The "New" Metallica

Nothing is quite so difficult to digest as hype. A few years ago, Metallica was preaching loud and proud about how'd they'd changed the face of their music and still kept their legions of fans and were still and ever growing. Then they split with Jason Newsted, went to war with Napster, and fiddled around for a few years while James Hetfield battled with the demon liquor. Next on "Behind the Music," the end of an era...

Now they've got a new bassist from Ozzy's band (Ozzy has a band? I thought Ozzy just walked around in a confused daze, mumbling like the village idiot), who looks like one of Saruman's Uruk-Hai from Lord of the Rings, and a new album that's supposed to evoke the rip-roaring, speed-metaling, Motorhead-worshipping Metallica of Yore. And in true form, everything that's happened to the band since the Black Album is now being mocked in the music press. Load and ReLoad, formerly mere annoyances to old-school metalheads, are now shameful sell-outs to Alternative Nation (The "Alternative" scene was well and truly dead by the time Load was released, but never mind). Garage, Inc. is now a lame attempt at re-kindling the magic. And S & M, the band's double-live album recorded with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, is now so embarrasing as to cause legions of fans to weep quietly in the night, clutching their bruised copies of Master of Puppets. Please.

S & M sucks? I didn't get that memo back when it was released in '99. Back then it was a bold musical experiment, that, unlike earlier rock-classical fusion attempts by the likes of Chicago, actually rocked. Nor do I recall the music critics throwing the hunks of dung at the other 90's albums that they pretend to have now that St. Anger is out. Consistency may be the hobgoblin of small minds, but it's a hobgoblin that could make some sense of our cultural narratives. Get that, you faux-intellectual wankers?

Incidentally, I've seen the video to the "St. Anger" and it's not bad. Maybe if Lars stops talking like a corporate drone, I may believe these guys are serious.

The Monks -- Black Monk Time

Because of cd-discounter's treachery, my goal of subsuming myself in mid-sixties garage rock was delayed by a month (I got my refund today, and promptly re-ordered The Sonics from a seller I know to be trustworthy). But my dissatisfaction is minimized, because now it's Big Time, it's Hop Time, it's Monk Time!

Picture this: five army draftees stationed in Germany in 1965, sick of the cutesy melodies of the Beatles and their clones. One guys plays guitar and sings, one guy drums, one guy plays bass. So far, so good. The fourth guy plays an organ. Interesting, but not too interesting. Ray Manzarek did that for the Doors, and several bands in the sixties messed with that. The catch is the fifth guy. He plays banjo, with a microphone stuffed in it. Then they all give themselves tonsures -- the reverse mohawk that's been the symbol of the monastic lifestyle since the Dark Ages -- and wear black gowns with white hangman's nooses.

Exactly.

Some folk call the Monks the first punk band, which is taking it a bit far to me. These guys have the abrasiveness, the repeated riffs, the joy in being nasty, but they're missing the crucial element: speed. Granted, the Velvets didn't play all that fast either. It's a conundrum best left to the individual listener.

This stuff is truly demented. The songs lurch along like broken machinery, tearing themselves apart in their bumping fury. My favorite track would have to be "I Hate You," which highlights the band's sense of humor. It's a simple joke, but I haven't seemed to get tired of it yet. Nor of the Monks. Bring it on, Sonics.

Joy Division -- Closer

This arrived with the Monks CD in Amazon's usual timeliness. When I first spun it, it didn't impress me near as much as Unknown Pleasures had. I blame rising expectations, and the fact that I'd read that the aura of Ian Curtis' suicide supposedly hangs about this album like an albatross (it doesn't). But repeated listens have allowed it to grow on me. I hear JD expanding their palette on this one, working with different rythmns and textures. I would say that it's a shame Curtis killed himself and left us with no more Joy Division, but the rest of the band soldiered on and became New Order, which still records and tours today. So the tragedy is minimized.

Seven Nation Army

I remember a few years ago, when music seemed to irredeemably suck. Between the rap-rock that was short of the good elements of either to the indistinguishable BET acts to the plastic people that teenagers are always willing to buy, there was nothing current that I wanted to listen to. Now I've reached the point where I can hardly contain my excitement for the New Rock. Yes, I know it's trendy, yes, I know it's working grooves that have been worked before. I don't care. I have the new White Stripes album, and it explodes across the eardrums like a ripe orange. Snoogens.

Who I am, Part 2: Gabba Gabba Hey!

Moving on from the cosmological definition of me, we proceed to the aesthetic. As the song might go, Andrew is a punk rocker. At least, he might be. He's a bit suburban, a bit un-nihilistic, a bit old to be a full part of the tribe. That's leaving aside how he manages to fit liking such a deliberately obnoxious, not to say Luciferean, musical genre and the admiration of the serene yet imperious mysteries of the Catholic Church together in the same head.



And to those who demand ideological purity, I'm sure it's something of a problem. Those who can use the phrase "true punk" without irony think religion is bad because it like, restricts your mind and stuff. And if many christians think Rock n' Roll is the devil's music, then punk is probably the hymns sang backwards and upside-down in the Ninth Concentric Circle while Satan is getting a deep-tissue massage from Stalin and Judas. Believe me, I've been through all this.



More to the point, just how relevant is punk today? I rented 24 Hour Party People a few weekends ago, and I was struck by how the advent of a band like the Sex Pistols in Britain could inspire a scene (that of Manchester) which would yield "the beatification of the beat," as the film's narrator puts it. The Beat is most definitely what rules pop music nowadays, be it hip-hop or shiny teen pop or even country (at least, going by Shania Twain, who is less than country in some circles). It's getting so bad for reg'lar rock bands that any stylistic throwback to the Glory Days of Alternative Music will be hailed by the critics as the Dawn of the New Age, whether they actually sell any records or not. In this our multicultural world, can the Aryan strains of grooveless distortion really matter?



Frankly, I could care less. Taste is a very personal thing, and musical taste a growing and evolving personal thing, if it is to have any legs. I call myself a punk, but I could just as well be called a jazzman or a blues-funkster or a yo-boy or a mod or a rocker, if liking any particular genre of music was enough for membership. I go with calling myself a punk because it is the largest category in my collection, and because I deliberately support the underground elements of it as an act of minor threat against the music industry which is a grotesque overflowing septic tank of lame. That attitude plus a fairly apt Sid Vicious impression ought to be sufficient credential.



Besides, the purpose of punk was never really to conquer and destroy rock music as it was to simultaneously ground it in its primal roots and enlarge its possibilities. Punk's aggression was the cool despair of blues driven outward, to the logical extreme, exploding like a hand grenade that never leaves your hand. It's message was simple: anyone can do it, any image can be used, any sound can be embroidered into the vibe. To an intellectual such as myself, this is a fascinating tradition, even when it trespasses against my moral compass. The political and sociological screeds that accompany the more self-important bands are to a large degree empty oppositionality, weren't invented by punk (Country Joe and the Fish, anyone?) and continues today in non-punk forms (Rage Against the Machine, anyone?). They can and should be safely ignored. Revolution? You better free your mind instead.



Besides, the songs are short, so I can indulge my attention span. 'Nuff said.