Keith Spillett
I have a lot of strange debris rattling around my mind that I need to work out in a useful way.
Homepage: https://tyrannyoftradition.wordpress.com
SPECIAL REPORT: Are Aliens Abducting Heavy Metal Fans?
Posted in Uncategorized on July 10, 2015
Three more public officials today denounced a new sub-genre of heavy metal growing in popularity amid recent widespread media attention. Known by fans as aliencore, the newest addition to the already saturated landscape of extreme music has been both praised and scorned by fans and critics alike. Now, some government authorities are calling for an outright ban of the music over allegations that it may be dangerous to its listeners.
The emergence of aliencore was first reported by music writer Budd Hopkins in an April 8th New York Times article. Investigating an increase in the number of missing persons cases among heavy metal fans, Hopkins inadvertently discovered an unusually high influx of new metal bands fronted by undocumented immigrants. Hopkins coined the term “aliencore” to refer to the new sub-genre created by these bands. Described by noted heavy metal documentarian Stanton Friedman as a cross between death metal and the drone of honeybees, aliencore has since garnered major radio airplay across the country and several bands have performed to national televised audiences.
The Times article references several of the more popular aliencore bands. In an interview with the founder of a group calling themselves Rings of Uranus, Hopkins quotes the musician as saying that he and his bandmates come from a small Italian town called Zeta Reticuli and, among other enigmatic statements, that he formed his band “around the time of the dawn of human civilization.”
The drummer of a band called Children of Kecksburg spoke to Hopkins about the artistic influences of the new aliencore movement. “It runs the gamut,” said the drummer. “Everything from 1950s-era civil defense films to cosmology and astrophysics to Whitley Strieber books.”
The members of another aliencore band called Hypnotic Regression seemed to imply that their music had an altruistic objective. “The mission of our band is to serve man.”
Despite the growing popularity of the sub-genre, several critical reviews have appeared. Phillip Klass, in a Rolling Stone review of a new album called The Drake Equation, referred to songs like Intergalactic Border Crossing and Paradoxical Paranoiac Probing as “nonsensical drivel.”
But the real controversy over the music stems from a report in the May edition of Scientific American that cited a connection between aliencore music and the disappearance of at least 750 self-described metalheads around the world. According to numerous local police sources, all of the missing people had attended a performance by an aliencore band only hours before their disappearances. While authorities continue to investigate, this circumstantial evidence has led several politicians and community leaders to call for the cancellation of all scheduled aliencore performances in their jurisdictions until a full investigation can be concluded.
Kenny Lofton, police chief of Gulf Breeze, Florida, held a hastily scheduled news conference this morning to announce the disappearance of at least 15 concertgoers from a performance by the band Sacred Hive the previous night. “We’re taking this extremely seriously,” said Chief Lofton. “Until further notice, I’ve issued a townwide prohibition against any further performances of this so-called aliencore music.”
At the same time, aliencore fans are expressing their support for the right of the bands to perform. Barney Hill of Rachel, Nevada, told CNN that be believes the disappearances have been blown out of proportion. “So what if a couple of dirtbags down in Kingman, Arizona, didn’t come home after an aliencore show last weekend? They probably got stoned and went camping or something. This is about free speech.”
In Europe, heavy metal fans have been as outspoken as their freedom-minded American counterparts. Herb Wells of Woking, England, was quoted by Sky News as saying that he fully supports the “right of these bands to perform. It’s the same thing every couple of years. Some group of parents or politicians wants to censor this kind of music.”
But in Aurora, Texas, Mayor Andy Van Slyke today ordered the destruction of all aliencore records from the local Sam Goody and Tower Records stores following the disappearance of three teenagers from a concert last week. “We’re fully cooperating with state and federal authorities,” said Mayor Van Slyke, “but in light of the many published reports concerning the possible connection between this music and the recent disappearances, we can’t risk any more of our children going missing.”
In recent days, several aliencore bands have gone on the record to defend their music. During an interview on MSNBC, Fhru Glarmorkiop, the bass player for a band called Fgoppreasewwmoarcqert, said “Yuydjh duirttyuu op rertnyopriy morkeeportuni nerlio.”
He went on to inform viewers that his band will defy any performance or recording bans and still plans to enter the studio next month to record its debut album, As the Wormhole Turns. The album, said Glarmorkiop, will feature a song played entirely in binary, called 001101000100100111010100, and include an aliencore cover of the Megadeth classic Hangar 18.
However, in the most stunning development of this unfolding story, an aliencore band called Hydrocephahic Hybrid may have admitted that a sinister connection does indeed exist between the music and the missing persons cases.
