So I have another blog now.

I'm pretty certain I'm biting off more than I can chew here, but I am my inspiration's slave in the end. Here if you want to read what I have to say about Heavy Metal, from now on.



I used one of the default blogger styles because I really don't have the time to learn how to extensively customize a second blog (this one was actually customized by friend Skurwy) and besides, it's a pleasing preset. If any dressing up is to occur, it will have to wait a long time.

I don't know how often I will be posting new 'reviews' there, it may be as often as twice a month and as late as... whenever. I anticipate covering the one hundred records will take a couple of years in the least, and that's fine.

There will be no more music posts on A/B, naturally.

More news on work and posts containing actual art (remember that?) very soon.
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How we listen to music / Welcome back, Helm!

Hi. I'm back from vacation. I had a nice time, though ridden by minor injuries.
I wrote something for Illogical Contraption before I went off my merry vacations, I'm glad to see it's online. You can go read it over there.

It has to do about how we listen to music. I like this picture Shelby put on it so I'm using it here as well. This must be one of the few times in the last three years that I've used header art on the blog that isn't mine.

More news below the jump.
1. Somewhat ironically, due to swimming I got a clogged ear a week ago. I woke up and decided to poke at it with a q-tip (more like fifty of them) and made things worse. Drastically worse. You know that feeling where you're messing with something and you're only making it worse, the mounting panic? I apparently pushed in wax and compacted it so the ear was completely closed. I was deaf from the left side. Furthermore I felt *massive pressure* inside my brain. I don't want any of you readers to ever have that experience, it was pretty awful. I couldn't get used to it, either. And it really gets old to ask "say what??" every time someone speaks too. Helm learned a life lesson: living with even minor disabilities sucks. Cherish your eyes and ears and arms and legs, guys.

So we go to the doctor to unclog my ear. You don't want to see what comes out of your ears. The doctors that deal with the icky stuff are weird, I mean, why? Like orthodontists and ear, nose and throat doctors are the worst. Wait, no, proctologists. Anyway, now I'm fine. In fact, I'm better than ever, upgraded my firmware. I can hear frequencies I had apparently forgotten existed. Lots of high-end that makes everything - especially the Heavy Metal music of death I so enjoy - have extra bite. If you like listening to music then, I now append the top list with another item:

Clean your ears

Haha, yes I know that sounds just like a dad would say to their son when he heard the noise he calls music. "But dad, I want to clean my ears to enjoy the noise even more!"

The other injury was bumping into rocks-trapped-in-concrete (sloppy masonry, I hate you!) on my very first outing in the sea with my girlfriend. I took a slice off of my left big toe almost clean off, only it held on by a little bit of skin. I tried to basically duct-tape it together with the rest of the toe and pray it mends but it got all pus-ridden instead. Strangely it didn't hurt much, I guess toes are resilient, I even swam with it. Really icky sensation to try to swim with the legs and feel a bit of toe flapping against the currents! A few days after the skin underneath grew back and I snipped off the extra toe with clippers. Fun times!

But on the upside, I had a long vacation (can you tell?) that I really needed. I'm full of ideas for art and music and words, words, oh god so many words. You'll see, soon.

So how were your vacations, humans?
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Technothrash revisited

Over at the Illogical Contraption, mr. Cobras has been gracious enough to host another compilation by myself after the one on Greek metal and another on progressive metal. This time it's about technothrash. You can go download it and read about the bands featured over there if you're so inclined. If you're not you should click on the link below instead.



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Beyond the realms of Arcana

Kind reader Nekromantis requested:

I'd like you to draw a dreamlike landscape inside the mind and some kind of ethereal gates (or perhaps two rune-carved monolith stones with space between) showing a glimpse of grandeur/weird/horrific on the other side. A passage to subconsciousness or arcana if you like.

I can't in good conscience put my pen to the paper to describe what life after the transcendence of the material plane would be. In the light may your imagination always find shapes of hope and wonder.


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Futurity and Human Depressions

Click on image (or here) to time-travel to a Primitive Future.



In the case you like looking at lines up-close click here.

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Wait, what? There's good prog metal too?!

Over at Illogical Contraption friend and fellow discordian Shelby Cobras is hosting a mammoth piece by me on Progressive Metal that Time Forgot. If you're interested in the music form, go check it out. The hilarious images are not my doing, as everyone knows I have no sense of humor.
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Up The Hammers live report

Here follow my impressions of a recent live show of several underground Heavy Metal bands (amongst them Atlantean Kodex and Slauter Xstroyes), those that are faithful to the older gods and daring, may crush the link with their mūs.

An club is a relatively small venue but one full of history. Situated in the urban epicenter of Athens, Greece, a usual 'third choice' for international rock bands and most certainly the first choice for most local ones looking for a host. I'd say six hundred people could be packed in there if an organizer were willing to risk an asphyxiation or two (and they mostly do). One of the few places in the capital where anyone can negotiate a live show for a decent cost makes it a staple for metal concerts organized by fans and supporters in the underground. Such is the case with the annual Up The Hammers festival whose focus is on the tried and true types of Heavy Metal. The selection of bands is made on what I suspect is a three-fold standard: quality, cult appeal and willingness to travel.

The club is as underground as the bands that will be playing. The ventilation is often spotty, as is the sound. The stairs up terminate to a civilian road so the early metalheads loiter in packs before the show, perhaps grab a bite in the adjacent sandwich shop.

From an anthropological point of view I expect the North American listener of extreme music (in the general sense) would be shocked to survey the crowd that gathers outside. Wave after wave of the traditional roving metalhead packs gather for the pilgrimage. Two or three dedicated longhairs, perhaps a girlfriend decided to come, perhaps the wayward metal brother that has succumbed to societal pressures is willing to put on the faded colors for the occasion. They gather in close-but-not-too-close circles, perhaps exchange some pleasantries with each other but mostly keep to their coterie. Uniformly the fashion is out of 1983 or so. Even the retro-thrasher look that is in vogue around the globe right now is a minority this night. Instead the paraphernalia of an older zeitgeist dominate. Manowar covers on cut denim on top of leather jackets, spikes on wristbands, bright red patches in a sea of black, a bandanna, 'Sign of the Hammer' or 'Melissa'. There's as many balding heads as there are manes. I saw a tall lanky dude with black raven hair, a widow's peak, pointy devil's goatee and Fu Manchu combo, long v-cut spandex shirt displaying a proud chest of hair, vinyl tights, knee-high black boots and a St. Vitus tattoo right on top of his heart and you know he means business. There aren't many beard-men around, not many casuals, even the women are decked out. These are the people who no longer wear the outfit to shock their school teachers, they wear it as a tribute to how the perpetually teen-aged spirit of metal has shaped them. For good and bad and worse.

