CHROMIUM DIOXIDE II: THE PUMPENING

So The Pumpening is all done and sent off to the immortal Scotty Woods of Sips Comics in Vancouver. Dave & I are more than pleased with the second issue, & in my humble opinion, it blows issue 1 outta the fuckin water. Lots of fun shit. Anyway, like issue #1 we're gonna have our release party soon & Dave & I will be DJ-ing again. Incredible turn-out last time so I can't wait to get drunk with every flavor of banger & punk again. The mag is avail by paypal from our site and various stores in States & Canada, but in Toronto it'll be sold at the following locations: HITS & MISSES, MONSTER RECORDS, SONIC BOOM, SUSPECT VIDEO, EYESORE VIDEO & ROTATE THIS. We're re-printing another 300 issue 1's as well. Awesome shirts coming too. That's it for now & yeas, we'll be posting a lot of new shit VERY soon too. Now, we begin CHROMIUM DIOXIDE III for Jan. release.

Animated Storyboards -NOT cartoons.

Here's a few storyboards Tobe & I did in Flash, just to get to know the programs. The sound is horrid, but we didn't care about that. It was done in a bedroom with a computer mic. It was an exercise in lip synching and editing. Piss poor, but not bad for a first Flash attempt. Again, they're crappy, but I was really proud of the sets & character designs. Anyway, thought I'd share it with you. I got extra credits for actually animating my storyboards. I'm a real fuckin keener, no doubt, but it just goes to show, CHROMIUM takes no goddam short cuts. LIVE IT! LOVE IT!

PITTSBURGH PENGUINS CHAMPIONS - 2008/2009

Reunited & it feels so fuckin good! Gonna keep this short for a number of reasons: It hasn't really sunk in yet. I can't stop tearing up (fuck, it's been 17 years) & lastly I'm so biblically hungover. All I wanna say at this moment is that all my training...the beers ..the chicken wings eaten, & the victory cigarettes...it was all worth it in the end. Congrats to my beloved Pittsburgh Penguins & to the greatest city in the world, PITTSBURGH! A big ol' high five to all the heroes & the muckers & grinders that made this come true and to finally topple that sinister Red giant. Fuck, I'm crying again! I gotta get a Gatorade. grape.

Fuck you Hossa, you...you..Benedict Arnold!

R.I.P. David Carradine

So like any other typical North American dipshit I sat my ass down this morning and checked my e-mail. As I opened up tha' net I was greeted by a headline that gave me a bit of a shock: Actor David Carradine found dead at age 72. I suppose you gotta leave this toilet we call Earth sometime. But he wasn't just found dead. Oh no. Ol' David "Frankenstein" Carradine was found hanging in a luxury suite in Bangkok, Thailand. Talk about greasy.

I had heard rumours that Carradine was a career on-and-off alchoholic and had struggled with various drug addictions. Perhaps his demons finally caught up with him in his twilight. Carradine was one of the last graduates of the old school "work for your money" actors and was in many ways a stately product of a gritty, exploitation film environment. We here at Cr02 figured his passing deserved observation.

Personally, I've always loved Carradine for his role as the crazed, sadistic Frankenstein in the 1975 automobile slaughterfest Deathrace 2000. DR2K was one of the very first cult flicks I ever saw, and did so at a very young age. Lurid scenes of bodies flying into the air after being pulverized by demonically souped up cars had my young, tender sponge of a brain enthralled. It may have been low-brow and low-budget but Paul Bartel's gas-driven, violence drenched vision of the future struck a chord with me and led to a pursuit of like mided films that carries through to the present day. And let us not forget Carradine's character Frankenstein. A leather clad motor-murderer extrordinaire with one of the most vicious on-screen rides ever seen since Phantasm's '74 Hemicuda rode out to Morningside.

The irony-tinged retro fascination that our culture seems be in the grip of gave a bit of a second wind to Carradine's career in the years leading up to his apparent suicide. Most of that is due to his major role in the Kill Bill franchise. Personally, I've always found Tarantino and his big-chinned work pretty fucking irritating, but I admit it was sage of him to toss ol' Carradinus Maximus in the mix as the remorseless badass villain.

Rest in Peace old boy. May you rack up and endless score of mangled pedestrians and children in heaven!!! Ride on! --Slimer

The Power Remains.... Amebix live!!

Yeah yeah, I can hear you Chrome-hounds out there: "Where the fuck is Slimer!?" So I'm a little late for the blog party, but hey, shit came up and you can't rush excellence.

