I decided to fuck with you a little bit today. Not in the carnal sense, of course. I mean fuck with your minds.
Below are two songs I discovered yesterday and am diggin’ mightily. I not telling you what they are. The first one is by a band I bet you haven’t heard of. The second one is by a band you’ve definitely heard of, but unless you’re one of the few people who have already heard the song, I bet you won’t be able to guess who it is, because the song doesn’t sound quite like anything they’ve done before.
If I lose either of these bets, I will send you $100.
Wait, that was ridiculous. Let me amend my offer. If I lose the bet, I will send you a picture of $100, plus a picture of a cookie. If I win the bet, you send me an actual $100. I’m relying on the honor system here. The mysteries will be revealed after the jump — but don’t jump until you’ve listened.
MYSTERY NO. 1:
[audio:http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3595267/Mystery%20No%201.mp3|titles=Mystery No 1]
MYSTERY NO. 2:
[audio:http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3595267/Mystery%20No%202.mp3|titles=Mystery No 2]
Did you listen? Did you think about what you heard and make your guesses about who it was, or did you cheat and jump right over here to discover the answers? You didn’t cheat? Really? Well, I fucking would have. For pictures of $100 and a cookie, you’re damned right I’d cheat. I’m not stupid.
Okay, so it’s time to solve the mysteries.
MYSTERY NO. 1
The first band, the one I bet you hadn’t heard of, is called The Phantom Carriage, and the song is called “The Horses Feed Their Birds”. I’m not going to tell you any more about them right now, because I will write more later — except for the fact that you can download the album which contains that song for no money, or whatever amount you may feel like contributing to the cause, by going here.
Well, I will say one more thing: I’ve listened to two more songs from this album — which is called New Thing — and the music is scrambling by brain just the way I like it, smothered in sliced jalapenos and salsa with hash browns and homemade biscuits on the side, but intensifying the dining experience by sticking a knife point into the base of my skull just short of the fatality point.
MYSTERY NO. 2
The second song is by none other than The Acacia Strain, whose 2010 album Wormwood kicked my fucking ass with heavyweight boots and then stomped on my neck while I was down, just to make sure I didn’t miss the point.
But this song . . . this song is a change of pace for those brawlers. It’s a cover of the Black Sabbath classic, “War Pigs”, from their 1970 album Paranoid. To me, it opens a whole new dimension in the way I think about The Acacia Strain, and I was pretty high on them before.
The song is included on that Homefront compilation we wrote about yesterday. I don’t know if that free download is still available or if the 25,000-download limit has been reached, but even if the limit has been reached, you know and I know that it’s already posted somewhere on the netz — and this is one instance where I would feel no remorse at all from downloading it from a secondary source, because the thing was being offered for free in the first place.
And by the way, there are some other good fucking tunes on that comp besides The Acacia Strain cover. One of the reasons this comp is so much fun is that so many of the bands step outside their customary styles. For example, it’s apparent that someone bet As I Lay Dying that they couldn’t thrash like the old school, and they said, “fuck you”, and went all in. Their song is a cover of “War Ensemble” from Seasons in the Abyss by Slayer, and man, do it kick some ass.
Fuckit, you might as well hear that one, too.
[audio:https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/01-War-Ensemble.mp3|titles=As I Lay Dying – War Ensemble]
Well, that mystery game was fun, wasn’t it? So much fun that I may do this again, even if none of you send me $100. But the $100 would help make up my mind. Really.
20 Responses to “MYSTERIES”
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I had no idea who either of them were…
But I’ve never listened to the Acacia Strain or the Phantom Carriage before either…so…….
That said, while the cover is good and I like what they did with it…I feel that there is literally no way to improve on the original War Pigs. Just ways to make it different.
Oh, and your money is TOTALLY on the way.
And I am TOTALLY excited about getting your money! I have a limited number of pictures of cookies, so I’m also really glad I didn’t have to pay off on the bet.
I decided to opt out of the bet, but I listened to the songs anyway. No idea who either of them were. I had heard of Acacia Strain before but never listened to any of their music. But I knew it was a Black Sabbath cover within the first few seconds. Both were pretty good, but neither were jaw-dropping. The Phantom Carriage might be worth spending free on.
Couldn’t you just send a box of girl scout cookies? Pictures of cookies are fine, but real girl scouts are better. Or something like that.
I’ve never seen a Girl Scout anywhere near where I live. I wonder why that is.
I’m pretty sure they are educated to stay away from headless metal bloggers.
Yeah, but I bet they give a badge for visiting old people with dementia in nursing homes. Why not a badge for visiting headless metal bloggers?
Good idea. I’ll suggest that at the next meeting, provided the let me in, of course.
Man I really like hearing AILD like this!!!! They’re are already thrashy, but this has that that metal-skate-thrash thing going on from the 80’s that I fucking love! Living Sacrifices’s latest offering had touches of it too… soo good…
As you can tell, I really like it too. Tough to take on a Slayer classic, but I thought they did it justice. And Living Sacrifice rules!
I prefer all the Slayer covers I own to the originals. Slayer are great at *writing* songs but I just don’t like how they perform them. Ha. Ah well.
The first song is from a band called The Phantom Carriage, its called Horses feed their birds
The second song is The Acacia Strain and its a cover of Black Sabath’s War pigs
I would like my prize pictures in poster size please.
thank you.
Ps: the phantom carriage is pretty good, i liked it.
Congratulations!! Here is a poster-sized image of your $100. However, I think you will have better luck spending the $100 if you print it in the size of an actual $100 bill:
https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/100-dollar-bill.jpg
And here is your cookie. This is a toffee-chocolate cookie. When you eat the print-out of this cookie, it will taste better with a huge bowl of vanilla ice cream.
https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/cookie.jpg
Please keep these images to yourself. I wouldn’t want the people who didn’t guess right to get the prizes for nothing.
the acacia strain song really disappointed me. In fact I’ve been disappointed with The Acacia Strain ever since I bought their DVD. They absolutely SUCK live.
I haven’t seen the DVD, but I have seen them live a couple of times, most recently about two weeks ago in the tour that was headlined by Whitechapel, and I thought their set was really strong. I’m a fan of their music, and I’m sure that’s a factor.
I don’t mind their music. Their lyrics are awesome. However, He does the tired, mumbling, out of breath parts of his lyrics live (think:Corey Taylor). It just disappointed me. I’m spoiled by all the veteran bands out there who put up a live show as good if not better than their albums.
Well, we agree on one thing: bands who play live better bring it — they better sound as good or better than they do on recordings. Adding something extra (and good) that you don’t exactly get on the recordings is the ideal. Revealing to all in attendance that you sounded good on the album only because of the miracles of modern recording and mixing technology is the ultimate fail.
Wow, both those songs were just terrible!
I will try harder, I promise, really I will. “Try harder” is my personal motto, followed by “Don’t expect to succeed.” In about 30 minutes, I will have 3 more songs in a post called “Mishmash”. On the other hand, I’m not positive you will like any of them better — though they’re very different from the two mysteries in this post.