Howard and Ray

The American writer of weird fiction, Howard Phillips Lovecraft, would have been 124 years old on Aug 20, if here were still alive. And who knows, maybe he is? The mythology he created has become so deeply ingrained in the fantasy and horror cannon, it might as well be scripture -- or, y'know, the truth.

Look at this great cover for one of his more terrifying novellas The Dunwich Horror:

The water color inks and psychedelic slant of the artwork reflects the story quite well, with beings that defy Earthly biology and cosmic magic that's only hinted at in the dark bottom portion of the cover. Read some Lovecraft, will ya?

A nice complement to this news is that Aug 22 is Ray Bradbury's birthday. Unlike Lovecraft's bleak, sometimes depressing horror, Bradbury had an inhuman gift for balancing moments of terror with genuine sweetness.

His work stands acts like a boilerplate for many screenwriters and filmmakers who have attempted (and a few succeeded, though never quite like Bradbury) at tapping into the mind of gentle, introspective protagonists thrust into unbelievable situations.

Check out this vintage cover art for Bradbury's novel Something Wicked This Way Comes. It's loaded with intrigue and hints of unforseen danger:

If neither of these makes you want to read even one short story from either of these authors, well buddy, you're on the wrong end of the internets.

Let's close this catch-up post with a bit of music appropriate to the topic. Windand formed in 2009, a five-piece playing stoner/doom metal with a real gift for atmosphere and bluster. The quintet wields dynamics for more than just sonic impact, with a gift for shading and mood that falls from the grasp of many bands working in those genres.

Their latest album Soma, was released nearly a year ago. And now there's a video for the song "Orchard." The visuals work well with the song, and demonstrate a great re-purposing of (what we assume is) public domain footage with newly photographed sequences. Let's get eerie:

WINDHAND - "Orchard" (Official Video) from Relapse Records on Vimeo.


[Editor's note: We're trying to track down the names of the artists who painted those book covers. If we can find them, we'll give credit.]

Moar Boar

Aldershot, UK sludge trio XII Boar put out another four-song E.P. in 2012 that we didn't mention. So go give Split Tongue, Cloven Hoof a spin and if you want it with you all the time, cough up some cash and download it asap.

(For posterity: "Triclops" thunders across the stereo, a mythic, massive beast of a song that makes us want to ride a dinosaur down the interstate, crushing all puny automobiles in our way.)

If anything, since we last mentioned XII Boar, the trio has gotten faster and noisier. And a self-aware sense of comedy has surfaced.

Witness the silly video they made for new single "Truck Stop Baby." In it, XII Boar sing the praises of a particular woman who offers services at a roadside stop for long-haul drivers who need to, er, relax. It's comes off like David Allan Coe reinterpreting Golden Earring.

What's far more interesting to The Typing Monkey is the b-side to the new single: A slower, (almost) softer reworking of "Train Wreck" from their debut E.P. XII.

XII Boar's groove-oriented riffery -- always a little peppier than your average stoner metal, let alone doom -- got pushed aside in the original take of "Train Wreck." As if to embody its title, the original recording barreled ahead at hardcore speed, a hairy, unstoppable song that should absolutely soundtrack a bar fight in a 1970s bike movie.

The newer version, parenthetically identified as a "(Slight Return)" gets somehow more biker-like, the kind of tune that gets posted on YouTube as a forgotten gem of the proto-metal variety. It's crank-blues that make lesser humans feel dirty. We're still chewing and digesting, and for now, prefer the pummeling original. 

That said, it's always compelling when a band re-interprets its own material. Lend an ear:

"Train Wreck"

"Train Wreck (Slight Return)"

Black Magic Woman

We've mentioned legendary doom metal band Electric Wizard at least once before. With a new album due this fall, The Typing Monkey figured it was time to (re-)acquaint readers with a terrific interview with Electric Wizard's guitarist -- no, the other one. Yeah, her, Liz Buckingham. The one who isn't Jus Osborn.

