COMPLEX MAN

Day 28: 25km

2011-08-07T11:59:00.000+02:00

Distance: 25.01 kilometres.

Duration: 2 hours 2 minutes and 8 seconds.

Pace: 4:52 per kilometre.

Date: Sunday 7/08/11 at 08:37am

Day 26: 18km

2011-08-06T23:30:00.000+02:00

Distance: 18.02 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 26 minutes and 31 seconds.

Pace: 4:48 per kilometre.

Date: Saturday 6/08/11 at 08:29am

Day 25: 10km

2011-08-05T20:58:00.000+02:00

Distance: 10.02 kilometres.

Duration: 50 minutes and 1 seconds.

Pace: 4:59 per kilometre.

Date: Friday 5/08/11 at 05:02pm

Day 24: 15km

2011-08-04T22:27:00.000+02:00

Distance: 15.01 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes and 44 seconds.

Pace: 5:02 per kilometre.

Date: Thursday 4/08/11 at 07:34pm

Day 22: 15km

2011-08-02T20:51:00.000+02:00

Distance: 15.02 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 19 minutes and 18 seconds.

Pace: 5:16 per kilometre.

Date: Tuesday 2/08/11 at 06:49pm

Day 21: 12km

2011-08-01T23:21:00.000+02:00

Distance: 12.01 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 6 minutes and 58 seconds.

Pace: 5:34 per kilometre.

Date: Monday 1/08/11 at 09:42pm

Day 20: 26km

2011-07-31T17:16:00.002+02:00

Distance: 26.02 kilometres.

Duration: 2 hours 9 minutes and 52 seconds.

Pace: 4:59 per kilometre.

Date: Sunday 31/07/11 at 09:29am

Day 17: 16km

2011-07-28T22:14:00.001+02:00

Distance: 16.13 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 22 minutes and 37 seconds.

Pace: 5:07 per kilometre.

Date: Thursday 28/07/11 at 07:03pm

Day 15: 10km

2011-07-26T17:36:00.001+02:00

Distance: 10.01 kilometres.

Duration: 51 minutes and 59 seconds.

Pace: 5:11 per kilometre.

Date: Tuesday 26/07/11 at 06:28am

Day 13: 25km

2011-07-24T15:09:00.000+02:00

Distance: 25.01 kilometres.

Duration: 2 hours 14 minutes and 6 seconds.

Pace: 5:21 per kilometre.

Date: Sunday 24/07/11 at 09:32am

Day 12: 10km

2011-07-23T17:06:00.003+02:00

Distance: 10.01 kilometres.

Duration: 49 minutes and 18 seconds.

Pace: 4:55 per kilometre.

Date: Saturday 23/07/11 at 09:17am

Day 11: 15km

2011-07-22T18:24:00.002+02:00

Did a 15 kilometre run this morning. My headphones and iPhone seem to have recovered from yesterday's run in the rain and were fully operational again this morning. I ran to the golf course and I'm starting to know my way around there: I mapped out a 2 kilometre tour and did a few rounds there. During the last kilometres it started to rain again, so I headed home and ran a couple more kilometres around the block to complete my 15 kilometres.

Afterwards I went on a 24 kilometre bikeride to check on my parents' house while they're on vacation. Listened to the new Lil Wayne mixtape, can't wait for 'Tha Carter IV'.

Distance: 15.01 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 13 minutes and 5 seconds.

Pace: 4:52 per kilometre.

Date: Friday 22/07/11 at 09:56am

Day 10: 17km Fartlek training

2011-07-22T09:38:00.007+02:00

I did a 17 kilometre Fartlek training today. I ran my usual 4 km warm-up to the channel and started doing my 2000 metre sprints there. According to Johan's schedule I had to run these 2 km in under 7 minutes and 40 seconds. That meant I had to run at a pace of 3:50 min/km. If you have been reading my blog you know that I consider anything under 5:00 min/km as alright. After all, if I would run a marathon at this pace I'd finish in 3,5 hours, which would be good enough for me.

But if Johan tells me to run 2000 metres in 7 mins 40 sec, I'll try so. And my first sprint today I made it under 7:40. I think I started out too fast but somewhat managed to stick to this pace and finished in 7 mins 35 sec. While I was enjoying my 10 minutes of "rest" (read: jogging) it started raining very hard and by the time I had to start my second sprint, I was literally soaking wet. I swear I might as well have jumped in the channel, crawled back out and continued running: I'd be equally wet. I figured I'd just continue my training: I was six kilometres away from home anyway, and I can't take shelter from the rain on marathon day either, so I'd just stick it out.

I did my second sprint in 7 minutes and 53 seconds. I was bummed I didn't make the 7:40, but I blame it on the weather and on the heaviness of my soaking wet shoes and clothes. My third sprint I finished in 7 minutes 51 seconds. Midway into this sprint my headphones started sounding bad and then just stopped working. Also the speakers of my iPhone didn't produce any sound anymore: no ringtone, no music, no text message notifications. Bummer, but I guess even Sennheiser and Apple technology isn't resistant to this kind of rain.

- 4 km warm-up: 4:58 min/km

- 2 km sprint: 7min35 - pace 3:46 min/km

- 2 km jogging: 5:50 min/km

- 2 km sprint: 7min53 - pace 3:53 min/km

- 2 km jogging: 5:40 min/km

- 2 km sprint: 7min 51 - pace: 3:51 min/km

- 3 km cool-down: 5:32 min/km

At night we had the very first gathering of Fixed Gear Hasselt and went on a 2 hour bikeride, something my quadriceps weren't too happy about.

Day Nine: Resting Day

2011-07-20T23:43:00.002+02:00

Today was a resting day again. I had scheduled an appointment with my physiologist to have my knees and shins checked out. Apparantly I'm rather prone to injury, and I'm pretty worried about this. Several years ago I had shin splint in both my legs and it had me down for months. I started feeling similar pains in my shins during the last couple of days, but luckily my physiologist assured my that it wasn't a shin splint yet, but it would become one if not threated properly.

I rode my bike there and back (20 kilometres in total) and on the way back I stopped at a specialized running store to check for new shoes. Johan advised me to get an extra pair so I could switch between pairs. They had me running barefoot on a treadmill and filmed my feet while I was doing so. Afterwards they analysed my movements and recommended me the Nike Lunarglide+3. The salesman obviously wasn't aware of the fact that I know my sneaker-stuff because he told me they were all out of Lunarglides 3 and had them on backorder. I know however that the Lunarglide 3 is set to be released on August 1st.

It seemed kinda odd to me that they would recommend me a running shoe that hasn't even been released yet. I mean, that shoe seems perfectly good to me, but when a stores that uses its running-experience as a main selling point recommends me a shoe that they possibly can't have experience with, I'll think twice. I will try to pay a visit to the Running Centre in Leuven in the near future and ask for a second opinion there.

When I got home from my bikeride, I took the train to Antwerp for a crossfit training.

Apart from the usual warmup, we did:

- pistols

- shoulder presses up to the maximum weight you could do 5 reps with.

- 5 sets of 5 shoulder presses with 40kg and 5 pull-ups, 90 seconds of rest in-between sets.

- waiter's walk with 16kg kettlebell

- farmer's walk with 16kg kettlebell

- tabata's: 4x 40 seconds of ropejumping, 20 seconds of rest in-between.

At night I chilled in a sauna centre for a couple of hours. It is a resting day after all...

Here is an interview with the designer of the Nike Lunarglide+ 3:

Day Eight: 19km

2011-07-19T23:39:00.001+02:00

Had to run 18 kilometres today. Last weekend Johan advised me to try and run in the woods or park or on anything softer than the concrete I usually run on. Honestly, I'm not a big fan of changing my routes: I like to run to the channel, run next to it until I'm halfway and then turn around and run back home. I don't have to worry about the distance (I hate when I arrive back in my street and my run is still a couple kilometres short so I have to run around the block like an idiot), I don't have to plan my route and worry about where I'm gonna end up.

Anyway, fact is that I will do whatever Johan tells me to do, so I started out in a different direction and ran past the movie theatre, to the Hasselt University, turned around and ran a couple of kilometres back to the golf course. When I entered the golf course I had about 11 kilometres done so I just ran tours until I had to head back home. However I didn't know my way around there, so I had to turn back several times when I'd be on a dead end path and I had to find my way back. I don't like runing like this at all: when I need to think about finding my way, it's harder to focus on my pace and my breathing. But I have to admit the scenery was beautiful and the trail felt better than running on concrete. I also ended up running 19 kilometres instead of the 18 I was supposed to do, because I couldn't calculate my distance.

Other than all this however, my run felt fairly good. I think I maintained a steady pace throughout the 19 kilometres and afterwards I barely had to catch my breath. If my knees and shins wouldn't hurt, I felt like I could easily run 10 more kilometres.

Distance: 19.1 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 36 minutes and 5 seconds.

Pace: 5:01 per kilometre.

Date: Tuesday 19/07/11 at 08:13am

I listened to the recordings for the upcoming Gypsy LP and to the War Hungry LP twice. I suggest you keep your eyes peeled for that Gypsy LP to be released! The songs and vocal patterns are really catchy, but the music is suprisingly heavy at times. I have no idea when this LP is going to be released or who is gonna put it out though. I'd think it'd be on Six Feet Under, but then again these recordings have been finished for a while now and SFU is not the kind of label to sit a great record and wait with releasing it.

The War Hungry LP is definitely something else. I thought after their 'Return To Earth' EP it was pretty clear where they were taking their sound, but still they surprised me with some of the songs. I am definitely into this record though, and I have been listening to this on a very regular basis for the last week. Unlike a lot of people I've been hearing, I don't think this is the best record ever (sic), but it definitely appeals to me and I often want to listen to it.

In the afternoon today, I took a trip to Antwerp for a crossfit training. Today's session consisted out of a test that everyone in the club took: we had to as many circuits of 3 different exercises as we possibly could in 15 minutes. Every circuit consisted out of:

- 10 push-ups with hand-release

- 15 wall-balls with an 8kg medicine-ball (throwing out of squat position)

- 20 ketllebell swings with an 16kg kettlebell

I kinda underestimated the heaviness of these excercises and started out rather fast, but after a couple of rounds I had to slow down. I ended up finishing 7 circuits and made it 2/3 into the last circuit. Considering that the club-record was 9 rounds, I guess I did kinda alright but I was exhausted and I feel like my heartbeat still hasn't found its normal pace as I type this.

Day Seven: Resting Day

2011-07-18T23:05:00.000+02:00

Even though I worked for 12 hours straight, today was a rest day and I feel like I needed it a lot. However, my fixed gear bike that's been in the works for a couple of months was finally finished over the weekend, so when I got home I just had go for a ride.

I wanted to see if in the future I would be able to go to work by bike, so I decided to try out part of the way to the city I work in. According to Google Maps it would be a good 21 kilometres from Hasselt to Beringen, if I'd ride next to the channel, and as I wrote on here before, I love running next to the channel so cycling next to it would be cool too, but I didn't know whether you can follow it all the way up to Beringen by bike. So just to check it out I rode the first 12 kilometres and then I turned around because it was getting dark. I did the entire 24 kilometres in little over an hour. I have no idea what a decent time is when riding a bike, but considering it's a fixed gear I guess that's alright.

Listened to Helmet 'in the meantime' on repeat for the entire ride. Such a good record.

Week 1 Total: 88km

2011-07-17T22:21:00.003+02:00

- In my first week of 'real' training I ran 88 kilometres in total.

- I did six runs this week.
- I spent 7 hours 12 minutes in my running shoes.
- My average pace throughout these runs was 4:54 minutes per kilometre.
- I burned 6697 calories this week.

Day Six: 21 km

2011-07-17T22:13:00.001+02:00

As I wrote the other day, I was really dreading today's run. After yesterday's fast 10 km my body had been aching all day so I was pretty sure this run was gonna hurt.
For the first 5 km it did hurt, but from then on everything seemed to get better and better. I ran from my place to the Albert-channel and ran on it's right bank from Hasselt to Genk. In Genk I crossed the bridge over the channel so I could run back to Hasselt on the left bank. While I was on the bridge (12 km into my run) I sent a text message to my friend Simon (I always run using the Nike+ app on my iPhone) because he lives two minutes from there and we drove over this bridge the day before and talked about running over it. He just texted me back "don't jump, life will get better".
Anyway, as soon as I hit the left bank of the channel, the hard wind hit my face and slowed me down A LOT. Next to the channel it's always windy but today the wind was particulary heavy and the thought of running 8 more kilometres didn't do much good for my morale.
Around kilometre 15 a car drove by that I recognised as Simon's car: he parked 20 metres ahead of me, jumped out in his running gear, ran past me and yelled I had to run behind him so I could stay out of the wind for a few kilometres. I had no idea how much of difference this would make, but with Simon's help I managed to work my pace up from 5:10 min/km to 4:30. Simon ran with me for about four kilometres, at which point he turned around and ran back to his car, leaving me with a renewed spirit and only a couple of kilometres to go. This really helped me to uplift my spirit and I managed to more or less stick around the pace o 4:30 min/km for the remaining kilometres, clocking in at a total time of 1 hour and 47 minutes, and an average pace of 5 min/km.
When I got home I drank a recovery shake, ate some cornflakes and sat in an icebath for 20 minutes. It may be psychological but taking an icebath after a long distance run in the morning seems to take away the pains and tired feeling that I usually have in my legs for the rest of the day.

Distance: 21 kilometres.
Duration: 1 hour 47 minutes and 14 seconds.
Pace: 5:06 per kilometre.
Date: Sunday 17/07/11 at 08:04am

Day Five: 10km

2011-07-16T15:24:00.002+02:00

Had to run a fast 10 kilometres today. I ran on an empty stomach again, to burn as much calories as possible. I changed my waterbelt for a new one, and this one fits better: it's tight enough to prevent the shaking up and down with every step. It also has a pocket for my keys and a couple of tubes of carbohydrate gel that I always like to have on me. It hardly ever have to use them but you never know when your body needs some extra carbs to burn when you're far away from home. Especially when running on an empty stomach.

