Friday 13 February 2015

Scott Ian spoken word DVD review

You may know who Scott Ian is for a variety of reasons. He has been a member of Anthrax since the very beginning back in the early 80's, or maybe you know him as that guy with the questionable beard that's always showing up at those metal awards shows and getting in magazines. Apparently he's also married to Meatloaf's daughter. Either way, he seems to be a guy who knows a lot of people and been around the world and he wrote a book about it that came out last year. That's expanded to him doing a spoken word tour where he hangs out, drinks beer and tells stories about it live.
This DVD takes place at one of his stops in Glasgow, Scotland in what looks like a large storage room of sorts. I know it's a decent theatre but it has an odd look to it. It starts with an intro to the beginning of his show where he reads from Anthony Keadis's book about heroin and jokes about being a junkie(he isn't). His first story is the start of Anthrax and the first media tour of europe where he met Lemmy. His story shows why meeting Lemmy in a bar is either a really good thing or a really bad thing if you have to fly to Germany and do more promos the next day. He fumbles a little when he segues into another story, actually his transition into each new bit is always a bit clumsy. But he moves on to talk about learning to drink with dimebag darrell and a long series of pranks that darrell played on him. This is where I also learned that Dime had a goat with a dyed goatee.
He tells a few more bits about Al Jourgenson on the set of AI and how he met Steven Speilberg. Luckily he has the powerpoint presentation in the background to help everything move along. He goes through a bunch of stories before he moves to the Q&A at the end. This actually ends up being the best part of the DVD because for some reason this freeform part has the most flow. Here we get to learn the answers to important questions like: "did you fuck Kelly Bundy?" "When was your first concert?" and most of all "what makes Gene Simmons cry?". The rest of the act didn't have a lot of great flow even though it was shot well. The powerpoint presentation in the background made it feel too much like a business presentation even though there could have been some cool stories in there. I think in the end the stories might have been a little better if they were told by someone else. Scott Ian needs a little practice but good on him for getting out there and trying this, maybe he'll keep at it and get better.


Michael F. Carnage

Victoria Locals only: The Gnar Gnars

There comes a time when you need a song that some won't sing, a song about that lump in your puke or that thing that got stuck in your ass when you were drunk. You need a band that comes from the middle class ghetto of the lower island ready to drink, bleed and maybe touch your sister. You need a band that will play in the bowels and maybe also sing about the stitches in your bowels. The GNAR GNARS are these heroes, these heroes that are ready for whatever greasy festivities you come up with as long as it involves three paper joints or maybe your grandmother's lack of teeth. They go by the names James, Hoon, Gino and Brains, fresh out of the Hillside Whorehouse. I got in touch with Gino to get more details:

AU:   What is gnar?

GINO:  Gnar is omnipotent. Gnar cannot be taught or learned. Gnar is both repulsive and delightful,and under the correct circumstances it will leave physical and emotional scars.......Gnar should be handled with care and yet abused to the fullest extent of ones depravity. It's basically just fucking Gnar.

AU:   How gnar does your music get

GINO: Our tunes get so Gnar that we had to say it twice to find a name Gnar enough for the Gnar Gnars. Between the four of us we  have a combined total of nearly 60 years of being Gnar in one band or another. So as you can imagine, that's pretty fucking Gnar. We have been called the Gnarest band of our generation by this dude we know.

AU:   How often do you guys get on the road?

GINO: we try to tour for a couple weeks a year and maybe couple 3-5 day b.c. Alberta trips but we decided (I decided) not to tour this year for personal reasons.  You have to understand, a tour bus full of assholes like us gets Gnar as fuck. I got so emotionally damaged last tour that my psychologist told me another tour could send me over the edge. That and we need to write a bunch of more songs so that next year when we tour our fan won't be disappointed.

AU:   I hear you guys have an album coming out, any details?

GINO: We have been working on our album, yet to be named for some time now. We are recording it ourselves in our studio so we are really taking our time to get the best takes we can. For once we don't have any pressure to get things done fast since we aren't paying studio costs.  So we are really taking advantage of that.  We are hoping to have the actual recording done in the near future and then we just have to send it off for mixing and mastering etc. We are also taking the time to pic the right person to do all of that part of it. So hopefully we will be spreading the Gnar like the deadly Ebola virus in the near future

AU:   Any crazy stories? Do you guys have a raccoon that can roll joints?

