This is just me, but I attend Darkest Hour shows mostly to make goo-goo eyes at guitarist Mike Schleibaum, fellow devotée of my boner band The Crown (and The Cars). That’s my M.O. no judgements please. Still I was bummed when sweet drummer Ryan Parrish announced his departure from DH late last year. But dude is already in A Cancerous Affair, the project started by his former DH bandmate and guitar freak Kris Norris. And which now welcomes its newest member, keyboardist Knockerz Randall.

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FEATURING MEMBERS OF GWAR, DARKEST HOUR, REVOCATION, INTRONAUT, ABYSMAL DAWN, BRUTAL TRUTH, THE ATLAS MOTH, AND IKILLYA

Every year year, MetalSucks asks musicians from across the vast spectrum of the metalsphere (or, in a few cases, the almost-metalsphere) what their favorite albums of the year have been. Death metallers, thrash metallers, black metallers, stoners, grinders, and djenters alike have graciously contributed lists to MS, and we’ll be running them in groups of nine to ten musicians at a time two to three times a day for the whole week.

After the jump, check out the next group… we hope you enjoy seeing what some of metal’s heaviest hitters were into this year as much as we have!

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I’m a big fan of John Henry, the vocalist for Darkest Hour, and all that he adds to that band’s music. (I like screaming. What can I say?) That being said, I’m also a huge fan of the other four dudes in the band, and will pretty much never complain about a chance to listen to the awesome dual shred brought by The Two Mikes (that would be Schleibaum and Carrigan).

And so I embrace the newly-released instrumental version of DH’s latest offering, The Human Romance. In a statement announcing this version of the album’s (very sudden) unveiling, Mr. Schleibaum proclaims it to be for “geeks, shredders, stem junkies and Karaoke fanatics;” I guess I fall into at least one, and possibly two, of those categories.

ANYWAY, you can buy the instrumental edition of the album on iTunes for just eight bucks, so get on that shit. And don’t forget that Darkest Hour are part of the MetalSucks-sponsored Summer Slaughter tour, which starts TOMORROW, and also features The Black Dahlia Murder, Whitechapel, Dying Fetus, Six Feet Under, Fleshgod Apocalypse, Oceano, As Blood Runs Black, Powerglove, and Within the Ruins. Get dates here.

-AR

I was thinking the other day about how some bands make a lot of money even though they always get bad reviews and it seems like nobody likes them. Like how everybody is all “I H8 DEATHCORE/METALCORE;;;ALL THE BANDS SOUND THE SAME;H8 U SUISIDE SILENCE;;H8 U ATTACK ATTACK,” and then they are like “U SHOULD LISTEN TO THIS BAND BECAUSE THEY ARE DOING SOMETHING REALLY ORIGINAL AND UNIQUE” and link to some obscure band I have never heard of. I guess it is cool to be original if you are OK with being a poor artist, but sometimes I think it’s stupid to be “original.” I think it is smarter to wait until someone else invents something, then after they make it popular, copy them (only do it a little better so you get more popular than the band who invented it).

I am going to list some bands who were stupid, because they were the ones who invented something that other people copied — metalcore, djent, and other popular styles of metal. Most of these bands were really good, but because they were one of the first bands to play that style of metal, nobody liked them and they didn’t make any money. I feel bad for them, but I want to share their stories here so you don’t make the same mistakes they did!!

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FEATURING MEMBERS OF INTRONAUT, DARKEST HOUR, THE RED CHORD, KYLESA, GORGOROTH, CORMORANT, RETURN TO EARTH, KRIEG, LAZARUS A.D., HAIL OF BULLETS, AND BLOODHORSE

For 2010, we decided to do something special as part of our regular end-of-year festivities here at MetalSucks — namely, ask musicians from across the vast spectrum of the metalsphere (or, in a few cases, the almost-metalsphere) what their favorite albums of the year were. Death metallers, thrash metallers, black metallers, stoners, grinders, and djenters alike graciously contributed lists to MS, and we’ll be running them in groups of ten to eleven musicians at a time twice a day for the rest of the week.