My run didn't go as easy as I was hoping it would: I could definitely feel I've been running a lot this weeks, and that I am giving my body not much time to recover.

It felt like I've been running as fast as my legs could possible carry me, and I did finish in 46 minutes with an average pace of 4:37 min/km, which is alright (at least it is for me) but it's not the fastest 10 km I've every done. Last Monday I did 10 km in 44 minutes, but ofcourse I hadn't been running as much the days before as I had now.

I was back home at around 9:30am, took a cold shower, ate corn flakes and went straight to the gym to do some shoulder presses, front squats and a bunch of abdominal exercises.

As I'm typing this my knees and shins really don't feel too good, and tomorrow I have a 20 kilometre run scheduled. Not really looking forward to this...

Distance: 10.01 kilometres.

Duration: 46 minutes and 20 seconds.

Pace: 4:37 per kilometre.

Date: Saturday 16/07/11 at 08:39am

Day Four: 11km

2011-07-15T10:41:00.000+02:00

Today I just had to run 11 kilometres: no specific pace or time-indications. I figured if I'd run this on an empty stomach I would burn some extra calories, so I got up at 6am to commence my run.

From the first steps on I could tell my body hadn't recovered very well from the 21km I ran barely 15 hours ago: my knees, shins, Achilles tendon and feet still felt sore. Even my upper arms and shoulders were stiff from swinging them so violenly in a feeble attempt to gain speed during the sprints.

Usually these pains last for the first 4 or 5 kilometres and then either disappear or I just stop paying attention to them. Today however, these pains stuck with me during the entire 11 kilometres so I just tried to find a comfortable pace and rhythm, and tried to hold that. That worked pretty well for me so I finished my run, but my left Achilles tendon kept hurting for the rest of the day.

At night I hit the gym for a good 1,5 hours and did some bench-presses, biceps curls, stability-pushups, and some side and front planks.

Distance: 11 kilometres.

Duration: 57 minutes and 54 seconds.

Pace: 5:15 per kilometre.

Date: Friday 15/07/11 at 06:11am

Day Three: 21km Fartlek training

2011-07-14T17:34:00.000+02:00

I had to do a 21 kilometre Fartlek run today, consisting of a warm-up, 3x fast 2km with jogging in between, and a 4 km cooldown. All odds were against me though: I got up at 5:30am so I didn't get to catch much sleep, had an extremely busy day at work and came home exhausted. It was raining pretty hard, very windy and cold, so I really had to drag myself into my running shorts and go outside knowing that I would spend the next 2 hours in the rain and cold. Mind over matter.

Let me break my run down for you:

4 km warm-up: I ran this at an average pace of 5:35min per kilometre, and had to really force myself to take it easy.

2 km sprint: I ran 2 kilometres at an average pace of 3:30 min/km. I'm not sure whether that qualifies as a 'sprint' but it's the fastest pace I could maintain for 2000 metres. It was kinda hard for my body to give everything I had when my mind knew I'd have to run 14 more kilometres after this.

10 min jogging: this was supposed to be the 'rest' in between sprints so I tried to jog real slow, but still ended up running at an average pace of 5:25 min/km and did 3 kilometres. Still, I was really surprised at how fast my body (breathing and heartbeat) recovered from the sprint, even while it was still making an effort.

2 km sprint: this time it was harder for me to find a pace that I could keep up with, but I finished these 2000 metres at approx 3:46 min/km.

10 min jogging: I let my body rest while jogging for 2 kilometres at 5:35 min/km. It's kinda weird to look back on this, because at the time it felt like I was the slowest runner on earth. I actually remember thinking "the people that cross me now, must think I'm such a loser".

2 km sprint: By now I had already ran 13 kilometres and apparantly it didn't show as much as I thought it did: I 'sprinted' these last 2000 metres at an average pace of 3:35 min/km.

10 min jogging: I jogged another 2 kilometres sticking around 5:35 min/km

4 km cooldown: the last 4 kilometres were supposed to be ran at an easy pace, but it felt like I still had something left in me, so I rounded up my half marathon at 4:45 min/km.

All things considered I think I ran a pretty decent half-marathon, I wasn't that far off from personal best on a 21km run, even including the jogging I did.

After the last half-marathon I did a couple weeks ago, I was plagued by dehydration, so I bought a belt thats holds four 160ml bottles. This was my first time actually using it, and it sucked! It kept shaking up and down, and kept me off-rhythm. I drank an entire bottle every time I was "resting" (jogging) and finished the last one during the cooldown. I may have to go get me a tighter belt though.

After spending these last two hours in the pouring rain, I took a well-deserved hot shower. I normally always shower as cold as possible, so I had forgotten what a hot shower feels like: heaven. I had a protein/oatmeal shake to restore my protein and carb levels, drank a liter of water, and laid on the coach reading for about an hour.

When I got up to get ready for the gym my stomach felt pretty upset and I felt kinda dizzy. I still went to the gym but it wasn't much of a workout: benchpressed for a while, did some . My stomach kept feeling upset for the rest of the night: I'll have to find out if this was because of the many calories I had burnt running (1672) or still the dehydration taking its toll.

On an unrelated note, I told you The Verve was played yesterday in the gym, well today they played the new radio-single of a friend of ours so that was pretty cool! She went to shoot the music video in California and wore a Deathwish bandana for the entire clip, which is awesome.

Distance: 21.06 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 43 minutes and 1 seconds.

Pace: 4:53 per kilometre.

Date: Thursday 14/07/11 at 03:27pm

Day Two: No Rest For The Wicked

2011-07-13T17:02:00.003+02:00

Today was supposedly a rest day from running, but as I had a couple of hours off from work I decided to hit the gym rather than just sitting around at home.

I didn't feel like doing slow, repetitive excersises for an hour, so I just improvised a little circuit of excersises to do back to back. I did the following circuit three times, and took just enough rest in between every circuit to catch my breath.

10x pull-ups

12x 60kg bench-press reps

5x 30 kg bear complex (deadlift/snatch/front squat/shoulder press/back squat/shoulder press)

20x 20kg kettlebell swings

10x push-ups with handrelease

No big deal to most of you and no heavy weights, but it made me feel useful on a rest day. When I train alone in the gym I usually wear headphones to block out the meathead's dumb, steroid-fueled conversations, but when doing circuits headphones would obviously only get in the way. So musicwise the highlight of this workout was the shitty radiostation playing The Verve's 'bittersweet symphony'. Some of you will know how much I love this song (if not, read here) so that was pretty cool.

Day One: 15km

2011-07-12T19:24:00.006+02:00

Yesterday I wrote that I had a plan for preparing myself for this marathon. What this basically comes down to is that Johan made a plan for me and I'm gonna try and stick to it.

I would thank Johan for using his extensive knowledge and experience to make a schedule for me, but I'm not sure how thankful I'm gonna be in a couple of weeks, because Johan is probably gonna make me suffer.

Anyway, today was my first training day and Johan scheduled a 15km run for me. I decided to run early in the morning, as I prefer running on an empty stomach because that way you burn more body fat.

Speed or pace was of no importance today, so I told myself to take it easy and tried to stick to a pace of 5:30 to 6 minutes per kilometre. However 5 kilometres into my run I noticed that I was running around 5:30 min/km, while still really making the effort to take it easy. I figured I'd try to maintain this pace till 10 km and then see how I felt and speed up or slow down accordingly.

So after 10 kilometres I felt like I hadn't been digging deep into my body and I sped up to run the last 5 km at around 5 min/km, which still went kinda easy, so I finished with an average pace of 4:53 min/km.

Distance: 15.02 kilometres.

Duration: 1 hour 13 minutes and 29 seconds.

Pace: 4:53 per kilometre.

Date: Tuesday 12/07/11 at 07:18am

Day Zero: Running Free

2011-07-11T17:22:00.002+02:00

It's been a long while since I posted on here, and from what I gather blogging has been replaced by Tumblr or whatever, but personally I still like the concept of an old fashioned website where you can read back the stories or look for the information you wanted to re-read. Not that I have anything worthwile or important to share, but I don't have the skills to build a website so I'll just settle for doing a blog.
The main reason for my attempt at re-starting this, is that I am currently training to run a marathon for which I need to keep a log anyway. I figured if I'm going to type my results and my thoughts about them in a Word-file, I might as well make the effort to share 'em on here. I get asked a lot of random questions about running and was even asked to do an interview about it, and although I am by no means an expert on the subject (or on any subject, for that matter) I like to write about it. So yeah, that's what Complex Man is gonna be about for the most part I guess, but I'll probably dwell on other subjects too.

I've ran long distances before, I've even finished a marathon before, so what makes it special enough to write about it this time? Well, the first time I ran 42 kilometres it was just because I knew I could do it: I knew I had the willpower and determination to finish it. I had ran 30 kilometres before so I figured I could just bite my teeth for 12 more kilometres, so I just did.

What's different this time, is that I set out a personal goal to work up to. I've never had much direction or many goals in my life, I've never made a plan or worked towards something: whatever happened, just happened. However, something you need to work up to something in life, to make a plan and stick to it.

So a couple of weeks ago, when I got an email about the Brussels Marathon that is happening on October 2nd and I just said to myself that I'm gonna run this. Period.

I know it's no big deal and many people have done this before me, I'm not gonna win this or I don't have a finishing time in mind: I'm just gonna prepare as well as I can and run 42 kilometres and that's it.

At the risk of publicly writing about this and having to call it off due to injuries later this month, this is what Complex Man will be mostly about for a while: so bear with me. Or don't.

Dem rockers broke the scene

2010-10-14T23:10:00.003+02:00

For any fan of Hardcore and Punk I think it should be clear that the Bad Brains are definitely one of the greatest bands ever. This should be a fact that's just not up for discussion. Yes the Cro-Mags are great and so is Black Flag, and yeah I like Agnostic Front and your band is great too, but the Bad Brains are just something else. I'm not saying they're better than any of the bands previously mentioned, but they're just something else. I don't even care if you don't really like the Bad Brains or if their music is not your thing: if you can't even just appreciate them, I don't think you can truly appreciate Hardcore. And that's not even an opinion.

The Bad Brains were pioneers that pushed the boundaries of a subgenre that on itself is all about pushing boundaries. As far as I'm concerned the energy, intensity and raw power that is displayed on their recordings is still unmatched today. Keep in mind the Bad Brains didn't have access to one 10th of the equipment nor to the logistical or financial resources every crappy band has nowadays, yet their earliest recordings still blow most current bands right out of the water, almost 30 years later.

To back up every word I said, allow me to share some Bad Brains live footage with you. Obviously I would've liked to upload the entire 'Live At CBGB 1982' footage, as that's just unmatched, but I suggest you just go buy that on DVD and watch it religiously as I do.
Meanwhile I put up some footage that was filmed by the Dutch national television in 1988, when the Bad Brains played Holland on their European tour. I hope some punkrocker soon infiltrates the Dutch national TV-station and steals the entire session from their archives. For now we'll have to settle for the Bad Brains playing 'with the quickness', 'the prophets eye' and 'I against I', with a short introduction in which we see the HR sniffing flowers while a sweet reggae-tune plays in the background. Little later you can see that the reggae-song is no background music edited in, but HR is carrying around a portable cassette-player blasting reggae. If you thought that's already cool on itself: the song he's playing is in fact taken from HR's own solo-record ('while you were sleeping' of 'Charge'). Some next level stuff right there.

Here's 9:22 minutes of coolness and brilliance. Enjoy.

millimetres away from being lifeless

2010-10-09T15:40:00.002+02:00

many miles away from being righteous

I've got a couple things in the works, but no time for a proper update now so let me just briefly share with you with I've been jamming in my crib, my car and on my headphones...

HAZEN STREET 'hazen street'
LIL WAYNE 'I am not a human being'
GUCCI MANE 'the appeal'
BITTER END 'guilty as charged'
DEAD AND DYING 'the prosecution rests'
WATAIN 'lawless darkness'
BIG BOI 'sir lucious leftfoot'
LEEWAY 'open mouth kiss'
BURN 'last great sea'

I don't do too much blogging

2010-09-28T22:19:00.002+02:00

I just run this town, I don't do too much jogging

Soooo... it's been a while since I last updated this blawg, and by ‘while’ I obviously mean a long ass while as it’s been over six months. A lot has happened to me during those six months and the more that happens to me, the less happens to this blog...
That being said, in case you want to know - and I assume you do since you're still reading this right? - allow me to give you a little rundown of my complex life in 2010 so far: at the end of January I went on tour with Rise And Fall and Trapped Under Ice for two weeks, and a couple of days later I joined True Colors on their European tour with Floorpunch. Both tours were great, even though I missed two of the Floorpunch dates due to unexpected work obligations. The weather in Europe was cold as life during this period and our spirits were definitely tried and tested, but gig-mentality prevailed.

The last show of that Floorpunch/True Colors tour also marked the last Rhythm To The Madness live performance as we know it. Nevertheless, we soon found ourselves writing and recording new music. In June we hit CCR Studios to record an 8-minute track entitled ‘challenging the heavens’ that will be released on the already notorious Six Feet Under compilation in the distant or not so distant future. Although I doubt anybody outside the band will like this, I’m pretty proud of the song in general and of its lyrics specifically, but I'll get more into that sometime later.

In May I tagged along with True Colors for a weekend trip to Russia. As if hanging with Packo, Peers, Dunk, Hingie and Geert isn't cool enough on itself, both shows were straight up amazing! The kids in Moscow and Saint-Petersburg were so welcoming, supportive and grateful, and the entire weekend was a perfect blend of Hardcore, sightseeing, gastronomy, culture shock and good hangouts. I wouldn't be able to spell their names but a big belated thank you goes out to Victor and his friends for taking such good care of us!

A couple of months later I found myself chilling in the wonderful city of Madrid, Spain. This must have been the first trip abroad that I made in over ten years that wasn't music-related and it felt a little awkward at first: when we arrived at Madrid airport, I instinctly started going through the motions of checking which club we were supposed to be, what time load-in was and when there'd be food in the backstage. This may sound odd or just straight up stupid to you, and it does to me too, but apparantly I couldn't set foot abroad without automatically going into gig-mode.
Anyway, once I realised I touched down in Madrid with the sole intention of chilling and relaxing with some of my best friends, I was able to get the best out of the weekend. Madrid is a beautiful city and we've been walking around, hanging around, acting like ignorant tourist and it was awesome. Whenever I see the pictures of that weekend, I just wanna grab my North Face weekendbag and hop on the first plane to Spain.

