Art by Mike Capprotti

HOLY SHIT, YOU GUYS. DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THIS?!?!?

I always thought that Jesus was made-up, like Luke Skywalker, or evolution, but after reading this, I am getting my ass to a church to start some serious effing repenting.

The Gazette says that this weekend at a Godsmack show in Dubuque, Iowa, FUCKING DIMEBAG showed up and gave some poor Godsmack fan a lesson in manners by ripping out the motherfucker’s tracheotomy tube. HOLY CRAP THAT IS AWESOME.

Brad Kluesner says he was minding his own business in the front row at the concert. That’s when he says a stranger to him, Darrell Abbott, started bothering him.

Click to read more…

Well, this is interesting.

Ex-White Zombie bassist and feminist rawk pioneer Sean Yseult recently posted a song called “Dawn of the Horrible Gorilla!” to her Soundcloud page — but it’s not a new Yseult solo jam, or a new song at all. Yseult explains:

“Dimebag Darrell, Sean Yseult and Philip Anselmo created this absurdity at 6am after a long night of drinking on a Pantera/White Zombie Tour in ’92. Recorded on Darrell’s 4-Track in his hotel room, the song was made up on the spot with Darrell on guitar (and drum machine) Sean on bass, and Phil singing. This comes from a cassette from Sean Yseult’s archives, never heard before!”

No shock given the circumstances under which it was made: the song isn’t really all that good. It’s also VERY 1992. That being said, it is a fun peek into what three young metal stars were doing with their free time — hey, you and me will never get drunk and record a song with Phil Anselmo, that’s for damn sure — and at this point, I think any long-lost Dime recordings are pretty valuable, no?

The track is not currently embeddable, but you can check it out here.

-AR

Thanks: Paul Bigue 

Photo by Alison Webster

This month, brutal death metal trio Hate Eternal, led by producer/guitarist Erik Rutan, has been at the center of a pitched battle between MS co-lord Axl Rosenberg and MS writer-at-large Anso DF. The conflict? Is Hate Eternal’s forthcoming Phoenix Amongst The Ashes record awesomely killer (per Axl) or is it insanely ripping (per Anso)? Does it fuck the face and slam the nutz (Anso) or does it render each listener “so fucking happy to be alive” (Axl)? Can its production and performances better be described as a high watermark of contemporary metal (Axl) or as a gift from another realm to every living music listener (Anso)? Is Phoenix a shoo-in for metal album of the year (Axl) or does it crush every other record on earth (Anso)?

Welcome to our love war.

When the time came to phone up Rutan for a discussion of Phoenix and other Hate Eternal affairs, we at MetalSucks opted to settle this battle of agreement with an interview conducted by both Axl Rosenberg and Anso DF. Unsurprisingly, Rutan took on the task with good humor and ease, only succumbing to confusion at times when Axl and Anso simultaneously rushed to hail Phoenix and its predecessor Fury & Flames. In its unexpurgated glory, we present our very special double-team interview of the great Erik Rutan.

Click to read more…

If you don’t know who Bobzilla is, here’s the quick version of his resumé: he was the bassist in Damageplan with Dimebag and Vinnie Paul, and now he’s the bassist in Hellyeah. In other words, he has a history of working with members of Pantera in bands that aren’t nearly as good as Pantera was.

So. Yesterday, we got the following e-mail from an anonymous reader:

“BOB ZILLA’S NEW BAND ORPHANED TO HATRED HAS GOTTEN THE THUMBS UP FROM VINNIE PAUL HIMSELF! THEY JUST RELEASED A SONG OFF OF THE UPCOMING ALBUM MASTERED BY VULGAR’S HOWIE WEINBERG AND MIXED BY LONG TIME PANTERA ENGINEER STERLING WINFIELD!”

So first of all… Yeah, no shit “Vinnie Paul himself” gave Orphaned to Hatred the thumbs up. What’s he gonna do, say his own bandmate’s side project sucks? So that endorsement means about as much as one from Bobzilla’s mommy.

Second of all… I was immediately weary of Orphaned to Hatred’s apparent desire to exploit their Pantera connection, especially because that connection really isn’t all that strong — I mean, I had about as much to do with Pantera as Bobzilla did. Seriously. Maybe he knew those dudes and I didn’t, but neither of us were in the band, and we both probably purchased approximately the same amount of CDs, merch, etc.

But then I went to check out the band on their Facebook page, and I saw the below image, and that’s when I got really, really cranky:

Click to read more…

It seems like the number of “Why did you ban me from commenting?!?” e-mails from readers has increased as of late, and the gist of those e-mails is often “Whassa matter, can’t take it when someone tells you you suck?” or whatever. And we’ve never banned anyone for disagreeing with us. We don’t give a shit if you disagree with us. We don’t agree with one another half the time — that’s part of the fun of MetalSucks.

Here’s what really happens: you use a word which is on our “no-no” list, and it gets stuck in our spam filter. Some of these words we actively do not allow on MetalSucks (e.g., slurs against minorities), and some of them just get stuck because so many actual spammers use them (e.g., “rape”). We try to be diligent about checking the spam filters and making sure none of you are getting caught in there, but sometimes we miss a few. And sometimes we ultimately don’t allow the comment onto the site (e.g., “I hate this album, this band is fucking gay” will never survive). But even then, we don’t BAN people from commenting. I think I can count on one hand the number of people we’ve banned in four years, and most of them were spammers and/or former Megadeth guitarists. So if your comment isn’t going through, consider first if you used a word we don’t allow, and if you didn’t, just shoot us a POLITE e-mail and we’ll investigage the problem ASAP. M’kay?

