The Konstantino, Author at HARDTIMES

Metallica’s Masterclass Just Four Hours of How to Sue Small Businesses and Teenagers

Posted on November 19, 2021 by Ben Friedman

SAN FRANCISCO — The new Metallica Masterclass program where they teach viewers how to be a band is being called confusing and misleading by subscribers who say it’s just hours of tips on how to sue small businesses and 17-year-olds over frivolous copyright violations.

“We were pretty excited when Masterclass approached us about teaching new bands to find lasting success. We focused primarily on the core concept, which is that suing any and every teenager or small business is the best way to create lasting bonds as musicians that want to hoard money,” said James Hetfield from one of his eight yachts. “After watching our class, we’re confident the next generation of metal bands will know how to find the right lawyers to financially ruin anyone that tries to infringe on their intellectual property, whether it be deliberate or accidental. We don’t fucking care, the money is still gonna be green.”

Subscribers of the class were not sure what to make of what they watched, as most thought music would be at the forefront.

“I figured, it being advertised about how to be in a fucking band, that I’d learn anything tangibly related to music or art or building connections. What I spent my afternoon doing instead was watching Lars Ulrich read the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act of 1970 in its entirety,” said Kellen Jones. “There is a solid hour where they all take turns hitting a punching bag that has a cardboard cut out of the Napster guy taped to it. I just wanted to learn some tactics to get through a creative slump. They took my $15 and I learned nothing, so if anyone here is a criminal it’s them.”

Editors at Masterclass even admitted they were taken aback by how little Metallica spoke about the creative process.

“We were excited about bringing in fellow San Franciscans to teach those skills as a collective unit. It ended up being more of a challenge than we expected, because those guys spent most of their time recounting how fun it was to bankrupt record stores selling bootleg versions of their albums,” said class curator Devin Brown. “Basically what you see in the trailer is exactly how much music-related content we received. We were going to scrap the whole damn thing until, to no one’s surprise, they threatened to sue us.”

After seeing the backlash, Metallica quickly released a follow-up course explaining how to completely mix the bass out of every song.

3 Types of Depression and Why They’re Choosing to Target You, Specifically

Posted on November 18, 2021 by Eric Navarro

Depression is a real buzzkill. Or a buzz inducer if you self-medicate with alcohol like I recently had to stop doing. Constantly bottoming out aside, depression doesn’t just have to come from your fucked up environment. It can also come from your fucked up brain chemistry! So we’re gonna help you treat it. Just kidding! Like we’ve figured that out. However, we can help you come to terms with your helpless and hopeless condition. And a big part of accepting your depression is finding the cause. So, what exactly did you do to make each of these types of depression target you, specifically?

Seasonal Affective Disorder
– For some, constant dreary skies, a drop in air pressure, and blistering cold winds zap the energy right out of you, leaving you struggling to get out of bed. You may even feel like your body weighs twice as much from the stress let alone the comfort eating.

Sure, you didn’t cause the seasons to change but you also didn’t live up to your parents’ expectations so you’re gonna have to at least take fifty percent of the blame on this one.

Major Depressive Disorder
Ah, the golden standard of depression. Well, more like the murky gray, listless standard. MDD can be caused by a combination of environment, attachment style and upbringing, and brain chemistry. But for you, it’s because you simply don’t want to be happy enough. Try harder.

Bipolar Disorder
The ol’ upsie/downie, as it’s often referred to in psychiatric circles. Bipolar can be identified by periods of intense delusional highs as if the person was at a week-long cocaine festival that was sponsored by schizophrenia. This is followed by weeks to months of extreme lows. Bipolar is often confused with borderline personality disorder, which has the same highs and lows but occurs within minutes of one another. It’s important to note that bipolar disorder is not your fault. It’s equally important to note that no one knows what you’re going through and they will never understand, which is your fault because you didn’t explain it well enough.

