INTERMISSION : NOT EXACTLY A ALL IN THE CRAZINESS OF STATS YEAR ENDING BLOG, BUT AN INCREDIBLE SIMULATION

Jumbo’s Clown Room – the place I really want to be right now. But something financial just came up right now that needs immediate attention.

Wow. 2023. Quite the year. I enjoyed it a whole lot. And with a Democrat running the US of A, I liked it a whole lot even better. Joe Biden comes from a family who’s fought oppression with evil bureacrats controlling coal companies. Occasional strikes and on the job grievences are embedded within his DNA. I, or rather me, myself or I work for unions – entertainment unions to be precise. I devised it to BE in my DNA, because I’M the only member in my family to dare to venture out to work in the entertainment industry – although I’m trying to ween one of my younger nieces to take up my mantle when I’m ever to evaporate into a cloud of mist. So Joe Biden wished us at The Writers’ Guild and The Screen Actor’s Guild the best of luck in getting the best deal we can stave off from the evil Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. I knew I was on the right side of history, when Biden himself was seen marching on the picket line for the United Auto Workers.

So what did the orange-hued piece of shit turd, who has the fucking audacity to be trying to run for president again, even after he publicly embarrassed the entire country by acting like a spoiled brat man-child because he couldn’t come to the reality that he lost an election for a return to the position that he was never really qualified to serve in the first place- say about that same strike – AND in the state of Michigan, no less, where nearly got kicked him off the state primary election ballot??

Here a qoute – “The idea that Donald Trump has ever, or will ever, care about working people is demonstrably false. For his entire time as president, he actively sought to roll back worker protections, wages and the right to join a union at every level. UAW members are on the picket line fighting for fair wages and against the very corporate greed that Donald Trump represents. Working people see through his transparent efforts to reinvent history. We are not buying the lies that Donald Trump is selling. We will continue to support and organize for the causes and candidates that represent our values.”

In other words, in his words playing out inside his head – ‘Shut the fuck up, stop this foolishness and get back to work whether you like the conditions or not‘.

And the nation’s greatest redneck assholes want this guy for president again?

Anyway, I don’t want to pontificate for too long. This going to be a shorty, compared to the David Lean long biblical epics that I’ve been shitting out for the past four months or so on my blog to blog coverage of these massive strikes that took up a good portion of 2023 away from me.

Personal projects I wanted to get off the ground suffered because of my dedication to see this entire kerfuffle through – and for not getting those project off the ground, I probably sacrificed my professional status for the next few comic-cons that I’m usually getting comps for.

Also as a result of my self-exiled procrastination – the numbers for this blog has widdled down to a all new time low. As of today, with only a half day to go until the impending year of 2024 permeates a new challenge of survival, my overall total of blog reads are less than 10,000 – so it’s really no use to give who is ever left reading this blog a through-top ten list of the most read blogs or where they found these blogs or which country has the most reads. It’s the exact assholes or ne’r do well trolls who keep clicking on the same links to whatever how many degenetate Hugh O’Connor or Harry Perzigian blog posts I’ve posted – EVEN though these blogs are NOT the sum of all its’ parts that I’ve intended this blog’s true potential to be. I suppose the only way to stop making myself into the worst enemy I could possibly be is JUST to TAKE THEM DOWN ALTOGETHER. But I can’t, because I have in mind a special 10th anniversary blog on a special project that Harry Perzigian was involved with posthumously that was recently released upon the throes of his adoring, or not so adoring public. I was personally asked to contribute to this project, but, I flat out refused (or rather I didn’t respond to his Facebook instant message until a year later after he sent it). If I had accepted his offer, it probably would’ve put me back in the crosshairs of his family and accusations would most likely fly that I was trying to personally profit from his legacy. Of which I’m not. Remember, I don’t get a dime for posting or writing anything on this blog. I’m a pauper when it comes to making art, much like many of you.

Instead, I’m going to mention the 10 top things that I thoughly enjoyed about the year 2023 altogether albeit comic book releases, record releases, what movies or concerts I went out to experience or what shows I enjoyed on the streamers or whatever boxset tested the mettle of my 5.1 surround system.

BUT FIRST, I actually lied in part- here are the top ten blogs of the year 2023. Nothing else. Top Ten Countries and Top Ten Search Items are excluded this year.

