James Hetfield has really let himself go

Stop

Yeah. Seriously. (Image courtesy of AHTBM.)

Fun with Google autocomplete

Fuck You! I like Hatebreed.

Good lord, I remember a time when Hatebreed would be booked to play a little coffee shop in my town like every two months. Half of the time, they wouldn't show up...but still. Times have changed.



Thanks again to Marne for the heads up.

The beauty and innocence of youth: Memories of outdoor shows in the early 90s

Two weeks ago, this amazing picture of New Jersey's Revenant was posted here at Metal Inquisition. To say that I love this image would be a severe understatement. I mean, many have tried to encapsulate the youthful abandon that permeated early 90s death metal, but few images have done it as succinctly as this picture. What, I ask you, is more metal than playing the Fourth Of July picnic at your apartment complex? The varying heights of their hi-tops, the varying shortnesses of their shorts, the varying degrees of shirtlessness upon their chests. If you were there during those years, you understand why this image is so great. This is what it was like back in the early 90s, and if you missed it...you missed it. Death metal was new, china cymbals were huge, and Morrisound Studios reigned supreme.

A sweet outdoor show in Italy, with an audience made up of no one...because the picture was taken with a tripod and a timer. This picture, by the way, officially started the musical genre known as "small amp metal". In short, this musical style can only be played with small practice amps, and is at its best when the stage the band is playing in is at least twice the height of the tallest amp.

Memories:

During my reign as drummer of a handful of so-so bands in the early 90's, I played a few outdoor shows...just like the one pictured above. The band I played the most with was more of a grindcore band, but our shows were almost exclusively with death and speed metal bands. As a drummer, these shows were particularly frustrating, since grass is pretty much the worst surface on which your drumset can sit as you attempt to rip a brutal blast beat. As my drumset rocked back and forth, the cymbal stands dug into the soft grass, and you suddenly realized that you were engaged in battle with nature. Luckily, the bands I was in never attempted to seem evil, so when my cymbals toppled over onto the flower beds in front of the drumset, I probably looked less stupid than the death metal bands who would play after us. They, I have to tell you, looked seriously stupid. Have you ever seen a dude growl "Our next song is about a brutal serial killer...and its called..." into a mic, while standing on grass, at 2 in the afternoon, and a fly starts buzzing around his stinky hair? By comparison, we looked downright presentable and cool. Which reminds me, at one such show, a local band who we despised introduced one song by saying the following:

"This next song is about a cannibal who eats people"

Hmmm. As opposed to a cannibal who eats what? Tofu? By definition, a cannibal eats people, no? But anyway, I'm getting off track here.Out of the handful of outdoor shows (in reality, they were more like "backyard shows") that I played in during the early 90s, one surely sticks out in my mind above all others. Imagine, if you will, driving to a remote and rural location in the midwest...a town that was little more than a conglomeration of homes and had just recently gotten its very first stoplight. Then imagine a flatbed trailer, like from an 18-wheeler, with bands playing on top of it while it's parked in the middle of a depressing field. Billed as a "metal fest", the show was merely six bands and an audience of about 40 people. If you're a math genius like me, you can probably figure out that most of the audience was actually made up of the other bands. Depressing, I know.

Not happy with the fact that only horrible metal bands were getting to play outdoors, pseudo-prog bands have recently started to get in on the action. Here we see a prog band's singer and keyboard player praying that his parents don't come home early and yell at him for using all the extension cords.

It was one of the first shows that our band had played, so we set up a boombox in front of the stage to record our set. On the drive back home, I remember listening to the tape in my brother's car. Quickly we realized that two stoned Pantera fans had been standing by our beloved Panasonic boombox during the whole set, and endlessly did their horrible Bevis and Butthead impressions into it's tiny microphone. As a result, what we ended up with was a thirty minute tape of two rural jerkoffs with no teeth testing out their comedic chops onto our boombox. I remember what they looked like, slightly overweight and with nearly identical Vulgar Display Of Power shirts. The fact that they were only missing a few teeth, made them stand well above the rest of the audience, most of whom had even fewer teeth, and the few they had were dark brown. This, I would later learn, was partially as a result of drinking water pumped from wells, which lacks fluoride.

