WHY HARCORE SUPERSTAR ARE BORING ME...

Not many of you have seen pics of me in a public capacity, like when I've been in magazines or fanzines or different band pics....simply because there are not that many of them. But if you are to find them, as far back as the start of Mr.Zippy in the mid 90s to the end of Lucien last year you will not find a single beer, drink or ciggarette in the picture.

It's not that we didn't drink or smoke or partake in the odd bit of other naughty from time to time, it's just that...what's the big deal with that and rock bands?

OOO the camera man is coming, quickly, light up a smoke and for gods sake someone get me that bottle of Jack Daniels I filled up with cold tea so I look cool.

I/we decided that it looked so damn lame that either you couldn't go without it while someone took your picture or that you obvioulsy have these substances in the picture to prove how "cool" you are. I actually think it looks fucking pathetic.



Kids theses days have enough problems without wanna be rockstars thinking they need to get wasted to be cool and being influenced by idiots who glorify substance abuse because it's "cool" leading the kids into more problems in the future.

And so onto Hardcore, they have released a new album called "Lick My Love Pump" or something on the same 80s cliche level with a picture of a girl licking between her fingers in a sexually suggestive way on the front. I mean...what is it? Is it not 2010, soon 2011?!? Have we not developed beyond this sexist cliche bullshit yet?



And with the new album, comes the rock press. Every magazine I pick up is a pic of them being all "rock"....they look like cartoon cliches of a rock band, like someone has sat a fancy dress on four guys if you had no idea about rock music and just wanted to do a picture of a "rocker".

In Sweden Rock Magazine was a large interview with one of them where he revealed all the crazy wild stuff the band does. Very lame that you have to tell the press yourself how "wild and crazy" you are. Are these things he says true? Well....actually I can say yes because some of them I was there for. But at the same time....are they not a band? Who gives a fuck which member of which other band stuck his cock in your mouth or how much your drank or what ever else you did....release a good album and you don't need all the rock cliche bullshit that goes with the lifestyle. And it's much cooler if the rock press writes about it without you yourself having to tell them eh?

Motley Crue...the dirt. We've all read it, read the end. Rehab, AA, Insanity, Plastic Surgery and reality TV, Prison. That's how it ends kids. It's not cool.

I live in the same town as one of Hardcore and have seen him about shopping in the 2nd hand shops with his woman on a saturday morning, looking very normal, not a single bottle of whiskey in sight. I give much more respect for that.


These days we don't need another cartoon cliche of a rock band portrayed by 30-somethings in eyeliner, and the kids need better rolemodels before we all end up with problems - Rat Skates' new film "WELCOME TO THE DREAM"is gonna open the lid on that I am sure, show us how young starry eyed rock wannabes are blinded by the substances and the livestyle that give them far more problems in the future, influenced to start by idiots who feel the need to glorify their substance abuse.

Me...If anyone asks me about my "crazy" life. I'll take the more romantic version of my rock and roll life. I'll quote Penny Lane in "Almost Famous" when accused of doing less then half the things she says she has...

"I've done TWICE the things I say I have"

And it leads to this:

A THOUGHT AFTER CHRISTMAS...

...After you've opened all your presents, watched the cartoons, finished the last of your turkey, stuffed down your stuffing and washed it all down with lashings of your chosen spirit, have a little think if you might know anyone that could well be sat there all alone at Christmas.

I'm not talking about the homeless or the elderly (although of course they should not be forgotten) but maybe you have a mate somewhere that doesn't have a family or anywhere to be.

You see, as you may have guessed I am not the biggest fan of the festive season, not only because of it's stolen themes and the complete forced commercial madness (and the shops closing, or being impossible to access) but because it's usually the time of year when all my mates are unavailable leaving me sat on my ass staring at the wall.


This year was my first alone for a few years and I got to remembering how it is, I can really see why the suicide rate goes up at Xmas. I was sat logging into my Facebook every 10mins or so to see endless status updates and pictures of the rest of the world celebrating while I didn't even have a telly to slob out in front of, no money to get anything nice in and basically nowhere to go.

