xniquet's middle finger technology: Readlist

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xniquet's vampire playlist: reprise

This is a more hip-hop flavored list to add to the Vampire List. It is great to listen to when you are playing your PS or computer games and not to mention when you are reading your horror story books; it serves as a great background music to add to the ambiance around. So take a deep breath, light up a candle and pretend that you’re in Heaven.

WC, E-40 & Christ Bearer/When The Guns Come Out
I just love the combination of acoustic guitar and sequencer.
Mos Def & Massive attack/I Against I
This is a really cool tune, it was played in Blade II, when Blade and the Blood Pack (Vampires trained to kill Blade) join forces and walked in the vampire’s safe house. “I against I, two of a kind but one will survive”
White Zombie/Blood, Milk and Sky
Dark eerie tune that makes you turn on the lights, Rob Zombie’s vocals has something to do with it.
Marilyn Manson/Lamb of God
Hip-hop like tune from Manson, one of a kind; a song about the death of stardom.
Massive Attack/Teardrop
This is the Trip-hop that everybody just loves.

Here I go again, bitching about vampires. But this time round, my theme revolves around the first three novels of the Vampire Chronicles: Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat & the Queen of the Damned and the two movies. Differences between the film and the novel:

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Queen of the Damned (Shit load of differences)
Film: Akasha is portrayed as having dark skin and green eyes which sometimes change into red ones. She was portrayed in the movie by the late actress and singer Aaliyah.
Book: Akasha and Enkil are as white as marble, all skin pigmentation having been lost completely due to their extremely advanced vampiric age, and Akasha has clear eyes.

Film: Marius is Lestat's maker, and is portrayed with short dark hair and dark eyes.
Book: Magnus is Lestat's maker; Lestat doesn't meet Marius, who is said to have long white-blonde hair and blue eyes, until about ten years after he has been made.

Film: Lestat has brown hair.
Book: Lestat has blond hair.

Film: Lestat sends a man out to bring back victims so that he can feed on them.
Book: Lestat takes his own kills at all times, choosing only to feed on "evildoers" for a large part of his existence.

Film: Marius instructs Lestat on how to be a vampire after he makes him. He tells Lestat not to drink from his victims when their hearts stop, or it will kill him.
Book: Lestat had minimal instruction from his maker, Magnus, and was left to fend for himself. Magnus does tell him not to drink until the heart stops, because he might follow the victim down (presumably into death).

Film: Marius comes to Lestat in the present, telling him he always knew where he was because he is Lestat's maker.
Book: Louis comes to Lestat, not Marius. Makers and their fledglings cannot read each others minds.

Film: Gabrielle and Louis are not mentioned.
Book: Gabrielle and Louis, Lestat's fledglings, are a significant presence.

Film: Jesse is twenty-something, is never mentioned to have psychic powers, and is a novice in the Talamasca. Jesse and Lestat are portrayed as being in love. A connection to Mael is only hinted at during the concert scenes, but completely overshadowed by her relationship to Lestat and Mael is killed off by Akasha.
Book: Jesse is thirty-five, a witch, and a field-operator of the Talamasca, which brings her in contact with Claudia's spirit, sparking her obession with vampires in general and Lestat in particular. Jesse is infatuated with Lestat but Lestat is merely impressed with her. If Jesse is in love with anyone, she is in love with Mael.

Film: Jesse learns about Lestat from his own journal in the Talamasca library.
Book: Jesse learns about Lestat and Louis from Claudia's diary, which she finds in a house.

Film: Jesse believes that Lestat is a vampire from the first moment she hears of him, and is eager to investigate. She tells David Talbot that she is going to Lestat's concert.
Book: Jesse is assigned to New Orleans to research vampires and Lestat, and she thinks the assignment is ridiculous. Once she does come to believe in him, she goes off to the concert against the Talamasca's wishes, and doesn't tell David. He finds out that she is there when he sees her at the show.
Film: Jesse is made by Lestat after the Queen is dead.
Book: Maharet makes Jesse after her neck is broken by a vampire at Lestat's concert.

Film: Mekare is never mentioned, her role merged into that of her sister Maharet.
Book: Mekare plays the most important role in the origin story and the climactic scene.