Outdoor shows in empty fields and backyards during the 90's would sometimes bring out bands who were barely metal at all. Like a community college who will let anyone in, backyard shows sometimes had bills with bands totaling well into the double digits. Inevitably, at least one band would feature a guy in a Dr Seus hat who was more than ready to use his wah-wah pedal for every song. Another interesting note about outdoor shows during that time: apparently no one was allowed to use anything other than small practice amps with 10" speakers.

You know how sometimes people talk about the "good old days"? When they do, all I can think about is that "fest". I remember standing in the hot sun for hours, playing on top of a trailer, watching fat dudes get drunk and turn their back on the makeshift stage as we played, so they could light off firecrackers in order to throw them in to the neighboring cornfield.

So why did I suddenly remember this less than memorable "fest"? Well, it's all because of the Revenant picture above, but also because of the videos below. The first video features an outdoor performance, but also the typical dude who is getting down, not realizing that he's really taking away from the "evil" atmosphere that the music is trying to convey. We had a few guys like this at our shows...one particularly memorable one was an elderly black man in a suit and tie who suddenly decided to take his tie off and wrap it around his head as he danced around like a six year old ballerina at a recital. His suggestive gyrating dancing is a sight I wont soon forget.

The second video reminds of this era because of the sheer number of bands that were this bad who I had the pleasure of sharing a bill with. Outdoor shows were particularly attractive to these types of bands. If at first you think they sound okay, keep watching...and wait until the singer starts. Thanks to the reader who sent this in.




This dude knows how to GET DOWN!




Although this show is taking place indoors, the musical quality is indicative of many small-amp/outdoor metal bands. Is this guy the greatest metal vocalist ever? Do you even have to ask? I'm glad that the drummer has headphones on, so he can play perfectly on time thanks to his click track.




A classic that we've posted before. Certainly worth checking out again.




Reader submission. Sometimes the show is not on stage at all...check out the dude dancing.

Metal Chicks - The good, the bad, but mostly the ugly

When I was a young teenager and my hormones were moshing through my blood to the beat of Exodus' "Pleasures of the Flesh", I never thought I'd ever score with a metal chick. They were very rare creatures back then and usually went for the older dudes who smoked Marlboro reds and wore Motley Crue shirts. Even with my razor blade earring, a short whimpy dude with a mullet, a Slayer shirt and no game, just didn't stand a chance. I thought I was condemned to a life of jerkin' it to pictures of Lita Ford and Doro Pesch (and of course Tracy Lords and Ginger Lynn). As years went by, I got more confidence and by the early 90s (with more girls into metal) my options multiplied ten-fold. Imagine my ecstasy when I finally landed a GF my senior year in high school. She wore a Testament shirt and owned a Benediction cassette! At the time there was no hotter chick. She was the queen of our loser metal circle and she was going out with me. She wasn't with Tiger, the drummer for a horrible local thrash band who drove a pick-up truck with a Metallica sticker on the back window. No, sir! She was my GF and all I drove was my moms' 1986 Subaru! She thought my Jason Newsted haircut was awesome and would actually request Napalm Death on my mom's car stereo when we made out in the parking lot of the middle school at night. I lost my virginity to this Metal Goddess (on the back-seat of the Subaru). Of course, our love didn't last. I moved after graduating and that was it. I never even knew her last name. I have not seriously dated any other metal chicks since. I did play Unleashed while fucking some girl in college once and I still try to play Dystopia while getting busy as often as possible, but it's just not the the same, you know?. Those 3 months were the only times in my pathetic life I actually lived the dream. For 3 glorious months I had a hot metal chick. Of course I look at photos of her now and she was pretty skanky.

