Winds of Plague ain't got shit on our steez

I love mash culture. It makes me feel like I am on top of all the latest developments in youth culture when I find a band that combines seemingly disparate influences, and because I am so culturally literate and young-at-heart, I totally get what they are doing. I love to smugly explain all the references to my clueless friends who still think of "World Demise" and "Far Beyond Driven" as "their new stuff." For a few minutes, I can forget that I am turning 31 in six weeks and have been going to hardcore shows since 1989. With that in mind, you can understand why I am such a big fan of Winds of Plague.

We blogged about this sextet of Southern California moshers a while ago (here and here), so if you are not familiar with them please take a few minutes to brush up on the band. Our printer is down at the moment, but we'll pass out a handout that has hard copies of both posts before we leave today. They'll be on the conference room table next to the Panera bagels and juice. There's also one of those cardboard boxes of coffee, please help yourself- we have Sugar In The Raw as well as Sweet N Low for Delores and Gail, our two administrative assistants who are also diabetic.

"[Being a wigger] isn't that tricky, you just say ignorant shit over and over."

Anyhow, the big idea with Winds of Plague is that they combine moshcore ala Hatebreed with symphonic black metal. You've heard that before, but Winds of Plague adds a wiggerish slant that would make Rick Ta Life blush. I feel like we mocked them pretty mercilessly in our first post about WoP, so I was really happy to see that Johnny Plague, the singer, posted in the comments and had fun with it instead of being a butthurt pussy like Short Bus Pile Up and Waking The Cadaver.

Since they were so cool, I figured we should find out more about what makes them tick. I caught up with them on the Summer Slaughter tour where they were playing with Dying Fetus, Suffocation, Origin, and a bunch of boring bands like Born of Osiris with names in the format of "____ of ____" that I had never heard of and didn't watch.

Affliction also makes a brand for girls called Sinful. It is even more atrocious and tacky than their flagship brand, but at least the ads have moderately attractive girls in them who are giving you the "I've been up for 65 hours on a coke binge with the guy from Buck Cherry" stare

In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that the Summer Slaughter tour is sponsored by Decibel Magazine, which is also owned by Metal Inquisition's parent company, Red Flag Media (this blog is the flagship piece of the viral marketing and social media division of Red Flag). Oh, and it's also sponsored by Affliction, which has nothing to do with our corporate structure, but is hilarious.

On wiggers
In retrospect, maybe it would have been better to warm him up a little bit, but I was too impatient and I cut right to the chase with Johnny. In my best Tom Brokaw voice, I tried to sound very frank and down-to-earth when I said "Have a seat, Johnny. I think you know what we're here to talk about: wiggerish arm movements." I thought he might get mad, but to my surprise, he was pretty sheepish about the whole thing, even apologetic!

I put on my best moshbro costume for the show, topped off by a New Era hat which I cocked at a jaunty angle. After all, when in Rome, do as the wiggers, right? (Photo by Kristen Randall)

He started by blaming someone else. "Not to point the finger, but I'm definitely going to have to put the wigger elements on our friend John, who recorded with us on that album. He also played on the new album, but we told him to tone it down," Johnny explained. I'd like to believe him, but as you can see in the photo of us above, he was wearing a Sworn Enemy basketball jersey and a backwards baseball hat. That's two strikes, my friend. If I go through your records and find a Downset CD, you're busted! He also credits moshcore pioneers 18 Visions with inspiration. "18 Visions had it going on. Speaking of wigger, remember when James had like fuckin' dreads and JNCOs?"

"I've grown out of the puffy vests. I had to give it to my friend that lives in Reno so I'm not tempted."

Life on the road can be tough. Just ask Metallica and Kid Rock, both of which have penned sorrowful, melancholy songs in which they sit on the tour bus looking wistfully out the window. Perhaps Winds of Plague will write their own version soon, because Johnny was not enjoying himself on this tour. I kept trying to get him to talk about wiggers, but he kept drifting back to how annoyed he was with this tour and wanted to go home. To bridge the gap, I asked him about touring with Suffocation. By inventing the slam riff and pioneering the use of 808 bass drops in death metal, they arguably created wigger slam metal, yet they have actual black people in the band, which makes things much less black-and-white (ba-dum crash!).

Lucho Metales with Mike Smith of Suffocation. Lucho is making awkward hand gestures in an effort to "be down." Mike appears to be holding his own penis. There is a cheap-looking door in the background.

Johnny wavered a bit, suggesting that "They have black people in the band so that's automatic street cred. I didn't know about [Mike Smith's] rap album, I wish I did before though." Despite such an initially authoritative answer, it seemed like he doubted himself, or was at the very least not yet comfortable with using the w-word. "I don't really know what to say about that, or... like... the word 'wigger' in general..." he stammered, recalling Sarah Palin when Katie Couric asked her which newspapers she read and Palin answered "A-all of them."

