So back in May, Max Cavalera blamed Andreas Kisser for our current lack of a Sepultura reunion. And while I took Max’s side at the time, Anso schooled me right proper just a couple of days later, proposing that Max might be, um, less than honorable. And now that Max is changing his story just seventh months later, it’s getting really, really hard not to think that Anso nailed it right on the head.

See, all of a sudden, Max is on an anti-Paulo Jr. campaign. Last week he told Revolver that Paulo was “the only musician that didn’t improve much” during the classic Sepult-era, even going so far as to allege that Paulo didn’t record any of the bass tracks on any Sep releases prior to Roots. I didn’t think much of it at the time; for one thing, I don’t think that Paulo is anyone’s favorite member of Sepultura, and for another thing, even though it might seem weird that Max is asserting that for roughly a decade the band has a bass player so untalented that he couldn’t record his album tracks and no one ever thought to replace him, I’m sad to say that I’ve heard stories like that before, so it actually seemed entirely plausible.

But now Metal Insider has brought it to my attention that Max is once again talking smack on his former bandmate, this time saying it’s all Paulo’s fault, and not Andreas’ fault, that there hasn’t been a Sep reunion. He tells Sonic Excess:

Click to read more…

So last night’s question was tricky — so tricky, in fact, that only one person got it right! Necro’s real name is Ron Braunstein, and, yep, he’s Jewish. And despite his name, Darkest Hour’s Mike “Lonestar” Carrigan is, indeed, half-Jewish. I was caught off-guard when I saw Igor Cavalera included in this article at The Gauntlet (where a picture of From Exile’s Eric Guenther, who is not Jewish, is used for the entry on Daath’s Eyal Levi, who is… but I digress), but some research unearthed that fact that the former Sepultura drummer apparently converted when he got married. His brother Max also married a Jew, although I don’t think he converted. In any case, that just leaves Poison’s C.C. DeVille.

I understand why people would think that C.C. DeVille (né Bruce Johannesson) is Jewish, given that he’s loud, from Brooklyn, and has a big schnozz — hell, I used to assume that he was Jewish — but, alas, he’s not. So mazel tov to reader Joe Caperon, the only entrant who correctly answered the question. Joe wins a mystery prize courtesy of Century Media, and a dreidel, courtesy of us. Go Joe!

Here’s the question for night three:

• What is the name of infamous metal-themed music retailer in Tel Aviv?

E-mail your answer to axl [at] metalsucks.net with the phrase “HEAVY METAL HANNUKKAH – NIGHT 2″ in the subject line. All entries should include your name and mailing address in addition to your answer, and are due by 5 pm tomorrow (Saturday, December 4) evening. Shortly thereafter we’ll announce the winner and post night 4’s trivia question. And while you don’t have to be Jewish to enter the contest, you do have to live in the U.S. We need to conserve moolah to get all the MetalSucks Mansion Monkeys their Hanukkah gifts!!!

-AR

Longtime reader “RB” sent us the below clip from Brazilian MTV’s 2009 documentary about the country’s metal scene, Ruído das Minas (Noise from the Mines). I’ve never seen (or even heard of) the doc before (and without subtitles I wouldn’t be able to learn much from it anyway), but the clip shows Sepultura performing the song “Antichrist” live in 1985, the same year the song was including on their EP, Beastial Devastation. The thing is, the band is wearing corpse paint during the performance!

Although I’ve never seen footage of the band in corpse paint, the fact that Sepultura experimented with the stuff in their earliest days isn’t a exactly secret — in fact, I thought this footage might actually be of the band with their original vocalist, Wagner “Antichrist” Lamounier (later of Sarcófago fame)… and I’m honestly still not sure that it isn’t. That sure does look more like Lamounier than Max Cavalera to me, and, given his nick name, I’ve always assumed that Lamounier had something to do with “Antichrist.” But some investigation shows that he has no songwriting credit on the track, whereas Cavalera does, sooooooo… maybe someone with more knowledge than myself regarding Sep’s pre-Morbid Visions days can clear this up.

In any case, the footage sure is interesting!

And here’s what is apparently Sepultura’s first promo pic, with Lamounier:

Click to read more…

As always, I have to preface any judgment made based on a bootleg by pointing that any unofficial (and in this case probably illegal) release is not the best work by which to judge an artist.

