Steven Blush’s American Hardcore: A Tribal History is one of the great rock n’ roll history books. And now it’s bigger. Originally published in 2001, the Feral House book nails the golden age of old-school hardcore, from the movement’s inception to the watershed year 1986. The book inspired a documentary, the 2006 film American Hardcore. The movie is a must-see that has inspired as much griping and controversy as the book.

Click to read more…

“BIG PANTS WASTE PRECIOUS FABRIC”

Step into my Nocturnus time machine and take a magical journey with me into a time long, long ago, an excursion into a world that scarcely resembles our own. In this world — we’ll call it Moshtopia — hardcore kids are known for wearing giant, baggy pants, not skinny jeans; there are people under 30 that know who Black Flag is; and metalcore bands worship Krishna, not Christ. This is not a fanciful episode of Jojo’s Bizarre Adeventure fan fiction, my friends, — it is the strange and wonderful world of mid-90s hardcore!

Click to read more…

Banner Designed by Cysquatch

Welcome to “Question of the Week,” a (sometimes) weekly debate amongst the MetalSucks staff regarding a recent hot button issue.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, which means we’re taking off early today and won’t be back ’til Monday. We’re sorry to leave non-American readers high n’ dry, but PLUS ONE FOR FREEDOM, MOTHERFUCKERS.

ANYWAY, in honor of the holiday, we decided to do a special Turkey Day-themed QOTW designed to make you feel all warm and cuddly inside:

WHAT (IN METAL) ARE YOU THANKFUL FOR?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

Click to read more…

Me BIG PIMPIN with a couple of my biatches at school lol, not everybody who listens to metal is a nerd!

Hey guys what’s up, thanks to Axle and Vince from Metal Sucks (link to their site) for letting me introduce myself to you guys!  I am a Junior in High School at Canyon Ridge High in Hesperia California, and pretty much just getting into metal. My uncle introduced me to these psyhcos of metal, he was in “Axle”s wedding (Axel isn’t his real name haha but I’m not telling you what his real name is you will have to find out!) and he has always been into metal, so I guess it runs in the family that we like Metal! I have been listening to metal of all kinds for like a year and a half now but I know there are a lot of bands I should check out but don’t know about and wanted to ask you guys for some ideas about what bands you think I should check out. I know you all are the experts lol!

BTW I only have dial-up 56K internet so I can’t use MySpace, Youtube, or BitTorrid or any of that so if you can just tell me stuff to buy that is what I’m looking for. My town doesn’t have a Hot Topics but they have a lot of stuff at Walmart so anything they have there they should also have at Walmart.

I like pretty much anything that is cool and heavy, so if there is anything you guys think I should check out just let me know (you can send an email to the comments and I will see it when I look at this), here is what metal bands I already like:

Click to read more…

To celebrate the release of Madball’s latest aggro masterpiece, Empire (two new songs streaming here!), we asked vocalist Freddy “Madball” Cricien to compile a list of his favorite non-hardcore (but still heavy!) bands. Luckily for us and all of you, he agreed! So we’ll be running two entries a day from Freddy’s list every day for the next five days, leading up to Empire‘s October 12 release. You can read Freddy’s initial installment here and his second entry here; to follow, enjoy day three of the countdown…

6) SLAYER

I got into slayer later than most probably. Like I said, my background wasn’t in metal. For me, when it comes to heavy music, it was H.C. and then I got into other heavy stuff via friends, etc. You have to give Slayer props. They are as hard as they come, have crazy longevity, are super influential, and keep it real with their style/sound. They are classic. What more needs to be said?! FYI — they are one of Hoya Roc’s favorite bands!

Click to read more…

To the MetalSucks Maniac known as “Sacajewea,” we would like to say the following: YOU ARE A FUCKING RETARD. It’s incredible how retarded you are, you stupid fucking idiot mongoloid half-wit retard.

We send this message because in October of ’09, Sacajewea left a comment on the very first post we ever wrote, saying he was “Just here to dig up the past;” then he left another comment, just this past June, which read:

“I did it twice. Fuck I’m retarded. If anyone sees this please find me in a recent post and tell me how retarded I am.”

On December 26, 2006 — a date that will live in infamy — we did what professionals call a “soft launch” but we just call “the day we first posted on this blog.” Our slogan was “Smart About Metal,” a play on the slogan for Film Comment magazine.

We had these two stupid South Park caricatures that Axl made at his then-job when he was bored. (Axl forgot until just now that he had a really long goatee in ’06; Vince still had phantom Jew ‘fro, where some days he can feel it, man!) We only posted once or twice a day, throughout the week, pretty much when we had time/interest. We didn’t use tags. We often didn’t post graphics or videos. Our headlines weren’t capitalized. We interviewed members of Stuck Mojo and Twisted Sister, because that’s who we could get interviews with. Believe it or not, we tried to get an interview with God Forbid… and we failed.

Basically, we had no fucking idea what we were doing.

We can’t believe that this is our 10,000th post. We can’t believe we’re still doing this almost four years after we started. We can’t believe that so many of you are reading it. Seriously: WE WERE ONLY FUCKING KIDDING.