These days I exclusively date really hot girls (follow my Twitter for proof), so that means none of my ladies are into metal. The hesher stereotype of a metal fan is like fucking kryptonite to hot ladies. It's a fact: super hot chicks, don't like metal. Of course, I'm not saying all metal girls are porkers, but do you think Jessica Alba knows or gives a shit who Trey Azagthoth is? I never tell chicks that I like metal, much less that I write for this shitty blog. I don't give a shit about scene points. I just wanna get my knob polished and, maybe, a ride on the meat-coaster.

Still, there's a small part of me that longs for a hot metal chick... I think about it from time to time. So, I decided to look into metal chicks again and see what (if anything) I'd been missing. Let's start with my long lost past...

LITA FORD / JOAN JETT

God, these girls were SO fucking hot. For a barley pubescent boy into Kiss and Iron Maiden, a band like The Runaways was the only thing better than my sister's Wet'n'Wild bathing suit catalog. To this day, this picture gets my crank going. Even though I now think this is the hottest Lita Ford ever looked, back then I thought she looked a little plain, and I loved glammed-up Lita better. And sure, now I realize Joan Jett looked like Freddy Mercury, but at the time Joan Jett was a wet dream come true. Well, not really "wet", since my boys weren't really swimming yet, but you know what I mean.

Joan Jett has even aged well. I'd hit that! Not so much with Lita Ford. She looks like the lady in the flea market that sells Indian dream catchers... I'll pass, thanks.

DORO PESCH

I'd never heard Warlock as a kid, but that didn't stop me from hanging a poster of Doro on my bedroom wall as I fantasized about what I'd do to her if I ran into her in the woods in Germany while listening to Running Wild on my walkman. Doro was not hot at all, but the leather pants and metal look was too much for my naive testosterone-filled body, and plenty of chubbies were popped. I still haven't heard (nor care to) Warlock or any of her subsequent stuff, but somehow I know I'm not missing much at all. Talking about not missing much, if Doro wasn't much back then, she sure ain't shit now.

Girl, you went from singing in a band called Warlock to looking like one.

Harry Potter was right to be scared of you, Voldemort!

VIXEN

Again, I've never heard Vixen and I'm pretty fucking sure I don't want to, but in 1988 they were the object of my adoration. Dude, their drums were shaped like a motorcycle! I now realize they weren't all that and that they sorta look like Angela Bauer, but I was young, and like I said, my metal chicks options were limited. Here's another bunch of gals to whom the years have not been kind.

Ouch. This looks like the Knox County Thursday-night knitting and bridge club.

OTHER "HOT" CHICKS FROM THE 80's

The Great Kat... Yeah, she was never really hot. Ever. She was just fucking trashy and creepy... see this.

I was told there was 2 chicks in Madam X, but I can't tell which is which.

Just as with the image above, I can't tell who in Girlschool is a dude and who's just an ugly broad!

CYCLE SLUTS FROM HELL

Around the early 90's Headbanger's Ball introduced me the CSFH. I'm sure without the make-up and denim vests these girls were average cows, but nothing made my tadpole splash like the "I Wish You Were a Beer" video on Saturday nights.

JO BENCH

Of all the girls featured on this post, Jo Bench is the only one I still have a crush on. Maybe it's cuz I still listen to Bolt Thrower, or because I think girls with British accents are hot. In person, she's prolly pretty nasty, but Jo can sit on my Bench whenever she wants to.

MYTHIC

I saw Mythic live a loooooong time ago and let me tell you, they were NOT hot. Still, a lady wearing a Morgoth long sleeve has a way of getting under my skin. If you wanna know how Sergeant D feels about these ladies (and Nuclear Death), click here.

DEMONOMACY

I had both of these ladies' demos and even saw them live once, while living in Miami in the early 1990s. They were sloppy at best and musically, as repetitive and generic as any Florida band back then. Even from this blurry and dark picture we can make out that they were no models, but they were in a Death Metal band and when I was 17, that's the only thing that mattered.

A FEW FINAL NOTES:

Listen, not all the ladies mentioned above may be Playboy material (most aren't even good enough for Amateur Allure, actually), but at least they were fucking born before "Live After Death" came out. This dumb Miley Cyrus retarded-ass-whore dares wear this Maiden tee? Seriously? I want to punch her in her ribs. And set her hair on fire.

