[Welcome back to Rigged! Last week Between the Buried and Me guitarists Paul Waggoner and Dustie Waring walked you through their live setups piece by piece. This week it's The Ocean mastermind Robin Stap's turn to show you his, um, "gear." Next week BTBAM drummer Blake Richardson breaks down his kit, and the week after that Robin Staps will be back for round 2. Between the Buried and Me and The Ocean begin their MS-sponsored tour with Job For A Cowboy (and on select dates Cephalic Carnage) this week. Get dates here.]

Hey everyone, happy to introduce you all to my rig and to some of the gear I use.

Let me start with the amp. My amp’s a classic 5150, don’t need to say much about it I guess… all tubes, nice fat tone, good attack and definition. I installed 2 pressure gauges in the front panel: they’re always telling me how much pressure is left in the air tank that’s behind the amp, so in case Loic farts too heavily and I need to inhale oxygen on stage, I never run out! Our live show is pretty sudorific anyway, ya know, gotta be prepared!
The outside is cobra leather. I killed that snake with my bare hands last summer, during our headlining tour in Burkina Faso. Had to smuggle it back to Germany, not an easy undertaking!

The wood is actually 100% mahagony which I intentionally made look like laminated fibre, because I felt the mahagony look would have compromised the cobra leather finish.

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It’s true, and it’s finally here — after so many relentless album spins, Germany progressive metal collective The Ocean will finally grace our earholes stateside and decimate the back room at Public Assembly in Brooklyn. Add to the mix MS faves East of the Wall and death-grinders Flourishing, and you’ve got yourself one hell of a show.

Vince and I will most certainly be in tow and whiskey’d up, as will Toto and the Tin Man, and many more of your least-favorite NYC r-tards….

JOIN US.

Thanks to BBG from Brooklyn Vegan & Rich Hallford from 1000 Knives for making this show happen.   Dreams can come true.

Be sure to catch The Ocean on their MetalSucks-sponsored tour around ‘merica with Job For A Cowboy and BTBAM starting this Friday — tour dates after the jump.

-KW

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…then check out this quote from a recent interview with vocalist Tommy Rogers:

“We have a really exciting set list for everyone this tour. We are going to do the entire new record [The Parallax: Hypersleep Dialogues] plus a set of old songs.”

Well, I think that’s great fucking news, and based on your reactions from when we debuted the EP last month, you’ll all find it happy-making, too. Plus the album is only thirty minutes, BTBAM are the headliners, and Tommy promised “old” (lulz) songs as well, so it’s not like you won’t get to hear favorites from the rest of the band’s discography.

In other words: this really exciting tour just got that much more exciting.

The Parallax: Hypersleep Dialogues is out today on Metal Blade, and the tour kicks off Friday! Get dates after the jump — BTBAM alone are enough of a draw, but Job for a Cowboy, The Ocean, and (on select dates) Cephalic Carnage are all on the trek, too, so you’re really gonna feel like a dummy if you don’t go. And also don’t forget to check out our recent “Rigged” column, in which BTBAM axe slingers Paul Waggoner and Dustie Waring take you through their live setups piece by piece. We’ll have another entry from BTBAM drummer Blake Richardson soon!

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Between The Buried and Me are heading out on the road on a MetalSucks-sponsored tour with Job For A Cowboy, The Ocean and, on select dates, Cephalic Carnage. We’ve teamed up with the band to give away one PRS SE Custom 24 guitar in Tobacco Sunburst and one copy of their upcoming album, The Parallax: Hypersleep Dialogues, due out April 12th on Metal Blade Records (which you can stream here for a limited time!).

Check out a picture of the pretty instrument up for grabs here, but please note the one you get will be in the Tobacco Sunburst color, not the orange shown.

For such a radical prize you’ve got to submit an equally radical entry, and as you know we like to keep things fun and light-hearted here at MS. So, do tell us via the comments: what is your favorite BTBAM song and why? Be creative.

Check out tour dates here, and stream the entire EP right here on MetalSucks!

So yeah yeah yeah, Victory is releasing a greatest hits package for Between the Buried and Me on March 29. We have avoided writing about it up ’til now because it’s one of those things where a label goes “We just lost one of our big bands, but we have the contractual right to try and milk some more money from ‘em, so let’s slap something together and get it out there.” (BTBAM recently ankled Victory for Metal Blade.) Sad, but this kind of thing happens all the time — hell, Victory did the same thing when they lost Atreyu a few years back. These collections usually aren’t even approved by the band, who legally have no say in the matter.

