Name: James Edward Raggi IV

Position: Publisher, Editor, Head Writer, Website Design and Updates

Contributor Since: September 1998

Birthdate: December 7, 1974

Quote of Relevance: "Why start the magazine knowing that all that happens is losing money, and your hair, and your time, and your youth?" - Andreas Katsambas

Five Songs of Note: Hammers of Misfortune's Doomed Parade, Katatonia's Brave, Arcturus' Alone, Edge of Sanity's Losing Myself, Opeth's Black Rose Immortal

Other Activities and Interests: Michael Moorcock, Elfquest, Pro Wrestling (I recommend the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, IWA Mid-South, and Low-Ki), Richard Lederer, M.U.S.C.L.E., The Vortex, Legos

Email: lotfp at lotfp dot com

Website: Lamentations of the Flame Princess: The Role-Playing Game

Name: The Other Writer

Position: Columnist

Contributor Since: January 2006

Birthdate: March 9, 1973

Quote of Relevance: "When you see the hand writing on the wall, you're in the toilet." Redd Foxx

Five Songs of Note: : Manowar's Spirit Horse of the Cherokee, Iron Maiden's The Aftermath, Gamma Ray's Strangers in the Night, Znowhite's A Soldier's Creed, Vio-lence's I Profit

Other Activities and Interests: Menacing motorists on my mountain bike, frolicking in the snow, hiking in the woods, watching movies, playing ping-pong and pinball. Cheese. Kim Stanley Robinson. Tad Williams. Conan of Cimmeria. Pittsburgh Steelers.

Email: scratcro at yahoo dot com

Name: Andreas Schiffmann

Position: Columnist

Contributor Since: October 2004

Birthdate: May 18, 1981

Quote of Relevance: "Humanity - A blind mask urging to be slit with eyeholes" Robinson Jeffers

Five Songs of Note: : Aghora's "Satya" , Spiral Architect's "Conjuring Collapse", Devin Townsend's "Earth Day", Psychotic Waltz's "My Grave", Nevermore's "The Learning"

Other Activities and Interests: Music apart from Metal: Jazz, especially double-bassists, pianists and saxophonists (John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Miles Davis, Albert Ayler, Dave Holland, Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea), Fusion (Mahavishnu Orchestra, Frank Zappa), progressive music from any decade (Tool, Dream Theater, Genesis, Spastik Ink,…) anything old and new that has guitars in it (A Perfect Circle, Soundgarden, Jeff Buckley, The Police, The Tea Party,…), Literature: piling up tons of books for my English and German studies, meticulously reading music-zines not to miss a great band (and finding none…), other activities: spending hours playing bass every day, all the time left is for watching weird documentaries on TV, cooking, drinking litres of green tea, going for a walk in wind and weather and physically exhausting myself at sports (sometimes).

Email: schiffmann at vr-web.de

Name: garth ferrante

Position: Proofreader

Contributor Since: September 2002

Birthdate: October 29, 1972

Quote of Relevance: "Let the Truth Be Your Guide."

Five Songs of Note: Misfits' Bullet, Scorn's Light Trap, My Dying Bride's The Raven & the Rose, Agalloch's In the Shadow of Our Pale Companion, Opeth's Harvest

Other Activities and Interests: I write poetry and am putting together an anthology that will, hopefully, be published very soon; I'm a community/college high school English teacher whose aspirations are to teach on a college level full-time; I mainly enjoy listening to music (preferably weird, wonderful, and extreme), watching Northern Exposure, the Zatoichi series, and MST3K episodes over and over again.

Email: horggard at hotmail dot com

Name: Hunter Ginn

Position: Columnist

Contributor Since: September 2004

Birthdate: December 30, 1978

Quote of Relevance: "There is room on the stage for one beast and one alone. All others are destined for a night that is eternal and without name. One by one they will step down into the darkness before the footlamps." Judge Hoden in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian

Five Songs of Note: : Cynic's Celestial Voyage, Anathema's One Last Goodbye, Mr. Bungle's Goodbye Sober Day, Blind Guardian's Bright Eyes, Anacrusis' Sound the Alarm

Other Activities and Interests: Music: Tech Metal (Cynic, Sieges Even, Watchtower, Psychotic Waltz, Spiral Architect, Mekong Delta, later Embrionic Death, Believer, Atheist, Obliveon, etc.); RIO (Univers Zero, Present), Shoegazer/Ambient (This Mortal Coil, Slowdive, My Bloody Valentine, Lush, Curve, Bark Psychosis, Labradford,), Weirdo-Metal (Pan-Thy-Monium, Maudlin of the Well, OLD, Arcturus, Root); 70s Prog (Pulsar, Grobschnitt, Museo Rosenbach, Finch, PFM, Banco, Eela Craig); Books (At Swim Two-Birds; Dance Dance Dance; Gravity's Rainbow; Blood Meridian; 100 Years of Solitude); Movies (Chinatown; The Big Lebowski; Brazil; Best In Show; Donnie Darko; Rushmore; Clerks; Pi; Election; Suspiria; Evil Dead II; Office Space); Television (Family Guy, Iron Chef, Aqua Teen Hunger Force, Upright Citizens Brigade, Sea Lab, Winston-Salem Cable Access Programming); Girlfriend: Caitie; Food: burritos de la roqueta; steak fajita nachos; red and green Thai curry; sushi; pizza w/ spinach, bacon, and mushrooms; Miscellaneous: laptop music; Asian hand percussion; formal and post-structural literary theory (despite its low currency in the academy); bowling; vinyl (esp. limited gatefold pressings); long walks; getting caught in the rain

