MetalSucks

These are some of my favorite producers and mixers for heavy music… It’s a challenging genre, and these guys are great in my opinion.

Click to read more…

Does anyone even remember Cannae? They were on Prosthetic. Their last album, Gold Becomes Sacrifice, was produced by Jason Suecof. But that was in 2005. Their MySpace page hasn’t been updated since 2006, but it also says that someone logged-in a couple of weeks ago. Meanwhile, Wikipedia makes no mention of them breaking up.

I don’t ask because I like Cannae; I found Gold to be wholly unmemorable. I ask because it’s a slow news day, and it seemed more fun to discuss the band with you, our faithful readers, than to e-mail someone at Prosthetic and ask “What the dilly?”

Here’s “Rats, Snakes and Thieves” from Gold Becomes Sacrifice.

-AR

If you enjoy melodic death-tinged power metal – and really, who doesn’t? – then it’s hard to imagine that you won’t enjoy Luna Mortis’ Century debut, The Absence. This shit is heavy, infectious, and epic as all get-out.

A big part of the reason why the album works is vocalist Mary Zimmer. A classically trained singer who once had aspirations of doing opera, Zimmer put to shame all the over-processed, auto-tuned vocalists that will inevitably let their fans down in a live setting. Her voice isn’t only powerful – it’s undeniably real.

Luna Mortis have just released a new, David Brodsky-directed video for the song “Forever More,” which you can watch above. They’ve also just hit the road with Edguy and Epicurean. You can get a complete tour itinerary here; then, after the jump, read my chat with Zimmer regarding all things metal. Raaaaar.

Click to read more…

Also quickly:

-AR

The first time we spoke to Dååth guitarist Eyal Levi, it was purely about being a Jew. That’s all well and good, but now that Dååth are about to release an excellent new album, The Concealers (out April 21 on Century/Roadrunner), it seemed like a mighty good time to actually speak to the dude about, y’know, music n’ shit.

In addition to being a ridiculously talented musician, songwriter, and producer, Levi is also just one of those people you meet who is all-around good dude. After the jump, get Eyal’s thoughts on the band’s new album, the media and metal scene’s perceptions of Dååth, why ATL purp is tops, and more.

Click to read more…

Few bands in modern metal are as exciting as Chimaira. That’s because few bands constantly undergo such a dramatic and undeniable evolutions from album to album – and do so with a bare minimum of line-up changes. From their 2000 self-released debut, This Present Darkness, right up to 2007’s Resurrection, Chimaira have never made the same album twice. Elements of thrash, death, groove, black, and even prog metal and punk abound, and, ultimately, the only thing you ever know for sure about a new Chimaira album is this: it’s gonna be heavy as a motherfucker, and just as catchy.

As the band – which includes guitarists Rob Arnold and Matt DeVries, bassist Jim LaMarca, drummer Andols Herrick, and keyboardist/sampler Chris Spicuzza – anticipates the April 21 release of their sixth album, The Infection, we were lucky enough to snag an exclusive e-mail interview with vocalist Mark Hunter. After the jump, read Mark’s thoughts on the group’s latest offering, the ongoing metamorphosis of their sound, reuniting with longtime producer Ben Schigel, the internet as a marketing tool, the state of his pure hatred, and more.

Click to read more…

While in the studio recording their new album, The Absence, the members of Luna Mortis decided to record a highly metallicized rendition of the Christmas classic “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.” Since the track won’t actually appear on the new album, they decided to let us pass it on to you… for free!

Luna Mortis vocalist Mary Zimmer explained the genesis of the track to us via e-mail:

What’s more metal than Christmas? A lot, actually. But, the suggestion from various people for us to tackle a ridiculous, guitar-laden, metal Christmas song had come many times, so finally we decided to do it. No vocals, we agreed, just ridiculous, shreddy, wanky & over the top. Brian [Koenig], our principal songwriter and shred master, wrote this hilarious, overdone rendition of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” and a few other popular holiday tunes layered in the middle of the song. We all thought it was great and tracked most of the song at my house. It was the first time we ever did anything like this, but we’re always messing around in our studio videos so it was only a matter of time before we recorded something like this. We hope you guys dig it and we wish you a very metal holiday season. Kick it Wisconsin style and crack some beer while you listen to this. Preferably a Wisconsin micro-brew. Go. Drink. Listen. Repeat. Metal.

-Mary Z

Stream the track below or download it here.

Luna Mortis, “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen”

The Absence was produced by Jason Suecof, and will be released on Century Media on February 10.

-MetalSucks

Get ready to start hearing a lot about Mutiny Within (formerly Mutiny), Roadrunner’s latest young gun signee. I had the pleasure of seeing this band perform in front of about 12 people at New York’s tiny Lit Lounge last year and was really fucking impressed that dudes so young had such impressive chops and brought such a powerful show.

Click to read more…

Here’s the Chimaira story for the week: even though it had been previously announced that the band would be making their new album with producer Jason Suecof, with whom they worked on 2007’s Resurrection, they are, instead, reuniting with Ben Schigel. Schigel was originally the vocalist for Switched, one of the worst nu metal bands these old ears have heard, but he did an awesome job producing two previous Chimaira albums, The Impossibility of Reason and Chimaira (He’s also worked with Walls of Jericho and – ugh – Drowning Pool.).

