European metalers CRYSTAL TEARS will release their new album, Hellmade, on March 28th via Massacre Records. The band have released the new album’s teaser trailer, pesented by Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal of GUNS N’ ROSES.
Drummer Chrisafis Tantanozis states: “So proud to publish such a trailer and co-operate with Ron Thal, certainly a highlight to our career! Bumblefoot is one of the most generous people and genuine rockers in the biz, an inspiration absolutely.”
Crystal Tears recently shot a video for the song ‘Out Of The Shadows’, from the forthcoming Hellmade. The video was directed and edited by FrameBox Productions.
Chrisafis comments: “Play it loud muthas! New lineup, new album, new record label, new video… this is the new face of Crystal Tears!! En-freakin’-joy!!!”
The cover artwork of Hellmade was designed by Siege Ind, who already worked with bands such as SCAR SYMMETRY, SUICIDE SILENCE and BLEED FROM WITHIN.
It’s fair to say that M:PIRE OF EVIL – featuring former VENOM members Tony “Demolition Man” Dolan (vocals/bass) and Jeff “Mantas”Dunn (guitars) with Marc “JXN” Jackson (drums) – gave 2013 a solid ass-kicking. Between a new album, festival dates, one-off club shows and a European tour with ONSLAUGHT the trio were busy from March through December, bent on building up momentum for an even busier 2014. There were a few setbacks along the way, of course, the biggest one of the bunch seeing Dunn sidelined for the first week of the Onslaught tour due to a back injury. That didn’t stop the M:Pire from delivering, however, with Dolan and Jackson hitting the stage as a duo supported by temporary Onslaught guitarist Leigh Chambers (ex-COLLAPSE); a mark of real integrity and all out balls if there ever was one.
Chambers, it turns out, was the only guitarist on a four band bill that dared to step into Dunn’s shoes, learning a Venom song a day over a matter of hours to offer M:Pire Of Evil fans more than just a rhythm section bludgeoning. A nerve-wracking experience for the three musicians but their efforts were well appreciated all around.
“I told Leigh not to try and play like Jeff, just to play like himself playing that music,” says Dolan. “When he plays with Onslaught it’s very precise, there are lot of twists and turns and stops and accents. He has to really be on it. He didn’t have time to do that with us, so we kept it as loose as we could so it sounded like Venom. The idea was that if he wandered, he wandered, and if he couldn’t remember a lick or whatever Leigh just did what he felt like. He just had to put his heart into it and that’s what the kid did.”
“The one thing I didn’t want to do, which was difficult, was compromise ourselves,” he adds. “We just said ‘Fuck it!’ and got up there and just did it. Having Leigh on stage with us made things a little less stressful. Mikey from Onslaught asked us if we were going to get rid of Jeff as Leigh learned more of the songs (laughs).”
The band’s latest album Crucified – featuring re-recorded versions of Venom songs from the Dolan years (’88 – ’92) – has sold a respectable number of units given the reduced album sales across the board for everyone in the industry. It’s easier and probably wiser to rate M:Pire Of Evil’s success on the amount of touring they’ve done.
“Labels these days can’t account for everything as fast as you want them to, so all we can gauge it on is fan turnout,” Dolan agrees. “It’s weird because we did Headbanger’s Open Air and it was packed. We went on just before OVERKILL, and Peter Hobbs from HOBBS’ ANGEL OF DEATH came out, the organizer of the Keep It True Festival came out, and they told us that every band in the place was watching us. It seems they thought we were great, so thank you (laughs).”
Dolan and Dunn have the benefit of their Venom history to draw attention to themselves, putting Jackson in the presumably difficult position of doing his bandmates’ legacy justice. Having replaced Antton Lant – also a Venom legend – in 2012, Jackson has put the naysayers in their place and is loving every minute of it as he continues to do so.
“I’ve learned a lot,” says Jackson. “I’ve played with other bands, but not to this extent. You realize when you’re playing with professionals and that there are people out there as creative as you are. I don’t just call myself a drummer, I’m a musician. There’s a big difference. Tony and Jeff are both musicians, they’re not just people in a band. We can play any style of music that we want so we’re not boxed in.”
“When we did the North American tour last year, we did a show in Laredo, Texas,” Dolan offers.”We played the set and the fans wouldn’t let us off the stage. They wanted us to keep going but we’d done our set; all we could say was that we’d be back. They said ‘No you won’t. Nobody comes back to Laredo…’ (laughs). Jeff said ‘Let’s do ‘In League With Satan’ but Marc had never played it. He didn’t even know the song. Jeff explained the basic 4/4 pattern and we played the song through to the end, and Marc had never even heard the song before (laughs).”
