We have a decent amount of new stuff this week, including quality releases from Skeletonwitch, Black Cobra, Hull, Fuck The Facts and more. This writer’s opinion on all of it after the jump.

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I’m going to put about as much effort into this introduction as…

Yeah. THAT much effort.

ANYWAY, we begin today with ”Illumination,” the video for the title track for the free EP Immolation are giving away right now via Scion A/V. This not-especially-spectacular performance video debuted on Noisecreep, but, again, it’s Immolation and  Get Out of Jail Free card and really who cares you should go download the goddamn EP because it’s great and did I mention it’s free?

Scion A/V Presents: Immolation “Illumination” from Scion A/V on Vimeo.

Click to read more…

Happy birthday, Reign in Blood! We love you. You don’t sound a day over one.

Here’s some other things that happened this week which are worth celebrating:

• We started the countdown to The Metal Suckfest.
• We debuted new music by Immolation and a new video by Early Graves.
• Devin Townsend and Textures’ Jochem Jacobs and Bart Hennephof took us through their live rigs.
• GWAR’s David Brockie discussed the NFL, Daath’s Eyal Levi discussed getting the fuck out, and God Forbid’s Doc Coyle discussed how the times, they are a changin’.
• We spoke to Mike Muir from Suicidal Tendencies, Mother of Mercy’s Bob Wilson, and directors Sean Dunne and Kenneth Thomas.
• We checked out new releases by Ghoul and Taake and Craft.
• Sergeant D. became the most popular feminist in metal.
• Bring Me the Horizon’s Oli Sykes had a bad week.
• We mourned the death of the album intro track.
• We wondered if Mastodon’s live vocals are getting better.

Now go crank some Slayer.

See ya Monday.

-AR

Holy crap, what a great week to be an Immolation fan. Not only did the death metal legends kick off their North American headlining tour with Jungle Rot and Gigan… but they also announced that next week they’ll be releasing a free digital EP, Providence, via Scion A/V… and they give away the title track for that EP via our friends at Metal Injection… and now they have bestowed yet ANOTHER track from that EP, “Swallow the Fear,” for us to give away right here at MetalSucks.

And we couldn’t be happier about it. Speaking of the title track yesterday, one of our readers wrote that “The words ‘Fucking’ and ‘Epic’ come to mind,” and we think that goes double for this spine-crusher of a song.

You can stream it or download “Swallow the Fear” via the below widget; Scion A/V will give the entire Providence EP to the world for the low low cost of nothing starting this Tuesday, October 11. Meanwhile, you can get those Immolation tour dates here — and don’t forget that Scion is also giving away free tickets to these sure-to-be-brutaler-than-brutal shows via their Twitter account, so you best follow start following ‘em.

And now, without any more B.S. from us, enjoy “Swallow the Fear”…

Just yesterday we learned that Immolation will release a new, free EP called Providence for download next week via Scion A/V. But in case less-than-seven-days is too long for your impatient ass to wait for some new ‘lation — and I don’t blame you if it is — you’re in luck. ‘Cause our hebros over at Metal Injection are now giving away the title track.

And, no, it absolutely does not disappoint. It’s very much in line with last year’s Majesty and Decay (out now via Nuclear Blast), which is great, because Majesty and Decay impaled aardvark babies in a pretty major way.

So check that shit out right here. Providence will be released on October 11; Immolation are doing a North American headlining tour right now with support from Jungle Rot and Gigan. Get dates here. You can also win tickets by following Scion A/V on Twitter.

-AR

Immolation’s North American headlining tour kicks off tonight, and that news in and of itself should be enough to make you giddy; after all, Immolation rule, and last year’s Majesty and Decay was nothing short of spectacular. PLUS support is coming from Jungle Rot and Gigan, so whatever you pay for your ticket will most surely come back to you tenfold in joy and mosh sweat.

But now events have taken a turn for the even-more-exciting: Immolation has announced that starting this Tuesday, October 11, they’ll be giving away a new five-song EP, Providence, via Scion A/V, the entertainment division of the evil car company that keeps funding talented metal and hardcore bands in exchange for not making any money in return. WHAT A BUNCH OF FASCISTS.

And, oh yeah, to top it all off, Scion A/V is also giving away thirty-six free tickets to the aforementioned Immolation headlining tour via their Twitter feed. That giveaway will start on October 11, so you should probably start following them now.

Majesty and Decay is out now on Nuclear Blast. You can get those Immolation/Jungle Rot/Gigan tour dates here.

