Metal Riot

Hey everybody. In case you were looking for it and curious…I haven’t been able to post yet about Neil from Rush dying, just too much of a loss to even process yet. I think, while it is the news, sites can often get vampiric in rushing to get the word out. It goes with the time sensitive news cycle territory and we all do want to grieve together, but I used to listen to his drumming with my dad and have an emotional connection to it so need to sort of go with my gut and wait until I feel like writing more after the feeling sits with me awhile. I know Neil Peart was a pretty astounding mind though and would probably view the afterlife as another horizon or learning experience, so I will leave it at that for now. Before I go listen to “Subdivisions” again today I will post some Code Orange news, on a different musical note!

The popular East Coasters are back in March (3/13) with a new Roadrunner release, this one called Underneath. Peep the first, semi-industrialized and vibey af video below. It’s catchy, memorable, moody, loud and it jams. Pre order HERE. I love this band and think they continue to do an admirable job of growing bigger while straddling that link between the underground and bigger rock awareness “market” with big tent energy vibes instead of elitism. Rock isn’t the hottest genre these days so more power to them for staying the course and still aiming high.

This week, Chicago-based metallic hardcore outfit NEQUIENT embarks on a run of dates with Nefarious Industries labelmates Oxx, currently out on a month-long US tour. Beginning this Friday, October 18th, NEQUIENT will align with their brothers for a seven-city rampage through Texas, Louisiana, Georgia, Tennessee, Indiana, and Illinois.

This tour will mark the final NEQUIENT tour dates supporting their Wolves At Your Door album, released through Nefarious Industries in 2018, as they are prepared to record the follow-up album for 2020, once again for Nefarious.

The NEQUIENT members collectively offer, “We are supremely stoked to join up with our labelmates and comrades in Oxx for seven dates of their US tour, the final shows we have planned in support of our 2018 release, Wolves at the Door. We’re particularly excited to hit several cities we’ve never played before and plan to hit them hard. At the same time, we’re preparing to enter Bricktop Recording in January and record our sophomore full-length, slated for a 2020 release through Nefarious. We’ll be performing several songs that are planned to appear on that record at these upcoming shows.”

Stream NEQUIENT’s Wolves At The Door in its entirety HERE.

NEQUIENT Tour Dates w/ Oxx:
10/18/2019 Rubber Gloves Studios – Denton, TX w/ Funeral Horse, Akkolyte, Vaults Of Zin [info]
10/19/2019 Santos – New Orleans, LA w/ Leafdrinker
10/20/2019 Valdosta DIY House – Valdosta, GA w/ Machinist!, Dying Whale [info]
10/21/2019 529 – Atlanta, GA w/ Lost Hours, Apostle [info]
10/22/2019 Hi Tone – Memphis, TN w/ Naildriver, Hallucinogenic Bulb [info]
10/23/2019 Free Base – Indianapolis, IN w/ Olam, Truus
10/24/2019 Liar’s Club – Chicago, IL w/ EXLEX, Mine Collapse [info]

[photo by Nicolas Côté]

Mumbai’s Pacifist released one of the absolute banger EPs of the year in the form of the must-hear Greyscale Dreams.How often do you get to hear a hardcore band that actually makes you still want to be a better person these days? People are so cynical that it takes a lot of spirit to cut through the Godforsaken fog of modern malaise. It will take you about fifteen minutes to finish the entire EP and I hope it will move you as much as it made me feel inspired. “Double Down” at the 2 minute mark from a crazed diagonal sounding edgy hardcore riff suddenly melting into a wash of brief almost shoegaze guitar and careful cymbal work paired with poetic, youthful musings is an exhilarating thing to have reach your ears and stir the blood.

I reached out to the band’s contact and they graciously agreed to an interview about hardcore, India, the EP and their influences and goals.

Read more BELOW.

