Lost your password?

News

ICED EARTH To Enter Studio On Monday

Manos Spanos
Metal4 magazine conducted an interview with ICED EARTH guitarist/mainman and singer Stu Block at this year's Rockharz open-air festival, which is taking place July 11-13 at Airport Ballenstedt in Harz, Germany. You can now watch the chat below. ICED EARTH has set "Plagues Of Babylon" as the title of its new album, tentatively due in January 2014 via Century Media Records. Speaking to Metal4, Schaffer said about the upcoming CD: "It's a bit of a different thing for us, because it's half of a concept and the other half is [standalone] tracks. Musically, I think it's just another step in the right direction. It's really heavy, it's very melodic. It has a really epic feeling. Even though there isn't, like, a monster, long epic track, the overall feel of the songs is very epic. I mean, there's no 'Dante's Inferno' or'Gettysburg' or the 'Something Wicked' trilogy or something like that on here, but I'm really happy with it and I'm really excited to get in and start recording. That's like my main…. I really wanna start. Monday, finally [we go in to begin laying down tracks]." Songtitles set to appear on "Plagues Of Babylon" (among others):
02 min read

COREY TAYLOR Says 98% Of His Stolen Musical Equipment Has Been Recovered

Manos Spanos
STONE SOUR and SLIPKNOT frontman Corey Taylor says that "98 percent" of the $36,000 worth of musical equipment that was stolen was his home has been recovered. According to The Pulse Of Radio, a police report filed with the West Des Moines, Iowa police department on Sunday (July 7) stated that the heist was committed by an apparent "friend" of Taylor and his wife while the couple was out of town. The Taylors discovered the theft after returning home from a monthlong European tour. Among the equipment that was stolen were two bass guitars from late SLIPKNOT bassist Paul Gray's signature line from Ibanez. Taylor and his wife told police that they believed the friend had stolen gear from their house and storage units.
01 min read

ALICE COOPER Says He Is ‘Three-Quarters Of The Way Through’ Covers Album

Manos Spanos
Legendary rocker Alice Cooper has told Billboard.com that he is "three-quarters of the way through" a covers album featuring songs that were originally written and recorded by THE DOORS, Jimi Hendrix, John Lennon and THE WHO, members of the so-called "Hollywood vampires" of the early and mid-'70s. A 2014 release is expected. "We're really happy, all of us, everyone involved in the covers because it's pretty much what we wanted to do," Cooper said. "We specified a certain time period and said, 'Let's stay within that. Let's not move it around too much.' We don't want to be doing cover songs from the 80s and 90s when the Hollywood vampires kind of thing was more '73, '74, '75." Back in March, Cooper told RollingStone.com about the upcoming CD: "We do a thing in our show, which is a tribute to Hollywood Vampires, my drinking club," Cooper explained. "And it was Keith Moon, John Lennon,Harry Nilsson, Micky Dolenz — a very eclectic bunch of drunks. Half of them are dead, so we do four songs in the show in tribute to them. We do'Break On Through', 'Revolution', 'My Generation' and Jimi Hendrix's'Foxey Lady'. I just kind of said, 'We've never done a covers album, let's think about that.' So [producer Bob] Ezrin and I are kind of bouncing it around right now."
02 min read

GEOFF TATE On Possibility Of Reunion With QUEENSRŸCHE: ‘Absolutely Not. What On Earth For?’

Manos Spanos
Tate: Ah, yeah, of course. It's not really a matter of losing from my perspective, it's just being done with it. I definitely just want to be done with it, I'm already emotionally done with it, I've ripped off the rearview mirror and I ain't looking back. I don't want to look back. The court date in November is to settle what we have, which is a corporate dispute and corporate disputes have a set formula that's regulated by the state and the government to how the case is settled and really when it all comes down to it, it's just a matter of compensation and that's what it'll be. EzineArticles.com: I remember in the 1980s the David Lee Roth/VAN HALEN split and the METALLICA/Dave Mustaine feud, both got pretty ugly at times, do you see the same thing happening between yourself and your former band? Tate: Well, I hope not. Yeah I hope not, I hope it's all settled peacefully and civilly and we can go on our merry way, you know.
03 min read

AURA NOIR Pays Tribute To SLAYER’s JEFF HANNEMAN At France’s HELLFEST (Video)

Manos Spanos
Fan-filmed video footage of Norwegian black/thrash butchers AURA NOIRperforming a cover version of the SLAYER classic "Fight 'Till Death" as a tribute to late SLAYER guitarist Jeff Hanneman at this year's Hellfest, which was held June 21-23 in Clisson, France, can be seen below. AURA NOIR's fifth full-length album, "Out To Die", was released in March 2012 via Norway's Indie Recordings. "Out To Die" marked the return of guitarist Rune Eriksen (a.k.a. ex-MAYHEM guitarist/songwriter Blasphemer), who resides in Portugal and previously led his own band AVA INFERI. Eriksen made several trips back to Norway to work on the new AURA NOIR songs with Aggressorand Apollyon (guitar, bass, vocals, drums; also bassist in IMMORTAL). Members of SLAYER released a statement on May 9 saying thatHanneman died of alcohol-related cirrhosis. He is credited for writing many of the band's classic songs, including "Angel Of Death" and "South
01 min read

