Heavy Metal Jock Jamz: What's your playlist?

With Mr. Olympia right around the corner, it's time to get serious about blasting your quads and getting shredded! There's no time like the present to get cannonball delts, crisp serratus, and lats that flare like the hood of an angry cobra! Since I am guessing most of you are either shut-ins with the physique of an AIDS patient or flabby Relapse beardos who haven't seen the outside of their mother's basement in a decade, I figured I'd share my Heavy Metal Jock Jamz and do my part to keep our readers get diesel!

Thanks to my Apple internetPod, my playlist is constantly changing. I can just put in a new tape when I get bored with the last one, so it's never the same twice. Still, I find that my Jock Jamz consistently fall into a few categories:

Infernal Revulsion are one of the many reasons why Japan is the leading producer of anime tentacle porn, Pokemon, and wigger slam.

Slamz & X Breakdowns X
This is a no-brainer: what would a gym playlist be without the fucking slamz?! I have written about this topic extensively so I won't duplicate all that here. Instead, here is a little checklist that you can use to evaluate any given slam band. Give them one slam for every time you answer "yes," and if they score 4 or higher, they are gym-worthy:

• Camo shorts (extra point if they're arctic camo)
• Puffy vests and/or parkas
• Band is from Russia or Texas (extra point if they are more than 75% Mexicans)
• Band name ends in "-ment" or "-tion"/"-sion"
  
• Video features wiggerish arm movements, crab-walking
• Bassist has his instrument below knee-level

Try it out and you'll see how quickly it will help you sort your slamz. For example, the clearly gym-worthy Katalepsy score a whopping 5/6 slamz, while Wormed scores 0. The checklist helped us realize that it is critical to choose occasion-appropriate slamz: Wormed are a great band, but not good gym material because they are too smart. Nobody wants thinking man's slam in their ear while you're trying to focus on your deadlift form.

Jer-Z will not be disgraced!! And look at those fucking puffy vests! Damn son! Get your ass over to the Willowbrook Mall and cop one for yourself!

The AC bro from Emmure and Jonathan from Forever The Sickest Kids both enjoy wearing colorful New Eras. I'd like to think that says that we can all be friends, whether we are scene, preppy, or 'core. We all love Hollister and New Era, and at the end of the day that is more important than our superficial differences, right?

Another genre for you to check out is what I like to call "scene wigger moshcore," which is basically shit like Emmure, The Acacia Strain, and Liferuiner. I coined this term because they have chinstraps and New Era hats like your standard-issue mosh wigger, but this bands rock them in bold colorways that would look right at home on Breathe Carolina or Dot Dot Curve. Anyway, all these bands basically sound the same: the ultimate expression of the 90s moshcore formula in a Zao-meets-Adamantium way. So basically, the fucking definition of gym-core.

Emmure's new album is brutal as fuck and full of sick XbreakdownsX and drama-inciting lines like "ask your girl what my dick tastes like."

When to play it: Pretty much anytime you want to feel fuckin' hard, for example when you are annihilating your abs with insane volume! Just put on some Cold As Life while you bang out a zillion reps, then mean mug the gym mirror, and be like, "750 crunches, what now bitch?! This gym ain't got shit on my steez!"

They look like Michael Moore, but these bros know how to write a fucking mosh riff that takes your mind off the pain of being alive for at least a few seconds.

Regretcore
Now let's talk about a very gym-worthy subgenre of hardcore that I like to call "regretcore." In a nutshell, it's the soundtrack to the moment when you look in the mirror, realize you're in your 30s, and that your life is a fucking mess because you're a fuckup who makes retarded decisions that you may not be able to fix. If you have had this moment you know exactly what I'm fucking talking about! Basically, it's "I'm honestly afraid I may have ruined my life forever" put to music, and it's so brutally honest that it can be a little hard to handle, like seeing your dad cry. Let me explain more...

Most of you already think I'm a gay poser, so whatever. When I wasn't listening to Pyrexia, 7 Minutes of Nausea and Dystopia in high school, I was jamming bands like All, Descendents, and later Blink-182, Saves The Day, etc. All their songs essentially amounted to "Wah wah, I like this girl but she doesn't like me back." That sucks but at the same time is kind of fun- you sit around with your friends and complain about chicks, go skate behind 7-11, and hit up Taco Bell. You forget all about it by the time side one of "Thrash Zone" is over.

I love regretcore so much that I got a Death Threat tattoo (the one on the left that says "Now Here Fast"). I am so gay that I got a matching Chris Isaak tattoo (the one on the right that says "Forever Blue").

Fast forward to 2009, we're all in our 30s, and shit is way too real. I ran into a friend of mine who I hadn't seen in a bit. His wife just left him and I wanted to see how he was doing. The dude is a LEGIT hard motherfucker who has fucked up a lot of people, but he's human like the rest of us and nobody shrugs off a divorce. I asked him how he was doing, and he just said, "Well, I had the gun in my mouth last night but I couldn't do it." I was also getting a "divorce" after 8 years with my ex and I was pretty much in the same place, so all I could do was nod in agreement and say "I'm with you, dude." In 10 short years, we went from "The girl who works at the mall doesn't like me, boo hoo" to "My wife left me and I literally want to die."

