Has it really been three years since An Overdose of Death? Holy crap, time flies, dude! I feel like that album came out yesterday. Wowza.

Not that I’m complaining that we’re getting a new Toxic Holocaust album or anything. The band’s latest, Conjure and Command, is coming out this summer, and now the first single has been unleashed. It’s called “Nowhere to Run,” and it’s catchy as hell. Theoretically it’s streaming on Toxic Holocaust’s Facebook page, but as of this writing said page is not functioning properly, so I’ve included someone’s illegal YouTube embed below. Check it out before I get sued for doing so (or, y’know, just keep clicking that link to the FB page until it starts working again).

Conjure and Command will be out July 19 on Relapse. You can pre-order it here, where you can also get a better look at the badass cover art.

And let me just say, in conclusion:

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Earthship‘s name is a funny thing, because the music the band makes takes us exactly away from Earth, not towards it. It’s strange to hear such otherworldly sounds these days, but it’s also quite refreshing. Like the best music should do, it creates vivid mental images. And that’s not something I often hear.

Exit Eden is one of numerous recent projects involving The Ocean mastermind Robin Staps, present in this band as rhythm guitarist. Like most of Staps’ projects, Eden is really good; in this case, however, the entirety of the songwriting is done by his bandmate, Jan Orberg (former drummer for The Ocean.) Orberg emplys a wide variety of techniques for his compositions. His style is far removed from Staps’ musical tendencies, even though there are definite similarities. Sadly, the album doesn’t have a whole lot to offer vocally — Orberg and drummer Dennis Bottcher sound an awful lot like The Ocean’s Mike Pilat used to sound — but that’s almost insignificant considering the musical prowess of the rest of the record.

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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. We kicked off the list yesterday and continue today with #24, Scale the Summit’s Chris Letchford…

Few young guitarists are as ridiculously skilled yet as calmly restrained in their playing as Scale the Summit leader Chris Letchford. This is doubly true considering the fact that Letchford’s band is completely instrumental. Only once have I ever heard Letchord completely go OFF on a shred run like those that most metal guitarists butter their bread with, and that was in an improvised song-ending jam out at the band’s recent New York City show… and who even improvises live these days? Most of the time, though, Letchford is doing what Letchford does best — play laid back, mellow, but somehow still metal rhythms and leads that take the listener through a journey of space and time despite the lack of vocals in Scale the Summit’s music.

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Eli Shaika is back with more Cooking Contaminated deliciousness, this time with drummer/vocalist King Fowley of legendary thrashers Deceased. The theme of Episode 9 is “game day” food… greasy, messy but oh-so-tasty finger food you can enjoy with your favorite cheap beer whilst watching the sporting event of your choice. King Fowley brings his recipe for “Easy Peazy” Ranch Pretzel Pieces to Eli’s kitchen along with homemade Chipotle Sour Cream Dip and Pepperoni Dip in which to smother them. Three easy recipes that’ll take no time to prepare but will satisfy your hunger for the duration of the game. Enjoy:

List of ingredients so you can follow along at home after the jump!

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I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the metalcore/deathcore scene is going through something of a Latino takeover — I call it the PIERCETHEVEILCORE MOVEMENT. These days, the scene is all about Mexican kids in skinny jeans, Asking Alexandria shirts and flatironed hair, and although the Minutemen might not be too happy about that, I think it’s pretty cool if it means more bands like UPON A BURNING BODY.

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Breaking news from Tyranny of Tradition;

In a continuing assault on the life and career of President Barack Obama, would-be Presidential candidate Donald Trump accused Obama of being the drummer for the metal band Overkill on the albums “Feel The Fire” and “Taking Over“.  In an interview with syndicated conservative talk radio host Jonathan Winthrop, Trump said “If you look in the liner notes at the first two albums they have someone named Rat Skates listed as the drummer.  That can’t possibly be a real name.  I believe that Barack Obama was playing drums on both of those records.”

This is another in a series of accusations made by Republicans that Obama is, in fact, a “secret metalhead”. The accusations started two months ago when Glenn Beck revealed that Obama was in a thrash band in Chicago while he was working as a community organizer in the mid-1980s.  Beck claimed that Obama’s band “mostly did Coroner and Slayer covers, but a few originals.

