So, to review the ways in bass players let us down this week:

• Coheed and Cambria’s Michael Todd robbed a pharmacy.
• Nick Oliveri from Queens of the Stone Age/Kyuss held his girlfriend hostage in a four-hour standoff with a S.W.A.T. team.
• Jeroen Paul Thessling quit Obscura.

Hi, everyone! I am back from my first vacation since 2006. I look forward to my next vacation in 2016. In the intervening five years, please do not send me countless e-mails about your friend’s terrible deathcore band, insisting that they are awesome. It would really help my stress level/ever-increasing therapy debt. Thanks!

ANYWAY, after sitting out by a lake in Connecticut for the past week, I returned to NYC and the MetalSucks Mansion to learn that bass players suck. I mean, I guess that’s not really fair; not all bass players suck. But between the news that Michael Todd is apparently the only rock star in the history of ever to not be able to score drugs without threatening to kill people, and now the news that Jeroen Paul Thessling has quit Obscura, and, well, one could reasonably deduce that bass players suck, or, at the very least, are inveterate heartbreakers.

So why oh why did he leave Obscura, mere months after the release of their latest and greatest album,  Omnivium? Here’s his official statement:

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Note to Catholic readers: I am not very well educated regarding all the headwear your church officials don. I apologize if the man on the cover below is actually supposed to be a Cardinal or something.

Note to non-Catholic Christian readers: I am not very well educated regarding all the headwear church officials of all the various denominations besides Catholicism don. I apologize if the man on the cover below is actually supposed to be Greek Orthodox or something.

Note to readers of all other religions and belief systems: What the fuck?

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As regular readers are aware, I’m usually dead-set against cover albums, which tend to feature meaningless, generally inferior versions of great songs the listener already owns in their original, classic forms.

But I’m willing to give Dying Fetus the benefit of the doubt that if they’ve made a covers album, it’s worth listening to. They’ve earned that much. Why? BECAUSE THEY’RE DYING FUCKING FETUS, that’s why. Duh.

So. In celebration of both their twentieth anniversary and their stint on the year’s edition of the MetalSucks-sponsored Summer Slaughter tour, this July the  band will release History Repeats…, which will not only feature the band re-imaging tracks from some of death n’ grinds finest (Napalm Death, Cannibal Corpse, Bolt Thrower, etc.), but will also feature “Rohypnol,” a brand new song. You might know rohypnol as “roofies,” or “the date rape drug.” So this tune is probably a charming power ballad in the vein of Bon Jovi’s “Bed of Roses.”

History Repeats… comes out July 19 on Relapse, and is limited to 5,000 copies. You can get it a f.y.e. stores, or just pre-order it directly from Relapse.

The full track list for this bad mother is after the jump, along with those Summer Slaughter dates. Other bands on the bill are The Black Dahlia Murder, Whitechapel, Darkest Hour, Six Feet Under, Oceano, Fleshgod Apocalypse, As Blood Runs Black, Powerglove, and Within the Ruins.

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“SINISTERRRRRRRRRRR!!!”

Man, this shit is rockin’.

So. File this under “Things We Should Have Been Talking About for Awhile Now ‘Cept We Keep Getting Distracted Making Fun of Peeps”: there’s a new Pestilence album coming out next month. It’s called Doctrine. And now there are two new songs streaming, “Salvation” and “Sinister.”

As you can probably tell, I am particularly fond of “Sinister.” Not only do Patrick Mameli’s desperate-zombie wails sound particularly deranged, but that riff… man, I know it’s nothing you’ve never heard before, but it’s got so much groove, dude, it just makes you wanna bop your head with it. Metal that actually feels good to listen to. This seems like an increasingly rare concept these days. Hm.

Mosh here. Doctrine comes out in April on Mascot.

-AR

[via Metal Underground]

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Welcome to “Question of the Week,” a (sometimes) weekly debate amongst the MetalSucks staff regarding a recent hot button issue.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, which means we’re taking off early today and won’t be back ’til Monday. We’re sorry to leave non-American readers high n’ dry, but PLUS ONE FOR FREEDOM, MOTHERFUCKERS.

ANYWAY, in honor of the holiday, we decided to do a special Turkey Day-themed QOTW designed to make you feel all warm and cuddly inside:

WHAT (IN METAL) ARE YOU THANKFUL FOR?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

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Last week Eyal asked you what you were all listening to, and as of this writing, three of you said Hail of Bullets. Now, this is one of these bands that I know some people LOVE — they’ll e-mail us about how great they are, or I’ll read rave reviews on another website/publication, or whatever.

And I don’t think Hail of Bullets are bad or anything… but I don’t see what the big deal is. I know that Martin van Drunen used to be Pestilence, and that’s great, but this band ain’t no Pestilence.

Here’s the band’s latest video, for the song “Operation Z.” Check it out and tell me what I’m missing.

Hail of Bullets’ latest, On Divine Winds, is out now on Metal Blade.

-AR

While these days metal fandom is basically just a contest to see who can fap harder and faster to obscure technical death metal, it wasn’t always that way. In fact, many of the bands that internet metal nerds regard as legendary icons today were either hated or ignored when they were at their peak — fellow oldz will know exactly what I’m talking about. In this post, I will remind us all what fickle, trendy conformists metal fans can be by taking a stroll down memory lane and recalling vintage popular opinion of a few of your pet bands (hint: it wasn’t good!).