I'm checking in for the first of many posts to regale you all about having one of my musical dreams fulfilled last Saturday night as I witnessed the mighty Amebix live in the flesh. I admit there was part of me that was initially skeptical when I heard they were re-uniting for a tour with none other than Rob Mayorga behind the kit. For me and many others, Amebix is a very personal band. Those of you who are fans may know what I mean. They have a very evolved and potent aesthetic to them musically and especially lyrically. I've always felt they left a perfectly succinct legacy behind them when they disbanded. Could a live reunion tour after all this time really have the same powerful, singular, goosebump inflicting effect that their recordings have?

The answer is yes. Unquestionably. Holy fuck!

The day began early under the weight of a nuclear hangover. Spending the afternoon in the company of old friends sipping vodka from watermelons and properly Tying One On to a soundtrack of vintage metal and ALF impressions had me in the perfect state to see one of my musical heroes.

Many beers later as I watched The Baron, Stig, and Mr. Mayorga take the stage I couldn't help but scream primordially in excitement. As they strapped on their instruments and a wash of dark noise came over the PA I realized it: "This is going to be amazing". Their set was loud as fuck, tight, powerful and spanned their whole recording career. Rob Mayorga is a fucking phenomenal drummer and the perfect human being to be driving Amebix forward. I and countless others were blown away and simply enraptured by the spectacle of these warriors delivering their vision of the world. It was such an intense show that I admit I shed a tear or two during the chorus of Arise.

If you have yet to witness this tour, do it. THE POWER REMAINS.

HEAVY METAL BBQ'd 09

Heavy Metal BBQ'd 09 was a huge success & this years attendees: TOXIC HOLOCAUST, AGGRESSOR, SLAUGHTER STRIKE, CAULDRON & MIDNIGHT CHAMPAGNE fit the roster just rite. Hats off to Craig Rose management on another fine-assed day of dynamite bbq. The spread was incredible and several can of Tiger Beer and Pabst lost thier lives in honor of the event. I was kinda' concerned about Dave not making the event. Apparently, Dave work up on someone's lawn in Kensington Market after a Biblical night of binge drinking Friday night. But in true Slimer fasion, the BBQUTIONER showed up (late) "prettied & perfumed" with a fistful of African sausages (hahahahaha. that doesn't sound right).
TOXIC lads brought a bottle of Vodka & a watermelon but didn't soak it all night, so it wasn't absorbing properly. We decided ro scoop its guts out and just fuckin pour it in and drink from the melon. Things kinda got greasy at that point.
Despite all the festivities - the ACE LANE, TORCH,

HELL, TALON, & U.D.O. sing alongs, I couldn't help obsessively thinking of the hockey game. Alas, Craig had no cable. But Philly Z had a brilliant idea to hook up an acoustic guitar to the back of the tv through a string. Finally a practical use for that goddamn instument. Worked perfectly, but it didn't help the PENS win. FUCK.

A great night all around and went into the early morning.
05:37 I woke up in the pits of hell. I felt a wave of nausea come over me not felt since the GREAT HANGOVER of'97. I ran to the washroom, but sadly did not make

it, sending a spray of puke all over the kitchen, slipped on it in my haste, puked on the walls (and EVEN the fuckin ceiling), only to make it to the toilet for a final spit and defeated sigh.

The Pens lost again that day. FUCK SUNDAYS ANYWAY.

BEFORE THERE WAS CHROMIUM,THERE WAS...disappointment

Of all the failures in my life, the biggest & the bitterest pill of all to swallow, would have to be the failure of my "could've, would've, should've" animation series, "JOBBERS."

To give you a little bit of backgroud on myself, I, along with my cousin, Toby Aylward owned & operated a comic/graphic/rock swag shop in Wabush, Labrador called ADMIRAL BLISS COMICS. Apart from running the shop, Tobe & I taught art & basic animation to BAD kids. Poor little bastards were exposed to a lot of shit waaaay before their time, and thinking back, perhaps a screening of CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST to a bunch of 10 year olds might've been an exercise in poor judgement but, I dunno. World's a wonderful shithole, & with seeing an anally impaled woman on a wooden stake or a rusty machete castration outta the way, they were well on their way outside the safe, naive confines of their Grade 4 walls.

