It’s here! It’s really here! WE got the email this morning, the title track for the new Tool record “Fear Inoculum” is in our hands! Be sure to tune in to hardDrive XL tonight to hear it! In the meantime, let’s get through today as quickly as possible!
I Prevail and Beartooth will join headliners A Day To Remember on a North American tour this fall. The “Degenerates Tour” will launch on September 6th in Buffalo, New York, wrapping up more than two months later on November 23rd in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Tickets go on sale this Friday.
I Prevail has been promoting the Trauma album, released earlier this year, and currently has the Number Three single at rock radio with “Breaking Down.” Singer Eric Vanlerberghe spoke about seeing audiences respond to that song and others from the LP: “Seeing all these kids sing every single word to every single song, and seeing ‘Breaking Down,’ seeing like kids tearing up and singing, screaming as loud as they can, some of these words…it’s crazy.”
Beartooth continue to roll out material from 2018’s Disease album, with the latest single being “You Never Know.” You can see the full list of dates on the Road Rage page.
Slipknot and former Stone Sour guitarist Jim Root said in a new interview that he and the singer for both acts, Corey Taylor, would have ended up killing each other if Root had stayed in Stone Sour.
Root told Metal Hammer, “Corey and I are much closer now. It’s the best thing, me leaving Stone Sour. We would have just ended up killing each other and driving each other crazy. I can’t spread myself that thin. I needed it, this band needed it and Stone Sour certainly needed it. I just didn’t have the time to commit that I’d have liked. I think they were tired of my s**tty attitude, that’s for sure.”
Root was dismissed from Stone Sour at the end of 2013 — even as he and Taylor were working together on a new Slipknot LP. Root spoke with us not long before he was fired about the difficulties of balancing both bands: “You know, when you’re in two bands like this, man, there’s some big sacrifices that eventually have to come along and there’s some, you know, kind of grown-up decisions you have to make and not all of them are gonna be easy decisions to make.”
Root did not speak kindly of Stone Sour in interviews after he was dismissed, saying, “Some of the guys in Stone Sour, I think they just want to be a radio band and write strictly for radio and try to be more of a poppy rock band. And that’s not really what I’m into.”
Root and Taylor are now happily preparing for this Friday’s release of the sixth album from Slipknot, We Are Not Your Kind.
Korn guitarist James “Munky” Shaffer told Los Angeles radio station KLOS that the writing of the band’s new album, The Nothing, was a difficult process following the August 2018 death of Deven Davis, the estranged wife of singer Jonathan Davis and mother of his children.
Shaffer explained, “It was not easy, because, as anybody knows, and most people do, when you’re dealing with grief and loss, you go through different phases, different stages — you can be angry one day and sad the next, and it could go on and on like that for months.”
Shaffer continued, “What he wanted us to do was much heavier than anything we’ve ever done, and then that kind of changed when we started handing him some demos . . . It started leaning towards more of a melodic thing. I think that’s just kind of what resonated with him when it came time to write lyrics and stuff. So it changed a little bit, but that’s part of the creative process.”
The Nothing will be released on September 13th and features the single “Youll Never Find Me.” Korn’s 13th studio LP follows up 2006’s The Serenity Of Suffering.
Godsmack singer Sully Erna will serve as a professionally licensed cornerman on Friday, August 16th, when two-time national PAL amateur champion David Tubbs makes his professional debut against Ranieri Souza in a four-round light heavyweight fight at Nashua Community College in Nashua, New Hampshire.
Erna, who regularly boxes as part of his fitness routines while at home and on the road, will be in Tubbs’s corner along with trainer Joseph “Hoss” Janik. Erna said, “Anyone who knows me, knows what a passion I have for boxing . . . I’m extremely honored to have been asked to work this corner with Hoss. He’s the real deal, and so is David Tubbs. Wait ’til you see him fight.”
The evening of professional boxing sponsored by Boston Boxing Promotions — including eight matches and a raffle — will benefit the Scars Foundation, a charity established by Erna to raise awareness of mental health issues and provide resources and tools to educate and empower people to deal with addiction, abuse, depression and more.
Godsmack will appear at the Bethlehem Musikfest in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania this Friday. The band next heads out on a fall tour with Halestorm supporting.
Papa Het to the rescue! Sort of… A woman who scared a cougar away from herself and her dog during a hike by blasting Metallica music got a congratulatory phone call from frontman James Hetfield. The video of Dee Gallant aiming the 1991 song “Don’t Tread On Me” at the predator went viral and found its way to Hetfield, who not only chatted with Gallant on the phone but sent her a selfie to prove it was him.
Hellyeah has shared the fifth in a series of webisodes featuring behind-the-scenes footage from the making of the band’s sixth studio album, Welcome Home. Due out on September 27th, the disc will mark the group’s final effort with drummer Vinnie Paul Abbott, who passed away more than a year ago. Hellyeah is currently on a headlining summer tour that will wrap up with a special celebration on Saturday, August 17th in Dallas.
Finally, we want to wish a Happy Birthday today to Barry Kerch of Shinedown, Jamie Jasta of Hatebreed, and the legendary Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden! Have a great Tool day!