Vents are working fine this time thankfully. Raging Storm open early to a friendly crowd and they capture the Greek power metal gamut perfectly, from Maiden-only-faster to more austere Manowar worship. Reformed for the occasion, there were some rough edges but on the whole a good way for the evening to start. There is much applause and wide grins all around, the underground is feeling good tonight.

Swedish newcomers In Solitude go up next. I haven't heard a note of them before. They look like they're sixteen years old, singer in particular is a handsome thin boy that's going for a King Diamond slash fashion catwalk look. Burly aged Greek metalheads survey below, takes some balls. They hit their first few chords and I quickly get what this is going to be about, Swedish NWOBHM revival but with a twist. The singer's displaced baritone vibrates overhead, conjuring a spirit that is ageless and nameless, those that love Heavy Metal know it well. Most bands don't conjure shit so I'm paying attention now.



By the graces of NWOBHM, the material's easy to follow, I'm chanting choruses I've never heard by their second repetition now. Singer, black paint under his eyes, third eye drawn on his forehead, teenage shoulder-length hair now tangled up and dripping sweat, holds his off-hand high and open, blesses crowd and says "It is strange where some find God, isn't it?". Yes, yes it is.

I've been spotting affiliations on the band's garb for a while now. Master's Hammer patch, Root decal. Repugnant guitar sticker. They're one of these Swedish death metal kids turned to full-on NWOBHM worship, aren't they? It's hard to imagine them having a different band before this one though, they look so young. There's a Bleak House logo on the singer's purposefully torn and dusted denim too, I might not be convinced but I am impressed. I look around and see I'm not alone. They finish their set with an instrumental, their singer leaves the stage early. Akimbo guitars feedback to the bitter end. Enthusiastic applause from grumpy Greek trad metalheads in their thirties, high praise.

Dexter Ward are up next but they're not doing much for me so I go up for air and a sandwich in the nearby eatery. They've got a projector showing a football game. Lots of lazy metalheads spending the inbetween there. Seems like the sandwich shop man knows how to cater to this crowd. It's still 0 - 0 but AEK is playing badly, I suspect Larissa will be winning soon.

I missed Atlantean Kodex's introduction but none of the material, that's great. Well, I'm not a huge fan but I can appreciate a heartfelt show when I see one. I don't listen to Heavy Metal to belong, I never did. Not in a posse, not in a scene, not in some forum, it's a private affair. The Manowar thing perhaps falls flat even more for me because of all the 'metal brothers' bullshit they keep going on about. No longhair is my brother by default.

Atlantean Kodex are very audibly huge Manowar fans. They do not mention any 'metal brothers' at all (in fact the bit of stage banter that stayed with me was "there's so much culture here [in Athens], it makes my dick hard"), but I get this strange vibe from them on stage and from the crowd below, as if they're one clan. Perhaps bands like Atlantean Kodex have misinterpreted Manowar, taken them literally (as most Greek fans of the band I've talked to certainly seem to) but all the more power to them, I say. They've taken a joke and turned it stone cold serious. They conclude their set aptly

"Beneath the black mountain we're lead astray
Never to see our home again
Beneath the black mountain our journey ends"



I see below their friends are moved. Everyone's singing the coda lyric, myself included. I am thinking to myself "by moonlight we ride / ten thousand, side by side" and it's not so funny anymore.

Overdrive are up. Some old NWOBHM band. Bizarrely, they also employ a keyboardist that is fond of arpeggios. I stay for a couple of songs, they're not bad, just not for me. At least not after Atlantean Kodex messed up my metal ontology. I go overground to check on AEK and replenish supplies.

When I return to the underworld Enforcer seem to be in their second song and over the course of their set I come to realize it sounds like their third, fourth, fifth song and probably their first one too. If In Solitude's were a pleasant surprise, this other set of Swedish teenagers... not so much. I've not seen such an energetic live show since forever, though. Everyone on stage is all over the place, tempos are two hundred beats per minute and up uniformly. No ballad, no epic dirge. Their Swedish chops hold the motörheadisms from running together too much, blond teenage-looking singer with the fluffy hair is falsetto yelping the-end-of-every-line. Their Guitar Left dude is playing with his teeth. I guess I should be impressed by their vitality and for the first twenty minutes I kinda am but by the time they hit their second encore I've never been so tired so fast. I don't take drugs but I expect that's how a cocaine down feels like.

Slauter Xstroyes are up next. Most readers might not be aware of the Chicago band's cult status in the underground, some might be reading their strange name for the first time. Appreciators of the history of metal often say the genre peaked in originality in 1984 and then gene-spliced itself to its various permutations by 1986 and "it's all downhill from there". Slauter Xstroyes put out their debut, 'Winter Kill', in 1985 to little fanfare. A year too late to claim to be originators, a year too early for their innovations to become standardized. Must have sounded so sci-fi compared to Priest and Maiden back then. Their extremely tightly performed US-styled power metal is characterized by the almost manic mood changes in both singer's John Stewart's delivery and in the accompanying twisted compositions penned by Guitarist Paul Kratky and bassist Brent Sullivan. They could be said to be spiritual peers of another early US metal juggernaut, Jag Panzer, standing proudly on a different league to the more 70's styled metal bands that thought a single good riff and a memorable chorus were enough to make for a good metal song. No duds on that record, no filler and no mercy either. It accumulated cult acclaim slowly over the years while the band were gathering steam for their sophomore outing, 'Free the Beast'. Sadly as was the case with a lot of promising US metal acts, things fell through and the 1998 release of that record was untimely as it was posthumous. Never mind that the record was a masterpiece, the ship had sailed for them.

