Anthrax – Among the Living

I started writing this blog a couple of months ago. But, I started to stall out with what I wanted to say about the memories I had associated with this album. As I write this(Summer 2012), I am experiencing a renewed interest in my comic book collection that was a big part of my life from about 1977-1982.  This summer saw the release of director Christopher Nolan’s 3rd Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises.  Along with this movie, I have been listening to the podcasts of director Kevin Smith(Mallrats, Clerks, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back) Smith is a big fan of comic books and has a weekly podcast devoted to Batman titled “Fatman on Batman”.  On his July 9th podcast, he talks to his longtime friend Walt Flanagan.  One of the events in their Batman “obsession” is this album. As they talk about this album briefly, I found myself nodding my head and thinking about my own recollections of this album.  With that being said, I want to talk about this landmark album from this east coast band of thrashers. 

The summer of 1987 was the last summer I spent living with my parents in Hastings before I moved to Kearney (permanently) to finish my college years. In those days of that summer, I would spend my time off (from mowing lawns and working at Kmart)perusing the record bins in various places. I would go to the pawn shop, the Musicland store in the Imperial Mall and a Budget Records in a newly constructed strip mall with soft-serve yogurt and an Applause Video. I remember finding a used copy(it was actually a store promo) of this next album in that Budget Records store. I would go have a look at this album over and over that summer trying to decide if I really wanted to buy the album that would become one of the most pivotal thrash metal albums of 1987.  I’m talking about Anthrax’s Among The Living.

I have a distinct memory about being very cautious about this purchase. I had seen albums by Anthrax. I knew they were a heavy thrash band and they were probably a loud band. I had become a big fan of Metallica and they were THE thrash band that I measured all others by. Metallica had singled out Anthrax in their “special Thanks” section of the album Master of Puppets.  I had heard a bunch of different thrash stuff from my college friend-Shaun. But, I was still hesitant. Would these guys be of the same caliber (in my mind) as Metallica?  By this time, I would stay up on Saturday nights and watch MTV’s Headbanger’s Ball religiously. I always figured I would catch a cool rare video that wasn’t in regular heavy rotation or one by my favorite lesser known bands. One of those summer Saturday nights, I saw the video for the Anthrax song Indians. It was heavy and intense. The drums start off the song with some kind of tribal intensity. The dual harmony guitars come in then to lead the song into some kind of “old movie Indian” theme. It was fast and slamming. Then, the vocals come in and it’s kind of a cool high vocal that (to me) separated them from the other thrash bands of the time with could be more guttural.  Joey Belladonna sounded like an actual singer with great vocal chops. I liked what I heard. But, I was like many music fans and wondered “what would the other songs sound like?”

So, on a HOT July evening, I walked into that Budget Records store, reeling from the summer heat. I remember taking in the comfort of the store’s air conditioning and bought that copy of Among The Living that had been staring back at me for the past few months. In those days, the 12 inch LP was a great source of entertainment when buying a record. Sometimes a band would fill the inside record sleeve with pictures, lyrics and a whole slew of people and bands in the “special thanks” section.  In those days, I knew that this type of album was VERY HEAVY and not everyone’s favorite. So, I would find time alone to put the album and take it all in. I dropped the needle on the Anthrax album and read through the liner notes on the album sleeve and read as they thanked a bunch of the usual record insiders and fellow thrash bands like Metallica. They even dedicated the album to the memory of Metallica’s bassist Cliff Burton that had died in a bus accident in late 1986. In the long list of “Thank Yous”, they also thanked such comic book icons like Batman “Thanks to Frank Miller and Lynn Varley for recreating the Dark Knight (He Rules) and Judge Dredd “(Sorry Bats…HE RULES…OK?)”. In 1987, Batman and Judge Dredd didn’t have any movie franchises going. There was an underground buzz going about Batman with the 1986 graphic novel called The Dark Knight Returns and Judge Dredd was the comic about a futuristic judge who was and instant judge and jury in one.  This was 2-3 years before Jack Nicholson starred as the Joker and Sylvester Stallone as a laughable Judge Dredd. So, here we had a group of guys in a Heavy Metal band that read comics. I had given up collecting comics around 1982 for more music and rock themed magazines like "Modern Drummer”,“Musician” “Hit Parader” and “Circus”. When you’re a teenage boy that reads comics, the girls don’t exactly flock to you. So, I thought that was really cool and that made the band seem really down-to-earth too.

 

The first track comes on and builds with slow chugging chords and then drummer Charlie Benante slams into the song with a double bass drum barrage that absolutely BLEW ME AWAY!!  I thought “this is faster than anything that Metallica does”  About six months later, I ran into my friend Shaun. I hadn’t seen or talked to Shaun in a long time. I went to see him and when I got there (I believe) he had an Among the Living promotional poster in his apartment. One of the first things he says to me is “Have you heard Anthrax? Don’t they just KICK ASS?” or something along those lines. Of course, I agreed wholeheartedly and I think I said “Man, Charlie Benante kicks Lars Ulrich’s ass on drums!”

The album starts off with the title track about the character of Randall Flagg from the Stephen King novel The Stand.  I think I remember reading about that in the liner notes. But, I had forgotten about it until I started writing this blog. It was slamming and heavy and they were using literary characters. These guys were aggressive and yet well read and intelligent too. Of course, the band had also listed Stephen King in the “thank yous” of the liner notes.

The second track is called Caught in the Mosh.  In 1987, “moshing” was a common event when you went to see a hardcore punk or thrash metal band. But, for any mainstream audience of the day, the term was unknown. I had been educated through various friends (mostly Shaun again).  It basically was an aggressive way of slamming and pushing into each other during an extremely heavy and hardcore concert. So, I felt like I was part of an elite educated club when the lyric would say…

Which one of these words don’t you understand?
WHAT IS IT …..CAUGHT IN THE MOSH!!

