What We Know About “Her”, According to Grinderman 2

Whether you think Nick Cave’s Grinderman side project (if you can call it that – it features members of his better-known band, the Bad Seeds) is a hilarious satire of cock rock or a loving homage to cock rock (the answer is “it’s neither” and “it’s both”), you pretty much have to hand it to Mr. Cave: Grinderman 2, the appropriately named second Grinderman album, totally fucking rocks. Which is appropriate, considering most of the song are about fucking. In fact, let’s just say that Grinderman is a new, very specific genre of music called “Fuck-Rock.”

Now, I could launch into a discourse about how serious Cave is/isn’t in all these crazy, sexy Grinderman songs, but the A.V. Club‘s Sean O’Neal has done all the (ahem) penetrating analysis you need: “In the Bad Seeds, Nick Cave thinks with his brain; in Grinderman, he thinks with his dick.” You don’t need to read any further in O’Neal’s review; he nailed it in the first sentence (besides, like almost all A.V. Club music reviews these days, the rest of the review sounds eerily like the Pitchfork review). So I won’t waste your time on the minutiae of Grinderman 2. Instead, I’ve found a rather entertaining game to play with this album. Since every song on the record is about one or many women, I’ve decided to pretend that all nine tracks are, in some way, about the same woman. It’s safe to assume that Nick Cave wants to have sex with her. But who is she?

For starters, we know that she’s a “bat-faced girl with dynamite curls”; so, safety and reason would dictate that she’s a non-smoker. Can’t be blowing up a whole city block when you accidentally ignite one of your dynamite curls. At this point, however, it is entirely possible that she is a super hero or villain. Not sure what else is implied with the bat-face thing there – perhaps she has poor vision and navigates by sonar when she can’t find her glasses?

Next, it would appear (according to “Worm Tamer”) that she’s good with a variety of snakes. However, a careful reading of the lyrics reveals that she is actually very good in bed – “You know I’m only happy when I’m inside her” shatters the metaphor of  ”Worm Tamer” and reveals that “she” could be, well, nearly any woman at all. But what we know, through two tracks of Grinderman 2, is that Nick Cave likes to fuck dangerous women.

Here’s where it gets tricky. According to Cave, she is 1) a “heathen child” 2) Allah (“the Allah”, according to “Heathen Child”) and 3) the Buddha. Based on my knowledge of Buddhist philosophy, she could potentially be #3 (so could every other living being on Earth. How’s this for a mind-fuck? Glenn Beck is a potential Buddha) without excluding her from being the other two. So she’s a transcendentally good lay with exploding hair – the evidence is starting to suggest that Grinderman’s muse is a hippie chick, or at least a vaguely religious woman who likes to fuck.

At last, a physical detail emerges in “When My Baby Comes.” She “has hand’s as white as milk and weaves a web of spider’s silk.” So Cave does not have the Jungle Fever. Interesting (or not) side note: this song contains allusions to gang rape, which doesn’t usually get a lot of coverage in rock ‘n’ roll songs that aren’t by the Insane Clown Posse. However, it is hard to tell from the lyrics whether Nick Cave or our mystery woman was the victim.

There is evidence to suggest that “she” is Nick Cave’s daughter. On “Evil,” he says, “You are my child, crying like a demon in your daddy’s arms.” However, if you remember anything else said about her on the whole album, you can safely assume that this is just some weird, Freudian kink that Cave has. You can also assume he likes to fuck dangerous younger women who are musically (or maybe just electronically) inclined: “Who needs a record player? You are my record player!” he exclaims.

On “Kitchenette”, we learn more: our woman is married, perhaps unhappily (“I can see that you don’t really dig him”), with kids: “What’s this husband of yours ever given to you?/ Oprah Winfrey on a plasma screen/ and a brood of junky buck-toothed imbeciles/ The ugliest fucking kids I’ve ever seen.” So, assuming a certain amount of superficial desirability on the part of this object of Cave’s infatuation, we can deduce that she is married to a genetically inferior male who makes good money (hence the plasma screen TV, upon which Oprah tells her how to cope with her turd-ugly husband and brick-stupid children).

