Photo by KOBARU Behemoth frontman Adam ‘Nergal’ Darski is one of metal’s most inspirational figures. After the black metal mastermind was diagnosed with leukemia in 2010, Nergal beat down an early mortality in heroic fashion. Now, with ever-improving health, Nergal was finally given the opportunity to meet the bone marrow donor who saved his life. “Thank you for life,” Nergal expressed to 25-year-old Gregory Kite upon meeting him for the first time. The black metal musician originally had no idea who his bone marrow donor was, but after two years of publicly stating that he wanted to meet his savior, it finally happened earlier today (Dec. 17). “The bottom line is that we won life, there are people, doctors who are struggling and want to win this life,” says Nergal, according to Polish news source tvn24.pl . “This is the core of everything.” Kite also spoke of the donor process that saved Nergal. “I had a series of tests,” begins Kite. “I passed it successfully.It turned out that I could give stem cells. The cell transfer procedure lasted several hours. It was painless.” Behemoth currently have only two tour dates scheduled for 2013, a slot at Impactfest in Warsaw, Poland and the See-Rock Festival in Graz, Austria, headlined by Iron Maiden , Slayer , Motorhead and more. [button href=”http://www.tvn24.pl/pomorze,42/dziekuje-ci-za-zycie-nergal-poznal-dawce-szpiku,294950.html” title=”Click here to watch Nergal meeting Gregory Kite on Polish TV” align=”center”]
Liz Ramanand, Loudwire No matter where your personal musical taste falls, you’ve got to give some serious respect to Machine Head frontman Robb Flynn . Soon after an emergency surgery to take care of two hernias in the area of his giggleberries, Flynn was hit in the family jewels by a New York City cab. After a four-hour hospital stay, Flynn rushed to the Best Buy Theater to perform that night’s set with his band, leading to an onstage diss in the direction of All That Remains for apparently refusing to switch set times despite Flynn’s debacle. Machine Head have experienced an odd month during the tail-end of 2012. Along with the metal act receiving a ban from the Orlando, Fla. House of Blues by The Walt Disney Company, Machine Head have run into some bad luck with Flynn’s hernia issues. The howling frontman toughed it out and returned to his band’s tour with Dethklok , All That Remains and the Black Dahlia Murder a few weeks after his surgery, and was almost taken out again by the NYC cab in a hit-and-run. However, there seems to be yet another issue in the life of Flynn, this one situated between himself and the members of All That Remains, as evidenced by a rant directed toward the New York City audience. Flynn addressed the crowd: About two days ago we played and the All That Remains guys asked us to flip-flop with them because their singer got stuck in traffic. And you know, we’ve been flip-flopping this whole tour so we were like, “Yeah, man, you know what? It’s no big deal, we’ll flip flop.” Because that’s what you do, you look out for your brothers, right? And today, I got hit by a cab, right where I had surgery four weeks ago, in my nuts. I got clipped in a hit and run. I spent the last four hours in the f—ing hospital and unfortunately I had to f—in’ rush back here — and actually, it is fortunate, because I’m very happy to be standing on this stage — but I had to fucking rush back here because nobody could f—ing switch, man, nobody could flip-flop, because that’s just how it is, I guess. That’s how it is when you look out for your brothers some of the time. This tour, I’ll tell you what, this tour has been so f—ing insane for us, man, we’ve had so many crazy things, and even things that affected you people: Hurricane Sandy. We’ve had surgeries, we got banned by f—ing Disney, all this f—ing bulls–t and you know what? Nothing is gonna f—ing stop us, nothing is gonna f—ing stop us, because we live to do this. We’re so f—ing honored, we’re so f—ing proud to be able to do this for you. According to one of our reporters, who was covering the New York City concert, All That Remains singer Phil Labonte addressed the issue onstage, claiming that he would have agreed to swap sets if he had been informed of Robb Flynn’s situation. Was Flynn in the right to air his frustrations? Check out video footage of Robb Flynn’s speech below and let us know what you think in the comments section. Machine Head’s Robb Flynn Slams All That Remains Onstage Stay tuned for Loudwire’s full recap + photo gallery of the show.