Ok, time to get into all Casey Kasem America’s Top 10 mode! As of December 31, 2023 @5:PM Pacific time:

Coming in @ #10 TWO MOURNINGS LATER IN THE EXTRAORDINARY AFTERLIFE OF HARRY PERZIGIAN with 82 total reads.

Coming in @ #9 If Both Hugh O’Connor and Harry Perzigian Were Still Alive Today, They’ve Would’ve Died of Coronavirus of The Cock And Other Highlights From My Criterion Movie Collection with 83 total reads.

Coming in @ #8 YES LOG 1979: You Could’ve Been a Golden Age Contender! with 123 total reads.

Coming in @ #7 The Songs of Harry Perzigian with 140 total reads.

Coming in @ #6 Another Prelude to A Parsippany Persona Non Grata Picture Show II with 172 total reads. I’m still very proud of that one. That one actually got the attention of David Zaslav, head of the then Discovery Network – WHO said they wanted to do an television episode of Discovery Investigations on it. However, as I stated in previous blogs, the producer got back in touch with me and said it was a no-go because they couldn’t secure serial killer victim Amie Hoffman’s sister’s cooperation.

Coming in @ #5 THREE MOURNINGS LATER IN THE EXTRAORDINARY AFTERLIFE OF HARRY PERZIGIAN with 411 total reads.

Coming in @ #4 ONE MOURNING LATER IN THE EXTRAORDINARY AFTERLIFE OF HARRY PERZIGIAN with 737 total reads.

Coming in @ #3 Carroll O’Connor Was A Racist Piece of Shit Scumbag Who Couldn’t Take Responsibility For His Own Asshole Son’s Irrational Suicide Actions And Shifted The Blame Of His Death on My Best Friend Instead with 1,300 total reads.

Coming in @ #2 And So We Dip Once More Into The Hugh O’Connor/Harry Perzigian Viewer Mail (Scum)Bag with 1,670 total reads.

AND @ #1 – What the fuck else?- HUGH O’CONNOR WAS A PIECE OF SHIT LOSER WHO NEVER AMOUNTED TO ANYTHING with 2,147 total reads.

As you can see – the whole Harry Perzigian/Hugh O’Connor/Carroll O’Connor backstabbing triumvirate continues…and it has been continuing for way too long. And that leads me to this fateful decision. Since people can’t move from bickering about my side of this saga and trolling me with raunchy online comments (in which I respond back in kind), insults and sometimes death threats, I’m announcing as of right of the tail end of next year when I post the final nail to this coffin with the forthcoming TEN MOURNINGS LATER IN THE EXTRAORDINARY AFTERLIFE OF HARRY PERZIGIAN to be posted next April. Yes, that’s fucking right, I will be deleting all references to all three of these rapscallions talked about on this blog. All entries will either disappear into the nether world or they will be locked away much like all your Disney classics wind up in: A fucking vault. Buried beneath tons of concrete. This way you can concentrate on my current adventures going on in the Hollywood Scene and the comic book community. Which reminds me:

The most read new blog that I posted this year is: THE CBS RADFORD STUDIOS PERSONA NON GRATA PICTURE SHOW: PART 1: ACROSS THE RED CLAY BRIDGE OF COLFAX WHERE THE BLUE MEAN STUDIO OVERLORDS ROAR with 65 total reads.

That’s the direction I want this blog to be heading in.

And now my TOP TEN of my favorite things and events that happened over this past year.

Coming in @ #10. Seeing Jethro Tull live again for the first time since 1989.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve seen Jethro Tull in action. I was really motivated this year due to the incredible album Ian Anderson and co released last April called RokFlote (sorry, my Norwegian translator is a little rusty), a little concept album about Norse Mythology filled with tiny digestable under five minute numbers about Odin, Thor, Loki, Fenrir the throat tearing wolf and other gods and godlings who you may have fantasied reading in the pages of old Stan Lee and Jack Kirby comic books. I truly believed the new album was a return of true to form. The previous year’s outing The Zealot Gene warranted no tour in support due to COVID restrictions in which Ian Anderson said on stage that he was still suffering from such symptoms, and as a kind of gesture, he asked patrons in the audience to please not take photos or videos until the last two songs. To make up for lost time missing on stage, Anderson performed two numbers from that album, the new album along with two tracks from the band’s 2003 Christmas Album never performed live on stage before at The Greek Theater, just two days after The Writers’ Stike was called off. Anderson still managed to find time to release a 40th anniversary box set of monolithic porportions commemorating 1982’s Broadsword and The Beast – a perennial favorite of mine back in my senior year of high school. If you go to check back one my past YESLOGS blogs detailing the 1980 Drama album, you may see me sporting a t-shirt of that tour when I posed in a picture with my old gal pal, Linda Freeman Yarosh way back then.