We know Black Metal dudes look like douche bags, but BM girls are WAY worse. BM girls are just pathetic, sad and plain gross.

Listen guys, the fact is that we all want a hot metal chick like what's her face from Lacuna Coil, but we have to face it: most metal girls were plain ugly.

Why Candlemass rules above all other shitty Swedish bands

***PLEASE NOTE: THIS POST DOES NOT CONTAIN ANY REFERENCES TO SWEDISH DEATH OR BLACK METAL.

I have never been much of a Candlemass fan. I don't know something about fat Swedish guys with brillopad hair wearing a Slanket never really turned my crank (Yes, I am aware he's not in the band anymore). However, if you follow my Twitter (and really, why wouldn't you?), then you'd know I've developed a little bit of an obsession with them. I have rediscovered them, if you will. Now, does the fact that I just started liking a band in 2009 that has been around since the 80s make me a poser? If some cretin came to me and told me he just now got into Hellhammer, I'd probably label him a fuckwad poser and steal his car. That's the usual poser punishment around here. Well, call me what you will, but I like Candlemass now. I did have Candlemass Live on cassette in high school, although I only listened to it once.

Other than the occasional Sabbath song here and there and some Paradise Lost, I don't usually dig on the sludgy slow doomy type shit, but lately Candlemass (and Messiah's fatness) have changed that. It's not only that I have found their songs incredibly catchy or that I have rediscovered how fat (and therefore funny) Massiah is, but the music seems to match my mood as of late. It's not that I have been sad or depressed. Quite the contrary, I have been on the up and up (which you'd also know if you follow my Twitter), but somehow their slow tunes have become an anthem to my life these days. Whatever, I'm a fucking werido.

The reason for this post, tho, is not to talk about the average Candlemass tunes, Messiah's fatness or to promote my Twitter, but to talk about the awesomest songs the Swedish meatballs, known as Candlemass, ever recorded. Read on, my friends. Read on!

Sweden has a long standing and well documented history of shit music. Who can forget Hick?

This image is so fucking funny on it's own, I'm not even gonna bother trying to say anything witty, mean or in anyway "funny" about it. I'll just point one thing out. We found Ron Weasely's real dad!

And there's Faith! Who can forget Faith? Who can forget the Doom pioneers who brought us the "Hymn of the Sinner" 7" single? Who can forget them? Not me! Mostly because it's hard to forget something you'd never heard of before until doing web research for a long-winded and all around retarded post about a second rate band like Candlemass.

From L to R: Assclown wearing my mom's suede boots // Moustache wilding frontman with a poodle haircut, my sister's sweater, my gym socks circe 1984 and a crucifix keychain // Guy looking sad 'cuz his mom won't let him grow his hair long // And... wait is that a dude or an ugly chick?

I didn't wanna bring these guys up, but...

So many poodle haircuts I don't know what to do. I wonder if that's like a "Swedish Thing", these terrible haircuts.

And then there's ABBA... Fuck me with a 15" black dildo! This whole Mama Mia! bullshit could have been avoided if these fucktarts would have died in their teens. *Sigh*, how I long for Nocturnus' Time Machine right now... Way to go Sweden, thanks for nothing.

Is it me, or does everyone in this picture look like his wearing a wig?

But all of the Swedish musical "legends," none is bigger (or lamer, really), than this gentleman. Allow me to introduce to Sigge Furst, a true Swedish icon. He was a mediocre actor and a horribly bad singer during the 40s, 50s and 60s.