In 2011, Kim Kelly, of NPR's music blog The Record, interviewed Buckingham. Asking smart questions to get smart answers, Kelly illuminates Buckingham's inspiring motivations. Like the best female musicians stomping around in a field still dominated by men, Buckingham isn't a female guitarist, she's a guitarist. Right on, Liz Buckingham. Right on.

Read it all here and get hip to the massive, too-much-to-smoke power of Electric Wizard.

Free Music: Interpretations & Trip-hop by Any Other Name

Let’s start this three-part offering of links to free music with the double-scoop ATCO: A Tribute from Xiomara, a musician from San Francisco.

Radical re-workings of rap are a dicey game, often producing novelty (which isn’t automatically bad) but usually cringe-inducing. But once in a while, the right performer picks the right material and does something genuinely interesting with a style of pop music not necessarily suited to cover treatment.

Xiomara spritzes Outkast’s “So Fresh, So Clean” with a nearly a capella first verse to show off her Depression-era blues voice that, appropriately rides into a sort of gypsy-jazz breakdown at the end. The flipside puts a daydream drift across “Electric Relaxation” by A Tribe Called Quest. It’s a watery, soft and positively sensual reading of ATCQ’s already drowsy tune. The original is a request, Xiomara’s reading is pure promise keeping.

Get it, spin it, dig it.

***

Electric Wizard’s legend is mostly true. The English doom metal act has conjured a certain strain of creepy, occult-shaded metal sludge so filthy that listening to them can still feel transgressive. But turn off the amps and most classic metal, and a fair amount of doom, can sound like folk-blues that trades in murder-ballad imagery.

So what happens when a talented fan scrubs the druggy fuzz from Electric Wizard’s music? Acoustic Wizard answers that with some of the scariest campfire jams you’ll ever hear. The first two volumes, each with three tracks, are called Please Don’t Sue Me, which seems unlikely as we imagine the members of Electric Wizard would be all over this. It’s an act of pure love, with wonderfully gloomy results.

***

Electronic music site Earmilk calls Goldbloc’s Black Gold EP “one of the best slept on acts of our time." The term “slept on” seems to have lost its potency in this era of music consumption. After all, there’s so much new music that even dedicated genre fans are going to miss out on something. It’s just too hard to keep up. That said, Goldbloc really is a fantastic duo from Boston.

As our headline says, the four songs comprising Black Gold are trip-hop. Whether Goldbloc calls it that doesn’t matter. Don’t go in expecting the languorous, end-of-the century angst of Portishead, nor the jazz-lite chillout sound that made coffee houses seem cool in the late ‘90s. Seriously deep bass rolls with midnight menace beneath slightly glitchy treatment of vocals that recall the post-coital rasp of Elin Kastlander from jj. This is where soul music should be today.

You can download the EP for free by liking them on Facebook. We got a download error message, but that’s just Facebook being willfully difficult. You should be able to see the Dropbox link where you can grab the compressed zip file. Roll up.

Free Music: Aleph Null

Heavy metal has more subgenres than any reasonable person can keep up with. Tastes at The Typing Monkey offices skew toward the blues-based stuff from the '70s, the NWOBHM, and the nearly self-explanatory genres: doom, stoner and sludge.

It's within those last three that Düsseldorf, Germany trio Aleph Null operate. The trio can blast out riffs heavier than a bison's balls during mating season -- the classic Black Sabbath devil's chord blooze that's been the cornerstone of metal since the 1970s. And they can pull it all back to fuzzy, lingering drones that build the kind of tension that is a hallmark of doom metal. Throw in the shredded, grunge-style vocals and kids, you've got a winner.

We call your attention to Aleph Null not only because they're a good band with a strong sense of dynamics and mood, but because so far, every recording they've made is offered up for free download via their Bandcamp site. And their new LP Nocturnal is a bruiser.

If you're doom/stoner/sludge-curious, you can't beat free, and Aleph Null isn't a bad place to start. Play "Black Winged Cherub" for a taste:


We admit that Nocturnal didn't bowl us over as immediately as their previous EP Belladonna (2013). The four tracks on that collection sound looser and a little more cosmic to our ears. Check out "Solar Sail" to hear the contrast:


If you like what you hear, Aleph Null says download it, people, for this music is like Jesus' love. It is ours to accept. And if this sort of brain-melting sound pleases you, enjoy your wanderings around the Web to seek out more of the same. Many doom/stoner/sludge metal bands offer "pay what you can" downloads, so do that. And buy a t-shirt.