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In the early moments of our conversation, I confirmed with busy Atheist frontman Kelly Shaefer that we would limit our interview time to the industry-standard 15 minutes. Shaefer responded amiably, “As much time as you need, man.” To this, I replied jokingly, “Gosh, how much time have you got?” And though we shared a chuckle at this, neither of us could’ve expected our little phone chat to stretch to 2.5 hours over two days. (Of course, it eventually became clear that nothing less should’ve been expected from two lefty pothead metal guitarists who drink a shitload of Mountain Dew and love talking metal.)

Last week, part one found Shaefer and I delving into big, brainy, conceptual stuff, like his approaches to songwriting and singing, the birth of his genre, and the right-on-time return to awesomeness by his classic band (the new record is called Jupiter, but duh you know that).

Today, MetalSucks unsheathes partie deux, in which the tirelessly gracious, funny, and plainspoken Shaeffer (above, right) indulges my questions about more tangible Atheist business, like record label politics, the importance of good packaging, former Atheist guitarist Rand Burkey, current Atheist guitarist Kelly Shaefer (he and his “guitar still are very best friends”), the squashing of inter-band beefs, America’s shameful marijuana policies (I started it, sorry), and so very, very much more. (Spoiler: We do eventually stop talking on the phone.)

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The MetalSucks-sponsored Pestilence Reigns Upon North America tour is now more than half complete, with the action set to wrap in New York City this Thursday at the Gramercy Theater. In addition to the technical metal legends, Warbringer, Vital Remains, Enfold Darkness and Sacrificial Slaughter will also be in tow; in addition to NYC, those of you in Chicago (tonight!), Montreal and Toronto still have a chance to catch this excellent tour, so don’t snooze and lose.

Axl and Vince will be in attendance at the NYC show on Thursday; as usual, feel free to buy us beers.

-VN

I don’t remember which show it was at, but Vince and I recently saw the ridiculous amount of cell phones snapping photos and video at a concert and started to reminiscence about that time in 1991 when Axl Rose jumped into a crowd in St. Louis to punch some dude who taking unauthorized photos of the show, thus inciting a riot (Rose’s first of at least four). If he pulled that shit today, it would seem even more ridiculous. Hell, before I ever saw Metallica live, I had some bootleg cassette of one of their shows that I bought off some dude at a flea market (seriously) for ten bucks. The audio quality was atrocious, but I still listened to the thing like eighteen-thousand times. Today, bootlegs of live shows are just a given; security doesn’t try and stop anyone from recording the show, because seemingly everyone is recording the show. Even if they find an audio recorder on me during the traditional pat-down, just saying “I’m interviewing the band” is sufficient to get them to ignore it. But they never ask to see my press credentials or anything, ’cause they don’t really care – they can’t take away every cell phone that comes through the place.

Which is all just a long-winded introduction for the very good quality fan-filmed footage of Pestilence playing at Neurotic Deathfest last week. We would have killed to have such easy access to this kind of footage when I was younger; now it’s pretty much expected that if you play a show, it’ll be all over YouTube within a matter of hours. Check out a clip below; you can watch more at Shut Yo’ Mouth.

And if that footage makes you feel all warm and tingly where your bathing suit covers, then don’t forget that MetalSucks and Decibel are teaming up to bring you Pestilence’s first U.S. tour in sixteen years (!) starting at the end of May; Warbringer, Vital Remains, Enfold Darkness and Sacrificial Slaughter are also on the bill, so you know it’s gonna be a good time. Get dates here.

-AR

It’s been over a decade and a half since Pestilence last toured the U.S., but their MetalSucks co-sponsored tour with Warbringer, Vital Remains, Enfold Darkness and Sacrificial Slaughter is right around the corner! I’m fairly certain we have a lot of readers who either weren’t even born yet or were suckin’ at their momma’s teat the last time these dudes came to the States, so this is gonna be a big one.

As if you weren’t already pumped enough for this tour, Pestilence have now posted rehearsal audio of a new song, “amgoD,” on their MySpace page. It’s instrumental right now, but it sounds pretty sick. It also features new drummer Yuma Van Eekelen, in what I guess technically marks his recording debut with the band.

Check out “amgoD” here. And while you’re there, find out when Pestilence are coming to destroy your town. ‘Cause only losers will miss this trek. You’re not a loser… are you?

-AR

As part of our ongoing effort to bring brutal metal tours to you, our deserving (sometimes) readership, MetalSucks and Decibel are proud to present a Spring headline run featuring technical death metal legends Pestilence, their first US tour in over 16 years! The 17-date journey will kick off in Baltimore as part of the Maryland Deathfest on May 30th and close at the Gramercy Theater in New York City on June 17. Support will be provided by Warbringer, Vital Remains, Enfold Darkness and Sacrificial Slaughter. Advance tickets will go on sale for all shows via http://enterthevault.com starting today.

That’s a killer lineup. All dates are posted after the jump. Before you Floridians bitch about how there aren’t any Florida dates, you should know two things: 1) we have zero control over the cities and venues that the tours we sponsor play, and 2) face it, Florida is out of the way, dude.

Onwards…

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New music that might tickle your pickle…

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