I was listening to an interview with Sarah Vowell last weekend, in which she proclaimed that, as a writing exercise, she did not allow herself to use any F-bombs in her new book, Unfamiliar Fishes. I decided to do her one better this week — I did not swear at all. Unless you count “crap,” “drek,” or “sucks” as swear words, which I do not.

So that was fun.

ANYWAY, here’s some stuff we did this week:

• We debuted new music from All Shall Perish and Thou.
• We debuted new videos from Valient Thorr and Meek is Murder.
• Unearth’s Buz McGrath, Hatebreed’s Wayne Lozinak, and In Flames’ Peter Iwers told us about their live rigs.
• We spoke to Aaron Turner from Isis and Helms Alee.
• We checked out new releases from The Bronx Casket Co. and Bedlam of Cacophony.
• Even though Dime would never approve, we made fun of some poor kid.
• We continued to sing Spotify’s praises.
• We voted on our favorite album from The Devin Townsend Project.
• We were sexually aroused by the prospect of Disturbed breaking-up.
• We wondered whether or not the return of Megadeth’s Gigantour is a good thing or not.

Alright, we’re out. Have a nice weekend, gang!

-AR

As part of our coverage of this year’s Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival – currently winding its way through North America — we’re bringing you a series of “Rigged” columns in which several of the tour’s musicians take you on piece-by-piece guides of their current live rig setups. Check out what Machine Head’s Phil Demmel had to say about his super-sweet rig last week. Here’s Unearth’s Buz McGrath:

Greetings! Let’s have a look at the rig I’m using on this year’s Mayhem Festival.

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It’s no secret that pretty much every band in metal wants to open for Metallica, even if that band’s best days are behind them – and God Forbid are no exception. Since we consider GF like family around the mansion, seeing them fulfill one of their ambitions and get to open for ‘Tallica would be pretty swell.

For better or worse, for right now we’re going to have to settle for Doc Coyle opening for Metallica.

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I’m not really a regular comics reader anymore so I have no idea if they still do this, but DC use to have this thing called Elseworlds where they basically reimagined the lives of various heroes – e.g., What if Superman had been Russian?, What if Batman was a vampire?, What if Wonder Woman had a dick?, etc. And I always really enjoyed those.

That same interest in the “what if?” questions must be why I’m also so fascinated when a band has to do a one-off gig without a key member and replaces said member with some other all-star musician – e.g., Metallica with Dave Lombardo and Joey Jordison, Trivium with Doc Coyle, and now Lamb of God with Unearth’s Buz “Banned from Wal-Mart” McGrath.

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