For this almost-delve into Moorcock’s dark and inspired quest fantasy The Warhound and the World’s Pain, I’m joined by author, playwright and Games Master David Griffiths. Inevitably, we ended up going down various routes in a wide-ranging conversation including Target Books (again), Moorcock and other inspirations, roleplaying games and, eventually, The Warhound and the World’s Pain, which is getting a fresh coat of paint thanks to Joe Monti and Saga Press and their brand-new hardcover Von Bek collection (releasing in December). We will follow up on this in the next few weeks with a deeper delve.
We also discuss Dave’s latest play, inspired by the events that led an under-sexed weirdo to produce the infamous Malleus Maleficarum, The Hammer and Helena.
This is the latest of Dave’s plays to be staged by Arts Groupie, a Liverpool-based Community Interest Company. Check out their website for more details, including Dave’s take on the Dickens classic ghost story, The Signalman.
We are firmly in our Halloween groove. The eco-horror of Pisces Rising may have given us a light step into the season, but now we’re up to our necks in it and our choices for this year not only include the winner and one of the runners-up from this year’s patron poll, but we’re also taking a look at one that has featured on past polls but never reached the top…
William Hope Hodgson’s classic of weird fiction and cosmic dread… The House on the Borderland.
Author, editor and musician Allister Thompson is back for this one (check out his musical retrospective and his debut novel The Music of the Spheres), and this was a pretty deep reading (by my standards anyway). We also touch on Lovecraft and some musical interpretations, including one by Nostalgia and Borderlands by Tactile, an extract of which can be heard at the end of the show.
In this bonus fix-up episode, I meet up with our pen-pal Robert MacMillan in a coffee shop in Bradford to set the scene for our journey into the worlds of Bastable… this wasn’t our initial plan. Still, life intervenes in strange ways sometimes and we follow the moonbeam roads as we must.
As well as Moorcock, we talk about 1980s coach holidays to Palamos, VHS tracking, Bond, Who conventions, Pontins Prestatyn, the literary merits of Lawrence Durrell and all sorts of other things.
It’s October already so it’s time for Graham to return for our traditional Halloween period of exploring killer critter features and, from time to time, discovering new author rabbit holes to tumble down. This time, it’s PISCES RISING by NEL stalwart Peter Cave and his one-time collaborator Margaret Wredden.
Fantastic creation myths combine with brutal deaths, drinking bitter in a pub in Lowestoft, and a sadly underfeatured octopus called Bluey.
New traveller Liam Jones drops by Derry & Toms to discuss one of his favourite things… Victorian Invasion literature… as we tackle the Moorcock-edited anthology Before Armageddon, a collection of Victorian and Edwardian imaginative fiction.
Liam also teaches me about the Parisian dandy criminals, the Apaches! (Who I must now write into my next game…)
And if you’re interested in the illustrations Liam mentions that accompanied The Great War in England of 1897, here are a couple of examples:
Very cool!
At some point we’ll take a look at volume II – England Invaded
Pig-bombs, priests in daisy dukes, dressing down the Theocrat of Pan Tang and getting torn apart by dogs are just some of the highlights as I’m joined in D&Ts once again by Steve Round to talk Stormbringer gaming and this time he’s brought the whole damn party.
The wandering beer table returns and, as a reward to the gang, we debut an all-new lazily assembled table of rubbish demon-bound quest goodies.
So join Steve, Chloe, Sara, Roddy, Jay, Richie and Ceirun as we board the Merciful Servant and reflect on what it takes to save the Young Kingdoms from the overbearing and stagnant forces of Law!
Content warning: The Void campaign is Moorcockian and therefore spicy. And Steve tries a smoked beer. Horrific!
You can find the full write-ups of The Void campaign and more on Steve’s blog – Cruising For a Musing
Allister Thompson returns to Derry and Toms as we hurtle back to 1918 and brave the cold waters of the Atlantic to take a look at The Land That Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs, subject of Michael Moorcock’s sole filmed movie script (along with James Cawthron of course).
