Here’s a day (or two weeks, I don’t know how badly this tape was edited) in the life of Lutte Internationale, better known to English-speaking people as International Wrestling. Located in Montreal, one of the traditional hotbeds of Canadian wrestling, International Wrestling was strong enough in Canada to be syndicated on a semi-national basis.

In 1986, International Wrestling was just winding down – it had briefly aligned itself with the WWF a year earlier and was being gouged for talent by that promotion. Things hadn’t become so desperate yet that Abdullah the Butcher and assorted talents from Puerto Rico’s World Wrestling Council would literally bleed International Wrestling to death. Even from watching this tape, I could tell that the lights were being turned off on the promotion. “New” talents I didn’t recognize were more prevalent than wrestlers I’d actually heard of. It’s not hard to spot when the talent pool is being drained.

Dino Bravo was perpetually the golden boy of International Wrestling. It’s impossible to talk about wrestling in Montreal without mentioning Bravo – during the time International Wrestling was subsumed by the WWF, his title became the WWF Canadian Championship. Bravo was co-promoter of International Wrestling with Gino Brito Sr. and Rick Martel, so he had a steady gig.

That still doesn’t excuse him from delivering this shitty promo hyping his match against The Great Samu. He stumbles through his promo points and makes many malapropisms. The VHS recording cuts out before Bravo finishes his promo, which is a blessing. I’m not sure how good Bravo matches of this era are, but if all his promos were like this I’m not surprised his face run in the WWF was a failure. It should be noted that this is before Bravo dyed his hair and hit the steroids heavily, so he still had some wrestling skill back in 1986.

You might not be familiar with Alofa the Polynesian Prince, but wrestling fans have seen him before. That’s right, this was Solofa Fatu, Jr. (d/b/a Kishi, formerly Rikishi) before he got fat and burned his Stinkface into the minds of unwilling wrestling fans everywhere. Eventually he became one half of the Samoan Swat Team. Some of you might have tried to forget him as The Sultan and/or Making a Difference Fatu. Here Alofa stumbles through his promo as seems to be the norm for International Wrestling, but at least he shows enthusiasm. He has a squash match on the tape I fast-forwarded through watched.

Eddie “The Brain” Creatchman isn’t too bad as heel managers go. In fact, he’s considered one of Canada’s greats. He did manage The Sheik and Abdullah the Butcher, so he had to be doing something right. Here he’s managing Sheik Ali, a white person (in this case, New Brunswick’s “Big” Stephen Petitpas) magically turned Arab via Middle Eastern garb and some facial hair. He’s no Makhan Singh, but few people are.

According to Slam! Wrestling Petitpas’ wrestling wasn’t bad. Why Creatchman speaks for him here is beyond me, unless the audience is supposed to believe Sheik Ali is really Arab and can’t speak English. Wrestling expects you to disbelieve 95% of the time, but I have to wonder how many people were fooled. Sheik Ali’s squash match just flew by me via the magic of fast-forwarding.

Bill and Scott Irwin crap on Tom Zenk and Dan Kroffat (Bill Irwin pronounces Kroffat’s last name Crawford for some reason), while Steve Strong puts down Rick Martel. Strong is surprisingly good on the mic, which makes me wonder why he didn’t become more well-known than he is. Creatchman promoted the Irwin brothers, since International Wrestling needed at least one manager to lean its heel wrestlers on.

Bill and Scott Irwin both had successful careers, especially in World Class Championship Wrestling. Bill would gain infamy in the WWF as The Goon, while Scott Irwin died of a brain tumour in 1987. Scott was a one-time NWA National Heavyweight Champion and once held one half of the WWWF Tag Team Championships, while Bill had his share of upper-card titles.

The match I saw on the tape was for the Canadian International Tag Team Championships against Zenk and Kroffat. It was actually decent, but seeing it twice was somewhat redundant. For those interested, the match ends when a masked Scott Irwin beats on Zenk in the middle of the Z-Man’s sleeper hold on Bill Irwin. The ensuing post-match run-ins are inevitable, but a feud is advanced and money is made. It’s hard to demand much more than that.

Here’s a not-very-good promo by Ron Ritchie. The announcer tries to set up Ron Ritchie as an up-and-comer, although he had been wrestling since 1978 and was only now starting to get career pushes. In fact, Ritchie was biding his time in 1986 between International Wrestling and Stampede Wrestling. Here Ritchie bigs up the importance of the Canadian International Heavyweight Championship, establishing his credentials in hopes of a good run in International Wrestling.

Ritchie’s greatest achievement was winning Stampede Wrestling’s North American Heavyweight Title, a feat only accomplished by five wrestlers that year. This isn’t a joke meant to denigrate Ritchie. In fact, this isn’t a joke; Stampede Wrestling was quite fond of short title runs. Steve Strong, under his real name of Steve DiSalvo, even beat Ritchie for the North American belt before flipping it to Bad News Allen a week later. Later DiSalvo became The Minotaur in WCW. *cough*

Samula Anoa’i was the other half of the Samoan Swat Team, but at this point in his career – I assume the tape is from June 1986 – he was challenging for the Canadian International Heavyweight Championship as The Great Samu. Here, the announcer is trying to fight Janet Jackson’s “Nasty” and failing. I know International Wrestling didn’t have the professionalism of WWF programming, and I don’t expect that from independent promotions of the 1980s. All the same, how hard is it to operate a mixing board? I also doubt International Wrestling cleared that sample, but at least the promotion is consistent with 1980s trends.

I don’t know if segments from two shows were spliced together on my tape or not, but it cuts to a backstage celebration. The Great Samu has won the Canadian International Heavyweight Championship. More of Janet Jackson’s “Nasty” is cued, since when I think Janet Jackson I think a relatively obscure Samoan wrestler. I imagine this is Samula Anoa’i's most significant heavyweight title win. As a special bonus, here’s a Samu/Bravo match where Samu is defending his title against Bravo. From the little I saw of Samu, he looked fairly good.

I should note that “Pretty Boy” Floyd Creatchman, Eddie Creatchman’s son and a fairly good manager in his own right, is speaking with Samu during the backstage segment. Unlike with “The Brain” and Sheik Ali, Samu is allowed to speak – not that he needs to say much with “Pretty Boy” Floyd speaking for him.

This clip marks a turning point in International Wrestling history. Bravo would not win the title back from Samu, and Samu dropped the belt in a few months’ time to “Dr. D” David Schults. By 1987 another regional promotion fell victim to the WWF’s North American expansion, as most of them did. Standard reasons are given for International Wrestling’s demise – not enough money made, not enough talent, the WWF stole everyone worth a damn – but I guess International Wrestling left with a bit more dignity than, say, the AWA or Stampede Wrestling.