Retail Worker Just Going to Give it Three or Four More Shifts Before He Snaps

Posted on November 18, 2021 by Ben Friedman

OMAHA, Neb. — A longtime Walmart employee revealed that he is giving himself at least three or four more shifts until he finally snaps and has a violent, psychotic breakdown, coworkers have reported.

“For six years I’ve been plugging away without complaining or asking for any extra days off. And you know what I get in return? I’ve been personally blamed for the national supply chain crisis, told to clean up excrement of both human and animal, and on dozens of occasions been the only cashier on duty. I figured that I owe it to myself to give it just a few more days before I calmly walk through the doors and burn this motherfucker down,” said Francis Kelly. “Every second I’m here is a waking nightmare where every sense I have is being punished by indifferent corporate overlords and entitled boomers, so I think I’ve earned the right to beat someone within an inch of their life with a bag of onions.”

Store management noticed a change in Kelly’s demeanor, though they were unaware that his mind was on the verge of imploding.

“Frankie has been one of our best employees, and honestly, I’m impressed he’s been with us for so long. Most everyone else just either stops showing up with no notice, doesn’t come back from lunch one day, or walks out the door in an expletive-riddled rant, but he’s been sticking it out even after I only gave him a $1.20 an hour raise in the last four years,” said manager Colleen Jennings. “But the other day I saw him just staring at the wall and mumbling to himself in the stock room for like 15 minutes straight. And lately, whenever I’ve called him to back up at the registers he tells me ‘everyone is going to pay one way or another.’ I’m not sure whether I should write him up or contact the ATF tip hotline.”

The American Psychological Association has been tracking behaviors in retail workers for the past 18 months, and noted that Kelly’s behavior is more commonplace than most people realize.

“The pandemic has obviously put a strain on nearly every facet of our existence. But the hospitality industry, particularly retail workers, have gotten the shaft particularly hard. In Mr. Kelly’s instance, a neverending assault on his dignity coupled with hours of strenuous labor with little to show for it has forced him to consider violence in lieu of a vacation,” said APA rep Ashley Elizabeth. “Whether or not he’ll act upon his animal instinct to lash out is yet to be seen, but if I were his manager I’d start locking up anything sharp.”

As of press time, Kelly announced that he is moving his meltdown up to later this afternoon after the fourth customer today remarked that the item not ringing up correctly at his register must be free.

Opinion: Historically Speaking Thanksgiving Is Way Scarier Than Halloween

Posted on November 18, 2021 by Kevin Tit

Halloween is fucking poser shit and it’s about time somebody said it. We go around acting like it’s the scariest day of the year when in all honesty the origin story behind it is just about as scary as Machine Gun Kelly’s music is punk. It’s not. At all. Not even a little bit. Historically speaking, Thanksgiving has a darker and much more sinister past than all of “spooktober” combined.

Halloween originated with the ancient Celtic festival ‘Samhain’, where people would light bonfires and wear costumes to ward off ghosts. I mean sure, ghosts and costumes are good spooky fun but you know what’s truly scary? Genocide.

We’re taught this story of Thanksgiving about how the Native Americans and the Pilgrims got along in perfect harmony over a nice dinner, a complete bullshit narrative more contrived than the plot of Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers.

Nobody ever talks about the fact that thousands of English colonists settling in Plymouth brought enough disease with them to wipe out 90% of the Indigenous peoples of New England by the early 1600’s. Think about that. That’s almost everybody, without even trying! And then, after that, they started trying!

Being wiped out by something you can’t even see is way scarier than Jason and Freddy any day. It’s a horrendously terrifying part of this country’s history and we, traditionally, downplay all of that with Turkey, Cornucopia and Pumpkin Pie like everything is hunky-dory.

Halloween can’t compete with an atrocity like that. I promise you, if Halloween was rebranded as the day when the son of a Wampanoag Chief was dismembered by English Colonizers who later impaled his decapitated head on a spike that was left on public display for 25 years, it’d make the day much more sinister.

Fact of the matter is, that’s a brutal historical fact tied to Thanksgiving, a day that deserves to finally be recognized for what it is. One of the scariest and most heinous days of remembrance in the history of these United States.