On a rather personal level the most important thing in 2010 so far, was buying myself an appartment. Actually, this is the main reason why I haven't looked after this blog in a long while: from February till July I've been arranging all of the paperwork, working in the appartement, packing, moving, and settling.
I always thought I'd never be a house-owner, but here I am sitting at my dinner table in my favourite city in my own place. I've always lived together with family, girlfriends and roommates but now this place is mine, and mine alone. This is my world, where everything goes my way and my way only, and y'all get shut out whenever I want to. This is my own personal kingdom where the Cro-Mags are officially the best band ever, where Henry Rollins and George Orwell wrote the constitution, and Henry Miller wrote the bill of rights. Where every TV-channel broadcasts The Sopranos and The Wire, and where Eddie Murphy is the king's jester. And where all of the above are considered sophisticated and socially accepted.

So basically this is what I've been up to in 2010 so far. I'm not sure where I'll take this blog or where this blog is gonna take me, but I'll try to update this once in a while, whenever my complex life allows me to.
In the meantime, feel free to check up on me at www.twitter.com/klaasvoets and follow me for daily egotripping and shinfo.

Allow me to finish this off with a little playlist:
BLACK BREATH 'Heavy Breathing'
WAKA FLOCKA FLAME 'Lebron Flocka James 2' mixtape
NAILS 'Unsilent Death'
TERROR 'Keepers Of The Faith'
DRAKE 'Thank Me Later'
FAT JOE 'The Darkside Vol. 1'

The Future

2010-01-29T16:07:00.004+01:00

ain't what it used to be.

So January is coming to an end and honestly I'll be glad to dance on its grave. During the last month I've been working like a madmen: 12 hour workdays, Sundays included. Not only has my regular job been hectic, in an optimistic moment I also accepted a chair in an exam commission that took up a lot more of my (already limited) off time than I expected. However I can say I enjoyed it and feel good about working hard and making myself useful. What I don’t really feel good about though is wearing myself thin, neglecting my otherwise pretty alright food and training schedules, and letting this blog go down the drain. After 12hour working days I just didn’t feel inspired or motivated to boot a computer.

However, that being said I think I earned the right to get away from it all for a little while. I haven’t done any touring since the True Colors/Bitter End tour last May and I’m anxious to hit the road again! I will join Rise And Fall and Trapped Under Ice, two of my favorite current Hardcore bands, on their European tour. Almost right after that I will hook up with True Colors and New Jersey’s Floorpunch for a couple of shows, leading up to their show at Trix in Antwerp on February 17^th. This will be one of the last True Colors shows, the last Floorpunch show and also the last Rhythm To The Madness show ever.

I may or may not pick up this blog again when I get back to the real world, but right now I feel more like rather dedicating my efforts to printed material instead of bits and bytes. We'll see about that...

Anyway, come say hi at one of these shows:

01/29: Bochum, Germany @ Matrix w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
01/30: Rosswein, Germany @ Jugendhaus w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
01/31: Katowice, Poland @ Marcholt w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
02/01: Wien, Austria @ Viper Room w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
02/02: Aschaffenburg, Germany @ Katakombe w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
02/03: London, United Kingdom @ Underworld w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
02/04: Manchester, United Kingdom @ Star and Garter w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
02/05: Nottingham, United Kingdom @ The Central w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall
02/06: Ieper, Belgium @ Winterfest w/ Trapped Under Ice, Rise And Fall

02/12: Peer, Belgium @ De Wissel w/ True Colors
02/13: Lichtenstein, Germany @ JZ Riot w/ Floorpunch, True Colors
02/14: Haarlem, The Netherlands @ Patronaat w/ Floorpunch, True Colors
02/15: London, United Kingdom @ The Underworld w/ Floorpunch, True Colors
02/16: Leeds, United Kingdom@ The Well w/ Floorpunch, True Colors
02/17: Antwerp, Belgium @ Trix LAST RHYTHM TO THE MADNESS SHOW w/ Floorpunch, True Colors

2009 Yearlists (3)

2010-01-08T15:57:00.008+01:00

FILIP VAN DAMME
Filip Van Damme aka Den Backtrack is an OG Soul Survivor, sneakerhead, head of RTTM Security, editor of Crunkswagger blog, Antwerp native, and if you ask me: related to Jean-Claude by blood...

Most important thing that happened in 2009:
Seeing I don’t have cable nor listen to the radio that often and mostly get information by word of mouth I tend to be pretty ignorant when it comes to what goes on in the world today. I mostly reside in my own little world and can’t really be bothered when it comes to the umpteenth revealed corruption/adultery scandal or the endless political bullshit that seems to rule the media nowadays. I do however think the recent copenhagen climate conference (even if the outcome totally flopped) is a positive evolution. I’m no environmentally conscient person whatsoever and my ecological footprint would probably make big foot look like a lil’ bitch, but I can only applaud the growing awareness of the way we’re completely ruining our planet. Furthermore I think Michael Jackson’s death is definitely worth mentioning. Although he hadn’t really contributed to the music world since 1991 and pretty much made making a fool out of himself into an art, he did shape the mold of popular music for years to come. Michael was to pop what chuck berry was to rock, black sabbath was to metal, the bad brains were to hardcore and lil’ wayne is to 21st century hip hop. On a more personal level a lot has changed for me this past year. Got sucked into what could be called the grown up life and finally settled into the idea of the necessity of having a full time job if I ever want to do the the things I have in mind for myself, yet ironically work often prohibits me from doing the things I want. The biggest challenge for me this last year was keepin’ a healthy balance between the real world and all the little things I take refuge in. I think I manage pretty well although I often have the feeling of missing out. Missing out on opportunities that present themselves in terms of career moves or financial gain, but also missing out on doing what I want whenever I want to do it. I guess that is the paradox of true freedom though. Maybe 2010 will help me solve this.

Person of the year:
Hard question. Although I tend to see a lot of good in people I’m convinced of the truth that lies in the saying ‘nobody’s perfect’. I can and will not point out one individual as being person of the year based on personal merit, talent, fame or fortune. I think the real persons of the year are those that stay true to theirselves, others and what they believe in. Those who don’t lead their lives by society’s forced standards, but have the strength and individuality to live by their own rules. Those who are in constant search for truth and happiness, who can see beyond their nose and and are able to cross set boundaries, who try to better themselves and those around them and don’t take comfort in what is handed down to them on a platter but instead seek for added value beyond what is common. No ceilings, only the sky!

Best musical releases of 2009:
I don’t feel like firing up the google machine to see if said releases were actually released this year, but the following have definitely grasped my attention and or have been in rotation the most: damien jurado – caught in the trees, lil wayne – no ceilings mixtape, iron age – the sleeping eye, ghostface – ghostdini: the wizard of poetry in the emerald city, xasthur – all reflections drained, winne – zonder strijd, thorr’s hammer – dommedagsnatt (if re-releases count), david bazan – curse your branches, birdman – family over everything mixtape, keri hilson – in a perfect world… , tiny vipers – life on earth, kid cudi – man on the moon: the end of day, kings of convenience – declaration of dependance, brand new – daisy, la roux – s/t, jim jones – pray IV reign, regina spektor – far, trapped under ice – secrets of the world, camera obscura – my maudlin career, kickback – no surrender, timbaland – shock value II and I’m still getting into that new Clipse record. I kinda suck at this as you can tell.

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
On the fanzine tip I’ve always appreciated angelo degryse’s and laura vos’ efforts, respectively tales of shatou and milkshake fanzine. I don’t really get around to reading that often as that is the first thing that gets skipped whenever I’m busy with other stuff. Since I’ve kept myself pretty busy I only got around to reading jeff chang’s ‘cant’t stop won’t stop’ on a 32 hour trip back home from LA. Oh yeah, I always have an issue of vice magazine laying around the can for those long efforts. Plus I enjoy flipping through Peter Beste’s ‘True Norwegian Black Metal’, which was an awesome gift for my birthday last year. I’ve started buying some more books, so we’ll see if I’ll pick up on reading again.

Best movie seen in 2009:
the hangover, no competition. tyson was pretty intense as well.

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
I only checked out my friend kathryn’s ‘the real deal’, which is a good listen, too bad it doesn’t come on till 2 am central european time. Other than that I can appreciate the duyster sessions on Sunday evenings.

Best live performance seen in 2009:
The most interesting and entertaining was definitely the superbowl of hardcore in brooklyn last june. Anthony Communale reaching his mic into the crowd holding it by the end of the mic stand with so much ease as if it was a chopstick. Ezec mounting the stage in ripped lightblue jeans that had the nyhc logo written in black magic marker all over them, opening up with icepick and finishing up the set with four songs off of the skarhead ‘drugs, money and sex’ EP with mike dijan on guitar. Seeing 40 year old mobster types doped up on blow in leather jackets and Kevone of BullDoze fame fuck people up on the dancefloor. Other than that I remember enjoying seeing madball in a pretty small club in bruges, the terror/trapped under ice/born from pain show in aachen. Cold World/Justice in Essen was pretty intense as well and definitely brought back good memories. Closer to home I saw Winne tear up club petrol last winter with his posse litterally just straight up losin’ their shit on stage. He litterally blew every hip hop act I saw recently away (including names like ghostface, gza, capone ’n noreaga, …). Live shows I saw of Damien Jurado, Bon Iver and William Fitzsimmons were pretty cool as well. Definite let down was Electric Wizard, although I love their releases.

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
I’m having a hard time singling one out. Yearly trip overseas to new york was good as always, plenty of commerce and calories. Three weeks of touring the states with rise and fall and hitting up 18 states is definitely something I’ll remember and cherish. The denim quest I sent myself out on in Stockholm and being imprisoned for four days. Two hour drive down to germany to go see rzl dzl that took us about four, jumping a fence with a wheelchair and chillin’ hard, eating sint catharina chicken sandwiches afterwards. Booking a flight to go see madball and rhythm to the madness play across the pond and returning within a 24 hour timeframe. Things that define a good roadtrip are definitely snacks / drinks / good company. I could go see a farmer milk a cow four hours away as long as the trip up there is good. Form over function.

Website of the year:
failblog.org

Picture/image/artwork of the year:

Purchase or gift of the year:

plane tickets (x4) / sara’s birthday package / new matress

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:

some/most people.

Best and worst decision made in 2009:

no regrets, no shame.

Quote of 2009:

“I was living the crimethinc. dream he man!” -OJ

Resolutions made for 2010:

stayin’ on top my game.

WIM JACQUEMIN
I'm proud to host the yearlist of yet another OG Soul Survivor! Wim aka De Hardway is a standup dude and I wouldn't flinch walking into a sea of ice with him. Known from The Hardway blog, boenking and his developed taste in New York Hardcore (the sketchier, the better!).

Most important thing that happened in 2009 (politics, entertainment, personal,…):
Breaking up

Person of the year:
It's just me myself and I. Whatever happens around us, it's yourself dealing with it.

Best musical releases of 2009:
Even though a lot of the older bands did some new releases, like KickBack, Maximum Penalty, Skarhead, Wisdom in Chains, Merauder... 2009 wasn't the best year for hardcore. Some records I have been listening to a lot:
Steel Nation 'Soul Swallower'
SetBack - Unfinished Business
Strength For A Reason - Burden of Hope

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
The Four Noble Truths, by the Dalai Lama

Best movie seen in 2009:
Public Enemies

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
Curb Your Enthusiasm

Best live performance seen in 2009:
Killing Time, Superbowl NYC
Stigmata - Superbowl NYC

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
Vacation: India - Nepal
As for a roadtrip, nothing can beat the idea of going hiking, unprepared, when -18 degrees.

Website of the year:
http://www.hardcorewebsite.net/bored

Picture/image/artwork of the year:
Gonna have to skip this one.

Purchase or gift of the year:
2009 was the year in which I didn't do any crazy purchases, but still never had money. I'm looking around here, all my money went to living.

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:
Women

Best and worst decision made in 2009:
Best: I don't make good decisions
Worst: check question 1 and 12

Quote of 2009:
"ik weet ni"

Resolutions made for 2010:
Must be the first year for which I have some resolutions:
Soul Survival
Get a grip on my financial situation
Find a new job
Be more disciplined in cooking / housekeeping / pumpin iron
Find inner peace
Mosh and hurt people in my camojacket one time

Photo Friday

2010-01-08T15:34:00.006+01:00

For the fourth edition of Photo Friday, Simon decided to go with some pictures taken by a Belgian: here's a fine selection out of Zona (Siberian Prison Camps) by Carl De Keyzer.

As always: Complex Man' Photo Friday is hosted by Simon Baerts of Wolk Creative.

2009 Yearlists (2)

2010-01-05T20:55:00.006+01:00

BJORN DOSSCHE
Editor of One Step Down Fanzine, Skulls And Skeletons Fanzine, and Mind Over Matter blog; former employee of both Genet/Phyrus Records and Good Life Recordings; associate of Complete Control Records; vocalist of The Deal and Rise And Fall... Not even mentioning the dozens of guest recordings he has done and contributions he has written, I think it's safe to say Bjorn's Hardcore-resume is unmatched by most. Here's how he looks back on the o'nine:

Most important thing that happened in 2009 (politics, entertainment, personal,…):
Personally (as much as I hate people that talk about their own band too much) I have to say that recording and getting "Our Circle Is Vicious" out there was the most important thing going on in my life in '09.

Person of the year:
Murph. I miss hanging with this dude more.

Best musical releases of 2009:
In no specific order:

Iron Age "The Sleeping Eye"
Dinosaur Jr. "Farm"
Dan Auerbach "Keep It Hid"
Morrissey "Years Of Refusal"
Shrinebuilder "s/t"
Converge "Axe To Fall"
Trapped Under Ice "Secrets Of The World"
Raekwon "Only Built 4 Cuban Linx II"
Kickback "No Surrender"
Blakroc "s/t"

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
James Ellroy "Blood's A Rover".