This tape hasn’t made me want to seek out more International Wrestling right away, but it hasn’t turned me completely off the promotion. I will say this – if I have to watch another bad Dino Bravo promo within the next five years, it’ll be too soon.

One of the things I’ve become more into now when I hit thrift stores is buying random VHS tapes to see what is on them. Mind you, I don’t buy a lot of tapes – there are hundreds of TV rebroadcasts of films like Iron Eagle III and The Money Pit out there, and who’s that desperate for Iron Eagle III? I tend to go for mystery tapes with vague labelling in hopes of finding pro wrestling and/or random broadcasts from the 1980s.

On one of these tapes, I was successful in finding 1986 broadcasts of both WWF Wrestling and International Wrestling. The WWF Wrestling show came from Hamilton’s CHCH, at that time one of Canada’s most well-known independent stations. International Wrestling could be seen on another well-known independent, Toronto’s CityTV.

CHCH doesn’t exist in its original form anymore. CityTV is still around, but its glory days have long since passed. International Wrestling (a/k/a Lutte Internationale – it did emanate from Montreal) died in 1987. The WWE, however, still airs jobber matches and continues to employ the Iron Sheik in some capacity. Some things never change, even when they need to.

The first match features everyone’s favourite 1980s jobbers José Luis Rivera and Leaping Lanny Poffo against…King Kong Bundy and Big John Studd. Rivera and Poffo are fucked.

Poffo reads one of his famous poems. He hopes that Andre the Giant slams Bundy and Studd like a feather. Only Hulk Hogan and Andre were allowed to slam the “unslammable” main-eventers back in 1986, so you can guess the outcome of this match without using one brain cell.

What’s to say about the match itself? Bundy and Studd beat the crap out of their opponents – this is WWF TV formula, after all. At least the audience gets to hear great Gorilla Monsoon/Bobby Heenan banter. There are Hulk Hogan chants for some reason, even though Poffo and Rivera have been established as jobbers and thus not important enough to rate a run-in by ol’ Fu Manchu.

Here’s the Junkyard Dog promoting a match at Maple Leaf Gardens. Sylvester Ritter goes through the gotta-keep-fighting spiel, puts over a match between “Macho Man” Randy Savage and Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat and bigs up a Dan Spivey/Mike Rotunda tag team. Savage and Steamboat would go on to make lots of money, Spivey and Rotunda would not and JYD would continue midcarding for a few more years. That’s not a slight on JYD – it’s hard not to like the man who grabbed them cakes, but Hogan was Vince McMahon’s cash cow for almost a decade.

The Macho Man puts over a King of the Ring tournament – crucially, not the official one – as he sells himself to Hamilton fans watching him on CHCH. Savage ohhh yeahs through his promo as he talks about some of the people in the tournament – Tony Atlas, the Rougeau Brothers, Mike Rotunda, Dan Spivey and himself, among others. You may notice a few seconds of silence during his promo, probably caused by someone being fired from or leaving the WWF. I’m not a good lip reader, so I don’t know who left. This is a standard Macho Man promo, but Macho Man promos are always entertaining.

Nikolai Volkoff (singing the Russian national anthem) and The Iron Sheik face off against the Marcus Brothers in another squash match, not that you couldn’t see this coming from a mile away. Are these matches entertaining to watch? Of course not – one of the teams is local, so obviously they have no chance of winning against the former WWF Tag Team Champions. Frankly, I just fast-forward through this match like I do all the other squash matches on the tape.

BONUS! This commercial for Fruit Fantasy is a bit homoerotic. It’s not meant to be, but what to make of lyrics like “whipping up the nectar” and “chomping the strawberry/nibbling the kiwi/munching the mango/biting the berries” sung in a breathy Caribbean style? Yeah, nothing suggestive in those descriptions.

For those ignoring the possible double entendres, there’s the black waiter in a white suit serving up this Fruit Fantasy while the Caribbean singer exhorts us to “taste the reality.” Fruit Fantasy, it should be noted, is a generic-looking frozen treat. Reading too much into twenty-two-year-old commercials is fun.

Stay tuned for International Wrestling action in my next post! Dino Bravo! A skinny Rikishi! Uhh…more jobber matches! All this and The Great Samu are coming your way! Don’t miss it!

The way I write articles for this site is ridiculous sometimes. When I compiled clips from Can I Do It…Til I Need Glasses? for this article about three months ago, I hadn’t yet learned that CodeRed was giving this film a May DVD release. Now my Media Home Entertainment VHS is obsolete. I know, declaring now that VHS is obsolete, I’m such a card.

Can I Do It…Til I Need Glasses? is the sequel to If You Don’t Stop It…You’ll Go Blind!!!, both films having thrown their diaphragms into the sketch-comedy film sweepstakes of the 1970s. This trend spawned Kentucky Fried Movie, Loose Shoes, The Groove Tube and Tunnelvision, but Can I Do It… almost seems like a film from a different era. Basically, it’s Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In with added naked ladies. Oh, and dirty jokes. This film aims for the highbrow.

Can I Do It…Til I Need Glasses? starts with a man in a bird suit initiating sex with a woman, I assume. The VHS tape starts the film in progress as early-1980s videotapes often do, so I’m lost as to what the bird suit signifies. Once the audience gets warmed up for Best Burlesque Jokes of 1928, it’s time for the opening credits and the catchy theme song. The theme is two-and-a-half minutes long, since Can I Do It… is 73 minutes long and time needs to be filled somewhere.

“Story Lady with Aunt Gloria” features the story of Little Red Riding Hood, who is pursued by a wolf as expected. The wolf announces that he’s going to eat her, and you can figure out the rest.

This is actually one of the better jokes Can I Do It…Til I Need Glasses? dramatizes. It’s either a good or bad thing depending on one’s tolerance to burlesque humour. Frankly, Can I Do It… blew its load by featuring one of its best jokes this early in the film.

Did you know Can I Do It…Til I Need Glasses? features parodies? Here’s The Lone Stranger and Pronto to prove it to you. The Lone Stranger gets bit on the trouser snake by a rattlesnake. Pronto runs like wind to doctor (all natives in this film speak broken English, it heap established cliché) only to find out that he must suck poison from wound.

If you believe the IMDb comments, there are three “Lone Stranger and Pronto” segments, two of them ending in the same punchline and the third ending with the Lone Stranger’s bandaged dick out of his pants. Long time, many moons, noooo choctaw.