Email: ginnbh3 at wfu dot edu

Website: Canvas Solaris

Name: Roman M. Temin

Position: Columnist

Contributor Since: September 2002

Birthdate: July 17, 1983

Quote of Relevance: "Thus repulsed, our final hope is flat despair... To be no more - sad cure, for who would lose, though full of pain, this intellectual being, those thoughts that wander through eternity, to perish rather, swallowed up and lost in the wide womb of uncreated Night, devoid of sense and motion?" - John Milton, Paradise Lost

Five Songs of Note: Edge of Sanity's Crimson, King Crimson's Starless, Immolation's Close to a World Below [while album], Candlemass' The Sorceror's Pledge, Porcupine Tree's Russia on Ice

Other Activities and Interests: Exercising [though I've been slacking in that regard a bit lately...], Reading socially relevant literature [and Tolkien!], website design, image manipulation, anime, video games, pro football [go Pats!], making sammiches

Email: belf_son_of_belf at hotmail dot com

Website: Blistering.com

Name: Matt Harper

Position: Columnist

Contributor Since: September 2002

Birthdate: February 11, 1978

Quote of Relevance: "The only true knowledge I have is that I know nothing."- Socrates

Five Songs of Note: Peter Hammill's A Louse Is Not a Home, Genesis' Supper's Ready, Opeth's Moonlapse Vertigo, Blind Guardian's And Then There Was Silence, Cynic's Urobic Forms

Other Activities and Interests: BOOKS: Hard Science Fiction (Stephen Baxter, Bruce Sterling, Arthur C. Clarke), Epic Space Opera/Sci-Fantasy (David Wingrove, Jack Vance, Roger Zelazny, Robert Silverberg, Michael Moorcock, Stephen King, Peter F. Hamilton), Fantasy/Horror/Humor (Terry Practchett, Neil Gaiman, HP Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard). BIOLOGICAL SCIENCE: Research in animal genetics, development, and behavior (LSU Dept of Biological Sciences, the department I work in). GAMING: Video and computer games (GameSpot, www.rpgamer.com, Final Fantasy series, Castlevania series, Bioware/Black Isle RPGs, Dungeon Keeper, Jagged Alliance, Street Fighter series, Heretic/Hexen series --> RPGs, action/adventure and turn-based strategy/tactics games), Neverwinter Nights module development (www.neverwinternights.com), Emulation of old video games, especially translated Japanese RPGs (www.zophar.net, www.emucamp.com, www.zsnes.com), Pencil and paper RPGs (D&D 3rd ed, White Wolf, Alternity, etc.), SLEEP, FOOD: Indian (curry!), Thai, Vietnamese, Greek/Lebanese, Mexican (autentico! no Tex-Mex), Japanese (sushi), Tuscan Italian

Email: llorenth at cox dot net

Website: Perpetual Motion

Name: Dan 'numbskull' Berger

Position: Columnist

Contributor Since: September 2002

Birthdate: March 2, 1965

Quote of Relevance: "Believe those who are seeking the truth; doubt those who find it." - Andre Gide

Five Songs of Note: Nuclear Assault's Brainwashed, Black Sabbath's War Pigs, Coroner's Masked Jackal, Rainbow's Stargazer, Emperor's Curse You All Men

Other Activities and Interests: Comics (Digital Webbing, COMICOM.com, Sequential Tart), Politics (The Nader Page, Green Party USA, Libertarian Party), American Football (National Football League, Cleveland Browns, New England Patriots), Computer Games (MaddenMania, Sorceror’s Place, PVP), The Iron Chef, Food TV

Email: danberger65 at yahoo dot com

Website: Dan Berger

Name: Jen Gore

Position: Occasional Website Support

Contributor Since: October 2001

Birthdate: November 30, 1974

Quote of Relevance: "Know Thyself"

Five Songs of Note: Devin Townsend's The Death of Music, Emperor's Ye Entrancemperium, Opeth's To Bid You Farewell, Havayoth's Burn, Betray My Secrets' God and Me

Other Activities and Interests: Singing, learning how to practice medicine, reading, drinking beer, thinking, daydreaming

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