On a segment of the O’Reilly Factor on Fox News last night, the band’s lead vocalist told host Bill O’Reilly that aliencore bands have been abducting their fans since late last year. “Look, we’ve been doing it the old-fashioned way for far too long now,” said the singer. “It’s tedious. You have to fly down during the middle of the night, shine some bright lights through the windows, float them out the door… We were hanging around one night and we realized it would be easier to get them to come to us. Your average heavy metal fan isn’t exactly the smartest knife in the cutlery rack, if you know what I mean. So a bunch of us formed metal bands and started playing shows and the next thing you know we’ve already met our quota for the year.”
Despite the growing sense of alarm, Hydrocephalic Hybrid will embark next week on a three-month tour of Midwest wheat fields and trailer parks in support of San Diego-based deathgrind band Cattle Decapitation.
(Dirty Dave on The FM is a special investigative reporter for Tyranny of Tradition. Hours after he filed this report his office was ransacked and he went missing. If you have seen Dirty Dave please contact the Tyranny of Tradition offices as soon as possible)
Metalcore Band’s Frontman Quits, Guitarist Says Band Will Continue Without Him
Posted in General Weirdness on July 8, 2015
As reported by Loudwire, the frontman of a famed metalcore band announced that he will be parting ways with the band. The news comes just after the release of the outfit’s latest studio album, released on a major label.
Many were shocked to hear that the vocalist would be departing just after the metalcore act was starting to gain traction in the mainstream, not to mention right before their world tour with a lauded post-hardcore band and rising pop punk act.
The renowned metalcore collective’s former frontman issued the following statement:
“After being with this certain metalcore band for a period of time, I’ve decided I can no longer continue being with this certain metalcore band for any more periods of time. I’ve had a lot of fun being with this particular act, but I’ve decided that my time with this specific metalcore band has to come to a close. I wish my fellow band members the best of luck, but it’s time for me to close the gap with this specified metalcore group.”
Many initially thought that this would be the end for the metalcore cohorts, but later, the band’s guitarist issued a statement via the metalcore clique’s Facebook page:
UPDATE!!!!!!! 11:34 AM EST It was just announced via Twitter that the vocalist of a world famous deathcore band will be joining the metalcore monolith full-time!!!!
The deathcore vocalist went on to disperse more exciting news via Twitter, the biggest announcement being that the infamous metalcore band will soon be heading into a studio to begin working on a new studio record, to be released sometime on a record label in the future.
We here at this music website are looking forward to see what this metalcore titan has up their sleeves.
(Article contributed by investigative reporter Jess Casebeer. For more hard hitting jurnalizmcore, check him out at his site)
Supreme Court Rules Man Has Right To Marry Vinyl Copy of Dokken’s “Tooth and Nail”
Posted in General Weirdness on June 26, 2015
When 49-year-old Charlie Ronce first heard Dokken’s seminal metal record “Tooth and Nail”, he knew loved it. Now, thanks to a 5-4 decision by the United States Supreme Court, he has the right to marry it.
As predicted by conservative pundits and politicians, the Supreme Court’s decision to allow gay marriage has opened the floodgates to all sorts of marriages between men and inanimate objects. In Paraphiliacs United vs. Cleaver, the court ruled that Ronce and any other depraved weirdo can do whatever the hell they want, anytime they want, to anything to they want without facing any repercussions whatsoever.
Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the landmark decision, which has cleared the way for an orgy of godless, disgraceful acts that will bring a quick, painful end to the existence of the United States of America. “No love is more profound than the love of a man for whatever gets him off. Now, go do whatever sick, disgusting stuff comes to mind without regard to decency or hygiene. It is so ordered,” wrote Kennedy in words that will forever embolden perverts everywhere.
Ronce’s courtship of “Tooth and Nail” began when he purchased the album at a Sam Goody in Yonkers, New York in 1985. He casually dated the album at first, still having relations with other albums including Kix “Blow My Fuse” and Sleeze Beez “Screwed, Blued and Tattooed”. However, by the 1990s, he found himself connecting to “Tooth and Nail” on a spiritual level and wanted to demonstrate his deep, abiding commitment to it.
He proposed to his copy of the album on a trip to Hawaii in 1994 after Don Dokken himself autographed it in the Honolulu Airport. Ronce then began his mission to have a court somewhere in America sanction his fetishistic love of the record. Today, his struggle for the right to do something that no sane person would really ever bother trying to do has been validated.
Conservative Justice Antonin Scalia wrote a scathing dissent, but was unable to read it because police detained him after he leaped across the bench and lunged at Justice Kennedy’s throat with a penknife. Scalia’s opinion contained nearly 50 references to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, talked at length about how much he hated the song “Just Got Lucky” and ended with the words “Drop The Bomb – Exterminate Them All!” scrawled in blood at the bottom of the page. Scalia was released later in the day on his own recognizance.
