I've spoken before about the metal genre known as "small amp metal". In said sub-genre, the majority of the amps used by the band's musicians are generally shorter than the stage upon which they are playing. Long thought to be extinct, small amp metal (SAM for short) seems to be resurfacing slowly, much in the same way that creatures first rose from the primordial ooze. It's with this in mind that I share this video with you. Please pay close attention to the singer's amazing vocal abilities. Also notice that at :31 seconds, I think the singer utters the line "she has wonderful titties"
Thanks to reader Omair for sending this in.
Showing posts with label baja jackets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label baja jackets. Show all posts
Monday, June 21, 2010
Monday, June 22, 2009
Guest post: Where's the love for awesome hardcore bands that turned into shitty metal bands?
This is the first of what we hope will be many guest columns from MI readers, in this case from frequent commenter and MI Twitter follower Snoopz. Naturally it isn't as good as something we would write ourselves, but you can't have everything, can you? If you're interested in writing something, please send it to our email or send a direct message on Twitter- the more the merrier!
This is my shot at a guest column for Metal Inquisition and it’s gonna be about hardcore bands that “went metal” in the 80’s and early 90’s, and, well, how that was totally fuckin awesome! Now right now, people who were hardcore fans in the 80’s, their heads are exploding, because what I just said is the equivalent of a teenager today telling me, a 30 year old, that it must have been awesome to be around in the 90’s to see the emergence of Slipknot and Sevendust. I’d say, “no, I went to Tattoo the Earth Tour and it sucked” and we would just not see eye to eye. Well I don’t connect well with older hardcore fans, record collectors, and so forth. I see them as the No Fun Club. Like, if my favorite Cro-Mags album is the wrong one, forget it, I’m not even worth talking to. No accounting for personal taste with these hardcore puritans, there are good albums and bad albums and, a consensus has been reached on the matter, and I should shut up.
School of Violence, Junkyard, and Broken Bones?! It's like a who's-who of forgettable crap all in one image!
The records I’m going to mention today, by Warzone, Token Entry, and DYS, are universally hated despite musical innovation and adventurous lyrics. What the fuck? I’ll get into this right now. I’m pretty positive most Metal Inquisition readers have a general awareness of hardcore music, but I should clarify that records I’m talking about don’t sound like the metalcore bands that were all spawned by At The Gates’ Slaughter of the Soul. In fact death metal is not really a factor. Think crossover, cheese metal, funk metal, thrash.
Here is a photo of my room around 2000. I was heavily involved in some hardcore archeology at the time, digging up albums from ten years earlier. Note all the tapes. Guess what? They were cheaper than Cds. And what tapes was I finding the most in used bins? The “sellout” metal albums by punk and hardcore bands that nobody wanted. Now you are getting an idea about why I know so much about this shit.
Warzone - Self-titled
Warzone was a NYHC band, had a killer 7 inch and two great, well-produced full lengths, and then the 1989 S/T album dropped, ruining everything in a lot of people’s eyes. When I was first listening to Warzone in the mid-90’s (they were reunited and playing often) I did not even know that the album existed. I found it hard to believe, when told by friends, that some “awful” Warzone record was out there with bullet holes on the cover. I searched for years. Nothing. Finally in the early 00’s I met a friend who had received the record as a birthday present. A gag gift of course. Amazingly his copy was a promo sent to a radio station and contained a press release for Caroline Records that was, I admit, rather funny, describing their logo as “the iron cross of unity.” My heart sank when I saw that the program director of the station had written on the release, in pen, “despite their best intentions, this is a lame band.”
The record rocks, good luck finding it on mediafire. Sure it has a thin sound, the guitars sound like a series of samples for a RUN DMC record all strung together, but this whole record moves at a mid-tempo groove that will fuck you up.
