It’s not that I think that the members of Napalm Death and Dream Theater have a limited musical palette. Quite the contrary; I’d imagine the musicians that make up these particular bands probably have very diverse tastes.

Still. If I found out that Alex Webster listened to a lot of Roni Spektor, I wouldn’t expect a collaboration between the Russian chanteuse and the death metal legend, y’know?

So. Tom Fassnidge sent us this video of Napalm Death’s Barney Greenway teaming up with some of the dudes from Dream Theater to cover Metallica’s “Damage Inc.” It’s an old video – lookit Barney’s hair!!! – but neither Vince nor myself had ever seen it before. And it’s pretty awesome – look at how much fun Petrucci and Portnoy are having! And, yes, I know that DT have covered entire Metallica albums live in concert before. But it’s the “WHAT THE FUCK IS A MEMBER OF NAPALM DEATH DOING UP THERE?” of it all that makes this video truly worthwhile, in my opinion at least.

Extra bonus: for those of us who find James LaBrie to be a big gaping vagina, we now get to see what DT might be like with singer who isn’t a eunuch.

-AR

Last night, I was among the privileged few permitted to attend the Nine Inch Nails show at Webster Hall, the second of four sold-out NYC club shows from the arena-filling industrial rock act. The setlist from the previous night at Bowery Ballroom appeared heavy with newer songs, which admittedly had me pretty skeptical walking into one of my least favorite venues in this city. That fat stinking sweaty territorial assholes had commandeered spots on the balcony railings to bootleg the show only added to my sense of dread that the show would disappoint. I found a halfway decent spot on the upper level and braced myself for the shitty sight lines and poor ventilation that defines Webster Hall concert experience.

Fortunately, Trent Reznor had something special in store for the crowd that would make up for everything: playing the entire The Downward Spiral LP from start to finish.

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If someone asked me to engage in a debate to determine what was the single greatest television comedy of all-time, a discussion of Arrested Development would, at the very least, be in order. For three (really two and a half) too-short seasons, the show was never anything less than genius. True Fucking Genius. The set-up for certain jokes was placed so far in advance that often you wouldn’t even realize there’d been a set-up until you had a second viewing. Every cast member was superb, every script a masterpiece. The show was too smart for its own good, and overlooked by viewers. I’m sure there are people who have seen the show and don’t like it, and those people are entitled to their opinion.

But I can’t take their opinion about any other work of art seriously. I don’t even think they’re dumb; I just know we’re clearly not in the same mind-set. I admire Arrested Development that much.

One of my favorite gags on AD involved a lawyer played by Scott Baio and named “Bob Loblaw” (say the syllables aloud if the joke isn’t immediately apparent). Here’s Bob Loblaw’s television commercial for his practice:

On the show, we also learn that Bob Loblaw runs a website – Bob Loblaw’s Law Blog.

And now I’ve found out that a terrible band, Run with the Hunted, has a song that takes its name from this fictional site:

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The schedule for next month’s MetalSucks co-sponsored Planet Caravan Festival in Asheville, North Carolina has been announced! Check out lineups for each day after the jump, then check out the official Planet Caravan website for a handy-dandy downloadable chart (in .pdf format) detailing the set times and stages for every band.

Single-day tickets for Friday or Saturday are now available for $49.50, while passes for the whole weekend are still available at $79.50 — that’s a fucking great deal for two whole days of metal if you ask us (and since you’re visiting this site, you did ask), especially given the awesomeness quotient of the bands on the lineup.

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Actually, I think I’d much rather watch this guy than have to deal with ninja moshpit asshole kids ever again.

-VN

[Thanks: Travis P.]

We’ve worked pretty hard to achieve our title of the “Most Negative Site in Metal.” And we’re proud of that title. We’ve earned it, damn it.

So we’re jealous that those fuckers at The Deciblog, and not us, thought of this brilliant idea:

THE DECIBLOG SCREAMO COVER ELIMINATION BRACKET.

Luckily, they invited us to participate.

Here’s the description of how it’s gonna work:

Click to read more…

“Just listen to it! It will blow your mind preblown!”

So read an email that graced the MS Mansion inbox this weekend from Olav S. The first statement is at least half-truth; their MySpace page says they’re from Kopervik, Norway, but who am I to argue? And the band is pretty good; I’m not sure it’s blown my mind, but it’s pretty good… as for “preblown,” I have no idea what the fuck Olav meant there. Listen below, and maybe you’ll figure it out.

-VN

First, let’s just talk about how we arrived at this place we currently find ourselves:

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Todays I ams havings dim sums for brunch. I knows the Chineses are different from the Japaneses, but as my daddys used to say, wes all pinks ons the insides.

