MetalSucks

Monday (actually sun down Sunday, but whatever) is Yom Kippur, which is the Jewish day of repentance. As you can imagine, I have a lot to repent for, so I won’t be doing any writing. Vince may or may not be here to give all the goy their bored-at-work dose of entertainment.

In the meantime, here are some fun things that happened this week:

• Dallas Coyle talked about “borrowing ideas” and talking shit, while Eyal Levi contemplated greener grass (not that kind of grass).
• We spoke to Every Time I Die’s Andy Williams and some of the dudes from Periphery.
• We suffered through the worst Metallica cover ever recorded.
• We wondered if Juggalos should be considered a gang.
• And it’s Gojira and Burst live FTW.

See ya Tuesday.

-AR

Luckily for Five Finger Death Punch, being total assholes who completely lack any musical talent isn’t hurting their record sales: their new album, War is the Answer, is apparently going to sell to somewhere between 35,000 – 40,000 copies in its first week of release… and that’s just here in the U.S. That probably sounds like a lot of units moved, and you’re right. It is a lot of fucking units moved. To put it in perspective with the sales of some awesome albums that came out this week…

Click to read more…

As one of the chief riff providers for swaggercore titans Every Time I Die, Andy Williams takes pride in making the discordant into catchy. For a perfect example of this, look no further than the band’s latest (MetalSucks-approved) album, New Junk Aesthetic. Distilling the band’s decade-plus essence into a tight half hour, it’s a satisfying mix of thunderous heaviness and easily the most appealing material the band have put to tape. But while he’s often overshadowed by vocalist Keith Buckley’s relentless wiseassery, it’s his and Jordan Buckley’s Skynard-by-way-of-Dillinger-Escape-Plan guitar work that make the band stand out and ultimately worthwhile.

A self-described “chatty Cathy,” Andy Williams was remarkably frank and refreshingly earnest in a recent interview with MetalSucks on the eve of the release of New Junk Aesthetic. Among other things, he discussed why he can listen to the new album and none of the band’s other material, his thoughts on the new Converge record, the changing landscape of the scene he came up in, and life over at ETID’s new label, Epitaph.

Click to read more…

Last Tuesday was a huuuuge week for new metal releases. Megadeth, Black Dahlia Murder, Shadows Fall, Living Colour, Dying Fetus, Porcupine Tree, Every Time I Die, Thrice and Ace Frehley all released new albums, and all charted in the Top 200! After the jump, let’s look at where they all ended up.

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Those that felt underwhelmed by Every Time I Die’s The Big Dirty (a company of which this writer is a part) need not worry – New Junk Aesthetic, their new album, has the energy, texture, and savagery the prior record lacked. And this isn’t to say The Big Dirty was a massive, St. Anger-style failure; it was just an alright album in the company of the splendid Southern-fried rock of Gutter Phenomenon or their debut, the up-there-with-Jane Doe lost metalcore classic Last Night in Town. And when viewed in retrospect, Big Dirty appears to be the band’s “growth” record: where they fumbled around, sounding somewhat bored and uninspired (though admittedly still pretty entertaining), perhaps even unsure of what to do next. New Junk Aesthetic is a band completely comfortable with itself, and pushing different boundaries because of that. Vocalist Keith Buckley belts out ridiculously catchy vocals hooks with his same refreshingly smarmy lyrical approach, while guitarists Andy Williams and Jordan Buckley tone down their Southern riff attack to eschew the risk of sounding like a novelty. The album finds the band at its most likable while occasionally incorporating a riff that wouldn’t sound out of place on their debut. If you liked Every Time I Die before, you’ll probably find reasons on this record to like them more. Click to read more…

Congrats to the winners of last week’s funny photo caption contest who will each receive a copy of Protest the Hero’s new Live DVD/CD Gallop Meets the Earth and a PTH t-shirt. The winners are:

• Hammer_Smashed_Hurtt: “Reeses cups $1.00. Bottled water $1.00. Inbreeding………………….Priceless.”
• I’m not racist, but I hate Oceano: “Every Juggalo knows Reese’s Cup is code for anal sex and bottled water is code for a blowjob. Why anal sex and a blow job cost the same amount of money we’ll never know.”
• \m/Eluveitie\m/ [in response to the above]: “Because for most Juggalos, you can’t tell one hole from the other.”

This week we’re giving away 2 prize packages, each containing Every Time I Die’s new record New Junk Aesthetic (out next Tuesday!) and a really sweet matching t-shirt. Just come up with a funny caption to the below photo (from AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com).

Here’s the band’s video for the title track from their new album, Wanderlust.

Am the only one who found The Big Dirty kinda disappointing? Gutter Phenomenon was awesome and I really liked Hot Damn!, but… I dunno. There was just something missing from Dirty – that certain “oomph!” that’s really made this band pop for me in the past. Hopefully Wanderlust will be a return to form.

Wanderlust comes out September 15 on Epitaph.

