I was actually aware that Canadian grinders Fuck The Facts were working on anything new, but, fuck it, this is great news. The band have released a new track ‘L’enclume Et Le Marteau‘ (which roughly translates to ‘The Anvil And Hammer’), from their upcoming EP Amer, and naturally it slays. For a band that are known to be a staple of the grindcore genre, they sure take the genre approach and twist it viciously, mixing in mid-tempo grooves and some surprisingly catchy and melodic riffs alongside the traditional sheer blastbeat fury that is a cornerstone of the genre.

Any previous fans of the band will find more than enough to sink their teeth into and, if you’re a grind fan that has somehow got to this point without checking these guys out, I’m certain you’ll be able to see why these guys are so widely praised.

Amer will available from June 18th, apparently (I may be wrong) in 10-inch vinyl format, cassette or as a digital download. Don’t miss out.

- DL

Last week we informed you that Karnivool‘s new album is done and will see an anticipated summer release. Along with the announcement, the band promised the release of a new song that the band have been performing live called ‘The Refusal’ would be available. The song is now available for free download, and it’s surprisingly heavy. There’s some screaming and pretty aggressive riffing going on, which sounds great in the context of their prog rock sound. The song’s production’s a little weird though. Perhaps it’s unmixed/unmastered? I certainly hope so anyway. Stream the track below!

A download of the track is available here. More Karnivool news when we get it! New album out mid-year!

- JR

]]> http://www.heavyblogisheavy.com/2013/05/20/new-karnivool-track-available-the-refusal/feed/ 16 http://www.heavyblogisheavy.com/2013/05/17/windhand-complete-new-album-announce-eastern-us-tour-dates/ http://www.heavyblogisheavy.com/2013/05/17/windhand-complete-new-album-announce-eastern-us-tour-dates/#comments Fri, 17 May 2013 17:27:57 +0000 Alkahest http://www.heavyblogisheavy.com/?p=40623

As far as blatant Black Sabbath worshiping goes, Windhand are one of the bands that do it absolutely right. The occult rock thing is getting a bit homogenous, but it helps when you’re able to be as catchy as Windhand. The band have just wrapped up their full-length Relapse solo debut (they had a split album with Cough earlier this year through the label) and are hitting the road this June.

Here are the dates:

06/05 – Baltimore, MD – Ottobar

06/06 – Philadelphia, PA – Golden Tea House

06/07 – Brooklyn, NY – St. Vitus Bar

06/08 – Providence, RI – AS220 !

06/09 – Boston, MA – O’Brien’s

06/10 – Cherry Valley, NY – Steve’s Koi Pond

06/11 – Buffalo, NY – Vault Art Space

06/12 – Pittsburgh, PA – Gooski’s

06/13 – Columbus, OH – Ace of Cups

06/14 – Chicago, IL – Ultra Lounge

06/15 – St. Paul, MN – The Turf Club

06/16 – Milwaukee, WI – Quarter’s Rock n Roll

06/17 – Indianapolis, IN – The Sinking Ship #

06/18 – Newport, KY – South Gate Revival House

06/19  -Nashville, TN – The End %

06/20 – Knoxville, TN – The Pilot Light %

06/21 – Raleigh, NC – Slim’s $

06/22 – Richmond, VA – Strange Matter $



! = w/ Elder and Morne

# = w/ Skeletonwitch

% = w/ Generation of Vipers

$ = w/ Inter Arma

The tour actually hits several towns around me in a four hour radius, but they’re all on weekdays. Bummer. Hit up your local spot if you can make it though! Windhand’s new album will be out this Fall. More news when we get it! Check out ‘Shepherd’s Crook’ from their Reflection of the Negative split with Cough below.

- JR

Sound Awake is my favorite album of all time. It’s the perfect mix of heavy and harmony, and it’s one of those albums you wish you could have written. However, it’s been four years since the band put it out, and although I’ll never tire of it, it’d be nice to have a new album or even just a new song to jam. Well, ladies and gents, it is nearly time.

Karnivool have announced that their new album will come out midway through 2013, is done being recorded, and a new song from the record, ‘The Refusal’, will be played Sunday night. The best part? They’re also releasing it as a free download on Monday. SWEETNESS. They’ve also announced a new music video is in the works and is being edited now. Being that this is my most anticipated record of the year (and probably also of 2011 and 2012 when I learned they had started writing it), this is huge news. Finally getting close to the release date means that soon the album will be out and everyone can enjoy it. It also means that they can come tour the US again and I can finally see them live, having missed them last time due to work.

