Tainted Tales from Twisted Tongues

Review of Metallica’s “Beyond Magnetic”

Are Metallica Back In The Saddle?

Maybe it was a present for their 30^th anniversary in 2011, or maybe it was the apology chocolates and flowers for the whole LuLu misunderstanding, either way the Beyond Magnetic EP from the Los Angeles Thrash Metal Gods Metallica was truly a gift from heaven.

Overlooking the fact that Metallica’s greatest release in the past 20 years is now four songs they chose NOT to put on the Death Magnetic album (popular opinion, not my own), the EP is a breath of fresh air for the 80’s die hards who sent death threats to poor old Lou Reed. When the four songs were released, the hype started immediately with YouTube and Facebook comments claiming that Metallica were back on top, the spirit of former bassist Cliff Burton (R.I.P.) lives on and that the band remembered how to write a song.

I was sceptical at first, being away on holidays I could only read comments and I couldn’t hear the songs for myself. It was almost torturing until I stole my friends iPhone to find them on YouTube, when I finally heard the EP all expectations were reached and then some. While all the songs sound like they’re from Metallica’s latest album, Death Magnetic, they also have a habit of reaching back and pulling memories of older albums forward. I can only describe it as Death Magnetic, …And Justice For All and Garage Inc throwing a party, and then St Anger shows up and remembered to bring guitar solos this time.

Beyond Magnetic has restored faith to Metallica fans worldwide, and generated a lot of excitement for Metallica’s 10^th album. Let’s pray the band has heard the joyous cries of the fans and bless us with more tracks that take from their older albums without sounding like they’re just trying to recreate them.

Deaducation

Thirteen years of suffering, misery and pain,

Every year gets harder but it’s still the fucking same

End it all, light the match, school begins to burn!

Got a gun against your head, now it’s time to learn

DEADUCATION!

All these words and numbers, clutter up my mind,

Only thing I’ve learned is to hate the human kind

DEADUCATION!

Skin begins to blister
As you move into hell.
Two weeks after death
And your body starts to swell.
Not that long after
You lose your hair and nails.
Your abdomen will rupture
And spill out your entrails.
In your wooden box
You begin to liquefy.
Nothing but a skeleton
A year after you die.

DEADUCATION!

Our Dream

Baby wont you lay down and stay up all night with me,
We can share some crazy stories as we brew your favourite tea.
We can watch the sun rise slowly from the darkness of its nap,
And I’ll hold you as fall asleep with your head across my lap.

And you’ll dream,
And you’ll dream.

I could stare into those eyes and get lost in ocean blue,
But no matter how deep I sink I’ll find my way to you.
On those hard days that don’t go my way and anger fills me deep,
I just fall down on my couch and think of you as I drift to sleep.

And I’ll dream,
And I’ll dream.

One day I will surprise you with a fancy golden ring,
But until I get a job I guess that all I can do is sing.
If there’s three things that I have to do before my time is through,
It’s to call you mine, lay side by side, and drift away with you.

And we’ll dream,
And we’ll dream.

The Room

A man sits alone in a dark room, the walls are all bare and their plain grey colour matches the loose fitting clothes he wears. A slight hum fills the room as the aged fluorescent light in the roof flickers and struggles to fill the room with its weak glow. The man groans and stirs, not remembering where he is or how he got there; as he tries to move, the sounds of rattling chains fill the room and the man wrestles but fails to stand. Lowering his head he slowly opens his eyes to see the letter straps around his waist and hand cuffs binding his wrists to the steel bench before him. Coming to his senses, the man begins to thrash but to no avail, the chains and straps don’t give at all. A booming voice quickly fills the room in reply to his panic, “Relax.”

The sound of the voice was deep, and seemed to come from an unseen speaker in the room. “Patrick Norman, you are in the Plumville penitentiary centre, you are being held on charges of murder,” the voice informed the man. The man looked lost and slowly stammered, “M-mu-murder? B-but I’ve nev-ver murdered anyone.” The voice replied with a more annoyed tone, “Patrick Norman, do you not remember the night of the fifteenth of November?” Patrick paused and looked down in deep though, “I remember, I remember, I went out with my girlfriend to celebrate the end of school. Halfway through the night I felt sick so I went home, had a shower and fell asleep. That’s the last thing I remember.” There was a long pause and Patrick swore he could hear voices off in the distance, but he couldn’t focus his mind on them. Minutes passed and the voice returned, “Does the name Brodie Powlett mean anything to you?” Patrick was quick to reply and now speaking with more fluency. “All I know is he’s a Year 12 at the school across the road from mine. Why? Can someone tell me what’s happened?” There was a longer silence, it felt like hours passed for Patrick and his mind not once stopped racing. He tried to struggle but the chain s held strong. By the time the door clicked open and the man with the briefcase walked in, Patrick was in tears, head buried in his arms. The man spoke with a familiar voice; he was the man from the speaker. “Patrick, look at me. Tell me you don’t remember that night.” Patrick looked up and met the man’s gaze; his eyes were tearing up with the look of a scared animal and without blinking or twitching in the slightest, he let out a desperate, “No.”

