I had no fucking clue who Design the Skyline were before Sergeant D. started writing about them (here and here), and knowing what I knew, I should have known better than to hit “play” on their new video, “Break Free From Your Life.” But I’m a fucking idiot, so I did hit “play,” and I think I hate this even more than I do Skip the Foreplay. It’s so bad that the only logical reaction I could come up with was to lay my head down on my laptop’s keyboard while a MetalSucks Mansion Monkey slammed the monitor down on my head again and again and again, WCW-style. If you had told me twelve years ago that some day there would be bands that made Limp Bizkit seem like the most sophisticated songwriters ever, I probably would have just killed myself then and there.

Side note: There are members of this band who aren’t sixteen?

Side side note: NO MORE VERB THE NOUN BAND NAMES ALLOWED. SERIOUSLY. CUT IT OUT WITH THAT SHIT. THERE MUST BE ANY NUMBER OF OTHER AVAILABLE BAND NAMES. COME UP WITH SOMETHING ELSE ALREADY.

-AR

[via Revolver]

Destiny Potato – Demo Preview by David Maxim Micic

This was not supposed to happen. Djent was not supposed to be the next annoying pop-metal trend.

When what would later be termed “djent” started brewing in the message boards frequented by guitar / home-recording nerds in 2002-2003, the genre had so much promise. Players who were passionate about their craft creating songs en masse for everyone to hear; good musicianship; the Meshuggah-revival guitar chug sound that was, at the time, novel; ambient atmospherics; interesting song structures and orchestration. Sure, the elements that caused djent to catch on like wildfire later on — namely catchy guitar hooks — were there in the genre’s infancy… but not to the degree they’re being mined, exploited  and endlessly imitated now.

This was not supposed to happen. For an interesting read, check out a guest blog TesseracT’s Acle Kahney wrote for MetalSucks about the birth of the djent movement. He was there way before you were and will be there long after.

This was not supposed to happen. It was nice knowing you while you were still fun, djent. I bid thee farewell.

-VN

Thanks: Dan Wolfson

(click to watch the video)

We’ve got nothing for love but Dave Grohl ’round here. Grohl’s metal cred needs no introduction at this point, and the man can seemingly do no wrong even with his Foo Fighters day job; the Foo Fighters just straight up rock, and we’re sick of having to make excuses for liking them. No, the Foos aren’t metal, but they are damn good, and they’ve been remarkably consistent in writing excellent songs throughout the many years they’ve been a band. They also deliver hilarious videos time and time again, and the video trailer they just released for their upcoming North American arena (!) tour is no different.

The video stars all four Foos as their trucker alter-egos stopping for hot showers at a truck stop. Homo-erotic hilarity ensues. I’m not sure if dude ass-cheeks are technically NSFW, but consider yourself warned! This video is up close and intimate.

Watch the video at the Foo Fighters’ tour website or by clicking the screen cap above. You can bet yer hot buns Axl and I will be rocking out at the upcoming Meadowlands, NJ date — we’re not too tr00 for the Foo.

-VN

It would appear as if Century Media has company: Metal Blade has pulled all of its artists off Spotify. At first I thought they were employing the strategy of pulling newer albums while leaving catalogue, until I realized that the older albums I was seeing on Spotify from Unearth, Behemoth, etc were actually released on other record labels.

Look, I’ve spent enough time arguing Spotify’s virtues (read by the folks at Metal Blade, I’m sure) and I don’t feel the need to re-hash those arguments. If Metal Blade and Century Media feel they can get better payout rates from Spotify by withholding their goods, hey, great for them, and I sincerely hope they DO get better rates. But I can’t imagine said rate increases would be enough under any imaginable scenario that they’d make up for losses in sales of music ownership (CDs, MP3s) that have been increasing over the past decade.

What this is really about is looking at the future and facing it head-on: will sales of recorded music increase, or even stay where they are now? I can’t see any sane person answering “yes” to that question. Pulling out of Spotify is almost like delaying the inevitable… key word “delaying,” not “stopping.” You can’t stop progress, and you can’t stop the 20+ million people (last I checked, probably more now) that have signed up for Spotify in the U.S. who all believe that it’s worth $10/month or free with ads and low quality audio. Unless every label pulls out of Spotify all at once, which is not gonna happen.

Click to read more…

Well, I feel vindicated.

See, I’ve been telling friends that Jack White was an idiot for years. YEARS. Like, pretty much since the first time I saw/heard The White Stripes. (In fact, I was opposed to entire movement of “The Plural” bands of the early aughties — see: The Hives, The Strokes, The Vines, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Fuck Your Mothers, etc.)  ”Fuck this guy!” I declared. “What a tool!”

“NO!” screamed back many of my friends and fellow appreciators of fine music. “JACK WHITE IS THE SAVIOR OF ROCK N’ ROLL!!!” Fuck, Rolling Drone said he was a better guitar player than Eddie Van Halen, which I think is roughly the equivalent of saying your niece who made that adorable fingerpainting on your fridge is a better painter than Da Vinci. For roughly the past ten years or so, I have just been astounded by how much praise has been heaped on this yutz.

And now Jack White is collaborating on a new album with the Insane Clown Posse.

So, clearly, I won that argument.

From Spin:

Click to read more…