Pink Floyd founder Richard Wright, photo courtesy of www.telegraph.co.uk
A little over a week has passed since Pink Floyd founder Richard Wright died at age 65 following a bout with cancer. Obviously, Pink Floyd were hardly a metal band, but their impact on the heavy metal genre is impossible to deny. And it isn't just psychedelic and atmospheric acts like Neurosis, Opeth, Mastodon, Isis, Pelican and Nachtmystium that were influenced by Floyd. The intensity of songs like "One of These Days," "In The Flesh" and "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun" and "Welcome to the Machine" was comparable to the tension and dynamics of metal. And the desperation, darkness, anguish and fatalism in the vocals and lyrics is as gloomy as that of any Sabbath-derived doom band.

And that's why a bunch of stoner, doom and experimental metal bands have gotten together to create Like Black Holes in the Sky: The Tribute to Syd Barrett. As the title explains, the album is actually a tribute to early Pink Floyd member Syd Barrett, whose madcap antics and excessive drug use and erratic behavior earned him an early dismissal from the band -- despite the fact that he wrote the majority of Floyd's stunning debut, 1967's The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. He was replaced by David Gilmour, who, over the next two decades, helped Pink Floyd reach creative and commercial heights few imagined possible. Barrett died of diabetes in July 2006 at age 60.

Click "more" to stream Like Black Holes in the Sky: The Tribute to Syd Barret, which features such acts as Kylesa, Jesu, Intronaut, Unearthly Trance, Giant Squid, Stinking Lizaveta, Pentagram and Yakuza. Read more...

Eclectic British deathcore band Architects is currently tearing it up on the Agents of Chaos tour with Beneath the Massacre, Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza, Stray From the Path, Abacabb and others. Like their peers, Architects fuse aspects of technical metal, death metal, hardcore and metalcore, but Architects don't cling to the hooky chorus, two-chord breakdown formula of moe deathcore. Instead, the band seeks new ways to destroy, overlapping caustic screams over hazy guitar textures, interweaving mathematical meters through pummeling hardcore.

We gotta admit, we're not too jazzed by a lot of deathcore videos, but we're pretty stoked to present the Online debut of "Always," the first clip from Architects' second album, Ruin. The video will debut on-air on this week's "Headbangers Ball." Click "more" to read a description of the song and video by vocalist Sam Carter, watch the clip and stream a bunch of songs from Ruin. Read more...

NOTE: For one week only, "Headbangers Ball" Will air from 2 to 3 a.m. EST. Set your TIVO.

It has been a pretty good week for All That Remains. First, the Massachusetts metalcore band landed its highest charting first week on Billboard's album chart, hitting #16 with Overcome, which sold about 29,000. And now, HeadbangersBlog.com readers have voted the band's video for "Chiron" back for the next show -- over clips by In Flames, The Human Abstract, Unleashed, Hatebreed and others. Read more...

Okay, the guys from Mastodon probably don't really head out into the woods on weekends with Dave Grohl and the members of Queens of the Stone Age, but it's funny to imagine the dudes stripping down to their skivies, putting on warpaint, bellowing like mountain wolves and getting in touch with their primal beasts within.

In a recent interview with MetalInjection.net, Brann Dailor joked about going on "wild man weekends" with Grohl, talking shop with Lars Ulrich during a European tour in which Mastodon and Metallica "got along like peas and carrots," getting paid for promoting Rockstar Energy Drink and his least favorite interview questions. Dailor also got serious about touring with Slayer, revealed that Neurosis guitarist and vocalist Scott Kelly will make a guest appearance on Mastodon's next record, which comes out in January 2009 and admits that Bullet For My Valentine are his favorite new band (not really). Click more to watch the fun: Read more...

Okay, let's veer away from the pulverizing world of metal for a few minutes and address something way more damaging. Anyone who reads Otep Shamaya's semi-regular posts on this site, or who doesn't live with a blaring iPod on 24-7, knows that the U.S. is speeding towards a critical juncture, and that the 2008 November presidential election may be the most important political contest this country has faced since the days of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Whether you're a Democrat or a Republican, there's no denying that the U.S. is in a state of crisis. We're ensnared in a war that's taking the lives of thousands of Americans and there seems to be no end in sight; we're facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression; we've become the most despised superpower in the world and we're destroying the environment at such a rapid rate we could face the threat of extinction if we can't undo the damage we've done.

Clearly, the country has taken some major f--kin' hits over the last eight years financially, politically and socially. Unemployment is skyrocketing, our banks are collapsing and more and more U.S. interests are being gobbled up by international corporations. Who would have thought six months ago that U.S. institutions like Bear Stearns, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and AIG would be either gone or in a state of governmental bailout just two months before the 2008? And things aren't getting better, they're getting worse. Would Barack Obama be able to improve the country? Who the hell knows. But one thing's certain. A vote for John McCain is pretty much a thumbs up to stay the course, and right now we're on a devastating collision course.

