The Big 4 Playing Yankee Stadium

So much for sports not being metal.

I'm not really sure why, but I didn't see that coming. Well so that's great, now I actually might have to go. Or I get to go. Either or. It's not that NYC isn't kind of a schlep from Western Massachusetts in and of itself, but it's certainly no Bunghole, California like where the "one and only" Big 4 show was played at originally. I'll check out tickets when they become available on May 6th. If the tickets cost less than $mydick , you young folks may get to enjoy The Brenocide Big 4 Experience after all. We'll see.

It just goes to show you that the fans can sometimes get what they want if they bitch and moan enough. Keep flaming Metallica's inbox and maybe they'll consider a full American tour. Maybe. Probably not.

For the full press release, check out Blabbermouth.net 

New Black Dahlia Murder Music You Probably Won't Like

Here's why most metal elitists don't like Michigan Death Metal band, The Black Dahlia Murder:

• They're from America. That's usually it... 
• They formed in 2001. 
• They have members with tattoos, short hair, and gauges.
• They have kind of a frilly sounding, sentence-long name.
• "Because they're deathcore man. This is deathcore. Nope, deathcore, they're deathcore, yeah that's deathcore. Yup."

Here's why you should like The Black Dahlia Murder:

They're actually pretty awesome, and so is their brand new track "Moonlight Equilibrium" off their equally brand new album, "Ritual". An album that I will be very eager to steal buy upon it's June 21st release.

In case you aren't on the up and up with your true metal statuses, and want to bitch about The Black Dahlia Murder being anything but a death metal band; TNM readers voted, and granted TBDM a pass through the gates of bona fide death metal on my blog several months ago. Then again, this was back when my blog only had like 300 viewers a night, but that's not really my problem. Either way, this album completely took me by surprise. I didn't hear about any plans to record a new album from TBDM, although it has been a little while since Deflorate, and judging from their studio discography, there's a consistent 2 years between releases. Sounds promising to say the least, and you should look forward to a full review when it comes out later next month.

If you're not too busy crossing your arms and scowling in your battle jacket to care, that is.

Mike Mangini Freaks Out

Because I couldn't resist:

Mike Mangini is new Dream Theater Drummer

James Labrie: "We have some news for you, and we'd like to at this point, welcome you to the family."

Mike Mangini: "Ohh!! OOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"

So we can finally put this retarded Dream Theater drummer search fiasco to bed. Dream Theater made the soul-searching, near impossible decision of selecting only one out of seven incredible drummers, and it happened to be the very best drummer that we all knew they were going to pick anyway. If you want to see the episode where Mike Mangini all but comes his pants after Labrie moistly whispers the good news into his ear, you can watch it here. 

What you should be listening to: Wolf - Legions of Bastards

There's two things that you could be doing right now. You could either be listening to the brand new album Legions of Bastards by Swedish speed metal band, Wolf. Or, you could not listen to the album Legions of Bastards by Swedish speed metal band, Wolf, officially making you a lame, shitty poseur who fails at metal and everything else in life. The choice seems pretty easy from where I'm standing. 

True metal people like myself, and I'm hoping you, have a handy metal math equation that we utilize when making decisions about our hard rock listening. The formula, is as follows:

80's > 90's

Obviously, this formula made a lot more sense when it was still the 90's, and the pain of popular 90's rock was still freshly stinging. Even though we're in the decade after the decade after the 90's, I consider the above equation to be more of a statement that declares the musical superiority of the 80's over the time periods that followed. It rings true with every decade that followed the 80's. Not to say that there hasn't been some great metal music released in the past two decades, but nothing produced these days is even close to worthy of holding a candle to the iconic masterpieces released during the time period that shifted the world from making only music that sucked, into making music that was awesome. Sure, there was the 70's, where heavy metal music was first being figured out, but it wasn't until the glorious age of big voices, big hair, and tight pants, that metal was fully established as being the best and only music worth listening to ever.

So with that said, the awesome thing about Wolf, is musically, it sounds like they don't have a clue it's not the 80's anymore. Awesome. I'm not going to call this neo-thrash, because it's not. Neo-thrash bands are like animatronic dinosaurs; mechanical creatures trying to look like, act like and sound like beasts that are long since extinct. But the band, Wolf? These bastards are Jurassic Park. These are living, breathing dinosaurs, causing prehistoric mayhem in an era they don't understand, and refuse to adapt to. If I didn't know any better, and you told me Legions of Bastards was released in 1985 or 87, much less 2011, I probably would have believed you. 

 

Now, is this a sound that's been done before? I'll be the first to admit: absolutely. Many times by many bands a very long time ago. This isn't anything you haven't heard before. I have to say however, this is speed metal done so flawlessly and played so viciously, that this band is a prehistoric animal I very much want walking modern day Earth.  

Sports

A few weeks ago, Brenocide posted a Violation about Mixed Martial Arts. As an avid sports fan and one who has come to appreciate MMA, I thought desperately of how I could rebuke such an attack on something that at its core should be 100% pure metal. The answer my friends, is that he is absolutely right and I will take it the next step further to say that all sports are not metal.

Competition, the struggle for victory, the pummeling of your opponent: all of these are perfectly fine and metal in their nature, but when taken into a sports context, they lose their metalness right then and there.

Football, hockey, and baseball – which are perhaps the three most common sports that a metalhead would enjoy – should stay as far from a show or the stage as possible. Does it matter if your favorite band wears sports apparel on stage or that they make Facebook posts supporting their favorite team in a playoff series? Absolutely not.

