Alright, I’ll admit it: I’m a lazy guy.

I’m the kind of person who will take a job and work as infrequently and minimally as possible (were you wondering why Part 3 took so fricken’ long after Part 1 and Part 2?). I use a lot of big words on my applications and key phrases like “people-person” and “success-oriented” (second to only to the ever popular “failure-oriented”). In other words, I’m a music journalist through and through.

In the music world we lazy, uninspired writers love to curmudgeon bands for being similarly lazy … and of course, uninspired. Sitting atop our glorious thrones of self-granted influence, we, with all our forum-crawling, shit-kicking expertise criticize what we probably couldn’t do any better ourselves.

But the fact is, there are plenty of decent — and even very good — bands that are more than happy to spend an entire career ignoring our occasionally constructive criticism. After all, not every band has to break new ground to be worth your time. But what happens when groups really do take such jabs to heart?

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photo by Francois Carl Duguay

The Inaugural Metal Suckfest is almost here!!!! Twenty bands will DESTROY The Gramercy Theatre on November 4 and 5, PLUS there’s an awesome, five-band pre-party at the venue the night before, making this THE can’t-miss hang of the year.

Tickets are on sale now right here, and you can hit up the fest’s official website for more info on the shows, including the complete line-up. In the meantime, we’re counting down to this weekend of chaos and debauchery by speaking to one member from each band on the bill. We continue today with legendary guitarist/vocalist Mike McGinnis of Fight Amp, who released a split, Lose Lose Lose, with Kowloon Walled City and Ladder Devils on Brutal Panda Records last year.

Read our chat after the jump. And don’t forget to check back in the coming days and weeks for interviews with more of the musicians participating in this awesome event!!!

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It was an ugly weekend in football and sports in general, and I found myself at times wondering things like “why do I care about this?”  The bad stories just kept piling up, and it was at times difficult and painful to watch. It didn’t help that the sports world was still digesting the tragic news of a horrible wreck during an Indy Car race in Las Vegas that took the life of driver Dan Wheldon. The promoters had packed way-too-many cars on a way-too-small track, and it only took 12 laps for an gigantic accident that involved almost half the 32-car field. So the sports weekend was already off to a start that could be termed… UGLY.

And it got uglier quickly, especially if you are a Washington Redskins fan. Once again your team was made a laughing-stock of the league, as QB Rex Grossman experienced an epic meltdown against the desperate-for-a-win Philadelphia Eagles. Grossman not only threw four interceptions, he almost got intercepted several other times, and repeatedly forced the ball into double and triple coverage until he was finally benched in the third quarter. But Grossman’s miserable QB rating was only the fourth worst in his career! Back-up John Beck fared a bit better, bringing the Skins to within a TD, but it was too little, too late, and the Eagles beat the Skins 20-13. UGLY.

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Where the hell do we stick Huntress in this current feminist metal movement debate? Juilliard-educated vocalist Jill Janus (a.k.a. “Tuesdae”) has clearly got a set of pipes and a legitimate love for good ol’ fashioned no-bullshit metal (in other words, not stupid scene shit), and, on top of that, she is clearly not at all shy about exploiting her totally excellent body to get the attention of drooling betas like me. Is it wrong of her to do so? Should she be trying to get notice for her talents alone? Or, ya know, if ya got it, flaunt it? I mean… the advantage she has over, say, those twins from that one band is that I think people would actually pay attention to Huntress even if Janus looked more like this than this. On the other hand, I do not mind looking at this one bit. The liberal, politically-correct mind boggles.

Consider your position as you enjoy the group’s new video, “Eight of Swords,” which debuted on on Noisecreep today, and is available for your viewing pleasure below. It’s actually pretty epic, and, yes, you do get to see quite a bit of Janus’ cleavage.

You can also download “Eight of Swords” for free here.

-AR

Making fun Attack Attack! / crabcore is so 2008, but this spoof video is too funny and too well-executed not to post. Everything about it is on point, right down to the color palette all these grassy field / behind-the-warehouse-dad-works-in videos use to achieve a dim, sunset-like glow.

Is crabcore dead yet?