He did more than 130 movies, and I'm sure they were all "very good." I wonder if the Swedes understood the concept of Two Thumbs Down in the 50s... Anyway, he was in the incredibly entertaining musical "I Dur Och Skur." What a picture that was! They sure don't make them like that anymore. Sven Lindberg was also very good in this movie. I recommend you put it on your Netlix list right away. In your Swedish Netflix, AKA "NeetFliiks"

And let us not forget the TV masterpiece "Himmel Och Pannkaka" featuring the incomparable Gunmar Bjornstand. That show was a kneeslapper! Imagine a mixture of Seinfeld, Gilligan's Island and and The Benny Hill Show! Actually that's not it at all, I just made that up. I have never seen and Sweedish TV, unless you count soft porn as "TV."

So, what does the prodigious Sigge Furst have to do with Candlemass? Aside from also being a Swede, in a stroke of true Swedish genius, in 1993 Candlemass decided to cover four songs by the late legend in an EP aptly titled "Sjunger Sigge Furst." I'm not sure why I said "aptly", since i have no idea WTF "Sjunger" means, but maybe I wanted to sound smart, and the use of words like "aptly" make you sound smarter than you actually are. I got a B in drafting once.

In any case, I think the whole EP is brilliance on mp3. Below, please find both, the original and the cover, of the catchy tune called "Bullfest." I don't really know if they even have bulls in Sweden, so I'm not sure what the song is about, but I love it! If it doesn't make you wanna get up and dance, there's obviously something really, really wrong with you. Or maybe there's something really, really wrong with me. Actually, I know there's something really, really wrong with me, so please disregard the previous statement.

I hope enjoyed that as much as I did. Probably not, but then again, I'm not sure I care.

Here's something else I found that I thought was interesting... Apparently Sigge Furst is not the only has-been dipshit Candlemass paid tribute to in the 90s.

So, what have we learned today, kids? Well, we learned that there is no cattle in Sweden, that I have serious psychological issues and that gluttony is a sin. Go fuck yourselves. Porn.

.

Where are they now (real estate edition): Jonny Z

SOD shirt? Check. Polka-dot suspenders? Check. Leave it to east coast Italians to set the fashion trends that the rest of us will follow for decades to come. To this day, you will never catch me at a formal function or presentation at work without rocking this very outfit.

This is a long post, so enjoy it.

As the foremost authority on washed-up metal nobodies, Metal Inquisition takes it's job seriously. It's for this very reason that we had a hard time ignoring the two emails that were sitting in our inbox, asking where "thrash metal grandfather" Jonny Z is these days. Granted, these emails were from Jonny himself, but nevertheless we found the challenge worth pursuing.

Who is Jonny Z?
If you don't know who Jonny Z is, don't worry...you're not missing much. I could play the "I'm way old school" card and make fun of you for not knowing...but really, what would that say about me? To make a big deal about my vast metal knowledge would be like bragging about the fact that I know in which episode of Perfect Strangers Balki mixes up the sugar and the salt (episode 18 by the way). While some might be impressed with such amazing knowledge, pretty much everyone would laugh at me and point...as so many people (mostly women) have done throughout my life. Having said that, I'll give you a quick rundown on why Jonny Z is mildly important, within a musical style that was itself only mildly important (more than 15 years ago) to a small group of acne-faced teenagers.

Question:
Is that Johnny Z and Billy Milano having a perfectly normal homoerotic moment at an MOD show as they both sing into a phallus....or is it two disgusting fat Italians fighting over an ice cream cone?

Answer:
Both

The facts:

