We can set this world ablaze!

Ever since I attended a Metallica concert in Horsens last year I have been hooked on a band called Mastodon. At the time following the concert, where they were a warm-up band, There was that one song that blew my mind. Then one day I started exploring the rest of the album my favorite song was on and found another track I fell in love with. A very good friend of mind told me about their new album last autumn but the first song was not really my cup of the so I didn't pay any attention to it. First at the start of February this year did I discover two insane songs off the new album that showed me something special. A metal band that has the incredible gift off writing heavy ass riffs with catchy and gorgeous sing-a-long choruses.

On the way down to Horsens to see Metallica we heard a song by Mastodon and though I knew it from somewhere it got a bit stuck in my mind. Then when Mastodon got on stage the song had gotten bigger in a way and even though I didn't know the lyrics I was able to sing a long and Though I watched both Metallica and Slayer following Mastodon, that song was the one I was humming afterwards. I am off course talking about the catchiest chorus ever written in metal: Oblivion. In the weeks that followed I was almost entirely listening Oblivion and nothing els. There is something about that song that I felt like I had never gotten out of any other song of the metal genre. It is one off those songs where it can play in the background at a party or something like that and I can hear it's that song but not care about it until that kick ass chorus comes and then I have to stop what i'm doing and listen to it. Mastodon has a very special set of voices in the band. Troy Sanders is the screamer off the group. he can both growl and sing rather high pitch while doing it. Though it seems like he can't always do it cause Mastodon usually lake a lot off punch when you hear a live recording. Brann Dailor is the Tenor and he has a very clean but yet a bit off a compressed voice that works awfully well in their songs, but he can't sing as well live as he can on the albums because off him having to drum like a motherfucker. Brent Hinds has a really weird voice that is kind of high but still coming from the back off his throat so it isn't to high. His vocal performance on Oblivion's chorus is insane. His different voicings mix perfectly together, but that has made it really hard to reenact on stage. But it's not really a problem when you see them live yourself.  

The album Crack the Skye is awesome and all but I don't get that awesome vibe off the other songs but there is one song that I think is great but in a completely different way then Oblivion. The Last Baron is a big and epic composition the goes beyond 13 minutes. And right from the get go you hear that insane opening line "I'd guess the would say we could set this world ablaze" and my god what and opening line that is. the song is very prog like and has some elements that are worse then others but the good parts are almost genius. One part in particular is awesome. about 8 minutes in the songs complexity changes completely and you go from a big proggy and apocalyptic sound, to a more punk like riff that blows my mind. It is so awesome and really is a hidden gem in a really long song that some times and be a bit to much.The lyrics in both The Last Baron and Oblivion are heavy but still have a fantasy feel. They have a way of making coll words rime with each other. The Oblivion chorus is three lines long and the three lines just fit perfectly to each other and the song's sound. "Falling from grace cause I've been away to long. Leaving you behind with my lonesome song. Now i'm lost, in Oblivion", Holy shit that's good The guitar work is so awesome and the solo just works so well with the rest off the song that the only guitar parts that beat it is the guitar work in the chorus, wich is just insane.It is a one of a kind chorus and i thought nothing would ever come close.



But I was wrong. The same band once again created almost perfection and this time they made to off them and on the same album: Once More Round The Sun. High Road is the song I like the least of the two but it is still a really good song that has that same feel Oblivion has. Again it's the catchy chorus the makes you wanna scream along to Brann Dailor's great tenor voice. A contrast build song that shifts from vers to chorus in a great way and it just fits together. Though I think the verses are a bit to dark sometimes and it's not a song I can listen to every day, but it's not at all bad.

The one song that really comes close to Oblivion is off course The Motherload. My god what a creation. It is contrary to High Road, more pop like. When I say pop like, I mean it has a simpler structure and is not as edgy and heavy in its build up. But boy, do I feel like i'm flying when that chorus comes around. The lyrics, in my book, speak about a person that has been wronged and cheated but this time it won't happen again, and that to me is awesome. You feel like Mastodon themselves or some out of this world power is watching over you and won't let you get fooled again. "This time, this time. Things will work out just fine. We won't let you slip away. This time, this time. Things will work out just fine. We won't let you leave this way". You can't help but to scream along, while chills rolls down your spine cause it's so awesome. Followed up by the high growl like voice of Troy Sanders and it's time to crack some skulls. This band really has something special within them. They can create almost perfect songs and to do that from a metal stand point is insane. You would have to be either Dimebag or a really special band with really talented people to pull that of and Mastodon in deed are special.
Morten........ Tusind tak!


Get a life and start listening to better music! 

A song that changed my life pt. 2: A transvestite creating umbrella!

