Sometimes we need to drink.

When we’re dissatisfied with our jobs. When it seems as though we’re stuck in limbo, neither ascending into the honey-sweet halls of Valhalla nor descending into the darkest depths of the liberating Lake of Fire. When our wheels are spinning without taking us damn near anywhere worth goin’ to.

Sometimes we need to drink.

When we want to warm our faces with synthesized satisfaction. When it’ll help us enjoy a movie by chopping chop down those imaginative barriers that go up when we become adults. When we want to forget about our broken spirits. When we want to fill our gullets with something tasty.

Sometimes we need to drink.

When we’re writing irresponsible blogs posts – not because we have to, but because it makes us happy.

Sometimes we need to drink.

Tonight, I need a drink. And so, I’m sipping on the Wachusett Brewing Company’s Milk Stout.

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[OCTOBERFEAST  is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as  Satan’s Snacktime]

There exist villains so ingrained in the rotwood known as the collective conscious that they’ll always have an open invitation to the OCTOBERFEAST. The tales of these harbingers of doom and gloom are passed from each generation to the next, racking up decades’ worth of childhood pee-pee stains and midlife heart attacks. These malefactors are the perennial horrors that are relied upon to keep every new human-litter honest-via-horror.

While there’re plenty of vitamin-enriched villains to choose from, there’s no denyin’ the power of the Wicked Witch of the West.

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[OCTOBERFEAST  is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as  Satan’s Snacktime]

Seeing the blood-red Hallow’s Eve moon begin to wink over the horizon, the OCTOBERFEAST revelers have begun assembling their costumes. The celebrants are still pumpkin-drunk and half-deaf from the cacophony of firecrackers and guitar solos, and they stumble and shout their way through the campgrounds in search of appropriate attire. They all eventually wind up at Rusty Ray’s tent, as he’s opened up the treasure trove of clothes and jewelry he claims his great-great-grandfather stole from the Globe Theatre in 1642.

He’s not lying.

Sammy, a wide-eyed seventeen year old with tremendous acne, excitedly excavates a demon mask. He holds it in front of his face and exclaims, “Come Halloween, ain’t no fools gon’ call me crater-face! Innfakk, I’ma pinch me some titty!”

He’s not lying, either.

By shrouding ourselves in layers of feigned-flesh, we are finally able to live out those furtive fancies that our feeble human frames cannot bear on their own. In those disguised moments, we are not tired or short or cross-eyed or dying of lupus. Instead, we are mutated into manifestations of ideas, archetypal concepts that’re time-tested and universally-recognized.

Ghosts. Witches. Hobos. Pirates. Vampires. Slutty nurses.

When these new personas are adopted, agency reaches an ejaculatory peak, as we are finally providing our own definitions of self. We become beings both defiant of corporeal circumstances and confident in our own prowess. We are free to do as we please, whether that means dancing to the Monster Mash, trick-or-treating around the neighborhood, or attending an orgy.

Disguised, we are not ourselves. And surely you can see that this opens up a world of possibility. But to be fair, this gift of liberation-via-secret identity also comes packaged with a caveat.

What if we’re not the ones wearing the masks? What happens when we find out that friends and loved ones aren’t who they say they are? What if those most adept at obscuring their identities actually want to see us brutally murdered?

What if they want to see the entire planet brutally murdered?

Such is the case with one of the Earth’s most terrifying foes: Skrulls.

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[OCTOBERFEAST  is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as  Satan’s Snacktime]

At the turn of the century, those of us fortunate enough to have survived the apocalypse found ourselves in the unenviable position of having to reconstruct society. The first post-apocalyptic years were full of tumult, with chaos seeping into every aspect of daily living. With few raw materials at our disposal, we frantically grabbed what we could and began assembling entertainment-jalopies. Sometimes, the pieces came together to create something beautiful.

Often, they did not.

So far-reaching was this poltergeist of piebald reassembly that not even the oxidized gates and sheep’s blood fountains of the OCTOBERFEAST could effectively ward it off. No, even the hallowed season of candied fright and salubrious Satanism fell victim to this malignant spirit. The surrealism of living after the End of the World, the yearning for yesteryear’s comforts, and the attempt to continue humanity’s narrative traditions writhed about in a baby-oiled orgy lasting throughout the tenth month of the year.

Perhaps the most infamous pregnancy attributable to this orgiastic blending is Donnie Darko. Keep Reading »

The economy has yet to recover from its monumental floundering in 2008. Most jobs are in short supply. Other Jobs are dead. Nations are entangled in conflicts its citizens don’t understand, don’t believe in, and don’t want to fight. Hordes of the disgruntled are flooding streets, occupying major metropolitan areas and declaring their dissatisfaction. Tumult is proliferating at unprecedented rates.

And yet, it’s Friday. Love is still free to give and receive. Guitars still vibrate-melodious. High-fivin’ a buddy still feels awesome. Even in these most turbulent of times, persistent are those little reminders of why we persevere. It’s one thing to acknowledge the human spirit, but entirely another to know its power.

I know that the general consensus is that everything’s awful and I’m supposed to check my optimism at the door. But I’m not going to.  Tonight, I’m taking a stand against the tyranny of our times. It’s Friday, goddamn it, and I’m going to enjoy my life for what it is and what it can be! Though my flesh-vehicle betrays me and society’s crumbling, art and beauty and truth still exist.

As does beer.

So, in the midst of existential collapse, I sip on BRRRBON.

