Music in your ears and fire in your belly

Update: Check out my playlists on Spotify! (links in the sidebar)

Music is great; we all like music, or at least, we all should like music. Music has been shown to have a whole host of positive benefits on the human psyche, mood and performance, but as this is a fitness blog, we'll stick to that topic. There have been a multitude of studies on the effect of music on sports performance, so here is a little, in-no-way-comprehensive round-up of a few relevant studies I happened across in 10 lazy minutes on Google Scholar.

This paper found that synchronous music enhanced performance in a 400m run; this paper found that both slow and fast music enhanced the time to completion (over a no music control) for 500m rowing sprints, with the fast music slightly outperforming slow. So for anaerobic performance, fast music or music that is in time with our activity is preferable, but if you prefer slow music, go for it. These two papers found that listening to 'arousing' (their word, not mine) music during warm-up (and only during warm up) leads to higher heart rate, which subsequently led to greater power outputs in tests. This means that you don't have to be hammering your ears into oblivion throughout your workout, in fact a quick blast of music before a set may be all you need to see a positive effect.

There is literally no article in which I will not put a picture of a scantily clad female. 

You may want to keep that music going through your set however, as this paper showed that self-selected motivational music increased muscular endurance, allowing subjects to hold a weight for longer than in a white noise condition; so your favourite pump up song may let you grind out an extra rep or two on a hard set, leading to bigger and better gains in the long run. Furthermore, this paper found that "significant increases in strength performance occurred when arousal was high", the arousal in this study was the result of imagery and breathing exercises, but as the above studies show, spinning a tune that stirs some emotion in you will achieve arousal, ergo likely bringing about these increases in strength performance.

If one entertainment source isn't enough to satisfy you, and like most millennials you need a constant stream of digital media into your face, this study showed that a combo of motivational music and video enhanced performance on a maximal effort run. It's probably not ideal to start watching Braveheart in the middle of your next set of bench, but if it could be safely done so, watching the right videos could make your cardio sessions both more fun and more productive.

At this point, I am going to share some of my own favourite lifting music which is almost entirely aggressive hip-hop, metal and hardcore; this certainly will not be for everyone so if you want to clock out now with the knowledge that listening to the music you like will let you get more out of your sessions, feel free to do so. If you are lacking angry songs by angry men (and ladies), then read/watch/listen on.

Hip-Hop
I considered jumping in at the deep end (double meaning full intended) with some of the heaviest stuff I listen to, but that would scare 99% of people, so we'll start crowd friendly...ish. Firstly, I listen to hip hop, not radio rap (call me a snob) I don't listen to anywhere near the amount that I used to, but what I do listen to tends to be verbose and magniloquent (think Lupe Fiasco, KOOL A.D., Jay Electronica, Elzhi, Aesop Rock) not always the in-your-face high energy tunes that lend themselves well to a high intensity training session. Nevertheless, here are some suggestions that may be lesser known (as I will assume everyone knows that The Chronic was a good album and Biggie may have had a decent song or two):

I love Danny Brown, he treads the line between intelligent and ignorant rap like no-one else. Either way, he always has incredible production (including loads of big 'EDM' names on his newer stuff) and rarely, if ever, has a bad verse.

Snowgoons are a production team from Germany who consistently make huge sounding boom-bap beats. All MCs are guest spots, so the verses can vary, but they have loads of material, and there is some gold in there.

P.O.S. brings a strange blend of hip-hop, punk and electronic; not all tracks are super high energy, but when they are (like the above, one of my favourite songs ever) there is no pause for breath.

Run the Jewels are getting some well deserved recognition finally, as El-P has had 10 years plus repping the ultra minority of gingers in hip-hop. High energy production and non-stop bars from 2 top calibre MCs, also not afraid to get political on videos, if that is your thing.

Despite the name, Mr. Muthafuckin' eXquire fires out smart lyrics at a million words a minute with one of the best flows in rap. Get him on a big beat and it's absolute magic.

Wu-Tang. You should know them. You should listen to them. You should also watch this video if you haven't.

Hardcore
If you see me in the gym, its highly likely I'm listening to something like the following:

If you are an emotionally dark and crippled human being like me, you too may fall in love with Counterparts. With some of the most profoundly negative, yet cathartic lyrics ever committed to tape (or whatever they commit to these days), pushing your physical capacities to their limit whilst blasting Counterparts is a near transcendental experience.

