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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…

There’s no introductory preamble necessary for this clip from Maryland Deathfest: The Movie III. You all know that Maryland Deathfest is an obligatory pilgrimage for any self-respecting blastbeat-worshipping Decibangers. And Godflesh are, well Godflesh: The marriage of riff to machine, the sound of urban alienation, of a dead city collapsing in on itself, et cetera….

Back in April 2010, Decibel pitted Finntroll against Norway’s Troll in a brutal troll-off. The segment, brilliantly titled Under the Bridge, can be found here in dB #66 if you’re at all curious as to who won the bridge battle. Then, in the winter of the Year of Our (Dark) Lord, the festive Finns in…

The Negator monikor sounds like a Decepticon from Transformers, but musically the Hamburg-based black metal quintet are as vicious as they are obscure. Go on, tell us you’re a fan. Anyway, across three well-received traditional full-lengths, Negator has earned a small yet ardent following. Led by frontman Nachtgarm—who also served time in Dark Funeral following…

Courtesy of the good people of Agonia Records, welcome to what is definitely the closest the Deciblog gets to a red carpet event: The Internet premiere of Swedish experimental post-metallers The Moth Gatherer’s video for “Falling Deity”. The track is culled from their forthcoming debut LP, Bright Celestial Light, a dynamic and genre-unspecific album that…

We couldn’t think of a better way to spread some Valentine’s Day love than premiering the brand new Incantation video for “Invoked Infinity”. Before you start headbanging at your desk to the opening track to last year’s Vanquish In Vengeance (and the band’s first video in ten years), we’ll let bassist Chuck Sherwood and Kristoff…

Massive, hirsute man mountains, the members of The Gates of Slumber are the living avatars of the music that they play. Their behemoth doom strides powerfully back through the mists of time, crushing all in its path. In the likely event that you’ve never heard them, the kind folks at Scion AV have given you…

Man, it gets fucking crazy in the Lightning Swords of Death practice space if this video for “Baphometic Chaosium” — the title track of the new record available now — is any indication. There are what appears to be grown-up versions of the Phantasm munchkins, a rather busty-sassy ram-headed demoness, and several trim dudes in…

The world of hard rock and heavy metal is filled with brilliant artists, and sometimes that thin line between genius and insanity gets erased. Usually in public. In very embarrassing ways. And there have been a lot of notable crazies in the music industry, but right now, Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine and The Smashing Pumpkins’ Billy…

We at Decibel get a lot of chances at firsts. We were the first metal magazine to put flexi discs in the Common Era. We were the first magazine to introduce the Hall of Fame. 95 and counting, to be awesomely sure. We were also the first magazine to premiere new Evocation album—in its entirety—Illusions…

Sometimes in the face of overwhelming shittiness, we need a little something to distract us. We suspect that a pretty large number of our brethren (and sistren, or whatever…) are currently without the ability to log onto the Interhole at the moment thanks to Sandy but for those who are, here’s something that is completely…

Name five great metal bands. Here’s the first ones that come to my mind: Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Metallica and Slayer. What makes them great? Priest and Maiden have iconic, virtuosic vocalists. Metallica, Black Sabbath and Slayer more or less all created their own sort of subgenres. But the one thing all five…

For the record, the “Exclusive” up in the title of this blog post actually means something. What it means is that this post is the only place where you can hear new music from the upcoming Dragged Into Sunlight album Widowmaker (and see the amazing artwork) until it is released by Prosthetic Records on MP3…

Decibel usually maintains a safe distance from the film and TV business because, well, it looks totally fucked up and confusing and the printed word is a tough enough mistress to keep. But when anthropologist, award-winning film-maker and metal fan Sam Dunn came calling looking for funding and support for an extreme metal episode of…

We’re pretty sure that there’s an old cliché that goes, “Your Youtube channel is a mirror to the soul.” You wanna see what’s inside a person, really get a sense of who they are and what they are about? Check out the weird shit they post on Youtube. And—watch this brilliant fucking segue—who at Decibel…

Normally, I’d sound off on something like this, but sometimes nothing more than “what the fuck?” needs to be said. Ok, let me just add one bit of commentary: the moustache that appears at 3:56 of part one kicked my ass like it’s never been kicked before.

