Oasis Vs. Blur Is Over!

Liam & Noel have called off their feud. Read all about it HERE. God Bless both bands. Make new records!

Decibel Hall of Fame: Brutal Truth, Need to Control

I remember seeing those ads for Sounds of the Animal Kingdom everywhere. It was the most ubiquitous metal marketing campaign I can recall to this day.

I was aware that the former bass player for Anthax and Nuclear Assault (and S.O.D.), Dan Lilker, was in Brutal Truth. I saw the band at the Fireside Bowl in Chicago and interviewed him for my 'zine. He talked to me about playing black metal in the cab he drove in New York. He didn't want to answer questions about his age. And he was rocking a short hair-cut that made him look like Loadera Kirk Hammett. I seem to remember people at Relapse telling me he was sensitive about the comparison, which prompted him to relaunch his locks.

A couple of years later, I met Brutal Truth's drummer, Rich Hoak, at Gordon Conrad's apartment. Gordon and I became friends when he was a publicist at Earache Records and he sent me Coalesce's 002 EP in 1995 during my brief stint in Atlanta, Georgia. Gordon went on to work at Relapse and started Escape Artist Records with one of Relapse's graphic designers. Escape Artist released Burn It Down's second EP and our only full-length. I believe I was staying at Gordon's place in Philadelphia during a tour. Rich was talking to us about his then-new band, Total Fucking Destruction. He struck me as hyper-friendly, and a bit hyper in general.

With all that being said, I have never listened to Brutal Truth.

Listening to Need to Control now, I think I may have been missing out. It's full of a lot of crazy fast stuff that isn't really my speed (pun intended), but the sludgier bits are awesome, and all of it is undeniably difficult to play and well-played at that. I'm on my second listen now and I'm glad I purchased this album on iTunes (We Are the Romans my friend Ati gave me; I figured since I had a promo copy of it once upon a time I already sort of "owned" it... Er, right?).

I must admit this album shreds.

Storm the Gates of Hell.

Decibel Hall of Fame: Botch, We Are the Romans

A few things came back to my memory while listening to this album (which I had previously owned, but had not spent much time with): one is their semi-legendary light show. For a band setting up on the floor and playing through crappy p.a. systems, it was incredible. My old band performed with Botch in Nashville... We might have played a show in Milwaukee together as well.

There was a certain sense of "togetherness" with the bands that were happening at that time in the so-called "Noisecore" scene. We felt part of it but apart from it at the same time. Like the redneck metal kids trying to fit in with the hipsters. I'd say that scene was basically made up of Coalesce, Dillinger Escape Plan, Botch, Cave In, Isis, The National Acrobat and a handful of others, all of whom we either toured with or played a couple of shows with at some point.

But I digress. This album is incredible and more than worthy of the "Hall of Fame" in which it was placed. It has twists, turns, depth, creativity and shards of emotional frustration to spare. I can do without the techno-ish outro (which gets repetitive and redundant much too quickly) but otherwise, it's an enjoyable listen.

The other thing I remembered was that this album has a "dis" track about the band Racetraitor. The title is brilliant ("C. Thomas Howell as the Soul Man") and the lyrics are pretty spot on: "The worst music I've ever heard/ the words fall onto the floor." It's remarkable that Racetraitor was able to land on the cover of two "big" fanzines and earn a spot on this somewhat important album without ever composing so much as one good song. It was all politics, theatrics and bravado. Very funny to think about.

*Yes I skipped the album from Atheist, although I listened to snippets. I know they are off-time, "important," and all of that, but I just can't bring myself to listen to a band with that name. Weird maybe, but true. I may skip a couple of others, as well.

Van Halen! High-Quality Rehearsal Footage...

Light Sabers in the Living Room

I have had no desire to purchase a Nintendo Wii (nor any other game console) to sit next to my dusty Playstation 2 that I used mainly to watch DVDs until I read about this.

Kicking My Butt

"Do not eat the food of a stingy man...for he is the kind of man who is always thinking about the cost. 'Eat and drink,' he says to you, but his heart is not with you. You will vomit up the little you have eaten" (Prov. 23:6-8).

