Soft Cotton, Slim-Fit, Fruity Pebbles Band Shirts

You all look like you caught Rainbow the Clown in a money shot sort of mood.

Way back in the summer of 2010, Shane Blay, lead chirpy riff player for Texas Christian douchecore outfit, Oh, Sleeper wrote an "eye-opening accounting" of how you don't actually make any fucking money when you're a touring musician. (Gasp!) He got so in-depth breaking down the costs and profits of touring in a van, that you'd think he wrote this under the impression that most of us didn't already realize performing metal made zero fiscal sense whatsoever. Regardless, I still think it's really worth a read. Especially for those of you young hopefuls, still out there with your B.C Rich guitars, playing your hearts out in the basements of the world, thinking you're ever going to amount to shit.

While there were a lot of noteworthy price points to consider in Blay's comment, which was originally posted during a debate about the subject on a Metal Sucks article; there was one particular cost and explanation of said cost for the members of Oh, Sleeper, that stuck out to me like a sore butt:

 "Merchandise is bough(t), printed, and shipped on the band(')s dollar. We print most (of) our shirts on American Apparel. They obviously offer the best fitting shirts, and kids are smart about looking good now(a)days. They won(')t sell unless you have slim fitting, soft shirts. The demand for better quality shirts from bands is higher (than it has ever been) in (the) last few years. 


 American Apparel shirts are very pricey to print. usually $7.50 a shirt. More for v-necks, 3/4 sleeve shirts, etc."


Alright fellas. Let's not say it all at once.

Two years is a long time, and I hope since that writing, Oh, Sleeper has made a big enough name for themselves to maintain a profitable enough line of v-neck shirts. (I'd be devastated otherwise.) So what's the point I'm trying to make here? Well, I focus so much on Oh, Sleeper's choice of merchandise not only because it solidly defines so well the pussy-face attitude of the current false metal scene, (gasp, you wouldn't catch me dead in one of those non-slim fitting, non-soft, non-American Apparel t-shirts!) but it also brings to light a very clear Violation in terms of heavy metal attire. I'm not exactly sure why I failed to bring it up sooner. I don't think you can draw a harder line in the sand between them and us, than by taking a good look at their merch in comparison to our merch.

First we'll take a look at the fake metal scenester's preference in color scheme:

Have you ever sat back and relaxed while you watched your pregnant wife or girlfriend painstakingly paint your future baby's room? It's always these light, soft, warm colors of green, pink, blue or yellow that are meant to look peaceful and promote harmony or some shit. As if that little ball of screaming, wriggling, shitting nerves she'll force out of her cunt is going to recognize or appreciate any of that fucking crap. For the first 3 years it will be too dumb to even know if it was aborted or not, and she's already trying to paint its room a color to its liking. Women...

Hey babe, I think you missed a spot.
Also, I hope you plan on picking all this shit up. 

Fake metal bands love to apply the same sort of cutesy, baby room color splash to their own merchandise. The color palette of an Emmure t-shirt also looks as if it were picked out by an overpaid, middle-aged, new mother with too much god damn money and time on her hands. Indeed, practically every shirt that a chug-chug riffing buttcore band prints these days, always looks like the same gag-inducing mess of bright blues, greens, yellows, purples and pinks. To add insult to injury, these offensive colors are often times, printed onto t-shirts that are not black. And therefore, not fucking metal. Soft colors for soft music.

Besides the gummy bear vomit coloration of every band shirt, here are some other key attributes you should look out for when properly identifying a poseur's favorite garb:

1. Inconsistent Band Logos

A band's logo is its most sacred emblem. It can define a band's genre and style with nothing more than a glance. The band logo is something pure, something that a band must be forever associated with, and there can only be one. How else would we as fans know what to draw on our notebooks, instead of paying attention to our overpaid, know-nothing professors? Overkill has had the same exact logo for 32 years and it will always look as brutal on the bathroom stall as it did yesterday. As we all know by now, however, scenesters hold nothing sacred. The holiest of musical genres is nothing more than their plaything, to be desecrated and fouled by their false ideals and musical atrocities. Band logos mean nothing to them, and they allow themselves to be as creative as they want in how the band's name is written on every different piece of merch. If only they could be this creative when it came to writing their shitty, cookie-cutter music...

2. Cartoony Artwork

Even if the picture on the band shirt happens to feature brutal imagery in concept (sharks, zombies, skulls, general monstrosities), these attempts at brutality are instantaneously voided when drawn to look like as if they belong in another ADHD-fueled episode of Adventure Time. Core kids, regardless of age or education, will always have the brains of children. The strength of this fact is only highlighted more by their preference for t-shirt images that belong in coloring books. Grow up and get a fucking job. 