This time around we're moving towards something really far from the music I have been listening to all my life. I have off course had my moments with electronic music and such but only when I got drunk or was gaming some high octane in quake 3 arena, but I was never ever a techno dude. But some songs get to me sometimes and stick around for a week or two, all but one. The first time I heard this song I was 6 or 7 years old and it was in a top ten hit-list here in Denmark called 'Boogie listen' where you saw new music videos and they had a top 10 of the most popular songs at the time. I was disturbed by what I saw and never forgot it. The music sounded weird to me at the time and the video was crazy so a didn't like it at all. Three years ago I heard it again and I was blown away. Suddenly everything made sense and I have loved the song ever since and worship the guy who created a timeless masterpiece. I am off course talking about Windowlicker by Aphex Twin.

it was 1999 and I felt sick to my stomach. Watching pretty women getting transformed into some mix between a man and a woman. All of them having a huge smile ten miles wide across their faces. Some guy was dancing like Patrick Swayze out of Dirty Dancing and he had a black umbrella that seemed to cause the transformation. And everything came with a weird beat and some goofy sounds. In other words: heaven.
Something brand new and different had just happened and now I'm old and wise enough to embrace it. Windowlicker is art from start to finish. One of my friends put it in a way that shows what this "song" is: Timeless and timeless it is. It wouldn't have mattered if the song had been released in 1994, 2004 or yesterday it so classical and yet new that it just works from the year 1990 and onward.




The song has one of the strangest lyrics I have heard. It is no more and different sounds like "dum dum dum" and "aaiieeeuurrgggh" but it just works like nothing els. Aphex Twin recorded his own voice and then bends and pitches the vocals so that they fit into each other singing different tones and working like vocal voicing. Right from the get go I feel i chill og awesomeness coming all the way up from my back. You hear a deep "ooohhhhh" that is follow by those odd but still amazing keys that work as a sort of back beat along with the drumpad that hits almost random beats at times throughput the song. This sounds weird I know but I don't know how els to put it. It is a weird composition but some how it is the best piece of electronic music to ever come out of a studio. 

On every level this song is insane. The thought of creating a piece of music with this form and shape is just crazy and I have no clue how this song started out. Even the backbone, the beat, is so different that can't see how to move on from it and start adding layers. The vocals are so soothing a calm that they just blend together into a big bowl of gorgeous mixture. At the time this was never scene before. Now bending and pitching vocals are all around us but still to this day, nothing comes even close to the manner of perfection that features in Windowlicker. And I don't think I'll ever hear anything getting near it in my lifetime. This piece of music is unique. Nothing will ever sound like it or have the same feeling. Once in a while a song, movie or book hits a brand new spot that sets the tone for everything els and Windowlicker is such a song. 

Aphex Twin/Richard D. James has ever since been seen as a god by poeple who have a brain that works from a musical point of view and rightfully so. He became a millionare over night and his song and the music video that followed set the world a blaze with medie attention and buzz. Everytime I hear this song I get a smile as wide as the one the women and Aphex Twin has in the music video and I fly away in a sea of perfection I have very rarely felt. Aphex Twin invented dubstep in 1998/99 some 12 or so years before it became popular. That is his insane genius. Inventing something 10 years before it was "really" invented is talent at a level above everybody els. Windowlicker gave me a new perspective when looking at popular and electronic music and regard myself as blessed because I can sit with some of my best friends and mimic the vocals while having big smiles o our faces. Thank you Mr. Richard D. James for making this one of a kind piece of music and being so insane.

Thank You.



Get a life and start listening to better music!      

Bang, You're Dead Max Payne!

In this post I will dive into one of my all time favorite game-franchises. I started out with Max Payne by buying Max Payne 2: The fall of Max Payne, on sale in a local supermarket for a price, somewhere around, 15 dollars, and I was blown away. I had tried the first Max Payne game at a friend on PlayStation 2 but hadn't really tried it for good, so I was shocked at how incredible it was. Max Payne 3 was a really good follow up and was off course improved in a lot off ways, but still had the same core values as the previous games had. The movie on the other hand was not so great. I don't hate it at all but it lacks a lot of key things a Max Payne fan wants. In this post i'll take a closer look at what made the games good and bad and have a look at what failed in the movie. The video games will be refereed to as: Max Payne 1, Max Payne 2/The fall of Max Payne, Max Payne 3 and the movie as: Max Payne the movie/The Movie.

First off the first game was a revolution in the sense that it change third person shooters forever. Though graphics and some of the mechanics are out dated, compared to today's standards, they were brand new and still to this day work really well.I don't think a series like Hitman would've gotten anywhere if not for Max Payne. Though Some games can pull of having a lot of extra mechanics and cutting edge Technology a lot off the time it's the simple things that work. Paine killers, Shoot, Reload, Movement, jump, Interact, aim and scroll through your weapons. That is all it took. Off course there are other keys, such as crouching and walking instead of running but you don't need them at all to get through the game. Everything is straight forward and you blazing way through mansions and subway stations along with your Winchester 1300 and a couple of Beretta 92fs'. there are off course other weapons but I think those two are the most significant, though a Desert Eagle is always lovely to have in your back pocket. The whole Idea off having the story told in a form of comic-style cut scenes was completely new and gives both the first and the second game an edge and storytelling to it, that no other game has had ever since.And leads me into the best part of the entire franchise: The story. 

