When Mastodon were officially confirmed for this summer’s Mayhem Fest, the first thought that came into our heads was “Wow, does this mean Mastodon is working on a new album?” Well late last night, Mastodon confirmed that the answer is “yes.”
Mastodon posted the following update on Facebook:
“For those of you who are interested, Yes we have been VERY busy writing and putting songs together for the next studio MASTODON album, we are down at our space hammering out riffs that can be friends and working our fingers to the bone to put out another great album. thank you to all our loyal fans!!!!”
Granted, it has been almost two years since their last album The Hunter. And who knows if the album will even be ready by the end of the year. Still, the fact that Mastodon are working on new music (and not just a Disney soundtrack) is exciting to us.
It’s been a decade since Brian “Head” Welch played with Korn, on 2003′s Take a Look in the Mirror. And after playing a few festivals with them, Welch announced that he’s officially back in the band (something both he and the band essentially hoped would happen).
Now the band is in the studio, working on their follow-up to Path to Totality, their dubstep album. The album, which is due out in late Summer, will not be as electronic-based as their last album. In fact, in the instrumental interlude posted on Rolling Stone today, the record almost sounds post-rock with the exception of the groove it settles into midway through. Also, in case you weren’t feeling old, we’d like to mention that Korn’s self-titled debut album turns 20 next year.
Here’s what Welch said about rejoining the band:
“We knew we would have a blast playing together, because we love each other so much, but we really wanted to make sure the music felt right before we committed to making a whole album together. But since we got in the studio, everything just started pouring out, now I can’t wait until our fans hear this stuff!”
The band begins a tour with Welch on May 15, with the album due out sometime later this year.
Turns out Limp Bizkit isn’t the only band producer Ross Robinson is reuniting with in the studio. According to Blabbermouth, Sepultura has tapped Robinson to co-produce their next album with Steve Evetts. Robinson last worked with Sepultura on 1996’s Roots.
On the one hand, Sepultura working with Robinson again is good news since Roots proved to be the band’s most successful/mainstream album. At the same time, fans who were happy that Sepultura’s last album Kairos saw them returning to their thrash roots probably won’t be thrilled by this for the same reason. It shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, though, that Monte Conner (former Roadrunner A&R who now runs Nuclear Blast’s U.S. imprint) was the one who suggested to Sepultura that they work with Robinson again.
The album will supposedly be tracked in June at Robinson’s studio in Venice, CA, and is due out later this year via Nuclear Blast Records.
Looks like LL Cool J’s new album is about to get some guitar hero treatment. Earlier this month, both the rapper and Eddie Van Halen posted photos of the two in the studio together. Then at his SXSW performance, LL Cool J himself confirmed that special guests on his new album Authentic would include both the Van Halen guitarist AND Tom Morello. LL Cool J further specified that Van Halen would be a guest on track twelve, which is currently entitled “Getting Paper”. Morello, meanwhile, will appear on the track titled “Whaddup”, which he performed with the rapper at this year’s Grammys (and which also features Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker and Public Enemy’s Chuck D).
It’s not the first time LL Cool J has collaborated with famous guitarists; Richie Sambora was featured on on the album Exit 13. It’s also not the first time Van Halen and Morello have collaborated outside their respective genres. Van Halen was obviously featured on Michael Jackson’s “Beat It,” while Morello has collaborated with many rappers (including a song with RZA & Raekwon, which unsurprisingly also involved Travis Barker). Either way, it’s funny to think that Eddie has possibly spent more time in the studio than with his own singer.
[via Van Halen News Desk]
At this point, everyone is just clamoring for a sample or a riff to will hold them over until Black Sabbath release their new album 13 (now confirmed to be released on June 11). Well, we’re not quite there yet, but if you’re desperate for anything new Sabbath relate, refer yourself to the video above. We get to hear directly from Rick Rubin about his thoughts on recording with Sabbath whilst being teased with snippets of new material. And when we say snippets, we mean snippets of snippets. So, you won’t hear much of the new material, but it’s more than what we got from the first video teaser. In case the video got you even more excited for new Black Sabbath material, 13 is now available for pre-order.
Megadeth has been working on finishing up their new album Super Collider, which is apparently colliding with a guest musician appearing on the album. Yesterday, Dave Mustaine revealed in a tweet that horn player Bob Findley would be appearing on the album. Specifically, Findley will be a guest on a track called “A House Divided”.
Findley has worked with many other artists, including David Lee Roth, Neil Diamond, and Steely Dan. He also has performance credits on the soundtracks like Carlito’s Way, The Hunt For Red October, and Grease II (though we would have left that last one out).
However, this isn’t the first time that Megadeth has collaborated with Findley; he was also responsible for the horns on the track “Silent Scorn” from 2001′s The World Needs A Hero. We assume that Findley will be playing the horn again, but might we also suggest experimenting with a didgeridoo, the electric triangle, or a hurdy gurdy? In all seriousness though, we’re looking forward to hearing the track and thirteen other songs on the rest of the album, which is due out in June.
