There’s a hole in the world like a great black pit
and the vermin of the world inhabit it
and its morals aren’t worth what a pig could spit
and it goes by the name of London.

Sweeney Todd - Peach Theatre Company

We went with a group of friends to see the Peach Theatre production of Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street. Brilliance. One of the most stunning pieces of live performance I’ve seen in years. And yes, this includes several metal shows.

In fact, it was so brutal and epic I’ve decided to make Sweeney Todd not only the subject of this week’s metal history, but the theme for the whole week. Yes, pie recipes, cannibalism and blood-splattered theatre are on Steff Metal this week.

We’ve been telling workmates and parentals for awhile about seeing the play, but no one seems to know what it is. The conversation goes a little like this:

Workmate “What are you doing for the weekend, Steff?”

Steff “Oh, a huge group of friends are going to see a play.”

Workmate “That doesn’t seem like the sort of thing you’re usually into.”

Steff “Well, it’s a play about a vengeful barber who cuts the throats of his customers and his neighbour bakes their bodies into pies.”

Workmate: “Oh … it sounds EXACTLY the sort of thing you’re into.”

The story of Sweeney Todd first appeared in print in the 1846-47 penny dreadful serial “The String of Pearls”, but it’s based on a much older urban legend. Penny Dreadfuls were serialized fiction booklets churned out on cheap pulp paper during the Victorian period, filled with stories of highwaymen, criminals and ghost stories. They cost a penny each and were aimed at teenage boys. Since a penny a week was quite a lot for a teenage boy, enterprising lads would form clubs to pool resources to buy and share the dreadfuls. Some lads would even buy the whole series and then rent it out to their mates.

“The String of Pearls”, Todd is a barber who – once he has an intended victim sitting in his chair – pulls a lever and sends them toppling back through a trapdoor into the basement of his shop, breaking their necks in the process. If they’re not quite yet dead, he wanders downstairs and polishes them off with his straight razor. Todd’s partner in crime, Mrs. Lovett, bakes the victims into pies which she sells in her bakery. One sailor Lieutenant Thornhill, who has disappeared after his visit to Sweeney’s establishment. Thornhill bore a gift for Johanna Oakley on behalf of her lover Mark Ingestrie – thought lost at sea. That gift was a string of beautiful pearls.

Thornhill’s friend, Colonel Jeffery, begins a search for Thornhill, and questions Johanna, who becomes suspicious of Todd and enters under his employment, disguised as a boy, in order to discover what he is doing. She finds hundreds of dismembered bodies beneath the shop, and her lover, Mark, has been imprisoned in the cellar beneath the pie shop and forced to work as the cook. He escapes via the lift used to carry the pies to the shop above, and announces to the customers:

Ladies and Gentlemen — I fear that what I am going to say will spoil your appetites; but the truth is beautiful at all times, and I have to state that Mrs Lovett’s pies are made of human flesh!

Todd poisons Mrs. Lovett, before he is tried and hanged. Johanna and Mark marry and live happily ever after.

The story became so popular it was quickly adapted into a british melodrama. A ballet was written in 1959, and Christopher Bond created a remarkable stage play in 1973. In 1979, Stephen Sondheim wrote a stage musical “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street”, which is based on Christopher’s play and is the most popular adaptation of the story performed today. It’s this musical from which the music for Tim Burton’s recent movie adaptation came.

The story is one of betrayal and revenge (rather than greed as in the older tales). Benjamin Barker, a barber, is married to the beautiful Lucy, and they have a daughter Johanna. However, the evil Judge Turpin wants Lucy for himself, so he ships Barker off to Australia on some trumped-up charge and rapes Lucy. Sweeney Todd opens 15 years later, when Barker returns to London, having escaped and changed his name to Sweeney Todd. He goes to his old house and finds Mrs. Lovett, who tells him Lucy is dead and Johanna has become Turpin’s ward.

A former assistant of Todd recognizes him and threatens to blackmail him if Todd doesn’t give him half his barbershop profits. Enraged, Todd kills the man, and Mrs. Lovett adopts Toby, his thick servant. He waits for Turpin to come for a haircut so he can have his revenge with “his little friends” (his razors) but Turpin is scared away by Johanna’s lover, a sailor named Anthony Hope, and vows he will never return to Fleet Street. Thinking he’s lost the chance for his revenge, Sweeney vows to kill as many people as possible, because apparently that makes things all better.

So Sweeney gets his wicked barber chair with his trapdoor, and Mrs. Lovett starts making the victims into pies. Previously known as selling “the worst pies in London”, Mrs. Lovett’s shop becomes extremely successful.

Finally, finally, Sweeney kills Judge Turpin, as well as a crazy beggar woman who he discovers is ACTUALLY his wife Lucy. She wasn’t dead after all. Mrs. Lovett lied to him. She says it’s because she’s in love with him. He throws her into the cooking over. Toby kills Sweeney Todd. Everyone’s bloody dead. In the older productions, the first thrree rows would be bathed in blood.

Some scholars believe Sweeney Todd might be based on an actual person, but the evidence is pretty vague. Peter Haining wrote two books insisting Sweeney Todd was an actual, real live person, living around 1800. However, no other researcher can find any of the evidence Haining cites.

