MetalSucks

I actually think that Metallica’s Live Metallica website is a cool idea. Even if James’ voice sounds like shit and I’m pretty sure Lars is literally confused about what those sticks some roadie just shoved into his hand are for, a high-quality recording of a show you recently attended is both a cooler and cheaper souvenir than, say, and $400,000 t-shirt (or whatever arena rawk bands charge for merch these days). And I fully support their recent decision to allow single-song downloads. Yes, it’s kind of ironic given the Napster mishegoss, but, y’know, whatever. Metallica aren’t the titans of metal that they once were, but every now and then they do something right.

Now Metal Insider tells us that they’ve launched an iPhone app version of the site, called – duh – Live Metallica:

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Because knocking on St. Anger never loses its appeal… even this techno re-imagining of Metallica’s “St. Anger” is better than the original. See also: the cover version by Theocracy’s Matt Smith.

[Thanks: Nicholas Antonio]

Zilty sent this one in… he is on a roll today!

This “tribute” to what is (in?)arguably the worst and most reviled Metallica album in that band’s career was created by Matt Smith of the Christian power metal band Theocracy, and is probably the best thing ever to be created by a Christian power metal band. It’s sophmoric, sure, but that doesn’t mean it’s not funny.

We have a good friend who actually really likes St. Anger and the snare sound on that record. To that friend, who I love like a brother and I know is reading this, I can only say: ppppffffffftttt.

-AR

Mere hours before Gojira played the best show of 2009, our friends at Metal Injection interview G to the Jira main man Joe Duplantier, and even got him to pick his favorite metal videos. No shock: the man has good taste. So, needless to say, this is pretty awesome.

Vince’s own interview with Joe should go up sometime next week. You’ll wanna read that, too. Trust me.

-AR

We’re pretty late on reporting this, but in case you haven’t heard, Megadeth main man Dave Mustaine has written an autobiography. It’s called Hello Me… Meet the Real Me, is supposed to come out in late 2010, and will actually be written by a dude named Joe Layden (Because rock stars never actually write their own shit. Except for the MetalSucks columnists like Dallas, Eyal, etc. But those dudes aren’t really “rock stars” I guess, so they still have some brains left.).

The clever title – which, in case you’re a total moron, is a lyric from “Sweating Bullets” – immediately made me giggle. Because while I think Mustaine is a brilliant musician, I don’t think he’s a very sincere dude, and I have a hard time believing that the book will actually tell us much about the “real” Dave Mustaine. Or, at least, the actual text won’t – there will probably be all sorts of fun Freudian deductions to made from reading between the lines. Still, there might be some good gossip in there somewhere. I definitely plan to buy a copy.

ANYWAY, here’s the video for “Sweating Bullets.” Side note: it was directed by Wayne Isham, who also directed 99% of all Metallica videos ever made. Hm.

-AR

Monday (actually sun down Sunday, but whatever) is Yom Kippur, which is the Jewish day of repentance. As you can imagine, I have a lot to repent for, so I won’t be doing any writing. Vince may or may not be here to give all the goy their bored-at-work dose of entertainment.

In the meantime, here are some fun things that happened this week:

• Dallas Coyle talked about “borrowing ideas” and talking shit, while Eyal Levi contemplated greener grass (not that kind of grass).
• We spoke to Every Time I Die’s Andy Williams and some of the dudes from Periphery.
• We suffered through the worst Metallica cover ever recorded.
• We wondered if Juggalos should be considered a gang.
• And it’s Gojira and Burst live FTW.

See ya Tuesday.

-AR

If I had a biological clock, I’d worry that’s it’s ticking. Because this is my second story about little kids today.

Reign in Blonde has made the awesome discovery of Jonah Rocks, who is a) the only four year old I’ve ever seen that can play the drums, and b) the only four year old I’m aware of that already has a stage name. He also seems to have an endorsement deal with Vic Firth. Holy poop.

For reasons that are totally beyond me, the videos of this lil’ tyke rockin’ out are not embeddable, but if you go here, you can watch Jonah play “Harvester of Sorrow” with more skill and passion than Lars Ulrich has displayed in years.

After the jump are some more links to Jonah playing. Some of these videos were made when he was only three years old!!!

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This video is from ‘94, but still… I’d never seen it before and found it, well, not funny, but, uh, interesting? Let’s say interesting.

I guess Cantrell and company weren’t too offended, though, ’cause in 2006, they performed with Hetfield:

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I don’t know who you are, Stefanie Heinzmann, but give yourself a big ol’ pat on the back. You’ve managed to make Avril Lavigne look like Chuck Schulinder. I’d rather listen to Attack Attack! cover Katy Perry, fer Chrissakes.

I’m saying this sucks.

MS Maniac Charlie Famer sent this to us, and claims that it was a big hit in Switzerland last year. Assuming that’s true, I’d just like to take this moment to say suck it, Switzerland.

-AR

Okay. So Manfred Nuggets clearly wins the “Tipster of the Day” award.

This is exactly what it looks like: Machine Head’s Rob Flynn. At Wembley Stadium. After his band opened for Metallica. In the crowd. Sining “Master of Puppets” along with the fans.

Regardless of what you think of Machine Head, you need to give the dude props for this. That is very cool.

-AR

Why, it was just yesterday that Rob Trujillo was saying if the Big Four tour goes down, “there’d be a lot of egos” to deal with, but that all the beef would be between Megadeth and Slayer, not, say, Megadeth and Metallica.

And then this morning we got a link to this clip from MS Maniac Manfred Nuggets:

Not that Hetfield’s voice sounds so good these days, but holy shit, is that fucking funny. And proof that there’s no love lost between Hetfield and Mustaine.

