In The Pit #10 - Kess73

Malice_ wrote: »

What got you into Rock & Metal in the first place and what keeps you interested in it?
How did you come across the Rock & Metal forum on Boards?
What keeps you coming back to the forum?
What do you do when you're not rocking out?
What album do you feel had the greatest impact on you?
Where did your username come from?

1) Queen and Iron Maiden are my earliest memories of rock and metal along with a big dollap of Thin Lizzy. Started listening to all three at the start of the 1980's and in 1982 I got Maiden's The Number Of The Beast
LP and I was hooked from then onwards.

What keeps me interested in it? Well I love music. Yes that is a cliched answer but it is true. I love trying to find new bands of all styles.

2) I found Boards.ie by accident when looking for something online and got hooked on the site. Finding the R/M forum happened whilst browsing the site.

3) I like the forum as it seems to have a good mix of people in terms of musical tastes and age. The fact that it seems to be a forum that rarely has squabbles is a bonus as I am not actually fond of arguing, something that my track record in the footy forum would disagree with though.


4) Sorry I don't understand the question. Is not rocking out possible?


5) Ohh that is a tough question as I have a lot of albums that I associate with big events in my life, and also many albums that introduced me to other worlds. I suppose within the boundaries of this forum's title I would pick The Number Of The Beast as that was the album that helped create Rock Kess.


6) My username comes from the Danish side of my family. I was called lille Kess ( was meant to be a short version of Little Kessler ) when I was younger by Danish relatives and it stuck. The 73 is my year of birth. I am a total mongrel as I was born in Limerick in Ireland, my family moved back to Liverpool when I was tiny. I went to school, college etc in Liverpool, but have a Danish grandparent who was big into teaching me about Danish culture etc, so I ended up living/working in both Germany and Denmark for spells once I left college. And I am back in Limerick again for the last half decade or so, so I have come full circle in some ways.

So with me you get an Irish born man with a scouse accent who can speak German, Danish, Irish and a handful of other languages with that same scouse twang.

Denny M wrote: »

What has been your favourite album out this year?

What was your first big name rock/metal gig you attended?

What band/artist in rock/metal can you not stand the most? (not over-rated, actually hate)

What other sections of boards do you frequent?

Do you prefer rock or metal, and which sub-genre of them is your favorite?


(Someone else can take my other 4 questions, help spread it out :P)

1) There were a lot of albums that I liked in 2010 but I am struggling to pick one stand out album that was actually released in 2010. I think I would alternate between The Birthday Massacre's Pins And Needles, Middle Class Rut's No Name No Colour and Bad Religion's The Dissent Of Man.


Ask me the same question in a month's time and I might have different choices there.






2) My first big name metal gig was probably seeing Iron Maiden at the Hammersmith Odeon during the Piece Of Mind tour.




3) Hmmm toughie. So many names come to mind straight away. I really don't like Kiss. I think they are utter uter shyte.

Judas Priest can get a bit of hate from me at times as well.

Ozzy Osbourne I think is a total prat.

Lars Ulrich is another that really bugs me whenever I see his stupid face, and moreso when I hear his "drumming".

Pete Townsend = bellend


Kerry King bugs me as well when he opens his mouth.






4) Footy forum, angling, boxing, pro wrestling, zombie forum, paranormal, film forum, Paleontology, politics, Limerick city forum, and probably about a half dozen others.




5) Don't think I have a favourite between rock and metal to be honest. If I was forced to pick one genre I think I would end up tossing a coin to pick between trash metal and 70's Rock (which also includes modern bands that are heavily influenced by it like Black Stone Cherry, Rival Sons, Middle Class Rut etc.)

Malice_ wrote: »

So with having Danish relations and living in Liverpool did you end up following the team Per Krøldrup played for or the one graced by Jan Mølby and latterly Daniel Agger?

Touché. I guess the question is intended to be read as "What do you do for a living" but obviously you're under no obligation to tell us .

Well with my scouse accent there is really not much of a choice in terms of guessing what team I support. You can pick between Liverpool FC, Tranmere or Marine for the answer. Here's a clue it ain't option two or three.

There was some other lot that play in a shed, but I never had time for them.

Of course you could always just wander into the footy forum and find me there in the one forum where I get caught up in stupid squabbles. Should not take long to figure out which pole my flag is nailed to in there either.



As for what I do for a living. I had the pleasure of moving back to Ireland to work for a large company, only to become an unemployment statistic last year when things went belly up.

So right now I am jobless and looking into the idea of moving back to Liverpool or back to Germany if nothing crops up in Ireland (well in Galway, Limerick, Kerry, Cork or Waterford at least, Dublin can feck off :P) within the first six months of the year.

The plus side to having more time is my bass play is improving and I am getting loads of gym time and running time.

