With that said, there is also this to say: May 31st will be my last day with Metal Martyr. It’s been a fun [almost] two years of bitching, ranting, misspellings, grammar butchering, hatred, (sometimes senseless) negativity and most important of all interacting with readers both seldom and avid. You guys kick ass and it’s been a pleasure. Between now and then I’ll try to update as often as time allows. The contest is still on and I’ll still announce it on my way out the door. Now, with all that said, here’s a few key things happening in metal today.

An Iron Maiden Flight 666 Online Video game cane be played at Ironmaiden.com. I haven’t played it yet but it has to be much better than Ed Hunter.

Judas Priest have announced that they will be releasing a live album of previously unreleased live tracks. That means they’ve never released the songs AS live tracks.

The Boy Will Drown’s debut album, Fetish is out now in Europe. This is like that technical deathcore type shit. It’s not bad but it can become redundant as every songs kind of sounds the same.

Mikael Akerfeldt doesn’t Facebook and he wants you to know this.

Sorry, folks but that’s all I have time for tonight. Peace.

Post from: Metal Martyr

Swedish death metal super-group (I hate that title) Bloodbath has made a statement that due to Mikael Akerfeldt and Matin Axenrot being occupied with Opeth, there will be no appearances with Bloodbath at this summer’s European metal festivals.

“Unfortunately, we’ve to announce that BLOODBATH must pass this summer’s festival season. Mike [Mikael Åkerfeldt] and Axe [Martin 'Axe' Axenrot] have both confirmed they’re too occupied with OPETH and cannot commit to any live shows with BLOODBATH until 2010, the earliest. Recruiting live replacements for Mike and Axe has been considered, but is right now not going to be possible for technical aspects and neither appropriate for obvious reasons.

I’m still fairly new to Bloodbath, but I don’t think I would want to see them without Mikael Akerfeldt anyway. Which reminds me, as much as I love The Fathomless Mastery…it never gets enough rotation time in my iPod.

Post from: Metal Martyr

Mikael Akerfeldt

When I bought the new In Flames early last year I was pretty happy with it. It was great to me but it didn’t have me looking for more In Flames. When I got Opeth’s Watershed it was a lot different than what I expected. It was enough to get me curious and want to hear more Opeth and now I have every Opeth Album and listened to Damnation, of all records during my morning workout. When I heard that In Flames won it, my first thought was that Swedish Grammy’s aren’t much different than American Grammy’s. The person you want and expect to win never does.

Opeth front-man Mikael Akerfeldt wasn’t sore about the loss. It’s tough to be upset about someone else winning something when that person or band is/are your friends(s). Here’s just a slice of what Akerfeldt had to say on the subject.

“We didn’t win the Grammy award this year either and I admit I got a little disappointed although it doesn’t really mean anything. Since I’m there at the show I wanna fucking win! But IN FLAMES got it. They’re mates of ours so I’m happy for them.”

He goes on to say that the Grammy’s were the same as usual. Boring and stuck up people with little career outside of Sweden.

Source: Blabbermouth

Image: Newscom

Post from: Metal Martyr

MM: You have quite a resume as a guitar player with bands such as Arch Enemy, Tiamat, Human Clay, Krux and now Opeth.

FA: I never played in Human Clay, that’s actually wrong. I think I may have played a guitar solo on one of their albums as a guest solo, but I was never in their band.

MM: So obviously you can’t trust everything on Wikipedia?

FA: Exactly. Maybe they put that in there because I may be credited in one of their albums for a solo.

MM: Now that you’re with Opeth, is this a temporary thing or is it a permanent gig?

FA: It’s a permanent gig, it’s been like that for a long time.

MM: You’ve know the band for quite some time?

FA: Yeah, when I played in Arch Enemy we were on Gigantour together, so we hang out a lot. I used to hang out a lot with Ax (Martin Axenrot) and Mikael. I knew Mikael before and I’ve known him for about five years and we’d meet at festivals in   and Stockholm.

MM: Back to Arch Enemy real quick. When you signed on for that gig, was there anything in the back of your mind thinking that Chris (Amott) might be coming back at some time?

FA: Yeah, I did think about that because you have the fact that they’re brothers and Chris was there from the beginning, but when I joined Mike Amott told me that he (Chris) wasn’t coming back, so I was like the permanent member. But he was away from the band for those two years and maybe he realized it wasn’t so fun, maybe he realized that he wanted to be back in the band so. It was cool for me because their brother so I understood. I still have good contact with both of them, Mike and Chris.

MM: How long have you guys been touring the US now on this leg?

FA: we’re right at the end of  a six week US tour.

MM: Was there any time for you to catch the Carcass reunion?

FA: yeah last summer we played a bunch of European festivals together and we actually played a couple of gigs with Carcass, so we actually went out in the crowd and watched them, in Greece actually. It was really good.

