The Days of Lore

Black Friday: The Days of Thorr

Friday, November 27th, 2009 | musiX | No Comments

Today’s the day. It was one year ago that Black Friday kicked off at The Days of Lore. Of course, the name was taken from that day people treat Best Buys and Wal-Marts like the front row of a Who concert just so they can snag a copy of Rock Band: The Beatles for three bucks.

But this Black Friday is devoid of corporate greed. There are no people. No lines. And I promise you won’t get trampled. What you do get is a look at the seedy underbelly of heavy metal. Take Valient Thorr. A friend of mine was recently raving about the celestial, stoneriffic rock outfit from Chapel Hill, North Carolina (or Venus, if you believe the band’s bio). Valient Thorr borrows from NWOBHM bands like Blitzkrieg and Iron Maiden and sullies it with the pure rock grime of MC5 and AC/DC, then buries plenty of political and social barbs underneath those mighty riffs.

Valient Thorr is fronted by Valient Himself … no, his name is actually Valient Himself. The band tours relentlessly (they played 272 shows in 2006, not even taking a day off for Thanksgiving), and has performed with the likes of Joan Jett, Gogol Bordello and Motörhead. They released their latest Immortalizer in 2008, which was produced by Jack Endino. Cred all around.

The new video for “Tomorrow Police” is just as silly as Black Friday … the shopping event and the metal feature. But I hear live is where you want to experience Valient Thorr. I just purchased my ticket to see the band in the NGC 2770 galaxy in 2079, and it only cost me 3,000 peggats. Take that, Ticketmaster.

Tags: Black Friday, Immortalizer, Jack Endino, Valient Thorr

Black Friday (the 13th): Slayer still slays

Friday, November 13th, 2009 | musiX | 2 Comments

How can the members of Slayer—now in their mid-40s—still manage to scare the shit out of me? I don’t know, but let’s look at the rest of the Big Four, shall we? Metallica: Harmless. Megadeth: Whiny. Anthrax: Bush-less.

Yes, Slayer still brings it—and in the almost 30 (!) years they’ve been around, have not so much as twitched as new trends and new bands and new serial killers and new wars and new presidents have come and gone. The latest World Painted Blood sounds like it could have been released during the Reagan administration … except, thankfully, it’s the Obama administration … and Oliver North is reporting for Fox News instead of, ya know, lying to Congress.

So. Slayer. I guess the only time critics have complained about the band veering from its direct path to Hell was ironically during Divine Intervention and Diabolus In Musica. But, I say to hell with the critics. Those are great records. You can actually hear Tom Araya’s bass. And the drums sound like your head is inside the double-kick. And I actually liked Paul Bostaph, who replaced original drummer Dave Lombardo in 1992.

But I like Lombardo more. No one’s faster. At 44, he still pummels the skins like he did decades ago on “Angel of Death” and “War Ensemble” (Lombardo returned in 2006). The riffs still gallop at blinding speeds (see “Psychopathy Red”). Solos squeal like slaughtered pigs (the intro to “Snuff” … wow). And there’s still plenty of dark and creepy imagery courtesy of Kerry King and Jeff Hanneman, who I think these days are just trying to out-gross one another. Which is what fans want. I mean, metal is the only category of music where exploration and experimentation are not welcome … see where it got Metallica.

Above all, Slayer still pulls it off convincingly—probably because they/we don’t know any differently. Put them next to Metallica, Anthrax and Megadeth and it’s like sicking a pit bull on a chihuahua … which, if I’m not mistaken, was the inspiration behind the song “Silent Scream.”

“Psychopathy Red” - Slayer

“Hate Worldwide” - Slayer

Tags: Anthrax, Black Friday, Dave Lombardo, Diabolus In Musica, Divine Intervention, Jeff Hanneman, Kerry King, Megadeth, Metallica, Slayer, The Big Four, Tom Araya, World Painted Blood

Black Friday: The silly and the sad

Friday, July 17th, 2009 | musiX | 2 Comments

It’s bad enough when bands reunite—only to return as a former shadow of themselves—but when they do so minus key members (especially the singer) it’s just kinda silly and sad … “sillysad,” which is now the official term for when a band makes an ill-advised and desperate decision to get back together. Of course, nothing should ever surprise me—people’s insatiable appetite for nostalgia always trumps dignity.

Smashing Pumpkins (Billy Corgan and no one else): Sillysad. The Doors: Extremely silly. Horribly sad. Alice In Chains—the darkest and most metallic of the grungies—is also back together sans vocalist Layne Staley because, well, he’s dead. Yet the band trudges on with vocalist William DuVall and will release an album of new material in September called Black Gives Way to Blue. Again, a little sillysad. The new song/video for “A Looking in View” sounds like Dirt-era AIC, but the whole thing feels icky. Besides, was the world really holding out for an Alice In Chains reunion?

Mind you, I was never a huge fan of the band, but I still think their 1995 self-titled album (and last with Staley) is great … much weirder and darker than the others. As these songs will attest.

