Anthrax may have stolen this week’s metal gossip thunder, but we’re always happy to re-hash old feuds for entertainment’s sake here at MetalSucks. The latest news had Dino Cazares taking a shot at drummer Raymond Herrera’s playing abilities, while Burton Bell has for the most part taken the high road and remained mum. Herrera and Christian Olde Wolbers both fired back this week, and here’s Wolbers’ latest:

Click to read more…

When a press release landed in the MetalSucks inbox a couple of months ago announcing that Fear Factory guitarist (and former bassist) Christian Olde Wolbers had released a signature Randall amplifier head and was currently booking interviews, I got to thinking. Could I possibly land an interview with Wolbers — who also happens to be a talented producer who worked on the recent Threat Signal record and tracked vocals for the new God Forbid album Earthsblood — ask him the one obligatory amplifier question, and then proceed to ask him questions about Fear Factory, producing, and his new band Arkaea? Yes, yes I could. And so I did. Our conversation, after the jump.

Click to read more…

Due to circumstances beyond our control / due to an unexpected situation / due to unforseen problems, Fear Factory vocalist Burton C. Bell’s ambient/experimental band Ascension of the Watchers has been forced to cancel their European tour. Oh, wait… what’s that, the band actually gave a concrete reason for their cancellation? From the AOtW MySpace blog:

My dear friends, it is with great sadness that I inform all of you that the Ascension of The Watchers tour that was scheduled for November 27 – December 14 had to be cancelled due to the lack of ticket pre-sales.

In these troubling economic times, the risk of the tour failing was far too great for all parties involved. After much consideration, canceling the tour for this season was the best course of action.

Well paint my neck red and call me John McCain; Burton Bell actually manned up and told the truth! That’s a good reason indeed for a tour cancellation. Now excuse me, I’ve got more press releases to read containing vague and nebulous reasons for tour cancellations.

-VN

PS: AOtW’s Numinosum was a pretty good album; read my review here, and then check out my interview with Burton.

The latest Blabbermouth [via Rock N Roll Experience] news sure to cause an uproar: Burton Bell just gave an interview where he calls Deftones front man Chino Moreno “a dick,” Slipknot’s Joey Jordison a “sloppy” drummer, and asserts that the last few Ozzy albums have been full of “shitty music.”

And, hey, you know what? Horns up to Bell for being honest. Because while I don’t think Jordison is a sloppy drummer and I don’t know Chino well enough to classify him as a dick or otherwise, but Ozzy certainly has been making shitty music for at least three studio albums now. And why the fuck should we fault Bell for speaking his mind? It’s better than the usual being diplomatic bull crap.

Ironically enough, the last time I remember someone this prominent in the metal world really speaking out like this was Chino’s infamous Revolver interview in the summer of ’03, when he slagged every band he was about to hit the road with for that year’s Summer Sanitarium tour (including Metallica). What goes around comes around, I s’pose…

-AR