Lest you doubt that Schigel and Chimaira are a winning combination, here’s the video for “Save Ourselves” from their self-titled album. The song slays, even if the video is one of the worst I’ve ever seen.

-AR

I know some people that are absolutely fuckin’ fanatical about All That Remains, the Masshole group fronted by former Shadows Fall front dude/devout Christian/self-professed porn addict Phil Labonte (who actually seems to have found a fairly stable line-up for the band after years of constant member changes). I’ve always had a lot of respect for the band, but never quite got to a point where I was as into them as some of their American New Wave peers; maybe that’s because, as much as I’ve enjoyed their albums (particularly 2004’s This Darkened Heart), I’ve seen them live a few times and they never exactly knocked my socks off. Still, I’ll take them over As I Lay Dying any day of the week.

ANYWAY, ATR have a new album, Overcome, coming out on Prosthetic on September 16, and now two new songs from said album, entitled “Before the Damned” and “Relinquish,” have made their way onto the band’s MySpace page.

Click to read more…

And now for something completely different…

Kataklysm, “The Chains of Power” – from Prevail (Nuclear Blast)

This is pretty much the most brutal song I’ve ever heard this band do… we can only hope the entire album is this crushing.

Prevail, the latest from our favorite Canucks, comes out May 27. It features guest appearances from members of Cannibal Corpse, Overkill, and Jason Suecof, who is also mixing the album. Then the band hits the road for one of the best tours of the summer.

In the meantime, check out our interview with Kataklysm front man Maurizio Iacono.

-AR

The hype would have you believe that Bury Your Dead’s self-titled new release is a fresh start for the band, but as is so often the case, the hype is bullshit. So what if the songs no longer have tongue in cheek titles? They sound exactly the same as anything that appeared on the group’s last album, Beauty and the Breakdown.

In case you don’t know what that sounds like, it’s wall-to-wall chugga-chug breakdowns that, at their worst, sound a little too much like Korny nu-metal slightly re-designed for more current trends; for too many of these tracks, like “Sympathy Orchestra” and “Womb Disease,” it’s all too easy for visuals of camptocormic, dreadlocked guitarists to start bouncing through your brain. And a lot has been made of the fact that new front man Myke Terry – the band’s third since January of ‘07 – “sings” on some choruses (”Hands to Hide the Shame,” “Fever Dream,” etc.), and while I appreciate the seeming lack of autotune, these choruses are still pretty much screamed, and the attempt to inflect them with melody mostly makes it sound like Terry can’t stay on key to save his life. I’m all for clean vox, but only when your vocalist can actually sing, and, alas, it would seem that Terry cannot.

The final aural letdown of Bury Your Dead is Jason Suecof’s production; Suecof has done a lot of brilliant work in the past, but everything here is too synthetic-sounding by half.

Look: occasionally, BYD seem to stumble upon a head-bang worthy breakdown. But that’s just the laws of mathematical probability working in their favor; if you hit on enough chicks in one night, one of them is bound to fuck you, right? I see no reason to pat Bury Your Dead on the back for accidentally accomplishing that which other bands do with greater skill and thought and seemingly less effort.

(two out of five horns)

-AR

Back when we first heard that uber-producer du jour Jason Suecof was working with Lennon, we were more than a little surprised. But now that the project, called “Devil’s Gift,” has emerged, our surprise has been ugraded to shock in light of the fact that the song, “Shadow Never Ending,” SUCKS.

Let me say it again. This song SUCKS.

Lennon was never especially good – she sought to give listeners a “worst of both worlds” experience by creating nu metal for the Lillith Fair crowd – but Jesus Christ, this is some of the most insincere, trend-chasing bullshit I’ve subjected my poor ears to in a long while. Seriously, what could have brought about Lennon’s musical 180 if not some desire to (once again) try to be a cool Johnny-Come-Lately to an already dying scene? I think In This Moment are providing enough bad female-fronted American New Wank, but I guess Lennon felt she had something to contribute, too.

I really, really hope Suecof was well paid for this crap, because his street cred just went right in the shitter. Oh, well. We’ll always have Crotchduster.

Watch the video below. Better yet, don’t.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/BZu4Idv06co" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

-AR

I’ve heard 5:30 Saturday Morning, the debut album Lennon (né Lennon Murphy) released back around ‘99/2000, and it basically sounds like Tori Amos playing Korn, which is to say, it sounds like Evanescence but pre-dates Evanescence by a few years. I guess the word to describe it, then, would be “unremarkable.”

So I was more than a little surprised to find out that Lennon is working on a new album with Jason Suecof, the producer du jour who made his name working with such distinctly un-Lennonish bands as Trivium, Chimaira, and God Forbid (to say nothing of his own project, the comedic metal outfit Crotchduster). I don’t know if that means that Lennon wants to go heavier with her music of that Suecof decided that Dave Fortman’s Amy Lee-shaped pool would be a nice addition to his own home, so I guess we’ll all have to adopt a wait-and-see approach on this one.

For those of you unfamiliar with Lennon, here’s the video for her song “My Beautiful.” Although the song appeared in a distinctly more nu-metal form on 5:30, apparently she re-recorded a different version (called “Where Do I Fit In?”) for a later album. Still, I think it illustrates the completely fucking bizarre nature of the fact that she’s now hooked up with Suecof.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://youtube.com/v/m0c2xYvGMRc" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Stay tuned next week for the announcement that Erik Rutan is producing the new Michelle Branch album.

-AR