Stonerobixx and Doommantia, are two great websites dedicated to these subgenres. And we'd be remiss not to mention the late, great Cosmic Hearse blog, our gateway into most of this stuff.

Holidays With the Devil

Hammer Films produced a lot of inventive, effective horror movies during the 1960s and early ‘70s. They put out a lot of dreck too, but that’s to be expected and in no way dampens the positively English stamp they put all over classic and new horror stories during their run as a go-to brand for movie-night scares. Even their duds are still fun in the right setting.

Just because Halloween has passed doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy some occult spookiness. We recommend a double feature of two Hammer titles: The Devil Rides Out (1968) and The Witches aka The Devil’s Own (1966). If anyone questions why you’re watching movies about the occult instead of some Christmas nonsense, tell them you’re following the European tradition of sharing ghost stories during the holidays. Then press play before they can protest.

The Devil’s Own
Hitchcock vet Joan Fontaine (Rebecca, Suspicion) stars as Gwen Mayfield, an English school teacher working in Africa. After a jarring encounter with a tribal shaman, and the local ancient pagan practices, she heads back to England. But soon after Mayfield settles in the village of Heddaby, she starts to notice strange behavior in the locals and outright claims of witchcraft.

Fontaine’s a joy to watch, hitting a very Hitchcock-esque tone of the everywoman in over her head. Mayfield tries to keep her wits and logic about her despite the mounting evidence that occult skullduggery is happening right before her eyes.

The pagan ritual at the climax of Devil’s Own may put off some viewers, as it seems a little like a community theater idea, but if those actors can commit to it, just give yourself over to the diet Walpurgisnacht and enjoy the ride. Besides, based on Pentecostal congregations, this performance probably isn’t too far off from the real thing.

One of the big charms of The Devil’s Own is the pacing of the story. There are pauses and diversions built into the story, including a surprising chapter in which Fontaine’s character is institutionalized. It makes the loaded front-end of the movie novel-like.

Based on Ebert’s Law of Economy of Characters viewers shouldn’t have too much trouble sorting the mystery of the village, and the ending reeks of MPAA style fiddling. But everything leading up to that is a good fun and a nice choice for viewers who generally avoid horror movies.

***

The Devil Rides Out
Christopher Lee gets to branch out from his regular Hammer jobs as Dracula, the Mummy, and Frankenstein’s monster in this chilling tale of Satanism.

Lee plays Nicholas Duc le Richleau (!), a scholar of the dark arts who calls on an old friend, Van Ryn, for help. Richleau is worried about a young acquaintance of his, Simon Aron. A visit to Aron’s estate confirms Richleau’s fear. There are 12 guests at Aron’s “party” and the guest called Mocata (the wonderful Charles Gray) has a certain air about him.

Spoiler: Mocata leads a Satanic cult and plans on baptizing Aron and his lady friend Tanith. Richleau is not about to let that happen, and the chase is on.

Rides Out is based on the Dennis Wheatly novel of the same name. We’ve never read it, but the film leads us to believe that Wheatly must have devoured the works of M.R. James, as the film unfolds with the casually mounting terror of James’ work, with real-world scares (a car chase on narrow country roads) gradually giving way to other worldly horror.

He sees you when you're sleeping

When Mocata actually summons Old Scratch (perhaps it’s Baphomet?) viewers may wonder where the filmmakers could go from there. Giant spider aside – which isn’t bad, but suffers from the effects budget – how do you top a middle act appearance from the Devil? Oh, but they do top it.

Richleau and his cohorts fumble on the way to toppling Mocata, ending in a showdown that turns out to be a demonstration for why you don’t come between a mother and her child. We repeat: Don’t mess with mom.

