GOD DAMN BULLSH*T TRACKS!!!!

Do you have any albums which just make you bury your head in your hands and wonder why the hell they stuck it on there? I'm not talking about songs which are just bad like Pretty fly (for a white guy) but tracks which are just noise or don't really sound like a song. Tracks that just boggle the brain as to why they were included in the album and are just an annoying distraction to the rest of the album. Alot of these bullsh*t tracks are usually about 30 seconds long and consist of incoherent noises or voice clips scatalogically arranged by some numbty who just can't be bosched. They leave me bemused as to how and why they are in the album. Theres usually several people who would have to approve songs for albums so to see these stupid tracks slip through the net just makes me wonder how they got through.

Good friends and a bottle of pills starts off with some soporific bass playing while Phil Anselmo is having a bout of Tourettes. For 30 secs he's just making "nya.... hmmp... ulah!" noises! After the spaz out he starts with the first ( barely ) inteligable lyrics I fucked your girlfriend last night CLICK! is the sound you hear when I'm listening to this because I ALWAYS press the next button. After he's done some more lyrics sounding like hes got some JD vomit gurgling at the back of his throat he starts doing some inhuman random unitelligable catewailing... probably cause after what I have heard so far of the track I ran over and grabbed him by the testicles and started squeezing them till they popped Brock Samson style (see vid below 30 seconds in :)...



"STUPID NOISES?! I'll make you make stupid noises!" squeeze NYAGGHH WHATTISSSAAADOOBBLEEYAAAAWAAAWAWW! and he wouldn't have to worry about lumps after I've finished that's for certain.

Well Machine Head usually write proper songs most of the time but they had a bit of a "brain toast" on their first album Burn my eyes with Real eyes , realize, real lies. It starts off with a guitar riff that just sounds like Jaws and then quickly starts with random massively overly distorted voice clips ( I ain't got a clue what most of them say so don't ask me!). It does this for 1:50 minutes! before Rob Flynn shouts Why? Real eyes, realize, real lies, lies! and then quickly just fades out with a couple more uninteligable voice clips. Once it's over I just can't get the thought out of my head So they all sat around listening to this and thought yeah lets put it in the album. great idea, amazing.. Not one of them just turned around and said WTF are you all thinking ???? See those flappy things on the side of your head, USE 'EM!

One track that seems to fit the mold perfectly is Lucifer in love by Edguy from the Hellfire club album. It's 30 seconds long and just POINTLESS. Basically consists of the little piano intro from Down to the devil, which was earlier in the album, slowed down so that it stretches to 30 seconds. Then a dodgy voice over which just sounds like some bloke doing orgasmic noises slowed down. Did they just nick that bit in that Guns n' Roses song Welcome to the jungle which sounds like Axl Rose having a wank while Slash is having a fret wank (you know, about 1:40 mins into Welcome to the jungle Axl Rose starts making orgasmic uh.. uhh... ughhh.... ahhh... mwaahhhh... noises. ). Maybe it's actually the devil himself busy making love to the band as they discuss the future direction of the band just like Bill Hicks mentioned with marketeers. Edguy were there in the recording studio talking about the next album Ahh nearly finished this album... say how are we gonna get more sales in the future? Well lets see... we're an epic metal band with so-so popularity... I know we'll change our musical direction. Lets get rid of the epic.... and the metal. Hmm.... get rid of the bits which are good about us... lets do it!. While this conversation was going Satan was busy getting freaky with them all. Little realising the microphone was still on and recording. After Hellfire club Edguy released the god awful Rocket Ride which, as is mentioned above, has no epic... or metal anywhere in sight. It's just some cliché turgid hard rock that I listened to about twice... then gave in to Vinyl Exchange in Manchester.