A standard frog prince, cursed by the Wicked Witch of Encino, convinces a woman to kiss him. The kisses don’t help lift the curse, and it’d spoil the joke to reveal what the frog prince really wants.

The frog wears a collar and bow tie, since that is what all frog princes wear in their amphibian forms. He also claims to live on a beach eating flies, although he’s roughly human-sized and capable of turning on stupid women. Seems to me like the frog is playing a confidence game. Dirty, dirty frog.

Can I Do It…‘s main claim to fame is that it featured Robin Williams before he became famous for both Mork & Mindy and his cocaine-fueled comedy act. Williams appeared on the Laugh-In revival around this time, but no one counts that. Williams’ footage didn’t make the cut the first time around, but fame has a funny way of causing people to cash in on a trend.

Williams doesn’t do much in this film, certainly not enough that he needs glasses or is in danger of going blind. This sketch has him in a courtroom questioning “Mrs. Frisby.” Turns out Mrs. Frisby is just a sex fiend and not a widowed field mouse with a pneumonia-stricken son, so it’s not much of a joke. For this and another sketch, Williams received priority billing when Can I Do It… was re-released in 1979.

A native American warrior named Chief Bowels (of the Farkakte Indians, since all natives are Jewish) is being evicted from his all-weather teepee, but Bowels doesn’t want to evacuate his ancestral home. If you think it’s a spoiler that this leads to “Bowels No Move” jokes, you’re just fooling yourself. This is the sort of joke that Jackie Martling tells in about thirty seconds, laughs to himself about, and then abandons for a Dirty Johnny joke.

More Robin Williams. Here the joke is that a gynecologist hangs a tooth over his office door. Williams plays the guy mistaking him for a dentist. If these were the only two scenes Williams appeared in, what was the point of wasting him like this? Even the end-of-joke music stings suck! What gives?

Here’s a joke that I think Jackie Martling “stole” (as if it’s possible to steal generic dirty jokes in the first place) for 1984′s The Only Dirty Joke Book. Compare the clip to Jackie the Joke Man’s version:

See what Martling does? He doesn’t belabor the point. The punchline is tighter and Martling actually admits how shitty the joke is. He also throws in Paul Reiser and Andrew “Dice” Clay references, which for 1984 is rather prescient. He improves on the joke. This is one of the worse jokes in Martling’s book, which should say something.

Another “Story Lady with Aunt Gloria” segment features Irving the sperm’s bid to enter the egg and become a baby. The sperm trains harder than anyone, focusing on his goal. The ending is trite – his efforts were wasted on a blowjob, so the best Irving could hope for is to become a mouth baby. The build-up to the joke is better than usual, though.

I imagine I come across as hating the hell out of Can I Do It…Til I Need Glasses? I don’t. Compared to, say, the average Andy Milligan film, Can I Do It… knows what it is and what goals it wants to reach. It’s just that I’m familiar with Jackie Martling – not that I’m a fanboy, I just prefer his retelling of dirty jokes to this film. In lieu of a proper ending to this article or me Ctrl-C and Ctrl-Ving “HOWARD STERN’S PENIS BABA BOOEY” thirty times, here’s more F. Jackie at work. Enjoy!

Previously on Fist of Fear, Touch of Death, “Bruce Lee” was having trouble dealing with his film family. His film brother and film parents could not come to terms with “Lee” being karate crazy. Meanwhile, a barely related series of flashbacks saw one of “Lee’s” ancestors plying his trade as a Chinese samurai. Great-grandfather “Lee’s” flashbacks are in colour because people had more exciting lives in those days. They flew through the air and shit!

Bruce Lee’s “father” is one of many reasons to see Fist of Fear… He never fails to be entertaining, whether he’s outing a teenaged girl as a slut or being insulting to his wife. Lee’s “father” also doesn’t do what his woman wants him to, acting like a Chinese Archie Bunker. In reality, Lee’s father was a Cantonese opera star and introduced Bruce Lee to both martial arts and acting, but facts have no place in a Bruceploitation picture. Eventually, “Bruce” runs away and manifest destiny reveals itself.

The train derails completely when “Bruce Lee” goes to Hollywood to try his luck as an actor. Even if Fist of Fear… is a complete pisstake of “documentaries” like The Real Bruce Lee, the humour is firmly in Bizarro World territory. Don’t believe me? “Bruce Lee” had no luck finding an acting job before a Hollywood producer placed him in a low-budget Chinese film, or something. I don’t know, Fist of Fear… stopped making sense long before this point. Lee actually spent a few years in the American entertainment system before going back to Hong Kong to work for Golden Harvest. Either Matthew Mallinson and Ron Harvey did absolutely no research on this film or they were purposely trying to get everything wrong to amuse themselves.

Back to “Bruce Lee’s film debut,” a clip of a guy jumping off a roof. That one image – which has become the URBMN masthead, it’s so etched in my mind – underlines the bizarre nature of the film. Is that supposed to be a joke? Were viewers set up by an overlong splicing of two Asian films for a three-second punchline? Fist of Fear… is full of these non sequiturs.

We’re now at the Green Hornet/Bill Louie segment of the film, where Louie wears the Kato outfit but forgets to shave that moustache of his. Fake Kato’s enemies are gangbangers and they round up their intended victims, two girls jogging. What follows is the least convincing rape scene ever – both a gangbanger and a victim have their clothes on – and Bill Louie beats the gangbangers up for their troubles. Naturally, the gangbangers are shitting bricks over Louie cosplaying Kato, regrouping with weapons but without success. Louie winds up saving the day, which should be obvious to anyone with or without a pulse.

Aaron Banks introduced Fist of Fear… by intimating that the winner of a fight between Louis Neglia and John “Cyclone” Flood would become the next Bruce Lee. He also says during the film that Bruce Lee was murdered by the Touch of Death, since cerebral edema isn’t as fun to exploit. Banks is known in New York for his karate school and has quite a history behind him. Banks still seems like a shameless promoter as “Bruce Lee” extols the virtues of his promotional skills.

Speaking of shilling, Fist of Fear… is a long-form commercial for Banks’ “Oriental World of Self-Defense” show, as that’s what Mallinson is actually filming. Teruyuki Higa and Richard Barathy do some demonstrations. Louis Neglia and “Cyclone” Flood fight an uneventful kickboxing match, with Neglia winning in the second round via a kick to Flood’s head. No matter how good Neglia or Flood were back then, Fist of Fear… cheapens both them and Banks’ show by using Bruce Lee to bait-and-switch casual martial arts fans. Way to go, Banks – you’ve undercut your own promotional strategy! Good job!

