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Have you guys all seen Junius live yet? Holy shit, they are SO GOOD. I’m not nearly as enamored of their recordings as a lot of other people seem to be, but I’ll happily go see them live anytime. Their energy is just so righteous.
And now they’ve announced a co-headlining tour with O’Brother, who are really not a metal band, but whatever. JUNIUS LIVE! This is gonna be fun.
Here’s the tour itinerary, which I stole from Lambgoat:
FEATURING MEMBERS OF MELVINS, RED FANG, JUNIUS, EXHUMED, RWAKE, ORPHANED LAND, HULL, EARTH, AND KILL THE CLIENT
Every year year, MetalSucks asks musicians from across the vast spectrum of the metalsphere (or, in a few cases, the almost-metalsphere) what their favorite albums of the year have been. Death metallers, thrash metallers, black metallers, stoners, grinders, and djenters alike have graciously contributed lists to MS, and we’ll be running them in groups of nine to ten musicians at a time two to three times a day for the whole week.
After the jump, check out the next group… we hope you enjoy seeing what some of metal’s heaviest hitters were into this year as much as we have!
No surprise, but Evanescence and Five Finger Death Punch nabbed the #1 and #2 spots on the Current Hard Music charts for the third week in a row. The rest of of the Top 10 isn’t much better; aside from Foo Fighters (#4) and Mastodon (#8), the lot is pretty disappointing. BUT, there were solid debuts from Carnifex, Russian Circles (!), Structures, Black Tusk, Junius and more. Those numbers after the jump.
This week’s list of releases covers a lot of ground, between the sludge punk of Black Tusk, Noctem’s blackened thrash, a heavier side of Russian Circles, East of the Wall, Carnifex, Hammers of Misfortune and much more. Check it all out by clicking below.
I’m running out of ways to describe how good I think Junius are. I’m also running out of ways to describe their sound. The very first time I read this description I knew that the writer had hit the mark: Junius are The Smiths gone metal.
There’s a new Junius track called “The Universe Without Stars” streaming below, courtesy Guitar World, from their new album Reports From the Threshold of Death (due October 25 through Prosthetic Records, available for pre-order here). It’s the kind of album a lovelorn teenage girl might listen to on repeat whilst lying on her back facing the ceiling for hours on end. It’s also the kind of album a furry metal blogger from Brooklyn might listen to whilst enjoying his morning coffee.
You know what else I’m running out of? Ways to comunicate how aces this band is live. Seriously, you don’t have any idea what you’re in for until you see it, so if you live in a city where they’re playing any time soon I implore you to go do it.
I’m also running out of toilet paper. BRB.
-VN
Yes, it’s true: our interview with Enslaved’s brilliant bassist/vocalist, Grutle Kjellson, came at the end of a very long and stressful day involving behind-the-curtains technical issues here at MetalSucks, and another devastating loss by Vince’s beloved New York Mets. So, yeah, we may have had a few to loosen up before heading into Kjellson’s dressing room to chat. And, yeah, Vince’s can of Bud Light and Kjellson’s can of Corona were both the same color. So, yep yep, at one point, Vince did indeed pick up Kjellson’s beer and take a swig, and, yes, Kjellson did notice immediately. Lucky for us, he was cool about it.
Also lucky for us: the man is a great goddamn interview, and, it should go without saying, a great goddamn performer — later that night, Enslaved absolutely obliterated us, and their stellar performance more than made up for our otherwise crappy day, the embarrassing imbibing of the wrong drink included.
And so, after the jump, get Kjellson’s thoughts on the band’s latest North American headlining tour, their recent collaboration with Scion A/V, plans for their next album, the upcoming celebration party for their twentieth anniversary (!!!), and more.
HUGE drop of new releases this week including much-anticipated new records from Mastodon and Machine Head, as well as a ton of excellent other stuff from Craft, Dead In The Dirt, Landmine Marathon and more. My release reviews are a bit shorter than usual just due to the sheer volume of material coming out this week, but I think I covered most points of interest. Check it out after the jump. On a side note, Metalsucks wants to send a birthday shout-out to Rodney Githens, member of Vertebrae 33 and the artist behind the awesome Metal Suckfest poster. Have a good one, dude.
Lotsa new metal hit the interwebs this week that we didn’t have a chance to report on because there was just so much going on. Make sure you’ve got plenty of time to crank this new stuff before continuing, because it’s all great! Let’s go:
Junius are one of those bands whose albums I feel kinda lukewarm on, but who I think are totally fantastic live. And so while I’m still pretty bummed that Ghost had to drop off of Enslaved’s upcoming North American headlining tour with Alcest, I am really happy that Junius are now taking their spot. Like I said yesterday, even Enslaved/Alcest alone would be pretty much unmissable — hell, I’d happily go see either one of those bands just on their own — but now with Junius… well, just think of it as yet another awesome, awesome bonus.
Tour dates remain the same, and you can get those here. Our friends at Brooklyn Vegan are also streaming a new Junius track, “All Shall Float,” and you should give that a listen to, ’cause I may be crazy about that whole “Junius are great live and not great in the studio” thing and I’m curious to hear your opinions. The tune will appear on the band’s new offering, Reports From the Threshold of Death, which comes out October 25 on Prosthetic.
