Photo: James Minchin It’s no accident that Linkin Park have one of the biggest fan bases going, and the band is continuing to do their part to keep their followers happy by staging the 7th International Linkin Park Underground Summit in Cape Town, South Africa, on Nov. 7. The group began holding summits for their fan base several years back and has spread out the locations to make sure that everyone who likes the band will eventually have the opportunity to attend one of the events. Past summits have taken place in London, Sydney, Chicago, Hamburg, Tokyo, and Camden, N.J., with the band offering meet and greets, backstage tours, the opportunity for fans to jam on their gear or walk across their stage, soundcheck entry, Q&A sessions and acoustic performances. Passes for the Summit will be available strictly for the band’s LP Underground fan club beginning this Friday (Oct. 19) at 9AM Cape Town time. Summit passes are free for LPU Plus Pass members as part of their membership. In addition, the group has announced that for the first time, they will be selling exclusive LPU Summit t-shirts specific to the Cape Town event for $25. You can purchase the shirt when you reserve your pass. Stay tuned to the band’s website for additional details, including a Music for Relief tree planting activity, in the days to come. To get a better idea on what’s involved with an LPU Summit, check out the video from their inaugural event in London below. Watch Linkin Park’s ‘LPU Summit in London’ Trailer [button href=”http://loudwire.com/linkin-park-in-the-end-top-21st-century-hard-rock-songs/” title=”Next: Linkin Park – Top 21st Century Hard Rock Songs” align=”center”]
Simone Joyner, Getty Images It’s always interesting to see how things will work when members from various bands decide to take on a project together, and one of the better collaborations this year is the new metal outfit, AxeWound . The band features Cancer Bats singer Liam Cormier, Bullet for My Valentine ‘s Matt Tuck (on guitar), Pitchshifter drummer Jason Bowld, Glamour of the Kill guitarist Mike Kingswood, and Rise to Remain bassist Joe Copcutt, and they just released their debut disc, ‘ Vultures .’ Loudwire caught up with Cormier, who told us about the band’s speedy recording period, how quickly the group has bonded, and his thoughts on bringing their music to North American audiences this fall. This record was recorded in a little under two weeks and you were the last addition to the lineup. What was it like being thrown into the fire with this record? I was at home just having some downtime from finishing the Cancer Bats record and I got a phone call from Matt Tuck basically telling me that he had written a record, a metal record, and he was asking if I wanted to sing on it. I was like, “Yeah man, that’d be rad. I’ve got some time off and I think we could do something.” He was like, “OK then, I’ll send you something, the eight songs that I have mixed down and we’ve got another three that are finished. Let me know what you think.” I had no idea that he’d even have that many songs finished or what was even up with the project and I got all these crazy metal tracks and I was like, “Whoa, this is awesome!” I called him back and I was like, “Hey man, I’m totally in. When are you thinking?,” and he [asked], “How soon can you get on a plane and fly to Wales? I need to do this before I write the Bullet [for My Valentine] record.” I was like, “Ooh, I guess I can jump on a plane next week,” and he [said], “OK, perfect.” So before I had a chance to even think it out, I was getting on a plane flying to England. I was basically trying to write out as much as I could while waiting to meet this new band. We went to Wales and recorded the vocals in five days and that was it. We were like a real band. That’s great, and listening to this you hear the immediacy. You did it so quick, there’s not much time to think about it. You just knock it out and move on. That was the real fun side of it. It was just all of our gut instincts, and we didn’t have time to overanalyze things, so when we were laying down vocals or in the same spirit when they were doing the tracking of the album – the drums and guitar – it was just like whatever was your gut feeling, what felt right, that’s what went. It was cool having that spirit throughout the whole thing. It was like, “Hey man, that sounds great. Let’s move on.” I’m like, “Oh, do you want an extra track?” “Nope, we don’t have time and that sounds perfect.” It was really positive for me being in the studio under those circumstances, cause it was Ginge who was recording and Matt who was producing just being really pumped on everything we were doing. I’d show them lyrics and me and Matt would work on it, change a few words up or take some things out and for the most part it was just hammering it out. It was fun. Matt had talked about in a previous interview how interesting it was for him not having to be the lead singer and letting someone else go crazy onstage. Given his experience fronting a successful band and your experience with Cancer Bats, how has it worked co-existing onstage together? Well that’s what he told me when he came into – “I just want to play guitar and