What is Emo, and Why does God Hate it?

There was no small amount of confusion last weekend when Jagged Spiral debuted it’s first Mega-Single, “God Hates Emo”. Many people were confused. They didn’t understand what Emo was, or why God hated it enough to phone Jagged Spiral and tell them to relay her message to the world. Hopefully, this video will help you understand Emo better:

What Is Emo?

Conrad Zero LogoYours Darkly,

Conrad Zero

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Metallica, Take 9

An absolute MUST READ for Metallica fans, concerning their upcoming ninth album.

As far as I’m concerned, Metallica died in a plane crash during the Black Album Tour, but no one told the band. People WANT Metallica to be good, but come on, “Give me Fuel, Give me Fire, Give me THAT WHICH I DESIRE?” WTF? And for the Love of Dog, could someone take that fucking Wah-Wah pedal away from Kirk Hammett?

They can talk all they want about ‘going back to their roots’ and they can fire and hire whomever they want. Hell, fire the entire fucking band, and replace them with teens picked out on a reality TV show.

IF they release good music, THEN I might buy it. This seems to have escaped the band currently calling themselves Metallica.

Conrad Zero LogoYours Darkly,

Conrad Zero

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Cold Activated

Last night’s Jagged Spiral practice was brought to you by Coors Light, and their new “Cold Activated” Bottles. Little did we realize what this meant when we downed the twelve pack between the three of us. After a little investigation, I discovered a difference between a cold beer from the fridge and an empty bottle.

Note the color of the mountains in the label. The cold one has Blue mountains, and the warm one has White mountains! It’s magic! How do the mountains *know*??? We decided that we would track down the head wizard at Coors Brewery, and have them use the same kind of magic on Jagged Spiral’s music instruments, so that when they are played out of time with each other, they will turn blue, so that even if we suck, we will still look cool…

Conrad Zero LogoYours Darkly,

Conrad Zero

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Lyrics for Ragnarök and the True Identity of the Antichrist

So I’m working on some lyrics for a song of a most peculiar nature, and I was wandering the wasteland of the internet looking for lyrics to end the world by. I was astounded to find out the TRUE IDENTITY OF THE ANTICHRIST!

No, Really! I really saw it! See, *that* is why I love the internet! It has Everything! The antichrist is so Totally Busted Out! HA! Yes, my friends, now I will share with you the name of the false shepard, the son of perdition, the agent of the world’s destruction:

Prince Charles of Wales is the Antichrist

I know, I was just as surprised as you are! I mean, he really doesn’t look that tough, I’m sure I could take him in a fair fight, but that’s the thing about those Antichristses, they aren’t likely to fight fair.

Like I said, I was kinda skeptical, but the proof includes the ‘fact’ that you can use some complicated mathematics to add up his name to get the number “666”. The math was a little awkward for me, so I simplified it here for you.

  1. Let any name that is “Prince Charles of Wales” equal the number 665.
  2. Add one, because, um, because there’s only one “Prince Charles of Wales.”

And WHAM-O!!! Now tell me that ol’ Chuck don’t have some SERIOUS explaining to do!

Never did find any good lyrical material though, but I’m sure there are plenty of words that rhyme with “Chuck”…

Conrad Zero LogoYours Darkly,

Conrad Zero

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Covering

Many bands have a musical reference to other bands that is integrated into their band image, usually in the form of covers, or in descriptions of the music. Even bands as preposterous as the Peppermint Creeps are providing us a cover of the Vapors smash hit: Turning Japanese. The local Minneapolis band, White Light Riot got their name from their musical heroes, White Lion, Gordon Lightfoot and Quiet Riot. And you simply don’t see a CD review without the music being referenced to other recordings.

Sure, people need a reference, and it’s almost impossible to tell people what the music sounds like. But it’s hard for bands to convey their originality when the review says they “sound like Band X”. Billy Joel already said, “There’s a new band in town, but you can’t get the sound from a story in a magazine…”

Covers in live shows are standard fare, they’re a quick and painless way to stretch out your set, and they are usually fun to play. But covers on recordings are sometimes used by new bands to ‘break’ into radio: “Hey, if you liked Band X then your gonna Love this Band X cover by new band Y!”