GINO:  We don't have a raccoon that rolls joints but if you know of any we are hiring.  One particular story that comes to mind, and kinda sums up the Gnar Gnars happened outside of Funky Winkerbeans.  We were parked across the road waiting for our show to start, in front of a greasy little bar, the name of shich I cant recall, and we were in a truck with a fairly loud stereo.  Earlier that day I had discover a phone app called The Fart Machine.  It's exactly what it sounds like.  Anyway I figured out I could plug it into the car stereo and if we opened the doors of the truck we could fill that block of Hastings st with obscene fart sounds.  So every time someone walked by, or cam out of the greasy fucking bar we would blast these immense fart sounds.  Later on after we played our show, I went to bring the truck a little closer to the door of Funky's so we could load our gear into it, and as soon as I pulled out of my parking spot the cops were on my with the lights and the whole deal.  As his partner walked suspiciously around the vehicle searching for drugs, terrorist, or whatever, the cop told me there had been 3 complaints about me playing my stereo too loud.  He had been waiting the whole time for me to come back to the truck to bust me. So I explained that we had not in fact blasted any music and that we were messing around with fart sounds he busted out laughing.  I think we made that cops night. They left us to our business, and even gave me the go ahead to pull an illegal U- turn and park illegally to load our gear. Good thing he never searched us or I wouldn't be answering these questions right now hahaha.

AU:   Who would you most want to tour with?

GINO: I would enjoy touring with the Dayglo Abortins.  I had the pleasure of touring Ontario with the Dayglos years ago when I was in Alcoholic White Trash, and it was rad. Most of the tours I have done we have organized ourselves. So usually we try to include one of the members other bands and make it a two band road show.  That's the most fun because it's like a punk rock vacation with all of your bro's. And you are travelling around meeting other bands that do this only because they love it. You meet the raddest people and make the raddest friends that way.  But as far as like famous bands go, the Dayglos, or the Dwarves or like, Fear or maybe Gwar..  Those bands rule and would be fun to tour with.

AU:   Would any amount of money make you want to do taylor swift covers?

GINO:  I'm not sure any amount of money could make us do a Talor Swft song.  but  I'm pretty some of the guys in the band would pay to do some awful stuff to Taylor Swift though.





Michael F. Carnage

http://www.facebook.com/thegnargnars

Tuesday 6 January 2015

SPARKY HUMANIMATION

Sparky
Humanimation
Independent

Sparky is a Saskatoon act playing an eccentric blend of rock/metal/lounge since their inception over a decade ago. Humanimationis their third full album and the first one in nearly eight years, following a lengthy period of infrequent shows thanks to real life moving forward at its unpredictable breakneck speed.
Three songs in, one will realize that this band can’t sit on a riff. They won’t stick to one genre on the album, or even stick to one genre over the course of one song. Case in point: about 30 seconds into "Silichondra" we get the first lounge feel with the lower tempo and vocals that evoke the 60's vocal feel before going back to really catchy ‘90s style alt-rock. Sparky then flits between a few different genres like funk, rock and lounge until the last minute of "Etheric Silver Lining." More than 20 minutes into the album, it's suddenly capital “M” Metal. Solid hard-charging Metal with really great riffs that makes you want to jump around. What follows are a couple of songs with a lower tuned, droning and darker feel, but even with that there's an underlying upbeat feeling.
Altogether, Humanination repeatedly crosses genres, making some songs reminiscent of mid ‘90s Faith No More. Whether they are being straight Metal, lounge or funk (or all of them at once) it works.  They seem to be able to take subjects like revolutions and zombies and give them an upbeat and positive feel with their music. With the use of tempo and dynamic tuning throughout they make an incredibly listenable album. 





