MP3 Download Dinner Bell for September

Recently saw this article  written by Dave Burns, which is really calling out (at extreme length) everyone/everything by name that he perceives as cheesily capitalizing on the new resurgence of metal as a hip influence on underground music. It's a fairly interesting piece and a subject much talked about these days and there are certainly enough arguments on both sides of the coin. While I personally don't see some indie kid buying Matador releases being turned on to metal for the first time via their roster's recently-signed Early Man as a real crime against humanity, I guess, uh, some people do. I definitely agree with a lot of the points in this piece, though Burns does sort of swing blindly at some named targets without really following through and explaining why they're on the shitlist, which is one problem I have with it. But on the other hand, there is something skeezy about the about-face of some artists who disavowed metal in the Nirvana age and suddenly are pretending they didn't. I guess. I don't know, I always heard the closet metalhead side of J. Mascis (I mean, the whole coda of Dinosaur's "Sludgefeast" is something you didn't hear in much of late 80's indie rock), so his new band Witch doesn't offend me. Though it seems to offend Burns. Needless to say, in response, here's some bastardized Sabbath covers for y'all. Freakwater's "War Pigs" (MP3) from 1990, the flip side of the country-offshoot to Eleventh Dream Day's "Your Goddamned Mouth" 45. Also, Edmund Welles, a Raymond Scott-like clarinet quartet from hell taking on "Into the Void" (MP3), and finally we dug up this version of "Fairies Wear Boots" (MP3), served up all sensitive/acoustic by Bill Patton. If Burns is really upset about the newfound home Metal has found amongst hip and even mainstream marketers, he best not view this.

Below is a digest of all MP3-heavy posts from Beware of the Blog over the past month (sliced and diced by Liz Berg):

- Get in touch with your inner-queen by snagging a ton of raucous, vampy gay stag gems from the '60s. You can thank Resident Clinton for this concentrated dose of sass.

- The Professor presents an internationally-flavored shortwave radio scan, submitted by FMU fan Ralph, who has some serious D-Xing skills and tools. Curious about shortwave? Dive into the captivating geekdom!

- Rare and fiery '70s Japanese underground rock (Murahachibu, Datetenryu, Sachiko Kanenobu), posted by Brian Turner in memory of Masashi Kitamura.

- Singing volcanos. Really. Lukas teaches us all that seismic charts can become musical scores with a little bit of science.

- Bathtub Bowie: some guy sings your favorite androgynous hits in the comfort of his own bathroom. Because Brian Turner believes that personal hygiene doesn't have to get in the way of rocking.

- More BT gold right here, check this unique style of Bangladeshi drone, utilizing mouth organs.

- Perhaps you prefer promotional MP3s from Western product-pushers. Listener Jim presents a batch of consumerist jingles.

- More shortwave fun on the 31 meter band, alarmist radio scans recorded and posted by The Professor.

- Fictional rock band PSAs, reminding you to always see a doctor at the first sign of an itch.

- Megan keeps us up to date on John Otway's latest tour: he's taking the audience with him... everywhere. You can grab the MP3 for "Really Free" right here.

- More Bowie worship thanks to Lukas. The Calatrava Brothers bring us a cover of "Comandante Tom" that is muy sabroso.

- WFMU has added a podcast of the Old Codger's radio program. Because there's always room for another grumpy old man in your life.

- Whistle while you work to these tunes of the proletariat, in honor of labor day. Thanks Lukas!

- British artist Banksy replaced hundreds of Paris Hilton CDs with his own parodical material in record stores across the UK. Doron hooks us up with Banksy's prank tune.

Comments

[mike]

Eh, some of us never liked metal in the first place. Not in the '70s; not when it entered the hardcore lexicon in the '80s; not during the whole Raging Slab era and not now.

[bartelby]

Nothing by Thor? I can't believe the disrespect. It's a sad day when people are not impressed by a guy blowing up a hot water bottle like a balloon until it explodes.

[mike lupica]

Raging Slab will rise again.

[mike lupica]

Oh, wait. A quick googling shows that they're still around. Where's Nude Swirl when I need them?