But this audio recording of Cavalera Conspiracy performing a new song, “Warlord,” is not hitting my g-spot.

What I — and I think most people — liked about Inflikted was that it sounded an awful lot like pre-Roots Sepultura. And awesome pre-Roots Sepultura at that. If the Cavaleras had actually reunited with Sepultura, we really couldn’t hope for anything better. Not only did it blow every post-Max Sepultura release out of the water, it blew every Soulfly release out of the water, too.

And this song sounds a lot more like Soulfly than it does anything on Beneath the Remains.

Listen to it and tell me I’m wrong. I actually WANT to be wrong about this. I want the new Cavalera Conspiracy album to come out and make me eat my hat. I actually don’t own a hat right now (weird, right?), but I would happily purchase one specifically for the purposes of Cavalera-inflikted consumption.

-AR

[via]

Holy shit, is it seriously August already? It’s gonna start getting cold soon. Motherfucker. Here’s what we did this week when we should have been enjoying the sunshine and fresh air:

• We’re streaming Dementia/Dyslexia, the Metal Blade debut of Fleshwrought,  a new project from Animosity/Animals as Leaders’ Navene Koperweis and Job for a Cowboy’s Jonny Davy.
• We debuted an EPK for Iron Thrones’ The Wretched Sun.
• We also debuted “Fear, Emptiness, Decibel,” a new column from the editors of our favorite metal rag.
• We had a little beard on beard action with Andy Williams from Every Time I Die and Liam Wilson from The Dillinger Escape Plan. We also spoke to Avenged Sevenfold’s Johnny Christ, The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Jeff Tuttle and Pathology’s Dave Astor.
• We checked out the latest releases from Chimaira and Decrepit Birth.
• We schooled Korn’s Jonathan Davis on the BP Oil Spill.
• We questioned the sincerity of Max Cavalera’s claim that his collaboration with Fred Durst is all Ross Robinson’s fault.
• We questioned Glenn Danzig’s sanity. Again.
• We got pissy that Eddie’s not on the cover of the new Maiden album.
• We got boners watching 72 minutes of pro-shot Gojira footage.
• We did not get boners looking at Emmure noodz.
• We found the best bass player in the history of forever-ever-ever.

We’ll be hanging out at the Summer Slaughter show this Sunday here in NYC; if you spot us, please bring us presents. We like presents. Thanks.

-AR

As much as I love Max Cavalera, Soulfly basically started as a nu-metal band (and Roots is a nu-metal album… sorry, kids), and it’s sometimes hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that Cavalera had Fred Durst do a guest rap on SF’s 1998 self-titled debut. I tend to ignore it because a) the friend of my enemy is not necessarily my enemy, and b) Max has worked with plenty of dudes I  don’t like (Jonathan Davis) and plenty of dudes I do like (Greg Puciato, Chino Moreno), so, y’know, shit happens.

But the topic of working with Durst came up in a recent interview with PyroMusic.net, and… well, Cavalera basically places the blame for Durst’s appearance on producer Ross Robinson’s shoulders:

Click to read more…

Can you imagine if everyone to whom we give endless amounts of shit followed Dino’s example? We’d have Rose Funoral cards and Tommy Lee faking his own death and Fred Durst pulling a Billy Madison and pics of Joey Belladonna with his twig and berries tucked back. That’s the kinda world I wanna live in. I believe we can make it happen if we try.

ANYWAY, here’s some shit we did this week:

• We did a second installment of Cooking Contaminated.
• We’re streaming new tracks by Son of Aurelius.
• Eyal gave us a Daath studio update.
• We spoke to Max Cavalera and Ratt’s Bobby Blotzer.
• We suckered Decibel‘s Andrew Bonazelli into writing about the Metal Mets for us.
• We checked out some new German cheese metal releases.
• We called out David Draiman.
• We watched some great music videos, some awful music videos, and some really awful music videos.
• We made fun of the most annoying little kid in the world.
• We were sorry about Abacabb breaking up, but really happy about BOOBS!!!

Speaking of Eyal and studio updates: on Sunday I’m flying down to Atlanta to visit Daath in the studio. If you never hear from me again, assume I’ve been lost amidst a cloud of ATL purp smoke and awesome metal. But what a way to go!!!