drink beer and have fun. I don’t want to have to worry about my voice or anything.” Originally it was supposed to be Matt singing on two tracks — ‘ Cold ‘ and ‘Collide’ — he had some ideas. But as we went on, just because he had some ideas, we were getting pumped and had some ideas, and I think it’s funny that I still roped him into being a singer [laughs]. It was like, “You’ve got a great voice. It’d be stupid of us not to take advantage of that.” And he’s got a really crazy screaming voice which I think is awesome. I think it doesn’t get presented as much as it could and Bullet, and the same with me and Cancer Bats, there’s some things I can’t do cause it wouldn’t fit the band. So this whole project was just trying different stuff. Like ‘Blood, Money & Lies,’ where Matt’s vocals are just brutal. It was awesome. I didn’t know he could scream like that. So it’s cool for both of us trying out different styles. With balancing Cancer Bats and AxeWound this past summer, does that just make you more energized when you return to one project after doing the other? It was fun this summer doing double sets, going from Cancer Bats to AxeWound or vice versa. It made me appreciate how different both projects were. I think when I’m screaming in the studio, it’s obviously Liam from Cancer Bats screaming on a metal record, but then playing those two different shows, it’s like, “No, I’m Liam from AxeWound, fronting this band.” I do see how different both projects are, especially when I’m doing them back to back. [laughs] Gotta say ‘Cold,’ such a great song to lead off with. Can you talk about how ‘Cold’ came together? ‘Cold’ was rad for me because that was the one song that Matt – it was the first song that Matt wrote for AxeWound. It was him thinking he had some stuff that was completely different from anything he was doing with Bullet. So for me, in the studio, that was actually the best because we were cramming, writing lyrics and working inside the can, and when it came to ‘Cold,’ Matt was like, “Oh I have the lyrics. We can just sing that.” It was like, “Whew! OK! Cool.” So we just banged that one out super quick. I think it’s rad because that song is such a 50/50 of Matt and I, between the verses and chorus, and to me that is the epitome of what the band is, having those different dynamics and how it comes together. I really like that song. It’s super fun. ‘Collide’ seems like the curveball on the album. It’s definitely heavy, but it’s got that soft piano opening and the strings, and after the brutality of the rest of the record, it kind of changes things up. We even position it in the set the same style, about halfway through as the sort of weird breather. But the song itself is super heavy when it all kicks in and it’s super fun to play live as well. But for those guys, they were telling me that when they were writing everything, they kind of got to a point where they didn’t want to rewrite the same style. We actually had that conversation of what other types of metal do we all really like. And having that theatrical style of things and Matt has a friend who plays all the piano on it, so we had this idea that we could make this heavy song, but have it be … Well, I like how all the songs don’t sound the same, and with this you’ve got something completely different. It’s a total curve ball. But once we put the vocals down, it didn’t seem out of place. I think on the album what’s cool is we can do something different, but it still stands up next to like ‘Destroy’ or ‘Victim of the System.’ It’s just as rad of a song because it has the theatrical and more dynamics to it. Obviously, we know you and Matt as the singers for your other respective groups, but man, Jason Bowld from Pitchshifter on drums kicks ass on this record. He’s like the secret weapon. Yeah, he’s an animal. It’s amazing playing with him live. He just locks in the click and just all of the songs he hammers home. It’s like you said – he is our secret weapon. Having this dude that’s like a machine gun behind you just let’s us go out and do our thing. You just always know that there’s this super solid dude backing you up. It’s the best. What’s crazy though for Matt is that with Jason, there’s some songs that, like ‘Victim of the System,’ Jason just laid down those drums and Matt wrote the guitars around it. So he wrote that song around the drum tracks. For a lot of guitar players and anyone in a band, it’s such a different way of thinking of things – doing drums first and then everything else according to that. But I think that Matt finds it really exciting. Just having this completely different way of doing things is refreshing. You’re also getting some love for ‘ Exorchrist ,’ and what a freaky video you’ve got for it. What can you tell us about the song and the clip? [Laughs] That’s one of my favorite songs. I just really liked it. When we were talking about what could be the next single, that one was up there for me. I love the chorus for the song. The lyrics and the idea was something that I had written. Actually, when we were throwing around ideas for a band name, I was thinking we could call the band Exochrist, like the opposite of an exorcism – getting all the good out and letting