There is an allure to a band that goes out in their prime. especially in 'cult metal' circles. Imagine if Metallica broke up after Master of Puppets. Slauter Xstroyes are usually framed by hyperbole when discussed by metal curmudgeons. “Better than Maiden any day” is one I've heard a lot of times. “Best bassist in metal” is another. Regardless of whether I agree or not I can see where the draw is that leads to such extravagant statements of adoration. I first listened to Winter Kill in a my friend Jason's bedroom. I was a teenager early into metal and he was three years older and a few hundred cherry-picked records wiser than me, he had decided to set me on the right path. I listened to Omen that afternoon, to Watchtower, to Cirith Ungol and to Slauter Xstroyes. He must have said something like “you probably won't like this” before he played me the Winter Kill title cut and like always, half in spite, half in honesty, I said I did. Although the singer was alternating between forceful mezzo and King Diamond shriek in a seemingly random manner, although the song had more stop-starts than three Megadeth records and although the production was remarkably both dry and muddy. There was something there, unique and proud, unashamed. It took me a long time to actually fully appreciate that record like many other gems he had played for me and now that he's no longer here I often wonder how I could thank him.

When I heard Slauter Xstroyes were back together I was really hesitant, I checked Metal Archives and saw original singer John Stewart is not in the reformed line-up and that Paul Kratky's the only guitar player now. I never check out touring youtube clips before going to see live shows, it defeats the purpose. I had seen Omen with a new singer and a nigh-incoherent Kenny Powell on guitar in the last Up the Hammers so I was expecting something equally disappointing.

So up they go, they introduce themselves and proceed to slay.

Heavy Metal might be a young man's game but there are glaring exceptions. I've often been disappointed by reunion shows if not for inability to perform up to standard by that most often the reformers seem to be going through the motions for a paycheck. Playing songs but not conjuring entities. This isn't the case here. To start with, this is the tightest, strongest power trio I've heard play live. Kratky's trading riffs for fills with himself and Brent Sullivan is in “best bassist in metal” form. An club has graced us with great, crunchy sound and that's a great blessing for bands like these (I remember how in a past Up the Hammers, Brocas Helm had played with an ear-piercing guitar tone so trebly one couldn't tell the what the tonality was anymore). So, the sonic foundations are there but that wouldn't be enough.

New singer's got the pipes too. He hits every Stewart scream with gusto and great respect (respect? Yes, there is respect in replicating sublime material exactly, as one does not improvise on top of a J.S.Bach fugue with a light heart) and he has grace. Simple stage presence but effective, he holds the crowd in sync and it's a wild ride through emotions that change as abruptly as the colored stage lights. I'm sitting here trying to chop it up in discrete pieces, 'this was good, that was great' but honestly Slauter Xstroyes were one thing up there, they were together as a band, not as 'some musicians doing a reunion tour'. Sweat is running down brows as chords and leads are struck and their grimacing faces don't look old now, they look ancient. Carved out of stone. I go from appreciation to awe in the span of the first song. You know that Heavy Metal feeling?



The negative space underlines the sculpted contours and they play a new song to drive the Gestalt in. It sounds like it would belong in 'Free The Beast'. Schizoid and playful like much of that record yet urgent, crushingly immediate. I'm on board for their new album now, excitement, anticipation. Hope they keep this singer. Hope they put out ten records as good as the first two. Hope they grow from cult favorite to sans cult, they deserve it and let the elitists bitch. Really glad, grateful to have seen them. I'm fourteen years old again, listening to this US metal record defining my whole life. Slauter Xstroyes, how do you even pronounce that?


Well, after that Doomsword played. I'd be kinder to them if they had played below Slauter Xstroyes, kinder still if they hadn't put out a few records worth of redundant material since the beautiful first two. I stick around for the first five songs. They play well, they believe what they're doing and the crowd appreciates them. Sadly I'm in no mind to follow their steady pace after the tangential excursions of the night's real headliners. I head home excited, my fingers are pressing Slauter Xstroyes riffs in the palm of my hand and with memories to guide and inspire.
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Do you like chiptune music?

Then you could visit STUFAJPGM! The latest episode is about chiptune metal but I listened to a few others too and it's all pretty tastefully selected and interesting!

The wonderful people involved even used some of my old pixel art in the latest episode.

New comic page tomorrow.
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Programmatic Ruin

Some metal music conjures potent images in the mind's eye of the listener. Most often these images are vague and not directly informed by the lyrical material of the songs they belong to, more abstract dream-like scapes in washes of violent warm colors. I think this happens mostly because for metal bands the riff-writing is a separate art to the writing of lyrics. I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of angry rock or metal bands write the music first and it doesn't later change much or at all to contend for the feel and meaning of the lyrics. In fact when we're talking about metal, the writing of riffs (of which there are many) is simply addressed separate from the writing of coherent compositions (of which there are few and far between) but that's a topic for another time.

It is then a small wonder when a HM band that for all intents and purposes writes exactly like this, ends up conjuring very relevant images to the lyrics. Annihilator are such a band.

It's worth noting Schopenhauer's position on the purposes of music here.

Music is thus by no means like the other arts, the copy of the Ideas, but the copy of the will itself, whose objectivity these Ideas are. This is why the effect of music is much more powerful and penetrating than that of the other arts, for they speak only of shadows, but it speaks of the thing itself. "Music does not express this or that particular and definite joy, this or that sorrow, or pain, or horror, or delight, or merriment, or peace of mind; but joy, sorrow, pain, horror, delight, merriment, peace of mind themselves, to a certain extent in the abstract, their essential nature, without accessories, and therefore without their motives. Yet we completely understand them in this extracted quintessence. Hence it arises that our imagination is so easily excited by music, and now seeks to give form to that invisible yet actively moved spirit world which speaks to us directly, and to clothe it with flesh and blood, i. e. to embody it in an analogous example. This is the origin of the song with words, and finally of the opera, the text of which should therefore never forsake that subordinate position in order to make itself the chief thing and the music the mere means of expressing it, which is a great misconception and a piece of utter perversity; for music always expresses only the quintessence of life and its events, and never these themselves, and therefore their differences do not always affect it. It is precisely this universality, which belongs exclusively to it, together with the greatest determinateness, [364] that gives music the high worth which it has as the panacea for all our woes. Thus if music is too closely united to words, and tries to form itself according to the events, it is striving to speak a language which is not its own."