If you need any evidence, think back to high school. Who were the biggest sports fans and participants of organized athletics? Probably not you. You had long hair and ragged clothes and if you had muscles, you used them to pound the shit out of poseurs in the pit and in the hallways. Inevitably, because you had no affinity for seeing your classmates naked or having one of them inject you in your ass, you were not one of them, even if you enjoyed laying a vicious hit on a defenseless wide receiver. Ultimately, you could never have their back because you were never one of them, which is the biggest rule of organized sports. Your brothers were pummeling each other to Kreator, not rubbing their members on one another to G-Unit, cruising the streets in their lifted Jeep Wranglers with their collas popped, searching for mad hotties.

There has been many an athlete attempting to bring metal into sports and musician to bring sports into metal. These are all failures in upholding the values of each and keeping each pure and true. There have been guitar playing Red Sox players who loved playing Metallica songs, Slayer wearing Oakland Raiders jerseys on stage, and countless others. When individuals do this, they make their product suffer. Athletes have more of a following than a metal band, thus infiltrating the metal band with a following of the false who think they are Bruce Lee and wear kimonos.

These guys don't belong anywhere near my shows.

Over a decade ago, a metal-loving freestyle motocross rider and his fellow competitor and friend formed a group and clothing line named after a classic metal song, which has now come to epitomize everything that is to be avoided in sports and metal: the Metal Mulisha.

Sweet bikes and tats, bro.

These two started as an extreme group of riders who happened to enjoy heavy music and had an affinity for attempting and landing some of the most jaw-dropping tricks in the sport. Obviously, this drew them recognition, so they created an apparel line. Now they host shows and have taken their venture into the MMA arena. Because of their success and appeal to a vastly different market, they break the metal rules. Supporting anything hardcore is not metal, competing in an organized sport is not metal, MMA is not metal; therefore, the Metal Mulisha fails at being both metal and a mulisha, whatever that is.

Some of you are going to inevitably argue, “Slayer wears Raiders jerseys and Slayer is metal, so anything Slayer does is metal.” Trip and bust your skull open on your dresser, dumbass. Using that argument is on the same grounds as telling a girl, “it’s not rape because I love you.” If Slayer auto-tuned Reign in Blood and used a drum machine instead of Dave Lombardo, would you still say that’s metal? Just because a band does something does not mean it happens to be metal. No one is immune from making a violation. Metallica, Pantera, Amon Amarth, Korpiklaani, and Slayer! They have all made violations from dreadlocks to jerseys to making pure suck for two decades.

Slayer is officially a violation, assholes.

If you are a metalhead and a sports fan, you have only one path for true metal redemption: live a double life. You cannot bring one into the other. They are separate entities and must remain as such. The sports fan in you can only reveal itself in a sports venue or on the field, course, court, or ice. You must be careful not to reveal your colors in the wrong context, or else you risk being shunned by both communities. I know the difficulties living a double life entails. It may not be easy, but it is the only way to keep sports and metal true. You want Bruce Lee in the pit as much as I do in much the same manner Roger Federer wants to share the court with Johan Hegg.

"I Listen to a Little Bit of Everything"

This guest Violation post is brought to you by Alkahest, main editor and creator of Heavy Blog is Heavy. If you aren't familiar with HBIH, it is a fellow metal blog "dedicated to heavy music and all of its friends, featuring metal news, reviews, and other nincompoopery", as opposed to my blog, which exclusively focuses on the latter. You can visit www.heavyblogisheavy.com, "Like" them on Facebook, or found out how much Alkahest enjoys the taste of any given burrito by following him on Twitter.

Enjoy!

"Yeah,  I like listen to a a little bit of everything, right now. I mean, I just love music, you know?"

I had the misfortune of having had to take a music appreciation class during my sophomore year of college. I had to fill some credit hours and it was required; it’s not like I needed some pretentious fuck telling me how I need to appreciate music more. It was out of my hands and I had to take an appreciation class on either Classical Music or Rock and Roll. My first mistake was the obvious one---I should have chosen Classical. That would have weeded out the musically retarded, at least.

No, I took History of Rock and Roll, thinking it would be an easy course and I could listen to music while I got real work done. Turns out the class was easy, but the teacher was this dumb broad who repeatedly referred to Flyleaf as a Christian death metal band and insisted that I was being unfair when I implied Jethro Tull shouldn’t have won that Grammy for being a Metal act. I couldn’t make this shit up if I wanted to, as I would be ill of myself for even coming up with something this absurd.

Despite being dumbfounded into an almost comatose-like state through most of the course (we spent a week on Run-DMC and Aerosmith while Black Sabbath weren’t even mentioned in passing), I vividly remember the first day of this class. The room full of mouthbreathers and I were given the task to introduce ourselves along with our major and music genre of choice. Just as I expected, I was to only one in the room who apparently had enough balls to listen to metal. The rest of the class rattled off their inferior genres (including an alarmingly large number of country and hip hop fans), but what was most interesting to me was that most of the females in the class gave the answer “I listen to a little bit of everything.”

Bull. Shit.

This vague and obnoxious answer was almost exclusive to the women in the room, which I thought was funny and did nothing but reinforce my low opinion of women and their taste in music (with the exception of Erin from 74,000 Riffs, who is metaller than not only most women, but children and small animals as well). Why anyone would admit to listening to Kenny Chesney is beyond me, but that redneck had big enough grapes to have confidence in his music taste, unlike these gals.  No one listens to and enjoys everything, especially not women.

I propose that women are attempting to do the following two things when they say they’ll listen to anything:

1)     Trying to seem open minded and intellectual.

