The Whore Church - Yule Log

It’s Christmas time! That means it’s time for giving, receiving and semi-pornographic mixtapes! And The Whore Church have given us ‘Yule Log’ in time for Christmas 2010.

The mixtape contains only 100% wholesome Christmas goodness, starting with a psychedelic intro containing satanic goats dressed as Santa:

Satanic goats FTW!

After the intro we’re treated to some evil Santa, boobies and some dude painted red to look like Satan. Needless to say, it’s a good start. Then it’s some kid who ‘wants to know what it’s like when Santa comes.’ Oo-er! *snigger*

With the next bunch of clips we get some soothing cookie-monster style death metal, which is nice. They’ve even been considerate enough to throw in some clips from The Smurfs, He-Man and Beavis & Butthead… ah, them were the days. When cartoons were proper cartoons!

Nearing the half-way mark we get CCTV footage of desperate shoppers invading shops fighting to get bargains. Always nice to see how the poor people live. Then, some pr0n:

... and they're the reason WHY Santa cums...

After a particularly vicious attack from a snowman we Barney the dinosaur and several men, dressed as Santa, getting blowjobs.

The Whore Church – Yule Log is an excellent, if short (11mins), mixtape for the festive season, something to stick in the DVD player for when the folks come round.

I leave you with a gratuitous screenshot of He-Man:

Good to see that She-Ra is still as hot as ever...

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Skeleton Farm's Halloween Horrorshow

As we head in to September it’s not long until that holiday of holiday’s makes an appearance, Halloween. Skeleton Farm have already turned out a new Halloween DVD, like the shopping channels who start showing Christmas decorations in July, but not as bad.

The DVD (yes, it’s a DVD, not just a bog standard AVI mixtape) has a nice menu with several options (trailer etc.) but the mixtape its self starts with a mad doctor (it says so on his lab coat) who tries to sound scary, but just sounds creepy, in a pedo way. Speaking of mad and creepy, we get to some Alice Cooper audio with some cool zombie artwork and animation. Not only that, but within two minutes we get some jiggly boobies! Yay!

White Zombie (Boogie Man) provides the audio for the next part of the tape which is more jiggly boobs, oh and some gore clips mixed in with the video for aforementioned audio track.

I particularly liked the clip from Tales from the Crypt with the Crypt Keeper dressed as Elvis. Couldn’t resist taking a screenshot of that!

Well, there's something you don't see every day...

Next, more groovy Halloween themed audio with a video of dancing skeletons wearing fez hats. Nice! I had no idea there was a rap song about Nightmare on Elm Street which has a video starting three largely overweight men running from Freddy Krueger. Thanks (I think!) to this mixtape I now have that memory engraved in my brain…

The Monster Mash is next with a cool stop-motion video! Yay for stop-motion! The half-way mark gives us a another groovy tune with some classic 50′s animation of skeletons trying to dice up a little dog (or something like that). Next is a horribly cheesy and embarrassing music video from the 80′s, fluffy man hair and gay dance moves aplenty.

Much kudos goes to Skeleton Farm for including some Groovy Ghoulies in here too, it’s not the cartoon’s intro, but it reminded me of my Saturday morning cartoon marathons. Another reminder was just how disco Alice Cooper sounded at times. He’s Back (The Man Behind The Mask)… I remembered it as such a cool song, but the Halloween Horrorshow has reminded me that it is in fact incredibly non-rock/metal sounding. Shame… but it does have some cool shots of Jason.

The last five minutes is a gore-a-thon and ends with a clip of Vincent Price making a simple poem sound creepy as hell, as only he can.

Halloween Horrorshow is top notch stuff. It has good quality videos, groovy Halloween sounds, it’s free and even comes with free DVD covers for you to print out! Yay!