The film ends as Adolph Caesar prefigures the Ric Flair “to be the man you gotta beat the man” speech. See, you can never be Bruce Lee since he’s dead and never lost an official fight. Rarely does a film outright tell you you’ve wasted your time watching it, but that’s what Fist of Fear… does here. The only person exiting Fist of Fear… with any dignity is Ron Van Clief, whose appearances are limited to chasing off a street gang and pointing out that Bruce Lee should never be imitated. Adolph Caesar quotes Clief and exits the now-empty arena as Fist of Fear, Touch of Death passes into budget-DVD limbo, still holding a place in the bowels of all who watch it.

This is the first of a series of articles (I hope) to point out the fact that I’m still alive. To put it mildly, URBMN has become a ghost town of articles for a year or so. Something needs to be done about my lack of interest in updating my own site. To that end, I’m posting a few multimedia-intensive articles based on films I have on DVD and VHS. I own a lot of crap, and I want to share that crap with you – anything to resuscitate this corpse.

Fist of Fear, Touch of Death (1980) is not like any other Bruce Lee documentary out there. In fact, it’s not much of a documentary, or even that coherent a film. The presence of bad comedy, what-the-hell moments and Fred Williamson playing comic relief makes me wonder how serious this “documentary” really was. Sure, Fist of Fear… shits on the memory of Bruce Lee, but a running joke about Williamson looking like Harry Belafonte? The only thing Fist of Fear… used the touch of death on is competent filmmaking, and that’s why I like the film so much.

The film is supposed to be set at Madison Square Garden during the “1979 World Karate Championships.” The film is actually set at the Felt Forum (now the WaMu Theater) at Madison Square Garden, so that’s technically true. Adolph Caesar, a few years before his Oscar nomination for A Soldier’s Story, reads stiffly from a cue card while pretending to be a TV sports anchorman. Caesar still turns in the film’s strongest performance.

Adolph Caesar introduces footage of “last year’s competition” as Bill Louie comically kicks some guy in the nuts. Without warning, he pulls the guy’s eyes out of their sockets and throws them to the audience. This out-of-left-field joke surprised the hell out of me when I first saw it. Fist of Fear… is Matthew Mallinson and Ron Harvey’s only writing credits according to IMDb, and I can’t say I’m surprised due to their rather esoteric ideas about “humour.”

We’re back to the smooth tones of Adolph Caesar’s voice as he interviews “Bruce Lee.” “Lee” sounds a lot like Brent Spiner as sepia-toned footage of Lee is poorly mixed with sepia-toned footage of Caesar. Wikipedia claims that the footage of Lee is actually from the 1971-72 ABC show Longstreet. You can hear the awkward pauses as Caesar dryly phones it in for a paycheque. Caesar deserved better roles than this, but at least he isn’t playing a slave or a butler.

More comedic martial arts footage is played, this time a petite woman tossing a fat black man over her head. Poor dubbing is used to point out that the obese man is just that, since calling him Fred the Flying Fat Man and showing that he’s fat isn’t obvious enough.

Here’s a rare sight – Fred “the Hammer” Williamson in a comedy routine! Granted, The Fucking Hammer (you have to say it like that, The Fucking Hammer) plays things straight as he should, since he is blaxploitation’s Lazarus. In the film, The Fucking Hammer has allegedly had sex five times with a white woman the night before the Karate Championships. Never satisfied, the woman expresses her displeasure for his not putting out enough while Williamson worries about “a Bruce Lee title that doesn’t even exist.” Naturally, sex wins.

More fun is had when a guy named Jasper Milktoast picks a fight with The Fucking Hammer over entering a taxi! Jokes about Williamson looking like Harry Belafonte abound, since a film about Bruce Lee needs those purposeful Belafonte references.

At this point in the film, a redubbed/sepia-toned Lei yu (a/k/a The Thunderstorm) is intercut with Tian zhan/Invincible Super Chan to comprise “The Bruce Lee Story.” This is where the film gets amazingly stupid, either purposely or otherwise. The in-joke with regards to “The Bruce Lee Story” is that Lei yu stars a young Bruce Lee. Were Mallinson and Harvey trying to comically redub Lei yu for a few laughs? Perhaps, but it seems more like Aquarius Promotions was trying to knock out a grindhouse title and needed a lot of filler. After all, characters are talking about Bruce Lee being karate crazy. Apparently, all martial arts are interchangeable to the slant-eyes. Lee was born to a lineage of Chinese samurai warriors, too! Truly, Fist of Fear… caters to the true martial arts fans and not utter morons.

The first act of this article ends with the award-winning dialogue that has made Fist of Fear, Touch of Death a martial arts classic. A cliffhanger has scarcely been as nail-biting, at least not since…uh…Cliffhanger. Here’s a severed head as a bonus you’ll mildly appreciate.

Rottrevore is an Indonesian record company and metal webzine that has existed since the late 1990s.  When the site came up with its first issue…well, let me explain.  I was trying to establish myself in the metal webzine world in 1999-2000 by fishing for e-mail addresses and band contacts.  It took me until mid-2003 to realize that spamming bands is a terrible way to procure review material.  I still read a few music sites and try to immerse myself in the metal scene as a contributor to Unrestrained!, but back in my formative years (essentially everything I did until 2003) I used to read a lot of metal webzines.  I know, “fanzines are shit,” that’s the retarded generalization some people use.  Those people are even more stunted intellectually than I am.

Rottrevore #1, essentially a page of reviews and an interview, was the worst attempt at a webzine that I’d ever seen.  It still is, really – blood bars and sites done entirely in Netscape Composer aren’t de rigueur these days, not when there’s Adobe Photoshop and Macromedia Dreamweaver to pirate and half of America has high-speed Internet.  Rottrevore has improved greatly and actually become respectable these days, but the early days of the Internet saw some frankly horrid writing and site design.  Everyone who had an opinion, a computer and a Geocities account could start a webzine, and that’s what the underground metal site world pretty much was in those days.

Even for the standards of the time, though, Rottrevore was shit.  I’m not picking on Indonesians, but some of the most horrible attempts at promoting the metal scene on the Internet came (still come?) from that country.  People familiar with sites like Atifah Netzine might understand what I’m talking about.  For those that don’t, here are some reviews from the first, FortuneCity-hosted Rottrevore.

