WE, THE GUARDIANS OF THE GENRE, DO VOW TO ABSTAIN FROM ALL THAT IS MUNDANE AND REVEL IN AND GLORIFY ALL OF THE MANY WONDERS THAT COME WITH THE
ACCEPTANCE OF THE GREAT AND GOOD GENRES!
SCIENCE FICTION! FANTASY! HORROR!
Lordi, the metal monsters from Finland are back! Babez for Breakfast contains fifteen 80's style heavy metal tracks that are guaranteed to rock your zombie brains out! Just in time for the scariest time of the year- Rocktober - Lordi released on September 14th this band's fear-ocious fifth studio album! The most monstrous tracks are track 2 - Babez for Breakfast, track 5 - Discoevil, track 8 - Zombie Rawk Machine and track 15 - Devil's Lullaby. I know I'll be spinnin' this party platter on the CD machine come Halloween!
Watch and listen to the first video from Lordi's new CD entitled This is Heavy Metal!
Every month, on Friday nights when the moon is full, I dig up Bill E. Bones' zombie homeboys from Zombzany's cemetery and we have a kick ass party! Why only once a month, you ask? Only when the moon is full does Zombzany the Necromancer take leave of his cemetery to wander in search of more corpses to resurrect and repopulate his necropolis. To celebrate this brief moment of freedom from his necromantic slavery, Zombzany's zombies gather in his graveyard to party till the break of dawn! Ever since I started hangin' with my boney buddy, we've been dancing with the dead every month! No one knows how to party like a zombie! I bring my amplifier and speakers, along with my CD player and latest Cd's (yeah, I know... I haven't upgraded to an mp3 player, but the zombies still think 8-track tapes are high tech). Zombies seem to really dig classic rock -- I still don't understand their fascination with The Grateful Dead -- but recently I've turned them on to the rockinest band in the world! No, it's not Kiss! It's Lordi!
Lordi is a Finnish heavy metal band that sports wicked cool monster costumes and plays tunes inspired by the best of classic and modern horror movies. Their first album, GET HEAVY, features the single "Would You Love a Monsterman?" and other kick ass tunes like "Devil is a Loser", Monster, Monster" and the title track "Get Heavy". Their second album -- and my personal favorite -- is THE AROCKALYPSE and features "The Dead Girls Gone Wild", "They Only Come Out at Night", "The Chainsaw Buffet", "Supermonsters" and my fave "Who's Your Daddy?". If you really want a good rockin' night, buy the special edition CD and you get an additional DVD that has a live concert of Lordi, a documentary on the band and some their best music videos, including the iconic "Would You Love a Monsterman?". Lordi's latest CD is DEADEACHE and even though it isn't quite as badical as their first two releases, it still has some kick ass tunes like "Bite it Like a Bulldog", "Man Skin Boots" and "Raise Heaven in Hell". You don't have to be a zombie to rock out to Lordi. You just have to have a need to listen to loud, hard rockin' heavy metal monster music! Rock on, Freaks!