The band also released a short video blog about the album, with some little snippets of songs, and judging by what I heard, it sounds like it may be their heaviest and most complex album yet. You can read the full statement from the band after the jump, but stay tuned; we’ll have the single up on Monday!

-SS

And that song is beyond awesome, and is easily my favorite song they’ve done so far. My affinity for this new track ‘Raped in Hatred by Vines of Thorn‘ doesn’t stop at its subject matter, but the song’s somewhat nostalgic view of classic melodic death metal brought into a contemporary context is really quite brilliant. The song is ridiculously catchy with the right amount of tech; that solo for instance is just blissful. Stream it here courtesy of Revolver.

This is a powerful track that bodes quite well for The Black Dahlia Murder‘s new album Everblack. It may be the first ever album of theirs that I actually pre-order, assuming I can afford it soon. That purple marbled vinyl, man. You can pick up the record at this location. Everblack is out June 11th on Metal Blade Records.

- JR

“The Wave” is a term that was said as a joke about the new wave of post-hardcore bands, including the likes of La Dispute, Make Do And Mend, and Defeater. The latter has been one of the most captivating bands out of this wave, and their albums are always really emotive and energetic. In keeping with the two year write-record-tour cycle, the band has recorded their upcoming studio album Letters Home and are set to release it July 16th via Bridge Nine Recordings.

Derek Archambault, the vocalist, had this to say in regards to the sound:

“Inspiration for this record came from a few places. Much like with Lost Ground, these stories are based around my two grandfathers’ service in WWII. Musically the record hearkens back to Travels and Lost Ground. EDSN was a bit of a departure for us, and I think we took some good chances on that record but Letters Home brings it back to why we started this band in the first place five years ago.”

Sounds promising! I personally enjoyed the new direction they took with EDSN, but it’s awesome that the band decided to go back to their roots. View the track list below:

01 – “Bastards“
02 – “No Shame“
03 – “Hopeless Again“
04 – “Blood In My Veins“
05 – “No Relief“
06 – “No Faith“
07 – “Dead Set“
08 – “No Savior“
09 – “Rabbit Foot“
10 – “Bled Out“

-SS

[via The PRP]

August Burns Red are one of the few metalcore bands that keep me intrigued. Though I wasn’t much of a fan of Leveler, I think Constellations is one of the best albums of the genre and completely set a new bar for it. I’m super excited for their upcoming record Rescue And Restore as are quite a few of the writers here, and today the band gave us a first glimpse of the record with their single ‘Fault Line’. And it’s awesome. It’s both heavy and melodic, with some of the best guitar work I’ve heard from the band. There’s even some clean vocals on this track, and they fit in quite nicely with the rest of the song. If this is any indication of how the new album is going to sound, I’m even more stoked. Rev up your excitebikes, ladies and gents!

Rescue And Restore is out June 25th via Solid State Records.

-SS

We think pretty highly of Arsonists Get All The Girls, even going as far as to say that their 2009 album Portals is among one of the greatest albums in the deathcore genre. I personally thought the band had hit their stride and continued to rise, but following their 2011 album Motherland, their contract with Century Media expired and the band lost two members. These arsonists aren’t stopping though, instead announcing that their new lineup (featuring original vocalist Remi Rodberg) will release their upcoming album Listen to the Color independently via Bandcamp.

Here’s the press release, featuring band quotes and a tracklist for the new record:

Listen to the Coloris a 15-track collection of AGATG resurrecting their thrashy quirky roots. The album was recorded with Zack Ohren (Animosity, All Shall Parish). The album clocks in at approximately 30 minutes and features many guest vocals from Cameron Reed (former vocals/keyboardist AGATG), Rob Smith (Heavy Heavy Low Low/Downstaaiirs), Kevin McCaughey (Ion Dissonance), Robby Bancroft (Five Characters In Search of an Exit).