Coming in @ #9. Getting my hair cut reasonably short since the end of the WRITERS/ACTOR’S STRIKE

Before…

…and after.

Hey, you were probably wondering – is that the same guy I saw running around zip tying picket signs and doing piss poor imitations of the Little Caesar’s roman character through a megaphone on Entertainment Tonight or local news coverage on The CBS Radford picket line? Yep, the very one and same. People were starting to recognize me on the streets from all that tv coverage, even as so much to beep their car horns behind me while I’m walking down Magnolia Blvd with heaping bags of Ralph’s groceries under my arms (and hey, thanks for offering me a lift – NOT). I was mainly inspired to cut it off because actor M.C. Gainey told me on the Warner Bros SAG-AFTRA picket line that I’d look like a asshole if I did cut it off. So here’s to you M.C.:  hope you enjoyed that Wishbone Ash gig you told me you were checking out just before the strike ended.

Coming in @ #8. Never Running out of Physical Media to jam into my 4K HD 5.1 sound system.

You’d think I was still under COVID lockdown with all this shit to watch – it’s like my personal fentanyl high.

This glass case right here houses nearly all my Criterion releases, Last November I went total apeshit again and purchased thirteen more. Just can’t help myself – it’s a film lesson in every box. Highlights for my next Professor Coatney Criterion masterclass taking place in the spring include Boris Karloff’s last film, Targets, popular French heist thrill Rififi, Terry Gilliam‘s The Adventures of Baron Munchausen and the David Bowie documentary Moonage Daydream in 4K. 2024, here I come!!

Area where I keep most of my comic book inspired animation and 5.1 surround sound mixed progressive rock releases.

Coming in @ #7. Seeing Yes live @ The Wiltern Theater with special guest: Roger Dean

A unusual Yes concert unlike any other I attended at The Wiltern Theater whereas the opening act was non other than cover artist and designer Roger Dean giving a thirty minute plus lecture giving insight into where he gets all his ideas of grandeur in painting his Asia and Yes album covers, plus his blueprints for a hotel that was constructed out in Australia and his very own home furniture. Truly a journeyman in every sense of the word. I took some video of what he had talked about, but alas I’m not on the WordPress preminum plan here, so I’ll have to do it the poor old man blogger way and find if I still have that youtube channel in good standing or not and load on to there someday. Overheard people talking during intermission that they were pissed that they missed Dean’s lecture. Roger Dean is one professor, whose stories you can’t simply nod off to. They are simply enthralling and correspond with your personal history of pop culture in general.

Roger Dean greeted fans before, during and after the show.

If you came in loaded with scratch like Tony Stark, you could’ve easily picked up a print or two. The only thing I think that I could’ve afforded with any cash to spare was a set of postcards fetching for $140. I rather would’ve used that $140 to splurge for two t-shirts, a cap and a commemorative mug.

And so I did.

And as for the band’s performance itself – it was quite unique from all the times I’ve seen the band perform. They brought some rarities not heard in several years like “Machine Messiah” from 1980’s Drama, “It Will Be a Good Day (The River)“, not heard performed since 1999’s The Ladder tour, a dedication to dear departed drummer Alan White through one of the few songs he ever co-wrote with the band (or at least one he was credited with) “Turn of The Century” from 1977’s Going For The One, as well as a new song from the magificently released Mirror To the Sky just this last May called “Cut From The Stars”. I wish more attention was paid to the new album, as it is very strong in production and musicanship and could’ve reached new heights of greatness if rendered live. By the time they reached Los Angeles, one of the modest longest tracks, the near 10 minute “All Connected” was dropped from the set list. Don’t quote me on that however. That’s what someone told me outside during intermission break.

