If you are a fan of the Livecast, you know that frontman Tim Lambesis revealed in a recent interview that his band, AS I LAY DYING is planning an album release in early 2010. The wheels are already churning on the new release, as Tim recently posted an update from the studio:

We've released little bits of information here or there in previous news posts and blogs, but there are still questions coming in concerning what we've been up to. Below is an unquestionably obvious outline concerning our future plans.

1) We started working on new album

2) We started recording that new album a few weeks ago with Adam [Dutkiewicz of KILLSWITCH ENGAGE] and Daniel Castleman at the reigns (and JMR for a couple weeks). (more…)

SYLOSIS, one of the UK's most buzzed about metal acts are eying an early-2010 release for their sophomore effort. The band is working with producer Scott Atkins, who previously worked with the band on their 2008 debut, Conclusion Of An Age (which rules by the way). Guitarist Josh Middleton issued an update and one sentence in said update got me really excited "I've been writing riffs thinking things like, 'What if (TOOL guitarist) Adam Jones played guitar in DEATH." The band is currently tracking drums and plans to finish the recording process in January.

Also, make sure to check out our extremely goofy interview with the blokes from this year's New England Metalfest. They were a great bunch of guys (and avid Metal Injection fans) and produced a hilarious interview. Check it!

We are proud to announce that the winners of the 2009 Metal Injection/MyGoodEye FREE Music Video Giveaway contest is Los Angeles, CA's own WOLFBEAR.

Shooting for the video is scheduled to happen sometime in late January.

We would like to thank all the bands who participated in this year's giveaway. (more…)

Pretty much the most anticipated release of 2010 for me is going to be the new DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN cd, Option Paralysis. Following the band on Twitter (here and here), I saw that the band completed tracking everything last week. They are done recording and have now entered the mixing phase. Today came the news that the band has set a release date for the record: March 23, 2010. The CD will be released on the band's own imprint, Party Smasher Inc (and distributed by Seasons of the Mist). Is it March yet? One can only the hope the band will be previewing some of the new material on their upcoming tour with THURSDAY.

If you haven't been keeping up with the band's recording process, they have release a slew of studio updates. Check them out here.

Wow, in an awesome reveal on their MySpace page, THE FACELESS have announced that they will be playing their most recent release, Planetary Duality, in its entirety on the band's upcoming tour with DYING FETUS. Here is what the band said:

We’re very excited to announce that we’ll be playing our latest album ‘Planetary Duality’ in its entirety from start to finish on our upcoming co-headline tour with Dying Fetus. I think this is going to be the best Faceless performance anyone has caught to date. You can expect a few older songs in there as well and we’re going to try and make this set a very unique experience for everyone who’s coming. Don’t miss this one!

If any up-and-coming band can get away with doing this, it's THE FACELESS. Fans are surely in for a treat. For the full itinerary of dates where you can see the band totally blow your fucking mind, click here.

Every band had to start somewhere right? Here is some footage from the summer 2000 of a young MASTODON performing in Tallahassee, FL. You will notice a fifth member in the band, a vocalist by the name Eric Saner. This is a great clip of one of the biggest current bands in metal just starting out. Check it out:

[Thanks to Keith from The Apparatus for the hot tip!]

Rumors of hopping on a thrash legends tour aren't the only exciting rumblings in the HIGH ON FIRE camp. A new album, tentatively titled Snakes for the Divine, is set for a 2010 release, and anyone lucky enough to catch their current tour with DETHKLOK, MASTODON and CONVERGE is getting a preview with a new song, "Frost Hammer," performed in Calgary in the video below. The video quality ain't great, but with producer Greg Fidelman (METALLICA's Death Magnetic, SLAYER's World Painted Blood) mixing Snakes for the Divine, we may not get a much better mix on record. However, it being by High on Fire, I can't wait for this album.

Peanut butter and jelly. Movies and popcorn. Pummeling metal and praying for world peace. Some things just go together perfectly.

Welcome to the spectacle that is episode 49 of Issue Oriented. First, your fearless host talks to Burnt By The Sun vocalist (and Issue Oriented contributor) Michael Olender about good and evil, the perils of personal creativity, his band's new release Heart of Darkness and much, much more. It's a thought-provoking piece and we know you'll love it.

Then hear film maker Jonathan Kalafer discuss his new award-winning documentary, We Love You. This film documents an annual event called the Rainbow Gathering, which takes place at a different National Park each year. With up to 50,000 people in attendance, Rainbow Gatherings culminate with a prayer for peace taking place each 4th of July – even if Federal Agents shoot pepper spray at kids on July 3. Which Kalafer captured on film. We Love You recently won Best Documentary at the Los Angeles International Short Film Festival. Check out this interview – you'll be glad you did.

LISTEN: Issue Oriented episode 49 with Michael Olender (Burnt By The Sun) and Jonathan Kalafer (We Love You)

Podcast: Download

Fresh off our brand new interview with DETHKLOK creator Brendon Small, the people at [adult swim] have posted a quick teaser for the season premiere of Metalocalypse and it's below. The new season of the show starts this Sunday at 12:30am (technically Monday morning) and begins the show's new half hour format.

Peter Steele, frontman of TYPE O NEGATIVE and founder of my favorite thrash band evaaar CARNIVORE was for a while, quite the trainwreck. I remember seeing a Carnivore reunion a few years ago, and noticed he did not look well. Recently though, TYPE-O started touring again and its clear by the interview below that Peter Steele is clean, looks relatively healthy and still has that dry witty sarcasm that he is known for. The interview was pretty fun at first but then slowly it started taking a turn for the worse…

Ladies and gentlemen, Peter Steele has found God. Does this mean hell has really frozen over? Not only has he found God, he thinks you should have God in your life too. OMFG WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO YOU??? He literally says "We are all part of God's plan." To that I ask Pete, was this part of God's plan?. All the God talk starts at about 15 minutes in.