Like Devil’s Own, Rides Out leans on a denouement that must have been at the bidding of various decency groups in Britain. And that’s fine. We don’t mind the happy ending, even if it does seem to be the cinematic equivalent of handing out a tiny bible as we exit the theater.

Everything else in Rides Out reads like source material for the wave of heavy metal bands that were beginning to fire up their amps, sparking up doobs, and incanting the names of demons for shock effect in the decade that followed. Surely Angel Witch has a DVD of this movie on their tour bus.


Reference material: Occult/Satanism horror tends toward the ridiculous or gore-filled. But somewhere along an alternate scale of films such as The Believers, The 39 Steps, and House of the Devil is the right tone for these two Hammer films. And we didn't link to The Witches/Devil's Own on IMDB for this piece, because the stupid DVD art gives away the big twist.

"Somebody would come looking for the Death master tapes"

This looks like a fun ride, in the classic story arc of "band more influential than famous gets rediscovered by a world finally ready for their music."



A Band Called Death is available now via various on-demand and download services, but it's also coming to various big screens.

We'd have made plans to see this movie anyway, but thanks to the crate-digging work of Rich at The Day After the Sabbath, we knew a bit about this band and can't wait to learn more.

Came the Dawn

January 1 is an arbitrary marker. If you're using it to signal a planned change in your life, a point at which to start or stop something, The Typing Monkey hopes you succeed.

Please turn your attention now to this video of Iron Maiden (Paul Di'Anno era) performing "Running Free" on the BBC program, Top of the Pops. Please note that they are playing live, a rarity on a show, where most musicians pantomimed to their studio-recorded hit.


[courtesy of dopewackshit -- yes, really]

Have a good year.

Blastissimo

We could talk about the English band Angel Witch and how they were part of the NWOBHM but were often unfairly derided as a Sabbath knock-off, when to our ears they have much more in common with Sweet, Queen and early Def Leppard.

Or we could discuss them reassembling to tour and even put out a record of new material this year, As Above, So Below, that defies typical "we're gettin' the band back together" disappointment by being really quite good.

But instead we'll just show you this picture of [roadies?] unloading a speaker that's part of their stage set-up:

Giddyup.

"... every sort of filth."

Dig this fan-made video for "Wizard in Black" by doom-metal legends Electric Wizard. It's eight minutes of punishing, bleak guitar fuzz and brontosaurus beats with Lovecraftian lyrics rasped for maximum effect. And that's just the music.

To accompany this crucial cut from the band's Come My Fanatics... LP is a series of horror film clips of corpses rising from their graves, ostensibly coming to tell you to turn down the goddamned noise and put the bong down because you have work tomorrow. Or maybe they just want braaaiins.



And if you want to know which films were used by the video creator, "thofilo13," here's a list straight from the source:

Let Sleeping Corpses Lie (1974); City of the Living Dead (1980); The Plague of the Zombies (1966); Tales from the Crypt (1972); Zombi (1979) The Beyond (1981) Return of the Living Dead Part 2 (1988).

Gruesome!

Things the Intertoobs Taught Us in 2011

Most media outlets publish carefully cultivated best-of lists for the end of the year. Some take it very seriously and that’s fine. Journalists and other media types generally like to argue and debate so making best-of lists feeds that urge.

The Typing Monkey is not immune to such impulses but we simply don’t consume enough new material to effectively create some sort of all-knowing inventory of things we think matter in music, film, television or whatever else.

Like the average jerks we are, we just mess around on the Web and document the things we find that entertain us. Some of those things make it to the blog.

In the spirit of year-end wrap ups and the critic’s inflated sense of influence, here is the first (and possibly last) "Things the Intertoobs Taught Us"

THE MUSIC
A. Dd+ – Dallas-based MCs Paris Pershun and Slim Gravy (!) slipped passed wider recognition. Too bad that, because they’re funny and smart, willing to lob lines such as “surprising everybody, reading a damn book” (“Likeamug”) in the midst of the kind of throwback boasting that workaday schmucks can actually visualize. On their March LP When Pigs Fly the duo was backed by wonderful soul-soaked production from Picnictyme. Grab the free download of their singles-collecting EP Loosies and thank A.Dd+ by paying for a copy of Pigs Fly.

