Gaza--He Is Never Coming Back

Today is going to be pretty lame.  Here in Austin, TX, the dastardly Arctic Blast has returned after just two glorious days of above freezing temperatures.  I woke up today to take my wife to work only to find that said Arctic Blast has cut a swath of destruction overnight, leaving ice on the roadways and blanketing my car with a thick coat of frozen-solid raindrops that prevent me from opening doors, using the windshield wipers, and doing virtually everything other than sitting idly in the car and listening to the radio.  Such natural vandalism irks me to no end, but since the Supreme Court has ruled that I can't sue nature for inconveniencing me slightly (thank you very much, Sandra Day O'Connor), I have to just sit back and take it.  Many people have said that this weather is not so bad, calling us hot-weather tuned scorpion-types "sissy," and "homo," just because we are dangerously inexperienced in driving around on roadways that are covered with ice and snow, but weren't built to handle said inclement weather patterns.

Just saying that Colorado has more snow doesn't give me tire chains or enough experience to avoid sliding into an intersection and being killed, so their arguments are moot.

On days like this I like to bring out the most vitriolic music I can find and rock it loud and proud.  It's all gray and cold out, and with the roadways icy like my heart and the sky black as my soul (and lungs), I let people with talent be angry for me.  Also, if I can't stave off the depression that comes along with this kind of weather, it'll make it that much harder to go to work and deal with my coworkers constantly calling me a faggot and saying that I'm stupid and stuff.  I mean, you wear a pair of Prince ladies' thong underwear to work one time, and all the sudden you're a creepy deviant who spends too much time in the bathroom.  BUT THE BATHROOM IS WHERE I GO TO EAT DOUGHNUTS AND CRY!  I just wish they would lay off me.

Speaking of bilious music for the socially retarded, Gaza's latest album, He Is Never Coming Back, came out a couple of years ago to much fanfare from the metal community.  I was immediately suspicious of Gaza, because their album title makes it so very clear that they are going to talk about Jesus a bunch, but not in the preachy way that Christian bands do it where the lyrics aren't subtle or well-written to convey that they have faith in a greater power.  No, Gaza was going to sing about Jesus in the preachy way that Athiests talk about Jesus, where they lyrics are slightly more subtle but with no less clarity that they think Jesus stinks and so do you if you have faith in anything. 

I'm going to go out on a limb right here and just say this: if you're a Christian, an Athiest, a Mormon, a Satanist, or whatever, I'm getting tired of hearing about your faith and how everyone else is stupid or wrong.  A common thing that I've heard Athiests do is slam Christians for constantly evangelizing about their faith, never shutting up no matter how old or annoying it gets.  Then the Athiest will begin evangelizing about their lack of faith, never shutting up no matter how old or annoying it gets.  This goes for all religions, but metal musicians seem to congregate around these subjects and beat them into the ground (I'm looking at you, Deicide).  I don't care about your stupid beliefs, just like you don't care about mine.  If I want to know about yours, I'll ask you, and you can do that same for me if you want to know about mine.  But let's maybe give some room for the subject to breathe for a while, shall we?

Ahem.  Let me just climb off my soapbox here...and...there we go.  Sorry about that.  Rill Talk, right?  Ugh.

At any rate, my suspicions of Gaza proved to be founded, but their music won me over in short order.  I happened to be at a show where Gaza were playing, down at Emo's.  I was always curious to hear what all the critics were talking about, since Gaza was getting so much hype at the time, so I was excited to hear their set.

It blew me away.

Their sound is very noisy and very sludgy, the riffs squalling sounds that only obliquely resemble guitar music as it is commonly known.  In other words, they don't sound anything like At the Gates or really any other easy-to-identify band.  The music is off-kilter, the drums jazzy, the guitars inspired soundscapes, and the vocals throat-shredding and honest.  It all sounds bleak, but not grim or kvlt like our frostbitten Scandinavian friends.  It's really, really good, and painfully heavy.

My favorite thing about Gaza, though, is the singer.  He's got a great voice and all, but when I saw him I was awestruck.  His name is Jon Parkin, and he's humongously tall.  I was able to find an artist's rendition of him the the interwebs, so steel yourself against his terrifying visage

Parkin preparing to feast on a puny mortal

In other words, he's tall.  Hur dur dur.

If you're interested in the music, you should follow your nose and take a listen, and if you are upset by my soapbox rant, well, I'm sorry.  But not actually.