CD Odyssey Disc 505: D.O.A. and Thor

On the heels of my Jim Cuddy review comes two more Canadian bands, although these ones are not quite as likely to have the same influence on the future of music.

Disc 505 is… Are U Ready “(sheesh – you spelled ‘are’ – you can’t spell ‘you’ while you’re at it?)

Artist: D.O.A. and Thor

Year of Release: 2003

What’s up with the Cover?  Presumably the two bands dug out some old photos and put them on the cover.  D.O.A. look like they are ready for a hockey riot and Thor looks like the God of Thunder, which is pretty much his thing.

How I Came To Know It:  I don’t remember.  I think I was digging around the bargain bin at some record shop and when I saw this I couldn’t resist buying it, even though I knew it was not going to be very good.

How It Stacks Up:  Shockingly, this is the only pairing of D.O.A. and Thor I have in my collection.  Of my three Thor albums, this one is probably in the middle, but it is my only D.O.A. album of any kind.

Rating:  2 stars because I’m feeling charitable

As I mentioned in the “How I Came To Know It Section” I knew when I paid some of my hard-earned money for this album that it wasn’t going to overwhelm me artistically.  D.O.A. is a fun Canadian punk act, and Thor is one of my metal favourites from adolescence but the main draw here is the weird amalgam of the two of them on a single album.

Marketed right on the CD case as “incredible sporting tunes!” this was apparently an album meant to inspire you to think of the music you hear between plays at a hockey game.  Of course, it presupposes that sports stadiums don’t shill out a bit of money to play actual hits for the crowd which – even at local WHL games – they thankfully do.

Still, if they were to play these D.O.A. and Thor songs instead I don’t think I’d mind terribly.  Do we really need to hear “Cotton Eyed Joe” and ACDC’s “Thunderstruck” one more time when we could get some truly Canadian kitsch instead?

The twelve songs on “Are U Ready” are evenly divided between Thor and D.O.A. although most of the Thor songs have D.O.A. playing with his band.  They may both be ‘incredible sporting tunes!’ but they approach the challenge very differently.

The D.O.A. tracks made me really appreciate these guys, who are like the poor, northerly cousins of the Dropkick Murphys.  Based on this record, I prefer the boys from Boston (The Murphys 2003 album was the amazing “Blackout” but in D.O.A.’s defence they’ve been doing this stuff a lot longer and still sound pretty good).

Anyway, the songs are a mix of punk and Canadian rock, and are mostly about playing rough hockey.  Titles like “Give ‘Em the Lumber” and “Beat ‘Em, Bust ‘Em” pretty much sum up the experience.  One (“Overtime”) even features a sample of the Hockey Night in Canada anthem.  These songs are not great but they put a smile on my face and made me appreciate my country’s national sport that much more.  The best line, from “Beat ‘Em, Bust ‘Em,” is “drop the gloves, pop ‘em in the beak.”  I’m pretty sure popping someone in the beak is a uniquely Canadian expression – and a damned fine one at that.

Beyond giving me a laugh and a good time, I didn’t love the D.O.A. tracks but it did make me want to hear more of their early stuff, which I have a suspicion I’m going to like.

Before I comment on the Thor songs, I should mention that I absolutely loved this guy back in the eighties.  The albums “Keep the Dogs Away” (1977) and “Only the Strong” (1985) were staples in the music rotation (my brother has both on vinyl).  “Only the Strong” is still a guilty pleasure.

With that admission out of the way, I have to say the Thor songs on “Are U Ready” are not great.  They are not even about hockey – with 2003 seeing him still mired in his ‘create a new mythology’ phase.

One of the songs, “Triumphant” is a repeat from his solo album of the same name (reviewed way back at Disc 218) and is passable enough, with a pretty good knuckle-dragging metal riff, but a lot of this stuff is derivative of his work twenty years earlier.

In fact another track, “The Challenge” sounds largely like a repeat of one of his mid-eighties songs “Rock the City.” This is made worse by the fact that he puts a live version of “Rock the City” right on “Are U Ready” just in case it might have slipped by you.  Both the new song and the live remake sound like they are recorded in a tin can.

I’m probably harder on the Thor songs because after so many years of remembering him kindly I wanted him to be better, whereas D.O.A. was kind of new to me but the truth is this album was never intended to be great art, it was intended to be a good time.  By advertising itself as the kind of music you’ll hear in arenas, it sets the bar for success pretty low but at least it delivers as promised.

Most of all I got the sense that these two Vancouver bands had a genuinely good time putting this together and that counts for something.  It is mindless, but it is mindless fun, and although it warrants being sold, I’m keeping it on that basis.

Best tracks:  Are U Ready, Beat ‘Em Bust ‘Em, I Am Canadian

CD Odyssey Disc 218: Thor

You know when something is so bad it's good? Well, if not, you soon will have an example. OK, maybe so bad it's average?

