Is producer Mike Elizondo a weird match for Mastodon? Do you foresee Mastodon jamz with funky beats and cloying catchphrases? Is this pairing the result of label meddling, artist contrarianism, and/or ambition? Will Elizondo grapple with the Mastodon sensibility or is he a mute concession to a returns-hungry record label?

Mastodon’s triumphant 2009 album  Crack The Skye was helmed by Brendan O’Brien, a super hands-on producer. Far from the type to cover his face with a newspaper and fall asleep at the mixing board, dude will play on your jam, co-write it, and arrange it. He gets up in there. It’s like having an extra band member who can play instruments that require study and who owns a studio.

So, it may mean something that Mastodon’s forthcoming fifth album will be produced by a maker of vacuous pop music for Alanis Morissette, Pink, and Maroon 5. A hip hop beat button-pusher! A bass player!! Well, that’s Mike Elizondo, whose recent track record includes timeless greats Switchfoot and Avenged Sevenfold. That’s the guy charged with shepherding the next Mastodon classic. That’s him above left!

-ADF

There are now six songs* available online from Slash’s Slash, his forthcoming sort-of-but-not-really solo debut (as though Slash’s Snakepit wasn’t a solo band) that I care far too much about. If you include bonus tracks, that’s actually more than a full third of the album; if you don’t include bonus track, it’s (obviously) even more.

So I now feel pretty confident in saying this album won’t be horrible, even if it’s obviously never going to live up to GN’R, and features appearances by Kid Rock, Fergie, and the girl from Maroon 5.

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So the Australian branch of iTunes has apparently uploaded thirty-second clips of all the songs from Slash’s forthcoming, self-titled solo album, and, of course, someone has uploaded all of those clips to YouTube. Gotta love the internet! So I thought we’d play one of our favorite games here at MetalSucks. It’s called “Let’s make premature judgments based on not very much actual music at all.” Listen to the clips in the video below, and then get my thoughts after the jump.

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Based on their incredibly lame name, I assumed, when I sat down to listen to Kill Your Ex’s From Words to Motion, that KYE would be the gazillionth American band making a desperate attempt to sound like they were from Gothenburg. Having now listened to this album, all I can say is, I wish Kill Your Ex played third-rate metalcore.

Instead what we get is horrific yuppie alt-rock that would haunt my nightmares, if any of it were actually memorable enough for even my subconscious to somehow absorb. This garbage isn’t on the same level as Dredg, let alone a band like Muse or Coheed & Cambria; fuck, this shit isn’t even on the same level as Maroon 5. When I think of all the better things that could have been done with the money and resources it took to make this album – feed starving children, research a cure for cancer, get someone high/drunk/laid/whatever – it makes me want to exterminate the entire human race.

I’d say more, but really, what’s the point? I’ve already wasted two minutes of my life I’ll never get back typing shit about this worthless, worthless band.

(Fuck You out of Five Horns)

-AR