A band that just does everything right, Hundredth make pitch perfect hardcore, just try listen to the "don't you fucking test me" drop in the above song without feeling a hit of adrenaline.

Von Wolfe appeared, dropped a 6 track EP of disgustingly good hardcore and then swiftly and tragically disappeared. Wasted potential aside, what we do have is a masterpiece of raw aggression.

Proving that anything the boys can do, girls can do just as well, we have Vales. Female fronted hardcore that pulls absolutely no punches.

The Ghost of a Thousand make music that makes me want to break things.

Liferuiner adds 20kg to your squat. Just look at the singer, I bet he can bench 4 plates.

This video has criminally low views for how incredible Statues are. Please watch it and be as blown away by both their music and the singer's glorious beard.

In case it is not clear, I love hardcore.

Metal(core)
It's different to hardcore. Sort of.

Misery Signals, the masters for over a decade.

Leaders of the new school. Northlane's first 2 albums were incredible, then their singer literally screamed his voice to it's breaking point. That's the price you pay for greatness. I can't think of any other singers that have the range of highs, lows and cleans that Adrian managed on early Northlane.

The Devil Wears Prada keep getting better, they just do everything right. Fantastic cleans, booming yells, one of the tightest live bands I've seen and even if it is not exactly on my wavelength, I have to admit there is something pretty cool about loving Jesus so much that you scream your face off about it.

When you need some Dillinger Escape Plan, only Dillinger will do. Is it genius or is it noise? Well, it's both. Also the singer is jacked, so clearly his music is fit for lifting.

The closest I have ever come to a religious experience is seeing this song live. The Chariot were something special. Their last album 'One Wing' is genuinely considered a modern masterpiece. Something about being a God botherer compels you to make incredible metal apparently.

Embrace the End do not let up. Speed riffs, blast beats and 2 guys screaming at you, this is the musical equivalent of PCP.

Call it technical metalcore, call it progressive deathcore, Born of Osiris know how to make some incredibly heavy beautiful music.

Speaking of technical deathcore (and finishing this list deeply in the stupid heavy regime)...Animosity.

If you have made this far, congratulations, you are probably me. Hi David, you should go and do something useful with your life now.

Do you smell what DC is cooking? - Part 1: Sauces and such

Dropping recipes on you fools like The Rock drops the People's Elbow on jabronis. I still don't actually know what The Rock was cooking; shit loads of Test, GH and D-Bol is what I assume from looking at how absolutely ridiculously jacked the guy is these days. I can't promise that these recipes will have anywhere near the effect on you that The Rock's cooking had on him, I just wanted a silly title for my article. As I know you all love me going on about hip hop in a way which is completely unrelated to the article, I'll let you have this fun fact: The Rock's original intro tune was recorded by Method Man (of Wu-Tang fame). It is possibly the best song ever recorded.

He is starting to look like a caricature of himself that came to life.

Anyway, back to cooking. Cooking is really easy. Some people can't fathom cooking for the life of them; those people are called idiots. If you can't steam or stir fry some veggies and roast/pan-fry/grill some meat until it is passed the point at which ingestion will make for an inadvertent colon cleanse, then I cannot help you. I feel that the basics should be intuitive and/or learned through some simple experimentation, but that is probably vastly overestimating many people's intuition and experimental aptitude. Thus if you are the type that can burn soup, maybe consult a book or two on the basics before you unleash yourself on the kitchen. A degree of competency in the kitchen is however pretty much essential for health, physique or performance minded people, as the vast majority of conveniently available food is sorely lacking in nutritional punch required to meet your goals. A conveyor-belt assembled chicken sandwich, a pack of prawn cocktail crisps and a coke is the lunch of of a depressed office worker, not the lunch of champions.

Of course on the flip side there is the commonly held (and not unwarranted) assertion that all fitness-minded folk will take their tupperware everywhere and joylessly chow down on tasteless chicken breast, broccoli and rice on the clock. Whilst this is true of many, and in fact most meals should be consisting of variation on the theme of protein and vegetables with or without a starch (depending on goals, timing and activity levels); the food needn't be tasteless or the act of eating joyless. Therefore what I'm going to give you in this mini-series is a not a how-to-cook guide, rather a bunch of recipes, preparation tips and ideas, so the food that makes you look and feel good, can taste good as well.