Oh hey, this chick listens to everything! She must be really smart and open minded. I really admire her and her ability to find enjoyment everywhere. She must thrive for adventure and is open to new things. I bet she’s nice. Wrong. She’s shallow and worthless. If you love everything, your love is worth less, and prices go up. Congratulations, you’ve just inflated the market. How does it feel to cause thousands of families to not afford paying their mortgages? You make me sick.

2)      Hiding their asses and being vague in attempt to shift their taste in music to fit whatever guy they’re currently pining for.

I don’t know about you, but the first thing I do when I’m selecting a lady is taking a look at their taste in music to not only check our compatibility, but her intelligence and susceptibility to being converted. If she listens to Chiodos, I might get her to eventually jump ship into bands like The Dillinger Escape Plan. I like a challenge! Thrill of the hunt, you see. If a girl says she listens to anything, she’s really just waiting for you to tell her what you like so she can feign interest and have you buy her drinks. Fuck that.

So ladies, unless you have Lady Gaga, Opeth, Charlie Daniels, Cannibal Corpse, Bjork, Miles Davis, and 50 Cent on your iPod, I don’t want to hear your shit. Just tell me what you listen to so I can get on with my day.

- Alkahest 

Up and Coming Metal Band Looking for New Guitarist, Bassist, Drummer and maybe other Guitarist

Is this your new band?

I am We are an up and coming, actively playing progressive/thrash/death/grind/black/melodic /ACDC cover/core metal band called Kingdom of Bullets from West Springfield, Massachusetts looking for some fresh blood for our band. You may have heard of us, we were formerly known as Throne of Bullets, but had to change the name due to copyright claims from another metal band based out of Tampa Bay, Florida.

The band's primary influences:

• Between the Buried and Me  
• Metallica 

I've been told multiple times that we sounded like a mix between Pig Destroyer and KSE, only more progressive and extreme. Kingdom of Bullets is currently in the market for a new lead guitarist, potentially rhythm guitarist, bass guitarist and drummer. Also a female keyboard player, but it's not mandatory at the moment. You must have all of your own gear, worthy of playing venues anywhere between an audience of 25 to 25,000 people. 7-string guitars and 5-string basses are a plus to achieve the punishing lows KoB is famous for. Most importantly, you must have an image that is compatible with the band! (Absolutely NO exceptions!)

• Hard Rock/Alternative Metal Look. If you don't own an assortment of camouflage shorts and black beanies, this isn't your band. 
• No old dudes! If you're like 29 or over, don't even bother, lol.
• Can't be over 5 feet, 10 inches tall. You're going to make me everyone look short.
• Tattoos a Plus But they have to be metal: barbed-wire armband, tribal scorpion, grim reaper holding the ace of spades, etc.
• Some vocal ability preferred. For backing vocals. Gutturals, clean singing, pig squeals, screaming and grunting already covered. 
• PASSPORT A MUST! The band is currently up and coming, but plan to tour Europe within the next couple years. 
• Band based in West Springfield. Must be willing to relocate permanently. Especially if you're the drummer.

I can't stress enough that this band will be your new job. The issues I had with the previous members of Kingdom of Bullets were a lack of dedication to the band.  You must be able to practice at least 6-8 hours a day, 7 days a week. Those with previous engagements such as, but not limited to: other bands, employment, school, church, family, children, marriage, a sex life, a social life, Thanksgiving, music lessons, probation, doctor's visits, summer camp, grocery shopping, or the attending of shows by other artists WILL NOT BE CONSIDERED!! You don't have to worry about rent and utilities when you're  living out of a van, constantly touring and promoting your band.


If you are interested, please e-mail me with a photo of yourself and demos of your previous work @

brenocide [at] thatsnotmetal [dot] com


\,,/ \,,/ \,,/ \,,/ \,,/\,,/\,,/

Whining in the Pit

Wahh, why are you touching me??

Everyone who has been to a few metal shows knows that there's two ways to see a show; standing or sitting on the sidelines or being right in the middle of the mayhem; the mosh pit. Generally the band interacts more with the people up front, maybe because they're getting on in years and can only see the first three rows, or maybe because this is where the hard work happens and the band knows it.

Let's face it: nobody leaves a pit without a bruise, a scratch or the sweat of a hundred smelly dudes on them. This is common sense, but it never fails, I always get up to the front next to a whiner.

"I can't breathe!"

"This dude is stepping on my toes!"

"Quit squishing me!"

Seriously? You're crushed in with 500 people in a 50 square foot area, what did you expect? But whenever the lead singer looks over in your direction, you smile and give the horns and scream like you're having the time of your life, only to regress back into bitching into my ear when he moves over to stage left. The security guards will eventually become concerned when you start complaining about your breathing difficulties and ask if you'd like out. "No, I'm okay!" you respond, and spend a few minutes pouting to appease him. Maybe if you didn't use all that oxygen snivelling about your terrible circumstances, you wouldn't be so bad off.

Also, you're in the most desirable place in the entire venue. Everyone wants their chance to fist-bump with the band, and they aren't going to give it to you that easily. Did you really think that everyone would see how very unique and special you are and provide you with a one foot bubble so that you may enjoy the concert in peace and solitude?

Newsflash: Mosh pits are uncomfortable. They really are. In any other situation, this would be the worst time ever. Imagine if a doctor's waiting room was really a 4x4 closet, and they just put you in there with all the diseased mouth-breathers until they called your number. Awful, right? This is essentially a pit, except instead of just coughing on you, they're also grinding against you, groping you, elbowing you, headbutting you, or worse.

