Speaking of there being no God, guitarist Greg Tribbett — one of two members of Mudvayne who is also in Hellyeah (the other being vocalist Chad Gray, duh) — sent out the below tweet yesterday, instantly breaking the heart of anyone who hates mediocre corporate rawk:

This probably isn’t a shock to anyone, given that Mudvayne have already been on unofficial hiatus since 2009. Still, the knowledge that we’ll have to put up with Hellyeah through at least 2013 is, frankly, enough to make me hope the Mayans were right, and the world is gonna end sometime next year. In fact, I think “The ongoing success of Hellyeah” was one of the things they said would be a sign of the end times, wasn’t it?

-AR

[via Metal Insider]

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Welcome to “Question of the Week,” a (not really at all) weekly debate amongst the MetalSucks staff regarding a recent hot button issue.

We haven’t done one one of these all summer, but we came up with a fun one for this week:

IF YOU COULD GO BACK IN TIME AND PLAY ANY METAL BAND/MUSICIAN SOME OF THEIR MUSIC AND/OR SHOW THEM PHOTOS/VIDEOS OF THEMSELVES FROM THEIR FUTURE (OUR PRESENT), WHO WOULD IT BE AND WHY?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

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Hellyeah have a new video for “Better Man,” a song unreasonable people would probably argue isn’t a power ballad. In the video, the band sits around someone’s house for no apparent reason and plays the song, all while remembering some pseudo-romantic tragic bullshit.

And if all this seems familiar, well, it ought to: sitting around a random house and playing a power ballad while remembering some pseudo-romantic tragic bullshit was one of hair metal’s silliest clichés. Take, for example…

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[Like my colleague Vince Neilstein, I too feel compelled to share with you, the readers, some "under-appreciated gems" that deserve your attention and consideration for your personal "Best of 2010" lists. Some of these may have suffered from lack of promotion, or simply may have gotten lost in the shuffle amid higher profile releases. Hopefully this informal series will help rectify that -- and not give too much away in advance of the publications of the staff lists on December 16.]

Pantera, much like their cultural forebears The Beatles, assuredly will never reunite. Even if we could discount the untimely, cataclysmic death of “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott in 2004 at the hands of a mentally disturbed assassin whose very name doesn’t deserve repeating, the fractures that resulted in the band’s dissolution have only deepened with time, categorized by seemingly endlessly feuding between factions of the surviving members and their surrogates. This year’s expanded 20th anniversary reissue of Cowboys From Hell – coincidentally timed with a boxed reissue of John Lennon’s solo discography — provides a view of what we can expect as Pantera’s legacy matures and amplifies, namely that music industry machinery will take advantage of contractual opportunities while the estranged and quarreling factions collect deserved checks and dangle demos, live versions, and previously unreleased “vault tracks” (such as “The Will to Survive”) to disproportionately feed our insatiable hunger for more.

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Like myself, Dallas Coyle is a huge film dork — I love geeking out with him, ’cause the dude really knows his shit. And I’m stoked to see that he’s started to put all that knowledge to good use: He co-directed The Judas Syndrome‘s new video, “Death of the Soul,” with Frankie Nasso, who has previously helmed clips for Mudvayne, Hatebreed, All That Remains, Sworn Enemy, and Demiricous, among others.

The video just debuted on Noisecreep, and is really cool; you can check it out below. Hopefully we’ll be seeing more from Dallas Coyle, cinemetal auteur in the not-too-distant future!

“Death of the Soul” comes off The Judas Syndrome’s Underneath Blood Skies, which is out now.

-AR

Apparently Sade has a new hit record and scored the #1 record last week. Who knew? Good for her… Sade’s pretty rad. I know at least one death metal dude who will be REALLY psyched to hear this news.

But I’m guessing you all care more about the new High on Fire record. Let’s find out how that and other metal and hard rock releases charted last week after the jump.

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Tomorrow is Halloween. This is great news, because it means that come Sunday (or Monday) people will finally fucking stop talking about Halloween. So sick of it already. When did I become so curmudgeonly? I’m gonna make a hell of an old man. Here’s what went down this week:

• Danzig drummer Chuck Biscuits died. Oh wait, no he didn’t.
• We debuted a new Mudvayne track and we posted live photos from Satyricon and Goatwhore/Eyehategod shows.
• We analyzed the business models of Earache and Roadrunner Records.
• The Boner Tour 2010 has been announced.
• Bison B.C.’s Dan And wrote two tour blogs for us while Horse the Band’s Lord Gold told us about women in diners.
• We spoke with Jucifer’s Amber Valentine and James Plodkin from Jodis.
• We’re giving away a buncha BTBAM shit and celebrating the release of their new album.
• We got all creative writing on your ass.

