Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

krisis

Krisis has been creating Crushing Krisis since 2000, writing songs since 1996, and reading comics since 1991. He is a Customer Success and Digital Brand Strategy executive, serial organizer, parent, and feminist, among other things. Based in Philly through 2017, he now resides in Wellington, NZ.

Music Monday: “Running Up That Hill” – Kate Bush

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The entire internet is talking about Kate Bush today.

I love it! (If you’re wondering why, it has to do with yesterday’s post. If you’re ready for spoilers, Variety has a great write-up and interview about it.)

I came to Kate Bush relatively late in my life of music consumption. As a teen, my main lady piano rocker who communes with the ethereal world was Tori Amos.

I’d encounter older music fans who felt Tori was derivative of Kate Bush, so of course as a major Ears With Feet (that’s what Tori fans were called, in her heyday) I completed eschewed Ms. Bush for nearly a decade, until I picked up her LP Aerials at Tower Records in 2005.

That record was certainly Amos-esque, so I felt I finally understood the comparison. Imagine my surprise when in 2018 I finally dug into the rest of Kate Bush’s catalog to discover how much more she is than “lady piano rocker” (just as Tori is, as well).

I’m sure I had heard “Running Up That Hill” many times prior to that (including from Tori’s own cover of it, medleyed with her own “God”). It hit me in a completely different way when I finally I listened to it in the context of opening of Hounds of Love

The insistent galloping of the drums. The strange synthesizer sighs swirling around my head, darting from headphone to headphone.

And, that iconic chorus:

And if I only could
I’d make a deal with God
And I’d get him to swap our places

Be running up that road
Be running up that hill
Be running up that building

Say, if I only could, oh

When I first heard “Running Up That Hill”, it made me think of Sisyphus. His is the eternal struggle of pushing the same boulder up the same hill every day, only for it to roll back down again. He is the undying patron of lost causes and impossible struggles.

Would you willingly exchange places with him, even for a day? Could you survive? [Read more…] about Music Monday: “Running Up That Hill” – Kate Bush

Review: Netflix’s Stranger Things – Season Four, Vol. 1

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Stranger Things Season Four, Vol. 1 is WILD, y’all!

(This post will be utterly spoiler free up until I give you a bold warning, below!)

Stranger Things Season Four PosterI didn’t meant to do it, but somehow I managed to binge all nine hours of Stranger Things Season Four within a single 24-hour period this weekend. Honestly, I just couldn’t turn it off, even if it meant almost completely sacrificing a day of sleep.

For a moment early in the season it seems like Season Four shared the same weakness as the past two seasons: The Duffers are convinced their breakout stars need their own storylines, which often feel like entirely separate shows within the show.

For a few episodes, it does feel like this story has become too big, too discursive. The core quartet of boys are fractured across multiple plots, and there are even more plotlines that don’t include them or Eleven.

Even as the plot feels bigger than ever before, Season 4 finally acknowledges that the show has never been about singular stars. It’s not a show about Eleven, Hopper, or even Hawkins. It’s about how your circle of friends grows and changes as you change how you define yourself. It’s about how things that used to be scary are now commonplace, and how the newest hurdle in your life always feels the highest.

Stranger Things could’ve become a horror anthology series returning to Hawkins again and again without our core cast of misfits. However, this time it really feels like a story about the misfits (like S1 did) as much as it is about the horror around them… and what caused it. The show’s ever-growing ensemble of actors makes it work the best it has since Season 1 (which I crushed on back in 2016).

Be warned: Stranger Things Season 4 is bloodier and scarier than any of the past volumes. There are fewer jump scares, but more outright gore and onscreen violence.

Also, the first few minutes of the first episode focus on the aftermath of graphic violence that might be triggering for some viewers – this week, especially. It received a special content warning in the states, but we didn’t get it here in New Zealand. If you’re sensitive to images of violence against children, you can safely skip from the big “knockout” blackout at the 7-minute mark to the end of the opening credits. You’ll see the same scene again in a less disturbing fashion later in the season.

(Continue reading if you want very minor spoilers about the characters and their arcs as of the beginning of the season.) [Read more…] about Review: Netflix’s Stranger Things – Season Four, Vol. 1

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 3 – The Realness of Fortune Ball: recap & power ranking!

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Welcome to my recap of the third episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – The Realness of Fortune Ball!

In this episode of this special All Winners season, each our eight crowned queens have to construct a garment from scratch corresponding to a fabulous and colorful vacation destination – the sorts of trips offered as prizes on classic game shows like Wheel of Fortune.

Making a garment from scratch might be the one standard Drag Race challenge I’ve still never tried myself!

When I first started commenting on and recapping Drag Race back in 2014 I was doing it as a complete layperson. I knew plenty about singing, songwriting, acting, and public speaking – which covered a slew of typical Drag Race challenges.

When it came to the actual drag on the runway, I knew very little about make-up or fashion that I hadn’t learned from the judges. I was going off of what was pleasing to me without being able to articulate exactly why.

This is a frequent topic of discussion in Drag Race fandom, and amongst the queens themselves. Who is qualified to critique the work of these incredible artists, who are make-up artists, costume designers, and stylists all rolled up into one. The Drag Race judging panel sometimes struggles to have the right references to understand where queens are coming from, so who are we to try?!

I’m of two minds about that.

On one hand, you don’t have to be an expert in something to talk about if it resonates with you. That’s a way people gatekeep themselves from appreciating fine art, classical music, runway fashion, or any other form of high art.