This smart man here explains, as I understand it, that the reason music is a universally loved and potent art is in that it doesn't (or shouldn't) seek to describe specific phenomena, but to be describe the archetypal expressions that all particulars spring from. In that sense metal bands might appropriate this definition of 'high music art' and comfortably consider their three chord riff-based abstractions to be a link to the primordial and be done with it. They are often right too. However I believe that Schopenhauer above had a far different standard of composition in mind to which most metal falls startlingly short of, not for their music being too linked to their lyrics to achieve universality, but by not being anything much on every level to begin with.

Secondly I think that abstraction has been hijacked by post-modernists with a consumerist agenda. How often do you hear, when trying to discuss the aesthetics and meanings of music, the offering of "dude, shut up, music is just music, man". I'm not sure Schopenhauer would be particularly proud. His sentiments can and have easily been appropriated by salesmen and vendors who would exclaim that since the music expresses universal emotions, then every one of us should buy all of it. If we look at popular music that is the distillation of abstraction in form and effect we see that it's working. So no offense to this smart man, but let's try to see what slightly different approaches offer us.

Annihilator above were not a band of very lofty ideals really, and the song posted doesn't have a high concept per se; It is in the plentiful abilities of main guitarist and composer, Jeff Waters that the composition of 'Road to Ruin' and indeed of most songs on their first two LPs, had become more involved than an average AC/DC song. He sounds like he has ADD, hyperactive, likes to cram in as many licks as he can but - unlike a lot of technical metal bands - has the good sense to compare what he's adding to what the song is achieving and rarely leaves a phrase in that is at odds. Jeff Waters can do what Annihilator do then because he's both extremely able on his instrument but also because he has the good sense to let the song's voice dictate what he (over)plays where.

In contrast, most metal (and rock) musicians struggle with a limited ability in their lead voice instruments, it is often a climb to express even an abstract concept. Sure, a lot of them play very fast or very precise, but what they play is often very limited and derivative. It might startle some knowledgeable Heavy Metal people to say for example that Autopsy (in the minds of most people a sloppy rude death metal band) are more erudite with their music than Meshuggah (a highly technical post-thrash band). The former simply have a larger musical lexicon. Most bands do not enjoy the mobility that great chops allow for to offer impressions of minutiae however. And those that work hard to get these chops usually masturbate with them predictable scale runs and basic syncopations over and over, impressive to laymen but ultimately one-note.

Not being a virtuoso is a blessing and a curse however. When one has barely 5 riffs in them, they tend to make them count and speak with them of encompassing emotions, namely despair and hope. This is the main characteristic of Heavy Metal really and it also explains why a lot of absolutely incredible bands often had just one great album in them, some even just a few great songs. That said, it's a pleasing variation and I feel, a worthy introduction to outsiders, to consider the minority of more skillful and considerate players that can strike with more precision once in a while.

The lyrics set the stage here:

No control tonight, the lights are going dim
The floor begins to tilt, it's blurring to a spin
Just let me find my keys, look down below
Fresh air is all I need, then I'll go

Leading up the road to ruin
You're full of alcoholic speed
Leading up the road to ruin
No last chance, don't bother to plead

High, over the limit, got to take it slow
Concentrate, kill the radio
It's not the first time, it'll be the last
I've said that before, in the past

Speed, I've got to make it home

Not too far to go, you're getting near
Just down the block, there's nothing left to fear
Carefree, on top of the world, feeling power
Impaired security at ninety miles an hour

Somebody's driving drunk, it doesn't end well.

The beauty of the thing is how the choices in riffs and voicings by Waters, along with the clean and tight lockstep of the capable rhythm section underline and amplify the sense of barely controlled chaos of the situation. Nearly every section of the song for me augments the picture, it supports an otherwise pretty stereotypical narrative.

Check out the natural harmonics lick at the end of the theme at 00:30 and how even before the plot is introduced a sense of instability and fragmentation hints of it in an otherwise straight ahead speed metal riff. Speed is the thing here but also blurriness, incoherency, confusion. These are the emotional elements that Waters' guitar pyrotechnics are most suited for.

In fact, for the duration of the verse, pay attention to how the regular palm muted riff is commented upon by a variation of different end licks, most of them choppy or syncopated, almost never repeating themselves, offering the listener no sense of security. Have you ever had manic thoughts that seem to dissolve before you're able to make them cohere to a larger structure, only to reappear and taunt you to try again? Have you ever been drunk?

The chorus with it's more austere and controlled rhythmics speaks in the second person. You're leading up the road of ruin, you're full of alcoholic speed. Look how effectively Waters shifts perspectives without any confusion just by musical cues. The unstable chaotic riffery belongs to the protagonist of the tale, the slower and regimented responses belong to a higher authority, a beholder. The listener feels compelled to empathize with both: id and superego together, schizophrenia. This is the overarching theme of Annihilator's early output.

Not to say that the song doesn't default to the familiar trappings of rock music, with its melody, verse, bridge, chorus and repeat. This is because Annihilator did not consider themselves purveyors of modern classical composition or anything, they probably had not heard of Schopenhauer not did enjoy programmatic music. They were writing hooky pop songs, but their inner ambitions overpowered the form. This is the basic definition of Heavy Metal in relation to its bordering musical genres, actually. The positives of the skeletal remnants of the basic pop song composition under this song are that the themes are reaffirmed and the listener is put to a hot-cold alteration between musical coherency and safety and then the wild chromatic deviations of Water that constantly upset. It's a potent dualism that fuels a lot of great Heavy Metal.

Check out the abrupt stop-starts under the first solo voice how they comment on its almost sonorous and hopeful tone (the driver hopes that he's going to make it home) but the second solo comes in mockingly, bending, rolling, laughing with this hope. It is appropriate that the most 'rock and roll' sounding part of the song is the voice of a higher fate, it's as if Annihilator are saying 'you're gonna crash and burn and let the devils dance in the flames'.

After a third chorus, the main riff is punctuated by sharp turns, futile floor breaks and finally the winding guitars signal the inevitable sounds of a crash. Every time I listen to this song I hum for hours after it not just the chorus or some melody but three or four parts in a row. I get hooked on a emotionally involving composition. I really love early Annihilator.

Not every song by them is so rich in imagery but most are. The most enjoyable ones actually are those written to lyrics of mental instability, Annihilator's forte, they let Jeff Waters' guitar go really crazy. Always a light band however, they're an easy way to get new listeners to appreciate Heavy Metal in other ways than just as a primal force that paints bluntly only the basest of scenes, screaming and growling and bludgeoning what is in effect existential ennui.

