Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2 – “Trust Fall”

* Part 2 of 6 of the Court of Owls storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2 – “Trust Fall”! In the previous installment, a mysterious mystery murder mystery is in full swing. Batman lit a wall on fire and a message in flames said “Bruce Wayne Will Die Tomorrow”. Dick Grayson is a murder suspect! What’s going to happen next?! Read on, gentle reader. Read on.

Issue #2 already! My, my, my, how time flies! So many nostalgic memories of this series already. Remember when they found that dead guy with all the knives stuck in him? Remember when Dick Grayson was a murder suspect? Ah, we were so young.

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2 [December, 2011]
Written by: Scott Snyder
“Trust Fall”

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2We begin with another soliloquy, this time it’s about the history of WAYNE TOWER, how and when and why it was built and all that. Bruce’s great, great grandfather Alan Wayne oversaw the project, and he intended the tall structure to be a warm, protective symbol to let all the citizens of shitty, turdy Gotham City know that they are all safe and in good hands. We see Bruce being kicked through one of the “unbreakable” windows at the top of the tower by a hired assassin, subsequently plummeting to his certain death! And so ends the entire Batman saga! The End!

We, the humble readers, are taken to a scene 24 hours earlier where Batman is chasing down some real nogoodniks who stole some museum statues. He drives his bike through their helicopter windshield, which sounds pretty easy to me but I hear that kind of thing takes finesse. Batman gets a call from Commissioner Gordon about the victim’s body and our caped crusader extraordinaire is on his waaaayyy!! DOOT DOOT DOO-DOO-DOOOOO!

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2
Yeah, simplifies jerking off to dead bodies without getting caught necrophilia-style! Zing!

Next, Batman basically does a Zoom conference call with Commissioner Gordon, who is spending time alone at the morgue peering longingly into the vagina-shaped autopsy hole torn into the murder victim. After doing some expert analysis in a way that only a business tycoon and a senior police official can, they determine that the victim was some sort of trainer for strong fighters, and one of his back teeth bears a symbol of an owl. REMEMBER THIS, OWLS ARE IMPORTANT! It is at this point that Gordon and Batman discuss a rumored Court of Owls secret organization. Gordon’s all like “That shit is REAL”, but Batman is all “No it ain’t, girlfriend.”

Batman ends his Zoom meeting and starts talking to Robin, who is actually called Nightwing now for reasons that I’ll probably discover in one of the other 64 million Batman series. Batman asks him why his DNA was found on the victim’s body, and Nightwing is all like “Uhhh, oh yeah, uh, when you were doing your speech thing at the party…like, uh, this guy grabbed me there. Yeah. He grabbed me hard and I have the scratch marks to prove it. I’ll show you if you want…but you don’t have to look if you don’t want to.” Batman is satisfied with this, and is like “Sorry bud, I actually already know that happened because I checked the cameras, dogg.” Nightwing also says the man had a message: “They’re real. They’re everywhere. And they’re sending him for you—all of you.”

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #2
Lincoln March is making a move. A little twincest in Gotham City?

Next, we cut to Bruce Wayne meeting mayoral hopeful Lincoln March at Wayne Tower, bringing us right back to the scene at the beginning of this issue. March talks to Wayne about wanting his vote, finding him to be a kindred spirit because they both lost their parents while young and they both have a giant boner for Gotham. Probably because they’re goddamned twin brothers or something, geez. If that doesn’t end up happening I’ll eat my hat, and I’ve already eaten many hats.

Suddenly a wild, rogue assassin appears! He throws one of those owl knives into March and kicks Bruce Wayne through the window, where he subsequently plummets to his certain death! And so ends the entire Batman saga! The End! Oh wait, ok, so this happens: The assassin jumps out after him to deliver a final blow (dumb), and Wayne grabs onto a hidden gargoyle (also dumb) installed by his great grandfather, Henry Wayne, Alan Wayne’s son (duuuuuumb). The assassin crashes down on top of a car and is presumably dead. EMTs load him into an ambulance, where eventually the assassin wakes up, kills the EMTs, and drives off into the darkness with his big, creepy, glowing yellow eyes.

