"Black Friday"

"Black Friday" is usually associated with shopping and/or Steely Dan, but it's also a thoroughly spectacular song by Megadeth.

Megadeth, "Good Mourning/Black Friday"


Peace Sells...But Who's Buying? is often simplified as the record where Megadeth ditched their obsessions with the occult, Satan, comic books and violence in favor of politics and realism. While it was the breakthrough of guitarist/songwriter Dave Mustaine's thrilling battle with current affairs and his own personal demons, songs like "The Conjuring," "Good Mourning/Black Friday" and an excellent Howlin' Wolf cover ("I Ain't Superstitious") enjoy the classic metal themes. All on the fine line between campy and scary.

Preceding Dimmu Borgir, Machine Head, Portishead and a quip on Dr. Katz with the "Good Mourning" pun, Mustaine serves us the album's sole pretty moment, a dual guitar intro that breaks into Mustaine's bizarre/goofy spoken word. While his range and tone are often mocked, I think it's pretty cool that he was the first metal god to talk/scream the horrors he depicted. Sort of like a headbanging Tom Waits.

The song slips into a jazz-like composition, with a speed and structure that was pivotal in establishing death metal and math metal. Uninhibited leads are hunted down by an authoritative rhythm section that pushes each player to their technical and creative limit. One can imagine Kerry King, Chuck Schuldiner and Ben Weinman all clasping their headphones closer to their ears when this song came on.

The lyrics are fantastic. A sadistic murderer who lands closer to Tobe Hooper than Alice Cooper gets a first-person narration, punctuated by a torrent of technical stunts and progression switch-ups. All of which build into to a mind-bending solo (courtesy of Chris Poland) and a climactic final chant (courtesy of the band.)

Perhaps the song's greatest endorsement comes from Mustaine. Now a born again Christian (who still writes good music,) Dave has expressed reservations about performing "Black Friday" in concert. "You know, I mean, I am sure if I wanted to I could do 'Black Friday' or 'The Conjuring,' because they don't really mean anything anymore," he once told a reporter. "'Black Friday,' you know, it's just gratuitous violence which, that's cool to a point, but there's so many death metal fans that do it better than I did."

"Good Mourning/Black Friday" could be considered Mustaine's exorcism, a release of demons that he can't bring himself to revisit. All the more reason for the rest of us to enjoy it.

Megadeth, "Good Mourning/Black Friday" (live)

Happy Thanksgiving

Ten reasons to pick up Chinese Democracy

1. Between Appetite for Destruction, Use Your Illusion I and II and even G N' R Lies, Axl's got a pretty great track record. Sure, this album doesn't have Slash, Duff or Izzy. But even what's technically a solo album from the guy who sang and wrote "Welcome to the Jungle," "My Michelle," "November Rain," "Estranged" and a few more of the greatest songs ever is well worth checking out.

2. It's a grower. I was indifferent to "Shackler's Revenge" when it came out on Rock Band 2, but now can't get the chorus out of my head. "Catcher in the Rye's" melody has me singing along on the third listen. "Sorry" gives Wish You Were Here a Black Album twist that sounds like nothing attempted previously in Axl history, and I sincerely thought they tried everything on Use Your Illusion. The processed vocal that opens "Scraped" weirded me out at first, but now I enjoy hearing it and knowing that a mega-hooked rock n' roll song is about to kick in.

3. Stick it to the man.


4. The industrial-tinged, "No Sleep 'til Brooklyn"-tagged riff of the title track.

5. Sure, Chinese Democracy has its misfires, but even the melodramatic "This I Love" might be worth more in replay value than a lot of better songs. Hearing Motörhead, AC/DC and other metal gods reworking their reliably awesome respective formats this year aren't nearly as compelling as hearing Axl vent the sickest parts of his mind. The Third World tale of "Riad n' the Bedouins?" The bitter, spacey "Sorry?" The flamenco guitar-laden, plausible porn soundtrack "If the World?" Every single fucking thing about "Madagascar?" I'm shaping up my top five records for the year, and while Chinese Democracy won't likely be among them, it's a more fascinating listen than any of the top contenders.