-Helm
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ZX Page 34: Montage

Alright, seeing that there was worship of Heavy Metal as requested, here's more ZX.



Another difficult page that I think turned out alright. I hope the reader realizes it's a flashback through various notable memories of Stephan's life as a child and as a teenager. I hope there's no confusion as to who is who.

The Greek expression is 'Guys are robots and girls are ferryboats' only, it rhymes. I'm very sad I can't use that in English and default to the American jock-idiot talk of 'bros before hos'. In fact if you, the native English speaker, know of an equivalent expression that is more childlike and innocent, do let me know.

For those interested in the formalities of comic making, consider the same page if the panel borders were drawn in, would it be so easy to move from one highlight in time to another, where years have passed between each strip?

-Helm
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See Death Walking, Death Alive

This is pixel art. Click here to go to a magical place where if you click on an image it becomes 2x the size and if you hold down the ctrl button and click on it it becomes half the size again so that you may inspect the pixel placements.

If you are interested in this sort of digital art, read the whole thread to get a feel of where the community online is on tool-use and methodology. Even if some things go over your head perhaps you'll be intrgued to know more and then you can browse Pixelation and Pixel Joint in earnest and make up your own mind.

This image was started before I got the impulse to make the ZX comic, so that is more than 9 months ago but I got a final push to finish it yesterday. You see when I did the first 10 hours of work on it I was listening to an excellent audiobook version of the first Elric of Melibone book. I had read this book for the first time back in 1998, when I was thirteen and it had a profound and lasting effect on me. Sadly the audiobook ran out and with it my impulse to finish the above piece.

On a whim I downloaded the second audiobook of the splendid 'Sailor on the Seas of Fate', it is not done as wonderfully as the first one but it did provide an impulse to go back to the old piece and put the final 5 hours in.

It's funny to me how the image looks basically like 'some zombie'. I realized that's how it'd be perceived when I was almost done with it and it kinda annoyed me 'cuz I don't like zombies and I was going for a more occult 'avatar of death' thing but oh well!

-Helm
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Ancient Greek Spaceships

Over at Illogical Contraption mr. Shelby Cobras has been kind enough to invite me to write about Greek metal circa 1990-2000 and posted it along a compilation of choice cuts of that period. Go download and listen and read if you're interested in underground Heavy Metal.

I don't write a lot about these things (and certainly not to that degree of detail) over here because the main focus should always be comics and how to live with them but who knows maybe some of you are also metalheads.

-Helm
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Mares of Hope

These walls are stained engraved with pain
You will find them under shadows casting shame
For some, it's all they've ever known, Angels of
the fortunate sons come and go ... You may not

Entities pass in the night
Guardians and the Reapers fight,
The will to live shall win
Mares of hope ride through their dreams
Blinding light awakens sleeping dawn
It seems it was all a dream, an endless dream

I will wish upon a star I believe in you
And if my will has strayed afar I remembered you
Will you remember me
I the one you sentenced penance unabsolved
Answer me, save my will, have you forgotten me

Pace the hallway blind man,
for a million miles of stars his mind has seen
Think you may that he lives in darkness
We're in the dark, he's seen the light of dream

Karen, she's been asleep forever
I know she hears me, she has so much to say
The machine sends sparks through her eggshell mind
A tear streams from her face
Into my hand, to my heart

I'm a fire without a flame
Helpless child without a name
With broken wings catch me I'm falling
I'm a question with no answer
Who are you that takes my life away from me
Unveil the boundaries of the black

I had a dream I was you
Strong as the fire in my veins
And when I called out your name
I would remain to witness the pain
I am beyond silent black
I will be back as your guardian

Angels in white you have sacrificed
You witness and bury the pain
You walk hand and hand with the fear stricken child
Strengthen the weak and the lame

Have you seen beyond the unborn
The pillars of penance and lore
Perpetual journey into the realm
The sovereign servitor


Human beings do not share a lot of common experiences. They share common drives which result in named emotions but the combinations of them as designed by circumstance and fate are unique to every one. The common experience of humans is not ideology either because words and meanings, while evoking with the austerity of thousands of years worth of pondering a deep respect, are in the end as subjective as the symbols conveyed by clouds.

The common experience of human beings is that of hope. Assorted elation and anger, fulfillment and despondency follow and mix and are difficult to describe but who doesn't know of hope? The illogical and untestable belief (if that word can begin to describe, because sometimes it feels so flimsy) that life will be good, one will achieve what they desire, the tally will be fair and finally, closure and contentment before the end.

Art isn't hope in itself. Art reminds of hope through awe. Artistic artifacts are fancy externalities, emotive curiosities that we often keep a safe distance from. We like to count them and catalogue them according to how often they made a controlled impact on us and we call that 'good art', thereleft the discard pile of bad art that made us feel nothing, highly suspect in both motive and design as usual. However from good art to great art there is a surrender that can only occur when the external breaks the safety net and reconfigures the internal, finds its vital place at the core. That's a violent process and it's shocking and it's a surrender and this is why people are sometimes reticent to talk not of 'good art' (art which has had some curious & controlled effect a week ago and might be worth suggesting to others on the same safe level) but of great art, the art which has climbed inside, has rearranged, has become real. People are reticent to talk about that because it's like talking about their deepest hopes.

As an aside, this is also why people often disguise merely 'good art' as great art and praise to the sky stuff that barely managed to have a bit of an effect on their mood last Saturday as if it's the self-defining pinnacle of all artistry. Merely a diversion. The undead like to appear breathing so as to gather around them a secondhand vicarious existence while their tender heart beats in the secret phylactery underneath their bed. You can spot these liches by their terminology when discussing said 'great art', avoiding personal risk and exposure.



Heavy Metal became an internalized reality for me during a troubled adolescence, as is common. Dreaming darkly through the disappointing minutiae that coalesce to a monumental disappointment, glimmering in still black water, a severe hope. A reflection of the stars above, so below, a proud dive inwards where the superego is distant and the ego can liken itself to the primordial fierceness of the id.

Heavy Metal has nothing to offer in ideology or social grace, its pursuits are personal & ingressive. It is dangerous because what it inspires is extremity and hyperbole: the world is for it, an eternal enemy. One might learn to shield themselves from it and be proud but what when the victory is complete and they are left alone? An absurdity of being calls magnetically to suicide and perhaps Camus would instead suggest the absurdity "requires revolt" but Heavy Metal is also dark and in some ways, a coward when it comes to toiling under a measured, endless burden.