After the jump, check out the fifth group… we hope you enjoy seeing what some of metal’s heaviest hitters were into this year as much as we have!

(And please note that these are musicians and that they, um, have a lot on their minds. So some of ‘em named albums that actually came out last year. Please don’t freak out.)

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It seems like the number of “Why did you ban me from commenting?!?” e-mails from readers has increased as of late, and the gist of those e-mails is often “Whassa matter, can’t take it when someone tells you you suck?” or whatever. And we’ve never banned anyone for disagreeing with us. We don’t give a shit if you disagree with us. We don’t agree with one another half the time — that’s part of the fun of MetalSucks.

Here’s what really happens: you use a word which is on our “no-no” list, and it gets stuck in our spam filter. Some of these words we actively do not allow on MetalSucks (e.g., slurs against minorities), and some of them just get stuck because so many actual spammers use them (e.g., “rape”). We try to be diligent about checking the spam filters and making sure none of you are getting caught in there, but sometimes we miss a few. And sometimes we ultimately don’t allow the comment onto the site (e.g., “I hate this album, this band is fucking gay” will never survive). But even then, we don’t BAN people from commenting. I think I can count on one hand the number of people we’ve banned in four years, and most of them were spammers and/or former Megadeth guitarists. So if your comment isn’t going through, consider first if you used a word we don’t allow, and if you didn’t, just shoot us a POLITE e-mail and we’ll investigage the problem ASAP. M’kay?

And on that note, here’s what we did this week:

• Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum gave us our latest Legacy Tour diary, Intronaut’s Sacha Dunable worked out his black metal daddy issues, and The Red Chord’s Greg Weeks offered to write a song for any sports team that’s not from New York.
• We spoke to After the Burial’s Trent Hafdahl and American Hardcore author Steven Blush.
• We got the skinny from Darkest Hour’s Ryan Parrish about why DH and Veil of Maya got kicked off their own tour bus, and asked Jucifer’s Amber Valentine about Sean Yseult’s claim to being the only woman in metal during her tenure in White Zombie.
• We checked out the latest release from The Unraveling.
• Sergeant D. schooled us in uber-kvlt metalcore bands.
• We contemplated the worst metal albums of 2010 and the best metal songs of 2010.
• We mourned on the six year anniversary of Dimebag’s murder.
• We celebrated Ozzy Osbourne’s terrific taste in modern metal (he put Korn above Firewind).
• We had mixed feelings about the retirement of Judas Priest.
• We got excited that At the Gates are playing more shows in 2011.

Alrighty then. Next week is our last week of regular posting before we shut down for the holidays. You know what that means – YEAR END LISTS! Get ready to argue like your entire sense of self-worth depended on everyone agreeing with you all the time with no exceptions ever.

-AR

As part of our sponsorship of The Legacy Tour featuring Darkest Hour, Veil of Maya, Periphery and Revocation, one member from each band will be penning an exclusive blog entry for MetalSucks to run during the tour (get a full list of tour dates here). Our first entry featured Veil of Maya guitarist Marc Okubo taking us on a run-through of his entire live rig, and the second entry was an update from Revocation’s Dave Davidson, and in the third Periphery’s Misha Mansoor talked about his new direct-to-PA live amp setup. For the fourth and final entry, here’s Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum resuscitating his “The Underrated” MetalSucks column:

LETS GET THIS BAND BACK TOGETHER: CURSED

Greetings from a rat infested parking lot in Lubbock, TX, AKA the road! While I could write about the military strategy Lonestar and Ryan used to get the Whiskey A Go Go dancers on the bus this week in LA or how the 5150 (3′s) made by Fender/EVH might just be the ultimate high gain amp, I’m not. Rather I have decided to litter the internet with yet another opinion-related piece.