-AR

To say that Max Cavalera put metal on the map isn’t exactly accurate; metal’s formative years dealt with pond-crossing pollination between Europe and the U.S. But Sepultura helped bring the idea that metal was a global entity into being, from their early death metal albums, proving them more than competen,t to their later thrash/groove metal records, which combined primal heaviness with South American instrumentation. Max has continued this in Soulfly, which, despite  hisliving in the U.S. for the last decade and a half, still includes bits of his heritage. Though Sabbath, Priest, Maiden, and so forth may have (unintentionally) presented metal as a mainly Anglo-Saxon phenomenon, Sepultura proved that if metal were going to be adored worldwide, it would be made worldwide as well. Their far-reaching success (both in the form of Max Cavalera’s Soulfly and the current incarnation of Sepultura) cements their very important place in metal.

Despite being in the game for more than twenty-five years, Max hasn’t shown any sign of slowing down. He founded Cavalera Conspiracy with his formerly estranged brother/ex-Sepultura drummer Igor; Soulfly’s recently-released Omen shows the same strength, vitality, and palatable riffs that the band has always been known for; and he’ll no doubt be hitting the road for the foreseeable future. In an interview with MetalSucks conducted shortly before the album’s release, Max talks about making Omen, discusses how he manages to rope in guest performers, and makes some lofty claims about the upcoming Cavalera Conspiracy album.

Click to read more…

I’m not so naive as to think that in any conflict there’s a evil-intentioned, deceitful jerk on one side who’s opposed diametrically by a lily-white innocent on the other. Especially in the entertainment biz, long a haven for those with awful people skills and only a passing acquaintance with reality. So we can all agree that to call hot, steaming bullshit! on Max Cavalera is in no way equivalent to an exoneration or endorsement of his foe and former bandmate Andreas Kisser. All I’m saying is that Cavalera’s latest statement, in which the woefully out-of-touch recovering nu-metalist attempts to turn the divided metal community against Kisser on the thinnest of premises, is embarrassing shit-talk at best and character assassination at worst.

Regardless of personal loyalties (full disclosure: I’m kinda anti-anything that lives in camo cargo shorts) or tastes (again, F.D.: Soulfly reeks), it’s hard to dispute the eye-rolling, head-slapping 8th-grade wackness of Cavalera’s logic. But just to be safe, let’s cart in the 100% impartial MetalSucks Translate-Bot 3000 to help us parse through the accusations in a May interview that Kisser squashed a proposed Sepultura reunion. Sure, even T-B3k emitted a sour wisp of oil fumes and the occasional clank when I began to feed in text that originates from a mega-stoner whose manager/wife has been describing his farts as musical perfume for two decades. But you’ll see that the results are stellar, if not uncannily laser-like in their precision. Take it away T-B3k:

Click to read more…

I don’t like to talk too much smack on Andreas Kisser, because he’s a terrific guitar player and I have no real evidence that he’s a jerk or whatever; I’ve never really seen or heard about him doing anything super-douchey, unless you consider his part in the dissolution of the classic Sepultura line-up super-douchey, which you might. It does seem awfully funny that Max Cavalera left and the band basically never made anything good again, but that really just suggests that Max was the driving creative force behind the Sepulturawesomeness, not necessarily that Andreas Kisser should suck it.

But awhile back there was a rumor that there was gonna be a Sepultureunion, and now Max has told AltSounds that it almost happened – except a certain guitar player ended up mucking up the works:

Click to read more…

Like a lot of projects that are the project after the project that made someone famous (got all that?), Soulfly seems to inspire a lot of heated debates. (Then again, this is metal, where the question “What’s for lunch?” seems to inspire a lot of heated debates.) I never liked Soulfly as much as a certain trio of Sepultura albums, but I never thought they were bad, either; Max Cavalera clearly wanted to follow the same creative path he started out on with Roots, and being one of three people in the world who doesn’t think that Roots was a brilliant game-changer, Soulfly just hasn’t been the super-awesome experience I’d like it to be.

