Interviews

Reminiscences from the Fire: Cliff Burton’s First Show with Metallica, 30 Years on

March 5, 2013

As much as I swore I was never going to do a blog post about goddamn Metallica, when Bazillion Point Books contacted me about doing a spread celebrating the 30th anniversary of Cliff Burton’s first show with Metallica (March 5, 1983, for those of you who aren’t so good with math) – featuring actual photographs…

Finland’s W.A.I.L. Was Absolutely Interviewed, Literally

March 1, 2013

Early in 2011, I was floored by a band I had never heard before making noise I never knew I always wanted to hear.  They’re from Finland, so, yeah.  Duh.  At this point I expect sweet Finnish lullabies to kick my ass and melt my face. The phrase “Wisdom through Agony into Illumination and Lunacy”…

INTERVIEW: Brutal Panda’s Bob and Mike

February 28, 2013

We spend a lot of time talking to artists—whether in blog posts or in each month’s issue—and rightfully so. After all, they put their blood, sweat and tears into making the music that brings us together. We haven’t necessarily dedicated a lot of space to the people actually putting out those releases, however, so we…

Scion A/V profiles Season Of Mist

February 27, 2013

It’s no secret, the audio/vision division of Scion, henceforth known as Scion A/V, has given some amazing opportunities to bands with limited means. Arsis, Revocation, Enslaved, Immolation, Meshuggah, and so on have all benefited from the niche-market, passion-fueled benefactors at Scion A/V. Whether it’s a CD or a 12″, a car used as tour support…

Thrash Comebacks and Revisiting the Embarrassing Past – The Return of Toxik

February 21, 2013

First thing’s first, bands: if you’re going to get back together and don’t want to have photos from your embarassing past dug up, the very least you could do is provide us hacks with at least one (1) recent picture. Otherwise, well…here’s a look at what New York’s prog-thrash conceptualists Toxik used to look like…

INTERVIEW: Astrohenge

February 21, 2013

Astrohenge was yet another band I stumbled across last year while perusing what was once a plethora of music blogs. As our Q&A with their fellow countrymen Dragged Into Sunlight indicated, Astrohenge is part of a diverse crop of UK bands “doing their own thing.” Although it’s been over a year since the London quartet’s…

Tales From the Metalnomicon: Eleanor Henderson

February 15, 2013

Welcome to Tales From the Metalnomicon, a new twice-monthly column delving into the surprisingly vast world of heavy metal-tinged/inspired literature and metalhead authors… If any subcultural phenomenon has ever truly earned the designation “stranger than fiction,” surely it must be the late eighties/early nineties youth crew/krishnacore straight edge scene. Yet, outside of a couple oral…

Throw Me a Frickin’ Label Hack: Ukraine’s Nonsun

February 15, 2013

Because every day another band records another song.  Because 83% of those songs are unlistenable and you can’t be bothered to sift through the dreck.  Because metal is about not giving a shit and waking your own personal storm.  Because music is universal, expression is boundless, and even indie labels (whatever that means these days)…

Q and A: Satanic Threat

February 13, 2013

Perhaps the most fun (and subversive) thing to drop in my musical inbox this year: a copy of Satanic Threat’s In To Hell. I missed it in 2008. As soon as I saw the cover — a perfect homage to Minor Threat’s HOF worthy Out Of Step — I was sold. So sold that I…

Throw Me a Frickin’ Label Hack: Montreal’s Pronostic

February 8, 2013

Because every day another band records another song.  Because 83% of those songs are unlistenable and you can’t be bothered to sift through the dreck.  Because metal is about not giving a shit and waking your own personal storm.  Because music is universal, expression is boundless, and even indie labels (whatever that means these days)…

Yes, We Love Verbosity: An Interview with Nolentia

February 7, 2013

photo credit: Lou Strummer France’s grindcore miscreats, Nolentia has recently made their newest and second album available to the world’s general populace and specifically those of you who enjoy your Nasum and Pig Destroyer weirded up a notch. The album’s called May the Hand That Holds the Match That Will Set This World on Fire…

Decibrity Playlist: Helen Money

February 7, 2013

Helen Money, aka Alison Chesley, dropped a new album earlier this week via the inimitable Profound Lore Records. As our Brent Burton described in Issue #101, the cellist’s playing is rather unorthodox as she “stretch[es] and distort[s] the possibilities of amplified cello with a bevy of effects.” To celebrate the release of her third record…

Blues Into Metal #1: Jason Ricci

February 6, 2013

Welcome to Blues Into Metal, an occasional Decibel interview and blog series on the history and ties between America’s homegrown music and the extreme fare our readers cherish. In it, we’ll seek out musicians from both genres to discuss the links and shared history between the blues and metal – and the misconceptions about both….