[Fred]

Nice to see stereotype confirmed by misspelling of "ad".

[Metalnnoyed]

It's true folks. I haven't read that article yet, but something's afoot... Just last Sunday night I sat in an art gallery in Atlanta and bled my ears to the sound of Essentialist, a new group featuring Rhys Chatham. It also features some guys from places with names like Vidalia and Marietta. I believe they are responsible for, uh, influencing Mr. Chatham. Oh, Essentialist was playing as part of the latest Table of the Elements festival.

[squarefan]

in the space of one riff, nirvana made all previous heavy guitar metal music seem:

1 incredibly insincere,
2 overly image conscious,
3 long winded,
4 bloated,
5 rigid,
6 too death-centric-negative-non-life affirning,
7 emotionaly flat,
8 way way way too serious,
9 not fun,
10 unessessary

i say nirvana and not grunge becuase most product pushed as grunge either lacked nirvanas punch, or was essentialy college rock (pearl jam, stone temple pilots) or proto metal (alice in chains, sound garden) itself/

[Brian Turner]

Well, I wouldn't say they eradicated all heavy metal; after all Nirvana loved Sabbath. But they definitely put a crimp on the marketing of the hairmetal that had dominated the charts up til 1991.

[TG]

It sounds like the Freakwater cover skips. Is it just me?

Anyway, thanks! The "Into the Void" cover is smoooooth.

TG

[lee m]

let us not forget WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS coining the terms ''heavy metal kids'' and ''heavy metal junkie'' . read 'the ticket that exploded' and its suggestions for sound and film manipulation . and 'wild boys' and....... . if you are wise you will read all his books from the first to the last and check out all the stuff he predicted and postulated. you all like heavy right? it dont get any heavier than UNCLE BILL B. as far as anyone inventing ''heavy metal'' music: i refer to the lyrics to 'late greats' by wilco. most of the great and ground breaking music of the 20th century was never recorded or the record companies didn't get it and passed on them ,leaving them to obscurity. some made it thru like SIR LORD BALTIMORe - an early 'metal' band, but not many. OK FOLKS NOW WHO WAS THE 1ST TO CALL THEMSELVES HEAVYMETAL, AND WHO WAS THE 1ST TO BE CALLED THE SAME? READY...............................GO!

[lee m]

OH- ALSO- what would you call the mid to late sixties guitar playing by SONNY SHARROCK, JOE BECK, DEREK BAILEY, ATILLA ZOLLAR, EDDIE HAZEL, TERJE RYPDAL, ETCETERA........... OH THATS RIGHT, THAT STUFF IS ''JAZZ'' OR ''SOUL'' AND I LIKE METAL ONLY......... DUYHEEE . I HAVE FOUND OVER THE YEARS THAT THE VAST MAJORITY OF METAL HEADS KNOW NOTHING WHATSOEVER ABOUT GREAT AGGRESSIVE JAZZ MUSIC. THEY SEEM TO PREFER THE NANCY PANTS ANAL RETENTIVE YELLOWJACKETS, PATTITUCCI, WECKYL ,COREA, MANRING STYLE GARBAGE/CRAP/PIGSLOP WITH NO BALLS AT ALL. ITS A SHAME BECAUSE THEY WOULD LIKE THE GOOD STUFF. MY MAIN AVERSION TO METAL IS THE LACK OF PERSONAL EXPRESSION IN LIEU OF ANAL RETENTIVENESS AND ''STYLE'' WHICH ARE BOTH [TO ME]WIMPY TRAITS BASED ON FEAR AND LACK OF CONFIDENCE. IMPROVISE AND EXPRESS YOURSELF. HARSH NOISE IS BETTER IF IT IS ALLOWED TO GESTATE AND BIRTH IN THE SAME INSTANT. NO LIVE METAL BAND WILL EVER TOUCH 'LAST EXIT' FOR SHEER FEROCIOUSNESS. NEVER NEVER NEVER. THAT CECIL TAYLOR SHOW I SAW WITH A TENTET WAS PRETTY DAMN GOOD TOO. ALSO: WHAT WAS HAPPENING IN OTHER PARTS OF THE WORLD? WHERE'S THE EARLY METAL FROM OH I GUESS THERE MUST BE HUNDREDS OF COUNTRIES?

