MetalSucks is oh-so-very happy to be teaming up with RED Distribution to bring you, our most beloved readers, the MetalSucks Fan Pack, which will be available exclusively at all FYE stores starting this Tuesday, April 12. Not only does this limited edition box full o’ metal come with a CD featuring twenty brootal tunes by twenty brootal bands (including Kvelertak, Trap Them, Believer, Napalm Death, TesseracT, Thomas Giles, Deicide and a bunch more) but it also comes with that HOLY SHIT THAT IS SO KILLER t-shirt you see above, which was designed by our friend Rodney Githens from Vertebrae 33 (you might also recognize his work from this sexy t-shirt and this Louvre-worthy poster that he did for us).

How much would you expect to pay for this incredible package? Twenty bucks? Fifteen bucks? Try $9.99. That’s right, gang — twenty songs from twenty bands and that guaranteed-to-get-you-laid t-shirt for under ten bucks.

But wait! There’s more! If you act now and head over to the official MetalSucks Fan Pack web page, you can get a coupon for 30%, which brings the price down to a mere seven dollars. Holy crap, that’s a metsieh if ever there was one.

So go here to get a complete track list of all the bands on the comp, and to use the nifty store-finder to locate the f.y.e. nearest to you. And, oh yeah, you can also enter to win this custom guitar:

So, yeah, that’s pretty fuckin’ bad-assed.

-Axl & Vince

The new version of Six Feet Under — which, in addition to founding and longtime members Chris Barnes and Steve Swanson, now features Chimaira’s Rob Arnold and Matt DeVries and Daath’s Kevin Talley amongst its ranks — made its live debut in Europe over the weekend. So, of course, we now have cell cam footage! Whoo-hoo!

There’s no new material here so the footage doesn’t really tell us that much about this reincarnation of the band, but… they do play killer covers of the Cannibal Corpse classics “Hammer Smashed Faced” and “Stripped, Raped, and Strangled” (which might be my personal favorite Corpse riff of all time).

Six Feet Under will be touring North America as part of the MetalSucks-sponsored Summer Slaughter 2011; dates for that trek will be announced on April 20.

-AR

[via The PRP]

Here’s some good news to wash the taste of Trent Reznor’s questionable choice for his next movie project out of your mouth: From Exile’s long-awaited Nine Inch Nails cover EP (preview here) is finally nearing completion, and will see its release in May. I still don’t have all the details just yet, but I do know that Emil Werstler, of Daath and Levi/Werstler fame, recently tracked some guitars for FE’s version of the achingly gorgeous NIN classic “A Warm Place,” and that From Exile have announced a record release show on May 14 at The Earl in Atlanta. Everyone who attends the gig will get a free copy of the CD, so if you live in the area, you should, y’know, go to that.

And, hey, here’s some even better news — video of From Exile performing a new, still-untitled track at a recent concert! And, no shocks here, it sounds pretty promising. Hopefully once the band finally wraps this NIN project up, they can get crackin’ on a new full-length. In the meantime, enjoy the vid below.

-AR

Photo by Scott Ferrara

Rob Arnold is a busy dude. As lead guitarist and one of the principal songwriters for Chimaira, he’s been one of the leaders of the New Wave of American Heavy Metal for more than a decade now; in 2009, he launched The Elite, a new project, with Bleed the Sky drummer Austin D’Amond; and then, just yesterday, it was announced that he’s the new guitar player for Six Feet Under, original Cannibal Corpse vocalist Chris Barnes’ legendary death metal band that has long been known as one of Arnold’s favorite acts. Phew! Can’t accuse Rob Arnold of slacking off, that’s for sure.

The very first thing I did when I heard that Arnold was the latest addition to SFU (along with new drummer Kevin Talley, who, coincidentally, was in Chimaira from 2004 to 2006) was shoot him an e-mail to see if he’d be down to answer some quick questions about his latest creative endeavor. Luckily for us, he agreed! After the jump, read about how Arnold came to join Six Feet Under, the new material he’s working on with SFU, the band’s future touring plans, and, oh yeah, that new album that Chimaira is currently recording…

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Earlier this month Six Feet Under shed 50% of their line-up, and I cracked wise that they should hire Chimaira’s Rob Arnold as their new guitar player. He’s a known SFU fan (check out the video of him singing “Remains of You” above), and he writes great riffs, so, yeah, I thought he’d be a killer addition to the band’s ranks.