the evil in. I thought that was pretty metal. So I kind of kept that idea around and wrote a whole song about it. The cool part for me was that I had the structure of that chorus set out a lot different, just more traditionally hardcore singing on the beat. But with Matt producing, he was like, “Let’s bring out that last line and make more of a statement,” and all of a sudden that opened up that song to me in more of a Judas Priest-huge rock chorus context. That sold me on that song so hard. It was so cool and was a badass way of ending the chorus, just bringing on the ‘Exorchrist’ with the ripping guitar. And when the idea for the video came, it was like no videos get played on TV for metal bands anymore. Just very few daytime TV slots at all, so we thought why not make the gnarliest metal video we can. We just wanted some of those fun metal things, so we had some gore and naked demons. It was kind of cool and that’s where the idea went. I showed up to the set, and there were these girls just covered in gore, and I thought, “Oh, yeah, I guess it’s pretty full on.” [laughs] But I like how the video turned out in the end. It’s definitely pretty cool and something completely different than anything I’ve done with Cancer Bats or any other band I’ve ever been in. You’re right that Exorchrist would be an awesome band name, but it worked out perfectly with AxeWound, which is also pretty cool, and you still got a solid song out of the other moniker. AxeWound was always the band name, and then we kind of had a bit of a talk about whether it should be the band name. We threw around some of the songs and song titles that provided potential band names, like ‘Church of Nothing,’ ‘Exorchrist’ – I still like the idea of them, so it was just like, “Oh, well I’ll just write a song called ‘Church of Nothing.’ I’ll write a song called ‘Exorchrist.’ Perfect.” ‘Church of Nothing,’ yes we’re expecting metal, but that song swings. I really like how gallop-y and almost how power metal it gets in the bridge, but it’s also one of the fastest songs too. It’s so thrashy. I like it cause it confuses kids too. Like when we’re playing it on the tour live, you’d see kids when we start up the verse start the circle pit, but before they’ve even made a full circle, it crashes back into the gallop-y chorus. It’s like, “Oh, I need to pump my fists.” You see these kids wanting to get involved, but then having to figure out what to do. [laughs] Speaking of the circle pit, ‘Burn Alive’ has to work for that, as well. Yeah, ‘Burn Alive,’ that’s our circle pit jam. I’ll call it out pretty huge before that one and it’s rad because it’s an easy one right off the bat. ‘Destroy’ is actually going over really well where kids are singing along with the huge chorus and the big fist pumps in that bridge. ‘Post Apocalyptic Party,’ ‘Exorchrist,’ and ‘Cold’ have all been killing it too, just cause kids have known those songs that longest. But it’s great to see the whole record getting well received live. You can tell kids have put in the time and are learning the words and getting really into the whole thing. Most of your dates so far have been overseas. How pumped are you to bring it back to North America later this year? I’m pumped to see what the reaction will be like over here. I know I have a ton of friends in Toronto and Montreal where we’re playing that are really excited to see it. But I think in general, just Cancer Bats and Bullet fans and Pitchshifter fans, everybody is kind of finding out about this project is really getting excited. I think these shows are gonna be good. If this does go on beyond this first album , how excited are you to be there from the inception the next time around? All of us have been getting along super well and this tour has gone off, so for all of us, we want to keep working on the project. For us, especially Matt and I, it’s just a matter of finding time. But we’ve all talked about getting together at some point – maybe at the end of the Bullet tour cycle for this next record and maybe writing the next AxeWound record together – the five of us. Just thinking of how quick we were able to put things together with the quick sessions and it would be interesting to see what we could do – the five of us – maybe if we’re locked in a room for a month, which is the next step for the band. But at the same time, I don’t want to lose that urgency that we have with everything. Everyone’s on the same page that way, so I don’t think we’ll give ourselves too much time. But sometimes when you have a good deadline and your back is against the wall, that’s when you come up with your best stuff, so I think to not lose site of that with this band would be awesome. It seems like the song ‘Post Apocalyptic Party’ would make for a good video… If we could do a video for that song, Matt and I had this idea of us riding dirt bikes. We both ride motorcycles, so we thought it would be cool to do a Mad Max style video where we’re riding around on dirt bikes in a wasteland, kind of ripping around. Maybe if we become the biggest band in the world, we can make our high budget AxeWound video. Watch AxeWound’s ‘Exorchrist’ Video
