MetalSucks

There’s a lyric in the song “Hour of Rats” from Fed Through the Teeth Machine, the album by The Red Chord, and this particular lyric has really taken hold in my brain as of late: “WE’VE KNOWN EACH OTHER TOO LONG TO BE FRIENDS.” What a simple, beautiful statement that I can 110% relate to these days. Hm.

Speaking of The Red Chord…

• We’re streaming The Red Chord’s new album, Fed Through the Teeth Machine, through Monday! It’s awesome, so definitely give it a listen, then go buy it when Metal Blade releases it on Tuesday, October 27! We also spoke to The Red Chord’s Mike “Gunface” McKenzie.
• We got a European tour wrap-up from Chimaira’s Mark Hunter, had a nice chat with Kowloon Walled City’s Jason Pace, and even played nice with Oceano’s Andrew Mikhail.
• Lord Gold from Horse the Band graced us with another awesome tour blog, Eyal discussed physical CDs, and Dallas explored the evolution and importance of deathcore.
• We checked out new releases from Converge, Ancestors, and Smite the Righteous.
• Janet Reno quit Attack Attack!
• We’re fairly certain that Dave Mustaine is still a Megadick. Actually, we’re positive.

Have a good weekend everyone…

-AR

Last week we gave Fed Through the Teeth Machine, the incredible new album from death/grind/prog pioneers The Red Chord, four out of five horns, and, honestly, we’re not even sure that that’s a high enough rating. Certain to make many year-end lists, Fed Through the Teeth Machine displays The Red Chord doing what they do best: defying expectations, breaking genre conventions, and tearing the listener a new asshole.

Metal Blade will release Fed Through the Teeth Machine this coming Tuesday, October 27, but as always, MetalSucks has ya covered: we’re streaming the entire album now through Monday, so you can hear how awesome it is before you buy it. We hope you love it as much as we do.

And while we’re on the topic, why you don’t read our interview with The Red Chord’s Gunface about the making of the album?

[This promotion has ended. -Ed.]

If there’s any justice in the world, The Red Chord’s excellent new album, Fed Through the Teeth Machine (read my four out of five horns review here), will cement Mike “Gunface” McKenzie’s status as one of his generation’s great guitar gods while introducing his truly unique playing to scores of new fans. Now The Red Chord’s sole axe slinger, Gunface really steps up his game on Teeth – the riffs and solos on this album are easily some of the year’s very best.

That being the case, I was very, very excited to have the opportunity to e-mail some questions to Gunface earlier this week. He follows bassist Greg Weeks and vocalist Guy Kozowyk as the latest member of The Red Chord to humor me by answering some truly idiotic (and hopefully a few intelligent) questions (I’m sure we’ll get to drummer Brad Fickeisen sooner or later). After the jump, get Gunface’s thoughts on the creation of Fed Through the Teeth Machine, writing solos, his various side projects, the value of the Death Star, and more.

Fed Through the Teeth Machine is out October 27 on Metal Blade.

Click to read more…

Only history will tell us for sure, but I suspect that The Red Chord’s 2002 debut, Fused Together in Revolving Doors, will end up being regarded as one of the most influential metal records of its time. Its title is truly appropriate; it’s not a death album, it’s not a grind album, it’s not a hardcore album, it’s basically just a “play whatever the fuck we want album.” There are now hordes of bands aping it, and most of them are doing a shit job.

Meanwhile, three albums, seven years, and a whole bunch of line-up changes later, The Red Chord are just as uncompromising and self-assured in their vision. I have no idea what a teeth machine is – apparently it has something to do with zippers – but Fed Through the Teeth Machine certainly makes me feel as though that’s exactly what I’ve experienced.

Click to read more…

‘Cause the muthafuckin’ man himself, Trevor “Heartburn” Strnad, is going to call in. He’ll be discussing BDM’s excellent new album, Deflorate (in stores now!), taking questions from other callers, and participating in MI’s patented “Death or No Death” game, where you try to guess which death metal band names are real, and which ones are fake. The last time Rob Pasbani and the gang played that game, it was with The Red Chord’s Gunface, and he won. Can one Metal Blade artist who likes to act silly out perform another Metal Blade artist who likes to act silly? You’ll have to tune in to find out!

The show starts at 8 pm EST tonight; you can listen by going here. The Metal Injection Livecast is on Wednesday nights now, not Fridays, so you’re shit out of excuses to miss it!!!

-AR

Metal Blade will release The Red Chord’s new album, Fed Through the Teeth Machine, later this year. In the meantime, guitarist Mike “Gunface” McKenzie is shooting and editing an in-studio diary for our friends at Metal Injection.

Watch part four below. You can check out part one here, part two here, part three here, and a new song, “Floating Through the Vein,” here.

-AR

The Red Chord guitarist Mike “Gunface” McKenzie is shooting and editing an in-studio diary for our friends at Metal Injection chronicling the making of the band’s new album, which will hopefully drop later this year.

When we interviewed Red Chord bassist Greg Weeks last year, he described the band’s writing and recording process thusly:

“We all get in a room and yell at each other about stupid shit and then painstakingly put riffs together even though it kills us a little bit each time… We argue, we each want it done our way, we smell, we curse, we bleed all over the place, I kicked someone, let’s eat, we yell, we hate the way other people breathe, cannon ball, kitchen craft, we ignore suggestions, we’re ugly and Santa was there, too.”

Hopefully we’ll get to see some of this insanity in upcoming episodes of Gunface’s diary. In the meantime, here’s his first entry, which documents some drum tracking:

-AR