Liz Ramanand, Loudwire Lamb of God vocalist Randy Blythe ‘s decision to take a moment to honor those lost Friday in the tragic Connecticut school shootings did not meet with the reaction he expected, and the rocker turned to his Instagram account to voice his disgust. Blythe reports via his Instagram account that during Lamb of God’s performance Friday night in Medford, Oregon, not everyone in the crowd complied with his request for a 60 second moment of silence, which led to his outrage. He wrote, “I have never been more disgusted with an audience in my life. I wish we hadn’t played. We, Lamb of God, asked for 60 seconds of silence during our first set break to honor the dead children and teachers in Connecticut. It seemed appropriate — it’s a g–damned national tragedy. Most of the crowd complied, but several didn’t, some cursing and even laughing. I wanted to walk off stage. I am so disgusted right now.” He continued, “If you were one of those who wouldn’t shut up for 60 lousy second to honor 20 murdered children, go look in the mirror. You are looking at a piece of s—. Your parents are obviously pieces of s— too, because they raised you to behave with no dignity. To the fans who were respectful, I thank you. I am also sorry you have so many g–damned a–holes in your community. You should do something about that. This s— would not have happened at a Lamb of God show where I live and that is a fact. We have more manners. I am just disgusted — thoroughly disgusted. You yelling people give metal a band name. Screw that. You give humanity a bad name. Grow up. Your parents should have beaten some manners into you, you savage little beasts.” Blythe concluded, “I will go to bed, say a prayer for those suffering, and hope for a better day tomorrow, because tonight sucked.” [button href=”http://loudwire.com/connecticut-school-shooting-rock-musicians-condolences/” title=”Next: Rockers React to the Connecticut School Shootings” align=”center”]
Liz Ramanand, Loudwire The Black Veil Brides army continues to march strong, especially with the band’s third studio album, ‘Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones,’ due out on Jan. 8. Loudwire had the opportunity to catch up with Black Veil Brides frontman Andy Biersack after her surprised 20 fans with his presence at a listening party in New York City. Biersack talked in-depth about ‘Wretched and Divine’ and how circumstances in his personal life helped with the creation of the new album. ‘Wretched and Divine: The Story of the Wild Ones’ is a very epic sounding album name. What does the title mean to you personally? Growing up, I wasn’t like the kid in ‘Breakfast Club,’ but I was like the weirdo like “Don’t let your kids around that guy” – I had like a James Dean complex when I was a kid and I wanted to be this rebel person but it wasn’t because I wanted to rebel against things it was just that my inclinations were more towards rock ‘n’ roll, leather jackets and that kind of stuff. I wasn’t a kid who got into trouble, I didn’t get into drugs as a kid but just the way that I looked and my interests made me into this social pariah. So at a young age I was already fascinated by the social dichotomy of if someone looks a certain way or someone has certain interests they can be labeled as a bad person without any actual knowledge of who they are. The older I got, I started to realize more it’s not necessarily that any of us are inherently bad or good, you just kind of carve your own way and you are your experiences and your surroundings and what you grow up in. I think on any given day somebody could help out a homeless person and cuss out somebody that cut them off in traffic and I think that everybody has that inside them, it’s just how you live that balance – so I think everbody is ‘Wretched and Divine.’ Our band also, we’re a very polarizing band in opinion – people either tend to love us or hate us, there’s not really anything in between. We like to think of ourselves and the people that support us as people on the fringe, we don’t care to be part of one group or another. We kind of exist on our own bubble so to speak and with that I think that may be where the title came from. Can you talk about the brand new single ‘In The End’ musically and lyrically? The song probably came about two or three weeks after my grandfather died. I was very close with my grandparents and through the course of writing the song, I started to think more and more about – just from my personal perspective because everyone in the band has their own feelings on when songs are written. But when I was sitting outside writing lyrics to it, I was feeling — I’m not a religious person but I grew up in a religious family. I went to the funeral for my grandfather, a person that I love very much and everyone is speaking about how he went to heaven and how he’s in heaven. I always fight with that because I would love nothing more to believe that my grandfather is in the clouds playing Xbox 460 or whatever awesome stuff they have up in heaven but I