6. It sounds incredible. Critics will haw that it's overblown and pieced together, but they're missing the gorgeous-sounding solos, the song-driving piano hooks and the rock-steady rhythm section. Axl's achingly versatile pipes will have you angry that he deprived us for so long, and not a note of all the orchestration, samples or sleigh-bell loops sound stifling or out of place. The mixers and sound engineers on the uber-raw new Metallica could've taken a lesson from this.

7. See how it holds up against older Guns N' Roses. Use Your Illusion I and II are some of the boldest, most challenging and flat-out best hard rock records ever released. Appetite for Destruction is as great as music gets. When was the last time you intentionally listened to "Patience?" It'll rule your morning in five minutes. Chinese Democracy is a worthy add to the legacy.

8. "Street of Dreams" has a stupid title, but the song pulls on my heartstrings just a tiny, little minuscule bit. Just a little. Just a little.

9. This matches anything you've heard for honesty and integrity. Casual fans will wish it were catchier or heavier, and others will gripe about its extravagance, but this is the record Axl wanted to make. There's nothing that latches onto the past, unlike those embarrassing David Lee Roth records. Nothing stands out as an obvious aim at MTV and radio, unlike the last 20 years of Aerosmith. For all the hype it's gotten, Axl has done nothing to promote this album. These are 14 diverse, painstakingly composed, arranged and recorded songs by one of the greatest singers in rock history. The closer, "Prostitute," is a little like Axl's "My Way" (Sid Vicious version,) and you won't be able to argue with him.

10. This album rocks. "I.R.S." will get your fist pumping, "Better" will have you banging your head and "Prostitute" will make you want to sit the whole thing through again. You may never hear a more exciting record. At least until the sequel.



Buy it.

Municipal Waste

Municipal Waste are a retro-sounding thrash metal band from the greatest state in the world. They blend the best elements of Anthrax and Suicidal Tendencies into something none too original but hugely enjoyable, and anyone who's ever wasted time on Blabbermouth should check out their sick sense of humor (see their Troma-produced video for "Headbanger Face Rip" below) and entirely awesome live show.



Anyhoo, a few years they wrote "I Want to Kill the President," a 17-second ode to slaughtering the leader of the alleged free world.



Five years later, the song becomes "I Want to Chill with the President."



Moral: Whoever thought that bad times inspired the best art was wrong.

"The Best Ever Death Metal Band in Denton"

Having taken indie rock lyrics to task in my last post, it's time to say something good about the Mountain Goats.

Mountain Goats, "The Best Ever Death Metal Band in Denton" (from All Hail West Texas)


At first listen, I didn't like this song. A self-consciously lo-fi recording of a relatively unexciting guitar progression, the song initially struck me as a snarky hipster joke about metal. I knew songwriter John Darnielle has a genuine love for headbangers, as evidenced in his excellent novel about Black Sabbath fandom, but this song's precocious tale of two kids' confused attempts at starting a band seemed more in line with a pretentious college kid's idea of metal. I could already hear Williamsburg kids snickering along to the "Hail Satan" chorus in between PBR sips.

I was wrong. This song is a eulogy for a vibrant metal god dream.

The titular band's founders are two boyhood best friends named Cyrus and Jeff. They practice twice a week, stencil their names (with a pentagram) in each other's instruments and dream of living the world's greatest profession. Not content to be mere "rock stars," these guys want to be death metal gods. Sure, as rock stars they'd get myriad fans, publicity, dollars, groupies and chances to perform and record music. But Cyrus and Jeff also want to terrify parents and politicians, while confronting the darkest aspects of mankind in the loudest, fastest music imaginable. What could possibly be more audacious and appealing?

It doesn't matter that the duo doesn't really seem to get death metal. They can't agree on a band name, and their plausible choices--"Satan's Fingers," "the Killers" and "the Hospital Bombers," all sound even less metal than "Wyld Stallyns." The belief that their chosen path will earn them "stage lights and learjets and fortune and fame" is a little absurd, given that the highest-selling death metal album in history sold under 200,000 copies (and was issued by a cartoon.)

