The Batlord

An Edumacation for You Dumb Cunts: Part Zwei

James Chance and the Contortions

Yeah, so The Contortions aren't a metal band. What, you thought I only listened to metal? Well, FUCK YOU! There are plenty of non-metal bands out there for the open minded metalhead, and James Chance and the Contortions are one of the finest. How should I describe them? Well...you know how sometimes you get a bit antsy, and you just need to stop taking the Ritalin for a bit cause you feel like it's eating your brain and you get sick of all the judgmental FUCKS trying to HANDLE YOU and turn you into some carbon copy pretty person who's FUCKING NORMAL and BORING and whose soul is just as DEAD as their's so you quit taking THE DEMON PILL but now your mind is going HERE and HERE and THERE and EVERYWHERE but not there never there that's the bad place so you gotta put on some righteous tunes to bring order to the madman's breakfast that is now your mind.

Excuse me as I wipe the spittle from my computer screen. There. All better.

The Contortions are the perfect band for this. Part of the New York No Wave scene of the late seventies along with such well adjusted and sensible bands as Swans and Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, the Contortions were out to finish the job that punk started and finally burn rock'n'roll to the ground and make an abstract, stream-of-conscious finger painting out of the blood and ashes even while the flames were still burning unchecked and the screams of the dying surrounded them but those who were burning had brought it on themselves so they're only getting what they deserve but when all is quiet and the rubble is cool then the Contortions will have nothing left no reason to exist all their energy spent empty meaningless dead and they shall cease to exist.

First you got the rhythm section. Frantic and chaotic, but with an infectious groove like old school R&B on cocaine and acid that hypnotizes your addled mind with its simple hysteria. Jaggedly zig-zagging around the beat like a deranged hummingbird are the shrill blasts of James Chance's saxophone capturing the formless thoughts flitting about in the background of your brain and bringing them into alignment. And to finally pummel your now terrified and desensitized consciousness into submission come Chance's vocals. They switch from a playful, nihilistic croon to a tortured scream that makes Henry Rollins sound like James Blunt at the drop of a dime. Sick nasty. You should now either be calm and centered, or are being forcibly removed from a potted plant in the mall and are now on your way to a mental institution. Either way, the Contortions fucking rule.

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