Well, now we have word from two of the band members themselves.  However, it looks like they haven’t exactly talked to each other to get on the same wavelength.

Here’s what drummer Joey Jordison had to say, according to Blabbermouth:

“There WILL be another record, no matter what.  We already have kind of a  timeline…We kind of know when we’re going to start.  It isn’t going to be too long.”

And here’s singer Corey Taylor’s take on the matter (again, thanks to Blabbermouth):

“It’s too soon right now, but we’re still talking, all of us are talking and everything’s good but we’ll see.”

That’s two drastically different responses to the same question, no?  In the end, I think it’s inevitable that Slipknot will continue on as a band, but with Stone Sour and Murderdolls occupying some of the band members’ time right now, any new music probably won’t come until 2012.

-Sam

That’s not the case with Iron Thrones, who recently won the Scion No Label Needed Contest that was hosted by MetalInsider.net.  Sure, the contest was an attempt to sell more cars from Scion’s perspective, but that’s fine with me because the winner, for once, is actually pretty good.

As the winners of this contest, Iron Thrones not only got their new 6-song EP, The Wretched Sun, recorded in a professional studio with a well-known producer, but they also met the guys in Shadows Fall in order to get career advice, took part in a professional photo shoot and subsequent press campaign, and received a new website redesign among many other things that bands signed to a big label probably take for granted.

Iron Thrones plays a particular style of progressive death metal that will be immediately evident to any fans of Between the Buried and Me.  In fact, The Wretched Sun sounds so much like a BTBAM record that you’d be forgiven for mistaking the two.  The major difference between the two bands is that while Iron Thrones captures the brutality, beauty, and complexity of classic BTBAM, their music never manages to be quite as brutal or as beautiful or as complex.  They are, in essence, the prog-death padawans to BTBAM’s Jedi-masters.  But that’s to be expected – after all, Iron Thrones is basically just beginning their career.

The six songs on this EP are really more like one long, extended track.  That’s because there are so many time signature shifts and stop-start transitions within the tracks themselves that the actual song breaks seem like mere formalities.  And these songs are dense.  This isn’t the kind of music you are going to want to put on in the background, because if you aren’t actively listening to it, it probably will just sound like heavy noise.  But if your ears are down for some deep digging, they will be richly rewarded by the complex melodies.

The singing is mostly heavy howls with a few instances of clean vocals added to the mix.  From what I understand, the lyrics are based loosely around the legend of Icarus, the theme of loss, and the story of a man fearful of his attraction to a woman.  That all sounds really cool, and I would have loved to explore those concepts more, but again, a metal band with difficult-to-hear lyrics failed to provide any written guidance.  Come on guys!

The Wretched Sun is a rock solid foundation to build off of in the future, and for once, it seems like the voters chose correctly in one of these contests.  Iron Thrones is just the latest proof that there are countless unsigned bands waiting to make the most of any opportunity they receive.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Click here to view the embedded video.

-Sam

Having been active in some way or another for close to 5 years now, these guys have built up a solid fanbase and live reputation in the UK, famous particularly for their jarring, synth-infused rhythms and frontwoman Eva Spence’s ferocious roar. They’ve been tearing up venues up and down the country, including high-profile support slots with The Dillinger Escape Plan and slots at the big summer festivals. A worthy live reputation causes problems for a lot of bands. The main issue being the difficulty of capturing the raw passion of a live performance on record. Rolo Tomassi, however, have no such issues.

Their spazzed-out tech-metal meets dance sound is perfectly captured on Cosmology,  which is a real relief considering just how easy it is to lose individual instruments and subtle arrangements amongst such a racket. Effortlessly switching back and forth from pummelling brutality to dreamy soundscapes,  Rolo clearly have the musical tightrope walking down. The beauty of title track/closer ‘Cosmology’ sits easily alongside the discomforting lurch of ‘French Motel’, and both are high-points. Lead-off single ‘Party Wounds’ is an absolute killer, displaying the prodigious vocal talents of Eva Spence, who straddles the line between angelic choir soprano and feral beast with a confidence rarely seen in metal music. When you throw in the fact that she’s barely out of her teens, it’s quite a remarkable performance. Throw in brother James’s yelping, and it makes for a fine dual-delivery that gives the album’s heavier moments real variety.

