Sunday, April 24, 2011

BIOGRAPHY: Ray Charles Adventures Pt. 1


Ray Charles

White Devil: The Ray Charles Adventures
The Autobiography of Ray Charles

Part 1

Ray Charles Stepped out of his time machine, gazing upon the glowing white forests of Antarus 9 with the eyes that the future had given him. They were alternating colors of green and red, and they rotated to let in different amounts of light, like the lens of a camera. They could only see in black and white. Also, they were way too small for his eye sockets, so they just kind of rested in the bottom of the fleshy cavities.

"So this is the land of King Grananathlphumpts?" he asked himself in a manner that might have resembled a small killer whale in the shape of a mouse, "yes it must be!" he answered to himself.
"Only this evil king, notorious for his racist tendencies, could unite such a beautiful people into a world of love and of eternal peace!"
"And also have mastered the art of Tae Kwon Do!"
"Oh, I didn't see you there, Dialogue Partner!"
"That, my friend, is, of course, because, of course, I am invisible to the naked eye! Which, of course, means that you, of course, cannot see me!"
"Oh yes, I remember that now. I better put on my magic see-invisibility glasses if I want to see you, while you are invisible, often!"

Ray Charles put on his magic glasses. They were bright pink, and had been decorated with colorful feathers by a class of middle schoolers. The decorations weren't glued on very well, so you could see the dots where they attached them to the frame. He could now see his friend, Dialogue Partner!

"Now that you can see me, you can tell that my outfit consists of many large beads, strung together into some form of decorative chainmail!"
"You're right," said Ray Charles, "I didn't notice that before, or anything."
"I knew you'd notice it once you could see me!"
"Thanks!"
"You are very welcome!" they both said at the same time.
Then they both said something else at the same time. It was:
"Look! There's something bad about to happen!"

And then something bad happened.
Very bad.
And very happenin'.



Wednesday, April 20, 2011

The Importance of Reading

Reading makes the world go round. Reading has the power to build nations and destroy cities. What makes us human? The ability to read. But can all humans read? No. (I will explain this phenomenon later in the context of racism) Reading has the power to take you places you’ve never imagined and never wanted to go.

If you can’t read, go learn how. The more you read, the more you know. Learn to read books. Learn to read poems. Learn to read nutrition labels. Learn to read binary code. Learn to read minds. Think of it this way. Reading is like eating. There’s a whole world full of food out there for you to eat, so don’t discriminate. Indulge yourself. Become obese with knowledge. Find your favorite dishes and eat them every night. As a citizen of the human race, you’re standing in the midst of an extensive potluck feast. So tonight for dinner, instead of eating, try reading.

There has never been a better time in the history of the world to start reading than now. It’s easier than cooking and better than drugs. Not everyone reads on the same level, so it’s important to pick the literature that’s right for you. If you feel challenged by big words and punctuation, don’t be discouraged. Try reading something easier like billboards, magazines, or catalogues. Don’t give up. Reading is a useful tool. Reading will grant you power over the culturally inferior. Recite your favorite sonnet to your love interest to put them on their knees. Read a Bible verse to an ethnic minority to save their soul. You can have the power. Simply pick up a book and read it.

FAQ

Is reading fun?

Reading can be fun. It can also be terrifying. Reading is as enjoyable or gruesome as you make it.

Is reading dangerous for children?

It depends. For many children, reading can be a traumatizing experience. With the power to destroy young minds, parental discretion is advised when teaching kids to read. Until the age of ten, I was lost without reading. Then I found how rewarding of an experience it can be.

Can black people read?

No. This is a common misconception. In addition to using jive talk and a collection of click dialects, black people commonly convey their thoughts with one another via the Retinal Authorization Process, or R.A.P. Nowadays a few white people use R.A.P., but this rudimentary form of communication is best left to the nappy-haired and socially unruly.

Friday, April 15, 2011

TIME2MOSH: Suffocation

This is the next installation of my critically acclaimed series of columns spotlighting the most punishing mosh riffs in existence, entitled TIME2MOSH. You may not always agree with my definition of a mosh riff, but you will probably ALWAYS agree that the riffs I pick are pretty gosh darn mighty.

Last time I spotlighted just a couple of the many thrash metal mosh riffs by the band Slayer. That was a good place to start, since they pretty much started the whole moshing deal-i-o, but honestly, they kind of suck at it.

In my eyes, there are two metal genres that really bring forth the mosh, and they are reviled by pretty much everyone on the internet, other than some guy:
Slamming Brutal Death Metal
and
Deathcore

These genres have BREAKDOWNS(!!!), which are half time chugging riffs in the middle of a song inteded for the sole purpose of CRUSHING PITT RIFFMENT(!!!). They go about breakdowns slightly differently, but the idea is generally the same:

1. Wear Baseball Caps
2. CRUSHING PITT RIFFMENT!!!

You can usually tell the genres apart because SLAM logos have a corny photoshop 3D effect on them, and are always in a single bad looking color, while -CORE logos look like they had a professional graphic designer and a record label, but not one that REALLY knew what they were doing, so like one of the letters will look bad or asymetrical or something.

The band that started both of these genres had nothing to do with baseball caps, or corny photoshop effects, but still had the pitt riffment that makes them great.

I am, of course, talking about the almighty Suffocation!

That's right. No caps.