And, hey, guess what? Even though I was just fucking around when I said Arnold should join the band, he has now done just that! Says Six Feet Under vocalist Christ Barnes (who also used to be in some band called Cannibal Corpse):

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In the spirit of “Two Bears Review Daath’s New Self-Titled Album,” longtime MS reader jtquake presents to you “Two Dogs Discuss Emmure’s New Album.” As my hero Larry David would say, pretty, pretty, pretty good. Especially this golden nugget of a line: “I was beating Street Fighter before you were born.” A+++ WDBWA. Worth sticking with it through the last line, too, for reasons I won’t spoil for you.

-VN

Why, it was just a couple of days ago that we learned that bassist Terry Butler and drummer Greg Gall have both quit Six Feet Under, and already, the band has announced a replacement for Gall: Kevin Talley, who is joining the group as part of his apparent bid to play with every band ever at least once. (Already on his resumé: Daath, Chimaira, Misery Index, Dying Fetus, Hate Eternal, Suffocation, The Black Dahlia Murder, The Red Chord, and probably fifteen other bands I’m forgetting about.)

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In a lot of ways, Francis Ford Coppola is to cinema as Metallica are to metal. He directed four incredible movies (the first two Godfather films, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now), all of which still hold up as examples of the craft at its finest, and then he devolved into self-parody. (The Godfather: Part III is pretty much his version of “The Unforgiven IV,” and if you don’t remember Jack, consider yourself lucky.) He basically sired one of Hollywood’s royal families (His children, Sofia and Roman, are also film directors, and his nephew is Nicolas Cage, who changed his last name in an effort to achieve success based on his own merits), and these days, Coppola makes his money via his winery (I’ve had some of his wines, they’re actually quite good!), and then self-funds small, personal art films, like 2007′s Youth Without Youth and 2009′s Tetro. These movies generally open to middling reviews and are seen by an audience of about ten people, but it doesn’t really matter, because Coppola is doing what he wants and he seems happy.

Why am I rambling on about this dude? Because he recently gave an interview to The 99 Percent in which he basically advocates illegal downloading, and the concept of the artist as an unpaid worker:

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I’m sad to say that Eyal wasn’t able to do a new “Jumping Darkness Parade” this week — but cut the dude some slack, he’s currently on tour in Europe!

So to make sure you get your Levi fix this week, I thought that now would be an ideal time to post the below live footage of Daath performing at the Crocodile Rock in Allentown, PA last weekend, as part of the band’s recent tour with Chimaira, Impending Doom, and This or The Apocalypse. It starts with a drum solo from the always-excellent Kevin Talley, and the goes into “Double Tap Suicide,” one my favorite songs from the band’s new, self-titled album. I haven’t had a chance to see the band perform any of the new shit live yet, so this video made my day.

If you’re one of our European readers, Daath’s current tour with Fear Factory and High on Fire continues through December 20. That’s a great fuckin’ bill, ain’t it? Get dates here.

-AR

[via Metal Injection]

So last night’s question was tricky — so tricky, in fact, that only one person got it right! Necro’s real name is Ron Braunstein, and, yep, he’s Jewish. And despite his name, Darkest Hour’s Mike “Lonestar” Carrigan is, indeed, half-Jewish. I was caught off-guard when I saw Igor Cavalera included in this article at The Gauntlet (where a picture of From Exile’s Eric Guenther, who is not Jewish, is used for the entry on Daath’s Eyal Levi, who is… but I digress), but some research unearthed that fact that the former Sepultura drummer apparently converted when he got married. His brother Max also married a Jew, although I don’t think he converted. In any case, that just leaves Poison’s C.C. DeVille.

I understand why people would think that C.C. DeVille (né Bruce Johannesson) is Jewish, given that he’s loud, from Brooklyn, and has a big schnozz — hell, I used to assume that he was Jewish — but, alas, he’s not. So mazel tov to reader Joe Caperon, the only entrant who correctly answered the question. Joe wins a mystery prize courtesy of Century Media, and a dreidel, courtesy of us. Go Joe!