The story was to me what set the first two games apart from everything els. One of the best maps to ever be produced is the first part of Max Payne 1. Everything gets explained and you start off at the end with Max Telling how it could ever had come to this. On August the 22. 1998 Max is going home from a days work at the NYPD. He has a beautiful wife and a lovely baby daughter waiting for him at home. His former partner Alex Balder, now with the DEA, talks with him about going over to the DEA but Max is not interested because he wants to focus on his family. and off course you have Already gotten the fact that James McCaffrey is the perfect cast. His voice is awesome and fits Max like a glove. Max Returns to Jersey where he lives and finds his home a mess. Chairs knocked over, Cabinets open and a big green V is tagged on a wall. The phone rings and it's some elder lady who seems glad that something is wrong"At the Payne Residence". Max runs upstairs and is met by junkies on the new drug Valkyr. He finds his little daughter butchered and wife murdered in a sea off blood. It is one off the best starts to an epic drama I have ever seen.

Max continuous through out the game, to dream and think about his wife and daughters murder and you see just how affected he is by him having constant nightmares and thoughts towards the incident. In nightmares he blames himself and the reality around him morphs into his dreams. This happens through out the first two games mostly and helps the player interact with Max and feel for his cause. To meet the sexy and cold killer Mona Sax and the charismatic Russian mobster Vladimir Lem. Characters who play a huge role in the second game and I love how the characters are pulled over into the second game. Some of the voice work sounds a bit low budget but at ads to the comic feel in the cut scenes

In Max Payne 2. The Fall of Max Payne you get just what you wanted: more of the same. The comic book style cut scenes, A fantastic voice actor casting, some of the same weapons, awesome storytelling filled with those long metaphors you see time and time again in the first game, updated graphics and great overall feel and impressions. Max Payne 2 feels a bit shorter then the first one and is a bit easier the play trough, when you look at the difficulty of the game. The story though is easier to follow but you still have the same feel for Max has he is screwed time and time again by people around him. The soundtrack, Late Goodbye by Poets of the Fall has the same melancholic and sad tone that the game evolves around and it also has that same light at the end off the tunnel feel you have in the game. I mean by this that at some point things have to end for Max Payne and please let him have revenge and at least die with a smile on his face.

Though the voice acting in the first game is great it is almost perfect in Max Payne 2. Vladimir Lem, voiced by Jonathan Davis, is so awesome and so cool. He really pictures that arrogant attitude that a Russian Mob boss should have. Wendy Hoopes has that soothing and soft though jet firm voice that fits Mona perfectly. James McCaffrey is flawless and a guy like Vinnie Gognitti is this time around a bit less fake and his panicky high pitch voice feels more real and fitting this time. The overall dialog is amazing from start to finish. Every time Vladimir Lem opens his mouth he is so calm and calculating you can't help but to smile knowing how well he played Max in the cleaner business.Though the Soundtrack during game play is simple and still based upon the soundtrack from the first game. It is much more heard this time and those deep piano parts really fits the storytelling. An example of that is when Max first has a talk to Vlad at his Restaurant and his Monologue is sublimely supported by the dark music around him. Some of the lines Max Payne has are just astonishing. When Annie Finn is killed in front off him he says "Like all the bad things in my life, it started with the death of a woman". Then you think right back at his wife and daughter and get that whole feeling again that everything is gonna get messy with the blood of bad guys in the near future.

A cool detail is that the TV-Series Lords and Ladies is still going strong in the second game. You can stand at a TV and listen to the cheesy lines going back and forth between the nobles being acted out in the series. Dick Justice was a name that a security guard gave his gun in the first game and now it's a TV-Series about the policeman Dick Justice. His life is very similar to Max Payne's and is set in the 70's so big Afro here we go. Address Unknown is a weird psychological horror series that at some point in the game morphs with one of Max's nightmares. A sadistic killer is killing in another mans name and has lines that echo the first game. "The flesh of fallen angels" and so on. They give the game a sort of self-conscious and ads to the replay value. the final level is long and hard and ends just the way you want it to even though Mona dies in most of the endings. It is still one hell of a game. 

Max Payne 3 is a completely different animal to deal with. It is by no means a bad game. not even close, but it lacks some of the magic. I feel like the story is a bit to far fetched when it comes to Max's involvement. I know he promised his friend and boss to help and save his boss' family but I still feel like he could just had run away at any point during the game. The setting in Brazil on the other hand is awesome and depicted perfectly. I know how crappy a country it is and I really think that all that happened in the game happens once a month in real life Brazil. The graphics are awesome and the mechanics work perfectly. Max is down and out and finds himself in trouble he can only get out of if he loads his guns and start nailing some head shots. The game is a real challenge in the higher difficulty levels and challenges and collectibles ad to the replay value. The multiplayer part is good and works well enough not to drag the game down. Once again the voice acting is awesome and the level designs are really special. The Panama Mission is really cool inside the canal and all that. Though I like the New York parts the best every chapter and part have something good about it. Max Payne 3 seems to have more focus on the shooter part of the game and it does that really well. The story is sometimes hard to follow and I still have question on the whole situation about panama and all that but you get the major points at your first play through. What you miss is your caring for Max. He is not really involved in a big way with the people killed other then they pay his bills. Other then that the game is excellent through and through and was a fitting end to the franchise if it turns out to be the end.