Vocalist Jared Monette has left the band on good terms to pursue a different career choice. Bassist Greg Howell comments on their vocalist change, “When Jared stepped down it felt natural to bring Remi back into the mix because we knew we wanted to continue with two vocalists to pursue a chaotic album.” AGATG welcomed back former vocalist Remi Rodberg, he comments on his return, “It’s on! Garin and the boys asked if I wanted to participate in the band again after about four years and I am ready. I am pumped to be back and jamming again and it makes our brother in the sky proud to see us taking this further than we ever thought.” Guitarist and founding member Arthur Alvarez has also left AGATG, the band comments on his departure, “Over the past year Arthur and the rest of us weren’t seeing eye to eye. Arthur stepping down was the only thing we could all agree on, it was mutual.”

Despite being a vocalist and guitarist down keyboardist and backing vocalist Sean Richmond complemented Rodberg’s vocal style sharing half of all the vocals on the album. Richmond’s unique piano interludes and 8-bit keyboard tones possess wacky dynamics bringing a funky Nintendo sound to the album. Richmond comments on the album, “This was a really fun album to write with all the boys. I have always been a big fan of Remi’s voice on the first two Arsonists records and I was really stoked to work with him on all the lyrics and vocal patterns for this album.” Guitarist Jaeson Bardoni also stepped up and wrote all of the guitar riffs on Listen to the Color. Bardoni comments on the new album, “With the band moral being so high the writing process was easy! Writing with great musicians such as Sean, Garin, Greg, and Remi has been nothing but fun, it was such an awesome process. It’s amazing to have our longtime friend Remi back in the game with us adding his own influences and creative dynamics to our music once again. Whether you’re a fan of our last few albums or our older music or even none of it at all, there is definitely something for all of you to enjoy on this album!”

Drummer and founding member Garin Rosen comments on the band and album, “We might not be a full time touring band anymore, but this is something we love to do—friends writing music together. I strongly believe this album will go down as a classic AGATG record. It will be one of the most intense 30 minutes you will listen to…”

Listen to the Color

1. Setting Course For Disaster
2. When I Was Your Age Pluto Was Still A Planet
3. Bottle City
4. MK-ULTRA: Psychotropic Puppets
5. MK-DELTA: Glorified Killers (feat. Cameron Reed former AGATG vocalist)
6. Disease Test The Best
7. Balloon Battle
8. Listen To The color (feat. Robby Bancroft of Five Characters In Search of an Exit)
9. Beast Fist
10. Bardonis Chonies
11. Play The Sheep
12. My Newest Vision (feat. Rob Smith of Heavy Heavy Low Low/Downstariis)
13. Ride The Wave (feat. Garin Rosen of AGATG)
14. Watchers (feat. Kevin McCaughey of Ion Dissonance)
15. Sunny places for shady people

It sounds as if the band will see a return to form of their early material. A half hour through 15 tracks could make for some whacky rapidfire grind-influenced progressive metalcore. Hopefully it turns out well! There’s no album art or release date yet, but we’ll share the news when we get it!

- JR

Two of the biggest releases of not only May but the entire year have got to be Tesseract‘s Altered State and The Dillinger Escape Plan‘s One Of Us Is The Killer. Both leaked last week and this weekend both records finally received full-length streams. First up, The Dillinger Escape Plan’s new record One Of Us Is The Killer is out tomorrow, May 14th, on Sumerian Records/Party Smasher, Inc. The album is just a blast of chaotic and progressive metal. It’s hard to say where it stands among their discography, but it seems like a nice mesh of every Dillinger album so far! Check out the stream over at Pitchfork.

Tesseract’s new record Altered State is a little further away in terms of physical release (May 28th), but Century Media reacted to the leak with immediacy, trying to turn anxious fans into legal streams with the full album on YouTube. That’s how you deal with a leak! Fans are just dying to hear the album, so if the leak already happened, it can only help to make a legit version available that counts towards some sort of statistics and revenue. Does Century Media’s Youtube have ads? If so, they made money from the leak. Smart.

Listen to Altered State below:

- JR

To be honest I kind of forgot that August Burns Red had a new album out on the horizon. It isn’t really that I hate them or anything like that, it’s that the band kind of exists in this plane of forgetability in my mind. I always seem to enjoy them during active listening, but after the record ends, so does my attention span. It doesn’t even seem like it’s been two years since their last album. Where has all the time gone?!

