Tri-Valley Party Paradise

I never knew Mike Paré but he was a name I likely heard from my friend & neighbor Robert & my sister both of whom were 2 years ahead of me in school. Party Stories Gallore are listed on his site. From down south in Fremont to the "Far East" of Springtown (at least from my Pleasanton-ian isolation) I have more of my own, coming soon. In the meantime check out some zombie party thrash from Municipal Waste:

Temptation, Pain and Hope

This is a random fan video from the UK edition of MTV's "Headbanger's Ball". The video itself isn't remarkably interesting compared to the list of "bargin bin" of hair metal contained within. This is my first time really viewing the style of host Vanessa Warwick. She seemed like an alright presenter. She did her research on the band (or at least read her cue cards really well) and put a decent amount of emphasis into what she was doing. Plus, she looked pretty good doing it. Although it's not in a that "Hey, look at me I'm a hot metalchick, muthafucka! Woo!" like her contemporaries "The Face of Metal" (?) Mistress Juilya, street team zombie Metal Sanaz and the ultra-skanky Jasmine St. Claire. Regardless of looks, it's more the to do with the simple and generally honest presentation that makes Warrick standout from these one sheets in fetish boots.

The list of bands read off in these clips reads like a "who's who" of Rip and Kerrang! circa: 1988-92. You can imagine flipping through piles of $1 bin LPs and cassettes that have collected dust from here to Helsinki. These are the bands not even VH-1 or Hit Parader has bothered with. Despite their major label (or "major indie label") status, the major of these bands failed instantly in the States. Does anyone remember the Fred Coury (Cinderella) & Stephen Pearcy (Ratt) "supergroup", Arcade? Sven Gali? Baby Animals? Tailsman? Skew Siskin? Sleeze Beeze? Dogs D'Mour, anyone? I heard them on KSJS...once. It wasn't half bad but that was in 1989, so who knows how it holds up today? Oh, yeah there's an unidentified Ramones interview in here. Blink & you'll miss it.

Being a mark for geography, Warrick & co. get kudos for doing "Swedish" and "Dutch" specials. Anyone truly obsessed with metal can tell you that it always has been an international phenomenon. The American Headbanger's Ball would've never tried that. Although, doing a "Bay Area Thrash" special or a "New York Metal" special would've been a lot more interesting than the umpteenth interview with Sebastian Bach or another Motley Crüe "update". All you had to do is interview say, 4 well known bands, and give mention to a few others that "the kids" should check out. Not that hard but it's not like anybody's hiring me to be research director.

Best of 2007 Albums

In no order of preference. Reissues & live shows will be in a later post.

Metal, Punk, Hardcore Best of 2007

1. Alcest - Souvenirs d'un autre monde (Profound Lore/Prophecy)
2. Red Dons – Death To Idealism (Deranged)
3. Totalitar – Vi Ar Eliten (Prank)
4. Marduk – Rom 5:12 (Regain)
5. Municipal Waste – The Art of Partying (Earache)
6. Jesu - Conqueror (Hydrahead)
7. Neurosis – Given to the Rising (Neurot)
8. Candlemass – King of the Grey Islands (Candlelight)
9. High On Fire – Death Is This Communion (Relapse)
10. Entombed – Serpent Saints (Candlelight)
11. Born/Dead – Final Colapse (Prank)
12. Turbonegro – Retox (Cooking Vinyl America)
13. Pig Destroyer – Phantom Limb (Relapse)
14. Big Business – Here Come The Waterworks (Hydrahead)
15. Chelsea - Faster, Cheaper & Better Looking (TKO)
16. The Fucking Champs – VI (Drag City)
17. Urgehal – Goat Craft Torment (Southern Lord)
18. Darkthrone – F.O.A.D. (Peaceville/Tyrant Syndicate)
19. Witchcraft – the Alchemist (Candlelight)
20. Deathspell Omega - Fas - Ite, Maledicti, in Ignem Aeternum (Southern Lord/Norma Evanglium)
21. Tangorodrim – Justus Ex Fide Divit (Southern Lord)
22. Infanticide – Extiction Scheme (Emetic)
23. Mammatus – the Coast Expodes (Holy Mountain)
24. Middian - Age Eternal (Metal Blade)
25. Nadja – Radiance of Shadows (Alien 8)
26. Nominon - Terra Necrosis (Ibex Moon)
27. Signal Lost - Prosthetic Screams (Prank)
28. Sodom – The Final Sign of Evil (SPV)
29. Parlimentarisk Sodomi - 2006 & 2007 Demos (self-released)
30. Wolfbrigade - Prey To The World (Unrest)
31. Baroness - Red Album
32. Fucked Up - Year of the Pig (What's Your Rupture?)

Everything Else (Noise, Folk, Space Rock, Ambient, Prog, Kraut Rock, Psych)

1. Mariee Sioux - Faces In The Rocks (Grass Roots)
2. Ulver – In the Shadows of The Sun (The End)
3. Titan - A Raining Sun Of Light And Love, For You And You And You (Tee Pee)
4. Earthless - Rhythms From A Cosmic Sky (Tee Pee)
5. Sixes – Cursed Beast (Troniks)
6. 16 Bitch Pile Up – Bury Me Deep (I Heart Noise/Troniks)
7. Arachnid Arcade – Sinophore Forest Organ (Organs)
8. DDR - DDR (Slusaj Najglasnije!)
9. Godheadscope - A City Out Of Sight (God Is Myth)
10. Human Anomaly – Human Anomaly (Life Is Abuse)
11. Julie Dorion – Woke My Self Up (Jagjaguwar)
12. Microscopic Suffering – Live At Hanta House 10-28-06, CD-R (self-released)
13. Kosmos – Kosmos (the End)
14. KTL – 2 (Mego)
15. Kiss The Anus Of A Black Cat - Turn Hegel On His Head 7" (Public Guilt)
16. COLL: Donec Ad Metam Part 1 and Donec Ad Metam Part 2 (www.neo-folk.it)

Depressive Black Metal "Jumps The Shark"?

Seriously? A band called "Happy Days"? This is literally saaaaad! I like the basics of the "depressive" Black Metal sound but this is pathetic - it's just a kid whining some "Psych 101" stuff about "denial" and "staring at the pool of razorblades". A pool? Wouldn't a goldfish bowl of them be enough? Must be the work of some stereotypical "emo" teens with a penchant taking the sonics of Burzum,
Xasthur and Leviathan and completely fucking it up.

This one man band creates some of the tinniest, shittiest guitar playing and vocal whining you'll ever hear. Really I don't think this is real. I think this sad fucker named Morbid wouldn't get his music on the jukebox in the satanic version of Al's Diner.

Metal Archives reveals they have a demo called "Alone and Cold". I get the first part but "cold"? Dude, you're in Miami!



Versus:

More evidence

And his side project is called Deep-Pression.
The Fonz ain't gonna like this...
(Inverted Thumb)"Ayyy!"(Inverted Thumb)
"Meeet me in 'da office, kid!"

"We'eahh readdah...are yooooouu reaaaddaah!?!?"

Through the wonders of the interwebs I got to finally hear the live version of Twisted Sister's "Shoot 'Em Down". This is from the Reading Rock Festival in 1982. I first heard this the second time I heard the legendary (in my mind anyway) "Hard Rock Cafe" show (which had NOTHING to do with that lame-ass chain of restaurants) on local radio station KRQR ("The Rrrocker"). The station cleaned up some of the intro and the two hosts Ron & John were joking around about censorship.

Ron: "We had to censor some of this...ah, now John's throwing stuff at me!"
(Ron & John both laugh).
Ron: "OK, here it is live from Reading Rock Volume One, Twisted Sister."

I was pretty blown away by this back in February 1984. This combo of AC/DC riffs (but seemingly louder) and a bit of Nazereth mixed with a New York attitude had me hooked.

Listen here

Sure, there's no question that Twisted Sister became a joke after they became safe, MTV fare. And unlike Umlaut, my small circle of friends & I weren't hanging out with Metallica and Slayer in '83-'84 hell, we hardly knew who they even were. We were dorks from Pleasanton for fox sake! We loved this song along with the attitude it conveyed. It didn't seem to matter to us that they looked like the world's ugliest trannies. They fukkin' rocked and that's all
that mattered.

My other early exposure to Twisted Sister was
this song which was used as an early promo for MTV. No one outside the New York area seemed to know who these guys were but hell, this was damn good heavy metal band. Yeah, let's forget that Dee Snider cranked up the lame after 1984. (And Metallica didn't?!?) The first two Twisted Sister albums "Under The Blade" and "You Can't Stop Rock N' Roll" are in part undeniably metal. While it's not as heavy as Metallica or Exciter but for the time period just as good.

ENDNOTES: KRQRs call letters are now being used by these assclowns in Chico who play Linkin Park but also have a metal show. It's the old but new again Z-Rock Format. WTF?