CHRISTIAN MISTRESS – Given the TMI offices are in Seattle we must apologize to this Olympia, WA quintet for not discovering their classic blues-based metal until this year. Singer Christine Davis may have started smoking in the 3rd grade in order to get that voice (tremble men, you can’t handle her). The rhythm section knows when to boogie, when to boom, and the clean, dual guitar leads muscle in right next to the Saxon patch on your denim. Get on this already, they’ve been at it since 2009.

“I’m In Your Church At Night” by ACTIVE CHILD – Pat Grossi, the man behind the name, has released plenty of good music over the past year. This single came out in November 2010 but we didn’t find it until February of 2011 so we’re including it here because nothing else he’s done moves quite like this majestic, crystalline work of weirdo pop. Dig the video and it will all make odd, wintry sense – just lovely.

BELL WITCH – A drum/bass duo from Seattle (again, where were we?) whose funeral-doom rumbles come with uncharacteristic peals of bright, cleansing light in the form of madrigal-like harmonies. The match makes perfect sense and the band gives the six-string bass guitar a home. Four dollars gets you their demo and that’s four bucks well-spent.

NYEMIAH $UPREME -- A Queens rapper whose mixtape Bad will probably draw comparisons to more mainstream/current peers but sounds more to us as if she's standing on the shoulders of MC Lyte and high-fiving Fannypack on her way up. There's a day-in-the-life narrative to Bad that actually works amid the sketches of beats, bass and police-procedural keyboards. Bad could come off as typical "because I'm worth it" aphorisms wrapped in party music. A deeper listen reveals an independent woman a little pissed off that too many men around her are there because they think they're worth it, and more, that she should agree.

“Mountaineer” by WHITE SEA – The video for this single gets the teens-being-teens aspect right but missed an opportunity to craft the John Hughes homage that the song embodies. Soaring, tragic, self-aware, Morgan Kibby sings the lyric “it’s a teen dream” as if she’s trying to reassure a teary heroine, and the whole affair has you running back to give that sensitive rich kid another chance because maybe you two can make something of this after all. “Mountaineer” is pure Kate Bush-style drama with all the synthesizers and crashing drums to realize its grand ambitions.

Worth Following – We doubled up our coverage of SP-33 and XII Boar since we discovered both their free EPs on the same day. The former is Chicagoan Ezra Funkhouse, whose Escape the Carter smeared Lil Wayne vocals onto bleak synth grime from John Carpenter's soundtrack to Escape from New York. The latter is a stoner-metal quartet from England who managed to graft some hardcore fury and pumelling doom onto their resin-stained melodies.

Since then SP-33 has put out a woozy ambient mix and an original single titled "These Moments" both of which show Funkhouse deliberately branching out. Meanwhile, XII Boar promises a new release in 2012 and continue to play around the UK and the continent.

Reference material: We wouldn't know about three of these bands without regularly visiting the essential Cosmic Hearse blog. The Typing Monkey staff also spends a fair amount of time at RCRDLBL, Ill Roots, and enjoy mining for great rewards at Cover Me.

SUPER HAPPY BONUS FUN TIME!

A Monkey Love Round-Up

That Monkey Love column to the right of this text leads the reader to a world of wonder. And from time to time we like to call out of few of those links for showing us what's what around the intertoobs.

A person who goes by the handle Zen Tiger runs the blog Beware of the Crosseyed Cyclops!, formerly Beware, There's a Crosseyed Cyclops in My Basement!!!  Apparently this wonky-eyed cyclops has broken out of the dank basement and ditched a couple exclamation marks along the way.

The site offers more digitized, downloadable vintage comics than you have time to read. So pick a few that fit your mood and dig in. We were especially pleased by the recent batch of Marvel Tales, including this winner:

The cover kinda spoils the ending, but admit it, you totally want to read that. She's trying to be a good neighbor, but so is he. Lady, don't say the gentleman didn't warn you.

