Celldweller - I Can't Wait

The Mire - Palmreader

Jimmy Fallon, Mariah Carey and The Roots - All I Want For Christmas

Baroness - Stretchmarker

Rammstein - Mein Herz Brennt

Rammstein Mein Herz brennt from Rammstein on Vimeo.

It's a Bad Brains Christmas, Charlie Brown!

It's A Bad Brains Christmas, Charlie Brown from Tad Was Here on Vimeo.

Music of 2012, so far. . .

I'm trying to put together the finished lists--this year, I think I will do several:  one for metal (it was a great year for metal), one for non-metal (yeah, I know that's not really a good category, but I mainly just wanted to separate the metal out since not everybody is into it), maybe some honorable mention lists, and another list of best songs of the year (as there are several songs that I thought were great but the artists didn't necessarily make it onto the other lists).  For the most part, I have things narrowed down, but as always, as other people start putting out their lists, I find a few things that I missed and still want to check out.  As it stands, you can bet that most things you will see will be from these first two groupings, below.

Love
Allegaeon - Formshifter
Anoice - The Black Rain
Baroness - Yellow & Green
Brendon Small's Galaktikon
Cancer Bats - Dead Set on Living
Car Bomb - w^w^^w^w
Carina Round - Tigermending
Chrome Waves - Chrome Waves
Deathspell Omega - Drought
Deftones - Koi No Yokan
Every Time I Die - Ex Lives
Gojira - L'Enfant Sauvage
Grizzly Bear - Shields
Meshuggah - Koloss
Mumford & Sons - Babel
Narrows - Painted
Paradise Lost - Tragic Idol
Pigs - You Ruin Everything
Primitive Weapons - Shadow Gallery
Royal Thunder - CVI

Really Like
7 Horns 7 Eyes - Throes of Absolution
A Life Once Lost - Ecstatic Trance
Anaal Nathrakh - Vanitas
Ancestors - In Dreams and Time
The Avett Brothers - The Carpenter
Black Breath - Sentenced to Life
Blacklisters - BLKLSTRS
Bloc Party - Four
Burning Love - Rotten Thing to Say
Caspian - Live at Old South Church
Cat Power - Sun
Cattle Decapitation - Monolith of Inhumanity
The Chariot - One Wing
Converge - All We Love We Leave Behind
Crippled Black Phoenix - (Mankind) the Crafty Ape
Dave Matthews Band - Away From the World
David Byrne & St. Vincent - Love This Giant
Elsiane - Mechanics of Emotion
Enslaved - RIITIIR
The Faceless - Autotheism
Fight Amp - Birth Control
Fiona Apple - The Idler Wheel. . .
Foreign Fields - Anywhere But Where I Am
Gaza - No Absolutes in Human Suffering
God Forbid - Equilibrium
Gojira - The Flesh Alive
Gorod - A Perfect Absolution
Hidden Orchestra - Archipelago
High On Fire - De Vermis Mysteriis
If These Trees Could Talk - Red Forest
Ihsahn - Eremita
Jeff Loomis - Plains of Oblivion
Josh Ritter - Five Angels
Mares Of Thrace - The Pilgrimage
Mark Lanegan - Blues Funeral
Matt Elliott - The Broken Man
Menomena - Moms
The Mire/Chronos split EP
Murder By Death - Bitter Drink, Bitter Moon
Neurosis - Honor Found in Decay
The Ocean - The Grand Inquisitor EP
Pig Destroyer - Book Burner
River Whyless - A Stone, A Leaf, An Unfound Door 
Scott Kelly & the Road Home - The Forgiven Ghost in Me
Thrice - Anthology
Torche - Harmonicraft
Toundra - III
Yeasayer - Frangrant World 

Like
Abiotic - Synthesis
Aesop Rock - Skelethon
Alfheimr - Lost and Found Excerpts From the Intrinsic Light II
Band of Horses - Mirage Rock
Bat For Lashes - The Haunted Man
Battles - Dross Glop
Bereft - Leichenhaus
Black God - II
Black Sheep Wall - No Matter Where It Ends
Bob Mould - Silver Age
The Caretaker - Patience (After Sebald)
Caspian - Waking Season
Celldweller - Wish Upon a Blackstar
City of Ships & Rosetta split
Clams Casino - Instrumentals 2
Clint Mansell - Last Night
Cody ChestnuTT - Landing on a Hundred
The Company Band - Pros and Cons
Dawnbringer - Into the Lair of the Sun God
Deadfile - Deadfile / Applied Oneironautics
Dead Prez - Information Age
Demon Hunter - True Defiance
Dethklok - Dethalbum 3
Devin Townsend - Epicloud
Down - Down IV Part 1 The Purple EP
Elbow - Dead in the Boot
El-P - Cancer 4 Cure
Esthero - Everything is Expensive
Gotye - Making Mirrors
Graveyard - Lights Out
The Great American Desert (formerly South of Lincoln) - Carson City
The Great Sabatini - Matterhorn
Hail Spirit Noir - Pneuma
Heartless Bastards - Arrow
Horseback - Halfblood
Isis - Temporal
Johann Johannsson - Copenhagen Dreams
Joseph Arthur - Redemption City
Josh Ritter - Bringing in the Darlings
Kepzelt Varos - Helium
Lamb of God - Resolution
Larvae - Exit Strategy
Latitudes - Individuation
Love Sex Machine - Love Sex Machine
The Mars Volta - Noctourniquet
Millions - Failure Tactics
Mono - For My Parents
Moving Mountains - New Light
The New Law - The Fifty Year Storm
Nocow / Hmot - Lost in Taiga
Olafur Arnalds & Nils Frahm - Stare
Orange Goblin - A Eulogy For The Damned
The Safety Fire - Grind the Ocean
Saltillo - Monocyte
School of Seven Bells - Ghostory
Scott Kelly, Steve von Till & Wino - Songs of Townes van Zandt
Secrets of the Moon - Seven Bells
Shining - Redefining Darkness
Sigur Ros - Valtari
Soap & Skin - Narrow
Soundgarden - King Animal
Struck by Lightning - True Predation
The Sword - Apocryphon
The Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza - Danza IIII The Alpha The Omega
Trace Bundy - Elephant King
Tweaker - Call the Time Eternity

Free and Open. Go add your voice.

Caspian - Halls of the Summer

School of Seven Bells - LaFaye

Mixhell with Greg Puciato - Exit Wound

Philosophical Nerdery

http://www.templeton.org/signature-programs/big-questions-essay-series

Well, this site is going to give me hours of entertainment and thought.  Below is a Youtube example of an answer from Neil DeGrasse Tyson to one of the questions posed.

How To Destroy Angels - Ice Age

Cancer Bats - Bricks & Mortar

Dumb Ways To Die

AmenRa - Nowena I 9.10

the darkest hours will seem long
they will feel like for ever
then new light breaks into dawn

novena burns for my brothers at night
a flame that burns the bodies of light

brothers burn. I see the fire in their eyes.

the past is your now
the present now passed

now is the time

(everything awaits you and the light will let you)

Twelve Foot Ninja - Mother Sky

Satisfying my Faith No More jones.

Car Bomb - w^w^^w^w

One of the year's metal surprises.  Here's the whole album--don't worry, the band did this themselves; or you can go to their Bandcamp

Beast Patrol - Disbeliever

Stumbled on this little gem after that last video I posted.

Mumford & Sons - I Will Wait

Dominik Hauser - The Rains of Castamere

Get to know this melody people--it will play a role in Season 3.  Book readers, you know what I'm talking about!

Cat Power - Cherokee

Pig Destroyer - The Diplomat

Some of my favorites from Remi Gaillard

Too Late

Too Late from SIDE FILMS on Vimeo.

Red Fang - Dirt Wizard

Also, if you haven't seen them, don't forget these.

The Green Ruby Pumpkin

The Green Ruby Pumpkin from miguel ortega on Vimeo.

I Love Sarah Jane

I Love Sarah Jane from Qoob TV on Vimeo.

Meshuggah - Demiurge

Monster Roll

Kimbra with Ben Weinman - Come Into My Head

The Origin of Creatures

Enslaved - Thoughts Like Hammers

Tiger, tiger, burning bright. . .

"This was a golden age, a time of high adventure, rich living, and hard dying… but nobody thought so. This was a future of fortune and theft, pillage and rapine, culture and vice… but nobody admitted it. This was an age of extremes, a fascinating century of freaks… but nobody loved it."

Above is the opening paragraph of Alfred Bester's 1956 sci-fi novel, The Stars My Destination.  It's one of my favorite books of all time.  Neil Gaiman does the introduction, and he talks about how a lot of sci-fi becomes dated after awhile.  This one hasn't become dated outside of a few, small nitpicks.  Written in 1956 about a future that has yet to arrive, and yet the above quote still represents our time, right now.

I'm re-reading it again, for about the 10th time, and still wondering at how brilliant it is.  And fun.  Larger than life characters, and full of the things you learned in high school English like symbolism, foreshadowing, allusion, etc. (it is partially a sci-fi re-telling of The Count of Monte Cristo).  It is the journey of a hugely selfish and terrible person, and their awakening, transformation and redemption as a hero.  A revolutionary.  A savior.  You want kids to read?  Give 'em this.

