(We present Daniel Barkasi’s evocative review of a new album by the Czech band Inferno, which will be released on July 17th by Debemur Morti Productions.) If you search for a band named Inferno on Encyclopedia Metallum, you’ll unsurprisingly get a lot of results. All of these are not created equal, of course. When we […]
The post INFERNO: “THE ANTHROPIC SOPHISMS (ON THE HEIGHTS OF DESPAIR)” appeared first on NO CLEAN SINGING.
The Rolling Stones will release their new album Foreign Tongues this Friday. I wrote a bit about it here. One track I didn’t mention is “Ringing Hollow,” the latest (and last?) song to get a pre-release preview treatment — not under an alias or with a star–studded video, but via an old-fashioned stripped-down performance.
The post Mick Jagger & Ronnie Wood Debut New Stones Song Lamenting America appeared first on Stereogum.
Trying to get a leg up as a touring musician? Are you tired of paying a 25% merch fee to venues so you could set up a beer pong table and sling your t-shirts and stickers? Has the door guy once again walked away with more cash in his pocket than your band because he’s been feeding his nose with door money? The harsh reality is that when you’re traveling across the country to get your music out to the world, the house always wins. If you want to get ahead in this industry, then you need to stack the deck!
The best way to get a leg up after months on the road is by trashing your van and committing insurance fraud. You’ve already redlined every single one of your credit cards, and you need to recoup your funds. We’re going to get into the best practices to make sure that your band gets out of the red, into the black, and probably on a couple of watch lists if you don’t cover your tracks because this is absolutely a felony.
You really can’t cash in on your insurance policy if your gear isn’t worth dick. Sure, maybe you bring your stage-bangers on the road, but those premium guzzling fat cats won’t pay top dollar for your entry-level Ibanez if it goes missing. The most practical workaround here is to take a lot of photos of your stage show when a more expensive backline is being shared. There’s an even bigger payday in it for you if you can borrow somebody’s PRS or Warwick for a set. That way, after you trash your own gear and set your van on fire, you can present the photos with your insurance claim, and say that it was your equipment.
If your insurance agent asks you about the serial numbers, just tug at your collar and laugh it off, and hopefully you won’t spend a year in jail.
Now that you’ve already gathered your “documents,” you’re already well on your way to committing fraud at the highest level. The best approach is to drive to a remote area, beat the absolute shit out of your van, walk to the nearest town, and call an Uber to the nearest motel with WiFi so you could start making some phone calls.
Have some fun with this one! You’ve been eating gas station hot dogs for months, and you probably smell like shit because you’re not due to stop at the laundromat for another week or two. Get creative, and channel your rage. Think about all of the times that your parents told you that you’re wasting your life by pursuing your dreams, how they’re probably right, and start slamming. Grab some tire-irons, and just go to town! Bonus points if you could graffiti tag your van with the insignia of a rival band before leaving the scene of the crime.
Now that you’ve committed the fraud, you need to realize that you’re only as strong as your weakest link. You might want to brag, and some parties involved may even have a guilty conscience. If you successfully rake in some serious dough, you might want to put some money aside to either keep everybody quiet, or to pay your legal fees.
When all else fails, or if you’re feeling a little iffy about filing a false claim, just set up a GoFundMe instead. The legal repercussions are a lot less severe, and people love dishing out their cash for stupid bullshit as long as it makes them feel good.
* DISCLAIMER: MetalSucks does not encourage or endorse criminal behavior in any way shape or form. For those unable to tell this entire piece, this is satire.
The post NET WORTHLESS With JOHNNY SPREADSHEETS: How To Upgrade Your Backline By Wrecking Your Van appeared first on MetalSucks.
Legendary hard rock bassist Rudy Sarzo, who played with iconic guitarist Randy Rhoads in Quiet Riot from 1978 to 1979 and again in Ozzy Osbourne’s band from 1981 until Rhoads’s death in a plane accident in 1982, has pushed back against the long-circulating narrative of a rivalry between Rhoads and Eddie Van Halen.
Speaking with Gastão Moreira of Brazil’s Kazagastão (transcribed by Blabbermouth), Sarzo was asked directly whether a rivalry existed between Randy and Eddie Van Halen. Rudy responded: “No, that’s… No, I think it’s a myth. A myth that people… We’re in a time in history where alternate realities are very common. People invent things to suit their own journey in life. People don’t know the difference between an opinion and a fact. So they’ll make a statement based on an opinion to somebody who has experienced what they’re talking about, because they’re so programmed to believe an opinion rather than a fact.”
Earlier this year, Quiet Riot’s original bassist Kelly Garni told the “Booked On Rock” podcast that Van Halen and Quiet Riot knew of each other, even though they only shared the stage one time while they were coming up on the Sunset Strip, on April 23, 1977, at Glendale Community College in Glendale, California.
“At some point, we became well aware of Van Halen,” Garni said. “Especially when we were at the Starwood, as we were for a number of years. And we knew they were playing down the street at Gazzarri’s, which wasn’t really our type of a club. Because the Starwood was. Of course, the Whisky was the Whisky, but it had more of a punk rock scene going on there. So, we kind of avoided that place. The punkers didn’t like guys that looked like us either, so you got the jocks and the punkers wanting to kill you.”
