I'M GOING TO STEAL THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

OK, maybe not.

I'm way too busy for such shenanigans, what with all my sweet guest appearances on heavy-metal-and-conspiracy-themed podcasts (OH HEY, did I mention that the "Illogical Conspiracy" episode of Metal Injection's Hand Ov Doom--featuring Yours Truly--is up now?), tours, forays in the IllCon clothing line, and the impending move from SF to Oakland... Shit, I've hardly got time to brush my teeth, much less accompany Extraterrestrial Nic Cage on his next adventure through the catacombs of subterranean Washington, D.C., searching for hidden messages in the text of ancient documents.

But long story short: The Apocryphon show in Arcata (Vallejo got cancelled--long story) was a fucking blast (see photos below for evidence), and thanks to all the die-hards who showed up. Dates are solid on our next Northwest tour, more on that in a second.

Now is the part where I devolve into an extended period of shameless self-promotion. Apologies in advance:

THIS SUNDAY, APRIL 29TH @ HEMLOCK, SF:

BADR VOGU

PRIZE HOG

APOCRYPHON

and motherfucking AUTHOR AND PUNISHER! Get a load of what this guy is all about:

What a freak.

Then, the following Friday, @ The First Church of The Buzzard in Oakland:

THE HAUNTING PRESENCE

MUKNAL

SUTEKH HEXEN

CRUCIFIXION (impossible to Google)

APOCRYPHON

Be there.

Then Apocryphon plays with Cerebrate (from Eureka) and Bone Sickness (ex-Funerot, Olympia, WA) at The Elbo Room Saturday, May 19th.

Then the mighty DALTON has a show at an art opening for our pal Ben Venom (remember him?) at Guerrero Gallery in SF with our bros Hazzard's Cure on June 9th.

Then Dalton is playing an epic "Rock and Roll Bro-B-Q/Fucking In Tents Fest" camp-out type thing in Half Moon Bay with Total BS (they're a Bob Seger cover band), Beer Drinkers and Hell Raisers (they're a Zed Zed Topp cover band), Chablis, Bar Fight, and Girl Problems on June 16th. We might even get a mechanical bull for this one. Seriously.

Then Apocryphon is playing in Eureka Thursday, June 28th (local bands and venue TBA).

Then Apocryphon is playing at Slabtown in Portland Friday, June 29th (local bands TBA).

Then Apocryphon is playing The Kraken (formerly Galway Arms) in Seattle Saturday, June 30th (local bands TBA).

And then...

That's right, motherfuckers. Apocryphon with Anhedonist, Grave Miasma, Vastum, and fucking DEAD CONGREGATION at the Oakland Metro Friday, July 6th.

More summer shows to be announced in the near future. Meanwhile...

Check out IllCon Radio tonight for an interview with the porn-soaked YouTube enigma known as The Spelunker, whose Smut Cave videos were previously featured on the blog RIGHT HERE. Tune in to FCCFreeRadio.com at 10 pm PST, and J.O. into the vortex with us!

"unfortunately terms like 'tin foil hats' may be amusing but serve the purpose to discredit conspiracies before fact 1 has even been looked at. Well done for being patronising (sacracsm)"

- some guy commenting on my episode of Hand Ov Doom

The 6 Shittiest Little Brother Bands Of All Time

Being the little brother of an established rock star is a mixed blessing. Sure you can get more hype for your crap band but you will forever be in the shadow of the dickhead that kicked your ass when you were little. Here at Ill Con Labs we have been doing extensive research on the phenomena of little brother bands and we have come to this conclusion: THEY ARE ALL SHITTY.

Deep inside Ill Con LABS

Through many years of studying we can now bring you the definitive list of THE TOP SIX SHITTY LITTLE BROTHER BANDS EVER (after the jump)!

HEAVY METAL ALBUM COVERS RE-CREATED IN MS PAINT (A Retrospective)

As a direct result of Nothing Left Inside's post Saturday about shitty album art, I present you today with yet another rabbit hole, namely the short-lived trend of extreme-metal album covers being redrawn in MS Paint. Thanks to a re-posting of NLI's IllCon piece on Facebook (courtesy of internet-radio giants WMFU), the Bad Album Art thread spread far and wide, ultimately resulting in virtual Uroborous that leads right back to good 'ol IC Classic.

