MetalSucks

We loved the last tour blog that Bison B.C.’s Dan And did for us so much, we’re only all-too-happy to present another! Below, please enjoy part 2; you can read part 1 here.

Sep 28 ‘09 (Albuquerque NM @ Launch Pad)

The first thing that struck me about this venue was the framed posters that line the walls… Melvins, High on Fire, Fu Manchu… some killer bands have been through here over the years. I was also struck by how nice and clean Albuquerque seemed. I would later find out that the town is ranked in the top five for violent crimes in the US. Okay then, never mind.

Played with a rad band called Roñoso. Weirdest guitar tone ever but it totally worked in their crust-saw sound. Kylesa sounds fucking huge tonight. Their (hilarious) sound guy Dave is working the system like it owes him money… and it probably does.

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Mere hours before Gojira played the best show of 2009, our friends at Metal Injection interview G to the Jira main man Joe Duplantier, and even got him to pick his favorite metal videos. No shock: the man has good taste. So, needless to say, this is pretty awesome.

Vince’s own interview with Joe should go up sometime next week. You’ll wanna read that, too. Trust me.

-AR

Thrice are something of an enigma, a band that’s refused to ever stay the same. The Irvine, CA-based foursome started out as a metal-influenced heavy punk band that incorporated more and more progressive elements into their music with each album. 2005’s Vheissu took a complete left turn by adding indie and electronic elements, a path down which the band ventured even further on their 2007/2008 4-part album suite The Alchemy Index. Beggars, their latest offering, incorporates all of their prior influences and stretches their indie wings still wider, still experimenting with new sounds and expanding their fanbase.

A few weeks ago I spoke with drummer Riley Breckenridge about the band’s constantly evolving career arc, public and critical perception of this change, the new album Beggars and its super-early leak, consuming music in the digital age, and what the band hopes to accomplish in the near and distant future. Our chat follows.

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Have you ever listened to Tool? Have you ever listened to Tool… on weed??? Have you ever listened to Tool played on a piano by one man… on weed???

This is pretty fucking incredible. The fact that composer Adam Monroe was able to create a piano rendition of “Lateralus” is pretty impressive. That his version doesn’t just ape the original but includes a whole lot of his own flair is really fucking impressive. And the fact that he sings on top of it and nails the performance of this epic song is just… wow. I really can’t fathom how he stays on top of three different rhythms and melody lines all at once — left hand, right hand, vocals. This is no small feat given Tool’s penchant for having each instrument do its own thing, only each guy in Tool only has to focus on his own part while this guy is doing everything at once. You know those crazy buskers you see on the street sometimes who play drums with their feet, sing, and play two different instruments with their hands? It’s like that. Unbelievable.

-VN

Actually, I’m pretty sure it’s just sad. Sad that this band, The Flood, thinks they’re actually doing something original. Sad that they don’t realize they’re ripping off Tool in every way except they aren’t nearly as good. The press release I got about this band says they just wrapped up a tour Static X… hopefully they’ll go right out on another one so I don’t have to ever cross paths with either shitty band again. Jeez. This band is just downright offensive.

-VN

This past Saturday night, Vince and Axl bought tickets to hipster-douche fest All Points West with the express purpose of seeing Tool and Tool only. There was a serious and very visible divide in the crowd – namely, other metalheads vs. people who think Interpol is cool  – and your MetalSucks editors were privy to some pretty funny dialogue as a result:

1. “I think they’re called, like, ‘Tools?’”
2. <robot voice>”Intergalactic, planetary. Planetary, intergalactic.” </robot voice>
3. Beat-boxing.
4. “Gogol Bordello are awesome.”
5. “Please don’t block my view of the stage.”
6. “There won’t be any moshing. Look at all that mud! No one wants to get dirty.”
7. “Where are the fried Oreos?”
8. Scowling at Axl’s Slayer shirt.
9. Scowling at Vince’s Paganfest shirt.
10. “What’s that smell?”

No matter; Tool kicked major ass anyways. It’s like there’s an unspoken agreement between the band and their fans: “You bring the weed. We’ll bring the lasers.”

Here’s Tool at All Points West on Saturday night, performing with special guest drummer Frank Ferrer of Guns N’ Roses fame.

-AR & VN

It’s raining in New York today. AGAIN. At least it’s warm; it’s been fucking rainy and cold for all of June (seriously… hoodie weather in June??). I feel like I’ve been cheated out of an entire month of summer. Fuck the world.

Here’s what happened this week:

• More arguing ensued over our 21 Best Metal Albums of the 21st Century… So Far list. You bitched and moaned to the tune of 444 comments (and counting) about the #11 pick of Deftones’ White Pony — just as you did last week with the debatably metal Tool (#12) and System of a Down (#14) picks — and then when we finally announced more trve/cvlt/br00tal albums you approved of (#10 Opeth, #9 Gojira, and #8 In Flames), comments were few and far between by comparison. You people are fucking morons. Especially Ziltoid.
• Rumors flew about the resuscitation of Headbanger’s Ball in 2010 with Jose Mangin as the host.
• More shit-talking between the two sparring Fear Factory camps provided us with endless amusement. We wondered aloud whether or not FF should be considered nu-metal.
• Shinedown’s Brent Smith claimed to have insider knowledge of a Soundgarden reunion, to which Axl — and possibly but not definitely Soundgarden’s own Ben Shepherd — took offense.
• We spoke with Scott Kelly of Neurosis and Vinnie Fucking Paul.