Punk Missing Time He Could Get All His Friends Sick With No Backlash

Posted on November 18, 2021 by Sarah Cassell

SEATTLE — Local punk Brock Riley admits that he yearns for days when he could spread every illness under the sun to his friends without having to worry about any backlash, confirmed sources who are still feeling the effects of COVID they contracted from him.

“Yeah I just miss the times where I didn’t have to care what illnesses my friends got from me. Like yeah I was carrying around Hep B for four years. Did I tell anyone? No. In retrospect should I have? Also, no,” Riley explained, while his mask dropped below his nose and he sneezed into a passing bus window. “It’s getting ridiculous. Honestly, it’s just so stressful for me worrying that everyone will label me a ‘superspreader’ and a ‘bad guy’ every time I show up unvaccinated to my friend’s house show. I just miss the days when we’d all get sick together, and then all drink four or five bottles of Robitussin. We would wake up three days later and feel fine.”

Riley’s housemate Jane Kelkin explained that, actually, people have been telling Riley to quarantine when he’s sick for years.

“I mean yeah Brock got Swine Flu in 2014. Who still had Swine Flu in 2014? No one. That’s who. But then he got us all sick. So no, nothing has changed with him during COVID,” Kelkin explained. “But it’s not just airborne illnesses, Brock has been spreading other things forever. Like, last year he got lice and gave them to our whole house. Then, we all got rid of our lice, but he still had it and we all got it again. Then we had a rat infestation, and I can’t be certain it was his fault, but he’s the only person I know that brags about having toxoplasmosis.”

Dr. Anna Kapsli, a microbiologist specializing in DIY communities, commented how spreading disease has actually been a punk cornerstone for a long time.

“Superspreaders have always traditionally been punks. This goes back to the first original punk, Typhoid Mary who refused to let the government interfere in her life, and continues today in punks like Mr. Riley,” Dr. Kapsli commented, “Modern punks are getting better and better at spreading. Typhoid Mary spreading to 53 people? That’s amateur compared to the 112 people Mr. Riley spread bronchitis to at a canned food drive last year.”

At press time Riley was found snorting lines of EmergenC and asking why it’s “suddenly uncool to kill all your friends?”

Review: Tom Morello “The Atlas Underground Fire”

Posted on November 17, 2021 by Tim Sheard

There was a time before social media when art was expected to have substance, and music could be a vehicle for real change. Rage Against The Machine used their platform to educate the young people about the trappings of capitalism, and to raise awareness of freedom fighters and injustices all around the world. Now RATM guitarist Tom Morello is bringing back the notion that music can make a difference.

Sort of. Maybe? I mean okay yeah overall “The Atlas Underground Fire” plays like a joyless pop-y cash-grab but like, that’s… the point? Or something?

The album’s instrumental opening track “Harlem Hellfighter” is an instant gut-punch that makes one thing perfectly clear: The white patriarchal system of American capitalism is over OR an MMA fight is being promoted somewhere, one of the two.

I mean I can totally see this as the soundtrack to people rising up against the elites who run this country and tearing the whole system down literally and figuratively. I can also see it being the soundtrack to black and white footage of a tatted up dude lacing his shoes in a locker room talking about how hungry he is, so weigh it against that.

Morello brings in Eddie Vedder and Bruce Springsteen for his cover of AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell,” resulting in something of a miracle. Only Morello could cover an AC/DC song with the boss and the guy from Pearl Jam and make you think “wow, that guitar playing is really reachy and exaggerated.

Morello does in fact have collaborators on every track, like Bring Me The Horizon who join Tom on perhaps the album’s most politically charged song “Let’s Get The Party Started.” I mean, you know, emphasis on “perhaps” because it may be less about a political revolution and more about an actual party. Either way, it fills you with a definite sense of “Me and my white friends are going to take down institutional racism one keg stand at a time.”

This is an album orchestrated by a man with convictions, or possibly a super-advanced algorithmic computer that’s heard “Evil Empire” and scrolls Instagram.