Maybe

"You know, sometimes all you need is twenty seconds of insane courage. Just literally twenty seconds of just embarrassing bravery. And I promise you, something great will come of it."--Benjamin Mee in We Bought A Zoo

Some monumental prose from John Dyer Baizley of Baroness

Below is an update from the Baroness website.  What he writes is extremely powerful and moving, and ultimately, inspirational.  Yellow & Green is still my favorite album of the year, and it's unfortunate that they got sidelined just as I believe their star was to rise.  Since their tour was cut short, I bought a t-shirt from the Relapse webstore, and I encourage fans to do the same (and hopefully, Baroness has a good deal regarding merch with Relapse).  Warm thoughts to the band and their speedy recovery, as well as their maintained sense of purpose and creation.--

On August 15th, just before 11 am, Baroness and our crew were involved in a very bad crash while on tour. The brakes in our bus failed completely, on a notoriously dangerous, incredibly steep (12% grade) hill in Monkton Combe, UK, on our way from a show Bristol to another show in Southampton. Our bus went entirely out of control, and we had no choice other than hitting a perpendicular guardrail going about 50 mph at the bottom of the hill. The guard rail and the 20 or 30 trees we ploughed through snapped like matchsticks as we went fully airborne and fell down more than 30 feet off of a viaduct to the ground below. Half of the band/crew were asleep while we lost our brakes, and a few of us were awake and sitting in the rear lounge. I was up front with our driver, and I bore witness to the entire thing. Once our brakes failed, the bus could do little more than gain momentum and plummet down the hill. There was nothing anyone on the bus could have done during our descent to avoid the crash, and no one, the local residents, the police or any of us can believe we survived the impact.

Most people who have been in accidents understand the pre-trauma sensation of time slowing down. There were almost two minutes during which I knew we were heading for a collision. It felt like two hours. I remember the sound of the air-brakes failing, and the panicked cursing of our driver as we slowly realized how desperate the situation was. I tried as hard as I could to yell and wake everyone up to prepare for impact. I remember the sounds of confusion from behind me as our collective terror rose. I remember seeing the guardrail split, then a cluster of trees smacking against the front windshield. While we were airborne my eyes met with our driver’s. I knew then that we each shared the same look on our face; and I won’t soon forget it. We had spent enough time in the air to appreciate, make peace with and accept a fate we thought inevitable, and we looked at one another with a horribly silent “goodbye” in our eyes.

When the bus hit the ground, I flew like a missile into the windshield. I can still see the double-paned auto glass turning blue and the spider-webbing cracks spreading outwards from the impact my body made. I hit the glass so hard, that the entire windshield flew from the frame to the ground, and I bounced back inside the bus. I landed on the ledge of the windshield. This came with an immediate and overwhelming pain throughout my body. I surveyed the damage to see instantly that my left leg was very obviously and badly broken. Then I lifted my arms forward to see if either had been damaged. My right arm was covered in burns, blood and broken glass, but working well enough. My left arm was crushed beyond belief, broken in the middle of the bone in my upper arm (humerus), and hanging 90 degrees backwar ds, with many spurs of bone poking through muscles and sinew at the surface of my skin. The bone was shattered into seven free-floating pieces, and my wrist and hand were swinging behind my back, spasming freely. Instinctively, I reached behind my back, grabbed my wrist and re-broke my arm forwards, hugging it to my chest, where it remained for the next three hours until it was cast in plaster. Meanwhile, I watched as some of the band was able to get off the bus and help the others, many of whom were broken-up as well, and several of whom were unconscious. There was blood, glass and diesel fuel everywhere.


We were all rushed to the hospital in Bath, and treated for our various injuries, broken arms, legs, vertebrae, bruises, cuts, etc. Our driver was air lifted to a separate hospital with many breaks as well. A few of us had to remain in the hospital for a few days, I was hospitalized for two weeks, following an eight-hour surgery in which my arm was rebuilt with the aid of 2 massive titanium plates, 20 screws and a foot-and-a-half of wire. The 15″ incision took almost 50 staples to close up. I was left completely immobilized for the remainder of my hospital stay, able to do next-to-nothing on my own and in need of constant care. Following those excruciating first two weeks, I was quite literally stuck in an apartment for another three weeks with my family while waiting for my doctor to allow me to safely board an airplane, for fear of bloodclots and swelling. I have just this past week returned back to the US and my home, where I am wheelchair-bound for another several weeks of physical therapy, learning to use my arm and leg again.

While I cannot lift a glass of water to my lips to drink with my left arm and hand, I am still able to play music with it. I picked up a guitar and played the day after I returned. Not without pain (for the time being), but the hand still acts out the creative impulses I give it. I’m told I was quite lucky to have regained any use at all of my hand and arm, though I have sustained quite extensive nerve damage. In spite of this and against my logic and reason, when I pick up an instrument, my hand remembers exactly what to do. It’s far from perfect, and will require a lot of therapy in order to recover mobility and strength, but I am encouraged by the ability I have been allowed. I do not believe in superstitious signs, but I am truly overwhelmed to have been granted the continued use of my hands.

As a result of the crash, I feel encouraged not only to recover, but to move forward with Baroness, as we had been doing every day previous to August 15th. This accident has inflicted an injury which has left its mark on the band: physically, mentally and spiritually. In order to rehabilitate ourselves fully, we must work towards and then past the goals we had prior to the accident. I will consider our immediate recovery a success only on the day we plug back in to play another show.

We cannot allow this accident, which I believe is unrelated to the band or our music, to slow down or stifle what has become so much more than a passionate hobby for the four of us. Through Baroness, we have discovered a method by which we may harness our drive to create, and channel all the emotion, anxiety and pain in our lives into something constructive. Music is the universal means of communication we have chosen to express ourselves. Our message has never been one of the absolute positive or negative, neither black nor white. True life occurs within the shades of grey, and I see this experience form that perspective. It seems only fitting to me that we continue working towards creating and performing again as soon as possible, as this band and its music are the vehicle through which we grow as individuals, artists and brothers. The injury the band suffered is an injury to my family and loved ones. Rather than allow it to become a wedge that forces us apart, I would like to see this experience become part of the glue that strengthens us. We have only begun to accomplish what we set out to do through this band. There is so much more to say, and though we do need to heal up a bit; we will not allow any of those things to be left unsaid.

I have no regrets about touring. I don’t blame music or the touring lifestyle for my current physical state, or for the accident itself. It happened the same way all things happen: randomly. If I was a carpenter, and I was injured on the way to the job-site, I wouldn’t consider quitting my job. That is truly how I see this situation. Baroness doesn’t stop because we got hurt on the way to work. We love what we do much more than that, and we have chosen this path because it offers us an unpredictable adventure. With any adventure that involves travel, and with any real passionate pursuit, one will occasionally come face-to-face with the reality of living on the other side of the yellow line. I didn’t choose to be a musician in order to live a risk-free life, safely avoiding bumps and bruises. I didn’t choose to play music because it seemed like a simple opportunity to make some quick cash. Nor did I ever make the assumption that things would get easier as we progressed.

We can do nothing but attempt to make something constructive and beautiful out of all this disaster, and we are well on the way to becoming active again. I have used this time, stuck inside my own head, to consider the importance of music and Baroness in my life. I can say, after nearly 6 weeks of reflection, that I feel more resolute and passionate about our music than ever. I have come to realize the importance of time in this particular equation, that is, I have none to waste and none to spare. There is no better moment than now, broken and in physical stasis, to devote ourselves more fully towards our art than ever. We cannot allow the traumatic fallout of our crash to cripple us internally. It seems simple: the shows we have cancelled we will reschedule and play in the future. It isn’t going to happen next week nor will it be next month. But it will happen. We will be back on tour as soon as we possibly can.

There was one moment in the crash that cut me deeply. For one heartbeat and one tiny sliver of time, I became disconnected entirely. It was, specifically, the moment I impacted with the glass. In that barest heartbeat of a moment, I came face to face with the infinite. I didn’t see a light, or the tunnel or hear any music. Nor did I get a “best-of” montage of my life. Instead, I felt the tip of my nose brush up against the very same fate I had accepted moments before. I looked into a cold, unreflective mirror. It was the dark, silent, dispassionate logic of the end. I realized in that moment that life can be seen as a light switch: “on” or “off”. When the moment passed and I heard the screaming, felt the pain, and tasted my own blood, I was overcome with joy. I was ecstatic to be back amidst all that chaos and horror because it was alive and real. I finally glimpsed the relative importance of all things. The support of our fans, our friends and our families has real meaning to me now. I say that now honestly, without false humility. Thank you. Everyone.
Till the wheels fall off . . . John Baizley & Baroness

Down - Witchtripper

Soundgarden - Been Away Too Long

I think I like this?  It's definitely better than the song that was on the Avengers soundtrack this summer.  There's enough of Kim Thayil's weird little riffs in there to make me hope that we might get a good comeback album.  Will it be as good as Alice in Chains' "Black Turns to Blue"?  Dunno, but hopefully we'll at least get some cool Ben Shepard bass lines out of it.