Film: Lestat's concert is held in Death Valley, California.
Book: The concert is held in San Francisco.

Film: The vampires at Lestat's concert attack him during the show, and Akasha rises from the stage, carrying Lestat away with her.
Book: The vampires attempt to attack Lestat after the show, and he runs away with Gabrielle and Louis. Akasha comes to him in his coffin, right before he falls asleep at sunrise.

Film: The vampires at Lestat's concert attack him during the show, and Akasha rises from the stage, carrying Lestat away with her.
Book: The vampires attempt to attack Lestat after the show, and he runs away with Gabrielle and Louis. Akasha comes to him in his coffin, right before he falls asleep at sunrise.

Film: Most vampires can fly, including the younger ones.
Book: Only very old or powerful vampires can fly. Lestat cannot fly until after he drinks Akasha's blood.

Film: Akasha and Lestat are awake during the day and able to go out into the sunlight without becoming burned. Akasha claims that Lestat can do so because he drank her blood.
Book: Vampires cannot go out into the sun without injury. Younger or weaker vampires will be destroyed by the sun; older or more powerful vampires will be burned. The extent of that burning will vary depending on the vampire's age or strength, along with duration and intensity of exposure.

Film: Akasha only kills vampires and the entire population of a Greek island.
Book: Akasha does not kill vampires that are known and loved by Lestat (she also fails to kill all vampires, as evidenced by the survival of those such as Khayman and Eric (and Thorne, who only emerges in Blood and Gold), who Lestat has never met). Posing as the Queen of Heaven (and the Virgin Mary), Akasha telepathically urges women to kill nearly all the men in third-world countries, making the man-woman ratio 1:100, because she sees men as the root of all evil.

Film: Akasha gestures to Lestat to drink from her, but does not move. Enkil never moves.
Book: In The Vampire Lestat, Akasha is awakened by Lestat playing the violin and comes down from her throne. As Lestat drinks from Akasha, Enkil almost kills him.

Film: Lestat is still playing with the violin of the beautiful Greek girl he charmed during his "instructions" (she was killed by Lestat when her father discovered he was a vampire).
Book: The girl with the violin was never in the books. The violin belonged to Lestat's second fledgling, Nicolas, who committed vampiric suicide while under the care of Armand. The violin is crushed when Akasha awakens from her throne.

Film: David Talbot is a middle-aged man. At the end of the film, Marius is seen going into David's home.
Book: David Talbot is old and Marius never met him in person, much less attempted to give him the Gift. In a later book, David actually forbade Lestat to turn him into a vampire when Lestat offered (although Lestat eventually did turn David after the affair with the body thief, which left David's soul in a younger man's body).

Flim: Pandora and Mael are killed during the final battle with Akasha. Pandora is shown as being Indian. Armand is blond and is looks to be in his early 20s.
Book: None of the vampires are killed in the final battle with Akasha. Pandora is a Roman with brown hair, and Armand has auburn hair and was made when he was 17 after being struck by a poisoned blade during a duel.

Film: Maharet drank the last drop of Akasha's blood, which killed Akasha and turned Maharet into stone like Akasha.
Book: Akasha dies in a vampiric showdown and laid to rest when the twin sisters consume her brain and heart. The scene is simultaneously a reenactment of the funeral service for Maha. ret and Mekare's mother, which was disrupted by the intervention of Akashas troops when they were taken into custody as famous witches, to be brought to Egypt to answer Akashas questions about the afterlife and the supernatural.

Film: There is no significant insight into or discussion of the origin of the vampires.
Book: The origin of the vampires is a central plot point in the book.

Film: Akasha simply aims at renewing her primeval rule and calls humans "brute creatures" and "merely food".
Book: Akasha tries to usher in an era of peace for the benefit of female humans. She kills the vampire Azim exactly for using humans as merely food.

