So a few weeks ago I was hanging out on the internet and I saw that MetalSucks is calling me out for not writing a weed column for their website. Well, guess what, dudes? I am going to write you a column for sure, but it’s not going to be about weed — it’s going to be about pro wrestling! Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

Anyone that knows me knows that I am a huge pro wrestling fan, and I don’t fuck around when it comes to useless wrestling trivia. I don’t know what it is about grown men pretending to beat the shit out of each other that I find so entertaining. I think it might be the fact that I have been watching it for as long as I can remember, and it reminds me of much simpler times, when Ninja Turtles and cartoons were my main interest.

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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…

For this week’s FED, I was all ready to write something (more) idiotic (than usual) about how we usually parcel out shirts, six-month subscriptions and Flexi series streams gratis, but this month—for the privilege of hearing the Black Dahlia Murder and special guest Jeff Fucking Walker covering Carcass’s Heartwork deep cut “This Mortal Coil”—you’d have to actually buy the magazine. Well, believe it or not, some enterprising young reader already ripped the fucking thing and posted it to YouTube. Which is cool and all, since we’re not officially streaming it. We’re particularly chuffed by said reader’s Senator Davis-channeling minor complaint “God damnit. I hate when the vocals first start it skips. My flexi must be flawed i cant get it to not skip there… shittttttttttttt.”

Anyway, go there and check it out. Strnad and Walker execute the most scintillating line trading since Marvin Lee Aday and Lorraine Crosby in “I Would Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That).” As always, it’s totally exclusive to the Decibel Flexi series, on commandingly virile royal blue. Sharpen your scalpels (read: set aside some money) and start slicing (read: subscribe).

-AB

Decibel’s July 2011 issue also features Morbid Angel, Coroner, Baroness, Autopsy, Revocation, Wormrot, and an incredible article about album packaging. That issue is available here, but why not get a full subscription to ensure you never miss one of these awesome flexi discs?

Once a month we pick a band from Roadrunner’s SignMeTo platform that’s tagged their profile with “MetalSucks” to be featured on this here weblog. Have a listen to past months’ featured bands here. And so, without further ado, meet Mindshift, the June featurees…

Many of this site’s readers will probably write off Sweden’s Mindshift due to the lack of growled/screamed vocals, but that’s kinda what I like about ‘em; they’re clearly not concerned with fitting into any prescribed mold or being perceived a certain way by the metal scene at large. Their music is certainly metal, at least to some degree, though; heavy guitars and drums, challenging musicianship, progressive arrangements and scorching, expertly crafted guitar solos. To top it off they’ve also got good songs, so rare in this game, and their vocalist is a real winner in a sea of generic, unoriginal screamers. These guys remind me a whole lot of Iris Divine, who we’ve featured on MetalSucks before. Check them out if you have an open mind for good music that doesn’t necessarily fit into what you think of as “metal.” The second song, “My Infamy,” is in my opinion the better of the two posted tracks.

-VN

Depressive black metal is a definite hit-or-miss of a subgenre. When it’s good, it’s bone-chillingly great. When it’s bad (and a LOT of it is bad), it’s just embarrassing. Remember when Xasthur used to be cool, before Malefic started collaborating with Pitchfork-approved songstresses and ultimately threw in the towel? Yeah, me neither (what happened after Defective Epitaph, bro?).  Alas, Shining have jumped the shark entirely, Make A Change… Kill Yourself haven’t put out a record in four years, Bethlehem spat all over their once-shining legacy with that rerecorded abomination (Kvarforth really just needs to disappear), I haven’t heard a peep from Nortt in ages, and it seems like Leviathan’s on ice while Wrest sorts out his legal woes. What’s a suicidal black metal fanatic to do? After all, someone’s got to chase away all this sunshine, and as depressing as the new Morbid Angel album is, those world-destroying techno beats just ain’t gonna cut it.

At least we’ll always have Krohm.