Our very own Corey Mitchell is gonna be on TV this weekend; he’ll be appearing on E!’s “20 Most Horrifying Hollywood Murders” on Saturday night at 6:00pm EST/5:00PM CST. In addition to his duties as the resident Mansion old fart, Corey writes books about true crime and is a respected authority on the matter so it should be an interesting (and br00tal) watch. Have a good weekend everyone.

Full confession: I haven’t had that much of an interest in Mudvayne since The End of All Things To Come. Even then I wasn’t too into the band, but I’ve always enjoyed a few of their songs. When Mudvayne’s label came to us about premiering their new track “Heard It All Before” I was a bit skeptical, but this is probably one of the best Mudvayne tracks I’ve heard in a while and it’s certainly the heaviest. There’s a killer guitar solo, and Ryan Martinie’s tasty bass licks are right out front throughout as always. This song is definitely one of the more original tracks the band has penned in quite some time; it still sounds like Mudvayne, but not in the same heard-it-all-before way (pun intended) the band’s been recycling for years now.

Stream “Heard it All Before” below. It comes from their self-titled album which will be released on December 22.

[this promotion has ended]

I’m not really a big Mudvayne fan, but I know a lot of you are. So it seems like my bloggerly duty to tell you that the band is streaming a new song, “Beautiful and Strange,” on their MySpace page.

And it sounds, y’know, like Mudvayne. If you like Mudvayne, I imagine you’ll like this song. If you don’t, I doubt this will win you over. At first I was like “Oh, listen to those drums, this is heavy!”, but then the song calmed down and just became a regular Mudvayne song. Not great, not terrible.

“Beautiful and Strange” comes from the band’s self-titled album, which will be out December 22. The cover art apparently looks awesome under black light.

-AR

Thanks to Kye for the tip!

I haven’t known anyone who’s owned a blacklight since I was thirteen, because that’s about the age when you realize “Hey, this is cool for all of ten seconds and then you’re just bored in a different-colored room.” Yes, even if you’re on drugs.

But our friends at Metal Insider tell us that Mudvayne’s new, self-titled album “is being printed on blacklight-reactive ink” and that the cover art “will be pretty much invisible to the naked eye unless your uncle still has that blacklight.” (And if he does, call the cops. ‘Cause he’s a pedophile.) Deluxe editions of the album will apparently come with a blacklight, just to save you that extra trip to the mall I guess.

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Last year’s contest in which we gave away a signed Mudvayne guitar was one of our most popular ever, so we’ve teamed up with Mudvayne and Warwick to offer MetalSucks readers a Warwick RockBass Vampyre bass, as well as the opportunity to have your questions about bass playing answered by Mudvayne bassist Ryan Martinie.

• 1st place winner: wins the Warwick bass, gets to ask Ryan Martinie their questions in a telephone interview, and wins a signed poster
• 2nd place winner: gets to ask Ryan their questions in an email interview and wins a signed poster
• 3rd place winner: wins a signed poster

Here’s how it’s going to work: Post a comment below, using a valid email address (winners will be contacted by email) in which you ask 5-10 questions about bass playing for Ryan Martinie to answer. Ryan will personally select three winners. You will have until 11:59pm EDT on Wednesday, September 9th to submit your questions, and winners be notified personally in the following days. So make your questions good! U.S. residents only, please. By entering, you certify that you have read the official contest rules here.

Our friends at Metal Insider made an interesting discovery over the weekend: Dope are no longer listed on the bill for the upcoming Pedal to the Metal tour. The tour is being headlined by Mudvayne and also features Black Label Society and Static-X.

MI wonders aloud if Dope have been kicked off the tour; I would obviously love if it that were the case, but I fear that the official explanation will be considerably less entertaining.

Still, for the sake of amusing myself, I’d like to pretend that Dope have been kicked off the tour (I’d also like to pretend that Static-X have been kicked off the tour, but I have no basis for that fantasy right now). So, to that end, I’d just like to serenade the members of Dope with this little ditty:

HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA, YOU GOT BOOTED, HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA, YOUR BAND SUCKS.

That is all.