Thankfully my day was saved when my girl showed up in the night to feed me homemade cheesecake, beer and an xmas present of a bottle of Jack. That was my saving, But I wonder how many people didn't get saved.

I think of all the people who have maybe been recently divorced, or recently seperated and trying to start out on their own. Or maybe those who might have moved to a new city or a new country, those who might not have the money or the circle of friends. Quite simply, being sat about with nothing to do when all around you the rest of the world laughs and eats and drinks and has that nice warm fuzzy feeling sucks. Lets remember that next year.

Next up....why New Year sucks elephant cock.

Elk out.

WELCOME TO THE DREAM

There I was doing my once-every-six-months crawl through all the bullshit that I get sent still on the LUCIEN myspace page (y'know..."hey, we have a new picture, please love us", "we have an album, it's free"......don't care) and I saw a post from Rat Skates that caught my eye.

I don't know how many of you know who Rat Skates is...he now looks like this



But once upon a time looked like this

(he's the one with the big curly hair)

He was the drummer for the first bunch of Over Kill albums and then went on to make documentary films, so far BORN IN THE BASEMENT and GET THRASHED - use your Googles to go check these films out they are an amazing account of thrash metal etc in the 80s and 90s.

So, he's making a new film and gawd bless 'im if it isn't one very close to my own heart. It's called WELCOME TO THE DREAM and is a focus on how many musicians go on to be wonderful and famous and rich...but that's only about 4%, the other 96% can end up with serious problems. Sometimes they just want it so much they get sucked into the world, others (and remember madness and genius often go hand in hand) have serious problems such as ADD, OCD, depression, alcoholism and drug abuse.

He describes it as "a rude awakening: Art - Money - Success - Ego - Fear...KIDS CANNOT SURVIVE WHAT THEY DO NOT UNDERSTAND". And I couldn't agree more!



Go into http://welcome-to-the-dream.com/ or look up "Welcome To The Dream" on Facebook and have a looky - especially for all you wannabes and hopefulls out there, it's gonna be an eye-opener. He's already got ANVIL on board!

Elk out.

THE HOWL OF THE LYKAN...

As GHOST have proved to us, we all love a good "mystery" band. Although now I know who GHOST are and it's not that exciting (most of us guessing are on the right lines...) they would be just as great as band if we all knew anyway.

Recently I came across a band called LYKANKULT which blew me away, raw and unrefined like a smash in the face from a block of ice. Pretty much some of the best raw Black Metal I have ever heard...but who the fuck are they!?!? Or he!?!? Or she!?!?

Doing an interwebs search I only found one page with no links (http://callofthelykankult.blogspot.com/) and nothing really on it...but I wanna know where I can buy more!



By the looks of the picture it's a he, or this could not be he/she/it... It might be GHAAL trying to gain some underground points...but then again it could be anyone with a beard!

Anyway...if anyone has any more info....get me it this way!

SATAN vs PUNK vs BUDDHA

Those of you who come here and read my bollocks on a regular basis will know of how I like to compare buddhism with the philosophy of punk rock from time to time. IE: to look around at society and be displeased and seek the truth instead of being dragged into the prison of "normal" society.

Since winter has drawn in and I have been diving head first into the realm of black metal I have noticed that the reoccuring theme of satanism comes up, but not satanism as the lay man knows it.


It is not a worship of an evil horned being like in a Dennis Wheatley film but more a dislike and rebellion against organised religion, and of course more so for christianity.

The famed church burnings in Norway and Sweden in the 90s and beyond were caused by "satanists" but only satanists in the way that they were rebelling against the religious blindfold and take over that had come to their land 1000 years ago.

Watching these interviews with people such as Darkthrone, Watain, Mayhem, Burzum and more you get the impression that "satan" as a being has fuck all to do with anything and it's been more so a desire to discover the truth in life as a human being. Some through rebellion,m some even through pain. Can we say asthetics? The people of ancient India that lived in the forest and believed that the only way to find the truth was through causing themselves extreme harm.