To Compete With Google’s “Unsend”, Apple Unveils Innovative ”Unlisten”
Posted in Uncategorized on June 24, 2015
While many may have been taken aback by the recent news that Apple’s new streaming service “Apple Music” will not be paying its artists during its three-month pilot period, and shocked by the announcement that they’ll now be paying artists a voucher for a free Denny’s Grand Slam per 10 million streams, and were perhaps even more uproarious about the more recent announcement that the 500 least-streamed artists on this platform will be hunted and killed by Apple’s patented T-800 robots at the end of the three-month trial, even those with the most disdain for the multi-billion dollar monolith were on their knees in worship at the reveal of their newest feature, the memory-wiping “Unlisten”.
Inspired by Google’s new feature, “Unsend”, which allows users to recant emails after sending them, Apple Unlisten’s open beta launched last Sunday, June 21st. Those who sign up for the “Unlisten” open beta will have access to an extensive database of every single song and artist they’ve ever listened to in their life, and, at the click of a mouse, users will have the ability to have any song they’ve ever listened to wiped from their memory, erasing any catchy lyrics, instrumentation, and fondest childhood memories of the dear friend that turned them onto the song that may still be lingering in their head.
“We thought it’d be a great idea,” Apple Music CEO Craig Jonas said in a press release. “One of my colleagues came into the office one day and said, ‘Man, did you hear that new Shinedown single? Man, what I wouldn’t give to unlisten to that monstrosity.’ We just stared at each other in amazement at the idea we had just birthed.”
“While we probably shouldn’t be surprised by how easily our users have been willing to give up their social security number, credit card information, name of their hometown, brain scans, and a strand of their hair for us to be able to acquire this information about them, like damn, just how much do these people trust us?”
Listeners have voiced their unanimous excitement at this innovative new feature.
“I think it’ll come in handy,” says Andy Johnston, 20. “Now the next time one of my douche friends links me the latest Rebecca Black song on my Facebook timeline, I can know that I can listen to it without being left with battle scars.”
“I’m absolutely thrilled,” Mark “The Bloodied” James, 27, told us in between his daily animal sacrifices. “Now all my fellow metalhead friends can’t shame me for liking that latest Charli XCX album, because now thanks to Unlisten, I can just forget that that album ever existed.”
We recently reached out to Mark again for further comment after testing Apple Unlisten, and his paranoid, stammered-out response simply went, “Who are you? Who am I? What have you done to me?”
(contributed by guest correspondent Jess Casebeer from Northwest Music Scene)
New Iron Maiden Album Cover Pays Tribute To James Franco In “Spring Breakers”
Posted in General Weirdness on June 19, 2015
Iron Maiden set the metal world ablaze this week by releasing the cover art from their soon-to-be-released double album “Book of Souls”. While many fans of the band were impressed with the artwork, some were surprised to learn that Eddie’s new look is based on James Franco’s performance as the drug dealing hooligan known as Alien in Harmony Korine’s 2012 film “Spring Breakers”.
Some die-hard fans of the band were angered by the Maiden’s unwillingness to bring back Derek Riggs to create the new cover. Protests were planned in 12 major American cities on Saturday to bring back Riggs. However, much of the uproar died down and the protests were cancelled when it was discovered that legendary street artist and 2014 Hipster Hall of Fame honoree Banksy created the new Eddie.
When asked about Eddie’s new crunk-for-2015 look, the band spoke about how the watching “Spring Breakers” launched them in a new creative direction. While the band says many of the tracks are the classic, straight ahead Iron Maiden you would expect, don’t be surprised if you hear a little of what Dave Murray cryptically referred to as “Dem Ruskin Arms Trap Beatz” on the new record. The band has even hinted at collaborating with Yung Jeezy on a crossover song tentatively called “Trap Somewhere in Time”.
There have also been rumors swirling around the Iron Maiden camp that “Book of Souls” is actually a concept album in which a mad scientist fuses Eddie and Alien’s DNA to create a new creature, known as “Crunkenstein”. The monster goes on a wild rampage through St. Petersburg, Florida during spring break searching for the one thing necessary to his survival, the souls of methheads. Unable to find any that hadn’t already been sold to Satan, Crunkenstein lays on the beach and spends his last moments alive singing an eleven minute power ballad about the life of Aliester Crowley.
Franco, meanwhile, was unable to be reached for comment. He is currently somewhere in the mountains of Guatemala working on a new book of poems titled “Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue: Meditations On Things I Was Thinking About While Watching Full House” that is set to be released sometime next year.
Danzig To Fight All Americans on August 1st
Posted in General Weirdness on June 18, 2015
Glenn Danzig has had enough!