Why is there not a metal version of any of the Sweeney Todd songs? The only metal song I know about Sweeney Todd is by the infamous Saxon “Demon Sweeney Todd”, from Into the Labyrinth. Let;s appreciate it’s brilliance below:

From a 1982 production of Sweeney Todd, starring Angela Lansbury and George Hearn, my favorite piece from the musical “The Ballad of Sweeney Todd” (which they didn’t use in the Tim Burton film). I repeat, why is there not a metal version of this? Musicians, get to it!

Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd.
His skin was pale and his eye was odd.
He shaved the faces of gentlemen
who never thereafter were heard of again.
He trod a path that few have trod
did Sweeney Todd
the demon barber of fleet street.
He kept a shop in London town.
Of fancy clients and good renown
and what if none of their souls were saved
they went to their maker impecably shaved.
By Sweeney,
by Sweeney Todd
the demon barber of fleet street.

Further Reading:

The String of Pearls, as a full e-text.
Mack, Robert. Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Oxford University Press, 2007.
Blood Butchers, a 1970s horror film.
Sweeney Todd in Knowledge of London – site makes out like the story is real but has some GREAT photographs.

If Sweeney Todd was alive today, he would …

Play bass for Dimmu Borgir
Throw awesome dinner parties
Be the first to suggest an after-gig pie run.

Tourist Information

Sweeney Todd’s barber shop is located on 186 Fleet Street, London, next to St. Dunstans church, and is connected to Mrs. Lovett’s pie shop in bell yard by an underground passage, acording to the original penny dreadful. Today, this address houses Dundee Couriers, and a Kwik copier shop underneath.

CDH and I, are not most NZers, so we went to a toy fair.

It was actually a rather impressive toy / model fair – an events centre filled with triumphs of engineering like this:

WW II Dioramas

And this:

Amazing bonsai from the Auckland Chinese Bonsai Society

And this:

Mechano dragon. And it totally moved!

As well as some awesome personalities, like this man.

A delightful mechano modeller

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a good photo of the amazing dollhouses. But one women had made a Halloween dollhouse with a skeleton and spider sharing a bath. Another had created a steampunk clockmaker’s workshop, not altogether dissimiliar to my “Clockmaker’s Wife” painting. CDH’s favorite was a dollhouse bakery, complete with cabinets of exquisitely sculpted donuts and mince pies.

After the fair we went to visit a train-friend of CDH’s, who told us he’d be running “mini-trains” on his property over the weekend. We weren’t sure what to expect, but it sure wasn’t this!

Mini steam trains!

Old train geeks helping each other out

These remarkable engines are scratch-built by their owners, and take some 1200 hours to complete. James’ train-friend had been working on one for 13 years, and reckoned it would take him another 13 to finish. Some we distal engines, powered by little two-stroke motors. But the stars were the steam engines: miniature replicas of their full-scale buddies, and able to pull three carriages of people around the garden trail.

around the corner ...

... wave to the people

At $2 a ride, I couldn’t just watch. So on we hopped, around the garden, waving at all the passing trains!

Little train!

We had to duck to fit through the tunnel.

Tunnel!

This clever fellow scratch-built this working tracktion engine, which he drove through the crowds trying to direct people towards the sausage sizzle (not that we need much direction when sausages are involved).

Traction Engine

so cute!

And, lastly, to make this post slightly relate to the topic of my blog, here’s what I wore:

• While lace blouse, Shanton
• Red Lolita dress, Gallery Serpentine
• Blue slip, Farmers
• Military-style jacket, Tripp NYC
• Spider thigh-high socks
• Jeffrey Campbell wedge boots
• Celtic cross necklace, a shop in my hometown (Waipukarau represent!) called Street Scene.

This gorgeous Lolita dress is made from a very soft velvet. Velvet can be difficult to wear as it can look a bit try-hard witchy-poo, especially if it’s crushed. And velvet behaves in strange ways. I have a black velvet 3/4 sleeve top with scraggly sleeves that literally rolls up as I wear it.

But this super-soft dress behaves exactly the way you ask it. When I brought it I didn’t realize quite how short it actually was, so I tend to only wear it over a slip, or as a pinafore over pants.

Apologies for another “here is what I did this weekend” post. I’ll be getting back to the real, meaty content next week.

Death, Lust and Puddling Crust.

Yggdrasil painting, Work in Progress, by me.

This rough style is very different from my usual method, but I’m really enjoying the experiment. As you can see, this is still in progress. I’m adding more colour, fixing the trees on the right, adding two more ravens and maybe the squirrel Ratatorsk. I’m keeping a lot of while because I think at Ragnarök there will be lots of ice.

The ash tree in the center – Yggdrasil, or the “world tree” – is groaning and dying. Yggdrasil is central to Norse Mythology and considered deeply holy. The gods go to Yggdrasil every day to preside over their courts. Yggdrasil’s branches extend into the heavens and it’s three giant roots plow and twist through the earth to holy wells and springs. Under one root lies Hel, under another, frost jötunn, and under the third lives mankind.