Even way back then in the times of 500bc or so when the holy men of the land were granted more status than the kings over the people did people start to rebel, hence how buddhism was founded. Although today it may exist as an "organised" religion, it has still remained pure in some way to it's original ideas, which has no god, or no proof of a god or an afterlife or anything like that but does have a focus on the true "spirit" within the mortal body of humans and the truth of existence.

So with the rise of punk rock in the 70s (some might claim also the late 60s) was this the ultimate goal. A look deep inside yourself and to find why you are not happy with what surrounds you. Some people are content with the 9 to 5 life, school, job, marrige, kids, house, car, death. Pay your bills, pay your taxes, obey the system, question nothing.


Buddha, punk rock and satanism all consider these people blind sheep.

Punk rock was also a rebellion against the system - although it became more of a parody of itself and even more so in later years, although the true still carry on in their millions worldwide.

The underground, the ones who will see and find the truth all carry on under different banners. Amen.

************

On a different note, I was made homeless a few months back and will be struggling to pay off huge debts I needed to create to get back on feet and find a place to live in Sweden and carry on with my school. Please help me out by looking at my online store

http://zombieattackrecords.blogspot.com/

and maybe buying one of my books I wrote or the Lucien CD, every bit will help!

Elk out.

A TOUCH TOO MUCH

Got to thinking on the way home from the palace of the Elf King how much rock music has slipped it's way into modern life these days. These days if you go into any old store or market place you can see t-shirts of bands like AC/DC and even once rebels of the underground Metallica.

When I was a wee 'un growing up in Bristol and then Clevedon there was no way we could really know about which band was which and it was really hard to find stuff. No fanzines, no MTV, no internet there was maybe KERRANG magazine and the sort lived "RAW" magazine to thumb through but they were only focused on whatever was big at that time. I swear for two or three years in the mid-90s every second page was only about Metallica.

you wish you were this cool in 1986

So rock music was hard to know and only the few bigger bands cut through mainstream music to our ears. I remember the yearly school discos which were an exciting thing because if we were lucky they might just play a rock song! My friend Ben who was in the year above used to come decked out in full "Slippery When Wet" uniform and my friends and I would don out black jeans, big white trainers and rock t-shirts, for once revealing to the world who we really were.

We would wait in the corner sipping on Tip-Top and bugging the DJ to play some rock, eventually he would crumble and the only rock record he had was "A Touch Too Much" by AC/DC. We knew who AC/DC were as "Blow Up Your Video" had recently come out but knew not of this song or of the crawling king snake Bon Scott.

It kicks off with that basic drum and single guitar, single note, we're already moving to the dance floor just waiting for something to happen and then Bon Scott kicks in as the chord changes...

"It was one of the nights when you turn out the lights, and everything comes into view..."

We're on the dance floor, nodding our heads slowly, the rest of the school forming a semi-circle around us. Malcom Young's guitar starts to pick a few notes

"She was taking her time I was losing my mind there was nothing that she wouldn't do.."

The lyrics are far beyond anything we understood...Malcoms guitar picks up a bit and so does our head nodding, up and down, side to side... then Bon Scott lets us know what's coming up, he starts to yell..

"It wasn't the first, It wasn't the last, she knew we was making love.."

Wow...Bon is IN THERE, he's gonna do stuff that I hadn't even read about yet to this girl..



"I was so satisfied, deep down inside, like a hand in a velvet glove.."

By now the bass is about to kick in, the drums crash, the guitars reach a climax, Malcom and the other bloke come forward to their mics...

"Seems like a touch!" DA DA DADA!!!!
"A touch too muuuu-uuch!" DA DA DA, DA DA DA..

That's it we're wild with the loud, loud rock, the guitars, for us it's like teenagers in the 50s watching Elvis, if we knew what sex was we would be wanting it bad.

It's the best thing EVER! We are alive...."Too much for my body, too much for my brain..." sing it Bon!