MM: What’s the major difference between playing with Opeth and playing in Arch Enemy?

FA: Playing in Arch Enemy was good for me because there’s a lot of thrashy, faster type of riffing. It was more…high adrenaline all the time in the live sets. And the Opeth song are more complex, longer songs and more diverse type of guitar playing. In Arch Enemy its more of a metal thing. A lot of solos in Arch Enemy. I don’t play as much solos in Opeth but I do play some

MM: Do you play any of the melodic acoustic parts?

FA: Oh yeah, I play like melody solos and acoustic parts and everything. That’s another difference with Arch Enemy because the Opeth type of rhythm guitar playing that Mikael does, the way he puts his riffs together is very odd, if you say?

MM: So he has his own unique style.

FA: Yeah, I think and it makes the gig even more fun to play and also there are a lot of acoustic parts with finger style picking that I put a lot of time in to. So it’s very cool and very different. It took me a couple of months to adjust to the sound but I was a big Opeth fan before so it made it east because I got to play with one of my favorite bands.

MM: was it difficult to learn some of the back catalog?

FA: Yeah, not so hard but more challenging but I like challenges which hopefully drives me to better guitar playing. In the beginning I was like ‘Oh shit, there’s so much material I have to learn’ but I took one riff at a time, one song at a time and Mikael showed me the riffs so that made it easier too.

MM: Any plans in the future for Krux?

FA: Yeah, I still play with Krux. It’s the only band I play with apart from Opeth, which is my main priority. Leif  who is the founder of Krux, Leif Edling (Krux Bass player) from Candlemass, he’s quite busy with Candlemass and the other guys have families. They used to be in Entombed, the drummer (Peter Stjärnvind) , the rhythm guitar player used to play bass in Entombed…

MM: Jorgen

FA: Yeah, Jorgen Sanstrom

MM: he used to also play in Grave

FA: Exactly, he used to sing in Grave.

MM: I liked Grave better when he was singing, but that’s just my personal preference.

FA: He’s cool, he has some other bands now and Peter, the drummer has Nifelheim. So everyone in Krux is busy with other bands but we will do a new record, it’s planned for the end of next year.

MM: How many tours have you been through North America?

FA: This is the fifth. Three times with Arch Enemy and this is the second time with Opeth.

MM: What’s the best thing about touring North America.

FA: I like it. I like also being on the bus and not having to go in to hotels with your bags and stuff all the time. It’s cool to always have a place to stay. It’s different, it’s a cool variation going to the east coast and the west coast…

MM: You catch it at the right time you get all four seasons. Does that ever become a problem going from hot to cold and maybe getting sick with different climates?

FA: I got a cold for about a week but it’s bound to happen with everyone on a  tour bus. It kind of gets passed around.

MM: What’s maybe the worse thing about touring North America?

FA: Some venues don’t have showers, but we can deal with that and sometimes you’re just dirty for a few days.  Another problem is that you really don’t get to see that much. I never got to see the grand canyon and you miss out on a lot of stuff. It’s not like being a tourist.

MM: Are you still playing ESP guitars?

FA: I played ESP when I was with Arch Enemy, but I went over to PRS after I joined Opeth. I still have a couple of ESP’s that I might play on the road but now I mainly play a single cut PRS guitar. They’re really good sounding guitars and they stay in tune.

MM: What are some of your favored guitars?

FA: I used to play a Les Paul custom but I don’t bring that out on the road anymore. In the late 90’s I played some Floyd Rose style guitars…

MM: something with a nice fast neck?

FA: I always like to fast guitar but I also like a guitar that makes you fight for the tone a little bit

MM: That’s all I have for you. What time do you guys go on?

FA: 10:00 I think. It’s like a two hour set.

MM: Wow. Well thanks again and I’ll see you out there.

FA: Thanks. Take care.

So there you have it. I also kind of tried to get some inside info on the reason Nachmystium got booted from the tour, but Fredrik is a professional dude and didn’t think he should talk about that and he said they’re a good bunch of guys and wishes them well.

All images property and © of MetalMartyr.Com 2008

Post from: Metal Martyr

Baroness went on at 8PM and I wasn’t in to them at all. I wasn’t a fan to begin with so I suppose that would have helped, but sometimes when I catch a band that I’m not really in to at the moment and I see them live it makes me a fan. Not Baroness, sorry. I was expecting a lot more from High On Fire, but I couldn’t get in to them. They were heavy but it just didn’t click for me even though they did pretty well for a three piece. The lighting for both Baroness and High On Fire was terrible so I didn’t get any good shots of them. Matt Pike from High On Fire plays this odd 9 string guitar. Not like a wide fret board type guitar, but this one was made by First Act. Yeah, they sell First Acts at Wal Mart but I’m sure the artists models are much better and you’d be surprised how many artists they have on their roster. Anyway, the treble strings are doubled up like a 12 string and it gives the guitar a thicker, chorused sound.

