Wow, almost an entire Monday without an update. Well, I assure you I have a very good excuse. The fact is that I started a new/old job today. I went back to work for my old employer in a new position. First day on the job “The Man” had me bustin’ my ass for 10 hours.

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.

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Opeth’s management is warning fans that the site Opethtickets.com is selling fake tickets and are urging fans to NOT buy from the site.

I checked in to this site and you’d be a blooming idiot to purchase from that site anyway. I check the Starland Ballroom in New Jersey and you can get tickets to that show for $20.00 in advance. On Opethtickets.com they are $59 to $550.00 each if you purchase two. I certainly hope that’s a typo and it was supposed to be $55.00. I don’t know how “Fake” they are because they sell them through stubhub.com, which as far as I know is a legitimate ticket outlet. Anyone that has already purchased tickets at those prices deserves to get ripped off just for being such a dumb-ass. I have found that the best bet is to purchase them through a venue’s website and it’s usually a little cheaper.

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Dream Theater will be taking their Progressive Nation tour to Europe and the UK. Along for the ride will be Sweden prog-metal masters, Opeth. Also on the tour will be Bigelf and Unexpect.

I’m sure you’re familiar with Dream Theater and Opeth, but chances are you haven’t heard of or heard much of Bigelf. Bigelf is a rock outfit that kind of fuses the sounds of Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd and The Beatles into an amazingly different, yet cool sound. They released Cheat The Gallows last year through custard records. Dates have yet to be confirmed for Progressive Nation.

Image: Amazon.com

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.

Opeth performed the track Coil from Watershed on Swedish TV with Nathalie Lorichs as guest vocalist. Nathalie is the girlfriend of Opeth’s drummer Martin Axenrot. The performance was aired on Nyhetsmorgon show on Swedish TV4.

Mikael Akerfeldt seems like a pretty down to earth and collected dude. I suppose to make the music that Opeth does, you have to have an immense amount of patience. I like In Flames Sense Of Purpose, but it didn’t have the effect that Opeth’s Watershed did on me. Up until about a year ago I was mainly in to American and British heavy metal. I knew of a few bands here and there from Sweden, Germany and such places but I never really pushed to explore until I started writing for Metal Martyr. I heard the names Opeth and In Flames many times before, just never got around to checking out their music.

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Metal Martyr Best Live Shows Of 2008. I’m going to break this down by single bands and not so much the tour or show name. I saw a good amount of shows this year. In fact I went to more shows just this year than I ever have in my whole life before before this year. This year has had some great shows come my way and a few I have had to travel a few hours for. Through some of these shows I’ve learned of bands and learned became a bigger fan of other bands. I’d say one of the best ways to discover new bands is to get to a show early enough before the headlining band comes on and catch the opening acts.  With that said, let me get to 10 of my favorite bands I saw live in 2008.

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2008 has been a great year for metal. Here is my Top 10 Favorite Metal Albums of 2008 (that I own). I know that there are probably a lot of other amazing metal albums that came out this year but I can only go off of what I own and what I’ve heard. So more or less these are my favorites and not some definitive collection of what I think is the best. How many people can honestly say that they have heard and thoroughly listened to every new metal album that came out this year? Anyway, let’s get to it.

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With Bloodbath’s new album comes new merch. One of those pieces of merch was a T-shirt that debuted around the 6th of November. The T-shirt titled “Mock The Cross“, the name of the 4th track from The Fathomless Mastery. The T-shirt in questions features Christ upon the cross with a demon puking on his head with snakes and vultures all around. For a detailed image click here.

Now this isn’t the worse T-shirt we have ever seen, nor is the artwork really all that good, but the depiction is obviously enough to upset people and the company that was printing the first round has stopped production due to the owners morals. Sure it is only a T-shirt, but it still offends people and especially Christians. That’s probably what it was meant to do in the first place. That’s what any T-shirt that has a sacrilegious image on it is meant to do.

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Alright, the contests for last month are over and here are the winner.

The winner of the Opeth signer guitar pick is Alex Rochon and the winner of the All That Remains Overcome CD is Giles.

I’ll send them out this week.