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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Hey check it out Van Halen news!!

• According to rumor, the band is divided into two camps: one exclusive to guys named Van Halen and the other populated by a sole Roth. And cooperation between the sides has been not awesome. Expected? Sure. Exaggerated? Prob. I only heard third-hand from the guys in Chickenfoot. You can set your watch to Sammy’s shit-talking I swear! Remember 1986?
• They have announced that the Grammy noms announcement press conference thingy will be the setting of a Van Halen performance, presumably of a new jam. If there is a more fitting venue for new music from gods like Van Halen, I don’t know of it. I do hope that charming Drake will be there. P.S. Release date please.
• The longtime Warner Bros act recently squashed an imminent deal with Columbia. Reports credit David Lee Roth with nixing the deal, alleging his preference is that VH signs with a closer-to-home label. So they just announced a new deal with Interscope (above), headed by Jimmy Iovine (above, in the hat) aka the mentor-type guy from last season’s American Idol. Huh I wonder if Diamond Dave wants Iovine to swipe him a certain somebody’s lucrative Idol gig? Wow, that’d be wild. Better watch your ass, Ryan Seacrest!

-ADF

Hipsters Out Of Metal! is the adventures of a smily ’80s metalhead all high in the srs internet world. 

Here’s a fun quote from a recent Sammy Hagar interview with Attention Deficit Delirium. Discussing the possibility of a reunion of the original Guns N’ Roses, Hagar says:

“They’ve proved it again and again and again that it ain’t [about] the money. They just don’t get along because Axl goes out for a lot less money with his version of Guns N’ Roses, and Slash goes out for a lot less money with Velvet Revolver or by himself. The amount of money they could make if they got it all back together, made a great record and toured the world would probably be as much as the Rolling Stones [get], and for them not to do it, it obviously ain’t about the money. Because they could do it. I would manage them. I’d be their manager and make sure they got the right deal from all the promoters. They could be the biggest band in the world if they wanted to.”

There’s three things I find funny about this statement:

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The release year is winding down. Aside from new Megadeth and Animals as Leaders records, I think we’re pretty much done with bigtime new albums until 2012.

The #1 record on the Current Hard Music chart last week came from a band whose music it’d be a stretch to call “hard.” Click through to find out who it was. Blessthefall, Misfits and Wayne Static had solid debuts, while a number of last week’s releases jumped off the second week cliff. All that and more, right here:

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I’m officially making the switch from the Top Hard Music chart to the Current Hard Music chart for the purposes of this column. While it’s interesting to see what classic Metallica and Aerosmith albums are charting and I still may occasionally reference the former, the latter chart paints a much clearer picture of the modern metal landscape by opening up more room for new records that sell less than classics, allowing a larger number of relevant new releases to place in the Top 100.

This chart has a slightly different way of tallying new releases, where sometimes they appear as having already been on for one week before official release — I’m still sorting through precisely what that difference is — so occasionally the chart positions are a little mixed up. But this only comes into play much farther down the list and this chart still provides a good gauge of relativity.

Now, onto the releases: as you all no doubt know, Mastodon and Machine Head were the biggies last week, and both did quite well — but the album that ended up at #1 is also a debut, and none of us saw it coming. Sebastian Bach, Warbringer and Maylene & The Sons of Disaster fared well in Week 1, while new records from Rose Funeral, Textures, Suffokate, Rwake, Brutal Truth and many, many more also appeared in the Top 100.

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I’m going to put about as much effort into this introduction as I put into trying to be sensitive to Hinder’s feelings.

We begin today’s cinemetal round-up with “Irresistible Force,” the first new video from Jane’s Addiction since whenever the last time they released a video was. The clip has some stuff going for it — like a lot of mostly-naked beautiful women, and a particularly funny moment, at the :54 second mark, when there’s some not-at-all-subtle vaginal imagery — but for the most part it’s pretty standard stoner stuff. The fact that the song is fairly boring doesn’t help.

