I was not aware of the existence of Singlish until just now, when I watched the below video interview that Invisible Oranges‘ Cosmo Lee conducted recently with Wormrot — but I’m not at all surprised that it exists. Are the band’s lyrics in Singlish? I’ve honestly never really paid attention to what front man Arif was screeching, and, kind of unbelievably, I can’t seem to find any of the band’s lyrics online. One way or the other, though, this is pretty interesting stuff.

While we’re on the topic of Wormrot: if you’re at SXSW this week don’t forget that they’re playing MetalSucks’ ABSOLUTELY FREE South by Southdeath party at Headhunters, at 720 Red River, from 2-6pm this Friday, March 18th. Kvelertak, Havok, Red Fang, and Meek is Murder are also on the bill, and Full Blown Chaos’ Ray Mazzola is MCing. It’s gonna be a killer time so be there. And bring some weed for Vince — he does so much for you!

Wormort’s new album, Dirge, will be out May 3 on Earache. I’ve heard it. It will not disappoint you.

-AR

After seeing that Red Fang are streaming a new song, “Dirt Wizard,” over at AP, I Googled the phrase “dirt wizard” to see if it has any special meaning of which I was unaware. But Google assumed I meant “dirty wizard,” which, according to the Urban Dictionary, is actually a sexual act I personally have yet to try:

“When one waves their dick around while saying ‘abracadabra’ and then cums on the girl’s face.”

It can also mean a dude with long, greasy hair. Red Fang probably meant that. That would make more sense for a metal band.

ANYWAY, the song rocks, and you should check it out. It comes off of Red Fang’s new album, Murder the Mountains, which Relapse will release on April 12.

And don’t forget that Red Fang are playing at our absolutey FREE SXSW party, South by Southdeath, from 2-6pm this Friday, March 18th at Headhunters, 720 Red River Street. Kvelertak, Wormrot, and Meek is Murder are also on the bill, and Full Blown Chaos’ Ray Mazzola is MCing. There are probably other SXSW  shows you could go do at this same time, but only if you’re lame. You’re not lame, are you?

-AR

Havok, the neo-thrash band that makes all other neo-thrash bands look bad, have a new album coming out on Candlelight on March 29. It’s called Time is Up. Yes, it’s terrific — if you dug Havok’s 2009 debut, Burn, you will dig this, and if you didn’t hear Burn, you should hear this, and if you didn’t like Burn, go jump in a fire.

I mention this because Metal Injection have a behind-the-scenes video of Havok in the studio making Time is Up. And you should watch it! Here, I’ll make it easy for you:

If you’re going to SXSW next week, don’t forget that Havok are playing MetalSucks’ ABSOLUTELY FREE South by Southdeath party at Headhunters, at 720 Red River, from 2-6pm on Friday, March 18th. Kvelertak, Red Fang, Wormrot, and Meek is Murder are also on the bill, and Full Blown Chaos’ Ray Mazzola, a.k.a. “One of the Funniest Motherfuckers in Metal,” is MCing. Be there.

-AR

I honestly should not have to sell you on listening to either of these tracks. Like a free bag of weed, shit should just sell itself. So:

• Agoraphobic Nosebleed (the four bad-ass motherfuckers in the photo above) are streaming two new songs, “Possession” and “Ungrateful,” here. The tracks come from And On And On…, their new split with Despise You, which Relapse will release on April 26. Again, I don’t think I should have to sell these songs, but OHCHRISTPLEASESAVEUSALL, “Possession” is already one of the best songs I’ve heard this year. I love it so much I want to make sweet love to it and look into its eyes and weep as I climax. And you’re not reading this anymore, because you’re pre-ordering And On And On… right now.
• Wormrot have thrown another new track, “Spot a Pathetic,” on YouTube — I’ve embedded it for you after the jump. And holy crap, now I feel torn between this and “Possession.” IT’S A GRINDCORE LOVE TRIANGLE, GUYS. OH FUCK ME NAKED WITH A SPOON, WHAT AM I GONNA DO? WHAT AM I GONNA DO?!? While I try to get my romantic life sorted out, you should know that Earache will release Wormrot’s sophomore brain-melter, Dirge, on May 3, but Wormrot will be touring the U.S. long before then — as in, right fucking now. In fact, they’re playing our ABSOLUTELY FREE South by South Death show at SXSW on March 18th along with Havok, Red Fang, Meek is Murder, and, hopefully, Kvelertak. Get tour dates after the jump, too.

Click to read more…

Wormrot have released another song (here’s the first) from their new album, Dirge. It’s called “Erased Existence,” and it’s a real cock tease, ’cause it’s so damn good, but it’s also only forty-five seconds long.