Our FB pal Aaron Neighbors hipped us to a shit-ton of his very own artwork (namely of the MS Paint variety) originally from a thread over on Nuclear War Now's message board (which in turn was spawned from earlier incarnations on DFFD and The Board That Shall Not Be Named), which blossomed, like the proverbial Corpse Flower, nearly overnight--eventually resulting in a stagnant pool of some of the most retardedly brilliant metal art I've ever seen. Out of respect for his diligence and hard work, we'll start with 25 of Mr. Neighbors' own designs, eventually moving on to another gallery of 25 greats from a further assortment of Nuclear War Now contributors.

This collection needs no further introduction. I believe the art speaks for itself.

When drawing goes wrong pt1

You may have seen those worst album cover lists going round on all the other, slightly less cool websites? Well I have been collecting my own bad album artwork for some time now and would like to present my findings in the first of not so often series. Despite a lot of these being anatomically incorrect I believe there is a certain charm present.

Its pretty easy to poke fun at metal art like this. Lets move on.

Bitches Sin showing a complete lack of respect for art history.

What makes this one so bad is the look of puzzlement on the barbarian's face. Or maybe its the sudden realisation of the situation he's in. Or the terrible font choice.

I spent 5 years at art college. The first lesson they ever taught us was that smudging is no substitute for shading. Druid's artist buddy obviously never attended art college.

I always feel bad about ragging on Pantera ( which I often do) but then I think of this cover and the feeling passes.

More recently we have this monstrosity. You would think with the obvious money this band have available for artwork and design they would try and avoid the "Amiga 500 game artwork" vibe the artist seemed to be going for.

I love Vision Of Disorder. But this cover still blows to this day. I have tried to work out what the theme was or how it links with the music. Always drawn a blank.

I sort of like this one. I don't know if its the homeless, crackhead criminal with his tattered shirt or the young lady enjoying the sunset unawares that does it for me.

This album actually contains some pretty sweet, pump up, montage-esque, Miami Vice jams. Sadly I don't know anyone that would want Russ Ballard leaping at them in 3D or even in real life. You didn't even get 3D glasses with it.

I can just imagine the brief for this one "The devil emerging from his cave/lava pit and trying to grab a flying horse." Pretty specific and I am pretty sure that's what they got by the look of this. This is actually my desktop background now.

Obviously there is nothing slightly wimpy about this cover other than the ink started running out as they where finishing the nude dude's torso shading.

All that is missing are the obvious lines on the A4 paper it was drawn on.

I had this written of as some terrible 7th generation nu-metal band going of this cover. Sadly, during this research I found out its a German Avenged Sevenfold covers band. I would like to think they have some concept of why a Werewolf is dressed like one of The Blues Brothers and running along the highway in the rain. But I really doubt that.

What makes this bad is the fact its got the Waking The Cadaver font at the top. Otherwise this would be a pretty sweet image. But the sudden association with terrible gore/slam/death malarky means it is relegated to bad artwork corner

Every one's favourite industrial elf surely knew this was a stinker from the get go. I don't know if this has any relation the the film/TV series of the same name or why he has chosen to show himself floating with a glowing aura. Completely unrelated, I remember hearing a story about Mortiis trying to hail a cab outside his record companies office when this album was out. They wouldn't stop so he was forced to walk the streets in full costume.

TO BE CONTINUED......

T-SHIRTS, TOURS, DOOM, ETC... (The IllCon Empire Never Sleeps)

ATTENTION HESSIAN MINIONS: ILLOGICAL CONTRAPTION NEEDS YOUR HELP!

First off, you can "help out" ol' Uncle Cobras by tuning in to the Hand Ov Doom show on Emerson College radio tonight, where I'll be appearing to discuss conspiracy theories, metal, conspiracy theories in metal, and all things great and small pertaining to the IllCon Universe. The show streams live 5-7pm PST (that's 8-10 EST, dummies) right HERE, then goes up in podcast form (via Metal Injection.com) right HERE. While you're at it, why don't you "help out" Metal Injection too, by heading over to iTunes and subscribing to their entire podcast roster, which includes not only Hand Ov Doom but a veritable multitude of excellent metal-oriented broadcasts as well: Metal Injection podcasts on iTunes!

Secondly, we implore the more artistically-minded amongst our dear readers and listeners to help us out with yet another podcast/radio-related item--of course, I'm speaking of the IllCon Radio T-Shirt Design Contest!
This really cool bro from Rochester, NY's own HTB Press has put an offer on the table in regards to producing some IC Radio-themed garb, and we're fully stoked on making it happen. The only problem: WE SUCK AT DRAWING THINGS. Can you draw good? Are you a fan of the show? Would you be interested in seeing your very own alien-smoking-a-bong-on-the-back-of-a-unicorn design emblazoned on the front of an IllCon Radio shirt, and would you be psyched to receive said shirt, for FREE, in the mail? Well shit, dude. The address is illogicalcontraption(at)yahoo(dot)com. What the fuck are you waiting for? We'll accept sketches, written ideas, scribbles on bar napkins... Whatever. Let's do this.

