Saturday, June 11, 1977. My name's Todd. I'm currently playing a 9th level barbarian named Ogkogb'god whose special attribute is spitting acid for a 1d6 attack that lasts three turns. My friend Bill's got a 9th level wizard called Pious Arthur, Tammy's playing Dexter, an archer with a ring of invisibility, and Tom's got a 9th level holy man named Pardue who occasionally goes insane trying to "join the great Hall." We haven't figured him out yet.

At any rate, Saturdays are role- playing night-- we get together and play Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, smoke an assload of pot, and listen to Kiss, Iron Maiden, Led Zeppelin, and recently C Average. C Average is the band I wanted to tell you about because, well... it's so weird.

See, last week, right before we started gaming, I went to the tape deck to put in Kiss' Alive, but this tape by C Average was already in. I took it out and looked at it-- the songs seemed interesting enough: "Forged In Birmingham," "Orcs Vs. Elves," "Riddermark Rock..." We took a listen.

Remarkably, they weren't dramatically different from Black Sabbath. The guys played dark heavy metal with a decidedly role- playing twist. The thing is, it sounds like it was recorded in someone's basement! We think it's part of their charm, though. We call C Average "lo-fi Dungeonmaster's rock."

But these songs are seriously bitchin'! I mean, "Orcs Vs. Elves" brings forth crushing heavy metal thunder that burns your soul in a pit of eternal hellfire, "Beer Drinkers and Hellraisers" mixes Hendrix- style blues with Satanic riffage. Of course, the best song is "Usurper Girl" which is about a powerful female warrior (we presume she's a Valkyrie) who journeys to a castle with the intent to kill its king.

The strange thing about this C Average tape is that is claims to come from the future! In the liner notes, it says it was "recorded and mixed by Scott Swayze at Moon Recording Studio Summer '98." Bill thinks it's a typo, though, just because it sounds so current. Besides, we're hoping that music will have come a lot farther than this by 1998. In the meantime, of course, it's pretty damn cool.

-Ryan Schreiber