I've recently become obsessed with the now extinct genre of instructional rap videos from the 80s. I've been playing most of my findings on our podcast (which is live TONIGHT @ 10pm Pacific on FCCFREERADIO btw). The perfect combination of coked out CEOs making bad decisions and Reagan era crypto-racism (HEY OUR EMPLOYEES ARE POOR "URBAN" KIDS! LET'S SPEAK TO THEM ON THEIR LEVEL!). Here now I present to you my very favorites.
5. RTD Maintenance Department
Great example of "the man" trying to get on "our level" and speak "our language" through the power of "the music of the streets." I know if I was an employee of the Los Angeles' Rapid Transit Department in the 80s I would be nothing less than inspired to wake each morning and proudly crank on those buses after watching this inspiring video. Score: 6.8
4. Selling is Service
Nope. Nothing weird or awkward about these white people rapping here. Great work guys, let's put it out. 5.4
3. Pier One Imports LET'S COACHING
The most modern out of all our videos presented today. Detailing the process known as "Let's Coaching" from the geniuses ar Pier One Imports. "Let's Coaching" (Let's engage the customers! Let's make a sale!) is kind of perfect in the way it illustrates everything wrong with corporate upper management bullshit language. The awkward terminology, the emotional exploitation of their customers, the straight up lying they teach to their poor clerks. It's all there. 9.7
2. Wendy's COLD DRINKS
Wendy's are the KINGS (queens?) of instructional rap videos as you will soon see.
I'm not even going to lie. This song is fucking tight. Based around an 8 measure New Jack Swing loop Teddy Riley himself would be proud of. Reminiscent of TLC's earlier work or later DeeDee Ramone, this heartfelt lesson on how to serve cold drinks is sure to give any Wendy's employee the gusto needed to make the customer happy! Score: 8.5
1. Wendy's Burger Rap
The classic track that made a generation learn how to love again. Not patronizing at all, this lesson on how to make a fuckin' burger has gone down in history as the premiere instructional rap video. These hamburger ladies are literal throbbing gristle. Singing gristle even! Also: doesn't feature any embarrassing white people rapping. Score: 10.0
Very Very Very Honorable Mention goes to this very incredible track released by KFC in 1987 credited to "Colonel and the Gang" on flexidisc (yes!) teaches the importance of making Chicken Littles and Shoestring fries properly, complete with references to "golden showers." If there was a video it would be number 1.
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)!
The Swedish have always been pretty handy at this death metal lark. If you asked someone to compile a list of favourite death metal bands then surely at least one would be Swedish. Its just the law of averages. Today's post, Vomitory, are Swedish and play death metal.
Redemption is the follow up to the primitive Swede-death brutality of 1996's debut, Raped In Their Own Blood. Catchy stuff, but Vomitory refined the brutality and blasted those teenage Venom and Slayer influences into shape with this album. Catchy, thrashing buzzsaw guitars, drums that shift between all out blasting and d-beat, some monstrous breakdowns and those depth of hell vocals combine with a pretty flawless production job courtesy of Henrik Larsson. From the opening blast of "The Voyage" to the crushing tempo shifting finish of "Partly Dead", there is no let up whatsoever. Swedish death wins again.
Being the first IC contributor to reach 100 posts is an unflattering achievement. Does it mean my boss just comes into work less often then your boss? Or does it mean I've stopped getting laid? Remember when I used to get laid all the time? What happened to that? I wonder if it has anything to do with my Four Loko phase? What was that about? And now that that's over, what's next?
It's been months now, Schultz. MONTHS. I can't stop listening to your rap album. I can't stop listening to the seeemingly endless stream of "fake" bands you created in the early half of this decade. You are a fucked up dude. In the BEST possible sense of the word. For any of you as of yet unacquainted with Mr. Steven Schultz, I offer a brief primer on this mysterious recluse's history and whereabouts: Schultz writes the excellent expatriate manifesto TOKYO DAMAGE REPORT from the comfort of his home in that city, expounding at length on the strange mannerisms, customs, and music of Japan; sometimes translating previously-untranslated novels in their entirety, sometimes sharing pictures, sometimes stories. It is an indispensable resource for not only the western Japanophile but for students of human nature in general, from the highest highbrow intellectual to the lowest lowbrow humorist. Schultz, once upon a time, resided in the Bay Area of California, and collaborated with many indigenous musicians. We share mutual friends but have never met face to face. He even wrote for IllCon for a brief, glorious moment.
