For Gore Lovers: vintage x 3

So I've been watching scary movies again and there's some great badness that I'd like to share with you!

I: Summer Of Fear (1978)
This one stars good kid gone posessed; Linda Blair. She lives a carefree life with her parents, brothers and horse untill all is disturbed by a new house guest; niece Julia. At first she is very happy with her brand new ‘sister’, until strange things start happening around the house. Soon she discovers that there’s something very scary and disturbing about Julia and that she’s not who she says she is....


Apart from the huge perms, and the scary high-wasted pants there’s nothing really frightning about this film. The make up was quite bad and the plot was not that surprising. But I really enjoyed watching it anyway. Was it the cozy family that gets torn apart but eventually makes it because they stick together? Or was it that yellow seventies sauce? Or the tiny role of Fran Fine? I don't know, it’s just my favorite era for films and Wes Craven is still a hero. If you’re into vintage horror and don't have the need for that sadistic new skool gore.. definately one to watch!

II Slumber Party Massacre (1982)
The film starts as a bad mix of Prom Night, Halloween and Teen Wolf with girls in a shower, picking on the new girl who turns out to be pretty cool after all. So she gets invited to a Slumber Party at the popular girl’s house, which off course turns out to be a bad idea. In the mean time, we see a dude with a van that has some suspicious things going on. When the night falls all elements come together and the killing begins. Leaving very little to the imagination (meaning: wearing no mask or whatever), the ‘driller killer’ comes to business drilling holes in all the girls and the walls and also some furniture. A shame to see 100 hours of aerobics go to waste? Neeh, very entertaining!


III: Slumber Party Massacre II (1987)
Terrible but crazy cool, they had me within the first 5 minutes. It’s about 4 girls that are in a band together (a cheezy version of The Runaways). The girl that plays lead guitar is a survivor of the first massacre and we can tell she’s still slightly confused. As they get together in an empty house to practise for the next show, the trouble begins. Lead guitar girl starts having horrible nightmares starring a killer that sings, dances and carries a bad ass guitar with a screw drill on the neck while he chops of hands and drills holes in everyone. Leaving the spectator with questions: is the director pulling a freddy Krueger?? Why does this guy look like John Travolta? Are these people really dead?? Why do I even like this?


Apparently there is a sixpack of Massacre films, that show us 2 films in 3 different subgroups: Slumber Parties, Sorority Row and Cheerleaders. All of them packed with a typical B-movie visual spectacle and crazy plot twists. The interesting thing about the 1982 Slumber Party Massacre part I is that it was written by feminist activist Rita Mae Brown. Who obviously got so wrapped up in the story of a dude sticking his screw drill in all these innocent half naked teenage girls, that she forgot all about her beliefs.

About Bart Constant

Finally the wait is over. It's been a good few years, but the artist formerly known as About is back!

After working and touring extensively with Dutch band Voicst and doing production work for loads of other artists, Berlin-based Rutger Hoedemaekers has reincarnated in the persona of Bart Constant. To give us a taste of the new album he has just released a video for one of his songs: Do Better. And it's absolutely AMAZING!!!! The song, which features Dustin O'Halloran on piano is so beautiful, and the video (well video, it's more of a mini movie) is stunning. The song and the vid just work so well together. It was directed by Mirka Duijn and produced by Nina Spiering, who collaborate under the name of Kimmo Films.

Somehow releasing an album never comes easy for Rutger. Just before his first album was supposed to come out he suffered from a collapsed lung, three (!) times. Just before he was about to master this latest record his mixer failed and he missed his flight to London and thus his appointment at Abbey Roads Studios. And then his purple Polo broke down while he was on his way from Berlin to the shoot in Rotterdam, the car he needed to sell in order to finance the video... Insane or what?! But even though he couldn't make an appearance in the video, it's here and it's great. The album has been mastered and we are now anxiously waiting its release. Until then marvel at this:

Night at the Museum

Even more thrilling than Ben Stiller's Night at the Museum (I fell asleep while watching..) is the annual Rotterdam Museum Night. Tomorrow no less than 46 museums and galleries in Rotterdam are open till the wee hours (2.00) as they put up special installations, events, live bands en parties. A great chance to check out the Custom and Tax Museum, the Museum of Chess Pieces (huh?) or the Feyenoord Museum (located in stadium De Kuip), just to name a few.