Token Entry - "The Weight of the World"
On to Token Entry, a melodic straight edge band from the late 80’s who dropped Weight of the World in 1990, a kind of hard rock funk metal record that is near and dear to my heart. Here are the words of AMG “The vocalist looks ready for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the guitarist is black, the bass player was kidnapped from a hairy metal band, and the drummer looks like seventy percent of the male actors in Los Angeles.” Too much for most hardcore fans I’m sure. A photo of a band not looking right on the back of the record is enough for most fans to dismiss the album as “sellout” before putting it on the turntable. It’s like, if the record’s cover is in full color, it’s a deal-breaker. Oh well, their loss, this release is real fun and was recently re-issued.
DYS - Self-titled
Last and the best. DYS, self-titled LP. Fuck man, it kills me to see people on Amazon.com saying the discography CD is good only if you program your CD player to play the tracks from Brotherhood alone. 1984, this record is not influenced by thrash, it’s really just longer hardcore songs, with some higher-pitched vocal. In the words of the guitar player, "the most technically proficient and cleanest sounding record in the history of Hardcore." This shit is all muscle, so look out. Lyrics?
Conclusion
Again, I’ll tell you all, I wasn’t there when all these records dropped, but I’ve been listening to this kind of shit for years and have got pretty much 100% negative feedback from people learning about my musical tastes. I dig Mucky Pup, and M.O.D., two bands recently dismissed here at Metal Inquisition. I don’t know why I got to go against the grain. A few years ago I saw a review in the thrash zine HeartattaCK lamenting that the cover of a new 7” featured cover art in the style of the Suicidal Tendencies Join the Army record cover. “I hope that this style of art does not come back,” said the reviewer. I wondered, “what the fuck kind of crappy album covers does this person like? Blurry photos with typewriter font lower-case text?” That is the antithesis of cool. Crossover rules.
This is my shot at a guest column for Metal Inquisition and it’s gonna be about hardcore bands that “went metal” in the 80’s and early 90’s, and, well, how that was totally fuckin awesome! Now right now, people who were hardcore fans in the 80’s, their heads are exploding, because what I just said is the equivalent of a teenager today telling me, a 30 year old, that it must have been awesome to be around in the 90’s to see the emergence of Slipknot and Sevendust. I’d say, “no, I went to Tattoo the Earth Tour and it sucked” and we would just not see eye to eye. Well I don’t connect well with older hardcore fans, record collectors, and so forth. I see them as the No Fun Club. Like, if my favorite Cro-Mags album is the wrong one, forget it, I’m not even worth talking to. No accounting for personal taste with these hardcore puritans, there are good albums and bad albums and, a consensus has been reached on the matter, and I should shut up.
School of Violence, Junkyard, and Broken Bones?! It's like a who's-who of forgettable crap all in one image!The records I’m going to mention today, by Warzone, Token Entry, and DYS, are universally hated despite musical innovation and adventurous lyrics. What the fuck? I’ll get into this right now. I’m pretty positive most Metal Inquisition readers have a general awareness of hardcore music, but I should clarify that records I’m talking about don’t sound like the metalcore bands that were all spawned by At The Gates’ Slaughter of the Soul. In fact death metal is not really a factor. Think crossover, cheese metal, funk metal, thrash.
Here is a photo of my room around 2000. I was heavily involved in some hardcore archeology at the time, digging up albums from ten years earlier. Note all the tapes. Guess what? They were cheaper than Cds. And what tapes was I finding the most in used bins? The “sellout” metal albums by punk and hardcore bands that nobody wanted. Now you are getting an idea about why I know so much about this shit.
Warzone - Self-titledWarzone was a NYHC band, had a killer 7 inch and two great, well-produced full lengths, and then the 1989 S/T album dropped, ruining everything in a lot of people’s eyes. When I was first listening to Warzone in the mid-90’s (they were reunited and playing often) I did not even know that the album existed. I found it hard to believe, when told by friends, that some “awful” Warzone record was out there with bullet holes on the cover. I searched for years. Nothing. Finally in the early 00’s I met a friend who had received the record as a birthday present. A gag gift of course. Amazingly his copy was a promo sent to a radio station and contained a press release for Caroline Records that was, I admit, rather funny, describing their logo as “the iron cross of unity.” My heart sank when I saw that the program director of the station had written on the release, in pen, “despite their best intentions, this is a lame band.”
