Whether you think the car manufacturer’s involvement in metal over the past few years is good or bad for the scene (and we’ve certainly heard compelling arguments from both sides and everything in between), one thing is certain about Scion: they’re pumping a fuckton of money into it. Whereas their involvement until now has pretty much been relegated to the death/black/crust/grind/doom types of bands — the more “indie” metal scene — they’re taking a big jump into the metal mainstream with their latest venture, a sponsorship of the recently announced Meshuggah U.S. tour with Baroness and Decapitated.

A tour sponsorship is one thing — big whoop, logo on a flyer — but the real news here is that Scion will be filming and recording the whole thing. In a post to the Scion A/V Facebook page late last night, the car company’s metal division spilled the beans:

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New releases from Goatwhore, Orange Goblin, Earth and Beneath the Massacre all placed in the Top 100 of the “Current Hard Music Albums” chart on Soundscan last week, while recent records from Van Halen, Lamb of God, Foo Fighters, Lacuna Coil and more just keep on truckin’. Also, a startling realization that Nickelback is more popular than Van Halen. Those numbers and more after the jump:

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Before we go any further, please note that L.A. “two-piece synthetic metal band” Children are comprised of Christopher Zeischegg and Chad Fjerstad (ex-Dead to Fall), whose day jobs are as adult film performers Danny Wylde and Chad Alva. WUT?! We know most dudes in metal bands have day jobs nowadays and that many of them have some pretty cool ones — music teachers, recording engineers, etc — but MALE PORN STARS has gotta take the cake.

I can’t say I know much (or anything) about the dudes in any of the porn flicks I’ve ever seen, but judging from Children’s new video for “Girl in the Dirt,” Christopher and Chad must star in some pretty classy flicks — the production quality of this video is amazing! I don’t wanna ruin it for you, so I’ll just say this: headless pigs, armless girl playing drums with her head, blood, fire, gore, and a whole lot more. Oh, and a pretty sweet Genghis Tron-meets-Austerity Program jam, too, which happens to have been produced by The Faceless’ Michael Keene. One can only surmise that they know each other through Keene’s pornstar girlfriend Andy San Dimas.

No full nudity here, but plenty of scantily clad female shots: gonna say NSFW just in case.

-VN

Hey you! Are you in a band? Would you like said band to be featured on MetalSucks? Do yourself a favor and take a cue from an MS reader by the name of Scott. Scott had a eureka moment when he realized that sending in a picture of himself wearing his MetalSucks t-shirt would be a surefire way to get his own band, Robbin’ Pain, mentioned on the site, ’cause we always post photos people send us of themselves donning MS garb (that’s Scott behind the drum kit wearing our “Completely Unreadable” t-shirt). For only $14*, Scott got a sweet shirt, a box of metal goodies for sending in this picture as part of our ongoing Show Us Your MetalSucks contest, AND publicity for his band! Great work, Scott; A+ in ingenuity.

-VN

* This does not mean that MetalSucks is a pay-for-play operation. No way no how, don’t even go there.

It’s a Presidential election year here in the U.S., meaning we’ll be hearing a whole lot of political opinion from anyone who cares to share it. That includes metal musicians (Gawker is even keeping a running list!), which is great for us because people luurrrrrrv to get riled up about politics in our comments section and we love sitting back and watching the sparks fly. Shit, last week when Dave Mustaine endorsed Rick Santorum and ya’ll topped the 100 comment mark. Fish in a barrel.

The latest topic du jour: gay marriage. Jesus Dave Mustaine loves to support full free-market capitalism but can’t support freedom in one’s own home — surprise! — while The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Greg Puciato published an unrelated anti-homophobia rant on his own personal website. Let’s take a look:

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Xombie are breaking all sorts of boundaries by joining the burgeoning Neo-Nu-Metal movement! I was once in a band just like this… in high school. Really, exactly like this: a rock band with an MC (we actually had two MCs!!) playing repetitive funked-up rock riffs, cringe-inducingly transparent pentatonic leads under the verses, “heavy” choruses we thought were really catchy, dual guitarmonies, and rambling, nonsensical classic rock-style guitar solos. We were also constantly hanging out on rooftops because that’s what you did when you grew up in NYC (we never shot a video but definitely did a rooftop photoshoot). These guys never gave up the dream, though. Viva la Nu-Metal 2012!

-VN

Thanks: Fuzzy Dunlop

This is the busiest news Friday I can remember in, like, ever. A new Meshuggah track, a new Municipal Waste track, more Bill Ward / Black Sabbath drama, Veil of Maya’s new album is streaming in full on Spotify of all places… and now Periphery have gone and released a new track too. Holy crapticles!