It’s the perfect background audio/video for your Halloween party 2010.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

I’d love to post a link to the torrent, but I couldn’t possibly go… http://tracker.zaerc.com/torrents-details.php?id=15138 OOPS! how did that happen?…

Retard-o-Tron II

It’s big, it’s bad, and it’s BACK! ZXQL3000 and Cinema Sewer return to give us a second helping of video madness.

If you’ve been living under a rock, on Mars, for the past while and never heard of Retard-o-Tron then you should head over to here, and read my review of the first Retard-o-Tron mixtape, and while you’re at it, read my interview with ZXQL3000, one of the masterminds behind the tapes.

Retard-o-Tron II begins with a rather hilarious take on Donald Duck, but with porn. How so? Well, I’m sure you’ve heard the odd sounds those chicks make when they’re gag reflex is not quite in order, well for the first few minutes were treated to pornified Donald Duck impersonations.

Several clips later we’re introduced to one of the strangest looking characters in a long time, some black dude that looks like a reject from Tod Browning’s Freaks (reviewed here incidentally). I wouldn’t like to meet him in dark alley!

Umm, it's OK, he doesn't normally have bleached hair...

Next were treated to a pilot episode of a TV programme which, thankfully, never made it past being a pilot: The Man With The Power. In short, it’s a guy who can move objects with his mind. Whoop-dee-do. After a few clips of evangelists, re-dubbed anime and chicks fighting, we get some mighty gay looking dancing and some clips of the chick that holds/crushes things with her ginormous boobs. Some violent wrestling is next, which is something I need to start downloading *ahem* buying. That’s then followed by several porn clips of chicks completely over acting… as they do. Then there’s some bull fighting, this type I’m all for as in these clips the bull kicks ass and the gay matador is fleeing for his life. Go bull!

For several minutes we get ‘The Retard-o-Tron, Oh Yeah-a-Thon’ which is several porn clips but with a counter on the side of the screen, counting how many times the chick says ‘ooh yeah’. Needless to say, it’s a high number. Several clips from Tourettes Guy feature here too, and that’s no bad thing. Fake or not, they’re still hilarious.

We’re after the half way mark now and it’s getting in to some backyard wrestling. Obviously these poor souls have been hit on the head once too many with a spectators chair. Still… it’s funny to see them accept such brutality. Speaking of brutality – EXOman… another series that (I hope) didn’t make it past pilot. It’s basically a guy wearing some chainmail.

EXOman! Fear his chainmail!

Calamari Wrestler makes an appearance too, and rightly so. It’s a very bizarre/surreal film that everyone should see. After some more porn clips we get some more backyard wrestling followed by, my favourite, dumbass skateboarders who fall off and get cracked in the nuts/head. Yay!

1hr 45mins later the madness comes to an end… awwwwww! But I feel better for having seen such madness, it makes me all fuzzy inside. Sure, some of the clips are a bit blurry and/or grainy, but that’s because they’re from the VHS era and are quite rare, but the majority of the clips are of excellent quality, probably DVD quality, and all squished in to a DIVX file.

You can download both mixtapes from ZXQL3000‘s homepage, but do consider buying a physical, real-world, DVD copy to persuade him to make a third mixtape. And don’t forget to check out his ‘Fans’ page for free boobage!

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Some clips from Retard-o-Tron II (does that make it a mixtape, of a mixtape?):

The dangers of fake suntan - mass suicides!

So, this mixtape, B-Videos 101, Vol.1, starts off with this really creepy looking old guy. Not only is he babbling on about the end of the world, but he sports an amazing fake tan.

Oh, wait, it’s just the Heavens Gate crackpot.

After a stop-motion toy shop orgy with dildos and inflatable dolls we get some old clips from The Daily Show followed by some mad preacher clips. I do like mad preacher clips.

After a clip of a dancing midget we get a rather hot contortionist chick dressed in a white leotard. Oh my!

Next… well, even this had me staring at the TV and thinking ‘what the fuck?!’ It’s a sex-ed video with a rather retarded looking girl asking about periods.