Max Payne the movie featuring Mark Wahlberg as Max Payne, is hated by a lot of people. I for one like it but not as a Max Payne movie. If you just watch it as an action movie it is awesome but is just messes with a lot of things that it should have kept as they were. Mark Wahlberg is on of my favorite actors. He is a badass all day long and I think he is alright as Max thou he might to much of a bad boy then an angry and revenge filled regular guy, though his no nonsense gun scenes are good. The military adaptation of Valkyr and Jack Lupino is good in my book. It would have been to weird to have all the satanic stuff and all that hanging around. The Valkyr part with burning skies and fallen angels is awesome. but here come the faults.

Valkyr is green not blue, so why make it blue. It would have been killer with green flames engulfing Max when he takes it but they chose a more linear and normal take on it. Some of the guns use in the movie are really well picked out but MONA SAX USES A DESERT EAGLE why even bother getting her another gun? The use of BB and having him be the bad guy is just wrong. He had nothing to do with the murder of Max's family. The role of BB is so wrong and the entire Aesir thing is so weird and complicated it makes no sense. Michelle didn't work for them but just by accident got involved with the Valhalla project that came to be Valkyr. Jim Bravura is black..... What? That is just ludicrous ;) Mila Kunis is hot like always but is not how I see Mona Sax. The entire story about Mona is so messed up I won't mention it at all. Nicole Horn is so far out in the distance I fail to see what the point of having her in the movie was. The scene where Max's family is murdered is ok but if some of the darkness of the games had been present it would have worked much better. The movie just seems rushed to me and should have been more true to the story. All that in mind it's not a bad action movie and still gets me when Max is on a rampage in Aesir Corporation at the end. And the scene where Max takes some Valkyr is killer. But it's not a Max Payne movie...... Not even close.

All that in mind I love the Franchise. Rockstar once again hit the Jackpot and impacted me forever. They made me replay every chapter time and time again after I bought Max Payne 2 and it was a pleasure. they are geniuses and I wish for them to once again make something new and unique so I can feel that rush again like I did the first time I played Max Payne 2.

Get a life and start listening to better music!  

Let off some steam Bennett!

I don't think any movie has left such a mark on me as this movie has. I saw it for the first time when I was 5 or 6 years old and right from the start I felt like this was a movie that kicked ass. The last 30 minutes of the movie is one long killing spree and my good is there none better at doing that then Arnold Schwarzenegger. I am off course talking about the most bad ass movie of all time: Commando from 1985.






You start off by watching some guys get taking out in different ways by Cooke played by Bill Duke and you have no idea what is going on but then my god does Arnold take charge when you need him to. You see his massive arms wrapped around a one ton log and a chainsaw and right there you just know, that whatever may happen somebody's going to get killed in awesome fashion. Arnold's character is named John Matrix...... John Matrix. That is one of the most bad ass names ever and he off course is a former black/spec ops guy who now lives with his daughter out in the woods of Oregon or something like that. You get to see John Matrix as a loving father and all but after just 11 and a half minute all hell breaks lose. John's former general has let the bad guys to his hideout and right after General Kirby leaves two soldiers at John's house, a one man wrecking crew is started and the only pauses he takes, are when drugged and when he needs to get some more guns. Off course they kidnap his daughter and demand John to do their dirty work but John Matrix is not a man you try to play tough with.   


John is captured after a mad driving scene where he ends up being drugged by one of the guys we saw getting blown up at the start of the film. John sees his daughter in a warehouse and agrees to do the job off killing the president off the country the pussy bad guy in a suite, named Arius, wants to rule. Sully and Jackson follow John to the plain and John tells sully "You're a funny guy sully. I like you, that's why i'm gonna kill you last.". Jackson is taken care off on the plain where John brakes his neck and then he jumps off the plain just after takeoff and lands in a swamp. He meets up with Cindy, a stewards/pilot and the two of them crash a mall, Kill 50 people, rob a military store, steals a plain and set of towards the Island Arius is on with his bodyguard and former member of Matrix's military group Bennett.     

First of all some of the discussions John takes are so awesome it you can't help but to laugh your butt of. One of the guys who attacked his house are telling him that he won't get his daughter back unless he cooperates. What does John do? He shoots the guy in the head and drives his car down a mountain to try and stop Cooke and his guys from getting away. John jumps off a plain while it takes off but some off the shots show that the plain is well in the air but he jumps into a swamp and nothing happens. How can you fall 500 meters or so, land in shallow water and just walk it off? At the Mall John is attacked by 7000 mall cops and while Sully tries to escape by getting into an elevator. John the rips some sort of soft plastic tube hanging from the rafters and swings himself onto the top of the elevator. When Sully is finally caught by John he hangs him in his left arm bye his legs out from a cliff. He then gets what he wants from him and says "Remember, Sully, when I promised to kill you last? I lied" and lets him go. When entering the warehouse Matrix was in earlier he doesn't try to get any answers from the soldiers there he beats the living crap out of one and then guesses where the plain Cindy and him are looking for is. He doesn't at any point try to contact General Kirby to get help or information he just want to clear the Island himself and then contact General Kirby to do the cleanup.