"OWWW!"

Verse two, full on guitar and bass is driving me and my friends are rocking out on air guitar...the rest of the school just witnessing the shells breaking on the three young guys with 80s mullets going insane to this "noise".

"She wanted it hard, and wanted it fast, she liked it done medium rare..."

Hard and fast...ok, this I get, Medium rare? She liked it a little undercooked...blue and dripping with blood? Ok, who knows what kind of women Bon Scott liked...chorus two!

"Seems like a touch!" DA DA DADA!!!!
"A touch too muuuu-uuch!" DA DA DA, DA DA DA..

"TOUCH ME"


And then the solo...OMG the solo...real basic stuff, but by now I am blinded by the rock, down on my knees leaning back, swinging my head from side to side and bouncing on my right knee then my left in time to the beat....a move I would carry through to around 2009 when playing with Lucien I realised I couldn't get back up again in a very Spinal Tap move.

Then came the build-up and the last chorus and more solos...Bon Scott is having his fill of this woman..."C'mon touch me,...uh, uh, touch me!"

And then...fuddily-dumph, the song ends, the DJ looks relived and puts on Bananarama and the dance floor fills up again.

We leave the floor back to our tip-tops, true true lords of rock. Back to being normal...until the year after when we brought our own records, this time it was Anthrax! But that's a story for another time.

THIS WEEKEND

Has been awesome, from drinking many beers, to being in the snowy forest, meeting new friends, catching up with old friends and making new bonds with others.

Went to see the Crash Diet guys after their gig in Gothenburg, took ages of secret handshakes and whispers to get up to see them backstage but was great to hang out with the guys again, happy they are doing so well. Haven't seen Martin or Peter since my last gig working with them on the "unattractive revoultion" tour and that was a few years ago. And great to see Eric too, who finally revealed to me exactly who GHOST are....shall I say? No, I am sworn to keep it secret.


Bumped into Johan from Snakestrom outside the club on the way home as well and had him pick me up off the floor as I fell over on the ice.

Slobbing out on the sofa or in bed and school finishing all in all it's been super! Think the "nyförälskade" Elk helps a bit too.

Promise to be angry about something soon!

OPIUM FOR THE PEOPLE

*Once again I add this disclaimer that I neither stand by or am against any religion*

The winter is upon us here in Sweden and it's cold and icey and the forest looks like a scene from many an album cover. To really get into this it's best to stack up on all the Norwegian Black Metal you can and just get into it....let the forest take you! I've even been watching all the many documentaries on the scene that exist around the interwebz.


Watching these, combined with also studying literature and history one comes to wonder exactly how christianity has survived over the years.

Now...when I speak about christianity I will point out that I mean the human beings that have carried out dispicable acts in the name of it and not the seed of the religion itself. I'm quite sure that was there a god and he came down to earth he would take 99% of the "Christians", put them over his knee, pull down their pants and give them a good hard slap across the ass.

The famed church burnings in Norway that rose with the Black Metal scene were not exactly an expression of satanism but an expression of rebellion against the christian take over of scandanavia. The so called extreme religious acts carried out these days by Islamic cults are seriously nothing compared to how invading christians treated the Norwegians back in the day, forcing them to convert by beating them, binding them with rope and forcing live snakes down their throats, taking their children and more. The scandanavian black and death metal scene is rife with images of satanism and norse gods, which is mainly a rebellion against a religion that has forced itself onto a long forgotten way of life.



Yet does it stop there? No!

We only have to study the literature and thoughts of writers from all over the whole world that came up with many anti-christian thoughts. After the middle ages came the "renaissance" period in which people started to seperate church and state and think more for themselves, Newton discovering theories such as gravity, Copernicus oppressed by the church for claiming that the earth revolved around the sun and not the other way round - people started to realise how much the church had been holding them back and started to develop, as happened in more periods such as Classicalism and the "Age of Enlightenment". Writers such as Defoe (Robinson Crusoe) proved that man needs no god, Moliere that spoke openly against the church but more for the king, Voltaire who claimed "how can a god create a world so evil", movements such as Deism that believed a god made the world but them left it over to humans to royally fuck up...Sartre, and more and more all come with the underlying philosophy that religion may have been a good idea but now it is just a way to keep people slaves, and that the church (specifically the Catholic) has been responsible for the worst crimes against humanity in the whole world, wanting complete take over and willing to use any method to get it.


