… let an old woman design your band’s logo, fall in love with her, take a sexy bath with her, and then you’ll be big, rich mega-rock studs just like The Dillinger Escape Plan! At least that’s the best I can come up with after watching DEP’s new video for “Parasitic Twins,” the creepy, David Lynch-like clip which was directed by David Merenyi and produced by Greg Toth. Take a gander over at NME or in the embed above and then tell us whether we’re missing any kind of deep meaning here. Did Ben Weinman’s mom actually design DEP’s now-iconic logo? Is there something Ben’s not telling us about his feelings towards his mom? Fuckin’ Oedipus, he’s so complex and shit.

-VN

[Updated with official tour poster, 2:16pm EST.]

Prepare to get stangry: we are about to announce the dates of a really sweet tour, and unless you live in or near a major city the chances are pretty high that it’s not coming to your town! If the members of Cannibal Corpse, Exhumed, Abysmal Dawn and Arkaik could speak to you, I’m sure they’d say “We really wish we could visit all of you! We don’t give any fucks about our families, comfortable beds, good meals or regular showers! All we care about is serving YOU, the people of South Dakota! Next time we’ll do a non-stop 150-date U.S. tour and we can all party together!” Or not. Because dudes in bands have lives. Folks of Florida, Montana and Nebraska: deal with it.

Lucky for you, this most brutal of spring tours actually DOES have dates in Florida (two!) and Nebraska. Sorry, Montana, you’re still out of luck. But if it’s any consolation, this tour is not hitting either New York City or Los Angeles, so at least you can revel in that.

Dates after the break [via Noisecreep]:

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Seas Will Rise have a strong connection to Landmine Marathon — the band features founding Marathoner Eric Saylor, and their debut album, Disease is Our Refrain, was recorded and mixed by current Landmine Marathon guitarist Ryan Butler. And if you’re sitting there wondering “Gee, does that mean that Seas Will Rise play brutal, filthy, hardcore-flavored death grind?”, then you will be happy to know that the answer is, “Yes. Yes they do. And they are AWESOME AT IT.”

And should you doubt us, well, we’ll prove it, fuckers — we’re debuting the track “A Sleeper’s Cell” below. It is some epic curb-stomping shit.

Here’s what Saylor had to tell us about “A Sleeper’s Cell” –

“Cormac McCarthy’s The Road has been a really big influence on this band. When I started thinking about what I wanted to do for this record, I really wanted to work on a cohesive theme of this post-apocalyptic world. Since we’re from Arizona, I wanted everything to be set in the desert. This is the first song on the record, so I wanted to set up everything that follows and capture that sort of desperate, exasperation that would come with literally being on a run for your life 24/7.”

Mission accomplished, Mr. Saylor. Mission accomplished big time.

Check out “A Sleeper’s Cell Below.” Disease is Our Refrain comes out March 6 via Man in Decline and Anxiety Machine Records. It’s gonna be limited to 500 LPs, 100 of which are bone colored, so if you want one, you should buy it up quick. You can do so here.

Last summer Poison toured with Mötley Crüe, and that seemed like pretty much the best glam metal nostalgia tour imaginable; now Rikki Rockett has announced via Facebook that this summer Poison will be touring with Def Leppard, which is, somehow, an even more sugary confection than the Crüe tour. Whether or not it will be as fun as the Crüe tour will be entirely dependent on Def Lep, since Poison have somehow managed to out-ridiculous themselves into oblivion. I haven’t seen Def Leppard since circa 2001, so I really have no idea how good or bad they are in a live setting now.

ANYWAY, presumably dates will be announced soon. While you wait, enjoy this poster from 2009′s Def Leppard/Poison tour. Just ignore the part that says “Cheap Trick” at the bottom, ’cause Cheap Trick will not, to the best of my knowledge, be playing this new trek.

-AR

With all due respect to Mark Hunter — a talented vocalist, extraordinary Tweeter, and Chimaira’s lone original member — this footage of three new[ish] members of Chimaira rehearsing together is about as exciting as this story’s headline makes it sound. While some would say this is “rehearsal” footage, it’d probably be a lot more accurate to call it “learning” footage. It looks like Daath’s Emil Werstler — Chimaira’s senior-most member with a 10-month silver coin – is running the show here and teaching the two new guys how to play Chimaira songs. These guys are all talented musicians and I’m sure the finished product will sound great, but at what point in the mass exodus of members does a band stop being that band? Watching a bunch of men in different bands learn songs so they can go up on stage and pretend to be some other band is just weird! On the other hand, if some kid who knows nothing of all the member swaps goes to a show and loves it, does it even matter? Does life even matter?? Aren’t we all gonna die eventually anyway?!?!?