Personally, I love the mosh pit. That's where the energy is. That's where you actually get to be a part of the show. Plus it's like a big, sweaty, rough bear hug. What's not to love?

Whining about something you just paid good money to enjoy is not metal. So if you know that the mosh pit is going to be so unbearable for you that you can't help but bitch to whoever is pressed up against you currently, just take a seat on the sidelines like the pussy you clearly are.

- Erin

of 74,000 Riffs

Look Who's More Metal Than You...

In my never-ending quest for true metal glory, I occasionally stumble upon a few oddities in the metal archives, relics of times past that have eroded from our collective memories for either good or ill.

For the most part, there is a very good reason these oddities have been forgotten. Either they are too absurd to work or are just plain horrible. However, that being said, the other day I stumbled upon this...

It’s a bunch of Black guys. That play metal! Not some stupid rap/funk hybrid, but honest to God, true, awesome metal.

The band are called Black Death (I would have personally chosen Iron Shaft, but that’s just me...) and sound pretty much exactly as they look, Classic metal al la Priest, Angel Witch etc played by a bunch of Black guys.

Putting aside the false stereotype that metal is listened to exclusively by white dudes (seriously, go to South America and find me someone who doesn’t worship Iron Maiden) how can anyone not think this is the best thing ever? I mean, just look at them!

Unfortunately, these guys only ever managed to release one album, their self-titled 1984 debut, which I highly recommend getting your hands on a copy.

Alternatively, you can listen to one of their songs here.

It kinda makes me sad that these guys never quite took off. Who knows? If these guys had gotten big, there may have never been a Limp Bizkit and other such well off White boys ripping off Black music. Perhaps, instead of gunshots, the Ghetto’s could have rung loud with the sound of clashing steel and glorious metal.

I can dream, can’t I?

Making fun of Black Metal is officially unfunny now.

I'm the only metalhead who doesn't miss Peter Steele really all that much.

I know, I'm all around a pretty shitty person. At this point, that fact shouldn't really come as a surprise to anybody. But I get it; it sucks when people die, as they often tend to do. I've been to funerals before, a lot of people cry, it sucks, it's sad, I got it. When Ronnie James Dio died after being so sick for such a long time, I felt genuinely crushed, as we all did. The reason for my grief, however, was directly connected to Dio's prominence in the heavy metal community and metal's very history. As a metalhead, I had perfectly good reason to mourn such a loss. Missing a man like Dio makes sense to me, because he was perfectly relevant to my culture, and did an immeasurable amount of great things for it.

What doesn't make sense to me, and try and keep up with me here, is why so many people in the metal community weeped into their beards, because they're not going to hear monumental rock anthems such as "My Girlfriend's Girlfriend" anymore...

Yeah, it sucks that Peter Steele is dead. Yes, there is a large enough network of music lovers out there that will properly mourn his unfortunate passing. I just don't think it should be my network. Does that make me such an asshole? Should metalheads hold a candlelight vigil on the anniversary of Kurt Cobain's death now, just because he wrote rock music too? It's not like I'm glad the guy is dead or anything. Far from it. My heart goes out to his friends, family, loved ones and fans. Fans, by the way, who I have yet to meet that don't look like they're in a Robert Smith look-alike contest. This is goth music written and produced to be enjoyed by goth kids. Or "Dark Waves" if you want be a fruit. Except to the dirty white hat wearing bro-dudes who don't know the difference, we're not really goths. At least I'm not. I just never saw any musical reason to consider him one of our guys, and as such, the burden shouldn't be placed on metal editors and bloggers to "Remember Peter Steele" for the 12th time this month, regardless of his short-lived thrash metal past in Carnivore. I guarantee when Slipknot's bassist Paul Gray overdosed, none of you gave a shit, and I think Slipknot hits way closer to home then this buckle-boot shuffling goth rock. 

Anybody else I can offend today?

Infernaeon Brings the Butthurt to GSA's Facebook Page

Frontman Brian Werner's mugshot.
He says the other members were the ones that deserved to be fired. I can't find their mugshots...

I'm not completely familiar with Florida death metal band Infernaeon, nor am I too familiar with this whole ordeal with vocalist Brian Werner being fired from the band; only to subsequently implement the clever strategy of firing the band back. To look into the whole story, you can click on the link I provided to Gun Shy Assassin's blog and follow that yellow shit road into the details. I don't really care and I don't want to hear about it. Band drama is an up and coming heavy metal violation in of itself, and I can't stand hearing about how tough it is standing next to a guy and playing an instrument.

So the whole band breaking up and acting like bitches about it isn't really what I'm interested in. No, what makes this ordeal special is that the honest to god members of the band took their crybaby bullshit to the Facebook Page of Gun Shy Assassin. Wow...

If the above screencap is too small, you can visit GSA's Facebook page to watch the 16-year-old girl Facebook fight between Brian Werner and Dave Stein actively unfold. It's currently right there, plain as day, on the Wall for everybody to watch and comment on. It is hilarious, but at the same time, incredibly depressing. Readers are freely and actively telling these guys to knock it off and stop being such a pair of stupid douchebags. 

And I mean really? A blog's Facebook page? This is like a new time low in unprofessionalism on both of their accounts. Not to say GSA isn't a pretty big time metal blog, but in a side-by-side comparison, at the time I'm writing this, I only have a little less than 100 Facebook likes than his page does, and I very much expect to have more than him within the next few months. My blog isn't shit. I haven't even interviewed an artist before, much less had a couple of them argue on my Facebook wall. Clearly neither of these artists are fit to work with anybody before they do some serious growing up. This is beyond sad. 

