Books: Heavy Metal In Baghdad - The Story of Acrassicauda. no comments

Heavy Metal In Baghdad - The Story of Acrassicauda by Andy Capper and Gabi Sifre.

Title: Heavy Metal in Baghdad - The Story of Acrassicauda.
Authors: Andy Capper & Gabi Sifre.
Publisher: MTV Books/Pocket Books.
Additional Information: Paperback, 290 Pages, RM 60.17, Kinokuniya Bookstore Kuala Lumpur.

1- I have watched the awesome video, Heavy Metal in Baghdad and now this is the book version of the same video. For those who have watched the video I believe you are familiar with story of Acrassicauda, a striving heavy metal band from the war torn city of Baghdad.

2- While the movie received a lot of positive attention and I personally think that the movie was awesome, unfortunately there is nothing awesome about this book really besides the fact that this is just another channel to milk for some more extra cash from the acrassicauda phenomenon. The book followed The Dirt formula, instead of an author telling the story of the band from a third person point of view, they let the band members themselves do the talking and story telling, a style made famous by that awesome Motley Crue autobiography, The Dirt.

3- I dont know but some of the word structures used were quite week grammatically. I am not a grammar nazi and not even grammatically proficient myself but come on, I paid a hefty lot of money to buy and read the book, I expect at least a good structure of sentences. So uninspiring for a very inspiring story. They even got one third of the book filled with the movie transcript. What the fuck? Why the fuck would I wan to read the fucking transcript? Was this a move to thicken the book?

4- Well, unfortunately I am not going to recommend this if you have already watched the movie. It's a waste of good money. By the way, if you are curious, Acrassicauda is now in the States and they have recorded an awesome EP, Only the Dead See The End of War with the mighty Alex Skolnick of Testament behind the producers chair. Get the EP not the book. Will they release a book about the process of recording that EP? I guess only time and greed will tell. Haha.

Rants: Understanding Metal. 1 comments

Unable to differentiate the various genres of metal music? No worries. Here are some fun and easy definitions of each main genre of metal which might solve your problem. Just for fun.

Heavy Metal: Rock music played with heavily distorted guitars, wailing vocals and weighty drums.
Glam Metal: Heavy Metal with make up.
Thrash Metal: Heavy Metal played fast.

Death Metal: Scary Heavy Metal played fast with deathly lyrics and sweat pants.
Melodic Death Metal: Less scarier Heavy Metal played fast with harmonies.
Black Metal: Scarier Heavy Metal played fast with satanic lyrics and make up.
Grindcore: Short Heavy Metal played ultra fast with political lyrics.
Porno Grind: Short heavy Metal played ultra fast with sick sexual lyrics.
Gore grind: Short Heavy metal played ultra fast with lyrics on human anatomy.
Speed Metal: Heavy Metal played faster.
Power Metal: Heavy Metal played faster with dungeons & dragons lyrics.
Industrial Metal: Heavy Metal played with a computer.
Doom Metal: Heavy Metal played slow.
Sludge Metal: Heavy Metal played slower.
Gothic Metal: Sad Heavy Metal with make up.
Groove Metal: Heavy Metal played with a groove.
Nu Metal: Groovy Heavy Metal played by douches with baggy jeans.
Metalcore: Groovy Heavy Metal played by douches with skinny jeans

Rants: Current Playlist. no comments

1- I am still playing Helloween's newest CD, 7 Sinners. I must say, all the songs in that album really grew on me. Of course 7 Sinners will never be as epic as the first three albums but for me it's already up there among the best Deris era albums of Helloween. Deris dominated the songwriting for this album with the other members contributed at least two songs each. The mighty main weenie, founder and guitarist Michael Weikath only contributed 2 songs; Raise The Noise and The Sage The Fool The Sinner. One thing for sure, there are a lot of double bass drum attacks in this album.

2- I do not know why but it seems to me that good heavy metal music nowadays only came from the more veteran bands rather than the newer ones. As of right now, I am waiting for Manowar to re-release their epic debut Battle Hymns with Donnie Hamzik on the drums and of course, their newest album, Hammer of the Gods. 

3- Well for me it's not really that big of deal who is behind the drum kit because Manowar's songs were always heavily revolved around Eric Adams's powerful vocals, solos from Karl Logan and the epic song writing capability of Joey Demaio. Manowar had always been straight forward with their heavy metal. There is no room for no Portnoys nor Lombardos of drums in Manowar. Sorry Scott, you will not be missed.

4- Metallica will start writing some new tunes somewhere in 2011. Hopefully they will try and get a better sound engineer this time and for the love of God, properly mix the songs lah this time around. Death Magnetic, a good but not great comeback and return to form album but the sound was pretty fucking horrible. I dont know about you but Slayer's World Painted Blood also got that same horrible vibe. Rick fucking Rubin.

5- I am no Malmsteen fan but if you like his stuff, be warned that his newest album, Relentless, will be out in store sometime this month.