My $180 shopping spree at Heartland Records

I’ve mentioned numerous times how Heartland Records in Melbourne, Australia, is my absolute favourite record store. So much so that once a year when the festive season rolls by, when asked by relatives what gift I would like, I imply that a Heartland Records gift vouchers wouldn’t be sneezed at.

Consequently, it’s around this time every year that I go on a Heartland Records shopping spree and end up with some killer new music. Here’s this year’s haul.

My annual pilgrimage to Heartland Records.

This is what I ask for every Christmas.

Bathory — Bathory

First cab off the rank: the first album in the Bathory discography and arguably one of the first true black metal albums.

I decided to buy this after I recently renewed my interest in Under The Sign Of the Black Mark (Bathory album number three) after owning it for several years. With this I’m expecting primitive, low-fi, Venom-inspired proto-evil noise. I don’t expect it to have aged well but I do hope to get a deeper understanding of what it must have been like to hear this for the first time all the way back in 1984 — that’s more than 30 years ago, in case that wasn’t painfully obvious.

Bathory — The Return…

Second cab off the rank: the second album in the Bathory discography. I’m familiar with just one track from this album, a cover version of the title track from the Marduk – Glorification EP. I’m expecting more evil low-fi noise, but of an improved calibre compared to its predecessor. Again, I’m going to try and imagine what it must have been like to be bludgeoned in the face for the first time with such an infernal racket when this was released in 1985.

Bathory — Blood Fire Death

When the discussion arises, I like to point out that Quorthon (Bathory main-man, guitarist, song-writer, etc.) is one of the very few people who can take partial or full credit (the jury is still deliberating) for creating not one, but two styles of heavy metal: black metal, which originated in the first three Bathory albums, two of which are listed above; and Viking metal (more of a term, yes, but still a thing), which has been agreed on as starting with the 1990 Hammerheart album.

I’m a fan of the melody, epicness (a heavy metal album entirely about Vikings, which gave rise to a thing called Viking metal, is as epic as it gets) and solid song-writing on the Hammerheart album. Blood Death Fire was its predecessor and was an in-between album. It bridged the rawness and downright evil vibe of the first three Bathory albums, and led to the more melodic Viking sound / concept / vibe of the Hammerheart album.

Bathory shirt

I don’t own a Bathory t-shirt, so this was an opportunity to correct that. What's that, wearing a Bathory shirt but not being intimately familiar with all Bathory albums makes me a poser? So far I’ve probably spent more money supporting this band than most people under 25.

Motörhead — Rock ‘N’ Roll

A couple of years ago I made a conscientious effort to appreciate more Motörhead, so I figured a good starting point was a neat box set containing the first six full-length albums in the Motörhead discography. I’m glad I did that because not only did I love these classic Motörhead albums, I’d also grown to appreciate and understand enough of Lemmy and Motörhead to be able to genuinely consider myself something of a fan before he died.
At the start of the year, I could genuinely say I'd gotten into Motörhead, yet there were something like 14 more Motörhead albums out there that I still needed to get to know. After Lemmy’s recent death, I made the point of getting to know more of his music, which is how I picked up this and another Motörhead album (below).

Coincidentally, I had a copy of Rock ‘N’ Roll on multi-generation dubbed cassette tape when I was all of 11 years old. I can’t recall what happened to my copy but I do recall when listening to it that it didn’t leave a lasting impression. More than 20 years later, I’m really loving Rock ‘N’ Roll, having fast-tracked this album to be listened to first off the pile.

Motörhead — March Ör Die

March Ör Die is the second of two newly acquired Motörhead albums. Apparently long-time Motörhead album cover artist Joe Petagno was incredibly unhappy with this one.

I haven’t listened to this one yet but I’m tipping it’ll be a great album. It’s not merely Motörhead, but it’s Motörhead doing the track Hellraiser, among other things. If you haven’t seen it, do make an effort to watch the video. As I said previously, no matter how awesome you think you are, you’ll never be Lemmy-winning-at-cards-against-the-Cenobite-Hellraiser-himself-awesome.

Various — Extreme Sündenfall 10

The Germans put out some superb EBM / industrial / goth compilations. Compilations like the Gothic Compilation, which hit at least 61 volumes, come to mind, as does the Extreme series (Extreme Sündenfall, Extreme Clubhits, Extreme Traumfänger, Extreme Störfrequenz, Extreme Lustlieder, and more).

This one appears to be one half of the 2010 edition. Like every Extreme Sündenfall volume, it’s got cringe-inducing cover art (every cover has a different nekkid lady or two for some reason), but that’s balanced out by what will hopefully be some decent music and new artists worth investigating.

Those wacky Germans. I guess a bit of flesh helps them keep the scene alive.

Marilyn Manson — The Beautiful People

In 1996, shows like MTV (when MTV still played music videos) and Rage began airing a disturbing music video from a then relatively unknown American artist calling himself Marilyn Manson.

At the time, Nine Inch Nails was a big deal, two years after the release of 1994’s The Downward Spiral. By extension, industrial metal was attempting to break into the mainstream. The much maligned creation called nu-metal was also busily being the bane of ‘serious’ metal heads who thought whining and wearing dreadlocks was an affront to heavy metal. It’s also worth noting that Kurt Cobain had been dead for two years and the grunge phenomenon was petering out.

Into this environment arrived former music journalist Marilyn Manson with his hit single, The Beautiful People. Produced by both Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails) and Dave Ogilvie (Skinny Puppy), its unmistakeable guitar riff to this day hangs like a chain around Manson’s neck, forever the Marilyn Manson signature track.