“Nothin’ Song” - Alice In Chains

“Frogs” - Alice In Chains

Tags: Alice In Chains, Black Friday, Blink-182, Layne Staley, reunions, Smashing Pumpkins, The Doors, William DuVall

Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest winner

Friday, June 26th, 2009 | musiX | 1 Comment

Congratulations to Mike Sargent—aka DJ Ratrace—of Arcata, Calif. He’s the winner of the Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest. For those of you playing at home, click the band name below to see the logo it belongs to. Enjoy … umm … or be disgusted.

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 1: Korgonthurus

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 2: Explosive Diarrhea

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 3: Utarm

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 4: Nokturnal Mortum

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 5: Biological Monstrosity

Oh yeah, you can listen to DJ Ratrace and Jakob Sweden spin rare, obscure, bizarro, weirdo music on their radio show Los Ensemble Economique every other Tuesday from 10 p.m. to midnight at www.khsu.org. If you ask nicely maybe they’ll play some Explosive Diarrhea.

Tags: Biological Monstrosity, Black Friday, Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest, Exxplosive Diarrhea, Korgonthurus, Nokturnal Mortum, Utarm

Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest: Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 5

Thursday, June 25th, 2009 | musiX | No Comments

Here ’tis—the final band logo in the Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest.

Again, here’s how it works: Decipher the five gnarly, nasty metal band logos. The person who gets the most correct out of five will receive a classic metal album from the Black Friday Vault. You can view No.’s 1 through 4 by scrolling down.

Shoot your answers to mark@thedaysoflore.com. Deadline is midnight (PDT), Thursday, June 25, and the winner will be announced this coming Black Friday.

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 5: This four-piece growls in French … so it sounds kinda sexy.

Tags: Black Friday, Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest, metal band logos

Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest: Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 4

Wednesday, June 24th, 2009 | musiX | No Comments

Moving along in the Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest. Again, here’s how it works: Decipher the five gnarly, nasty metal band logos. The person who gets the most correct out of five will receive a classic metal album from the Black Friday Vault. You can view No.’s 1, 2 and 3 below. I’ll post another one on Thursday.

Shoot your answers to mark@thedaysoflore.com. Deadline is midnight (PDT), Thursday, June 25, and the winner will be announced this coming Black Friday.

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 4: Not Scandinavian. Un-American. Wears corpse paint. Eats babies.

Tags: Black Friday, Black Friday Read Between the Lines Contest, metal band logos

Black Friday: Reading between the lines

Friday, June 19th, 2009 | musiX | 3 Comments

Historically in metal, a band’s image is as (if not more) important as the music itself. From the band’s name, to its garb, right down to the logo. Alice Cooper and KISS were better-known for what they looked like than the music they made (more true with the latter). When metal ruled in the late ’70s and the ’80s, it was all about image … until it regressed to absurdity before finally getting smothered by the always-fashionable flannel shirt.

The Me Decade is when the metal logo was truly birthed—a single, defining brand that could be easily seen and recognized on records, posters and, most importantly, T-shirts. Bands like Motörhead and Judas Priest went with classically ornate logos, while the aforementioned KISS chose a simple, very memorable signature lighting-bolt “SS” (turned into backwards “ZZ” when the band toured Germany). It carried over into the ’80s when it was all about the logo—Metallica, Exodus, Slayer, RATT, Anthrax, Dio, Def Leppard, AC/DC—all of which could be found scrawled on notebooks and in bathroom stalls, or crudely written or carved on school desktops … or so I’ve heard.

The tradition carries on today. In metal if you don’t have a tough/menacing logo, you might as well be playing Showtunes. Especially in black metal. In fact, in the world of black metal a band’s logo might be the first, and sometimes only, identifying element. It doesn’t even have to be legible for chrissakes, as bands are seemingly trying to one-up each other in keeping their names a mystery to the world.

So. For this Black Friday, I’ve scoured the bottomless pit of the Interwebs to find the most unruly, tangled, illegible band logos possible. It is your duty to try to decipher them. I’ll post one new logo per day (not including Saturday and Sunday) through Thursday, June 25. Shoot your answers to me at mark@thedaysoflore.com. The person who guesses the most band names correctly out of five will win a classic metal album of my choosing. Yes, this means all five people who both listen to metal and read TDoL have a chance to win a disc. It will, of course, be an incredible metal masterpiece.

Deadline is midnight (PDT), Thursday, June 25, and the winner will be announced next Black Friday. It will take a keen eye. It might also help in some cases to be fluent in Finnish.

Ridiculously unreadable band logo No. 1: This band comes from—you guessed it—Finland. They enjoy long walks in the snow, and their lyrics are as unintelligible as their logo.

Tags: AC/DC, Alice Cooper, Anthrax, Black Friday, Def Leppard, Exodus, Iron maiden, Judas Priest, KISS, metal band logos, Metallica, Motörhead, RATT, Slayer