And remember: never trust anything that bleeds for days and doesn't die.

That’s right, periods. So for the next ten minutes we have her mother and sister explaining a Japanese flag to her. Very odd, but then we get to rock out to some KISS which is actually a news item about some God-squad nuts who were trying to get their concerts banned. Can I start a non-religious movement where we go around closing bibles and burning churches? Oh no, sorry, burning bibles and closing churches. Oops, my bad.

Dancing, deformed, strip-show anyone? I’m not even going to try and explain it. Behold:

Yes Alex, she does go topless...

After the half-way mark we get a couple of spoof ads, short films and animations oh, and a lengthy segment of what looks like The Osmonds doing Star Wars on stage. We finish with a rather arty chick who sticks paint up her ass and fires it at a wall, I should try that, might actually sell them.

If that's not paint, she needs to stop eating her veg with tomato sauce.

It’s a solid mixtape full of unusual weirdness (aka: retarded kid asking about periods) it’s only downside is that it’s obviously from the VHS era so the picture quality isn’t top-notch, but that didn’t bother me.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

The Ultimate Hardgore Splatter Tape

The Ultimate Hardgore Splatter Tape is a video cornucopia of gore clips taken from many of our favourite horror/gore films.

Our trip into this tape begins with, among others, a clips of big hairy spiders crawling all over some hot chick, I don’t mind spiders at all, but I don’t know if I’d have the bottle to just lie there, unflinching, while they were all over my face. Kudos to that actress!

The first clip to make me ‘ugh!’ was one where some guy is being killed – no, that didn’t make me ‘ugh’, the woman who has – what looks like – forks protruding from under her eyes, that did it for me:

Ugh! If there's one thing I can NOT stand is things being done to eyes *shudder*

Then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, we see a chick peering through a peep-hole in a door, for a bullet to come flying through it and take her eye (and brain) out. God dammit, was this tape custom made to repel me?!

Next, some quality boobage from the mistress of boobage herself, Ilsa (aka: Dyanne Thorne)

Hooray for Dyanne Thorne and her ample bosom! HOORAY!

Following on comes the (in?)famous dick chopping scene from whats-its-face, the cannibal film. I always get the Holocaust’s and Ferox’s mixed up. A woman then decides to deep fry her hand and munch on it, nice!

Reaching the half-way mark, we get some Tetsuo weirdness. I can spot that grey, mechanical, oddness anywhere. Speaking of oddness… Rikki-O makes several appearances. No bizarre gore tape would be complete without some Rikki!

Another clip that I thought kicked ass was this one of some devil dude popping up in front of a monk:

If that suddenly popped up in front of me, I'd most definitely pee AND poo myself!

Don’t know what film it’s from, but I shall be looking through the end credits to find out, as that devil makeup looks kick ass for a black and while oldie. Assuming it’s not a newie with oldie effects applied to the picture.

UPDATE: I believe the film is called Häxan (aka: Witchcraft Through the Ages), from 1922. So I hope to review that soon!

The last part of the tape has the inevitable Necromantik scenes and a music video from some band I don’t recognise.

I feel like I'm John Holmes now... even I'm bigger than that! Although his IS about to be lobbed off...

I’m not even going to pretend that I know where all the clips come from, but there’s an authoritative list of clip sources (and music sources) at the end of the tape, which is something I wish more mixtapes would do, as there’s nothing worse than seeing an awesome clip but never knowing where the clip originated.

Even though it only runs for 65 minutes, it packs a punch and should be watched by all. I have no doubt that there will be at least one clip that will make you want to look away. And several that will make you rewind and replay.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Retard-o-Tron

Here we have an email interview with Roel, one of the (somewhat warped) masterminds behind the now legendary Retard-o-Tron mixtapes! My review of the first mixtape is here.

How about a brief introduction of yourself?

I’m Roel.

What inspired you to make your mixtape?