Happy Easter! Listen to Blasphemous Death Metal

I had to go visit family today. Needless to say I'm hopelessly smashed right now. You guys have no clue what it's like to have to deal with these people...

"So what day did Jesus actually rise on?"


*swig* 


Instead of celebrating a delusional holiday sipping mimosas and eating ham because of some 2,000-year-old Jewish zombie, I opted instead to listen to Immolation.



Death metal not your speed? Mercyful Fate has got you covered:



Just listen to something satanic and awesome, to spite this "holy day". More like "holy shit", I had way too much bacon, waffles, beer and stole all the kids jelly beans. I'm going to severely regret being alive tomorrow morning. In other news, I implore you guys to go buy this t-shirt, because it is awesome. Even if you don't even like Mastodon. It doesn't even matter. This is the greatest t-shirt ever designed and I am buying it immediately to wear year-round:

It's only up on Mastodon's site for a limited time, so stop reading this crap and buy it. Buy it now. 

So Happy Easter. Enjoy your family-induced hangovers.

Rapper Samples Opeth Song

So I may not be as deeply in love with Opeth as the next metalhead, but there are some transgressions against the metal genre that can't go ignored or unpunished, regardless of my opinion. This is one of them:

You heard that correctly. In the background of what could possibly be the single most cliche rap song you've ever listened to, is the closing riff from "Credence". Mother of shit. This isn't even a particularly good rap song either. This guy must be one of the "sucka MC's" that the established rap groups are all talking about. Money and hoes? Really? I forgot it was still 2002, jerkoff.

Unfortunately, I don't think there's much an artist can do about some untalented, unoriginal urban lyricist sampling music as long as he gives proper credit for the track he used. This "TKO Capone" guy even went to the lengths of crediting Opeth in the video title on YouTube. Which is kind of like crediting your mother for you becoming a serial rapist.

Thanks to Gun Shy Assassin for finding this.

Woe is Metal Music

I think especially after I took all those days off, that you guys are more than overdue for some truly terrible, fake metal music listening. As I've stated multiple times in the last couple of weeks, synth and auto-tuned driven bleepbloopcore is the latest weapon in a poseurs' musical arsenal, and today we're going to be looking at Atlanta, Georgia riff chuggers Woe Is Me. This is the latest dirty bomb that fake shitty metal will be dropping square on the integrity of hard rock music. Man this sucks.

After I looked at their class photo-sized band photos, you'll be surprised to hear that Woe Is Me is actually a 7-piece. Newsflash bands: If you need two guys to do nothing but sing vocals, you're doing it wrong. It's not like screamo vocals are anything close to difficult or require any actual special talent to do. That one guy with the 10-year-old boy haircut who sings like an auto-tuned Michael Jackson could just as easily try sounding like a house cat in heat and replace the other dude altogether. This is just a case of the Slipknots where we have to let all of our buddies into the band so we can all be rad and famous together. Also, where do you shitty jun-jun-jun bands get off thinking you need more than one guitarist? Forget breakdowns, it's time for some lay-offs. Consider playing your music efficiently, and realize you have 3-4 more members than you need to make this shitty music. 

WE'RE GONNA NEED A BIGGER FIRE.

Special thanks to Stuff You Will Hate for enjoying bands like this, and sharing them, so I can subsequently share them and hate them.

Metal Breakup Music: Dealing with Heartbreak the True Metal Way

I don't care if you have a cold, black, lion heart of steel. Love hurts. At some point in our lives as men, we're going to experience our hearts being torn to unrecognizable shreds by the women that we hand them to. Unless you're lucky enough to be in some fatal accident while currently in a committed relationship, this is a fate that is inescapable. Unless of course, you're one of those mouth-breathing metalheads who exclusively listens to death metal and avoids making eye contact with people or going outside. You're going to die alone, and won't have to ever worry about any of this.

Lucky you.

Of course, the opposite is true for the women reading this as well. Heartache is a universal emotion and it sucks more than sold out Iron Maiden tickets, (if the feeling is not one in the same). It's an almost unbearable anguish, and when one goes through a rather difficult breakup, they need about as much support from their friends and loved ones as they can get. As music fans, many of us rely on the power of song to get us through the painful emotions of love and loss. Fortunately enough, there are thousands of songs out there, many of which are incredibly popular, that are written about the feelings of a broken heart. Not so fortunately, most of them are a lot like this:

Look, I know you're hurting big time bro, but you can't make everything worse just because you think listening to stupid shit like this is somehow going to help make you feel better. You have a reputation to uphold. She already took everything else from you, don't let her ruin that as well. Like always, your true metal guide and master Brenocide is here to lend a hand. Today I'm going to show you in several stages of emotional music listening, how you can utilize passable heavy metal music to help get you through this difficult time in your life, without looking like a total unmetal pussy in the process.  

So after she sucks you dry of all your worth and then casts you aside like yesterday's trash, your mind is going to suffer through some very strong emotions. Two of said emotions will be extreme amounts of sadness and hate. Sadness because you're going to miss her, all the times you spent together, and at this very moment, you're convincing yourself that nobody is ever going to love you as much as she did, and you'll be miserable for the rest of your pitiful existence. Hate because she's a foul, evil, rotten succubus for leaving you in such a pathetic and lonely state. So if Sadness and Hate are your two predominant feelings at this time, why not listen to a glorious masterpiece of the same name by Finnish shred titan Jari Maenpaa?

