Metal Riot

Very, very cool news today as we learn that one of the brightest new stars in metal Paladin are releasing a covers EP dedicated to the legends Nevermore this month! Prosthetic is releasing the EP digitally on December 13th, 2019 to end the year on a soaring and intense note.  The cover art for the Anamnesis EP has been created by Travis Smith, a longtime artistic collaborator of both Nevermore and Warrel Dane.

Pre-save the Anamnesis EP at Spotify HERE. 

Of the choice of songs on the EP, PALADIN guitarist/vocalist, Taylor Washington comments:

“River Dragon was an obvious choice since it’s probably their most recognizable song. I wanted to do something from This Godless Endeavor since it’s still my favorite Nevermore album, and Final Product was kind of the default choice since it doesn’t have any super ridiculous hard parts in it. We also wanted to do an older song, one that wasn’t played on a 7 string. The name is a mouthful, but I’ve always been partial to 42147 because it’s filled with great riffs and the subject matter is interesting.”

A chance meeting with Nevermore drummer, Van Williams, gave PALADIN the impetus to pursue the idea of recording the songs, which will be released on 13 December – the anniversary of Dane’s death. The band’s connection to Nevermore goes back several years as Taylor explains:

“I remember picking up This Godless Endeavor from a liquidation sale at a music store back in high school. From the first listen it immediately resonated with me and I knew it would become one of my favorite albums and Nevermore one of my favorite bands. When Prosthetic proposed the idea of doing a Nevermore tribute EP to commemorate Warrel Dane’s death, I honestly hesitated. Jeff Loomis is an absolute monster on guitar and Warrel had one of the most distinct and dynamic voices to grace the metal world. The task of having to do justice to those two and Nevermore as a whole was a daunting one, but I couldn’t say no. I decided to sing the songs the way I would rather than try to sound like Warrel since that would feel disingenuous to me.”

Cynic‘s Traced In Air makes me feel like friggin’ Light Hope from She Ra has appeared in a vision above me and told me the universal deep feels hidden truths of prog metal. It is crazy that it has already been over a decade since the bold album brought the well-heralded band from a fifteen year dormancy and bursting back into the scene with a more melodic yet superbly potent tendencies. Now this week there is an incredible NEW version of the album Traced In Air Remixed for us nerds to lose our collective gushing shit over…and it is a huge blessing! It was an integral birth of a new era for the band and deserves more scrutiny in any form that takes.

Now, a decade later, CYNIC usher forth a renewed edition of that very album. Featuring new tracking by virtuoso bassist Sean Malone and a vibrant new mix by PERIPHERY’s Adam “Nolly” Getgood (ANIMALS AS LEADERS, DEVIN TOWNSEND, HAKEN) plus mastering by Ermin Hamidovic (PERIPHERY, THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT, ANIMALS AS LEADERS, etc.), ‘Traced in Air Remixed’ underscores the record’s importance within the genre. 

GRAB IT SEPT 27th! 

Track List:
01. Nunc Fluens (02:57)
02. The Space For This (05:47)
03. Evolutionary Sleeper (03:36)
04. Integral Birth (03:45)
05. The Unknown Guest (04:09)
06. Adam’s Murmur (03:29)
07. King Of Those Who Know (06:08)
08. Nunc Stans (04:14)

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We are proud to announce that we will release our Doomsday Roadburn, Live from @roadburnfest 2018 album on November the 8th 2019 via @svartrecords on LP/CD and Century Media digital. The album is a lush double vinyl of live Beastmilk and Grave Pleasures tracks mixed and mastered by @orgone.studios with artwork by @danielmartindiaz a large photo booklet with live photos and 2 unreleased tracks from the Motherblood studio sessions! We will have 100 very special ltd edition white swirl copies available via our official webstore at @evil_greed in Europe and @deathwishinc in North America and also on our November tour with @tigerarmy . You can pre-order one of the very limited white swirl vinyls now with a new shirt design via the link in bio or directly from Svart Records on red or black vinyl. Pictures by Teddie Taylor and Estefania Silva #doomsdayroadburn #svartrecords #deathwishinc #evilgreed #danielmartindiaz #motherblood #gravepleasures #beastmilk #climax

A post shared by Grave Pleasures (@gravepleasures_) on Sep 10, 2019 at 9:59am PDT

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