…’Cause when you have morning wood, all you really need is ’5 Minutes Alone’.

We decided at the last minute that we were going to do this blogcast pretty much without a format. We (DGR, Snagon and I) still kind of had an idea of what we were going to cover in a few spots, but for the most part we just rolled with it and whatever came up, came up. We still did the usual “shit we’ve been listening to” and a “bit-o-news” and the new releases, but the rest was kind of spontanious.  This was my first weekend off in about a month, so by the end of the blogcast I was pretty shit-faced. Good times, good times.

We got two hours of nonsense, making fun of “The Watchtower”, discussing the new I-ron May-den album and taking a look at our top ten’s in each of our Last.fm accounts. We also have two very “special” guests at the end of the blogcast that had no clue they were going to be skype-jacked.

I do feel the need to apologize for being a drunken asshole towards the end and trying to pull Tre Watson into the chat about 3 times, when he obviously didn’t want to be bothered. Sorry, Tre. That was all me. Playlist is below.

1. Wormrot – Good Times
2. Exhorder – Unforgiven
3. Poisonblack – Casket Case
4. Carcass – Carnal Forge

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Mark The Shark

I find it hard to believe we’ve done 14 of these things already. I mean 14 isn’t a huge number or anything, it just seems like we started doing this yesterday. Quigs joined us once again and I honestly think by the next one, our ignorant American asses will stop finding his accent entertainingly funny and maybe stop playfully mocking him. Trve Nate and Secret Agent Snagon were back this week and as always, DGR was there. THis week we talked about the usual news in metal, even though it’s been a dreadfully slow news SUMMER! We took the segment of albums we’re listening to and limited it to 3 albums each, with each person adding in a little bit about the album; kind of like a very short and useless review. For the most part, the blogcast was just 5 guys talking shit and playing music for about an hour and a half. Playlist is as follows.

1. Vektor – Hunger For Violence
2. Eluveitie – Everything Remains (As it Never Was)
3. Hemoptysis – Shadow Of Death
4. Disarmonia Mundi – Stepchild Of Laceration

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Kind of like David Carradine, a little Suffocation makes me hard.

Wow, I thought we got off subject easily when Snagon attends these things. It’s twice as bad with Quigs and False Nate. Regardless we had a great time laughing with Quigs and his British accent and we learned what a “Peta-file” is. We also found out that quigs would almost go gay for Rob Halford, but cock-block his own bum at the last second. Quigs talked about the movies The Road, the upcoming Tron: Legacy movie and we all rambled a little bit about pointless bull shit and Bob’s your uncle. Playlist is below.

1. Cynic – Integral Birth
2. Woods Of Ypres – Shards Of Love
3. Wretched – Aborning
4. This Is Menace – Return The Favour (pronounced “fave-our”)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

I have a love/hate relationship with Stone Sour. I used to love them; now I hate them. I mean, when they first released their self titled album it was a nice alternative to Slipknot. The Nu-metal era was still hot and that album was pretty damn good. It introduced us to a softer side of Corey Taylor and I really enjoyed hearing him actually sing. Bother, whether you love it or hate is a good song. Sure it probably wouldn’t have got the attention it did if it wasn’t on the ultra-shitty Spiderman sound track, but it is still a great song. The rest of the album was pretty solid in my opinion as well.

Come What(ever) May was a good follow up with the exception of the song Silly World, which ironically was a single. The worst song on the album and they make it a fucking single. Honestly I really like the softer songs and I would like to hear more acoustic work from Taylor. Well, I thought I would anyway. Now I’m not so sure. Read more

Photo By Chris Roo

I recently had the opportunity and amazing privilege to interview Bruce Lamont, the lead singer and saxophone player for Chicago, Illinois’ Avant-Garde band Yakuza. Along with Yakuza, Bruce is involved with various projects, as you’ll find out in this interview. Mr. Lamont touches base on albums leading up to their recent release, Of Seismic Consequence, what goes in to composing and what was different about writing this album. If you’re interested, you can check out some of Bruce’s work outside of Yakuza on his Myspace page.

There may be instances during the interview where it breaks up a bit. This is the product of using Skype for an interview, but for the most part, it came out really good. I’d like to thank “Steve” for offering up the opportunity and Bruce for granting us the interview. Listen to it streaming or download it below.