Greetings, y’all. Wanted to get this Fourth of July week of hellish fireworks and bloated nationalistic selectivism off to a better bang with some activism against this hateful Trump regime. I am just back from an ICE/Concentration Camp protest outside Democrat Antonio Delgado’s office in Kingston, NY where many gathered to protest Dems caving on giving funding to Trump’s manufactured border crisis. There was a diverse and passionate crowd including one Jewish man who spoke in horror of having any kind of horrible camps still on this planet. I interviewed a Jamaican immigrant who was a landlady now and she described the racism she had to overcome and a lot of positive energy was put out into my community in the face of this horror show today. I am thankful to have a month and a half sober again, to be back doing activism more and encouraged by my community and support to be back on low dose estrogen , living my truths and experience other amazing people around me who care about trying to heal the world.

There is a lot of negativity in the metal and rock scene and entertainment in general. Ronnie Radke the walking Wikipedia landmine this week was making very transphobic sounding tweets then trying to backpedal through retweets that clunkily seem like he is trying in bad faith to “learn” while simultaneously disavowing the gender spectrum. I tweeted to Brett from Epitaph that maybe it was time to drop their worst signing ever Falling In Reverse but I am sad to say that the dude from Bad friggin’ Religion, one of my all time favorite bands, was too busy retweeting Ricky Gervais both sides schticking about “leftist extremists” being “bad as well” and thus helping do “Antifa is bad” propaganda layup assistance to Andy Ngo grifter fash supporting false equivalency types. Ughh. Jasta also tweeted in support of Louis CK this week and Corey Taylor liked it, which got crickets. Oh, and fucking Varg has a twitter where he is pretending to be god damned…I can’t…Gandalf The (cough) White. FML. And I thought it was a bad time to be a Swiftie this week!

THANK FUCKING NO GOD then that the excellent souls of Black Flags Over Brooklyn and Bandcamp have put out a sick as fuck hardcore, metal and weirdo RIFFS FOR REPRODUCTIVE JUSTICE comp to help inspire morale and fight tyranny as well as fight back for abortion rights for people who can get abortions (which includes trans men, by the way). The comp features some of my favorite acts including my friends in Fucked and Bound (covering Sonic Youth, ahhh!!) , Cliterati, my fave Hether Fortune, Redbait and many more. Emma Ruth Rundle, Terminal fucking Nation, Ithaca, Jucifer, False, Woe, Vile Creature, Twilight Fauna, Immortal Bird, Svalbard, Twin Temple, Racetraitor, mighty Underdark…the list of radness goes on and on. HELP SUPPORT and raise funds for abortion rights! Let’s do this!

This comp is a tremendous example of good and positive energy and momentum in the scene and I hope it keeps growing so everything can get better and we can all treat one another with respect for the sake of the future. Pick this up today and spread the word far and wide!

'Riffs for Reproductive Justice' is a new metal, hardcore, and dark folk @Bandcamp comp to raise $ for @AbortionFunds and @YellowFund, with new tunes from Thou, @RACETRAITORcore @EmmaRuthRundle @closetwitchband and more. #AbortionRights now and forever! https://t.co/CVbdtwhI8M

— Black Flags Over Brooklyn 2019 (@blackflagsovrBK) July 2, 2019

Pacifist

Pacifist from India are a spectacularly energized post-hardcore band who cite Drive Like Jehu, Snapcase and La Dispute amongst their influences. I am hearing some RAtM in the incendiary vocals. The band have a very worth your time new EP called Greyscale Dreams that evokes dismay at the current alienating circumstances of human constructed social evils, a cry of unrest and powerful riffs. It would be very cool to see this band live as their electricity leaps out of the speakers and must be pretty fierce in person.

Stream new chaotic anthem ‘Reactionary’ at Unite Asia, RIGHT HERE

Pacifist are more than ready to launch their brand of hardcore music firmly in the global landscape, embarking on a string of shows to promote the EP, produced & mixed by guitarist Apurv Agrawal & mastered by Brad Boatright of Audiosiege Studios. The EP artwork & booklet features strong, impactful shots that serves as a carefully constructed tapestry of city life in Mumbai in different locations & settings, shot by Abheet Anand & designed by Sanjana Bhatt of Blankfound.