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Yesterday I interviewed Mike Mangini for a new Rigged feature in which he’ll run through the gigantamongous new drum kit Pearl built him for his brand new gig. It’s a good thing we decided to do a phoner instead of him just sitting down and writing the thing, because the dude probably would have spent hours painstakingly penning it out instead of the 40+ minutes he took to explain it all on the phone. Let me tell you all something: Mangini is STOKED. Stoked on his new gig with Dream Theater, stoked on playing drums in general, stoked on music, stoked on LIFE. Dude is one of the most stoked people I’ve ever encountered in this jaded business.

So it wasn’t without interest that we didn’t report on yesterday’s news of a new Dream Theater album release date and tracklisting, it’s just that we were pre-occupied. A Dramatic Turn of Events will come out on September 13th via Roadrunner, and as we all know it will be the first DT album plus Mangini minus Portnoy, so we’ll see how that goes. This resident MS Mansion DT Fanboy will keep you informed as events develop.

-VN

Children of Bodom’s video for “Roundtrip to Hell and Back” has to be one of the most gorgeously photographed performance clips in recent memory. Not only does the absence of I’m-having-a-seizure-style editing allow the viewer to enjoy the gracefulness (yes, we said “gracefulness”) of COB’s live performance, but the images are so textured that not only can you see the sweat dripping from each musician’s brow, you can actually feel the heat from the stage lights. Awesome.

Also awesome: The actual song. No wonder Children of Bodom are the premiere death n’ roll band in the world today.

Below, check out the video, which we are only too happy to be debuting for North American fans. Concert footage of such quality is just the thing to put you in the mood to see Bodom live, which is great, ’cause they’re about to begin a tour with some other orgasm-inducers — namely, Devin Townsend, Obscura, and Septicflesh. Get dates here.

And don’t forget that “Roundtrip to Hell and Back” appears on Children of Bodom’s Relentless, Reckless Forever, which is out now on Spinefarm.

Last month our own Leyla Ford admitted to being a Lady Gaga fan and even declared Uglier Madonna to be “one of us,” and the reaction from the MS readership was something typically calm and reasonable, along the lines of “!?#@$%?!*?!!!!” Which I didn’t really understand – I don’t like Lady Gaga, either, but at this point it’s pretty hard to argue that she’s just another poseur wearing metal t-shirts for ironic and/or fashion reasons. I mean, she likes Maiden. She really, really likes Maiden. And she got the thumbs-up from Kirk Windstein and Dave Wyndorf. Free pass, Lady Gaga is thy possessor.

But this is the internet, so logic be damned — LET’S ROAST THIS BITCH ON A SPIT!

So. If a blogger declaring her love for Gaga made you upset, well, this should give you a fucking heart attack.

It’s a mash-up of Lady Gaga’s “Judas” and Judas Priest’s “Painkiller,” and, I have to say, it’s pretty well done. I mean, I’m not gonna put it on my iPod or anything, but you can’t say that its creator, Wax Audio, didn’t do a fine job blending the two songs together.

Go totally apeshit for no discernible reason in the comments section.

-AR

[via Metal Insider]

I like reading bad reviews. (I enjoy a crucifixion. I don’t know, maybe I was Roman in a past life.), but I really, really hate writing them. An old job I had used to consist of reviewing live shows and local, unsigned bands, and it was one of the most soul-crushing things I’ve ever had to do. I have a conscience. I don’t like completely annihilating something someone has spent so much time on. Something they put their heart and soul into. It’s generally why I stick to reviewing things that I’ve enjoyed and defending my reasons for that enjoyment. Maybe my enthusiasm will help sway someone’s mind.

That being said, I’m not going to feel obliged to write a good review for the hell of it. That sucks.

So. I got sent a couple records recently. I wasn’t too enthusiastic about them, and figured I would just let them fall by the wayside. Then I felt guilty about that. Good grief. It’s such a passive thing, though. Just man up and give an answer/ review, right? I think it’s better to be acknowledged, even in a negative light, rather than  be full-on ignored. So here are the two reviews I’ve been putting off for a while.

On the bright side, they’re quite the study in opposites: Turkish hardcore vs. Californian power metal.

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Back in late April, we were thrilled to provide the exclusive pre-release album stream of When The Smoke Clears, the latest album from Atlanta’s straight-edge up-and-comers Foundation. This exceptional and oh-so-metallic record has garnered a great deal of attention from the hardcore community and seems to have already served to raise their profile in an otherwise crowded scene. (Album cut “Devotion II” might have single-handedly accomplished this task.)