Director: Michael Rymer
Novel : Anne Rice
Screenplay: Scott Abbott & Michael Petroni
Year: 2002
Cast:
Aaliyah … Akasha aka Queen of the Damned (But she was damned fine)
Stuart Townsend … Lestat de Lioncourt

They compressed two novels into one two hour feature film and the result you get is a great shit load of differences and a lukewarm response from the throngs of Vampire fans. Fans were displeased because the back story of Akasha and the Story of the Twins were omitted, despite these being virtually central to the plot of the novel. Some novels aren’t supposed to be cramped up like sardines. But some movies are supposed to be cut-off and end when it is supposed to. For instance, Lord of the Rings’ Return of the King should have ended when Frodo wakes up in bed and Sam came in and see him and gave him the almost Gay smile. But Peter Jacks rolled his camera on and made like another 100 endings which left most of the people in the cinema feeling restless and a pain in the ass for being in the cinema for too long. I was like WTF all the way towards the ending of that show.

Random “Vampiric” Stuff I did last few days:

Watching Blade’s Trilogy again but this time it was a marathon, 3 movies straight up.

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Re-reading the Vampire Lestat and the Queen of the Damned.

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And yes, I rented the books but I was too lazy to return them. It’s not stealing okie? My deposit will be forfeited. Anyway, it states that I borrowed these two books from Easy-Rent-A-Book-Center, Bandar Sunway. But I think I rented it in Subang Parade. The tiny-weenie book store near Esquire Kitchen besides that Satay shop. I don’t know if it is still there, It’s been too long the books are starting to smell like recycled toiler papers. I wonder if they would return me my refund if I go there and return these books. Then again I wonder if there are still there.

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Playing Dracula’s Crazy Castle on my O2 which is so stupid and boring…

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I am starting to feel like a vampire, waking up later and sleeping at the break of dawn. I guess I should take it easy and start becoming more human. Promise not to post any more vampire post, at least the next few post will definitely be non-vampiric, we need our rest and sleep.

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xniquet's vampire playlist: part one

I have been reading and watching one too many books and movies on vampires these days, and in junction with the release of Manson’s new CD, which is a vampire theme album. I came up with a Vampire Playlist. I know some of you wanna slap me silly but I don’t care. Vampires are one of my favorite subjects.

Marilyn Manson/If I was Your Vampire
A six minutes epic of Manson’s return, with the lyric - The heart is where the hole is
Concrete Blonde/Bloodletting (The Vampire Song)
Alternative rock band Concrete Blonde's song "Bloodletting (the Vampire Song)", the title track from the Bloodletting CD, is based on Anne Rice's The Vampire Lestat.
HIM/When Love and Death Embrace
Finnish’s band - His Infernal Majesty’s (HIM) dark yet melodic love song.
Marilyn Manson/Evidence
Manson’s best song from his new album “Eat Me, Drink Me” which is an album about cannibal, consumption, obsessive, violent-sex, romance angle, but with an upbeat swing to it
Rob Zombie/Return of the Phantom Stranger
This is an eerie yet cool tune; love the beat on this song.
DMX Feat. Marilyn Manson/The Omen
Taken from Flesh of My Flesh Blood of My Blood CD, 1998 collaboration, I don’t really like DMX’s rap but Manson’s rap in the chorus is pretty convincing, he could make it as a rap artist.
Rob Zombie/The Scorpion Sleeps
One of the better songs in Rob Zombie’s Educated Horses, this song kind of reminds me of Marilyn Manson’s Disposable Teen. Maybe it is because Marilyn Manson’s Ex-guitarist John 5 is now on the rooster of Rob Zombie’s band.
Jay Gordon/Slept So Long
This is my favorite song from the Queen of the Damned soundtrack. In the movie Lestat (Stuart Townsent) sang this song in the Death Valley concert. “I see hell in your eyes, makes me feel alive”

Vampires are mythological or folkloric beings that subsist on human and/or animal life force. In most cases, they are reanimated corpses who feed by draining and consuming the blood of living beings. Vampirism is the practice of drinking blood from a person or animal. In folklore and popular culture, the term refers to a belief that one can gain supernatural powers by drinking human blood. The historical practice of vampirism can generally be considered a more specific and less commonly occurring form of cannibalism. In zoology and botany, the term vampirism is used in reference to leeches, mosquitoes, mistletoe, vampire bats.

