Review Summary: Seasoned metal hands try to take a humorous look at more or less everything.
It used to be a trend that when musicians are trying to inject some comedy into music is they used the singer/songwriter frame as their preferred vehicle. Beat merchants like Beastie Boys and all-around musical chameleons like Ween (who these days seem to prefer country as their main musical source) seemed to be exceptions to the rule. But then, heavy metal seems to be gaining main popularity with musical comedians. The trend probably started with Kiss, who started out as a band/joke in itself, learning to play along the way. Gwar continued the trend, turning itself into an actual ‘serious’ metal band. More or less could be said about both, Tenacious D and The Darkness.
The latter two actually either knew a lot of the metal chops or acquired the licks along the way, and that should be an essential prerequisite with anybody trying to do humor through any kind of musical form - you have to really know the media through which you are trying to send the (humorous) message.
And humor is the message with Coral the Merknight vs. Searantula and their album It Weaves a Web of Metal. As is obvious, the spoof starts right off with the band and album name, the cover… the song titles (how’s “Or Would You Prefer a Rousing Game of Battle Boat Beer Pong? No!? Then Obviously You Have a Hankering for Block Tower Flip Cup!”), let alone the lyrics. First off, the band is composed of obviously seasoned metal hands who decided to have some fun, actually a lot of fun. The band is comprised of Travis robin from “Darkest Hour” and Adon Fanion from “Ghost Ship Octavius”.
Knowing the musical media in which you want to operate is an essential prerequisite for it to have any chance of working, and this guy will easily come up with any heavy metal riff, lick or vocal even barely associated with the genre, with few extras to boot. They certainly know their metal stuff - whether it is the ‘basics’ like in “Videogames > Girlfriends”, growl vocals of “500 + 500 = 1000 miles” or the more progressive oriented material like the closing “Fish Outta Water”. Basically, Coral the Merknight vs. Searantula can do metal and they can do it well, in all shapes and forms.
The question that remains open is what is the quality of the humour they come up with, and there the debate can be opened, and it is a matter whether like in sitcom world, you like when Seinfeld and George are “talking about nothing” and Kramer drops in with a joke “about nothing”. In essence, it runs from silly (“Tragedy”), to not so silly (“Videogames > Girlfriends”), when the duo takes a look at the male teen view of why they stick to video games instead of girls.The part where Coral the Merknight vs. Searantula operate the best is when they do metal spoofs of The Proclaimers (“500 + 500 = 1000 miles”), Dolly Parton (“ScarJoLene”) and particularly “Under The Sea”, when they turn a track from Disney’s “Little Mermaid” into a death metal workout.
Like some forms of metal, It Weaves a Web of Metal, can be an acquired taste, squarely depending on the listener's sense of humor, or maybe the lack of it.