Stephanie Mabey - The Zombie Song

Also:

The Gundersen Family - Doxology/Poor Man's Son/Down To The River To Pray

Noah Gundersen & The Forest Rangers - He Got Away

Muse - Madness

Some people are butthurt that Muse is using some "dubstep" elements in their new music.  Those people are not me.

Radiohead - Lotus Flower

Pig Destroyer - Burning Palm

Murp - Zombie Skin

Cute.

Allegaeon - A Path Disclosed

Apparat with Soap & Skin - Goodbye

Bloc Party - Octopus

Elsiane - Underhelped

Converge - Aimless Arrow

Blacklisters - Trickfuck

If the name of the song isn't an indication, this is probably not safe for work viewing.

Thoughts on D&DNext and RPGing In General

Warning!  This post is for nerds only.  Seriously.  Most of my friends probably won't even understand what I'm talking about.

I have played roleplaying games for decades, though not continually.  I started around junior high (7th grade?).  I have played every edition of D&D from the basic red box through 4E, with the exception of 3.5.  Within D&D, I have played in the settings of Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, Al-Qadim, Spelljammer, Ravenloft, Planescape, Oriental Adventures and Dragonlance.  I've spent the most time in my life playing 2nd edition, and Planescape was my favorite setting.  I have also played Boot Hill, Top Secret, James Bond, Middle Earth, Shadowrun, Marvel Super Heroes and Star Frontiers.

I am currently (and I use the term 'currently' loosely) running a campaign in 4E.  It's very different from the other editions in mechanics, but has been enjoyable for the most part.  It does a lot of things well, and introduces a tactical element that was mostly missing in previous editions, due to having to use grids and minis.  Most of combat encounters involve being mindful of placement on the grid, controlling the field of battle, and the like.  It's fun to involve actual tactics in combat, but it's also incredibly ponderous (and sometimes tedious).  There's lots of things to keep up with, lots of options for each character and enemy to consider, and so a session of 6-8 hours really only gets you through an average of three encounters.  That's too slow.  And it has kept me from wanting to play, despite the fact that I like most of the rest of it.  Granted, in the rules, it targets encounters at about an hour for each, but this is rarely obtainable (and still too slow).

So, they began playtesting for the 5th edition (currently coined D&DNext), so I thought I'd look at it.  Before the playtest began, the game designers were asking lots of questions of their community, trying to gauge what players wanted and what they thought was crucial to the brand D&D.  Let me also mention that like most of the rest of the internet, there are volatile and hyperbolic "edition wars", where people pursue mostly negative criticism of whatever they don't like about certain iterations of our hobby.  These are some of the people that are now being questioned by the designers, and many I'm sure are checking out the playtest material with the intention of slagging it before we even know much about it.  I say this as a preface, because I want it clear that I have enjoyed every edition of the game that I have played and I think that both the desingers of the current playtest and the hyper-critics alike have both gotten it wrong about what our hobby is and should be.  And it doesn't bode well for a sustainable business model, I'm afraid.

So with D&DNext (which I'll call DDN for the rest of this), the promise is to create a game that pleases everyone, from old-school fans to fans of the most recent edition (which is where the biggest divide occurred), and from a business standpoint, to attract new players.  That's a pretty tall order, and I'm not sure it's feasible, or even how they should be thinking of it.  Regardless, from what I've seen so far, there are bits from each edition hodge-podged into this new version.  But not really in a consistent manner.  Like with every other edition, there are some things I like and others that I don't.

The new mechanics of advantage/disadvantage and the combat superiority for fighters are things that I like.  I do not like that the template of how the combat superiority works isn't also used for the other classes.  If you want to attract new players, why would you make a system where you have to learn different sets of rules that don't resemble each other at all depending on which type of character you'd like to play?  Were I designing, I would eliminate classes altogether, create rules for creating a general character, and then let the options that you get for creating a character (and for gaining new levels) be spent to build whatever kind of character you'd like to have.

Instead of creating a fighter, you'd create a character that could spend all their options on combat maneuvers or styles.  If a player wanted to stick to the traditional version of what a fighter was in previous editions, then they'd only spend their options in this area.  But if someone wanted to flavor it differently, then they could spend some of their options in different skills or magical or divine abilities.  Likewise, if a person wanted to play the traditional wizard, they could focus on magical abilities; but if someone wanted to do something else, then they could by sacrificing magical ability for a few combat abilities or skills like sneaking and lockpicking.  Classes have always been a part of D&D, but this is one of the things that has been mistaken for what is essential to the feel of D&D.  Multi and dual classing has always been a clunky mechanic in every edition (and quite honestly, hybrids in 4E are next to worthless).

It would be easy for the new edition to tackle this by using the combat superiority mechanic and applying it to spells and skills as well.  Stop worrying about having things that "make a fighter different from other classes" or "what makes a wizard a wizard" and just set up a mechanic for the game and let players and DMs decide what their characters are going to be.  Part of this baggage comes from balance issues in the previous editions--older editions favored magic-wielding classes as you leveled up and fighters were kind of boring to play (at least so sayeth the critics); whereas in 4E, the martial characters have just as many options throughout their career (which is one of the things 4E got right) and in my opinion, wizards are kind of a drag compared to other magic-users, but necessary for a party to survive.

Instead, we are again chained to classes, as if it makes sense what a cleric or an assassin is as a RPG Platonic idea instead of merely a profession or background.  Clerics, in and of themselves, are boring, and often just a necassary evil (metaphorically) because a party needs someone to heal them during and between fights.  How is this fun or interesting for the player saddled with the cleric?  If people have to play an uninteresting character because they need someone to heal their party, then the mechanics are off.  4E addressed a lot of this issue pretty well, although I'd argue that clerics are still pretty boring.  What if, instead of some cliche heal-bot, players could create the type of character they wanted using the method above, and instead just flavor it with adherence to a deity or domain?  Why do we need a paladin class instead of just creating a character that is primarily combat based with touches of divine abilities or a priestly background?  Let a character choose a focus on divine powers if they want to simulate the cleric, but leaving options open helps the end result be more interesting.  And don't get me started on the assassin.  Any type of character can be an assassin, because that is a profession; something you do for money--why is it always shackled to being a subclass of the thief or rogue?  It you want a darker character, flavor it with darkness through your options, background and the way you play, don't make people have to choose a specific and generic class to do so.

So, how would this look?  A standard progression table for leveling for every character.  Gaining options, feats, skills, whatever you want to call them at the same rate.  Let players use those options however they want to choose between combat maneuvers, skills, arcane abilities and divine abilities.  Segregate arcane abilities into magic schools (illusion, necromancy, etc.) and divine abilities into domains (sun, death, luck, etc.).  And this still leaves room to add something new later, like psionics, that could use the same mechanics template, just with a new segregation of abilities from which to choose.  And here's the most important part:  players and DMs need to work together to create backgounds and stories for their characters.  This is what flavors the character more than any mechanics will ever do.  This is what should influence how the character acts during an adventure instead of looking for ways to maximize the math and use their abilities.

So, really, I didn't spend too much time even talking about the DDN playtest material.  And that's because, while I see a few promising ideas, I don't see what I'm looking for, and I certainly don't see any consistency with the set of rules as presented.  Like I said before, I have played every version of this except 3.5, and more importantly, I have purchased almost every book for those older editions.  I am not going to do so again, not without having a really good reason.  I'm not seeing anything yet that I haven't already seen, so why do I need to invest in a new system?  If the company is smart, then I am not really the target audience for a new edition (and neither are any of the rest of the current gamers out there).  And here's the problem that both the designers and the current players seem to be overlooking.

For a sustainable business model, they need growth, not just the continued patronage of an ever-fracturing client base.  To do that, they have to compete with all the other sources of entertainment out there.  And yet they need our help because no one gets into a game like this on their own.  I had purchased books as a kid because I loved monsters and mythology, but it was another gamer that taught me how to play.  And that branches out.  I seriously doubt many groups of people that have never played an RPG before decide to sit down and start without having at least one gamer already in the group.  But it's also a niche hobby.  It's complex and largely imaginative.  And this is what baffles me about some of the complaining you can see on internet forums from current gamers.

Many seem to want the developers to create some sort of perfect game system where they don't have to do any work or use their own imagination.  I wonder why these type of people even play RPGs.  We always house-ruled in or out various pieces that we wanted or didn't want.  We let play flow from within the different settings (both Spelljammer and Planescape offered easy solutions for travel between the various settings).  Even now, those worlds are connected in my campaigns.  I allow characters from Eberron and Athas to be in the same party.  Why?  Because it's interesting, but ultimately, if that is what a player wants to do, then the DMs answer should be yes.  That doesn't mean I never say no or disallow certain things.  That's part of the DMs job.  But many of the loud voices now seem to think that a non-experienced DM should be able to have a fantastic adventure for a group of non-experienced players because the designers should have a perfect set of elegant rules that tell them how to do everything.  And that's never been my experience in almost three decades of gaming.  What is D&D?  It's not the mechanics that define it.  It's the epic storytelling, that is collaborative between the DM and the players.  It is exciting adventures and danger and the wonder of discovery.  And quite honestly, good DMs are rare.  The rules don't matter as much as the willingness of the people playing the game.

