Back last summer, the Belgian based techno overlords Lords of Acid made a welcomed return to Detroit as they played Blondie’s to probably the largest crowd I’ve seen at the venue to this date. The group’s thumping beats and highly danceable [...]]]>

Praga Khan and company hit Blondie's once more on Sunday.

Back last summer, the Belgian based techno overlords Lords of Acid made a welcomed return to Detroit as they played Blondie’s to probably the largest crowd I’ve seen at the venue to this date. The group’s thumping beats and highly danceable tracks made for a throwback night to the days of industrial domination in the rock world- or at least as close as it ever was.

Since the last visit to Detroit, Praga Khan and company have been working on their first album since 2002’s “Private Parts”, and hope to have the untitled album out sometime this year. It will be the latest in the on going saga of sex, drugs and electronic music which started out all the way back in 1991 with the band’s large debut “Lust”.

The ever changing lineup will bring DJ Mea, lead singer of the band Me and My Machine, in front of the microphone for Lords of Acid on this upcoming tour. The tour has recently just started and will run through March 26^th. But the Lords will make their way to Detroit for a repeat performance at Blondie’s this Sunday (March 13^th) for their “Sonicangel” tour- which is also the new music platform Khan is looking to promote to help fund newer bands out there.

So, whether you’re interested in the new business venture, or just wanna get out there and dance- the return of Lords of Acid in Detroit will be right up your alley for debauchery and carnal fun.

Lords of Acid play at Blondie’s on Sunday, March 13^th. Tickets are $17 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and band info can be found at www.lordsofacid.com.

Montreal is a hotbed of metal these days- along with bands like Katalkysm and the now defunct Despised Icon, the French Canadian speaking city puts out more extreme metal bands than Toronto and Vancouver combined.

Neuraxis is another one of the bands [...]]]>

Neuraxis and Deicide converge on Detroit this Sunday at Blondie's.

Montreal is a hotbed of metal these days- along with bands like Katalkysm and the now defunct Despised Icon, the French Canadian speaking city puts out more extreme metal bands than Toronto and Vancouver combined.

Neuraxis is another one of the bands from Montreal making a name for themselves. Formed in 1994, the band has cranked out a severe sounding technical death metal sound that helps push boundaries and musical creativity in the genre. Through 5 albums over the 15 year time period, the band has delivered their signature blast beat and vicious vocals and keeping consistency with what seems to be a ever revolving cast of characters in the band.

This week brings the band’s sixth (and second for Prosthetic Records) album, “Asylon”. While the band doesn’t want to use the term “concept album” with the new album, the band guarantees the listener a dark journey that will seem more experimental and progressive than what the band has done in the past.

The guys in Neuraxis are going to be busy guys this year on the road. Later in the year brings the band a tour with Sepultura. But for right now, the band is out on the road with Florida death metal legends Deicide, who are promoting their new album, “To Hell With God” as well. This tour runs through the end of March, but will head to Detroit when they invade Blondie’s on Sunday, February 27^th.

While most of the country sits through another bland Academy Awards show, you could end up heading down to Detroit and checking out some intense death metal that those Hollywood types only wish they had.

Neuraxis plays at Blondie’s on Sunday, February 27^th. Tickets are $22 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and band info can be found at www.neuraxis.org.

You may not know the name Barren Earth yet, but if you’re a metal fan, odds are you’ve heard of the bands some of the guys in Barren Earth have worked with. The Finnish “supergroup” comprises members from Kreator, Swallow The Sun and [...]]]>

Some of Finland's finest invade Blondie's Feb. 20th.

You may not know the name Barren Earth yet, but if you’re a metal fan, odds are you’ve heard of the bands some of the guys in Barren Earth have worked with. The Finnish “supergroup” comprises members from Kreator, Swallow The Sun and Amorphis. After forming in 2007, the group released an EP in 2009 and followed up quickly with their full length debut “Curse of the Red River” last year.

