Bieber Hate

Well well Boys and Girls,


It seems Bieber hate is back on the rise. Yes, the ancient ritual by which all metalheads  attain status in the trve metal army - calling Justin Bieber a faggot - is  on the resurgence, and on the resurgence bad. 


Some of you may remember when the feud between (12 year old) metalheads and Bieber fans escalated into all out war about six months ago, mostly as a result of this kid saying that "metal sucks dick", and inadvertenly sparking the most violent flame war of all time. Bloody and vicious were the glorious battles waged in the comments sections of YouTube.
No quarter was asked for and none given, as both sides fought tooth and nail to prove that Bieber either was, or was not, a "fagit" and "ghey". 

 The comments section of "Baby, Baby"

The carnage and senseless trolling eventually abated. The sheer intensity of hatin' was simply unsustainable, and the energies of both sides were spent. The war lapsed back into stalemate and the occasional skirmish via Video Response. 

Also this.

You know what the real tragedy about all this is? This is how you imagine it. To hear some people talk, you would a think that it was 1096 and Pope Urban had just declared the start of the First Crusade against Bieber fans. The more dedicated trolls were actually organising "raids" on YouTube videos and setting up websites to co-ordinate their efforts. It was really, really fucking stupid. Every single Metal video on YouTube had some shit-for-brains comment like "You say Bieber, I say Metallica! You say 50 Cent, I say Led Zeppelin!" or, worse still, "You guys, we should stop bashing other metalheads! We must unite! We are Metal Brothers!". But, thank Christ, it eventually subsided. Instead of anti-Bieber comments, "anti-trolls" appeared, and the top comment on every video suddenly became something to the effect of "Stop talking about Justin Bieber and he will go away". Internet logic… But at least we no longer had TRVE Metal Commissars rounding up recruits to defend the Motherland, as if every Metal video was like that church  in The Patriot.

"Faggot!"

It seemed that at last, we could all enjoy our metal without some fuckhead whinging. 
How wrong I was. Just the other day, whilst I was enjoying some Entombed, I casually  scrolled down to the comments section, to peruse this video's version of the genre-debate/race war/argument over religion. And my flaming TRVE metal eyes fell upon… 

Bieber:

1. Fucking sucks

2. Has no musical talent

3. Talks like a chick

4. Is a huge fucking faggot

5. Sucks his own dick

6. Can fucking burn

Fuck justin bieber, HAIL METAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! \m/

Straight from the desk of Field Marshall McFalse at Poseur HQ. 

I have never seen something so blatantly written by a child trying to act metal. My personal favourite is Reason Number 4: "Is a huge fucking faggot". 


You: Yeah brah! Hail METAL!!!! Bieber is a faggot! Kill that little-

Say it again. I fucking dare you.

But what comment sparked this rant? Did someone have the audacity, the temerity to insult the greatest musical genre of all time and say that Bieber was better? The comment which the writer of the above comment (Megaslaytallicathrax) was replying to, is as follows:


Bieber


And that's it. The simplest, most genius piece of trolling ever. All you have to do now is go onto a metal video, and type "Bieber" into the comments section, and some twerp will shit blood all over his keyboard. It is beyond ridiculous. 


There is nothing, nothing, hardcore or alternative about hating Justin Bieber. Absolutely nothing. It's not as if the whole world is listening to him, and by listening to Master of Puppets you are performing some illicit, criminal activity (though if I was in charge, listening to that shit would definitely be illegal), and sticking two fingers up to the whole of society, man. 


I am not saying I like Justin Bieber's music, or that I advocate not trolling false metal poseurs mercilessly. What I am saying is that calling "Biebz" and his fans "faggots" is a complete waste of time, because a) you'll just make them love him more, and b) if you were metal and not a poseur, you would spend your time listening to metal, not typing your stupid illiterate opinions into a box. 


Listening to metal, and arguing over metal, are metal activities. Arguing over anything else is most definitely not metal, and next time I catch you doing it, you will be branded a poser and viciously slain, as shown below:

And probably raped as well by the look of things...