But Heavy Metal sings of hope even through surface morbidity and through the naive solutions of a romanticist destruction and in this way it is a human art (humanist has become a different word meaning "that which likens but is not" so let me avoid) and the way it can get inside and rearrange is through the awe it inspires. Awe reminds us of our hopes. Some times people I meet who listen to less obvious types of music struggle to see how I - a person they think, of some sophistication and education - can be very single-mindedly given to Heavy Metal, why I become easily bored or disassociated from other types of more faceted, glib, subversive music. It is because I have been awed by Heavy Metal, I have fallen in love with it and the love will last forever. I have no strength for many mistresses and those who dabble with them all I do not want to emulate nor do I ever trust completely.

Heavy Metal induces awe with ancient, simple meaning. When Fates Warning sing of secret promises to stars, of obligation and of remembrance, they are not humans named John Arch or Jim Matheos, they are a primordial entity, named as far as the warnings of fate can be given names. Clotho spins the threads of life, Lachesis will measure them and Atropos will cut them with her shears. A god sings distant, a symbol behind the symbols of clouds, he doesn't teach anything but shows with grace: one has been given back what they always possessed.

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early heavy metal memories

Those guys are scary

Over at Invisible Oranges there's been a vibrant comment space on the subject of first records to get readers into Heavy Metal. I interpreted the question a bit more openly and besides listing of records I also mentioned formative heavy metal experiences. Here's the relevant bit below:

"[...] My second HM experience was a year or so later [when I was aged six] where my mom let me go to the close-by playground on my own for the very first time, in Crete and there were two teenager metalheads there (must have been early 1990, remember, at that time only delinquents and misfits listened to Heavy Metal in Greece, the traditional 10 year delay in music vogue from America to most European countries) all decked out in denim and leather and chains with long hair. I looked at them shocked. One turns to the other and says "hey, do you see my friend here? He likes to eat little boys like you" His friend grinned devilishly. I ran away crying. When I collected my six-year-old courage, I found a piece of wood and returned to the playground to 'beat them up' (I don't know man, I was six) but they had left."

I had some free time earlier today to pencil the memory (well... reconstructed, 20 year old memories are very foggy but the gist is there), when I'm done with the comic I will endeavor to return to this one and ink it as well. The past couple of days have been a bit of a downer but it was pleasant to do this one and with rejuvenated feeling I return to the ZX comic :D

-Helm

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Going to Denmark

Back on the 4th of January.






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Running down the memories, wrapped up in desire

I spent this morning listening to Secrecy and playing Solitare Mahjong. I don't know if the reader has spent time with any variation of this computer gaming staple, if they have they might agree it's pretty conductive as a backdrop for active thinking because it engages on a very shallow level, requires calculation of a couple moves ahead at best. It's no Go game, but it's not mind-numbing either like Peggle or whatever. Secrecy were a pretty emotional band (really worth a blog post in themselves) and although I'm familiar with the lyrics to both Raging Romance and Art In Motion, they're often vague enough that subconsciously my own emotional experience fills in the ambiguous space. Their singer in particular, does this half-step note ascending plead with his voice a lot that holds some teenage angst connotation for me.

So here I was in relative solitude, brain and heart activated, what could ever come bubbling in the conscious surface than my own woeful adolescence? Perhaps another factor that contributed was that I awoke this morning from the common recurring semi-nightmare of being back in high-school, going through finals (badly). Come to think of it that's probably the catalyst for what I came to think about and not the music+game combo. I probably put on Secrecy exactly because of the dream. Trying to sort out subconscious-to-conscious causal paths is complicated. Anyway, this is a post about a girl. Due warning that I'm going to be pretty honest below and if you have a heart it probably is going to remind you of your own teenage heartbreaks and do you really want to have a melancholy morning?








Fair enough.

I think I was fourteen or so, I was taking English after school. I was a bad student in school but very good in English due to an early fascination with heavy metal and adventure games. English held my interest long enough to learn, unlike most other subjects, basically. So in the English classroom was my only chance to academically gloat. I now realize most of my classmates disliked me for it though they were quiet about it. I can now see why, it's pretty embarrassing to see an awkward teenage introvert desperately grab his chance to show off, must have been pretty overbearing. A common post-facto realization I have about myself is that I'm overbearing.

So I was the classroom know-it-all for once in my life and this - I theorize in retrospect - had the uncommon side-effect of getting this girl to be interested in me.

We talked a lot before and after class, she was very enthusiastic about getting to know me to which I adapted surprisingly quickly (introvert kids do not necessarily lack a big ego). I wrote her *a lot* of heavy metal mixtapes because though CD burners existed back in ancient 1998 I didn't have one. She showed enough enthusiasm for me to keep on doing it. She was trying, I realize, to cut out a small space in her reality for me by adopting some of my music taste which should have tipped me off that she was interested in me for reasons other than my record collection. Were I more experienced in these matters I'd have caught up but hey give me a break, I was fourteen.

This went on for close to a year I think, perhaps more. In any case it was thereabout that a mutual acquaintance told me that she knew for a fact that our mutual friend wanted to be more than a friend to me. It rocked my world. Up to that point it hadn't entered my young mind that such a very attractive girl would be into me. The reader might remember how at an innocent age when they looked at beautiful people they didn't connect that with their nascent lust, that's how it was for me, I realized just how beautiful she was and how I'd like to get together with her in the space of the few seconds after being informed that she was interested in me.

The rest of this story demonstrates how whatever Gods that may be are cruel masters.

As it was explained to me much later the common friend that had informed me about her interest had also told her about it and she freaked out because she was into - or in a semi-relationship with - this other guy about whom all I remember was that he had a small motorbike and was a 'bad boy' so he had me at a startling disadvantage. She didn't want to risk ruining our friendship or whatever, I don't think I'll ever understand this rationale, I've had sex with all my close friends and it's always worked out great! Anyway, what happened was that as I was trying to make my gentle (some would say weak-ass) advances she shut me down in the severest way, which, dear readers and humans, is not found in the finality of a confrontation (wish I were so lucky) but instead in constant evasion. She left just enough room for us to keep on being friends but not enough for me to ask her out, it was a pretty confusing guessing game for young Helm and what was most confusing of all was this feeling of mounting anger inside me. I can since summon this feeling at any time I think about that situation and it's a hollow orb in my chest that pulls inwardly my sanguine humour leaving me exhausted but manic. Manic to DESTROY.

