In mid 2009, Metal Blade re-released The Ocean‘s 2004 release Fluxion. I was offered a promo download and at the time I didn’t give it a good listen and immediately forgot about it. The band didn’t catch my interest again until I heard everyone gushing over how great their latest album, Heliocentric was. I remember thinking to myself “I don’t think I liked that band”, but something made me listen to the album anyways. I was surprisingly pleased at what I was missing and was quickly a fan and seeking out older releases. The Ocean is a band that doesn’t get nearly enough of the credit and recognition that they deserve. The ocean also have a tendency to make 2 part albums and Anthropocentric is the follow up second part to Heliocentric. The album is set for a November release on Metal Blade records. Below is the details from the press release on Anthropocentric. Read the rest of this entry »

All That Remains is offering a free download to the title track from the upcoming album,…For We Are Many. All you have to do is click HERE or check out the widget below and enter your email address and it will send you the link to the download. I couldn’t help myself and I must say that I really like the song. Very heavy and sounds like something more off of Fall Of Ideals.

You have to be quick on this one! Here is your chance to win a copy of the new Iron Maiden, The Final Frontier Album (Review coming soon). As you may know, the album comes in various packages. The one we’re giving away is the Mission Edition. The mission edition is packed in a nice metal case and offers you access to exclusive online material such as the director’s cut of The Final Frontier video, a video interview with the band, an online photo gallery, wallpaper and “Mission II” of The Final Frontier online game.

All you have to do to win is be the first person to answer the following questions. Read the rest of this entry »

Holy mother of deathcore. Here is a tour that the scene kids are going to love. Whitechapel, Oceano , Impending Doom, Miss May I and I Declare War. It’s a metal elitists worst nightmare. At least it’s not one of those tours where the headlining band is some old, well respected death metal band and you have to sit through 4 deathcore bands to see them. Tour dates are after the fold. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week the track list for All That Remains upcoming album …For We Are Many went public. This week Noisecreep brings us the artwork with comments from Phil Labonte. Now I’m not sure what is going on here, but it’s a pretty cool looking album cover.

“I’m really proud of the artwork for this disc,” vocalist Phil Labonte told Noisecreep about the album’s cover design and concept. “I wanted it to be heavy and let the art speak for itself. That was part of the reason for leaving the name of the band off the cover.”

The artwork was done by Travis Smith, who also did The Fall Of Ideals. Read the rest of this entry »

The release date for The Big Four: Live From Sonisphere DVD and Blue Ray has been set for the UK (October11th) and Japan (October 13th) on Universal Music , but there has yet to be an official release for the U.S., or North America for that matter. Since the 11th falls on a Monday and the 13 falls on a Wednesday, people are guessing that the U.S. will see a release date on the 12th of October. We’ll have to wait and see.

Read the rest of this entry »

3 Inches Of Blood recently had a Facebook Status saying “Thanks Oklahoma. Bands sure love venues that take 30% of T-shirt sales, 10% of CD sales and enforce a rule that carries a $2,500 fine if anyone uses profanity on stage.”

Wow. 30% of t-shirt sales and 10% of CD sales? I think that’s kind of fucking rotten, considering that a band brings customers to a venue, where they spend plenty of cash on beverages and such. The venue in question is The Zoo Amphitheater in Oklahoma City, OK, where the band played on the Silver Star Stage of the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival‘s closing date.

A venue that large with a summer festival that big already charging people an arm and a leg for food and water, making quite a profit, I’m sure, off of ticket sales and vendors. So why do they need to take any more money from working bands that probably aren’t making that much money in the first place. 30% for t-shirts and 10% for CD’s is a pretty fat chunk of change taken out of their already empty pockets. The bigger bans probably don’t have much to worry about, but the smaller ones need every cent they can get.

Do you think venues should get a cut of a bands merch sales?

I honestly don’t know what could help Sebastian Bach these days. His prime days of hitting the soprano notes are well over, no matter how tight his pants still are. We all know that. The thing is that he’s not even singing in tune much anymore. On top of his voice being shot and singing out of tune, he tries to cover with a god-awful vibrato. It’s pretty bad when your back-up singers are better than you are and it’s obvious. See for yourself as he sings Monkey Business and Heaven And Hell in tribute to Ronnie James Dio.

Kataklysm‘s new album, Heaven’s Venom comes out in a short week and a half. Though the band doesn’t try to push their boundaries, they have made another solid Kataklysm album. Here is their new video for the 4th song on the album, Push The Venom.

Maurizio Iacono: “After the crazy videos we did with EX DEO it was only natural for us to upgrade the KATAKLYSM visuals as well. We decided to try to recreate the underworld fantasy atmosphere depicted in the artwork with some great visual effects. The song is about surviving the judgment that others cast upon you, and that which is important and feels right to you. Spread your venom and not the lies of your enemies! Ivan did another fantastic job and we are super happy with it and hopefully you guys dig it too. See you on tour!”

You can preorder Heaven’s Venom at Nuclear Blast’s online store.

According to DÅÅTH vocalist Sean Z (for some odd reason I keep thinking this dude’s name is Steve), the new album is going to be “Better, awesomer and more heavy”. The new album title has been and release date has been set.

Century Media News: Extreme metal at its very best, plain and simple, is what the Atlanta based quintet DAATH delivers. The group’s highly anticipated third full-length release is going to be self-titled and is set for an Oct. 26th North American release.

Another highly anticipated album for me in 2010. So far this year there really hasn’t been any huge disappointing albums for me. There have been ones that fell slightly short of expectations, but not totally bombing.

SkullsNBones.com‘s “Metal” Mark has had the privilege of hanging out in the studio with DAATH while they’ve been recording, so check that out.

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