Meshuggah announce US tour with Animals As Leaders and Intronaut

Sweden’s masters of extreme technical metal MESHUGGAH are pleased to announce their 2013 headlining return to North America with Animals As Leaders as direct support and Intronaut opening each evening. This continent-shifting, sonically devastating tour will launch in Orlando, Florida on February 11th and will run through March 3rd in Las Vegas, Nevada. 

Guitarist Mårten Hagström shares the following about the upcoming trek: “Finally we’re getting our asses back over the pond to deliver a second helping of the Ophidian trek across North America. We are excited. We WILL see you there!”

02/11/13  Beacham Theatre – Orlando, FL

02/12/13  Center Stage – Atlanta, GA

02/13/13  The Fillmore Charlotte – Charlotte, NC

02/14/13  Theater of Living Arts – Philadelphia, PA

02/15/13  Roseland Ballroom – New York, NY

02/16/13  The Fillmore Silver Spring – Silver Spring, MD

02/17/13  House of Blues – Boston, MA

02/19/13  Sound Academy – Toronto, ON - CANADA

02/20/13  House of Blues – Cleveland, OH

02/21/13  Bogart’s – Cincinnati, OH

02/22/13  House of Blues – Chicago, IL

02/23/13  Pop’s – Sauget, IL

02/24/13  Mill City Nights – Minneapolis, MN

02/26/13  Union Hall – Edmonton, AB - CANADA

02/27/13  MacEwan Hall Ballroom – Calgary, AB - CANADA

03/01/13  Ace of Spades – Sacramento, CA

03/02/13  Wiltern Theater – Los Angeles, CA

03/03/13  House of Blues @ Mandalay Bay – Las Vegas, NV

Advanced presale tickets & V.I.P bundles are available via Artist Arena: http://tixx1.artistarena.com/meshuggah/  Login: meshuggah ; Password: tickets

 Tickets will go on sale through normal ticketing outlets on Friday, November 30th.

Review: Parkway Drive - Atlas

The fourth album from Australian metalcore outfit Parkway Drive gives both fans of the band’s early releases and fans of the more experimental side shown in their last album Deep Blue something to enjoy. With 12 diverse tracks that offer any metal enthusiast something to chew on, Atlas may become Parkway Drive fans’ favorite album to date.

The opening track “Sparks” serves as the perfect introduction to the album, leading into the aggressive “Old Ghosts/New Regrets.” Vocalist Winston McCall’s guttural screams of “We’re born with nothing and we die alone” grab the attention of the listener and leave a lasting impression. Parkway Drive changes it up with the more melodic “Dream Run” before leading into “Wild Eyes.” Perhaps the best track Atlas has to offer, “Wild Eyes” brings gang vocals into the mix of hard hitting drums and punching guitars that characterize a classic Parkway Drive song. “Dark Days” picks things up with endless double-bass kicks, plenty of growling, and the necessary breakdown or two.

“The River” starts off things with melodic, even atmospheric, music and includes a choir section, a nice rest from the break-neck pace and harshness of the rest of the album. More standard tracks that you would expect from Parkway Drive follow, but the quintet offers another change in pace with the title track. The incorporation of the string section gives an almost celestial feel to the song, a complete 180 from the high-intensity of the previous two tracks. The album finishes strong with “Snake Oil and Holy Water,” a thrasher from beginning to end, and “Blue and the Grey,” the final and longest track of the album that combines trumpets into the mix.

 While Atlas includes tracks that embody what Parkway Drive is all about and why they are so respected in the metalcore scene, it is in the moments that the band steps away from the consistent fast-paced metalcore standard that really makes Atlas stand out.

Track by Track: Under City Skylines' “Destinations”

Under City Skylines takes us through the band’s new record, Destinations. Buy the album (if you haven’t already) and read the descriptions below.

Inception - Intro

A Becoming Of Me - This was honestly one of the first songs written for the album, it was originally called something much less serious then the actual song name. We decided when recording that the album was essentially going to be a concept album based on where the band and all our experiences consisted of. This song was all about identity for us, it was when we first pretty much went from a Drop D sound to a much heavier sound in Drop A#. To us it was such a great first song to really capture where we were going as a band. This song is often played live because of the energy of the song in its entirety.

What This Means - This song is completely and well evident that its about strained relationships. Everybody’s relationships in their lives are not perfect so this song was written for everyone to relate too. This song in our opinion is
more poppy then the rest. We didn’t want every song to become so repetitive for the album. This song was also structured a little differently then what we were usually accustomed to with a bridge and 3rd chorus. Overall we enjoyed the up tempo sound of the song but we generally don’t play this song live because its not that crowd interactive.