METAL CHURCH: New Album Title Announced

Manos Spanos
Reunited METAL CHURCH — Ronny Munroe on vocals, Kurdt Vanderhoof and Rick Van Zandt on guitars, Steve Unger on bass, andJeff Plate on drums — has set "Generation Nothing" as the title of its new album, due before the end of the year via Kurdt's label Body Of Work Recordings. The CD was recorded at Vanderhoof's English Channel studio in Washingtion. The band previously stated about the new effort: "This could be the best MC record of the METAL CHURCH MK3 era!! Woohooo!!" Munroe said in a recent interview with Metal Assault that the newMETAL CHURCH CD would contain material that is "very reminiscent of the old days with some stuff that's very 'now.'" He added: "There's a bit of… I'm not going to say 'prog' because it's not, but there's a couple of elements in there that are a little bit progressive. For the most part, out of this batch of songs, they really sound more reminiscent of the early days than anything we've done before with this lineup. This excites me very much, and I think the fans are really going to dig it." Regarding the circumstances that led to METAL CHURCH's breakup in 2009, Ronny said: "Well, in a nutshell, without going into a huge and long story here, it was certain aspects of things that had continued to happen to the band throughout its career. Not having the proper management and the proper people in place that were handling us
03 min read

AVENGED SEVENFOLD Singer Breaks Down Three Songs From Upcoming Album

Manos Spanos
AVENGED SEVENFOLD singer M. Shadows spoke to U.K.'s Kerrang!magazine about three of the songs that will appear on the band's sixth studio album, "Hail To The King", due on August 27. The new disc was once again produced by Mike Elizondo and is the first to be wholly written without drummer and key songwriter James "The Rev" Sullivan, who died in December 2009. Sullivan has since been replaced by Arin Ilejay, a former member of CONFIDE. "Shepherd Of Fire" M. Shadows: "This is the very first song. If you just listen to the music, it feels you've been taken down to Hell. From the riffs, to the bells ringing, to the horns, to the drumbeat, it feels like you've been dragged down. It's very like [THE ROLLING STONES'] 'Sympathy For The Devil', in that there's a silver-tongued Devil speaking to you. He's not all about fire and brimstone; he's luring you down and telling you he can make your life better than the guy above. There's a temptation vibe to it, with pure chaos going on behind it."
04 min read

Extract From MINISTRY Mainman’s Memoir Available

Manos Spanos
Metal Forces has exclusively published an extract from the newly released book "Ministry: The Lost Gospels According to Al Jourgensen", written by MINISTRY mainman Al Jourgensen with Jon Wiederhorn and published through Da Capo Press. A portion of the extract is reprinted below. "You know you're in trouble when you try to say goodbye to your wife and all you can do is gargle blood. I was dying. Well, that was nothing new. I'd tempted fate for more than four decades. I've had kidney failure; liver failure; hepatitis A, B, and C; and I tried to invent D, but all the doctors I saw were too dumb to grasp my creativity. I lost a toe, all my teeth, and nearly an arm, and I'd overdosed on heroin twice and had to be resuscitated. "That's how I was supposed to go out, like a rock-star cliché with a needle in my arm and a groupie on my dick. But that wasn't happening. See, I've always done things back-assward. I became a singer even though I hated singing, sold out to a major record label before anyone even knew who I was, and then wrote slow, desperate, crushing music when everyone wanted to hear fast thrashy stuff.
03 min read

VINNIE PAUL On How Close DIMEBAG Came To Joining MEGADETH (Audio)

Manos Spanos
Cindy Scull of the Dallas radio station 97.1 The Eagle recently conducted an interview with former PANTERA and current HELLYEAH drummerVinnie Paul Abbott. You can now listen to the chat below. On the differences between European and American heavy metal audiences: Vinnie Paul: "I would just say the main difference is that the people there still live and breathe the music; they really believe in the lifestyle of the music, and they wanna know everything about the bands. That's why some of these bands that have been around forever are still huge there, because [the fans] never forget, they're really into, whereas the U.S. is more 'here today, gone this afternoon' kind of thing. It's really hard to keep staying current here, because people just move on to the next thing so fast." On how MEGADETH's Dave Mustaine has been to tour with on this summer's Gigantour:
02 min read

PHILIP ANSELMO: Entire ‘Walk Through Exits Only’ Album Available For Streaming

Manos Spanos
"Walk Through Exits Only", the his career-first solo album from Philip Anselmo, legendary frontman of PANTERA and DOWN, is available for streaming in its entirety below. Due on July 16 via Anselmo's ownHousecore Records (MRI/Megaforce), "Walk Through Exits Only" will be available digitally, on CD and on vinyl. Produced by Anselmo and Michael Thompson, and recorded over the past couple of years at Philip's New Orleans studio, Nodferatu's Lair, with his band THE ILLEGALS — guitarist Marzi Montazeri(ex-SUPERJOINT RITUAL) and drummer José Manuel Gonzales(WARBEAST) — "Walk Through Exits Only" is abrasive, aggressive, anthemic and 100% Anselmo. The album's eight songs are as unstrained as it gets, from "Battalion Of Zero" to "Usurper's Bastard Rant", to the album's title track that goes against the grain and right through the exits. Brash, brutal guitars cut through punishing percussion as Anselmoscreams with uncompromising ferocity and uncontainable fire. "Walk Through Exits Only" track listing:
07 min read