At the Island John Matrix is most importantly equipped with a Valmet M83 and a M60E3. Both of these weapons seem to have unlimited ammunition. John just keeps on spraying and spraying until everyone in front of him is dead. The M60E3 is fed by a belt and though the belt shortens in one clip it is back to full length in the next. His Remington 870 shotgun never need another shell and usually never needs a pump. Only a king like Arnold could pull magic like this off.



The punch lines are so awesome it's a pleasure to hear them over and over again. "i'l be back Bennett", "Don't disturb my friend he's dead tired", "Come on Bennett lets Party" and many more gives Arnold what he needs. He needs to be a bad ass all the way with an awesome tone and edge towards the bad guys. 




Speaking off the the bad guys how in the world could a guy like Bennett be a special forces guy. He's out of shape, kind off fat and that mustache he's rocking makes you think he's 50 years old. He's wearing some sort of chain mail on top of his t-shirt and it looks so gay it's funny as hell. Bennett is played by Vernon Wells and he's okay but Bennett is more insane then skilled, and you always feel like, there is no way in hell John Matrix can lose to this guy.

Commando is 80's art at its peak and no movie has ever gotten close to matter shire violence and pure awesomeness that this movie is filled with. Arnold is perfect as the guy who kicks ass all day and loves it. and off course you end off on the best punch line of all time. At the final stand off John and Bennett fight in the basement of the mansion on Arius' island. John is down on his knees and Bennett is beating him up, while telling John that he's an old man and he's a dead man to, but John lunches back up while yelling "Bull Shit" and lands a fury of left handed punches and Bennett is backed up towards a hot water tank and while trying to stand up tells John "John, I'm not gonna shoot you between the eyes. I'll shoot you between the balls" and he cooks his uzi. John though rips a led pipe off the wall and throws it trough bot Bennett and the hot water tank. And while steam blows out the end of the pipe and Bennett is grimacing in pain John ends the fight the most powerful line in movie history "Let off some steam Bennett". My god does this movie kick ass.




Get a life and start listening to better music!     

Are you high or just incredibly stupid?

Here we go again with another rant at people I don't like but this time it's not against musicians. No, this time it is against the worst music magazine on the planet: RollingStone. This magazine has dazzled me ever since I read one of their articles in my teens. They are a complete suck-up to what has trended at it seems they don't know a damn thing about real music. The senior editor David Fricke, who writes on rock music, has either been drinking so much of his own piss that he has turned deaf, blind and retarded or els he ha just represents the magazines philosophy of blowing smoke up people's asses. The one article I hate most of all though is their Top 100 Guitar players of all time.


First of I agree in a way with a lot of people about how you can't measure one guitar player over another, but I just think that some are better then others. The RollingStone list seems to be made with no common sense what so ever. It seems like they've made a list of the most influential guitar players of all time but still have some really unimportant players high up on the list. I'm going to pick out some of the picks that have shocked me the most and at the end I will make a list with my favorite 5 guitar players and a list with the 5 players I think are the best, cause there is a BIG difference. I have no clue of how the voting has influenced this list but it seems like it hasn't mattered at all. Cause some off the voting musicians can't be that stupid. 


The list starts off on a good note by having Lindsey Buckingham out of Fleetwood Mac as number 100. That is not a bad way to start cause he has an incredible ear for hits and pop and is not that bad a guitar player, but from this point on everything is fucked.

#98 Alex Liefson. From the band that invented hard prog-rock and have sold tons off records we have Alex Liefson. He is the third part of the greatest trio to ever play together, Rush, and you have him at number 98. Are you kidding me. He has influenced millions of guitar players, created massive rock hits and is a master at work. Tight as a drum and knowing his limitations he is an amazing guitar player that have some speed, technique and great melodic talent. 

#92 Dimebag Darrell. Right here is a straight piss in the face of a dead man. Dimebag revoke the guitar play in metal during the 90's with blistering speed, his own unique stile and most off all his insane ability to create riff after riff of metal perfection. Zakk Wylde called him the best guitar player in the world and the RollingStone have him at 92 just ahead of Paul Simon. WTF?






#88 Carl Perkins. If you insist on having influence as the most important aspect of a guitar player, Carl Perkins should be in the top 20. He invented Rock'n Roll and was a great musician. The master of the Blue Suede Shoes was an early hero to many blues players and his work with Johnny Cash is so soul-full and deep it shows what a great musician he was.

Through the entire list you see sing-a-song writers standing with guitars on stage. They are not GREAT guitar players. Willie Nelson a guitar god? Bruce Springsteen a shredder. I don't even think the RollingStone knows what a guitar player is, but moving on.

#72 John Frusciante. I have no beef with the RHCP at all but Frusciante is a second class guitar player. In a Rig Rundown he shows off all his effects and stuff but why do you need 7 phasers when you sound is clean all the time. Dani California is the only real song where he uses any effects. RollingStones love his accords during the intro of Under the Bridge but WTF has that got to do with guitar playing? Jack shit, that is song writing.

A common problem on this list is that I don't know a lot of the players. How can I, a guy whole revels in the art of guitar playing, not know 50% of the players on the list. That makes no sense other then they are not great guitar players!