From “Palaces of Montezuma”, we learn that she is petite and into classic literature – Cave promises her gifts of “The epic of Gilgamesh” and “a pretty little black A-line dress.” She’s also clearly into cinema, if “a custard-colored super-dream/ of Ali McGraw and Steve McQueen” would appeal to her. Along similar lines, we know she’s a history buff with a special love of presidential politics (or Nick Cave thinks she is) if Cave intends to win her love with “the spinal cord of JFK/ wrapped in Marilyn Monroe’s negligee.” At the very least, we know that Nick Cave is willing to go to kind of disturbing lengths to get this tart to his dessert plate.

In fact, on “Bellringer Blues,” he straight up offers to kill her ugly, stupid kids. Apart from my birth mother, what kind of total fucking psycho could be successfully wooed this way?

The thing that makes this tough is the “dynamite curls” thing. Maybe it’s an allusion to fire-power? And maybe the whole she’s a heathen/Allah/Buddha thing is a reference to her desire for some kind of power or omnipotence. So maybe she’s a power-hungry gun owner (who, being bat-faced, might wear glasses) with a wealthy, useless, hideous husband (whom she clearly despises) and the ugliest, dumbest kids Nick Cave has ever seen.

Sweet Zombie Jesus. Nick Cave wants to fuck former Alaska governor Sarah Palin…

Wait.

Shit.

No he doesn’t. The whole “epic of Gilgamesh” thing kills that – he wants a dangerous woman who knows how to read.

The Eagles of Death Metal Leave No Sex Pun Unturned

The Eagles of Death Metal are to Death Metal what Don Henley’s Eagles are to… um… music. That is, they are antithetical to it. However, The Eagles of Death Metal are pretty good at rehashing rockabilly and generally providing a good time. You could say, in fact, that they are to classic rock what The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion was to blues. So if you like that sort of thing (and Beavis and Butt-head quality sex puns), you’ll probably like Heart On, the new album by Jesse Hughes and Josh Homme. Homme,  the lead Queen of the Stoneage, plays drums for The Eagles of Death Metal and sings back-up. Hughes provides the guitar licks and downright silly vocals (If you have a little brother in junior high who wanted to write songs about fucking and sing them in a way that seems badass to a thirteen-year-old, you’d understand where Hughes is coming from).

Clearly, The Eagles of Death Metal are out to have a good time. That’s why their album title is a sex pun, most (if not all) of the  songs are about fucking (“Solo Flights” is about masturbating – way to shake it up, guys!), and there’s plenty of grunting and groaning in the vocals. Normally, I have no patience for novelty songs but The Eagles of Death Metal aren’t a novelty band (sorry kids, The Darkness was totally a novelty band). They’re not serious, but that’s not a bad thing; Interpol is intensely serious and also extremely boring. The Eagles of Death Metal are pushing the old Chuck Berry shtick to its logical, modern conclusion. Ramona’s traded in her tight dress for tight pants and she’s out on the dance floor with Hughes and Homme instead of Mr. Berry (who has, undoubtedly, hidden a camera in the lady’s room of whatever club this is. How the mighty have fallen).

The trick for The Eagles of Death Metal is to create pretty bangin’ arrangements for their lyrical silliness and then keep the songs brief. There are only two songs on Heart On that are longer than four minutes and most are under three. And while the sense of humor is front and center for The Eagles of Death Metal, they never sacrifice melody. These are well-crafted songs about fucking, the sort of perverse little ditties that I wish had populated the FM radio of my misspent youth.

The opening hand-claps and Rolling Stonesish guitar of “Anything ‘Cept the Truth” let you know what you’re in for. Homme is a more-than-capable drummer (far better than that shitty Lars Ulrich) and once you get past the pastiche, the guitars are good for a nod or two of the head. There are some surprises as well, like the Tom Waits-esque growling that inexplicably introduces “Wannabe in L.A.,” (one of the few puns that isn’t a sex pun on the album). “Tight Pants” features a chorus that’s minor-league LCD Soundsystem, one of the many treats that keep Heart On from becoming too tedious.

Of course, Heart On still does feel a bit tedious, and that’s largely due to the subject matter. There’s very little diversion from the macho pretense and cock-grabbing songs about gettin’ it on. Which is why I get bored about half way through the album and start to look around for other things to listen to.  “Now I’m A Fool,” is nice break from the machismo, and it’s one of the first Eagles of Death Metal songs I’ve heard that smacks even slightly of real depth.