Final Thoughts

Somebody wants to kill Bruce Wayne, but why? Do they know his secret, that he is actually Batman, and they don’t like Batman, so they want to get at him when he’s not wearing his utility belt because that would be easier? What’s going on with the owl knives? Is the Court of Owls a really real thing that’s real? How can Batman think that the Court of Owls isn’t real when owls are popping up everywhere on people and things that are trying to murder him to death?

All will be revealed in the next exciting chapter of the saga!

But, yeah, probably not.


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tUnE-yArDs, Stortregn, and Noga Erez

This week I have new releases from tUnE-yArDs, Stortregn, and Noga Erez! Indie throwback pop with some infused soul! “Diverse” extreme metal! Middle-Eastern hip-hop! Eclectic! Exciting! I’m bored now.

tUnE-yArDs – sketchy.
(March 26, 2021)

tUnE-yArDs - sketchy.

Oh man, remember tUnE-yArDs, you guys? Merrill Garbus’ project was one of the biggest names in indie music circa 2010, and then everything about it dropped out of the zeitgeist as if it were a snuffed-out candle flame. Was it the annoying AOL-era alternating-caps band name? Although that probably didn’t help, it’s because indie music changed and Merrill Garbus didn’t whatsoever. This music hearkens back heavily to the weirdo-pop aesthetics that the indie scene was known for during its ’00s heyday. This stuff is passé now. tUnE-yArDs was one of the last ones in on it, and one of the first ones phased out.

I was surprised to find out that sketchy. is the FIFTH studio album! The band fell off my radar, just like everyone else’s, after w h o k i l l topped all the charts in 2011. And, yeah, after throwing this on for a spin, my immediate reaction was that Garbus was still stuck in the past. But after getting over that notion, this album is pretty fucking phenomenal. Varied instrumentation is layered over the goofy electronic chirping and blurping sound effects to create some very lyrically heavy R&B and blue-eyed soul. Garbus has a great voice, and her political messages are sincere and poignant. I especially enjoy “silence pt. 1 (when we say ‘we’)” where she laments the slowness and perceived futility of single-handedly making a difference in this stupid, fucked-up world through lines like “Not in my lifetime/I know, I know/Not in my lifetime/I know, I know, I know” and “She said ‘change yourself to change the world’ and I’m gonna try“. This is followed by “silence pt. 2 (who is ‘we’?)”, which is just that: one minute of silence. Sometimes something uncomfortable happens and you have to sit with it. Then you move on.

Here’s a funny anecdote: I have a friend who’s having his first baby this week, and I praised this album to him highly. He probably shouldn’t listen to “hold yourself.” though, because the song is about why parents fuck up their children even if they have good intentions. As a parent myself who agrees with the sentiment, it’s not the best message to get into your head when your life suddenly changes after the birth of that first kid. If you’re reading this, and you know who you are, sorry about that!

There’s a lot that’s incredible about this record. I have no hesitations with giving this the big ol’ fat grinning face. Gonna catch up with tUnE-yArDs. Maybe. Some day.

Early Verdict:

Stortregn – Impermanence
(March 12, 2021)

“Stortregn” is a Swedish word that means “downpour”, so with heavy metal band Stortregn’s fifth album Impermanence I was expecting just that. I wouldn’t describe their music as a downpour, per se; this sounds like rain I’d like to play in. La la-la la-la…

Beats me why a band from Switzerland would name themselves after a Swedish word, but they did, and here we are. At the beginning of this album, with its gentle acoustic lead-in to a neoclassical flurry of melodic speed metal guitar and hoarse, raspy vocals, all I could think about was Children of Bodom. I was about to write Impermanence off as another cookie-cutter melodic death metal record, but I kept picking up on little surprises as I made my way through. Some technical death metal riffs here, some gothic metal vocals there. Some passages were thrashy, some passages had blackened blast beats. Sometimes the shrieky vocal delivery was easy enough to understand, sometimes the guttural utterings were so distorted it sounded like some good old-fashioned barnyard pig-fuckin’ was going on! I even picked up on a quick, crunchy guitar solo I’d expect from Cynic or Voivod that I wish lasted a bit longer. And all the while I was impressed by the pacing and sequencing. And, of course, at 44 minutes it’s a great length too. Color me smiley.

