New Rocknowledgy Episode 40 is UP yall!!!

Alahoyus truest believers!
 It is I Valient Himself back with the Nov episode of Rocknowledgy.... Yeah I'm a few days late. It happens. I was in Europe all month. Anyway, this is a helluva show that me and the T-6000 whipped up for ya. Oh- if it looks like somehow you missed episode 39, its because last month I was going crazy after my dad's passing, and basically just called it the wrong thing. Anyway- the Tribute to my Pop episode is actually 39 not 38. Besides that- thanks to all of you all over the world reaching out and sending me your condolences. I'm so grateful for all the people I've met over the world (and the ones I've only spoken to online...). You all keep me going, with writing, rocking, singing, painting, drawing, thinking, and the fact that you are still around after all these years makes me feel successful in my endevours. Hope everyone had a good beginning to holidays whether you're celebrating Thanksgiving or Chanukah or whatever else was on your plate. Sit back and enjoy, and I'll have something else ready for your stocking come XMESS.
Thanks yall!!

CHECK IT OUT HERE: http://rocknowledgy.libsyn.com/

or here's a direct link fer yer phone! http://traffic.libsyn.com/rocknowledgy/Rocknowledgy_Episode_40.mp3

Episode 40 playlist: T-6000 intro,
 Lucifer's Friend- Natural Born Mover,
 Peter Tevis- A Gringo Like Me,
 Status Quo- Oh Baby,
 The Datsuns- In Love,
 Pat Travers- Rock'N'Roll Suzie,
 Thor- Sleeping Giant,
 Angelo Badalamenti- Red Bats With Teeth,
 Frank Black- (I want to live on an) Abstract Plain,
 Tuff Darts- Rats,
 Al Wilson- The Snake,
 Wishbone Ash- Blowin' Free,
 Orange Goblin- They Come Back (Harvest of Skulls),
 Socrates Drank The Conium- Killer,
 Gogogo Airheart- I Knew (unreleased version),
 Alan Parsons Project- The Eye In The Sky,
 Eddie Vedder- No Ceiling,
 Hawkwind- Master of the Universe,
 Was Not Was- Walk The Dinosaur

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985)

"The trained mind does not need a watch. Watches are a confidence trick invented by the Swiss." - Chiun

"It would be better for you to eat this can than what is inside of it. Why must everything in this country be coated with monositi-... monosoti..." - Chiun, "Monosodium glutamate. You can't even say it." - Remo, "I can say "rat droppings." That does not mean I want to eat them." - Chiun

"All I can promise you is terror for breakfast, pressure for lunch, and aggravation for sleep. Your vacations will be two minutes when you're not looking over your shoulder, and if you live to draw a pension, it'll be a miracle." - Conn

An old favorite of me and my pop. Here we have Fred Ward playing an ex cop turned super assassin. This film is based on the "Destroyer" men's novel series that began in 1971. A pretty bizarre little story that was supposed to serve as the introduction to a James Bond style character, in hopes of starting a franchise. When that didn't work they tried a television pilot. Then I guess they gave up. With a cameo by Wilford Brimley, this one always made me smile. I give you REMO WILLIAMS: THE ADVENTURE BEGINS!!!

An ex-military cop gets a call out to some docks and is ambushed. Then his car is dumped in the river and he is presumed dead by his cop friends. They have a funeral for him and all that. When the cop comes to in the hospital, much to his surprise, his face has been rebuilt and some dude is standing over him telling him he's going to now be named after his bedpan. "Remo" isn't having it, so he tries to escape in an ambulance, only to find the dude is in the ambulance. His name is Macready. He takes him to meet his new boss, Wilford Brimley.

Wilford tells Remo that he is now employed by a organization called CURE that operates outside of the government effectively policing it. He says the government is corrupt and its their job to keep them in line. Remo's job will be enforcer (or destroyer if you will). So Mac takes him to his first "assignment". He's supposed to kill the target inside. Remo tells the dude in there to watch out. The elderly Asian gentleman ends up being his target and dodges the bullets fired at him. The target ends up really being his trainer Chiun. He's there to show Remo that he has a lot to learn. And then we see that Chiun doesn't like him very much. Or really he thinks that theres no way he can get such an older man trained in time to be of any real benefit to their organization. Chiun is a master of a rare type of martial arts called Sinanju.

So we have a good portion of the movie devoted to Remo's training. There is much haranguing, jeering, and derision from Chiun who puts the pressure on hard. And in the spirit of ROCKY and KARATE KID, we have several montages of our protagonist finally becoming the man he is supposed to be. Dodging bullets and running across water. However, Remo's training is cut short when Wilford sends over papers requesting him to get info on some dude he's supposed to kill. The dude turns out to be a defense contractor who's making shitty weapons and selling them to the government. But he's a powerful dude cause if you cross him you usually disappear. Also this Major chick is doing some investigating of her own. She sees the weapons fail and questions the guy Grove about it. Grove sicks his boys on her, and they follow her to the Statue of Liberty. They try to kill Remo, but he does some fancy footwork atop the Statue and eludes them. He informs Wilford and Mac and they tell him if it all goes wrong they'll die and if he messes it up Chiun will kill him.

