Elks Blood

Elks Blood sound like a promising metal band from Seattle. Their website says they have a demo. Check out "Dune" on their myspace.

Metal Genres Explained

This is a pretty well done video. Too bad he stopped at ten.

Baroness Live

Baroness and John Baizley have just begun a tour in support of the Blue Record. Here are some great live clips from Metal Injection. "The Sweetest Curse" is my favorite song off this album, and this is a great live clip.

Artwork by Baizley

I haven't posted in a while, so I thought I'd take this chance to talk about something different. I'll probably have some pictures from Joel Smith and Modest Mouse when I get around to it. This post is about artwork by John Dyer Baizley. Baizley does awesome cover artwork for some pretty cool metal bands, including the band in which he is lead singer/guitarist, Baroness.

Baroness's new album comes out this october. The Blue Record artwork can be seen below. Baroness has two preview tracks from this album up on their MySpace.

(clockwise from upper left)

Baroness - Red Album
Baroness - Blue Record
Skeletonwitch - Beyond the Permafrost
Flight of the Conchords - I Told You I Was Freaky (out in October)
Torche - In Return
Kylesa - Static Tensions

Skeletonwitch - Spokane, WA (6/12/2009)

I first heard about Skeletonwitch when they were added to the lineup of the Scion Rock Fest in February. Skeletonwitch play fun, straightforward blackened thrash metal. I say fun not to diminish the heaviness of their music. The riffs are punishing, and frontman Chance Garnette commands the stage with his black metal inspired growls. You can't take yourself too seriously in the world of metal or you are doomed to become a joke trying too hard to be hard. I fall firmly on the side of GWAR and Iron Maiden on the metal theatrics argument.

These guys were nice to talk to, and you could tell they had a blast playing. Before playing one song, Chance told the crowd, "This one's about Sataaaaaaaan!" before guitarists Nate and Scott launched into a twin axe attack as smoke billowed out from the back of the stage. That is what metal is about.

Skeletonwitch has Beyond the Permafrost out on Prosthetic Records which I picked up at the show. They are working on their new album and recording in Seattle. Here's a live video of them in Brooklyn to give you idea of their live show though the sound isn't too great.

Until the Light Takes Us

If you didn't know already, I am fascinated by Black Metal. It is one of the most interesting musical subcultures out there. Its music is strongly DIY, but is also surrounded by controversy. Like any good subculture it has its own fashion sense. This is the reason I'm excited for a new documentary exploring the depths of this extreme metal subgenre.



Until the Light Takes Us has some limited showings in Portland and Seattle this May.

Vinyl Spotlight: Wolves in the Throne Room - Malevolent Grain

Wolves in the Throne Room - Malevolent Grain

This EP was released last month by the Olympia black metal outfit on Southern Lord Records. This release features two operatic songs each over 10 minutes long. When mailordered directly from Southern Lord, this album is pressed on forest green vinyl out of a 1000 copies. The forest green edition is probably one of the best looking pieces of colored vinyl I have seen. The cover also features a gold foil stamped logo. Fresh off their performance in the Scion Rock Fest, the Wolves have a full length due out at that end of the month.

Scion Rock Fest

It's hard to find good metal festivals. Usually you have to put up with a fair amount of sub-par bands. The Scion Rock Fest on Feb. 28th is the exception. Too bad it is in Atlanta. 2 of the 4 bands from my best metal albums of 2008 will be there.


Full band list (my picks in bold):

Mastodon, Neurosis, High on Fire, Converge, Boris, 1349, Cryptopsy, Torche, Nachtmystium, Wolves in the Throne Room, Baroness, Harvey Milk, Kylesa, Zordaster, Withered, Krallice, Toxic Holocaust, Skeletonwitch, Rwake, A Storm of Light, Warbringer, Salome, Suidakra, Tyr, Alestorm, Eyehategod, SuidAkrA, Septic Flesh, Soilent Green, Trash Talk, U.S. Christmas, Apocalyptic Visions

If only Gojira and The Sword were going to be there. Speaking of Gojira, here is their new video for the song "All the Tears" from The Way of All Flesh. It's not my favorite song off the album, but it has a pretty trippy video.