For years, Americans have mocked him. They giggled at his bluesy, Elvis-like vocal style. They chortled at the novelty of a man nearly 60 years old still attempting to fit into muscle shirts. They created hundreds of thousands of memes with him carrying kitty litter to his car. They howled watching the guy from the Northside Kings knock him senseless.
Now, Danzig will make them pay. 
At exactly 10 o’clock this morning Danzig issued an official statement from his castle on the outskirts of Lodi, New Jersey throwing down the proverbial mesh shirt and challenging anyone who wants to poke fun at him to no-holds-barred battle for survival. Danzig has stated that on August 1st at noon he will be behind the Wawa in Hoboken and willing to fight all comers.
“I told your children not to walk my way. I told your children to hear my words. What they mean. What they say,” read Danzig’s Press Secretary and former Nixon aide Ron Ziegler from a somewhat incoherent prepared statement written by the famed vocalist.
The throng of reporters gathered in front of the moat surrounding Danzig’s famed Castle Liberskull looked on incredulously as Ziegler continued. “They laugh and they laugh. Silly little puppets dancing on their silly little strings. AHHHAAHHAAAAA…look…Danzig’s buying an ordinary consumer item that all cat owners have purchased at one time or another. He’s a normal person.”
“Or…HAAAAHAAAA… some guy from some band that no one has ever heard of sucker punched Danzig and he slipped on a wet spot on the floor and fell. He’s no superior being. He’s a mortal. Like me. Well…meet me at the Wawa at high noon on August 1st and we’ll see who the superior being is.” 
Danzig has hired boxing trainer extraordinaire Freddie Roach to train him to fight the mob of hundreds of thousands of so-called “internet trolls” who are reportedly ready to descend on Hoboken in order to get their shot at knocking out a heavy metal legend.
Roach was an odd choice for Danzig, considering he’s an expert in training fighters like Manny Pacquiao for one-on-one combat, but has never prepared a man to simultaneously fight the population of a medium sized American city. Still, Danzig is confident that the training regiment Roach has prepared for him, which features regular sparring against a pack of feral wolves Danzig keeps locked up in his basement, will ready him to destroy all in his way.
An unInterview With Johanna Sadonis From Lucifer Performed By Mickey Rourke Before All The Plastic Surgery
Posted in People Who Were Willing To Speak To Me on June 15, 2015
Last night, I was abducted from my bedroom during a fitful sleep by Lucifer vocalist Johanna Sadonis, actor Mickey Rourke and former US Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird. My wife informed me later than the three performed a bizarre Santeria ritual around my bedside and poured some mind-altering substance into my CPAP machine. They then hoisted me out the window and onto famed metal musician Lee Dorian’s flying couch. I awoke hanging from my feet nearly 30,000 feet above the city of Nashville, Tenneesee while Secretary Laird painted my feet with ox blood. To the best of my recollection, here is what was discussed….
Rourke: Do you know Johnny Favorite?
Sadonis: I deliberately chose to create a new concept this time around, as when I founded The Oath. I felt no need to repeat it. I loved that one album we did with The Oath and her raw style of playing fit very well with it. With Lucifer however I wanted to put more weight on 70s Heavy Rock influences and Doom. Deeper, more moody and defined.
Rourke: How terrible is wisdom when it brings no profit to the wise?
Sadonis: Lucifer is not so much influenced by the folk stuff. Black Sabbath is the greatest influence to Gaz and me, yes. Gaz is also a huge Trouble fan. Other big influences to Lucifer are Deep Purple, Uriah Heep. Blue Öyster Cult, Aphrodite’s Child, Lucifer’s Friend, Led Zeppelin, Pentagram. The list goes on! I am personally also very influenced by 70s Heart, 70s Fleetwood Mac, Jefferson Airplane and the Shocking Blue.
Rourke: You ever watch the Mickey Mouse Club? Because you know what today is?
Sadonis: These are two great bands. Bands like these of the 1960/70s have an original fire and spirit because what they did was fresh at the time. Heavy distorted guitars and in the case of bands like Coven and Black Widow wrapped into a magic dress. I just watched a Black Widow full show on the German TV program Beat-Club the other day. It was a black mass ritual complete with magic circle, a nude girl as a vessel, ritual knife etc. Today that is not shocking anymore but then it was obscure and fairly fresh. It was daring, extreme and creative. I love that spirit and look up to it. I also love hearing the direct influence these bands drew from, music my mother raised me with.
These bands are direct successors of their influences in blues and you can still hear it prominently shining through. That is beautiful to me as it is the musical language I grew up with. I’m a rock’n’roller at heart. I’m not saying modern bands in general lack this but it is certainly difficult trying to reinvent the wheel within Rock Music nowadays, so yes, I can relate much better to the original spirit than to copies of copies.
Rourke: What gives human life its worth anyway? Because someone loves it, hates it?
Sadonis: Thank you so much! You took the words right from my mouth!