So Remo and Mac dodge dogs and infiltrate a warehouse owned by Grove to check on the weapons and this satellite activates and is destroyed by a laser. Guards come out and capture Mac but not before he slips Remo a disc. Remo then escapes and Mac commits suicide rather than spill any beans to Grove's goons. Wilford confirms that HARP is a fake and Grove can be assassinated. So Remo goes to the weapons test facility and gets locked in a gas chamber with a goon and the Major. Remo kicks the goons ass and uses his diamond tooth to break the glass and escape. They find Chiun and steal a truck with no brakes. As it crashes, Remo and the Major jump out but Chiun can't. He escapes unscathed anyway. Then Remo takes on the bad guys riding a log flying through the air and making it drop onto a jeep. Anyway, I don't wanna give away the very end. But yes, you should check this one out. Its good 80s dude action fun.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Superman II (1980)

"Come to me, Superman! I defy you! Come and kneel before Zod! Zod!" - General Zod

"Guy's a clod. Promises were made, gifts exchanged. I gotta hand it to you, you know. You always told the truth, a guy always knew where he stood with you." - Lex Luthor

"When? Where the hell have you been, mac, on a desert island?" - Diner owner to Superman

This was always my favorite superhero movie as a little dude. For some reason, 3 evil super beings with the same powers as Superman was such an awesome concept. They had the smart general (Zod), the hot female (Ursa), and the oversized brute (Non). Now the version I watched of this for this review was the much talked about "Richard Donner" cut. This cut is a good bit longer with more Marlon Brando as Jor-El and extended footage in the beginning telling more about the Phantom Zone, etc. I think its quite a superior film (no pun intended) to the Richard Lester cut from 1980. No reason to go into the details of why the switched and all that, you can look that up for yourself online. What we have here is a classic film where Superman is not only up against his biggest threat yet, but dealing with his desire to BE a human. Its a well written gem of a flick. I present to you Christopher Reeve, Gene Hackman, Marlon Brando, and Margot Kidder in SUPERMAN II !!!

This film is a very different film than the first cut that everyone has come to love. Even so, its still a better film. It makes more sense. See Richard Donner also directed the first SUPERMAN movie. They were actually filming them at the same time, so his sense of storyline was completely thrown out when he was let go from the movie. He had filmed 75% of it as well, so when they reconstructed this, it was as his vision was originally intended. Now the flick starts off with Jor-El banishing Zod, Ursa, and Non to the Phantom Zone. Then when Krypton exploded, the explosion sent their weird flying disc prison on the same trajectory as baby Kal-el's spaceship. Then we get a flashback scene from the first movie, showing the missile that Superman sent into space is what actually broke the super villains prison allowing them to escape.

So the villains head toward the moon and wreak havoc on some astronauts stationed there. Then they make their way toward Earth. Meanwhile Lex Luthor is making his escape from jail by hot air balloon and Lois is trying to trick Clark into revealing that he is really Superman. She tries by jumping out of the Daily Planet window but Clark saves her and makes her feel foolish. Then they are sent on assignment to Niagra Falls and she finally tricks him into revealing himself to her. Then they fall in love and Lois begins to go crazy because she can't tell anybody about who he is. Zod arrives on "planet Houston" and destroys a hick town. They fly to Washington and make the president "kneel before Zod". Everyone keeps telling Zod he'll be sorry when Superman comes to town. So Zod challenges Superman and its broadcast over all televisions the world over and they await his answer.

Superman doesn't hear any of this shit though, because he takes Lois up to his house at the Fortress of Solitude and spends the night with her. Then he asks the ghost of his dad what he should do. He decides to become a regular old pecker head shitty human and takes a bath in red Kryptonite. Bad timing. Then they start to head home and Clark gets the shit kicked out of himself in a redneck bar. Then he sees something on television about Zod taking over the Earth. Now he really feels like a shithead. So he goes back to his dad's ghost and his dad's ghost is like,"yeah yeah, I knew this was gonna happen", and he tells him he has to physically USE all the rest of the power in the Fortress to make it happen. And basically after it was done, he could never talk to him again. So he does that. Meanwhile, Lex had flown there and figured out that the fortress was Superman's house, and he then flies to the White House to exchange that pertinent information to the big 3 baddies for control over Australia.

SO... Zod decides Superman's true weakness is his love for the humans. Ursa suggests to him that they take the one he loves the most. So Luthor takes them to the Daily Planet to kidnap Lois. Then Superman shows up to whoop ass. But after a lengthy battle, decides that 3 of them with powers equally matched to his own was too much. He was outnumbered and couldn't win. So he flies off towards the Fortress. Superman knowing that Luthor was a treacherous jerk, let's him in on the chamber that takes away your power's secrets. Luthor rats him out according to plan, so they put Superman in the chamber, but ho-ho! Supes was too smart for them. He reversed the polarity on the chamber and with all of their powers drained, Supes makes light work of them. Then he pulls that reverse time trick and sends them back to the Phantom Zone, Luthor back to jail, and Lois back to not knowing who the Hell he really is. Which was just fine with him. Should you? DUHHHHH.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D. (1990)

"I was depressed, I was confused and I was turning Japanese." - Harry Griswold

"At the end of Mercury's next journey, the Dragon shall dance through the hoop of Jupiter. If at that moment the Monkey will ride the Jaguar and the Tiger will feast on the Nubile, the order of the Universe will be such that the Evil One will reign supreme for Eternity!" - Lotus

"I like a dog-faced monkey that has an appreciation for expensive sports cars." - Sgt. Kabukiman

I was so looking forward to watching this for a very long time. I thought for some reason that this was supposed to be a really good bad flick. I assumed since a lot of times when you see a promotion for Troma films you usually have two mascots dressed up or at least a guy in a Toxie mask and a guy in a Sgt. Kabukiman mask. Boy was I ever duped. This is one of those films that takes at least three or four tries even to get started. If you try to put this on and are even the slightest bit tired, you're done for. And maybe that's what you're looking for in a bad flick. Not me jack. This is grade "D" horseshit. I present to you, one for the books, SGT. KABUKIMAN N.Y.P.D.!!!

So apparently in NYC, there's a big underground Kabuki community. Legend has foretold that this old guy is supposed to pass his super secret Kabuki powers to a young actor in this community. However, the dude who was to become the superhero was brutally murdered along with his entire family. So the spirit of this mythic Japanese warrior is just hanging there inside of the old grandfather where unbeknownst to him his beneficiary has just been killed. Enter our protagonist goofball cop Harry Griswold. He narrates the story as if its a film noir. He's investigating the murder of the dude. We are introduced to and can tell right away something is up with this billionaire philanthropist named Reginald Stewart. He is responsible for bringing the Kabuki theater out of the small playhouses and into the spotlight in Manhattan. Meanwhile this chick Lotus is backstage somewhere preparing with her grandfather for the Kabuki actor who was killed to become the new incarnation of the hero that is to save not only the city, but the universe.