Best movie seen in 2009:
Inglourious Basterds.

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
I'm afraid I'll have to be that backwards guy again, I don't watch television or listen to the radio really. If "Curb Your Enthusiasm" is broadcasted around here, then I'll go with that.

Best live performance seen in 2009:
Morrissey, Antwerp.

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
Rise And Fall / Blkout - Australia.

Website of the year:
whatchedgewears.blogspot.com

Picture/image/artwork of the year:
I'm bad at this.

Purchase or gift of the year:
Craziest gift: J's. Thanks Jeffrey.

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:
Bringin' It Down, the band.

Best and worst decision made in 2009:
Best: Taking 6 months off work. Worst: Holding off going to the dentist.

Quote of 2009:
"Een A met nen circel derrond en gaan met die banaan!"

Resolutions made for 2010:
Surviving 30.

ALEX RUSSIN
You may know Alex from playing guitar as well as providing some vocals for a lil band called Cold World, but did you know he casually writes breakdowns for War Hungry or Frostbite? Also just released an EP with his other band, called Gypsy. Make sure to check that out on Six Feet Under Records.

Most important thing that happened in 2009:
The Pittsburgh Steelers won 6th Super Bowl in Franchise history, making them the best franchise, in the history of the best sport in the world.

Person of the year:
Arthur Rizk

Best musical releases of 2009:
Tegan & Sara - Sainthood / Title Fight - The Last Thing You Forget / Tigers Jaw - Spirit Desire

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
Nothing really impressed me this year.

Best movie seen in 2009:
The Hangover

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia

Best live performance seen in 2009:
Tigers Jaw, Cafe Metropolis, Wilkes-Barre, PA November.

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
Cold World / Dirty Money Germany Weekend

Website of the year:
www.trumbullisland.com

Picture/image/artwork of the year:

Purchase or gift of the year:
Space Jam's

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:
When Rifkin got everyone to believe he was straight edge.

Best and worst decision made in 2009:
Best - Quitting my old job. Worst - Eating the chicken I ate last night.

Quote of 2009:
"Jews didn't invent the Rueben, they just put a patent on it" - Arthur Rizk

Resolutions made for 2010:
Throw my cell phone in the susqy.

KOEN GOETSCHALCKX
Aside from being featured on an Agathocles discography, Koen aka XKOENX also plays guitar in The Dying aka the best trash metal band to come out of Belgium since Asphyxia. He is also playing guitar for Destined To Burn as well pursueing a career in cyclism. A friend of animals and more than a friend to his friends, I am once more honoured to have him featured on here. I wish I could have posted a video of Koen reading this list to you 'cause that'd be the only way you could ever fully grasp his touching honesy and wittiness.

Most important thing that happened in 2009:
Living together with my girlfriend. Too much right winged flemish people.

Persons of the year:
All my friends. They just are who they are and that is the best.

Best musical releases of 2009:
The Devil’s Blood - The time of no time evermore

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
Pink floyd book

Best movie seen in 2009:
Inglorious Basterds: Bonjowrnow

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
Radio Klara. For Tv it must be Top gear and some stuff on National Geographic or the Discovery Channel.

Best live performance seen in 2009:
The Devil’s blood

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
Cold world Roadtrip/Vacation in NY/tour with Hatesphere

Website of the year:
www.facebook.com

Picture/image/artwork of the year:

Purchase or gift of the year:
A racebike

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:
Scientists saying that humanity is not responsible for nature.

Best and worst decision made in 2009:
Best: joining the CO2 reduction workgroup at work.
worst: crossing the street

Quote of 2009:
“Hou het maar allemaal goed in het oog!”

Resolutions made for 2010:
Living life, riding a new racebike, hanging out, maybe become a bit more POSI.

Quote Of The Week: Chain Of Strength

2010-01-04T13:37:00.010+01:00

"I can't believe another year has gone by

and still nothing, as if we don't even try...

And there's nothing to be proud of,

and nothing you can truly stand by.

It's time to believe.

I've got some things to say,

and I can't save those thoughts forever:

I want to see a change but you don't feel a thing.

I cover you up with words, so nicely said,

just to make you sound good.

I want to believe.

Oh, sure people fucking buy it,

but nothing is standing up with time.

And if you really want to say something,

were we ever really saying something?"

Chain Of Strength - "impact" - The One Thing That Still Holds True - 1996

As much as I dislike the term because it provides haters way too much opportunity to take their cheap shots, when I hear the word “crucial” one band comes to mind: Chain Of Strength.
To me this band has all that I look for in Straight Edge Hardcore, simple as that. Besides having what may very well be the best bandname ever, they also have the perfect logo and T-shirt designs, the best lay-outs and the coolest pictures. Chain had the positivity and the anger at the same time and they captured it like very few others could. They had the lyrics that were simple and catchy, yet meaningful and effective. Chain Of Strength has always been a band much criticized for its image and its heritage yet when it comes down to Youth Crew styled Hardcore, Chain Of Strength still blows most bands out of the water.
People call it cheesy, I call it true to its form. People say it was a pose, I say it was a stance.

2009 Yearlists (1)

2010-01-04T13:16:00.008+01:00

Entering a new year and a new decade always involves a little bit of looking back too. I've always been a fan of yearlists and it's been a tradition for me to host them and post them, so I figured I might as well post up some on Complex Man. A big 'thank you' goes out to all the contributers for taking the time to fill this out! This is the first batch, I will post some more during the next few days. Hope you enjoy, 'cause I know I did...

BART DE DUYTSCHE

Let's kick off with the yearlist of Bart De Duytsche aka The Flex, as he was the first to send in his list on my request and as I know he does these things thoroughly. Editor of The Ghent Decontrol Fanzine, running enthousiast and movie connaisseur.

Most important thing that happened in 2009:
Growing up and growing pains, moving to a bigger apartment, settling for a steady job because life forces me to, getting into (and out of?) running again, playing poker regularly, Secrets Of The World.

Person of the year:
My cat.

Best musical releases of 2009:
I can't help but feel kinda out of touch with current music, not that I want to be, and I probably ain't, but I can't think of much releases that blew me away in 2009. These are definitely among the best things I heard in 2009: Secrets Of The World, Our Circle Is Vicious, Obliteration's second EP, Farm, History Of.. Tape reissue, The Sleeping Eye, Raw Life.

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
The best stuff I've read is the interview I did with Kevin Crowley in early 2009 for my still to be finished final issue of The Ghent Decontrol.
I don't think I've read many fanzines this year, but still more than in 2008. I liked Heat Fanzine, not bad for a bunch of Germans.
I've read some books in 2009, but as usual I don't finish much and/or most are about technical stuff on making movies.
I've read The Road, which I liked. I've read the Dave K NYHC book, but that's an unfinished book and when reading you def can tell it is.
I'm pretty sure I've read a few other good books, but since I'm not at home I can't check my shelve.
The best book of 2009 I still have to read but is on top of my 'to read' pile: Everybody's Scene.

Best movie seen in 2009:
Must be Inglourious Basterds. Fuck the haters. I was thoroughly entertained from the first moment on, both times I went to see it. Movies should be about forgetting everything else and not worrying about a thing (well, most of the time anyway).
I really really liked Hunger, maybe the opposite of Inglourious Basterds, not entertaining at all, and very raw.
Further I liked Revolutionary Road, The Wrestler, De Helaasheid Der Dingen, Anvil: The Anvil Story, Star Trek, Slumdog Millionaire, District 9, Eden Lake, Away We Go, The Hangover, Public Enemies, The Cove, and a shitload that I'm forgetting.
Worst shit I've seen this year is GI Joe: Rise Of Cobra, Terminator Salvation, Sorority Row and Synecdoche New York.

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
I don't listen to the radio, sometimes to Henry Rollins' Harmony In My Head or an American Cinematographer's podcast, but that's it.
I don't know if I saw the final season of The Wire this year or last, but that must have been the best. Curb Your Enthusiasm season 7 was great, even better than season 5 and 6. I liked Californication and 30 Rock. Eastbound And Down was a good television show as well, though there should have been more episodes.
I really dug television shows about cooking food in 2009 such as Mijn Restaurant, Komen Eten, Beste Hobbykok Van Vlaanderen or SOS Piet. I further more enjoyed Poker After Dark and Super8.
I watch too much stuff.

Best live performance seen in 2009:
Hands down the first time I heard Rise And Fall play In Circles live at Ieper fest. That song was absolutely the heaviest thing I've seen this year. Cock Sparrer in Amsterdam was the best show I've seen.
Other shows: Tragedy in Amsterdam, Fy Fan in Venlo, Iron Age in Ghent, Criminal Damage in Leuven, Dinosaur Jr. in Leffinge, Sex Vid in Antwerp, Cold World in Germany, FVK in Rotterdam, Murphy's Law in Eindhoven, Pete Dorothy in Lokeren.
I'm bummed I missed out on another Trapped Under Ice tour and My Bloody Valentine.

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
I didn't go on vacation this year and only made it out for a short trip to the north of France, so I guess that has to be it. I haven't been on many road trips this year and def not on tour. The best road trip would be to the FVK show in Rotterdam when cops pulled up to the car next to us at a traffic light and held the dudes in the car at gunpoint. It would have been cooler if Toon had gotten out just before to take a leak (as he wanted to do).

Website of the year:
1) Google
2) Facebook
3) xSharex

Picture/image/artwork of the year:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/punkarchive/pool/

Purchase or gift of the year:
A new iPod.

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:
Synecdoche New York. Google Wave.

Best and worst decision made in 2009:
Getting a real job.

Quote of 2009:
My name is Shosanna Dreyfus and THIS is the face... of Jewish vengeance!

Resolutions made for 2010:
Running a few half marathons and if I get in shape fast, running a full one, less wasted time, more fun, more hanging out, finishing my zine (Floorpunch in Antwerp!) and hopefully more good music and movies.

ADAM RIFKIN

Wilkes-Barre native and Into Another-devotee, Rifkin is probably known to most as the drummer for bands such as Bad Seed, Gypsy and No Tolerance. On the side he does a little roaddogging for War Hungry, Rzl Dzl, Mother Of Mercy and will soon join Floorpunch on their European tour.

Most important thing that happened in 2009:

the first black president of the united states of america

Person of the year:

no one was good in 2009, year of the dirty dogs.

Best musical releases of 2009:

(i'll just do hardcore) trapped under ice - secrets of the world

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:

i'm just gonna pretend that radio silence came out in 2009 cuz thats when i bought it...

Best movie seen in 2009:

watchmen

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:

lost, duhhhh

Best live performance seen in 2009:

Negative approach in philly

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:

seattle with cold world for rain fest. (thanks to posi chris for showing us the town)

Website of the year:

http://www.anonib.com/ssbs/ (hehehe)

Picture/image/artwork of the year:

Purchase or gift of the year:

new x swatch, blackberry tour, cp company winter jacket

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:

our driver crashing the van in england, good prank...

Best and worst decision made in 2009:

mother of mercy full us tour with comeback kid (sucked but it was the shit, you know what i mean?)

Quote of 2009:

"its 2009, fuck it..." - bad seed inc.

Resolutions made for 2010:

tour more, take the g.r.e.'s, and apply to a grad school program

GEERT HOLLANDERS
Geert Hollanders aka Geert To The X aka Bompa aka Hoogie is editor of Line Of Defense Fanzine, former Powered Records associate, founding CEO of Control Records, founding CEO of Nailed To The X Products, and curator of the 'Museum Of Hardcore And General Coolness'. I am proud to call him one of my best friends and honored to have him featured on here.

Person of the year:
Adam Malik

Best musical releases of 2009:
On - Double Vision lp / No Tolerance ep

Best book/magazine/fanzine read in 2009:
Radio Silence book

Best movie seen in 2009:
Public Enemies

Best television/radio broadcast seen/heard in 2009:
Californication

Best live performance seen in 2009:
Cold World set, Essen Germany / Edge Day show, Boston USA.

Vacation/roadtrip/tour of the year:
July 10th till August 3th that included Cold Worl weekend - Have Heart, shipwrecked, Rise And Fall euro tour - Boston + California S&F trip.

Website of the year:
Double Crossed blog / Ebay.com

Picture/image/artwork of the year:

Purchase or gift of the year:
Air Jordan III 2001 edition

Joke/prank/hoax of the year:
Have to be something that involves Peers.

Worst decision made in 2009:
Watching Bringin'it Down for a couple of songs at Ieper fest.

Quote of 2009:
'het zal wel zeker!'

Resolutions made for 2010:
just being and doing the same stuff as the last 17 years.

Photo Friday

2010-01-01T23:42:00.005+01:00

I know I've been posting light for the last week, and I'm not gonna apologise for it. I do however got a few things in the pipeline, so keep checking back. Today however is Friday, which means Simon Baerts of Wolk Creative is hosting the weekly Photo Friday, and whether it's Christmas Day or January 1st, Simon delivers no matter what. This time he wanted to share some pictures by Robert and Shana Parkeharrison with us. Hope you enjoy!

Quote Of The Week: Chamberlain

2009-12-28T23:32:00.004+01:00

"Winter comes hunting like a wolf on the wind,

and the lovers lie unknowing in their beds.

It won't be long before the cold and the snow

kill off the flowering armies that summer's led.

You dig for your last smoke as the highway leads you home,

and this day's going down in a flame.

And evening is a reminder of the beauty of the end

and that the end might be the reason why we came.

Night's handing silence to the hillsides where you walk,

but you want that deeper silence that stays up in them hills.

The field is a lover with her colors at your knees

but you know there are stranger flowers still.

And somehow you tell yourself that, like a rain cloud:

"I'll be back again."

But as you pull up to your house you know that you can't go in..

Until the day burns down.

We live the long walk of a question, my friends.

I think about my sister out in the rain;

and all the heroes I know that she'll never find,

and that she'll never leave as perfect as she came.

My mind is a symphony in the dark

and my heart is an old museum with all of these memories that I keep.

I got to get back to where the sun raised the flowers

and the flowers, they raise me.

And somehow you tell yourself that, like a rain cloud:

"I'll be back again."