The most common meaning put forth for the world “Yggdrasil” is “Odin’s Horse”. As we learnt in Metal History: Runes, Yggdrasil was the tree on which Odin hung for nine days to reveal the secret of the runes. As a common idiom for the gallows is “the horse of the hanged”, a translation of “Odin’s Horse” makes sense.

Many creatures live in Yggdrasil, including an unnamed eagle, who perches on the topmost branches, four stags – Dáinn, Dvalinn, Duneyrr and Duraþrór who chew at the leaves, the dragon (wyrm) Níðhöggr, serpents who gnaw at the roots, and a cheeky squirrel named Ratatoskr who delivers messages between the eagle and the wyrm.

(I am imagining an adorable children’s book. Don’t steal my idea!)

Odin remarked that Yggdrasil must feel such great pain, what with the rotting and the gnawing and the chewing and holding the weight of the heavens. I’m reminded of a recent Dr. Who episode, where an alien entity was enduring great pain to keep a spaceship of humans alive.

Ragnarök – “final destiny of the Gods” is a battle foretold in Norse legends, which will kill off the gods Odin, Thor, Freyr, Heimdall and the the jötunn Loki and immerse the world under water. The earth will rise again, fertile and renewed, and the remaining Gods will meet. The earth will be repopulated by two human survivors. It all sounds rather Biblical, but it’s not. It’s metal.

Brothers will fight
and kill each other,
sisters’ children
will defile kinship.
It is harsh in the world,
whoredom rife
—an axe age, a sword age (and the sun rises)
—shields are riven—
a wind age, a wolf age—
before the world goes headlong.
No man will have
mercy on another.
Völuspá, Poetic Edda

Other events attested during Ragnarök – “the wolf” will swallow the sun and her brother the moon, and mankind will mourn their loss as a great disaster. The stars disappear. The earth shakes violently, trees are uprooted, mountains crumble, the sky splits in two.

Yggdrasil painting, work-in-progress, Steff Metal.

Fenrir’s bonds crash away and he charges across the landscape, spraying flames, his great jaws scouring the earth.

Yggdrasill shivers,
the ash, as it stands.
The old tree groans,
and the giant slips free
stanza 45,Völuspá, Poetic Edda

The gods, the demons, the creatures, Æsir and the Einherjar advance to the field of Vígríðr, an expanse measuring”a hundred leagues in each direction.” Fenrir swallows Odin, and Odin’s son Víðarr avenges him, by kicking Fenrir in the jaws and tearing them apart, till he has killed Fenrir.

Thor kills the serpent Jörmungandr, but he walks nine steps before the poison kills him. The hound Garmr (described as the “worst of monsters”) breaks free from his bonds and fights the god Týr, killing both God and beast. Loki and Heimdallr also kill each another. The world burns.

Scholars such as Hilda Ellis Davidson and Bertha Phillpotts interestingly point out the simularities between Ragnarök and a volcanic eruption. Given the unpronounceable volcano currently doing its thing over much of Europe, I can see how the Norse might have found annihilation by volcanic eruption a clear and present danger.

You can see blood and venom under the roots of Yggdrasil. The rawns represent the fallen Gods and the gnarled trees in the background also burn. But it’s a clensing of the earth, which will soon be remade again. The earth will soon appear one more from the sea, green and ready for crops. Two humans, and some Gods survive, and Sól – the personification of the Sun – has a daughter as beautiful as she, and pretty much everyone lives happily ever after.

closeup of first raven on Yggdrasil painting.

This piece – when it’s finished – will be going into an exhibition for the Franklin City Arts Festival, and, if not sold at the exhibition, will be on sale through my website. I am considering a limited run of high-quality Giclee prints (as little as 5) of this piece, depending on interest. If you think you might be interested, let me know, and I’ll consider it.

Thoughts?

Our gorgeous steam engine

Now, to give you folks in first world countries an idea what it’s like getting around New Zealand. The line they ran the steam train on is a freight line – passenger trains don’t even go from Auckland – Whangarei. If we were to drive to Whangarei from our house, it would take around 2 hours. Guess how long it takes on a steam train?

Seven.

Yep. Seven. The reason – the track is in such bad condition the . If you are ever thinking of coming to NZ and expecting to navigate this country by ease with public transport, THINK AGAIN. Rent a car. Hitchhike, or be prepared to add another two weeks travelling time to any trip you make. We’re on narrow gauge track here, which means – slow trains, poorly maintained track, and a schedule which is more conceptual than actual reality.

Our steam locomotive – the NZR 4-8-2 J Class (4-8-2 refers to the layout of the wheels) – were engineered to follow the head-load K-class monsters, as a lighter-axle train was needed for the secondary tracks. She was built in Scotland, and managed to elude several German U-boats on her trip over here (with 39 of her brothers and sisters) to come into use in NZ in the 1940s. She’s capable of over 60mph with a 300-ton express train, but because of the speed restrictions on the track, they couldn’t push her nearly that hard.

View from the train.