#55 John Lennon. I hate the Beatles but I hate Lennon even more. His show with Yoko Moko Loko Ono where he feeds and she screams shows just how little the guy could do with a guitar other then simple chords. He had no clue of what a guitar player needed to be because he wasn't. That is the main thing. He wasn't a guitar player!

#50 Ritchie Blackmore. Again a guy that has influenced every guitar player that should be in the top 20. He wrote the best riff in music history and was a really experimenting musicians in his day. He is very pentatonic based in his solos but it workes and though crazy he was a starting point for a guy like Yngwie Malmsteen, though Yngwie himself denies it.

#44 Mark Knopfler. Yeah Knopfler at 44. Insanity at its peak. He is a master at work. He has his own style, tone and has proven to be on of the best rock song writers ever. i'm going to say three words that says it all: Sultans of Swing. How can he be so far from the top 20 picks. That makes no sense.

#40 Tom Morello. You have a guy that is build on effects above some of the guys mentioned above? Morello is a descent guitar player and has the ability to write really good riffs, but it ends there. He doesn't even get close to Liefson or Blackmore at any point so again this makes no sense.

#38 The Edge. The "Lead" guitarist of the band I hate most of all is a joke from start to finish. He can't play jack shit. He has no talent at all and has been nursed through the records by engineers that turned he shitty sound into new wave sounds. My god what a fool/tool. Rollingstone pride themselves by claiming knowledge on how bands work and all that but The Edge being at number 38 shows you that, that is what they lack.

.

#36 Randy Rhoads. Finally a player that is around the spot he should be in. Roads was a monster but the fact that he died at the age of 25 means he didn't leave the mark he could have. The things he did leave behind are spectacular and unique so he should be around the 35 to 25 mark.

#33 Prince. They call Purple Rain the greatest Power Ballad solo of all time. Ha ha ha ha ha ha. it's not a solo itself but an outro where the guitar runs wild. It is a great piece of guitar work but the statement of it being the best is naive and wrong. His performance at the George Harrison HOF thing on While My Guitar Gently Weeps is good and fitting but it's basic blues licks everybody knows and uses in the same way he does. I like Prince but he should clime no further on this list then into the 90's.

#28 Johnny Ramone. I hate punk but RollingStone said it themselves: A pure rhythm engine, Ramone almost never played a solo. How can a guitarist that can't play a solo be on any list at all? Once again they show the lack of any common sense regarding guitar playing.


#11-1. Only two of the 11 top players on the list belong there: Van Halen and Jimmy Page. Clapton is a close call but I have just always felt that Clapton couldn't do anything more then he did while it seemed like Page and Van Halen where unstoppable at times. but Clapton is a top 20 lock for sure. but the rest of them: Keith Richards, George Harrison, Duane Allman and so on are just blaspheme. Duane Allman died before The Allman Brothers Band got any good. The guy that took over, Dickey Betts is at 61, but he's the one that had any sort off hits and skills other then crashing on a motorcycle. I hear everybody praise him all over but he hasn't shown me shit. Keith Richards is a shitty player with an ear for melody and hits and that deserves respect but he couldn't play a convincing solo if his life depended on it! George Harrison is only this high because he was in The Beatles. The old blues guys i'm not even gonna mention. And then comes Jimi.

#1. Jimi Hendrix revolutionized the guitar and everything around it but that doesn't mean he's the best. He was great and wrote and covered some songs that changed the world but his play got lost in the madness of it all. His death was tragic and all but that also means that he screwed it up for himself. He could have been a god but became a martyr in a way. I feel like if he hadn't come, someone els would have done the same thing. Be was special but JIMI HENDRIX IS NOT THE BEST/GREATEST GUITAR PLAYER OFF ALL TIME! He might be the most influential but that doesn't mean your the best, at all.

Here are my 5 favorite guitar players:
5. Reb Beach
4. Shawn Lane
3. Dimebag Darrell
2. Steve Lukather
1. Eric Johnson


Now, this list shows you which guitar players I cherish the most and now i'm going to explain why my list of the 5 best guitar players is different. Guitar playing is, in my book, measured in skill and sound. Not on their influence. Though I like a lot of the stuff made by the guitar players I think of as the best they are not even close to the love I give others. The 'best', show why they are better in every solo and chance they get to show off. They master every technique at a high level and know when to play fast and when to play slow. Hit making ability is a point that can be put into consideration if it's a close run but shouldn't matter in the long run.


Here are the 5 players I think are the best:
5. Dimebag Darrell
4. Shawn Lane
3. Guthrie Govan
1. John Petrucci
1.  Paul Gilbert

Petrucci and Gilbert are so equal I really can't pick one firmly above the other. Gilbert has a slight edge cause he was insanely skilled right from the get go. Petrucci though has that one song I absolutely love and he is from a different school and music style then Gilbert. They both kick ass and are some of the best musicians to ever walk this earth.

Now this was my take on a list but I respect others opinions as long as they have the backing of it but RollingStone are stupid people and need to listen to some music before talking trash.



Get a life and start listening to better music!     

Sometimes I wonder, what is wrong with the world? Pt. 2: Tonedeaf is a worldwide epidemic!

