Metal Scientists Successfully Create Rainbow in Dark
Posted by birthad1 in Uncategorized on May 17, 2015
On the fifth anniversary of singer Ronnie James Dio’s passing, metalhead scientists at MIT have announced they have successfully created a rainbow in the dark.
“What was once just a cryptic metaphor is now a scientific reality,” said Chief Physicist Dr. Jim Durkin in a prepared statement, “Until now, rainbows were only possible with the presence of ultraviolet light. In this setting, we have been able to generate a rainbow in a completely dark room with its refraction as the sole source of illumination. This could pave the way to other discoveries like cold fusion.”
As of now, the potential of this new technology remain to be seen. Some researchers have suggested it could prevent people from being brought down by lightning or being left on their own, but most experts agree that its proper applications remain elusive.
“What we’re looking at here is an image caught in time,” said Dr. Wolf Hoffmann, MIT Laser Sciences Director, “when I consider the possibilities of this incredible find, it leaves me virtually speechless, like words without a rhyme.”
A symposium on the significance and meaning of a rainbow in the dark will be held this fall at the National Science Foundation in Washington, DC. Prominent physicists and engineers from all over the globe have already announced plans to attend.
At press time, a team of nautical engineers at Stanford University have announced their intention to design and build a Holy Diver, as soon as they figure out what the hell that is.
Napalm Death’s “Scum” and Woman’s Search For Meaning
Posted by Keith Spillett in Really Brilliant Things You Should Read But Probably Won't Because You Are A Pantera Fan on May 15, 2015
I was born in 1982, seven years shy of the end of the Vietnam War. My birthdate left me unaware of the horrors of napalm, and because I like to justify my historical ignorance with the phrase, “I don’t know because I wasn’t alive then,” I’ve remained unenlightened for the past thirty years. But the real tragedy, readers, the unspeakable terror, is that I’ve known nothing of the band Napalm Death, the darling of the grindcore genre and a pioneering influence in the celebration of noise for noise’s sake.
I’ve been given a gift from my friend Keith Spillett: an invitation to review Napalm Death’s debut album, “Scum.” And fittingly, my exposure to this musical vanguard was a baptism by fire, and I can say with absolute clarity that I’ve been born again.
Go with me, readers, on a journey of the utmost existential significance.
“Scum” opens with the introduction of our protagonist, Angry Man. We don’t learn much about Angry Man on this track, only that he likes to yell, “Genocide! Stalin!” But soon, in the track “Instinct of Survival,” we find that Angry Man does not go through life alone. He has a faithful companion, St. Bernard, prone to manic barking (“Ruff! Ruff! Ruff! Ruff!”, times 32), and St. Bernard seems to be pulling Angry Man on his leash, urging his master to keep going and demanding that the listener go the distance.
Next up: “The Kill,” a track that introduces us to the album’s penchant for surprise. It opens with musical phrasing that fools us into believing that we’re to be treated to “You Really Got Me” by The Kinks. But it’s not to be: Angry Man has more to yell. And his message swells in the titular track, a song that rivetingly follows the classic A/B/A/B/C structure, A being palatable, B being obnoxious, and C being the hate child conceived between A and B premaritally.
Just when we think that Angry Man could not be more eloquent, we reach track 6, “Polluted Minds.” It’s among the most lyrically complex tracks on the album, leaving us pondering our role in society’s corruption. He explodes and engages: “Do you hear my muffin?! They must die!! Yo yo yo yo yellow dress!” There’s a story here, propelling us forward. What flavor is the muffin? Does the dress have an empire waist or a fitted bodice?
We’re confused. We want answers. We push on, and our persistence goes unrewarded. Frankly, track 8, “Siege of Power,” is self-indulgent and obtusely academic. The musicians seem to be boasting, “Look how fast I can drum! Look how unintelligibly I can make sounds come out of my face hole!” Angry Man mixes his messages, sounding in track 9 as if he’s hopping in the snow wearing only his boxers, vulnerably howling, “Follow your dream! Where’s my doll?!?!”
But then we come to track 12, “You Suffer.” The element of surprise introduced in “The Kill” finds delightful fruition here, as we meet Angry Man’s high-pitched foe: Toddler Alien. “Why?” screams Toddler Alien repeatedly, and as he belts out an aggressive duet with Angry Man, we find ourselves asking the same question. For this is the turning point of the album, the moment at which we must think critically about our need for answers, for neatly tied resolutions. We realize with sudden clarity that we’ve been waiting for Godot.
As we take a breath and move on to “Point of No Return,” we begin our ascent to the album’s climax. Angry Man throws up, then eats Cookie Monster, leaving us to wonder if our hero’s tragic flaw is his weakness for tasty Muppets; the linear reversal of projectile vomiting and food consumption challenges our dependence on the concept of time. We listen helplessly in “Negative Approach” as Angry Man’s identity dissociates into SNL’s Colonel Angus coming home from war, unable to stop the mockery of Toddler Alien’s Elfin Uncle who laughs mercilessly in the background.
And the cruelty of circumstance only becomes more intense. Angry Man’s destiny is not to resolve his conflict and achieve victory over his foes; we’re not to experience the catharsis of a happy ending. He loses a tooth in “Deceiver,” then finds himself bound and gagged in “Conservative Sh%^head.” His shackles remain, even after repeatedly screaming out of his rope-gagged mouth, “Just wait ’til my lawyer gets here!” His needy cries of “We want corn! We want corn!” go unacknowledged in “Pseudo Youth,” and finally his tongue is numbed in “Divine Death,” leaving us with his final intelligible phrase of the album: “Ride this thing!” Haunting.