When I was in high school, my friends and I used to buy six-packs of Tab soda and take turns draining the cans (warm) as fast as we could;  this resulted in some lengthy and raucous belches. It’s a good time for bored adolescents, and it might be fun to revisit sometime, but I’m kinda past that point in my life. That’s how I feel about Heart On by the time I get to “Cheap Thrills”. Heart On isn’t a bad album, but I’m not gonna crank it up a hundred times a week and it’s not gonna change my life. That’s not its mission, though. I suspect its mission is to get Hughes and Homme laid and I wish them every success in that endeavor.

Douche Bagnetic

It’s Rocktober 1st. Rocktoberfest is coming up on the 18th (if you don’t know what that it is, consider it a pity you’re not invited). I’ve bided my time. I’ve read Tad’s “words” if you can call ‘em that and I’m ready to weigh in.

So what do I think of Metallica’s Death Magnetic?

Though the internet is frequently derided as the home of indie/hipster types (I’ve been called a hipster for voicing my opinion – also an objective fact – that Journey sucks; I include this just so you have some sort of criteria upon which to judge me), it is full of people who will gladly call you a fag in a tirade replete with misspelled words if you happen to suggest either of the following: 1) Metallica sucks or 2) Guns ‘n’ Roses sucks, and Chinese Democracy is more likely to end the world than the Large Hadron Collider (how, you ask? Why, it will create a massive black hole of Utter Suckitude that will pull the entirety of the universe into it; I think Stephen Hawking has published articles on this). Stop by any given music thread on Fark if you don’t believe me.

So I might be incurring the wrath of these internet Metallica-lovers by saying so, but the fact is, Death Magnetic is not only awful, it’s frequently unintentionally hilarious. These are grown men singing about “death,” “darkness,” “blackness,” and things shouting things like “We! Die! Hard!” (clearly a reference to the fact that you get a stiffy when Rigor Mortis sets in). It’s like watching a Wes Craven movie. No one with half a brain is frightened by Wes Craven movies, just as no one with half a brain believes the spolied millionaires in Metallica are really the tortured souls they’re trying to portray on Douche Bagnetic. This shit should be dark and broody, and all that, but the fact is, Metallica is less compelling as a metal band than Dethklok. When you’re getting your ass kicked by a joke cartoon band, it’s time to hang it up.

James Hetfield, as ever, is a histrionic mess on Death Magnetic. I’m guessing that’s supposed to be cathartic for metalheads or whatever, but it sounds ridiculous. When he shrieks “This I swear!” on “The Day That Never Comes”, I feel like he should be a villain in one of the Joel Schumacher Batman movies. Hetfield’s villain  name could be The Nightmare and he could make puns about death and blackness while singing about hunting Batman down “All Nightmare Long.” Sounds more than a little plausible, doesn’t it? Fortunately, the Batman movie franchise is now in the much safer hands of Christopher Nolan.

Unfortunately, Metallica is still a band. There’s a place for brooding on mortality in song, don’t get me wrong. I See a Darkness is one of the finest (and most cripplingly depressing) meditations on love and death (mostly death) I’ve ever heard. But the difference between Will Oldham and Metallica is that I See a Darkness convinces the listener that this is what was on Oldham’s mind at the time, that he’d actually sat down and thought about this shit. Death Magnetic convinces me that Metallica had a meeting where they pulled metal tropes out of hat and said, “Ooh… that would be cool in a song. Like, what if we badly paraphrase Nietzsche and then scream ‘We! Die! Hard! at the end? That would tight, dog.” You see the difference? It’s not merely the subject matter that’s the problem here – it’s the assholes delivering it.