And so, where are the developers going wrong?  Well, first by catering too much to the naysaying crowd. Criticism is not constructive if you can't do it in a civil manner and maybe even offer up some solutions or ideas yourself.  People are really ugly about 4E (and I get the sense that many of the current developers are in this group).  4E does a lot of things right and rolling back to earlier editions off which to base DDN seems like a step backwards.  After all, if I want to play an older edition, I still have all that stuff.  I don't need to buy DDN because I can still play 2nd or 3rd (or Pathfinder). 

Secondly, by continuing to simply reskin the things we have already seen in an effort to make us all re-purchase product from them.  This is why I stopped playing Magic the Gathering, by the way (interestingly, WotC owns both D&D and Magic, and is in turn, owned by Hasbro--it hasn't always been this way).  It's a great strategy card game, but if you don't keep pumping money into it to buy the new releases, you end up getting stomped by players that do.  Kind of associated with this mentality of 'out with the old, in with the new' is the lack of support for older editions.  I understand they might not want to expend their design manpower on physical books for older editions, but they could at least continue to create adventure modules.  Besides, everything now for older editions could be done digitally as pdfs, with very little production costs involved.  A recent announcement stated that they were going to offer older books this way, and that's a step in the right direction.  The other major flaw in this is support for electronic tools.  3rd edition promised to offer electronic tools for PC creation and DM tools, but never really fulfilled that promise with finished product.  4E had some really great electronic tools, but again, failed to finish any of them or keep them updated with their latest physical releases.  And as a final point on this--piracy is not my problem, so don't make it my problem by forcing DRM or some other lame attempt at protection.  It doesn't work in the music, movie or video game industries, and it's not going to work for RPGs.  If I buy something, it's mine.  Period.  People are always going to find a way to pirate it and you're just going to have to live with that.  That, and find positive ways to encourage people to spend their money on your product (and I have an idea for that below).

Next, one of the things that was better about the older editions was the sheer amount of adventures they produced.  I know I said above that the DMs and players imagination was the better investment, but by simply having more and better modules, this would help solve the newbie problem.  A well designed, interesting and exciting adventure module is not only good for playthrough, but it's also good for a burgeoning DM to see how such an adventure is designed.  Then, when they get tired of pre-built or are ready to create their own material, they have a template of success and it's not as much of a crap shoot.  4E made a lot of really bold design changes, and many of them were successful.  Content-wise, however, we just got reskins of Forgotten Realms, Eberron and Dark Sun.  Other settings were forgotten.  And the adventures are L.A.M.E.  Somewhere along the line, there was a manager-type that looked at the numbers and said, "We don't make money on adventure modules because a group of players will only buy one per group and share it, whereas they will buy five or six Player's Handbooks."  That might have even been true at the time.  But it certainly couldn't have been true when TSR owned it judging by the sheer amount of modules produced for Advanced D&D and 2nd edition.  And we also don't live in that world anymore where a group of players each buys their own Player's Handbook either.  In fact, with 4E, a group really only needs the Rules Compendium and a handful of DM and monster books, grids, minis and dice.  We simply don't need all the splat books that get produced afterwards, which give everyone more options that should have been included in the first set but also helps create game bloat.  But a company has to sell their product, and as consumers, we get charmed into wanting something new.  Then, for some strange reason during 4E, a game that requires minis to play, they discontinued their minis production (they were also extremely ugly--we purchased metal minis from Reaper instead).  There map/tiles selection was laughable (and not physically big enough).  Here's my solution:

Start producing adventure modules again.  Good ones.  Where are the Against the Giants, Queen of the Spiders, Tomb of Horrors, Temples of Elemental Evils, White Plume Mountains, Expedition to the Barrier Peaks, Ravenlofts, Dragons of whatever (the Dragonlance modules were each titled with a different version), or anything as epic as the Planescape stuff?  What makes D&D what it is?  These!  It's not mechanics.  It's when your halfling thief is separated from his party and Strod has him cornered on a balcony and he decides that it's better to jump off the balcony than face the vampire alone.  It's when Tanis and his party are trying to get to the levels hundreds of feet below, with gully dwarves underfoot and draconians leaping off the floor above to land in the giant bucket-on-a-chain-and-pulley elevator to send it rocking precariously while they fight.  It's when, after discovering the dungeon is so dangerous, a formely good party shows their true colors by forcing the halfing thief (a different one) to walk 30 feet ahead of the rest of the party, tied to a rope so they can try to pull him out of any pit traps he sets off (that halfling was destroyed, by the way, when he was forced to crawl through the mouth of the bas relief demon's head which contained a Sphere of Annihilation).  It's when Drizzt and Wulfgar, with gleeful abandon, charge into a cave full of marauding giants to slaughter.  It's when, instead of returning the magic weapons they'd been asked to retrieve as the basis for the adventure, the assassin decides he'd rather keep Blackrazor for himself.  This, along with the flavor of the specific settings and certain monsters like beholders or mind flayers, is what D&D feels like to me.  It doesn't have anything to do with the mechanics of the game.  The Dragonlance novels were created due to what happened when the authors played through the adventures, not vice versa.  And that first trilogy is one of the best fantasy trilogies ever written.

And that's another way in.  Through novels.  A good novel will make people want to play.  Re-reading that Dragonlance trilogy convinced me to go buy a 4E Player's Handbook after not having played in years.  D&D has a couple of other great trilogies of novels under their belt.  It's well past time to retire Drizzt, but those first six books are classic.  Paul Kemp's Cale and Riven had some pretty epic stories.  I haven't read much of the new guard, but of what I've read, it's just not as good as the older novels.  In fact, there's very little I've even been interested enough to pick up.  Part of that, is that those older writers didn't care what the mechanics of the game were (and they certainly didn't write the mechanics of the game into the story itself).  They didn't care what stats their characters had (in fact, every attempt to stat those classic characters in game terms has failed miserably).  They just created epic heroes (and villains) and put them in epic situations.  The game needs to reflect this.  And also keep in mind that we now live in a post-Game of Thrones world.  Those books make most other fantasy look positively juvenile in comparison.

If they produced good adventure modules again, they could offer pdfs for sale electronically at little production cost.  If they wanted to help combat piracy by giving people a reason to actually purchase a physical product, then they could sell a Collector's Edition that not only included a physical booklet with the adventure and nice artwork, but also maps big enough to play on and either tokens or minis for every monster or enemy encountered in the module.  As far as I know, there's not a way to pirate minis yet.  Now they'd have a product that wasn't just a slapped together adventure.  They'd have an event that a group would likely want to take part in (as long as the content matched the physical items).  If that's too cost-prohibitive, then simply open up the gaming license to become a Creative Commons project where third party developers create modules, hosted and offered for sale by the company and offer a 50/50 split with the creator of the module.  This is what much of the competition is doing, by the way.

I probably come off a bit as one of those longing-for-the-good-old-days type of gamer.  I'm not.  Some of that is likely the nostalgia of my youth.  I do think that over time, companies lose what made them passionate about creating a product and start to worry too much about what other people think and the profit margin associated with it.  Ultimately, I'd like to play a game that recaptures some of that passion, but is simple enough that I don't have to crush all my adult relationships in order to play.  Unfortuantely for the RPG industry, I don't really see a good outcome for a large production company.  Players that love to play the game because of the imagination factor already have everything they need, and it's unlikely the company will produce something better (just looking around on people's blogs, some of which are linked under Nerd Stuff on my own blog, I often see material better than what WotC puts out).  For the players that complain about what is wrong with the game, it's unlikely the company will produce something that makes them happy (because they have a problem).  From a purely business perspective, they have to gain new players.  It's certainly not going to produce a 'game for everyone'.  I don't envy them their position, but I love the game and so maybe someone will read what I wrote and try to implement my ideas that I listed above.

My conclusion.  Unless I see something really cool and different, I'm out.  I will use what I already have.  I'll rack my brain to try to make 4E more efficient and faster, leaner.  If I can't then I'll simply roll back to 2nd or 3rd.  I may even eventually rip out pieces of DDN and implement my own ideas to create a whole new system (but probably not).  Really, if I'm going to play, I'd rather spend my time trying to come up with something that comes close to some of those epic adventures I still remember.

High on Fire - Fertile Green

Idol And The Whip - Heavy Sleeper

Great, unsigned band.  Check it out right here, or go to their website or Bandcamp

Tom Waits - Hell Broke Luce

So, apparently all those little teases in my email that I posted here were for a new video?  Great marketing, but I think we were all hoping for something more?  Anyway, here's the video, and it's great:

Baroness - Take My Bones Away

Tom Waits - Occidentalis

Tom Waits - Never Bring a Gun to a Spoonfight

Tom Waits - This is Not the Boat

Pigs - Give It

Cultura Tres - El Sur de la Fe

http://culturatres.bandcamp.com/album/el-mal-del-bien

Noah Gundersen - David

Noah Gundersen - Family

Matt Elliott - Dust Flesh & Bones

Devin Townsend Project - Supercrush!