Thirdly (and most important): Let's hook up some Apocryphon dates for this summer! If you're an Illogical Contraption reader, you're also undoubtedly an Apocryphon listener, so how 'bout you help out your favorite psychedelic deathgrind homies with a couple tips on booking West Coast dates? We've only got a couple small windows of opportunity to get out of town this June, and the specific dates we're looking to book are as follows:

- Thursday, June 7th: Eureka/Arcata, CA
- Friday, June 8th: Portland, OR
- Saturday, June 9th: Seattle, WA

- Friday, June 22nd: Los Angeles, CA
- Saturday, June 23rd: San Diego, CA

Do you live in any of these places? Where are all the metal-friendly venues and easy women? Who has the cheapest booze? WE WANT TO PARTY WITH YOU. Let's make it happen!
Again, illogicalcontraption(at)yahoo(dot)com, or check us out (if you haven't already) on Bandcamp/Facebook/Last.FM. (Groovy DALTON news coming up in June as well, stay tuned...)

Speaking of epic tours:


This Friday...


Apocryphon is slated to devastate "The Dank Room" in Vallejo on 4/20, along with Short Fuse, Ill Content, Viral, and ZombieDeathFuck (Newtdick dropped off this one). Facebook "event page" HERE.

Then, Saturday:


Back up to the 'ol hometown (namely The Alibi in Arcata) for a night of cacophonous, sludgy, schizophrenic chaos with our best bros Hazzard's Cure. NOT TO BE MISSED.


Thanks again for your encouragement and support in all things IllCon. We'll be seeing you out on the road soon!

Live Report! SPELL OF BLOOD tour: Sacrament Ov Impurity, Blood Etchings, Miasmic, and Vellum at the Lil Red Lion, Eureka CA

Holy shit! I'm still recovering from this show, I think. Thursday night's gig at the Lil Red Lion in Eureka, CA (Cobras' favorite town!) was friggin' awesome! And that isn't the booze talking! Yet... It is rare to see a show up here in the Arcata/Eureka area of this caliber. I mean we'll get maybe one or two of these bands but not all four! Here in Humboldt County I've witnessed a few heavyweights pass through on their way to SF or Portland while on tour, namely Embryonic Devourment, Vile, Decrepit Birth, High On Fire, WITTR, Vektor, Nachtmystium, Earth, Skeletonwitch among others. We even have a few metal bands here that are of worthy note: Locust Furnace, Miasmic, Ash Borer, Cerebrate, Unholy Crucifix, and Sadistic Hallucinations but to get a tour coming through here - or any metal band to play for that matter - is amazing to say the least! The bands that played Thursday weren't necessarily huge but they each have their own following and deserve mentioning.

So without going into a long, laborious and detailed account of the show, I will simply post some brief info on each band. You can check them out further on your own.

FYI: Currently Sacrament Ov Impurity and Blood Etchings are wrapping up their tour tomorrow at the SUB-Mission in SF. No they're not these guys... and no, they're not these guys either, but they're solid musicians and if you like going to shows at smaller venues and you happen to be in SF tomorrow evening, I would recommend checking them out.

So first things first, MIASMIC rules. Period. They spawned from the ashes of an old band I used to be in up here, morphing from an embryo of mixed ideas into a formidable juggernaut. I don't have a link to download any of their material yet but plan to do a proper review of them soon enough! In the mean time go check them out, befriend them on Facebook, and immerse yourself in the Redwood Darkness that is MIASMIC!

Facebook / Metallum

***

VELLUM hail from the LA area and are good friends of Miasmic. They are an obscure band with little info out there on them but they have solid intentions. Rumor has it that they literally drove up from LA to Eureka just to support Miasmic - apparently is was their first gig even! Talk about dedication! Having recently lost their drummer, Iishtok from Miasmic filled in on the kit despite literally only having a week or two to learn their material... Despite this and time constraints, it was an epic set! Hopefully we'll be hearing more of them soon!

Facebook

***

BLOOD ETCHINGS were interesting. They were menacing. A bit rough around the edges perhaps. They were engaging enough to hold my interest at least. They had a bit of an attitude that I could have done without but they had several worthy songs. They label themselves as "Black Baroque Metal". Definitely had a black/death vibe going at times but shit, at that point the last gin & tonic I had been drinking began to catch up to me so my account is a bit fuzzy.

