MetalSucks

Is there really not already a metal song called “Lethal Injection?” I know there’s an Ice Cube album by that title, but I can’t think of any metal tunes by that name. That seems weird, ’cause it’s such an obvious title. Am I forgetting something really obvious?

While I search through my CD collection (’cause I still have a CD collection) to try and figure out if I’m missing something, here’s a bootleg video of “Lethal Injection,” a new Soulfly song, being performed live. Max Cavalera even got Prong’s Tommy Victor to come out and do guest vox, as he apparently does on Soulfly’s new album, Omen. It sounds pretty much like a Soulfly song to me. But props to Cavalera for being the metal d00d who finally laid claim to the song title.

Metal Injection also has a bunch of exclusive studio reports on the making of Omen. You can check those out here. The album comes out May 25 on Roadrunner.

-AR

Well, it certainly looks like a Bison B.C. cover.

The album comes out April 13 on Metal Blade. I have a hard time believing it will do anything but rock.

-AR

P.S. Yes I am aware that Soulfly also have an album called Dark Ages, wise ass.

If you’re a regular reader of this site by now you should know all about Mutiny Within, Roadrunner’s latest metal young guns. Their debut self-titled album comes out next Tuesday, February 23rd… and we’ll be streaming the whole thing here on Monday. In the meantime you’ll just have to take my word for it that the album is great, the perfect mix of pure American metal and Euro power written by guys with an amazing sense of songwriting for such a young set of dudes.

Mutiny Within just finished up their opening stint on the MetalSucks-sponsored Tyrants of Evil tour with Arch Enemy, Exodus and Arsis. During the tour’s final week I caught up with bassist Andrew “AJ” Jacobs to chat about the tour, the new album, the support Roadrunner has offered and what it’s like being a new band on the road.

Click to read more…

Not that this really has anything to do with anything, but Blabbermouth reported over the weekend that Max Cavalera and his wife/manager Gloria are selling their Phoenix home (above) – which is 2,794-square-feet and has five bedrooms and three and half baths – for a list price of $1.475 million.

Now, Max’s musical output over the past ten years has been really solid, so he’s obviously not one of these rich dudes who has fallen out of touch and now makes art that is wholly irrelevant. And I know that taxes n’ shit will take a large chunk of whatever he and his wife end up making from the sale. Still, I no longer feel guilty about the fact that I never bought any Cavalera Conspiracy merch.

Also, the value of this home is still only, like, 1/100th of that of the MetalSucks Mansion. I actually tracked Vince down in Egypt and suggested we buy this home under the condition that Max be at the closing so we could meet him, but Vince, ever frugal, told me I should place an interview request through his publicist instead. What a party pooper.

If you’re wealthy and want to capitalize on Vince’s mistake, you can get more info on buying this luscious pad here.

-AR

…and that omen said it will come out May 4 on Roadrunner. And that it will feature guest appearances from The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Greg Puciato, Prong’s Tommy Victor, and (on b-side covers) Igor Cavalera and Zyon Cavalera. And, oh yeah, that it will be called Omen.

I’ve never liked Soulfly as much as I love Sepultura, but I did really enjoy Dark Ages, and the one time I caught the band live, they slayed. So while I’d much rather have a new Cavalera Conspiracy record, color me curious to hear this.

I’m less curious to hear the cover of “Refuse/Resist,” featuring the aforementioned Zyon Cavalera. Why does anyone ever cover their own song? The results are almost always disasterous – just ask Chuck Mosley or Slash…

-AR

I think I’ve made my feelings about remixes pretty clear in the past, but just to reiterate – I find them boring, pointless, and usually pretty awful. I mean, good for the band for getting their hardcore fans to pony up for a terrible version of a song they already owned, but I’m gonna pass.

So I was pretty pissed when I read this statement from Iggor Cavalera on Noisecreep:

“We have some ideas of maybe doing a remix album of ['Inflikted'] and have people like Justice or Soulwax — even some dub artists that my brother likes — remix the whole album.”

Mercifully, Iggor goes on to say that the remix record is “just an idea. It’s nothing confirmed,” and promises that he and brother Max “are talking about doing a new album in the future.” But I just want to be on record right now as saying that they just wait to do said new album. ‘Cause a collection of remixes won’t do much besides lower the cool quotient of Cavalera Conspiracy stock. I mean, “Sanctuary” needs a lot of bleeps and bloops and dee-dee-dees and do-doh-dos like Gene Hoglan needs a sandwich, y’know? Let’s just leave good enough alone fellas. Thanks.