Rourke: Are you an atheist? Do you speak French? Are you from Brooklyn?
Sadonis: It is a very powerful name, yes. I put a lot of thought into everything I do. It shouldn’t matter so much what people think. It has to make sense to me and it does.
Rourke: Why do you have a thing about chickens?
Sadonis: I have been playing in bands since I was a teenager and have been along the way very involved with the Metal scene in general all these years as a DJ, as a local promoter putting up shows and running events in Berlin. I have for example an old school Heavy Metal party called Kill Em All Club for almost six years now too. When we released the first single with The Oath on High Roller Records, several labels approached us for the album. Rise Above was one of them and we decided to go for them because of their catalogue and dedication. I didn’t meet Gaz until we played in London with The Oath.
Rourke: Mephistopheles can be a mouthful in Manhattan, don’t you think?
Sadonis: Lucifer genuinely plays from the heart and not what might or might not be expected. I don’t measure Lucifer with other bands. I’m not looking at modern bands for inspiration. We might share similar influences with some of these bands. Whatever these inspirations are channeled into though, be it any of the mentioned bands or us, I don’t think needs to be compared. We all differ musically very much from another. I am however friends with most of these bands and respect and admire their work as contemporaries.
(Robert De Niro suddenly appears on the flying couch looking very much like Satan)
De Niro: Some religions think that the egg is the symbol of the soul. Did you know that?
Sadonis: In fact, my parents were listening to 70s music. My rebellion as a teenager was listening to Heavy Metal. I was a complete misfit for it at school actually. I went to my first metal shows at the age of 13. That was GunsNRoses and Metallica. Danzig then turned me onto a darker path and by the time I was 15/16 I started deeply into Black, Death and Doom Metal. Later on I opened my horizon musically and started digging into the past of musical history and here we are now.
DeNiro: Would you like an egg?
A huge difference indeed. The devil is only part of the whole picture. A metaphoric figure. Devil worshipping might have a strong appeal but it is very one sided. I am very interested in the dark side of things and had a time in my life I leaned very strongly towards it. However I learned that it applies much more to my life to draw perspectives on existence, death and everything beyond from ALL religions and philosophies. There is a universal duality. There is no dark without light and vice versa. And ‘as above so below’ as a central principle. I embrace it all with an open heart. I’m a very spiritual person and I have been looking for answers from an early age on – everywhere.
Melvin Laird: Why did you let Bedbug Eddie take Paulie’s thumbs? Do you worry that protecting him from his own mistakes will eventually lead to your undoing?
Sadonis: Lucifer is a very complex figure. He is the morning star, the bringer of light in the Hebrew bible, Greek and Roman mythology. As the morning star, he represents Venus, the brightest star in the sky, only seen while descending during morning hours, hence Lucifer ending up as the fallen angel in the bible. The Old Testament had very positive things to say about the son of the morning. Unfortunately later on his figure was used to teach a lesson Christian style. He was now pictured as a favoured angel to god for his beauty and intellect and cast out of heaven when it got to his head and he started ‘sinning’. He ended up as being this common misconception for being a rebel: the devil. A wrong picture conjured in the bible. To me Lucifer is beautiful, bright and very misunderstood. A misfit. The name is not related to Kenneth Anger even though I am a fan of his work.
That’s the last thing I remember. I awoke the next morning in my bed unharmed.
An unInterview With Gary Meskil From Pro-Pain That Didn’t Really Take Place After I Was Beaten At Shoprite
Posted in People Who Were Willing To Speak To Me on June 8, 2015
If I could be anyone when I grow up, it would be Gary Meskil from Pro-Pain. I have an unhealthy fascination with the man’s work. The band has several thousand albums and I have memorized every detail about every one of them.
You can imagine my surprise when I ran into him in a Shoprite in Passaic, New Jersey. He was buying turnips. I was so overcome with joy that I began leaping up and down and shouting. I attempted to hug Mr. Meskil when a store security guard, who erroneously believed I was trying to assault him, hit me over the head with a billyclub. I lost consciousness.
When I awoke, I was in a hospital room. Gary was standing there with my family looking extremely concerned holding a Whitman’s Sampler and a card that said “Get Well Soon, Champ!” on the front. I began asking him questions…
Me: I saw the band play back in 1992 when “Foul Taste of Freedom” had just come out. One of my favorite shows ever. It was in a Guido bar in New Rochelle, New York called Marty and Lenny’s that occasionally did metal shows under the equally awful name “The Rocker Room”. I was a skinny high school kid with a Gabe Kaplan from “Welcome Back, Kotter” looking Afro. I was wearing an Immolation shirt. How would you rate my performance in the pit that night?