I considered calling in Snoop Dogg for an emergency wigger deprogramming session after hanging out with Johnny for the evening

WoP also share the bill with wigger slam pioneers Dying Fetus. I was thinking Johnny would have taken advantage of the opportunity to compare notes and ask Fetus how to be a slam wigger. Had he ever sat down with Fetus singer Jason Gallagher and asked for tips? "On how to properly do it? No. It's not that tricky, you just say ignorant shit over and over."

"Honestly I don't even know what 'steez' means. Is that even a real word?"

On the left is 18 Visions singer Jame Shart rocking his vintage look of dreads and Excessive Force shirt. Also pictured are Earth Crisis vocalist/weirdo Karl Beuchner (far right, with red eyes) and Metal Inquisition's Director of Latin American Communications Jose Galvan Jr (in blue)

Not ready to let him off the hook, I asked him about my favorite line from my favorite WoP song, their wigger mosh anthem "Reloaded." In this song, one part that makes the moshbros go crazy goes "Bustas fall down when we're barking commands. Atlas ain't got shit on our steez." Having moshed my balls off to it earlier that night, I asked for more detail on exactly what Winds of Plague's steez were. Finally the dam broke. Johnny let it all out, all the shame, the lies, the wiggerish secrets he'd kept inside for so long.

If you haven't seen this video yet, you are missing out. This rivals Biohazard's "Punishment" video as an instruction manual for wiggerish arm movements.

"Honestly I don't even know what 'steez' means. Is that even a real word?" he said plaintively. "The wigger stuff is from our one music video," he volunteered. "The video was an awesome idea that wasn't done well. It was supposed to be over the top. I had a great time doing it, and I guess it's cool because we had fun, but in the big picture it's not really the way we wanted to be portrayed... yeah. Going into it I was like, 'Who the fuck watches music videos, anyway? So let's just have fun with it.' We didn't have much of a budget, our friend had a nice car, so we just said fuck it." While the band was generally happy with it, Johnny had some ideas on how it might be improved. After a thoughtful pause, he reflected that "the guys did a great job on it. But there should have been more chains, more large black women."

Pete Wentz from Fall Out Boy used to play in a wretched hardcore band called Extinction. When I saw them in 1997, he had dreads and was wearing a puffy DKNY vest like this one. Now he is married to Ashlee Simpson... I am convinced he somehow gained access to the Nocturnus time machine to pull that one off!!

Most musicians are comfortable to stay within the narrow, conventional definition of what it means to be in a band. But like Dave Mustaine's ventures into the coffee business, Sammy Hagar's tequila brand, and Kiss peddling, well, absolutely anything, Johnny has dreams of being a stylist-slash-image-consultant for bands like his. As the band works on repositioning its brand, Johnny is getting the ball rolling by making some small changes to his personal brand. "I'm gonna say, I've grown out of the puffy vests. I had to give it to my friend that lives in Reno so I'm not tempted," he said, looking down and picking at the table as though he was craving his Nautica vest like a tweaker fiends for a bump.

Totally would, even though she has an ice cream cone tattoo. Her excellent eyebrows make up for it. What is it with the kids these days and their tattoos of junk food? Back in my day, you got tattoos of skulls, monsters, and the Black Flag bars, not fucking candy!
(In case you are wondering why I included this picture, she plays keyboards for Winds of Plague)

On chicks
With the wigger discussion behind us, we moved on to the second most important item on the agenda: chicks. As long-time readers of this blog know, I have advanced-level game, so I wanted to talk shop with one of the few people who might have even better game than me, if such a thing is possible: a dude in a band.

Hot Chicks With Douchbags, metalcore edition: Semi-Gothic Keyboard Hott is surrounded by a horde of Southern California Wiggerish Moshbags

Johnny is a modest guy, so he was hesitant to offer any suggestions on how I might improve my game. "This isn't really the best question for me. I mean, I don't have any game, I really don't. And I'm not afraid to admit that. But basically, just be loud and obnoxious, hang around the merch table and try to trade free shit for head I guess!"

Johnny, if you're reading this, please tell me you know this girl and will introduce me!!

He wasn't nearly as timid when I asked him when band had the most haggard groupies, though. Literally without a split second of hesitation, he said "Blackguard. I love them to death, don't get me wrong. They're kind of a folkish metal band. I dunno man, they just attract some real, uh, winners." I'm sure it's pretty slim pickings on these metal tours, which Johnny confirmed. "Dying Fetus pull some fuckin'... dude I don't even know what the word would be... trollish, stone age type women. I'm not saying they're hooking up with them, I don't know if that happens, but they're there in full force, drunk as fuck."

Drummer Art Cruz showed me some pretty sweet gambits he uses to snare groupies, such as a variety of magic tricks like the one where he made a coin seem to go through my hand. It was cool, but I started to get uncomfortable after a minute because I thought he was going to kiss me or something. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Jeff Foxworthy: If your band sells mesh shorts... you just might be a wigger!