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Everybody loves a good vampire story, from the ever famous Bram Stoker’s Dracula to the 80s cult hit, Fright Night to The Chinese Jiang Shi 僵屍 movies Mr. Vampire to even our local Pontianak. It keeps people flooding the cinema. Usually the vampires are the bad guys but Anne Rice has created a world where vampires are viewed as beautiful predators. The readers finally understand how it feels to be a vampire. Her fiction is often described as lush and descriptive, and her characters' sexuality is fluid, often displaying homoerotic feelings towards each other. Rice said that the bisexuality was what she was looking for in her characters; a love beyond gender especially with the Vampire Chronicles because the vampires where not of human society, therefore did not go by the expectations of that society.
The Vampire Chronicles
-Interview with the Vampire (1976)
-The Vampire Lestat (1985)
-The Queen of the Damned (1988)
-The Tale of the Body Thief (1992)
-Memnoch the Devil (1995)
-The Vampire Armand (1998)
-Merrick (2000)
-Blood and Gold (2001)
-Blackwood Farm (2002)
-Blood Canticle (2003)

New Tales of the Vampires
-Pandora (1998)

-Vittorio the Vampire (1999) (I am currently here, I know it’s been almost 8 years since the book have been published but I am slowly making my way down this list)

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My hardcover of Vittorio, The Vampire.

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“In 1450, Vittorio is a sixteen-year old nobleman and his family is murdered by a powerful and ancient coven of vampires. The image of his siblings' severed heads with eyes staring fixedly at him strike him permanently. Vittorio, however, escapes such a dreadful ending because of a vampire's intervention – Ursula. Vittorio plots his revenge against the vampires who are invading the lands and killing the innocents. With the help of his own angels, and a very powerful armor wearing angel, Mastema Ursula and Vittorio as an age old Bonnie and Clyde, killing and drinking until they had their fill.”

I know there are tons of vampire movies and animation but here are a few of my vampire movies in my collection of VCDs and DVDs.

List of Movies:
Vampire in Brooklyn – Eddie Murphy, Angela Bassett
Bram Stoker’s Dracula – Keanu Reeves, Gary Oldman, Winona Ryder
Tales from the Crypt’s Bordello of Blood – Dennis Miller
Vampires – James Wood, Daniel Baldwin, Sheryl Lee aka Sherri Moon Zombie
From Dusk till Dawn – George Clooney, Quetin Taratino
Fright Night – William Ragsdale, Roddy McDowall
Fright Night II - William Ragsdale, Roddy McDowall
Wes Craven’s Dracula 2000 – Jason Lee Miller, Gerard Butler
Horror of Dracula – Christopher Lee
Vampire Vs Vampire (Cantonese)
Mr. Vampire (Cantonese)
Les Vampires (B grade erotica)
The Erotica Rites of Countess Dracula (B grade erotica)
Blade – Wesley Snipes
Blade 2 – Wesley Snipes
Blade Trinity – Wesley Snipes
Dark Stalker (Animation)
Hellsing (Animation)
Van Helsing – Huge Jackman, Kate Beckinsale
The Twins Effect (Cantonese)
Stephen King’s Rose Red – Nancy Travis
Queen of the Damned – Aaliyah, Stuart Townsent

Essential Vampire Movie list
Number 1#
Interview of the Vampire
Don’t expect a human hero going on a hunt, driving stakes, stuffing garlic into vampire’s mouth in this show but expect Louis the guilt- ridden vampire (Brad Pitt) going amok, setting vampires on fire while holding Death-like sickle slashing vampire into halves. Tom Cruise as the infamous Lestat, Antonio Banderas as the Vampire Armand (Oldest Vampire). This flick features an All-star like, Stephen Rae, Christian Slater and a very very young Kirsten Dunst. This motion picture also produced a good soundtrack which features Guns N’ Roses cover of Rolling Stones’ Sympathy for the Devil. Must have in your Vampire Collection, unfortunately I lost mine.

