 |
Predator H.M.S.Q Arrakis Full Frontal Assault FTW Overkill Predator Streetwalker Running Blind Traveller Foxholes all lyrics by Guy © 1992-2008 Propaganda Records used by permission click song title to view lyrics/ liner notes |
|
H.M.S.Q
It's gettin' late, not much action left tonight First song Curt and I wrote together, first one recorded for the Predator sessions, we used it to open the set for years. Also the first one Chuck played on. The lyrics pretty much say where my head was at the time. Basic bogus metal tropes, really stupid stuff, reading it now.
The music was solid however. This song, like most of our first compositions, was based on a riff Curt came up with jamming. He was always coming up with great licks like this and I would seize on one and start writing around it. I think almost all of the music on this is based on licks he came up with. The drum stop on the second verse was because on a very early demo I accidently erased the drum track trying to punch something else in right at that point, but it was kind of cool so we kept it in all version from then on. The lick during the break is reminiscient of Savatage's Sirens, and I used to sing "SIRENS" during that break as a goof. You can hear me doing it at a gig we played with Savatage here: HMSQ 92.06.13 Rocket Club with Savatage: A Farewell to Jon Oliva .
Desert winds burn at my skin Based on the Dune trilogy by Frank Herbert, I certainly outdid myself sticking in references to the book, and using Herbert's pseudo-Arabic names and words. Heavy Iron Maiden influence (they had covered "Dune" in "To Tame a Land", but being a Dune aficionado, I didn't think they'd done a very good job, lyrically, so I thought I better improve on their version.
Since I'd been kind of forced onto bass, I wanted it to be as dominent and fun to play as possible in the songs I wrote. This had a big Steve Harris influence, and first song I wrote on bass. I approached writing on bass much the same way he did, using all the strings at once to make a kind of layered bass approach, as opposed to single note runs. This was also Mike and my first foray into trying to stack vocals really big, Queen style, no mean feat when you only have eight channels to work with. They are pretty primitive, but it's a start and we were still feeling our way around. Later we would become much more proficient at it. The sound quality is not too bad throughout the album, for all its experimental devices by amateurs in the studio. It was a little compressed, but it was out of necessity due to the technical limitations and we were ping-ponging stuff on 8 tracks with no noise reuduction system, meaning I couldn't afford to have any quiet passages, everything had to be fully saturated at all times. Before this we were on four tracks, so we felt like we had room to branch out a little, stacking guitars and vocals. The drum sound suffered, though, done on one channel and run through a stereo reverb to give it ambiance and width. We were always a little ahead of ourselves compositionally and what we wanted to do prodution-wise in relation to our technical and hardware limitations.
Full Frontal Assault Written in the AC/DC tradition-come up with a title, then fill in lines to fit the idea. Another in my sex and violence series. I find these lyrics truly hilarious now, I wonder if I got the humor then, I forget now. I think I may have been dead serious.
I got a lot of the lines straight from a TV news report about a war, I was struck immediately by the double entendre possibilities of some of the lines. I had even more but even then I could figure out it was getting ridiculous, and since I've seen Carlin (RIP) do a bit about the same subject. Instrumental written over a drum fill pattern Chuck came up with. One of the few we really cranked out just jamming in the studio. We overdubbed the toms for a big sound. Named after one of Chuck's several tattoos. He eventually got a "Vengeance Inc." tattoo.
You force me further Along the lines of Full Frontal Assault, this one appears to have some pretty disturbing references to fisting.