Metal Inquisition + Winds of Plague = hella mass tight bros
I am not sure why so many people pick on Winds of Plague. As you can see they can take a joke and will make you mosh your balls off, and I'm not sure what more you can ask of a band than that. I thought they were going to be uptight dickbags, but it couldn't have been further from the truth. Even if you don't like metalcore, you should pirate their album to show your support!! Every click counts, my friends!!

Check out Winds of Plague on MySpace and Twitter

Winds of Plague & Terror bring wigger black metalcore to the Bluegrass State

This is what hardcore shows look like in Kentucky.

I somehow found myself in Covington, Kentucky this Sunday for a metalcore show featuring Winds of Plague, Emmure, Terror, All Shall Perish, The Ghost Inside, and some Christian moshcore bands whose names I forget.

"If you smoke near my merch I will karate chop you into a million pieces. Faggot."

Moshcore rednecks don't like the gays
The first thing I noticed was how much people at this show liked to say "faggot." I'm far from the PC police: I love the GG Allin, Meat Shits, Gut, Necro, and all kinds of random goregrind/pornogrind. Even with nearly 20 years of sleazy grindcore under my belt, I have to admit I was kind of shocked to see the word "faggot" twice at this show, and even more shocked that nobody seemed to care.

"God said you're a faggot."

The Mystery Method: it' not just for chicks!
I'm a big fan of the VH1 show The Pickup Artist, in which a douchelord named "Mystery" teaches a bunch of nerds how to become master pickup artists. The methodology they use is called "The Mystery Method," and while it is definitely more than a little ridiculous, it works! I've used it with great success to chat up hot, crazy chicks over the past few months. The basic concepts are simple: you use an opening line (called a "gambit") to break the ice with a group of people (a "set"). From there, you employ a variety of techniques to keep the conversation going and move toward closing the deal. For example, you attempt to gain the upper hand by playfully criticizing the target (called "throwing negs"). You might also DHV (demonstrate higher value) by telling them you have to leave in a minute (an "FTC," false time constraint). You look for IOIs (indicators of interest), and if you don't see them, roll off (stop talking to the set). There are tons of other concepts, but you get the idea.

Mystery compares meeting women to playing the 12th level of a video game without being able to save

Anyway, I've been seeing this girl and things are going well, so I'm turning my attention from chicks to making more friends that are dudes. The great thing about the Mystery Method is that it works with any group of strangers, not just the ladies! For example, I saw a three set of old hardcore dudes standing near me, and deployed my gambit. "Hey," I asked, "you guys look old and tired like me, how late is this show supposed to last?" I took it from there, looking for IOIs and threading to new material accordingly, and before long I had three new friends. Say what you want, but shows aren't just for moshing and scamming on dumb scene girls- you can actually make friends there too!

For example, I still remember when Lucho and I met back in 1998 while we were both working the door at a show in Columbus, Ohio. Gene Hoglan's Balls and I met at some show in New Jersey in the 00s, and while I don't remember exactly when, I also met Awakening (the jerk who never posts anymore) at a show in 1997 or 1998.

Speaking of dumb scene girls, though, I ran into the daughter from the mom/daughter combo at the Brokencyde show the other week. I made eye contact with her from across the bar, giving her one of those "shame on you" kind of looks that a school teacher would give you while looking over their glasses. She got really nervous and scurried away.

Merch guy's away message while he sang Ezec's part in "Spit My Rage": Sup? Wah... Gone moshing for Terror. Back before the end of the set!

Terror
I went to this show with my friend from work who knows absolutely nothing about hardcore, but used to live with one of the guys from Terror by coincidence. We asked the merch guy if Doug was around, and he explained that he had just quit the band, got fired from his job at some mail order place, and was working as a doorman at some bar (I'm guessing the Hemlock). I bought a "Suffer to Return Harder" shirt and thought about how awesome it would look on me at the gym.



Scott Vogel was in tremendous form that night, with some great Vogelisms. Two gems: "We are not a rock band. We are not cool. We are fucked up kid just like everyone in this room." "We're all here for the same thing, whether we are black, white, or brown. Dick. Pussy." I also remembered that Scott used to date/fuck my neighbor when I lived in Cleveland about 10 years ago, so I told the merch guy, "Hey, tell Scott that a girl named J**** H******* is here and wants to talk to him." Anyway, they played all my favorite songs like "One With The Underdogs" and "Spit My Rage," and if I wasn't about to go hang out the previously-mentioned girl, I would have moshed my balls off. I didn't want to either get too sweaty or get punched in the mouth or something because that would inhibit my ability to make out.

Amazing lyrics: "Busters fall down when we're barking commands. Atlas ain't got shit on our steez."

Winds of Plague & Emmure
I was hoping to interview Winds of Plague for this post, but the press guy at Century Media blew me off and wouldn't return my calls. Anyway, I left before they played because I was in a hurry to see that hipster hottie. I kinda wanted to see them, but it was getting kinda late, and as much as I like their brand of moshcore... if you saw her you would understand. I finished off the last of my drink and bounced- but hopefully I'll get a chance to catch Winds of Plague this summer.