“It was bizarre,” laughs Jackson. “At first all I could think was ‘Are we really going to do this?’ But, I just got on with it and it worked. The same thing happened in Italy when we did ‘Welcome To Hell’. I’d only heard the song once at that point but I was like ‘Let’s just fucking do it.’”
Go to this location for the complete story. Check out a preview for the band’s forthcoming album, Unleashed, here.
Prog Magazine recently caught up with ex-NIGHTWISH vocalist Anette Olzon, who discussed getting fired from the band while on tour in October 2012. An excerpt from the interview is available below:
The sudden split followed the dismissal of previous frontwoman Tarja Turunen in 2006, and came midway through a US tour. An official announcement stated the move had been made “in mutual understanding”.
But Olzon insists that’s not the case. She tells Prog: “I have been getting frustrated with people saying I left the band – because I didn’t. I was fired exactly as Tarja was fired, but maybe in a more quiet way.”
She points to her pregnancy as the reason behind her dismissal. “That’s how I see it,” she says. “Why should they kick me out when they got to know I was pregnant?
“We, of course, had some problems in 2009, but we had a good tour and there was nothing else coming until then.”
She was replaced at short notice by Floor Jansen (REVAMP, ex-AFTER FOREVER), who was recently confirmed as Nightwish’s full-time vocalist. The band recently released live album Showtime, Storytime with Jansen fronting the band.
Olzon adds: “The reason I didn’t say this a year ago is because I didn’t want to state something so negative. I felt really bad about the situation – it was quite a big divorce.”
Go to this location for more. Watch for Prog’s complete interview with Olzon, due to be published in February.
The Nightwish camp recently responded to accusations levelled by Olzon in the Finnish publication Menaiset via their official website here, disputing many of Olzon’s claims:
“Welcome to the laundry room…
The interview of our former vocalist Anette in Me Naiset magazine is full of twisted truths and defamation. This ‘one woman vs. the Neanderthals’ scenario is an easy to way to take advantage of our media history.
The split with Anette wasn’t because of pregnancy or illness. We discovered her personality didn’t fit this work community, and was even detrimental to it.
These claims we can invalidate right away:
Claim: Moments before being fired, Anette had told Tuomas Holopainen of her pregnancy
Truth: Anette told of her pregnancy to the whole band already a week earlier in Montreal. Everyone was congratulative, and Anette herself offered an option of hiring a replacement vocalist if she can’t manage everything, which was already agreed on. Later she took back her decision, and the difficulties really started. Fear of losing money and position seemed obvious.
Claim: The boys of the band decided everything for me
Truth: Neither Tuomas nor any other of the boys of the band can singlehandedly decide where we take off to and when. There have been discussions inside the band and support of people on a personal level. Also Anette. Managers and promoters discuss about possible concerts, record releases, etc., and wishes of all the band members have been taken into account. All these details have been negotiated with Anette and her manager. We have the e-mails.
“To keep the touring life bearable, it’s reasonable and right to make things comfortable on a personal level. Based on these discussions, Anette was given liberties from interviews and fan meetings. She and her family got an own tour bus and driver in both Europe and America. The expenses were paid by the organization, not Anette or her company. Others of the band didn’t use similar benefits.
Claim: Other income went directly to the men
Truth: Anette and her company has been paid a fifth of everything that was done during her time and with her. We have no reason to lie, because this cake has provided enough slices for us all. The finances of the band have always been handled openly, honestly and evenhandedly. The books exist. How individual members spend their share is up to their own responsibility.
We neither want to nor intend to comment this more now.
Doing the laundry is tiring. Remember to help your ladies with that occasionally.”
Dubai-based NERVECELL have posted a short trailer for their forthcoming band documentary, Shout Symphony:
Nervecell guitarist Rami Mustafa spoke with WhatsTheScene India in early 2013. An excerpt from the interview is available below:
WTS: So now that there is easier access to underground metal, is there more reception to Nervecell’s music?
RM: “Of course! When we started in 2001, the scene in Dubai was bad. But 2001 to 2005 it was really good. There were a lot of bands and a lot of underground gigs but people didn’t know too much about metal. They used to come to our shows and learn and realize – this is metal, this is death metal, this is thrash metal. We used to talk with everyone. We used to go out after our show to our friends and fans and have a chat and talk about bands and sometimes trade albums. It was a learning process. So yeah, for the past 3-4 years, I think the internet and YouTube and technology have helped the younger generation to learn about metal really faster than before, in a shorter span of time. Nowadays I find that musicians that can play a guitar lesson on YouTube (laughs). It’s not a bad thing at all you know!”