FORGOTTEN – OBSESI MATI promo 1999
More sick and more,more,more,more and more !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This extreme death/grind concept and destructive has bring them to create second full lenght under two lables
on April 1999.Their line up is perfectly enough to kill your girlfriend and give the meet to dogs.This promo contains of two dangerous songs so much hateful energy that even
an angel must be like to kill………
for more info/interview click here

There is nothing funnier than the opening tirade to this review.  When I read this site in 2000, I laughed at that “More sick and more,more,more,more and more !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” line for at least five minutes.  In 2006, I still laugh at that line for more than five minutes.  It is the worst line to ever appear in a music review.  Indonesian sites are (or were, I don’t know how much death metal and/or its fans have improved over there – at least Rottrevore has) written in the worst English allowable by law.  This was bad even for the relaxed grammar of Indonesian metal sites back then.  Frankly, there’s no way reviews could be worse than this, as evinced by the fact that I haven’t found a site worse than what Rottrevore started out as.

That’s a good thing, by the way.  That doesn’t mean I don’t come face to BLOODY ROTTING SKULL with bad English and “HAIL SETAN”-isms to this day.  It’s a willfully stupid music genre, this “metal.”

BRUTAL CORPSE – FUCKED BY MAGGOTS SKULL!!!!
Quite extreme,sadist,high voltage…………..
BRUTAL CORPSE has won over the most ultra high of Death metal enthusiast with excited tempo and powerful phenomenal drumworks.
Check out “Resurrection”,”suicide”,”Out of normallity” are their no speed limits.Born from DEATHVOMIT city has losed all bands before them.
This is agrressive force!!!!!!!!!Yeahhhhhh….god give me nothing!!!!
contact : Anggeng
APIKRI
Jl.menukan 10
Yogyakarta 55153
Indonesia

I love the interjections coming from the Rottrevore writer.  There’s the usual “this is brutal” and “God sucks” patter, written so poorly as to be comedy classics.  Considering this is from an Asian source, I wonder which god the writer’s talking about.  It might be the Christian God, it might be a Hindu god or it might be a piece of sidewalk.  Whatever God is being talked about must obviously suck, of course – you know, metal kayfabe.  FUCK YOU, GENERIC GODLIKE BEING!  HAIL GENERIC POLAR OPPOSITE!

I will admit there are some lucid words in this review, but those words are limited to “powerful phenomenal drumworks.”  The rest is all broken English and cliché.

For years, I thought Brutal Corpse’s album title included the word “skull!!!!”  It turns out that whatever browser I was using (I was an early user of Opera until the browser started crashing every five seconds) didn’t recognize the blink tag.  Yes, I included the blink tag in this article to recreate the true Rottrevore experience.  I didn’t include the blood bar, though.  Those things are always dire.

DELIRIUM TREMENS – DEMOSYNDROME
One of the most brutal “high class” death band in Jakarta has already prove theirself to spread their sickness and wild to exterminate things as far as we can see
Blasting drums,intense riffs guitars make your ears bleed.
It put DELIRIUM TREMENS is one of incredible band in Indonesia,you must enjoy this bloody brutal death gore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
contact : Jolly
Jl. Kramat Lontar VI/j 141
Jakarta 10440
Indonesia

I MUST ENJOY THIS BLOODY BRUTAL DEATH GORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  MORE SICK AND MORE,MORE,MORE,MORE AND MORE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  YEAHHHHHH….GOD GIVE ME NOTHING!!!!  I know Indonesia isn’t nearly as developed a country as Canada.  Still, even factoring in Australasian enthusiasm for metal and grindcore, I’m surprised no one was embarrassed putting that on the Internet.  A “high class” gore band?  Aren’t the terms “gore” and “high class” mutually exclusive?  At least the Rottrevore writer describes what Delirium Tremens do, so that’s a plus.

Funnily, I don’t think any of the bands reviewed by Rottrevore managed to break out of their local scenes, not that being local is in any way a bad thing.  I somehow always manage to confuse this band with the Swedish label of the same name.  Considering most Indonesian bands are anathema to a lot of the civilized world I don’t think Delirium Tremens have much of a name on the world stage.  Hell, they may have broken up four years ago.  I don’t follow the Indonesian metal scene that closely.

IMPIOUS – ELEVATION OF THE CROSS
Contain six songs brutal grind showing the drummers power which is unbelievable,very very fast than
even FERRARY will think before it act!”stamping on holy cross”and “rotten smell” as prove.
Horrific vocals from IMPIOUS is enough to kill your mama!!!!!
Dave from LIVIDITY must be aggree about that.
contact : IMPIOUS
Jl.jeruk no.62 B BINTARO
Pesanggarahan Jakarta Selatan 12320
Indonesia

One thing that’s notable about the Indonesian death metal and grindcore scenes is that bands employ very fast drummers.  Those Indonesians love speed.  Still, who is this Ferrary?  Is he/she/it one of those transforming robot cars from Space Thunder Kids or just some random Indonesian?  Whatever Ferrary is, he/she/it better think before rushing headlong into brutal grind.

I learned a lot from this review.  A member of an underground American death metal band must agree that Impious’ vocalist can kill mothers with sound, for instance.  The drummer’s power is unbelievable, too.  Songs like “Rotten Smell” and “Stamping on Holy Cross” prove it!  This is in no way a badly worded review!  How could something from FortuneCity be crap, anyway?  I suck!

CORPORATION OF BLEEDING – BLOOD FEAST SKULL!!!!
COB is brutal gore influenced by CANNIBAL CORPSE,just hear the hammer-on technic guitars,and half of
CRYPTOPSY (godz!)
High speed running tempo,arise from Jakarta.This is fucking sick album!intense riffs,growl vocals
clench hands into fists,it make grinding our teeth!
contact : Porry
Jl.kamboja II no.14
Rawamangun jakarta 13220
Indonesia

Somewhere in that morass of improper sentence structure and descriptors can be found what needs to be known about Corporation of Bleeding (dumb name for a band, but this is Indonesia.)  They sound like Cryptopsy, have Cannibal Corpse-like lyrics, and are high-tempo.  Why not just say that instead of writing this stream-of-consciousness shit?

I was going to make a cheap joke about technical guitars being hit with hammers, but the review’s so nondescript that it’s just not worth the bother.  I might complain about bad metal bands, the metal scene’s celebration of its own ignorance and/or band names like I Shit On Your Face.  I can’t remember any metal sites on the web that were or all poorer overall than original Rottrevore, and I’ve been following this shit since 1999.  It’s a good thing Rottrevore improved, because I can’t really see how the site could get worse.

