MetalSucks

How does he do it? Between writing and recording four albums, touring, producing, taking over our site for an entire day and being a proud Canadian family man, Devin Townsend somehow still found time to do a remix of Rammstein’s track “Rammlied” from their oftentimes pornographic 2009 release Liebe Ist Fur Alle Da.

Rammstein are always good for some fun headbanging as is Mr. Townsend, and thankfully the results are as good in reality as they might seem on paper. Stream Devin’s remix, entitled “Rammlied: ‘Rammin’ The Steins’ Remix” below. The remix is actually one of four remixed tracks from Liebe Ist Fur Alle Da that are all included as “B sides” on the digital single for “Ich Tu Dir Weh,” available today on iTunes.

For more fun with Rammstein remixes check out this and this.

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Australia’s Double Dragon have apparently been tearing shit up on their native island: they’ve played support slots for Slayer, Megadeth, Mastodon, Lamb of God, Chimaira, Carcass, Dark Tranquillity, Arch Enemy, In Flames, The Haunted, The Black Dahlia Murder, Kataklysm, and Soilwork. Not too shabby.

Unfortunately, the band don’t have a U.S. or European record deal, which means that their most recent offering, Devastator, hasn’t been available to fans outside of Australia… until now. The band are giving Devastator away for absolutely no cost. You can download the torrent here.

The band is currently in the process of recording a new album, which vocalist Lee Gardiner promises me is “not going to be heavier, or softer, or more or less moody, just new music, from us five cunts.” Sounds good to me!

-AR

Hardcore has a template–musically and lyrically–which is why it’s always so gratifying when artists in that scene take this potentially limiting construct and do something unique with it. Dangers, a Los Angeles-based hardcore act, does just that on Messy, Isn’t It?, their potent and thought-provoking new album. Fronted by the eloquent Al Brown and featuring Graf Orlock’s Justin Smith, the band’s approach to the sound pops, fizzles, and explodes with eccentricity, angularity, and, yes, brutality. But don’t just take my word for it; TAKE A LEAK!

Dangers – “Stay at Home Mom”

“Stay At Home Mom” opens the album with a fucking scathing indictment of shoddy parenting and the disaffected children it yields. I’ve posted the lyrics below (along with a few tour dates) so you can scream and rage along with Dangers. Like what you hear? Then why not order the LP/CD combo right now before it sells out?!

Click to read more…

Vince thinks that After the Burial’s new album is gonna fuck your face off when it gets released later this year. But that’s an educated guess based on enjoying the band’s past work; truth is, we haven’t heard any new material from the album… until now.

Reader Nathan Shaw sent us this footage of After the Burial performing a new song, “My Frailty,” at the London Music Hall earlier this week. The quality’s not so great, but good enough for you to get the gist of it. Check it out below, then make snap judgements in our comments section.

-AR

Earlier this week I hinted that there’s an awesome metal release coming out on 4/20 (besides the new Periphery album), and based on something I wrote, a bunch of you guessed that it’s the new album from Cynic. And I’m sorry to tell you that that’s not quite right.

But what’s coming out on 4/20 is gonna be awesome, and at some point real soon, I hope, we’ll get a new Cynic album, too. In the meantime, a reader known to us only as “Mario” says that his buddy Luigi Luke filmed the below footage of Cynic performing a new song, “Wheels Within Wheels,” this past Monday in Cleveland. To say it sounds promising would be to put it mildly. Enjoy!

-AR

This song ain’t about no fish.

Reader Randy Gatto sent us a link to the below stream of “Bullets Are Blind,” a new song off of Kalmah’s forthcoming album, 12 Gauge. It seems it’s been up on YouTube since December, so I’m assuming this isn’t a completely illegal leak, but who knows. If you wanna hear it, maybe you should listen now in case it gets taken down.

In any case, it’s a Kalmah song, which is to say, it will induce whiplash. And I’m being serious when I say I find the title unsettling. What a not-so-gentle reminder that guns don’t kill people, morons with guns kill people.

12 Gauge comes out March 3 on Spinefarm.

-AR

SMN just alerted me that a “fashionably “old school” Korn demo track,” entitled “My Time,” has leaked onto the internet. Out of morbid curiosity Because I hate myself As a sacrifice for you, the readers I really have no fucking idea why I listened to it, but, holy shit, is it awful. It makes me long for the days of… whatever the old fucking Korn songs were called. I think there was one where Jonathan Davis was all angsty and Fred Durst directed the video or something. That was better than this.

ANYWAY, if you care, listen to it now before it gets yanked from YouTube.

Korn’s new album, Who Gives a Shit?, will be out Who Gives a Shit 12th.

