armageddon in '07

___________ new year, 2007 / XLII Anno Satanas to you all. you can insert your own adjective in the blank there, my feelings on this holiday (among others) have been made quite clear in the past. i don't want to piss on anybody's parade but i'm not gonna piss in your glass & tell you it's champagne, either, so i'll leave the whole emotional process of "New Year's" in your hands.

this image is as much an intro to 2007 / XLII A.S. as it is an effigy for 2006 / XLI A.S., which was by far the hardest year of my life, in pretty much every way. so i bid farewell & good riddance to last year & prepare for yet another... seems like the hits just keep on comin'... as much as i'd like to think that i don't believe in time anymore, 20+ years of living enslaved to the concepts dictated by clocks & calendars can't just be flushed from the brain like the proverbial shit that it is. but i'm workin' on it. so here's my manifesto for Armageddon in '07...

i've had the basic idea to do a pic like this for a while now, it's inspired by the music of EYEHATEGOD, as well as the lyrics & other liner notes i've been reading with my reissue albums of Take as Needed For Pain and Dopesick. in between various other chaotic propoganda in the Take as Needed For Pain booklet/liner notes, you'll find a list that reads "Nine Steps For Terrorism" - put down yer phones, it ain't the Homeland Security kind of "terrorism", simply the most basic definition of the word: "the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion" (Merriam-Webster Dictionary). anyway, the "Nine Steps" are: "(1) absorb contradiction, (2) soak up distraction, (3) kill your boss, (4) be filthy of mind, (5) reinstate illogical conversation, (6) embrace negativism, (7) baptise by addiction, (8) preach vice & (9) steal for worthlessness." these words intrigued me immediately, for many reasons, especially in the context of the surrounding information & the horrific sonic scourging that is their musick. great stuff to listen to while you're writing, or doing anything creative really, so long as you're not handling dangerous machinery or anything like that... but the unique use of language in this tiny little corner of a page really struck me. it the epitome of the most simplistic & the most chaotic, brought together in a few words. so it didn't take me long to start brainstorming similar little "Steps" in my mind, geared towards my own personal philosophies. you see, "Total Fucking Doom" isn't just 3 words i stuck together because i thot it sounded cool, or an expression of my fondness for doom metal & profanity (although i do whole-heartedly support both those things), no, it's far far more than anything so superficial. from it's inception in the poem i wrote (here) it immediately became a rapidly unfolding & wide-reaching concept. today, the views, perspectives, opinions & beliefs i associate with those 3 words are far far too complex & chaotic to explain... except perhaps in the most simplistic & chaotic format i could begin to frame them in. so i put my EHG CDs in the stereo, turned to a fresh page in my notebook & labelled it "Steps to Total Fucking Doom". before the opening track, "Blank", could finish, i already had quite a few more than 9 "steps" written down & i've been gradually adding piece by piece to that litany of anti-prophecies since then. there are several dozen now, some of which i'd be glad to share, some of which would be seen as quite offensive, many of which wouldn't make an ounce of fuckin' sense to anyone but me. i didn't even have to look further than some of my own wurds in the beginning - "The Futility of Innocence" is the title of a poem in my "in progress" folder, "Deny Reality" has been a phrase i love to toss around for a while now. it was even quite easy to slip my views on time right into the list. #10, "hate for hatred's sake" actually just came to me on xmas morning, inspired of course by that ol' holiday saying. and, well, #11, "create meaningless art", i just had to include because i find it so g0ddamn amusing, in my sick, twisted little way. if the rest aren't self-explanatory, then you're on your own. they're in no specific order, either, by the way. i didn't leave myself enough room to include everything i wanted to, so i made the "tear" at the bottom, implying much more beyond what's there. here's a few more "Steps" i might have included if i wasn't such a fuck-up & had started on a bigger canvas: • revel in failure • vandalize vanity • prove yourself unreliable & incapable of responsibility or obligation • eat from honored flesh • dress to depress • appreciate the artistry of self-mutilation / self-destruction • and way beyond... so does this mean i'll be making a follow-up image? nah, i doubt it, but stranger things have happened. oh & as for the ripped off line, #12 - you don't want to know what that one is, trust me...

since the spark for this whole idea came from EYEHATEGOD, i tried to pay tribute to them as much as possible in the image. aside from the obvious flyer clipping, the text on the "Caution" label (which i made using the Warning Label Generator) is also a slightly modified excerpt from the Take as Needed For Pain liner notes. i know i've done the whole scotch tape & cut-out paper thing before but i'm doin' it again, so deal with it. i don't remember where i got the stock image for the prescription pad background (sorry) so if it's yours, let me know & i'll give credit where it's due. assembled in my PaintShop Pro 8 program, as usual, over the course of the last week, week & a half, maybe. listened mostly to EHG tunes while i worked, with some Motörhead, Today is the Day & Dog Fashion Disco thrown in there as well, if memory serves. and that's about all there is to say about this, i guess. it's shitty lookin' cause it's supposed to look like i did it real half-assed... which i did... plus i may have been a bit drunk at times...

same rule goes for this pic as with everything else i submit: love it or shove it.

Eyehategod.com
Southern Nihilism Front

TOTAL FUCKING DOOM


_{© Inferno Silver & The Jackals in Inferno Silver's head, who speak & exist on behalf of The Blessed Dead. all wurds, voices & visions © XLII Anno Satanas / 2007, Total Fucking Doom Creations - All rights taken, used & abused.}