Since I have written in the past of unsung heros or overlooked records, I thought I might do that once more. Living on tour every day keeps us surrounded by music and fresh sounds (good or bad) assaulting our ears every day. Still, it’s important not to forget great bands and records that for whatever reason have their little notch in time. So I’ll just plug our new record, The Human Romance, out Feb 22, 2011 on E1 and then I’ll use this space right here to tell you about a band that should not be forgotten: Canada’s Cursed.

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The cover art for the new Darkest Hour album?

On Saturday night we went to see Darkest Hour on their MetalSucks-sponsored fifteenth anniversary Legacy Tour along with Veil of Maya, Periphery, and Revocation. We had an AWESOME time, and you should definitely hit one of these shows up if you can (get dates here). Darkest Hour are playing material spanning their entire discography, including some pretty rare shit they haven’t done live in a long, long time. Vince and I both have this thing where we won’t listen to a band we’re going to see for weeks beforehand, because the delayed gratification makes the experience of seeing them that much more killer; but I know we’ve both been cranking Darkest Hour in our respective corners of the MetalSucks Mansion pretty much non-stop ever since.

And soon we’ll have another offering from the band to rock out to — they’ll be releasing a new album (their debut for E1) early next year. The Metal Injection dudes interviewed DH guitarist/MetalSucks columnist Mike Schleibaum  and drummer Ryan Parrish before the show, and got all kinds of exclusive skinny on the new record, including the album’s title and release date, plus the duo’s thoughts on working with producer (and Soilwork guitarist) Peter Wichers. Check the interview out here.

And if you’re itching for even more Darkest Hour info, check out Vince’s interview with Schleibaum about switching to E1 from Victory here.

-AR

Well, funny you should ask that question, because Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum and Periphery’s Misha Mansoor just got together to jam and filmed it for ya’ll. This is topical, of course, because both bands are touring together as part of the MetalSucks-sponsored Legacy Tour along with Veil of Maya and Revocation.

Mike and Misha are two extremely talented writers and guitar players with distinctly different styles, so the concept of a collabo is pretty cool to me. Seeing as they’re both D.C. natives, maybe they’ll get together to record a proper shred record at some point in the future? Based on this video I certainly think that’d make for an interesting album. Make sure you sit through the intro stuff in this video to watch the jam sesh at the end… or just skip to around 1:50, you impatient prick.

Also: how stoned does Mike look in this clip?

-VN

My little date book (yeah, I still keep a hand-written calendar!) tells me it’s almost November, which means the MetalSucks sponsored Legacy Tour — featuring Darkest Hour playing a “best of” set from their 15 year career, along with Veil of Maya, Periphery and Revocation — is right around the corner. The tour kicks off November 12th in the Northeast and runs counter-clockwise around the U.S. and Canada, ending exactly 1 month later back east, meaning most of you should be able to attend what will surely be a fun night of metal. Even those of you in Florida!

To give you all fans a little something extra, Darkest Hour are teaming up with Guitar Hero to offer one really adept plastic-button-pusher the chance to show their mad GH skillz in a battle royale against DH real-deal-shredders Mike Schleibaum and/or Mike “Lonestar” Carrigan. Alls ya gotta do to enter is submit a video or screen cap of your “Difficult”-level high score on certain GH games. In addition to the meet-and-shred, the winner will also receive a whole buncha other cool shit. Details for the contest are here.

As for those tour dates, jump on past the “read more” to have a gander.

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What do dudes in bands do when they’re not out on the road and they’re still between album releases? Work on side projects of course, an endeavor I’ve previously stated to have a strong affinity for. I just love getting to hear what metal dudes write when they don’t feel confined to the specific style of their main band because the result is usually at least one pretty big step away from metal and we get a good glimpse into said metal dude’s non-metal influences.

