Queen Nothing

Apologies for the delay, but I dedicated a fair bit of time to responding to a critique of my Bullet For My Valentine article from March last year by someone who missed the point and wanted us to all hold hands and drift off into the coma of mediocrity…
It took two comments to contain my response.

Anyway, The Queen is dead, long live Metallica.

That is essentially the message sent out by the British rock festival going set this summer. Queen, the Saturday night headline act announced on it's website that, with regret, Sonisphere UK 2012 had been cancelled.
The fact that the announcement has since disappeared means nothing, the damage one feels, has been done - especially as it was blasted all over Radio One the next morning.
Last month the internet whispers that had been rumbling suddenly exploded into force, suggesting there would be an announcement to the fact.

Whilst I thought that this years Sonisphere was largely awful and have spent the month in relative poverty having forked out an arm, a leg and promised first born children to the expensive hiking weekend that is Download, it is still a blow for the UK festival scene to lose what has genuinely been welcome competition to Live Nation's annual band ransom.

Download started in 2003, rebooting the old Monsters Of Rock festival into a slick 3 day summer jaunt that allowed interactivity, multiple stages and a chance to grab some of that Reading festival type camping experience for fans of harder edged music.
Sure Monsters Of Rock used to have camping, but it was all the type of thing with Pig's heads, compulsory beer drinking, park anywhere, please yourself, no health and safety officials in sight... you know, fun.
This at least would yank Neanderthal metal fans into a slicker, more savvy, technologically inclined era. And there would be showers too so you wouldn't be a filthy greebo all weekend. Unless you wanted to.
All good (clean) santised fun.

To be honest it wasn't bad actually, weekend ticket, plus camping and car park came to around £100, Maiden headlined the Saturday, Metallica played a secret show on the Sunday and Audioslave closed out the weekend having had Limp Wristed pull out in the weeks running up to it.
Having made such a success of it Download announced it had a five year plan to become the biggest rock festival in Europe and set about expanding and adding twists.
Like all things the beauty of that first year was lost a little along the way. The charm of being on the old MoR stomping ground, nestled within the track of the hallowed Donington race track eventually had to be moved due to size restrictions, the cash bars disappeared to be replaced by a godawful voucher system and then of course there was the price.
This year my Download ticket (plus early bird entry, plus car parking, plus booking fee, plus random shirt from back fee and postage) came to a wopping £218.95. That's more than doubled in ten festivals.
Given that wages haven't and we are currently in the middle of a global recession, Live Nation are still not afraid to bend you over without any lube.



Conversely the guy who pioneered Download was sacked after 2005 as the festival started to turn the screws on the fans, get bigger, moving the site and for some reason decide that every element of the place needed to be a fourty-five minute walk from everything.
Car park to campsite - 45 mins.
Campsite to village - 45 mins.
Village to arena - 45 mins
(based on drunk 2010 figures)
Last time out it was quicker to exit the arena via the carp park to get back to the campsite.

Anyway so having been unceremoniously removed from Live Nation's payroll the guy, let's call him Stuart cos that's his name, who pioneered the resurgent Download along side Andy Copping thought he would start his own venture and sure enough Kilimanjaro was born.
2009 saw the sleek Sonisphere festival announced featuring the incredible line up of Metallica, Linkin Park, Machine Head, Nine Inch Nails, Jane's Addiction, Lamb Of God, Heaven & Hell, Alice In Chains, Anthrax (with John Bush) and a whole load of other bands...
To be honest if it wasn't for Faith No More and a few others Download couldn't hold a candle to it.

The next year I went to both (a tres expensive summer...) and the comparison was huge.
Not only were the tickets affordable, but the site and numbers were smaller, there were cash bars (so you don't get stuck with £13.75 worth of unusable card at the end of the festival like my good self...) and you could leave the campsite and be at the main stage in less than a year.
And Maiden headlined.
Also it was staggered so you could see all the bands on the main two stages - a novelty compared to Download with it's millions of line up clashes.
In short Sonisphere 2010 was probably the best festival experience (for bands and facilities) since I used to go to Reading or the very first Downloads, not to mention that the staff didn't treat you like a cunt despite the hefty price you paid to be there.
I was actually moved enough to write a letter of thanks.
I shit you not.

Last year I opted out of the whole thing due to investing in bricks and mortar, but another strong line up between both - Download had 30 bands I wanted to see, Sonisphere 23... something like that. The Voice of Doom, my companion from 2010 went and said it was exactly the same. Same, friendly, reasonably priced, quality weekend and was pining his hopes that Machine Head would headline so we could all go back this year.

Last year whilst performing a post-mortem on a car crash I expressed how underwhelmed I was by Download
As time has worn on the Midlands festival has strengthened sufficiently that I have bought my ticket and Machine Head are on the bill.
The fact they are under The Prodigy and contractually positioned Chase & Status is an issue that I won't start ranting about here.
Sonisphere didn't make an announcement until February and finally proclaimed Kiss, Faith No More and Queen featuring Adam Lambert as headliners.
If I thought Download was uninspiring then this was completely disinteresting.



Faith No More I love, but they have been working the nostalgia circuit since reforming, with no intention of doing anything new and deep down you know they hate each other, besides much as the first return from absence was welcome, now this slick cash grab on the lucrative festival scene is a kin to watching the Star Wars re-edits with your young cousin... you feel you should keep quiet so they can enjoy the unique experience, but the grinding erosion and sullying of the things you loved as a youngster makes the thought of them liking this... facsimile of a band that you realise you have bitten half through your tongue so now you are bloodied, angry and in pain.

Kiss have never been embraced here by us cynical Brits, unlike our cousins from over the pond who go giddy for four dudes in make up playing average rock and roll. Having sort of seen them in 2008 I thought they'd died in an explosion, but it turns out that was just the climatic pyro.