At night, Tobe & I drank excessively in the shop, listening to tunes, from SLAYER to ALDO NOVA, & began developing an animated series of our own. Not entirely sure of what we wanted to do, we toyed with a couple of ideas ranging from the lurid adventures of The Bearded Child (yes, I was smoking a lot of Hash) to a villanous rouge named SIR-GRAPES-A-LOT. Nothing was really gelling. I was sick as fuck of superheroes, but for some reason (maybe it was the fact that we were developing in a comic shop) it was all I could think. But then, in a stroke of genius, Tobe blurted, "what about wrestling?" Boom. Genius. It was in front of us the whole time! Tobe is one of the biggest wrestling fans of all time (he owns every VICTORY, WWWF-WWF-WWE mag ever!). I hadn't been a fan since Hogan lost to that over-rated fuck, the Ultimate Warrior in 1990, but it seemed like it could be a funny cartoon, with a lot of great characters. We aggreed that it had to be raw & very adult humor driven, like a PG-13 to an R-rated Hulk Hogan's Rock n' Roll Wrestling. Here's what we came up with:

"JOBBERS" FOCUSES ON THE CONTINUING CONFLICT BETWEEN 2"HAS BEEN" WRESTLERS & THEIR RESPECTIVE OPPOSING FRAT HOUSES ON THE CAMPUS OF A PRESTIGIOUS UNIVERSITY -SPECIALIZING IN EVERY ASPECT OF PRO WRESTLING. A TERRITORIAL BATTLE ON CAMPUS BETWEEN "THE PENALIZERS" (HEELS), LED BY A VERY BITTER SIR GRAPES-A-LOT & "THE MISSIONARY SIX" LED BY FORMER CHAMPION THE GOLDEN IDOL WHILST TRYING TO ACHEIVE THEIR DEGREES AND ENTER THE BIG LEAGUE & A CHANCE TO FOR THEIR LEADERS TO REGAIN FALLEN SUPERSTAR STATUS.

Long story short, we wrote a 40 page bible: character discriptions, rotation sheets, mouth charts, 24 episode synopsis & a hilarious pilot show that had the balls to begin as a "remember when" clip show, something that a series wouldn't dream of doing unless, of course, they were running out of ideas. We gained a lot of attention, and people were interested. Tobe & I closed down shop, moved to Toronto to take it to

the next level & then...the air blew outta the sails. No one would touch it. We attended several conventions & a lot of false promises were made. Even a game was proposed. We were told that we needed to make the pilot first. We also needed a production company and we had ZERO fuckin money. We charged at it with blinders and sadly. we hit a brick wall...hard. I was pretty depressed & kinda felt utterly defeated. Sad part was, I know it'd work. Fuck man. THE WRESTLER won academy awards! That was the same story, but ours was a comedy. Either way, it seemed to be a lost cause and I started doing freelance work designing menus, business logos, some band t-shirts & covers. To make ends meet Tobe & I took jobs as Security guards on Gerrard/Jarvis dealing with hookers, bums, & crack heads. Not exactly the plan.

(TOP: L-R MASKED ALCOHOLIC, MAGBJORN P.I.,SIN-IN-THE-SUBURBS, AGING HIPSTER, HUMAN SCORPION MAN & GOLDEN IDOL. THREE DOLLAR BILLIE)

(BOTTOM: L-R BEE KEEPER, SERFEI PISTOV, JAILBAIT. NAPOLEON COMPLEX. DISHONORABLY DISCHARGED SEAMAN, SIR GRAPES-A-LOT, SHEIK AHNEIDTOSHEET)

CHROMIUM's really been a pick me up and when I say thanks for buying it, I REALLY fuckin mean it. And a big thanks again! Metal's always been there & always will. A solid bastard of a bro - a sexist, sometimes misogynistic, immature, corny, pissy pal, but no matter what, it's ALWAYS put a smile a face & I can't think of anything else I'd rather be doing with my life than writing about it...apart from escorting urinating bums off property & dodging pocket knife weilding hookers, of course.

Yes, what a wonder shithole this world is.

WORKING ON THE SECOND ISSUE

It's 11:16 on Friday night & here I am slaving away on the second issue of CR02. Sad really. Actually, I'm feeling kinda' shitty from another fuckin cold coming on, and the thought of drinking tonight is making me feel worse (See Ma, I'm not an alcoholic). Just finished an interview and a few drawings in between a couple of Castlevania III sessions. The second issue's really shaping up and 75% of the art is drawn, inked, and scanned at 300 dpi. (any bigger andit really slows down the process.

For those of you who may've noticed a kind of blurriness in the first issue, it was due to me designing EVERYTHING in Photoshop Elements. Every page had about 150-200 layers, then flattened. It turned the text to a JPEG image creating that blurry effect. My bad...sorry. Fuck it, it was the first issue. You have to learn.

As for the printing process, issue 2 will once again be done by SIPS Comics (South Island Printing Services) in Vancouver. They've been real bros about the whole thing & I wanna stick with them. Ontario, funny enough, wasn't too co-operative. We learned quickly that it was easier to ship it in from Vancouver, if you can believe it.

Getting back to the first issue, we're running pretty low. We're gonna reprint some more, but that'll be it. 2nd printing will also have something slightly different, just to be all George Lucas/Marvel comics marketing-like.