-AR
Fan donations are becoming an increasingly common fundraising tactic for bands to raise some dough following catastrophe; we’ve re-posted a handful of such calls on MetalSucks when bands found themselves in dire straight on the road due to van accidents, thefts or other shenanigans (Poison the Well, Periphery and The Ocean immediately come to mind). Philly-based post-metallers Rosetta are taking things to the next level, though, by not only asking for donations to cover costly van repairs bills incurred on their last tour but by promising to put some of that money towards a new recording. And by doing so in a much more organized manner than the usual “send donations to this PayPal address”-style drive.
Rosetta are using Kickstarter, a platform specifically designed for bands soliciting fan donations, to ask for money to help fund the recording of a new track for a split with MetalSucks fave atmospheric Cure-metallers Junius. Their goal of $900 has already been long surpassed (as of this writing they’ve raised $1,832) but perhaps the most striking figure is this: of the 47 people who have donated (“backers”), 9 people have pledged $100 or more to receive the “super-duper special package” (an LP of the Rosetta/Junius split from the most limited color pressing, signed by Rosetta, with your name in the album credits as a sponsoring partner). The band only made 9 of these packages available, meaning they’re sold out. Wow! Talk about fan loyalty and a new way of creating value in music in the Internet age.
Sir Sweatsalot Valient Himself leads the audience in mass synchronized rowing. Photo taken by yours truly.
“You had to be there.” It’s a phrase oft uttered by would-be storytellers who just can’t seem to convey the hilarity of said story to anyone who wasn’t, ya know, there. And it’s a phrase that perfectly applies to not just the particular Valeint Thorr, Junius and Howl show Axl and I witnessed in Brooklyn last week, but to each individual band in the broader sense. Try as we may, there’s no possible way we can convey to you how freaking awesome each band was at this show, and try as those bands may, it seems damn unlikely that any of these bands will ever be able to make a record that even comes close to approximating what it’s like to see them live. Simply put, these three bands are the very embodiment of “you had to be there.”
Valient Thorr must be experienced live to be experienced at all. Sure, you can get down with VT’s delicious concoction of southern rock and punk on their records, but in order to truly appreciate and understand what this band is about you’ve got to see and be a part of the live show. Mainman Valient Himself is all too aware of this fact, and it’s a topic we talked about at length in my interview with him last week. Turns out — surprise, surprise — that’s he’s got all sorts of theories about it, that a live show is the ultimate art form as a combination of audio, visual, and physical stimulation. The ideas he shared with me over the phone came off a whole lot like his infamous on-stage rants at VT’s shows. And if you’ve seen VT live, you know full well that said rants (VH describes them as “beliefs”) are some of the best in the biz.
We also chatted about Valient Thorr’s new record Stranger (out today! read a review by our own Urbandale Grimes here), their upcoming seven-week U.S. tour with Junius and Howl, how Valient Himself spends his time off, what it was like to work with producer Jack Endino, and how the band’s career might’ve been different if their records had been pushed in Walmarts the nation over.
I initially had a hard time reaching Mr. Himself on the phone, so he had to call me back from a landline at VT’s self-described “secret laboratory.” Our chat, after the jump.
So our year-end lists and the holidaze took over (as they often do), and I’ve been snoozing on writing something about this show….but a few things ought be said bout these two bands.
After the antics of the first day of the festival, I felt more than ready to get into day two with a healthy dose of music from the beginning. Unfortunately, that was not to be so for me, as at the time I thought I would be continuing on after SXSW into further ridonkulousness, all the way to a family vacation during Spring Break in Mexico….and today was the day that my renewed passport was meant to be FedExed to the flophouse where Vince and I were crashing.
When I had returned to said flophouse the night prior and to my surprise found an open couch in the living room right by the front door (where I was told FedEx homeboy would appear bright and early), I figured it prolly made the most sense to sleep right there on the ground floor as opposed to the stank upstairs sweat lodge where I would be sure to miss any sounds of door knocking.
Sadly, no FedEx arrived in the morning as promised — I was actually awoken by a phone call from Vince around noon wondering where the hell I had ended up last night. After a couple more hours my passport finally arrived, at which point I had to wait at least another hour for a cab to take me down to the action.
HOLY SHIT.
After yesterday morning’s scare, thankfully Kip turned up. On the couch downstairs at the flophouse we’re crashing at. Phew!
It was another fine day in Texas; 80 degrees, sunny, lots of metal. First up was Full Metal Texas, at which I saw Black Math Horsemen, Kylesa, Skeletonwitch and Fact. The End Records / MetalSucks showcase followed, at which Junius, Hull, These are They, Goes Cube, Tub Ring and Early Man rocked the confines of a tightly packed room that looked like an old European castle. My quick summary after the jump.
MetalSucks is proud to present, along with our friends at The End Records, an actual Official South by Southwest 2009 Showcase! Kip and I will be rockin’ with our cocks out in Austin, TX non-stop from Wednesday through Saturday while Axl and a particularly clever MS Mansion Monkey named “Higgins” hold down the fort here in NY. You’re likely to catch us at many of the awesome metal-flavored SXSW events going down this year (including but not limited to Full Metal Texas), but you will absolutely catch us at the kick-ass MetalSucks / The End Records showcase at The Ale House Pub on the eve of Thursday, March 19th. The killer lineup includes Junius, Hull, These are They, Goes Cube, Tub Ring and Early Man — holy fuckin’ shit!!
Set times and location after the jump. See you there.