At any rate, they do in fact have a new album coming out just around the corner called Rescue and Restore. The eye-popping artwork above hanging out in my Facebook feed tipped me off that we probably should have covered this already. Like, days ago in fact. Consider it rectified. Finals has been hitting us hard.

Here’s the tracklist:

01 – “Provision”
02 – “Treatment”
03 – “Spirit Breaker”
04 – “Count It All As Lost”
05 – “Sincerity”
06 – “Creative Captivity”
07 – “Fault Line”
08 – “Beauty In Tragedy”
09 – “Animals”
10 – “Echoes”
11 – “The First Step”

I’m actually looking forward to this because of the excellent album art. I know we’re not supposed to judge books by their covers, but it certainly helps if your cover stands out from the rest. Rescue and Restore is due out June 25th.

- JR

Anyone who reads Heavy Blog regularly enough knows our love of extreme avant-garde music. The blending of metal with far-out influences allows for the creation of some powerful art, and one up and coming artist that has really captured our attention is Tristan Shone and his project Author & Punisher. I first became aware of his unique act after playing a direct support set for A Life Once Lost in a small convention center in my hometown. Upon entering the room, instead of the usual setup — guitars, drums, mic, what have you — a collection of odd machines and electronics sat on stage. It became immediately clear that Author & Punisher was no ordinary metal act; Tristan Shone is a true example of a one-man band, recreating his complex drone-influenced industrial compositions with an array of homemade machines. I was so impressed with his act that I approached him after the show for an interview, and we talked for a good twenty minutes about his setup and his new album Women & Children, among other things. Read our conversation below.

Well I suppose first things first! I know you’re Author and Punisher, obviously, but introduce yourself!

Oh hi, I’m Tristan Shone. Nice to meet you.

I think the first thing about your show that’s interesting is that before you even come out, people can see your instruments that you made yourself, right?

Yep!

What was the process of making those instruments?

For these instruments — and I have these previous ones that were much bigger and heavier [pointing to the cover image of Drone Machines, right] — I guess I’ll start with the most recent ones. I had to make something that would tour that I could take on airplanes and stuff, because I’ve found that with the previous ones were so large. I liked that weight; It was about that drone and doom, so I wanted it to be heavy and slow moving. But the new ones had to be of a much faster dynamic. I wanted to be able to play faster music, more rhythmic, so I basically just sat down with the CAD [computer-aided design software] on my computer and I started sketching.

I started designing bits and pieces of instruments that I know that I wanted. For example, do rhythm with the right hand and pitch with the left hand, and I wanted do something with my voice — I typically always want to do that. I’m just NOT left handed, so I can’t make a left-handed device for rhythm because it’s just too hard, but with my right hand I have more power and agility. So I just sat down and started thinking, “what sounds do I want to make?” and, “What’s the physical connection to that sound?” For the heavy stuff, it was drone, slow moving; for this stuff, it was much more about faster dynamics and just be able to change my body in any way and change the song up. In the middle of any song, I can just sit and say, “fuck it, I’m just gonna change this completely.” And I do sometimes.

Yeah, I noticed that you don’t have an in-ear monitor when you play, so you can just change tempo on the fly.

Yeah, or just sometimes I just don’t want to make this [the normal performance of the song] and just stop it and do something irrational. I like that because I can make that decision on the fly and improvise.

Actually, my next question was if your act was improv. Do you go in with a handful of ideas that you know you’re already going to do and go from there?

I mean, I know my setlist. When I first make instruments, the first year or something is just learning how to play it. I’m gonna play shows, because I’m not just gonna sit in my studio; I’ll go crazy. I’ll go out and play a show with a general couple of riffs and just mess around with them. It’s much more droney improv, but now I’ve got my songs together and I kind of work off of those.

Like, last night I had a twelve minute set, so I just did some parts and melded them together with a lot of noise. And I was angry, so I was just screaming and doing a lot of droney dissonance. I was actually pretty happy with the set even though my stuff wasn’t working properly. Just because it was able to capture the emotion of that moment. But fuck, I’m frustrated! I’m gonna do something really awful right now! [laughs]

Yeah, I could imagine with a short set time — how much time did you have tonight?

I had as much time as I wanted.

Oh really?

Yeah, these guys [A Life Once Lost] didn’t kick me off this time. [laughs] Usually, they just soundcheck right up until I’m supposed to play.

Yeah, I saw them setting up behind you as you were setting up.