Jonny Z had record store in a flea market in New Jersey. He signed Anthrax and Metallica, ran Megaforce records, and then listed himself and the Executive Producer of every horrible thrash metal album throughout the 80's, in order to keep making money off of these bands long after their members had been forced to sell their Toyota Corolla's in order to pay rent at their parent's houses. This, more or less, is all you need to know. I'll stop there, because the idea of looking into the seedy underbelly (and what a fat belly it is) of Johnny Z's musical career simply brings up troubling and painful memories for all of us. What troubling memories you ask? Well, much like a Vietnam vet has trouble sleeping under ceiling fans, I too have issues remembering all that was the 80s thrash scene, and Megaforce Record's output in particular. One part Holocaust, and one part 9-11, the musical output of Megaforce Records and the bands associated with Jonny Z are enough to make even the strongest man dry-heave. There's Overkill, Anthrax's, MOD's Surfin' MOD, not to mention the entire Testament catalog. Yes, "Practice What You Preach", I'm looking at you, and your badly mixed bass. But anyway....why are we looking into the matter of where Jonny Z is today? Well, there's those two emails from him that I mentioned earlier where he begged for some exposure in order to sell the six thousand remaining copies of the first Kings X album that are still sitting in his basement (by the way, remember how Kings X were deemed to be "the new Beatles" by the press, including Rolling Stone?) Aside from the emails urging us to talk about him, there was the unbelievable curiosity we had regarding what kind of house being the "executive producer" on Kill 'Em All, and that one live Trust album will buy you. It was with that question in mind that I released the Metal Inquisition hounds, in order to find Mr Z. By the way, I don't use the phrase "releasing the hounds" as a figure of speech. Most of our investigative reporting is done by an actual group of hounds, five well-trained dachshunds to be exact. These dachshunds have a real nose for sniffing out thrash metal empresarios, the movers and shakers of metal if you will. Sadly, because their training is in searching for "emprasarios", they returned rather quickly to the MI headquarters having found no information. I quickly realized my error. I had told them to look for an "empresario", not a fat annoying guy who is best known for his cameo in MOD's True Colors video. Having realized my error, I gave them a new task: "Go look for information about fat Italian dudes who produced Attack Of The Killer B's, and profit from the work of lesser douchebags." This was a command they understood. Sadly, they found Alex Perialas' house in Ithica NY. By the way, how great is it that if Alex Perialas, a man who accomplished so much during his life, ever Googles himself, he'll see that our blog comes up higher in the results than his own MySpace page. He recently wrote a comment on that post about his house, which leads me to believe that he's an okay guy....even if he did produce Overkill's entire catalog. His comment said:

Alex@pyramidsounstudios.com said... AP says life is good and I still know how to get a guitar tone bitches!! This site is some funny sh*t.

Thank you Alex!

Although commonly known as a trait and skill of "pointer" dogs, the Metal Inquisition dachshunds will stand, almost frozen, once they find the living quarters of any metal pseudo-celebrity. Pictured here is the littlest of the bunch, Helmut, who once stood in this very position for four hours outside an apartment that three guys from Internal Bleeding share in Long Island.

Where is Jonny Z today?

At first, I thought I had found this elusive figure of the metal world rather easily. I assumed, incorrectly, that Jonny had finally gone ahead and tried his hand at crafting his own music, rather than simply profiting from the tiny amount of talent that bands like Anthrax could piece together. I found this CD, and thought I had found my man. I quickly realized that wasn't the right Jonny. Then, I found another Johnny Z in the greater New York City area who claims to be a "maestro of sound and entertainment", which means he will DJ your son's Bar Mitzvah, or your amazingly fun company picnic. Quickly, however, I realized I had found the wrong Johnny Z. While they are both "maestros of sound and entertainment" (what would you call the I'm The Man EP after all), one was fatter than the other. With the MI hounds still out searching, I realized how horrible I really am at investigative work, and how terrible the MI dachshunds are at their job.

Damnit, wrong Johnny Z. Like the one I was looking for, this one is a washed up nobody with horrible facial hair and clothing. The difference? This guy was NOT involved in the recording of absolutely crucial albums like Raven's All For One, Ace Frehley's self titled album or any of the MOD records.

Having found the wrong Johnny Z twice over, I re-re-released the hounds...having had them smell a copy of SOD's album to track the scent. Quickly, the correct Jonny was found by the MI hounds. Redemption at last. Jonny Z, the real one, lives in Bucks County Pennsylvania. He lives right by the New Jersey border, which I fully understand. Much like flies don't often fly far away from feces...Italians don't often move far away from Jersey. My excuses to fellow poster Mr Gene Hoglan's balls who is both Italian and a Jersey resident. I know he wont be offended, however, because he knows these things are true. I mean, if I suddenly explained the concept of gravity to you...would you be offended? No, because you know it's true. You'd probably say "Right, right, I know...keep going with your story already...sheesh." So anyway, he lives in Pennsylvania now...not New York or New Jersey. Why?