So in the end these bands might as well jack off and shout IM A GENIUS, IMMM A FOOOKEEEN GENNNNIUSSS!! and record that because it'll be less embarassing and torturous to listen to. As mentioned in the previous post Perfectly skippable songs being able to just leave these pointless tracks off a playlist is a god damn relief cause if I accidently get an ear shot of Good friends and a bottle of pills... hmmm I was gonna mention murder but... FFS WTF DID THAT F*CKWIT HAVE TO KILL DIMEDAG DARREL!!!!!!!!!!! I don't dare mention anything at all when Pantera's involved now cause i'll get some tit moaning that it's in bad taste. I remember watching "Mock the Week" with Dara o'Briain talking about Englands defeat in the cricket and saying that This is the worst defeat since 1916 but back then they had an excuse... they all died in the Somme. Then the audience sighs the "disgraceful" sigh and Dara just pipes up Oh come on!!??? Too soon?. See that's the sort of thing you get nowadays. If I put a disclaimer in plain view before warning of tasteless material I'll still get a bunch of whingy gits COMPLETELY IGNORING IT and moaning anyway.... errr I'm turning into one of them so I'll shut up now. Hmm thats a point Bill Hicks... DEAD... Barry Manilow.. STILL ALIVE! oooo Bill wouldn't have liked that :) Cya next time.

How to finish off an album PROPERLY!

How many albums do you have that you listen to from start to finish that finish with an absolute ripper? Albums that leave you gagging for more because the last song was so dam extreme, so good, such a great finale? Well there's alot of classic albums that finish on a high, just consistent from start to finish, leaves you with a song that "rips your face off" as a common metal metaphor goes. I'm thinking of genius albums like Master of puppets by Metallica which finishes off with Damage inc., an absolutely ripping track that just doesn't let off till the final notes ( the only major gripe I have about the song is the 1 + min of dodgy uninteresting violining guitar notes as an intro... hmmm I see a future blog post. ) or A predator's portrait by Soilwork. These albums keep you interested till the very last second and when the album finishes your really up for putting another album on.

Now there are other albums which just end with a down beat calm slow song or even just filler. One band that regularly does this is Fear Factory where they finish absolutely ripping albums like Demanufacture with a song like A therapy for pain. As soon as the guitar starts doing the main riff you just know it isn't going to then start blitzing away like... well... the REST OF DEMANUFACTURE! A therapy for pain just doesn't go anywhere, the main riff pretty much plays throughout most of the song in some form or another which, when you consider it plays for over 6 minutes, just starts to get piss annoying ( Hohoho how clever am I? From Pisschrist to piss annoying!.... ok, not that clever, rather just coincidence. ). The vocals are the worst on the whole of Demanufacture (even though they are completely clean) with the long warbbling notes that feel purposely held back to attempt a creepier atmosphere. When you think the song is over after over 6 minutes (!!!) there is some weird keyboard sound effects going to play out, another few minutes! When A therapy for pain finally ends it clocks at the 9 minute mark. That's 6 minutes odd of funeral paced riff played nearly consistently and then 3 minutes odd of noise. By this time my brain is deactivated, dulled, numbed by this, Half the time I don't even noticed the album has finished because my attention would wander to anything else ( blog writting for example :) or just even day dreaming. You know you've lost people if they start day dreaming! ). I rarely sit and try listening to A therapy for pain because it's just one of those songs I could have mentioned in a past blog post Songs you just wanna skip RIGHT NOW! and with it being at the end of the album it's just far too easy and tempting to press the stop button.

Dragonforce are just plain mad with their hyperactive songs that just plough a way through your mind. All 3 of their albums have a ballad in them for some reason ( I don't know what it is with bands that on every album they do they put one track on it that is completely out of place from the rest of the tracks, usually ballads seems to be the most common type of these songs and Dragonforce are no exception. ). On the first two Dragonforce albums Valley of the damned and Sonic firestorm the ballads are in the middle of the albums but in Inhuman rampage it's at the end of damn album! When I first listened to Inhuman rampage I got through to track 7 The flame of youth (Yep, a rather dodgy song title but a good song) and was thinking Ahhh cool they've stuffed the ballad this time, surely they wouldn't stick one on the end of the album... ) but when track 8 Trail of broken hearts comes on and the piano voiced keyboards come in with the alternating chords and I just stop and think God damn it NOOO!!!. Just why do so many bands need these out of place songs in their albums? From then on I just could not be bother listening to the last track, I didn't bother skipping the ballads on Dragonforce's previous albums but on Inhuman rampage I cannot be bothered listening to the last track.