Chrome Waves - Light Behind A Shadow

Kimbra - Settle Down

So, this girl seems like a combo of Audrey Horne and Carina Round?

Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know

Tom Waits - Hear the Sirens? Dive Deeper

Demon Hunter - God Forsaken

And because I was so hard on them, let's just take a moment to enjoy one of the best songs on the album.

Demon Hunter - True Defiance (Review and a Criticism of the Idea of Warfare in Modern Christianity)

 

This will be a mini-review of the album really, because what I find more interesting to write about is the lyrical content and how I believe it reflects part of what is wrong with modern Christianity in the U.S.

I'm a fan of Demon Hunter. Loved the first three albums, but then they kind of lost me a little with Storm the Gates of Hell and The World is a Thorn (which I'll get to in a minute). Demon Hunter excel at what is typically called melodic metalcore. Similar artists are Killswitch Engage, As I Lay Dying, and Trivium. All of these bands, as well as Demon Hunter are probably the high marks of the genre. A mix of heavy groove with European-influenced guitar work and good cop / bad cop vocals. Demon Hunter are not afraid to be influenced by secular metal, and you will hear bits of Pantera, Slayer, Prong, and more recently bands like Soilwork and Scar Symmetry. The music and song structures are rarely original (which is kind of a flaw in metalcore in general), but they are always competent. If you are in the mood to listen to metalcore, Demon Hunter excel at the formula. I am also a fan of Ryan Clark's vocals. He can pull off the screaming parts well enough, but it is his melodies that shine. And despite using some studio trickery in places on the album, I've heard him pull it off flawlessly live. The production is just presentation; they've always had the ability to deliver a good performance.

So, as I said, they had begun to lose me with the last two albums. I honestly don't remember much about either of them. Nothing really grabbed me. What I do remember is being really turned off by the lyrics and chest-thumping. Demon Hunter are a Christian band. I've known that from the beginning. And some element of this has always been present in the lyrics, but it was usually more restrained, or at least less present. Now to be fair, the message of lyrical content usually doesn't bother me. I listen to lots of Christian bands, just like I listen to bands that hail Lucifer, and any other number of ridiculous concepts. But for some reason, from the title alone of their fourth album Storm the Gates of Hell, I began to become really turned off to their message.

So, before listening to this album, I had already assumed I wouldn't like it and that I would only listen out of loyalty to the fact that I used to like them. I turned out to be right in one sense, but wrong in another. Despite the pre-supposition, I enjoy the music on this album despite my misgivings. They won me over again with the catchy melodies. I would currently give this album a 4 out of 5. It is currently sitting in my second tier of favorite albums for the year; albums that are being considered for inclusion in the ever-expanding top-whatever list.

But then there's the lyrics and attitude. I have met Ryan Clark. I have shaken his hand and seen them perform live. I've read interviews. He seems like a cool and nice dude, and I've no doubt that he is. He's definitely talented. In metal, you generally have to be angry about something to channel into your performance. It's abrasive music. It's meant to shake up the status quo. It's meant to be oppositional and defiant. It's meant to be a release of aggression. If it were just poetic license, it wouldn't be a problem, but it's actual belief that then translates into action in the real world. So here I am, wondering where the disconnect has happened for people that believe in a God of love that makes them talk about their faith in terms of violence and warfare. In the past, I wouldn't have given it much thought, but then I started noticing this is our culture, outside of the metal world. I started thinking back to my own study of the Bible as I was growing up. The language of Christianity is rife with the jargon of warfare.

Before I get into specifics, I want to mention another problem with modern Christianity that turns me off (and likely many others as well). Where did Nth-generation, white, middle-to-upper-class Christians get the idea that they are a minority? That they are beleaguered on all sides by enemies? That they are victims? I don't want to be mean about it--I'm not writing this out of a desire to battle with people (in fact, that's the exact opposite of what I want to accomplish). The statistics of oppression are simply not on the side of this demographic being a minority. In any sense. Not even if you are just talking about ethics or family values (they like to believe morality only exists alongside their belief system, but they are simply mistaken on that).  It is this belief that helps fuel the fire of the violence and warfare rhetoric. Instead of reaching out, I see a lot of fortifying the walls in preparation of a siege. Instead of continuing the teachings of Christ, many seem to be simply preparing for the events of Revelation. They have already written off this world and the people in it, not just as no longer worth saving or helping, but as actual enemies.

Jesus dwelt among the sinners, after all.  And I believe a case could be made that this is what bands like Demon Hunter are doing.  They are taking their message where they believe it needs to be; to people that listen to a style of music that is often full of imagery that is directly contrary to Christian ideas.  People that are often disillusioned or are outcasts.  And they happen to be fans of the style of music as well; the members of Demon Hunter were raised on metal, just like I was.  I get that.  And I get that because of that, the members of Demon Hunter may in fact be more familiar with being a minority than most Christians in everyday life.  And yet, I still feel like some of the message is counter-productive and ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy by further dividing us into unwavering granfaloons.

And for further reading, here is a track by track breakdown from Ryan in AP.  You'll notice there's more talk about the music and not as much about the lyrical content, but I will address what he says about the lyrics, along with the examples.  Likewise, here's the review from some subsidiary of Focus on the Family (again, I'll address some concerns with their piece later).

Examples:

Track 1 - Crucifix

We will trample on our children til this world is flooded red, no boundary
for depravity, no silence for the dead, now weep for the life that you've
lead. We will follow vacant voices into a shallow grave, reiterate the
verses of some self consuming slave, now pay for the hell that you praise.

Every curse, lie, violation of our lives. Every careless shallow breath,
corruption of our minds. All the blood and the shame, defamation of name.
The weight of a wicked world embodied on a thankless - crucifix. Embodied
on a blood soaked - crucifix.

The sacrament is broken, and all I see is red, the idols of humanity they
tower overhead. Now weep for the life that you've lead, the gates have
severed open, setting death upon this place, compelling us to hope in a
revolting human race. Now pay for the hell that you praise.

every curse, lie, violation of our lives. Every careless shallow breath,
corruption of our minds. All the blood and the shame, defamation of name.
The weight of a wicked world embodied on a thankless - crucifix. Embodied
on a blood soaked - crucifix.

My - Eyes - Have - Seen.

Sometimes I close my eyes to escape this crooked place, it seems these
fools will never learn, I guess it's easy to see the world the way I do,
the emptiness is a promise, the sin is just the proof.

embodied on a thankless - crucifix.

My - Eyes - Have - Seen.

Well, that's a glass-half-full approach to your faith, isn't it?  The world and everything in it is just awful.  And by the end of the song, he's gone from using inclusion words like 'we' and 'us' to end up saying 'these fools will never learn'.  I'm betting he tried hard to make it sound like the moral struggle affects all of us, but there's definitely an undercurrent of Us vs. Them beginning that slips it's Freudian head in by the end.  Oops.  And the 'My eyes have seen' phrase is always condescending and arrogant in this context.  Ryan doesn't say anything about the lyrics in the AP interview, but here's what the other link says:  "Album opener "Crucifix" rejects "the idols of humanity" and placing one's "hope in a revolting human race," while reminding us that Christ alone took on the sins of the world ("Every curse, lie, violation of our lives/Every careless error of breath, corruption of our minds/ … The weight of a wicked world/Embodied on a thankless crucifix")."  Way to mourn your faith.  And I'd like to add that the idea of Christ suffering was to make up for everyone's sinning nature, not that he alone is the only one that suffers.  We all suffer; it's part of the human experience.  We all take on the sins of the world, and from the tone of this, and a lot of the rest that we'll get to, Christians often take the opportunity to crawl up on the metaphorical cross while in the same breath trying to claim that Christ is the only one that has done so.

Track 2 - God Forsaken

So my descent was a shallow defense I made to lay waste through the powers of fame?

When all the blame I carried around my neck, viscous cycle of hate that I changed to find my way!

When the sovereign comes to me, I eclipse in the shadow's veil, Killing all I cease to be.
For the passing vein is hate!

[Chorus:]
I fall to the fires of Hell, never fail to awaken, Though my soul descends in the darkness of my heart, again; I'm God-Forsaken.

I fall to the fires of Hell, never fail to awaken, Though my soul descends in the darkness of my heart, again; I'm God-Forsaken.

With every turn I fail to learn my path, and it's wearing down my days, To be the voice of a half-dead suffering age I never want to read that I ceased to find my way

When the sovereign comes to me, I eclipse in the shadow's veil, Killing all I cease to be.
For the passing vein is hate!

[Chorus:]
I fall to the fires of Hell, never fail to awaken, Though my soul descends in the darkness of my heart, again; I'm God-Forsaken.

I fall to the fires of Hell, never fail to awaken, Though my soul descends in the darkness of my heart, again; I'm God-Forsaken.

Now the grayness of our souls!

[Chorus:]
I fall to the fires of Hell, never fail to awaken, Though my soul descends in the darkness of my heart, again; I'm God-Forsaken.