Coming in @ #6. The Blue Beetle movie

DC Comics released four movies this year. 2 of which were released during the strikes, while Marvel could only muster 3 for all of 2023 (and The Marvels was a real stinker -due to the atrocious editing that happened throughout the entire movie which made the story come off as very incoherent). Of the DC movies I really thought Blue Beetle was a gem- which comes to a surprise even to myself, as I am not a big fan of the character in general as depicted in the comic books itself he’s been rebooted so many damn times. I’m a big fan of the character when he was a 1940’s old time radio show star (yes, he’s been around that long) and when Steve Ditko got his hands on the character in 1960s through his Charlton Comics appearances, This movie had a lot of heart and it mostly centered on how a family learns to deal with the acceptance of one of its’ members gaining super powers rather than the individual keeping it all to himself and I thought that was a different perspective than depicted in most comic book genre movies. There was no hiding like Billy Batson and Freddy Freeman did with Shazam! although the mom and dad in the sequel movie got let in on the skinny in last February’s Shazam! Fury of The Gods, which was kind of underwhelming with the exception of Gal Gadot’s cameo appearance as Wonder Woman. Also this movie, with its’ Hispanic roots should’ve been made more culturally in the spotlight as Marvel’s Black Panther did when bringing Black culture to the forefront. I really thought that direector Angel Manuel Soto, as well as cast members Xolo Maridueña in the title role of Jaime Reyes, George Lopez (I once had lunch with him on the Warner Bros lot) as the tinkertoying uncle, Damián Alcázar as his father (instantly recognizalbe from Apple+ TV’s Acapulco), Elpidia Carrillo as Jamie’s mother and the gun-touting crazy grandma Adriana Barraza really hit this one of the park. Susan Sarandon was a real basass villain too and her demise in this film was really just diabotical and cringeworthy to sit through. For the other two films, The Flash was just not great other than the return of Michael Keaton as Batman and Michael Shannon as General Zod. Ezra Miller is just not lead actor material, suffice to say. I recently had a good time seeing Aquaman and The Lost Kingdom in IMAX. I looked at it fondly as an extension to the orginal movie as more time was spent with Black Manta going off the fucking rails. And no classic super-hero/super-villain movie clash is ever complete without Aquaman or The Black Manta trying to bash each other’s brains in.

Coming in @ #5. Attending San Diego Comic Con in the summer amidst the actor and writer’s strike, where I nearly got arrested while my roommate was looking for a place to park.

I’ve said too much about this subject already in my recent couple of blogs. Nearest experience I ever had getting arrrested by the police on the spot as I tried to enter the convention center with a picket sign. Six cops had to detain me as their Watch Commander came over to give me a stern talking to as in ‘take it across the street, you protesting hippie!‘. All the while this was happening, my roommate, who was only coming down for a day was trying to find a parking space in all of downtown San Diego

Coming in @ #4 Donald Trump’s 4 giant-size whopping indicments. A total of 91 counts altogether.

I was constantly entertained on the picket line by text alerts on my phone of whenever Donnie Daughter Diddlefingers got notified that he had surrender peacefully to the authorities either be it in his good ol’ hometown of New York, Florida, Georgia or Washington D.C. This unqualified genius should’ve never been allowed inside the Oval Office in the first place. Don’t EVER lecture me of it being a constitutional right with anyone who’s 35 and over and legally born in the US can become a US president WITH ZERO experience working previously in government. You ever hear the old adage ‘experience makes a old man wise’? Well, not this tossled haired asshole. If he wanted to be in politics so much, why didn’t he start out a as city councilman or been elected mayor like his old disgraced pal Rudy “Ginger Mint” Guiliani – a.k.a. The 148 Million Dollar Payout Man once did to get meaningful job experience in learning how politics actually work? Not go directly to the top like the hypocritical greedy fat pig fuck that he really is his when he looks in the mirror to demean Chris Christie. You know why I call him Donnie Daughter Diddlefingers? Well, while we go around bitchin’ and whinin’ of how Joe Biden likes to sniff little girls hair, there’s pictures all over the internet of Donnie putting his teeny-tiny clammy hands all over his own daughter Ivanka Trump‘s thighs, having her sit on his lap in mini-skirts and skimpy bikinis, all the while trying to pawn her off as a cheap whore on The Howard Stern Show. Like this picture demonstrates.

Yeah, go call Joe Biden a pig all you want. But if you want to justify how questionable or how more righteous this image looks compared to whatever Joe Biden has pulled off – knock yourself out. In the meantime I’ll be popping the Orville Redenbacher in the microwave for a ringside seat in front of any of the trials CNN cares to carry live.

Coming in @ #3. THE WGA/SAG-AFTRA STRIKE Real Life actors and writers flooding my facebook page following the strikes.

