Metal Break or FIVE MINUTES OF METAL!!!!!!!!!!!

Metal Introduction to the Metal Post
So as you may have noticed if you read the last set of reviews, I've been listening to a lot (for me) of metal and metalcore. There is more to come (both reviews and metal). In this spirit I thought I would take a chance to do a little break here for all things metal. Not all things actually. Really just a few things. So here is a paltry few things metal.

Metal Name Generators.
Metal Names
Metal Band Names
I got these in a newsletter from Guitar Player magazine. They make me chuckle.

Metal News
Metal's favorite, anti-downloading sons, Metallica, have a new album. That's old news. What is news to me is that these ass clowns have garnered themselves 4 (count them, 4) Grammy nominations. Are you kidding me? I have to assume that a. this is part of the Grammys' ongoing campaign to relieve themselves of relevance and b. James Hetfield is still a douchebag.

Metal Video Clip
As much as I meant what I said above, this video is pretty ballin'. Dana doesn't like it, but she has a thing about zombies.



Thanks to my friend Chrissy for bringing this video to my attention.

More Mini Reviews, and a Shameless Plug

Since I kind of enjoyed writing up my thoughts on that Fake Problems EP, I thought I'd try doing small quickfire reveiws for all the albums I'd listened to since. If I enjoy this I may continue to do it. If I don't I won't. It's fun being me!! So here they are from the album that came after Oh No! to the most recent:

Between The Buried and Me- Colors
I hadn't ever really listened to much BTBAM, but I figured I should check them out. I've actually seen them live once, but the sound was terrible and by the time they got it figured out, the headliner (who shall be named later) wanted them off the stage so they could tear it up. I was pretty impressed by this offering from the boys from North Carolina. They can certainly bring the brutal when they want, but they really aren't afraid to lapse into more eclectically influenced territory.
The Descendants- 'Merican EP
This EP has two of my favorite Descendants songs on it; Nothing With You and the title track so to be honest the other two could have been two minutes each of white noise and I would have liked the EP as a whole.
Norma Jean- Bless the Martyr and Kiss the Child
Ah Christian Metalcore you are my weakness. There's something about the when the lambs of god starting getting wrathful that makes for some awesome metalcore. Stand out track for me is Memphis Will Be Laid To Waste, but that could be becase I've heard the Legion of Doom mashup with it and Ebolarama by ETID (B to the rutal).
Latterman- No Matter Where We Go..!
I can proudly say that I own all three of the Latterman albums and I've payed the boys for all of them. For the longest time however I haven't had the two albums on this list on my computer because I bought them on vinyl (thats right, records). So now I had the chance to complete my cyber collection. Best two tracks for me are Fear and Loathing on Long Island and Video Games and Fantasy Novels, but you really can't go wrong with anything on this album. Punk the way it was meant to be.
Shai Hulud- A Profound Hatred of Man
Shai Hulud has a thing about not liking people. This is a concept that I, personally, can embrace. This album has some great brutality from the transition between hardcore punk and its more technical brother, metalcore. I liked it but I have trouble getting past the fact that the guitarist now plays in New Found Glory. About that....
Dragonforce- Sonic Firestorm
Dragonforce was the aforementioned headliner and they do put on one heck of an epic-fest. What impressess me most about them is how in the midst of all the pyrotechnics there are definitely some dynamics and some hooks which make the songs listenable. While Sonic Firestorm doesn't have anything destined to be one of my all time faves, it's a pretty decent dose of epic.
HORSE the Band- Natural Death
This band and this album are perfect examples of what I like to think of as 'weirdcore.' I don't really mean that as a bad thing. I thought this album had less of the 8-bit sounding synths that I tend to think of when I think of HORSE the Band and at 16 tracks ran a little long for my taste.
Mineral- Power of Failing
Words cannot describe. Mineral never fails to amaze me. They are violent and peaceful at the same time, frantic and calm. Chris Simpson can write lyrics like a champ and is currently one of the bigger influences on my song writing in that he gives me permission to lay off the irony and glibness that I get from an adolescence spent listening to Brand New and Taking Back Sunday.
Latterman- We Are Still Alive
Latterman again. This album lacks the standout tracks of "No Matter Where We Go..!' and by this I mean when I looked at the track list I didn't recognize anything immediately. That said when I began listening I found I knew a lot of the words. So freaking anthemic. This band makes it to at least the top 10 of bands that need to reform (Jawbreaker I'm looking at you, I know you've played together in the past two years). I'm sorry Bridge and Tunnel's just not doing it for me.