WTS: The Middle East is seen generally as a very conservative society, has there been any sort of opposition to your music and your lyrical themes?
RM: “No, not at all! A lot of people get confused by countries like Dubai and Qatar, these countries are really modern, very globalized so it’s not a problem. What we sing about is really about humanitarian issues and personal issues, nothing extreme lyrically. So we’ve never had these problems. As kids, growing up in the society we learned that we have to respect traditions and morals no matter what. For me, it was purely about the music and then the lyrics. We were fine you know. Other countries have issues with metal at gigs and concerts. We’d have had some problems playing there but we’ve never been to these countries. We try to avoid trouble and we were very careful so there has been no problem.”
WTS: So did growing up in the Middle East influence your music in any way?
RM: “Yeah, of course! The thing is James, he writes the lyrics, its a self-expressive kind of music and doesn’t necessarily have to be negative. A lot of it is about reality, it could be about what’s happening around us and it could be about things between close friends or could be about what’s happening in the world in general. We don’t really have topics that pinpoint and they are mostly general. What’s happening in the world does affect us but we don’t really take it to the level where it’s concentrated to the lyrics. We always concentrate on the music first.”
The clinic footage below was posted by DREAM THEATER drummer Mike Mangini on his official YouTube channel:
According to an overview, “this is a slowly developing and slightly distorted sounding drum solo clip. It is the first solo of the 2013 Mike Mangini Europe Clinic Tour. This one displays the testing, improvising and executing of the beginnings of the ideas used on the whole clinic tour. It contains probably the longest groove sections of Mike’s solos where many ideas were developed without changing the main feel. 15/8 is the first one. It also has some impromptu sections due to equipment malfunctions, not failures. The gear had to be set up very, very quickly and for the first time, so the helpers and Mike forgot to check somethings. Some of the unplanned adjustments are one time things only played in this solo, so that is why it is being posted.”
On November 5th, Eagle Rock Entertainment released Dream Theater’s Live At Luna Park on 2DVD, Blu-ray, Visual Digital Formats and a Deluxe Edition. The release has landed at #1 on the DVD charts in both the US and Canada. Watch ‘Metropolis Pt. 1’ from the release below:
The deluxe edition of Live At Luna Park is an 11.5” square 60 page hardback photobook containing the Blu-ray, 2 DVDs and 3 CDs presenting all the key physical formats in one release; the CDs are only available in this Deluxe Edition.
These releases boast the 160-minute main show – accompanied by a wealth of bonus material – and feature many of the band’s classic tracks including: ‘Metropolis Pt. 1’, ‘The Silent Man’, ‘Pull Me Under’, ‘The Root Of All Evil’, ‘The Test That Stumped Them All’, ‘The Spirit Carries On’, and the recent ‘On The Backs Of Angels’ which can be viewed below:
Dream Theater began their mammoth A Dramatic Tour Of Events world trek in July 2011 with the final leg in South America taking place in August 2012. It was here at the Luna Park Arena in Buenos Aires, Argentina, that they decided to film the two nights that make up this DVD release.
The Live At Luna Park band line-up for this show is James LaBrie (vocals); John Petrucci (guitar); Jordan Rudess (keyboards); John Myung (bass); and Mike Mangini (drums) – this was Dream Theater’s first tour and album with their new drummer and all the tracks from that album, A Dramatic Turn Of Events, are included in either the main show or the bonus performances.
Source: Bravewords.com Classic rock legends WISHBONE ASH have issued the following update:
“Happy New Year to all our friends, fans, benefactors and business associates! May your year be happy, healthy and your days filled with Blue Horizons.
Our new album is in the can, as they say, with release slated for late February.”
Founding member Andy Powell, Muddy Manninen, Bob Skeat and Joe Crabtree will perform the entire Live Dates double album as part of their set in Holland on these dates:
January
16 – Patronaat – Haarlem
17 – Boerderij -Zoetermeer
18 – DePul – Uden
19 – Burgerweeshuis – Deventer
Don’t miss these exclusive performances.Meet the band after the show and experience an unforgettable evening with Wishbone Ash. Celebrate 40 years of Live Dates.
The music remains as popular as ever. See you on the road that never ends.”
THE ROCK ALCHEMIST – Italian Rock Band from Turin with a strong sonic identity that blends modern rock with progressive, hard, alternative, and pop elements!
Kimmo Kuusniemi’s SARCOFAGUS return with a Historic 2010 Concert Video Premiere on YouTube! Click image to watch the video
