Trollheart

Submitted for your consideration: an ordinary street in an ordinary town. Could be your town. Or the one a few miles away. Or another town in another city. Or state. Or country. Basically, a street in a town whose location has not yet been, nor probably ever will be, confirmed. Can you please let me get on with this without so many questions? Thank you. Now, as I was saying: an ordinary street in an ordinary town. But this town, and this street, is anything but ordinary. For if you look through the curtained windows and peer behind the normal-looking facade of the painted doors, you'll find people hard at work in bedrooms and lounges and attics and kitchens, with desktop or laptop, ipad or phone, sitting feverishly writing about their favourite bands, artistes, gigs and albums; perhaps movies and drugs too. And television.

You look back towards the road that led you here, and an icicle stabs your heart as you realise you can no longer see that road: it does not exist. You are now on a street and have no idea how you got there, and there seems to be no way to leave it. Mesmerised, transfixed, you find yourself drawn towards the neat rows of houses as the sounds of muttering, typing, cursing and music grows louder in your ears until it blocks out all other sounds. There is no turning back. You've just crossed over into


Although much of his time is being taken up by the new journal he shares with Unknown Soldier, of which more later, Anteater has still managed another small leg of http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...ravaganza.html, bringing us artistes such as The Coral, Geyster and Al Jarreau

while Deadchannel comes back from the, er, dead, to proclaim he is in fact not passed away, http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...ell-funny.html. Indeed. He's kicking off his new journal with Pord and then venturing into the murky world of jazz with two giants, Coltrane and Davis.

And still http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...-darkroom.html, Frownland has pictures of his doggy (so cute!) Zappa, as well as some of his own band, including a weird Nosferatu-like cautionary tale on smoking...

http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...63-2013-a.html is up to 2007 (not far to go now, huh? What do you do at the end of this, I wonder?) and albums he dug from that year include Animal Collective, EI-P and Burial

while innerspaceboy is listening to art-punk/jangle pop and also undertaking to enrich the musical appreciation of his co-worker. Generous, I say.

Down at http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...seur-cave.html Isbjorn is listening to Ensiferum and, um, Taylor Swift? Hell, Batty listened to Britney! But still...

Thre's a lot of Pokemon going, um, on in http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...is-arcade.html as well as some Mario, and a character spotlight on Jasper from Fable III, while in http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...nal-music.html he's listening to the music of MB members (see further on too) with albums from Mondo and Frownland.

http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...de-sparks.html continues with everything you needed to know about the band plus live reviews

Machine is listening to Jeff Rosenstock, Death Grips and Leviathan, as well as writing some more lyrics in http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...-its-dumb.html

Oriphiel is playing some video game soundtracks while he's http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...ck-garage.html, with Gun, Dynasty Warriors 4, Dark Cloud and Morrowind

Plankton is giving props to a friend of his in http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...listening.html

and http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...o-reviews.html returns as the starry one reviews Foo Fighters.

After our lengthy Tom Waits discography, http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...d-journal.html gets back to some srt of normality with a review of Journey's Escape in the “Klassic Korner” section, and other than that, not much happening in my journals this week. Plenty of writing but I've kind of missed the deadline for posting, so expect a lot next week. Oh, http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...-showroom.html resurfaces with a review of Mondo's latest album. Told you there'd be more later!

Judas Priest are just outside the top five for 1984, at number 6 with Defenders of the faith in http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...y-history.html, and in http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...78-2015-a.html, Unknown Soldier and Anteater move on to the fifth album, Isolation. Having discovered that bassist Mike Porcaro passed away recently, they'll also be running a tribute to him, but that will only make it into next week's update.

Finally, the long-anticipated and awaited smackdown between Wpnfire and Chula Vista never materialised, so Zep go unavenged by their staunchest defender. Wonder if he saw the review? Anyway, the armed one is now moving on to Doom Metal, with Paradise Lost, and brings the curtain down on the update in style with an interesting discussion of the album sleeve.

And as I like it when people put thought and a bit of entertainment into their writing, that very article is the one I'm picking for my

Taking

this week is the discussion engendered by
http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...de-sparks.html
Seems everybody is a fan of Sparks. Except me. Never got into them. But there's surely a lot of conversation going on in Lil's new journal...


December began with more haiku reviews and then Isbjorn looked into MC5's Kick out the jams, Sonata Arctica's Silence and then returned to his exploration of Folk with Simon and Garfunkel's The sound of silence (see the link? Unintentional? Only he knows for sure...) Next up it was more haiku reviews and then Wishbone Ash's Argus followed by the godawful (apparently) Dragonvarius by Dragon Guardian, proving that you can get worse than Dragonforce! And so into January of this year.

Joining forces with the now-defunct (sorry man, can't say I didn't warn you it was a huge undertaking and you had better be ready to back it up) “Devils' Dancefloor”, Isbjorn reviewed Maiden and Sabbath's debuts, and Judas Priest's Screaming for vengeance before throwing in some more haiku reviews and on to London calling by The Clash as well as Orthrelm's debut, finishing up with some more haikus.

So, as next week sees February and March, I'll probably throw in April too and finish off Isbjorn's journal there. Any takers for my next Classic Journal?

Yes. The last words of a dark stranger, half-glimped in the shadows, flow around your ears and echo in your brain as you stumble towards what looks like the headlights of an oncoming car. You have to get out of here. Or do you? Perhaps you should stay, a seductive voice sings in your ear persuasively. Perhaps you will stay. You WILL stay. The voice has changed from cajoling to threatening, and you can now see that the lights you thought were those of a car are in fact the flickers from torchlight as a procession makes it way along the street, comes level with you and passes on down the road without a word or a sound.

Unable to resist, and with the final lines of Iron Maiden's “The number of the Beast” ringing in your ears hypnotically, you find your feet pulling you after the crowd, joining the procession, falling in step. You realise you are forever now trapped in...

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