The shocking-rock imagery and theatrics, the heavy but accessible metal / hard rock sound, and extremely savvy publicity machine (Brian Warner, before he took the stage name Marilyn Manson, was a music journalist with an uncannily sharp nose for how rockstardom worked) ensured Marilyn Manson was constantly in the headlines. And with that, he managed to get himself successfully lapped up by an entire new alternative music generation.

I was never much of a Manson fan to be honest. I don’t own a copy of Antichrist Superstar, from which The Beautiful People is taken, probably because I recall borrowing a mate’s CD copy not long after it came out and not thinking very much of it.

The single that is The Beautiful People represents a throwback to a time when three-track physical releases, put out on the cheap in cardboard sleeves like this one, were a viable way for record labels and distributors to promote themselves, and for pre-streaming / downloads / torrents / YouTube / etc. kids to get their hands on new music.

Those were the days. A widespread alternative music culture was alive and kicking all over Australia — embodied by the tremendous variety and credibility that was The Big Day Out, when it was a genuinely cool alternative festival.

1996 was a good time for a kid to be into alternative music.

Ministry — Twitch

Ministry are a group that its devotees rant and rage over with all their heart, and which I personally took a very long time to ‘get’.

I never actively disliked Ministry. It’s just that they had a sound that kind of didn’t do much for me. The combination of Al Jourgensen’s raspy vocals and the heavily processed, kind of second-fiddle guitar tone just didn’t excite me.

Then one day I had a Ministry breakthrough moment after buying The Last Sucker album, incidentally as part of a previous Heartland Records stash. The first and closing tracks from The Last Sucker — they’re very different but both stompingly good tunes — got me interested in Ministry again, and from there I ‘reverse engineered’ things. I re-discovered classic Ministry albums that I’d previously purchased on reputation alone and from there grew to appreciate all this great music from the Ministry discography that had previously not done much for me.

That’s one of the reasons why I collect physical media. I feel that a predominantly digital-format collection is too ephemeral for my needs. You might not love or appreciate something at the time but you may grow to love and appreciate it later in life.

With digital media it is too easy to forget, which means it is too easily deleted. A physical collection, by virtue of its physical presence, forces you to revisit and re-evaluate. Indeed, I can’t recall the number of times I have bought a release, not thought much of it, shelved it temporarily, and then re-discovered and genuinely re-appreciated it at a later time.

Ministry’s Twitch album is (apparently) a predominantly electronic album. I don’t know how I’ll feel about it compared to later-era, guitar-based Ministry, given that Ministry for me wasn’t love at first sight. And what if it doesn’t grip me first time?

Then I'll shelve it for now and stumble across it at a later time.

Ministry — The Land Of Rape And Honey

Ministry album number three and also the album released immediately after Twitch (above). It’s Ministry’s first attempt to get serious with industrial metal by way of guitars. As with Twitch, I’m not sure what to expect on this one. It’s from Ministry’s early days and is bound to sound remarkably different to later releases.

As for the appalling name… apparently it’s taken from a slogan for a real, actual, genuine location somewhere in America that specialised in rapeseed and other agricultural products. Trust Al Jourgensen to come up with that.

Various — Celebrant 2003 Der Mittelalterliche Klangkörper Zum Wave-Gotik-Treffen

I'll buy you a cookie if you're a non-German speaker and you manage to pronounce "Der Mittelalterliche Klangkörper Zum Wave-Gotik-Treffen" that without inadvertently spitting on yourself.
There are few places in the world where a full-length compilation of artists making Medieval and Medieval-inspired music makes financial sense; there are even fewer places that will host an entire stage playing this style of music at a major international festival.

Germany is one of those very few places. Or possibly the only place.

Wave-Gotik-Treffen is the famous international ‘black scene’ (as the Germans call it) festival where once a year every incoming flight to Leipzig is transformed into Flight Number 666 as thousands of black-clad-wearing freaks invest the city to catch 150 or more bands playing ‘dark’ music, from noise to industrial to goth to — you guessed it — medieval-inspired.

“Der Mittelalteriche Klangkörper” roughly translates as “The Medieval orchestra.”

There are 15 tracks on this compilation from the 2003 “celebration” of the festival. Other than that I have no idea what to expect. I recognise one group here: Corvus Corax, a group associated with Tanzwut, who in my view play the greatest bagpipe / Neue Deutsche Härte rendition of the Beethoven’s Ode To Joy ever recorded.

Medieval-inspired German Medieval music. What’s not to like?

Metallica — Death Magnetic

A few years back I saw this at JB HiFi for the princely sum of $14. At the time I felt that was too much, not because it’s fashionable to trash everything Metallica has touched in the last 20 years (which is laughably easy to do) but because I’d heard so many terrible reports about the dreadful audio compression that Metallica, for all their financial power and production nous, neglected to get right on this album.

Death Magnetic is the album that, apparently, has an unbearably messed up dynamic range. Fans hated it because it could have been a decent album, if only it didn’t sound like arse. Famously, an earlier release of this album's music — released for a video game, no less — didn't get the final dynamic range-ruining, ultra-compression treatment. That is, the video game version sounded far superior.

Nonetheless, I’ve heard worse albums — albeit not from the world’ most successful and best-resourced heavy metal band. For this reason, I felt Death Magnetic shouldn’t be entirely discounted, so I decided to give it a go when I saw it at Heartland Records for the equivalent of $8.