And as for Queen being fronted by the runner up of a karaoke competition... well, in the words of Bunk from The Wire, shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.
Now I don't like Queen particularly due to being force fed them as a child, but even I have to feel for fans of the band, for fans of music.
Who the fuck is Adam Lambert to be fronting Queen?
I'd have stayed away on principle.
Having logged on this morning and seen Queen announce four dates across the UK including one in July in London to make it up to the five people who bought Sonisphere tickets to see the Mercury-less May and Rogers flog the legacy in the way that they claimed alllllll the way in the early nineties they would never do.
My betting is that these shows will sell out, proving that this was a horrendous decision by Kilamanjaro to book them as clearly they are a band for people who are happy for a bit of souless entertainment rather than your average festival going rock fan.
I mean the Queen musical written by Ben Elton probably (like Ben Elton himself) sells out on a fairly regular basis... but that doesn't mean your die hard festival going metal/rock fan is going to accept bands of this nature clogging up the bill.

What it does highlight is the same drum I have been banging for a while.
Headliners.
With Maiden restricting their appearances to more strategic opportunities to maximise their appeal I genuinely think Sonisphere struggled to get a big name draw this year.
With Download popping out of the blocks with a sackful of cash and a setlist Metallica committed to Donington and fair enough - they haven't played their since 2006 when they did all of Master Of Puppets *grinds teeth at absence due to being on the honeymoon of a short lived marriage*.
But they have been back to the UK approximately a million times since then doing their own festival show at Wembly, at least two legs of the Death Cliptatsic tour Sonisphere, Reading, Sonisphere again and now back to Download.
Even my bosses daughter who is a child said to me the other day it would be nice to go to a festival and NOT have Metallica headline.
So who else is there?
I could use this opportunity to bemoan Machine Head's lack of opportunity, but instead point out that the downturn in the nineties and subsequent splits of bands like FNM, Soundgarden, Rage, Stone Temple Pilots, the death of Layne Stayley even the suicide of Cobain seems to have derailed an entire generation of bands.
Sure they are back now and capable of headlining, but it feels a little forced.
Couple that with Korn's pitiful output, the demise of Pantera, the directionless joke that Linkin Park have become, Sepultura and Max splitting and the crumbling of the recording industry as a money making business and there is a huge hole where bands making the stratospheric leap to global headliner should be.
That and as I pointed out to my critical friend some of them just aren't that good.

As we know, metal will survive but the question is will Sonisphere?
As the mad scramble for paying gigs begins from bands who have already booked flights and itineraries over here (Skindred confirmed for Download last week) you have to wonder how many will look to booking a festival that has struggled quite so soon after it's inception and possibly left many out of pocket and a hole in their plans.

It would personally be a sad day to lose Sonisphere as it is infinitely the better festival, with the right ethos, not mention it's existence will force Live Nation to stay competitive, but for fucks sake Kilimanjaro remember who your fucking audience are and book better bands.

On a side note I have actually been to two great gigs on the relative doorstep of Bristol.
Over the Bank Holiday weekend I had the pleasure of seeing Slabdragger, Dopefight, Grifter, Church Of Misery and Orange Goblin in my old stompin ground of the Fleece and last week took in the Jagermiester Tour at the O2 Arena featuring Turbowolf, Black Spiders, Therapy? and Skindred which was fucking excellent and at £5 the bargain of the year.

The Good, The Bad & The Ugly 2011

When all is said and done this is a time of year when people get demotivated.

You have a million and one things to do, apparently a need to catch up with a million and one people for no other reason than Coke-a-Cola adverts on TV, the need to boost the economy by spending all your money on other people and gorge yourself on fattening foods and liver threatening beverages and all of these in turn for the sake of the mythical birthday of a guy who would be nailed to a tree at 33 years old for saying what a good idea it would be to be nice to everyone (thank you Douglas Adams - gone but not forgotten).

That's right Christmas is upon us, the house is full of tinfoil, fake German trees, the little lady is telling me to stop being a grumpy cunt (well that's just normal to be fair) and across the land magazine staff do that thing where they fill their product with lists to distract from the fact they can't be arsed to do any work.

Here at History Towers we are no different really... I look back on the year and think 'Man, only one thing pissed me off in November?' well of course it didn't, loads did, but that's another story... anyway, back to the plot. Now that the door has slammed shut on metal releases worth talking about I'm going to tell you about the albums that have made an impact here this year. I have tried to narrow my list down to the top, er under ten, best, worst and not necessarily either of 2011.

Anyway before we get down to final lists there are a few worth mentioning that edge outside of the final er, inconsistent number.

British Metal had a reasonable year, Architects disappeared off to America and continued adding melodies to their Baby Johnny Truant sound with January's The Here & Now. Son of The Air Raid Siren, baby Dickinson's band Rise To Remain released the metalcore City Of Vultures which won them fans aplenty (although in my house he is not a patch on his father); Technical Djent merchants Tesseract released the dizzying One and ragga-metal favourites Skindred released the entertaining but not ground breaking Union Black... still it is a lot of fun.

Elsewhere Morbid Angel alienated their fan base with a bizarrely industrial flavoured effort, Chimaira returned with Age Of Hell - their best effort in years, Opeth released Heritage but the thought of listening to it bores me, Alice Cooper got round to releasing Welcome 2 My Nightmare which is actually a great classic rock album and nowhere near as bad as it sounds. Former Skid Row squealer Seb Bach released Kicking & Screaming which serves as a reminder that, before he was using his mouth as Axl Rose's bidet, the guy could, on his day, kick the fat Ginger fuck up and down the stage vocally, Jane's Addiction returned with the above average 'Great Escape Artist', Al Jourgensen decided he couldn't live without Ministry and started to record 'Relapse' whilst finally releasing the crazy Buck Satan project (which has arrived after the cut off date) and lastly my chance to rip into MegaDave some more was denied when the 'Deth boys turned in Th1rt3en and it was actually alright...