Sauces, marinades and other flavour saviours

A good sauce to slather over your meat and veg (hey now) can save the most boring of meals. Firstly I will hold my hands up and say that it's very hard to beat Sriracha sauce; if you have not tried Sriracha sauce, then the most important thing you can take from this article is this: Go and get some Sriracha sauce. You may be asking "but what is this unpronounceable condiment?"; basically, imagine ketchup was made with mild chillies and a hint of garlic in place of tomatoes. Now imagine a sauce that shits all over whatever you were just thinking in every conceivable way; I'd go on but The Oatmeal does a much better job of describing the joys of Sriracha than I ever could.

Sriracha: like thousands of tiny sexy devils dancing on your tastebuds

Moving on from the greatest condiment ever, some actual recipes:

Chimichurri - this Argentinian garlic and herb sauce is a revelation, similar to salsa verde but better all around, once you've had it, a steak sandwich will seem incomplete without it. This is slightly more calorific than some options on here, but between the olive oil's heart healthy monounsaturates, anti-oxidant phenolic and polyphenol compounds from the oil and the parsley, and the cholesterol reducing, anti-cancer, legitimate superfood properties of garlic; this sauce packs a load of health benefits.

Serving suggestion. Strongly suggested.

•  a couple of red chillies (to taste)
• 8-12 garlic cloves 
• 2 large handfuls of parsley (or coriander for a variant)
• 2 heaped teaspoons dried or fresh oregano
• 2 heaped teaspoons dried or fresh mint
• 2 teaspoons salt
• about 100 ml red wine or sherry vinegar
• about 100 ml extra virgin olive oil

Peel the garlic, chuck everything in a food blender and blitz until well chopped but slightly chunky. Alternatively chop for hours and do it by hand. This will keep at least a couple of weeks in a sealed container in the fridge as the garlic and vinegar will kill most things, it also tastes best after a couple of days as the flavours seem to develop. If you like spice use more chillies, if you like your garlic, add more of that. If you are weak and want a less punchy sauce, cooking the garlic beforehand will greatly cut down on the 'bite' of the sauce and give it a much more mellow, almost nutty flavour, however any Argentinians that hear about you doing this will probably slap you. Either way, spoon liberally onto any meat and enjoy.

Home made hot BBQ sauce - A short while back I had a few months where I became slightly obsessed making batches of home made BBQ sauce, altering and tweaking each batch; not to give myself too much praise, but what resulted were literally the greatest condiments ever to be created on Earth (bar Sriracha, obviously). I, however, have a habit of not writing any of this stuff down, so what follows is my best guess at the mana I created.

Individual results may vary

• 200 g tomato paste
• 75 ml cider vinegar
• 75 ml water
• 3-5 teaspoons (or tabs) sweetener (I use Stevia for pretty much everything, alternatively any other sweetener or sugar will do, but amounts required will likely vary)
• 3-4 teaspoons soy sauce
• 3-4 teaspoons smoked paprika (or more)
• 1-2 teaspoons onion powder
• Cayenne pepper/chilli paste/some ridiculously hot hot sauce (to taste)

Mix everything, tasting and adjusting as you go. You can chuck it in a sauce pan, bring it to a simmer and stir well for 10 minutes to give it a better texture, but to be honest I'm usually too lazy for this. For heat I bought the absolute hottest hot sauce I could find, the type that doesn't convey much flavour other than fire, so I could add literally a teaspoon or two to a whole batch of BBQ sauce and get a bit of heat without any extra flavours. I put this on pretty much any savoury food, so my serving recommendations are pretty broad: meat, veg, sandwiches, rice, whatever. While this tastes delicious, the tomatoes will give you a significant intake of lycopene, which is a powerful antioxidant and protects cardiovascular function, and the combo of tomatoes and paprika makes for a shit load of vitamin A, which will benefit vision and immune response. I'm just some dreadlocks, a good tan and a bad song away from getting a deal on Dragon's Den out of this.


Korean(ish) sauce - This is my new obsession now I'm bored of making BBQ sauce; the taste isn't a million miles away from BBQ, bringing sweet, savoury and spicy together, just with a lot more garlic. Again, I tend to just intuitively chuck together ingredients to make a big batch of this, tasting and altering as I go.

This is apparently Korea's premier fitness model, therefore this photo is relevant.

