Tag Archives: horny

As in, “with horns” you pervert

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NAISSANT, Promo 1999 (1999, demo)

The skull:
Though he bears some similarities to SKULL148, this fellow’s horns are stubbier, less developed, nascent, you could say. But while Takashi’s metallic hornyskull looks to have been fashioned from modelling clay and silver spray paint, Naissant’s cover-adorning BDS is more likely an extreme close up of a chintzy skull ring, possibly obtained for the Greek equivalent of twenty-five cents from a vending machine at a supermarket in Athens. Bonus points are awarded for the drippy, Misfits-esque, best of 1987 horror font. It’s a classic for a reason.

The music:
Reputedly black metal, Naissant left almost no digital trace of this lone recording, released on cassette. Most of the members have gone on to other bands in the Greek scene, but poor ol’ Promo 1999 has thus far failed to inspire even a single upload. While I lament not being able to more fully report on this Big Dumb Skull, I can’t say I’m disappointed that I didn’t have to listen to what is most likely a terrible demo.
— Friar Johnsen

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THE KILLING MACHINE, Fellow’s Wait (2005, demo)

The skull:
This looks like some super-generic horror movie poster. Or actually, like some super-generic direct-to-DVD horror movie cover. You can practically see the small serifed font underneath that says something like, “Evil bursts through.” The big skull actually has a little skull nestled into his forehead, like the beginning of a nasty skull fractal, but because the size differential is so great, and because the little guy is clearly of a piece with the big guy, we’ll treat it as an adornment and not a second skull for the purposes of Skullection qualification. But yeah, it looks like the skull is emerging from a satin bedsheet or something, which I guess would be kind of scary. But what the hell does “Fellow’s Wait” mean? Does it, and the image (with the sheets), imply some supernatural sexual menace? As in, “This fellow’s wait for some action has been so long, he’s a skull now, and he’s not gonna wait anymore!” That must be the plot of the movie: this skull flying around the haunted house some nubile young lady has just inherited, making kissy noises and chasing the sisters of the heroine’s sorority, who though this would be an awesome location for their Halloween mixer with the dudes from Kappa Tau. Damn. I need to call my agent. This is gold!

The music:
The Killing Machine began as an Iron Maiden and Judas Priest cover band, and this, their lone demo, bears those influences out. Sadly, they sound more like late 90s Maiden and Priest than I think anyone would prefer, but they’re not a terrible band. Just a little dull. They even have a song called “We Bore,” which is the saddest mission statement I can imagine. There is some life and even some originality in “The Mansion” but mostly, this is metal that fails to excite. The singer is adequate, with a reasonably wide range, but his voice has a weird pinched tone, as if he forgot his allergy medicine. The demo is produced a bit oddly, but there’s something very natural about it that I find appealing. The band is “on hold,” supposedly, but with only this one demo to their name, I think it’s probably safe to say this is the last we’ll hear of The Killing Machine, but if they do reactivate, hopefully the intervening ten years will have imparted the wisdom and taste to take this music in the direction it needs to go.
— Friar Johnsen

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OVERKILL, The Years of Decay (1989, Atlantic)

The skull:
Although Overkill has a number of Big Dumb Skull covers (all of them depicting their mascot, Charlie), this one is obviously the finest for a number of reasons. First, the skull is bigger than any of the others (excepting, maybe, Bloodletting, which wouldn’t really qualify as a proper BDS anyway). Second, the wings are de-emphasized (here they’re depicted as windows, but if you didn’t know to expect a bat-winged skull on every Overkill album, you probably wouldn’t even make the connection). Third, the Council and we Friars have a soft spot for architectural skulls. And finally, this cover just fucking rules, and if you can’t see that, you’re some kind of idiot.

The music:
While I have met perfectly reasonable metalheads with otherwise defensible tastes who don’t care for this album, I secretly believe all those people are mentally deficient and possibly criminal. The Years of Decay, for me, is a foundational thrash album, a unique and almost perfect gem, a desert island disc. I love basically everything about this record: the production (dark and dry), the guitar tone (the ultimate expression of the ADA MP-1), the playing (Sid Falck’s drumming is a highlight, and Bobby Gustafson’s solos are absolutely unhinged), and of course the songs and lyrics. The riffing is insanely great (just the intro to “Elimination” is worth a million bucks) and Bobby Blitz’s lyrics are peerlessly pissed off, while still featuring some of the cleverest, funniest turns of phrase ever delivered. I can’t think of any lyrics in the entire corpus of heavy metal that are so believably angry, and Blitz’s career-peak delivery, manic and melodic, perfectly captures that feeling we all have sometimes, asking, “How can the world fucking be this way?” From the explosive buildup of “Time to Kill” to the shreiking blackout that ends the album (with the song “E.vil N.ever D.ies,” the conclusion to the four song “Overkill” song cycle started on the band’s debut), there’s almost nothing to complain about here. Almost. The plodding dirge of “Skullkrusher” goes on way too long (although the frantic middle section largely makes up for this), and the title track is perhaps a bit too mopey for its own good, but while these songs have their individual shortcomings, they nevertheless work perfectly in the context of the full album. This is a thrash album that sounds like nothing that came before and nothing that’s come since, a classic for the ages, and anyone who disagrees with me can go fuck themselves until they come to their senses!
— Friar Johnsen

