The Metal Militia

Nice nipple plates Missy, you truly are a Heavy Metal goddess....Maningrey has been shaking out the dandruff to a selection of classic metal, here are my current faves...and some disappointments...





For some reason I have found myself downloading a load of old metal albums, this is not a genre I have had much experience with but having almost exhausted all the other types of music out there from D n'B, Dubstep, Best of Eurovision ballads and Bag Pipe Dreams play the Moody Blues, I decided to see what all the tattooed 'alternative" hoards find in this racket. I was surprised at how many had stood the test of time and the ones that proved a damp squib.

Metallica - Kill Em' All

Am I the only person who finds later day Metallica either idiotic ("Of Wolf and Man") or dull as two ditches ("The Thing That Should Not Be")? While it was Alchoholica's ability to add new textures to thrash that soon put them streets ahead commercially of the Anvils of this world, it also made them a little tepid. Heavy metal is only exciting when it is completely unaware of its own idiocy or the band are young enough to get away with lyrics such as " No life till leather, We are gonna kick some ass tonight" and sing it with conviction. This blazing debut is rough around the edges with a wasp in a coal mine production but pound for pound it is the most rocking set they ever produced, no acoustic ballads about war, no southern rock boogie, just 9 rifftastic tunes about leather, phantom lords and more leather..Like Judas Priest in no way gay..This little beaut takes no prisoners and in "Seek and Destroy" features two of the best riffs of all time...Motorbreath is still shit however....




Slayer - Reign in Blood

This albums has everything wrong about metal, lyrics about goblins and wizards (sleeves?),no tunes, hundreds of solos and bad hair...but it all works! The best way to describe this album is simply to list the best bits, like a classic comedy it has moments that are constantly quotable...One to embalm and keep!

The cover is awesome, combining the worst bits of Bosch and Bruegel this is a Hell that makes you want to run to your mummy and swear you will never ever be bad again. Also features two giant penises which nobody noticed at the time due to all the gore...

The opening scream like a cat caught in a dishwasher or balls in a zipper.

The opening lyrics to "Necrophobic":"strangulation, mutilation, cancer of the brain, limb dissection, amputation, from a mind deranged!"

The way Tom Araya growls "Enter to the realm of Satan!" in "Altar of Sacrifice" and manages to make it sound scary rather than cheesy. His shouting through out the whole album basically invented the Death Metal "grunt", much more fun than all that Axl Rose style wimpy falsetto.

The way he sings "leave you ripped and torn" in "Reborn".

The rain at the beginning of the final track "Raining Blood".

The two best metal riffs of all time in "Raining Blood" intro and "Angel of Death" middle section.




Soundgarden - Superunknown

After wading through lots of grunge "classics", including the holy scripture that is "Nevermind", I found that only "Superunknown" was actually still any good. Nirvana sound like Bryan Adams, Alice in Chains are always out of tune, Pearl Jam were always shite and Mudhoney, well I just didn't even bother to download any...Everything else Soundgarden did was poor but for some reason the planets aligned and their freaky mixture of Sabbath, psychedelia, unusual scales and colossal vocals were hung onto actual songs and riffs you can whistle as you deliver the milk. Everything is so murky and layered that strange cool bits keep popping out of the mix at unexpected moments like the the squiggly bass riff in the middle of "My Wave". While technically proficient players they use their skills to investigate interesting avenues rather than just showing off, songs are in odd meters with alternative tunings and possibly due to Kim Thayil's Indian heritage the riffs and solos are sitar like with disorientating effects. In fact its only due to Chris Cornell's viking wail that people got this album, everything else sounds like its was destined for cult bargain bin obscurity.




