A&E has set a September 7th premiere for Biography: The Nine Lives of Ozzy Osbourne, a new documentary chronicling the metal icon’s life and career. The documentary, which was first announced in January, was slated to premiere at SXSW in March prior to the festival being canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The 86-minute feature combines archival footage with new interviews, including sit-downs with Ozzy and his family (Sharon, Jack, and Kelly), Marilyn Manson, Rick Rubin, Post Malone, Rob Zombie, Jonathan Davis, Ice-T, and more. As a press release states, “Biography: The Nine Lives of Ozzy Osbourne traces Ozzy’s life from his childhood in poverty and time in prison, to fronting the iconic Black Sabbath and a successful solo career, to one of rock’s elder statesman and a lovable 21st...
Ihsahn (courtesy of Spinefarm Records), Taylor Swift (courtesy of Republic Records) The cover artwork of Taylor Swift’s surprise new album folklore immediately caused a stir on social media, thanks to the decidedly metal look of the gloomy black & white forest scene. Now, an actual black-metal legend, Ihsahn, is calling out the pop superstar for the folklore cover’s uncanny resemblance to the artwork for his “Stridig” single, released earlier this year. The woods and black metal have had a longstanding relationship over the decades. Many a time, our favorite corpse-painted musicians have found themselves stuck in the middle of a desolate forest, with their only way out a combination of shrieking vocals and heavily distorted guitars. Now, Taylor Swift has found herself in the same predi...
Zeal & Ardor frontman Manuel Gagneux has revived his long-running solo project, Birdmask, and is premiering the music video for new song “Set Me on Fire” exclusively via Heavy Consequence. Birdmask is Gagneux in his own creative element. Although some of the atmosphere and experimental ideas of his metal outfit Zeal & Ardor are present here, Gagneux embraces a varied spectrum of sounds — “pop-rocked-bliss” as he calls it. Most notably, his soaring vocals remain right up front. “I’ve had this song ready for a couple of years now but being preoccupied with other projects kind of forced me to leave it on the back burner,” Gagneux says. “I feel like it’s about time to let it out. In the time between then and now I was lucky enough to tour the world with a different project, score ...
Stone Temple Pilots, featuring current lead singer Jeff Gutt, have announced an upcoming livestream performance of their classic 1992 debut album, Core. Plus, they’ve released a pair of archival concert recordings from 2011 and 2019, the former featuring the late Scott Weiland, the band’s original frontman. As live music remains in a relative stasis during the pandemic, the Stone Temple Pilots livestream is the latest in a bevy of virtual performances from isolated bands and artists. Like a ticket to a physical concert, access to the pay-per-view performance costs $9.99. The show airs next Friday (July 31st) at 5:00 p.m. PT / 8:00 p.m. ET via live music curator nugs.tv. Stone Temple Pilots are also sharing shows from 2011 and 2019 via nugs, which hosts official live recordings of many popu...
The Sword have announced a new socially distant performance series, Conquest of Quarantine. The heavy rockers are today premiering the first tune from the three-song lockdown session, a cover of T. Rex’s “Children of the Revolution’, exclusively via Heavy Consequence. The new series comes on the heels of The Sword’s recent career-spanning compilations, Conquest of Kingdoms and Chronology 2006-2018. Both cull archival live recordings, B-sides, and rarities. As singer-guitarist J.D. Cronise told us in our recent interview, the band hoped to tour in support of the album before the pandemic effectively paused live music. Instead, The Sword performed together virtually in isolation and streaming the footage for fans. “Since we’re not touring this summer as originally planned, we figured we shou...
If you’ve ever wanted to build your own Clutch setlist, now’s your chance. The band might even play it during its upcoming livestream performance, dubbed “Live from the Doom Saloon Volume II”. Clutch are encouraging fans to pick their “dream 14-song setlist” for the virtual concert, which costs $9 and streams at 5:00 p.m. PT / 8:00 p.m. ET on August 7th (and available on-demand through that weekend). Donations from the show go to benefit the Innocent Lives Foundation. Any Clutch song from their 1991 “Pitchfork” 7-inch through 2018’s Book of Bad Decisions and their recent Weathermaker Vault Series is game. It’s a lot to choose from, but whoever submits the winning setlist — as picked by the band — will receive an insane prize pack including: a TremLord 30 combo amplifier from Orange Am...