But so many of you have e-mailed us about the below video, which shows off the packaging for this compilation, and… yeah, it looks killer. Like, Tool-album-packaging-killer. Even though there’s absolutely no new material on this album (there are two CDs and one DVD, the latter showcasing all the band’s music videos), this is an increasingly-rare instance of a label actually giving fans a good reason to purchase a physical copy of an album. Whether or not you think that makes it worth it to pay for music you already own, well… that’s up to every BTBAM fan to decide for him or herself.

Meanwhile, BTBAM will release a NEW (not just recycled material!) three-song, thirty minute EP, The Parallax: Hypersleep Dialogues, on April 12 via Metal Blade. Then they’ll headline a MetalSucks-sponsored tour with The Ocean, Job for a Cowboy, and, on select dates, Cephalic Carnage. Get dates for that trek after the jump.

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Drummer Mike Justian is out of The Red Chord… again. I guess in all fairness, it was never really clear if this founding member was re-joining the band on a permanent basis, or if he was just filling-in after Brad Fickeisen split with the group last year. Then again, Justian’s been back in TRC for over a year, which seems like a long-ass time to just be filling-in. And even as a massive fan of the band, it’s certainly funnier to think of Red Chord skinsmen in Spinal Tap terms, spontaneously combusting at random intervals.

But fuck do I know? A statement from the band certainly makes the split sound amicable:

Click to read more…

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

This week’s query was suggested by our very own Anso DF…

IF YOU HAD THE POWER TO GIFT A RECORD TO EVERY ACTIVE MUSIC LISTENER IN THE WORLD, WHICH RECORD WOULD IT BE AND WHY?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

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Speaking of AP debuts that seemingly caused MetalSucks readers to just completely lose their shit and e-mail us messages to the effect of “YO POST THIS SHIT RIGHT NOW!!!” en masse: Alt Press is streaming an excerpt of the song “Specular Reflection” from Between the Buried and Me’s new EP, The Parallax: Hypersleep Dialogues.

And before you get sad that they’re not streaming the entire song, be aware that said track’s total running time is nearly eleven-and-a-half minutes, and AP has six-and-a-half of those glorious minutes. Also, Parallax only has three songs, although it’s total running time is roughly thirty minutes. So, really, you’re getting to hear more than 25% of the album with this clip.

Headbang here. The Parallax: Hypersleep Dialogues comes out April 12 on Metal Blade. And don’t forget that BTBAM will headline the MetalSucks-sponsored Hypersleep Dialogue Trek starting in April, along with Job for a Cowboy, The Ocean, and, on select dates, Cephalic Carnage. It’s gonna be killer. Get dates after the jump.

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Yesterday we got news of a new Between the Buried and Me record and today we get news of a new Between the Buried and Me North American tour! Yippee!

We already kinda knew that Between the Buried and Me would be touring this Spring with The Ocean and Job For A Cowboy based on one leaked date and the fact that all three bands appear atop this year’s New England Metal and Hardcore Fest lineup. In all honesty, though, we already totally knew; in case you haven’t noticed yet, our logo is on that there tour poster above, meaning we’re a sponsor of the tour… and it was killing us not to tell ya’ll these past couple of months because we knew how excited you’d be. But now you know, we all know, EVERYONE knows, and together we’ll revel in this awesome lineup, which also features Cephalic Carnage on select dates!

Full list of dates after the jump.

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It’s been a long three years since The Ocean toured the U.S.; Precambrian had just come out, and they came to the States for a headlining run — perhaps a bit prematurely — with Withered, Lair of the Minotaur and Kylesa, an awesome bill but perhaps not the right one for The Ocean at that time. Their live show was stunning and left me wanting more, but The Ocean weren’t quite at the popularity level they are now and, at least in NYC, the room had mostly cleared out by the time they want on. Three years and two albums later it appears The Ocean appear to be finally headed back… with Between the Buried and Me and Job For A Cowboy (or whoever is playing in the latter these days), in a support role that’s much better suited for them.

ThePRP.com has picked up on an April 29th date for all three bands at The Rickshaw Theater in Vancouver, B.C., and as we already know all three bands sit atop Saturday’s bill at The New England Metal and Hardcore Fest on April 16th. As we learned in high school geometry, two points make a line; I think it’s pretty safe to assume there will be a full U.S. (North American, really) tour featuring all three bands.