But as you pull up to your house you know that you can't go in...

Until the day burns down.

If I could hang the stars up, I'd hang 'em up one by one,

to leave this world with something my hands made.

And when that sun came up and made 'em all disappear

I'd know my work was real, because nothing real can stay."

Chamberlain - 'until the day burns down' - The Moon, My Saddle - 1998

Photo Friday

2009-12-25T09:28:00.006+01:00

So once again a Merry Christmas, and welcome to the second installment of our new weekly section called Photo Friday!

In a time where every girl randomly purchases an overpriced camera, gets a flickr account and starts calling herself a photographer, Complex Man decided that it's time to separate the wheat from the chaff. These fisheye-lens-abusing amateurs seem to forget that photography is art, and art requires talent, skill and practice.

This is exactly why Complex Man brought in a professional photographer to host Photo Friday: Simon Baerts has a Master's Degree in Audiovisual Arts, is a webdesigner and a certified writer. Simon will carefully select a couple of pictures for us every Friday from now on. You might want to check out and support his newlyfound enterprise called Wolk Creative.

Supposedly, a picture is worth a thousand words, so we intent to keep this section short on commentary and let the images speak for themselves. Today’s photos are all by Elliott Erwitt. Enjoy!

The night before Christmas...

2009-12-24T17:52:00.010+01:00

I'm losing my mind over this Christmas, trying to grind for everything on this wishlist:
1. Forgiveness
2. New knees
3. A little upwards twist to my wheel of fortune
4. Death to all snitches

A couple of weeks ago, when scheduling the remainder of my vacation days at work, I figured I wouldn’t need any days off during the holiday period. In a few altruistic moments I thought I’d let the people who have families take their days off, and I’ll just take my vacation days early 2010 when I have some touring planned. Win-win right? Well not really, because this week has been the slowest four work-days I’ve been through in the last six months. I like my job and I won’t complain about it, but the thing is: I just love Christmas and it bothered me to be working when the rest of the world was preparing the Christmas days or celebrating early. I know it’s uncool and cheesy for a man my age to admit enjoying the Christmas season, but here’s why: there is just so much great Christmas Music out there! And the problem is I can only listen to it during a two weeks every year… So I have a strict personal policy that says during the days leading up to Christmas, nothing but X-Mas music will be played in my car, as several of my friends are able to confirm. I’m gonna keep this short because it’s Christmas Eve and I have places to be, but let me just share a glimpse of which albums the X-Mas playlist on my iPod consists of, among too many songs to list here right now...

- Jim Jones And Skull Gang Present: a tribute to Bad Santa (hosted by Mike Epps - 2008)
- Jim Jones – A Dipset X-Mas (2005)
- Various Artists – Christmas On Death Row (1996)
- Various Artists - Christmas Rap Volume II (1987)
- Johnny Cash – Christmas With Johnny Cash (2003)
- Booker T. & The MG's – In The Christmas Spirit
- Crass – Merry Crassmass EP (1981)
- Vince Guaraldi - A Charlie Brown Christmas
- Snoop Dogg - Landy & Egg Nog: A DPG Christmas
- Snoop Dogg - Christmas In Tha Dogg House (2008)

Besides these albums, my X-Mas Playlist consists of dozens of other random Christmas-themed songs. One of these is the version of 'do they know it's Christmas' that Fucked Up recently released. These Canadian punks recorded this cover with the intent to donate all money to charity, so please support some good causes and enjoy so good music at the same time. Here's some more info on this song and the causes, directly from the band:

"Hi everyone, we're finally ready to go with this year's installment of our benefit Christmas-themed 7"/mp3. This years edition is a cover of "Do They Know It's Christmas?" which is available NOW via ITUNES. HERE. Now before you ask or text your friends - we know that this song is a lame 80s relic and that we are posers who "jumped the shark" so long ago and that the combination of these things is enough to make you go into convulsions apoplexy and make you want to throw the Fucked Up records you haven't sold on ebay yet into the fireplace, just remember that you'd be missing the point. The point is Christmas, people.

Like last year, this release will be %100 for charity. The money from the sale of this mp3, and the 7" (where this song will be the b-side to a new FU song called "Davids Plan", and will be released mid February) will be split between three groups:

Justice for Missing and Murdered Ingigenous Women
Missing Justice is a grassroots solidarity collective based in Montreal that works to eliminate violence and discrimination against Indigenous women living in Quebec. The collective seeks to consult and collaborate with Indigenous communities and organizations to foster understanding and dispel harmful stereotypes commonly held in regards to Indigenous women who are targets of violence. As a collective, our overall strategy for achieving these goals includes popular education initiatives, media outreach, coalition-building, case work, poster awareness campaigns, research projects, information sharing, publishing and broadcasting, political demonstrations, and direct action.

DTES Power of Women Group
A grassroots group of DTES women who work to empower, educate and
mobilize around issues affecting their neighbourhood such as poverty,
housing, and violence against women.

Sisters in Spirit
The main objective of the Native Women's Association of Canada - Sisters In Spirit initiative is to address violence against Aboriginal (First Nations, Inuit and Métis) women, particularly racialized and/or sexualized violence, that is, violence perpetrated against Aboriginal women because of their gender and Aboriginal identity. Specifically, to increase public understanding and knowledge at a national level of the impact of racialized, sexualized violence against Aboriginal women often leading to their disappearance and death.

This is the real deal people. A great way to help out three groups working to represent an extremely marginalized group of people in Canada. As we've said before, we've always thought that the importance of marginalized art and cultural movements (punk, DIY, indie, you) is the ability to make connections and support other marginalized people within society. Issues like cancer are of course important, but for people like us, it's just as important to attempt to highlight and support causes that most people will never come in contact with.

As an added bonus, this song feature's many of your favourite indie rock a-listers, who graciously donated their time to sing on this track. Here are the technicals:

Cover Photo by David Waldman: http://kid-with-camera.blogspot.com/
Engineered by Jon Drew at Giant, November 2009
"Do They Know It's Christmas?" written by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure, performed by J. Falco, Ezra Koenig, Bob Mould, Tegan & Sara, Andrew W.K., GZA, Kyp Malone, Yo La Tengo, David Cross & Kevin Drew.

Anyways, we've had all our albums leaked and downloaded months before they came out. Thats NBD, and every member of FU torrents the shit out of some free albums. But if you swap or trade this song you are a cretin - it's 99 cents to buy, and for a good cause. It sounds pretty cool and is funny to. SO BUY IT IF YOU READ THIS AND WHO CARES IF WE ARE LAME NOW. Thanks! Tell yr friends. Also don't forget you need to do this through itunes. If you don't have a credit card just borrow your moms."

Make sure to support these causes and enjoy a good tune by buying this song from iTunes HERE!

All there's left for me to do is to wish you all a Merry Christmas, and if you're still not feeling it, please enjoy this video from Jim Jones' X-Mas Mixtape.

Death or glory...

2009-12-22T22:34:00.007+01:00

...becomes just another story.

To anyone remotely into Punk Rock music, today was a sad day seven years ago. On December 22nd 2002 Joe Strummer died and, according to many, music died with him. Personally I don’t think music will die as long as I got functioning eardrums, and even then Strummer’s musical legacy is left behind for me to enjoy. And for every person with good taste in music to enjoy it with me. I think Joe Strummer was one of many great musicians and definitely a charismatic frontman, even though I’m not all too familiar with his solo work or the other bands he did after The Clash, but it’s safe to say that many of my days have been brightened by the first four albums by The Clash. I know a lot of people won’t agree with me and it gets you more street cred to like their first two records, but my favorite The Clash album will always be London Calling. Thirty years after its release, this album still sounds catchy and fresh to me. I know it gets talked down on because it supposedly is “too mainstream” and “cheesy”, but to me this album is just flawless. Yes ofcourse the self-titled album has a grittier and more Punk Rock sound, and Give ‘Em Enough Rope has less Reggea and Ska influences, but I’m not saying it’s their best album, I’m just saying it’s my favorite and the one I listen to the most. In my eyes Punk by no means needs to be associated with Pop Culture, but this is 2009 so get over it and just agree with me that London Calling is the perfect transition from Punk to Rock music. Show me a man that tells me ‘spanish bombs’ isn’t as perfect as a rock song will ever be, and I’ll show you a man that doesn’t know a thing about music. Show me a woman that doesn’t get fired up hearing ‘brand new Cadillac’ and I’ll show you a woman that has no heart and soul. Thank you Joe Strummer, for the many fine moments I’ve experienced listening to The Clash. Rest In Peace.

Check out this amazing live footage that may give us an idea of the greatness of a live performance by The Clash:

Quote Of The Week: SubZero

2009-12-21T21:54:00.006+01:00

Last weekend when we left at 6am on our way to the French border, Filip was in charge of the iPod and decided to provide an appropriately themed playlist. Among many others, records and songs by the following bands were played: Cold Front, Frostbite, The Icemen, SubZero, Trapped Under Ice,… Little did we know how appropriate this theme would later turn out to be. On a sidenote I talked to an outdoors specialist today and he stated that we literally could have died and that we would have needed professional alpinist material to go hiking under these weather conditions. This kind of sweetened the bitter taste of defeat that our premature return had left in my mouth.

Anyway, when Filip played the Ice Age EP in my car I realised that SubZero is a band that I listen to way too little. Whenever I hear SubZero I think they are one of the best bands ever, yet I hardly ever listen to them. Maybe it’s because I only really dig their earliest work: I like several songs on the first full-length Happiness Without Peace, but most of the ones I like are actually re-recorded old songs. I don’t want to sound like all those posers that claim about every band that they liked the demo better, but uhm… I just like the demo and first EP better. I can’t help it: SubZero’ s earliest recordings capture a darkness and negativity that they later on lost to the better recording quality and more melodic and straight up catchy songs.

I do like to think of myself as a positive person nowadays: I gave up on hating a long time ago and I believe in, and try to live by, a Positive Mental Attitude. However there was a time when I let hate, discontent, anger and general negativity get the best of me. I guess these feelings will forever be instilled in me, but I’ve become strong and smart enough not to let them surface as much as I used to. Looking back I’m glad I’ve wised up(*) to a certain extent, but I still can relate to negative lyrics – it’s just that they don’t consume me anymore. So this week’s quote is not something that I live by – and neither should you – but are just words to one of the hardest Harcore songs to ever come out of New York: ‘boxed in’ by SubZero. I have five different versions of this song: a promo recording from 1990; the version that appeared on the Ice Age EP in 1991; a demo recording that dates back to 1993 and features some ill keyboards under the chorus; the most common version that was included on the Happiness Without Peace full-length in 1996; and the reanimated version that they did for 2004's Necropolis: City Of The Damned. I have always preferred the version SubZero recorded for the very first promo tape, I don’t care if it sounds sloppy and is of poor sound quality: to me this is the rawest and ugliest version of ‘boxed in’ and this is definitely a song that needs to sound fucking raw and ugly! Right here and right now I will take an oath and swear to god that if I ever see SubZero play at CBGB’s I will kill a man during 'boxed in'. Or die trying.

"the burning air seems so cold

thinking back to the days of old

wondering where I tripped and went wrong

searching for myself only gone

sentenced to death, not much time

I sit in my cell awaiting each chime

all tied up in thoughts of my past

but now it's too late, I'll never last

no feelings - for what I've left behind

no guilt - for the victims of my crime

no consience - just a burning deep inside

no pain - I'm here just to die"

SubZero - 'boxed in' - various releases between 1990 and 2004

(*) accidentally mentioning two Bold song-titles in half a sentence should suffice as proof of my positivity I guess...

...still on the path of the righteous life.

2009-12-20T19:06:00.007+01:00

I didn’t expect to be able to update this blog this soon but I'm glad to say the three of us made it home safe from the hiking trip we embarked on. At the same time it pains me having to admit that we had to cut our stint short. I'm not proud of it but we just had to face defeat in order to preserve our physical wellbeing. We were aware that we picked the darkest and coldest weekend of the year to go out camping, but it rarely ever gets this cold in Belgium/France so we just weren't prepared nor equipped to last three days and two nights under these extreme circumstances. Although some of us definitely did look pretty extreme, as you can see...

Even though the weather was beautiful during the day, it still was -12°C in the sun and our water supply got frozen in literally 20 minutes. The temperatures didn’t bother us as long as we just kept moving, but whenever we made a stop to prepare some food and heat up some tea, the cold simply became unbearable. During the night temperatures dropped to -18°C which makes it impossible to sleep and one more night out there probably wouldn’t have done us any good. Despite the cold we all had a great time and it was definitely fun. We tested ourselves and pushed it to the limit, but in the end we just had to give in to force majeure and shorten our trip. To make up for this we vowed to go for a swim in the North Sea on January 2nd. We will also walk 100 kilometres at once in August, and give our hiking trip another chance in a couple of months.

Never living, just surviving...

2009-12-18T19:51:00.002+01:00

As the frequent visitors of Complex Man may have noticed, I took a week off from blogging. I went on a little trip to Ireland as mentioned below and have been working long hours for the rest of the week. Long hours as in: leaving for work at 7am and getting home at 1:30am. Yes, making appearances at work receptions and celebrations is hard work too. Also I just accepted some extra jobs on the side, so it doesn't seem to be getting better on this front...

It's all good though, the last week has been a lot of work and very little leisure but that is about to change for the next couple of days, as me and two of my friends are about to leave for a little hiking trip in the French Ardennes. Last August Filip, Wim and I agreed to go on a hiking together sometime soon, but due to conflicting schedules, the upcoming weekend is the first weekend we could finally make this happen. I've been hiking before, but not in a period that gives us only 8 hours of daylight and will have us sleeping in tents at temperatures of 11°C below zero. This is gonna be interesting to say the least. Here's a little preview of Wim aka De Hardway putting his newly bought outdoor gear to the test in urban environment:

Anyway, this means no blog updates for the next couple of days. I do have a couple of things in the pipeline though, so keep checking back next week. If I don't report back by Tuesday, you might want to ask the French authorities to start a rescue search around the area of Herbeuval-Breux. Please tell 'em to look for three underequipped idiots that froze to death or got killed by a boar. I'd appreciate that, thank you. Byeluvyah!

