Frank Turner – Positive Songs for Negative People

Frank Turner has had one hell of a career since the end of Million Dead back in 2005. He has played 1708 solo shows (as of Sunday the 9th of August 2015) and released six albums. That’s not even mentioning side projects like the brilliant Mongol Horde. In that time, he’s risen from playing the back rooms of pubs to a handful of people, to selling out arenas, all seemingly off the back of word of mouth and good songs. It’s a journey that now continues with Positive Songs for Negative People.

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10/08/2015 1

Lamb of God – Sturm und Dran

If tough times create great music, then we can all be forgiven for getting a little bit excited about the new Lamb of God album. Throw in the fact that they are consistently one of the best heavy metal bands we have and Sturm Und Drang already feels like a contender for album of the year. However, after all the shit that Lamb Of God, and in particular lead singer Randy Blythe, have had to go through in the last couple of years, can it really stand up to fan’s expectations?

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29/07/2015 0

Discover Weekly

With competition rearing its head from Apple Music, Spotify have introduced a new feature. Discover Weekly. A weekly playlist put together by, I assume, an algorithm buried away in Spotify which look at what you’ve listened to and comes up with other bands that it thinks you might like. It’s a nice feature for those wanting to move outside of their musical comfort zone, but does it really work?

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23/07/2015 0

Wilson – Right to Rise

Wilson grabbed everyone’s attention with their debut album Full Blast Fuckery, a beer fuelled orgy of hard rock. Tracks like ‘Viking Pussies Fuck Off’ were perfect at catching the attention. This year they’re back with their second album, Right to Rise, which sees the band growing up and cementing themselves as one hell of a hard rock outfit.

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22/07/2015 1

Second Chances – Nekrogoblikon

Until recently my only real experience of Nekrogoblikon was on the Kerrang tour in 2014. Sharing a bill with the wonderful Baby Godzilla (now known as Heck), the not really my thing but aren’t they good live Crossfaith and the yes they are ridiculous but god they are fun Limp Bizkit, it’s safe to say they stood out. Mainly for being a bit shit. I don’t know if I missed something, but the selling point seemed to be the fact they had a bloke dressed as a goblin. And that wore thin fast.

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13/07/2015 0

Refused – Freedom

The band that changed punk rock or the ultimate sell outs. Refused are a lot of things to a lot of people, but very few can deny the power of The Shape of Punk To Come. The album which was thought to be their last was released before the band imploded in a basement in Virginia. Afterwards they declared they would never play music together again. But times change and people grow and seventeen years later they are back and not just playing shows, but releasing a whole new album, Freedom.

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03/07/2015 0

Music Vs Money

Gene Simmons has a habit of opening his mouth and having shit spew out. He’s proven himself an ignorant bell end when it come to issues like mental health, but his recent comments on music fans having to bear the brunt of the responsibility for the decline of the music industry are at least interesting.

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22/06/2015 0

Faith No More w/ The Pop Group

Heavy metal is generally not seen as a smooth or classy genre. There’s a lot of grunting, screaming and throwing your body into people. Yet when Faith No More stroll onto the stage of the O2 Academy dressed all in white and surrounded by flowers, there is definitely an air of sophistication to proceedings. It’s hard to imagine that just the night before this band was playing in front of the muddy denizens of Download festival. They are far too clean.

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15/06/2015 0

Bullet For My Valentine: Where Did it all go Wrong?

Here’s a little secret for you, that isn’t actually at all a secret. The first heavy metal band I truly got into was Bullet For my Valentine. They broke at the same time I was moving from Nirvana and Jimmy Eat World onto Metallica and Iron Maiden (not that I stopped loving either of those bands). They were the first band that felt like one of my bands and The Poison is still a cracking album. However, at some point in the last few years things have gone a bit off the rails for Bullet. Rather than, as many predicted, a rise to festival headliner status, they have seen themselves flounder around the same level. Never able to make that next big step.

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05/06/2015 0

Camden Rocks 2015

Camden has long been a musical hot spot. Whether it’s Britpop or punk rock, it’s been key to more than one musical revolution. So a one day festival encompassing a whole host of venues makes perfect sense. Enter Camden Rocks, which features over two hundred bands, ranging from Bullet for My Valentine to competition winners. There was also beer, oh so much beer.

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01/06/2015 0