And then:

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In March we announced our SignMeTo Roadrunner Records contest, in which we’re offering one unsigned band per month the opportunity to have a featured article on MetalSucks in conjunction with Roadrunner’s SignMeTo platform. Check out March’s featured band Spun in Darkness and April’s featured band Meadows End.

Pompano Beach, FL’s Written in Blood bare more than just a namesake similarity to recent Roadrunner signees Baptized in Blood; their brand of metal, like that of the latter, pays a hefty tribute to the ’80s with ballsy thrash riffs and twin-guitar leads around every corner. Where Baptized lean more Motley, Written lean more Metallica, but Written add a slight metalcore bent that serves their choice to stick with clean vocals quite well, ala Mutiny Within. Though Written in Blood don’t have the slam dunk songs or technical prowess of Mutiny Within, the three songs on their SignMeTo page show that they’re headed in the right direction; these Floridians have boatloads of potential.

-VN

Since summer and, thus, summer festivals are almost upon us, I thought I’d take a closer look at Sonisphere, one of the biggest European music festivals. Mostly because I wanted to do some research on it, since  it’s the only festival in which I am indulging this year. Probably.

(Note: I don’t much like festivals, especially ones that are outdoors. The bands I like never play for that long ,and unless I want to be stuck in the way back, I have to suffer through all the other artists just to get a decent spot. Not to mention, the weather. I hate hot weather. I swear to God I was born with menopause, because I’m always having hot flashes. I try to spend my summers carefully planning my routes with air conditioning and avoiding any chance of getting damp that isn’t shower or pool/sea/any body of water-related. But no one likes a cranky, sweaty bitch, and I split my time between two especially humid cities, so I grit my teeth and steel myself for my few months of personal hell.)

The Sonisphere Festival has been around only since 2009, when Stuart Galbraith joined the events company Kilimanjaro Live. His idea was to hold a series of events that would change and adapt to wherever they were being held. That’s what is really interesting about Sonisphere — unlike a traveling festival with one specific list of musicians and bands that tour the continent, they have a changing roster of artists for each “territory.” In 2009, the Germany date featured Die Toten Hosen and The Prodigy, adding a more punk and house air to the festival, while the Sweden shows featured The Cult and Primal Scream to suit their audience. Of course, there are bands that headline each show (in this case it was Metallica), but I’ve never seen audience preference be such a priority for a huge festival.

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Miley Cyrus — who wasn’t even two years old when Kurt Cobain killed himself — recently did a live cover of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” and it’s actually pretty interesting. Not because it’s good (see headline), but because it’s literally the first time I’ve ever been able to understand the words to the song. “And I forget just why I taste?” Has that seriously been the lyric this whole time? Fuck me, I really gotta pay more attention to this shit.

ANYWAY, I’m sure this is exactly what Kurt Cobain intended to happen when he wrote the song. I mean, dude refused to tour with Guns N’ Roses, so what objection could he possibly have to Miley Cyrus?

;

I predict that this performance will seem to take on new meaning roughly five to ten years from now, when Miley’s career has tanked and she’s undergone what is commonly known as “The Full Courtney.”

-AR

[via Metal Insider]

I was more than a little intrigued yesterday when we received a press release announcing the line-up for the 2011 edition (Have there been previous editions?) of Dame-Nation, “Chicago’s premier female-fronted metal festival” (Does Chicago have other female-fronted metal festivals?). The idea of doing a whole show based around bands that are fronted by women isn’t new; as I write this, the Revolver Hottest Chicks in Hard Rock tour is about half complete. And the organizers of Dame-Nation seem to only kinda-sorta know what they’re doing. But it’s their complete lack of polish that I find, well… admirable, really.

One key difference between the Hottest Chicks in Hard Rock tour and Dame-Nation is that none of the bands on Dame-Nation are famous. In other words, if the Hottest Chicks in Hard Rock tour features bands that no one would care about if not for the fact that they have attractive girls in the group, then Dame-Nation features bands that no one cares about despite having attractive girls in the group.

Maybe the bands on HCIHR have ascended somewhat higher on the metallic food chain (fiscally if not creatively) than the bands on Dame-Nation because they know how to sell themselves; HCIHR makes no bones about its own marketing ploy. Just check out the poster… what product is it actually advertising?

