Before there were blogs there were these things called magazines, and the only metal magazine we still get excited about reading every month is Decibel. Here’s managing editor Andrew Bonazelli…

And now, it’s the time of the week you’ve all been waiting for: the three-hour window your folks are out of the house, allowing you to jack off comfortably Decibel’s monthly Guess Next Month’s Cover and Win a Decibot Shirt Contest! I’m going to predict this will be the first “FIRST” to get the answer right —provided, of course, that the band/musician/farm animal we’re spotlighting is in fact typed out below the “FIRST.” Unless the first person who sees this types in “System of a Down,” just to be a dick/radical. That said, it’s been a few years since System of a Down proper existed — although who hasn’t enjoyed the “Five Serj Tankian Solo Albums Nobody Cares About/Bassist ‘n’ Friend Randomly Beating the Shit Out of Brent Hinds Era” — so they could ostensibly be rocking spiked wristbands now.

But no, it’s not System of a Down. There’s your hint.

-AB

Decibel’s June 2011 issue, which features Ghost, Killing Joke, Mastodon, Hate Eternal, Gorguts, Protest the Hero, Born of Osiris, and Scale The Summit is available here, or make your mama proud and just get a full subscription.

The below video collects the entirety of Napalm Death’s seminal debut, Scum, and plays all the songs at once, right on top of one another. I saw it first at Invisible Oranges, where Cosmo Lee asserts that Napalm Death are now “semi-polished,” but that “the mashup has a strange beauty.” I don’t mind telling, you, that the beauty of it is basically lost on me; I think Cosmo’s admittance that “maybe it’s all just a pile of noise” is much more accurate. But give it a listen and feel free to disagree with me.

One way or the other, it’s pretty funny that somebody did this; pretty funny that that person apparently may or may not be Merzbow; and pretty funny that the whole thing lasts less than four minutes.

-AR

Photo by Emily Di Frances

A few days before I crossed paths with the big Deftones and Dillinger Escape Plan tour last week, Deftones drummer Abe Cunningham told me that the band has only now emerged from years of intra-band discord and label battles. It kinda blew me away to hear that “it absolutely sucked” to be involved in the making of Saturday Night Wrist, a classic record which seems like the product of a thousand men’s pooled awesomeness, not of five embittered, isolated former friends (plus Bob Ezrin). The live shows from those fractious years gave no clue to their travails, either; they played awesomely killer always. Weird.

Cunningham’s words got me pumped to assess the newly happy, friendy, post-wake up call Deftones. The question: With no one to battle, would their blades grow dull? Does this band thrive on friction like fellow all-time raddest American bands Faith No More and Talking Heads? Are they poker-faced like other ego-rich Yank greats Slayer and Van Halen? Now that they are tight again, would their on-stage fury be sapped of its fuel?

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Last year (and the year before) I got way too busy with this thing called life and missed out on a lot of quality music. I am here to rectify the error of my ways, month by month.

Here are the April 2011 releases that got under my skin, burrowed their way into my brain, made my ears bleed, or simply tickled my unmentionables:

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One black metal band I really can’t ever imagine eating tofu is Marduk, a group whose name is Swedish for “Scary Motherfuckers Who Want You Off Their Stage.” The band has a new three-song EP, Iron Dawn, coming out on May 27 to coincide with their appearance at Maryland Deathfest, and are now streaming a new track from that EP, “Warschau 2: Headhunter Halfmoon.”

Now, “Warschau,” for those that don’t know, is just how funny people from countries that don’t matter say “Warsaw.” (And Warsaw, for those that don’t know, is a city in Poland. That’s one of those countries in Europe. Y’know, the one Behemoth is from.) So why is this song called “Warsaw 2,” and what does the headhunter halfmoon (whatever the fuck that is) have to do with it?I honestly don’t have the slightest idea. Nor do I care to speculate what goes on in the mind of this man. I need to grasp tight to whatever little sanity I have remaining.

