Metal Reviews

ive been meaning to ask someone from australia about karnivool. i have karnivools stuff and i really like it. i like the first full length themata better than the second although the second is good as well just a little different. the song themata though is really good. so my question is this: how are they percieved in australia i would assume that they are much bigger there than here. what are your feelings on them? and have you ever seen them live?

Sorry to say I'm the wrong aussie to ask! I've never seen them live, and I don't really know their stuff. Not because I don't like them, it's just one of those bands I've never really explored.

Maybe ask Dead1 or Trooper of Steel. They're the other resident aussies around here.

All good. Figured I'd give it a shot.

Snake, have you ever got all psyched up on heavy metal and/or controlled substances and then engaged in a brutal fist fight or other act of violence?

yep. im assuming you want a story or two...

you said psyched up on heavy metal the first thing that came to mind was this: a little backstory first.

when i was in middle school i was chubby and had absolutely no self esteem. i got made fun of. this pissed me off over time. by the end of eighth grade i was slimming down and shit was getting better/easier for me. girls were taking more of an interest blah blah blah. im hanging with the cool kids (cool kids=kids that drink and smoke weed and girls who like to hook up blah blah) i get to high school and join the football team get into better shape whatever. by this time ive been fighting all threw middle school. snake does not take shit anymore. from anyone. fast forward to 10th grade. this kid is talking shit over something i cant remember for the life of me. i confront him he denies it. ( snake had a reputation) i say whatever dude just fuckin shut your mouth blah blah blah. i find out in the morning next day that he is telling people he is gonna fuck me up. so i got my walkman with master of puppets in it. we will get to that in a min. so i know where this kid goes in the morning to wait for homeroom and hang out. there is a corridor between wings of the school that he goes threw. i wait there with master of puppets playing. im so fired up im shaking with anticipation. (snake had serious rage issues due to a lousy upbringing and getting picked on early in life) (im getting a little pumped rehashing this memory) so he comes threw the door but doesnt look up yet. the door swings shut behind him. he has three friends and his GF with him. i have one buddy who knows DO NOT BY ANY MEANS GET INVOLVED. ( the kid im about to fight was all ripped up. supposedly he was taking steroids. i used to like a challenge) i rip my head phones off toss them to my buddy. i was like ten feet from this kid i say "hey chris" and he knows its on. we square up (snake dont like sneaking people but i could of got that off cause this idiot wasnt paying attention to his surroundings. he throws a punch i take it in the face and know its over. i think he knew it to. muscles mean nothing if you dont know how to fight or throw a punch. i give this kid a thrashing. the whole time the main riff from master of puppets is going threw my head. none of his friends step in. they know. it doesnt last long. he ends up with his hoodie pulled over his head hockey style while im wailing on his skull when a teacher comes in and its over. we both got suspended blah blah blah.

if you want ill tell you about the race war that broke out in 11th grade... that shit was crazy.

Favorite part. That's kinda a fun story though. If you don't mind telling them, I'll keep reading them.

i dont mind. i just dont want to sound like im trying to sound like a tough guy. im not. i was just a pissed off kid who ended up all kinds of jammed up with the law and everything else. but i dont mind telling them.

just to clarify im nothing like this today. i was really nice back then too for the most part.

disclaimer: some of these stories are kind of brutal.

well as for controlled substances when i was in highschool it was ecstasy, weed or booze i was on. two of those i wasnt fighting on but yeah when i was drunk i did some awful things.

dude throughout my life up to a couple years ago ive been stabbed twice. shot at three times (never hit) ive been jumped ive done drugs ive sold drugs. my life has not been fun. most of that is my fault ive come to realize. when i was young i thought being a badass was cool. so i went this route. i wish i hadnt. no one tells you when your young that badasses have shitty lives. when i was young i didnt care. i never thought i would live this long to be perfectly honest. the fucked up part is i didnt really come from a super bad area. idk its hard to explain. ill say my childhood was fucked up. that had alot to do with why i was the way i was. it was the time too. in the nineties shit was different. being cool was different. i dont think kids today act like we did then. we were way too mature for our ages. my sister is five years younger than me. she tells me that high school for her was totally different than when i was there. kids changed, times changed. idk

so the race war...
i need to start off by saying im in no way racist.
it wasnt really a race war per say. this kid chris parnell (black kid) for some unknown reason starts with me in the cafeteria. dont remember why exactly. im walking by him and he says something or other. we fight. he loses. i get suspended.

