Autobiographies Sell...but Who's Buying?

Today is the night of the American Carnage tour, Megadeth, Slayer and Testament, for Phoenix. It was originally slated for January, but Tom Araya had to get back surgery performed. Thankfully he's made a full recovery and I'm sure they will literally slay at the show tonight.

Also today Dave Mustaine appeared for a book signed at Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe. I had gotten there around 8:15am, after a stop at Starbuck's to wake up dead and get a little bit of sustenance. The line was only a handful of people at the time. Most were wearing the obligatory Megadeth shirts. Some had added to the ensemble by donning Megadeth tattoos. Everyone was friendly. Conversations were generally about what Megadeth shows we've been to prior. How awesome Megadeth is. The history of Metallica and Megadeth. And just general discussion about metal.

Mustaine wasn't slated to arrive until 10am, so there was some time to kill. I had brought along Boneshaker by Cherie Priest to pass the time. I got through a couple of chapters but ended up talking with some fellow metalheads.

We were eventually corralled into orderly lines determined by what letter we had which is based on what position the book was purchased prior. I was assigned letter G. I'm not sure how far down the alphabet they went, but the line moved smoothly. This was aided by the fact he was only signing the book and no posing photos were to be taken. At first it was no photography at all, but they loosened up and allowed photos to be taken up to meeting Mustaine and after. Just no poses. That part is a bit unfortunate as I would've liked to taken a picture with him, alas it is not to be.

A disheveled musician wishing he could just relax instead of pretending to enjoy the fans.

I got to meet the man who helped give birth to the thrash metal sub-genre. I had a few words with him, and shared with him an inside joke that I have with my girlfriend. He seemed like a nice enough guy and he has done a lot for metal, despite some of his rivalries and his downfall into drugs and alcoholism. Here's to one of the greatest guitarists and songwriters in all of music. \m/

I met Dave Mustaine. I'm more metal than you!

Most Metal Video Games (Part 2)

Hails and pixels metalhead gamers! It's been awhile but here's another installment of the Most Metal Video Games series! Last week I debuted the series with Too Human, a futuristic-cacophony-Norse-Mythology-Diablo style game.. This week's most metal video game is none other than:

DOOM


The granddaddy of all first person shooters; Wolfenstein 3D and others might have come before it, but no other game revolutionized gaming quite on the level as DOOM. Why this game is metal is pretty much a no-brainer. You are a lone-ass-kicking-soldier against the infinite denizens of Hell with some bad ass space-age and not so quite space-age weaponry like the shotgun and in the sequel, the almighty double barreled shotgun. With it's creative creature designs and fantastic labyrinth levels, it's no surprise why this game helped kick start shareware and make the mod community what it is today. Of course this game also has a great soundtrack even if it is pretty much ripped off.

Bobby Prince, who was originally a lawyer; what he practiced is beyond me as it's not stated on his Wikipedia page, composed the soundtrack. It's been said that due to his law background he was able to get away with much of the copyright infringement because he knew how much constituted substantial similarities to the source material. Personally, even though I'm not a high-priced-city-slicker-fancy lawyer I can definitely hear the similarities between the original songs and DOOM's versions.

Granted most of DOOM's songs play the main riff for a few bars then move that same riff up a few steps to create repetition; at least he took from some great source material. Slayer. Metallica. Pantera. Alice In Chains. Despite the seemingly infringement going on, I have never heard a lawsuit peep from any of the bands. This is particularly surprising as Metallica is involved and we all know how protective Lars Ulrich is about his music. Regardless, the music fits the intensity of the game and it has withstood time by being continuously covered and rearranged by musicians the world over. To close out this post, I'd like to share my favorite medley of DOOM music performed by Finnish symphonic metal band: Epiclore.



Currently Listening To: Black Sabbath - The Mob Rules