Here’s the question for night three:

• What is the name of infamous metal-themed music retailer in Tel Aviv?

E-mail your answer to axl [at] metalsucks.net with the phrase “HEAVY METAL HANNUKKAH – NIGHT 2″ in the subject line. All entries should include your name and mailing address in addition to your answer, and are due by 5 pm tomorrow (Saturday, December 4) evening. Shortly thereafter we’ll announce the winner and post night 4’s trivia question. And while you don’t have to be Jewish to enter the contest, you do have to live in the U.S. We need to conserve moolah to get all the MetalSucks Mansion Monkeys their Hanukkah gifts!!!

-AR

Agalloch’s Marrow of the Spirit: Apparently not a candidate for best album of the year.

Yep yep yep: the right honorable Mr. Phil Freeman of MSN’s “Headbang” blog has revealed the 135 finalists which will soon be whittled down for his “Twenty Best Metal Albums of 2010″ list, which will presumably be published sometime in the coming weeks. You can go here to read it, and then leave Phil angry comments about how your favorite album isn’t even on this list of 135 records.

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We’re shuttering the Mansion gates early today for tomorrow’s Thanksgiving holiday, ’cause let’s face it: you’ve all gone home already and have long since put up your “I am out of the office. If it’s urgent, call my cell phone” auto-responders. Please, people: no one cares about you. Get over it!

Here’s what happened in this abbreviated week while might or might not have been checking your Blackberries:

• Two bears reviewed Daath’s new record and called us faggots.
• Haste the Day decided to hang it up, as did Chimaira’s Jim LaMarca.
• Two Greeks showed us the only proper way to react to a brass band busking on the street.
• All of J.S. Bach’s organ works are available for free download; know your metal forefathers, son!
• Revocation’s Dave Davidson kept us up to date with the latest shenanigans to befall The Legacy Tour with Darkest Hour, Veil of Maya and Periphery, while Daath’s Eyal Levi thinks the picture looks bleak for today’s unsigned metal bands hoping to make it big.
• Are there single songs you like by bands you otherwise abhor?
• Crowbar released a new jam!
• Bob Cock spoke with Slough Feg’s Mike Scalzi.
• We Contaminated our Cooking by making baked mac and cheese and collard greens with Woe’s Chris Griggs.

We’ll be stuffing our faces full of food and booze tomorrow and recovering all day Friday. See ya Monday!

-VN

Newsflash: You’re not going to get signed and become a rock star. Fucking get over that dream. I know I’ve talked about this before, and here I am talking about it again. You see, DAATH just went out on tour again, and once again, we’re getting demos and pressure to hand them over to our A&R guys and hook people up with their dreams. Once again, we’re seeing decent people of all talent levels that are  just plain misguided. Maybe they don’t want to accept what’s going on right now? Maybe they just are not aware.

Either way, while the people running the show are trying to get out of a huge bind and keep their lights on, there’s still many people trying to get into the game with starry eyes and puckered assholes. The saddest part is they have no idea the game may not exist in this form for very much longer. This is a PSA to all bands who think that anybody in the music industry that’s isn’t on the highest of levels can do anything for your career: Kill that idea. It’s doing you more harm than good.

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I really love this. But for the record, even though I know Vince is a big Daath fan, too, if you bothered to read any of the bylines on the various articles we’ve been doing about Daath, you’d realize that I’m really the faggot who has been too busy shoving Daath’s dicks into my ears to actually listen to the music. In my defense, I can’t help it, as the Daathers just seem to have the perfect sized cocks for my ear holes, and it tickles so good.

And as a big of a fan as I am of Daath, I don’t think they’re better than Tool. I don’t think the dudes in Daath think they’re better than Tool.

Also, Depeche Mode rules.

As you were.

-AR

Thanks: Aaron N.

I definitely woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning, most likely because I fucking hate Thanksgiving and just want it to be over with already. So I could have used some good news, like maybe Pig Destroyer surprising everyone with a new song, or a leaked Cristina Scabbia/Marta lesbian sex tape, or someone raising Chuck Schuldiner from the dead in order to have him wipe deathcore from the face of the planet.

Instead, I see this statement from Chimaira on The PRP:

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Why am I writing this week’s “Worst Week” entirely in questions? Could it be to irritate you? Or am I just trying to keep myself amused at the end of the week?