-AR

I’ve never been that into Every Time I Die (nothing against ‘em… just never really got into them) but for some reason I have this gut feeling that they are about to release an excellent album. New Junk Aesthetic comes out September 15 (check out the awesome artwork in full here), and the band has just posted a new song called “Wanderlust” for streaming on their MySpace page. It’s not as raw and dirty as some of their prior material, but it’s still pretty fucking cool.

Inevitably the MS Haterade Mafia will come out in droves for this one accusing me of pimping the latest “shitcore” band (I’m looking at you, Zilty) but I really don’t see anything “core” about this band, so fuck off. Listen with your ears and not your brains, fuckos, and enjoy this for what it is.

No word yet on the state of Andy Williams’ beard.

-VN

Yesterday, at 10 a.m., our friends at Metal Insider reported that Fall Out Boy’s Pete Wentz has recorded guest vocals for the new Every Time I Die album.

This morning at 1 a.m., they reported that ETID drummer Mike Novak has split from the band due to “personal conflicts.”

Coincidence?

While you ponder that, enjoy the new ETID song below, entitled “The Marvelous Slut.” Metal Injection discovered it floating around on YouTube. It originally appeared on a recent Hurley-Epitaph Records compilation, which you can download here.

And, yes, that is Dillinger Escape Plan’s Greg Puciato doing guest vox.

-AR

We aren’t sure which member of Buffalo, NY metal warriors Every Time I Die wrote the below “official” press release we received today, but we’d like to think it’s axe-slinger Andy Williams, if only because of his ginormous, manlier-than-thou, f’ing awesome beard:

November 3rd, 2008

An Open Letter to Axl Rose Ending With an Impression of Howard Dean,
Thanks a shitload Axl. You haven’t put out a GNR record in 10 years and the month we decide to go out on a tour cleverly named NOVEMBER REIGN, you find it prime time for “Chinese Democracy” to hit shelves. You couldn’t have waited another 3 weeks? We haven’t done a single headlining tour on “The Big Dirty” so this was a really big deal for us. You should have seen Josh’s face light up when he thought of the name. The guys in THE BRONX and STICK TO YOU [sic] GUNS were happier than pigs in shit to be a part of this epic journey across the east coast. But you just couldn’t stand to see us happy.
Buckethead probably wouldn’t have stolen our thunder. And when I met Matt Sorum at House of Guitars like 16 years ago, he came off as a real nice dude
who would be glad to let us have November to ourselves. Well fuck it, we’re doing it anyways. Starting November 1st, we’re going to Quebec City! and
then we’re going to Milwaukee! And then we’re going to JOPLIN AND NASHVILLE AND RICHMOND AND THEN WE’RE GOING TO FARMINGDALE TO TAKE BACK THE
CRAZY DONKEY!!! BEYYYYYAAAWWW!!!!!
love every time i die.
ps. you rock.

Full tour dates, featuring Every Time I Die, The Bronx, and Stick To Your Guns, after the jump.

Click to read more…

With all due respect to Killswitch Engage skinsman Justin Foley, this shit is pretty sick:

Special thanks to MetalSucks maniac Morrizz for the tip. It’s been a slow fuckin’ news day if ever there was one.

-AR

I don’t even know where to begin with this. It could be the fact that Fall Out Boy is playing Pantera (albeit with Every Time I Die’s Keith Buckley — who has at least some metal cred — on vocals). It could be the voices of pre-adolescent children in the bacvkground. It could be that the band skipped the guitar solo. Has Dimebag-based rhetoric become so ubiquitous and marketable at this point that it’s acceptable for a teeny-bopper emo band to play Pantera live? Ten to one, no one in Fall Out Boy knew a note of Pantera before Dimebag’s death almost 3 years ago.

Somewhere Dimebag is rolling over in his grave. Or is he? On one hand, Fall out Boy — fucking FALL OUT FUCKING BOY — is butchering a Pantera song. But on the other hand, I guess it’s cool that kids who wouldn’t otherwise be exposed to Pantera are hearing it? Fuck it, all the kids are singing along and they clearly know the song — fuck this band, fuck them hard in the poo-holes. Fucking fuckity fuck fuck fuck.

And now the video in question, which according to Blabbermouth was filmed November 19 in Buffalo, New York at a secret Fall Out Boy show (they performed under the name Schrute Farms) at the Mohawk Place:

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/YhR3AwGIH8I" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Can I get a collective sigh of “kids these days…”?

-VN

Our pals over at Metal Injection have boatloads of new videos from this summer’s Sounds of the Underground tour. They’ve already got interviews posted with members of Every Time I Die, Chimaira and the legendary Testament, and new interviews with Amon Amarth, Darkest Hour and Job for a Cowboy coming later this week. Also be sure to tune in for the hilarious Moscow Metal Minute search for the kings of blood and jizz, Gwar.

Visit MetalInjection.net for all the madness.

-VN