Direct copypasta from the last thread:

What's the most excited you've been about something Rock/Metal? (Like announcements, or purchases or whatever)

Who do you think is the smartest in the genre and why? (In terms of musical ingenuity or smart business decisions.)

Numina wrote: »

Direct copypasta from the last thread:

What's the most excited you've been about something Rock/Metal? (Like announcements, or purchases or whatever)

Who do you think is the smartest in the genre and why? (In terms of musical ingenuity or smart business decisions.)

1) Bruce coming back to Maiden was a big one. Was stoked by that news.

I have had countless albums over the decades that I was very excited about when I heard they were being released. Some lived up to expectation, some were alright, and some were shyte.

Maiden's Somewhere In Time I can remember being really excited about before it came out, and it blew my mind. I can remember getting the LP and running home to play it and to spend hours checking out the artwork that was riddled with injokes.

Jane's Addiction's Strays was another that had me excited when I heard it was due, and I loved it from first listen.








2) In terms of being business savvy/total merch whore, it has to be Gene Simmons by a mile. I cannot stand the man but I have to tip my hat at his ability to turn everything into an opportunity to make money.


In terms of musical ingenuity I think Trent Reznor has to rank pretty highly in terms of how his many projects sound, and how he can change and adapt.

Nailz wrote: »

If you could form a Super-group of 4/5/6 DEAD Rock & Metal musicians, who'd be in it and what would it be called?

If you could play a (new) instrument instantly what would that be and what song would you love to be able to play instantly on that instrument? Keep it in the boundaries of heavy music.

Damageplan or Superjoint Ritual?

What Rock/Metal song do you wish you wrote?

Are you a fan of wearing band merch, like T-Shirt's and shīt like that; and if so, how much do you have (roughly speaking) and what are your favourites?

What's your favourite film soundtrack, if you have one? Any genre if you like, but if you want it to be Metal for the sake of the forum, that's up to you.

1) I think I would make two supergroups, one rock and one metal.

The metal one would be made up of

Layne Staley
Dimebag Darrell
Randy Rhoads
Cliff Burton
John Bonham


And be called Blinded By Silence


The rock one would be made up of


Ronnie Van Zant
Steve Gaines
Jimi Hendrix
Jaco Patorius
Keith Moon


And be known as Foot Tap.






2) Like I said in the earlier post I would have to go with the drums as the instrument I could play straight away at the highest level. If you had not added the genre stipulation I would have named a few jazz tracks as my choice, but seeing as it is limited to something heavy, my choice would have to be able to play like Charlie Benante on Only or Sodium Penathol from Sound Of White Noise or like Charlie on The Enemy from Spreading The Disease.

The tracks I picked are not unusually intricate or anything like that, but are tracks that I would love to be able to play drums on due to how the drums sound on those tracks and because of how the drums seem to carry and drive the songs.


I think that Charlie Benante is an amazing drummer, and his excursions into funk, prog, and jazz through guest spots are a treat to listen to. People rave about how good Portnoy is on the drums, but when Benante joined up with the Liquid Tension Experiment as a guest drummer he made Portnoy sound one dimensional.





3) Damageplan. I think they would have gone on to make some cracking albums had Dimebag not been murdered.


Plus I cannot stand Anselmo.






4) Springsteen's The River or Thin Lizzy's Bad Reputation.





5) I tend to live in tshirts at the best of times so I have a mix of band tshirts, film tshirts etc. I have a silly amount of them built up over the years and have the bad habit of hoarding my old rock/metal tshirts.



6) Hard to pick just one. I am very partial to the soundtracks of Morricone, especially his work on spaghetti westerns and also of the 70's soundtrack work of Lalo Schifrin.


Composers like John Williams, Clint Mansell and Hans Zimmer are up there for me as well.

In terms of a rock/metal style soundtrack, I love the Fight Club soundtrack by the Dust Brothers, and also the soundtrack for The Social Network by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross. I love the industrial feel to those albums.

The soundtracks to both Daredevil and Spawn I really like as well, with the latter having some really cool metal remix jobs on it.

Denny M wrote: »

If you could go drinking with 5 people in metal, who would they be?

What would be the lineup of your dream gig?

Assuming you like any of them, which of the big 4 of thrash is your favourite?

What was the last rock/metal album that really let you down, cause you expected huge things from it?

1) Are we talking dead or alive folk?

Because I think the best ones are dead at this point.


Keith Moon
John Bonham
Bon Scott
Ronnie Van Zant
Phil Lynott


With that line up , I think what Philo said sums it up best.

The drink will flow, and blood will spill,
And if the boys wanna fight you better let 'em.


Would certainly be a lively night.




2) The classic band member line ups of Thin Lizzy, Queen, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Bruce Springsteen and the E street band (circa 1974-76) all on the one bill.