As is the case with some of the more experimental works of art, Cosmology  is at times a hit-and-miss affair. ‘French Motel’ is an impressive piece of music, but it manages to display both the strength and weakness of the band’s approach. One section sees the most unusual use of the synth amongst a discordant mess that really doesn’t add to proceedings – an example of how difficult Rolo can be to listen to at times – but that section precedes the brilliant use of the synth to emphasise the heavy riffs with a distorted effect, which absolutely pummels the ears. In fairness, those wrong turns are very few and far between. Rolo have polished their sound, focused their efforts, and produced an album which is a real step-up from mental debut ‘Hysterics’.

If you like your music difficult, dense and experimental, then this group of Sheffield youngsters will be right up your street. If you’re into hooks and melodies, steer clear if you don’t fancy a challenge. I like my music either way, and I enjoyed this album. Recommended.

If you want to make a compelling parody/cover, you’ve got to commit to it, ladies!  Otherwise it’s just embarassing.

But the guys in Pennsylvania get it.  In fact, they had me at “Pennsyltucky.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

-Sam

This comes from Kings of Leon drummer Nathan Followill, in reference to the band’s recent show in St. Louis:

“So sorry St. Louis. We had to bail, pigeons shitting in [bassist] Jared [Followill]’s mouth. Too unsanitary to continue….Don’t take it out on Jared, it’s the fucking venue’s fault. You may enjoy being shit on but we don’t. Sorry for all who traveled many miles.”

Yummy!

That really sucks for both the band and the fans.  It’s too bad there weren’t any umbrella hats on hand that the guys could have strapped on to protect them from the fecal showers.  I wonder if, in the future, the venue will consider doing what the Cincinnati Bengals considered when they had a similar problem a few years back.

-Sam

He’s also the one-man wrecking crew behind the band Mose Giganticus – handling all the songwriting, lyrics, vocals, drums, and synthesizers himself with a rotating cast of characters backing him up on guitar and bass both live and in the studio – kind of like Trent Reznor and Nine Inch Nails.

Gift Horse is the band’s major label debut on Relapse Records.  The brand of metal that is put forth on this album is difficult to nail down.  It should be no surprise that a keytarist liberally uses synthesizers and vocoder in his music, but Gift Horse isn’t industrial metal in the vein of, say, The Downward Spiral; nor is it anything like the recent bastardizations of synth in metal like The Devil Wears Prada or Attack Attack! (or any other group of kids wearing neon shirts and sporting girls’ haircuts while banging on a keyboard).

Metal and synths have traditionally walked a fine line together, and the band that successfully incorporates one with the other is generally the exception rather than the rule.  But after all is said and done, Garfield has managed to come out on top in that regard, seamlessly mixing the electronic elements with the metallic into a combination as fine as chocolate and peanut butter.

Throughout the album, the electronics and guitars fade in and out of prominence with Garfield expertly substituting synths for lead guitars on several of the tracks (”Days of Yore,” “The Great Deceiver”).  On others, they play more subtly in the background, and because of that, this is definitely an album that rewards multiple close listenings.  You’ll pick up more textural sounds and details each time.  And while Garfield makes use of a vocoder for some passages, it’s never offputting  (think of how Mastodon has made use of it on their last two albums.)  And speaking of Mastodon, Garfield boasts an impressive voice that straddles the line between singing and yelling a la Troy Sanders.