So to the nitty gritty of my year.

The Ugly

6. In at six is the mighty Mastodon. A confusing band who one moment have this brutal punk vibe going for them, the next they are all clever and prog with too many notes and time signatures going on.


Having released the challenging and in part incredible Crack The Skye album in 2009 they stripped their sound back down and went balls out for The Hunter. Somewhat of an enigma that to me their more accessible release was harder to listen to. Less refined and a return to the uncompromising sounds of their earlier releases this is an album I will file under 'needs more time'.

5. As I have previously indicated I placed a great deal of expectation on the shoulders of Unearth this time out as I felt that since the Oncoming Storm they have been dependable, but not kicked on. III: In The Eyes Of Fire and The March were good, but more of the same, perhaps not as good.


Armed with Killswitch jackass Adam D behind the studio desk once more and Killswitch drummer Foley I felt this time could be something special for the Massachusetts metalcore crew. Sadly I am left feeling a little short changed and this is in part due to the introduction of clean vocals which smacks of an attempt to widen their audience. There is no shame in this, and it's not bad, just not the world beater I hoped for.

4. Another metalcore forerunner As I Lay Dying followed up their acclaimed 2009 album The Powerless Rise with a 'ten year celebratory special EP' Decas, which smacked of fulfilling contractual obligations.


Consisting of 3 new songs, a handful of covers - including heavy weights Judas Priest and Slayer as well as several remixes of their own earlier material, it is as hit and miss as it sounds. The new songs are strong and follow on where they previously left off, the covers are entertaining if not fairly pointless and redundant and the dance remixes are well, just fairly pointless and redundant.

Don't get me wrong I love AILD, I have listened to this a fair bit considering the sum of it's parts... But I just can't see the point in it.

3. I wrote about Emmure's Speaker Of The Dead earlier this year so I won't labour the point... it is lumpen and as musically dumb as the proverbial bag of hammers.


And hammers are a good analogy really; harking back to Douglas Adams - he described the drink The Pangalatic Gargle Blaster as being hit in the head by a gold brick wrapped in a slice of lemon... Well, substitute the lemon for a blunt paper, exchange the gold brick for a sack of Go-Bots, broken Transformers, Brass knuckles, a couple of Nintendo cartridge games and some bling and you'll probably still be nowhere near the effect.

The very essence of ugly, yet I have found myself compelled to listen to it.

2. This year also saw the return of Five Finger Death Punch. Promising harder, heavier, more melodic, more cowbell and more kitchen sink than ever before, the 'Death Punk' crew rolled over the airwaves with American Capitalist and you know what? They were right. Like a huge big, dumb, awful, brain melting cartoon with a massive side helping of cheese, they are fast food, low brow, quick fix and most of all fun.


I fucking love them, yes they are AWFUL, seriously bad at times but Evan Moody has a great voice and Zoltan Bathory is a great guitar player - they are the perfect 3.30pm festival band and this is their latest instalment, it's probably the weakest of the three so far, but it's not not even important at this point.

1. What is the ugliest record I heard all year?

Actually to phrase that better what is the ugliest record I have heard this year that doesn't fall into the worst album category?


Earlier in the year I wrote a lengthy rant about the ridiculousness of Limp Bizkit's 'Golden Cobra' even going as far as to dub it 'Golden Shower' but on reflection as the year draws to a close there are a couple of reasons I can't place it in the 'worst album' category.

i) As retarded as they are, they are great live entertainment. Durst is a shit lyricist, but a great frontman.

ii) They are self aware - they know how shit they are, but every now and then Borland and Otto let rip with these musical interludes that say, we only write this cos you people buy it.

iii) They are crap, they always have been crap. If you listen to it expecting genius, then you are a bigger idiot than Bizkit's frontman.

I hate them, yet I can't honestly sit here and tell you it deserves to be in the worst album category, because it never stood a chance of being in the best one.

Make of this what you want, but Golden Cobra is definitely the ugliest thing I have heard all year...

The Bad

5. I'll put my hands up on this one. It's a 2010 release, not 2011.

Sure there are some awful records that have assaulted my ears this year, but I thought it was incredibly mean spirited to sling Golden Cobra into the top 5 worst albums I have heard this year as in truth it would be like pointing out the defects in Li-Lo's Photoshopped Playboy shoot.


However I heard earlier this year Bring Me The Horizon's 2010 'There Is A Hell, Believe Me I've Seen It, If There Is A Heaven, Let's Keep It A Secret'. Not only does this win the most retarded title award, but is in actual fact, 100% ear cancer. Devoid of anything remotely endearing the band, who also are strong candidates for shittest name to come out of the Random Emo Name Generator, have had a busy year fighting with their own audiences and being universally booed across Europe supporting Machine Head.

The worst thing was I only found out they were British the other week. They achieve the less than glowing compliment of making Parkway fucking Drive sound good.

Fuck this band and their douchebag front man, I boycotted Machine Head thanks to you and fucking Devildriver; if your music was a living entity I would shoot it in the genitals to stop it spreading. Just about the worst thing I have heard this year.

4. Annnnnd back to to the present....

It is sad to say that I have to finally give in and admit defeat with In Flames. Once proud pioneers of The Gothenburg Sound (Melodic Death Metal to you and I) who seemed to be clawing back a little bit of credibility, this years awfully titled 'Sounds Of A Playground Fading' managed the dubious achievement of making everything they have released since 2000's fan dividing 'Re-route To Remain' sound interesting and cutting edge.


Essentially there is little wrong with what is on the disc - trademark In Flames riffs, moany lyrics, fast solos... all check but the fact is it is so incredibly stock and fucking boring that I would rather they just hadn't bothered.

