Thursday 28 February 2013

Song of the Day: Burning Empires - Heart First into Hell

     What kind of mood is everybody in this evening?  Maybe a little pissy, a little angry, or even a little riled up? Feeling some tasty hardcore from the supergroup you've never heard of? OK.

Wednesday 27 February 2013

Song of the Day: System of a Down - Snowblind

     We've had another snow day here in Kingston, so I've raided my memory banks for good snow-related songs. I think the song I've chosen for today qualifies.

Tuesday 26 February 2013

Song of the Day: Animals as Leaders - Song of Solomon

     Since tonight is Tired Tuesday, and I want to make it Sleepy-Time Tuesday as quickly as possible, we're just going to go with something tried and tested and call the whole thing Tasty Tuesday, OK?

Monday 25 February 2013

Song of the Day: Closure in Moscow - Vanguard

     I've written about Australians Closure in Moscow before, but a) it's been a while b) they're cool and c) I need something with an M in it, because it's...

Sunday 24 February 2013

Song of the Day: The Sleeping - Believe What We Tell You

     Back in the Before Time (in the Long Long Ago, for those of you in the know) I wrote about a band called Night Verses that happens to have an alumnus of The Sleeping among its current membership (I'm looking at you, Douglas Robinson). But tonight we're going to rewind things a few years a feature a song from Doug's old band, The Sleeping.

Saturday 23 February 2013

Song of the Day: Baroness - Cocainium

     I'm sure you all know how awesome Baroness is. I'm sure you're all aware of their special brand of sludgy space metal and of their proficiency at creating head bobbing grooves. But have you ever thought about the amount of disco-type sounds, beats, and influences going on over the course of your average Baroness record? No? What am I talking about?

Friday 22 February 2013

Song of the Day: Existem - Slay the Giant

     Regular readers might remember that I frequent a couple of other metal blogs (namely MetalSucks and Heavyblogisheavy) and that with their aid I sometimes come across some really cool stuff. You have Heavyblogisheavy and their pretty positive review of Existem's debut album to thank for today's song.

Thursday 21 February 2013

Song of the Day: Toadies - Possum Kingdom

     You can thank my mp3 player's shuffle once again for this one, as this morning this song came on a got me thinking. You see, the way I see it this song is an interesting phenomenon, a cool, quirky little song that nearly everyone around my age has heard, likes, and cannot identify. This song never got big enough for this band to qualify as a one hit wonder, but they definitely give off that vibe.

Wednesday 20 February 2013

Song of the Day: Exit Ten - Godspeed

     Yesterday's choice of an Incubus song led me indirectly to today's song, in the sense that Incubus singer and general prettyman Brandon Boyd bears a passing resemblance both physical and vocal to Exit Ten vocalist Ryan Redman. Not an uncanny resemblance, by any stretch, but enough that I'm going to grab this segue and milk it for all it's worth.

Tuesday 19 February 2013

Song of the Day: Incubus - Summer Romance (Anti-Gravity Love Song)

     This morning was another one of those "old mp3 player" mornings, which is actually kinda fun despite limiting my selection to a much smaller variety of songs. The reason for this, as I think I've mentioned before, is that my old mp3 player hasn't really been updated since I got the new one a couple of years ago now, meaning that the old one is a little audio time capsule. Or a little time machine. Maybe a little rip in the space-time continuum. Take your pick, really.

Monday 18 February 2013

Song of the Day: Lamb of God - Blacken the Cursed Sun

     Randy Blythe's manslaughter case has been back in the news lately as the trial itself has gotten underway in the Czech Republic. The fact that the trial has also been delayed for a month or so due to the illness of one the witnesses doesn't mean we have to stop sending our good vibrations out into the universe on Randy's behalf.

Sunday 17 February 2013

Song of the Day: Perhaps - Volume One

     Given my choice of song for today, it would perhaps have been prudent of me to get it posted before now, so that you might have some time this evening to check said song out (trust me, you're going to need it). But since it's a long weekend, you should have nothing better to do tomorrow than crank this song, and thus I don't feel so bad for not giving you enough lead time.

Saturday 16 February 2013

Song of the Day: At the Drive-In - One Armed Scissor

     I'm out of town tonight, leaving me out of the loop for any shenanigans that might be going down even as I type this. But that won't stop me from sending a song out to a couple of my buddies that I can't be with tonight. Sure, they likely won't ever see this, but that doesn't stop me from asking that they have a drink for me...

Friday 15 February 2013

Song of the Day: Death Before Disco - Barricades of Rumble

     Hey kids, another quick one today in which I'm letting my shuffle do the walking. Or talking. Or whatever. Anyways, we're dealing with another one of those defunct bands whose hypothetical 2013 record I'd love to hear.

Thursday 14 February 2013

Song of the Day: Arsis - Beyond Forlorn

     It's been a long day and I lack the energy to get creative on your collective asses this evening, so instead you get the heaviest song that came on my shuffle this afternoon at work. Enjoy!

Wednesday 13 February 2013

Song of the Day: Weerd Science - Fuck You and Your Filthy A&R Dept.

