Tool, "Forty Six & 2"

A friend recently sent me one of those "What Your Favorite Band Says About You" articles, and one passage in particular stuck out to me:

"Tool: You’re either really smart or really dumb."



Tool is a little like metal's Chuck Palahniuk, an artistic, sensitive and homoerotic talent with a dedicated fanbase of bros. Radio metalheads like to sing along and like to shoot their gun, and one can almost see the band mocking their unsuspecting admirers by getting frat boys to wear t-shirts with the word "TOOL" printed across the front. Yet Tool are also favored by nerds and Liberal Arts kids who enjoy their long, mathematical compositions, abstract lyrics and music videos modeled after the Brothers Quay. The result is a band that sells millions of records, wins Grammys and packs large venues despite barely doing any interviews and refusing to put their music on iTunes.

Another way that Tool is akin to Palahniuk is that all their art is pretty much alike. Tool devotees (and boy, are they devoted) can tell me that 10,000 Days is more conceptual than Undertow, and I'm sure that if you listen to both of them 10,000 times that's true. But for those of us who also want to make time for other bands, 1996's Ænema, featuring "Forty Six & 2," will satiate our alternative prog-metal needs just fine.

"Forty Six & 2" is inspired by the Jungian Shadow, referring to the human unconsciousness. Tool also references Jung's idea of gaining two more chromosomes in the next evolutionary stage, hence the title. But more impressively, Tool signified the next evolutionary stage in heavy music, building on Metallica's thrash symphonies, Nine Inch Nails' industrial intimacy, Neurosis' post-metal artistry and the Melvins irreverent unpredictability with their own artistic stamp. Tool may not have evolved since Ænema, but as heard in bands like Gojira, Opeth and Intronaut, they got metal to evolve for them.

Nine Inch Nails at Prudential Center

CMJ hit the New York City area this week, and an abundance of shows, panels, screenings, showcases and industry parties flooded our town. Artists and businessmen of all sorts flocked through, representing all kinds of music, ideas and levels of success. All of them almost certainly had one thing in common: none of them could compare to the show that Nine Inch Nails brought to the Barclays Center and the Prudential Center this week. For all the talents that might have been performing nearby, there was only one genius playing in the city this week.

25 years into one of the most innovative careers in rock music, Trent Reznor, who is as much Nine Inch Nails as Prince Rogers Nelson is Prince, could have filled the arena with a microphone and a karaoke machine. Yet Reznor brings the passion and perfectionism that marks his best studio work onto the stage. Each song got a different light and LED treatment, with mesmerizing patterns guiding us through much of NIN's terrific new album, Hesitation Marks. A blue screen silhouetted the band for "Find My Way," magnifying Reznor's two-handed microphone tricks and guitarist Robin Finck's guitar god strutting. Strobe lights underscored the intensity of "Copy of A" and "Somewhat Damaged," perfectly supplementing a band that made the most abrasive dance music known to humanity.

Of course anyone with the right budget could afford a light show, but Reznor takes it to another level. For another band, it would have been distracting, either bogging down the pacing or an obvious distraction from inferior songs. Artists like Tool and Rob Zombie have extraordinary light shows, but both employ them at the cost of spontaneity, playing identical shows each night to stay in line with the mechanics. But Nine Inch Nails played a rock show, changing up the setlist, swinging their instruments and blowing through every song with a forcefulness that no machine could match. A pair of female backup singers, including Lisa Fischer from the Rolling Stones, gave NIN's music an R&B swing that worked shockingly well, revealing Reznor's funk sensibilities in the new "Satellite" and the underrated "Into the Void," wherein when Reznor traded stanzas with Fischer like an industrial Mick Jagger and Merry Clayton. At 48, Reznor is still unearthing his talents as an arranger.

But even if he weren't the composer, programmer and producer of every Nine Inch Nails record, Reznor would have been a rock star. Grappling the microphone and hurtling himself toward the crowd, he's a ferocious lead singer, bellowing stories of pain and hatred that transcend the adolescence that he wrote them in. Whether or not he's outgrown the lyrics to "Wish" or "March of the Pigs," Reznor understands that those feelings still matter to a lot of people, and he expresses them beautifully enough for us to keep coming back. By the time he finished "Head Like a Hole," with blazing searchlights dying down for a huge LED screen with the NIN logo, there was no doubt that Reznor's talents as a performer are in a league with his studio wizardry.