The new song, “Passenger,” actually isn’t brand spankin’ new, as in from Periphery’s forthcoming 2012 album; it’s a bonus track on the deluxe edition re-release of their self-titled album, recently released by the band’s overseas label Roadrunner, so some of you probably already have it. It certainly sounds like something that could’ve been on that album. Here it is, courtesy The PRP:

-VN

I’ve got some really special unsigned picks for you this week. I know what you’re thinking: “But your taste in music is impeccable, Vince, and your picks are great EVERY week!” I know, I know, I know! It’s tough being me and having to out-do myself every week, but just you wait until you hear this new music from Town Portal, Anuryzm, Shturm and A Little Bitter.

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That’s as good an excuse as any.

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Last week we offered up a test-press vinyl and poster of Former Thieves new album The Language That We Speak out now on No Sleep Records. And for the second week in a row, the winner is:

• Hybridofsteel: “He got really excited when they told him he was going to ICP. Unfortunately, he didn’t know that they were talking about Indiana County Prison.”

Woop woop!

This week we’ve got a very special prize to give away. It’s a clear vinyl of Animals as Leaders’ latest LP Weightless, but instead of the usual artwork vinyl jacket it’s got a plain white slip cover signed by all the band members. So not only is this is a limited edition item, but it’s a super-rare version of a limited edition item! Bonus. Check out a photo of the actual item you’ll be getting right here. AAL will be on tour in Europe throughout April (dates here), and Tosin Abasi himself is on a guitar clinic tour of Australia and New Zealand right now.

So get on it: leave a comment with the funniest caption to the photo below (sent in by MS reader Bryan Kemp). Remember to use a real email address (or post it along with your comment if you’re logged in with your Facebook or Twitter account).

I know that’s a bold statement, but I’m so confident in it that I don’t feel the need to back it up — the band’s music will do that for me.

Towards the end of 2011 I saw Reading, PA’s Rivers of Nihil absolutely destroy the tiny basement of NYC’s Lit Lounge. PULVERISE THE FUCK OF THAT BASEMENT. We see a lot of unsigned bands, but it’s rare I see one as tight and as singularly focused as Rivers of Nihil. I was dumbfounded, staring their in awe at this phenomenal band steamroll through their set of brutal progressive death metal that actually has something new to offer the scene. No scene, no djent, no -core, no bullshit breakdowns… just pure, crushing modern death metal. Think: the best parts of Aborted, The Red Chord, Decrepit Birth, Nile and Gojira all rolled into one. Lots of bands attempt to do this, but none do it as well as Rivers of Nihil.

Stream some songs from Rivers of Nihil’s two EPs below; track 5, “Sea of Neurons,” if my favorite. The band gave me a copy of their latest EP, Temporality Unbound, and I haven’t been able to stop streaming it since.

-VN

Thanks to No Clean Singing for inspiring me to stop being lazy and finally write this post.

If you haven’t heard of Chrome Waves yet we won’t blame you, but now’s the time to listen to correct the error of yours ways by listening to a new track from one of the best new black metal bands I’ve heard in some time. The band features The Atlas Moth vocalist/guitarist Stavros Giannopoulos, ex-Nachtmystium guitarist Jeff Wilson and Gates of Slumber drummer Bob Fouts. The results sound like a delicious stew concocted from the best parts of all three bands, a dark and dreary mix of black metal, Atlas Moth-ian dreary, atmospheric doom and a certain rawness of which Gates of Slumber fans would approve. Here’s new track “That Cursed Armored Train:”

Sweet, right? I look forward to a full-length Chrome Waves album whenever it comes out.

-VN

Thanks: Matthew

It’s not exactly news that the once very hairy ’80s revival festival Rocklahoma has eschewed its roots for what’s best described as “Red state rock” or “flyover rock,” but every year when the lineup is announced I cry a little tear inside for the lineups that once were and the lineups that could have been. Since the epic fail that was Rocklahoma 2009, AEG Live has taken over the festival and revamped the format, and presumably it’s working, because this is the third year in a row the festival’s billing has featured bands that were big in the year 2000 instead of the ’80s modern bands. And for the first time ever (I think), there are even a few bands that readers of MetalSucks might enjoy.

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In October we told you about BabyMetal, the J-Pop-meets-metal Japanese tween girl group which is exactly as weird and creepy as that description sounds. And now, based on what we can gather from this recently released promo video, BabyMetal is coming to a venue near you! If you live in Japan. And are 13 years old. And female. And have no respect for your own self dignity.

WATCH, and be awed. Throw up your Fox Signs, everybody!!

-VN

Thanks: Duane Hay

Our inboxes have been blowing up with links to that quote from Dave Mustaine in which he whole-heartedly endorses the U.S. Presidential candidate named after the frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the by-product of anal sex. The impetus behind these emails is presumably that we haven’t seen this quote yet because we haven’t written about it. Don’t worry, we’ve seen it — and it mildly raised an eyebrow — but it’s not exactly surprising to us given all we know about Mustaine’s inane religious zealoutry of late. We didn’t write about it because it seemed pretty obvious that a man who believes in an invisible man in the sky would support a Presidential candidate who believes gays choose to be gay and the earth was created 5,000 some-odd years ago by said invisible man. In other words, this is news?