I’m sure I’ve offended some metal fans by writing this article.  If me making fun of half-assed reviews is enough for you to tell me off for doing so, please get a hobby.  Alternatively, drink some cyanide.  Do some of you anal-retentive types even know how to smile?  I know it’s not kvlt, but just try.

I subscribe to a lot of mailing lists.  I do this because, at heart, I am part of the entertainment business – well, I pretend to be.  I’m about five steps away from having no life at all, so I need to keep myself occupied with something.

One of the lists I subscribe to is the Scratch Records mailing list.  The company seems to do very well with its distribution arm, but its store…the store is a maze of press releases.  Independent bands/labels there tend to sell themselves with more hyperbole than a mortal can stand.  Also, the prices at Scratch can be awfully expensive and I’m not that rich or easily led a music fan.  I’m not trying to bash Scratch Records, but it seems the term “judicious editing” has never crossed the newsletter editor’s head there.  Am I wrong?  Take a look at selections from recent newsletters and TELL me I’m wrong.

UNDER PRESSURE-s/t  CD (Primitive Air Raid/PAR002) $10.50
Successive waves of tough guy metal dogshit and content-free straight edge pablum have rendered hardcore a dirty word for most discriminating 21st century music fans, but Canada has been at the forefront of the genre’s recent revitalization through such real-deal outfits as Fucked Up, Inepsy and Career Suicide. Winnipeg’s Under Pressure are set to continue this welcome trend with their newest effort, an eight-song ripper of quick, raw hardcore inspired by Poison Idea, Black Flag and Motorhead, delivered with smarts, chops and energy to burn.

What a bunch of overwritten ad copy.  Essentially, this bit of purple prose can be boiled down to its “FUCK THAT METAL/SXE BULLSHIT!  THIS IS HARD…TO THE CORE” lowest common denominator.  Is it good that I can recognize one of three local Canadian band names being dropped here?  Since when was Motörhead considered hardcore, by the way?  Makes sense to reference a speed metal band when talking about how old-school hardcore you are.  I know when I write a comedy script, I always study shows like Mannix and Baretta just to get that comic timing down.

Frankly, this reads like a grindcore band’s bio.  If Under Pressure aren’t grind, I’ll eat my hat.  At least the CD is “budget priced” for those bargain hunters.  Never mind that $10 is the maximum I’d ever pay for a CD – how can I pass up something that sounds like Inepsy or Fucked Up?  Could you?

NICK CAVE & THE BAD SEEDS-The Good Son  CD (Mute/8417832) $32.99
We can’t get the cheaper Mushroom pressing any more, so we bring you this more expensive Holland import of Nick’s fine 1990 album.

NICK CAVE-The First Born Is Dead  CD (Mute/8417872) $22.50
Replaces the previous Mushroom version, but no change in price. From 1985, hear Nick sing the blues.

There is no reason to pay $32.99, even in Canadian dollars (seriously, the dollar’s been worth >$0.80 US lately, enough of the Canadian Tire jokes) for an import copy of a Nick Cave album.  I can’t believe people will accept paying more than $20 for something because it’s a limited edition or because it’s an import.  I can understand why imports are more expensive, but good lord!  I can buy seven used CDs for that price, and possibly those old Nick Cave releases Scratch Records is talking about!  How is this cheaper than my local record store or Music World?  The last time I paid $30 for a CD was when I bought an “import” version of Atari Teenage Riot’s Burn, Berlin, Burn!…IN 1997.  Now that I’ve said this, of course, Nick Cave fans are going to berate me for having bad musical tastes and I’ll continue to be shunned until I develop the mental illness of being a hipster.

THE USED-I Caught Fire  CDEP (Reprise/9362428872) $8.50
Kelly Osbourne’s grubby and unbearable ex-boyfriend returns with several anthems for the delusional youth. Tracklisting: 1. I Caught Fire
2. The Taste Of Ink (Live) (From Channel V – Australia) 3. All That I’ve Got (Acoustic Version) 4. Lunacy Fringe (Acoustic Version)  5. Alone This Holiday (Non-album Track) “It’s clear The Used know who they are now; they’ve found their voice. They are plainly aware of their position in the music world today, and it feels good. They’ve delivered the record their fans have been asking for- one that places them squarely on the top of a genre they’ve helped create”. That genre must be Nu Bad Music.

THE STROKES-Juicebox  CDEP (RCA/82876759722) $8.50
It took three albums for these turds to sing U2 [and The Cult/Doors] overtop of the Batman Theme. Ew. [Really, this may well be the single worst song ever]. The second track, “Hawaii”, is much better. Tracklisting: 1. Juicebox 2. Hawaii 3. Juicebox (Live In Rio De Janeiro, Brazil) 4. Juicebox (Video – Director’s Cut)

Why the hell would a record store based entirely on appealing to a specialized audience sell albums it hates like this?  What’s the point?  I know the music industry exists purely to make money, and independent record stores do that by wrapping themselves in friendly, trend-conscious images.  Even so, who’s going to buy something from a retailer that points out how much the album it’s selling sucks?  Is that good business?  Couldn’t the Scratch Records employee responsible for writing these album descriptions just list the album without the “don’t buy this” spiel underneath?  Frankly, if people want to buy The Used’s new EP, they will regardless of what anyone else says.  Maybe this is a Vancouver thing and I just don’t understand.

FUN 100-Hit It & Quit  CD (Hockey Dad/HDR10) $10.99  
With “dance-punk” now a household word and Gang of Four crowding everyone’s “Favourite Band” list on MySpace, it is quite obvious that punk rock has nearly lost its fun side. Indeed, it seems that the heyday of mindless punk rock occurred when most of us were too young to buy clove cigarettes or Pabst Blue Ribbon. Enter Fun 100, five dudes who understand that punk without the pop is like dad without his minivan –it’s not taking you anywhere! Rocking out in church basements, public washrooms, houses, and sometimes even real venues, Fun 100 has been the pulse of the teenage heartbeat for the past four years. These guys are the real deal, their bedrooms ordained with hockey trophies, dirty laundry, and a whole lotta records. Adding synthesizers and a whole bunch of attitude, the band has picked up where the best pop-punk left off. Hit It & Quit, the group’s debut full-length, showcases the group’s superior song-writing and high-octane style. From the anthemic group chorus of “Hot Popular Girl” to the dance-inducing new wave of “Computer,” the record is a surefire instant classic. Look out for Fun 100 on tour for the better part of 2006. “Pure teenage zit rawk angst!” Nardwaur the Human Serviette  “Fun100 was headlining—they’re fucking amazing and still so young. Their songs are fast and filled with incredible things. They’re the Ramones and they’re the Exploding Hearts and they’re Blink 182 when you admit that yeah ok, sometimes pop-punk isn’t so bad… those little Abbotsford boys really know how to get the party started.” Terminal City  “True to their name, Abbotsford’s new wave pop-punkers Fun100 were a hell of a lot of fun to watch. Their ‘Computer’ song is about as danceable as they get and bonus points to the lead singer for wearing the same Mario Lemieux t-shirt that a friend of mine had in grade 7.” Only Magazine

Translation: it’s new new wave, and some people you’re supposed to like think Fun100 is tits.  At least the CD is $11, which is sensible enough.  I don’t know if Scratch Records or the distributed bands/labels set the prices, but punk and metal bands usually seem to understand the concept of “value.”