Decibel Hall of Fame: At The Gates, Slaughter of the Soul

This is an album I had in my collection already of course as well. Don't let all of the watered-down Americanized versions of this band bum you out, or cause you to forget how crucial and unstoppable this album really was. I remember that during my brief stay in Atlanta, Georgia in 1995, Gordon Conrad (who then worked at Earache and now works at Relapse) sent me this CD.

I have Gordon to thank for hipping me to Coalesce that year. Gordon's label, Escape Artist, would later release material from my band, Burn It Down. But I digress. This album rips. I'd put it alongside Megadeth's Rust in Peace as one of the best of its decade in the metal category. That year I became acqainted with Fear Factory's Demanufacture as well. While exciting and different like At The Gates (and the subject of more repeated listens at the time), I don't think it holds up as well.

Am I crazy for liking the first Haunted album even better than this record? I know it's not as important, however, Peter Dolving's vocals really added something to the stew, not to mention that Jensen guy from Witchery, he's a heavy metal badass as well.

Decibel Hall of Fame: Anthrax, Among the Living

I have decided to listen to all of the albums that have been inducted into Decibel magazine's "Hall of Fame" in alphabetical order; or at least, most of them, I have yet to decide if I want to tackle a few of the death and black metal ones. I will be working as I listen, but I intend to be blogging as well as time permits.

I've started with Anthrax's Among the Living.

Obviously this is one that I already own. I first purchased this on cassette in 1987 or 1988, perhaps 1989. I'm thinking I was in middle school. I had discovered thrash metal through Megadeth's second album (still no Megadeth albums in the Hall of Fame!) and after purchasing Cream Presents: Thrash Metal Magazine issue number one because it had Dave Mustaine on the cover, I proceeded to read Don Kaye's "20 Greatest Thrash Metal Albums Of All Time" article and became enthralled by many bands including Slayer, Metallica, Overkill, Testament and so forth, and this album was, I believe, among them.

I never liked Joey Belladonna's vocals, but I liked the lyrics, and I loved the music. I still feel the same way about this album today. I have to say that Anthrax's first album with John Bush, Sound of White Noise, is my favorite album by Anthrax. It was the most angry, had the most genuine depth, dropped the gimmicks (and the Stephen King book reports) and Bush's vibe suited them much, much better. However, there's a reason that when the ill-fated "reunion" happened a couple of years ago, it was billed as the "Among the Living lineup." That's because this album shreds. The title track, "Caught in a Mosh," "I Am the Law," "Efilnikufesin (N.F.L.)," "A Skeleton in the Closet" (Stephen King book report), "Indians" (of course), the entire album is classic thrash with the unmistakable rhythmic crunch written mostly by the DRUMMER and played skillfully by Scott Ian, who wrote a lot of the lyrics. Did Belladonna and Spitz really ever do ANYTHING in this band? HAHA.

LOVE THIS ALBUM.

Ninja Turtle guitars and all.

Demon Hunter Video...

Left to right: Tim "Yogi" Watts (Demon Hunter), Dave Peters (Throwdown) and myself on the set of the music video for Demon Hunter's "Fading Away," Universal Studios Backlot, Universal City, California, USA, Earth.

Ryan & Ryan

That's me interviewing Ryan Clark from Demon Hunter over the weekend. Photo by Ethan Luck.

Labor Day Weekend

Saturday the guys from Demon Hunter were in town to shoot their new video. We worked on the Universal Studios lot, not far from where they film "The Office" and the offices for Amblin Entertainment.

We hung out on the "town square" set from "Back to the Future," though unfortunately, the clock tower is now gone ("Save the clocktower!"), just like the theme park ride.

That shot above is from the Demon Hunter video. It's going to be so sick.

The band's call time was at 7PM and they worked until nearly 8AM the next morning (we left for our two hour drive home about 2:30AM) and the following day we were all back together, this time near Pasadena at an old monk's abbey for a photo shoot.

My friend Dylan begins his full-time employment with Superhero Artist Management today.

I never realized just how much As I Lay Dying's old stuff sounds like Zao. The song "Illusions" is straight up like an outtake from Blood and Fire. Everything I've heard on A Long March: The First Recordings sounds like Zao thus far, haha.

Luckily the guys in AILD have taken Zao on tour, had Dan Weyandt on their records, and otherwise shown love and appreciation.