Maria Brink has a nice pair of sunglasses.

Now contrast this with the poster for Dame-Nation:

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It should surprise no one that Axl and I are huge Avenged Sevenfold fans — they’re only one of the best pop metal bands of the past decade! Duh. People who call Avenged Sevenfold gay are gay.

So we’re pretty excited about the fact that there’s a new A7X song called “Not Ready to Die” on the webernets today, released concurrently as a single with the new Call of Duty DLC video game. The band has been posting a series of cryptic message via their Twitter account over the past few days… I can’t be bothered to fill in the blanks, especially given the fact that the riddle has already been solved in the form of today’s new song, but you can take a look at those messages here.

Jam “Not Ready to Die” above. It sounds like Avenged Sevenfold, so while A7X fans will surely enjoy it I wouldn’t expect any haters to suddenly be converted.

-VN

Thanks: Christopher Russo

I guess combining brutal death metal and mathcore is something to be commended, in that it’s like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole if the peg and hole are screaming at each other. And France’s Zubrowska do it fairly well: the line between brutal death and tech-death is razor-thin, yet Zubrowska manage to sound more like a decent mathcore band in their noodlier moments than Necrophagist Ripoff Collective #687b. They even sprinkle in bits of latter-day DEP weirdness and post-hardcore dust. The thing is, though, by keeping so many elements reined in and sounding coherent, the band don’t manage to do anything particularly memorable. They’re pretty formidable and manage to avoid the whole train wreck thing, but one almost wishes they’d be a train wreck so they could leave more of an impression.

Not that Zubrowska Are Dead, their latest, is a chore to listen to, though. The band keep things interesting by illuminating the fairly unexplored common threads between brutal death metal, mathcore, and post-hardcore. Hammer-ons/pull-offs rain down frequently, jagged chords are hit like a nail, and vocals veer back and forth between esophagus-scraping screaming and brees (hell, clean vocals are kept to a minimum, so you know they’re trying their best to make this easy for us). The hypothetical chaos is kept at bay thanks mostly to drummer Theo Astorga, who kind of brilliantly navigates between math-y jazz drumming and tight death metal blasts. But… there’s nothing to grab on to. There’s no juicy riff that embeds itself in your head, no moment of overwhelming chaos, no brutal death extremity eviscerating whatever flesh isn’t attached to a bone. Zubrowska do everything competently, often exceedingly so; but is that enough for what they’re trying to do (or, possibly judging by the album title, did)? The album is never really boring, but one can’t help but feel they’re coming up short.

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New releases from Wormrot (available for free download!), Before the Dawn, Leaves Eyes, Samael, While Heaven Wept and Xerath officially see the light of day today. Vic Vaughn takes a look at each after the jump.

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Rex Brown is not participating in Down’s current tour, and this interview seems to suggest that he’s never coming back to the band. And so, in an effort to get some clarification, The Delaware County Daily Times, your leading source for rock and metal news, decided to ask Down’s Pepper Keenan outright whether or not Brown is still Down. His answer?

“I don’t know what to really say on that; he’s not out of the band, but he’s not playing with us live.”

Well, that’s reassuring!

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No longer do you have to take our written word for it; thanks to South By South Death 2011 sponsors Roxwel.com you can now see first-hand just how much fun we had at our inaugural SXSW showcase with Kvelertak, Red Fang, Havok, Wormrot and Meek is Murder. Roxwel did an incredible job capturing all the madness with multiple cameras, soundboard audio and interviews with all the bands, and now we relay said madness to you, oh faithful MetalSucks reader.

The first installment is a wrap-up video featuring clips of performances and interviews with every band on the bill; it sets the stage nicely for all the full songs Roxwel filmed from each band, which we’ll post in the coming days.

South By South Death 2011 Recap
Watch Music Videos at www.roxwel.com

Last week a friend asked me to read one of her friend’s writing samples. And I read it. “Well,” I told my friend, “it’s not the worst thing I’ve ever read.”

And my friend replied: “Coming from you, that’s a huge compliment!”