Well, some black metal bands are too in love with selling “limited edition pressings” of their latest missives for $30.  Is it really that clever to use “only 666 copies pressed” as a marketing ploy?  Does the average underground metal band actually sell 666 copies of anything?  I’m not being flippant – the sheer number of bands ripping off Carcass and Impetigo would worry even the most cretinous grindcore fan.

V/A-COMEDY BREAKS  LP (Filthstyle/FIL001) $17.50  
“Do you need a hook for your next song or need a solid diss for your next opponent in a DJ battle? If so, then this is the break record for you. Comedy Breaks features voice samples from Eddie Griffin, Richard Pryor, Rodney Dangerfield, Eddie Murphy and Dave Chappelle that will appeal to any producer, DJ or human with a sense of humor! The LP is packed with intros, outros, insults, skits about cops, women, racism, sound effects and more. A sure album for today’s creative music artist.”

I don’t understand why this is necessary.  I’m sure better thrift stores and charity shops have whole Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy albums for fifty cents or so, though they might not be easy to find and the albums are often in pisspoor shape.  Still, it’s more economical than paying almost twenty dollars to find out what the five fingers said to the face.

Richard Pryor made his own drugs.  May he rest in peace, and be remembered for more than saying “nigger” every fifth word in the process.

THE PINKY VIOLENCE COLLECTION  4DVD (Panik House) $99.99
Much anticipated collection of early 70’s Japanese exploitation gems. “Female bikers! Gang violence! Catfights!” are the promise to be delivered by these remastered, fully restored, uncut versions of DELINQUENT GIRL BOSS: WORTHLESS TO CONFESS / GIRL BOSS CUERILLA / TERRIFYING GIRLS’ HIGH SCHOOL: LYNCH LAW CLASSROOM / CRIMINAL WOMAN: KILLING MELODY. Extras include audio commentaries for each, trailers for each, actress and director bios, poster & still galleries, boxset bonus CD of Reiko Ike, and a 24 page booklet written by Chris D.
http://www.panikhouse.com/

I received this as a promo.  Either I’m extremely lucky or there’s no way that the 4-DVD set is actually worth $100.  Wow.  Frankly, this is why people go to DeepDiscountDVD and other discount DVD sites.  I tend to go the press route on some things, because there’s no way I can afford to be a film buff otherwise – I mean, Panik House releases some good stuff, but $100?  $40-60, possibly, but there is no way people are going to pay $25-30 for one DVD in 2005.  DVDs in cardboard slipcovers sell for a dollar, for crying out loud!

PART CHIMP-I Am Come  CD (Monitor/MON027) $15.99  
“Volume. It goes to eleven. Sure. Bleeding ear drums. Sure. But the use of volume is not a gimmick for Part Chimp. Volume and amps maxed out is needed to reach the sounds and feelings that ended up on their second LP I Am Come. Nearly becoming complete tape scramble, Part Chimp takes volume to the clipping point. After displaying their near ear drum bursting levels on their first LP Chart Pimp, Part Chimp have refined their sound, maintaining the walls of distortion, yet adding more hooks and harmony. The word evolution could be used here, but without being punny, let’s say Part Chimp have developed, but the inner ape is still with them. If Part Chimp’s debut was crusty punk fueled by an Ampthetamine Reptile crunch, then I Am Come is a highly refined offering, standing alongside distortion dwellers such as My Bloody Valentine, Sonic Youth, and Sunn0))). Recorded and mixed deep in the red by John Cummings of Mogwai, I Am Come is an unbelievable mix of dynamics, harmony, and dissonance.”

SO WHAT YOU’RE SAYING IS PART CHIMP ARE LOUD?!  I’M SORRY, I COULDN’T HEAR YOU!  MY EARDRUMS ARE BLEEDING THROUGH MY BRAIN, THEY’RE THAT LOUD!  I HAVE I MIGHT BRAIN THINK DAMAGE!

I’ve always considered Sunn O))) to be one of the stupidest names I’ve ever seen in metal.  How am I supposed to pronounce O))), anyway?  I know, the band’s name is pronounced “sun.”  The O))) is not pronounced and the band appropriates the name and logo of an amplifier brand, that’s not the point.  It looks ungainly in print.  Some people use a zero (0) for the circle, others use an upper-case O.  Some use three )’s after the circle, others two or four (five if the particular music scribe is demented.)  Sunn O))) are well-loved by people and they have a sizable fanbase, but the name is just one step up from Frantic Bleep.  I’m not kidding.

HAEMOTH-Kontamination  CD (Southern Lord/SUNN47.5) $16.50  IN MONDAY  
“[T]he brand new fithy, sickening burnt offering from the French Black Metal Underground terrorists: Haemoth. Brittle trance inducing cold blast of black metal with a lethal injection of extremely killer riffs. First official USA release ever. CD is limited to 2,000 hand numbered copies. Haemoth support all that can contribute to the ruin of the human being, every form of vice, and don’t give a fuck to the means used top reach that point. Any form of vice, destruction and hate have to be preached. Haemoth encourages every act, physical or spiritual which could carry to the decline, blasphemy or pain. To become one with Him, the interior death is inevitable. the weak ones don’t have their place here. May they burn in hell…”

Yeah, yeah, yeah.  This black metal band hates everyone, Satan is God, the clichés all familiar and cozy like a bed of nails.  Frankly, it’s better when black metal bands go WAY OVER THE TOP, because…well, I’ve never understood the appeal of black metal and why people take what any musician says seriously.  Note the limited amount of copies.  Not overshooting your press run is kult.  I’m going to masturbate in front of your hogtied mom now while sacrificing a goat with a sword made of skulls and pure chocolate FOR SATAN, because I’m kult.  And evil.  Buy my album.  I’m not trying too hard to offend you, really.

