Top 10 Metal Holiday Gifts 2010

Since times are tough, this year’s holiday metal gift guide focuses on more affordable items. If one must buy tchotchkes for others this season, one might as well keep the money within the community. You can give your money to some multi-national corporation or a label/band/artist who actually needs it. The choice is yours.

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10.

Gift certificates

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The most practical gift of all. So far I’ve found gift certificates available for Hells Headbangers; Willowtip; The End; All That Is Heavy; Aquarius Records; Crucial Blast; Deathwish, Inc.; and Warlord Clothing.

If you find more gift certificates for metal-related stores, supply links in the comments below, and I’ll add them here.

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9.

Black metal greeting cards

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These are a little silly, a little profound, and very affordable ($5 each). Housed in black envelopes, they feature black metal photos on the front with pithy greetings inside like “Thinking of you”. Farron Loathing, a formidable artist, designed them. You can buy them (along with other works of his) at his store or this Etsy store. (Thanks to Van D for the tip!)

Mr. Loathing also designed Dreaming Dead’s latest t-shirt, available here.

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8.

Black metal post-it notes

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Tom Neely, the artist of the infamous Henry & Glenn Forever comic, has sketched a series of black metal portraits on post-it notes. They are remarkable for conveying a lot with few strokes. Still available are portraits of Wrest (Leviathan), It (Abruptum), Frost (Satyricon), Ancalagon the Black (Crebain), Nocturnus Horrendus (Corpus Christii), and Alice Cooper. The already-bought ones are well worth a look, too. See the collection here.

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7.

Harvey Milk merch

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Harvey Milk are solid men making difficult music. They deserve support. Until the end of the year, if you pre-order the vinyl of A Small Turn of Human Kindess (which includes a download card), you get 25% off other Harvey Milk merch. I recommend the Harvey Milk coffee mug.

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6.

Ludicra merch

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Ludicra are scrappy men and women making amazing music. They deserve support. In a wide array of fabric formats – patches, shirts, longsleeves, hoodies – they have five lovely designs. See selection here.

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5.

Profound Lore merch

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Profound Lore put out many of your favorite metal records this year. It deserves support. Its merch selection currently includes limited edition Agalloch zip-up hoodies, and shirts for Dawnbringer, Salome, Dispirit, The Devil’s Blood, Amesoeurs, and Thralldom. Check these out here.

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4.

Mark Rudolph’s book of illustrations

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Mark Rudolph does one of my favorite parts of Decibel, the illustration accompanying each lead review. I particularly like his recent ones for Agalloch and Electric Wizard. They’re quite, for lack of a better word, cute. Now he’s collected many of these illustrations together in a 60-page book. Cute overload awaits here.

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3.

Justina Villanueva zines

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Justina Villanueva was the first photographer to show me that metal photography could be insightful. Sure, I’ve seen Ross Halfin and Peter Beste wield virtuoso technique in photographing rock gods. But Villanueva is down on the ground, ducking headstocks, eating hair, and consistently producing some of the most amazing concert photography around. She has five zines for sale (#1, #2, #3, #4, #5). Until the end of the year, they are 25% off.

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2.

Bazillion Points books

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Every book from Ian Christe’s Bazillion Points imprint is an event. The material is quality, and so are the layouts, paper, and bindings. Daniel Ekeroth’s Swedish Death Metal, Annick Giroux’ Hellbent for Cooking, Tom G. Warrior’s Only Death Is Real, Tesco Vee and Dave Stimson’s Touch and Go, and now Jeff Wagner’s Mean Deviation – the hits keep coming. Download a chapter from Mean Deviation here, and view the whole catalogue here.

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1.

Stephen Kasner donations and purchases

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You’ve probably read the original post, but if not: Stephen Kasner, one of the great artists of our time, is gravely sick and in need of financial help. We’re running two giveaways to induce more people to help. All donations to or purchases from him will be entered for a chance to win a signed hardback copy of his WORKS: 1993-2006 career retrospective book. Furthermore, all donations above $20 will also be entered in a drawing to win one of five t-shirt/CD packages from Black Sleep of Kali. To enter these giveaways, send me screenshots of your donations and purchases by midnight PST tomorrow, Friday, December 17. (See full details here.) But, of course, keep spreading the word and giving if you can. Giving should not end just because some commercial holiday comes and goes. There’s too much at stake.

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