Maybe Hunter is trying to go the Chris Barnes route; shit, Barnes has been doing it for years and Six Feet Under are still going strong… so I guess fans really don’t care. Speaking of Six Feet Under, former members of Chimaira just wrapped up their Six Feet Under cover band recording sessions and are currently in the mixing process! Now the former members of Six Feet Under just need to join up with Eyal Levi in a reconsituted version of Daath and this three-band circle jerk will be complete.

-VN

This week brings less than a ton of new metal, but it does mark the unveiling of a tasty upgrade to MetalSucks’ beloved Shit That Comes Out Today column. The new format makes it easy to preview tracks and peep cover art, but that’s not all: In the new STCOT, we boldly list a few similar projects (y’know, for context) and recklessly recommend which new records might deserve priority in your new record-buying plans (in case your budget doesn’t accomodate all the hot new shit). So, like it? Hate it? Check out this week’s shit then give us your input in the comments. 

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What was once inconceivable is now a reality: A David Lee Roth-fronted Van Halen is set to release a new album! It took 28 years, a soul-crushing false start with Roth in 1996, the dumping of bassist/backing vocalist Michael Anthony, and a new label home, but A Different Kind Of Truth finally arrives today. However, a fair appraisal of Truth could be dicey: Fans might get swept up in the grand return of a pined-after loved one, while the indifferent can effortlessly cry foul at Truth‘s mining of 35 year-old material and at suspiciously deft Wolfgang Van Halen bass lines. And yet early reviews state that Truth is a remarkably authentic classic Van Halen experience.

Here’s what steps VH took to recapture that old magic:

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In what is sure to reignite controversy in the hardcore scene, Southern Lord has apparently gone all-in by signing Cro-Mags’ co-founder Harley Flanagan to the label for “several upcoming releases.” To quote label owner Greg Anderson:

Through the power of the net and sheer luck I started talking to Harley Flanagan over emails and telephone past year. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the intensity and honesty of his playing also carried through in his personality. Harley is humble, raw, intelligent, driven and focused. To say it is an honor for Southern Lord to be working with Harley Flanagan is a enormous understatement! We’re in shock and CAN NOT WAIT to get this shit going! The first release we will be doing together will be the forthcoming Harley’s War album. The demos of the material he has shared with us for this are fucking phenomenal! The new Harley’s War material has the same feeling as the initial musical impact the Cro-Mags first had in the mid-’80s. Killer songwriting, raw lyrics and Harley Flanagan’s trademark bass playing. As mentioned above this is “other level” shit!

So why do I think this is a brilliant (albeit a tad risky) move on Southern Lord’s part?

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Good morning!!! As you read this, I am sitting in an oral surgeon’s chair, having my wisdom tooth ripped from my skull. But you get to do something much more fun: listen to “Parasitic Scriptures of the Sacred Word,” a new Goatwhore song which is now streaming here. If you’re feeling angry or stressed, this lil’ ditty is the perfect thing for ya. FEED YOUR RAGE UNTO IT!!!

Look, guys. I played this album backwards the other day, and then my cat turned inside out, and the floor opened up and fire started spewing forth and shit, and this really ugly demon broad arose and gave me the best sexual experience of my life, and then my face melted. Okay so that may not have really happened, but Goatwhore’s new album Blood for the Master is really good, and you should listen to this song, and then you should buy Blood when Metal Blade releases it on February 14. You should also read our own Sammy O’Hagar’s recent four-outta-five-horns review of the record.

And I’m gonna go listen to it again right now this very second.

-AR

Have you checked out KillswitchEngage.com today? We’re not sure how long it’s been there, but as of the time this article is being published there’s a splash screen up with a photo of the band — including original lead singer Jesse Leach. While the band has yet to release a statement via their website, Facebook page, press release or any other medium, a photo is worth 1,000 words and we can’t think of any other possible way this could be construed.

After Howard Jones’ departure on January 4th, asking Leach back into the band seemed like only logical course of action; 3rd vocalists never work out, and duh, it just makes sense given all the history and Leach’s recent relationship with the other band members. Welcome back, Jesse!

Thanks: Corey B.

