Earlier this year,  the world of film lost acclaimed actor Philip Seymour Hoffman to a tragic heroin overdose. Now it appears the drug is also responsible for the demise of one of metal’s most beloved figures. Dave Brockie, popularly known as Oderus Urungus, died on March 23, but it wasn’t until yesterday that officials ruled…

If you’re a metal fan, you have to know your history, know where the music you like comes from. It’s funny, though, when you find yourself digging through the lesser-knowns of “proto-metal” if you will, the Sir Lord Baltimores, the Buffaloes, the Pentagrams, you can lose sight of the forest for all those darn trees….

Scion A/V have tossed lots of free singles, EP’s, splits, compilations, and socks to the ravening metal hordes, but it’s rare that a band releases an entire album through that imprint. Los Angeles-based heavy rock trio Moab are doing just that. Their latest nine-song opus of fuzz and feedback, Billow, will be released later this…

It’s been thirty years since Yngwie Malmsteen unleashed Rising Force on an unsuspecting world, obliterating any and all preconceived notions of what was possible with an electric guitar. Now comes Guitar Gods, a tour featuring the legit insane line-up of Malmsteen headlining over a shred-heavy bill that includes Uli Jon Roth (Scorpions, Electric Sun), Gary…

Decibel has been excited for Black Anvil’s third album Hail Death since last year, when we gave readers a sneak peek of studio happenings in a print story. We’ve since teamed with the band to offer the first view of the documentary Making Hail Death. You can order Hail Death now from Relapse. Jason Shevchuk.

** Death metal record of the year? It might just be Vanhelgd’s new album, Relics of Sulphur Salvation. Featured in DB (June #116), we decided mainman Mattias Frisk had too much to say than we could fit in print. So, we took out the full transcript for ‘heads everywhere. Read on and don’t sleep on…

What happens when members of Revocation, Municipal Waste, Goes Cube and Freshkills get in a digital room together, run through a few ideas over craft beer (presumably picked and curated by none other than Dave Witte), realize they have less time than they ever had before but decide to form a new music project? That…

The metal institution known as Grave Digger has been around almost as long as the genre of heavy metal. They will release their seventeenth album (yes, that’s correct) called Return Of The Reaper on July 11. Your friends at Decibel got a chance to premiere the lyric video of the track “Season Of The Witch.”…

Semi-rural, semi-suburban Maryland is hardly an obvious spawning ground for gritty black metal.  With Washington D.C. and Baltimore hogging all the attention, and Frederick area bars almost exclusively hosting good-time cover bands of dubious quality, the area’s heavy music scene is pretty damn subdued. Dweller in the Valley drummer/vocalist Dane Olds is a current Frederick,…

Montreal’s kings of noise rock diversity and awesome promo photos, The Great Sabatini (who we have mentioned on this blog previously), have a new album in the starting gate. It’s called Dog Years and you can listen to the whole damn thing below while you read guitarist/vocalist Sean Sabatini discuss the record’s nuts ‘n’ bolts…