Until then, enjoy this live music video (with album audio) of The Ocean playing the Heliocentric track “The Firmament,” one of my faves from that record. Thanks to TNOTB for alerting me to its existence.

-VN

Well, the line-up for this year’s New England Metal & Hardcore Festival — one of the oldest and most revered extreme music fests in the U.S. — has been announced, and it’s… interesting. The fest returns to a three-day format after being only two days last year, but if I’m not mistaken, this is the first time that the initial day will be a Thursday, not a Friday. And as reader Brian Kessler pointed out to us via e-mail, there are two noteworthy aspects to the lineup:

• It seems like metal and hardcore have been further segregated on the bill — Thursday appears to be almost entirely dedicated to deathcore and crabcore bands, Friday seems to be entirely devoted to hardcore bands, and Saturday is dominated by metal bands. There are pros and cons to this approach — the pro being that if you’re only a fan of one particular style of extreme music, you can cherry pick which day you’re going to attend, and the con being that new fans are less likely to be exposed to bands with whom they were not already familiar.
• There seem to be fewer “big name” acts. Sure, Hatebreed and Biohazard are on there, but that’s still a far cry from years’ past. In fact, plenty of big name who have new albums scheduled to come out this year — like Amon Amarth, DevilDriver, Arch Enemy, In Flames, and Children of Bodom — aren’t playing the fest.

Please note that I’m not knocking the fest — in fact, I think Saturday, April 16 is full of killer bands — and I don’t think every fest needs to be headlined by a band of Megadeth’s stature. I just think this particular line-up is… interesting.

Anyway, here’s the full bill:

Click to read more…

Well, the line-up for this year’s New England Metal & Hardcore Festival — one of the oldest and most revered extreme music fests in the U.S. — has been announced, and it’s… interesting. The fest returns to a three-day format after being only two days last year, but if I’m not mistaken, this is the first time that the initial day will be a Thursday, not a Friday. And as reader Brian Kessler pointed out to us via e-mail, there are two noteworthy aspects to the lineup:

• It seems like metal and hardcore have been further segregated on the bill — Thursday appears to be almost entirely dedicated to deathcore and crabcore bands, Friday seems to be entirely devoted to hardcore bands, and Saturday is dominated by metal bands. There are pros and cons to this approach — the pro being that if you’re only a fan of one particular style of extreme music, you can cherry pick which day you’re going to attend, and the con being that new fans are less likely to be exposed to bands with whom they were not already familiar.
• There seem to be fewer “big name” acts. Sure, Hatebreed and Biohazard are on there, but that’s still a far cry from years’ past. In fact, plenty of big name who have new albums scheduled to come out this year — like Amon Amarth, DevilDriver, Arch Enemy, In Flames, and Children of Bodom — aren’t playing the fest.

Please note that I’m not knocking the fest — in fact, I think Saturday, April 16 is full of killer bands — and I don’t think every fest needs to be headlined by a band of Megadeth’s stature. I just think this particular line-up is… interesting.

Anyway, here’s the full bill:

Click to read more…

Seems like a while since we’ve posted a photo and rewarded your asinine, immature comments with sweet metal bounty, no? Our last photo caption contest was all the way back on December 17th, in which we offered a signed copy of Atheist’s tech-metal comeback album Jupiter. But we have no intention of stopping the fun, and we’ve got even biggerer and even badasserer prizes in store for 2011. Here’s the winning caption for our last contest of ’10:

• metallicbrian: “HOLY SHIT, THAT HOODIE GREW LEGS”

Nicely done. The funniest caption actually came courtesy of Sean Goff, but Sean didn’t follow directions by including his email address since he was logged in via Facebook. Tough titties for you, Sean, and nice titties for metallicbrian.

These week we’re giving away two copies of The Ocean’s Heliocentric, which comes in a silver foil-stamped digipak with full-color tarot cards for each song on the album and is generally one of the prettiest packages I saw in all of 2010. Alls ya gotta do is come up with the funniest caption to the below photo (sent in by reader Anthony Showalter) and remember to use a real email address (or post it with your comment if you’re using FB Connect)!