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Here’s an interesting excerpt from a recent interview with Sammy Hagar that was conducted by Forbes, your leading source for rock and metal news:

“I was asked at one time to be in Mötley Crüe. I was asked at one time to be in Pantera by their mangers. I was asked to be in Velvet Revolver when Scott Weiland quit and went back to the Stone Temple Pilots. I was waiting to be asked to be in Led Zeppelin to say no, since they were the greatest band on earth and no could replace Robert Plant. I was asked to be in Aerosmith and I said no. Certain bands and certain front man singers are more difficult to replace than others. Steven Tyler and that band have stayed together for forty years and you don’t to walk into something like that. They had one moment years ago, when they replaced Joe Smith, but it’s still always been Steven at the front of Aerosmith. You don’t replace that. When I came into Van Halen, it was easy because Dave wasn’t a great singer, but he was a good front man. In those times, I was selling out the same arena’s they were so it was like the combination of two forces and it worked but it’s a rare thing. We were all lucky that the fans accepted it and it got bigger. I would avoid bands that are going to break up pretty soon.”

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It’s no secret that Sammy Hagar is no super-brain, but I read his interviews lest they include some sort of hint to his achievement of mega-wealth. How, I ask myself every payday, does a bimbo like Hagar fall assbackwards into riches so throughly and regularly? He sold 40 million albums with Van Halen alone; his tequila and cantina ventures regularly reroute cash from dummies into the Hagar coffers; he’s in the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame and one of his jamz reached American Idol last week; even his garage door opener business is a winner. What is his secret? It’s love! Hagar told The Onion:

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Massive amounts of alcohol: Never responsible for altered memories or people saying stupid, insane shit.

So the thing is, Sammy Hagar seems like a swell fella — certainly much nicer than any of his former cohorts from Van Halen — and there was a time when I really enjoyed Van Hagar, and was able to view the (then-) two different VH eras in a kind of different-from-one-another-but-both-killer-in-their-own-way light. (“Poundcake” and “Runaround” from For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge actually still get my blood pumpin’.) But the Van Hagar albums have not aged very well, and Chickenfoot is certainly a total waste of resources. But, on the whole, I have nothing against Sammy Hagar.

Oh, yeah, except that he’s apparently crazy, and thinks he was abducted by aliens — multiple times. Mr. Not DLR tells MTV:

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So Metal Insider tells me that “On March 3, guitar virtuoso Steve Vai and Berkleemusic (Berklee College Of Music’s Online Continuing Education Division) will attempt to set the Guinness World Record for the largest online guitar lesson.” I have no idea why Steve Vai would want to do this, other than to remind people who don’t read Guitar Geek Monthly that he’s still around, and he’s not the dude in Chickenfoot.

ANYWAY, as you can probably tell, I don’t really care about that, but I do care about anything Spinal Tap-related. So: Tap’s axemaster, Nigel Tufnel (really actor/filmmaker/hermaphrodite lover Christopher Guest, who doesn’t look a day over dead), has done this commercial on behalf of Vai’s endeavor. It’s actually not THAT funny, but it does exist, so, uh, yeah. Enjoy. Or don’t. I really have no emotional investment in your reaction either way. Anyone got a sandwich?

-AR

What year is this? Last night Axl and I went to see Slash, tonight we’re going to see Billy Idol (with mutual man-crush Steve “Jewy Jewowitz” Stevens on guitar!!) and now I’m posting about a new song by Joe Satriani. Sergeant D overslept today or else I’m sure he’d be kicking our asses and making us listen to way cooler music from the ’80s and ’90s like, I don’t know, Leeway or Black Army Jacket, but your Uncles Axl and Vince weren’t nearly so cool back in the day.

So for now it’s Satch, and ya know what? Cheesy Chickenfoot project included, dude can still play his balls off although Satch ought-ten is way more restrained than Satch nineteen-ninety. It’s like Satch realized a long time ago that he can’t keep up with today’s kids by out-shredding the shredders so he took a conscious step back from the speed in favor of a calmer, bluesier, dare I say loungier version of himself. Which was a good decision if you ask me, because the key to longevity in music is finding a way to slide gracefully from your youth into whatever follows. If only Slash would be so prudent and make a straight blues album (or five) instead of still trying to rock, man! we know it’d absolutely smoke faces, instead of Slash’s recent solo album which is perfectly ok but… tries just a little to hard to rock, man!

Hear neo-Satch on his brand new track “Light Years Away.” It’s available for free and comes from his forthcoming jam Black Swans and Wormhole Wizards, out October 5th on Epic Records.