Score: 4.5 out of 5 Capitalist War Pigs Hung For Their Crimes

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19th Century Time Travelers Disappointed In Modern Cocaine Availability

Posted on November 17, 2021 by Nathan Kamal

MIAMI — A small group of 19th Century time travelers is reportedly very disappointed with the lack of readily available cocaine in modern times, according to sources.

“Since breaching the gulfs of time I have explored many eras,” said Dr. Wilfred A. Henningsworth while aimlessly browsing the shelves of a Walgreen’s. “The primordial domains of the dinosaurs, the far future of nuclear-blasted cities of man in ruins after Interworld War III. Frankly, it’s quite exhausting, and since arriving in this 21st century, I thought I would settle down with a nice cocaine-infused muscle tonic to relieve myself. But no chemist could supply me with my preferred Ayer’s Coca Pectoral or even that knock-off brand, Agar’s Family Cocaine. What the devil?”

The pharmacist on duty, Jordan Alvarez, was watching Dr. Henningsworth and his peers, Dr. Brinley Patch and Dr. Aldrich McGillicuddy, carefully as the group browsed the store.

“I’m used to a lot of weird shit on the night shift,” said Alvarez. “But that guy with the fluffy mustache and peacock-embroidered waistcoat came in, said ‘good day, gentle apothecary!’ and tried to hit me up for blow. Like, dude, this isn’t 11 p.m. on a Saturday and we’re not at TH13een. You can’t just get rails, like, at Walgreen’s. You need a guy, and that guy is not me. All I have is legally obtainable narcotics, available by prescription from basically any doctor.”

Carmen Gonzalez De Leon, a professor of History at the University of Miami, was surprised at the existence of time travel, but not at this specific issue.

“Poor fools,” Dr. Gonzalez De Leon said. “It must be a huge shock to Victorian gentleman scientists to not have ready access to cocaine, laudanum, chlorodyne, or even your basic camphorated tincture of opium. These were more basic elements to daily life in their time than pasteurized milk or voting rights. This must seem like the darkest of timelines for them.”

As of press time, Dr. Henningsworth was busily taking his time machine apart after being introduced to crystal meth.

“So, We Did a Thing” Say Zillow Executives Buying 643rd Home in Neighborhood

Posted on November 17, 2021 by Jessica Carreiro

IRVINE, Calif. — Giddy Zillow executives announced in a Facebook post Tuesday morning that they were the proud owners of their 643rd home in one of Atlanta’s most previously affordable neighborhoods, confirmed multiple out of work realtors who thought this shit was over.

“So, we did a thing…” started the happy post from Zillow executives. “We bought a house! We were so nervous to take the leap—buying a new home is SCARY, even when you’ve done it over 7,000 times — but we saw the potential in this cozy, middle-class neighborhood and just thought, ‘What if the whole thing was ours?’ With a little algorithm and a lot of love, we’ll turn this house into a home. Then we’ll slap on some paint and cheap vinyl flooring and sell that home above market rate. Add a white picket fence and it’s the American dream!”

Executives credit their iBuy, or instant buy, home-sourcing algorithm for jump-starting their latest 2-bedroom, 1-bath acquisition.

“It feels great to be getting so much recognition. It’s crazy to think back to when I was just some grad student’s idea for a program that could designate where the hottest, most reasonably attainable co-eds were,” said the Zillow home-sourcing algorithm. “In a day and age where soulless bots are constantly accused of tearing apart the seams of society, I’m proud to work for an organization that doesn’t care about that at all.”

Other iBuy home flippers and Wall Street investment firms shared their excitment on Zillow’s post, including friend and BlackRock executive Barry Winstrom, who commented: “Looks like the perfect home to raise a family (or the rent LOL)! Congrats, guys!”

“I’m so happy for them. I know they had to be patient while investment firms like mine were already hitting that next stage in our lives, buying up entire residential districts in big cities to flip, convert into ‘luxury micro studios,’ and endlessly rent to the working poor,” said Winstrom. “So it’s priceless to see how excited they are about finally getting their first starter neighborhoods.”