Anyway, enough train geekery. We hop on the train at 7:30am, and settle into our seats for the day. After a hearty train breakfast (cheese, ham, tomato, pineapple toasties), we settle in to enjoy the view, play a few games of naked Greek Men cards (I won), a few games of travel chess (I lost), read our books (I finished Jasper FForde’s “Shades of Grey” which I am insanely jealous I, as a person with achromotopsia, didn’t write.) and talked to more train geeks. I made a cake for CDH to share with the crew, which went down a mighty treat.

Cheese, tomato, pineapple toastie. Breakfast of train geeks.

They stopped the train regularly for photo stops, where they let everyone out, haul the train up the line, and drive it past so everyone can take photos. Most of my photos came up rubbish.

A little NZ countryside for y'all.

View from steamtrain, just past Welsford

Snapped by CDH

We did practically nothing in Whangarei, as there is NOTHING to do. We did find a sweet shop, and wandered around the port and talked about piratical adventures we would have on the boats, and found some tacky sourviner shops, one of which had Puffer Fish on the wall, which you could buy and hang from your ceiling, if you’re that way inclined.

I love the diverse amount of geekage in the world. I’m a metal geek. On Saturday, I met some hardcore train geeks. As in, they sat on the train with GPS and maps, timing the train’s route. They brought expensive camera equipment to take pictures of the train. They have train geek lingo for talking about trains. It was really quite an eye opener.

Whangarei sweet shop

Having held one of these bastards in the ocean, I would hate to have them hanging on the wall. Look how pissed off they look!

I loved all their long-suffering wives, who held maps and made toasted sandwiches, and lugged their camera equipment around while they geeked out.

So yeah, that was my weekend. What did you get up to? I’m sorry posting’s been light over here – I’ve been distracted by work and learning Eluveitie and Einsiferum songs on the tin whistle.

Going off the rails … \m/

The amazingly, awesome V from avesnoir / eternityrites has created this wicked grymm wordpress website for me, including all the artwork and some incredible new features. I – being a bit un-co – haven’t got it all working perfectly yet, but do feel free to have a look around and let us know what you think.

I am over-the-neptune happy with this theme, which I think incorporates a heavy metal aesthetic with a steampunk feeling (in line with my novels). I’ll be experimenting with the new features and getting the sidebar running better over the next week, but I’m back online now and looking pretty flash, if I do say so myself. If you are ever in the need of any website / wordpress services, I can definitely recommend you contact V! She’s set this up so well, even I couldn’t mess it up. Seriously V, you and your creative mind totally rock! \m/

\m/ To bigger and better things!

So, if you’re fascinated by everything ancient – or you just want a deeper appreciation of Nile’s lyrics – I recommend a visit to Egypt. And here’s what I think you should do:

CDH and I in front of the pyramids at Giza (he's very impressed, really. He just HATES being in photographs)

1. Crawl Inside a Pyramid

The pyramids are indescribable. Until you’ve been there, you won’t know. I knew exactly how big they were, exactly how many blocks it took to make them and how many workers pulled those blocks, but I still stood beneath them

What surprises many people is just how close the pyramids are to the city. They’re right on the cusp of the western edge of Cairo.

Many – less educated tourists mistakingly assume the Pyramids at Giza are the only pyramids in Egypt. They’re wrong – there’s over 75 pyramids discovered to date, spanning a period of over 1000 years, and many more
still undiscovered. You might wonder how archaeologist might possibly miss 150m high sandstone monstrosities poking out of the desert, but the truth is most pyramids have been demolished in ancient times by people using the stone for other projects. The Romans take some responsibility for this, as do the Greeks, the English, and pretty much everyone who’s ever attempted to penetrate Africa. Most pyramids exist only as foundations.

Great Pyramid

Most tourists visit the Giza necropolis and maybe the step pyramid of Djoser, and then go shopping or something, but if you’re still pyramid hungry, visit the necropolis of Dashir. These pryamids (the red pyramid,
black pyramid and bent pyramid) are a little further away, but you can easily find someone to drive you there (we organised a taxi with a couple of others from our group).

The Bent Pyramid.

The bent pyramid was the first smooth-sided pyramid design, and one of the first pyramids every built – by the famous architect Imhotep. After constructing part of the slope, Imhotep realised that if he continued using the angle he had chosen, the pyramid wouldn’t support its own weight, and this wouldn’t please the king’s eternal soul. So he changed the angle, and after a few more rows reailsed this angle was still too steep, and changed it again. He finally completed the pyramid, but the Pharoah looked at it and said “Well, it’s not really very staight-sided, is it? I was really hanging out for a straight-sided pyramid. If you could start on that, that would be super.” So Imhotep built another Pyramid – the Red pyramid.

It costs you nothing to see this necropolis, and something like 15LE to go inside the Red Pyramid, and it’s worth every, single, cent.

Unfortunately, you’re not allowed to take pictures inside.

2. Play Nile on the Nile

Yes, it’s dumb, but our friends dared us to, so we played a little “Papyrus Containing the Spell to Preserve Its Possessor Against Attacks From He Who Is in the Water” in our suite on the cruise ship.

Nile on the Nile

3. Climb Mt. Sinai on a camel.

Camel travel is the best travel.