But why not seize the opportunity to visit kids museum Villa Zebra with no kids there?! Besides their excellent current exhibition they've got workshops and performances by actors from theater company Jeugdtheater Hofplein. The festival and Villa Zebra are both celebrating their 10th birthday, so all the reasons to party twice as hard. That's why yours truly will play the best songs of the last decade. Hop on the special Museum Night bus or boat and come to Rotterdam's most fun museum! It's going to be a looooooong night!

*FREEBIE ALERT*
We've got special (digital) vouchers to give away for those of you who would like to visit Villa Zebra tomorrow. With this voucher you'll get FREE entrance!! Interested? Email us at info [@] dutchdolls [.]nl. Please note, this is for Villa Zebra only, you'll need a passe-partout to visit the other participating museums. These will be for sale at Villa Zebra (€17,50) (buy tickets in advance for €13,50 here).

Yeah yeah I'm a fan pt II

As I was searching the web the other day for an image of a jumping spider (which must be the cutest insect on the planet) I stumbled upon the spider below and couldn't believe my eyes. As I dug deeper into the person behind this incredible piece of art I found out it was done by a girl, by the name of Aurel Schmidt.


She was born and raised in Vancouver, Canada but moved to New York 6 years ago. To seek some thrills as she says, because it is hard to draw rotting corpses when your life is 'peachy'. And I am thankful she chose to live out of a suitcase because this decay is the most wonderful thing I have seen in ages. One more horrific than the other, but all wonderfully complex and soft. These days, she's also known as a New York socialite, a photographer and my new hero.


want to know more? Read an (quite old, yet cool) interview here.

New Relics

This weekend Rotterdam is all about art; museumnight is an annual event that turns the whole town upside down. Performances, live music and lots of artsy stuff all over the place!

All the established and not so established galleries, ateliers and museums make sure they have something special planned for this night. And so does Gallery Blaak 10 with their exhibition New Relics that opens this thursday at 19.00h.

This group show is all about new works of none other than Silas (Antistrot, Machinegewehr, Viper Cobra), Eelco van den Berg and newcomers Sober Industries. This will be the perfect pre-party for museumnight with music, beers, art and good company!

Check flyer for info.

Fear and Loving

Because I've mostly seen acts that were all heavy basses and synths over the past few weeks (Magnetic Man, James Blake, Nero, Chrystal Castles), the time was right to rock out again! Time to rock out properly: Les Savy Fav was in town!! A band that puts on one of the best live shows on planet earth if you ask me.

I love Les Savy Fav. They've got catchy songs, great guitar hooks and damn I wish my bum was as tight as their rhythm section. But their real trump card (joker?) is their singer Tim Harrington:


He is fat, bald and has a very large beard. He spends more time off the stage than on doing all sorts of crazy stuff (and so he is always very sweaty). I fear him! That's why my favorite place to see them was in the late Waterfront in Rotterdam. This venue had several large pillars, so I could easily hide from him (mind you, this was back in 2001 and there were maybe 20 other people there so the chances he would come up to you and yell in your face were considerable!).

Alas, the only pillars at The Globe in Cardiff are at the back near the bar, but you wouldn't want to be watching the show from way back there. Anyway, the show was sold out so there were plenty of other possible 'victims'. A good thing because once again my fears proofed to be grounded: Tim came on stage dressed up like Gaddafi, he went through several sets of garments that all got torn to pieces, he shouted in some woman's face (she got really pissed off - she even slapped him in the face - which of course made him prolong his harassment haha), he ate some guy's hair and licked the nipples of another. He even went crowd surfing, at which point I heard somebody yell in agony: "GRAB HIM BY THE ARSE, HE'S REALLY HEAVY!!!!". My 5th Les Savy Fav concert was again a memorable one.


Les Savy Fav - Patty Lee. Get it here (YSI).


Les Savy Fav - Tragic Monsters. Get it here (YSI).

p.s. Did you know that... Tim and his wife design patterns under the name of Deadly Squire (he went to Rhode Island School of Design after all)? This one is based on his doodles of flowers:

Makes him a lot less fearsome, doesn't it?