In the case of Darkest Hour founding guitarist Mike Schleibaum, while he’s been working on writing the very first Darkest Hour record for new label E1 he’s also managed to find some time to put a punk side-project together with what he describes in a personal email to MetalSucks as “a bunch of my old friends.” If you’ve ever met Mike or even read interviews with him, you know the guy grew up on punk in addition to the Swedish and Swedish-inspired metal that’s defined the band’s sound. So in the case of his new project — Beasts of No Nation — what we’ve got is a bonafide punk band. The music is fun and up-beat… and fuckin’ punk. I’m no punk expert so I’m not gonna risk making a fool of myself by name-checking potential influences I know nothing about, so I’ll just say this: I like Beasts of No Nation, and so should you!

Check out three songs from Beasts of No Nation’s forthcoming album on MySpace (release date TBA). Beasts of No Nation will play their inaugural show on Thursday, August 26th @ DC9 in Washington DC with Domino Team and SEAS. I bet that show is gonna be a lot of fun.

-VN

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

Six albums and ten years after signing with Victory Records, Darkest Hour found themselves free agents after their most recent release, 2009′s The Eternal Return. Last month’s announcement that Darkest Hour had signed with E1 (formerly Koch) came as a surprise to many who thought they’d end up on a more established metal label but makes perfect sense given E1′s recent track record of signing already established metal acts.

Shortly after the band announced their new label, I caught up with Darkest Hour guitarist, occasional MS columnist, fellow member of The Tribe and MS interview alum Mike Schleibaum to chat about the band’s career, their recent label move, and what to expect on the next record (it’s already being written). Darkest Hour were doing a short string of headline dates on their way back from their U.S. tour with Dillinger Escape Plan, Animals as Leaders and Iwrestledabearonce, and though a slight snafu prevented us from talking the day we’d originally planned on, we hooked up the next afternoon. Our chat after the cut.

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The second-to-last night of Summer Slaughter — the first of two nights at NYC’s Irving Plaza — was a fucking party. Axl and Vince arrived before doors opened to interview Darkest Hour mastermind Mike Schleibaum and were summarily handed beers. “New York City . . . oh god. Suffocation, and also sharing your dressing room [with Suffocation]. . . there’s going to be a lot of drinking. Beer is going to be hard to get. We should really start right after this interview!” mused Schleibaum before handing us a couple of Bud Lights to get things started off right. “It’s just a Bud Light, my friends,” he responded after we thanked him for the hospitality; true, but somehow “just a Bud Light” turned into “just a bottle of Jack Daniels” being completely polished off in the DH / Suffocation dressing room shortly thereafter. “The thing is – it’s going to get all drank by the time Blackguard’s finished,” prophecized Schleibaum. And so it went. The men of DH like their Jack (and their weed) and the endless stream of Suffocation ladies — 40-something Lawngisland bleach blondes with giant, fake tits — that paraded through the room all night provided much amusement for our chemically altered brains.

But before all of the shenanigans went down we sat with Mr. Schleibaum and chatted about the Summer Slaughter tour, the band’s new album The Eternal Return, the end of Darkest Hour’s deal with Victory Records and what that means for the band, the departure of guitarist Kris Norris and subsequent replacement with ex-At All Cost axeman Mike “Lonestar” Carrigan, working with producer Devin Townsend in the past, and a slew of other topics. Our chat, after the jump.

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It may be a new year on the calendar, but we’re still talking about the same stupid shit here at MetalSucks. Here’s where we focused our energies this week:

• Most awesomest metal festival EVARRR! Not to be confused with the most awesomest tours of early 2009.
  
• New music from Cannibal Corpse!!!
• Mastodon counted down to a new website while Trent Reznor counted down to giving away approximately 400 Gigs of HD concert footage for fans to tinker with.
• We questioned Drew Barrymore’s interest in metal and demanded she take off her shirt.
• We spoke with members of All Shall Perish and Job For a Cowboy.
• Mike Schleibaum declared The Crown’s Deathrace King underrated while Dallas claimed music critics are overrated.
• Can’t anyone make a decent heavy metal TV show?
• One Roadrunner Records staffer named MetalSucks.net the #10 best album of 2008.