Camel’s are seriously the coolest creatures. They are so clever, totally mischievous, and they have such unique personailities. The guys who run the camel’s at Mt. Sinai seem to genuinly love the animals and we didn’t
see any cruelty being directed towards them (unlike an experience we had riding donkey’s in Jordan).

CDH’S camel bolted on ahead. He told me later it was plodding along, when it’s owner turned on his cellphone and started playing some music, and his camel jived the rest of the way to the top, plodding in time to the beat.

My camel believed in “slow and steady wins the race”. He was extremely polite and would pull over and wait for people to pass him. His name was Petey and he had the coolest smile.

The journey is about 1 and a half hours, and by the end of it, you think your thighs have permanently worn into a bow shape, but then you look at all the tired people. trudging along around you, and you think “Yep,
Camel travel is the only travel”.

For those of you unfamiliar with biblical mythology, Mt. Sinai is where Moses received the ten commandments. It’s an extremely sacred place for Christians and Jews, and the 3am hike lit by the moon and stars and lanterns, with people singing songs and camels farting. There was a wisp of magic in the air.

Camel Travel

4. Buy the world’s Tackiest Souvineers

Egypt is the land of tack. If you can dream it, they can slap a cartoon sphinx on it and try and sell it to you. I needed a new pen to write my diary and the man we approached was absolutely convinced what I REALLY needed was not one, not two, but SIXTEEN of his tacky pens. An entire box. We didn’t buy them, thank god, because my tacky pen ran out pretty fast.

I'm is in ur temple, defiling ur religious iconograffie

5. Go Shopping

CDH deliberating over papyrus. We spent so much money the manager invited us up for tea.

When you’re in Egypt, be prepared to be treated as though you are an inconveinent means of transportation to your wallet. Everyone wants money for something, and you’ll be dishing it out just to make them all sod off.

We did however spend a really fun afternoon in Cairo visiting a papyrus factory, a cartouche factory and a perfume factory. We also went to the Khan el Khalili market and tried our haggling skills – what haggling skills? Exactly.

Holiday Reading:

Christian Jacq, the Ramses series
Wilbour Smith, River God
Terry Pratchell, Pyramids
Tim Powers, Anubis Gates

Holiday Soundtrack:

Nile – Amongst the Catecombs of Nephren-ka
Iron Maiden, Powerslave
Nile – Annihilation of the Wicked
Ramses – Dellrio de Desastre
Katra – Katra
The Bangles – Walk Like an Egyptian

Salaam Alekum \m/
Steff Metal

Steampunk iPod mod

I read a post over at Gala Darling today, and she talked about your palate band – the group or songwriter who made you realize music was more than just the top 20.

I can’t define just one song, or one band, but I can name about ten pivotal songs, bands or musical “epiphanies” that have not just impacted my taste in music, but affected my life and personality profoundly.

Ever since I can remember, we always had music on in the house – whether it was the local classic hits station, my “Snoopy’s Christmas” tape, or my parents’ vinyl collection, my sister and I spent many a happy hour sitting in front of the huge speakers, drawing and playing and arguing and absorbing all that wonderful music. Queen, Pink Floyd, Alice Cooper and T-Rex stand out during this period – bands I still love today.

As a child I listened to more music than I watched cartoons – and for a kid, that’s saying a lot. Even the TV I did watched tended to be taped replays of my favorite snoopy cartoons, the rugby with my dad and Walt Disney’s Monster Hits (one of the first major musical influences of my life). If you’ve never seen this, it’s a collection of all the darkest, spookiest clips and songs from disney films. Songs like “Bad Moon Rising”, “The Monster Mash” and “Evil Women” should ave given the world the first clue I was born to be a darkling. It gave me delicious shivers – a sense of the kind of art I eventually wanted to create.

snoopy: my childhood hero

At primary school, I was bullied. Horribly, brutally bullied. And I found solace in the music. I developed my first ever “obsession” over a song – “Runaway Train” by Soul Asylum. I still get teary every time I hear that song. I wanted so badly to just up and run away, go somewhere where no one knew me, and I could start over – a couple of times I even did, but I never got very far. I’m always drawn to songs about freedom, like Iron Maiden’s “Running Free” and Metallica’s “Wherever I May Roam”.

At around age 10, I caught the Spice Girls bug. Yep, I did. The local radio station I listened to played mostly classic rock, but would sometimes play a few “chart” hits, and they stated playing Wannabe and I just LOVED it. So catchy. My parents brought me the album for my birthday and I got caught up in the whole Girl Power thing. I was quite insufferable. I dressed up to look like Sporty Spice (she was my favorite, and the first girl I ever saw with a tattoo), and I wanted to be just like them. The Spice Girls appealed to me because they were the first solely female band I’d ever heard, and the first female singer that made me feel like being a girl made me special and powerful, rather than weak, like I felt at school. This started my lifelong love affair with women in rock and metal.

At around age 12, I met Alanis Morrissette. From the first note, I was in love. That voice, that rage, those lyrics like poetry. This was around the time I started going off the Spice Girls.

At age 14 I was listening to a local chart show, that “Phat Forty” and they were taking requests for a “Back Phat” – a hit from somewhere back in time. Someone rang up and requested Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.”