The suited man lifted his briefcase onto the table and it landed with a heavy thud as the leather dropped onto steel. Not a word was said between the two as the man opened the locks with a series of metallic clicks and then continued to shuffle through the documents within. Minutes of silence passed and all Patrick could do was squirm and sigh as he remained bound by the chair, this mysterious man occasionally glancing at him over his papers like he was waiting for something. Patrick couldn’t take it anymore, he felt like he was going to crack until the man finally made a move, laying down a series of photos on the table. “Patrick,” he began, “you told me that you went home early, but these shots from the nightclub’s security tell otherwise.” The man pushed the photos across the table towards Patrick; they were pixelated shots, but the faces were recognisable enough. “Here we see your girlfriend, Leanne Davie, leaving with Brodie Powlett at 2:07 on the morning of the sixteenth and in the second photo we see you storming out at 2:19 AM.” Patrick was speechless and trying to stammer out anything, but before he could get his tongue around the words the man spoke again as he pushed across another photo. “This footage is from the local 24/7 Coles Supermarket, their records show you bought a large kitchen knife and paid cash.” Patrick paused and slowly mumbled, “I-I must’ve needed a new one for my apartment.”

“Oh really?” the man retorted. “Then one would expect it to be in the kitchen.” The man slowly reached into his case and pulled out a plastic zip lock bag; inside was a large knife with a dull metal blade stained in crimson splashes. “This was not found in your kitchen Patrick; this was found almost six inches inside Brodie Powlett’s head.” Patrick was stunned and whimpered, “I couldn’t have, I didn’t, it wasn’t me”, he buried his head into his hands and in the silence you could hear the quiet splashes of his tears on the table. It had finally hit him, the barriers he put up in his mind own mind came crashing down and the terrible truth of the atrocities he committed came flooding in. He bought the knife, he killed Brodie Powlett, he was guilty and he knew it.

Patrick slowly raised his head, the tears had stopped flowing from his red eyes, but their trails had stained his cheeks. The despair on his face had changed to malice, “She said she loved me, that I was the only man she ever wanted,” he snarled, “So when I saw her leave with that scumbag, I lost control. She should be lucky I let her live, some part of me still loves her.” The man pulled out a tape recorder from inside his jacket and pressed stop as he calmly said, “Well, that’s all I need”, picked up his case and left the room.

Roses & Violets

Roses are Red, My soul is Black;

I’ll end it all, if I can’t have you back.

Violets are Blue, My blood is Red;

It’ll flow down my arms, until I lay dead.

Roses are Red, My corpse is White;

I struggled so hard, but I still lost the fight.

Violets are Blue, My coffin is Brown;

I’m sorry everyone, I let you all down.

Righteous One

Surrounded by evil
Yet still standing tall
Blood will stain dirt
And bodies will fall

Bullets fly fast
Hearts beat faster
The piercing screams ring
I am death’s master

Nowhere to hide
From Heaven’s fury
Just executioner
No judge, no jury

Steel brings pain
Petrol brings fire
No life for the sinner
The thief and the liar

Nostrils are filled
By a thick smoky haze
Lost in the mind
Thoughts caught in a maze

The air comes clear
The blood’s soaked in
Now know only peace
And feel no more sin

Darkness

As I stumbled towards my room in the night’s shelter, the hum of the old light bulb was now silent and although it was dark, I knew my way through the mess on my floor. I sat on the edge of my creaking bed and beheld the shadows around me, and what I saw was something I had never seen before, I saw true darkness. Darkness that was not the absence of light, but the absence of hope, with a malevolent presence that instilled claustrophobia in the bravest of men.

 Before I could even begin to comprehend what was enveloping me, I knew I had to act, for evil was afoot. I lay down and exposed myself, embracing and accepting the darkness. I breathed it in, tasted its essence, I heard the screams of the thousands of hopeless that were lost inside. Now I knew my enemy. With a mighty scream I expelled the tainting poisons and began to focus. I peered inwards and began to create something powerful and brilliantly luminous within.

 I awoke in a land that never existed, created in a moment out of time, and as I opened my eyes and saw the hungering stygian beast for what it truly was. I felt the power from inside take over and unleash all that I had summoned in to the darkness. A ferocious light stormed out of me, clashing with the beast. I became a beacon in the darkness and a saviour to the lost and hopeless victims, as they came to me I grew stronger and the light burning from within intensified. When I could hold it no longer my fury manifested into a blinding white explosion, burning to all those who opposed it, free all those who accepted it. There was nothing but a singularity of dazzling light that contained within it an unmatched purity.

 After the light had faded I opened my eyes to witness the rebirth of the world around, and all around I could see the beast of darkness and nightmares had been purged and hope restored for the lost. The souls now free rushed to find me to give praise and worship, but by the time they reached the source of the banishing light, I was nowhere to be found. I was back in my room, sitting on the edge of my creaking bed, looking into a room that didn’t seem that dark, even though the hum of the old light bulb was now silent.

Beauty of the Rose

Beauty of the rose,
Although I long to hold you,
Your thorns cause me pain.

We all long to be closer to beauty,
Struggle with the pain as we struggle for acceptance.