It seems that every five years or so there is something new trending in the music business. In the 90's Spice Girls, Britney Spears and such had huge success and later on came the boy-bands like Blue and Westlife. Somewhere during 2000's a wave of Nu Metal and Rap-Rock popped up like P.O.D and Linken Park with huge hits, that lead to worldwide acclaims and applause. Here in Denmark a lot of techno acts like Italobrothers had a lot of the success during almost the entire 2000's. Then came Katy Perry and Rihanna as the new bread of pop stars but now there is something wrong. Something terribly wrong.


With the pop stars of my age you always had something to look at. It was like they had to be good looking, able to dance or something to ever be considered a shoot at fortune and fame. The voices where not the most important to the producers and even though I hate that production method so much I can't stand what is going on right now in popular music.

I don't care about Nicki Minaj and here big ass and shitty voice. I don't care about Rihanna trying to star in a shitty movie like Battleship. What I do care about is the amount of lies and ignorance everybody is filled with. Let me start of with everbodies favorite little girl: Lorde. I have never heard of anyone rising so fast for no reasons what so ever. She is at the epicenter of the new trend. "Ugly girls who produce their own music". I don't think Lorde is ugly, but it's a term I use to show the new direction some off the pop scene is going in. It's moving away from the polished beauty queens and all the staged surroundings. Now we are gong for the "normal" girl who has so much talent she can record hit upon hit upon hit. Well the shit is gonna hit the fan. the only good thing she has ever associated with was having Randy Marsh touch his clit on stage. Peoples faces are being stuffed with this shit and they want them to think that she wrote this song in her basement and she is so innocent and pure, untouched by the filthy record companies. When someone is set to work with a songwriter that is not a part of their band or act that means the songwriter writes everything. Joel Little wrote all her stuff. Lorde only sings some of the vocals. There is nothing wrong with doing that at all. But it gets wrong when you lie about it and try to make yourself look better.

Sia, Seinabo Sey, Lorde, St. Vincent, London Grammar, Lana Del Rey and so on all have that hipster look and sound. They do sound different in what they do but it's either slow electronic beats or boring ass piano songs with no flavor. I am clueless to how the hell this stuff keeps on getting produced. What a lot of these artist have in common is that the female voices are rather deep and drowning. Lorde's song Royals is one of the most boring peices of music I have ever heard. And on top of that I had to hear it every time a good movie on television was interrupted by commercials, cause it featured in a Pepsi commercial. Sia's Chandelier has that interesting vocal rise in the chorus but other then that it's forgettable. She has however written music for big pop stars so she can write real music, but when you hear her live through the chorus and she fails to be sharp and spot on in her vocals I just can't take it serious. I don't know how people with no musical education can sit there and suck it up. When you know that, even popular music, has been better at some point in time. Way settle for that shit put in front of you? Go get some real food in the fridge. And by the way it has been a long time since anybody got anything good outside of electronic music, out of a drum-box. Every drum-track from these artist sound so flat and terrible it's a catastrophe. 


Trust me I would rather have real independent women like MØ to do their thing, then Miley Cyrus and so on, but when the majority of the artist lie and only do the vocal on their songs, and get to say they did the whole thing, then I would rather have honest artists. To go out side of the box and talk about someone els who does the same thing we have the band I hate most of all right now: Volbeat. 

I am rotten to the core with jalousie towards them, cause they play hard rock/metal on stadiums i the US but my god are they doing it in the worst possible way. Only once every decade does a band with such little skill get that much attention. You fire the guitar player when you get to America only to get some random dude from the US to get some extra points from the american audience. Your record companies pays football stadiums to play your songs, not because they kick ass. You can't do jack shit when your playing live, everything is to loud and such a mess that you can't tell the sound check from the actual gig. Everything is written for you when you have to record an album. The albums claim that everything is written "only" by Volbeat but you had a song in The Gardeners Tale that had something special, and that you just can't create again. Bullshit! The lead singer fakes himself playing guitar on stage and sings in such a mellow and dreary tone/key you want to blow your head off before every chorus, because you just know that there's coming more of the same. Yes I am hatting but I do it because I wish for everybody to get as big a kick out of good music as I get but none of the music mentioned in this post is good music.





Get a life and start listening to better music!           

You gotta see them live, man!

This post is a bit different the the once i have written before. I'm going to look into a strange phenomenon in music and that is bands that either excel on stage or completely crumples. 

First off bands are almost always worth the experience of listening and watching them live. There is something about watching your favorite musicians perform in real life. Even though the sound might be off you get a kick out of watching them give it their all and singing along to your favorite songs. Sometime you might get surprised about a band that's warming up for the main band or something like that and in that way get hooked on a new band. But where this post starts off is with bands that kick ass live as well on record.

Metallica are kick ass in any way possible but after And Justice for all there was a feel of something missing.When Metallica (The Black Album) was at the starting point Bob Rock felt like Metallica hadn't found the vibe they got when playing live and been able to put it on tape. They were more powerful, soulful and connected much better with the audience on stage then on their records. I love some of the older stuff but do get the feel when comparing with The Black Album that the production value is lower and more narrow. The black album was much wider in it's approach and some of the songs were simpler in the build up. This meant that a wider spread of audience started to attend the concerts and had some songs that had he same feel off as well as on stage. so go see them live if you've ever thought about doing it. It's awesome!

Toto is off course the best band in the world but had you only heard the studio records then you could have some fears regarding over-production off the songs. The really create a wall of sound on every album and yes it would be impossible to recreate that on stage, due to facts like the weather, the equipment and so on. But my god are they just as perfect as it gets. Some bands stay to their songs and don't really go outside the box when performing. Metallica usually stick to their songs on stage but Toto have that ability to take their songs to a higher level. Songs get extended from 4 to 7 minutes with eZ and the way they do it always fit the song and their talents. Having a big setup on stage with many vocals and brilliant mixing helps them reach those fantastic harmonies live. The 35th Anniversary Live From Poland proves just that.

Dire Straits had a bit of the same abilities. The music might be different but they could also take their songs to another level. The version of the live show On The Night, of Romeo and Juliet features one of the best intros I have ever heard. The Piano is so soft and gentle and that Saxophone..... My god is it something els. The whole performance is brilliant and a song like Your Latest Trick is a million times better then it is on the studio record. Dire Straits really capture the simple yet refined feel they have on their albums and pump it up to fill out the entire arena or stadium. Mark Knopfler is a genius. 

Slipknot is a band on the other hand that is insane live and lack some off that fire in the studio. They are not that bad in the studio, but something like the drums on the live album 9.0: Live from 2005 are so tight it hurts and that ability live is missing somewhat on the studio albums. The guitars are a bit muddy but when you watch them go crazy with pyrotechnics, their masks and all the stuff it's just elevated to another level. They kick ass like hell and though they have never really been my cup of tee I have to admit that it really is a sight to behold.

Slayer sound like crap any way you put it but watching Kerry King killing his B.C. Rich and the huge wall of power hitting you in the chest every time there is a beat is so awesome. It is loud as hell and you can't hear anything when their done, but you stand back with a smile 10 miles wide and a huge boner cause you have just gotten blasted away by the gods of metal.though some off the records a flat and just noise it just works live. You stop carrying at some point because it is so loud and so powerful that everything els just doesn't matter.







Now to the part about bands that simply can't perform on stage. I'm leaving out shitty popular artist because I don't give a fuck what they do on stage cause they don't/can't sing themselves. But there is a trend among metal bands in particular, where they just can't play what they record. Every now and then something can go wrong on stage or your songs suck, but having completely nailed a track in studio and then ruining every thing live is different.

The speed demons out of DragonForce are one of a kind. Ever since Through The Fire and The Flames came in Guitar Hero 3 they have been household names. Herman Li is not an idiot. He really knows what he's working with on stage (I mean his Gear) and Sam Totman has the best looking Ibanez Iceman guitars ever but when they shred on stage the suck balls. They are fast guys and all that but if your going to pull of skills like the once they claim to have you can't be so loose and loud all the time. Sam is off on every live performance I have heard and it kills the solo every time. The rest of the band is muddy and seems to lack fundamental skills in knowing how to sound good and not choke everything out but being to loud and off the markings. The singers have been/are typical new age metal singer with a semi deep voice and no clue off what he's doing but on the album that song is awesome. An insane amount off work has been put into this band to make them sound good at the mixing table but my god is it hard to turn shit into gold! search DragonForce Fail on youtube and see what I mean.

A song I really like that nobody knows is Metalingus by Alter Bridge. I know of it because of my former interest in wrestling. Edge/Adam Copeland had this them for almost his entire pro career and it is a great song. The lead vocal is spot on and the guitar work is amazing. Mark Tremonti is working with PRS Guitars and has his own awesome signature series and from that track alone you can see why. But oh my did I get of my high horse when I heard it on a live recording. That riff has to be spot on to make any sense and Tremonti was terrible. He was so busy with his pitch harmonics that he was off beat every time he had to shine. The vocal was disgusting and I think Myles Kennedy's using Auto-tune when hitting the high notes. The palm muted sections are completely impossible to get a hold off, cause all the hits sound like a low D. It is like this every time. I don't even want to check out more of their songs cause I just know inside that it is not real.

My pet cat is one song by Soil. Their song Halo is a masterpiece. It is the best metal song to come out after the millennium right after Oblivion by Mastodon. Halo has an insane vocal performance and the whole song is crafted together so well it makes me want to cheer them on all the way to the bank. But as you might have guessed they have no clue off how terrible they sound on stage. They're having a good time on stage and the mind dead audience is sucking it all up and fail to hear how dreadful Soil are in real life.The only time this song has sounded anywhere near the original was at Ozzfest in 2002 when Zakk Wylde had to come and save them on stage. The lead singer can't scream like he does so majestically and he can't remember the lyrics. The guitar is off and the drummer always plays the drum intro to fast. WTF. How can the other guys not hear that his tempo is off at every live show i've heard. It breaks my heart to kill these guys so much, but I love this song and I believe that they just happened to create this magical song out off straight luck. That blows cause this song and the album Scared should have been a major first step for a new class of metal kings to be crowned 




Get a life and start listening to better music!