-AR

I hope everyone has been stashing loose change in their piggy banks, because it seems like there’s an awesome new tour for the fall being announced every few days recently. There’s the four incredible bills we’re sponsoring — Arch Enemy/DevilDriver/Skeletonwitch/Chtonic, Decapitated/Decrepit Birth/Fleshgod Apocalypse/Rings of Saturn/The Haarp Machine, Toxic Holocaust/Holy Grail/Krum Bums, and Exhumed/Goatwhore/Cephalic Carnage/Havok — plus the incredible bills with which we have no official connection — like Periphery/The Human Abstract/Textures/The Contortionist, and a bunch more you can find by perusing our “Tour de Force” section.

And the season just got that much more exciting: the mighty Immolation have announced a North American headlining tour, with support coming from Jungle Rot and Gigan, just to make the whole affair that much more worthy of your hard-earned dineros. It’s hard for me to imagine these shows won’t be a lot of fun; I mean, they basically had me at “Immolation.”

So, yeah… holy shit. It’s going to be impossible to be bored this fall.

Here are dates:

Click to read more…

We may have gotten a bunch of reader e-mails about the new Fleshgod Apocalypse video, but you know how many we got about the new Immolation video, for the title track from last year’s A Glorious Epoch? None. Zero. Zip. Zilch.

Again, I’m not taking issue with Fleshgod Apocalypse, who I think are great, but… c’mon, folks! IT’S IMMOLATION!!! Show some respect. Not only does this song absolutely CRUSH, but director Tommy Jones did a nice job with the clip, even if it isn’t really anything you haven’t seen before.

A Glorious Epoch is out now on Nuclear Blast. Hey, that’s the same label that’s putting out the new Fleshgod Apocalypse album!

-AR

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

This week’s question was once again suggested by “Hipsters Out of Metal!” columnist Anso DF, and even though the Grammy nominations were actually announced last week, it still seemed like a fun debate to have. So:

WHAT ARE YOUR NOMINATIONS FOR BEST METAL GRAMMY?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

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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.

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

This week, we have our first ever reader-suggested QOTW, coming from MetalSucks Maniac Cougar Party:

WHAT BANDS DO YOU HATE THAT YOU HAVE SEEN LIVE MULTIPLE TIMES BECAUSE THEY ARE ALWAYS OPENING FOR SOMEONE YOU LIKE?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

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NOTE: Devin Shidaker is no longer in Rose Funeral, even though for some reason he’s still listed as a member on the band’s MySpace page. Our apologies for including his name when we initially ran this story.

UPDATE: A source very close to the band tells us that this entire story is true. So that sucks. Original story follows…

Alright. So we’ve been getting e-mails about this since Thursday, and Vince and I struggled with whether or not to run anything about it because, well, the internet can be a terrible place full of nonsense, and we have no way to verify whether or not this event ever actually occurred. But now we’ve gotten so many e-mails about it, it seems like we have to say something.

Still, two disclaimers before we move forward:

1. This should be treated as an unsubstantiated rumor until further notice. Like I said, we’re currently unable to verify if there’s any truth to this story or not.
2. We’re not making any judgments, positive or negative, about Rose Funeral’s music. Whether or not we or anybody else thinks they’re a good band or not is the very definition of “beside the point” in this instance. The point is whether or not one or more members of the band did something really heinous.

And with that being said, here’s the story, as described to us via various e-mails from people who claim to have been present when this all went down…

Click to read more…

We’ve had the new Immolation album, Majesty and Decay, for a few weeks now, and, geepers, it’s swell, just swell. And as the headline says, track seven, a.k.a. “A Glorious Epoch,” is my favorite on the album.

And Immolation, or someone at their label, obviously thinks it’s a neat song, too, ’cause the band is now streaming it on their MySpace page! Along with the previously released (and MetalSucks-approved) track “The Purge,” this is Immolation fans’ second chance to hear some new music from Majesty, and, well, if they’re not already convinced the album is good, they’re never gonna be.

So stream the track here and then let us… ah, fuck it, you know the deal.

-AR

This ain’t exactly new news anymore, but I’ve been away for over a week so cut me some slack ok? NYC death metal OGs Immolation have a new song called “The Purge” posted on their MySpace page and it absolutely rips assholes, scrotums and vaginas. Sonically it sounds much better than anything they’ve done in the past and the playing is cleaner too — I haven’t heard their whole new record Majesty and Decay yet, but if the rest of it is this good then consider my psyched.