With the band’s line up almost solidified before the release of the initial EP, the band was still in the need of a guitarist. With the members of the band all living in the same town in Finland, the band was able to recruit Kreator guitarist Sami Yli-Sirnio into the mix and start with the shredding. Yli-Sirnio is now spreading his time between Barren Earth and Kreator.

Early 2010 brings Barren Earth to their first tour in the States, as part of the “Finnish Metal Tour”, which includes Ensiferum and Finntroll on the bill. On one of the first days for the tour, I had a chance to talk with Yli-Sirnio about the way he was brought into the band, as well as balancing both bands he works with.
Here’s my interview with Sami:

AM: How have the U.S. crowds been treated the band so far on tour?
SYS: Well, we had our first show last night and I think things went quite smooth. There were a good amount of people in the crowd and seemed to be enjoying things so far. There has been a bad storm in Oklahoma City and that is our next date, and hopefully people will still come out to the show, with all the bad weather that has happened to them. We’ve done festivals and small club shows back home before and everything has met expectations so far.

AM: The band boasts a mix between prog-rock and metal- where do your influences lean more towards?
SYS: For me, it’s a combination of both. When this band got together, they had very much a sound like Porcupine Tree, but knew we could do more. Once everyone started to become more comfortable with one another, we started to see the styles get more varied between the two styles and were different from song to song. But never did the band want to plan the next songs out too far ahead and just went with things.

AM: The band was almost set before you joined the group, how did you get asked to join the band as the last member in the group?
SYS: Well, all the members of the band live in or near the same city in Finland. It’s a small town, where everybody knows everybody and kept running into each other at a local pub. It didn’t take much convincing to join the group. It is nice, because with Kreator, I live in another country than the rest of the guys. But with Barren Earth, it’s a lot easier to jam when everyone lives in the same town.

AM: Will Barren Earth be the only band we are working with for the foreseeable future?
SYS: I will be working on this for the next little while, with some festival dates in the summer. But I am already working on the new Kreator album, which we are sending files to each other back and forth right now. After the Barren Earth and a month off after that, I will be doing the Kreator tour. We are hoping to get back into the States later this year, as well as another European tour.

AM: Has the band begun work on new material already?
SYS: We have already written 13 new songs for the new album, and we’re planning on having the same people mix and master the album. We started working on these songs right after the release of “Curse of the Red River” and we’re really just trying to concentrate on the arrangement of the songs at this time.

AM: What can fans expect from the upcoming “Finnish Metal Tour”?
SYS: Ensiferum are the headliners of the show and the bands really vary in sounds- every body has their own sound. There are grindcore bands, power metal bands, prog-rock bands- hell, it’s all just metal though.

Barren Earth plays as part of the “Finnish Metal Fest” at Blondie’s in Detroit on Sunday, February 20^th. Tickets are $22 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and band info can be found at www.myspace.com/officialbarrenearth.

Last time we checked in with the Wisconsin based metal band Lazarus A.D., the band was touring behind their debut “The Onslaught”. During that time in between, the band has recorded their sophomore album, “Black Rivers Flow” and [...]]]>

"Black Rivers Flow" is out tomorrow, and Lazarus A.D. hits Blondie's on Feb. 8th.

Last time we checked in with the Wisconsin based metal band Lazarus A.D., the band was touring behind their debut “The Onslaught”. During that time in between, the band has recorded their sophomore album, “Black Rivers Flow” and the album is receiving some pretty strong acclaim from places like Blabbermouth.net and other metal websites. This in turn could be the band’s big break up the metal hierarchy and could make these guys from Wisconsin the next big thing in thrash metal.
A lot of thrash metal can sometimes be very one-note and that was something that the band vehemently avoided when recording the album and critics are praising the diversity on the album.
As guitarist Alex Lackner was none too thrilled having to deal with the usual January weather in Wisconsin (which looked a lot like the weather in Michigan in January), I had a chance to talk with him before the band went on tour with thrash metal underground heroes Death Angel. Alex and I discussed the diversity on the new album, and how the band stepped up their game with “Black Rivers Flow”.

