Some of you complained about the Radio Rebellion tour roundtable clips we posted yesterday. Being the optimists that we are, we'll assume you were merely disappointed because the video snippets were so incredibly interesting and there were only two of them. Well, here are two more and the last batch is coming tomorrow. Don't forget to use that "read more" button. Read more...

Everyone put down your iPods and go set your Tivo. Due to some temporary reshuffling at corporate headquarters, MTV2's Headbangers Ball will be moving to Tuesday for a couple weeks, starting this week.

On Saturday, February 16 The Ball will not air, but will be broadcast on Tuesday, February 19 at 4 a.m.

We're back in our regular 11 p.m. timeslot on Saturday, February 23 and the show will repeat on Tuesday, February 26 at 4 a.m.

But then on Saturday, March 1 Headbangers Ball will not air at 11 p.m. Instead, look for the show on Tuesday March 4 at 4 a.m.

Starting Saturday, March 8, The show will return to its regular 11 p.m. timeslot on MTV2.

We now return to our regularly scheduled program with some old Manowar:

To celebrate their tenth anniversary, the New England Metal and Hardcore Festival will lock horns this year with one of the biggest summer metal festivals, Gigantour. The event will take place from April 25 to 27 at the Palladium in Worcester, Massachusetts. Friday night's show will feature Megadeth, In Flames, Children of Bodom, Job For A Cowboy and High on Fire, courtesy of Dave Mustaine's traveling metal carnival. And for the rest of the weekend, the Metal and Hardcore Fest will pull out its own big guns. Saturday's lineup will include Dimmu Borgir, Shadows Fall and Behemoth. Sunday will feature Ministry, Meshuggah and Nevermore. Tickets go on sale February 15 at 10 a.m. The cost is $47.50 for Friday, $45 for Saturday, $45 for Sunday, or $129 for a three-day pass. Read more...

Few ten year old metal bands have been through as many label changes as New York's hardcore chuggers Sworn Enemy. First there was State of Mind, the Stillborn, Elektra, Abacus and now Century Media. But through it all the band members have stuck it out, whether it seemed like they were on the verge of falling apart or breaking into the mainstream. Read more...

One of the most exciting tours of 2007 was Radio Rebellion, an extreme metal outing that featured Behemoth, Job For a Cowboy, Gojira and Beneath the Massacre.

The tour ran from mid-October to mid-November, and while it was going full steam, Headbangers Ball Blog sat down with Behemoth frontman Adam "Nergal" Darski, Job For a Cowboy singer Jonny Davy and guitarist Bobby Thompson and Gojira frontman Joseph Duplantier for a roundtable discussion about all things metal. Read more...

What the devil is going on here? Slayer just won the Grammy for "Best Metal Performance" in the 50th Anniversary Grammy Awards for a track that was recorded for an album that came out in 2006. Read more...

Yes, this week's indecipherable logo belongs to Evilwar.

The Brazilian black metal band was formed in 1999 by vocalist Sabatan, guitarist Azarack, bassist Typhon Seth, drummer Ichtys Niger and keyboardist Nathaivel. The band's savage riffs and majestic melodies attracted the interest of Somber Music, which released the band's debut Unholy March, in 2001. After the album was released, Azarack quit and was replaced by Halphas. Evilwar released their self-titled second album in 2004, but before they started their tour, Seth, who had lost interest in black metal, quit and was replaced on bass by Shaitan. Then, Sabatan left and Halphas became the guitar-playing frontman. In 2005, Evilwar signed with a new label, Mutilation Records, and the following year they recorded Bleeding in the Shades of Baphomet, which came out that May. Read more...

Pig Destroyer, Cephalic Carnage, Cattle Decapitation and Leng T'che might be the modern noisemongers de rigueur, but none would even exist were it not for the groundbreaking grind of Birmingham, England's Napalm Death.

Back in 1987, when most extreme bands were trying to sound like Slayer and Venom, Napalm spewed forth with Scum, one of the heaviest, most extreme hybrids of hardcore and metal the world had ever seen. The songs were short, brutally fast and ferocious, echoing with the social and political frustrations of a subculture that refused to be silenced. The album was created in two recording sessions with almost completely different lineups, and while none of those musicians are still with the band (having left to form the comparably influential outfits Carcass, Cathedral and Godflesh), Napalm remain the godfathers of grindcore.

Singer Mark "Barney" Greenway joined the group for their third album, 1990's Harmony Corruption, which signaled a modification of the band's sound. Though still influenced by punk, the music was more metallic and became characterized as death metal. But whatever it was called, it was still unflinchingly brutal. Even in the mid '90s when Napalm Death downplayed speed a little bit to experiment with different sonic textures, chord structures and approaches, the band remained a punishing listen, and effectively influenced a new breed of musicians that would later form bands like Coalesce, Today is the Day and The Dillinger Escape Plan.

Whatever old-school fans thought of the experimental era of Napalm's career, the ones that stuck around were placated in 2000 with Enemy of the Music Business, which combined the unbridled ferocity of the past with musical innovation, and from that point on, the band hasn't slowed. In fact, Napalm Death's last two albums, 2005's The Code is Red ...Long Live the Code and 2006's Smear Campaign have included some of their most aggressive, uncompromising material since 1992's Utopia Banished.

In addition to remaining musically vital for more than 20 years, Napalm Death have inspired political awareness in their listeners, who respect them for being not just vocal about their beliefs, but informed and articulate -- qualities that are more important now than ever.

During the Headbangers Ball Blog podcast interview with Napalm Death singer Barney Greenway, the frontman talked about the history of grindcore, the dangers of organized religion, the follow-up to Smear Campaign, the way bands that break up get more credit than those that stick around and Napalm's upcoming tour with DevilDriver and Walls of Jericho.

Click here for an MP3 download of the podcast interview with Napalm Death singer Mark Greenway.
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Clearly "Black Bubblegum" isn't the heaviest song on The Dillinger Escape Plan's new album, Ire Works (it's not even metal, really), but did you honestly expect them to play "Fix Your Face" on national television? We'd much rather see a devastatingly off-kilter band like Dillinger rip it up with a pop song (and a pretty great one) on a mainstream program like Conan than only watch the band do hardcore stuff on underground metal programs. And seeing Greg Puciato climb on top of Conan's desk while the talk show host air drums with glow sticks is pretty classic. See for yourself:

Man, those swords are pretty bad-ass. We're not sure whether or not they're officially part of the logo, but even without the double-edged blades, the pentagram and angular letters look cool. And the way the letters and inverted-star blend into one another is a nice artistic touch. But back to the weapons for a second. If we had to fight to the death, we'd take the sword on the left, which seems to have some sort of bird talons on the handle that remind us of Slayer's early logo. Maybe that would grant us the power of the dark ones as we prepared for battle. We'd probably still get impaled within seconds, but we'd look good as we choked on our blood.