• 100 ml light soy sauce
• 100 ml rice vinegar (or cider vinegar with some sweetener of choice)
• 100 ml tomato paste
• 40 ml sesame oil
• At least 8 minced garlic cloves or 2-3 tsp garlic powder
• To taste minced chillies/chilli paste/cayenne pepper (these can vary hugely in heat from type to type, so add a bit, taste and repeat)
• To taste sweetener (again, sweetness will vary depending on whether you use sugar/stevia/sucralose etc.)

Proceed as above: mix, taste, adjust. Repeat until happy. And happy you will be. This contains a few of our superfood buddies that we introduced above, garlic and tomato, so again we get the all the healthy stuff from them. In addition, if you decide to give this a good kick of chilli, evidence suggests the capsaicin can give a slight boost to fat burning and decrease inflammation, which is nice considering this tastes so good you'd probably want to eat it even if it was awful for you.

Tzatziki - A counter to the above fiery, flavour packed options. Tzatziki is a cool, mellow Greek dip/sauce that  is ridiculously easy to make and you can use as a far less calorific, better tasting alternative to mayo.

Fuelled by tzatziki ...maybe.

• 350g low fat thick Greek yoghurt
• 1 cucumber
• Juice of 1 lemon or 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 2 garlic cloves
• Pinch of salt

Peel and grate the garlic finely, peel the cucumber, remove the seeds, grate finely and give it a good squeeze to get some of the juice out. Now throw everything in a bowl, mix around and enjoy. Beyond being nice and calorie light, if you use a decent Greek yogurt this has a modest protein boost, a decent amount of calcium and a bit of potassium and vitamin K from the cucumber, so your muscles, bones and heart get a benefit as well as your boring ass meals.

Cheater's BBQ meat marinade/slow cooking liquor - I call this "cheater's" because the fact that this makes meat taste super good essentially piggy backs on the fact that Cherry Coke/Dr. Pepper tastes pretty damn good. The soda confers sweetness and acidity to the marinade and due to the phosphoric acid content, actually helps to tenderise the meat slightly. If you are using this as a marinade, cover your chicken/beef/pork in it and leave for anywhere between a few hours and a whole day before frying/grilling/baking. If you are using this for slow cooking, pre-sear some meat, throw it in the slow cooker, cover in the tasty tasty liquid and cook. I use this to make pulled pork by cooking trimmed and seared pork shoulder for 8-10 hours on low and if I may say so myself, it is God damned delicious.


All the below 'measurements' are very approximate and are more 'best guesses' than actual guidelines.

• 200 ml Diet Cherry Coke or Dr. Pepper
• 3-5 teaspoons smoked paprika
• 2 finely minced garlic cloves or 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon chilli powder
• 1/4 teaspoon cumin
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon black Pepper
• 2 teaspoons salt

As far as health benefits go, due to this being a marinade or cooking liquid you aren't consuming much of it, so they are essentially negligible, but screw it because it tastes good.


Simple stir-fry sauce - Stir frys are a quick easy and healthy (as long as they don't get too oily) food option. To minimise the use of cooking oil, I tend to go for a steam/stir-fry hybrid, cooking chopped vegetables in a wok with a splash of water, refreshing if the wok goes dry. Once I have almost-cooked veg and little-to-no water remaining, I'll throw in chopped pre-cooked meat, rice or noodles and a sauce not unlike the below. I'm sure this isn't an authentic recipe, but it tastes good.

• 50 ml light soy sauce
• 50 ml rice vinegar (or cider vinegar with a bit of extra sweetener of choice)
• 1 minced garlic clove or 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• ~2 tsp minced ginger or 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1-2 tsp cornstarch mixed in ~50 ml water
• Sweetener (if desired)

This is really easy to throw together and makes a good base sauce, but feel free to add more fun ingredients: chilli, galangal, lemongrass, coriander, Thai basil, Chinese 5 spice, fish sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil, coconut milk, peanut butter, lemon zest; variations are plentiful.

You may be wondering what purpose the cornstarch serves, at high temperatures this will form a gel, which forms a sauce with thickness and body that will coat your food, as opposed to a watery sauce that will pool at the bottom of your bowl. For the most part this sauce doesn't even need to be pre-mixed, just have the ingredients on hand and throw them in one by one, adding the cornstarch solution last and  then stir like a mad man (or woman).


So there we are, a few ideas to inject some life into your food. Anyone eating dry chicken breast or limp tasteless vegetables now has no excuse.