If you’re the kind of person who is able to pick apart the nuances that separate all the heavy metal sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-subgenres, then Impermanence defies easy classification. A lot of the mood is a little same-y, but the replayability factor here is high due to their diverse, yet seamless, take on extreme metal.

Early Verdict:

Noga Erez – KIDS
(March 26, 2021)

Noga Erez - KIDS

Noga Erez is an Israeli-born and -based hip-hop, pop, and electronic musician, citing influences such as Flying Lotus, Kendrick Lamar, and Björk. Pretty cool, right? Based on that list, plus the overwhelming critical acclaim, I expected more than what I got.

First of all, the very first song (after the 11-second intro track) rips off its melody from The Roots’ “Criminal”, which I noticed right away and it kind of tainted my perception as I made my way through the record. Am I the only one who noticed that? Maybe because it’s a deep cut on a subpar Roots record anyway? But it’s there. I can’t help but hear little bits here and there on KIDS that sound too similar to what I’ve heard before. Like she chopped up and pasted pieces of her influences together instead of making something of her own from it.

I feel a little harsh, though, because this record does have its moments. Erez has good, smooth flow for sure, likely drawing from Kendrick, and there’s non-stop energy even when she’s projecting a slurred, lazy persona. I also appreciate a lot of hooks, especially the chorus of “NO news on tv”, which I’ve been humming for a while now. If you want female-fronted Israeli hip-hop, well my friend, look no further. I’m hoping some more of her own personality comes out in the future, though, because a lot of this just feels like she’s playing a character that hasn’t been fleshed out fully yet.

Early Verdict:


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Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2 – “Growing Pains”

* Part 2 of 7 of the Power and Responsibility storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1) Issue #2 – “Growing Pains”! In the previous installment of the series, Peter Parker is a nerd who gets shoved around a lot at school and is overflowing straight out of his eyeballs with teenaged angst! Mary Jane is pretty but you’re a nerd, Peter Parker, so don’t even bother! On a class field trip to Norman Osborne’s Chocolate Factory, Peter Parker gets bitten by a spider like some hapless dipshit! Yada yada yada, he gets strong and can climb walls, we all fucking know this origin story. The issue ends with Peter Parker hanging on the ceiling of his bedroom and he’s all like “I’m soooo stoned.”

What will Peter Parker do with his brand new powers?? Will he spin webs in the rafters with words in them in order to save Wilbur the pig from being cooked into bacon? Read and find out!

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2 [December, 2000]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis
“Growing Pains”

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2OK, welcome back! I trust that you finished reading the above recap for Issue #1 less than seven seconds ago so I don’t need to bore you with a recap, right? Peter Poopypants Parker hangs from the ceiling and-

Whoops, sorry! OK, so Issue #2 begins with a hilarious nod to Ben Stein’s character from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off by writing out the entire scene from the movie, verbatim, where he’s being a boring high school teacher! It takes about seven panels to get through and then it ends with Parker having a fit at his desk and then all the other students make fun of him again! I’m quite looking forward to Peter Parker being bullied for 141 more issues.

So after shooting a real humdinger of a quip back at our cuddly, obese schoolyard antagonist Kenneth “Kong” McFarlane (“Hey! How about you shut that stupid face of yours or I’ll shut it for you!”), Peter Parker excuses himself to the bathroom so he can smile vaguely in a mirror for a bit. He discovers that he grew some muscles. You know. Like a spider?