This grandfather is sucking down a box of mealworms just as our boy Harry is suckin on a chili dog. We're supposed to surmise that Harry is simultaneously going through the same ritual that this actor was supposed to go through. Lotus is getting super anxious since their dude hasn't showed up to receive his powers and she begs her grandfather to give them to her instead. He goes out for his performance with Harry in the audience, one of the Kabuki guys pulls out a machine gun just as Stewart and his entourage splits. More dudes pop outta the stage floor and fill grandpa full of lead. The audience laughs away and Lotus is screaming her head off. Harry figures it out, starts a riot and charges the stage. A thug tries to kill Lotus, but Harry straddles her and shoots his dick off. Lotus hates Harry right from the start. She throws him on top of her grandfather who kisses him and the magic mealworms jump into Harry's mouth signifying that he is the new Kabukiman.

Now we get another 45 minutes or so of Harry trying to cover up to his coworkers and explain why he's always dressing up in "dresses" and has paint on his face. We get more insight on just how bad Stewart is and what all he's involved in. Fast food chains, crooked churches. He even kills his own nephew. We get Captain vs Harry cop shit, and we get Lotus talking about women's rights. Harry has a cop girlfriend who was getting really close to the case. Finding out more than she should. So she gets attacked in the park and Harry tries to help but gets beat up enough to turn him into the full Kabukiman. Utilizing all his powers such as missile chopsticks, he defeats the thugs, but his girl is sent to the hospital. Stewart sends one of his thugs to the hospital to finish her off.

So over the next hour (this movie's true fault is its length. It should have been edited for sure), Harry decides he can't do anything but figure out his powers. And he keeps getting in trouble with his boss. AND he needs Lotus to help him and there are montages, and they of course fall in love. And he turns into a clown for some reason, and there are chase scenes and there's this part about a shirt thief at the local dry cleaners. Then they catch Stewart in the act but the bungling cops let this one chick loose and then Stewart is able to enact his plan as "the evil one". "The tiger begins to feast on the nubile" as it goes, and Stewart begins to become the Evil One, but Harry gets knocked out. He comes to and begins to fight what looks like the Hobgoblin from Marvel Comics. Luckily Lotus stops the monkey from riding the Jaguar, but did was Harry saved from the resulting explosion??? You'll have to sit through this one to find out! Should you find out? Well, upon second viewing, its not much worse than any of the other Troma flicks which I happen to enjoy... It just suffers from being too long. So... maybe watch it on fast forward.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Evil Dead II (1987)

"Then let's head on down into that cellar and carve ourselves a witch." - Ash

"I don't think so. We just cut up our girlfriend with a chainsaw. Does that sound "fine"? - Mirror Ash

"There's something out there. That... that witch in the cellar is only part of it. It lives... out in those woods, in the dark... something... something that's come back from the dead." - Ash

Sequel or remake? This usually is what people talk about when they are talking about this flick. I guess in the context of the film itself, it doesn't really fucking matter. Is it worth a shit? That's the question we should be asking. In all actuality its probably a bit of both sequel AND remake. A little retelling of the beginning and rewriting and polishing to make it a better story. Is it the best movie ever? No. Is it incredibly scary? No. Is it completely awesome and full of gross out, slapstick horror comedy? Yes. And with that I give you Bruce Campbell in (the middle film of Sam Raimi's trilogy) EVIL DEAD II !!!

So, second verse same as the first right? Not quite actually. In what is supposed to be a recap of the first movie (or so they say) we get a fresh perspective on our hero Ash and instead of his sister and gang of friends, we have his girlfriend with him. Very quickly they get excited for a romantic evening in this old cabin when Ash finds a tape recorder in the bedroom. On this recorder a professor explains he's made a wild discovery with his family in tow. It seems they found "the Book of the Dead" in the back of some castle and he brought it back to this cabin to decode it. He then recites some lines from the book that cause a wicked smoke to rise up out of the woods and give birth to true evil. From there Ash's girl Linda is out into the woods and her head comes off. Ash buries her and then goes back to the cabin where her dead body taunts him all night until he goes insane.

Just before daybreak, he's out in the woods fighting this evil and it throws him through the woods seemingly for miles and he hits a tree and splashes down in a puddle. When he gets up, he's possessed. But the sun comes up and the smoke goes back into the ground and seemingly so does his possession. He passes back out in the puddle for most of the day and then tries to drive his car outta there. No dice, the bridge is out. Suddenly, the daughter of the professor comes back from whereever and meets her dude. They can't get there by bridge so she hires this local redneck and his girlfriend to take them back out to her father's cabin. It seems she had been off looking for missing pages of the book.

Meanwhile Ash has been freaking himself out in the cabin. Talking to himself, seeing things, and finally having to cut off his own possessed hand which is trying its best to kill him. When Annie (the daughter) makes it back, they have to lock him in the basement because they think he's a killer. Finally they realize whats up and the professor's dead wife starts to attack Ash in the basement. They let him out and he ends up having to kill Annie's boyfriend who is also possessed. Then they're haunted for at least another half hour by Annie's dead mom.

The redneck makes them go try to help him find his girlfriend who has disappeared but Ash goes crazy again. Annie stabs the redneck and throws him in the cellar where her mother turns him into gallons of blood that sprays everywhere. Ash almost kills Annie, but sees Linda (his girlfriend from the beginning)'s necklace and transforms back into himself. Then they give each other a pep talk and he glues a chainsaw to his nub and fights off the demons as she recites the missing pages incantation that opens up a portal sucking everything back to the year 1300. Unfortunately it sucked up Ash as well and after quickly dispersing of a screaming flying hideous monster is hailed by the knights as their prophesized hero. To which he screams, "no, no, noooo, no......NO!!!" And this sets us up for the sequel which actually did come out a few years later. Should you? You already should have. Yes.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Chrome And Hot Leather (1971)

"...no man, you don't get it. You leave when you're excused. Now say it: P-L-E-A-S-E may I be excused?" - T.J.