But I did like 2005′s Dark Ages quite a bit; when I saw Soulfly play at Download in ’06, they put on a really fun show; and I think that their latest, Omen – which is now streaming in full – is the best album they’ve ever made. It is, by and large, far less nu-metally and considerably more old-Sepultura-ish than Soulfly has been in the past. Hell, a lot of the songs on the release are Sepulturic enough that they could be Cavalera Conspiracy songs. (Because let’s be real – the Sepultura we grew up with and love is alive in well, they just ain’t called “Sepultura” anymore.)  And since the new CC album ain’t comin’ out ’til 2011, well, Omen is not at all a bad way to tide yourself over.

Stream Omen here, then rage on in the comments section.

-AR

A few hours ago authorities evacuated Times Square for the second time in a week after someone found a “suspicious cooler” on the street. Of course, everyone was just being overly cautious, but as long as it doesn’t infringe on my civil rights, there’s nothing necessarily wrong with that. I think Vince was in Michigan when 9/11 went down, but I was here, and if I never see another tank rolling down my street again or run all over the city because there’s no cell service and I need to make sure that all of my friends and family are still alive, well, I’ll be good.

While I nurse my PTSD, here are some happier, metalier things that happened this week:

• We’re streaming Keep of Kalessin’s new album, Reptilian. We also debuted new music by Lamb of God and The Funeral Pyre.
• We also also also debuted new videos by Soulfly and Cancer Bats.
• We also also also also debuted our new cooking show, Cooking Contaminated.
• Cynic’s Paul Masvidal discussed the shape of silence, Periphery’s Bulb taught you how to get that “big” studio tone, As I Lay Dying’s Nick Hipa had some questions about L O S T, Matt from Rumpelstiltskin Grinder fondly recalled Maryland Deathfest, and Batillus bassist Willi Stabenau gave us a studio update.
• We talked to Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum, Reign Supreme’s Jay Pepito,  Jackyl’s Jesse James Dupree, and unveiled part one of our massive two-part interview with Buzz Osborne.
• We checked out the latest release by The Howling Wind.
• Does the fact that Mike Portnoy is touring with Avenged Sevenfold make you wanna see ‘em?
• We don’t want Joey Belladonna to return to Anthrax. Seriously.
• Sergeant D. wants to know if u mosh 4 Christ???
• Damnocracy’s Evan Seinfeld and his porno Howdy Doody also do bar mitzvahs.
• We wish there was really such a thing as a Slayer burrito.

Next week brings even more betterer br00tal goodness – interviews, debuts, guest blogs, all that shit. It’s gonna get real up in this bitch. See ya then.

-AR

Max Cavalera is still the fucking man. He’s been going strong with Soulfly for over a decade, continuing to carve his place in metal history and show the kiddies how it’s done. In fact, Soulfly’s seventh album, Omen, comes out May 25 on Roadrunner, and shows that Max is just as relevant to metal today as he was when Sepultura released Morbid Visions nearly twenty-five years ago.

MetalSucks is proud to bring you the exclusive worldwide debut of “Rise of the Fallen,” the new video for the first single off of Omen. It intercuts awesome performance footage with a you-are-there representation of Soulfly’s brutal pits and, of course, even features an appearance by The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Greg Puciato, who contributes guest vocals to the track. Check out the clip below – and don’t forget to pre-order a copy of Omen!

[This exclusive has now ended.]

For a limited time only, Soulfly are giving away a free mp3 of a new song, “Rise of the Fallen.” I found out via a tweet from Roadrunner, so I didn’t have any of the usual details of the track that come with a press release. And so when it started playing, I was all, “Gee, that’s not Max Cavalera singing. But the voice is so familiar. Is that Greg Puciato? It is Greg Puciato!” I’d like to think I would have recognized his voice even if I hadn’t been cranking Option Paralysis all week.

ANYWAY, “Rise” sounds pretty much like Puciato singing over a Soulfly song, which is to say that it sounds very much like Puciato singing over a Roots-era Sepultura song.  And while it’s kinda bizarre to Puciato singing on such a nu-metalish tune, his vocal performance really is top notch; I especially like the section that begins at the 2:41 mark. That’s some epic mosh-pit shit, dude.

Download the song here. It comes off of the new Soulfly album, Omen, which will be released May 25 on Roadrunner.

-AR

The artwork for Soulfly’s forthcoming Omen has been released, and… it’s not at ALL what I was expecting, but I’m really digging it. Soulfly artwork has been, in the past, more rooted in traditionalist metal imagery (skulls, weird creatures, etc.) and pseudo-ancient iconography; but this is some Dune-looking shit right here. I dig it.