As such, Foundation are doing the logical thing and hitting the road for shows throughout North America, culminating in their appearance opening for Underdog at the first night of this year’s highly anticipated This Is Hardcore festival in Philly. Tour dates are below, though I have it on good authority that there are more to be announced. Oh no, I’ve said too much!

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The days when a musician stands a chance of making a living as a musician may very well be coming to a close. It’s one thing for the members of Crowbar Abortion to have to get jobs at the mall when they’re not on tour, but when even the dude from Guns N’ Roses is giving guitar lessons on his down time, you know times are tough.

Which gives a little extra edge to the below video, in which our doppelgängers at Metal Injection ask various musicians what they’d do with their lives if they weren’t in a band. Because that’s a question most metal musicians should probably ask themselves at some point or another.

Best answer comes from Revocation drummer Phil Dubois-Coyne, although I’m down the response A Life Once Lost’s Doug Sabolick and Bob Meadows provide, too.

This video is the first in a new series Metal Injection is doing, called, cleverly enough, “Ask the Artist.” Go here to make sure you stay up-to-date on all future installments, as I’d wager that they will continue to be this entertaining.

-AR

Did you know that Tosin Abasi’s Animals as Leaders cohort and fellow 8-string guitar wielder Javier Reyes auditioned to be in Periphery five years ago? Me neither, but that’s one of many interesting tidbits of information to be gleaned from this excellent video interview Ryan’s Rock Show recently conducted with Abasi (#2 on our Top 25 Modern Metal Guitarists list) and Reyes (equally deserving, no doubt).

Other things you’ll want to know if you don’t have 17 minutes to watch the above interview:

• Tracking for the band’s sophomore album has begun, and everyone in the band is involved in the writing. The album is expected to come out this fall.
• Drummer Navene Koperweis is producing the new album (Misha Mansoor produced the debut).
• The new album will “incorporate whatever we thought was missing from the last album,” will be “more concise,” have “better songs,” and “there will be some new stuff, but it’s definitely Animals as Leaders.”
• Tosin was “freaking out” about the pressure to live up to peoples’ expectations for new music following the success of the first album.

The interview goes on to talk about T.R.A.M., whose debut will come out on June 28th via Sumerian, AAL’s upcoming touring plans and more. Definitely worth a watch if you have the time.

-VN

I neither aspire to a position of authority nor wish to regularly face off with violent jerks, so I’ve never considered becoming a police officer. But shit nobody told me that the job might entail sending 500,000 volts of electricity into Hollywood actor/batshit kook Nicolas Cage’s defenseless son, who fronts black metallists Eyes Of Noctum. Talk about killing two birds with one stone! Man, I’m so pissed at my high school guidance counsellor right now. From the always trustworthy The Hollywood Gossip:

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How did we ever miss this? We’ve been following the progress of the new Textures album (their first since 2008′s Silhouettes, which single-handedly bolstered stock in the Kleenex Corporation by 180%) with such rabid excitement that I have no idea how we never saw this footage of the band performing a new song in Delhi. The clip has been online since November, fer Chrissakes!

Oh well, no matter — reader Ashley Lee sent us a link to the vid, and now we can all indulge. As is the case with almost all live bootlegs, the A/V quality is questionable, but it’s good enough for me to know that I want to hear this new offering immediately. Alas, I shall have to wait until the fall, when Nuclear Blast is scheduled to release the group’s new, yet-to-be-titled album.

Also, if someone could please bring Textures to America to perform for me (and, oh, okay, the band’s other fans, too), that would be swell.

-AR

Why, it was just yesterday that I was saying how excited I am for the new Chimaira album, The Age of Hell, and now the band has released a teaser  for the album (which focuses on some kind of crazy zygote, or something). The bad news is that it’s only forty-three seconds lon,g and only ten of those forty-three seconds feature new music. The good news is that it has any new music at all, and that August will be here before you know it, so JUST TAKE DEEP BREATHS AND BE PATIENT, AXL.