I’ve always had a thing for bizarre, sensationalist, non-mainstream movies and music. When I was a kid I heard older friends talk about the “Faces Of Death” videos or the insane backstage antics on heavy metal band videos, and those really piqued my interested. Thanks to Troma and movies like Braindead I took a deep plunge into the cesspool of B-movies and other low budget schlock, and swam around long enough in it to discover awesome examples of bad taste.

I also loved watching skateboard and graffiti movies, some of them containing early blueprints for shows like Jackass. I also dug shit like blooper videos and all kinds of “caught on tape” shit. Obviously, porn was a great source of amazement and disgust. I love to see what some people will do for money.

When broadband internet became available and our computers became portals to the immense media library the internet offered, I set about to find the darkest corners and see what else was out there. At a certain point I looked at what I had collected over the past 15 years and figured, “there’s so much good shit in there that’s hard to find, I should put some of it together”. I thought the mixtape concept would be ideal for this, so I went and started work on Retard-O-Tron Video Mixtape #1.

How do you get the clips?

From buying VHS tapes or DVDs on thriftshops, garagesales and fleamarkets, ordering from small underground mailorders like the amazing B-Videos 101, trading with fellow geeks, scouring P2P networks like Edonkey, newsgroups, torrent sites, or foreign P2P networks like Perfect Dark or Winny. I didn’t have the hardware to transfer VHS to my computer, so I tried to find versions online that somebody else already captured.

How long did it take to get all the clips?

I used some clips that I had lying around for over 10 years, and some clips that I found while working on the Retard-O-Tron DVDs. Sometimes you try to find a particular scene or piece of footage to complete something you’ve edited together, and you’ll find something totally unexpected instead. Also, people like Bryan of B-Videos 101 or Robin Bougie of the awesome Cinema Sewer empire sent me copies of really obscure and rare items from their collection. It really helps if you have people like them helping you out!

Were there any clips you didn’t use? (if so, which ones!) and was there anything you thought was too harsh to include?

Although I was initially fascinated by “death tapes” like Faces Of Death, I really don’t like that stuff anymore. The cruelty of human kind and the inevitability of death have become perfectly clear to me since I first seen Faces Of Death. You’ll see some nasty ways people get hurt in ROT, but no death footage.

I’ve also gone on a few Japanese fetish porn binges, which are always a great source for shock value, cruelty and imaginative ways to help perverts float their boats. Some of that stuff is really hard to watch though. There’s a whole branch of perversion that solely seems to revolve around degrading and abusing women. Some of that stuff is hard to watch: gorgeous women dressed in beautiful bridal gowns getting force fed shit, up to the point where they’re crying while puking up a brown sludge. It scores incredibly high on the WTF-scale, but it ain’t the stuff I’d like to see when chilling out in front of my TV with a bong and a beer. So I kept that stuff out.

I’ve got a few nasty clips that didn’t make it to ROT#1 and ROT#2. Mixtape makers who think they’re up for it are free to contact me and use the clips though.

The presentation is slick, how long did it take to edit each tape?

I think I spent a year on each tape, from the moment I decided to start work on it untill the finished DVD was in my hands. Early on in the process I’ll just be editing clips together at random, till some sort of order starts to appear. I’ll shuffle stuff around, polish up rough cuts, find more or better clips, better fitting music, until the mixtape is feature-film length. Then I spend plenty of time on the titles, DVD menu, trailers, extras, DVD cover, booklet and stuff like that.

Do you have a favourite clip from one of your mixtape(s)?

After finishing a mixtape I have seen each clip a thousand times, and I’m sick of most of them. Hervé Villechaize singing has always been a favorite of mine, though.

Favourite movies?

In the field of video mixtapes, I really dig Crazy Dave Tape II. I came across it right when I was finishing work on ROT#1. I didn’t know people were still making mixtapes (or party tapes, whatever you wanna call them). I only knew old stuff on VHS, most of it I never even seen.