Various — Maschinenfest 2002

Maschinenfest is an annual festival in Germany (of course — where else?) focusing on industrial, noise, experimental and other extreme electronic music.

I’ve got some great stories about Maschinenfest after I went there with a mate in 2013. It was my first ever European festival and the gig (and the trip there and back) was one of my memorable.

I totally had an intriguing, fascinating, thigh-slappingly funny account all written down and ready to share. Then some lowlife burgled our house and stole my stuff. I lost my backup hard drive with a whole bunch of treasured holiday pics.
So that was a bit discouraging.

One day I’ll retell the story of our adventure to Germany and Maschinenfest 2013.

I believe the Maschinenfest organisers release an annual compilation of featured artists. The version here is the 2002 edition, released 10 years before the event I attended, when music (and by music I mean noise) creation technology was less sophisticated. I’ll be interested to see how it stacks up to the 2013 edition, which I vaguely recall I have lying around somewhere.

Imminent Starvation — Nord

Talking of noise, I know of at least one person who claims that hearing this album changed their perspective on industrial music. I don’t know much about Olivier Moreau, the artist behind Imminent Starvation (later renamed just Imminent) although I own his triple seven-inch ‘cowboy-noise’ collaboration with Synapscape. It’s an odd release, being a collaboration of two artists playing rhythmic noise (do the kids still call it powernoise?) and twangy cowboy guitar. For real.

I get the impression that Nord was something of a watershed movement for a lot of people. The individual mentioned above, for example, claimed he lost interest in ‘regular’ EBM after hearing Nord. I’ve heard comparable views, though not quite as drastic, from others over the years.

Nord is eminently dark and foreboding. I heard a few tracks some years back but I was into other, more accessible electronic music at the time. I imagine Nord still holds up today and is as nasty and cold and intense as it was when released in 1999.

God Module — The Magic In my Heart Is Dead

I own the below God Module tour shirt and it makes me feel really old. It’s from God Module’s 2009 Spooky Down Under, which, by my calculation, is getting on to seven years ago. The gig doesn’t feel like it was that long ago, hence why it makes me feel old.

God Module circa mid 2000s was a first-tier name that was routinely mentioned on flyers and in conversations when talking about EBM, terror EBM, terror banana, or any other synth-based danceable music with distorted cookie monster vocals.

It feels like yesterday, just seven years ago.

God Module releases up to 2005’s Viscera album were good, but I thought the follow up, 2007’s Let’s Go Dark, wasn’t as strong. It was fun and had a couple of good tracks, but I felt it didn’t have quite the same strong song-writing qualities from previous releases.

The Magic In my Heart Is Dead was a follow-up EP released in 2010, the first major new release after Let’s Go Dark. I haven’t heard it yet, but I’m keen to know where God Module went with this.

Mz O and Her Guns — Damnation / Salvation

Despite the fact that I spent years attending goth clubs and gigs, spent a lot of time hanging out with goths, and for some time back there probably devoted considerable energy (or at least, considerably more than I should have) to dressing like a goth, I really didn’t get that heavily into goth rock.

I loved all the new EBM and industrial music that I was discovering every week; I loved the huge stripe of alternative music that got played at goth clubs; and when bona fide gothic actually rock got played, I rarely objected to it. However, I just wasn't that heavily into gothic rock. The most extensive collection from a gothic rock artist that I own amounted to half a dozen or more CDs from Australians Ikon. I’ll happily concede that this anomaly in my collection has a lot to do with them being a local group that I gladly wanted to support and which I saw play live on numerous occasions.

Otherwise, my CD collection lacks a significant guitar-based trad goth component (at least as a proportion to my heavy metal and EBM / industrial collection). It’s a shame really, because there is so much excellent trad goth music out there outside of club floor hits.

I wonder sometimes if this dearth in appreciating trad goth rock music had something to do with the radical anti-EBM stance of some of the traditional purists from my clubbing days. Without mentioning names, there was (as is commonly the case with alternative groups) a certain group of people who loudly trumpeted the traditional gothic rock cause, and who were openly hostile to anything that sounded EBM-related. It led to dramas and arguments and silly feuds, and I suspect they played a part in putting me off gothic rock for so long.
Now this was all a very long time ago. We've all grown older and more chilled out. I’d like to think that all parties kissed and made up, or at least feel they could do if called on to do so.

More to the point, it’s never too late to get to love new music. And while one CD from a Christian Death vocalist is a small start, it’s a good starting point nonetheless. I hope Mz O and Her Guns does an unprejudiced job of opening my mind to more trad goth rock.

Assemblage 23 — Defiance

Assemblage 23 is one of those prime offenders who specialised in the above-mentioned EBM devil’s music. I owned the mandatory EBM-goth-industrial club floor filler that was the Disappoint single (more of an EP really) – specifically, that Funker Vogt remix that wows you when you hear it when you enter a club for the first time, and three years later makes you cringe because they’re still playing it. Like come on, they could at least play one of the other six remixes, right? Oh wait, no one will dance if they do that.

Alas, what’s the old adage? The DJ can please all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but never all the people all the time.

Tom Shear (that’s Mr Assemblage 23) is a cool dude. I saw him perform live once and I follow his witty, clever, and genuinely interesting Facebook posts. Apart from the Disappoint single, I own one other Assemblage 23 album, 2004’s Storm (along with two accompanying singles).