At the risk of sounding like a washed up, jaded idiot...I still marvel at how the NYHC symbol was so nicely co-opted by Anthrax and Megaforce Records at large. I hope Roger Miret and the Raybeez estate get royalties from its use.

Having co-opted what little juice and iconography the New York City hardcore scene had back in the day (see picture above), I suspect that Mr Z and his family had to flee the greater New York City area in fear of retaliation from members of DMS, or perhaps because of threats from from New Jersey's own Mucky Pup. Those dudes were straight up Jersey gangsta's. Just look at this terrifying picture that the New Jersey Gang Task force sent me:

Can you really blame Jonny Z for having fled New Jersey due to fear of retaliation from Mucky Pup? These guys are a mix of extras from the Sopranos, with a tiny bit of Juggalo, and two parts douchebag thrown in for good measure. Man, nothing says class like purple MC Hammer pants, a sweet Nike tracksuit and dress shoes.

What about his house?
Funny you should ask, because the Metal Inquisition hounds came back from Bucks county quickly, and much like Lassie, their doggie noises were easy to decipher. "What is it girl? Where does he live? Near New Jersey? What? You want to take me to his house? It's by the well? Please take me there!" So I followed the hounds, and they took me here:

This well-apointed master suite is where the brains behind the entire Kings X catalog rests his weary head.

Now look...I'll be honest with you. As much as I want to laugh at the non-cohesive styling cues of the house, as much as I want to laugh about it's "1984 contractor chic" aesthetic values, or its unsuccessful blend of materials and decidedly middle class decor...I have to admit I was surprised that Mr Z could live in a house that is not falling apart. It's size alone was not what I expected. At 1.9 million dollars, in what is basically a semi-rural area of the east coast, I guess being the executive producer in Kill Em All as well as Fistful of Metal really does pay the bills. Seeing this house (all 5 bedrooms, 6 baths and 7,669 square feet of it) suddenly made me feel bad for Joey Belladonna. Why? Because earlier this year, we reported that Joey was living in upstate new york in a house that is merely valued at 300k. How can this be? Jonny Z has a nicer house than the guy who played drums in the musical epic known as I'm The Man? Life, it turns out, is not fair at all. I mean, was Jonny the one waring the indian head dress on stage for all those years? No. Was Jonny there to coach Scott Ian through his hairloss tantrums of '87? No. It was Joey who was there...and now Jonny Z has a nicer and bigger house? Joey is so broke these days, he can't even afford a full mic stand. As a result of all this information, I have finally been able to answer one of humanity's most pressing questions: Does god exist. The answer: Yes, there is a god. Sadly, like most of us, he hates Joey Belladonna.

When you look at Belladonna's entire body of work, you suddenly start to realize that "I'm The Man" as well as the outfit he wore on this picture are actually among the high points in his career. Speaking of "I"m The Man", was it really necessary to give fans like eight versions of the damn song in one EP? It's a bit like bragging about the fact that you can take a shit in eight different positions. We get the point, we're just not impressed.

Back to Jonny Z's house. As much as I was ready to laugh at his tiny, shitty house...I have to say that the house's hefty pricetag (1.9 million) left me silent. Suddenly, the Metal Inquisition offices were almost completely quiet, and all that could be heard was Seargent D practicing the main riff from Forced Entry's "Macrocosm, Microcosm" on his guitar. Putting the Forced Entry song aside, I suddenly felt guilty about having wanted Jonny Z to be living in a small house that looked like a pile of rubble, much like members from Manowar do. I remembered the last time I had a similar feeling of guilt, which was when Peter Steele of Type O Negative (and, more importantly, Carnivore) did a spread for Playgirl. I remember wanting to laugh at Mr Steele's man-junk, but when faced with photographic evidence of what he was working with...I suddenly felt shame, sadness and desperation. Wait a second...wait. Did I just willingly tell the whole world that I saw Peter Steele's Playgirl layout? Damn this truth serum, damn it all to hell!