[laughs] Yeah, we did that because we didn’t want to have to be rushed this time and we wanted us both to be able to have our full sets.

And I could imagine with your style of music, having a short set time makes it hard to build tension and get to where you want.

It is sometimes, yeah. If I only have fifteen minutes, I’ll know which songs I’ll drop. I have one song, that last song, which is about twelve minutes. Yeah, for sure.

Going back to the instruments — obviously you make them yourself, but do you build them from scratch? Do you tear apart other instruments? Do you have a background in any sort of electrical engineering?

Yeah, I’m a mechanical engineer. That’s my day job, so I work in the neuroscience lab at the University of California, basically designing XY robotic mechanisms for microscopes, so it’s very similar to the technology I use for my instruments. So as I’m there working on that stuff, I’m kinda most of the time thinking about music [laughs].

So I’ll just sit and design these. There’s some electronics inside. Each device is made from raw materials, so I’ll basically design them on CAD and go buy the chunks of metal — aluminum or steel — that I need to make a single part, and I’ll sit there and machine every part out. And then some things I’ll buy. Like, I have this chain that moves when I slide, and it holds the wires because if the wires were just dangling, they would eventually break, so you have to use this chain’s wire carries to make sure the wires stay put. I start expecting this and I buy them and put it all together.

And there’s a microcontroller in each instrument that essentially takes the data from each motion and puts it into midi and sends the midi through USB to the computer. Basically these are all about finding physical ways to encode your motion so they can control computer sounds.

Your music is very peculiar. Especially given that this is a small town, I was going in afraid that a lot of people wouldn’t get it.

Right.

Have you ever experienced that in a live setting, where people just did not know what was going on?

Well, yeah. Sometimes you don’t know if they don’t like it or if they are just confused. But at the same time it’s also pretty heavy so I feel like people think it’s little too abrasive. Like, I’ve had people straight up come to me like, “why don’t you play lighter music?!”

[laughs]

“It’d be much more popular, and people like the machines! Your music is so brutal.” I’m like, “yeah, that’s the way I want to do it.”

Before you came out, I heard a guy say, “is he gonna play dubstep?”

[laughs] Yeah, exactly! There’s a lot of dubstep I still like. It gets a bad rap because people like Skrillex and things like that. It kind of ruins it.

Yeah, what do they call it — brostep?

Brostep, yeah. But I like James Blake and all these guys who do it much more mellow. Like, Benga and some of the guys in the UK do good work. I mean, there’s a huge group of people doing dubstep influenced stuff. I’m influenced by dubstep. I like the beats and the bass, drum n’ bass and stuff.

Going from there, how did you originally get into doing what you’re doing? I mean, I couldn’t imagine you were like, “I’m just gonna wake up and make some stuff…”

Well I wanted to be a one man band. After being in many bands, I just didn’t want to deal with the complexities of people. I used to play with a drum machine, Alesis SR-16. I would program my beats, play along with it. Then I started doing it on a computer, but I did it mainly to be for a band. Then all of a sudden, I went back to art school for grad school after working in the industry for a long time, like five years in a white collar cubicle kind of thing. I decided to go to art school and in working with sculpture and playing in metal bands, I just decided that I’d combine them, because it didn’t make sense to do the two separately and making just normal sculpture that I could play with didn’t feel right. I would make sculpture that was just kind of about something, you know? But really on my mind was thinking about music. So I just decided at some point, these machines on the Drone Machines album, this was my project. This is my master’s thesis project. My main performance at the end of the thing was just this big drone metal performance. I built all the speakers, the ones you saw up there and more. So it was just like, I’m going to combine engineering, art, sculpture, and music.

And now you have sculptures that you can literally play with…

Yeah, so you don’t just build them once and then they sit somewhere and you’re like, “fuck, I’ll just put them in a crate.” Even though I don’t play [the instruments from Drone Machines] much anymore, they’re still sitting there and I can go back and play them. I’m gonna tour with them sometime in the Fall. Probably not too extensively though, because that one right there weighs like 300 pounds. So I don’t know if I’ll be coming out East with it.

What are some of your influences? We’ve likened your music to Sunn O))) and SHINING, the Norwegian metal band.