Musical comparison to other bands is required in Press Kits, and expected on websites and in the “sounds like” box on Myspace. I have no problem with giving a tip of the cap to your forebears, but I also wouldn’t want to become famous for a cover song. Are there Any famous ‘cover bands’? There’s plenty of famous ‘knockoff’ bands that try to be like someone else, and if you are a talented musician but an untalented song writer, this is the way to go. Weird Al Yankovich is a ‘parody band’ and therefore, the exception that proves the rule.

When most bands cover songs, they try to be extremely true to the original. I think that’s not always the best idea. The closer people get to sounding like the original, the less I like it. If I wanted to hear “Cars” by Gary Numan, I would pull out the 12″ vinyl record of The Pleasure Principle and cue it up. If your band manages to pull off the perfect cover of Cars, note-for-perfect-note, guess what? It still ain’t the real deal. You didn’t write it. But if you grab the song by the balls and give it a twist the way Fear Factory did on their Obsolete album, that’s pretty cool. They made the song their own.

The best twist on a cover song was the Scissor Sisters cover of “Comfortably Numb”. Brace yourself: its Disco. I’ll pause here to let that sink in – A Disco version of Comfortably Numb.

Sacrilege right? I would have thought so if I hadn’t seen them play it live at the Fine Line. Talk about making a song your own. It was pretty amazing.

Not that all cover songs need to be twisted. Led Zepplin’s “Rock and Roll” was made to be covered and played live, but there is no need for anyone to release a recording of their bands version of this song.

I’m blogging up all this nonsense about covers because Jagged Spiral is learning some covers to pad our (dare I say it?) live set. Each of us picked a song (and of course, we all have to agree that the other’s choices won’t make us puke). Colin picked “Temple of Love” by The Sisters of Mercy. We played through “Temple of Love” a few times, and decided it was a keeper, it’s a good song for us to play just the way it is, without much twisting at all. We will still sound more like Jagged Spiral than The Sisters of Mercy, and I think that’s a good thing, since we aren’t The Sisters of Mercy.

Josh picked Black Sabbath’s “Children of the Grave”. We haven’t practiced this song together just yet, but I think that song will suit us well.

I was waffleing over some ancient Marillion songs like “Freaks” but Josh asked me if I might like to cover the Fleetwood Mac song, “Tusk”. Wow. Simple, distinctive, catchy, cool. We listened to the song and talked about the tuning, structure and progression of the song. We are going to give it a try next week, and see if we can make it work for us.

Anyway, the image of Jagged Spiral is growing, as we pick cover songs that define us as a band, and as we pick out references to other bands for our press kit. We’re also working on a band logo.

It will be interesting to see what all this adds up to…

Conrad Zero LogoYours Darkly,

Conrad Zero

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Lefsetz on the New Reality of Band Marketing

Wow, Lefsetz nails it again. I guess I knew this, but it’s strange to read the cold hard facts. While “the old way”of band marketing still works (Just ask White Light Riot) that way is on the outs, and “the new way” that Lefsetz points out is how bands will gain traction and popularity in the new market.

Marillion is a band that really treats their fans well. Their fan club get a Christmas CD every year filled with odd covers, acoustic versions, and live performances. Every year Marillion has a Weekend Getaway, where the fans come from all over the world to hang with the band at a small resort and have intimate concerts where the audience helps to pick the setlist. On their 1999 release, “marillion.com” fans could send in their pictures and the liner notes were filled with fan headshots.

Because of their fan following, Marillion was able to get enough people to preorder their 2001 album “Anoraknophobia“, to cover all production costs. Twelve Thousand fans Paid Marillion to make an album. In advance. They were completely free of any industry pressures and made the album exactly the way they wanted it. Everyone who preordered the album got their name in the album credits. Why this was not widely publicized I don’t know, (maybe it was ‘cross the pond where Marillion live, but here in the States it was never mentioned).

Fans wear the band t-shirt and put the bumper sticker on their car, because they identify with the band image. It says, “This is who I am”. They want the band to hear their ideas and input. They want updates on what the band is doing during that long, dry spell between album releases and concert dates. They want to be connected. They want to be an extension of the band. “Street teams” the non-industry calls them. People who go out and put up fliers for the band out of sheer love of the music. People who spread the gospel of [Insert Band Name Here] on the street, just the way the Jehovah’s Witnesses go door to door spreading the word of the Lord.

I swear to Dog that the first person who comes to my door on Saturday morning wanting to talk about how great White Light Riot is, they will end up missing some teeth.

Conrad Zero LogoYours Darkly,

Conrad Zero

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