This next review is a treasure trove of the ridiculous - I could probably start a whole new blog solely dedicated to the lyrics alone, but in the interests of brevity I'll just hit some high points a little later on.

Disc 218 is...Triumphant
Artist: Thor

Year of Release: 2003

What’s Up With The Cover?: A near-naked warrior takes a moment out from fighting some primitive screwheads to strike a saucy pose. This guy's helmet looks very protective, but he might've given some thought to having some other form of protection beyond his belt of skulls. Or maybe his belt of skulls is designed to help him blend in with his surroundings - I see a skull in the foreground, and the mountain in the background is shaped like a skull as well.

This painting is by a guy named Mike Hoffman, and although not artistically inspiring he has managed to create a little magic after all; it is causing Frank Frazetta to spin in his grave.

How I Came To Know It: I saw a video for a Thor song back in the early eighties called "Keep The Dogs Away" which I thought pretty awesome at the time. I've never seen any of Thor's eighties records on CD, so I bought this much later entry out of nostalgia.

How It Stacks Up: I have three Thor albums, this one, a collaboration with D.O.A. and 1985's "Only The Strong". Technically, "Only The Strong" is not an original album - my buddy Chris used a computer program years ago to transfer it from vinyl.

Imagine my excitement when I visited Thor's website to find that "Only The Strong" has been released on CD this year as the "25th Anniversary Printing". Soon, it shall be mine - as soon as I decide if I can trust thorcentral.com with my visa number.

Anyway, of these three albums, I'm putting "Triumphant" a distant third.

Rating: 2 stars.

Thor is a Canadian metal artist that goes back all the way to the late seventies. He is also a body builder who's show used to feature a sort of hard core variety show of heavy metal music, and Thor doing feats of strength. Among these, he would: blow up a hot water bottle; bend a metal bar in his teeth and; smash bricks on his chest. I've seen him do the first two on MuchMusic's Power Hour, and thought it exceedingly cool at the time.

He also used to do interviews as if he were actually "Thor" as in - the Norse God of Thunder. Again, I thought that was pretty cool at the time.

When I was fifteen I loved Thor's music, but "Triumphant" is...er...not his best work. It sounds very much like an artist that hasn't grown very much, and is still doing the same schtick. In fact, this album even features a reworked version of "Thunder on the Tundra", which originally appears on "Only the Strong". However, if you're going to do a fantasy "Thunder God" schtick, you should go all out, and Thor certainly does.

The music is basically straight ahead heavy metal. Just imagine eighties metal never changed - there was never hair metal, never grunge, never death or speed or thrash or black metal - just straight ahead mid-eighties metal. Musically, that's all you need to know.

I'm not sure what to include and what to exclude from this review. I thought maybe I'd start by saying it includes a song written for Fubar: The Movie, because that seemed the most illustrative point I could make. The song, "Fubar is a Super Rocker", doesn't seem to be written with any ironic intent. However, this fact alone doesn't really do the record's excesses justice.

So then I thought I'd just include some of the song titles as a sort of short-hand of what to expect like "The Guardian's Flame Opus" (in 3 parts) or "Throwing Cars at People On Coke With Thor" but even this didn't quite fully express how far this album goes.

So I decided to focus on the fact that this album appears to principally be an attempt to do a concept album or soundtrack for something called "The Intercessor" which the sleeve advertises as a "movie & CD coming soon." I could try to explain just what "The Intercessor" is about, but I'm pretty sure nothing will do justice to the liner notes in Thor's own words, so here they are without edit:

"It is the year 2045...After the great apocalypse...The continent of Norway had broken away from its foundation causing a collision and hence melding with North America. A strange new land had arisen. A land where mutation thrives and demons roam and of demi-Gods. A mighty North American Viking-Warrior stood tall...who battled demons and mutants and those attacking from other planets...His quest to save the planet and destroy those opposing the "Metal Avenger" came to an end when he sacrificed himself to save others and was killed in battle...Many years later in the year 2965 the Soul and Warrior Life Form of the "Metal Avenger" returns as the INTERCESSOR..."

Still confused? I'm not sure how you could be, but for a more artistic expression of our protagonist's motivation, consider these telling lines from "Back For Blood":

"Lightning strikes twice, but so do volcanoes
Of men and mice - I'm a twister, I'm a raging tornado
I'm back, I'm back, I'm back for blood
Get the soap, wash your mouth out with suds
I'm back, I'm back, I'm back I say
Now's the time for you to pay."

And at this, I am speechless. I could, in the immortal words of Fubar's Deaner ask Thor to "turn up the good, turn down the suck!" but I think doing so would just ruin it. So instead, I'm going to add an extra star for Thor just because years later he is still keepin' on Given'r.

Tracks that most giv'r: I Am Thor, Triumphant, Back For Blood,