Metal Nerdery Podcast

A house is supposed to be a safe, sane sanctuary from the evil and insanity relentlessly lurking around every corner of the outside world. However, hearing eerily unnatural sounds and witnessing uncanny otherworldly phenomenon (especially at night, right next to your bedroom) can be an extremely unsettling and terrifyingly traumatic experience, especially as a child. In the case of KING DIAMOND’s...

Depending on which side of the pond you’re on, PIECE OF MIND, the fourth offering from NWOBHM legends IRON MAIDEN, was released on May 16 and/or May 28, 1983, and irregardless of which side of the pond you’re on, the worldwide multitudes of metal fans rejoiced with gladness. As an homage to Nicko McBrain’s “maiden voyage” as the “drum-shaman” for this, his first album behind the kit with the might...

By now, you’ve no doubt noticed how we embrace our collective verbal turdery and nonsense early on so we can get it out of the way and move on to the good stuff. In the case of this episode, however, we completely veered off the docket freeway onto an offramp of SHIT-TAH and “blew out the lines” to give everyone a mental breather and help lower everyone’s expectations (yours and ours) down to zero...

WARNING:  As a service to the greater tri-county, podcast-enjoying multiverse, we’d like to offer and advise listener discretion prior to the consumption of ANY of our existentially exhausting, provocatively off-putting, and irrationally irresponsible YET ALSO exceptionally hilarious, highly rated, and absurdly entertaining content.  (You’ve been warned…) MUNICIPAL WASTE, the crossover thrash wiza...

The only thing more rewarding than having Waffle House after a show or consuming Chick-Fil-A on a Sunday (that was pre-purchased previously) is knowing that you share a city with an established, successful metal band. And it’s even more kick-ass when that city is Atlanta, Georgia and that metal band is SEVENDUST! Prepare to get “hooked up” and time-travel with us through joyous, old-school flashba...

“M” is for Many things. Madness, Meat, Metal, Merch, and Most iMportantly: “M is for Martha” Meaning Martha Splatterhead, the Mascot of Oak Harbor, Washington’s crossover Masters, THE ACCUSED. The dudes in THE ACCUSED left their Mark on Metal with a new Mutant genre of Metal called “crossover thrash” which blended all of the best eleMents of punk, hardcore, and thrash together to Make Metal More M...

With the upcoming PANTERA reunion in the works, we felt it would be reprehensibly “irresponsible” of us to NOT touch on one of the greatest live albums by one of the greatest live bands to have dominated metal during the 90’s:  Pantera’s OFFICIAL LIVE:  101 PROOF.  Not only does it span the era of their catalog from “Cowboys” to “Trendkill”, but it also comes with a generous helping of between son...

Before QOTSA, Them Crooked Vultures, or Eagles of Death Metal, there were the godfathers of Desert Stoner Metal, KYUSS.  And before anyone gets upset, excited, or bolth, please note that this is undoubtedly our most progressive* episode yet. Because while we merely made mention of this “episode’s band of the episode” on the previous episode, this time we’re ACTUALLY talking about this episode’s ba...

“Why can’t you just enjoy it? Why do you gotta complain about it?” People worldwide have been asking these EXACT same questions forever (OR, at a minimum, at least the last couple of years). Whether it’s with regard to hijacking someone else’s pleasure, enjoying some over-done meat drapes, or debating whether a band is its brand (or vice versa), these questions (along with countless others) persis...

Combining the literary influence of horror legend Stephen King with the ultra-groovy, ultra-speedy, and ultra-heavy thrash metal wizardry of ANTHRAX could only result in one possible (yet ever so glorious) outcome:  the 1987 masterpiece, AMONG THE LIVING.    The album is so mind blowing & perfect that had it been released in 1986, all other forms of “lesser” music (aka: everything NOT thrash) woul...

A time of momentous change in the world. The Weather Channel premiered on cable television, Sony introduced the first compact disc player, “E.T. – The Extra-Terrestrial” was released in theaters and Metallica released their “No Life ‘Til Leather” demo. (And that’s not even “everything” that happened in 1982!) 1982 METAL was morphing into something louder, faster, and heavier, helping to lay the fo...

For an album that was originally going to be called “Cocaine” (yes, you read that correctly, but the suits chopped that idea. The band even tried for “Snowblind”, until the suits bumped that idea as well), BLACK SABBATH VOL. 4 is a landmark album and (somewhat ironically) a stoner metal masterpiece built on the stony, doomy, metal foundations crafted by the band over the course of their 3 previous...

As of this episode, it’s the last day of the first half of 2022, and there’s a veritable plethora of NEW METAL that’s either already been unleashed OR is scheduled to be unleashed during the second half of 2022. There’s metal we’re not as familiar with, metal we’ve been eagerly anticipating, metal we’d almost forgotten about, there’s even some incredibly “titillating” metal.   For this episode, we...

