Featured

Catapult The Smoke – Contest!

August 4, 2011

CTS – Always Favour My Side by Decibel Magazine Alright, here’s another chance to win big. A lot of people go through life and they never win anything. Losers. Some babies are stillborn. The ultimate losers. Here is an opportunity to be better than that, by winning a copy of Catapult The Smoke’s new album…

GREAT FALLS FUTURE TOUR DIARY

August 3, 2011

Tour diaries suck. Here’s one from the future from Great Falls bassist/Decibel tell-it-like-it-isser Shane Mehling (not pictured, thank god). They will cover Sponge songs on request, but only from Rotting Pinata or Wax Ecstatic. Shudder before the insightfulness. Great Falls Future Tour Diary Wed, Aug. 3 – Baltimore, MD Fly in late and get picked…

Disposable Heroes: Refused’s “The Shape of Punk to Come”

August 3, 2011

There’s little more annoying on this planet than the immoral majority telling you how essential, transcendent and (huh-huh) seminal a particular extreme album is, when you know that it’s overrated as fuck. Hence, our new Wednesday morning column, “Disposable Heroes,” in which one brave soul sails against the current to inform all you clones why…

Whiplash! This Reissue’s a Bitch

August 2, 2011

For whatever reason, when people talk about influential metal scenes of yore, the L.A.area  just doesn’t seem to get the credit it’s due. Sure, the whole Hollywood/Sunset Strip glam thing left its mark in the mid-’80s, but some of the world’s biggest and influential, ahem, “real” metal bands arose from the L.A. area much earlier…

Just When You Thought the Immolating Was Over…

August 2, 2011

What’s it take to walk the working class death metal mile? Immolation stalwarts Ross Dolan and Robert Vigna school Scion A/V on death metal’s majesty and decay in this exclusive follow-up to the Decibel premiere of the slick video for “A Glorious Epoch” last month. As a bonus, here is high quality footage of Immolation…

OH, THE HORROR! DENIAL FIEND’S TERRY BUTLER SPILLS SOME BLOOD FOR THE DECIBLOG

August 1, 2011

Denial Fiend could be considered an all-star death metal crew but that’s kinda disengenious when it’s more a case of seasoned offenders stitched together by previous convictions and a jonesing for horror movies and punk. Since forming in 2006, Denial Fiend have been part of the new old-school death metal revival much in the same…

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

July 29, 2011

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. Que pasa? Your boy Waldo here, telling you about THE BEST—and I mean THE BEST—upcoming releases this next couple of weeks. Everyone that’s a fan of the old-school should check out…

Something for the weekend: Vastum’s sexy NWOSDM Q&A, The Redux

July 29, 2011

Until interviewing Bay Area old-school nasties Vastum for dB #82, I thought metal’s attitude to man’s carnal desires extended just to the more is more philosophy of take it when you can get it, and like Skid Row’s Sebastian Bach was probably right when he said that sex addiction is one of the healthier addictions,…

Interview: Ides of Gemini

July 28, 2011

For years and years, we’ve heard bands and musicians who’ve had their work slighted and slammed by the press defensively proclaim that so-and-so journalist should have his/her opinion taken with a grain of salt, or discounted entirely, because they’re not musicians themselves. That metal’s press corps should actually shut their pie-holes because they’re able to…

Wine Up – Beer Down

July 28, 2011

Alright, enough with the PBR and Bud already. It’s a bit juvenile to still be drinking beers like your in high school. Are you having another TV party tonight or what? You can still hit your wife with a chalice, so maybe it’s time to grow up some and sophisticate yourself with a nice bottle…

Celebrate Jared Southwick’s Life in Indy, Sept. 3rd

July 27, 2011

As with many artists, Jared Southwick’s passing has been a tragedy both emotionally and financially. His family are not only dealing with the loss of a loved one, but shouldering the burden of unpaid medical expenses. So Saturday, Sept. 3rd, Jared’s friends and fans have put together an amazing show to further pay tribute to…

Dave Matrise’s (Jungle Rot) Top 5 Best Things About Wisconsin

July 27, 2011

5. SummerfestSummerfest: Biggest Outdoor Music Festival that is held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Fest brings in over 100,000 people in a day. It has many types of music playing every day, with over 100 stages. It brings in all the heavyweights from metal to country, even R&B and hip-hop. Summerfest has something for everyone to…

Don’t Mess With Leslie West

July 26, 2011

Leslie West will never be known as the “Eric Bedard of heavy rock.” The former Mountain guitarist/vocalist, who’s now well into his 60s, is apparently un-fucking-stoppable. Mere weeks ago the brother, who is diabetic, had to have emergency surgery to amputate one of his legs just below the knee. For most 60-something guitarists that would…

River Runs (Lipstick) Red: Marissa Martinez on the Path Keith-Mina Caputo Need Not Walk Alone

July 26, 2011

So after managing to squeeze out only one record since reuniting nine years ago — the massively underrated Broken Valley — Life of Agony is apparently disbanding, sadly, and Keith Caputo has seized upon the opportunity of the band’s farewell tour to brashly announce her most controversial transition since briefly morphing into Whitfield Crane during…

Kings of Comedy: Gentlemans Pistols’ guide to British sitcoms.