a couple weeks go by and chris and five black kids jump me in the hallway during class. i fight but they get the better of me. and i get the shit kicked out of me. what can i say it happens.

so another couple weeks go by. im in the movies with this chick jessica. after the movie i find out that my buddies al and steve see the black kid chris on the street and beat him badly for the jumping i took. now shit is starting...

im at work at this place chicken holiday with al. we bath work there. steve calls the place and tells me and al that this kid chris is outside his house with his boys and is just waiting for him to come out. i dont remember how that ended to be honest. i think the house next door called the cops and they took off. something like that.

some more shit goes down at school. and the faculty gets wind of whats been going on since the initial suspension i recieved.

there is a pep rally that im not allowed to go to because of the faculty being afraid of a race war. haha that shit cracks me up. they thought i was the anti christ. anyway a day or two after this. class lets out and if you guys remember high school when class lets out its pandamonium for a minute or two. me al and steve leave a class start down the hall where chris and his boys are waiting for us. chris charges me with a utility knife. somehow steve grabs his arm and the knife slides across the floor. i punch chris dead in the jaw and drop him. he falls to his hands and knees. i have steel tip boots on and kick him full force in the ribs. i hear the sound of a pumpkin being smashed that dull thud sound. it was sickening. his friends run up or where already running up. idk it all happens so fast. steve and al grab two of them that leaves two. i hit one of them and the other one grabs me when the teachers and security run up and its a shit storm.

i got expelled. chris got a concussion and three broken ribs. al and steve got suspended. im pretty sure chris got expelled too. so that was the last time i saw chris parnell. i still dont know why he hated me so much. he was going to kill me with that razor he had.

i moved in with my dad in south philly after this and shit got worse for me. haha if i had some writing ability i could write a book. for real. this is just high school shit. in philly shit got very real very fast.

again i just want to say. for the most part i did not start trouble. i wouldnt back down from it. but i didnt start with people that were minding there business. i had gained a reputation and for whatever reason people always wanted to test it. thats all. im not a tough guy. really. im actually really nice. back then and into my mid twenties i was angry and bitter and just filled with hate. thats the only real excuse i have for this shit.

We want.

EDIT: sorry, looks like you just posted a second before I wrote that.

Don't sweat it dude, it happens. I come from an upper middle class family, almost upper class actually, and I had parents that were as loving as supportive as you could imagine. I still managed to set my entire life back about 5 years with meth, weed, pills and alcohol when I was a teenager.

Nothing too drastic, I never O.D'd and ended up in a hospital and I never like, had to blow anyone for meth (like i said, rich parents) but I still managed to do enough drugs that I dropped out of uni twice and set my life back a few years like I said. It can happen to anyone, dude.

As for that race war, sounds fucked up. We don't have too much shit like that in Australia. I mean we have Aboriginals, but the truth is, after our government tried to commit Genocide against them in the 40s and 50s, there's really not that many of them left around, especially here in Melbourne, so while the dichotomy between the races is still a sensitive cultural issue, you don't see it very much in your day-to-day life. I always wondered what it would be like in America, having to like, watch what you say and how you act.

well black americans are a totally different breed than africans or aboriginals i would imagine. of course there are decent black people. i know quite a few actually. but then you have the ones who think they live in a rap video. the wanna be thugs aggrevate me. but yeah man ive had my share of addictions. never did meth though. i did other shit. that was later though a couple years after moving to philly. i lost about 13 years to foolishness. from 17 to 30 really. what can i do? its done now. alot of good times in there too. kinda...

Oh, yeah, of course there are decent black people! Most of them are, I'm sure. I never would suggest otherwise.

I just meant it would be weird to live in an evironment where you had to watch what you say because it could be misunderstood or taken the wrong way, even if you didn't mean anything racist. Because once you're pegged as a racist, people look at you funny.

My bad. I didn't mean to imply that. I knew what you meant. It just came out wrong.

Ehhh its not that weird here. Idk though maybe I'm used it.

Love reading your posts snake, and you definitely have some writing skill. A lot of professional writers get by on much less.

thanks man.