The record rocks, good luck finding it on mediafire. Sure it has a thin sound, the guitars sound like a series of samples for a RUN DMC record all strung together, but this whole record moves at a mid-tempo groove that will fuck you up.
Token Entry - "The Weight of the World"
On to Token Entry, a melodic straight edge band from the late 80’s who dropped Weight of the World in 1990, a kind of hard rock funk metal record that is near and dear to my heart. Here are the words of AMG “The vocalist looks ready for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the guitarist is black, the bass player was kidnapped from a hairy metal band, and the drummer looks like seventy percent of the male actors in Los Angeles.” Too much for most hardcore fans I’m sure. A photo of a band not looking right on the back of the record is enough for most fans to dismiss the album as “sellout” before putting it on the turntable. It’s like, if the record’s cover is in full color, it’s a deal-breaker. Oh well, their loss, this release is real fun and was recently re-issued.
DYS - Self-titledLast and the best. DYS, self-titled LP. Fuck man, it kills me to see people on Amazon.com saying the discography CD is good only if you program your CD player to play the tracks from Brotherhood alone. 1984, this record is not influenced by thrash, it’s really just longer hardcore songs, with some higher-pitched vocal. In the words of the guitar player, "the most technically proficient and cleanest sounding record in the history of Hardcore." This shit is all muscle, so look out. Lyrics?
A demon trapped within all menDamn, you should listen to that stuff when working out.
Has won the battle here
And those who set the demon free
Now have cause to fear
Gone the days of loneliness
Trapped within his brain
He steps forth into darkness
And remembers all the pain
Conclusion
Again, I’ll tell you all, I wasn’t there when all these records dropped, but I’ve been listening to this kind of shit for years and have got pretty much 100% negative feedback from people learning about my musical tastes. I dig Mucky Pup, and M.O.D., two bands recently dismissed here at Metal Inquisition. I don’t know why I got to go against the grain. A few years ago I saw a review in the thrash zine HeartattaCK lamenting that the cover of a new 7” featured cover art in the style of the Suicidal Tendencies Join the Army record cover. “I hope that this style of art does not come back,” said the reviewer. I wondered, “what the fuck kind of crappy album covers does this person like? Blurry photos with typewriter font lower-case text?” That is the antithesis of cool. Crossover rules.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Life of Agony has the method of groove to grab your attention
There are few bands I listen to more often than Life of Agony. They've been there through thick and thin, like an old baseball glove or a girl who you call to fuck and borrow money from every time you're single. With that in mind, it's high time Metal Inquisition sings their praises, album by album!
River Runs Red
Theme: "I wanna mosh."
When I wrote that theme, I sang it like Twisted Sister's "I Wanna Rock" and thought of how great many 80s songs about dancing would be if you changed them to being about moshing: "All She Wants To Do Is Mosh," "My Girl Wants to Mosh All The Time," and so forth.
Anyway, I like to think of this album as the gay version of Carnivore. It has brutal mosh parts, but also lots of "wah wah, I hate my daddy" parts. I used to hate this album because of the unusual vocals. I just wanted to hear Bulldoze and Dmize, but now that I am an old, lonely man full of little else but despair, hopelessness, and shattered dreams, the vocals sound pretty good to me.
The songs seem to be broadly divided into two sets: songs about how they will mosh all over you if you step to them and their crew, and songs about crying. On the mosh tip you have tracks like "Method of Groove" in which they make sure you know that their method of groove will grab your attention. Then there is "Respect," which informs the audience that someone or another has a thing to learn about respect. I am not sure who it is supposed to be targeted at, I like to think that it's about a jerky cop who kicked me out of the Safeway parking lot in 1995 when all I wanted to do was skate with my bros. He definitely has a thing or two to learn about respect!!
There is also plenty of crying. For example, "Bad Seed," in which Keith passive-aggressively suggests that he is going to kill himself:
Ugly
Theme: "I wanna cry."
On this album, Keith abandons the songs about moshing and talks a lot about how he misses his mommy. I don't get along all that well with my mom, but I am a sensitive pussy, so this is my favorite LOA album. Every time I get my heart broken by some 23 year-old hipster girl (usually two or three times a month), I put this album on, curl up into a ball and hold myself while I rock back and forth in the corner and cry myself to sleep.