Throw Me a Frickin’ Label Hack: Brazil’s Bode Preto

February 1, 2013

Because every day another band records another song.  Because 83% of those songs are unlistenable and you can’t be bothered to sift through the dreck.  Because metal is about not giving a shit and waking your own personal storm.  Because this post was up last week for about a minute, but you didn’t see it,…

Interview with Cloud Rat

January 31, 2013

Mount Pleasant, Michigan’s Cloud Rat play grind and they play it really well. They have a new album in the holster and on the ready entitled Moksha, courtesy the fine folks at Halo of Flies. What follows is an interview with guitarist Rorik Brooks and some vids and crap I lifted from their website. Check…

Decibrity Playlist: Misery Index

January 24, 2013

With the throes of winter usually comes a dearth of new releases. So after perusing the innumerable year-end lists, there’s no better time to catch up on all of the records you missed, not to mention your back catalog. If you’re in a band, it’s also a good time to put out something new given…

Screaming Past ‘The Cemetery’

January 22, 2013

Not only is The Cemetery an exquisite slab of nasty/fun uber-brutal indie horror — think Cabin Fever via Evil Dead — it also throws extreme music fans a serious bone with a soundtrack featuring a gang of grind n’ blasters including Fleshgod Apocalypse, Gorod, Ulcerate, Circle of Dead Children, Defeatist, The Year of Our Lord,…

INTERVIEW: GOJIRA’S Joe Duplantier on touring hard and his New York State of Mind

January 21, 2013

When the Deciblog caught up with GOJIRA frontman/guitarist Joe Duplantier last week, he was clocking up the road miles across Canada on in a tour that’ll see the French progressive/death-ish metal quartet take in the west coast of America before snaking along the south and terminating in New York. Supporting their fifth album, L’Enfant Sauvage,…

Esa Holopainen (Amorphis) interviewed

January 21, 2013

How will the new album, Circle, differ from Beginning of Times?Esa Holopainen: Our producer Peter Tägtgren has brought lot of old school ideology back to band. I guess that we have needed sort of encouragement to go for slightly more extreme sound world. It is more low bass-ed, guitar-oriented and there’s shit load of varieties…

Interview with Switchblade

January 17, 2013

Let’s face it: there are too many bands out there releasing too much music for any one magazine-blog-social media platform combo to cover it all adequately. Or at least cover it all to the adequate degree that all those bands and PR people would want to be covered. Stuff gets lost in the shuffle the…

Decibrity Playlist: Ancient VVisdom

January 17, 2013

The dudes in Ancient VVisdom’s have already put together a pretty impressive resume considering they only got started in late 2009. For starters, the Austinites have put out a split and debut full-length and hit the road with Ghost and Blood Ceremony (and, along with Pallbearer and Royal Thunder, will be supporting Enslaved starting January…

Anchors Aweigh: Clamfight full album stream and interview

January 16, 2013

Clamfight has a much better ring to it than, say, Mollusk Warfare (and we already have Insect Warfare). We’d quickly exhaust our nautical jokes in a sentence or two so we’ll leave it at the headline. Here’s the scoop: for your listening pleasure below is Clamfight’s new album I Versus The Glacier. This writer digs…

INTERVIEW: Jason “Venien” Ventura of VON on blood, Satan, and being unconsciously black metal

January 14, 2013

Even though VON have been kicking around since ’87, are pretty much responsible for Watain’s existence (their name, at least), they only managed to get their shit together and release debut LP, Satanic Blood, in October of last year. There are mitigating circumstances and all, what with the band splitting and going into what appeared…

Rami Jämsä (Convulse) interviewed

January 14, 2013

What prompted you to return to Convulse? It’s been a very long time.Rami Jämsä: My old pal from Nokia asked [us] to play in his Heavy Metal festival 2012. At first I refused. Then original bass player Juha took contact and showed his interest. Pretty soon it was clear that there was no chance to…

Decibrity Playlist: Holy Grail

January 10, 2013

If you’ve been keeping up with our last two issues (which also happen to be our year-end and 100th), you’ve probably noticed that there’s a new Holy Grail record coming out this month. While you’ll have to wait until January 22nd to see if your excitement about Ride The Void even comes remotely close to…

Enter A Sweet, Sweet Deci-Hell, Courtesy Metalcakes

January 8, 2013

“The weak pale in the face of both baking and metal!” Metalcakes proprietor Kathy Bejma declares when asked how she first came to realize heavy metal and cupcakes belonged in the same mixing bowl. “Plus ovens are like little mini hells accepting your sacrifice of unborn chickens, butter, and sugar…Occasionally I’ll get the How dare…

Tales From the Metalnomicon: Dustin LaValley

January 4, 2013

Welcome to Tales From the Metalnomicon, a new twice-monthly column delving into the surprisingly vast world of heavy metal-tinged/inspired literature and metalhead authors… Gonzo dark fiction author, screenwriter, martial arts sensei, serious connoisseur of heavy metal and hardcore — there’s a lot thrown into the mix when it comes to the literary force of nature…

Throw Me a Frickin’ Label Hack: Black Table

January 4, 2013

Because every day another band records another song.  Because 83% of those songs are unlistenable and you can’t be bothered to sift through the dreck.  Because metal is about not giving a shit and waking your own personal storm.  Because music is universal, expression is boundless, and even indie labels (whatever that means these days)…

Decibrity Playlist: Rotten Sound

January 3, 2013

Not only does Rotten Sound have a new EP coming out later this month, but the Finnish quartet is also celebrating its vicennial. So when bassist Kristian Toivainen suggested putting together a playlist with picks from a certain year, it took us back to a feature we used to have in the magazine. Back in…

Say What? Not So Long Long Converge Quotes

January 2, 2013

Often, there is a lot of left over content that doesn’t quite fit the narrative or direction of a story. Case in point #1: Converge for dB #96. Case in point #2: Throughout the interview process, the members of Converge had rad stories to tell, but somehow the quotes never quite made the cut. So,…