Their debut EP launches digitally on the 16th of June, and the band has been working hard touring across India in support of their upcoming release.

photo by Rebecca

Redbait‘s pending June 14th release Cages (Pre order HERE) is mandatory listening if you don’t want to miss out on one of the brightest lights of 2019’s underground. The band’s New Age Records debut will make you feel revolution singing in your blood, a powerful second EP from a group with so much promise ahead of them. Listening to their guitars churning like a raging river atop powerful drums backing up intense political vocals, you can’t deny the immediacy or the band’s ability to lay it all on the line. There is nothing worse to me in music than being apathetic about your art or platform and no one would ever accuse Redbait of that.

Today we are thrilled to debut one of my favorite songs from their new release, the thrilling composition “Bred For The Knife”. The production is pitch perfect between remembering energy over pristine while still sounding incredible, well serving the driving and subtly complex song. This one has a few tricks up the sleeve you wouldn’t expect from where it begins, including my favorite bridge of the EP (it kind of sounds like Queensryche meets Bane!). This band knows just where to give more and when to hold back. It’s exceptional. I hope someone whispers in the ears of Rolo Tomassi or Propagandhi to take them on tour immediately.

Says Madeline –

“We wrote “Bred for the Knife” as a commentary on the commodification of animals, specifically in factory farming. The problem of violence against animals isn’t taken seriously and I think that can largely be attributed to the fact that the butchering and processing of animals bodies are discreet and avoided. It isn’t a practice that a lot of people are willing to confront. The lyrics mention animal cruelty, environmental destruction, and worker exploitation as interconnected struggles in this industry. The commodification of animals is a cruel outcome of capitalist society. It’s something that most of us feel very compelled to talk about and inspire conversation through the music we make.”

It really is an important issue. Some pro life dipshit on Twitter was arguing with my girlfriend yesterday and saw no harm in not caring about the environment or animals when she brought up why he ate meat if he was pro-life. He said he doesn’t eat babies, refusing to see her point. Well, bud – you ever have leg of lamb? Congrats. You ate a baby. It’s still a baby. Asshole.

Recorded and mixed by Will Jameson, Cages will be available on 7” vinyl from New Age Records.

Transparent green: 200
Transparent pink: 400
’77 Pressing (transparent pink with green New Age label): 77

Digital version will be available 06-14-19 at https://redbait.bandcamp.com/

The best thing I have heard yet in 2019 is “ICE watch”, a completely rugged face buster from Arkansas hardcore band Terminal Nation which premiered at No Echo HERE. It will give you the insane over the top feels of a lot of heavy stuff without wondering if the band members have become weird conservative farts or are suddenly gonna cape for YAITW. The song even manages to out mosh the band’s recent tune “Pulse Of The Dead” from Absolute Control.

Good news is, TN have a split out with the homies in Neckbeard Deathcamp in February (it is sure to be a big year for both bands this year) and the gossip is we might get a TN full length this year as well. If you want to feel socially responsible while still doing reprehensible shit in the pit (I mean watch out for your peeps if someone falls down…but you know what I mean), this band will be entirely your shit. Bellowed vocals, powerviolence glory and a firm anti-xenophobia message.

Mike Shaw from the band Mindforce and his partner Nicole are old friends of mine and I was very upset to hear that homie almost lost his very valuable life – seriously, this is one of the good guys – when he was hit by an oncoming vehicle early this year. Please help out if you can. It is a long recovery and Mike is a strong dude but the PMA from the community is vital right now. Send some love and money if you can. Represent!

Please donate to help Mike in his recovery – any little bit counts! https://t.co/Rp94U5PcoK

— Mindforce (@MindforceNY) January 7, 2019