We out. Stay tuned in a couple of hours for our #7 Best Metal Album of the 21st Century… So Far. I’ll be at tomorrow night’s Black Anvil show at the new Duff’s location in Brooklyn if anyone wants to come out and hang. See you next week for more shenanigans!

We recently polled a wide array of musicians, managers, publicists, label reps, and writers from within the world of metal to find out what they thought the 21 Best Metal Albums of the 21st Century So Far have been. Eligible albums were released between January 1, 2000 and April 1, 2009. Each panelist turned in a ballot, with their #1 album worth 21 points, their #2 album worth 20 points, and so on and so forth. The ballots are now in and we’ll be counting down one album a day until we reach #1. Today we present the #12 album, coming in with a total of 139 points…

Tool, Lateralus (Volcano Records, 2001)

Maynard James Keenan – Vocals

Adam Jones – Guitars

Justin Chancellor – Bass

Danny Carey – Drums

Produced by David Bottrill and Tool

I’m sitting in my living room with my B&W speakers cranked through my Krell stereo, listening attentively in complete darkness. I’m STONED. Half a song in and Tool’s Lateralus is every bit as great as I remember it being; dark, rich, lush, creepy, challenging, accessible; Adam Jones’ buttery smooth yet razor-sharp crunchy guitar of “The Grudge” cuts through my chest. Justin Chancellor’s groovy bass-slapping locks in with Dan Carey’s rhythmic, guttural pounding… they all come together in a furious sonic whirlwhind, and then there’s Maynard’s voice letting out a gut-wrenching, soul-destroying, 15-second long scream. Chaos unfolds by the second, yet it’s completely calculated and organized chaos, wrapping together into a neat, pounding, CRUSHING riff that twists your soul and body with every unexpected turn of the music, then it locks into one final chaotic coda and it ends. Is there one more turnaround? Nope. But there’s more madness around the corner. TOOL, motherfuckers, TOOL!

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When Axl and I were in our formative years of MTV watching, Tool were the absolute undisputed kings of bad-ass music videos. Guitarist Adam Jones — a pro animator in his pre-Tool life — worked on the videos for “Sober” and “Prison Sex” with director Fred Stuhr (who also did Green Jelly’s “Three Little Pigs”), and Jones carried the torch on his own from thereon out with eye-pleasing, head-trippy gem after eye-pleasing, head-trippy gem.

In 2009 music videos certainly don’t carry the weight they used to, but whereas Tool have all but stopped releasing videos, a record deal with Warner Bros. has left the lads of Mastodon as the beneficiary of some pretty hefty video budgets, allowing the band the creative freedom to take drummer Brann Dailor’s hair-brained conceptual album schemes to their full-blown visual realizations. We had the eery, sci-fi social commentary of Blood Mountain’s “Sleeping Giant,” the epic cave man shreddery of this year’s “Divinations,” and now this, a trippy, space-age freakout adventure for “Oblivion,” the first track from this year’s spectacular masterpiece Crack the Skye. What’s great is that — like Tool — Mastodon’s videos all share a common look and feel and all seem to tie together in some loose way. This is more than just random eye candy; it actually means something. As to whether you can or think you can parse Dailor’s actual intended meaning is another question, but again, like Tool… Mastodon keep you guessing.

-VN

After the jump, check out those “Sleeping Giant” and “Divinations” videos.

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It was a short week, but despite Axl being under the weather and Vince gettin lucky in Kentucky, we still managed to get shit done around the ol’ Mansion, even without the help of our favoritest MS Mansion Monkey, Higgins:

• We’re making a list: we give you a hint, another hint and yet another hint. No, it’s got nothing to do with Jacob.
• Ozzy Sharon filed another ridiculous lawsuit, while Dillinger Escape Plan left Relapse Records sans-lawsuit.
• IWABO and Bloodbath released new videos.
• Killswitch Engage gave you a new song for free, we gave you a new Hull song for free, and Job For A Cowboy and Darkest Hour let you hear new songs for free. Crikey!
• We spoke with Nick Hipa of As I Lay Dying and J. Costa of Thy Will Be Done, the former about music and the latter about beards.
• Dallas, The Blogronaut and Eyal all wrote blogs.
• Best Band Ever announces festival appearance atop worst lineup ever.

I had a wisdom tooth pulled this morning so I feel like a giant sack of assholes at the moment, but hey, Percocet! See you tomorrow.

-VN

In typical Tool fashion, the current reigning title-holders of “Best Band on the Planet” status have announced a mini U.S. tour for this summer with little fanfare or press hullabaloo. The first date of the tour — the rest of which was announced this morning on their head-scratchingly-still-stuck-in-2001-website — will take place on August 1st in New Jersey, and is actually part of the 3-day All Points West festival. The festival features a bunch of bands no one who reads this site will give a shit about (save possibly My Bloody Valentine; possibly some of you might be into this band, I’m looking at you Gary Suarez), which is quite frustrating as the rest of the country gets just Tool.