But no matter. These are best friends with a dream that's real enough to taste. Of course, just craving death metal stardom is still dangerous enough to send Jeff to reform school (or maybe worse--Darnielle doesn't elaborate.) In the most decidedly metal act in the whole song, Jeff plots revenge on his oppressors in a letter to Cyrus. "The best ever death metal band out of Denton/will in time both outpace and outlive you," concludes Darnielle.


If this song has a contemporary, it'd be Shel Silverstein's poem "Rock n' Roll Band."


If we were a rock 'n' roll band,
We'd travel all over the land
We'd play and we'd sing and wear spangly things,
If we were a rock 'n' roll band.

If we were a rock 'n' roll band,
And we were up there on the stand,
The people would hear us and love us and cheer us,
Hurray for that rock 'n' roll band.

If we were a rock 'n' roll band,
Then we'd have a million fans,
We'd giggle and laugh and sign autographs,
If we were a rock 'n' roll band.

If we were a rock 'n' roll band,
The people would all kiss our hands,
We'd be millionaires and have extra long hair,
If we were a rock 'n' roll band.

But we ain't no rock 'n' roll band,
We're just seven kids in the sand
With homemade guitars and pails and jars
And drums pf potato chip cans.

Just seven kids in the sand,
Talkin' and wavin' our hands,
And dreamin' and thinkin' oh wouldn't it be grand,
If we were a rock 'n' roll band.

Lamb of God vs. Saul Williams

One major problem with critics is that they have a lyrical bias.

Being writers and not musicians, they appreciate the skills it takes for Lou Reed to describe and convey New York City over the past few decades. But they can't comprehend Frank Zappa's artistic reinventions of electric guitar playing for rock, jazz, orchestral and electronic music, unless he says something funny.

Similarly, movie critics fawn over Charlie Kaufman's screenplay-driven works and scratch their heads over Robert Rodriguez, while book reviews will reliably favor Joyce's stylistic innovations and literary allusions to a rock solid Lovecraft tale.

Lyrics are important, no doubt. As moving and amazing as they are musically, it's hard to imagine that bands like Nirvana and Metallica would be nearly as effective without the brave, cerebral and even literary verses of "Heart-Shaped Box" and "For Whom the Bell Tolls." Of course, this helps account for why both bands have landed Rolling Stone cover stories.

"Heart-Shaped Box"


"For Whom the Bell Tolls"


Few others have been so well-received--Pitchfork will lather praise on twee, stilted and ironic lyrics from Vampire Weekend and Belle and Sebastian. But a search for "Pantera" on the corporation's website will produce zero results. No reviews, and even Dimebag's murder, easily one of the most devastating music world events of the decade, is ignored. I'd argue that Pantera have much stronger lyrics than the aforementioned hipster darlings, but I guess not having lyrics about the Oxford comma is grounds for expulsion by major publications.

"The Oxford Comma"


"Mouth for War"


As far as great albums go, I'll take music over lyrics any day. Check out any number of brilliant literature, poetry or nonfiction for outstanding prose, but we're talking about musicians here. That's what they offer us--music, with the occasional bonus of great lyrics.

Consider the case of Lamb of God vs. Saul Williams. Two absolutely amazing live acts who also write some incredible songs.

Williams started as a poet and writer, and it shows. His verbose, literate and provocative lyrics are more astute than anything by M.I.A., Zack de la Rocha or Common, but he can't bust a rhyme or a hook as well as any of them. His music is usually a nondescript, relatively enjoyable soundtrack that never overwhelms his lyrics, which are always the focus of his compositions.

His most recent album, The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of Niggy Tardust!, features his best music to date, thanks in big part to producer Trent Reznor.

"Convict Colony"


"DNA"




But still, the music here is just a platform for his poetry, which is all it needs to be. Niggy Tardust is a great album, but easily the best tune is the one written by Bono and the Edge.

"Sunday Bloody Sunday"


On the other hand, we have Lamb of God. Musically, they've taken metal to a new level, fusing thrash metal leads and blast beats into hooks that landed them in the Billboard Top Ten. By reinventing extreme metal into something fans outside the metal cult can bang their heads to, Lamb of God took metal to the masses in a way that was previously unthinkable, while giving modern rock a set of balls in the process.

