able to foster a rabbit?

Back home and back to work... More of the usual posts to come, but in the meantime here is a request for help from a group called Rabbit Rescue. Get in touch with them if you can lend a hand.

Via Niagara Action for Animals:

Friends of Rabbit Rescue,

Many of you may have heard by now that we are involved in helping in a specific case with hundreds of rabbits that desperately need us! We have until Thursday to gather as many foster homes as we can to help these wonderful bunnies. Most of them are Holland lops or dwarfs, ranging in age from babies to adults, with every colour under the sun!

We are specifically concentrating on helping the adult bunnies. These rabbits have been through hell and back, and while we cannot share details on this specific case right now, we will be able to shortly. What we can tell you is that if we do not get enough foster homes for these bunnies, the outcome is not going to be positive for them. There are still about 70 rabbits that need foster homes.

If you can foster a bunny, please email us immediately! We will provide a cage with supplies, plus a bag of food kindly donated by Martin Mills!

If you cannot foster right now, or miss this Thursday deadline, please contact us when you can foster! As our current foster homes are going to be completely filled up, this means we will not be able to offer our help to the shelters that rely on us to take their rabbits in when they become full. The situation for them, will become dire quickly too.

We need your help, and the bunnies need your love. Please consider fostering or adopting today. If you can't foster, donations are greatly appreciated. We will be spaying/neutering every rabbit that comes in, plus providing them all with medical care. You can donate
here: http://www.rabbitrescue.ca/donate.html

Thank you for your support!
Haviva Lush
Executive Director, Rabbit Rescue Incorporated
www.rabbitrescue.ca
Finding Rabbits Loving Homes

back on the road again

...or, more precisely, the train tracks.

My next trip is to Montreal, for my third conference of the year (whether I will do any concerting while I'm there is yet to be determined). My first of 2011 was ICFA-32, the annual conference held by the International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts. Conference two was held by the new Popular Culture Association of Canada in Niagara Falls. Next up, IASPM-Canada (International Association for the Study of Popular Music). I'm off to present my nth conference paper on metal.

In preparation I re-watched the DVD Pagan Metal: A Documentary, and was again surprised by how much interesting dialogue could emerge from and despite the deliberately stupid and careless interviewing, editing, and general film making that went into the production. But it turns out that multiple viewings only make me more annoyed with the attitude toward women and 'girlie' metal displayed here, demonstrated through the way Leaves' Eyes is framed, particularly singer Liv Kristine and her sister Carmen, whose band Midnattsol appears only in a spliced performance clip. What qualified appreciation I have for the movie clearly emerges from the dynamics of the scene itself and the intriguing personalities involved in it.

There are at least a few other papers on metal scheduled for this week's conference. We'll see if after hearing them I've picked up enough to report back.

hellbound summer metal meltdown continues (plus more to read)

Hellbound's Summer Metal Meltdown is on air again tonight on CFMU 93.3 FM. We're down at least one voice since Heavy Metal Adam is off gallivanting around Europe but the show goes on!

And while I'm on the subject of Hellbound... Our Maryland Deathfest recap continues with Day 2 and Day 3. Plus Hellbound's 2nd birthday celebrations are ongoing as well, with more staff interrogations. Mine went up this week!

With all this going on, among other things, I'm having a hard time keeping up on all the cool new releases that have been coming out lately (never mind the mediocre and bad ones...). I did manage to cover a couple things for exclaim.ca though, including

the North American release of Anathema's We're Here Because We're Here

and the new Amorphis, The Beginning of Times.

more post-MDF fun

Wooeee! Hellbound.ca's MDF day 1 recap is up now. Check it out. (more to come)

Don't forget to read our 2nd birthday celebratory staff interviews while you're there, especially the one with Kieran, the oldest son of Hellbound overlord, Sean.

... and, in my last post, I totally forgot to mention my favourite Maryland Deathfest purchases!

I'm cheap, on a tight budget, and get totally overwhelmed when there's too much selection. With multiple vendors, official merch tents, and scores upon scores of clothes, patches, pins, cds, vinyl, and even cassettes, the shopping-oriented part of my poor brain had a minor short circuit at the fest. Despite that I came out with a souvenir MDF shirt, a couple Kylesa records I hadn't gotten around to picking up before, and - I am excited to add - a Cemetary shirt plus a double Morgion album from Relapse. After being soothed by Solinari earlier this morning I'm now peacefully dooming out to Among Majestic Ruin.

stronger than metal (I am not) and happy birthday, hellbound!

Monday evening I arrived home from Maryland Deathfest: four nights and two afternoons of live metal bombardment, sandwiched by two days of first class heavy metal roadtripping. It was an amazing time with awesome people. I, however, am now a lump of aching, viral-infested quasi-human flesh. Was it worth it? Of course! Will I again sit in a vehicle (admittedly, a comfy one) for sevenish hours each way and stand on concrete for four days - all in the name of metal? Don't doubt it! (that's assuming I survive the recovery process...)

My initial review of the four-day MDFest is already up at exclaim.ca. And stay tuned for Hellbound's MDF coverage of the performances, to which I will contribute, starting this Friday. For now, I'll just say that I was delighted to be provided with free water and to a selection of vegan/veg food to eat while I was there: veggie burgers, veggie penne, hummus and chips, fruit salad, all provided by the on-site food tent, plus veggie and fruit kebabs offered by the Hollywood Diner just outside the gates. I'd also like to throw some heavy metal horns of thanks to the hotel staff who greeted us warmly every time we made our way through the front doors, and to one man in particular, who made sure to say goodbye at the end of his shift and give us a cheery 'see you next year'.

We Hellbounders will have our say about the music, plus some live photography courtesy of Albert Mansour. But I know Kevin Stewart-Panko was engaged in some people-watching as well so I expect some amusing quips on more than just the bands. If you're looking for more insight into the festival experience, check out the four part MDF round up already in process at Toronto in Metal - as told by a chick. Alexx and her dude Kevin generously chauffeured me and Heavy Metal Adam to Baltimore, and I look forward to her entertaining commentary, photos, and links to live fest video clips.

And speaking of Hellbound.ca, we're two years old today! I'm thrilled to have been a part of things for the past two years and look forward to many many more. Celebrate with us on the site or, if you like, by tuning in to hear some of us hosting Hellbound's Summer Metal Meltdown on McMaster's CFMU this Saturday night at 10:30pm.

p.s. my review of the new epic My Dying Bride - Evinta, is also now up at exclaim.ca.