MetalSucks Maniac Wayne Graham just tipped us off to the fact that Mastodon’s official website is currently counting down (see screen shot above).
The question, of course, is what are they counting down to? An official first single? A tour announcement? Both? The clock will run out on Thursday. Guess we’ll have to wait ’til then to find out…
-AR
2008 was a huge year for Sweden’s legendary Bloodbath, with their tremendous album The Fathomless Mastery receiving universal critical acclaim (including a #10 nod on our own Axl Rosenberg’s “Best of ‘08″ list).
To celebrate, MetalSucks is teaming up Bloodbath to give away a really fucking sweet Anders Nyström signature model Mayones guitar. To win, all you have to do is:
The winner will be selected on Monday, January 19th. This oughtta be fun; last time we did a “Metal Face” contest we got some hilarious entries. The signup form is after the jump, and only those who fill out the entire form will be considered. Have fun, and good luck.
… here’s a fan-filmed live video with surprisingly decent sound quality [sent in by MS Maniac Damotello] of DEP covering Van Halen’s “Hot For Teacher” at this past summer’s Warped Tour. Watch as the band tears it up — especially guitarist Jeff Tuttle’s near-perfect rendition of EVH’s guitar shred — and the song’s significance is completely lost on the mostly teenage audience, despite the many false cheers that erupt when Greg Puciato mockingly asks how many people know the song.
-VN
Well, Metal Inquisition does anyway, doing the Internet dirty work to bring you the finest in American metal douchebaggery. Since we’ve all seen this guy or some version thereof in New Jersey at our favorite metal locale, head on over to Metal Inquisition for the writers’ sardonic commentary on this fine chap and others:
As all cool metal guys, this guy also has great Photoshop skillz…and he puts them to use in order to pose in front of Sarah Palin? I’m so confused. Also, judging by his jewelery, he must sell his wares to Chuck Billy.
-VN
Well… happy friggin’ new year, everyone. We gots some catchin’ up to do.
As Dillinger Escape Plan fans may have heard by now, the band has hired some dude no one has ever heard of, Billy Rymer from The Rivalry, to replace Gil Sharone, who, in turn, replaced founding drummer Chris Pennie for 2007’s orgasm-inducing Ire Works and all subsequent touring for that album. Now, I know that Sharone’s departure may worry the DEP faithful - the dude was not only an awesome drummer, but watching how chill he always was live, even while playing some retardedly complex drum parts, would seem to suggest that he may very well be a god amongst men (or at least drummers). Hell, even DEP front dude Greg Puciato told us that Sharone is like “the kid in school who always gets good grades just because he’s naturally fucking super gifted.”
But here’s the thing.
Needless to say, we are all very psyched to ingest the rapidly approaching new Mastodon album, the self-proclaimed “more under the rock category” Crack the Skye, which will hit shelves in the next couple months (no official release date yet, but I’m told sometime in March). And if you’re interested in Mastodonian things such as track listings and awesome interviews with band members, let alone video interviews from our interweb bretheren, well…you know what to do.
But if you wanna hear a taste of the newly new newness, you can proceed to HERE (courtesy of “Metal Bastard’s MP3 Blahg” — read full post here). Apparantly, the track is called “Divinations”, it will indeed appear on the new album (according to the always-reliable blogosphere), and this recording is from this year’s Bonneroo Festival, where I hope Mastodon melted the faces of hordes of unsuspecting hippies…literally.
Tasmanian metallers Psycroptic’s Ob(Servant) didn’t make any MetalSucks writers’ year-end lists, (though it did make my initial short-list of albums to be considered for year-end top honors.) MetalSucks commenter “Anal Beadz” was quick to point out this omission in our final tally of year-end honors:
number of time[s] psycroptic’s ob(servant) mentioned in year end lists
…0
YOU FUCKING CUM DUMPSTERS
Mr. Beadz, I hate to say it, has us pegged. The more I listen to it, the more I’m starting to think I made a mistake by leaving Ob(Servant) off the final list; the album straight up pulverizes in the most artful way. Psycroptic’s brand of extraordinary mind-bending tech-death hits in all the right spots; crushing brutality, punishing grooves, weaving riffs, and stellar technical death metal musicianship. Anyone who splooged their pants over The Faceless’ excellent Planetary Duality (i.e. all of you) ought to give this band a fair shake.
Set to At the Gates, natch.
-VN
Torche’s a.d.d.-ish Meanderthal did not make any of our top ten lists this year (although Vince did give them a leel shout-out), but they certainly deserve a bit o’ New Year’s love…their full, stony, harmony-heavy sound ain’t particularly original, but with each album they have definitely upped the ante and come that much closer to being supremely awesome.
Alas, me shan’t be puffin’ at the moment, but by all means you oughtta…
TORCHE - “Grenades”, from Meanderthal (2008)
TORCHE - “Amnesian”, from Meanderthal (2008)
-KW
I predict that 2009 will be at least 4/7ths as brutal as this song…do your part, will ya?
And Happy F’n Jew Year!!!!
BENEA REACH - “Purge”, from Monument (2006)
-KW
-Axl, Vince, and Everyone at MetalSucks
This is a band called Red Fang. The director’s name is Whitey McConnaughy. Everyone involved in this video deserves a big pat on the back.
Thanks to longtime MetalSucks Maniac Pick-Axe Bobby for the tip.
