Not that we had any doubt Baroness’ Blue Record would have a strong debut, but it’s always nice to see the proof. And Skeletonwitch’s ripping new record Breathing the Fire had a great debut too; I’m elated to see the band sell as many records first week as they did. Elsewhere it was the usual radio rock / alt-metal suspects dominating the charts. Click through to see chart positions and sales figures.
No, Trent Reznor won’t be fucking you like an animal anytime soon: he has apparently tied the knot with some chick named Mariqueen Maandig, formerly of a band I’ve never heard of called West Indian Girl. A half-dozen reader e-mails pointed me to Pink is the New Blog, where photos from the wedding have been posted, and I wanted to re-post them here for two reasons:
Enjoy the pics.
Industry guru Bob Lefsetz, in one of his typically off-topic rants — in this case, a lengthy story about getting his ass checked for colon cancer (yes, really) — managed to sneak in this gem of insight about Tommy Lee:
And then they’re running late [at the doctor's office]. Which gives me enough time to read “Fortune” and find out that Tommy Lee is letting the public record his album. Enough with the gimmicks Tommy, NO ONE WANTS YOUR ALBUM! Yup, he records drums and vocals, you create the music and he owns it. Huh? Why does everybody keep paying attention to Mr. Lee. He’s a DRUMMER! He should be thankful that people still want to see him in Motley Crue.
I mean, right? Can we all please get a big, rousing “WHAT THE FUCK???” for Tommy Lee? Why do we even waste our breath talking about the guy? Let’s all collectively agree to stop buying into Tommy’s shenanigans and just ignore the damn guy.
But then again… the new American populace Methods of Mayhem is probably gonna give us tons of material here. Nevermind.
-VN
While I’ve been defending Roadrunner Records against Dave Mustaine, there’s been drama brewing in the Megadeth camp.
It all started when Mustaine gave a video interview to a Norway’s Lydverket blog. The half-hour long conversation was edited down to about four and half minutes for its final presentation, and a portion of that was devoted to Mustaine talking, for the trillionth time just this year, about being fired from Metallica. (This time he blamed it on the fact that he apparently decked James Hetfield back in the day for kicking his dog, because, y’know, Hetfield is a puppy-hating asshole and Mustaine is a saint and nothing is ever his fault.) And for reasons not entirely clear to me, Mustaine was seriously offended by the final video, and threatened that “as soon as I see that interviewer again, I am going to put him in a hospital.” (The journalist in question was actually a woman, but, hey, it’s hard to remember the little details when you never think about anything but yourself.)
Well, a full, unedited version of the interview has been released now, and as it turns out… Mustaine is the one who brought up Metallica. Mr. “I Don’t Want to Talk About Metallica Anymore.” Yes, the interviewer asks him to elaborate on his point a little, but he basically just starts talking about them, and going on and on and on… and then he brings up the whole Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame thing, which he was never asked about… I mean… Kerry King was right: give this dude some rope and he will hang himself. I’d call the dude an asshole, but really, this is just sad. Because Dave Mustaine is that guy who never got over his girlfriend leaving him, even though it was a million years ago and he’s now married to someone else.
Go to roughly the fifteen minute mark to see Mustaine bring up Metallica.
Meet Senor Bivins. I read about him this morning on Sergeant D’s Stuff You Will Hate. Bivins posts lots and lots and lots of videos of himself on YouTube doing those vocal covers of deathcore songs that we find so amusing here at the Mansion. And the Sarge is pissed because apparently Bivins gets a lot of pussy from doing it – or, at least, he gets to take photos of himself standing next to semi-cute scene girls making obscene gestures:
It’s not clear to me whether or not he’s actually fucking these chicks or what. If he is getting groupies without even being in a band, then, well, I guess that’s a whole new scam and maybe someday Neil Strauss will write a book about him or something.
ANYWAY, even more interesting is this video of him defending deathcore as “not scene.” Check it out:
Halloween is making me absolutely fucking crazy this year. You know how people get fed up with the mass-consumerism of Christmas and what it says about American society? I kind of see Halloween in the same light. As soon as October hits (and often even before), the grocery store isles fill up with candy and all anyone can talk about is “what are you gonna be for Halloween this year???”. There’s SO much emphasis and pressure on it that it just becomes crazy and stressful. Like on New Year’s Eve how everyone stresses about where they’re going to be when the ball drops… who fucking cares? It’s a damn cluster of lights signifying the fact that the earth has once again passed by an arbitrarily determined point in space. Get over it. Can’t we just leave Halloween be as a fun time for dress-up for the kiddies?