[Hats off to Lazarus A.D.'s Jeff Paulick for stepping in when we needed him this year to take over the Unnecessary Roughness column and doing a fantastic job with it. Thanks for playing, dude! -Ed.]

Well, the Super Bowl ended pretty much how I anticipated it would. It was a great game, and congrats to New York. I was a naysayer when they entered the playoffs, but when you beat Green Bay, San Francisco and New England, that’s beating the best teams in the league this year. I wish I could argue against that, but I can’t!

I’m sure everybody watched the game so I’m not gonna recap it. There were a couple key mistakes that the Patriots made, otherwise they surely would have won. I thought they outplayed the Giants, and their defense surprised me. But in the end, the Giants took care of the ball better and they made plays when they needed to; that’s been their MO all year.

First I want to get to the debate of Eli being an elite quarterback. Nobody really wants to throw him in that discussion because he doesn’t play with the same passion as his brother or as Tom Brady, but he does win — twice now. That’s very impressive. I don’t like the guy, I think hes a dork on and off the field. He’s just awkward, and football isn’t an awkward sport. It’s a fucking brutal high tempo gauntlet where steroid filled behemoths try to all but kill each other. And Eli looks like he should be hosting Blues Clues, not commanding Big Blue. He has something that you can’t teach, something special about him, though. Something I can’t explain, something nobody else can explain. There’s just something else there that his brother doesn’t have, call it magic if you will. When he hucked that ball to Mario Manningham, immediately I said to myself, if this guy catches that ball this is fucking magic, and he caught it. You can’t script shit like that, you can’t count on having a play like that to keep you alive and win the game, but he always does it. And he did the same shit last time in 2008 with David Tryee. Luck is thrown out when you do this more than once. Little Eli is clutch, and he’s just one bowl behind Brady and already one ahead of his brother. Hats off.

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Context

Emmure is a band that was formed in Connecticut in 2003. They were clearly influenced by a style of music known as “metalcore,” which was very popular in the Northeast during the early twenty-first century. Given its name due to the fact that it combined elements of heavy metal music and hardcore music, metalcore eventually evolved into another genre, deathcore, which differed from metalcore primarily in its utilization of simpler riffs and more diarrhea vocals.

Emmure are largely considered to be one of the pioneers of the deathcore genre by those who have never heard of The Acacia Strain.

Plot Overview

The Narrator, a voyeur, expresses a desire to see man’s penis sucked upon by someone else. The Narrator knows that it will be a pleasurable experience for all parties involved. The Narrator strongly values eye contact as well.

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Despite what their name might suggest, The Safety Fire are not an indie rock band. The group, having toured with the likes of Periphery and Monuments, are a progressive metalcore band from the UK and their first proper album, Grind the Ocean (hooray for still verbing the noun!), is a rock solid prog metal production that is far better than its fretboard over-caffeination gives it any right to be. The Safety Fire sound right at home within the scene that bred such bands as Sikth, Architects, and The Arusha Accord and, much like those noise specialists, they’re spastic, crazy technical, and quite melodic at the same time. But unlike most of these names (save for Sikth who will always hold a warm and fuzzy place in my heart), The Safety Fire are actually pretty listenable over an extended period of time.

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So, hey, remember Red Lamb, the new project from former Anthrax guitarist Dan Spitz and forever Megadeth boss Dave Mustaine (and once upon a time called DeuxMonkey)? Well, guess what? Their self-titled debut full-length was released on Friday via iTunes. And you’d think that first album from a band featuring two founding members of Big Four bands would be treated like a huge event and reported on by every metal news outlet in the galaxy, but it wasn’t, because there was no press release sent out, and the only official announcement came earlier today via the band’s Facebook page. So, that seems pretty weird.

Also weird: yeah I don’t think Mustaine actually had anything to do with this record.

Here is my evidence:

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Speaking of prolific artistis, The Ocean just released two epic concept albums in the middle and end of 2010 and they’re already back at it. That might seem turtle-paced compared to Devin Townsend’s breakneck writing schedule, but one and a half years is as long as it usually takes Metallica to write three or four songs, Slayer to re-write about half an album’s worth of old songs, and Tool to write approximately one riff. How’s that for perspective?

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Justin Hawkins from The Darkness turned up in a Super Bowl ad for one of those not-an-iPhones last night, which I guess means that The Darkness really are back, which I guess means fuck my life. Although if using an imitator of a superior artist to sell an imitator of a superior product was some producer’s idea of symbolism, well, mission accomplished, I guess.