But I do know that if you enjoy Marduk, you will enjoy this song. It’s some intense shit.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

-AR

The album that I’ve tried to jock your face off for two years now is finally coming out. Oakhelm’s second album, Echtra, will see a late summer release through Forest Moon Special Products… and MetalSucks is beyond stoked to have an exclusive track from the band in conjunction with Forest Moon’s pre-orders, which launched just the other day. Check out the exclusive stream of Oakhelm’s “The Way Of Bleeding Bark” after the jump, along with more info on what will surely land near the top of this guy’s year-end list.

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Hammerfall are completely ridiculous (in a good way), and their new video for “One More Time” is no different (also in a good way). One day I will see Hammerfall live. But until that day I will maintain the illusion that their live show is [almost] as ginormous and impressive as Rammstein’s, complete with fire, dozens of light arrays, lots of hair, and, uh, zombies, just like it is in this fantastic cinematic masterpiece.

Nuclear Blast will release Infected in Europe on May 20th and in North America on June 7th. So that’s May 20th worldwide, for anyone living in 2011 who uses the internet.

Because no post about Hammerfall is complete without the video they made with the smokin’ hot ’06 Swedish Olympic Curling Team, you’ll find that after the jump.

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The interview that accompanied Noisecreep‘s debut of “Subverse,” the new video from This or The Apocalypse, tells me that “the song is sung from the perspective of a solider at war,” and not from the perspective of a band that relies almost as heavily on choreography as the Pussycat Dolls do. Still, I can see where such lyrics would nonetheless fall under the category of “write what you know” — I mean, it takes a lot of work and discipline to be in the army and then go off to war, and it takes a lot of work and discipline to plan out the choreography, practice it over and over again until you get it right, etc. So being in This or The Apocalypse and being in the army is pretty much the same thing.

In other news, it’s good see that the popularity of autoLabonte is finally waning.

-AR

Well, if you don’t, here’s a hot tip: do not read the rest of this post. It ends badly for you.

If you do, then, swell! ‘Cause guess what? Here’s the band playing “Toxicity.”

Sure does sound like “Toxicity,” doesn’t it? So there’s a real shock.

System of a Down will be playing songs you remember the way you remember them for the rest of the month. Get remaining dates here.

-AR

[via Metal Underground]

It has literally been years since we’ve done a new edition of “Board to Death,” the column in which we make fun of people on internet message boards, because we’re nice people like that. But last night Ozzy Osbourne’s intern made this announcement on the Ozzfest Facebook page…

…and while I can’t for the life of me understand why anyone would care in light of the fact that there’s still The Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival featuring the Jagermeister Mobile Stage, Vans Warped Tour, The Rockstar Energy Drink Uproar Tour, Summer Slaughter, Slaughter Survivors, Slaughter Slaughter, The All Stars Tour, The Cool Tour (actually I don’t think that one is coming back but still), The Old People Doing Glam for the Sake of Nostalgia Tour, The Hellmann’s Dijon Mustard Extreme Grindcore Festival, and eighteen thousand other Ozzfests that aren’t called Ozzfest. But some people do care, and those people left inadvertently hilarious messages under this announcement.

I’m not gonna do screencaps for all of these, nor am I going to identify everyone by their full name, because it’s been seven whole days since someone last threatened to sue us and I’d like to see if we can make it as far as ten days. But obviously it would be very easy for you to just go to the aforementioned Facebook page and see who I’m talking about.

And on that note, here are some of my favorite comments…

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Metal Blade is now accepting pre-orders for the new Unearth album, Darkness in the Light. And, as is de rigeur these days, those pre-orders are available in a variety of attractive packages — although, clearly, one is more attractive than the others: the one that comes with a beer bong. That has to be the best piece of merch I’ve seen in some time… and it’s certainly band appropriate, too. I wish it said something funnier on it than just the title of the record, but I’m willing to let that slide because, well, more bands need to seriously consider making beer bongs. Beer bongs should be the new patches.