(above photo by Chris Roo)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Jesus Christ, it’s been a busy week or so. Winding down my last two weeks at my current job has gone by way too slowly. Imagine supervising about 36 to 40 convicted felons every day. Now add estrogen, attitudes and two managers above me that are overbearing, disrespectful and treat you like shit and you can imagine that every day I go to work is ABSOLUTE-FUCKING-HELL! Luckily I only have a few days left before I start my roll as a manager at a much smaller, men’s facility. I certainly hope that grass is much fuckin greener! Getting around to finishing this list has been low priority but time is finally hear to close it out. Here are my top 20 favorite album titles.

20. God Forbid – Earthsblood: Why they made this a one word title is beyond me. As Dallas Coyle explained on Metalsucks one time, the title came to him after watching the movie There Will Be Blood. Oil, a huge subject of controversy, yet something it doesn;t seem that we can live without right now, is like the Earth’s Blood. We tap that vein 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, bleeding this planet dry. Sooner or later that blood will no longer run. What the fuck will we do then?

19. Deicide – Once Upon The Cross: When I was a little God hating bastard, I used to love this cover and title. For a Satanic death metal album, Once Upon The Cross sounds like an intro to a very evil fairy tale.

18. Danzig – III How The Gods Kill: I love this album and I love Danzig, even if Glenn is only 4’3″. Read more

Fuck yeah, new Slayer!
Oh, Wait. This isn’t Slayer?
Still cool in my book!

My score: 4.5 out of 6

On another blog awhile back, I wrote a short post about how Waking The Cadaver is NOT grindcore after seeing too many people refer to them as grindcore. Now I’m not a huge grindcore fan. I’m a casual grindcore fan, much like I’m a casual black metal fan. There are a handful of bands from both of these metal sub-genres that I like. However, I have also been around long enough to understand the roots of grindcore. Even if you have no clue where grindcore actually came from, you could easily use this wonderful new invention called “The Internet” to search and find out exactly where the term and/or genre grindcore comes from. You would also think that other people that also use this “Internet” thingy solely for trolling, internet goatse porn, and downloading enormous amounts of shitty music, would be intelligent enough to do a search before they open their ignorant mouths and make themselves look even more idiotic than they already are. Let me elaborate. Read more

So far I have revealed 20 of my 50 favorite album titles. This time I’m obviously getting in to the third round. I’ve heard some great suggestions from the comments and appreciate seeing other people’s insight on their own favorites. Let’s just remember that this is not some definitive list of “The Best Album Titles In The History Of Metal”, but my own favorites. A lot of people forget that when they start reading a list. Here is number 30 through 21. Enjoy and let’s hear some more of your own favorites.

30. Sheer Terror – Love Songs For The Unloved: To think that a hardcore punk band could actually write a love ballad would just be atrocious. Fortunately Sheer Terror have a sense of humor about them and this album is as heavy as it is brutal and not in the death metal sense.

29. Pink Floyd – Dark Side Of The Moon: Grover said he didn’t give a fuck if this was metal or not. I never really said that this was going to strictly be a metal based list. Pink Floyd make amazing music and I’m a fan of Post-Syd Barret era pink floyd. Dark Side Of The Moon is a killer album title just because.

28. Opeth – My Arms, Your Hearse: Another album title that really needs no explanation. My Arms, Your Hearse. Self-explanatory.

27. Morbid Angel – Altars Of Madness: Morbid Angel’s first “Official” release, 1989′s Altars Of Madness was satanic death metal at it’s finest.

26. Kreator – Pleasure To Kill: German thrash giants followed up their debut album with Pleasure To Kill in 1985, a year where we saw so many great metal albums released. Pleasure To Kill is considered by many to be their best album and I also believe it to be their best album title. KREA-TOR!
Read more

We have proven that even with a streamlined format for the Blogcast, we can still fuck it up. In this episode we shoot the shit about the usual news, albums listened to, reviews, leaks and contemplate “The Big 4” of other metal sub-genres. Snagon and his girlfriend give us a recap of their experience at last Thursday’s Charred Walls Of The Damned show where Snagon met Mr. Richard Christy, but had to get past that big black dude from The Green Mile.  Somehow we managed to drag this thing out for almost two hours. But that’s what happens when you have one guy from New Jersey that likes to talk and an old man that likes to tell old, pointless stories. Playlist is below. Enjoy.

1. Blood Stain Child – ‘Live Inside’ (Idolator)
2. Charred Walls Of The Damned – ‘In A World So Cruel’
3. Scald - ‘Night Sky’ (Will Of The Gods Is Great Power)
4. Thin Lizzy – ‘Johnny’ (Johnny The Fox)
5. Judas Priest – ‘All Guns Blazing’ (Painkiller)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download