Slipknot Sucks: I Say Death By Axe!

What’s sad about Mushroomhead is that their image is supposed to be EXTREME!, but they are slower and poppier than Slipknot. Their masks brought them a few moments of spotlight, but their appearance was too similar to Slipknot and they were not as talented musically. Slipknot is kind of a joke amongst real metalheads - it is metal in the same way that Lil Jon is rap; it's a poppy and superficial ripoff that appeals to angsty teens and other people who are unwilling to really delve into the genre. However, I loved them in highschool, and occasionally I still put them on to remind me of more rebellious and stupid times. I used to like the percussion but the fact that they need three different drummers to produce that sound is really pathetic: why not just get a good drummer like Hellhammer, Gene Hoglan, or Thomas Haake. I did not realize until later that they had nothing original to offer the heavy metal genre outside of there weak attempts at combining turntablism and rap vocals in their distorted slurry; ironically, this is my least favorite part of their music. But at the time, I genuinely liked their brand of down tuned, fast paced sludge, this was before I discovered baroqueian pedal points in death metal, or the classic “gallop” which originated from the Gods: Judas Priest and Iron Maiden. Even back then, before I was schooled in the ways of rock, I thought the masks were silly.

I love Ace Frehley’s Signature guitar excessively equipped with three humbucking pickups, but I have always hated KISS. I must admit that their first album is mediocre, but then everything "spiralled out of control." Their movie, KISS Meets the Phantom in the Park, is the funniest piece of crap that was ever filmed, and that's kind of how i feel about them musically; plus the costumes are lame. Lordi, Finnish hard rock/heavy metal act, does have intricate and very expensive costumes, but they may be the worst “monster band” I have ever heard. There is no variety in their sound and with serious lyrics such as “the devil is a loser and he’s my bitch,” they have no musical creativity and they are not even scary; their image is the only reason they are famous. Combined with their shitty sound, their stupid look just makes me dislike them that much more, and most musicians who have to dress up to sell generally suck.

There is one exception to this rule which really stands out: Gwar, an acronym for God What an Awful Racket. Comprised of evil monsters from another planet, they may be some of the best performers I have ever seen, and it’s mostly because of the costumes. This may be an unfair claim: it's not that they are posers, because they were around in 1985 during the birth of thrash, the seeds of death metal had been planted and later they would dabble in it. They do sometimes bark sarcastically, but their vocal style has never had strong metal characteristics, no ear piercing hair metal crescendos, no raspy black metal screeching, no growling death metal cookie monster grunts. Their vocal style has been inconsistent throughout their 11 studio albums, but is largely punk based, and I think they are definitely influenced by the maniacal monk vocals of Jello Biafra from the Dead Kennedys.

The guitar is not as fast I remember, and they will occasionally play fragmented slow gallops while the bass chugs along faster. The parts that I enjoyed the most were the lightening speed “breakdowns” which are reminiscent of Dimebag Darrel from Pantera. This element which is now widespread in metal originated in hardcore, and is when the main melody stops and becomes minimal. This is often the climax of the song, when everyone moshes the hardest, and is usually driven by one loud guitar riff accompanied by either rests or palm mutes in between. This produces a jarring and/or pounding effect: it's stereotypical headbanging time. When the strobe lights came on they seemed to be synchronized at the same speed as the guitar. The guitar solos are also Dimebaggian, except not as technical. They are short and often start out with slow tapping, and end with basic tremolo picking. I’ve noticed that they also really like pinched harmonic vibratos.

Lordi formed in 1992, and recently have become popular, and there have been many comparisons to Gwar because of the appearance (Lordi claims to have never heard of Gwar until they hit it big, which I have a hard time believing). Aside from Lordi totally sucking as a band, the main difference between Lordi and Gwar is that Gwar is a parody. Their lyrics are satirical and intentionally overexaggerated. They normally talk about the joys of politics and enslaving the human race, they love war and think violence is sexy. They also make fun of the metal genre: watching Gwar feels kind of like seeing a thrash metal version of Spinal Tap: except so overdone and extreme that not even Dethklok from Adult Swim’s Metalocalypse could compete. In between songs, they tell jokes and indulge in grotesque theatrics. Monsters or politicians or religious figures will come on stage and flick off the crowd or anger Gwar by claiming to be more evil and they will get into axe or sword fights. During a fight someone always dies, loses an appendage, and literally sprays fake blood all over the crowd for at least a minute while writhing and dancing around.