-AR

Max Cavalera and Soulfly are back in the studio, working on their seventh (shit, time flies!) album, tentatively titled Omen, and those cool motherfuckers at Metal Injection got Mr. Cavalera himself to do an in-studio video update. Check it out:

Not to be disrespectful to Max Cavalera or nothing, but while you happen to be in a studio with Logan Mader, do you think you could give your brother a call and get crackin’ on a new Cavalera Conspiracy album, too? I’d be much obliged if ya did.

-AR

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

Click to read more…

Sorry we didn’t do one of these last week. Shit happens.

The logo from two weeks ago belongs to the clever wordsmiths in the band Dickless Tracy, and apparently that was pretty easy for a lot of you to figure out. (Although I did appreciate the entry from the dude who guessed it was “Pickles Tracy.” That’s a much better name for a band.) But I only have six copies of The Best of Spineshank to give away and the luck of the draw tells me that they’re going to Christopher Yeagle, Adam Riley, Izan Lewis, Tony Rice, Martin Chavez, and Alan Brenner. Hope you enjoy the free CDs, my friends.

This week the extreme people over Roadrunner Records have donated a limited edition copy of Max Cavalera’s self-titled Soulfly debut. It comes with a sexy black cover and some bonus tracks that weren’t on the original album, so it’s pretty much a most-own for the Cavalera faithful.

All you have to do to win is identify the name of the band whose logo appears below, then shoot me an e-mail with your answer, your name and address at axl [at] metalsucks.net. We’ll randomly select one winner from everyone who gets it right, and announce his or her names next Monday.

I think this week’s logo is a little harder than the last one, but I know y’all love a challenge, so have at it!

-AR

South Carolina’s Alan Brenner is now one copy of Opeth’s Watershed richer, since he correctly identified last week’s logo as that of Craniotomy. Good for you, Alan. Show South Carolina how to rock.

This week, in honor of the release of Soulfly’s new album, Conquer (read David Bee Roth’s review here), the cats at Roadrunner have provided us with a deluxe, double disc edition of Soulfly, the band’s self-titled debut. In addition to the regular album featuring such gems as “Eye for An Eye” and “The Song Remains Insane,” this bee-atch comes with a bonus disc featuring remixes, unreleased tracks, and all that good shit.

All you have to do to win is identify the name of the band whose logo appears below, then shoot me an e-mail with your answer, your name and address at axl [at] metalsucks.net. We’ll randomly select one winner from everyone who gets it right, and announce their name next Monday. This week’s logo is kinda easy so I expect you mo’fo’s to stop guessing “Dragonforce” and make a real go of it.

Good luck, and remember to let your soul fly…

-AR

Just in case Max Cavalera’s reunion with his brother Igor in The Cavalera Consipiracy wasn’t enough to provoke a few curious listens, Brazil’s favorite metal son has come around again this year with a new release for his long running brainchild, Soulfly. Now while the skepticism of whether the world really needed two new Cavalera outputs in a single year (and not one of them involving a reunion with you-know-who) is probably well deserved, let’s all us keep an open mind to try and see what unique snowflakes we can find in this avalanche of new material.

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Well, well, well.. at least one person thought Apocalypto was a good movie, and his name is Max Cavalera.

The below, Gibson-esque video is for “Unleash,” the new single from Cavalera’s Soulfly, which will be the former Sepultura main man’s second release this year, after Cavalera Conspiracy’s Inflikted. It features guest vocals by Pantera’s Phil Anselmo Throwdown’s Dave Peters, and while I think it’s an okay song, it lacks that Sepultura-ness that made Inflikted such a nice surprise.

Check out the video and then weigh in in our comments section. Soulfly’s new album, Conquer, drops July 29 on Roadrunner.

-AR

1. There’s a brief snippet of a new Slipknot song, “All Hope is Gone,” available on Amazon. Based on these thirty or so seconds, I’d say it sounds like a super-catchy slice of pop metal in the vein of Vol. 3. Which is a good thing. In any case, it gets an official release this Friday, June 20 (and there will also be a “heavier” song sent out to radio stations in the next week or two), so we should have a better sense of the track soon. Thanks to every MetalSucks reader, because I’m fairly certain each and every one of you e-mailed us about this over the weekend.
2. There’s also a brief snippet of a new Soulfly song, “Unleash,” on Amazon. Based on these thirty or so seconds, I’d say it sounds like Soulfly. It gets an official release next Tuesday, June 24.
3. Blabbermouth reports that Trivium’s new album, which may or may not be called Shogun, will drop September 30. Below you can watch a “teaser” for the new album, although it’s even lamer than the teaser Slipknot released last month. Nothing to get you excited about new music than a pulsating graphic accompanied by no music whatsoever, right?