Honestly no matter how many spins I have given it I don't think I could pick a song out if it set itself on fire and ran around my living room.

No one expects this band to rewrite Jester Race, but when this isn't even as good as Come Clarity you have to wonder if this once great band have over stayed their welcome.

3. Once upon a time there was a band called Anthrax... stop me if you've heard this one before... oh you have? 3 Singers and the fact they settled on the one most likely to earn them the quick cash on the back of The Big Four tours rather than the one that would have them make the best music?

That's right.


In essence a lot of people are/will be very happy with Worship Music, that's the truth of the matter. It sounds like a very eighties 'Thrax album, albeit in an extremely contrived way. Skeletor sounds the same as ever (by which I mean he sounds like he did on Among The Living, but I would rather he sounded like John Bush), the music is, well it's like a nostalgia trip back to the golden age of youth... although imagine when you got up close to the Delorian you lovingly remembered without the rose tinted specs on you saw it was a bit plasticy, a bit naff looking and cheap... and it handles like a cow.

That is the Anthrax album I heard.

Horrendous lyrics like Judas Priest (not about the band), Fight Em Til You Die etc, music that sounds overdone and a bit forced, but the worst thing for me is that Anthrax progressed during the Bush era, pushed themselves - like they did back in the real eighties probably to their career detriment - and here they sound like they have gone backwards and produced someones idea of a classic era Anthrax album...

Of course they have, they made my mate The Boy Tuesday's idea of a classic Anthrax album - he loves it, but then he thinks music died with The Black album.

Mind you this is the same guy who is now excited by Metallica playing Download... and he hates that album, go figure.

However if I wanted to listen to yesteryear Anthrax I'd have gotten in my time machine and revved it up to 88mph.

2. From the dated to the contemporary there is one thing consistent, some people make dreadful music in the name of progress. Now I am probably going to be labelled small minded or a hater for this but crashing into the top five for the second year running is the latest Korn coaster, this time entitled 'The Path Of Totality'.


Here the Bakersfield crew have updated their dated nineties sound to a more modern Dubstep influenced sound. Yes that's right folks, coming straight outta South London in 1998 the latest dance trend has taken until recently to break through into the mainstream. Despite a favourable reception to III: Remember Who You Are apparently Fat Mexican Pimp-a-like Jon Davies has been DJing a lot recently and has gotten into Dubstep and so off they go again in another attempt to stay relevant, collaborating with all manner of bad dance music producing nerks to make this shambles of an album.

Now I know I should in reality commend them for actually taking a risk and trying to evolve, but fuck me, Dubstep is bad enough on it's own and Korn are bad enough on their own, together it's like a bunch of children let lose on Garage Band or something... I like dance, I like industrial, Prodigy's cover of L7's Fuel My Fire s awesome, this sounds like an annoying console game soundtrack with a millionaire still bleating and whinging over the top.

Call me close minded, but I tell you I still listen to Fear Factory's Remanufacture and even now it's great, this however is just bollocks.

1. So have you guessed it yet?

Honestly if you have needed a hand guessing what has to be the most execrable thing heard all year you must have being living in the same universe where they convinced Korn to write Dubstep. Without a shadow of a doubt by far the biggest piece of shit to be released this year under the banner of music is Lou & Metallica's dismal, dismal collaboration Lulu.


Sure someone is going to tell me it's art, someone is going to tell me it's brave, someone is going to tell me they have always gone against the grain, it's not a proper Metallica album, I don't get it... well you know what?

They can fuck off off as well.

It's rubbish, it's just utter garbage in fact and I fear it is the straw that broke the camel's back for me. When The Boy moans about Metallica selling out with the Black album and he can't listen to them, it makes me laugh - St fucking Anger, Death fucking Cliptastic and now this!

Fuck you Metallica - 20,000 copies sold in a month tells you how bad it is!

I notice now in an attempt to divert attention from this monstrous suckfest you have release the Beyond Magnetic Ep this week - four tracks from the Death Cliptastic sessions, OOOOO thanks guys, four songs you and Rick decided weren't good enough to go on the album, four songs you deemed worse than Redemption & Suicide? My Apocalypse? End Of The Line? The Judas Kiss?

Well fuckin' cheers guys, not only is it bad enough you couldn't be bothered to record and master the last two albums properly, this time it seems you couldn't be bother to write it either, or sing in tune, or play music properly on this one.

And as for Lou Reed... oh fuck it, even Lou Reed fans seem to hate him these days so let's leave him out of it as he clear doesn't know any better, the money making machine that is Metallica's management should have shot everyone involved with this project the moment the demos came in.

Aaaannnnnnyyyyywwwwaaaaayyy!

There has been some good to come out of the year apart from being pushed over the edge by one of my favourite bands and the fact that the longest list on this article is good means that the disappointment has been outweighed by the good (get me all positive!). So without further ado...

The Good

7. In at seven is Jamie Jasta's solo album, the imaginatively titled 'Jasta'.

Again I loved this album so much I was moved to write about it earlier this year, rather than labour the point here in I'll skim briefly so if you want a lengthier dissection have shufty at the article 'Caught Jasta'.


In short this album offered far more depth, melody and song writing nouse than I expected. Sure I was confident it could do aggressive yet uplifting songs and at no point does it disappoint, but the sheer scope of the album was far beyond Hatebreed and had more in common with Kingdom Of Sorrow. The guest slots from Phil Labonte, Randy Blythe, Mark Morton, Tim whatisface from As I Lay Dying, Zakk Myilde may be to boost confidence, and are great but in truth they are not needed as tracks like Set You Adrift and Anthems Of A Freedom Fighter prove. This is an extremely listenable and accomplished album.