Expectations - Lyrically this song was written in the studio, because in production some things got changed and structured a little different. The electro part was exactly what we were going for as a break for this song so we were
really excited about this song. Coming right out in the beginning this song it says “You Mean Nothing To Me”, haha it was definitely an angry song and was directly related to everyone who has lied on us for personal pleasure or gain. In this crazy four years we have been told many things including every lie in the book, so basically this was a “Fuck You” to everyone who never held up to their end of their word. Expectations is a song we love playing live as well.

Hopeless - Probably the most popular song of the album because it was our first single off the debut album, we loved how this song came out and it is a personal favorite as well as a fan favorite. This song was about our vocalist’s struggle with his family and this was a coming clean song for him. For the longest time I always tried to live up to my fathers expectations and I finally wrote a song about pretty much just saying that I was done trying to please him. I was going to start living for myself, says Ricky(vocalist). This is a song that we felt most people could relate to one way or another with whatever personal problems they have going on in their life. This song also had our good friends in Us From Outside guest appearing towards the end. Be sure to check this one out!

Footprints - (Interlude) This was just pretty much a space eater as well as a great transition to “A Paved Path”.

A Paved Path - This song is very up tempo in your face kind of song. Since this band has been in existence we have always been formed on Christian morals but have never claimed to be a “Christian Labeled” band. We didn’t want the added pressure of trying to be a certain kind of way or be upheld to a certain standard. Therefore, we decided to make a song based off the struggle of being a Christian but not really living the standard that is associated with living that way! In todays world it is so hard to live with a Christian mindset, so we wanted to demonstrate the harsh reality of believing but at the same time having so many questions and roadblocks of living that kind of lifestyle. Check out the sick breakdown towards the end and follow the lyrics; very strong stuff.

Together or Alone - This song is an all out assault on how we feel our friends are our family and about keeping your loved ones close. Since some of our members have grown up in very strained relationships in the families or their friendships we strived to make a song that hit home on so many levels with how we felt about that. This song in our opinion is well structured and we love the 2 step transition we incorporated to keep to our rooted Virginia Beach area on how we first started. This song is played a lot live and for some of our fans who have gotten ahold of this song they really seem to enjoy it, which to us is the most important part of why we make songs such as this.

Make the Effort - This song is the shortest song but not the weakest of any sorts. For the most part this song was written in the studio. We had a plan and knew what we wanted to do with it but we just had a lot of missing pieces. With the help of Taylor Larson (who recorded/produced the record in Bethesda MD) he really helped push this song into a personal favorite of the band. This song really has such an awesome message about being the best person you can be as you walk through your life. This song ended up being short because we didn’t want to overdue and make such a typical oversaturated metalcore song.

We felt like we did just enough to it to stay tied to the roots of UCS but at the same time represent growth of the band on where we were willing to stretch our musical minds to find new things people had never heard from us before. We hope you enjoy this song as much as we do!

Destinations - The title track is a very emotional driven song as we stated earlier this record was such a driven record on where the band wanted to go and where we at in all our lives as well as musically. This was our first studio record where we put everything into the material we had. The image of Under City Skylines is right here in this song throughout. The song to us had such a catchy chorus, and just stayed really strong throughout. The ending is definitely something new that we had never done, where we implemented a spoken part over the music.

It’s such an inspirational part of the song much like something of the likes like “For Today”. The words have endless meaning for anyone who applies it to something in their life which is really cool to us. This song has been talked about being played live but it has never formulated, right now it seems as it definitely is a track to buy the album for!

Goodbye To Gravity - New Album Available For Streaming

Bucharest metallers GOODBYE TO GRAVITY’s offered up their debut CD for
free streaming for one week only on the band’s Youtube Channel
(www.youtube.com/goodbyetogravity). The album was recorded at Traian 150 
Studios in Bucharest, Romania and mastered at Fascination Street Studios
in Sweden by Jens Bogren (OPETH, KREATOR, SOILWORK etc).

The band played this year’s Summer Breeze Open Air festival in
Dinkelsbühl, Germany, after being selected from over 2000 bands to
compete in the yearly ‘New Blood Award’.

The band has already released three videos, also available on their
Youtube Channel www.youtube.com/goodbyetogravity

Hailing from Bucharest - Romania, GOODBYE TO GRAVITY started as an
unexpected mixture of former members from the heavy metal band
THUNDERSTORM (which in their 10+ years of activity opened for
heavyweights like JUDAS PRIEST, MANOWAR, HELLOWEEN, RAGE, EVERGREY etc.)
and the winner of the 2008 national TV casting show Megastar (Romanian
equivalent of Idol).

