MetalSucks

So. Unless you live under a rock, chances are you’re aware that the movie adaptation of Watchmen opens tomorrow. The reviews are decidedly mixed and I’m still not convinced it won’t suck, but it’s already apparently making a ton of bank in ticket pre-sales, so, uh, yeah, people wanna see this bitch I guess.

Anyways, this week iTunes had some members of the cast do their celebrity playlist thing. A few actors chose a few metal songs – Patrick Wilson (who plays “Nite Owl II”) has some Van Halen and Extreme songs, Malin Akerman (”Silk Spectre II”) has some Nine Inch Nails, Jeffery Dean Morgan (”The Comedian”) was apparently pals with Layne Staley and included “Rooster” in his mix, etc.

But Jackie Earle Haley – the Oscar nominated actor playing the ultimate right wing sociopathic fascistic badass, Rorschach – created a list that is almost entirely comprised of metal.

Terrible metal.

Click to read more…

So last week Dillinger Escape Plan’s Greg Puciato and Ben Weinman got up on stage in Australia with Nine Inch Niles to help out with “Wish,” a song DEP had previously covered. Up ’til now, all we’ve seen is shitty cell phone capture of the performance – but now NIN have posted something considerably higher quality on their web site.

Not much to say here – you just gotta love it when there’s so many great musicians on one stage.

-AR

Hey, it worked for 300, right?

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Today would have been Johnny Cash’s 77th birthday. In his honor, here’s his video for “Hurt” – a cover of a Nine Inch Nails song from the producer of Reign in Blood.

Is this version superior to Trent Reznor’s original? Cash’s age (and personal history) certainly lends the lyrics extra poignancy; he’s not a young man belly aching, but an old man looking back at the mess of his life.

Discuss!

-AR

I know we keep on saying this, but Trent Reznor is just the coolest fucking dude and he keeps making it impossible for us not to comment. The latest, originally posted by Trent himself on Twitter and picked up by Hard Rock Chick, is a behind-the-scenes video shot backstage during a mid-show power outage that nearly drove the Australian audience to riot. The most interesting parts are the head of security prepping the band for a quick exit in case of riot, and Trent making ad-hoc adjustments to the setlist in case power is indeed restored (which it eventually is). These looks into seemingly mundane moments are what I’ve found most fascinating about following Trent over the past year or so; the man just lets it all out for his fans to see.

-VN

NIN Sydney 2.24.09 – Mid-show Power Outage [HD] from Nine Inch Nails on Vimeo.

Uberdrummer Josh Freese is getting ready to release a new solo album, Since 1972 (Freese’s YOB, natch), and is apparently determined to one-up his former boss Trent Reznor for the “Rockstar Adapting to a Changing Market in the Coolest Fucking Way Imaginable” award. Now, it’s entirely possible that Freese is just joshin’ around (sorry, couldn’t resist) – but even if he is, he’s funny as fuck. Here are the various price levels for purchasing Since 1972, and what Freese is (allegedly) offering for said price levels… I don’t even have to make any jokes here because Freese has done all the work for me:

Click to read more…

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…

From nin.com [via MetalSucks Maniac Sukey Scorer], we have an update to Trent Reznor’s mysterious weekend countdown message:

The internet is full of surprises these days.
I was contacted by a mysterious, shadowy group of subversives who SOMEHOW managed to film a substantial amount (over 400 GB!) of raw, unedited HD footage from three separate complete shows of our Lights in the Sky tour. Security must have been lacking at these shows because the quality of the footage is excellent.

If any of you could find a LINK to that footage I’ll bet some enterprising fans could assemble something pretty cool.

Oh yeah, you didn’t hear this from me.

Just the latest in a long, long string of ultimate “bro” moves by Trent Reznor over the past year.

But wait; it doesn’t stop there.

Click to read more…

From the front page of NIN.com, posted yesterday by Trent Reznor:

Remember that gift I mentioned?
It’s almost here.

Last time this happened we got a tour, and the time before that a full album — for free. What’s ol’ papa Trent got in store this time?

-VN

[Thanks: Sukey Scorer]

So remember last month when Axl posted a rant about Trent Reznor’s selection of Lostprophets’ drummer Ilan Rubin to fill the drummer’s throne left vacant by the recently-departed Josh Freese? Axl was understandably miffed that a member of the sucktastic Lostprophets would be replacing a legendary member of NIN, but it turns out (as many of you posted) that the kid is actually a phenomenal player.

Not only can the kid beat the shit out of the drums, but he’s got a solo project — dubbed The New Regime — in which he plays every instrument and sings. That’s fucking impressive. What’s more, it’s actually good, and can be summed up in one word thusly: Muse. And I mean that in the best way possible, because Muse is one non-metal band that all metalheads should learn to love.

-VN

[The New Regime on MySpace]

There’s a rumor going around that Billy Howerdel’s Ashes Divide have broken up. To which I say: HUH?

Click to read more…

Trent Reznor talks almost as much shit about other musicians as Kerry King does, but it’s usually excusable as a) he’s hilarious, b) he’s right and c) he’s so much cooler than most rock stars that even if he’s wrong, it’s still not very bothersome. For example, I once read an interview where Reznor said he remembers exactly where he was the first time he heard Alanis Morrisette’s “You Oughta Know,” and that remembering where you were when you first heard that terrible song was his generation’s equivalent of remembering exactly where you were when you found out JFK had been killed. Now, that’s obviously melodramatic (and ironic, considering that Reznor’s one-time collaborator Dave Navarro played guitars on that song), but it’s also totally hilarious.

So. Drummer extraordinaire is leaving Nine Inch Nails, and Reznor has hired twenty year old (!!!) Lostprophets drummer Ilan Rubin* (pictured above) to take Freese’s place.