I’m not that familiar with his earlier material, like Defiance here, or his later three albums, so this is a good start for a ‘staple’ of the EBM / future-pop that I love and danced to so much.

Nine Inch Nails — The Day The World Went Away

Have you ever listened to an album and thought, wow, how I wish I’d discovered this artist all those years ago when I was an angry teenager / was going through a hard time / was still into good music / etc?

My proper introduction to Nine Inch Nails was when a friend lent me The Fragile double-album. It was 1999, I was in the final stretch of my last year of school, I was desperately trying to figure out where I fit into the world by way of establishing my identity, and I was grappling with all the intense anxieties that come with being 17 years old.

At the time, I thought the first disc of The Fragile was ok. I especially liked (and still do) the epic track We’re In This Together. However, this was pretty much my first foray into electronic music and I vaguely recall wondering just what the big deal was with this band called Nine Inch Nails. CD burning and ripping, let alone file sharing, wasn't prevalent, and I eventually returned my borrowed copy to my mate and didn’t think much of it.

Believe it or not, it wasn't until year later that I got to hear the masterpiece that was The Downward Spiral. Sure, I’d heard Closer and other tracks from the album a million times in clubs, but I’d never sat down to appreciate and properly listen to The Downward Spiral in my own time.

Which is a real shame. In fact, the very thought makes me genuinely sad.

That’s because there is no doubt in my mind that I would have absolutely latched onto the angst and dark themes and sharp, contrasting moods that make up The Downward Spiral. Looking back at my 14 to 17-year-old self, I can easily imagine being blown by away this album, reading into every skerrick of subtext, interpreting every minute part, and totally identifying with this album’s nihilistic meaning, man.

14 to 17 years old is a profoundly formative age. Among the many, many, many things going on at that age that shape who you are and who you become, it’s also the age when you figure out what music works for you. We all move on to discover and love new and exciting music as we move along (or in some cases, tragically leave it all behind), but the albums that we discover and angstily identify with when we’re young will always occupy an unassailably special place in our hearts.

I know that The Downward Spiral should have been one of those albums for me. But alas, somehow it flew past me. By the time I finally got around to listening to The Downward Spiral, it was too late to become a ‘formative’ album. I got The Fragile instead.

As I said, The Fragile wasn’t a bad album. And now that I got my hands on The Day The World Went Away single here, the first single from The Fragile, I genuinely appreciate the mellowness, rich guitar production, and vibe of this track.

But without trying to diss Trent, The Fragile was — for this confused 17-year-old boy who, like others like him, didn’t know his arse form his elbow and therefore based a large part of his identity on the music he loved — the wrong introduction.

Various — The O-Files

Once upon a time I bought 25kg of music from an independent record store. They were closing down and decided to sell their remaining stock by the kilo.
There was I, patting myself on the back for thinking what a fortune I would make on ebay. Then I gradually discovered that this scheme didn’t quite work as planned.
I’m embarrassed to say though that I did this more than once (see my story on buying too much music).

One of the collections I purchased contained a large amount of early to mid-90s industrial and EBM. This was music from an era when goth and industrial were still stewing (sort of) in similar black cesspits. They were less culturally distinct than they were by the turn of the millennia, and bright, fluffy, fluoro raver and graver gear wasn’t a common thing (yet).
The O-Files is a compilation, named after releases on the Off Beat record label.
This record label is known not only for its influential roster, but also because it led directly to the creation of Dependent Records after its demise. Based in Germany, Off Beat and especially its 'spiritual successor' released multitudes of synthy, danceable, future-pop-like or cookie-monster-vocal-accompanied EBM and industrial from artists that became a big deal in the first decade of the new millennium.

Often in concert with the enormous (relatively speaking, anyway) Metropolis records, Dependent released a whole bunch of albums from the likes of Seabound, Covenant, VNV Nation, Suicide Commando, Velvet Acid Christ, and many more.

All of these artists had originally either appeared in some way on the Off Beat roster (either signed or at least distributed through it in some way), or otherwise took their cue and inspiration from the artists on this label.

Having said that, the industrial and electronic music from this era doesn’t blow me away. The production and recording equipment has that distinct ’90s filter, something which I think you had to be around for at the time to genuinely appreciate.

This isn’t to say that there wasn’t a shortage of ripper music released during this time, only that I personally prefer a late ’90s and onwards sound when it comes to EBM / industrial / aggrotech / whatever terror banana sound.

The O-Files is four singles from four artists: Numb, Click Clic, Individual Totem and New Mind (albeit with several remixes). This is always a nice way to better understand the breadth of an artist because, despite being ostensibly a compilation, this makes it almost album-like. Indeed, anyone who collects compilations knows that the old one-track-per-artist compilation is a notoriously hit and miss method to appreciate an artist.

Of course, this being a singles collection, I’m expecting some filler from the remixes. Then again, I may strike obscure gold.

Skinny Puppy — Too Dark Park

Talking of a ’90s filter, how about a late ’80s filter? Like Nine Inch Nails, Skinny Puppy was a Big Deal in industrial music, yet they’re a group I was never into. With Nine Inch Nails it was a case of just two ships passing in the night, whereas with Skinny Puppy it was a case of missing the boat entirely.

I suspect I just wasn’t quite old enough to Dig It with Skinny Puppy (see what I did there?). That is, Nine Inch Nails was a big phenomenon when I was around that I somehow missed, whereas Skinny Puppy was probably five to ten years before my time for me to be really in the right state of mind, at the right time of life, to ‘get’ them.