With all the moaners about Islam these days, they should take a look back at the Catholic church's history and decide...who is the real bad guy.

My point is, it seems that almost every "enlightened" person has made a stand point against organised religion...it seems to be most the very intelligent and talented, yet "Jesus Camp" lady can stand there and tell children not to read Harry Potter as he is a "warlock and an enemy of god".

You do the math. Elk out.

GRAVES AT SEA

During the late 80s and early 90s Death Metal hit a wall, mostly due to Earache Records and Roadrunner Records starting off a machine of producing death metal bands like a conveyor belt. Most of these bands were recorded by Scott Burns and Morrisound in Florida and had an album cover made by British artist Dan Seagrave.

Some of these bands stuck around and stood the test of time. Sepultura, Morbid Angel, Entombed etc. But some just vanished, even though they were just as awesome.

So today a small tribute to some of the bands I think should have stuck around.

NOCTURNUS


First album "The Key" was a bit of a jump into the unknown for this genre as they used Keyboards! A big no-no at that time but it worked. The Key is a concept album about a robot that goes back in time to destroy christianity. The band released about 3 more albums then vanished when the world was busy jumping about to Nirvana.

ATHEIST


One of the oddest death metal bands about....listen to their early albums and then check out the way Hypocrisy went and you'll see how that came about. With a bassist dying after the first album they went on to flap out two more before the world wasn't interested anymore. Atheist were hard to listen to in one go as they were Death Metal with jazz and funk blended in....but I loved them. Now I read that my wish is come true as they have not only reformed but have a new album "Jupiter"...guess who is scouring the interwebs later!

SADUS


First album "Swallowed In Black" was a bit of a WTF! Mostly due to Steve DiGiorgios fretless bass wobblings, you couldn't help but to focus on it. He ended up playing in Death, Autopsy, Testament, Obituary and about 100 more....basically James Murphy but on bass. He's still off doing his stuff but that first Sadus album...ooo yeas!

I HAVE AN AMERICAN DREAM, IT INVOLES BLACK MASKS AND GASOLINE

So this weekend Sweden got it's first taste of alleged terrorist attacks. I say "alleged" because for all we know it might not be Al-Qaida or whatever, they might just be claiming it or we might just be jumping the gun.

Fact is however that two explosions hit the middle of Stockholm. The reason is being linked to three things. Swedens troops in "hostile" territory, the anti-islamic stance of the Swedish Democrats and Lars Vilks cartoon of a dog with the head of Mohammed.


Those of you that read regular will know that I fall in two teams. The first that all religion has been perverted by the human race to cause just a bunch of shit and the second that if we're going to all run round believing in stuff we have no proof of we should at least respect each others opinions...until we get some solid scientific proof....then we know and everyone else can STFU.

So what impact will that have on a nation that has a growing Islamic population, my thoughts is that it will just spread more racism and ignorance. 90% of the Muslims that live in Sweden moved here to escape a country torn by war and oppression. They are not extreme, they do not walk around with bombs preaching, in fact most of them are glad to escape the religious bindings they had back home and live a more relaxed life where their religion doesn't have to play such a big part.

Here are my thoughts on what happened somewhere...



I wish more people would see this instead of instantly judging a person by their religion. There is a world of different between a Catholic and a Protestant, or a Mormon, or a Mooney. Just as there is a world of difference between different offshoots of Islam.

Get the troops out. Stop the slander and hate, let Sweden be a smarter country where all races and religions live in peace.

HIDE BEHIND THE SOFA!!!!

Just finished watching "Paranormal Activity 2" - a pretty good pant-shitter of a movie, some really great jump-and-hide-behind-the-sofa scenes. Not as good as the first one, which was scary as hell.