Buru Buru Dog and Keith Caputo both like to sit in the corner and quiver while they cry
I also like to put on "I Regret" and "Lost At 22" when I look back on my life. I wish that I could say that it has been one spectacularly disappointing choice after the next, but I'm such a loser that my failures aren't even spectacular. I'm not even interesting enough to be a trainwreck, I'm just slowing puttering down the road to fizzling out. Eventually I will just sigh deeply and crumple into dust as my soul escapes through my mouth... probably around the age of 34. When I think about this, I put on "I Regret" and fill page after page of my diary by scrawling "SHED MY SKIN AND START AGAIN!!!" over and over. It's what Keith would want me to do, I think.
My favorite LOA song, though, is "Coffee Break." Just like Keith says in the chorus, "No one understands me." In fact I am sure I am going to die alone because of this. All I want to do is listen to BrokeNCYDE, watch Bridget Jones and snuggle with a nice girl, but I am more convinced it will never happen every time I listen to this song. Keith is the only one who really gets me, I think.
Soul Searching Sun
Theme: "I wanna rock... while I cry."
On this album, LOA decided that they wanted to be a rock band. Basically this record sounds like Creed, which is cool with me because I like Creed, although it does represent quite a change from the old days in which they sang the praises of moshers who were unwilling to change for society. I half expect him to ask the audience if they can take him higher.
For example, "Angry Tree" reminds me of that one Belly song about the tree or whatever. It's hella 90s, I don't remember the name but I liked it a lot. The singer was hot as I recall, although if I went back and watched it now, I would probably vomit because she's probably wearing Doc Martens or something, not to mention what must be a giant bush lurking beneath her striped tights. And odds are their is someone with a Dr. Seuss novelty hat in the video somewhere. Mucky Pup proved that much. Writing songs about trees is definitely a relic of the 90s.
Keith wants you to think that he is done being a crybaby on this album, but I beg to differ. For example, in "Hope" he says "This song is meant to uplift you, not to tear you apart." Really Keith?? I don't believe you! I think you want to bum us out so we will listen to you play acoustic Bob Marley covers!! (In case you haven't heard it, LOA actually did an acoustic cover of "Redemption Song") You're not fooling me! Not cool bro, save that sensitive shit for Cyco Miko.
Conclusion
Life of Agony has a song for every mood and every time of your life! Lifting weights, tending to a broken heart, crushing despair, whatever- Keith and Joey Z have you covered! By the way, is Joey Z related to Johnny Z from Megaforce?? I hope not, because I feel like Joey Z would never have signed Overkill. Anyway, don't be an "I only like the demo" guy and tell me that "River Runs Red" is the only good album, because they all jam for their own reasons!
River Runs RedTheme: "I wanna mosh."
When I wrote that theme, I sang it like Twisted Sister's "I Wanna Rock" and thought of how great many 80s songs about dancing would be if you changed them to being about moshing: "All She Wants To Do Is Mosh," "My Girl Wants to Mosh All The Time," and so forth.
Anyway, I like to think of this album as the gay version of Carnivore. It has brutal mosh parts, but also lots of "wah wah, I hate my daddy" parts. I used to hate this album because of the unusual vocals. I just wanted to hear Bulldoze and Dmize, but now that I am an old, lonely man full of little else but despair, hopelessness, and shattered dreams, the vocals sound pretty good to me.
Unwilling to change for society, Keith is gonna be who he wants to be! He is the underground, the underground- yeah!
The songs seem to be broadly divided into two sets: songs about how they will mosh all over you if you step to them and their crew, and songs about crying. On the mosh tip you have tracks like "Method of Groove" in which they make sure you know that their method of groove will grab your attention. Then there is "Respect," which informs the audience that someone or another has a thing to learn about respect. I am not sure who it is supposed to be targeted at, I like to think that it's about a jerky cop who kicked me out of the Safeway parking lot in 1995 when all I wanted to do was skate with my bros. He definitely has a thing or two to learn about respect!!