Here’s my interview with Alex:

AM: Is there more of a sense of anticipation or nervousness going into the new album’s release?
AL: I don’t think there’s a sense of nervousness right now. I think with this album, we wanted to see a bigger progression in the band, in the evolution of the band. We didn’t want to play the safe card and do something that everyone else has been doing. There is better song structure, song writing and vocals than on the first album. The reaction so far is good, but perhaps exactly what we expected. Some fans feel that it may not be as “thrashy” as the last album, but I think it shows more diversity than before.

AM: When the band was first recording the new album, what was the band’s feeling about the direction of the album?
AL: I think it comes back to the diversity of the album. We’re more musicians than we are vocalists. I think the music on the first album is how we wanted it, but I think the vocals weren’t where they needed to be. Jeff (Paulick- bassist) and Dan (Gapen- guitarist) took it upon themselves on the vocals this time and really improved the sound. Before the first album, Jeff had never really sang like that before and he does more of the raspy, growling parts, while Dan does more of the melodic chorus. It makes for a good balance on the album.

AM: When looking back at “The Onslaught” now, what would you change about that album?
AL: We recorded and released “The Onslaught” before we were ever signed to Metal Blade and we didn’t re-record it when we were signed. The album was written when we were still in high school and I thought that the album was monotonous at times. But it still came off as organic, but knew the next album would sound far different.

AM: The song that seems to be getting the most praise is “Eternal Vengeance”, how did that song come about?
AL: That was the last song written for the album. Whereas most songs and the structure of those songs were figured out all before getting in the studio- that song was completely developed and recorded while in the studio. It’s our longest song to date and was extremely different for us. You always run into the problems with a long song and it’s hard to keep the fans attention beyond the usual song lengths, but I think there’s extra elements that take you on a journey. Whether it’s the melody or hooks, or the guitar- it’s just a different song for us.

AM: With your second album now done, do you feel dealing with the music industry is easier or more difficult now?
AL: I think it’s becoming easier for us. Going into this- I think we all had certain notions of what the music industry would be like. Some of those notions were right on, but other ones, we had no idea what to really expect. When we were younger, the industry was so different, people made money from CD sales, touring, you name it. With the downloading, anybody can hear the music for free and I think one of these days, all music is probably going to be free and bands will make a living touring more to make money.

AM: What can we expect on the tour with Death Angel?
AL: Good times for sure, we are looking forward to it. It’s our first tour that we’re direct support. We’ve done plenty of opening slots and it’s fun to play early and spend the rest of the night hanging out. But it will be cool to play later and still have time to check out Death Angel’s set.

Lazarus A.D. opens for Death Angel at Blondie’s in Detroit on Tuesday, February 8^th. Tickets are $20 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and band info can be found at www.lazarusad.com.

In order to have a convincing black metal name, stealing a name of a character from the classic novel “The Crucible” is probably a good start. Taking their name from the main accuser of the “witches” in the Salem Witch Trials in the [...]]]>

Abigail Williams opens for Immolation at Blondie's tomorrow night.

In order to have a convincing black metal name, stealing a name of a character from the classic novel “The Crucible” is probably a good start. Taking their name from the main accuser of the “witches” in the Salem Witch Trials in the late 1600’s in the novel, Abigail Williams forges out a metal sound that pay a huge debt to the European black metal bands of the 1990’s, with a bit of a more modern take on things.

After releasing their debut in 2008, the band has just released their sophomore album, “In The Absence Of Light” and preparing to release the next wave of their atmospherically blackened sound.