Will there be more mixtapes from you?

I’m afraid so. I wrapping up work on another Cinema Sewer and ZXQL3000 co-op, which is a religious themed porn movie called “The Cumming Of Jizzus“. After that, we’ll start work on ROT#3 — the final one.

If yes, what can we expect in the next mixtape?

More emphasis on movies and television weirdness!

Anything else you’d like to add?

I want to give a shout out to some of “new generation” of video mixtapes, like the Crazy Dave guys, the hardest working man in video mixtape land Brian Unfried, and all the other guys who made a VMT and put some effort into it. I love seeing video mixtapes that take their own approach to the phenomenon, that uncover even more hidden gems. I don’t like the ones that just slap together some random clips they found.

And oh yeah: MAKE YOUR OWN FUCKING MIXTAPE!!

Don’t forget to visit the ZXQL3000 guys and buy their stuff!

Many thanks to Roel for taking the time to answer my highly inter-ma-lectual questions. Best of luck on RoT3 and The Cumming of Jizzus, surely one of the best titles EVER!

How about a brief introduction of yourself?

I am part of the silent majority: conservatives who know just as much about partying as those who wake up choking on their own vomit. I’m 41, married, 2 kids, a metal head, a big fan of porn, pro-choice, and a big fan of Sarah Palin. I’m a writer. A musician. I have a 4-octave range. I don’t match any stereotype. Basically, I’m a mutant.

What inspired you to make your mixtape?

Curious to see what I’d been doing with audio would translate to video. I’ve made about 14 audio mixtape recordings, using fictional band names like Anal Bitch, Frigid Bitch, Anal Cunt-ilingus…see a pattern? Basically, I decided to put to use some of the hundreds of video clips I’ve collected over the years. I saw the Crazy Dave Tape Pt 2, and thought “Hey, let’s give that a try.”

How do you get the clips?

Downloaded from the net. Or, from the videotapes I’ve transferred to digital files. Or from DVD’s I’ve stripped. Or from videos I recorded from YouTube using Camtasia Studio. Basically, I’m a video freak.

How long did it take to get all the clips?

I’ve collected clips for more than 10 years now. I’ve cataloged most of them. Still get the occasional clip from time to time, but with over 600 discs collected now, I’ve slowed down because I’m running out of room.

Were there any clips you didn’t use? (if so, which ones!)

Oh, there are plenty of clips I could never use in any compilation. Nasty stuff, from German “scat” porn to Iraq beheadings. I could never show this stuff, or risk putting it together so someone could sell it second-hand. I do have a sense of morality. Some things are better left shared between friends, or at least with people you know can handle it. There should be a sense of responsibility when it comes to some of this stuff. I mean, I have kids, and I wouldn’t want them to see any of this until I knew they were old enough and mature enough to handle it.

Was there anything you thought was too harsh to include?

See my previous comments on the Iraq beheadings. I downloaded those clips from the now-defunct Ogrish web site. I keep them because if anyone ever wants to see the true face of evil, I can show it to them. It’s for educational/historical purposes only. And it has to be for an audience that can handle it. I won’t let my wife see this stuff, even though she’s asked about it. I think many people really don’t have a clue as to how brutal evil can be.

The presentation is slick, how long did it take to edit the mixtape?

Wow. That’s a compliment. It really didn’t take long. Maybe a week. The other productions I did after this one took longer. Like Video Hell. The title says it all. That one was a monster. I experimented more with editing and timing of audio/video, so it took maybe a month to put that one together.

Do you have a favourite clip from your mixtape(s)?

Hah! Yeah. I do. I have this one clip where this blonde chick is whining about how porn stars aren’t respected. Then some faceless stud comes over and shoves his cock in her mouth. I fucking lost it when I saw that clip! It’s drop-dead hilarious.

Favourite movies?