Photo Friday

2009-12-18T19:05:00.005+01:00

I am proud to present to you a brand new weekly section on Complex Man Blog: welcome to Photo Friday!

In a time where every girl randomnly purchases an overpriced camera, gets a flickr account and starts calling herself a photographer, Complex Man decided that it's time to separate the wheat from the chaff. These fisheye-lense-abusing amateurs seem to forget that photography is art, and art requires talent, skill and practice.

This is exactly why Complex Man brought in a professional photographer to host Photo Friday: Simon Baerts has a Master's Degree in Audiovisual Arts, is a webdesigner and a certified writer. Simon will carefully select a couple of picures for us every Friday from now on. You might want to check out and support his newlyfound enterprise called Wolk Creative.

As a kickoff, Simon selected two pictures by Gregory Crewdson. Hope you enjoy!

If you're interested, you can learn a thing or two from Crewdson in this little clip:

Ball of destruction

2009-12-10T22:48:00.001+01:00

In a couple of hours I'm leaving for the airport to catch a plane and go on a little 24-hour visit to Dublin, where Rhythm To The Madness will be playing a show with New York City's legendary Madball.

The only time I've ever been to Ireland was years ago when hiking through its plains for 10 days, during which every sign of civilication or human presence was carefully avoided. So I've never been to Dublin and neither has anyone in our road crew, and if you've been an avid Complex Man reader you know how much I love Madball. Needless to say we're all pretty psyched on this little trip!

Besides seeing Dublin and watching Madball, we're looking forward to playing a show. It's been a while and this will be the last-but-one Rhythm To The Madness show, the final one being on February 17th in Antwerp, together with Floorpunch and our brothers in True Colors. But more info on that later. Or not.

I'm not familiar with the first two opening bands, but I've crossed paths with Famine a couple of times on the True Colors/Bitter End Tour last May, so it's gonna be good to see those guys again. I must say I think Famine on itself is a pretty silly bandname UNLESS you're an Irish band! After all it was during The Great Famine that a million Irishmen died of hunger and another million emigrated, decreasing the Irish population with over 20%. So an Irish band naming itself 'Famine' would be like a South-African band called 'AIDS' or a Russian band called 'Suicide'. Or an American band called 'Leave The Weak Behind'. I'm not sure how the Irish look back upon The Great Famine, but I think for an Irish band to name itself Famine is pretty gutsy. Imagine a Belgian band printing references to The Great Irish Famine on specially made T-shirts to sell at a Dublin-show. I'm not sure whether that would classify under 'gutsy' or just 'poor taste', but it definitely sounds like a thing Rhythm To The Madness would do. Tell me I won't...

Courage and carnage...

2009-12-08T22:00:00.013+01:00

Exactly five years ago today, on December 8th 2004, Dimebag Darrell was shot to death. Darrell Abbott, better known as the guitar-player for the legendary Metal band Pantera, got shot 5 times on stage. Here's a detailed story of this tragic evening five years ago...

On December 8, 2004, while performing with Damageplan at the Arosa Villa in Columbus, Ohio, Abbott was shot onstage by Nathan Gale. Abbott was shot five times, including once in the head, killing him instantly. Damageplan's drum technician, John "Kat" Brooks, and tour manager, Chris Paluska, were injured. Gale fired a total of fifteen shots, taking the time to reload once and remaining silent throughout the shooting. To avoid being injured or killed himself, Abbott's brother and bandmate, Vinnie Paul, was taken to the bar/kitchen on the other side of the club. Jeff "Mayhem" Thompson, the band's head of security, was also killed in the incident while engaging in hand-to-hand combat with Gale. Alrosa Villa employee Erin Halk was killed after charging Gale after he had run out of bullets, expecting him to reload more slowly than he actually did. Audience member Nathan Bray was killed while trying to perform CPR on Dimebag and Mayhem.

Brooks scuffled with Gale onstage but was overpowered and taken hostage in a headlock position. Brooks was shot several times (once in the right hand, his right leg, and his right side) while attempting to get the gun away from him. Five police officers came in the front entrance, led by Officer Rick Crum, and moved toward the stage. Officer James D. Niggemeyer came in through the back door, behind the stage. Gale only saw the officers in front of the stage; he never saw Officer Niggemeyer. Niggemeyer armed with a 12 gauge Remington 870 shotgun approached Gale from the opposite side of the stage, to avoid hitting the hostage Niggemeyer fired a single shot, striking him in the face. Gale was found to have 35 rounds of ammunition remaining. Nurse and audience member Mindy Reece, 28, went to the aid of Abbott. She and another fan administered CPR until paramedics arrived, but were unable to revive him.

In May 2005, Officer Niggemeyer testified before the Franklin County grand jury, which is routine procedure in Franklin County after a police shooting. The grand jury did not indict Niggemeyer, finding that his actions were justified. Niggemeyer received a commendation from the Ohio Peace Officer Training Commission for his outstanding police work in time of crisis as well as the National Riffle Association award as 2005 Law Enforcement Officer of the Year. The five other officers that were first on the scene received Ohio distinguished law enforcement medals for their efforts. In 2006 James Niggemeyer penned the foreword to a book written about the event A Vulgar Display Of Power.

Early theories of motive suggested that Gale may have turned to violence in response to the breakup of Pantera, or the public dispute between Abbott and Pantera singer Phil Anselmo, but these were later ruled out by investigators. Another theory was that Gale believed Abbott had stolen a song the he had written. In the A Vulgar Display Of Power book, several of Gale's personal writings, given to the author by his mother, suggest that the gunman was not angry about Pantera's breakup or about a belief that Pantera had "stolen songs"; instead, the documents suggest that Gale's paranoid schizophrenia caused delusions that the band could read his mind, and that they were "stealing" his thoughts and laughing at him.

Abbott's grave is located at the Moore Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Arlington, Texas. He is buried alongside his mother. He was buried with Eddie Van Halen's Charvel Hybrid VH2 - a black and yellow Frankenstrat guitar, also known as "Bumblebee," that was pictured with Van Halen on the cover of the album Van Halen II - because Dimebag had asked for one in 2004, shortly before he was shot. He was buried in a Kiss Kasket.

There's nothing I can say about this that hasn't been said before. So allow me to quote Phil Anselmo's lyrics from the Down-song 'I scream'. "All scorn me / a monster should be feared / witch hunt blame /regret and damn the day/ I scream / fallen leaves/ from the same family tree/wind blown halves / regret is all that's left / all that's left / words cut deeply /there is no secrecy / so long since seeing /my lifetime appealing / the two are not healing / I cannot help feeling regret / regret reflecting our memories / we know the pains of living/and I know he's seeing both of we/ regret he would not want to be..."

Rest In Peace, Dimebag!

August 20th 1966 - December 8th 2004

Gone, but not forgotten!

Quote Of The Week: Cold World

2009-12-07T21:15:00.000+01:00

Every Monday Complex Man will leave you with a Quote Of The Week to help you kick off your week in a confident manner. Some inspirational words of wisdom that will influence the mind and soul. Something to elevate your thoughts. A quote that will instantly upgrade your spiritual existance. Or just something that sounds cool...

Wilkes-Barre has spawned a wave of great Hardcore bands in the last couple of years. Aside from the established bands such as Cold World and War Hungry, there’s also the up-and-coming bands such as Bad Seed, Title Fight, Pegasus and Gypsy. I’m not from W-B so I didn’t witness the rise of this scene from the beginning, but I think it’s safe to say that to the outside world Cold World can be seen as the originators of this scene, and they are definitely my favourite band to come out of Wilkes-Barre.

Anyone that has seen Cold World will agree with me that they are an incredible powerhouse live and know how to turn every venue into a battlefield. I have seen them play pretty sloppy shows (ssup Partyboy!) and still blow away friend or foe! On a sidenote I will go on record and say that I am the only person in the world that has been at every single Cold World show that they played on the European continent. Except for Dan Mills and Derek Scace, but they are in the band so....

Anyway, this week's quote is lifted from the lyrics to the title track of Cold World's Dedicated To Babies Who Came Feet First. This is their first and so far only full-length and expectations were high for this album. Cold World came out in 2004 with their self-titled EP and it wasn't before 2008 that they finally released a full-length record. During this 4-year gap they did release theIce Grillz EP, their split with War Hungry and a couple of songs on compilations, and all of the previously mentioned recordings were put on the No Omega LP, but needless to say that a popular band not releasing a full-length during the first four years of their career creates a lot of anticipation among their followers. I guess it was hard for Cold World to live up to these expectations and the multiple line-up changes didn't really help.

Dedicated To Babies Who Came Feet First was received by varying opinions, but personally I loved and still do. When it first came out I listened to this record on repeat when running and I never got bored of it. In fact, just thinking of this makes me want to strap my Nike Structures and go for a run right now!

I like all the songs on this record (that was named after a line from a song on my favourite Raekwon-record) equally, except for maybe one featuring Warrior Queen but I understand it's kind of a big deal having her do a guest appearance on your record so I still think that's pretty cool. In each song there's a couple of riffs, lines, breaks or details that I really like, yet I had no problem picking one song to quote on here. From the beginning this part in the title song of the record particulary spoke to me. I used to listen to the Dedicated To Babies... demo recordings all the time before the actual record came out, the ones with Nick Woj singing and this part always stood out. I got so used to listening to these songs with Woj on vocals that I started to wonder whether the final recordings for the LP were gonna live up to my expectations, and whether Dan Mills was gonna be able to live up to the high standards Woj set for this particular verse. So when I finally received the actual record i was anxious to hear its title song, not knowing what to expect of it. Upon first listen I was surprised to hear George Hirsch of Blacklisted sing my favourite part, and I literally got goose bumps when this verse came up!

"Still ill after all these years.

I feel at ease around my peers,

but there's a difference between them and me:

I can't run away from my fears.

Times have changed,

times are strange,

but I know I've seen the worst.

Someone must know how I feel,

this is dedicated to babies who came feet first."

Cold World - 'dedicated to babies who came feet first' - Dedicated To Babies Who Came Feet First - 2008

Five finger crawl

2009-12-06T15:38:00.009+01:00

So I'm a day late and a dollar short, but this is a returning feature on Complex Man: on the fifth day of every month five top-fives will be posted. Feel free to send in top 5's or suggest future top 5's you'd like to read!

Five best HBO-shows:

1. The Sopranos

2. The Wire

3. Band Of Brothers

4. Deadwood

5. Entourage

Five best Agnostic Front live quotes:
1. "a lot of you people ain't gonna live to see tomorrow if you keep fucking around this way!"
2. "this is not a racist song, this is the goddamn, fucking truth!"
3. "... if Vinnie Stigma's ready. ... We got through a lot of shit here in this band. And you know we still hate eachother but we still play with eachother."
4. "do you guys wanna see the band or do you wanna see the bouncers?"
5. "this is also on our new album we just put out recently this year. The album was called One Voice. It's basically not just my voice, it's the voice of all of us here and everyone in America... And in Europe. What we are saying is that we are the voice of the oppressed people, 'cause we've all got problems, and we all try to hang out with eachother... It's all about unity, and about one... equal... voice. This is called 'one voice'!"

Five questions Kris Peers aka LL Cool P has been to known to ask:

1. "Why do mobilhomes and caravans only come in the colour white?"

2. "Why are The Rolling Stones 27 times on my iPod when I scroll down my 'artists'?"

3. "Is Casey Jones a person or why is this band called like that?"

4. "Why did Koen pull up his socks up until his knees all the time?"

5. "How come there's snow on the right side of the highway but not on the left side?"

Five books that I plan to read in the not-so-distant future:

1. Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace (started reading this book on tour but wasn't able to finish it, as it was pretty difficult to fully understand and it's hard enough as it is to concentrate on anything on tour. I wish there was a Dutch translation I could read to prepare for the original version, but I want to give the English version another shot and hope to finish it this time.)

2. The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón (finished his first book The Shadow Of The Wind in just a couple of days so I'm looking forward to cracking this one too!)

3. Burmese Days by George Orwell (I read this book when I was 13 years old and obviously way too young to completely get it and enjoy it. But I still remember a couple of paragraphs that struck home with the 14-year old me, and that I've used in my life ever since. Therefore I'd like to re-read this because who knows how many life lessons this book still holds for me...)

4. Lords Of The Bow and Bones Of The Hills by Conn Iggulden (I read all four books of his Emperor Series in a couple of weeks earlier this year, and started the first book of his Conquerer Series on Genghis Khan right after. Will have to pick up both follow-up books to Wolf Of The Plains soon!)

5. Burning Fight by Brian Peterson and The Anti-Matter Anthology by Norman Brannon (have had both of these laying around for a while now, but haven't been urged to read any of them so far. Of the latter I probably have read most interviews in the original fanzines though. Now that I come to think about it, I'd really like to read that Mike Judge interview again so maybe I'll get around to reading this book now...)

Five Nike-things I put on eBay this week that sold for way more than I purchased them for:

1. Nike Air Max 90 Infrared: purchased these at Foot Locker with a Friends&Family coupon for 90 euros and sold 'em for 170 euros. Will probably regret selling these one day, but I still have an extra pair though.

2. Nike Air Jordan Mars Blackmon T-shirt: bought this on tour in Manchester for 1 pound (not even 2 euros) because it had what appeared to be a huge Ice-Tea stain on it. Washed it once, no trace of the stain, put the tag back on and sold it for 25 euros.

3. Nike Air Max 1 original 1987 colour: got these at Foot Locker with the Friends&Family coupon too, paid 65 euros for 'em and sold them for 111 euros on eBay. Never liked this colourway and definitely won't regret selling these. Unless you offer me twice that amount next month...

4. Nike Air Max 1 Newspaper Edition: bought these for about 25 euros on eBay, held onto them for a couple of years and now sold them for 73 euros.

5. Nike Air Ben Drury 'hold tight' windrunner jacket: picked this up for 25 euros together with the bag that came with it. Kept the bag and got 60 euros on eBay for just the windbreaker. Will probably regret selling this cause it's a great jacket , but I wore it 2 times in the last couple of years and I'm not a huge fan of Ben Drury so whatever...