Death Magnetic runs rampant with examples of Metallica’s painful suck – on “Cyanide,” Hetfield drops this turd nugget: “Suicide/ I’ve already died” See what he did there? He rhymed “Suicide” and “died.” And then says “Cynaide/ dead inside.” Point being, this fucker cannot write. There is not one song on Death Magnetic equal in awesomeness or quality to Lordi’s “Devil’s a Loser.” Not one. There is also not one song shorter than five minutes on this album; Metallica has to allow for Kirk Hammett’s noodly, wah-drenched solos (I was hanging out w/ Radio America after their gig at the Viper Room a couple of weeks ago and Tom Stuart brougth up a salient point. When it comes to using a wah-wah pedal, you have to ask yourself one question: “Are you Jimi Hendrix? If the answer is ‘yes,’ then you can use a wah-wah pedal.”). At a certain point, you have to admit Hammett is an accomplished musician, technically speaking. At a cetain other point, you realize that pretty much makes him the Kenny G of the guitar. Knowing a lot of notes and being awesome at playing notes are two drastically different things.

Of course, the elephant in the room here (the bloated, corporate elephant of cock-rock excess) is “The Unforgiven 3.” On paper, this is just fucking stupid. On record, it’s shameless. Especially when Douche-tallica eases you into the song by ripping off Richard Wright’s (rest in peace) awesome keyboard lick from “Comfortably Numb.” Yes, Metallica has resorted to putting bits from great songs in their shitty songs. The result is an aneurysm-inducing failure of epic proportions. We find out in “The Unforgiven 3″ that, according to Hetfield “It’s me I can’t forgive.” I can’t forgive you either, James. Go fuck yourself.

At the end of the day, if you’re like Tad the K-ROQ intern (who was recently found dead, by the way, stabbed repeatly by a shiv made from what appears to have been a broken and/or twisted Red Bull can; contrary to popular belief, I was not at the scene of the crime but in my office listening to the new TV on the Radio album), you’re gonna love Death Magnetic and hate my guts for pointing out that it sucks so hard that it makes me laugh. If you’re like me (a devilishly handsome person with dignity and taste), you probably haven’t even trifled with Death Magnetic. In that case, you might be wondering why I even subjected myself to such torture; I can only answer that my best friend is paying me twenty bucks to sit through Beverly Hills Chihuahua next weekend, so it might have something to do with a masochistic streak buried none-too-deeply under the surface.  Whatever. Go look up “Devil’s a Loser” on YouTube.

A Guest Review of Death Magnetic

Editor’s note: Given the previous animosity shown by Bollocks! towards Metallica, Chorpenning realized that he could not possibly give an objective review of Metallica’s new album, Death Magnetic. So Chorpenning went to a strip club in North Hollywood and found Tad, the K-ROQ intern, to review the album for this site. Chorpenning will post a response to Tad’s review later; for now, Chorpenning is drunk and sitting in the corner, listening to London Calling at top volume and mumbling something about barbarian hordes taking over his website. We now turn Bollocks! over to Tad, the K-ROQ intern, to present his review of Metallica’s Death Magentic.

What up, bitches? My name is T-to-tha-A-to-tha-D, and I’m totally fucked up on vodka and Red Bull! I’d like to give a shout out to LA’s real rock alternative, 106.7 K-R0Q. And I’d like to shout a big “fuck you!” to Indie 103.1 – fuck you guys and your morning jackets! So check it out – I was totally eyeing up some tig ol’ bitties (editor’s note – Tad has asked that we not correct any of his spelling; he maintains that this would be “censorship.” Since Chorpenning is too drunk to mediate this dispute, we have reluctantly agreed not to correct Tad’s manifold spelling and grammatical errors) when this pointy-haired asshole in a Hold Steady t-shirt came up to me (did you know Hold Steady is a band? I never heard of ‘em either. they probably suck) and mumbled something about how he has this blog where he talks about music and did I like Metallica? Well, I downed a Jager-blaster, tossed a few bucks at teh hottie on stage, and said, “Fuck yes! I fucking love Metallica. What’s it to ya, skinny fucker?”  Well, the asshole was all like, “Could you review their new album for my blog?” And I was all, “Yeah, I could do that.” I offered to throw in a review of the new Kid Rock album, but he vomited on my shoes. Indie fags can’t hold their booze, I guess.

So here I am. And let me tell ya, dudes ‘n’ bitches, Death Magnetic is the most metal of all metal albums. Ever. It’s a total return to form for Metallica. They got some guy to produce it, I don’t know who, but he’s a different guy. So the album sounds more like …And Justice for All than St. Anger. It starts off with this ass-pounding tune, “That Was Just Your Life,” which has, like, this heartbeat that starts it off (see, it symbolizes life – this is a totally deep album) and there’s some totally pussy guitar stuff before the loud guitars and Lars Ulrich (fuck John Bonham, fuck Keith Moon – Lars is the best drummer in human fucking history). James Hetfield is totally on point on this song, yelling something about “curse the day is long” or something. It got me thinking, though: the day is long. Man. Heavy.