Of course, they could also just release a slowed-down version of the song to make it last longer. Sure, why not? Apparently they recently had to slow down some of their shit in order to convince event permit officers in Vietnam that they have “mellower” material, too:

Click to read more…

Wormrot aren’t messing about — 2010 saw them rise to prominence in the metal community, and they’re taking full advantage of all the momentum they built up in 2011. They’ve already got a new album, Dirge, scheduled for a May 3 release date via Earache. And even though that date is still almost four months away, they’ve already debuted a new track, “Manipulation,” online. (It’s okay for them to release music that far in advance, see, ’cause the song is only like a minute long, and if Dirge is anything like the band’s last album, Abuse, it’s gonna have 18,000 songs on it anyway.) You can, and should, check it out below. That graphic is the cover art for Dirge, by the way, and it was created by Andrei Bouzikov, who has also done work for Skeletonwitch, Municipal Waste, and Cannabis Corpse.

By the way, the press release announcing the arrival of the above track also confirms the rumor that Wormrot will be playing this year’s Scion Rock Fest in Pomona, CA on March 5; it also says that the band will be doing a full U.S. tour through April, including a stop at SXSW. If you missed the Greatest Band from Singapore Ever Ever Ever on their first U.S. tour last year, you should absolutely not, under any circumstances, miss them again. Abuse is a great record and I’m sure Dirge will be excellent, too, but this band’s full power really becomes apparent in a live setting.

-AR

FEATURING MEMBERS OF ISIS, MUNICIPAL WASTE, ELUVEITIE, WORMROT, LAST CHANCE TO REASON, ZAPPA PLAYS ZAPPA, GOD DETHRONED, OWEN HART, NIGHTFALL, HORSEBACK, AND OCTOBER TIDE

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 fourth 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.)

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 question was once again suggested by “Hipsters Out of Metal!” columnist Anso DF, and even though the Grammy nominations were actually announced last week, it still seemed like a fun debate to have. So:

WHAT ARE YOUR NOMINATIONS FOR BEST METAL GRAMMY?

The MS staff’s answers after the jump.

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Agalloch’s Marrow of the Spirit: Apparently not a candidate for best album of the year.

Yep yep yep: the right honorable Mr. Phil Freeman of MSN’s “Headbang” blog has revealed the 135 finalists which will soon be whittled down for his “Twenty Best Metal Albums of 2010″ list, which will presumably be published sometime in the coming weeks. You can go here to read it, and then leave Phil angry comments about how your favorite album isn’t even on this list of 135 records.

Click to read more…

Earlier today, I downloaded Earache’s new, completely free Extreme Stage Diving app, a video game in which “you take control of a burly bouncer and throw the pesky stage invader as far into the crowd as possible.” And I’m happy to report that it’s going to make an excellent time waster (that’s a compliment), and may soon usurp Slayer Pinball (or whatever the fuck it’s called) as my favorite metal-themed smartphone procrastination tool. It’s simple yet challenging, it appeals to my 8-bit sensibilities, there’s plenty of blood, and, oh yeah, the soundtrack is killer.

Yes, of course, this is meant to help Earache promote their shit. But the game features a bare minimum of songs by Earache bands I don’t like (cough, Oceano, cough cough), and those songs are more than offset by the inclusion of groups like At the Gates, Deicide, Brutal Truth, Decapitated, and Wormrot. And whomever designed the game was smart/cool enough to make it so that you can skip to whichever of the ten featured songs you like — in other words, if Bonded by Blood comes up and you don’t like Bonded by Blood, you can easily move along to The Haunted or whatever your particular cup of tea might be. (And apparently there’s a bonus track that you can unlock, but I haven’t gotten that far yet. I’m hoping it’s a Godflesh song, even though that would make no mothertruckin’ sense whatsoever.)

Check out a sample video below…

If you go here and give Earache your e-mail address, you can also potentially win the helmet the charcter in the game wears, although I think the game itself is a much cooler prize, and you don’t need to enter no contest to get it.

You can download the game here. Like I said, it’s totally free, so you really have nothing to lose by trying it out (other than the time you’re going to spend playing this instead of doing something productive). And you can get the full track list after the jump.

Click to read more…

Photo of a real live female in a real live pit courtesy Justina Villanueva. Hey, Justina is a woman, too!