The lyrical scope on this record is pretty epic.  The seven songs detail a dialogue between Jehovah and Lucifer.  Each side starts off the album by laying out their mission statement (”Last Resort” and “The Left Path”) and from there they go back and forth trying to determine who is “The Great Deceiver.”  You’d expect this sort of thematic confrontation to come to a head in a climactic manner, and you’d be spot on.  The album ends with “The Seventh Seal” which is easily one of the best songs I’ve heard in a while.  It starts off with an elephantine stomp and ends with an amazing riff that is brutal in its simplicity and catchiness.  Oh yeah, and there’s a killer proggy solo thrown in for good measure.  The lyrics are inspired by Genesis’ “Tonight, Tonight, Tonight,” as Lucifer proclaims “You’d keep telling me you’re going to help me / that you’re going to save me, but you won’t / and now I’m in too deep / all I have left is sleep.”  The emotion is palpable and the result is a perfect capstone to the album.

Mose Giganticus’ major label debut isn’t perfect – some of the more straight-ahead songs (”Demon Tusk”) come across as a bit dull – but that may just be because they are surrounded by a fresh sound that is rare in the world of metal.  This is one Gift Horse that you should definitely look in the mouth.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Click here to view the embedded video.

-Sam

Whatever your thoughts are about Lady Gaga, I can’t see any rational human being siding against her in this particular instance.

You see, according to Rolling Stone, this past weekend Gaga had a show in St. Louis which was protested by the Westboro Baptist Church.  If you don’t know who the WBC is, they are the people who picketed the funeral of Matthew Shepard (with signs that said things like “AIDS Cures Fags”) along with multiple funerals of soldiers killed in action.  They’ve picketed the funerals of Michael Jackson and Dio.  They’ve protested outside the Holocaust Museum, calling the Holocaust “minuscule” and saying “Jews are the real Nazis.”  A few years ago, after the Sichuan earthquake in China, they released a press release praying “for many more earthquakes to kill many more thousands of impudent and ungrateful Chinese Communists.”  And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

The Anti-Defamation League has classified this “church” as a hate group.  And it’s sad to say that this group actually is a church because in reality it’s nothing more than the giant inbred family of Pastor Fred Phelps.  And yet it still receives the tax exemption from our government.

Anyways, according to these worthless abominations, everything tragic that happens in the world is directly attributable to homosexuality.  And Lady Gaga is well known for  having a devout following of LGBT fans.  So naturally, as the attention-starved whores that they are, the WBC showed up to her concert to call Gaga a “false prophetess” and warn that she and her “gender-confused, self loathing, tone deaf” fans are headed to hell.

Gaga handled the situation brilliantly, in my opinion.  If attention is what these people want, then you simply have to deny them it, no matter how hard it may be to turn the other cheek.

Preempting the group’s protest, Lady Gaga tweeted a lengthy multi-part message to fans to warn them of potential clashes with the “hateful organization.” She urged concert-goers to ignore the protestors writing, “Do not interact with them, or try to fight. Do not respond to any of their provocation. Don’t waste your words or feelings, no matter what you hear or see.” She encouraged her fans to “Be inspired to ignore their ignorant message, and feel gratitude in your heart that you are not burdened or addicted to hate, as they are.”

Thankfully, the show went off without incident.  Curiously enough, however, this was not the WBC’s first attempt at undermining Gaga.  They’ve actually made a couple “parody” songs of their own hate messages set to Gaga’s hits (warning: these songs are terrible):

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

-Sam

She says,

The band goes by The Will and they have a rock sound influenced by Hot Water Music, Nirvana, Against Me!, and Chuck Ragan.

Well, I don’t see the Nirvana influence at all, but the other three fit.  I’d hazard a guess that these guys were influenced a bit by Sublime too (and hey, waddaya know, they have a cover of “Badfish” posted at their MySpace).  Hailing from California, you can definitely hear the Pacific sound all over their music.

It doesn’t really do a whole lot for me, but you can check them out at their MySpace page.

-Sam

It’s that time of year again.  I’m talking, of course, about the annual Gathering Of The Juggalos, now in its 11th year, which is both mindblowing and deeply depressing.

If you are unfamiliar with the Gathering, then you should consider yourself lucky (although, granted, it is a tremendous source of derisive laughter at the expense of morons).