3. This Has Nothing to Do with Your Music

After seeing this image, I listened to all of Attack Attack!'s albums in their entirety to see if I could find the song about an alien fighting a pack of wolves, because a song like that just has to be worth listening to. What I got instead was a whole lot of dick hurt feelings about a nameless ex-girlfriend (per usual), and a bunch of house music mixed with "metal" meant for people with hair in their eyes. I almost lost all hope in music and killed myself there on the spot. I took the 12-gauge out of my mouth, only when I realized how much some Norwegian high-schooler would really appreciate reading this article about how much I hate the stuff that other people wear. 

With all wars, knowing your enemy is crucial to your victory. The neverending battle against fake metal is certainly no exception. The good news for us is that it's not difficult to understand scene kids. They are about as one-dimensional as a person can get. The way their merchandise is designed may seem so bizarre, so unusual, so plain wrong and depraved, that good metalheads such as you and I might not ever want to understand it. Want to or not, the explanation all comes down to one simple concept: Irony. Yes, there's that word again. Literally every action a scenester takes in his or her life is done to be as ironic as possible. They are all fully conscious of the fact that their clothing, accessories, hair, music and overall demeanor is all completely fucking backwards and retarded. However, they think it's cool and edgy to dress themselves like they have down syndrome, and as we all know, being cool is the only thing that matters.

For example, regardless of how weak their music sounds to people with good taste, The Devil Wears Prada is convinced that their music is actually dark and heavy in some form or another. I know, it's totally batshit, but they're also devout Christians with tattoos, so they aren't the type to listen to reason. Heavy, dark music has always been associated with dark imagery, as any perusal through a worthy collection of metal album covers will reveal to you. In order to maintain their scenester allegiance to all things ironic, The Devil Wears Prada sells band shirts covered in neon-pink, cartoony images that have nothing to do with their music's subject matter. They do it solely because it's the opposite of what's expected from a band of their type. "Hey guys, we're a metal band, right? Wouldn't it be so fucking hilarious if we put out a t-shirt of a bright yellow cartoon monster vomiting neon pink tentacles and crying seafoam green?!" This is, without a doubt, the exact thought process of every metalcore band who prints a shirt like this.

Disclaimer: Civilized society frowns upon the act of hitting women, and so too will a jury of your peers. :(

The major paradox here is that baby blue band shirts with pink writing and cartoon characters are now the generally accepted norm for fake metal bands. Since it has become the expectation of their genre, it isn't ironic anymore, and therefore not cool. Due to the fact that scenesters have broken reality in such a way that irony itself is no longer ironic, there is literally nothing they can do to be cool kids anymore. This will cause their entire musical genre and following to deteriorate from the inside out. We have already won, my brothers. Our enemy being solely responsible for their own miserable defeat. I just can't wait until they all finally realize it, so all the bands similar to Like Moths to Flames stop selling albums and break up. 

So, with the candy-coated color scheme explained, now all that's left to consider is the cut and fabric of these t-shirts. As Shane Blay pointed out at the beginning of this post, if you're a band trying to sell merch, your stuff "wont sell unless you have slim fitting, soft shirts." Really? It won't? How about we ask Iron Maiden if they've had any luck selling some of their heavy cotton, regular fitting t-shirts lately?

Now sold in soft, extra soft, baby soft, and Miss May I fan!

Call it speculation, but there must be some major reason that all scene kids require of their favorite bands to only print t-shirts on the lightest, airiest, snuggliest, pillowy-softest cotton, ordered direct from American Apparel for top dollar. This is a wild guess, but is it safe to jump to the conclusion that you're just a bunch of pussies? Now, when I say a "bunch of pussies" I'm not talking about all of you. I'm only talking about just one of you. You yourself are a bunch of pussies. What should be a typical human epidermis, is instead replaced with this weak organic tissue stretched thin over your whole body, that can only be best described as a million tiny vaginas, raw and irritated as if fresh from a heavy period flow. The only way of relieving said irritation, is the numbing feeling provided by a tattoo needle drawing Japanese fish and flowers all over your skinny ass. You also need to wear fabrics that are as soft as possible, so as not to further irritate your freakish vaginal shell.

How exactly could a person's skin get so sensitive and frail? Perhaps it was from robbing your body of the precious protein it required, by making it suffer through a strictly vegan diet? Maybe all this exposure to weak music has taken a physical toll on your form, transforming you into a weak-skinned person? I guess we'll never really know for sure. This much I definitely can tell you: If you turn your nose up at regular, stiff cotton band shirts, in favor of cuddly, cushiony, fluffy, mushy, over-sized infant pajama t-shirts, then you're a little bitch.

If a fake metal band shirt isn't colored like a fruit roll-up or girl panties soft, then it will almost always be slim-fit. A slim-fitting t-shirt is definitely a necessity if your entire audience is comprised of either lanky, spaghetti-armed, 90-lb weaklings, or shameless attention whores whose curves have to be shown off for personal validation. 

Cute blouse, queef.