Battle of the "same name, different band" bands

Metal and Punk Rock Geeks know about the "same name different band" phenomeon. Someone über collector geek at a record swap once told me that there were TWO (!?) Dead Kennedys. The other one was from Cleveland but never recorded anything. Other examples include the three Incubuses (Incubi?) - one from New Orleans that played death metal, a Morbid Angel connected Incubus that also played death metal and the more radio friendly rock band.

In the 80's this was often the case with 3 bands named Slayer (UK, Texas and Hell er...Orange County). What punker hasn't had the Subhumans (Canada) vs. Subhumans (UK) debate? Moving on, we find 3 mainstream fluff-rock or "coke-metal" bands (as Aesop from Ludicra calls 'em): Poison, Warrant and Slaughter. All three names have been splattered about MTV, VH-1, Hit Parader and even Spin. The "bizarro metal" of these three polished & slick outfits were Poison from Germany, Warrant also from Germany and Slaughter from Canada.

Battle I

vs.

I was introduced to the vile sounds of West Germany's Poison (Hereafter known as Poison WG) by a newsletter called "Power Thrash" I got in the mail. It was from a guy named Gene Khoury in New Jersey. He wrote for Kick Ass zine and DJed the "Power Metal/Thrash" show at Monclair College's station, WMSC. The newsletter contained his playlists and some record and demo reviews. Names of the way brutal Hellhammer, Sodom, Bathory and the then unknown to me Poison (WG) were mentioned on his playlists.

Poison (WG)'s sound falls under that "eternally fukked up" sound that many of the bands that were part of the first wave of Black & Death metal possessed. EX: Bathory, Sodom, Hellhammer, Sacrofago. Their style is SUPER low fi and ugly as sin. Vocals may or not include words or may be complete obscured growls, roars and gurgles. Guitars are almost completely washed out, drums are in the mix and somewhat loud but for the most part this ultra-cult distorted mess is hit and miss. It takes awhile to sink in. Although after a few listens you'll see a trajectory spanning from this tinny, basement in hell-level recordings to Mayhem circa "Deathcrush" through Blasphemy's first weeks of hanging around Ross Bay cemetery. An interesting bit of underground metal history but not something to throw on at yer weddings or parties.

Battle II

vs.

Enough of these downer boys! Deutschland's Warrant mixed up plenty of the hard n' heavy riffing, old-styled power metal and Accept-like choruses. Their 1985 full-length The Enforcer is on par with the intensity of Anvil or Exciter although not quite instant-classic like those two, it's a lot of fun. Sometimes it jumps into thrash. And since we're talking about coincidences their "Nuns Have No Fun" isn't a Mercyful Fate tune but it does have these classic lines:

"Nuns have no fun, they are always on the run

Words like fucking
They don't wanna know
But deep inside their souls
Dirty jokes

Only vibrators
Can make them high
A risk much too dangerous
God's waiting inside"

Kick ass!

Battle III

vs.

Onward to...Slaughter! We're NOT talking about those Vegas wimps fronted by high pitched chump Mark Slaughter. We're talkin' proto Death Metal rage played at tempos that made Slayer seem slow. Their 1986 "Strappado" LP is defintitive of their name the opener "Disintegator/Incincerator" should be known as much as anything that the big four thrash bands did, it's just that fuckin' great. Twisted genius like this...

"In suits they were dressed
When the button was pressed
They fed upon semen
The governments a demon"

is pretty rare these days.

Slaughter had that perfect blend of thrash metal intensity and hardcore's aggression while not being a "crossover" band. They have been name checked by more than a handful of death and thrash metal bands. More recently they've been mentioned by Fenriz of Darkthrone whose newest release "F.O.A.D." features the song "Canadian Metal" that mentions the Strappado track "Tortured Souls". Make way for the In-cin-er-aTORRR and listen to the REAL Slaughter!

Epilogue: I once owned Posin's (er...Poison's) album "Looked What the Cat Dragged In" on a tape. Some L.A. glamoid friends my sister's made me the tape. I listened to it about 3 1/2 times and later taped over it with a prog rock radio show a few months later. I never owned any of the false Warrant or Slaughter albums. By late '87, big hair bands were really stale to me and as mentioned above, I was now a prog-rock nerd but that's a whole 'nuther chapter.

Best lyrics of the year?

“Mascot War” by Boston thrashers Lich King

“One day there was a mascot war, the body count was large
Metal vs. cereal, and Eddie led the charge
Toucan Sam was kneecapped and his beak was smashed apart
When Murray clubbed him in the face and then ripped out his heart

Tony didn't feel so great when Wrex opened his head
With some friendly violent fun that stupid tiger fuck was dead
Not manned up and with a punch proceded to lay waste
Planted a fistful of metal right in Wendell's smarmy face

Silly Rabbit didn't look, was in for quite a shock
When Vic Rattlehead came from behind and brained him with a rock
Snaggletooth impaled Booberry on his piggy tusks
And then roasted him, his breath turning the undead fiend to dust

It's a mascot war

Grim Reaper jumped his motorcycle through a church window
There he found the Corn Flake Rooster, killed him with a solid blow
Jack-O-Lantern took one of the seven keys, said "die,"
And then Lucky, that poor bastard got it crammed into his eye

Honey Bee and Chaley battled high above the ground
With a hammer of his head the winged skull, he won the round
Flotzilla towered high above the battle, with a chop
It was doomsday for deceivers known as Snap, Crackle and Pop

Count Chocula, a wooden stake inside his heart, was slain
It was placed there with no mercy by bloodthirsty Baphomet
Cap'n Crunch was stomped upon and then his head was pissed
Because Sargent D was coming and he was on his list

There's too much at stake tonight
Metal mascots take the throne
Diggum's skull is gleaming white
and Frankenberry dies alone
Frankenberry dies alone
Frankenberry dies alone
Mascot war

Breakfasttime your time is up
Show the Honeycomb thing no fear
Hold fast and stand your ground
Our time is now, our moment's here”

Danish Cartoon Controversy (or Twisted Minds Think Alike)

First there was this from my zine "Stoner Wall" in Fall 1998



Then today I found this:



I dunno when this guy Rob from Denmark made this cartoon but I think we were on the same page, so to speak. Controversy? Nah, more like coincidence. Rob's site didn't have his "about" section active so I have no idea about him aside from being a random guy in Danmark who likes hard rock & metal and makes cartoons. My Danish isn't good enough to figure out much else. But this is really awesome regardless.

Deep Purple (Mark II) - Bombed out epic jams

Messrs Blackmore, Glover Lord & Paice play a half-hour long version of "Mandrake Root" bombed out of their skulls. Ian Gillan does the very stoned & giggly intro. Audio via >WFMU's wonderful "Beware of the Blog" and DP's Live In Aachen, Germany 10th July 1970 This version is only half of the entire thing. I might be daring enough to play the whole thing on KZSU someday.

Led fuckin' Zeppelin could never pull this off - their strength was the rhythm section whereas Deep Purple was a BAND. Dare I say Purple was heavier and much more intense? Beyond "Smoke on the Water" and maaaybe "Highway Star" they're pretty much unknown on American radio. They were giants in Japan & Scandinavia but they sure as hell weren't a "two song wonder" like say Foghat or some drek. Unlike Zeppelin they rarely had that "bloated" feeling which isn't so much Zeppelin's fault as it is the dumb-ass hardcore fans and the coke-addled marketing machine that's behind their legacy. You wanna take this up some more? Meet me after school - by the bike racks. The bike racks!

Thieves, thieves and liars! Hypocrites and bastards!

"If the people wonder at the suffering you've caused
And your massive avarice has left them at a loss
If by chance they notice your bloody snapping jaws
the blood upon your claws
your shifty eyes and laws
the nauseating flaws in all you've said
Trot out the dead
Trot out the dead

If by chance they give you the slightest bit of grief
Or perhaps they notice you're a liar and a thief
If they dare to question your lunatic beliefs
The wicked web you weave
The slimy trail you leave
Or maybe they perceive they've been misled
Trot out the dead"
- Hammers of Misfortune, "Trot Out The Dead"

Even though I'm only affiliated with Stanford's radio station , I'm still curious about what goes on the campus. War criminal Donald Rumsfeld last Fall land himself a cushy job as a Visiting Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institute. Some of the more conservative staff members on campus thinks the anti-Rumsfeld campaigns are "an implicit threat” to Hoover and “a kind of McCarthyism.”

OK, so, a "threat" as in blowing up the building threat? Or a telling him his a self-centered prick who's only looks out for himself & his cronies in fear of Rummy going on a shooting rampage at Stanford Mall? McCarthyism? They're just not gonna hire him. McCarthy destroyed people's careers and in many aspects their lives. Multi-administration, lifetime bureaucratic creeps like Rummy don't know what it's like to go to over 20 different job interviews in a month and still be rejected. He has it made-full stop. He'll get a book deal (If he doesn't have one in the works already) and likely a think tank gig somewhere else and there's always FoxNews. Ironically, that these conservative rich guys are feeling like Rumsfeld is being "persecuted for his beliefs" as if he's some kind of oppressed minority?