Did you know we asked some other questions this week?

• Was Sergeant D. kidding when he said that there are only two good songs in Reign in Blood?
• Why did Dimmu Borgir change their album art post-release?
• What’s the big deal about Volbeat?
• Is Glenn Danzig actually perfectly reasonable?
• Is there anything better than a Devin Townsend show?
• Can Ozzy restore your sanity?

And have you asked yourself these questions as well?

• Did you know that we debuted new music by The Ocean, Dukatalon, and Gozu?
• Did you read Anso’s chat with Dave Wyndorf from Monster Magnet?
• Is Oderus’ advice column worse than Vinnie Paul’s? Do you agree with Doc Coyle’s assessments on the issue of European metal versus American metal? Do you find, as Eyal Levi does, that creative prison is for pussies? Is Greg Weeks imagining it, or does it smell like poop and onions right now?
• Did you buy the new album from Dallas Coyle’s Genetic? You know the money goes to cancer research, right?

Are you worried that I’ll still be doing this on Monday? Do you think I care?

-AR

I’ll admit, I had some writer’s block coming into this blog. Sometimes it’s hard to think of what to write. I’ve been racking my brain for a few days now with the burning question… “What will I write about next time?” Good fucking question, and I really don’t have an answer in sight. So I’ve decided that I’m just going to write about not knowing what to write.

Writer’s block is an interesting thing. It’s kinda like having mental constipation. You know the ideas are in there. You know the ideas want to come out. But something is just clogging the passageway. I guess the only way to get the ideas to bubble forward is to move some shit around. So I’m doing that by exploring this topic, which by the way, is one that many people write to me about.

I think my strongest suite as a musician is in composition. I’m a much better writer than I am a player. To me, that’s where it’s at. Sit me down for a year and I’ll write you a few records. It’s what I do. and I’m used to getting questions like, “How do you come up with ideas like…?” or “How did you learn how to write so much?”, etc. Well, I guess my overarching answer to all “how to” writing questions is this — “JUST FUCKING DO IT!”

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So as you’re no doubt aware, Halloween is on Sunday, and as you’re hopefully aware, we’re holding a “Heavy Metal Halloween” contest with SPV. The deadline was announced as being on midnight on Halloween, the logic being that people would snap their photos before they went our partying; but Vince wisely pointed out that people might not get to upload those photos right away. So now we’re extending the deadline to midnight on November 1. Hope that helps! If you need a refresher on the rules, go here.

Here’s what else happened this week:

• We debuted a new music video by Nile.
• We also debuted new music by Havok, White Arms of Athena, and Shred Sean and Allan Tecchio.
• Daath’s Eyal Levi talked about trust issues while The Red Chord’s Greg Weeks talked about football.
• We spoke to J. Randall from Agoraphobic Nosebleed and our old pal Eyal from Daath.
• We checked out the latest release from Kylesa, and a new book by the Cro-Mags’ John Joseph.
• We went on a “Reader’s Choice” local scene binge.
• We prayed for the end of karate mosh pits.
• We watched Abigail Williams lob a dildo at Iwrestledabearonce.
• We defended Phil Labonte’s angelic singing voice.
• Sergeant D. taught you about bands you would have hated/ignored in ’95.

And that’s all she wrote this week. Don’t forget that our own Gary Suarez is playing in a Jesus Lizard cover band on Sunday night. Swing by if you can!

-AR

Raise your hand if you’ve got trust issues.

I’m sure that at least ten thousand of you readers raised your hands. And I’m sure that those of you who didn’t are either living in denial or just have figured out the key to trust. I think I figured out the key to trust, and while it’s one of those “Easier said than done” types of things, at least I have it now. It makes sense to me.

Have you ever had a friend who stabbed you in the back? I’m sure you have. Check out this situation from when I was nineteen. I’m sure this is fairly typical, but it doesn’t diminish how terrible it feels. I had a girlfriend. We were in young love. I then went off to college and tried to keep it going with her. She visited a few times. We had a fantastic time the first time, but a horrible time the second. Bad vibe central. Anyhow, I started to suspect that something was amiss. When I got home for Christmas break, I realized that my intuition was right-on. She had been sleeping with one of my very best friends.

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