As you are (hopefully) already aware, God Forbid’s latest opus, Earthsblood, hits stores today. Guitarists Doc and Dallas Coyle was cool enough to give us a track-by-track breakdown of each song on what is inarguably the band’s best record to date. Enjoy!

1.”The Discovery” – The intro for Earthsblood came about in a peculiar way. The original piece started with the doomy guitars that kick in around 40 seconds into it. We wrote it as part of our black metal side project called Hell Nigger. It was the outro for a song that we wrote in one day. Without the keys and stuff, it sounded more like Morbid Angel, but with the new album having a much darker tone, we thought it would make a cool intro to the album. The piano piece was actually played and composed (with some direction from Dallas and I) by my Dad, Kevin Coyle. We showed him the chords that the guitars were playing, and he started doing this arpeggiated Danny Elfman thing that just killed. Our Dad is a piano teacher and has been playing for like 40 years. He also played on our last album. The orchestration was performed by Michael Romeo from Symphony X. We met each other through our producer, Eric Rachel. He has his own home studio where Symphony X records their albums and this orchestration program that costs some ungodly amount of money, and takes 4 computers to run. Apparently, they use that program to do film scores. Mike is incredible, and I can’t thank him enough for adding some much virtuosity to the record.
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Holy crap. After what seems like forever, God Forbid finally released their first DVD, Beneath the Scars of Glory and Progression, earlier this week (trailer and clip above).

And you know what?

It was totally worth the wait. Click to read more…

At the beginning of April, just as genre-bending metal masters The Red Chord were kicking off a tour with Converge, Genghis Tron, Baroness and Coliseum, we were given the opportunity to e-mail bassist Greg Weeks some questions. Of course, we jumped at the chance.

And then we never heard back.

At the time, we assumed that Greg had decided our questions were just too stupid to answer (and who could blame the dude?); in fact, there was another culprit at fault for Greg’s delayed response.

After the jump, find out why it took Greg so long to get back to us, and read his thoughts on such incredibly relevant political topics as why no producer will work with the band more than once, touring with Disturbed, and the current state of large beards in metal. For, surely, this interview proves our journalistic integrity.

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God Forbid drummer Corey Pierce has finished laying down drum tracks for the band’s new, still-to-be titled album, which is being produced by Eric Rachel (The Dillinger Escape Plan, Atreyu). In a statement, Pierce says:

“So everyone, I am finally done with the drum tracks for the new record. I have to say just how proud I am of what we have accomplished with this new material. I know that once you guys out there hear it, everyone will be feeling it. This is the best of the best. I love my band, our friends and fans that helped us get to this point and we think you will all be pleased to see where we are headed. I can’t wait to hear people’s reactions, so stay tuned to www.myspace.com/godforbid for news and video reports from the studio.”

I think I can safely speak for Vince and Kip when I say that there are few albums we’re anticipating as much this year as the new offering from God Forbid. Here’s what guitarist Doc Coyle told us about the album back in December:

“We’re just doing different… trying different types of song. We’re not tied into a formula. One song we have, it sounds like a Dimmu Borgir song. One song sounds like Opeth. Then we’ve got more stuff like “To the Fallen Hero,” more hook-oriented stuff too. And some really technical stuff. Some super, heavy slow stuff. In a way not being a massive band like Killswitch or Lamb of God or Slayer, you don’t have as much to risk as far as trying different things. I don’t know, we’re trying to make an impact.”

The new album should be out before the end of the year. I can hardly wait.

-AR