6. Named after an Latin oath to tell the truth Sacramento screamers Will Haven dragged themselves Lazarus like back from the brink of whatever happens to cult bands when they falter and fade with this years Voir Dire. Having endured the last, disappointing album with new vocalist/long time friend Jeff Jaworski 'The Heirophant' and it's subsequent tour where frankly I out sung him on classic 'I've Seen My Fate' and no one knew any of the band members they seemingly sunk without a trace.


Following a One Love For Chi benefit gig (being long standing mates of the deftones) it was announced that original vocalist and maths teacher look-a-like Grady Avenell had returned.

In a triumphant celebration of everything great about Will Haven 'Voir Dire' positively smashes it's way out of the speakers, grinding and clawing with revived fury. Not only are the original band members mostly back (although Slipknot's Chris Fehn handles bass duties) but they have rediscovered their fire and drive with Avenell sounding like a bug eyed madman on tracks like 'When The Walls Close In' whilst Jeff Irwin's guitar pummels the senses.

Sonically this sounds like a follow up to their classic 'El Diablo' album but they have enhanced it with a depth and a light and shade that makes it almost melancholy at times, but with Avenell back there is something special about it.

I love this band, and it's great to have them back.

5. Wine making, enigmatic baldy Maynard James Keenan wondered into view, blew effortlessly on his finger nails, look up and said 'What?' as Tool fans everywhere cried out for a new album, but found themselves curious about 'Conditions Of My Parole' the sophomore album from dark, ambient, electro-pop, as easy to describe as it to nail jelly to the wall, bit on the side Puscifer.


Picking up where the previous EPs and album left off this is an exercise in effortless cool from start to finish.

I mean who the hell else can get pouty, rake thin, Resident Evil star Milla Jovovich to sing backing vocals and look at him all googly eyed, professing to be a huge fan whilst he stands there and blows it off like it's nothing? Honestly if the man wasn't a living stone cold genius you'd punch him in the dick for being such a wanker.

Fortunately 'Conditions...' is another hedonistic blend of dark, throbbing sexual undertones, subtle guitars, tripped out electronica and clever lyrical turns; less direct and and amped as the first album, this feels more like the work of a band than a one off side project.

Relaxing and unsettling at the same time, but only criticism here Mr Keenan is that Tool's '10,000 Days' was released in May 2006 which means it will now be at least six years between that and any new releases. This year has seen Justin Chandler playing the National Anthem at a WWE Pay Per View Event, Daney Carey appearing in music magazines hawking his own line of drums, a failed A Perfect Circle reunion, Puscifer live dates and now this. In short thank you for an extremely enjoyable album, but get your fucking ass back where you belong please.

4. Nepotism rules, ask the Redknapps and the Lampards.

As such, here is my full review of the eponymous Grifter album for The Sleeping Shaman.

Grifter

Let me be clear, they aren't here because they are my mates, this isn't to boost their egos because gawd knows they are bad enough already (sorry Ollie couldn't resist), they are here because genuinely I feel they have released one of the best albums I have heard all year and the plethora of great reviews (including 8/10 in Metal Hammer UK) echoes this.


I am so proud knowing how hard the guys work at something they absolutely love that they are finally getting the exposure and credit they deserve.

Catch em on tour with the mighty Orange Goblin next year.

3. Again I seem to be repeating myself a lot this time out, but despite the fact that (as great as they are) Down seem to inhibit great music as much as they make it. By this I mean that Corrosion of Conformity, Crowbar and Eyehategod all suffer from stuttering output due to the demands of the NOLA supergroup, but finally this year Kirk Windstein came home to Crowbar, got off the drugs and cut waaaaaayyyyy back on the booze and made one of his best albums in years in 'Sever The Wicked Hand'.


But as I kicked the ass out of that back in February I invite you to refresh your memory on that entry.

And cos I'm lazy.

2. Getting to the business end now and one of the most welcome and surprsing records of the year has to be The Hymn Of A Broken Man by Times Of Grace.

Yes, who? Quite.


Times Of Grace was the first collaboration between Killswitch Engage's Adam D and former Killswitch singer Jessie Leech since 'Alive Or Just Breathing' - the last time Killswitch were a great band.

The whole album, whether full on raging Metalcore or tender acoustic numbers shows the fantastic chemistry and interplay between the two that is so missed in the sleepwalking by numbers emo dross churned out by Killswitch these days. Written when Adam was laid up in agony awaiting back surgery these tunes plumb dark depths of the human psyche in an elegant and article way that I thought Dutkiewicz had long since forgotten. The emotion weight of this darkness and uplifting parts of The Hymn Of A Broken Man make this a breathless journey from the title track, through Strength In Numbers and The Forgotten One.

This rejuvenation is thanks in large part to Leech, a far superior vocalist compared to his replacement he quite simply shines on this record, clearly relishing the reunion with his old sparring partner. Lavishly accompanied by a DVD of arty videos that compliment the music this is as much a work of art as it is a side project.

Bottom line is that this was released at the start of the year and it has never been far from my ears all year, my biggest regret being that I could not make it to Download to see the band make their UK debut as, unless I am extremely lucky, it is highly unlikely we'll see an album this good from the Killswitch axeman for some time, if ever.

1. So when it comes down to it, what was the best thing I heard all year?

Simply put and without any fucking around, it was Unto The Locust.

I started with doubt and I was blown away.

I didn't think they could innovate, I was wrong.

I have to say I can't stop listening to it, it's fantastic.

I've reviewed it already in October (as I seem to have done with anything worth waxing on about this year) but I stand as much by that opinion now as I did then.

Machine Head are home, go buy this album, make them headliners, give them the chance to continue metal's legacy, a band who are proud to be what they are, who care about their fans, who can make an album sound awesome and above all who want to push the genre to dizzying heights.

In short this album made me excited by music this year and it is a joyous celebration from start to finish.


So barring Buck Satan, that's it for this year unless something happens between now and New Year so I will bid you a Happy New Year and hope 2012 is kinder on all.