Napalm Death have shared the new song “Backlash Just Because”. It’s the lead single and first music we’ve heard from the band’s upcoming album, Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism, out September 18th. The ferocious track finds the UK extreme metal pioneers in their thrashing element. The song’s chaotic noise and grindcore absurdity is anchored by frontman Barney Greenway’s subversive lyrics. “Backlash Just Because” set the blueprint for the rest of the album’s lyrical content and the skeptical optimism of its evocative title: Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism. “This song in particular really spurred me on when I was writing lyrics for the album overall,” Greenway said during an interview on Sirius XM’s Liquid Metal. “It’s raucous and traditional, but also quirky and discordant and ...
AC/DC’s legendary Back in Black album is turning 40 years old, and we’re celebrating with a special digital event featuring a bevy of notable musicians. “AC/DC Back in Black 40th Anniversary: A Virtual Celebration”, presented by Consequence of Sound and Gibson Guitars, premieres Friday, July 24th, at 5:00 p.m. ET / 2:00 p.m. PT. Hosted by guitar virtuoso Jared James Nichols, “AC/DC Back in Black 40th Anniversary: A Virtual Celebration” will stream across Consequence of Sound‘s social platforms, including Facebook, YouTube, and Twitch. The event features testimonials, performances, and guitar tutorials from such prominent artists as Slash, Juanes, Dee Snider, Alice in Chains’ William DuVall, Orianthi, and members of Cage the Elephant, Trivium, Anthrax, Maná, Airbourne, Beartooth, Refus...
The 2020 Aftershoc Festival in Sacramento, California has officially been rescheduled to fall 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Organizers have announced that previously revealed 2020 headliners Metallica and My Chemical Romance will remain on the bill for the 2021 iteration, which takes place October 7th-10th. Metallica were scheduled to play two sets at Aftershock 2020 as part of five U.S. festival appearances this year, all of which have been canceled due to the pandemic. The thrash-metal legends will play two sets at the 2021 edition, headlining Friday, October 8th, and Sunday, October 10th. My Chemical Romance headline the Saturday in between. The festival released a statement announcing the postponement: “After all the harm caused by COVID-19, there is nothing that we wanted mo...
Clockwise from Upper Left: Vincent Price, WIlliam DuVall, Cammie Gilbert, AJ Channer, Skin, Rasheed Thomas Heavy Culture is a monthly column from journalist Liz Ramanand, focusing on artists of different cultural backgrounds in heavy music as they offer their perspectives on race, society, and more as it intersects with and affects their music. The latest installment of this column features multiple rock and metal musicians recounting their early experiences of racism. The death of George Floyd while in police custody earlier this year has had a profound impact on the nation and the world. In recent months, people from all walks of life have joined together to protest injustice that Black Americans have been facing for ages. In last month’s installment of “Heavy Culture”, several musicians...
France’s Hellfest Open Air has announced its 2021 lineup, and it features 90-percent of the bands who were scheduled to perform at the 2020 edition of the festival before it was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Deftones, System of a Down, and Faith No More will still headline, as they were slated to this year. The fest will take place June 18th-20th in Clisson, France. The festival wrote in a Facebook post: “Hellbangers, a little ahead of usual, here’s the lineup of the 2021 edition! 90% of the groups have reconfirmed their presence for next year, and as you know, they are particularly impatient to find you in Clissonese lands!” The statement continued, “Unfortunately, 13 bands scheduled for the 2020 edition could not confirm their presence for 2021: Incubus, Mastodon, Infectious Gro...
YouTuber Lars von Retriever has done it again! For his latest “Metal Trump” video, he has cut up the president’s dialogue to match the Iron Maiden classic “Run to the Hills” — and the results are frankly terrifying, albeit impressive. Given Trump’s flippant remarks, stubborn denial, and generally abhorrent reaction to the COVID-19 pandemic, the songs refrain — coming from Trump’s mouth — hits a little close to home: “Run to the hills/ Run for your life“. Iron Maiden wrote “Run to the Hills” for 1982’s The Number of the Beast as a historical concept piece about the genocide of Native Americans and indigenous people by North American settlers. “White man came across the sea/ He brought us pain and misery,” sings frontman Bruce Dickinson in the original track. Odd words coming out of Trump, t...