So my tip to you is DON'T END WITH A FOOKEEN BALLAD (or rather any weaker slow soporific song)! Your song will likely get skipped. Your album would not leave the listener craving more if you loose his attention before the end. If the listener doesn't automatically think OOooo... the album's just ended, better get some more tunes on then you might have failed to leave an impression on the listener. Just end with a brilliant song that doesn't tail off slowly or leave them with anything that leaves them high. Till next time cya later (See? No fannying around finishing this post. Just ends with Cya.).

Songs you just wanna skip RIGHT NOW!

Do you have any albums that are generally good, even some absolutely cracking songs on them, but there are also songs you just must skip immediately!? Songs that are either coma inducingly boring ( is "inducingly" a real word or have I just adjectivanised "coma inducing" to describe how utterly boring some skippable songs are? "Adjectivanised"! Yet another example of blantent language butchering... I love it! ) or so intolerably unpalatable that they make your ears bleed.

Right time for an example. The Offspring make some absolutely class songs and some absolutely ass songs. They (come out) swing(ing) from one end of the spectrum to another with just a simple change of track in one fell swoop! For example on track 3 of Americana you have Staring at the sun. When it kicks in it goes like the clappers and you realise how good The Offspring actually are but then..... Pretty fly (for a white guy)... oh dear, this song is so painful the Americans were thinking of using this in Guantanamo bay but feared that it would get sonic interrogation banned ( Interrogation.... hmmm... euphemism for torture by the sounds of it. Just like the phrases "Martyrs" instead of suicide bombers and "Enemy combatants" for prisoners of war. I could whinge with glee till my lips rot talking about the double speak that goes on )! Just the intro vocals gives an immediate sense of dread that you will not enjoy this song. Give it to me baby.... aha aha SKIP.
If you dare to keep listening you get subjected to more stupid lyrics like he asked for a 13 yeah but they drew a 31 ... eh? What the fudge? Actually I think I'll probably be better off not knowing what it means. I can see why they say ignorance is bliss but not enquiring about this song. Think that Give it to me baby.... aha aha was the preserve of the intro? Think again this spine twisting insipid torture is the main chorus, the central piece of the song. Just no.

I use to think that The Offspring were a bit pants in the past because I heard songs like Pretty fly. Only later after not listening to the singles that the album only songs are actually really good. Songs like The noose and Genocide to name a couple as well as a slew of others but these are intermingled with dull or intolerable rubbish like Original Prankster ( British peeps guess what bit of crude wordplay I can do to the word "Prankster" to more appropriately describe the song. Leave a comment with the correct answer and get a Brownie point! ) or She's got issues which starts off with lyrics I'm seeing this girl ... WRONG! I cannot think of a song where the subject is about relationship problems that is actually any good ( though maybe Weird Al Yankovic might have done a funny one ). Just some god awful mid toned mid tempo-ed pop pants that makes me loose faith. There are about a dozen ( about half the singles Offspring have released are actually the songs I hate ) songs which regularly if not always get skipped. It's a good job the're on CD rather than tape so they are easily skipable. In fact with mp3s ( or rather Oggs, sound better than mp3s for the same amount of hard drive space usage and music programs and players can include support for them libre and gratis ( that's free and err... free in english. I won't mention the difference here, maybe in the future. So no excuses not to support Oggs... APPLE! ).) you can just delete them. Not quite satisfactory punishment for the songs being condemned to bit heaven but what can you do?