-AR

After the horrific murder of his brother, no one would have faulted Pantera/Damageplan drummer Vinnie Paul for dropping off the face of the Earth. But instead, the man chose to soldier on, starting his own record company, Big Vin Records, and resuming his drumming duties for boozy groove metallers Hellyeah. The former has signed Type O Negative side project Seventh Void and released the successful Dimebag Darrell tribute DVD Dimevision; the latter’s toured the globe in support of their debut album, with plans to record and tour again in the near future. A relentlessly positive guy who sounds a little like the metal version of King of the Hill’s Boomhauer, Vinnie seems content with the past and satisfied with the present (upon hearing that I was conducting the interview from Massachusetts after I shut my tape recorder off, he gave his thoughts on the Boston Bruins’ then-upcoming playoff game with Montreal Canadiens and stated that his dream Superbowl would be between the Cowboys and the Patriots, if it were possible). In his inteview with MetalSucks, he gives his thoughts on the upcoming 20th anniversary of Cowboys from Hell, running a record label, and the future of Hellyeah.

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I can’t believe that there’s going to be a new Hellyeah album. I honestly thought we’d be rid of this insipid band after one phoned-in cash-in. I guess I don’t have any real reason to be too upset though, as not only will I never ever never listen to this record, but I honestly don’t know anyone else who ever will either.

In any case, here are some things I’d rather hear than new “music” from Hellyeah:

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Lamb of God and God Forbid dominated the metal charts in their Soundscan debut weeks. A quick look at the numbers of those and other notable releases after the jump with our own witty commentary, natch.

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Ya’ll’s entries for last week’s funny photo caption contest were mostly unfunny. But these new Unearth and Amon Amarth CDs need to find a home, so here are the mostly-funny entries that will each receive one CD in the mail:

Muttweiler: “After surviving the mighty New Found Glory moshpit, Paco is getting his balls up for the Hollywood Undead show by stage diving onto his uncle Rico’s love doll.”

Keith G: “Public Enemies [sic] new album, Straight outta Oslo.”

Congrats dudes. This week’s we’ve got a really special prize; one winner will receive a brand new Washburn WI-14 guitar — signed by all the members of Mudvayne! (Check out a picture of the actual guitar we’re giving away). Just come up with a funny caption to the below photo [courtesy of Metal Inquisition] and it’s yours.

Mudvayne have a new album called The New Game dropping November 18th on Epic Records; and from what we can tell, this version of “Never Enough” sent in by a loyal MetalSucks Minion is the first track to leak other than the lead single “Do What You Do,” which is all over radio and streaming on their MySpace page.

What is there to say, other than that it sounds just like Mudvayne. Surely Mudvayne are one of those bands whose supporters will come out in droves and whose detractors will cry “false metal;” personally I got behind “World So Cold” and a small handful of other songs, but the band’s later material hasn’t done much for me. Where do you stand on Mudvayne?

Mudvayne – “Never Enough”

-VN

MetalSucks devotee Kye sent us a YouTube video still for the new leaked Mudvayne song “Do What Do You,” a clip of which is currently streaming at the band’s MySpace page. Shockingly, it sounds just like a Mudvayne song. If you like Mudvayne it’ll probably be right up your alley, and if not… Well, you know.

I’ve never been a huge Mudvayne fan though I’ve dug a few of their songs in the past, and this one sounds pretty much in line with “new” Mudvayne. Of note, there’s a guitar solo in this song, which I can’t recall hearing from the band before (hey, guitar solos are in vogue now). I’ve always been able to somewhat tolerate this band, and this song is no different; though in a live setting they literally put me and Axl to sleep at Ozzfest a few years ago. Anyway, here’s the song. Do what you do with it.

Mudvayne’s new album The New Game drops November 18th on Epic.

-VN

I had no intention of posting today, but last night I was taken aback by the discovery of just how many people actually DO have to work today – sucks for you guys – so I thought I’d throw a dog a bone.

The latest from Mudvayne – actually a slapped together collection of random b-sides and whatever, meant to tide over fans while two of the band’s members are off cashin’ it in with Hellno – doesn’t hit stores ’til Tuesday, but Beta Download has it right now. Personally, I don’t think it matters if this album or any other album of Mudvayne’s is any good or not – ’cause they suck live, so what’s the point? And before you Mudvayne fans get pissy, I’ve seen them live twice, and they blew goats both times. So I gave ‘em a shot, alright?

Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. I’m going back to sleep.

-AR