Instead of having straight sides and room for your body to breathe and flow with man-sweat, slim-fit shirts are specially stitched to tightly cling to every nook, corner and cranny of your torso. This cut is ideal for pencil-necked cunts who are too ashamed of how a proper band shirt looks like a giant pancho on them, hanging loosely off of their weak, meager frames. Slim-fit attire simply has no place within the brutal realm of us true metal masters. Our t-shirts require room for our potentially Manowar-sized moshing muscles, or (more likely) our savage beer guts. My beer gut alone would tear any slim-fit shirt asunder, regardless of its sizing, leaving it in tatters strewn across the ground. As if Hulkamania just freshly ran wild on it. Whether or not aforementioned gut was more attributed to a love of cake and a lack of regular exercise, rather than straight beer drinking, should not undermine its manliness or metalocity.

With that said, let us speak of how a band shirt should be:

First and foremost, no metal dude worth his iron would ever give two lily-shits about the comfort and softness of his band shirt. Even if manufacturers were to start using a fabric woven with reinforced concrete; so long as our favorite bands were featured on the shirts, we would still fucking wear them. Shit, I think we'd be way more likely to wear them... All kidding aside, a proper band tee is made of 100% stiff, black cotton. The stiffer the better, as these shirts are a means to protect us from the elements and our fellow moshers. Should your shirt naturally soften and fade over time from washing and wearing, so be it. At least your fabric's softness is the result of your own valiant efforts and illustrious lifestyle. It wasn't specially prepared that way beforehand, specifically for comfort-craving, entitled little cunts with too much of their parent's money to blow on "looking good now days". (sic) 

Let it be known that every band shall print their logos and artwork on a t-shirt of the purest color black. Not pre-faded black, not gray, not white, BLACK. Just like how you take your coffee if you're not a pussy. The more a band shirt is void of bright colors, the better. Band tees printed on t-shirts of colors other than black are an abomination. A black t-shirt is God; you shall have no other false color t-shirts before it. This divine truth applies to all, regardless of a band's supposed metalocity. No tolerance, no exceptions. 

The band name on your merch shall be written in your predetermined, official logo. You shall not write your band name in a generic running blood/slime font, hardcore-style jersey font, nor make it look like the title of a shitty B horror flick, nor write it in a whacky, swirly cursive type. If any of that describes how your band logo actually looks, fuck you, break up. Otherwise, the logo will appear on your t-shirts how it always has been and always will be; the same one logo you print on your albums, have featured in magazines, and share on your web page and social networking profiles. 

Logo consistency seems pretty minor, but I believe is key to your band's successful self-promotion. If I wore a green t-shirt with a cursive lower-case "s" on it, nobody would jump to the conclusion right away that it was a special kind of Superman shirt. I don't tell you this just because I have a stick up my ass about everything (guilty). I say it for your band's own benefit. If you use the same logo at all times, it will make your merch that much more easily recognizable. If I saw five dudes walking down a hall, side-by-side, all wearing different Bring Me The Horizon shirts, it would be really difficult for me to tell at first. They'd have to be close enough to see the whites of their eyes/purple of their highlights before I could even confirm it. I hard press you to have the same issue looking at five dudes all wearing Saxon shirts. Also, the Saxon fans probably won't be holding hands. No guarantee for the BMTH buddies...

Moral of the story, if a guy sees one Brymir shirt, he's gonna know it right away when he spots another one. This means it is more likely he will become curious about the band, check them out, and potentially become a fan himself. From there, he may buy his own shirt, with that same exact logo, and the cycle could repeat with someone new. Gas money for touring is precious, so you might as well do everything you possibly can as a band to try and make it for yourself.

Finally, all original artwork featured on your band shirts must be prepared by exceptionally talented artists, using darker shades of colors, and look either incredibly badass, gory, or both. True metal is a brutal, serious genre, only to be represented by imagery that is equally brutal and to be taken as seriously. If your band shirt features artwork of a dragon, that dragon should look majestic and fierce. The light of its fire breath should shimmer against its scaly armor as the village folk desperately flee, or a champion stands against it defiantly. What you shouldn't do, is have it be a neon green, cartoon dragon wearing shutter shades and a flat-brimmed cap, holding a PBR in its claws and giving the peace sign.

If you put that on a band shirt, I will bow and arrow you in the fucking mouth.

No compromises.

So, my fellow defenders of the faith; let us celebrate our toughness and acceptance of heavy black cotton, epic band shirt imagery, and defiance in the face of modern day fashion! These things are staples of our true metalocity, and a major contrast that sets us apart from all things false and scenester. It was well overdue for a mention on this blog, and I'm happy to finally address it properly. Raise your horns in protest, brothers! Let the regular-fitting sleeves of your dark black t-shirts dangle freely from beneath your raised arms! Praise be to our aegis of Anvil and Gildan variety, and cross our arms in disapproval at the hipster cloth of American Apparel and others like it. The poseurs shall destroy themselves, caught in a paradox of their own ironic tendencies, and we are to rejoice at their defeat.

There will be cake and beer at my place. 

 - Brenocide \,,/