For the encore, Reznor introduced the band (it was his first banter of the evening) and treated us to a few more songs, including "Echoplex" and Hesitation Marks standout "While I'm Still Here," the latter including the first-ever saxophone on an NIN record. But best of all were "I'm Afraid of Americans" and the closing song "Hurt," two drastically different compositions that gave two legendary artists (David Bowie and Johnny Cash, respectively) late career comebacks. One could take it as a pat on Reznor's back, or even a reminder that he doesn't need any guest songwriters or producers as he nears 50. Those of us in attendance saw that, like Cash and Bowie, Reznor deserves to be held in the highest regard for the way he's reshaped modern music.

Openers Godspeed You Black Emperor played just one song, the perfectly-named "Behemoth," a droning, 45-minute song that has not yet appeared on an album. Their performance may not have won them any new fans, but it was an appropriate gesture for a band that recently made a mockery of their Polaris Prize and once trashed Radiohead for being "owned...by a gigantic multinational corporation."

Dissidents

How does one make a political metal mix for someone who already has "War Pigs," "Peace Sells," "Cult of Personality" and "Bring the Noise?"



Dissidents

1. Metallica, "Blackened"
2. System of a Down, "B.Y.O.B."
3. Faith No More, "We Care a Lot"
4. Living Colour, "Pride"
5. Guns N' Roses, "Civil War"
6. Suicidal Tendencies, "Send Me Your Money"
7. Marilyn Manson, "The Love Song"
8. Saul Williams, "List of Demands (Reparations)"
9. Lamb of God, "As the Palaces Burn"
10. Revocation, "Pestilence Reigns"
11. Megadeth, "Symphony of Destruction"
12. Ministry, "Thieves"
13. Gojira, "Vacuity"
14. Motörhead, "God Save the Queen"
15. Sepultura, "Kaiowas"
16. Rage Against the Machine, "Wake Up"
17. Body Count, "Cop Killer"
18. Misery Index, "Traitors"

Answer: It's hard, but not for lack of songs. How to pick just one selection from Rage Against the Machine or System of a Down? Is Tool's "Ænima" political enough? Is Saul Williams' "List of Demands (Reparations)" metal enough? There are already enough political metal mixes, with names like Psalm 69 and As the Palaces Burn. How can anything compete with those?

I ended up pulling up a little from everything. This is for someone who probably agrees with Cattle Decapitation philosophically if not melodically, so I'm throwing down the biggest metal trump cards. I picked "Blackened" over the other ...And Justice for All contenders by virtue of the fact that it rocks the hardest, and "Symphony of Destruction" for not having a verse about the Punisher, plus being still sadly relevant in an era of Morsis and Putins. Sepultura's "Kaiowas" landed here for proving that a metal band didn't need amps, or even lyrics, to send a message about forced evictions of natives in Brazil. I also dug up "We Care a Lot" from Faith No More's pre-Mike Patton days, a gleefully incisive takedown of the Live Aid and "We Are the World" celebrities which I'd still pit against anything Bono and Bob Geldof are doing today. I'll add that "We Care a Lot" predated The Book of Mormon ("I am Africa") and Get Him to the Greek ("African Child (Trapped in Me)") by at least 20 years.

More recently, the Political Metal flag has been raised by French progressive environmetalists (sic) Gojira and relentlessly confrontational deathgrinders Misery Index, the latter of whom earn the Thomas Paine and John Brown references on "Traitors" by being one of the only metal bands to put as much care into their lyrics as their music. But my favorite is Revocation, whom match their politically-charged lyrics (they recently debuted a song called "Fracked") with the most sophisticated metal that these ears have found over the past few years. "Pestilence Reigns," a chilling depiction of air raids, solves all of my problems with neo-thrash and technical death metal, giving the former a death metal makeover and the later a sense of songwriting direction.

Finally, I couldn't put together a political metal mix without including the most controversial metal single of all time. If you haven't heard it, that's because it's been banned from CD release since 1992.

Sambo Ray, Jr.

I see so many re-imaginings of metal songs going around online that I barely think to post any of them anymore. However, Sambo Ray, Jr., also known as Sam Westphalen, has uploaded some amazing one-man covers of iconic metal songs. It's billed as "guitar percussion," but fails to mention that he actually plays both--guitar and percussion, with lots of slapping and hammer-ons--at the same time, with just two hands. I've never heard anything like this. If I ever saw him busking, I'd probably miss my train.