Peace and Goodwill to most men....

Selling out for the sucker

I have been building a new kitchen now for what seems like forever. I have been doing it so long it seems to have permeated every aspect of my life (as evidenced here) - granted a lot of this is down to my insistence on largely doing it solo and an anally retentive attention to detail; but last night whilst I was engaged in my latest task my phone rang.
I must have answered in a pretty testy manner as my friend on the other end remarked that it was the sound of a bad day.
In truth it was merely the fact that with DIY there is a process:
Identify job.
Buy materials
Allocate time.
Start task.
At this point something will go wrong due to the seemingly inconsistent nature of walls, doors, floors, materials, instructions, human error etc and that time allocated slips away and suddenly you've spent the whole day producing the sum total of fuck all but a headache and a bad mood. I went from being super smug and ahead of schedule the day before to cursing injustice and screaming at now being behind schedule over something simple.
So in this mood I answered the phone (Sorry c.).

Anyway the point of my good friend phoning was to float the idea of possibly taking  the idea of educating pork, sorry The Masses, onto a radio platform due to the local radio crying out for a midweek late night rock slot. 
Rather than the 'play this contemporary shit' stance of say a Friday nigh slot (apologies if one exists, that was merely an example) it would be a chance to put my shelf furniture, sorry CDs and my mine of useless information to good use.

I loved it - the idea of putting a more palatable version of A Brief History Of Metal across to the world, maybe less of the narrow minded ranting and swearing that I have claimed as the corner stone of this blog (a teacher friend of mine lamented recently that he thought it was interesting, some times well written and informative, but sadly a little too racy to use with his students), but maybe enough to provoke debate and still give a decent account of rock music.
Topics swirled around my head for a fair while after that - things I have written here, things I have yet to write, all with a slightly more presentable version and less calling Fred Durst a cunt (gratuitously jamming that one in there to emphasise the point!).

The it occurred to me, if I did this would I in turn be doing something I have viciously attacked some bands for? In seeking a larger platform for my voice would I effectively be compromising what I set out to achieve here? Would I, guardian of the 'Towers, be selling out?

So it got me thinking, what is selling out and why is it such a crime?



Rock and roll and in particular it's uglier younger offspring has always been about rebellion and catharsis; Johnny Cash sang about kicking against the pricks and punk was about smashing a brick in their face.

Punk is a good place to begin really as the sell out accusation probably cuts deepest in this genre.
Punk was formed with the notion of not conforming; your dress, your attitude was about not fitting in, not wanting to fit. The scene became the great exponent of the Do It Yourself ethos - don't like our music enough to produce it on your big shiny corporation?
Well fuck you, we'll record it in a dank rehearsal room on a shitty 8 track and release it on our own label on a blank tape with a photocopied handmade cover.
Of course the irony is the more popular something gets, the more people buy into it the further away from it's core aesthetic. 
This was apparent by the time the Sex Pistols exploded back in 1977. 
The were everything that punk represented, but in a marketable version.
Both simultaneously a genius act of scene affirmation and exploitation - Rotten and co were basically encouraged to go out and be as obnoxious and anti establishment as they could be (and boy could they), yet at the same time they were creating a look and defining the commercial sound of punk.
Cue a million bands trying to bring about Anarchy in the UK.
This of course is the tip of the iceberg really and the whole evolution of punk would cause myself and the aforementioned friend to grow heated over much red wine. He of course knows far more than I do about the true gritty nature of crust punk that would come to spit in the face of 'pretty boys' like the 'Pistols, the Damned etc - the DRI's, Discharges and Black Flags of this world who came harder and later and I in turn could bore the tits off you about the light, poppy Southern Californian punk that was pioneered by Bad Religion.
My case in point example for this scene is that before Blink 182 were a huge pop chart bothering behemoth they were a NOFX/Bad Religion style band and I liked them. Genuinely.
Then they released that album with 'All The Small Things' on and were massively played to death on the radio. Now not only was this a softening in style but on tour when I saw them, it was like they hadn't existed before that album and weren't playing to please the people that had, until that point given them a career, but to those fair weather fans who would buy their stuff because of the new single.

Metal and rock was a dinosaur by the time punk spat in it's face at the end of the seventies and as a result it mutated, often adopting the DIY approach, Iron Maiden and the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal (from here on out NWOBHM) would record their own records (Maiden's first EP is the much sought after Soundhouse Tapes) until they were signed and this approach is almost de rigour in todays digital age with platforms like Myspace helping to break acts far beyond the confines of their towns and cities.
The problem is that this creates a mentality where people in a scene identify with the musicians; they share backgrounds and tastes, they sing about the same issues that effect the people who turn up at shows - there is a connection and an underdog mentality to metal.
When a band expands beyond this and gets famous there is a thin line between staying 'true' to their roots but maintaining success and whoring themselves for the almighty dollar.

Take the biggest sell outs in metal: Metallica.
Now I still love them, but you have to admit that they are a pale shadow of their former selves.
They started out as a hungry young band with a hardcore sound, didn't make videos, dressed like everyone else and were very much in touch with their fan base.
This year they released Metallica Monopoly...
RRP $42.99



I appreciate that in the age of digital piracy bands don't make any money from CD sales anymore; the irony of an artist being in the position where they have more control over every aspect of their careers than ever before, is now there is no money to be had. Therefore bands that would have survived are now forced to tour the globe hawking ugly black t-shirts, wrist bands, thongs, bottle openers, belts, shoes etc to earn a living, but honestly... Monopoly?
How do you win? - Do you sell out?