I’ve bought a couple of Skinny Puppy albums over the years. Some of their early, ’80-era material in particular has me wondering in amazement just how a couple of miscreant kids managed to create such varied and messed up sounds with nothing more than a minimal music setup that they brapped away at over the weekend.

Too Dark Park was Skinny Puppy album number six. I’m wondering if it will be my breakthrough Skinny Puppy moment. If not, like so many releases before it (and as has been mentioned several times already) I’ll simply relegate it until it calls me again at some other time, which in this instance will hopefully be the right time.

C-TEC — Cut

Cut is the second album from this industrial EBM ‘super group’ that was at various times called Cyber-Tec Project, C-Tec, and (according to some releases, albeit listed incorrectly) Cyber Tec.

Their track Let Your Body Die, released in 1995, was popular club hit with a sound that still stands up today — no small achievement given that it’s more than 20 years old!

Cyber-Tec Project counted amongst its members the unmistakeable voice of Front 242 vocalist Jean-Luc De Meyer, plus at various times (live or in the studio) members of Cubanate and even the drummer from Nitzer Ebb.

In addition to Let Your Body Die, which featured its own EP and numerous remixes, I was also a fan of a few tracks on C-TEC’s first album, Darker, a mellow electronic album that takes some getting used and which has long moments that sound nothing like barn-storming, dancefloor-hit stomping dance tracks.

Jean-Luc De Meyer’s vocals, as I said, are unmistakeable. I feel that even a lousy EBM track is made better thanks merely to his contribution. Given the talented pool of people involved in the creation of Cyber-Tec Project / C-Tec material, Cut is unlikely to sound dated, despite being more than 15 years old. It might, however, take some getting used to.

Sunn O))) — Void

So I’ve mentioned three or so times on this page already that the best thing to do with a release if you don’t dig it right away is to hold onto it and revisit at a later time.

This is one of the reasons I trash and criticise albums outright. How you feel about music — even music you don’t like — is so very subjective and dependent on countless external factors not strictly related to how an album sounds.
These factors can range from what your personal expectations are about a release you’ve been waiting for, to whether you’re stressed that day, to whether something meaningful is happening in your life at that moment, which just happens to coincide with you playing a particular lot of music on repeat. The significance and prevalence of all these factors and so many, many, many more can change from week to week or from year to year. Their combined mass amounts to how you would otherwise feel about a certain artist, release, song, or genre. Hence, as I keep saying, if you don’t like something one day, it’s always a good idea to revisit it later; and hence, this is one reason why I love physical media, because it’s harder to delete and forget a physical item.

But once in a while I will come across something that, try and try as I do, just is not for me.

Drone metallers Sunn O))) are apparently one such group.

A mate strongly recommended Sunn O))). So did a record store owner.

And as far as I can tell, abandoning a guitar next to an amp to make feedback noise for an hour is not too dissimilar to this studio-recorded Sunn O))) album.

Perhaps I’ll revisit this 10 or 15 years from now, like I did with the Ministry and Nine Inch Nails releases listed here. Maybe then Sunn O))) will finally sense.

Until then, I’ll stand by the adage that if one doesn’t have anything nice to say, it’s best not to say anything at all.

Clearly drone metal isn’t for me. Goodness, what a snooze fest!

Soundwave Melbourne 2013 in photos

As the title suggests, I got to attend the 2013 Melbourne leg of the Soundwave festival tour. In case you’ve been living for too long on one of Jupiter’s inner moons (or you’re just not from Down Under), Soundwave is the largest Australian music festival of its kind to feature predominantly guitar-based alternative music.

The last time I went to Soundwave was two years ago, where I got to tick off that bucket list box labelled “I’ve lived” after seeing Iron Maiden for the fifth time. This time my must-see artists were Anthrax — who I sincerely hoped would play some cuts off the classic and crowd-favourite Among The Living album — and, to a lesser extent, Metallica. The most successful heavy metal band in history had visited Australia several times in the past but I’d never caught them live, so it would be good to tick them off that list. There were a few more bands I wanted to check out despite not being intimately acquainted with their music: Mindless Self Indulgence, Vision Of Disorder, Cypress Hill, Ghost, and a few others. But other than that, I’d be happy as long as I got great performances from Anthrax and got a reasonable dose of old-school Metallica. Anyone else that stood out during the day would be a bonus. Here’s how it went.

Preparation is of course the most important component for an outdoor festival. Take those trusty 12-up bovver boots as an example. Yes, one’s feet get sore by the end of a long day, but they’re essential protection in any situation where a large crowd is expected to do a whole lot of jumping up and down in a packed space. A proper hat, sunnies and sunblock are also vital. While wide-brimmed hats are better for sun protection, I’ve blogged previously how I discovered the hard way that such a hat can lead to unexpected back injury. Therefore, constant re-re-re-application of sunblock is necessary. As an added bonus, a pasted face of inch-thick white cream means you’ll fit right in with the crowd should you happen to be seeing a black metal band. Other essential items include the programme (sorry, program), emergency poncho, and a robust pool of cash to pay for the most expensive food and drink in Melbourne.Not shown: trousers, which are better than shorts if it’s cold and also mean less sunblock needs to be applied; and unimpressed fiancée, who noted that I stripped the whole bed just to get the neutral-white background for this photo but then ran out of time because I had a train to catch.