On the other hand, I think Drag Race fans have consumed so much of the Drag Race industrial complex of endless franchise seasons, recap shows, podcasts, and fashion reviews that they think they’re an expert just because they’ve heard so much from the experts. There’s a Dunning-Kruger effect there, where even though fans don’t fully understand something about drag they assume they have have as much know-how as the queens themselves.

I’ve always been sensitive to that second bit, especially because I’m qualified to seriously critique a lot of elements of Drag Race OTHER THAN the drag itself.

That’s why I’ve spent the past few years trying to actually learn about drag other than by watching the show. I’ve read up on drag history and pageants. I’ve watched countless make-up tutorials. I’ve been keeping up with fashion blogs and runway shows. And, I’ve actually done my own drag make-up – which will never see the light of day on the internet! (At least, not until I’m much better at blending.)

I don’t think all of that is required to recap Drag Race. Nor do I think following runway collections and knowing how to contour doesn’t mean I’m anywhere in the same solar system of talent compared to these All Winners!

What I do think is that if you’re going to spend to time to go past consuming art to engage with it critically, you owe it to both yourself and to the artist to better understand their art form. (And, also, engaging critical doesn’t mean hating or belittling these artists! Turning in uneven work on one episode of a TV show has no bearing on how great a drag artist you are.)

Does that mean I understand how these queens built their dresses from scratch for this week’s design challenge? Hell no! Design challenges involve the peak of a drag queen’s power to create something from nothing, and I’ll cover every step of that process in detail here! Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 2 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 3 – The Realness of Fortune Ball: recap & power ranking!

How to slim down your comic collection

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I have too many comics.

If you haven’t seen my collection-moving video, let me set the scene for you: We’re not just talking a bookshelf full of comics. It’s not just a stack of longboxes in closet. I’m talking about a full on library of shelves full of collected editions and accompanying stacks of 100+ shortboxes in my garage of collected editions and floppies.

All told it represents over 30,000 individual issues. That’s why I have an occasional YouTube show called “Shelve, Store, or Sell?” where I work on thinning things out (but mostly wind up moving more things from the stacks to the shelves).

“Too Many Comics” is a relative amount. I have too many comics for me, today, in 2022. Me in 2012 would’ve delighted in this collection! For some people, “enough comics” looks like one shelf on a bookcase, and any overflow must be mercilessly sold. For others, it’s seemingly every comic ever printed.

I fall somewhere in the middle. I started expanding my childhood collection in 2010, before Marvel Unlimited and Marvel’s collection program both really exploded to offer widespread coverage of nearly everything. Mapping every X-Men comic book meant buying hundreds of uncollected issues. If I wanted to create a comic guide for a Marvel character and read all of their appearances along the way, that started with buying.

Would I have made the same decisions in 2020? Oh my goodness, no. Marvel is now systematically working through their back catalog through Masterworks, Epic Collections, and Complete Collections, leaving very few stones unturned. Every issue that winds up in one of those books is also on Marvel Unlimited. For less than the cost of one omnibus a year, you can read all of it, any time you want. DC is slowly moving in the same direction with their DC Universe service (though other publishers now all lag behind thanks to the shuttering of Comixology a few months ago).

Which brings me back to my too many comics. Deciding to slim down your comic collection isn’t easy. Sure, you can Marie Kondo it and “keep only those things that spark joy,” but what does “joy” even mean when it comes to a huge collection of collectibles? You might be happy you own a copy of Uncanny X-Men (1963) #137, but you might not plan on having a meaningful interaction with it once a month, or even once a year.

As I’ve shot the “Shelve, Store, or Sell” series, I’ve settled on my own paradigm for evaluating which of my “too many” comics are “just enough,” and I think it could be helpful for anyone with a too-large comic collection. (It also works for books, movies, music, or any other form of consumable media.

I call it “read, re-read, reference, collect.” The good ol’ 3RC.

What do I own for the purpose of reading it for the first time? Am I ever going to do that?

What do I own for the purposes of re-reading? Have I re-read it already? Will I re-read it again?

What do I own for reference purposes, including books I just enjoy flipping through or lending? How often do I actually touch the book?

What do I have purely for collecting? Why? What do I gain, monetarily or emotionally, from having it in my collection for another year compared to getting rid of it?

Want to understand more about each of these criteria and how I decide if a book qualifies? Keep reading! [Read more…] about How to slim down your comic collection

Crushing On: J. S. Bach’s Lute Suite in C minor, BWV 997 performed by Evangelina Mascardi

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As a rule, I try not to let social network algorithms touch my life.

Why would you let the whims of an algorithm meant to keep you on a site change your priorities, dictate your schedule, or change your mood?

Yet, sometimes… sometimes you peek into the vast abyss of the algorithm by mistake and you see one tiny glimmer within it. Not a distraction. Not a waste of time. Not a cheap piece of disposable joy.

It is the glow of something extraordinary. Something life-altering on a deep, meaningful level that you will carry with you.

Here is Evangelina Mascardi playing J. S. Bach – Suite in C minor BWV 997 on a period-accurate 24-string Baroque lute entirely from memory, recorded a year ago. It was composed for (and typically performed upon) a Lautenwerk (lute-harpsichord) – a keyboard instrument.

(If you don’t have the patience to watch all 24 minutes, at least go watch the final movement. Just extraordinary.)

While watching this I had… I don’t know if I would call it an “epiphany,” but it was a moment of extreme calmness and presence within my own body. Not just a moment, though. Entire minutes. It is one of the most beautiful juxtapositions of composition and performance I’ve ever seen and heard in mylife.