When Randy Blythe was nineteen years old and Jamey Jasta was thirteen years old, a really silly white dude who is named Rob Van Winkle but insisted on calling himself “Vanilla Ice” released a song entitled “Ice Ice Baby,” which was a huge megahit. There can be no doubt that Blythe and Jasta were aware of the song’s existence, for such was its prevalence in pop culture. Of course, we have no way of knowing what these someday-modern metal legends thought of the track, but I think we can reasonably assume that at no point did the thought “Someday Vanilla Ice will come see me perform and we will hang out backstage after the show” cross their respective minds.

And yet, this:

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Holy shit, is it seriously August already? It’s gonna start getting cold soon. Motherfucker. Here’s what we did this week when we should have been enjoying the sunshine and fresh air:

• We’re streaming Dementia/Dyslexia, the Metal Blade debut of Fleshwrought,  a new project from Animosity/Animals as Leaders’ Navene Koperweis and Job for a Cowboy’s Jonny Davy.
• We debuted an EPK for Iron Thrones’ The Wretched Sun.
• We also debuted “Fear, Emptiness, Decibel,” a new column from the editors of our favorite metal rag.
• We had a little beard on beard action with Andy Williams from Every Time I Die and Liam Wilson from The Dillinger Escape Plan. We also spoke to Avenged Sevenfold’s Johnny Christ, The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Jeff Tuttle and Pathology’s Dave Astor.
• We checked out the latest releases from Chimaira and Decrepit Birth.
• We schooled Korn’s Jonathan Davis on the BP Oil Spill.
• We questioned the sincerity of Max Cavalera’s claim that his collaboration with Fred Durst is all Ross Robinson’s fault.
• We questioned Glenn Danzig’s sanity. Again.
• We got pissy that Eddie’s not on the cover of the new Maiden album.
• We got boners watching 72 minutes of pro-shot Gojira footage.
• We did not get boners looking at Emmure noodz.
• We found the best bass player in the history of forever-ever-ever.

We’ll be hanging out at the Summer Slaughter show this Sunday here in NYC; if you spot us, please bring us presents. We like presents. Thanks.

-AR

By the time The Anti Mother came out in 2008, a not-unsubstantial portion of fans found themselves unable to come to grips with the more accessible and, yes, catchy sound Norma Jean had taken on. It’s hard to blame them for being cynical or even angry about it. After all, the Georgia metalcore act followed the Botch-esque mathcore masterpiece O God, the Aftermath with two Ross Robinson produced records which, each having its own merits, had veered them into much safer waters. Not content to live in the shadows of Tacoma, Washington’s cult heroes, Norma Jean dreamt bigger and built an even larger following over the years. But the past was clearly on their minds, as made evident by the 2009 tour where the group played Bless the Martyr and Kiss the Child – a record that only two remaining members had even played on — in its entirety. Through press releases and public tweets, Norma Jean declared their next album to be a return to the group’s roots. So then, is Meridional a fan-friendly rehash of the old days, another broken promise, or something else altogether?

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Thanks to MS Maniac Aaron M. for pointing out the hilariousness that is ensuing over at Ross Robinson’s Twitter account re: the new Korn record. Yeah, Robinson is producing the new Korn record — somehow I missed that too.

I have somewhat of a difficult relationship with Ross Robinson. On one hand he produced one of the bestest albums ever in the form of At the Drive-In’s Relationship of Command, and he also produced landmark albums by Glassjaw and Slipknot. On the other hand he produced way more albums that are just all sorts of terrible — records by Limp Bizkit (this in and of itself is a crime worthy of corporal punishment), Korn, Cold, Soulfly, Machine Head’s cringe-worthy rap-metal phase, and Vanille Ice’s nu-metal “comeback” record. As a producer who was definitely pigeonholed into a genre (rightly or wrongly), unsurprisingly Robinson hasn’t had a whole lot of work lately.

But he sure got a nice money gig for the new Korn joint. And he’s all sorts of excited about it! Here we go:

Korn, Day one: pikt out drums/cartage broke wheel of my 24 trk tape mchn/fairchild on cymb/made catbox/knee wnt out of socket-kicks ass12:01 AM Aug 6th

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Remember Bless the Martyr and Kiss the Child, or O’ God, The Aftermath, when Norma Jean were basically Converge wanna-bes? And then they hooked up with Limp Bizkit producer Ross Robinson, and everything even remotely interesting about them went straight out the fucking window.

The downward spiral continues with “Robots 3, Humans 0,” the new song currently streaming on the band’s MySpace page. The music is bland, but the vocals basically make me wanna stick knives into my ear drums.

I’m saying this song isn’t very good.

ANYWAY, the track comes off an album called The Anti Mother, which Solid State will release on August 5. It promises to, um, have music on it.

-AR