can’t. I remember sitting around in my grandmother’s house afterwards and everbody’s doing what you do after — you all go back somewhere and you talk about the great stories of the person that died and that came to me very clearly: Whether you believe or don’t believe in an actual physical afterlife, you cant deny that there is a certain element of an afterlife in the legacy that someone leaves. A bunch of people sitting around a room talking about how wonderful this person was and how positively they affected their lives is always going to, in a sense, be heaven — heaven on earth. I think heaven and afterlife is for the living, it’s for the people that continue on and remember that person and if you’ve done something that is substantial in your life then you can leave a legacy and do something positive. It obviously applies to the storyline and this battle and being at the end of it and not having won or loss — just knowing that you did something for what you thought was right. Artists such as Bert McCracken from the Used and William Control are on the album. What did these other musicians bring to the table? With this we were doing something so different than anything we’ve done before, it opened itself up to inviting friends and different people in. In the past we never really had guest vocalists but this felt like it was bigger than just the five of us – it’s almost like doing a play and you only cast you and your friends, you have to have stuff that exists outside of the base where the story was written. If anything else, it was bringing people in that had different perspectives and different sounds so that we could play more with the sonic level of the record and have different sounding things. Can you talk about the F.E.A.R spoken word parts of the album and the idea behind those sections of the disc? I’ve sort of just like the whole Orwellian, dystopian future – I like the idea that it doesn’t seem to crazy or far off that there could be someone who is this omnipotent, omniscient power that tells you what to do. I think that people always make the metaphor pretty readily with television or media brainwashing and the people with the tinfoil on their heads think that everything’s brainwashing them. So, if you were to have a situation where it’s an all sweeping political, religious, psychological just this entity that exists on every level to where you get your food, you get your God and you get your health from this one entity and they kind of control everything — that just always interested me. I like the idea of having the narrative told through the perspective of the bad guy more than anything else. You rarely ever hear something narrated through the villain’s perspective and it was fun. If nothing else, this record boils down to stuff that I just thought was fun and cool and what we could have fun with as a whole. Where did the idea of the Black Veil Brides film ‘Legion of the Black’ come from? Again just fun, honestly it was as simple as just the childishness of “We should do a movie” and then the reality of, “How do you do that and how do you get the financing for that?” We were very fortunate to have great friends Patrick Fogerty and Richard Villa, who have worked with us from day one. Richard does our artwork and Patrick has directed every video I have done since I was 17 years old and so they have a lot of friends and were able to pull a lot of favors and we were able to agree with the label on a budget. So instead of doing these promotional videos, we decided that we would do a cohesive film to compliment the album because it is this larger than life kind of thing. [button href=”http://loudwire.com/black-veil-brides-unleash-video-for-in-the-end/” title=”Check Out Black Veil Brides’ Video for ‘In The End'” align=”center”]
YouTube Korn fans now have a chance to see singer Jonathan Davis in a different environment, as the rocker’s recent short film, ‘ Wounded Warriors ,’ is streaming online. The 17-minute film follows Davis as he tours Germany’s Ramstein Air Base. The movie, directed by Sebastien Paquet, finds Davis experiencing several of the tasks that soldiers go through on a daily basis. The singer says, “I’m just in shock. This film is not about me. It is about all the troops and what they sacrifice to keep our life going. I am truly grateful for every single one of them.” During his time at the base, Davis gets a tour of the C130J Hercules Aircraft from airmen of the 37th Airlift Squadron and an explosives demonstration from the 886th Civil Engineer Squadron Explosive Ordinance Disposal Flight. In addition, Davis spent part of the trip visiting with soldiers at the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center and talking with them about their sacrifices. “Reality’s a bitch,” says Davis in the film. “You’re watching the news and you’re seeing everything that’s going on and It doesn’t really hit you until you actually get there and see the actual faces and the actual equipment and you see what’s going on. I really do think that people should go meet these guys and see what goes on. [They’d] be a little bit more appreciative of what they have.” The film made its debut Nov. 10 at the GI Film Festival in Hollywood and won the “Audience Choice Award.” It will make its television debut on the Pentagon Channel as part of the GI Festival next May. Check out the ‘Wounded Warriors’ short film starring Korn’s Jonathan Davis below: Watch the ‘Wounded Warriors’ Short Film [button href=”http://loudwire.com/korn-fan-presents-uniform-of-fallen-marine-brother-to-jonathan-davis/” title=”Next: Jonathan Davis Receives Fallen Marine’s Uniform” align=”center”]
