SOUNDTRACK: CHASTITY BELT-Fuck Chastity Belt (2012).
This is the worst music you will ever hear.
Chastity Belt is the worst band to ever exist.
So says the Chastity Belt band camp site for this EP. Which also states that: The album was produced by Peter Richards. Peter Richards is deaf in one ear.
The cover photo was taken by William Newman-Wise. William Newman-Wise is blind in one eye.
Chastity Belt are not the worst band I have ever heard, not by a long shot. But they sure do love to provoke, like their band photo (see below). And the fact that is you try to look them up online, you will find many many images that you don’t want to see (not their band photo).
This four song EP is pretty representative off their full length album–intertwining guitars, catchy (if not vulgar) choruses, and a lead singer’s voice that soars above the music (and reminds me a bit of Grace Slick, although not exactly). The band comes from Walla Walla Washington. That and the cover photo reminds one of the Pacific Northwest riot grrrl scene, and there is so me of that slightly abrasive and yet still catchy feel to their music.
The biggest difference seems to be that although their lyrics are feminist and take-no-shit, there is still some humor in the lyrics too. Not that the original riot grrrl scenes wasn’t funny, but it was much more intense, and unlike to include lines like: “God damn, that boy is hot damn, he makes me so stupid crazy and drunk.”
Of the four songs, I like them all, but the second, Dodge Ram is the least exciting for me, although I do like the “lead” guitar line that runs through the track (perhaps 4 minutes is too long for the song?). “God Damn” is a great lead off track a simple guitar riff played slowly with an air of sloppiness that may be more of the recording sound (which is a bit staticky). The segue into chorus really pretty.
On a far more serious tone is “A Bloody Spiral of Unyielding Fury” which is not a super fast belligerent death metal song, in fact it starts with a rather sweet high-pitched guitar melody. But then lyrically, the chorus of “he wants me dead but I don’t want to die” informs the rather scary song about a guy with a knife (yet always with that rather happy guitar riff).
The one thing I don’t like about the record is the rather tinny sound of it. There is bass, but it’s not very loud, and the two guitars are certainly turned up in the mix (and play mostly the high strings). Having said that, “James Dean” (which also appears on their full length) has a much fuller sound, bigger chords and some of the most straightforward lyrics yet (all in Julia Shapiro’s keening voice)
You’re a slut
I’m a whore
we’ve fucked everyone before
Oh boy, when I fuck you
you make me feel like a prostitute
yeah, when you fuck me
I make you feel just like James Dean
You can check the EP out on their bandcamp site.
On this recording, Chastity Belt was On this record: Julia Shapiro, Lydia Lund, Annie Truscott, and Gretchen Grimm.
[READ: January 21, 2015] Chew: Volume Seven
After the horrible events at the end of Book Six, Book Seven was a chance for Revenge!
Tony Chu has not taken the event of book six lightly, and he is ready to get the bastard–the “vampire”–who has caused such distress to his family. In fact, things are so serious that Tony (and Colby) have been reinstated to the FDA (and their boss doesn’t seem to mind).
And remember the high priestesss from the church of the super ova? (I had forgotten about her, but she’s back with all those writings in the sky and whatnot). Well, she is looking to cause a lot of trouble.
But not everyone is happy that Colby has been transferred back. His former boss at the USDA is terribly sad to see her bed partner go. Of course, Colby’s new boss (who was his old boss) is suddenly also quite keen on having him back…I love how that is resolved with a nod and wink from the authors several chapters later.
About midway through the book Colby realizes that Caesar is still working with Mason. They get into a fight until Caesar convinces him that they all want the same result in the end (even if they did beat the crap out of each before realizing it).
Oh and Tony Chu is trying reconnect with his daughter Olive after all these years–with mixed results.
In an increasingly elaborate center spread which keeps Poyo on the pages but not in the story, Poyo!!! is in the antarctic attacking Pengthulu–“Panic in the Permafrost! Insanity Among the Icecaps!”
We also have a few new food based superpeople. Dominic Partridge is a Ciboinvalescor which means that anything he eats gives him superstructure; Jeremiah Cumberland is a Coquerafthartos–whose cooking a single dish granted him an extraordinarily long life (even if everyone else thought it tasted like ass); Alphonso Capsaicin was a Lubodeipnosophistes–able to seduce anyone he dines with; there’s a Cibocelerent who can cook fast; a Mnemocoques who cooks memories into his food; a Ciblocutor who communicate through food; a Cibolinguist who can speak the language of the dish she cooked in; a Mixosecerner, who creates drinks that compel you to tell secrets and, least practical of all the Lagamousikian who can strings guitars with pasta noodles. All of these special people were being collected by The Collector. And he is the man who Tony Chu is after.
In the meantime, Colby is after a politician named David Eccle a Bromaformutare–his head turns into whatever he has eaten last. Eccles has a secret–he loves (the now illicit) chicken. He may come in handy in the war against the Cult of the Divinity of the Immaculate Ova.
And as the book ends Tony tries to connect with Olive in a gross but telling way… with a special surprise added at the end. This give me hope for Book 8
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