Awful Metal Video: High Society Double Feature (BMTH, RATT)

It's safe to say that listening to and subsequently reviewing Bring Me The Horizon's "There is a Hell..." was one of the most exhausting experiences of my life. You'd think that it would be along the lines of watching a movie so terrible that it would be good for some laughs, and within that, have at least some form of entertainment value. That's kind of what I was expecting before I put the album on. That this was just some limey kid's deathcore album I was going to blow through in 20 minutes, get to snort at and write a couple snide remarks about. But no. Within the last couple years, Oli and the gang decided they wanted to become artists and ripped a big, smelly art all over this album. It was such a badly serious attempt at making real music, that I couldn't even have fun hating it. The song "Blessed with a Curse" was a perfect example of BMTH's creative juices getting sprayed all over this album's production. As opposed to where it usually lands, like some jail bait's face...



Of course it's only natural that a song with such strong feelings was going to be used to make some video director's artsy fartsy short film. People (me included) complain about performance videos a lot, but is this what we would rather watch? Black balloons and branches? Extreme closeups of some goth fairy looking sullen? Oli Sykes sticking his grubby little mitts in my face? Knock that shit off. What is he trying to do anyway? Girly slap to the beat? Is that what you kids from the UK do as opposed to Jersey fist-pumping? Not like I'd take one over the other.

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So she's sitting at this big cliche', rich person dinner table with the napkins folded all fancy. She's in her cliche' rich person gown, all by herself, ripping up some photographs. Her neck gets covered with fake blood in random shots too; with no apparent wounds of course. I guess the photos are of her richy-rich ex, who left her alone to wallow in her vast fortune? Cry me a river. But no, she's actually ripping up pictures of herself ripping up pictures of herself ripping up pictures of herself. It's one of those art film endings that's supposed to make you go "whoa", but usually just makes me go "pfft".

I know all of you guys must be pretty worn out from all that thought-provoking imagery, and the deep feelings of betrayal and regret when the lyrics made you think about your ex-girlfriend. So what I'm going to do for you is lighten the mood with some false metal from a different decade --



What we're seeing here is a higher-class family who's enjoying some dinner with guests. The butler, who's secretly an undercover, 60-something roadie for glam rockers Ratt (before there actually were 60-something roadies for Ratt), let the band into the mansion's attic. How they got in the attic from some back entrance? Who cares, it's a music video. Their mission, in the name of all that is fun and rocking, is to assault these innocent people, destroy their home, and most of all, just ruin what would otherwise be a quiet, elegant dinner.

The father at the head of the table hears some guitars wailing away upstairs, and he seems pretty annoyed. Rather than doing something rational like calling the police, he just makes some faces, mimics guitar movements, yells at his transvestite wife, then leaves the table never to be seen again. Their daughter is pretty slamming for an 80's broad, and you can tell she's becoming more undeniably moist for Ratt's rip-roaring, upstairs riffage every minute that goes by. She excuses herself from the table to fulfill her life-long destiny of becoming a skanky groupie. The butler serves the guests some disease-ridden, flea-infested rats, then looks wicked proud of himself. What am I supposed to think at this point? "Haha, stupid rich people, can't even handle some vermin on their dinnerware!" Dudes, I'm like one step above trailer park status, and if anybody put a rodent on my table, even as a joke, I'd put a fist through their sack.

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Before you know it, Ratt's rhythm guitarist smashes through the ceiling and manages to land on the dining table, completely unscathed to perform his part of the solo. How he does this without breaking his legs, or amplifier assistance for that matter, is beyond me. For my own amusement, I'll just picture him doing it without an amp in front of the understandably mortified dinner guests. *dink dink dink*

At what point the young girl loses all her hair and becomes the Bride of Frankenstein on the way up to the attic, I'm not really sure. Nobody's that clumsy. Nevertheless, it is what it is, and she slinks around the band lustily like a weird little freak. The butler gets on his glam gear, and pumps his fists victoriously atop the ravaged dining room table. The traumatized family members and dinner guests, are hopefully out somewhere safe, trying to contact the proper authorities about this random, menacing act of violence and vandalism. 

Also, let's not pretend like the members of Ratt weren't this stinking rich themselves.