That's all I have to say now, really. Just an update. But know this, CHROMIUM DIOXIDE 2:THE PUMPENING will rip your balls off & store 'em in a jar right next to Papa Doc's. I'm off to bed, soft core Spanish porn is on.

E.T. VS. PREDATOR

So here's the plot so far. Film takes place, like. 3 or 4 years after E.T and Elliot part ways. When E.T. comes back to visit Elliot on his March break weekend, like 3 or 4 years later), he finds Elliot has changed a lot. He's got new friends & a controlling bitch girlfriend. No place for E.T. So basically, E.T. says "fuck this," bails on Elliot (without burning any bridges) and goes off to explore other worlds.Long story short, E.T. arrives on the planet....Predernia. He doesn't fit in and the Predators are gonna kill theshit out of him, but then, the village elder of the Predators (a hard ass, but time-has-kinda-made-him-soft-sort-of-guy) realizes that E.T. would be a good companion for his autistic predator son. E.T. agrees, and the rest is movie magic.Let me know if you'd like to fund this project.

NHL PLAY OFFS 2009

Alright, I know, ok. So this is supposed to be a metal site and what do I do first thing? A post about hockey!? Deal with it, assholes. My second favorite thing in the world, the immortal PITTSBURGH PENGUINS, are returning to the finals after a crushing defeat last year by the evil Detroit Red Wings. The defeat, to say the least. was a solid kick in the balls...but sadly expected.

I won't bore you with stats & figures, but the Cliff's Notes version of the PENS 2008-2009 season was less than impressive: Crosby went into a scoring slump, we lost way more then we won (how's that for simplified), and coach, Michel Therrien was given the boot. My eyebrow seemed to be permantly cocked at that point, & I really saw no reason for it to be lowered. Until after Christmas.

On Feb. 15th, Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins coach, Dan Bylsma stepped in as interim coach and at age 38, making him the youngest coach inthe NHL. Through his first 25 games as Penguins' coach, his 18–3–4 record amounted to 40 points—the second most of any coach in NHL history through their first 25 games. (I know, I know...stats!)
On Tuesday April 28, 2009, Penguins General Manager Ray Shero announced that Bylsma had been named permanent head coach of the team.

Under "Disco Dan" Blysma, the Pens made it into the finals, eradicating past sins, and sliding comfortably into 4th in the Eastern division.

The playoffs this year weren't as smooth as last year. Pens, off the bat, had to face 2 of their dreaded foes, the Philadelphia Flyers & the Washington Capitals. Long story short, Pens defeated the Flers in six games in a brutally violent series, and the Caps in a crushing, bitter-sweet 6-2 win over the Caps & Ovechkin in 7 games. A great fuckin series! Hats off to the Ovie' & the Caps, but a bigger fuck you, all the same. Enjoy your summer. Next up was this years sleeper team, The Carolina Hurricanes. I was really worried about this one, especially with Cam Ward in net. But apparently I had nothing to worry about- the PENS swept them in 4 games!?

Now, my friends, the PENS find themselves back into the lion's den againt Detroit once again in the first back-to-back cup rematch since the 84-85 OILERS/ISLANDERS series. I just wanna say how much I fuckin HATE Detroit, as much I fear & respect them. Let's face it. They're fuckin machines...and they know it, coming across at times like heels in some Vestron Video, 80's sex comedy - a bunch of tennis racket carrying, Chaz Worthington III's, out to close the local arcade, so that Daddy can set up a whites-only golf resort. It's true, Get out your hockey cards & look at them, for fuck sakes!

Am I nervous? Yes, I'm shitting my pants, but I will say this:very rarely do you get a second shot at the cup. The PENS have earned that opportunity. Last year, experience triumphed over youth, and yeah, the better team one. This year, however, the PENS have experience under their belt too (albeit, less than the Wings) They know how to win, because they know how to loose (deep). Malkin's awake, Crosby's on fire, Guerin & Kunitz have fit in beautifully, adding to Crosby's game. Fedatenko has filled the void for that cock-sucker, Hossa, and even Talbot and Eaton have surprisingly stepped up. What about Gonchar, you say? Fuck yeah, Gonchar! But he's gotta step it up way more in the PENS dismal powerplay against these Nazis. As for goalie, Marc-Andre Fleury, (a true metal head, by the way) he's been doing amazing as well -WHEN HE STAYS IN THE FUCKING NET!!!

Anyway, that's all I gotta say about that. Game 1 tomorrow on CBC in Detroit. GO PENS GO. oh yes, and one more thing, FUCK YOU HOSSA, you miserable sack of shit