Michael F. Carnage

Sunday 23 November 2014

THE BODY POLITIC/QUARTERED LOGANS PUB OCT 24TH

BODY POLITIC/QUARTERED/THIS DAY BURNS/SYNAPSE/VAULTRY  LOGANS OCT 24TH

I showed up and the venue was already half full. pretty good being that the bands hadn't even started up yet. And much to my surprise the first band started right on time. First up was a local hardcore band doing their new school approach to the genre. They're really energetic and a little on the screamo side of things but they put a lot into their set. For a band that's been together less than a years they play a tight cohesive set. Couple more screams and a couple more breakdowns and the short set was over.
Synapse have been their particular brand of melodic hard rock for a lot of years now and the experience shows through. You might not be into it but these guys are all pretty good musicians, they have kind of an Against Me sound but I like them better. The set they played tonight was a lot more mellow than the last few times I saw them, I think they might have been holding back a bit because they were just in the second slot.
This Day Burns is kind of all over the place as to the style they feel like playing. It's mostly a hard rock kind of thing but then its female singer/sonwriter style quickly followed by a song of screaming and spastic time-changes. It totally works for them though and keeps you wondering what's up next. And then to top it off they brought up even organizer Clayton Rourke to share vocals on the last song. And with the show keeping on time the set was over pretty quick. The fact that they were all dressed as ninja turtles did make me like them a lot more.
Next up was Vancouver's Quartered and they started full on with intensity from the first note. They are that mix of rock and post hardcore that still can find a place on the radio. The crowd got right into it and a solid moshpit was going by the second or third song. Whoever wasn't moshing and jumping around seemed to be singing along to a lot of the words. I guess I've been missing what's been going on the last few times they've been in Victoria because they look like they have a good following here. And with this show I think it's been assured that they will be booked again here, probably going to get booked in a lot of other places too. I'm new to this band but I'm going to listen to them again and might check them out the next time they hit town.
The Body Politic is a Vancouver Island band that's been generating a lot of buzz over the last year or so. The six piece band took the stage with a tonne of confidence and a sea of cheers. You notice the proggyness right off the start and all the instruments are at the forefront with equal levels. There's a lot of crowd interaction and I can only assume it's because this band has a lot of fans that are regulars at their shows. They had a song "Wait for the sunrise" that involved every girl in the bar singing the chorus. They play a pretty radio friendly style, or maybe poppy is a better way to put it. They look like they're working really hard and putting the time in to be successful and I'm sure they will be. If you can get a bar full of girls to sing your chorus for you then you're probably going somewhere.
Most of the show wasn't really my style but it ran without a hitch which is a lot to say. The bands went all out and played their set-times and didn't fuck around getting on and off the stage wich is pretty nice to see. Justin and Clayton at Arbutus Promotions have their shit together and run a tight show.


Michael F Carnage


http://www.soundofsynapse.com/
http://www.thisdayburns.com/
http://www.quartered.ca/
http://www.thebodypolitic.ca/

ONSLAUGHT/ARTILLERY/VX36/TORREFY NOV 21 VICTORIA BC

THRASH INVASION TOUR NOV 21  V-LOUNGE VICTORIA

Early shows at the V-lounge are always fun because you can hit up the strippers first. Afterwards I got upstairs to hear some awesome metal.  Torrefy was starting the night off with the release of their album "Thrash and Burn". From the first note it was the kind of energy you get from a young band fighting for attention. Hearing the bassist Simon start the vocals on a Game of Thrones inspired song was definitely unexpected but put a grin on my face. The duel vocal work got the attention of most of the bar. They thrashed it up for most of their set getting a mosh pit going. There was a lot of headbanging and drinking and I would bet that Torrefy got more than a few new fans tonight.
I'll have to be honest, I have never heard of VX36 before and based on their name I was expecting to hate them. For some reason I thought I was going to get some sort of shitty thrash-core band and I was totally wrong. What I got was three pieces of deafening thrash monstrosity. Vocalist Nate had a lot of stage banter but I couldn't really understand much of it so I just assumed he was saying "Here's another awesome fucking song" because that's what we got. Their set was fast, tight and short so I'm likely going to spend some time searching them on youtube.
Artillery is a band I know a few songs by and I like a lot of the 80's essence they have going on and they brought a lot of that to their show tonight. A lot of thrash bands you see now don't even look like they were born in that decade but this band had the vibe that goodtimes and parties just followed them everywhere. Being Europeans they usually make sure of their showmanship and Michael Dahl was all over it. He made sure to keep the crowd fist-pumping and hair-spinning right along with him. They had a bit of a mix in eras with the songs but seemed to play more of the newer catalog. Probably has a lot to do with the new members.
Onslaught started without a lot of introduction, they just started playing. They are of the harder side of old school thrash with gruff vocals and lots of attitude. These guys meant business and played the songs with the forcefulness that would win any argument. Vocalist Neil Turbin has the presence of that 80's tough guy that you didn't want to fuck with but you also totally wanted to be like. The rest of the band followed him in behind like a musical gang of badass through a set that didn't seem like it lasted long enough. They crushed every song they played with a confidence of a band that knows you're there to see them.
Heavy Metal UVIC put together a great show and Victoria should be thankful that we had this lineup here. I doubt that anyone in the bar had a bad tie except maybe the bartenders, but they're always a little grumpy. Hopefully the V-lounge keeps letting metal shows play there because I'll keep going to them. And to Heavy Metal UVIC, I hope they keep putting on good shows.