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Regular readers of this site know full well that your editors are not fans of Isis or Neurosis. It’s not what we dislike those bands… we just don’t like ‘em. Don’t see what all the fuss is about or why people go so fucking ga-ga at their mere mention. No matter how many times people we trust say “duuuude… you gotta listen again! trust me!” every time I listen again (and there have been many), I still don’t give a fuck.

So it is with extreme surprise that I report the following: I like the new Isis song.

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According to Consequence of Sound, the best band in the world, aka Tool, are going to headline one night of this year’s Lollapalooza. Now a 3-day festival, this year’s event is set to take place August 7-9, 2009 in Chicago’s Grant Park. It would be Tool’s 3rd time at the festival, having played on the touring incarnation in 1993 and 1997.

Of course, nothing is official, but according to Mr. Leaky Faucet himself, aka The Chicago Tribune’s Greg Kot, “multiple industry sources confirmed” the much speculated rumors during last week’s South by Southwest.

Time to book a flight to Chicago? We can only hope that this won’t be a one-off and Tool will add more dates. I CANNOT possibly be expected to wait until 2010, possibly 2011, to see Tool perform again.

-VN

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:

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Yesterday Vince speculated that there may be new Mastodon music in the trailer for the forthcoming video game Splatterhouse. Then we got an e-mail last night from composer Howard Drossin, who explained all:

“The music featured is not by Mastodon. It’s mine. I’m the composer on the game. I really appreciate that you thought it might be Mastodon. They are a big inspiration and I respect them enormously. I post the trailer on my blog as well if you’re interested.”

Howard also contributed music to the recent Afro Samurai video game, and from what I can tell from our brief e-mail exchange, he’s a very chill, humble dude. Be sure to check out his website. And thanks for setting us straight, Howard!

After the jump, more Mastodonews.

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At least according to this, erm, “press conference” video for the set of recently announced Puscifer shows in Las Vegas.

The best thing about this video is the personification of the d-bag, frat boy Tool fan at 2:45. Nailed it, right down to the long-sleeve-under-a-short-sleeve T. You all know we love Tool ’round the MS Mansion, but that set of d-bag fans needs to go.

-VN

Finally… we have a capable, intelligent, forward-thinking new U.S. president. No, it’s not Dave Mustaine. Here’s what else happened this week:

• We wondered aloud and speculated about Slayer’s co-headline tour, New England Metal & Hardcore Fest, Scion Rock Fest (aka Atlanta Metalfest), and The Faceless’ headline tour. This spring just got awesome.
• We ran to the hills to avoid a shitty classic metal cover. Meanwhile, we found Iron Maiden in Iran and on the big screen.
• We got sexi(vious) with members of Cynic and Textures.
• We looked at new releases from Satyricon, Cattle Decapitation, 16 and Rumpelstiltskin Grinder.
• Maynard got all Jiu-Jitsu on our asses and Carcass played a wedding.

Axl, myself and our girlfriends (we have girlfriends… whowouldathunkit???) are going to see The Dark Knight on the IMAX tonight. Hopefully weed will be involved. Later, suckaz!!

It may be that the frontman for the best band on earth is opening an organic fruit market in addition to his already-established winery in his hometown of Cornville, Arizona. But don’t let those fruitish tendencies fool you; the diminutive Tool singer attended West Point and continues to practice Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. An unsuspecting fan who attempted to climb on stage during a Tool performance found out the hard way not to fuck with Maynard James Keenan. Watch the clip [via Revolver] below.

-VN

File Isis under “bands I just don’t get.” I mean, I GET it… long, drony songs, heavy, fuzzed out bass, big, loopy riffs, raw production, lack of traditional song structure… but I don’t GET IT get it. As in, see what all the fuss is about. Im fully aware of the importance and influence of this band, especially to those who grew up with more of a punk background as opposed to a metal background… but man, every time I try to listen to an Isis record (a feat I’ve attempted many times) I just get bored, zone out, and forget I’m listening to it. Kinda like when you’re reading a book but your mind is elsewhere and you get to the bottom of the page only to release you can’t actually remember anything you just read… actually, listening to Isis is exactly like that for me. Consistently.

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Revolver Magazine Editor-in-Chief Tom Beaujour has revealed in an interview with our chums at BITPOM.com that the magazine is planning an all-Pantera special edition issue for December, on the heels of their wildly successful and highly amusing all-Tool issue this past Spring.

If ever there’s another metal band that inspires as fervent a fan-base as Tool I’d think Pantera is certainly that band, and it makes perfect sense for Revolver to release a tribute issue. I’ll especially be looking forward to this one, as there is SO much to explore, especially in the way of new interviews with the remaining living band members — so long as the good folks at Revolver hold off on tacky Dime tributes (this topic has been beaten to death, deader than a dead horse fucking another dead horse in the bunghole) and so long as Rita Haney keeps her obnoxious trap shut. I’m also interested in seeing how much, if any, editorial space the magazine devotes to Pantera’s oft-ignored glam metal years.

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