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2

Harry Potter grew some muscles!

We are transported to after-school basketball practice. Even the gym coach makes fun of Peter Parker! Will the ridicule never end? Over by the wall, Flash “Bowl Cut” Thompson is hitting on Mary Jane with the subtlety of a basketball to the face. Speaking of which, Parker throws a basketball at Flash’s face! After some exchanges of testosterone-fueled smack talk that, frankly, well, I just don’t know how there were any survivors in the aftermath, the coach sends Flash to the showers so that he can probably spy on him through a peephole he drilled through the wall in his office. Mary Jane thanks Peter for sticking up for her. Peter beams like a doofus.

AFTER-SCHOOL SMACKDOWN! LET’S GET READY TO RUUUUU- ok, this is lame. Peter just keeps dodging all of Flash’s punches. Bring the hurt, son! Here’s what happens: Peter stops a punch with his hand and breaks about 450 of Flash’s hand bones. Flash cries about it. Pfft.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2

NNGG…AAHH! THAT WAS MY JERKIN’-IT HAND! WAAH!

Peter Parker, like a pussy, immediately regrets hurting Flash, but this cumsock deserved it so what’s his problem? There’s even a tear in his sad, little eyeball! Spider bite! Take advantage, yo!

This decimation of Eugene “The Flash” Thompson becomes the talk of the town. Kenny “King Kong” McFarlane is chatting with Harry in Osborne Manor about it over a bag of chips. “He just broke Flash’s hand and said ‘Next time I’m gonna KILL you!'”, Kong says with an air of bald-headed reverence. Beat up Flash! Laid the smackdown! Norman Osborne is in another room eavesdropping upon Kong’s poetic storytelling. “That guy is like a scary alien freak, man. First, what? Like he doesn’t say two words all year. Nuthin’. Just all in full geek-mode, right? Then all of a sudden he’s all — he’s all breakin’ his desk in half, then he’s all up in our face. Then he’s all smackin’ Flash down.” Ahh, Kong, you’re a cherubic treasure.

Norman Osborne is intrigued by hearing that his monster spider turned meek little Peter Parker into some jock-destroying little Peter Parker. He accosts his mumbling, apprehensive son with a proposal to let Peter have tour of laboratory after school the next day AND GEE I WONDER IF HE HAS SOME SORT OF ULTERIOR MOTIVE ABOUT THIS? Harry answers with a “huhh, burrhhhhh, uh, huhhh, yeah, ok” and Norman walks out of the room with a devilishly furrowed brow and a devilish ear-to-ear grin. Harry looks at him with an “I finally got Father’s approval” glint in his wet doe eyes.

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2

Easy, tiger. You don’t want to be sent to your room without dinner, Spider Boy.

Back at the Parker household, our favorite ponytailed uncle gets a call from the Flash family. It seems that Flash’s hospital care is costing a pretty penny, and if Uncle Ben doesn’t cough up the dough then Mr. Flash is going to sue the pants off of them. Uncle Ben says “you don’t have to sue to get my pants off, Mr. Flash” and then he winks into the phone receiver. Actually, he looks pretty grim. I suppose ol’ Benny didn’t have it in him to put on his sexy charm after being told that Flash’s hospital bill is $2,500. Aunt May finds it harder to keep her cool about this. “Peter, this is not the way you were raised. This is now how human beings behave.” That’s pretty stone-cold, May. Just because you’re out $2,500 bones doesn’t mean you can treat your non-biological charge like some sort of MONSTER!! Like some sort of CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON!! Like some sort of SPIDER- oh, wait. As you can see to your left, Peter takes umbrage at this indignantly. When Ben jumps in to defend May, Peter runs away shrieking “YOU TAUGHT ME TO BE A WIMPY LOSER LIKE YOU TWO!” Ha! Points for Peter here in my book, that’s some funny shit!

