Top five horror DVDs

With Halloween approacing at a scary speed, Brandish proudly presents its Top 5 Horror DVDs:

5 Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace
This brilliant parody of low-rent Brit-horror, set in Darkplace Hospital in Romford, first hit our TV screens back in 2004, but it’s only been released on DVD this week. It’s been worth the wait (I think Channel Four is currently repeating the first series at the moment, too). If you’ve not seen Darkplace before, you can get a taste of it by watching the opening credits sequence here. In the humble opinion of Brandish, it’s the most underrated British sitcom of the last decade. BUY IT

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Create-a-cassette

You’ve always dreamed of being in a band… the women… the drugs… the adulation… well, Brandish can’t offer you such dreams without talent, but we can help you to create a picture of a cassette with your name and album title on it. It sounds boring, but the last 20 minutes has just seen the creation of about 60 different tapes with daft band names sent to mates. Click here to create your own cassette.

Pitchfork website reviews Jet’s new album

The best album review of all time is still Charles Shaar Murray’s one-word dismissal of Lee Hazelwood’s ‘Poet, Fool or Bum’ album (quoting in full: "Bum"). But it’s run pretty close by music site Pitchfork’s appraisal of Jet’s new ‘Shine On’ LP. Ouch! Acute critical opinion playing to the tastes of its readers, or just a snarky journalist making use of a comedy YouTube clip to avoid having to write any words about an album they hate? You decide!

Five new albums we love

5 THE LETTING GO – BONNIE ‘PRINCE’ BILLY
After the disappointment of The Brave and the Bold, Will Oldham’s recent collaboration with Tortoise (of whom more below), The Letting Go is a return to the confident form of 2003′s Master and Everyone. Dawn McCarthy (Faun Fables) provides wonderfully intimate backing vocals throughout. The perfect autumn album, best listened to whilst drinking whisky in front of a roaring log fire. BUY IT

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Five great graphic novels

5 HALO: THE GRAPHIC NOVEL
You’ve played the videogames, now read the graphic novel… The Halo brand is so strong that Bungie and Marvel Comics couldn’t be arsed to come up with a better title than Halo: The Graphic Novel. What next? Halo: The Nutritious Breakfast Cereal. Anyway, H:TGN looks gorgeous and is a cracking read, whether you’re familiar with the games or not. Hardly surprising, given the talent roped in for this project – best of all is the jaw-displacing, as is the  artwork of 2000AD veteran Simon Bisley. BUY IT
PS. Interesting fact: Simon Pegg’s character in Spaced (Tim Bisley) is named after Simon Bisley.

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Curb Your Enthusiasm, Season Five DVD

The fifth series of peerless American sitcom Curb Your Enthusiasm hasn’t yet been aired on British TV – as far as I’m aware, anyway – so I highly recommend that you pre-order the DVD from Amazon now (see link, below), for £16.99. Btw, Curb fans will be happy to learn that HBO has commissioned a sixth series. Larry David rules. BUY IT

Pele’s coffee-table book is more expensive than your coffee-table

I love Pele. I loved him in Escape to Victory and I loved
him in a Brazil shirt and I loved him in those Viagra ads. However, I
don’t love Pele enough to splash out £1,600 on a book about him. That’s
right, the coffee-table-punishing PELE costs £1,600.
This limited-edition book weighs 12kg, contains 1,700 photographs
(including snaps by Andy Warhol and Juergen Teller) and contains more
than 300,000 words. If you want to save money, you can pre-order it on Amazon for a bargain £1,440!

For that money I’d expect Pele to deliver the book personally and then have a kick-about with me in my back garden. BUY IT

[Via Who Ate All the Pies]