"Don't worry about a thang boys, its just like pluckin' feathers off a hot hen." - Hank

"Holy Mackaral boy- ya done lost again. The only way we gonna get rich is to own tha casina!" - Jim

Here we have a motorcycle movie from 1971. The only thing different from this biker flick from any other biker flick is that usually we have someone from one of the biker gangs is one of the heroes. Or possibly we have a skirmish betwixt two different biker gangs and we see who winds up on top. This one is young veterans vs. biker gang and it paints the bikers in a negative light. There was a time when the biker was glorified and this shows the turn that begun to show bikers as more trouble than they were worth. Possibly stemming from negative newspaper articles and books such as Hell's Angels by Hunter S. Thompson, the wild biker was now the enemy, not some bohemian ideal lifestyle. Starring MARVIN GAYE (!), today I bring you CHROME AND HOT LEATHER!!!

Mitch a his squadron of Green Berets have just been released to head home from Vietnam. Mitch's girlfriend and her friend and driving down some long stretch of what looks to be Sedona or somewhere in the desert in California. They run afoul of a biker gang called the Wizards, and one of the bikers decides right then and there to make an example of them. He ends up running the girl's car off the road after smashing in their windshield with a chain whip killing both of them instantly. After being yelled at by the group's leader TJ, they hightail it outta there before anyone sees them and go into hiding.

So Mitch gets home and realizes his old lady has been murdered. He of course vows revenge. First things first. He goes looking around for any motorcycle gangs that live in the area since the person who found her saw some iron horses riding off from the scene while the car was still down in the ravine smoking. One part I don't understand is how exactly are all of those Green Berets from the same town? They were all just drinking together in a bar in Bangkok asking where they are all going, and Mitch is the only one who mentions going "home" to his girl. Seems unlikely that they were all from like Riverside, CA. Anyway, they hear about this gang called the Devils and then almost get into a fight in a bar with some other bikers asking about the Devils. So they decide to ditch their army fatigues, and buy matching red Kawasaki's(?) to fool bikers into thinking they're a gang. Only problem? They don't know how to ride.

So they head out to the desert and learn to ride these Kawasaki's in the sand. A brief montage later and they are pretty prolific. Then they're back out looking for the Devils. They split up and arent' having much luck until they come by this old gas station and Mitch meets up with some of the members of the Wizards. He follows them back to a bar they frequent and Mitch actually gets in with the chick of the dude who killed his old lady. By this time there's a power rift growing between T.J. (the leader) and Gabriel (the dude who killed the chicks). Gabriel thinks TJ is getting soft but TJ whoops his ass and shows him how soft he is. He even grants Mitch the alone time he needs with Gabriels chick. And Gabriel splits sulking.

Eventually Mitch meets back up with the other berets at the gas station and he fills them in. Then they go to an old friend in the military and secure all the bombs, guns, rockets, and whatever else bullshit they need to spook and beat the hell out of this biker gang. Then there's a whole big set up and they trap them up in the mountains and scare them and if you really wanna know the end, you'll just have to check it out yourself. Problem is... Should you? Well, I can't say that I fully back this one. There are at lease 100 other ones that are probably better. That's all I'll say. But if you like biker trash, go for it!

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Watership Down (1978)

"All the world will be your enemy, Prince of a Thousand enemies. And when they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you; digger, listener, runner, Prince with the swift warning. Be cunning, and full of tricks, and your people will never be destroyed." - Narrator

"I'm in a mist! Everything's bad! Oh, I've got a funny feeling in my toe! *Hraka*!" - Bigwig mocking Fiver

"Look. Look. That's the place for us. High, lonely hills, where the wind and the sound carry, and the ground's as dry as straw in a barn. That's where we ought to be. That's where we have to get to." - Fiver

Wow.  I started this review a good long while ago.  Then I got super busy.  Its been a long time, but I've watched a shitload of flicks and kept notes, so prepare yourself to be immersed.  It is the holiday season though and maybe we'll all have time to catch up on some old favorites.  This film is based on a book written by Richard Adams, the same man who brought us PLAGUE DOGS.  Although this story deals with displaced rabbits instead of dis(mis?)placed doggies.  Anyway, its not nearly as heavy as PLAGUE DOGS, but in the vein of animated apocalyptic animal movies such as SECRET OF NIMH, or ANIMAL FARM, this pill should be easily swallowed.  I give you WATERSHIP DOWN!!!

So there's a quick prologue telling us that the animal god Frith made all the animals and ended up getting pissed at the prince of rabbits because he wouldn't control his rabbit constituency.  So Frith made rabbits taste good to a great many other animals.  But then just to give them the upper hand and be kind of wishy washy and fucked up the ways some gods can be, he made them swift and cunning and said, "yeah they'll be alright."  Fast forward, and we have this psychic weakling rabbit named "Fiver" who starts running around telling everyone they have to get the hell out of there because something bad is going to happen.  The only one who vaguely believes him is his brother Hazel.  They decide to go tell the rabbit mafia "the Owlsy", but they tell them to bugger off.  Hazel gives in to his brother and decides to help save as many as he can and they convince about 8 to come with them but end up having to fight the rabbit cops to get away.  Worse than that?  The only chick with them gets eaten by a hawk on day two.  BUMMER.