May and Ben are in pickle. Their adopted son sucks right now, and they have to give a bunch of money they don’t have to some other snot-nosed kid’s family. As they discuss their options, Peter sits at the top of the stairs in a shameful chagrined fashion.

Peter Parker bolts up out of his bed at 3am. He suddenly has an urge to run out to an abandoned warehouse-type building to climb around the walls and throw some cars around. He feels alive!! I think he’s an idiot. Peter apologizes to his aunt and uncle the next morning. They notice that he’s not wearing his glasses. He’s got spider-vision now, bitches. Spiders don’t wear glasses!

Harry Osborne, with Peter in tow, bring their golden tickets to their tour of Norman Osborne’s Chocolate Factory. They pass through DOCTOR OTTO OCTAVIUS’ working station and he’s a big scary guy! Boo! As Peter fancies all the, uh, animals that Doc Ock is keeping in airtight green vessels, Ock stabs him really quick with a motherfucking needle and draws some of Peter’s blood. “WHAT THE CUNTING FUCK?” says Peter, essentially, while Ock goes “Whut? Whut?”, essentially. As Doc Ock grins triumphantly, Peter runs away like he was just getting lecturing by Aunt May!

Ultimate Spider-Man (Vol. 1), Issue #2

Look out Peter, a DANGER is occurring!!

Doc Ock studies the blood sample and learns that Peter Parker is as healthy as a horse! And not even one of those sick horses that you need to turn into glue, he’s as healthy as a healthy horse! Norman, intrigued by this news, dismisses Ock and calls his other lickspittle lackey into his office. Norman tells him that we wants to duplicate the Bitey Spider incident on another human subject. His lackey smiles in quite a sinister fashion, but then his eyes bug out when Norman asks him to pull his own file! DUN DUN DUUUUNNNNN!!! DUN DUN DUN DUN DUUUUUNNNNNNN!! DUNN DUUUNNNDDUNDUDNDUDJ

FINAL THOUGHTS

What’s this Norman Osborne guy up to?! Is Flash Thompson actually hurt or is he faking for sympathy?! What does MJ see in this Peter Parker piece of shit?! Who’s dick does Harry Osborne have to suck to get his dad’s respect?!

These final thoughts are stupid! I guess I don’t have any real final thoughts right now. See you in the funny papers, Spider-Fan.


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Sonic Youth

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Sonic Youth
I can’t think of a single band that better epitomizes the young Gen-X dilettante too-cool-for-school hipster bohemian New York art rock aesthetic better than Sonic Youth. When I think of the immediate wimpy American post-Talking Heads art school punks, Sonic Youth wins right away (with Pixies, Pavement, Guided by Voices, Superchunk, Dinosaur Jr., and Sebadoh coming later, but nevertheless also carry the torch in their own right). The funny thing is, Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon are too old to be part of Generation X! And while Kim Gordon holds a Bachelors degree in Fine Arts, Thurston Moore dropped out of college after one quarter, so he’s a fucking art school wannabe!

Formed in 1981 as part of the burgeoning New York no wave scene, which rejected new wave’s commercial appeal and punk music’s rehashing of established rock music tropes, Sonic Youth was an underground cult success for the better part of the ’80s. From the very start, the writing and vocal duties were evenly split between Thurston and Kim, which is likely what helped them stand apart from many of their less-successful contemporaries. As the decade went on, the band became more rock and roll friendly while maintaining a trademark sound achieved by (purposely) tuning their instruments improperly. However, even the early Sonic Youth output wasn’t particularly “noisy” anyway, and their progression to alternative rock makes sense since they seemed to have been frontin’ a little bit in the first place with their early desire to make challenging fuck-you music. Needless to say, their rock-oriented albums are better.