I fall to the fires of Hell, never fail to awaken, Though my soul descends in the darkness of my heart, again; I'm God-Forsaken

This song is catchy as hell, by the way.  This one isn't really one of the offenders, though I do find the lyrics sad.  It saddens me that a tool of Christianity is guilt and self-deprecation to the point of mentally condemning yourself to hell.  Humility is a good thing, but this isn't humility, it's something else.  If an actual person in life made you feel this way about yourself, you would be in an emotionally abusive relationship.  I fail to see how this is productive.  At least it's from the first person POV this time, instead of laying this on everybody.  Again, Ryan has nothing to say about the lyrics, but here's the other link:  ""God Forsaken" explores, albeit cryptically, spiritual self-sabotage, specifically how our tendency to embrace our shame instead of relinquishing it results in soul-deadening distance from God ("All the blame I carry around my neck, a dead cycle of pain")."  I actually think this is a good interpretation of the lyrics.  I find this interpretation much more honest and positive.  It's hard to say, because I don't think this is clear from the lyrics alone, but I'd like to think this is what he was going for as opposed to continuing the shame that is associated with a belief system that perpetuates the idea of original sin and constantly comparing yourself to some idealized being and how you could never be that perfect.

Track 3 - My Destiny

 I cast my heart unto the beast
Unto my sin
I would never find my faith in this belief unseen again
The solitude of youth
My conscience wearing thin
I will suffer my infliction as a desecrated man

But the fear, the blood, the sweat and sound
They brought me here to wait for the will to appear

We were blinded by the sacred light
They carried us away
Like a razor through the dark that night
My destiny

Now the weight of living word
Come calling true
And my heart will drink the blood of death my soul forever knew
On the reverence of a voice
My clarity of you
The king of whom I never was has run my spirit through

We will carry that flame

The fire is in our name
We will carry that flame

Here's one I don't have an issue with.  This is what Ryan says about it:  "This is one of the only Demon Hunter songs that is heavy and aggressive pretty much all the way through, but tells a really uplifting story. I call it a "heritage" piece, because it's about growing up in the suburbs, spending most of my time skateboarding with friends, getting into trouble, not knowing what I wanted to do with my life... and the moment that I found music, and everything changed. I remember going to my first live show and just being enthralled by it all. That's what the song refers to when it says "but the fear, the blood, the sweat and sound." It was the passion and the honesty of it that drew me in. Ever since I was 15, I knew that I'd be doing music for the rest of my life."  That's human and relatable.  I much prefer this kind of lyric when talking about beliefs and spirituality.  His message is still present; there's no doubt he's referencing his faith, but it's a personal story and isn't beating you over the head with it.  And it's much more likely to attract someone that is curious about your faith that brow-beating people because they are "sinners".

Track 4 - Wake

Lay your fear on the line and Wake Up!


Now solitude of will has held you still against that wall, Device of former self you cannot help but to disown.

(WAKE UP)
Don't come crying for help when the Fire surrounds you, When desperation calls you will not ply
Don't follow the mass into an endless grave!
You've heard that final main, now

(WAKE)
Now lay your fear on the line and Wake Up!
My quest is, unholy tears
Throw your panic aside and let go!
They bring to light your fears.

The gravity of death is on your breath,
It dwells inside.
Hold fast to your distraction, feeding paralyze your time.

(WAKE UP)
Don't come crying for help when the Fire surrounds you.
When desperation calls you will not ply
Don't follow the mass into an endless grave!
You've heard that final main, now

(WAKE)
Now lay your fear on the line and Wake Up!
My quest is, unholy tears
Throw your panic aside and let go!
They bring to light your fears.

Hold your breath, between the silence, I won't buy your self-reliance!

So don't come crying for help when the Fire surrounds you, when desperation calls you will not ply
Don't follow the mass into an endless grave!
You've heard that final main, now

(WAKE)
Now lay your fear on the line and Wake Up!
My quest is, unholy tears
Throw your panic aside and let go
They will bring to light your fears now!

Ryan doesn't say anything about the lyrics in the interview.  I like that he's calling into question our tendency to let fear control our actions--in general, I think our culture should take a closer look at the psychology of fear and it's influence in our lives, from the day-to-day, to our media, our political system, our economy and within our spirituality.  Fear is rampant, but unfortunately, his line about fear becomes undermined by the rest of the lyrics that conform to the dogma of punishment and hell.  Which are nothing, if not based on fear.  Also, the title 'wake' apparently wasn't meant to just be about 'waking up'--you'll notice the word (and complete title of the song) is just 'wake', which I'm sure is also meant to invoke the tradition of a wake before a funeral.  Furthermore, to add 'don't come crying for help when the fire surrounds you', shows a distinct lack of compassion with which I've always had a problem.

Not only believing in a concept like hell, but going so far as to believe that someone that would end up there deserves it seems contrary to a loving God to me.  If I can conceptualize that no one deserves infinite torment for finite actions in life, then surely a God that is greater than me not only in knowledge and wisdom, but also in benevolence wouldn't subscribe to this either.  I understand that this is a huge part of the Christian religion, and not easily abandoned, but the violence in the concept really hurts the ability for it to appear reasonable to people that might be interested in other aspects of the religion.  It's not only archaic, it's barbaric.  What if instead, Christianity starting thinking a little outside the box of dogma and came up with new, non-literal ways to talk about hell?  What if what hell really is, is just isolation from God?  Isn't this much nicer?  Doesn't that sit better with the idea of an all-knowing, all-loving God?  Doesn't it still potentially describe the human condition?  Doesn't it make a relationship with God seem more relatable, while at the same time, taking fear out of the equation?  I'm not saying it's a perfect solution; it still holds some philosophical problems, but not anywhere near to the same degree.  Personally (and I didn't come up with it, and I'm sorry that I can't remember who did), I think hell as isolation from God is an elegant solution, not just rationally, but also as a way to speak to others about your faith without strapping on sandwich boards.

Here's what the other link reads:  "Meanwhile, "Wake" counsels against following the masses on the broad path to destruction ("Don't follow the mass to an endless grave") and warns against self-reliance as a means of salvation ("The gravity of death is on your breath/ … I don't buy your self-reliant soul")."  To this, I'd like to point out again that it's actually the masses that claim to be following Christianity--whether they actually are or not could be another discussion, but to be a Christian in the U.S. means you are, in fact, part of the masses.  A truly introspective Christian might let that be food for thought.  I understand that Christians believe that Jesus is the means of salvation, but to warn against self-reliance again misunderstands the human condition.  I guess God doesn't really help those that help themselves?  Unfortunately, the hidden message in that seems to be that self-reliance = doubt in God, and doubt is bad.  Never mind the idea that if we were created in God's image, then that means he's at least a little bit like us as well.  We have the gift of a rational mind for a reason (if you believe we were created by God), and that reason isn't a tool of the devil.  Also, blind adherence to tradition and dogma probably isn't what God had in mind for free will either.

Track 5 -  Tomorrow Never Comes

Is there nothing I can say
When you turn around and carry on this way
Have you lost the path we made
When that feeling pulled you far away from grace?

See you're fading out again
All your promises are taken with the wind

And if tomorrow never comes
For all the cold and bitter ones
We can breathe
And if tomorrow never comes
For all the cold and bitter ones
Let us sleep

Did they steal your beating heart?
Did they take your words and tear them all apart?
'Cause it killed to let it go
I hope it follows you and breaks your frail bones

See you're fading out again
All your promises are taken with the wind

And if tomorrow never comes
For all the cold and bitter ones
We can breathe
And if tomorrow never comes
For all the cold and bitter ones
Let us sleep

Here we are
One final time
To go and leave
Your soul behind

And if tomorrow never comes
For all the cold and bitter ones
We can breathe
And if tomorrow never comes
For all the cold and bitter ones
Let us sleep

This one tones down a bit, both lyrically and musically.  For the most part, the lyrics don't bother me, with one implied exception that I'm pretty much willing to overlook (but I'll bring it up anyway).  Here's what Ryan has to say:  "I have to admit I like to play with words that sound like they're saying something but actually mean another, which is definitely the case with the chorus on this song. "If tomorrow never comes for all the cold and bitter ones, we can breathe." At first glimpse, it seem like I'm saying "if the cold and bitter people would just die, we could breathe easy," but what I'm actually referring to is someone whose life is in a downward spiral--and the hope that whatever ill fate dwells around the corner, never comes for them."  With this quote, I have to admit that it might be possible that I have misinterpreted all of his lyrics (I don't think that I have, just due to my own experience with the Christian faith, but it's possible).  His tone in that quote seems to be born of compassion, and that's encouraging.  The one, small thing that nags at me though is the implication that again, he is excluding himself from the 'cold and bitter ones'.  Assurance of your own salvation while claiming that others lack it sets you on the path to arrogance and judgment, and again smacks a little of condescension.  But I buy the compassion behind the statement, so I give it a pass.  Here's what is from the other review:  "Tomorrow Never Comes" recognizes that fear has the power to pull us "far away from grace."  Fair enough.