Not since Fiona Apple’s “Tidal” have I been so powerfully affected by the symbolic significance of a debut album. I recommend “Scum” unequivocally, with absolute assurance that you too will be catapulted into your own search for meaning. Readers, in our life on this earth, we won’t always be able to understand the words. Sometimes what sounds like “Die! Die! Die!” and an angry lawnmower is really a clarion call, an opportunity to question our place on earth, a chance to swing toward the absolutist tenet of nihilism or the belief that “everything happens for a reason.” Obviously, Napalm Death falls into the latter camp.
“Scum” by Napalm Death:
2 birds up
(Amy wrote this. She is the Chief Existential Heroine over at ‘Bring On The Whimsy’. She received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1978 for creating the Island of Madagascar. Her hobbies include botany, vanilla and water buffalos. She is not a Sagittarius)
You Go To The Beach Because You Are Stupid
Posted by Keith Spillett in Here's Why I Dislike You So Much on May 8, 2015
The Beach: America’s Garbage Can
Summer is just around the corner, which means a bunch of mindless automatons (often referred to derisively as Americans) will be burning their feet on scorching hot sand and wallowing in polluted, filthy water in order to have what the kids today call “fun”. The hotter it gets, the more people crowd into these mini-hells in order to soak up as much skin cancer as they can. Beaches are like giant moron magnets.
The beach is the single worst place in the world. Every last one of them. When I was a kid, we’d occasionally go to Jones Beach. If you got there by about 5 AM, you’d be one of the lucky people who go to get into Beach 6. It was everyone’s favorite because it was a short walk to the water. If you were any later than that, you’d stumble through a stretch of land resembling the Gobi Desert in order to have the rare treat of spending the day rolling around in dirt and washing it off with salt. I still swear I once saw a Jawa buying an ice cream sandwich from a vendor somewhere around the 11-mile mark of Beach 1.
Myself and Several Bedouins I Met On Our 8 Hour Walk To The Waters of Beach 1
If I wanted something a little closer to home, there was always Glen Island, made famous for its rare ability to attract used syringes, putrefied squirrel carcasses, tires and tennis balls. Demotion Hammer fans probably know what I’m talking about because I believe the song “Infectious Hospital Waste” was inspired by a trip there.
Of course, there was always Orchard Beach, a vile place that always smelled vaguely like horse vomit and Muscatel. Orchard Beach had a lovely, post-apocalyptic type ambiance that always made me feel like I was on the set of one of the Mad Max films.
What amazes me is the willingness people have to spend gobs of money to plunk themselves down in the middle of some miserable tourist trap surrounded by screaming children, drunken college students and kvetching adults under terribly uncomfortable conditions in order to what…relax???
Fork over hundreds of dollars to get on a crowded plane next and sit six centimeters from some chronic halitosis sufferer. In order to fork over hundreds more to stay in a shoebox sized room with LeRoy Nieman paintings and HBO. In order to burn your skin to the point where it peels off of your body. In order to take selfies that no one except for stalkers and the NSA care to see. In order to find what passes for happiness in this sick, decaying world of ours. In order to dream the same futile, ridiculous dream for 50 more weeks until you can repeat the unpleasantness again if you don’t drop dead first.
But, hell, who am I to ruin someone else’s obscene, twisted fantasy? You want to be a lobster colored version of Walter Mitty? Go ahead. You like the sensations of hot filth and wet slime all over your body? Have at it. You want to pass off discomfort as joy and feculence as beauty? Be my guest. Only don’t talk to me about it. As a matter of fact, just don’t talk to me. Not until winter anyway.
Government to Decommission Nikki Sixx; Plans To Build Nikki Sevenn
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on April 23, 2015
Dead Again?
One of the military-industrial-entertainment complex’s most talented warriors has been targeted for termination. The lovable, alcohol and cocaine fueled robot-musician known as Nikki Sixx was created in 1981 by the Pentagon in order to help distract teenagers from engaging in issues that actually effect their lives and keep them focused on the fantastic illusion of limitless excess. While many Sixx-like androids have surpassed its work, Nikki’s place in the history of American disempowerment will not be soon forgotten.
Sixx was the sixth in a series of metal-o-bots, cyborgs created by the government to pacify a generation of young people who had begun to question the absurdity of America’s institutions and customs. The original prototype, Nikki Onee, was created in the 1960s. Its purpose was to play rock and roll then teargas anyone who danced to it. It was tested in a high school in Arkansas but was determined to be “too square to be effective”.
Other failed Nikkis included the progressive rock playing, Operation MK-Ultra inspired Nikki Threee. It attempted to use odd time changes, unique instrumentation and lysergic acid fumes in order to stupefy young people into obedience. Unfortunately, it was discontinued after a malfunction caused The Great 1973 King Crimson Acid Freakout in Pocatello, Idaho.
The cynical, doom-riff spewing Nikki Fivve had to be destroyed after a bout with robot depression. According to Nikki Five’s creator Frank Stein, “Fivve left the lab for a few days, but came back. Its goal was to convince everyone they were inconsequential and that changing the world was a waste of time. I guess it started to believe its own logic, because it just moped around the lab and ate Cheez-its until we disconnected its power source a month later. A hopeless failure.”
Finally, in 1981, Nikki Sixx was released to the public. He joined with the band Motley Crue in order to lure teenagers into believing that the way to rebel against the feeling of pointless futility created by life in a mindless consumer culture was, quite simply, to consume more. Sixx was instrumental in turning the angst of an entire generation into a sense of perceived longing for drugs, sportscars and airbrushed Playmates.
However, time has taken its toll on the cybernetic being. Other, more fashionable machines like the robot known only as Jay Z and the Taylor Swift-o-matic 9000 (later shortened to Taylor Swift) have caught the attention of a new generation of alienated young people.
