MetalSucks

Vince, Kip, and Anton OyVey are all down at SXSW, but don’t worry about lil’ old me; Higgins and I got shit covered. Here’s what happened in the world of metal this week:

• We all finally got to hear the new Mastodon album! Needless to say, intense debate ensued.
• We spoke to Wolves in the Throne Room drummer Aaron Weaver and Lazarus A.D. bassist/vocalist Jeff Paulick.
• No penis? No Dir En Grey!
• Is this new Teagan and Sara shirt metal as fuck, or total hipster bull pucky?
• The Megatallica rivalry continued as we watched Dave Mustaine kill on Jeopardy and Lars Ulrich eat it on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
• Fieldy = Jesus
  
• Read Vince’s initial SXSW reports here and here!

Alright-y, then. Higgins and I are off to make like chimneys and blow smoke. See ya Monday!

-AR

Thanks to MetalSucks Maniac Amanda Dobbs for pointing us towards this very unusual story on Pollstar. It seems that Dir En Grey will be playing two shows in their native Japan that are “male only,” and have posted a note on their website to this effect:

“We will confirm your sex at main entrance, therefore you will need to bring a public certificate including health insurance card, pension book, passport, resident’s card. In some cases, we will conduct careful checking. If we cannot check your sex on the day, we may have to refuse your attendance.”

We were curious as to how the band is planning to “conduct careful checking” of audience members’ sex, since we can’t imagine any world in which the ticket holders line is asked to drop trou right there in the street. So we contacted them* to get some answers. After the jump, learn six ways the band plans to make sure everyone who attends these concerts is, indeed, a dude.

Click to read more…

So Axl and I are shuttering up the gates to the MS Mansion when we get wind that there’s a new Lamb of God video for “Set to Fail” available. Fucking BAD ASS!!!

Before this event of over-arching importance occurred, here’s what we would’ve said was important this week:

• We spoke with Salome’s Aaron Deal and Chimaira’s Mark Hunter.
• No Ozzfest this year. We don’t buy the excuse that it’s because Ozzman’s working on a new album, but at least the Osbournes will be making asses of themselves on national TV again… oh wait.
• We watched Mastodon in the recording studio while we falsely assumed a new track of theirs appeared in a videogame trailer. No matter; Crack the Skye is coming March 24th and there’s a super-special limited edition package available for pre-order.
• Limp Bizkit announced their inevitable reunion. With Wes Borland. No surprise.
• We joined Twitter. Webernets, watch out!
• We looked at new releases by Scale the Summit, Obscura and the new DVD by Dir En Grey. The world previewed the new God Forbid record… and overwhelmingly liked it, by golly! In the Coyle Commune annex of the MS Mansion, Dallas slyly grinned while tapping his fingers slowly together and saying, “Exxxxxxcellent.”
• We pontificated the seemingly complete irrelevance of the Grammies and then immediately forgot about them.

Enjoy cuddling up with your shnookums (metal!) on Valentine’s Day tomorrow and celebrating a day called “Presidents Day” — even though no U.S. presidents were actually born on said day — by not going to work on Monday. Seeya Tuesday.

-VN

Of the dozen or so Japan-based acts that have attempted to crack the English-speaking market, Dir En Grey is fortunate to have an edge in their singularity; no band sounds like them in America or elsewhere. Sure, we can trace the roots of their spare, low-register guitar parts to Korn; the rabid, multi-voiced, and diminutive singer to Cradle of Filth; the addictive melodies to uh Duran Duran; and the caustic imagery to Marilyn Manson and Japanese visual hyper-rock. But like a Hayao Miyazaki or Pretz, Dir En Grey is exotic but not exclusionary, foreign but not impenetrable. Different but the same. And awesome!

Click to read more…

This coming Monday the entire MetalSucks staff will each release Top 10 lists for the entire year in metal of 2008. Get psyched! Things have been slowing down here at the MS Mansion as the holidays approach, but we still found ways to keep it fun this week:

• Axl Rose finally did some press to support Chinese Democracy… but as usual, there’s an asterisk.
• We debuted a new, exclusive Daath track — a medley of Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel and Dying Fetus covers.
• We interviewed members of Clutch, Bison B.C., Dir En Grey, and Fear Factory / Arkaea.
• Job For a Cowboy’s Jonny Davy blogged about urination and hotel trashing, while Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum’s guest blog claimed that Entombed’s Uprising and Morning Star are two of the most underrated albums of all time. Oh, and The Haunted’s Peter Dolving blogged about sleep.
• Gojira’s Joe Duplantier orders you to stop the killing of baby seals but apparently has no problem with ripping New York City a new arsehole.
• Meshuggah + Cynic + The Faceless = The Erection Tour of 2009.
• The metal industry lost a kindred soul. R.I.P. Adrian Bromley.

Interviewing Japanese rockstars Dir En Grey — whose excellent new album Uroboros is out now on The End Records — was one of the more challenging tasks I’ve been faced with as a journalist hack blogger. Interviewing a band you don’t know that much about and doing so on short notice? Been there, done that, easy. Having to do so in a completely foreign language through an interpreter? That threw me for a loop. Who do I look at while asking the questions — the interpreter or the band? Like, obviously I’m talking to the band, but in essence I’m talking to the interpreter since he’s the only one who understands what I’m saying. Kinda awkward. Did my questions get through as I intended them? Did the band members say I was a complete asshole? I’ll never know.

In any case the band’s two guitarists Kaoru (blue guitar in below pics) and Die (red guitar in below pics) were good sports, the interpreter did a fine job (at least as far as I know!) and the interview came out pretty well. My chat with Dir En Grey — which in retrospect seems really short because every question and answer had to be repeated — after the jump.

Click to read more…

All is not lost in the world of metal; in fact, this past week brought some nice surprises, along with the usual mish-mash of shitty radio rock bands. Last week’s sales numbers, with our usual sardonic commentary, after the jump. (Hint: look at the tags below, and click “read more” if any of those bands interest you!).

Click to read more…

Mostly this week I just watched the Puppy Cam. But when I could pry myself away for a few moments, this is what I focused on:

• Proto-jazz-metallers Intronaut released an artsy new video, as did Protest the Hero and Dir En Grey.
• We interviewed Brother Von Doom.
• Ozzy may be pretty good at shilling for Samsung phones these days, but we still like him better the old way.
• Arsis did some member-swapping. Yes, again.
• We reviewed new releases from The Faceless, The Bronx, and a bunch of awesome bands on Prosthetic Records.
• We contemplated the prospect of new releases by Carcass, Napalm Death and Down.

Party it up, it’s the weekend. See you next Tuesday Monday.

That I don’t know what the fuck “Dozing Green” is about is understandable given it’s entirely in Japanese; but apparently Dir En Grey even make their videos in Japanese, because I have no fucking clue what the hell is going on in this one. Nevertheless the song is pretty cool and so is the video, both in unexpected and non-cliche ways. Psyched to see these dudes play in NYC this Friday with The Human Abstract.

-VN