Apparently so. Here’s the quote:

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(photo credit: Loren Scott Photography)

Given how much we love Animals as Leaders here at MetalSucks it’s kinda hard to believe that we’ve never formally interviewed band mastermind and founder Tosin Abasi, but there you have it — until now. Abasi, who was ranked #2 by MetalSucks on last year’s Top Modern Metal Guitarists list, is about to release the debut album by his jazz-fusion side-project T.R.A.M., so it seemed like a good time to catch up with him and talk all things related to his multi-faceted career.

Turns out that Abasi is currently in Australia and New Zealand on a guitar clinic tour, something he says he plans to do a lot more of in the future. He gave us lots of juicy info about how T.R.A.M. came together, how the music was written (music nerds, you’re gonna live this part), his thoughts on the explosion of the instrumental prog scene and “djent,” and what the future holds for Animals as Leaders, T.R.A.M., and Abasi himself.

And as an added treat, T.R.A.M.’s given us an exclusive premiere of a 2-minute snippet of the song “Consider Yourself Judged” from their forthcoming album Lingua Franca (February 28th, Sumerian). All that, after the break.

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When your shitty crabcore band indulges in every video cliche known to man, you’re sure to get lots of little tweeny metal girls all hot n’ bothered in their privates like Capture the Crown do. So, this is what Sergeant D meant by Formulaicore? About the only thing missing from Capture the Crown’s video for “You Call That A Knife? This is a Knife!” (lol @ movie reference from way before they were born) is a grassy field, but thankfully there’s a graffiti-covered warehouse in its stead. Some of my favorite parts:

• the crushed oil drum the singer is using as a “monitor” to rest his foot on
• why is it raining really hard inside this warehouse?
• this band apparently has an invisible keyboard player. where is he??? superpowers ftw.
• skipping in place. this is never not funny.
• the pants these guys are all wearing. um, WUT??!
• the fact that these guys have their amp cabinets on $1k+ flight cases with rollers, JUST IN CASE they’re picked up for a big tour straight from this shoot!

This video is approaching 500k views, and surely Capture the Crown are selling bucketloads of their comically stereotypical Varsity font SHOUTABLE GANG VOCALS t-shirts. Century Media or Rise Records should get on signing this band asap!

-VN

Thanks: Joel Sigsbee

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That Dethklok mastermind Brendon Small has been working on a solo side project for some time now isn’t exactly a secret — he’s mentioned it publicly a few times, teasing it in an interview with us last summer and an interview with Metal Injection back in April of 2010 — but until now details have been extremely sparse. The reliable MS informant going under the moniker Fuzzy Dunlop has just informed us that a Facebook page for “Brendon Small’s Galaktikon” appeared out of the ether last night, and while there isn’t a whole lot of information on it the fact that this project is in the “create a Facebook page” stage means the record is probably coming soon, which is pretty exciting. The Facebook page includes the above (bad-ass!) album cover, an older photo of Brendon in corpsepaint, and this brief description:

This is the official fan page for Brendon Small’s GALAKTIKON: A high stakes intergalactic extreme rock album coming soon!

“High stakes”! “Intergalactic”! Sounds awesome. “Extreme rock” is a strange word pairing, but I’m intrigued. We’re ready.

-VN

Pantera aren’t one of the first bands I’d necessarily point to in the whole “metal is basically modern classical music” debate, but the Portland Cello Project begs to differ:

PCP believe that the angst of Pantera is something not so distant from some of their favorite composers, including early period Beethoven, Khachaturian, Shostakovich, etc. To flesh out this connection, the group will play an opening set that follows a chain of darkness and angst in classical music from the baroque period, up through the classical and romantic periods, into the 20th century, including some seminal heavy metal songs. The evening will conclude with a performance of Vulgar Display of Power from beginning to end.

And who am I to argue with a bunch of classically trained cellists who could beat me over the head with their giant wood instruments? And I admit, this arrangement of the Pantera classic does drive home the point the Portland Cello Project is trying to make. 

Also: sick feaux-Dime solo @ 1:30!

-VN

“Stoner pop” quartet Torche have a new record coming out in April via new label home Volcom, and hard as it is to believe it’s their first full-length since 2008′s infectious Meanderthal turned the metal world over onto its happy head. Hydra Head released the Songs for Singles EP in 2010, originally recorded as a full album, but for whatever reason the band decided to chop a few tracks off and keep things shorter. Will Harmonicraft, out April 24th, feature some of those axed songs or is it comprised of entirely new material? Can’t say as we know.

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