Expect discussions about mysterious island tropes, personal propensities to cannibalism, dodgy theories of race and C Thomas Howell!
Allister’s latest release (at time of posting this at least) is Apocalypse Man by Khan Tengri and it includes a nice Moorcockian track too.
PS Here’s that Patrick Tilley designed cover I mentioned…
In our continued deliberations about tackling Michael Moorcock’s Doctor Who novel The Coming of the Terraphiles, several questions about the pitfalls of writing for established IPs have arisen, and a pressing one is:
What happens when Trumpton and British politics intrude upon the Alien universe?
We investigated so you don’t have to. Join Miles Reid-Lobatto (writer and co-host of the Casual Trek Podcast) and SF Starship artist and designer Ian Stead AKA Biomassart as we look at what makes the Alien IP tick and how some recent books have tackled it.
Mainly Alien: Colony War.
But also Alien: The Cold Forge. Which we probably should have talked about more, because it’s great.
You can read my 2012 feature on Alien 3 here (just don’t start any more flame wars you Colonial Marines fans you).
Oliver Brackenbury returns to Derry & Toms to talk about the next phase of his excellent mag New Edge Sword and Sorcery. Moorcock talk, uncovering and unleashing a golden age hero anew and copious amounts of caffeine and lemsip dominate.
That’s a rhetorical question really as I’ve long since come to the realisation that as we gradually return to our natural state of sludge and atoms time just speeds up at a frankly ridiculous rate. It’s a shame too as (as ever) all I want to do is produce more episodes and talk to more people about the things I’m into. Only this morning in fact, I clocked the book cover above (another marvellous 70s thriller photo cover) on social media and immediately regretted not having the time to dip into the copious shelves/piles of similarly adorned paperbacks and run a side podcast diving into the world of Panther Crime novels, the wild array of Pan and Mayflower wonders, and further into NEL pulp exploitation books (which we have of course touched on with Andrew Nette). I’m sure Andrew would agree that there is probably an entire podcast just covering photo covers featuring women with guns (photo c/o his twitter feed).
But… no time…
So I’ll be sticking with the main roster of content for BITR, the next of which will be Moorcock/Butterworth/Hawkwind cross-over/mash-up The Time of the Hawklords in the company of Hawkwind: Days of the Underground author Joe Banks, returning to Derry & Toms for the third time. That will be out in a few days.
Over the coming weeks, we have some other things in the pipeline in the form of:
a bit of Sheckley from Pops’s shelves that’s been on my mind for over 30 years w/Derek AKA Imrryr
the return of Andrew Nette to talk about Quatermass (for reasons that will become apparent)
Part two of The Pheonix in Obsidian w/ Phil
a long overdue second look at Conan in some shape or form with Dave AKA SÖNUS
MM’s obscure political chapbook w/ a variety of guests (possibly in multiple parts)
The Land That Time Forgot (in its various forms) with Allister Thompson AKA The Gateless Gate (and we’ll probably talk about The War of the Worlds again at some point)
…and some other stuff I’ve talked about with various interlocuters that we just haven’t managed to get in the diary yet including Loz, Hussein, Tash and Miles. The latter is something Miles and I have been mulling over for a while related to the perils of writing spin-offs for established IPs. MM has form for this of course… more on that when we decide how to tackle it.
Meanwhile, Andy Darby pinged me a link to a decent article on Esquire titled The Death of the Multiverse, ostensibly an observation on why ‘multiverse stories’ are getting tiring and a little bit passé for mainstream audiences thanks to Marvel and co but it delves deep into the philosophical dimensions of that type of storytelling and MM gets some coverage too. Well worth a read, particularly the bit about the actual origins of the term ‘multiverse’.
Now, I must take my leave to eat crisps, listen to the howling gales and hope our wheely bins are still local.
For now I’ll sign off with another Pulpcurry special, so wherever you are pards… take care, stay safe and be SUPER.
Breakfast in the Ruins Podcast 