One of the most enjoyable parts of being a metalhead, in my opinion at least, is being able to catch my favorite bands live. The concert experience – whether it’s taking place at an arena, a bar, or a basement – is an integral part of our culture, and that fact alone is one of the few things keeping this industry alive (financially, at least; metal itself is forever. Duh). Now, as many of you may have noticed (and lamented), there is a distinct lack of estrogen floating around amidst those churning seas of testosterone we call metal shows. I’ve been to many, many, MANY metal shows, and am always invariably one of the few (if not the only) women there. It depends on the genre, of course; you’re probably not going to find nearly as much eye candy down front at Darkened Nocturn Slaughtercult or Cannabis Corpse as you’ll stumble across at a stoner rock show or see at, I don’t know… Lacuna Coil or As I Lay Dying. The safer (and lamer) the band, the more chicks you’ll find lining up to buy a ticket. Why? I wish I could share the secret with you dudes, but honestly, I don’t get it either. Why a fly-ass honey wouldn’t want to squeeze into a dark room packed with sweaty, hairy men and blow out her eardrums in the name of Satan is beyond me, but I’m not going to delve into the why-don’t-girls-like-metal debate today – it’s been done. Instead, let’s just be stoked that girls are coming to shows at all, in ever-increasing numbers no less.

I’ve come up with a handy little survival guide of sorts for both my sisters-in-arms, as well as ladies who’ve never been to a metal show before, but are curious about what goes on and might be interested in popping their concertgoing cherries. A lot of this stuff is pure common sense, but I’ve also picked up a trick or two over the years that just might make your night a helluva lot better, and may get you to bring some girlfriends out to the next one!

Click to read more…

Full confesstion: I had never even heard of Uphill Battle before this summer, when Empyereon/Meek is Murder drummer Frank Godla turned me onto them after this past August’s Cynic/Intronaut/Dysrhythmia show. I think what happened was, I said something about how much I love Danny Walker’s drumming in Intronaut, and Frank said, “Oh, you’ve heard Uphill Battle, right?” Turns out Walker was in Uphill Battle before Intronaut ever existed. Needless to say, upon learning this information, I told Frank I needed to hear something ASAP. Wreck of Nerves (Relapse, 2004) has been, like, wrecking my nerves pretty consistently since that night.

Click to read more…

So Wormrot, who are currently tearing new assholes across America, are doing a tour diary for Invisible Oranges. And you should read it, ’cause you should do anything and everything you can to support this great band. But also, because we get a shout out in the inaugural edition. Check it:

Let’s start with the show in The Bowery Electric, New York. It was a last minute gig for us. Wormrot is actually not in the lineup but Earache managed to squeeze us in. The promoter was cool to let us play last minute. It was our very first show in the US and it was fucking awesome. We also get to meet the Earache US team in the club and Mike from Sunyata Atanamar blog was there too! We didn’t know MetalSucks staff was there until we read their blog. Great people, great place, great gig! It was a great start of the tour after the 21 hours flight from Singapore!!

Well, thanks, fellas! We’ll try to introduce ourselves at your gig in Brooklyn in October.

Read the rest of the tour diary here, and get Wormrot tour dates here. Really, blow me if you don’t go see these guys; they crush.

-AR

That’s right! One of MetalSucks’ most controversial voices — which is really saying something — is gonna be the DJ at tonight’s Heavy Metal Happy Hour at Arrow Bar (85 Avenue A). There are 2-for-1 drinks from 6:00PM until 9:00PM, so if you’ve ever wanted to get drunk and ask Gary “ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS OR WHAT?!?!” in person, here’s your chance!

Now the week’s highlights:

• We debuted new music by The Absence and Vanisher.
• We spoke to Accept’s Wolf Hoffmann and Sebastian Bach (but not really with that last one).
• We checked out new releases by Filter, Neurosis, and The Last Felony.
• Vince contemplated a Mike Portnoy-less Dream Theater.
• Sergeant D. contemplated the new Escape the Fate song…
• …while we couldn’t even pay attention during the new Oceano song.
• We considered bidding on the best band name in the world.
• As it turns out, Wormrot are really good live, too.
• Neil Young and Burzum are collaborating on a new album?!?
• Wanna see a fat man eat seven cans of ravioli in time to a Fuckshovel song? OF COURSE YOU DO!!!

As Eyal promised yesterday, next week will see the full-on return of “Jumping Darkness Parade.” Plus we’ll have more contest, more video and track debuts, more interviews, more everything. Be there or be ᄆ.

-AR

I don’t know what to tell you that you can’t learn from the headline. Our pal Atanamar over at Sunyata — Mindful of Metal captured some pretty good quality footage of this past weekend’s Wormrot show here in New York, including the below video, which features both the song “Blasphemy My Ass” and a new song, the title of which is currently unknown.

I was talking to Atanamar about this last night, and he actually thinks this new song is Wormrot’s best yet. What do you think, our beloved fellow grindfreaks?

Head over to Sunyata — Mindful of Metal for more footage from the gig!

-AR

Incredibly unprofessional photo courtesy my iPhone and PBR.

