Truth be told, I spend way too much money on music. Truth be told, and considering my monthly take home, I spend waaaay too much money on music. A couple years ago, as a means of avoiding homelessness, I came up with a plan to curtail my record shopping insanity. Basically, if I’m browsing at…
Every other Friday, Waldo the African Grey Parrot, frontbird of thrash-grind immortals Hatebeak, will get you caught up on the week’s latest “extreme” releases. What’s up? Your boy Waldo is back from the humdrum void of “real” work. As the year starts to wind down, so do the releases. Not that there’s not plenty coming…
This is some pretty hefty call-and-response type shit going on here, so it you’ll thank me in advance for not yammering on with no end in sight about how great Tom G. Warrior is, about how Celtic Frost and Hellhammer‘s collective legacy is responsible for some of the most essential records in metal, a whole…
Yeah, I know what you’re thinking, it’s a bit early to start thinking about the album of the year. It’s only mid-September. But such are publishing and album release schedules that we Decibel footsoldiers are mentally ensconced in winter, like, this year is so over. But the thing is, compiling a top 10 ten or…
I’ve done a lot for metal over the years. In an attempt to sport the longhair uniform, despite genetics handing my follicles a bum deal, I walked around looking like a frizzed out crackhead throughout most of the 80s. Rooms in my house are filled with records, CDs, magazines and not much else to varying…
Spare a thought for all those hardy underground searchlights who’d been holding their breath waiting for Oakland, CA power-trio Brainoil to follow up the riff ‘n’ tumble of 2003’s superlative self-titled debut. They will have been dead and buried now, asphyxiated, gone purple in the cheek from the eight-year stretch when bassist/vocalist Greg Wilkinson, guitarist/vocalist…
Back in the early 2000’s, my old band (who had a song called “Twitter” almost a decade before, well… you know) was signed to a Swedish label called Lunasound Recordings. The label was run by a gentleman with obviously impeccable tastes named Stuart Ness and his wife Chelsea Krook (an ex-member of the “apocalyptic folk”…
Surveying the Apocalyptic Necromancy track listing it is pretty clear those with an actual fear of gore might have their gag reflexes tested a bit by the latest fetid offerings from Goreaphobia — see, for example, “Rust Worms and the Noxious Fevers They Bring,” “Shroud of the Hyena,” or “Void of the Larva Queen.” Thus,…
What with Neurot reissuing Neurosis’ Sovereign EP, we thought it was probably no better time to celebrate how great they are. Currently working on the follow-up to 2007’s Given to the Rising, work that we most definitely won’t see ’til 2012, Scott Kelly’s is one of the bona-fide ayatollahs of giganto-riff. Like, him and Steve…
David Hall is the director of Disgorge, Mexico: The Movie, Axis of Eden: The Feature Film, Maryland Deathfest: The Movie and Maryland Deathfest: The Movie II. He attended Maryland Deathfest last May 26 – 29 with the intention of shooting the second sequel. Suffice it to say, things did not go as planned. Hunker down…
Here I am back after a long silence. What can I say?! I naively thought I could be writing while on tour… I was wrong. For one, I was sick as a dog during the majority of the European tour, so for the most part the routine was: from bed to stage to bed. Day…
Almost every band has that album: you know, the critically and/or commercially reviled dud in an otherwise passable-to-radical back catalog. Well, every Wednesday morning—in this case, Thursday, and former invisible orange-man Cosmo Lee would like to offer you a personal apology for the delay—a Decibel staffer or special guest will take to the Deciblog to…
Almost every band has that album: you know, the critically and/or commercially reviled dud in an otherwise passable-to-radical back catalog. Well, every Wednesday morning, a Decibel staffer or special guest will take to the Deciblog to bitch and moan at length as to why everybody’s full of shit and said dud is, in fact, The Shit. Today,…
Almost every band has that album: you know, the critically and/or commercially reviled dud in an otherwise passable-to-radical back catalog. Well, every Wednesday morning, a Decibel staffer or special guest will take to the Deciblog to bitch and moan at length as to why everybody’s full of shit and said dud is, in fact, The…
By Dan Caycedo (Sons of Tonatiuh) The police were in full force. Four days before we left I decided it would be a grand idea to crack my heal bone. So me and the boys went out for a hockey game one night, and jumped off a 5 foot ledge for fun. I went to…