Adult Swim It’d be easy to forget that Dethklok are seen as an animated band, since braintrust Brendon Small is such a skilled guitar player, and the music isn’t secondary to the hilarious and bombastic plots of the show ’Metalocalypse.’ Strip away the funny and fantastical elements of the ‘Metalocalypse’ cartoon and listen to the music of ‘Dethalbum III,’ and it’ll become painfully obvious why metalheads love the show, the band and Small. First of all, the guitar riffs rip and snort. They are as well-constructed and as gnarly as it gets, fitting squarely into the melodic death metal categorization. But here is where the humorous aspect certainly adds some levity to music that is serious as a delinquent tax bill. How can you not have a chuckle at a song titled ‘I Ejaculate Fire’ before launching into fast and furious headbanging, courtesy of guitarwork so swift that it likely burned the fingerprints right off Small’s fingers? Small has rendered himself a more than capable riffsmith. Journeyman drummer Gene Hoglan’s footwork is as complex, propulsive and powerful as ever, with the percussion and blast beats being a signature and anchoring element of Dethklok’s sound. ‘Crush the Industry’ is a death metal gem, loaded with fills, guttural growling and overall chilling atmosphere. Put simply, it crushes skulls. ‘Andromeda’ sounds like it could have been reared in Florida, after hang sessions with Cannibal Corpse, Six Feet Under and Obituary, as it hacks a deep groove, thanks to its riffery. The galloping solo is as potent as moonshine. Most of the songs hover at four to five minutes, which is just enough time to get in, scramble your brain and get out, moving on to the next slab o’ metallic goodness. ‘Dethalbum III’ is certainly not extra progressive nor is it dynamically dazzling or esoterically experimental, but we don’t want it to be, either. It’s the extremity of the music that keeps us tuned in for 12 tracks. Another standout track is ‘Impeach God,’ which features an opening salvo so vivid, you can almost imagine fingers sailing up and down a fretboard. ‘Killstardo Abominate’ is a battering ram, as is ‘Biological Warfare.’ The riffwork on ‘Skyhunter’ is also exceptionally standout. ‘Dethalbum III’ is able to take a super serious (and often gore-slathered) genre like death metal and make it ‘deth metal.’ That is, it fuses skilled playing with a sense of humor, which is often not the case in the genre’s offerings. Big ups to Small for having created and continued his own genre. [button href=”http://loudwire.com/dethklok-discharge-crotch-blazing-new-video-for-i-ejaculate-fire-nsfw/” title=”Next: Watch Dethklok’s ‘I Ejaculate Fire’ Video” align=”center”]
Razor & Tie I Am War , the new band featuring Atreyu ‘s Alex Varkatzas and Bleeding Through ‘s Brandan Schieppati, have unveiled their first video, ‘Uninvite Me To Your Facebook Party.’ The track appears on the outfit’s debut album ‘Outlive You All.’ Varkatzas says of the song and video, “’Uninvite Me To Your Facebook Party’ is a super-fast, tongue in cheek number about how ridiculous social media can be when people become too obsessed and attached to it. The video itself was a blast to record. Lots of high energy footage of I Am War tearing it up and sweating bullets in the process. The perfect recipe for a killer video!” Schieppati handles guitars, bass, and backing vocals on ‘Outlive You All’ and Varkatzas does the brunt of the vocals. The collaboration began when Varkatzas emailed Schieppati about his idea of doing an album of aggressive and brutal music. “Everything instantly clicked,” Schieppati recalls. “I was stoked when Alex got in touch. We wanted to keep it fast with very little ‘shredding’. It hearkens back to the good ole days of angry music.” Even though their respective bands have been very successful, the duo didn’t feel any pressure for I Am War to top the charts. “Brandan and I aren’t doing this to become rich a–holes and travel the world,” affirms Varkatzas. “We wanted to make an awesome record and release it. There’s no pressure to produce a hit or conquer the charts. The only pressure is not to look like complete jackasses. That’s liberating.” Watch I Am War’s ‘Uninvite Me To Your Facebook Party’ Video
Ryan Pierse, Getty Images It seems that all is right in the world of Limp Bizkit again, as estranged member DJ Lethal has returned to the band after apologizing for his actions during a feud that had lasted several months. DJ Lethal had recently gone on a Twitter tirade about Bizkit. In one particular tweet, Lethal posted , “I hate a–holes that judge me for leaving a ‘band’ I was in for 15 years. Your like a f-n moose that got lucky!! F— Fred Durst. I was talented and was an artist [long] before u even knew who Fred was. If [you’re] gonna be a #wigger, than do your homework. #houseofpain b-tch!” Luckily for Bizkit fans, the battle seems to have been brought to a halt, as DJ Lethal once again went to Twitter on Oct. 10. Here is a compilation of a series of Tweets from the turntablist: I want to clear the air about limp bizkit. I have had some personal issues over the last few years that have led to some outbursts. I lot of the things I said about the band and fred was out of pain and anger. None of which I really meant deep