Track 6 - Someone to Hate

A figure for the closing of time, the antagonist divine
Void of vacant word, one final answer to be heard
I will carry my decree into a storm of lead
This is total war, my want for tolerance is dead

To my last breath
I am someone to hate
I will spit upon the idol for which you stand
I will carry the weight
I will bury your deception with a wrathful hand

Heart is cold, and my weapons are washed in blood
I avow to the call on high
My resolve in the blessed above, in this ever-consuming divide

A figure for the closing of time, the antithesis defined
Threat to faith untrue, I am the enemy of new
All you advocates of Hell, you corruptors of free will
The culling is nigh, better get your fill

I am the cry for the falling of time

Born into the lust within our eyes
Taught to write the scriptures for our lives
We inherit the lies

To my last breath, to my final day

And, now we're back to the content that sparked this post.  This one is just, wow.  This is the epitome of what is wrong with modern Christianity.  The idea that the Christian is a maligned and oppressed minority who is just not going to take it anymore.  Love is dead, and now it's time for beatings if you oppose me.  Change a couple of key words, and this becomes a black metal song.  I know Christ is believed to have come as a lamb, but will someday return as a lion, but this?:  "This is total war, my want for tolerance is dead."  Life is not a war.  Spirituality is not a war.  And I'm sorry, but tolerance is not well known to have been associated with Christianity through any period of history.  This kind of rhetoric is what damages the religion of Christianity in our culture.  Please stop doing this to faith.  If you want to see good examples of Christian faith, look here (and my thoughts on that, here).  It's ok to make mistakes and get frustrated, but when this approach in these lyrics and what is commonly seen in our current culture takes the center stage, no one wins.  Ryan doesn't mention the lyrics in the interview, but I'd like to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that they were born out of being a spiritual minority in the metal culture only.  Here's what Plugged In had to say:  "The ominous-sounding "Someone to Hate," meanwhile, is actually about the band's willingness to stand up for what it believes, even if it generates a hostile response ("I avow to the call on high/My resolve in the blessed above, in this ever-consuming divide/ … To my last breath, I am someone to hate")."  I get it, and I'm not advocating that anyone stops standing up for what they believe.  But if you do it in such a way that is this confrontational, aggressive and belligerent, then don't be surprised when someone else steps up to oppose you.  This isn't seeking understanding, this is looking for a fight.

Track 7 - This I Know

Let my soul be a silent storm
Conceived in the fire of war
I am the ruthless bane of a wicked world
and I pray on the killing floor

When I carve my name across this place it is to defile its vain and vile ways
With every breath like a threat for tomorrow's embrace

And the battle is my way
I will go this path alone
I will take unto my prey,
this I know

All others will fall

Let my will be a violent path
to tear apart what's left
All Hell falls down around my feet
when I speak with a word of wrath

When I carve my name across this place it is to defile its vain and vile ways
With every breath like a threat for tomorrow's embrace

And the battle is my way
I will go this path alone
I will take unto my prey,
this I know

All my life will sing the Pain
My suffering will show
In the fight I find my name,
this I know

The blade of my call
One name above all
All others will fall

And the battle is my way
I will go this path alone
I will take unto my prey,
this I know

All my life will sing the Pain
My suffering will show
In the fight I find my name,
this I know

The blade of my call
One name above all
All others will fall

This is clearly a song about Batman.  Or maybe the Punisher.  Nope, it's about the lone, Christian warrior, fighting for what's right and vanquishing his enemies.  Now I love Batman, and I like the Punisher, but they're fantasy.  They are not how I would choose to live my spiritual life.  The language in this is not only revisiting the violence and warfare imagery, but now the protagonist is literally alone; "I will go this path alone"; "All others will fall".  I know the line "One name above all" is probably meant to be for God or Jesus, but the way this is written, it makes it sound like it's meant to be this holy avenger's name.  And isn't God supposed to be ever-present?  Then why is our protagonist alone?  Because it's more of the woe-is-me, I am a misunderstood and hated hero that no one appreciates.  And yet again, apparently the entire world is terrible and lost and only he has the true path.  And then we get oft-used (and philosophically incorrect) phrase, 'This I Know".  My last post talked some about faith and knowledge, and this is a good example of when the theist side of the argument claims belief as knowledge.  I'm sure the Son of Sam believed he was being told by God (through a dog) to do the Lord's work too.  Re-iterating your belief does not make it knowledge.  

It's possible that this song is written from the point of view of the returned Christ, striking down the wrongdoers like in the Seventh Sign and helping to bring the end of the Earthly world as written about in the book of Revelations.  If that's the case, then again, I question why you think this is acceptable as spiritual guidance.  Ryan offers nothing on the lyrics, but here's Plugged In's take:  " "This I Know" rejects "vain and vile ways." As often happens in Demon Hunter's songs, other lyrics in that track describe the spiritual battle between God's people and demonic forces: "Let my will be a violent path to tear apart what's left/All hell falls down around my feet when I speak with a word of wrath." It's a battle that reminds combatants of their true spiritual identity ("In the fight I find my name, this I know/The blade of my call"), and the song concludes with a clear allusion to Christ ("One name above all/All others will fall")."  

I think another psychological aspect that would be interesting to explore is why people build their identities around the opposition of another's.  It's convenient to blame all the misfortune in the world on the straw man of another group; to claim the righteous path and stand for all that is good in the world.  But like in any actual war, there is collateral damage.  There are innocents that suffer.  Both sides claim the right, the truth, but usually they are both at fault.  All you have to do is be even slightly familiar with world history or read world news (not the drivel the media feed you either; go look for some actual news, maybe on BBC or somewhere it's not as controlled by ratings, corporate interest or spin from a group that has sway and a political agenda).  When war becomes the focus, the main goal (as it is with Christianity's war of souls), then terrible, terrible things are justified in the name of the 'greater good'.  If you need something to fight against to maintain your sense of self and your dubious set of ethics, then you are not a spiritual leader.  You are a war profiteer.  You are not an agent of love or compassion.

Track 8 - Means to an End (this is an instrumental, so we can take a breather)

Track 9 - We Don't Care

This is the end of everything
A degenerate culture's elegy
Now the reaper is waiting at the door
Drunk on our blood and craving more

This is the sound of a thousand holy feet
Treading on a soon forgotten grave
This is a life-long declaration of war,
No sacrifice in vain
Let them remember the name

Feels like we've run out of air
They tear the breath out from our lungs
And we don't care
Feels like we've run out of air
Damnation passed down to our sons
And we don't care

Witness the end of apathy
We have embraced our suffering
Will the pain illuminate our fall?
Or will we see the blame at all?

This is the sound of a thousand holy feet
Treading on a soon forgotten grave
This is a life-long declaration of war,
No sacrifice in vain
Let them remember the name

Feels like we've run out of air
They tear the breath out from our lungs
And we don't care
Feels like we've run out of air
Damnation passed down to our sons
And we don't care

No compromise to end
We'll wash the blood off from our hands and fight again

Feels like we've run out of air
They tear the breath out from our lungs
And we don't care
Feels like we've run out of air
Damnation passed down to our sons
And we don't care

Remember the name

No comment on the lyrics from the AP interview, and here's the other piece:  "Likewise, "We Don't Care" laments "a degenerate culture" in which "damnation is passed down to our sons" while apathetic people sit around and watch it happen. The band, however, is determined to fight the rising tide of apathy ("This is a lifelong declaration of war, no sacrifice in vain")."  Sigh.  More of the same.  What else needs to be said here?  This comes to mind:

Track 10 - Resistance

Conviction was your shelter
Boarded up, rejected, left behind
To lower life where aimless spirits die
Suffer your indifference
Tie that troubled stone around your neck
Exalt your fall and hear your mother's cry

Colder now
Thank your hopeful solitude it's colder now
Throw your blackened heart into

Resistance
(You had reason in your hands and you walked away)
Resistance
(Your time will not outlive your debt to pay)
Resistance
(You had reason in your hands and you walked away)
Resistance
Defiance on this day

This plague is not your Savior
Turn the barrel's eyes upon this strife
The truth, it will reveal that fading line

Colder now
Thank your hopeful solitude it's colder now
Throw your blackened heart into

Resistance
(You had reason in your hands and you walked away)
Resistance
(Your time will not outlive your debt to pay)
Resistance
(You had reason in your hands and you walked away)
Resistance
Defiance on this day

There is a kingdom beyond your eyes
Whole of redemption, defining will
The path of self is wrought with fatal lies
Send them back to Hell

Resistance
(You had reason in your hands and you walked away)
Resistance
(Your time will not outlive your debt to pay)
Resistance
(You had reason in your hands and you walked away)
Resistance
Defiance on this day

Send them back to Hell

 

More of the same, but this one confuses me a bit.  It seems like the resistance and defiance talked about here is about the subject of the song, the one who "had reason in your hands and you walked away".  It seems like the lyrics are being addressed to someone that has not yet been given redemption and is openly defying salvation.  And yet, the rest of the album seems to hold their particular brand of defiance as special and righteous, as long as it's for the Lord.  To add to the confusion, here's what Ryan says about the lyrics:  "Also in this chorus is the only use of the word "defiance" throughout the record--tying it in with the album title."  Well, that's true I guess, but you used the word defiance in this song, to tie into the album title, and yet you're talking about the "bad" kind of defiance; whereas on the rest of the album (and the fact that it's titled True Defiance), you promote defiance as a red badge of courage.  It appears that the only good reason to stand up for your principles is if you happen to be on the right and/or winning side?  Please refer back to my post about faith and knowledge.