Here’s the regular edition…

…and the special edition is after the jump!

Click to read more…

Is there really not already a metal song called “Lethal Injection?” I know there’s an Ice Cube album by that title, but I can’t think of any metal tunes by that name. That seems weird, ’cause it’s such an obvious title. Am I forgetting something really obvious?

While I search through my CD collection (’cause I still have a CD collection) to try and figure out if I’m missing something, here’s a bootleg video of “Lethal Injection,” a new Soulfly song, being performed live. Max Cavalera even got Prong’s Tommy Victor to come out and do guest vox, as he apparently does on Soulfly’s new album, Omen. It sounds pretty much like a Soulfly song to me. But props to Cavalera for being the metal d00d who finally laid claim to the song title.

Metal Injection also has a bunch of exclusive studio reports on the making of Omen. You can check those out here. The album comes out May 25 on Roadrunner.

-AR

Not that this really has anything to do with anything, but Blabbermouth reported over the weekend that Max Cavalera and his wife/manager Gloria are selling their Phoenix home (above) – which is 2,794-square-feet and has five bedrooms and three and half baths – for a list price of $1.475 million.

Now, Max’s musical output over the past ten years has been really solid, so he’s obviously not one of these rich dudes who has fallen out of touch and now makes art that is wholly irrelevant. And I know that taxes n’ shit will take a large chunk of whatever he and his wife end up making from the sale. Still, I no longer feel guilty about the fact that I never bought any Cavalera Conspiracy merch.

Also, the value of this home is still only, like, 1/100th of that of the MetalSucks Mansion. I actually tracked Vince down in Egypt and suggested we buy this home under the condition that Max be at the closing so we could meet him, but Vince, ever frugal, told me I should place an interview request through his publicist instead. What a party pooper.

If you’re wealthy and want to capitalize on Vince’s mistake, you can get more info on buying this luscious pad here.

-AR

…and that omen said it will come out May 4 on Roadrunner. And that it will feature guest appearances from The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Greg Puciato, Prong’s Tommy Victor, and (on b-side covers) Igor Cavalera and Zyon Cavalera. And, oh yeah, that it will be called Omen.

I’ve never liked Soulfly as much as I love Sepultura, but I did really enjoy Dark Ages, and the one time I caught the band live, they slayed. So while I’d much rather have a new Cavalera Conspiracy record, color me curious to hear this.

I’m less curious to hear the cover of “Refuse/Resist,” featuring the aforementioned Zyon Cavalera. Why does anyone ever cover their own song? The results are almost always disasterous – just ask Chuck Mosley or Slash…

-AR

I think I’ve made my feelings about remixes pretty clear in the past, but just to reiterate – I find them boring, pointless, and usually pretty awful. I mean, good for the band for getting their hardcore fans to pony up for a terrible version of a song they already owned, but I’m gonna pass.

So I was pretty pissed when I read this statement from Iggor Cavalera on Noisecreep:

“We have some ideas of maybe doing a remix album of ['Inflikted'] and have people like Justice or Soulwax — even some dub artists that my brother likes — remix the whole album.”

Mercifully, Iggor goes on to say that the remix record is “just an idea. It’s nothing confirmed,” and promises that he and brother Max “are talking about doing a new album in the future.” But I just want to be on record right now as saying that they just wait to do said new album. ‘Cause a collection of remixes won’t do much besides lower the cool quotient of Cavalera Conspiracy stock. I mean, “Sanctuary” needs a lot of bleeps and bloops and dee-dee-dees and do-doh-dos like Gene Hoglan needs a sandwich, y’know? Let’s just leave good enough alone fellas. Thanks.

-AR

Max Cavalera and Soulfly are back in the studio, working on their seventh (shit, time flies!) album, tentatively titled Omen, and those cool motherfuckers at Metal Injection got Mr. Cavalera himself to do an in-studio video update. Check it out:

Not to be disrespectful to Max Cavalera or nothing, but while you happen to be in a studio with Logan Mader, do you think you could give your brother a call and get crackin’ on a new Cavalera Conspiracy album, too? I’d be much obliged if ya did.

-AR