Cookin raw with the Brooklyn boy

2009-12-04T16:09:00.005+01:00

"Shawn Carter was born December 4th, weighing in at 10 pounds 8 ounces. He was the last of my 4 children, the only one who didn't give me any pain when i gave birth to him, and that's how i knew that he was a special child".

Shawn's mom must have told me this story literally over a thousand times and it still never gets boring to me. I guess every mother thinks her child is special and tells stories like this to whoever (they think) wants to listen, but I highly doubt that there is another mother on this planet whose story has been heard by an audience as broad as the people that listen to Shawn Carter's mom on a daily basis.

I mean what do you know about Martin Luther King's birth? Have you ever heard specifics about Nelson Mandela's birth? No you haven't, but have you ever been told how much Shawn Corey Carter weighed when he was born? Yes, you have. And if you haven't, then you have now.

So today is the birthday of Shawn Carter, probably better known as Jay-Z, and in his honour I listened to The Black Album today. Maybe not his best album (which is The Dynasty) but certainly the one I listen to the most.

I saw Jay-Z play a show in Belgium, and still stand by my saying that this was one of the best live performances I've ever witnessed. Most rappers I've seen so far bring out a DJ and a couple of up-and-coming rappers that get their 3 minutes of fame every night on tour. Hova on the other hand brought out an entire band, background choir, trumpet section and ofcourse the obligatory guest emcee's too. Jigga was communicating with the crowd, did some amazing freestyles and was just genuinely enjoying himself and loving the music.

So here's to Jay-Z: congratulations Hova! I'm throwing my ROC-sign up right now!

And if you can't respect that your whole perspective is whack, maybe you'll love me when I fade to black.

Focus on the light

2009-12-02T22:17:00.009+01:00

No time to write an update for this blog today, but I did write this for True Colors and it is an update so I might as well post it up here I guess:

We're heading towards the end of another year and we figured we'd give you a little update before we dive headfirst into a new decade. True Colors started out in 2004 and as we enter the sixth year of our existence, we realise we have outlived many great bands. However, True Colors too has decided to call it a day in May 2010. We have achieved way more than we hoped to achieve, and experienced way more than we hoped to experience. We feel like True Colors has run its course and we decided to call it quits while we're still ahead.

We will play a last show on May 22nd in Mol at Gompelhof, Belgium. More info about this final show will be announced soon. At this show, we will release a new 7" EP which we will start recording in February. Right after the recording sessions, True Colors will be joining Floorpunch on their first European tour since 1999.
From March 25th till April 11th we will do a US tour with Mindset that will start at United Blood Fest and will end at React Fest, and in late April True Colors will play a couple of shows in Russia.
More info about the tours, the final show and the upcoming new EP will be announced when it's due, but for now just make sure to mark May 22nd on your calendars!

FLOORPUNCH - TRUE COLORS TOUR
13 feb. '10 Jz Riot - Lichtenstein (GER)
14 feb. '10 Patronaat - Haarlem (NL)
15 feb. '10 The Peel - Kingston London (UK)
16 feb. '10 The Well - Leeds (UK)
17 feb. '10 Trix - Antwerp (BEL)

Quote Of The Week: Blacklisted

2009-11-30T22:39:00.006+01:00

Every Monday Complex Man will leave you with a Quote Of The Week to help you kick off your week in a confident manner. Some inspirational words of wisdom that will influence the mind and soul. Something to elevate your thoughts, a quote that will instantly upgrade your spiritual existance. Or just something that sounds cool...

Today Blacklisted released a new album, it's called No One Deserves To Be Here More Than Me. I've said this before but Blacklisted is one of my favourite current Hardcore bands: musically, lyrically and definitely attitude-wise as well. The way those guys handle their band should be an example to every starting band out there. Their work-ethic, their love for Hardcore, the way they keep going regardless of whatever setbacks cross their path...

So as always, I am psyched to hear new Blacklisted songs! Their sound has been evolving with every new record, and judging from the live versions of some new songs and the album info, this record promises to be even more challenging than ever before! I guess we can agree most Hardcore bands are rather stagnant and too much exploration of musical boundaries is generally frowned upon. Well, Blacklisted doesn't just explore boundaries: they fuck 'em up. And this new record seems to be no exception on this fine BL tradition, so make sure to order it here! I'm anxious to hear it and expect more about this record on here, but while I wait for my copy to arrive let's kick off this week with some great George Hirsch lines. When deciding which song to quote I just couldn't quite chose, so I picked two songs that appear on Blacklisted's Peace On Earth, War On Stage EP as well as on their Heavier Than Heaven, Lonelier Than God LP.

I've always been a fan of George's lyrics, as they're not only extremely well-written, they also give you a glimpse inside the writer's mind and heart. I know that's what every lyricist claims to be doing, but rarely do we get to see the writer's honest, unfiltered thoughts and feelings. George writes the kind of lyrics that are too hard for most singers to put into words and that are too confronting to write them down for others to read. Let alone literally go on record and truly open up to thousands of listeners, and sing them to crowds of strangers every night. To me, his lyrics are often painfully personal and the upcoming album seems to be no exception: "sometimes I leave the house early, just to ride the subway all day. Sizing up every station, to see which one fits my plan of jumping in front of the train" or "maybe they're hiring scarcrowes, I can sit in a field in the sun. I don't need the training, I already repulse everyone". I can't say I know George through and through but I have spent a good total of four weeks on tour with Blacklisted and I do know this: these words are as real as it gets.

In my life there's no truth, there's just mountains of lies.

Search for identity but wear a disguise.

I run and I run and I run and I run and I hide.

I'm complicated, so frustrating.

I know you hate it, but I just can't fake it.

You've seen my worlds at war, when I unlock my door.

Showed you things I hoped you'd never see.

You just said "Oh George, you could be so much more."

"You lost your way, it's a damn shame."

How do you criticize, when you stand so safe inside?

How do you climb, when you built your walls so high?

How do you fight, when your hands are firmly tied?

How do you rise, when all you know is the downside?

Cause all I know is the downside.

Blacklisted - 'memory layne' - Heavier Than Heaven, Lonelier Than God - 2008

Martyr without a cause, stripped of all my pride.

The same pride that won't let me lay down and die.

Alone exposed to the bone, stripped of all my skin.

The same skin I been hiding myself in.

Plagued with thorns in my side,

age shown by scars in my mind.

You've never laid in the beds that I've made.

Don't tell me about being afraid.

You've never died the ways that I've died.

What do you know about speaking to God?

You've never roamed the homes that I've roamed,

using your body to shield your soul.

Blacklisted - 'canonized' - Heavier Than Heaven, Lonelier Than God - 2008

The time has come for all to hear...

2009-11-29T10:58:00.007+01:00

...Madball's back so just beware!

It must have been the spring of 1995 when I purchased what has remained one of the best records ever released in my eyes: Madball's Set It Off. Back then the internet was still unheard of (by me at least), so we didn't have as easy access to music (or to just about everything) as one has these days. Hardcore music was still hard to find at that time and I wasn't involved deeply enough yet to know about mailorders or tradelists. So when the 13-year-old me had saved up enough allowance to buy a CD, it was always a tough choice. You couldn't download every single release to sample it and I could only purchase a couple of CD's a month, if even that... So it was always hard to decide which record it would be and the options were based mainly on hearsay, band shirts other people wore whom I assumed to have good taste, and whatever mention Hardcore got in this Dutch metal/rock magazine called Aardschok (meaning "earthquake"). Another factor that played a main role in the process of choice was availability: I had to order my records through a local record store, and Hardcore records were kinda hard to find at that time, because obviously New Age Records or Indecision didn't have a distribution that would make to a record store in a 11.000 people counting town in Belgium...

So yeah, I had saved up enough money to purchase a new CD, I had heard and read a lot about this band from New York City called Madball, their latest full-length was on Roadrunner Records and thus readily available, so I rode my bike to the local record store and ordered Madball's Set It Off. Nowadays kids get upset when they don't receive their order in a timely fashion, but back then a two week wait was nothing: I distinctly remember it took six weeks for my White Devil Reincarnation CD to arrive. But that's another story for another time...

Obviously saving up the right amount of money, the well-tought out decision of which record, and the long wait all added up to the excitement and made the record more valueable. Maybe that's one of the reasons why I still love Madball's Set It Off as much as I do, why I still listen to it on a regular basis, and why I know every single word by heart. Or maybe that's just because Set It Off is simply one of the greatest extreme music albums ever written and recorded.

I dinstinctly remember putting this record on for the first time, and thinking it was such amazing music that the world needed to hear this and I wanted to share its greatness with everybody! I put the volume of my crappy CD-player at full blast, opened up the windows of my bedroom and figured my neighbours and the world would be instantly touched by this exciting music. Needless to say it was rather my parent's doorbell that got touched by the finger of many an angry neighbour.

But to this day, almost 15 years later, I still get shivers down my spine when hearing that short street noise intro build up to "we don't fake it, we just take it" after which the title song kicks in and sucks you into a different world for the next 25 or so minutes. A world of violence, discontent, loss, frustration, rage and pain. But at the same time a world of loyalty, pride, honesty, friendship and uprising. Two opposing worlds that could only be combined in a metropolis such as New York City...

"I see it everyday, everywhere I look they say

another life has been taken away.

It makes my stomach turn,

but livin' here you gotta learn.

Get used to it, it's reality.

Say your prayers, hope it won't happen to you.

Mind your business, do what you gotta do.

Don't look for trouble, sometimes trouble finds you

and what can you do, what can I do?"

It has always been striking to me how an at that time barely 18-year old Freddy Cricien was able to capture this atmosphere so accurately in his song lyrics. Don't get me wrong: I'll never fully grasp the feeling of how it is to grow up in such an environment as Madball grew up in, but saviour Set It Off's lyrics and feel what goes on behind this music, and Madball will slap you with a different kind of reality across your face. Acroooss your... face!

I can't count the hours I've spent listening to Set It Off, reading the lyrics and browsing the thankslist which basically reads like a 'best of Hardcore - class of 94', and which has introduced me to dozens of other great bands. I always thought the lay-out was awesome too: simple but effective, and perfectly carrying the vibe brought on by the music and the lyrics. The Madball logo on this is looking so ill, and there's was a time I'd pick up anything that featured this logo. Needless to say I stopped buying Madball T-shirts when they changed the logo in 1998 on the cover of Look My Way...

I also love that they used only one picture in the lay-out, apart from the cover: a great bandpicture taken by B.J. Papas featuring Vinnie Stigma, Freddy Cricien, Hoya Roc, Will Shepler and Matt Henderson captured in their natural urban biotope.

Other than that you'll find a collage of newspaper headlines displaying the New York City reality, accompanied by a little note saying that "at the time Set It Off was recorded (March/April '94) 264 people were killed by guns in NYC. That number has more than doubled since its release (approximately 2,5 months). STOP THE VIOLENCE!!!"

There isn't much else I can say about record without repeating myself more than I already did. Just allow me to say that not only is Set It Off a seminal record, it is a document. A document of working oneself up from an urban, crime-ridden environment. A document about not getting caught into the traps and temptations that growing up in New York City exposes you to. A document about turning the bad things in your life into a good thing. This is something I've always tried to do and I thank Madball for that.

Day and night...

2009-11-24T21:31:00.003+01:00

So due to the stomach flu that nailed me to my couch last week, I now have a lot of work to catch up to and I've been working long hours for the last couple of days. Hours meaning evenings/nights. This means no time for in-depth blogging but allow me to share with you which records I've been spinning to brighten up my late night work a little:

Lil Wayne - The Drought Is Over 2 (Carter III Sessions)
Birdman - Pricele$$
Kid Cudi - The Man On The Moon: The End Of The Day
Young Jeezy - Let's Get It: Thugh Motivation 101

All four of these albums are dedicated to my man Jeffrey! He had been advising me to check out Lil Wayne for a long time, and I did give Tha Carter a couple of spins but I though it wasn't hard and pounding enough for my taste. I always like my music intense and I initially thought Tha Carter was kinda soft but after a while I started to grow into it and when I got to Tha Carter III I realised what a genius Lil Wayne is! But definitely more on Weezy later.

I've also repeatedly been listening to Kid Cudi's debut full-length and I'm liking it. I used to call this kind of music soft and it would've never held my attention a while ago but I've really grown to like this and now I'd file this under 'chill' and 'feel-good vibe' instead of just 'soft'.

So props to Jeffrey for persisting to force his exquisite musical taste on me, love you no homo! Just a minute ago I took an oath to never question whatever J advises me to check out, and this oath will stand!

Other stuff I've been listening too, mainly just because I wanted to checked it out...

Jim Jones - Pray IV Reign: I'm not blown away by this but it's a solid album in good Jim Jones tradition!
Skarhead - Drugs, Music & Sex: this just couldn't hold my interest for longer than a couple of songs, and I had to force myself to sit this out. That 'D.F.F.' song is kinda catchy I guess, but other than that, nothing worth your while... I loved and still love Kings At Crime so I kinda had high hopes for this one, but I guess I should've known better...
Mannie Fresh - Return Of The Ballin: has some good songs on it but I wasn't urged to give this a third listen really.
Rihanna - Rated R: good songs, good guest appearances, great voice! Go hard or go home.
Snoop Dogg - I wanna rock mixtape: I'm no Snoop Dogg fan at all but I just wanted to check this out for the sake of giving it a try. Didn't make it through. I did lol'ed at the title of his upcoming album though: Malice In Wonderland. I know it's silly...

Tomorrow Rise And Fall, Iron Age and State Of Mind are playing the Dynamo in Eindhoven. Three great bands and you've got nothing better to do anyways...

That's it for now, byeluvya!

Quote Of The Week

2009-11-23T23:26:00.002+01:00

Every Monday I will leave you with a Quote Of The Week which will help you kick off your week in a confident manner. Some inspirational words of wisdom that will influence the mind and soul. Or just something that makes me sound cool.