I remember Curt had brought his then-gf along to watch me lay down the vocal tracks to this. I used to sing in the control room so I could run the tape-deck myself, usually through necessity, but I always liked to lay down vocals all by myself and do countless takes, plus I would be too impatient with someone else running the deck, I knew where I wanted to punch in and out, it was just quicker and easier. Anyway, she was apparently unaware of the style of music he played and was horrified, not only by the lyrics and my singing (screaming) but by the fact that he played such a (she thought) hopelessly un-commercial form of music. We were very serious about getting a major label contract at this time and she (perhaps rightly) thought he was nuts playing power metal. Until they parted company she tried to get him to quit the band, or, failing that, start writing more radio-friendly stuff. She was the inspiration for the song Whipped, and a lot of the lines are literal takes on shit she would pull, like trying to get him to skip practice or to come to the phone during practice, or leave practice early. Curt of course co-wrote the music to this, along with all these except Traveller, which I wrote, and Running Blind, based on an idea I came up with jamming with Bruce Batton of Brat, so this was his music, not some music we were trying to force upon him, but she could never see that. Curt was actually a fan of really dark and sludgy stuff like Priest's Metal Gods, or the German influence, like Michael Schenker, Yngwie of Ritchie Blackmore.
|
Predator
Death casts a shadow and
it's passing o'er the mountainside One of the few songs on this album with somewhat worthwhile lyrics, still cliché ridden, but some nice lines here. Still getting my feet wet, this is probably the second song we wrote, after HMSQ, and it was a highlight of the live show 'til the end, played with Reign of Terror as an intro, as I wrote on the notes for that song.
We had been working on this since Curt's brother Dave was playing drums for us and had done several versions, sort of as a recording exercise, even as far back as with the 4-track. I remember bringing a cassette of it around everywhere with me and torturing people by making them listen to it. We were quite proud of not only the song, but our increasing recording ability, which was very slight at that point in time. It didn't really get to poing I'd call "quality" until Bad Crazy. Beside sound quality, dynamic range and frequency range was a problem with slow moving (8ips, or 15ips, but tape was expensive) thing (1/2 inch) tape. Even on Malicious Intent, we couldn't get the bottom end we wanted, forcing us to make a midrange heavy mix so that we could get decent volume. I remember Curt said he played it for his Dad, and he remarked it sounded "brassy", which was a good description.
Blonde in the corner with a pagan smile Based on a true story. the names were changed to protect the guilty. The back of her leg line is especially picturesque. Some of these lyrics are cringingly bad to read now, but the style was standard for the time. You either wrote about sex or violence, and we cover the gamut here from S to V. Only on Traveller did I try to break out a bit. It would take several more albums before I'd totally get past that trope.
I try to live life on the run This one breaks the mold of most of the other songs; it is actually about something personal, the frustrations of trying to get a contract, beating your head against the wall, even in these early days of our "career". Flows very nicely, I recorded this one by myself in the studio with Chuck on drums. As I've mentioned elsewhere, its based on an idea I came up with jamming with Bruce Batton of Brat. We wrote a song together, but I discarded his portions of the song and wrote this, and he discarded my parts and wrote his own for Brat. They did relatively little recording over their career compared to us (nearly 100 released songs, altogether, with compiliations), and never they laid it down, as far as I know.
I have always been a Traveller Probably the best song on the album, lyrically, even when I was a kid I seemed to have been obsessed with time passing and not accomplishing what I wanted, or thought I could do, a theme that recurs in songs like Goodbye '89. On the break I did my first real stacked guitar work, although I had been experimenting with it on songs that never saw the light of day. This final product still stands up, very nicely done I think.
She gives me a shock like a heart attack And here we are back to form lyrically with Foxholes, a song name that speaks volumes. The title came from a porn flick, and the song holds true to that ideal. Actually this one is a little better than the other crotch rockers on the album, I particularly like the "slave to the master that lives in my pants" line, it was a catchphrase for our friend Bobby "Deacon" Gibbs, with whom Mike, Chuck and I recorded an album in a contrived band called "Deacon". I'll try to commemorate that album on the site as well.
This one is pure speed metal, our old encore before we started doing Action. Altogether not bad for a first album, other than vocally. The vocals are so bad and so frightening and embarrassing to me that I seriously doubt I'll convert them and upload the mp3s unless my sense of personal shame takes a real hit. As a completist, it does hurt me not to add them, I only wish they were better.
|