Author Archives: Alex

Diamond Head hearts Metallica

I don’t know what it is these days, a few years ago it was pretty standard slamming Metallica in the press. Now they seem to get mostly positive comments and praises. I wonder why that is. Actually, no I don’t, I honestly don’t care.

But Diamond Head are always credited with influencing Metallica a lot, Lars always praises them, blah blah, so the band is grateful that they’re getting so much attention from the four horsemen:

“I think without Metallica coming along and covering our songs, and giving us a leg up to reform and things, we may have just faded away like a hundred of other New Wave of British Heavy Metal bands. We may have got the odd little mention here and there, but I think without Metallica’s help, we would not have survived to this day.“

Read full interview here.

Aww, look at all the metal love and the British and American bands getting along. I’m actually a bit annoyed by this, a positive comment on a band is pretty boring for me to write, and probably even more boring (or is it boringer? Fuck you, what am I, Shakespeare?) for you to read. Where’s all the “Fuck those guys!!!” hate?

Nowadays the only metal hostility is on Blabbermouth and YouTube. If those trolls also start getting along, we might just have to start listening to Justin Bieber.

Kiss won’t kiss MJ goodbye

It was reported that Kiss would be part of a Michael Jackson tribute concert, but we didn’t post about it because we had better stuff to do…

But now it’s being reported that Kiss got kicked out of the gig, and we’re writing about it because, well, we’re lame and hypocritical. Apparently fans ratted Gene out:

“We have listened to Michael’s fans and are grateful to have been alerted to these unfortunate statements by Gene Simmons.  Under the circumstances we fully agree that even though Kiss is a band Michael admired we have no choice but to rescind our invitation to them to appear in our tribute concert.“

Read full article here.

So a couple of MJ fanboy snitched to the promoters that Gene actually called Michael a pedophile, so they gave him the boot. That’s pretty awesome… To be fair, I really don’t care about this story at all, so I have nothing else to add.

There are a few child puns I could try but let’s not get carried away here.

Dave Mustaine is a horseman

Ever wondered what the story behind Metallica‘s ‘The Four Horseman’ song is? Me neither, but Megadeth will release a new album soon, so expect a lot of Metallica/James/Lars name-dropping from Dave until the album is out. It always happens.

So, here is Dave’s novel story about the name ‘The Four Horsemen’:

“I had always called us, as a group, the ‘Four Horsemen.’ Before I was in Metallica, I really loved this band called Montrose, and their guitarist was Ronnie Montrose. He went on to form a band called Gamma. One of their records had a shark fin cutting through the grass, which I thought was so awesome. Anyway, he had a song on there called ‘Four Horsemen’ that I did with my band Panic, which I was with before Metallica. So when I joined Metallica, I had the song ‘Mechanix’, which I wrote, and ‘Four Horsemen’ was a suggestion of mine to do ’cause we were doing cover songs. So that had planted the seed with James. And one day when we were coming to rehearsal, Lars had just said something about slowing down my song, ‘Mechanix’. I had just gotten to the studio with Cliff, and we had been listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd, and I was being a jerk, so I played ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ instead of ‘Mechanix’, and that’s basically the middle part of what would become Metallica’s ‘The Four Horsemen’.“

Full article here.

Hey, we didn’t need your whole biography, Dave. A simple “We wanted to cover another song called ‘The Four Horsemen,’ but my own song ‘Mechanix’ got slowed down, renamed and had a Lynyrd Skynyrd-like interlude because I was messing around with ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ in rehearsal.” would have sufficed.

I hope no one asks him where the name ‘Mechanix’ comes from, cause we’ll get another book out of it.

Anyway, all of this is from the “Big Four” issue of Revolver. Check it out here.

Nick Oliveri will not rejoin QOTSA

I’m assuming he won’t, because he faces up to 15 years in prison for his little stunt, so that’s more than the time he’s spent being in that band. Yes, sensationalist title, slightly misleading. Blow me.

“Former Queens of the Stone Age bassist Nick Oliveri has been charged with four felonies after a tense standoff with a S.W.A.T. team in L.A. last month — and now faces up to 15 years in prison.

After a fight with his girlfriend escalated into a four-hour standoff with police. Oliveri was booked on felony domestic violence — and after police searched his home, they found a fully-loaded rifle. But that’s not all they found — according to the charging docs, police also found cocaine and methamphetamines.

Oliveri is charged with two counts of possession of a controlled substance with a firearm, 2 counts of possession of a controlled substance, and one misdemeanor count of resisting, obstructing or delaying a peace officer.If convicted on all counts, the 39-year-old faces a max of 15 years in prison.“

Full article here.

That sucks, I always liked Nick and I really wanted him back in QOTSA. Then again, when you pull a stunt that sounds straight out of a 90s buddy cop film, what would you expect?

Let’s hope he doesn’t get the maximum sentence. Can someone get him Lindsay Lohan’s attorney?

Today’s Dose of Metal: Metallica with Dave

Since Dave wants a band with James and Lars so badly, thought I’d show you guys this clip from 1983.

Yes, that is Metallica with Mr. Mustaine performing ‘The Mechanix,’ the original version of ‘The Four Horsemen’ before Dave was kicked out. He would, of course, eventually release it as Megadeth with the original title.

By the way, make sure you watch it in full HD. <insert sarcastic emoticon here>