It is long documented and debated about when Metallica sold out - most people will say The Black album and at 20 million sales and still climbing you could argue why. They took their honed thrash metal and dulled it, made it more accessible, shorter, more hit based (they released six, yes six singles from it).
However I would argue they sold out as a result of this album - it gave them everything they could have ever dreamed of, including the idea that they were 'done with metal'. They created an incredibly heavy album, kicked in the door of the mainstream and decided they had beaten metal itself.
The next two albums saw country, blues, self indulgence and more importantly entropy.
Sure the fire of youth is replaced by the consideration of age and if anything Hetfield's lyrics benefited from moving from the musings of sixth form poetry to the wisdom of the bar stool, but anyone who has seen Some Kind Of Monster saw the selfish, spoilt whiny posers they had become.
How can you identify with a man who sells a painting (pissed on a sofa) for more than most of us will ever see?
This is a band who came from tape trading and shut down Napster with Lars threatening to come round peoples houses and confiscate their hard drives - I had never downloaded their stuff, but at this point I queued up the whole catalogue in the hope the tubby tub thumper would come round so I could smash him in his gurning little face for the hypocrisy.
But downloading is not an issue I want to get into (again) here today.

The fact is that Metallica's last truly good album was probably The Black album. Since then they have become a marketing, merchandising vehicle - the first time I saw them was at Donington 95 and they were arrogant, self indulgent, took the piss out of the other bands, declared metal was dead and fucked around with their own songs. They may have gotten back some of that fire live and made a heavy record again but the fact is they just aren't as good as they were or the myth that what they are now is as good as people say it is just because they are not churning out shit like that fucking song with the Hurdy Gurdy... Low Man's Lyrics that the one, you know the mock Irish crap from Reload?
Ultimately Metallica don't care anymore - 'Sold out? We sell out most nights' - James Hetfield. 
To me this is the equivalent of hearing about Ashley Cole (alleged beard needing, philandering pisspot and English left back) recalling how he trembled with rage because Arsenal 'only offered him £55k a week'.
Only! Oh, Poor fucking you - I'd like to make that in two years fuckface.
See some of us hated Cashley way before he cheated on warbling Geordie rascist and new national sweetheart Cheryl Tweedie.
But honestly as I said a while back Metallica could release a turd in a box with their logo on it and someone out there would buy it. Given that I buy anything with an Iron Maiden logo on what's the difference?
Maiden still care, Maiden still make challenging music, Maiden never sneered at everything that put them where they are or pretended to be something they weren't.




Music is art in the end and people will argue that in order to bring it to an audience you have to compromise a little - be it with band mates, yourself, the club owner, the record label etc - as fruit loop, wine making, stalling tactician Maynard James Keenan of Tool said on Hooker With A Penis
Dumb shit I sold out long before you ever knew my name,
I sold my soul to make a record and dipshit you bought one.

But the idea that your art panders to a commercialisation first before serving it's purpose is wrong, it creates a banal version of what has gone before - going back to the mad baldy from Tool at least he said this about the music industry:

I write these songs to move through some pain or work out some issues. and if I'm successful in my art and my expression I shouldn't feel the same way I did when I wrote those songs anymore and there should be a logical progression. But if as an artist I can express myself in someway that ends up helping someone else get through some hard time I guess that's great for everybody, that helps other people. The problem with the music industry in general is that artists get into it be use they have a desire to be desired and they have a desire to scream their heads off for whatever issue happened to them in the past, they weren't armed with the proper tools to move through any trauma or their childhood divorce or loss of parents and what  they do is end up screaming their heads off and at some point they get popular now they are part of an industry that is run by people who are uneducated emotional people, in a way it's kind of a dead end and in this society we expect those artists to continue screaming to the end of their days..

Spot on in my book - look at suicide inducing, three chord wonders Nirvana. Cobain actually admitted to selling out to make money with Nevermind, of course once on that train he couldn't take it, like it or live with himself.
If we wanted to listen to jangling three chord repetitive bollocks, we would listen to the radio.

Talking of which:
Metal is an expression, sure it varies in degrees, Linkin Park's Hybrid theory was so universally transcendent that I know three different people who reckoned 'it was about their life' - Crap. It was just so non committal that the themes could be applied, but it was still good. Fast forward and they started making the same by the numbers bullshit again and again because it was on the Transformers movie soundtrack.

You can change so violently you alienate people, you can assume that people want to hear the same ideas again and again, you can stop trying to push yourself, stop trying to challenge your audience; instead of strengthening a genre by pushing boundaries you weaken it by settling for mediocrity, labels sign bands who were medicare to start with and the whole thing circles the drain.
A beautiful failure is far more attractive than an emotional flatline in my book, especially as you don't have to buy a CD to hear a band these days.

Of course this is all subjective and I should pull the plug soon on this epic rant.
The rules for selling out are complex, hypocritical and convoluted and in essence:
1. Any band that is popular/profitable
2. Any band that appears to be popular/profitable
3. Any band that you dont like
4. Any band that someone you dont like likes
5. Any band that makes a follow-up CD that isn't identical to the previous
6. Any band that changes their musical style
7. Any band that doesn't represent your style

But you can spot the pretenders a mile away, for every thousand bands barely 5% will have a career and even less than that be any good so it a shame that we are presented with a watered down marketable version of these things by people whose emotional barometer is completely fucked with regard to the 'product' they are putting out.

Now I'm rambling, but I have finished the kitchen and am off for a beer and to listen to c's debut rock show, I may join him next time.

Check it out
www.phonic.fm/listen-online

The Big Flaw?

After all the dizzying excitement of last summer when 'The Big Four of Thrash' toured together for the first time since... well, never, they are back to do it all again to the delight of the metal world.
They didn't do it back in the day don'tcha know.
'Why not?' you say.
Well because Metallica thought Dave Mustaine was a dick, Kerry King (balding, axe wielding Slayer meat slab) thought he was a bitch, Mustaine in turn hated everyone and everything, including his band and excluding Heroin, and well no one really thought a great deal about Anthrax in the grander scheme of things - I mean sure their trainers were nice and white, they did that song with that rapper and their frontman wore an Indian head-dress on stage, but when it came to slugging it out unit for unit in record sales and quality songs it came down to favourites and they for me (sadly) lagged behind the brutality of Slayer, the er speed of Megadeath and the forward pressing Metallica.

