The Next Eight Reunited Metal Bands That Should Make New Albums
Once upon a time I took an anti-reunion stance, the thought process being that when bands reunite, they have a legacy to live up to, and if they fail, that legacy could go right in the shitter. Like, The Empire Strikes Back is forever tainted by The Phantom Menace. Future generations won’t even remember a time when the latter didn’t exist. It’s a dire situation.
I no longer hold this belief however — mainly because in the past five or ten years, we’ve seen a plethora of GREAT reunions: Carcass, At the Gates, Alice in Chains, Godflesh, Van Halen, Living Colour, Autopsy, Pestilence, Armored Saint… and those are just the bands that successfully managed to make new music together! So, yeah, a few years ago I might have been like, “Hey Faith No More, slow your roll,” but now I’m like, “Hey Faith No More, let’s get this new album out into the world ASAP!!!”
To that end, here are five metal bands that have reunited for the purposes of doing live shows, but have , at least as of this writing, not made any new music. Hopefully, that changes soon.
EMPEROR
It’s been fourteen years since the release of Prometheus: The Discipline of Fire and Demise, and the band played their first live show since 2007 this past June to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of In The Nightside Eclipse — but they haven’t announced any more reunion gigs, let alone a new album. Given the ongoing quality of Ihsahn’s solo output, it seems fair to assume that he and his fellor Emperors, Samoth and Faust, would still be able to churn out something worthwhile.
REFUSED
The hardcore outfit’s reunion gigs were mega-popular — like, hard to get into popular. It would seem that, as is the case with their fellow Swedes in At the Gates, Refused’s fan base has increased exponentially since their break-up. So why not take things to the next level?
INFECTIOUS GROOVES
The band played two shows in eight months and then nuthin’. Granted, its members have plenty of other shit on their plates — Mike Muir is, of course, in Suicidal Tendencies, Robert Trujillo is in some small thrash band called Metallica, reunion guitarist Jim Martin (ex-Faith No More, not invited back for that reunion) is pumpkin farming, etc. But if the band writes and records any new music, there is a 1,000% chance that it will be better than the new Metallica or Suicidal albums. Although it still probably won’t be better than Jim Martin’s pumpkins. I mean, let’s keep our expectations realistic, people… those are prize-winning pumpkins!!!
PSYOPUS
The innovative mathcore outfit has been making their comeback slowly but surely, first with a Grateful Dead cover, of all things, and then with a string of live shows. The band’s small-yet-fiercely-loyal fanbase is still clamoring for a follow-up to 2009’s Odd Senses.
SAIGON KICK
Vince and I saw these dudes blow the roof off The Studio at Webster Hall not too long ago, and I’ve been praying for a new release ever since. Guitarist Jason Bieler’s talent has never really been in question (besides The Kick and his solo work, he’s produced albums for SikTh, Skindred, and Mutiny Within, to name but a few), so, as is the case with Emperor, the concept of him writing a new album which is worthy of the Saigon Kick name seems not at all far-fetched. In fact, I’d argue that Saigon Kick have a major advantage over almost any other band that has reunited as of late: they don’t have a “signature sound.” Their work was always incredibly diverse — it’s probably part of the reason they were never as big as they should have been — so they could do pretty much anything they want and the fans would probably go with it. Nostalgia is not an issue here.
SIKTH
Speaking of SikTh: these Brits have also played some live shows recently; those gigs were all in Europe, but I hear they went well. It’s been almost a decade since the release of their masterpiece, Death of a Dead Day. Let’s book these fellas some studio time already!
THE RED CHORD and DESPISED ICON
This is a cheating a little bit, because a) The Red Chord never really broke up, and b) these two bands have nothing to do with one another besides the fact that they’re playing a show together in December. But this week marks the fifth anniversary of TRC’s last release, Fed Through the Teeth Machine, and I’m sure I’m not alone in saying that I’m DYING for some new material from the band. Meanwhile, it’s been more than five years since Despised Icon’s last album, Day of Mourning; now that they’re performing together again, aren’t some fresh skull-smashing breakdowns in order?
And in conclusion, I’d just like to add: is it too late to stop Coal Chamber from making a new album?