SLAYER have just announced the cancellation of their Canadian tour next week, as well as a planned live performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live citing Tom Araya having back issues. Here is the statement we received from the band's publicist:

Slayer's Tom Araya is currently under the care of a specialist for a back injury, thought to be related to his on-stage activity, and the physician has ordered an immediate surgical procedure to take place in Texas tomorrow (Tuesday) morning.

No further information is available. But this is obviously a total bummer for Canadian Slayer fans, and really all fans of Tom Araya and his fantastic scream.

More info on the rescheduling as soon as we get it.

So Revolver's new Hottest Chicks in Metal Ever issue is now on newsstands. You can go buy the issue or scan through it right here and it features your typical array of pretty girls. What does this have to do with metal? Not much really, but I think when Grace Perry of Landmine Marathon got the call, she was pumped because if she was a dude, there is no way in hell Revolver was covering that band. The cover is above and we have some other photos after the jump. (more…)

Time is winding down! You only have until this Saturday, appropriately Halloween day to submit your best impersonation of Alexi for a chance to win his sick-ass ESP guitar. In case you forgot what the deal was here is a snippet from the contest page:

Between now and October 31, you're going to film yourself doing your very best impersonation of Alexi Laiho. What does that mean? Exactly what it sounds like; you're going to do whatever it takes* to create a video where we can't tell you apart from Alexi. You can wear a wig, you can adopt Alexi's stage moves, or anything you want within reason. But to win, you'd better make us laugh, or blow our minds with your ability to be a clone of Alexi. In any case, our panel of judges will watch each video, and the one we deem the coolest will be selected to win an ESP Alexi Laiho Signature Series LTD AL-600 Scythe guitar!

So what are you waiting for? Get to recording and enter the contest!

Last month, details emerged about MASTODON scoring the upcoming movie of the Jonah Hex comic book. In a new interview with Paste Magazine, Troy reveals that the writer/director of the film, Jimmy Hayward listened to the band's classic record Blood Mountain a lot during the writing of the film for inspiration. So much so, says Troy, that he called the band and wanted them to score the movie.

The band recorded five new songs, as well as other small musical interludes totaling an hour of new music, described by Troy as "spacey, Melvins B-sides, Pink Floyd-like, surreal outer space, like Neil Young’s Dead Man. Swirling, nausea music." Also, if you think the band is getting rich off of this callabo, think again:

“I guarantee an incredibly popular misconception will be, ‘Oh my god, they’re selling out doing a fucking comic-book movie. They probably got a huge paycheck and don’t give a shit about integrity,’” Sanders continued. “The fact is the exact opposite. We sacrificed another two weeks away from home to give away an album’s worth of material for nothing in return but satisfaction in being a part of something incredible.”

An hour of MASTODON music in a movie? Sign me up! One has to wonder though if their dreams of making a full length Crack The Skye movie have been abandoned.

JOEY BELLADONNA may have recorded ANTHRAX's best-known songs, but anyone who's ever been caught in a mosh knows that JOHN BUSH had the best voice of any of Anthrax's singers. Now that they've brought back Joey, fired him again, brought in a new guy, fired him and released conflicting stories to the press, it looks like Anthrax are as tired of lead singer drama as the rest of us and have settled on a winner. From blast beat pioneer CHARLIE BENANTE at Noisecreep:

"We are in the process of regrouping with John Bush. We played two shows with him, and we are looking forward to proceeding with this lineup…If we move forward with him, that, to me, would make my life complete. It would be perfect."

While not a definite yes, that's more than promising enough for us to get pumped for a reunion (album? Tour? Please??) If any of you possibly forgot how killer We've Come for You All is, here's the video for "What Doesn't Die," complete with zombies and BRIAN POSEHN (oemacnikufesin.)

No wonder everybody talks shit on Ozzfest. They treat the bands like crap! While doing the rounds promoting his upcoming solo project, THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT, Devy was interviewed by Noisecreep and revealed just how shitty the band, and all second stage acts were treated.

There was one point, early on, when the band was walking to the catering area to get food, and [guitarist Jed] Simon walked down the wrong ramp, leading an Ozzfest stage manager on a tear. “He went fucking ballistic on Jed, so Jed was like, ‘Fuck you.’ The guy went nuts, and pulled this rank thing on us, like we were a bunch of upstarts and we spent the next three weeks at war with Ozzfest. They wanted to kick us off, we wanted to leave… the guy who put the lineup together didn’t want us to leave.

“Finally, I went up to the Ozzfest guys and said, ‘We’re old, for sure, but you gotta know we’ve been doing this for 15 years, and we have no delusions of becoming the next big thing. We do this because this is what we do, and the label paid $80,000 for us to be on this tour. So either we’ll spend the rest of the tour hating each other or we’ll pull it together.’ And they were like, ‘We’re old, to… let’s just get along,’ so I just went up on stage every day after that and gave the show shit.”

Yesh! Whereas everybody speaks wonders of how Mayhem Fest treats them, every second stage Ozzfest act I've spoken to has had similar stories to this. Speaking of that Ozzfest, it brought us the now-legendary interview of Snake from A Life Once Lost interviewing Devy about how much he hated being where he was.