Red Fang "Prehistoric Dog"

My new favorite music video.

They were doing it there way in pre-history.

Ride The Pterodactyl is the long awaited first album of Tony Borg and The Human Tofu. Every track on the album can be described as epic or even timeless. They have taken rock music to a new level not of confidence and power but of distorted bass licks in a mesh with higher "cleaner" bass "leads", wacky riffs and various grunts and groans. Somehow they managed to produce one of the best records of the year without the use of percussion instruments. "We hate drummers. That's pretty much become our motto. They always steal our drugs." This was the only comment of The Human Tofu in a short post gig interview granted a week ago, after playing in a strangers driveway. We asked Tony Borg about what this album means, and about the message and feelings the band is trying to convey in this revolutionary style of play. "Well, what really inspired my end of the creative process was when I was a child in the late 80's. Two teenage Iron Maiden fans broke into my parents garage when I was home alone and started huffing paint. It was fuckin' sick dude." The influence of heavy metal titans like Iron Maiden is notable throughout the album, though Maiden's epic studio releases feature many lengthy tracks. Borg and Tofu's longest track spans about a minute and a half. Tony Borg commented, "we really went all out on this one... but at the same time we just wanted to get to the point." Ride The Pterodactyl takes this classic metal influence and all out destroys it with a barrage of stupid core that only Tony Borg and The Human Tofu can pull off, totally defeating the purpose of playing in the first place. "We pretty much cancel ourselves out. It's nihilistic. It rocks." I asked them about their other influences and inspirations. "7-Eleven nachos and other bands that wear sweatbands." I also asked them what inspired the band name. "Shut up, this interview sucks."



Tony Borg and The Human Tofu: Ride The Pterodactyl (2008)

1. The Lizard Gods
2. Ride The Pterodactyl
3. Robots From Hades
4. Wielding Excalibur
5. The Power Ninja
6. Impaled With A Spatula
7. Death. Kill. Bleed.
8. Mighty Bearded Wizards

warfare in another place and time

In a rail car riding over an enormous canyon the wind blew sand in my face. It was the strangest feeling to be traveling several hundred feet in the air across one rail. It seemed as though we were placed with no reference in an exciting yet haunting space and time. As we moved across, the rail came to several switches. He operated a lever to control our direction at each switch though he seemed to do it with great reluctance. He had never been there either. We didn't know where we were going. The car was completely constructed of metal. No seats, no windows other than the long narrow one in front used by the operator while moving forward. The continuous intense scrapping of metal on metal made it impossible to have a conversation as we traveled at high speeds. There were spots of the interior that had rusted out yet the car and the rail were still functional. There were fires burning over the tops of huge chain link fences on the other side. In the distance atop plateaus I could see countless flying objects with wings but too small to be planes. Past the last switch the car came around a winding left turn straight for the edge of the canyon. It felt like a roller coaster yet the rail was seemingly suspended in air. The entire car was empty and stretched about fifteen feet back, maybe six feet across. The rail climbed to make the edge of the flat land where I looked out to the right to view numerous infernos. Massive burning fuel tanks and power plants in fenced compounds were exploding, hit with bombs from the sky but not from planes. Men with mechanical wings that encased small incendiary bombs to dispose of at will were destroying this industrial area with little opposition from a small army trying to defend it. The force of an exploding fuel tank shook the car to point of almost derailing it. As a crazy array of gunfire flew past us I realized that more of these strange rocket powered men were flying over us but it was clear we weren't the intended target. I watched as several of them were hit and rapidly spiraled to the ground. In one last glance at the chaos we were passing a saw several of these men swirling past each other in opposing colors, gray and blue armored suits. The rail car continued to ascend toward another plateau in this unknown desert. We were refugees in some futuristic yet outdated mode of troop transport, trying to stay alive. It was weird.

The Bastard

New Adventures In Daywalking

We parked in a small turnaround and got out of Adam's car. "Look! That is the trail we are going on," he said. It didn't look like much of one but none the less it was the only one. The first few feet were covered with thorny bushes which should have given me an indication of things to come. We ascended the hill at a moderate pace for a few minutes than stopped to admire the view.


This place reminded me of somewhere I had been before but couldn't place it.


We were headed to some caves at the top of a large hill. Soon we arrived at a meadow that was almost completely overgrown by blackberries. The trail vanished into the thorns. So we did the only thing adventurous souls would do: made or own trail. Making our way through the woods in an attempt to avoid the sea of thorns that populated the area proved to be a challenge, then over one ridge,
to where we faced the incline of another. It had been a long time since I had been in a place that untouched, or at least not recently touched. Here and there we found overgrown skitter trails and old stumps of trees logged decades ago. Along the damp forest floor the dead wood was just the top phase of the soil. There were several logs that I stepped on that turned to dust under my feet. At the top of the next ridge were huge steep rocks. This is where Adam had remembered the caves.

Adam

We made our way up a winding trail to the rocks. I was ill equipped for the expedition in my treadless Dr. Martins but made it up a steep rock on the second attempt despite my now aching ribs. The caves were more like canals that led down through the rocks from one open space to another. I didn't want to take pictures because I just wanted to be in the moment. I figured I might internally use them as an excuse to not go there again. I had sweat the toxins out of my body. It felt great. We made our way down between two rocks to a ledge where Adam had lost his machete on a previous expedition. It was about six feet wide and led to the entrance of another cave. We climbed inside. There was some red spray paint on the walls. In large letters "LARRY AND ELLEN" and below that "ELLEN AND JOHNNY". "Man, Ellen is a whore," Adam said. I didn't trust this "Ellen". I wondered about the bones that we had come across at the bottom of the ledge.


"We better leave before Ellen gets back," I grinned.

South of the cliffs we jumped a barbed wire fence and walked into a meadow. All the thorny bushes had been flattened. I still had my walking stick. We made our way down a road and eventually arrived at what first appeared to be a crooked shelter. Then to our right there were several others spaced out at the bottom of a rock face some fifty feet high. After review we came to the realization that they were once used for feeding cows.


Eventually we made in down through the meadow to the road where Adam used my walking stick to prop a gap in the barbed wire so we could get through. Night had fallen and we made or way back to Adam's car. It was a hell of a time in all its peculiarity and eeriness. And totally worth it.

daywalking

The light of day is not a disease but more like an allergy. Not an ultimate daily obstacle but an itching inconvenience. Blinds drawn I lay in wait, then I remember that I work days. I won't turn to ash any sooner than the rest of the world. Can I at least get a cloud so my head doesn't hurt. When all this comes back around I will be cursing the rain. More to come, but less of this.