Metal also has irritatingly bad songs that would wake the dead just so they can skip the track. I have just been listening to Sikth ( yep, that's how it's spelt ), a completely mad band that plays some nutty and very heavy and complex music. However there is one song on their first self titled ( The trees are dead & dried out, wait for something wild ) album that I ALWAYS skip every single time. After a weird ( this one is weird even compared to their other songs! ) song called Tupelo ( a somewhat curious listen. When I hear this song I always keep on getting images of Andrew Lloyd Webber in my head... shudder! ) you get this song called Can't we all dream?. It starts off with a creepy little atmospheric keyboardy ( there I go again. "Keyboardy" - like a keyboard or has properties that are similar to a keyboard. ) noise ( the best part of the song. Because it's the only part that does not make you skip immediately. ) mixed with random hollering with lyrics alternating between love is in the air, hate is in the air death is in the air in all sorts of silly screeching to lowly whimpers. You listen to this and start getting a little impatient, you turn to see how long this has been going on for and you see "2 MINUTES"! This dodgy rubbish goes on for more than two and a half minutes!!! I'm sorry but... skippable already unless there's some redeeming feature in the main song.
When the intro is "over" you get some subtle delicate drum work and the atmospheric keyboards get less piercing. The hollering lyrics change to some random ramblings that aren't worth noting. Another look at the clock and you see "5 MINUTES"! Bloody hell when's this intro going to end? Surely this is the longest intro ever. Around this point there's a little breather where the drums go silent and the keyboards go quiet but only for a while before it returns to the torture. At 6:10 suddenly the vocals go all Tourettes and sounds like he's having an epileptic fit! Around this time... if you have not died of boredom or suspended belief... you hear the can't we all dream? song title mentioned for the first time. Woohoo the song's about to start bit no it sort of sticks to the same tosh as before. Just after 7 minutes... YES THAT'S CORRECT! 7 MINUTES. seven, sept, shichi ( think that's correct Japanese ) the vocals just start repeating can't we all dream? while the instruments tail off and go silent. Oh I see, no actual main song is it? Just going to end with can't we all dream tailing off... I said we "tail off" with it... yes we finish now... 30 seconds after the rest of the instruments have finished and the vocals are still going strong. 1 minute in and still going!!!
The song finally finishes off at 8:50 minutes. That's nearly ONE AND A HALF MINUTES of can't we all dream? sung really stupidly. What sort of song's this? It's just PLAIN WRONG. Why oh why did they think that was a good idea just boggles the mind. It's weird because most of the rest of the album's great. Songs like Scent of the obscene ( the first song I heard of Sikth ) are still completely mad but they are genuinely good highly original decent songs I'll keep listening to again and again. But Can't we all dream? ... skipped every time without prejudice.

Now here's one that's gonna get me murdered ( DON'T YOU EVEN DARE CONTEMPLATE PUTTING A COMMENT DOWN ABOUT "how untasteful that is" UNTIL YOU'VE READ THE WHOLE OF THIS ARTICLE!!!), Walk by Pantera. I don't understand why it's everyone's favourite song? It's just so pedestrian ( excuse the pun... man that's so bad I'm not sure which is worse. Saying Walk is horrible or that pun. ), just so slow and monotonous, just doesn't go anywhere. Walk just sounds like filler especially when it ends and Fucking Hostile suddenly rips on your stereo. Suddenly any memories from Walk just vanish.
Ok Walk is not one of those songs that can wake the dead to change the channel but it's ( in my humble opinion ) the dullest song on Vulgar display of power by a long margin. With genius songs like Mouth for war with it's classic riff pinched by ID software for Doom ( probably knew that heavy metal fans and computer geeks are almost completely mutually exclusive sets of people and few people would notice. ) and Rise ( my favourite Pantera song ever. Perfect except for Phil Anselmo's slightly "odd" singing ( "odd" singing... sounds like another blog post. ). Also nicked for Doom.) I'm affraid Walk is just dwarfed by these giants.
Man that pun was bad, unless I've been murdered stick around for more posts vaguely ( Knowing me, very vaguely... ) to do with music and things related to it. Cya later.

If anyone feels I might have stepped the mark with talking about being murdered for something trivial to do with Pantera. I am aware that Dimebag Darrell ( or Diamond Darell during Vulgar display of power ) was shot and killed merely for breaking up Pantera. It boggles my mind and sickens me to the gut to even contemplate somebody doing that for such a relatively tiny insignificant thing.