Sep 122012
 

(Armed with free tickets, DGR took a trip down memory lane, attending two Sacramento shows headlined by Powerman 5000 and Static-X, and here’s his write-up about the experiences.)

In all seriousness, I never would’ve thought that I’d ever see Powerman 5000, or Static-X. I loved them back in the beginnings of my music listening days but as I got older my tastes changed. They were constantly touring when I was about thirteen, yet I couldn’t afford to go to any of the shows, much less try to convince my parents to take me out to some fucking club in Oakland or San Jose because some band with goofy hair happened to be there, which would’ve taken more effort than I could fathom.

After I could afford to go to such shows I began to play with the idea of seeing both bands, but never seriously. That was until about three o’clock on Wednesday of last week when the lovely people from Ace Of Spades in Sacramento emailed me a message that basically said, “Hey, you’ve been to a lot of shows here, do you want to go to these two for free?”

My response initially was, “Well that’s bullshit”. I checked the email more closely though, and all they asked for was my name and the number of tickets I wanted, and I figured, well shit, it’s a drive downtown, which is fifteen minutes tops. All I have to do is hit the door, have them tell me that I’m a fucking idiot, and then go home and sleep. Yet 6:30 hit on Wednesday and there I was, standing inside the venue, ready to watch four local bands and then Powerman 5000 take the stage, with two tickets to a Static-X show on Friday as well.

So you know what? Why not talk about some of the bands I saw over those two days, at the very least providing a link to their Facebook page so other people can look into them, whether I liked them or not. As always, I’ll be including the Facebook links in their band names, and if any video from that specific show pops up I’ll be sure to add it.

If you’re looking for the usual heavy stuff you may want to move along, I’ve got more of that in the works but this won’t be it. Continue reading »

Sep 172011
 

As a public service, I thought I’d let you know about two North American tours I just noticed yesterday, plus two others announced earlier but not previously mentioned at NCS. The first of the newer ones is advertised by the poster above. What caught my eye, in addition to the name Korpiklaani, was the fact that Russia’s Arkona is on this tour. Arkona is a recent discovery for us here at NCS, thanks to our friend Trollfiend, who provided a guest review of the band’s new album Slovo. Also included on the tour are Polkadot Cadaver and Forged in Flame. I don’t yet know anything about those two bands, but I’m very tempted to see this show simply because of Arkona (though I like Korpiklaani, too), especially because the Seattle stop will be at a relatively small club.

The second tour is the 2011 edition of Thrash and Burn. This has been a summer tour since its inception, but it was a no-show in the summer just past and now appears to have emerged as a re-branding of Winds of Plague’s fall headlining tour. Following in the footsteps of Summer Slaughter, Winds of Plague and the promoters of this tour nominated a group of bands to fill the last tour slot and let fans vote for a winner. A couple days ago, the winner was announced, and it’s Volumes. Interestingly, Volumes was also one of the nominated bands on the Summer Slaughter ballot, but didn’t make the cut that time and instead were included on the Slaughter Survivors Tour. Volumes has a new album called Via that’s getting some buzz, though I haven’t heard it yet.

The rest of the bands on this version of Thrash and Burn are Chelsea Grin, As Blood Runs Black, For the Fallen Dreams, Upon A Burning Body, In the Midst of Lions, and Like Moths to Flames. In other words, the tour should be renamed Deathcore and Burn. No tour schedule has yet been announced.

I must admit that among the fall tours we haven’t yet mentioned at this site, I’m personally more interested in the Mastodon/Dillinger Escape Plan/Red Fang tour and the Mayhem/Keep Of Kalessin/Hate/Abigail Williams tour (which will be joined by Woe on 13 dates not yet specified). The schedules for the Korpiklaani tour and those others I just mentioned are after the jump. Continue reading »

Feb 272011
 


We’re jumping the gun on this post, since the month doesn’t end until tomorrow. Why? Uh, because this post is ready to go and we don’t have anything else finished for today yet. Work and other shit interfered with our grand plans for a Sunday post.  We might still get another one up later today, but for now, feast your eyes on the barrage of metal headed our direction.