I only stayed for about half of Opeth’s set. Their set runs about 2 hours and the venue was packed like a sardine can. They sounded great and the lighting for them was good for photos since they don’t let you use unless your using a point and shoot type camera from the crowd. Opeth put on an amazing show. It may not be a balls out, slam-fest, but it’s a great show. There was no moshing that I saw of and I think it was for two reasons. First reason was that Opeth is kind of a tough band to mosh to because of the tempo changes. Second reason, as I stated it was crammed in there. If you ever have the chance, go to an Opeth show. Buy your tickets before the show and save yourself the trouble and the few bucks. T-shirts and other merch is expensive so bring plenty of extra cash for that if you want it. Below is the set-list for the show.

1. Heir Apparent
2. The Grand Conjuration
3. Serenity Painted Death
4. Hope Leaves
5. The Lotus Eater
6. Bleak
7. The Night and the Silent Water
8. Deliverance
9. Demon of the Fall
10. The Drapery Falls

All Images are property of MetalMartyr.Com and are not to be used with specific permission from the owner.

Post from: Metal Martyr

How’s the chemistry with the other bands? You guys have probably toured with High on Fire before but maybe not Nachtmystium?

MA: No, we’ve never toured with them. We never met those guys, so we’re just getting acquainted with them. They seem like nice people, but we haven’t hung out that much yet. We’ll have time because this tour goes all the way through October, but not with Nachtmystium; they’re leaving in the middle of the tour.

Have the fans been generally responsive to the new material when you play it live?

FA: Yeah, it’s very good.

MA: Well it sounds better than the old stuff.

FA: When we did the Progressive Nation Tour, for instance, we tried out “Heir Apparent,” the second track from the record. I would say the reaction was louder than the old songs.

MA: We’ll see stuff on forums and E-mails we get through Myspace “Oh I want to hear the new songs.” I seem to recall when I went to gigs for like Iron Maiden or something; I was like “Oh, that’s that new song.” That’s a good thing that people seem very anxious to hear what we’re doing now as opposed to what we did before.

Do you worry about alienating the old fans because of the change in sound?

MA: No, but I think what we’re doing is actually the only way to keep all types of fans. To be honest even though people have their favorite records and eras of the band, I think generally somebody might be wishing for another Blackwater Park, but I don’t think that would please them. I think we have to basically take our pasts with us but try to develop something new. Once you try to please the fans, you come up with something shitty or gimmicky.

Speaking of that, do you guys agree or disagree as it applies to Metallica? Have you guys heard the new album?

MA: I heard one song.

One song? What did you think?

MA: It started like Load or something, but then it picked up and became really fast. I thought it was cool and definitely a step in the right direction. I think it’s a bit like a desperate move in a way for them. People want the old stuff, so it didn’t sound like a step forward more like a step backward. I still think, from what I heard, people are saying that it’s the best one since the Black Album which I don’t think is far from the truth. I didn’t like the Load or Reload albums. I didn’t like St. Anger either

To read more on this interview head on over to Metalsucks.net

Image used with permission from Newscom.com

Post from: Metal Martyr

Bloodbath

The next chapter of this brutal saga arrives on October 6^th 2008 with the release of the new studio album, The Fathomless Mastery.

The Fathomless Mastery mini-site is now online at www.peaceville.com/bloodbath/thefathomlessmastery .

The site will feature a different track from the album each week in the run up to the release with Iesous being added today. Check back next Friday for the next track. The site also contains info on the album, downloads, a free mp3 of the track  ‘Mock The Cross’ to anyone who signs up to the mailing list and also gives you the chance to pre-order the album.

Hints of what The Fathomless Mastery may possess were provided by Unblessing The Purity, the mini-album released earlier this year on Peaceville Records. Described by Metal Hammer as ‘a near-flawless celebration of Swedish brutality’ and by Zero Tolerance as ‘a slab of storming, top-quality death metal’, the mini-album has set the bar high.

‘Unblessing The Purity’ also featured the return of Opeth’s Mikael Åkerfeldt on vocal duties and arrival of Per ‘Sodomizer’ Eriksson (ex-21 Lucifers, ex-Genocrush Ferox) on guitar, joining Katatonia’s Anders Nyström and Jonas Renkse and Martin “Axe” Axenrot, also from Opeth.

This line-up has once again reunited for The Fathomless Mastery which they have described as representing ‘nothing but hateful brutality.’ Promising their ‘most crushing production yet’ few would dare to argue with the band’s claim that…‘Bloodbath is here to slay, Bloodbath is here to stay!’

Post from: Metal Martyr