Category — Albums

Dave Grohl is excited to get back behind the drum kit for his new project, Them Crooked Vultures.

Currently, Grohl is lead singer and plays electric guitar in the Foo Fighters.  He was previously known as the drummer in Nirvana.

He has now hooked up with Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age and Led Zeppelin’s bass guitarist, John Paul Jones in a new supergroup, and the resulting band will unveil their debut album later this month.

“I don’t need to be the lead singer of a band,” Grohl told BBC 6 Music.

“Within the first couple of minutes of playing, I just knew this is going to be good.”

Grohl and Homme have collaborated before, most notably on the Queens of the Stone Age hit No One Knows in 2002.

However, the Foo Fighters star added that while he had “hung out” with Jones in the past, he had before never had the opportunity to jam with him properly.

Apparently Weezer drummer Pat Wilson misspoke, or something else is a afoot. Pat Wilson told Billboard on the first day of Weezer’s current US tour that the band would be heading back to the studio with Jacknife Lee in November to record a follow up to the band’s “Red Album.”

Guitarist Brian Bell has just recently told Spinner.com that this isn’t exactly happening…

“Someone jumped the gun,” Bell notes, without directly implicating his bandmate. Bell suggests that the band’s current aim is to “focus on promoting The Red Album, and when we have the songs and the time feels right, we’ll record.” According to the guitarist, Weezer’s attitude toward non-Cuomo contributions of late has been a friendly one, and as such, productivity’s at an all time high. Even still, says Bell, “it would be kind of silly to put a timeline on a record that we felt wasn’t ready.”

When I first heard the news from Billboard about another Weezer album coming out so soon, I was skeptical. Last time the band had a successful record (The “Green Album”) and immediately followed it up (”Maladroit”), that record didn’t do so well.

It is exciting that all of the band members will be collaborating this time around. It seems some of the bands best early material was the result of collaborations. Drummer Pat Wilson was never really known for being a busy or even complicated player, but his early work with the band on his Yamaha drum kit was exactly what the songs needed. He is now a Ludwig drums endorser and can be seen playing Ludwig drums exclusively.

Weezer is currently in the midst of finishing up their current US arena tour with Angels & Airwaves as the opener.

10-14 Inglewood, CA - Great Western Forum
10-17 San Diego, CA - Cox Arena
10-18 Phoenix, AZ - Arizona State Fair
10-20 Austin, TX - Frank Erwin Center
10-21 Grand Prairie, TX - Nokia Theater
10-23 Houston, TX - Reliant Arena
10-25 Duluth, GA - Gwinnett Arena

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The Guns N’ Roses “Chinese Democracy” album, which was 17 years in the making, will finally be released on November 23rd, a Sunday.

The album has been rumored, made fun of and talked about so much that it is hard to believe its actually coming out. The album is a Best Buy exclusive, so fans looking to purchase it will have to head there to pick up a copy. After what supposedly happened to an unsuspecting blogger who downloaded and leaked the tracks, you might want to forget about downloading it.

Drummers featured on the “Chinese Democracy” album include Josh Freese and Brain. I have no idea what kind of kits these guys played, or even how many other drummers could’ve been involved in the sessions. I did see pictures of a Pearl drum set accompanying an article about the recording of the album. Both Freese and Brain endorse DW Drums though.

Guns N’ Roses also has a few tracks from the album coming out in various other ways. Chinese Democracy track “Shaclker’s Revenge” will debut in the video game Rock Band 2, while “If The World” will be featured in the credits to “Body of Lies” the new Leonardo DiCaprio/Russell Crow film.

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Recently Brian “Head” Welch, formerly the guitarist of hugely successful metal band Korn spoke to Fox News (of all places) about leaving Korn and his latest album. The album is entitled “Save Me From Myself” and features none other than studio-great Josh Freese as well as bassist Tony Levin (Peter Gabriel, King Crimson, David Bowie).

Blabbermouth.com has a link to the Fox News interview with Head. And while his album is already out and has debuted on the Billboard Top 200, I still haven’t heard it. Even though I was never into Korn, I’m interested to hear it just for Josh Freese’s drumming. I admit that he does a lot of projects, but I’m also wanting to hear the interplay between him and Tony Levin. Also, Josh Freese has long been a DW Drums endorser and I’ve never been disappointed by the drum sounds he manages to get, of course he does have access to some of the best drum tech’s, mics and gear in the world.

I will do my best to check out the album and post my thoughts here.

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With a lot of buzz still going strong after the release of the groups new album “Death Magnetic” (which I actually think is pretty good)…It has been announced that the group is being considered for induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Billboard reports… “Metallica, Run-D.M.C. and the Stooges lead the list of nine acts up for induction next year into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Five will be chosen in January for enshrinement during an April 4 ceremony at Cleveland’s Public Hall.”

The 2009 ceremony will be the first one open to the public since 1997 and will be held in Cleveland, Ohio the home of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Metallica has made a lot of missteps over the years, specifically “St. Anger” and the snare drum sound that came with it. Regardless, the band is arguably one of the most important metal bands of all time and also one of the most successful. Also, contrary to what most people say about Lars Ulrich’s drumming, he definitely knows his way around a kit and how to perfectly compliment James Hetfield’s rhythm guitar.