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[OCTOBERFEAST is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as Satan’s Snacktime]

Today’s OCTOBERFEAST guest is a man whose reputation precedes him, creatively murdering people for the past twenty-seven years. When this dude targets you, he infiltrates your dream, exploits your fears, and then commits horrendous acts of barbarism. Also, he wears a sweet Christmas sweater and is responsible for some of the horror genre’s most hilarious one-liners of all-time.

The homicidal dream-slasher in question is, of course, the one and only Freddy Krueger.

As a villain five times in the 1980s, twice in the 1990s, and twice in the post-millennium, many consider Krueger to be an exemplar for slasher-flick murderers who has stood the test of time. After all, what’s more horrifying than the notion that our dreams – the venues we use to play out hopes and dreams and unspoken fantasies – can become the grounds of our gruesome demises?

Krueger’s deeds speak for themselves. So hit the jump and check out some of the handiwork of Elm Street’s most malignant spirit.

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[OCTOBERFEAST is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as Satan’s Snacktime]

Most of the year, society politely asks its freakazoids and dweebies to shut the fuck up. To stay in the shadows. To look at the ground when walking. To never – ever – look an authority figure in the eyes.

From the ash-heap cinders of incendiary ostracization is born the Weirdo-Phoenix. LAN-parties and midnight movies and D&D basement gatherings and comics conventions? The nests of the Weirdo-Phoenix, the few designated safety-zones in which it’s okay to not fit in. In which it’s okay to debate whether orcs or Skrulls are more formidable foes. In which Dew flows like wine. In which the familiar themes of fantasy and sci-fi and horror are life philosophies.

Needless to say, OCTOBERFEAST is the absolute Mecca for gawky misfits.

So who is the resident misfit at the `Feast, the seasoned kook who can bequeath sagelike guidance unto the next class of angsty asthmatics? Well, some people call him Brian. Others call him the original Antichrist Superstar.

But we can call him Marilyn Manson.

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[OCTOBERFEAST is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as Satan’s Snacktime]

It was during the 1984 OCTOBERFEAST that an elderly Chinese bro stumbled into the fairgrounds and changed the celebration forever. Inside the basket this Chinese sage carried with him was a creature called a Mogwai, which was bequeathed unto the OCTOBERFEAST itself. All that the man requested was that three simple rules be followed:

– Never expose it to bright light.
– Never get it wet.
– Never feed it after midnight.

Of course, the revelers were too hammered to understand the dude’s thick Sino-accent, and so the poor Mogwai ended up succumbing to light, water, and midnight snacks. Gremlins ran amok, and much fun was had!

It seemed as though it’d be a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence, and we were confident that we’d never have to worry about Gremlin-invasions again.

Boy, were we wrong.

In1990, the OCTOBERFEAST was once again overrun by Gremlins! Only this time, the creatures were of an entirely new batch, capable of far more charming parodies and subtler urban-warfare tactics. This event, hilarious and terrifying as it was, is now referred to as Gremlins 2 by the history books.

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Babies and gents, please don’t forget this one fact. Hell, if you forget this, you’re really up the creek, `cause humanity’s been leaning on it since we done sloughed ourselves out of the primordial muck. Without this truism – no matter how you want to take it and run with it – we’re bound to fall face-first into the sludge of post-history and asphyxiate on the our own shortsightedness.

HOPE IS ABOVE THE HORIZON.

God? Space travel? Giant griffins that’ll swoop down, snatch us up with their pillowed talons, and nurture us in their super-nests? Could be. All I know is that we’re not going to actualize the potential of the collective unconscious by grinding ourselves down at jobs we hate.

So on that note, welcome to the MONDAY MORNING COMMUTE! This is the spot where I show off the various wares I’ll be using to safeguard my mind from ennui and work-related dementia. After you take a peek, hit up the comments section and share your own recipe for the Entertainment Cocktail de huit jours.

Faux-French? Goddamn, let’s just get to this.

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[OCTOBERFEAST is the greatest celebration of the year, a revelry dedicated to pop-culture’s most nutritious Halloween detritus. Plastic screams and artificial sweeteners have never been more bountiful. In the old country, villagers refer to the extended party as Satan’s Snacktime]

The malignant hordes have festered upon the campgrounds, sprawling about in a triumphant display of terror. They take killer rips from gasoline tanks teeming with Mountain Dew. They burning effigies of the Kardashians. They feast upon orange-frosted cupcakes and handfuls of roasted pumpkin seeds.

There is no doubt that the OCTOBERFEAST merrymakers are having the times of their lives.

However, total immersion in the immoral leaves the partygoers defenseless! At this point, virtually every one of `em is pumpkin-drunk and fear-fatigued. What should happen if some Donnie Decency stormed the gates, pamphlets about hygiene and righteousness in hand? Well, we could very well see the dark disciples converted, repurposed for existences without surfeits of sugar and regular poltergeist-attacks.

The horror!

Fortunately, there are those who keep careful watch over the OCTOBERFEAST – after all, the success of any evil entity is contingent upon the strength of its sentries. Voldemort has the Death Eaters. Darth Vader has the Stormtroopers.

Not to be outdone, OCTOBERFEAST has its own last line of defense: Etrigan’s Guild. For the safety of the celebration, the identities of this cacodemonic collective’s members are shrouded, revealed only to the perpetrating do-gooders. But in the spirit of Satan’s Snacktime, tonight the captain of the guild is stepping forward, making his presence known to any considering infiltration.

The Captain of Etrigan’s Guild: Glenn Danzig

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