"Like a chemical lobodomy"

As you may have noticed, all's been quiet on the Count front, at least on this blog. So it is with much emotion that I can finally tell you that your highly-anticipated Count update has finally arrived! If you haven't shit your pants already, then get ready to!

I reported back in May that a documentary about black metal called Until the Light Takes Us was in production and scheduled to release "sometime in '07". Can you guess where this is going? That's right: the movie is ALMOST DONE! Until then, the filmmakers have released a tantalizing teaser clip of the Count being interviewed in prison to get us foaming at the mouth for the movie's release.

Go to their Myspace page and you can check out the most boring Count footage you've ever seen in your life. The most exciting part of the whole thing is when a chime plays like it's dinnertime on a cruise ship and an intercom announces that it's time for the prisoners to get their meds. The Count then sniffs haughtily and snarks on the drugs as being "like a chemical lobodomy." Which is a totally great quote...if you're not Count Fucking Grishnackh! Doesn't he have anything meaner than that? Like how the guards are all freemasons and how the Jews are trying to keep everyone else drugged so they can take over the world? But then again, this is the guy who stole a Saab station wagon and led the Norwegian cops on a low-speed chase.

Once again, total let-down...

Also, please tell me this isn't part of the movie. If this is the teaser clip they are offering up that's meant to entice us to the theater to see the whole film, we're in for the disappointment of our lives. Where's the face paint? The animal skulls? The superficial cutting? If this is the best they've got, I will launch my Movie Meal at the screen and march right out of there for a refund.

You also may remember that parole is on the Count's plate for '08, and the Burzum site had a non-update on that as well:
In 2006 Varg Vikernes failed to release from the prison. And the court session regarding this issue was then postponed to 2008. However there is still no particular information when or even whether this happens. And I don't even bother to ask Varg about it to avoid the attraction of any unnecessary public attention to this event.

Let's review, shall we? The Count regularly:
• publicly posts lengthy white power screeds on his website,
• threatens anyone who mentions him on Myspace,
• throws shit fits over his domain name, and
• blabbers about how unfairly he's treated to anyone who will listen.
And yet, the one thing he wants to avoid shining public attention on is HIS FUCKING PAROLE? The Count: a mystery wrapped in an enigma dipped in riddles and sprinkled with WTF.

In other exciting metal news, here's a look at the tour rider for the metal outfit Cranial Impalement. It's so fucking ridiculously funny you won't even believe it. I totally thought it was made up. In fact, I thought this might be a fake band, a la Dethclok. But, unbelievably, this is all too real.

First of all, their contact person is Danny "The Cobra" Bernard, or "Cobra Sound" at soundofthecobra.com. This just gives you a taste of what's to come. The overcompensation is rampant from page one.

Behold the backstage requirements:
-We require access to a forklift for unloading the foam penis.
-Lead singer Bleedus Foetus requires an "electric foot spa" in his separate dressing room
-The band requires "1 CD-player or boom box with various pump-you-up CDs (i.e. Jock Jams)"

In the Meet & Greet Lounge:
-1 inverted cruicifix (large) encrusted with faux fecal matter
-2 fountains filled with believable blood
-1 banner flourescent under black light that reads: "DEATH TO GOD"
-3 couches (badly burned)
-1 gallon of fake ejaculation (the band prefers corn syrup and corn starch)
-1 large bowl steamed entrails, positioned to spill forth from a mannequin's stomach
-24 live bats (domestic) flying loose in room
-1 giant breast appearing to lactatae whiskey
-1 coffin filled with candy corn (awww!)
-1 edible model of the venue (burning or melting)

OK, now, come on! Who are these guys, anyway? Axl?

Refreshments are pretty run-of-the-mill with kosher hot dogs, a fruit tray and Cheez-Its. Sadly, one of the band members has a peanut allergy. But then we get to "Services":
-1 very old man in a cloth diaper to shuffle into and out of shadows at regular intervals
-2 topless models wearing PVC undergarments and gas masks and holding severed goat heads
-1 enormously fat woman with a keening or unpleasant laugh
-1 man who will wear a priest costume and eat simulated feces
-1 man completely covered in tattoos who can eat anything on command, up to and including human bones
-2 women with the heads of owls or falcons; a missing breast or nipple is preferred
-1 man with magma in place of blood
-1 man or woman who can turn into a giant crow.

Also, the band may want pizza after the performance. But they must be delivered by mutilated mules or shackled human slaves.

OK, OK, so they admit they don't HAVE to have all that stuff. But if anything, here's what they'll settle for:
-Gutter Pig wants lowfat American cheese
-Luciferus Bile wants a "local choir able to sing in cool-sounding Latin"
-Hate Mountain wans a Footsie Mozart Kick n' Play Piano for his daughter.
-Bleedus Foetus wants a poster of George Bush, which he promises not to do anything shocking to as "he has great respect for the office of the presidency."

And to think people used to be shocked about that Van Halen/brown M&Ms thing. Something tells me these guys would be way into the chemical lobodomy thing.

Take my hand...off to Never-Neverland

So sick of interacting with family that you can hardly stand it? Here's some news to make you feel a little better. Remember The Pixy? Of course you do: he was the Stupid & Contagious Person of the Year for 2006. You may remember that I also did a fangirl post where I simply couldn't find it in my little black heart to snark on him.

Well, there's big news in Pixyland: the Pixy got engaged! TO A CHICK! And they totally dress up as fairyland characters together and hang out at Renaissance Faires and whatnot. There's even a pic of them wearing matching Little Lord Faulterouy outfits. It's sickinengly fabulous and I love it. He promises a "fairy tale wedding" and you better believe you'll be hearing all about it.