It’s 3:30 pm here in NYC. Time to start pre-gaming.
See ya next year.
-AR
I reviewed The Acacia Strain’s latest album, Continent, a couple months back and I remember being suitably impressed by its seamless integration of death metal intensity and hardcore attitude (both flavors of breakdowns, too). It might still be the only record I’ve heard that really makes sense to be called “deathcore” in a descriptive, non-pejorative way. After having said that, however, I am just glad that vocalist Vincent Bennett was on a different continent (hah) at the time of our interview, or he might have just terminated me. Read more from Vincent’s emailed responses about the dirty d-word and touring in Oz after the jump.
MetalSucks’ own Kip Wingerschmidt and the ballerina turned cock rawk supahstah from whom he takes his name have more in common than a mutual love of getting stone on Saturdays. Turns out they both think Lars Ulrich drinks donkey semen, too. Ulrich can spotted in A Year and a Half in the Life of Metallica (Y’know, the less-famous Metallica documentary that doesn’t make you feel quite as embarrassed to like this band) throwing darts at a pull-out of Kip Winger; now, in an interview with C.C. Banana for Metal Sludge (IT’S ALIVE!!!!), Winger has decided to strike back at the diminutive Dane drummer. Asked if he has himself ever thrown darts at Ulrich’s photo, Winger responded:
Yarmulkes off to Kirsten Hogenson, who correctly answered last night’s trivia question by letting us know that Axl Rosenberg’s surname means “Mountain of Roses.” Kirsten wins the last of our Century Media mystery prizes, and, of course, a dreidel.
Thanks to everyone for participating, we had another great year! And thanks to Century for all the neat goodies!
-MetalSucks
Mazel tov to MetalSucks Maniac Doug Gross, who correctly answered last night’s trivia question by identifying Kiss as the band Nikki Sixx once referred to as “greedy Jews” after they fired his friend, guitarist Bruce Kulick (who is also Jewish, therefore proving once and for all that Nikki Sixx is a grade A mo’ron). Doug wins a mystery prize, courtest Cedntury Media, and a dreidel. Yay Doug!
Well, it’s been an awesome Festival of Lights, but all good things must end. Here’s the final trivia question for our 2nd Annual Heavy Metal Hannukkah:
E-mail your answer along with your name and mailing address to axl [at] metalsucks.net with the phrase “HEAVY METAL HANNUKKAH - NIGHT 8″ in the subject line. All entries are due by 6 pm EST tomorrow (Monday, December 29) evening. Shortly thereafter we’ll announce the winner.
Okay! Last chance to light those candles…
-MetalSucks
Joe Fey is the winner of last night’s mystery prize from Century Media/dreidel from MetalSucks. Joe not only correctly named thrash legends Exodus as sharing a name with a book and movie adaptation chronicling a chapter of Jewish history, but he was able to name said book’s author (Leon Uris) and the movie’s star (Paul Newman) and even its director (Otto Preminger). Go Joe!
There’s still two more chances to win something cool. Here’s tonight’s trivia question:
E-mail your answer along with your name and mailing address to axl [at] metalsucks.net with the phrase “HEAVY METAL HANNUKKAH - NIGHT 7″ in the subject line. All entries are due by 6 pm tomorrow (Sunday, December 28) evening. Shortly thereafter we’ll announce the winner of the Century mystery prize and dreidel, plus we’ll post the final night’s trivia question.
Now if you’ll excuse us, we’re going to go cash the check our Aunt Sadie gave us for Hannukkah, and then feel really, really guilty for no good reason.
-MetalSucks
MetalSucks Maniac Nikki Moody correctly answered last night’s trivia question by going above and beyond the call of duty and citing both Slayer’s “Angel of Death” AND Metallica’s “Creeping Death” as songs that describe unpleasant chapters in Jewish history (the Holocaust and Passover, respectively). Nikki wins a mystery prize from Century Media and a dreidel. Congrats, Nikki!
If you haven’t won yet, you’ve still got three more chances before The Festival of Lights comes to its conclusion. Here’s tonight’s trivia question:
E-mail your answer along with your name and mailing address to axl [at] metalsucks.net with the phrase “HEAVY METAL HANNUKKAH - NIGHT 6″ in the subject line. All entries are due by 6 pm tomorrow (Saturday, December 27) evening. Shortly thereafter we’ll announce the winner of the Century mystery prize and dreidel, plus we’ll post night 7’s trivia question.
Now if you’ll excuse us, we’re going to drink a Christian baby’s blood and count all the gold in the basement of our synagogue.
-MetalSucks
Blabbermouth tells me that the below video of Darkest Hour preparing for their recent Washington, D.C. homecoming gig was created by a blog called DCist. But to be completely honest, my interest lies in seeing former At All Cost guitarist/new edition to Darkest Hour, Mike “Lonestar” Carrigan, become integrated into the band. Mike is a) one of the nicest dudes on the face of the planet, b) an awesome guitar player, and c) half-Jewish, so it’s basically awesome to see him rocking out with founding member/MetalSucks guest blogger Mike Schleibaum - I mean, look at Carrigan shred! Ridiculous.
Also ridiculous: what happens to Mike at the 1:06 mark.
Yuk-yuk.
-AR
This is pretty self-explanatory. Thanks to MetalSucks Maniac Alexandra Perdreau for the tip!
You can get a larger version here.
-AR