So last year, in a bid to royally shaft all other festivals in Europe, Sonisphere put out 'The Big Four' for the first time - Metallica, King and Mustaine buried the hatchet in a vomit inducing bout of letting bygones be bygones and Scott Ian stopped tweeting about poker long enough to grab onto the coat tails and drag the twitching corpse of Anthrax along for their biggest payday since 'Bring The Noise'.
The glaring omission was of course the UK, Sonisphere boasting the only date for Iron Maiden, which by the way was two ball busting hours of greatness...

So this year and the festival race was on, Sonisphere bursting out of the blocks with Slipknot's first show without the late Paul Grey. In between the (frankly) pathetic online contradictory statements from Joey Jordison and Corey Taylor (which seems to herald any of the Iowan Nontet, er Octet's activities these days) it seemed like a reasonable stab, if not one that went down like a cup of cold vomit in my household.

Download countered with the reunited, looking for a payday, System Of A Down. Daron Malakian must have stopped shovelling the drugs Scarface style long enough to realise his bank account was edging towards zero considering Scars On Broadway went down like a cup of cold vomit across the world, yet alone in my household and Serj Tankian is too nice a guy to ignore the pleas of the rest who were eyeing the back of the dole queue with increasing alarm...
They followed with the ever predictable Linkin Park for the 8,796th time and the surprise of Rob Zombie, whose first tour in 8 years sold out faster than Glastonbury and gave new meaning to the words Ebay and Rocking Horse Shit.
Download looked to be taking it back, especially as Sonisphere revealed it's second headliner to be the less than impressive Biffy 'Indie Band' Clyro to universal outcry which managed to lessen the years other tragedy, the fact that Avenged Sevenfold had found a drummer to tour with them and were taking their brand of bullshit to my spiritual home, then BAM! - Out of the blue Sonisphere announced the 'Big Four' and metalheads old and new creamed themselves at the prospect of something that could never have happened 'back in the day'.

It is however, in my not so humble opinion an odd to time to try this.

Metallica - as fond of them as I am, they stopped being a thrash band somewhere around 1990, since then has followed the Universe-shagging 'Black' album, blues, haircuts, cocaine, country, Napster, sackings, therapists, St Anger and 'Comeback' thrash album that is about as thrash (realistically) as, well words fail me at this point, but you know deep down in your heart that if you put 'Kill Em All' through 'Justice...' on and then listen to 'Death Magnetic' it's not thrash, no matter how much the audio clipping makes a mess of the sound when you turn it up.
As for the live show, it's great. Lars will try not to fall off his stool or keep his mouth shut, James will sing everything in a Country stylee, Hammet will get his own solos wrong and the new guy is FAMILY don'tcha know... just like Eastenders.

Slayer - fair enough, the only band on the bill to consistently remain thrash. They are still going strong, well Tom Araya is broken, Kerry King contradicts himself with every passing year, Jeff Hanemann is seemingly fading into the background and Dave Lombardo barely drinks these days; none of which seems to matter with a rabid fan base that keeps pretending that they haven't (successfully or not) made the same album again and again since 'Seasons In The Abyss' as long as they get to hear 'South of Heaven', 'Reign In Blood', 'Angel of Death' and 'Dead Skin Mask' live.
I know I do.

Megadeth - I loved them as a kid. For one glorious summer they were my band of choice over Metallica and Iron Maiden. I listened to 'Rust In Piece' all through the holidays and could even make out the words behind his nasal whining... then they, like Metallica, they went all commercial. 'Countdown To Extinction' was good,'Youthanesia' passable all the way downhill until 'Crush Em'. I had already bailed somewhere between buying 'Cryptic Writings' and getting home and listening to it.
Then Dave found God, quit drugs and started whining about everything else, embarrassed himself in 'Some Kind Of Monster' (although everyone did to be fair...) and eventually started making thrash albums again. To give him his credit, they are thrash albums, boring ones maybe and his Sylvester the Cat vocals fight with endless solos, but none of it will compare to the static stage show that will wow approximately no-one... then again maybe I'm just bitter because I have seen them three times and he has failed to play 'Peace Sells' and 'In My Darkest Hour' in the same set...

Anthrax - Now I actually feel sorry for dedicated fans of Anthrax... their lot has been hard over the years. They seem to be split into two camps Belladonna verses Bush. The old school will tell you Joey is their boy because he is on all the classics; the John fans will tell you Bush is their boy because he can sing.
I kind of straddle the ages on this one. I grew up with the old school but never felt passionate about them, I heard 'Sound Of White Noise' and suddenly they were a great band. Problem is no-one bought the records in the same quantity and the last couple of years have been a revolving door of vocalists - Belladonna back, Belladonna out; Bush in, Bush out; Dan Nielson in and out for allegedly shitting on the chest of the guitarist who isn't Scott Ian and making a pass at the poker players wife... so Bush back, no wait, Belladonna Zzzzzzzzzzz.
Fact is they were barely a thrash band in the eighties, certainly not in the nineties and given they have been making a new album nearly as long as it took Axl Rose who the fuck knows what they sound like anymore...
The new Anthrax album with old material and new vocals (or new songs and an old vocalist) is expected some when. Don't hold your breath... as a live act I have seen them twice with the old corpse and can say, hand on heart (and not for the first time), I wanted Bush.
Yeah, that was cheap wasn't it...?

So there we have it - cynical cash grab or giving the fans what they want?
The Big Four of Thrash featuring one thrash band...
It could be a great day out but having seen all four bands numerous times, you'd have to hope the experience is greater than the sum of it's parts.