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I wouldn’t say Sunn O))) because by the time I had heard of them I was kind of already doing my own thing, but I totally like them; they’re great. But other bands — like, I first heard Godflesh in freshman year of high school. I think it was the Selfless album that had come out at that time, I really liked it. From there, there was Fugazi, Helmet, Neurosis, and The Melvins. Those were the ones. Like, The Melvins’ Lysol album, when I see people describe that album as being kind of the quintessential doom metal album that changed everybody, it’s totally true! That IS the album I remember listening to in high school on the way to school being like, “WOAH, the bass on this…” Joe Preston, you know, his bass style…

So then when I was like 18-24, I loved going to big electronic drum and bass parties and stuff. The really minimal dub that’s extremely heavy bass but with clicks and stuff over the top of it, I really like. Pole is one of them. Deadbeat, Rhythm and Sound. I mean, it’s like reggae influenced beats, but that stuff — the really minimal stuff — that was just… I have some songs like that from time to time. I could never recreate what those guys do, but I’d like to.

You said you started out making slower music but wanted to build faster machines, and your music got faster. From an evolutionary standpoint, you have a new album coming out this year, right?

Yep.

How does it compare?

I mean, I still have some slow stuff; I just love droning out slow stuff, right? But I’m really into syncopated rhythms now, so there’s a little bit of sequenced beats that I’ve cut up on here. I don’t want to say breakcore, but some influences of that, and a little more industrial. It definitely has a little bit more of an industrial feel.  [Pointing to an album on his merch table:] And this one has about four or five songs on there that have some sequenced keyboards…

And what is this album called?

This is Drone Machines. So half of this is the machines and half of it is… —- there’s like four songs on here that are played with guitar and drum machine. I would say that there’s elements of that sequenced stuff on [the new album], so for my next tour I’ll be playing my machines but my wife will be playing keyboards and doing visuals. So just a little bit more — the dynamic range is a little bit larger. I don’t know how that’s going to work out. I also have new machines beyond this that are designed, but I just haven’t had time to build because I’ve been touring more now, so things have slowed down a bit.

Speaking of touring, how did you envision where you would go when you started? Did you imagine that you would be bringing these things on tour?

Not with [the old] ones. The bigger ones I didn’t, and that’s why I started trying to make them, you know, workable. So… yeah, I always thought I was gonna go somewhere with it. I wasn’t quite sure it was going to be the same way it is now, playing metal shows in clubs and stuff. I thought it was going to be a little bit more like art festivals and things, but I’m happy. I like being able to play in galleries and also in clubs, because if you just play in dirty metal clubs all the time, it’s just dark, and, you know, you turn into that. So I like playing in an art gallery where there’s people that don’t usually see metal and they drink wine [laughs]. Bright, you know?! I like playing in bright places sometimes. Really bright, like white. Keep the lights on fully! Then you can see, like, drooling more, and all the nastiness [laughs]. That should be the new thing. Don’t hide from the light.

Yeah, drone and experimental music is getting much more popular. Well, I don’t know about popular, but it’s accessible and there’s more of these acts coming up, you know? So I could see how getting used to playing with metal bands almost exclusively becomes weird, but when you take a look at all these certain subgenres, it feels in place. Like, all three bands on the tour are very psychedelic in nature, so I think on the surface, though it may seem weird to those who aren’t familiar, it actually does make some sense.

Yeah. I think A Life Once Lost’s stuff has changed a lot. Yeah, it’s more psychedelic, but not psychedelic in the way that I find doom metal bands that are psychedelic that are just cut and paste. I tell ya, it’s old, you know?

Yeah, there was this band — Sabazius or something like that — that recorded a twelve hour doom track. They did it to make a statement, kind of like a self-parody. There was one section of the song that is literally three hours of feedback. They cut most of it, but they left their guitars just sitting there. Are you afraid that you might be lumped in with that excess?

No, I don’t care. All of my music is what I think it should be. It isn’t ironic or a joke. Sometimes it might drag on, but that’s because I wanted to do that. I’m very against irony.

[laughs] Yeah, your act does seem sincere.

Yeah, I just try to be as [intense] as I can. That’s why on this new album, I don’t know how I’m going to even play it live in some ways. Actually, the first song I played tonight was off of it; that’s the opening track, it’s called ‘Women and Children.’ But I don’t always play ‘em, like on [Ursus Americanus], there’s probably half the songs that I’ve never played live. You know, there are some that are live tracks and some that don’t work live.