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MINOTAUR, Death Metal (1990, Remedy)

The skull:
Do these guys not know what bull horns look like? I know they’re thrashers and not farmers, but still. Or, did they think, “Who says we can’t have some other horned skull on our cover? We’re not married to Minotaurs just because we’re called Minotaur. Sodom doesn’t always have, like, dicks and butts and pillars of salt on their covers or whatever.” As horny skull dudes go, this guy is pretty cool, if totally generic. But as we’ll soon see, that’s completely appropriate for this band!

The music:
Despite the title, this is not death metal, but thrash. To be fair, there was a lot of confusion on that point in the late 80s/early 90s, although I don’t think anyone could have called this music “death metal” with a straight face even back then. This is an exact cross of Pleasure to Kill and Expurse of Sodomy. Minotaur adds precisely nothing to the Teutonic thrash formula, and singer Andi even splits the difference between Mille and Angelripper. So, if you like early Kreator and Sodom, you’ll probably like Minotaur. If you don’t, you won’t. Weirdly, for a cult band with a ton of demos and EPs and split 7″s, Minotaur have so far resisted compilation, so unless you want to trawl ebay for old vinyl and cassettes, you’ll have to content yourself with one of their two full-lengths, from 1988 and 2009. Probably that first one is alright, but I’d be pretty skeptical of the second.
— Friar Johnsen

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SOULBENDER, Soulbender (2004, Licking Lava)

The skull:
A broken up skull with horns. How original. But wait, this devil skull is also sporting a halo? A traditional signifier of holiness? Surely there must be some mistake. Surely Soulbender realizes that longstanding graphical tradition assigns horns to badness and halos to goodness. What could they possibly mean to suggest by thus combining them in a single figure? In a skull, no less! A skull floating over a generic yellow and brown background. Soulbender are totally challenging all my preconceived notions, here, forcing me to question everything I thought I knew. It’s like the very core of my being, my soul if you will, is being twisted into some new configuration, bent into… woah……………. Dude!

The music:
Soulbender are only barely metal, and at that, they’re the worst kind of metal: alt-metal. Think Alice in Chains, but slightly heavier. Like, if AiC listened to Tool but couldn’t quite figure out what they were doing. It’s Soulbender’s pedigree alone which (barely) convinced The Council of their worthiness for the Skullection, as the band includes Queensryche guitarist Michael Wilton, and My Sister’s Machine’s Nick Pollock on vocals. Granted, this is about as low-watt a supergroup as you could conceive, and they put their combined talents to even less fruitful use than most such assemblies, but if the Skullection is about anything, it’s about barely trying and hardly succeeding. Queensryche’s post DeGarmo wilderness years were marked by increasibly terrible albums, although in the recent brouhaha Wilton and company claimed to have been either disengaged from or shut out of the songwriting process altogether. But, if Soulbender is any indication, Michael Wilton was fully qualified all along to join Geoff Tate in the ruining of Queensryche. There’s not much worse than an album so calculatedly written to court commercial success as this was, but when the effort reveals an understanding of what the public wants that’s close to a decade out of date, the entire spectacle just becomes sad and embarrassing. Although, come to think of it, sadness and embarrassment is pretty much Wilton’s stock-in-trade anymore. It’s what he’s best at, even.
— Friar Johnsen

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SALACIOUS GODS, Piene (2005, Folter)

The skull:
Though this is obviously a piece of bargain basement Photoshoppery, I prefer to imagine that the plastic flatness of this cover was achieved by different, analog means. I’m speaking, of course, of Colorforms®. Imagine the possibilities! A few pieces from the “Skulls, Teeth, and Bones” starter kit, then a few maces from the “Medieval Weaponry” set, a pair of horns from “Goats, Sheep, and Cows,” and finally, something from a pack of “Spiky Crowns and Pointy Accoutrements”. Obviously the people who make albums like this have the minds of children, so it would make sense to cater to their edutainment needs. Frankly, I can’t imagine why the University Games Corporation hasn’t yet come out with an entire line of Big Dumb Skull® Colorforms®. I’m sure The Council would consider a license for so esteemed a property.