A pro-Rummy & pro-Condisleastack Rice editorial appeared in the Palo Alto Daily News awhile back. This editorial claims the Stanford community's mostly anti-Rumsfeld and anti-Condisleastack stance is "Politically Correct intolerance". Here are some choice quotes:

"Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is on leave from Stanford and indicated she plans to return after her time in Washington. Must she, too, be sent packing in the interests of tolerance, honesty and open inquiry?" - Answer is NO because for one she's a "Stanford Graduate" who didn't seem to learn anything about taking action after she "believes" she read a report "titled Bin Laden to attack America". Stanford graduate, folks. Secondly, it has nil to with tolerance, honesty and open inquiry considering she's made her career and enhanced many of the other crooks in the White House's career by doing the exact opposite of these three concepts.

"And Hoover, after all, is a conservative think tank, with close ties to Republican administrations." Fine. I don't have a problem with guys the furrow their brows, write poorly written editorials and wear giant glasses. But I DO have a problem with the pro-torture and privatizing defense stance of Rumsfeld. In fact, Nation reporter Jeremy Scahill who broke the story on Blackwater, notes Rumsfeld's post-9/11 policy:

"It became known as the Rumsfeld Doctrine. "We must promote a more entrepreneurial approach: one that encourages people to be proactive, not reactive, and to behave less like bureaucrats and more like venture capitalists," Rumsfeld wrote in the summer of 2002 in an article for Foreign Affairs titled "Transforming the Military."

To the great satisfaction of the war industry, before Rumsfeld resigned he took the extraordinary step of classifying private contractors as an official part of the US war machine. In the Pentagon's 2006 Quadrennial Review, Rumsfeld outlined what he called a "road map for change" at the DoD, which he said had begun to be implemented in 2001. It defined the "Department's Total Force" as "its active and reserve military components, its civil servants, and its contractors--constitut[ing] its warfighting capability and capacity. Members of the Total Force serve in thousands of locations around the world, performing a vast array of duties to accomplish critical missions." This formal designation represented a major triumph for war contractors--conferring on them a legitimacy they had never before enjoyed.

If you're that close to Haliburton and Blackwater you are guilty of working with war criminals and therefore are an accomplice. Last I checked the "politically correct intolerance" (as defined as censorious left-wingers and not apparently black & white world having censorious Bush cronies) was coming from people ranging from the Army War College who said the Iraq War was a mistake (real commies, that lot), ex-Clinton and Bush's former chief counter terrorism expert, Richard A. Clarke and many of the military people themselves who don't like Haliburton and Blackwater due these private contractors being far better equipped and paid at 10-20 times as much as regular soldiers.

Worst Use. Of Vikings and Metal. Ever.

Forest are a bunch of jackbooted jackoffs from Novomoskovsk, Russia. Nothing like throwing in SS iconography with your piss poor concepts of vikings. That ain't floatin' my (dragon) boat, comrade. Their music is very half-assed, kinda raw 90's black metal with some vague "pagan" leanings.

Aquarius Records seems to dig 'em, though.

"Yet another disc of glorious blackened woodland buzz from AQ faves Forest gets the deluxe reissue treatment. A grim Russian horde, Forest captured our shriveled black hearts with their Burzum-meets-Jewelled Antler debut. As they progressed, the clattery forest ambience receded, and the black buzz took over, but on Foredooming The Hope For Eternity, there was still plenty of non-black weirdness to balance the blazing buzz."

Pfft. Whatevah dood that's not what I'm hearing.

Here's the band's retarded babble here:

Note: The Pagan Front are a bunch of Noxious Sucky Bonehead Metaldouches. I recommend NOT buying or supporting their loser bands.

Strangely enough that album cover reminds me of another piece of propaganda that the nazi used to indoctrinate the masses in Norway

Translation: "(with) Waffen-SS and The Norwegian legion against the mutual enemy: AGAINST BOLSHEVISM" The original of poster is in Oslo's Hjemmefrontmussett or Home Front Museum, the memorial to the victims of the 1940-45 Nazi occupation of Norway. Interestingly, Denmark who were also occupied by the Nazis in this time had a resistance group called "Vikings" which essentially said: "Piss off! That's OUR history - not YOURS!" All hail! Why is it these nazi viking fetishists never mention the real history? Do they not read anything beyond own "Aryanically Correct" bullshit? FACT: Vikings intermarried with Celts and very like with Inuits (read: NON-white people). Lest we forget all the Greeks, Slavs, Arabs and Jews they traded goods with?

My position on NSBM is, was and forever shall be: F.O.A.D.!

Voting Green Part II

"You've been nailed to the wheel but never really turning
You know you got to want it allllll!"
Stand Up And Shout...Let It Ouuuut!"

Dio "Stand Up And Shout"


It's been awhile since I've posted a "wasted youth" story. In the words of Monty Phython: "Here comes another one!" After graduating 8th grade a bunch of the local heshers played softball in front of the portable classrooms at our old grammar school, Donlon. Everyone would pile their BMX bikes in front of the outside benches and spots of grass near the entryways of the classrooms. Mongooses & Schwinn Stings a plenty and the rarer Redline, Robinsons and Diamond Back - which yours truly raced on the brutal dirt tracks of Livermore and Fremont.

Alongside the BMX bikes were several skateboards a few Hosois, and a scattered Powell-Peralta. Unlike some towns, the skater/BMXer thing wasn't split between punks on skateboards and heshers on BMX bikes. Just like the jock/brain/redneck nexus didn't soley fall unto one clique or the other. For as fucked up as Pleasanton was in the 80's was - it did at least have the benefit of seeing how two-dimensional people could be. Unfortunately, my friends & I experience two dimensions which were: "he's cool, when he's by himself but get him and a bunch of other bakeheads together and they'll act like total dicks." There were a few exceptions to this harsh reality and we tended to gravitate towards those guys. Especially the ones that were equally music geeky as us.

The summer of '84 was a mixed bag for me. I travelled a lot: NYC and D.C. with my dad & sister. L.A. for the Olympics with my uncle Jim. While there was plenty of tourist-y things I did on these trips. Namely, riding my cheap-ass skateboard down the skatepath from Venice to Santa Monica and getting hasseled by the cops for having a skateboard on a "bike and rollerskate only" path. Fuck you pig! I'm possessed to skate!

Also, I took in thte Track & Field Finals and geeked out by filling in all the first, second and third place finishes in my Olympic memorial edition of Runner's World magazine (note: I've never been much of runner, I suck at it). Plus, I took in the usual Venice stuff like breakfast at the awesome place called Barry's, this amazing old-school (even by 80's standards) Mexican eatery that had an old lady hand-making tortillas. NYC & DC was filled with the usual cool stuff of muesums, big ass buildings and memorials. Not to be left out was the massive amounts of record shopping I did in all three places. Ok,I didn't buy a massive anount of records but the 14 year old me was totally floored by the all the classical rock and metal records I indulged in.

One of the best was "Seconds Coming Records" in in NYC's Christopher Street. I bought Iron Maiden's "Piece of Mind". Interestingly Christopher Street was NYC's traditionally gay neighorhood. The notion only crossed my mind since I was on vacation with my dad, who was out of the closet by then but not so much when he visited right-wing, hypocritical 'burgs like Pleasanton. In retrospect, it seems like metal has had a overlap with my interaction with a lot of gay/lesbian people. Buying 'Maiden records on Christopher Street and of course the legendary Record Vault was on Polk Street in S.F. which all the homophobes knew was "fag central". (I always thought it was Castro St. but I suspect I would've been beat up for even making such a clarification. I'm sure they would've said I was a "total fag" for even knowing it).

Later in the summer, I dealt with a few random instances of getting high from local tough guy & Ritchie White lookalike, Jason Kuntzer. Jason shared some of his weed that summer before the pick up softball games. Jason suprisingly was often more cool to me than not. His rival toughguy, James Rogers was another story and a total fucktard. I was slowly getting used taking bong hits and now even moved on to smoking out of shoddily assembled pipes. The kind that were clandestinely put together in woodshop classes. Somehow the weed made me feel really cocky, not an emotion I experienced then - especially being both rather shy and also only really comfortable in front of 1-2 people at this time. I played outfield with my now tattered 6th grade-era baseball mitt. A high but easy fly popped up in my direction and I couldn't get a hold of it what so over. A bunch of groans and screams of "you suuuck!" came in my direction. I yelled out "just wait...til uh...next time, fuckers!" Luckily, the next batter hit a piddly 'lil grounder to 1st and was out instantly.