Next up, is the track about the comic book character Judge Dredd called I am the Law!  I really had not heard anything about this character. He wasn’t a hero from DC or Marvel comics that I had grown up with. He was actually a character from a British Sci-fi magazine called 2000 A.D. But, the fact that a Metal band had written a song based on a comic book character was very very cool. The album never had any songs about Batman on the album. But, it was obvious they were fans. It would be a couple years later that Warner Brothers would release the Tim Burton Batman movie in 1989 and it wouldn’t be until 1995 when Hollywood Pictures would release a Judge Dredd movie starring “Rocky/Rambo” himself…Sylvester Stallone.   I remember talking with my Metal loving friends how cool it would have been to have had Anthrax do the music for either the Batman movie or the Judge Dredd movie. Alas, they didn’t.

 

Next up, is a song called Efilnikufesin (N.F.L.). After listening to the song, you understand the title completely. N.F.L stands for “Nice F**king Life” Also, take “Efilnikufesin” and spell it backwards..pretty obvious.  After looking back at this album, I can’t remember if I knew or not. But, this song was about John Belushi and his life, addiction and tragic death.

“Wake up dead in a plywood bed six feet from the rest of your life
When you couldn’t see your own dependency….N..F..L…”

Next is Skeletons in the Closet. Looking back, it didn’t seem like anything special. But, it definitely tied the album of songs together for a well flowing album. I believe this track was the last track of the vinyl LP’s side one. So, when I flipped the album over to side two, It started off with the track Indians which is the song that hooked me first. At this point, the listener is now on the 6th track of this album. So far, quite the intense ride for a first time listener. From there, the album slams home with 3 more songs One World, A.D.I/Horror of it All, and Imitation of Life.

A couple years would pass and I would gain a few more friends through my connections at the college radio station and at Dustys Records.  My friend Steve C. bought a video copy of the Anthrax live video Anthrax – Oidivnikufesin N.F.V.  Once again, if you figured out what N.F.L. stood for, you could figure out what the title of the video stood for.  This had to be around 1988-89 or so. At this time, most people had VCR’s. But, how many people had them hooked up to their stereo system?  My Dustys co-hort Bob had just bought a new stereo system and had his VCR hooked up to it. So, we took the Anthrax live concert video over to Bob’s and turned it up.  Most of the Among the Living album is played on this video. This only fueled my excitement for this album. 

In 1988, The band would release their next album State of Euphoria. I remember liking the album. But, it didn’t seem to have the “edge” that Among the Living had. Once again, this was the topic of deep conversation with my music and metal loving friends.  My friend (and future roommate) Matt came to loving Anthrax through the State of Euphoria album and I remember Steve and I telling Matt that he really needed to check out Among the Living.  He eventually did.

In 1990, the band came out with the album Persistence of Time album with a really heavy cover of Joe Jackson’s Got the Time. This would be the last Anthrax I would buy for awhile. My tastes in the early 90’s changed. I was less interested in the Heavy thrash stuff that I had been listening to in the 80’s and was more into “groove” oriented bands and jam bands.  Anthrax had also started to spearhead a new “metal/rap” crossover movement. That had an EP in between Among and Euphoria called I’m the Man which was seemed kind of a rap parody song. While it was fun. It wasn’t my thing. They eventually would record with rap artists Public Enemy with a cover of their song Bring Da Noise. It was definitely not my thing and I passed on that one.

In 1992, lead singer Joey Belladonna was fired from the band and replaced by Armored Saint singer John Bush.  I had been a moderate fan of Armored Saint in the 80’s. There was also many stories told of how Metallica had actually considered John Bush as their vocalist before James Hetfield took on the role of frontman. But, this was not enough for me to welcome Bush into the fold.  I liked Bush’s music with Anthrax. It just wasn’t on my radar of favorite things to listen to.  Bush stayed with the band for another 10 years or so. Then, in 2005-2006, the Among the Living band lineup reunited for a short tour. Belladonna left the band again and then rejoined finally for the band’s 2011 long awaited album Worship Music.  I was actually very excited about this return to the band and the new album of material.  It reminded me of how I felt listening the Among the Living all those years ago. I actually wrote about it in my Listening Habits of 2011 blog.  I was excited to hear the new music. But, it also got me thinking about how I felt in 1987 when I was 20 years old and exploring all kinds of new music.

1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die contributor Joel McIver wrote:

New Yorkers Anthrax hit their artistic, critical, and commercial peak early, with their third full-length album, Among the Living.  A perfect blend of the speed that thrash fans hungered for, crafted tunes of breathtaking unpredictability, and a unique sound.
There is no forgetting the sheer joy of thrash’s peak era – and this album is among the best

On a side note…. I had read Batman: The Dark Knight Returns back in the summer of 1988. It didn’t really resonate with me back then. Perhaps I felt I was too busy in those days going to college classes, working in a record store, working a college radio shift or frequenting the bars on weekends. It just wasn’t something I was excited about.  This summer, I found a renewed interest in everything Batman. So, I checked out a copy of this game-changing graphic novel, quieted my mind and took the whole thing in.  I loved it and was completely engrossed in it too. For its time, it really was a reinvention of the Batman mythos and was very influential in all the Batman related media that would be re-imagined over the past 25+ years. Warner Pictures is getting ready to release a direct-to-DVD animated feature of this graphic novel in the Fall of 2012. I am looking forward to it. I don’t think there’s an Anthrax tie in with this one either.  I don’t mind. I have my memories that connect this album with the Dark Knight….and this is my blog too.