-NC

Obviously, the style of this song isn’t exactly de rigeur for Converge. Maybe that’s why it’s actually my favorite song off of No Heroes. In any case, I find it to be a very emotional song, and a great song to listen to when you’re high.

There’s some more material that’s kind of along these lines on Axe to Fall, by the way…

-AR

After Eyal’s blog getting everyone to introduce themselves, I e-mailed him to thank him. I told him that the old cliché is true – genius is the simple idea that no one has ever thought of. And he’d brought the community together. I literally used the words “This could be the dawn of a new era on MetalSucks.”

And then I wished Dimebag a happy posthumous birthday and total fucking war broke out.

With all due respect to people who don’t like Dime or Pantera – to say that he wasn’t popular and influential prior to his death is just plain wrong. It’s like saying that grass is pink and clouds are purple and Obama’s health care reform involves death panels for senior citizens. It just has no basis in reality whatsoever.

Here are some other head-scratchers that emerged this week:

• Justin A.W. wants to know why Gary Suarez writes for us. I want to know why Justin A.W. keeps visiting this site and leaving comments if he hates us so much. I also want to know where anyone with “Trustkill” in their e-mail address gets off questioning our credibility.
• NoCowNoFood says “Dude if yall dont have Dtv or Dish Network/ u guys are fucking broke.” There’s a huge leap of logic there, man. But you tried to link to Solid State Records and failed, so I do think we can safely assume that you’re an idiot.
• Dave B accused us running a scam on you guys to get demographic info. Actually, Dave, we just wanted your information. So that we can we better understand how to avoid you.
• Zilty says that his “one prerequisite is that the music has to be good.” But I’ve listened to every band Zilty has recommended, and they all sound more or less like a thousand other bands in their respective genres, except less famous. So I think it’s more accurate to say that Zilty’s one prerequisite is that they have to be semi-obscure (and I stress “semi”). In any case, I guess we’ll “learn” more when he’s running the site next Friday.
• Shinaain thinks that Rick Springfield is the shit. Actually, I think she’s right and I have nothing bad to say about her. And now I know that she’s a she, because we scammed you all into giving us your demographic info. Next up: putting you all on an annoying mailing list and selling your e-mails to porn sites.

I’m gonna go listen to some Pantera now. Because they weren’t the sharpest tools in the shed, but they did make awesome music that influenced an entire generation of metal bands.

-AR

Okay. It’s time for me to get the answer to a question which has been haunting my soul for a few years now. How many of you metal fans are musicians, how many of you are musicians in bands, and how many of you don’t play any instruments at all and just love the music? Please feel free to get as detailed as possible with your response.

DAATH is the kind of band that likes to meet all of our fans. Granted, we’re not as big as the Jonas Brothers yet, so we have time every night to talk to our fans. But regardless, we make a point of doing so. The grand majority, and I mean GRAND majority of fans we talk to, at some point will tell us about their band, or about a guitar they own, or about some sort of musical inclination they have. Is metal a style of music by musicians for musicians? Are straight up music fans that don’t play anything the minority? Or is it just that way in the more extreme genres of metal – since there aren’t as many fans to begin with are the people that are there just generally the bands in the scene?

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I love Metal Insider‘s Bram Teitelman so much right now I could kiss him on his Quaker Jewish mouth right now (And no, I’m not kidding. And, oddly enough, Teitelman is the second Quaker Jew I’ve known. Bizarre.). See, Bram noticed what the rest of us failed to – that the riff from the new Kiss song, “Modern Day Who Gives a Fuck,” is more or less a total rip-off of The Sword’s Freya.

Think Bram is wrong? Listent to both and decide for yourself.

Here’s Kiss:

And here’s The Sword:

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Lookie at that; our little boy is all growed up. The fine lasses at Reign In Blonde tapped Señor Suarez for an interview about metal, writing, and writing about metal. It’s a pretty damn fine read if you ask us. To wit:

Which of your Ed Hardy t-shirts is your favorite?It’s ridiculous that people think they’re better than Ed Hardy shirts.  Especially metalheads, who have about as much fashion sense as a ham sandwich.  There was a post on the Stuff White People Like blog about how honkies love to rag on Ed Hardy, and it summed up all my feelings about this.  Christian Audiger deserves credit for being a successful entrepreneur, though his recent brand extensions into things like energy drinks are pretty fucking ridiculous.  He should stick with clothing.  For the record, I own one Ed Hardy shirt.  It doesn’t have rhinestones or anything gaudy like that, but it has a classic eagle tattoo which is pretty cool.  There’s a sister line called Smet, which I like a whole lot more.  You may have seen Smet stuff on Rock Of Love, because Audiger clearly donates clothes to the producers behind these VH1 shows.  Oh, and Affliction sucks.  So does MMA.  Boxing, however, is awesome.