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Foo Fighters frontman and former Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl is one of the featured musician in an upcoming holiday compilation entitled “We Wish You A Metal Xmas And A Headbanging New Year.” The album which is being released by Eagle Rock Records on October 14^th, will include metal renditions of 12 classic Christmas songs like “Grandma Got Ran Over By A Reindeer.”

This album features many unique collaborations such as Dave Grohl, Lemmy and Billy Gibbons on “Run Rudolph Run,” a song made popular by Chuck Berry in the 1950’s. You can here a sample clip of it on their myspace page. Grohl’s drumming is awesome as always. Other awesome drummers on the album include Korn touring drummer Ray Luzier, former White Zombie drummer John Tempesta and Alice Cooper.

And if that doesn’t have you excited, how about “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” performed by Black Sabbath vocalist Ronnie James Dio and Tony Iommi! You’ve never heard this song played right until you’ve heard played by the original riff-master himself.

Get all of the details about the performers on each track here.

Metallica’s “Death Magnetic” album hit stores Friday and a lot of buzz is still swirling around about it. I came across something I think a lot of drummers will be interested in.

Dave Grohl of Nirvana and Foo Fighters fame, as well as Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins, interviewed Metallica about their new album “Death Magnetic” and some of the songs were broadcast for the first time during the event. Luckily, it is on YouTube currently and features info about the band’s songwriting process and the general theme of the album.

Let it be known that Dave Grohl should seriously consider getting his own radio show. He is a pretty funny guy, as most people know, but he is pretty hilarious asking Metallica all kinds of questions. You can tell these guys have a mutual respect for one another and Dave Grohl even states that he has been a hardcore Metallica fan since 1984.

It was reported earlier this year that the drummer of the Strokes, Fabrizio Moretti, had joined up with his girlfriend, Binki Shapiro and singer/songwriter Rodrigo Amarante to form a band called Little Joy. Their album, will be released November 4th on Rough Trade Records, also home to such acts as Arcade Fire, Low and Jenny Lewis.

Check out this interview for interesting tidbits (like how they named their band after a bar down the street from me in Echo Park).

Little Joy will begin a tour this fall, performing with acts such Devendra Banhart and Gregory Rogove’s Megapuss, who Moretti will also be drumming for on tour.

Little Joy Tracklist:
01 The Next Time Around
02 Brand New Start
03 Play the Part
04 No One’s Better Sake
05 Unattainable
06 Shoulder to Shoulder
07 With Strangers
08 Keep Me in Mind
09 How to Hang a Warhol
10 Don’t Watch Me Dancing
11 Evaporar

Little Joy Tour Dates (w/Megapuss):
09-24 San Diego, CA - Casbah
09-25 Los Angeles, CA - Troubadour
09-26-27 Big Sur, CA - Festival in the Forest
09-28 San Francisco, CA - The Independent
09-30 Seattle, WA - Neumos
10-01 Portland, OR - Doug Fir

A week ago, Lars Ulrich commented on Metallica’s long-anticipated new album, Death Magnetic, being released early via a French record store and leaking to the internet within hours. This week, he gives a little more in an exclusive interview with the drum magazine, Rhythm, which you can read in its entirety in the October 2008 issue. However, in the meantime, (or for those of us who know we are too lazy to ever pick up a real-life magazine) Music Rader gives us a few interesting tidbits to read. Ulrich speaks about working with producer Rick Rubin and how “his whole thing was: ‘We’re not going into the studio until the songs are written. We’re not recording until you can play these songs with your fuckin’ hands tied behind your backs, upside-down, while you’re sleeping…So the studio is not a place of creativity, it’s a place of execution.”

Wow that’s a novel idea, isn’t it? Wish more bands would stick to that philosophy.

I can’t honestly say I’ve heard the new album yet, but something else I think I will appreciate on the new record is that the drums don’t have too many effects. Ulrich mentions that Rubin “likes stuff to be in your face and to sound as organic and natural as possible” and I agree. I want to be able to sit down with the record and feel like the drummer is sitting across from me…a feeling I get when I listen to my 180g copy of In Utero (thanks to Steve Albini). I just find it surprising that someone who has also worked the Dixie Chicks and Justin Timberlake doesn’t want “big fat samples on them and all that shit.” But hopefully Mr. Rubin knows what he’s doing when it comes to saving careers, even if Pitchfork doesn’t seem to think so. After all, if he can do it for Johnny Cash and Neil Diamond, why not Metallica?

Good luck, boys. I’m waiting till Friday to grab your album.

Usually I’m really on top of reporting leaks, especially for big name bands. This time however I’m a few days late, not just because I didn’t know but because I don’t really care that much. Maybe my mind will change once I get to listen to the whole album, but after hearing “Cyanide” and new single “The Day That Never Comes” I just wasn’t really that psyched to hear the rest of the album.

While I cannot legally link to the leaked album, I can direct you to Stereogum’s post about the leak which includes several youtube links compiled in one place.

From what I’ve heard so far, Lars Tama drums are sounding pretty good, as is his drumming…it is the weak and recycled songwriting that ruins the album for me, even though there are some killer riffs. Check out “Unforgiven III” to see what I mean.