-VN

Thanks: Alex Reynoso via Asian Glow

I gotta be honest: I cannot for the life of me keep track of who the crap was in Periphery or Haunted Shores when. Misha Mansoor was definitely involved with Haunted Shores at some point, but I assume that involvement ceased before former Periphery vocalist Chris Baretto joined… although I don’t think that Baretto a part of that band now, though I could be wrong… and then I guess at some point current Periphery vocalist  Spencer Sotelo also did a track with Haunted Shores… and we just got a press release telling us that HS guitarist Mark Holcomb (above, with Mansoor) has joined Periphery full-time after filling in with them on their last few tours after other other guitarist Alex Bois parted ways with the band back in July, and… maybe now Bois can join Haunted Shores? And I just went cross-eyed typing all that shit. Seriously, it’s easier keeping up with who is what version of L.A. Guns than it is with who was in what version of each of these bands at what time.

I’m sure someone will try to explain it to me in the comments section, but don’t bother. The important thing is, like I said, Holcomb is the new permanent guitarist in Periphery. Or, uh, that is, he will be, following the band’s upcoming European tour with Dream Theater, because a dude named Nolly from Red Seas Fire was already slated to be on that tour. But after that! Holcomb all the way!

In all seriousness, I saw Holcomb play with the band just a few weeks ago, and he was great. So if any Periphery fans were worried about who Bois’ replacement was gonna be, they can now breathe a sigh of relief.

-AR

Here’s a great tip if you wanna get laid: follow around your alcoholic friend who girls actually like , and then, when said friend passes out, pick up his not-quite-sloppy-seconds! That’s what Axl Rose recently told some Paraguayan fans he used to, at least (video below), admitting that Slash (the drunk in question) was good for something besides accidentally writing the riff to “Sweet Child O’ Mine.” And let me be the first to congratulate Axl on proving, once again, that he is not at all creepy or weird or kinda sad. After all, it’s a well known fact that you catch more bees with someone else’s honey! LEGITIMATE SOCIAL SKILLS ARE FOR LOSERS!!!

I guess the good news is, he didn’t yell at anybody this time.

-AR

[via Metal Insider]

It seems like the only people who actually dug The Haunted’s most recent album, Unseen, are me, Vince, and the members of the band themselves. And that’s a bummer, ’cause while Unseen may not have been the group’s heaviest effort, it still rocks, and the songs are incredibly catchy.

The catchiest — and my favorite on the record — is “No Ghost,” which now has a live video, filmed at the most recent edition of Wacken.It’s not necessarily the best live video I’ve ever seen, but the band sounds great, and if it gets X number of new people into the song, then it will have done its job.

Unseen is out now on Century Media.

-AR

Today’s release of Iced Earth’s new album Dystopia is kind of a big deal. The band’s been around since the late ’80s and released their first album in 1991; since then they’ve released nine more full-lengths and they were one of the flag-wavers of true heavy metal when it was the farthest thing from cool throughout most of the ’90s and early ’00s. This is also their first album with new vocalist Stu Block (Into Eternity).

So why the fuck is no one talking about Dystopia? When Vic Vaughn included it in this morning’s weekly Shit That Comes Out Today column I actually had to check multiple websites to make sure that Dystopia was, in fact, coming out today. Other than this Revolver premiere of the album’s title track and Axl’s commentary on the album artwork I really haven’t seen anything about Dystopia at all. Iced Earth should be on the fucking cover of Revolver. Perhaps Jon Schaffer is too busy railing against the Federal Reserve to worry about press. Perhaps metal fans have moved on and just aren’t interested in the brand that Iced Earth are peddling… but man, if so, that’s a travesty.

Recognize and support true heavy metal. Recognize and support Iced Earth. Listen to “Dystopia” here; it’s big, it’s anthemic, and Stu Block sounds fantastic. Buy Dystopia.

-VN

When word got out that Nergal from Behemoth was going to be a judge on the Polish version of the reality show The Voice, a lot of metal fans were, well, baffled. And not just because Nergal is apparently an honest-to-Satan rock star in Poland (whereas, like I was saying on Twitter last week, metal really has no rock stars anymore in this country) — just because the idea of someone so bad-assed participating in something so, well, um, I hate to say it but “lame,” was just kind of a head-scratcher.