D. 

Celebrating the New Year

Salutations, 

So, did you have fun celebrating the New Year? Countdown to midnight and all that, yes? 

Good time? 

I hope it was worth being a poser for. What were you, a so-called metalhead, doing celebrating the New Year? Hoping to score some drunken she-maw were you? 

Fuck you.

2012 will almost certainly be a terrible year for Heavy Metal. And you celebrated its arrival, and all that it will bring. Let's look at the damage 2012 has already managed to cause after just 9 days:

 1) Tony Iommi has cancer. 

Maybe I should just stop here. That alone makes 2012 potentially the worst year ever for Heavy Metal. Everything after this is really just a rubbishy side note, but nevertheless:

2)  Iron Maiden have pissed me off.

3) Van Halen will be touring. Given the popularity of neo-Thrash, I wouldn't be surprised if this gave birth to Neo-Glam, or possibly, if we're really unlucky, Glamcore. 

4) A bunch of shit bands will release shit music, further dragging the good name of Heavy Metal through the Mud(core). I've already heard that Killswitch Engage will have a new atrocity out this year…

All in all, it looks like more steaming, hot, fresh turd will be pinched out onto the face of true, righteous Heavy Metal over the course of this year. While Metal Hammer and Kerrang will continue to rave about empty headed, neck tattoed embarrassments, actual decent bands will continue to be completely unheard of. And if that keeps you and your karate kid moshing, fluorescent t-shirts, hair straighteners and gauges away from them, that's fine by me. We really should think of some way to keep all that crap contained in one place, to contain it ... some sort of event that will lure them all, like flies to shit…

Yes, 2012 will be another disastrous year for the greatest musical genre of all time. Possibly the worst yet. But who knows? Maybe this could be the year the -core assault finally loses momentum.
 I can dream, can't I? 

D. 

Tribulation: Putrid Rebirth Review

It could just be me, but it seems that Swedish Death Metal acts have a somewhat higher bar to get over in terms of quality than most of their peers. It could simply be that the Swedish are inherently better at making Death Metal, but does it really matter? No. What matters is that usually when you pick up some Swedish Death Metal, you know that chances are it’s going to be at least halfway decent. This was, to an extent, the theory that I was working on when I dipped my toe into the foetid waters of Tribulation, who formed in 2005, and in 2006 released today’s subject for review, Putrid Rebirth, a 4 track E.P. 

A glance at the track listings unnerved me slightly, as they sail awfully close to the wind of cliché with titles like Zombie Holocaust (off the top of my head I can think of 4 Thrash/Death tracks that mention zombies in the title, and cannot begin to guess at how many feature the Undead in the lyrics at some point or other) and even the album title Putrid Rebirth has a cookie-cutter death metal title feel to it. Furthermore, several of the tracks feature soundbites at the beginning a la Mortician, though thankfully Tribulation manage to restrain themselves, and so we don’t have to sit through half a track’s worth of chainsaw whirring and screaming that adds nothing to the song and frankly gets a bit boring after a while. Ahem. 

  The album opens with Dread City of Death, and a crazed frenzy of snare beats, whammy bombs and furious solo trading, vaguely reminiscent of Slayer. Fortunately, this is no “mind-bending” tech-death album band, as you would be lead to believe by the opening. Guitarists Adam Zaars and Johnathan Hultén calm down as the song progresses, throwing the odd solo our way but without becoming over-bearing, seemingly satisfied that they no longer need to convince anyone that they can in fact play their instruments. In fact, one downright melodic lead break materialises towards the end of the track, and the overall impression given by the instrumentation is that these are a group of musicians who could quite happily spend the entire album showing off their “sick chops”, but would much rather write some good tunes. I wish most, nay, all bands operated on the same philosophy. 

 The rest of the album continues in this vain, with each musician tastefully showing off his skills at the appropriate time, (including that most daring of musical maneuvers, the bass interlude) but overall being more concerned with playing together as a group, rather than as individuals. Which is of course the whole point of a band. 

