Credit: Found On Internet

“God” is in a cage, being whipped by a PVC nun. A midget Satan is standing to the side, jeering through a megaphone. And Robb Flynn is a few feet away, knocking back shots of Jaegermeister. The Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards have come back to Camden’s KOKO.

Rewind four hours, and “God” (or The Editor-in-Chief, as we at Music Towers call him) is stood on the roof of KOKO, shouting insults through a megaphone at passing motorists. A slow cavalcade of  blacked-out motors pull up near the doors. While Slayer roll out of a modest SUV, who turns up in a giant, over-sized stretched limo? Dee Snider and his wife (I know it’s his wife, I’ve seen their baroque nightmare of a mansion on MTV Cribs). I guess those Twisted Sister royalties pay better than anyone thought.

“MACHINE FUCKING HEAD! MACHINE FUCKING HEAD!” The sound off the crowd inside deserves those capital letters. Jamey Jasta, erstwhile frontman of Hatebreed, who’s taken over from Ian Camfield on presenting duties, looks more lost than a cow that’s walked into McDonalds. Whether they shunted Camfield off stage because he’s happier asking questions to the nominees on the red carpet, or that someone at Hammer finally clocked that he sits behind a radio desk for a reason, remains unclear.

At least the assembled throng of fans have some self-respect, with the collective jeers and boos when Avenged Sevenfold’s victory in the Best Video sounding louder than many of the cheers for bands at Download. Poor little Jasta looks terrified. Not even the hugely-deserving victory for Job For A Cowboy is the Best Underground category can calm the front rows.

Luckily, the fist live performance of the night comes and saves him. Turisas would be ridiculous if they didn’t have the ultimate self-deprecating turn in their cover of Boney-M’s ‘Rasputin’. It's party-metal for a party night, and if anything, it just accelerates everyone's drinking...

I like Mastodon as much as the next person, but the Dimebag Darrell Shredder Award that they get smacks of tokenism. It’s as if Metal Hammer wanted to give the riff monsters, Bill Kelliher and Brent Hinds, an award for something, but by the time they got round to Mastodon’s turn they realised they’d run out of all the others. Wasn’t this award supposed to be for young new players? Guys with 4 albums already surely don’t qualify?