Rarely have I felt as close to a room full of mostly strangers as I did at Wormrot‘s first show of their U.S. tour this past Sunday evening at the Bowery Electric. As you’ve probably heard, the band missed the first few dates of the tour due to visa issues, and almost didn’t make it to the States at all; once it became clear that they were going to make it across the ocean, the promoters of this bill — which also included Evoken and Wizardy, both of whom are worth checking out if you’ve yet to do so — were able to slide Wormrot in at the last minute. This combination of “Awesome Cinderella story band from Singapore almost didn’t make it and then did and scheduled this show at literally the last possible moment” made the entire thing feel that much more special, and the fans in attendance behaved accordingly.

Click to read more…

UPDATE: While Wormrot won’t be able to make tonight’s scheduled performance, they have rescheduled for this Sunday evening, September 5, at 11 pm at the Bowery Electric. Be there or be square.

We were crazy excited about Wormrot’s first U.S. tour, and so when a reputable source recently told us that the band were having difficulties getting into the country, we more or less had a panic attack. Then we saw this tweet from Earache head honcho Digby Pearson, and our eyes started to well up with tears.

Now an official press release confirms that these troubles have passed, and the band will begin the tour this Monday, September 6, in Cleveland. The bad news is that fans who were hoping to see Wormrot at any of the dates scheduled for prior to this Monday won’t get to see them — although the band is going to re-schedule tonight’s NYC date, probably for the end of the tour.

Get remaining dates here.

-AR

Congrats to MetalSucks Maniac Devin Garvin, who not only correctly identified last week’s logo as beloning to the band Gutted with Broken Glass, but, per my weekly instructions, included his mailing address with his entry, because he’s not a total ree-ree who either doesn’t know how to read, or who thinks that I can somehow intuit his address, or who thinks that I’ll e-mail him to get his address even though plenty of other entrants were smart enough to follow the rules and include their address with their entry. For getting the answer right AND not being an idiot, Devin wins any two CDs and/or DVDs from whatever the hell we have lying around the mansion this week. Devin, please check your e-mail for your list of choices!

This week we have a really, really awesome prize, courtesy the nice folks at Earache Records: a prize pack featuring every Earache artist currently on tour in North America! That’s includes a two CD import copy of Wormrot‘s Abuse, a copy of Order of Ennead‘s An Examination of Being WITH a t-shirt, a copy of Bonded by Blood‘s Exiled to Earth, a copy of Oceano‘s Depths, and a copy of And Hell Followed With‘s Proprioception. That’s a whole lotta free shit!

All you gots to do to win is identify the name of the band whose logo appears below, then shoot me an e-mail at axl AT metalsucks DOT net with your answer, your name, and your address. FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS HOLY, ALL ENTRIES WITHOUT AN ADDRESS WILL BE DISQUALIFIED. From everyone who gets it right, we’ll randomly select one winner and announce his or her name next week.

This week’s logo was suggested by reader Steve Wigmore…

-AR

Singapore grind bastards Wormrot are pretty much everyone’s favorite new discovery this year — our own Sammy O’Hagar raved about their album, Abuse (out now on Earache), and then did a great interview with their guitar player, Rasyid. But I kind of assumed that we might never get to see them live, since, like I said, they’re from Singapore, and it’s not like there’s tons of cash to be made from travelling all that way to play grindcore.

Luckily, I was wrong! Reader Chris Halbert has alerted us to the fact that band are, indeed, doing a U.S. tour this fall, including two weeks with Phobia and Maruta. These shows should be CRAZY, and you definitely don’t wanna miss ‘em, ’cause who knows when/if Wormrot will return to the States.

All the dates are on the poster above, or you can get ‘em on Wormrot’s MySpace page.

-AR

Holy crap, was that awesome Faith No More show really a week ago already? I think I may be suffering from post-FNM depression. We’re seeing Maiden on Monday night, and I’m more excited to hang out with my friends than to see Bruce, Steve and the gang. I just wanna go see FNM again… is that so wrong???

Luckily, there’s plenty of stuff going on in the metal world to keep me distracted from dreams of Mike, Mike, Billy, Roddy and Jon. For instance:

• Bulb from Periphery got his groove back, and The Austerity Program’s Justin Foley consulted with the dudes from Aquarius Records as he continued his search for the perfect Taco Riff.
• We debuted new music from Asher.
• Sergeant D spoke to Miss May I’s Ryan Neff and Sammy O’Hagar chatted with Rasyid from Wormrot.
• We checked out new releases from Soilwork, Allegaeon, and Sister Sin.
• The possibility of new Beavis and Butt-Head episodes gave us a collective boner.
• The hippies in Phish got aggressive and covered Rage Against the Machine.
• We looked at a plethora of terrifically terrible music videos, and Vince wondered if the medium was even a relevant tool for promotion anymore.
• Vince also took time out of his busy schedule to find me a new woman. Yowza!

Next week we’ll have a song debut from our fellow stoner nerds, an interview with a power violence band, and some other shit. Plus, Question of the Week will finally return. ‘Til then… enjoy your weekend!

-AR