Rudy Panucci On Pop Culture

Month: November 2014 (Page 2 of 4)

Existentialist Hitman of the Future

The PopCult Bookshelf

Johnny Nemo: Existentialist Hitman of the Future
JohnnyNemo_Cover.jpg.size-600by Peter Milligan and Brett Ewins
Titan Comics
ISBN-13: 978-1782760702
$22.99

“It wasn’t every day I had a Nun in my office, and I can’t remember the last time one of them exploded.”

Johnny Nemo is not your typical private eye. He operates in “New London” in the year 2921. It’s a crowded, nasty place where, to quote the back cover copy, Johnny has to deal with “Death-Juice junkies, Latin-spouting armored fascists, exploding nuns and a religious cult who worship Bing Crosby’s left testicle. It’s also home to ultra-violent, foul-mouthed private eye Johnny Nemo – a streetwise PI who deals in death… and simple solutions to complex problems!”

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Comedy Time with Video

It’s a triple-threat Wednesday for comedy locally. There’s a great live show at The Empty Glass, a Podcast and a video. Check ’em out…

Carlos Valencia

Carlos Valencia

First up, we have a night of comedy at The Empty Glass with regional headliner Carlos Valencia, musician Vincent Elliot, and also featuring local comedy favorite Ryan Carrier. Hosted by Patrick “Madman” Felton.

In addition to his stint featuring for Doug Stanhope’s Dirty Comedy, Valencia has performed comedy in over 30 states from Washington to Florida in comedy clubs, colleges, theaters, casinos, boats, taverns, watering holes, churches, diners, coffee shops, prisons, military bases, bowling centers, back alleys, redneck bars, punk rock clubs, hip-hop joints, and heavy metal dives – with some of the biggest names in comedy – and on some of the most prestigious comedy festivals in the country.

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The PopCult Toybox: Archer, the Board Game

archerbox_3dArcher, the hit animated absurdist spy show on FX, begins a new season in January, but if you don’t want to wait that long you can make your own Archer Adventures with a new Board Game, Archer: Danger Zone. This is a must-have for fans of the show, and it’s a great way to work your obsession with cartoons into some sort of semi-acceptable social activity.

The game will set you back a little more than thirty bucks, which is a bargain for the endless hours of fun you’ll have. It’s produced by Cryptozoic Entertainment, who make all sorts of specialty games and trading card sets. here’s the PR direct from their website:

Archer The Danger Zone! Board Game: A high-stakes game of espionage, international intrigue, and screwing over your co-workers.

image_0The object of the game is to gain the Upper Hand over your opponents by insulting them, doing well on missions (quite the ego boost), and encountering random guest stars and secondary characters from the show. Each player starts with 5 Upper Hand. The first player to get to 20 Upper Hand wins the game.

Each player chooses one of the following characters to play: ArcherLanaMaloryCyrilPamCherylRay or Dr. Krieger. The insults and dirty tricks you deliver to the other players are based on actual quotes from the show that your character makes. The cards in your unique deck of 20 cards give you the ability to hurl insults, “come on” to another character, or say something that builds up your character’s own ego.

The action takes place at the ISIS Headquarters, though spy missions send the gang off to exotic locales each round of play. The game features 6 important office locations within ISIS, but you (typically) play with around 4 of them, archer_event_promos.pdf-1making each game play out very differently as the “Office Map” will be vary from game to game. Each location does something different, but only the first person to go to each location each round gets the benefit listed on that location. Surely there will be no name calling when another player beats you to the punch!

The game is all about other players ticking you off and wanting to get the better of them.

There are naturally plenty of opportunities to belittle your co-workers while in the office and out in the field. Doing so will knock them down a peg or two on the Upper Hand track.

It all adds up to a humorously good time!

Archer: The Danger Zone looks like tremendous fun, and it’s also the first unofficial entry in The 2014 PopCult Gift Guide, which will kick off in earnest the week of Thanksgiving. You can find it at Amazon and other online game retailers.

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Radio Free Charleston: Week Two on New Appalachia Radio

New Logo WEEK TWOIt’s the second week of RFC Volume Three on New Appalachia Radio at Voices of Appalachia. Every Tuesday morning we’re going to post the playlist for our new show which can be heard at 10 AM and 10 PM, and again Thursday at Midnight and late Saturday night at 2 AM (all times Eastern).

This is free, streaming radio that you can listen to HERE. Update: You can listen to this show now in the Voices of Appalachia archive HERE.