With song titles like “What Hells Await Me” and “In Death Comes The Great Silence”, it’s pretty obvious that the music keeps the overall aesthetic of black metal, but as the band has trimmed some members of the past few years- the band’s sound is shifting a little. With vocalist Ken Sorceron taking over producer duties and hiring new guitarist Ian Jekelis and new drummer Ken Bedene, Abigail Williams is shifting to more of a black metal crunch and fury versus the sometime keyboard influenced sound that dominated much of the first album. But the raw energy does give the album more of a early-mid 90’s European black metal vibe versus the Americanized take on it through the past couple of years- but alas- no corpsepaint.

As the new album is released, the band is venturing out on a month long tour with longtime metal favorites Vader and Immolation. The tour runs through October 30^th, but the bands hit Detroit on October 6^th as Blondies’ host the fury of these bands. But before checking out the show, make sure to pick up a pure blast of darkened metal as “In The Absence of Light” is out now.

Abigail Williams plays at Blondie’s on Wednesday, October 6^th. Tickets are $15 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and band info can be found at www.myspace.com/abigailwilliams.

Being influenced by groups like the Cure and Joy Division might not be the most obvious choices for a European death metal band, but for Stockholm’s Katatonia- those influences have given the band it’s edge.

Formed in 1991, the trio of Jonas [...]]]>

Katatonia will deliver some melodic metal to Blondie's on Wednesday night.

Being influenced by groups like the Cure and Joy Division might not be the most obvious choices for a European death metal band, but for Stockholm’s Katatonia- those influences have given the band it’s edge.

Formed in 1991, the trio of Jonas Renkse, Anders Nystrom and Daniel Lijiekvist, Katatonia has been a fixture on the circuit, releasing 8 albums in that time, with the band’s latest “Night Is The New Day”, released in 2009 to lots of love from the metal and hard rock press for its progressive yet highly intense sound. The band has also released an EP, “The Longest Year” earlier this year- that shows the highlights of the full length, such as the title track and “Day and Then The Shade”. The material on both “Night” and the EP prove that Katatonia still got it, and provide some of the most infectious riffs and vocals in the genre.

To coincide with the two releases, the band is mounting their first U.S. tour in a few years as the band plays 26 dates that last through October 7^th. But the band will be hitting Detroit early on in the tour as they play Blondie’s on September 15^th. There are meet and greet opportunities available as well for the show, so make sure to take a look at Blondie’s site or Katatonia’s site for more information to get up close and personal with one of Europe’s most prolific names in death metal.

Katatonia play at Blondie’s on Wednesday, September 15^th. Tickets are $27 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and info can be found at www.katatonia.com.

For black metal fans here in the States, it should be a good upcoming few months for the scene. Even though the Behemoth tour has been cancelled for the States, due to lead singer Nergal’s health issues- there are still plenty of shows [...]]]>

Black Metal from Belgium takes over Blondie's Thursday night.

For black metal fans here in the States, it should be a good upcoming few months for the scene. Even though the Behemoth tour has been cancelled for the States, due to lead singer Nergal’s health issues- there are still plenty of shows to keep the corpsepaint legions happy.

One of those tours rolling through the States is the long awaited return of Belgium’s Enthroned. Born in 1993 in the wake of the wild stories of church burnings in parts of Europe, the band has toured extensively in Europe, but has not been here in the States since 2001. But now the band is back here in the States behind the release of their new album, “Pentagrammon”.

The album is a eleven song rip-roarer of blast beats and fury. Lead by songs like “Ornament of Grace” and “Unconscious Minds”, lead singer Nornagest and company pound and deliver doses of evil sounding metal that will please fans of the genre alike.

The band is currently out in the States through September 1^st, before heading back to Europe. But the band will be making their way to Detroit as Enthroned (along with Destroyer 666 and Pathology) hits Blondie’s this Thursday (August 26^th) for a night of searing black metal.

Enthroned plays Blondie’s on Thursday, August 26^th. Tickets are $20 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional tour dates and band info can be found at www.enthroned.be.