I’d say the most offensive and funny thing I saw this year at the December 1rst show was Pope Benedict goose-stepping onto stage, screaming “heil Hitler,” making fun of the fact that he was a former member of The Hitler Youth; obviously, he was killed by axe. This was followed by some dummy which came out on stage claiming to be Jesus, and he spoke to Gwar and the crowd at the same time talking about salvation, and death to all Jews, which did not make sense until it turned around and on the other side of the head was Hitler. It went back and forth from Hitler to Jesus, until Gwar became aggravated and they drew weapons. As Hitler-Jesus was dying, spraying blood from its neck, it masturbated blood from his extremely large phallice all over the crowd. With all of the Jewish jokes, it only seemed appropriate for the giant, 9-eyed, bird-dog-monster, Jewsifer, to flap its dime-pinching Jewish wings and attack. This was the grand finale fight, and the star-of-david-wearing demon was definitely their best dummy.

The show was almost ended when Gwar left the stage, and a cop strutted out waving his nightstick, telling us there was nothing to see and to go home, he was then beaten and killed, and Gwar played an encore just for the hell of it. They recently had an appearance on MTV's Viva La Bam, which I think is lame, because I dislike Bam Margera as a person. However Bam Margera did come onto stage and talk with Gwar, "Hey dudes, I'm filming Jackass three in Hell right now." Gwar was not impressed, and began to poke fun "Yea, well maybe we'll see you down there, and instead of getting Jessica Simpson to suck your dick, we'll get OJ Simpson to suck your dick." Bam thought that sounded like a great idea, and leaned in to make out with Oderus Urungus, and to his surprise, got his tongue and part of his face bitten off; then his eyes were poked out, and he started screaming and spraying blood, saying "this is great, are you filming this?" The city of Charlotte once banned Gwar for a year, and fined Urungus for obscenity charges. They made a reference to that saying, "This town once stole my penis, but God I love this town." In 1993 one of Gwars shows was shutdown in Athens Georgia and with the help of the ACLU they sued. When they won, they donated the money to charity.

2004’s show was better and funnier than this years, probably because they had more political material to work with; their 2004 cd, War Party referenced the war on terror. That and they had an actual "blood cannon", which was awesome. There were far more characters: Lacy Peterson gave birth to a lobster, Michael Jackson talked about how much he loves kids, President Bush asked us if we wanted any coke, and Osama Bin Laden came out of with a bomb strapped to his head talking about how he was going to be having sex with 72 virgins. The show was ended by a Gwar rap side project with great beats, and one of the gwar monsters spraying the blood cannon all over the crowd going wild.

The costumes are really incredible, some really are scary while others are just outlandishly stupid. Their music alone is not unique enough to distinguish them from literally hundreds of other similar sounding bands, but I will see them live every chance I get. This first class novelty act will never die because they have always recieved warm support from their diehard cult following. In return they have served us with more than twenty years of brutality and stupidity, and have always charged moderate prices, even though their shows cost them a lot of money. I paid twenty bucks, and fourteen bucks last time.

Despite their over-the-top image, they have not let rock star excess affect their performance, reliability or reputation. I know that when I am 35 I won't have to drop 180 euros (starting price) to see their one time reunion, like the upcoming Zeppelin shebang. The audacity...you disappear for 20 years, and now you charge 250$ for one ticket?! This sucks, I don't have that kind of money! I just want to rock out to Valhalla, is that too much to ask!? Some moron just paid 83,000 pounds online for a pair of remaining tickets, setting the record for most expensive concert ticket. Only rich bastards or psychos will be able to see this, which is not fair because i'm relatively sane and poor. Come on Jimmy, way to repay the fans: I say you are now obligated to tour world wide for this tremendous tease, or else you will meet inevitable death by obsessive fan, like John Lennon. Just because your biggest fans will pay big prices doesn't mean you should exploit them. I mean, you know most of your fans are stupid, they did all the same drugs you did in the 70's, remember? ...oh yea, I guess you don't. Gwar should beat your ass.

Anyways, as a fan/audience member I am primarily influenced by sound, and have a pretty short attention span for anything else. The moral of the story: if you’re in a band that's going to wear costumes, you better have a pretty good act to go along with it. It's probably best to have a sense of humor too. This is not for those who are easily offended, but it is a great time that I would suggest to anyone who likes metal or punk, and wants to see something insane. Just don't wear anything nice, because they do spray a lot of blood.