Majesty and Decay comes to the U.S. March 9th (and March 5th everywhere else), so we’ve only got to wait a little under 2 months to hear the rest of the Immolation pummeling. Immolation are currently bruising bodies all across the U.S. on the MetalSucks-sponsored Those Whom the Gods Detest Tour alongside Nile, Krisiun and Dreaming Dead (click for dates).

-VN

* I had to look up the meaning of “immolate” on Dictionary.com before writing this headline. True story.

Because Vince is in LA and I had a familial obligation, we totally missed the NY stop of this killer tour… But the now Abigail Williams-free, and the rest of the lineup is killer – Nile, Immolation, Krisiun and Dreaming Dead? That sounds like an awesome night of death metal to me.

Here’s some fan-filmed footage from the aforementioned NYC date, which I spotted on Blabbermouth. Get a complete list of remaining tour dates after the jump!

Click to read more…

… and the lineup is that much stronger for it, if you ask us, because they were kind of the odd band out on this tour anyway. Seems that drummer Ken Meyers has been injured, but no other details have been released.

The MetalSucks-sponsored U.S. trek also features Krisiun and Dreaming Dead, the latter of whom Axl recently realized are the cats pajamas and then some. The tour kicks off TODAY in Baltimore, so make sure you check the list of dates after the jump to see when it rolls through your town.

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This winter is shaping up to a great incredible one for U.S. metal tours.The European Summer festivals ain’t got nothin’ on us… ok, well yeah they do, but this winter’s U.S. metal tour slate is still most excellent.

There’s the much ballyhooed Between the Buried and Me / Cynic / The Devin Townsend Project / Scale the Summit North American Orgasm Tour, about which Axl shared his man-juice excitement yesterday. On January 15th death metal Egyptologists Nile kick off their mammoth Those Whom the Gods Detest Tour with Immolation, Krisiun, Abigail Williams and Dreaming Dead. Only five days later Arch Enemy embark on the MetalSucks-sponsored Tyrants of Evil Tour with Exodus, Arsis and Mutiny Within. The Pagan/Folk metal tour du jour this Winter is headlined by Korpiklaani with Tyr, Swashbuckle and White Wizzard in tow (the latter of whom are certainly not pagan or folk). And tomorrow The Metal As Art Tour featuring Hypno5e, Revocation and The Binary Code kicks off in Brooklyn and traverses the country for 31 days. Yowza!

Full lists of dates and venues for all four tours are posted after the jump. There’ve been a few venue changes so make sure you double-check… then feel free to bitch about how none of these tours are coming to your city and proceed to blame us.

Click to read more…

Nile, the reigning kings of extreme, technical, historically-themed brutality — and Immolation, New York based disharmonic-blackened-death-metal legends — are about to embark on the “Those Whom The Gods Detest” Tour in the new year! Joining them on the Decibel and MetalSucks-sponsored trek will be Brazilian death metal kings Krisiun, Abigail Williams, and Dreaming Dead.  The 32-date tour commences on January 15th, 2010 in Baltimore, Maryland.

Full list of dates after the jump.

Click to read more…

If there’s any justice in the world, The Red Chord’s excellent new album, Fed Through the Teeth Machine (read my four out of five horns review here), will cement Mike “Gunface” McKenzie’s status as one of his generation’s great guitar gods while introducing his truly unique playing to scores of new fans. Now The Red Chord’s sole axe slinger, Gunface really steps up his game on Teeth – the riffs and solos on this album are easily some of the year’s very best.

That being the case, I was very, very excited to have the opportunity to e-mail some questions to Gunface earlier this week. He follows bassist Greg Weeks and vocalist Guy Kozowyk as the latest member of The Red Chord to humor me by answering some truly idiotic (and hopefully a few intelligent) questions (I’m sure we’ll get to drummer Brad Fickeisen sooner or later). After the jump, get Gunface’s thoughts on the creation of Fed Through the Teeth Machine, writing solos, his various side projects, the value of the Death Star, and more.

Fed Through the Teeth Machine is out October 27 on Metal Blade.

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Noisecreep have unveiled their list of the Top 10 Death Metal Debut Albums (although the list is in no particular order), courtesy Friend of MetalSucks, Carlos Ramirez.

And for once, I don’t actually have any complaints. The list is pretty good.

That being said, I’m sure you folks will find something to bitch about, so… have at it!!!

-AR