They achieved mainstream success in the ’90s after their breakout 1988 album Daydream Nation put them on the map and their 1990 album Goo further increased the momentum significantly. From that point forward they maintained a successful career that was only moderately inconsistent at its very worst until disbanding in 2013 (steered predominately by Gordon and Moore’s divorce in 2011 after 27 years of marriage). They left behind 15 studio albums, a mess of experimental SYR (Sonic Youth Recordings) releases, an archive of live performances that they have been steadily releasing to the public on a routine schedule since 2018, and some other odds and ends that I might review someday maybe. Thurston Moore maintains a spotty, rather invisible solo career. Kim Gordon put out her first solo album ever in 2019 at the age of 66, and it kicks a lot of ass. She has more talent than Moore anyway, she got her degree! I don’t give a tinker’s fuck about Lee Ranaldo.

Sonic Youth’s Bandcamp page

JUMP TO:
(1983) Confusion Is Sex
(1985) Bad Moon Rising
(1986) EVOL

Confusion Is Sex (1983) – Rating: 7/10
No Full Album Review Yet

Sonic Youth - Confusion Is Sex

Early Sonic Youth wanted to create atmospheres of dark, unsettling drone-based mud. Yeah, who didn’t? That’s not new territory whatsoever in 1983. Luckily for them, though, their tendency to keep things melodic in spite of their efforts against making melodies resulted in dark, unsettling drone-based, but occasionally catchy, mud.

For 1983 standards, Confusion Is Sex is a frightening experience and it’s unique to the Sonic Youth catalog. It sounds like the band has dragged the listener into the woods for a séance ritual, and the woods are adjacent to a long-abandoned steel mill in a ghost town. The sinister sensations, Thurston and Kim’s wavering, deadpan voices, the odd, experimental techniques they use to make the instruments sound otherworldly and foreboding. They nail the mood handily.

I imagine Sonic Youth could have left their legacy on this album alone, pioneering (along with Swans) the American version of industrial and experiment creep-o-rama post-punk. Speaking of Swans, the best track on Confusion Is Sex “The World Looks Red” was written by the skeezy-even-when-he-was-young Swans frontman Michael Gira. He reworked the track into a peaceful drone for Swans’ 2016 album The Glowing Man, but it works pretty well here with Moore’s frustrated and disillusioned vocal delivery (“People with fish eyes, the ground SUCKS!“). Although, Gordon’s vocals are more effective on her tracks since her naturally cold and husky voice pairs perfectly with the chirping and bleating and groaning of the guitars, the thumping bass, the rickety drums.

Good album, not their best. It could’ve been someone’s best, but Sonic Youth are more talented than this.

Bad Moon Rising (1985) – Rating: 6/10
No Full Album Review Yet

Sonic Youth - Bad Moon Rising

The second album is fine, but’s probably their worst one for no other reason besides that it largely retreads the sounds and moods already established on Confusion Is Sex without bringing much new to the table.

The “songs” are a little less “songy-y” overall, with more of that Swans-style talking over throbbing basslines and screeching guitars than exhibited on the debut. Hell, “Society Is a Hole” begins with sampling of rock music’s biggest fuck-you statement of all time, Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music. My minor issue with Bad Moon Rising overall is, while Gordon’s thick feminine timbre enhances the texture of these spooky, pummeling riffs, Moore’s voice doesn’t even have a fraction of the weight and intensity of Swans’ Michael Gira. For this very reason, tracks like “Satan Is Boring” don’t deliver as adequately as one would hope.

The social politics of Bad Moon Rising are more overt, too. People find “I Love Her All the Time”, sung by Moore, sexy, but I think it’s horribly off-putting (in a good way, but certainly not sexy, unless weird serial killers are sexy or something). In “Flower” (and “Halloween”, which is just a minor reworking of “Flower”, both tracks tacked on to the end of the now-standard CD version), Gordon urges the listener to “Support the power of women/Use the power of man” which is all too sadly relevant even today, 36 years later.

I have a hard time ranking this above a 6, though. I feel like this is more of a meandering from the career path than an actual stepping stone along the way. Not at all bad, but not at all momentous.