The Age of Hell comes out in August on eOne.

-AR

We had a lot of fun doing our list of The Top 25 Modern Metal Guitarists, but now the fun is over… until we do our next big list which is sure to make a large percentage of you unnecessarily angry. Oh, how we cannot wait for that time!

Until then, you can relive all the magic below, where we’ve collected the entire list in one place for your convenience. Our writers did some outstanding work fellating the honorees, and there’s also lots of cool videos of these dudes shreddin’ n’ shit, so if you haven’t already, be sure to check ‘em all out, and if you have, well, check ‘em out again!!!

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The first episode of Vegan Black Metal Chef was something of a phenomenon; friends of mine who absolutely despise metal were sending me links to the video, telling me how amazing they thought it was.

Now there’s a second episode! This time the VBMC teaches viewers to make “All Star Redneck Medley,” which, unlike the tofu thinger from the last episode, sounds like something I might actually eat. And, perhaps more amazingly, I actually think this new installment is funnier than the previous one — there’s a line about crushing potatoes with a mace and showing them no mercy that had me crying with laughter.

Enjoy!

-AR

I’m going to put about as much effort into this introduction as King and Hanneman put into writing coherent solos.

We’re actually gonna begin today with two videos that are really cool, before moving onto the total crap.

The first cool video — and the cooler or the two cool videos — is Amebix’s clip for “Knights of the Black Sun.” Sometimes it seems a bit literal-minded (when vocalist Rob Miller sings about time, we see a clock, when he sings about birds frozen in flight, we see a flying bird, etc.), and the storyline could have maybe used some more variation (there really are a LOT of shots of that flying bird), but the visuals are so fantastic that it ultimately doesn’t matter.

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A couple of weeks ago, Chimaira debuted a new song, “Trigger Finger,” live. The audio quality of the inevitable fan-filmed bootleg was even crappier than the audio of most fan-filmed bootlegs, and it was hard to hear anything other than new drummer Austin D’Amond (also of Bleed the Sky fame).

So it’s kinda funny this new video of D’Amond running through the song at soundcheck actually offers a clearer (if still not nearly 100% perfect, or even 90%, 80%, or 70%) listen to “Trigger Finger.” And what I hear is a potent reminder of why I get so excited about new Chimaira albums — they just write the best fucking songs. The track already sounds like it has a strong hook and just oh so much groove… I keep thinking of the word “delicious.” I know that sounds ridiculous, but Chimaira music is delicious.

Chimaira’s new album, The Age of Hell, should be out later this summer on eOne.

-AR

[via Metal Underground]

Accuse The Last Nova of not being metal and you’ll be correct. So if you’re offended by the presence of a little sugary hard rock in your morning dose of br00tal-O’s, kindly skip to the next post.

San Francisco hard rockers The Last Nova play the kind of nu-metal-riff-inflected hard rock that was popular in the early-mid aughties; if bands like Depswa, Systematic, Dark New Day or Alston mean anything to you then you know exactly what I’m talking about. No rapping, DJs or samples, but that little bit of nu-metal guitar tonality and radio rock friendliness, and, in many cases, really good vocalists, as is the case with The Last Nova (dude reminds me a lot of Alston’s Kobie Jackson).

In case you couldn’t tell, I think The Last Nova write really catchy hard rock songs that could smoke most of what’s on hard rock radio today (heyo Seether). So if you’re like OG MetalSucks reader Sammy and usually dig this kind of stuff, check it out.

-VN

When I was a kid, Monopoly was always known as “That game we’ll never have time to finish.” Like, if we needed something to do, we might see what board games we had (Do kids even still play board games? I know that’s a ridiculous question, but, seriously… do they?), and someone would be like “Monopoly?”, and everyone else would be all “It takes too long, we’ll never finish it!” The result is that the game actually almost never got played. Everyone owned it, but it only got broken out like once in a blue moon. What a colossal waste of money.

And now it will be a waste of money that is even more colossalier: Metallica have announced on Facebook that they’re going to be releasing their own edition of the game next week on their webstore. Because nothing is more metal than buying and selling real estate. (Except for maybe zoning issues.)

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