Track 11 - Dead Flowers

I feel ashamed
With abandon in my heart and on my face
I suffered the blame
I would show to you this way, but I'm too late

When the sorrow, it breaks them
I will replace them for you

Dead flowers for the torn apart
Laid at the grave to heal a broken heart
Let it rain until it floods
Let the sun breathe life once more
Reborn

Wish you the same
To walk beside and carry on this flame
To see you again
With a radiance of pure and holy name

There's shame again.  And for what?  From what I can tell, it seems like it's guilt over not being able to convert a lost loved one?  Like maybe, he is not just mourning, but also blaming himself for not 'saving' this person?  What does Ryan say?:  "This is another instance of using verbiage that seems to convey one thing but means something deeper. In this case, there are quite a few double-meanings within the chorus, which I think packs the song full of life. Dead flowers both symbolize and commemorate a deceased loved one. The water that once kept them alive is now being begged for as a flood of cleansing--like tears from the Heavens. And the sun that nurtured the life of the flowers is also used in reference to the son of God, offering eternal life."  And here's what Plugged In says:  ""Dead Flowers" mourns the loss of a beloved friend or family member, but looks forward to that person's resurrection ("Dead flowers for the torn apart/Laid at the grave/To heal a broken heart/Let it rain until it floods/Let the sun breathe life once more/Reborn")."  Still not clear, but I'm willing to still go with my interpretation.  If so, then I hate it for the guy that he not only mourns, but is adding shame to his sorrow.  It probably terrifies Christians to think someone they love might be in Hell after they die.  I don't really know what else to say about that, other than it's just sad on many levels, and I hope that everyone finds some peace about it.

Track 12 - What is Left

I saw you from my window
I let you crawl inside
Your face became my shadow
Your voice became my guide

Oh, what is left
I take what i can get
And black out all the rest
What is left
Some words that i forget
And more i regret…

I came here alone
I thought you’d gone
I left you in bones at the end of the road…
I came here alone
A lonely heart
I left you in bones at the end of the road…

I’m trying to evade you
I’m trying to be kind
One solemn night i’ll take you
Down the barrel of my gun

Oh, what is left
I take what i can get
And black out all the rest
What is left
Some words that i forget
And more i regret…

I came here alone
I thought you’d gone
I left you in bones at the end of the road…
I came here alone
A lonely heart
I left you in bones at the end of the road…

I came here alone
I thought you’d gone
I left you in bones at the end of the road…
I came here alone
A lonely heart
I left you in bones at the end of the road…

I came here alone
I thought you’d gone
I left you in bones at the end of the road…
I came here alone
A lonely heart
I left you in bones at the end of the road

That's the end of the commentary of the tracks by Ryan (these last two tracks are bonus tracks).  This one's the most cryptic, and I don't really have a problem with the lyrics.  They seem a bit more open for interpretation, and it seems at least that by now we're done with the war-mongering.  Here's what Plugged In says:  "Deluxe edition bonus track "What Is Left" threatens, "I left you in bones at the end of the road/I'm trying to evade you/I'm dying to be done/One solemn night I'll take you down the barrel of my gun." Fans of the band will assume right away the target here is Satan. The overt gun reference obscures that spiritual context for everyone else."  That's a valid interpretation, but I'm not so sure about it.  There's a sadness in the words that makes me think it might be an examination of a weak point in his spiritual life and that the "target" isn't Satan.  Also interesting to me, is that the Plugged In review has labeled all the previous tracks commentary in a section titled "Pro-Social Content", and this track alone is under the title "Objectionable Content", primarily, I assume for the gun reference (though they didn't seem to mind in track 10 when he says "Turn the barrel's eyes upon this strife", nor with any of the additional violent or aggressive imagery throughout the rest of the entire album).  Don't let it be said that Focus on the Family isn't watchdogging your kids' entertainment so you don't have to.  As long as it's in the name of Jesus, violence is A-OK!

Track 13 - I Am A Stone

It’s Hard to Say
That I’m Back
On a Straight Line

You See My Path
Is In Fact
Just A Fault Line

It’s In My Blood, It’s In My Lungs
And It Won’t Die

I Fight These Words, I Bite My Tongue
So I Don’t Lie

Though It’s Me to Blame
There is No More Shame in Me
In Me…

I Just Feel the Same
Immune to All This Pain
And the Scars Don’t Write a Song for Me At All…

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
Your Fool I Will Not Be

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
(I Am a Stone)
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
(I Am a Stone)
Your Fool I Will Not Be

I Try to See and Believe
In the Short Sight
Accept the Burn of A Vain
And A Half-Life

And How You Rest Your Faith in These for a Lifetime
That Hollow Lie Against My Hope That I Won’t Buy

Though It’s Me to Blame
There is No More Shame in Me
In Me…

I Just Feel the Same
Immune to all You Say
And the Scars Don’t Write a Song for Me At All…
No Your Tears Won’t Line A Path for me to Crawl

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
Your Fool I Will Not Be

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
(I Am a Stone)
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
(I Am a Stone)
Your Fool I Will Not Be

The Waters Rise Above My Eyes
I Will Breathe It In and Go Out With the Tide
And When You Think This is The End
You Will Find Me There Where I Have Always Been

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
Your Fool I Will Not Be

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
Your Fool I Will Not Be

I Am a Stone, Unaffected
(I Am a Stone)
Rain Hell Down Onto Me
Flesh and Bone, Unaffected
(I Am a Stone)
Your Fool I Will Not Be

I Am a Stone…
I Am a Stone

Lyrically, it's unfortunate that these last two songs are only on the special edition, as they would go a long way to break up the overbearing condonment of equating the role of spirituality to the Dubya manifesto of "You're either with us, or against us!"  At least on this one, he sounds like he's got normal, human struggles with faith instead of some sword-wielding angel of death.  And good for him, it looks like he's trying to leave shame behind.

There's no comment on this song from either of the sources from which I've been quoting, but here is the final summary from Plugged In about the album as a whole:  "Suffice it to say, images and ideas like these are a long way from the CCM mainstream—but not, it's important to point out, from the metal mainstream, much of which zeroes in on similar subjects from a nihilistic, despair-filled perspective. For fans of metalcore, thrash and death metal, Demon Hunter continues to offer a provocative alternative, appropriating similar language in the service of an altogether more hopeful message … even if it doesn't always sound like it on the surface.".  Fair enough--they agree that maybe what Demon Hunter is doing is putting their message into a demographic that doesn't normally get it.  And in all honesty, there's plenty of lyrical content in non-Christian metal that is much more graphic and shocking than this.  I am only being so hard on Demon Hunter (and Christianity) because when Cannibal Corpse writes awful, violent and misogynistic lyrics, it's a cartoon.  It's hard to take seriously because it's so over the top and ridiculous that no one believes that it's an account of the truth.  That is the double-edged sword for a band like Demon Hunter.  They are claiming to uphold a set of spiritual beliefs that are meant to guide people to the truth (as they believe it).  The ideas in these songs do not just exist in the metal culture.  They exist in the actual Biblical writings of the past, and the words and actions of Christianity's current believers.  One of these days, I may write about the beliefs of some of the main guys involved in black metal culture, and their terribly misguided values (watch Until The Light Takes Us if you want an idea).  But black metal is not a culture-wide influence.  Christianity is.  And what's more, they claim to know the true path to morality, so they get to be the focus of higher scrutiny.

I know a lot of this may have sounded like harsh criticism.  It may have sounded angry.  It really isn't.  I'm not angry about this kind of thing anymore.  But I am disappointed.  I'm disappointed that our culture seems to only deal in binary.  That it wants everyone to divide up into false categories and get on board the float in the Granfaloon Parade.  That no one seems to be entering into real debate, and more importantly, that so few vocal proponents seem to turn any introspection towards their own set of beliefs.  It's ok to ask questions.  It's ok to doubt.  It's ok to shut up for a minute and maybe turn your attention to someone that might really be suffering.  It's ok for us all not to agree.

I don't want the dissolution and destruction of organized religion.  I just want people to be compassionate towards one another.  I want people to reach for something better with their faith; to really uphold their values without lashing out and oppressing others.  To try to understand where another person is coming from without fearing that they are going to tear down the walls of your sanctuary, of your carefully constructed microcosm that reflects only your values.  That kind of control is an illusion anyway, and the sooner we all realize that, the sooner we might not feel as threatened by something different.

I had a conversation with a guy I worked with in a restaurant many years ago--I wish I could remember his name, because what he told me has stuck with me since.  He was in missionary or seminary school and we had a conversation about God and religion once (I'm agnostic now, but I used to be a very angry anti-Christian).  I told him about some of my problems with religion, and how I had lots of questions that weren't ever really giving me satisfying answers.  His reply was simple and confident.  "Why would God fear your questions?"

Question away then.