Secondly, The Typing Monkey draws your attention to the truly weird comic Tales from Greenfuzz. We found it via the always incredible Monster Brains. The issue of Greenfuzz, by artist and animator Will Sweeney is titled "Kebabylon!" and tells the a fairly traditional story of boy-loves-girl, villain-kidnaps-girl, boy-goes-heroic. Except the boy is a sandwich, as is his girlfriend, and the villain is a hot dog who wants to rule the world and make everyone wear leiderhosen.

And there's a cat with a beard:

You aren't doing anything so important that you can't spend a little time enjoying Greenfuzz or a selection from the Cyclops library.

If you need some music to accompany your read, Cosmic Hearse has taken a turn recently toward jazz. Host Aesop Dekker still posts the metal, punk and the variations on heavy rock and roll he's always dealt. But he's expanded into deep catalog Blue Note bop and killer early 20th century blues. Some of the bop proves so hard The Typing Monkey can't really get on board, but at the very least we get educated. That's the real service he provides, and it's damned entertaining too.

Free Music: XII Boar and SP-33

Music distribution has changed, just in case anybody here hasn't been paying attention. Giving away singles, EPs and sometimes full albums is often the method emerging artists use to get attention in a crowded marketplace.

The viability of that model is and has been discussed ad naseum -- it's all speculation and only time and failure will reveal the best path. By then we'll have already reached a destination.

Meanwhile, three dudes from the U.K., with a deep and abiding love of Motorhead, doom/stoner metal and other heavy sounds, decided to form a band last year. They're called XII Boar and they're giving away a four-song EP titled XII.

XII Boar spew high-density sludge with moody curls of smoke filling up the spaces in between the blasts. They have a good feel for dynamics and at least one of them digs hardcore ("Train Wreck").

The EP's closer, "Skol" follows a sparse percussion break with a tonal shift in which the band does a quick variation on Blue Cheer's "Summertime Blues" trick by letting each member of the trio take two quick measures to hammer down a short solo and step back to make room for the next guy in line.

Find multiple download links for XII here. [And an enthusiastic goat's head to Angry Chairs.]
 
***
 
The Typing Monkey knows nothing of the DJ/producer/musician known as SP-33. Statistics favor a dude in his mid-to-late 20s behind the moniker but for all anyone knows SP-33 is two teenage girls. What we do know is that we've been playing SP-33's Escape from Tha Carter a couple times a day since we downloaded the free LP a week ago.
 

SP-33 chopped up John Carpenter's soundtrack from Escape from New York and spliced it with equally shredded vocals from Lil Wayne's Tha Carter discs. (Mostly from Tha Carter III.) It's standing on the shoulders of Dangermouse's Grey Album in order to reach past mash-up status and into collage territory.
 
Escape retains the desolate tone of Carpenter's compositions and often grinds up Weezy's vocals -- already treading into drain-cleaner territory -- into a coarse paste that blends well with the music's zombie-Vangelis sound.
 
Get the download here or if you want to save bandwidth play it on Soundcloud. [Wink & a nod to XLR8R.]

Put Some Clothes On

A recent rekindled romance with the Friends of Hell album by NWOBHM stalwarts Witchfinder General [not to be confused with the film, which is excellent -- ed.] inspired a search for merchandise so that we could feel superior while wearing it around the office and then explain to the uninitiated about the band.

Lucky us, we landed at Grumpy Clothing. Aside from being the official source for Witchfinder General t-shirts, the Canadian retailer also offers dozens of tees with art both clever and high-quality. Go now and check it out, surely you'll find something for yourself or a friend. Stimulate the global economy and then wear it with pride.

[Image courtesy of Grumpy Clothing, copyright 2009]

And though you didn't ask, the Witchfinder General tee looks fantastic. You must wear something, no?

Tankcrimes Brainsqueeze

Please enjoy this advertisement for a thrash festival in Oakland, CA this October. It does reference that 17-minute infomercial for the 2010 Gathering. But if you haven't seen that, the entertainment value of the Tankcrimes Brainsqueeze ad will in no way be reduced. (Some cussin' involved, so tell the kids to go outside.)




[A neck-snapping headbang to Cosmic Hearse.]