FEATURING MEMBERS OF GOD FORBID, AT THE GATES, DISFEAR, MACHINE HEAD, BETWEEN THE BURIED AND ME, THE OCEAN, JUCIFER, THE BINARY CODE, HULL, DYSRHYTHMIA, INDIAN, AND DARKEST ERA

For 2010, we decided to do something special as part of our regular end-of-year festivities here at MetalSucks — namely, ask musicians from across the vast spectrum of the metalsphere (or, in a few cases, the almost-metalsphere) what their favorite albums of the year were. Death metallers, thrash metallers, black metallers, stoners, grinders, and djenters alike graciously contributed lists to MS, and we’ll be running them in groups of ten to eleven musicians at a time twice a day for the rest of the week.

After the jump, check out the sixth group… we hope you enjoy seeing what some of metal’s heaviest hitters were into this year as much as we have!

(And please note that these are musicians and that they, um, have a lot on their minds. So some of ‘em named albums that actually came out last year. Please don’t freak out.)

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Back in October, I took the time to chat via Skype with Robin Staps, founder and main songwriter of the Ocean Collective. We talked about the band’s new album Anthropocentric, discussed the unfortunate theft the band experienced while on tour, the band’s plans for U.S. touring in 2011, and more.

Click to read more…

Whoah shun, it’s The Ocean!!

-KW

Scottish rockers Mogwai are another one of those non-metal bands that a lot of metalheads seem to like a whole lot. And it’s not just metalheads; Mogwai seem to have a fanatical following amongst general fans of good music all over the world. Either you don’t really know anything about this band / don’t care or you fucking LOVE them (I’ve never heard anyone say “Mogwai sucks.”) I’m in the former category, but I’ve heard enough good things about them over the years to spark my interest. When I interviewed The Ocean mastermind Robin Staps during their U.S. tour two years ago he mentioned that after the tour he’d be going to some festival in [I think] Sweden to see Mogwai, and he was extremely excited about it. Just yesterday the trustable lads over at Crustcake expressed a similar excitement about the band’s upcoming album. If Robin Staps and Crustcake are into any one band, color me interested!

So what Mogwai albums should I check out? Do you like Mogwai? Mogwai is one of those words that sounds funny when you say it too many times. Mogwai mogwai mogwai.

-VN

Why am I writing this week’s “Worst Week” entirely in questions? Could it be to irritate you? Or am I just trying to keep myself amused at the end of the week?

Did you know we asked some other questions this week?

• Was Sergeant D. kidding when he said that there are only two good songs in Reign in Blood?
• Why did Dimmu Borgir change their album art post-release?
• What’s the big deal about Volbeat?
• Is Glenn Danzig actually perfectly reasonable?
• Is there anything better than a Devin Townsend show?
• Can Ozzy restore your sanity?

And have you asked yourself these questions as well?

• Did you know that we debuted new music by The Ocean, Dukatalon, and Gozu?
• Did you read Anso’s chat with Dave Wyndorf from Monster Magnet?
• Is Oderus’ advice column worse than Vinnie Paul’s? Do you agree with Doc Coyle’s assessments on the issue of European metal versus American metal? Do you find, as Eyal Levi does, that creative prison is for pussies? Is Greg Weeks imagining it, or does it smell like poop and onions right now?
• Did you buy the new album from Dallas Coyle’s Genetic? You know the money goes to cancer research, right?

Are you worried that I’ll still be doing this on Monday? Do you think I care?

-AR

May the speculation and waiting end; now you can finally hear the second of two Ocean albums released this year, the stunning and expansive Anthropocentric. The album won’t come out until November 9th in North America, November 19th in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and November 22nd in the rest of Europe… but we’ve got it for you today to enjoy for the entire next week.

So; how does it stack up against this album’s counterpart Heliocentric? Is it indeed the “heavy” release that was promised? How does it compare to past Ocean albums? Should Robin Staps run for World President? You be the judge and tell us what you think in the comments.

Order the album here and help The Ocean recover what they lost last week when they became victims of an actual highway robbery in Spain, or donate whatever you can via PayPal.

[this promotion has ended]

A lot of you commented on yesterday’s article about The Ocean robbery saying that you wanted to donate, but had already preordered the album — or that you didn’t want the album but still wanted to make a donation. So we sent Metal Blade an email asking for a PayPal address so those of you who still want to donate can just send some money. You should send all donations via PayPal to:

info [at] theoceancollective.com

Include a note like “robbery donation” so The Ocean knows what it’s for. You can also still include a donation if you pre-order Anthropocentric. Thanks again to everyone for helping out a great band in a time of need.

-DM