Sixx served his country by helping to defeat any sense of community in the young, leaving them isolated and powerless against the great soul-sucking nightmare often referred to as The American Dream. The Pentagon will honor him by playing “Dr. Feelgood” and lowering all umlauts to half-staff on Friday.
Plans are already in development for Nikki Sevenn, a new virtual “glambot” that will allow people to artificially perceive themselves as admired and loved by others while sitting in the stark loneliness of their basement or cubicle. Using the latest in artificial intelligence, the Sevenn Series will allow customers to virtually experience a “Just The Highlights” simulated rockstar experience. You will be in Nikki Seven’s head for the partying and the groupies but miss out on the harsh realities of venereal disease, hangovers and the crippling sense of meaninglessness that a life of rock and roll excess can yield.
Nikki Sevenn will be available to download into your Home Sweet Home by next Christmas.
Is Chuck Mangione Leaving Slayer?
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on March 30, 2015
When most fans of heavy metal think about Slayer, the first word that comes to their mind is often “flugelhorn”. However, many heavy metal websites have noted that other heavy metal websites might have indicted that Slayer’s 2015 release, which will be called “Upcoming Slayer Studio Album”, might be the first since Hell Awaits to not feature the man many have called “The Jimi Hendrix of The Flugelhorn”, Chuck Mangione.
According to sources that overheard sources discussing the band, Mangione has become concerned about Slayer’s artistic direction over the past few albums. Flugelhorn solos, once a hallmark of the band’s distinctive “flugelcore” sound, have been few and far since the band released “God Hates Us All” in 2001.
While early Slayer records like “Reign in Blood” and “South of Heaven” are best known for the juxtaposition between the band’s jarring thrash metal savagery and Mangione’s light, breezy jazz sound, the newer material is either paint-by-numbers heavy metal which could numb even the most ardent Slayer fan into a coma or embarrassing, gimmicky nonsense meant to appeal to meth-addled, tone deaf Marilyn Manson fans (see “Playing With Dolls”).
Mangione At A Recent Slayer Show in Dusseldorf, Germany
Listen, now that I’ve got your attention…I need your help. I just made up the first part of the article to get it past the creatures that have been monitoring each of my correspondences with the outside world since 2010. I am currently trapped in the basement of a house in Spokane, Washington where a group of “government agents” have been conducting mind-altering experiments on me in the hopes of using my pyrokinesis to fight what they continue to call “The Enemies of Freedom”.
I’ve learned a thing or two about our government while down here. They speak loudly upstairs and I’ve learned to make out much of what they say. I’ve also been able to peek through the keyhole and observe them when they are not shooting me up with Monsanto weed killer and making me watch Joel Osteen sermons for hours on end. They are not what you think. I don’t want to sound paranoid, but I can tell you unequivocally that the United States has been infiltrated and is now controlled by gigantic insects that can morph into human form at will.
I’m not sure when it happened, but most of the world you know has been manufactured by these Bugs. From what I’ve heard, they took over the world at the end of The Great Bug War. Today we call it World War 2 and discuss the importance of fictional characters like Hitler and Churchill. In real life, a war did take place but it was much more similar to the one in Robert Heinlein’s novel “Starship Troopers”. The Bugs joke about that book a lot. Apparently they think it’s hysterical that the one historical artifact that has any truth to it has been passed off as fiction and consumed by an unknowing public.
They came down from space and destroyed many of our major cities. We fought valiantly, but were eventually defeated. Once they gained control of our world, they reprogrammed the human mind in order to share in a massive hallucination about the past.
All of our books, websites, television broadcasts and even historical artifacts in museums have been altered to hide history of the enslavement of the human race at the hands of our Bug overlords. They even created tiny versions of themselves that crawl and fly around in order to lull us into the belief that we are larger and more powerful than them.
When you’ve heard a few of them gather together and talk about the con job they’ve pulled on us, it’s terribly depressing. I remember crying for days when I heard them laughing about planting dinosaur bones throughout the world in order for scientists to “discover” them and make up crazy tales of what happened before humans were here on the so-called Earth. The scientists today aren’t real scientists…they are merely people who participate in a giant scavenger hunt created by the Bugs.
From the little I’ve been able to pick up about our true history, scientists of pre-Bug times were capable of miracles that run the gamut from inter-dimensional space travel to creating a low cost substance that could feed all human beings. Famine and disease had all been eliminated by these people. Apparently, our world was once like the Bug-created fictional Garden of Eden. But, Eden is gone.
The Bugs have taught us how to fear and hate one another. They have helped us create artificial divisions in order to isolate us from our fellow humans. They have instilled in us the ability to hurt and destroy each other in the name of control and survival. Apparently, humans used to live for hundreds of years. They have taught us to lower our life expectancy so we are never around long enough to see through the lies and learn the truth.
Many of our so-called “world leaders” are simply Bugs in disguise. Barack Obama, Angela Merkel, Rush Limbaugh, Benjamin Netanyahu, Bill Gates, The Clintons, The Bushes, The Gores, even Cat Stevens…all Bugs. They are everywhere, pulling the strings and making the world spin, all the while the Bugs use the lint created between our toes as fuel to power the rockets that allow them to take control of planets throughout the solar system. They invaded our world for this toe lint and now they have turned our world into a gigantic toe lint factory. They come to us in the night, when we are fully asleep, and take our precious toe lint for themselves.
We have only one form of resistance, the removal of our toes. If you are reading this, immediately go to your local emergency room and ask for these digits to be amputated. They will look at you in a strange way at first, but tell them the story I have told you. They will understand. The thing about the truth is, if you tell it to someone, no matter how bizarre it may sound, they will eventually see what you are saying and go along with what you ask. Down deep, they will know I am right and they will neatly, professionally cut your toes off.