300. That flick says it all. Give them nothing, but take from them everything. I love my country. And I’d die for it. Too many people take the liberty and freedom in the U.S. for granted. But not me. Oh, and The Dark Knight. Heath Ledger as The Joker was the performance of a lifetime. I’m pretty convinced that it killed him because the guy was so over the top in that movie. I haven’t seen anything else like it.

Will there be more mixtapes from you?

I may re-release new pressings of “Video Hell” 1 and 2, Shut Up, Bitch!, Snuff ‘Em, and “Your Face Is My Cum Rag” if enough people bug me. Since my friend from Skeleton Farm Productions has told me that my stuff is circulating in bit torrent circles, I may get motivated faster.

If yes, what can we expect in the next mixtape?

If the stars line up right, I’ll release “Brutal TV” as a DVD compilation. I did a bunch of shorts with that title, and you can see a few of those on one of my sites: www.makeyourdisc.com. The site is under construction (because now I”m writing a novel), but it gets the job done as it’s just a “fun” site.

Anything else you’d like to add?

Hope people take this stuff for what it is: fun. That’s all. Pure and simple. Of course we’re infringing on copyrights by making this stuff, but it’s done for sheer fun. I’m not selling these things to get rich, or to try to piss someone off. Basically, I just decided to do something fun with all the files I have archived on CD and DVD. This is meant to entertain people, and to help put collectors in touch with one another so they can add things to their collection they may have been looking for over the years. It’s a great way to get noticed by fellow video heads and freaks. If you want to talk with me more about this stuff, you can check out the myspace page I have at www.myspace.com/vincebrusio, or www.makeyourdisc.com, or email me at ospubs@yahoo.com.

Many thanks to Vince for taking the time to answer our thoroughly probing (yeah right!) questions. Send him some email. Harass him in to releasing his other stuff… do it, it’s for the good of mankind.

Psychedelic Hell Trip begins with some very professional presentation! Not only does it have a cool warbly Country & Western song playing over its menu, but it has some nice extras too! But we’ll get to them at the end.

Our trip begins with a good old fashioned celluloid countdown then were in to some quick, rapid fire, clips introducing us to the Hell Trip logo (left). Proper clips now are some hippy chick making doped up cookies, a very gay looking dancer, an American Gladiator who sounds like a reject from Bill & Ted, a horrible white rapper song then a most bizarre Japanese clip…

I'm not even putting a comment here...

God I love Japanese TV shows!

The madness continues with several clips among which are a porn Exorcist, some very embarrassing black dancers, someone having way too much fun with a sex doll and a black and white clip which looks like it’s from a fighting game, but I don’t think it is. Is it? Keep me right here folks…

Is it a video? Is it a game? Dunno, but either way it's cool...

Quarter of the way in and we hit various dope scenes (LSD rants, kids buzzing aerosol fumes etc.), some incredibly well done fake sex videos starring someone who I assume is famous somewhere, some leprechaun sex, and a music video starring Ron Jeremy. Then a highly informative clip which has given me the knowledge that it is in fact possible to poop deep underwater. Discovery Channel never told me that. Midget wrestling, creepy looking clowns and poodle exercise classes are at the half way mark…

I have no fucking idea what is going on here...

Heading in to the last quarter we get some sex advice and history lessons then some more amazingly well done fake celeb sex videos. Then some Vanilla Ice and midget sex. The End is the infamous Mr Hands video which, for one man, really was the end. Ironic.

Like I mentioned at the top of the review, this is very well presented, the extras include drinking recipes, a party mode, some music videos and ‘the restroom’ with some extra clips which aren’t in the main feature.

Psychedelic Hell Trip is easily one of the best mixtapes I’ve seen, most of the clips were new to me, even though PHT is from 2008, and must have taken God-only-knows-how-long to make. But we’ll find out soon enough, check back soon for an interview with the creator of that hellish trip.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

How about a brief introduction of yourself?
My name is GRiND, a long time horror/exploitation and hard-rock/metal fanatic. I dabble in Audio/Video editing and scream for a metal band.

