Although the metal world has somewhat opened up to newcomers and outsiders over the last decade, for most of its existence, the subculture was gate-kept by self-appointed arbiters of “real metal” and “true fans.” These Comic Book Guys in jean jackets wanted to keep their fandom pure, which usually meant they only wanted to surround […]
FOUR PILLARS OF A ROCK BAND: SONGS: The best shows fade into memory, but the records are here for the long haul. Chuck Berry is “Maybelline.” The Beatles are “She Loves You.” Amy Winehouse is “Rehab.” To this day, Foreigner tours, even though its guitarist is the sole remaining member of the band (and […]
One hour. One song. This album had to happen someday and it was probably going to be made by a band whose members regularly smoked a metric shit ton of weed. Sleep’s Dopesmoker probably isn’t the most famous stoner/doom metal album. (That’s probably Electric Wizard’s Dopethrone.) And they didn’t originate the genre. (That would probably […]
It’s the 20th year anniversary of this album, which means that for some reason there are a couple appreciations of it appearing in the music press. I find this interesting, because Sonic Nurse is not exactly a landmark album. It’s not Sonic Youth’s so-called “return to form” like 2002’s Murray Street, or the final album […]
Welcome to Metal Mondays, Wagner. This one’s for you because it has a million notes played really fast. According to The Onion, we should just give up on this art thing all together because Megadeth already created Rust in Peace. https://www.theonion.com/humanity-still-producing-new-art-as-though-megadeth-s-1819578062 I won’t go that far, but I do feel that Rust In […]
Okay, last Steve Albini album for a while. It’s probably the most famous Albini-produced album. It’s probably one the most famous rock albums of the last 30 years. Oops, it’s actually over 30 years old. Albini, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic sat down with Conan O’Brien to talk about its production last year. That means […]
If you’re into extreme music or movies or artwork, eventually you will ask: how far does it go? Where’s the edge? At what point will the work I’m consuming make me want to barf? You may freeze frame the camera going into Drew Barrymore’s intestines in Scream, you may seek out Martyrs and Faces of […]
Happy Wednesday. Another Albini pick. Released two years before the decade began, Surfer Rosa is the foundation of 1990s alternative rock. It has the loud/quiet/loud, it has girl/boy vocals, it has weird songs with weird structures and weird chord progressions, and yet, it’s all very poppy. When a record exec tried to get Frank Black […]
Hardcore punk and metal have been kissing cousins since the 1980s, although their provincial fan bases hate each other. Luckily musicians themselves aren’t so close-minded, which is how we’ve got the whole genre of extreme music, which includes the most straight up fusion of the two, metalcore. I think drummers are tuned to love metalcore. […]
Three things: 1.) I’m a day late, apologies, 2.) Albini Month continues, 3.) normally these albums have at least some relationship to Heck Reckoner’s music, and this just ain’t the case today. The Magnolia Electric Co. is a country album (or “alt-country” whatever that means) and it’s the perfect example of how a band (and […]