Two of the biggest names of the techno/industrial world of the genre’s early 90’s heyday are heading out as Lords of Acid and My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult are out on tour together as they co-headline the “Sextreme Ball” tour.

The bands toured [...]]]>

Lords of Acid hit Blondie's this Wednesday.

Two of the biggest names of the techno/industrial world of the genre’s early 90’s heyday are heading out as Lords of Acid and My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult are out on tour together as they co-headline the “Sextreme Ball” tour.

The bands toured together in 1995, under the “Sextasy Ball” moniker and the two groups are united and giving the fans a updated version of the group’s set that will be based heavily in, you guessed it, sex….

With songs titles like “I Must Increase My Bust” and “Rubber Doll” (believe me, these are two of the titles I can actually use on a PG-13 friendly website), you know that sex will be on the brain for the longtime German techno mavens Lords of Acid. The brainchild of Praga Khan (born Maurice Engelen), the band hasn’t released an album since their best-of compliation in 2002.

Out on the road with the band as a guest vocalist is Lacey Conner, who reality show fans might know as a “villain” on one of the seasons of VH1’s “Rock Of Love”. Somehow, I don’t see a battle between suitorettes of Bret Michaels ensuing at this show.

Meanwhile, Chicago based industrial group My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult were darlings of the early industrial scene, with songs like “Sex On Wheels” getting major exposure, thanks to movies of the era such as “Cool World” and “The Crow”. The band has been a bit more active than Lords of Acid this past decade, releasing their most recent album, entitled “Death Threat” last year. The band’s still deliver a tried and true form of industrial that will keep fans old and new satisfied.

The Sextreme Ball lasts through the middle of August, but the tour makes a stop in Detroit as the groups hit Blondie’s on Wednesday, July 28^th. It is sure to be a lesson in carnal debauchery as Lords of Acid and My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult show how industrial should sound.

”The Sextreme Ball” featuring Lords of Acid and My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult play at Blondies on Wednesday, July 28^th. Tickets are $20 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional dates and tour info can be found at www.sextremeball.com.

One of hip-hop biggest underground names, Tech N9ne, is also one of its hardest working. From putting out six releases since 2006, and touring with more traditional hip-hop groups to fusion groups like Hed (pe) and Kottonmouth Kings, it’s easy to say [...]]]>

The always busy N9ne heads to Blondie's on Thursday.

One of hip-hop biggest underground names, Tech N9ne, is also one of its hardest working. From putting out six releases since 2006, and touring with more traditional hip-hop groups to fusion groups like Hed (pe) and Kottonmouth Kings, it’s easy to say that Tech N9ne doesn’t see his hometown of Kansas City very often.

Demand for Tech N9ne’s music has picked up over the past few years, and after nearing two decades in hip-hop, this has been one of Tech’s most commercially fruitful times. His 2008 album “Killer” debuted in the Top 20 of the Billboard Album Charts- pretty much a rarity these days when it comes to underground hip-hop. His follow up, 2009’s “K.O.D.”, pulled off the same feat, debuting at #14 last fall. But N9ne is never one to rest on his laurels, releasing collaboration albums in between his more proper album releases.

As Tech (real name: Aaron Yates) prepares to release his upcoming collaboration album, “The Gates Mixed Plate”, due out July 27^th, Tech has been touring as always in anticipation of the release of that with a month long tour. Starting back on May 12, the tour is starting to enter the home stretch as his tour hits Detroit this Thursday (June 17^th). After plenty of shows at Harpo’s and the Fillmore Detroit, Tech N9ne makes his first trip to Blondie’s, which is sure to be a good time to see one of hip-hop’s underground heroes up close and personal.

Make sure to check out Tech N9ne’s furious beats and rhymes as he makes another trek to the Motor City.

Tech N9ne plays at Blondie’s on Thursday, June 17^th. Tickets are $25 and are available at www.ticketmaster.com. Additional dates and info can be found at www.therealtechn9ne.com.