[Vic Perry]

I HAVE TO WRITE IN ALL CAPS CUZ THE METAL IS SO ROCKIN

[James]

DC indie rockers Quixotic did a great cover of Black Sabbath's "Lord of This World"...

[DanO]

Nirvana didn't render ANYTHING obsolete. they simply brought hard music back. hard music that was not as simplistic as punk. 90% of people who like heavy metal like a driving beat, distortion, heaviness and screaming. metal had become a saccharine concoction of overly falsetto singing and slickly produced melodies.
heavy metal's courting of the popular music business(or vice versa) is what created its death.

and i remember an Aquarian Weekly around 96 that struck a chord with me about the metalheads that hated grunge.
why?
because Nirvana and their ilk ran out of subject matter to sing about after one good album.
once the subtle nihlistic strain of their commentary was heard a few times, it came across as COMPLAINING. they sounded like a bunch of whiners - and while you can throw a lot of insults at heavy metal bands, they were never whiners.
p.s.- Dave Grohl is and always was a metalhead.

[Vic Perry]

"while you can throw a lot of insults at heavy metal bands, they were never whiners."

Maybe this is true of the bands, but not their fans.....I knew lots of metal teens in the 80's and all they did was complain about how people looked down on them.....the Dave Burns article that Brian Turner linked to is full of whining....Dave Burns is more interesting to read than any regular current rock critic, but he is paranoid, like when he thinks that John Darnielle is ironic in his metal appreciation...wrong...Darnielle obviously relates to metal as a listener in a big way. And hasn't Burns encountered Joe Carducci's writing yet? You aren't alone in the wilderness, bozo.

I by the way am a rock fan and as to metal as I am to rap: I know there's a there there, a vital chewey chewing center, but both genres suffer badly from stilted cartoonish tough guy-isms and pointless loyalty tests (all the keepin' it real / real metal crap -- it starts with a desire to not sell out as the utmost aim and ends with stifling all the artists with brains enough to want to move it on). Metal contributes stylistically to rock but few metal bands rock because they aren't loose enough; they are too busy observing the metal etiquette.

I feel I learned all I need to know about paranoid genre prisoners from reading science fiction as a teen, when I briefly imagined I might be a member of the SF ghetto until I read J.G. Ballard who cared for the ideas but not the dorks who herded them....from reading "Analog" magazine and so on I learned everything I need to know about self-segregating taste ghettoes from here to eternity:

they think their "nobody understands me" problems are actually unique and end up completely paranoid --- most especially when their achievements actually become interesting to outsiders --- it is then that the most bitter complaints ensue.

[DanO]

ooooookay Vic.
you got a lot to get off your chest there. a whole lot about you and very little about the subject at hand.

go buy "South Of Heaven", take a valium, and TRY to enjoy yourself. try not to overthink it all. good luck and have fun.
:)

[Vic Perry]

Wow. Touched somebody's nerve I guess. Having plenty of fun actually, thanks for the carebear.

[Rotkop]

That Burns guy probably means well but he's totally missing the point. Heavy Metal is not something separated from the rest of the music world. It has its origins in blues and rock'n'roll in the first place. Heavy Metal now doesn't sound anything like it did 20 or 30 years ago because it has evolved since then. It needed the influence of Punk/Hardcore, Progrock, Industrial, Jazz and Avant-Garde etcetera to do that. Purism is fun if you're 18 but Heavy Metal influenced by Heavy Metal is an evolutionary dead end. Musical apartheid simply just doesn't work.

[JT]

Ha ha. Well a bit of heat over this one.

I started on Deep Purple young and never totally left metal. So for all the punk and shit I like - in fact, out of respect for it - let me say "get the fuck over it, stupid". Just because some Williamsburg hipsters just discovered metal doesn't change anything in my life (and I lived there before they did, too - "I was there" - "I was there when Lou Barlow got kicked out of Dinosaur" - "I was there").

If the money gone n***** be the fuck gon' wit' it.