Need a Ride?

The Typing Monkey would never tell you what to do. However, we have no qualms with nudging you in the right direction, just like a sitcom dad, and trust that you’ll make a good decision.

Now then. There’s a gentleman named Aesop Dekker* who runs a music blog called Cosmic Hearse. If you’re going to run a music blog, this is the way to do it. Straight from his site:

"It's about sharing hard to find and special recordings. It's not about taking anything away from the artists themselves. Of course if something is in print and you like it, buy it. If you have legitimate claim to something posted here and want it removed, just write me and I'll do so."

That's an invitation to LOVE -- the love of getting your brain-junk kicked repeatedly by music you didn't kow you needed in your life.

And what is that music? It’s metal of many varieties (black, death, doom, thrash, ‘70s, NWOBHM, et al.); rock of multiple stripes (hard, psych, classic, prog, Eastern bloc, etc.); some punk and hip-hop; and plenty of just plain weird stuff that you won’t find easily unless you spend too much time (and money) scouring record bins.

Aside from the bounty of amazing music at Cosmic Hearse, Dekker writes thoughtful and genuinely funny summaries, criticism and reality checks about the content. His enthusiasm for the music and his blog has pushed The Typing Monkey staff to investigate music we might have otherwise passed by anywhere else.

So quit hanging around this dump and get over to Cosmic Hearse. [Scruffs your hair and smiles] Now go on, champ.


[A belated tip of the hat to Dr. Fred.]


*Dekker also plays drums in the San Francisco black metal band Ludicra. Their album The Tenant is out now. Do check it out.

Visibly Frenzied

It must be noted that Dr. Fred Beldinstein now operates out of an Arbor called Ann. He's painstakingly restored and reassembled his lab there and has resumed posting to his video blog Frenzy of the Visible. There he lets all his personal demons run free in the form of YouTube, Hulu and other online video files.

Need to see the preview of the Mexican vampire movie The Genie of Darkness? Crave some vintage concert footage of Venom? Done and done. At FotV Dr. Beldinstein posts educational films, forgotten cartoons, punk videos, schlock horror films and clips that defy easy classification.

He finds them so that you don't have to waste time looking for entertainment you didn't know you needed. We suggest you click on over there post haste.

Going to Hell Again

HELLSONGS
Hymns in the Key of 666
(Minty Fresh)
Recasting heavy metal songs as crisp modern folk with chalky female vocals isn't ironic or post-anything. The two genres share much thematic content. After all, if you're going to write a song about a train and you're not a Mississippi Delta blues singer, then chances are you're a folkie, or Saxon.

The Swedish trio chose smartly for at least half of their 10-song LP. Two compositions from Iron Maiden -- "The Trooper" and "Run to the Hills," both tales of brutal combat and the futility of war -- work so well in folk form that the line between original and cover version blurs. And the previously mentioned Saxon tune about the mail-carrying train ("Princess of the Night") reveals its nostalgic core once the amplification and denim are removed.

Musically, Key of 666 holds up for a good stretch. The rococo soloing of metal translates nicely into simplified, plucked acoustic guitars and icy piano. Peeling away the pummeling rhythms also exposes the blues and rock structures at the core of early metal and the new wave of British heavy metal.

One of the trio's biggest surprises comes from the face-value reading of Twisted Sister's "We're Not Going to Take It." Though it never reaches the level of coal-miner union fight song, it does make you realize what a crafty songsmith Dee Snider is. And they put light raga decorations on AC/DC's "Thunderstruck," giving a fine impression of '60s hippy noodlings in Eastern divinity.

The inclusion of Europe's "Rock the Night" is puzzling to American ears. Also, Hellsongs should have known not to touch the overexposed/over-covered "Paranoid." Really, with such a bounty of Black Sabbath material to plunder, why that one?*

Reference material: It's difficult to learn of Hellsong's premise/gimmick and not think of the French duo Nouvelle Vague. That's okay, because Hellsongs likely has the same shelf-life. Who knows what folk-metal enthusiasts think of Hellsongs, but heshers who love classic metal might check out Hymns in the Key of 666, now that it's finally available in the U.S.