I have one more chapter to chronicle detailing the days of helping SAG- AFTRA reaching the finish line of their strikes. Many of us at of the CBS Radford Radicals picketline came out in true force to show their solidarity and many lifelong friends and alliances were forged including Myles Warden, Barry Rubinowitz, Glenn Rabney, Dan Peck, Jeff Zimmer, Samwise Aaron, Rick Overton, Robert Amico, Teamster Driver Johnny, co-worker and actress Cheryl Chapman-Teague, Joelle Garfinkel, Andra Whipple and her hubby Jonathan Werden, alongside previous facebook stalwarts professionals such as stonemover and movie critic Zak Alverez, showrunner bike rider Steven Kriozere. and co-Warner Bros colleague Bradley Marcus , along with his twin brother, Kevin are now the grand poomba administrators of The Saturn Awards. We really did one for the history books and I hope we all get to see each other again in and out throughout the rest of our natural lives on picketlines in the future.

Coming in @ #2. The Pineapple Thief – How Did We Find Our Way and other 5.1 surround sound mixed boxsets.

This year, unlike any other was peppered with 5.1 surround sound boxsets – more than any before when I started to adapt to this relatively new format. Shown above is the first six The Pineapple Thief studio albums remixed to 7.1 Dolby Atmos and 5.1 Dolby Surround in a easy to grab package- all mixed by the creator and bandleader himself, Bruce Soord – who is proving himself to be quite the challenger to Porcupine Tree‘s frontman Steven Wilson himself in the surround sound Sir Mix-a-Lot sweepstakes. Soord usually tackles Ian Anderson’s current Jethro Tull and solo works, while Wilson tackles Jethro Tull’s back catalogue. But the improvements that Soord has made to his personal back catalogue of The Pineapple Thief pioneering albums, no doubt is due to Wilson’s masterful engineering tutelage and it’s a sonic achievement to behold. This boxset kept me pumped throughout the entire summer length spent in striking splendor with personal insights from Bruce himself and listening to many unheard tracks from his personal archives. Bruce Soord also had time to release his third solo album Luminescence, also mixed in 7.1 Dolby Atmos and 5.1 Dolby Surround Sound just as the strikes had ended.

Thrills and chills kept me focused during the past summer strikes with this 8 disc collection of early Pineapple Thief gems. A new studio album It Leads To This is slated for release this upcoming February.

AND coming in @ #1. Peter Gabriel’s i/o 3 mix blu ray and CD collection.

I’m not one for cherrypicking. When a favorite artist of mine releases a new product albeit one of all new original material for the first time in twenty years (didn’t really follow all that I Scratch Mine and I’ll Scratch Yours cover swapping debacle), I don’t want to listen to it in drips and draps – I want the whole thing all right up front to be consumed as a whole. The same applies to seeing it all performed in concert. Without knowing the material firsthand, chances are I’ll forget what experiences I felt the first time hearing it will carry over to the first time that I’ll hear it at my own house. With that being said, when Peter Gabriel the Prog Master himself decided to go all piecemeal via youtube updates posted on whatever a new full moon appeared (I got to credit the original marketing idea,: genius), I was sold on the first two tracks of the album, “Panopticon and “The Court” both with super funky sounds and rhythms within a dark overtoned candy coating and I decided that was enough for me to savor until the official release date of the entire product. Well, that didn’t happened until last December 1st and he already toured, even passing through the Los Angeles area last October performing the yet to be released album throughout almost in its’ entirely with the exception of one light acoustic number. Still, I couldn’t face it within myself to plunk down loads of hard earned income for a performance of material I was not familar with. I stood my ground – much to the chagrin of actor Samwise Aaron who argued with me that all the material is available to hear online. Online?? No way! Not without hearing it in my prestige format of 5.1 and 7.1 first. I’m glad I stuck to my guns, because the format I ended up purchasing it in was a overall assault on the aural senses and I can listen to the completed product in three different methods: The Bright Mix, The Dark Mix both in 2.0 NTSD CD stereo (via the blu ray disc) and the 7.1 Atmos mix, The Inside Mix (also on the blu ray disc). The reason why I put this as my Number #1 is because the chorus to the title track ‘I/O” is going to haunt me as the song that Myles Warden never had blasting on his blue tooth:

I-O, I-O
Coming out, I’m going in
I-O, I-O
I’m just a part of everything

And that’s the key operating phrase of the day in such a uplifting song of unity and hope for the future: “I’m just a part of everything” That’s how I would sum up The Great Strike of ’23.

See you all next year for the concluding chapter of The SAG-AFTRA strike.