But oh hey guess what? Poland continues to be an awful fucking place for freedom of expression, and following more than eighteen months of religious controversy involving Nergal and right wing conservatives in his native country, he has now been fired from from the aforementioned Voice program. Sez Metal Underground:

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New releases from Iced Earth, Insomnium, Electro Quarterstaff, Evile and Puscifer top this week’s list of new face-melters, while a b-sides / re-imaginings compilation from Cradle of Filth might actually be the week’s biggest new record. As usual, all of these are available at Amazon for less than you’ll find them at most other places. We take a look at the above releases and more after the jump:

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Man oh man, am I ever jealous of the dudes at Metal Injection. While Vince and I (and, of course, our friend Rodney Githens from Vertebrae 33 and Metal Band Art) were manning our booth at this past weekend’s New York Comic Con, Injection co-heads Rob and Frank were at a roundtable with Mike Judge, a.k.a. the creator of Beavis and Butt-Head, King of the Hill, Office Space, and a ton of other stuff that’s made you snarf over the past twenty years. And, of course, they asked all the best questions — which is to say, they got Judge to spill on whether or not there would be metal videos in the series’ upcoming re-launch, and to discuss his own metal fandom. Suh-weeeeeeeet. Click on the below screen cap of Judge talking about metal subgenres to watch the whole interview, which, needless to say, is pretty damned great.

Beavis and Butt-Head finally returns to MTV on October 27. Check out a trailer for the new season here.

-AR

Lars Ulrich has a history of saying really dumb shit to promote his latest really dumb endeavor, but his most recent brain fart may actually be his stinkiest one yet.

See, back in 2003, before there even was a MetalSucks (unless you believe the kid I met at New York Comic Con this weekend who very excitedly told me he’s been an avid reader since 2002), there was a rumor going around that Lars Ulrich was going to do some of the scoring for Kill Bill, Quentin Tarantino’s then-heavily-anticipated martial arts opus. Of course, that never actually came to pass, and now Ulrich has explained why in a guest column for The Daily Beast. The issue, it seems, started when he sat down to read the script (which is available here if you’re interested):

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On September 15th we published Part 1 of an epic Rigged piece in which new Dream Theater drummer Mike Mangini embarked on a quest to take MetalSucks readers through every single piece of his massive drumkit. On September 29th we posted Part 2. It wasn’t our intention to have to split this Rigged feature up, it’s just that the dude’s got so. much. gear. and is so passionate and detailed about explaining how it all works that we simply didn’t have a choice but to split this feature up into three! We could publish a friggin’ book with this thing. So, FINALLY, here is the third and final part:

I want to end with the electronics. I’m using what’s called Tru-Trac pads that Pearl developed to use with their e-Pro drums. Pearl’s electronic drums are not trying to rival Yamaha or Roland’s fabulous electronic drums; those are awesome and those guys make absolutely great stuff, but Pearl is not trying to copy or rival them. Pearl decided that they wanted to have a drum set that could be smacked and it would feel like an actual drum set. It’s not that the other electronic kits don’t work and can’t be learned and adjusted to; it’s just not the same as hitting the acoustic drum. They know it. Everybody knows it. Pearl said “we’re going to make something different.” Because I’m an acoustic kit player and I play a lot harder than it looks like I’m playing (but you can tell if you look at the dB meter), what’s happening is when I hit these pads, I have a connection to them with the feel. That’s the reason I’m using the Tru-Trac pads. As far as the sizes are concerned and the amount, I have one with each foot and they’re all 10″ diameter pads. Why 10″? The bigger ones are heavy. I don’t want to be putting a large electronic drum way up high on a rack. Somebody has to lift that and god help me if it falls.

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You should all know that Keith Merrow is one of our very favoritest solo instrumentalists, seeing as we write about him all the time. But what you may not have known is that our bro-love is reciprocal: Keith is a fan of MetalSucks too!

The very day we posted the home studio walkthrough video Keith put together, he happened to be wearing the MetalSucks t-shirt that comes with our FYE Fanpack. So he did what all good Suckalos do and sent us a pic. Lookin’ sexy, Keith; you’ll be receiving a box of CDs and other assorted metal goodies in the mail from us right quick for sharing your love of MS with the world.