It's important to recognize what exactly you're feeling at this crucial time, and extreme metal band Wintersun is going to lay it out for you plain and simple with this song. This song is full of hate, and guess what; full of sadness too. After your breakup, the first thing you're going to be is impossibly depressed. I'll tell you right now, you're no less of a man for crying. You're only less of a man if other people find out about it. What you should do is go to your bedroom, lock the door, blast this song as loud as you can to cover it up, and then proceed to let it all out. You're probably going to look a lot like this guy on the Wintersun cover, sprawled out on your bed and weeping. Except instead of being face down in a pile of cold snow, I recommend you find yourself face down in a pile of cold Ben & Jerry's.

Speaking of Ben & Jerry's, if you're only going to listen to one band while dealing with a soul-crushing breakup, it better be doom/sludge metal outfit Crowbar. I don't know who or what damaged husky front man Kirk Windstein so badly in his life, but he's been writing discographies of music about sadness, loss, betrayal, hopelessness, and internal torment for decades now. Even his super group with Jamie Jasta is called Kingdom of Sorrow. This guy is just not a happy camper. I guess it wasn't easy being the big kid in school. Crowbar music is the quintessential soundtrack to laying around and feeling really shitty about yourself and as such, is mandatory listening during your healing process.

Yeah okay, I know you're not Spawn. But you don't have to be to relate to him and his feelings of anguish. He gave up everything and sold his soul to the Dark One to become a satanic powered super soldier, just so he could see the love of his life one more time. So did you... Right? Well maybe you did it for different reasons, but those harsh feelings of loss and sacrifice are still there. We just don't get sweet ass capes and gauntlets out of the deal. At least not for free.

So after your feelings of deep anguish and sorrow have subsided, you'll be left with feelings of bitterness and hostility towards your ex. This is perfectly normal, and who better than a band like Pantera to assist you in your rage? Don't take it out on her with threatening voicemails or death threats on Facebook. Caucasian, please. That dumb broad has demanded your undivided attention for months or years, the last thing she deserves is any god damn more of it. I also wouldn't recommend killing yourself for her, or killing her for yourself. Disregard those options completely. Just remove her from your contacts altogether and crank this song up. You should also note, that regardless of Phil Anselmo singing almost the exact same words in the lyrics of This Love, this song is the polar opposite to Michael Bolton's "Said I Loved You, but I Lied". Ahem... not like I would know anything about that, of course...

Continuing on with your advanced feelings of hatred and resentment, we have the tune "So Common, So Cheap" by Boston hardcore legends Blood for Blood. Yeah, I know, Blood for Blood is through and through, about as hardcore a band as it gets. Nevertheless, this was just too good a song to pass up in featuring here. (Let's face it, a lot of modern hardcore music is really just thrash metal without guitar solos anyway.) On a lyrical standpoint alone, it's impossible not to love this song. Unless you're one of them hos that spreads on the first date, of course. If not anything, this track is pretty hilarious, and you could use a humorous outlook on your situation at this point.




Don't lie to me. You would listen to a song along the lines of She Was Asking For It when you were still together, after she was done nagging you. With a big goofy grin on your face, no less. Take this time to listen to one of these songs now; bring up the negative feelings you had while you still had to deal with her, and remind yourself what you are now eternally free of. Feels good, man.   

So during your breakup, in forms of metal music we have confronted emotional stages of soul-crushing depression, betrayal, meaningless sacrifice, as well as hate, rage, resentment (and possible homicidal intent). It's now time to get over it, get off your ass and move on with your life. Twinkly fairy dust metal they may be, and 9 times out of 10, they're as depressing a band as the next. However, the song Paid in Full by Sonata Arctica is a great, upbeat tune about emotionally strengthening yourself, distancing yourself from a former love, and ultimately, moving forward without her. Giving you a positive outlook on what so far has been an entirely negative situation. It's the perfect bridge to carry you from being a butthurt, crybaby wuss, to becoming the stone cold, bad ass metalhead we once knew you as, before you got dumped.

There is one last step however, to complete on this road to true metal recovery. We must permanently mend your broken heart; crushed, violated, and weak it may be. With this next anthem, we shall once again transform it into a solid piece of rock solid steel, ensuring you are propelled forward, flying on the wings of true metal destiny, never to again look back...

Welcome back, brother. \,,/

Do you guys have any great metal breakup songs that you would like to share? Or just songs in general that helped you get over a tough time in your life? You can share them with me in the comments below, or better yet, Like the Facebook page, and share on the wall for everyone to see. Thanks for reading!


- Brenocide  

brokeNCYDE Brings Teh Lulz Dawg!

I feel slightly conflicted even sharing this with you, but nonetheless...

For those of you who like to keep up with this sort of thing, reigning Crunkcore champions (massive sarcasm) brokeNCYDE have released a new skit ( butthurt rant) on whatever it is they do (I won't call them albums out of respect for music as an art form) called "Sorry We're Not Slayer"

Y U Be Hatin Dawgs?

In case you didn't already know, Crunkcore is the Afterbirth that results from mixing Hip-Hop and Screamo. It is mind-bogglingly awful to the extent that it doesn't even warrant a mention on this blog in most cases. However, this was so lulz worthy that I thought I'd bring it to your attention.

What the "skit" consists of is a short rant explaining that all the members of brokeNCYDE are little girls who are getting their feelings hurt by all the negative feedback they are getting on their facebook page, and if it doesn't stop soon, they are seriously going to cry.

There are many dawgs and homies thrown about and it seems that their overall justification for their existence is that they're a Hip-Hop group. Now, I don't listen to any Hip-Hop and I'm not sure what the standard for what constitutes good Hip-Hop is, but I'm sure even the most devoted Wigger wouldn't be caught dead within a hundred mile radius of this "crew".