And — oh yeah, lest we forget! — the band has also released the first single from this latest offering. It’s called “Eyes of Black,” and you can stream it below. (Hmmm… “Black”… “Darkness”… I’m sensing a theme here.) The band hasn’t changed their sound very much, but when you sound like Unearth that’s really not a bad thing. I’m especially fond of the groovy, Pantera-esque section that starts around the 2:03 mark

Darkness in the Light comes out July 5 on Metal Blade.

-AR

We’ve been getting emails for days about a supposedly leaked pre-production demo version of “The Eidelon Reality,” a new song that The Faceless have been playing live for some time. But every time I’d go and click a link the song would already have been pulled from YouTube [sad face]. Here I thought Sumerian Records was being pissy about a song leaking out that wasn’t supposed to (what’s the harm? good press, right?), but now we come to learn they were just doing a little quality control; peep the “official” pre-production version above with a handy-dandy “New Album Coming This Fall” bumper in case somehow there exists a Faceless fan that didn’t already know.

Peep the new track after the jump:

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MetalSucks recently polled its staff to determine who are The Top 25 Modern Metal Guitarists, and after an incredible amount of arguing, name calling, and physical violence, we have finalized that list! The only requirements to be eligible for the list were that the musician in question had to a) play metal (duh), b) play guitar (double-duh), and c) have recorded something in the past five years. Today we continue our countdown with Tool’s Adam Jones…

I love thinking of Tool’s Adam Jones as an awesome guitar player. I mean, it’s true, even despite his total lack of resemblance to those we think of as rad axedudes. He’s not that kind of virtuoso. Like, I find no photo documentation of his jumping off a monitor or rocking out with his lead singer. Nor does he pucker his lips or drop his jaw whilst ripping. Gosh, he doesn’t really rip, ever. No screaming artificial harmonics or tapping; no runs or tremolo picking; I can identify only a handful of Tool moments that qualify as a solo, or even a second guitar part. Mostly, his accents go only far as wah pedal and wicked vibrato. That is what Tool requires; that is what Jones is awesome at.

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We’ve already had a lot of great entries, but we wanted to remind you about this awesome contest we’re running in case you’re pot-addled brain forgot!!!

Above you see a photo of an awesome, ONE OF A KIND, Silver Surfer-produced, Obscura vaporizer, with a retail value of $600. And we’re just gonna give it away to one lucky winner! Plus, oh yeah, some copies of Obscura’s orgasm-inducingly good new album, Omnivium (out now on Relapse — order one here!), and some sweet Obscura merch, too.

Here’s how you win:

• Anytime between now and June 17 — one week before Obscura kick off their most excellent summer tour with Children of Bodom, Devin Townsend, and Septicflesh — send an e-mail to MetalSucks with “OBSCURA VAPE CONTEST” in the subject line.
• In the e-mail, include a design for a weed smoking device that would be ideal for use in outer space (in keeping with the theme of Obscura’s album art for both Omnivium and Cosmogenesis). How you present that design is entirely up to you — you can just describe it (but be colorful… this is MetalSucks, not your high school science fair), or send in a drawing, a diagram, pictures of a sculpture, or, if you really wanna go for the gold, a photo of an actual working unit.
• OBSCURA THEMSELVES (!!!) WILL JUDGE THE WINNERS, which we’ll announce just before they kick off the aforementioned most excellent tour.
• One grand-prize winner will get the vape (including a soft carrier and all necessary accessories — e.g. a glass blower, tube, etc.), a copy of Omnivium, and an Obscura t-shirt.
• Two runners-up will get a copy of Omnivium and an Obscura t-shirt.
• Unlike so many of our contests, this one is actually open to fans from around the world! In part because the vape actually has European voltage/wiring, which means non-Europeans will have to purchase a converter

And that’s it! We’re really stoked on this contest — remember, this is a one of a kind vaporizer that you cannot get anywhere else – so get crackin’! The more creative your entry, the better your chances of winning. Good luck!

And after the jump, check out more pics of the vaporizer in question, plus get tour dates for that Children of Bodom/Devin Townsend/Obscura/Septicflesh tour!

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I don’t know if Arsonists Get All the Girls will ever make something I enjoy as much as The Game of Life again. It’s not like they ever stopped being totally schizophrenic in their musical dealings, it’s just that they haven’t quite regained their stance atop that peak of insanity.