You too can get a box o’ swag by donning your MS merch and sending in a fun picture of yourself to news[at]metalsucks[dot]net as part of our ongoing Show Us Your MetalSucks contest. In addition to our standard line of MetalSucks shirts (and hoodie!) we’ve still got a few left of our limited edition “Appetite for Deconstruction” shirts featuring animated versions of our own faces (we’re modest). Get on it.

WSOU, Seton Hall’s radio station, is probably the best metal radio oulet on the East Coast, and possibly in the entire country. We’ve been avid listeners for years and years now, and we’re huge fans of what they do there. Which is why we’re very happy to tell you that we’re on the air even as you read this.

If you don’t live in the area, fret not! You can still listen to us by streaming the station right here. We’ll be on until 6pm EST, playing some good tunes, talking up The Metal Suckfest (and giving away a free pair of tickets!) and this Friday night’s CMJ showcase we’re presenting with our buds at Metal Injection and 1000 Knives (co-headlined by Skeletonwitch and Kvelertak and featuring support from Barn Burner, Turbid North, and Battlecross), and a ton of other fun stuff. You can even call in and talk to us, ask us questions, tell us how awful the site is, whatever.

Listen here. Like we said, WE’RE ON THE AIR RIGHT NOW!!!

-Axl and Vince

The Inaugural Metal Suckfest is almost here!!!! Twenty bands will DESTROY The Gramercy Theatre on November 4 and 5, PLUS there’s an awesome, five-band pre-party at the venue the night before, making this THE can’t-miss hang of the year.

Tickets are on sale now right here, and you can hit up the fest’s official website for more info on the shows, including the complete line-up. In the meantime, we’re counting down to this weekend of chaos and debauchery by speaking to one member from each band on the bill. We continue today with legendary drummer Timmy St. Amour of Howl, whose most recent album, Full of Hell, was released last year on Relapse Records, and who will have a new release out on that label early next year.

Read our chat after the jump. And don’t forget to check back in the coming days and weeks for interviews with more of the musicians participating in this awesome event!!!

Click to read more…

Something I am 110% positive the world did not need is djent-rap, which is exactly what it sounds like. But I suppose it was inevitable that someone attempt djent-rap at some point anyway, because while we can’t seem to cure cancer, we can make sure that every child believes that he is a unique snowflake, and that every terrible idea he has is worth pursuing.

And so, ladies and djentlemen, I give you Hacktivist, who will probably be in the biggest band in the world a year from now.

I’m sure some of you will be tempted to defend this drek, so I’d like to pre-emptively assert that there is no defending it. Even if the guitar tone obviously owes a large debt to Fredrik Thordendal and company, the actual riffs and compositions are straight out of the Munky/Wes Borland playbook. And while there is such a thing as good rapping/flow/whatever, this ain’t it. If you like this now, I strongly suspect you will be embarrassed in five years.

Next up on the docket of awful concepts that will force their way into our reality: black djent. I guess that would be djent with croaky vocals and what my friend Nick calls “bumblebee guitars.” I fearfully await that genre’s arrival.

-AR

Thanks: Dan Wolfson

Hard to believe it’s already the CMJ Music Marathon again; time passes so fucking quickly my brain can’t quite comprehend it. Before we know it it’ll be winter, which means soon enough we’ll be old men and then we’ll be dead, and then humans will flood themselves off this planet into oblivion and we’ll all be dead. But at least we get a week’s worth of cool metal shows first!

You all already know about the MetalSucks / Metal Injection / 1000 Knives CMJ showcase featuring Kvelertak, Skeletonwitch, Barn Burner, Turbid North and Battlecross, Friday, October 21st at Club Europa in Brooklyn (tickets here), right? Did you know that we’re giving away FREE BEER between 6 and 7pm??? It’s true, courtesy of our friends at E One Entertainment. Get there early or you’ll miss out, and get smashed with us in record time. Did you know there are a whole bunch of other metal shows this week, too? After the jump, the official MetalSucks guide to metal at CMJ 2011.

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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.

Sorry for the delay. Been extra busy writing books, covering film festivals for Bloody Disgusting, and watching zee American football. Also, my listening tally practically doubled with the introduction of Spotify in my home.

Here are the August 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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