All The Tears




EDIT: 4/16 Added final lineup

2008's Best Music (Metal Edition)

Since I discovered most of these albums through other year end lists, this is a little late. These are the metal albums I enjoyed that were released in 2008. It's harder to find good metal albums, and I'm sure I missed a few this year.

1) The Sword - Gods of the Earth (Stream)
2) Nachtmystium - Assassins: Black Meddle Pt. 1 (Stream)
3) Torche - Meanderthal ("Healer" MP3)
4) Gojira - The Way of All Flesh

Awesome Chart

Thanks to Metal Sucks

GWAR - Spokane, WA (11/15/2008)

GWAR brought their brutal stage show to the Knitting Factory in Spokane on the Electile Dysfunction tour. There were gallons of fake blood and many celebrity decapitations. Toxic Holocaust and Kingdom of Sorrow were the openers.

Toxic Holocaust

Kingdom of Sorrow


GWAR

The Aftermath


Flickr, Last.fm

Setlist

1. Battle Lust
2. The Salamanizer
3. Go To Hell!
4. Bring Back the Bomb
5. Bonesnapper (The Faces of the Slain)
6. Murderer's Muse
7. Crack in the Egg
8. A Short History of the End of the World (Part VII(The Final Chapter(abbr.)))
9. Crush Kill Destroy
10. Ham on the Bone
11. Krosstika
12. War Is All We Know
13. JCSS
14. Destructo Song
15. U Ain't Shit
16. Rock & Roll Never Felt So Good
17. Eighth Lock
18. Slaughterama
19. Sick of You

Tracks 2, 18, 19 - from Scumdogs of the Universe
Track 15 - from Hell-O
Tracks 7, 10, 16 - from America Must Be Destroyed
Track 9 - from RagNaRok
Tracks 4, 5, 11 from War Party
Tracks 3, 6, 12, 17 - from Beyond Hell
Track 8 - from We Kill Everything
Track 1 - from Violence Has Arrived
Tracks 13, 14 - ?

Boxset Mayhem

2 huge boxsets have recently gone on sale.

Mastodon Boxset

*3 Studio Albums (Remission, Leviathan, Blood Mountain)
*1 EP (Lifesblood)
*1 Compilation (Call of the Mastodon)
*1 Previously Unreleased Concert (Relapse Contamination Festival 2003)
*3 Cover Songs
*1 Slipmat
*1 Sticker Pack
/11oo copies

Price: $225 + Shipping


Nada Surf Boxset 1994-2008

*5 Studio Albums (High/Low, The Proximity Effect, Let Go, The Weight Is a Gift, Lucky)
*1 7" Single (The Plan/Telescope)
*1 24-Page Full-Color Booklet
/1000 copies

Price: $100 + Shipping

Mastodon boxset seems a little expensive. Their website claims that there are "9 LP's in the set", which obviously means 9 discs not albums. That is $25 per disc. The Nada Surf boxset is a little more affordable and probably worth picking up if you are really into the band.

The Art Of The Scream

So this is what it's come to? Screaming is an artform now. Apparently, there are two schools of thought in modern metal music; inhale versus exhale screaming. I can't for the life of me understand what has become of "metal" music. There is an article over at Metal Inquisition (Yes, a link from a blog to a blog) with a number of youtube videos illustrating what inhale screaming is. It sounds like a bad parody to me.

For me, metal music has always been about one thing: The Riff. Unless you're Rob Halford, you're vocals should just stay out of the way. I can't count the number times I've listened to a new death-grind-doom-funeral or whatever metal band that is supposed to be the new thing, when the "singer" comes in growls out his personal poetry book in an incomprehensible cacophony. It doesn't help that whoever is mixing these albums feels the need to jack up the snare, bass drum, and vocal levels so that the guitar and bass become an annoying buzz.

Here are some songs that might be cool if they were instrumental: