Mo' production, mo' problems

Over-production is the curse of many a modern rock and metal album. All too often the vocals will be polished to within an inch of their lives (never more prevalent than on HIM's latest Screamworks... album - Ville Valo's vocals have no hint of the dark, doom-ridden malevolence of Greatest Love Songs Vol. 666) and you're subsequently left listening to some sort if grandiose example of music that could never be recreated live without Metallica-sized budgets.

The wonderful thing about punk music is that broadly speaking, it tends to avoid the overblown dramatics of soaring, multi-layered guitar harmonies and gets straight to business. I am, of course, referring to actual punk bands and not pop punk clusterfucks like Simple Plan and All-Time Low. Proper punks like Loudmouth, the more melodic Samian and bands such as

Satanic Surfers that came from the skate scene.

This week a copy of Executioner's Anthology landed on my desk. Formed in California in the early 1980s, this group of miscreants have put out a 29-song catalogue of their finest, rawest, most socially unacceptable punk rock. The guitar is fuzzy, the drums are tinny and the vocal levels are all over the shop. It's absolute class. It sounds like punk should sound and creates a crystal clear picture of nutters with mohawks and skinheads draining beers and stamping bovver boots into each other's foreheads. In a nice way, of course.

Don't get me wrong; I'll happily stick on Dimmu Borgir's In Sorte Diaboli and get lost in a whimsical world of black metal fantasy as the plentiful string sections fuse together to create a unique ambiance. But sometimes you get bored of all that bollocks and simply want to get drunk with your mates and sneer at the general public. It's then that the likes of Executioners, Christ on a Crutch, and more recently Trash Talk and Arson Anthem, become the only viable soundtrack.

M

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MADman's final thought

For my final blog of this decade I thought I'd look back at a couple of my musical highlights of the year and muse in a thought-provoking fashion about what the future holds. That's the theory, anyway...

There are a few musical happenings that deserve a mention, so in no particular order:

Sick Of It All come to the Home Counties

My home town is a middle class hotbed of wax jackets and children called Hermione. Imagine my surprise when Sick Of It All announced a gig at our shitty little local venue back in April. Me and Si-KO, my oft-mentioned Straight Edge homie, had a fucking riot that night as the hardcore legends absolutely devastated the 250-capacity venue. A true lesson in how to set it off.

Trash Talk bring the noise

Cancer Bats came to town with Trash Talk in tow; Trash Talk proceeded to destroy everything in their path. From circle pits on broken bottles to foot-to-face interaction, this was one of the most insane gigs I've ever been to. Lee Spielman is an astounding frontman and manages to mix amicable banter with straight-forward abuse during every song. What an experience.

This is me and Spielman in a rare moment of calm:

Please note: Spielman is tall; I'm not some kind of midget with terrible posture.

AC/DC at Download for the absolute win

I mean, come on; if you were there you'll understand. One of the gig highlights of my life, not just 2010. Despite having a combined age of about 500, AC/DC's energy was something to behold and the crowd lapped it up. If ever I feel stressed, I simply close my eyes and regress to AC/DC playing For Those About To Rock, and all in the world is good.

2011 is going to be an odd year for me and Hot Chick as we're not planning on going to any festivals...although Sonisphere has pulled an absolute blinder out of the bag by securing the Big 4 to headline their Friday night. The flip side of this is Biffy Clyro headlining Saturday, which to me is a bit on the random side. Don't get me wrong; Biffy have had a couple of good tunes but when I've seen them at festivals, they're shit. And bearing in mind the headliners either side of them at Sonisphere (Big 4 on the Friday, Slipknot on the Sunday) I can't see this being an easy gig for them.

Download has the return of System Of A Down on Friday and Linkin Park on Saturday. SOAD I'd be interested to see, Linkin Park I couldn't care less about. The word is that Bon Jovi will be closing the show on Sunday but it's all TBC.

All this being said I've got Iron Maiden to look forward to in August 2011 so happy fucking days! On the subject of the mighty Irons, I recently became friends with the legendary Krusher Joule on a famous social networking platform. Krusher is the genius artist behind albums such as Ozzy's Bark At The Moon, Sabbath's ground-breaking Born Again and Maiden's Live After Death. I'm hoping to share a beer with him in the New Year at some point but as he's a complete nutter and is barred from most of the pubs in London, it may be a challenge...

I'm planning on some exciting shit for this blog in May, which will no doubt change the world of music journalism as we know it. Perhaps. But fear not; Metal Harmony will continue to deliver a few minutes of attempted comedy and basic musical waffling every Friday (or thereabouts) over the next 12-month.

Now run along, you crazy bastards; eat, drink and be merry during this festive time. May you all get hammered and vomit into a Santa hat.

Have a good one,

M

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Serious as cancer

Sometimes you have to accept you're living a lie. A few months back I declared my resignation from the pit primarily due to laughably long recovery times. However, last night I fell off the wagon in a big way as my town was absolutely destroyed by Vera Cruz, Trash Talk and Cancer Bats.

French mob Vera Cruz are a fairly nonthreatening cartel to look at, particularly diminutive frontman Flavien. They took the stage to a relatively full room and started a really quite splendid display of hardcore. The crowd was dead and fuelled by Newcastle Brown, I made the executive decision that a pit needed starting. I consider myself an ambassador for the local music scene and thought it imperative that our European friends got a decent response. So a couple of other lads got stuck in and before long we were getting a decent swell, and I felt a bit smug to be honest.

Vera Cruz left the stage, I pounded a beer and chatted to my fellow pit monkeys about the need for organised chaos at hardcore shows, then Trash Talk came on to Lagwagon's Stokin The Neighbours, which gratified me a great deal. Unlike Vera Cruz, these lads seemed a bit more likely to look you in the eye whilst pissing on your shoes. Bassist Spencer Pollard started vocal proceedings before front man Lee Spielman opened his mouth and, to coin an oft-used phrase, unleashed hell. They are pure, nasty hardcore, and the place went mental. Beers, spit, teeth, probably some piss, a couple of shoes, bodies, hair and expletives were being thrown all over the place. A personal highlight for me was my shout of "CIRCLE PIT!" that was greeted by "listen to the guy in the Morbid Angel top!" from the lead singer.

Spielman was a proper mental. He was in the pit, up on shoulders, kicked a heckler in the face and told a chap who insisted on being ultra cool and sitting on the stage drinking a beer that he was going to kill him (shortly after stealing his beer and downing it).

Despite an older gent warning us about the broken glass on the floor, which I think was my bottle of Brown, the pit was insane. By the end of Trash Talk's set I was cripplingly exhausted and went outside for a breather. Then a fellow patron who was talking to a bouncer points at me and says "he's fucking mental"; after an accolade like that I had no chance of staying still during Cancer Bats, did I?

One more quick pint and back in. My first time seeing the Canadians live and the rumours are true; they're sick. Liam Cormier said he recognised people from other gigs they've played in our town over the years which might have been fluff but fuck me, it worked. The entire floor was moving, people were flying all over the place, and by the time Cancer Bats played their excellent cover of the Beastie Boys classic Sabotage the air in the room had been replaced by a misty hue of sweat and Red Stripe.

It's the morning after and I really, really hurt. Banging my head on the stage during a particularly raucous moment wasn't ideal, I could have done without getting windmilled in the jaw and the Vans-shaped bruise on my back is a little on the sore side but what a fucking gig. Absolutely immense. Ten out of ten. Simple as that. However, I am definitely retired from the pit now.

Honest...

M
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