The music:
Speedy mid-fi black metal, reminding me of early Immortal, or Gorgoroth minus the madness. Competent, but so utterly derivative that I can’t be bothered to even try to enjoy it. I don’t as a rule seek out black metal, and yet I’ve heard dozens, maybe a hundred bands exactly like this. Salacious Gods even wear corpse paint. Well, at least they wore it in 2005 when Piene (which means “full” in Italian) came out, but way back then, corpse paint was only 75% as gauche as it is today, and I if it frightened their mothers and their old school teachers and the other straights, well, I guess it was worth it.
— Friar Johnsen

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DEVILDRIVER, Winter Kills (2013, Napalm)

The skull:
By the sacred waters of Lake Cachuma, at the darkest hour of the desolate California winter, the jerkalope goes to die. Felled, like all the warriors of his kind, by ink poisoning, the jerkalope in his throes sloughs off his overtinctured skin to reveal at last the one true soul tattoo emblazoned on his unburdened brow, the mystical mark of all which is aggro and pure. And though the crows may feast on his rotted flesh and carry away his lesser osseous leavings, they dare not disturb the jerkalope’s inviolable headbone, so that pilgrims to the mystic shores of Lake Cachuma may gaze on the gnarly remains of the brutal and pray to the souls of them who have voyaged to the great circle pit beyond.

The music:
This fucking band. God damned DevilDriver. It’s not that they’re offensively bad, it’s that they’re offensively bland, gratingly mediocre. Fake tough-guy bullshit groove death metal. DevilDriver wants so desperately to be “hard”, but there’s no musical conviction there, only sanitized double bass and just enough melody to go down easy: death metal for video games and minivan dvd players. This band is the walking embodiment of corporate metal, the tools dishing out exactly the pseudo-rebellious pap that angry teenagers with a little disposable income crave. It’s astounding and depressing that Dez Fafara has been able to successfully pull this prank twice, once with the bottom-scraping nu-metal troglodytes Coal Chamber and again with DevilDriver. He’s a talentless weight around the neck of Heavy Metal, a visionless shit merchant trying to pass tattoos and tour buy-ons for talent. I’d say that DevilDriver can’t go away too soon, except that the minute they’re no longer profitable, Fafara will rise again to play dub slam or whatever it is low-achieving mouthbreathers are listening to in 2020.
— Friar Johnsen

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DEATHWISH, Demon Preacher (1988, GWR)

The skull:
I’m pretty sure this guy is a distant overseas relation of the skull on all those Nuclear Assault albums. The resemblance is uncanny. Also, for a skull that’s all chained up, to a logo no less, he sure looks pleased with himself. Maybe he’s into bondage, in which case we’re probably looking at a very turned-on skull right now. Which is just how he likes it. I’ll concede that he might be a demon, but all he’s preachin’ is the joy to be found in embracing your kinks.

The music:
Most British thrash tends toward Metallica worship, and most of it is pretty mediocre. There were good UK thrash bands (Xentrix first and foremost) but the birthplace of heavy metal has a pretty poor record when it comes to this particular flavor of the stuff. When Slammer and D.A.M. are numbered among your better thrash acts, you know you’re working with a poor scene. And if Deathwish had stopped after one album (the decent but unimpressive At the Edge of Damnation), they would be held in the same low esteem as Cerebral Fix and Anihilated. But, they pressed on and managed to release the rather excellent Demon Preacher before hitting the skids. Demon Preacher, as thrash goes, is a precise, controlled affair, but it’s still fast and bursting with energy, and frontman Jon Van Doorn, with a voice that splits the difference between JD Kimball and Blackie Lawless, brings the hooks in these well written (and skillfully played) tunes. That said, there’s not actually a lot of music here. Excluding a church-bell and powerchord intro and a seemingly eternal outro that puts to use all those classical guitar lessons David Brunt’s mom made him take when he was a kid, AND leaving off the fine-but-needless cover of Black Sabbath’s “Symptom of the Universe,” you’re left with just over 25 minutes of thrash. That’s scant even by 80s LP standards. But, I’d rather 6 good songs than 9 shitty ones, and these six songs are indeed quite cool. Are Deathwish one of the foremost thrash bands of the 80s? Not by a long shot. But, they were pretty damned good, and Demon Preacher is well worth owning if you have any fondness for thrash at the more melodic end of the spectrum.
— Friar Johnsen