Meanwhile, it turns out the ad was directed by Bobby Farrelly, one half of The Farrelly Brothers, the writer/director team that made Dumb & Dumber, Kingpin, and There’s Something About Mary in the 90s, and Shallow Hal, the remake of The Heartbreak Kid, and Hall Pass in the aughties. I’m just telling you so you’ll understand why the commercial isn’t funny.

Meanwhile, it turns out that the Mötley Crüe/Kia Superbowl ad was also directed by a filmmaker of some note — Noam Murro, who is helming the sequel to 300, and was briefly attached to A Good Day to Die Hard, a.k.a. Die Hard 5.

See? If you didn’t have me around, who would tell you all this useless bullshit you don’t actually care about?

-AR

[via /Film]

I fucking love, love, LOVE Cannibal Corpse’s new album, Torture – and one of my favorite tracks from that upcoming release, “Scourge of Iron,” is now available for streaming. It’s not crazy-fast chaotic Cannibal Corpse — to utilize some recent examples from the band’s catalog, it’s more in the vein of “A Cauldron of Hate” or “Evisceration Plague” than “The Time to Kill is Now” or “Make Them Suffer.” But I love when Cannibal Corpse break out the slower shit — they have a real talent for elephants marching riffs, and they don’t just play the same thing over and over and over again, instead making small-but-distinct changes to the riffs as the song progresses, ensuring that the track remains dynamic throughout.

And besides, I promise you, there are plenty of faster songs on Torture, too (like the already-released “Demented Aggression”).

Headbang — slowly — right here, then come back and discuss the fact that Cannibal Corpse are somehow still awesome after more then twenty years in our comments section below. If you haven’t done so already, I also strongly suggest that you read this interview MetalSucks’ own Dave Mustein recently conducted with Cannibal Corpse’s Alex Webster.

Torture comes out March 13 via Metal Blade.

-AR

That we adore Devin Townsend here at MetalSucks is no secret. But whether you think he’s worthy of all the praise or you think he’s an overrated hack, this much is not disputable: dude is incredibly prolific. One gets the impression that when Devin isn’t touring or spending time with his family he spends ALL of his free minutes holed up in his home studio writing and recording. And his well of inspiration never dries up: the four albums in three years that comprised the Devin Townsend Project suite were apparently just the beginning of his busiest artistic period yet, as THREE new albums are already in the works, each a completely different concept. Here’s the lowdown from the man himself via a post on the official Hevy Devy forum [via Heavy Blog]:

I found as a reaction to the complications of decon and the sheer bulk of work thats been going on (seriously, it’s insane) my writing ended up going in 3 ways recently:

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Hordes of Zombies is Terrorizer’s first release since the tragic passing of guitarist Jesse Pintado — but despite the loss, the band hasn’t missed a beat. Hordes of Zombies is an unrelenting, no-bullshit, no gimmicks, ugly, ugly, UGLY tumor of a death-grind album, the kind of release that reminds you why you ever got into the genre in the first place. If the music contained on Hordes of Zombies actually DOES wake the dead and induce them into a mad feeding frenzy, no one should be surprised. Pintado would be proud.

MetalSucks is thrilled to debut the title track from Hordes of Zombies, which you can stream below. We’re confident you’ll agree that it’s easily one of the most merciless releases of 2012 so far. The full album comes out on February 28 via Season of Mist; you can, and should, pre-order it here.

If you’re a fledgling metal band trying to break into the big time, allowing a movie to be made about your struggles is probably a bad idea.

Remember Acrassicauda? The heavily persecuted Iraqi band pulled on the heart strings of the entire metal world in 2007, and the folks at Vice felt so moved by the band’s plight that they decided to make a documentary about them, Heavy Metal in Baghdad. With Vice’s help, the band finally arrived in the U.S. in 2009, began playing shows, touring, and eventually released a record. It was a great story, a triumph for heavy metal and personal freedoms that surely warmed the hearts of even the most jaded grinches (us included). But where are they now? Once the PR buzz and good will of the film wore off, Acrassicauda were left to make it on their own in an extremely competitive metal marketplace, back to square one (although admittedly way better off in their lives). We haven’t heard very much about them since.

Of course you all know about Anvil, a band whose Real Life Spinal Tap-like film was so touching that its tentacles reached far beyond the metal world and catapulted the band into the international spotlight. But… where are they now?

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