One of the Owlsy rabbits Bigwig comes with them.  Then they end up meeting this other rabbit named Cowslip who invites them to come hang in his "warren" with all his boys.  But Fiver thinks this is a bad plan and him and Hazel split.  The rest of the group kind of wants to stay and just as Bigwig is giving them the business for "making waves", he gets trapped in a snare and almost dies.  They get him out and realize that those other rabbits trick outsiders into coming to their spot and a farmer feeds them and protects them if they give him sacrifices.  Which doesn't make any fucking sense to me.  How did they strike this deal with the farmer?  Sounds suspect.

So they find a bunch of chicks at this one farm but they can't rescue them b/c the animals are too tough.  Then they actually find the "watership down" warren that Fiver has been seeing in his visions.  Hazel becomes the chief and they start hanging out with this pelican.  The pelican tells them they need chicks and he'll go scout out the farm for them.  Hazel gets shot, but the pelican helps him and tells them he found another dangerous warren full of chicks for all of them. They find a wounded rabbit cop named Holly from their old warren who tells them they shouldn't go to this Efrafan warren because its a totalitarian state and ran by a bunch of pricks.  So here's where the facade falls away and we realize its definitely about politics.  No SMURF analogies here, its right in your face.  So Bigwig infiltrates the Efrafan warren and becomes a rabbit cop again and starts spreading the word that he's their to rescue the chicks.  There's this HUGE rabbit boss named General Woundswort and he's tough.  Bigwig gets the chicks to split with him and with help of the bird they escape down river and back home.

So the Efrafan rabbits track them back to the watership down warren.  They tell them to surrender the escapees and Bigwig.  Hazel tells them Hell no, but then the Efrafan rabbits take siege on the warren.  Fiver passes out and has a vision about a dog.  Hazel gets the idea to let loose a dog to kill all the Efrafan rabbits, but he's worried that it'll kill his warren too.  So he prays to Frith to take his life for his warren.  Frith hears him but leaves it up to him.  So Hazel looses the dog and it comes and breaks up a heinous fight between the General and Bigwig.  The General tries to take on the dog and we'll leave it there.  Check it out for yourself and see what becomes of the watership down warren.  Should you?  Yeah if you can score a copy.  It should be easier to find than PLAGUE DOGS, and you'll cry less as well.

ROCKNOWLEDGY FINALLY BACK! NEW EP 39 UP (TRIBUTE TO MY FATHER)

UPDATE**** Sorry I labeled this episode 38... my brain really is fried.  This was ep 39.  I say 38 on the actual episode, but make no mistake, the tribute to my dad ep is actually 39. thanks!)

Hey everyone. So so sorry for the long break. After a long hiatus, I was geared up to begin again with a new episode on October 10th. Unfortunately my Earth father passed away and it was heavy and terrible and all that. So, without saying much more, I decided to push the other episode and make my first show back in many many months be an all out tribute to him and basically lay out my education in music (or my "Rocknowledgy" if you will) that started way way back and share with you guys some stories about my old man and some jams he laid on me that I never wanna forget. So thanks for being patient with me, I should be back with episodes once a month from here on out, so if you're a new comer, add me up on itunes or a list serve or whatever and keep coming back for more. Enough talk, check out the show!

 RIP GH Abernethy.

http://traffic.libsyn.com/rocknowledgy/Rocknowledgy_Ep_38.mp3

check more eps here (and back up on itunes asap): http://rocknowledgy.libsyn.com/

Song list: intro by T-6000,
 Manhattan Transfer- Boy from NYC,
 ZZ Top- Sharp Dressed Man,
 Bob Dylan- Rainy Day Women #12 & 35,
 The Doors- Spanish Caravan,
 Crosby Stills Nash & Young - Teach Your Children,
 The Seeds- Pushin' Too Hard,
 Sam the Sham- Little Red Ridin' Hood,
 The Chambers Brothers - Time Has Come Today,
 The Lemon Pipers- Green Tamborine,
 Bubble Puppy - Hot Smoke & Sassafras,
 James Brown - I Got the Feelin',
 Atlanta Rhythm Section - So Into You, Country Joe &
The Fish - The "Fish" Cheer/ I-Feel-Like-Im-Fixin-To-Die Rag (live at Woodstock),
 Barry McGuire- Eve of Destruction,
 Chicago Transit Authority- I'm A Man,
 Steely Dan- Don't Take Me Alive,
 Edwin Starr- 25 Miles,
 Temptations- Can't Get Next To You,
 outro by T-6000,
 Mamas and the Papas- Words of Love

 Thanks to my sponsors this week: Eric Walls/Jersey Beat, Thrashhits.com, Sarateashop.com, Green Machine from Germany, Village Pawn in Greenville, NC, & Friends With Music podcast!!!

NEW NEW Rocknowledgy Update!!

Excelsior Rocknowledgists! I'd like to announce that I have enough sponsors to move forward with the new episodes of Rocknowledgy and it will be coming now very very soon! Thanks to everyone for being patient and being psyched on killer jams and the ramblings of a very handsome nerd! Keep yer eyes peeled here for more!!!

Rocknowledgy Update!!!

A company has pledged to sponsor a portion of the show for one year. That's 12 months, 12 ads on 12 shows for $60. If I get three more companies to do that, then the show is paid for for a year. Anyone know anyone who may be interested, send them my way. Anyone else who wants to donate, $5 guarantees you an ad or an extended shoutout or whatever you want really. I have some really awesome interviews planned and of course tons of the killer jams that rocknowledgists have become accustomed to hearing. Thanks again from me and the T-6000. Hopefully you'll be hearing from me soon. Questions or donations (paypal to) smokedoggg@gmail.com.

ROCKNOWLEDGY FANS!!! Want Rocknowledgy to come back???