-AR

Extreme experimental metallers Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza posted a new song called “Yippiekayay Motherfucker” on their MySpace page back in October, but that was just the tip of the iceberg. The Danza have a full new record on the way later this year via Guy Kozowyk’s Black Market Activities label titled Danza III: The Series Of Unfortunate Events, and while we haven’t heard anything from that album just yet (unless the aforementioned Bruce Willis-inspired track will make it onto the record) we do have something to tide you over in the meantime. Here’s a statement from frontman Jessie Freeland:

Soooo, basically we were just getting bored and wanted to post a song. We can’t post any of the new stuff at this time so we decided, what the hell, let’s do a cover. The first thing that jumped into our heads was ‘Teen Spirit.’ There’s nothing special about the song to us – we basically just wanted to see if we could pull it off. So, with a little help from Jack Daniels we got it done and here it is.

It’s a pretty straight cover of a song we all grew up on, but that makes it no less awesome; as one might expect, Freeland absolutely lets loose during the choruses, screaming his guts out on Kurt Cobain’s famous lyrics. Stream and download the track below.

Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza – “Smells Like Teen Spirit”

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In the “bands that obviously look up to Tool but don’t sound exactly like Tool” department, Australian quintet Karnivool are clear winners. Their sound is big, dense, layered and just as intricate as the music of the aforementioned heavy prog rock masters… but unlike so many bands, Karnivool aren’t content to simply rape and pillage the tones of their heroes. Karnivool’s sound is a whole lot more atmospheric, lighter (in terms of mood) and a touch more melodic — and shit, maybe even a little more varied.

Karnivool’s album Sound Awake is old news to those in the band’s native Australia but the album isn’t officially getting released stateside until February 16th. Unsurprising then that they’re a pretty big deal at home but are only starting to get a foot-hold here; when they played Don Hill’s in NYC (a shithole in the truest sense of the word) last month, eyewitness reports came flooding in that the band absolutely blew the roof off the place, even without the aid of the phenomenal light show they usually bring in tow.

I’ve got my hands on a copy of Sound Awake and it’s a doozy indeed, but more than anything I’m anxious to see Karnivool live when they hit the states in March and April (dates on their MySpace page) starting with an appearance at SXSW. Stream the new track “Goliath” in its entirety below.

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Goliath by Karnivool

Halfway between the classic stoner rock of Baroness and the progged-out, furious rolling soundscapes of Mastodon lies Blood of the Tyrant, a Chicago-based band that’s good enough to have a burger named after them at famed heavy metal eatery Kuma’s Corner (and with a name like The Blood of the Tyrant Burger… that shit better be ordered none other than bloody RARE).

“Helena,” from their self-titled four-song EP, is the longest, most involved and most impressive track on the record, recalling elements of both of the aforementioned bands while creating something all their own. The band has given us “Helena” to offer to you for free; stream or download it below, and let us know what you think.

With a merciless touring history that includes shared stages with the likes of Minsk, Yakuza, Battlefields, Kongh, The Atlas Moth, Javelina and more, I’d be mighty curious to see these guys live next time they roll through NYC.

Blood of the Tyrant – “Helena”

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Fight Amp’s new album Manners and Praise came out on Translation Loss and Brutal Panda this past Fall, a steaming brew of stoner grooves and punk rock energy. We’ve got an exclusive download of the crushing “Faith in Man” from that album which you’re welcome to listen to or download for the cost of air! The band are currently on a nation criss-crossing tour of the U.S., the dates for which you can check out on Fight Amp’s MySpace page. Enjoy the tuneage below.

Fight Amp – “Faith in Man”

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Hey, lookit that! Our pals at Metal Injection posted some fan filmed footage of another new DEP song, Option Paralysis, which comes out next year.

So now we’ve heard two new songs, neither of which sounds like the poppier material on Ire Works. And while the mathcore shit is great, I really, really hope the band didn’t ditch that whole Faith No More thing they had going on on that album – ’cause that shit was a great, too, and I’d argue that there’s room for both the melodic and the chaotic in DEP’s music.

-AR

Two Jamey Jasta headlines in one day! Oh boy!

We’ve known for some time that Mr. Jasta was helping Sebastian Bach write material for his next solo album, the follow-up to the borderline-unlistenable Angel Down. Which actually strikes me as kind of a good idea – Bach hasn’t really brought the heavy since Skid Row’s underrated Subhuman Race album way the fuck back in 1995. We even got an ever-so-brief taste of that music back in May.

But now Blabbermouth has posted video of Bach and his new solo band, all of whom are apparently willing to pay for their own gas and rehearse for free, performing a new song in its entirety. It’s called “Live the Life” and, well, it’s pretty bad. And not heavy in the slightest.