Now you know me, I love the horror films, scarier the better. I actually get a bit of a boner to be scared, as I firmly don't believe in ghosts or demons or elves or anything like that.


The horror film genre has taken some trends recently, one is the "torture" genre,which is pretty good I guess. Films like Saw and Hostel, They, Funny Games, it's a pretty good genre.

And of course the "hand held cam" style horror film, which are generally pretty good. Guess the one that brought it to the front line was The Blair Witch Project, which for me pretty much stands as one of my top 10 best horror movies ever.

That movie was just the best. The actual duration and running of the film was just a small part of the whole thing that was built up around the myth that made the film so awesome. I was lucky enough to catch the (fake) documentary on the Blair Witch and the killings in Blair before watching the actual film, which made it just a lot more better. I recommend looking that documentary up and then watching Blair Witch again.


What made it so good was that they wanted us to think that it was real, and that we saw nothing actually scary on screen. It's a bit like that first Alien film, you see nothing (well, not until the end) but the atmosphere makes it more scary. The other thing that made it great was that I had to wait at the cinema, which was packed for the whole week, when I finally got in to see it the cinema was packed out and at the end of the film the whole cinema gave out this "WTF" gasp....one woman actually stood up and said "that was never worth the hype". Well, I am quite sure to someone it was...

Anyway, for those that don't know Blair Witch wasn't the first of it's kind. In 1980 the film Cannibal Holocaust was released to the world. A movie about a group of documentary film makers that went missing in the Amazon. Their film reels are discovered later on and watched to reveal what happened to them. Basically the film makers are a bunch of wild jocks that discover a tribe and treat them like crap, raping and killing and abusing the forest before being eventually killed by cannibals themselves.


The film was banned in many countries upon it's release, the violence is very graphic, including a woman raped with a large stone, a woman impaled on a spike from ass to mouth, a guy getting his dick sliced off (which a lot of people thought was real, which added to the films reputation) but what is real in the film is the killing of many animals, including a rather sick dismembering of a large turtle. When you watch the movie now you see that it is a critic on American or "civilized" society. Recommended - go watch!

Recently came the movie "Welcome to the Jungle" which was like, the same thing but not as grim. A film named after a Guns & Roses song? Pffffft, The Misfits wrote "Green Hell" after Cannibal Holocaust, it's obvious who wins!

SOCIAL NETWORK MY ARSE

Years ago it was internet forums and MSN, then came Friendster...good idea and then Myspace. After a while everyone had Myspace and it was set to be the best thing ever....until Facebook popped up and basically pissed it out of the water.

My did Myspace fail? I have a few ideas. The whole having a band side was good until you started getting mails and posts from 10,000 shitty bands a day. Might have even been a few good bands in there but you'd never notice. The other thing that made me turn away from it was there over use of graphics and stuff. Y'know, you'd go into someones pages and your computer would stop dead trying to load all the details of the page while you're left with some band blasting out at you at 11 and you can't do anything about it.

THE OATMEAL have a very good take on Myspace - look HERE to check it out.

I can't even look at Myspace right now as they have changed how their page looks and works again and there is so much HTML and crap on it my laptop won't cope with it.

They even made a new look profile which is totally different and not as user friendly as the old one.

Then Facebook did it too. I mean why? It really is WTF, if it all works why change it?

Just waiting for the next thing to come along so we can all leave Facebook with their new profiles and layouts every 6 months.

You can't send a mail to anyone who is online, you can't see the persons status unless it's in the newsfeed, it wants you to input information and the info must be taylored to them. I tried to enter my hometwon, which is a small place in Cornwall, but they only have 5 Cornish towns listen.

Bollocks. Lets burn it.

GRAVEYARD.....in Borås!

Stoner rock is awesome. Fact!

Sweden had been churning out some of the best 70s-influenced stoner rock (with or without the satanic undertones) for years. Spiritual Beggars, Witchcraft and more recently Ghost.