3) Hmmmm I used to lean towards Anthrax a lot out of the four, but the shyte with John Bush has tainted them somewhat for me.

Metallica grew out of the big four thing in my eyes, (and in their own eyes until it made commercial sense to try and be seen as part of it again it could be argued)

Slayer have bored me with pretty much everything they released after Seasons In The Abyss.

Megadeth has been very hit and miss.

If I have to pick one of the original four, then I will still probably go with Anthrax, but if the question was which Thrash metal band of that era do I think is the best now, then I would have gone with the excellent Testament.





4) Rob Zombie's Hellbilly Deluxe II was a big let down when it came out last Autumn. Coming after Educated Horses I expected big things from it and was hoping for something that was like a heavier and faster version of Hellbilly Deluxe.

What I got ws a steaming pile of crap.

lord lucan wrote: »

CD's/Vinyl with artwork or digital download?

CD and vinyl for me. I do download music from itunes etc from time to time but if I love what I hear I often end up double dipping to get the cd.

Malice_ wrote: »

More questions:

Who's the most famous musician you've met?
Who do you think is the biggest idiot in metal and why?
Who would be your favourite rock/metal babe?
What was the last album that you bought?
Which artists have inspired/influenced you as a musician?
What's your favourite Rock/Metal album artwork?

1) Bruce Springsteen. Met him through one of my old jobs.

In metal terms ,and also not through my old job, then I guess it would be tied between members of Maiden or members of Metallica in terms of the biggest names actually met. Maiden was both backstage after their 1993 date here and also in the hotel, and Metallica was also in Dublin.

My old job in the UK meant I got to meet a lot of musicians and actors as I was a regional manager for a large music chain.

I have also met a few through a friend of mine who I went to the same school with in Liverpool and boxed at the same ABC as him. We kept in touch as we got older and he went on to become a professional boxer and then an actor, so every now and then we we meet up their is a recognisable face with him.

I have a somewhat famous nemesis as a kid though in Pete Burns. I had a long running battle with him when he was a worker in Probe Records at the start of the 80's. Me as the snot nosed kid who was getting into metal in a big way, him as the guy who would argue with me over music. I think there is a long list of people who would have similar stories about Pete though as he got into a lot of heated debates in that shop with customers. Thankfully I had a sarcastic streak of my own forming at the time, and a competitive streak because if you did not come back with some kind of smart comment to the man when he fired one at you, then you would be verbally destroyed by him.

Paul Rutherford worked there around the same time as well.






2) So many choices for this one. It is not going to be Gene Simmons as although I cannot stand the man's public persona, I have to acknowledge and respect his ability to maximise his revenue from his brand name.


I think the two biggest idiots for me have to be Lars Ulrich and Ozzy Osbourne.

I see both of them as very fake people who will jump on any bandwagon to try and further their own image but unlike many others that do likewise, both of them try to make out that they are credible in doing so. I generally take them opening their mouths to talk as a precursor to a verbal torrent of self parising bullsh*t.







3) Right now it has to be Cristina Scabbia in the metal catagory, and PJ Harvey in the rock department.





4) The last albums I bought were Paul Gilbert's Fuzz Universe and Coal Chamber's Dark Days. Both arrived in the post on Wednesday.

I pre ordered trhree albums last night on Amazon thanks to a voucher I had, so technically they may be the last albums I purchased.

The three are the new Pearl Jam live album, plus the reissues of Thin Lizzy's Jailbreak along with Live And Dangerous





5) Phil Lynott, Jaco Pastorius, Frank Bello, Charles Mingus, and Stanley Clarke, in that order as my main influences in picking up the bass and in how I try to play it.


Guys like Melvin Gibbs, Cliff Burton, Les Claypool, John Paul Jones, Rob Trujilo ( his Suicidal Tendencies stuff), Matt King, Tim Commerford, and Garry Tallent would make up my second group of influences.


Yep there is no Steve Harris on my list despite me being a massive Maiden fan.




6) Probably Powerslave. The LP cover, front and back, looks amazing, with the inner slipcase looking very cool as well.

Knifey Spoony wrote: »

What do you think of the Irish rock/metal scence? Assuming you have an interest in it, what would be your favouite Irish band?

I think the Irish scene is nowhere near as good as many like to think or pretend it is. I love going to metal shows like The Siege Of Limerick and checking out the bands that turn up. But I cannot help feeling that an hell of a lot of the bands that get touted as being brilliant or the next big thing are nowt more than pretty average cover bands at best. The lack of originality is staggering at times.


The rock scene is similar with a hell of a lot of bands just sounding like watered down rip offs of bigger bands.

I still turn up at small gigs in pubs and clubs as I get entertained by what I see, but being entertained is not the same as walking away and feeling like you saw something good and somewhat original.