What inspired you to make your mixtape? (review here)
In the late 90′s a buddy of mine used to get weird vhs tapes, some were random stuff like Tard Spasm, some were oldschool video mixtapes like Evil Video. That started me collecting VHS/DVDr-dupes from sites on the internet. Now about ten years later, after
watching Fucked Up Movie (and later Retard-O-Tron), I decided to mix my love for underground music with my love of underground films, steering away from the real gross-out porn and mondo stuff.

How do you get the clips?
From my personal collection of VHS and DVDs and my massive collection of XViD rips from the best sites offering that kind of thing. I meticulously selected a soundtrack of a few favorite songs.

How long did it take to get all the clips?
I had a week off at Thanksgiving ’08 so I cut, clipped, converted over 100 scenes, and mostly assembled them in three days. Spent another week tightening and cutting what I didn’t like seeing over and over. Then I sat on it for months and edited it down some more. I used Nanddub or Tmpgenc to clip, NeroVision to edit, and DVD Architect to make the DVD.

Were there any clips you didn’t use? (if so, which ones!)
Lots! ET Porn for one (no shit, really)… some I cut after seeing them other mixtapes after I made mine. Some are now in CCV2, others will remain in the dark, starving and alone.

Was there anything you thought was too harsh to include?
Well I designed my mixtape to be friendly to groups of average youngsters. I wanted to blow there mind, but not rape their soul. So I weened away from real-death and gross porn. I wanted you to be able to put this on at parties where even the less-initiated could enjoy it and maybe become interested in the video madness out there. The only clips included I found that made people really squirm uncomfortably are the vagina stabbing and the severed-dick-toss.

The presentation is slick, how long did it take to edit the mixtape?
About a week and a half total. I tweeked it here and there for months before release though.

Do you have a favourite clip from your mixtape(s)?
I like the Bloody Birthday/Death From Above 1979 mix. Julie Brown was so hot and the song is catchy as hell!

Favourite movies?
Dellamorte Dellamore, JC’s The Thing, Deadbeat at Dawn, Zombi 2 and From Beyond, to name a few.

Will there be more mixtapes from you? If yes, what can we expect in the next mixtape?
Oh yeah, I got two new CCV’s nearly complete. Also 2 other themed tapes in the works.

Anything else you’d like to add?
You can visit me on myspace.com/constipationcampvideo or bad-good.org for news and updates, friends get to see links to grab them on torrent. Never pay for my tapes or sell them please! You can email me at grind@hushmail.com. Thanks for watching!

Our thanks go out to GRiND for taking the time to answer our questions, keep up the good work Sir!

How about a brief introduction of yourself?

I’m simply another one of those random people on the Internet that happens to like schlocky horror and strange video clips. I enjoy the underground video scene and am happy to at least attempt to give something back in the form of these mixtapes.

What inspired you to make your mixtape?

I first stumbled across Crazy Dave and Retard-o-Tron through a mixtape usenet flood a few years ago. I was mesmerized by the combination of insane clips and in the case of crazy dave, strange setup clips. I decided that I simply had to join in on this and sat down and created Video Armageddon.

How do you get the clips?

I have a fairly large collection of genre films, mostly on Laserdisc (about 2,000+) plus a ton of DVDs and VHS, so a lot comes from my personal collection. Otherwise I scour the usual sources online (usenet, cg, t3, etc) as well as charity shops etc. Of course there is also a lot of great genre videos on DVD these days.. so it’s a combination of everything really.

How long did it take to get all the clips?

The original Video Armageddon took about 6 months to compile the clips for. Video Armageddon 2 took probably about 13 or 14 months so well over a year. I had over 6 hours of clips before I even started putting VA2 together and ended up having to get an hour or two more when all was said and done. Problem is you might have a 5 minute clip thats fairly awesome but in all honestly only about 15 seconds are truly insanely awesome so 6 or 7 hours whittles down to not very much in the editing stage. I see why a lot of mixtapes include long clips or even short films – to pad out the running time because its hard to do 70 or 80 minutes of just clips. But I hate long sequences in mixtapes so i never do that.