Maybe I’m just being an old curmudgeon. The ladies of Reign in Blonde took a stab at suggesting how some of their favorite metal musicians should dress up for Halloween this year. Doc Coyle as Wolverine? I like it.
Last year Frank @ Metal Injection went as a pagan metaller, full-on clad in skins, makeup and the whole 9. It was a brilliant costume I wish I’d thought up myself. This year we’re having a little party at the MS Mansion Vince Division and I think I’m just gonna be Louie and run around offering to dip my balls in things. What all do you have planned? Anything metal?
-VN
Anthrax’s courting of John Bush is just going to drag on and on, isn’t it? It’s like Anthrax are reconnecting with an estranged ex-girlfriend on whom they’ve cheated, getting together to talk — or maybe to make out a little bit — time after time to rebuild trust. Won’t they just fuck and get it over with already? They know the sex was much better with their ex.
To be fair, John Bush was definitely wronged, whatwith how the band handled the whole Joey Crapadonna reunion. I can understand if Bush needs to go one step at a time.
But Scott Ian posted a video on Twitter of the band performing the classic “Only” at this past weekend’s Loud Park festival in Japan, and it’s great. The video was presumably shot by a roadie or tech, as it’s from the side/back of the stage.The band sounds good and it looks like they’re having fun. Won’t they just get together and fuck, full on penis-in-vagina already? It seems inevitable. They already have 5 dates on the books for Australia’s Soundwave festival in February/March. For how long will this courtship continue?
-VN
Thanks to Adam for giving us the heads up that Pelican’s new album, What We All Come to Need, is now streaming on the band’s MySpace page. And… that’s really all I have to say about that. I kinda just wanted an excuse to post my favorite clip from Scarface. Sammy O’Hagar will have a comprehensive review of the album soon.
What We All Come to Need comes out October 27 on Southern Lord.
-AR
The CMJ Music Marathon — aka the slightly tamer, lamer, older brother of SXSW who moved to NYC to pursue his dreams but fell slightly flat — is now upon us. Here’s my wrap of metal-worthy events happening this week, of which there are fewer than last year. Feel free to add others in the comments.
Congrats to Graham Fahey of Manchester Center, VT for winning our Mastodon Vans contest. His winning entry, why he deserved to win:
“cause i’m starting a shoegazing band.”
Simple but clever. In case you’re wondering, Graham chose the colored low-tops and wears a size 9 mens.
Enjoy, Graham!
Ever hear the phrase “<so and so person> could take a shit on a microphone and people would still fawn over it.”? I often hear it applied to Radiohead, and it’s kind of true… Thom Yorke could literally record himself leaving a stinking, putrid pile of diarrhea on a microphone and the press would laud it as absolute genius and hail it as groundbreaking [full disclosure: I love Radiohead]. Lately it seems like Mike Patton is approaching the “shit on a microphone” status of musical godliness… it doesn’t matter at all what the guy does and people drool like it’s revolutionary. And since the guy releases like 6 albums a year in styles that are all over the map, this happens quite often [full disclosure: I love Mike Patton].
Anyway, check out this video the lasses over at Reign in Blonde posted of Patton playing “a contraption called a intonarumori: a noise making thing-a-ma-bobber from the WWII era that was used to mimic the sounds of machines.” Apparently there are shows scheduled in both San Francisco and New York at which “artists” will be playing this “instrument” live. Sounds like it’d be right up Gary Suarez’s alley.
-VN
See. We told you not to worry.
-AR
Do you need dating advice? Having troubles with your girlfriend, or boyfriend? Wondering why that cute Goth chick at the mall won’t fuck you, or why your man can only get it up when music featuring the guitar work of Tripp Eisen is playing? Or maybe you’re worried that you masturbate too much while listening to Cannibal Corpse, or that you’re a little too turned on by the cover of Look What the Cat Dragged In? Rich Hallford, the Sensei of Pussei, is here to answer all your romantic queries. Just send an e-mail to hallford AT metalsucks DOT net, and your question may be answered in a future edition of “Rob Halford Doesn’t Like Girls, But Rich Hallford Does!” So what are you waiting for? Your life isn’t just going to sort itself out on its own!
I haven’t gotten to write a review of Brutal Legend yet because, well, I just haven’t had time to play all the way through the game, and it seems like writing a review of half a game or whatever isn’t fair. But I’ve enjoyed what I’ve played so far.