You can watch the infomercial for this year’s event below, but here are just a few of the acts you can see if you decide to slap on some clown paint and head into the fields and forests of Illinois to contemplate the miracles of magnets (how do they work?) and the joys of a Faygo shower: Naughty by Nature, Gallagher (and don’t worry, it’s “not that fake ass Gilligan motherfucker either”), Ron Jeremy (he’ll be “telling jokes about slangin’ dick”), Warren G, Tila Tequila, Afroman, Coolio, Tone Loc, Vanilla Ice, and Method Man and Redman (honestly, guys?).

And speaking of Coolio, here’s what happened the last time he toured with ICP.

But the Gathering is never about just the “music.”  Oh no, this year you’ve got midget wrestling, a bubble-foam party with naked chicks, regular non-midget wrestling featuring Viscera (what, couldn’t get Mideon?) and the Road Dogg among others, as well as flashlight wrestling where the only lights are from the flashlights that the crowd brings at 4 am (”and some of these legends are drunk as hell.”)

This year’s infomercial definitely isn’t as good as last year’s (or SNL’s awesome parody of it and ICP), but it will still make you laugh and feel better about yourself as a human being.  And the announcer sums it up best I think, calling it “the greatest time you motherfucker (yes, singular) will ever have.  I put that on my nuts, bitch.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

-Sam

What struck me at first was how restrained the album sounds. The general vibe of the songs on show here is one of wistful rock melancholy; and the too-clean rhythm guitar goes a long way in assisting that feeling. The fact is, it takes an awful lot of listens to get past that initial lack of production-punch. With ‘The ‘59 Sound’, the band proved that you don’t have to crank the distortion up to 11 to make a record that rocks. At first, it seemed like the band had taken that mantra too far with ‘American Slang’, especially considering frontman Brian Fallon’s promise that they were returning to their punk-rock roots.

With all that negativity out of the way, I’ll get down to the real review: this is an awesome album. On that seventh or eighth listen…the whole thing just seems to click. Admittedly, a good-quality stereo system and having the volume cranked up was required to really feel the flow of the album, but when you can really hear that passion cut through the songs…it truly is something special.

The album kicks off with the title track and lead-off single – a highlight that managed to make an impression even on that unsure first listen. From there, it’s sweet, good old-fashioned Americana heaven. ‘Stay Lucky’ is up next, and is probably the best track here. It rattles along with an effortless grace, whilst still managing to maintain the momentum of the opener. Fallon delivers one of the strongest vocal performances of his career on ‘Bring it On’, an absolute stormer that’s all pounding drums and classic rock leads. The soulful chants of “The Diamond Church Street Choir” mix things up a little, reminding the listener that these guys have some startling tricks up their collective sleeve.

‘American Slang’ continues in a similar vein. ‘Boxer’ and ‘Old Haunts’ mix their trademark wistful lyrics with soaring melodies and toe-tapping choruses. I would recommend hunting down iTunes exclusive track “She Loves You”, as it seems to round off the album better than standard closer “We Did it When We Were Young”. God Knows why it wasn’t included in the standard track-listing, as it’s a real winner and by far one of The Gaslight Anthem’s most mature and affecting songs – all choirs and regrets etc.

The instrumentation proves to be the biggest step-up for the band (even if Fallon’s vocal delivery occasionally sounds a little forced). They sound tighter and more passionate than ever. Benny Horowitz’s drumming is innovative without being intrusive, but the real star here is Alex Rosamilia. This, my friends, is a vintage lead-guitarist performance. He’s not one of those guys who noodles away at his fretboard endlessly like countless other (let’s face it) show-offs. His leads sound organic and always prove to be the strong point of each track. Considering the personal troubles Rosamilia went through leading up to the writing/recording of the album, it’s astonishing to hear just how much raw emotion he wrings from each note. This release is worth purchasing for his performance alone.

Buy ‘American Slang’. Give it your time. Give it your love. It will repay you tenfold.