(The) Melvins, embarking on a 30th-anniversary tour (in both standard and Melvins Lite variations, depending on date) on July 12 alongside Honky, is releasing a covers record April 30. Entitled Everybody Loves Sausages, the album showcases the band’s many talents by covering artists as diverse as David Bowie, Queen, The Jam, and Venom. It also features myriad guest stars, including JG Thirlwell, Scott Kelly (Neurosis), Jello Biafra, and more.
Another year, another torrential downpour of albums across our desks. As always, we encountered way too much amazing music, from Meshuggah to The Mars Volta, Converge, Killer Mike, P.O.S, and many more.
Twenty-five years after the influential sludge- and post-metal band issued its first LP, Neurosis remains as stark and dichotomous as ever with its 10th studio full-length. Again led by guitarists/vocalists Scott Kelly and Steve Von Till, Honor Found in Decay pushes and pulls between anguish and ascension — between darkness and light — sometimes within the same passage.
The 11th album from sludge- and post-metal pioneer Neurosis — to be released on Oct. 30 — promises to be “both torturous and transcendent.” Trick or treat indeed.
[audio:http://alarm-magazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Generation_of_Vipers_Eternal.mp3|titles=Generation of Vipers: “Eternal”]
With a pair of members in US Christmas and one in A Storm of Light, Tennessee trio Generation of Vipers has kept quiet for the past four or five years. But the sludgy post-hardcore three-piece finally self-released its third album, Howl and Filth, last year, and now it gets a proper push and release from Translation Loss.
Jarboe, a rare female crusader of the male-dominated metal scene, developed her formidable, performance-art-inspired presence as a member of influential no-wave band Swans.
[audio:http://alarm-magazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Neurosis_Souls_To-Crawl-Under-One-s-Skin.mp3|titles=Neurosis “To Crawl Under One’s Skin”]
Earlier this year, pioneering sludge-metal band Neurosis reissued its third studio album, Souls at Zero, on its own label, Neurot. Though it sounds just as fresh today, it has been nearly 20 years since that influential mixture of heavy grooves, diverse folk instrumentation, and mammoth metal riffs first cropped up. We asked frontman Steve Von Till to compile a playlist for us, and he came up with 11 bands that were instrumental in Neurosis’ formation and development.
Bands Integral to the Origin of Neurosis by Steve Von Till of Neurosis
This playlist may contain the secrets to the origin of thousands of bands who became inspired to give it all.
1. Joy Division: “New Dawn Fades”
The driving bass. The melodic yet primitive guitar. The empty and bleak space as large as the riff. The words, “Me, seeing me this time, hoping for something else.” The emotions left behind.
(The) Melvins: Everybody Loves Sausages (Ipecac, 4/30/13)