  

The vocals are fairly standard death metal, more rasping than guttural and of course blend nicely with the music without being too much of a strain on the ears. Whilst being perfectly acceptable and suited to the band’s suited, they are hardly “standout” or particularly memorable, to my mind at least. 

  The album is far from an exhausting tour de force of blast-beats and sheer dumb speed, though like any self-respecting band, Tribulation know where to throw these in, but relent from devaluing speed and “thrashiness” through over-use. The mix of tempos adds some variation and the changes between them are interesting while avoiding the overstated “look at me I just changed tempo/time signature” given off by some. During the aptly named Churning Sea of Absu the band completely abandon speed for a somewhat sludgy two minutes at the end of the album. 

  All in all this combines to make one very satisfying and pleasing Death Metal EP, which I find grows on me more and more as I listen to it. 

Iron Maiden Fuck Everyone Off

Greetings Underlings, 


It is not often, or indeed ever, that I get angry with Iron Maiden. They continue to put on fantastic shows even at their age, and release material that is reckoned by many, myself included, to be as good as if not superior to, their "old stuff". Needless to say, compared with most bands their age, they are doing pretty damn well. They have managed to both achieve success and (mostly) maintain their integrity over the course of a long and illustrious career and are one of the very few bands to have progressed their sound without alienating the old fans. In short, they are the most successful heavy metal band in the world.


You: But Metallica have sold more albums! So Metallica are more successful!


Yes Metallica have sold more albums (mostly to fuckwits like you), but let me ask you this: Do Metallica have their own fucking plane?!  Exactly. Now shut up. Metallica's music is shit anyway.


But Maiden are not without their flaws. Their fans have put up with infrequent new albums, releases that are identical (looking at you Flight 666 and Somewhere Back in Time), bullshit "Best Of" albums (of which there are at least 5 now), and hearing the same old songs from their 80s era, while other, better songs from the same era haven't been played since 1987. There are nine (9) versions of Run to the Hills in my music library, and I don't even have all the official ones. How many live versions of Infinite Dreams do I have? 1. And it's not even from an official release. How many live versions of Caught Somewhere in Time do I have? 1. And it's a bootleg. There is no official (and therefore decent quality) live recording of Caught Somewhere in Time, a song which features one of Adrian Smith's best solos ever. There are also no official live versions of Alexander The Great, Stranger in A Strange Land, The Prophecy or Still Life. These are just a few of the songs that the band don't play live but should. Especially Infinite Dreams. Instead we get Run to the Hills, 2 Minutes to Midnight and The Trooper. Over and over again. Unless you live in Ireland, in which case they don't dare play The Trooper in Dublin after what happened last time (a riot broke out), and they aren't even allowed to play it in Belfast. Something to do with waving a Union Flag on the stage, i.e. bullshit. 


But this rant is a very familiar one for Maiden fans, and it's all been said before, and we all put up with it. I have quite happily put up with it all, because I am grateful that Maiden are still going, and regardless of what they play live, it is always great (even if it could be better, but hey, everything could be better). But then somebody decided to take the piss. 


Yesterday, a banner appeared on the Iron Maiden website, proclaiming: "something of primal interest to all maiden fans. Monday 2nd January, 9pm GMT". I went nuts. In the past, the only things that have been given so much buildup have been tour dates or new album details, and so, like every other Iron Maiden fan, I assumed that this was something similar. "Could it be a tour celebrating the 30th anniversary of the release of Number of the Beast?!" I feverishly thought. "Or better yet, the long awaited release of Maiden England on DVD with a supporting tour?!" 
For half an hour before the announcement, I was sat in front of my screen, quivering with anticipation, my mind reeling with the endless possibilities. I was on the verge of cancelling  summer holiday plans for fear of missing the UK dates of whatever tour was about to be announced.  


To say that I was disappointed would be an understatement. 

That's it. Adrian Smith's side project. The reasoning behind the use of the phrase "PRIMAL interest" suddenly became horribly clear...