You can listen to said rant Here.

Genre classification and abysmal music aside, it seems that the main thing you can take from this is that brokeNCYDE really can't take any negative comments without shriveling up into little butthurt worms.

Now, I would never suggest something as uncouth and juvenile as trolling their facebook en masse. I just find it interesting conjecture that, as a professional band (don't quote me on that) these guys get so hurt by any negative feedback they get.

Sometimes it's best to just ignore these things...

Dream Theater acts like nobody has ever replaced a drummer before.

Oh no! Their drummer quit! Because you can't find anymore of those anywhere. Give it a rest Dream Theater. You guys are making a Lebron James spectacle out of replacing your human beat machine.

Before I continue, I'll inform you that the above clip is something you're only supposed to be able to see after you set yourself up for spamageddon and like Dream Theater on Facebook. So one of the Metal Sucks dudes managed to track down a clip being played (with no "likes" attached) on The Gauntlet. Metal Sucks gets it from The Gauntlet, and I get it from Metal Sucks. Isn't metal blogging fun? Anyway, it's probably going to be taken down soon, so if it stops working after getting pulled, I'm apologizing for that right now.

So if Portnoy was such a "family member" to them, why make replacing him into this shameless VH1-style reality game show phenomenon? From how they're explaining their relationship as a band, finding a new member in such a fashion would be like trying to find your next spouse in the same... you know what, never mind. The clip reveals the drumming contestants as Thomas Lang, Aquiles Priester, Mike Mangini, Marco Minneman, Peter Wildoe, Derek Roddy, and Virgil Donati. 

This just in! TNM EXCLUSIVE! Brenocide locates replacement as new Dream Theater drummer:

Quoth the Loomis, "Nevermore"... with Nevermore

Guitarist, Jeff Loomis and drummer Van Williams are quitting Nevermore. Yeah, I know. According to Blabbermouth, the two released this joint statement:

"In a mutual decision, Jeff Loomis and Van Williams have decided to leave NEVERMORE. The time has come to pursue our own paths from the group. Due to internal struggles and ongoing issues within the band, we feel it is our time to move on. We would like to thank all of our fans around the world for their years of love, support and enthusiasm. This was not an easy decision but a very necessary one at this point, may we all meet again someday, somewhere in time." 

First K.K Downing won't stick it out for one more tour with Priest, and now this. What a shitty week. Why is it so hard for metal band mates to maintain a friendly, professional relationship with one another? Yeah, I never was fiercely in love with any of my coworkers, but we managed to see each other through our days of answering angry customer phone calls, or whatever I would pretend to do for 8 hours. I assume writing awesome metal music would be at least a little more fun than that. Probably.

I mean, as a Nevermore fan, I can't just disregard the fact that Loomis and Williams were with Nevermore since their self-titled debut back in '95. These two guys practically are Nevermore. Loomis especially, that crazy-fingered albino. As far as I'm concerned, this band is all but finished. I wish both of these guys the best of luck with whatever they do, and I'll definitely be following any new projects they have planned.

What do you guys think? Should Nevermore just call it quits after this, or replace Loomis and Williams and move forward?

The Genre Debate

Allow me to be frank: You are not a biologist. Your credentials to accurately classify anything are sub-par at best. Your mother and father dropped to their knees and embraced you, with tears in their eyes, the moment you first pointed and accurately identified a "train". You were 11-years-old. I'll safely assume that at the time, a hockey helmet was still very much a necessity. I'm sure it was the last proud moment your parents ever got to experience in their time spent raising you.

But you're older now (regardless of whether or not you act like it), and have miraculously developed the necessary brain function to navigate to the YouTube website on your browser. From there, you search furiously for your favorite metal songs and music videos. After locating them, you spend about 10% of your free time actively listening to and enjoying them, and 70% of it arguing with other retards about whether the band is "blackened ambient death groove" or "post doom thrash prog grind". (The other 20% you probably spend fapping to fat chicks jiggling their butts to rap music, or thinking Fred is funny.)  

If you're not taking part in a genre debate on a YouTube comment section, then it will be somewhere in a heavy metal web forum, the comments section of some metal blog where nobody cares to hear your worthless opinion (yo), or on some Facebook wall with a perfect stranger, whose profile picture you glare at nightly, enraged that someone with a such a shit-eating grin had the audacity to disagree with you about your classification of a rock band's sub-genre. You all are guilty of it, and you're all retards for it. 

I can't even begin to fathom what microcosm of a shit you think I give, that any single one of you have some potential theory in what to call a metal band besides what I call them. NEWSFLASH: I don't. But to humor both of these evolutionary failures: Sonic Syndicate is about as "melodeath" as Atreyu, and there is no such thing as "viking metal". It's a lyrical theme geniuses, blow me and die. Vikings played flutes, Marshalls didn't exist back in the day. If you're a folk, death, or black metal band that likes to talk about Odin and wear fur on stage, you're still a folk, death, or black metal band. Blind Guardian sings about Tolkien works a lot, but I'm not going to call them Hobbit Metal. As for Cock, "Hey have you heard that new post-hardcore with some electronica band, Jamie's Elsewhere? They are my new favorite post-hardcore with some electronica band. They're gonna make it big in the post-hardcore with some electronica scene. 

2 syllables beats 10, douchetard. Like always and forever, I win. Die in a fire.