And that’s just the nature of the music.

That’s just the nature of the music. You know, some of them have that energy and the other ones are studio bits. I’ll probably only play like five songs off the new album.

When you were recording Ursus Americanus, were there any parts that were improv? Did you have some improvisational moments or was it all planned out before you recorded?

Oh, there’s improv. Like all the vocals, because mostly there’s no lyrics. All the vocals I would just like, blurt out stuff. I would just record a bunch of it and cut it up. Some of it I would like, so I’d start doing it live. But yeah, I’d say a lot of it is improv. For the whole new album I would record stuff and then take it back to my laptop and sit there every night start to just write it out, take the drum beats and cut them up. I’d have a keyboard here and a beer here and a microphone and just keep on the couch. I don’t have a studio or anything, I’d just do it on my couch; it’s just more comfortable. I don’t work with a recording studio because then you’d just have a fixed amount of time and I like to be writing haphazardly…

And it gets expensive.

It’s expensive, but then you’re forced to write stuff quickly and I like to do haphazard… I just… I dunno.

You worry about deadlines and stuff, but [Ursus Americanus] just came out last year, right?

Yeah.

And you have a new one coming out this year.

So it was quick.

Sometimes it’s quick.

But the new machines… I have these masks that I’ve made too; these, like, robotic masks that kind of modulate your voice. I’ve made a couple of videos, but I’ll probably do some more art performances with them and I won’t use them in live performances like this. The thing is with shows like this is that people wanna see something that’s really polished, you know? And a lot of times when I’m first starting with something, I just go out and make a big mess.

That’s what happened with black metal. You know, it was a protest to polished. [Varg Vikernes of] Burzum would just use the worst equipment he could get. Sometimes grit’s important. It makes the sound; it makes the environment…

Yeah, just be a little messy. I guess you just get better at being messy after a little while. You just gotta know your equipment. Just knowing how to make good sound was a big battle, so that took a while. Now feel like I have a little bit of a handle on that, so even if I’m improvising or making a mess, at least it’ll sound good even it it’s not organized— riffing in time and all that. But yeah, it was a pleasure playing here!

What does your schedule look like for the foreseeable future?

In May I’m going to Europe for about a month. I’m only playing for three weeks, but I won’t play every day. I’ll probably play like twelve shows or something.

Who are you playing with?

No one. By myself just getting on random shows. I had booking agents over there who really tried, but I dunno, maybe due to the nature of the music or something… Some of the shows are really good. Like, some of them are art galleries, some of them are record stores. We’re going to Prague, Slovenia, Berlin, Amsterdam, Eindhoven, and then over to the UK. That’s the one time where I’m playing with three bands. One band, Gnod, check them out. They’re kind of more electronic, too. Then an art gallery in London, and then my wife and I are going to have our vacation [laughs].

So what’s the name of your new album coming out?

Women & Children. It’s on Seventh Rule and it’s coming out June 11th. I just finished the mastering. Because I’m on the road it’s kind of hard for me to make tweaks that I need to make, so it got delayed by a couple of weeks because of this.

Alright, this is going to sound ridiculous because it’s kind of an inside thing we do, but how do you like your eggs?

I do the over medium, but actually very specifically. I cook it with olive oil in the pan. About a quarter inch of olive oil in the pan, crack the egg in that. So when you cook it, it doesn’t get any crispiness on it. It’s perfectly smooth. Try it!

Oh my god. I learned something over Maclyn’s dumb joke.

And it just kind of slides down your throat!

…

Be sure to add Author & Punisher on Facebook and look out for Women & Children when it drops June 11th on Seventh Rule. Below, you can watch a music video from his 2012 record Ursus Americanus, ‘Terrorbird.’

- JR

Using the average two-year album cycle, it was kind of a no brainer that Georgia progressive metal titans Mastodon were working on a follow-up to 2011′s The Hunter. Even still, it’s good to get confirmation! Mastodon have updated their Facebook with the following status update:

For those of you who are interested, Yes we have been VERY busy writing and putting songs together for the next studio MASTODON album, we are down at our space hammering out riffs that can be friends and working our fingers to the bone to put out another great album. thank you to all our loyal fans!!!!