Facebook

***

SACRAMENT OV IMPURITY stole the show. Simple as that. They recently lost their bassist/vocalist. I had the opportunity to purchase and download their debut two weeks ago prior to the show so I was already familiar with their material. There were subtle differences, especially where the bass should have been and the change of vocals but they held it down. They played a solid set to a small but solid crowd. Despite not understanding a single word she was saying, Naphula was one hell of an intimidating vocalist - and that is coming from a vocalist! (she was pretty hot also but that may have been the booze talking)

Metallum / Facebook

Official Website

***

As mentioned, Blood Etchings and Sacrament Ov Impurity are wrapping up their tour tomorrow in SF. If you live in or near the City, I recommend going and checking it out.

...for those curious, I am compiling a list of songs from these bands and others as a mix of sorts for y'all in which I plan to feature in a subsequent post at a later date...

THE WEEK OF HONG 2: BLOODSPORT 3

Goddamn it, Seth. Why do you put me through this shit? I've been nothing but a friend to you, and how do you repay me? I'll tell you how: By making me sit through not one, but two goddamn Bloodsport sequels, and afterwards, I don't even get the small fucking dignity of forgetting about them altogether--OH NO, I have to actually write about the fucking things, in a way that's supposed to be "engaging" and "interesting". Well fuck you, Seth. Fuck you and the scraggly-ass VHS tape you rode in on.

Now where were we?
Ah yes, Bloodsport 3. The 1997 follow-up to the abysmal 1996 shitfest known as (surprise!) Bloodsport 2 (full-ish review HERE). I guess we might as well get this over with:



So this whole "Week of Hong" was supposed to be about the iconic actor James Hong, but to be honest, his character Sun gets killed off pretty early in this movie, being replaced as a "father-figure"/"master" by the twin team of Pat Morita (conspicuously absent for the majority of Part 2 in spite of his high billing) and a mysterious shaman called "The Judge". So, rather than dissecting Hong's performance in this particular film, I will instead use today's post as a vehicle to express my disgust at mid-90's-sequel-direct-to-video action fare, to further condemn Seth Goodkind and his frivolous journalistic requests, and to call attention to the fact that Bloodsport Fucking Four still lurks like a shadowy specter on the horizon, mocking me from the very pits of Daniel Bernhardt's dead, soulless eyes:

Click for full size and lol @ "The Most Successful Action Franchise Ever!"

This movie is ass. Surprisingly, it is slightly less ass than its predecessor, due mostly to the scene where a bad motherfucker named Beast kicks the shit out of the aforementioned Daniel Bernhardt and also the presence of comedy-dwarf John Rhys-Davies as the main antagonist. But yeah, it's pretty unbearable.
Bloodsport 3 suffers from a bit of an identity crisis: yes, they went and hired that same vaguely-European splits-enthusiast guy to pretend that he's JCVD again, and yes, the plot revolves around another "underground fighting tournament" (he has to sneak in to this one! How chilling!). But Bloodsport 3 ups the yawn factor by trying to incorporate some sort of 007 angle (Bernhadt's "Alex Cardo"--read as "Even Lower Budget Frank Dux"--has to get all dolled up in a white tux and flirt with some chick in a casino), a premise with is both laughable and a little sad. There is no intrigue, no sexual tension. Hell, there isn't even any Don Gibb.

I don't know. I don't even have enough words in my mental arsenal to fully disassemble the Bloodsport sequels and Mr. Seth J.G. Goodkind to the subterranean levels they deserve. But together, they sent me to the very deepest and darkest corners of my own private Hell, and the only way I can even attempt revenge is to suggest that others endure the same pain as I. Please experience Bloodsport 3 in all its glory forthwith:




MORE HONG HERE:

Monday April 9th
Fist of B-List - The Dynamite Brothers
From the Depths of DVD Hell - Big Trouble In Little China

Tuesday April 10th
Direct to Video Connoisseur - South Beach Academy
Lost Video Archive - Teen Lust

Wednesday April 11th
She Blogged By Night - Seventh Sin
Lost Video Archive - Cyber Bandits

Thursday April 12th
Booksteve's Library - China Girl
Lost Video Archive - Gladiator Cop
From the Depths of DVD Hell - Balls of Fury

Friday April 13th
Direct to Video Connoisseur - Caged Fury
Lines That Make Things - The A Team (TV episode)

Saturday April 14th
Illogical Contraption - Bloodsport III
Explosive Action - Ninja III: The Domination
Lost Video Archive - Blade in Hong Kong
Thrilling Days of Yesteryear - Bat Masterson and Checkmate


I made this: