In 1991 Alice in Chains landed themselves a place on the Clash of the Titans tour, opening for Anthrax, Megadeth, and Slayer. Unsurprisingly, a band now synonymous with Grunge wasn’t fully embraced by the largely Thrash-devoted audiences. The irony of time is not just that Alice in Chains went on to commercially outshine the other bands that shared the stage with them on that tour, the years have seen their tentacles creep their way into many a metal band and sub-genre.
Avenged Sevenfold are potentially one of the most divisive metal acts out of the US since Metallica. All you need to do is look at their previous two albums, 2013’s Hail To The King & 2016’s The Stage to see the extreme polar oppositions these albums created. The former for how the band wore their Metallica influence on their sleeve, creating their own version of The Black Album, and then the following 2016 release throwing all of their previous influences and sounds up in the air, bringing in outside sources from the likes of Pink Floyd, and creating a wholly new progressive rock/metal experience.
Until his untimely death in February of 2022 there were few singers who could match the gruff, forlorn weariness of Mark Lanegan. But while the world won’t be able to look forward to a new release from the former Screaming Trees frontman in 2023, on The Last Black Flower (Lay Bare Recordings) the second album by Soothsayer Orchestra, the spirit of Lanegan is ever-present.