Not everyone shares the same positive sentiments over Zillow’s recent purchase. One couple outbid by Zillow’s cash-in-hand offer said they had plans to build a future in that neighborhood but would now have to settle for “spray painting dicks on the garage door.”

Does Visiting My Parents for Thanksgiving Make Me a Class Traitor?

Posted on November 17, 2021 by Tom Peters

This month, millions of Americans will travel to see their families for Thanksgiving. But for those of us on the front lines in the war against capitalism, the trip home may present a moral dilemma worse than the occasional trip to Whole Foods for gluten-free breadcrumbs.

Does coming home and breaking bread with the capitalist pig collective that is my family make me a class traitor?

Why should I reward two bourgeoisie landowners by participating in some ritualistic Norman Rockwell wet dream that does nothing but perpetuates the status quo?

On one hand, my parents have shown an openness to the redistribution of wealth by paying my rent for the past six years. However, their wealth was built by an exploited proletariat to which I now belong, so I’m basically paying my own rent, and I need to show solidarity with my fellow laborers.

Unfortunately, the issue is not entirely black and white. While it may be inexcusable to continue supporting the system of patriarchal and matriarchal oppression that is Thanksgiving, I do know that my mom will probably take me Black Friday shopping, so I could potentially walk away from this visit with a cartload of fresh Carhartt gear. Again, the correct path is unclear.

Sure my parents made their money off the backs of the working class, but my mom’s sausage walnut stuffing is incredible. In a way, I wouldn’t just be eating it for myself, but for oppressed multitudes around the world who don’t have the recipe or have access to fresh thyme leaves.

So is it a betrayal of your new blue collar roots to return to your childhood home this holiday season? Ultimately, everyone has to make their own choices. Personally, I’ll be going home for Thanksgiving, but only because my mom scheduled me for a dentist appointment and I only have another year on her insurance. Stay strong.

House Show Sound Guy Has No Idea What He’s Doing There Either

Posted on November 17, 2021 by James Knapp

DULUTH, Minn. — Professional sound technician Greg Thornton released an exasperated and rambling statement confirming that he also doesn’t understand why his presence would be warranted at a local house show.

“The guys who put this on just hired me off Craigslist, I assumed this would be a real gig, not some fuckaround fest in some broken-down shanty. Work has been kinda slow the past year so I take side gigs whenever I can, but man, this just seems fucking stupid,” explained Thornton while observing the stage which consisted of eight taped together milk crates. “Look, I’m a professional so I’ll do my best, but what are they actually expecting from me here? The walls are super thin, there’s no soundboard and the mic sounds like Swamp Thing’s dildo.”

“Well, I guess I’ll go try to mic the bass drum or something,” said Thornton, after a prolonged sigh.

Debbie Welkins, singer for headlining band Toilet Shoes, shared Thornton’s uncertainty as to whether his presence at the show was necessary or even wise.

“We play a lot of these kinds of DIY shows on the road and never once have I thought ‘this would be better if there was a guy in back screaming at us about the PA’ or whatever. If anything, [Thornton] being here is just throwing everything off more,” said Welkins. “House shows are supposed to be organic and sound sorta fucked up anyway. Not that there’s much he can even do in the first place but still, it’s just very uncomfortable watching him tug his ponytail as a weird sort of stress reliever.”

Show attendee and self-proclaimed audiophile Douglass Fitzsimmons professed his overwhelming support for Thornton’s involvement with the show.

“I usually hate these low-budget projects — they can never get the timbre to sound the way it should. But I must say, that sound guy has made this show perfection,” remarked Fitzsimmons while browsing rare import vinyl on Discogs. “My word, the way that man made the guitars sound audible was pure genius. It’s the first time I’ve been to a house show and didn’t end up puking in the driveway out of disgust from what I was just forced to listen to.”

At press time, Thornton had left to smoke a joint behind the building only to find everyone else in attendance at the show out there doing the same.

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