It is important that you go to a hospital to have this done. I removed several on my own and nearly died from infection. They have special tools at most hospitals for toe removal. The Bugs only saved me because they want me to make the planet Neptune explode into flame so that their rival, the Worms, will lose a critical military base.
Digs Smooth Jazz
Metal websites have already begun to speculate about a possible replacement for Mangione. Metal Infection.net claims that the band has already contacted Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass about joining them on the next tour. Metal Bar Through A Guy’s Forehead.com has also reported that Kerry King was has been listening to “a lot of Kenny G” over the past few months and might look to include the diminutive jazz saxophonist in a future project.
Millions Of Heartbroken Tweens Mourn Abbath’s Departure From One Direction
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on March 26, 2015
Tweens everywhere were shocked and horrified by news yesterday that singer, songwriter and pop icon Abbath had left One Direction. Reactions have run the gamut from mournful posts on Twitter to self-immolations. Across the world, saddened little Tweens with tear-streaked corpse paint makeup are suffering unimaginable suffering unimaginably.
Abbath was a god among many Tweens. Some Tweens loved him for his hotness. Others chuckled at the silly memes made using his likeness. Still others covered themselves in the blood of mammals and chanted the lyrics to songs like “Story of My Life” and “What Makes You Beautiful”. 
Now, millions of Tween dreams lie shattered in pieces on the sidewalk; a decaying detritus of prepubescent post-modern boy band botulism. A free-form fetishistic festival of fury has formed in the face of festoons of fermented festering but fleeting flulike symptoms. The Tween dream has turned into a full-scale Tween nightmare. And no one can stop it.
A walk through any local mall tells the story. Tweens curled up in a ball whispering “Abbath….Abbath….Abbath” over and over again. Tweens shrieking the lyrics to “Call of the Wintermoon” and destroying watermelons with sledgehammers. Tweens laying waste to entire rows of “Hello, Kitty” merchandise with no regard to their own safety or well-being. Tweens flinging cups of Orange Julius haphazardly at innocent nonTween bystanders. Windows to Hot Topics and Forever 21s boarded up; their owners fearing a wave of Tween looting. Gangs of Tweens shouting “Death To America!” while turning over mall cop segues. The whole Tween universe…a powder keg ready to explode at even a passing mention of Abbath.
A survey of Tween sadness done earlier today by The Aldo Nova Institute For The Study of Tweenology showed that over 90 percent of Tweens were “totally, like, messed up” by Abbath’s departure. Many media outlets have gone so far as to refer to Abbath’s departure as a “Twagedy”. 
If you are the parent of a child who might or might not be experiencing Abbath-related Tween Angst (word copyrighted 2015 by tyrannyoftraditionLLC), it is important that you take the following steps in order to help your Tween make it through this trying period.
First, soak your Tween in a bathtub filled with vinegar for 5 hours. At first, they will protest and possibly even fight back, but it is critical to cleanse their pores of Tween Angst Toxins.
Second, talk to your Tween about other options to focus their obsessive little Tween minds on. Lavinia Fisher took time this morning to help her two Tween daughters Posh and Sporty Fisher take down the Abbath posters in their room. “My girls are heartbroken. Devastated. As a parent, I feel like it is important that I take action immediately and help them fixate on another cultural phenomena as soon as possible. It is critical to our survival as a species that we find some trivial novelty to think about so that pondering the looming specter of eventual death doesn’t consume our every waking second in this hell.”
Third, make sure that your Tween UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES runs away to join ISIS. There have been several reports of Tween Angsters so overwhelmed by grief that they have boarded planes to the Middle East in an attempt to deal with their sadness by “binge joining” jihadist groups. Be vigilant. Remember, YOU are the parent. Radical Islam is NOT OKAY for Tweens. 
Morbid Angel To Reissue Limited Edition Copies of “Altars of Madness” Covered in Sriracha Sauce
Posted by Keith Spillett in Uncategorized on March 25, 2015
Doesn’t This Thing Look Like It Is From An Episode of Scooby-Doo?
What do Thomas Jefferson, William Blake and Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer have in common? If you guessed that Morbid Angel is reissuing a thousand copies of “Altars of Madness” covered in Sriracha Sauce, you’d be correct.
That’s right, Sriracha sauce. That spicy sauce with the rooster on it that took America by storm in the summer of 2013. The sauce that has been linked to the death of famed character actor Wilford Brimley and Ghanaian President Kwame Nkrumah. The sauce that toppled the regime of Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega. The sauce that broke the major league record for most hit batsman in 1972. The sauce that indirectly led to the capture and beheading of Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin by magpies. The sauce that Shakespeare himself claimed launched a thousand ships when he wrote the King James Edition of The Koran in 1861.
In 1905, Belgian doctor Wolfgang von Golfwang created Sriracha sauce in an attempt to manufacture a new version of blood. The chemical was pumped in the veins of several men who were born without blood in an attempt to help them increase their libido. While the chemical killed all the test subjects, it was later discovered that it would make a great topping for food from the Far East.
Morbid Angel first began listening to Sriracha sauce in 2001. Along with Yoko Ono’s second solo album, Sriracha sauce became singer and nasal vestibule David Vincent’s biggest influence. In a recent interview with Boys Life Magazine, Vincent claimed that “You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”
(When I was a kid, my mother had a VW bug. It had the trunk in the front and an engine in the back. It didn’t make the car drive all that differently, but it was the sort of ‘unique’ feature you can put on an automobile in order to sell it to people who don’t really know the difference between a V6 and a V8 engine)
THIS WAS BEFORE DRONES!!!!!