That being said, their new album, Motherland, definitely comes pretty close.

So. We’re just a week away from the album’s release, and now the band is streaming it in full on their MySpace page. (MySpace: still a thing.) I’m curious to hear what my fellow AGATG fans think. I’m less curious to hear what people who don’t like AGATG think, but I’m sure they’ll leave some oh-so-intelligent remarks in the comments section anyway.

Motherland is out May 17 via Century Media.

-AR

So the good news is, after a scare last week that the Sonar in Baltimore might be shut down and that, consequently, the revered Maryland Deathfest would need to find another venue IMMEDIATLEY, it’s looking like the Sonar will remain open after all. This means that the fest will go forward as planned, with a minimum of headaches.

That’s the good news.

The not-great news is that Death Breath have had to drop off the bill due to scheduling conflicts. That obviously has nothing to do with the almost-issue of the venue, and would have happened one way or the other; also, there’s still SO MANY KILLER BANDS playing the show (see poster above, proceed to splooge in shorts) that I kinda think, with all due respect to Death Breath, that one band more or less really isn’t gonna make much difference to attendees’ enjoyment of the show. Still, I’m sure some of you will be bummed.

But here’s something that might cheer you up: entering in the MDF MVP contest we’re doing with Relapse!!! You could win any 2 shirts, 1 LP, 2 CDs , and a  mystery prize from the Relapse booth at this year’s MDF (Relapse titles only), and the contest is being judged by a who’s who of MDF luminaries: Andres Erickson (General Surgery/Sayyadina), Matt Harvey (Exhumed/Depakitator), Rich Hoak (Brutal Truth/Total Fucking Destruction), Mike Hrubovcak (Monstosity), Mike Majewski (Devourment), Matt Moore (Absu/ Rumpelstiltskin Grinder),  and Proscriptor (Absu)! Go here for all details on how to enter. The contest ends next Monday, May 16 at midnight EST, so if you haven’t entered already, you’d best get crackin’!!!

-AR

The webernets seem to be slightly abuzz with Connecticut black metallers Ipsissimus.. Who are these guys? Are they worth checking out? Let’s give ‘em a go.

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The Foo Fighters and Hollywood Undead were finally toppled from their respective #1 and #2 spots last week after holding down the fort in that order for three straight weeks prior (with Hollywood Undead at #1 the week before Foo Fighters’ debut), but rest assured, they’re still at #2 and #3 and show no signs of letting up. Nikki Sixx’s new Sixx A.M. record nabbed the top spot on the Hard Music Charts this week, undoubtedly due to this record-shifting post.

Elsewhere, Shinedown debuted their new live album, another Poison greatest hits collection flopped, and some other bands sold some records too. The numbers:

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Black Market Activities, the label helmed by The Red Chord frontman Guy Kozowyk, has announced a new distribution and artist development deal with Good Fight Entertainment, bringing to an end their long-standing distribution arrangement with Metal Blade. With that announcement also comes an exciting calendar of new releases set to roll out this summer via BMA:

June 7 – Engineer – Crooked Voices
June 7 – Khann – Erode
June 21 – Fit For An Autopsy – The Process Of Human Extermination
June 21 – Ed Gein - Bad Luck
tba – Today Is The Day – Pain Is A Warning

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We’re not exactly sure who’s threatening Gypsyhawk’s good times and why said good times need defending, but we do know this: Gypsyhawk are guaranteed to deliver some good times on their current Defending Good Times Tour.

Gypsyhawk aren’t so much metal as they are rock, but who gives a shit when you’ve got twin guitarmonies this sweet? If you enjoy retro-sounding hard rock / metal like Holy Grail and Cauldron, there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy the maximum rockage of Gypsyhawk too. Speaking of those two bands, here’s Gypsyhawk opening for them a couple of weeks back in L.A.:

The Defending Good Times Tour kicked off May 6th in California and is currently winding its way east through the upper midwest before heading back west via the south. Get tour dates after the jump.

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