Alahoyus Rocknowledgists! So, I want to keep doing Rocknowledgy, but the service I use to keep it on iTunes and posted up so everyone can have it for free now costs me $20 a month. To keep doing Rocknowledgy and make it free for everyone across the universe, I either need to solicit enough adds to pay the $20 a month fee, or garnish enough donations from you the fans and rocknowledgists to keep the boat afloat. So here's my plan: IF you all want me to keep Rocknowledgy going: I'm giving up adspace to sponsors for $5 a month for a 30 ad about your business or whatever you want. It'll reach over 50 countries and several thousand downloads per episode. If you're interested send me an email at smokedoggg@gmail.com. Alternatively if you'd like to just donate to the Rocknowledgy fund, you can Paypal me at smokedoggg@gmail.com as well. Please write on there that it is for Rocknowledgy so that it will go to the appropriate place. If I get enough bread after this first month of solicitation and all goes well, Ill commit myself to (at least) one episode per month. I never had to commit before because I just did it leisurely, but its so much fun and so many of you have hollered at me about it over the last few months of tours, I feel like I need to bring it back asap. Ok, let the commerce begin. You want an ad? Send me an email. You wanna donate for all the great jams you've discovered? Make it happen. Thanks from me and the T-6000. Jam for yall soon. Valient Himself

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: The Crying Game (1992)

"...and as they both sink beneath the waves, the frog cries out, "Why did you sting me, Mr. Scorpion? For now we both will drown!" Scorpion replies, "I can't help it. It's in my nature!" - Jody

"Who knows the secrets of the human heart?" - Col

"You ever try picking up your teeth with broken fingers?" - Fergus

Here's a classic thriller that is almost always ruined or preceded by someone already TELLING you what has happened or is going to happen and ruining the surprise for you. Kind of like that first M. Night Shamalama flick, SIXTH SENSE. I never watched that because someone told the deal before I even heard of it. So fuck it, why do I need to see it now? The suspense is gone. So for whatever reason, maybe you actually haven't heard of the deal with this movie and the surprise is intact, let me go ahead and put a giant *********** SPOILER WARNING SPOILER WARNING SPOILER WARNING SPOILER WARNING!!!!! ************ on here, so that I'm not the one who f'd it all up for you. Also for some reason, I always got this movie mixed up with CRY BABY. So I was always like, "big deal, Johnny Depp has a weiner, who cares, nothing special." Anyway, that's a different movie. This one is Forrest Whitaker, a bunch of Irish people, and a few English blokes in THE CRYING GAME!!!

So Jody (Whitaker) is this British soldier cruising for some ass in Ireland at a country fair. He's got this one chick named Jude hemmed up and she lures him down toward some place where they can get comfortable. Much to the chagrin of our man Jody, it turns out to be a trap and a bunch of Irish IRA dudes jump outta the bushes and beat the hell out of him and tie him up. They mean to hold him for ransom and threaten to execute him if some IRA soldiers are not released by the British. They kind of know all along that the Brits are never going to release him, but they go along with their plan nonetheless. Fergus is one of them that is more sympathetic and gets put in charge of watching over Jody. He sits with him for pretty much the whole three days and they develop a strange friendship, or a least they bond. Fergus has to pull out Jody's wiener for him so he can piss. Guess they should've thought that kind of stuff out beforehand. Anyway, it starts to look bad, and the other IRA guys are calling Fergus out for being kind to Jody. They treat him like shit, and tell Fergus it won't be any easier when they have to kill him. Jody tells Fergus that if they do have to kill him, he wants him to go to England and tell his girl Dil that he loves her and she was the best thing ever, blah blah blah. He also tells him a little moral story about the nature of things called "the scorpion and the frog".

Well it comes time to do it, and Fergus walks him out into the woods and Jody makes a run for it. Fergus screams for him to stop, but Jody runs out into a road and get slammed into by a big British army truck. So he's essentially killed by his own people. Fergus runs like a bastard, and the IRA hideout is exposed and shot full of holes. Fergus then escapes to England. A few years go by I think and Fergus starts to feel bad about the whole thing and he's constantly haunted by the ghost of Jody playing cricket. He goes to find this Dil and ends up getting a haircut from her and then follows her to a bar. Dil takes to Fergus right away and you can tell she's kind of a quirky chick. She speaks through the bartender to "Jimmy" (which is what Fergus is calling himself while he's in hiding from the IRA). He sees her sing the song "The Crying Game" at the bar. She has this English dude treat her like shit in public on the reg, and finally Fergus reluctantly confronts the dude. He threatens him and then starts hanging with Dil. He's very careful though not to do anything to let on that he knew Jody. Only after a while he starts to comment on the pictures she still has up of him.

Fergus starts to fall in love with Dil and they take it slow. Finally one day they begin to make love at her apartment and the camera pans down and BIG REVEAL: SHE HAS A DICK!!! Fergus FREAKS out accidently hitting her and busting her nose on his way to the bathroom to puke! He then splits. Finally after a while he feels super bad about the whole thing and leaves her a note. She eventually forgives him because she's in love with him too. All of a sudden, two of his ex IRA pals show up! He thought they were dead. The chick Jude is a real bitch and she tells him that if he doesn't help them kill a judge they'll kill him and Dil. So ol Fergus is in a real pickle. He has to start treating Dil weirdly because he doesn't want to reveal his secret to her and he also doesn't want her killed.

So Fergus, who even though he feels weird about it, still loves Dil and wants to protect her. So he cuts her hair, and puts her in dudes clothes. He then goes and inspects place where he's to assassinate the judge. He returns and finds Dil drunk as hell. He stays with her overnight and confesses to her about Jody. When he wakes up he's tied to the bed, unable to meet up with the IRA and kill the judge. The one prick IRA guy tries to kill the judge himself and is killed. Jude hauls ass over to Dil's to kill them, but instead is shot several times by Dil and then shot in the neck. Dil almost kills Fergus too, but then tries to kill herself. Fergus talks her into hiding and then wipes her prints off the gun and takes the fall for her and is made to serve 6 years. Then we see Dil visiting Fergus in prison several months later and she's counting the days till he gets out. Dil asks Fergus why he took the fall, and he tells the story of the scorpion and the frog, relaying that it was in his nature. Plus it was his fault that Jody died, so he probably felt he needed to atone for his sins. Pretty great flick. Should you see it? Yeah, hopefully you already have and I didn't just ruin it for you. I did warn you though.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Tremors (1990)

"Cold, my ass, he's dead! We killed it. We killed it! *FUCCKKKK YOOOOUUU!!!* - Val

"There's no way Walter Chang's getting his slick mits on this for no 15 bucks." - Earl

"I think I have a plan. Why don't we throw a bomb the way we want to go and then when it goes off, we run like goddamn bastards!... Pardon my French." - Rhonda

Man, this is one that I just missed out on forever. Now a great cheesy cult horror classic, this one had tons of names, used to be's, and almost was's! Kevin Bacon, Fred Ward, EGG CHEN!, Reba McEntire, and Michael Gross (FAMILY TIES) star in TREMORS!!!