(Anyway, one time on a lark, we filled the entire front trunk with fake chattering teeth. The ones you find in novelty shops or in Groucho Marx movies. This was back when people at gas stations would check your oil and pump your gas. We waited and waited for months for an attendant to not realize the whole front trunk thing and open up the front thinking he was checking the engine)
MAKE THE HAMSTERS STOP RUNNING IN CIRCLES ON MY FACE!!!!
(Well, this went on for months and nobody ever opened the trunk. So we got the idea that I would ride in the front trunk with the false teeth and bang ever so slightly on the hood of the car to make it appear as if the engine were making a strange noise. After three months trapped inside the car, an elderly mechanic fell for it and opened it only to find me, covered from head to toe in mayonnaise in a trunk filled with chattering teeth. He fell over dead on the spot. Hours later, Iranian militants took over the American embassy beginning the worst hostage crisis in American history and single-handedly clearing a path for Ben Affleck to win an Academy Award. I can’t help but think that I am responsible and to this day break into tears anytime I see an Ayatollah Khomeini bobblehead doll)
Evil D: Keepin’ It Real
The reissue of the album will feature a Bee-Gees style remix of “Chapel of Ghouls” along with a recent live cover of “The Pina Colada Song” by Rupert Holmes. Unfortunately, Morbid Angel no longer own the rights to the song “Maze of Torment” and, therefore, were unable to put it on the newest version. The original was in a hope chest in the living room of the band’s former bugle player Mike Browning. In 2008, Browning’s home was robbed by futuristic droids who escaped in a flying DeLorean piloted by Michael J. Fox with “Maze of Torment” and 46 pounds of cream cheese in tow.
Would you be mad if I stapled your tongue to your forehead? Are you failed children?
Behind The Masque: The Day ISIS Tried To Recruit Me
Posted by Keith Spillett in Existential Rambings on March 9, 2015
I was wandering out front of my local twenty-four hour CVS a few nights ago when I felt a bottle smash into my head. Shattering glass, shooting unreasonable pain. My hand, simple white adornments to my arms, were now covered in blood. My blood! Another bottle to the head sent me reeling into an incoherent stupor.
I knew I was being lifted by my legs and arms. Why? Had I not paid the correct change for the package of gum I purchased? Confusing, absurd thoughts moshed through my mind. I know I gave them the correct change! “I ave u….now(spitting blood)….rect change.”
They dropped me next to a car. “Will you shut him up!” said a man in a black mask. I could barely make his voice out, but it sounded familiar.
At that moment, I was struck with the full annihilating fury of a boot to the back of the skull. Things went dark quickly. I reached to put my tooth in my pocket but passed out too quickly to make it happen. I liked that tooth. Gone.
It seemed like hours I was in the trunk of this automobile. I smelled of sweat and blood. I was able to mat down much of the blood with some stray socks left in back, but beyond that, I was in pretty bad shape. I was too weak to bang loudly on the trunk, so I rapped consistently until I passed out after what seemed like an eternity.
When I awoke I was out of the car lying in a comfortable hospital bed. The room had no windows. A black hooded medical attendant was there to try to see if I’d be coherent enough to participate in what insanity was about to take place.
I may have a concussion, hell, I might have worse that that, but I have watched enough of the news to know what is going on.
“You are those bastards in ISIS! Aren’t you?! You degenerate murderers. And now you’ve got me. And just what the hell do you think you are going to do to me. This isn’t that post-apocalyptic warzone Syria gave you because it wasn’t worth defending. We are in America, pal. You touch one hair on my head and my kids will be singing the National Anthem at the Super Bowl while you and your crew of “warriors” will be sucking pounds of Deer Park water out of a towel while some lunatic tries to get you to recite the zip code for every city in Bangladesh.”
The hooded man sat next to me. It was oddly comforting. In a computerized voice, used to protect the speaker from giving away any clue as to who they might be, softly said “I’m sorry for how we got you here. The boys get carried away from time to time. It’s a hazard in what we do. My name is T. Let me promise you right now, you will not be harmed for the rest of your time here. Let me also promise you this, if you like what we are doing, you are welcome to stay with us for a while and help the cause.”
“I’m an atheistic, anarchist Jew. The closest I have ever come to jihad was arguing with a Palestinian over the price of shwarma at a restaurant in the West Bank 15 years ago. I think you grabbed the wrong guy. My name is Keith Spillett.”
“The Keith Spillett who writes The Tyranny of Tradition website…kind of like The Onion but for….”
“YES!!!! YES!!!! That’s me! If I hear the Onion comparison one more time….”
“Didn’t mean to offend you. Actually, we are great admirers of your work.”
“I hadn’t realized that the Jihadist community was big on metal satire.”
“Oh…yes, we loved the Rick Santorum one. We even thought about creating some Celine Dion internment camps, for obviously different reasons. Oh…and the one where Cronos is related to Kate Middleton! Killed me! Al-Baghdadi himself said that your story on Van Halen causing Ebola was the hardest he had laughed in years. We spotted your talent right away. You have the rare ability to make a ridiculous lie sound completely truthful.”
“Well, is this a job interview?,” I said laughing uncomfortably.
“Yes….yes…you could say that. Certainly not in a traditional sense, but we would like you to help us better get our ideas across to average Americans. They see us doing these beheadings and are horrified. But, they are missing the deeper meaning. I have chosen you to bring that meaning to them.”
“And if I don’t???”
“I give the briefcase of money to someone else, you take a nap in the trunk and you’ll be there for work Monday morning. We mean you no harm.”
“Can you try to better explain to me what is happening and what you want?”
“Better than that…I’ll show you.”