I was due up 4th in the line up. They figured the first 3 or so guys could get on base and by that point they didn't give a shit what happened to me. I took the first two strikes and swung at it like Charlie Brown in the Peanut cartoons, all hyperexteded arms and legs. Even swinging around so hard I wacked my self in the fucking knee. Another two innings later I let the first pitch go by, swung at the next and was told by Marc Roble (an asshole hesher dude who I used to race BMX with) "you ain't gonna get shit, you gump!" I yelled out "fuck off Marc, you pussy - just you wait I'm gonna clobber this one down yer fuggin' throat." I was certain to take the next train to Bangkok or at least a victorious trip around the bases. Next pitch - foul tip and uproarious laughter from Roble and this fellow dickweeed insfielders. Next and final pitch "wiff!" Marc: "You suck! Who's the pussy now? Huh?" I came close to going after him but he & I already had a confrontation a few months before that at school. Plus, I didn't wanna repeat of him sluggin' me in the jaw. Another regrettable trip in getting stoned in the boring as realm of mid-summer Pleasanton. Blazing sun, anger, social anxiety + plus lots of weed = a bad mix. Arrgh!

Yo, yo, muh foo-ball team's gotta band n' shit

Eastside Catholic in Washington State uses this shitty nu-meddle song to "pump up".




And I thought my freshman year high school coach was a douchebag for using the Rocky theme (all three of 'em including the sappy "Gonna Fly Now"). This is so many kinds of wrong yet "appropo" since it's assgrab season...I mean football season. Only in America can homophobic Christian jocks can play a sport that has more double-entendrés than a Turbonegro album. While Manowar might have the "international bear" imagery, American football has full on ass-grabing. Football trumps them by a chest hair

Speak English Or Diet

Sounds weird but I've had a mini-obsession with a movie I haven't even seen before. I've been utterly amused by a 1991 British movie called "The Pope Must Die!" Not only because of it's obviously controversial title but also because of what became of the controversy. The title was changed to the "Pope Must Diet". Yes, diet. I know of a few medeval kings called "The Fat" but never a pope. The imdb entry tells more:

"After much outcry from Roman Catholics, the film's US title was changed by the addition of a single letter. The new title, "The Pope Must Diet", was marked on some promotional material with the final letter "T" in the form of a crucifix. "

I've always done the "die" to "diet" change in my head when reading certain song or album titles or lyrics. A few examples:

"A Fine Day To Diet" and "Diet in Fire" - Bathory
"Never Say Diet" & "Diet Young" - Black Sabbath
"Diet Hard", "Live Like An Angel Diet Like A Devil" - Venom
"Diet By The Sword" - Slayer
"March or Diet"- Motorhead
"Diet, Diet My Darling" - Misfits
"Eat Fats, Diet Young" - Bulimia Banquet
"Diet By His Hand" - Exodus
"Do or Diet" - Viking
"Invader #1 Must Diet" - Bad Vibes
"Too Young Drunk to Live To Young To Diet" - Alcatrazz
"Kill Fuck Diet" - W.A.S.P.

Band names:

Watch Them Diet
Diet Toten Hosen
To/Diet/For

How 'bout Metallica lyrics: "Diet, Diet By My Hand I Creep Across The Land Killing Fatborn Man". It'll work for slogans, too "Posers will Diet!" This might only work for Richard Simmons and Manowar, though. (*Meh* Same difference)

Time for this silliness to fuck off and die(t). Anyway, this movie does worth checking out. Mostly because it stars Adrian Edmondson better known to "Young Ones" fans as Vyvyan Basterd. There's something admirable about having talents like: "wiring the doorbell to a bomb and adding a 289 CID Ford V-8 engine to the vacuum cleaner which proceeded to suck up the carpet, the floorboards and a friend of Neil's."

Thrashing is my business...and business is good

Today my show at KZSU was a suprise. The first hour went as usual, slow while I played a bunch of noisy/experimental stuff most of which worked. Eventually I move into the complicated prog of Uplison Acrux and the groovy 70's jams of Fuzzy Duck. I expected people to be tune out or at least maybe there was one weirdo listening.

Sure enough the moment I switched from "Pretty Much Metal" (Pelican) to REALLY FUCKIN' METAL (Dekapitator) everything changed. OK, I was also giving away tickets to see Megadeth at the Warfield but work with me here. Last week I tried to give away tickets to the same show and no one called. WTF? Last week I made it super easy, no trivia question or lame contest, just "be my second caller". I didn't even get a first caller.

Today the exact opposite happened. Right as I had the Dekapitator ready to go they were calling. I suppose if you make a recognizable "call to "battle" like "Alright you heshers and thrashers...now, yes NOW is the time (phone rings on air) ok...not right now! So...if you wanna go see Megadeth at the Warfield be my first caller...here's Dekapi-tA-TOOOOR!"

I actually made it even easier and gave 'em away to the first caller. There were 4 callers after him. I was flashing back to the intensity of 20 calls an hour of KSJS' "Brain Pain" (circa: 1992-93). I halfway expected the dudes (yeah they were all dudes) who rang up after the winner to call me "dudeplaySlayer". I've been referred to as such, I hold that in high esteem. Among the metalheads that called I got requests for Gwar, Soilwork, Light This City and Graf Orlock, which we didn't have, only one DJ seems to have that. Me thinks I should get off my ass and actually go see them play & nab their CD. I threw in Overkill, and a bunch of new stuff from an (un)holy Swedish trinity: Entombed, Candlemass and Marduk.

If that weren't enough - my friend & fellow Kevin Sullivan afficionado, Soy Ricardo called me to tell me a number of things he liked. Señor Ricardo does a really awesome show on Thursday mornings from 6-9am. His show is like what college/non-commercial radio should be: unpredictable, ever changing, weird and downright fun. There's nothing like hearing Totalitar at 7:15am while you're shaving.

I've made an attempt to give out the number for the station more often and try to improve my skills as a DJ. Even though it's been 10 years at KZSU (and 4 in the early 90's at KSJS) I'm still not a perfectionist. Some people in college/non-commercial really care, often too much about arcane facts like how many people are streaming the station. I pay a little attention to these things. However, it's more about that one guy or girl that calls and tells me they like what I do whether it's one of my good friends or a complete stranger. This is what's important and this is what's real.

"I don't care if we play in front of two people or two thousand people if someone likes us that's great" - Steve Albini, Big Black sometime in the 1980's

Dragonships are charging through the waves!

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

12:45 PDT DUBLIN, Ireland (AP)

Viking Ship Completes 1,000-Mile Journey

"A replica Viking ship sailed triumphantly into Dublin's harbor Tuesday after attempting to re-enact the arduous 1,000-mile journey Scandanavian warriors made more than a millenium ago.

But this time around, there was a little towing with the rowing, and absolutely no pillaging.

The six-week journey of the ship "Stallion of the Sea" crossed the waters of northern Europe from Scandinavia, around Scotland and into the Irish Sea, retracing the path of Vikings who invaded Ireland. At times, it passed through violent waters and high winds.

Spectators cheered and sailors blew their horns as the ship drew into the harbor in Dublin, which was founded by Vikings in the 9th century.

The 65-member crew was overjoyed upon arrival.

"Of course we're happy," Capt. Poul Nygaard told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. "Tonight we will be celebrating in an Irish pub."

Danish culture minister Brian Mikkelsen, watching the ship arrive, chose the occasion to apologize for the Viking invasions of Ireland.

"In Denmark, we are certainly proud of this ship, but we are not proud of the damages to the people of Ireland that followed in the footsteps of the Vikings," Mikkelsen said. "But the warmth and friendliness with which you greet us today and the Viking ship show us that, luckily, it has all been forgiven."

The Vikings, who hailed mainly from Denmark but also from neighboring Scandinavian countries, plundered Ireland and Britain through the eighth and ninth centuries, briefly conquering a vast stretch of England. Denmark's royal family traces its lineage to Viking king Gorm the Old, who died in 958.

Experts have long wondered at the Vikings' navigational prowess and the ship was intended to simulate the conditions of a Viking voyage from Scandinavia to Ireland. But it carried some decidedly un-Viking-like equipment — a support ship, global positioning systems, radar, radio, life jackets, survival gear and satellite weather forecasts.

The initial plan was to travel nonstop from Roskilde to Dublin relying only on the wind and raw rowing power — like Viking warriors did 1,000 years ago. But when the winds were not cooperative, the crew stowed their oars and had their vessel towed 345 miles across the North Sea.

Nevertheless, the experiment has proven the seaworthiness of Viking vessels, said Anton Englert, a curator at the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, where the original is on display. He said it would have been too difficult — and dangerous — to completely recreate the original sea crossing.

"We modern people cannot in the course of one summer season make up for the navigational experience and feeling of weather-hardened Viking Age professionals," he said in an e-mail.

The crew had been blogging from the boat and well-wishers could follow the progress using satellite imagery by Google Earth.

The 100-foot Stallion is a replica of a Viking ship believed to have been built in 1042 in Glendalough, Ireland. The craftsmen who built it used Viking-era tools.

Englert said the ship's arrival in Ireland would close an archaeological circle, returning a copy of the ship to where the original was made.

The replica will be kept at the National Museum of Ireland, which is dedicating a special exhibition to the Sea Stallion before it sails back to Denmark next year.

The ship's crew came from Britain, Ireland, the United States, Germany, Australia and Scandinavia."

Apparently there's a country called Scandinavia? Regardless of that error this is a great story. I've seen the real thing before, up close at Oslo's Viking Ship Museum (aka: Vikingskipshuset) which was quite stunning. I highly recommend it, you will not be disappointed.