What I felt before that when considering my interpersonal prospects was a sort of resignation. I felt like an ugly child and even uglier teenager (thin, hairy, pretty awful acne too, and earlier than most of my friends!) so I had devised fortifications to shield me from disappointment: I didn't even try to get anywhere with girls. The anger was new and it had to do with how - I realize now - my emotions had been toyed with, being constantly offered something and then once I reached for it, pulling it away mockingly. At the time I couldn't internalize this anger, I got pretty passive-aggressive with her, to the point where I straight out stopped talking to her/avoided her. There were some lapses where we'd start talking again and I'd get passive-aggressive again, and the more psycho I got the more she became cold, though never decisively frostbitten, like the Sphinx she offered riddles and I always had to torment myself for the answers. It took me a long time to understand the mechanics of mutual attraction and the memories are pretty embarrassing, but what it comes down to is she - like most women I've discussed their relationships with - had mistaken emotional fortifications against the chance of a relationship as self-assuredness, and she was attracted to this guy that had his own world-view, his own tastes, his own desires and dreams and wasn't afraid of anything. This guy wasn't me, though. As my weaknesses unfolded in front of her she was gradually appalled. There was a quiet violence, a horrible manipulation to get what I wanted and for her to get what she wanted instead, whose truth crystallized in me only through masochistic later-life repetitions of this same situation. Hopefully I think I've broken out of that loop for the last few years.

You might think how a girl not having a relationship with me isn't such a big deal and how your own memories of actual relationships that failed must be way harsher. It's not that simple, it wasn't that we didn't have a relationship, we did. We just skipped from friendship and then courtship, straight to the painful breakup without the good stuff in between. No acceptance, no safety, no stability, just alternating scalding hot showers of promises and freezing dips into the pools of denial. Afterwards I learned that her best friend had, when she deferred to her on what to do about the choice between myself and 'bad boy', told her to adopt the avoidance routine so she could have both; Thanks a lot for a hellish summer, her friend.

Well at some point English class ended, I got my couple of Proficiencies and she didn't and had to stay on, hah! take that! . . . We lost touch and I went on to have my heart ruined by a string of other women, but the first one will always be special.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I had segued from pre-teenage innocence straight to the emotional stability found in being accepted and loved during these years and although the anger was internalized (and used for good!) until it wasn't needed anymore, I don't think the deeper wound will ever go away. I'm still paranoid in any relationship (sexual or otherwise) that I've outstayed my welcome, that I'm being a burden. I do not trace all of it back to that situation when I was 14-15, but it certainly didn't help. And it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy also because when you think that way, you extrude doubt and fear when you should be all about self-assuredness and capacity. I ran into a pretty bad combo after this and it culminated with me giving up on sexuality and emotionality (or as Robot-Helm would have said *hrrhk* IN-STICT *kkrk*) on the whole for 3 years, but that's a completely different story.

Adversity shapes the psyche in positive ways also. I try to be sympathetic for anyone who is being deprived of what they'd like to have and especially of the bitterness and anger that prolonged denial creates. The only way for such a selfish animal like the human to allow other people's heartache to touch them is if their own heart is spacious. The world is cutting and carving little pieces out of it, the sooner one comes to terms with what they're left to work with, the better.
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So you want to order a book!

Why would you? It's all in crazy moon language (Greek)!

Well if you insist, we can at least talk about it.

It would cost you 5 euros plus shipping to whichever crazy part of the world you're at. We'll have to sort this out between the two of us. I'm a virgin when it comes to shipping costs. Will you teach me?

You would pay me through paypal, optimally. Or you could entice me through promises of sexual favors that you'd think would never have to be acted upon to forgo currency for a time. But what if we perchance meet in the future?! Would you deny me then?

It's 60 pages. The full-page comics are from this blog (though delicately printed in their original resolution!) and there's a boatload of comic-strips I haven't posted here. The page-setting and graphic design has been handled by the wonderfully resilient and beautiful Anny (though you'd have to take my word for it) and the cover has been painted by the formidable German mountain of talent that is Ptoing (Sven Ruthner to his enemies) and you don't have to take my word for that, you can go over there and see for yourself! Lino-cuts now! There's even a professionally shot photo of me in there by Dominika Dzikowska (some of her work here). I find the photo to be wonderful, though some guys made fun of me for it in the festival. The women liked it though, I uh.. hope.

You may see its dimensions - for they are hefty and inconvenient for any but the most spacious bookcases - below:

Amebix + Bolt Thrower = B.F.F.E.

People tell me it's great. They have to, otherwise the charming person above in the photo with me breaks their kneecaps. Yes, while wearing that on his head.

I don't expect to sell more than 5-10 internationally since it's in Greek so I feel pretty alright with the idea of going to the post office these few times. Uh, actually I don't, that sounds really boring. That at the idea of shipping stuff I feel bored my true lack of ambition for success shows. Hey, you might have to wait a few days to get your order, actually. A week? If the weather is good, less because I go cycling with my dearest friend, Nick, towards the post-office when the weather is good.

But why would you want this anyway? Perhaps you should reconsider.

If you are dead-set about this you may leave me a message through e-mail. You can find my e-mail if you're reasonably crafty.

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A 24hour comic! (Page 3)

Page 3 of 5.

Well the book is being printed so everything is fine on that end. I will have it in my hands on the 21st, it seems. That's fortuitous because the Babel comics festival starts on the 22nd. Kinda excited.

About the comic, this is where the paneling starts to become a bit more sedate because the brain didn't feel up to fancy designs anymore. The band that formulated after the demise of Nick's earlier effort still exists and plays and records today though by design its material is not something to share publicly. That band however is pretty much the 'other half' of my artistry and it takes a similar amount of my time as do the comics. It being very private is a different sort of experiment to what I'm trying to do with my public art. I think a lot of artists have a more private and a more open side even if they don't strictly differentiate the two by different art forms. It's kinda strange when an artist dies and slowly the work which for whichever personal reason they had deemed unfit for publication, slowly leaks out there. Kavafis, a Greek poet comes to mind. Do people feel a degree of shame when they peruse something that wasn't intended for them? I certainly do.