KOLDBRANN to release 'Vertigo'

Norwegian black metal enforcers KOLDBRANN are the latest addition to Season of Mist’s Underground Activists Division. The band’s forthcoming album is entitled ‘Vertigo’ and has been set for release on January 22nd in North America.

“Vertigo” can be pre-ordered at the Season of Mist E-shop. The album is available in CD format, and a gate-fold double LP available in black and transparent vinyl.

KOLDBRANN recently unleashed “Totalt Sjelelig Bankerott”, a 7” single strictly limited to 300 copies worldwide, with an exclusive B side entitled ““Kasjtjeijs Svøpe”. This vinyl edition is already sold-out but the single is available digitally! The a music video for “Totalt Sjelelig Bankerott”, directed by Effektor and featuring guest vocals by Erlend Hjelvik from KVELERTAK can be viewed at Season of Mist’s Youtube channel.

Monks of Mellonwah win "Best International Rock Act" at LA Music Awards, play U.S live shows

Australian alternative rock group Monks of Mellonwah recently won the “Best International Rock Act” award at the 2012 Los Angeles Music Awards on November 15. Currently, the band are touring throughout the California and New York regions, including shows at the iconic Whiskey A Go-Go in Los Angeles and the Mercury Lounge in New York City.

The Monks have had a whirlwind of a year since their “Best Indie Rock Band” win at the 2012 Artists in Music Awards earlier in 2012 and the Summer release of their new EP “Neurogenesis”, which received very positive reviews. The music video for “Neverending Spirit” landed the Monks airplay on the MTV network and a heightened popularity worldwide.

The new full-length album will find them working with famed producer Keith Olsen for 3 tracks, and self-producing the rest. The album is due for release in early 2013. Monks of Mellonwah full tour dates are below (dates subject to change. Visit www.monksofmellonwah.com for updated dates):

Nov 25 @ Whiskey a Go Go, Los Angeles, CA
Nov 29 @ TRIP, Santa Monica, CA
Nov 30 @ Garage Inc, San Bernardino, CA (HOLD)
Dec 01 @ Jose’s Underground, Monterey, CA
Dec 02 @ Rockit Room, San Francisco, CA
Dec 03 @ Old Ironsides, Sacramento, CA
Dec 06 @ Shrine World Music Venue, Harlem), NYC
Dec 07 @ The Room, Brookfield, CT
Dec 08 @ BSP Lounge, Kingston, NY
Dec 09 @ The Saint, Asbury Park, NJ
Dec 10 @ Mercury Lounge, New York, NY
Dec 11 @ The Grape Room, Philadelphia, PA

The Cellophane Flowers offer ‘Tears of a Clown’ as an early Christmas present

With the festive season around the corner, full of sparkly dresses, Christmas parties, spending time with friends and family and bursting with the spirit of giving a little more love this year, and The Cellophane Flowers are definitely getting all festive with their early Christmas present, ‘Tears of a Clown’.  The sensational quirky indie-pop foursome are giving the track away as a free download for you to add to those playlists, especially if you’re wanting to slow things down a bit and take a step back from the busy, glitzy and energetic time of year.

Download ‘Tears of a Clown’ free here:

http://soundcloud.com/altpr/the-cellophane-flowers-tears/s-r5hfK

Eat Your Heart Out Tour announces bands

The first annual Eat Your Heart Out Tour featuring King Conquer, The Last Ten Seconds Of Life, Sworn In, and Adaliah will be running February 1st-28th, 2013 and hitting Eat Your Heart Out Festival in Poughkeepsie, NY February 8th-10th. Dates will be announced soon.

Quicksand's 2nd Pressing of '93 Major Label Debut 'Slip' Now Available

SRC Vinyl has released the first official vinyl reissue of Quicksand’s major label debut, Slip, since its original pressing in 1993. The album from the 90’s NYC post-hardcore band fronted by Walter Schreifels (Gorilla Biscuits, Youth of Today, Rival Schools) is re-mastered for vinyl at Sterling Sound and the gatefold jacket contains new photos not on the original pressing.  View the photos as: http://www.shopradiocast.com/product_images/p/149/quicksand-slip-gatefoldjacket__68337_zoom.jpg.

While the first pressing of Slip quickly sold out, the second pressing is shipping now on 180 gram red vinyl.

To pre-order the second pressing: http://www.shopradiocast.com/products/Quicksand-%252d-Slip-LP.html. The album is also available in stores.