The only thing to do now is to drink mead and listen to...Amon Amarth? Unleashed? Bathory? No, it's onward to the viking metal might of Enslaved.

"Strokes from oars could be heard, beautiful ships gushed through the sea. Like a wind from the north, our ancestors reached the shore"

from "793 (The Battle of Lindisfarne)/793 (Slaget Om Lindisfarne)"

Hail the brave crew of the Stallion of the Sea!

Like A Camat From 'Da Sky!

From 1982-89 I was hugely into Pro Wrestling. In the Spring of 1982, Danny (yes, the same born-against Christian, Danny) told me about Georgia Championship Wrestling on WTBS. Over the next few weeks heschooled me on the "who's who" with names like Buzz Sawyer, Stan "The Lariat" Hansen and the Don "Magnificent" Muraco. Interestingly, Georgia Championship Wrestling was the highest rated show on WTBS in 1982. I left it behind the for awhile likely due to my BMX & growing metal obsessions. In 1984 & early 1985 I watched the World Wrestling Federation. Danny, Danny's dad & I went to see a WWF show at the Oakland Coliseum Arena. While we had nosebleed seats we could still make out some of the action between Sgt. Slaughter vs. the Iron Shiek. We also saw the high flying Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka and the "inbred-freak" looking Moondogs. While I thought the WWF was good, I only watched it maybe every other week.

The Moondogs circa: 2003 with valet April


Sgt. Slaughter with ex-NWA/WCW jobber George South who now jobs for Jesus.

The clincher was in the Summer of '85. My friend Steve & I took a one day construction job in San Jose. We were responsible for cleaning out debris from a bunch of apartments. During lunch Steve told me about the wrestling show on WTBS. It was now called "World Championship Wrestling". He told me about guys like Ric Flair, Dusty Rhodes and The Midnight Express. He gave me the scoop on all the story lines and who was the bad guy and who was the good guy. The next Saturday afternoon came around I watched and I was hooked. If Steve had to work or if I had guitar lessons that day we'd fill each other in on what happened. It wasn't long that were were even arguing who was cooler or tougher - Ric Flair or Dusty Rhodes

I became more of a casual fan in the early 90-mid 90's. I watched wrestling probably once a month. I was in the midst of college and work. I also discovered an amazing concept called "relations with girls". Besides, looking back the characters and story lines in this time mostly sucked. I went back to watching the WWF & WCW around 1997 until about 2002. In this era there were a few things that stuck out like "Stone Cold" Steve Austin whose "Texas badass" character was really cool for awhile. That is until his catch phrase became "What?". Literally the word "what". Who writes this shit? The Rock was also fun to watch. While his mic skills were always ace, but his moves like "The People's Elbow" were pretty lame.

Although, the best was watching the hour-long, no bullshit, Extreme Championship Wrestling on TNN. My roommate Michael & I watched it every Friday night. Shows ya what lives we had.

Getting back to the 1980's, one wrestler whose image I was obsessed with, Kevin "Prince of Darkness" Sullivan. Sullivan for many years was a mystery. I only knew about him from the proto-black metal looking photos and random Florida territory reports published in the magazines like Wrestling All-Stars and Pro Wrestling Illustrated. Sullivan's ex-wife Nancy appears in the first clip below as the young girl. In the mid-90's they split up and she married Chris Benoit. In recent months you've probably read about the tragic end of that relationship.

Kevin Sullivan's "awesome factor" was his combination of bizarre imagery and original, crazy mic skills. While his character was supposed to be a satanist he never mentioned satan or wore any satanic symbols. Was it because some born-again Florida nut job might want to kill him? Instead of the devil or hell he spoke about the "betel nut" and an obscure prophet named "Abbabuddahdeen". Pro Wrestling Illustrated listed him hailing from Singapore. While not as strange as "Parts Unknown", Singapore was likely thought of as a satanic paradise that was run by rotund guys with strong Boston accents.
True Floridian Black Metal Wrestling - None Shall Defy!

After working the Florida territory Sullivan showed up on the "World Championship Wrestling" show. One week he wore a Nasty Savage shirt. When I told Steve that it he said the previous week (that I missed) Sullivan wore a Mercyful Fate shirt. Soooo METAAAAL! Steve was in Nasty Savage's fan club. The band's frontman Nasty Ronnie was obsessed with wrestling AND he was in a killer metal band. So maybe we weren't dorks after all? Ronnie would later go into wrestling in the late 80s with a local Florida based organization. (IWF?)
This one went on my wall in '85

Here are 3 classic moments from the Prince of Darkness involving his feud with "Superstar" Billy Graham.

Part 1 shows Sullivan with his manager Sir Oliver Humperdink fighting Kendall Windham and Nancy Sullivan (aka: "Cindy Lou") and then turning on his tag team partner "Superstar" Billy Graham. Graham's biblical counterpoint is straight out of an Ed Wood movie. Classic!


Part 2 "I Yam In Ya Soul And Yam In Yah Haht"

Sullivan and Graham go "weirdo a weirdo" yet again.


Finally, look below for the 3rd part of this unholy trinity. Sullivan & King Curtis (along with horde o' evil) speak of a far travelling guru. Whereas, their opponents Blackjack Mulligan and Superstar Graham claim Sullivan is talking "backwards" and call out the "chairman of the board". (Sinatra?) Listen for Superstar's AMAZING "Armageddon Freestyle".

Unfortunately chapter 3 is a wash in "this no longer available". However, here's Sullivan's pre-Sunn O)) ritual. voice over by the late, great Sir Oliver Humperdink. Someone needs to mix in Beherit or Blasphemy of this.

Would you pay $1.25 for this?

My friend The Big Chief recently told me about some major CD scores he made at the Dollar Store. It's actually the $1.25 Store nowadays. Maybe the 25¢ extra pays for the poor schlubs that have to work there? Following Chief's sagely advice I went there yesterday afternoon. Among my many finds was a hard rock & metal compilation of disasters anxiously waiting to plague my ears. The order is song/artist/original artist.


1. Falling In Love - Marq Torien/George Lynch [Scorpions]
2. Welcome To The Jungle - Kevin DuBrow (Interface mix) [Guns n' Roses]
3. Rag Doll - Ted Nugent [Aerosmith]
4. Unchained - Jack Russell/Dweezil Zappa (KMFDM mix) [Van Halen]
5. Still Of The Night - Steve Grimmett Of Grim Reaper [Whitesnake]
6. I Want You To Want Me - Jani Lane [Cheap Trick]
7. Rock Brigade - Joe Leste [UFO]
8. No More Mr. Nice Guy - Roger Daltrey/Slash [Alice Cooper]
9. Iron Maiden - Paul Dianno ['Maiden]
10. Tie Your Mother Down - Lemmy/Ted Nugent (Die Krupps mix) [Queen]
11. Walk All Over You - Dee Snider/Scott Ian (Synical mix) [AC/DC]
12. Misty Mountain Hop - Taime Downe (Sigue Sigue Sputnik mix) [Led Zeppelin]
13. Live Wire - Steve Summers Of Pretty Boy Floyd (Die Krupps mix) [Motley Crue]
14. In League With Satan - Voi-Vod [Venom]
15. Creeping Death - Physical Attraction (Filter Section mix) [Metallica]

The good:

* Roger Daltry & Slash - I always thought Daltry & Alice Cooper's voices sounded kinda similar and this works rather well. Would be ever better if they did a video with some rockin' out Muppets.

* Di'anno - Naturally Di'anno aces a song he's been singing for most of his career. For all his bitching about getting booted from the band he knows that this is his bread & butter. Hardly anyone cares about his "pomp rock" album or Battlezone.

The not too bad:

* Marq Torien & George Lynch - I never thought I'd like anything associated with Bulletboys but this is decent. The vocals are pretty Klaus Meine-y and the guitars work pretty well.

* Steve Grimmett - it would go in the 3rd category but Grimmett knows how to wail on the mic like Coverdale did in the original. Plus the added relief of not having to view Tawny Kitean humping a Jaguar. (Though I didn't seem to have a problem with that when I first saw it. Hmm...)

* Lemmy & Duh Nuge - Lemmy sounds awesome the guitar could use a little more "oomph" though and the random electronic bits are unnecessary. Me thinks Lemmy could kill Ted with his bare hands.

* Voi Vod - They got the riff but Snake's vocals are REALLY awful and sound like a dying robot in the chorus. It's about 1/2 good. Their cover of "Witching Hour" on the "War & Pain" reissue however, kills!

The ugly & unbearable

* Kevin Dubrow - G n'R with some has been singer (kinda like G n'R now, eh?) singing over chopped up riffs and clunky "club" beats.

* Ted Nugent - Already covering an already shitty Aerosmith track. This is hopeless, just like Ted.

* Jack Russell & Dweezil Zappa - Ugh! Completely unrecognizable sounds like a mix of Vince Neil, C+C Music Factory and a video game with a hint of guitar wank.

