Thunder and lightning. Enter four MUSICIANS, clad in velvet and
tights, and carrying AXES. The MUSICIANS, herewith known as the
METAL SHAKESPEARE COMPANY, begin playing their AXES loudly as LORD
SIMMS sings lines of poetrie directly from the work of one WILLIAM
SHAKESPEARE.
And the scene is set for the Metal Shakespeare Company, a Portland,
Ore., group fronted by Jason Simms (aka Lord Simms), who, despite his
birth sometime in the 20th century, has an uncanny ability to speak as
if he were a denizen of Elizabethan England.
“Though my language may beguile thee, I assure you my story is
completely true,” said Simms over the phone from Portland, before
telling the story of the group’s inception while Simms was a student at
Lewis and Clark College in 2006. “I wast imbibing ale in a tavern one
eve when I didst say to a mate of mine, ‘Sir, I wish that I could
perform the type of music played by minstrels such as Iron Maiden,
though I fear I wouldst be mocked, for to do so with a straight face
would not be in vogue, as they say,'” explained Simms. “So he did
suggest, without hesitation, that a Shakespeare metal band couldst be
conceived and more well-received by the audiences of the day.”
From there, Simms set out on a quest to find musicians who shared
both a love of metal and a love of the Bard, and the group’s signature
sound, “bardcore” was born. Since then, the group has toured the
country and released one self-titled album. They also have a brand-new
7″ that will be sold at upcoming shows.
Simms is quick to point out that the metal the Metal Shakespeare
Company invokes is neither death nor thrash, since “methinks our
death-metal-and-thrash cousin wouldst suit perhaps another poet.” But,
as he explained over e-mail after a digital-recorder meltdown (“There
is a wizard who doth bewitch frequently our equipment, and I am loath
to know that thine he hath bewitched as well!” wrote Simms. “And o’er
such distance!”), “In the case of the Bard and that metal most shining
and true, one canst find a peculiar mixture of the masculine and
feminine. If thou lookst to the great metal minstrels of the 1980s, one
shall find a group of silly men clad in wigs and tights, not unlike
those men who didst portray the fairer sex in Shakespeare’s Globe.”
Translation: Shakespearean drama and heavy metal are really not all
that disparate. “In each, there is sophistication—metal minstrels
must have catlike skill within their realm or be cast aside for more
suitable players,” said Simms. “But each must appease the base. The
Bard didst compete with bear baiters for plebes, and so do we with the
myriad mindless diversions of our day. And ’tis for that I stand upon
bars, kiss spectators of both sexes, wrestle when called upon, and
otherwise refuse to be ignored.”
The Metal Shakespeare Company takes the dramatic nature of their
music and lyrics to heart during live shows, performing duels with
swords—and even public executions. It’s metal antics
pre-pyrotechnics; one can, in fact, see Ozzy Osbourne’s biting the head
off of a live bird as not too far away from the realm of Titus
Andronicus or Richard III.
Continued Simms, “Methinks too there is an element of bombast in
each. For one couldst compare a love as powerful and quick as that of
Romeo and Juliet to a summer’s day, but perhaps a 90-second
finger-tapping solo wouldst be truer.”
Verily, the music that the Metal Shakespeare Company composes for
monologues and scenes, such as Macbeth’s “Is this a dagger which I see
before me?” speech (Act 2, Scene 1) or Isabella’s plea to Angelo to
spare her brother from Measure for Measure (Act 2, Scene 2),
expertly transcribes the emotion and depth of each scene with
instruments.
The Metal Shakespeare Company is also not limited to plays; their
new repertoire includes a version of Sonnet 66, “Tired with all these,
for restful death I cry.” Said Simms, “In these 14 lines, Shakespeare
doth renounce all that makes him hate the world. ‘Tis a most metal
subject indeed.”
This, ultimately, is the Metal Shakespeare Company’s goal: to find
that which is most metal within the work of Shakespeare, and use that
power to bring the work of the Bard to audiences of all ages and
backgrounds.
“Upon the stage of an S&M dungeon we have flogged and been
flogged,” said Simms. “And upon the stage of the Oregon Shakespeare
Festival—the largest in the land—we were cheered and
honored by children yet half-grown and their silver-headed elders. Our
destiny is untamed, and without roads laid before us, for we are the
first to take up our work. But of all the groves where we may go, the
kingdom of Las Vegas doth beckon above all others. With travelers daily
new, we couldst refine our arts without wearing the soles of our shoes
in long and treacherous travel. If we didst construct a globe of steele
to be our home and stage, ‘twould be in that land surely best
loved.”
Most metal, indeed.
Exeunt.
This article appears in Jul 23-29, 2009.