The whole act of just getting to a festival is in itself something of a ritual. On my way to the city to meet mates Al, Gabi and their friends for breakfast, I managed to feel much older than I was comfortable with after eavesdropping on some kids who had the following conversation: “Oh, she’s moved to Baxter. Baxter, really? I had a cat called Baxter… but he died. Yeah? My cat diarrhoead all over the floor this morning.”

Kids today, eh?

After a very solid man-sized breakfast — the only kind of breakfast to have before a music festival — we boarded the party train for Flemington Racecourse. Again, the buzzing vibe on the way in is all part of it, leaving the train as you get nearer, spotting nervous-looking prats on the lookout for sniffer dogs and picking the right gate to enter. You look up as you hear the noise from some not-so-distant stage and shuffle through security. And then you get to the most essential and wallet-destroying part of it all: obtaining your pisshead pass, i.e. your 18+ armband. Then you get your bearings. Which usually means heading straight to where that armband gets used.

A good part of the day was spent within the separated 18+ area. It’s separated by a fence but as you can see the stage is still visible. This is a big improvement on the last time I was there, where you couldn’t see or hear bands from the drinking area, meaning you had to be constantly vigilant of times.

I genuinely believe that separating it this way is the best way to run the show. The worst-behaved crowd I’ve ever encountered was at the 2011 Future Music festival. This was a fully 18+ event with no restrictions on where you could take alcohol. There was booze everywhere and I witnessed at least two unpleasant scuffles or fights, plastic bottles getting randomly thrown into the crowd, and a raver mate getting roughed up because he was wearing an LED lights outfit as part of his outfit. This at what was technically a dance music festival (as if there wasn’t enough alcohol all over the place, the giant Smirnoff logo, flashing in sync with the music on a smaller stage, was hard to miss).

We were actually quite comfortable with drinking alcohol behind a fence for most of the day while seeing bands we weren’t utterly devoted to. Your hearing doesn’t get obliterated, you preserve your energy, and quite frankly, I’ve done my share of hot sweaty crowd crushes.

Anthrax was the first band we’d intended to check out, booked to play the criminally early time of 12.30 in the afternoon! From where we were sitting we would be directly opposite the stage, so we waited for The Blackout to finish their set on the one adjacent to the right.

The Blackout’s Wikipedia entry say they play “post-hardcore” and while their singer seemed to angrily shout, scream and jump around a lot, their audience didn’t seem all that into it, something that was evident by the lack of a significant response when he leapt into the crowd.

At one point he introduced the next track to the crowd with words to the effect of “this is the best track we’ve done all year” or somesuch. I think we were getting a bit over it when suddenly we heard this tremendously heavy, electrifyingly bad-ass sound coming from the stage opposite us. It was the Anthrax guitar tech doing a quick sound-check and, oh boy, it was the best 30 seconds I’d heard all day.

Sorry The Blackout, but the Anthrax sound-check had more balls than your entire set. Which is just as well, because Anthrax were just about to hit the stage.

Where to start? Why not with Caught In a Mosh — as much of an anthem as you’ll ever get when it comes to thrash and speed metal. Show the band that just played how to really do it. It was loud. Fast. Energetic. Kids around me who weren’t even born when this album came out were totally getting into it. It was followed by Fight ‘Em Til You Can’t (which really is about zombies), taken from the latest album Worship Music, and then onto one of their best known tracks (albeit a cover), Antisocial.

I decided I’d head closer to the stage and arranged to meet Al and Gabi later on. As I approached, singer Joey Belladonna fired up the crowd up with a call to start dancing. “A war dance!” more specifically. For those not in the know, this is a reference from the track Indians — an Anthrax live staple and, as you can see, the perfect excuse to don an Indian war bonnet.

The most magical moment from the whole day came next: the song In The End. The second track from the latest Anthrax album, Worship Music, I later found out it’s a heartfelt tribute to Ronnie James Dio and Dimebag Darrell, two metal greats who are no longer with us. I don’t have Worship Music so I didn’t recognise the track at first, but the message was very clear through its sombre church bell intro, slow and epic pace and heart-wrenching chorus. As the song started, two large flags with bright portraits of Dio and Dimebag were raised. “It’s Dimebag!” I heard someone say excitedly next to me.

Also, at this time I got the first of many compliments on my Iron Maiden battle jacket. I wasn’t complaining. For now anyway.

Oh man, if a tear-inducing tribute like that didn’t move you, then the next and closing track surely did. Bassist Scott Ian, who incidentally has one of the best beards in metal, introduced the next track as coming from their forthcoming Anthems EP of cover tracks. “We think you might know this one,” he said. “So we’d like you to help us play it by singing along.” A few seconds later, the heart of every bogan within a 10km radius swelled with rockin’ Aussie pride. It was T.N.T. by none other than Acca Dacca. You don’t have to guess what happened when the crowd joined the of-course-you-know-this-bit “Oi! Oi! Oi!” that goes for much of the song. And it was even more authentic by Joey Belladonna’s uncannily good mimicking of AC/DC singer Bon Scott’s unmistakable nasal drawl.

Alas, Anthrax’s painfully short and early set came to an end after a mere 40 minutes. Apparently at the Brisbane concert they closed with I Am The Law (the most metal song ever about Judge Dredd) but it was not to be. Nonetheless, it was everything I had hoped for in a performance. Part I of this day was successfully accomplished. Now I just had to survive the rest of the day until Metallica.

After Anthrax I went for a bit of a wonder to check out Mindless Self Indulgence while Al and co caught Stone Sour. While I can’t say they’re my cup of tea there’s no denying singer Corey Taylor’s qualities as both a front-man and a vocalist. I caught most of the opening track before I was on my way.