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BOLT THROWER, Spearhead (1992, Earache)

The skull:
This oddly shaped skull (note the depression in the dome) bears four downward-pointing horns that appear to be of a bony piece with the skull. There’s no bottom jaw, but that’s just as well because it would be hard to fit in all those pointy teeth if they had matches underneath. The ominous, ancient-looking skull floasts atop an eldritch amulet of some sort, intricately worked and featuring a miasmic symbol of eight underneath. It’s the heavy-lidded eye in the center of that star that gives this up immediately as a Bolt Thrower cover. No other band has worked such magic with that otherwise cliched symbol of chaos than Bolt Thrower. One suspects that if they had chosen to go with pentagrams from the start, they could have made even that hackneyed totem classy.

The music:
We Friars in the service of the Council hold many opposing musical positions. Friar Wagner loves Darkthrone, I love Angra. He loves Italian prog rock with ludicrous acronymic names, I love bubblegummy power pop from the 70s. But there is one musical truism in the priory, held above all others by the Council themselves: Bolt Thrower rules supreme. It is permissible, of course, to prefer one Bolt Thrower album over another (although it is universally recognized that Realm of Chaos is the best), and there is room, even, for debate over the merit of Dave Ingram. So, when speaking of Bolt Thrower, it is not necessary to state that a release is good, but only how good. Spearhead is a single/EP released in support of The IVth Crusade, which I generally hold to be a middling album in the band’s mighty discography. On one hand, there’s something to be said for the smoothness of the sound and the greater degree of melodicism in the riffing, but on the other hand, one can’t help but miss the punishing heaviness of Realm or even the band’s (so far) swansong, Those Once Loyal. “Spearhead” is also not my choice for the best song on that album (nor, evidently, the band’s, as they generally only play the title track from that album live anymore) but it’s good enough, even if the “extended remix” does little to improve upon the original. “The Dying Creed” is an excellent number from the album also presented here, with a great dirgey chorus that highlights the unique pessimism of the lyrics on the album as a whole (normally, Bolt Thrower’s war-themed lyrics take a neutral moral position on their subject). The real value in this single, though, is in the two non-album tracks, “Crown of Life” and “Lament.” While I wouldn’t call them the band’s greatest songs, they’re certainly excellent additions to the corpus and a reminder that at one time, the band had too much good material for an album, instead of too little, as the case sadly seems to be now. “Crown of Life” sounds almost like it could have fit on Warmaster, while “Lament” is IVth Crusade through and through, a doomy plod with surprising harmonies and a mournful solo. Both these songs (and the “Spearhead” remix) can be found on the contractually obligated Who Dares Wins which, like Entombed’s self-titled compilation, also uses recycled artwork (this very skull in fact) to front an obligatory assembly of rarities. Buy or die.
— Friar Johnsen

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NEURASTHENIA, Possessed (2007, UKDivision)

The skull:
I was going to start with, “I’m no expert on skull horns…” but then I realized I probably am about as close as it comes to such a thing, so I can just flat-out say that I don’t think that’s where the horns go. The only justification I can imagine is that Neurasthenia is positing a very literal kind of possession, where a little demon actually sets up shop inside your head. This seems like an awful way to go, I must admit! But, these Italian thrashers must really love the idea, because basically this exact skull appears on their next album as well, albeit ringed by a necklace of smaller, evidently unpossessed skulls. I guess they’ve gone all in and decided to also steal the concept of recycling skulls from Nuclear Assault, which is odd, but I’ll allow it.

The music:
Thrash, but not your typical rethrash. I guess almost all thrash, at this point, is inherently retro, but Neurasthenia seem to be shooting for the weird not-sure-of-itself thrash of the early 90s, like the weird groovy miscalculation of Nuke Assault’s little-loved Something Wicked or the third Xentrix album. Those comparisons are sure to make Neurasthenia sound worse than they are, but I can’t think of a better frame of reference. At their hookiest and most melodic (as in “Filthy Lucre”) Neurasthenia are pretty good, actually, tempering their old thrash tendencies with a helping of melodic death metal, and they rarely plod in the unfortunate fashion of bad 90s thrash. Singer Neil Grotti makes the best of a limited range, eking out some fairly catchy melodies with less than an octave of Hetfieldian yarl, and while the riffing is short on stand-out exemplars, it also doesn’t offend with naked derivation. Overall, this is a moderately pleasing, if slight, late thrash entry that functions as something of a corrective to all the pizza mosh bullshit out there.
— Friar Johnsen