The one band that stuck in my head musically in recent times, and maybe somebody here can help me with the name, is a band that are called something like The New Police or The Real Police. They had Police in their name and had a cool Pearl Jam/Soundgarden vibe to their music but with very modern and fresh feel at the same time.


I am assuming that you meant smaller bands and unsigned bands when you asked the question and not signed bands like The Answer and so on.

Malice_ wrote: »

Are there any bands from Liverpool we should be looking out for (apart from Carcer City)?

Not a huge fan of Carcer City, but another band who would be in the same vein as them soundwise would be the Institution, also from Liverpool.

http://www.myspace.com/vowofthevoiceless





To be honest the rock and pop scene is much healthier in Liverpool than the metal scene in terms of bands writing their own stuff, in my opinion. Liverpool has plenty of hardcore bands and lots of bands who sound like Carcass, but some of the rock and psychedelic rock bands sound a bit more interesting and probably have a better chance of making it beyond playing local clubs.

WhiskeyHeadshot would be one that falls under the psychedelic rock/pop, and are actually quite a good live band in that their live stuff sounds closer to BigElf at times than it does to their studio stuff. They split for a bit but it seems that they are back together again.

http://www.myspace.com/whiskeyheadshot



Outside of Liverpool you would have bands like The Belonging from Bradford who would be black metal, or Old Corpse Road who would be like Skyclad crossed with Venom.


Also from Bradford would be Gods Of Hellfire who would be doom metal in sound.

http://www.myspace.com/godsofhellfire


Skull Branded Pirates would be a Leeds band that often plays in Liverpool. They really really really like Pirates.

http://www.myspace.com/skullbrandedpirates




One band I always try to give a shout out to, mainly because there is a friend of mine on bass for them coupled with the fact that they are quite good, is Circuits. They are not metal but would be rock/ska punk in sound, similar to the Police at times. From day one they have tried to write and play their own stuff and are had an album released as well. They are not from Liverpool but could catch the ear of anyone who liked the Police.

http://www.myspace.com/circuitsband




Keep the questions coming guys, you have me all day today, but tomorrow I will be flying out as I head back to Liverpool with the intention of roaring on the Reds against the bitter Blues, unless of course I get allowed to answer any last questions on Monday morning when I get back.:D.

Malice_ wrote: »

Any more questions folks?

Looks like that is that then. And me checking first thing after getting in the door after my day taking on the bitter Blues.:(

Numina wrote: »

Then I'll oblige then and give one last question.

What is the one relatively unknown song that you would want everybody to hear once in their lives.

edit: Also Malice, don't forget next person is #11.

Tough question. For every song that gets thrown out as being somewhat unknown there would probably be a string of folk to say that they love the song and that it is not even remotely unknown.


A rock band that I thought should have been big was Span. Sadly they are no more as a band.






And another band that hails from the same country who are criminally ignored imho are Audrey Horne, a band who sound very very different to what you would expect from it's band members due to their other work.






Anthrax during the John Bush era were not listened to by enough people in my opinion, and based on their declining sales during that period I reckon that I am right. To my ears the Bush years were a step up on the Belladonna years, and this is coming from someone who got to hear all of the Belladonna albums as new releases and grew up with that era.












Testament are another that I think have not had the listenership their music deserved. Everything from Thrash and almost death metal to melodic rock has been covered by this band and they still remain pretty unlistened to by the masses of rock and metal fans if their sales are anything to go by.















But if I have to pick one song, then I am going to pick one from a huge band. A song that, despite how many millions of albums the band went on to sell, would not be recognised as being by that band other than by fans of the band.


I had the album this song is on playing in the car as I drove back from Cork this afternoon, as well as the brilliant The Ritual, and I had almost forgotten how good the album is as a unit. So many tracks on the album that still sound good and modern to this day despite the album being 30 years old this year. It is not really a metal song in the traditional sense and it is a bit of a marmite song to some fans of the band, but I like it and I get to decide in this thread.


The band is the mighty Iron Maiden and the track is Prodigal Son from the album Killers.

Malice_ wrote: »

I don't know what you're talking about, there's nothing wrong with my numbering :P.

Kess73, you mentioned The Birthday Massacre earlier in the thread, do you listen to any other similar stuff? Groups like Hungry Lucy, I:Scintilla, Porcelain and The Tramps, Velcra, Genitorturers, Kidneythieves, Layhannya

Yep I have listened to all bar one, Layhannya, on your list there, so thanks for popping up a new band for me to check out.


Elysion, Dark Princess, Queen Of Light, and Collide may be others for you to check out if you have not done so already, but looking at your list I have a feeling that you will know of them already.

Pins And Needles was one of the better albums of 2010 imho.