* Jani Lane & The Mission UK - More electro-rock clutter with some "almost but not quite Robin Zander" vocals. If I didn't know who it was it might actually be Robin but I know he'd never stoop THIS low. For the love of Bun E. Carlos, make it stop!

* Joe Leste of Bang Tango - Making a perfectly decent Def Leppard (from their "yes, it's actually good" first album) song into pure generic hard rock.

* Dee Snider & Scott Ian - So this is what they do when they're not on VH-1. What the fuck is this? AC/DC with a techno beat breakdown? AC/DC is about guitars! 'nuff said.

* Tamie Downe - Seriously don't! There's far too much Zeppelin played on the radio and way too many cover songs. Cock rock with electronic beats? Yeesh.

* Steve Summers - Motley Crue with loud-hip hop beats? The vocals sound exactly like Vince Neil. Summers is from Pretty Boy Floyd? That CAN'T be a real band, right?

* Physical Attraction - Remixed by the band that did "Hey Man, Nice Shot". Horrendously fucking up an already perfect song. EBM beats with a nu-metal vibe. Sounds like every video game movie soundtrack ever made.

So, if you've ever had the need to hear what an already lame cover of Van Halen would sound like with a techno beat - then here's your chance. There's no note about who's actually in the mysterious band called Physical Attraction. Considering how awful they sound, it's probably best left unknown.

I safely (?) got the single disc version of the CD. There's a another version with a bonus live Bang Tango disc. Bang Tango? and live? Someone's selling it for $10 on eBay I wonder if there's a desperate soul with $18.99 who needs it right now.

What do Metallica and the Spice Girls have in common?

"Tell me whatcha want what whatcha really want!" "Um...I just wanna have you listen to my feelings"

Sad but true? Indeed.

National Day of Stryper II: Honestly Lame

  Stryper seems to have started the whole horrible militarized cops trend.

Stryper – Soldiers Under Command (Enigma, 1985)

This is the second album from these “bumblebees for Christ”. Starting with the "Dokken meets Styx” title track which for what it is, ain’t bad. Stop laughing – it’s 1985 and some of you were not even born or "rockin'" to Mr. Mister on MTV. Where this gets shitty is in the next song, which like the first it starts with proper (albeit poppy & cheesy) hard rock then makes me feel like I can't do anything other than wanting kill when I hear the chorus of: “Jeessss-usss…king of king makes me want to sing”. Rock that stigmata motherfucker!

Next is the "Styx meets Poison" of “Together Forever” is a bit shaky if anything. Then…comes burning bush of musical shit: “First Love” even for (Odin forbid) Circa: 1985 pop metal” this is going WAYYYYY too low! A 100% sappy piano ballad with even sappier vocals. Almost making “Sister Christian” sound like Venom. Then “The Rock That Makes Me Roll” No, it’s not about his wife or girlfriend as his "rock/foundation" to rely on. Nor is it some abstract concept encompassed in “the rock (and roll)”. Yet again it’s…Jesus! Surprisingly not too bad for super-dorky cheesy metal from ’85 with the “typical of any metal” line of “stand up and fight…” I'm trying to give them a little credit here.

(Thee battle hath commenced and...brains lost)

Side 2 is full of melodic choruses and more of the crap they did on side A. “Reach Out” is a sugary sweet mess. Catchy as a plague of frogs from the sky. The next song “(Waiting For) A Love That’s Real” is more bubblegum rock for the “water into wine” set. “I love you, I want you…but that won’t change the way I feel” The way you feel about playing this wretched song? Next up another sturdy, turdy ballad called “Together As One”. Suddenly they get back to rockin’ or something. What’s that: “Oh…Jesus Christ is the lover of your soul and he wants to give you every thing you need!” Really? Uh, how about a new apartment and $8000 bucks? Some primo hash? Helloo...Jesus are you there? Admittedly solos are passable and wouldn’t be out of place on some proper metal release. They close everything with a ‘cover’ of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” a super shitty ‘American traditional’ (Aka: Another damn Christian song,us 'Mercians are supposed to "honor"). If you think this is shitty wait ‘til you hear the Manowar version. Both are dead even in the amount of SUCK they produce.

By the Hammer of Thor! I can’t believe I just reviewed a whole Stryper tape. Praise Cheesus that I had a fast forward button. It now rests it "holy soul" in the Palo Alto Goodwill.

 How is this NOT on TV right now? 

As for their bible throwing antics, I've been told of 3 different occasions where someone got a Bible violently thrown into their eye socket. "By his sharp cornered bibles ye shall be healed?" Here's what they look like now. Not so "strype-y".

Stryper used to have a giant 666 with the international sign for "no" over it on each side of the stage. The 777 concept is odd. Some people think it's lucky because of how many times the number 7 appears in the bible. Although this dude thinks otherwise. He says they're as bad as Steve Vai and even..."Mr...Crowley"

Well, I can't find an image of their anti-666 stage thingy but I bet they'd hate luchadore Damian 666.

OK, I swear on a stack of flying Stryper bibles that I don't have any Bloodgood stories. Eh...except this:

(KZSU about 5 years ago)

Me: "Yeah there was this other Christian metal band in the 80's called 'Bloodgood'.

My friend Katie: (In total disbelief): "BloodGOOD!?!...as opposed to "BloodBAD?!?"

Me: Nah, I don't think there was a Bloodbad but yeah...they were really lame."

Hmmm...I wonder if people tried contact them through this guy?

7/7/07 - National Day of Stryper?

Last year on the "Day Of the Beast" I listened to KFJC's "Day of Doom" 24 hours of Doom Metal and...they threw in Slayer & Deicide near the end. This year the 7/7/07 sequence came up. Reminding me of a certain bunch of Jesus freak rockers in bumblebee suits.

 

For those of you that read the first issue of my zine "Stoner Wall" you might remember this exchange I once had with my "Born again Christian yet liked certain metal bands and later turned into a reggae listening, acid dropping hippy" friend, Danny:

The scene: early Fall 1984. Danny & I had just come back from record shopping in Berkeley. His mom was a judge for NCAA gymnastics. I had bought a new issue of Kerrang! and more importantly an Iron Maiden picture disc 12" of their new single "Two Minutes To Midnight". Danny bought a Stryper tape.

The place: Highway 580 going east towards Pleasanton.

Danny (hands his mom the tape of Stryper): "Here mom, can you play this?"

Danny's mom: "Uh...I don't know what this is..."

Danny: "It's a band called Stryper, they're not one of those devil groups like Iron Maiden that (RagnarR's real name) listens to!"

Me: "Whaaaat!? Iron Maiden isn't a 'devil group' they had only one song about the devil!"

(Above: something "totally devil group-ish" via 'Maiden's "2 Minutes to Midnight") 


Danny: "No, they're ARE a 'devil group'! They wear crosses...I mean maybe they wear crosses but its for anti-Christian purposes!"

Me: "Not even!...I've never seen a single photo of them with a cross! You don't even KNOW what you're TALKING about.

I had seen practically every photo of 'Maiden in the press and not one with them wore a cross rightside up or upside down. He was likely confusing Black Sabbath or even Slayer with 'Maiden. I figured he would've at least been able to know the difference.

Danny: "Whatever!" (cue wussy intro to "The Yellow and Black Attack")

A few years later in my "I like everything that's hard rock and metal" phase (1986-early 87), I traded my friend Steve a Lizzy Borden LP for his Stryper "Soldiers Under Command" (on white vinyl, natch). A "crap for crap" trade looking back at it. Although I was socially awkward but I knew everything about METAL!...Or maybe not?

Their arch-nemesis The Killer Bees from the WWF

This news from a metal festival in Mexico with Slayer and Stryper on the same bill (!) is pretty weird. 

If that wasn't enough, Scott Ian tells of Anthrax, Raven and Stryper playing together in Reseda, CA. Metal nerd note: technically Metallica and Stryper once played together. One of Metallica's earliest gigs in L.A. was with a band called Roxx Regime who a few years later became Stryper. Roxx Regime also had the "stripe schtik" and another soon to be famous big-haired dork named C.C. Deville.

ENDNOTES: Look at how Stryper's "holy missiles" are about to completely destroy earth yet Iron Maiden's "2 Minutes to Midnight" was a warning against nuclear war. I know whose side I'm on...

I’m in the Top 50…of today's metal nerds

Today I took this Metal trivia quiz.

It’s pretty awesome you can do the questions by category (i.e. Black, Death, Thrash) or by Album, Song, Band Members. I did it for all categories except for gothic metal (which is neither). It's all multiple choice and you don't need a #2 pencil or scantron. Sometimes the questions are simple like "Who released Master of Puppets?" Whereas other times they ask you which Gorgoroth album did Frost of Satyricon play drums on. (In still have no clue, uh... "Antichrist"?, "Pentagram"? some other badly clichéd album title?). The 3rd game I played they asked a D.A.D. related question. Who? Look in the dollar bin next to D'molls and Dangerous Toys.

Congratulations!!!