"You go Brenocide! Labels are for soup cans!" Shut up, goth kid. I'll never be against any bands being classified as a specific genre. Regardless of the fact all of them are against it. Band members are consistently riding this high horse where they are under the false impression that their music doesn't sound like anybody else's. That they are their very own little genre, and that genre is Burzum. In a typical genre debate, one party always brings up a band's opinion of how they're generalized. As if it barely matters. Case in point: Massachusetts mosh factory, The Acacia Strain refuse to be referred to as "Deathcore", regardless of the fact that they carefully follow every specific guideline of a Deathcore band to a tee. They simply want to be referred to as "heavy". Seriously? They give people like this musical instruments? You can't listen to heavy. Unless we're talking about your girlfriend walking on a hard wood floor.

Sorry musicians, but when you focus all of your artistic efforts on down-tuned heavily distorted tremolo picking, blast beats, and screeching vocals because you heard all the other black metal bands doing it, I'm not going to feel bad for you when someone calls you a black metal band. I know you're all really dumb, or children, so I'll use peanut butter as an analogy to help you understand. You go to the store and you want some peanut butter, because you like it. So you go to the peanut butter section to find some. Now, we understand that not all peanut butter is created equal; there's different brand names that taste differently and use different ingredients, whether it be Jif, Peter Pan or Skippy. Then there's also smooth peanut butter, chunky, light, organic, etc. Some taste really good to you and others are really gross. Maybe while you're in the peanut butter section, you find some that you've never heard of, bring it home to try it, and now you're a fan. Regardless of all these differences, it's all still god damn peanut butter. Jif is not about to call itself "post sweet peanut blend cream". Nor would they blend peanuts into butter, knowing full well what it is and that other people have done it. Then turn around and say "We don't consider ourselves any specific type of food. We just make the food that we like."


Jif would never do that. That would be retarded.


So my issue does not lie within the act of classifying metal bands, which ultimately helps bands earn new listeners (you're welcome) and gives potential fans a basic idea of what to expect from your music. My issue is with arguing about it. Who gives a shit? Everybody is so passionate about being considered the most world-renowned heavy metal scientist. Like you're the late Steve Irwin, and all you have to do is jam your thumb up a rock band's backside, to accurately bestow upon us your expert opinion of whether it's of hardcore or post-hardcore gender. By the way, clever use of the term "post", jerkoffs. I didn't know we had such celebrated hard rock historians in our midst. It's like hardcore music has become the new birth of Christ, and the names of all our musical genres are going to be chronologically based on whether or not they came before or after the holy age of hardcore music.


Here's an idea: come back and talk to us about it when you're post-suicide.


Bottom line is, if it's within the realms of true metal music, you hardly need to worry yourself with what it's supposed to be called. It's all metal, and it's glorious. The only decisions you need to concern yourself with are whether or not a band is to be considered true metal. Almond butter may want to be peanut butter, but we in the peanut butter elite fully recognize it as a false nut-based cream spread for poseurs and wannabes.

All hail the glory of our TRV peanutty gods. \,,/

Retirement

A little more than four months ago, the Metal Gods, Judas Priest, announced their farewell, EPITAPH world tour; citing no reasons, leaving us (me) to speculate that they have had too many years ‘screaming for vengeance,’ ‘hot rockin’ to the point of frailty and reminding us that eventually we all must face the ‘sad wings of destiny.’ Like many of you, I was upset to hear that one of my favorite groups would provide me and the world with pure heavy metal no longer, however; I came to terms with the fact that death eludes no man and would have to cough up the last bits of my life savings to attend their American tour.

I awoke this morning to my usual routine of Facebook stalking my “friends” and reading the headlines of the updates to bands and pages that I have yet to block, when I stumbled upon a post linking me to this. I had yet to consume my morning cup of coffee, so I hastily brewed my caffeinated beverage, made myself a hearty breakfast and re-checked what I had seen to ensure that what I saw was not the remnants of a horrible vivid dream. Faithful TNM readers, you are not mistaken nor was I. Click here for the official press release.

K.K. Downing is the founding member of arguably the greatest heavy metal band of all time. He has been with the band since day one and could not manage to stick it out for another year/year-and-a-half? What?

K.K. must have sprained some of his arthritic fingers on this tour.

I get it, K.K., you’re old. So are your buddies Rob, Glenn, Ian, and Scott. Barring information like cancer, AIDS, or Alzheimer’s that they are withholding, there is no excuse for giving up on your fans months before your FAREWELL TOUR. Even Matt “Family First” Barlow had the balls to say goodbye to his European fans before taking off to change diapers, flip pancakes, and scrub the toilet.

Former rocker K.K. Downing outside his house, announcing some news about the golf course he built. Seriously. Check it out. I read it on BBC.

What is happening with our genre? There are all of these mixed signals it seems. Am I asking too much of my favorite artists that they rock until they die like our late great hero Ronnie James Dio? I understand bands like Priest, Maiden, and Motörhead are exceptions to the metal rule of longevity, but I expect a little more from the founding members. Hell, after 40 years, I would assume that he knew he was made of a different fiber than the rest of us and for him to understand that he is not a normal human being any longer. He had been a pivotal piece to the unique sound of Judas Priest, especially playing lead, so now we as fans are left with only a partial tandem of metal licks so vile that Satan himself falls to his knees offering his mouth to the work of oral stimulation to ensure that such sounds will continue to plague the Earth. Did he have a “senior moment,” is he suffering so greatly from senile dementia or Alzheimer’s that he forgot the rules or the songs? If not, what other explanation is there that can justify quitting before the quitting tour? I know which path I would choose if I could either go out one last time in TRV metal glory or enter the hospice.

K.K. in a few years (man near left). Have fun with retirement, asshole.

I guess we know where they got “Judas;” and I thought it came from the Dylan song.