When I arrived at what I was certain had to be the Mindless Self Indulgence (MSI) stage I felt a tad bewildered, as did a whole load of people who seemed to be waiting aimlessly for something to happen. The pic shows the stage where MSI were meant to perform… so where was the band? All that was to be heard was the sound check for Billy Talent (which had nothing on Anthrax I might add). A row of vaguely confused people were leaning against the front row of the empty stage, but not much else was going on.

I eventually asked one of the security guys what the deal was and he responded that the band’s baggage had been lost. Indeed, Soundwave promoter AJ Maddah later scathingly Tweeted that Virgin Airlines had lost the band’s equipment. So there was nothing to it but to see what else was going on.

As I said, I’d planned to catch up a bit later with Al, Gabs and the rest of my group, but with a full set’s worth of nothing to do something else to do I went for a wonder. I caught the closing track from metallers Sylosis, which I recall wasn’t all that bad, but didn’t blow me away. The dude at the bottom of this pic wearing the Bulls shirt obviously thought differently.

Also, it was around here that I got another random compliment or two about my Iron Maiden jacket. I still wasn’t complaining. But by the end of the night some dude liked my jacket so much he wanted to shake my hand in the toilet. But more on that later.

As if MSI’s mysterious no-show didn’t already throw a spanner in the works, it soon emerged that confusion was brewing among patrons due to seemingly contradictory set times. Just after Sylosis some random dudes asked me if they could compare set times. Their “official” programme, which they’d collected from the gate, differed from mine, which I’d brought from outside the venue.

Look carefully (click on the pic for a close-up, changes are highlighted) and note how Fozzy / Sylosis / Orange Goblin have been switched around on Stage 5, while Slayer was moved to a completely different stage entirely.

And this was them. One of these dudes was really concerned that he’d miss Orange Goblin (one of the bands above that had been shuffled around). Hell, if one of the bands I’d specifically come to see had their stage time changed and I didn’t know about it I’d be just a tad agitated too. They seemed nice enough and not too crushed that they might have just missed their favourite band — which is more than I can say for some of the confused and very unhappy Slayer fans I overheard on my way back to meet the rest of the group.

We caught up and decided it was time to get another drink or two. Forget footwear, adequate sunblock, a hat, water or any other precautionary measures to make the day less harmful: the things that will sustain the most damage during a festival are your wallet, followed closely by your liver. Yep, that really is $11 for a can of spirits and the slightly less outrageous $9 for a can of beer.

Consider that tickets alone were almost $200. That’s a lot of cash to get sunburnt, bruised, trodden on, worn out, maybe even pushed around all day, then followed by a long and tiresome trek home. Yes, we wouldn’t have it any other way!
We reconvened and caught Tomahawk. Now this band has always been a quirky to say the least and the performance was no exception as vocalist Mike Patton snarled, sang, chirped, hummed, roared, rhymed, whistled, whispered and sang his way through 45 minutes of twisted weirdness.
Now I have the utmost respect for Mike Patton’s four trillion side-projects and incredible vocal range. Nonetheless, I suspect there was a contingent of die-hards at the front who totally got it while the general gist I got from where we were sitting was that everyone else at this arena-sized venue didn’t get it (and no, funny how it sounded nothing like Faith No More). Sadly, I didn’t get any pics of Patton telling off someone in the audience, singling them out because, as Mike Patton said, “I’m trying to work here”.

After finally getting out of the booze queue it was time to kick back and catch some Slayer. This would be the third time I caught them live — I’d seen them once at their previous Soundwave appearance, and before that when I was 16 or so (yikes!) at Festival Hall.

There were no major surprises in the set. It was chock full of classic Slayer including: War Ensemble, Altar Of Sacrifice, Jesus Saves, Seasons In The Abyss, Dead Skin Mask, South Of Heaven, Reigning Blood (of course) — and one of my Slayer favourites Mandatory Suicide. This is one of those tracks that is always better live than the original studio version.

It’s worth noting that Slayer were the most high profile of the half a dozen bands to suffer from this year’s “Soundwave drummer’s curse” after Slayer Drummer Dave Lombardo had parted ways or been dismissed after a financial dispute with guitarist Kerry King. I say that because I suspect a lot of people were thinking about exactly that every time we saw substitute drummer Jon Dette (who incidentally was also filling in for Anthrax’s Charlie Benante) on the big screens .

Tom Araya (shown) can still very much rock the hell like it’s 1986. And although it’s not in the least bit related, check out this official and very lovely Slayer Christmas sweater that sold out in record time.

With Slayer over we headed off to A Perfect Circle. I’m not a huge fan — I’ve only owned one album which I ended up selling — whereas Al was a major Tool / Puscifer / A Perfect Circle / general Maynard fan. I didn’t mind, although their set seemed laid back, slow and quite minimalist. Only when Al pointed out that “they’re playing all their mellow stuff” did I realise that it wasn’t just me.

Incidentally, this was the closest we got to the stage for any band throughout the day. It also served to debunk the debate as to whether Tool / Puscifer / A Perfect Circle vocalist Maynard actually exists. True blue Tool fans know that in the spirit of smell-your-own-fart-because-we’re- that-awesome that only a progressive rock act can cook up, Tool’s stage performance requires singer Maynard to be visible as only a fleeting shadow or illuminated pattern. That is, Tool is a band that performs with a singer who is not visible on stage. This was the case at their last Big Day Out performance (look it up if you don’t believe me) and it occasionally leads to the theory that Maynard either doesn’t exist or at least isn’t there on stage.