Click to read more…

I don’t know if it’s the work of director Zack Snyder or his marketing peeps that make the decision as to what music will appear in the trailers for his films, but this much is true: the use of metal-friendly bands sure does take this ad campaigns a long way (Iann Robinson has a cameo – as a zombie! – in Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead remake, so at the very least, I assume that Snyder has some knowledge of all things metal.). First there was the trailer for 300, which was practically a Nine Inch Nails video; then there was this summer’s Watchmen teaser, which made use of the Smashing Pumpkins; and now comes the full trailer for Watchmen, which features Muse’s awesome “Take a Bow.” And while Muse isn’t exactly metal, we still think you should care.

Check out the trailer below.

-AR

The whole idea of a TV station called Music Television that doesn’t play music is completely ridiculous; nevertheless, this has been the reality of MTV pretty much since the late ‘90s. Forgive me if I’m slightly behind the times as I don’t have a TV, but apparently there’s a new channel called MTV Music (yes, folks, welcome to the Department of Redundancy Department: That’s “Music Television Music.”) that specializes in playing music videos. Is this not completely fucking ridiculous? [I realized post-publishing that this is solely a website, not a TV channel. Read on, as most of my points still stand. -Ed.]

Dear MTV: NEWSBREAK! It’s called YouTube, assholes! And it’s got just about every video ever, plus tons of live, unreleased and otherwise unofficial stuff you’d never air. The idea of a TV station being relevant to music in 2008 is about as good as the idea of traveling to California… by horse and buggy. You’re hopelessly out of date. Especially for metal. Deal with it.

Anyway… said new(ish) channel has launched an ad campaign that attempts to invoke ’80s and ‘90s nostalgia — in anyone that was alive and watched the original MTV when they still played videos — by bringing back the classic modified-MTV-logo theme retrofitted with band imagery sure to invoke just that nostalgia. This includes some of our favorite heavies, notably Metallica (above), as well as Guns N’ Roses, Nine Inch Nails and Stone Temple Pilots, pictured after the jump.

Click to read more…

The following e-mail was sent out to all Nine Inch Nails fans on their mailing list last night. I’m just gonna go ahead and re-print it in its entirety:

Click to read more…

This past spring, the opportunity presented itself for me to do a phoner with Steve Austin, mastermind for Today is the Day. Since I a) think Today is the Day is brilliant and b) knew that Austin had recently started his own label, Supernova Records, I jumped at the chance. And when I called him, I thought I was gonna get the usual ten to fifteen minute chat full of the usual B.S.

Boy was I wrong. Not only did Austin stay on the phone with me for close to an hour, but he answered every question with a level bridge-burning honesty not usually found by even the most hardcore of the most hardcore. It should go without saying that Steve’s opinions are his own and not necessarily those of MetalSucks, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t find the dude fascinating. After the jump, read his thoughts on pretty much any and every topic under the sun.

And, uh, oh yeah: this is easily the longest interview we’ve ever done. Fair warning.

Click to read more…

Apparently there’s a new Strapping Young Lad video floating around the Interwebs for the song “Almost Again,” from 2006’s The New Black. The video is intensely dark and morose with twisted imagery that could come only from a demented mind like Downward Spiral-era Trent Reznor… Or, naturally, Devin Towsend. The timing of the video seems odd given the band broke up last year and their greatest hits collection 1994-2006: Chaos Years came out several months ago already… But hey, we’ll take it.

With the death of SYL came the demise of Devin’s skullet, but at least Ronnie James Dio and Karl Simon of The Gates of Slumber still carry the torch.

-VN

[via Buzzgrinder]

Have you been following the Nine Inch Nails blog? If not, put that shit in your RSS reader because you’re really missing out. Anyone that thought Trent Reznor’s groundbreaking media initiatives surrounding the release of Year Zero and The Slip were a flash in the pan or just a publicity stunt was totally wrong; the guy is really talking the talk and walking the walk, and continues to innovate on every level by embracing the Internet as his friend.

Click to read more…

To say that Vince and I aren’t Kid Rock fans probably ranks with statements like “Vince and I aren’t Limp Bizkit fans” or “Vince and I aren’t Disturbed fans” in terms of its level of “Well duh”-ness. I once heard some jackass on VH1 says that “Bawitdaba” or whatever the fuck it was called “Sounds like rock re-entering the building,” but to me is always sounded more like dignity taking a nose-dive off the roof.

All of that being said, Kid Rock’s statements in a recent interview with the BBC actually make him sound less like a a rap metal redneck and more like Trent Reznor. When asked why his music isn’t readily available on iTunes, Rock said that “the internet was an opportunity for everyone to be treated fairly, for the consumer to get a fair price, for the artist to be paid fairly, for the record companies to make some money,” but that iTunes stuck to an “old system” whereby everyone gets paid… save for the artist.

Click to read more…

While Robin Finck fans everywhere mourn the loss of his Vince Neilstein-size beard (see NIN rehearsal pic right, or click here for additional pics), Trent Reznor has decided to give a little promotional boost to the bands that will be opening for him on his summer tour, including A Place to Bury Strangers, Does it Offend You, Yeah?, Crystal Castles, and Deerhunter. Via the NIN website:

“I assume some of you may not be entirely familiar with the acts I’ve chosen to join us on various legs of this tour, so we’ve compiled a sampler EP for you. Click here to download this for free. If you like what you hear, be sure to show up early to the show (and please remember to support them by purchasing their music, if so inclined).”

Well, as usual, Trent has won “coolest rock star” award with this latest move. Most support acts on big tours like this one are lucky if the headliners even acknowledge their presence; by offering this free sample, Reznor is actively encouraging his fans to check out these bands, which shows he has real belief in their talents. What a refreshing change of pace.

-AR