I swear, most black metal albums are backstory first, image second, musicianship waaaaay in the back.  It’s why I can never take extreme metal too seriously.  I think I’d be mentally retarded if I did.

THE INVISIBLE EYES-Laugh In The Dark  CD (Bomp/BCD4096-) $15.50  
“Take heed! Here be music for troglodytes and spacemen, monks, drunkards and sophisticated hip shakers alike. Primordial fuzz and reverberous caterwaul teetering on the precipice. New hymns by new primitives. A laugh in the dark, a shot in the arm and a kick in the ass. You can’t hold it in your hand, but it feels pretty good nonetheless. The twang and the thump, the rumble and the wail; the hypnotic sound of things breaking, oscillating and coming apart. There goes Bo and the Duchess in a whirling vortex of feedback held together with duct tape and safety pins. Somewhere over yonder a lonesome organ plays a hauntingly familiar tune while a tambourine can’t stop shaking. “Just what the world needs to hear,” said Greg Shaw.”

So…what sort of music do The Invisible Eyes play?  I hate these long, meandering bios.  They say absolutely nothing, yet make out like they’ve revealed a profundity that only gods would be able to see.  I’d like to know what a certain band plays, what neat genre I can file the band under, and what I should expect from an album.  This seems to be an indie rock album, so why can’t the label say so?  Greg Shaw, Bo and the Duchess might like this album.  Since when do they speak for ME?

Frankly, if Scratch Records doesn’t kick me off its mailing list after this, I’ll be pleasantly surprised.  Those wacky Vancouverites and their expensive tastes, they’re adorable.

One of the things about the mail is that there will always be something from the Reader’s Digest or Publishers Clearinghouse Sweepstakes chum mills in it at least once a year.  Lately, there have been new companies that don’t even bother with the subtleties of pretending to be a legitimate business or offering any sort of actual service, and there’s one “company” that takes this conceit to the next level.  Well, it’s actually not one company – this sweepstakes mill is more like a hundred companies, but they all point to being small parts of a grand ripoff.

The company goes by National Awards Commission, Westport Enterprises and a hundred other names with different mailboxes in Las Vegas, Kansas City, and Rogers, Minnesota.  The spiel is always the same – here’s a check for $1,000,000 or other large sum if you send the letter by this date while buying some product of vague description, if you have the winning number.  Here, “National Awards Commission” is selling a coupon book good for “over $2,500″ of “savings” from “certain participating establishments.”  If that’s not enough, the PRE-SELECTED WINNING NUMBER IS VERIFIED!  At least Reader’s Digest gifts readers with its edited book anthologies and other bits of assorted junk, though the company uses negative billing to make people pretend that they’re obligated to pay anything for things they weren’t asked for.  Here, you pay some “acquisition fee” for some vaguely defined national…something – in this case, a coupon booklet.  God knows who might be stupid enough to fall for this, but that’s why these insta-companies exist.  You’re supposed to fall for it.

The greatest part of these letters is the rules and regulations slips, with the occasional badly edited space or bit of bizarre English that suggests that the letters may be foreign in origin.  A PNG of the actual official rules for this sweepstakes is there for you to peruse, but there are a few bits of comedy gold here that I can’t get enough of.  Prepare yourself…FOR BULLSHIT!

Doesn’t that fill you with pride?  The chances of winning the Grand Prize are not to exceed one in 300 million!  Essentially, that means there’s only one “Grand Prize.”  Earlier versions of this letter have the typical odds for prize payouts, with that deathless “odds of winning $1: 1:1″ line that always puts an angry smile on my face.  Here, National Sweepstakes Pretense doesn’t even do that – it’s just one grand prize for essentially the well-off parts of North America.  In fact, wording is so vague here that this line could suggest that the odds of winning can be one in 500,000,000 or one in infinity, but not one in 299,999,999 or anything approaching fairness.  Hell, the company can “draw” a number that no one has, and nothing can be legally done about this.  It’s all predetermined.  The odds are better of sweetposer.tk suddenly becoming a bloody buzz site, and the odds of that happening are what?  1:49,999,999?  Really, now.

Here’s the part where the discount coupon book is discussed.  I love lines like “purchases are required at time of redemption to receive the full benefit of the discount coupons.”   Oh, using the coupons is the only way to benefit from them?  No shit?  Never mind the fact that no one knows what the hell the coupons are good for.  Oh wait, they’re good for “hotel, car rental and cruise discounts.”  The way this is worded, the coupons are also good for restaurants, trips and amusement parks.  Neat!  So National Fake Contest Shillers’ coupon book gives you actual businesses?  That is one powerful coupon book.  I must send my $14.89 post-haste.  Might as well send a voided check, so National Westport Dummy Corporation can continue to leech off my bank account.  What do I need with money?

Here’s where the Engrish starts to show.  In this linked picture, the general conditions start off well, but what this part of the rules seems to say is that the Sweepstakes can be terminated if “compromised for any reason.”  There’s the bit about administration, security etc., but the sponsor can just theoretically stop the contest if a legislative body decides to look into the legality of it, since the terms are written so vaguely.  Considering the “National Awards Commission” has one PO Box, “Westport Enterprises” has another and this sweepstakes is similar to the other five hundred that came through the mail this week, this has the markings of a scam.  The contest could be shut down, and the schmucks that paid $14.89 for a coupon book would be left with a coupon book and no chance to win.  After all, this is junk mail.

Here’s the best line of all:

With odds like that, how can you lose?  No one but National Thingy Bit knows what the criteria are for drawing this number, and it’s predetermined anyway.  It makes the whole concept of actually running a contest moot.  You’ve already paid the $14.89 (or not, like it matters how legitimate this business is), and the lack of obligation to enter means the coupon book is separate from the promotion itself.  All anyone’s doing by entering this contest is subjecting oneself to more mailing lists, since this is just one giant address farm.  One letter sent to National Address Farm seems to be all this company needs, a confirmation that one wants more of these letters sent constantly.  Why anyone enters is ridiculous.  The odds are terrible, the presentation is even more unconvincing than sweepstakes like this usually are, and the mailings are incessant.  If this sort of sweepstakes lasts longer than the year or so it ought to, I’ll be surprised.

At least “Westport Enterprises” is honest about the purpose of this sweepstakes.  I’m placated by the cut and paste job done on this rules sheet, really.  Yeah, this company’s real legitimate.  Assuredly Westport will be around forever in some form, as long as someone wants to make a fast buck off the burgeoning idiot populace.  Truly, there will be no end to these sweepstakes, not even when humanity evolves into the sentient humanoid armadillo race it is destined to become.