I have recently started going by the mantra 'you can only make your first album once', because I see so many horrible freshman releases by new bands and stuff, and I think Suffocation really had this in mind when they made theirs. Effigy of the Forgotten. (I don't count the album before it, Human Waste, because it's gosh darn terrible!) Effigy of the Forgotten is full of some of the sickest, most crushing, crushing pitt riffment ever. Take for example this song:

I'm not even going to tell you where to mosh, cause if you can't hear it, you should probably just kill yourself or something.

After that they had like two albums where they tried to be complicated or proggy or something, and I don't like them, even though everyone else does.

That's cool though because a couple of years ago they released a monster called Blood Oath, and it goes back to the Crushing Riffment no problemo!!!

CRUSHING PITT RIFFMENT AT 2:29, ANYONE???

So that's basically Suffocation. If you know anything about music, you can see how they pretty much influenced every band int he past 20 years with their massive riffment. They're pretty much just like The Rolling Stones, if The Rolling Stones had guitars tuned to B-flat, half-time chugging grooves, sick guttural vocals, arbitrary blastbeats, and atonal riffage.

Next Time: Next time will probably happen a few more times from now than this time happened from last time, but that was just because I was just so excited about the pittage! Next time I'll probably talk about either Devourment or Internal Bleeding, depending on my mood. Colorful band names await! Off to the skies, Superman!!!

Thursday, April 14, 2011

TIME2MOSH: Slayer

This is the first post in my new series TIME2MOSH, where I will pick a band/mosh riff I like and talk about how much I like them. Keep in mind that moshworthy riffage is very subjective, and you won't always agree with my definition of what a mosh riff exactly is, but you'll probably ALWAYS agree that the riff twin-guitar-attackages that I pick are pretty gosh darn mighty.

Pictured: SLAYER

Slayer was the natural first choice for a column entitled TIME2MOSH because, as we all know, before Slayer there wasn't really any such thing as moshing. Have you ever heard of slamdancing at a Led Zeppelin concert? Thought not.

I had to think for a while about what riffs I should include, because they have SO MANY GREAT ONES!!!
The first riff I picked it midway through Raining Blood, and it slows the galloping propellant rhythm down to a half-time crawl. We now know this as a breakdown. That makes this the first breakdown, meaning it effectively started a few new metal subgenres with a single riff! (See video below)

Mosh at approx 2:10!

This is a really boring mosh riff, but I give it a pass because it's like, the first one ever. Slayer had a really great thing going for them. I feel like up until the mid-nineties they had this really menacing vibe that no other band possessed except maybe like Morbid Angel or something.

Riffage number two comes from a different album altogether: Seasons In The Abyss. I could probably write a whole post on how much of a moshfest that album is, but especially this song. This song.
This song.
War Ensemble!
Tom Araya talks about killing people and other things of a violent nature in this song, so you know it has to have a great mosh riff. Actually the whole song is just a mosh riff. Literally, pick out any 5 second sample and it will have you moshing. My favorite riff comes partway through the song after a ludicrous drum fill courtesy of a Dave Lombardo.

Mosh at 2:20!!!

This riff actually sounds angry and mean, which is something that all of the metal releases of the past 20 years seem to lack. Regardless, many bands jumped onto the moshtrain, and in the decades to come we would be presented with some truly terrifying moshage. I just picked Slayer for this first post so people could start to see the evolution of the mosh or something like that.

Next week we'll continue our exploration of total mosh fury with a band who I think started the modern breakdown template that most ____-core bands follow today, and pulls it off to a much greater effect:
SUFFOCATION!!!

Wednesday, April 13, 2011




Picture a cow nose.






Go on, picture it.






That's funny, you can't picture a cow nose! Why? Because 20% of people haven't actually ever seen a cow or don't know what it is. It's also because another 70% of people rarely see real cows (the remaining 10% of people are cows).


You might have a general idea of what a cow nose looks like, but 90 percents say you don't know exactly what a cow nose looks like.

That's because it looks like this:
















Now if you just said "That's exactly how I pictured it!" then I know for sure that you don't know what a cow nose looks like. Why? Because that is a picture of a dead turtle.  Poor turtle; he was handsome, with his mustache and all.

Take a minute of silence for him if you need to.

We loved him.  And he loved us!  Boy, did he love us.  He never failed to be there when we were down, and he never looked down on us when we failed our English classes because of those pointless essays.  As our backs got longer and his back got harder we would sit in the fields and reminisce about the days when we had shorter and softer backs (respectively).

As it turns out, his back was getting longer, too.  But a back just can't get longer and harder at the same time you know.  And that's why he died.

R.I.P.
Kirk Turtle

This is known as Harder-Longer Back Syndrome.  It has been devastating (even killing) most turtles and even one small Russian child (we have no idea why).

How do you avoid HLBS?  The easiest way, of course, is to not have a back. But assuming you're not a slug, bird, or ex-president, the first thing you're going to want to do is purchase the shiniest cape you can find.  Not only will this make you look stunning at any event, it will protect your feeble back, preventing it from being harmed, which will in turn prevent it from becoming any harder or longer (a further explanation of this can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dura_mater).



Friday, April 8, 2011

QUICK: Tomorrow

Just a quick heads-up: tomorrow is mustache day! Oops, it's already tomorrow!

Sorry, please try again next mustache day.

Friday, April 1, 2011

No More Blogging

It's stupid. We've all agreed to stop this nonsense and shut down the site ASAP. Thanks for reading! It was good while it lasted. (That's what she said!)