As I walked out of the makeshift hospital room it finally dawned on me that I was in the back of a trailer. The trailer door opened and a radiant, punishing sun beat down on my head. Men dressed head to toe in black were pacing around filled with frantic, nervous energy. It looked horrifically familiar. I’ve seen this place before. This is ISIS territory! Where they do all the beheadings! My god! They are going to kill me!
My breathing sped up, I began hemorrhaging sweat, my eyes darted around looking for a way out. A calming hand caressed my back. “How did I get here? We can’t possibly be in the Middle East. Not unless I was in the back of a flying car!”
“Relax…we are somewhere in a safe area of Alabama. Type of place you go and people don’t ask questions.”
“So….you do some of these beheadings IN America???”
“Sure! It’s much easier in terms of organizing the supplies you need inconspicuously. We’ve done some shoots overseas as well, but this is usually our favorite setting. It looks very dramatic around nightfall.”
“So…ISIS members are everywhere! Jesus Christ! We’ve been overrun. They are taking control. I should have never voted for Obama!!!!”
“Relax, Keith. Just relax. Let the events unfold. You will understand soon enough.”
I sat alone on a side of a hill unguarded. I could have run off, but they knew they had played deeply enough on my morbid curiosity to keep me around. Things were so bizarre. These anti-modern religious men were putting together what could only be properly described as a scene for a movie. A set was created from the natural elements of the ground, fake trees and a lighting scheme that made the whole place seem like the most dramatic dusk since the one Jesus saw on the cross.
Suddenly, they brought out a woman. She was screaming and trying to escape. Writhing with agony. She had been clearly beaten and tortured. It was apparent that these were going to be the last moments of her life. My God…they were going to behead her!
Was this a trick? Did they want me to make up some story about how some crazy fake ISIS beheading of like, Lita Ford, took place. T quickly found me and grabbed me by the arm. “We must go there now! Now! It’s happening NOW!”
She handed me a video camera and I ran with her. I had lost my identity for a moment in the crazed energy that exploded out of her. I knew only to run and then film. The woman’s head was pushed onto a wood block. “Now….you must film NOW!” and so I did.
The blade of her executioner smashed down on her neck. Blood shot out, but the neck remained intact. Her scream was the worst noise I have ever heard. There is nothing it can be compared to. He hacked again and again. I disappeared into the task at hand. ‘Tell The Story With The Camera’ I kept saying over and over in order to keep from shaking or collapsing.
What happened next was unforgettable. The executioner lifted the head from the ground and held it skyward in unspoken presentation to Mohammad. Blood drained all over his black outfit. Then, he casually tossed the head off screen. T told me “Cut!”
“Jesus Keith….that was great!!! You got the whole thing in one shot. Perfect. You have the guts of a cat burglar. I told you this was the guy! He gets it! This guy really can look past the horror to see the truth.”
In an oddly familiar voice, the executioner mumbled, “yes…yes he can.”
“You look like you need a drink. Sit down in the chair right over by the trailer.”
I slumped into the chair. T followed quickly with two glasses of bourbon. I took a glass and fired it down without speaking a word.
T began, “I’ll never forget my first beheading. It was extremely difficult at first, but once I understood…”
“UNDERSTOOD! We just murdered a woman. I just filmed the murder of a woman.”
T began laughing…”Yeah…yeah you did!”
“What the hell is wrong with you? What kind of Jihadist would give me alcohol? And you are laughing! Don’t you understand what you…what WE just were a part of?”
T’s mask turned towards me, “I certainly do…I just think that YOU don’t. I think when you’ll see the whole picture you’ll understand. It’ll make all the sense in the world, Keith. Then, you can decide what you want to do.”
Then, T shouted something loudly in a language I guessed to be Arabic. Quickly, all of the black robed, black masked ISIS killers surrounded me.
“Alright,” said T, “here goes!”
With that the mask was untied and I was staring directly into HER face. The soothing radical jihadist with the computerized voice was none other than Hillary Rodham Clinton. She smiled ear to ear and winked at me.
“WHAAAAAAAA???”
Then, the executioner removed his mask. It was President Barack Obama.
“HOWWW!!!!?!?!?!?”
The next mask removed belonged to former President George W. Bush. “Fooled ya, huh!?”
“I DON’T….”
Each face more bizarre than the next, former football player Ray Lewis, Metallica “drummer” Lars Ulrich, Tim Tebow, Danzig, Steve Jobs (who I believed had died!), Mrs. Glessman, my former 3rd grade teacher. All of them. Others too. They simply became a blur. What the hell was going on?
“T…or…Hillary…why are you doing this? WHY?”
“Freedom!”
“FREEDOM!!!!”
“Yes! Yes! Freedom! True Freedom!”
I stared incredulously.
“Keith, you know the answer to this question, but I’m going to ask it anyway. Who is more free, a Jihadi who can kill or steal anytime the mood strikes him? This person has the power to act on every horrible whim that passes through his mind at any given moment? Or the fellow who spends his entire life with his head buried in a cubical praying he gets a raise so that he can afford to buy another piece of electronic equipment? The zombie…drifting from cradle to grave trying to create tiny manipulations in order to get the simplest, most basic image of freedom for a fleeting few seconds. Hell, if you cut his head off, you’d be doing the second guy a favor!”
“Why Keith? Because this carnival you see here….THIS IS TRUE FREEDOM. We sprinkle in a bit of the sections of the Koran to show we are capable of restraint and all that but never doubt for a moment that this is about Freedom.”
“But, she was an American?”
“Yes she was. Of course! This is Alabama! Who were you expecting? A Korean?…..Are you following this? You still look a bit confused?”
“Why me?”
They all began laughing. “Because you are the audience, dummy! Who do you think this is all for? When you realize you can do whatever you want whenever you want to whomever you want, you have become a true member of the freest society on the planet. We got there first and as your public servants, we plan to bring as many of you as we can with us.”