See, I can explain...although I KNOW that my explanation sounds as made up as they come. Hear me out. When that magazine came out, I was living in Miami. My friend had introduced me to a gay friend of her's, who was an ex-punk rocker turned drag queen. A stretch, I know. This guy had the magazine, and showed it to me. I know you will all say I made this up...but it's totally true.

Okay, where was I? Oh yes, his house. So there you have it...it's big. Bigger than Joey's, and not too horrible looking considering the awful taste that Italians usually have, and the low quality of construction available in the United States.



What else is Jonny Z up to?

Like any other 57 year old man-child, Jonny has a Myspace page and a blog. It's in his blog that we can learn the most about this unlovable man...the man who first had Raven tour in the United Sates. Did you just read what I typed? This is the guy we can thank for bringing Raven to the US? Wow, next up I'll do an article about the Immigration officials who signed the visas for the 9-11 hijackers. But back to his blog. In said blog, we learn about Jonny's obsessive collecting of Nightmare Before Christmas action figures. Just read the quote below, which surely explains his passion for this movie:

“It made me think…What is this Jack really all about…is he really as deep and complex as these faces portray him….we figured there must be something more to this film…” - Jonny Z

If that statement doesn't grab you and tugs away at your heartstrings (mine are tuned to a drop C, for heavier riffing) I don't know what will. I don't know exactly what that quote means, so I'll leave it up to you to figure it out (much like a community college proffesor would when introuducing his students to Nietzsche). I do understand one portion of this quote, however, and that's the question he poses, that of there being "more to this film." As it turns out, MI staff contacted Tim Burton to see if there WAS in fact more to this film. We called his office, and identified ourselves as the guys who "wrote that funny post about the houses that the guys from Manowar live in". They hung up. So that settles that one. Oh, I forgot to mention that Jonny Z also owns an action figure store in New Hope PA, and lists the following people as his heroes:

- Malcolm X
- Ahmet Ertegun (founder of Atlantic Records)
- His wife

I'll let you all ponder that list, but rest assured that some PhD theseis work will be done on it very soon.


What do the demi-stars of thrash metal say about Jonny Z? What does the media say about Jonny Z?

I know that all of you consider us to be the absolute authorities on horrible music that no one cares about, and we thank you for that. Still, in order to keep our status as a peer-reviewed scholastic journal, we have allowed almost-well known bands comment on the man himself. Please watch the videos below.


First, let's all watch a news story about Jonny Z's Rock N' Roll heaven record store from back in the day.









In this video, Anthrax talk about the famed store that Jonny Z had in a New Jersey flea market, a store that has been discussed in every single interview that Anthrax, SOD, Raven, Venom, Testament and Overkill ever did. Megaforce Records insisted that all bands signed to the label mention the store, and Jonny's importance to the scene in all interviews. In some videos, you can actually see Jonny standing off camera pointing a gun to their bands, thus insuring that all mentions of him were included. Jonny Z is first mentioned in this video at 1:10. Please don't get distracted by the amazing poodle haircuts or hairy eyebrows.





Incredibly annoying video of Overkill, where they discuss Megaforce records and Jonny Z...as they were contractually obligated to do. Like most bands from Jersey and Long Island, Overkill claimed to be from New York City, as you can see in this video. Please note the fashion statements made in the video, which are incredibly tasteful. Notice how the one guitar player who always tried his hardest to look exactly like James Heatfiled (even using the same guitar as James and rocking the same long sweatbans on his forearms) takes a break from swinging from Metallica's balls and quickly pays homage to Max Cavalera by wearing some sensible urban camo. Johnny Z/Megaforce Records mention occurs :30 seconds in.




So what have we learned today? Absolutely nothing...except that making Lars Ulrich share some of his wealth as a result of you having been the executive producer on one of his albums almost 30 years ago will buy you an almost-nice house in Eastern Pennsylvania. Class dismissed.