As before, ask questions and you will receive honest answers.

Also, since I guess most readers don't follow all the comments I'll state it clearly here: Due to a recent adverse situation, I would please advise commentators-to-be to not abuse their anonymity. A great way to do this would be to register with blogger to begin with, and make your profile link to something of yours. I really enjoy wondering through the links found thusly and this sort of communication is imperative to what I'm trying to do.

- Helm

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Enter Vast Dominions, Welcome to My Dream (part the first)

Sorry for the pompous post title, I enjoyed the synchronicity of listening to Savior Machine while writing this post. Perhaps you could listen to them while you read it also, wouldn't that be nice? We are not the same person and we will never know the inside of another but here, let's pretend!

This is material made originally for the 2006 Babel comic art festival here in Greece. This is an annual festival organized by the people who put out the same-named comic magazine. Both the festival and the magazine enjoy a rich history and culture and they've been absolutely fundamental at increasing awareness of 'comics for adults' in Greece. It was the first time I was asked to participate and participate I did. The theme for the show was 'Dream, Perhaps?' (a reference in a collected work by M. Manara when we was still making amazing, beautiful, insightful pieces of art and not just ass comics). My entry is emphatically a dream (as stated in the introductory page). I took a few liberties which I'll discuss further on, but on the whole the dream experience is unaltered.

Exactly because this is a dream, there are some visual language tricks that I try to recur a lot so they become familiar though always odd and (hopefully) unsettling, what with the squiggly lines that signify beat pauses... and also I am trying to make the textual elements become textural as well, much like G.P.Russell, whom I respect very much (check how in the first panel they obey perspective). Also the hard black line for the stare at the last panel.

I've been discreetly placing these curvy lines in so many comics of mine since we put out the 'Free Your Line' magazine (on the third issue of which I also put this story) as a bit of an inward homage. The name of the fanzine might have come to us as a jest but I tried to take it as a lateral concept, the idea that one 'frees his line', that he doesn't define his work by the standard of others. I place the squiggly line a lot by my signature even when I'm not using it as a visual language piece as a little respect to that circle of friends and what they mean to me.

When this went to the festival some snide comments by other artists were conveyed to me about the quality of the paper I had used. You cannot see here but the original (which I gave to the show as opposed to photocopies) was inked on very cheap paper with the result of the big black border in the intro page - which was hand-inked, there's no floodfill bucket in real life, as sadly, there's no undo - had visibly 'scarred' the paper. The black in places and was generally not completely opaque, the handwork was visible. In the version you are looking at of course I have ran sharp Levels in photoshop so the black is black black, but this is not because I agreed with these comments and was ashamed by the paper or the 'hand-doodled' effect. I believe a piece for a festival should be shown in the format it was made, imperfections and all, it's not just a comic story to be read, it's an artifact to be examined. The Idea Space comic can wait for when it's publicised in print, I see no reason to pretty up the original when I'm showing the original, nor do I really see the reason to buy fancy expensive paper for work that'll be harshly thresholded for final print anyway. What, will better paper make the comic better? That sort of 'professionalism' makes me wary of professionals. The sort of people that keep their doodles and serious work alike in perfect carefully plasticized folders named after each month of each year. Just make the thing and it's done, it's made, you can move on.

Oh well! I will return with page 3 (of 5) in a couple of days.

Also, it is now 2009. I have made some resolutions of my own that aren't very easy to explain... it's perhaps because I don't usually make resolutions that when I've decided to do so they became quite involved and multi-layered... the gist of it is that I'm leaving behind the shames that I've got left, slowly but surely. I will try to stand more bare until I am naked, slowly but surely. I will take what I desire because this life is mine and I owe no shame to anyone man or institution or belief. That sort of thing, it might sound abstract and distant but it's not, it has to do with every single day that'll come. It'll be interesting therefore, this year, the 25th year of my life. I can't tell if it will be a good year for it but I can hope. I hope for me and I hope for you.

We could obviously not start then in any other way than with a short story about what makes simple things worth it, by a suspiciously monosyllabic faux-prehistoric giant bird.



-Helm

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What's in the bag?

I'm sorry. Prosopagnosia and Karistos. Some things Just don't translate any better than that.



This comic came to be due to a happy accident, as Bob Ross would say. I didn't have time to ink and color it, and the color page was a mandatory one for the newspaper so this is just pencils and photoshop color. I don't generally like to color my comics, nor do I particularly enjoy painting on the whole, so I went for an impressionistic, mostly limited hue palette that I felt suited the goings on in the comic. I'm not sure how well this conveys what I was going for, I don't think I ever got any feedback for it so I guess this is the time to check for real!

I am especially fond of how - again by accident - the bottom row left three panels seem as if they're cut out of a different page and collaged together on top of a very red canson paper or something. It suits them because that is the only moment of emotional elation in the comic.

As to Prosopagnosia, the illness. I'm afraid I've taken some liberties with how it actually works, as there really doesn't seem to be a time when you 'remember someone more'. However as a parallel to an interpersonal relationship, I think it works. At the point of when I was making this comic (somewhere between Deep Inside The Earth and Anger Managment) I was really not very emotionally or psychologically sound and a lot of my personal frustrations carried on to the pages. Therefore I am really not convinced anyone would be able to gather neither the extremity of my personal condition at the time (which even if they could, the merit of such a thing would be debatable) nor to extapolarate from it something closer to their own experiences. However given how Deep Inside The Earth has resonated with a lot of you readers and humans I can only hope this might as well. If not, sorry for wasting your time.

On the formalist level, look at that non sequitur shot at the lampposts between the two pieces of conversation. Just a simple empty beat, but try to imagine the comic without it, would be worse, wouldn't it? Just run-on sentences. Also this is one of at least 3-4 comics I've done which feature a motorway or railway, suspended bridges and that sort of stuff, I really like drawing them because they're man-made and they usually cut incisions over otherwise natural terrain, but unlike other human constructions, nobody really lingers there, nobody walks around on them, they're just places in between that people pass through with their cars or trains. On a metaphysical map level, they're blank spots. Human stories happening in blank spots pleases me.

If I were to draw this today, I'd ink it, though. It would probably be less of an effective comic (whatever the effect is, I'm covering my ass here) but it would nag my Inking Sense less, at least. We all have our obsessions.





But what could be in that bag.

-Helm

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