As the title suggests, today’s post is brought to you by the letter M (as in mhmm). I figured the first day of the week would be a perfect day to spotlight a featured genre, but struggled between two choices: “Metal Monday” or “(emo)nday.” Ultimately, I’m a sucker for alliteration and couldn’t quite figure out how best to pronounce (emo)nday. E-Monday or E-Moanday? So, metal it is! If banging your head and conjuring the likeness of Satan isn’t exactly your thing, well then just enjoy a three day weekend courtesy of Holepuncher. But if you’re down with having your blood pumped and your genitals destroyed then Mondays at Holepuncher are for you. Lastly, if you were really pulling for (emo)nday, don’t worry; I’ll be getting to emo soon enough. I promise. Please do not cut yourself (kidding).
Frodo sucks.
Friend of the blog, Brandon J., recently informed me that he was actually in a band called “Holepuncher” back in the early 90’s. Can you believe that??? I’ve been searching high and low (mostly low) for a band with this great name, and there it was in my own backyard. Sadly, and perhaps the root of their eventual demise, they later changed the name to “Paperface.” Not a bad second choice, but clearly the band would never be the same. Since then, Brandon’s tastes in metal have fortunately not suffered any lasting effects of this ill-advised naming decision. One of Brandon’s favorites is a band that caught my immediate attention about a year ago on the travesty that has become MTV’s Headbanger’s Ball. Hoping you’ll have a similar reaction, I’m going to point you to that video first and say nothing else about it except for this: if you can’t stomach the music that’s okay. But hit “mute,” don’t hit “stop.” Just watch this thing. It’s incredible.
See? Everything about Amon Amarth is iconic. From the hair, to the choreography of the hair, to the name – which is elvish for the most metal of icons in Lord of the Rings, “Mt. Doom” – it all adds up to an amazing blast of Swedish melodic death metal. If the words “melodic death metal” sound like a contradiction to you or something you wouldn’t normally enjoy, I understand you completely. I considered myself to be of the same mind. But then a weird thing happened. I could not get this song out of my head. Or those images! I mean, who the heck are these guys? Are they for real? Their album is called With Oden on Our Side? Do they really think they’re vikings?? Is this all a tongue-in-cheek joke?
I’m convinced it isn’t. Best I can tell, this is a band who takes what they do extremely seriously while keeping a sense of humor about themselves. When asked about the band’s genre, singer Johan Hegg said “We play death metal. We write about vikings so therefore some refer us to viking metal, but I have no idea what that is. I can’t imagine the viking’s [sic] veer into metal at all except on the swords and stuff. And musically, I guess they only played these strange lip instruments and some bongos or whatever.”* Ha! I love it. Go get “Runes to My Memory” stuck in your head, too.
Download Amon Amarth – “Runes to My Memory”
Side note: at the time of this writing the video embedded above had been viewed 1,666,058 times. Coincidence? Thor only knows…More tomorrow.
*taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amon_Amarth
2 responses so far ↓
unholypassions // July 28, 2008 at 12:43 pm |
Looks like I may start liking Mondays. I cannot be held responsible if any of your readers decide to rape and pillage their neighboring villages after reading today’s entry. I’ll never be ashamed to be seen without my shirt on thanks to their singer, Johan.
And Yes. They pull off the sychronized headbanging hair windmills flawlessly at a live show. It has to be seen to believed.
For Vahalla and Metal Mondays!!!
B
holepuncher // July 30, 2008 at 12:02 pm |
You know, I very nearly made a comment about Johan’s physique in the post but then remembered that these dudes probably own a lot of swords, so thought better of it.