Sorry, Rob.

-AR

It was a mere two weeks ago that I was feeling pretty cynical about the prospects of a rumored Big Four tour becoming a reality. It just seems like there’s too much bad blood between too many of the bands for everyone to hit the road together.

But there’s also a lot of money to be made there, and in 2009 money wins every fight, even in the world of metal.

So here comes Robert Trujillo to get the rumor pot a-stirrin’ again. In a recent interview, the man/crab hybrid had this to say:

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The always-brilliant Rob Pasbani of Metal Injection was going through his usual daily routine – wake up late, wander over to computer, get high, play on computer, remain in boxers, fail to bathe… y’know, the life of your average blogger – when he made an amazing discovery: Google’s suggestions for popular searches related to metal are actually pretty dead-on. To wit, this non-altered, completely, 100% real screenshot:

AMAZING, right? Now if only iTunes and Netflix could actually make some decent recommendations based on my previous purchases and rentals.

Head over to Metal Injection for more incredible screenshots of metal-related Google search suggestions.

-AR

This is a story about a band I don’t care about getting involved in some drama with a band I haven’t cared about in at least fifteen years. But it’s still kinda amusing, so I’m posting it.

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If any two of the big four bands tour together, I think it’d be a pretty sweet show. Any three? Fucking amazing. But all four? That would have to be some kind of miracle, right? I mean, half these dudes hate each other. King and Mustaine practically make their living talking shit about Metallica – and one another, for that matter. So it’ll never happen, right?

Well, King now tells Metal Hammer otherwise. Sort of.

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We are often asked how we train the MetalSucks Mansion Monkeys, and the answer is surprisingly simple: we just play them metal. That’s one of the key reasons we selected monkeys to do our bidding. Yes, they like to throw poop, but they are excellent typists and just fucking love metal.

And now a scientific study at the University of Wisconsin confirms this little fact (about monkeys liking metal, not them being excellent typists). Satan Rosenbloom just showed us this story about the study, which found that monkeys prefer metal to classical, jazz, and even a certain classic rock giant:

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It’s a well known fact that Weezer mastermind River Cuomo is a metalhead (see ridiculous photo above). But I’ve read numerous interviews with the guy over the years where he promised (or threatened, depending on your point of view) to a metal album – even going so far as to claim that Maladroit was Weezer’s metal album – and the thing never seems to materialize.

Well, as it turns out, Weezer might have already made their contribution to metal, and I just wasn’t paying very close attention. SMN News pointed us to this interview with Weezer mastermind River Cuomo, in which he admits to biting off Metallica:

“‘The Sweater Song’ was the first Weezer song I ever wrote, back in 1991… I was trying to write a Velvet Underground-type song because I was super into them, and I came up with that guitar riff… It wasn’t until years after I wrote it that I realized it’s almost a complete rip-off of ‘Sanitarium’ by Metallica. It just perfectly encapsulates Weezer to me — you’re trying to be cool like Velvet Underground but your metal roots just pump through unconsciously.”

Oddly enough, I’d never really noticed the similarities between the two songs in the past. Hm.

Check out both songs after the jump and decide for yourself whether or not Cuomo really owes Metallica a royalty check or ten.

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So what was your entre into the world where denim, leather n’ demonology reign supreme? Where you adore the goat and sway to the symphony of deee-struction? Every man (or woman) has a tale to tell. Here’s mine. You’re gonna hear a lot of names you might be unfamiliar with, especially if you’re a member of Attack Attack! (Or just plain anyone under 23!) You’re gonna be thinking, “Damn, this fucker is old!” Yeah, well just remember that I’ve seen seen stuff that would make you shit Perrier with jealousy. I’m definitely old enough to have seen Minor Threat, Cliff Burton-era Metallica… the list goes on… before most of you were a tadpole in yer pappy’s population paste.

Let’s start at Discharge. I could go back and trace the whole history of early 80’s hardcore for you, but neither of us have the time or attention span. Let’s just say, the minute I heard these Stroke-on-Trent monsters of the nuclear reactor riff on the monstrous Hear Nothing, See Nothing, Say Nothing album, I nearly pissed my pants. It was the gateway to something far heavier than I had ever heard on a scratchy 7” from the new record store that had opened in Boston called Newbury Comics.

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It’s not that I think that the members of Napalm Death and Dream Theater have a limited musical palette. Quite the contrary; I’d imagine the musicians that make up these particular bands probably have very diverse tastes.

Still. If I found out that Alex Webster listened to a lot of Roni Spektor, I wouldn’t expect a collaboration between the Russian chanteuse and the death metal legend, y’know?

So. Tom Fassnidge sent us this video of Napalm Death’s Barney Greenway teaming up with some of the dudes from Dream Theater to cover Metallica’s “Damage Inc.” It’s an old video – lookit Barney’s hair!!! – but neither Vince nor myself had ever seen it before. And it’s pretty awesome – look at how much fun Petrucci and Portnoy are having! And, yes, I know that DT have covered entire Metallica albums live in concert before. But it’s the “WHAT THE FUCK IS A MEMBER OF NAPALM DEATH DOING UP THERE?” of it all that makes this video truly worthwhile, in my opinion at least.

Extra bonus: for those of us who find James LaBrie to be a big gaping vagina, we now get to see what DT might be like with singer who isn’t a eunuch.

-AR

Behemoth vs. Winds of Plague; Poland vs. America; Corpsepaint vs. wigger hats; ugly men vs. hot chick; real metal vs. deathcore; substance vs. gimmick. Who won????

The answer, as well as more of this past week’s metal Soundscan chart positions and sales figures, after the jump.

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