Later, gators…

[In which Darkest Hour guitarist Mike Schleibaum waxes ecstatic about the most underrated metal albums of all time, in his humble opinion.]

So you love Swedish Metal. You have all the sick records by In Flames, At the Gates, Entombed, Soilwork, The Haunted, Hypocrisy, Opeth, shit, you even have Darkane and Dismember in your collection. Sooooo  then you love The Crown right? Yeah ok, there’s probably a few dudes thinking, “Shit, I know who The Crown are. Is he crazy?” I’ll get into it later, but I know for a fact that even at the height of their popularity in the USA we as metal heads in the states did a shitty job of showing the love. (And that was four or five years ago!) It’s with this in mind that I fear this great band (in particular this specific great record) may pass unnoticed and in the spirit of all things rock I offer up to you The Crown and their slaughtering Deathrace King record! Take it from a dude who has spent all of his adult life searching for inspiration in metal: this band, this record, are inspiring.
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Blabbermouth tells me that the below video of Darkest Hour preparing for their recent Washington, D.C. homecoming gig was created by a blog called DCist. But to be completely honest, my interest lies in seeing former At All Cost guitarist/new edition to Darkest Hour, Mike “Lonestar” Carrigan, become integrated into the band. Mike is a) one of the nicest dudes on the face of the planet, b) an awesome guitar player, and c) half-Jewish, so it’s basically awesome to see him rocking out with founding member/MetalSucks guest blogger Mike Schleibaum – I mean, look at Carrigan shred! Ridiculous.

Also ridiculous: what happens to Mike at the 1:06 mark.

Yuk-yuk.

-AR

[In addition to writing and performing in New Wave of American Heavy Metal pioneers Darkest Hour, guitarist (and BS degree in Social Work!) Mike Schleibaum also writes for his own informative and funny website Ask The Dude. The dude himself contacted us about writing a guest blog for MetalSucks, and somehow in between his various other activities that actually, ya know, pay the bills, he somehow found time to do it. We hope he'll be a regular contributor whenever time allows. Let us know what you think. -Ed.]

The Underrated: Entombed

Like many fellow dudes who have dedicated their lives to moshing hard and jamming heavy metal I find myself continuously on the hunt for new records that can make me feel the way I did the first time I heard Metallica’s Master of Puppets, At the Gates’ Slaughter of the Soul, or Pantera’s Vulgar Display of Power. As age and experience wear away at me I find that sadly this feeling is harder and harder to obtain. I mean let’s face it, a good seventy percent of modern metal is total bullshit (and I think that’s me being nice since I know a few people are going to read this). Not only has the genre been raped by the mainstream and watered down by the internet, its safe to say that every Tuesday more and more “death metal” or “heavy metal” records hit the street here in the USA that have less and less to offer the genre and us listeners than ever before. I believe that metal actually doesn’t suck, and there are great metal bands out there who for whatever reason didn’t get the attention they truly deserve. The following is one dude’s opinion. I do not claim any of it as absolute truth but, if I can use this printed space for nothing more then to turn at least one more dude out there onto a record that has touched my life, then it was time well spent.

With that in mind let me turn the focus to one of my all time favorite metal bands, Entombed. Now there are some of you out there who just read this and are thinking, “Fuck this guy, Entombed is not underrated, they are known as one of the pioneers of Swedish Death Metal.” And to you dudes I say, “I know, but just hear me out.”

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Funny things usually happen when musicians take their thoughts to the Interwebs. Such is actually not the case with Darkest Hour guitarist Mike Schleibaum’s new blog Ask the Dude [via Buzzgrinder], in which the college-educated shredder answers fan questions in a Dear Abby-style advice column. Recent topics include balancing being in a band while staying in school, the merits of taking music theory classes vs. learning by ear,  lead singer’s disease, and the gauge of his guitar strings. It’s actually quite a great read, and I have a feeling we’ll be linking back quite a bit more (RSS feed: added!)

-VN

[Ask the Dude]