Anyway, big congrats to The Pixy and his Tinkerbell lady friend! Stupid & Contagious salutes both of you and wishes you a happily ever after. And thanks for helping me get my mind off of the Doorbusters. God almighty how I hate the Doorbusters...

Drinking the Top Model Flavor-Aid

Sorry I have been neglecting my blog. I'm sure everyone is dying for some breaking news and important analysis from me. So here it is. And get ready—I'm already annoyed by the holidays, so I'm in full-on balls-out rant mode.

I've been meaning to post on America's Next Top Model for a long time now. I have a love/hate relationship with this claptrap. This season has the fugliest lineup yet. I don't care what Tyra Banks says. No way any of these butterfaces could ever compete with the 15-year-old Ukranians slinking around the Bryant Park tents during Fashion Week. The one that got voted off last week looked like Gary Coleman, for Christ sakes. I hate it and I hate Tyra. And yet I watch it every single week.

Don't you think Tyra looks like Gossamer after Bugs Bunny did his hair with dynamite rollers? I've provided a side-by-side comparison above as a visual. And like Gossamer, Tyra prowls around in giant shoes, procuring innocent dopes for torturous scientific experiments. Tyra Banks is the Jim Jones of the modeling world. She brainwashes, manipulates, preaches, evaluates, cuts down, builds up, controls, persuades, influences, rewards, deprives...a regular cult fuhrer of her very own People's Temple. To prove that things on the Top Model set are far more nefarious than UPN television would ever lead us to believe, here are five common traits of cult leaders. All hail Tyra!

(FYI, this article wasn't my idea; Radar published a story about this a while back. Although my interpretation is much funnier.)

1. Leader claims divine authority.
Tyra fancies herself a sort of Jill of all trades, boasting incessantly about her various career endeavors. She's more than just a model, people. She's also an author! A movie star! A television actress! A photographer! A producer! A talk-show host! A horrifically bad singer! She's one of the world's most influential people! As thus, every word that comes out of her mouth must be immediately absorbed and applied to life for success. To reiterate her dominance, she surrounds herself with a panel of judges and a phalanx of industry professionals who admonish those who don't comply with Tyra's Rulez of Fashion™.
"Tyra told you to stop wearing ponytails because it makes you look like a common high school girl!"
"But I am a common high school girl..."
"OBEY!"
"I'm sorry, Noted Fashion Photographer Nigel Barker*! I promise to try harder next time."
"In fashion, there is no next time!"

2. Followers become dependant on movement/leader for their view of reality.
Tyra is fond of analyzing a modeling shoot by saying, "You did this (makes model face), and you should have done this (makes exact same model face)" and the model in question nods emphatically, eyes wide, starstruck and basking in the almighty council of Tyra Fucking Banks. Everything Tyra says is gospel, even when she's contradicting herself (which is pretty much all the fucking time). Example: "As a model, you have to know your limits!" versus "As a model, you have to step out of your comfort zone!" The girls are often demanded to prove how much they "want this" by groveling, sobbing and performing ridiculous tasks, such as walking a runway with a basket of fruit on their heads.

If Tyra told the girls that only winners drape themselves in Cavalli and then drink cyanide Crystal until they swoon onto their single beds at the model compound with only their Jimmy Choos sticking out, they'd line up at the bar. Then Tyra would cattly evaluate them for not looking fierce† enough in death. Of course, no one ever mentions that the girls are taking modeling advice from the fattest, ugliest Victoria's Secret Angel with the most cellulite and the biggest ass. Take that, Miss Authority! OK, that was catty, but it's nothing compared to some of the things she's said about her little proteges.

3. Isolation.
The wannabe models are all forced to live in a super-phat pad, complete with a runway, confession booth and...gigantic, airbrushed pictures of Tyra everywhere. Reminds me of a little world leader we all know and love called Mr. Kim Jong-Il.

4. Important decisions are made for followers by others.
Each season in what usually ends up being the most popular episode, Tyra gives all the girls makeovers and tells them how they are going to look from now on. Painful bleachings, excruciating extension application and Sampson-style eradication of girls' secondary sex characteristics. For some of the tearful model wannabes, cutting their hair off is the equivalent of a clitorodotomy. What would Noted Black Author Alice Walker say about that, Ty-Ty?

Another prime example happened in "Cycle" (another veiled vag reference?) 6 when the final two girls, Danielle and Joanie, both got painful teeth revamps after Tyra threatened that they wouldn't move on in the competition if they didn't comply.

5. Leader is not open to discussion.
The most infamous instance of this is the Great Tiffany Tell-Off of Cycle 4. In this embarrassing clip, contestant Tiffany is voted off and sob enough for Tyra's liking. Tyra tries to get the last word in about how disappointed she is and, when Tiffany blows it off, she has a full-on head bobbing, finger-waving kiniption fit. She screetches about how her mother yells at her because she loves her and tells Tiffany to shut up about 50 times. Just try to watch it without backing away from your computer. Since that incident, no one ever questions Tyra for fear of unleashing the Five-Headed Demon.

Come to think of it, Tyra's more of a Charlie Manson than a Jim Jones. The incoherant rambling, the nonsensical advice, the questionable inspiration...she even once made the girls pose as dead bodies! Yes, it's all starting to make sense now: Heatherette = Helter Skelter. Squeaky Fromme is an anagram for "Queer for my mask"! Freaky, man.

Manson once said, "Look down at me and you see a fool; look up at me and you see a god; look straight at me and you see yourself.” Take a sip of THAT Flavor Aid, ANTM wannabes.

* What the fuck is he "noted" for anyway? Cat Fancy? Juggs? The Pamida ad from last Sunday's Koupon Klipper?
† Speaking of "fierce", can't we think of another adjective to describe awesome modeling? How about ferocious? Savage?Vehement? Cannibalistic? Next season they should issue each judge a thesaurus.