And on that note, here’s what we did this week:

• Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum gave us our latest Legacy Tour diary, Intronaut’s Sacha Dunable worked out his black metal daddy issues, and The Red Chord’s Greg Weeks offered to write a song for any sports team that’s not from New York.
• We spoke to After the Burial’s Trent Hafdahl and American Hardcore author Steven Blush.
• We got the skinny from Darkest Hour’s Ryan Parrish about why DH and Veil of Maya got kicked off their own tour bus, and asked Jucifer’s Amber Valentine about Sean Yseult’s claim to being the only woman in metal during her tenure in White Zombie.
• We checked out the latest release from The Unraveling.
• Sergeant D. schooled us in uber-kvlt metalcore bands.
• We contemplated the worst metal albums of 2010 and the best metal songs of 2010.
• We mourned on the six year anniversary of Dimebag’s murder.
• We celebrated Ozzy Osbourne’s terrific taste in modern metal (he put Korn above Firewind).
• We had mixed feelings about the retirement of Judas Priest.
• We got excited that At the Gates are playing more shows in 2011.

Alrighty then. Next week is our last week of regular posting before we shut down for the holidays. You know what that means – YEAR END LISTS! Get ready to argue like your entire sense of self-worth depended on everyone agreeing with you all the time with no exceptions ever.

-AR

Today was Friday the 13th, but absolutely nothing bad happened to me. I mean, the night is young so shit could still go horribly awry I suppose, but all in all, I had a pretty good day – nay, I had a pretty good week. If only the same could be said for the world of metal. Here’s some disasters the plagued various musicians this week:

• Slash completed his decade-long indoctrination into the Metallica “Fuck Our Fans” Club.
• We’re not sure if Steven Tyler is still in Aerosmith or not, but we are sure that we don’t give a fuck either way.
• There was a lot of controversy over a really, really ugly painting.
• No can explain to me why I should care about Alter Bridge.
• Fear Faction ate s’more babies, released a new song.
• R.I.P. Jerry Fuchs.

And, oh yeah, some good news: MetalSucks is going to do a digital release of The Binary Code’s Suspension of Disbelief on December 15 for just five bucks! Get stoked.

Alright. I’m off to go hear Vince spin. Have a nice weekend everyone. Next week we have another extra, super-duper special surprise for you…

-AR

So some people are all up in arms about the above painting by the artist Tom Sanford, The Assassination of Dimebag Darrell, which will be going on sale at an auction later this month (read all about it here and here). I don’t want to spend a lot of time on this, but I do want to make two quick points:

1. Metal fans really don’t get have the right to be offended by artistic portrayals of horribly violent acts, even if they’re based on a real incident. If you’ve ever enjoyed Slayer’s “Angel of Death,” you should understand my meaning.
2. It’s just a painting, and, really, the most offensive thing about it is how ugly it is.

Weigh in with your thoughts below.

-AR

I know you’ve all experienced this. You get into a band. Your friend introduces their music to you, or you find them online, or however it is you discover bands. Their album or songs start to get stuck in your head. You start listening to them on your iPod, in your car, at the gym, wherever. You start reading up on them. You look for tour dates. You get excited because one’s coming up. You go see them. Lights go down. Its go time! AAANNNNNDDDD your dick goes limp, or pussy dries up, whatever the case may be, because these dudes just can’t pull off what you heard on their CDs.

But wait, everything sounds like shit in this club. Maybe it’s the soundguy. Maybe it’s just an off night. Maybe somebody’s mom just died. Who knows? So you give them the benefit of the doubt and you remain a fan. Then a few months later you get a chance to see them again, and same story. Limp dick bullshit. I’ve experienced that soooo much. In fact, I’d say that the majority of bands I’ve heard in this genre give me that feeling.

There are only a small percentage of bands that I think can really stand up to what they put down on CD. It’s not hard to understand why this happens.

Click to read more…

I just read this on the ol’ Bmouth:

SLAYER guitarist Kerry King, a close friend of the late “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott (PANTERA, DAMAGELAN), had the legendary axeman’s guitar in the studio during the recording process for SLAYER‘s new album, “World Painted Blood” (although he didn’t use it it during the sessions), still with the same strings that were on it the last time Dimebag played it. “The one thing that made me look at my lead playing a little differently was when Dimebag passed away,” revealed King. “Not that I’m going to fill Dime‘s shoes because nobody can do that, but I paid more attention to my leads while recording this album. I wanted to make them more memorable in memory of Dime.”

Click to read more…

Against my better judgement, I’ve been watching L.A. Ink these past few weeks because someone tipped me off that Dimebag’s “widow,” Rita Haney, Sebastian Bach, and Scott Ian would all be getting tats on the show. And while I appreciate the work Kat Von D does* and the opportunity to hear more Dime tidbits from Haney (cheesy though it is, I loved hearing that the first thing he asked her every morning is “What did you dream?”), I’m having a hard time getting around the fact that Kat is, for lack of a more polite term, an idiot – I mean, if anyone ever asks me to “hang ten on the couch,” I’d have no choice but to kick them in the shin.

What do you fine folks think?

Rita Haney Gets a Dimebag Tat
[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/DDtanNo_JH8" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Baz Gets an Angel Down Tat
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/ia3t98FX2pA" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Scott Ian gets an AC/DC Tat
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/eBQv61EWuvI" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

*Although I still think Paul Booth’s shit looks cooler – it’s more bad assed, and more three dimensional.