Month: May 2013

For Those About to Squawk: Waldo’s Pecks of the Week

May 31, 2013

Holy hell! I’m FIRED the peck up about this band from Baltimore. NOISEM release Agony Defined on A389, and man, is this a ripper! Part old-school Kreator, part old Pestilence at times, these kids — and I do mean kids — get this deathy thrash thing down pat. This thing moves and breathes, and has…

Floor – “Floor”

May 31, 2013

Floor’s history is fraught with turmoil, disappointment and what could have been. Yet, between three untimely breakups, countless empty-room performances, super-short stints on various record labels and a revolving cast of collaborators, Floor crafted the full-length of full-lengths, the heaviest of heavies, the mountain of mountains.

We Are All South of Hanneman Now

May 31, 2013

We all come to grips with death in our own way.  Personal loss has informed much of our favorite music, and last month a much more widely experienced sense of loss affected the heavy music community when Jeff Hanneman passed away.  Artist Justin Bartlett’s tribute to the late guitar hero came about as an online…

Chaos in Tejas Fest: the Gmail Interview

May 30, 2013

The ninth annual Chaos in Tejas fest begins in Austin, TX tonight. I have barely recovered from last weekend and Maryland Deathfest, but ever since attending CIT for the first time last year, I made the promise to myself that sleep, work and all that other crap can be worried about later when there’s more…

Decibrity Playlist: Kings Destroy

May 30, 2013

As someone who takes the subway every day, I’m disappointed in myself for never having thought to pair albums with various lines. So I give loads of credit to Kings Destroy vocalist Steve Murphy for not only coming up with the idea (not to mention his preference for express trains and disdain for the L),…

STREAMING: Kalmah’s “Deadfall”

May 29, 2013

For your streaming pleasure today we have a track from Kalmah’s new album Seventh Swamphony. Listen to “Deadfall” below. Preorders are available in the band’s webstore. The album will be released via Spinefarm on June 18. From the press release: Finnish death metal legion Kalmah are pleased to unleash their seventh studio offering this June,…

Brent Eyestone, Graham Scala & Ryan Parrish (Highness) interviewed

May 29, 2013

How’d Highness come together?Brent Eyestone: Highness is a name I’ve wanted to use on “something” over the course of several years. There’s been just about as many lineups while the ultimate realization was being formed. Originally, the band was to be half of the All-American Rejects and half of Forensics when Mike, one of their…

Road Rituals: Blood Ceremony Tour Diary, Part 2

May 29, 2013

Pre-show vampification ***As chronicled by Alia O’Brien, singer/flutist/organist for Canada’s finest occult rockers, from their current tour with Kylesa, White Hills, and Lazer/Wulf. Remaining tour dates listed below; preorder their phenomenal new LP, The Eldritch Dark, here Many people that we met in New Orleans insisted that the city is alive, and a short stay…

Studio Report: The Body

May 28, 2013

The Body’s Lee Buford is a man of few words, but he makes up for it with his band’s sheer amount of recorded output. They’ve hunkered down in Machines with Magnets in Providence, Rhode Island, and they are using their time in the studio to its fullest. “We’re recording three records right now at the…

Slayer Bundle Available Now

May 28, 2013

We’ve been bringing you exclusive and comprehensive Slayer content since issue #2, featuring our first-ever Hall of Fame for Reign in Blood. Now’s your chance to get all of their cover appearances in one affordable package. Thrash over to the webstore and pick up our version of the Big Four.

Better Living Through Metal: Featuring Iceage

May 28, 2013

Iceage may be young bucks creating some of the most intriguing/enlivening post-punk noise rock out there these days, but spinning the excellent You’re Nothing we had a hunch the much-lauded Copenhagen quartet might have ingested some metal along the way, too — and wound up getting this uber-sophisticated list of five extremely extreme favorites from…

DevilDriver Studio Q&A

May 27, 2013

You started recording in December 2012 and finished in April 2013. That’s a long time to track. Who are you? Metallica? I’m kidding. It was done in pieces, correct?Dez Fafara: [Laughs] Yes it was. The first part was that we had the demos and went on a two month run in the states and I…

Tales From the Metalnomicon: The Devil of Echo Lake

May 24, 2013

Welcome to Tales From the Metalnomicon, a twice-monthly column delving into the surprisingly vast world of heavy metal-tinged/inspired literature and metalhead authors… Douglas Wynne understands we’re living in a post-Clive Davis/Oh God! You Devil world. He knows you can’t just go out to the crossroads howling your rendition of “Me and the Devil Blues” and…

Contest Alert: Win Heartless 7″ Stuff

May 24, 2013

With a spat of excellent releases from the likes Light Bearer, Amber, Momentum, Northless, Multiple Truths and Protestant, Halo of Flies Records has recently and consistently been knockin’ ’em out of the park. Another stellar forthcoming release is Certain Death, the new 7″ from Pittsburgh grinding powerviolence-ers, Heartless. To celebrate the occasion – and to…

Streaming: SLIDHR’s Deluge

May 24, 2013

Sometimes our love for quasi-musical extremes has a flattening effect on the diversity of material we hear.  Dynamics traverse the vast range from loudest to loudest-er, wanton mayhem and terror begin to appear tame enough for family breakfast conversation.  It can be refreshing to hear an album like Slidhr’s Deluge try to save black metal…

