“Scheduling has been a nightmare for a long time,” says guitarist Rob Caggiano about Temple Of The Black Moon. That seems like hyperbole, but gosh maybe not: TotBM drummer John Tempesta has been dashing between The Cult and Testament tours; singer Dani Filth’s full time job is Cradle Of Filth; Caggiano is bound to Anthrax’s rigorous itinerary, and his TotBM writing partner, Tom Cato Visnes, has been involved with Sahg, I, Gorgoroth, and Ov Hell outings in just the last five years.

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Say, are you one of the three people in the world who not only thought that metal needed another supergroup, but also thought that metal needed another supergroup featuring Anthrax/The Damned Things guitarist Rob Caggiano? If so, have we got a band for you!

They’re called Temple of the Black Moon, and in addition to Caggiano, the group features Cradle of Filth vocalist Dani Filth, former Gorgoroth bassist King ov Hell, and drummer John Tempesta, who has played a gajillion different bands, including both White Zombie and Rob Zombie’s solo group, Exodus, Testament, The Cult, and Helmet. It seems safe to assume that Caggiano played a significant role in putting this project together — not only did he produce two Cradle of Filth releases (2004′s Nymphetamine and 2006′s Thornography), but Tempesta has also worked as a drum tech for ‘Thrax — but between the two bands he’s already in and the producing he does, I can’t believe he felt like he had too much free time. Maybe Worship Music is seriously never coming out.

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In his review of The Underworld Regime, the debut album of “black metal dream team” Ov Hell, our own Sammy O’Hagar wrote the following:

With a group of dudes as impressive as this, all the great things about black metal are all but guaranteed to show up. And they do: the riffs are wall-to-wall excellent, Shagrath’s vocals — even despite the fact that I’m not particularly fond of Dimmu Borgir — are solid, and I’ll be damned if there’s a better drummer in black metal than Frost that’s not named Trym or Hellhammer (and even then, it’s a three-way tie). Ice Dale and Teloch even manage to throw in a spidery arpeggio every now and again to keep things from devolving into a haze of tremolo-picked minor chords. Yes, it’s cheesy, but like good power metal, it fully and unironically embraces it, transforming what most would make a groan-worthy affair into chest-beating awesomeness.

That sounds like something you’d wanna listen to, right? Well, now you can! Even though Prosthetic won’t release the album until April 13, our PLPs (that’s “platonic life partners”) at Metal Injection are streaming The Underworld Regime right now. Ov Hell features members of Dimmu Borgir, Gorgoroth, 1349, Enslaved, and Satyricon, so you just know it’ll be ebil. Listen now.

-AR

I suppose I distrust supergroups because it’s too easy. Throw a bunch of dudes in bands people like together and it should instantly equal something people like/something people will throw money down to hear. And while there are exceptions (Them Crooked Vultures, Shrinebuilder, Cream) to the eating-up-downtime/cash grab rule, it’s more often than not the standard (see: Damn Yankees, Chickenfoot, a library’s worth of other names). But occasionally bands fall right in the middle, where they’re not in it for breaking new ground but also aren’t in it to exploit listeners to get a new yacht (or a first yacht). And along with that comes a sense of nothing-to-lose, in that the bandmembers will have their more-successful day jobs when the project ends, so why not have a good time in the meanwhile? And this is the case for black metal dream team Ov Hell, which includes members of some of the most important bands in Norway. Jagged yet refined and mean but kind of fun, Ov Hell manage to sound pretty decent on their debut, The Underworld Regime. Not quite a classic but certainly more than a distraction, Ov Hell are some of black metal’s most essential dudes flexing their frostbitten muscle, and that’s certainly never a bad thing to hear.

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MS Maniac Kye has alerted us to the fact that Gorgoroth’s official website has posted an update regarding the long-brewing Gorgoroth naming rights battle, in which Gaahl and King ov Hell attempted to trademark the Gorgoroth name shortly before quitting the band. And…. the verdict has come down in favor of Infernus:

Oslo City District Court has today delivered a verdict on the main question in the Gorgoroth trademark case, which took place at the end of January 2009. The court has decided that King ov Hell’s trademark registration # 243365 of the band name Gorgoroth is NOT valid and shall therefore be deleted. The court states that King ov Hell and Gaahl excluded themselves from the band Gorgoroth when they tried to fire Infernus in October 2007. The court further states that Infernus cannot be excluded from Gorgoroth, unless he himself decides to quit. Infernus is very pleased, but not surprised, by this verdict. The remaining issues concerning financial matters and such are yet to be decided upon.

I’m not a big enough Gorgoroth fan to care much one way or the other, but presumably some of you will be extremely excited/outraged about this development. Battle it out in the comments section.

-VN