Pantera, "Mouth for War"



Slayer, "Seasons in the Abyss"


Tool, "Lateralus"

James Hetfield's Instagram Account

Were I ever to join Instagram, the first account that I'd follow would be James Hetfield's, which he runs under the username papa_het_. It almost feels like a parody account (see PrinceTweets2U or ElBloombito), yet it's actually too goofy to not really be him. Keeping in line with his status as metal's least self-conscious frontman, James comes out as a middle-aged dad who just discovered photoshop and hashtagging, loves cars and guitars, tries to draw like Ralph Steadman and still thinks that adding letters to street signs with a sharpie is hilarious. He also makes faces that almost certainly humiliate his kids.

The gangly, leering adolescent on the back of Kill 'Em All would probably have been appalled by these pictures, but it's hard to not take pleasure in seeing him so happy. I usually like to know less about my rock stars' personal lives, and the ones who keep themselves shrouded in mystery are usually applauded for doing so (Axl Rose, Tool, Ghost). But looking over Hetfield's Instagram makes me like him even more.

Met Oliver and mom. 'Make a wish' / 'Starlight' from UK here at Orion. #mff #IronMaidenLegs #metallicaFamily #orionmusicandmore

 #finderskeepers #orionmusicandmore #mff
 

Karma! In my next life! #ThatsOneUglyCat #mff #wtf #AtLeastiCanLickMyOwnBallz

Het kidz and friendz unleashing a traditional TPing of a friendz house who just graduated high skool. #mff #Over100RollsServed #MomWillBeSoMad #MeOnCopWatch

Inking yesterday. After doing this It made me realized how any injury that's happened to me has been on my left side. #mff #motorbreathgallery #PapaInk

R. I. P. Jeff Hanneman #mff #StunnedAndSpeachless #Slayer #big4 #MetalBrother

Til next time Abu Dhabi / Dubai. #SoLongCamelToe #HadAblast #SendMySpeedingTicketsToLarsHouse

  
Face the Face that should not be! #FacePracticeForTour #BrrrEeeeaafffvvvvrrYeahea

Halloween 2009 blues brotherz. Me and Great friend Jim Breuer. Guess what's in the briefcase. #throwbackthurz #breuer #bluesBrothers #WutsInTheBriefcase

  
Captain Crunch inda howse! #letTheCrunchBegin #StupidStuff #wtf #StopThisAndGetWritingNewSongs

 James Blart , Mall Cop #dork

Papa Met wants YOU #tallica #photoshopboredom

 'The Mad Sharpie' strikes again #defacepublicproperty #art

 The 'Mad Sharpie' strikes again! #HQ #2tonBalls

Damn kidz! #SuckaPunched #NoRespect

Heavy Meddle

Like a lot of males, I was fascinated with Pink Floyd throughout middle school and high school. The Dark Side of the Moon, The Wall and Wish You Were Here were all beautiful and profound to me. But listening now, they sound thoroughly adolescent, and not in a cool, AC/DC-like way. It's more like a high budget version of the kind of well-meaning but self-serious art that you'd see in a high school talent show.

   

When people compare Pink Floyd to bands like Radiohead or Tool, I can only think that it's because they're both weird and arena-famous at the same time. When people compare Floyd to Porcupine Tree or Dream Theater, I can only think that it's because they're both boring. For lack of a better term, most of their songs leave me comfortably numb.

But listening to Dub Side of the Moon, the audacious Pink Floyd reggae tribute album that's somehow more enjoyable than most Pink Floyd or reggae, I was reminded that Floyd have some lovely songs. It's not really their music that I have a problem with--it's their heavy-handed delivery. Roger Waters compared himself to Picasso in Rolling Stone a few years ago, but anyone who'd ever made it to side four of The Wall could already tell he had an astronomical ego that his talents didn't quite live up to. Yet when removed of his band's self-importance and wankery, Pink Floyd's songs lend themselves well to interpretation. 

1. Voivod, "Astronomy Domine"

Pink Floyd got bigger without Syd Barrett, but they never released anything better than Piper at the Gates of Dawn, their 1967 garage-psych debut. The world was still catching up to it in 1989, when Voivod dropped Nothingface and crashed Headbanger's Ball with their version of "Astronomy Domine." I think Voivod's is more haunting than the original--playing the chorus melody on guitar instead of keyboards was a good idea, as was getting rid of the space rock sound effects. Had it not been for this song, Elektra Records might have never taken a chance on Kyuss.

2. Alice Cooper, "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)" 

I'll take Alice Cooper's anti-school anthem over Pink Floyd's any day of the week--it's easier make the case that you don't like school when you don't sound like a child pretending to be an adult. But on his recent tours, Cooper's been slyly acknowledging his own influence on Floyd by quoting "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)" at the end of "School's Out." It's amazing how much a little verve and humor transforms that song. There's not an HD version online, but the thrill of Alice's show could even come through on a shaky cell phone video.