Garni, who was Quiet Riot’s bassist from 1975 to 1978 and played on the group’s first two albums — 1978’s Quiet Riot and Quiet Riot II, which were released only in Japan — went on to say that there was “no competition” between Eddie and Randy. “And most certainly, there was no competition in Randy’s world,” he explained. “Because Randy didn’t compete. It just wasn’t in him to try to compete. He couldn’t. The way his brain was wired, he could not form the thought, ‘Oh, I’m gonna be better than that guy.’”
As for whether Eddie and Randy ever met, Kelly said: “[Randy] went down to Gazzarri’s because people were talking about this guy, and Randy said, ‘Well, I’ll go see what the deal is.’ So he went there, he and his girlfriend Jan, and he wanted to meet him. He saw him play, and he went, ‘Yeah, okay, the guy’s good.’ And so when they got all done, Randy was trying to get backstage to meet him, and he did get back there.”
“You gotta remember, Van Halen was doing all cover tunes at this point,” Garni continued. “Every once in a while, they’d sneak in one of their originals. But that was the deal at Gazzarri’s, is a more upscale crowd went there, that weren’t the rowdy, unpredictable, way-underage bunch at the Starwood.”
“So he did get back there, but Eddie was acting kind of crazy and bouncing off of walls in his underwear,” Kelly recalled. “And Randy was, like, ‘Oh, okay. Well, not the best time to meet this guy.’ So that was his opinion. He said, ‘Yeah, he was really good. But he looked kind of nutty.’”
Rhoads’s pre-Ozzy band Quiet Riot had been gigging on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, California, at the same time as Van Halen. Although both Rhoads and Van Halen later became some of the most influential guitarists of the 20th century — playing with a similar flair and incorporating finger-tapping into their fleet-fingered solos — Eddie found commercial success before Rhoads, due in part to the fact that Van Halen landed a record deal years before Quiet Riot did.
Rhoads and two others were killed on March 19, 1982, when the small plane they were flying in at Flying Baron Estates in Leesburg, Florida struck Osbourne’s tour bus, then crashed into a mansion. Rhoads was 25 years old. Eddie Van Halen passed away in October 2020 at St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica, California. The 65-year-old died from complications due to cancer.
The post RUDY SARZO Says Publicized Rivalry Between EDDIE VAN HALEN And RANDY RHOADS Is A Myth: “People Invent Things To Suit Their Own Journey in Life” appeared first on Sonic Perspectives.
Twin Temple, the LA-based duo of married couple Alexandra and Zachary James, have carved out an interesting niche for themselves. They make old-timey doo-wop and early-’60s pop pastiche that’s full of campy Satanic imagery; hits include “Lucifer, My Love,” “Sex Magick,” and “Let’s Have A Satanic Orgy.” Apparently, not everyone appreciates this whole gimmick. The duo were booked to play a couple of shows next week with Charley Crockett, the old-school outlaw country star who just released his shelved album Clovis, but they say that they’ve been dropped from those shows because of their Satanic imagery.
The post Twin Temple Say They Were Dropped From Charley Crockett Shows Over Satanic Imagery appeared first on Stereogum.
It’s a story as old as, well, the six years since the pandemic: one-man project is given birth during the days of lockdowns and isolation. Eventually, once the lockdowns are lifted, that one-man project slowly gets fleshed and filled out to the existence of a full band where one person had previously spent their forced alone time playing and writing by themselves and staring into the glow of a computer screen. Originally coming to be in Gatineau, Quebec, Volubilis formed in 2020 by multi‑instrumentalist Miguel Marcheterre‑Pina with the first public showing being an instrumental demo issued in 2023. Since then, Marcheterre‑Pina has assembled a lineup — André Dubien (vocals), Jacob Collins (drums), Alexis Rioux (guitar), and Shawn Hillman (fretless bass) — and made the move to Montreal.
Most relevant to today’s posting however, is the band’s forthcoming debut album, Theasterion, an astute masterstroke of progressive melodic death metal wrapped in thoughtful and technical aggression, deep space sci-fi storytelling and stunning amounts of conservatory-level musicianship reminiscent of Obscura, Gorod, Fleshgod Apocalypse and Beyond Creation. You can give the band and Theasterion a spin below, as we’re ponying up the chance to listen to a stream of it in advance of its official release tomorrow.
Here’s what mainman Marcheterre‑Pina had to say about the album and all y’all (hopefully) taking the time to give it a listen (which we’d recommended, because it’s really f’n good): “After a couple of years of composing, recording, and working on the worldbuilding aspects of Theasterion, we’re very proud to finally share it with the metal community! It’s been a long and stressful process, so having Decibel premiere our very first album is a great honour, and we are extremely grateful for this opportunity. Getting our music out in the world is a huge check off the bucket list, and we are excited to see its legacy in our music careers!”
Photo Credit: Jade Weeles & Miguel Marcheterre-Pina
The post Album Stream: Volubilis Ride a Tech Rocket Into Space With <em>Theasterion</em> appeared first on Decibel Magazine.