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Note to self: never let Mike Patton see you on your cell phone while he’s performing.

Thanks to Geoff Hansen for the tip.

-AR

It’s no secret that Metallica is the exception to the rule, and that being a touring musician in a metal band does not make for a very glamorous lifestyle. Your stinky fart-box of a van often serves as your bed, unless you’re lucky enough to be able to find a floor or couch or something to sleep on. And that would require that you either a) know someone near the tour stop, b) make a friend at said tour stop, and/or c) actually have time to sleep (as opposed to driving all night to make the next gig). You might like to think that these problems only plague smaller bands, but guess again – plenty of well established bands have made a van seat their bed time and again. These facts serve me personally as a constant reminder that I could never be a touring musician – I’m a spoiled brat and I need a fucking bed.

Well, AdFreak.com reports that Motel 6, that classiest of motel chains, is now doing something to try and help out:

Click to read more…

God Dethroned will be assaulting North America for the first time since 2007 on the headlining War Propaganda World Tour 2009 in support of their newest album, Passiondale (recipient of four-out-of-five horns on MetalSucks!). Vocalist/guitarist Henri Sattler and co. will embark on the coast to coast campaign starting on September 30th. Joining the MetalSucks, SMNnews.com and MetalInjection.net-sponsored march will be Abigail Williams, Augury and labelmates Woe Of Tyrants. MetalSucks and SMNnews will be giving away tickets to shows and MetalInjection will be posting video updates from God Dethroned as they tour across the US. Stay tuned for details as they become available.

Sattler comments on the tour: “The second leg of the tour [the first leg was in Europe] starts on September 30th in Tucson, Arizona with Abigail Williams, Augury and label mates Woe of Tyrants and leads us through the States up to Canada. We are really excited to tour the U.S. again and to promote our latest album “Passiondale”, which was released last April. Our last show in the U.S. was in 2007 so we can’t wait to see many of our fans again soon!

Full list of tour dates after the jump.

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The last time I wrote about Rob Zombie’s Halloween II (which is actually Halloween X, but hey, who’s counting?), it was to discuss an interview where Mr. Zombie talked about the film’s soundtrack; subsequently, the MetalSucks Maniac known as “Joshie” said he was curious to know how The Moody Blues’ “Nights in White Satin” would be used in the film.

Well, here’s your answer, via a “leaked” trailer that wasn’t really leaked at all but, rather, released by Zombie himself.

This is a way better trailer than the ones we’ve seen before (and I imagine it wasn’t “officially” released because it doesn’t feature John Carpenter’s iconic and highly marketable theme music – which I’ve heard is absent from the film as well), but I’m still convinced the movie isn’t gonna be any good. I guess we’ll find out when it opens a week from today.

-AR

[via Metal Underground]

Seems some beef’s been abrewin’ around Otep Shamaya’s politics over at The Gauntlet. Surprising, right? Here’s the short version:

1. Otep blogs about healthcare reform, blasts Republicans for spreading anti-healthcare reform propaganda (i.e. “death panels”)
2. Gauntlet commenter “CM” responds, accusing Otep of only “smashing the control machine” when Republicans are in office, thereby rendering her points moot.
3. Otep responds to CM saying she often criticizes Obama (i.e. marriage equality, indefinite detention), attacks credibility of anonymous Internet poster.

Generally speaking, I agree with Otep. I actually find Otep Shamaya to be an incredibly charming, intelligent and thoughtful, articulate person. I can’t stand her music, but that’s besides the point — Otep’s the kind of person who, if she were my upstairs neighbor or something, we’d probably hang out a lot, you know? I also have the utmost respect for what she represents as an outspoken woman in rock and roll. However, I wish she’d stop using hyperbole to emphasize her points. There’s no need to call Republicans “colostomy bags” (for example); this will only infuriate the opposition and draw attention away from the true issues at hand. Dear Otep: if you’re reading this, please try and stay away from these kinds of thin insults. It dilutes the issues and paints you as an angry liberal when you seem to be able to transcend this stereotype using ordinary words, logic and reason. You’re above that kind of name-calling, I know it.

Oh hey, and since this is a music website, Otep’s got a new album out this week that is apparently on track to sell nearly 15,000 copies. Holy crap!

-VN

I wasn’t even gonna report on this because, at this point, it’s barely news – I mean, we’ve known for awhile now that Gus G. from Firewind is Ozzy’s new guitarist. But so many of you e-mailed us this morning that I guess I have to write about this.

Randall Amps has jumped the gun somewhat by announcing that, yes, Gus G. is Ozzy’s new guitar player, and, yes, he will make his debut with Ozzy tomorrow at Blizzcon. Here are some random, uncollected thoughts:

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