What we do with these installments of METAL IN THE FORGE is collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last 30 days (or in this case, the last 27 days) about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know them yet. And in this post, we cut and paste the announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

This isn’t a cumulative list, so be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming New Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported in previous installments. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones. There’s some awesome shit on the way. Continue reading »

Feb 132011
 

How did Deathcore get to be such a lightening rod for controversy within the extreme metal scene? Seems like all you gotta do to ignite a testosterone-fueled, name-calling slagfest on most metal blogs and message boards is mention the word. In some quarters, shitting on deathcore is like a litmus test of metal purity: If you take a big verbal dump on the genre, that’s evidence of sophistication in your musical taste, and if you express enthusiasm for the music, it proves you’re a retard.

All the controversy seems to have moved some deathcore icons (like Job For A Cowboy, Whitechapel, and Carnifex) further away from core and further into straight death, and other bands who have remained true to the template don’t want to be called deathcore bands, even if that’s really what they still are. Even a lot of deathcore fans seem to feel they have to take part in the branding of some bands as no-talent wastes in order to buff up their cred in praising other, almost indistinguishable, bands as the real deal.

Connecticut/NYC band Emmure may be the lightening rod of all lightening rods within the genre. They’ve got an intensely devoted cadre of fans, but man, they’ve got an equally devoted army of haters out there, too. Here at NCS, we’ve been somewhere in the middle, like crouching down in the open space of the floor right before a wall of death is triggered. The three of us who started this site saw them play Seattle as an opening act on their first national tour, and we liked their debut album. On the other hand, we were unanimous in thinking their last release, Felony, was an embarrassment.

They’re on the verge of releasing a new album on Century Media (due February 15) called Speaker of the Dead, and two singles have surfaced so far, including a video for one of them that debuted just a couple days ago. We’ve got both those songs for you after the jump, along with some thoughts about the music. Plus, we’ve also got a brand new song from the forthcoming album by LA’s Winds of Plague, and a fairly new video from another deathcore lightening rod, Chelsea Grin. If you feel like gettin’ your breakdown on, stay with us. Continue reading »

Jul 312010
 

My, how time flies. Another month is in the history books. However much time you have on earth, you now have 31 days less of it since since the last installment of this post. Drink up!

But have no fear. You’re headed for a better place. That’s right, basically the same existence you had a month ago, but with more new metal ahead of you. Drink up!

And all those physical processes that are inexorably decaying your bodies on the rocky road to your demise, they’re still there and they’re still working on you like termites that have found a rotting log. But hey, you can still bang your head, so . . . Drink up!

Yes, we’re now a full seven months into 2010, and so it’s time for another monthly update to the list of forthcoming new albums we first posted on January 1. (All the other updates can be found via the “Forthcoming Albums” category link on the right side of our pages.) Below is a list of still more projected new releases we didn’t know about at the time of our previous updates, or updated info about some of the previously noted releases.

Once again, we’ve cobbled together news blurbs about bands whose past work we’ve liked, or who look interesting for other reasons. Perhaps needless to say, these are bands that mostly fit the profile of music we cover on this site — the kind that would like to tear your head off.

So, in alphabetical order, here’s our list of cut-and-pasted items from various sources since our last update about forthcoming new releases. Look for the bands you like and put reminders on your calendar. Or if you’re like us, just stick post-it notes on your forehead. Of course, if your foreheads are the low, sloping kind, you may only have room for a few, so be choosy. Continue reading »

Feb 242010
 

Miseration‘s new album, The Mirroring Shadow, is not at all what we were expecting — but it’s a most welcome surprise.

Our expectations were based on the band’s first album, 2007’s Your Demons – Their Angels. That album was a particularly melodic rendering of melodic death metal, marked by the same mixture of clean singing and harsh growling that vocalist Christian Älvestam brought to his former band, Scar Symmetry. In fact, the similarities to Scar Symmetry were far more dominant than the differences.

That wasn’t a bad thing (cuz we liked the old Scar Symmetry just fine), but it seemed to us that Älvestam’s partnership in Miseration with guitarist/drummer Jani Stefanovic had become less a catalyst for change than a vehicle for continuing on with the songwriting style and musical sound of the band Älvestam had just left.

But on The Mirroring Shadow, Miseration has become a different breed of cat altogether. And we mean something like a prehistoric sabretooth — big, fast, powerful, vicious, and with teeth the size of carving knives. (more after the jump, including songs to hear and a digression about album artwork. . .) Continue reading »