July 25, 2011

Avowed rock atavists Gentlemans Pistols aren’t the sort of chaps to limit their appreciation of British pop culture to the pressed rat and warthog of ’60s/’70s classic rock. Catching up with vocalist/guitarist James Atkinson and drummer Stuart Dobbins after they’ve had a post-festival night battering the ale seemed as good a time as any to…

24-Hour Contest: Learning to Beer with Metallica in N.Y.C.

July 25, 2011

If metal was a mother, beer would replace breast milk. The folks at esteemed N.Y.C. drinking establishment Idle Hands Bar in the fragrant East Village neighborhood know this very well. (Do your beer gut a favor, and follow them @IdleHandsBar.) They’re teaming up with the brewmasters at Harpoon and Speakeasy to bring you Learning to…

The Lazarus Pit: In Extremo’s Sünder Ohne Zügel

July 22, 2011

Welcome to The Lazarus Pit, a biweekly look at should-be classic metal records that don’t get nearly enough love, stuff that’s essential listening for students of extreme metal that you’ve probably never heard of.  Stuff that we’re too lazy to track down the band members to do a Hall Of Fame for.  This week, we…

Queens of the Stone Age: Josh Homme Q&A

July 22, 2011

A few months back I spoke to Josh Homme about the reissue of Queens of the Stone Age’s eponymous debut album, and, like all alpha-dudes from bands of a certain size, phone time was strictly rationed to 30 minutes and no longer. But he’s nothing if not a rule-breaker and talked way longer. That first…

The World’s Northernmost Southern Rock Band

July 21, 2011

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”…

Soundgarden: 7/10 & 7/13

July 21, 2011

Finally. Waking the grunge: a Soundgarden tour. I creamed my flannel pajamas. Fuck Coachella, this was it. A reunion I thought would never happen because Chris hated the idea. Besides saying he put a lid on it, in ’09 he cynically said, “Someone in my position, if I wanted to sell out I’d just get…

Disposable Heroes: Anthrax’s “Among the Living”

July 20, 2011

There’s little more annoying on this planet than the immoral majority telling you how essential, transcendent and (huh-huh) seminal a particular extreme album is, when you know that it’s overrated as fuck. Hence, our new Wednesday morning column, “Disposable Heroes,” in which one brave soul sails against the current to inform all you clones why…

Tommy Rogers (Thomas Giles) interviewed

July 20, 2011

How important was it to separate your solo project, Thomas Giles, from Between The Buried And Me?Tommy Rogers: I think it was very important to separate the two. One of my biggest pet peeves is when people do solo projects that sound like their main band. I wanted to step outside of what I normally…

Play Unearth Trivia, Win an Autographed Beer Bong!

July 19, 2011

Unearth and the generous folks at Metal Blade Records have provided us with a little swag to give away to celebrate the recent release of the band’s new album, Darkness in the Light, and their current stint on the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival tour making the rounds through the middle of August (see dates…

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

July 19, 2011

Every other Friday (well, Tuesday just for today), 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, guys? Sorry my column is running a little late, but hey, even your boy Waldo needs a vacation once in a while. I got…

Dude, where’s my guitar? The Gates of Slumber’s Karl Simon’s sermon for guitar dorks.

July 18, 2011

Y’know, despite being erudite professionals here at the Deciblog every now and then there’s an interview that spirals out of control and onto matters unrelated to, well, anything that it was supposed to relate to like that phonecall to Steve Asheim about a Deicide tour turns into a fullblown dialogue concerning the merits of cheeseburgers…

Brief Interviews with nihilistic men, Vol. 1: Jimmy Bower (Eyehategod/Down)

July 15, 2011

In the hours before an Eyehategod show, finding people lucid enough to begin a sentence let alone finish it is a challenge that someone oughta reward with medals cast in gold, silver and bronze. It’s an Olympian feat to just negotiate past the bodies laying strewn across the dressing room, and this is on the…

“FINELY AGED DISHRAGS”

July 14, 2011

Odds are if I were to corner Missy Elliott and ask her how old the Motorhead shirt she’s sporting in the photo above, the answer would include variations on the phrases “My stylist picked it out for me,” “I don’t know” and “Motor-whatnow?” before her security detail – inevitably led by a 6’8” 475-lb black…

The Answer Is Still “Nobody:” Megadeth’s Peace Sells… But Who’s Buying? At 25

July 14, 2011

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a whole quarter-century since Megadeth sprayed the eternally-burning napalm of Peace Sells… But Who’s Buying? all over the unsuspecting mulleted masses; hell, I was still listening to Sesame Street albums at the time. Presumably, this thing would have scared the hell out of four-year-old me, even though kids…

Disposable Heroes: Carcass’s “Symphonies of Sickness”

July 13, 2011

There’s little more annoying on this planet than the immoral majority telling you how essential, transcendent and (huh-huh) seminal a particular extreme album is, when you know that it’s overrated as fuck. Hence, our new Wednesday morning column, “Disposable Heroes,” in which one brave soul sails against the current to inform all you clones why…

Drinkin’ n’ Bloggin’ With Carson of Tombs

July 12, 2011

It’s a well-established fact that we like to drink beer and listen to metal. But second only to that pursuit is being able to talk brewskis with other like-minded beer geeks. So upon hearing that Tombs bassist Carson Daniel James is an equally devout barley-pop imbiber, we called him to talk (and drink) beer. Decibel…