Twitter C/D

X suspends accounts that violate the Our Rules pic.twitter.com/BSfUQxEWDz

— 🐕 l n h l g s n 🐕 (@DLNHLGSN) September 18, 2023

I have become a Twitter Main Character today for posting that a metal band I like should have dressed better to be on the cover of a magazine. It's kinda hilarious. If the people responding thought I was a woman, it would probably be a whole lot less hilarious and a whole lot more death- and rape-threat-y, but for now it's all good fun and has even included a reasonable and thoughtful exchange with a member of the band in question. Still, I haven't riled this many people up in a long time. It's exhilarating.

lol. I essentially agree with you, but also think rocking a Fido Dido shirt on a magazine cover in 2023 is some kind of weird flex.

which band and which magazine, we need to debate the merits of this post here on ILX, home of civilised discourse

I like the new Tomb Mold record a lot. But death metal bands really need to understand that getting your picture on a magazine cover fucking means something, and meet the moment. Death metal needs more Akercockes, and fewer examples of...this. pic.twitter.com/TqWIAPWYYb

— burning ambulance (sign up for the newsletter) (@burn_amb) September 18, 2023

I saw that tweet and I thought it was a joke tbh

Tomb Mold look like normal schlubs, and that's relatable

BTW Phil the Kate Gentile album you praised in last month's Downbeat is great

Tomb Mold look like normal schlubs, and that's relatable

I'm sure they're great guys! I've been going back and forth with the guy in the Resident Evil shirt, and he seems smart and cool. But metal band photos are not the time or place to look like normal schlubs. If you're in a metal band, and it's picture day, you wear denim and leather, you scowl at the camera... I follow Rob Halford on Instagram, and he posts tons of pictures of himself wearing shirts with cute kittens on them. But does he wear those shirts in the promo photos for the latest Judas Priest album? He does not. It's about embracing the showbiz of it all. You wanna be anti-showbiz? Join an indie-rock band. You wanna play metal? DRESS METAL.

'millennials are KILLING the metal promo shoot industry with this one weird trick'

re2 shirt is dope

Guy on the left looks like an Albini wannabe

Is the photo on the left supposed to be the good photo iyo?

Cause it looks like a still outtake from Ghostbusters 2.

sorry, meant photo on the right

yeah i truly don’t understand why a band needs to show off except via their skills as a band.

one of the best poetry readings i’ve ever been to was given by a guy wearing kelly green sweatpants and a stained flannel shirt.

who gives a fuck.

You wanna play metal? DRESS METAL.

― read-only (unperson), Monday, September 18, 2023 6:39 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

give me a fucking break

On one hand, I obviously do respect the “street clothes as mission statement” which certainly did well for the Ramones, Run-DMC and, uh, Metallica. On the other hand these look less like street clothes and more like “I put on my flip-flops to do a 7-11 run.” Honestly I have no problem with Tomb Mold looking like schlubs but, as mag covers go, there’s not exactly a concept here and that’s not on them.

They look like an UCB improv team

the well dressed metal photo shouldve been more metal imo throw some spikes in there blood or whatever you know

the one guy looks exactly like a guy fawkes mask

It’s a bad magazine cover, but that’s on the designer / editor / photographer / production artist, not the band and whatever they choose to wear

its a nice photo of them tho, not really stylistically magazine cover material, but they good, engaged

certainly a better photo than mumftallica and sons

i mean the two guys on the left look like they went thrift shopping after a bunch of history professors died

Band on the right looks like the cast of a Dark Shadows remake.

Now people can make fun of unperson here, too, which I guess is what they wanted? Who needs twitter?

they?

It is the present day! Ooze some sobriety and wisdom, for cryin' out loud.

I thought this was a cute joke. Imagine how much effort went into this. People work hard for their posts these days. https://t.co/jZOO8CphvA

— Don Hughes (@getfiscal) September 19, 2023

voluntarily posting a tweet where you got cooked on twitter to be subsequently cooked on ilx is a total unforced error and extremely funny

Still, I haven't riled this many people up in a long time. It's exhilarating.

― read-only (unperson), Monday, 18 September 2023 bookmarkflaglink

Unperson loves this. Let's not worry about it.

they?

― vashti funyuns (sic), Tuesday, 19 September 2023 4:30 PM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I have no idea who unperson is, not wanting to make assumptions

hurrah to unperson for their courage in letting us know their pronouns. they / them it is!

If you're in a metal band, and it's picture day, you wear denim and leather, you scowl at the camera...

ok but then why did you post a pic of a band dressed up as 19th century detectives

Metal bands are entitled to Casual Friday

I'd imagine most people join metal bands because they're really into being told what to wear.

yeah i truly don’t understand why a band needs to show off except via their skills as a band.

Bowie wept.

Leave your corpsepaint at home and bring your skills to the battle

i dunno i thought it was all just a riff on this classic meme

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FPxUzJoXIAckHJl.jpg

Ackercocke's early promo shots were indeed great, they had a very cool sense of presentation, & the Tomb Mold cover is kinda funny, but the generational divide between "seriously a resident evil 2 shirt to your cover shoot? you didn't even fucking change clothes" and "my man in his resident evil 2 shirt like the king he is. living his best life" is super fascinating. because I relate more to the former aesthetically -- you didn't even change clothes for the photoshoot? just got up, grabbed one from the drawer, and went to wherever they'd told you the photographer was? -- but that's actually, like, a complex choice, it says something just like "I got all dressed up" does.. for whatever it's worth, before I got too injured to run, I had instituted a policy of "I'm not changing clothes for photos any more, I look how I look" and it was liberating, but now that I'm struggling I gotta put on clothes that won't make me feel like shit when the pictures run

Maybe it’s an inversion of the “pop star wears Deaththrone tee in recent photo shoot” trope?

I actually love the cover, but hate the steampunk other photo— same band? I hate it

Choosing to wear a Fido Dido shirt is so specific that I don’t believe this was an art direction decision on the part of the magazine, but a “t-shirt is model’s own” thing

yeah, i cannot imagine this prob but i guess if my pose was "i'm street all the time even for poto shoots," my street clothes would need to become way more intentional

that’s a crisp clean t-shirt for a classic game. probably would command a hefty price in the vintage market if it’s official merchandise. probably a prized possession only worn for special occasions

what if taylor swift showed up to a concert in stained sweats. what then

people would start expecting her death metal album

but the generational divide between "seriously a resident evil 2 shirt to your cover shoot? you didn't even fucking change clothes" and "my man in his resident evil 2 shirt like the king he is. living his best life" is super fascinating

Is this as simple as a generational divide? I think wide swathes of Indie music and semi-associated styles like Grunge already displayed the latter attitude, partially perhaps as a conscious stance against "phony" "showbiz" stuff. And then every now and then you'll get some ultra glam band in those genres trying to stand out exactly because they're not just wearing t-shirts. Anyway I don't think zoomers or millenials invented this.

Anyway it's fine to dress up and it's fine not to, haranguing a band on social media for making a choice on that topic either way is sadlol.

if ms swift's theoretical stained sweats appeared in the midst of all her usual concert trappings of monumental set design, dramatic lighting, lots of dancers and costume changes, her fans would probably think the stained sweats were a clever bit of irony

yeah i truly don’t understand why a band needs to show off except via their skills as a band.

Bowie wept.

― hat trick of trashiness (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, September 19, 2023 7:00 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Bowie also said he was a fascist!

_Come As You Are: How street fashion came to define Xers_ coming to a bookshelf near you xp