On this occasion Maynard was indeed there, fully visible to the audience, donning what looked like a funny wig thing. He didn’t, however, move from his little soap box on stage, choosing instead to spend the entire set standing in that position.

A Perfect Circle finished at 5:20. We kind of agreed without actually saying it in so many words that we’d take it easy for a bit, so we headed to near Stage(s) 2 to camp out for a bit. We were getting a bit tired, but clearly not as tired as this guy. Imagine shelling out $200 to see your favourite bands, only to sleep through the event!

Cypress Hill may have seemed like an unexpected choice for what is ostensibly a guitar shredding festival. However, considering Cypress Hill mainman B-Real’s background with more than just dabbling with metal it didn’t seem so out of place. It wasn’t for us though. We eventually caught the last track, (Rock) Superstar — minus guitars — before Garbage fired up in the adjacent stage.

Gabi was the real Garbage fan among our ranks. I personally don’t mind them that much — back when I still had idealism I used to attempt appalling DJ mash ups using Cherry Lips and industrial tracks — but like A Perfect Circle and Stone Sour, they’re not on my playlist.

Garbage front-woman Shirley Manson’s Wikipedia page makes reference to her “formidable stage presence” and that at least is something I can agree with. Despite her small frame, her deathly serious diva look and coagulated blood red hair and makeup made her difficult to miss. And man, did she own that stage.

Between songs I chatted a bit with Gabi about the band and we agreed that there was something of a gender imbalance among the performers. Apart from Shirley Manson, the Paramore vocalist, the two girls from Mindless Self Indulgence and the girl from Fucked Up, we couldn’t think of any other outfits (or at least good ones worth seeing) among the 70+ bands on the bill that weren’t composed exclusively of men (NOTE: leave a comment if there are any others).

Garbage closed and it was time to dig in and catch Metallica. They were due to start at 7:45, but from memory it was later than that. I seized the moment and decided it was time for a crucial toilet break. Except… when the sun goes down on a festival, the freaks come out and things get really crazy. You need to be careful who you bump into because you might just unexpectedly run into Skeletor.

And then there’s the actual toilets.

NOTE: Before you reach for the sick bag, that filth is just accumulated MUD AND DIRT from thousands of feet trudging through the toilets all day. Nonetheless, festival toilets are one of the least glamorous aspects of a festival, and they get progressively more feral throughout the day.

As the saying goes though, “when you gotta go, you’ve gotta go.” Nothing to it then but to pull up your pants — as high as I could pull them I might add — and do the business. Indeed, images like this are another reason why big stompy boots like my 12-ups are essential festival footwear. At least I had my own space around me. Earlier that day I had to do my best stare-ahead after I getting deliberately shoulder-bumped by drunks at the urinal. Then on the next occasion I heard a voice behind me exclaim his praise for my Iron Maiden jacket. I turned around and he told me “mate, that is just beautiful.”

Then he insisted on shaking my hand.

“Ah… cheers mate, but you know, I haven’t washed my hands,” I said.

“Mate I don’t give a fuck,” he responded warmly.

I still didn’t shake his hand and I think that was the last compliment I got for the night.

Finally it was time to see Metallica. A little bit late to hit the stage I think but it was on nonetheless.

They opened with Hit The Lights, a golden-era speed / thrash metal anthem from an album that was released — are you ready for this — 30 years ago. Being played, right there in front of thousands of people, all rocking out like mad. THIS was heavy metal.

I won’t go into excruciating detail about how fantastically old school the MetallicaSoundwave set was. You’ll get a better account by clicking the previous link for the full set list, where you’ll notice that all bar one track were classic songs from the first five albums.

Yes, Metallica are rightly an amazing live band who know how to rock out. In no particular order, here are some of the things that really stuck with me.

For a start, people around us were having religious moments. A young girl who we’d never seen before was windmilling near us like mad when she buried her head in the shoulder of someone in the group. Quickly asked if she was ok, it turned out this was the first time she’d seen Metallica and she could hardly believe it was happening.

There were so many other, smaller things that worked beautifully. Robert Trujillo just being an incredible bassist, and Leper Messiah being introduced by James Hetfield with “Cliff wrote this”. Or the fact that, according to the previously posted set list link, My Friend Of Misery “has only ever been performed 18 times including this Soundwave show and only ever before as part of the complete [Black Album] album shows of 2012.”

And then there were all those song that I’ve heard countless times over the years, but which translated so well live. Harvester Of Sorrow with its slow, plodding beat and fatalistic riffing and Nothing Else Matters, which made me want to break out into spontaneous waltzing.

There is nothing more metal than the band that wrote Creeping Death playing it live in front of a couple of thousand people (even if, as every Metallica fan should know, guitarist Kirk Hammett took the “Die! By your hand” bridge that everyone loves from a track from when he was in Exodus, along with several other of Metallica’s best riffs).

As with Anthrax, so too did Metallica — live for the first time in my life — deliver everything I could have ever hoped for. I’ve been as vocal a critic as anyone for the last 20 years’ worth of material but you know what? Screw the haters. They were awesome live and I, along with just about everyone else there, loved every moment of it.

And then… home at last!

Tired. Sore. Thankfully not sunburnt but feeling a bit out of it as you can see.

Then Patapuss appeared for an investigative sniff. I bet he was thinking “where have you been all day?”