-VN

April 20th was circled in my calendar well in advance, and not just because it’s holiday we at the MS Mansion take very seriously — April 20th marked the biggest release date of the year thus far for metal releases with new offerings from Periphery, Ratt, Sevendust, another greatest hits repacking from AC/DC, Circa Survive, Airbourne and more. Let’s see how those releases fared in their first week out, as well as how other metal and hard rock records are performing after the jump.

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No, I don’t know why I decided to make a reference to that stupid cat in the headline, either. Sometimes, I just make myself giggle, and fuck the readers.

ANYWAY, Van Halen’s Michael Anthony (and he is “Van Halen’s Michael Anthony,” not fucking “Chickenfoot’s Michael Anthony”) jumped at a recent Ratt gig, which means that a) a founding member of Van Halen is friends with some of the founding members of Ratt, b) Michael Anthony went to a Ratt show and has probably been to other Ratt shows, and c) a founding member of Van Halen is friends with some of the founding members of Ratt. My adolescent self is so fucking happy right now.

Anyways, they covered Hendrix’s “Fire,” and, honestly, they didn’t do that great a job. But come ON. IT’S MICHAEL ANTHONY AND RATT.

-AR

[via Blabbermouth]

While there are more obvious statements than “supergroups more often than not fail to meet our expectations” – “fire will ruin your house” and “Guns N’ Roses have gone through numerous line-up changes” are tied with it – there aren’t many. And yet, with the announcement of a formation of one, excitement is usually the first emotion called upon. And while saying that supergroup prospects should immediately be met with caution is like saying a new car should be approached with the attitude that you will most likely wrap it around a tree, the failure/success ratio is sadly stacked toward the former. However, this usually isn’t the fault of the uber-collective, but our own gargantuan expectations assuming that this new band featuring members of other bands we like will be as good as all the involved bandmembers main projects COMBINED. And while there have been some out and out failures as of late (cough Greymachine cough), the other two most notable supergroups that reared their heads this year – scraggly doom metal gathering of titans Shrinebuilder and semi-unkempt gathering of some dudes from your uncle’s favorite bands Them Crooked Vultures – have gotten an unfair rap in the wake of their respective debuts’ releases. While to say the bands’ detractors dislike their albums because they don’t rival Neurosis, Sleep, the Melvins, Nirvana, Queens of the Stone Age, or Led fucking Zeppelin is unfairly ignoring their actual grievances, to write off either Shrinebuilder or Them Crooked Vultures would be a damn shame, in that, while not reinventing any sort of wheel, in a year where the biggest supergroup commercially was Chickenfoot, a solid doom metal album and a solid stoner rock album are two pretty significant things to dismiss.

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Not that we had any doubt Baroness’ Blue Record would have a strong debut, but it’s always nice to see the proof. And Skeletonwitch’s ripping new record Breathing the Fire had a great debut too; I’m elated to see the band sell as many records first week as they did. Elsewhere it was the usual radio rock / alt-metal suspects dominating the charts. Click through to see chart positions and sales figures.

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Last Tuesday was a huuuuge week for new metal releases. Megadeth, Black Dahlia Murder, Shadows Fall, Living Colour, Dying Fetus, Porcupine Tree, Every Time I Die, Thrice and Ace Frehley all released new albums, and all charted in the Top 200! After the jump, let’s look at where they all ended up.

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I just saw this dude out on the street:

It is one thing to like Sammy Hagar. It is another thing to wear his shirt when you’re clearly going out of your way to look like Sammy Hagar.

Just sayin’.

-AR

Behemoth vs. Winds of Plague; Poland vs. America; Corpsepaint vs. wigger hats; ugly men vs. hot chick; real metal vs. deathcore; substance vs. gimmick. Who won????

The answer, as well as more of this past week’s metal Soundscan chart positions and sales figures, after the jump.

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Wow. This has to be one of the lamest videos I’ve ever seen. Even by middle-aged corporate rock standards. Sheesh.

-AR

Last week was a ginormous week for new metal releases, and with new ones from Killswitch and Suicide Silence this week promises to be the same. Topping last week’s crop was Dream Theater’s Black Clouds & Silver Linings which debuted at #6 on the Soundscan Charts. Wait a minute… Dream Theater debuted at #6?? Holy fuckity-fuck. Darkest Hour, The Mars Volta, Maylene and the Sons of Disaster and Goatwhore also had strong debuts. Click through for chart positions and sales numbers.

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