MetalSucks

Los Angeles psychedelic-doom drivers Ancestors are already back with another new album after last year’s acclaimed two track debut Neptune With Fire, and this time around they’re  arguably even more ambitious. On the eight track Of Sound Mind, the band expands their scope and continues their doom-laden trip down nostalgia lane, with plenty of prog rock inspirations. And lots of guitars.

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Full confession: I missed my pre-show interview slot with Bigelf’s eccentric frontman Damon Fox because I fucked up with directions on the subway. I’ve lived in this city for 22 of my 27 years on this planet and it still happens from time to time… oops. Doesn’t help that the Beacon Theater, the host of this year’s Progressive Nation tour (Dream Theater, Zappa Plays Zappa and Scale the Summit in addition to the aforementioned), is in butt-fuck nowhere compared to our usual stomping grounds.

But it ended up for the better — missing the pre-show slot allowed me to see the phenomenally talented Scale the Summit, and seeing Bigelf for the first time immediately thereafter gave me a lot more material for my interview. After waiting patiently post-show whilst Fox signed autographs at the band’s merch booth for half a fucking hour, I was finally able to snag him for an interview. Fox is a smart guy who has a lot of strong, well-thought out opinions about metal, music, genre-labeling and the industry in general. We also chatted a bit about the band’s history and their recent surge in popularity.

Our interview started as many do with subjects who aren’t familiar with our website. “So, why DOES metal suck?” jabbed Fox, who clearly “gets it.”

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I had a total stoner moment on Thursday; in my haste rushing out of the MS Mansion to attend a private, live performance of Living Colour’s entire new album Chair in the Doorway (Axl’s gonna write about this later today) I prepped our Funny Photo Caption Contest post ahead of time, leaving blank spaces for the winning entries which I intended to fill in later… only I forgot to choose winners before the post automatically ran at 5pm. Oops! What’s more, only like two of you actually noticed / cared enough to comment about this omission, instead entering a new caption and opting in favor “free stuff!! free stuff!! free stuff!!” like that juggalo bitch who drugged her baby to death but all she could do was bitch about a missing ICP poster. Yeah, I called you all juggalo bitches. Deal with it.

So, here are last week’s winners, each of whom receive a copy of Burnt by the Sun’s Heart of Darkness:

Uglymicrowave “shreks upset because he didn’t get to go to the gathering”

Anselmowitz: “Faygo troll guards entrance to Area 51.”

This week I’ll try and do better. In the meantime, enter this week’s contest: the winner gets a signed CD and a tour t-shirt from prog masters Bigelf. Get on it!

Congrats to __ and ___ for winning last week’s funny photo caption contest. Both winners get a copy of Heart of Darkness, the ass-rippingly good new album by Burnt by the Sun, for coming up with the following captions to the photo at right:

Let’s continue our Gathering of the Juggalos 2009 photo series with this week’s contest! This week we’re giving one lucky winner a signed copy of progressive rock masters Bigelf’s Cheat the Gallows, as well as a tour t-shirt (choice of sizes M-XL). Bigelf are currently finishing up opening for Dream Theater on the Progressive Nation Tour in the U.S., and they’ll be on the European Prog Nation tour (w/ Opeth on the bill!) starting at the end of September. Just come up with a snicker-inducing caption to the below photo (from Brooklyn Ski Club), and you win.

The second annual Progressive Nation Tour — featuring a re-jiggered and suddenly worth seeing lineup of Scale the Summit, Bigelf and Zappa Plays Zappa supporting Dream Theater — hit New York’s historic Beacon Theater on Sunday night. This year’s proggier leaning lineup (last year’s had Opeth, BTBAM and 3 in the support slots) brought out an older-skewed audience, but as is always remarkably the case with Dream Theater there were plenty of youngins in attendance. In fact, the most frequently spotted band t-shirt I saw all night was for The Faceless; stew on that one for a second.

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Back in March I bitched that this year’s Progressive Nation lineup — featuring Pain of Salvation, Beardfish, and Zappa Plays Zappa supporting Dream Theater — was decidedly less metal than last year’s lineup (which featured 3, BTBAM, and Opeth supporting DT — killer show) and wasn’t worth the price of admission to anyone under 50. A press release delivered good news to the MS Mansion earlier this week, announcing that Bigelf and Scale the Summit have replaced Pain of Salvation and Beardfish. Suh-weet!

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So Keith Bergman at Blabbermouth gave Bigelf’s latest, Hex, a perfect score in his review of the album. I don’t think Bergman gives those out so easily and I respect him as a critic, so I checked out the band the way one does these days – that is to say, I paid a visit to the their MySpace page – and it all just sounds like really generic, uninteresting stoner rock to me.A little help here? Can anyone explain to me what’s such hot shit about this band? ‘Cause, seriously, I’d much rather listen to some Hidden Hand or Electric Wizard. I mean, seriously – look at that band photo. Doesn’t that just annoy the shit out of you?

-AR