Gary: I would give it the highest of scores. A perfect 10! Aerodynamic haircuts are timeless and seem to be quite practical in and out of the confines of the pit. The spherical shape obviously aides in getting to the forefront of the circle pit and also in eluding certain rough and tumble types. The Gabe Kaplan cut was a good one! Add an Immolation T-shirt and you have a perfect score!
Me In High School
Me: Was Johnny Black a real guy or is that a made up story?
Gary: It’s a true story, but I made it vague enough so that the fans could relate to it via their own story. It’s generally about a modern day James Dean type. Someone whom we all looked up to “way back when”. Then as the years went by, everyone and everything seemed to change around him, yet he stayed exactly the same. As a result, those who once idolized him suddenly frowned upon him. He died young, and I was inspired to write about my observations of people who lose their inner child as they grow older. Suddenly everything becomes shallow and forced, with talks about the weather and such. I admire people who have the guts to always be themselves.
Possibly The Only Person On Earth Who Could Wear A Polo Shirt At A Metal Concert And Look Cool
Me: You have an incredibly powerful, distinctive voice. Have you ever ended up in a public situation where a used car salesman or some other idiot is jerking you around and all of a sudden you change your voice like in “Johnny Black” and scare the hell out of them?
Gary: That’s a great idea, but I can’t recall ever vocally changing gears like that as a fear tactic in public. However, as a father it came in quite handy sometimes to use my “stage voice”, since I’m in favor of sparing the rod.
Me: (in a serious voice) A running theme in your music is a weariness and frustration with American military adventurism. From “Iraqnophobia” to “To Never Return” (a song I believe to be one of the most passionate indictments of US foreign policy ever put to music), you have railed against the government’s choice of wars. Do you see anyway for the United States to, at this point, extract ourselves from decisions driven by the military-industrial complex or are we pretty much stuck playing that hand until Armageddon or revolution?
Gary: It’s pretty idealistic to think that war is somehow not perpetual. That is indeed how insane the world is. There seems to be a disharmony between humans and nature. Perhaps we are alien to this Earth. The wars and occupations will continue as long as at least half of the citizens of the occupying country are somehow convinced that it is necessary. The world desperately needs more tolerance and less ignorance.
Me: You have done some interesting experimenting with your sound over the years. Have you ever thought of doing a really freaky, out-there Pro-Pain album? Maybe a mix of thrash, hardcore, gospel, and Bangladeshi folk music. Or something in that vain?
Gary: That would be interesting, if nothing else. I think there are bands out there who experiment to the extreme in that regard. System Of A Down comes to mind. They use their influences really well, in my opinion. With Pro-Pain, there have been quite a few exploratory moments over the years, and more than we are given credit for (I’m sure). We used 808 samples (now called bass drops) in 92’, we had trumpets on our debut , a sax solo and Ice-T duet in 95’, horn sections on various songs, melodic vocals, and lots of guitar wizardry….yet some still categorize us as just a hardcore band.
Here Is Gary. He’s Actually Flying.
Me: I’m in the Pro-Pain Army on Facebook. Is there any chance we could go to war with the Kiss Army? We could invade the makeup aisle at Target or something. Go after anyone who has whiskers painted on them. What do you say?
Gary: Sounds like a plan, (and good PR). We might be outnumbered, but their Love Guns are no match for our PRO-PAIN Tanks!
Me: What do you think the greatest film ever made is?
Gary: The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz
Me: Really? Why?
Gary: Because it was beautiful on it’s face, ugly inside, and was magically and majestically presented on the big screen circa 1939. To this day, there is still so much room for all kinds of interpretation (political and otherwise). Fascinating stuff!
Me: Once I was hanging out with a bunch of serious hip-hop heads that were all freestyling rap lyrics. Everybody sounded really good and I was nervous because I can’t freestyle for my life. Each guy did a verse. They were making fun of me because they didn’t think I could rap. Luckily, I knew “Pound for Pound” by heart and none of them listened to metal. I jumped up and did the whole song. They all looked at me in stunned silence and acted like I was some sort of genius. I pretended I made the lyrics up and they all thought I was cool from that point on. I’ve always felt guilty for passing your work off as my own. You’re not angry, are you?
Gary: No. It must have happened some time ago though, because “Pound For Pound” is now required learning in most urban schools around the country. The class is called Street Cred 101.
Me: (at this point, I dramatically grabbed his hand…I think it made him horribly uncomfortable, but I wanted to convey the importance of what I was about to say) Promise me you’ll never stop making Pro-Pain albums. EVER! I want your word on this.
Gary: Define EVER. My word is that I’ll keep making PRO-PAIN albums as long as I’m ABLE. (see ABLE under definitions).
