Hard Digest February 1: Early Access Black Metal, Flogging Molly, and Aging

Black Metal Band Maintains Their Dark Atmosphere While Playing Sparsely Populated Bowling Alley

By Chris Bowen 

CAMILLUS, N.Y. — Local black metal band Bügnorkvlt shrouded a crowd with their evil, mystifying atmosphere, despite playing at a barely attended bowling alley, corpse-painted sources report.

“Being one of the only seven people there to watch them play their set, I must say I was impressed at how well they pulled it off,” show attendee Jill Crossgrove explained. “I felt like I was fully immersed in the cold, dark atmosphere they were presenting despite the fact there was a child’s birthday party happening in the lanes directly next to me. The kids didn’t seem to enjoy the fog machine or amateur pyrotechnics. The father of one of the children even complained about missing a 7-10 split because of the band. There’s just no way that was the reason.”

Bügnorkvlt’s bass player and founding member Todd “Goathammer” Snee admits he was a bit reluctant going into the gig.

“I didn’t think we had enough to convey the overwhelming dread we were going for, but I think we easily achieved total dominance over all that is light through our 20-minute set,” Snee said. “We weren’t allowed to wear our usual combat boots on the floor, so we had to rent shoes there. But the fact half the lights were already dimmed or out completely, plus how cool it looked with our hair blowing around from the hand driers, we pulled it off quite nicely, I attest.”

Owner of Pinnsbury Lanes, Randy Martinez, revealed that most bands actually do quite well there.

“Some might say having your band play at a bowling alley is ‘uncool’ or ‘embarrassing’ or ‘lacks integrity’ or whatever. But if you remove the bumpers and tune out the sound of the bowling balls rolling down the lane and striking the pins, it’s just like a real music venue,” Martinez explained. “Some of the best sets I’ve ever seen were played right here underneath the Coors Light ‘Beerwolf’ overhead lights. I still keep the bowling pin GG Allin tried shoving up his ass when he played here in the early ‘90s behind a glass case. Lotta great memories made here!”

At press time, Bügnorkvlt embarked on their three-date weekend “tour” consisting of bringing black metal to local arcades and Chuck-E-Cheese establishments within a 25-mile radius.

We Sat Down With the Wrong Flogging Molly and Now We Owe $600 to an Irish Dominatrix

By Alex Salcido

OK, so apparently our new intern Caleb is completely full of shit. We hired him because he said he could make an interview happen with legendary Celtic punkers Flogging Molly, but it quickly became obvious that he didn’t expect to have to fulfill this promise when we brought him on. Is this at least partially on us for having hired him on sight simply because we liked his Samhain shirt when we met him at Jersey Mike’s? Possibly, but he had to have foreseen this whole ordeal ending poorly when he used Craigslist personals to set up the interview.

So there we were, tablets in hand with questions at the ready, nervously awaiting Flogging Molly’s arrival. We’ve been fans since “Swagger,” so this was a really big opportunity for us. Suffice it to say we were taken aback when a red-haired woman dressed exclusively in black leather arrived at our offices in lieu of Dave King, and we immediately knew something had gone awry when we saw that she had brought with her ball gags, posture collars, whips, and something called a “fisting swing.”

It turns out she, too, adopted the entirely appropriate moniker “Flogging Molly” for her work as a dominatrix for hire, and she had driven to our Los Angeles offices all the way from Fullerton at Caleb’s behest. We tried to make the best of the situation by asking if she happened to know anyone in Flogging Molly, but she didn’t, and in fact had never even heard of them. Any pretenses of this session even remotely resembling an interview then went out the window when she rather rudely instructed us to don one of her gimp suits.

While this certainly wasn’t how we expected the afternoon to go, we’re never ones to turn down a new experience, so we acquiesced to Molly’s demands and endured the entire three-hour long session that Caleb had apparently scheduled. We won’t go into the details, but if you happen to be looking for a dominatrix in Southern California, we definitely recommend Flogging Molly.

Unfortunately, it never occurred to us during our painful and eye-opening time with Molly that she would be expecting recompense for her services, so we were a little dismayed upon receiving the $600 bill. There is currently no money in the Hard Times bank account after we drained it to pay Caleb’s sign-on bonus (really, really stupid of us, we know, but you should’ve seen how cool his Samhain shirt was) so we’ve now found ourselves in a bit of a financial quandary.

We definitely need to honor this outstanding payment, so please don’t be surprised when you see The Hard Times become a pay-per-article news site. It’s just until we can pay this debt to Flogging Molly, we promise.

Local Man Enters Involuntary-Groan-While-Sitting-Down Phase

By Trevor Graham 

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Local 43-year-old Craig Peterson entered a new phase of life where he lets out an involuntary groan any time he sits down, sources who want to know where the Aleve is confirmed.

“I don’t really know what’s happening or why but it seems like whenever I go to take a load off this noise comes out of me that is somewhere between a sigh and a wince and it seems to be completely out of my control,” said Peterson. “And not only does that happen but if I sit down after standing for a long time I’ll let out the groan and follow it with a breathy ‘ahh boy.’ What is that? What does it even mean? For some reason I can’t stop saying it. Ahh boy.”

Peterson’s wife says she has noticed the groaning and can hear him doing it from every room in the house.

“The first time I heard him make that sound I ran to the living room to see if he was alright but he was just lounging on the couch. I asked him if something hurt and he said yes but that he honestly couldn’t say which area on his body it was,” says Jennifer Peterson. “It’s really the worst when I’m working from home and I’m on a call and in the background you can hear Craig letting out this utterance just because he settled into a chair. I try to cover for it by telling my coworkers that I just live in a haunted house but that only works some of the time. Can’t believe this is now my life for the next several decades. ”

Primary care physician Dr. Jane Berman says this is a common symptom she sees with patients of a certain age and that it may lead to further complications.

“We see this a lot where a patient enters into the middle years of their life and begins to exhibit odd new behaviors such as letting out a reflexive vocalization of discomfort from simply moving around or existing,” Dr. Berman said. “Other signs that patients have begun the slow descent after just passing the apex of life include starting to forget the names of actors from their favorite movies or using the flashlight on their phone to see the menu at a restaurant. These are clear signs that their long path of decline has just begun.”

At press time, Peterson was heard asking the barista at his local coffee shop if they wouldn’t mind turning the music down just a bit.