To start this off with, I want to quote some song lyrics by the Cro-Mags. The Cro-Mags are one of my all-time favourite bands and this is one of my all-time favourite records. Besides having written some amazing music, I think what lifts the Cro-Mags way above most bands are their lyrics. I sure can appreciate good music for what it is, but I've always preffered music that came with a message: if you have nothing to say, why say something?

Well, John Joseph and Harley Flannagan definitely have something substantial to say, and the following is just one the many great examples of how these uneducated and street-raised survivors still always have been able to define themselves. Expect more worshipping of this band and this record on here in the future, during Cro-Mag Week. It's just unavoidable.

Anyway, here's some of my favourite lyrics off this album: 'seekers of the truth'.

I live by these words. Cro-Mag Life.

wastin' my time, servin' my mind

for sense pleasures I can find

gotta get back, back to the truth

you know it was left behind

it's so easy to see, if you wanna be free

don't wanna be just a slave

cause no matter how you choose

you know you'll lose

if you ain't looking for the truth

searchin and searchin for something real

you gotta know how I feel

cause we been looking after the truth

rejected those lies of our youth

you've seen the proof

this ain't no spoof

they tried to bend the truth

and we won't regret the things we met

if we're on the path of righteousness

now we gotta, we gotta go back

something ain't right so we gotta, we gotta go back

trace our steps and see what we've done

it's time for us to go back to square one

you just can't seem to see what I mean

you know what I'm talkin about

cause we been in bondage much too long

don't you think it's time to get out

see time has taken it's toll

and they're in control

we can't let this madness last

gotta make our move

get in the groove

we gotta do something fast

Cro-Mags - 'seekers of the truth' - The Age Of Quarrel - 1986

The film double taker, the illusion type faker.

2009-11-21T19:04:00.001+01:00

I've been at home with stomach flu for a couple of days now, so what can one do besides laying on the couch while reading Tolkien, sipping hot tea and listening to Belle & Sebastian? Watch tons of movies of course...

Now, I think a little warning is at hand here because when it comes to motion pictures you probably won't find a person as inexperted and unknowledgeable as me. By now my friends are used to it, but less familiar people are always amazed by the amount of movies that I've never seen.

It just so happened that my parents didn't have a television set until when I was 10 years old or so and even then we didn't have cable TV, just an anthenna (*). I couldn't watch cable until I was 19 and lived by myself. Most of you may not even remember watching TV with an anthenna, but in Belgium this meant you could only receive two Flemish, two Walloon and maybe one or two German stations. Obviously I could only understand the Flemish ones so my choices were limited. This meant I couldn't watch all the cool TV-shows and movies that my friends had seen and would discuss the day after at school, as those government funded TV-stations obviously weren't gonna broadcast Rambo, Indiana Jones, MacGyver or The A-Team...

In fact all the movies I've seen on these two Flemish stations seem to have blurred into one shitty movie about the first female ever to join the police/army/firefighters, something about a planecrash, and somebody going to jail for something he didn't do... The only movie that stuck out was about Malcolm X, and for a couple of weeks they did broadcast a series about Elvis Presley on Friday nights, which is how I got hooked on music so I guess after all I do owe a thank you to BRT1!

So when it comes to movies I still have a lot of catching up to do, probably more than I'll have time for in this lifetime. However my friend Geert took it upon himself to give me a belated schooling on flicks that every boy must have seen and guided me through Robocop, Terminator, Indiana Jones, Die Hard, Back To The Future, Red Dawn and the likes. Now I can't say I liked them all equally, but I certainly could understand why these films are still magic to most people that grew up around that time. Also my friend Simon recently hooked me up with a fine selection from his DVD-collection, covering a broad spectrum of must-have-seen movies.

I made it clear by now that I am not a movie connoisseur, so these are not reviews but when the couch unwillingly became my refuge for the last couple of days, I was relieved when the fever dropped so I could sink my teeth into the following movies...

Magnolia: I've always preferred films that are unpredictable but make sense at the same time. You know that feeling when you think you've got the plot figured out, but then all of a sudden everything comes together in one shot and you realise you've been missing the clues by focusing on the wrong ones? Like in The Usual Suspect when Keyser Soze walks away in the end? Or Fallen, where the last shot makes you realise you were wrong all along? That's when I know a movie is good, or in both these cases brilliant. Brilliant is definitely a word that crossed my mind several times while watching Magnolia. This may not be a 'the ending explains it all' type of movie, but all these different story-lines coming together on different levels is... well, brilliant. In the beginning of the movie I noticed some ropes clearly forming the numbers 82 and after that the number appears on several occasions. I figured it'd be a clue but when the movie was done, I still had no idea what 82 meant, until I happened to be reading my bible later that day and all of a sudden came across Exodus 8:2 which explained everything. Like I said: brilliant!
And yes, ofcourse I just Googled it, the only Exodus I know is a trash metal band.

The Remains Of The Day: An enjoyable, almost laid back film that takes place in a beautiful setting with victorian interiors. I felt like plebs drinking my tea out of a Starbucks mug and not a porcelain cup. There doesn't seem to be happening much but Jack Nicholson is great as always.

Kramer Vs. Kramer: this is a movie that could've easily been broadcasted by BRT1 as it deals with a separation, a father raising his child alone and court battle for custody. Despite these tragic sounding storylines, it is actually a fun movie to watch and brought a smile to my face at times. I did enjoy this.

Scent Of A Woman: I used to own this on VHS but it's been years since I'd seen it and I was happy to be able to see it again. Ever since I saw Scarface (which was probably way later than you've seen it) I've been a huge fan of Al Pacino. I think the best monologues I've ever seen were by Al Pacino, I mean The Devil's Advocate? Your mind is blown! Any Given Sunday... City Hall... All have great monologues. But Pacino's speech towards the end of Scent Of A Woman is definitely my favourite. His cracking voice going into screaming, eyes wide open, spit all over the place... "if I were the man I was five years ago I'd take a FLAME THROWER TO THIS PLACE". Great movie!

Serpico: Had never seen this before and can't believe I called myself an Al Pacino-fan without having seen this. Great movie. New York City always delivers the best sceneries for movies...

Lords Of Dogtown: picked this up a while ago for 3 euros, because I loved the Dogtown And Z-Boys documentary and figured I'd check out the movie as well... It's not bad I suppose, but more words needn't be spilt on this. Check out that documentary though!

Van Vlees En Bloed: didn't watch this Flemish series when it was broadcasted on television, and I had pretty high expectations because of the reputation every actor/writer/director involved has (in Belgium that is). I guess it's pretty good and all, but I wasn't really impressed, and in retrospect didn't really understand the hype this got when it was aired 10 months ago... Did fall in love with Maaike Neuville though! Call me if you read this Maaike.

Thanks to Geert, Simon and Kris for hooking me up. Also thanks to Koen for attempting to broaden my horizons by lending me a DVD boxset of Gooise Vrouwen...

(*)That's right Anthony Martini, my TV had a hanger for an anthenna too

War, Wisdom and Rhyme

2009-11-20T21:56:00.005+01:00

These are some of the records that I've been listening to on a regular basis during the last few weeks:

Ghostface Killah - Ghostdini: Wizard Of Poetry In Emerald City - Def Jam Recordings
Ever since Iron Man came out in 1996, I've been an avid follower of Ghostface's solo career. I eagerly awaited the release of every album and even though can't say I loved them all equally, none of his (seven) albums were below standard! This is something you can't say about the solo career of most Wu-Tang Clan members - or about any artist that's been in the game for over 15 years. It's a given that the quality of Ghost's back-catalog is just solid and several of his albums can be considered classics. I can't say that Ghostface Killa is my favourite rapper of the Wu-Tang Clan but I gotta be honest and admit that he's simply the best rapper of the Clan. And way beyond... This eighth album by Ghostface Killah aka Tony Starks aka Pretty Toney aka Ironman adds another alias to the list: this time he operates under the pseudnym Ghostdini. This albums was widely annouced as Ghost's "radiofriendly R&B album" and I'm generally not into most "radiofriendly music": from my understanding this implies that the music is created with the intention of getting radioplay. Now I just like music that's good, simple as that, so I don't care whether it gets played on the radio or not, but writing music with the intent to gain money and/or fame is not creating but fabricating, in my eyes. Now, that's none of my business and it doesn't matter to me, but it's just that I've come to learn that fabricated music hardly ever appeals to me. That being said you'll understand that I didn't really get my hopes up for Ghostface's so-called R&B album. BUT I simply have to admit Ghost pulled it off and it's a great record! It is indeed leaning towards R&B, but it's just a solid recording! It is a soft album but it's soulful and Ghostface's rapping and rhyming are on point as always. His lyrics deal with love and the female sex, and are honest and sincere even though the songs are not always as classy (you don't wanna drive your mom to pick up her car at the garage and have the song 'stapleton sex' come on, something that may or may not have happened to me earlier today). All in all this turned out to be a good record, and I hope it becomes the commercial succes Ghost aimed at, just so that Def Jam would spend enough money on the next Ghostdini record to get some good R&B singers come in for a guestspot.

Baroness - Baroness - Relapse Records

Publicly better known as the blue record, this second full-length by Baroness resembles their red album in a lot of ways but at the same time the fourpiece seems to have added a broader range of influences to the songwriting. Most likely this is due to the switch in the guitar-departement, leaving newly welcomed axeman Pete Adams with the ungrateful task to prove himself right away by co-writing this sophomore full-length. Apparantly Baroness mocks the second album syndrome by fulfulling the high expectations (mine at least) and even raising the bar for an entire current wave of sludge bands. To a certain extent the blue record picks up where the red album left off, but at the same time adds a lot more 70'ies rock influences. The vocals seem to have gotten cleaner since the debut, yet the riff are often heavier and more metal-orientated. As always Baroness' songs grab your attention and don't let go until they decide it's time for you to be let go. One of the most absorbing records I've heard in a long while.

Withdrawal - Unknown Misery - Wendigo)

I hadn't heard of this Canadian band before, but I heard someone compare them to Integrity, Ringworm and Catharsis so I decided to check them out. Not in the least because of the Clevo-comparisions, as every band claims to be influenced by those bands nowadays and let's be honest: 90% of the time these bands suck. "Know what, I'll wear an Integ shirt in the band-pic, we'll cover some Ringworm song and people will start saying we sound like those bands. Oh, oh I'll write some lyrics about apocalyptic themes and stuff, how 'bout that huh?" Fuck 'bout that! When you are genuinly pissed off and frustrated with your life and the world around you, and your only way to deal with that is by making music, THEN and only then will you sound like those bands. Catharsis however is a reference that doesn't get thrown around like that often, and it's a band I am way into. They seem to be forgotten for the most part, but I'm pretty sure that the people that ever experienced a Catharsis live show won't (and can't) forget. Anyway, Withdrawal indeed does resemble Catharsis to a certain extent, except this is cleaner than Catharsis, not only in sound quality but in song-structures too. I could've done without some of the high-notes in the guitar work, because these lean towards general metallic hardcore at bit too much for my taste. It sometimes takes away from the brutality these songs do capture for the most part. Ofcourse it's impossible to sound as raw and dirty as Catharsis (and unnecessary too), but I feel with a grittier, less crisp sound these songs would be even more brutal.

Lyrically the singer draws influences from the nihilistic and pessimistic side of his mind. In most bands this comes off as a pose to me, as they're all rich mommy's boys and most probably the only problems they have are luxury problems. However these lyrics seem honest and real, and are exceptionally well written.

I gotta say it's been a while since a young band has been able to draw my attention like this, and I've played this several times over the last couple of days which is something that rarely ever happens to me. I definitely would like to hear more from Withdrawal.

Other than these three records I've been repeatedly listening to Rise And Fall's new full-length entitledOur Circle Is Vicious, expect to read more about that next week. Also Maximum Penalty's Life And Times as well as the self-titled Pegasus EP have been spinning a lot lately. Besides that I've been listening to all three of the Gucci Mane's Cold War Mixtapes, on which I'll have to hold back my verdict for a little longer.

In other notable news:

The other day I mentioned how Moscow is the second city I most want to visit someday, but apparantly nowadays anti-racists risk to get shot in the head over there. Check this article. I might have to reconsider either my top 5 or my political ideologies.
Speaking of politics, I am proud to say that the Prime Minister of Belgium has made it to 'President of Europe', but dear God please let Yves Leterme not replace Herman Van Rompuy as Prime Minister! Sure, government-wise this country is enough of a mess already, but let's pretend it's not and celebrate because one of our few politicians with some class is leaving.
What's more important than petty politics though, is that the long-awaited rock debut Rebirth by Lil Wayne, as well as Young Money's We Are Young Money, both have been pushed back to December 21st, instead of December 15th. This is gonna create a though situation for me as traditionally during the week leading up the 25th, I exclusively listen to Christmas mixtapes.
Some True Colors news to be announced later this weekend.

The eye of the liger

2009-11-19T17:58:00.010+01:00

Alright, I'm gonna go all Boyd Matson on y'all for a minute here and talk about wildlife. Well, maybe not wildlife in the true sense of the word but whatever... Check out the real king of the jungle, the biggest and the baddest: the liger!

Supposedly the result of an accidental hybridization of a male lion and a female tiger at the Institute of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species in Miami, a liger was born. According to the owner of the institute "ligers are not something we planned on having, we have lions and tigers living together in large enclosures and at first we had no idea how well one of the lion boys was getting along with a tiger girl, then lo and behold we had a liger".

I don't think it's ethical to cross different species, and I'm not sure whether to believe that a professional, experienced animal trainer and zoo-keeper would let something like this happen by accident, but still the result is pretty amazing.

Facts:

- the one pictured (Sinbad) is weighing in at over 400kg at age 3

- ligers enjoy bathing and swimming, unlike waterfearing lions

- they appear to be slow but can run over 80 km/h

- they generally eat over 8 kilos of meat each day

- tigons are a cross between a female lion and a male tiger

- ligers may have made an appearance in Rhythm To The Madness song lyrics

- the oldest liger died at age 21 and weighed over half a ton

A visit to Miami is not gonna happen for me in the near future, but word on the street is that a liger resides on Germany soil. As soon as my sources are able to confirm this, I will make it my goal for 2010 to track down the German liger and see it with my own eyes.

Check out some interesting footage of ligers here and here.