be driving the other way. David pulled over and started snapping pictures of the car chase when suddenly Robert saw David, screeched to a halt, jumped out of his truck and started charging towards David gun-in-hand. David was able to snap off a number of photos (obviously) before he realized that he could be in some deep shit so he got the hell out of there. As he drove off he could hear the heat laying some major lead into Robert. When he felt he was safe he pulled over and took more shots. To see his entire sequence of shots click here sucka!

VANCOUVER INTERNATIONAL DANCE FESTIVAL

Who on EARTH decided that this would be a successful promotional card? I think it's not a very successful campaign whatsoever. If it was the following card, I think it would be exceptional:

I mean come on! Look at the guy! He's the toothless undead coming to gum you to death!

UTAH HAIR

Last year John "JohnDryden" Dryden went to visit fellow "Snake" Jared "Potato Chip" MacKenzie in Utah. While down there, John found that there was a new style of hair-do that girls were wearing which has been referred to as "Utah Hair." Basically it's super-do's and up-do's and what-have-you's; full cans of hair-spray are being used to achieve a prom look -- only they're just walking around the mall in their sweat-pants with the high-school volleyball team's name arched across the butt.

Well it looks like it's finally made it to Vancouver. In the past two days, I've spotted 4 cases of Utah Hair at various Skytrain platforms and it's truly incredible. Right now it's very subtle, but it's most definitely Utah Hair. I'm sure the number of sightings will increase as will the hairstyles themselves as girls begin to try and out-do (no pun intended) each other.

Stay classy, lassy!

THE FORCE TRAINER

Thanks Ken Henderson!

Look for The Force Trainer on store shelves this year! Basically you wear a simplified medical instrument which reads a certain electrical activity produced by your brain (Electroencephalography--EEG). This instrument then wirelessly transmits the signal to a fan which pushes a ping-pong ball up a transparent tube. You begin to focus your attention to that part of the brain and achieve better results.

Expect to find a number of EEG-based games this year. I remember reading about EEG games about 20 years ago in a book called "The Last Book You'll Ever Read" by Vancouver-based futurist Frank Ogden aka Dr. Tomorrow. Back in about 1993 he was playing demos of EEG games with his mind. One game was a skiing game where you had to psychically control a skiier down a mountain through a slalom course. He predicted that future games would have you flying a fighter jet craft with the control stick while activating various weapons and the pilot's POV with your brain.

9

Thanks Gio Entertainment News!


A whole shwack-load of years ago, while I was a wee-man at Mainframe Entertainment, I remember watching a short film called "9" and was really impressed. Rumours were flying that a feature was going to be made with Tim Burton as a producer. While on a tour one sunny afteroon at Bardel Entertainment, here in Vancouver, the fine folks there showed me their animation test (Bardel was one of the studios that Burton's folks were looking at) for the feature and I was really impressed with how nice their test looked. It was spot on to the original short. Unfortunately, Bardel did not get the gig. NOW BEHOLD and see the trailer for the feature! Pretty awesome looking I must say!!

MYSTERIOUS MONSTERS

THIS is the series which started my fascination with Mr. Sasquatch when I was about 6 years old. I haven't re-watched these yet in their entirety but skimmed through some of them. Although it's been 32 years since I last saw it and though I only saw it once, it's very familiar to me and I was able to remember what was about to happen.

Part 1 of 10


Part 2 of 10


Part 3 of 10


Part 4 of 10


Part 5 of 10


Part 6 of 10


Part 7 of 10


Part 8 of 10


Part 9 of 10


Part 10 of 10

DEAR GRADMA...

Look at this little note I found on the sidewalk...