Halloween Eve, 1983… Nothing screams “early black metal” like MERCYFUL FATE!   (Correction:  nothing screams “legitimate” early black metal like having KING DIAMOND, an actual satanist, as the frontman of MERCYFUL FATE!!!)   The fascinating thing about KING DIAMOND and MERCYFUL FATE is that while they are different bands, the many shared similarities between the two coalesce to form what can only...

Although the differences between thrash and DEATH METAL seemed subtle at the time, there was a distinctive demarcation between the two subgenres, most notably with DEATH METAL having much deeper, guttural sounding vocals, faster time signatures and much darker, supremely bleaker soundscapes and lyrical themes than thrash. There was something palpably different there, we just couldn’t quite put our...

“DAVE MUSTAINE FOR PRESIDENT, 2024!!!” While many outside the tri-county metal multiverse would be absolutely mortified to have the MEGADETH leader as the “Commander In-Chief,” many feel it’s the only way to ensure that America (along with the rest of the planet) stays metal (and awake) forever.  With the release of their third album (1988’s SO FAR…SO GOOD…SO WHAT!), Megadeth continued to hone and...

It’s time to embrace the sound…of Skynet! Obviously, “Skynet Core” isn’t a thing (yet), but INDUSTRIAL METAL certainly IS!  Nothing else in the heavy metal multiverse sounds quite like this ultra-modern, mechanical subgenre of metal which most closely resembles a symphony of machine sex augmented with synthesizers, sequencers, sampling and (obviously) a ton of tambourine!  Prepare to check-in to t...

“Which of The Big Four ‘Black Album-ed’ first?”   It’s a delicate subject, one which SLAYER fans will be unable to refute or deny, but SEASONS IN THE ABYSS (as genius as it is) IS actually (kind of) “Slayer’s Black Album”.   Do you want proof? Well, there’s hooks (wait:  hooks?), there’s melody (that’s right:  melody), and there’s the perfect sonic coalescence of their four prior studio albums, ma...

Talk about problematic procrastination:  only twenty-three years AFTER they were first eligible to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, JUDAS PRIEST will FINALLY have their day!  Few bands in the history of metal have matched the long, prosperous, and influential career of JUDAS PRIEST, who have been collectively “screaming for vengeance” and “defending the faith” (as it were) for more...

With the release of “RANDY RHOADS:  Reflections of a Guitar Icon”, we felt compelled to take a closer look at the brief yet mythical career of one of the most gifted guitarists in the history of heavy metal and a true “game changer” in the realm of heavy metal guitar playing, RANDY RHOADS (of Quiet Riot and Ozzy Osbourne’s Blizzard of Ozz).   Grab yourself a handful of some “special van candy”, ge...

Don’t get all “twisted up and twanglified” that we were so all over the road on THIS episode, because THIS is our very first “official” GRAB-SACK episode!  Since the GRAB-SACK is a potluck of metal (and being “the number two” podcast that we are), we went out of our way to be inclusive of ALL metal currently available in the greater, Tri-County listening area, navigating through a veritable cornuc...

The most impressive thing about the BON SCOTT era of AC/DC is that every word, every riff, every beat, and every note of every song just oozes a certain essence of sleaze and debauchery (in a good way). And let us not forget the incredible double-entendres splattered across the entirety of the lyrics for the album (umm, “balls” much?).  We’re doing our best to render “rim-shot hilarity” to everyon...

“DUDE! They’re like KISS, but next level, man!”   (J/K. But seriously, NOW that we have your attention…)   Hidden deep behind the anonymity of their grotesque masks and monochromatic, prison-style jumpsuits, SLIPKNOT have remained forever faithful to the sinister, dark ambiance that permeates every pore of everything they do; sonically, lyrically, and visually.  SLIPKNOT isn’t some lame, throw-awa...

Don’t deny the power of three. Whether it’s certain “anti-relaxers”, a brilliantly executed joke, or the divinely strange shades of psychedelic metal weirdness created by the “power threesome” known as PRIMUS, three packs quite the powerful punch. PRIMUS have always stayed in the realm of the weird and unorthodox, forging their own unique path by blending surrealistic bass driven prog metal with a...

Close your eyes, take a deep breath, and inhale the enticing aroma of the “jam room bouquet” while basking in the brown wood paneled, wall-to-wall orange shag carpeted, STONER DOOM jam room aesthetic (complete with a fully loaded “infinity hookah” in the middle of the room to tie it all together).   DOOM and STONER metal bands should really be classified by “strain” instead of “genre”.  Some bands...