Left: Mr. Schultz also freelances as a terrorist from time to time.
But first and foremost, this guy is an insane fucking musician. Within the last few months, he has been releasing a steady stream of old recordings (via MediaFire) on Tokyo Damage Report, from solo albums to the aforementioned "fake" bands to "real" bands he was in to extended inside jokes that turned into full-length albums (check out "The Criminally Insane Project". It's really, really, really weird shit, and, in a way, seems like the perfect soundtrack for reading Illogical Contraption (but only on our very best days). Schultz's music is schizophrenic, well thought-out, offensive, funny, eclectic, and often, pretty stupid. Like I said, I'm hooked. It's been MONTHS.
Below, I've posted my "Top 5" Schultz albums. There are many, many more, which can be located easily by clicking on the "my mp3's" tag over at Tokyo Damage Report. I highly recommend going over there and having a look around if you like what you hear, as Schultz always includes extensive liner notes, full lyrics, and conceptual backstory for everything he posts--something I am absolutely unqualified to do. Schultz is a madman, and a 100% "acquired taste". But if I can teach just one person about the terrifying wonders of his music--just ONE--then I have done my job. Please enjoy responsibly.
1) STEVEN SCHULTZ - I FORGOT TO GET A RAP NAME (2000)
As good a departure point as any. Tripped-out, off-beat, off-time rap songs about stalking Maury Povich, being a gay pirate, being a whale, being an Eskimo, rap-metal being lame, being the singer for Christian Death, and "other people's hypothalamai". A dark voyage into the horrifying depths of Schultz's psyche. Amazing, confusing, addictive, and hilarious. The sound effects in "Wackness Quotient: Intro" alone make this CD worth the cover price.
2) PUNY HUMANS - NO ONE WILL EVER UNDERSTAND OUR GENIOUS (2002)
Bungle-esque mindfuck collaboration between Schultz and Impaled guitarist/all-around musical genius (genious?) Jason Kocol. The whole album is basically a complex series of obsessively-orchestrated funk/jazz/metal/avant-garde pieces structured around a series of inside jokes and samples from The Big Lebowski, and repeat listens will only serve to confuse you further. Guaranteed to make your head hurt. Let's not forget about the showtunes ("What's Really Happening To Me") or the music-nerd ProTools psychobabble during the coda of "Sweep-Picking The Flugelhorns" either. Fuck.
Ever wonder what it would sound like if Morbid Angel covered Van Halen? How about Corrupted playing the theme song for Meow Mix brand cat food? Sinatra doing Black Flag? No? Well, you suck. Because Schultz not only wonders such things, he actualizes them. The Amino Assholes are another of his short-lived "fake" bands, the concept behind which being "impersonations of bands and/or artists covering other bands and/or artists". Is your mind completely blown yet? It should be.
I guess this is as close to a "rock" album as Steven Schultz will ever create, although it occasionally lapses into free-form Zorn worship from time to time as well. Schultz claims that this is his version of "romantic" music, which, if you think about it, is quite obvious: there are at least three songs about ASS ("Kingdom of Ass", "Looking All Deformed Like Cindy Crawford", and "More White Ass For Asian Guys") and at least two written on the subject of TESTICLES ("Take My Balls" and "Scrotum Symphony"). If Frank Zappa had sex with The Illuminatus! Trilogy, their love-child would look something like Defrag My Heart. Except even Zappa would have a hard time writing a piece of music as fucked up as "Terpsecholorean Splendor of Careening Trilobites".
Another "fake" band, this one an ESL/Japanese hardcore group bent on annihilating every living (and non-living) thing in the Land of The Rising Sun. I guess Schultz was pretty angry at Japan in general when he wrote this stuff, and the vitriol shines through. But, like everything he does, it remains pretty fucking hilarious at the same time. The process of creating Tokyo Aizo involved writing lyrics for 33 songs in Japanese, which he then filtered through a translation program back into English and published on TDR. The results are super awesome amazing Engrish fun! Check 'em out via the link below the album cover.
I apologize for the unabashed hero-worship, but Schultz deserves it. His music is like a big stinky onion--the more layers you peel away, the more pungent it gets. Only download this stuff if you have lots of free time to devote to it. You'll need it to decipher the heaping portions of hidden messages, shredding metal riffage, inside jokes, psychedelic lyrics, and sheer, unadulterated GENIOUS contained herein.
... All of which is, of course, just my way of asking Schultz to move back to the good ol' US of A and play lead guitar in my new band. PLEASE?
