When Ontario introduced an additional character to license plates, the new system incorporated a random, four-letter sequence at the start of the plates.
During the process of programming a machine to select the sequences of letters to be used, somebody surely saw fit to include a statute that, should any colourful language arise from a random set of characters, it should be passed over.
Of course, as large a list as possible of foul foursomes would be desirable, to prevent the largest amount of people from being offended, so a lot of people would need to weigh in with their favourites.
Then, someone would need to enter all of the sequences to be skipped into a computer that would, of necessity, be on federal or provincial property, which means that somewhere, the Canadian government has a machine containing all the best four-letter words ever, which was paid for and stocked by us, and we’re not allowed to see these words on a license plate.
And That’s why I like music like this.
Drudkh ? Blood in Our Wells
Drudkh is the soundtrack to a wintry forest glen that occasionally hosts glorious duels. Pretty and distant piano and fiddle interludes replace the standard ?Grr grr grrr!? of black metal, and a lot of the heavy bits are modest and melodic in their own right, though it does get pretty brutal. For fans of Opeth and Dimmu Borgir bored with solos and plastic spikes.
NoMeansNo ? 0 + 2 = 1
0 + 2 = 1 is one of the best albums by one of the best Vancouver bands of all time and deserves to be listened to for a number of reasons: the music seems impossible at first, layered beyond belief with out-of-sync bass lines, wailing guitar squelches, and technical yet maddeningly simple drum beats, but somehow ends up so catchy and driving that it won’t leave your head for days; the Dylanish use of obvious metaphor is coupled with a fantastic enthusiasm and swift styling that Dylan certainly never possessed, and has a lot of weight behind the words; It’s way punker than D.O.A. ever was, and these guys never ran for office; and the list goes on.
Just trust me, this album is worth your time.
Ufomammut ? Idolum
Sometimes when I’m in a quiet place, I’ll notice a noise (perhaps dripping water) repeating rhythmically in the distance, and realize that It’s been doing so all along, only my focus changed to appreciate it.
Then my awareness of the sound amplifies it and adds to it and builds on it until I’ve got a full-fledged orchestra pounding in my head around this sound, and That’s usually when I realize it was just Ufomammut all along.
The Kittens ? Bazooka and The Hustler
This is what Nirvana would have sounded like if they were from Winnipeg and Kurt wasn’t high all the time. Pretty much the best band ever.
Morbid Angel ? Domination
I’m told that Florida has an awful lot of swamps, so It’s no surprise that the forefathers of sludge metal are natives there. This is one of the heaviest and dirtiest sounding recordings of all time, designed specifically with causing aggression in mind.
When Dr. Phil and his army of mutant counsellor-psychiatrist-self-help-gurus take over the world with book clubs and guest appearances, music like this will come with warnings like ?May cause you to destroy public property,? and ?Not recommended for anyone who wears paisley.?
Toner Low ? Toner Low
This is pure rock and roll, stripped of wanky solos and turned up to 11. Simple, unadulterated, heavy rock riffs plod along a deep trench of sludgy but compelling beats and speaker-blowing bass, marching in a cadence like horned, fire-breathing rock ants. Anything this album doesn’t break wasn’t there in the first place.
Macabre ? Morbid Campfire Songs
That’s right. An album of campfire singalongs based on the grisly true details of famous mass-murder careers. Fun for the whole family.
Entombed ? Sons of Satan Praise the Lord
When Entombed released Clandestine, the face of black metal was forever changed by the raw, heavy, and stylistically intense way the album sounded. That’s probably why nobody really expected this record to come from the same band, stocked front to back with covers of KISS, Alice Cooper, Roky Erickson, Bob Dylan, Bad Brains, and MC5.
It just goes to show that there will always be bands out there willing to undo the knots of definitions so mercilessly used to tie them down by playing punk versions of ?Amazing Grace.?