 

3. Guns N' Roses, "Mother"

Like "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)," "Mother" is best heard in a small dose, out of context. I usually can't sit through it's overwrought lyrics, or David Gilmour's schmaltzy solo, but the melody is actually quite sweet, proven by the sparse, minute-long reading that Axl and Slash gave it near the end of their Use Your Illusion II video from the Tokyo Dome. Subtlety is not something that one usually equates with Guns N' Roses, but "Mother" proves that when called to the task, they delivered.

 

Four Good Omens for 2013

New Intronaut:

So what if The Mars Volta broke up and the new Tool got delayed again? Intronaut is making the catchiest, most addictive prog-metal in the universe, as the intoxicating rhythms of "Milk Leg" demonstrate. You'll read about this one on Pitchfork--say goodbye to one of metal's best kept secrets.

New Kvelertak:

From Motörhead to Discharge, the best-punk metal bands have a way to make the same songs sound fresh album after album. The first single from Kvelertak's newest is exactly the kind of fist-pumping slice of shoutalong thrash that you heard on Kvelertak, but producer Kurt Ballou has me hoping that this one will be even better.



New Megadeth:

Dave Mustaine may be an insufferable lunatic, but I love the way his slide guitar plays over what sounds like a banjo(!?) in this preview clip.



New Nails:

Where did these guys come from? Apparently Kurt Ballou has been producing them also, but the black metalcore riff-fest that they're calling "God's Cold Hands" in the first that I've heard of them. Can't wait to hear the rest on Abandon All Life.

Song of the Day: Rage Against the Machine, "Know Your Enemy"

This week, VP hopeful (not Origin guitarist) Paul Ryan turned a few extra heads when he expressed an appreciation for Rage Against the Machine. It doesn't sound quite as strange when you remind yourself that Ryan was 22 when "Killing in the Name" dropped, but the ideological contrast between the most outspokenly left wing rock band on the planet and a man who claims that Ayn Rand inspired him to get into public service is still fun to look at.

"Paul Ryan's love of Rage Against the Machine is amusing, because he is the embodiment of the machine that our music has been raging against for two decades," guitarist Tom Morello recently wrote in Rolling Stone. "He can like whatever bands he wants, but his guiding vision of shifting revenue more radically to the one percent is antithetical to the message of Rage."

Morello continues, "Don't mistake me, I clearly see that Ryan has a whole lotta 'rage' in him: A rage against women, a rage against immigrants, a rage against workers, a rage against gays, a rage against the poor, a rage against the environment. Basically the only thing he's not raging against is the privileged elite he's groveling in front of for campaign contributions."

In honor of Paul Ryan's commendable musical taste and abhorrent policies, here is Rage Against the Machine's "Know Your Enemy." That's Tool's Maynard James Keenan singing and Jane's Addiction's Stephen Perkins drumming on the bridge.



Nobody literally puts the pedal to the metal like Tom Morello. His riffs are pretty straightforward (in fact, this one sounds a little like Edgar Winter's "Frankenstein,") but his brilliance lies in his limb-like effects. I'm also sold on Zack De La Rocha's spitfire delivery, if not his claim that hypocrisy and brutality are American dreams. But when the music is this great I can overlook disagreeable messages. Kind of like Paul Ryan.

California Metal

My sister is moving to California this month, and I agreed to make her a corresponding mix CD. This was before I realized that there are a lot of songs about California. I figured that I'd work things out simply by not including any bad California songs, but I'm still struggling to cut down 40 or so great tracks into an 80-minute CD.

Some outtakes:

The Dillinger Escape Plan with Mike Patton, "Hollywood Squares"

Two of the most idiosyncratic artists in metal bring out the best in each other, taking noise and melody to parts unknown.



Tool, "Ænima"

A 12/8 finger extended to L.A. gangbangers, scientologists and folks who don't believe in climate change. The weirdest song to ever win a Grammy.



Public Enemy, "Burn Hollywood Burn"

Metal by association. Dig Flavor Flav dropping punchlines before he became one--the Driving Miss Daisy reaction still makes me smile.



Guns N' Roses, "Move to the City"

In title alone is this appropriate for my baby sister.



Guns N' Roses, "Paradise City"

As grand a statement as ever recorded, but not the GNR song I'm picking for the mix.



Soundgarden, "Outshined"

These days, Chris is probably looking Minnesota and feeling California.



Kid Rock, "Cowboy"

I love this song. My sister, like most intellectuals, does not.