Frank Micelotta, Getty Images Few musicians possess the talent and character to retain ‘Rock God’ status nearly 20 years after their demise, but since 1994, the memory of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain has not faded one bit. Countless tributes have been paid to Cobain since his suicide, with the latest being a strange and multidimensional stage show featuring Sonic Youth ‘s Thurston Moore . The artistic tribute , simply called ‘Kurt,’ was showcased at the Gusman Center for the Arts in Miami, Fla., on Dec. 6, as part of the city’s Art Basel extravaganza. The Cobain experiment began with a 12-minute film by contemporary artist Adarsha Benjamin, which depicted a Cobain-like figure wandering through a Super-8 world and tearing up musical instruments while Pacific Ocean waves violently crash along Northwestern shores. The face of the Kurt Cobain figure was never fully revealed, although flashes of the late musician’s physical characteristics were shown as a mysterious tease. After the film’s conclusion, a bizarre dance based off Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ video began, complete with flannel shirts and a smokey atmosphere. After some strange conceptual dancing, a proverbial snake charmer with a left-handed guitar blasted out a solo guitar piece with piercing distortion, entrancing the grunged-out dancers. To conclude the night, Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore introduced himself, speaking informally about his own life before focusing on the life of Kurt Cobain. “I want to read a couple of things I wrote,” Moore stated, “now or maybe later, with Kurt in mind. I thought the film was beautiful and I was happy to see that film. I love the idea that we can just be expressionistic in our feelings towards people, whether we were intimate with them or not, as long as they brought beauty and feeling into our lives.” Moore concluded the night with a multitude of spoken-word poetry along with an experimental and massively distorted noise piece. Check out some of Moore’s performance from ‘Kurt’ below. Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore Performs in ‘Kurt’
Theo Wargo, Getty Images Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan has continued his non-stop press tour with interviews with ‘CBS This Morning,’ the Chicago Tribune and Sound Magazine recently. Out of the three sit-downs, plenty of riveting news and quotes was offered by Corgan, such as the possibility of writing a triple album, the current state of rock music and much more. During Corgan’s appearance on CBS ‘ This Morning ,’ the frontman responded to praise from fans regarding Corgan’s newest album, ‘Oceania,’ and the belief that the frontman seems creatively rejuvenated. “I think America is obsessed with what I call ‘the peak moment,’ says Corgan, but as an artist I’m invested in the journey, and when I study other artists, I’m just as interested in the fallow times as I am interested in the great times.” Corgan went on to reference the works of artist Pablo Picasso to represent the timeline of the Smashing Pumpkins. “There are some horrible paintings in there, but you can learn a lot from the horrible paintings because, ‘What was he trying to express that he wasn’t able to?’” During Corgan’s Sound Magazine interview, the musician flirted with the idea of creating a triple album. “Actually we’ve talked about making a triple album, not with this current album, but the next one. We started talking about what that would mean. I would like to do another big work but that just takes so much energy and commitment. It just takes over your life” Finally, Corgan voiced his opinion of today’s rock world during his chat with the Chicago Tribune . “I do believe rock and roll needed to change away from a hero-worship culture back to what it always was, which is sort of a mystical culture,” explains Corgan. “But that has been subverted basically by commerce. It speaks to a bigger sociological point, which is: Everything is for sale now. One painter can paint a house and make it feel haunted and another painter can paint it and bore you to tears. So, what is it about the painter of the haunted house capturing the symbolic forms? That’s how I look at it.” The Smashing Pumpkins are finishing up their 2012 U.S. tour dates tonight (Dec. 10) at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y. Billy Corgan on CBS ‘This Morning’