(from Unpopular Opinion Rick Perry)

Whew, what a week. I don’t know where you all are, but here in NYC it’s 5pm and it’s already been completely dark outside for a while. FML. Here’s what happened this week:

• Corey discovered that our “Best of 2011″ lists weren’t as bad as you thought they were with fancy mathematicals to back it up.
• Axl and Vince live-chatted it up with y’all and fielded all your stupid questions… and a few good ones.
• We interviewed Giant Squid’s Aaron Gregory, Porcupine Tree’s Steven Wilson, and Nikki Sixx.
• We premiered new music by Lamb of God, Whores, Abysmal Dawn, and Nothnegal.
• We laughed at the BBC’s distorted view of metal culture not once but twice.
• We announced that we’re retiring some of our older t-shirt designs and that we’re having a fire-sale to get rid of them; get ‘em while you still can!
• Vince pondered a new ranking system that could supercede Soundscan.
• We cracked jokes about another laughable Rolling Stone Top 100 lists of guitarists.
• We introduced Lazarus A.D.’s Jeff Paulick as our new NFL columnist; please direct your hatred of the Packers his way.

Vince out.

-VN

Writing headlines for Rage Against the Machine is too easy, because those dudes just rage against everything (except a couple of shitty Audioslave albums… oh snap! But I did enjoy the first one). Rage, rage, rage.

The latest raging is happening in the U.K., where the band are jumping on board with a fan-led initiative to land “Killing in the Name” on Top of the U.K. Christmas Singles chart. MS Maniac Charlie F. sent in this clip of Zack and Tom doing an interview with the BBC, followed by a full-band live electric performance of the track. The performance is passionate and fierce, and the song is still as vital as ever all these years later. Make sure you listen to the entire performance (which starts around 4:10); there’s a special surprise at the end that would make Howard Stern proud.

Man, when this album came out I could not get enough of the “Fuck you! I won’t do what you tell me!” part. My ten year old ass was running around screaming that shit EVERYWHERE! It still gives me shivers.

After you listen to the performance below, click through the jump for a special surprise that’s a new take on an old joke but still really fucking funny [thanks: Morizz].

-VN

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I think that I (and about a hundred other people who write about metal) have extolled the virtues of Decibel editor Albert Mudrian’s Choosing Death many times in the past, but just to be sure: it’s an awesome history of death and grind, and if you’ve never read it, you really, really should. He got pretty much everybody to go on record about the early days of metal’s most extreme subgenres. If you’re new to these styles of music and need a primer, it’s a perfect place to start; if you already love these styles of music, I guarantee you you’ll still learn some shit ya didn’t know.

One of the things that Mudrian spends a good deal of time discussing is John Peel’s old national BBC radio show, which was the place to hear all the best new grind. And now Earache will commemorate Peel’s show with Grind Madness At The BBC (The Earache Peel Sessions), a three disc (!), three and a half hour set that will feature 118 recordings of sessions done on Peel’s show, including performances by Carcass, Extreme Noise Terror, Godflesh, Napalm Death, and a shitload more.

This is obviously a must-own for grind fans. Earache puts the set out on October 12. Mark it in your calendars.

-AR