As Metal Insider readers may recall, Eminence performed for the first time in the U.S. aboard our CMJ boat show with Prong and For Sleeping Or Jumping. Now comes word that the Brazilian metal group has reunited with Danish producer Tue Madsen (Moonspell, The Haunted, Sick Of It All) and is currently recording their follow up to 2008’s The God Of All Mistakes. And as it turns out, the album will feature a guest appearance from Sepultura bassist Paulo Xisto Pinto Jr.
Eminence recently released footage of them in the studio with Paulo Jr. (who also plays with guitarist Alan Wallace in The Unabomber Files). Watch Paulo Jr. recording his guest appearance in the video above. The as-yet-titled album is due out later this year, but fans attending SXSW next month can look forward to seeing Eminence play at The Jr. on March 15.
43 years ago today, Black Sabbath’s self-titled album gave birth to metal. And today, the band have unveiled a look at the sessions for their new album, 13, out in June. And by “look,” that’s exactly what we mean. While we see the band reuniting in the studio and playing with Rage Against the Machine drummer Brad Wilk, like yesterday’s teaser clip, it’s set to a medley of Sabbath classics and sound bites from the likes of Ozzy Osbourne and Tony Iommi. Much like producer Rick Rubin, new music is nowhere to be seen or heard in the three minute clip. Maybe it’s just as well, since it gives us a little time to reflect on the awesomeness that was birthed in 1970. Check out album highlight “The Wizard” after the jump. Read more »
It’s just a simple screen capture of a word defined in a dictionary. Except when that word is “completion” and it’s coming from The Dillinger Escape Plan frontman Greg Puciato’s Instagram account, that’s reason to get excited. It was announced late last year that the band had signed with Sumerian Records, and that the album was coming in Spring. Presuming that the band is finished, it would appear that things are right on schedule for a Spring release. With the band playing the New England Metal and Hardcore Festival on April 20 and the Golden Gods Awards on May 2nd, it wouldn’t be a stretch to assume that they’ll be playing some music from the album, which still doesn’t have a firm release date.
Long Island hardcore band Stray From the Path recently wrapped up recording sessions for their seventh album at Belleville NJ’s Machine Shop. Last week, as vocalist Drew York completed vocals with producer Will Putney, Metal Insider caught up with guitarist and founding member Tom Williams, drummer Dan Bourke, and bassist Anthony Altamura about the new album, how it differs from their past work, and who WON’T be making an appearance on the album, which is tentatively due out later this year via Sumerian. Here’s what Putney had to say about working with the band on consecutive albums:
Stray is one of my favorite bands to work with because they are a BAND. I know that sounds obvious but the way they feed of each others ideas and gel together live and in the studio is inspiring to watch. It’s not one guy’s creative output and people following along, they’re a sum of all their parts like all great bands are. On this record I tried to capture that, and the organics of the production are going to bring that feel to life. They really stick out for me in a very predictable age of heavy music, and it’s great to be a part of.
This is your second album with Will Putney. What made you come back to him?
Tom: We did previous records with other pretty well-known people with reputations, and it was cool, but it always felt like us and this other person on the other side. With Will, it was cool, because for the time being, it’s almost like he’s a member of the band. His humor is the same, and his ideas are very much like one of us would be saying it. It’s cool because we can make fun of him and he thinks it’s funny, and he can do the same to us. We couldn’t do that with other people we work with. We worked with him on Rising Sun, and we worked with him on the single for “Landmine” that went up a couple months ago, so why wouldn’t we come back? I’m sure we’ll come back for the next one?
Do you feel like it’s an East Coast thing, where you guys just get each other?
Tom: It’s a New York thing. He’s an asshole and so are we. (laughter) That’s pretty important, and I’m not even joking. To be able to say something like ‘you’re a piece of shit, Will,’ and him say “Yeah I know. You’re an asshole” actually means something.
How was working with Will this time, as opposed to last time? Have you learned from him?
Dan: We’ve learned a lot from Will. He’s a fantastic producer, so he has all of these ideas, almost about getting out of your metal or hardcore mindset and writing a song as you would from a different genre, and then turning that into a metal song. A lot of metal or hardcore bands that have a lot of fans have this different way of going about how they write a song. It’s not the same as we normally do it, and that’s something that Will does really well. So i think we picked that up from him. It’s also really about not being content with what you have. You don’t want to be like ‘I think that song’s pretty cool. Hopefully kids will like it.’ But working on it and working on it and making sure that it’s definitely cool.
Did it take less time?
Tom: Yeah. We’ve been here since the 3rd, and it’s the 21st, and we’ve had two days off.
Dan: We came very prepared, and what we’ve learned from Will in the past, we really did that for ourselves this time. In our own practice space, recording our own songs, doing pre-production all by ourselves. When we came into the studio, we were way more prepared to start working with Will. That’s why this recording session has gone by so much quicker than it did in the past.
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When Mastodon were officially confirmed for this summer’s Mayhem Fest, the first thought that came into our heads was “Wow, does this mean Mastodon is working on a new album?” Well late last night, Mastodon confirmed that the answer is “yes.”
Posted by Zach Shaw on Tue, May 7, 2013 at 9:55 am
In The Studio