Val (Bacon) and Earl (Ward) are handymen in a very small town in Nevada. They are trying to get out of town because they can't really save any money that only has fourteen residents. Finally one day after getting shit sprayed all over them they decide to pack the junk they have in the truck and split. They meet up with a young graduate student who's studying seismic phenomena in the area. On the way out, things keep happening that send the guys back into town. First off, they see an old man way up on an electrical power tower. Val figures he's drunk and goes up to bring him down. He soon realizes the old man is dead and dried up. They take him back into town figuring he died from dehydration after being drunk.

Then Val and Earl go see this dude named "Old Fred" who is a sheep herder. The only problem is all of the sheep are slaughtered and old Fred is dead and his head has a bed in the...dirt. He was dead, whatever. So they think a killer is on the loose and they go to tell the rest of the people in town. They tell these two road workers and then something grabs one of them by the drill and pulls him in the earth, and the other dude gets crushed beneath a pile of rocks. So Val tries to call the police from their town (Perfection), and the phones are dead, so they try to make it to the next town over (Bixby) to get help. Unfortunately there's the rock slide blocking the way and they are now trapped in town. They get ready to go back to town, but Val has the truck trapped in the rubble (he thinks). Back in town at Walter (Egg Chen)'s store, they see that some kind of underground snakes were wrapped around the back axle of the truck. That night, an old man and his wife who are building a house out in Perfection are swallowed up by the snakelike creatures, station wagon and all!

So Val & Earl set out for help on horseback the next morning and some of the snakes attack them. They turn out to really be 3 tongues that are hooked to a giant wormlike creature. It chases them and they run into the grad student Rhonda who is still out there with her readings. The giant worm dies when it crashes into an underground retaining wall and they figure out that there are 3 more of them in the area. One of them traps them out on some rocks because it can feel them move. They are blind but feel through vibrations in the land. So they spend the night on the rocks and escape to the truck in the morning by pole vaulting from rock to rock until they reach it. They get back to town but no one believes them until one of the worms busts through the ground and steals Egg Chen and sucks him into the ground. They then all rush into their homes and the store and up onto their roofs.

So the couple with all the weapons are back in their house and they hit everyone up by cb. They manage to kill one of the worms but another is tearing their underground bunker apart. Back in town, the foundations of the buildings are being torn apart and Val and Earl quickly realize the worms are going to eat them by making the town fall down around them. Suddenly they have an idea about dragging a tractor trailer bed with a bulldozer. They get it going and pick up the couple with the weapon supply. Then they head off into the desert. They THEN get trapped on more rocks because the worms become smart and dig a trench that foils their bulldozer plan. Then they start throwing bombs at the worms and nail one of them. But the last one is much more crafty than the others and it takes them a bit to come up with a spontaneous plan to off it. Finally, Earl urges Val into going for Rhonda who is kind of heinous. Should you? Why not? Its nothing special, but a pretty good stoned out watch.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Savage Streets (1984)

"You're a tough little bitch, aren't you? I like that. But I don't give second warnings. So consider yourself suspended." - Principal Underwood

"Well, well, well... what do we have here? The game's over, bitch. This time you're dead for sure. First, I'm gonna fuck you. Then, I'm gonna slice you into little pieces." - Fargo

"Go fuck an iceberg!" - Principal Underwood

"Ima hide that salami so far up in you, goddamn Christopher Columbus couldn't find it." - Fargo

my buddy Ryan Waste talked this flick up to me a long time before I was able to check it out. If you're a fan of gang flicks, exploitation trash, 80s grit, vigilante justice, or horror film stars Linda Blair or Linnea Quigly then you're in for a treat here. Almost a companion piece to CLASS OF 1984, this one should already be in your collection. Violence, girl's locker room fights, senseless gang murder and the ramifications of raping a girl's deaf sister are all packed into SAVAGE STREETS!!!

So Brenda and her friends have taken her little sister out on the town for the night. A gang of drug dealers who have a young progeny are similarly out doing their thing as well, shaking down low dealers for bread and ripping their girlfriends shirts off and what have you. To teach them a lesson, the girls steal the leader's convertible and drive off leaving them in the dust. The gang finds their car down the street later that night covered in garbage. They scream into the air and vow revenge.

The next day tensions rise all over the place. Brenda is in gym while her school rival is cheering on the squad outside. Brenda's deaf little sister is supposed to wait on her in the gym while she showers and then they'll go hang. However, Brenda gets in a fight in the locker room with her rival over some dimwitted dude and they are sent to the principal's office. While they're in there, the gang comes in and rapes her deaf sister. It's tough to watch. Brenda comes back and finds her sister missing. Her friends help her search for her sister and one of them screams. The girl goes to the hospital, and frustrated, the girls go out to the bar(?). Brenda is crying and getting supported by her friends. Meanwhile, the gang (the Scars) are there at the nightclub too. What are the chances? I thought this was NYC. Everyone at this high school goes to the same hangouts? Must be Brooklyn. Anyway, the gang is still shaking people down and grabbing chicks. They grab one of Brenda's friends (Francine) and some dudes try to stop them and start a fight. Francine stabs the head Scar in the back with a switchblade and escapes.