*At the time of this posting, Hellsongs' MySpace includes their version of "Warpigs" and it's vastly superior to their bland take on "Paranoid."

Very Metal

Have you talked to your children about The History of Heavy Metal? Perhaps it's time.

Artist Mike Hill, a longtime fan of heavy metal music, decided to make a "single drawing -- a giant timeline that contained every heavy metal band from the 1970's to present day, organized by subgenre."

It has since evolved into four parts, and even if you don't know Angel Witch from Morbid Angel, the art pieces themselves are worth a look simply so the viewer can marvel at what a monumental task Hill assigned himself.

The "Metal Subgenre Popularity Index" has an almost geometric-abstraction look, until a closer examination reveals that it's a functioning chart.


Hill keeps a blog about his endeavor too.

On the Importance of a Band Mission Statement

Thanks to abundant media and new technology, everyone on the planet is in a band.

Few modern bands, however, issue a genuine mission statement. And we're not talking about some hardcore act or politically motivated band stating political intentions. That's a manifesto, and should have been left in the early 1980s along with your shaved head and G.B.H. patch.

Go to any band's MySpace page right now. Go ahead -- we'll wait.

Now scroll down a bit to the "About us" section. Chances are it's a band bio. With rare exceptions, band bios are dull and as rote as the story arc to the average slasher film. People meet and make music all the time. Few of the "how they met/who they are" stories are interesting to anyone outside the band.

But a mission statement is an opportunity for a musician to tell an audience what to expect and charm us into paying attention. Even clumsy attempts at humor in a band's letter of intent are better than telling us that they were born and raised in a small New England farming community but life really began the first time they heard a New York Dolls record.

Here's a good example of a successful mission statement from the thrash band Annihilation Time, verbatim from the quartet's MySpace page:

Quite simply the most powerful band in the world at the moment. Forget about the once-great dinosaur bands still roaming the earth (Metallica, Blue Oyster Cult, Winger): their time has past. This planet's future lays in the hands of the mighty Annihilation Time, who day by day, are slowly creeping their raunchy rock and roll across every inch of this dying heap of shit we call a world. Standing virtually alone in sea of garbage music played by garbage people for garbage people, Annihilation Time shines as a bastion of what was once great in rock music; Sex, alcohol, drugs, loundess, filth, and destruction. Taking cues from now deceased masters like the Sex Pistols, Black Flag, Thin Lizzy, and Black Sabbath, Annihilation Time sonically lays waste to your every brain cell and fiber of being. You have but two options: worship or be crushed.

Nice, huh? Is it true bravado, or self-deprecation disguised as impossibly lofty goals? It doesn't matter. The beauty of Annihilation Time's mission is in the group's directness. Move away old people and vapid entertainment, a scary group of white kids is here and they smell like sweat, beer and bong water. Also, they're loud and offensive.

Another approach to the mission statement comes from Girl Trouble's MySpace page, where they've made better use of the "influences" section by making a vow:

It is our solemn promise that we give you the most value for your entertainment dollar. In each town we will attempt to spread the goodwill of the Pacific Northwest and make sure we clean up afterwards. We sincerely hope you will enjoy our musical performance and manage to catch one of the complementary prizes that K.P. Kendall will distribute during each show. We will strive to be good citizens and obey all safety rules and regulations. Our goal is to entertain in a professional and courteous manner. This is our pledge to you!

The Typing Monkey has purchased consumer durables from paid sales staff who didn't try that hard. The Girl Trouble pledge forgoes the band's usual self-deprecation in favor of light humor and a genuine, almost church-potluck like level of sincerity. Yes, the band has a traditional bio further down the page, but it says more about them that they put the pledge as close to the top as possible.

Dear bands, combos, solo musicians and other musical entertainers: Try harder. Start by immediately removing the carefully crafted band bio you posted and replacing it with a mission statement, declaration of intent or oath. Your music is your product, and nobody wants to know how all the parts of their new sneakers came together. We just want to be assured that these shoes will help us run faster, jump higher and impress people we want to have sex with.