"Virgin Witch" is the sixth cut on Rob Zombie’s HELLBILLY DELUXE 2 and what it lacks in lyrical clarity, it makes up for in mind pounding drumming and unremitting gnashing guitars! The chorus "Vigin Witch", is interspersed with the narrative verse, forming a strange mind picture, but still not telling a clear tale. “Death and Destiny: Inside the Dream Factory” is obviously Rob’s rant on his love/hate (and if the lyrics of this song are any indication – mostly hate) relationship with the film making industry known as Hollywood. This is one of Rob Zombie’s angriest and most sarcastic songs yet! The verse “Free your mind and feel the passion, baby, Death and suntan, still in fashion, baby” is followed by “Crush your idols, they can afford it, baby, Permanently vile and fascinating” clearly demonstrates Rob’s frustration with the magic movie machine that is Hollywood. This song makes me wonder how much longer Rob is gonn’a be barfing out crud like Halloween II. The next song on the cd, “Burn”, puzzles the crap out of me! The verse is a mixture of end of the world type scenarios, which are interrupted by the ironic chorus of “Papp-oow-mow-mow, Papp-oow-mow” – which is a nonsensical lyric from the doo wop song by The Rivingtons, but better known as the chorus from the song “Surfin’ Bird” by The Trashmen. I dig this one, baby, but it’s still wack! “Cease to Exist” is a paean to death; with darkly emotive lyrics that are accompanied by telephone-noise vocal effects, dirge-like synthetic keyboards, and a steady base-drumbeat. It ends in a crescendo of pulsing rhythms and synthetic noise with the simple refrain of “Cease to exist, your mind is breaking free”! Disturbing, but brilliant! “Werewolf Women of the SS” is a song that riffs off his fake trailer from the 2007 film Grindhouse. An interesting choice of surf-guitar style is played - including a wicked pissa solo - to the funniest lyrics that Rob is likely to write in a long time. This song is major mojo manic and a classic in the making! The last song on the disc is “The Man Who Laughs”, which is a song based on the (most likely) 1928 silent film of the same name; which was adapted from the 1869 Victor Hugo novel. The song tells an abbreviated version of the film/novel about the mutilation of children to use as slaves to beg for money. Rob’s use of violins and other classical instrumentation, clearly demonstrate his admiration for the silent film version of The Man Who Laughs. Typical of Rob, there is a four minute drum solo in the middle of this song, for no apparent reason other than to show off drummer Tommy C’s mad skills! Overall, Rob Zombie’s HELLBILLY DELUXE 2 is a culmination of Rob’s past musical skills, mashed up with his recent creative divergences, to provide this Rob-freak with one wicked good long ‘n loud rockin’ ruckus! Bring mo a’ da ruckus, Rob!
I admit it. I was never a fan of Rob Zombie’s first band White Zombie. I even bought ASTRO CREEP: 2000 for the wicked cool “More Human than Human” single. I sold it to a younger metal fan, after only playing it through a couple of times. In 1998, Rob Zombie released his first solo disc HELLBILLY DELUXE. It featured two singles: the addictive “Dragula” and the syncopated “Superbeast”. I bought this disc and played it endlessly for weeks. I have been a wicked Rob Zombie fan ever since! I dropped heavy cheddar on his next two cds THE SINISTER URGE and EDUCATED HORSES. Both are kick ass discs, but EDUCATED HORSES seemed like Rob was trying to mix up his sound even more -- which I thought was badass! It’s been five long years, but Rob has finally cut his fourth cd: HELLBILLY DELUXE 2! There are eleven electric cuts on this cd and all are worth repeated listens. The first track sets the tone for this monster mash-up of a cd! “Jesus Frankenstein” starts with slowly building guitars, which unleash to a grinding guitar crescendo, that run smack into a wall of thumping bass drums! That’s just the first 1:44 of this song. Rob’s lyrics are sparse and elusive, but imply the obvious parallels between Jesus’ resurrection and the undead life of the Frankenstein Monster. The simple “All hail, Jesus Frankenstein” chorus, sung by a powerful male choir, raise in furor until the screeching climax of the song! This is wicked pissa freakin’ Frankenstein cool! The second cut, "Sick Bubblegum", is one of the lesser cuts, but still has a nice grinding rhythm and some outstanding solo guitar work. I think the chorus of “Rock the motherf*cker hurts the punch of the song, rather than helps it. The third cut, “What?” , is a tribute to “B” movie tropes, that makes excellent use of Rob’s classic fuzz-vocals to describe “Vampire Lovers”, a “Cannibal Man” and “Satan’s Cheerleaders”! The second best cut on the disc (right after “Jesus Frankenstein”, of course) is the fourth cut, “Mars Needs Women”! As Rob did on his previous cd, EDUCATED HORSES, he uses a lengthy opening of acoustic guitar and stringed instrumentation to set the tone for this pulsing, throbbing beat-driven song about Mars needing “Angry Red Women”. Spastic use of electronic noises and a breathy female vocal bridge conjure up powerful erotic images that make me think this could be a future favorite of strippers everywhere. The fifth cut is another pissa scary song, “Werewolf, Baby”. Accompanied by fuzz slide guitars, Rob sings a lament to his werewolf baby who is “afflicted by what the fangs did”. A classic Rob Zombie tribute song to a classic monster, that rivals even “Dragula” from the first HELLBILLY DELUXE cd.