After “That Was Just Your Life,” there’s “The End of the Line” which isn’t the end of the line – it’s only the second song on the album!!!1! But it’s totally heavy, it’s got this “Sad But True” vibe to it (Metallica was the best album ever and if you don’t think so, your a total pussy) and Kirk Hammett shreds the fuck out of those guitar licks. You know who I don’t miss at all? Jason Newsted. He wasn’t that good of a bassist (he’s probably doing something totally pussy right now) and this Robert Trujillo guy is so much better. He mostly stays out of the way of Kirk and Lars doing what they do best, which is rocking my fucking ass.

So the third song on here is “Broken, Beat & Scarred” which is my most favorite song on this album ’cause it’s all about how “what don’t kill ya/make ya more strong,” which is totally how I feel about life. That’s why I’m not afraid to do a little pre-funking before I hit the 24-Hour Fitness. Working out sober is for pussies and indie-fags. The song has this totally killer hook where James shouts, “We! Die! Hard!” It’s totally awesome and makes me want to watch Live Free or Die Hard again. That movie was tha shit.

Then there’s this soft intro (kinda pussy) before “The Day that Never Comes” (haha, “comes”), which isn’t as wimpy as it sounds at the beginning. The song’s totally about domestic violence, I think. So fuck you haters, Metallica cares about this shit. Don’t hit your chicks. It’s not cool, even in the mosh pit. “The Day that Never Comes” shows that Metallica not only totally gets domestic abuse, but they also still know how to write a kickass power ballad (a big “fuck you,” by the way, to all you haters who think that power ballads aren’t cool).

The album gets back to rocking with “All Nightmare Long,” which is like a sequel to “Enter Sandman” and that’s fucking awesome.  It’s followed by “Cyanide” which is about dyin’. You know, ’cause the album is “Death Magnetic,” so some of the songs have to be about dying. Whatever.

Next up is the highly anticipated “The Unforgiven 3.” Before the haters get to hating, I have it on good authority that “The Unforgiven” was always supposed to be a fucking trilogy (hello? like the Matrix?). So suck it. Irregardless of what the haters say, “The Unforgiven 3″ is a totally kickass song on it’s own and really completes the story told in the first two songs. I know I was wondering what would happen after the end of  “The Unforgiven 2″.  Okay, total spoiler alert, though, for real: In “The Unforgiven 3″, it’s revealed that “it’s me I can’t forgive” – so the “Unforgiven” was him all along. I haven’t seen such a mindfucking twist since I rented The Village!

The next song is called “The Judas Kiss,” which is about how Judas kissed guys or something. I thought there weren’t any fags in The Bible, but I guess I could be wrong. It’s a pretty awesome song, though, even though it’s about a queer. Moving on. “The Judas Kiss” is followed by “Suicide & Redemption” which starts real quiet and then gets real loud, which is something Metallica has perfected. Its a total ten-minute metal instrumental that shows just how rad Kirk Hammett and Lars Ulrich are. Kirk is like the second coming of Joe Satriani and if you don’t know who Satriani is, I’m gonna find you and beat your ass.

Death Magnetic ends with “My Apocalypse,” which talks about… well, I don’t know. It’s too loud and awesome for me to make out too many words. But I think James says something about “death magnetic” in this one, so I think its like the title track or something. There’s a totally gnarly guitar solo in there and Lars is beating the shit out of his drums and then James screams something about “spit it out” (ha! maybe the song’s about blowjobs. I like blowjobs). And then there’s some more skullfucking music and James says stuff about seeing “the end.” And then the album ends. To say the least, Death Magnetic is the totally triumphant return of true metal gods. It might be their best album ever and I know it’s gonna top everyone’s year-end best album list, along with Chinese Democracy, which is coming out… uh… I don’t know when, but Axl should hurry up and put it out so that he can tour with Metallica. It’d be just like the old days, but ten times better. Tad out!