Metal May Monster

The month of May was Metal Month on VH1. They played more Metal videos, they premiered the Pantera Behind the Music and recently completed the four-part Heavy: The History of Metal documentary series. They are also running Supergroup, a reality TV show with some great and legendary hard rock/metal musicians trying to form a band and write music over 12 days: Scott Ian of Anthrax, Sebastian Bach, Evan Seinfeld of Biohazard, Jason Bonham and the Motor City Madman - Ted Nugent. I’ve been a big fan of Anthrax since they started writing songs about Stephen King books and Judge Dredd many years ago. My first concert was Aerosmith, with opening band Skid Row, so yes, I’ll be tuning in every week to watch this show.

Now to the History of Metal - of the four episodes on this thing, the first two are probably the best. These two episodes (rightly so) spend a great deal of time on Black Sabbath, Judas Priest, Led Zeppelin, and Iron Maiden. Sabbath and Maiden are probably two of my favorite bands, metal or not. The third episode was mostly about the glam rock scene in LA and the New Wave of British Heavy Metal while the fourth episode spent collectively, about 15 minutes on the big four as they are sometimes known: Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeth, and Metallica. On the other hand, about 15 minutes was dedicated to Marilyn Manson, who is controversial, but not explicitly Metal and will not be as remembered as, at the very least, Metallica. Barely any mention of Pantera, the band many (including myself) feel helped to keep metal alive during the grunge years/early 90s, barely any mention of some of the current crop of metal bands. I find a little odd that the big four get only a glancing mention, especially when Geezer Butler of Sabbath states: "Thank God for Metallica" and they spend half of an episode on hair bands like Poison and a quarter of an episode on Marilyn Manson.

What do they close out the four parter with? A reunion show of Twisted Sister. Yes they were an important band, and were big 20 years ago. However, they aren't exactly where Metal is now, and where it is going with bands like Trivium, Shadows Fall, Hatebreed, In Flames, Lacuna Coil, Killswitch Engage, or even progressive metal like Dream Theater and Stratovarious.

Enough ranting about Metal. Today, I posted my latest review, Monster Blood Tattoo: Foundling by D.M. Corninsh.

This blog has been on stutter steps lately, the new job is really taking up my time. That and finishing up the novel I started writing in November. I told myself when I knew I wouldn’t finish it for NaNoWriMo 2005, I wanted to have it finished by this summer. It really looks like that will happen. Once I feel satisfied with the ending, I save it, print it, and keep away from it for a few months.