Regretcore is what happens when you get a hardcore band made up of dudes in their 30s who are fuckups like my friend and I. Instead of singing about how the cute girl who works at Dairy Queen has big boobies, they write songs about trying to pick up the pieces of your life after a divorce, rehab, or prison. They don't have songs about how hard their crew is, their songs are self-directed pep talks that go something like, "Dude, I won't lie, you fucked up pretty bad. But don't kill yourself. If you're lucky you can maybe get a job at a gas station or something and piece together a few scraps of self-respect."

HAD TO BITE AND SCRATCH TO STAY ON MY FEET - WITH A HEART MADE OF STEEL, I SMASH THROUGH EVERYTHING!!

While bands like Sheer Terror, Crowbar, and Life of Agony paved the way, Terror are pretty the Led Zepplin of this subgenre: they're not regretcore, but it couldn't exist without Scott Vogel being a charismatic fuckup who writes uncomfortably straightforward songs about it. Lines like "Time and time again, I've fucked things up. All my hopes and dreams have been gone so long" are a trademark of the genre: Chris Barnes-like statements of fact that were probably written in a moment of tearful self-hatred after a week long coke binge and maybe beating someone half to death for reasons you can't remember.

Furious Styles is the hardest thing out of Seattle since Everything Went Black, check it out and maybe they'll give you a glimmer of hope that you can salvage your pathetic life. It didn't work for me, but who knows, maybe you're not as far gone as I am.

Death Threat is another cornerstone of regretcore, with brutally simple lines like "When you've got nothing you don't give a fuck" and "I know no other way to take the pain. Insted of trying to make things better I get fucked up everyday." You really don't know what to say because that really says it all in the most straightforward way you possibly could. Perhaps the ultimate regretcore line, though, is from post-Bulldoze band Terrorzone: "I regret what I did, though I had to do a bid." Translation: "I went to prison because I lost my cool and fucked some dude up, that sucked."

When to play it
Regretcore has no equal when it comes to gym motivation! When you have to dig deep and squeeze out those extra few reps, there's nothing like a little voice (I like to imagine it's Scott Vogel) whispering in your ear, "If you don't stay in shape no woman will ever be attracted to you and you'll die alone. Now give me one more set of squats, you fucking loser!"

Burn Halo is the new Douchebro Anthemcore band from 18V singer Jame Shart

Douchebro Anthemcore
Whew, that was heavy! Sometimes you get burned out on the regretcore and you need to lighten things up a little, using positive imagery to motivate yourself and get your hustle on. For that, there is nothing than a good Douchebro Anthem- what we used to call "hard rock." Sometimes you just want to forget your troubles, forget that you're a worthless trainwreck who wasted your potential, and just think about making (really fun) poor life choices, usually some variation on getting fucked up with some hotties at a party or club.

There are a lot of options when it comes to Douchebro Anthemcore, because there are a lot of douchebro that start bands, and apparently it sells because labels keep putting it out. It really depends on what kind of douchebro you're looking to be.

Some guys are more of the sensitive douchebro, so maybe they'll put on some Cold, Staind, or Hinder and think about how much tail they would get if they played an acoustic set at some "hole in the wall club" so it would be "really intimate." Then they would get really intimate with some recently divorced office hott who got shitfaced and left at the club alone by her equally shitfaced friend who promptly abandoned her when she met some dude.

The best part of this video is the retards who got Avenged Sevenfold tattoos- specifically, imagining the burning embarrassment they feel every time they see that this video has nearly 2 millions plays.

Me, I'm more of the aggro/party douchebro, so you'll find more stuff like Papa Roach and Avenged Sevenfold on my Heavy Metal Jock Jamz. I'll be flexing in the mirror, practicing my flirty pout that will melt the office hotts' panties off and playing air guitar to "Unholy Confessions" or "Last Resort."

When to play it: When the only way to cope with the crushing despair that comes with realizing you're a piece of shit is to act like an even bigger piece of shit.

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What's on YOUR Heavy Metal Jock Jamz playlist? What makes YOU want to blast your quads??

Retroview: New York Death Metal

Before there was slam metal as we know it today, there was NYDM. When I discovered NYDM, I was listening to Morbid Angel, Obituary, Napalm Death, and all the other classics. I loved those bands, but it wasn't quite scratching the itch. I couldn't put my finger on it, but I knew I wanted to hear something more... When I first heard the slamming slamz of the NYDM sound, it was like someone reached into my brain and pulled out the sounds I had in my head and put them onto, er, cassette. It was as though I had found my musical soulmate! On that note, this is far from a comprehensive study of NYDM, but here is an overview of the bands that I liked the most.