Boston’s Revocation are one of the finer exports of modern metal according to many a metalhead. Their all-encompassing, jack-of-all-trades approach delivers the goods for fans of almost any extreme subgenre out there, but never feels derivative or uninspired. Personally, I have yet to hear another band combine intensity, intelligence, skill, and emotion to such an extent, and I’m sure there’s others out there that would agree with me, based on the widespread recognition their 2011 opus Chaos of Forms and its successor Teratogenesis received.  Following a relentless tour cycle that is set to culminate with this year’s rendition of the Summer Slaughter Tour, the guys are going to release their upcoming self-titled full-length this summer. As the first proper release with new bassist Brett Bamberger (ex- East of the Wall) on board, this album is building up quite the anticipation within the community.

Well, now us Revomaniacs (hey, don’t judge, the band members themselves use that term!) finally have a taste of new music to sink our teeth into. The band has released a new studio update video that documents the drum and bass tracking process, along with a snippet of new music to boot. There’s also some neat footage of Brett improvising some bass tapping, as well as some not so neat footage of Brett flashing the sure-to-be unwary audience. And obviously, the guitar solo that opens and closes out the video is as brilliant and shredtastic as anything Dave Davidson has ever laid his fingers on.

You can check out Revocation’s previous stuff on their bandcamp page. If you like what you hear, you can give them a like on Facebook  or even get their latest EP for free, courtesy of Scion A/V.

Strychnine is a highly toxic alkaloid, used as a pesticide to kill off animals such as small birds or mice. After ingestion, the chemical causes severe nausea and vomiting before asphyxiating the animal as a consequence of extreme convulsions and muscle contractions. This doesn’t have much to do with the music of Strychnia, other than the fact that I knew it off hand and it’s pretty damn brutal, don’t you think?

Regardless, this death metal quartet are the latest finding I’ve gathered from the wonderful world of Facebook suggested posts — they most likely found their way into my feed through the inclusion of Dying Fetus‘ John Gallagher on guest vocals for the track, but as others have noted in the comments section, I came for the Fetus and stayed for the Strychnia because ‘Reanimated Monstrosity‘ sounds is relentless.

Mashing all manner of death metal titans together, such as Cannibal Corpse, Deicide and that aforementioned power trio, Strychnia stride far in this track with groovy riffs, mid-tempo stomps and sickening drumming. The track will feature on an EP of the same name set for the 14th of May, so get on this quick.

- DL

I know I’m kind of in the minority of metal blogs when I say this, but Korn are an alright band. I’m a bit biased since they were my gateway into heavier music, and the nostalgia factor is there, so keep that in mind before you chew my head off over this. Korn III is actually the only album of theirs that I actively disliked, and I even enjoyed most of their 2011 dubstep-themed record The Path of Totality. I have a high tolerance when it comes to Korn, and I can’t help it. They were once my favorite band, but now that I’ve moved on, I have a bit of a casual interest in the group.

This interest has been piqued a bit since their live reunion with original guitarist Brian “Head” Welch who left the band to kick drugs and pursue Christianity. Now that everyone has had time to heal and grow since the split — including an alleged sobriety across the group — both parties were ready to start again. Apparently the reunion went quite well, because Head has joined Korn’s lineup on a more permanent basis, even being actively involved in writing the group’s upcoming album — their first album together in a decade.

Rolling Stone is hosting a video featuring studio footage and a fairly interesting instrumental. Here’s an excerpt from the accompanying article:

Welch last played with Korn on their 2003 album Take a Look in the Mirror, but the guitarist felt an instant reconnection with his bandmates. “We knew we would have a blast playing together, because we love each other so much, but we really wanted to make sure the music felt right before we committed to making a whole album together,” Welch tells Rolling Stone. “But since we got in the studio, everything just started pouring out, now I can’t wait until our fans hear this stuff!”

I’ve gotta say, as a former fanboy, this is exciting news. While I love Korn’s post-Head industrial/experimental leanings, Head’s solo material actually had quite a bit going for it in terms of that familiar riffing and instrumentation despite the songs being generic and straightforward overall. Hopefully the upcoming album will match Head’s definitive guitar work with Korn’s willingness to experiment to create a brilliant comeback record. This is probably the first new Korn record I’ve actively been EXCITED for since Untitled. We’ll see where this goes when the album drops late this summer.

- JR