Allegaeon‘s music is so heavy and technically intricate that it needs a bit of comic relief. That’s why the technical melodeath band from Fort Collins, Colorado are as well known for their wacky and lighthearted videos as they are for their epically crushing compositions. There is something oddly satisfying about a band whose songs deal with subjects as weighty as astrophysics, trigonometry, extraterrestrial life, and stem cell research making goofy videos. In the clip for their recent single “1.618” (a song about the so-called “golden ratio”), they mocked the ridiculous modern metal scene by spinning the “wheel of subgenres” and then morphed hilariously into the corresponding fashions.

In the video for today’s Massive Metal Monday track “Threshold of Perception,” they visit the beach for a little fun, sun and death metal. You ain’t seen nothing until you’ve seen a blast beat on children’s sand pails or a death metal singer brushing his teeth while growling gutturals! So check it out, crank it up, and enjoy. And, if you dig what you’re hearing, pick up a copy of Allegaeon’s brilliant new album Elements of the Infinite on Metal Blade Records.

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When I was growing up in rural Indiana in the early ’80s, there was very limited access to heavy music. These were the days before MTV blew up with the whole hair metal, Headbangers Ball phenomenon. But on Sunday nights, there was a two-hour radio show that came from WOXY, just across the state line in Oxford, Ohio (home of Miami University of Ohio). It was called Massive Metal for the Masses and I would wait all week for it to air. It was through this show that I was introduced to bands like Venom, Bathory, WASP, Michael Schenker Group, Slayer, and countless others. This Monday weekly column is my tip of the hat to that show. I call it Massive Metal Monday. Every week, I will pay tribute to defining moments by the artists that laid the groundwork for heavy metal to become the worldwide cultural bond for all of us metal heads.