Pyrexia
I will start with my favorite NYDM band. They don't get nearly as much press as Suffocation or Internal Bleeding, despite sharing some members, but in my opinion they are better than either. That's right, better than Suffo!! They aren't as accessible as Suffo because they don't really use melody as much, they just fuckin' slam, slam, and slam some more. "Sermon of Mockery" is their best release, although I like all of their records. After "Sermon" they changed their style up, and followed it up with the "Hatredangeranddisgust" EP and "System of the Animal" LP. Unlike "Sermon," which is just pure death metal, those two records pretty much sound like hardcore, or more specifically like Hatebreed playing death metal covers. They're good for sure, but nothing like "Sermon." I recommend that you download all of them, but definitely don't sleep on "Sermon."



Baphomet
Buffalo's Baphomet get no love! OK, they're definitely not the best band of all time, but they don't have to be, they just have to slam- and slam they do. Baphomet is one of those bands that are sort of like Kraft singles: you know they're a shitty, half-assed imitation of the real thing, but you can't help but binge on them every now and then anyway. With that said, I would say this record is for genre enthusiasts only... but still awesome! It's meat-and-potatoes NYDM with no frills or fancy shit, but for some of us, that's just what the doctor ordered.



Internal Bleeding
If you were into this shit in the 90s, you remember how controversial Internal Bleeding were. Lots of people hated on them for their Long Island guido steez, but "Voracious Contempt" struck a chord with all kinds of douchebags and meatheads such as myself. Years later, I was at a Suffocation show in Poughkeepsie, and the fat guy who was singing for them at the time was sweating my girlfriend at the time super hard because she was a skinny indie girl with good hair. In her words, "he wanted it bad." Malamor also played that show, who almost warrant a paragraph in this post... but not quite. They will be featured in the upcoming post entitled "Bands who are named after marshmallows." Anyway, Internal Bleeding didn't invent the "slamz for slamz' sake" style, but they definitely popularized it. For those about the slam, we salute you!



Suffocation
I'm not going to write about Suffocation because I hope everybody reading this is more than familiar with them. All I'm going to say is this: do you remember the Spazz song "The Egg On The Hirax Cover"? They should have written one called "The Killer Robot On The Effigy Of The Forgotten Cover." If you'd like to read more about our thoughts on Suffocation, please read this article which goes into extensive detail on Frank Mullen's Trump Plaza shirt from the "Effigy" photo shoot.



Dehumanized
These guys were B-level for sure, and not that great. Their record was pretty much just OK, except for the song "Prophecies Foretold" which was fucking siiiiiiiiiiiiiiick! I was equal parts bummed and surprised that I couldn't find the studio version of the song on Youtube, but you can at least catch a live version above. Watching them bounce to the slam parts is worth a LOL or two when you're not busy moshing your balls off.


Disfigured
I am extremely disappointed that I couldn't find any of their songs on Youtube! It's 2009, shouldn't every song by every obscure Long Island slam metal band be available within like four mouse clicks?! Where's Al Gore, I would like to lodge a complaint. In any case, Disfigured were like thinking man's NYDM. Their song structures were more interesting and nuanced than other B-level bands like, say, Dehumanized, and they could definitely play their instruments a lot better. The drummer, whose name I forget, was particularly good. I know it was something French-sounding, we'll just call him George St. Pierre for now. Anyway, these guys were/are highly underrated, and if there is any justice in the world they will attain legendary kvlt status like Ripping Corpse and Havohej. If you want to impress the Guttural Slamming Brutality Crew with how down you are with NYDM, do yourself a favor and download their EP, "Prelude to Dimentia."



Repudilation / Entorturement / 420
I am lumping all three of these bands together because they shared many of the same members, and were similar in sound and spirit. I could go on forever about them, but for now I'll just say that all you need to know is that these guys were the first geniuses to combine rap and slam metal! Also, the drummer for Repudilation used an ice bell for a ride, which is kind of hilarious and awesome at the same time. And let's talk about how amazingly awful these kids were at naming bands. I mean, it just went from bad to worse! Repudilation is at least a real word, but Entorturement is one of the worst names ever. It was a big source of inspiration for Lucho and I when we named our band Disengorgmentification. But then they managed to one-up themselves by calling their next band fucking 420! It's like the best part of ICP, Internal Bleeding, and Cypress Hill all wrapped up into one. Needless to say I love all three of these bands a lot! If anyone has the full version of the 420 album in the video above, please link it in the comments!!



Morpheus Descends
I'll conclude with one of the godfathers of NYDM. They're really more of the Demolition Hammer style of half-thrash, half-death metal in that they never blast and never really slam, but if you listen closely like the RCA dog, you can def hear the roots of slam in there. Because they were on JL America, the only label shittier than Wild Rags, it was kind of hard to get into Morpheus Descends back in the day. If you were really down with NYDM, though, you tracked that shit down because you saw the dudes in Suffocation rocking Morpheus Descends shirts all the time. And you knew that if it was good enough for Terrence Hobbes, it was fucking good enough for you!! Anyway, if you're into Incantation or that style of sludgy, proto-NYDM, make sure you track this shit down. CORPSE UNDER GLASS!