So…

Thanks to Kip (who has been here longer than anyone besides Vince and Axl!), Sammy, Gary, Anso, Satan (the MetalSucks contributor and the deity), Sergeant D., Bob, Leyla, Corey, Urbandale, Dave, Matt, Ferris, Dallas, Eyal, Sacha, Paul, Bulb, Arthur, Anton OyVey, Rich Hallford, David Bee Roth, Van Arseface, Mike Pattongill, Angela Gossowski, Joey V., and everyone else who has ever written for us… MetalSucks would not be where it is if not for all of you.

Thanks to everyone in the music industry who has helped us over the years, even as they must have been secretly hoping we would van flip.

And of course, thanks to all the MetalSucks Maniacs, Suckalos, annoying people who can’t use the “search” function, and dudes that have sent us death threats. We can’t tell you how grateful we are that you read our site. Thank you thank you thank you.

Now, with a complete lack of humility, Axl and Vince present their ten favorite MetalSucks posts of all time. Enjoy.

Click to read more…

When Randy Blythe was nineteen years old and Jamey Jasta was thirteen years old, a really silly white dude who is named Rob Van Winkle but insisted on calling himself “Vanilla Ice” released a song entitled “Ice Ice Baby,” which was a huge megahit. There can be no doubt that Blythe and Jasta were aware of the song’s existence, for such was its prevalence in pop culture. Of course, we have no way of knowing what these someday-modern metal legends thought of the track, but I think we can reasonably assume that at no point did the thought “Someday Vanilla Ice will come see me perform and we will hang out backstage after the show” cross their respective minds.

And yet, this:

Click to read more…

So the Rockstar Mayhem tour is underway, and for the first stop in San Berdino, CA, Hatebreed brought Lamb of God’s Randy Blythe on stage for a rendition of “Doomsayer” from 2003′s The Rise of Brutality. And, honestly, I don’t understand why bands don’t do shit like this more often. You’ve got twelve bands all out on the road with one another for a month and thousands of excited fans — why isn’t everyone hopping on stage with everyone else? Even if it’s for something ridiculous: two years ago, “supergroup” Ladder Up an Ass was the highlight of Mayhem’s stop at Nassau Coliseum.

The Rockstar Mayhem tour is ongoing through mid-August. Most years all of the bands party together after every show; hopefully as they all begin to bond, we’ll see more of this kind of thing on future dates.

-AR

[via Metal Insider]

Like myself, Dallas Coyle is a huge film dork — I love geeking out with him, ’cause the dude really knows his shit. And I’m stoked to see that he’s started to put all that knowledge to good use: He co-directed The Judas Syndrome‘s new video, “Death of the Soul,” with Frankie Nasso, who has previously helmed clips for Mudvayne, Hatebreed, All That Remains, Sworn Enemy, and Demiricous, among others.

The video just debuted on Noisecreep, and is really cool; you can check it out below. Hopefully we’ll be seeing more from Dallas Coyle, cinemetal auteur in the not-too-distant future!

“Death of the Soul” comes off The Judas Syndrome’s Underneath Blood Skies, which is out now.

-AR

Well, that didn’t take long; just one day after Kingdom of Sorrow took over MetalSucks, Crowbar debuted two new songs at a show in New Orleans and Axl posited that Crowbar must be working on a new record. After all, it’s been five years already. And as we learned yesterday via press release, he was correct.

“Sludge Metal legends CROWBAR have signed a worldwide deal with E1 Music,” says the press release. “The band will be releasing a new full-length album later this fall. ‘CROWBAR is very excited to have landed this deal with E1 Music! We have always been very proud of what we do and the new record will not disappoint and of our die hard fans.’ says front man and guitar player Kirk Windstein.”

Click to read more…

Kirk Windstein is a poet. Of this, there can be no doubt. Since Kingdom of Sorrow took over our site on Tuesday, Vince and I have decided we really, really wanna take a trip to New Orleans and just go eat with the dude (well, probably get high and then go eat with the dude). But secretly, I have aspirations of someday being able to pay the man to teach my children how to speak good. I can dream, can’t I?

Here’s some other shit that went down in the Mansion this week:

• We debuted a clip from The Haunted’s new DVD, Road Kill.
• We also debuted new music by Early Graves.
• We spoke to Stephen Carpenter from Deftones.
• Ken Sorceron from Abigail Williams doesn’t wanna talk shit about Winds of Plague, so instead he just left a comment on our site saying “it its embarrassing to once again see our name next to theirs on another metal news site.” Way to not talk shit, Kenny!
• We checked out a new release by Black Pyramid.
• Sergeant D taught us about the history of metalcore and screamo.
• We engaged in debate about the new Maiden song, the new Maiden setlist, and the old Maiden album art.
• The new Methods of Mayhem song is the worst thing ever.
• Rose Funoral finally spoke out about the Uno Incident.
• Vince thinks the BP oil spill is Korny.