As the IllCon Global Elite already know, we like to kick back and celebrate every 500 posts or so around here, taking a moment to pontificate on the wonderful, wacky universe that has been created herein over the course of the last two years and thirty days. Our last retrospective, ONE FUCKING THOUSAND, was published March 15, 2010, and its predecessor, The IC 500, hit the presses on May 15, 2009--how fitting that lucky post number 1,500 lands right square on New Year's Eve 2010. Anyhow, we need not spend any time fellating ourselves over the huge cultural impact IC has had on society at large, nor do we need to expend any unnecessary energy fist-bumping over the huge piles of cash and hot babes this blog has scored us. Suffice to say that WE'RE SUPER EXCITED, and a quick walk down memory lane, encompassing the high points of the last half-thousand posts, should be celebration enough.
IllCon came strong out of the gate right after post number 1,000, publishing the highly influential and Earth-shattering GLOM (Gorgeous Ladies of Metal) post on March 17. This post was written as a response to Revolver magazine's exceedingly patronizing "Hottest Chicks In Metal" yearly feature, showing that chicks have chops in the game, and that success in the metal genre doesn't always depend on cup size. I think our friend Generic Viagra summed it up pretty well in the comments section, when he claimed (and I quote):
"That is the real deal, no playing around with girls that are in the spotlight just because they are hot. That is not Metal, that's fashion with a riff. This is Metal for real and these bands simply kick ass.
Viagra Online Cheap Viagra"
Speaking of ladies in metal, Seanford followed up the GLOM post with a fascinating Blackholicus interview on March 18, in which he quizzed bassist/vocalist Margaret mercilessly on the mind-numbing minutae of everyday life in one of the NWOAHM's finest new bands.
The People Vs. Joey DeMaio (March 19) was some fucked up shit, and was immediately followed by further fucked up shit in the form of March 24th'sFrom Philly To Montauk post. Is the Montauk Monster indeed a multi-dimensional visitor from astral planes unknown?
Yes, of course. Don't be an idiot.
An old classic:
A new classic:
The Second Annual IC Coloring Contest (left) once again reared its ugly head on March 25, bringing in approximately 10 times the entries it did in Year One, many of them disturbing, all of them awesome. The results were published on April 1, and the winner was announced the next day (it was my nephew, whose entry is shown below). But even the most innocent contest can turn ugly in a heartbeat, and my failure to send Nephew Carlos his prize in a prompt fashion raised the ire of my sister, who hired a mercenary rapper to extract revenge. The saga closed months later, when I was thoroughly PWNT by Rap Master Maurice via voice message on September 13th. Harsh.
Speaking of controversy, who else remembers the hubbub that followed my post about Bobby Liebling (right) and his young, pregnant wife Hallie on March 28? Man, people got pissed about that. Good times.
We then interviewed Mike Scalzi, guitarist/vocalist for The Lord Weird Slough Feg, on April 20, and explored the wonders of grindcore ho-bag Cyco Eva the following day. That shit was brutal.
BOOTY BASS, published on May 5, 2010, was a personal favorite of mine. Whose soul is so dead that they can't appreciate the exquisite intricasies of BOOTY BASS? Especially when it's coming out of the back of a mid-90's mini-truck? Not I.
IllCon participated in The Blair Blog Project on May 12, reviewing the Leslie Nielsen/Linda Blair classic Repossessed! in the process. We thank Mr. Goodkind for our inclusion.
Yachtmystium (May 12) was wacky fun, but things soon got somber with the death of IC Hero Ronnie James Dio on May 16. Our reactions to the passing of a heavy metal icon can be found here,here. and here.
June 7, 2010: NPR reads IC? (It's true, and so does Stephen Colbert.)
No matter which side of the fence you're on in regards to the Juggalo-Parrothead controversy, I'm pretty sure we can all agree that Hipsters Can't Name Bands For Shit (July 1).
On July 4, IllCon asked for requests. These were the results:
All of the fuss about San Francisco's metal scene was followed by a quick departure to Austin, Texas, as Seanford introduced us to the History of Fancy Metal (July 11).
We were introduced to the technicolor douchery of Burning Dan on August 23, 2010, and were genuinely saddened to hear of his death less than a month and a half later. RIP Burning Dan. You might have been a douche, but it seemed like you were at least a nice douche. Has anyone else noticed that all the cool people are dying? Captain Beefheart, Dio, Swayze, Gary Coleman, Cory Haim. What gives? I guess some folks are just too good for this Earthly plane. Speaking of death and sadness...