EVOL (1986) – Rating: 8/10
No Full Album Review Yet

Sonic Youth - EVOL

Transition album! New label, new drummer, new visions. Good thing they didn’t stick with the formula forever. EVOL marks the beginning of the indie rock sensibilities that would continue from this point forward with all of Sonic Youth’s studio albums until their breakup, and thus it’s the perfect jumping-in point for anybody. I mean, listen to Daydream Nation first of course. But EVOL is good.

This album doesn’t coalesce Sonic Youth’s essence quite so definitively yet. Although everything here, barring some exceptions, sounds unmistakably like rock music, taking a step back reveals that the band is still trying to find their footing as they explore their personally uncharted territories. Elements of their previous two albums stubbornly persist (the spoken-word “In the Kingdom #19” and the dingy “Secret Girl” feel like spruced-up holdovers from Confusion Is Sex/Bad Moon Rising), but much of it mixes beautifully with their newfound desire to present songs that actually sound like songs, even overcompensating at times with it. I mean, come on, the same band who wrote “I’m Insane” wrote “Starpower” a year later? What’s going on?? There’s still that vibe, though, that rebellious, nihilistic attitude that suggests maybe this is the future of hardcore and that Sonic Youth are at the frontlines. Ha! Right, I just threw up in my mouth a little. But the band wants you to believe that to an extent, and confidence is everything.

Oh yeah, the music. The first three tracks make the new alternative rock direction clear: the mellow “Tom Violence”, the speckled synth droplets of “Shadow of a Doubt”, the somber yet poptimistic “Starpower”. If anything, the disaffected voices of Thurston and Kim (and the many moments of screeching guitar dissonance) are even more powerful as a contrast. The instrumental “Death to Our Friends” predicts the jammed-out hypnosis of ’90s Sonic Youth and is an underrated track in the middle of the album. “Expressway to Yr. Skull” (known as “Madonna, Sean and Me” or “The Crucifixion of Sean Penn” depending on the release you’re listening to) may be a tad overlong with minutes of minimalistic nothingness tacked on at the end, but the band was never very good at editing down anyway. And they never will be. Fuck it.

I can’t speak enough about why EVOL might just be the single most important Sonic Youth album. I’ll save it for a full review someday.

PAGE IN PROGRESS – TO BE CONTINUED

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1 – “Knife Trick”

* Part 1 of 6 of the Court of Owls storyline *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1 – “Knife Trick”! I know jack shit about Batman. OK, that’s not true, I know there’s Michael Keaton and Heath Ledger and Jim Carrey dressed up like the Question Mark Guy on TV who tells you how to get free money from the government. Also, something about the pencil trick! But this isn’t about the pencil trick. It’s about the knife trick!

Batman (Vol. 2) is part of a complete DC reboot that started in 2011 called “The New 52”. I’ve heard that there were polarizing opinions of this particular reboot from longtime fans, but since I’m absolutely NOT a longtime fan and since 2011 was the first time that every series simultaneously starts again with Issue #1 since 1938, I consider it a perfect launching point for my fruitful DC Comics reading career. I’m not reading Golden Age shit where Superman spends half the issue selling Fig Newtons! Hell no!

And so we begin Batman, Volume 2, Issue #1, “Knife Trick”! This better be worth it or someone’s getting smacked! Again, if you have access to this issue, feel free to read along for the best shitty experience of a lifetime.

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1 [November, 2011]
Written by: Scott Snyder
“Knife Trick”

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1

I don’t know what the FUCK is going on. We start with some sort of soliloquy from Mr. Batman himself about how residents of Gotham can submit their own three-words-or-less description for the “Gotham is…” section of the local paper. Mostly stuff like “Gotham is shit” or “Gotham is really shitty” or “Gotham is shit fuck shit”. Meanwhile, he appears to be fighting bad guys when, suddenly, the JOKER HIMSELF pops in to help! The Joker! Helping Batman! Even I know that’s crazy! What is going on?!