Changed my life.

Metallica

This was what I had been waiting for. This was the music I was born to listen to. All I wanted was more, more, MORE. I went to the Warehouse and brought my first Metallica Album – S&M (Yeah, a weird pick, but I didn’t know what any of the albums were, and that one had the most songs on it. I didn’t even know it was a live album). I took that baby home and it was like a religious conversion, I loved it so much. Over the next couple of months, I brought every metallica album. Someone told me about a radio station “The Rock” which played lots of Metallica and other metal, so I swapped over and started listening to that instead. I brought my first ever metal shirt – an original, official Metal Up Your Ass one, which I still own. I became a little Metallica-obsessed. I heard Iron Maiden for the first time and brought a couple of their albums.

I became annoyed at The Rock, because apart from Metallica and Iron Maiden, they didn’t really play any “metal”, and I knew there had to be more. When I was … around 16, I think, my parents got the internet! Eeeeee! Napster had already gone under (we were late to the game) but my enterprising sister downloaded Kazaa (remember Kazaa?) I started by downloading the back catelogue of every artist Metallica covered on “Garage Inc” and obsessively reading Metallica forums and checking out the bands they listened to.

I discovered Slayer, I discovered Meshuggah and Testament and Saxon. My CD collection started to grow. I was hooked for life.

I also discovered Nick Cave.

A young Nick Cave

Who I will marry one day, even if I have to gag and kidnap him. Nick Cave is … heaven. His songs sound like my books – at least, they sound the way I want my books to read: darkly funny, incredibly clever, full of puns and mythic reimaginings and literary figures. I was lucky enough to see him live and meet him in person and I tell you he is hands down the best performer on earth, metal or nay.

And his voice … ergggggg *drools on keyboard* Nick Cave’s voice haunts my dreams. I am a sucker for men with dark, interesting voices. My BFF’s ex once rang our flat and CDH answered and ever since, she’s wanted to meet him because his voice gives her orgasms.

At uni I met a wonderful friend, Johnowar, and he introduced me to Manowar and Blind Guardian. My love of metal from Europe was born. I, in turn, introduced European metal to CDH, who used to be a no. 1 Cradle of Filth fan, but now bounces around like a happy baby at a Blind Guardian concert.

So these are my palete bands. If you haven’t guessed, these songs will feature in this week’s Metal Mixtape. But now I want to hear from you – what were the turning points in your music appreciation? How did you discover these bands – did you hear them by chance, did you have a metal “mentor” who thrust CD after CD upon you until you heard something that made your knees weak? Don’t worry if you’re not actually into metal – just tell me about how you found the music that shaped your life.

Yours with Nick Cave’s Bastard Children \m/
Steff Metal

I’ve been reading your blog for a few months now. It’s very different to the other blogs I read - totally inspiring!

I’m a visual artist, and I’m thinking of starting a blog to help promote my work (I have an Etsy store but no website as yet). But I don’t want to start, make some kind of horrid mistake, and have to do everything again.

So, can you give some advice to a novice – how do I start a blog? What should I do to make a blog a success?

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I recieve this question and variations thereof all the time. People seem to believe I’m an authority on the matter. They’re wrong. While I’ve created two reasonably successful personal blogs, and written for several business blogs, I don’t know everything there is to know about blogging. I haven’t tried everything. Not by a long shot.

However, I’ve probably had more experience than the people sending me these emails, and I did just finish writing my Grymm & Epic Guide to Blogging. So I can offer a few words of encouragement.

Elvira's Gramaphone, print by artist Blonde Blythe, $5

Blogging is not a one-size-fits-all game. What works for one person will be a disaster for the next. Whenever all the experts say “DON’T DO THIS! IT’S BLOGGING SUICCIDE!”, someone does it and becomes a millionaire. So I can’t tell you how you should start a blog and make it a success. I can tell you how I start a blog, and you can take from that what you will.

The first thing you need to do is assess why you want to start a blog, and what your blog should be about. I go over this in great detail in my blogging ebook, but I’ll summarize a little for you here:

Why do you want to blog:

• You love writing and want to write and publish in an immediate format
• You want to document your crazy life
• You’re interested in start an online business
• You’ve got a funny idea for a blog
• You want to promote your book, music, artwork, game, etc.
• You want to be an internet personality

Your reasons for blogging are very important, as they permeate every facet of your blog. You know you want to promote your artwork, but is that all you want to do with your blog? Why do you want a blog, specifically, rather than, say, spending money on advertising or making a static website?

What is your blog going to be about? You should choose an overarching concept and a niche topic or niche demographic. It’s not enough to say “my blog is about my life and everyone in it.” I wouldn’t read that unless you were hilariously funny, because I don’t know you, so it doesn’t have any relevance to me.

Who are you writing for? Your friends and family? The artistic community? Customers and clients of your artwork? twenty-somethings? fifty-somethings? Metal-lovers? Cupcake-lovers? The nature of your blog changes depending on the audience you choose.