You got 1800 points.
With those points, you made some Top50-entries!

Your score can be found in the following entries: today's


My 1800 points was nowhere near the 3762 points that someone named Sad Wings got. Then again, he was “destined” to win, eh? Sad Wings + Destiny…? Hello?…Is this thing on?

Heavy Sounds From Hippyville - Side B

*flip*....*click*

* King Missle - "Jesus Was Way Cool" - "if he wanted to...he could turn sugar into cocaine...or vitamin pills into amphetamines" Need I say more?

* Strange mix of "Readings on the Beat Jack Keuoack, John Zorn covering Orenette Coleman and early 70's Budweiser commercials.

* Krack - "Infection" rather good, nasty noise rock with burly guitars.

* Hedgehog - "Burning the Green" stoned out, loose, Dinosaur Jr.-like indie rock from Santa Cruz. They had a few 7"ers. The song is actually about a forest fire not taking bongloads, though.

* Silverfish - "One Silver Dollar" - bad-ass UK punkish/noise rock with female vocals. They did a couple of albums all of which were pretty good.

* Dinosaur Jr. - "The Lung" - a great, huge rockin' semi-epic, totally unforgettable and tons of great guitar work. This show in particular got me way into Dino Jr.

* Buffalo Tom - "Birdbrain" - Dinosaur Jr. Jr. some called them back then. Except the vocals were a lot different they just weren't as out of control. I'm hearing more of a Screaming Trees influence. Not a bad band but they only had a handful of songs that really stuck out and this is one of them.

* Public Enemy - "Bring 'Da Noise" - Motherfuckin' Public Enemy! While I dug a lot of early hip-hop like Run DMC & even some of the first few LL Cool J albums. Although,
P.E. was the first band that a HUGE sound. The DJ made a super lame error in running a "why you should donate" promo during the intro. "THEE....Public Enemy!"

* Public Enemy - "Don't Believe the Hype" - A perfect example of how they bridged the serious and comical. Especially that odd background voice that keeps going "WHooooooo-haaahhh!"

* Last Poets - "Jonestown" I still hear this thinking - "Whoa -what was this?" Radical, political, African-American poetry/proto hip-hop. "I'm driving a white horse into my main vein..." All kinds of shit going on in this. Told from the perspective of a junkie who's "jonesin'" Rather grim and still holds up.

* Dr. Know - "Mr. Freeze" Killer, slightly metallic hardcore. My tape cut off during this song and it took me YEARS to figure out who did this. It made sense that it was Dr. Know as I liked their "Plug in Jesus" LP that I borrowed from my sister but for some dumb reason I didn't tape that. (Yet I taped crap like Lizzy Borden and Kiss' "Animalize" what was I THINKING"?). Some band called Slayer covered this song.

The station also had a Middle Eastern show called "Unfiltered Camels" which I found is still on. I listened to it a few times during the first Gulf War.
I can't tell much from their website what exactly they're playing aside from some standard indie fare but a few suprises. I discovered like their metal show called "Hell Bent for Heavy Metal" that played "Gladiator" by Nasty Savage! The rest of the metal programming leans towards "moldy oldies" like AC/DC, Ozzy and new crap like Black Label Society.

Heavy Sounds From Hippyville - Side A

A few weeks ago I fished out a tape of a college radio show "Zen Crux" from
KZSC UC Santa Cruz's show. This show was from about October or November 1990. After 14 years in Pleasanton, my mom sold our house and we moved out of our apartment across town. So I split to Santa Cruz. I picked it up down in Aptos when I worked at the Pixie Plaza market. Pixie Plaza was a convienience store that catered to mostly drunk idiots. One of it's biggest selling items was this foul concoction of fruit juice and hard alcohol - called Cisco.

This particular "Zen Crux" show was during their pledge drive which normally would've been irritating but the DJs made it pretty fun. This was college radio in the age before Pitchfork and even before Nirvana. This was indie rock with an emphasis on ROCK. I'm not saying that it's perfect but take a look at this list of bands & songs and see how different this is from the puds who play The Decemberists and Death Cab For Cutie and feel like they're doing something "cutting edge". The problem with a lot of college stations and so-called "indie bands" isn't so much that they don't rock (OK, maybe it IS!) but it seems to be that the bands that take real risks get overlooked.


SIDE A

* Screaming Trees - "Ocean Of Confusion" - Seriously rockin', perfectly melodic and catchy. The Van Conner brothers and Marc Langean worked so well together. It's a damn shame they've gotten overlooked after Nirvana hit it big. Lanegan's solo stuff is fantastic as well. I lucked out and saw them play live twice in the same night when they opened for Sonic Youth.

* Mustard - "Lady Day" (live on KZSC). Mustard along wiht Hedgehog were played a lot on Zen Crux and it's precursor show Zen Bubblegum which was essentially the same show with a different co-host. This song is a John Coletrane cover even though I've never heard the original it has that odd mix of hippie jam band mixed with passable '68-'71 era psych rock interplay. I was always suspect about Mustard as they were from Santa Cruz AND had a song called "Groovy Waters".

--- DJ back announces calls Mustard "local, groovy band" and says about Screaming Trees "another underground band makes the majors". Interesting as this was in the pre-Nirvana time. He also played "Stargirl" by Seaweed which I had on another tape. They played this song a lot but it wasn't till I heard their debut on Sub Pop "Weak" when I got really into Seaweed. I got to interview them in 1993 for KSJS. They were really nice, funny guys. We talked about all kinds of stuff outside their band like Venom, AntiSeen and strange cover songs of Lee Hazelwood songs. (i.e Einstrüzende Neubauten's version of "Sand")

Seaweed like a number of bands in the 90's got pretty bad as time went on. Their cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Go Your Own Way" was just the beginning. They just seem so goddamn smug playing that shitty song. I have yet to hear their one & only major label album "Spanway" but it apparently is pretty spotty. Although this video is pretty cool. Oddly enough in 1994 they were ahead of the curve by showing 80's retro stuff like Pre-X Games era BMX bikes and dudes in 3/4 sleeve concert tees. I can relate, gimme
Diamond Turbos and a Rush '84 tour shirt & I'm good.

* Stooges - "I Wanna Be Your Dog" - The first time hearing this oddly enough. It still sound raw and powerfully (no pun intended). The Stooges haven't haven't been worn out by nostaligia trips for me. At least not yet. I went out a week later and got a copy of "Raw Power" on gatefold LP at Logo's for a scant $3.50. Still plays just fine.


* Helmet - "Repetition" - Another first. Once I heard that first riff kick in I though "whooa- what the HELL ? This is FUCKING HEAVY!" Riff after after and even a guitar solo? Wait this was metal or at least really close. Thing is the vocals are either shouted or almost spoken. This was the new stuff on a label I had just discovered then - Amphetamine Reptile -which I read about in Maximum Rock N' Roll. I heard a few of their early releases on KFJC but Helmet was really new. Helmet live was another story. They became a one trick pony. I saw them once in 1992 second to last on the bill with Quicksand, Gray Matter (D.C., the Discord band not Grey Matter which was a medicore "alt.rock" band in early 90's San Jose), Hammerhead (the AmRep band) and Melvins (who headlined). Helmet was pretty dull live. The first time I saw them they got blow away by the openers and the headliner. Then the next time they out outshined by both the openers - Therapy? and Jesus Lizard.

* Boredoms - "Bubble Pop Shop" even though I had heard the Boredoms via Maximum Rock N' Roll's radio show on KFPA a few months earlier - THIS was something way the fuck out there. Screaming male and female vocals, bashing drums, audio martial arts ("hi-yah"), and some insane variations of "We Will Rock You". I later found out that this LP sounds incredible awesome played backwards.

* Wedding Present - "Kennedy" - I never heard of "the Weddos" (as N.M.E. would called them) before this. In college I had 4 friends that had most of their records. This is a pretty phenomenal track especially considering the time. Plenty of bands (re: lame ones) played 'jangle rock" guitar but the Wedding Present played it and fast with a huge bass line with a enough variation in the chords that kept your attention. Really sarcastic lyrics with the refrain "too much apple pie".

* Victim's Family - "Supermarket Nightmare/Polka" Victim's Family is one of those bands in the 90's I wanted to really like but never really could. They played great but they songs were kinda samey. Fast bouncy, slightly funky and proggy bass lines both of these tracks are above water but overall they just never really did much for me. I bought a copy of "White Bread Bread Blues" at the original Streetlight Records in San Jose. Anyone remember when they were in that converted house next to the freeway?

--- DJ #1 backannouces - "...(the Boredoms) that was the Japanese answer to the Butthole Surfers" DJ #2 "Can you say that?" "Rollins would want you to donate to KZSC...it's a very Rollins, punk rock thing". (DJ #1 says "grooviness" again, WTF?)