Baroness Appearance at Charleston, SC Record Store

May 24, 2013

Do you love Decibel‘s most favoritest non-metal-but-kinda-pretty-metal band? Live near Charleston, South Carolina? Or just happen to be passing through the area this coming Monday, May 27th? If so, make sure you roll on over to Monster Music & Movies for a special in-store performance and signing session with Baroness, scheduled for 4:00 pm on…

Decibrity Playlist: Zozobra

May 23, 2013

Adam McGrath plays by his own rules, nobody else’s, not even his own. So when he sent over a list that simply included five “sweet” songs, who were we to argue? Not only does his time in Zozobra (guitarist/vocalist) and Cave In (guitarist) give him more than enough cred, judging by his selections (the first…

Getting to Know MDF: The Movie Director David Hall

May 23, 2013

As quickly as Maryland Deathfest architects Evan Harting and Ryan Taylor brought the rage to outdoor stages, photos capturing the scene on Saratoga Street emerged, taken from the multi-story parking garage atop the venue. One thing very noticeable in said pictures are glowing cell phone screens being held aloft as folks attempt to capture the…

Repulsion cover Bathory’s “The Reaper” with Pelle Åhman

May 23, 2013

Things always come full circle. And when they do it’s either super-rad or pretty depressing. For Repulsion’s first visit to Stockholm, Sweden, it’s super-rad. Why? Let’s just say, the extremely extremes of Sweden’s early metal scene influenced Flint, Michigan’s grindcore/death metal revolutionaries Repulsion and, in turn, the dudes from the city whose motto is “Strong,…

Inside The Shredder’s Studio #6: Mark Thomas Baker of Orchid

May 22, 2013

Shredding in metal dates directly back to Tony Iommi, who is inexplicably still writing riffs and will be a big part of the new Black Sabbath album due next month. So, we figured it was a good time to invite a new generation of doom shredder into the studio this week. Mark Thomas Baker of…

STREAMING: Aosoth “One With The Prince With A Thousand Enemies” + Interview

May 22, 2013

How would you describe Aosoth to a newcomer?BST: We’re a French black metal band. The project has been created in 2002, but started really being an active band when MKM (vocals) asked me to join as a guitarist and song writer. That led us to record our first EPs and our first album. What originally…

Road Rituals: Blood Ceremony Tour Diary, Part 1

May 21, 2013

***As chronicled by Alia O’Brien, singer/flutist/organist for Canada’s finest occult rockers, from their current tour with Kylesa, White Hills, and Lazer/Wulf. Remaining tour dates listed below; preorder their phenomenal new LP, The Eldritch Dark, here Two days and ten degrees (Celsius!) stood between our homes in Toronto, Canada and our first date supporting Kylesa on…

Cobalt Rising

May 21, 2013

First-class “war metal” masters Cobalt are about to set out on a short (and, no doubt, highly volatile) east coast tour.

EXCLUSIVE: From Hell premiere “Unholy” from forthcoming LP, Heresy

May 20, 2013

“Thrash, Gothic, D-beat” . . . From Hell can spin their sound any number of ways, but, the truth is, they are probably having a bit of mischief with a description of a sound that pulls in as many different directions as there are explodo-throat moments of fierce, faceripping freak-outery on debut album, Heresy. Released…

STREAMING: ZED “Desperation Blues”

May 20, 2013

There are times when you need to strip away the blastbeats, the growling, the hyperbolic horror movie cover art, the hyper-aggressive posturing and just rock. Plain and simple rock. Clutch does it. Maybe they jam a bit, but the core is tried and true rock. Same with Zakk Wylde when he isn’t over using pinch…

For Those About to Squawk: Waldo’s Pecks of the Week

May 17, 2013

What’s up, beaks and geeks? Your old boy Waldo is gearing up for the U.S.’s biggest metal party of the year. And while I’d LOVE to do a Maryland Deathfest-centric blog, there just aren’t enough new releases by those artists this time around; but, you know, fuck it, right? ZOMBIEKRIG release Den Vanstra Stigens Ljus,…

Decibel’s Jeff Hanneman Tribute Issue Now Available

May 17, 2013

It’s impossible to be hyperbolic about the legacy of Jeff Hanneman. Our own Justin Norton comes right out and says it in this month’s cover story: “Every band ever featured in this magazine owes [Slayer] something.” Hanneman and Slayer have coursed through Decibel‘s lifesblood from the onset, from two Hall of Fames to two exhaustive…

Streaming: Steve Von Till’s 2000 Debut, As the Crow Flies

May 17, 2013

The man-boys in Converge suggest we shouldn’t have any heroes.  Ironic, that, since they qualify as heroes themselves.  Another hero whose deeds we love to celebrate is Neurosis vocalist/guitarist Steve Von Till.  The man has helped guide the forces of nature his band channels into masterpieces of world-ending ferocity, and this alone makes him an…

Old School Hardcore Thursdays with AC4. This Week: Visual Aggression

May 16, 2013

Today marks the final installment of Old School hardcore Thrusdays with the members Umea throwback punks, AC4. Check out parts one and two, if you should so desire. This week, I asked bassist Christoffer Jonsson and guitarist Karl Backman to list off the albums they spent as much time longingly staring at back in the…

CONTEST: Win Tickets to See Fight Amp in Philly!

May 16, 2013

Want to know how excited Fight Amp is to be playing its first hometown show of the year? So excited that my fellow South Jerseyans decided to give away a pair of tickets to their May 28th show at Philadelphia’s Kung Fu Necktie and asked us to help. Oh, did we mention that the evening…