“Keith, we need you to write stories for us. Crazy terrorist plots that were foiled in the nick of time. The crazier, the better. Make them funny. Have terrorists shoot the Space Needle at New England! Have “ISIS” set up a casino style betting service where people can profit through decapitations and different styles of murders. The government is 100 percent behind this. Blow up Yankee Stadium! You know you want to! We can make whatever you write come to life. Just give us a few days notice, we’ll make it happen.”
“For us to truly realize our birthright as Americans, freedom, we must destroy all the things that stand in our way. Love, compassion, empathy….all impediments to experiencing true freedom. We will teach them freedom through wars and beheadings. Freedom will come to America when we can own every awful thing we’ve done or will do with a smile on our face and without a trace of guilt. Because this is what it means to be free!”
She extended her hand out to shake mine. In that moment, everything flashed before me. All my actions, my thoughts, my beliefs, my fears, my dreams….every element that mentally constructs the thing that calls itself Keith Spillett. No one to answer to, no God to punish me, no law to force me into a prison cell….only the will and what it most wants in every moment.
Every day a celebration of my innermost wants above the needs of all others. A license to will the world into whatever I want it to be. So much suffering will be caused, so much sorrow, so much terror, so much pain…but not for me.
I shook her hand and smiled, “When do we start?”
Another Season in The Abyss???: The 2015 Tyranny of Tradition Baseball Preview Issue
Posted by Keith Spillett in Blithering Sports Fan Prattle on February 27, 2015
(Last fall, the editorial staff at Tyranny of Tradition received a $100,000 grant from the Arthur Schlichter Foundation For Integrity in Sports in order to cover sports with the passion and zeal with which we cover heavy metal. The grant was meant to last us 10 years, but the editorial staff had a really strong feeling about Valparaiso covering the spread on the road against Cleveland State in a college basketball game a few weeks back. Needless to say, our grant has dwindled down to about $317. Certainly not enough to start a whole sports department, but enough to send Tyranny’s baseball reporter Dirty Dave on The FM on a Greyhound Bus from Patchogue, Long Island to Port Saint Lucie to cover Spring Training for a day or two)
(We could not afford to put Dirty Dave up in a hotel, so he patiently slept outside of the Mets spring training complex until he was arrested at 4 AM for vagrancy and forced to spend the rest of his time “covering” baseball in a Florida jail cell. In spite of this, he was able to put together some of the finest, most in depth coverage of the changes that will be coming for the 2015 MLB season)
(He’s a good reporter and I think you’ll like the article. Plus, he’s taller than Tim Kurkjian. Then again, most adults are. Even some 2nd graders)
As winter begins to wind down and the annual Major League Baseball spring training season gets under way, baseball fans are looking ahead, but not necessarily forward, to a 2015 season shaping up to be unlike any other in the sport’s long history. When Allan H. (Bud) Selig retired from his post as Major League Baseball Commissioner on January 14, he was widely expected to order a series of eleventh-hour rule and policy changes reminiscent of the flurry of last-minute political pardons that accompanies the exit of U.S. presidents from office. The changes, which have now been independently confirmed by high-ranking staff members in the Commissioner’s Office, will usher the national pastime into a new era of innovations that many baseball historians are describing as more radical than any others implemented during the game’s modern age.
Selig, who was named Commissioner of Baseball in 1992, has been the target of controversy before. Widely recognized as one of the most progressive leaders in the history of the game, Selig is known for dictating a number of departures from baseball tradition, including interleague play, the addition of two, and later four, wildcard teams to the postseason, and instant replay.
According to sources, several of the changes for 2015 will fundamentally alter play itself. Starting on Opening Day, hitters will be required to bat with their eyes closed, pitchers must throw standing on only one leg, and fielders will use their hats in lieu of gloves. Additionally, teams will universally bypass the fourth inning and play a tenth inning instead. In the event of extra innings, the thirteenth inning will likewise be bypassed in consideration of any triskaidekaphobes who may be in attendance.
Late Yankee Mascot Don Zimmer During The Battle of San Juan Hill
Other changes will have less effect on the game and more impact on the fan experience. To capitalize on the popularity of recently-introduced ballpark amenities like full-service restaurants, swimming pools, and night clubs, several sources are reporting that Selig has directed teams to offer additional extraneous activities at the ballpark, including water polo matches in the infield, fox hunts in the outfield, and recreational scoreboard climbing. Ballpark fare will be changing, too. Snacks that are virtually synonymous with baseball such as peanuts and Cracker Jack will be removed from inventories and substituted with walnuts and Triscuit. And several sources have confirmed that hot dogs will start being produced using actual dogs.
An anonymous source close to the former commissioner, who would identify himself only as Executive Vice President of Baseball Operations Joe Torre, explained that as his retirement approached, Selig became concerned that he hadn’t done enough to secure baseball’s future. “Since his first day on the job, Bud’s number one goal has been to bring baseball into the twenty-first century as a viable, competitive sports product,” said the source. “With so many other entertainment options vying for the attention of today’s consumer, Bud has worked tirelessly to keep baseball at the forefront. These final reforms will ensure that baseball will remain our national pastime for decades to come.”
