Me and my advanced reptilian brain (ahem, rather: ‘my advanced reptilian brain and I’) were never the biggest fans of stoner rock mainstays Clutch, but they sure did make it hard to hate on their simple n stony hardcore-flavored early jamz from the beginning of the gay 90s.

These daze the spirited Maryland band is still goin, allbeit in a much blusier thump-rock fashion — currently on the road in Europe and soon back in the States, whilst gearin up to release yet another album this July entitled Strange Cousins From The West. Congrats on th’longevity!

Now pass the ten-footer this way, k?

CLUTCH – “Big News I”, from Clutch (1995)

CLUTCH – “Spacegrass”, from Clutch (1995)

CLUTCH – “Binge and Purge”, from Transnational Speedway League (1993)

“Come on motherfucker, come on motherfucker, come on motherfucker — LET’S THROW DOWN….just try me, just try me — what are you waiting for?!?”

TRIVIA FACTOID: drummer Jean-Paul Gaster played drums on Wino‘s recent solo album Punctuated Equilibrium, and has also worked with Opeth keyboardist Per Wiberg on a side project that will hopefully see daylight soon. with the other Clutch dudes too (minus vocals) called The Bakerton Group, which we’ve actually discussed before. Duh.

Clutch (and JP Gaster w/Wino) tour dates after the jump the jump.

-KW

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Baseball season officially got underway and New England Metal and Hardcore Fest is coming up next weekend. Surely all is peachy in the world then, yeah? Not so much.

• Dave Mustaine feuded with a mystery band, then kissed and made up before we even knew it.
• Protest the Hero released a new video and gave us a bunch of tickets for their tour to give away.
• We spoke with Daath’s Eyal Levi and TAD/Tadgarden’s Tad.
• Kip W. gave us two recaps (Day 1, Day 2) of our booze-fueled SXSW journey.
• Fear Factory got back together… except not.
• Ya’ll argued about which Mastodon album is the best and whether Jesse or Howard was/is the better KsE frontman.
• Ya’ll argued even more about IWRESTLEDABEARONCE and Oceano.
• We got an exclusive red carpet report from Metallica’s Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony.

See you next week. New England Metal and Hardcore Fest!!

I have never, and will never, understand the point of doing a cover if you’re not gonna make the track your own. Seriously, why just do an exact replica of the original when we all still have, y’know, the original?

Which is how I feel about Hatebreed’s new cover of Slayer’s “Ghosts of War.” I like Hatebreed but I can’t see anyone ever listening to this, especially since I think literally every metal fan in the whole wide world owns a copy of South of Heaven.

Hatebreed have an all-covers album, For the Lions, coming out May 9 on Koch. I hope some of it is more creative than this.

-AR

[via Headbanger's Blog]

Novembers Doom have been around a long time, to be sure — just look at the list of ex-members on their Wikipedia page. But with longevity comes expertise, and 20 years into their career Novembers Doom are still kicking out some of the finest death/doom opuses of their career. The band just finished recording their new album Into Night’s Requiem Infernal with a release expected on The End Records some time this year, but we’ve been given an exclusive first listen of the new song “Empathy’s Greed,” right here, right now. Have a looksie for yourself and stay tuned for album release news as it becomes available. Listen and download:

November’s Doom – “Empathy’s Greed”

For more Novembers Doom:

http://www.novembersdoom.com/
http://www.myspace.com/novembersdoom

Blabbermouth tells me that Dave Mustaine has released yet another of those bizarrely cryptic messages (No, I’m not going to make the obvious joke) he digs so much:

“Today is the 9th of April and I have agreed to doing something last night that I am sure a lot of people are going to be very excited about, and something that I had hoped would one day lead to another one of the potential feuds going away for good, if not for a long while.

“I can’t confirm the band or the dates yet, and I have to go get my youngster up for school. Rest assured, as soon as we are ready to announce it, you will be one of the first to know.”

Man, Mustaine loves his teases, don’t he?

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These three bands have very little in common other than the facts that a) they are metal bands, b) they rule, c) I’d like to write about all of them today. Enjoy some completely new music today instead of arguing for the 16,989th time about Disturbed, Jesse Leach vs. Howard Jones, how shitty screamo-crunk is, or whatever the fuck the topic of the hour is, you fuckwads. Awesome new music after le jump.

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