Things have remained strange and fascinating here in IllCon land recently, as we've checked in with our favorite reader Generic Viagra not once (10/15), but twice (Dec 20). It's almost TOO MUCH stimulation!
The Goodkind was nice enough to invite us back for Kotto Week on November 19, and IllCon obliged with a detailed post about the insurmountably amazing Yaphet Kotto/Gary Busey star vehicle Eye of The Tiger. Hopefully we'll see more collaborative film blogging in the future.
Bullshit For Shitty Boy (11/21) was a fine venue for me to express my rage. I'm glad you all felt it too.
But nothing, and I mean nothing, could have prepared me for the reaction to what happened on December 6: HOLOCAUST! Seriously, that shit was fucked up. Who knew that having opinions on the internet was so frowned upon, and could get you in so much trouble? It was SO bad, in fact, that I had to return to make amends on December 9: APOLOGY. I guess I'm still learning the proverbial ropes, eh?
THE TOP 5 IMAGES OF THE LAST 500 POSTS
BLACK SEAS OF INFINITY
SPACE JUGGALOS!
BEST ALBUM COVER EVER?
DAT ASS
Let's end it right there, with what might possibly be the most inspiring image ever seen on this blog (or elsewhere).
I thank you all for your continued patronage. Let's talk again at 2,000.
I never really pursued the music of Jerusalem's Melechesh much, probably because I read one too many ball-scrubbing reviews of their work on MetalSucks and just assumed they were crap. And, in defense of my unjustified prejudice, their later albums proved to be unsurprisingly mediocre. But I'll be dipped in dogshit if their 1996 full-length debut album As Jerusalem Burns... Al'Intisar ain't a monumental mindfuck of an album, a true standout from a time and a place where no one ever really expected it. I'm definitely glad I finally gave these guys a shot, and Jerusalem has stayed in heavy rotation around ICHQ as of late. But it's not only because these dudes sound like a more-technically-proficient, desert-ified, Nightside Eclipse-era Emperor. There are several reasons why this band (or, more specifically, this record) is exceedingly remarkable amongst its peers. Please find just 5 of these reasons below:
1) When you're listening to Melechesh on your iPod on the bus or BART or whatever, every once in awhile a guy will sneak up and shake a rattle or a rainstick or some shit in your ear (on the recording, that is). It keeps you on your toes, and, as Melechesh are actually from the Middle East, their use of "native instruments" comes off as a bit more LEGIT than Nile or whoever.
5) OK, this one is kind of hard to explain, but you know when a drummer is playing a blastbeat, and then they go into a different, faster blastbeat? Not doubling the tempo or anything, just a slightly different beat, which makes the whole mess just sound that much weirder and more twisted? I love when drummers do that, and dude from Melechesh does it really well.
Go to the exact middle of the title track of this album for an example:
Fuck that rules. Anyway, do you guys need MORE than 5 reasons to get this? I think not.
I’ve been feeling short on time lately. Not like, near death, where has my life gone, short on time (like old man Cobras). Just too busy with nonsense to really get into some rad shit. The rad times to nonsense ratio is FUCKED right now. It’s a drag. ANYWAY, when you’re short on time, demos, EP’s and 7”s are the perfect solution to a busy lifestyle. Only going to be home for 8 minutes? That’s alright, you can still take in a complete piece of art, without that, “man have I ever even gotten to track 9 on this record” feeling. Check your PLAYS column in your iTunes (if you roll that way). It’s seriously crazy how many albums you’ve never finished off. You might even find some of your favorites have unexplored tracks way down at the bottom. I guess we’re all a little ADD these days. ANYFUCKINGWAY, it’s going to be EP’s, demos, and 7”s from me for a bit. I hope you dig’em.
HOLOCAUST. Most defiantly one of the absolute best NWOBHM bands of all time. “But Sean, these dudes are from Scotland?” Which is true. But, due to the relatively small size of the NWOSHM movement, these guys qualify. HEAVY METAL MANIA is the single off their best record, NIGHTCOMERS (which you already own). However it’s totally worth downloading this top notch EP because the versions are totally different and owning both the single and the record is more than necessary for even the most casual NWOBHM fan. If you don’t own NIGHTCOMERS, you can correct that below. It’s easily one of the top 5 NWOBHM albums of all time, a long with anything by Witchfinder General. Which brings me to this question:
What are YOUR top 5 NWOBHM albums of all time? Let me know, I’m totally curious. Well, what are your other 4 besides NIGHTCOMERS.