America’s second biggest rock and metal festival, Rocklahoma, has announced their daily lineups for the 2018 fest. The event takes place in Pryor, OK from May 25th-27th and features A Perfect Circle, The Cult, Stone Temple Pilots, Godsmack, Ghost, Poison, Cheap Trick, Halestorm, I Prevail, Sevendust and many more!Continue reading
Legendary New Wave Of British Heavy Metal band Diamond Head, a massive influence on Metallica, Megadeth and all of heavy metal, have signed a new management deal with Dave Mustaine’s company Thrashville, based out of Nashville, TN. They are preparing a new album for release in 2018.Continue reading
The 2018 Rocklahoma festival will be taking place from May 25th-27th in Pryor, Oklahoma. Today the organizers have revealed the full lineup, and it’s got a little bit of everything. Continue reading
In those glorious/hideous (delete as applicable) years before the inexorable rise of the internet, compilation albums used to be the staple of many record buyers collections. Those of a certain age might remember such collections as Masters of Metal (K-Tel), the superb (and newly reinvigorated) Speed Kills (Music For Nations) series, the Metal Killers Kollection (Castle Communications) series, Axe Attack (K-Tel), Time To Rock (WEA), and the magnificently titled Metal Treasures and Vinyl Heavies (Action Replay).Continue reading
Before you sink your teeth into this, let me make a quick disclaimer for those of you looking for a standard review. This ain’t it. If you want to read, ad nauseam, about each band that played, who was good, who wasn’t, what songs they played or how many bands are “female fronted,” have female members or where any of these bands are from I can guarantee you a quick internet search will get you your fix somewhere. If you are looking for someone to tell you what any of the bands sound like, look like or act like then here is a novel idea, buy their music, go to a show and form an opinion for yourself. No offense intended to anyone writing something like that or looking for that kind of thing but you won’t find it here because I don’t feel like writing something everyone else has or will. (Offense intended to anyone still finding some ridiculous need to write or read about bands being “female fronted.” Fuck off.)
Oh, also there will be naughty words.Continue reading
Psycho Las Vegas 2017 will be taking place from August 18th-20th at the Hard Rock Hotel And Casino Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada. The initial lineup seemed to feature every band ever, but now they’ve added Mastodon as the final headliner, and it’s officially one of the sickest bills ever created. Continue reading
Rocklahoma, now 11 years and counting has unveiled a massive lineup of rockers for its 2017 festival.Presented by Bud Light, the fest runs Memorial Day Weekend – May 26, 27 & 28, 2017 at “Catch the Fever” Festival Grounds in Pryor, Oklahoma, just outside Tulsa. Soundgarden, Def Leppard, The Offspring, Stone Sour, Seether, Three Days Grace, The Cult, Skillet, Ratt (featuring Stephen Pearcy, Warren DeMartini, Juan Croucier and Carlos Cavazo), Jackyl, The Pretty Reckless, Pierce The Veil, Taking Back Sunday, Suicidal Tendencies, and more have been announced. Continue reading
Part 2
After a wobbly Saturday morning start, Akercocke carried on from where they left off a few years ago, improving and gaining/regaining fans as they went along. Rotting Christ sounded fantastic, The King is Blind completely owned the second stage for forty brutal minutes, and Fear Factory treated the crowd to all of 1995’s Demanufacture album while singer Burton C Bell tried his best to keep his voice from cracking. Paradise Lost played a set filled with heavier material, and Gojira stunned the majority of the audience with a set that not even headliners Mastodon could come close to touching. A typically eclectic set, the Atlantan four-piece struggled to get any momentum going, and even with the aid of some fancy video screens, only occasionally showed signs of being genuine headliners. A new version of old UK thrashers Acid Reign also managed to steal Mastodon’s thunder all the way from the second stage, playing one of the fastest and most enjoyable thrash sets of the festival while singer, ‘H’, looked resplendent in his shocking pink suit and top hat.
And so to Sunday, and to the wonders of Ghost Bath. Only possessing the vaguest of knowledge about this band, I was simply unprepared for the next forty highly confusing (and occasionally eye-wateringly funny) minutes. Imagine a Black Metal band fronted by the shrieking goat from YouTube and you’d have a good idea of what I witnessed that morning.
Although the pedigree of the members of Metal Allegiance is not in question, I’m afraid the same cannot be said of their collective efforts. Cover version after horrible cover version was mauled and discarded, as people turned to each other in disbelief and disappointment. Playing all of 1996 album Nemesis Divina in full, Black Metallers Satyricon put in one of the performances of the weekend, even in the blazing sunshine. Finland’s Whispered took to the stage in their Japanese costumes and make-up and proceeded to win over an entire tent of confused onlookers. Technical Thrashers Vektor followed and even more people left with smiling faces. Symphony X gave everyone on the main stage plenty to sing along to, but Anthrax obliterated their memory in seconds. The last time the New York outfit played here in 2013, it was all fairly average, maybe even disappointing. But not this time. They were on fire from the second they launched into ‘You Gotta Believe’ until they left the stage to ‘Indians’. Nobody even cared that they dropped a couple of favourites in order to showcase newer material.
Even headliners Slayer struggled to keep up. Again, like Anthrax, it was a much improved performance from 2013, but things seemed to go a little awry in the latter stages of their set. For some reason, ‘Hell Awaits’ became an instrumental after the first chorus, and Tom’s demeanour changed from happy and smiling to fairly disinterested around the same time. Still, when they came back out for the encore of ‘South of Heaven’, ‘Raining Blood’, and ‘Angel of Death’ everything was quickly forgiven and forgotten. It was left up to New Orleans band Goatwhore to close the weekend on the second stage, and they did so imperiously with one of the loudest, heaviest hours of the festival.