Lately, I’ve presented a few Borknagar gems that may make it seem like I’m partial to the Norwegian pagan/progressive/black-inspired metallers. I am, actually. OK, full disclosure: Borknagar’s been ruling my seven seas from the time when the then-unknown supergroup issued its debut album, Borknagar, and lead Borker Øystein G. Brun were penpals of sorts. The…

Last year, Gilead Media nailed it—“it” being something tangibly awesome—by releasing the Untitled EP by Minnesota black metal jaw-droppers False. With two songs spanning 12-minutes each, Untitled had the length to explore early Emperor-ian majesty, with a little of Gehenna’s mid-period key-centric nastiness, and Tombs’ dark hardcore tendencies. Well, False fans, black metal from the…

Mephedrone (bath salts), mushrooms, a new kind of acid—and in the case of Miami face-eater Rudy Eugene at one point—weed? So far, pretty much every official explanation for the wave of bizarre crimes slowly blanketing the planet has hinged on drugs with histories that make their purported roles unlikely. No wonder people are holding on…

Getting compared to Black Sabbath’s legendary debut is a mixed blessing. Of course, it’s going to stoke interest in your band but is there anyone that can measure up to the album that’s quite literally responsible for everything on this blog and magazine? Berlin, Germany’s Kadavar have elicited those comparisons, at least from the folks…

Courtesy Arte Live Web, here is some awesome pro-shot footage of the entire recent Napalm Death set at Hellfest: The boys still got it! Also check out sets by Sacred Reich, Nasum, Sodom, Orphaned Land, and…Sebastian Bach amongst many others.

So for his first solo album, YOB mainman Mike Scheidt has gone the way of Wino and like 57 percent of Neurosis and decided to showcase his sensitive singer-songwriter side.  This thing is unplugged all the way, and I would be lying if I said that it wasn’t the least extreme thing ever featured on…

Destruction, legendary kings of the Teutonic thrash metal scene, are continuing to thrash ’till death with their 30th Anniversary Tour. Almost halfway through, the band plays NYC tonight and then begins a furious march as they burn through Canada towards the west coast. If you’re wondering if these guys are still doing the anti-lord’s work,…

Yes, we know this about the laziest kind of post we can throw on yon Deciblog, but good christ we could not pass up the opportunity to share these. The simplest search on Youtube netted us some gems that 1) we could not stop watching and 2) were so bizarre as to make us wonder…

Here’s my first holy shit column, as documented in the annals of the Deciblog. Check it out to get an idea of what I’m holy shitting about.

As someone who grew up on shitty Midwestern boner rock radio, I get a little more excited than most of our staff (most of whom were making corpsepaint rorschachs in their diapers) when a clever, no-bullshit hard rock band graces our pages. ÆGES have already got some Upfront and reviews section love (well, they will…

Swedish black metal horde Watain have been forced to pull out of the first four shows of their previously announced Decibel Magazine Tour—scheduled to begin tomorrow (April 11) in Columbus, Ohio—due to delays in the visa process. They will join Behemoth, the Devil’s Blood and In Solitude as part of the tour on April 16…

Back before Metallica wrung out the last of their fans accumulated goodwill with the release of KSP’s boyfriend, St. Anger, there was an idea to do something that would have either mitigated the backlash or increased it ten fold. An unnamed racing/battle game was to be released, inspired by the band, their music and, well,…

Endless excretor Dave Mustaine decided it was about time to unleash another turdlet in the punch bowl of public discourse by affirming his fuzzy knowledge of history, geography and conspiracism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpZzFYYWFj8&t=7m52s (If you go back a little you’ll hear the equally incredible assertion that Rick Santorum could be the next JFK.) So yes, Mustaine is…

The unholy unification of Euro extremists Behemoth, Watain, the Devil’s Blood and In Solitude on this spring’s Decibel Magazine will be having its way with U.S. audiences in just a couple weeks. But the official tour trailer is here now: Psyched? You should be. Go get your tickets here. See you down in front.