The wild rose captures the essence of beauty,
Try to get close, it will bring pain,
Thorns dig in, pain turns to suffering,
Yet you suffer, suffer through it all, beauty is so close,
Ripped skin, tears mix with blood, look in the mirror,
Who is beautiful now? Only photographs of old.

Beauty as told by the media,
Everywhere you see, confidence for sale,
Anorexia glamorised and idolised,
Understand everyone is beautiful, it’s not on the skin,
Take the time to seek the true beauties of life,
You may learn something about yourself.

Crimson Beauty

As I walked down those steep, creaking, wooden steps I was hit with the familiar odour of the basement, that dense, dark atmosphere filling my nostrils. I felt around for the light switch, my fingertips brushing against the cold, damp stone walls. I knew this place well, for not too long ago it was mine. The old fluorescent light flickered sporadically for a brief moment, before filling the room with its dusky white light. In the light I could see the bare stone room exactly the way it was weeks before when I had to give up this house, and in my arms I could see Her. She had no name to me, because naming Her would make Her human, and humanity is too ugly for Her.

I remember back to my days in art school, how young and eager I was, how the first thing I was taught was “Beauty creates beauty”, and how the last thing they told me was “You just don’t have beauty”. Well I have beauty now, and she lay cold and lifeless, yet completely unblemished, in my arms. As I reached the bottom of the stairs I took in another deep breath, tasting the air as it rolled over my tongue. “This is my canvas,” I stated to no one in particular, “and you are my palette.” This comment was directed to Her.

Wasting no time, I laid Her down in the centre of the room, pausing only briefly to gaze at perfection before retrieving my tools. Amongst them were the regulars, brushes of all sizes and so on, but because this was a special project, it required special tools. Whilst setting up a blood bag to drain in to I spoke to Her. “You know, I really do feel bad about this, but try and see it from my point of view,” I paused for a moment to insert a needle into Her arm and begin the harvest. “From the moment I first laid eyes on you, I knew it had to be you. The fact you were buying my house just made you more easily obtainable. I guess what I’m trying to say is, this has nothing to do with you taking my house when I lost everything. I don’t want you thinking this is personal.” I paused once again expecting a reply before remembering I was conversing with a cadaver. I began to empty out the rest of the tools from my bag; a scalpel, some high strength thread, a needle to go with it, and at last, a bone saw. I was ready.

I stood over Her and observed the room, mentally plotting out my masterpiece. First, I’ll need to position Her perfectly, and then I’ll start at the head and work my way down to Her feet, decorating Her pale white skin with the gleaming blood. Out from Her body, I’ll continue the pattern across the floor and up the walls, until there is no blood left to paint with. But, I had to hurry, time was of the essence and rigor mortis was upon Her. So I seized my scalpel and made the first slice through Her tear gland, soon she would be crying crimson tears, their trails staining her soft cheeks. I’ll never forget that first cut, the first cut is always the sweetest.
After a long day I sat on the basement steps admiring my completed work and drinking the lemon, lime and bitters I found in the fridge upstairs I didn’t think She’d mind. I spoke to Her once more to break the silence. “If only those pompous jerks from the art school could see me now. What we’ve made here today is sweet, beautiful art. Here’s to us!” I raised my drink and took another mouthful. “I remember when you had your first inspection of the house, how you asked if you could keep all my paintings on the walls for a little bit extra. Thank you, because of you I chose not to give up on my art like my lecturers told me to. Instead I went for one last big shot, and here it is, with you as the star of the show!” I put down my drink to applaud her, before continuing what was becoming my unveiling speech. “I’ll be branded as a freak, a monster and a sicko for this, but that’s because they won’t see what I see in you. All through my life, no one ever saw it like I did, but now with this, with you, they’ll see.” I stood up and took a bow. It was a marvelous speech if I do say so myself.

Looking down at myself now, I noticed my work had made me rather unclean and I didn’t want to leave looking unpresentable, so I waltzed up to my old bathroom, with a spring in my step, to clean myself up. Whilst looking around to find where she moved the washcloths to I knocked over Her bag, and that’s where it all went so dreadfully wrong. Out fell a small plastic device with yesterday’s date scrawled on it in permanent marker, I picked it up to inspect it and noticed on the other side there was a small panel with a blue cross on it. The sudden realization of what I’d done swept over me like a tidal wave as I dropped the pregnancy test and fell to my knees, throwing up in self hatred and disgust.

My mind was burning with guilt, I had no idea what I was doing or how I got back down to the basement. I felt faint, my breaths were short and sharp, with each one feeling like a razor to the throat. I was on my knees in front of her, She was on her knees praying, just as I had left her. Praying forever, praying for her unborn child. She probably never got the chance to tell anyone, the child would be forgotten, mourned by none. I raised my hands to pray with her, feeling a searing pain shoot through my entire body. As they came level to my eyes I saw clenched in one fist the used pregnancy test, clenched in the other a stained scalpel, and across both wrists, gushing blood from my lacerated wounds. Suddenly I remembered how I got to the basement, suddenly I remembered what I’d done, suddenly the darkness came.