-AR

Is the world ready for a new Soulfly album? It seems like Cavalera Conspiracy’s Inflikted just dropped, and it turned out to be so killer, I don’t see any reason Max Cavalera couldn’t just chill for a beat before giving the world its next dose of Cavalera Lovin’.

Max isn’t just gonna chill for a beat, though; he’s the kinda guy who thinks metal is like Chinese food, so he’ll release Conquer, Soulfly’s latest, on July 29 via Roadrunner. I’ve heard at least one insider say that it’s superior to Inflikted – but that person also thinks that Cavalera Conspiracy sounds too much like old Sepultura, which is exactly why I like it so much. So take that for what you will.

ANYWAY, here’s Soulfly performing a new song, “I and I,” “Blood Fire War Hate,” [My bust - AR] at the XIII Festival Arte-Nativo Viña Rock 2008 festival earlier this month in Spain. It sounds pretty fuckin’ heavy… but I’ll reserve final judgement for when I hear the proper studio version.

-AR

[via Blabbermouth]

I’m really, really impressed with Inflikted, the debut (if you don’t count Sepultura) album from Cavalera Conspiracy.

Unfortunately, the new cover art for the album sucks even worse than the old cover art:

Okay, remember when Sepultura used to have freaky, scary, horrific, bad ass metal cover art? So why the fuck does this album have some modern-art Devo shit? It’s a good thing the album is actually good…

Thanks to MetalSucks reader Morizz for the tip!

-AR

I’m feeling ready to be not so cynical about the Cavalera Conspiracy, the new Sepultura semi-reunion between brothers Max and Igor Cavalera (Soulfly’s Marc Rizzo and Gojira’s Joe Duplantier round out the line-up on guitar and bass, respectively). And why, pray tell, am I feeling so generous towards the band these days? Well, it’s cause these just released tracks, “Sanctuary” and “Inflikted” actually sound more or less exactly the way I wanted them to, which is to say: they sound an awful lot like good ol’ school Sepultura. Yes, it seems that the shitty band name, cheap album art, deliberate “hip” misspellings and other general shenanigans were bad omens not to be taken seriously… although I suppose the complete album could still totally suck.

Download the tracks below and let us know what you think.

The Cavalera Conspiracy – “Sanctuary”

The Cavalera Conspiracy – “Inflikted”

-AR

[Welcome to the second entry of our exclusive blog series from the new thrash supergroup Iron Steel, featuring Morgan Rose (Sevendust) on drums; Jim LaMarca (Chimaira), Dave Ellefson (ex-Megadeth) and Rachel Bolan (Skid Row) all on bass (!); with vocalist and guitarist Fran Strine and guitarist Tommy Redd. Each week a different member will be posting a blog entry at MetalSucks. This week Chimaira's Jim LaMarca reports on the post-NAMM show apocalypse.]

As the wild NAMM weekend came to a close, Iron Steel almost broke up. Hung over from our release party, we had our first band meeting. Tommy was late, as usual, because he and Diggity Dave from Pimp My Ride closed down the party and moved it over to the custom shop, bringing the majority of the women in attendance with them. Fran had been barricaded in the bathroom of his hotel suite, hiding from Lacey from Rock of Love. She stalked him during the party and chased him all the way back to his hotel room. Morgan took his Sevendust bandmates, John Connolly and Sonny Mayo, left the party early and somehow wound up in jail for performing lewd acts at nearby Disneyland. Ellefson, in his usual ‘work mode’ did an impromptu ‘side-side project’ with some of the remaining musicians in attendance at the party – recruiting Mick Thomson (Slipknot), Josh Rand (Stone Sour), Marc Rizzo (Soulfly), Doc (God Forbid) – into a band that was all guitar players – and he was the only bassist (finally). I observed it all with Rob and Matt from my other band, Chimaira, sitting in the ultra-ultra-VIP section where nobody could see or speak to us – it was an invisibility chamber, actually – created just for Iron Steel.

Click to read more…

As you probably well know by now, the brothers Cavalera of the legendary Sepultura have a new album coming out under the Cavalera Conspiracy moniker, featuring Max and Igor alongside Marc Rizzo (who played with Max in Soulfly) and Joe Duplantier (Gojira).

The album, called Inflikted, comes out on March 25 — but Mr. Arf has a lo-fi but listenable leak of the new song “Sanctuary.”

As you enjoy this track, channel the spirit of Martin Luther King on this fine holiday.

-VN

[Thanks to MetalSucks reader "UT2010" for the tip]