EXECUTIVE EDITOR BRANDON GEIST: A VALENTINE’S DAY LIST—THE GREATEST METAL ANTI-LOVE SONGS

I don’t think it’s an accident that the acronym for Valentine’s Day is V.D. Like love itself, which has a painful, poisonous, and sometimes pus-oozing dark side, so February 14—the 24-hour period designated by whatever sadistic fuckers control this sort of shit as the day we celebrate amore—has a pitch-black underbelly. Just ask anyone who’s been alone on Valentine’s Day, or in a shitty relationship on Valentine’s Day, or, yes, contracted the V.D. on Valentine’s Day. Metal has always reveled in the dark side of life, so it only makes sense that on this date when everyone else is buying each other—or, in those particularly sad cases, themselves—roses and chocolate, we should celebrate the dark side of love. And here are six kickass songs that do just that.

Pantera: “This Love”
If the song “Fucking Hostile” didn’t already tip you off, ladies, the next tune on Pantera’s magnum opus, Vulgar Display of Power, should make it clear that Phil Anselmo is not someone you want to be cuddling up to.
Sample lyrics: “If ever words were spoken/Painful and untrue/I said I loved you but I lied.”

Type O Negative: “Unsuccessfully Coping With the Natural Beauty of Infidelity”
Before Pete Steele and his Brooklyn crew started courting the goth-chick demographic with albums like Bloody Kisses and October Rust, they were slapping the black lipstick right off unfaithful female friends with an album called Slow, Deep, Hard, on which you’ll find this particularly disgruntled number.
Sample lyrics: “You went to L’amour Saturday night/Red nails and lipstick, dressed two sizes too tight/His tongue down your throat/His hand up your skirt/Yeah, I’m a man/But it still hurts/Slut!/Whore!/C*nt!/I know you're fucking someone else (He knows you're fucking someone else).”

Megadeth: “Loved to Deth”
He’d just been dumped by the ultimate mistress, Metallica, when Dave Mustaine penned this track from Megadeth’s debut, Killing Is My Business…, so who could blame him for a little bitterness. Or, in the case of this song, and the case of poor Dave himself, a whole fucking lot of bitterness.
Sample lyrics: “I loved you to deth/If I can’t have you/Than no one will/And since I won’t/I’ll have to kill/My only love.”

Soilent Green: “She Cheated on You Twice”
Our soon-to-be ex-president George W. once said, “Fool me once, shame on…shame on you. Fool me…you can’t get fooled again.” If only that were true, Soilent Green wouldn’t have had the material to write this bile-soaked anthem about gettin' two-timed two times.
Sample lyrics: “She wanted to be mine /But she lost her mind /This bitter taste of remorse /This love, a lost cause.”

Guns N’ Roses: “Used to Love Her”
What metal group hasn’t written a song about offing a significant other? (If your band hasn’t yet, get on it.) But most of those tunes have obviously been just elaborate fantasies purging feelings of rejection, betrayal, etc. Then an actually crazy dude like Axl—who beat up his onetime girlfriend, model Stephanie fucking Seymour—sings a song about it, and somehow it sounds just a little less outside of the realm of possibility.
Sample lyrics: “I used to love her, but I had to kill her/She bitched so much/She drove me nuts /And now I'm happier this way.”

Cannibal Corpse: “Fucked With a Knife”
Actually, this one is a love song. My bad.
Sample lyrics: “Tied tight to the bed/Legs spread open/Bruised flesh, lacerations/Skin stained with blood/I'm the only one you love/I feel her heart beating/my knife deep inside/Her crotch is bleeding.”