Faith No More - Angel Dust

Faith No more have a lot to answer for; funk metal, baggy shorts, synths in rock and nu metal...But "Angel Dust" is a genuinely weird album on reappraisal. Following on from the huge hit "Epic" which wedged their whiteboy funk, operatic vocals and pomp rock keyboard sound into the top ten of every frat hour beer bust in the US forever, Mike Patton seized control of the band and took the newly christened (by me) "Paedophilia Rock" to the charts. "Paedophilia Rock" is a combination of singing songs in as many styles as possible while avoiding a melody and making you think of old Amish kiddy fiddlers, surrounding this with musical accompaniment from a haunted circus, making every lyric about how depressed and useless Americans are but somehow making it all rock!

All the bands that tried to follow this approach were horrible, Korn, Incubus, Limp Bizkit so yet another crime is added to the list above but in its way this album is more progressive than Kid A as it made experimental music something teenagers wanted to jump around to while Kid A was bought by people who read the Wire..



Megadeth - Rust in Peace

Megadeth were always seen as Metallica's wannabe idiot brothers, mainly because Dave Mustaine was booted out of the first line up of Metallica and his voice was even more grossly unpleasant than even Jemini at Eurovision. But I have to say if you like your songs massively long and complex with lashings of twiddling guitar solos and lyrics bashing politicians, evil wizards and organised religion then this could be the album for you! The solos just keep on acomin' kids, each more technically perfect and more Middle Eastern sounding than the last, oddly reminding me of punk legend's(and kings of alternative cred) Television. It's interesting how some bands fly under the radar of "cool" (admittedly having a grinning skull man on your album covers does not help) while producing music genuinely without boundaries while ultimately dull musical semi literates like Beck gain critical hosannas. The almost Public Image post punk meets King Crimson prog after reading "The Sheltering Sky" racket of "Hangar 18" is the best example...




Pantera - The Great Southern Trend Kill

This is just a raging bracing blast of hate, that makes the Tube journey to and from work entertaining. The singer looks like an extra from "Oz" (best TV series eva my friends), the guitar player is a mountain troll and they played in front of a southern flag like a KKK convention but Pantera made the long slow trudge from awful glam metalers to marginally less awful south rawk thrashers to textured metal gods, best shown on the creepy song below...




System of a Down - Toxicity

Rabble rousing Armenian Americans these guys avoid the sophism of so many alternative metalers (stand up Korn) and plunge headfirst into agitprop finger pointing. Merrily ignoring the ironies of being corporate slaves while bitching about their White Collar American paymasters, a paradox that other "political" bands such as The Clash and Rage Against the Machine never resolved, SOAD take pot shots at all and sundry while never forgetting they are entertainers first and foremost and there to open up teenagers minds not burn cars. Weirdly reminiscent of some of Zappa's more poppy outings this album is lean and wiry where Soundgarden are thick and sludgy, just one guitar a fistful of crazy time changes and strange chords sprinkled with a voice that says "NO" in a really catchy way.

When this was No1 in the States during September 11th it was perfect cultural symmetry.




Here are two "classic" albums that did not make the cut...

Rage Against the Machine - Rage Against the Machine

I know I know, hard to believe! But for such an influential album apart from the obvious classic singles it drags like a stone. Stiff rather than funky every riff sounds like a rip of "The Ocean" by Led Zeppelin, the guitar solos that we all raved about are in fact really annoying, why not just get a turntables rather than making your guitar sound like one? The killer blows to this albums status are the vague lyrics and terrible rapping, Zac De La Rocha makes Mike Patton sound like Slick Rick and compared with the razor sharp poetry of System of a Down it comes across as rather ill informed and juvenile.

Guns and Roes - Appetite for Destruction

First of all "Welcome to the Jungle" does rock and I even enjoyed "Paradise City" (apart from the 'orible synth part) but the rest?? Boring boogie woogie rock like an Aerosmith tribute act, nasty misogynistic lyrics and of course that ear splitting fires alarm screech. Slash does play some fancy solos but you can't help thinking of the ridiculous self parody he is now. Ultimately this is not a million miles away from such tripe as Poison or Motley Crue, G n'R just happened to be better musicians so you get drawn in to their murky world, but take a step back and its a little depressing.

maningrey