But it’s good to see that Baz can still headbang like it’s 1989.

If I were Baz I’d put out some of those songs he wrote with Jasta ASAP. This shit is fucking embarassing.

-AR

What the fuck, Nekrogoblikon? You said your new album, Stench, was “almost finished” way back in April, and here’s it’s fucking December and no release date. C’mon, dudes, don’t leave me hanging!!!

Oh well. At least MetalSucks Mega-Maniac (and F.O.N. – that’s “Friend of Nekrogoblikon” ) Mark Moritz-Rabson sent us this video of the band performing a new song, “Return to the Sky,” and word that some of the band members told him the album will finally be out in January or February. I’ll believe it when I’m holding a CD in my hand, or at least have the mp3s on my iPod.

-AR

Reader Luke Papadopoulos sent us the below video of Attack Attack! performing a new song. Even with the lo-fi audio, it’s easy to tell that the song is fucking awful. Still, there’s three things I’d like to point out, at the risk of coming across as a major homophobe:

1. The song is called “Sexual Man Chocolate.”
2. Attack Attack!’s current front man is named Caleb Shomo.
3. Attack Attack! previously covered Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” – and didn’t change any of the lyrics to make them gender appropriate.

In conclusion, looks for Attack Attack! to tour with Burzum sometime in 2010.

-AR

Our bestest buds at Metal Injection found the below footage of DEP performing a new song, “Farewell, Mona Lisa.” It’s hard to get a really good feel for it given the mediocre audio quality, but it sounds pretty cool to me…

DEP’s new album, Option Paralysis, comes out March 23 on the band’s own Party Smasher label, via Season of Mist.

-AR

Norma Jean have been playing their excellent Bless Yo Mama and Kill the Chives (or whatever its called) in its entirety on their most recent tour, and I’m hopeful that re-living those songs night after night will give the band back some of the piss n’ vinegar they lost on their last two albums, Redeemer and The Anti Mother, both of which I thought were watered down and missing the sense of “What the fuck will they do next?” that made Bless and O God, the Aftermath so great.

That being said… they’ve also been playing a new song, “Kill More Presidents,” on this tour, and while the usual YouTube bootlegs are all I have to go on, they’re of fairly decent audio quality, and I don’t find the track encouraging. This sounds like more of the fairly typical metalcore stuff the band specialized in on those last two ho-hum outings.

Here’s the first video, which was originally posted on Blabbermouth. There’s another one after the jump. As usual, you can argue about the track in our comments section.

Click to read more…

So Slash performed a new song, “By the Sword,” at some benefit over the weekend, and of course there’s bootleg footage now on the net. It sounds better than the crap we’ve heard before, but the sound of Slash taking an actual crap would sound better than the crap we’ve heard before, so whatever.

The vocals are being performed here by Carrot Top. I don’t remember anyone saying that Carrot Top was on the actual album, so either he is and we just didn’t know it ’til now, or someone else sings the studio version. Let’s hope it’s the former.

Filling out the band for this performance is Dave Navarro, another dude from Jane’s Addiction who isn’t Navarro or Perry Farrell, and Blink-182’s Travis Barker, who tragically survived a plane crash earlier this year.

Slash’s solo album should ruin your 2010 sometime in the spring.

-AR

Venezuelan metallers Noctis Imperium just independently released their Imperium EP, and we’re happy to be able to offer one the EP’s strongest tracks “Descensus Ad Inferos” as a free download. Noctis Imperium’s brand of blackened death metal isn’t necessarily anything you haven’t heard before, but they’re as solid a band of this type as I’ve heard in some time; think Marduk, Belphegor, or hell, even the heavier elements of Enslaved, with some death and thrash influence thrown in as well. The Imperium EP offers five tracks of well put-together, punishing yet approachable and intricate black metal flavored by elements of brutal death with an intangible artsy element. Check out “Descensus Ad Inferos” below, then listen to more on the band’s MySpace page.

Noctis Imperium – “Descensus Ad Inferos”

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I’m not entirely sure what a “frost hammer” is – it sounds like the name of a band I wouldn’t like, actually – but it’s apparently the title of a new High on Fire song. You can watch bootleg footage of it being played live below, courtesy Blabbermouth.

Meanwhile, Snakes for the Divine has been announced as the tentative title of HOF’s new album, which will be out on E1 next year. Greg Fidelman, who produced the new Slayer album and worked on Metallica’s Death Mehgnetic, is producing. HOF are doing that whole Dethklok/Mastodon tour right now – if you’ve yet to see Matt Pike shake his flabby shirtless body, definitely go check it out.

-AR