And it seems like the game owes a debt to Metalocalypse. Besides some similarities in general tone, style of humor, and a love of violence, there’s the fact that Legend takes place in a magical, faraway land where everything is related to metal and everything looks more or less like it belongs in Mordhaus. Obviously Metalocalypse already owes a debt to metal imagery as old as Sabbath itself, but… there’s definitely a connection between Dethklok and Brutal Legend.
So kudos to the fan who made the below video. At some point it might get yanked for copyright infringement, so enjoy it while you can… I have to say, it seems pretty impressive for something fan-made. And wouldn’t be awesome if there really WAS a Dethklok/Eddie Riggs crossover?
Major props to Christopher Silverio for sending this in… thanks, dude!
-AR
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Dave Mustaine is a brilliant fucking musician, but that doesn’t mean he’s not also a whiney little bitch.
Reader Elvin sent us the below, which Mustaine apparently posted on the Megadeth forums:
Droogies!
I don’t know what to say.
How a record company could be presented with a Worldwide [sic] critically acclaimed record, and that they can let it plummet down the charts in just four weeks into the hundreds, is inexplicable.
I knew I shouldn’t have done this. Why didn’t I trust myself?
I regret a lot of things in my life, but this is the most regretable [sic].
A very disgusted Megaman.
Now let me tell you why I have a serious problem with what Mustaine is saying.
A tweet from former Nine Inch Nails touring member Danny Lohner has alerted us to the fact that Pretty Hate Machine, Trent Reznor’s awesome debut, was released twenty years ago today.
Wow. Hard to believe that that’s true – and it’s funny that so many people forget that Reznor actually started doing his thing in the 80s.
Anyways, to celebrate, here’s the video for “Head Like a Hole.” Like most people, I imagine, this video made me aware of NIN for the first time. And it’s still an awesome song.
-AR
According to a press release just picked up on the newswire by the MS Mansion Monkeys, Polish death metallers Decapitated — who were decimated by a car wreck in 2007 that killed one member and left another in a coma — are on their way back. Wacek “Vogg” Kieltyka, guitarist & founding member, has issued the following statement:
“It’s time to come back! After a two-year break, DECAPITATED is coming back with new members. The official new line-up for DECAPITATED will be announced at the end of December.
“As you all know, the decision to continue the band was really, really hard for me, but everything I do now is to keep DECAPITATED alive. [Vocalist] Covan’s situation has not improved much and he is still in bed and unable to function on his own. He still fights to recover as we speak and we are all still 100% behind him and hope for the best. It has been the hardest thing for me to move on without [brother & drummer] Vitek by my side, but he would have wanted me to continue with the band.”
It strikes me as odd that Vogg isn’t revealing the identities of the new members, seeing as everyone seems to know that Kerim “Krimh” Lechner — whose impressive solo work I posted earlier this week — is the new drummer. Even the band’s Wikipedia page (not that Wikipedia is always the bastion of truth… but still) claims that Krimh was announced as an official member on July 31st of this year, and you all immediately called it in the comments of the above-linked Krimh post. Perhaps Krimh has been dismissed? I guess we’ll have to wait until December to find out. In the meantime, check out the above video of Krimh’s latest song “Go In Circles.”
Vogg then goes on to reveal the band’s upcoming touring plans:
Animosity, largely revered as one of the best bands of their kind, are apparently throwing in the towel. A statement from vocalist Leo Miller to Lambgoat explains:
I’m not really a big Mudvayne fan, but I know a lot of you are. So it seems like my bloggerly duty to tell you that the band is streaming a new song, “Beautiful and Strange,” on their MySpace page.
And it sounds, y’know, like Mudvayne. If you like Mudvayne, I imagine you’ll like this song. If you don’t, I doubt this will win you over. At first I was like “Oh, listen to those drums, this is heavy!”, but then the song calmed down and just became a regular Mudvayne song. Not great, not terrible.
“Beautiful and Strange” comes from the band’s self-titled album, which will be out December 22. The cover art apparently looks awesome under black light.
-AR
Thanks to Kye for the tip!
File this under “YouTube Vocal Covers” actually gone right [thanks: MS reader Zoker]. Sure, the guy doesn’t hit every high note, but he does a damn fine job overall with both the growls and the clean singing parts. The guy’s clearly got ability and I’m presuming he’s available for the half the price of the current two SS vocalists. Ya win some, ya lose some.
-VN