Lyrically, they rely on simple, effective chants that are easy enough for fans to scream along to. Basic, tried and true themes articulated in a way that's neither embarrassing nor poetic, just there to supplement the music.

"Redneck"


"Ruin"


"Now You've Got Something to Die For"


Like Williams, Lamb of God address politics, inner turmoil and social injustice in their lyrics, which never rise above adequacy. But if a writer of Williams' quality were to compose Lamb of God's lyrics, the messages and poetics in his words would get tangled in the music. Similarly, Lamb of God would sound convoluted with a long-winded orator like Williams at the helm. Thankfully, Lamb of God's lyrics are there to showcase the music, Williams' music is there to showcase his lyrics, and both parties continue to make the great music that they should make.

But I know which one I'll listen to more often.

Another reason why Slash rules

November Rain

For Veterans Day

From Luke Lewis of NME:

"There is a US record label, To The Fallen, that specialises in releasing music recorded by war veterans and active service personnel. Proclaiming themselves "the world's only military record label", To The Fallen have issued folk, country and hip-hop albums – but the vast majority of their output is heavy metal. Which raises the question: is metal the only medium that can truly express the horrors of war?

Popular music is littered with anti-war protest songs, from the thrillingly direct (Edwin Starr's 'War') to the oblique (R.E.M.'s 'Orange Crush', inspired by the US army's use of Agent Orange during the Vietnam War). But hardly any of them detail the visceral effects of warfare as experienced by soldiers themselves.

The shadow of nuclear Armageddon hung over much 80s pop – even Prince's party-fantasy '1999' imagined a populace "running everywhere" beneath a purple sky on the eve of destruction – yet only a very few songs, such as Kate Bush's 'Breathing' ("Chips of Plutonium are twinkling in every lung") dared examine the physical effects of nuclear war - radiation sickness, the voiding of blood, birth deformities.

I believe a truly great war song is one that offers an unblinking, soldier's-eye view of conflict. And by that criteria, Metallica's 'One' surely deserves the crown – especially when experienced in tandem with its harrowing video.

Released as a single in January 1989, 'One' is sung from the point of view of a World War 1 veteran who wakes up in hospital a prisoner in his own body, having lost all his limbs and senses in a mortar attack. Inspired by the novel 'Johnny Got His Gun', the lyrics paint a terrifying picture of living death ("Darness imprisoning me, all that I see, absolute horror").

The real master-stroke, though, came with the video, which used dialogue and footage from the film-of-the-book to ratchet up the despair even further:

By the end, as the guitars reach peak velocity and the narrator realises the helplessness of his situation ("Inside I'm screaming, nobody pays any attention"), you're left with, not just a peerless evocation of the human horror wrought by war, but also a profoundly disturbing metaphysical conundrum: without access to our senses, how do we know if we are alive or dead?

Admittedly, there are other songs that vividly capture war's effects – Dylan's 'A-Hard Rain's Gonna Fall' prophesises a world poisoned by nuclear fallout, while Eric B & Rakim's 'Casualties Of War' finds its narrator crouched in the hot sand of Kuwait as the bullets whistle overhead – but none does do with the unflinching potency of Metallica's 'One'."

Experience Mitch Mitchell

In case Axl doesn't get enough press this month

A friend confided with me (over Lucky 13s) that he can't stand Guns n' Roses.

Writing about G n' R this month is selling coals to Newcastle. Besides being one of the most obsessed over, stalked and written about rock bands in history, Chinese Democracy is allegedly really coming out now, commencing an inescapable whirlwind media frenzy that I'm not giving any more time to. Rather than debate whether Axl's band is really Guns n' Roses, or if Chinese Democracy's really coming out, or if it'll be any good or why Velvet Revolver sucks, re-visit (or appreciate) one of the greatest bands in American history.

As to not reiterate what everyone already knows, none of these songs came from the unauthorized and entirely useless Guns N' Roses Greatest Hits that came out a few years ago.


"Nightrain"



There's not a more badass song than this.

"Coma"



Buried on the final track of Use Your Illusion I, rarely played lived for its exhausting length and complicated structure, "Coma" remains one of the finest examples of G n' R's talents. Axl's internal crises are at the forefront, with Slash's monstrous playing pushing the entire band to their limits. It's a huge, frightening, stunning and beautiful mess, kind of like the band that plays it.