From the almost comical amount of crowd surfers (Acid Reign alone clocked 263 in one hour – an average of over four per minute) to the spontaneous chant of “MAN IN YELLOW”, directed to one of the security staff stood on the scaffolding before Slayer, to the glorious weather and generally contagious good feeling of everyone in attendance (even a lot of the campsite toilets were still usable by the Monday morning!), there was only one place to be last week.
There were a few odd little problems, of course. Since the festival ended, a story has emerged that a girl was sexually assaulted in her tent, and the amount of moshpit idiocy seems to be on the increase again. Not, this time, from the shirtless circle-pitters and kung-fu merchants, but this time from the people who stand on the barrier all day, doing their best to punch and deliberately tear clumps of hair from any crowd surfer (male and female) unlucky enough to invade their personal space as they get dragged over the front. Making sure at all times, of course, that security have a firm hold of their target first so that they can’t retaliate.
The worst thing this year though was the repeated loop of the same bloody music videos on the big screen all weekend. When I arrived in the main arena on the Friday, I said “hey, this new Wormrot song’s great. I’ll definitely be getting the album”. By the time Saturday evening came around, I never wanted to hear fucking thing again. And as for the constant exposure to the videos of Wakrat and Blackberry Smoke, let’s just say that if I ever meet either of those bands in person, then it won’t end pleasantly for either of them.
Overall though, and yet again, Bloodstock Open Air was a roaring success.
Roll on next year.
WORDS BY GARY ALCOCK
Part I
For those of you who may be unaware, Bloodstock Open Air is a UK festival which began at the Derby Assembly Rooms in 2001. After four successful years, the decision was made to turn one festival into two. One would remain at the same venue, while a bold, open air venture would take place at Catton Hall in nearby Walton-on-Trent. The outdoor festival proved to be a hit, the indoor show was subsequently dropped, and the annually held event has gone on to expand in both size and stature ever since.
Thursday’s festivities were kept fairly low-key as usual, with short, enjoyable sets from Karybdis and Sumer, with Ireland’s Psykosis left to really get the party started. The evening was rounded off by the newly renamed Phil Campbell and the Bastard Sons (formerly Phil Campbell’s All Starr Band), the former Motorhead guitarist ploughing through a selection of Motorhead covers plus ‘Heroes’ by David Bowie, ‘Sweet Leaf’ by Black Sabbath, and ‘Sharp Dressed Man’ by ZZ Top. Joined on stage by Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider and Pepper Keenan of COC for a truly memorable version of ‘Born To Raise Hell’, the band eventually brought things to a rousing climax with a cover of ‘Silver Machine’ by Hawkwind.
Friday is where the entertainment really begins at Bloodstock though, and you don’t get much more entertaining than songs about unicorns and space wizards followed by a battle cry of “We are Gloryhammer and we sing songs about hammers!” Evil Scarecrow followed, and you simply haven’t lived until you’ve held your pincers in the air and scuttled from side to side for the mighty ‘Crabulon’. Corrosion of Conformity played a typically crowd-pleasing set of which my only criticism would be ‘Clean My Wounds’ being used as the backbone for a rambling, ten minute long jam session. Venom‘s Legendary bassist/vocalist, Cronos, snarled and joked his way through their set, but the band let themselves down with a poor choice of songs. No such problems from Behemoth though, who played latest album ‘The Satanist’ in its entirety before finishing with a blistering encore of ‘Ov Fire and the Void’ and ‘Chant For Ezkaton’.
Britain has always held a special place in Twisted Sister‘s heart and it really showed in their last ever performance here. Drawing the biggest ever crowd for a Bloodstock headline act, it was the perfect send off for one of the finest American Heavy Metal bands to ever grace a UK stage. Diamond Head finished off the evening on the second stage in competent, if unspectacular style. At least they didn’t sound like a tribute act to themselves like they did the last time I saw them.
WORDS BY GARY ALCOCK
Returning to the studio after an absence of nine years, West Midlands NWOBHM act Diamond Head go down the self-titled route with their comeback album Diamond Head (Dissonance).
Guitarist Brian Tatler may be the band’s only original member, but new singer Rasmus Bom Andersen sounds like he’s been in place for years. The band have returned to their classic sound, and his voice suits them perfectly. In fact, if it wasn’t for the album’s crisp production, you could be fooled into thinking this latest offering had been lost in the vaults for years.
There’s nothing here which is going to change the world, or suddenly turn the band into megastars, but if you want to hear what the follow-up to 1982’s Borrowed Time (MCA) could have sounded like without all the Prog waffle and experimental nonsense of Canterbury (MCA) then this really is the album for you.
Tatler’s playing is superb, and the riffs fly at you from all directions. It doesn’t even matter that some of them sound a little familiar. The solos are sweet and precise, the choruses are memorable, and the whole thing is just enjoyable. Something a Diamond Head album hasn’t really been for years.
‘Shout At Devil’ and ‘Speed’ rock seriously hard, ‘Diamonds’ is a great closer, ‘All the Reasons You Live’ is nice and dark, and the amusingly dirty ‘Wizard Sleeve’ with it’s “can I come inside your wizard sleeve” chorus is a song which really does sound like it could have been recorded in the early ’80s.
A fine, and long overdue return to form by a band who don’t sound like they’re desperately attempting to recapture former glories, but who are just doing what comes naturally.
And I didn’t even mention Am I Evil or Metallica once.
Oh…
7.0/10
GARY ALCOCK
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