I've somehow got a sponsorship...

How to get a sponsorship:

1. Be very interested in the strength and conditioning game, spend copious amounts of your free time reading the latest research and opinion from leading experts.

2. Structure intelligent training according to 1, help to train others and write articles for those you don't train with.

3. More or less phase out working on 1 and 2 due to time pressures from working towards a PhD and a general dissatisfaction with the B.S. of 99% of the fitness industry.

4. Keep training hard, keep repping legit companies you believe in, occasionally post about both on Instagram.

5. Completely out the blue, get approached by said legit company, asking if you want a sponsorship.

6. Profit.

I concede, it's not the usual route, however much to my surprise, this is what has just happened to me. As such,  after being a long time fan, I'm now a very happy member of (ludicrously potent supplement and awesome apparel manufacturer) Chaos and Pain's #TeamMostHated.

"Well what the bloody F does that mean to me?" you may very well ask. It means you can get 20% off everything at Chaos and Pain (click to visit) by using the discount code 'CnPwithDC' (see what I did there). For those familiar with the general badassery CnP bring to the table, I likely need to say no more. For others a little context may be necessary.

This is Chaos and Pain, in their own words:

Chaos and Pain began as a tiny blog stuffed into a dusty, long forgotten corner of the internet, a minor bit of esoterica awash in a sea of mediocre writing, unoriginal thought, and oft-regurgitated dogma. The progenitor of the blog, Jamie Lewis, and his occasional training partner, Wayne Banks, decided one day that the Chaos and Pain training style (high volume, high frequency, haphazard and teeth-gnashingly aggressive) would play well into supplements. Jamie had been making his own fat burners for years, and the market has been dying for hyper-extreme, yet legal alternatives to the industry standard. Thus, the two forged a business partnership to bring Jamie's vision for the supplement future to market.

Domination of the competition is the name of the game, and Chaos and Pain is about to bring their success on the field of strength sports into the world of supplements. You have been warned.

Look at some of the goodies that you can get 20% off.

As it says above, CnP started as a blog of the insanely strong and generally just insane Jamie Lewis. Well researched, aggressively delivered and never afraid to unapologetically go against the grain; I immediately counted myself a fan and proceeded to read every article on the site.

Fast forward a bit; a lot of articles (containing a lot of NSFW material - you have been warned!) and a few world records down, CnP start selling their own supplements. True to form, these do not look like your average globo-supplement-company products. Ranging from pre-workouts that push the borders of legally acceptable stimulant doses, to impressively complex blends of research backed brain boosting compounds, to sleep aids, joint support and more; these are well thought out supplements, wrapped in a bit of CnP's signature aggression and put to market at very reasonable price points.

Who else sticks Vlad the Impaler on their T-shirts? ...no one, that's who

I'm sure some may think that I'm merely saying all this now the company have decided to give me some free stuff, but Chaos and Pain are genuinely a company I have been a long time fan of and have repeatedly spent my money on the awesome shit they sell. Anyone that knows me well knows that parting me and my money is no easy feat, so if they can count me among happy returning customers, they must be doing something right.

That is me, doing squat lockouts with as much weight as the bar at the gym could hold (330kg, for any wondering), I'm also wearing a Chaos and Pain T-shirt. Coincidence...I think not.

Is your personal trainer a waste of money?

There are over 20,000 PTs in the UK, you may have regular sessions with one, you may be thinking about hiring one, you may even be one. Some of these PTs are fantastic; they create smart personalised programming for their clients, adjust based on objective and subjective feedback, keep things interesting (but don't introduce variety for the sake of it), provide motivation and deliver results. Some tick a few of the boxes, which may be all you need. However others to provide little more than could be gained from a Googling 'workout' and playing a tape of someone saying stock motivational phrases.

- Plato, circa 400 BCE

Before we get into it, I should probably try to rub off the target that I painted on my back by deciding to write this and make sure that I'm not totally hated by every PT I know (just a little bit hated, because I'm a generally disagreeable person). This article is not a slur on all personal trainers, there are many, many good PTs out there; nor is this a claim that I know more or can deliver a better service than said trainers, it is simply my opinion on what you should be looking for if you feel like spending your hard earned money on some professional fitness guidance.

Not a personal trainer, just an opinionated loud mouth

With that said, your personal trainer is likely a waste of money if...