And so, Norma Jean fans, please feel free to bask in the glow of the compliment I just paid this video in my headline. It’s not that original and I got kinda bored after about half of it, but a lot of the individual shots are cool, and clearly some thought went into the editing, which is to say: it’s still better than most videos I see these days!

-AR

[via Altpress]

Flip flops, the preferred summer season footwear of douche bags and date rapists everywhere, just got metallier: yesterday Van Halen unveiled a line of flips flops modeled on Eddie Van Halen’s famous “Frankenstein” guitars.

And they’re great, because not only are they way overpriced (thirty bucks a pair for what amounts to two pieces of foam and some string), but they feature the design right in the spot where your feet would go, so no one will ever really see it anyway. Unless you just, like, leave them on display in your home or something, in which case you are a loser.

If you’re part of the .00000001% of the population that somehow enjoys Van Halen and Dave Matthews in equal measure, feel free to purchase a pair of these here. You can also go get them at Urban Outfitters, if you prefer to waste your money while listening to irritating music.

No word on when matching Van Halen shirts with pre-upturned collars will be released.

-AR

[via Noisecreep]

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 kick off our countdown with Origin’s Paul Ryan…

Tragically, it seems like there are a lot of people don’t even know who Paul Ryan is, and a lot of those who do know who he is dismiss him as just another trend-following guitarist — albeit a talented one — in the death metal scene. An awfully large amount of metal fans just view Origin as “that tech death band with that really fat vocalist and crazy sweeps,” but James Lee’s recent departure should hopefully clear shit up for people.

Paul Ryan is actually one of the most skilled pioneers of the tech death scene, primarily because he doesn’t just use technicality to create mindless and forgettable wankery (see: Brain Drill et al.) and because he doesn’t just use heaviness to create mindless and forgettable breakdowns (see: Oceano et al.) It’s pretty sad that the majority of other bands these days are so bad, but it’s great for Ryan — his skill stands out from among the masses.

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If you like songs about castles, monsters, and wizards, you are probably a metal fan. And I get it: what better way to escape from the brutal reality of being, well, who you are?? I can’t fault you for wanting to escape, but that’s never been me. I like the way metal sounds, but I can’t get with the ridiculous lyrics, costumes and all that. When it comes down to it I am a hardcore kid, and I will always like bands who keep it real (even if they end up being a little bit lulzy along the way). More specifically, I have a pretty serious self-destructive streak, so I’ve always been drawn to bands who are more about being fucked up, confused and angry than emo/p0litical [via college freshmen].

When a lot of these bands come up, the fanboys come out of the woodwork with third-hand stories about stuff they supposedly did and how tough and “crazy” they are. You won’t find any of that here– I’ll save the gossip for the little girls and Euro fanbois, but if you are interested you can consult the Bridge 9 “Hardcore rumors and myths” thread, Frank 151′s DMS issue, or my interview with Ezec and fap away. This is about their actual music, not addressing your feelings of inadequacy by making up exaggerated stories about guys in bands to turn them into the alpha male you always wished you could be.

In this post, I will share some of my favorite REAL HARDCORE bands- I’m leaving out the obvious stuff like Terror, Hatebreed, etc because we all know about that. I’m also not including any emo, political or artsy bands, so no Chokehold, Converge, Botch, and all that nonsense. And if you want to show everyone that “you really know what you’re talking about” and tell me that I should be into JFA, Violent Children, Impact Unit, and Deep Wound that’s cool too- feel free to leave a comment to that effect!

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Of any non-metal band I might expect to write a tribute song to black metal, My Morning Jacket wouldn’t been on my short list… but here they come with “Holdin’ On To Black Metal” from their forthcoming album Circuital, out May 31st. I wonder if MMJ vocalist / guitarist / primary songwriter Jim James has some Venom, Bathory or Burzum in his past? Inquiring metal bloggers would most certainly like to know.

I’m actually quite fond of My Morning Jacket; they’re that rare indie(ish) band that I can get down with, in no small part because they’re all such great musicians (and they write great songs and aren’t annoying). My Morning Jacket are my ace in the hole whenever metalgf and I are on a road trip and I’m tired of putting up with Taylor Swift.

“Holdin on to Black Metal” is definitely best enjoyed with the lyrics in front of you, so check those out courtesy of SongMeanings.net after the jump as you watch the YouTube vid above.

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