On September 1st, Ventenner dropped their monolithic new album, Distorture, via Sonic Fire Records. Recently, front man Charlie Dawe hit us up with his own personal guide to some of the most important electronic rock songs, ever.
Vincent Cavanagh on being a recording artist: “You just become more honest at time goes on. It think it’s one of the things about growing up. You chip away the layers of your personality, of your façade, especially like young working-class males from the north of England. You kind of have a strength to show, you don’t want to show any weakness… there’s a lot of pent-up things that you’re feeling that you want to get out at that point as well, so it kind of goes hand and hand with that and your adolescence. But then of course as you realize that you don’t really have very many things to worry about, if you’re OK, if you’re very secure, then you can start to be yourself and at that point other sides of your music comes out.”
American Death Metal entrepreneurs, Six Feet Under, just finished a mini tour through some North American cities. The reason for said campaign was to support their latest album, Unborn. Considered as a companion piece to their previous recording, Undead, this new studio venture sees the group navigating throughout some familiar territories. However, on both Undead and Unborn SFU also explores new sonic landscapes while during the process becoming a more technically proficient entity. Just before going on tour, iconic growler and SFU’s founder, Chris Barnes, spoke with us about the particularities of these new vicious slabs of infectious, groovy Death Metal.
I recently had a chance to speak with Wayne Petti, vocalist and guitarist for the band Cuff the Duke, a group that blends indie rock with traditional country and folk music creating a sort of alt-country sound. Here’s what Petti had to say.
JD & The Straight Shot’s founder and frontman Jim Dolan sat down with PureGrainAudio’s Mitch Lafon moments before their November 7th, 2012 show in Montreal (opening for the legendary ZZ Top). Dolan, who is President and CEO of Cablevision and Executive Chairman of Madison Square Garden, Inc., also oversees New York sports teams the NBA’s Knicks and the NHL’s Rangers. In this exclusive audio interview, the extremely busy rocker discussed his love for music, the music business itself and the band’s latest album, Midnight Run.
Boy Hits Car recently wrapped up their extensive “Embrace The Fire Tour” which had them crisscrossing the United States like crazy! Earlier on, just before the tour was starting, we managed to connect with vocalist and guitarist Cregg Rondell to talk gear. Cregg highlighted his favourite gear, namely his Takamine 12 string acoustic/electric.
The two man sludge metal band Galvano hails from Gothenburg, Sweden and consists of vocalist/guitarist Mattias Nööjd and drummer Fredrik Käll. With just two members, the band still manage to create a thick, thundering wall of sound. Mattias caught up with us and broke down his guitar and amp rig to help us understand how said sound is made!
On October 20th at Le Métropolis in Montreal, QC, Black Label Society front man, guitar God and all around awesome dude, Zakk Wylde, sat down for a candid one-on-one with PureGrainAudio’s Mitch Lafon. The two talk at length about BLS’ last album, The Song Remains Not The Same, Zakk’s book, “Bringing Metal to the Children: The Complete Berzerker’s Guide to World Tour Domination”, and much more. Zakk his usual humorous and charming self, and elaborated on the rumoured Pantera reunion that would feature Zakk on guitar, his love for Deep Purple and his new Guitar Apprentice series.
I recently had the opportunity to speak with Mike Riggs, vocalist and guitarist of the band Scum Of The Earth, about the newest release, The Devil Made Me Do It. This is the band’s third full-length release since their formation back in 2003, after Rob Zombie took some time off to pursue his movie career. Here’s how the conversation went.
I recently caught up with lead singer and guitarist Cody Page and drummer Eddie Core of the indie rock band Armada to discuss their new release, Paper Ghosts. This three piece outfit weaves terrific storytelling into a lush musical landscape creating a sound all their own. Here’s what the guys had to say about the new disc, their writing process and more!
Not long ago I had the great pleasure of speaking with thrash metal legend and pioneer Steve “Zetro” Souza about his new band Hatriot. As one might expect, Hatriot’s music is old school thrash with a modern twist that really kicks some serious tail. Here’s what Souza had to say about the band, the new material and what it’s like to still be trashing after nearly 30 years.
Gojira guitarist and vocalist Joe Duplantier held court with PureGrainAudio’s Mitch Lafon at Heavy MTL in Montreal on August 12th, 2012.
Love ’em or hate ’em, Nachtmystium have put out some pretty important albums over the past decade. Their Black Meddle releases reinvented how black metal could sound and by mixing it with the psychedelic sounds of Pink Floyd they successfully created something new and highly interesting. While those albums may have been more “popular” than their pure black metal offerings, they’re never been afraid to try new things. Diehard fans will be happy to hear though, that with their new release Nachtmystium has returned to their true form with their most black metal-sounding album in ages. Read our interview with band leader Blake Judd for some insight and crank up the new record!
In light of the release of Exumer’s third studio album, and first in over 25 years, I caught up with frontman and vocalist Mem Von Stein to discuss among other things, the new record Fire & Damnation, his day job and his view on why Exumer didn’t make it into the revered ranks of the Big Three of teutonic thrash metal. Von Stein and I also go on to speak about the difficulties faced by the band over the years, his retrospective views on the unholy trio’s success, the surprisingly un-metal activities he does outside of his music career, and an inane question from yours Truly. Read on and enjoy!