1. Your sessions are an unplanned collection of exercises with no structure for progression

"How about we start with the curl machine, then maybe some burpees, then uhhh, some push ups... on a bosu ball... super-setted with TRX mountain climbers, then we'll see how much time we have left and use whatever equipment is free."

"Confuse the muscles"...also confuse anyone trying to make sense of your routine

If you hear something like this from a PT, just leave. Completely improvised sessions that have no week to week structure like this are far from uncommon, and usually occur for one of two reasons. The first is caving to the need to make sessions seem as varied and interesting as possible, throwing in all the exciting bits of equipment, fun exercises and pseudo-advanced techniques to make new trainees feel like they are getting great value. While this may seem fine, lack of a structured, personalised plan makes it far harder to objectively progress in the areas which you want to. Added to the fact that paying a PT to reel off random exercises represents terrible value and provides you with none of the tools to construct your own effective training in the future. The second reason is pure laziness and lack of preparation, if a PT is unable to construct a solid training plan and know exactly what needs to be achieved in your coming session, they are likely not worth your money. However, just being given a plan doesn't mean all that much if...

2. You are given a generic programme/diet, identical to all other clients

Generic/cookie-cutter/off-the-shelf programmes can be great, from 5/3/1 to Smolov to whatever the hell Olympic lifters do, to the deep, dark vaults of Bodybuilding.com, there are many very good programmes out there, written by men and women far more knowledgeable about training than you or I. Programmes such as these provide training frameworks that have proven to be successful in allowing trainees to reach the stated goals of the plan.  The cost of obtaining these programmes ranges from 2 minutes of your time spent locating them on the internet to around £30/$50 for the most pricey training (e)books. As that amount of money might not get you 1 hour with some trainers, it is not unreasonable to expect a custom designed programme for your goals and personal needs, or at the very least, some tailoring of a pre-made, tried and true programme; especially as many of the off-the-shelf programmes encourage and detail a degree of customisation to the trainee's wants and needs. This means that a trainer that simply hands you a pre-written programme with no thought is literally less useful than a 12 page PDF. We may not all be completely unique snowflakes, but all trainees will all differ somewhat in their aims, abilities, preferences and attitudes; a good trainer will recognise this and adjust their methods accordingly.

A cookie cutter AND a special snowflake. Mind blown.

A training plan customised to your needs is a great start, however, a you will not achieve all you can if...

3. Your progress is not monitored

Whether you are trying to lose fat, gain muscle, increase endurance or get stronger, physical self improvement lends itself very well to objective measure as a means of tracking progress. If your trainer is not weighing you, taking body composition measurements or regular photographs, you cannot get accurate feedback on your rate of muscle gain or fat loss. If you are not performing the same exercises under the same conditions on a regular basis, you cannot accurately determine whether you are getting stronger or increasing your endurance. Every session does not need to be a test and indeed doing so would be counter productive, but monitoring progress under standardised conditions is the most accurate way to determine whether progress towards a given goal is being made. This allows good trainers to observe whether what you are currently doing is working and tweak your diet/training accordingly, optimising to reach your goals.

If your sessions look like this, you may have gone a little too far

If a PT checks the above 3 points off the list, they are likely a good trainer and you will make good progress when working with them; however the best trainers set you up to keep making good progress, long after you stop paying for their services, which won't be the case if...


4. They complicate, instead of simplifying and tell you what to do, but not why

Many trainers will complicate to profit, leading you to believe that their special methods are key to progress and for that reason, you need to keep paying them as long as you want to be making gains. In truth you can get very deep into the complex minutiae of nutrition and exercise science, but for 99% of people, this is completely unnecessary and learning basic, overarching concepts will serve you far better. A PT that teaches the principles behind training for your goals and gives you basic knowledge frameworks to construct your own training is worth far more than the trainer that gives you fancy, complex workouts, but doesn't explain the concepts behinds them.

If you can find a PT who will listen to your needs and goals, construct a training plan and/or diet to help you reach those goals, take objective feedback to track progress and modify your plan accordingly, all while educating you and giving you the tools you need to a self-dependant and motivated trainee, that is someone worth throwing a fair stack of cash at.

Alternatively, you can pay someone a couple of bills a week to pluck a few exercises out of their arse and shout at you while you sweat a bit. Rinse and repeat for weeks/months/years, until you notice that you have absolutely no gains. Realise your personal trainer was a complete waste of money and time. Cry a little.