Many artists / business people make the mistake of blogging about what they know – running a business. Unless you plan to run a business telling people how to run a business, writing a blog with advice for emerging artists probably won’t help you sell paintings. Writing a blog with interesting article about gothic artwork – it’s history, personalities and techniques – will attract people interested in gothic artwork, and will probably help you sell your own art. See how it works?

Once you’ve figured out your angle, you need to choose a blogging platform. For people with zero experience producing content online and no desire to learn more about creating websites online, I recommend blogger. It’s free and extremely easy to use. Alternativly, wordpress.com (also free) and livejournal (although I only recommend livejournal for very personal blogs – business blogs don’t work so well there.)

Beware though, that all of these free blog platforms place limitations on the functionality of your blog. Also, they’re all hosted on a subdomain (suchandsuch.blogspot.com instead of suchandsuch.com). You don’t have total control over what your blog looks like and the content you publish on it. I don’t like this – I prefer being creative and in-control.

I always choose my own domain, which I buy through my hosting company. I use self-hosted WordPress to run my site and manage my content. I LOVE it and always recommend it.

Now you’ve got your blog all set up, you get to start the fun part – writing! Yaaay! Happy dance! Keep a long list of topics you’d like to blog about near your computer. That way, when you sit down to blog, but you don’t know what to write about, just look over your list to find ideas.

Create a blogging schedule, and stick to it – whether you blog once a week or five times a day (I recommend 3-5 days a week to build blog traffic). I’ve found consistant blogging to be the way to bring in traffic.

When writing your blog, don’t forget to add other types of media – pictures, videos, music, interactive games and polls, quizzes … the possibilities are endless. Don’t limit yourself to only words on a page – especially if your medium is visual – or your readers will get bored.

To promote your blog, find other blogs who cater to the same audience as yours, and comment on their posts. If you make enugh intelligent comments, people will click through to look at your blog. I earn a lot of traffic by writing guest posts on other, more popular blogs. You could also try promoting yourself on Twitter – it’s working wonders for practically every blogger I know.

I’ve only scratched the surface here, but I must quit now, or I’ll write out all 45 000 words of my ebook, and then no one will buy it and I won’t be able to afford to go to Wacken next year. And that will make me a sad metalhead :(

You can find more information (250 pages of more information) about writing a blog and building a following in my ebook Grymm & Epic Guide to Blogging, which is on sale THIS WEEK ONLY for $15 bucks.

So, readers, I ask you now, why do you blog? How and why do you choose the topics you write about? What mistakes have you made, and what advice could you give to this novice blogger?

Super Snuggles and Shoggoth Kisses \m/
Steff

Grymm & Epic ebooks is my line of ebooks about the heavy metal life. They are like my blog posts, but much, much longer. I wanted a way to talk in-depth about topics I’m passionate about, and since I’ve already written five ebooks, the format works for me.

I’m launching Grymm & Epic ebooks with the most EPIC ebook I’ve ever written – the Grymm & Epic Guide to Blogging. This mammoth document of doom contains 250 pages and over 45 000 words on creating, maintaining and growing a blog.

You can read more about the Grymm and Epic Guide to Blogging in the Steff Metal Shop.

Why Grymm & Epic?

My ebooks are GRYMM because you won’t find any corporate salesy stuff or “I know best” – just honest, down-to-earth advice from a fellow businesswoman / blogger / metalhead about what works and doesn’t worki in my rather crazy and exciting life.

My ebooks are EPIC because they are monsters. I don’t believe in selling $10 or $20 ebooks with only 50 pages of text. You’ll find my ebooks will be about the length of a book you buy in the shop.

To celebrate the launch, I’m offering a special price for THIS WEEK ONLY, for anyone who wants to buy Grymm & Epic Guide to blogging through the Steff Metal website. I’ve priced this book at $19, but you can buy it for $15, if you follow the link below. After seven days, the price goes back to $19.

So yeah. If you’re keen, take a look and let me know what you think!

I would love to have a new ebook out every month, but because I write so bloody much, this won’t happen. You might see the next ebook out in a couple of months, or it might be six months away, I just can’t say. I can tell you it will be the “Grymm & Epic Guide to Cookery” and will be filled with lots of wicked ass bad recipes and ideas for metal dishes and parties.

Over the next few months I’ll also be editing the ebooks I’ve already written Freelance Writing Success will become the Grymm & Epic Guide to Freelance Writing, the Gothic and Halloween Wedding Planners will become Grymm & Epic Guide to Wedding Planning, etc. (Only 33 Mistakes Writers Make about Blind Characters will remain as it was). If you’ve brought an ebook from me before, you will be automatically sent an update of the ebook.

A few other exciting things are happening in the world of Steff Metal, including an incredible site redesign, which we shall be revealing in a few weeks.

Keep it Grymm \m/
Steff Metal

the Fox and the Raven print, $14.50 from Etsy

About Steff Metal Readers (that’s you!)

Steff Metal readers are 76% Female, 24% Male. Due to the high level of “fashion” and “wussy” content on the blog, I’m not surprised by this.

I’m also not surprised that 96% of you identify with at least one subculture, the most popular being Metalhead, Goth, Steampunk, Geek, and Medieval / Viking / Faery. Most of you ticked “I’m Just Me” than ticked three or four more boxes.