GRAVEYARD are one of the more recent wave of pure 70s evil stoner rock, formed in 2006 and even being cool enough to record reel to reel and not digital!



Happy as a pig in a big pile of shit that they are playing in Borås this weekend (Saturday Dec11) - if you're in the area come! It's going to be awesome, I'll be up front and at the middle, fist in the air!


The support band THE WOLF VERINE come also with my stamp of approval....think Ozrics, Hawkwind, Desert Sessions....one of if not THE best band in Borås in a long time!


THE DEETS....

Viva Nightclub, Sandgärdsgatan 21 Borås
Ålder +20 (18 år vid förköp)
Portarna hissas upp vid 21.00

TICKET TO HELL: 100 SEK

Graveyard (GBG)
http://www.myspace.com/graveyardsongs
http://open.spotify.com/album/2mN77WjIWnTvBcgGmOJaxG

Ett rop på hjälp (GBG)
http://www.myspace.com/ettroppahjalp

The Wolf Verine (BORÅS)
http://www.myspace.com/thewolfverine

THE TRUE MEANING OF CHRISTMAS

As my regular readers will know, I am not a hater of religion - I believe most of them started out with good intentions but were then perverted and abused by mankind into the twisted fuck up we have these days. I do not blame the religion, I blame the humans that turned "be nice to each other" into "I'm better than you and you are wrong". Anyway, around this time of year we're bound to get a lot of friendly churchy folk reminding us of the "true meaning of Christmas". Well, this won't be news to a lot of you but let's examine shall we? Come, climb upon my sleigh(er)....

Well...The Roman god Saturn, who started as the Greek god Cronos. Saturn was the god of agriculture and harvest. At the winter solstice in Roman times there would be a large celebration to Saturn called "Saturnalia". During this period, Roman courts were closed and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people. At the festival’s conclusion, December 25^th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman. In addition to human sacrifice there was widespread intoxication; going from house to house while singing naked; rape and other sexual license; and consuming human-shaped biscuits. I guess right there we have the origins of gingerbread men and carol singers then.



So...as a lot of us know, when the Catholic Church started taking over the world sometime around the 4th century and "converting" it to Christianity ("You gonna be a Christian?" no *STAB*. "Are YOU gonna be one?" No, *STAB*. "Are you?"...yes ok just stop stabbing me!) they weened out the Roman side of it and replaced it with the celebration of Jesus' birth. Even the greater percentage of Christians know that December 25th was not the birth date of Jesus.

So what else did the power-mad Catholic Church steal?

THE CHRISTMAS TREE

Pagans believed that by bringing a tree, better still an evergreen tree into their homes during the winter solstice it represented keeping the greenery alive and for a good harvest the next year. They worshiped the tree and offered it food and light etc...which is why Christmas trees are decorated.

MISTLETOE

Norse mythology recounts how the god Balder was killed using a mistletoe arrow by his rival god Hoder while fighting for the female Nanna. Druid rituals use mistletoe to poison their human sacrificial victim. The Christian custom of “kissing under the mistletoe” is a later synthesis of the sexual license of Saturnalia.


PRESENTS

In pre-Christian Rome, citizens brought offerings and gifts to the emperor during the Saturnalia. Later, this ritual expanded to include gift-giving among the general populace. The Catholic Church gave this custom a Christian flavor by re-rooting it in the supposed gift-giving of Saint Nicholas SANTA The early early origins of this one were in fact Christian. Saint Nicholas - He had a reputation for secret gift-giving, such as putting coins in the shoes of those who left them out for him (presents in the stockings anyone). Many countries and cultures have their own version of the magical kind gift giving entity. Babooshka, Chris Cringle and so on. Even in other religions, the "fat buddha" statue is said to be an image of a zen monk sometimes known as ChiChe who carried a sack with gifts for children. Fat, laughing, sack, gifts....hmmm. There is also the thought that Santa is red and white because of Coke...


