Satanic Rock -- Almost as Terrible as Christian Rock?

The advent *ahem* of Christian rock has astounded me, having taken the world by storm with the likes of shitburgers like Family Force 5 and Relient K. The fact alone that I can name ANY Christian Rock band other than DC Talk means we already have a problem.
On the other hand, Satanic Metal, in all its cacophonous noise-driven fury, has somehow stood the test of time, telling me that either the power of Satan is greater than I previously thought, or there really are enough people out there with a rampant desire to listen to music that I can only imagine is the equivalent of getting a bunch of 5 year olds hopped up on pixie sticks and giving them instruments to bang the shit out of.

I think about the two, about Christian Rock and Black Metal, and I can't come to a conclusion about which one I honestly hate more. I mean, where would you assume black metal came from? I could see it coming from some war-torn state where corpses outnumber living humans, or where the landscape has been ravaged by huge machines trampling the earth, spewing toxic venom into the atmosphere and killing all living things.
Alas, black metal isn't from any of those places that I just mentioned. It's from Norway. NORWAY. THE MOST PEACEFUL COUNTRY ON THE PLANET EARTH. So what if that's where the vikings were from -- just because your ancestors were badass doesn't mean you are. That's the same as that weird kid at school who paints his face and colors his hair and wears his dad's old military fatigues, but you know deep down that if he were ever in the shit, there'd be a beatdown and a sock full of 9-volt batteries waiting for him.



On the other hand, at least you can give them kudos for trying. Christian Rock is so sugary I could scrape one of those power-chord friendly ballads and cut crack with it. In either form, teenagers are still going to buy it. I sometimes wonder whatever happened to the odes to girlfriend-beating that Britney professed or the beautiful wavy innuendos that the genie herself Xtina asked me to rub her with (read: my penis)?

So I'm trying an experiment. I played two videos -- one Dimmu Borgir's "Sacreligious Scorn" and the other Family Force 5's "Love Addict". The control I used to cleanse my palate between these two atrocities (I can't say I'm not biased) for this experiment was Dredg's "the Canyon Behind Her", quite possibly the greatest song ever written. I'm pretty much going to see how long I last before laughing or turning away in disgust.


I'll post my findings later.