A side project was ascribed a degree of importance hitherto reserved for tours and albums. I think I would be less angry if a picture of a giant middle finger had appeared. Or Rick Astley. Then again, this amounts to much the same thing: a massive fuck you. A fuck you  so grandiose, immense, and downright obnoxious, that even a fanboy like me is pissed off. The site has been used to promote any number of things totally unrelated to Maiden in the past, from Nicko's restaurant to Lauren Harris' (latest) band, but getting us all excited with that little message was just too damn far.


There better be something absolutely fucking incredible coming to make up for this. 




D.

Guitar Playing: Doing it Right.

Salutations! 


There is no denying that the guitar is the defining instrument of Heavy Metal. There is also no denying that the riffs and solos produced on said instrument are awesome, and, by extension, also define Heavy Metal. There is nothing better than a soaring, blistering solo that dazzles a crowd of adoring fans and leaves little puddles around the feet of any 
females present. A good guitar solo is a glorious thing to behold.

What you're doing right now is beholding.

But of course, the guitar solo is a difficult beast to tame, and a double edged sword. A bad guitar solo is simply nightmarish, as you are about to demonstrate:

There is nothing worse than a guitarist who has forgotten the true purpose of soloing, and it is far from glorious.

Read this next bit very, very carefully and make sure you understand before the next time you reach for your cherry red Squire Stratocaster. 


Guitar solos were not invented for showing off. 


Certainly not so that you could show off. 




Do you genuinely think that your fretwork and shredding is so blisteringly fast that no one will have ever seen anything like it before? Do you seriously think that you're the only person who can sweep pick or tap in the whole world? We've all seen that before, and we're tired of it. Guitar solos were invented to make the song better, and that's what a good one does. What a good one does not do however, is bombard the listener with a random mishmash of high notes played very quickly.


 Playing a guitar solo faster does not by default make it better. 


Playing the guitar very very fast is a technique often used by shitty guitarists to make their playing sound more impressive than it is. 


Exhibit A: 

What the fuck is this? No doubt the appalling quality of his microphone isn't helping (if you want to show off your "wickid skillz" on YouTube, invest in a decent webcam so I don't have to put up with this shit), but that is exactly what I'm talking about. 


You: But he's not playing in a song! He's just entering into Guitar World's "Bet you can't play this" competition. You were complaining about bad guitar playing in songs, so this doesn't count!" 


Silence dog! This video goes to show how deep rooted the idiotic belief that fast=good is in people's minds! Guitar World even have a competition based around it! As for an example of shitty guitar soloing in a song, skip to around 3:21 in this little beauty:

The only notable thing about those solos is that they were played very, very fast. And that was it. If any other thought had gone into them, I couldn't hear it. Their sole purpose was to be fast. Not the beautiful, graceful and above all powerful beast that a guitar solo should be. 

FUCK. 

Bad guitar solos are less like the man-eating, lesser spotted snow leopard, and more like Formula One cars: they're extremely fast, but flimsy and lightweight. And this isn't Lightweight Metal, this is HEAVY METAL. Guitar solos aren't meant to be light, and aren't supposed to be like Formula One cars. You know what else Formula One cars are? Whiny and boring. 

Yawn

There is more to a guitar solo then speed, people. You won't impress anyone who knows their shit, and therefore has an opinion that matters, by trying to play scales really, really fast. If however, you aren't playing guitar solos in order to produce the aural equivalent of a man-eating lesser spotted snow leopard, and are simply trying to "get pussay", then you aren't using your guitar for what it's for, and should burn it, you poseur piece of shit.


D. 

People You Think are Awesome But Aren't, Part 1

Salutations, 

Metalheads are a bunch of sheep. Leaving one herd and joining a smaller one doesn't mean that you stop being a sheep. In fact, not only does the metal scene (or if you want to be that way, "community") possess just as much of a herd mentality as any other, it actually appears to be stronger than many others. 