Number 2#
Blade
One of the major plots of the film was Blade has to prevent Frost (Stephen Dorff) from raising La Magra, the Vampire blood god, and causing a vampire apocalypse. When Frost successfully became La Magra, he gained certain powers, making him almost invincible. Each ability he gained were from the twelve pure bloods (Ashe, Cianteto, Dragonetti, Faustinas who held two seats, Ligaroo, Lemure, Kobejitsu, Lobishomen, Von Esper, Upier, and Pallintine) sacrificed in the ritual and Blade, who was only bled. Some of those abilities/attributes include:
· Far superior strength and speed from that of a regular vampire.
· Red, bulging eyes.
· Instant regeneration of lost limbs.
· Impervious to silver.
· The ability to walk during the day due to Blade's blood.
· Can instantly turn any human in his path into vampires. This comes to debate since Dr. Karen Jenson was in the same area where La Magra and Blade's battle took place and was not instantly turned, though it's a possibility that La Magra needs to concentrate his powers in order to make the turning possible. More likely, however, this may be a figure of speech describing the "unstoppability" of a scourge-like entity.
· Can control minds, matter and the elements
· Can shed his skin, turning into a ball of fire to methodically stalk his prey

Number 3#
From Dusk to Dawn
Script writer Quentin threw in everything he knew into this Vampire Opus. Fans of horror genre will get a kick when a pair of bank robbing brothers hook up with an ex-pastor’s family on vacation and end up at a nightclub from Hell – The Titty Twisted. I love that bar!!!

Number 4#
The Queen of the Damned
Second film adaptation of the Vampire Chronicles came out in 2002. Starring Aaliyah as the Queen of the Damned and Stuart Townsend as the infamous Lestat, the movie combined incidents from the second and third books in the series but released under the title of the third book, The Queen of the Damned. The plot was substantially altered from that of the book, and the film was poorly received by fans and critics alike. This falls into my A list because it has a great soundtrack. All songs was inspired by movie written by Jonathan Davis (Korn) and Richard Gibbs. However Jonathan or Korn didn’t perform any of the tracks. It featured guest vocals from a number of famous bands like, Wayne Static (Static-X), Marilyn Manson (Marilyn Manson), Chester Bennington (Linkin Park), Jay Gordon (Orgy), David Draiman(Disturbed.

Number 5#
Fright Night
A teenage is convinced that his neighbor is a vampire – and he is! He enlists the aid of an old former screen vampire hunter and the result is a screamingly funny horror spoof.

Vampire Movie Shit List
Wes Craven’s Dracula 2000
Dracula has a daughter and his true identity is Judas Iscariot??WTF….
Tales from the Crypt’s Bordello of Blood
I was so bored; I don’t even know what the show was all about.
Bram Stoker’s Dracula
Great cast but lousy screens play.
Van Helsing
Huge Jackson should have just stopped when he was getting better at portraying Wolverine. Bram Stoker would have slap The Dracula in this show for being so lame.
Blade Trinity
Apart from Hannibal King’s (Ryan Reynolds) jokes about penises, the show is fucking lame

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For gamers besides movies and soundtrack, there is nothing like a workless afternoon in the office playing Konami's Classic - Castlevania to enhance my vampirism skill. After spending hours opening cans of whoop ass with my whip, I still haven’t got the chance to whoop Dracula’s ass. Darn it.

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I have officially joined VampireFreaks.com (a gothic version of Ahmoi.com). Here you can lead a double life being a vampire and occasionally meet some; a real untapped resource for meeting cute looking Japanese Goth chicks/Goth dudes or weird people from everywhere. You will be surprise with the amount of young gothic Malaysians who are listed here; I am trying to find out when their next death metal gathering. Satan Rules!!! Whee!!! Once you are in, don’t forget to join a cult there, it ranges from almost anything, from animation, movies to rock bands. I for one have joined Manson’s Legion in Marilyn Manson’s cult and also since I am a fan of BLEACH, I have joined it too. Did I mention you can start your own cult too? I did, I am the proud owner of the BIKINI BOTTOM PARTY cult. A cult worshipping Sponge Bob Square Pants; so if you are there, don’t forget to join my cult, I am pretty lonely there since I am the only member in this club. Me thinks, bunch of Vampires and Goth don’t usually tune in Nickelodeon.

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