As for the promised shameless plug, the boys and I have pretty much finished hammering out all the parts of the last song I wrote this summer (took our time didn't we?) and the other day at practice we played with Greg's pocket recorder going. The cymbals in particular are pretty dominant and besides a few shouted words you can't even tell there's singing going on, but it'll give you a very rough taste of what will be taken in the next batch into the studio. Listening can be done here.

Sadly Underwhelmed

So recently Adam gave me a ton of music and I'm slowly methodically loading into my computer's music player (yeah I'm not saying a brand name! why? because I'm punk-as-hell that's why). I say slowly because I'm listening to every song on every album at least halfway through to see if it is destined to become a favorite or not. I've been listening to everything from Katy Perry (yeah yeah shut up) to Converge (not laughing now are you?). Lotta Converge actually, I'd forgotten how happy they made me. I also finally got my hands on Every Time I Die's song Ebolarama which has long been a favorite of mine. But just a few precious minutes ago Greg and I were sitting around listening to Fake Problems' EP 'Oh No!' Now Fake Problems come fairly highly recommended. Their most recent album had critics and bloggers falling over themselves to compare them to folk punk icons (ugh ugly word) like Against Me! and This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb. This EP, I should note, is not that most recent album. In fact, it predates their first album by about a year. That said, I was completely underwhelmed. None of the songs really seem to go anywhere and maybe two of the six tracks even hint at the folk punk enthusiasm the band has since shown they were capable of. Most of the songs however are simply limp, meandering acoustic songs that would be better suited to some lead singer's discarded solo project. I'm so glad these guys turned the corner they did.

On a brighter note, this song by New England's own Smoke or Fire is fantastic. I burned my fingers out playing the riff over and over again and I still don't get tired of it. So without further ado, The Patty Hearst Syndrome.

Sittin' in the studio, talkin' 'bout a side project.

So on Friday, Greg and I met up Adam at the studio to do some vocal recording. Unfortunately, the studio was locked and we couldn't get the key anywhere so ended up heading back to our room and listening to music. A bit of back-story for this, Greg and I are constantly thinking of side projects we want to do and while we were in New York for a Mountain Goats' show I came up with the idea of doing an indie band called Funion. Back to present day, we're hanging out and as often happens when music people are hanging, a guitar is being passed around. Next thing you know we're throwing down tracks on a computer, creating a myspace page and Funion is born. So for anyone who wants to see said myspace page, that would be here. For those of you who are too lazy to click the link, here's a little taste courtesy of our friends over at last.fm.

Addendum

I would just like to throw my two cents in regarding Greg's now long departed Halloween Costume. While both the 50-cent and the Goldfinger costumes were pretty weak (albeit pun-tacular) the Lincoln hat showed a certain admirable craftiness and ingenuity.

P.S. For this to make any sense at all you have to go read my band's blog here.

P.P.S. Criteria is a fantastic band.

YAY

There is a new name!!! and now it's almost like a new blog. I swear to god I'm going to start updating more. My computer and I are still recovering from a particularly nasty little virus we picked up while attempting to watch the third season of a show called Psych. Fantastic show, terrible virus. Not really a good trade off, I'll watch it on dvd. In other (computer related) news, I have found (Dana found it first, but I was the one who tried it first so ha!) a really cool website where you can enter books/movies/whatever that you have read/watched/whatevered and rate them and it will suggest more things for you to read/watch/whatever.

books.livingsocial.com

add me as a friend, we can compare things we've gotten around to rating.

P.S. Dana-add a damn picture to your living social account.