Your Heavy Metal Roger Ebert
The first time I remember cursing out a calendar year being a thing on social media was in 2016, because David Bowie died in January. It didn’t seem to matter that Bowie suffered from a long illness and spent his last months preparing an artistically graceful death, people needed a culprit for their unexpected loss and decided that some cosmic force might’ve hexed the new year. It was a pretty dumb reason to condemn twelve months of human activity, in retrospect.
I like David Bowie’s music as much as the next guy, but 2020 redefined what a bad year could be.
From a personal and professional perspective, it wasn’t a terrible year at all. Outside of Scarlett’s untimely passing from a degenerative disease, the pandemic left my life relatively intact. Once again, you guys showed up whenever I made content and your passion for books, movies and music contributed to the site’s success. So thank you! I often say that I’m the primary beneficiary of Dead End Follies, but it wouldn’t be the same without you guys.
Getting you into weird shit
In 2020, I let my own interest dictate what the site would be able. I wanted it to become a greater reflection of who I am and I was by all means successful at that. But I think the quality of content sometimes suffered a little bit from the lack of clear direction. It stagnated because I didn’t open myself to new ideas. You found the same authors and the same kind of in my Best Reads of 2020 list. These are solid recommendations, but I found it distressing nonetheless.
This is why I’m going into a clearer direction in 2021. Dead End Follies is going to become a bridge between mainstream and niche culture. A place where you come to better understand why you were mildly unsatisfied with Wonder Woman 1984 (first review of 2021, by the way!) and leave with three movie suggestions, one book to read and one new recording artist to check out. Because there is more to culture than what Disney is offering you.
Don’t get me wrong. You shouldn’t be ashamed to like Star Wars or Marvel’s Cinematic Universe. If this is all you want from culture, it’s fine. You’ll find some of that here. But Dead End Follies is for those who want something else. Something better tailored to who they are and not necessarily meant for the largest possible audience. If you feel like every movie available looks the same or that every new artist sounds terrible, you need Dead End Follies in your life.
I am the guy who will help you regain faith in culture. I will be your gateway into the weird stuff.
….wut?
This new direction was born from an audit of the site I’ve made. I’ve found out that I was writing for two different audiences: casual and dedicated. Although my writing tone was always meant for the dedicated, 75% of my content was stuff meant for casual viewers. As a writer, my gift is to be a casual explorer of weird, niche stuff. The more extreme something is, the more I’m interested in it and I’m interested in a lot of stuff. Long-time readers know that already.
In 2021, I will be your heavy metal Roger Ebert. Your J-horror Wesley Morris. Your weirdo friend that goes to superhero movies with you, but also drags you into midnight screenings in raunchy theaters. I will listen to your favorite Ghostmane record and recommend you weird industrial music afterwards. I will read Jonathan Franzen with you and we’ll follow it up with a Blake Butler novel. Oh yeah, I promise to be that fucking guy from now on.
See you in 2021, folks! This one will be different. This one will have purpose like no other before.