Vince, the young progeny starts freaking out. The gang shows up at school looking for Francine. Vince makes them promise not to hurt her. Brenda's teacher tries to reach out to her but she isn't having it. In another class, her rival again provokes her by calling her sister a "retard". Brenda rips her shirt off and her titties fall out in front of the whole class. The principal expels her. The gang finally catches up to Francine and Fadden (the leader) THROWS HER OFF A FUCKING OVERPASS! Vince freaks and runs off. He runs to the hospital room of the deaf girl and confesses everything in earshot of Brenda who chases him off and then goes home to take a hot bath.

Brenda sits in the hot bath contemplating while 80s rock music plays and then gets a crossbow and a bunch of beartraps and takes off in her Trakker. She heads over to Vince's house and tricks the dad into letting her in. She threatens to kill Vince unless he tells her where the gang is. Then she goes out to find them and corners the mohawk one and Fargo in a warehouse teasing them with a threesome. The two chase her into the warehouse simultaneously hoping to hurt her and fuck her. She puts a crossbow arrow through Fargo's neck, and then gets Red the mohawk dude. Vince takes out a loan from one of his bosses and is making a getaway until Fadden comes out of the shadows in an alley and runs over Vince with the convertible. He then goes to find the gang, but opens up the warehouse to his two dead buddies. He hears Brenda laughing at him in the distance. He fires off his pistol hoping to hit her, but gets an arrow in his thigh, and then another in the other. He gets caught in a snare and turned upside down, but manages to use the door to knock her out and down. He gets down but she escapes and runs into another paint supply warehouse. He's coming after her but just as she's about to get caught, she slings a pan of Gesso on his head and then sets him on fire. He screams and freaks out and dies. Then the cops come. Cut to a scene where all the girls including the deaf girl are at Francine's grave. The End. Was it worth it? Yeah, pretty much for the girls locker room scene alone. Check it out.

Bad/Awesome Flixxx Review: Explorers (1985)

"Look, I know I must look weird to you but how do you think you look to me? Listen, I watched four episodes of "Lassie" before I figured out why the little hairy kid never spoke. I mean, he rolled over, sure, he did that fine but, I don't think he deserved a series for that." - Wak

"Elephantitis is when something gets bloated and ugly like your ASS." - Ben

"I would like... cheese... go... to... hell..." - Heinlein the Mouse

This was SUCH AN AWESOME FLICK when I was a little duder. My lil adopted Earth brother is 11 now and i just told him he basically had to stop whatever he was doing and go watch this immediately. Rewatching it, there are so many little parts that i had forgotten about. I just remembered the basic plotline. Forgot that these guys were the losers. Makes me like it even more now, probably why I dug it so much in the first place. The film debuts of River Phoenix and Ethan Hawke in EXPLORERS!!!

When the flick begins 6th grader Ben (Hawke) is having a dream where he's flying over his town and then he's in some kind of computer or what looks to be an early TRON-like video game. He sees some kind of weird circuit board but he doesn't even know what it is. When he wakes up, he's watching THIS ISLAND EARTH (The movie they watch in the actual MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000: THE MOVIE) and its super loud and probably why he was having wild dreams in the first place. So he draws a picture of what he saw in his dream and takes it to his buddy at school the next day. His buddy is named Wolfgang (Phoenix) and he's super nerd. He is busy getting beaten up when Ben comes up and helps him pick up his scattered books. He tells him about the chip and shows him the drawing. He tells him don't worry because the kid who beat him up has elephantitis. Word gets back to dude and then Ben is fighting at lunch. Some other negative kid bails him out and runs from the bullies but drops his walkman. Ben follows him home and brings it back to him trying to thank him.

The thing about Ben is that he is SUPER DUPER FUCKING CHIPPER, POSITIVE, AND OPTIMISTIC about the future. About everything. He's so syrupy it makes you wanna puke. And the other kid has a bad home life, & as much as he hates to he takes Ben up on going to hang so he can get away from his abusive alcoholic dad. They stop by Wolfgang's on the way home and he's built the circuit already and when they connect it, some kind of forcefield puts a hole through all of his dime store novels... in a row... like a bullet. So they freak out and then the next day, he's figured some more shit out and he makes whatever the force is visible and says he can program it to go anywhere in space on a fixed grid. Some shenanigans ensue and they end up meeting over the course of the next half hour (for a few weeks) and do tests... way up on a hill, and then they accidentally figure out that they can get inside of it. So they decide to build a "ship" to protect them from falling as they decide to travel around town in it. They must be staying up late every night to build it because we get a montage of them falling asleep in class and getting answers wrong that the teacher is asking, etc.

So they get it up and running and test drive it, zooming by the chick Ben like's house and then destroying the snack bar at the local drive in. Before they can get home a police helicopter catches up to them and can't decide whether it was aliens or a practical joke or what. They begin to go higher and Wolfgang pulls the circuit out and puts it in backwards and the force takes them safely home. The other guys can't wait to go back, but Wolfgang says, no way, we gotta do more tests. The cop goes back out and thinks he's spotted something weird in the ravine where they are hiding the ship. The kids all have the same dream so they know something is telling them to go back into the ship, they can feel whatever it is calling to them. Meanwhile the old cop figures out Ben's identity and goes to his house but Ben slips through his hands and gets to the ship. The boys take off right when the copper rolls up and he looks up at them and smiles, delighted because he always wanted to be a "fun-loving-space-ship-sci-fi-nerd-kid-who-went-to-space" too.

So they go up to space and they are taken into this large ship and they meet a couple of aliens. Then they have some actions, and some reactions, and then something else happens. No spoiler for this one. There's a neat twist to the ending that I don't wanna give away. Its cute, and worth watching even if Ethan Hawke is like a glass of sweet tea that needs to be cut with unsweetened. Undrinkable. But definitely watch this.