Call for Contributions

You may recall a while ago I called Atlantean Kodex's The Golden Bough one of the worst albums of 2010. I also noted that the only other review gave it a perfect score. Well, now it has another perfect score.

I don't mean to pick on this guy for disagreeing with me, but what I do want to pick up on is the angle he took. He titled his review "True anti-poser metal at it's [sic] finest". The highlight of the review:

[L]et me say as my title states this is true metal at its finest and not for posers or fans of modern metal.

Since I don't like it, I guess that means I'm a poser.

This kind of mentality is far too prevalent in metal. Each and every band or album is given the thumbs-up or thumbs-down, and if your opinion does not match approved canon, then you're a poser.

Well, I want to do something about it, by giving a voice to others regardless of whether I agree with it.

I want your contributions to this site. As you may already know, I have twins on the way, and they're coming very soon. For the first month or two I won't have enough time to keep the site updated as often as I'd like. So, I'm asking for contributions from others. If you run a blog of your own (on any topic) this is an opportunity to generate traffic and cross-pollinate readership. If you're in a band, this is a chance for exposure. If you don't have the time and/or energy to run a full-time blog, this is a chance for you to talk about something you feel strongly about, without the commitment.

You can write on just about any topic you want, with the following guidelines:

1. Give me something original. Don't plagiarize, and don't submit something you've already posted somewhere else on the Internet.

2. Connect it to metal in some way. (But it doesn't really have to be about metal.)

3. Make it more than simply an introduction of yourself, your blog, or your band. (If you want to talk about your local scene and include how your band fits into it, that's great.) Go straight into the meat of the article without introducing yourself, as I'll make it clear who it was written by and give a little information about you.

4. If you can, write something I would never write myself. Maybe you could talk about a topic I don't know anything about, like slam death or hardcore. Perhaps you'll want to write on a topic I never do, or maybe you want to extol the virtues of hair metal. If you're reviewing an album, you may want to tear down something I loved or build up something I hated.

5. Don't promote illegal activity or take a stance that's likely to get the site monitored by the authorities.

6. No Christ-bashing.

7. If the article is image- or video-intensive, be sure I can identify which image/video goes where, since I'll be doing the formatting.

8. Submit it to me at kelly [dot] hoffart [at] gmail [dot] com with the subject line "FMA" or "Full Metal Attorney". Include a little information about how you'd like to be identified, such as a link and/or some information about yourself.

9. This is by no means an absolute deadline, but try to have it to me by Monday, June 13.