Pile onto this much more company made commericalism, cards, lights etc and you have the "true meaning of Christmas" - A stolen Roman Pagan festival of indulgence perverted into a commerical high point that somehow got Jesus thrown into the mix by order of the Catholic Church.

Bah Fucking Humbug.

WORMS OF THE SENSES

The Chinese have the same word for "crisis" as they do for "opportunity" - much as it's a thing that can be poo pooed over and over it is to some extent the truest thing in life.

Buddha, in his teachings made it very clear that everything around is just a temporary state and that is what is our problem with our very living. We are always striving for bigger and better things and once we get them we are scared we will lose them, therefore never giving us the chance to enjoy our view from the mountain top as it were. This also, I think is true. Although not for everyone and because I consider myself a little "switched on" certainly not for me.

I have goals - I want the education I never got when I was a kid and then I want to be a teacher and help others to learn.

There is so much more.

Yes.....by the way it's gonna be an unfunny "personal reflection" type post so, just skip to your daily porn site if you like.

The Swedish attitude to alcohol is one that was given me a lot of problems and, dare I even say it, pain in the past. As many of you that read regular will know myself and the beer have a love hate relationship, but when I get down to the core it is such a simple thing. In Sweden we have this thing "systembolaget", you can't just buy a beer from any old store, you have to go to a certain store between a certain time or no beer for you m'laddo!

It is said to stop people consuming so much...which must be why at any given systembolaget at opening time you'll only see a bunch of alcoholics finishing off the rest of their regular-store-bought 3.5% before going in.

A - it's like telling a young kid he can't eat the candy or watch that certain film. Is he gonna say "ok" or want it more?

B - When you are told that you will fail, you think you will fail, you will fail. Who was it that said "whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right"? Good point. When an English man that is used to drinking a moderate amount quite often is suddenly repeatedly told not to and that he has a problem, whats a guy to do but have a problem? I'll go back to the South Park episode "Bloody Mary" (it's probably on the Youtubes or somewhere)....when told you have a disease, you have a disease! It's a reverse placebo and the way you handle it is not always you behind the wheel.

No I have complete freedom over when I drink and how much, I have lost any signs of a "problem" I might have had. And more, although I love a good binge, I don't binge because no longer am I confined to getting it all in in a short space of time.

Well, good folk. A while back as you know life went to the hounds but as one door closes another opens and walking through it I've picked myself up off the floor, dusted myself off, had a look round and thought "hey this isn't so bad!" Moreover every worry I had, every attempt at reaching a goal that was forever running farther away has been replaced with a gentle walk when I can appreciate everything as I pass it instead of running by.

Is it good? Of course my horse!

Now lets open a cold one, fuck the world and get this show on the road.

Elk out.

UNLEASH THE ORIGINALS!

Now I know a lot of you like me have a bit of a stiffy (or a widey) for MUNICIPAL WASTE. Why? Well probably because they are awesome. But today I'd like to reflect and take some time to tip off a few of you younger 'uns to where they got that sound and style from.

Their first album is totally like some bands from the 80s called DRI, Intense Degree and Gang Green but I'm talking about this skate-thrash Unleash The Bastards stuff.

First up, to make a nice Municipal Waste meal you'll need a big pot of EXODUS:

Then we'll need to add some NUCLEAR ASSAULT:

A health dash of SACRED REICH:

And we'll definately need some TANKARD:

There is all our basic ingredients but we will need some style spice and for that we will need to add equal parts 80s ANTHRAX:

...and equal parts SUICIDAL TENDENCIES:

And there you have 'THE WASTE....now go drink a mind eraser!

STOP FIGHTING NORTH AND SOUTH KOREA...

This should be a follow up post about "Until The Light Takes Us" but I just have to post this about what happened yesterday in my social studies class.

My teacher started to talk about North and South Korea and drew a little map up on the board...it looked like this.

Now,I'm already having a little giggle but then he started explaining sectors and where the weapons are and who is doing what where and (no joke) he drew these lines as he was talking.

I don't know what happend in class after that, I was too busy sniggering.