The most compelling evidence for this is the ridiculous hype machine around various idols or bands in the world of metal. These are the people who noobs like you hear about first when they foray into the world of metal, and as a result they have become untouchable gods who never put a foot wrong and defined entire genres with their work. 

They are nearly all shit and/or wildly overrated. And you will like at least some, if not all of them, and try to argue that they are "gods", "legends" or some other crap. 

Today I began the long and painful process of explaining to idiots like you why they are shit. 

We start with a big one.

Dimebag.

Darrell Abbot, more commonly known as Dimebag Darrell, is most famous for playing guitar for Pantera, and the hype around him is nothing short of ludicrous. Search his name in  Google Images, and I kid you not, there are pictures of him with angel wings flying amongst the clouds. He has practically become a saint. People have even written songs dedicated to him.

To explain why Dimebag is overrated, we sort of have to explain why Pantera are also heavily overrated (and shit). Obviously there is a heavy dose of what I like to call "George Best Syndrome" involved, i.e. Dimebag and by extension Pantera owe a lot of their fame to his untimely and brutal death. This sort of thing happens all the time, and past cases include Kurt Cobain, John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, Freddie Mercury, and most recently, Amy Winehouse. These are all highly influential and talented musicians (except the last one), but premature death has turned them into little short of deities, and Dimebag is no exception. Premature and violent death has caused his significance and achievements to be magnified past all proportion. 

You: "Wut are you talking about?!?!?!/!?!11? Dime (R.I.P.) was in Pantera!1! His guitar playing was so original and they where such an awsum and original band who creatid there own sound!!111!" 

Half of you didn't pick up on the misuse of "there" in that, and far more than half were thinking something along those lines. 

Silence fool! Prepare for a revelation. 

Pantera stole their sound from Exhorder. 


Here's a random Exhorder song as an example. 

I didn't give it a quick listen before posting it here to make sure it proved my point, because I don't need to. Hell, I don't even remember what it's called. It contains everything that you think makes Pantera unique and genius. This is Exhorder's second album, Slaughter in the Vatican, released in 1992, the same year as Vulgar Display of Power. In 1990, they released their debut, The Law,  the same year Pantera released Cowboys From Hell, and guess what, they sound extremely similar. There was nothing unique about Pantera's "post-thrash groove metal" sound. It was a sound which Exhorder had nailed on their first album and, might I add, did it better than Pantera. 

Whilst Exhorder had been nailing the "groove metal" sound from album one, how long did it take Pantera to get there? 

Only six years and four albums of GLAM. 

Pantera circa 1988,  an original and free-thinking band who cared nothing for trends.

They looked and sounded just like every other shitty american glam band from that period. 
Here they are again just two years later:

See that shirt Anselmo's wearing? Yes, that's an Exhorder shirt. I wonder who Pantera were listening to at this time…? 


It's worth noting that this was the year that Cowboys was released, showcasing Anselmo's dramatic shift in vocal stlye…to one identical to that of Exhorder vocalist Kyle Thomas. 




D. 

Good Evening Children,


Seasons Greetings! Christmas is almost upon us, like it or not! Die hard atheists are doing their best to piss off Christians and ruin everyone's fun. If you are a real atheist, you will not be celebrating Christmas at all, and will donate any presents you receive to a charity (but probably not Christian Aid). Otherwise you're having your cake and eating it. And this isn't cake season. It's turkey season! Unless you're in Eastern Europe, in which case it's duck. Get your shit together, fucktard. 


Now, next thing. I owe my readers, such as they are, a present. So i thought I'd share a little festive spirit with you all! 

Wasn't that lovely! But, since I am most generous and benevolent, I bestow upon you not one, but TWO (2) gifts of yuletide cheer! Christmas Present No.2: 

And there you go, two things that have just made your Christmas much, MUCH, more metal. For so long, the two have been portrayed as mutually exclusive (that means you can have one but not both, you child), but now, thanks to my wisdom, you can have BOTH! Isn't that just so much better? 

Shut up you. Get back to reading about Nietzsche on Wikipedia and calling yourself a misanthrope. 

Merry Christmas! 

D.