86% of you are below the age of 35, with 5% being below 18. (Does this mean I can talk about “grown-up” things? heh heh). You’re an educated bunch: 33% of you have Bachelor’s degree and 14% have professional qualifications, and a whopping 10% having earned a Doctorate.

You’re a truly international bunch, with most of you living in the US, Germany, the UK and Australia / New Zealand. I also have readers from Scandinavia, Argentina, Singapore, Canada, Austria, Holland and Russia. Most of you live in urban (43%) or suburban (38%) areas.

You’re all rather internet savvy: 76% of you use Facebook, 57% of you are on Twitter, 48% love YouTube, and 28% use Flickr. 28% of you shop on ebay and 38% use blogspot or wordpress to make blogs. Only a few of you use Myspace, LinkedIn, Polyvore, Formspring, Tumblr, Digg, StumbleUpon, and Last.FM.

62% of you regularly read other metal blogs, 28% read other fashion blogs and 43% read other “lifestyle” blogs. In print media, only 25% of you read metal magazines, 62% enjoy fiction books, 48% enjoy non-fiction books, 37% read webcomics and 5% read or contribute to zines.

98% of you consider it extremely important to buy from independent, subculture labels, designers and musicians. This is important, because y’all spend a LOT of money on clothing, accessories, music, DVDs and concert tickets each month.

What you Want

“Ask a Bogan” was voted the best Steff Metal column by 51% of you. The next most popular columns were Cthulhu’s Closet, Kvlt Fashion, Linking Horn and tr00 metal life.

As I expected, most of the male readers rated the fashion-related posts – Cthulhu’s Closet, Kvlt Fashion, etc – as their least favorite columns, and the metal book and movie reviews as their favorites.

Most of the girls wanted to see more of the fashion columns. And 45% of you didn’t like the “get a real job” column. Thank you all for being honest with me – I’m still trying to come up with a mix that pleases everybody.

I often wondered if I was doing somethin wrong, because of the low level of comments verses my high level of traffic, but 84% tell me you just don’t like commenting uness you have something important to say. That’s cool – I’m not going to force you. But … the comments are there if you ever want to. Likewise, feel free to email. I love meeting you!

48% of you want to see more ‘Funny Shit’ – for which I can only promise that I will try. Apart from that, you would like to see more life advice, alternative fashion, outfit posts (I have to get better at taking them, first) and wacky metal articles.

A whopping 65% of you wanted to see articles on medieval and viking history (yes!). Others want to see me cover travel, weddings, the publishing industry, sex and satan. Only 4% of you wanted to see me cover hair removal creams, and 1 person wanted me to cover metalcore.

In the Steff Metal shop, most of you want to see Jewellery (this I wasn’t expecting, as I’m not known for my jewellery-making skills), other apparel, artwork, art prints and ebooks.

1 person wants to see naked pictures of Steff. No, I don’t know who this was.

Most of you said you liked Steff Metal just the way it is (awww, shucks). Only 1% of you thought the blog needed a discussion forum or flickr group, for which I breath a mighty sigh of relief, because the thought of coding and monitoring one gives me the shivvers. It’s bad enough trying to keep spam out of comments. Phew!

Postcard Set, $6, in the Steff Metal shop

Improvements

I’m working on a site redesign. At the moment, I use a generic WordPress theme, which is quite a metal theme, I must admit, but I’d like something a bit more “grymm” looking, with a few more features.

It will take a few months before I get the redesign concept in my head and find a designer I like and gel with. I’m just letting you know, in case you have any ideas or you happen to be a designer looking to work on a site such as this.

I’m toying with a more “magazine” style layout, but will probably end up with something similiar to what we’ve got, just with a third column down the left-hand side, and better graphics.

Since many of you prefer to find out about new content on the site through Twitter and Facebook, and so many of you asked for it, I’ve caved into pressure and set up a Steff Metal Facebook Page. You can become a fan by clicking on the button in the sidebar. The blog automatically imports to the fan page, so you can read all the posts from Facebook.

58% of you want me to post more often, so I am trying to post 5 days a week now, instead of just 4. One day I would love to increase this more, but at the moment I just don’t have time.

I am starting a NEW column on the blog: Metal History – which is not about the history of metal music – although that would be fun – but historical essays about things that interest metalheads.

Also, y’all wanted more content about travel. I am happy to oblige. Grymm and Frostbitten Lands will be coming back with a vengeance – I haven’t blogged much about my travels recently, so look forward to a series of posts about various “metal” places to visit all over the world (I’ve been to 26 countries, so I know a few good spots). Also, if anyone out there wants to write a “guide for travelling metalheads” for their city / country, shoot me an email.

My first Steff Metal ebook – the Grymm and Epic Guide to Blogging – will be released … maybe April. The next ebook will be Grymm and Epic Cookery. The Third will – most likely – be “Living a Grymm and Epic Life”. I’m hoping to have all three released by the end of the year.

I might see what I can do about this jewellery thing.

I’m working on getting some giveaways, but I don’t want to come at this half-assed, so it could be awhile away.

Thoughts, Comments, Opinions?
Steff