The most important thing HeadbangersBlog.com readers can do is get to the polls and vote in November. Okay, enough ranting from us. Click "more" to hear some way more intelligent and entertaining ranting from documentary filmmaker Michael Moore, who has just posted his entire new film "Slacker Uprising" for free to anyone who signs up for a copy. We've included the link to stream or download the flick, which was shot after Moore's sobering 2004 film "Fahrenheit 911" during the run-up to the 2004 election. Read more...

Cattle Decapitation vocalist Travis Ryan with Carcass bassist and vocalist Jeff Walker

Pessimism -- Recanting the Saudadeous: My Carcass Reunion Show Experience
by Travis Ryan

I wasn’t going to do it. I honestly can't remember the last time I paid for a show, let alone fifty f--kin' dollars for one. It was actually no surprise to me to hear that Carcass was going to play the States. My band Cattle Decapitation had been talking to various booking agents and managers for the last year or so trying our hardest to land a slot on the tour. Didn't happen. So, I knew there was no way I was going to pay all that to get in. Perhaps we would know one of the support bands and get a hook up that way? At the last minute possible, my buddy Sal hit me up saying they had an extra spot in the car and an extra ticket. I wasn’t going to miss this, especially after the adrenaline and rush of nostalgia that hit me while watching the videos of their performances on the European festivals on the Internet. Read more...

What could Paris Hilton possibly have in common with Filter's frontman Richard Patrick, Slipknot percussionist Clown and Ozzy Osbourne bassist Blasko -- besides a taste for Paris' homemade porn, that is? They've all contributed to the wacko horror film songfest "Repo! The Genetic Opera," the soundtrack of which comes out September 30. The opera also features Broadway star Sarah Brightman, Paul Sorvino, "House of 1000 Corpses" actor Bill Mosely, ex-From First to Last singer Sonny Moore, Skinny Puppy screamer Nivek Ogre and more.

The production was written by Darren Smith and Terrence Zdunich ("Chain of Souls") and directed by "Saw" franchise writer and director Darren Lynn Bousman, who helmed a version of the rock opera when it opened as a stage play in Los Angeles in 2001. The show has also been performed in New York. Repo! "The Genetic Opera" takes place in the future at a time when a worldwide epidemic of organ failures devastates the planet. Out of the tragedy, a savior emerges: GENECO, a biotech company that offers organ transplants... for a price. And those who miss their payments are scheduled for repossession and hunted by The Repo Man. Click "more" to read a guest blog from Bousman and stream eight songs from the offbeat production, which is best described as a cross between "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" and "Blade Runner." Read more...

The scathing jokesters at Metalinquisition.com dug up this absurd photo of a black metal warrior wearing a metal Pope hat, a guitar that doubles as a pitchfork, enough bullets to take out 50 Cent and some magic bulletproof wristbands to deflect any return fire that comes his way. Click "more" to read an even more vicious description of the poor dude and check out some more equally hysterical shots and write-ups. Read more...

The Pen is Mightier Than the Sword, art by Stephen Hansen, courtesy of ZenethGallery.com

Here we are. Again. Mired in the muck of the worst kind of political warfare the swine and insects can muster. I, of course, can stomach it because I'm demented and have a penchant for intellectual bloodshed. Indeed. I know it has been a sweet minute since I scribed anything of value on the election and the repulsive circus it has conjured, so allow me to make it up to you, as only I can. Please note that virgin eyes unaccustomed to my venomous diatribes should divert now and go about their business. This is grown folks territory. Wild, uncut. Indeed. 

To the meat.

I would just like to begin by stating, unequivocally and without remorse, and after much deliberation and scrutiny:

 "F--k You, John McCain - you are an intellectually dishonest, spiritually defecating, embarrassment to American politics. You are a liar, a hypocrite, and the worst kind of swine opportunist." Read more...

Technical and multifaceted extreme metal is sometimes hard to digest on the first (or even 15th listen). We can't count the number of times we were fairly unimpressed by something, and then six months later that record wound up on our year-end top 10 list. In fact, many of our all-time favorite records are ones we initially had trouble grasping. Fortunately, experimental and progressive Norwegian band, Enslaved, are streaming their new album, Vertebrae, for fans a full month before it hits shelves in the U.S. on Octover 28.

To be honest, Enslaved probably weren't thinking of us Yanks when they set up a streaming link with the folks over at Terrorizer.com,. The disc actually comes out in Europe in about a week, but their oversight is our gain. We've got no idea if the link will still be up after the end of the month, but it's there now. Click "more" to check it out. Read more...