Rick Santorum Declares War On Heavy Metal
Keith Spillett’s satirical article on Santorum at The Tyranny of Tradition blog is the funniest political story I’ve read this week. Or this year.
Rick Santorum has been on the offensive lately, but his target has not been Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney or even President Barack Obama. For the past week, Santorum has been using his campaign to take aim at an issue he feels to be the single most dangerous force in America today: Satanism in heavy metal. “If you listen to the radio today, many of these brand new, so-called heavy metal music bands like Black Sabbath, Venom, The WASP and Iron Maiden use satanic imagery to corrupt the minds of young people,” announced Santorum at a 10,000 dollar a plate sock-hop in Valdosta, Georgia on Thursday.
Santorum’s popularity in the polls has grown substantially since he began speaking out against metal and its assault on traditional values. He has spent much of the past week in the Midwest encouraging young people to stay away from metal artists and listen to performers like Michael W. Smith and Pat Boone. In a recent Gallup Poll, 87 percent of Republican voters think that the biggest problem in America today is “the demented bloodlust of teenagers caused entirely by heavy metal music.”
In the past, Santorum has accused heavy metal of being the cause of some of the worst crimes in American history…
West Memphis Three “Plead Guilty”, Freed After 18 Years
The trio of teenage friends were accused and convicted of several child murders in Arkansas in 1993, with the evidence more or less amounting to their interest in heavy metal music and dark-colored clothing. DNA evidence since confirmed their innocence, turning them into a cause célèbre as symbols of legal injustice, ’90s-era hysteria over provocative music, and, more broadly, the human tendency to scapegoat outsiders. The Los Angeles Times writes:
The three men known as the “West Memphis 3,” who have been imprisoned for 18 years for a notorious 1993 child-murder case, have won their freedom in an Arkansas courtroom.
In an agreement with prosecutors, Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley and Jason Baldwin pleaded guilty to the murders of three 8-year-old boys in May 1993, but are able to claim they are innocent, an arrangement known as an “Alford plea.” The three men were released Friday after serving sentences of 18 years plus credit…
What Do You Get If You Blend Metallica And Lou Reed?
Metallica & Lou Reed (from metallica.com)
You don’t need to guess the answer to this question – the Metallica guys and Lou are releasing an album of their collaboration. From the Metallica site:
A few months ago our own Kirk Hammett hinted at a new Metallica project that’s “not really 100 percent a Metallica record.” While Kirk may have jumped the gun a little (and has since been properly punished with a series of push-ups!), we are more than proud to announce that we have just completed recording a full length album that is a collaboration with none other than the legendary Lou Reed.
Ever since we had the pleasure of performing with Lou at the 25th Anniversary of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at Madison Square Garden in October of 2009, we have been kicking around the idea of making a record together. Some of you astute Bay Area residents may…
Sammy Hagar Abducted By Aliens
Is revealing that he was abducted by aliens a good career move by Sammy Hagar, the sometime Van Halen frontman? This interview with Eric Spitznagel for MTV Hive will probably move a few copies of his new book Red: My Uncensored Life in Rock, at least!
Okay, let’s just cut to the chase. I’m just going to come out and ask it. Have you ever been abducted by aliens?
I think I have.
What? Really? I was kidding. You seriously believe that?
[Laughs.] Now you’re making me sound like a crazy person.
How is that crazy? I wasn’t there, I don’t know what happened to you.
Remember the story in the book, where I have a dream about being contacted by aliens in the foothills above Fontana?
Yeah, yeah, I’ve got the page right here. “I saw a ship and two creatures inside of this ship… And they were connected to me, tapped into my mind through some…
Heavy Metal Solutions For The Middle East?
Writing for Al Jazeera, Mark LeVine explores the uncanny popularity of dinosaur metal band Iron Maiden amongst a young, Middle Eastern fan base and “asks if heavy metal music offers a blueprint for modernization in the Middle East.” I certainly hope LeVine’s geopolitical thesis is correct — reconfiguring staid Mideast nations using the tenets of Maiden as a basis sounds brilliant, for the resultant national flags alone.
I first saw Iron Maiden in Dubai in 2007, at the Dubai Desert Rock Festival, which although only three years old was becoming known as the “Mecca for Middle Eastern metal”.
This was pre-crash Dubai, in all its excessive splendor, and the festival was filled to capacity with 20,000 metalheads, mostly Arabs, Iranians and South Asians, cheering, screaming and even crying during Maiden’s headlining show.
The members of Iron Maiden still recall that first Dubai show fondly, but in reality Dubai represented the very antithesis of…
Christmas Lights + Slayer = Holiday Magick (Video)
One homeowner’s breathtaking homage to those titans of metal in holiday lights, makes me wonder what he had going for Halloween:
Why Do Metal Bands Believe In Reptilian Aliens?
io9’s Phil Freeman brings up the old chestnut of reptoid aliens secretly controlling our world, reminding me, at least, of the Montauk Project and David Icke’s Royal Family…
Why are these metal bands convinced that the world is secretly ruled by extraterrestrials called reptoids who are breeding with humans in their hidden caves?
If you believe reptoid “expert” David Icke, our planet is secretly ruled by extraterrestrials who walk on two legs, appear human, and live in tunnels and caves…when they’re not crossbreeding with humans to produce leaders like the Egyptian pharaohs, every U.S. president, and the Queen of England. Icke believes the reptoids are the same race, the Anunnaki, discussed in Babylonian creation mythology, and they are prominently featured in his books The Biggest Secret, Children of the Matrix, Tales From the Time Loop and Infinite Love is the Only Truth, all of which are sold as nonfiction.
This wouldn’t interest me in the slightest…
Hevisaurus: Scandinavian Heavy Metal For Toddlers
Why are the Scandinavians so far ahead in everything? This is a brilliant idea: a band of clawed, Barney-like dinosaur creatures that play heavy metal, as a way to introduce young children to the world of mosh pits and headbanging. Hevisaurus, from Finland, is gaining a growing amount of attention, but sadly the United States is not included in their summer 2010 tour dates.