down inside. So I think I owe it to fred,Wes,sam and john and the fans to really admit the truth. I had some problems. Be it partying on the road. Talking shit when I was drunk and causing internal conflicts. Today is the day that I can finally be a man and step up and say I’m sorry. The rants are done. And were really embarrassing. I think the guys in the band were actually looking out,I really needed a wake up call. So to finally come clean is really hard but the weight of the world on my shoulders is even harder to carry around. I’m in a great place now and want to thank everyone who had my back through the dark times. So to all the fans and the band. I really was fkd up for a while. I’m sorry. Fred and the band are great people. We’re all human. All love!! Feels great to finally step up to the plate. I hope we can resolve our issues because I miss my friends and band mates. FC Ty for his help. The guys in our band are true gentlemen. Giving me a second chance after the stupid shit I talked and the way I acted really shows class.LBF Now it’s time to step up to the plate and I’m hitting this ball out of the park. I was wondering how it would To be back. AMAZING!grateful” In response, Bizkit guitarist Wes Borland tweeted out a big virtual kiss to Lethal, simply writing , “Muah! @djlethal.” And in Lethal’s latest Tweet, posted Sunday (Oct. 14), he stated that he would be hitting the studio with Bizkit to write songs for their upcoming album. [button href=”http://loudwire.com/limp-bizkit-fred-durst-reveals-single-video-studio-return-plans/” title=”Limp Bizkit Reveals Single, Video and Studio Return Plans” align=”center”]
Mary Ouellette, SheWillShootYou.com Zakk Wylde ’s new signature edition guitar instruction collection titled ‘Guitar Apprentice’ is now available exclusively at Guitar Centers in the U.S. as of Oct. 1 and now the leader of the Black Label Society has released a humorous clip to promote his rock ‘n’ roll lessons. Recorded live at Wylde’s on Black Vatican studio in Los Angeles, Calif. ‘Guitar Apprentice’ takes a song and methodically breaks it down to fifteen different levels of playing so anyone can follow along. Starting with one chord, users work their way up to playing all the guitar parts including all headbanging solos, but at their own pace. The set offers detailed explanations of all the details from signature rhythm patterns to tones and even pedals and gear. In the clip below Wylde barks out ‘This ain’t no video game!’ to the camera, but it actually was a video game that inspired the project. Wylde told MusicRadar.com that when the developers of the project approached him they asked him what he thought about the ‘Guitar Hero’ video franchise. “I said it was awesome,” Wylde said. “Who knows – you could have the next Jimmy Page or Dimebag or Yngwie coming out of that thing. Some kid starts out on that, and eventually he says, ‘Man, I want to get a real guitar.’ That’s what you want to happen. To me, anything that promotes the guitar is good.” Wylde also noted that this isn’t easy, so be prepared. “We’re talking from a very beginner to being about to play the solo to f—ing ‘Crazy Horse’,” Wylde explained. “And you can do it, too, but you have to put in the hours. You’ve got to practice and get your technique together. But it’s all there, man.” Head over to www.guitarapprentice.com for more information on the Zakk Wylde Signature Edition Guitar Apprentice. Watch Zakk Wylde’s Video Teaser for ‘Guitar Apprentice’
Facebook: Papa Roach With their new disc ‘The Connection’ now out on shelves and fiery frontman Jacoby Shaddix on the mend after recent vocal surgery that forced the band to drop off of this summer’s Rockstar Energy Drink Uproar Festival, Papa Roach are officially back! But wait, that’s not all – the band recently announced that they will be participating in an upcoming episode of ‘YouTube Presents’ later this month as a special thanks to their supportive fanbase. With a live ‘YouTube Presents’ broadcast scheduled for Oct. 23 at 5PM ET, Papa Roach will deliver a live set that will be streamed worldwide followed by a question and answer session with fans in attendance during the hour long show. The band will also be giving away a trip to one lucky fan to fly out to the live performance so tune in to their Facebook page or watch the video below starring Jacoby Shaddix for all the details. Shaddix recently talked to Loudwire about the new disc: “This is the record that our fans have been waiting for. I think it encompasses all of our styles over the years of our career and we kind of just brought it all back around on this record. It’s really exciting. It’s an exciting time and rock music is at an interesting place right now and I just feel like this is the right record for rock music and P-Roach.” ‘The Connection’ debuted on the Billboard 200 in the No. 18 slot with first single ‘Still Swingin’ checking in at No. 3 on Loudwire Radio’s Top 20 Songs of the Week list. Papa Roach Frontman Jacoby Shaddix Talks About Their ‘Youtube Presents’ Episode ? [button href=”http://loudwire.com/papa-roach-jacoby-shaddix-record-fans-have-been-waiting-for/” title=”Read Our Exclusive Interview With Jacoby Shaddix” align=”center”]