Mindy Cohn
Among the many anticipated changes, the following are expected to draw the most ire from baseball purists:
- Selig will move the Milwaukee Brewers, the franchise he originally owned, back to Seattle where they will re-adopt their given name, the Pilots, and the Seattle Mariners will be sold to a Turkish investment group and moved to Istanbul
- To help limit the number of concussions and other serious baseball injuries, all players will be required to wear full Kevlar-reinforced body armor uniforms, baseballs will be replaced with Wiffle balls, and when approaching the plate runners will be required to come to a full stop and politely ask catchers for permission to slide
- To discourage any further commercialization of baseball, teams will be prohibited from selling the naming rights of their stadiums to corporations and all such stadiums will be renamed after obscure 19th century U.S. presidents; several new names have already been announced: Citi Field in New York will be renamed Rutherford B. Hayes Park, AT&T Park in San Francisco will be called Franklin Pierce Field, and Petco Park in San Diego will be renamed William Henry Harrison Stadium and then rechristened 30 days later as the John Tyler Coliseum.
- To broaden baseball’s global appeal, several new expansion teams will begin play in 2015, including the Somalia Pirates, the Moscow Reds, and the Mumbai Indians; to avoid confusion, the Pittsburgh Pirates will be renamed the Pittsburgh Old Fashioned Cartoony-Type Pirates, the Cincinnati Reds will be renamed the Cincinnati Slightly Lighter Shade of Reds, and the Cleveland Indians will be given the generic and non-offensive moniker the Cleveland Original Inhabitants of America.
- Derek Jeter will embark on a never-ending farewell tour, travelling from stadium to stadium in an endless cycle to receive a ceaseless quantity of free gifts
- Popcorn will be banned at ballparks, because where do you think you are? The movies?
- To further distinguish the geographical specificity of the team for its fan base, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim will be renamed the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim That Play Their Home Games In Orange County Off The I-5 Which Is Pretty Far Away From Dodger Stadium But Still In the Same Metro Area
- To help reverse the trend of increasing game times, all contests that proceed beyond the 15th inning will be decided by a sudden death “Punkin Chunkin” competition
- The Colorado Rockies and Seattle Mariners will replace their designated smoking sections with designated toking sections
- In tribute to former players Al Oliver, Oddibe McDowell, and Oscar Gamble, the number 0 will be universally retired by all teams
- In addition to the substances currently banned by Major League Baseball’s drug policy, players will be prohibited from using or possessing eggplants
- The National League will officially merge with the American League, the combined entity will then merge with the Canadian Football League, and the resulting organization will merge with Golden Corral
- More beards
- Any fan not removing their cap during the National Anthem will be waterboarded while forced to listen to a 24-hour repeating loop of Joe Buck broadcasts
The Major League Baseball Players Association could not be reached for comment.
Lou Pearlman’s Former Boy Band Black Sabbath Enter Their 45th Year
Posted by Keith Spillett in General Weirdness on February 13, 2015
Pearlman In His Pre-Prison Days
Long before famed music impresario Lou Pearlman created famed boy bands like The Backstreet Boys and N’Sync, he left a more lasting and indelible impact on the world of music by creating the most famed heavy metal band in history. Black Sabbath, the brainchild of the teenage Pearlman, initially came into being as what he liked to call a “heavy boy band”. Years later, they are metal legends.
Pearlman, who is currently serving 25 years in federal prison for conspiracy and money laundering, recalls the early days of the group fondly.
“I remember thinking to myself that if I had a little bit of front money and four out-of-work British musician looking guys, I could really strike it rich. All the stuff coming out at the time seemed really dark, so I figured if I created an evil version of The Beatles it might catch on. Throw in a little satanic imagery, some hip shaking grooves and wham…bam….Magic Sam…we got ourselves a number one hit record.”
One of Pearlman’s First Sabbath Pictures
Pearlman discovered the band outside of an unemployment office in Workington. He offered them 20 dollars and a warm place to sleep for the week if they’d agree to take some photos pretending to be a band called Sabbath (Pearlman later changed the name to Black Sabbath because it sounded ‘even more evil’).
There was only one problem, none of the men had ever played an instrument.
Lou, whose uncle was Ray Pearlman an IBM employee who developed a punch card computer system that wrote and played music in the late 1960s, borrowed the system and within two hours penned the entire first Black Sabbath record.
“The music sounded great, but the computer couldn’t simulate a voice that sounded right. I thought about it and realized Mick Jagger couldn’t carry a tune if it had handles on it. I just went in and asked the boys who could yell the loudest. Ozzy raised his hand. The rest is history!”
Pearlman gave Ozzy a steak and a bottle of Thunderbird wine in exchange for the vocal tracks. Pearlman edited them into the music (using the alias Rodger Bain in order to not have his fingerprints all over the band’s work) and sent it to a friend of his at a label known as Vertigo. Within a few months, the album reached number 23 on the Billboard Top 200 list.
For the band’s early years, Pearlman was pulling most of the strings. He carefully orchestrated a menacing, sinister image for the band and had them take lessons to learn their instruments in order to help heavy boy band music (later known as heavy metal) catch on. He even created a convincing back story about the members of the band being parts of earlier projects with bizarre names like Earth and The Polka Tulk Blues Band.
Boy Band Black Sabbath Today
In an odd turn of events, Pearlman, who gained a reputation for allegedly scamming bands out of their just due, was himself robbed of his rightful place in the annals of heavy metal history. The band cut ties with Pearlman, who at that time was going by the name of Incognito Johnson and running a series of tanning parlors in Arizona, in 1974. His name was removed from everything associated with the band and members of Black Sabbath have claimed to have no idea who he is.
Pearlman, who is expected to be released from prison in 2029, believes that he will one day be rightfully acknowledged for his role in creating heavy metal.
“Look, I know I’ve probably done a few bad things in my life. Ponzi schemes, releasing music that was unfit to be played in Guantanamo Bay torture chambers….hell, I even stole a blimp once! But, at the end of the day, I deserve to also be remembered as the guy who brought the world the greatest boy band of all-time, Black Sabbath.”
The Tyranny of Tradition 