By Ashmedi (Melechesh) The first column for 2011. And it’s number 16. For a person who used to hate writing I find this quite the accomplishment. 2010 was very productive year. It is the year The Epigenesis was recorded and not long ago released, so I felt a sense of accomplishment and relief. We are…
How did you get past the personal and professional challenges that faced you while writing and recording Black Rivers Flow?Alex Lackner: With everything that was being thrown at us during the process of making this record many would seem to fail. We didn’t even allow that to be an option. To start with, the whole…
Over the past few years, we metallers have seen our special sigil—the goat horn—stripped of its significance (i.e., magical power) by clueless celebrities (Miley Cyrus gets it wrong first then gets it right second) and pop culture junkies looking add ‘edge’ to their persona. That ‘edge’ they seek is, or rather was, ours. True, I’ve…
Almost every band has that album: you know, the critically and/or commercially reviled dud in an otherwise passable-to-radical back catalog. Well, every Wednesday morning, a Decibel staffer or special guest will take to the Deciblog to bitch and moan at length as to why everybody’s full of shit and said dud is, in fact, The…
Almost every band has that album: you know, the critically and/or commercially reviled dud in an otherwise passable-to-radical back catalog. Well, every Wednesday morning, a Decibel staffer or special guest will take to the Deciblog to bitch and moan at length as to why everybody’s full of shit and said dud is, in fact, The…
A sequel to Lords of Chaos this surely ain’t: According to a recent AFP article (which reads more like one of John Darnielle’s “South Pole Dispatch” satires than a legit news story), Armenian police have began cracking down on “emo” rock fans: Officers have visited schools, searched pupils whose distinctive clothing marks them out as…
Oh, lordy. A post-emo kid in a tragically deep v-neck t-shirt and festooned with the requisite rejected-by-Flock-of-Seagulls haircut runs to MTV for help confronting his deathcore band fronting tormenter via Bully Beatdown, a reality show based upon the flawed premise that if you have a professional mixed-martial artist humiliate some asshole on television, that’ll be the end…
By Valient Himself (Valient Thorr) Alahoyus. This will be the final transmission of the VALIENT THORR FALL- INTO MADNESS TOURR. Or the VALIENT THORR AUTUMN OF 1000 CHARACTERS TOURR. Or whatever. I like to change the name nightly. We have definitely met some interesting cats out there this go round. When we last left off,…
What is black metal?Carnifex: Nefarium’s (Myspace link) primary thought concerns the communicative aspect, with the idea that a black metal listener could understand a message of hate and anger towards those elements that can be [considered] personal. In an apathetic and driven world, powered by hypocrisy, we seek personal illumination to give the most adequate…
I know, I know, with all the thrilling Jets shootouts going on this year, it’s hard to believe that the fourth consecutive completely pointless baseball season hasn’t ended yet.
The Light… was written in an entirely different way than March…, and there’s a healthy four year period between the releases, so a lot of time was spent rehearsing and generally getting the feel for what we wanted the second album to be like. Most of the debut album was written in a relatively short period in 2005, whereas the The Light… songs have taken form organically in the rehearsal room in a real band setting, which I think makes the songs more real and solid.
Hot on the heels of this summer’s Profound Lore debut, Of Seismic Consequence, Chicago prog-monsters Yakuza scored perhaps the baddest-ass black metal tour of 2010, scorching the States with Triptykon and 1349. Frontman/White Sox fan-for-life Bruce Lamont will periodically fill us in on the gory details. Day 1—drive day Got Pat Clancy from Nachtmystium (sitting…
This was a hectic summer. The album recording took all my time and attention. I lost track of night and day, was locked up in the studio for around over a 100 days. Give or take a few days. So, am I excused for the delay in delivering this edition? I would like to thank…
After traveling 10 000 miles (or 16 500 kilometers for us Canadians), playing all across North America, canceling / missing two shows, suffering through two broken windows, and much more, Woods of Ypres is finally finished their independently booked and managed tour. On the downside: “Multiple stolen possessions.” On the upside: “No sickness, disfigurement, or…