There is also plenty of crying. For example, "Bad Seed," in which Keith passive-aggressively suggests that he is going to kill himself:
So please don't keep on askingIt reminds me of this Scott Baio movie from the 80s called "The Truth About Alex" where he finds out his best friend is gay and is going to kill himself. He tells his little brother melodramatically, "You can have all my records... I won't need them where I'm going!" Then he drives his Camaro off a cliff. I feel like Keith Caputo is also crying out for attention in songs like "Bad Seed" and "My Eyes." I like feeling sorry for myself too, though, so I'm cool with that.
If there's something wrong
'Cause you know damn well if I was fine
I would've never ever written this song
UglyTheme: "I wanna cry."
On this album, Keith abandons the songs about moshing and talks a lot about how he misses his mommy. I don't get along all that well with my mom, but I am a sensitive pussy, so this is my favorite LOA album. Every time I get my heart broken by some 23 year-old hipster girl (usually two or three times a month), I put this album on, curl up into a ball and hold myself while I rock back and forth in the corner and cry myself to sleep.
Buru Buru Dog and Keith Caputo both like to sit in the corner and quiver while they cryI also like to put on "I Regret" and "Lost At 22" when I look back on my life. I wish that I could say that it has been one spectacularly disappointing choice after the next, but I'm such a loser that my failures aren't even spectacular. I'm not even interesting enough to be a trainwreck, I'm just slowing puttering down the road to fizzling out. Eventually I will just sigh deeply and crumple into dust as my soul escapes through my mouth... probably around the age of 34. When I think about this, I put on "I Regret" and fill page after page of my diary by scrawling "SHED MY SKIN AND START AGAIN!!!" over and over. It's what Keith would want me to do, I think.
My favorite LOA song, though, is "Coffee Break." Just like Keith says in the chorus, "No one understands me." In fact I am sure I am going to die alone because of this. All I want to do is listen to BrokeNCYDE, watch Bridget Jones and snuggle with a nice girl, but I am more convinced it will never happen every time I listen to this song. Keith is the only one who really gets me, I think.
Soul Searching SunTheme: "I wanna rock... while I cry."
On this album, LOA decided that they wanted to be a rock band. Basically this record sounds like Creed, which is cool with me because I like Creed, although it does represent quite a change from the old days in which they sang the praises of moshers who were unwilling to change for society. I half expect him to ask the audience if they can take him higher.
An incredibly pussed-out version of "Let's Pretend" in which Keith wears a windbreaker with the hood up the entire time
For example, "Angry Tree" reminds me of that one Belly song about the tree or whatever. It's hella 90s, I don't remember the name but I liked it a lot. The singer was hot as I recall, although if I went back and watched it now, I would probably vomit because she's probably wearing Doc Martens or something, not to mention what must be a giant bush lurking beneath her striped tights. And odds are their is someone with a Dr. Seuss novelty hat in the video somewhere. Mucky Pup proved that much. Writing songs about trees is definitely a relic of the 90s.
Nuclear Death was much better at writing metal songs about trees. For example, "The Corpse Tree" from their 1992 7" "For Our Dead"
Keith wants you to think that he is done being a crybaby on this album, but I beg to differ. For example, in "Hope" he says "This song is meant to uplift you, not to tear you apart." Really Keith?? I don't believe you! I think you want to bum us out so we will listen to you play acoustic Bob Marley covers!! (In case you haven't heard it, LOA actually did an acoustic cover of "Redemption Song") You're not fooling me! Not cool bro, save that sensitive shit for Cyco Miko.
Conclusion
Life of Agony has a song for every mood and every time of your life! Lifting weights, tending to a broken heart, crushing despair, whatever- Keith and Joey Z have you covered! By the way, is Joey Z related to Johnny Z from Megaforce?? I hope not, because I feel like Joey Z would never have signed Overkill. Anyway, don't be an "I only like the demo" guy and tell me that "River Runs Red" is the only good album, because they all jam for their own reasons!