Definitions:
ABLE: See EVER
Me: (I look away from Gary and directly into the eyes of YOU, the audience) They have a new album coming out this month. It is called “Voice Of Rebellion”. You need to buy multiple copies of it and give it to all of your family members and friends. If you do not buy at least five copies, hundreds of bees will attack you when you are not expecting it. Like, when you are sleeping. Or, on an airplane.
I’m Not Kidding About The Bees
Triple Crown Winner American Pharoah Eaten By Members of Heavy Metal Band Watain
Posted in General Weirdness on June 8, 2015
Have you ever been so hungry you could eat a horse? On Sunday night, members of the black metal band Watain did just that.
At the end of an impromptu show at Wantagh, Long Island’s VFW Hall 3666, singer Erik Danielsson and the rest of the band carved up the now-legendary horse American Pharoah and consumed him raw. After the band concluded their concert and meal, they donated the remaining edible flesh of the animal to the audience of nearly one hundred formerly enlisted soldiers who served our country with honor during The Korean War and World War 2.
The thoroughbred’s owner Ahmed Zayat, who himself plays in a Megadeth cover band called Hoof in Mouth, is a huge fan of heavy metal and Watain in particular. He demanded that trainer Bob Baffert play Watain’s seminal metal song “Reaping Death” for at least an hour during each of Pharoah’s workouts in order to inspire the horse to greatness. Zayat’s love for the band is so great, that he gave up the hundreds of millions of dollars in stud fees that the horse was bound to command in order to “feed Satan’s Hunger” and pay tribute to his heroes.
Many parts of a horse are not consumable by human beings. In an attempt to be environmentally conscious by not wasting unused horse parts, the band threw many of the animal’s organs into the mosh pit of elderly servicemen during their show. Later in the evening, in a prank inspired by Francis Ford Coppola’s seminal film “The Godfather”, they broke into the nearby summer home of Slayer guitarist Kerry King and placed the beast’s head in bed next to him.
While eating a raw horse is rare among metal bands, involvement in the sport of horse racing is certainly not unprecedented among some of the genre’s legendary figures. Former Samhain vocalist Glenn Danzig is believed to have sired several horses that have run in past Triple Crown events including 2007 Kentucky Derby runner up Twist of Cain and 2011 Preakness winner Her Black Wings.
Metal has also seen its share of horse racing controversy. Texas gore metallers Devourment were briefly detained by police back in 2003 when they were thought to have stolen and consumed the body of diminutive jockey Willie Shoemaker. Shoemaker’s remains were found safely weeks later in a basement in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
The question on everyone’s mind after the evening’s festivities was just how did the horse taste? According to Danielsson, “Kind of like baby.”
An unInterview With Zyklon-V From AntiKosmos; I Am Transforming Into A Beagle
Posted in People Who Were Willing To Speak To Me on May 28, 2015
Photo by Kassandra Carmona of Konvulsion Photography
Zyklon-V from AntiKosmos is the mammal pictured above. She is wearing animal blood and wooden shoes. Myself and a team of botanists from NASA interviewed her moments before the heat death of the universe. Here’s what happened…
Me: AntiKosmos?!?! What…do you just want to see the Kosmos banned? Then what, only criminals and the government will have access to the Kosmos? You know who banned the Kosmos? Hitler! You know who thought it would be a bad idea to ban the Kosmos? Gandhi!
V: I’ve always found “Turkish Delight” to be a really presumptuous name for a candy (or, I should say, so-called candy). I mean, what’s delightful about popping a sweet into your mouth only to discover that some nasty, fez-wearing miscreant bent on revenge against the decadent West has swapped it out for one of those decorative rose-scented soaps your grandmother used to keep in the guest bathroom but yelled at you if you actually tried to use to wash your hands? “Turkish Disappointing Surprise You’ll Be Tasting With Every Burp For The Next Presidential Administration,” more like.
M: It’s your birthday. Someone gives you a calfskin wallet. How do you react?
V: I once listened to “Yakity Sax” for 36 straight hours on a loop while totally naked in a sensory deprivation tank, with no breaks for food or toilet. When I emerged, everything was exactly the same as it had been when I went in, except there was a gentle trickle of cerebro-spinal fluid from my ear that continued for a week, and I subsequently lost the ability to taste mallocreme. I think this is as relevant a commentary on the state of black metal as anything I have read in a glossy music criticism publication.
Q: If Arby’s began selling a sandwich covered in the sweat of Glenn Danzig, why do you think we faked the moon landing?
V: When I was a kid in primary school, I fell off my bike and scraped my knee so bad the kneecap was visible. My mother wanted to use a toothbrush to get the pebbles out of the wound, but my father said that was torture and used a washcloth. After that, I charged my classmates money to pull the bandage back and gaze upon the wound, like the contents of the briefcase in Pulp Fiction. I got addicted to the fame, and after the wound healed, I would eat anything brought to me for money – I ate bugs, pre-chewed gum, once all I had to do was put a found mouth guard in my mouth for thirty seconds. I guess what I’m saying is that child prostitution is educational but ultimately dehumanizing, and AntiKosmos does not use fake blood in our performances, so please stop asking.