Next, we see Batman talking to Commissioner Gordon about Arkham Asylum, which is a video game for the Xbox 360! Actually, it appears that Batman has been snooping around the nuthouse looking for a guard named Dan Matthews. They say the name enough times that I filed it away in my IMPORTANT brain bin, but I already forgot it! Give the guy a less non-descript name. Like Chuck Fuckerman, or Spiro Agnew.

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1

–shit! Turncoat piece of shit! The Joker is a turncoat piece of shit. Of FUCKING shit!

Now we cut to Bruce Wayne hanging out in his, uh, lab? Does Bruce Wayne have a lab? The Joker is with him, it seems, and these two knuckleheads are discussing Wayne’s fancy new contact lenses that let him access his nerd computers remotely. It is then revealed that the Joker is Dick in disguise, which EXPLAINS WHY JOKER WAS HELPING HIM AT THE ASYLUM! OHHHHH! Dick is Robin, right? Man, this is gonna be tough for me. Bear with me here.

In the next scene we’re at Wayne Manor where Bruce Wayne is hosting a fancy-ass party and giving a fancy-ass speech about how the people of Gotham shouldn’t be worrying about what Gotham City “is”, but rather what it “can be” or “will be” or “it depends on what your definition of ‘is’ is”. Ha! Bill Clinton. Anyway, Wayne’s speech is incredibly inspiring, and I can tell that this is the case from the various facial expressions of his inspired party attendees. Bruce Wayne promises to fund efforts to restore the city to a less Detroit-like state, which we all know is futile. Throwing money at a problem doesn’t always make that problem go away, Brucey. He also ends up encountering some guy named Lincoln March during the event, who is drawn identically to Bruce Wayne except with better-combed hair. March intends to run for mayor. I’m guessing he’ll be dead by Issue #3. After eavesdropping on a Commish Gordon phone call about a murder, Wayne puts on his Batman pants and heads out.

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1

Apparently every new Bruce Wayne clone takes turns playing Robin.

CRIME TIME! There’s a murdered guy in his underwear pinned to an apartment wall with a bunch of knives stuck in him. The knives have owl symbols on them, and since the first six issues of this series follow a storyline called The Court of Owls, I’m guessing these owl symbols are just as important, IF NOT MORE SO, than this Dan Whosits fella.

This crime is a bad crime, as it turns out. It’s even more crime-y than meets the eye, because written on the walls with paint thinner was the message “Bruce Wayne Will Die Tomorrow” that Batman discovered by lighting the wall on fire, which is a cool thing to do to an apartment building that probably has other people besides the dead guy in it. Has Bruce Wayne learned NOTHING from the Surfside condo collapse??

During the scene, Batman took some skin discovered under the victim’s fingernails and sent it to his lab through the back of his hand somehow (?). Alfred (or, as I call him, MR. BUTLER) ran some tests and the results were already in: BATMAN IS NOT THE FATHER! But he is, I guess, to Dick Grayson, and that’s who the DNA matches with. Dick Grayson is Robin! I think that’s true. This is how the issue ends, complete with the tagline “Because above everything, Gotham is… a mystery.” Ooooohhhh, chills!

Batman (Vol. 2), Issue #1

The Bruce Wayne clone is trying to get the other Bruce Wayne clone to help the Bruce Wayne clone to satisfy the agenda of the Bruce Wayne clone.

Final Thoughts

I don’t know what’s going on yet! I don’t like how the artist made ten other people in the comic look like Bruce Wayne. I think Commissioner Gordon needs to shave off his Sex Offender Registry mustache. Why does somebody want to kill Bruce Wayne? Not just Batman, but Bruce Wayne! Do they not want Gotham restored to some fictional former glory? How is Dick Grayson aka Maybe-Robin tied into this? Did he kill the guy with owl knives? Why didn’t he use his robin knives? Ha! OK, and why doesn’t Commissioner Gordon know that Bruce Wayne is Batman yet? Is he a stupid man?

All will be revealed in the next excited chapter of the saga!

Or maybe not.


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