* Rollins Band - "What've I Got?"/"Tearin' Me Apart" - While I think I liked Black Flag when I first heard 'em (it was "My War" around early '85) I just forgot about it in the onslaught of metal obsession. These two songs go me into Rollins Band (as did his killer cover of The Pink Faries "Do It") that made me go back and check out Black Flag. I saw Hank & a guy named Don Bajemia do spoken word in December of 1990 at UCSC. It was in a lecture hall that held about 400 people. I briefly talked with Henry after the show - he signed my copy of "High Adventures in the Great Outdoors". He seemed pretty cool but really overwhelmed and intense (go figure).

* Negativland - "Car Bomb" - I had heard Negativland's "hit" "Christianity Is Stupid" a few times and even listened to their bizarre "Over The Edge" show on KPFA earlier in the year but this song was really different. This is Negativland at their most straight up punk yet it's still pretty weird. It's a list of different car parts with a fast thumping beat and a clocking ticking down, explosions and the crazy, shouted chorus of "...Carrrr-- Booaaammmmmb!"..."covered in a bumpersticker that says...'no other possibility".

*Click*...Time to flip over the tape.

Happy Pants Pumpkin Dance

Helloween's video for the song "Halloween". The festive action going on can only be described as the "Happy Pants Pumpkin Dance". Check for the cameos by Klaus Nomi clone and band mascot Mr. Pumpkinhead (what IS his name anyway?). The song was originally 13:19 and was cut down to a little over 5 minutes. Thus the weird "where the hell did this guitar solo come from?" effect. The U.S. version was cut even more The chopped a few frames since the original European version showed a woman's nipple through her sheer dress. Typical of MTV that they can show Steve Tyler of Aerosmith dry humping some dumb model but if some real looking German girl's nipple shows through her dress - forget it!

Also of note the band warns on the LP "anyone caught spelling the song "Halloween" with a 'e' or the band name with an 'a' will be turned into a pumpkin!"

The night this video premiered on "Headbanger's Ball" (sometime in August of '87) I got back from my visiting my cousins in Nevada City. My clothes smelled of the Sierra Foothills red dirt and which mixed with the freshly wafting stench of the cigarettes that came from a letter I just opened. The lettter was from Chrissy, my pen-pal in Connecticut who was a severe metalhead (and worked as a stripper but that's another story). I was simulateously reading through Chrissy's letter with her record collection attached. My mom walked into the room while my eyes were flipping between "Death - Scream Bloody Gore (LP), White Lion - Prey (tape)" and the visuals on the TV.


Mom: "Who's this?"
Me: "It's a band called HE-LL-O-Ween" (Emphasizing it was about "HELL" and therefore unsafe and unparent-friendly) "...they're from Germany."
Mom: "Wow...these bands you're into are from all over the world, huh?"
Me: (Suprised) "Yeah....they are um...this other one they played video of a few minutes ago is from Japan!"

Granted it was the lame-ass E-Z-O but hey at least it was representing the United Brutha & Sistahood of Metahaaaooool!

It was also at this time that I had penpals from Austrailia, Sweden, Newcastle UK (Venom, Raven & Newcastle Ale, oh my!) and some place called New Jersey. I didn't have too many female friends in high school but I had a LOT of them as penpals. Why I did clue in and go visit them is beyond me.

Heaven And Hell - Story Behind The Album Cover

This an audio interview with Lynn Curlee who did the cover to to Sabbath's legendary album "Heaven and Hell" (as well as as B.O.C.'s "Agent's of Fortune, B.O.C. means Blue Oyster Cult NOT Boards of Canada). Now (to paraphrase Ronnie James Dio on "Live Evil")

The name of the album 'Heaven and Hell' this is 'Heaven....and Hell'

"Sing me a song you're a SINGEAH!..."

check it out here

"Do me a wrong you're a bringah of EVIL!"

Voting Green - Part I

I first got stoned in June of ’84. It was the end of 8th grade and my school Wells Junior High even had a graduation ceremony. I think I held on to my diploma for exactly one week. I knew that wasn’t worth the paper it was written on. I hadn’t really been around weed at least among people my age. There were a few people that got stoned at Sandy Bueno’s party early that April (see “My First Party” from Stoner Wall I). I’m guessing my parent’s smoked a few joints incognito style at some of the parties they had with my dad’s co-worker friend Rich, who used to crack up laughing and pound on the walls. After my parents split my mom was dating this sorta hippie-ish shop teacher from the high school she taught at. He had some summer house in Denver where my mom visited him at. My sister said they experienced a certain kind of…”Rocky Mountain High”.

Pop culture also invoked the weed thing – it was hard to not be conscious of it. From cheesy TV shows like

“Facts Of Life” (which had at least two episodes that dealt with weed) and
"Diff'rent Strokes" to Afterschool Specials like
“Stoned” with Scott Baio and even more ‘serious’ fare like the “The White Shadow” - a TV show that had A LOT of anti-drug episodes). At the same time there was headshops a plenty. The Carter Administration seemed to be a bit lax on the Federal laws and even in the first few years of the Reagan era drugs like weed were still pretty common and considered at least “normal”. In the summer of 1981 I went on a road trip through Northern California and Southern Oregon with my mom an her then boyfriend, Don.

I stayed in the back of his camper whilst I listened for any sign of rock music on his tinny radio. Unfortunately all I could come up with was the occasional baseball game or “pop country”. The game faded in & out far too often so alas Juice Newton, Dolly and Glenn Campbell won out. I took a long sleep and woke up trippin’ out to the sound of rushing water. “Where are WE?!?" I thought we had parked in front of a lake but it turned out it was the Shasta River and a few steps outside the camper I got a an amazing view of the mighty Mt. Shasta. I bought a bunch of basketball cards at the KOA campgrounds. (A few of which are worth some good coin but alas I don't even have a friggin'
Tree Rollins card to my name).

We stayed in Shasta for a day then traveled further north into Oregon. In Oregon we stopped in Ashland which didn't look too exciting though the part we were in had some cool "old west" type of architecture. Then again we had some of that junk in downtown Pleasanton.

Next was the town of Medford. We stopped near a park where I wander off through. Lots of dark greenery, a few hippies and weirdo looking folks that I avoided. I saw a few ducks in the creek which I didn't get to visit too long because one of the hippie weirdos was approaching and I didn't wanna waste any time with 'em being a mere 11 year old whose more into Star Wars, baseball and hard rock than weed and 'the Dead. I wandered off to the nearest group of stores. The first one I went into was a record store/head shop thingy. I had no clue what a headshop was but it had drug paraphenilia laid out completely normal like it was bread or cheese. Remembering the "Facts of Life" episode from a few years earlier I knew the name of these "smoking cylinders" was "bongs". There was a lot of psychedelic stuff, too. Having not lived through the 60's I hadn't seen a lot of this imagery aside from the few trip I took to Tower Posters in Berkeley with my dad. Tower Posters didn't have the psych swirlies and paisley done up too much - it was more of regular rockers place - with Cheap Trick beltbuckles, Van Halen bookcovers and the occasional political shirt or naked girl poster.

Going back to June 1984 there were a few guys who were gonna party on graduation night. I was inviting by this guy named Jimmy who I had know since at least 5th grade. Jimmy had generally been cool with me. Rumor had it that he was "more advanced" in terms of partying. Allegedly taking acid in 6th grade and meth around the same time. Luckily he was only bringing weed this night. Along with Jimmy came Jason K. Jason K. was a troublemaker type often in trouble for taking back teachers, stealing stuff from stores, smoking and drinking. He had a New York accent, too. Given that he looked kind of like Ritchie White in
Over The Edge made him seem that more cool and dangerous.

Also joining us this evening was Scott & Steve F. both of whom had stayed back in 7th grade and graduated in our class. Both of 'em were generally tolerable. Steve F. Scott with the short stature and annoying nasly voice. Steve F. with the muscular build (he was later on the high school football team) and rather "burly dude voice". Steve F. seemed to gravitate to the idea that I was still a "weed virgin". Jason brought a big 'ol bottle of white wine. I sold it to me for a scant $3. It wasn't Thunderbird but whatever the 1984 equivalent to "2 Buck Chuck" was. So it was cheap nonetheless. Around 7:30 we all gathered a began to party. Our location - Donlon Grammar School was suprisingly NOT suspect to the cops. This despite the fact that we were in an alcove that faced out onto a busy street.

Jason brought out his bong - a real D.I.Y. deal - ceramic and glazed in loud red and yellow. A real shop class job. The type that you tell the teacher is a "flower vase" for your "mom". Jason showed me how to smoke out of thing and after a few flicks of the lighter I finally got the whole lighter/inhaling while listening to bubbling water thing. I coughed a bit and exhaled a tiny bit, too. It was rough going but it felt good. I took in some of my wine. This process repeated itself at least two more times two when I said "whoa...dudes....how LONG have we been HERE?!?" Scott said "it's only 8pm, duh." This 1/2 hour felt like 3 hours. I continued to take at least 4-5 more bongloads and eventually drank all my wine. I suprisingly didn't have to hurl. Thankfully they all warned me about this. Not only were these guys being nice to me which was always had an iffy potential but I was always partying with them. This was the beginning of an really stoned summer...