Were there any clips you didn’t use? (if so, which ones!)

Absolutely. Some clips seemed cool at the time but ended up just not flowing well or being kinda boring. Clips that I thought were too ‘famous’ or that people may have already seen I also took out. I know genre hounds will recognize a lot of clips no matter what you do but I at least try to keep everything fresh and generally obscure. I made a super mistake in the original Video Armageddon with the clips from things like Story of Riki. I never want to have something so “underground mainstream” again, at least not intentionally! I even avoided clips from some newer films as I figured they’d end up on everyones tape.

I also instituted a new rule on VA2 – no more than 1 clip per source – which I mostly kept to. So even if there were two really kick ass clips from one movie I only used one.

The best of the clips that didn’t get used will show up in the DVD version as an extra.

Was there anything you thought was too harsh to include?

I had a few porn clips that were a bit too close to just being pure gross out clips that I decided not to use. We’ve all seen the German or Japanese shiza video stuff, it’s not all that outrageous anymore so no real reason to throw the flow of the tape off with that sorta stuff. And while I love the most vile gore you can imagine in a horror movie I’m not the kind of person that sits around watching autopsy videos so I stayed away from that sort of thing as well.

The presentation is slick, how long did it take to edit the mixtape?

The hardest part was definitely getting the clips. The editing was easier, probably taking about a month or two.. With the original I taught myself how to use Adobe Premiere, on Video Armageddon 2 I also learned a little bit of After Effects to punch up the titles a bit. I also tried to shake things up a bit with the chromo-key and animation sequences.

The goal was always to make something that at least looked semi-professional. I didn’t want to put something out that screamed ‘I used Windows Movie Maker to do this!!!’. Obviously I’m not saying either tape is some perfectly edited piece of art.. but I at least tried to make it look good.

Do you have a favourite clip from your mixtapes?

It’s hard to pick any one clip. My favorites are the ones that are just completely insane, or completely insane when taken out of context. I think that’s one of the best things you can do – find a clip that makes reasonable sense in it’s original narrative but becomes a complete non-sequitur when show on it’s own. That or anything from a East European horror film, hard to beat that shit.

Favourite movies?

I’m a big fan of all the sub genres – horror, fantasy, gore – you name it. I love everything from the ‘classics’ to some of the better new schlock films. My favorites though are probably the delightfully cheesy low budget straight to video films from the 80s and 90s. Definitely anything by Full Moon or Charles Band.. that sort of thing.

Will there be more mixtapes from you?

The amount of time and effort Video Armageddon 2 took was staggering. I’m a big fan of trilogies so I can’t imagine not doing at least one more at some point.. but it might be a year or two. I do have something planned for probably next year, but it won’t be a mixtape in the traditional sense but should be very useful.

What can we expect in the next mixtape?

You’ll see…

Anything else you’d like to add?

I never charge anything for these tapes and in fact urge everyone to please spread them as much as possible. The only thing I ask is if you liked it (or hated it even) drop me a note (abob333@myway.com) or stop by the myspace (myspace.com/video_armageddon) and let me know. The only reason i made a second tape was because there was so much positive feedback on the original. So if you want to see a 3rd at some point let me know if you liked part 2!

Otherwise stay tuned there will be a DVD edition of VA2 sometime in the next few months. Like the original there will be a significant amount of ‘bonus’ footage to make it worth the wait and download, promise!

Many thanks to Mr. Video Armageddon man for answering our highly probing (ooh-er!) questions. I promise to review both Video Armageddon tapes soon, but needless to say, they both kick ass. So drop Mr. VA an email and demand VA3. If not, I’ll have Alex do horrible things to puppies…