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Reader request: Mucky Pup
I never really paid attention to Mucky Pup back in the day, but reader Savage made a request in the comments of our earlier Nocturnus post, and if there is anything that defines us here at Metal Inquisition, it's customer service. In fact, at one of our innovation retreats in 2008, we rewrote our corporate vision statement as follows:
I don't really know a damn thing about this band other than that they have a dumb name and I never gave them a chance back in the day because of it. Also that some of them were in Dog Eat Dog, who I listened to a little bit.
U Stink But I Heart U
Apparently this song was their big break, and I actually vaguely remember it. I was a huge fan of the comic strip Bloom County when I was a kid, including the hair metal band Billy & The Boingers that featured Bill The Cat. The guy who created the comic strip held a contest in which he asked bands to record their version of Billy & The Boingers' hit song "U Stink But I Heart U." Mucky Pup's version won, and was included on a flexi that came with one of the Bloom County books (which I had).
I'm not exactly sure what it mean when your band's biggest accomplishment is winning a jokey contest from a comic strip, but it is safe to say that's Mucky Pup's biggest claim to fame. Maybe they can tell me why Sarge is always so mean to Beetle Bailey!! And for christ's sake, why can't Blondie let Dagwood enjoy a sandwich in his hammock with nagging him about chores?? Fucking bitch.
Hippies don't like water
Aside from "U Stink But I Heart U" I don't remember any other Mucky Pup songs, so I fired up Youtube and checked it out. WTF is this shit?! It makes Brokencyde seem dignified, respectable, and stylish! Then again, I have to remind myself that this was 1991 and things were very different back then. Hypercolor wasn't ironic, Living Color thought it was perfectly acceptable to wear Body Glove wetsuits on stage, and MDC had turned into the hardcore version of Weird Al (see "Tofu Spaghetti"). The Youtube description notes that MTV never aired this video... weird! I can't think of a single reason why they wouldn't air it 24/7!!
Ugh I don't even know what to say... 1000000x worse than Brokencyde!
Also, "hippies" were still a relevant part of the cultural lexicon, with bands like Enuf Z'Nuf blending really shitty hair metal with a particularly superficial, irritating take on the 60s. Apparently Mucky Pup did not like this, so they made a novelty song about it. I'd like to think of it as an abominable, cringeworthy combination of Ugly Kid Joe and Murphy's Law... only without the cool parts of Murphy's Law like hitting people with an 8 ball in a sock, and with more fatties.
It gets worse when the fatty starts skanking and you can see his enormous, pasty thighs shake like a bowl full of vanilla jello
From the perspective of someone writing this in 2009, it seems quaint and a little charming to complain about hippies like we did so vigorously back in the 80s and early 90s. And maybe it is a little naive, but it reminds me of my salad days. It makes me long for simpler times, before screamo crunk and beardos, before scene hair and one-man MySpace drum machine goregrind bands. I just want to put a Scatterbrain tape in my Walkman, put on my baja jacket, and go skateboard behind Safeway. Either that or go smoke weed on a rock in the woods and listen to Pantera. Instead, I have to do my taxes and write a proposal for market research on Crest toothpaste and I am listening to Lady Gaga. Sigh...
Mr. Hand
This song is about how the singer masturbates a lot, presumably because the ladies aren't checking for him. It is actually sort of catchy, once again in a "poor man's 'Crucial Barbeque'" kind of way. I probably would have thought it was pretty funny in 7th or 8th grade. But I also thought it was a really good idea to wear red sweatpants, a Forced Entry shirt, a Batman hat and puffy white high tops from K-Mart (the brand was "Jox") six days of the week.
Between his physique, wardrobe, and hair I have no idea why he isn't drowning in pussy
Apparently the world had a big appetite for comedy metal in the 90s, and one of the staples of the genre is wearing oversize, zany Dr. Suess hats. The drummer for a local comedy punk/metal band called Dumt wore one every fucking time they played and it made me want to kill him even though I loved Dumt a lot. Actually, I still do.
These hats fill me with rage in a way that very few things are capable of
The Dr. Suess hats remind of other early 90s fashion mishaps like those stripey tights that were so popular at Lollapalooza. I always wanted to fuck the art fag chicks in my 8th grade art class that wore Doc Martens with stripey tights and listened to Skinny Puppy and Alien Sex Fiend.