Starting next week RFCv3 expands to TWO HOURS each week. Our first hour will feature a variety of local and regional music, while the second hour will have a different theme each week. We’ll tell you more about that next week. After the jump, you can take a look at what you can hear on this week’s episode of the show:

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The RFC MINI SHOW with Under The Radar

Rusty, Mark and Bill

Rusty, Mark and Bill

This week’s RFC MINI SHOW was recorded Halloween night at The Bowling Alley-Dunbar. The RFC crew captured the reunion of Under The Radar, who hadn’t played a show together in over six years.

Under The Radar is Rusty Marx, Bill Robinson and Mark Lanham, and they had a blast getting back together for a night of classic rock tunes. This week we bring you their versions of Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll,” and another great cover that we’re not going to name because they do a unique take on it and we don’t want to spoil the surprise.

Under The Radar first appeared on the fourth episode of Radio Free Charleston, back in 2006, and it’s great to see them back in action, even if was for one night only. Listen for some original songs by Under The Radar in the coming weeks on Radio Free Charleston: Volume Three, our audio show on New Appalachia Radio.

Monday Morning Art: Slinging Web

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Last night the last Dr. Sketchy’s session of 2014 happened at Uncork and Create, and it was a Spider-man-themed evening. Above you see Parker Olsen as Doc Ock menacing Kitty Killton as The Black Cat. Below you see Dave Houston as your friendly neighborhood Spider-man, also encounting Kitty as The Black Cat. These were quick digital illustrations. In the future you will see more from this session that have a bit more thought put into them. Dr. Sketchy’s will return to action next March.

Click ’em to see ’em bigger, and check PopCult later today for The RFC MINI SHOW starring Under The Radar.

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Sunday Evening Video: Elephant Parts

B0000844IZ.01.LZZZZZZZMost people know Mike Nesmith as the tallest of The Monkees, the pre-fab four, a 1960s rock band that was created for television. Ridiculed for not writing their own songs or playing their own instruments, the band rebelled and eventually proved that they were capable of being very creative on their own. Then they broke up.

After the end of The Monkees, Nesmith became a pioneer in the worlds of music video and home video distribution. In 1981 he released Elephant Parts, the first video concept album, with original songs and comedy sketches mixed into a fun package, which was originally sold directly to viewers on VHS or Beta. That’s it up above. Check it out. You can find it on DVD now, if you want a better copy. This gem won the Grammy for best music video the first year that catagory was introduced.

RFC Flashback: More Classic “MARY”

Our showcase of past episodes of Radio Free Charleston that feature songs from The Contemporary Youth Arts Company production, MARY: A Rock Opera, continues. This week we’re going back to 2008, the first year that we covered the show. Mary was played by Molly Means, Gabriel was played by Tanya Dillon-Page and Elizabeth was played by our own Melanie Larch. You can see the three come together to sing the famous “Trio” in the above “half-episode” of the show, from November 2008..

MARY opens Friday Nov. 28, 8PM, at the WVSU Capitol Center Theater, Charleston. with performances Sat. Nov. 29, 8PM, Sunday Nov. 30, 2PM matinee, and Thurs Dec.4, Fri. Dec. 5 Sat. Dec 6, 8PM. 

Below you’ll see Molly’s rendition of “Child, My Child” from that year’s production of the show. Next week we’ll bring you clips from 2010 and 2012.

Get Your Music on RFC, plus Do Stuff

MUSIC WANT THUMBThe PopCulteer
November 14, 2014

It’s been another busy week for your PopCulteer. Work progresses on both the video and audio versions of Radio Free Charleston, and we’re still plugging away at our other regular PopCult features. This week we’ve got a plea for music submissions and then we’re jumping right into the list of Stuff To Do this weekend.

Open Call For Music

For the past eight years it was confusing enough to have a video show called “Radio Free Charleston.” Now that we have joined Voices of Appalachia and have an audio version, it’s even more confusing.

And that’s the way we like it.

However, one major advantage of the audio version is that it is, audio. We don’t need to drag our cameras out, and we can even play studio recordings by our local and regional artists.

I have a huge archive of local music, but I can always use more. If you have recordings of yourself (or others) that you would like to hear played on Radio Free Charleston at Voices of Appalachia, you can contact me through the RFC Facebook page or drop me an email at rudypan@suddenlink.net.

All the music I play on the show will also be entered into the Voices of Appalachia music library, and will show up in the rotation of songs played between scheduled programming. RFC is a format-free show. We will consider any music submitted for play, regardless of genre.

So send me some stuff. Chances are I’ll play it.

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