Here’s an awesome way for you jumpstart your weekend: with the debut of “I Am Spartacus,” a brand new track from Liberteer. A new one-man project from Matthew Widener of Cretin and Citizen fame, Liberteer is a new, unique spin on the grind game: sure, it’s fast n’ furious, but Widener also injects the music with classic-sounding grooves, allowing the tunes to enjoy more breathing room than grind fans might be used to. We think it’s pretty sweet, and we hope that you do, too.

Check out “I Am Spartacus” below. It will appear on Liberteer’s new album, Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees, which comes out January 31 via Relapse. You can pre-order it here, and get more info on Liberteer here.

Liberteer – “I Am Spartacus” by MetalSucks

Okay, so I’m not a punk, and never claimed to be. My punk cred is spotty at best (though I do have sweet Amebix neck tattoos!), and my knowledge is far from encyclopedic. However, I do love the fuck out of crust punk, d-beat, fastcore, powerviolence, 80’s hardcore, and grindcore, so you’re going to have to deal with me writing about it within the context of this series, because a) there are tons and tons of badass female musicians within those scenes, and b) duh, this shit rules! Of course, lumping all those disparate genres together is a little lazy on my part, but you’ve gotta admit that punk and grind go together like peanut butter and chocolate (or whips and chains).

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Earlier this week I had a dream that I was working with Atreyu. I don’t know in what capacity I could possibly find myself “working with” Atreyu, since I’m not a manager, nor a publicist, nor a label rep, and they’re about as likely to end up doing a guest column here as I am to give the new In This Moment album a perfect 5-horn review, but, hey, the subconscious works in mysterious ways. Why did I have Atreyu on the brain? Was my mind trying to tell me “The glass is half-full?” Do I have  a hankering to re-watch The Neverending Story? Did I just ingest too many different substances that night? I’ll have to bring it up in therapy next week.

Here’s other shit that happened this week, some of which, believe it or not, is even more terrifying than the thought of working with Atreyu:

• Freddy Madball is counting down his favorite hard and heavy non-hardcore bands of all time, TesseracT’s Acle walked us through the history of djent, The Austerity Program’s Justin Foley spoke to Converge’s Kurt Ballou about Taco Riffs, The Red Chord’s Greg Weeks made some suggestions for losing NFL teams, Intronaut’s Sacha Dunable contemplated the ways in which technology has changed touring, Daath’s Eyal Levi wondered, “Is this it?”, and a wide array of metal stars previewed the just-begun NHL season.
• We spoke to Kirk Windstein from Crowbar/Down/Kingdom of Sorrow, Sean Z. from Daath, Daddy X and Dirtball from Kottonmouth Kings, and Yoshiki Hayashi from X Japan.
• We checked out the latest releases from Abysse and Deafheaven.
• We contemplated trancecore.
• As the headline says, we heard the worst thing ever.
• We reviewed the history of terrible Limp Bizkit cover songs.
• We had fun with misheard song lyrics.
• We bemoaned the signing of another re-thrash band.
• We applauded Slayer fans’ desire to help the physically disabled.
• We had yet another laugh at Winds of Plague’s expense.

We have a special surprise for you next week. I can’t promise you’re going to like it, but I can promise you’re going to have a strong reaction to it. See ya then.

-AR

So right now you’re probably thinking 1) “Hey, assholes, the NHL season actually started last night so this can’t really be a ‘preview’ in the traditional sense of the word,” and 2) “Hey, assholes, at least one of these artists isn’t actually signed to Relapse Records.” And, yes, we know we’re a little late, but this is metal, so who the fuck is ever on time? And, yes, we know that at least one of these artists isn’t actually signed to Relapse Records, but most of them are, and the fine people at Relapse really did all the work in putting this together, so ppppfffffttttt.

So. After the jump, you can find previews of how the freshly-begun NHL season is looking for the favorite teams of members of 3 Inches of Blood, -(16)-, Buried Inside, Cephalic Carnage, Cretin, Dekapitator, Exhumed, Fuck the Facts, Gravehill, Hero Destroyed, Indian, Misery Index, Mortuous, Repulsion, and Toxic Holocaust. Enjoy!!!

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Decibel have followed-up on their fascinating 2008 article on the transformation of Cretin’s Dan Martinez into Marissa Martinez with an interview with Martinez chronicling her vaginoplasty. Which is exactly what you think it is. Here’s an excerpt:

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