Anyway, this song is fucking terrible, I don't even have the patience to look on Rapidshit for a copy of their album (or albums... did they have more than one?). This is like the equivalent of playing old NES games for the first time. Maybe if it was 1988 you would have looked past their many obvious and serious flaws, but it is 2009 and this shit sucks by today's standards.
Dog Eat Dog - "No Fronts"
I guess some people from Mucky Pup were in Dog Eat Dog, but I'm not looking it up because I just want to be done writing about this awful shit. I used to listen to this band a bit, but I haven't heard them for years and they are much fucking worse than I remembered them being. Apparently they felt like they hadn't made big enough assholes of themselves in Mucky Pup and decided to start a new band in which they would do the most embarrassing shit possible, then record it onto a CD which they would sell.
Look at him rap aggressively into the fisheye lens! He's so angry/authentic!
Listening to this song for the first time in years, the main thing I noticed is how these are maybe the very worst lyrics I have ever heard, even surpassing Brokencyde's "hardcore shit make u feel the toxic" line. I will highlight the parts that make me cringe and vomit the most:
Conclusion
I like Ugly Kid Joe and Murphy's Law better, fuck this band. Some things deserved to die with the 90s.
The mission of Metal Inquisition is to provide society with superior products and services by developing innovations and solutions that improve the quality of life and satisfy customer needs, and to provide bloggers with meaningful work and advancement opportunities, and investors with a superior rate of return.With that in mind, we enter the bizarre and frightening world of Mucky Pup.
I don't really know a damn thing about this band other than that they have a dumb name and I never gave them a chance back in the day because of it. Also that some of them were in Dog Eat Dog, who I listened to a little bit.
U Stink But I Heart U
Apparently this song was their big break, and I actually vaguely remember it. I was a huge fan of the comic strip Bloom County when I was a kid, including the hair metal band Billy & The Boingers that featured Bill The Cat. The guy who created the comic strip held a contest in which he asked bands to record their version of Billy & The Boingers' hit song "U Stink But I Heart U." Mucky Pup's version won, and was included on a flexi that came with one of the Bloom County books (which I had).
I'm not exactly sure what it mean when your band's biggest accomplishment is winning a jokey contest from a comic strip, but it is safe to say that's Mucky Pup's biggest claim to fame. Maybe they can tell me why Sarge is always so mean to Beetle Bailey!! And for christ's sake, why can't Blondie let Dagwood enjoy a sandwich in his hammock with nagging him about chores?? Fucking bitch.
Hippies don't like water
Aside from "U Stink But I Heart U" I don't remember any other Mucky Pup songs, so I fired up Youtube and checked it out. WTF is this shit?! It makes Brokencyde seem dignified, respectable, and stylish! Then again, I have to remind myself that this was 1991 and things were very different back then. Hypercolor wasn't ironic, Living Color thought it was perfectly acceptable to wear Body Glove wetsuits on stage, and MDC had turned into the hardcore version of Weird Al (see "Tofu Spaghetti"). The Youtube description notes that MTV never aired this video... weird! I can't think of a single reason why they wouldn't air it 24/7!!
Ugh I don't even know what to say... 1000000x worse than Brokencyde!Also, "hippies" were still a relevant part of the cultural lexicon, with bands like Enuf Z'Nuf blending really shitty hair metal with a particularly superficial, irritating take on the 60s. Apparently Mucky Pup did not like this, so they made a novelty song about it. I'd like to think of it as an abominable, cringeworthy combination of Ugly Kid Joe and Murphy's Law... only without the cool parts of Murphy's Law like hitting people with an 8 ball in a sock, and with more fatties.
It gets worse when the fatty starts skanking and you can see his enormous, pasty thighs shake like a bowl full of vanilla jelloFrom the perspective of someone writing this in 2009, it seems quaint and a little charming to complain about hippies like we did so vigorously back in the 80s and early 90s. And maybe it is a little naive, but it reminds me of my salad days. It makes me long for simpler times, before screamo crunk and beardos, before scene hair and one-man MySpace drum machine goregrind bands. I just want to put a Scatterbrain tape in my Walkman, put on my baja jacket, and go skateboard behind Safeway. Either that or go smoke weed on a rock in the woods and listen to Pantera. Instead, I have to do my taxes and write a proposal for market research on Crest toothpaste and I am listening to Lady Gaga. Sigh...