H: Have you ever walked up to someone wearing those weird plastic “Bubba” novelty teeth that are pointing out in all weird directions started pointing and laughing hysterically then realized the person is not actually wearing novelty teeth and really looks that way?
V: For years, I avoided eating bananas because I read that an enzyme your skin secretes after banana consumption makes you more susceptible to mosquito bites. Then I realized I live in a high rise apartment complex in the middle of a city, and I haven’t seen a mosquito in almost a decade. So I bought a bunch of bananas, and when I reached for the first one, as if to mock the celebration of my return to banana-dom, I was immediately viciously attacked by a tarantula that had hidden itself amongst the bunches in a do-or-die immigration attempt from Honduras. Needless to say, I don’t watch televised figure skating anymore.
Ed: You get into a taxicab. The man sitting in the seat next to you has a necklace made out of the ears of deceased members of the Kennedy family. You ask the driver to go north, he immediately proceeds south. He has a picture of a Benito Mussolini branded into his forehead and looks slightly like Florence Henderson on the early episodes of The Brady Bunch. Over the radio, you faintly hear the whimpering of a small dog. What do you do next?
(warning the following answer contains strange Dutch stuffed animals talking to one another If you are allergic to stuffed animals or Dutch people or your workplace has a policy in which watching talking owls can cost you your job, do not click the link)
Click here if you dare
K: In John Cassavetes’ 1976 masterpiece, The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, the lead character, Cosmo Vitelli, skillfully played by Ben Gazzara, is sent on a mission for the local mob boss to whack a bookie that is cutting into his business. At some point during the film, a nuclear bomb is detonated in the city of Calgary. Years later, three-headed Canadian beasts emerge from below the surface of the earth and consume all of the margarine available on the United States mainland. Have you ever committed a blunder and later regretted it?
V: People make a lot out of famous last words. I think some people reveal themselves to be utter deathbed try-hards (not naming names here, but I’m definitely looking at you, Oscar Wilde). For my money, the greatest last words ever uttered were those of Thomas Grasso, who was executed in 1995 for strangling an elderly woman to death with her own Christmas lights over what amounted to $137. His words stay with me to this day, and now I’m passing them on to you so their wisdom will echo through the ages. He said, “I did not get my Spaghetti-Os, I got spaghetti. I want the press to know this.”
KL: You’ve got a little boy. He shows you his butterfly collection plus the killing jar. What do you do?
V: Did you know that there’s a sort of tunnel-like spot in the architecture at the Canadian Embassy in Washington where you can scream as loud as you want, but nobody outside the tunnel can hear you at all? I’m starting to feel that way about this interview.
5: You’re watching television. Suddenly you realize there’s a wasp crawling on your arm.
V: I get a lot of emails from Smithsonian magazine. They’re that sort of “we want you back” emails that you get when you let your subscription lapse. They’re all intended for an ex-boyfriend I dated 6 years ago. I never mark them as spam or take myself off the mailing list, because I enjoy reading the mini articles they use to try to tantalize you into re-subscribing. There’s probably some ironic commentary there about the detritus of old relationships haunting you long after they end, but right now I’m much more concerned with when the 100,000 Dollar Bar changed its name to 100 Grand, and what made them think they could be so colloquial all of a sudden.
U: You’re in a desert walking along in the sand when all of a sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down, you flip the tortoise over on its back. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that?
V: As a small act of protest against the patriarchal hegemony asserted by this question, I’m going to ask your readers to join me in a silent, ten-minute contemplation of the McRib sandwich (not available in all markets; check your local franchise for details and nutritional information; limit 17 per customer).
Photo by Kassandra Carmona of Konvulsion Photography
K: One more question: You’re watching a stage play – a banquet is in progress. The guests are enjoying an appetizer of raw oysters. The entree consists of boiled dog stuffed with rice. The raw oysters are less acceptable to you than a dish of boiled dog.
V: Great question. I get this one a lot, and it never fails to really trip me up and make me think. The thing we all have to come to terms with, I think, has less to do with whether human life is imbued with inherent value by nature or some sort of creator being (I think we waste a lot of time contemplating this – time that could almost certainly be better spent ingesting frozen custard), and more to do with whether there really is an “airport rate” that hired cars in Albuquerque are required to charge for rush-hour travel through downtown, or whether that cab driver was ripping me off. Look out for AntiKosmos’ debut long-playing record album “Lachryma Mortis,” available at finer stolen car chop-shops later this year.
The Tyranny of Tradition 