     I'm feeling a little saucy this evening, so we're going to experiment with a little Weerd Science. I know I've written about Coheed and Cambria drummer Josh Eppard's MC moniker before, but it's been a while and since it's the kind of thing you rigid metalheads might not normally listen to I figure Josh should get another day in the sun.

Tuesday 12 February 2013

Song of the Day: Cloudkicker - From the Balcony

     If you're reading this humble little blog (and the odds are you aren't) you've probably got a pretty decent presence in Ye Olde Blogosphere, which means you've probably heard of Cloudkicker before. You likely know that Cloudkicker is the nomme de guerre for one man post-metal madman Ben Sharp, and you likely know that Ben's the purveyor of a unique brand of post-metal (for lack for a better, briefer term) and that he's also a pretty prolific fellow.

Monday 11 February 2013

Song of the Day: Meshuggah - Pitch Black

     The way I see it, Meshuggah is the kind of band that you're all probably already listening to. Or at least you all say you do, even if you don't actually, because listening to Meshuggah carries with it a certain amount of metal cachet. But even if you do dig Meshuggah for reals, there's still a chance you haven't yet heard that they've just put out a new (free!) EP on Scion AV, the new saviours of modern metal.

Sunday 10 February 2013

Song of the Day: Vanisher - Into the Sands

     I'll confess right up front to not knowing a ton about today's band, Vanisher. I downloaded their 2012 release Unbound last year (for free!) from their bandcamp, but I haven't really listened to much of it except when it comes up on shuffle -- like it did today. Only today it hit me that more people should probably have heard about these guys. They're decently heavy but still the kind of thing you might hear on the radio, albeit not in a bad way. And there's enough blast beats, screamed vocals, and shreddy guitar to convince me that Vanisher is more than just a catchy chorus.

Saturday 9 February 2013

Song of the Day: Coheed and Cambria - Key Entity Extraction V: Sentry the Defiant

     This past Tuesday saw the release of the second half of Coheed and Cambria's latest space epic The Afterman. Last October saw part one of the story of Sirius Amory, entitled Ascension, and now we've got the second half in Descension.

Friday 8 February 2013

Song of the Day: Alexisonfire - Crisis

     I know there's not that many of you out there who are regular readers, but of those of you who are, perhaps a few of you are in Southern Ontario tonight, looking out your windows as snow continues to pile up in your driveways. If you've gotten as much as we have here, perhaps you've even been out shoveling already, or maybe you're just waiting until tomorrow to dig yourself back to civilization.  Whatever your personal snow day situation might be today, I've got the perfect song for it.

Thursday 7 February 2013

Song of the Day: The Dear Hunter - This Body

     I don't know if you've ever heard of The Dear Hunter. I hope you have, since I've written about them before, but maybe you're still in the dark. If that's the case, then it's time you saw the light -- every single colour of it.

Wednesday 6 February 2013

Song of the Day: Haji's Kitchen - Sidhartha

     Today's song has one main purpose: to showcase what can be done with the bass guitar in modern metal, and what most bands aren't doing. Most of the time the bass is in the background, just minding its own business and not really doing much of anything cool. The guitars, drums, and even vocals usually get most of the attention. But if you've got a guy who can play some bass, and you let him do so, you get this:

Tuesday 5 February 2013

Song of the Day: Wintergatan - Sommarfagel

     So I'm over on Heavyblogisheavy earlier (gotta give credit where credit is due, right?) and one of the posts for today implores readers to check out an eclectic Swedish band called Wintergatan for their cool melodies and interesting rhythms. I did, and now I'm joining Heavyblogisheavy in recommending this somewhat unusual band to you.

Monday 4 February 2013

Song of the Day: Mandroid Echostar - Lost Luminaries

     So: Mandroid Echostar. I don't know if you know them -- they've had a song of the day before, but not for a while -- but today's the perfect day to get acquainted. Why? Because they've just put out a badass triple guitar playthrough video for one of their songs.

Sunday 3 February 2013

Song of the Day: The Mars Volta - Roulette Dares (The Haunt of)

     I read the other day that, if tweets are to be believed, The Mars Volta is no more. This is really a shame, since I can't really think of another quasi-mainstream rock act of the last few years that pushed the envelope to new and interesting places as much as The Mars Volta. It also occurred to me in the wake of this news that, despite writing about The Mars Volta at least once, I've never given them their own day. That changes now, while I still have the chance.

Saturday 2 February 2013

Song of the Day: Tesseract - April

     Back when I was writing my post about which albums have me excited for 2013 (hard to believe it's been like a month already) I made the virtually unforgivable mistake of leaving out British prog djentlemen Tesseract and the new album they're working on. I don't really know how I did it, considering their debut, 2011's epic One, is one of my favourite records of the last few years. But however it happened, today I apologize. Sorry Tesseract.

Friday 1 February 2013

Song of the Day: Nine Inch Nails - The Perfect Drug

     Recently I've read a couple of things about the place of electronic music within heavy music (in particular an excerpt from an interview with The Dillinger Escape Plan's Greg Puciato in which  he talks about the overlap of electronic music and metal) and I thought a song of the day would be the... ahem, perfect opportunity to remind everyone how electronic music and heavy music should overlap.