Next week will bring some more streams, interviews with Max Cavalera and Bobby Blotzer, and more self-righteous rage over fairly trivial topics. ‘Til then…

-AR

What’s up everyone! In celebration of the new KINGDOM OF SORROW album coming out today, MetalSucks have been nice enough to let me takeover their site! I figured I’d better make the reading interesting and at least cause some discussion, so here goes, this is probably the longest run on sentence you’ll ever read, haha, enjoy!

Since we’re well into 2010. I figured I’d start my blog with my top ten “most listened to” metal and hardcore albums of the last decade, and the top ten albums I hope to enjoy this decade!!! It’s not a top ten “best of” the decade or anything like that, it’s just what I’ve listened to the most while on the road, at home, in the gym, in the office or in my car. Keep in mind that the criteria for these albums to make this list was that they were released between 2000 and 2010, that is all.

The top 10 records I’m “most hopeful & excited for” are more like a wish list. It will be cool to see some of that stuff happen!

Click to read more…

I’ve been making music, touring, playing shows and doing what I love for well over fifteen years, and I’m very grateful. I barely have a 9th grade education and I’ve never had any musical training or lessons. I’ve just worked hard and stayed focused on what I wanted to achieve. I’ve played everywhere from basements, backyards, skateparks and VFWs right up to clubs, theaters, arenas and fucking stadiums! So keep doing what you love and fuck everyone who tries to bring you down or hold you back!

1995

Click to read more…

#5 – Necrophagist

Technical German death metal that crushes!

Click to read more…

My top five show flyers… okay, it’s really six, but only because I had a tough time deciding! Keep in mind this is based on the memories, not the flyers themselves!

Click to read more…

Every time I come home from tour, I ask myself: “What the fuck am I going to do with all these CDs?!” Because when I go to my storage room to drop off gear and tour supplies, there they are. Literally, thousands of CDs stacked to the ceiling in multiple storage rooms. Bands like The Program, Right Brigade, Oblige, AK Corral (The country CD I put out! Haha… that’s a completely different blog I will one day write.), A Thousand Falling Skies, The Autumn Offering, Full Blown Chaos, etc., etc., etc. Basically stuff that I put out on my labels that didn’t sell well or that we pressed too many of. Now I really don’t want them going in a landfill or polluting the ocean. The thought of a baby seal choking on a Sworn Enemy CD really doesn’t sit well with me. So I figured I would take to the internet to see what could be done. Now if you really want to be a great person and buy any of them, please visit martyrstore.com or stillbornstore.com – they’re cheap! Okay? So here’s some videos to check out, you decide what I should do with this stuff!

Should I make jewelry?

Click to read more…

These are just record covers I thought were great. I like when a CD cover provokes thought and makes me want to interpret what message or messages the artist or band are trying to purvey.

#5 – Behemoth, Evangelion

Done by Polish artist Tomasz Danilowicz, who has worked on Behemoth’s previous albums. This is just bad ass.

Click to read more…

I was really, really excited to hear Kingdom of Sorrow’s self-titled debut in 2008; unfortunately, the finished product didn’t do all that much for me. But I know Gary Suarez loved it, and I’m still curious to hear their sophomore effort, Behind the Blackest Tears, because, well, it’s Kirk Windstein and Jamey Jasta – they deserve the benefit of the doubt.

And if nothing else, the cover art is certainly capital-”M”-Metal.  The color scheme is similar to the cover art for the band’s first album, and the skull certainly seems to be sporting the same mask as the knight on that earlier cover – so I guess whatever task he set out on, he completely failed to achieve. Ah well.

Behind the Blackest Tears will be released on June 8 via Relapse.

-AR

I am going to assume that a decent portion of the followers of this site are themselves musicians with bands of their own. That is generally how it goes with metal. There are seamless lines blurred between the “fans” and the “bands” because, like myself, many metal patrons represent both categories. Without this large sector of musician fans, technically proficient bands that cater directly to this base (like Dream Theater, Meshuggah, and Necrophagiast) would be much less successful. So to those musicians, I would like to use this blog to shine a light on one of the harsh truths in all music and entertainment that many musicians choose to ignore -

Image matters a lot in this industry. In fact, it’s probably just as important as the music.
Click to read more…

Brian Posehn is easily one of the funniest stand-up comedians alive. I have never missed a chance to go see him live, and he has – quite literally – made me fall out of my chair from laughing so hard. Add to that the fact that the dude loves metal, and, well, he’s just so damn sexy I can’t handle it.

Posehn is the only comedian I’m aware of currently signed to Relapse Records. He’s that fucking metal. And he’s going to release another album through that label, entitled Fart and Wiener Jokes, on April 27. That too-small image above is the cover art, which is absolutely fucking EPIC.

Needless to say, I am insanely excited about this album, which, in addition to some sure-to-be uproarious comedy, is going to feature two songs – “More Metal Than You” (!!!) and a cover of Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler” (!!!!!!!!!!!!!) – which will feature guest spots by Posehn’s buddy Scott Ian, Jamey Jasta, Mark Morton, John Tempesta, Russ Parrish, and, according to a press release, “more.”

So clearly, this is gonna own all our asses in April. You can pre-order the album in a variety of nifty packages here.

And I think I’ve posted this before, but it never gets old so fuck it:

Click to read more…