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Head: Save me from myself

26/09/08 || Lord K Philipson

I happen to love some of Korn’s earlier work though I wouldn’t say I’m much of a fan nowadays. I actually fucken hate what Korn’s doing today. It’s unlistenable garbage, overproduced by meaningless hip-hop affiliates and whatnot. It’s shit. S-H-I-T. When I really think about it I usually skip any Korn song not from “Follow the leader” when it comes on my Winamp. Maybe I’m not such a fan after all… Fuck it, what it leads us to is that Korn’s become a goddamn circus with different drummers and whatelse 7 times a week. This circus lost one of its clowns some years back. Coz as the infamous shirt said: “Korn gave Head to God”. It’s not exactly like they gave anyone to the good ol’ “God” fucko, though. Head seemed to think it was the right time to be walking down the boring, “righteous” path all by himself. Good for him. By the way, the shirt print sure was ace.

Who’s next in line to get head? Korn were first. And Korn represent the devil’s music according to some, so Papa Satan was first too. Jesus turned up taking sloppy seconds. Whoever the third will be, congrats – you just got yourself a talented musician blowing your cock for everything it’s worth. And with some luck he might be quoting the bible while doing it so you can have a laugh at the same time. I don’t think we’ll see 50 Cent in the competition anytime soon though, you all know about the ridiculous letter(s) and the song (originally called “A cheap name”, now entitled “Home” on this album) Head sent him, trying to convert him into, and I quote, “God’s frontline soldier”.

Now this is the part I absolutely can’t cope with. I despise what Brian Welch stands for and all his muthafucken Jesus-talk. I have a beef with people like that. Delusional, psychotic, lost, weak fucken people. People who, after years of doing crack/smack/whatever suddenly find Christ and everything turns into fucken Graceland (with Elvis alive and well), a new world where Michael Jackson is not a pedophile and OJ Simpson is not guilty of murder. La-la land de luxe. Go away, you are rats. Some of these idiots obviously have a talent for music though, and in this particular case it’s quite clear who actually managed to make Korn sound decent-to-great in the past. By the way, 50 never replied to Head, or commented on anything Head-ish, according to all news sources. 50 prolly thinks Brian is a (drumroll…) DickHead, haha, hoho, haha… Shut up.

On to the album at hand…

This Head fucko knows how to write catchy tunes and on his debut full length he shows it. Ofcourse you can hear stuff that could have been suitably placed on some older Korn recording, after all – he was in that band for quite some time before the drugs wore out their effects and he decided to move on and play with Jeebus’ penis. Anyways, he’s cooked up some fine rockish half-metal on this here piece, I can’t deny it. It sounds somewhat fresh with a crystal clear production and some decent vocals. Those vocals are, by the way, in need of some improvement (the badly used Auto-Tuner at times is not helping the overall impression either) as they are, sometimes, not really living up to the actual music presented on “Save me from myself”. They are not bad per se, but they are lacking something at times.

The drums could need a bit more punch to them as well (especially the snare) and while we are at it – I wouldn’t have complained if I was actually able to hear the bass a bit (alot) better. But hey, these are just minor flaws. And no, thank god (hohoho), the lyrics aren’t a festival of “Hey dude! Jesus likes your cock! Oh shit, and he loves you too!” bullshit. But it’s definitely as borderline horrendous as Brian’s got the imagination and vocabulary that of a 5 year old kid. Sure, there are some silly and cheap references to Head’s new-found belief in his lyrics, do like I do and ignore them. What we can’t ignore though is that we won’t see Head winning prizes anytime soon for being Lyricist of the Year since some/most stuff on here is really, really embarrassing. Just check this out, from “Flush”:

“Tell me no gossip. I don’t wanna know. Jimmy got caught. Smelling like beer. By his mom and his dad. He’s grounded for a year. Lisa got popped. She got a DUI. She cussed out the cops. She’s lucky she’s alive. Tell me no gossip. I don’t wanna know. Pedro got jumped. He’s always starting fights. Every time he gets drunk. It happens all the time. Reggie OD’d. From slamming heroin. He’s not a dope fiend. He was trying to fit in. Take me away please. Oh know life blows”

Who the FUUUUUUUUCK sings about Pedro?! It’s a good thing for Head that I’m not focusing on the lyrics (too much) when I score this album or we’d end up with a 2. The examples of terrible, terrible lyrics are many, many, many. Luckily, all the written words by Head aren’t this awful. Only about 85 percent. As said, ignore what he’s singing and concentrate on the music, let the vocals be just another instrument. That will make the album better. If you wanna see more of what kind of crap (I have warned you) Head writes, this is the link to use.

So now when we are in full ignore-the-lyrics mode let’s state (again) that Head’s got a knack for writing memorable shit (just listen to the section 30 seconds into “Re-bel”, one of countless of parts on this album that is absolutely fucken ace) that you can hum in a second and that won’t leave yer head if you are into this kind of shit aka heavy, simple guitars with some steady, grooving beats backing them up, spiced with some neat electronics here and there (pretty much everywhere actually) accompanying the guitars, giving the tunes a nice vibe. There are some nice piano parts interfering with the “metal” formula as well, and we all know I tend to dig pianos and whatnot in my music.

I heard some samples from this album (or the fucken EP released prior to this, whatever) some time back and was surprised of the fact that it sounded this “heavy”, considering Jesus himself obviously was writing for this album through poor Head. Well, I know what I fucken dig and what I don’t. Head’s ideologies and ramblings about god/Jesus/tacos/dolphins can fuck off to Illusionville, but I’ll take another round with this album any day since it’s some damn fine music that makes me nod my head (no pun intended) approvingly more often than any given fucken grvm’n‘tr00 black metal band these days. And you know where I stand when it comes to a proposed “god” and religions themselves.

I’m as surprised with the quality of this album as Head himself will be when he discovers Jesus was nothing but a carpenter with some excellent writers around him who created some historical book while being all fucked up beyond comprehension – all thanx to a fantastic cocktail made out of mushrooms, LSD, Angel Dust, PCP and horse semen. I can only imagine how good music this guy could come up with if he put all of his mind into it instead of spending 95% of his time in the Holy Blowjob Marathon, working up the sweat.

7.5 “Christi(ns)anity”‘s by Grave out of 10. It could actually have been an 8, but the lyrics are just way to juvenile and irritating – no matter how hard you try to ignore them.

Information
Released: 2008
Label: Driven Music Group
Website: www.brianheadwelch.net
Band
Brian Welch: vocals, guitars, programming
Archie J. Muise, Jr: rhythm guitar
Tony Levin, John Peña & Trevor Dunn: bass
Josh Freese: drums

Tracklist
01. L.O.V.E.
02. Flush
03. Loyalty
04. Re-Bel
05. Home
06. Save Me From Myself
07. Die Religion Die
08. Adonai
09. Money
10. Shake
11. Washed By Blood

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