Mr. Hand
This song is about how the singer masturbates a lot, presumably because the ladies aren't checking for him. It is actually sort of catchy, once again in a "poor man's 'Crucial Barbeque'" kind of way. I probably would have thought it was pretty funny in 7th or 8th grade. But I also thought it was a really good idea to wear red sweatpants, a Forced Entry shirt, a Batman hat and puffy white high tops from K-Mart (the brand was "Jox") six days of the week.
Between his physique, wardrobe, and hair I have no idea why he isn't drowning in pussyApparently the world had a big appetite for comedy metal in the 90s, and one of the staples of the genre is wearing oversize, zany Dr. Suess hats. The drummer for a local comedy punk/metal band called Dumt wore one every fucking time they played and it made me want to kill him even though I loved Dumt a lot. Actually, I still do.
These hats fill me with rage in a way that very few things are capable of The Dr. Suess hats remind of other early 90s fashion mishaps like those stripey tights that were so popular at Lollapalooza. I always wanted to fuck the art fag chicks in my 8th grade art class that wore Doc Martens with stripey tights and listened to Skinny Puppy and Alien Sex Fiend.
Anyway, this song is fucking terrible, I don't even have the patience to look on Rapidshit for a copy of their album (or albums... did they have more than one?). This is like the equivalent of playing old NES games for the first time. Maybe if it was 1988 you would have looked past their many obvious and serious flaws, but it is 2009 and this shit sucks by today's standards.
Dog Eat Dog - "No Fronts"
I guess some people from Mucky Pup were in Dog Eat Dog, but I'm not looking it up because I just want to be done writing about this awful shit. I used to listen to this band a bit, but I haven't heard them for years and they are much fucking worse than I remembered them being. Apparently they felt like they hadn't made big enough assholes of themselves in Mucky Pup and decided to start a new band in which they would do the most embarrassing shit possible, then record it onto a CD which they would sell.
Look at him rap aggressively into the fisheye lens! He's so angry/authentic!Listening to this song for the first time in years, the main thing I noticed is how these are maybe the very worst lyrics I have ever heard, even surpassing Brokencyde's "hardcore shit make u feel the toxic" line. I will highlight the parts that make me cringe and vomit the most:
No fronts no tricks no soap box politicsHoly fuck that was hard to bear, I seriously thought about smashing my monitor a few times just to make it stop. It's like a bunch of band geeks heard "Urban Discipline" and decided they wanted to give being tough a shot... only they added fucking trumpets to the mix, so it didn't work out so well. The video is full of the most annoying 90s cliches like flannels, fisheye shots, snowboards, and beanies. It's like a Saturday Night Live parody of post-Beastie Boys 90s culture, only it's all too real. Do not want.
No guns just blunts we kick this just for fun
We come with the fat joints
To uplift the moods
Big up to people catchin' on this groove
This is Dog Eat Dog not a snitch or a snoop
I might chew a bone but don't call me pooch
We're not braggin - No
Are we laggin - Never
I can already see we got your tail waggin'
I could doggy bad ya
Or have you for lunch
The answer is no now - who fronts?
Introducing the kids who get loose
Microphone check one to the deuce
Deuce to the tre relax and parlay
With the 4-5-6 we roll hits
Flip the script to move your hips
Flavor we kick the boom to the bip
The boom to the bap ABK type fat
Strapped with crazy herbs and that's that
Alright kid what ya want ya get
S.G. Dog Eat Dog represent
You know the time so act like you know
Listen to the way this ill shit flow
We travel around all boro, any city
Some got beef but they wont get to me
If you come correct and your vibes are true
Peace to your crew
We're looking out for you
Conclusion
I like Ugly Kid Joe and Murphy's Law better, fuck this band. Some things deserved to die with the 90s.
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