"Pretty Tied Up"



Axl, Slash and Duff are overflowing with attitude and charisma, but any G n' R fan worth his Jack Daniels could tell rhythm guitarist Izzy Stradlin' wrote some of the band's best tunes. Lots of bands write about being "Pretty Tied Up," but never as tunefully or as convincingly insane as these guys.

"Bad Obsession"



Another Stradlin' gem. If they'd stayed together, I'd like to think that the band would be tapping more into their Stones influence, the way that they do here.

"You're Crazy"



Really anything from Appetite for Destruction is as great as music gets, as is much from the Use Your Illusions. On the Lies EP, Axl and the boys recorded an acoustic shakedown of Appetite's "You're Crazy." More impressive than their drastic rearrangement of the original is the way that the stripped down, folksy and communal-sounding version still sounds fierce. I'd hate to meet the person that Axl would deem "crazy."

Encore:

Check out Elton John's performance of "Bohemian Rhapsody" at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert. Just watch it.

Did environmetalist (sic) Joe Duplantier just get even more awesome?

I think so.





It's an honor to be a metalhead.

Sad Brains

Bad Brains are irrefutably one of the smartest, catchiest, most inventive and best punk bands ever. They obliterated the "punk" label by genre-hopping more than any great hardcore band in history, and anyone with a passing interest in punk, reggae, funk, metal, hard rock, jazz, ska or rock n' roll should be exposed to H.R., Dr. Know, Darryl Jenifer and Earl Hudson. If only any of that was discernible at the Bad Brains post-Election Day show at Irving Plaza.



A wide-eyed, enthusiastic fan introduced the band, exhibiting energy and excitement that Bad Brains were unable to match. The songs were all there--from "Attitude" to "Sailin' On," from "Re-Ignition" to "Fearless Vampire Killers," and the band gave proper representation to their sound latest album, Build a Nation. But even a faultless setlist couldn't overpower the listless performance from the band, predominately singer H.R., who was content to stand planted behind the microphone and mumble half of each song's lyrics, sometimes out of sync with melody. He also sat down several times and wiped his brow fervently, but that came from his sweltering attire and not any on stage action.

Between a few gaps for tuning, the band raced through every song, dutifully adding backup vocals when necessary and playing their '80s repertoire like pros. The rush of hearing the intros to "At the Movies," "Soul Craft," "Big Takeover" and many more were genuinely thrilling, until blah performances muted the music's vibrancy. Save for a few seconds during the new "Give Thanks and Praises" when pulled off a Michael Stipe-ish dance move, H.R. stood in front of the microphone with an irremovable Cheshire grin, occasionally muttering indecipherable stage banter and looking down at lyrics sheets.

For a band playing some intensely political music ("Riot Squad," "The Regulator,") there was surprisingly no mention of the monumental American political event from the night before. It's well-known that reggae (like Bad Brains) can be belligerent, principled and socially conscious music. It can also be a beach party soundtrack, and it seemed as if H.R. finally was content for it to be the latter.



It's also possible that substance abuse and age have left H.R. semi-incapacitated. But consider the red-blooded performances that Nick Cave, Iggy Pop and other aged/shopworn rock vets consistently deliver, and H.R.'s appearance was just disappointing.

By the time Bad Brains rummaged through "Pay to Cum" and "Banned in D.C.," it was hard to tell how those songs made the band so dangerous in the '80s. Purists will ralph, but Rancid's performance last summer at the same venue was all-around a better punk show.

H.R. assured the crowd that there would be an encore, led the band offstage and trotted back moments later. A different enthusiastic fan was enlisted to introduce the final song, funk-rock prototype "I Against I." It was a move that would have seemed spontaneous and laid-back at another show, but here it seemed like H.R. just needed someone else to do his job for him. The house lights turned on an hour and ten minutes after they dimmed, but no one seemed too broken up about it.

"Hi boys and girls I'm Jimmy Carl Black and I'm the Indian of the Group."

Rest in peace.

"I Want Barack"