Michael F. Carnage

http://www.myspace.com/onslaughtuk
http://www.artillery.dk/
http://www.vx36.com/
http://www.torrefy.bandcamp.com/

Sunday 19 October 2014

Anaal Nathrakh-Desideratum

ANAAL NATHRAKH is a British/American two-piece band that is pretty popular with the extreme metal crowd. They've been making music for about fifteen years now and are always testing boundaries pushing towards their goal of being the soundtrack to the apocalypse. They have already brought the sounds of evil, hate and violence to seven albums, more than a couple of festivals and the Peel sessions on BBC. Their next album is called "Desideratum" and will be released by MetalBlade this fall.
This album starts with everything you expect from someone whose goal is to induce horror, a layer of shreiks, growls and atmosphere. As you get into the second track "Unleash" there's the start of clean vocals but not the normal kind. It's the haunting kind that add to the layer of terror. Relentless drumming add into the slight synth/sampling effect to complete it. By track four "The one thing needful" they've mixed it all perfectly, clean/harsh vocals with synth/sampling and great guitars. It has an epic yet brutal feel, touching mountain tops while still dragging corpses through the valleys. It stays this way through several songs mixing exactly what I like from black metal and industrial with a little of the classic metal. #7"Idol" is one of those tracks that most would call brutal that I think is catchy and and radio-friendly, makes you want to sing a-long to it. And then next song is shreiking mixed with jackhammer drumming, also included is an wicked riff that comes in and out throughout. "Rage and Red" is comparatively slower than the rest with a little more industrial feel, a little more spoken lyrics and etheral flow. The last song ends it with fast, reckless anger and violent cacaphony, just the way I like my extreme metal.
This album gave me what I was looking for. It was as awesome as a night terror, perfectly layering soundscapes of industrial and black metal. Having it all lurking and readu to lash out with nightmare inducing noise. If you have heard this band before you know what you're getting into, they work really hard to create the sound of armegeddon. as they promise one day humanity will be destroyed and this is the music that will be there to chronicle and soundtrack its downfall.

Michael F. Carnage


 http://www.anaal-nathrakh.com

Saturday 18 October 2014

Fallujah/Archspire Oct 12 Victoria BC

I was really excited to get a ticket for this show after hearing the rumours of it selling out, but thanks to Cavity Curiosity Shop I got me and a friend in. But due to my own bad time management I showed up five minutes before the opening band finished. They were called Tenchu and all I got out of them was a few pig squeals, which I like so I'll have to catch them again.
Archspire then started a long soundcheck while I bought some wicked T-shirts. When they got started they hit the stage running, no warm-up at all just straight Tech and Death. A few songs in they started having a few sound issues which is weird because I think they brought their own guy with them. It seemed to be fixed by the end of "Seven crowns and the oblivion chain". The band pushed through and started killing it again. You can tell this band practices a lot, there's so much tech but also a little bit of groove. They were totally back in shape by the time they hit "Lucid collective somnambulation". Most of the crowd seemed to recognize this song and got really into it, it was nice to see a good crowd at Logans really reacting to a band. All their shirts say "stay tech" and that's just what they did.
Fallujah is from San Francisco and I'm pretty sure they have never been on the Island before. I'm glad I got the chance to see them again. They started their set much in the same way, diving right into the show fast and hard. "Cerebral hybridization" was a great example of them being on tour and just playing as a well rehearsed machine. Through progginess mixed with brutality they got the crowd into every one of their songs. I'm sure everybody who showed up unaware of who the band was left being a fan. By the time they hit "Dead sea" everyone was holding up lighters and horns up for the guitar solo, I don't blame them either because that solo really pushes a lot of the barriers of death metal.
It was a sunday night so the bar had to be done by midnight, this was partly the reason I think the show went by so fast. Probably had something to do with the killer bands as well. All had a good time turning their turkey comas into booze comas. For Logans it was good to see a decent crowd come out on a sunday night and I hope this helps more bands make the trip to the island. I want to finally catch Tenchu and the other two bands should know they did a wicked show.


Michael F. Carnage


http://www.youtube.com/Archspiremetal

http://www.facebook.com/fallujahofficial